“One gone missing,” Mother mused. “That’s not quite so bad as it could be.”
“We may have one son missing on top of that,” Father groused.
“Speak and he arrives,” I muttered as the back door creaked open. Twice as wet as we had been, and looking like a cat that had been dumped into the wash, Michael clumped into the kitchen, tracking mud behind him.
“Hey,” he said. I had to clap a hand over my mouth to stifle my snicker. How one person could wrap up so much defeat into one word was simply beyond me.
“You are soaked to the bone! Come now, breakfast is almost ready,” Mother exclaimed, helping him remove his outer layers so that they could hang by the fire. She pressed a hand to his cheek before he could pull away. “Your skin is clammy.”
“I don’t suppose you found any of the sheep?” I asked innocently batting my eyes.
He glared, kicking off his boots. “No. I didn’t.”
“We found all but one,” Father said, looking between the two of us. “I’m hoping that one makes her way to the field or to the barn in her own time.”
“It could happen.” Mother set plates of food in front of our usual spots. To me she said, “I’m not going into town today, not in this weather, so you don’t have to worry about walking to and from in your wet things. There will be no one down by the wash, and I’m more interested in being here in case our sheep happens to wander back through.”
I slumped back into my chair in relief. “That’s great. I’d hate to go back out into this rain just as I’ve gotten out of it.” I shot a look at Michael, but he was pointedly ignoring me, stuffing his face with his breakfast.
“All right.” Father sat up a little straighter. “What is going on between the two of you? You’ve been taking shots at one another since yesterday and it’s about time you settle whatever it is.”
“They’ve had a small fight.” Mother put a hand on Father’s forearm.
“So, you told her—big surprise,” Michael spat at me.
“I didn’t tell her everything,” I shot back. Michael bit his tongue and settled for glaring at me harder.
“That’s enough. Both of you.” Mother raised a warning finger. She had caught my emphasis on ‘everything’ I could tell by the way she glanced between us, but she didn’t press it. “I swear, you’re too similar sometimes. I mean it. I don’t want to hear another word from either of you unless it’s something nice.”
Michael made the motion of buttoning his lips. I rolled my eyes and ate another piece of bacon. As though he was the wronged one in this situation. He was the one changing things. He was the one leaving and calling the rest of us simpletons. He was the one lying to Mother and Father. To my dismay I felt tears prick at my eyes and I quickly screwed them shut, keeping my head down.
When I had gotten myself under control Mother and Father were eating with purpose. They clearly thought the matter was settled. Michael was—I started. Michael was looking at me in a way I didn’t understand. It was not apologetic, as I might have hoped. It was speculative, like I was a strange word he was trying to figure out in a new book. I didn’t like being stared at in a normal sense, but something turned the expression from odd to creepy. His eyes were slightly dilated, as though the kitchen, cheerily lit with morning light, was dark.
When he realized that I was looking back at him, he returned to his meal as though nothing had happened. I blinked and shook my head. Perhaps I was more tired than I had thought if I was seeing things. Once he finished what was on his plate, he turned to address Father, and the problem with his eyes was gone, if it had ever been there.
“Should I take the sheep to the field?”
Father cleared his throat, and scratched the back of his head. “That’s fine. Remember to be extra careful. I want you to bring Benjie as well as Brooks, and you can take my cloak. It’s dry.”
“Thanks.” Michael stood and went to gather what he’d need for the morning. “Taryn, is the crossbow in your room?” He asked from the family room.
I shoved my chair back, rising. “Yeah, I’ll get it,” I called back.
I ducked out of my parent’s too concerned gaze, and into the other room. Michael was leaning against the brick of the fireplace, eyes on the wooden floor. I grimaced and stalked past him, down the dimmer hallway towards my room; I heard him follow behind me. As I knelt and reached my arm under the bed to pull the crossbow out of its hiding place he finally spoke.
“Come on Taryn, what’s your problem?”
