A Pride of Gryphons

by Kristen S. Walker

He tapped his fingers on the desk, counting off the counter arguments. “We’d be gone from the city for several days, and there’s a lot going on to prepare for the second half of the year. Kyratia’s citizens may like us as fighters for the moment, but our neighbors are suspicious, and this would give them more reasons to doubt our peaceful intentions.” He sighed heavily. “And on a personal note, I’d have to go spend time with my brother. We’ve barely spoken since our fight months ago. I don’t look forward to an awkward encounter with him in a narrow valley with an audience of two hundred and fifty other riders who used to follow my command.”

  She got up from her chair and slipped into his lap, putting her arms around his neck. “Don’t worry about it so much,” she said in a soothing voice. “You said that you wanted him to learn how to run the company by himself, and by reports, he’s stepping up and doing more with Navera’s help instead of consulting you. He’s probably forgotten about the fight by now—Varranor tends to fly off the handle in the heat of the moment, but he doesn’t hold grudges for months on end.”

  He put an arm around her waist, but resisted pulling her any closer to avoid getting distracted by her touch. They needed to talk this problem all the way through. “Grudge or not, it won’t be easy for me to talk to him.”

  “Then why not do it at the cloudfruit harvest when he’ll be in a good mood?” Korinna had only been once, last year when she caught Sungold, but that was enough for her to know how the other riders treated it as a celebration. “And we deserve a little trip away from the city to take a break from all of this work. Even the best ruler takes a vacation now and again.”

  Galenos tapped his chin as if he were considering the idea. “There are vacations that would have a less damaging effect on my reputation. I’ve heard that some dukes put up their mistresses in nice country estates, then go visit them when they need some rest and recreation.”

  Her eyes narrowed at the reference to her father’s lifestyle, glaring at him, but then she laughed and punched him in the shoulder. “Oh, you silly fool.” She pressed against his chest and whispered in his ear. “Even if you wanted a mistress, you wouldn’t have the time or energy to keep one. You barely have time for me.”

  He laughed too, but pushed her gently back. “Come, now, we’re supposed to be working.” He cleared his throat. “So you think we should go to the harvest?”

  She straightened up and nodded. “Yes. No one else will bring fruit back for us if we don’t go, after all, and we still have a responsibility to Nightshade and Sungold even if we don’t fight with them anymore. Besides, it would be so nice to see everyone. You may not want to be around your brother, but surely you had other friends in the company that you’d like to see again.”

  He paused, considering her casual question. He didn’t know if he could call them friends—there were officers he’d trusted and relied on for advice, especially Navera, but he’d never confided in anyone else on a personal level besides Varranor. But when he thought about being at the harvest, sitting around the campfire and singing with the other riders, he found that part of him did long to be there again. It would be strange to think of all of them being there without him and he staying behind in the city—then he’d truly be cut off from his old life.

  “You’re right, I do want to go,” he said at last. He smiled at her and shook his head ruefully. “And maybe it’s selfish to think of what I want instead of what we need to do here, but perhaps we could afford to leave for a few days. But who do we leave in charge while we’re gone?”

  She squealed and tightened her arms around his neck again. “Oh, I’m so excited! I can’t wait to go.” She leaned across him and snatched a paper off of her desk. “I already spoke to Diokles, and he’s willing to act as our deputy during the trip. He won’t make any major decisions while we’re gone, just keep the place running until we get back, and he knows enough about what we want that it should be no problem for him.”

  He looked down at the paper she handed him and read a proposed agreement for ruling the city in the duke’s absence. Sure enough, it was already signed by Diokles, and was just waiting for Galenos’s signature to make it official. He frowned at the thought that she’d arranged all of this before he’d even agreed to go, but perhaps he hadn’t been giving her enough to do and she was taking the initiative to find her own work. He made a mental note to add more tasks to Korinna’s agenda when they came back before she started meddling in other things without his knowledge.

  He glanced up and saw her watching him anxiously for his reaction. He relaxed into a smile. “Very good,” he said. He reached around her to the desk and picked up his pen, signing the agreement with a flourish. “Now that that’s taken care of, perhaps we can take a little break right now.”

