Through and Through
 
  Kalen tugged at his leather gloves idly, leaning against a wooden support beam. Smoke, heat and noise hung heavily in the dark interior of the Hammerhold inn, giving no hint of the noonday sun Kalen had seen before entering. He sighed, glancing one again at the door to the inn, firmly shut. Alyiah was late. Again. Kalen was crafting a suitably annoyed comment for when she did inevitably show up when a conversation from a nearby table drew his attention.
 
“Seen it, I did! With my own eyes!” Kalen didn’t recognize the man. Worn jerkin, poorly stained with faded dyes. Dirt around the eyes and ears. A farmer, maybe? From some nearby hamlet?
 
“I don’t believe ye’, I said. I’ve not seen hide nor hair of this supposed creature in -” A local farmer, Kalen recognized the face. He struggled for a moment to place it. Was it Jon? Jackson? He owned the northern farm with the neat row of beets Kalen often passed by on the way to the Quiet Spring Woods.
 
“Not a creature! A monster! A true skyterror, this one! Killed me best horse, it did!” The unknown man interrupted, gesticulating with his arms to emphasize the statements.
 
“Oh I’m sure it did. Y’know, I think it killed me best cow, too - the one filled with all me jewels. Maybe I ought ta’ ask the baron about compensation, eh?” The fletcher, Yande this time. Kalen knew him well. Fletched up the very bow he carried on his back. The locals shared a laugh as the man Kalen had failed to recognize shot them a dour look.
 
“You look awfully interested in that conversation.” Kalen started, somewhat guiltily. Alyiah was right next to him. He’d been so engrossed in the conversation he hadn’t even seen her enter the inn. Her brown eyes sparkled in amusement at him from beneath her heavy, dark hair.
 
“You’re late.” Kalen tried to cover up his embarrassment by reshouldering his bow and dark green cloak. “Come on, we’ve a decent hike ahead of us.” Alyiah frowned in response, pulling her own quiver up slightly.
 
“That’s not very nice, you know. With all my da is paying you, you could at least be respectful.”
 
“Sir Tennak paid me to teach you hunting, and to keep an eye on you while he concludes his business here. I don’t remember a ‘be nice’ clause anywhere in the agreement.” Alyiah stuck her tongue out at him.
 
“You absolutely cannot take a joke.” She remarked, shaking her head. Kalen shrugged, then winced as the bright midday sun blinded him for a moment as he stepped out of the inn.
 
 
“Likeable personality and laughing at jokes is extra, and your father wasn’t willing to pay.” He smiled lightly as he held the door open for her.
 
“Oh ha-ha. With an attitude like that, I can see why my da didn’t pay the extra.” Kalen shrugged a second time. Some arguments were simply unwinnable.
 
  They made good progress through Quiet Spring. The woods here were dense, the towering trees letting in only an uncertain shadow of the afternoon sun, but Kalen wasn’t worried. He’d spent a year or two here and knew these woods inside and out. He was surprised by Alyiah, though. He’d expected a city dweller, especially one as wealthy as herself, to know very little in the way of survival skills. Instead she’d been quietly competent, and had even pointed out tracks that he otherwise would have missed. They’d been tracking a family of elk for around an hour now, judging from the fleeting glimpses of the sun behind the trees. She had shown herself an adept tracker, but Kalen was interested in seeing whether that skill extended to her usage of the bow as well. Ahead, the tracks lead into a thicket. Glancing over it, Kalen saw them. Two males, a female, and three juveniles, grazing peacefully in a small clearing. Just behind them a small brook tottered out of the woods, chittering quietly to itself as it pooled into a small pond near the center of the clearing. Kalen lowered his daypack to the ground silently and gestured to Alyiah to come up to him. As she crouched down he pointed at the thicket.
 
“Two males, a female, three young.” His voice barely above a coarse whisper. “Just past there. Pick a male. Aim for the heart, I’ll be here to make sure you’re using good form.” Alyiah just rolled her eyes and nocked an arrow.
 
“It’s not the first time I’ve used a bow and arrow, you know.” She shuffled around to the edge of the thicket for a better view. “You and I both know I know what I’m doing. You ought to just drop the charade of teaching me anything. My da just paid you to keep me out of trouble, really.” She raised the bow and pulled the string taut.
 
“Don’t hold your breath while you aim. And your left elbow is a little bit low.” Alyiah snorted, ignoring him, before loosing the arrow. The feather adorned haft screeched through the intervening space before tearing into the neck of the leftmost male elk. The creature staggered as its family bolted, seeking shelter in the trees. The male took several unsteady steps, as if to follow them, before collapsing. Alyiah smirked at Kalen.
 