My fingers twitched on the crossbow and I turned, the weapon propped on my bent knee. His silhouette was a dark spot in my doorway, “What’s my problem?”
“Yeah, what’s your issue? You were fine with me going not two days ago, and now it’s like I’ve killed somebody.”
“I was fine with it Michael, until you started lying and putting on airs.”
“I’m not putting on airs!” he exclaimed. “Why can’t I say that I can do better without you taking it as a personal attack?”
“Because that’s not what you’re saying! You’re saying that there’s nothing for you here. Nothing!”
He pointed a finger into my face, speaking as I stood to get clear of it. “I told you that you could come with me. You said no.”
“Just because you’re doing something, that doesn’t mean I have to! I happen to know my duty to our parents, and I like our home!” I clenched my fists at my sides.
“Well if duty to my family means being miserable then I refuse it. And you can’t tell me Nophgrin has everything you want. I know better.”
Those stupid tears threatened to come out again. I shoved the crossbow at him. “Here.”
He took it gently, and his eye brows slanted upwards. “Please don’t hate me Taryn. I couldn’t bear it.”
Cradling the crossbow, all his haughtiness gone, he looked like my brother again. I tilted my head to the side. He wasn’t though. This was the man Michael had grown into when I wasn’t paying attention. He wasn’t a bad man, perhaps a little eager to prove himself and a little careless with the feelings of others, but he genuinely wanted to do better for himself. I sighed, and if this was what he thought it would take, it wasn’t as though he’d be a treat to be around if I coerced him into staying.
“I don’t hate you. You know that. I think I’m scared,” I admitted.
“Of what?”
“Of who you’re becoming. Of who I’m becoming. I don’t know them quite as well as I thought I did.”
Michael’s eyes widened and then his expression relaxed. “Maybe it’s a good thing you don’t know who we’re growing into. It’ll be a surprise.” This was him trying to tease me, and I allowed myself a small smile.
“Maybe. I just don’t want to wake up in five years and find you a stranger, and me a bumpkin.”
“You will never grow up to be a bumpkin,” he promised me. “This I know for a fact.”
“I’m frightened that you’re going somewhere I can’t follow,” I whispered. “There are things I want that aren’t here, you’re not wrong. I just can’t imagine leaving all of this behind, to go out into the world and get them. I’m not ready for that. I don’t know how you suddenly are.”
“What are you two doing?” That was Mother, her tone a mixture of sternness and concern. It broke through the stillness that had settled over the two of us.
Remembering what I had told her earlier, I bit back a grin. “She thinks I’m wailing on you.”
“Can I guess that’s because you told her you were going to?” My guilty face told him everything he needed to know. Michael shut his eyes as his face broke out into full smile. “Well then I ought to go and alleviate their concerns. Are we ok?” He searched my face earnestly.
I wanted to tell him yes, but my smile was bittersweet. “No. I’m angry with you, Michael. I’m going to try and be good about it because I know you have to go, but you’re going to have to give me some time.”
He inclined his head, subdued. “Ok. I
get that. Can you at least promise me again that you won’t tell the parents about my plan?” At my doubtful look he hurried onward, voice hushed, “I’ll think of a way to tell them, I promise, just not now. The whole thing is complicated, and I want them to get used to the idea of me going in the first place.”
I exhaled gustily through my nose, eyebrows high, my lips pressed together in what I was certain was an excellent impression of Mother’s signature expression. “Ok, but then you can’t get mad at me when I snap at you. You have to let me be mad.”
He snorted. “I can try Taryn. I’m not that good a person.”
“Michael?” This time it was Father.
“All right, I have to go. Quiver?”
“Oh!” I crouched and quickly retrieved the quiver full of bolts from the same spot the crossbow had been and handed them to Michael. He pulled me into a hug as he grabbed them, and they poked painfully into my chest, but I didn’t pull out of the embrace.
“It’s going to be fine Taryn. I’ve got everything under control, I swear.”
