The Golden Griffin (Book 3)

by Michael Wallace

  “There!” Mufashe said. He leaned over the pool of quicksilver, his eyes alive with interest. “Who is that?”

  A young girl rode on a camel. She watched her surroundings with an eager eye. A falcon sat on her wrist. Chantmer knew the girl well.

  Oh, Daniel. If I’d known you came to Marrabat, I’d have warned you not to bring the girl.

  “I have no idea,” Roghan said. “But she’s only a child, my sultan.”

  “She’s old enough. And look at how she holds that falcon! She’s got the right mixture of girlish abandon and sweetness, I can tell.” He licked his lips. “A challenge—I like that.”

  “Her name is Sofiana,” Chantmer said. “A wild child, not a young woman at all, yet. Twelve years old, I believe. Perhaps thirteen, but no more.”

  The sultan turned a sharp glance in his direction. “You know her then?”

  “Yes, I know her. She is the daughter of King Daniel of the Citadel. Or rather, of Whelan of the Knights Temperate.”

  “Ah, Whelan’s bastard child. Yes, I have heard of her.” The eager gleam burned even more fiercely.

  Roghan’s mouth turned downward. He gave Chantmer a look.

  “They will never give her to you,” Chantmer said.

  “Of course they will. Look at them! They’re going to deliver her into my hands.”

  “My sultan,” Roghan said. His voice had taken on an air of caution. The quicksilver faded until it became once more a metal disc on the floor. “You risk war. We’re not ready.”

  “Then let it be war. They cannot touch us in Marrabat.”

  “Sultan,” Chantmer said. Fury rose in his breast. Faalam, the eunuch, put his hand on his scimitar. His posture changed. Chantmer forced calm upon himself. “This is madness. The girl is nothing.”

  Mufashe’s mouth hardened, and he rose to his feet. “I tire of this audience. Go, you are all dismissed.” He looked at his guards. “Everyone.”

  Everyone did not mean Faalam, apparently, for Sultan Mufashe grabbed the eunuch’s arm as the others turned to go. His eyes regained their gleam, and he had already begun to scheme with Faalam how to get the girl before the others departed the room. The guards left for their quarters, while Roghan turned away and rubbed at his smooth chin.

  In spite of his anger at the sultan, Chantmer was pleased to find himself free of the eunuch. “The sultan is a fool.”

  “The walls have ears. Follow me to the meditation chamber.”

  “No. Alone.”

  “Outside, then,” Roghan said.

  The two men retreated to the gardens where Chantmer had been meditating earlier. They stopped next to the fountain, where the burbling water would mask their voices.

  “The sultan must be stopped,” Chantmer said. “He cannot take the girl.”

  “I abhor Mufashe’s appetites as much as anyone. But she is one child—will you free all of the girls of the harem?”

  “There are more?”

  “Many.”

  “Then, yes. I would put an end to such a disgusting habit. But my concern is more practical. That girl was Sofiana of Arvada.”

  “I thought you were bluffing.”

  “Not at all. She’s the daughter of one king and the niece of another.”

  “She didn’t look like a princess.”

  “Believe me, she’s no princess and never will be. Nevertheless—”

  “I understand. And the knight? Her protector?”

  “Her uncle,” Chantmer said. “That’s the former king of Eriscoba.”

  “King Daniel? I thought he was dying.”

  “Not anymore.”

  “So Mufashe risks more than the wrath of Kallia of Balsalom,” Roghan said. “This is not a development to encourage.”

  “We must stop him.”

  “There is the small problem of the eunuch. Faalam is a loyal slave—he’ll take the girl, daughter of the king or no.”

  “Then kill him.”

  “I can’t. There are . . . complications. I will be discovered.”

  Chantmer allowed himself an inward smile. For all of Roghan’s boasting, the mage apparently had his limitations. He couldn’t handle a simple palace eunuch.

  “Then I’ll do it myself.”

  “Your magic will be detected,” Roghan said.

  “In better times, no, it wouldn’t. But I’m a shadow of my former self. It will have to be other means. Non-magical means.”

  “What do you need?”

