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azvolrien · 10 days

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Flight Camp

A pleasant weekend giving flying lessons to a group of young gryphons goes somewhat awry.

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“At least the weather’s good this time,” said Asta. “How many weekends have they had to postpone this, now?”

“Three,” said Redbolt with a deep sigh. “Now, I’ve flown in some pretty rough weather, but don’t suppose it’s fair to ask the little chickies to fly in a full-tilt thunderstorm.”

“It could be a useful skill for them,” said Asta, smiling. “We are in Stormhaven, after all.”

Redbolt gave a soft clicking laugh in his throat. “Likely save that for the advanced classes.”

However bad the summer storms had been, they had passed completely with no sign of returning just yet. The sky above Aberystrad Beach was a clear, pure blue, only interrupted by a few high white wisps flying in the wind coming off the sea, but despite that, the beach itself was almost deserted, other than a handful of beachcombers along the tideline and the gaggle of young gryphons – older than fledglings, but not by much – gathering on the white sand.

Redbolt leant over the edge of the huge gryphon sculpture’s head to glance down at them. “How many’s that now, d’you reckon?”

“Mmm, I think I see twelve,” said Asta. “Thirteen, if that one off to the side is with the group as well.” She flipped back the top of her satchel and took out her notebook to check the roster. “And there were… Fifteen on the signup sheet.”

Redbolt settled back with another sigh. The remaining half of his tail twitched slightly, suggesting that a phantom tail-tuft flicked to and fro in relaxation. “I’ll give them another few minutes to show up, then.” He glanced at the notebook in her hand. “Were you always this keen with notebooks and such, or did you catch it off Master Gwen?”

“She is a fearsomely organised woman,” said Asta, double-checking an earlier page for the weather forecast. “But no, in this case; I don’t think I’ve gone anywhere without a notebook since I was at school.” She paused. “Certain circumstances notwithstanding. Actually, while we’re talking about the College, I was wondering something, and it’s turned out to be surprisingly difficult to find in the library. Even Arianrhod – you remember her, I lived with her for a few weeks when I first came to Stormhaven – wasn’t sure if they had any books about it. I was hoping you might know more about it.”

“Hrm?”

“Do gryphons have magic?”

“Hrm.” Redbolt wiggled his ear back and forth a couple of times, something like a human making a wavering gesture with one hand. “Yes and no.”

Asta frowned. “What do you mean?”

“Well – we all have magic. All of us, every one of us. It’s worked into us, like… like threads in a tapestry. Runs through every feather, every drop of blood. I mean – look at me.” He unfolded both wings to their full, huge extent, more than thirty feet from one wingtip to the other. “Now, I’m lighter than I look, air sacs and all that, but still, you think a beast my size could get off the ground without at least a spark to help out? The wizards always look forward to our moults – our sheds can be useful ingredients for potions and whatnot.” He folded his wings again, shuffling them a little to settle them more comfortably along his back, and looked out to sea.

“So, yeah, gryphons do have magic,” he went on. “But if what you’re really asking is ‘can gryphons be mages’ – that’s rare. That’s very rare. It’s not unheard of, but every generation only hatches one or two, if that, who can really channel and control their magic like the wizards do. I think Owl and her little apprentice are the only ones around at the moment. They live a ways outside the city – Oakhollow, nice little place a bit east of here – but you might have seen her around now and then. White and pale grey feathers, sort of a ruff around her face, hence the name.”

“I think I have seen her once or twice. I’ve never seen one at the College, though. Not as a student, at least – Inkfoot and the messengers are always around, of course.”

Redbolt shook his head. “You wouldn’t have. It sort of – it goes along different lines to a human mage, I’m told. Not much point trying to teach a gryphon to wield magic the same way a human does, ’cause it just won’t work. I did hear that the little one wanted to sit in on a few theory classes, though, so she might turn up now and then after the summer.”

“I’ll keep an eye out for her,” said Asta. She checked her watch. “That’s after ten o’clock now. I think anybody who hasn’t shown up by now is just going to have to deal with being late.”

