The Dark Griffin (11 page)

“Dad, I’ve never even
been
in the North.”

“But the North is in your blood,” said Cardock. “I’ve seen it, Arenadd. Ever since you moved into that city you’ve been trying to change. Wearing Southern clothes, using a Southern name. You won’t even speak our language any more. What are you so ashamed of?”

“Dad, our ancestors came here in chains,” said Arren. “They were
slaves
. I really don’t see why that’s anything to be proud of.”

Cardock rubbed the livid scar on the side of his neck. “A slave collar can’t take away a man’s dignity, or his heritage.”

“I’d say it does a pretty good job of it,” said Arren. He sat back in his chair. “Listen, Dad, there’s no point in trying to hang on to the past, so just let it go. I’m sure the North is a beautiful place, but I’ve never been there and neither have you. This is our home, right here. Forget about the old days. They’re done.”

Cardock sighed. “I suppose you’re right there, Arenadd. But I won’t forget who we are, and I advise you not to forget it, either. Because other people haven’t.”

Arren tried not to think of Craddick the smuggler and his snarling voice.
Go back to the North, blackrobe
. “I’ve come here to give you some news,” he said.

“Yes, what is it?” said Annir, sounding relieved.

Arren recounted the story of the raid, finishing with “. . . so now I have to go down to the South for a week or so, to earn some money to pay it off.”

“Where in the South?” said Cardock.

“Oh, nowhere in particular. Some village called River-something. Hold on a bit.” Arren fished the scroll out of his pocket; it was badly squashed, and he smoothed it out. “Okay, it says, ‘Cattle went missing every night for months before someone finally saw the creature taking them, an enormous griffin with black feathers, which flies out from the Coppertops to steal from us. It became bolder when we locked the cattle away at night, and broke a hole in the roof of a barn in order to take what it wanted. Then, a few days later, a man went missing from out in the fields. He was never seen again. Others also disappeared. We discovered that the griffin was taking them. We beg you to send some of your people to destroy the beast, before it claims any more victims. We are in fear for our lives.’ ” Arren turned the scroll over and examined the simple map drawn on it. There was a large X over a village by the mountains. “It’s called Rivermeet. Probably because two rivers come together there.”

“So, they want you to kill a wild griffin?” said Cardock.

Arren nodded. “There’s a bounty on its head. If I can capture it alive, I’ll get even more.”

Annir looked aghast. “But they can’t just send you off like that! On your own, when you’ve never done anything like this before!”

“I can fight,” said Arren. “Honestly, Mum, there’s nothing to worry about. All I have to do is get close enough to hit it with an arrow. I’ve got some special poison to coat the barb with. No matter where I hit it, it’ll be knocked out in a heartbeat.”

“You think you can hit a wild griffin in the air?” said Cardock.

“I’ve hit moving targets before. And if the worst comes to the worst, Eluna can defend me. And . . .” He paused. “If it turns out to be more than I can cope with, I’ll just give up and come back and tell someone else to go deal with it. Maybe try again with someone else helping.” In spite of his casual tone, the more he talked about the idea, the less certain he felt about it. But it was too late to back out now.

Cardock, though, looked fairly unconcerned. “I’m sure you can do it. You’ll have Eluna with you, after all.”

“Well, be careful,” said Annir, not quite able to hide her worry. “I don’t want anything to happen to you.”

Arren embraced her briefly. “I’ll be fine, Mum. Really.”

A
rren hated to leave his parents, but the sun began to sink and he was forced to get back on Eluna and return to the city. This time the flight went a little more smoothly, and he managed to control his fear better. That gave him some hope. Maybe, some day, he would be able to fly without being afraid.

Once he’d arrived home, he took Eluna’s harness off and packed a box with a selection of things to go to his parents, including everything perishable in the house. Coming back to a cupboard full of rancid cheese and shrivelled oranges was not a pleasing idea. He nailed the box shut and put it by the door. Gern could come and collect it in the morning.

It was dark by now, and Arren put on his cloak before he left. Time to go and meet Gern, Flell and Bran at the Sign of the Red Rat. He found them there waiting for him; they were sharing a pitcher of beer and called out cheerily when they saw him coming. Arren went and joined them, gratefully accepting a drink from Bran.

