It was a border of hundreds of leagues of wilderness, and the Emperor himself had not been able to “guard” it; he had relied on the wilderness itself to do the guarding. This was not as insurmountable a task as it might have seemed; with gryphons to fly patrol, it was possible to cover vast stretches of countryside with minimal effort. Outpost Five was the most remote and isolated of all of the border posts. Because of that, it was hardly the most desirable position so far as the Silvers were concerned.
For most Silvers, perhaps, but not for Blade and Tadrith. This meant three whole months in a place so far away from White Gryphon that not even a hint of what transpired there would reach the city unless he or Blade sent it by teleson. There would be no watching eyes, waiting to see if he could replicate his legendary father. There would be no tongues wagging about his exploits, imagined or real.
Of course, there would also be no delicious gryphon ladies for three months, but that was a small price to pay. Three months of chastity would be good for him; it would give him a rest. He would be able to use the leisure time to invent new and clever things to do and say to impress them. He would have all that time to perfect his panache. By the time he returned, as a veteran of the border, he should be able to charm any lady he chose.
Outpost duty was a long assignment, in no small part because it was so difficult to get people to the outposts. Even though magic was now working reliably, and had been for several years, no one really wanted to trust his body to a Gate just yet. Too many things could go wrong with a Gate at the best of times, and at the moment the only purpose anyone was willing to put them to was to transport unliving supplies. The consumables and their mail and special requests would be supplied to their outpost that way; a mage at White Gryphon who was familiar with the place would set up a Gate to the outpost. Workers would then pitch bundles through, and the mage would drop the Gate as soon as he could.
No one wants to leave a Gate up very long either. You never know what might go wrong, or what might stroll through it while it’s up.
“You know, of course, that there’s a great deal of uninhabited and poorly-surveyed territory in between Five and home,” Blade went on with relish. “We’re going to be completely on our own from the time we leave to the time we return.”
“What, no lovely gryphon ladies and human stallions to wile away your time of exile?” jibed Keenath, and shuddered realistically. “Well, never mind. I can guarantee that in the case of the ladies, I can make certain that they will not notice your absence, twin.”
“They are more likely to cry out in pain at your I poor attempts at gallantry, Keeth,” Tadrith told him and turned back to Blade. “You realize that this shows a great deal of trust in our abilities, don’t you? I mean, the usual first assignment is something like—”
“Like guarding the farms, I know,” she replied smugly. “That must have been why they kept us behind the others, training and overtraining us. They wanted to be sure we were ready, and I bet they decided to send us out there because we’re the only people who really want to go. In fact, I would bet my favorite armband that Aubri plans to send us out on long outpost duty every chance he can get!”
They grinned at each other with relish, for there was another aspect to outpost duty they both anticipated with pleasure. Those so posted were expected to do a certain amount of exploring, and sometimes the explorers found something valuable. The Emperor Shalaman got a share, of course, as did the treasury of White Gryphon, but the generous portion remaining went to the intrepid explorers who made the discovery. Not that Tadrith was greedy, of course, but he did have a certain love of ornamentation, a pronounced interest in the finer things of life, and finding something extremely valuable would make it possible for him to indulge his interests. And it didn’t hurt to have the wherewithal to impress the ladies, either, and ornament them a bit now and then.
“Just how much exploring has been done up there?” he asked.
Blade’s eyes widened knowingly. “Not all that much,” she replied. “And there are more ways to explore than sailing over the tree-canopy, hoping something on the ground will show itself.”
He nodded, following her thoughts. Probably most of the Silvers assigned to Outpost Five in the past had been gryphon teams; that made sense, although it probably wore them down terribly, not having humans and hertasi to tend to them. A human on station, though, could make a detailed survey of a particular area, including the smaller animals and plants living there, and take mineral samples. That was something a gryphon was ill-suited or, for that matter, ill-inclined, to do.
“There’s been no trouble from that sector for years,” she mused. “We should have plenty of time for surveys.”
“But most of all, you’ll be on your own,” Keenath said enviously. “I wish I could find some way to escape for a few months.”
Blade patted his shoulder sympathetically. “And miss all the benefits of trondi’irn, hertasi and kestra’chern fawning on you every spare moment? The horror! You could ask to be taken on by the Silvers once you’ve finished training under Winterhart,” she suggested. “Then you’d get some assignments elsewhere. Down with the embassy at Khimbata, maybe; you could go as the trondi’irn taking care of the Emperor’s gryphon-guards.”
Keenath’s eyes lit up at the idea, and Tadrith knew how he felt. For a chance to get out of White Gryphon he would have put up with just about anything.
The problem was that there was literally nothing that he said or did that Skandranon didn’t eventually find out about. It wasn’t that Skan was purposefully spying on his sons, or even deliberately overseeing them—
Well, not much, anyway. And not overtly.
—it was just that everyone told the Black Gryphon everything that went on in this city. A mouse couldn’t sneeze without Skandranon finding out about it eventually.
