With a gay shriek, the coppery mare twisted free of him, and halted stiff-legged, panting. Jan wheeled and also plunged to a halt, breathing heavily. His companion stood looking at him with her bright, brown eyes. She laughed again, pawing at the sand with one round, solid hoof, swished her long-haired, silky tail against one flank, her beardless chin held up impertinently. How like and yet unlike a unicorn she was!

Laughing, he shouldered against her. She nipped him lightly, a playful champ—then started back with a cry of alarm as the shadow of some winged thing in the air above fleeted over them. Jan, too, looked up, then wheeled and stared. A blue-pinioned shape was diving toward them out of the cloudless morning sky.

“Get behind me, Ryhenna!” the prince of the unicorns cried, dodging in front of the hornless mare.

Above them, the winged figure banked suddenly, rearing back. Its elongated pinions stroked the air as it touched down with a spindle-shanked, gangling grace on the golden sand. Jan stared. Though all over dusty blue—the color of a gryphon formel—the creature before them was much smaller than a wingcat.

It stood upright on two lanky, coral legs. Its slender neck crooked, head tilting from side to side, examining him and Ryhenna first with one salmon-colored eye, and then with the other. Fanning its rosy crest, the figure before them trilled happily, a hollow cooing from deep in its throat. Red chevrons beneath its pinions flashed as it folded wing. Ryhenna crowded against Jan, her voice hushed, terrified.

“What is it, my lord?” she whispered. “Is it a gryphon?”

Jan whickered with relief. “Nay,” he cried, euphoria filling him. “No enemy, but a friend. Greetings, Tlat, queen of the seaherons. Well met!”

The queen of the wide-roving windriders nodded, mincing toward them across the sand. “Greetings!” she shrieked. “Greetings, Jan-prince! Welcome, welcome. We feared cat-eagles had seized you. We feared you lost!”

Jan fought the impulse to rush forward and rub shoulders with Tlat as he would with one of his own people. The delicate herons, he knew, were ever wary of being knocked down or trampled by the heavy hooves of unicorns. The young prince restrained himself, keeping his heels planted and still.

“Not lost,” he assured Tlat. “Not seized by gryphons—though I was pursued by them. A terrible storm swept me out to sea. It has taken me all this time to find my way back.”

“Ah!” cried the heron queen. “So the cat-eagle spoke truth after all. We thought he lied to save himself. But who is your companion? What is this odd, hornless one that stands beside you?”

Jan blinked, lost for a moment. The darting thoughts of herons shifted like the winds. Tlat stood craning and eyeing Ryhenna. Jan moved aside to allow her a better view. The coppery mare shifted nervously as the other approached, stabbing her bill into the air and fluttering her folded wings with growing excitement.

“Color of sunsets! Color of burning!” the heron queen exclaimed. “Such a hue among unicorns we have never seen. And round feet—not pairs of half-moon toes, but only single ones: solid as a mussel shell, round as the ripe egg of the moon. Amazing! Where is your beard, burning-colored mare? Where is your horn?”

Ryhenna seemed disconcerted, at a loss for words. “I…I am no unicorn, as my lord Moonbrow is,” she managed. “I am only a da from the City of…of Two-foots, far to the west.”

“Two-foots? Two-foots?” cackled Tlat. “My tribe know something of these. They glide the waves in great hollowed-out treefish. Sometimes we see their windwings on our journeys, but we veer clear lest they hurl their hunting sticks at us. They eat our kind and steal our feathers. They are our enemies, as the cat-eagles are! If you have shared nest with our enemies, non-unicorn mare, then you, too, must be our enemy! Be off!”

The heron queen’s agitation grew even as she spoke. Her crest fanned in anger, not welcome, now. Bill cocked, she danced grimly before Ryhenna, ready to fly at her. Hastily, Jan stepped between.

“Peace, great queen of the windriders,” he soothed. “Ryhenna’s people are prisoners of the two-foots, as was I this winter past. When spring arrived, she aided my escape. Now we are grateful to have come once more among our fast allies, the noble herons, instead of among our common enemies, the two-foots or the gryphons.”

“Ah!” clucked Tlat, ruffling. “Ah! I see. My apologies, fiery colored mare. I spoke in haste. Prisoners! Yes. Did the two-foots steal your horn?”

Ryhenna cast about her helplessly. The other’s brash manner had clearly unnerved her. Quickly, Jan addressed the heron queen.

“The two-foots’ captives grow no horns,” he began, but Tlat’s raucous cries interrupted him.

“No horns? How misfortunate—useless! Crippled. Like a broken wing! My commiserations, imperfect mare.”

The dark prince saw his companion’s face fall, her frame droop. She seemed utterly crushed at the heron queen’s screeches of sympathy. He drew breath.

“Indeed it is a great pity, but it cannot be helped. But tell me, Tlat, what has passed since the storm separated me from my band this autumn past. Has word reached you of how the unicorns fare?”

The heron queen bobbed, her gaze turning once more to Jan. “No word,” she cried. “Badly, we fear. Winter here was harsh. Too stormy to risk flying far from our cliffs. Many deaths. Our Mother-the-Sea did not yield much fish. Much courting this spring, though! Each hen has chosen her mates and begun to lay. Soon a great hatching will follow: a great squeaking and crying from the squabs just pipped from their shells. Then will the flock of the herons be renewed! Then will we forget the deaths and sorrows of this winter past.”

Her words sent a chill through Jan.

“But no word from the Vale?” he asked. “You do not know for certain how my own people fared?”

Tlat wagged her head, beginning to dance again, her tone dolorous. “No word. Though the winds have moderated since equinox, we have been too busy replenishing our lost numbers to think of travel. We fear your people wintered as poorly as did we, but we have sent no envoys to inquire. Scouting for cat-eagles and fishing to feed my mates, I spotted you upon the strand. Great will be the rejoicing among the herons when I bring word of your return!”

Her words, shrieked and croaked in heron fashion, warmed Jan.

“I am grateful, great Tlat, for the ardor of your welcome. Truly the far-ranging herons are the invaluable allies of the unicorns. May your consorts be many and your nests bountiful. I would stay longer, enjoying your company, but I dare not. I must return to my people. Already I have been absent too long.”

Tlat started with a cry, flapping her wings. Ryhenna half shied. “Too long! Yes! I, too, have been gone a great while. My mates hunger, their warmth dwindling. Each now sits his nest, incubating one of my rosy eggs. Soon the hatchlings will pip! I must return. Having fished, my crop is full. But first, come. You must not depart our shores until I show you the thing we have been keeping all winter. It put us to great trouble, but we persevered out of loyalty to our allies, the unicorns. We knew that you would want us to. I had planned to send fliers to your Vale soon to alert your people of its presence upon our shores. The cat-eagle we captured. One of those who attacked you this autumn past.”

Now it was Jan’s turn to half shy in surprise. Captured a gryphon—one of the raiders that had harried him and his fellows upon the strand more than a half year gone? He marveled the gracile seaherons had managed to capture such a formidable enemy, much less hold it prisoner for over half a year. But before he could so much as draw breath to question Tlat, the heron queen had spread her wings to the stiff sea breeze and risen into the air. In another moment, she was out of earshot. Earthbound below, Jan and Ryhenna could only follow.