I was playing with the arrow and thinking.

Then I ran to mom.

"Mommy!!! Mom's mom??" (I was trying to make her understand the concept of grandma or aunt..)

She turned her head like an idiot. and looked to the east and let out a little whine.

"mommy no more!"

"Oh no.." "Mommy mommy dead?"

"No... no more! Me afraid to run away brother sisters gone.."

I put my wing hand to my temple, as if readjusting invisible glasses.

I sighed, the situation stuck and turned to dad.

"DAD??? DADDY MOM???"

"Weak mom early die not hunt..".

I did not understand his gibberish..

"Mir see mom dad!"

He looked at my mother and we felt that he was uncomfortable. The instinct and the animal habit...

I climbed on his back and he flew away. But my brother and sisters also took the opportunity to accompany me. With me, the snacks were never far away .....

Daddy then flew to the void and we left the protective nest.

To my great surprise, we didn't go far but very low, near the river that flowed at the bottom of the canyon.

We landed on a meadow at the water's edge and against the cliff, a cave, accessible by foot and without any real need to fly. It was enough only to climb with its talons and to reach the entrance to 8 meters of the ground.

A step for us, well the adult wyverns...

For me, it would be climbing but I could fly so... no problem. My siblings also made the jump.

But daddy stood between us and the black hole. It smelled strongly of wyvern, the old wyvern.

"Groaah."

He put down a deer we had caught a few hours earlier and threw it into the black hole and we heard a grunt, followed by the crunch of prey being eaten.

Daddy: "Mommy Daddy eat... OK... not eat.. MIR danger.."

I understood that we were dealing with an old wyvern and that we had to feed it if we wanted to approach it.

Then a white creature came into the light, and very fearful, in total submission before Dad.

Dad must have been the Alpha, from what I could see.

I expected to see a creature decrepit with age, but it was wrong. Completely wrong.

The white wyvern was mutilated, old wounds having pinned it to the ground and hunger and starvation having turned its scales into a kind of abrasive, discolored skin.

Her membrane skins hung down, torn and thus she was unable to fly. Then, balls showing a cyst on her hanging wing. Probably, a piece of spear or large arrow.

Immediately, I rushed to her, holding her close to me, with my small size.

She was 10 times my size but she purred.

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

Then I turned around.

"DADDY! GRANDMA!!! HURT!!! HUNGRY!!!"

Daddy would bow his head and secretly come over and bring his mommy some food, not wanting to leave her to her fate.

This was also why he often came back empty-handed.

He also fed the members of his "tribe" who were condemned to die of hunger. But it was a losing battle.

He looked at me, then turned his long neck and looked up at the sky from the entrance of our cave.

Then we heard him give a little groan of helplessness.

My siblings looked at me as if they were waiting for me to speak.

But I went around Grandma and thought about how I could treat her

I would need knives and pliers and thread and needles and... fire and alcohol... and... bandages...

I could save grandmother who was...actually still a young wyvern...but afflicted by malnutrition and handicapped in the sense that she was limping and unable to fly and therefore unable to hunt and feed herself.

First, she would have to regain her strength before I could operate on her...An infection and that would be the end...

Dad looked at me and turned his head as if to say that it was over...That he was going to lose his mom and he would have to make a choice...feed us or her and in the nature of things, his offspring came first.

"DADDY!!! MIR HELP GRANDMA"

I jumped out of the cave and went to the river bank and Dad followed me because I needed protection.

Maybe there were predators lurking, in the water or in the sky?

I was still very vulnerable and I had to accept that. I thought about magic, but we were so busy surviving and finding food that there was no time for anything else, and when night fell, we slept.

Soon my eyes fell on hazelnut, reeds and other long-stemmed shrubs.

I took out of my little rabbit skin bag some sharp stones, the famous "COUPE COUPE" and distributed them to my sisters and my brother.

I arrived at the shrub and said "CUT CUT CUT" and showed them how to saw the stems without damaging them.

Soon we had a hundred stems and then I showed "SCRAP" and started scraping the green bark skin off of the large, uncut stems.

We soon had shavings and I spread them out in cords that I tied.

Then I took the stems and Dad, like Grandma, looked at my work with curiosity.

Mom came to join us and was obviously not happy with the escapades of her male.

But she watched and the adults tried to cut stems like us.

They made a huge pile but I concentrated with my 3 usable fingers, the other 2 serving as wings, it was not obvious and everything was far away with big arms but my long neck compensated and I helped myself from time to time with my mouth serving as a clamp.

Quickly, the grid was transformed into a trap after 2 hours of work.

The first one being the most difficult, the others should be enough.

Then, I went towards the river and dad helped me where I had no footing to put some stones and make a passage then we placed the creel and we wedged it with other stones.

Then we went upstream and hit the water.

Some fishes appeared and ran downstream... towards the wicker / Hazelnut creel.

And then it clicked when Dad, Mom and Grandma saw 2 big fish stuck in the creel.

"Plus Nasse Plus Fish!"

The adults licked me... Once again, I had found a way to eat and save Grandma.

She would just have to make a creel and put it in the river and she could fish and eat.

Daddy: "Daddy make more bowls?

Me: "No.. Daddy hunt. Grandma make bowls for other wyverns... exchange food".

I explained that we should let grandmother make the traps and thus make herself useful for the tribe. She could exchange the bowls for game.

I tried to explain to Dad that injured or old wyverns had their uses. Collecting materials, preparing traps in exchange for food.

The basics of bartering.

The little ones also had to learn from the old ones and also not to make the same mistakes again.

The days passed and there was now rabbit and fish on the menu, and from time to time bird.

We had to keep the feathers! and separate the big ones from the down.

But we needed rope and there were too few of us to make a village but too many given our size.

The following days were better in the sense that we were not hungry anymore but I knew the trap that meant.

Either the wyverns would hibernate and spend the winter to wake up in the summer or they would die and only the strongest would attack the new season.

It was necessary to learn to make reserves!

And also I had to be very careful to stay alive and I was sticking to dad and mom, like the rest of my family.

It was a headache.

I had glimpses of predators, like drakes but looking like raptors. They were my size but stockier, more muscular

Then, wild wolves, almost as big as me. And ... terrible birds, like ostriches but with eagle beaks.

And giant eagles.

Dad deviated several times from their path, the membrane of the wyverns being a weak point. The sting is not always a guarantee of victory. The venom not being instantaneous either.