by Jess E. Owen
Kajar.
Shard took a deep breath. “Kajar and his line ruled the Winderost?”
“Once.” Valdis lashed her tail, and eyed the violet sky warily.
Shard perked his ears. Kjorn’s great grandfather. With Valdis’ words Shard realized Per hadn’t simply styled himself a king when he conquered the Silver Isles, as he’d always thought. He was a king. He’d wondered what tier Per and Sverin held before fleeing the Winderost.
It wasn’t tier at all, but the very crown of the Dawn Spire.
Once, all of the Winderost had been united.
What changed? Shard had asked Asvander.
The king.
“It became clear,” Valdis continued, “that the dragons hungered for the blood of the red kings. Per took all who bore the curse of the dragons, and fled starward. We don’t know if he fled from fear, or because he thought it would rid us of the scourge. But they stayed, and he left.” She blinked at Shard as if making sense of it for the first time. “And discovered the Silver Isles.”
Stigr spoke at last. “As he wasn’t in a hurry to get back and help rid you of the scourge, I’d say he was a coward.”
Valdis slanted one ear, looking uncertain. “Perhaps. But their bloodline still has loyalties here.”
“I see that,” Stigr said, and Valdis shot him a dark look.
“Tell me about the cursed families,” Shard asked before they could argue. The painted wolf Nitara had said the same thing.
Valdis glanced at Stigr, but spoke her answer to Shard. “Kajar didn’t fly alone to the land of the dragons. His wingbrother of the plains went with him, and others, warriors, representing clans of the Winderost, and they began their war and stole treasures. The dragons tracked them back, so they are cursed by their greed.”
“And brought this curse on you,” Stigr reminded.
“We can lift it,” Shard said quietly. “We can rid the Winderost of dragons if we plan it right.”
Silence fell. The answer burned as brightly to Shard as Tyr’s first rays of light. He wanted to fly, to soar and leap for joy. It was all so simple.
“This is madness,” Brynja whispered, crouching low, looking out nervously into the dark.
“I know,” Shard said. “We must go in. But before you sleep tonight, consider.” He lowered his head and his voice, and they leaned in as the night sentinels flew overhead, changing posts with those of the evening watch.
“What if I offered peace with the painted wolf packs, an alliance with eagles, and lions, and an end to your war with the dragons?”
“I’m with you,” said Asvander.
“It’s impossible,” Valdis sighed. “The king will never agree.”
“What if,” Shard glanced to one side and dropped his voice, “I offered you a new king?”
41
In Stillness the Wind
Kjorn didn’t know how long he crouched at the dark pool, the scent of mineral water and strange, distant sounds echoing through his senses, staring at phantom images.
The raven wings carried him back through the days of red rowan and he saw all that had passed.
The wolves lived on as if they’d known their whole lives underground and he saw it all. Laughing, happy, hunting at night and bringing their kills home. None of them planned attacks on the gryfons as Sverin feared in his waking dreams. They didn’t fear or hate gryfons. In fact, they barely spoke of gryfons at all. They sang winter songs and lived underground, waiting for Sverin’s anger to cool. At the sight of fresh deer kills, warm saliva pooled under Kjorn’s tongue, though he smelled only water and stone.
The wings tilted him away, bringing him something new.
On the Sun Isle, gryfons huddled in their caves, eating salted, secret meat from Sigrun. Kjorn saw it all as if he were a bird that could flutter in and out of each den.
Sverin lashed out against wolves, the Vanir, the evils of darkness. But everyone knew that as the nights grew longer, dark and full of ice, it was the king’s fear that drove him, the memory of his mate’s death. The Long Night approached and it was the only monster in the world that set a chill down red Sverin’s back.
When Sverin declared any Vanir half bloods were to be quartered in a separate section of dens, Kjorn curled his talons against the stone.
“Would that include my mate, Father?” he snarled at the water. “And Halvden, who poisons your ear? Is this true? Has this happened?”
Beside him, the wolf witch was silent.
Then Kjorn’s vision reeled, across the black tossing waves of the sea.
