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realized, he knew, that he’d been planning to go ever since he learned that Sverin had flown, mad and Nameless, away from the pride.
    She reached up to run talons gently over his mending wing. “Be cautious.” Her voice rose in pitch, trying too hard to sound light. “I won’t have my good work go to waste. I would hate to have to break your wing again.”
    Caj laughed weakly and began to lift his wing, then thought better of it. “As would I.”
    Before, when they’d all thought him killed by a boar, Caj’s wing had started to fuse wrong. To force it to heal correctly, Sigrun had to break it again. He would still fly again, but only if he let her splints do their work.
    “I’ll stay,” she murmured. “But please, if it comes to a choice between danger and safety, between risk and caution—”
    “Between him, and you?” Caj offered, glancing at her sidelong. Twilight dimmed the day. It would take Caj most of the night to walk, through the tunnels underneath the islands, to the next isle where he could search. It was time to get moving. “Only think what you would do in my place, and try to understand.”
    Sigrun looked away. She had chosen her wingsister over him, once. Surely she couldn’t begrudge him this quest to find and save his wingbrother. She slipped her head under his chin and Caj nuzzled down, aware of wolf eyes on them, and the laughing calls of ravens in the distance.
    “Just return to me,” she whispered. “I lost you once—”
    “I’ll return,” he promised, and savored another moment close to her before drawing away, letting the cold come between them, and walking away.

~ 5 ~
Earthfire
     
    S HARD PRESSED HIS EAR against the crystal and closed his eyes, listening for the faintest scratch or rumble. Hikaru, sitting behind him, peered through the ceiling of their chamber. Already his senses grew sharper than Shard’s own, and Shard relied on his hearing.
    “I think they’re asleep,” Hikaru murmured, his tail sweeping slowly across the ground. He lowered himself to a crouch on all fours, pressing his paws against the earth. “Does the ground feel warm to you, Shard?”
    “It’s from you, I think,” Shard said quietly, pulling back from the wall. Hikaru shed warmth like a fire, and the ground had warmed steadily under their feet for the last few days. The other possibility, that the volcano was waking, wouldn’t matter once they fled the mountain.
    “I don’t think so,” Hikaru said. “I think it’s something else. You said that volcanoes sometimes make earthquakes.”
    The short feathers between Shard’s wings stood on end like wolf hackles, as if skyfire crackled near.
    Nerves, he thought.
    “It won’t matter in a few moments.” Shard crept to their tunnel and began drawing out the dirt as quietly as he could. “We’ll be out of here soon.”
    “You’re sure we shouldn’t leave at night, while they’re gone hunting?”
    “No. The moment they realize we’re gone, they’ll hunt us all night. In the day, they won’t follow. We’ll have a head start.”
    Shard slipped his talons down through the loose dirt, and dug it back out. They’d tunneled through to the other side of the crystal wall and refilled the dirt each day so the dragons wouldn’t suspect their plan. The last of their fish was gone. With Hikaru shedding heat, the air dried up and they needed water. Even if Shard had wanted to wait another day, they couldn’t risk losing more strength to hunger and thirst.
    “Only in the stillness the wind,” Hikaru was murmuring, eyes closed, “only from ice the flame.”
    “Are you ready?” Shard asked as he pulled dirt from the tunnel. “We’ll have to be swift.”
    Quietly Hikaru answered, “I’m ready.” Hikaru’s claws clicked together. A new habit, a nervous habit of threading his digits together and wringing his paws. “Shard?”
    Shard paused at the note of fear in his voice, and wriggled back out of the tunnel to meet his gaze.
    “What is