“Hrm. Don’t suppose it’s fair to keep ’em waiting, the ones who got here on time.” Redbolt stood, stretched, and nodded for Asta to climb onto his back. He waited for her to buckle the safety strap around her waist before he unfurled his wings again, stepped off the side of the sculpture’s head, and glided down to the beach. The gathered youngsters looked up when his shadow passed over them, and had formed up into a wobbly line by the time his claws touched down on the sand. Asta undid the belt and slid off his back.

“We still waiting on anyone?” asked Redbolt once he was within earshot of the young gryphons. “One, two, three, four – yeah, fifteen of you here now. Right! Like as not you’ve seen me around the place – not like this face blends into a crowd easy – but we’ll do some intros anyway. The name’s Redbolt, lately Flight Captain in the Second Assault Wing. Retired the year before last after eighty-odd years in the Army. Saw action in the Battle of Second Eyrie, the Darkwald War, and more border skirmishes than I can even remember.”

“It shows,” said one female on the end of the row. Her neighbour gave her a scandalised look and made a desperate shushing sound.

Redbolt just looked at her for a few seconds until she began to stew. “Yeah, I’m missing a few bits,” he said mildly. “This one here is my pal Asta; mostly she just tagged along for something to do, but she can help you out if you need anything noted down. Any of you got more than a nest-name yet?”

A few of them did; the one who had commented on Redbolt’s scars went by Vinegar for reasons she declined to explain, while a small male halfway along the row was called Goldcrest for reasons that were entirely obvious. Most, however, were still nameless other than whatever their families shouted to get their attention.

“Well, maybe a few more of you’ll have proper names after the weekend,” said Redbolt. “Think I got my first one when I was about your age. So! Let’s make a start. I take it you’ve all been out at the practice trees? Got in some branch gliding, worked up your flight muscles?” Nods all around. “Good. Sky above knows why your families would’ve sent you out here if you hadn’t. So, since you know how to glide down from a high place, lesson one for today: getting off the ground. What do you already know?”

There were a few seconds of silence as the students all glanced at each other, before Goldcrest held up one fore-claw. It seemed such a human gesture that Asta smiled. “Uh… Flap?”

Redbolt laughed. “You’re not wrong, but there’s more to flight than flapping. Look at the shape of my wing.” He held one out to the side. “Not how it’s shaped from above, but from the side. See how the leading edge is rounded where all the bone and muscle is, then it trails to a sharp edge at the back where the feathers are. Then each big feather is like that too, but smaller, with the vane and the shorter barbs at the front and the longer barbs towards the back. You’ve all got the same. How you hold your wings, how the air flows over that shape – that’s just as important as flapping. More, I’d say. See the gulls up there? How they soar about, only moving their wings now and then? It’s the same for them.

“Now, me, I’ve got enough power in my chest and my back legs that taking off with one big downstroke-leap is easy enough for me, and I’ll try you out on that later, but for now let’s start you out with a wind take-off. Good weather for it today; nice strong breeze off the sea, not too many eddies to throw you around. Asta, you’d better go off to the side for a bit.”

“Yes, I think I better had,” said Asta, and sat down on the sand at the base of the statue. A couple of the students turned to watch her go, clearly still wondering why a human was sitting in on a flying class.

Redbolt cleared his throat to regain their attention. “All right! Step one! Spread out so you don’t all crash into each other.” He waited until they had done so, forming a straggling row along the tideline. “Step two!” he went on, raising his voice so they could all hear him. “Face into the wind. Step three! Wings out.” He waited until all of the young gryphons had their wings spread. Most of them were, in gryphon parlance, ‘eagles’ like Redbolt, with long, broad wings built for soaring, but a few had the shorter, rounder wings and longer tail-feathers of ‘hawks’. Redbolt nodded his approval and turned towards the sea, spreading his own wings. “Step four!” he shouted. “Make shallow flaps like this, and run!”

