The Griffin's War (Fallen Moon Trilogy) (14 page)

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Authors: K. J. Taylor

BOOK: The Griffin's War (Fallen Moon Trilogy)
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The miller did not smile. “Ye can leave yer sword here, lord, an’ come for dinner.”
“Thank you, but I’ll keep it with me,” said Erian.
“As ye wish, lord.”
They returned to the next room, where Erian accepted a seat at the head of the table and waited in silence while the miller’s wife added more vegetables to the pot over the fire.
The two adults kept away from him and made no attempt at conversation, but the children were openly staring at him. There were four of them—three boys and a girl—and eventually the girl came up to him, standing only an arm’s length away.
Erian ignored her for as long as he could, but the intrusion quickly became irritating.
“What are you looking at?” he said.
The girl’s eyes widened, but she said nothing.
“Well?” said Erian.
Apparently plucking up some courage, she reached toward him. “Yer sword,” she said.
Her mother hurried over. “Adyna! Stay away from him!” She scooped the girl up in her arms. “I’m sorry, lord,” she said to Erian. “She’s never seen a Southern . . . one of yer people before, lord,” she corrected hastily.
“She seems to be more interested in my sword,” Erian said sourly.
The woman eyed it. “She’s . . . never seen one of them b’fore either, lord.”
On an impulse, Erian drew it. The other children darted away, and their mother gasped and half-fled before she restrained herself.
Erian laid the sword down on the table. “There. Look at it if you want to, girl.”
The woman relaxed slightly. “Can . . . can she?”
“Yes,” said Erian. “They all can.”
The girl started to wriggle in her mother’s grasp. “I wanna see!”
“Well, if his lordship says ye can, then take a look,” said the mother, putting her down.
The girl instantly made for the table and climbed onto one of the stools so she could look more closely at the sword. She turned her head, watching the light play over the blade, and cooed excitedly. Her brothers emerged from their hiding places and came to join her.
“It’s like ice!” the eldest one said. “See how it glitters there on the edge?”
“It’s so big!” said another. “How d’ye lift it, sir?”
“He lifts it ’cause he’s big an’ strong,” the third said instantly. “See how thick his arms are? I bet he’s stronger’n Da!”
Despite himself, Erian swelled a little with pride. “This sword is very old,” he said. “It belonged to my father. You can see his name engraved there, just below the hilt.”
They looked respectfully at the engraving.
“Can ye read, sir?” said the eldest, in awed tones.
Erian started. “What? Of course I can! Can’t you?”
“I met a man who could read once,” said the boy. “He come over here for the fair. He was very clever.”
“It says ‘Rannagon Raegonson,’” said Erian. “He was my father. Before him his father, Raegon, had it, and all the way back to our ancestor Baragher the Blessed.” In fact he had no idea if this was even close to the truth, but he told himself it didn’t matter. What would they know anyway?
“What’s
your
name, sir?” said the girl. She reached out to touch the blade.
Erian batted her hand away. “Don’t touch it!
Never
touch it, understand?”
The girl stared blankly at him for a second and then burst into tears. Erian gaped at her and then looked away, embarrassed, as she ran to her mother for comfort.
The eldest boy glared at him. “Why can’t we touch it?”
Erian picked up the sword. “My name is Erian Rannagonson. And you can’t touch it because it’s against the law. None of your people are allowed to own weapons or even touch them. On pain of death.”
“Why?” said the boy.
The mother rushed to intervene. “Yorath! Stop that now! Don’t ye dare speak that way to the—”
“Because your people already proved that you can’t be trusted with them,” Erian snapped, ignoring her. “The last time you handled weapons, you did terrible things to other people. That’s why we made a law to stop it from ever happening again.”
The boy, who looked about thirteen, thrust out his chin. “Well, ye can’t make us be like that forever. Lord Arenadd is gonna stop ye. He’s gonna drive ye out of Tara, an’ then we can do whatever we want.”
Erian reached down and slapped him across the face, so hard he threw the boy to the floor. “
Never
say that name. Do you understand? Never say it in front of me, or any other time. If I ever hear you say it again, I’ll kill you. Understand?”
The boy struggled to his feet and ran out of the room as fast as he could. His sister cried harder than ever.
The mother struggled to keep her self-control. “Go on,” she said, pushing the girl toward the door. “All of ye, go outside an’ play. Ye can eat later. Go on, go! The griffiner needs t’be left alone now.”
The children needed no further encouragement; they all but ran out of the house.
Erian sheathed his sword and turned to look at the parents. Part of him was horrified, but he was too angry to care.
“My lord, I’m so sorry,” the miller babbled. “I never knew he could say anythin’ like that, I swear. He must’ve bin—there was these traders in here last week; they was—”
“I’ll make sure he’s punished, l—” the wife began.
“Shut up,” said Erian. They did. “Now,” he said, glaring at them. “I don’t know where that boy heard that, and if I ever found out who told him that, I’d see them executed on the spot. Fortunately for that person, I’m in too much of a hurry. But I intend to make sure that the Eyrie finds out about this very soon.”
The miller blanched. “My lord, there’s no need to—we’re only farmers; we can’t do no harm t’ye, lord—”
Erian almost hit him, too. “I’ve seen all the harm in the world done by the son of a leather worker. Now be quiet and give me my food.”
They looked slightly relieved as he sat down again, and scurried to bring him a bowl of stew. It was overcooked and had dirt in it and mostly consisted of vegetables, but he took it anyway and ate it. It was almost certainly the most unpleasant meal of his life; the miller and his wife ate nothing and stayed at the edges of the room, saying nothing and only watching him.
It seemed to take an eternity to get to the bottom of the bowl, but in the end he finished and put it down. “No thank you,” he said in reply to an offer of another helping. “I’m going to go and visit my griffin now.”
He left the house without another word, and the instant the door shut behind him he felt relief wash over him like a bucket of cold water.
In the stable, Senneck was busy tearing her way through what looked like a side of salted pork. The bones made an unpleasant crunching noise under her beak.
“These fools would not know good meat if it bit them,” she muttered. “Ah. Erian. Back so quickly?” She paused to rip the spine in half and rubbed her beak against the wall to dislodge a piece of bone that had caught in it. “Did you find a better meal than I did?”
Erian picked up a stray piece of meat and toyed with it. “Not really. It wasn’t very . . .”
She raised her head. “Yes? What is it?”
“There was a boy in there. The miller’s son. He said something about . . . Arenadd.”
Senneck became instantly alert. “What did he say?”
“He said that the . . . that Arenadd was going to drive us out. He said he would set them free.”
She hissed to herself. “Already, the message is spreading. Yet it seems odd—”
“Well, yes!” Erian burst forth. “How could they be talking about him like that now? The story of what happened at Malvern couldn’t possibly have reached here yet. Even if a griffiner could have carried it, it’s obvious none have been here for a long time.”
Senneck nibbled at her toe. “There must be another explanation behind this. I only wish we had the time to discover more. As it is, I suggest that you avoid mentioning this again. We cannot afford to risk any trouble for ourselves, and I wish to leave here as soon as possible.”
Erian tried to calm down. “Yes. I suppose you’re right.” He thought of the frightened faces of the miller and his wife. “I should probably go back. I need to ask if I can have some supplies for tomorrow anyway.”
“Go,” said Senneck. “I am tired and need to rest; I must regain my strength for tomorrow.”
Erian nodded gloomily. “See you in the morning.”
He left her to her food and wandered back to the house, absent-mindedly chewing on the piece of meat.
He was reaching out to open the door when he heard the argument on the other side. He froze for a moment and then crept closer, flattening himself against the wall and placing his ear close to the wood to listen.
“. . . can’t do anythin’, understand? It’s too late!”
“Well, he’s got t’be warned. Does Caerwys know about this?”
“Of course he bloody does! It’s all right, understand? There’s no way the Bastard could know about him. He’s bin warned by now, sure as fate; he’ll be miles away before the moon even rises.”
“An’ just as well.” This was the woman’s voice, laced with bitterness. “If the gods’re kind, he won’t be comin’ back. All this nonsense about raisin’ the stones—it’s Arddryn’s talk, all over again, an’ it’ll come to t’same end, ye can be sure of that. Bloody blackrobes, they’re nothin’ but trouble. An’ trouble for
us
. If those whore’s sons at Malvern find out about—”
“Well, they won’t, see? It was just a threat, an’ what’s he gonna tell ’em? It was nothin’ but a boy’s talk—when would Malvern take that seriously?”
“It’s nothin’ we want anythin’ t’do with anyway,” said the woman, more calmly. “An’ if Garnoc thinks . . .”
Erian listened further, until the argument wound down, and then quietly turned and left, making for the stable at a fast walk.
 
