The sun was out, but only a faint hint of its light had reached the room when the hum of the alarm woke Erin the next morning. After checking that her mother’s necklace was still firmly clasped about her neck and her tablet tucked away inside her messenger bag, she wandered downstairs and found a housekeeper who showed her where to wash up, then pointed her to the kitchen for some breakfast.
Tannoran and Kaleit had both left already, so it was up to Erin to make her own way to the Aerie. After finding a stable hand to saddle up a horse for her, she rode there on her own with no trouble, having gone for many lessons and trail rides when she was a kid—usually with Desmond. The happy memories only added to her melancholy now.
When she did reach the Aerie, she wanted to check on Wrath and her keets first, but couldn’t remember the way. She spent some time searching for someone to direct her to the mother’s apartment, or to the Aeriemaster. Upon hearing the the rustle of straw bales being hefted and stacked, she followed the sound into a freshly-vacated apartment.
She paused in the doorway and frowned, but she was on a mission. It was Kaleit who was doing the stacking, bits of golden straw nestled fetchingly in his clothes and hair. She firmly ignored that, inquiring of him with an unceremonious, “Where's Wrath’s room?”
“I’m working,” he said, “and so should you be. It’s after seventh. The shovel is there.” He indicated the tool’s location by a thrust of his chin just before lifting another bale off of a wheeled cart and adding it to the pile.
Erin looked over, already having a sinking feeling about what she’d see. As she’d expected, the shovel and a matching wheelbarrow were awaiting use in the corner that the griffin who’d last lived there obviously used as its bathroom. “No. No way. I’m not shoveling that.”
“Is that so?” Kaleit stepped back from the straw, presenting it to Erin with a “have at it” swing of his arm.
Setting her jaw, Erin went to the cart and grabbed hold of the strings of one bale, like she’d seen him do. Easy enough. Getting it off the cart was harder. Straw, it turned out, weighed a lot more than it looked like it should. Trying her hardest not to grunt in a very unladylike manner, she slid the rectangular bale off the cart and bore its weight against her pelvis and torso, struggling to keep it balanced. It was so long that her knees banged on one end while the other end rose up above her head. One slip and it was either going to drop down to the floor and she’d never be able to pick it back up, or it would push her over backwards and snap her spine.
Thankfully, she only had to turn and take a few steps to the stack, but she was stymied again when she realized that the row she had to place the bale on was chin-high. She let the upper end fall forward against the stack, then tried to lift it the rest of the way using the strength of her legs. It might have been a successful maneuver, but the two bales that touched caught on each other, and Erin just ended up pushing against herself. She was determined not to embarrass herself by admitting defeat, but Kaleit grew tired of waiting and, one-handed, pushed the bale up and into place.
“How much do these weigh?” she asked, breathing harder than she’d have liked to, and avoiding eye contact at all costs.
“Four stone and a bit more.”
The measurement meant nothing to her. All she knew was that those bales were heavy.
"It's not worth breaking your back over," Kaleit said, sounding bored. "The shovel. It's there. Use it."
Erin did, holding her breath as long as she possibly could in between quiet gasps into the collar of her shirt. Griffins only ate meat, so what they left behind in the dark corners of their apartments was Especially Bad™ when stirred up. She caught glimpses of Kaleit over her shoulder now and then, and had the feeling that he was watching and laughing at her, even though he made no sound other than the rustles of the bales he moved.
About halfway to filling the wheelbarrow, Erin's stamina started to give out. She cursed herself for not writing her character to be stronger. Luckily, Aeriemaster Gunu appeared in the doorway. He crossed his arms as he looked at the two young workers, a sprig of wavy hair drifting down to hang over one eye. "Kal, I need you in Wrath's apartment. Erin, you too."
She dropped the shovel as if it were on fire. He didn't need to ask her twice.
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Given no chance to stop and gawk at the keets, Erin was immediately tasked with sweeping debris from the nest that had spread out from Wrath's cage and into the open area of the room. Kaleit and another hand were busy with more straw bales, setting them out in rows that she recognized as seating for the event that afternoon. A third fellow was inside the cage, making way through a corner with his shovel in a much more efficient manner than Erin could have managed. The mother griffin was nowhere to be found, and Gunu had left immediately after handing out tasks, but no one else seemed concerned, so Erin tried her best not to worry, stealing as many glances at the keets as possible as she worked.
