Griffin's Fate

Chapter Four - Part One

Ken layered his things into a colorfully-painted zaajinwa box. He padded clothes around the few books and baubles he was taking. Eventually he realized his Mum was leaning in the doorway. She made a tired smile and he returned it, but there wasn't anything more to say. The absurd broom event had removed any doubt. It felt like someone had looked at his peaceful life and decided to play a cruel joke.

His Mum drifted over to his shelf of collected treasures. Suri's broken rock was there, among several empty shapes in the layer of dust. She paused over two little griffin dolls she had sewn for him ages ago, and patted their lumpy heads. Griffin toys were common down south. One of his pair was black while the other was brown, and heavily faded and stained from being the favorite. They slouched adorably, stuffed with cattail fuzz and sawdust, and had watched him grow up through glass eyes she'd had specially made.

"I've always been proud of these," she confessed, then her attention went to something long lying under the tawny one's paws. She relieved the doll of its guard duty, and ran the giant feather's oily smoothness through her fingers.

"Well it is no wonder things are happening," she teased her son, and held the feather up to the pale morning light at his window. "Where did you get this?"

"Found it yesterday. Sitting in the path." He preoccupied himself with packing. "And yes, I'm aware of the irony."

"Well, you would not have actually wished on it!" She chuckled at him. That was a toddler's game. But when he just sat there and regarded her quietly, she matched his frown and slid the feather back under the doll's paw.

"Oh, you did."

"I figured what could be the harm?" He tossed up his palms. "It wasn't like I could have been holding a real griffin feather. But now we get to see what my real destiny is, apparently. And if they're real I bet they're having a good laugh. And every dandelion I've ever puffed on and coin I've tossed in the fountain is going to have a go at me next!"

He looked down and aggressively looped a rope around the crate to secure the lid. She silently came over, tousled his hair, and laid her tiny hand on his shoulder. It was easy with him sitting on the floor.

"My wondrous little Dreamer. And I never said They were not real," she reflected in Arnabi. "Just that no one knows, anymore."

"It is fine." He made the gesture of smoothing sand. The matter was forgotten.

"You are not taking these two?" She made a pitiful face for the winged dolls. He didn't know what or who awaited him at the end of the South Road, but a bunch of powerful mages would probably smirk at his baby toys.

"They can look after Grampi. He is going to need it."

She kissed the top of his head while he sat surrounded by the pieces of his life, and left to finish her own packing. When he was done, Ken turned at the doorway for a final look at the tidy spare room in an old man's attic.

The new orus was quietly staying in the locked desk and his practice lute still hung on the wall. Those strings were wrapped around his heart, but they were another promise he'd be back in a month, maybe two. And fear of It taking hold while playing for strangers further set his mind. Ken thought guiltily of the other lute. He wasn't sure what Raylim was going to tell the goddess' new owner. He hoped things turned out all right for her.

Raylim had hauled their tujini, a zaajini's bland and dependable sibling, out of the musty shed. Ken's Grampi had spent hours yesterday inspecting every inch for soundness and vermin. Meanwhile Muriel had come back livid after negotiating the rental of a swaybacked horse to pull the cart to Loskier.