He made himself comfortable, and once Blade draped a blanket over him so that he was warm, he fell asleep quickly.
Strange images, too fleeting to be called “dreams,” drifted with him. Visions of himself, visiting a trading fair in Khimbata, but as an adult rather than a child trailing after his Haighlei nurse, Makke; moments of flying so high above the earth that even with his keen eyesight, humans below him were no more than specks. There were visions that were less rational. He thought, once, that the trees were talking to him, but in a language he didn’t recognize, and that they grew frustrated and angry with him because he didn’t understand what they were trying to tell him.
None of this was enough to actually disturb his rest; he roused just enough to dismiss the dreams that were unpleasant without actually breaking his sleep, then drifted back into darkness.
He was just about on the verge of waking all by himself—half-dreaming that he ought to wake, but unable to really get the energy to rouse himself— when Blade shook him slightly, enough to jar him completely out of his half-sleep.
He blinked up at her; her face was a bizarre mask of purpling bruises and dancing golden firelight. If it had been a little more symmetrical and less obviously painful, it would have been oddly attractive. He tasted bitter herbs in the air as she yawned, and guessed that she had bandaged herself with some of her human medicines.
“I took more painkillers, and I can’t stay awake anymore,” she confessed, yawning again. “I haven’t seen or heard anything that I can confirm, although my imagination has been working away nicely.”
“Fine, then get some sleep,” he said, a little thickly, and blinked to clear his eyes. “I’ll take over until dawn.”
She settled herself between the wall of the tent and him, lying against him. He let her curl up in such a way as to take the most advantage of his warmth; she needed it. And she probably needs the comfort just as much, he thought, as she tried to arrange herself in a way that would cause the least pain to her broken collarbone. It can’t have been easy, sitting here, staring into the dark, and wondering what was out there, with your partner a great snoring lump beside you.
Granted, he wouldn’t have stayed a great snoring lump for long if there’d been trouble, but that was no comfort when you were straining your ears trying to tell if that was a nightbird, a bug, or a maneating whatever out there.
Gryphons were not noted for having powerful night vision, but both Skandranon and his two offspring were better than the norm at seeing in the dark. They weren’t owls—but they weren’t half-blind, either, and they were better than humans. He let his eyes adjust to the darkness, and mentally marked the shadows so that he knew where everything was. Some, he could even identify, by matching the general shape with his memory of the objects surrounding the camp; the place that looked like a crouching bear was really a stump overgrown with inedible fungi. And the bush that seemed to have a deeper shadow at the heart of it really did; it had grown around what remained of a snag, which could have passed for another crouching creature. Deep in the distance, a phosphorescent shape was a rotting tree with a patch of foxfire fungus in it—and it wasn’t really moving, that was an illusion brought on by eyestrain. Things that might have been pairs of eyes reflecting the firelight were nothing of the kind; if he watched them until they moved, it was clear that they moved independently of one another, which meant they were only a couple of light-bearing insects, probably flying in pairs because they were in the middle of a mating dance. A swift and silent shape passing from branch to branch above his head was an owl; one that flew with a faint fluttering just out of range of the firelight was a bat.
Once he identified things in his range of vision, he began cataloging sounds. The obvious buzzes and whirs were insect calls; likewise there were croaks and cheeps he knew were frogs. There were some calls he recognized from around White Gryphon; not all the creatures here were new to him. The occasional sleepy twitter or mutter from high above meant that something had mildly disturbed a bird’s rest—nothing to worry about, birds bumped into each other while they slept all the time.
Then there were the howls, barks, and growls. He took note of all of them, keeping track of where they were coming from and under what circumstances. Most of them originated from up in the tree canopy; that meant that, barring something completely strange, whatever made them wasn’t going to bother the two down below. The things living in the trees would, for the most part, be prey rather than predator; life in the tree tops was difficult, with the most difficult task of all being how to get to water.
Anything living up there had a reason not to want to live on the ground. Any creature up there would probably be relatively small, no bigger than Blade at the most, with a disproportionately loud call, because in the thick leaf cover up there, it would be hard to keep track of herd- or flock-mates. And if you yelled loudly enough when something grabbed you, there was a chance that you might startle it into letting go.
Predators in the tree canopy would either be snakes or winged; four-footed predators would hunt on the ground. While it was certainly possible that there could be a snake up there large enough to swallow Blade or even Tad, it would not be able to seize both of them at once, and it would not be very fast except when it struck. That left winged predators, and Tad was confident that he would be a match for anything that flew, even grounded.
No, what they had to worry about was what lay down here, so sounds up above could be dismissed unless and until they erupted in warning or alarm calls.
While his vision was incredibly keen by human standards, it was even more suited to picking up tiny movements. So once he had identified everything that lay in front of the shelter, he did not need to sit and stare into the darkness as Blade did. He need only relax and let his eyes tell him when something out there had changed its position. No matter how clever a predator was at skulking, sooner or later it would have to cross a place where he would spot it moving through the shadows, even on a night with no moon.
His hearing was just as good, and now that he knew what the normal noises were, he could listen through them for the sound of a grunt, a growl, or the hiss of breath—or for the rustle of a branch—or the crack of a twig snapped beneath a foot.
That was the other reason why he didn’t mind taking second watch. When all was said and done, he was much better suited to it than Blade was.
Now, if anything decided to come up behind them, he wouldn’t see it, and he might not hear it either. But it wouldn’t get through the canvas and basketry of their shelter quickly, and they should have time to defend themselves.
Or so I tell myself.
He stared out into the darkness, watching winking insect lights, and finally acknowledged to himself that, far .from feeling competent, he was feeling rather helpless.
We’re both crippled and in pain, we can’t use most of the weapons we have left, we aren ‘t entirely certain where we are, and we’re too far from home to get back, and that’s the honest truth. I don’t like it at all.
They had to hope that in three days or so, when they didn’t make the appointed rendezvous, they’d be missed, and that White Gryphon would send out a search party looking for them. They had to hope that they could survive long enough to be found!