Consisting of soft piles of fluff in a rainbow of red, brown and black, they were all definitely cute at this stage. They were lively, too, moving about their nest and pecking at anything that looked interesting—all except the little yellow keet, who huddled against the wall of the nest, alone and out of the way.
The wind-egger. After hearing the harsh way Tannoran had said it the night before, Erin realized just how cruel it really was to call them such a thing. Along with the whole citizenship concept, it was just one more bit of lore she'd rather be taken back, but it was somehow already official canon.
When Gunu returned, he brought a young couple with him, beckoning them with a wave of his gloved left hand. They were a woman about Erin’s age with bright red hair, and a man with golden brown hair—obviously a wereling, for he had expressive catlike ears and a tail covered in silken fur. An unusually pretty fellow, but Erin was more interested in the girl. She didn’t look quite like she had in Carybelle’s fanart, but there was no mistaking her identity.
“The dam is away to feed, so it’s safe to approach if you’d like a closer look,” the Aeriemaster said to them.
They crossed the room toward the cage, but as she passed Kaleit, the redhead’s eyes strayed his way. She stopped to watch, as if suddenly mesmerized by the rhythm of the swinging straw bales.
“Can I help you?” he said without pausing his work. When she didn’t answer, he put his current bale back down on the cart and stared her down.
“You’re a hard worker,” she said, gaze drifting to his strong arms and hands.
“And I’ll continue as such until I’ll get what I’m working for. Move along.” He went back to his task, paying her no further mind. Erin was torn between disgust at his attitude, and understanding of it. If the girl was trying to flirt, there was definitely room for improvement… and maybe some subtlety. Her… boyfriend? Bodyguard? Whoever he was, he was right there, for crying out loud. Kaleit did have nice arms from all that lifting, though.
“Kaleit—” the Aeriemaster began to scold, but the girl smiled and waved dismissively. She gave the boy another indiscreet side glance, then went to have a look at the keets.
Without a word, her wereling companion pointed into the cage. “Poor thing,” the girl said when she looked, no doubt referencing the little yellow wind-egger. “I’ll bet it’s braver than all of its siblings combined.”
“It’d have to be, to show its face at all,” he replied. “Born to live as nothing but a burden to others.”
His voice carried a note of sympathy in it, but Erin’s heart rate spiked, and heat rose to her face. “She’s not a burden,” she snapped, clenching the broom handle against her chest. “She is braver than the others, and stronger, too. She’ll prove it someday. You’ll see.”
All eyes fell on Erin. Her stomach shifted sickeningly, but she was determined not to show it, even if she did feel like the room was shaking.
The redhead glanced at the keet again, then went to the other girl. She gently pushed the broom down, then smiled as she briefly took Erin’s hand in a friendly grasp. “I think you’re right,” she said. “She will prove it someday.”
Erin didn’t hear the Aeriemaster call the visitors out of the room to observe Wrath in the flight cage. In her mind, she was still eye to eye with the other girl, who felt somehow familiar. There was a strange pull, like a tug on her heart—though she couldn’t name what, exactly, was calling.
“Don’t count on it,” came Kaleit’s quiet voice. Erin came back to herself and found him standing nearby. He had a cold look on his face as he watched the pair leaving with Gunu. “Some people think that just because they say something, that makes it true, or because they want something badly enough and believe in it, that they are guaranteed to receive it someday. It doesn’t work like that. The world isn’t going to trouble itself to change anything for you, or anyone else.”
“Belir, Kaleit, with me,” said Gunu. “We’ll need some assistance in the flight cage.”
They left. Kaleit’s words rang in her head, and she hated them. He was wrong. He had to be.
Such a sour jerk. What does he know?
Before she knew it, her eyes began filling with tears. The man in the cage was giving her awkward looks as he worked, so she put down her broom and left. She went into the first empty room she could find, sat in a corner, and buried her face in her arms, hiding it as she’d wanted to do so many times in the last day alone.
A short while later, a loud squeak startled her into looking up, eyes blurry from crying, just in time to see a shadow passing by the room. Another squeak—an animal of some kind. Another, slightly fainter as it moved away. A cold spike shot through Erin’s chest.
By the time she flung herself through the doorway, the man from the cage was just turning to go down another hallway. He froze for a moment as she appeared, clutching two wrapped bundles under his arms. Each was about the size of a griffin egg.
The next squeak she heard definitely came from his direction.
She commanded him to stop, the cry half shriek, half bellow, and wholly ugly. Multiple startled griffins screamed back, and still others answered those, echoing across the Aerie.
He ran, and so did she.