Two of the students almost immediately crashed into each other and fell to the ground in a tangle of limbs; one tripped on an inconvenient stone and planted his beak in the sand up to his nostrils. Three others managed to take off in a wavering glide for a few seconds before settling relatively gently in the surf and wading back to shore. The rest, however, successfully caught the wind at just the right angle and, and they picked up speed, lifted their claws from the sand and rose into the air. Redbolt nodded again and led them in a wide, gently rising spiral over the sea before coming back in for a long gliding descent to the beach. Asta couldn’t hear what Redbolt shouted back to them as they neared the sand, but presumably it was something to do with how to brake properly. Their landings were less graceful than their take-offs; only four of the students managed to copy how Redbolt dropped his hindquarters, fanning out his tail feathers and spreading out his wings to slow himself before he lowered his hind claws to the sand, took a couple of awkward little hops as his speed fell, and finally dropped to all fours and came to a halt. ‘Crash’ was probably too uncharitable a way of describing the others, but it wasn’t that far off the mark. One came close, but went to all fours too quickly and fell flat on her chest; another missed the mark with his hind legs and tumbled over in a rather spectacular forward roll.

“Everyone still in one piece?” asked Redbolt, to a chorus of pained but affirmative groans. “No broken bones or feathers? Good. Little ones like you should still be bendy enough to take a few knocks with no damage to more than your pride. Right, everyone back up to where we were first.” He waited until everyone had assembled once more and lay down on the sand, crossing his front claws over each other. “Now for the bit everyone loves,” he said, with something like a wicked grin in his voice, though his body language betrayed nothing. “Crrrriticism! Now, you two, and you,” he said, nodding towards the ones who hadn’t even left the ground. “Don’t think I need to say where you went wrong, eh?”

“We’ll stand further apart next time,” said one, glancing sheepishly to the side.

“And keep a better eye on where I’m putting my feet,” added the one who had tripped.

“Good. Now, you three, you had the right idea, but you needed more lift, which in this case means you needed more speed.”

“So, run faster,” said one of the trio who had landed in the sea.

“Run faster,” agreed Redbolt. “Like I said, I’ll try you on a leaping take-off later, but I want to see about getting you all off the ground this way first. Now, as for getting you back on the ground…”

Asta had, she privately admitted, been a little dubious when Redbolt had told her about the flying lessons. She didn’t have much contact with the other military gryphons, but those few she had spoken with who had trained under Redbolt remembered it with something approaching horror; one had told her with a haunted expression that they still dreaded the occasions when he came in as a guest instructor. However, he had clearly adjusted his teaching style for a non-military audience. ‘Gentle’ was probably still not the right word, for he made sure every one of his students knew exactly where they had gone wrong, even those who, such as Vinegar, seemed to Asta’s eyes to have performed perfectly, but he had tempered his criticism with enough coaching on how to improve that soon they were all raring to line back up for another attempt.

It was almost sunset when Redbolt finally called a halt. They had, finally, all managed to take off into the wind, circle around, and land without crashing at least three times.

“Bit trickier than a quick flutter up to the top of the statue, eh?” said Redbolt, pointing up to where they would all have been presented to Lady Starfeather after growing their first set of flight feathers. They murmured their agreement. “We’re gryphons, chickies. Flight’s in our blood. You’d get off the ground without my help, sooner or later. But instinct’s best when it’s paired with proper training.” His tail twitched from side to side in a ‘smile’. “Reckon you’re all starving now, though. C’mon, back to camp for some grub.”

A cheer went up and they followed him back through the coastal dunes in a ragged crocodile, to where a series of tents big enough to comfortably house gryphons had been set up around a huge firepit. Another cheer greeted this sight, for an entire ox had been roasting on a spit over the fire. The team of human cooks who had overseen it lifted the spit from its supports, carried it over to a wide, flat area of stone that had been carefully swept clear of sand, and stood back as the students descended upon the carcass like a flock of starving vultures.

“Gruesome sight, isn’t it?” said Redbolt, almost laughing.

“I think Goldcrest just put his entire head inside the ribcage,” said Asta faintly.

“Yeah, I didn’t think he had that in him, truth be told,” said Redbolt. “Struck me as more of the fussy type.” He glanced sideways to catch Asta’s mildly horrified expression. “Ah, it’s just a flight camp tradition to go a bit wild on the first night. Tomorrow’s dinner’ll be a bit more civilised. Might even have tables.”