Neither can we—except that it’s guaranteed that if we sneeze, someone will go running to Father with the news. Not only that, but the report would be detailed as to how, when, and how well we sneezed.
It wasn’t exactly tale-bearing, for people made certain to bring Skan the most flattering reports possible. Skan was a very proud father.
He can’t get enough of hearing about all the marvelous things Keeth and I are doing, especially now that we aren’t in the family aerie to bully into making reports on ourselves. The trouble is, he is fully capable of blowing the most minor accomplishment up into the equivalent of a brilliant piece of wartime strategy or heroism.
It was embarrassing, to say the least.
And, of course, anyone who wanted to curry favor with the Black Gryphon knew the fastest way to his heart was to praise his sons. Skan would go out of his way to see that someone who flattered the twins got a full hearing and careful consideration. That was all he would do, but often enough, that was sufficient.
As Keeth continued to look envious and a little pained, Tadrith preened his short eartufts in sympathy. “I wish there was a way to send you out of the city for trondi’irn training, Twin,” he murmured.
Keenath sighed. “So do I. When we were all choosing the subject we wanted to study, I tried to think of some discipline I could enjoy that would also get me out of the city at the same time, but I couldn’t. I think I’m going to be good at this, and it certainly feels right, but it means I’m stuck here.”
Blade wore as sympathetic an expression as Tadrith.
“There is this, Keeth,” the gryphon said to his twin. “You can just go on doing what you are doing and you will have earned every right to be considered unique and special. You’re writing your own definition of a trondi’irn. You don’t have to stand there, blushing at the nares with embarrassment when someone comes in acting as if running the obstacle course was the equivalent of stealing one of Ma’ar’s magical weapons.”
But Keenath ruffled his neck-feathers and clicked his beak. “That’s true up to a point, but there is another problem. Father literally does not understand me. We have absolutely nothing
in common. When I talk about what I’m doing, he gets this strange look on his face, as if I were speaking a foreign tongue.” He laughed weakly. “I suppose I am, really. Well, I’ll get my chance eventually.”
“You will,” Blade promised, but she made no move to rise to her feet. “I’m going to have to break the news to my parents, assuming that they don’t already know, which is more than likely. Tad, you’d better figure out how to tell yours.”
“They’ll know,” Tadrith replied with resignation. “Father is probably already telling everyone he thinks will listen how there’s never been anyone as young as I am posted so far away on his first assignment.”
Blade laughed ruefully. “You’re probably right. And mine is probably doing the same—except—”
She didn’t complete the sentence, but Tadrith knew her well enough not to pressure her. They each had their own set of problems, and talking about them wasn’t going to solve them.
Only time would do that.
Or so he hoped.
Silverblade sat back on her heels when the twins began to argue over what Tadrith should pack. She was in no real hurry to get back home; since she was still living with her parents, she did not even have the illusion of privacy that her own aerie would have provided. The moment she walked in the door, the questions and congratulations—bracketed by thinly-veiled worry—would begin, and at the moment she did not feel up to fielding them.
She breathed in the scent of salt air and sunbaked rock, half closing her eyes. I love this place. The only neighbors are other gryphons, quiet enough that the sound of the surf covers any noise they might make. And I love the fact that there are no other humans nearby, only tervardi, gryphons, and a few kyree.
How she envied Tad his freedom! He really had no notion just how easy a parent Skandranon was to deal with. The Black Gryphon had a. sound, if instinctive and not entirely reliable, knowledge of just when to shut his beak and let Tad go his own way. He also attempted to restrain his enthusiasm for the accomplishments of his twins, although it was difficult for him. But at least he showed that he approved; Amberdrake had never been happy with the path-choice his daughter had made, and although he tried not to let his disapproval color their relationship, it leaked through anyway. How could it not?
Perhaps “disapproval” was too strong a word. Amberdrake understood warriors; he had worked with them for most of his life. He respected them most profoundly. He liked them, and he even understood all of the drives that fueled their actions.
He simply did not understand why his child and Winterhart’s would want to be a warrior. He can’t fathom how he and Mother produced someone like me. By all rights, with everything that they taught me, I should never have been attracted to this life.
That was a gap of understanding that probably would never be bridged, and Blade had yet to come up with a way of explaining herself that would explain the riddle to him. “Blade, would you play secretary and write the list for me?” Tadrith pleaded, interrupting her reverie. “Otherwise I know I’m going to forget something important.”
“If you do, you can always have it Gated to us,” she pointed out, and laughed when he lowered his eartufts.
“That would be so humiliating I would rather do without!” he exclaimed. “I’d never hear the last of it! Please, just go get a silver-stick and paper from the box and help me, would you?”
“What else are gryphon-partners for, except doing paperwork?” she responded, as she rose and sauntered across the room to the small chest that held a variety of oddments the twins found occasionally useful, each in its appointed place. The chest, carved of a fragrant wood that the Haighlei called sadar, held a series of compartmentalized trays holding all manner of helpful things. Among them were a box of soft, silver sticks and a block of tough reed-paper, both manufactured by the Haighlei. She extracted both, and returned to her seat beside Tad. She leaned up against him, bracing herself against his warm bulk, using her knees as an impromptu writing desk.
