Belladonna spread her wings in one smooth motion as she raised her forepaw, exposing needle-sharp talons. Suddenly, the cavern grew pin-drop quiet.
“Thou hast returned, Dayna Chrissie of the Land of the Angels,” she declared, in her solemn screech of a voice. “I am informed that thy plans are about to reach fruition! But I have foreseen thy downfall, and such evil plans as yours shall surely fail. I only wish to be present upon such an occasion.”
I heard a choked cough from one side, a titter on the other. Many griffins still weren’t taking the Eldest’s rants all that seriously. I had a suspicion that their attitudes might change in a hurry.
“I have indeed returned, Eldest,” I said, as I took a few steps forward to speak in front of her and the assembled crowd. “Yet my plans were never set against the griffins. I’ve been blessed to stay among you for several days now. You are a proud, noble, and strong people.”
A couple of pleased murmurs rose from behind me. Everyone liked praise, and my reputation from the contest involving Thundercrack and the resulting pride-spar probably scored me a few extra points. Thankfully, no one seemed to be cursing or blaming me for the death of the Valkir Pride’s Lance Captain.
Belladonna looked confused. Her wandering eye joggled back and forth as she spoke. “But…thou hast admitted to me that thy magic brushes were never meant to help my warriors! And thy plans did involve the sacrifice of thy pawn, Thundercrack of the Valkir!”
Some angry muttering boiled up behind me. I bit my tongue against replying quickly; griffins respected strength. Instead, I forced myself to take a deep breath.
Without looking back, I held up my right hand.
The griffins around me went quiet. Only then did I speak.
“My ‘brush magic’, as you call it, was meant to find out who was worthy. Both of serving with Andeluvia’s Air Cavalry…and also of my trust. Because there is treachery in great supply here at the Reykajar Aerie. That treachery is what killed the Lance Captain of the Valkir, not I!”
“Liar!” Belladonna spat. “There is no dishonor, no treachery in my demesne unless thou hast brought it here in thine own black heart!”
Good, I thought. At least Belladonna is being predictable in her outrage. And I just got the opening I wanted.
“If you believe that there is no dishonor in your demesne, then will you allow me to bring someone here to prove that very thing?”
“Thy lackey has already told us of your demands,” she snarled. “For the treaty we share with the nation of Andeluvia, I shall permit it, envoy. But beware! This request tries my patience, and thy king shall hear of it! So tell me, miscreant: who could one such as thee bring to judge the honor of my people?”
I smiled.
“How about the Fayleene Protector of the Forest?”
A burst of both disbelieving and excited whispers broke out amongst the assembled griffins. Even Belladonna looked a little shocked. I nodded to Galen, who murmured a magic phrase under his breath.
A snap-BANG, and in a flash of white, our friend Liam stood at my side before the Elders.
Gasps of wonder came from all around us. Once assuming the role of the Protector, Liam’s maturation had accelerated, turning him from a bedraggled, fawnlike buck into a handsome young stag. His body was still on the small side, but his shoulders had widened with new cords of dun-colored muscle. Even his mismatched eyes simply called more attention to his refined deer face and symmetrical ten-point rack of antlers.
Liam had a jeweled cloth barding across his back, similar to the one he’d worn when he’d been first anointed as the new Protector. Back then, the barding had been bright green and studded with emeralds. Now, the Fayleene’s ornamentation was bright red, orange, and black. The cloth he wore fairly dripped with blood-red rubies, orange sunstones, and polished cabochons of onyx. He was easily the brightest object in the entire cavern, and the griffins closest to him drew back as if in fear.
“Be at peace, High Eldest,” Liam stated, in the firm voice of a young ruler. “I am Liam of the Fayleene, the Protector of the Forest.”
“I greet thee, mighty Fayleene,” Belladonna said, awestruck. She made a slight bow, which sent a jangly rattle through her piled-on beads and bangles. “You honor us with thy presence.”
