She touched him. Her fingers were warm, soft, undeniably human. Mord Gabion blinked, and his eyelids made slow painful movements. They creaked like stone scratching stone, like a gargoyle coming to life while its body was still frozen in its sleep - which it was.
He shouldn’t be awake, shouldn’t be aware of those supple fingers, or the scent of ginger and spice drifting towards him. Shouldn’t be aware of anything, ever again — but he was.
Her fingers ran down the planes of his chest, traced the line of bone that formed the top of his wings, which were folded in sleep, but itching with the need to open, to take his body soaring through the night sky.
“Such detail,” she murmured.
His eyes shifted in their sockets. He wanted to see her, needed to see her, but his body wasn’t quite ready. It was still locked in its rocky state.
She edged closer, her feet scraping over the hard ledge on which he was perched. He could feel it too now, through the thin-soled shoes he’d worn when he’d agreed to the sorcerer’s bargain, agreed to go to sleep for eternity so his enemies, the chimeras, would be put into the slumber too.
He and the others like him had given up their freedom, their lives, to save the world from the chimeras who would have enslaved humanity - but he was awake. He swallowed, or made the motion at the back of his throat; the action was uncomfortable, unnatural locked in this stony condition.
He tried again, managed to move his head to the side, but only an inch. The woman pressed against him, studying him, and didn’t notice. But the movement was real. He was coming awake.
Were his enemies too?
Kami Machon clung to the gargoyle, kept herself from looking down by concentrating on the impossible detail of his wings, muscles, everything. How she wished she knew who had sculpted him, how the sculptor had put such strength and darkness into the white marble he’d used to carve the creature.
She’d been sculpting with clay for years, but had recently forked out the dollars for a block of alabaster. Her fingers itched to pick up that chisel, make the first chink in the stone. But she was afraid, wanted it to be perfect, beautiful, like this gargoyle.
She ran her hand lower, towards the strange kilt-like cloth that covered the gargoyle’s lower body. The stone beneath her hand quivered. She jerked, then laughed at the flight of her imagination. Real as he might appear, this gargoyle (or grotesque, to use the more accurate term) was stone, cold and hard. He couldn’t feel her hand moving over him, couldn’t react to her touch.
She shook her head, forced her feet to inch further along the ledge. One hand gripping the gargoyle’s for balance, she lowered her other to the flashlight that hung on a string from her neck. It was dark, past midnight - the only time she’d been sure no one would see her, try to stop her.
She’d tried going through regular routes, asked permission from the building’s owner to view the statue up close, but her calls had been ignored. Then, miraculously, the temp agency she worked for part-time had offered a position with the building’s cleaning service. The rest of the crew was gone now. She was left with free access to the outside ledge at the top of the building where the gargoyle perched, keeping watch over the city.
She flipped on the flashlight, directed its small beam onto the gargoyle’s profile. His jaw was strong, firm. She laughed again of course it was. He was carved of stone. She lowered the light so she could feel the strength there, memorize it to replicate in her own work. The beam danced along the ledge and over her feet, drawing her gaze for just a second.
From the corner of her eye she saw movement, started to turn, but something hit her square in the back and knocked her off balance. She screamed, grabbed at the gargoyle’s stone fingers, felt her own digits slip one by one until she fell free, and tumbled through the air towards the cement circle 200 feet below.
Mord heard the female scream, felt her fingers slip over his knuckles. His body tensed, vibrated with an uncontrollable need to save her. The stone encasing him cracked. His muscles flexed. His wings shook. He took a breath, forced it into his lungs. There was another crack - louder, like a cannon firing -and he was free. He shoved his body away from the wall, felt his feet break from the ledge beneath them. His wings expanded and he free-fell for a few seconds, revelling in the feel of the air rushing past him, of being alive again.
The night air was dark and cold, invigorating, just like in his memories. And the city below flickered at him like he remembered, but now with more lights: strange bright ones zigging along at impossible speeds.
The woman screamed again, pulling his mind back to her. Saving her was not his concern. People jumped from buildings. Before his forced sleep he’d seen plenty make that choice, hadn’t tried to talk one out of it. He was a gargoyle, not a priest. His duty was to protect humans, but as a race, not individuals, and not from their own stupid choices. If the weak died, it made the whole stronger: part of the great formula that kept the world strong, vibrant.
Still. . . His gaze zoomed to the body falling beneath his. Her arms were flapping as if she thought she could take wing.
He shouldn’t save her. He had issues of his own: finding out why he’d been awakened, and if others, allies and enemies, were awakening too.
