Ember’s molt happened in the middle of a hurricane. Fortunately for her, her parents had decided in advance not to send their molting children out, no matter what that took. Unfortunately for Torch, it meant toughing out the storm outside to evade the smell. Because hurricanes usually don’t bring lightning he didn’t mind it too much. Ever since the… incident… he hasn’t been terribly fond of being outdoors during a thunderstorm.
Ember would have plenty of other opportunities to show off her survival skills. But unlike most dragons her age, she didn’t get the choice to live independently if she wished. Torch was vehemently opposed to the idea of her moving out and Blaze wasn’t a fan of the idea either.
Ember was a premature hatchling and had been small in stature for most of her life at this point. She had only caught up with her peers in size and strength within the last two years. This, combined with her father’s personal experience with surviving in the wild as a dragon who was far too young to do so, made him immovable on the subject.
Ember didn’t have exciting molt stories to tell and felt like an odd one out because of it. The other dragons made the molt trial sound like an exciting adventure, but she just had to have a smothering dad who treated her like a delicate pony almost. That was how she felt about it for the longest time anyway. After the gauntlet she started to connect with him more and, as dragons began opening up about their feelings and talk about their upbringing to her, she began to appreciate his protective side for the love language it really was.
The iconic cave designated for sitting Dragon Lords is now officially Ember’s home and she is perfectly within her legal rights to expel her whole family from it. She doesn’t have the heart to do this, though. Her parents have shown her too much kindness for that to sit right with her. Besides, what kind of horrible monster evicts a gravid dragoness from her home?