Year of the Griffin (39 page)

“Father can marry us,” Isodel told him. “The throne of Luteria has priestly functions. Lukin can give me away. Does your palace have room for a medium-small dragon?”

King Luther watched and listened with his teeth clenched to prevent his jaw from dropping. “I don't,” he said to Ruskin, “I simply don't know my children.”

“Ah, Your Majesty,” Ruskin rumbled, “you might want to consider stopping calling them your children and referring to them instead as your sons and daughters.”

King Luther stared down at Ruskin. The grim anger on his face froze and slowly melted to thoughtfulness and finally to understanding. “I should like,” he said stiffly to Ruskin, “to appoint you advisor to the throne when your education here is finished. At any rate my queen and I would be happy to welcome you at the castle during the holidays, along with Lukin and Olga.”

Lukin and Olga were just turning delightedly to one another when the griffins arrived. The empty gray sky was suddenly filled with winged shapes, the whistle of pinions, and the excited babble of many griffin voices. Something like the very largest rookery you could ever imagine, Claudia thought, staring upward in amazement, along with nearly everyone else. The noise quickly gave way to the muffled boom and blast of cupped wings as first Don, then Callette, then Cazak, then griffin after griffin came down to land in the courtyard, shouting greetings to Kit as they came. Elda screamed with excitement. In spite of what Callette had told her, she had never imagined there could be so many of her own kind in the world. Kit leaped up to meet them all, shouting like a trumpet. Everyone else hurriedly cleared off to the sides of the courtyard, except for Querida. Querida found herself stranded beside Wizard Policant's statue and stuck there as the place filled with more and more griffins, each one folding wings with a clapping rustle and then galloping aside to let other griffins land: white griffins, yellow griffins, speckled and brown-barred ones, gray griffins, chestnut ones, and several who were almost blue. The courtyard was very shortly a mass of gleefully snapping beaks, great round eyes, switching tails, and tossing wing feathers.

Those of the Emir's unfortunate soldiers who were not halfway through a roof hastily threw themselves flat. When, after a minute or so, they saw that the griffins were not attacking them, most of them climbed down the outside walls and streamed off indecisively to guard Healers Hall instead. This was a great relief to Titus's small squad of unmounted cavalry. They had thought they were going to have to fight to protect their Emperor, knowing they would lose.

“This,” said Wizard Policant to Querida, “is where I step in, I think. Roofs are easy to mend, but it is very much harder to stop a battle. I am so glad we were not called upon to do that.”

Querida, rather hoping she was dreaming, looked up and found that the stone of the statue was splitting into irregular shapes, like dry mud cracking. The same thing seemed to be happening to the plinth she was clutching, revealing a yellow, buttery shine under her fingers. Upon the statue, like dry mud, each piece of stone shrank, curled up at the corners and fell away. Inside it there seemed to be a live person in wizard's robes, as elderly as she was but very much a living one.

Wizard Policant shook himself, and the last dry piece fell off him into powder. “The enchantment was tied to the wards of the University,” he explained. “When they go down, I return to take up my post as Head here. There was a prophecy made that this was only to happen in the Year of the Griffin. Unkind persons held that this meant never, griffins in my time being thought to be mythical creatures, but I see that the prophecy was quite correct. I do hope you yourself will not mind stepping aside to work with me as Chancellor?”

“Not at all,” Querida said a trifle faintly. “It'll be a great relief.” Of all the enchantments she had seen in her long life, this one astounded her most. But she was recovering rapidly. “You do realize,” she said, in quite her usual manner, “that two-thirds of the teaching staff here will have to be fired?”

“Of course,” said Policant. “I
have
been here on the spot for years after all. Will you be so kind as to summon every wizard on this continent here tomorrow? Except Corkoran, of course. We shall choose new staff from among them.”

“They may not want to come,” Querida warned him.

“No, but they will come. That is part of the enchantment, too,” Policant told her. “Now I wish to say a word to everyone present here.”

There was a sharp rapping noise, rather like a stick rapping a lectern, only much louder. Everyone, human and griffin, turned to where Wizard Policant stood on his pedestal, high above them. Everyone could somehow see him, even those who happened to have a griffin in the way.

“May I have your attention, please?” Wizard Policant's amplified voice said. “I am Policant, once Head of this University, now Head of it again. We shall of course in future run this place both as a means of educating wizards of true power and as the center for magical research it was designed to be. Meanwhile the power vested in me gives me the right to perform all ceremonies, civil, magical, and religious. It is therefore my pleasure to officiate at the marriage of Isodel, Princess of Luteria, and Titus Antoninus, Emperor of the South. If these young people will step forward, I shall be happy to pronounce them man and wife.”

Everyone cheered. They had all expected a long and pompous speech. During the noise Wizard Policant asked, much more quietly, “Will somebody fetch me something to step down upon, please?” He bent down and passed Querida a clod of red earth. ‘Take great care of this. It is a person from another planet who wishes to see this one. I judge that she, he, or it will see more of the world with you than by staying here with me.”

As a student dashed into the buttery bar and seized the nearest stool, which happened to be Wermacht, for Policant to step on, and the griffins crowded aside to let Isodel and Titus walk toward the pedestal of the statue, the barkeeper looked up to find Flury looming over him.

“Set up every barrel you've got,” Flury said, “and I'll conjure you more wine. There's going to be rather a big party. Griffins drink a great deal.”

“Oh?” said the barkeeper, out of long knowledge of students. “And who's going to pay?”

“The University,” said Flury. “The pedestal of that statue is solid gold.”

At about this time the forgemasters on their ponies were riding into the ravine that led to the Central Peaks fastness. All of them, ponies included, were relieved to see they would be there before nightfall.