  His arms tightened around her waist and he stood up from the chair, drawing her to him in the same movement. He crossed the room in a few steps, pausing only long enough to fumble with the lock on the door, and then laid her down gently on the rug. She reached up and kissed him, drawing him down to join her.

  He had a passing thought in the back of his mind that it could be useful to bring some more furniture into their office. He hadn’t bothered to decorate it beyond the desks they needed, cabinets to hold their spare files, and a bookshelf, but there was still room for a few luxuries. A couch would be welcome right now. He was always careful when he touched his wife, hyperaware of his greater size and strength, restraining himself to the gentlest of touches to keep from hurting her.

  But a few minutes later, it was obvious that Korinna didn’t mind being on the floor at all, and the thought was lost again.

  Korinna II

  Korinna ripped apart her chest of old riding clothes and rider gear, tossing things over her shoulders without caring where they landed. “They have to be here somewhere,” she grumbled, mostly to herself. “Saddlebags don’t just get up and walk away on their own.”

  Aristia hovered nearby, holding an armful of bits of leather and straining to look into the chest. “I swear I always put everything back when you’re done, m’lady,” she said, her voice quavering.

  Korinna sat back on her haunches with a sigh. “I know, dear, it’s not your fault.” She brushed a strand of hair out of her eyes and looked around the bedroom, now a chaotic mess with piles of clothes everywhere. “The trouble is, I haven’t needed the saddlebags since—well, since I moved in here. Now I can’t remember where I stashed them.”

  She needed some sort of bag to pack her clothes in for the cloudfruit harvest trip. She had been worried that Galenos wouldn’t agree to go for some reason, but now they were finally getting ready to leave the very next morning. Since they were flying the whole way, she could only bring what Sungold could carry, and it wasn’t like she could strap a chest of clothes to the marewing’s back and ride her at the same time. Of course, she could always go buy new saddlebags or borrow them from Galenos—he was probably one of those over-prepared people who had doubles and triples of everything—but she knew that she had a pair of her own and they were stored in her bedroom. It was incredibly frustrating that she couldn’t find them now.

  Aristia turned toward the wardrobe which held Korinna’s nicer clothes. “Do you want me to check in the bottom of there again?”

  She shook her head. “No, we already checked, and I wouldn’t have put them in there in the first place. The oil on the leather stains all of the good dresses.” She scanned the room again. “There has to be someplace we haven’t checked yet. It’s always the last place you look, right?” She laughed weakly. “Oh, and you can put that down anywhere, it doesn’t matter now. We’ll have to sort it all out again to put it away when we’re done.”

  The girl placed her burden of leather straps and buckles in a neat pile next to some of the other riding tack and straightened up. She cocked her good ear back toward Korinna. “Do you want me to get my mother to come help us? She might have an idea that we haven’t thought of yet.”

  Korinna rubbed her eyes. �
�No, you know my room better than anyone else, and if neither of us can find them, then I can only assume that they’re not here after all. Maybe I just imagined that I kept my saddlebags.”

  Egina and her older daughter were usually preoccupied with other household duties, so Aristia was learning to be Korinna’s handmaid—a new arrangement for both of them, because Korinna had never had a personal maid any more than Aristia had served another lady. But she appreciated what help the girl could give her and didn’t mind her little quirks, like her limited hearing.

  Then her wandering eye fell on several shadowy lumps under the bed. “Aha!” Korinna cried out, crawling across the floor and reaching underneath. She reemerged holding two dusty but very real saddlebags. “I’m not imagining things! They were under here the whole time.”

  Aristia bent down and saw the dust bunnies collected underneath the bed. She gasped, clapping a hand over her mouth. “Ma said I was s’posed to clean under there, but I never saw the sense in it, so I didn’t know.” She dipped into a shaky curtsy. “I’m so sorry, m’lady.”

