Digging too hard at the memories makes Lionstar dizzy, but he remembers enough. “My watch. I’m...sorry...” He tries to turn, to see Sakshemar’s face. “I...who...? And, where, now?”

"Who is people who find our camp before. Where is cave."

...Lionstar should have questions, probably, but moving his head is ill-advised and thinking even more so, and now the ground is spinning and making him seasick, and he squeezes his eyes shut and curls away from it until, finally, everything fades.

He swims under a sea of glue, and half-surfaces to dark and cold and his body, distant, shivering uncontrollably, there’s wetness where he must have pissed himself and he should...apologize...or something, but the glue pins him down and he gives up. 

(If Sakshemar tries to wake him, after this point, he’ll notice that Lionstar will mumble out something garbled but can’t be roused.)

He does try to wake him, and then he cleans up the mess, and then he sits and worries for a while. He's no longer in danger of burning the forest down around them, but Lionstar is in a bad way and Sakshemar doesn't know how to help.

...it's maybe time to go look for a Healer.

But - Lionstar probably wouldn't be thrilled about returning to White Gryphon, and realistically that's the only place they're getting one - but Lionstar is barely capable of conscious thought, and Sakshemar has to do something.

Okay. He can - wait a little while, maybe, not more than a day, and try to keep Lionstar supplied with water and maybe eventually attempt to feed him some stew, and see if he becomes conscious enough for conversation at any point. And if so then he can ask. And if not... then they're going to White Gryphon.

The sun rises and Lionstar grimaces and stirs and tries to wake up, the glue isn’t budging easily and he can’t particularly think but he eventually gets his eyes open and croaks out his friend’s name.

"I here," he says, hurrying to Lionstar's side. "I think you need Healer."

Lionstar has to chew on that for a few moments before the words turn into concepts. “Yes,” he manages. “Agree.” He’s never felt this bad for this long before and it’s not obviously getting any better.

"Gryphon people have Healers," he says. "I bring you. You hit head, is not surprise you different, remember different, act different. Sometimes hit head do that."

...This sounds like a terrible idea.

But Lionstar can’t hang onto all the pieces, can’t put the considerations in order and make it fit together, much less see which decision is better. He should be able to and he’s nearly in tears with frustration but he...can’t.

“You decide,” he mumbles finally. “Trust you.” And he’s exhausted again and maybe he will just go back to sleep now.

...aww.

Sakshemar holds him for a little while longer, and then he sits for a minute and thinks about it, really thinks about it, because this is important and Lionstar is trusting him and that means he has to not fuck it up for once.

And...

...it's not that it isn't a terrible idea. It's absolutely a terrible idea. It's just that all of the other options are worse. Taking care of a person with a bad head injury, untrained, alone in the woods with no one else around to help? They'd both be dead the next time one of those wyrsa things showed up. No, this is the only way.

So.

He packs everything up again. It's a shorter job than last time; he hasn't exactly had time to make this cave a home.

And he carries Lionstar through the woods, in his best guess at the direction of the White Gryphon settlement, moving slowly and carefully and reaching out ahead of him with his empathic senses to see if he can glimpse anything resembling civilization.

Kechara is a good gryphon. She works very, very hard for Skandradon and Zhaneel who she loves so very much, passing messages between the gryphons – the messages are usually of the confusing grownup kind but she doesn't mind that – and then, afterward, she can play. 

She's playing in the woods, today, because her friends are busy and all the scouts are out. Except that there's someone there!! A friend?? Kechara doesn't recognize the mind-flavor but that's even better – a new friend!

(Her adoptive parents have, in fact, warned her multiple times to be wary of strangers and to come tell them right away if anyone she doesn't recognize is nearby, but Kechara isn't very good at remembering warnings and she's so excited right now.) 

She leaps through the bushes, pretends to pounce on a mossy hillock, and trips on her too-long wings and rolls over. The new-friend is closer now, it's a boy and he's worried and sad. Kechara hates it when her friends are worried and sad.

...And there's a fainter mind, one that tastes familiar-but-not, and now she's close enough to smell and it is someone she knows! It's Lionstar – who was never very nice to her, but Kechara is generous and would call him her friend anyway – only there's something wrong. 

And she bounds ahead and bursts out of the trees and almost runs into a comically startled-looking young man with the funny dark skin that the Haighlei have, and he's carrying Lionstar in his arms. 

"Hi!" she says brightly. "My name is Kechara! Will you be my friend?" 

The Haighlei stranger blinks at her in utter bewilderment.