And he saw Shard. Impossibly, he saw his wingbrother stalking alone through the night, in a sleet storm across a desert of red stone.
“Shard,” he whispered.
In the vision, Shard’s head flew up, startled, speaking in disbelief. “Kjorn?” echoed Shard’s voice in his mind. It couldn’t be real. Kjorn couldn’t have seen him all the way across the sea, spoken to him, heard his voice in turn.
“What is it?” asked a black gryfon beside Shard, but their voices muddied and fell away as Kjorn saw something else.
Something dark coiled along the edges of the vision. Something horrible and huge and dark on the edge of the world, stalking Shard and the black gryfon beside him, and Kjorn had no voice to warn him.
“What is that?” Kjorn whispered desperately. “What is that creature?”
A strange, coarse male voice answered like a raven call. “Kajar’s legacy.” Black wings tilted him away from the shadow so that he saw Shard clearly, alive and real.
“Shard, be careful.”
The world around Shard grew dark and Kjorn watched monstrous beasts forming out of the night, all strange wing and fang and talon. A horrible scream ripped in the air, as if the very rightness of the world was torn by black claws.
Kjorn fell among them, and saw Shard far away, battling against another shrieking monster.
“Shard!” Kjorn shrieked in the midst of the writhing, deadly blackness. His wingbrother didn’t answer, or didn’t hear, or was gone.
Kjorn fought free and flew up, away from the creatures and their shadow talons, up away, landed suddenly hard on a stone floor…
And he realized he stood in the silent cavern. Catori watched him. He panted, the horrible vision whirling in his mind before fading like a dream, only he had never slept.
Furious, Kjorn slapped talons against the water. “Witch! Mud-covered, lying wolves! How dare you call up my wingbrother’s memory! How dare you plant nightmares in my mind?”
The she-wolf lunged back when Kjorn leaped at her, and he nearly crashed into the wall.
“He’s no memory! What did you see? You’ve been granted visions for your sacrifice here. This is a hallow place you’ve found, carved by the earthfire of the First Age, cooled by Tor’s sea, blessed with fresh water. Whether you saw Shard now or in the past or the near future isn’t sure. But it is true. What nightmares you might have seen are warnings, are signs for what you may soon face, for your destiny. You’ve had a vision. What did you see?”
Kjorn, out of breath, trembling with hunger, could only stand and stare, unable to decide what was true. If it was real, he wasn’t afraid. He could fight the raging beasts from the nightmare. If that was his destiny somehow, he didn’t fear it. The vision had revealed something more important to him. He watched Catori warily.
“Shard really lives?”
“Of course,” she yipped merrily.
“Did he really fly to the home of my fathers, as your brother said? He lives?” Kjorn saw a flash in his mind. Kajar’s Sign. The starfire, soaring windward across the night sky. It was his guide to travel across the sea, and he should have followed it.
“Yes,” Catori answered after seeming to watch those thoughts pass over his face. “He lives.”
“Who are you? How do you know these things?”
“I am Catori.” She dipped her head almost in true respect. “Sometimes I see. I only guided you to your own path. Where will you fly?”
“I don’t know,” Kjorn whispered. “I’m lost in here.”
“Do you believe your vision?”
Kjorn stared at her, every instinct telling him to attack. No. Not instinct. That was hunger, anger, blindness. His true instinct guided him to trust the wolf before him, to know what she said was true. His deep heart longed to know that Shard was alive.
It’s not longing. He is alive. We never found a body or saw one in the sea. The Vanir gryfons of the pride schemed and whispered of something. Now Kjorn knew, it had to be Shard’s return.
“Yes. I believe it.” Instead of worrying that his wingbrother planned an overthrow, for a moment all Kjorn felt was joy, and regret for the way they parted. Catori seemed to see it shining from him.
“Then you’re on your path.”
“Please,” he forced himself to utter, and lowered his wings to a mantle, bowing his head. “Will you guide me out?”
“Not yet.” The words fell deep on the stone. Kjorn fought a snarl and didn’t raise his head, to hide his anger. She’s still toying with me?
