First Voyage

by David Healey

  They soon saw the white surf line of the coast, then dunes, then trees. The gryphons swept in low over the fields. Even over the rush of wind in his ears, Alexander thought he could hear Desdemona sniffing the air.

  To think that Lord Parkington and Lemondrop were out there somewhere in all the vast country that lay ahead made finding them seem all that much more impossible. Alexander imagined his friend somewhere on that coast, lying wounded, or perhaps already a prisoner of the Napoleonists. The thought made him shudder. Captain Amelia had bragged that Desdemona was a good tracker, but they would also have to be extremely lucky.

  Gryphons are unique in that they have the highly developed sense of smell of a lion, but also an eagle's keen vision. Desdemona's eyes were now so intent that they seemed to cut through the mist below like a torch.

  At first glance, the woods and fields could have been England, not unlike the ones Alexander had explored as a young boy. A closer look revealed something distinctly different about the landscape. Something foreign. From the air, the French countryside was a patchwork of fields separated by massive hedgerows and stone walls. Country lanes wove through like the seams of a quilt. The farm houses here had thatched roofs like the ones in England, but the buildings themselves were made of stone and lower to the ground, unlike the whitewashed, story-and-a-half cottages of England.

  A few farmers worked in the fields, appearing as little dabs of gray and white fabric. They scarcely noticed gryphons anymore because this area near the coast would be patrolled constantly, the skies dotted with the passing of messenger and sentry gryphons.

  While the French farmers gave them scarcely any notice, it was these enemy gryphons that they were most worried about, lest they raise the alarm. While Desdemona and Captain Amelia scanned the countryside, the other gryphon piloted by Rigley and carrying Professor Hobhouse hung slightly back and above, keeping an eye on the skies.

  "There!" Amelia shouted through the speaking tube. "French cavalry!" She pointed down, and Alexander spotted a file of horsemen passing along one of the muddy roads. Even in the gloomy light he could see their armor and steel helmets glinting, marking them as the dreaded cuirassiers of Napoleon's army.

  "What should we do?" Alexander shouted back. They were traveling light and had no bomblets or anything useful for attacking the cuirassiers, just pistols and swords.

  "Nothing," Amelia said. "With luck, they shan't even notice us."

  Amelia was right. If the cavalry even paid them any mind, they would take the British gryphons for a French patrol. Still, Alexander couldn't help but think they were on borrowed time. Two British gryphons couldn't fly for long in the French skies before they were noticed, and then there would be trouble. Meanwhile, it seemed to Alexander that they were searching for the proverbial needle in a haystack, albeit a French one. There were no clues, no trail to follow. What had seemed this morning like a daring rescue mission now felt like a fool's errand. He felt his heart sink.

  They flew for nearly an hour, searching in larger and larger circles. Nothing. Just brown, wintry countryside. Three times they had to duck into drifting cloud banks to escape detection by passing French couriers.

  "We've come too far," Captain Amelia announced via the speaking tube. "We'll circle our way back to the coast."

  Amelia signaled Rigley, and together the two gryphons worked over a new grid of woods, fields and farms, slightly south of their first search zone.

  "What if they were captured?" Alexander couldn't resist asking. "There's no way we could know that."

  "Maybe they were captured, or maybe they're wounded and hiding out under a hedgerow," Amelia said. "We've come this far, and I'm not giving up yet. Now stop distracting me with silly questions, Mr. Hope, and let us focus our attention on the search."

  The flyer captain hadn't said it, but Alexander knew very well that every minute they spent searching put them at greater risk of detection by the French. If that happened, their best hope was to make a run for Resolution. Desdemona was swift, and if the French did catch them, Biscuit was quite the fighter. Alexander gave no thought to surrender, for surely that meant being hanged as spies—and who knew what fate for their gryphons.

  Desdemona shrieked urgently and pulled to the east, nearer the coast. Amelia gave her gryphon free rein. With a few powerful beats of her wings, the gryphon put on a burst of speed that Biscuit was hard pressed to follow. Alexander held on for dear life as they dropped through a low cloud and leveled out over yet another winter-blasted French field.

