A Shard of Sun (10 page)

S
NOW BLINDED
C
AJ AS
he dragged himself across the frozen peat fields of Crow Wing. Named for its shape from above, the isle actually had very few crows that Caj had seen. Rather, the scent of wild horses wafted with every breath, and their round, sliced tracks stamped the snow in every direction. The packed snow made for slick walking, but it was easier than wading through chest-high drifts, so against his better judgment, he followed the horse trails.

His wing ached. His muscles protested in sharp twitches and melted snow soaked the fine feathers of his face. He needed the warm down and long winter feathers of a Vanir for this kind of expedition—but he didn’t have that. Only his will. Only his need to find and redeem his brother.

“Sverin!” He ducked his head against a blast of wind that rattled his core. Snow stung like tiny stones. He thought of Sigrun and Thyra, cuddled up in their family den to wait out the blizzard.

Curse you, Sverin. Or curse me.

But he’d found the red feathers. His first day exploring the open, nearly featureless isle, and he’d found feathers near a pile of snow-covered boulders, where his once-king had obviously found shelter. To his relief, he’d found no green feathers—though perhaps Halvden knew to carry his away to avoid being tracked, if he’d dropped any at all. If so, Caj reasoned, he would’ve picked up Sverin’s as well. Or not. He could never tell if he gave the arrogant young warrior too much credit, or too little. A spasm shot through his wing.

Too little,
he though ruefully. A growl built in his throat as he shoved forward against the wind and snow. The next rush of wind drew the breath from him in a gasp.

Time to shelter out the storm.

Caj paused, waiting for the wind to calm before he peered around. A gray mass stood out in the dimness of the snow, and he trudged toward it. Rock, tree, giant drift—it didn’t truly matter, as long as it blocked the wind.

The scent assaulted him in the same instant he realized what the shape was.

“All winds,” he breathed, staggering forward, ears lifted. At the top of a short rise, the mangled remains of a pony yearling marred the snow. Its short, fluffy mane ruffled with every shift of the wind, giving it the illusion of life. Caj climbed the rise and looked down at the carcass. Normally his appetite gnawed at the sight of a kill, but not since the vow. He and the others had vowed, before Ragna, Tyr, and each other, to take no more red meat from the land of the Silver Isles, unless it was for special reason with the wolves’ blessing, and unless they properly honored the animal they killed. There were only two who had not taken that vow.

Caj opened his good wing, his stomach roiling not in hunger but an eerie nausea he’d never felt before at the sight of a dead creature of prey.

Did this young hoof beast have a name? Awareness? Fear?

Surely, fear. Long talon marks slashing the hide gave no doubt as to the breed of killer, and Caj knew of only one who would hunt on the Crow Wing Isle.

“Oh, my king,” he murmured. If Sverin was still mad, still Nameless, of course he would be hunting on land. Of course he would have no awareness that their sun had set, the tide turned on the Aesir and what was once the only acceptable hunting was now forbidden by conscience and by law. The creatures of the Silver Isles already hated them. Caj feared what more damage this might do.

A strange drumming, a warm, thundering sound lifted his hackles. Yes, the yearling had a name—and a family.

Slowly Caj turned, his good wing still open but in a gesture that he hoped looked peaceful, as a dark line of horses pounded toward him through the storm. His instinct roared at him to ramp up, to flare, to challenge, to intimidate the ground-pounding foe.

Try my ways,
Sigrun had asked of him after he took the vow.
Try our ways. I have tried yours.
There can be balance yet.

The indistinct line became individual beasts, flashing all different colors—gray, dun, red, splashes of black and spots, all coats shaggy and soft for winter. They broke into two lines and drummed in opposing rings around Caj, trumpeting challenges, tossing their heads. Their eyes rolled to reveal white rings when they caught a whiff of the blood of their fallen yearling.

Caj realized he looked challenging, not welcoming, and closed his wing. For a moment he stood very still, only breathing, noting with relief that their warlike dance at least blocked the wind from him for a few moments. They spoke a different tongue, a guttural, whickering, whistling language. Caj closed his eyes, listening to the throbbing of their hooves on the packed, frozen earth.

