The Dark Griffin (36 page)

“What about the collar?” someone shouted from the gallery. “Where did that come from?”

“Ah,” said Rannagon. “Yes. I am afraid that, most likely, he put it on himself.”

“How?” the same person demanded.

“There are plenty of slave collars left in the city,” said Rannagon. “Mostly kept as ornaments or conversation pieces. As it happens, one went missing from a house on Tongue Street . . . at around the same time as Arenadd was seen in the area. But it seems to have woven itself in with his delusions; I wouldn’t be surprised if he didn’t even remember stealing it.

“However,” he went on, “while insanity is not a crime, what followed is unforgivable. After he had confessed his delusions to Lord Roland and sent him here to bring me the story, he took advantage of the fact that he had been left to guard the hatchlings, abducted one of them and fled the hatchery, obviously intending to leave the city and find a place to hide with it. Fortunately, by coincidence, his house had caught fire because of an unattended candle—an investigation of the ruins has confirmed this—and he was caught by the adult griffins from the hatchery, who had noticed the missing chick and had gone looking for it. There is no doubt whatsoever that he committed this crime. More than thirty people have already testified to having seen him attempting to escape, and the hatchery griffins confirmed that he was the only person in the hatchery when the chick went missing and that they saw him holding it captive. Therefore, I have no choice but to hand down the sentence of death.”

The crowd roared. It was not a shout, not a scream—it was a deep collective
bellow
, full of rage and hatred and pure, unrestrained bloodlust. Many of the griffins in the gallery rose up, wings spread, and began to snap their beaks, stretching their heads out toward him as if they wanted to tear him limb from limb.

Arren started to struggle, trying to pull away from the hand covering his mouth. The guards restrained him again, but then Rannagon turned toward him and said, “Arenadd Taranisäii, have you anything more to say before you are removed?”

The hand was taken away.
“Liar!”
Arren screamed. “You godsdamned
liar
!”

Once again the rage rose up inside him, filling him with terrible strength. He shrugged off the guards as if they were nothing and lunged forward, trying to climb over the wall between him and Rannagon. Shoa darted forward to defend her partner, but Arren managed to hook a leg over the edge of the dock and started to pull himself over. The guards hauled him back, but he slammed into them, heedless of any pain, and began to shout,
“I’ll kill you! I’ll kill you!”

More guards came running. They dragged him bodily away, and he fought every moment of it, lashing out wildly at their faces and screaming. “I am not insane!
Liar!
You can’t do this to me!
Liar! Murderer!
”

But there was nothing he could do. The guards took him out of the chamber, to the jeers and screeches of the crowd, and he kept his eyes on Rannagon until the doors slammed on him. Once they had him out of sight of the crowd, the guards beat him into submission. Not laughing or jeering or taking any pleasure in it, but simply hitting him in places calculated to hurt, in a methodical, almost bored way, until he finally stopped fighting back. Once he had fallen silent and gone limp and passive, they hauled him upright and led him away. They left the Eyrie by a back door and travelled a short distance through the city, accompanied by other guards who had been waiting for just that purpose. Arren already knew where they would be going. The prison district. It was very large. Once it had housed nearly a hundred slaves. Now, though, it was virtually empty. Now that the slaves had gone, the only people kept there were criminals waiting to be punished then freed or to be put to death, either by execution or in the Arena, at the claws of wild griffins.

Arren was taken to a large wooden building and there handed over to the prison guards. They checked him for weapons and then took him to a room where there was a row of huge wooden cages resting on sealed trapdoors. The cages were attached to the ceiling by thick ropes threaded through pulleys and wrapped around a series of large windlasses. His new guards removed the manacles and bundled him into one of the cages, tying the door shut behind him. Then they opened the pair of latches that held the trapdoor beneath it shut. It swung open with a loud bang, revealing nothing but empty air underneath. The floor of the cage was made of wooden slats, the gaps between them almost as wide as Arren’s hand. He yelled and hurled himself at the cage door, trying to force it open, but it would not move. The guards ignored him. They went to the windlass and began to turn the handles, and the cage jerked and began to move downwards, through the trapdoor and into the void. It went down and down, swinging gently from side to side, the mountainside passing in front of him. It drew level with a platform that jutted from the rock and came to a stop. There were more guards on the platform, and they hurried forward and snapped a set of wooden holders into place at the base of the cage, to secure it.