The smell of ginger reached out to him as she screamed again, or tried to. Her voice was hoarse now, almost lost in the wind.
He gritted his teeth, started to turn away, to point his face towards the other buildings where gargoyles and chimeras had spent their nights before the freeze. But as quick as he did, as sure as he was that he was making the right choice, his body decided otherwise. His wings flexed, his shoulders shifted and he dived — straight down — towards the now silent woman plummeting to the earth below.
Air whooshed past her, tore at her clothes. Fear clutched at Kami’s chest, made it impossible to breathe. She was falling . . . falling. Her brain screamed to reach out, grab for something to stop her descent, but there was nothing to grab, nothing around her but angry air. It roared in her ears. She was going to die. There was no way around it.
The thought echoed through her head, settled into her stomach. She was going to die, and it was her own fault. What idiot crawled onto a ledge to see a statue?
She screwed her eyes shut, tried to pull her arms in close but couldn’t, the wind stopped her.
Tears ran down her cheeks, cold more than wet, and her world started to shift . . . fade.
She drifted for a second, forgot where she was, what was happening. Suddenly, something hit her, jarred her back awake. Despite her fear, her eyes flew open. The ground . . . had she hit? Survived?
She was still moving, fast, but sideways. Something . . . arms . . . held her. Her head fell backwards, over one of those arms, against a chest - solid, cool, bare. Her heart was beating. She could feel it, could feel air moving in and out of burning lungs. She’d been screaming. The thought seemed random, unattached to anything. Like her reality.
Nothing seemed real. . . She pressed trembling fingers to her cheeks. Felt that, felt everything.
She was alive. Impossibly someone had saved her. Finally, she forced her face to turn upwards, to see who held her.
A smooth, chiselled jaw. High cheekbones. Angled, strong features that should have been unattractive, but somehow, put together, were arresting, commanding and . . . familiar. She reached up, heard a whisper of movement and turned her gaze to the noise. Wings, six feet wide, glowed back at her — white as if carved from marble. Her eyes shot back to her saviour’s face. He was looking at her now with features as strong as rock.
Rock, wings . . . the gargoyle.
Dear God. She’d been saved by the gargoyle. Her mouth opened, a scream ripped from her throat.
He ignored her, tightened his hold and dived forwards until air whooshed past her again to steal both her breath and the scream that had been flying from her throat.
Mord angled his wings to slow their landing, let his feet skid across the roadway. The female in his arms lay limp, pale. She’d screamed as she was falling, and screamed again when he caught her.
He bent one knee and lowered her to the grass. They were in some kind of park. A statue of a man, dressed in a uniform unfamiliar to Mord, guarded the entrance. A large fountain that Mord remembered from when he had last been awake and flown over this city lay a few feet past that.
He stared at the statue for a moment. The date, 1944 - forty-six years after the gargoyles had agreed to the great sleep. He started to stand, to leave the female where she lay. He’d saved her. His job was done.
The wind shifted. The smell of ginger wove around him, halting his steps. He glanced back at the female. She was pale, too pale for a human. He knelt down and placed his hand next to her face. Her pallor almost matched his own, and he was still in his gargoyle form. He wasn’t able yet to shift to his human shape.
He flexed and unflexed his wings, enjoyed the feel of them moving behind him. A breeze from his movement caught the female’s hair and threw it across her face. The dark locks clung to her lips. He brushed them aside, or tried to. The tendrils wrapped around his hand, seemed to pull at him, refuse to let him go. He cursed. He couldn’t leave her here, like this. He knew nothing of this time, the dangers that might lie in wait for an unprotected female.
He scooped her up. She weighed nothing, but was warm against his chest. Her arms fell at her sides, but this close, holding her, he could hear the even in and out of her breaths. She was alive, just passed out.
He exhaled, annoyed at his unexplainable need to care for her, to see she was OK before leaving to investigate whatever awaited him in this new time. He strode to the fountain. The water splattered onto a carved bowl then spilled into a bigger section at least twelve feet across. Kneeling, he opened his arms and let her roll into the water with a splash. As she sank below the surface, he bent his knees and propelled himself into the sky. The water would awaken her while allowing him to leave undetected. He couldn’t risk staying by her side, revealing himself any more. Humans didn’t know the gargoyles’ secret. They couldn’t.
His wings spread and he flattened them, allowed himself to glide for a second, silently, so he could hear her sputter back to life. He’d watch from up high as she pulled herself upright, then made her way back to wherever she called home.
Except she didn’t. She sputtered and shook, rubbed her hands over her hair and face. Then she stood in the knee-high water, her thin shirt and obscenely short pants clinging to her breasts and buttocks. Water dripped from her hair. She shook her head again, then stared at the sky.
