The Dark Griffin (43 page)

“Eluna.”

Arren’s hand stopped twitching, and his head became still, his face slackening. His shattered chest moved frantically up and down, but then it slowed and weakened until it was barely moving at all.

“Arren,” Darkheart whispered.

Arren’s eyes turned toward him, and then looked up at the moon, whose light shone down on his face and turned it black and silver. Then they, too, stilled. One moment they were looking at the moon, and the next something behind them, some light that lived on the other side, had gone out.

Quietly, mourned by no-one, watched over by the moon and by the looming shape of the dark griffin, Arren Cardockson died.

23

Risen Moon

D
arkheart stayed by the human’s body for a long time, unable or unwilling to move. From time to time he shifted slightly, his tail twitching, but then he sighed and settled down again, his great shoulders hunched. His wings and legs hurt, and his neck, but he ignored them. He nibbled at his forelegs, where the manacles had rubbed the scales away and left deep scars behind. There was a bald patch on his neck, too, from the collar.

He looked up at the moon, so bright and cold, shaped like an eye, and felt a deep despair fill him. Suddenly, all his energy had left him, along with his joy in being free. He could fly back to his valley—but he didn’t care about it any more. He couldn’t even remember it properly, and he did not know the way back. He was lost here, in this place he did not know, with no-one who could show him the way.

He lay down, his head on his talons, and looked at the dead human who had been his only link to home. The one who knew how to open cages, who could appear out of nowhere like a shadow come to life. The one he had known when he was home. The one who wore a collar so much like his own, and who fought like a wild griffin.

“Arren,” he whispered.

He pushed at the human’s shoulder with his beak, trying to make him wake up, but he had gone stiff and cold and was not like himself any more.

“Free me, Arren Cardockson,” Darkheart said.

But Arren did not reply and never would again.

Darkheart looked up at the moon once more. It seemed to look back. A powerful longing rose in his chest, and it was not the longing to be home but the longing for something else, something he did not know or understand. He thought of the yellow griffin with whom he had mated all those years ago, the one with blue eyes like the sky. He thought of Saekrae, her eyes and voice now fuzzy in his memory, and he thought of his two siblings and the warmth of their bodies against his. He thought of the nest where he had lived as a chick.

The longing grew more powerful, and then it moved into his throat. And there, the feeling came back. That burning feeling, that maddening energy. The scream, still trying to get out. He stood up abruptly and opened his beak toward the sky, trying to let it out, but he could not make a sound. The scream caught behind his tongue and would not go, and the feeling grew and strengthened, first a hundred times stronger than before and then a thousand, until his entire body started to shake violently.

He began to run this way and that, darting back and forth and colliding blindly with the rocks all about, and then he fell over onto his side and began to thrash, tearing at himself. Strange whimpers and grunts came from him as he tried with all his might to let the scream out. But all in vain. He stilled and then thrashed again, churning up the soil. The moonlight touched his face, and then something broke inside him.

Light burst out of him. Black light. It was like a hole in the world that outlined every hair and feather, its edges shimmering silver, a darkness so intense that it was darker than the night all around, darker than his fur. It grew in intensity, making his outline ripple and distort, like water. Darkheart ceased his struggles and became stiff, as though dead. Then he jerked upright, not as if he had decided to stand but as if he had been dragged to his paws. His head came up and his beak opened, pointing down at Arren’s body.

And then he screamed.

The sound burst out of him like blood from a wound, and it was no griffin’s voice, or human’s, or the voice of any other living creature. It was like a thousand voices all screaming at once, or like the sound of a gushing torrent of water, huge and fast beyond comprehension. It was a sound that had never been heard in the world before.

And with it came light. It came from Darkheart’s beak, pouring out of him like water. The glow around him faltered and then faded, and the light moved out of him and into Arren’s body, vanishing inside it and transferring the glow to him. His hair and skin were haloed with the darkness of a living shadow, which made his outline warp and twist before it reformed into its old shape.