She stepped forward and touched her nose to the top of his head between his ears. Kjorn shuddered and his muscles twitched to flee or fight. She could bite his neck, crunch it like a branch. He forced himself to remain still and she spoke before he could question her.
“You’ve wandered for days. It is not a good time now, to begin a journey. Come with me and eat good food. Come with me and celebrate your strong vision with my family. It is long past time they should know that you’re so different from your father. Wingbrother to the prince we love.”
“I have to leave,” Kjorn argued, fighting his temper. He couldn’t find his way out without her. “I have to face my father and set the pride right.” And then find Shard, he promised himself. Find Shard and fight those shadow beasts, if that is my destiny. He would follow the starfire as his great-grandfather had, even if he was late in doing so.
Catori only shook herself.
Kjorn opened his wings, pleading, “Don’t you see? They’re all in danger.”
“Not yet,” she said firmly, ears set forward. “The time isn’t right.”
Kjorn’s tail lashed. “Why? Who are you to decide?”
Catori’s ears swiveled uncertainly. “Very well, you decide. But, gryfons believe that all things are best begun under Tyr’s light?”
“Yes,” Kjorn said.
“Then you must wait.”
Kjorn felt suddenly cold. “The Long Night.”
Catori dipped her head. “It has begun.”
42
From Ice the Flame
“More waiting,” Shard burst out when he and Stigr were safe in Shard’s den. “I have the perfect answer and it’s more waiting, more talking.”
“I thought you liked talking,” Stigr said, and when Shard glared at him added, “Shard, perfect answers aren’t always easy answers. They have a lot to contend with here.”
“Kjorn is the rightful king of the Winderost.”
“Maybe, once, but his coward father and grandfather lost him that birthright.”
Shard ruffed, pacing to the back of his den, then turning to face Stigr again. “He would fight beside me. We could win it back!”
Stigr sighed. “This was never our fight.”
Shard walked to his nest, straightening the long dried grasses and juniper bows. “It is. It’s all our fight, because it’s tied together, don’t you see? If we win back Kjorn’s kingdom, then we won’t have a reason to fight in the Silver Isles. It’s all tied, Uncle. All of it. You can’t teach me that we’re all linked and then say, all of us but the Aesir.”
“Hm.” Stigr huffed, and ground his beak to stifle a yawn. “Fair enough, my prince. But please. Listen to Valdis this time. Let her get sight on what she thinks the queen will do before you say anything else to Orn.”
“Oh, it’s listen to Valdis now?” Shard chuckled and Stigr growled in warning. Shard dipped his head. “All right. I won’t say anything else to Orn.”
Stigr nodded, turned, then paused at the mouth of the cave, looking over his shoulder at Shard. “What are you planning?”
Shard whispered, “He speaks to all who hear.”
“Shard…if you’re saying what I think you’re saying, it’s madness. From all I’ve heard…”
“Don’t try to stop me.”
Stigr took a slow, measured breath. “When? You’ll have to go at night, or Asvander’s guards will stop you.”
“Tomorrow night. Rest well, Uncle.”
“Shard—”
“No more waiting,” Shard said quietly. “This has to be done, and if I am the Summer King, then I must be the one to do it. You can come with me, or not. Either way, I’m going.”
Stigr’s tail twitched. “Leave without me, and you’ll have worse than dragons to worry about.”
Shard’s managed to laugh. “Thank you, Uncle.”
“Tomorrow night,” Stigr confirmed, eyeing him, and Shard nodded. While Valdis and the others negotiated, it was time for Shard to do what all of the creatures in the Winderost said could not be done. Before they declared war, before they fought, before anything else.
It was time to speak to the dragons.
The next night, freezing damp wind swept across the Winderost. Shard and Stigr watched the lighting of the fires, let themselves be seen entering their dens, bidding good night. Then they waited. Shard dozed. It was Stigr who woke him at midnight.
