The wingcat staggered in the air, whirling to bat Tek’s horn away. Jan pitched forward. His knees struck earth. The gryphon’s weight came down and knocked the breath from him. He could not gather his legs beneath him.
“Run!” shouted Tek. At first Jan thought she was talking to him. Then he saw Dagg before him on the hillcrest, blinking at the blood from a long scratch on his forehead. “Away. Give the alarm,” Tek was calling. “Go!”
She reared and brought her forehooves down on the fallen gryphon, but was driven back by the great, thrashing wings.
“You’re too small to aid me here. Fetch help!” cried Tek. She whirled on Dagg and struck him across the flank with the flat of her horn. “Haste, away!”
Dagg bounded over the hillcrest, shouting the alarm.
The wingcat rose to her hind legs and scrambled to turn. Jan felt himself clutched again; she dragged him with her. As she and Tek faced each other now, the formel began backing away. Tek pursued her, slowly, over the brow of the hill. The young warrior’s head was down, her horn ready. The gryphon held Jan between herself and Tek.
The formel edged backward through the trees. Jan caught a glimpse of open space behind. The Vale spread out below them. Dagg’s distant cries told him his friend had nearly reached the valley floor. As the gryphon edged toward the end of the trees, Tek feinted and sidled, seeking to drive her back into the wood. But the wingcat screamed, snapping and holding her ground.
The slope opened treeless behind them. Jan felt the formel spring backward once, twice. He was dragged along—and they were airborne again. Jan struggled furiously, for if she got him away from the ground this time, he knew he was lost.
The formel’s wings caught an updraft, beating hard. Tek sprang from the hillside, seeming to fly herself for a moment. Jan still thrashed in the gryphon’s grasp, but could not break loose. Tek passed beneath them—too low, and cold anguish filled Jan as he realized she had missed her lunge.
Then the wingcat lurched downward suddenly, losing her hold. Her talons tore across his shoulders. He slid free and dropped to the rocky slope. Jan bolted to his feet, wheeling about, and saw Tek skidding downhill with the gryphon’s tail caught fast in her teeth.
Tek scrambled to brace herself. She turned, her forelegs splayed, weight thrown back on her hindquarters like a wolf cub playing tug-at-bone. Jan saw her head shaken from side to side, the sinews of her long neck straining, her forehooves lifted from the mountainside as the wingcat fought to flee.
Abruptly, the formel faced about, tearing herself loose. The half-grown mare ducked and dodged. The gryphon struck at her with beak and talons. Eyes half shut against the buffeting of those massive, blue-gold wings, Tek feinted clumsily twice, three times with her horn, but missed each time. Jan saw lines of blood against the pale rose of her neck and shoulders.
He yelled, bounding downslope, and sprang between them. Rearing, he struck the gryphon with hoof and horn. Anger welled in him. Why wouldn’t Tek fight? She merely stood, her head bowed, backing slowly downslope while the relentless formel boxed and buffeted her. Jan drove the gryphon back.
“No!” Tek shouted furiously, and shouldered him roughly aside. She snatched the formel in her teeth again, by the wing this time, dragging her forward, past Jan and farther downslope. Below, behind them in the Vale, Jan heard Dagg’s alarm cry taken up by other voices.
And he understood then, suddenly. It was a trap, a game. Tek was baiting the gryphon, holding her until the warriors arrived. Jan bounded after the pair of them. If Tek would drag, then he would drive.
He reared and fell on the formel’s furred and feathered shoulders. She wheeled, freeing herself from Tek, and struck at him with her great, hooked beak. Jan fell back, feinting at her. He had seen young warriors do that when they sparred.
“Stay back!” Tek shouted. Jan circled downslope, drawing the gryphon after him, toward Tek.
“You’re too small. You’re not a warrior,” she cried.
“Get behind me. Get back!”
She interposed herself between him and the gryphon. Her backward stepping forced him farther downhill. Too enraged to think of escape, the wingcat lunged after them, screaming and snapping. In the distance behind, he was aware of war cries, the drumming of hooves upon the slope.
“Let me by; let me fight,” Jan yelled at Tek. He dodged, trying to slip past her. Tek sidled and kicked at him one-footed to keep him behind.
“You haven’t the skill,” she snapped, parrying a feint from the formel’s claw. She kept herself squarely between the gryphon and Jan. “If she catches you again, she’ll carry you off. She can’t lift me—stand back! You’re in my way. Keep b….”
Her words bit off suddenly. Jan saw a stone skid from under the young mare’s heel. She sprawled sideways, head up, her throat exposed. The formel’s beak darted, and Jan cried out, vaulting forward before he could even think. He was aware of yelling, keening some terrible war chant.
And suddenly, unicorns, others of his people were surging around him. He glimpsed Tas snorting and plunging, and Leerah his mate. Tek had found her feet again and was fighting like a hillcat. The formel was a fury of screams and talons. Jan saw Dagg charging amid the fray, tearing at the gryphon’s wings.
Then someone was rearing, fighting beside him—massy and powerful, blacker than storm. His mighty voice thundered, “Alma, great Alma! Stand at my shoulder, O Mother-of-all!” Other warriors took up the cry. The formel shrilled. The sky above spanned amber and amethyst. The sun in the west was fire.
Jan saw his father rise to stand against the sky, a poultice of chewed medicine wort above his eye now beginning to flake and fall away. A gash. It was only a gash! Jan felt relief flooding his limbs. Korr glanced at him, and Jan saw a gleam he had never seen there before.
His heart lifted, soaring. His aching limbs felt suddenly wondrously strong. Pride, pride lit his sire’s eye! He let go a war chant, sang wild and high. He was redeemed. It made him giddy. A deeper trumpet sounded from the prince of the unicorns.
Then it was over, all at once, too suddenly. Jan realized dizzily the fight was done. He came to a halt, and let the careening world around him steady. Unicorns ringed the fallen formel. Fur and feathers lay on the ground.
Dagg stood across from Jan, panting and grinning. His father nearby him pawed the earth gently with one forehoof. Beside him Leerah, pale with dark red dapples, nudged the dead formel with her horn. Tas bent to clean the blood from a nick in his mate’s neck.
Jan shook his head and snorted. The fire in his blood had not yet stilled. Tek stood two paces from him, putting no weight on her near foreleg. On the others, Jan saw only a few feather cuts and bruises, a slash or two. He was astonished how unscathed they all were. He ached to the very bone.
Jan turned then to look at his father. The look of approval had not faded from Korr’s eye. “Have I not always said,” the prince was saying at large, “what a clever colt I sired—to spot the gryphon that got away when none of the rest of us saw? A fighter, too.”
The warriors snorted, stamping their assent. Jan’s ears burned. Korr was deceived. The prince knew only half the truth. But at that moment, Jan would not have enlightened his sire for all the world. He shook himself And, if he had not entirely earned his father’s goodwill, he was resolved to do so faithfully from this day forward. No more Lawbreaking. He swore it.
More quietly, his father was asking him now, “Are you hale?”
Jan nodded. “Aye.” His voice was hoarse from yelling. “And you?”
The prince nodded. “I’ll mend. Come, then.” He turned, and Jan went beside him. “Teki the healer should see to those cuts.”
Jan felt a throbbing in his wounded shoulders then. His side felt bruised. His hurt leg bore his weight only unsteadily. Slowly, he and his father started down the slope. Below them, on the valley floor, Jan saw others waiting. His pale dam, Ses, her round belly heavy and ripe, stood among them.