The scream stopped abruptly, and Darkheart’s beak snapped shut. He slumped onto his belly, panting and exhausted, but unable to look away. He saw the light move over Arren’s body, embracing him, and then it began to fade, retreating into his skin and disappearing like water soaking into the earth. Then it was gone and it was all over.

Darkheart’s head dropped and he became still, his eyes gently sliding shut. His tail continued to twitch for a time, and then that, too, fell to the ground and did not move again.

T
he stars began to go out, the moon faded and the first light of the sun appeared over the horizon. As the sky lightened, birds began to chirp in the trees, and in the city above, griffins called their names, announcing their presence to the world. Another day had come, but neither Arren nor Darkheart saw it.

Darkheart woke up slowly, rising out of a morass of dark dreams. His body ached and he felt strangely drained and weak, even vulnerable. He sat up slowly and yawned, his wings opening wide. It made him feel slightly better, but it was not until he began flexing his front legs to ease the stiffness in them that the memory of the previous night came rushing back. He stopped dead, head darting this way and that to take in his surroundings. It was dawn, and he was sitting among some rocks by the base of the mountain. There was sky above and trees in front of him, and a lake beyond that.

He stood up sharply, tail twitching, and scanned the sky. No sign of other griffins. He could fly away without being seen.

He looked down and saw Arren, still lying where he had been the previous night, and that was when he remembered everything else. The struggle, the scream, the light . . . and the strange and terrible feeling of something pouring out of him and into the human’s body, taking all his strength with it.

Darkheart sniffed at Arren, and pushed him lightly with the back of one talon. He was no longer stiff, but he still did not move.

Yet Darkheart persisted. He continued to nudge him. “Arren,” he whispered.

And then something happened. A great jolt went through Arren’s body and travelled into Darkheart, making him shriek in alarm and back away. It had felt like a single, massive heartbeat—one so powerful it had made his entire body jerk with it.

On the ground, Arren’s mouth opened wide and he breathed in a great gasp of air. He twitched once, all over, and then started to breathe again, his chest heaving frantically. His eyes snapped shut as he coughed, but then he opened them again and looked up at Darkheart, and they were alight with life and intelligence and personality. Alive.

T
he first thing Arren felt when he woke was pain. It went ripping through him in one massive burst, like a giant heartbeat pumping burning-hot blood through his system. He felt himself jerk violently, and then his mouth opened and he began to breathe. The moment the air flooded into his lungs, the pain disappeared. He sucked it in greedily, and it brought everything back. Light, sound, thought and vision. His eyes opened and he saw the black griffin looking down at him, looming in the sky like a feathered mountain.

He tried to get up for a moment, but then slumped back, trying to think. He didn’t know where he was or how he had got there, or what had happened to him. He couldn’t even remember his own name.

His hand went to his throat, and touched a cold metal surface. It was scratched and dented, clinging to his neck, and he pulled at it. It came free with a sick, wet sound, and he flung it aside and sat up. He felt strong, and he stood up and dusted himself down. There was an arrow sticking in his leg. He pulled it out and dropped it, then looked around. He was in a forest at the base of a mountain, among some rocks, and there was a huge black griffin sitting nearby watching him.

He looked at it, trying to remember what it was. There was something familiar about it.

The black griffin stood up. “Arren Cardockson,” it said.

And then he remembered. It came rushing back in an instant, hitting him all at once. Run, fight, escape, fear . . . and then the fall. He remembered seeing Bran’s face as he toppled backward and then fell from the edge of the city. He remembered falling into darkness, screaming, the wind tearing at him, blood crawling up the shaft of the arrow embedded in his body and being whipped away. And he remembered hitting the ground. He remembered the agony that had smothered him as he looked up at the face of the black griffin . . . and died.

