Holly landed next to a fallen, half-buried tree trunk and patted the surface with one outstretched wing. I slung the packs containing my swab kits over my shoulder and dismounted while she smoothed out a spot in the sand to stretch out. All around us, griffins were making themselves comfortable in similar fashion.
“What do we do now?” I whispered. Actually, there was no specific reason for me to keep my voice low. But it just seemed proper, given the expectant feeling in the air.
“When the spicewood burns down to the embers, then is the time for the telling of the family sagas,” Holly replied. “This is one part of what draws our people back from all over Andeluvia.”
“Griffins really are travelers.”
“Many of our kind travel, few wander,” Holly mused. “That’s one of the old sayings, anyway. But that is the way of our kind. Plus, few of us are smiths, farmers, or good with crafts. Rather, we excel at hunting, flying and fighting, so we barter our skills with many countries in exchange for metalwork, goods we cannot create easily, or service in kind.”
I nodded, thinking of the arrangement the griffins had with the nation of Kescar. Obviously, one of the plum assignments was to be part of Fitzwilliam’s Air Cavalry. “You said the saga was one part of what drew griffins. What are the other reasons?”
A throaty laugh. “You shall see. It is not hard to figure out.”
The griffins off to our right passed around a huge, dual-handled white cup. The size and shape allowed each griffin to grasp the container easily with their lion paws. Also, it let them each take a deep drink of the contents before they passed it on to the next person.
“That is the sacred drink made from spicewood,” Holly said, as the cup came our way. “You will be the first human in many years to have tried it.”
Hopefully I won’t be the first human in many years to have died from drinking it, my mind helpfully supplied, but I pushed that thought away. Griffins were able to tolerate eating and drinking a lot of things I’d categorize as ‘inedible’. But I trusted Holly’s judgement, so I didn’t think I’d need transformation into a magical deer to try the spicewood drink.
I wasn’t strong enough to handle a cup the size of a sports trophy, so when it came to my turn, Holly helped me hold the vessel as I put my lips to the blood-red mixture inside and took a big slurp. I nodded, let go of my end, and she took a long drink of her own.
I swirled the liquid around my tongue and then swallowed. The brothlike substance was tart and herbal at the same time. In fact, it reminded me of a stew I’d had at a back alley place in Chicago’s Little Sicily. I immediately felt a flush of good feelings pervade my insides.
“Take note as to what my father is doing,” Holly said with a nod. Sure enough, Grimshaw was working his way among the different fires, speaking with several griffins and pointing in my direction. “He does not wish to antagonize his True Born so he keeps his distance, but he is busy sending all the newly arrived warriors over to you for your magic test.”
“He wants me to test them here, now?”
“It is the best and only place. All the warriors are here. They will be much too distracted or tired later on.”
“But what of the family sagas?”
“Talk and revelry are expected,” she reassured me. “Elder Ulrik knows your task, he shall not take offense if you work while he speaks.”
I certainly hoped that, under Holly and Shaw’s guidance, I wasn’t committing any major faux pas. Griffin warriors began to politely line up, waiting for me to perform my test. I hastily set up my kits on the wide, flat surface of the fallen tree and motioned for the first to approach. The warriors were of many different ages and dress – some wore armor, others headdresses and earrings similar to Belladonna’s, while most eschewed any ornamentation other than stripes of colorful war paint.
The fire from the braziers had dimmed down and the smoke turned to lavender when Elder Ulrik abruptly rose, stood upon his hind legs, and spread his wings to the sky. At the other fires, the remaining Elders performed similarly.
“Harken unto me,” he chanted, his voice echoing what was heard at the other fires. “For this night, the night we celebrate the turn of the season to harvest and blood moon, we shall tell the saga of the Dagfinnar family.”
A couple of the griffins around our fire let out raucous caws of approval. Similar noises came from the other gatherings, though I’d heard distinctly different names spoken there. Holly spoke quickly before the noises of excitement died down.
