A Shard of Sun (8 page)

Then the rogue scoffed, and his tail switched back and forth. He lifted his beak to the wind, sniffing. “The usual. Nothing to concern yourself with.”

“What’s the usual?” Kjorn asked. “I’m trying to make a peace. We’ve never met, I’ve committed no crime against you.”

“Be quiet. I’ve had enough of your smug voice. Windbrother,” he called to the wolf, who stood and shook himself, padding over. “Watch our prince. I’m going to fish.”

“I will.”

Kjorn tried to catch Rok’s eye again but he turned away, shoved up, and glided out over the water. For a moment Kjorn watched him. Then he sighed, and let his gaze drift along the wet shoreline.

“Son-of-Sverin.”

Jolted by the address, Kjorn swiveled to stare at the wolf, eyes wide. He hadn’t seen him since the day they took him prisoner, and had barely heard him speak then. “You remembered my name?”

The wolf tilted his head, the strange whorls of white and brown like snow and mud across his flashy pelt. A black mask over his face gave him a shadowed, sinister look, but his eyes gleamed bright, aware, and knowing. “Yes. I remember everything now.”

Kjorn just watched him, wary, and waited for him to say more.

“The first day,” said the wolf. “The first day we found you. You said you were looking for Shard.”

Kjorn shifted, his blood quickening. “Yes.”

“You’re a friend of Shard?” the wolf asked. “The Star-sent, the wolf and lion brother?”

“Yes,” Kjorn said cautiously, thinking Shard had been busy indeed. “Though we’ve made mistakes against each other, he was my closest friend and my wingbrother. I’ve come to find him and make amends. I am a friend of Shard,” he confirmed again, since it was what the wolf had asked.

The wolf’s gaze flicked in the direction Frida and Fraenir had gone, then toward the water, where Rok was now a distant speck over the gray waves. Kjorn’s muscles bunched, ready for anything. The wolf stretched out on his belly so that his powerful jaws were a talon’s breadth from Kjorn’s throat.

“I am Makya, of the Serpent River pack.” Dark eyes considered Kjorn’s face. “I, too, am a friend of Shard, though I forgot myself for a time.”

“I’m honored,” Kjorn managed, smelling old meat on the wolf’s teeth. “How did you know Shard?”

“I watched as he faced down a great wyrm and tried to avenge the death of my leader and pack mate, Nitara. Then fear overcame me and I forgot myself, and I ran. But now I remember,” the wolf said quietly, “and I remember Shard, and I hope he survived.”

Kjorn shuddered at the mention of a great wyrm, recalling a nightmarish vision he’d had earlier that winter, and tried to picture Shard standing against such a foe. Cautiously he said, “Then we are friends, you and I.”

“Yes,” Mayka agreed, baring his teeth wider. “Now, you must do exactly as I say.”

He bent his head in, jaws opening to reveal long, sharp fangs. Kjorn flinched—then perked his ears as Makya set his teeth to the seaweed binds.

S
HARD AND
H
IKARU HUDDLED
under a sprawling pine, escaping the worst of the rain. It turned out that Hikaru couldn’t fly forever, though he’d done his best. It was Shard who had called a halt, when it was clear Hikaru might drop from the sky in exhaustion. Ash coated the air for leagues and leagues, though they’d flown for an entire quarter into the early afternoon. Shard caught a rabbit, and now they waited for Hikaru’s wings to stop aching, and the rain to slack.

“This is delicious,” the dragonet purred, again, crunching the last of the rabbit bones. Shard watched him, certain he needed five times the food. “Much better than dry fish, much better.” He sat back on his haunches, licking his front toes and claws clean.

Shard watched him in a weary, mesmerized daze. Everything about him was like watching water—liquid and graceful. Or fire. Shard remembered the sight of the dragon’s blood, steaming in the hot air, and how it had burned the murdering wyrm’s hide bright red.

Has he grown larger?
It seemed impossible.

“Thank you, Shard.” Hikaru dipped his head to bump against Shard’s wing.