 
T
he boy, Yorath, darted behind a patch of thorn-bushes and hid there, panting. His heart was pattering frantically, like a rabbit’s, and he breathed deeply. Almost immediately, though, his breath became a shudder, and he struggled to stop himself from crying. His face throbbed, and he could feel a bruise starting to rise on his cheek. The griffiner’s threat still rang in his ears; the thought of it, and that huge sword, made him tremble.
Tears started to leak from his eyes, but he gritted his teeth and forced the rest to stay back. He peeked out from behind the thorn-bushes, and once he was sure there was no-one else around he ran into the trees and away from the village as fast as he could go.
He hadn’t been this way on his own before, and once or twice he thought he was lost, but he found a familiar tree or stump and sped up.
It was further than he remembered. He slowed down after a while, gasping for breath and suddenly aware that it was getting dark. He looked upward and was alarmed to see the first stars had come out.
He looked forward again. Light had drained out of the trees with frightening speed, and he realised that if he didn’t find the place quickly he would be lost.
He screwed up his courage and moved on, biting his lip.
A twig snapped behind him. He froze and then turned, raising his hands to defend himself.
There was no-one there. Yorath resisted the temptation to call out and stayed where he was, watching for any sign of movement. Nothing. He snatched up a stick and ran away, heart pounding, expecting something to grab him from behind at any moment, but nothing did, and he ran on blindly, branches lashing at his face.
Something caught around his ankle, and he pitched forward with a yell of alarm, landing hard on his face. For a moment he lay there, winded and gasping, before fear galvanised him back into action.
He got up, swearing to himself, and stopped dead when he saw a light up ahead. Relief flared in his chest, and he picked up his stick and ran toward the light as fast as he could.
The light was coming from a clearing hidden among some birch trees. Yorath burst into it, shouting. “Garnoc!”
A fire was burning in the middle of the clearing, and the man who had been sitting by it leapt to his feet; grabbing a long spear. “What?”
Yorath skidded to a halt and threw his stick down. “Garnoc, it’s me, Yorath! The miller’s son!”
Garnoc stared at him, and then relaxed. “Dear sweet holy gods, boy, yer scared the skin off’f me. What are y’doin’ here?”
Yorath bent almost double. “There’s a griffiner,” he gasped. “In the village.”
“I know,” said Garnoc.
Yorath looked blankly at him. “You do? How?”
Garnoc, a big, heavy man whose black hair was cropped close to his head, growled to himself and ran his thumb over the blade of his spear. “D’yer think the villagers are stupid, boy? They sent a runner down ’ere to tell me what was happenin’ before the Southern filth had even touched ground.”

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