As the twins argued over each item before agreeing to add it to the list or leave it out, she waited patiently. Only once did she speak up during the course of the argument, as Keenath insisted that Tad include a particular type of healer’s kit and Tad argued against it on the grounds of weight.
She slapped his shoulder to get him to be quiet. “Who is the trondi’irn here?” she demanded. “You, or Keeth?” Tad turned his head abruptly, as if he had forgotten that she was there. “You mean, since he’s the expert, I ought to listen to him.”
“Precisely,” she said crisply. “What’s the point of asking his opinion on this if you won’t take it when you know he’s the authority?”
“But the likelihood that we’d need a bonesetting kit is so small it’s infinitesimal!” he protested. “And the weight! I’m the one who’s going to be carrying all this, you know!”
“But if we need it, we’ll need exactly those supplies, and nothing else will substitute,” she pointed out. “We don’t know for certain that there’s a bone-setting kit at the Outpost, and I prefer not to take the chance that the last few teams have been as certain of their invulnerability as you.” Keenath looked smug as she added it to the list, unbidden. “I’m going to insist on it. And if it isn’t in that basket when we leave, I’ll send for one. We may be in a position of needing one and being unable to ask for one to be Gated to us.”
Tad flattened his ears in defeat as he looked from one implacable face to the other. “You win. I can’t argue against both of you.”
Gryphons could not smirk like humans could, but there was enough muscular control of the beak edges at the join of the lower mandible that one could be approximated. More than a touch of such an expression showed on Keeth as they continued on to the next item. Part of the reason why Blade felt so comfortable in the Silvers and with the gryphons in particular was that their motives and thoughts were relatively simple and easy to understand. In particular, they made poor liars; gryphons were just too expressive to hold a bluff effectively once you knew how to read their physical cues, such as the lay of their facial feathers and the angle of their ears. Although they were complex creatures and often stubborn, gryphons were also exactly what they appeared to be. The kestra’chern, her father in particular, were anything but.
Their job was to manipulate, when it came right down to it. The whole point of what they did was to manipulate a client into feeling better, to give him a little more insight into himself. But she wasn’t at all comfortable with the idea of manipulating anyone for any reason, no matter how pure the motive and how praiseworthy the outcome.
Oh, I know things simply aren’t that black-and-white, but—
Ah, things were just simpler with the Silvers. Issues often were a matter of extremes rather than degrees. When you had only a single moment to make up your mind what you were going to do, you had to be able to pare a situation down to the basics. Subtleties, as Judeth often said, were for times of leisure.
She noted down another item, and let her thoughts drift.
I can’t wait until we’re away from here. I wish we could go without having to talk to my parents.
Once they were away from White Gryphon, she would finally be able to relax for the first time in several years. And once again, it was her father who was indirectly responsible for her unease of spirit.
He knows too much, that’s the problem. When she had been a child, she had taken it for granted that Amberdrake would know everyone of any importance at all in White Gryphon. She hadn’t known any reason why he shouldn’t. But as she gradually became aware just what her father’s avocation really entailed, she gained a dim understanding that the knowledge Amberdrake possessed was extraordinarily intimate.
Finally, one day it all fell together. She put the man together with the definition of kestra’chern and had a moment of blinding and appalling revelation.
Not only did her father know everyone of any importance, he also knew the tiniest details about them—every motive, every desire
, every dream and indecision. Details like that, she felt deep in her heart, no person should ever know about another. Such secrets gave the one who held them too much power over the other, and that would weigh as an unimaginable responsibility.
Not that Father would ever use that power. . . .
Or would he? If he had a chance to manipulate someone for a cause he thought was right, wouldn’t he be tempted to do just that? And wouldn’t the fear of having such secrets revealed to others be enough to make almost anyone agree to something that Amberdrake wanted?
She had never once seen any indications that Amberdrake had given in to the temptation to use his tacit power—but he was her father, and she knew that she was prejudiced on his behalf. For that matter, she was not certain she would know what to look for if he had misused his powers.
Oh, it’s not likely. Father would never do anything to harm anyone, if only because he is an Empath and would feel their emotional distress.
She ought to know; she was something of an Em-path herself, although in her case, she got nothing unless she was touching the person in question.
That was one of the reasons why Amberdrake was so confounded by the idea that she wanted to be a Silver. How could an Empath ever choose to go into a profession where she might have to kill or injure someone?
Easily enough. It’s to prevent the people I must take care of from killing or injuring others.
He would never accept that, just as he would never accept the idea that she would not want to use her Empathic ability.
She shuddered at the very idea. He knows every nasty little secret, every hidden fear, every deep need, every longing and every desire of every client he has ever dealt with. How he manages to hold all those things inside without going mad—I cannot fathom it. And that he actually wants to know these things—I could never do that, never. It makes my skin crawl. I don’t want to know anyone that intimately. It would be like having every layer of my skin peeled off—or doing it to someone else over and over.
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