The Black Gryphon

“The quail that escapes is always fatter than the one you catch,” she observed. “I will try, if you think that will work.”

“Since no one has ever succeeded in playing that particular game with Skan before, I suspect that it will,” Amberdrake replied with amusement. “And what’s more, I think it will serve him right. It will do him good to think that he suddenly can’t have any lovely lady he wants. Should surprise him that there’s one who is immune to all his charms.”

He brushed Zhaneel’s feathers down with a slightly oiled cloth, both to pick up the feather-sheath dust and to shine the feathers themselves. “There,” he said, stepping back. “You look wonderful. Sleek, tough, competent, ready for anything.”

Zhaneel bobbed her head with modest embarrassment. “Or anyone?”

He put his hand beneath her beak and raised it.

“I tell you again, you are a match for any gryphon that ever existed.” He nodded approval as she lifted her head again. “Never forget that, and remember who told you. I am a kestra’chern. I know.”

“I shall try,” she promised solemnly.

“Good.” Amberdrake tossed the cloth into a pile of things for Gesten to clean up and sort, pulled the tent flap aside, and gestured to her to walk beside him. “Care to take a stroll with me? I have time, if you do.”

But she shook her head, “I would like this, but truly, I must go. I have a mission to fly in the morning.” She glowed with pride. “A real mission, and not make work for a misborn.”

His heart plummeted. It had been so easy to think of those exercises of hers as mere games, and to forget that they were intended to make her fit for combat. It had been possible to pretend that she would never go where so many others had been lost. “A long one?” he asked, trying not to show his apprehension. There was no more reason to be apprehensive about her than about any other gryphon. Less so, in fact, for the makaar could not anticipate her moves as they could those of a gryphon with conventional training. Wasn’t that what made Skan so successful, that the makaar couldn’t anticipate what he would do next?

Nevertheless, a chill he knew only too well settled over him. That is what makes Skan so much of a target as well. Eliminate him, and you strike a terrible blow at the gryphons as a whole, for it makes them more predictable.

Once again, someone he knew and cared for would be going away, making herself into a thing the enemy could strike at and-

And this was a war, however he might like to forget the fact. It was Zhaneel’s responsibility to obey her orders, wherever they took her, a responsibility for which she had been bred and trained.

And she was so pleased, so happy about this assignment; so very proud that she had been entrusted with it. How could he spoil it with his own fears and nerves?

He couldn’t, of course. So, as always, he tried to ignore the way his insides knotted up around a ball of ice in the pit of his stomach, and smiled and praised her, as he had smiled and praised every fighter he had sent out to this war. And despite the anxiety he felt, he did mean every word.

That was his duty, his responsibility. Give them confidence; relax them. Make them forget the past if they must, and remind them of what their reasons for fighting are. Show them that they have a life beyond the fighting, a life worth saving.

“It is a high-flight mission,” Zhaneel continued, blissfully unaware of the way his heart ached, and the pain in his soul. “The place where Skandranon found those stick-things. I am to carry the thing that Urtho made, which undoes them, and fly a pattern while I make it work; the rest of Sixth Wing East is to rain them with smoke-boxes. Then the fighters come, under cover of the smoke.”

So she would be above the general level of the fighting, presumably out of reach of any ground weapons. But makaar?

They’ll have to fight their way through Sixth Wing to get to her, he reminded himself. She’s carrying one of Urtho’s magic boxes, which makes her nonexpendable. They’ll protect her.

If they can. If the makaar don’t get through. If the magic really does work on those lightning-sticks.

If, if, if. Who commanded this mission anyway? If it was General Shaiknam-then even carrying a precious magical artifact, Zhaneel was considered expendable by virtue of the fact that she was a gryphon.

“Urtho pla

“Then fly high and well, warrior,” Amberdrake told her, patting her shoulder with expertly simulated confidence. “I shall have fresh fish waiting for your return, and a victory feast.”

Zhaneel’s tiny ear-tufts rose at that. “Fresh fish?” she said, clicking her beak in anticipation. “Truly?” She adored fresh fish-by which she meant, still alive-and liked it better when they wiggled as she swallowed them. Where she had acquired this particular taste, Amberdrake could not imagine; most gryphons preferred raw, red meat, and none but she liked their fish still living.

Maybe there’s some osprey in her somewhere. Or there are some eagles that have a liking for fish. Or maybe it is only because it is Zhaneel. “Truly,” he promised. “A victory feast between friends, though I shall have my fish nicely cooked.”

Zhaneel made a little hiss of distaste to tease him, but readily agreed to the celebration.

What Amberdrake had not told her was that it was not going to be a victory di

Now let her only survive this, he thought, as he saw her off to her roost for the night. Let her only survive this. . . .

Zhaneel held the precious box between her fore-claws, although it was quite securely fastened to her elaborate harness by clips and straps so that it did not interfere with her flying in any way. Her orders from Urtho had been quite detailed and just as specific. She must come in very high, far above the rest of the Sixth Wing; she must then dive as steeply as she could, then level off at about treetop height, making a fast pass above the heads of Ma’ar’s troopers, and press the catch that opened the bottom of the box as she did so.

A spy had confirmed that lightning-sticks had been distributed to the fighters. Urtho had told her before she left-Urtho himself!-that the thing in the box was something like a lantern, and its “light” would make the lightning-sticks useless as its rays fell on them. She would have to make several passes in order to be certain of getting most of the lightning-sticks, and each time he wanted her to come in from high above at great speed-hopefully so great that no one could train his weapons on her in time, and no makaar would be swift enough to follow. Like a peregrine falcon on a flock of ducks-or a merlin harassing pigeons.

It would take several passes to be certain of most of the lightning-sticks, for the box was useless past a certain range. And even Urtho was not sure how many passes it would take to neutralize the bulk of them. It depended on how closely the troops had been packed together, and whether Ma’ar’s mages had put shielding on the sticks themselves, or those who carried them.

It would likely be on the stick. Ma’ar would not care if the man survived, so long as the stick did.

The box would work through a shield, Urtho was confident of that. He’d warned her not to use any spells if she had them, saying the box was simply a thing that negated the controlling force on magic. It would negate the shield as well as the stick’s power pent within. The trick was, he couldn’t anticipate the effect of two spells being negated at the same time. He had used the only example of the stick that they had in making certain the box worked at a reasonable distance. Zhaneel had seen the effect of that-not much. A little light, and that was all.