![Image](http://mob52.photobucket.com/albums/g3/Baals_Baby/Lucain/RandomShrewdMale3.png?t=1339263510)
This was a ridiculous idea, Peregrine though to himself, grumbling from time to time as he stared harder into his binoculars. He sat on the beach close to one of the high cliffs, magnified gaze trained on the face above. There, hundreds of white seabirds wheeled, landed, and took off to dive. Most people would have just passed them off as gulls and paid them no mind, but the human-form Lucain knew better than that; the red crest and black flash beside the eye marked them as Imperial Terns, and the entire flock had come south on their yearly migration to mate.
If he had been here on this remote beach simply to watch some rare birds, he would have been content with the expedition. Unfortunately, that did not seem to be the case. His friend, Basil, had conned him into coming here with talk of terns and sea eagles, but he really wanted to get his name in the history books. The Paragon had caught word of a discovery of a rare fish called the Inessi in these waters and decided that it needed more study. Basil had never really done any of the studying before, but he figured that, since he would have Peregrine's help, he should have no trouble once he actually got his claws on one of the beasts.
Peregrine would rather have no part in it. He was an ornithologist for Gods' sakes! What did he know about fish? The fool would be better off finding an ichthyologist who was actually interested in the discoveries to be made about this creature, but, no, they might try to steal the credit. Bah! Researchers do that; he would just have to make sure he found someone with a name that comes after "Finnegan," and his name would still go first on the paper.