When they reached the entrance hall, Ariom checked the panel on the wall and then opened the front gate. Thenio looked over his shoulder at the image on the panel and was surprised to see that their visitor hadn't arrived in a carriage but was riding on....

Thenio's eyes widened. "Is that a real gryphon? Not a golem?"

"Yes, that's his familiar. He checked with me ahead of time to make sure it was all right to bring her." Ariom glanced back at him. "Haven't you ever seen a parrot gryphon before?"

Thenio shook his head. "Only raptors. And I've only seen those from a distance a few times. The only ones I've seen up close are gryphon-shaped golems."

Parrot gryphons came from more tropical climates. They weren't native to Kafron, so they were much less common than the raptor breeds. But they looked flashy, so they were a popular model for carriage golems.

When Ariom opened the front door, the gryphon was trotting up the driveway toward them.

"Wow! A big, huge cat-bird with pretty feathers!" Iggy said excitedly, waving his tail.

Since Humerus wasn't there, no one bothered to correct his choice of words. And it was a pretty accurate description. The gryphon was huge. Parrot gryphons were smaller than raptor gryphons on average, but the creature in front of them was still at least as big as Ariom's horse golem. And her head, shoulders, and chest were covered in beautiful iridescent blue and turquoise feathers that faded into light yellow fur with large black and brown spots. There was an enormous pair of turquoise and black wings on her back, and she had a black, hooked beak and inquisitive gold eyes.

The gryphon came to a halt in front of the steps leading up to the front door, and the man riding her jumped off with an easy, graceful motion. He was on the small side but looked very athletic. His skin was golden brown, and he had untidy white hair and bright blue eyes. That coloring, together with the fact that he had a gryphon familiar, probably meant that he was a wind or storm mage.

"Jasel Yaron?" Ariom asked.

"That's right," the man answered with a smile. "You must be Ariom."

Ariom frowned slightly, perhaps due to Jasel addressing him so casually. It was normal to refer to grandmaster wizards using their title if you weren't closely acquainted, as a sign of respect. But he didn't comment on it.

"Yes. Thank you for coming." Ariom gestured in Thenio's direction. "This is my assistant, Thenio Iterune. And my familiar, Iggy." He reached up to pat the little dragon, who was still riding on his shoulder.

"Good to meet you." Jasel was still smiling, but Thenio noticed that the man gave him a long, appraising look. Then he reached out and patted the gryphon's neck. "This is Casturi. I appreciate you letting her come. A lot of people feel uncomfortable having a gryphon around, so I have to leave her at the aviary a lot of the time."

Thenio felt a bit sorry for the gryphon, but he could also empathize with the people who felt uncomfortable around her. He'd known gryphons were big, but seeing pictures and measurements in a book wasn't at all the same as seeing the real thing right in front of him. And that beak looked awfully sharp....

Ariom, however, didn't seem to be bothered by the gryphon's size and fierce appearance. "It's no problem. I run a private enchanting workshop here, so being able to accommodate large familiars is a matter of course. She can wait in the atrium with Thenio while we're checking over the equipment. He's very good with magic beasts."

Thenio shot Ariom a slightly panicked look. Magic beasts seemed to like his magic, but that didn't make him some kind of expert with them. And this wasn't a pygmy gryphon they were talking about here....

Jasel seemed to notice Thenio's unease and gave him an encouraging smile. "Do you have any experience with gryphons?"

Thenio shook his head.

"Well, you don't need to be nervous. I know gryphons have a reputation for being aggressive, but not all of them are like that. Casturi is a real sweetheart. And she's a retired circus gryphon, so she's very good at interacting with people and other magic beasts. As long as you don't try to hurt her, the only thing she'll do to cause trouble is getting into everything." Jasel laughed and patted Casturi again. "Parrot gryphons are notoriously curious. But you can just smack her on the beak if she gets too nosy."

"Don't tell him to smack me!" Casturi protested, flattening her tufted ears. "I understand words, you know?"

"Do you? Sometimes I wonder...." Jasel said in a teasing tone.

"I do!" she huffed, glaring at him.

"You got along fine with Kino the other day," Ariom said, ignoring the bickering pair and looking at Thenio. "A gryphon isn't too different from a storm hound."

