The Griffin's War (Fallen Moon Trilogy)

by K J Taylor

  “But you have to go back,” Erian told himself sternly. “It’s your destiny to face Kraeai kran ae. And what about Elkin? She’s waiting for you! Oh for the love of Gryphus, stop talking to yourself, you sound like a lunatic.”

  He fell silent, heaved The Pride of Gryphus back onto the sand and turned it over to inspect the places where it had been leaking. He’d stuffed palm fibres into the gaps he’d found; it worked well enough, though he had his doubts over how long they would last. Long enough, hopefully.

  There was a soft thudding of paws on the sand behind him, and Rannagon came to join him.

  Erian bent to scratch the chick’s head. “Hello, Rannagon, how are you?”

  The chick looked up at him, bright-eyed. “Am strong!” he boasted. As he grew toward adulthood, he had taken on some of the gawkiness of his father, Eekrae; so far, none of Senneck’s grace was showing through in him. But his feathers were a rich shade of brown, mottled attractively with grey on the wings, and his fur was a pleasing sandy gold.

  “Of course you are,” Erian said fondly. “You’re so big now!”

  Rannagon, already bored, waddled over to inspect the boat. “Is big,” he said. “We ride soon?”

  “I think so,” said Erian. “I’ve tested it, and it floats well enough. Do you think you’re brave enough to sit in it with me?”

  Instantly provoked, the chick drew himself up and puffed out his chest. “Am griffin! Griffin not know fear!” he declared. “I go with human!”

  Erian chuckled. “I wouldn’t dream of leaving you behind. Or your sister.”

  Rannagon snorted dismissively at the mention of his sister. “We go soon?”

  “If your mother agrees,” said Erian. “In fact, we should go to her now. Shall we?”

  Rannagon darted away and rushed ahead of him by way of an answer, and Erian trudged after him, tired out from another day’s work.

  Back in the village, Senneck was sunning herself while the still unnamed female chick scampered about, chasing a butterfly.

  Erian stopped to watch them, while Rannagon went ahead to his mother. Now he had been reminded of the trouble that had to be taking place in his absence, he found it hard to imagine that such an idyllic scene could exist while his home was being ravaged by war.

  His resolve hardened, and he strode forward and sat beside his partner. “Senneck.”

  She looked up. “What news?”

  “It’s finished,” said Erian, as he watched the chicks play fight each other. “I tested it again; it’ll float well enough.”

  “Even when you are inside it?” Senneck asked, suspiciously.

  “Yes,” said Erian. “I paddled it around the lagoon without much trouble.”

  “You still have not told me how you plan to take it back to the coast,” said Senneck. “I am not convinced that you could paddle that far.”

  “I can rest every so often,” said Erian.

  “But there are tides and currents in the open sea,” Senneck pressed. “Could you fight back against those?”

  “I . . .”

  “As I suspected,” said the brown griffin. “Erian, I am not willing to risk your life and the lives of my chicks by allowing you to do this.”

  Erian reddened. “Senneck, I spent months making that boat. I can do it!”

  “You cannot paddle that far,” said Senneck, with terrible finality.

  “Well then—”

  “However”—Senneck laid her head down on her talons—“I have a solution.”

  “You do?” said Erian.

  “I cannot carry you that far,” said Senneck. “But I believe that I can pull your boat with me as I fly.”

  “What?” said Erian “How?”

  “With rope,” said Senneck. “If you weave one long and thick enough, and tie it to the front of your boat, I shall grasp it in my talons and pull you with me.”

  Erian began to get excited. “You think you can do that?”

  “It is a chance,” said Senneck, reserved as always. “But we shall have to practise first, to see if it can be done.”

  “Of course,” said Erian. “I’ll start making the rope right now.” Senneck made a rasping sound. “Perhaps the length of your fur has changed, my human, but your impulsiveness has not. Weave your rope now if you must. And bring food for the chicks; they will be hungry after so much exercise.”

  “Of course!” said Erian.

  He scurried off, heart pounding. After so long, they could finally leave. In a matter of days they could be back in Cymria, on their way to Malvern with the magical sword. He could be facing the Dark Lord before the next full moon. He could . . .