“Gargoyle,” she whispered. “Where are you?”
Her voice was low, stunned, but sure. She’d seen him, and could somehow see him as he soared over her head. She was watching him.
He hesitated for a moment, then turned. She only thought she’d seen him, would easily convince herself otherwise soon. He’d been through this before. Humans were good at protecting their own realities. They believed what they had been trained from birth to believe.
And stone didn’t come to life.
She’d forget him soon.
Water dripped from Kami’s hair. She slicked her hands over it, sent a river running down her back, but kept her gaze on the sky. She wasn’t crazy. The gargoyle was alive and had saved her.
Something moved above her, but high up — too high to make out in the darkness. She ran her hands over her arms, realized she was shaking. The wind whispered. She spun, hoped it was the gargoyle returning, but the grass beside her was empty.
She stepped from the fountain and wondered for a brief second how she’d landed there. Then another sound caught her attention, an engine turning over. She froze, prayed the driver wouldn’t see her. She had no explanation for where she was or the state she was in.
She glanced up at the building she’d fallen from and the window she’d left open. She was sure of the last, but it was closed now. Strange. A memory tickled at the back of her mind. Something about her fall.
She frowned and stared at the ledge. The gargoyle? Her gaze darted to the right. Nothing. No statue, no sign one had ever perched there. Her heart jumped.
He was real.
For some reason the thought warmed her. With a smile she patted the keys in her pocket. Still there. She could drive herself home, or go back inside, see up close that he was really gone.
Knowing exactly what she was going to do, she stepped off the grass and into the road. She was halfway across when a motor roared behind her. She spun. Lights beamed at her, blinding her, freezing her steps.
For the second time in half an hour, she was facing a sure death.
Mord, clinging to a cold metal and glass building nearby, watched as the female stared up at the skyscraper he’d called home. Wonder, then joy, lit her face. She stepped off the kerb then moved with purpose towards the building.
He frowned. She was supposed to leave, to forget him. She looked up again, her gaze locked onto the spot where he’d been perched, frozen ... for how long?
He was still staring at the ledge he’d vacated when he heard a strange, mechanical roar. Instinctively he jerked towards it, saw twin lights burning through the night, pointed at the little female. The machine rushed towards her and she stood frozen, staring at it.
Without thinking, he pushed away from the building, pointed his wings to the ground and the girl, and snatched her like a hawk capturing a rabbit from a field. The machine whizzed beneath them. He made out eyes, dark and intense, peering over the wheel.
Then his attention turned to the female. Her hands were wrapped around his neck, her cheek pressed against his chest.
“You came back,” she murmured. Her fingers stroked his neck, reminded him of how she’d touched him when he’d been locked in stone.
Who was she? And why couldn’t he leave her to her fate?
Kami stared at the man settled on her couch. Mord. That was all she’d got out of him - his name. He’d given no reaction when she had supplied hers. She’d needed him to know it, hoped he would repeat it, like that would somehow make all this more real. But he’d done nothing, barely blinked or breathed.
Still, he was sitting on her couch, nothing could be more real than that.
His chest was bare. A cloth of some sort was wrapped around his hips. She’d mistaken it for a kilt before, but now could see it was less structured than that. It was more a strip of wool he’d knotted in place.
His wings had disappeared, and his skin was no longer marble pale, but she knew he was the gargoyle. Nothing he said would convince her otherwise. She’d traced his features with her fingers, memorized each chiselled inch of him.
A tingle ran through her. She clenched her fists and tried to ignore the need to run her hands over him again, to feel those same planes and angles, now warm and human. But male, still very male.
“What are you wearing?” she asked. It was an asinine question, but all she could think to say. Her mind seemed to have gone blank.
He glanced down, brows lifting. “A cloth.”
Well, that explained it.
Mord stared at the female, struggled to make sense of why he was here, why he hadn’t left before now. She stared back, her eyes huge in her heart-shaped face. Minutes ticked by with neither saying a word. Finally, unable to sit still, he stood, wandered to a far corner where a drop-sheet lay on the floor. Sealed buckets were stacked around its edges. In the centre sat a rectangular piece of stone. Alabaster. He moved towards it, bent to trace his finger over its top.
“You carve?” he asked. Perhaps this was the reason for his reluctance to leave. Perhaps she had a connection to the stone, thus a connection to gargoyles - to him.
She stepped closer, her gaze darting to the block of stone. “Not yet, but I want to. That’s why I was on the ledge. I wanted to . . .” She raised her hand, held it up as if she were going to touch him, like she had when he was frozen in sleep.
