Pets

I'm going to do a post on animals in Othere soon, but I'd also like to mention that certain animals play a very important part in my story. Here's a few important ones that I'd like to mention:

First, there's GOLDEN ICE, Mollie's first real friend. He was a birthday present to her from Venezza, and despite all of Mollie's princessy instincts, Mollie couldn't resist. Mollie has a soft spot for animals, and who can't resist an adorable little wolfdog puppy who has fur that sometimes looks like actually gold, and one brown eye and one blue eye?

Golden Ice plays a very important part in Mollie's tale, and not just because he's lovable and cuddly. In the third book, he's at Mollie's side every step of the way, protecting her - and even with his life, when he sacrificed himself for her when a Grimling was going to slit Mollie's throat. Golden Ice interned by throwing himself in front of Mollie, and died. But Mollie and Golden Ice... they were friends till the end. And afterwards, Mollie still had a miniature version of Golden Ice, in his pups - especially in Bright Star.

Wolf version of Golden Ice, coming soon.

POLA: Pola's not just any ordinary messenger fristie. Besides having an unusually rainbow-like sheen on her wings, and being pure white instead of dappled, Pola's also a skilled messenger, good flier, and very intelligent - smart enough to speak in simple sentences in Calathic, and actually understand what she's saying. Has shown sympathy and kindness towards Mollie in the past. Yeah, Pola's not an ordinary bird. Mollie told me that ever since Golden Ice, she'd secretly wanted more pets. Well, Pola's better than a pet - she's a real friend.

FLAKEY AND CHANTER: I met these guys in Elysium, after I heard they were going extinct. Flakey and Chanter are fire-breathing unicorns. They're the last ones left of their particular species, although there's other types of unicorns out there, most fire-breathing, one type healing. It's that type that used to live on Earth but was transported to Othere because the Earth humans were intent on killing it. Anyway, I kept Flakey and Chanter as pets in my house in Elysium. They hung out in the stables out back. I'm not much of a horse person, but they don't eat, so no smell - they're pretty much all fire inside, so as long as there's oxygen they're okay.

PYRO: I met Pyro on the quest for the Talisman, and she's just awesome. She's one of thirteen phoenixes in the entire worlds - worlds, because one lives in Arabia and one lives in Egypt. The rest live here on Othere. Technically, phoenixes shouldn't have names, but it's more polite to say "Pyro!" then "Hey, phoenix! Over here?"

Anyway, Pyro's a few thousand years old, and she's seen practically everything. Even Mollie and Irisa respect her. To call her, you've got to release incense, phoenix ash, phoenix song, and a bit of light from a phoenix flame, in order to call her. I keep that stuff in a magical pouch Pyro gave me. Pyro's cool like that. Also, technically, phoenixes don't have genders, but I call them she's, because though they're reborn every 500 years, they lay an egg of their self and collapse inside, so they re-hatch out of the egg. And in my opinion, anything that lays eggs is female.

IRISA: Mollie met this dragon around the end of our quest for the Talisman, through Venezza. They were instant best buds. I think Golden Ice was a little jealous. Both of them considered themselves high and mighty - Mollie because she was royalty, and Irisa because she was the daughter of Hellfire and Corinne (Venezza's dragon mother - so Irisa and Venezza were half dragon sisters.) BTW, Hellfire is like the chief of the tribe in that particular part of the Crags, where a lot of the dragons live. Anyway, Irisa helped Venezza bring the Red Dragon and lots of dragons from the Crags into the final battle. And Mollie was riding Irisa when she approached Virginia in that final, epic battle... Irisa kind of looks like the pic above. Just imagine - small enough to fit in a bedroom, and a little feminine around the eyes.