Maybe not if you were just looking at their magic power. But Casturi was about four times Kino's size....

Ariom glanced at Iggy. "What do you want to do, Iggy? Do you want to stay with Thenio and Casturi?"

"Mmm! I want to play with the cat-bird!" Iggy said eagerly. He didn't seem to be intimidated by Casturi's size either.

"Never pass up a chance to play with birds, do you, little guy...?" Ariom shook his head. Then he turned and started back toward the door. "Well, come inside."

They had to open both of the double front doors for Casturi to fit through. Thenio had assumed that the main entrances to the house and atrium were extra large just to look impressive, but if Ariom was in the habit of entertaining wizards who had familiars as big as gryphons, having a large entrance suddenly seemed much more practical.

"Did Jasel tell you about not using magic around Thenio?" Ariom asked Casturi as they walked. "I know it's inconvenient, but he's very sensitive, so even a little magic can cause problems."

Casturi nodded. "He told me. I'll be careful."

"Good. Thank you." Ariom turned to Thenio. "I cut up some fruit earlier. It's in a bowl in the kitchen. Bring that out for the familiars to snack on. You can get more from the ice box if it's not enough—we have plenty. And we'll just be downstairs if you need anything."

"All right."

Truth be told, Thenio was still a little nervous about being left alone with Casturi, regardless of what Jasel said about how nice she was. Logically, he knew that it was almost unheard of for a familiar to attack anyone without being provoked or ordered to by their partner. And actually, Casturi probably wasn't any more dangerous than the other familiars he'd interacted with recently. They'd all been careful not to use magic around him, so he wasn't sure exactly how powerful they were. But he knew that even a tiny, half-grown dragon like Iggy would easily best him in a magic fight.

Still. It was easier to walk among giants when they didn't look like giants....

How were you supposed to interact with gryphons, anyway? He wished Ariom had told him about this visit ahead of time so he could have read up on the subject.

Was it okay to just treat her like a giant cat? A lot of the books he'd read talked about gryphons as being very cat-like. But the bird half had to have some influence, too, right? Did she like to play with string? Would she get mad if he tried to scratch her chin?

Despite having these thoughts running through his head, he obediently took Iggy from Ariom and then went to open the doors into the atrium for Casturi.

As he watched her walk through, it occurred to him that the dream beast was even bigger than she was, and he hadn't been afraid of it. Well...that was just a dream, though. It made sense for huge creatures to be scarier in real life.

"Oh, that's a nice tree," Casturi said, stopping to look up at the oak tree.

"That's my climbing tree!" Iggy told her. "Ariom and Toflyn made it for me! It's good, huh?"

Casturi nodded. "Very good. A little on the small side.... But dragons are small, too, I guess." She turned to look at Thenio. "Is it reinforced?"

Oh, right. Gryphons liked to climb trees, didn't they? Most wild ones lived in forests or jungles where particularly large species of trees grew. Thenio remembered reading about that.

"Yes. Ariom puts reinforcement enchantments on basically everything. And he makes really strong ones, so I think it would be fine for you to climb the tree if you want to, as long as you stay down on the larger branches." He looked down at Iggy, who he was still carrying in his arms. "Is it all right if she climbs your tree?"

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"Mmm! It's okay!" Iggy wriggled out of Thenio's hold, jumped into the air, and flew off toward the tree. "Come on, cat-bird! Let's go climb together!"

Thenio gave an awkward laugh and looked over at Casturi. She hadn't actually said she wanted to climb the tree, so he hoped she wasn't annoyed by them making that assumption.

But Casturi was already trotting happily after Iggy. When she reached the tree, she stood on her back legs and reached up to sharpen her claws on the trunk. Then she paused and inspected the area where she'd been scratching, as though checking for any damage. Apparently satisfied by whatever she did or didn't find, she crouched down and then jumped up onto one of the lower branches. Again, she paused and looked around, examining the tree and watching the excited Iggy dashing through the tunnels overhead, before she stepped over to another branch and started slowly climbing higher.

Since they seemed to both be occupied for a few minutes, Thenio decided to go to the kitchen to get the fruit that Ariom had mentioned.

"I'm going to go get your snacks," he called over to the familiars. "I'll be right back, okay?"