Arren tried not to look down, but he couldn’t help it. Through the slats he could see the ground so far below, right under his feet.

His whole body went cold. He stood absolutely still for a heartbeat, and then he ran forward and started to wrench at the door which faced the platform. “Let me out! Please, I can’t stay in here! No!”

The guards paid no attention; they returned to their posts without even looking back at him. Arren yelled until he was hoarse, but went utterly unheeded.

He slumped into a sitting position, his arms wrapped around the bars in front of him, gripping on as if they were the only thing holding him up. He could feel himself trembling violently all over. The wind tugged at his hair and he closed his eyes. He was going to fall . . . The floor was going to break and he was going to fall . . .

His eyes had gone wide and staring, bulging with terror. He looked toward the other cages that hung alongside his, and then at the guards, beseeching them. “Help me,” he whispered. “Someone help me.”

19

Hanging

“... A
rren? Arren?”

Very slowly, Arren looked up. There was a strange, fixed look on his face, and he squinted at the person looking down at him as if he had no idea what he was seeing.

Someone nudged him in the shoulder. “Arren? Arren, say somethin’.”

The blankness in Arren’s face receded slightly. “Bran?”

Bran looked relieved. “Thank gods, I thought yeh didn’t recognise me. Arren, listen, there’s someone here to see yeh.”

Arren looked past him. There was a woman standing behind Bran. She was holding a piece of paper and a stick of charcoal, and was watching him without much interest. Seeing him looking at her, she came forward. “Arren Cardockson?”

Arren nodded vaguely.

“I understand you’ve been condemned to death,” said the woman.

Arren said nothing, and the woman glanced at Bran, who nodded.

“Well then,” she said, “I’ve been sent to make you an offer.”

Arren looked up at her and listened silently.

The woman took that as her cue and went on. “You have two choices facing you at this point,” she said. “You can either accept the immediate death sentence or you can volunteer to fight in the Arena tomorrow. Now, if you choose the Arena and you win the fight, you’ll be set free. If you’re interested, put your mark on this piece of paper and everything will be arranged. You will be allowed a weapon in the Arena, and you will be given better food beforehand. Make your choice.”

Arren was silent.

“Should I take that as a refusal?” said the woman.

The sound of her voice seemed to recall him to his senses. “Which one would I be fighting?” he said.

“I’m sorry?”

“Which griffin would I be fighting?”

“There would probably be more than one,” said the woman. “Why do you ask?”

“I want to fight the black one,” said Arren. “I want to fight—I want to fight Darkheart.”

“That shouldn’t be a problem,” said the woman. “Darkheart is very popular at the moment. He goes into the Arena nearly every week.”

“Alone,” said Arren.

“I’m sorry?” the woman said again.

Arren’s grip on the bars tightened. “If you let me fight the black griffin on my own—just him and me—I’ll say yes.”

The woman looked thoughtful. “I’ve never had anyone make a request like that before.”

“Promise me,” said Arren, hauling himself up on the bars. “Promise me I can fight the black griffin, and I’ll do whatever you want.”

The woman hesitated a moment, then nodded. “I don’t see why not. I think Orome would like the idea. Yes, I agree. Just give me a moment.” She knelt, placed the piece of paper on the wooden decking beneath her and scribbled away with the stick of charcoal, adding a few extra lines. This done, she offered the charcoal to Arren. “Just put your name here, or an X or whatever you like. Just as long as it’s your mark.”

Arren stared at the blank spot on the paper for a few moments and then gripped the charcoal stick and drew a crude picture of a wolf’s head holding the moon in its jaws. The woman took it from him and said, “Excellent. I shall go and tell Orome at once. Good luck.” She inclined her head briefly and left.

Arren watched her go and then sighed, almost with relief.

Bran had been watching all this in silence, keeping well back from the cage. “Why’d yeh do that?” he asked now.

Arren looked at him as if seeing him for the first time. “I’m going to die, Bran. I want to die fighting. If I can have revenge before then, I’ll take it.”