“It is fitting, for I have been called here on a matter of honor.” Liam tilted his head towards me for a moment, then took a step forward as he spoke. “I am a being of the fey. We sense evil the way a griffin smells blood and smoke on the wind. I tell you now that Dayna Chrissie is a creature of the Good and the Light. It shames me to think that she would lack the friendship and trust of all who encounter her.”
Belladonna leaned back on her haunches as Liam stepped towards her.
“But…great Protector, she claimed to be serving the Dark Ones I have seen in mine own dreams.”
“A ruse. Wise Belladonna, your dreams contain shades of the truth. There are forces moving that seek to harm those who count as Creatures of the Light. But they have you jumping at shadows when the real threats sit out there in front of you. As a creature of honor, will you allow me to help Dayna reveal the truth?”
The High Elder simply bowed and spread her wings. Go on, her gesture seemed to say.
Liam’s voice rang out across the cavern as he spoke. “Nigh on twelve days ago, two or more griffins somehow transported themselves to the other world. The world of Dayna Chrissie’s people. There, they broke into a dwelling known as a ‘museum’ and stole a set of magically potent crystals. Dayna was charged by both her people and the Andeluvian King to find the culprits.”
I risked a look around. The griffins sat quietly, eyes rapt upon the Fayleene ruler. So far, so good. Liam was sticking to the script we worked out. Not only was this getting the griffins to listen, it was slowly slipping me off the hook with Belladonna. But my fingers were tightly crossed for the next part.
“The magic contained within Dayna’s brushes will not only tell who is physically capable of serving King Fitzwilliam,” Liam went on. He began to slowly walk a circuit around the inner part of the cavern, looking at each griffin in turn, making sure that he could be heard. “They also speak to a griffin’s bloodline. A single drop of blood, a single strand of fur, a single feather – any and all things can tell Dayna if a griffin has been present when a crime has taken place.”
Liam had completed a third of his circuit. I snuck in a glance at Holly and saw nothing but a mask of fear and impending rage on her face.
But we were set on this path now. I had to see it through.
“Yet this is only one of her sources of magic, and it is one we must return to,” Liam cautioned, as he continued his slow walk past the halfway point. “In her world, devices exist that record events of times past. In the case of the theft, only part of a griffin’s wing was seen.”
“Yes, but this is old news to us,” Elder Ulrik stated. “Dayna has told us that the culprit had green feathers along his wings. The only griffin in this aerie who had such coloration was Lance Captain Thundercrack. Why bring this painful memory to the surface for us?”
Now it was my time to step forward.
“Because I was wrong,” I said, and something inside of me made a painful twinge. This hurt, and not only because of the death that it had led to. Damn it, I was used to being right. “I was wrong, and someone used that fact to frame Thundercrack. The Lance Captain was innocent of any wrongdoing.”
A small chorus of caws from the griffins around us, probably members of the Valkir Pride. Again, I waited a moment before raising my right hand. The griffins finally went quiet.
“The color I saw on the suspect’s wing was only a trick of the light. It appeared only under the strange lanterns in use at that dwelling. And again, I was wrong to believe that it was just a sheen to one’s feathers.” I looked around meaningfully. “Rather, it was a pattern as unique to the wing as fingerprints would be to my people, or the number of feathers atop each griffin’s head.”
Th
e High Elder spoke next, and this time her voice had lost its skeptical sneer. “That is well and good. But unless thou hast brought these lanterns to our world, I see no use in thy information.”
Liam completed his circuit and came back to stand by my side. Galen took a step ahead as well, subtly flanking me.
“It is true I have none of the special light to see by,” I acknowledged. “But I don’t need it. You see, the griffins are not the first people I have walked among. They are the second. The first were the Fayleene. While there I learned something that few else know: their vision goes further into what my people call ‘the visible spectrum’. That means they can see colors no one else can. That means Liam the Protector can see which griffin came to my world as a thief.”
“Can this be true?” Belladonna breathed.
Liam inclined his head to her. “It is true, High Elder.”
Now it’s all or nothing, I thought. I cleared my throat.
“Protector,” I asked. “Have you found the griffin whose wings match the pattern?”
