Gryphon in Glory

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About me there was only the gray light of predawn, which left the ridges black and harsh against the sky. Like all who deal secretly, I used this cover of shadows as I prepared to ride forth. Though I believed I was well armed in spirit for what I must do, still I shivered under my mail and leather as if I needed the cloak now rolled behind my saddle.

“Lady Joisan—”

That voice out of the dark, deep-set Abbey gate gave me a start. I swung around, my hand going without bid of conscious thought to the hilt of the sword swinging heavy at my belt.

“Lady. . .”

It was Nalda, who had been my right hand, and sometimes the left also, when the invaders drove us out of Ithdale and we wandered guideless westward across unknown lands. Last night I had given her, not my orders, but my confidence.

She had listened as I pointed out that those who were left of our people were now safe in Norsdale, that they would continue to be given shelter and work by the Dames, even as were the other refugees who had come this far, there being no near fear to trouble their future.

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