‘I don’t want one at all,’ murmured Jasmine. ‘Not at all.’
‘Whenever,’ said Medlo firmly. ‘So that it will be here when Leona returns.’ Yet when Thewson returned with a limp burden over his shoulder and Medlo started to make a gag for it, he turned from it, retching. ‘Take it away, Thewson.’
‘Is it dead?’
‘No. But it has no tongue. The tongue has been cut out. Leona will need one that can speak.’
Thewson made an exclamation of disgust, then spoke a litany of some kind in his own language. ‘Ya! Fomun luxufus, ya zhoanu. Ya! Fua Foxomol, sar luxufus.’
‘Do you know what he’s saying?’ asked Jasmine.
‘It’s a prayer. Something about, “God, if you made people so foolish, it’s your own fault.” I was on a ship once which touched at the Wal Thai delta where that tongue is spoken.’
They settled into depressed silence, finding it more difficult to speak of anything. Even breathing was too much effort. At last Thewson returned again, this time with a body which struggled and made strangled noises.
‘This one talks, all the time. This one is a boss.’
The Keeper turned to gaze at them, eyes full of a strangeness which Medlo could not identify. It was not precisely anger, nor hate. No, it was a kind of dim, fervid hollowing look, as though the creature had been burned away from the inside, leaving only a speaking shell. Gagged, it stared and burned at them.
They waited once more, silent except for the long, honing sound as Thewson sharpened his spear blade, a deadly whisper in the tangle. The sun dropped. Darkness gathered. They rose wearily, ready to find a sleeping place in the forest once more. Then they halted, listening to a thin, far crying.
‘Haii. Haii. Haii.’
‘It’s Terascouros,’ said Jasmine.
Leaving the Keeper tied in the tangle, they went toward the sound to find Terascouros stumbling along the edge of the trees, pausing to call out from time to time. She was exhausted.
‘Well,’ she whispered. ‘So you’re here. Well, so are we, in a manner of speaking. I had to find you first, because – because I had to tell you, Thewson, to give Medlo your spear and let him hide it somewhere. Leona says that. Please, she says.’
Thewson drew himself taller and said ominously, ‘I do not give my spear. And if Medlo takes it, grandmother, he will be a dead picker of flowers.’
‘Just for a little moment, Thewson. She says it is important. For the space of a few breaths, no more. Give him the spear, and let him hide it, then come with me.’
There was a long, hostile silence, but she looked so tiny and harmless that Thewson shook his head. The poor old grandmother was a pitiful sight; let them get this nonsense over with so that she could sleep. He tossed the spear to Medlo, sneering as Medlo staggered under the weight. He turned his back pointedly, as Medlo carried the spear into the dead forest and put it somewhere out of sight. The old woman turned away along the trees, among stumps and fells, up a little hill beside an outcropping of stone, ochre and dun in the failing light. She stopped, peering ahead, and there at the edge of the trees was the gryphon – huge, brazen, and terrible.
Thewson cried out, ‘Umarow,’ and again, ‘Great Beast.’ He flung himself forward, searching the ground for something to use as a weapon, and Terascouros tripped him so that he fell sprawling.
‘Wait,’ she cried, her shrill old voice like the cry of a hawk. ‘Wait. It’s not your Great Beast, warrior. It is Leona.’
Thewson sat up stupidly, his usual expression washed away by one of combined greed and wonder. He began to rant a long, complicated tumble of words in his own language, waving his arms. Terascouros sat down beside him, her head hanging with weariness.
‘Oh, I know. Yes. I know. I was there when she changed. Went into the north, we did. Found a place by a stream with the moon on the edge of the world. Stripped, she did. Told me to hold her clothes. There I was beside her, one moment she was there, the next moment she was gone. I was close enough to touch her, but I couldn’t see her. She kept calling. “Look at me,” but I couldn’t see her. I felt the wing knock me over like a great wind, and then I knew – I knew I needed a seeing spell, and I cried out to the Air-Spirit. I needed a spell, you know, to convince my eyes to see. I had to convince myself that there was something there. Too many years spent learning there’s nothing there, then suddenly having to learn there is something there after all…. But you, you saw her at once. Strange. Perhaps because you are all young. Well, I can see her now.’
The gryphon paced slowly forward into the waning light, huge beak opening and tongue vibrating with a metallic call, the call of a bell struck with a padded mallet, softly resonant dwindling to a hum. They stared and went on staring. The light dimmed as the tableau continued. At last Thewson rose.
‘It is Leona. Where are the dogs?’
‘She left them behind. Couldn’t carry all three of us through the sky. They’ll hunt; they’ll be all right. She’ll get them later.’
‘I need my spear.’
‘You’re not going to try to –’
‘No.’ He shook his massive head, the tails of his bound hair whipping the air in negation. ‘You say it is Leona. I know it is. We will do something now, and if we do something, I need my spear.’
Medlo went for the spear, grateful for the chance to move away alone. He saw, but did not believe what he saw. He believed, but did not know how he could believe. ‘Too much,’ he said.
