1.4

The Eyrie was a welcoming and comfortable sort of place for Jewel. Carved rooms into the stones of the mountain which sang of feathers and gryphons and eggs.

The greatest of the chambers was a high vaulted space that Jewel could not reach the ceiling of even while rearing back onto her hind claws.

Riders and their steeds could be found everywhere in the Eyrie and the halls and doorways had been made to suit them, but of the Gryphons there were almost always wide gaps afforded unless it was the close knit preening and nuzzling reunions of children with parents or the stoic affection afforded between the mated pairs.

For siblings and strangers there was not a single Gryphon who did more than tolerate one another in close quarters.

Jewel was enamored with having every door, hall and room made for riders, affording enough space for a Gryphon and as a result plenty of space for her own over-large self.

And what furnishings there were had either been carved into the stone or made of incredibly sturdy oak that bore many layers of scars from claws and curious beaks.

In fact, Jewel was pretty sure she had tasted the scent of this sort of wood before from her own old dining bowl (which she still used but mostly for snacks rather than the main dish of her meals).

All around the Eyrie was a delight as accommodations for Gryphons readily served for young lady Wyrms.

In fact, the only thing really lacking was a place for a hot bath.

The gryphons apparently preferred a combination of preening, rolling in dust and stones, or taking dips in the cold lakes that collected on the far side from the Eyrie landing cliff.

However it was good that the accommodations were so accommodating because apparently gryphon eggs, while nowhere near as unpredictable as wyrmish ones, did not seem to precisely hold their schedules to the day.

Alexander and the other prospectives had made it up the cliffs and were being settled into a routine of training and martial evaluation with bow and trips even further up the mountain under heavy load while they waited.

But wait they did.

For close on to eight days.

They were nearly into the end of harrow season, by Jewel’s count.

She had come to spend much of it sitting in the nest chamber for the expecting formel and drake, Honeydown and Bloodbeak. The eggs were never left alone by either of them.

She had sought some distraction socializing amongst the riders but here were only so many drills and acrobatic maneuvers to be praised for.

Jewel still could not extend her wyrmflame as far as a Gryphon’s wake did but still with how light she could become while buoyed by the flame coursing through her flesh and bones, she had finally begun to make up for her lack of speed.

Now, however, she was settling in to watch (at respectful distance) the two parents as they fussed over their eggs, sometimes turning them over with foreclaw or beak between taking up their roosting duties.

The prospective parents were overburdened with offerings of food from all the gryphon riders for the duration.

Feeding both drake and formel nearly to the point of bursting and if not for the cliffs Jewel was pretty sure even the great wakes of a gryphon would have been unable to take them aloft.

Honeydown was especially plump, although Jewel thought most of that was her prodigious pale crimson and yellow plumage which when not in flight hid almost every detail of the predatory formel’s shape.

She was an unbonded gryphon, the hatchling of one of the northern riders. Kept tame and accommodating by easy feed. Quite friendly to any and all even while she brooded.

But like all of her kind who had not been taken up at hatching, Honeydown was unchallengeable in her pride.

Her mate and sire of the eggs was grey and black feathered and reminded Jewel of an owl more than any other bird.

He had once been bonded to a rider, but the knight had perished of illness between campaigns and now no other would be accepted to force their weight upon him.

They were both first time parents according to Fiebron.

Jewel believed it, for how much they fussed with care over even the slightest branch or bit of bedding amiss in their brooding nest. She’d seen similar nervous fussing in newly weds and even the youngest hens.

As she watched them between her only obligations of lunch and supper, Jewel considered and pondered. She thought of her mother back in Rochford.

The eggs were reported to be seven in number, Something Jewel had eventually verified with her own eyes.

Which took a while as neither parent left more than the briefest moment of the eggs open to observation.

This afternoon Honeydown broke all pattern set for the last four days with a sharp warbling cry. The formel’s eyes wide as she flapped and stepped uncertainly back from her nest, wings flared and neck arched.

The expression of shock poignantly clear to Jewel. A mirror of her own instinctive flare.

Those riders that had been passing through the nest chamber ran out in a rush.

Calling for the lords and the prospective riders to return only once they were well down the hallway.

The first hatching was at hand and their chance for a new rider to be accepted and bonded had arrived.

