by Jess E. Owen
“The wyrms of the Winderost—”
“If you will listen quietly,” Groa said with all the patience of a mother, “I will tell all I remember, and then you may ask your questions at the end, if I haven’t answered them.”
Shard dipped his head in apology, and in the dream she could see the gesture. “Pardon me.”
Groa continued, and though Shard smelled smoke, he saw only her vision. Enormous dragons soared through his vision. As she wove the dream he also watched what she did, and thought he understood how she led him from one image to the next.
“They would not teach us how to make fire. It was then I began to suspect they weren’t as enlightened and flawless as we first thought.” The half light of the dream darkened to a hazy red with her change in mood, like sunset just before a storm, and Shard shuddered.
“And worse, something changed in us at the sight of sparkling gems and moonlight shining on gold. The treasures also began to seep into the minds and hearts of many of Kajar’s warriors, and they competed with each other to see who could charm the more elaborate or bejeweled bit of gold or silver or armor from the dragons. Oh, the dragons found us amusing. We would host games and contests of skill to show off, to impress them.”
Shard saw fighting arenas nestled in the valleys of vast, snowy mountains. The arenas, built to accommodate dragons sparring, filled with competing gryfons.
“These games grew fiercer and more dangerous with each passing turn of the sun until, at last, the unthinkable happened. A gryfon, in the midst of mock-battle, lost himself in the fight, blinded by the prospect of winning, of treasure, deafened by the encouraging roars of the dragons. He killed his own wingbrother.”
Shard closed his eyes against the sight—against Groa’s vivid memory of the battle. Almost afraid to know, he asked, “Who?”
Groa stared below. “The murderer was Kajar. And his wingbrother, his closest sworn ally and friend, was my brother. To kill one’s own wingbrother—unthinkable. That was the first blood to stain Kajar’s name.”
Eyes narrowed, his heart cold, Shard looked toward the arenas. “What happened then?”
“All grieved after the death of my brother,” Groa said at length. “The dragons felt terrible—or acted so—that their encouragement had led to the accident. They made us more gifts. More things,” she said, her voice sharpening, “as if metal and stones could replace my brother. They burned his body, the highest honor of their kind. But our hearts were turning cold. I longed for home. Kajar, I could tell, longed for home, for his family.
“Our band was splitting into those who sympathized with him and those who desired revenge, though on Kajar himself or the dragons no one could decide. There was so much anger and fear. It had been nearly a year at that point, mind you. I should have been there for him, Shard, but I never spoke to him again. I know what it is to become Nameless in the hunt, to forget yourself in a fight, but I never thought it would happen to Kajar. Not his noble bloodline, the blood of the very first kings to ever rise out of the dust of the Winderost.
“Kajar began asking more questions. Where did all the gold come from? For we’d kept exploring and found no tunnels or the mines of which the dragons spoke. He demanded to know where the riches came from, why the dragons were so powerful, why they led such brief lives. Why wouldn’t they teach us how to make fire? Oh, they didn’t like the questions. They thought he was being greedy.”
“He was curious,” Shard said softly, more to himself then her. Amaratsu’s story was much simpler, more misguided, or, as Groa had said, kit-like in its portrayal of the events. For a moment the vision of the Sunland faded, and he saw only mist, and her voice in his mind. “I would have been curious too, after that.”
“Yes. Anyone would have been. Certainly a prince like Kajar. I don’t know what they say of him in the Winderost now, Shard, but I wish you could have known him as I did.”
Shard thought of Kjorn, and was able to imagine what Kajar might have been like. “I do too.”
Groa seemed to gather herself, re-appearing as her young self in the dream and flinging her wings out. The vision of the Sunland and the dragons and gryfons unfurled before Shard again.
“Kajar, disgusted with himself and with the dragons, disillusioned, made preparations to leave.” Groa’s voice swelled with a distant passion, and for the last part of the tale she looked and sounded young again, as if it had only happened the day before. “The dragon emperor was displeased. Perhaps he feared we would try to take revenge later, or would spread tales of the sad events through our homeland.” A mountainous dragon whose scales shimmered like pearl flashed before Shard’s eyes.