Suddenly, he knew what kept him here, why he couldn’t leave. He stood still, his heart thumping slowly in his chest. She took another step towards him. He could feel her warmth, smell her ginger scent. Her hand shaking, she reached closer, touched his shoulder first then ran her flat palm down his chest and over his abdomen.
He held perfectly still, used his gargoyle skills to keep from moving. Didn’t even breathe.
“What happened to your wings?” she asked. She walked around him, her fingers still tracing his body, skimming his sides.
He didn’t answer. She wasn’t supposed to accept him so readily, believe the statue she’d seen would come to life. No human he’d encountered in his past ever had.
“They were here.” She rose on her tiptoes, prodded his back where in his gargoyle form his wings appeared. “But I don’t . . .” She paused, moved her fingers round and round then found the nub that hid his wings when human. “Here. Is this it? How?”
She continued her explorations. Mord’s body tensed, tightened. He bit back a groan. Her touch was torture on this most sensitive part of him, but he couldn’t tell her to stop, couldn’t acknowledge what she was doing to him. That would give him away, be an admission that he was different. And, his mind whispered, he didn’t want to, had been untouched for so long. Even gargoyles enjoyed being touched. They didn’t feel like humans did, not emotions anyway, but they enjoyed physical sensations, and she was providing him with plenty.
She leaned closer. Her breath warmed his skin; her hair brushed against him.
He could stand it no longer. He was at risk of exploding, jerking her warm human form against his, showing her exactly what her innocent curiosity was doing to him.
“You’re imagining things,” he blurted, his voice rough.
Her hand paused in its movements, hovered above his skin. “Imagining?” She leaned forwards, spoke with her lips almost touching his skin. “My imagination isn’t this good.”
He took a step and turned. He needed to see her, decide what powers she held. She wasn’t a simple human. He knew that. But what was she? And why had she come so close to death twice in their short acquaintance?
“Who wants you dead?” he asked.
She jerked, frowned. “I don’t . . .” She shook her head. “I fell. It was stupid of me to climb out on the ledge, but I’d seen ... I ...” She closed her eyes. “I had to get closer.” Her eyes opened, pinned him. “I had to see you. But I never imagined . . .” Her words drifted off. She curled her fingers into her palms and waited, like she expected him to say something more, to acknowledge that he was the gargoyle she’d sought out, or that he felt the strange pull between them, too.
He couldn’t give her any answers. Secrecy was one of the gargoyles’ greatest strengths. If humans learned the statues they walked by every day could come to life, that these statues had the strength and power to destroy mankind, fear would take over. His kind would be hunted. Attempts would be made to capture or kill them as they slept.
And the gargoyles would be forced to make a choice - destroy or be destroyed.
It was unthinkable.
As was admitting he felt the same pull she did. She was a human. Humans and gargoyles didn’t mingle. And gargoyles didn’t feel. Whatever was happening to him now was due to the sorcerer, and the wearing off of the spell, not her. It couldn’t be her.
“Someone in the machine tried to run you down.” He laid the words in front of her, stated them as the fact they were.
“Someone . . .” Her eyes widened and her fingers pressed against her lips. “Someone tried to run me down,” she repeated. She caught his gaze. “And pushed me. Someone pushed me off that ledge. I remember now. I felt a hand.” She pulled her shoulders back, as if the fingers still pressed against her skin. “Why?”
He waited, made sure her reality had sunk in, then headed towards the door. He’d done his part, made her aware of the danger she was in. Now he had a bigger threat to search out, one potentially disastrous to humanity as a whole - the chimeras.
“Wait!” She hurried after him, grabbed him by the arm.
A shock shot through him like a chisel hitting marble. He contracted his still-hidden wings, felt them reverberate in his back.
“You can’t leave yet. You haven’t told me anything, or explained who you are, how you are.”
He gritted his teeth and took another step towards the door, but not far enough, not fast enough.
She moved with him, wrapped her hands around his biceps. “You can trust me,” she murmured.
The one word that could stop him cold: trust. He’d believed in trust once, before he’d been betrayed by his brother ... or the one being he’d let close enough to think of as a brother.
He turned. His shoulders pulled back and his eyes narrowed, he looked down at her. “Who can you trust? That’s what you should be thinking about, not letting your mind run wild with some fantasy you created while you were falling.”
She dropped her hand. He started to turn again, thought he’d shaken her, put her in her place.
Then she smiled. “So, I did fall. Over twenty floors? And what? That fountain saved me?” She laughed. “Now who has the imagination?”