  "What is it?" he called.

  "She smells something."

  The farm below was not much. He saw a low-slung stone farmhouse with thatch roof, surrounded by a muddy farmyard and a collection of outbuildings. A couple of milk cows nosed at the brown grass and chickens scratched in the dirt. No humans were in sight.

  Captain Amelia signaled Rigley, and the gryphons descended. Desdemona landed gracefully but Biscuit came down with a thump like a lump of dough, so hard that Professor Hobhouse nearly toppled from his saddle. The four of them unbuckled and slipped off their gryphons. Amelia and Rigley drew their swords, and Alexander touched the butt of the pistol in his belt to reassure himself. Only Professor Hobhouse did not draw a weapon.

  Their arrival seemed to have gone unnoticed. Not so much as a dog barked. And yet the silence itself seemed threatening.

  "It's almost as if they knew someone was coming," Alexander said. "I don't care for this quietude."

  "Desdemona smelled something. I know she did. Keep your eyes open."

  The four of them spread out and moved as silently as possible toward the barn. The gryphons guarded their backs.

  Desdemona lifted her head toward the barn and made soft, birdlike sounds.

  "They must be in the barn!"

  Without waiting for the others, Alexander ran across the farm yard and threw open the barn door. The day was dark, but the interior was yet darker. He stepped inside and found himself face to face with a large, bearded man wielding a pitchfork.

  "Arrêtez!" the man shouted. Alexander guessed from the pitchfork tines just inches from his face that the farmer had just warned him to stop.

  Captain Amelia came forward with a raised pistol, but the Frenchman did not put down the pitchfork. He had a wild look in his eyes.

  From inside the barn, a familiar voice called, "It's all right, Pierre. These are friends. Mon amis."

  Slowly, the farmer lowered his pitchfork. Amelia did the same with her pistol. Alexander ran deeper into the barn, where he could pick out Lemondrop's glowing yellow eyes in the gloom.

  Lord Parkington stood beside the gryphon, holding a pistol in one hand and a sword in the other. Around his head was a bandage stained with blood. Alexander ran up and grabbed his friend by the shoulders and gave him a good shake. "Toby! We found you, all right."

  The flyer gave him a broad, genuine smile. But the young lord was more pale than ever and his eyes looked drawn with pain or worry.

  "Pierre saw you circling a while ago and sent his family to hide in the woods," Lord Parkington said. "He thought it might be a French patrol looking for me. Then he came in the barn. We heard you land and heard voices, so we were afraid the French had found us out."

  Captain Amelia spoke up. "Mr. Parkington, please explain why a Frenchman is hiding you in his barn."

  "He has his reasons," Parkington said. "I can tell you about that later."

  "Can we trust him?" Amelia asked. She looked at the French farmer, who still stood gripping his pitchfork.

  "He has risked his life for me so far."

  "Then the sooner we're gone from here, the better for us all," Amelia said. "The skies are full of gryphons and the roads are full of cuirassiers. We need to get moving. How badly are you hurt?"

  Parkington touched the bandage. "One of the French flyers grazed my temple with a pistol ball and knocked me out," he said. "Pierre’s wife fixed me up. I'm fine now. It's Lemondrop who's hurt. The French chased him all the way to the
coast and he must have gotten into a fight with them. He was raked rather badly. He can't fly."

  "Well," said Amelia. "Let us take a look."

  The captain stepped forward to lift the blanket that covered Lemondrop's side. That alone was a bad sign, for a gryphon is not a creature to huddle under blankets. Amelia gasped at what she saw.

  "Pierre has been helping me take care of him. He made a poultice to draw off any infection. It's what he uses on his horses."

  "I fear it is a grievous wound, my lord," Amelia said quietly. "It may be quite some time before Lemondrop can fly again."

  "He did it for me, to save me," Parkington said. "The French would have killed me or captured me otherwise."

  "Biscuit can carry three back to the ship," Amelia said. "He's a great, strong flyer. As long as we don't run into any French patrols, we'll be fine."

