their marks. Verdilith left the flesh; he was bent on carnage first, not feeding. He would not eat until all lay dead. Only one beast escaped: a bay mare. Her lathered skin shuddering in fear, the mare somehow clambered over the corral’s high walls. The horse ran blindly into the woods, and night swallowed her up.
Verdilith slaughtered the remaining horses, delighting in the blood and the dung and the flesh. It was a beautiful carnage, worthy of a dragon such as he. The blood was hot and charged with fear, and it slaked his thirst.
Chapter V
Flinn had found abelaat tracks in the deep snow during his latest check of the trap line, and he and Jo now rode the griffon to the spot. A light dusting of snow had fallen since Flinn had found the tracks, but he had notched a tree so as to find the area again. Flinn searched the ground for fresh tracks, hoping the abelaat was a creature of habit.
“Two of my traps were damaged,” Flinn said in the silence as Ariac waded through the deep snow, his crippled wings fluttering now and then to maintain balance. Ariac wasn’t accustomed to carrying double weight. The trail they followed was an old and familiar one, however, and the beast moved ahead with confidence.
“Do you think the creature got caught in the traps and escaped?” Johauna asked. She shifted in her seat behind the saddle, trying to get comfortable with Flinn’s bow and quiver and her sword strapped to her back. Jo rubbed her nose, then returned her hands to Flinn’s waist.
“No, I think it’s too smart for that,” Flinn replied. “More likely it tried to eat whatever was in the trap. I think it succeeded, too. The two traps wouldn’t have been so badly damaged otherwise. There was blood around each.” Rounding a break in the woods, the trail curved down around the side of a large, frozen pond. The sky was gray and laden with snow. Flinn felt the girl shudder behind him. “Cold?” he asked, a grim smile forming on his lips. “Scared,” she replied quietly.
The warrior stroked her hand at his waist. “We’ll get the beast, Jo, have no fear,” he said gruffly, his voice low with emotion. “If not for your sake, then for mine. I’ll get more sleep once you stop waking up screaming.”
The girl turned aside, then said, “I am not the only one who wakes up screaming, Fain Flinn.”
Flinn drew in a breath and released it slowly. The old nightmares still dogged him, but over the years he had learned to accept them, albeit reluctantly. “But your nightmares can be dispelled, Jo.” He nodded once and then clasped her hand. “We’ll kill the beast today.”
Unexpectedly, Jo leaned forward and embraced him. “Flinn,” she said, “you are a good man.” Just as quickly, however, she leaned away.
Flinn cocked an eyebrow and looked ahead along the trail. He said nothing and gave Ariac a little squeeze of his legs. The griffon continued at a walk.
The former knight and the would-be squire continued their trek in silence, Flinn pointing now and then to a few landmarks. When they reached the spot where Flinn had seen the creature’s tracks, he didn’t bother to dismount. His keen eyes traced the remains of some creature’s trail. The abelaat’s? Flinn wondered. The outline of the tracks was too decayed to tell for sure.
Ariac clicked his beak, sending a small puff of breath into the breeze. Flinn shushed the griffon immediately, then turned the beast up the incline to their left, following the line of tracks. He patted the sword strapped onto the saddle’s pommel, secure in the knowledge that it was close at hand.
It had been impossible to wear it with the girl riding behind him.
“Be quiet,” Flinn said softly to Johauna. “I think we may be in the abelaat’s territory now.” He fidgeted a little in the saddle, shifting the breastplate on his chest. He had grown accustomed to not wearing armor over the years, and he’d forgotten how cumbersome it was.
The girl nodded, checking the weapons strapped to her back.
They climbed slowly through the rugged, wooded terrain. The brush grew thicker and the trail grew more obliterated. Ariac slowed. Flinn began to wish he had left both the griffon and the girl behind. But Jo needed this kind of experience to prove herself to the council. The woods deepened. Flinn gazed dubiously at the trail. Is it a false track? he wondered. Or perhaps a trap?
