“Well, I think, on the whole, it will be a good thing for you to have six months to learn what it is that Blade is made of,” he said, in a lighter tone. “And I shall have the benefit of knowing that there will be no other young men at this outpost that may convince you to turn your attentions elsewhere. So any decisions you make—concerning our friendship—will be decisions made by you, only.”
She snorted. “As if any young man could ‘make me change my mind’ about anything important!” she replied, just a little sharply.
“Which only proves that I cannot claim to know you any better than any other friend!” he countered. “You see? This much I do understand; you have a strong sense of duty, and that will always be the first in your heart. I would like to think that I am the same. So, whatever, we must reconcile ourselves to that before we make any other commitments.”
It was her turn to shrug. “That seems reasonable . . . but it isn’t exactly . . . romantic.” That last came out much more plaintively than she had expected, or intended.
“Well, if it is a romantic parting that you wish—” He grinned. “I can be both practical and romantic, as, I suspect, can you.” He took one of her hands, but only one, and looked directly into her eyes. “Silverblade, I crossed an empire, I left my land and all I have ever known. I did not expect to find someone like you here, and yet—I do not follow some of my people’s reasoning that all is foredestined, but it sometimes seems as if I was drawn here because you were here. Now I know something of what I am. I believe that there is in you a spirit that would make a match for my own. If, in the end, a few months more will bring us together, such a wait will be no hardship.” He patted her hand. “I trust that is romance enough for your practical soul?”
She laughed giddily. “I think so,” she said, feeling as light-headed’as if she had just drunk an entire bottle of wine. “I—I’m not nearly that eloquent—”
“Neither is the falcon,” he said, releasing her hand. “But she is admirable for her grace without need of eloquence. Go become a passage bird, Silverblade. When you return, we shall try out hunting in a cast of two.”
Blade hadn’t needed to do all that much packing last night, but she had pretended that she did—and as soon as she was done, she blew out her candle and willed herself to sleep. The need for rest was real, and if she had not torn herself away from her overly-concerned parents, she would not have gotten any. They would have kept her up all night with questions, most of which she didn’t have any answers to, since all of them were fairly philosophical rather than practical.
She dressed quickly and quietly, and without relighting her candle. With any luck, only her mother would be awake; Winterhart, for some reason, seemed to be handling this better than her spouse. Don’t people usually complain that their mothers never see them as grown up? she thought, as she pulled on a pair of light boots, then fastened the silver gryphon badge to the breast of her tunic.
The Silvers had no regular uniform; Judeth thought it better that they wear the same clothing as those around them. Uniforms might remind people too much of the regular troops, and war, and even the most battle-hardened wanted to put warfare far behind them.
Now—if I can just walk quietly enough, I might be able to get out of here without another discussion of my life-view.
Her father Amberdrake was notorious for sleeping late—to be fair, it was usually because he’d been up late the night before, working—and she hoped by rising with the first light, she might avoid him at breakfast.
But no. When she carried her two small packs out to leave beside the door, she saw that there were candles burning in the rest of the house. Amberdrake was already up.
In fact, as soon as she turned toward the rear of the dwelling, she saw him; dressed, alert, and in the little nook at the back of the main room that they used for meals, waiting for her. But so was her mother, which might temper things a bit.
She sighed, while her face was still in shadow and he couldn’t see her expression. Breakfast with Amberdrake was always a bit strained at the best of times, and this was not going to be “the best” of times.
He keeps remembering when he was the chief kestra‘chern and it was his habit to find out about -his fellows when they all drifted in for breakfast. He keeps trying to do the same thing with me.
“Good morning, Father,” she said, feeling terribly awkward, as she approached the tiny table. “You’re not usually up so early.”
She wondered if Amberdrake’s smile was strained; he was too good at keeping a serene mask for her to tell. However, it was obvious that he had taken special pains with his appearance. Silk tunic and trews, raw-silk coat, some of his Haighlei gift-jewelry, and Zhaneel‘s feather in his hair. You ‘d think he was having an audience with Shalaman.
