“All right, let’s take her outside before you mount up,” Charles instructed.
The griffon master led her outside to a pitching station, where he tethered the griffon. “Go on and climb up in the saddle,” Charles said once Muireann was settled.
Kari put her foot in the first stirrup and hopped gracefully onto the griffon’s back, and the elder human moved in front of Muireann and let her grip his forearm lightly in her beak. “Now then, ma’am, Muireann here is well-trained. She’ll obey yer commands and yer gestures, so ye don’t need to yank on the reins too hard. If ye have any experience with war horses, ye can also guide her fairly well with yer knees.”
Kari nodded silently. She made sure to maintain the proper posture for riding as she listened to Charles’ instructions. The saddle wasn’t designed with a rir tail in mind, but Kari was able to shift enough to make it comfortable without giving Muireann the impression that she was trying to lead with her weight. She could feel the strength of Muireann’s back, the griffon supporting Kari’s weight effortlessly, and the terra-dracon woman ran her hand gently along the creature’s muscular shoulders. Muireann clicked and whistled again.
Charles laughed and untethered the majestic animal. When he moved toward Kari, he ran his own hand along the griffon’s shoulder. “My, she’s already taken quite a liking to ye, ma’am,” he commented before he looked over his shoulder at Eli. “I guess our half-demon guest will benefit from getting most of my attention, since I think Muireann’ll be taking ye out flying in no time.”
“Are you sure you’ve never ridden one of these before?” Eli asked skeptically.
“Sevaat, teyla, sevaat!” Kari said, again speaking that foreign language.
Muireann bounded away from the pitching station and nearly knocked Eli over as she headed out into the inner paddock. Kari acquainted herself with guiding the griffon with her knees, and when she came around to face Charles and Eli, the elder human was clearly impressed. Kari couldn’t figure it out herself; she was a fair rider when it came to horses, but she couldn’t have ridden a horse the way she was riding Muireann. She felt an odd kinship with the creature that somehow let her speak with it, and whether she gave vocal commands, tugged on the reins, or guided the griffon with her knees, Kari was able to get Muireann to do whatever she wished.
Soon she had the griffon trotting laps around the paddock, and all Charles and Eli could do was watch her in amazement. “My word!” the human exclaimed as Kari had the griffon do a pirouette. Muireann took to the air, then, and Kari just caught Charles tell Eli, “Ah well, I guess we should go introduce ye to one of yer own.”
Kari felt the griffon’s power as it lifted off from the ground, its massive wings beating huge blasts of air to climb into the morning sky. Kari folded her own wings in tight to avoid being parachuted from the mount’s back. Muireann didn’t fly too high, getting just above the walls, giving Kari a good view of the western paddock and her three paladin friends riding their horses therein. All three stopped and watched Kari fly a circuit around the battlements and then another around the inner keep.
Muireann landed on the angled roof of the keep at Kari’s command. She rode the griffon along the edge of the castle’s roof and once again felt the power in Muireann’s thunderous steps across the tiles. When they reached its edge, the griffon leapt off fearlessly and banked hard to her left to return to the inner paddock, but Kari wasn’t prepared for that. She lost her balance and then her seat, and plummeted quickly toward the ground.
Kari opened her wings and cut through the air just enough to angle her descent, but the strain was hard on her back. She gritted her teeth in pain as she tried to slow her fall by gliding. She hit the ground and then the wall of the castle hard, though she was able to take the brunt of the blow with her shoulder and not her head. The impact knocked the wits from her, and Kari lay in a daze until Muireann approached, stood before her, and let out a sharp whistle followed by two short clicks.
She tried to shake free of the cobwebs and started to rise, but stopped when she felt the sharp sting of cracked ribs and a badly bruised shoulder. She was injured, so she lay still while several of the servants in the courtyard approached to see if she was all right. Before they could reach her, Muireann nudged the terra-dracon woman in the side with her beak, and Kari reached up and patted the griffon’s neck, forgetting the warning Charles had given her.
Fortunately, the griffon accepted the touch and nudged Kari in the side again, and the demonhunter managed to get to a sitting position before the servants reached her. She felt queasy, which was testament to how badly she was actually hurt, and she drew her knees up to her chest, lay her head upon them, and tried to push down the feeling.
Many of the servants were afraid to get close to the griffon, who glared hard at them with the plumage atop her head splayed in warning. Even in her dazed state, Kari realized Muireann thought she was hurt and that the servants might try to kill her, so the griffon was protecting her rider. Kari put her good hand on Muireann’s shoulder to keep her calm, and the griffon lay down at Kari’s touch.
With Muireann under control, the servants helped Kari to her feet. Charles approached with Eli by his side, their faces both showing deep concern. Charles offered a quick apology but decided getting the griffon back to her stall would be best, so he took her reins and led her away from the gathering around Kari.
“Are you all right?” Eli asked. He put Kari’s good arm around his neck for extra support.
“He failed to… mention that staying in the saddle when… airborne is a bit tricky,” Kari said, half of the words coming out between gritted teeth.
“I don’t think he expected you to be able to speak with the griffons or fly them on the first day,” Eli returned, his humor a bit muted in the face of her injuries. “Come on, let’s get you inside so you can lie down.”
Eli got Kari back to her room with the help of the servants. It wasn’t long before the earl and the Moreville twins came to see what had happened. For someone to ride the griffons the way Kari had on the first day was unusual, but Markus was more concerned with Kari’s injuries. He insisted he would summon his physician from the city and, embarrassed as she was, Kari agreed. It was clear the injuries weren’t terrible, but they were serious enough that healing them on her own would cause a considerable delay in her plans.
Once she’d agreed to a visit from the physician, the others left her alone to get undressed and rest, and Kari inspected the graying bruise that already enveloped her entire left shoulder. She didn’t think anything was broken, but her ribs were painful and her shoulder was stiff, having been jammed awkwardly.
The injuries, however, were simply the result of an accident. What intrigued Kari was her inability to explain the language she’d spoken, or why she had such a connection to the griffon. Though the words she’d spoken were not czarikk, she couldn’t help but suspect that it had come from the memories Sakkrass had imprinted upon her when he taught her the language and history of his peoples. She thought perhaps it was the dialect of another race the czarikk had dealings with—possibly even syrinthian—and Kari closed her eyes and prayed quietly to her adoptive father for some clarity while she rested. With the lucid dreams she had, she expected Sakkrass might give her some revelation within them.