“Easy.” Kalen frowned.
 
“Perhaps. Let’s go look.” He bent down to pick up his pack before pushing around the thicket and into the clearing. The sun was dangerously close to touching the horizon - they’d have to return to Hammerhold after this.
 
  The elk lay where it had fallen, in a slowly expanding pool of its own blood. As they approached, it took a single deep, shuddering breath, causing blood to spurt out of the wound in its neck. Kalen sighed. The creature hadn’t died. Rather it lay there, bleeding out painfully. He dropped his pack clear of the bloodied grass and bent down to examine the wound. It definitely damaged the artery, judging from the amount of blood pouring from it. If the suffocation from the destroyed windpipe didn’t kill it, the blood loss would.
 
“Not so easy, I think. You failed to kill it.”
 
“I - I see that, you know.” Alyiah was noticeably paler than usual. “Can’t you just… deal with it?” Kalen raised his eyebrows.
 
“‘Deal’ with it? This is your kill. As you said, I’ve nothing to teach you - come here and finish what you started, or stand there and watch this creature bleed out. Your choice.” Alyiah didn’t deign to reply, growing paler and paler by the minute. The beast took another shuddering breath. Finally Kalen relented.
 
“Fine. Have it your way.” He drew his knife, and leaned in to the elk. “Go in peace.” he murmured, running his knife through the unfortunate creature. It kicked once, then lay still. Kalen stood up. Cleaned his knife. Stepped back.
 
The silence stretched as the sun slid toward the horizon.
 
“Th-thank you.” It was Alyiah who broke the silence, finally. “All that blood… I just… That wasn’t the common tongue you spoke, to the elk. Was that some sort of prayer?”
 
“Hm? No. No, I just told it to go in peace. I learned a bit of Scyvish, among other things, at the Raheje royal academy.”
 
“Scyvish? Isn’t that the language of monsters and savages? And an academic education? You certainly don’t look the part.” Kalen grinned.
 
“Looks can be deceiving. And,” he paused. “To answer your question, yes and no. Scyvish was once the language of several species of chimeric beasts - but those that spoke it were all hunted down and killed a long time ago. It’s a dead language. Nice trick to impress people at social events, though.” Kalen looked down at the body, glued to the ground in death. “I suppose you expect me to carry this back to town as -”
 
  A great gust of wind ripped the rest of the sentence from him. He and Alyiah staggered backward as a huge mass slammed into the ground in front of them. Alyiah recovered before him.
 
“Gods above!” She scrambled to tear an arrow from her quiver, backpedaling as quickly as she could without falling over. Kalen stood, mouth open in shock. The creature stood almost as tall as he, razor sharp beak open and threatening, bone-white feathers spreading down from its face to its wings, flared in obvious challenge. A lion’s tail whipped about behind it. He was facing a real gryphon, in the flesh. Before he could recover Alyiah loosed her arrow. It struck the creature square in the flank, looking like no more than a feathered toothpick sticking out of its hide. The gryphon screeched in agony, and turned its amber eyes, burning with hatred, on Kalen. He didn’t even have time to regret his life choices before it was on him, biting and clawing. It bit heavily into his left thigh, and raked its claws down his chest, destroying his leather jerkin and shirt. A second arrow in its side caused the creature to grunt, pausing its attack just long enough for Kalen to redraw his knife. He didn’t get the chance to use it, though, as the gryphon dropped him and leapt at Alyiah.
 
Kalen collapsed to the ground. It was soft, and warm, and he wanted nothing more than to take a short nap there, but then a scream yanked him out of his stupor. High pitched and shrill. Alyiah. Her father was a good man, and Kalen had promised him that his daughter would return unharmed. In a supreme bout of effort, Kalen heaved himself back into consciousness and rolled to his feet. The creature had pinned Alyiah, staring down at her, drool dripping off its open beak. Kalen took four heavy steps, his left leg threatening to give out underneath him, before flinging himself onto the gryphon’s back. It reared up with a shriek, trying to throw him off. Kalen cursed as his knife was bashed from his grip. Alyiah had taken the moment to scramble free, though, so there was some good among this mess.
 
“Run, Alyiah!” He shouted as the beast jumped around, head turned as it tried to bite him. She didn’t need to be told twice. She scrambled to her feet and ran, crashing through the underbrush.
 