“Oh, yes. I spotted it almost immediately,” Liam replied.
He swung around and indicated the griffin with a tilt of his head. As one, the entire room looked to where he pointed to a single reeve.
“It’s her, without a doubt.” Liam said.
My heart sank.
His antlers pointed unerringly at Grimshaw’s daughter, Hollyhock.
Chapter Forty-Two
Liam’s voice rang bell-clear. “It’s her, without a doubt.”
Hollyhock remained still, muscles coiled as if to spring.
“You spin a fine story,” came a voice. Heads swiveled to see Lance Captain Ironwood speak from across the cavern. “Yet you have neglected to tell us three things. Why would a reeve seek to do these things? Why would anyone help her? And how would she cross to your world to commit this so-called theft? I think there are pieces to this tale that simply do not fit.”
“Do you think so?” I retorted. “Perhaps you speak too soon.”
“Then you have answers? Do share them with us, for I am skeptical.”
I looked up at Belladonna. “I don’t have the solution for the last of Ironwood’s questions. But I believe that my answers for the first two will draw that final one out. That is, unless you wish to break the news to Grimshaw yourself?”
The High Elder fidgeted uncomfortably where she perched atop her boulder. Shaw’s voice boomed from where he came to stand by Liam and Galen.
“Thou hast something to say regarding my daughter’s guilt?” he growled, without an ounce of the respect he had shown earlier. “Speak to it then, Eldest. For to my simple ‘lackey’ mind, Dayna draws out a poison which hath seeped into this aerie!”
“I need not converse with thee, sire of the dishonored,” Belladonna said sullenly. “It seems that thy human friend, the deceiver twice over, can speak to it.”
I glanced over to Holly again. Her stance had not changed, but her head hung forward, listening but not looking. I had no choice but to continue.
“The answers to the first two questions are the same: vengeance. Vengeance upon the Council for the destruction of both of her eggs. Probably to be done in a way that my presence here interrupted before it could be carried out.”
The cavern remained quiet, but not silent. Most of the griffins looked away, while some nervously tapped a paw or nervously swished their tail. Shaw’s expression slid into astonishment.
“Thou art right, Dayna,” he breathed. “And they know. They all know.”
“All that were present at the aerie when the punishment was carried out,” I acknowledged. I raised my voice as I went on. “And it was a punishment, wasn’t it, Eldest? I discovered only yesterday that Hollyhock hadn’t helped me test her brothers. Instead, she took the test for each of them herself. I didn’t know why, until I found flecks of shell and smashed pieces of nest in her dwelling. The shells belonged to two different eggs. Each egg came from a different sire. Whoever those sires were…had a genetic makeup that was extremely close to Hollyhock’s own.”
Shaw looked at me, shocked. “What…what dost thou mean?”
“Each egg was sired by someone in the family line. Someone even closer to Holly’s genetic code than her own father.”
“But…how?”
The words boiled out of me like hot pitch.
“How? What would you expect, when your three True Born were treated like outcasts for most of their lives? They had talents and abilities that should have put them into the top ranks of the griffins, but were they welcome at the mating rituals of the Autumn Winds? I was so blind, so new to your culture, that I didn’t hear the words, I missed all the signs.
“Holly even told me the truth to my face, and I never saw it. She was the one who told me, ‘I made my own family. Or at least tried to.’ And the play-bites, the wounds that Galen told me are the signs of courtship? I’ve seen that exchanged before – between Hollyhock and her two brothers. Her two lovers. Her two eggs’ sires.”
Belladonna finally spoke in a hiss. “Incest cannot be tolerated in the aerie. That kind of breeding saps our species’ strength. It is an abomination!”
Blackthorn let out a deep snort. “Your rule is an abomination.”
I spoke again before Belladonna could protest.
“You certainly wanted to make your feelings clear, Eldest. For I found something even more interesting on the remains of Hollyhock’s nest. Your DNA. And Elder Ulrik’s. And that of the remaining seven Elders. If I had to guess, you wanted to make a point of punishing the ‘children of arrogance’. So, you passed Holly up for Lance Captain, destroyed her young, swore any and all witnesses to secrecy, and then you forced her to sleep on the remains. Whether you feel this was justified or not, I’d say that this gave all three True Born plenty of reason to hate you.”