He huffed. He wasn’t used to humans — anyone — talking back to him. His wings tingled beneath his skin, screamed to be unfurled. That sight would overwhelm her, force her back into her place.
And it would reveal with absolutely no doubt that he was a gargoyle. A hiss escaped from between his closed teeth.
She placed her hand on his chest. “I know you were stone and somehow came to life. You flew. You saved me.”
Her gaze was intense. It threatened to burn through him.
He wrapped his thumb and index finger around her wrist, plucked her hand from his chest. “Believe what you want. I can’t stop you.”
“Who . . .” Her hand shook. He could tell she wanted to touch him again, and damn everything, he wanted it too. She swallowed, glanced at the block of alabaster beside them then back. “Are you a man or a statue?”
He needed to leave.
“Did someone create you?”
He stopped at that. She was right; someone had created him, had created all of his kind. A sculptor turned sorcerer. He’d carved Mord, carved all of them, then infused them with life. He stared at the female with new interest.
Could she create more gargoyles? Did her touch awaken him? Could she awaken the others without awakening the chimeras?
“Touch me,” he ordered.
Touch him. She wanted to do nothing but touch him. Afraid he’d change his mind, continue on his trek out of her apartment, Kami placed both hands on his chest.
His skin was smooth and firm, colder than hers, but not as cold as the marble creature she’d touched on that ledge. And he was perfect, every inch of him. She ran her hands down his sides, let her fingers dip where his muscle dipped, rise where it rose. If he had been carved, his creator had been a master, better than she could ever dream of being.
She looked up at Mord, placed one hand on his chin. It was smooth too, no sign of stubble. There was a cleft in his chin. She hadn’t noticed it before. Now she focused on it, ran the pad of one finger over it. What care had the sculptor used to perfect that?
Her heart was beating loud and fast, as if she’d sprinted up three flights of stairs. She exhaled. Her hand that had been resting on his chest moved upwards. He had inhaled.
She exhaled again. He inhaled.
She shifted her gaze to his eyes, wondered if he was playing with her. For a second he stared back, wonder and something close to fear reflecting back at her. Then he stepped backwards, breaking their connection and his gaze shuttered closed.
“Someone wants to kill you and I think I know why.” The statement was low and earnest. The look on his face was startling, ferocious.
For the first time, she was unsure around him, scared. She glanced at the door, but he seemed to have forgotten it.
“When did these attempts on your life start?” he asked.
She stared at a bucket filled with clay, wondered what had possessed her to bring him here - to be here alone with him. “I ... I don’t know. Not until tonight on the ledge, I guess.” Even after recognizing that she’d felt a hand press into her back, she still couldn’t believe someone was trying to kill her, couldn’t fathom the possibility. She was no one. It had to be a mistake, an accident.
“On the ledge. When you were next to me?”
His voice was so level . . . safe. She looked up and frowned. “Yes.” She could see the truth in his eyes. He truly believed someone wanted to kill her. Yes, she’d felt a hand, but . . .
She thought back. Memories flooded her brain - little sounds as she was perched on the ledge, sounds she’d disregarded. Did someone lean through the window and reach towards her? If it had been an accident they would have screamed, right? Called someone? Done something? Reality hit.
Someone had pushed her, and on purpose. Someone wanted her dead.
His lips thinned. “I don’t think this is about you. Not really.”
“How can it not be about me?” she asked, her mind reeling. Someone tried to kill her. The thought shook her, more than anything that had happened that night. Meeting Mord, learning that gargoyles (whether he would admit it or not) weren’t just the inanimate hunks of stone people thought - that hadn’t surprised her at all. It had actually been reassuring.
Deep inside, she’d always known there was life inside stone. She’d felt it but been afraid to let the thoughts creep into her consciousness. Still, deep down, she’d known. Mord coming to life had been the evidence she’d always been lacking, the proof she needed. For the first time, everything made sense.
But a killer targeting her? That made no sense.
Mord held out his hand - large, square and reassuring. She slipped her fingers into his, let out a breath as his hand enclosed hers.
“I think I need to tell you a few things.”
Kami’s fingers were so small, so fragile, but they made Mord tingle with life.
How could he have missed it at first? Then doubted it? It was obvious she was no simple human. She held the secret to life in her touch. She was the reason he was awake, and he was the reason someone wanted her dead.
“Have you carved around anyone? Has anyone shown an interest in your work?”
She shook her head. “No, I ...” Her words trailed off, her gaze shifted to the block of alabaster. “There was ...” Her head tilted, her brows drew together. “No, that’s silly. It wouldn’t make sense.”
“What?” The word came out more order than question.
