The Dark Griffin Read Online Free Page B

slipped, sliding almost gracefully sideways off the branch and into space. He hung by his front paws, hind legs dangling, and tried to pull himself back up with his beak, but then the branch broke and he fell.
    He thudded into a branch below, but tumbled off before he could grab hold, and for a long heart-stopping instant he was falling, down and down, bouncing from branch to branch and shrieking. He had fallen about halfway down the tree before his flailing foretalons managed to latch onto a branch and halt his descent. He clung to the rough bark for a few moments, quivering with fright.
    He was bruised and winded, and his beak hurt from where it had smacked into something. He chirped his distress, calling yet again for Saekrae, but still she did not come.
    Fear gripped him. He wanted desperately to go back to the nest, but the branch above him was too high to reach. He managed to shuffle back along the branch to where it joined the trunk and tried to haul himself up by digging his talons into the bark, but it was soft and tore away as soon as he put his weight on it. He tried harder and managed to go a short distance, only to come sliding back down again. He was stuck.
    He stayed on the branch for some time, unable or unwilling to go either up or down. He paced back and forth, searching for a way out, but none looked particularly inviting.
    Eventually, though, a strange calm came over him. He crouched on the branch, at the thin end of it, and looked upward, toward the sky, showing blue through the forest canopy. There were birds up there, circling casually on the wind. They had wings and they could fly. Saekrae had wings and she flew.
    The black chick spread his own wings. They were big and wide, with long feathers. A few wisps of babyish down still clung to the vanes, but the strong feathers of adulthood had finished growing.
    He beat them experimentally. They nearly unbalanced him, but he held on tightly and tried again. He could feel them catching the air and lifting him very slightly with each blow. Feeling a little more confident, he flapped them as hard as he could, faster and faster, trying to make them lift him off the branch and into the air. They didn’t, and the violent motion threatened to send him tumbling to his death.
    He gave up—tired, hungry and frustrated—and ripped strips of bark off the branch, growling to himself.
    He calmed down eventually and sat still, thinking. How does his mother do it? She didn’t just beat her wings to fly. She jumped. He remembered that now. He’d seen her do it dozens of times, but never really thought about it.
    He looked upward again. If he could fly, he could get back to the nest and then Saekrae would come and bring him food. He turned to look toward the end of the branch. Suddenly, it didn’t look so daunting. Without another thought or a moment to prepare himself, he braced all four legs on his perch, spread his wings wide, and charged. He ran as fast as he could, claws scattering bits of bark, holding his wings and tail out rigidly as he had seen Saekrae do, and staring straight ahead. As the branch became thinner, it started to bend. He could feel it threatening to break, and for an instant he panicked. Then he jumped.
    The branch acted as a springboard, and the black chick launched himself into space. His wings caught the air and held him up, and he went into a clumsy glide. When he realised he was flying, he panicked and began to beat his wings wildly, terrified that he was about to fall. He didn’t, but not knowing how to steer with his tail, he lurched crazily around in the sky, unable to go in any particular direction or at any particular height. His wings, still too weak and uncoordinated for true flight, started to falter. He managed to stay up for a while, but his wings finally gave out and he careened toward the ground. It wasn’t an outright fall—his wings stayed open and acted as a kind of crude parachute—but he didn’t have the strength to pull