  Korinna brushed the worst of the dust off the saddlebags and waved a hand to make Aristia rise. “Oh, don’t worry about it. My mother used to scold me for not cleaning under my bed, too, but I obviously didn’t learn my lesson.” She winked at the girl. “The important thing is, we have them, so we can start packing. Now, what happened to the clothes we sorted out for the trip?”

  Aristia looked over the haphazard piles and finally pointed to one near the head of the bed. “I think that’s them.” She picked up a tunic and started folding it into a neat square.

  Korinna grabbed a pair of pants and held them up. “No, see, you can’t fit them in that way. Don’t mind the wrinkles, just roll it up tightly so it takes up less space, see?” She demonstrated rolling the pants like wrapping flatbread around a filling, then stuffed them into the bottom of one bag.

  Aristia copied her movements and caught on quickly. Before long, all of the clothes needed were tucked inside the saddlebags with room to spare. She looked to the pile of weapons and armor next. “Do you need to take all of that, too?”

  Korinna laughed. “I’m going to harvest fruit, not fight in a battle.” She’d already laid out her flying leathers to wear for the trip, and her bulky metal armor would just add extra weight that she didn’t need. She pointed to her bow and a small eating dagger. “I’ll take that for hunting and protection, just in case, but I won’t need anything else. Nobody but the riders even know where the valley is, and if there are other monsters, I’ll have the entire Storm Petrels airborne division to protect me.”

  Aristia listened to her with wide eyes. “Are you sure that you can’t take me with you? I could help you in camp by cooking your food or something.”

  Korinna smiled but shook her head. “It’s just for riders,” she repeated. “There’s a few other soldiers who are allowed to go, but they’re mostly candidates who are trying to catch their own marewings, and the blacksmith. Besides, you can’t ride. Sungold only lets me on her back, and Nightshade won’t carry anyone but Galenos.”

  The little girl tilted her head to one side. “What if I talk to her? Maybe I could get Sungold to like me.”

  Korinna suppressed another laugh at the child’s expense. It wasn’t her fault if she didn’t understand just how dangerous marewings were. “Marewings are monsters. You can’t befriend them with a few kind words. I had to learn that the hard way—have you seen the scar on Varranor’s arm?”

  Aristia nodded and fell silent with a frown. Her disappointment was palpable, but there was nothing Korinna could do to help her. The girl would have to get used to the idea that even the duchess couldn’t give her everything.

  She sighed again and sank onto the bed, looking around at the huge mess left behind by packing. She knew that she should start organizing it all and putting it away, but suddenly she felt very tired.

  Aristia saw her look and scrambled to pick up the nearest pile. “I’ll take care of this, m’lady. You don’t need to worry about it.” She cast another glance at Korinna. “Although if you don’t mind my saying so, milady, you shouldn’t go on such a long flight if you’re not feeling well.”

  Korinna smiled at the girl, too weary to protest her cleaning up alone. “No, I’m alright, I just need a little rest.” She slumped backward, twisting around the pile of clothes blocking her way, and looked up at the ceiling. “Please, don’t tell my husband.”

  Aristia nodded solemnly and didn’t ask why. She cleared the clothes off the bed first, giving Korinna more room to lie down, then went about the rest of the room quietly.

  The truth was, Korinna had been feeling tired more easily in recent weeks. She wasn’t ready to tell anyone else the reason why, but she suspected—hoped—that it had something to do with her monthly course’s sudden absence. Although it was far too early to feel anything, she splayed a hand across her stomach, wondering if there was a new life growing inside.

  She was excited to tell Galenos about her possible pregnancy, but she’d decided that she would wait a little longer. She wanted to be sure she was right and for things to calm down. After the cloudfruit harvest was over, she’d love to surprise him with the happy news.

  Tatiana III

  Tatiana and the other rider candidates, a large group of over sixty, followed a blacksmith into Neusici Valley. She’d never heard the name before, and because of the winding trails they’d had to follow through the mountains to reach it, she wasn’t sure she could pinpoint the location on any map. It didn’t look like much, just a thin stream that ended in a marsh with a bunch of strange trees. Tatiana had learned to identify a lot of new types of trees in Kyratia over the summer, but she’d never seen ones that grew in such an unusual shape, like strands of a rope twisted together instead of a solid trunk.