“We promoted her brother Ironwood as soon as we were able,” Elder Ulrik rushed to say. “What was done, was done. But we do not feel that True Born have no value.”
“For that, I thank you,” Ironwood said acidly. “Though your gifts of rank and speech in our favor are ones given out of guilt, not love.”
Ulrik recoiled from Ironwood’s words, though it was matched in its dark tone as Holly finally spoke. She raised her head as she spoke, and her eyes glittered like metal coins.
“The outworlder speaks the truth. The Elders arrived at my nest, only minutes after I had placed my newborns into the nest. I was exhausted from the birthing, and my two chicks’ shells had not even hardened in the night air. I had no strength to pit myself against a single griffin, let alone nine. Dayna has correctly called all of the events, save for one: that the Elders forced me to watch as they smashed my lineage and let their yolk run into the dirt.”
The cavern fell silent for a single moment. The boom of the surf edged up a notch, as if the ocean itself had felt the unrest in the room.
Then Holly raised her voice in a clarion call. “Griffins, will you stand to be ruled by this Council, which stands only for its own power, its hidebound rules, and its cruelty? Stand with me and my brothers in its stead! We will embrace the future, not fear it!”
Urgent whispers spread through the crowd around us. Uncertain whispers. I heard some of the louder voices.
She is right, the Elders stifle us!
Only oath-breakers would raise a hand to the Elders!
I won’t fight for a True Born!
Now is our time, for the glory of our pride!
A drake with a black-feathered head spoke up.
“I am Wulfrik, newly chosen Lance Captain of the Valkir Pride,” he declared. “That Hollyhock of the Reyka has been treated as a mewling chick is not my concern. The Valkir will never stand with those who slew my Captain, all to avenge tainted chicks sired by one’s siblings!”
“Thou speakest true, Lance Captain!” Belladonna urged, grasping this first straw of resistance. “Defend thy rulers, attack the True Born!”
Wulfrik shook his head. “Th
undercrack had no love for you or your old ways. Neither do we of the Valkir. You ignored our cries for justice when he was slain. You sought to placate these True Born by letting them slaughter our Captain! We shall no longer join our pride to this aerie! See to your own defense, if you can!”
With that, a fifth of the griffins present marched out of the room by one entrance or another. I heard curses and muttered oaths as some griffins exchanged harsh words with the Valkir.
Galen and Liam drew closer to me.
“I don’t like the feel of this,” Liam whispered. “Half of these griffins’ loyalties waver in the wind.”
“I must concur,” Galen whispered back. “Also, I cannot tell which griffins to fight.”
“I know,” I agreed. “Just…defend against whoever attacks you.”
“Might we still hope for a peaceful solution?”
I gritted my teeth. “Maybe. But Holly’s shown her intent to take the Council down. She might think that this is her best shot, while–”
“Blackthorn!” Holly cried, “Ironwood!”
She dug at the feathers at the base of her neck. I spied a glint of silver chain as Holly brought out the tiny pendant I’d seen her wear on the very first day I met her. She squeezed it and spoke an incantation I couldn’t hear over the crowd.
A piercing tone erupted from the very walls of the Lair with an ear-stabbing SHREEEE!!
My eyes teared up and I winced in pain. Galen clapped his hands to his ears and staggered back, falling to all four of his knees. Liam let out a cry of his own and collapsed.
So did the rest of the griffins, save for the three True Born.
“Dayna!” Galen gasped, even as he pointed up towards the skylight. “The crystals!”
I craned my neck and saw a glitter from the rock face above the network of chains. Shards of pure white crystal had been set into the tiniest rock crevices around the rim of the opening. Whatever magically enhanced sound-based weapon Holly and her brothers had placed there, it didn’t affect me as badly. So I pulled my gun, held it in both hands, and aimed at the closest shard I could spot.
Grand Theft Griffin Page 25