  "I'm not leaving Lemondrop here," the flyer said with finality. Not for the first time that day, Alexander was amazed by the bond between flyers and their gryphons.

  "Mr. Parkington, you do not tell your superior officer what you are or are not going to do," Captain Amelia snapped. "You do it!"

  "Different rules now apply," Parkington said in the cold, steely voice that Alexander recognized as a sign that his lordship was not to be trifled with. "We are on French soil."

  "I am your captain!"

  "And I am Lord Parkington, cousin to his majesty the king," the flyer said haughtily. "Who are you to command me?"

  Amelia and Parkington stared at each other. Had it been possible, Alexander was sure smoke and sparks would have poured from their eyes.

  Professor Hobhouse stepped forward and cleared his throat as if beginning a class. "If I may," he began. "I'd like to point out that the weather is getting worse, our gryphons are tired, and a return flight to the Resolution would be ill advised. I suggest we see how Lemondrop fares tomorrow morning, and make a decision then."

  "Very well," Amelia said. "You make a good case, Hobhouse. We shall have to see. We'll post a lookout while the others rest. Mr. Rigley can go first."

  "Aye, aye," said Rigley hurriedly.

  "If we can make it until nightfall without any cuirassiers showing up, we should be fine—at least until the morning."

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Night came early, which was a relief. Darkness meant they were safe from the prying eyes of passing gryphons or cavalry. In his broken English, the farmer invited the British to his home for dinner, and they all went. With Desdemona and Biscuit in the barn, it was decided that Lemondrop would be safe enough without any of the Resolutions guarding him. Gryphons were very protective of their flyers and of their own, and any stranger who chanced upon the barn would be in terrible jeopardy.

  The house was very small, really just a one-room cottage with a sleeping loft above. Yet to Alexander it seemed perfect—cozy and warm against the damp winter night, heated by an enormous stone fireplace. Delicious smells came from a large pot simmering on a crane over the fire, and the table was set with wooden bowls and pewter spoons. Though battered and scarred with use, the heavy wooden table was large enough for them all.

  "Mon famile," the farmer said proudly, once they were all seated.

  One by one, he introduced his wife Estelle, and their daughters: Chloe and Celeste. Chloe was around fourteen and Celeste was six years old, as she proudly informed them. They both kept smiling shyly at Alexander and the older girl, Chloe, even blushed when he said hello to her. Neither girl seemed as taken with Lord Parkington or with Rigley, who was too old for them.

  They had worn their cloaks into the house, but now took them off in the warmth of the kitchen. Chloe murmured appreciatively when she noticed Alexander's sea horse cloak pin, the one he had brought from home. Though the pin was purely decorative because Alexander wore a modern pullover sea cloak, he loved the way it gleamed against the rich wool fabric. The sea horse was more heraldic than pretty, portraying a beast known as a hyppocamp—a fierce, rearing stallion with a wild mane, forelegs that ended in webbed claws, and a body tapering down to a powerful mermaid-like tail. The pin was beautifully wrought in silver and the way the firelight danced over it almost made the sea horse seem alive.

  "Les hippocampes balade anglais tels?"

  Professor Hobhouse and Pierre laughed. Hobhouse replied to her, "Non, jeune dame, Neptune roulé hippocampes. Ils sont bêtes des Dieux. Neptune rode a seahorse. They were beasts of the Gods."

  "And it's against regulations to wear such things on a proper uniform," Captain Amelia sniffed.

  Estelle served the delicious hot stew, ladling the bowls to overflowing, and Pierre poured them all a glass of apple cider. There were thick slices of bread fresh from the oven with butter.

  "Ragoût de lapin," Pierre said, pointing his spoon at the soup.

  "Rabbit stew," Professor Hobhouse translated. "It smells heavenly. Bon appetite!"

  For several minutes there was very little sound except that of spoons scraping bowls. Then Captain Amelia finally seemed to remember her manners and asked, "So then, monsieur, how is it that you came to help a British flyer?"

