The Griffin's War (Fallen Moon Trilogy) (61 page)

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Authors: K. J. Taylor

BOOK: The Griffin's War (Fallen Moon Trilogy)
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She accepted it. “Torc Taranisäii of the Deer Tribe, I accept yer heart an’ yer love for me, an’ know I love ye in return an’ always shall. I take yer sacrifice, an’ offer mine.” And she cut her own hand and took, his so that their blood mingled.
Arenadd reached out and touched their clasped hands. “As the master of all tribes, and the one blessed and chosen by the Night God, I approve your marriage and seal it now. Saeddryn, come to me.”
Saeddryn let go of her husband’s hand and turned to face Arenadd. “My lord,” she murmured.
Arenadd picked up another mask from the ground beside him. “Give up the wolf,” he told her.
Saeddryn removed the wolf mask and held it out. As Arenadd took it, he caught a glimpse of her uncovered face, and saw the tears shining in her eye.
He put down the wolf mask and replaced it with the other, that of a doe.
Saeddryn accepted it.
“From this day on,” said Arenadd, “you are a member of the Deer Tribe, Saeddryn Taranisäii. May your husband teach you the ways of his people, and may they welcome you.”
Saeddryn turned away from him, and Torc took both her hands in his and held them silently.
Arenadd looked up at the moon, then back at them. “I now pronounce this marriage sealed,” he intoned.
 