“Good to see yeh,” said the burly guard. “We were start-in’ to think maybe yeh’d bailed out on us.”

Arren took a mouthful of beer; it was cheap but strong, and he sighed and wiped the foam away from his mouth. “Sorry about that. I had to go and see my parents.”

“How’d they like the leather?” said Bran.

“Dad was pleased. Said it was good quality. It was, too. I had a look at it first. Should’ve kept some for myself, actually. I could use a new pair of boots.”

Flell laughed. “That’s the weirdest thing I’ve ever seen, you know, a griffiner who makes boots.”

“Well, it’s a skill, isn’t it?” said Arren. “My dad always said we ought to value our skills above our status. ‘Maybe Lady Riona is Mistress of the Eyrie, but she can’t make boots, can she?’”

Gern snickered. “He really said that?”

“Yeah. He gets some funny ideas every now and then.”

“I saw him in the marketplace the other day,” said Flell. “I thought about saying hello, but I decided not to. It’s amazing how much you look like him, you know.”

Arren frowned. “What was he doing there?”

“Trying to buy something, probably,” said Flell. “I almost wish I
had
spoken to him. Maybe I could have got him to tell me what your real name is.”

Arren had another drink. “A stupid one,” he said, swallowing. “Trust me on this.”

“But if you were gonna change your name, why change it to something so plain?” said Gern. “If my name were up to me to pick, I’d go with . . . I dunno, something dramatic. Vercingtorix, maybe.”

“Well, Gern,” said Arren, once the laughter had died down, “you know why I chose something plain instead of something, uh, dramatic? Because there’s a reason why people have plain names.”

“Maybe it’s ’cause they’re plain people,” Gern muttered.

“Balderdash. You can be as colourful as you want to be and you can do it without having a name no-one can pronounce—actually, that’s not quite true. About me choosing a plain name, I mean. I didn’t really choose anything. Arren’s just what I called myself when I was three because I couldn’t pronounce my real name.”

“Ah, so it starts with an A, does it?” said Flell.

“Arthen?” Bran suggested. “Arenthius? Arinu? Arnren?”

“No, no, no and no,” said Arren. Beside him, Eluna pecked at the dish of herb-flavoured water she’d been given.

“Arentho?” said Flell.

“Areninan?” said Gern.

Arren threw up his hands. “Good gods, all right, all right, I take it back. There’s no way my real name is
that
stupid.”

“Well, what is it then?” said Flell.

Arren finished off his beer. “Fine,” he said. “But you’ll only tease me about it for the rest of my life. It’s Arenadd Taranisäii.”

Silence.

“ ‘Arenadd’?” Flell repeated. “That’s—”

“Stupid, I know.”

“Actually, I was going to say it sounds elegant,” said Flell. “What does it mean?”

“Oh, it’s the name of some old sage from a Northern legend,” said Arren. “My dad reckons I’m being pretentious by refusing to use it. Says I ought to be proud of my inheritance, or something.”

“Well, yeh should be, mate,” said Bran. “Everyone should be, right? An’ I don’t reckon Arenadd is that bad of a name. Sounds all right to me.”

Arren scratched his neck. “Slave scars aren’t a proud heritage, and I really wish my father would get that into his head. Arren is fine.”

“What was that surname, sir?” said Gern. “Taranisi?”

“Taranisäii,” Arren corrected. “It just means ‘of the blood of Taranis.’”

“Was that the name of your tribe?” said Gern.

Arren rolled his eyes. “Gern, I don’t
have
a tribe. I’m not from the North. I was born in Idun, damn it.”

“So, who was Taranis?” said Gern.

“I don’t know.”

“Yes you do,” said Flell. “Come on, Arren. You told me about it before. Taranis the Wolf, son of Tynadd Traeganni.”

“It’s just an old story,” Arren muttered.

She looked at him kindly. “And you say you aren’t ashamed. Go on, show them your tattoo. I’m sure they’d like to see it.”

“Depends on where it is,” said Bran, grinning.

Arren gave up. He rolled up the sleeve of his tunic and turned to let them see the bare skin of his shoulder. There was a tattoo there of a blue wolf’s head holding a white globe in its jaws. Inside the globe was a symbol of three spirals joined together.

“That’s amazing, sir!” said Gern.

Bran squinted at it. “An’
my
tattoo just says ‘MOTHER.’ What’s it mean, Arren?”

