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skywings
biology
distinctive features of skywings are their large wings and long, twisting horns. their scales may range from washed-out yellow to bright orange to deep red. the saturation of the scale colors generally correlates with the strength of a skywing's fire, with fireless dragons being very pale and firescales very bright. firescales also often have fire in different colors from the normal orange-yellow. peril, for example, is in the cyan-to-blue range. skywings can produce fire regardless of outside conditions. if an able-bodied (read: not born fireless) skywing loses their ability to produce fire, it is an indication that they are experiencing severe hypothermia and need immediate care.
a well-fed and well-rested skywing may fly for up to 12 hours with little to no pause. in extreme situations, they may even be able to surpass this limit, though it is not healthy. some skywings have feathered wings and tails, some only one or the other. feathers are considered pretty in skywing society, but many dragons dont have any. skywing horns grow their entire lives, but they slow down considerably when the dragon reaches adulthood. the tightness of the twists can range from basically a spire rotating around itself to big spiralling loops.
kingdom
uh oh the treachery. every signle person is my enemy
beliefs
as all dragon societies, skywings believe the world to be a giant dragon partially submerged in water, with the moon as her eyes, the sky as her wings, and the sun as her blazing crown of fire. various parts of that dragon are, themselves, living entities. the sun is one such entitity, and skywings believe it to be their guardian and rightful crown to their kingdom. solar eclipses are thus interpreted as the world turning her head away from herself, leaving the dragon societies vulnerable. they believe the cause of this to be that someone or something has drawn her ire, and try to appease her with prayers and rituals.
skywings are very connected to their dead and do not fear them. it is believed that the spirit of a dragon resides in its bones, which is why bodies have to be burned, so that the spirit may be released and rise up as smoke into the clouds (dragons deemed so evil that they should not reincarnate are buried so that even when their bones decompose, the spirit will be trapped underground. digging up a grave would be like setting the evil spirit loose in society, and the offending dragon may even be exiled from their community). the clouds are seen as the accumulated mass of all spirits that havent been reincarnated yet.
when it is foggy outside, it means that the spirits have come down to reunite with their living family. thus, the skywings celebrate this reunion, as detailed in >customs>festivals. dragons born during the fog are said to have a special connection to spirits, which makes them more qualified to, for example, be stormwatchers (as detailed in >kingdom>societal structure). the reason stormwatchers are so important is that lightning and thunder are the most direct communication that can exist between the dead and the living. these messages are often omens, and stormwatchers are trained to be able to interpret them.
customs
this is like, the one interesting thing tui gave us about them. hooray. after death, a body is wrapped in white (and particularly flammable) cloth, and left open to the sky for a full day (changed from canons seven days because honestly, do you have any idea how much it would fucking stink after a full week?) before being burned so that their spirit may rise up into the clouds to be reincarnated as a skywing. the bodies are usually laid out on platforms specially made for that purpose, these can range from simple wooden or stone platforms in poorer communities to large and ornate platforms on pillars in a section of the palace.
language
is a huge work in progress argh