She regarded him objectively for a moment. He was still a strikingly handsome man. Despite the white streaks in his hair, her father scarcely looked his age in the low mage-light above the table, and the warm browns and ambers of his clothing disguised in part the fact that there were dark circles under his eyes.
Caused by worrying, no doubt.
“I didn’t want to miss saying good-bye to you, Silverblade,” he said, his voice quite calm and controlled. “If I slept until a decent hour, I knew that I would. You dawn risers are enough to make a normal person’s eyes cross.”
She knew that her answering laugh was a bit strained, but there was no help for it. “And you night prowlers are enough to make people like me scream when we think of all the perfectly good daylight you waste sleeping!” She slid into the seat opposite him, and helped herself to fresh bread and preserves. He reached across the table and added thinly-sliced cold meat to the plate quite firmly. She didn’t really want anything that substantial first thing in the morning, but she knew better than to say so. Why start an argument? That would be a poor way to leave her parents.
What can it hurt to nibble a piece to please him? It can’t, of course. Not that long ago, she would have protested; now she knew there was no point in doing so. She’d only hurt his feelings. He was only trying to help.
And after today he won’t be able to be so meddlingly helpful for six whole months! I should be pitying the people, gryphon and human and her-tasi alike, who will wind up as my surrogates for his concern.
She ate one slice of the meat, which was dry and tasted like a mouthful of salty old leather, and went back to her bread. Amberdrake pushed a cup of hot tea toward her, then made a move as if he was about to serve her a bowl of hot porridge from the pot waiting beside him.
“Oh no!” she exclaimed. Not for anything would she eat porridge, not even for the sake of pleasing her father! “None of that! Not when I’m flying! I do not want to decorate the landscape underneath me!”
Amberdrake flushed faintly and pulled his hand back. “Sorry. I forgot that you didn’t inherit my impervious stomach.”
“No, she inherited my questionable one. Stop badgering the child, dear.” Winterhart emerged at last from the rear of the dwelling, putting the last touches on her hair. Blade admired the way she moved with a twinge of envy. Winterhart managed to combine a subtle sensuality with absolute confidence and a no-nonsense competence that Blade despaired of emulating.
Now if I looked like that. . . . Ah, well. Too bad I inherited Mother’s interior instead of her exterior!
Unlike her mate, Winterhart had not dressed for a special occasion, which much relieved Blade. Her costume of a long linen split skirt, tunic, and knee-length, many-pocketed vest, was similar to anything she would wear on any other day. The only concession she had made to Amberdrake’s sartorial splendor was to harmonize with his browns and ambers with her own browns and creams.
“I hope we won’t be unwelcome, but we would like to see you and Tadrith leaving, Blade,” Winterhart said, quite casually, as if they were only leaving for a few days, not six months. “We do know how to stay out from underfoot, after all. Yours is not the first expedition we’ve seen on its way.”
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Now it was her turn to flush. “Well, of course I want you there to see us off! Of course you won’t be in the way!” she replied, acutely embarrassed. “I would never think that!”
The only trouble was, deep down inside, she had been thinking precisely that.
She gulped down her cooling tea to cover her embarrassment and guilty conscience, as Amberdrake toyed with a piece of bread, reducing it to a pile of crumbs.
He’s trying to pretend that he isn’t worried; trying to put on a brave face when I know he’s feeling anything but brave. Why? Why is he so worried? If he’s transparent enough for me to see through, he must be all of a knot inside.
Finally Amberdrake looked up at her, slowly chewing on his lower lip. “I know I probably seem as if I am overreacting to this situation, ke’chara,” he said quietly. “I shouldn’t be so worked up over the simple fact that you and your partner are going off on a normal, peaceful assignment. I realize that I am being quite foolish about this, and I can’t even pretend that I have some mysterious presentiment of doom. It’s all due to old—well, I suppose you’d have to call them habits, habits of feeling, perhaps.”
