Drumbeats pounded and torchlight flickered, shattering what had been a still night. Mendrion and Siggorund crouched near their small campsite and peered through the trees and underbrush. A band of small, wiry figures hurried along a dirt track below. Sometimes they called to each other in rough tones. Other voices sounded from various directions.

They’re built wrong for dwarfs. What are they after? Mendrion wondered. He would have asked the Gryphon’s Claw, but the talisman lay in his pack within his tent. He wanted to avoid the attention he would attract by going after it. He glanced at Siggorund, who watched the searchers steadily.

The noise of shouting brought them about. A group of the wiry figures had found their tents and extinguished fire. Siggorund, who had grabbed his sword upon rising, drew it from the scabbard. The warrior stepped forward and faced the intruders, his massive weapon raised. The small men hesitated and then backed down.

They had scarcely retreated to the edge of the camp when one sounded a hunting horn. The cries around them intensified. Mendrion raced to his tent, grasped his pack, and stumbled backward. Watching him intently, the intruders nevertheless made no move to stop him. Siggorund picked up his own satchel from where he had lain in the open. He motioned Mendrion to follow him, and they plunged into the forest.

Instantly, horn blasts rang in the air. Shouts and footfalls followed them. Mendrion scrambled up the mountain slope right behind Siggorund, who chose a path through the remains of fallen boulders. The warrior skidded to a halt, spun, and grabbed Mendrion by the arms. A thick finger pointed toward a gap between two large stones. Mendrion could see nothing beyond the gap—a perfect hiding place? He told himself later that he should have known better than to go into a dark hole, but he did it anyway.

Crouching, the Seer squeezed into the gap while Siggorund kept watch. Panic seized Mendrion when he realized that the hole opened into a cave barely big enough for him to sit in. He fought to turn around.

Suddenly the ground gave way.

Mendrion fell for a moment and then grunted when he hit solid rock. Dirt and pebbles rained down on him. Coughing against thick dust, he rolled onto his knees. Blackness and the smell of old dirt encompassed him. He strained to look up, but nothing appeared. He swore his eyes were wide open, and briefly he thought he had gone blind.

A light flashed and then burst into the cavern. Mendrion threw an arm over his eyes. When he could at least squint, he looked around again and saw a halo around him. He glanced up to find Siggorund looking down at him and holding a torch. The warrior was perched on the edge of a hole in the ceiling. Siggorund dropped the torch onto the floor of the cave, glanced over his shoulder, and then launched himself over the edge.

Even the expected grunt never came, reminding Mendrion of the warrior’s mute state. Siggorund stood, gave Mendrion a cheerful smile as he brushed cavern dust from his arms, and picked up the torch. The light barely hinted at a wall around them, though one end stood dark. Beams shored up the sides and ceiling, so someone had been here at some point. The pair moved forward and found that the darkness opened into a tunnel. Mendrion hesitated. That passage could end in ten feet, but it could also extend for miles and branch in numberless directions.

Far-away shouts from the hunters urged them to move ahead. May as well, Mendrion thought. We can’t get back out the way we came in. He tried not to think about what would happen if that was the only way out.

But there had to be a different way, a more established way. As they walked, the Seer realized that patterns in the layer of dust beneath their boots hinted at geometric impressions in the floor. Doorways—indeed, stones arched over the openings—marched past at regular intervals on either side. Occasionally, a larger hole suggesting a tunnel appeared. Surely a numerous people had lived here once. But where was everyone? Mendrion strained his ears for sounds of the inhabitants, but he heard only the scrape of their boots on stone and the creak of Siggorund’s leather and plate armor. They had stayed in the main tunnel the entire time, but it gave no illusion of stopping short of the far side of Gryphon Mountain. Mendrion wished he could see farther than the glow of the torch about them.

See. Of course.

“Hold on,” he said to Siggorund, and the warrior turned toward him. Mendrion reached into his satchel and took out the Gryphon’s Claw. “I should have thought of this before,” he said to his friend. Siggorund just watched him.

Mendrion looked at the glass nestled within the claw and asked, “How can we safely leave this cave without our pursuers finding us?” The glass flared, and then Mendrion’s view sped along the corridor, past two large shadows, and into a vast chamber. Swinging to the left, the magic raced along the wall and then up a set of stairs. The Seer was trying so hard to pay attention that he found himself forgetting everything. He looked at Siggorund and gestured with the Claw. “Straight ahead.”

Perhaps another hour passed—but then, who could tell?—and Mendrion began feeling weary. After all, the intruders outside had roused them before they could fall asleep. Siggorund glanced over at him just as he rubbed at one eye, and immediately he stopped. “No, I’m fine,” Mendrion insisted without firmness. Siggorund shook his head and led the way into one of the rooms.