  Erian’s excitement darkened with fear, and he found some raw palm fibres and the carcass of a bird and took them back to Senneck without the trace of a smile.

  Arenadd stood on the balcony outside Skandar’s nest, watching the moon over the roofs of the city and trying to think. He had lost half of his memories . . . including the memory of how he had lost them, if he had ever known why in the first place.

  Why?

  “Why have I forgotten?” he said aloud, his eyes on the moon. “What did I forget? Why did I need to forget? Did you make it happen, master? Why?”

  There was no answer—not that he had been expecting one. Perhaps the Night God wasn’t yet strong enough to speak to him while he was awake.

  Maybe she had nothing to say.

  He rubbed his broken fingers. Somehow, the loss of his memories didn’t distress him. And why should it? he thought. I don’t know what I forgot. I don’t have any attachment to it any more. For all I know, none of it was worth remembering.

  It wasn’t that he’d forgotten everything. He remembered things he’d learnt, experiences, sensations, knowledge. It was the personal things that he’d forgotten. The names of his parents. The place where he had grown up. The life he had lived before Skandar found his shattered body and filled it with magic, and so unwittingly fulfilled the purpose the Night God had given him.

  “It doesn’t matter who I was before then,” Arenadd told the moon. “That man is dead. I know who I am. What you made me, master. What you made me. And at least you gave me life . . . of a kind. And more than life.”

  More than life, oh yes. She had given him power.

  Gods, how he loved it now. The ability to appear and disappear at will, and to kill his enemies without remorse, but most of all the immortality—the sheer, perfect knowledge that no matter what happened he could never be killed. He had seen the looks of horror and dismay on the faces of his enemies when they hit him and found it had no effect, when they realised that nothing they did could save them. I am the Shadow that Walks.

  Arenadd grinned to himself. He would have given up far more than his memories and his heartbeat to become what he was now.

  “Forgive me, master,” he said. “I shouldn’t be ungrateful. Not after—”

  He broke off mid-sentence, turning sharply as he heard a noise behind him. Something big and dark moved: Skandar, stirring in his nest.

  “Human come,” the griffin rasped.

  Arenadd reached for his sickle, but it was only Saeddryn.

  “Sir,” she said. “I’m sorry . . .”

  “What is it, Saeddryn?”

  She sighed and looked him in the face. “Sir, yer mother has just died.”

  Arenadd stared blankly at her. “What?”

  “I’m sorry, sir,” said Saeddryn. “We’d have called ye sooner, but it happened so quickly. Yorath was with her; he says he stepped out t’get a drink, an’ when he got back she was dead.”

  Arenadd’s blank expression did not change. “Saeddryn, what are you talking about? What do you mean my mother died? I don’t . . .” He trailed off. I don’t have a mother, do I?

  Saeddryn looked sympathetic. “I can understand it’s a shock t’ye, sir.”

  “Well . . . uh, yes,” said Arenadd. It was true enough. “I suppose I . . . I should go to her.”

  “Yes, sir,” said Sae
ddryn.

  Arenadd followed her back through the nest. Skandar looked as if he was thinking of coming, too, but he changed his mind and lay back down in his nest with the chicks nestled between his front paws.

  Saeddryn led the way down to a lower level of the tower, and as they approached a certain door, Arenadd had a sinking feeling in his stomach. This was the room . . .

  Inside, Yorath and Torc were sitting by the bed and talking in low voices. They looked up when Arenadd came in, appearing as shocked and guilty as if they had just been caught stealing.

  Arenadd nodded vaguely to them and walked over to the bed, but he already knew what he would find there.

  The tortured woman from Warwick, grey faced in death, with her mouth slightly open. She looked as if she had died in great pain.

  Arenadd, looking down at her, heard her voice again in his memory. My son is Arren. My son is dead.

  Arenadd saw her hair, tangled on the pillow around her face. Curly. He reached up to touch his own curls, his expression far away. Arren, my son is Arren.

  “Oh gods,” he breathed. “Oh gods. She’s . . . Saeddryn!”

