A Shard of Sun by Jess E. Owen Page B

to be. It hasn’t erupted in…well.” He faced them, raising his wings. “At least an Age. Not in the history I know of. Perhaps it is a sign.”
    “Of what?” Fraenir asked, ears perked.
    “Who knows. The world’s end, maybe.” He shrugged his wings, as if he were either prepared for such an event, or unconcerned about it. “Let’s move on. I can see His Highness is growing weary.”
    He strode forward, looped seaweed around his own chest, and tossed some to Fraenir. In that way, they dragged Kjorn across the ground. The thick ropes of seaweed cushioned Kjorn from the worst of it, though the gryfons didn’t take much care to avoid large rocks or uneven footing. Frida walked alongside to make sure Kjorn didn’t try to chew through the binds. When he tried to talk to her, to reason, she only huffed and looked away. It seemed a lot of work and trouble. Kjorn wondered what Rok thought he could gain.
    He ducked his head as they dragged him over a series of short, sharp rocks.

     
    They traveled windward along the coast and Kjorn lost track of the sunmark under the cold gray cover of rain. He tried to track his surroundings and how far they had gone, but much of it just rolled on in wind-swept cliff tops that reminded him of the Sun Isle.
    After a rest at one point near mid-day, Kjorn managed to roll to his other side and instead of the inland scenery, he watched the sea bump and drag by. Eventually the cliff top sloped down in a hill that graduated into a long, sandy shoreline.
    It was then that the painted wolf returned.
    Kjorn had nearly forgotten about him. Upon hearing the wolf’s greeting warble, Fraenir dropped his seaweed vine and flapped away to meet him. Kjorn wriggled, managing to prop up on his side, and watched with interest as the wolf and gryfon greeted like pride mates, or wingbrothers, pressing their shoulders together and laying their heads briefly on the other’s back.
    “Lazy oaf,” Rok snapped, stumbling forward against Kjorn’s dead weight. Kjorn took note of the fact that Rok couldn’t haul him on his own. He hadn’t had a chance to stand up next to Rok but suspected he was taller than the rogue, and heavier. If he could take leadership of the bedraggled band, it could be a great help. But it had to happen before they reached wherever they were going, before Rok traded off Kjorn to whoever he planned to meet.
    The elder Aesir back in the Silver Isles had reminded Kjorn of the borders, the different claims and boundaries. Once, they’d all been united under a single rule, a single bloodline of powerful kings that stretched back to the first gryfon to claim a kingship in the Second Age. Kjorn’s bloodline. But with Kajar’s quest came the madness of the dragons, the Dawn Spire splintered, and the clans broke away and returned to their own lands, under their own rule. Kjorn couldn’t count on a warm welcome anywhere, not even the Dawn Spire. Perhaps especially not the Dawn Spire. But if Shard had gone there, then Kjorn would too.
    As Rok, Fraenir and the wolf exchanged news, Frida watched over Kjorn. He sat still, thinking. If loyalties and schemes and tier-climbing and poachers infested the Winderost, then Rok thought he could take advantage of Kjorn’s tie to the Dawn Spire. As near to the coast as they were, Kjorn could think of only one place the poacher would be headed, and that was the Vanheim Shore.
    What kind of gryfons dwelled there, and what link or enmity they had with the Dawn Spire, Kjorn didn’t know. His father had left him nothing of his true birthright, no knowledge, no heritage. Only a false kingship in a conquered land. A creeping, hollow sense of insecurity carved its way into his chest when he realized that finding and reconciling with Shard would mean that Kjorn himself would have no true place in the Silver Isles.
    If we are friends, what then? I can’t still claim his land as my own.
    Rather than mire in a line of dark questions, Kjorn knew it would be wiser to