“Who’s Lydda?” Ruskin rumbled.
“Her sister. One of the other griffins,” Lukin whispered.
“Last week, over on the other continent,” said Callette. “Kit and Don and I all went to the wedding. Blade was the only human there. There are quite a lot of griffins across the ocean, in big families. Lydda’s is called Harrek Acker. Acker’s a high-up fighting family, though they do have a few wizards in it, too. They gave a very good wedding out on the plains just before we started for home. Tremendous amounts of food.”
Elda spread her wings and jumped up and down. “Callette, tell it properly! You never do! How did Lydda meet this Acker person? Does she like him at all?”
“Like him!” said Callette. “It was the soppiest thing I ever saw. We were still on the boats then, but we could see the land, and Lydda was going to fly there, so she was in the air. But there was this war on. That was why we were there, to try to stop it. And it turned out that there were griffins on both sides in this war, as well as humans, and Harrek was flying patrols for his side. He saw our boats and came over. Or down, I think. He was up near the clouds. The first thing we knew, there was this smallish whitish griffin diving in on Lydda. He has a hooked beak and bent-back wings. They say that’s how a real fighter looks. And Lydda yelled and turned upside down to meet him. She says that’s how you fight, and it was instinct. But instead of fighting, they sort of spread, wing tip to wing tip, and went over and over in the air.” Callette shrugged, in a rattle of feathers. “We didn’t know what was going on. Kit and I both took off to help, but before we got anywhere near, they both yelled out that this was their mating flight and to go away. Love at first sight, Lydda said.”
There was a sigh of sentiment from most of the listening students. Lukin hugged Olga to his side.
“Huh!” said Callette. “Neither of them was any use at all after that. Mooning about. Twining necks. Rubbing beaks. We had to settle the war without them. Mind you, Don was almost as bad by the end. Females coming out of his ears.”
“And Kit?” Elda asked with acute interest.
Callette put her beak in the air and rolled her eyes. “Kit? There aren’t too many black griffins over there. They think he is so handsome. Girls were flopping out of the sky and fainting at his feet.”
“But did he like any of them?” Elda asked.
Callette considered. “Not so’s you’d notice,” she conceded. “His head didn’t get half as swelled as I’d expected. He told me he wanted to get the world straightened out before he settled down.”
Elda giggled. Somebody at the back of the crowd called out, “How about you? Did you meet anyone?”
Callette’s tail lashed irritably. “None of them are big enough.” She turned pointedly toward Elda. “Elda, Mum’s gone into a complete fuss about Lydda. That’s why I said I’d come and tell you. Mum says she’s got to go there and check that Lydda’s happy. Dad said he’d go, too. They’re taking Flo and Angelo and going as soon as we can find them a boat. Blade’s over at the coast seeing about that now. Kit’s at home trying to calm Mum down. Kit says to tell you he and Blade will try to come over to see you after that—today if they can. You’re not upset like Mum, are you?”
“I don’t think so,” Elda said, though it seemed very strange to have another sister married. “Is this Harrek good enough for her?”
“You sound just like Mum,” Callette said. “He’s fine. Nice. Aristocratic, the way families stand over there. Not very stupid. It’s Lydda’s life. I quite like him.”
But Lydda might have waited until the rest of her family could get there, Elda thought. She knew just how Mum must be feeling. Anxious, rather hurt and left out, and suspecting that Kit had organized it all, saying grandly that he would deal with their parents. Oh, well. As long as Lydda was happy …
She was smelling griffin quite strongly all the while she was thinking this. It was not Callette’s sweet, familiar, feathery smell. This was unwashed griffin, dirty. Kit? But Kit kept himself as clean and well preened as Callette did. Don, however, was not always as fond of washing as he might be. “Where’s Don then?” Elda asked.
“Still at sea,” Callette told her. “His boat didn’t have a wizard—” Her head jolted up. She had smelled dirty griffin, too. “Oh, gods!” she said. “I don’t believe this! I warned that Flury—Get all these people out of here, quickly!” Callette rounded on the gathered students, wings up, beak outstretched, eyes glaring, tail slashing, looking so menacing that even Elda backed away. “All of you clear out of this courtyard. There’s a griffin coming who isn’t nice. Go on. Shoo!”
“Why? What’s wrong with this griffin?” Claudia asked. She had ventured out to gaze at Callette, too, calculating that someone Callette’s size could protect her from any number of legionaries and probably the whole Senate as well, and was standing behind Elda with the cloakrack faithfully at her side.
“Everything’s wrong with him,” said Callette. “I hate him. He makes me go soft and squeamish inside.” The smell was stronger now. Ruskin and Olga had both caught it and were making faces. Everyone else was still standing, staring, innocent and unbelieving. Callette’s head switched back and forth in exasperation. She swiveled back at Elda. “You’re a wizard. Make me go invisible or something. Come on. Quickly. Maybe he’ll go away if he thinks I’m not here. Quick!”
Callette was so agitated and so obviously in earnest that Elda turned anxiously to her friends. “How do I?”
“Willing her to disappear, do you think?” Olga suggested.
“If we all try willing together, maybe,” Felim added.
“Let’s try. Everyone will Callette invisible!” Elda said. She put her head down and willed, hard and urgently. Beside her Claudia, Olga, and Lukin linked arms and willed, too. Felim hauled Melissa in on the other side of Elda and put his head down beside hers. The distant raucous scream of griffin voices came clearly on the wind. This caused most of the other students there to realize that Callette had not been making a fuss about nothing. After glancing uneasily in the direction of the screams, almost everyone put his or her head down and willed.
Callette’s enormous shape was suddenly not there. She did not blur or fade. She simply winked out of sight like a burst bubble. She seemed to be gone so completely that Elda raised her beak and sniffed anxiously. Under the now almost overpowering smell of alien griffin, Callette’s scent was still faintly there.
“She really is just invisible, I think,” Elda said uncertainly.
“Just in time,” Ruskin said, pointing.
Not one but five big winged shapes were wheeling th
rough the air above the Spellman Building, screaming remarks to one another as they came. No one could catch the words, but it was evident from the tone that violent, derisive things were being said. The yell with which the foremost griffin folded his wings and plunged to the courtyard made hearts lurch and goose pimples rise on backs. Elda felt her hackles wrench themselves upright, from her tail to her crest. Nearly all the students stampeded for safety as the first griffin plopped to the ground, and the next plummeted screaming after, and the next after that. Each one was at least as big as Callette, and all, as Callette had said, were not nice creatures in any way.
Elda stampeded with the rest and found herself, along with Ruskin, rushing hard into something huge and soft and warm, in the region of the statue of Wizard Policant. Realizing she had run into Callette, she backed hurriedly off, only to find that she and Ruskin were almost alone in the courtyard with the alien griffins. Claudia was the only other person out there. Claudia had tripped over the wretched cloakrack, realized when she picked herself up that there was no more time to run in, and was now on one knee with both hands wrapped around the central pole of the cloakrack and the hook-laden head of it aimed aggressively at the nearest griffin, in the manner of an Empire legionary pointing a spear. Though doorways and windows were full of anxious faces, the three of them were the only ones in the open, if you did not count Callette, and Callette was clearly lying low.