  She looked at Hobhouse, expecting him to translate her question. But it was Parkington who answered. "Oh, Pierre wasn't always a farmer, you see. As a young man he went to sea." Parkington babbled something in fluent French to Pierre, and the two conversed for a moment.

  "I was not aware you knew the lingua franca, Mr. Parkington," Amelia said with raised eyebrows.

  "Yes," he said, without further explanation. "Pierre was shipwrecked off the coast of Breton. A squall blew up and his ship ran upon the rocks and it went to pieces. He clung to a piece of wood for hours and would have been lost, but a British frigate happened by and with great risk in such a storm sent out a boat to pick up Pierre. Our nations were not at war then, and he was treated very well. He even learned a little English. Well, a little. Once he made it back home he vowed never to return to sea. He became a farmer. When I appeared yesterday he said it was his time to repay the debt he owed the Royal Navy for saving his life."

  "C'est vrai," Pierre said, nodding approvingly.

  "It appears, Hobhouse, that we might not have needed you, after all."

  "Well, I shall try to make myself useful one way or another," he said.

  Captain Amelia raised her glass of cider in the universal gesture that needed no translation. She smiled. "Salut!"

  When they had finished eating, Alexander and Rigley insisted on helping the girls and their mother clean up, even though she objected. The flyers were all exhausted—none of them had slept well the night before and the day's tension had sapped all their energy—but it was apparent that the French family wasn't ready to turn in. It had been a long time since they had seen this kind of excitement.

  Once the table had been cleared, Pierre poured them all coffee. If that seemed leisurely under the circumstances, it was because they were not so worried about French patrols because a cold, heavy rain was falling. It was the best guard they could have wished for, because no gryphons would be flying in this weather, and the roads were far too dark and wet for cavalry.

  They were just about as safe as they could be. And yet an awkward silence fell across the room as their little group realized they might be in for a long evening together. Their two nations were at war, even if there was a truce in the modest farmhouse.

  The little French family sat on one side of the table, and the Resolutions sat upon the other. Communication was halting at best, with Pierre having his broken English while only Hobhouse and Toby spoke any French. The crackling fire seemed to grow louder in the silence, as did the soft drumming of the rain on the farmhouse roof.

  Pierre said a few words to his wife, who seemed to consider what he had said, then nodded in agreement and went to the kitchen. Pierre fetched a bottle and poured each of the adults a glass of rich red wine, giving Rigley a conpiratorial wink as he did so. Estelle returned with a huge earthenware bowl. It was clearly old, the surface glazed with cracks
, and yet the bowl was elegant in its simplicity. The farmer's wife said something to one of her daughters, who got up and returned with a pitcher of water that she used to fill the bowl. The water swirled about and then lay still as glass.

  Pierre spoke to Lord Parkington, who shrugged, then explained to the rest of them: "Pierre says his wife has some skill in scrying, if we should wish to pass the time."

  "Oh," Captain Amelia said. It was a noise of disdain. Scrying was a method that peasants—and gypsies—used to tell fortunes and predict someone's future. A talent for it was often passed down from mother to daughter, though men were occasionally known to have the gift. In England, scrying parties were sometimes held for entertainment—though there were some who put great store in these predictions of the future and regularly sought out those with the ability.

  "I think it sounds like a fine idea, and it would only be polite," Lord Parkington said. He said as much to Pierre in French while Captain Amelia scowled at him, but his lordship seemed not to notice.

  Lord Parkington went first. There were various methods one practiced in the art could use for scrying with a bowl of water, which served as a looking glass into the future. The person whose future was being read could blow across the bowl, or dip a hand in. Once that was done, some essence of the person was left behind in the water. By staring into the bowl, the person who had the gift of scrying could tell what the future held.

  Lord Parkington put his hand into the bowl and took it out when the farmer's wife nodded. She stared intently at the water. The woman suddenly looked up sharply at Lord Parkington and said something in rapid French that made the boy turn red. Professor Hobhouse chuckled.

  "Well?" Captain Amelia asked, clearly curious. "If you've made us play the game, Parkington, then I hope you shall tell us what she predicted about you."