The chamber contained a few pieces of furniture, all obscured by a thick layer of dust. Siggorund covered his mouth with his beard and brushed the dust from a couch. Then he gestured for Mendrion to take it. Too tired to argue, Mendrion wrapped himself in his cloak and lay down. In moments, he was asleep.

When Siggorund roused him, they reentered the passage and pressed on. Mendrion felt better, but he had no way to tell how much time had slipped by.

An hour or two later, the passage opened into a massive chamber. Mendrion’s stomach dropped away when he noticed that the cavern lacked a floor. A ledge hugged the wall all the way around. Several arches of stone lifted from the walkway around the room and converged in the center. Something in that convergence seemed to draw him—he felt an inexplicable need to investigate.

He took a step toward the nearest arch, but then he remembered that he and Siggorund were trying to escape their pursuers. They had to find their way out of the tunnels before they could be cornered. Visualizing what the Claw had shown him, Mendrion led his companion along the wall, looking for an exit where stairs led upward. They passed a couple of doorways that led to blackness. The next one matched the route the Claw had shown him.

Mendrion looked over his shoulder at the center of the chamber. Something was there, something important to him. He was suddenly certain of it.

Sparing a glance at Siggorund, the Seer strode to the closest bridge. Abruptly, his stomach clenched at the thought of crossing the open space. If he lost his balance and fell, Terla would be looking for another Seer. Mendrion scrutinized the span of stone, looking for cracks or other hints of weakness. He saw none.

He thought better of bidding Siggorund to wait for him here. Should he slip, Siggorund couldn’t help him from the ledge. “Come,” he whispered. The warrior’s brow wrinkled and his head cocked slightly, but he came to Mendrion’s side. The Seer proceeded across the bridge, which was twice his shoulders’ width and had no railing or balustrade. Slowly, they crossed the chasm to where a pillar rose at the center.

As the torchlight fell upon the end of the bridge, it revealed an eagle’s head and beak, then a lion’s legs and body. Finally, when they stood before it, they saw a pair of wings half unfurled behind the beast. Despite the statue’s age, the carving of feathers and fur had lost no detail. Mendrion had never seen a gryphon, had only heard tales of them, but if the real thing was more majestic than this figure, they surely ruled over all creatures. He stood in awe, looking up at the fierce, proud expression, and the eyes seemed to peer back and delve into his mind as surely as the former inhabitants of the caves had cut away the stone of the Mountain.

He almost felt … acceptance? Approval?

The halo of the torch hinted at the forms of three other gryphons, all sitting with their backs to a raised platform. Mendrion carefully moved to his right and up a set of short stairs that brought him level with the gryphon’s heads. An ornate stone gazebo sheltered a pedestal. At first, Mendrion thought the pedestal stood empty, but even before Siggorund’s light fell over its surface, a stone at the top glowed blue of itself. The Seer felt an energy emanating from the stone. His skin prickled.

A hum drew his attention to his satchel. He drew out the Gryphon’s Claw. The glass flared pale blue and went dark once more.

Mendrion looked back at the stone nestled in the top of the pedestal. He still felt the energy coming from it. He wanted to put his hand on it, but his complete lack of knowledge of the consequences stopped him. Mendrion looked at Siggorund, who watched him with that intent gaze, but the warrior made no move to discourage or urge him.

“We had better move on,” Mendrion said. “I’ll find out what this thing is when we’re not being hunted.” They returned to the stairs leading out and left the chamber.

The Seer consulted the Gryphon’s Claw one more time to be sure of the way out. They traversed another tunnel and emerged through an old, short door hidden behind tangles of brush and vines. The sun had just set, dusk falling again on the land, and the travelers could see the flicker of distant torches below them. “We’ve lost them—for the time being,” Mendrion whispered. Siggorund nodded, and they continued their ascent of the north slope of Gryphon Mountain.

Mendrion thought of the way he had been drawn to that stone in the cavern. And of how he had felt when looking at the gryphon statue. He would be blind if he thought it wasn’t tied to his being Seer of Gryphon Mountain, but beyond that…. The cavern had been empty of anyone who could have told him what that stone was—or his feelings.

At least there was Terla. If anyone could tell him what it was all about, she could. If he made it back. Who were those who pursued him and Siggorund? They were built wrong for dwarfs, and he was on good terms with the White Forge Kindred. Something was going on that he didn’t even vaguely understand.

He took some courage in the fact that he and Siggorund had discovered the cave at the moment they needed to escape the eyes of their pursuers. Perhaps the Mountain had sheltered him, literally and figuratively. But he couldn’t spend his entire journey escaping and hiding.

At some point, he would have to take on his opponents and get some answers.

This tale is #6 in “The Coming of the Seer,” the story of how Mendrion becomes Seer of Gryphon Mountain. Read the beginning of the story, “The Seer of Gryphon Mountain.” The next tale is “Kings of the Sky.”

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