Sleet and thick darkness covered their leaving. Sentries and fire keepers kept busy lighting their backup flames as the rain drove against the bonfires on the high towers. Lower pyres under overhangs and within empty caves cast pale light through the Dawn Spire, but it lacked the brilliance of the usual fires. Together, Shard and Stigr crept out of their dens and into the shadows.
Cracked hunting roars boomed through the downpour. The enraged, mindless calls of dragons in the night. They sounded closer that night, as if the beasts reveled in the gloomy dark of the rain. Or maybe it only seemed worse because of what Shard planned to do.
“Let me strongly discourage this once more, my prince,” Stigr said over the wind, once they were far from the Dawn Spire.
“Stand by me,” Shard said as he had at the Wintermeet, and Stigr could only bow his head in the rain.
“Always.”
They took off, gliding at a mid-level above the earth toward the Outlands. The rain slid from Shard’s wings and he fluffed his feathers against the cold. No moonlight made it through the storm, but he wasn’t afraid. Stigr had taught him long ago how to walk and fly in the dark, his birthright as a Vanir. He knew that Sverin only feared the dark because of the dragons, the beasts his grandfather had brought down on them. Sverin and the Aesir believed their danger made the dark unholy and dangerous.
But Shard knew bright Tor guarded his back even from behind the clouds.
“I’ll make it right,” he muttered into the dark, talons closing. The wind answered him, blowing hard from starward and pelting him with rain.
An owl or bat shot overhead and in the wind, Shard heard his name.
It sounded like Kjorn’s voice. Shard?
“Kjorn?”
“What is it?” Stigr asked, startled. Shard worked his beak for a moment, staring up and around in the dark, wings working hard in the rain.
“Nothing. I thought…nothing.”
A familiar scent slivered through the rain—not dragon. Shard followed it, angled down and swept fast along the ground, calling out.
“Nitara! Hail, painted wolves, hail friends!”
Stigr followed, Shard’s shadow.
Skyfire raked the clouds and revealed the wolf pack sprinting through the rain. Shard picked out Nitara and landed, running hard beside her. She panted, flashing fangs at him. Thunder boomed and after it echoed a dragon roar, closer than Shard had ever heard.
“Why must we always meet in the rain, graywing?”
“Why do you hunt in the rain?” Shard asked, la
ughing. The wolves streamed around him, and he sensed Stigr at his side in the dark. A murky scent crawled through the night and Shard’s skin prickled.
“Why do you?” Nitara asked.
“I hunt dragons.”
She stopped and circled and Shard stopped quickly before he ran over her. Tendrils of skyfire lanced above, and a moment later the crack and roll of thunder. “Don’t be foolish.”
“I must.”
Nitara tossed her head, and looked to Stigr. “Your pup is mad! Take him home. Let him dry off.”
“I tried,” Stigr said in hollow voice. Shard laid his ears back.
“I’ve spoken to creatures before that others thought were witless.”
“It isn’t their wit that worries me,” Nitara said. “It is their hate. If they smell gryfon on the wind…”
“Then why haven’t they attacked the Dawn Spire? Why didn’t they follow Per?”
Nitara turned in a nervous circle with a whine, and lifted her nose to the air. There must have been a rotting carcass nearby, for the next rush of wind brought the smell of decay. “I don’t know. Perhaps they enjoy causing fear more than killing.”
“If they enjoy it,” Shard said, “then they can feel and think, and hear.”
Rain pounded. Shard flexed his talons, squishing them through the mud.
The thought struck all of them at once that it had been moments since they’d heard a dragon’s hunting roar.
A rotting scent filled the shifting wind, dead flesh and something metallic like sun-baked stone. The familiar scent of reptilian flesh.
Shard blinked as a slow, alien panic rose in his chest in reaction to the scent. Nitara’s eyes slid away from him, falling to an eerily blank expression.
“Shard,” Stigr said, dangerously soft. Shard watched Nitara.
“Nitara,” Shard whispered. The dogs milled and panicked whines filled the air.
Shard tried to hold Nitara’s gaze fear crowded out her strength and wisdom.
“Stay strong,” Shard urged, though sudden terror grasped his own chest. “It’s only a beast, only another creature, fight this!”