  He turned, only to find the room deserted. Saeddryn must have taken Torc and Yorath with her, thinking that her master needed to be alone.

  Arenadd turned back to look at the body, his mind racing. She looks like me. She said her son was Arren. She said he was dead . . . she looks like me.

  And yet, somehow, as he looked at her, he didn’t feel as if he had any connection to her at all. Her face was completely unfamiliar. Her voice had been unfamiliar, too. No.

  She’s not my mother, he thought. She can’t be. I have no mother. I never had a mother. She’s not my mother. She was mad . . . raving . . . thought I was her dead son. Yes. She’s not my mother. Saeddryn was just confused.

  For some reason, the thought gave him a feeling of peace, as if some inner voice was whispering, Yes, yes, that’s right. You’re right.

  Still, that didn’t mean he shouldn’t feel sorry for this woman. What the Southerners had done to her was unspeakable.

  He reached down to touch her cold face. “I’m so sorry . . . Mother.”

  He wasn’t sure why he called her that. Perhaps because she had wanted to believe he was her son.

  “Saeddryn!”

  Saeddryn must have been just outside, because she came almost instantly. “Yes, sir?”

  Arenadd rubbed his eyes. “I want you to say the rites for her.”

  “Yes, sir. When, sir?”

  “At once,” said Arenadd. “A small ceremony—there shouldn’t be any need to wake people up for this, especially when they’ve been training all day. And I don’t think many of them would want to see the poor thing in this state.”

  Saeddryn looked taken aback. “Yes, sir. I can understand if ye’d want it t’be a private thing. We could hold it in one of the smaller courtyards if ye like, sir.”

  “We’ll do that,” said Arenadd. “I’m sure Yorath and Torc can carry her out there for you. As for me, I’m tired and I need to be alone. I’ll be in my chamber, and I’d prefer not to be disturbed unless it’s important.”

  Saeddryn stared at him. “Sir, I don’t want t’press ye, but I think ye should come t’this.”

  “I’ve been to enough funerals lately, Saeddryn.”

  “But sir, she’s yer own mother! Don’t ye care enough t’at least come to the funeral?”

  Arenadd glanced back at the frail shape in the bed. “She’s not my mother, Saeddryn,” he said. “I don’t have a mother.”

  And he walked away without a backward glance.

  Maybe he hadn’t looked back, but that didn’t stop him from feeling a strange sense of remorse as he locked himself away in his room. He did his best to push it out of his mind as he sat down in front of the fire and pulled off his boots. There was blood in the tread; he made a mental note to clean it off in the morning.

  He’d put a jug of wine on the table close to his seat, and he put his feet up and poured himself a cupful. It was a good vintage—nice rich flavour, with a hint of raspberry.

  He took a good swallow, and gasped as he felt it burn its way down inside him. Beautiful.

  As the wine started to relax him, he sat back and thought about Skade. She had been gone hardly any time, but it felt as if it had been a hundred years.

  I need you here, Skade, he thought. I need to touch you, kiss you . . . talk to you. I could talk to you about anything, couldn’t I? Skade . . .

  He sighed and drained the cup before pouring himself another one, which he emptied even more quickly.

  But despite his thoughts of Skade, and despite the alcohol beginning to dull his senses, the dead woman crept back into his mind.

  Gods, what if she really was my mother?

  He downed another cup of wine. No. It was impossible. How could he have a mother when he hadn’t been born in the first place?

  I was born . . . somewhere else, he thought. Not in this world, but somewhere else. I was made to fill this body, which no-one needed any more. Yes.

  The conviction helped to soothe him.

  But what about before then? What about before Arenadd Taranisäii was born? What if I was someone before that? Is there something left in me from that time?

  He didn’t know, and the realisation disturbed him.

  Without thinking, he got up out of his chair and padded barefoot back out onto the balcony with his cup in his hand. Out in the cool night air, he looked up at the moon again.

  “What have you taken from me?” he demanded. “What? Was that woman my mother? Did you make me forget her? Why would you make me do that? I don’t understand! Speak to me!”

  Nothing happened, and he breathed deeply to try to calm himself down. But his agitation did not die away, and he paced back and forth, sipping from his cup and muttering to himself.