Iggy appeared from a cluster of leaves and ran out to the end of an overhanging branch. "Mmm! Okay!" he called back, waving his tail around wildly. Then he turned and scampered back into the leaves.

Crazy little dragon....

Shaking his head, Thenio left the atrium and went to the kitchen. When he got there, he discovered an enormous metal bowl on the counter, piled high with fruit, including peeled oranges, melon slices, peach halves, cored apples and pears, and a small mountain of assorted berries.

He stood and stared at the huge pile, feeling a bit stunned by the sheer amount. It seemed excessive at first glance, but considering Casturi's size, she probably needed a lot of food.

After thinking for a moment, Thenio went and got out the refreshment cart and carefully loaded the heavy bowl onto it. He also added a few cleaning cloths. He wasn't sure about Casturi, but he knew Iggy was probably going to be a sticky mess by the time he was done snacking on the fruit. Then he pushed the cart out into the hallway.

When he got back to the atrium, he was greeted by Iggy flying toward him. The little dragon stopped and hovered a short distance away, and Thenio could see a worried expression on his face.

"Thenio, come quick! The cat-bird needs help!"

"Huh? What happened?"

"The cat-bird got stuck! Up in the tree! Come look!"

Without waiting for a reply, Iggy turned and flew back toward the tree. Thenio abandoned the cart and hurried after him. When he reached the base of the tree, he looked up....

...and burst out laughing.

"Don't laugh at me!" a grumpy voice called from above him. "Come and help!"

"Sorry...I'm sorry..." Thenio said, struggling to control his laughter. "It's just...it looks really funny from down here...."

Casturi was about halfway up the tree. She had apparently tried to squeeze through a gap between two branches but hadn't quite made it all the way. Her front paws were resting on a lower branch, but her hindquarters were stuck in the gap and were hanging up above her head.

Maybe she really was just like a big housecat....

"Wait a minute. I'll climb up and help you get out."

Thenio grabbed onto one of the lower branches and pulled himself up. The tree was designed so that it was actually quite easy to climb. He'd done it a few times before while he was playing with Iggy. He made his way up to a branch that was just underneath Casturi.

"It looks like you're kind of wedged in there. But I think you could get out fine if you could just lift your back end up a little," he told the gryphon, leaning to one side to look more closely at the place where she was caught. "I'm going to go behind you and try to give you a boost up, all right?"

The branch he needed to get to was a little too far away to just step over. Thenio crouched down on the branch he was currently standing on, gauged the distance carefully, and then jumped across, landing neatly on the other side.

"Cat-bird, look! Thenio is really good at climbing trees, huh?" Iggy was perched on a branch up above them, watching Thenio's rescue efforts with great interest. His tail was swinging enthusiastically below him.

"That doesn't help me feel any better..." Casturi said, glaring at Iggy with flattened ears.

"Calm down," Thenio told her in a soothing voice. "It's all right. We'll get you out of there."

He moved closer to her, trying to find a stable position to push her up from. Her long, thick tail was hanging down and twitching temptingly right in front of him, but he knew better than to try to touch it.

"All right, I'm going to put my hands under your left foot. Then, when I tell you, push up with that leg. I don't think I'm strong enough to lift you very far, but if you can just get up a few inches, I think you'll be able to hook the claws on your right foot onto the tree and pull yourself up the rest of the way. Got it?"

Casturi nodded. "Got it."

Thenio put both his hands under her large, furry paw and then braced himself. "All right. Go!"

He felt the gryphon pushing against his hands and did his best to hold her up. After a few seconds of straining against the heavy weight, he heard a scratching sound and felt the relief of the weight being lifted off him. He looked up to see that Casturi's back claws had finally caught hold of the branch underneath her, and she was sliding through the gap and down onto the branch in front.

"Yay, you did it!" Iggy cheered, hopping up and down on his branch. "The cat-bird is free!"

Casturi gave herself a little shake. Then she apparently decided she'd had enough of the climbing tree, because she jumped down to a lower branch, heading for the ground.

Thenio followed behind her, moving a little more slowly. The gryphon was sitting on the grass under the tree licking her tail by the time he reached the lowest branches.