“Every year, each Elder chooses which family saga they wish to tell,” she explained. “You are in luck. The family that Ulrik picked this year has a long, fabled history. You will have plenty to listen to as you work.”
She wasn’t kidding about that. While the pace of my testing was slow, it was steady and unrelenting as more and more griffins arrived from all points of the compass. In the meantime, Elder Ulrik spoke in his deep, steady voice about feats, births, and battles. I don’t know if I could have followed the multi-hour saga if my full attention had been on it. But it was interesting stuff, rather like having a radio show in the background at work. Obviously, I missed lot of the cultural fill-ins that had the griffin audience gasping in shock or rollicking in laughter. But I did my best to make out the gist of it.
The Dagfinnar came, like the rest of the fabled griffins, from the far shore of the Weatherglass Sea. They dueled the great drake Reyka to a draw, honoring the legendary pride founder by pledging their service to him and something called the Alliance of the Four Winds.
Reyka and the Dagfinnar had innumerable adventures: finding the source of the Eastern wind, seeking the resting place of the North Star, flying in the service of a lord or a country long since vanished into the mists of time. Often, the griffins in the story would encounter monsters I’d never heard of, battle to the last, and leave said monsters splattered in meaty chunks all over the ground.
Like human audiences, these action parts were the ones that went over big. Unlike human audiences, descriptions of the heroes gobbling up said meaty chunks went over even bigger.
The sun finally dipped below the horizon, the sky purpling over towards black as I finished the last griffin in line. That was a good thing, because while Ulrik continued his story, the audience had grown more rowdy.
It wasn’t that the griffins had gotten restless. Rather, the spicewood drink, which made the rounds many more times, seemed to have made both drakes and reeves less inhibited, though not reeling drunk. All along the beach groups wandered away from the fire, forming and re-forming into good-natured clashes of beak and talon, letting out cries and calls that echoed all along the shores of the sound.
“Holly,” I said, as I realized something needed to be done. “I forgot, I need to–”
She remained rooted to the spot, her thoughts elsewhere. Perhaps it was the spicewood drink, but I didn’t think she even heard me. I nudged her gently on one shoulder until she turned her head.
“My mind was busy preening,” she said, with a shake of her head. “What is it?”
“I just realized something. I have all the Reyka Pride’s samples but those of your brothers.”
“They attend, but are on patrol duty tonight.”
“Even on the night of the Autumn Winds?”
“No matter the revelry, griffins do not lightly put down their guard!” she snapped, as if I’d suddenly annoyed her. “Give your magic brushes to me and I will handle it.”
I quickly wrote names on the swab kit slips, explained what went where, and then held the entire bundle out. She snatched them up in her talons. “Holly, I didn’t mean to offend you.”
“No matter. I know how to use your brushes, I’ve seen it done enough times.” And with that, she took off into the darkening sky to seek out her siblings.
Elder Ulrik finally fell silent to muffled stamps of approval by his griffin audience. To my surprise, he held his forepaw out to me, indicating that I should stay where I was, then sent griffins
loping to the other fires. In no time, they brought back the other eight Elders to join me in a great gray-furred and armored line. Grimshaw brought up the rear next to Ulrik, an expectant look on his eagle face.
The High Elder strode up to me, her white lion-fur as glistening and sleek as her eagle head feathers were mangy and tattered. The beads in her headdress clattered as she spoke up in her scratchy voice.
“So, outworlder!” Belladonna demanded. “How goes thy campaign to corrupt my people?”
Chapter Thirty
I was ready for this.
In fact, I’d expected the High Elder to be checking in on me more often.
“My plans are going well, Eldest,” I reported. “Your most trustworthy griffins are bending to my will.”
“So, ‘tis as I thought: thou art instead finding that we griffins are a tough people to crack.”
“Truly, your vision is keen. This is a challenge, even for my powers.”