She didn’t look back.
 
Kalen managed to hold on for several seconds before the gryphon threw him. He sailed through the air like a kite across the clearing before being stopped dead by a thick tree. There was a muted snap at his waist on impact, and Kalen fell limply to the leaf covered ground below. He tried to stand, but his legs refused to obey him. They sat limply at his side, unmoving. The gryphon screeched at him from across the clearing.
 
“I’ll die before I let your kind take me again!” Kalen couldn’t believe it. Scyvish! The creature had just spoken at him in Scyvish! Kalen would have taken the time to be properly amazed had he not been bleeding and had a huge chimeric beast hurtling at him at high velocity. As it was, Kalen threw himself to the side, putting extra force through his arms to compensate for his useless legs, and only barely managed to avoid the flying leap the gryphon had directed at him. It slammed into the tree, tearing a deep gouge through the trunk. As it untangled itself, Kalen tried to force himself into a sitting position.
 
“Wait!” He coughed, spitting up blood. “Wait. Hold on. There’s been -” Another cough. More blood. “Just… Wait a second. Hold on.” The gryphon stared at him, pupils tiny dots in an ocean of amber.
 
“You speak? Not like the other ones.” A single amber eye filled Kalen’s washed out vision. “Why did you attack me, then? I will… wait, as you have instructed. Only until you explain. Then I will decide.”
 
“Attack you? You attacked us.” Kalen took a shuddering breath. “We were just hunting and you dropped from the sky -”
 
“So you were the ones that killed the meal?”
 
“The - what? You mean the elk?”
 
“Yes. The food. You killed it?”
 
“Yeah. Had planned to take it back to town and -” Another cough. Yet more blood. “Anyway… I’m going to take a nap now.” The gryphon hissed at him. It was an ugly sound, causing the hair on the back of Kalen’s neck to stand on end.
 
“No!” The creature released a long breath. “You are dying. I caused this. Ruined your hunt. I can help, surely. I can fix this.” Kalen was surprised to detect something approaching actual remorse in the voice. There was more to this creature than he had initially thought. Kalen pulled himself up against a tree, fighting the fatigue and darkness eating the corners of his vision. Blood still welled sluggishly from the deep wound in his leg. Must have nicked the artery.
 
“I’m a pretty lost cause… But if you want to do something, bring me my bag.” Kalen pointed weakly at his pack, partially trampled next to the body of the elk. The gryphon stomped over, picking it up in its beak, before returning and dropping it on his lap.
 
“Hellsbough…” Kalen muttered as he rifled through the contents. “Ought to stop the bleeding, at least.” He stripped the leaves off the stalks and crushed them in his hands. “Ah. Water. I’m missing…” Before he could finish the sentence the gryphon had set off toward the pond. Kalen suddenly could feel his legs. He struggled not to cry out. With every heartbeat, his punctured leg throbbed with a pain he’d never felt in his life. The other injuries made themselves known, as well. A broken spine. Deep tears across his chest and stomach. Even if he did stop the bleeding, would still he survive? The gryphon was in front of him again. Beak open, a deep well of water in the lower half of its mouth.
 
“That’s, eh, not exactly… That can’t be…” Kalen gave up. “Beggars can’t be choosers.” He muttered, pulling a cupped hand’s worth of water from the creature and mixing it with the bough into a thick paste. He smeared it into his leg and the throbbing was replaced by a sharp stinging. Kalen winced. Hellsbough. Hurt like hell but it could stanch about any open wound. Prevented infection, too. He scooped out another handful of water and crushed some more bough into paste, smearing it into the claw rends in his chest.
 
“I won’t bleed out, at least. Thank you.” The gryphon tilted its head back, audibly swallowing the remainder of the water. Kalen watched it travel down the beast’s gullet and into its chest. “Though small comfort that is, given my legs don’t work.” The gryphon brought its head back down, staring at the deep green paste in Kalen’s wounds.
 
“You cannot walk?”
 
“Nah. Think you broke my spine.” He gestured to the gryphon’s flank. “Let me see the arrows. Still have a little paste left; I should at least make sure they don’t get infected.” The gryphon paused, eyeing him up and down for a moment before slowly turning to let him see the wounds. The arrows had barely penetrated. He could still see the base of the heads sticking out of the wounds. He pulled them and tossed them aside. “This is going to sting, alright?” The creature nodded, but couldn’t help but hiss as the hellsbough made contact with the wounds. Kalen sat back against the tree, feeling so very incredibly tired. He seemed to be operating only on the pain from the hellsbough at this point.
 
