Three
Skandranon continued to peer off into the blue, cloudless sky for a long time after Tadrith and Silverblade were out of even his extraordinary range of vision. Even after fooling himself several times that some speck or other was them, he gazed on, feeling his eyes gradually go out of focus as his thoughts wandered.
He was torn now between pride and anxiety. Their takeoff had been a very good one by anyone’s standards; stylish, crisp, and professional. There had been no exhibitions of fancy flying, but not a single mistake in maneuvering either. With so many people watching, he would have been tempted to indulge in some theatrics, when he was Tad’s age.
And the odds were fairly good that I could have pulled them off, too. But on the other hand, I did have my share of foul ups. With the rising sun in his eyes, though, it didn’t make any sense to keep staring off after them. He suppressed a sigh, and told his knotting stomach to behave itself; a gryphon’s bowels were irritable enough without encouraging cramps through worry.
Well, they’re gone. My nestling really has fledged, gone past the brancher stage, and now—well, now he’s on his way to have his own adventures. Real adventures, not just high scores on the obstacle course. He’ll be making a name for himself now, just like I did.
He dropped his eyes to meet Zhaneel’s, and saw the same pride and worry in her gaze that he felt. She wouldn’t show it in front of the boy and, in fact, had kept up a brave and cheerful front, but he knew this sudden departure had her upset.
He tried to look completely confident for her, but it was a struggle that he wasn’t certain he had won. Adventures. Huh. Now that he wasn’t the one having the “adventures,” he wasn’t so sure whether or not looking for adventures was such a good idea. Was Tad ready? With the war, there had been no choice but to go and face the dangers—whether one was ready or not—but this wasn’t war, and it seemed to him that they could all afford to be more careful of their young.
His wings twitched a little as the temptation to follow them rose before him. I could use some exercise. Lady Cinnabar is always telling me to get more flying time in. And if I happened to parallel their course—
“You promised not to fly as the children’s wingman all the way to the outpost,” Zhaneel whispered, quietly enough that no one else could have overheard her. “Remember. You did promise.”
Drat. He had. And she could read him like a child’s primer. He twitched his wings again, ostentatiously settling them. “I’m glad I’m not making that trip,” he said, not precisely as a reply, but to reassure her and to show her that he had heard her and he remembered his promise. Granted, she had caught him in a moment of extreme weakness and vulnerability last night when she extracted that promise, but that did not negate the fact that he had made the promise in the first place. If the Black Gryphon’s word to his mate wasn’t good, how could anyone trust him?
Aubri sniffed derisively. “You couldn’t make that trip, old bird,” he retorted. “They’re a lot younger than you, and in better shape on top of that.”
Skan bristled and started to retort, but paused for a moment to rethink his position. Aubri was not going to get him going this time. “Oh, in theory I could,” he replied, as mild as a well-bred matron. “You did, and I’m in better shape than you—what’s more, Tad’s towing that carry-basket, and that will slow him down to a pace even you could hold. But what would the point be? What would I have to prove? That I’m stupid enough to make a pointless journey to show I’m still the equal of a youngster? It would be a complete waste of time, and I don’t have enough time to waste.”
Aubri looked surprised and chagrined that he hadn’t managed to egg Skan on to rash words or a rasher boast.
Zhaneel cast him a look of gratitude which promised another interesting evening, and more than made up for the faint blow to his pride administered by Aubri’s taunts.
Judeth had listened to the conversation with a wry half-smile, and now put her own opinion. “So, now the next generation goes off hunting adventures,” she said, combing her fingers through her hair, “while we stay home and see to it that when they come back, they won’t find anything much changed. Personally, I don’t envy them in the least.”
“Nor I,” Skan said firmly. “Adventures always seemed to involve impact with the ground at a high rate of speed, and ended in a lot of pain. Maybe my memory is faulty sometimes, but I haven’t forgotten that part.”
Amberdrake finally came out of his own reverie and sighed. “Your memory isn’t faulty, old bird. I remember picking quite a few pieces of broken foliage and not a few rocks out of your hide, and more than once.” He patted Skan’s shoulder. “I don’t know why you couldn’t have picked a gentler way of collecting souvenirs.”
Skan winced, and Aubri grinned at his discomfiture. From the look in his eyes, Aubri was about to make another stab at puncturing Skan’s pride.
But Aubri had reckoned without Winterhart, who had been listening just as intently to the conversation as Judeth had.
“And I recall that rather than collecting souvenirs of enemy territory, Aubri specialized in attracting enemy fire,” she said, with a little smirk and a wink at Judeth that was so fast Aubri didn’t catch it. “In fact, he did it so often that his wing used to refer to getting hit by flamestrike as ‘being Aubri’ed.’ As in, ‘Well, I’ve been Aubri’ed out until my primaries grow back.’ Or, ‘Well, you certainly got Aubri’ed back there!’”
Aubri met this piece of intelligence with his beak open in a gape. “They did not!” he gasped indignantly.
Of course they didn’t. Skan, who had known every piece of gossip there was to know back then, would have heard of this long before Winterhart ever had. In fact, Winterhart would probably not have heard any such thing, since before she was Amberdrake’s lover, she had tended to treat the gryphons of her wing as little more than intelligent animals. Such an attitude was not likely to make anyone tell her anything.
But Aubri’s reaction was so delightful that everyone fell in with the joke. For once, someone besides Skan was going to come in for a share of abuse.
Is it my birthday? Or has the Kaled’a’in Lady decided to bless me, however momentarily?
Judeth rubbed the side of her nose with her finger. “I’m afraid they did,” she confirmed impishly, and then elaborated on it. “When I deployed your wing, they always liked to fly formation with you on the end since it just about guaranteed that no one else would get hit with lightning or mage-fire. Once or twice I heard them talking about ‘Old Charcoal,’ and I think they meant you.”
Aubri’s beak worked, but nothing came out; the muscles of his throat were moving, too, but he didn’t even utter as much as a squeak.
“It could have been worse,” Winterhart continued, delivering the final blow. “I did succeed in discouraging the nickname of ‘Fried Chicken.’”