  “Silver bite. Can you get it?”

  “That is a rare poison in the sultanates.”

  “Silver bite is rare everywhere. And that is why I must use it.”

  “How much do you need?”

  “One hundred grains.”

  “That’s a lot. Expensive.”

  “Quite. Can you get it?”

  Roghan looked thoughtful. At last he nodded. “Very well. But be careful. Don’t underestimate the eunuch.”

  Chantmer nodded. He didn’t know what had the mage spooked, but it didn’t matter. In Chantmer’s current, weakened condition, it was a prudent reminder. Markal’s slave boy had nearly bested him on the Tothian Way. He would take no enemy for granted, not even a palace eunuch.

  Roghan left him alone. Chantmer remained next to the fountain for several moments, flipping through the dusty tome of his memory to call up the use of silver bite. There would be no way to administer the poison directly. Faalam would not be so foolish as to accept a cup of tea from him. But that wouldn’t be necessary.

  Chantmer would administer it through his very touch. That meant great personal risk.

  “Such concentration,” a voice said over his shoulder. “Such a scheming expression.”

  Chantmer turned to see Faalam standing directly behind him. How long had he stood there? The eunuch’s eyes narrowed to slits, and Chantmer felt a strange itching in his head, as if the man had somehow reached in to pluck out his very thoughts. Faalam carried a scimitar. If he drew it, he could cut Chantmer in two. In the wizard’s current condition, he’d be helpless to stop him.

  Chantmer glanced around the courtyard, as if looking for someone. When his back was turned, he whispered a counter spell to whatever was digging in his head. The itching feeling passed.

  “No wonder the sultan wants me to watch you,” the eunuch added. “I leave you for five minutes, and already you’re working mischief. Come, the sultan has a scroll he wishes you to translate.”

  He turned on his heel. Chantmer clenched his teeth and followed. His first step brought a wave of dizziness, and he staggered before catching his balance.

  The simple spell had cost him dearly. He wished he had the strength to silence this insolent man. He must regain his powers.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Griffin riders stared when Daria flew into the encampment on Talon’s back. Their mounts struggled against tethers, flapped wings, and tried to get airborne. The sight of the wild golden griffin made them anxious to either fight or flee.

  Talon descended into the squawking, flapping chaos calmly, seemingly above the fray. One of the white-crowned griffins nipped at his wing. He whipped his head around and glared. The other griffin shied away with a nervous cry. Riders tugged at tethers to get their mounts to a safe distance. A few riders scowled at Daria, but most stared in awe.

  Daria’s mother watched her descend, then turned back to a heated discussion with Daria’s uncle, Jhon Kellsworth. Palina and Jhon had spread a large sheepskin map over a flat rock in the middle of the slope. Two of the Swansin men squatted nearby, repairing leather armor, while one of the Swansin women and two of her children—too young for battle—attached iron tips to eight-foot lances made of ash wood.

  The hillside was the site of some ancient holy site. In addition to the flat rock on which Palina and Jhon studied the map, there were a number of giant cut stones that ran in a semi-circle across the grassy slope. They faced the khalifates on the distant plains thousands of feet below. The largest stones were twice the height of a
man and had long-since toppled to their sides, but a number of smaller stones, five or six feet high, remained standing in the turf. Riders had tethered their mounts to many of them while they busied themselves with other matters.

  Daria’s first inclination was to do the same, but she remembered what the old man in the mountains had told her. Instead, she swept back her cloak and put her hands on her hips.

  “If I leave you alone, you won’t fly off or misbehave, will you?”

  Talon squawked.

  “I know, believe me. But you won’t earn their respect if you cause mischief. You’re not tethered, it’s up to you.”

  Daria collected her breastplate and her father’s hunting horn before she left him to make her way to her mother and uncle. She threw the horn’s strap over her shoulder and carried the breastplate under her arm.

  As she turned to go, Talon waddled after her.

  “No, you stay here.”

  He squawked again.

  She made an awkward squawk back. Stay.

  He answered. I go.

  “Fine. Have it your way.”