“Thank you.” The gryphon still was staring at him with some concern.
 
“Don’t worry about it. I’m Kalen, by the way. I think I may have failed to properly introduce myself.”
 
“Mh. I am Cefyrn.” There was a brief silence. Kalen was just drifting off to sleep when Cefyrn spoke again, jarring him awake. “But you cannot walk. You are much too weak to be left alone here.”
 
“Don’t worry about me, Ceffy, buddy. Just lemme take a quick nap here and I’ll be alright. The ground is nice and soft, perfect for a quick nap.”
 
“You fall asleep here and you may never wake again.”
 
“Yeah, that may be so, but I can’t walk. And if you tried to pick me up and carry me, you’d just pull one of the gashes open, and then I’ll bleed out. You’ve already done enough… just let me sleep.” Cefyrn placed a cold, taloned claw around Kalen’s chest, just tight enough to keep him awake.
 
“No. I did this damage to you. I was taught to take responsibility for my actions. And I will.” It may have been his imagination, but Kalen could have sworn he saw a slight smirk grace Cefyrn’s beak for just an instant. “Do try not to struggle… you may injure yourself.”
 
  With that ominous statement, Cefyrn stretched out his neck. His beak opened, and opened, and opened, revealing an ever lengthening undulating tunnel of bright pink flesh that shivered as it approached Kalen’s head. I must be hallucinating. Kalen thought, as Cefyrn’s sharp tongue ran up the side of his head, leaving a slimy trail up his face. It all felt so real, though. The hot breath against his head and chest as Cefyrn considered him, beak surrounding Kalen’s head in quiet control. Cefyrn’s taloned grip on Kalen’s chest tightened slightly, and the gryphon heaved him up at the same time as he slammed his head down, forcing Kalen’s upper body into his close avian gullet. The flesh at the back of Cefyrn’s throat pulsed, sucking lightly at Kalen’s head and shoulders as it weakly attempted to pull him deeper into the now black tunnel. Kalen felt the creature gag slightly as it tasted the hellsbough on his chest and couldn’t help but smirk. The feeling didn’t last long, though, as the hot flesh surrounding him pressed in and down, clamping him in place as Cefyrn lifted his head up.
 
 
The gryphon bobbed his head once, swallowing heavily, sucking Kalen down to his knees, and then bobbed again, getting Kalen in to his feet. The tunnel became tighter as it went along, pulling and pressing on his body in a strange sort of rhythm. Kalen heard the distinct click as Cefyrn snapped his beak shut, having managed to fit Kalen’s entire body down his throat. Kalen felt the monster’s tongue on his feet, playful, tasting, before the creature gave another, much heavier swallow. Kalen was shunted down, and forward, and then forward again with a second swallow. All at once he hit the solid end of the gryphon’s esophagus, and felt himself curling up inside a hot, tight sack deep within Cefyrn’s body. The turgid chamber groaned and pressed inward on him, restricting his movement. Kalen knew he should be terrified, but for some reason could not bring himself to care. Even not bleeding out, without his legs there was little chance he would have been able to leave the woods alive.
 
 
“No moving in there. You also will not have any issues with wounds reopening.” Kalen recognized the voice of Cefyrn, muffled through thick layers of churning flesh. The bird sounded something close to smug. “Rest now. I will take care of the rest.” Kalen opened his mouth to voice a question, then paused. His leg didn’t hurt. In fact, he felt none of his wounds anymore. In that moment, the last remnants of the adrenaline powering him quietly evaporated, and without the pain to sustain his consciousness, he slipped away.
 
 
  It was late evening when Kalen’s mind filtered back into wakefulness. He was laying down on a hard stone slab, facing out toward the setting sun, the deep orange plate just beginning to dip below the forested horizon. He pushed himself up to a rough sitting position, back against the rock. A light mid-spring breeze brushed softly against his chest. Glancing down, he saw that the deep gouges left by the gryphon Cefyrn looked much better than he had last seen them. Only thin tears were still visible on his skin, and the ugly discoloration around the edges was gone. He looked around, briefly, but the rock outcropping and cave behind him were empty. He was alone. Looking down, Kalen could see much of the Quiet Spring Woods spread before him like a green chessboard. He could have been at Kayore’s Hill, perhaps. Kalen took a deep breath, wincing as his injured ribs protested. Fixing his eyes on the horizon, he watched the sun paint the clouds orange, and wondered about the future.