by Laurence Yep
Scirye was impressed by the other girl’s desire, but she was as concerned as Kaccap about accidents. “Please, Lady Māka. We’re not asking you to quit magic, just let it rest for a little while. What if, by some mistake, you shrank all the griffins’ wings?”
Tute nudged her. “Yes, like she said. We won’t help anyone but the vultures if we’re just stains on the rocks.”
Māka reluctantly dipped her head to Scirye. “As you wish, lady,” she said as she tucked the book back up her sleeve.
Am I any better at being a hero than Māka is at being a magician? Scirye wondered to herself. So far, every time they had caught up with Roland he had gotten away. Or at least I wish I could feel half the passion for this quest that Māka has for magic.
* * *
They traveled along the pass without any more mishaps and emerged into a wide valley nestled between walls of black rock so sheer it was as if they had been cut from the mountain range with a knife. Though snow covered the ground like a fine sheet of fleece, she saw more war griffins sparring with dummies mounted on tall poles. When a griffin struck a dummy in the wrong spot, the dummy swiveled and the pole attached to the dummy hit the griffin and sent her spinning to the hoots and laughter of the other griffins.
Still other griffins were honing their agility by flying obstacle courses that contained not only hurdles on the ground, but nets suspended in the air with only narrow gaps through which to fly. And a third group was attempting to take a mock fort from a fourth group.
In the valley beyond, lean, sleek griffins darted around pylons over a snowy oval. “Are those warriors too?” Leech asked.
Scirye had seen pictures of them. “No, griffins come in all sizes for all sorts of purposes. Those griffins are getting ready for the great air races in the summer.” She pointed to another group swooping and swirling. “And those griffins are practicing for aerial polo.”
A forest of pines covered either slope at the end of the valley and here griffins about the size of collies took turns diving upon a dummy of a bird. Their shoulders were broad but their haunches were slender.
“Are they war griffins too?” Koko asked.
“Those are hunting griffins,” Scirye explained.
As they flew over steep gorges sliced out of the mountain by the river and wide valleys, Scirye realized that Kles’s eyrie was much larger than she had thought, for it included not only training grounds but pastures with sheep and goats eating from bales of hay. Fences separated the fields—resting under the layer of snow—and their bordering fences stitched the land like a patchwork quilt. Though bare of leaves now, there were also row after row of almond and fruit trees waiting to blossom in the spring.
Everything suggested a prosperous and well-managed domain. In fact, Kles’s clan believed that Oesho the wind god had created this lovely home just for them.
Leech let out an appreciative whistle. “The griffins have everything they need for the winter.”
“It’s not just winter that can cut the land routes off,” Kaccap explained. “The lyak have invaded in the past to steal the gold.”
Koko had been sitting hunched with fatigue but he perked up now. “Gold?”
“The eyries were placed here partly to guard the imperial gold mines,” Kaccap said. “Lyak means thief in the Old Tongue.”
“You wouldn’t happen to have any samples around, would you?” Koko asked. “You know, sort of as a souvenir.”
“Forgive the badger,” Bayang said. “His mother dropped him on his head when he was a baby.”
Two giant griffins had been carved from the stone at the mouth of the next pass. They stood, ever alert, unwinking eyes staring at the world. At the moment, though, snow covered their shoulders and icicles hung from their beaks.
When they burst over the next valley, Scirye saw numerous humans and wagons on the road leading to a sizable, prosperous town. Beyond it was another lake, but this one was as large as a small sea.
Kaccap explained that the miners, farmers, and shepherds lived here along with all the other humans who served the eyrie’s needs.
From the way Māka pressed herself against her griffin’s back as if trying to hide, Scirye suspected they were also overly critical of the entertaiment hired for their banquets.
The ancient eyrie of Kles’s clan lay at the end of the lake in the tallest mountain honeycombed with caves and tunnels. Here and there were areas where the gateways had been cut in even rows and at equal intervals, but many had been carved as needed over the centuries so that they were scattered about randomly.