Thenio swung himself down and landed next to her. "Are you okay? You're not hurt anywhere?"

"I'm fine," Casturi said sulkily, turning away from him and starting to preen her feathers.

She was clearly embarrassed.

"Hey, don't feel bad." Thenio reached up to stroke her back. "That kind of thing happens to everyone sometimes."

"Right! It does!" Iggy jumped down onto the branch Thenio had just left and nodded sagely. "That's why I'm not allowed to play hide and seek unless Ariom is close by, you know? So he can come and rescue me if I get stuck someplace. It's normal to get stuck, okay?"

Thenio raised an eyebrow at him. No, he'd played hide and seek with Iggy a couple of times, and the little dragon's ability to get himself stuck in strange places definitely wasn't normal....

He gave Casturi a pat. "Why don't you come have some snacks? Ariom got a lot of nice fruit ready for you. Eating something will probably help you feel better."

The gryphon reluctantly paused her grooming session and followed him over to the patio. Iggy flew down and landed on Casturi's back as they walked.

"Oh, the cat-bird is nice to sit on!" he said happily. "She's all soft and fluffy!"

"Iggy, you should ask for permission before you land on someone like that," Thenio scolded him gently. "Casturi might not like it."

"Oh." The dragon's ears drooped a little. "Um...is it okay if I sit on you, cat-bird?"

The gryphon turned her head back to look at him for a moment. Then she faced forward again. "I guess it's fine. Just don't pull any of my feathers out."

Iggy's ears perked back up. "I won't! The cat-bird's feathers are pretty and comfy, so I won't hurt them, okay?"

"Good." Casturi nodded. Then her ears also perked up as she spotted the bowl of fruit on the cart. "Oh. Looks tasty."

Thenio spread the fruit out on one of the patio tables for them. Iggy jumped down and perched on the edge of the table, picking up pieces of fruit with his paws and munching on them in his squirrel-like way. Casturi picked up the fruit in her beak with surprising dexterity, although she had a strange habit of occasionally dropping a piece on the ground before she ate it.

Thenio wasn't that hungry, and he didn't want to take snacks away from the familiars, but Iggy seemed concerned that he wasn't eating anything, so he sat down at the table and nibbled on a peach half to be sociable.

"Jasel said you used to be in a circus," he said to Casturi, who seemed to be in a much better mood now that she had something to distract her from her earlier embarrassment. "Did you like it there?"

The gryphon tilted her head thoughtfully. "It was okay. It was better after they let Jasel form a familiar contract with me. Before that...I didn't really understand what the circus was all about. It was just a job. If I did my tricks during the show, the trainers were happy, and they gave me treats. I didn't really care about anything else. But after I became a familiar, I started to understand why all those people came to watch us. All the irritating noise they made turned into words I could understand. And I finally realized that my tricks could make people laugh or feel awed. They could make people happy. I enjoyed performing a lot more after that."

"Wow...that sounds kind of amazing...."

Thenio hadn't really thought much about how a magic beast's perspective on the world would change when they became a familiar. The only familiars he'd spent much time with so far were Iggy and Humerus. Iggy hadn't experienced anything like that because he'd already been a familiar when he hatched. And Humerus didn't like to talk about what his life had been like before he formed a contract. When Thenio had asked Bero about it, all he'd said was that it was tough being a wild revenant and that most of them were happy to escape that life when they got the chance.

"What about Jasel?" he asked. "Did he work for the circus, too?"

Casturi nodded. "Right. He was one of the magic acrobats I performed with."

Thenio's eyes widened. "A magic acrobat? Really?"

He couldn't help feeling a sharp stab of envy....

Casturi cocked her head, looking at him curiously. "You didn't know that? But you know he's an acrobatics trainer for the Magic Corps now, don't you? Isn't it obvious he would be a magic acrobat, then?"

"What? No, I didn't know that...."

The gryphon blinked at him, looking confused. "That's why we're here, though? Jasel is supposed to be giving you acrobatics lessons. They're down installing your new training equipment right now."

Thenio stared at her, his mouth hanging open. The partially eaten peach slipped out of his hand and rolled onto the ground.

"Oh." Casturi looked down at it, then back up at Thenio. "Do you still want that? I can clean it up for you if you don't."