  “. . . have to trust her. She’s my master. She knows what to do; she’s a god. If she made me forget, it was for a reason . . . a good reason . . .”

  In the end he was driven back inside when he realised the cup was empty. He growled to himself and slipped past Skandar’s sleeping form back to the fire and the wine jug.

  He sat down again and tried to relax, but he couldn’t. Angry with himself and his situation, and more than a little frightened, he refilled the cup again and again, gulping the wine down recklessly.

  Eventually the strength went out of his limbs, and he slumped in his chair, staring fixedly at the fire.

  He reached for the jug and nearly knocked it off the table. After a few attempts he managed to grip the handle. His cup had somehow ended up on the floor, so he tilted the jug to his mouth instead. Wine gushed into his mouth, and he managed to swallow most of it before the jug slipped out of his hand and bounced onto the floor.

  “I feel better now,” Arenadd mumbled, before sliding off his chair and landing on the hearthrug in a drunken stupor.

  Something hit him, hard.

  He stirred and tried to lift his head. Instantly a wave of unbearable nausea went through him, and his head dropped back onto the rug.

  The thing hit him again. “Human! Human!”

  Arenadd groaned. “Skandar?”

  Skandar hit him a third time. “Human, wake!” he rasped. “Wake, now!”

  Arenadd managed to open his eyes. The first thing he saw was Skandar’s huge foreleg. He struggled to make himself wake up, but his head ached appallingly. Everything seemed to be spinning around him.

  “Wake!” Skandar said yet again, and the urgent tone finally brought something resembling coherent thought back into Arenadd’s mind.

  He managed to lift his upper body off the rug, and rolled onto his back with a painful thud. He could see Skandar’s enormous head looming over him. “What?” he said. “What’s—”

  “Enemy!” said Skandar. “Enemy come, human! Wake! We fight, now! Fight!”

  All of Arenadd’s sluggishness evaporated. “Oh, by the Night God’s eye . . .”

&nbs
p; He hauled himself to his feet, staggering slightly, but made it to the table, where he’d left his sickle. He stuffed it into his belt and, forgetting his boots, stumbled out to the balcony.

  He saw them quickly enough. They were on the horizon—a massive dark cloud, coming closer all the while.

  Mouthing Northern curses, he turned to run back inside. Skandar was there already, hissing with aggression.

  “Quickly,” Arenadd told him. “Go to the top of the tower and send out a call; wake the city, the way we planned! I have to get the chicks to safety and organise the other humans. The moment I’m ready, I’ll come out onto one of the balconies and call for you, understand?”

  They had already gone through his plan many times. Skandar clicked his beak. “Not wait long!” he warned, and hurled himself into the air.

  Arenadd scooped up the chicks—no easy task—and ran out of the nest with them. He nearly fell over when he found the door to his room locked, but he managed to get in after some fumbling and ran down through the tower, shouting all the while.

  “Attack! Attack! Griffins coming from the South! Attack!”

  Everywhere people came running, as if his voice had called them into existence. Arenadd rapped out a few quick orders as he passed, still struggling to restrain the three wriggling chicks. In spite of the urgency of the situation, he still had room to feel like an idiot. The great Dark Lord Arenadd, staggering barefoot down the tower with a hangover and an armload of griffin chicks busy trying to claw his face off.

  Iorwerth and Saeddryn came to him in what seemed no time.

  “Sir, what’s goin’ on?”

  Arenadd shoved one of the chicks into her hands. “Here, hold on to the little bastard, will you? We’re being attacked. There’s griffins coming from the South—Malvern, for sure. They’re still a fair way away—Skandar saw them in time—but there’s a lot of them, I know that much. And they’re almost certainly carrying more firebombs—probably worse. Iorwerth, you and Kaanee must lead the attack in the air. Saeddryn, you’ll organise the defenders on the ground, the way we discussed—is the water ready?”

  “Yes, sir,” said Saeddryn.

  “Good. Iorwerth, go and get ready, and for the love of the Night God be quick about it. I want our griffins in the sky immediately. Go on, stop gawping at me and go!”