Unlike the rest of the mountains, the snow had been tidily swept away from the openings as well as the ledges and platforms. On its peak, though, was a steel radio tower, a concession to modern times. Snow blew from the mountaintops, reminding Scirye of the white curtains of snowflakes dancing before the Arctic winds.
A river fell from the right shoulder of the eyrie’s mountain, but winter had frozen the spray into icicles so that the resulting waterfall looked like a giant tower of crystal. Through the spike-covered walls, she thought she saw water continuing to rush downward. It was only at the waterfall’s base that the water remained free, rippling in a large pond, before it slipped under the ice and into the lake.
From his ragged, clumsy flapping, Kles seemed to be on his last wings. It was no longer merely Scirye who was casting concerned looks at the little griffin. Leech and Koko too kept checking on their friend.
And yet when they were finally near their goal, Kles seemed to find some hidden reserve of strength. The beat of his wings became more regular and he lifted his head as if he were just out for a casual flight. Scirye couldn’t have been prouder of her friend.
“Welcome to the Tarkär Eyrie, the home of the Koyn Encuwontse,” Kles panted proudly.
Despite the frigid air, griffins of all sizes swarmed in and out of the eyrie. Some were flying in slow gyres as if they were sentries, but others were going about more peaceful tasks.
Several fledglings were even playing an aerial game of tag when they noticed Bayang riding a griffin. A dragon was such an unusual sight that they flocked about her.
A young racing griffin, lean as a whippet, boldly hovered in front of them. “What’s a dragon doing here, and why isn’t she flying on her own?” He gave a whoop when he saw the dotted beak of the griffin that Māka and Tute were riding. “And what happened to you?”
Kaccap clacked his beak in annoyance. “You’ll learn soon enough if the Keeper thinks it’s necessary.” At a wave of his paw, his squad streamed past the inquisitive griffin.
“I’m sure I know what went wrong,” Māka said to her mount. “So let me fix it.”
“No!” came a chorus of voices.
By then they had attracted the attention of other griffins, including some older ones, until they were surrounded by griffins of all ages and all sizes. And their pace slowed from necessity.
A hunting griffin peered at them curiously. “Ragtail?”
Kles puffed. “You’re looking a little moth-eaten, Yente.”
“And you’re out of shape,” Yente snickered, and then over her shoulder, she shouted, “Hey, Ragtail’s come home just as shabby as when he left.”
That was too much for Scirye. “Excuse me, but we have urgent business with the Keeper, so I’ll ask you to get out of our way.”
Yente folded her forelegs. “And just who are you to give us orders?”
Kles seemed to recover some of his old spirit. “The Lady Scirye of the House of Rapaññe, and”—he raised his voice— “the daughter of Lord Tsirauñe the Griffin Master.”
Yente looked as skeptical as the war griffins had, but Captain Kaccap made shooing motions with his forepaws. “So show some respect for the griffin master’s daughter.”
At the mention of her father’s name, the griffins respectfully withdrew in all directions, forming a living tunnel now through which Scirye and the others flew.
“I always wished I had family,” Leech sa
id. “Now I’m sort of glad I don’t after seeing how they treat Kles.”
Scirye couldn’t help wondering if the humans would welcome her any better than the griffins had Kles.
12
Bayang
Kaccap took them to a circle about twenty feet in diameter. Carved in a wide ring around the opening were scenes with griffins—the dragon assumed they were scenes from the clan’s history because the eyrie was featured prominently on several panels.
Fire imps burned upon niches in vessels of glass, casting warmth and light. Ruby eyes the size of rice grains watched them land. In the illumination, Bayang could just make out the occasional shadows of chisel marks still on the stone of the walls and ceiling of the cylindrical passage. But the floor itself had been polished flat by centuries of passing paws.
As his paws touched the rock of his home, Kles started to sag. Instantly, Scirye hopped off Kaccap and scooped her friend up into her arms. “Are you all right?”
“Yes, yes, now put me down.” The lap griffin struggled to break free and then gave up.