Arren pulled his sleeve back into place. “It’s the sign of the Wolf Tribe. The moon is—well, Northerners believe it’s the eye of their god.”

“Do you?” said Gern.

Arren shook his head. “It’s just a tattoo. I thought it would look good. I was a bit drunk at the time.”

“It does look good, sir,” said Gern. He paused to pour himself another beer. “So, what’s all this Flell’s telling me about you leaving?”

“It’s nothing much,” said Arren. “I’m going down South for a while. There’s a problem at one of the villages, and they’ve asked me to deal with it.”

“Why, does it have something to do with trading?”

“No. They just need a griffiner. Oh—” He glanced at them all. “I’m not really supposed to talk about it, so just keep it to yourselves, okay? You haven’t told anyone else, have you, Flell?”

“No, just Bran and Gern. Why the secrecy?”

“I’m not allowed to talk about that, either.”

“So, why are you going South, sir?” said Gern.

Arren took in a deep breath. “Well, it’s like this . . .”

6

Rivermeet

T
he journey southward began the next day, at dawn. Eluna woke him up as usual, and once he had fed her the last of the rats from the cage, he dressed warmly and slung his bow and arrows on his back then strapped them securely in place. Eluna was impatient to leave and shifted around while he put her harness on.

“There,” said Arren once it was in place. “We’re done. Just wait a moment.”

He went back to his half of the house and picked up the box of food. Gern had agreed to collect it some time during the morning, so he left it on the doorstep before he closed the door and locked it from the inside. He’d hidden all his valuables under the floorboards, but he wasn’t particularly worried about them. Very few people would risk breaking into a griffiner’s house. Nevertheless, he put the shutters over the windows and locked the back door to the balcony before he returned to the stable and passed through it to the second balcony, the one without rails, where Eluna was waiting.

The griffin stretched her wings and flicked her tail, inviting him to get on her back.

Arren climbed on, put his arms through the loops of the harness and braced himself. “All right. Let’s go.”

Eluna chirped eagerly and stood tall, bracing her paws and claws on the wood. She darted forward with a sudden burst and hurled herself off the edge of the platform and into space.

Arren couldn’t hold back a yelp of fright. The wind snatched at his hair and cloak, pulling at him like a giant hand. For a moment they were falling, straight downward, and Arren buried his face in Eluna’s feathers and gritted his teeth. She was there, she was solid, she was a kind of solid ground to hold him up, he wasn’t going to hit the ground, he wasn’t—

Eluna’s wings opened. Arren’s insides gave a giddy lurch as she pulled out of the dive and swooped upward, shooting into the sky like an arrow. She reached soaring height and levelled out into a steady glide, and Arren breathed deeply.

“Are you all right?” Eluna asked. A griffin’s voice carried well, even in flight.

“I’m fine,” said Arren.

“Good.”

The journey began.

At first Arren did his best to keep still and either looked straight ahead or kept his eyes shut, but as they flew on he found himself fighting the temptation to look downward.

“Look at the sun,” Eluna said suddenly.

Arren did, and his heart soared. There were mountains to the east, far away in the distance, and the sun was rising from behind them. Bright golden light was spilling out over the landscape, tinted with pink, and the mountains themselves looked black against the red-and-orange cloud behind them. Above that the sky was pale blue, almost purple. It reminded him of Flell’s eyes, and with that thought his fear was suddenly gone.

“It’s beautiful,” he said, half to himself.

Eluna said nothing, but he could almost sense her satisfaction as she flew on.

His fear did return a little later, when he risked a glance downward. They were flying very high, much higher than they had done the previous day. Idun had already vanished, but when he looked back over his shoulder he could just see Eagleholm shrinking in the distance. It looked like nothing, a tiny black hump on the horizon.

He shuddered and looked away. His heart continued to beat rapidly, and he could feel himself sweating, so he concentrated on trying to remember the precise wording of the letter from Rivermeet. Getting there should be fairly straightforward; he’d shown the map to Eluna, and she had said she could navigate there without any problems. All she had to do was follow the river. There were plenty of villages built along it where they could stop for the night, and some patches of woodland where she could hunt if the need arose.

He and Eluna stopped several times during the day to rest and finally landed that evening in a small town called Lansdown.