Griffin's Fate

Chapter Two - Part Two

His Mum returned in the last blue light of evening. She snuffed the lantern and set the boots silently in the hall chest.

"Cara will be by in the morning," she said, tired. "They're drawing us a map."

"Where are we going?" a shadow asked from the doorway to her sewing room.

"Tor Melvary. The closest college. East past Loskier, at the end of the South Road."

He had never heard of any of those places.

"H...How far?"

"Two weeks, by our tujini."

Ken's jaw hung slack. He'd only been inside the closest waystation, half a day's walk on the South Road. His Mum flowed past him into the kitchen, finding a myriad of things to do.

"It was that or Gilhaven." She attacked the barest hint of dirt on some dishes. "But that's another five days."

Ken's soul perked up out of its sad, dark cave.

"Gilhaven has a college? But that's perfect! We'll wait til Cades' Ageing Day, and then—"

A plate clattered back into the tub. His Mum hunched, her hands braced on the edge of the washbasin. Suds dribbled down its front and onto the clay tiles.

"Tisn't a matter for waiting, son." Raylim said, and laid a hand on Ken's shoulder but they all saw him hesitate. "Do as yer Mum says."

"Cara said Melvary mages are the brightest," Muriel resumed like she had not heard. Her back was still to them, and her hand brushed her wet cheek as she pushed back her hair. "They will know what to do. Best we get to bed. Tomorrow we pack. And Kendal?"

"Yes, Meru?"

"No. Trying. Magic."

The evening wore on and Raylim found rest by the sound of his snoring. But past midnight Ken was standing numbly in the weak moonlight of his nook's four-paned window. A candle flickered under his Mum's door and she beckoned him in when he knocked. She was in her favorite indigo and rose homespun robe that made him think of the night sky at sunrise. She patted the quilt atop her bed for him to sit alongside. She had been going through a stack of zaajinwa letters. It was rare that she was without her orus at night, and he didn't see it anywhere.

"Come unload your heart, Kupru. Days like these breed questions."

He could think of many things she wouldn't be able to answer. So he took a stab at the question that had always been there. He braced his hands on his knees and looked at the knots in the pinewood floor.

"I...I think I need to hear about him," he whispered. "Is this why you've never even told me his name?"

"That's your question?" she whined from exhaustion. "You know It doesn't always pass down—"

"Your book has more ink than mine, Meru." He tried to ply her with a desert saying. Her shoulders sagged and she stood to light another, fatter candle. She set it on her nightstand so they could both gaze into the flame. It was going to be that kind of talk.

"I was going to tell you at the next full moon," she said. "But you've always been one to be early. And I never lied." She held her chin high. "About your father being a soldier."

"On the Arnabi side?"

"The Charlen side." She said it like an ultimatum, and there went his hopes. Noting his reaction, she pulled herself taller. "When we met he was in his officer's armor, riding a fine horse." Her voice was warm and nostalgic, like for all desert stories. "His troop stayed in our Neb-Asul a whole season, gathering supplies to help our soldiers stall the Dohali army. He was confident, and knew how to charm a local girl who'd never seen a jaatem." She gave her son a sly, sideways look. "But I doubt you want to know the finer details of how you came to be."