There were a few snickers from the escorting griffins, but Scirye glared around so fiercely that none of them actually said anything.
Kaccap spoke quietly to a lap griffin with a chain of tiny golden bells about his neck. They jingled as the griffin flapped away.
While they waited by the entrance, human servants brought basins of warm water and towels.
Kles immediately roused. “We need to make ourselves more presentable too.” He fluttered clumsily within Scirye’s grasp to take a washcloth and dip it into the water. Then he was fluttering all around her head as he rubbed out the travel dirt.
She snatched the cloth from him, her face now red from the scrubbing. “I can do that myself, Kles. See to yourself.”
As Scirye tried to clean the dirt from her face, the griffin tried to groom his feathers and fur, but between their travels and battles, his fur and feathers were matted with grime—and it would probably be easier to burn the hatchlings’ filthy coveralls and furs than clean them.
Bayang contented herself with washing her paws and muzzle, as did Tute, while Leech and Māka cleaned their faces and hands. But the fastidious Koko went so far as to clean his fur as well.
By the time that was done, the lap griffin with the bells returned. “This way, Lady Scirye,” he said with a bow.
Scirye set off with Leech and Koko flanking her and Bayang bringing up the rear. Kaccap and his griffins surged around them, keeping just enough space so that it was hard to say whether they were guiding or guarding them.
The dragon had been in many strange places but nothing like the eyrie, which seemed like a giant beehive. The walls of the passages were free of decoration except for lamps and markings in a flowing script that reminded Bayang of the writing on the antique flying carpet they had ridden when they had first begun their pursuit of Badik. She assumed the words were like street signs.
It was a different matter for the chambers that opened off the passage. Some had been hewn out of the stone like the passages, but sculptors had been free to ornament the rooms with patterns and pictures. Bayang noticed that in their ornamentation the griffins were fond of curves and spirals rather than straight lines—just as the walls of the eyrie itself.
Other rooms had been created by Nature. Glowing stalagmites reared from the floor while stalactites plunged downward like daggers, and water dripped down with plinking sounds. Over the centuries, the water had left minerals that now formed walls that dripped like cake batter while the floor undulated like a carpet that had been flung down hastily. Hot springs within the mountain kept even the upper levels warm and slightly humid.
Some of the rooms were offices, storerooms, or classrooms. Though there were tables and desks, there were few chairs or sofas. Rather, the griffins preferred to perch on wooden posts that ran from floor to ceiling. Projecting from the sides of the posts were perpendicular roosts.
One large cavern must have served as a nursery with nursemaid griffins making small neat nests of straw. “They’re getting ready for the spring hatching,” Kles explained.
“Yum,” Tute murmured, licking his chops. “Omelettes.”
Māka rapped him on the head with a knuckle and scolded him. “Mind your manners. It’s not polite to eat your hosts’ offspring.”
“Especially when your hosts are so much bigger than you,” Bayang added softly.
“Well, that vegetable soup didn’t fill me up very well,” Tute groused.
Koko glanced at Kles over his shoulder. “So who knew griffins were hatched and not born?”
“Don’t be crude,” the lap griffin frowned.
“I can’t help being curi— Whoa!” Koko had been so busy chatting that he fell through the circular hole in the floor.
“Mind your step,” Kaccap said as he caught the badger’s paw.
Since the captain had spoken in the New Tongue, Koko blinked in angry ignorance.
“Who puts a doorway in the floor?” Koko demanded.
“It makes sense when all the occupants have wings,” Scirye said and pointed at the ceiling a little farther ahead of them. A rectangular doorway had been cut into the stone, giving access to the level above. Even as they watched, a couple of lap griffins fluttered upward.
It would have been faster for the griffins to carry them through the openings, but it seemed they were being received formally, and etiquette required they be able to use staircases in the rear of the eyrie, also cut from the stone.
As Scirye mounted the stairs, she looked about curiously. “I feel as if I’ve been here before.”
“Perhaps you visited with your father,” Bayang suggested.