“Of course.” Shard blinked to alertness, realizing he’d almost dozed. “And don’t worry. We’ll find much more food.” He didn’t know quite where, for the forest so far had only boasted small game, but if they both hunted they’d do better.

Hikaru’s eyes seemed to glow at him through the dim light, and Shard felt keenly, once again, that he did not deserve the young dragon’s admiration. “I’m not worried.”

Shard fluffed his wings and chuckled. “I’m glad one of us isn’t. Why don’t you take a little rest? I’ll wake you before long, and if you feel like pressing on, we’ll fly more.”

“Or walk,” Hikaru said, even as he rolled himself into a neat coil around Shard. He
had
grown larger. “If we really must keep moving, then I am happy to walk, and learn everything about the ground that you know.” He laid down his head and shut his eyes.

Shard sat within his coils and peered out into the gray. Under the large pine the ground was dusty, dry, and cool. Gray mud, tainted by volcanic ash, slithered in rivulets around the rest of the forest floor. They did need to keep moving, to stay ahead of the wyrms if they eventually tried to follow. Shard could not lead them to the Dawn Spire again. The land starward seemed barren and inhospitable. He would follow his instinct nightward, hope it was Tyr and Tor who led him, and teach Hikaru as quickly as he could.

“Shard?” the dragon murmured. Shard looked down, but Hikaru’s eyes were still closed.

“Yes,” Shard said, at first thinking the dragon only wanted to be assured Shard still sat within his coils.

“I don’t understand something.”

“Ask anything,” Shard said quietly.

A great sigh heaved the black-scaled ribs, but Hikaru’s eyes remained closed. “When you spoke of meeting my mother, you said she told you the Tale of the Red Kings, the tale of Kajar that you told to me.”

“Yes.” Shard cocked his head, listening to the forest for danger with one ear and Hikaru with the other.

“You said you didn’t understand why Kajar chose power over friendship, but then when my mother offered you the choice, you hesitated.”

“Yes…” Shard remembered the moment. He looked down.

Hikaru’s eyes were open now, watching him. “Why?”

Shard pressed his talons to the earth, then sat back and raised them to gently stroke Hikaru’s wing. “That’s a very good question. I think it sounded easy when it was happening to someone else. We think we know what we’ll do in any challenge. But then when it happens…” Shard recalled multiple times he’d made decisions that may or may not have been the right decisions. Speaking to the wyrms. Lying to his wingbrother.

Releasing Sverin and diving into the sea.

Hikaru’s whole body reverberated with a warm, rolling sound that mimicked a gryfon’s purr as Shard combed talons through his feathers, but his gaze was intent on Shard’s face, waiting for a better answer.

“When something like that happens,” Shard said, “you realize it’s harder to make the choice than you thought it would be. You realize all the things that could go wrong, you realize how your choice will affect other things.”

Hikaru shifted, his gaze flitting out toward the rain. “You thought she might deceive you.”

“Yes. In the moment she challenged me, I doubted everything. But I decided to trust her.”

Hikaru raised his head so quickly that Shard jumped. He loomed over Shard, his whiskers twitching, testing the air. “I’m glad you did.”

Shard chuckled, resettling his feathers. “So am I.”

Hikaru’s lips pulled back in fanged amusement like a wolf, then he dipped his head low, looking worried. “Shard. What are we? That is, I know that I am Amaratsu’s son, but you were the one I saw when I hatched. What are we?”

Shard shifted, lowering his talons to the earth. Rain pattered on the boughs above, only a few drops slipped through to hit the ground, or their backs. “You and I?” Hikaru’s head bobbed once in a nod. “Well, it wouldn’t really do to call you my nest-son, although that’s what gryfons do. In few months you’ll be able to pick me up off the ground with one paw!”

Hikaru laughed, then the concerned expression returned.

Shard let his laughter fade. “You and I,” he said firmly, “are brothers.”

“Brothers,” Hikaru said. Pleased with the word, he laid his head down again and for all Shard could tell, surrendered to sleep, satisfied with his new answers.

Shard remained awake in the dragonet’s black coils, staring out into the rain, listening for the sound of anything, anyone, who might wish them harm.