  The Kellsworth tower sat on the hillside above the slope, just visible through the trees on the edge of the grass. A face watched from the uppermost window, and someone—Daria’s cousin, she guessed—waved an all-clear to two more riders who soared in from the south.

  Her Uncle Jhon flashed a warm smile as Daria approached. She embraced him, then her mother.

  “So this is the golden griffin I’ve heard so much about,” Jhon said. “Is he ready?”

  Talon cocked his head and eyed Jhon as a robin might eye a tasty worm. Daria rubbed her hand against his neck. He twitched restlessly and watched as several riders took their mounts to the air. They wheeled overhead, charging and feinting with the new lances.

  “As ready as any of us,” Daria said. “Where’s the dragon?”

  Palina turned to the sheepskin map. She put down a black stone north of the Tothian Way. “Right here.”

  The map itself showed mountains, rivers, forests, and canyons. It marked the castles of Montcrag and the Teeth along the Tothian Way as the road passed through the Spine. It showed the Old Road and the Wylde to the north of that, and the highest peaks along the range. It didn’t show towers or hidden aeries. Some of these had been marked, however, with small pebbles. A white stone showed their current position, perhaps a hundred miles south of the black stone.

  “So far already,” Daria said, dismayed. “Does that mean all the Wylde is burning? It must be a hundred miles below where we saw it a few days ago.”

  “Not all of the Wylde is burning,” Palina said. “But enough is.”

  “It’s a wasteland up there,” Jhon said. “Mountains charred from the foothills to the tree line. Soot falling from the sky like ash. Rivers running black and dirty. Animals fleeing or burning alive by the thousands.”

  Daria looked at the sky. It was blue, clear in every direction as far as the eye could see. And warm, with the air coming up from the south a welcome change from the chilly weather of the past week. But those same warm air currents pushed the smoke and haze ahead of them. She was sure if she rounded the giant hump of a mountain above and behind them, she’d see a vast stretch of brown and black smoke hanging all along the range to the north.

  “The dragon is lying in a narrow gorge near the Old Road,” Jhon said. “Dragon kin and their wasps guard it, together with riders on horses. Enemy soldiers. I didn’t expect to see them this far from Veyre. Not after the beating they took in the battle.”

  Daria thought about Markal’s talk of ravagers on the road. Were they with the dragon now?

  “We scouted the area but didn’t dare risk a closer look,” Jhon continued. “Not with so many wasps to give chase. I’m not sure what they’re doing down there, if the dragon needs its rest or if it’s injured. Maybe something else.”

  “They’re stoking its fires,” Daria said. “It used everything it had burning the forests, and now they’re feeding it charcoal.”

  “For how long?” Jhon asked.

  “A day, a week. Who knows? But sooner or later it will be up and destroying again.”

  “When it comes, we’ll make our stand here,” Palina said. “Wait until the enemy comes around the corner, then ambush them.”

  Daria shook her head. “No, that’s not the way.”

  “We know the terrain,” her mother pressed. “We can duck into the forest, or fight over the grass if the enemy burns the trees. The Kellsworths have a good watch tower, perfect for spotting distant enemies.”

  Uncle Jhon looked worried. This was his home she was talking about. “What if they know of this place already? They could swing west, come over the mountains, and be on us before we have sounded the alarm.”

  “How would they know?” Palina asked.

  Daria cut them off before they continued that particular line of thought. “It doesn’t matter if they do or don’t. We’re fools if we wait for the battle to come to us.”

  “It’s what we should have done in the first place,” Palina said. “If we had, your father would still be alive. The mountains wouldn’t be burning, because the enemy wouldn’t even know we were here. They’d carry on their war with the flatlanders, and it would be none of our business.”

  “It isn’t that sort of war, Mother.”

  “You don’t know that. You can’t be sure of anything. If we stay here, maybe they’ll be content to fly around for a while, burning, then head east to rejoin the war.”

  “Do you really believe that?” Daria looked at Jhon. “Or you?”

  They didn’t answer. Palina stared at the map. She rested a hand on the black stone and rubbed her thumb along its side.