 
T
hey spent the rest of the night after the wedding in Taranis Gorge, in the shelters they had built while they waited for moonrise. Arenadd had made his a good distance away from the one Torc and Saeddryn would share; he had no wish to disturb them or for them to disturb him.
He lay on his back on the crude heap of brush he had used to make a bed and stared at the ceiling, his ears full of Skandar’s deep, rumbling breaths from just outside.
Gods, I wish I had something to drink,
he thought, and eventually went to sleep.
Morning came, and he staggered out of his shelter, yawning and a little irritable. His dreams had been full of fighting, against a foe he recognised: the sneering, blond-haired boy and his arrogant, vicious griffin, always with the sun shining from behind them and into his eyes, blinding him.
It was a vision that had been troubling him for some time now.
The griffins were wide awake and complaining of hunger, but Torc and Saeddryn were slower to rise. They emerged eventually, both looking slightly embarrassed. Arenadd, watching them, wondered if they had consummated their marriage that night. If so, then they had probably both lost their virginity: Saeddryn had always been forbidden to involve herself with a man other than the fellow Taranisäii her mother insisted on, and Torc had been a slave since birth.
Well, it was none of Arenadd’s business. “Let’s go home,” he said.
The journey back to Fruitsheart passed uneventfully enough, and Arenadd was very glad when its walls came into sight.
As they passed over it, he noticed some kind of disturbance in the streets, which puzzled him.
When Skandar landed on the tower-top, Iorwerth and Kaanee were already there, running to meet them.
“My lord!” Iorwerth exclaimed. “My lord, thank gods ye’re back! Ye’ve got t’do somethin’!”
Arenadd almost vaulted off Skandar’s back. “What’s going on?”
Iorwerth paused to wipe his forehead. “They’re everywhere, my lord. I don’t know what t’do.”
“
Who
are everywhere?” said Arenadd.
“Blackrobes,” Kaanee interrupted. “Thousands of them. They came into the city somehow. They are everywhere, swarming like ants.”
“Black—you mean slaves?”
“Yes, my lord,” said Iorwerth. “Garnoc and Nerth are tryin’ to get things under control, but—”
Arenadd’s eyes had gone wide. “Slaves? Then—”
There was thump behind him, and he turned.
It was Hyrenna. “Arenadd Taranisäii, what have you done with my chicks?” she rasped.
Arenadd gasped. “
Hyrenna!
You’re back—where’s Skade? For the love of gods,
where’s Skade
?”
Hyrenna ignored him. “Where are my chicks?”
“Two of them are up there,” said Arenadd, pointing at Aenae and Iekee, who were still flying into the city. “Eerak should be around here somewhere. Hyrenna, where’s—”
“Here, you blind fool,” said a voice, and
she
emerged, from behind Hyrenna’s wing.
Arenadd stared at her. “Skade . . .”
Skade came toward him, smiling. “Arenadd.”
“Skade,” he said again, and then she was there in his arms, and he was kissing her fiercely, holding on to her so tightly it was as if he were trying to make her a part of him.
She held him in return, just as fiercely, her sharp nails digging into his back and giving him exquisite pain. “My love,” she breathed, and her voice was like music in his ears.
He didn’t let her go for a long time, and when he did all he could do was look at her face. “Skade,” he said, and laughed. “Oh gods, Skade. You’re back. Skade . . . my sweet Skade, I missed you so much.”
She laughed, too. “Oh, Arenadd. My Arenadd. I have wanted to die since we have been apart. But you are safe, and we are together again, and that is all that matters.”
He kissed her again. “Yes. That’s all that matters, Skade.”
Hyrenna, meanwhile, had been reunited with her chicks, or two of them at least. Aenae and Iekee looked at her with a kind of awe while she inspected them, sniffing their feathers and apparently searching for any signs of sickness or injury.
Finally, she straightened up. “You are fine, strong youngsters,” she announced. “You have been well fed and cared for. But where is your brother?”
“I shall find him,” said Iekee, and flew off.
“Where have you been?” Skade asked Arenadd. “Hyrenna and I came directly to the city with the slaves, but you were not here and we did not know what to do.”
“I’m sorry,” said Arenadd. “I was at the Throne, with Saeddryn.”
“Why?” she asked sharply.
“Conducting a wedding,” said Arenadd, missing her angry paranoia in his joy.
Skade stared at him in utter shock. “What? A
wedding
? Whose wedding?”
“Saeddryn’s, of course,” said Arenadd. He nodded at Saeddryn, who was looking at Skade with veiled but intense dislike. “While you were gone, she finally found a husband for herself.”
Skade’s shock and hurt began to twist into pure fury, but at that moment Torc nervously approached. “Hello, my lady,” he said. “I don’t know if you remember me, but I’m Torc. Uh . . . and . . .” He pulled himself together and took Saeddryn’s hand. “An’ this is my wife, Saeddryn,” he added proudly.
Skade looked blank. “You and Saeddryn were married?”
“Yes, just last night,” said Arenadd. “I conducted the ceremony myself.”
Skade stared at him, and then burst out laughing. “Oh! Arenadd, forgive me! I thought when . . . when you said Saeddryn had married, I thought
you
. . .”
“What?” said Arenadd. “No! Skade, how could you?”
She hugged him again. “I am sorry I doubted you. You have my congratulations, Saeddryn. And you, Torc.” She looked at Saeddryn with just a hint of triumph in her yellow eyes as she slid an arm around Arenadd’s waist.
Arenadd could see this was turning nasty. “Look, let’s go below,” he said. “We’ve got so much to talk about.”
“Yes,” said Skade. “We have.”
35
 