“He invited Kajar and all his warriors to a feast, and Kajar agreed, mostly to make sure his band was well-fortified for the flight home, and to make as peaceful an end possible.
“The dragons laid out every extravagant manner of food you could imagine, Shard. Fish from the deepest sea, seabird eggs boiled in water using fire, mussels, seal, great carcasses of snow bear and penguin and reindeer.” Shard saw the feast, and through Groa’s memory, smelled it too. “Much of it they roasted using fire, but we never cared for the taste of it. It appeared to be a gesture of honor and friendship.
“Kajar knew better. We knew better. We ate politely, made conversation, spoke of our homeland while not exactly saying which direction it was. Near the end of feast, the emperor rose, and, looming enormous over the rest of the gathering, asked Kajar’s forgiveness. It was then that he told us from whence all the jewels and metal ore had come.
“He spoke of other dragons in a green land in the far, far, Nightward Sea, a land rich with metals and jewels. He spoke of those dragons, but called them wyrms, more like beasts than Named allies, who toiled happily in exchange for shining things. All the Sunland dragons had to do was promise them ornaments, and they dug in their mines, took orders, submitted to discipline. A reward here and there, for the wyrms are much longer lived than any other being, with an ancient memory.
“Do they also battle for your entertainment? Kajar asked him. I nearly choked, Shard, while Kajar continued. Do you dangle pretty pieces of metal at them rather than teach them the ways of honor, friendship, the light of Tyr, and use their own greed against them? Why do they toil for you, if not out of ignorance or fear? For Kajar could see the dragons had no love for those nightward wyrms, no respect, only contempt.
“All they care for in the world is gold, the emperor responded. Will you be like them? Or will you accept our true friendship?”
A dark sense of foreboding and revelation sat heavily over Shard’s heart, and he gazed, rapt at the scene Groa painted for him. But it wavered and faded before him. Then he remembered that part in Amaratsu’s version of the tale. “That’s when you left. You knew it was some kind of test.”
“I admit, Shard, I was a coward then. I could feel the tension gathering like a thunderstorm. I claimed the cooked meat made me ill and fled the gathering. I left the dragon’s grounds and waited outside the limit of their territory, where I could see if the rest of my companions made flight, and join them home.
“But instead of a great host of gryfons flying, after a time I saw them walking out of the dragon’s territory, toward where I hid in the foothills beyond the mountains where the dragons nest. A single dragon joined them. I knew her. She’d only just hatched the summer before we arrived, and had lived her whole short life knowing gryfons—and she was besot with Kajar from the moment we’d arrived, whether as a brother or in some other way I never knew. They came close to me, but I didn’t trust the dragon, and I stayed hidden in a cluster of rocks, eavesdropping.
“She told Kajar she’d never met the wyrms but that she felt as Kajar did, that there had to be another way of mining their gems, or a more equal partnership. She knew the emperor took advantage of the wyrms’ hunger for gold and thought it was wrong. She admired Kajar, and feared for him, for standing up to the emperor. And it was there, in front of all his gathered warriors, and I who w
ouldn’t come out of hiding, that this now old and withered dragoness told Kajar that she loved him, and that she had a gift for him, a true gift.
“Help me die, she asked of him. I am old, she said, and I don’t want to live in this land without you. I hurt, and I cannot bear the greed of my brothers and sisters any more.
“Kajar said she could fly with them and she only laughed and answered that she was too old, that she would fall in the ocean and die there.
“‘I give you the gift of my love,’ she told Kajar, and the others. ‘I am summerborn, and my element is fire. With my death and the fire of my blood you will see yourselves as I see you. The world will see you as I see you and your descendants for all time will bear the strength and beauty of the Sunland in their blood. But be warned, with a dragon’s blessing, everything that you are will be more so. If you are strong, you will be stronger. If you are arrogant, you will be more so, and if you are fearful and dishonest, you may lose yourself and your very name. If you are kind and honorable, there will be no creature alive to match you, and the blessing on you will serve as something to aspire to, or as a warning against arrogance and greed.