  “This is a war of domination,” Daria said. “Everything will fall. Balsalom, the Western Khalifates. Eriscoba. The Golden Tower. The mountain castles that guard the Way. They’re going to burn the mountains from one end of the Spine to the other. The lucky ones will die.”

  “We can’t survive this,” Palina said. “Look at us. Fifty riders. That’s all we can muster.”

  “More are coming,” Jhon said.

  “Not enough.”

  “Have the Wingets arrived?” Daria asked.

  “Not yet, but they’re on their way,” her mother said. “They’ve given plenty already, but they’re coming.”

  The Winget clan had suffered terrible losses at Sleptstock, but Daria thought they could still muster a dozen griffins.

  “When?” Daria asked.

  “Tomorrow morning, at the latest,” Palina said.

  “Maybe a few others, too,” Jhon said.

  As if to punctuate his words, a griffin dropped from the sky. Oh its back was Kellum Highfall, a dour rider from the north country, whose wife had fallen in the Battle of Arvada.

  “Then we’ll wait until morning,” Daria said. “Whoever we have at dawn, that will be our army.”

  Daria lifted the hunting horn to her lips and let out a short blast, followed by a second, longer blast. The sound echoed over the peaks that rose behind the hillside.

  Griffins dropped from the sky. Other riders untethered their mounts from the ancient stones and led them toward where Daria, her mother, and her uncle stood around the flat stone. The force of beating wings sent a wind that lifted the stray hairs from Daria’s braid and swirled them around her face. Talons and paws tore at the turf as griffins landed, and a few griffins nipped irritably at others when they came too close. They all kept their distance from the golden griffin.

  “No more flying for tonight,” Daria told the assembled throng. Talon was growing jittery, and she put a hand on his head to calm him.

  “We’ll need our strength for the morning,” she continued. “Find whatever place you can to hole up for the night. Be ready to fly at dawn.”

  #

  Daria’s uncle brought their griffins into a separate room off the aerie and made beds for Daria and her mother by the fire. Daria’s younger sister Lacey joined them later
, having been busy bedding down Joffa and Yuli. Lacey was only sixteen, and had been deemed too young to fly at Slepstock and Arvada. Now, a few short months later, she’d be flying into battle for the first time.

  Between the deerskin rugs, the pillows stuffed with griffin down, and the warmth of the fire and her two companions, Daria was comfortable enough. But her stomach refused to unclench, and she kept worrying about tomorrow. Lacey and her mother fell asleep at once, their breathing regular, peaceful expressions on their faces. How did they manage?

  It wasn’t fear of combat that she wrestled with, Daria realized. There was nothing she could do about the actual fighting but face it as bravely as possible. She had a superior mount. She enjoyed excellent balance and better skill with the swords than most riders, and was certainly better with her weapons than any dragon kin. She was not even particularly afraid of death. If she fell, the Harvester would gather her soul and sow it anew. That was the way of the world.

  No, what terrified her was the crushing responsibility. If she failed, if the dragon overwhelmed her riders, her people would be destroyed. The dragon and the vermin that flanked it would fly unopposed from the frozen north to the Southern Seas.

  Burning everything.

  #

  The next morning, griffin riders rose in a single, massive flock from the hillside beneath the Kellsworth tower. Daria blew her horn, and they turned north. It had snowed on the highest peaks during the night, and as they climbed in elevation, the forest beneath lay crowned in brilliant white. The wind burrowed through her heavy cloak. Her gloved hands grew numb. The air smelled of smoke and fire.

  Talon stretched into the lead. He was swifter than the others and more eager. He screamed in joy. Daria pulled back on his tether and leaned to speak in his ear, warning him to silence. They were still miles and miles from their quarry, but she needed him to understand the importance of surprise.

  Find them on the ground. Smother them from above.

  They flew high in the mountains on the west side of the Spine in a glorious, sweeping phalanx of beating wings, helmets glinting in the sun, and iron-tipped lances.

  They flew first over Estmor, then Crestwell, then finally spotted the Old Road where it snaked its way through the mountains. Daria pulled to the front of the formation. She made a hand signal that passed through the flock. They cut east.