One of Belladonna’s earrings jangled as she cocked her head. “Though I know thou art apt to lie when bending others’ wills to yours…what mysterious and inscrutable powers dost thou employ?”
“Um…well, I can’t really say. Because my powers are, after all…inscrutable. And mysterious.”
“I knew it!”
“Eldest…” Shaw called, motioning with a forepaw.
“Yes, yes,” Belladonna groused. “To show that we remain manifestly unafraid of thy powers, the Council of Elders has decided to allow thee to use thy magic on them.”
Well, that was unexpected. But not unwelcome. I quickly dug into the dwindling supply of kits I had remaining and did buccal swabs on each of the Elders. Shaw came up last, and I did his with a quick whisper in his ear.
“Thanks, Shaw.”
He made a noncommittal grunt until I finishing swabbing the inside of his cheek.
“Thou hast made a fine impression on the Elders,” he said quietly, when I had packaged up the swab. “I must accompany them all this evening. They have openly said that they are pleased with thy participation in the Rites tonight.”
I found myself beaming at that. “Well, I wanted to experience everything a griffin can.”
A soft chuckle. “Those who are not griffins would find the next part difficult, to say the least.”
Leaving me even more puzzled, Shaw followed the Elders as they continued on their course along the expanse of beach. I stacked my completed kits next to me on the sandblasted wood surface and watched the moon rise into a sky of midnight blue shot through with the same streaks of purple rising from the bonfires.
The milling groups of griffins from all along the beach had taken to the sky while I’d been completing my last swab tests. Now, their movements had taken on new qualities. The beat of wings became more frenzied, more energetic. But at the same time, to my eye, the groups had become synchronized, moving in complex patterns that I could only just make out. Each group came together into a dense mass. Then one after another, the groups broke apart like fighter jets exploding out of formation.
I watched the closest group, hypnotized by the aerial dance.
A single griffin would ascend to the heavens, surrounded by four or five others who circled around in a tight spiral. Then, at some predetermined point high in the sky, one of the circling members would strike out with their talons, locking claws with the lone griffin. A tumble of feathers, fur, and wings were all I could see as the pair plunged to earth.
Suddenly, before they reached the ground, the two would separate in a burst of unfurled wing, and the cycle would begin again.
It took me only a moment to realize that this wasn’t just an aerial dance. The single griffin at the center of it all was a female, an adult reeve. The rest, the mass of circlers, were male.
It was a mating ritual.
One in which partners locked beak and talon in a death dive, only to recover as the ground rose up disturbingly close.
I found it entrancing. Exhilarating, even.
And to be completely honest…I wasn’t sure how much of my interest came from the fact that I’d been going through my own dry spell.
The undulations of the groups became faster. The males spiraled tighter to the females, the plunges ending closer and closer to the ground.
Finally, on a plunge that ended up so heart-stoppingly close to the beach that the hovering pair kicked up a blizzard of sand, the dance ended. And though the preceding part was thoroughly eagle-like in its rapturous mid-air dancing, the culmination was purely feline.
For griffins, the climax of the moment came in the manner of a pride of lions, or a glaring of domestic shorthair cats. The female landed, tail slashing the air in eyeblink fast Z-patterns. Her powerful rear legs spread, her rump raised invitingly.
Her partner on the last dive had become fully erect. His organ swelled to its full length and he buried himself in her in a single thrust. The act itself was fast, punctuated with an avian screech from the male and an echoing feline snarl by the female. She turned as best she could, slashing at him viciously with her foreclaws. He disengaged with a massive beat of his wings, lifting himself just out of range of a killing blow.
Then another male took his place. He too thrust himself into place, driving himself and his mate to climax in less than ten seconds. Then a third, and another, and another.
I looked around to see that the remaining dancers had moved their action to the beach as well. In one case, the lone female and her four suitors all lay out on the sand, already deep in the bliss of post-coital sleep. Two of the drakes bore triple claw marks across their faces, but they didn’t seem to be concerned about it. In griffin society, that was probably the equivalent of getting a hickey.