“‘Take the gifts my kin and I made for you, to remember us by, but remember they are not us, they are not our friendship or our time together. Only remembrances, only rocks and metal. Kajar,’ she begged him them, ‘now let me die.’
“I looked away, Shard. I knew Kajar would do as she asked. I heard great gasps from the rest of the warriors and I looked back, expecting to see them covered in dragon blood—but oh…I cannot tell you how it looked. Her body had burned into shining red flames like fire, but so much brighter, and washed Kajar and the others in that fire. Then it faded, and they stood there with her ashes and the snow. They looked radiant, like cut jewels. The colors that had once been natural were now impossible hues. Kajar himself, once ruddy like a Winderost hawk, now blazed the red of a dying fire.
“I’m sure the rest of the tale is much as your friend Amaratsu said. I fled after that, fearing for Kajar and the others, fearing for myself. I couldn’t bear to go home without my brother, without the blessing of the dragon on my feathers and in my blood. I have been here ever since, learning of the other creatures here, of dream catching, of fire…and at last, at long last, I heard a bit of silver in the wind. I heard a song of summer, and I sought you.”
As the dream images melted into a vague, starry twilight around them, Shard tried to gather his scattering awe. He had no words.
Groa laughed softly. “Shall I teach you dream catching and weaving? Then you may seek visions of your own, or send dreams to others, to any who dream.”
“I watched you,” Shard murmured. “I think I understand.”
They stood on a familiar cliff, and the thick scent of seawater and pine drew a loose breath from Shard’s throat. The Silver Isles.
Groa shimmered before him. “Is this your home?”
“Yes.” As she had done, he opened his wings, and felt in that place that he could gather and send his thoughts and his heart ever outward for all the dreaming world to hear. From his wingtips burst an apparition of Stigr, and the black gryfon wisped in front of them like smoke before fading.
“Well done,” Groa murmured. Her voice sounded old again, breathless, and he noticed that she was blind again in the dream. It was now his dream. “Again.”
Through her eyes he saw the dream net, and understood at once how the spirals echoed in the waking world—the winds and star light and the darkness of night tilted and turned in patterns repeated by leaves, shells, unfurling wings and beating hearts. He saw how he could soar along a strand and find a friend’s dream, and weave an image for them.
So Shard did it again, folding together the salt wind, the stars and earth to show Groa all the things that he loved. He showed her the pride, his birth mother Ragna, his nest-sister, Thyra, now a queen. Stern Caj and practical, caring Sigrun. For her he wove wolves rushing through the dark forest, and Aodh the graying caribou king, and the laughing ravens, Hugin and Munin. He showed her Brynja, the huntress’s wings broad and ruddy as fire in the dream light, and Groa laughed in delight to his desires displayed.
“I thought you might have the knack.”
“You see why I have to go,” Shard said, and drew forward all his memories of Kjorn, and his new and dear memories with Hikaru. “You see why I have to try.”
“I do,” Groa said. “And I wish you all luck and the blessings of each wind. But I urge you to be wary about the dragons. They are not all that they seem. There will be one dragon among them who keeps separate the truth and the lies. A storyteller, I can’t recall…”
“Do you know that dragon’s name?”
“In my time it was a dragoness called Umeko, and she was my friend. She gave me a silver chain. But she had a title too, I can’t…I can’t recall. I’m sorry.”
“I will find a dragon to tell me the truth. Thank you.” They stood on a dream of the Copper Cliff, near the King’s Rocks. “Thank you for all of this.”
Groa seemed bright, and he realized he could see the sea and the sky behind her, through her. She was waking, leaving his dream. “I have told you all I can, and I grow weary.”
A sound made him aware of his body, of the cave, the smell of smoke. He was waking, too. For a moment he strained to remain there, to find Catori or his mother or a raven and tell them he was well.
“It is morning, young prince, and time to fly.”
Groa seemed to speak in his heart, not his ears. “Shard. I have two last gifts for you, Shard.”
Shard curled tighter on himself, eyes closed. Bitter wind gusted beyond the warm cave.
