Chapter Five Kion #3
His stymph is right. Cronus’s scarlet eyes flare, the last dazed remnants of pain skittering out of sight as Taissa slowly places her hand on his beak.
“I can’t watch,” groans Knox, mournfully pressing his face into Kion’s biceps.
It’s a testament to Kion’s affection for the lad that he tolerates his hysterics for a few more seconds before shoving him off.
Knox instead drops to his knees, covering his eyes with his fingers.
“Oh, mercy, mercy, just tell me when it’s over… ”
Cronus emits a high, piercing vocalization, wings jerking, chest feathers puffing with indignation.
The stymph’s eyes are wide with fury as he jerks away from Taissa, sharp feathers angling toward her.
Kion watches without breathing as the old bird feints forward, jabbing his sharp beak into the air, a clear warning that Taissa would be smart to heed.
But what does Taissa do?
Does she back away like any person with half a brain would?
No, of course not.
Of course not.
Instead, she snorts, somehow sounding both unamused and entertained at the same time. A talent, thinks Kion, and then abruptly rolls his eyes.
“You’re full of shite,” Taissa snaps at Cronus. “And I don’t mean figuratively. If you don’t want anybody to step in your precious dung piles, do a jobbie somewhere else.”
For Merlin’s sake. Kion pinches the bridge of his nose. He’s reached a new level of exasperation that he didn’t even know existed. “Cho,” he grits out one last time, a commendable final effort. But she’s too busy putting her hands on her hips and staring Cronus down.
The Winged, of course, can’t understand mortal language without the Bonding glyph—but somehow, Cronus seems to have gotten the gist. The other glyph-bonded stymphs, like Cato and Jemmy, must be translating for him. His sharp talons dig into the grass, and that formidable beak snaps again.
“Oh dear,” Isla says, finally sounding frightened out of her wits. “I-I actually do think she’s going to die, Kion. Do something—”
“Oh, yes, you’re so scary.” But Taissa’s hard voice softens as she looks down. “That Voltaic got you good, didn’t it?”
Cronus hesitates, and Kion follows Taissa’s gaze toward Cronus’s left foot, where one talon is smoking, blackened, and burned. Scowling viciously, Kion whirls on Markus, who sneers.
Back before Cronus, Taissa is slowly drawing out her qyl.
Cronus squawks, furiously this time, lifting into the air with a flinch, powerful wings creating gusts of wind that nearly knock Taissa down as the stymph hovers.
His talons are face-level with her now, and Kion is mentally calculating how quickly he can sprint over and knock Taissa aside when she reaches out and pats his uninjured claw.
“Oh, you poor baby,” she croons, staring up at him.
Evidently baffled beyond belief, Cronus seems to forget his plan of attack.
“You poor, ickle, wickle baby.” In one fast, fluid motion, Taissa is gently etching a glyph into Cronus’s injured foot.
Even from here, Kion can tell it’s a Healing glyph, a Level Two Panacea.
The glyph can be used for healing almost anything, from Level One paper cuts to Level Three broken bones and whatever the hells a Level Five would constitute.
Near-death? The Level One base resembles a knot, with one loop and two ribbons, but it only gets more complicated from there.
Only trained healers have learned Level Four and Five Panaceas, but even then, applying it correctly takes a load of concentration. Things still go wrong.
It’s a testament to the strength of the Wingeds—even now, so domesticated—that their skin can tolerate the potent magic used by witches. Other beings besides witches and warlocks can’t be exposed to the glyphs without devastating consequences.
As Taissa steps back with a flourish, the damage to Cronus’s talons begins to heal, the burnt bone becoming dark, wrinkled bronze again. He squawks, this time in soft confusion, before settling back on the ground before Taissa.
The old Winged’s eyes are very wide. Kion holds his breath as the giant stymph approaches Taissa hesitantly, as Taissa smiles and reaches out to stroke his massive head. As Cronus…bows it.
“The fuck?” mutters Markus.
But then, before Taissa’s fingers can even graze his feathers, Cronus’s head is snapping up and he’s squawking in the witch’s face, wrinkled black tongue jutting out as Taissa’s hair blows back in the mighty gust. As she staggers back, Cronus looks to Kion and the others as if to say, Fuck you all, and your mums, and your grandmums, too, and then he’s taking off, wings flapping furiously as he rises into the air, and flies back to the highest perch on Yggdrasil.
For a long moment, nobody speaks.
And then Taissa’s turning back toward them, her face set in determination, eyes blazing.
Fucking hells.
Absolutely not.
“No,” Kion says immediately, just as she points to the insane old Winged glaring at them from his nest and declares that that’s the stymph she wants.