“Am I glad to be home!” said Genno. “Feet up by a nice fire and an artisan girl bringing me supper!”

“And rich. Rich beyond the dreams of average!” Dobrey answered. He flourished the Book of Truth, which had never left his hand for the entire journey.

Arrows ripped down around them from the heights. One of the ponies reared.

“Stop right there!” shouted a female voice from the left-hand cliffs.

Dobrey looked around to see that they were inside a small hedge of arrows, each one sticking upright in the ground. “Nice shooting,” he remarked to Genno. “Who is that up there?”

“Rooska, by the voice. That's Ruskin's cousin—or sister, I forget,” Genno said. “She's got half her clan up there with her. The other half's up on the other side.”

“Come down off there, Rooska!” Dobrey shouted upward. “What are you playing at?”

“Not playing at all, forgemaster.” Rooska's voice rang back. “We artisans have taken over the fastness. We're all equals here now. The ones who wouldn't be equal are dead. Where's Ruskin?”

“Sold him for the biggest treasure on earth,” Dobrey boomed, waving the book again. “Come on, Rooska. Stop this nonsense. We're all tired.”

“Ruskin's
alive
then?” someone else shouted from the opposite cliff. “Swear?”

“Swear it!” all the forgemasters chorused.

Genno added a further shout. “Sold to the Crown Prince of Luteria, if you must know. Now come on down and open the fastness for us!”

“You don't
understand
!” Rooska bawled. “There's been a revolution. You're not in
charge
any longer. Because Ruskin's alive, we'll let you live, but you've got to
leave
. Go on. Go
away
!”

The forgemasters exchanged looks of true dismay. It began to dawn on them that the home comforts they had been looking forward to might not be available.

“We can settle this quietly!” Dobrey yelled. “You
need
us! You need the spells against the demons of the deep!”

“No one's seen a demon in six hundred years!” someone yelled back. “It's all a big fraud!”

That voice was followed by massed yells from both sides of the ravine.
“Frauds! Get out!”
and this merged into a chant, “
GET OUT NOW, GET OUT NOW, GET OUT NOW
!” The chanting was backed up by more arrows, all of which fell inside the first ones, uncomfortably close to the forgemasters. And Rooska screamed a descant to the chant:
“We'll kill you if you're still here tomorrow!”

Dobrey looked drearily from the other forgemasters to the book in his hand. “They don't care. They didn't listen when I waved the greatest treasure on earth at them. If there
were
any demons, they deserve to be infested with them.” He sighed deeply. “Come, fellow forgemasters. If we hurry, we can get to Deeping fastness by midnight. They'll take us in there if we give them the Book of Truth.” He sighed even more deeply. “The most expensive lodgings in the world.”

Followed by the chant and by yells and hoots and catcalls, the forgemasters turned their ponies around and plodded off again.

Sometime later, when the party in the University was in full swing, Blade fetched Flury another glass tankard of wine with a fresh straw in it, and sat down on the refectory steps, level with Flury's head, to drink his own.

“Flury, if you don't mind my asking, what are you doing here?”

Flury rested his feathered elbow on Wermacht, who was still a bar stool, and sipped at the wine. “I thought you knew my government sent me with Jessak,” he said. “He was the prime minister's son, you know. I'm sorry I had to send to you for help.”

“Oh, it was
you
, was it? I thought it was Elda. But I know that innocent tone, too,” said Blade. “I mean, why did you
stay
here, at the University?”

“I quite like teaching—and everyone was being so badly taught,” Flury replied, and put his head on one side to gaze across the courtyard.

Blade followed his gaze, across crowds of laughing human heads, some in helmets and some bare, over bottles and tankards being passed among bobbing griffin beaks and swaying wings, across dancing griffins and singing humans, all under a few flecks of rain, bright in the lights of the courtyard, which even Wizard Policant seemed unable to hold back, and found that Flury's gaze ended at Wizard Policant's golden pedestal. Olga and Claudia were sitting on the pedestal, back to back, with Elda pressed against them on one side and Lukin crowded in on the other. Ruskin and Felim were sitting leaning on the pedestal at their feet. All six of them were singing, five of them very badly. Blade could hear Claudia's sweet, strong notes coming out over the din. For a moment he lost himself in thoughts of her thin, greenish face with its smile that creased into a dimple, her bright, intelligent eyes, her strangely coiling hair, and the way she laughed at things in spite of having had the sort of life that should make her severe and solemn. She was laughing now as she sang. Then a particularly discordant squawk from Elda made him wince. Elda never could hold a tune, Blade thought. And at this he understood Flury. Elda, of course.

“She's pretty young still,” he told Flury.

“She can always see me,” Flury said. “I tell myself that's a good sign until I realize how much she despises me.”

“She doesn't like you being humble. She told me,” Blade said.

“Oh.” Flury was surprised. “I thought that was proper courting behavior. But she's used to Kit, I suppose. Blade, she's so beautiful that I
ache
.”

“I know the feeling,” Blade said.

Flury shot him a bright-eyed look. “I believe,” he said slowly, “that both our ladies have some growing and adjusting to do. Yours, if that terrifying Querida is any guide, has breeding that leads to some fairly powerful magic. That takes growing into.”

Blade stared fuzzily at Flury. In all the years he had known Querida and that green skin color of hers, he had never realized that Querida had Marshfolk blood. Well, well. That accounted for a lot. “And Elda's young for her age,” he said. “We shall just have to keep visiting and hoping. Do you want me to find you work over here that your government will agree to, so that you can stay here and wait?”

Flury's eyes twinkled, almost luminously. “Yes, please.”

They solemnly clinked glasses.