His quick exit caused a draft to billow out my door after him and I wrapped my arms around myself. There was still time, maybe he would change his mind.
The morning was slow, and dull. I helped Mother clean the dishes, and then we cleaned the floor of muck. Throughout the day we turned the clothing that was by the fire, making sure everything dried evenly and nothing singed.
Father and I worked on my aim for a scant hour before I had to leave. I enjoyed the training, but I found myself grateful when it was time for me to ride out to the field. Father’s full attention always made me nervous. He was a serious man, who seemed to be good at most things he put his mind to. Even telling myself that he’d had years to reach that level of skill, I wanted him to be proud of me. Every time a bolt went wide I cringed.
Outside, the rain had yet to completely fizzle out and there was a crisp wind blowing steadily, but everything I wore was toasty from the fire. I kicked Hale into a gallop as soon as I turned out onto the road and we made it to the field in record time. The trees whizzed past us, a sage and russet blur. We were going too fast to even think about the lesser gryphons that jeered from the tree line. Riding Hale at her full speed always felt like stepping out of the world. For the duration of the ride the funk that had settled over me the past few days lifted.
When Michael saw our speedy entry into the field he clambered to his feet and stalked out to meet me, his face a mask of displeasure.
“What are you doing?” he demanded as I reined the pony in.
My mood plummeted. “What?” I asked sullenly, sliding off Hale’s back. Michael grabbed me as I attempted to push past him and he gave me a small shake. It was then that I saw the fear in his expression. “Michael, what?”
“You can’t ride her so fast Taryn. It’s wet out. What if you had fallen and broken your neck?”
“I never—!”
“There’s a gryphon prowling.” I noted that his knuckles were white on the hand that gripped his crook. “Dashing around like that is like trailing bait past a trout! I don’t know what I’d do if you got killed.”
My heart thumped painfully, and a hand raised to anxiously rub my collarbone. “I hadn’t thought…”
“Well you need to. You’re the one worried so badly about the gryphon. You’d never see it coming, and I couldn’t stop it if it was dead set on killing you—if it attacked you back on the road. That’s out of the crossbow’s range.”
I shook my head, mind racing over what I had seen of the woods as we had galloped through them. I hadn’t seen anything, and not because nothing had been there I was certain. I thought of the rabbit mother and I had seen on the way to town. It had never seen the lesser gryphon coming either. I swallowed.
“Thanks. Michael, I swear I didn’t think of it.”
Michael rubbed his brow. “Yeah, you know I wouldn’t have thought of it either until I saw you ride up. Though, to be fair, I don’t ride Cherub at a gallop unless you and I are racing.”
“No, you don’t.” I leaned against the warmth of Hale’s side, and stroked her shoulder. “Gods above and below, I’ll tell you this— if there was any part of this life that I might understand you wanting to leave, it’s gryphon season.”
“I’d say so.” Michael scanned the field and trees behind a final time before walking back to Cherub. “Of course, there are other monsters besides gryphons.”
“True, we don’t have dragons out here,” I acknowledged.
Michael flicked a glance at me. and there was something I couldn’t place in his face. “True,” was all he said.
Benjie and Brooks were both at the tree. The older of the two was lying, eyes closed, and I wondered how much longer he’d be able to make even these occasional trips out to the field. His eyes opened as I approached, and he wagged his tail but didn’t so much as raise his head. Brooks trotted over to give me an affectionate greeting.
“Beyond my own idiocy, has there been anything of note today?” I regretted mentioning my own failing as soon as the words left my mouth. Still, I reasoned, that was what I would have said before this month of fighting. I was used to being candid with Michael, and I didn’t want that to change.
Michael shook his head as he packed away his items. “Nope. Haven’t seen the hunting party or any gryphons. Saw a herd of deer a little earlier. They’ve been hanging around.”
“I saw them yesterday. I have to say, I sort of find them comforting. They’re so skittish, if there’s a gryphon they’ll bolt as fast as a sneeze.”
