The Intuitives(81)

“Give it some room, everybody.”

They all moved back toward the walls, trying not to frighten it. Even Sam stepped carefully out of the circle and backed away, crouching low as she moved.

The gryphon turned this way and that in midair, watching them all. When it was satisfied that no one was trying to grab it, the cub finally descended toward the plate.

It landed neatly, coming down on its hind legs and then using its wings to settle down gently until it was standing on all fours. It folded its wings into its sides and stretched its neck forward to examine their offerings, drawing in a few long breaths as though trying to smell the food through its beak.

“That’s unusual,” Kaitlyn whispered.

“For a gryphon?” Sam whispered back, her glance registering obvious skepticism.

“I mean for a bird,” Kaitlyn clarified, shooting Sam a wry scowl. “It has an eagle’s head, but eagles don’t have a great sense of smell. They hunt with their eyes.”

“I don’t think they have ears either,” Sam responded, her voice managing to drip with sarcasm despite being barely audible.

“That’s true,” Kaitlyn conceded, ignoring Sam’s tone.

“We must not make the mistake of seeing it as either an eagle or a lion,” Ammu murmured, seeing that the gryphon was not disturbed by their words, “or even as a combination of the two. It has surface similarities to both of those animals, but the gryphon is a creature in its own right, neither eagle nor lion, but only gryphon. We must see it as it is if we are truly to understand it.”

The gryphon seemed to agree, whipping its head away from the plate in disgust, not having discovered anything upon it that was worth eating—least of all the dead mouse, one whiff of which had caused the gryphon to shove the plate violently away from itself with one strong, taloned foot.

“Well, that didn’t go well,” Sam muttered.

“We need to try the paint,” Ammu directed, nodding at Mackenzie, who stood closest to the table with the spray can. “If you would, please.”

“It already didn’t like the food,” Mackenzie argued softly. “If we start spraying paint at it, it’s never going to trust us.”

“If this creature becomes too suspicious of us, we will summon something else for further experimentation,” Ammu said gently. “Please, Mackenzie. The paint can.”

But we know it will work with us. It did before, when we summoned it on our own, she thought, but she couldn’t admit that, especially here, where they were surely being filmed. I’m sorry, she thought to it helplessly. I’m so sorry.

She got up and moved toward the spray can, picking it up in one hand and pointing it toward the gryphon cub, which cocked its head at her inquisitively. Mackenzie took a deep breath, preparing herself for the task, but just as she was about to hit the trigger, she heard a sudden whistle from the edge of the room.

Startled, Mackenzie and the gryphon both turned toward the sound to see Daniel crouching near the wall, trying to appear smaller, less threatening. He motioned to everyone to do the same, and they all did, kneeling or sitting in place. Then he whistled again, several notes this time, repeating a piece of the tune he had sung during the summoning.

Mackenzie trembled in relief, releasing the breath she hadn’t even realized she had been holding. She felt as though she had just received a stay of execution, if only a temporary one.

Daniel clearly had the gryphon’s attention, and he whistled at it again—but the cub glanced around behind itself, staring uneasily at Miller, who still stood in the corner, armed and alert, completely unable to see what was happening.

“Get down,” Mackenzie whispered to him, pressing one hand down through the air to reinforce her words.

Miller stared at her and then glanced back at the one-way mirror.

“Just do it,” she hissed, knitting her eyebrows together and tightening her lips, trying to look more adamant without raising her voice.

Miller watched her uneasily, but when no counter order was forthcoming, he finally crouched down in the corner, maintaining a ready stance while allowing one knee to rest on the floor. He shrugged his shoulders and raised his eyebrows at her questioningly, but the gryphon seemed to be satisfied, turning its head back toward Daniel and whistling the notes back to him.

“Awesome!” Sketch whispered. “Do more!”

Daniel grinned and nodded, humming more of the tune. In response, the gryphon took two steps toward Daniel and whistled at him again, repeating the sequence perfectly. Encouraged, Daniel sang to the gryphon softly, not stopping this time, and after a few moments, the cub moved toward him, cautiously at first but then more boldly, whistling along with him where sections of the eerie melody repeated itself. It sat in front of Daniel, cocking its head, and Daniel signaled to Mackenzie to hand the can to Sketch.

Grateful to be out of the hot seat, Mackenzie made her way toward Sketch, stretching out to hand him the paint can as soon as she was within reach and then backing away from them both. Sketch moved the can into position as though to spray it and looked at Daniel for confirmation, but Daniel shook his head. Instead, Daniel reached his hand out toward Sketch.

Sketch placed the can in Daniel’s hand, but Daniel just shook his head and handed it back to Sketch, pushing it toward the other boy until he took it. He placed his hand in front of Sketch one more time, and Sketch finally got it. Grinning, he sprayed a mess of wet, neon orange paint into Daniel’s hand.