She licked her lips, blew air out of her rounded mouth. He breathed in, couldn’t stop himself. Pulling air into his body that had just left hers seemed to strengthen him, make him more alive than he’d ever been before.
She continued, “The man who sold me the alabaster. He called himself the Mason. He talked to me about what I was going to do. He had pictures of gargoyles, lots of them.”
“He wanted you to carve a gargoyle?” Mord asked.
“Yes, but . . . not like you. All his pictures were of mixed animal grotesques - lions with wings, cat heads on eagle bodies. That kind of thing.”
Chimeras. He had wanted her to create chimeras. Mord hid his shock, concentrated on getting Kami to talk. It wasn’t hard. She almost bubbled over with information.
Within minutes she’d shared enough that Mord knew he had to find the man who’d sold her the stone, question him at least.
But the sun would rise soon and Mord would turn to stone. Hopefully, when night fell again, he would awake. Mord clenched his jaw - hopefully. There was no guarantee. He wasn’t supposed to be awake now. Was supposed to still be under the sorcerer’s spell. Once night fell, whatever magic had awakened him might disappear. He might go back into his rocky sleep never to wake again.
Kami’s fingers flexed in his hand. She smiled up at him — trusting. And unexplainably, he wanted her to trust him. Wanted to wake the next night to be with her again.
But why? She offered only complications to his situation, kept him from travelling out and checking on the other gargoyles, the chimeras. He should want to be free from her.
What was happening to him? Some other piece to the spell?
He shoved the questions from his mind. Daylight was still a couple of hours or more off. He’d concentrate on Kami for now, then perhaps he’d be able to forget her.
Mord had been silent since they’d left her apartment. He was still human. There was no sign that he was in reality a gargoyle, except his perfect physique - a physique so well developed and balanced it had to have been crafted. No amount of training or special diets would have given those results.
And he was dressed as a human. Kami had gone next door and explained to her neighbour, who was just returning from a party, that her date had spilled marinara on himself at dinner. Luckily her neighbour was huge, although not in the same way as Mord, and generous. He’d supplied her with pants that managed to cover Mord’s muscular thighs and a shirt that was able to close over his chest.
She’d sighed when Mord had pulled on the clothing. She missed being able to study him, press her fingers against his bare skin. He’d started to leave without her, but she’d insisted he take her, assured him she’d go alone to the Mason’s if he didn’t. Still, he’d only agreed when she pointed out that he couldn’t know for sure where the Mason was - that he could be hiding nearby, to attack her as soon as Mord left.
She unlocked her car and waited outside the driver’s door as Mord eyed the machine, then started to slip his massive body into the passenger seat. Her apartment was within walking distance of Mord’s skyscraper. She’d walked by him every day for the past three years, but to get to the Mason’s shop, they would have to drive - or fly. Although Mord had quit denying what he was, he had made no move to reveal his wings. She hoped he’d get past his hang-up and learn to trust her.
Lights came down the street, blinding her. She raised a hand to protect her eyes and fought the surge of panic that rose in her breast. It was just a car. Yes, someone had tried to run her down with one earlier, but she couldn’t jump at every automobile that drove by. And last time she’d been alone. Now Mord was with her.
The car turned into a side street, an alley really, covered in gravel. She relaxed, laughed. See, silly.
She waved at Mord who was wedged into the passenger seat, looking crowded and tense. She laughed again and forced herself to find humour in his situation, to pretend all of this was normal.
She somehow dropped her keys in the process.
She bent to retrieve them and heard tyres crunching over gravel. Panic shot through her so quickly, she knew it had never really left her. She clawed at the ground.
An engine roared. She didn’t have to look, she knew the car was speeding towards her.
Mord heard the auto turn. Kami had disappeared out of sight after bending to retrieve her dropped keys. Without seeing her, he didn’t know if she sensed the danger, but it didn’t matter. The human female had no hope of out-running the car. She was trapped between the one swinging towards her and her own. It had taken Mord a lifetime to wedge himself into Kami’s tiny vehicle. He’d taken extra care so as not to damage the seat or frame as he shoved his too big body into the constraining space, but it took only seconds for him to free himself.
He thought of the danger approaching her. His anger rock hard, his body immediately shifted, grew even larger, more muscular. Wings sprouted from his back. Metal shrieked as they unfolded and ripped through the vehicle’s roof. The door he’d just carefully pulled closed flew from its hinges; one strike of his elbow sent it sailing into the building Kami called home.
He sprang onto the street, didn’t pause as he leaped again, his thighs propelling his body upwards, his wings, straight and strong, keeping him on track. He shot into the sky, saw the car -the same one that had tried to run her down earlier - hurtling down the road. Its lights were off this time, making the driver’s intention all the more clear.