For all the commotion Jewel had eyes only for the first egg in the nest, a light tapping from within, a faint burble.

A shifting body straining.

As the men rushed back and forth, Alexander and the other young men and boys were rushed into the room.

All plans of feasts and activities other than attending the hatching were abandoned.

Raw strips of the tenderest meats were prepared for each prospective.

Honeydown was given what meat and comforts she would accept.

Her drake Bloodbeak was given equal measures when he arrived and fluffed up almost as round as his mate, turning from svelte and dangerous to a round scrambling checkered ball of black and gray plumage in his own consternation.

Jewel could smell and hear Alexander, dressed in heavy leathers and burdened with a soft slice of liver.

Stood up third in line with the other boys.

And then as the egg rattled and cracked, as the beak within tried to pierce the shell they began.

First among them, some northerner Jewel did not know.

Dark hair and eyes, slight build.

Maybe eleven?

He walked up nervously to the nest with a portion of meat, to try and seek a bonding with the chick yet hatching.

But his nerves betrayed him.

His fear that stank so thick that Jewel could have faced him with her eyes covered and her ears full of wax alarmed Honeydown.

The formel flared her wings and lowered her beak. As round and friendly her plumage might make her, the sudden growling hiss which washed over all in the chamber put a stop to this prospective.

The boy froze.

And the expectant mother puffed up her plumage even more, somehow making a nearly completely round orb of yellow and red hints look like fury and death.

Another rider, likely the boy’s sponsor (if not his father), was beside him in a blink, pulling back the prospective rider until the gryphon calmed.

The terror reek so sharp Jewel thought the boy nearly pissed himself.

They all waited tense seconds as the cracking of the egg continued, shell flakes had burst out and they could see the beak. They did not have much more time before the opportunity for this hatching was passed.

The second in line seemed to make up his mind, and where the other had stank of too much fear this one smelled far too little of it.

He looked confident, yes. He was older then almost any other there.

But he also was arrogant. Aggressive as he stepped up.

He also did not watch as carefully as the other and when the plumage of Honeydown started rising in agitation, he simply kept approaching the nest.

Instead of giving a hissing warning this time the Formel lunged fast as a cat, beak sharper than a spear. The boy had only a moment to realize his mistake before he was thrown back by the Gryphon pecking him full in the chest.

This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

A wet gurgling wheeze and the scratch of his leathers scraping to a stop along the stone of the chamber. Jewel spared the slightest glance to verify that at worst he probably only had a cracked rib.

Which considering he had just been struck by a Gryphon mother defending her nest was an incredibly soft rebuke.

He likely would live although he might never take breath the same for the rest of his life.

There was another tense lull after that.

Offerings of meat to the tame but still fiercely protective Gryphons were done. All tension in the riders was absent when they approached. All practiced gentle posture and soothing voices.

Softening the fear of Drake and Formel alike. But a few soft whispers in the room were saying they would only have another attempt after this at most before the egg had to be left to their parents.

Some insisted too many attempts had already been made to risk the gryphon’s trust further.

The arrogant boy was taken from the chamber as the last prospective had.

Now it was Alexander, who stood watching, brave and foolish as ever.

But also cautious and careful.

He watched the still agitated mother, who was mostly fusing over the slowly emerging chick. Its beak had mostly broken free, a pale white nearly the same as its eggshell.

Parting open as it drank in the air.

Soft gurgling and the first mewling warbles.

A new life emerging into the world.

Jewel’s attention was torn between catching glimpses of the egg and her brother slowly approaching.

Not at all predatory, but simply softly, unassuming.

Gentle and with a face of concern.

His gaze instead of fixed to the egg were on the Formel Honeydown herself.

The other attendants finally noticed him but trapped far too close to an only tame but not bonded gryphon could not risk any sudden sound or shift in posture to admonish Alexander.

They barely even glared at him, but he reached out to the mother and whispered softly, he spoke gently and much as Jewel did and she felt a new tension suddenly build in her wyrmflame.

If that gryphon started to prepare to strike her brother-

But there was no sense of malice, only confusion and the same undercurrent of worry to Honeydown.

She rumbled and boomed at Alexander.

But he merely waited and let her relax before approaching.

When she did not give a sign of forbiddance he reached out.