Then he bellowed from the earthy part of his heart, in a language he knew they would hear. “I come here peacefully!” He crouched back, lifting his talons to show they were clean. “I didn’t kill this young one!”

A mare nickered her disbelief, and all of their anger washed over Caj in waves. He shuddered, mantling his good wing as if he could block it. “Hear me! I seek out the one who did this, to bring him to justice.”

“
Lies!
” screamed a plump, spotted mare, whose coat matched the dead colt at his feet. “You killed my son! Poacher, thief, blasphemy under the eye of Tor!”

Caj lunged aside as the hysterical mare broke the ring and charged him. He whirled, ready to dodge again, but she shied at the sight of her own dead son, then her knees buckled and she bowed before the carcass, whinnying grief toward the earth.

“I will find the one who did this,” Caj said, raising his voice again over the thunder of the hoof beats. “If you can tell me if you’ve seen him. Him, with feathers like blood, or a younger, with feathers like spring grass—”

“No.” Another broke from the ring, a tall, well-muscled stallion that Caj judged to be middle years for a hoof beast. At his word, the horses began to slow, and turned inward, forming a dangerous wall of hooves and teeth. He tossed his pale head. “You are not welcome here. Not welcome to hunt, not welcome to walk, to fly, or to speak.” He stamped a hoof.

Caj curled his talons against the snow, savoring the feel of them breaking through the frozen pack.

A mare, older and the color of mountain stone, joined the stallion. To her, all the others bowed their heads.

So, Caj did too.

Her voice sounded like wind in a pine bough, high and breathy. “The Red Scourge has done enough here and on every other isle. You are not welcome.”

“I am friend to the Vanir,” Caj began, and the mare flipped her forelock out of her eyes in what he could only think was an expression of disdain.

“The Vanir are weak for allowing you here, and they are not welcome either. I will grant you this chance to leave and to never return.”

“Honorable…friends. I…” He swallowed hard against a lifetime of knowing a certain way of things, and a lifetime of pride. “Allow me to search this island. I’ll rid you of the…the Red Scourge. I am friend to Vanir, and to you. To the Silver Isles. I am Caj, son-of-Cai. Honor me with your name.”

“So humble!” trumpeted the mare, and her male consort nickered. A rustle of stamps and tail flicks indicated the herd’s agreement. Black, large, cold eyes focused on him, a ring of contempt. “So humble, when you cannot fly—yes, I see the mud cast on your wing. I hear from the birds that the son of Lapu would have killed you, if not for the mercy of wolves. So humble, when you have nowhere to run, Caj, son-of-Cai. So humble, when you have no friends.”

“I wouldn’t run from you.” Anger ate away at his calm. He smothered it.
What did I expect? They would fall to my feet and make peace?
At least he had tried. Perhaps he should’ve brought Sigrun after all. But these hard-headed beasts didn’t seem to hold the Vanir in high regard, either.

“A proud and bragging poacher from the Sun Isle,” said the mare. “If you will not leave, and you will not run, then you will die fighting. We don’t need your help ridding our isle of the Red Scourge. We don’t fear him, and we don’t fear you.”

“My lady—”

She ramped, hooves flashing, and three half grown stallions whinnied their approval, broke from the ring, and charged Caj.

“I offered friendship!” he bellowed. “I offered peace!”

“We refuse,” shouted one of the half-growns, surging into a hard gallop. Caj judged distance, the horse’s height, and if he could make the leap and take his throat.

He crouched, muscles tight and ready, tensed—then thought of Sigrun’s face if she heard he’d killed an island horse.

With a grunt he rolled aside as the stallion trampled past. The second stallion, dusty gray, pivoted and charged Caj’s new position. The lead mare encouraged them, promising them glory and honor for a lifetime if they killed an Aesir conqueror.

Caj held his ground, breath short, and when the gray’s hooves touched down close enough, he shoved himself straight up, wings closed. He slapped a forefoot against the gray’s back, talons flat to leave no injury, his hind paws hit and he launched himself off the horse’s back toward the third attacker.

That one had less stomach for a full-grown gryfon warrior flying at him, broken wing or no. He shied away and instead of landing on a running horse’s back, Caj hit the snow and rolled. He groaned as pain shot up three different ways across his wing. No time for that. He spun and flung out his good wing, hissing warning at the three young stallions, who minced uncertainly, tails whisking, heads bobbing in challenge.

