The Poison Jungle

The thirteenth book in the Wings of Fire series is set in a world where dragon tribes rule continents. On the continent of Pantala, three tribes coexist uneasily: the HiveWings, who live in towering cities called Hives and are secretly mind-controlled by their ruler, Queen Wasp; the SilkWings, an oppressed tribe forced to serve the HiveWings; and the LeafWings, believed extinct after the Tree Wars, a devastating conflict with the HiveWings 50 years ago, but actually surviving in hiding within the deadly Poison Jungle. The story follows Sundew, a young LeafWing with extraordinarily powerful leafspeak, the magical ability to sense and accelerate plant growth.

A prologue shows Bryony, a LeafWing soldier, preparing with Hemlock, Sundew's father, and fellow LeafWing Pokeweed to burn down Bloodworm Hive using flamesilk, a fire-producing silk spun by rare SilkWings. A SilkWing named Grayling from the Chrysalis, an underground resistance movement, reports that SilkWings inside have been warned to evacuate. Bryony feels guilt when Grayling thanks the LeafWings for the rescue, since the LeafWings' true motive is vengeance.

The main narrative opens as Sundew flies toward the Poison Jungle with four companions: Cricket, a HiveWing immune to Queen Wasp's mind control; Blue, a SilkWing who can produce flamesilk; Swordtail, Blue's bold SilkWing friend; and Bumblebee, a HiveWing dragonet Cricket is raising. Sundew carries a secret jade frog, a token connected to someone she is forbidden to think about. When the group enters the jungle, Swordtail is swallowed by a Venus dragon-trap, a carnivorous plant large enough to engulf a dragon. Blue panics and uses his flamesilk, nearly igniting the forest. Sundew grows a firebreak with her leafspeak, saving the jungle and freeing Swordtail. Cricket forces Sundew to reveal her ability to accelerate plant growth.

At the LeafWing village, a living dome Sundew built to shield her tribe from the jungle, Wolfsbane, a LeafWing warrior, suggests killing the HiveWings and keeping only Blue. Sundew demands her companions' safety. Wolfsbane's son Mandrake introduces himself as Sundew's fiancé, a betrothal arranged since hatching to produce dragonets with stronger leafspeak. Cricket nearly exposes that Sundew mentioned having a different "one true love." Sundew's mother Belladonna, the faction's commander, storms out at the presence of outsiders but grudgingly agrees to keep the companions as hostages to control Blue. Blue then discovers that Sundew secretly collected some of his flamesilk and gave it to her parents, who used it to burn Bloodworm Hive. He is devastated, and Cricket and Swordtail feel betrayed.

After midnight, Sundew slips out to a familiar pond and places the jade frog on a boulder as a signal. A flashback reveals she met Willow, a calm LeafWing from the rival SapWing faction, at age two. Over four years of secret meetings, Willow urged Sundew to leave Belladonna's faction; Sundew always refused, believing she must destroy the HiveWings first. In the present, Willow arrives and Sundew tells her everything.

Queen Sequoia, the elderly, battle-scarred LeafWing queen whose survival Belladonna hid from younger LeafWings, emerges having followed Willow. She leads Sundew to the SapWing village, where Sundew meets Princess Hazel, Sequoia's great-granddaughter and heir. Willow shows Sundew the village's other guests: Io, Swordtail's sister, rather than his missing flamesilk girlfriend Luna as Sundew had hoped; and two SeaWings from the Distant Kingdoms, a continent across the ocean. Tsunami explains that she and Turtle swam across the ocean after Luna washed ashore on their coast and asked them to find Blue and bring help. Tsunami firmly refuses, however, to help wipe out an entire tribe.

Sequoia summons Belladonna and estimates Wasp's army could arrive within a day. She assigns Sundew, Willow, and Cricket to find Hawthorn, a dragon who has studied the breath of evil vine for 50 years and may have an antidote to the mind control. Sequoia recounts the Legend of the Hive: When the first dragons arrived on Pantala thousands of years ago, coordinated swarms of wildlife attacked them, all controlled by a vine called the breath of evil. The ancestors destroyed the plant and the attacks ceased, but some survived in the Poison Jungle, guarded by Hawthorn. Belladonna insists Mandrake and Nettle, Wolfsbane's aggressive daughter, join the quest.

The journey is treacherous: Nettle falls into a giant pitcher plant and must be carved free, and the group navigates lakes surrounded by aquatic dragon-traps before passing through the Den of Vipers, where hundreds of dragonbite vipers stand frozen and watchful. They reach a clearing where a huge LeafWing introduces himself as Hawthorn.

Hawthorn opens a chest of gnarled roots he calls the heart of salvation, claiming it is an antidote. He then confesses he found the surviving breath of evil, altered it with his leafspeak to target only HiveWings, and secretly slipped it into Queen Wasp's food at a peace summit, hoping to control her and prevent war. The plan backfired: Wasp was not controlled but instead learned to use the plant herself, gaining power over her entire tribe. Queen Sequoia knew and did not stop him. Sundew is shaken to learn her tribe caused the very evil she has spent her life fighting.

Back at the village, guards force-feed the root to a captured HiveWing, who appears to wake free of Wasp's control. They plan to burn the roots in a bonfire near the army so the smoke will free all HiveWings at once. Blue agrees to light it, but only after both queens promise his fire will never burn Hives. Sundew breaks her engagement to Mandrake, who reveals he always knew she loved Willow.

Before dawn, Sundew tries to grow more antidote with her leafspeak, and the plant explodes from the earth. She recognizes it with horror: The heart of salvation is actually the breath of evil. The antidote was a lie. Hawthorn appears on the opposite riverbank holding Willow hostage with a viper around her neck, while vines pin Sundew, Cricket, and Mandrake. Speaking through Hawthorn, the true enemy reveals itself: not Wasp, but the plant itself, a sentient consciousness called the othermind. It once ruled the continent before dragons arrived and has been inside Hawthorn for 50 years, manipulating him. The bonfire smoke is now infecting every dragon near it, LeafWings and SilkWings included, and the othermind intends to seize Sundew's powerful leafspeak to spread across all of Pantala.

While Cricket stalls with questions, Sundew secretly grows a tiny sundew sprout into a massive predator that snatches the viper from Willow's neck. Willow grabs a thorn and kills Hawthorn, breaking the vines' coordination, and the captives escape. The othermind still controls Wasp and all newly infected dragons. Willow convinces Sundew that charging into battle would hand the othermind the continent's most powerful leafspeak; they must retreat.

They race to evacuate both LeafWing villages. Hazel discovers a hidden map sewn into the back cover of the Book of Clearsight, a prophetic text central to the group's earlier adventures, showing a chain of islands between Pantala and the Distant Kingdoms with arrows marking a flyable route. Io arrives with 200 Chrysalis SilkWings and takes a copy of the map to warn remaining SilkWings in the Hives. The othermind sets the jungle ablaze, and Hazel orders the combined refugees to fly southeast toward the first island.

An epilogue shifts to the Distant Kingdoms, where Jerboa, an ancient SandWing with animus magic (the innate ability to enchant objects), meets Queen Snowfall, the young IceWing queen. Snowfall demands Jerboa fortify her borders, but Jerboa reveals animus magic has stopped working. Snowfall's scouts have spotted hundreds of unknown dragons approaching across the ocean, which she interprets as an invasion. Jerboa suggests they may need help, but Snowfall refuses to listen, setting up the conflict of the next installment.