Kami. Where was she? An icy coldness wrapped around his chest, startled him. He’d heard humans describe the sensation. They called it fear. But gargoyles didn’t fear, didn’t feel any emotion. They did their job because they did - they got no joy from their acts, suffered no loss at their failures. They just “acted”. Which is what he had to do now, if Kami were to survive.
He landed beside the car, facing the attacking vehicle. His feet crunched through the road’s surface. He spun, ignoring the debris he’d created. “Kami,” he called, intending to scoop her up, whisk her to safety.
“Here.” Her voice was rough, afraid. She’d rolled under the car, lying with her face inches from the pavement; her keys were clasped in her hand. “Get out of here. The car - it’s—” Her eyes widened.
Mord spun, faced the car. He could see the driver again — a man, small with a hat pulled low over his brow. The human grasped the car’s wheel, his knuckles white. There was fear in his eyes. He knew he was going to die.
There was no time to stop the inevitable. Mord stood strong, let the man-made mass smash into him. The front of the car bowed inwards. Tyres squealed, metal screamed. White balloons of cloth billowed into the windows, muffling whatever noise the man emitted.
Mord thrust his fist through what remained of the car’s windshield and grabbed the human by the front of his shirt. He hung there, limp.
“Is he ... ?” Kami whispered from beneath her car. Her voice shook, but Mord could hear her scrambling beneath the vehicle, scooting her way to the other side. Within seconds she stood beside him.
He pulled the man who would have killed her close, stared into his blank face. “I don’t know him,” he muttered. He’d thought the man might be someone from his past.
“It’s the Mason,” Kami murmured. She stepped over mangled pieces of metal, didn’t stop until she stood right next to Morel. She lay her hand on his arm. “Put him down. Is he—” she swallowed “—dead?”
“I—” Mord started to answer, but other voices cut him off.
“What’s happening out there?”
“Dear God. Call 911.”
Kami gripped his arm tighter. “The police, they’ll be coming.”
Sirens sounded in the distance. On the horizon the first pink strip of the coming sun appeared.
Mord glanced back at the man in his grasp. Blood stained his face, and his breathing was shallow - but it was there. He was alive.
Kami saw it too. “Put him down.” Her touch was warm and insistent.
There were only minutes until Mord would turn to rock. If he didn’t leave, take his place back on the building, he’d be found here. Then what? He didn’t want to leave the man alive, but he also wanted to question him, find out what he knew about the gargoyles and their enemies, why he was hunting Kami.
Kami pressed her fingers into Mord’s skin, nodded towards the ground. “Put him down. I’ll be OK. I know now, and he’s in rough shape. He may not make it, and if he does it will be a long time before he can try again.”
She was right, but setting the human down, not crunching her would-be killer’s throat under his foot was one of the hardest things Mord had ever had to do.
And he had to do it because Kami asked it of him. She’d brought him back to life - he owed her, but it was more than that. He wanted to do it because to do otherwise would cause her pain.
He never wanted anything to cause her pain again.
He set the man down.
Relief washed over Kami’s face, and she smiled. “It’s right. I couldn’t . . . thanks.” And she smiled again at him.
Then she leaned forwards and pressed a kiss to his lips. “Go back to my apartment. I’ll talk to the police, then later ...” She squeezed his arm again, her eyes glowing. “We’ll talk.” She ran a finger along his chin. Mord’s hands rose. He had to fight to keep himself from gathering her to him. He could already feel his skin beginning to harden, his blood to slow. Her magic wasn’t working, or had run out. With the sun, he would return to stone.
Would he wake again? Or was this it? His one chance outside the sorcerer’s curse? He should be happy that he’d had this night with Kami. He could feel the sadness that leaving her was causing him.
Up on the building, perched on the ledge, he stared down at her as he began to lose feeling in his feet. All he could think of was how much it hurt to leave her, to know he might never see her again.
Kami had awakened him more deeply than he’d thought, changed not just his frozen state, but his heart - his soul.
Impossible as it seemed, he loved her.
And the next time he woke might be one hundred years in the future. Or perhaps, he’d never wake again.
Kami spent hours at the accident scene, telling her story over and over, or the one she’d made up. The bowed hood of her attacker’s car was hard to explain, as was the passenger door that Mord had torn off her vehicle. By the time an officer discovered the footprints broken through the asphalt, they quit asking, just shook their heads and snapped photos.