“Yeh’ll be killed,” said Bran. “The thing’ll tear yeh to pieces.”

Arren sneered at him. “What a tragedy.”

“Stop it,” said Bran. “This ain’t my fault, an’ yeh know it.”

Arren turned away. “Well, that’s nice. Now I’ll feel a lot better when my head comes off.”

“Don’t blame me for this,” Bran snapped. “I was just doin’ my duty. Yeh think that just because we’re friends I can let yeh get away with what yeh did?”

Arren looked back at him, suddenly ashamed. “Bran, I—”

Bran’s anger disappeared, and he came closer to the bars. “Arren, why’d yeh do it?”

Arren bowed his head. “I couldn’t help it. I tried to put up with it for so long, but I couldn’t. I just couldn’t. It was too much for me. I wanted back what Rannagon took from me.”

“Arren—” Bran hesitated. “Arren, yeh know it ain’t true, don’t yeh?”

“I know what’s real, Bran,” Arren said coldly. “I know that every word I told you was the truth.”

Bran sighed. “Gods, Arren, how did it come to this?”

“Bran, Rannagon killed Eluna. He
told
me he’d done it.”

Bran turned away. “Stop it. Just stop it.”

“You’ve got to believe me!” said Arren, coming as far forward as he could and grabbing hold of the bars. “Please, just listen to me. I’m
not
insane.”

Bran looked back at him, his face full of misery. For a moment he looked as if he was going to speak, but then he turned and walked away, head bowed.

“Bran! Bran, come back! Please!”

But Bran did not look back. He went back to his post at the entrance cut into the mountainside and did not return, and Arren was left alone with his terror and his despair.

At noon food was brought to him. It was plain but solid and plentiful, and he ate ravenously. Afterward he felt a lot better. His wounded cheek had scabbed over, though it hurt every time he blinked or moved his mouth, and his neck had returned to its usual dull pain. Neither of them would stop him from fighting the next day. He would face the black griffin again, and this time he would kill it, and he didn’t care if he himself died in the process. After all, what attraction did life have left for him?

He put aside his plate and settled down to rest, keeping his eyes on the rock wall in front of him to avoid looking at the drop below, and wondered vaguely if there really was an afterlife. Would he meet Eluna there? And Gern?

Movement from the doorway made him look up. Bran and his fellow guard had turned to greet someone who had just arrived on the other side, and now Bran came toward Arren’s cage, bringing them with him.

Arren stood up, and the two people came to meet him.

“Mum! Dad!”

Annir stared at him for a moment and then rushed forward, reaching through the bars to hug him tightly. “Arren! Oh gods, Arren, no . . . no.”

Arren held on to her as best he could, the bars pressing into his chest and making the scars throb. “Mum, I’m sorry. I really—
ah
!”

Annir pulled away, staring at the collar. “Arren, what in the gods’ names—”

Cardock started forward. “Who did this?” he roared. “Who put that on you?”

“I don’t know—Dad, I’m sorry. I’m—” Suddenly, Arren started to sob. “Dad, I’m sorry. I’m—I’m such an—you were right. You were right. You were always right. I couldn’t pretend forever. I couldn’t be one of them. I couldn’t be a griffiner. They’ve—they’ve killed Eluna. They burned down my house; they put this collar on me and I can’t get it off and it hurts all the time. It—I—I just couldn’t—”

Cardock reached through the bars and took him by the shoulder. “You shouldn’t have stayed,” he said. “You should have come home.”

“I thought I
was
home,” said Arren. “I thought—I thought it didn’t matter. I thought I was a Southerner, but I’m not, I’m not. I’m a blackrobe. I don’t want to be. I kept trying not to be, but they—I couldn’t help it. I couldn’t stop it. They took everything away and now they’re going to kill me.”

“Arren, it’s not your fault,” said Annir. “It never was. Never let anyone tell you that. You didn’t ask for this.”

“We’re going to the Eyrie as soon as we leave here,” said Cardock. “We’re going to talk to the Mistress. I’m going to demand your release, or at least stop them killing you. Don’t worry, Arenadd, you’re not going to die. I’ll save you.”

Arren shook his head vaguely. “It won’t work. I did it, Dad. I stole that chick. I’m guilty.”