“Tables!” said Asta. “How decadent.”

“No need for us to join the scrum, though,” said Redbolt. “C’mon, over – ah, hm. You do eat meat, yeah? Never thought to ask but I know some humans have a thing…”

Asta assured him this wasn’t a problem and followed him over to a second, smaller firepit where the cooks had roasted a pig for Redbolt. He must have warned them in advance that he had human company: they were prepared with a plate and cutlery and carved off a few slices for Asta before placing the rest down on another clean stone for Redbolt. He gave a grunt of approval – evidently high praise from the way the head cook smiled – and began to tear into it with his beak, pinning it in place with his great hooked talons. Long since used to Redbolt’s eating habits, slight neater than the youngsters’, Asta watched quietly as she ate her own helping, noting how he used his other claw to compensate for the missing talon on his left. She frowned thoughtfully, her gaze drifting up from his claws to the great scar that cut through where his eye had once been.

“Redbolt?” she asked once he had mostly finished his pig.

“Ayah?”

“You’re missing part of your tail.”

“I am?!” said Redbolt, letting his jaw drop. A strip of pork fell from the corner of his mouth. “Why did nobody tell me?!”

“Very funny. I was just wondering, after watching you with the students today – does it affect how you fly?”

“Good question,” said Redbolt. He retrieved the fallen scrap and swallowed it before twisting his head around to look back at his tail. Intact, it would have been some six feet long, but whatever long-ago wound had taken it had left less than half of that. “It did throw off my balance at first,” he said after surveying it for a few seconds. “Had to re-learn a lot of that. But see these big feathers at the base?” He fanned them out in demonstration. “They’re what’s really important for steering in the air. You see it with birds too. Use ’em to shift the airflow over the wings.”

“I think I understand.” More hesitantly, Asta went on. “How did that happen? I know you lost your eye and your talon in the Darkwald War, but…”

“Hah, nah, the tail’s an older thing. Not even a war wound, really, if we’re strict about it.” He sighed. “Gang of slave raiders had climbed up into the Chainbreaker Hills, a good bit north of the Harbinger Pass. Started preying on a couple of the little tiny villages up there, chaining folk up and making ready to drag them back down the hill. And somehow – dunno where they got it – they had a bladehound with them.”

Asta gasped. The terrifying war-constructs had been designed for killing wizards, loaded with as much resistance to magic as their creators could manage, but their sheer bulk and steel claws as sharp and heavy as meat cleavers made them easily a match for a gryphon on the ground.

“Yeah. I was with a border patrol when we came across them. Killed some, chased the others back down the hill, and freed the people they’d grabbed. But I reckon whoever’d been giving the bladehound its orders was one of the dead, because the thing went berserrr – uh, ran wild. Started flailing around like nobody’s business. Well, we got pikes, started forcing it back towards a drop that might break it up enough for us to finish the job, when one of my mates got too close. It went for him, all claws, and I lunged to get him out of the way. He did. I didn’t quite, and, well…” He brought his own talons down in a decisive motion. “Chop.”

Asta drew her breath in through her teeth. “I suppose you were lucky to only lose that much. If you’d been any slower it could have severed your spine.”

“Strictly, it did,” Redbolt pointed out.

“Well, yes. But you know what I mean.”

“Heh. Yeah, I know.” Redbolt paused for a moment and continued, a hint of reluctance entering his voice for the first time. “Actually,” he said slowly, “if I’m honest… losing the eye was worse for flying. Made it harder to judge distances, you know? Crashed a few times when the ground came up faster than I’d thought, until I got used to it.” He stared into space for a few seconds, then gave himself a shake as if to dislodge a bad memory. “Still, I am used to it now. Barely remember what it was like to have two, really.”

Asta found that difficult to believe, considering that Redbolt was more than a hundred years old and had been missing an eye for less than twenty, but thought it best not to voice as much. “You’re very philosophical about all your scars,” she said quietly.