When Arren opened his eyes, he found himself lying on the ground. He hadn’t even realised that he had fallen over. He got up and patted himself frantically, feeling his stomach, chest and face. It was all still there, just as it had been before. His curly hair, grown quite long over the last few months, the ragged beard that Flell had complained about, the puckered scars left by Shoa’s talons, the wound under his right eye. The collar was gone, but it had left a ring of puncture wounds all around his neck. They were bleeding, but they didn’t hurt. In fact, nothing hurt. There was no ache in his back, no twinging from his ribs. There was an arrow wound in his leg, but that didn’t hurt, either. Nor did the slash on his cheek.

Panic-stricken, he turned and ran away from the black griffin as fast as he could go, dashing into the trees. His wounded leg was weak, but he didn’t let it slow him down much. He ran on until he reached a small pool among the trees and there limped to a stop and fell to his knees by the water’s edge. He splashed his face and then drank, and it helped to clear his head. As the water stilled, he looked down into it and saw his face reflected back at him.

His own eyes stared into his, and he, too, became still, taking in the face that looked up at him.

He looked the same—and yet different. His face was still pale, with black eyes and a black beard, and black curls hanging over his forehead. He looked dirty and his face was gaunt and thin, making it appear even more angular than before.

It was still his face. But there was something wrong with it. Something he couldn’t quite pinpoint that had changed. He did not know what it was, and yet it struck fear into him.

“What’s going on?” he whispered. “What’s happened to me?”

He felt different, too. It wasn’t weakness or sickness or pain, but there was something wrong in his body. He patted himself all over again, searching for some sign of it, and again there was something wrong, but he didn’t know what. Something about the feel of his skin and flesh. It was cold, he realised. Colder than it should have been. Then he touched his throat again, feeling the wounds left by the collar and trying to understand why they didn’t hurt.

They
did
hurt, he realised suddenly. In fact, all his wounds hurt. But somehow the pain felt faint and unimportant, without the power to distress him.

He dabbed at the blood on his neck, and once again the feeling of wrongness came over him. It was in his neck, that was it. Whatever was wrong with him was centred around it. He rested his hand on it and kept it there, trying to find it. It was something about how his neck felt to the touch. Something missing.

That was when he realised. It came upon him slowly, like an old memory, and his face slackened gently in horror. He moved his hand and pressed it into his neck, feeling desperately for the thing that was missing, but in vain. He tried his chest, and then his wrists. Nothing. Not a sign. It simply wasn’t there any more.

“No,” he moaned. “No! This can’t—this can’t happen!”

He pounded his fists hard against his chest, but nothing happened. He made himself breathe as fast as he could, until his head spun, but still nothing.

Arren began to shake. “No,” he whispered. “No!”

There was a noise behind him. He turned sharply and saw Darkheart standing there, watching him in silence.

He got up and started toward the griffin, limping on his wounded leg. “What have you done to me?” he screamed. “What have you turned me into?”

Darkheart drew back a little, confused. “Arren,” he said. “You live. You live.”

Arren hit him hard in the face. “Give it back!” he yelled. “Change me back!”

Darkheart retreated under his onslaught, hissing. “Arren,” he said. “Arren!”

Arren continued to hit him, feeling not the slightest trace of fear. “This is your fault! You monster!” He lunged forward and grabbed the griffin around the neck, squeezing tight, trying to kill him.

Darkheart kicked him, knocking him off and sending him flying. He landed against the base of a tree but got up almost instantly. “Make it come back!” he shouted, snatching up a stick. “Give it back!”

Darkheart said nothing. He sat on his haunches and watched the human, uncomprehending.

“Give it back!” Arren shouted again. “G—” His voice faltered and he fell to his knees, sobbing brokenly. “Oh gods, oh gods, help me, help me.”

Something touched his head and he looked up. Darkheart was there, crouched in front of him, the wind ruffling his feathers. “Arren,” he said softly.

Arren shoved him. “Go away,” he said. “Leave me alone.”

Darkheart did not move. Arren got up and walked away from him, but he followed, not taking his eyes off him.

Arren snatched up a rock. “Go away!” he screamed, and hurled it. It hit Darkheart on the beak, and he stooped and picked up a handful of others. He pelted the black griffin with them until he backed away, tail lashing. “Get away from me! Go on, go away!”