The trail led him to a tiny valley, no more than three hundred paces long by fifty wide. There the trail ended, leading into a small stream-not yet frozen over-which ran swiftly through the bottom of the valley. Animal tracks of all sizes and shapes littered the snow-covered ground of the valley’s bottomland. Flinn dismounted and Jo did the same.
“Well,” said Flinn, “we’ve lost the trail. I won’t be able to pick up the abelaat’s tracks through all this. If, indeed, we’ve been following the abelaat. Those tracks were pretty obscure.” He knelt and studied the hopeless muddle of tracks on the ground. Looking up at Jo, he sighed, his breath curling away in white tendrils. “We’ll water Ariac, rest a bit, then make our way back up to that ridge-” he pointed to the northwest “-where we’ll find a little higher ground and maybe easier going.”
“Do you think we’ll find the creature today, Flinn?” Johauna asked, her voice edgy.
Flinn glanced up at the clouds. The breeze had grown stronger and had shifted behind them. A heavy storm was moving in from the southwest.
He shrugged, the breastplate rising up, “Maybe, maybe not. I’m going to water Ariac. Stay here.”
“I’d rather follow, if you don’t mind,” Jo said nervously. Flinn nodded and led the griffon over the stony ground to the open water. On the bank of the stream, caps of untouched snow marked the presence of boulders, the largest of which was half the height of a man. Flinn gazed toward the swift water that lay just beyond that rock. The warrior stepped cautiously forward, leading Ariac among the large, snow-covered mounds. After passing the first few, the griffon stopped and lowered his beak, his nostrils blowing puffs of white. He sniffed at the path Flinn had made.
Flinn, annoyed, turned to face the griffon. Tugging on the bridle rein, he called sharply, “Ariac!”
Suddenly, the rock behind Flinn moved. The bird-lion reared and screeched in fear. Ariac’s buff-colored wings flapped awkwardly, the tips stretched wide as though to bat back some unseen assailant. Flinn’s scabbard and sword, fouled by the flailing wings, flew to the rocky shore. The braided leather rein broke near the metal bit.
Flinn wheeled about. The “rock” rose up, its scabrous surface unfolding into a towering beast. Thin, almost skeletal arms swung out to its sides as razor-tipped fingers slowly unfurled. Snow dropped in clumps from its knobby back, and its eyes fastened on Flinn.
Flinn dived to one side between adjacent boulders. The corner of his breastplate caught upon one rock, somersaulting him forward. The abelaat lunged, its claws snagging the warrior’s pant leg. Flinn’s boots followed through above his head, striking the beast’s face and driving it back. The warrior rolled to his feet. The creature dived again, its claws arcing toward Flinn’s neck. Flinn fell back against a rock, unable to avoid the blow. The claws stopped short, however, and a blood-chilling howl erupted from the beast. Ariac had reared and sunk his claws into the monster’s shoulders, the leather balls dangled from the cuffs. The abelaat turned, its talons closing around the feathered forequarters of the bird-lion.
For the second time that day Ariac screeched, but this time the sound was terrible to hear. The griffon tore loose from the monster and then stumbled backward, shrill squeals filling the air. Ariac fell thrashing into the shallow stream, the pain in his forequarters driving him into a frenzy. He beat the rocks and water with his crippled wings and clawed at the snowy riverbed. Lunging frantically, he cleared the water and crashed away into the brush.
The abelaat turned and faced Flinn. Slowly it rose to its full height, baring its teeth and as if testing the air. The eight prominent canines dripped rust-colored saliva as the creature hissed.
Flinn eyed his sword, lying two paces beyond the monster. He side-stepped quickly, positioning himself behind one of the boulders. Whichever route the creature took around the large rock, Flinn would run the opposite way and retrieve his sword. Then he saw Jo, stealthily approaching behind the beast, her wooden sword gripped at both the pommel and the center. Flinn grimaced. She doesn’t even remember how to hold a sword! he thought.
Jo shouted “Flinn!” and threw her sword. The abelaat leaped to scramble over the rock. The wooden blade arced over the beast’s head as the first claw sank into Flinn’s left arm. In the breadth of a heartbeat, Flinn snatched