Another grouping continued, though with more tenderness than I’d seen with the others. The female on the sand coupled with one male, while allowing the others to stroke her flanks with their wings, or rub their beaks sensuously along her feathered cheeks. The expressions of sheer bliss shone out, even from the severe-featured eagle faces.
A beat of wings and a shower of sand came from my side as Holly rejoined me. She furled her wings and handed me my remaining swab kits.
“This took some doing,” she said. “I’d guess that you haven’t been bored?”
“I’d be lying if I said I was,” I replied, as I stashed the kits away.
Understatement of the year, I thought. Being a first-person witness to a griffin orgy definitely had not been on my to-do list for the day.
That said, Holly had been gone for while. It made me wonder, so I decided to ask a question that I hoped wouldn’t put me back in hot water with her. She reminded me in so many ways of Shaw, but her temperament remained mysteriously mercurial.
“So…did you join in? I mean, with the activities.” I made a vague gesture skyward, where a lot of erotic play continued.
“The activities? You mean, did I have sex?”
Her directness reminded me of her father as well. “Ah…yes, that’s what I meant.”
She laughed ruefully.
“Nay, I did not. True Born are…typically not welcome in these circumstances.” She saw the expression on my face and quickly added, “Do not think that I dislike the act of mating – far from it! Mating is done between griffins in many situations, not just at the Autumn Rites.”
That made sense, actually. To think otherwise would be as silly as if Hollyhock concluded that all human mating was done in the honeymoon suite, or in the back seat of a car. But she had misinterpreted my expression; I wanted one of my questions finally answered.
“That’s not what I was getting at. It’s just, you’re mentioning this ‘True Born’ thing again. I want to put a pin in this once and for all, now that I have my swabs.”
“All right.” She seemed agreeable enough at the moment, to the point of settling down comfortably in the sand next to me. “What do you wish to know?”
I took a moment to review the facts I had in my mind before I spoke.
“Bef
ore I came here, I was told that a griffin had no question as to their parentage. I’m trying to figure out why.” I nodded off to the side, where one lusty reeve was taking her sixth or seventh lover of the night. “You might know your mother, but you could never truly know who your father is. And when I met Linden a couple of days ago, Shaw said that she was one of the sixteen who counted him as their ‘named sire’. That implies something,” I said, as my mind put the pieces together a little click. “That implies choice, doesn’t it?”
Holly nodded, looking a bit surprised at my insight, and let me continue.
“So, if you know your birth mother…but you get to choose who you count as your father…then of course you’ll never have to guess about your parentage.”
It was a very griffin-like way to view the world, I realized.
Much like the lack of distinction between whether one could not see through a wall, or one should not – to a griffin it was one and the same. Whether or not a given drake was your father, if you believed it was so, that made it biologically true to this species.
“When we reach the age of the gryphlet,” Holly confirmed, “We learn who could have sired our egg. It is for us to select the champion, the drake that we admire the most, the one we wish to be like upon our adulthood. My sire comes from a long line, with many heroic deeds. He has been the honored mount of a Captain in the Andeluvian Air Cavalry, and has gained even more fame under you. It is to no one’s surprise that so many fledglings select Grimshaw the Great.”
The night breeze tussled the violet smoke that rose from the nearby brassier, filling my nose with the scent of ripe apples again. “That’s still only half the story. If choice is what defines a typical griffin’s parentage, then that must be lacking for a True Born.”
Holly’s eyes glowed golden in the firelight. “Your mind does make interesting banks and swoops. And yet, it does nab its prey in its talons. You are correct. Sometimes, when there is a special love between griffins, the reeve forsakes all other suitors for an entire cycle and dances only with him. My mother Ingoldir felt to such a degree for Grimshaw that she did this for him no less than three separate times. This exclusivity, this pair bonding, I assume that it takes place sometimes with you humans too?”
Grand Theft Griffin Page 17