Freed from the mountain and his primary concern of escape, his thoughts delved toward difficult things, friends he’d left behind, the choices he’d made that were wrong. He wondered what had happened to Brynja, the huntress to whom he’d offered his heart. He could see her face, bright as morning, with fierce eyes and freckles of vermillion on the pale feathers under her eyes. Sometimes, she fluffed with laughter at his wit or her wingsister’s antics before returning to quiet dignity again. Vividly Shard recalled her voice, the night he had tried to pledge to her, to offer her everything he had if she would stay by his side until the end of their days. He also recalled her voice, regretful, saying it couldn’t be. She had duties, and she was promised, like a rabbit pelt in a trade, to another.

But she had also spoken of caring for him.

I’ve fought for my family, for my islands, for my friends. I will fight for her, if I must.

He drew his talons through the pine needles, knowing that wouldn’t be easy, for the gryfon who was promised to Brynja was also a friend. Asvander, First Sentinel of the Dawn Spire.

He wondered what had become of all of them—the gryfons who’d aided him and Stigr, who’d offered even to betray their own king—Valdis, Asvander, Dagny.

And Stigr. Shard closed his eyes for a moment, seeing it again. For one brief moment, his uncle laughing, triumphant in battle, then felled by the brown wyrm. His wing, sliced clean from his shoulder. They’d called healers.

Shard opened his eyes, curling his talons into the pine needles.

If they’d called healers, there was a dim, distant chance that his uncle was alive. That would be reason enough to return to the Dawn Spire. When the time was right. Shard looked down at Hikaru’s peaceful face.

For the moment, he had other responsibilities, and Stigr would not want him to shirk a promise he’d made.

For three days they traveled through the expanse of forest nightward of the Horn of Midragur. Alone, Shard would have covered twice the distance—but they went at Hikaru’s pace. The young dragon flew valiantly during the day, sometimes as long as three marks of the sun before he tired or grew ravenously hungry. During the day, they flew and hunted. Shard knew the dragons of the Winderost hated the sun, or were shamed by Tyr, and wouldn’t travel during the day. At night, he and the young dragon walked as far as they could before their muscles gave out and they slept until dawn.

Shard taught him the basic hunting that he knew, though he sensed that Sunland dragons, like Vanir, were built better for fishing. They found a single deer on their trek, ran it down and killed it. Shard taught Hikaru to honor any creature he killed, whether for food, or in battle.

“Do you think I will ever see a battle?” Hikaru consumed most of the deer before a mark of the sun had passed.

“I hope not.” Shard ate his fill and was amazed at the dragon’s appetite. His body from shoulder to rump had grown to twice the length of a gryfon, and his neck and tail stretched well beyond that. His whiskers drooped handsomely from his snout and the budding horns between his ears shone silver in sunlight.

They sat in a sunny clearing ringed by towering cedars. The forest—Shard recalled an eagle of the Winderost mentioning the Forest of Rains—boasted dense ferns, crawling greenery and bright songbirds. Shard smelled a fox trail here and there, but no wolves, no gryfons or other large predators. No wyrms.

After appearing to think about Shard’s answer, Hikaru asked, “Why not? They seem exciting.”

“Some creatures like to fight, and they’re good at fighting.” Shard thought of his rival, Halvden, who before Shard’s self-exile had become a deadly foe. “Some think it’s better to do everything possible to avoid a fight.”

“What do you think, Shard?”

The weight of Shard’s answer sat heavy in his chest, for by Hikaru’s bright gaze, he knew that whatever he answered could become Hikaru’s answer too.

“I think it’s important not to fight for the sake of fighting.”

Hikaru bobbed his head, as if that made sense. “Because you could be hurt.”

“Yes. Or you could hurt another, and that’s another kind of pain.”

“Then,” Hikaru began slowly, “if you don’t fight for the sake of fighting, what do you fight for?”

The question was so innocent, yet so wise, Shard laughed, then butted his head against Hikaru’s shoulder. The sunlight of the clearing felt good after the dark cave and the cold rain, the dense trees like a green cavern over their heads. “That’s a good question, and no one has the truest answer.”