Scirye frowned as she searched her memory but then shook her head. “No, I think I would have remembered.”
“Well, maybe you were in a kennel of wet dogs, because that’s what it smells like to me,” Koko murmured.
At last, they came to a huge cavern. On the three sides, griffins filled ledges cut into the walls that rose layer upon layer toward the ceiling, or they perched on wooden posts set horizontally into holes in the walls.
Each of the griffins must have been someone important, judging from the amount of gold they wore—though the styles varied from finished torques, armbands, and anklets to raw lumps of gold on chains. Red garnets and blue lapis lazuli and turquoise were sprinkled liberally among the jewelry.
All of the griffin castes were represented here and in a definite “pecking order,” with the war griffins seated at the top with the hunting and sports griffins a little lower, and the lap griffins at the bottom.
The fourth wall was covered with banners, gold plaques, and huge medallions the size of trays that had been presented to the clan by past Kushan emperors as battle honors.
High above a hunting griffin with gray streaks of fur spoke, “The lyaks grow bolder and bolder. Each time they raid deeper into our lands. And if it is this bad in the winter, what will happen this spring after the snow and ice melt? The caravans with our gold must get through to Bactra. I say we take the fight to the lyak lands and end the menance once and for all.”
Cheers of approval and raucous squawks of protest echoed from around the chamber.
“What’s going on?” Scirye whispered to Kles.
“This is the Nest,” her friend said in a hushed voice. “The elders must be holding a war council.”
Protruding from the wall of battle honors was a golden tree branch. On it sat a single griffin. Her fur was silver with age and her wing feathers almost as white as the snow outside. In the light of the fire imps, they glowed like moonbeams. Around her head was a mesh of gold from which hung sapphires and rubies, but she wore no decoration and her fur, though brushed to a sheen, was left unbraided.
She carried herself with a natural authority that expected to be obeyed, and her beak bore a deep straight groove, perhaps a scar left from some battle-ax. Bayang had heard that the griffin clans were matriarchies.
; “I believe Captain Kaccap has a report to make on this subject.” The silver griffin motioned with her paw for him to come forward.
The captain strutted forward, bowing first to the silvery griffin. “Keeper.” He then bowed respectfully in turn to the griffins on the other walls. “Elders. My patrol just destroyed a band of lyak raiders by the upper lake.”
There was an uproar as every griffin tried to speak at once until the Keeper struck her branch with the steel-tipped claws of a forepaw. It rang like a bell and as the echoing notes died, she commanded, “Silence! I believe Elder Kacar had the floor.”
“This is outrageous,” the gray griffin said, flapping his wings irritably. “How long will it be before they begin attacking our very eyrie?”
Bayang saw a way of obtaining help for them against Roland. “My Lady Keeper, if I may speak?”
The Keeper looked at Kaccap. “Captain, are these the guests you mentioned in your note?” She craned her head forward. “Merciful Oesho, is that Klestetstse?”
Kles fluttered into the air, hovering at the same height as Bayang. “My Lady Keeper, let me introduce you to Lady Scirye of the House of Rapaññe, daughter of the griffin master, Lord Tsirauñe.”
The griffins stirred all around them with whispers and a rustling of feathers as they all leaned down to peer at Scirye.
The hatchling bowed gracefully. “My Lady Keeper, will you hear my friend, Bayang of the Moonglow clan?”
The Keeper glanced at the gray griffin. “Elder Kacar, do you yield the floor?”
“We are all as curious as you,” Elder Kacar said.
“We are pursuing thieves who stole the Jade Lady’s ring in San Francisco,” Bayang said.
“I heard of the theft,” the Keeper said. “It was an outrage.” She dipped her head to Scirye. “And I was sorry to hear about your sister, Nishke. When she was small, she accompanied your father several times on his visits here.”
Bayang set a paw upon Scirye’s shoulder. “Lady Scirye bravely chased after the thief, Badik the dragon, and we have helped her in her quest.” The dragon nodded to Kles to continue.