“Ah, well. Don’t see much point being otherwise. Not like pulling my feathers out will make my tail grow back, eh?”

“Hm.” Asta ran one hand back over her shoulder and beneath the collar of her blouse, finding the uppermost whipping-scar across her back with her fingertips. Only after a few more seconds of silence did she realise that Redbolt had turned his head and was watching her without speaking. She met his steady golden gaze and raised an eyebrow.

“It’s different, I think, with all of mine,” he said, his raspy voice unusually gentle. “They weren’t fun – actually picked up a nasty infection with the eye, had to sit out the last few months of the war – but… I was on my feet and fighting, you know? Heat of battle sort of thing. Them or me. There wasn’t the same…” He paused, wiggling his ear again. Asta imagined he might have wrinkled his nose, had his beak been capable of such an expression. “Wasn’t the same kind of… of cold cruelty behind it that there was with that.” He nodded towards her back. “And I think maybe it’s that that haunts your dreams as much as the real pain of it.”

“…You might be right.”

Redbolt grunted and gave himself another shake. “You said your berserker killed the one who did that to you?” he said, his voice back to its usual deep, gruff tone.

“Yes. She did.”

“Good. Else I might’ve had to track him down.”

Asta smiled despite herself. “Oh, he wouldn’t stand a chance.” Another short, companionable silence passed by before she changed the subject. “So, you said you might try the students with one of your leaping takeoffs tomorrow?”

“Yeah, we’ll see how many can manage it. They’re young still, and it takes a lot of muscle. They would’ve sort of done it for their presentations, but going into level flight from that is a different skill to a quick flap-flap-flap straight up.”

“You know, I can’t say it’s one I’ve ever had much cause to master.”

They finished eating and, after briefly taking the students to wash up in the river, turned in for the night. Redbolt unbuckled his harness and left it in a heap at the edge of his tent. All he had with him for a bed was a huge rug made from a number of sheepskins sewn together, which he had brought from his eyrie in the city and laid out on the tarpaulin floor, but someone had thoughtfully provided a camp bed for Asta.

“They must’ve been worried I might roll over on you in the night if you just slept on the ground,” said Redbolt as Asta laid out her bedroll on top of it.

“As cosy as your feathers are, I would rather avoid that,” said Asta. “Though as a matter of fact, it wouldn’t be the first time I’ve slept next to a gryphon.”

“Yeah?”

Asta nodded. “On the way south with Curlew, I was sharing Captain Steel’s cabin. That first night on the ship, I… was not in a very good place. Mentally speaking. I was trying to muffle it with the blankets they’d given me, but she must have heard me crying anyway, because she got up from her own bed across the room and lay down next to my pallet instead. She didn’t say anything, just folded a wing over me and went back to sleep.”

“Huh. She didn’t strike me as the cuddly sort.” Redbolt yawned enormously, arched his back, and turned around in a circle before he lay down on his front and rested his head on his forelegs. “Well, feel free to snuggle up if you have a bad dream, but otherwise – I’ll see you in the morning.”

They didn’t make it to the morning before both of them woke with a start. Screams echoed from down by the beach, not human voices but the earsplitting shrieks of terrified young gryphons. Somebody clawed frantically at the tent door, talons piercing the canvas. “Redbolt! Mr Redbolt! Sir!”

Goldcrest. Asta sat up and dragged her hair into an unbrushed ponytail as Redbolt lurched to his feet and wrenched the flap aside. “What’s wrong?”

The little gryphon cringed back from Redbolt looming over him. “I- We were- it’s-”

Asta went down on her knees, bringing their eyes to the same level, and took his face between her hands. “Look at me. Deep breaths. Now, what’s happening?”

Goldcrest drew in a long, slow breath, nervously fluffing his feathers out. “A few of us went back to the beach for a bit more practice after lights-out,” he said. He cast a cautious glance up at Redbolt, who just listened in silence. “One of the others, that hawk with the sort of falcon markings? She – I don’t know, she must’ve panicked or something, and, well, um…” He pointed back towards the beach.

Redbolt looked. “Ah.”