“Or better yet, the gryphon will satisfy itself with venison instead of veal.” Michael mounted, and shoved his long hair back over his shoulder. His hair needed trimming, I thought. It was getting unruly.
“Now that is a sentiment I can get behind!” I said with forced cheerfulness. “Ride safely, all right?”
“I’ll ride like the slowest snail in the garden,” he said agreeably. “See you at home.”
The carving I had been working on for the past several days was all but finished. Truly, it needed some detail work that I couldn’t manage with my fingers stiff from the cold or covered in my mittens, so I left it in its pouch.
Unlike Michael, who could sit reading a book for hours at a time, I took little pleasure in reading. There had also been no mending to bring. I sang some, mostly old shepherding songs, made to echo over the hills. I’d never be a bard, but my voice wasn’t terrible either. When I’d tapped all that I had in my repertoire the silence felt deeper than before.
I made myself move about the field then. If there were any signs of creatures that ought not to have been there I would find them. I ended up following fresh boot tracks the whole way around the field. I acknowledged with amusement that they must have been from Michael doing the same check. That warmed me. With his concern at how fast I had ridden in, and these tracks, it seemed clear he was not as aloof as he wanted to appear. He cared about how close the gryphon was coming to our land—and to me.
It seemed that neither of us needed to have bothered looking around. The only animal tracks to be found were that of the sheep and deer, and the only dung was of the same nature and that of rabbits. I knew that if anything else had been on the ground it would show in the muddy earth, and I tried to let that soothe me, but still my chest felt tight.
I also found, much to my relief, that the sheep were not inclined to wander in the direction of Glenn’s property. However, they were testing their boundaries for how close they could get to the unfenced portion of the field before I had the dogs bring them back around. It was just as well that Brooks and Benjie were both with me because it was a battle all day keeping the sheep in line. I wondered if the smell of the slaughter to the west had reached their nostrils. It would explain their skittish behavior. The dogs seemed unchanged, but then they weren’t prey animals and were more comfortable with the scent of blood.
A bleak drizzle kept on the whole afternoon. It would clear for a half an hour at a
time, long enough for me to feel hopeful that I might dry off, and then it would rain again. I had brought my broad-brimmed hat which kept the rain from my eyes, but eventually I had to forsake my usual place by the tree to perch on a boulder, or else face sinking into the mud.
Two hours before dusk the hunting party rode through Glenn’s land. They were noisy enough that the sounds of raised, angry voices, the jingling of tack, and the stamping of hooves punctuated the white noise of the rain. A few yells of agreement and disagreement were all I could catch as they faded off again. I gathered up the sheep as quickly as I could, hoping to catch them on the road home, but I didn’t. Frustrated as I was, I dared not push the sheep to go any faster, thinking of Michael’s warning.
By the time I got to the house, Father and Mother were saying their goodbyes to Willy and Laura, who had declined an invitation to stay for supper. I hurried the sheep past them. “How did the hunt go?” I twisted in my saddle to ask.
Willy shook his head, his expression gloomy. “Your father will tell you.”
“Put the sheep in the barn,” was all Father said.
When I returned from the barn Willy and Laura had gone; Mother and Father both had withdrawn to the house. They were in the kitchen, finishing the supper preparations; Michael was presumably in his room. The smell of baking bread hit me like a warm hug as I stepped inside and shed my moist outer wear.
“I heard them as they were coming back from the hunt,” I said hesitantly. “It did not sound good.”
Father had his pipe out and he nodded as he puffed, getting the tobacco to light properly. He inhaled the thick smoke deeply into his lungs and then let it out in a soft, fragrant trail. Mother coughed delicately and waved her hand in front of her nose. He shifted to face me so the smoke blew away from her, and I came to sit next to him.
“Well, did they find anything?”
Of Gryphons and Other Monsters (Taryn's Journey Book 1) Page 9
