The Black Gryphon

By now she must feel like the most beautiful and capable gryphon in the entire world! Amberdrake always knows how to say exactly the right thing to make someone feel good. He’s given me so many compliments, and he’s hardly ever wrong. Maybe once I’m recovered, he can give me a tryst-grooming, and we can talk about how much good my suggestion did Zhaneel.

The Black Gryphon sighed and settled down for a nap, smug in the knowledge that all was right with the world as far as Zhaneel and Amberdrake were concerned.

Amberdrake found Zhaneel curled into a ball in the farthest corner of the tent, shivering, her head tucked under her wings. It was a saddening, u

Instead of the expected strike, she didn’t acknowledge his presence at all. Nothing. Yet, with the touch, a staggering rush of sickening emotions blinded Amberdrake for the span of a heartbeat.

She hates herself. She genuinely hates herself. Self-doubt, self-pity, an overwhelming sense of worthlessness, of loss. From a gryphon! This I could expect from a human, but from a gryphon? They’re all convinced that Urtho created them as an improvement on all other races! Who or whatever made her this way was long in building. If it can be stopped, it has to stop now. If I can change her-it has to start now.

He spoke quietly, soothingly. “Zhaneel?”

She whimpered, the barest whisper of sound.

“Shh, little one, I am here for you. Please listen. Please listen. I’ll make you feel better, I promise it. I am here for you.” He moved in closer and folded his robed body across hers, to comfort her as he had other distressed gryphons with the sensation of protective, caring wings wrapped over them. He could feel her underneath him, body temperature high, breathing fast, and there, yes, her eyes tightly shut. Her delicate ear-tufts folded back tight to her head. Drake stroked her neck feathers and spoke more reassuring words, keeping his voice steady and deep, speaking “into” her, and held her as her shuddering subsided.

The sexual anticipation earlier can help some, at least. . . . Amberdrake swam through Zhaneel’s nerves with his Healing powers, found her pleasure-centers, and gently stimulated them while he soothed her with his words. Gryphons’ bodies held stores of specialized fluids, elements, in various glands and repositories, and the delicate touch of an experienced Healer could release them at the right time. A careful nudge there and a feather-light stimulation so, and the “rewarding” sensation following a mating coursed through her veins; in a small amount, by no means as great as the euphoria following a real mating, but definitely there. It had the desired effect; she slowly went from quivering to a state of relaxation-physically, at least-and uncurled from her ball after what felt like a harrowing eternity. All the while, Amberdrake reassured her and spoke encouragements. It didn’t cure any of her problems, no, that could come later, but her gradual relaxation at least opened a doorway toward a cure.

A candlemark must have passed since her arrival before she spoke again. It was a time in which her kestra’chern held her and scratched her ear-tufts, all the while carefully touching her mind and soaking in the feelings she unknowingly projected into him. He could not help thinking that it was a good thing she had chosen him, rather than a kestra’chern with no Empathic or Healing abilities. Anyone else would have had to send for her Trondi’irn-and an apprentice would have been as terrified and traumatized as she.

“Zhaneel,” he said urgently, “you must tell me why I distressed you so. I had no intention of hurting you.”

She shivered all over. “You . . . kessstra’cherrrn. Think I am mmmisssborrrn, too. No desssirrre, nev-errr. . . .” She hunched her shoulders and hung her head, deep in purest misery. “Should have died,” she cried softly. “Not worth raisssing, ssshould have died. Trried.”

Amberdrake didn’t hesitate a moment; strange how, after waiting in silence for so long, a moment’s delay in a reply could cause damage. “No, lovely child, you misunderstood me entirely! You’re far from misborn, Zhaneel. You were made by Urtho as his proudest creation. And you are lovely to me.”

She uncoiled some more, and nervously looked at him with one eye. “But you sssaid-no lover. Physssically. Not even you want me-“

He rubbed his cheek against hers, as a gryphon-sib would do, and replied quickly. “Zhaneel, no, little one! I said I can not, not that I would not if I could. I am only a human. Thin skin, and smaller than you. We wouldn’t fit, you and I, our sizes and bodies are too different. And you’d tear me up trying.” He allowed a small chuckle. “Dearheart, believe me, if I were a gryphon, you and I would be in the sky together the moment after I saw you.”

She opened both eyes and blinked, twice, as if the dry observation that humans were perhaps a third the size of a gryphon-in every salient way-hadn’t even occurred to her.

Some people think a kestra’chern can do anything!

“Never learned how mating goes. Parents died. Left me, left me alone.” Zhaneel slumped down, her beak touching the floor. “Misborn, wings too long and pointy, too long for body, head too big, too round, no ear-tufts at all!” she cried out, shivering. “That’s why they left me, why they flew and died. I was misborn, and they were ashamed.”

Amberdrake scratched her head, fingers disappearing into the deep, soft down-feathers, and projected more calm into her, soothing her, lest she ball herself up again and never uncurl. “I just can’t believe that, Zhaneel. You are lovely and strong. Your parents must surely have treasured you and looked forward to seeing you fly.”

Apparently, a floodgate had been released when she had first started speaking. She continued to pour out her feelings. “Not enough talon to hurt even mites-“

Amberdrake surveyed the outstretched forefoot dubiously. The talons looked plenty long to him.

“-freakish, misborn, should have died,” she whispered hoarsely. “No one wants Zhaneel in wing. No one. No one wants Zhaneel as mate. Worthless.”

Amberdrake lifted her head up, a more difficult task than he tried to make it appear, and caressed her briefly around the nares, then held up the forgotten reward-square.

“If you’re so worthless, then how did you earn this? They don’t give these away for digging latrines, sky-lady. Only the bravest receive this kind of reward.”

His left arm was complaining bitterly about supporting the weight of her head when she finally lifted it herself and blinked. Then she looked down.

“Not brave,” she insisted faintly.

Amberdrake smiled gently. “Why don’t you tell me how you earned it, and let me be the judge of that? I would sincerely like to hear, Zhaneel. Join me. I’ll make you a fine strong tea.” He stood up creakily and gestured for her to come with him; she rose, took three hesitant steps toward his bed, and then sat beside it.

“No one would accept me into their wing. But I wanted to fly for Urtho. So I-I just moved into a wing. Kelreesha Trondaar’s wing.”

Ah. Interesting, the same wing that merc mage Co

“I flew patrols. The back patrols-the ones fledglings fly in relays.” Her voice broke at that. The duty she described was humiliating for an adult gryphon, usually reserved for punishment because of its length and uneventfulness, and for training fledglings in procedure. “It gave me-time away from the camp. Time to fly. Can fly the circuit faster than anyone else.”