The Black Gryphon

“I think you’d better hurry.” That was all the hertasi said, but it was enough. He left the splinting of the final bone and the binding of the wing as a whole to one of the assistants, and came around to Gesten’s side of the table.

He knew with a glance why Gesten had called him; the sheer dead weight of the injured wing was so great that the bolt wound was tearing open, and the great wing vein was perilously close to the site of the wound. A fracture under that pressure could simply break wide open and sever the vein as it went.

Quickly, he directed Gesten under the gryphon’s wing, to take some of the strain off, and reached out to hold the wound closed, being careful not to pinch. He closed his eyes and concentrated, Seeing the injury, examining it with his i

Skandranon moaned and coughed weakly, as if something were caught in his throat. His breathing steadied as the fourth Healer pushed him back into slumber, but he was taken by a fit of coughing again that caused everyone near to hold onto him tightly. Amberdrake was peripherally aware of Tamsin putting his arm down Skandranon’s gullet while an assistant held the beak open with a metal bar, and then the badly wounded gryphon wheezed, shook, and fell into deep sleep again.

The assistants administered fortifying herbal and mineral infusions of all kinds into the gryphon while Amberdrake set Skandranon’s fractured forearms and splinted his foreclaws.

Finally, it was over, and he swayed away from the table, letting the assistants do their mechanical labor of bandaging and bracing. He saw then that Tamsin and Ci

The tables and floors were a disaster. Blood-how could a flyer hold so much blood? he thought-and cut-away feathers pasted bits of bark and leaves to the floor. On the table, a length of a crossbow bolt lay amid the other debris, next to something that was relatively clean-a leather-wrapped handle of some kind, perhaps a broken sword. That must have been what was blocking his throat, Amberdrake thought numbly. How would it get there. . . ?

Amberdrake blinked once and staggered back.

“No, you don’t!” Gesten left Skandranon’s side to go to Amberdrake’s, getting under the kestra’chern’s arm and bracing him upright. “It’s bed for you, Drake. Skan’s going to be fine-but you’d better lie down before you pass out!”

“I think you’re right,” Amberdrake murmured, actually finding a chuckle somewhere. Skan’s going to be all right. He made it back. That was all that really mattered, after all. The cold place inside him had warmed; the emptiness erased. Skan made it back.

With Gesten’s help, he tottered off down the slight slope to the kestra’chern’s portion of the camp, just beyond the Healers’. He was so tired, he hardly noticed when he was guided into his own tent, except that the bright light of the morning sun dimmed, and the cool, fresh air took on a tinge of incense and body-scent. That was when he pulled away from Gesten, staggered to his bed, and collapsed across it. He managed to position himself the right way, but after that, he knew nothing more.

Amberdrake felt Skandranon’s pain and frustration as he awoke. Even after-how many?-hours of needed oblivion, there was a dull ache in Amberdrake’s body in all the places he’d helped Heal in Skandranon’s body the night before. In all the places that Amberdrake didn’t have a direct analog to-the wings and tail, especially the wings-there was an ache. It was an aftershock effect that Healers knew well and had to live with; in the case of the wing pain, it bunched in Amberdrake’s shoulder blades and upper arms, like a bruised muscle cramping to the bone.

Amberdrake had awakened feeling as if he had run for days carrying a full pack; as if he had worked for two days without a rest-

-in short, as if he had served his full roster of clients, then Healed a gravely injured gryphon.

Gesten-loyal, competent Gesten-had drawn the sleeping-curtains to block as much light as possible from reaching the exhausted kestra’chern and was, no doubt, away from the tent clearing Amberdrake’s schedule of responsibilities.

Amberdrake pulled the blankets from himself and stood up, steadying himself on a ring set into the oversized bed frame. He washed quickly and gulped down a meal of meat strips and flatbread, then pulled on the caftan and belt Gesten had laid out for him. By his clothes was a roster-sheet of appointments for the day; all but one had been crossed out, and that one was not due for another two hours.

Amberdrake stepped out from the spell-quieted canvas of his multiroomed tent into the afternoon daylight of the camp. Messenger-birds shot past, brightly colored, calling their descending chittering cry, while smoke from cook-fires scented the air they flew through. Three laughing children ran by, wearing the green and yellow ribbons of their parents’ cadre, chased by a playful kyree with a bright red ball in its mouth. This was the way life should be. Amberdrake stretched, then ran a hand across his chin and cheeks as he squinted in the light; time to shave again before serving that client. A thorough general grooming was in order after he insured that Skandranon was healing properly. Being immaculately groomed always made him feel better.

He threaded his way through the shacks, forges, and service huts to the great tent where he’d left the Black Gryphon languishing that morning. In the daytime, the camp was far more inviting, despite the tension that was apparent everywhere you looked.

Assistant Healers and surgery aides surged past Amberdrake as he stepped inside, all intent on taking care of small administrative tasks and stocking supply shelves while the luxury of time was theirs. Casualties could course in like an overwhelming wave at any moment, so any spare minutes had to be spent in preparation. The war hadn’t left the Healers much time to rest; they (and the grave diggers, body burners, and clergy) had few hours of leisure time. That was the nature of a war, after all. It ate spirits and bodies. It fed like any other creature.

War forced individuals and species together in ways no peacetime situation would duplicate, and some of the oddest friendships-even loves-came out of that. Amberdrake’s affection for Gesten was natural, given the long association that hertasi had with the Kaled’a’in. Only the war and the needs of the fighters for support perso

But the bond between himself and the Black Gryphon-that was something that would never have occurred in peaceful times. The gryphons were literally u