“Shard,” she whispered, and he made a soft sound of acknowledgement, unable to open his eyes, still trying to see her in the dream. He was so weary, the story was almost too much to take in, and his leg ached from too long in one position.
“Come over to me, Rashard. I have two gifts for you. The first is a set of fire stones. A raven stole them from the dragons for me. You need only strike them together to make a spark, and if you have dry tinder ready, you will have fire. The second is the only dragon treasure that I bothered to keep.”
Her words overlapped the very last dregs of his dream, she seemed to call him from across the waves.
“Shard. Shard, come over to me.”
Come over to me.
Shard.
Shard jerked awake. As he opened his eyes, the dream still felt more real, for a moment, than the cave. Dull silvery light touched the entrance, and the last warmth was seeping out into the rock. The cave was empty.
The fire was dead.
Trembling, Shard pushed himself to his feet, favoring his leg. “Groa?” He peered around. She could not have left without him hearing. Really, she couldn’t have left without crawling over him. “Iluq? Groa!”
He spun around. She was only just here, just speaking to me!
After shaking himself hard enough to jolt his injured leg, Shard limped around to the other side of the fire ring, and stopped, looking closely.
There lay the bones he couldn’t identify before, from behind the smoke and fire. There, where the ancient, blind, impossible gryfess had sat weaving her dream tale, lay the bones he’d thought were wolf bones. But as Shard looked closer he saw that the dusty skeleton had the unmistakable skull of a gryfon, and two tucked sequences of bones had once been wings, now coated by dust and the decay of ancient feathers just barely preserved in the cold.
~ 21 ~
The Queens’ Decree
THE WIDE BUT LOW-CEILINGED den where Ragna dwelled, alone, faced the starward sea and boasted a view of the Star Isle. A respectably sized cave for a small gryfon family, or one queen, it was now filled to cramping with Caj, Sigrun, Ragna herself, Thyra, Halvden and his mate Kenna, and her wingsister, Astri.
Caj watched the Widow Queen. After the first bustle of outrage at Halvden’s return, the chaos of Aesir, Vanir and half-bloods alike demanding Halvden pay for his crimes
, the Vanir queen had ushered them away for private council.
Unlike Sverin, Ragna preferred to deal with large matters privately, not loudly before the pride.
It was Thyra, however, who allowed Astri and Kenna to be present.
Caj, Sigrun, Astri, and Kenna sat ringing the back of the den like an audience, while Halvden stood before Ragna and Thyra, who blocked the exit and were outlined in sunlight. They’d let him sleep through the night in a guarded, empty den.
“Halvden, son-of-Hallr,” Ragna said quietly. “You stand ready to admit your crimes and atone?”
Halvden looked at her, then turned and addressed Thyra. “I do, my lady.”
Beside Caj, Sigrun tensed at the affront to Ragna. He nudged her with a wing, trusting their daughter to handle the situation.
“You will show respect,” Thyra said, “to the regent of the Sun Isle.”
“You are my queen,” Halvden said, voice low. “If Sverin is restored to his senses, he will be my king. If not, then when Kjorn returns, I will bow to him alone, and atone for my crimes to him.”
Caj had to admire that he held his tail still, didn’t show his agitation. Young Astri, star-white but brighter than Ragna in the way of a half-blood Aesir, let out a muffled, whimpering snarl. Kenna tapped her beak in warning.
Ragna remained unruffled, cool and still as marble. She turned her head to face Thyra as well. “What will you then, my lady?” Her voice sounded too amused at the idea that Halvden thought he had any choice in his punishment at all, or who he would respect, and not.
“Halvden, as usual, you spew bold and arrogant words,” Thyra said coldly. Even though her belly bulged, she stood tall and fair in the dim afternoon light, and Caj could have fluffed with pride. “My father led me to believe that you were willing to show humility, that you were ready to ask forgiveness. Of all the warriors in this pride, it is his forgiveness you should seek. You tried to murder him. You lied. You covered your lies with further, cowardly lying, and when Kjorn himself returned and presented himself to Sverin, you tried to discredit him. Him, the very prince you now claim to wish to serve. Tell me why we should allow you to live, much less to atone for these unforgiveable crimes?”