The other students had gathered in a frightened huddle, staring helplessly at the cyclone hovering above the beach. Although the sky was otherwise still clear, the funnel of howling winds had whipped sand and spray alike up into a veil around a lone figure in midair, lit up now and then by a flicker of sparks.

“She’s a mage?” said Asta.

“We didn’t know!” one of the students wailed. “She didn’t know!”

“Vinegar!” Redbolt bellowed over the wind. The gryphon in question sat up on her haunches to stand out from the pack. “Oakhollow’s a straight flight four miles east of here. Think you can find it in the dark?”

“Yes, sir!”

“Good. Go. We need Owl, and we need her fast.”

Vinegar nodded, took a run-up, and disappeared into the night in a flurry of feathers.

Redbolt looked back at the miniature windstorm on the beach, ran his talons through the feathers on his chest, and sighed deeply.

“What are you thinking?” asked Asta.

“That next time I run one of these, I should enlist a couple more adults to keep an eye on the youngsters.”

“I’m an adult,” Asta pointed out.

“Adults who can fly.”

Asta’s eyes flicked down to the sand at the bottom of the funnel. “How close can you get me?”

Redbolt turned his entire head to stare at her. “What?”

She pointed, grabbing a handful of his feathers with her other hand. “Look – look at the base of it. It’s moving.”

“Of course it’s moving, it’s a storm!”

“I don’t just mean around in a circle, I mean it’s drifting towards the sea! However long it takes Vinegar to find this village and then for Owl to get back here – I don’t think we have that long until that thing turns into a waterspout. And then – well. I don’t want her to drown, do you?”

Redbolt continued to look at her doubtfully.

“I know I’m not a mage and I’m certainly not a gryphon, but I do work at the College. If there’s one thing I have done a few times by now, it’s calm down a panicking apprentice.”

Redbolt looked from her to the storm and back a couple of times, breathing slowly and deeply, before he nodded. “Get a good hold on my neck, then. No time to go back for my harness.”

He took off at a run the second Asta was on his back, leaping into flight above the dunes and hurtling towards the cyclone. Asta clung harder to his feathers as he half-folded his wings and plunged into the funnel, riding the gale in a tight circle until he burst through into a pocket of still air in the middle.

The young gryphon hung in the very centre, not as motionless as Asta had initially thought: her body spasmed as bright bluish-white light crackled over her feathers, pulsing along the stiff vanes of her primaries and glowing in her wide, staring eyes, while her talons raked at the air as she tried desperately to steady herself. Her beak gaped open as her chest fluttered with rapid, shallow breaths. Slowly, jerkily, she managed to turn her head to look at them, but if she cried out, the sound was instantly torn away by the wind.

“I can’t hover, Asta!” Redbolt shouted, circling in a small ring above the youngster. “Whatever you’ve got planned, do it quick!”

Asta steeled herself and, before Redbolt could object or she could second-guess herself, threw herself from his back. He gave one appalled squawk, shocked out of his coordination, and the wind tossed him head-over-heels out of the funnel. Asta flung her arms around the young mage’s neck, dragging them both a few feet downwards before the uncontrolled magic arrested their fall. Pinpricks of sparks crawled across her hands as they dug into the slate-grey feathers, but she kept her grip and brought her mouth as close to one pointed ear as she could.

“Can you hear me?” A nod, felt rather than seen. “Have you got a name?” Shake. “I think you might after tonight, but we need to get safely back on the ground first. For now, just close your eyes and focus on my voice. You’re going to be all right.”

The gryphon’s forelegs twitched upwards to wrap around her waist; Asta winced as the talons dug in through the thin fabric of her blouse, but kept it from her voice. “Now, close your beak. Breathe in through your nostrils for a count of one… two… three… four… five… and out through your mouth. Like this.”

Slowly, the gryphon’s breathing evened out. The sparks became fewer and further between, the glow fainter, but the funnel surrounding them did not let up.

“That’s it. You’re doing well.”

“The wind-”

“Don’t worry about the wind yet. It’s not the wind holding you up here. Have you ever seen a wizard levitate? For now, just think – down.”