“I thought you wanted to kill an Aesir today!” Caj slashed his tail through the air. At his back and all around, the double ring of the giant herd hit their hooves against the snow to encourage the stallions. “Well? Shall we have words, instead?”

For a moment, Caj thought they were ready to speak, thought they acknowledged that he could have killed the young male horse, and hadn’t.

Then the wind stirred the scent of the dead colt.

“Never,” said the queen mare from afield. Her voice imbued the stallions with new vigor. They exchanged glances and murmurs, then split, readying a triad attack. Caj waited, but they did not charge. A silence that sounded strange after all the shouting and drumming settled over the herd, and they all held still. Caj did too. They were prey beasts, their senses heightened. They’d heard or smelled something he hadn’t.

Then, he did.

And he never, in life up to that day, had been more glad to hear the low, long howl of a wolf in the distance.

“Don’t panic,” commanded the queen mare. Her consort left the ring and butted his head against the others, giving them confidence, encouraging them with his powerful height and his strength.

Caj couldn’t think of a single wolf in the Isles who would be stupid enough to charge a herd of horses in search of a meal, when deer were more easily gotten on the Star Isle, and the Vanir offered shares of their fish. Unless the wolf was not there for meat. Unless it had come for some higher purpose, some duty beyond instinct.

Unless Sigrun, in her worry, had sent someone after him.

Caj strained to hear the calls of more wolves, but heard only the one, and his relief soured. One wolf. One wolf against a vengeful herd of warrior horses. He watched though, amazed that they reacted as if it was a giant pack. Eyes rolled. Muscles twitched to flee. The next low howl sent three yearlings thundering away into the blizzard. They caught a scent and more fled, leaving an open space through which the wolf could enter.

And he did, appearing out of the snow and springing through the broken ring lithely as a fox.

His long, almost mocking howl sent another shiver through the herd, though Caj admired the queen mare for standing her ground, then stepping forward.

“This is no affair of yours,” she told the wolf. “Go back to your island.”

“Proud fools,” sang the wolf, a young male.

Caj tried and failed to remember where he’d seen him before, or if he just looked familiar because most wolves looked the same to Caj. His pale, golden coat repelled the snow as he padded up to the queen, who, lock-legged, met his friendly bow with a curt jerk of her head.

“Do you not know the nest-father of Rashard, prince of the Sun Isle?” The wolf stared around the ring. “Do you not know Noble Caj the Just, friend to Vanir, to wolves, nest-father of Shard, the Summer King?”

Don’t overdo it,
Caj thought, watching the mare’s dark eyes.

She looked unimpressed. “I know poachers,” she declared. “Murderers, thieves—”

“Harm him,” snarled the wolf in a different tone, “and I will name you an oath breaker.”

Caj’s talons clenched unconsciously against the snow, and probably would always clench at the sound of a wolf growl. But he didn’t interrupt.

The mare shifted, tail whisking uncertainly against her flank. “Of what oath do you speak?”

“Your allegiance to the caribou Aodh of the Sun Isle, your dam’s and her dam’s vows to Aodh’s father, and him, and his sons to always stand where the cloven-hoofed stand when needed, as one herd.”

She tossed her forelock out of her eyes, and the certainty slipped from her voice. “What do you know of our oaths?”

The wolf bared his fangs as if amused, but Caj thought it was not entirely on accident that this put the mare further on edge. “I know everything.”

“I have not heard from Aodh since the Conquering. I know not where he stands.”

“He stands with the Summer King.”

This sent a flurry of disbelief, head-shaking, and hoof-stamping through the herd. “Ask the wind, ask the birds,” said the young wolf, “if you think I have a reason to lie to you. But until you know for sure, I would not kill this warrior. He’s here to help you.”

The mare snorted steam. The blizzard began to wear itself out, and instead of wind, only heavy, fat flakes of snow fell around them. The mare considered Caj, then the wolf, and Caj heard her teeth grinding.

“Very well. You have our leave to stay. But you will hunt no game on this island, and you will leave if it’s clear your Red Scourge is no longer here.”