There was another drug that did the same service for gryphons; she dragged the pack of supplies nearer to Tad, fumbled out a larger vial, and handed it to him. He tilted his head back just enough that he would be able to swallow, and poured the contents into his beak, clamping it shut instantly so as not to waste a single bitter drop.
She knew the moment it took effect; his limbs all relaxed, and his breathing eased. “Now what?” he asked. “You can see what’s wrong better than I can.”
“First you are going to have to help me,” she told him. “I can’t try to move you until this collarbone is set and immobilized. If I try, I think I might pass out again—”
“A bad idea, you shouldn’t do that,” he agreed, and flexed his forelimbs experimentally. “I think I can do that. Sit there, and we’ll try.”
He was deft and gentle, and she still blacked out twice before he was finished amidst his jabbered apologies for each mistake. When he was done, though, her arm and shoulder were bound up in a tight, ugly but effective package, and the collarbone had been set. Hopefully, it would remain set; they had no way to put a rigid cast on a collarbone. Only a mage could do that; the Healers hadn’t even figured out a way to do so.
Then it was his turn.
It could not have been any easier for him, although he did not lose consciousness as she rolled him off the broken wing, set it, and bound it in place. This time she did use the bonesetting kit; the splints and bandages that hardened into rigid forms when first soaked, then dried. She was no trondi’irn, but she had learned as much as she could from her mother, once it became obvious to her that her old playmate Tad was going to be her permanent partner. Besides that, though, she guessed. She didn’t know enough of the finer points of gryphon physiology to know if what she did now would cause lifelong crippling. Thin moans escaped Tad’s clenched beak from time to time, however, and he did ask her to pause three times during the operation.
Finally they both staggered free of the ruins, collapsed on the thick leaf mold of the forest floor, and waited for the pain to subside beneath the ministrations of their potions.
It felt like forever before she was able to think of anything except the fiery throbbing of her shoulder, but gradually the potion took greater hold, or else the binding eased some of the strain. The forest canopy was still preternaturally silent; their plunge through it had frightened away most of the inhabitants, and the birds and animals had not yet regained their courage. She was intermittently aware of odd things, as different senses sharpened for an instant, and her mind overloaded with scent or sound. The sharp, sour smell of broken wood—the call of one insect stupid enough to be oblivious to them—the unexpected note of vivid red of a single, wilting flower they had brought down with them—
“What happened?” she asked quietly, into the strange stillness. It was an obvious question; one moment, they were flying along and all was well, and the next moment, they were plummeting like arrowshot ducks.
His eyes clouded, and the nictitating membrane came down over them for a moment, giving him a wall-eyed look. “I don’t know,” he said, slowly, haltingly. “Honestly. I can’t tell you anything except what’s obvious, that the magic keeping the basket at a manageable weight just—dissolved, disappeared. I don’t know why, or how.”
She felt her stomach turn over. Not the most comforting answer In the world. Up until now, she had not been afraid, but now. . . .
I can’t let this eat at me. We don’t know what happened, remember? It could still all be an accident. “Could there have been a mage-storm?” she persisted. “A small one, or a localized one perhaps?”
He flattened his ear-tufts and shook his head emphatically. “No. No, I’m sure of it. Gryphons are sensitive to mage-storms, the way that anyone with joint swellings is sensitive to damp or real, physical storms. No, there was no mage-storm; I would know if one struck.”
Her heart thudded painfully, and her stomach twisted again. If it wasn’t a “natural” event. . . . “An attack?” she began—but he shook his head again.
But he looked more puzzled than fearful. “It wasn’t an attack either,” he insisted. “At least, it wasn’t anything I’d recognize as an attack. It wasn’t anything offensive that I’d recognize.” He gazed past her shoulder as if he was searching for words to describe what he had felt. “It was more like—like suddenly having your bucket spring a leak. The magic just drained out, but suddenly. And I don’t know how or why. All the magic just—just went away.”
All the magic just went away. . . . Suddenly, the chill hand of panic that she had been fighting seized the back of her neck, and she lurched to her feet. If the magic in the basket had drained away, what about all the other magic?
“What’s wrong?” he asked, as she stumbled toward the wreckage of the basket and the tumbled piles of supplies.
“Nothing—I hope!” she called back, with an edge in her voice. What’s closest? The firestarter? Yes-there it is! The firestarter was something every Apprentice mage made by the dozen; they were easy to create, once the disciplines of creating an object had been mastered. It was good practice, making them. They were also useful, and since their average life was about six months, you could always barter them to anyone in the city once you’d made them. Anyone could use one; you didn’t have to be a mage to activate it—most were always ready, and to use one you simply used whatever simple trigger the mage had built in. The one in their supplies was fresh; Tad had just made it himself before they left.
It didn’t look like much; just a long metal tube with a wick protruding from one end. You were supposed to squeeze a little polished piece of stone set into the other end with your thumb, and the wick would light.
You could manipulate it with one hand if you had to, and of course, she had to. Hoping that her hunch had been wrong, she fumbled the now-dented tube out of a tangle of ropes and cooking gear, and thumbed the end.
Nothing happened.
She tried it again, several times, then brought it back to Tad. “This isn’t working,” she said tightly. “What’s wrong with it?”
He took it from her and examined it, his eyes almost crossing as he peered at it closely. “The—the magic’s gone,” he said hesitantly. “It’s not a firestarter anymore, just a tube of metal with a wick in it.”
“I was afraid you’d say that.” Grimly she returned to the tumbled supplies, and pawed through them, looking for anything that had once been magical in nature. Every movement woke the pain in her shoulder, but she forced herself to ignore it. The way that the supplies had tumbled out aided her; the last things into the basket had been on top, and that meant they were still accessible.
The mage-light in the lantern was no longer glowing. The tent—well, she couldn’t test that herself, she couldn’t even unfold it herself, but the canvas felt oddly limp under her hand, without a hint of the resistance it used to possess. The teleson—