Preparation
 
“W
e were lucky,” said Skade, down in the dining hall with Nerth, Garnoc, Iorwerth, Saeddryn, Torc and the rest of the council there to listen. “If we had chosen any other time to buy those slaves, we would never have succeeded. But the whole of the South is afraid because of what is happening in the North.”
“We kept expectin’ them t’send help t’Malvern,” said Saeddryn. “Like they did last time.”
“They have not, and I doubt that they will,” said Skade.
“There is civil war in the South. The other Eyries fought each other for Eagleholm’s lands, and now the situation has devolved into outright war. What was once Eagleholm’s territory is now burning as those fools slaughter each other for the right to own what they are destroying in the process. They have utterly forgotten their cousins in the North.”
There was a pause, and then Saeddryn laughed. “An’ all because Lord Arenadd burned the Eyrie at Eagleholm! Hah! Sir, ye crippled the whole of the South with one burning tower.”
Arenadd allowed himself a smile. “Who would have thought it?”
“Not I,” said Skade. “Yet that is how it has happened. But the Southerners now expect to see strange griffiners flying everywhere, and they no longer want or trust their slaves. They were more than willing to sell them to me, at any price, for fear they would rise up and rebel as you have here. I doubt there is a single one left in Cymria who has not come with me to Fruitsheart.”
Arenadd chuckled. “And that’s that. The final step. We have our brothers and sisters back.”
“And next . . .” said Iorwerth. “Malvern.”
Arenadd looked around at the others, one by one. “Yes,” he said softly. “Malvern. The time has come. Our time.”
Saeddryn grinned horribly. “We’ll see that cursed city burn at last, sir,” she said. “In my mother’s name.”
“And I will meet
Aeai ran kai
and kill him at last,” said Arenadd. “The time has come. Now I’m ready.”
 
 
T
hat same evening, Erian and Elkin sat together on the balcony outside her chamber, sharing a cup of wine in companionable silence.
Erian couldn’t keep his eyes off her.
Gods, you’re so beautiful
. He wanted to say it out loud, but he was too shy to break the silence. And besides, there was no need to say it. She knew how he felt.
He took in her pale green eyes and her fine hair, so blonde it was nearly white. Her features were so delicate he could imagine she were a wood sprite or a fairy rather than a human. Just looking at her made his heart ache magnificently inside him.
Oh, how I love you, Elkin
.
She caught his eye, and smiled. “You don’t know how much I missed you, Erian.”
Erian smiled back at her. “You can’t have missed me as much as I missed you, Elkin.”
“Oh, I don’t know,” she said softly. “I don’t know.”
He finally fought down his nervousness and reached for her hand. She didn’t pull away, and he clasped it, marvelling at how small her hand was. It made his look big and rough.
“Elkin,” he said. “I wish . . .”
“Yes, Erian?”
“I wish I could have been here. If only . . . if I could have come back sooner, if . . . if I could have been here to fight for you . . .”
“No. There was nothing you could have done without the sword,” said Elkin. “And if Gryphus wanted you to be gone so long, who are we to argue? Our god knows best. He always has, and he always will.”
“But what if I fail?” said Erian. “What if I can’t do it? What if . . .”
She reached out and touched his chest with her delicate hand. “You won’t fail,” she told him. “Because you have what the Dark Lord doesn’t: a heart.”
Erian smiled. “No I don’t. Not any more. I gave it to you a long time ago, Elkin.”
She smiled back at him. “You’re such a silly man sometimes, you know.”
“I—” Erian was suddenly embarrassed.
“Perhaps that’s why I love you,” she said, and kissed him.
The kiss seemed to last for a long time.
Erian withdrew gently, his blue eyes bright with love. “Marry me, Elkin,” he said.
That caught her off guard. “What?”
Erian took her hand and gently pressed something into her palm. “Take it,” he said. “I want you to have it. Marry me, Lady Elkin.”
It was a stone, uncut but beautifully smooth and round. It was blue. Blue as the sky, blue as his eyes. “Erian . . .”
“Please,” he said. “Take it. I want you to be my wife, Elkin. I want to marry you now, before it’s too late—while we still have the chance. Before the Dark Lord comes.”
She stared at him a moment longer, and then her fingers closed around the stone. “Yes, Erian,” she said. “You’re right. I will marry you.”
He leant toward her, eager. “When?”
“Tomorrow, at dawn.”
Erian wanted to laugh aloud, but he didn’t. He kissed her again instead.
 
 
A
nd, in Fruitsheart, Arenadd and Skade were alone by the fire.
Arenadd held Skade’s hand in his maimed one, and she held on to his twisted fingers without flinching. “Don’t you wish we could get married?” he asked.

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