The gryphon took another deep breath, and slowly they began to sink until finally their feet touched the sand. The gryphon’s rear talons dug in as if to cling to the ground, and she opened her eyes. The glow was gone, revealing them to be a shade somewhere between a chick’s brown and an adult’s gold, but the wind still spiralled around them both.

“There we go,” said Asta, holding eye contact. “That’s the worst part out of the way.”

Then, a flash of motion. A pale shape hurtled through the air outside the funnel, circling around and around opposite the direction of the wind. Bit by bit the storm slowed until they could see the newcomer clearly: a lone adult gryphon, her feathers a snowy white fading to a pale grey on her wing coverts, and a strange ruff around her face. She brought herself up short, golden light coursing along the vanes of her her flight feathers, and thrust both wings forwards with a sound like a thunderclap. With one huge gust of wind towards the sea, the young mage’s storm disappeared. The waves settled, and the beach was peaceful once again.

The youngster let go of Asta’s waist and backed away, looking at the sand as Owl landed. Redbolt hurried forwards and swept Asta in under his wing, preening her hair with the tip of his beak. She pushed his beak away half-heartedly before she hugged him around the neck and buried her face in his feathers.

“You sure the berserker’s the mad one of the pair of you?” muttered Redbolt, bowing his head over her shoulder.

“Heh. Well, under certain circumstances…”

Redbolt lifted his head again to take in the scene. Now that the storm had ended, the rest of the students had crept down from the dunes, edging carefully towards the mage. At their head, Vinegar sat up and punched one clenched claw towards the sky. “Galewing! Galewing! Galewing!” Soon the others had taken up the chant, and didn’t stop until Redbolt let go of Asta and stepped forwards.

“Looks like you have another apprentice,” he said to Owl. She didn’t look terribly pleased by this development. “You know the law,” Redbolt told her, his tail twitching. “All those with magic must learn to control it.”

Owl tipped her head back until it almost rested between her shoulders and gave a long, drawn-out groan. “Fiiiine.” She eyed the newly-named Galewing for a second, and her bristling crest-feathers settled into a somewhat gentler expression. “Well, I guess Sunbeam’ll be happy to have a ‘study buddy’,” she said, the last two words a little stilted as if she was unfamiliar with the term. She lifted a front claw and jabbed one talon towards Galewing. “I’ll see you at Oakhollow first thing on Ravensday to get started. You’ve got until then to sort things out with your family.” Galewing nodded. Owl lowered her talon and turned away. “Good.” She groaned again. “I’m going back to bed.”

“You know,” said Asta once Owl had flown off, “when you mentioned her earlier, I think I imagined someone with more… gravitas.”

“People usually do,” said Redbolt with a sigh. “But she does know magic, and she’s softer than she likes to act. Galewing’ll do fine with Owl keeping an eye on her.” He looked back at the rest of the students, who were still bunched in a loose half-circle around Galewing, and unfolded his wings in a shooing gesture, herding them back towards the camp. “The rest of you, back to bed as well! And stay there until morning this time!”

“I’ll speak to Master Gwen when I get back to the college,” said Asta as they walked back through the dunes. “I’m sure she can set aside some time for a chat with you before the next time you run one of these weekend events.”

“Huh? What for?”

“Because,” said Asta, “I don’t think there is anyone in Stormhaven with more experience organising groups of magical children than her.” She poked him in the side of his neck, grinning. “You are going to learn all about risk assessment forms.”

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What has two thumbs and spent more time than is probably necessary reading about bird anatomy and flight physics? 👍👍

Gryphons aren't real! They don't need to be 'scientifically accurate'! And indeed kind of can't be, considering the aforementioned 'not real' thing. But I've always felt that at least a few nods in that direction adds a certain verisimilitude to fantasy and helps to suspend disbelief about all the stuff that's just nonsense. This was also the rationale behind noting that yes, Redbolt does actually have trouble with his depth perception.

I'm not sure how old the young gryphons are chronologically, as their aging doesn't really map neatly into human terms, but developmentally I'd put them in sort of the 8-10 range.

#az writes stories

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