There is a pause while he sorts through his feelings, confusion and alarm fading quickly into curiosity and endearment and—hope?

"Yes," he says, very firmly.

But then his smile fades a little, and he looks down more seriously at the boy in his arms, and back up at the gryphon. "Can you help? My friend hit head, need Healer."

Kechara is very distracted from Lionstar (who is her friend but not a very nice one and maybe the new stranger will be nicer?), and it isn't until now that she notices his hurts. Kechara has helped some of the Healers at White Gryphon, using her strong Empathy with patients who are frightened (because she is a very good gryphon!) and when she's paying attention, she knows what a head wound Feels like. 

"Oh no!" She spins in a distressed circle, wings and tail leaving tracks in the fallen needles. "I call for help! Get Healer!" And she Reaches. 

Drake is busy with a client and brushes her off his shields with a 'not now, sweetling.' One of the other Healers is free, though, and soon Kechara opens her eyes. "I Call! Healer Sunleaf is coming!" 

"Thank you," says the new friend. "I am Sakshemar. Is good to meet you."

Lionstar moans, people keep talking and why won't they go away, he feels like he ought to recognize that voice but it's through someone else's memories to begin with and his head is so foggy. "Sakshemar...?" he mumbles. "Where...?" 

"I am Kechara! Good gryphon!" She's so excited that she trips on her wing-ends again. 

And now Sunleaf is hurrying through the trees toward them, wondering why in the world Kechara is dragging her out here this time and hoping it's not another injured squirrel. 

This situation is honestly vastly improved by Kechara being tremendously adorable.

"I find gryphon people," he murmurs to Lionstar. "Is safe. Meet gryphon, gryphon get Healer, all good."

Sunleaf reaches them. 

"Kechara, what? Who is thi–" She cuts off midword and sprints the remaining few yards. "Lionstar!" She has her hands on his forehead. "Oh no, this isn't good. Young man, where did you find him? He's been missing for weeks! Are you with that exploratory troop that swung by earlier? Come on, let's not dally – help me get him back to town. This way." 

"I find him in forest," he says, carrying his friend as directed. "He not want go back to White Gryphon, I not want go back to Khimbata, we stay in forest together. Then this. Now here."

The Healer opens her mouth to say something else, and then closes it, and just hurries him faster. They break out of the trees and hit a large meadow, with cultivated fields visible further off, and there's a road paved in...seashells? Sunleaf waves and yells and flags down a passing farm-cart, dragging the three of them into it, and barks instructions to the farmer, who nudges his mule into a faster gait. The air smells strongly of ocean.

(Kechara is very excited about riding in the cart, and delightedly announces this several times.) 

They plow through a cozy little village of wooden buildings and reach the cliff-edge. White Gryphon itself might look very odd to Sakshemar's eyes – rather than being built at the top of the cliffs, it's dug into terraces in the limestone itself. Befitting the name, everything is very bright white in the midday sunlight. 

Sunleaf directs the farmer to a set of stairs leading downward, tersely asks Sakshemar if he can manage them while holding Lionstar, and doesn't really wait to hear his answer. 

Fortunately, he absolutely can.

They go down three back-and-forth switchbacks of limestone stairs, which fortunately are very neatly carved and easy to walk on, with a short wall and a bit of rope railing between them and the drop. They reach the first terrace, and Sunleaf speeds the pace even more, until they hit a limestone building and she shoves through the door and nearly plows into another man. "Drake! We've found him!" 

The other man is taller than Lionstar, and much older, with features that otherwise resemble his. He seems to be in much less of a hurry, and surveys their little group before nodding deeply to Sakshemar. "Our gratitude goes to you, youngling. My name is Amberdrake; I am on the Council of our humble city, and I am also a Healer. Please bring your friend this way."

He smiles; he has a very reassuring smile. They must be in some kind of Healers' space, because Amberdrake nudges aside a curtained alcove to show a tidy little limestone room with a cot in it. "You can lay him down here and we will have a look. Our dear Kechara has passed on some of the tale, but I do not know all of it. What befell him, exactly?" 

"We meet other people in forest," he says in his heavily accented Kaled'a'in. "They steal our food, try bring Lionstar here. He not want, they try anyway. I tell them go away, not steal food, not try take my friend where he not want go. They say sorry, they go away. Then, middle of night, someone attack. Same people I think. They hit his head, I kill them. I try take care of him, but..." He shakes his head. "Not know enough. Bad. So, now here. He not want here but I think he not want dead more."