He stroked her plumage as he often did Jewel when no one else was watching.

He spoke gently as he did to Zephyrvam.

He was tense, he was careful.

His eyes were watchful and he always paused before actually touching her.

But he did it.

And as the egg rattled and cracked again the other riders moved further back, for fear of claiming the bond undue them.

Wasting half a gryphon’s life in service to an adult that would perish before them was a shame that none wanted in the brotherhood.

Leaving Alexander alone with the two gryphon parents.

He clucked and soothed Honeydown. Even tore a small piece of the strip of meat he had and after graciously taking a bite, chewing and swallowing himself offered her a small portion.

The Gryphon though prideful and extremely overfed seemed nervous enough with the egg to accept the curious tiny human’s offering.

That given there were mutters from some of the older riders that Alexander had cheated his turn to sneak close to the egg.

Others seemed impressed with the audacity of him and that he had done so well.

But her fool brother, rather than taking the advantage to position himself in the nest, turned after that and walked as he had to Honeydown to her mate.

Slow, gentle, always letting each parent see and know where he was going, never meeting their eyes but also not turning away from them entirely.

Not fearful but not arrogant.

He walked past the nest entirely and to the Drake.

He offered the same ritual as he had done before, a bite for himself from the same meat and then an offering of a piece that was meant for the newly hatched chick to the father to be.

With a shake of his feathers and a head tilt that nearly went completely upside down Bloodbeak gently took the offered snack in his red tipped namesake and swallowed it.

Only then after meeting with both parents did Alexander turn gently and without any guile to his posture to face the nest, glancing slowly and smoothly from one gryphon to the other before taking a single tentative step.

It was slow and gentle.

Honeydown still gurgled in concern.

So Alexander stopped.

The egg was cracking, the voice of the nearly free gryphon was almost done.

The time for Alexander to earn the trust of its parents and their blessing to take and care for it was rapidly dwindling away.

But still he stood and waited until the feathers in Honeydown settled, until the more subtle tension of Bloodbeak eased.

Then he was able to take two steps closer to the nest and the hatching egg before there was protest.

Jewel could feel her wyrmflame coursing so harshly through her body it took a moment for her to remember that she should breathe to avoid starving her flesh of vitality.

Five steps.

Ten.

And then he was there among the eggs, slowly lowering near the hatching one.

But only just.

The crack of an egg shell startled everyone in the chamber, Jewel, Honeydown, Bloodbeak, Jewel and all the riders.

Everyone jumped but Alexander.

He simply sat there in a squat with his portion of meat beside the nest, giving cautious, slow sweeps of his head up to either side to watch each gryphon’s posture.

And the chick, now most of the way out of the egg, wrinkled horrifically and pink with flesh far too loose and sickly looking was tilting precariously in its mostly broken egg.

Eyes still closed, voice peeling through the air in demand of food.

Alexander extended his arm to the chick and its open mouth.

He watched Honeydown tense but where before he had always stilled now he merely slowed.

The meat was hanging from his heavily armored hand.

The same meat he had eaten.

The same meat Honeydown and Bloodbeak had also tasted.

He held it over the wide open mouth of the still blind chick.

Waiting, the noise from the wrinkly thing’s throat scraped at the inside of Jewel’s skull with its demand for food.

The grating was putting everyone, including the gryphons, on edge.

It seemed to hold forever.

And then with an exhausted warble the formel slumped down from her over tense posture into a sprawled heap in front of the nest.

Alexander nodded to her and dropped the thin meat into the waiting beak.

Who upon even feeling it hit their tongue was swallowing it down fast as could be.

He was already taking up the soft woolen blanket that each prospective student had been given.

Slowly scooping up the Gryphon chick into a single armed carry.

Hardly bigger than a hen right now.

He stepped back slowly with the parents watching him intently, returning to the rest of the riders.

Holding his charge in the crook of his arm.

But he had fed their chick, and silenced the first hunger cry.

He had earned their trust and acceptance.

Alexander had done it.

He had proven he would be a gryphon rider.

But Jewel could somehow not quite find it in herself to feel proud of him.

She had only eyes for the confused befuddlement and exhaustion that was present in every feather of Honeydown and even Bloodbeak.

Something was there that made Jewel’s insides clench in dismay.