Winterhart stood behind him and put her hands on his shoulders, gently massaging muscles that must have been terribly tense. Outside, seabirds cried, greeting the dawn and the winds that would carry them out to their fishing grounds.
Amberdrake reached up and covered one of his mate’s hands with his own. “I have two problems with this assignment, really, and neither of them is rational. The first is that it is you, my daughter, who is going off for six months to a place that is unsettlingly far away. And you’ll be all alone there, except for a single gryphon. If it were someone else, I would see him or her off with a cheerful heart, and go about my business.”
“But it isn’t,” she stated.
“No.” He sighed, and patted Winterhart’s hand. “Your mother is handling this better than I.”
“I have perfect confidence in Aubri and Judeth,” Winterhart said serenely. “They wouldn’t send anyone that far away who wasn’t prepared for any contingency.” Her tone turned just a little sharp as she looked down at him. “If you won’t trust Blade, dearheart, at least trust them.”
“Intellectually, I do” Amberdrake protested. “It’s just—it’s just that it’s hard to convince the emotions.”
He turned back to Blade, who was even more embarrassed at her parent’s decision to bare his soul to her. She struggled not to show it. And underneath the embarrassment was exasperation.
Can’t he learn that I am grown now, and don’t need him to come haul me out of difficulties? Can’t he just let me go ?
“The other problem I have is very old, older than you, by far,” he told her earnestly. “And it has absolutely nothing to do with your abilities; it’s something I would still feel even if you were a warrior out of legend with magical weapons at your side. It doesn’t matter to my heart that this is peace time, that you are simply going off to man a wilderness outpost. The point to my reaction is that you are going out. When—” momentary pain ghosted over his expressive features. “—when people used to go out, back in the days of the wars, they didn’t always come back.” She opened her mouth to protest; he forestalled her.
“I know this is peacetime, I know you are not going forth to combat an enemy, I know that there is no enemy but storms and accident. But I still have the emotional reaction to seeing people going out on a quasi-military mission, and that fact that it is my daughter that is doing so only makes the reaction worse.” He smiled thinly. “You cannot reason with an old emotional problem, I am afraid.”
She looked down at the polished wood of the tabletop, and made little patterns with her forefinger, tracing the grain of the wood. What on earth did he expect her to say? What could she say? That was years and years ago, before I was even born. Can’t he have gotten over it by now? He’s supposed to be the great magician of the emotions, so why can’t he keep his own trained to heel? What could possibly go wrong with this assignment? We’ll have a teleson with us, we ‘II be reporting in, and if there is a life-threatening emergency and they can’t get help to us quickly, they ‘II take the risk and Gate us back!
But that wasn’t what he wanted to hear, and it wouldn’t help anything to say it. “I can understand. At least, I think I can. I’ll try,” she finished lamely.
True, it is nothing but wilderness between here and there—but when we get “there,” we’ll be in a fortified outpost built to withstand storm, siege, or earthquake. And, granted, no one has even tried to explore all the rainforest in between, but we’ll be flying, not walking! What could possibly knock us out of the sky that our people or the Haighlei wouldn‘t have encountered a long, long time ago ?
It was—barely—possible that some mage-made creatures of Ma’ar’s survived from the Cataclysm. It was less likely that any of them could have made it this far south. And even if they did, there had never been that many of them that could threaten a gryphon. The last makaar died ages ago, and there never was anything else that could take a flying gryphon down. We’ll be flying too high for any projectile to hurt us, and even if we weren‘t, there‘II be the mass of the carry-basket and all our supplies between us and a marksman.
“Father, I promise you, we’ll be fine,” she only said, choking down a last dry mouthful of bread. “Makaar are extinct, and nothing less could even ruffle Tadrith’s feathers. You’ve seen him; he’s one of the biggest, strongest gryphons in the Silvers!”
