gimme your take on skywings bc 1) your take on mudwings is excellent 2) im writing a story that focuses on the skywing military and their employment of child soldiers and bread-and-circuses style of rule and 3) the skywings are so poorly designed and worldbuilt in canon
I LOOOOOVE the SkyWings. I’ve only recently fully understood the appeal of the tribe and after working on a few headcanons for them and Prince Cliff (pre-blog) I realized just how much sustenance they were lacking and how much they were deserving! I’d love to talk your ear off about what I have in mind.
SkyWings were once a tribe focused on music, theater, storytelling, and the arts. They prided themselves on their bards. They were known around the world as one of the most artistic tribes whose bands you simply HAD to have at your events, the sculptors you HAD to commission for your bust, the tribe you HAD to come to the parties of or else you simply haven’t lived. They were a tribe of merriment, festivals, games, and more. And don’t even get me started on their impressive air stunts and light displays, the fire dancers, and more.
The SkyWings were close friends of the SeaWings, who loved to share this passion for the arts and exchange techniques, styles, and inspiration. It wasn’t until the SeaWing Massacre that this friendship became unsteady and nerve wracking, until they cut each other off - officially, sans a few independent artists - completely.
In the grand scheme of things, the militarized SkyWings are a very new idea. It wasn’t until a few queens before Scarlet that the tribe aimed to display strength and firepower as opposed to inspiration and joy. And perhaps this is why these dragons are seen as more grumpy nowadays. They’re simply not in touch with their personal side and under Scarlet’s reign, they simply stagnated in creativity and individuality.
Scarlet’s reign used her dragons as pawns for her master plans, instead of individuals who could improve their tribe. She was inspired by the elite theater productions her mother had taken her and her sisters to when she was young. So much so that she thought the drama, the fights, the bloodshed, oh, it simply HAD to be brought to reality. She relished in the emotional turmoil of pitting her citizens together, watching reality television in real life as her servants turned against each other for fear that they’d push each other onto Scarlet’s bad side. She threw dragons in her arena for the pettiest of crimes to watch them duel, with her daughter by her side, and her sons preparing and pleasing the crowds.
This only ceased, somewhat, when the war struck. Oh, a war would simply bring so much entertainment for the arena. Scarlet organized the breeding program to further strengthen her dragons for war, children raised for battle, with more armored scales than the elder’s flexible scales made simply for flying. Dragonets without parents. Simply a duty to their tribe and to their throne.
Ruby’s reign is going much better, to say the least. She’s trying to bring back the theater, music, and arts, with Vermillion taking lead in things such as opera and theatrics. Her son, Cliff, is taking massive steps in bringing back individuality, so much so, he rejected his responsibilities as Prince but uses their wealth for a plethora of creatively inspired organizations.
But Ruby’s rule still isn’t perfect. She’s trying hard to inspire the youth to take the steps to be individuals. But they were born soldiers. They were born to fight and survive for the throne, but there’s no more war to fight, and with no families to turn to and very little stability to take them in, the tribe is trying to rebuild to accommodate these dragonets with lost childhoods.
As for appearances, SkyWings are comedically long, lanky dragons. They struggle participating in other tribes’ social spaces due to how long their spines, tails, and wings are, in comparison to their quite stumpy legs. They often walk like arched up cats or perpetually bent inchworms in order to get around on land. No wonder they prefer flying. SkyWings typically have beaks, talons, vents for their internal fire, and feathers. Though most dragons often burn their feathers by accident, those in higher positions such as royalty, merchants, or artists tend to have the cleaner, more elegant ruffs of feathers behind their ears.
An important part of the SkyWings’ cultures are their horns. Their horns never stop growing as long as they’re alive and can bend in a number of intricate patterns, remain somewhat straight, or loop like rams until they’re stabbed by their own bones. But it’s gravely looked down upon to shave your horns or trim them down, regardless of how much they might irritate your scales or may weigh your head down. Elder SkyWings struggle to get through doors because of their pride in their heavy rack. Taking care of your horns is a priority in SkyWing culture. While women are always bigger than males, there is no discernable dimorphism between their horns.
True SkyWings lacked armored scales. They were often very thinly protected by their soft scales with the texture of feathers, but as of the war, armored scales are more common, alongside inflated firepower. Firescales, in the reigns leading up to the war, were becoming more frequent due to the steady escalation of dragons with more intense fire.
Speaking of firescales, I like to take this idea more literally and say that firescale SkyWings literally look like they are on fire. All SkyWings are capable of venting smoke from their scales if they feel a bit too intensely, but can control their internal fire. Firescales are incapable of this, and burst into flames with every heartbeat, every sense of emotion, and every feeling. To kill firescales dragonets was seen as a mercy. They could never be loved properly, they claimed, and their only destiny was destruction and death.
In a similar idea, SkyWings killed animus dragons and firescales because they had a deep sense of self accomplishment. Being born with special powers was something they looked down upon, whether literally or socially. Everyone had to earn things equally, and no one could simply earn magic or the ability to set themselves on fire. These dragonets were killed on the mountain side, in the hopes they would be reborn anew. While recent queens forbade those who bore animus or firescale SkyWings, the parents were often encouraged to lay new clutches in hopes that their children would be reborn in their families.
One other idea I’d like to add is the subset of SkyWings I’ve been playing around with. Mountain SkyWings are SkyWings who are essentially hermits, recluses, and loners of the dragon world. Derogatorily deemed “feral,” mountain SkyWings are individuals who live in the cave systems of their queendom, horde the treasures they find, and enjoy their territory in their lonesome. They chase off other dragons and grow so old that they frequently die in their own caves, unable to find their ways out due to their size, deteriorating vision, or simple exhaustion.
Queen Scarlet prioritized reacquiring mountain SkyWings to “reintroduce them with a sense of nationalism,” but mostly because she simply wanted their hordes. Osprey was one of these dragons, an individual who had lived in the mountains his whole life, his scales rocky, spiked, and brittle, and was forced to join society as a standoffish, snappy SkyWing with a love of literature and law, looking for loopholes to get his treasures back. He unfortunately died before he could find a loophole from Scarlet’s “because I say so” judicial system, but found joy in giving Peril, a terrifying dragonet, someone to look up to, confide in, and talk to without going into full body trembles.