  She worked with the others to set up camp where the stream met the marsh and started cooking supper, but she kept looking back over her shoulder at the cloudfruit trees. She didn’t see any fruit, just dark pods hanging down from the branches. They felt ominous, looming darkly over the edges of the camp, and she could not see what lurked in the shadows beneath them. The marsh itself was muddy and dark, so she couldn’t see to the bottom.

  At sunset, the marewing riders finally arrived in waves. She’d seen marewings at the fort where she trained, and even had one brief flight with another rider, but she had never seen the entire aerial division of the Storm Petrels in one place at the same time. They were so beautiful, their glossy coats shining in a myriad of colors and patterns, from pale white and gold to dark brown and black. Some of them had splotches of many colors all over their bodies, others looked as if they’d dipped just their ankles into white paint. There were so many that their leather wings blotted out the setting sun.

  Tatiana gaped, open-mouthed, then went to find Philagros. He was the only one she knew from training, so she got up the courage to talk to him sometimes. She nudged him and pointed to two marewings who flew in alone, one gold and white, the other solid black. “Is that the duke and duchess?”

  Philagros nodded, tracking the pair with wide eyes. “I didn’t know they would be here. I thought they were retired.”

  Sergeant Navera and her assistant, Itychia, landed next to their camp and came to greet the candidates. “Good job,” Navera said, looking around with a smile. “Let’s eat quickly, because we need to get this fire out before moonrise.”

  Tatiana looked around the valley nervously. She didn’t like the idea of being here in the dark without a fire. What if there were animals just lurking nearby, waiting to sneak up on them? Worse—when would the wild marewings show up? A tamed marewing was dangerous enough with a rider to control them. A wild one attacking them in the middle of the night was a terrifying thought.

  But the others were already hurrying to obey the sergeant’s orders, so she joined them in finishing up the last of the cooking and serving up the hot food. There was a pot of fish stew and cattails roasted on the coals
, most of which the candidates had gathered themselves that day.

  She forced her own plate of food down. It hit the pit of her stomach like a lump and just seemed to sit there. Navera hadn’t told them anything about what they were going to do, just said to wait and see what happened. This could be the most important moment of her life, how could she sit here and wait without knowing?

  All up and down the valley, she could see the riders lighting their own fires and setting up camps. Even from a distance, she could tell that they were celebrating, circulating from one campfire to another and passing around bottles of wine. Well, maybe it was easier to relax when they didn’t have the pressure of catching a marewing looming over them. She feared that she wouldn’t be able to sleep that night.

  Then the fires went out and everyone gathered near the edge of the marsh. The full moon peeked over the mountain range in the east, shining silver light down into the valley. Cracks rang out across the valley, ending in splashes from the water. Her fear increased. Was there something in the marsh?

  A dark shadow passed overhead. Sergeant Navera pointed up. Tatiana’s eyes widened, hardly believing what she was seeing. A cloudfruit tree soaring up into the sky. As she watched, a bat-like shape darted toward the tree, tearing something from its branches. A wild marewing!

  The riders around them began to sing about climbing the trees and jumping off in a leap of faith. As the implications of their words washed over her, she froze in terror. Was that what it took to catch a marewing—climbing one of those flying trees and jumping after a marewing in midair? The trees were rising higher and higher into the sky. A fall from that height would be fatal.

  Philagros, sitting next to her, reached out and gripped her arm. “Tell me they didn’t just say what I thought they said,” he whispered in her ear.

  Tatiana nodded numbly. There was a whole herd of wild marewings now, or a flock, or whatever the proper term for such a large group was—dozens of them, flying around the cloudfruit trees and tearing the fruit from their branches. None of them landed on the ground or even came low enough to snare with a rope. “I think you would have to go up there just to get close enough to them,” she whispered back. “Maybe the riders will give us a ride up?” But the sinking pit of her stomach told her she was wrong. They’d spent far too many days on climbing exercises.