But Amberdrake shook his head. “Blade, it’s not that I don’t trust or believe in you, but there is far more in this world than you or Tadrith have ever seen. There were more mages involved in the Mage Wars than just Urtho and Ma’ar; plenty of them created some very dangerous creatures, too, and not all of them were as short-lived as makaar. I will admit that we are a long distance from the war zones, but we got this far, so who’s to say that other things couldn’t?”
He’s not going to listen to me, she realized. He’s determined to be afraid for me, no matter what I say. There was more likelihood of moving the population of the city up to the rim of the canyon than there was of getting Amberdrake to change his mind when it was made up.
“What’s more, as you very well know, the mage-storms that followed the Cataclysm altered many, many otherwise harmless creatures, and conjured up more.” His jaw firmed stubbornly. “You ask Snowstar if you don’t believe me; some of the territory we passed through was unbelievable, and that was only after a year or so of mage-storms battering at it! We were very, very lucky that most of the things we encountered were minimally intelligent.”
“Sports and change-children die out in less than a generation,” she retorted, letting her impatience get the better of her. “That’s simple fact, Father. There’re just too many things wrong with most magic-made creatures for them to live very long, if they’ve been created by accident.”
He raised an elegant eyebrow at her, and the expression on his face told her she’d been caught in a mistake.
“Urtho was not infallible,” he said quietly. “He had many accidents in the course of creating some of his new creatures. One of those accidents was responsible for the creation of intelligence in kyree, and another for intelligence in hertasi. And neither race has died out within a generation.’ ‘
She had already spotted the flaw in his argument. “An accident may have been responsible for the intelligence of the creature, but not the creature itself,” she countered. “Creature creation takes great thought, planning, and skill. An accident is simply not going to be able to duplicate that!”
He looked as if he were going to say something, but subsided instead.
“Besides,” Blade continued, taking her advantage while she still had it, “people have been going to this outpost for years, and no one has seen anything— either there or on the way. Don’t you think by now if there was going to be any trouble, someone would have encountered it?”
Amberdrake dropped
his eyes in defeat and shook his head. “There you have me,” he admitted. “Except for one thing. We don’t know what lies beyond that outpost and its immediate area. The Haighlei have never been there, and neither have we. For all we know, there’s an army of refugees from the wars about to swarm over you, or a renegade wizard about to take a force of his own across the land—”
“And that,” Blade said with finality, “is precisely why we will be there in the first place. It is our duty to be vigilant.”
He couldn’t refute that, and he didn’t try.
Blade extracted herself from her parents with the promise that she and Tad would not take off until they arrived. With one pack slung over her back and the other suspended from her shoulder, she hurried up the six levels of staircase that led in turn to the narrow path which would take her to the top of the cliff. She was so used to running up and down the ladder-like staircases and the switchback path that she wasn’t even breathing heavily when she reached the top. She had spent almost all of her life here, after all, and ver-ticality was a fact of life at White Gryphon.
Below, on the westward-facing cliff the city was built from, she had been in cool shadow; she ascended as the invisible sun rose, and both she and the sun broke free of the clinging vestiges of night at the same time. Golden fingers of light met and caressed her as she took the last few steps on the path. It would be a perfect morning; there were no clouds marring the horizon to presage storms to the east. Red skies were lovely—but red skies required clouds. If I am going to be traveling, I prefer a morning like this one; not a cloud in the sky and the air dry, cool, and quiet.
At the top of the cliff a great expanse of meadow and farmland composed of gently rolling hills stretched out before her. It was completely indefensible, of course; like Ka’venusho, Urtho’s stronghold, there was no decent “high ground” to defend. This was why the city itself had been built into the cliff, with the only access being a single, narrow path. You couldn’t even rain boulders down on White Gryphon from above, for the path had been cut into the cliff so cleverly that it channeled objects falling down from the edge away from the city entirely.
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