It was almost ten the next morning when she was finally released. The Mason had been rushed off as soon as an ambulance arrived. She’d learned he was alive, but in critical condition. No one would say if they thought he would make it or not.
Kami wanted to get home, to be with Mord.
She hurried inside, but the place was empty. Belatedly, she realized she’d locked the door. He’d had no way in. He must have gone somewhere else to wait, but where?
Realizing exactly where he would go — the only other place he could go - she raced back out of the door without bothering to pull it closed behind her. She wanted to see him. Needed to see him.
Beneath his building, she paused, shielding her eyes from the bright light. He was there, right where he’d always been, in all his gargoyle glory. She smiled. All these people walking by and none of them realized he was alive.
She jumped up and waved to grab his attention.
He didn’t move.
She jumped again.
Nothing.
He wasn’t moving. He wasn’t pretending. He was rock. Solid, hard rock. Just like the lump that had formed in her gut.
She raced towards the building, flew past the doorman who tried to stop her from entering and made it into the elevator. The other occupants stepped back, stared at her. She caught a glimpse of herself in the polished metal doors - hair tangled, eyes wild. She looked like someone who’d missed her meds, someone who believed in gargoyles.
She ignored the thought, darted from the elevator as soon as the doors opened. The room that led to Mord’s ledge was empty. It was easy to get in, to slide up the window and crawl along the ledge.
He was there - beautiful, perfect. She whispered his name, reached out to touch him, and felt a hand wrap around her ankle. She heard a woman’s voice shrieking, a man speaking softly as he pulled her in off the ledge. “You’re fine now. Someone is coming.”
But she wasn’t fine. They didn’t understand. She wasn’t fine because Mord wasn’t with her. She was alone. Again.
Months had passed. Months filled with medications and doctors, telling Kami gargoyles were just statues, that her vivid fantasies had caused her to somehow crash her car and cause a terrible accident that had almost killed a man.
She’d taken to walking the streets at night, staring up at the building, at Mord. He was always there, never moved.
The doctors were right. He wasn’t alive, but it couldn’t have all been a dream. It couldn’t have.
The wind whistled past Mord’s face. Another night, awake, alone. He’d travelled the city, searched to see if other gargoyles were awake, if the chimeras were awake. None were. He was alone.
His search for the sorcerer had also been futile.
Then he’d turned his attention to the Mason. The man had a warehouse full of statues, each intricately crafted, each a mix of man and beast. An army of chimeras, but locked in stone. Mord had walked among them in the deep of night. None had stirred. The Mason had to be building a force of chimeras, planning to use Kami to bring them to life. Was he alone? Or were there others in on his plan?
If Mord hadn’t been so fixated on saving Kami, he might know the answer. But he’d reacted to the danger to Kami with no thought of saving the one man that might have the information he needed to keep the world safe - The Mason. He’d risked everything for one human: Kami. It couldn’t happen again.
He gazed down, only his eyes lowering. Kami was below on the street, watching again. Every night she’d watched, appeared at erratic intervals. She needed to give up, move on. He couldn’t be with her. A part of him said he couldn’t even afford to allow her to live. Yes, she could bring the gargoyles back to life, but she could also be used against them. If she were dead, that risk would be gone.
At first he’d told himself he’d use her to awaken the gargoyles, then eliminate her once the job was done. But he knew that was a lie. He knew if he allowed himself to get that close to her, he’d weaken and think of another reason to spare her. But as long as the chimeras remained asleep, all would be well. Which brought him back to killing Kami.
But he was weak, couldn’t bring himself to do it.
Night after night, she appeared, as if to torture him. And night after night he fought the same battle inside himself, between his head and his heart; the latter, an organ he hadn’t had to deal with before meeting Kami. Which one would win?
“One last time,” Kami told herself through her tears. She’d bribed a member of the cleaning crew, bought her way back into the building, and out onto the ledge. The crew was gone now, everyone was gone. Even the streets were empty.
There was no one here but her and Mord.
She inched forwards. Ran her hand down his arm. He was cold, still, stone.
She was here. Mord tried to stop his heart from beating, tried to stay in his stony state. If he revealed that he was alive, he’d have to make the choice. Do his duty and kill her? Or go with his heart and let her live?
Her hand grazed his arm, warm and supple. His body tingled, the feeling of life flowing into him almost painful. He gritted his teeth. Why wouldn’t she give up?
“Mord?” Her voice caught. “Mord?” A whisper. Her fingers trailed down his side.
He kept his gaze firm — straight ahead.
“I love you.” She pressed a kiss against his shoulder, started to move backwards, towards the window.
He’d won. She’d given up.
Then he heard it, a sob. He felt the moisture she’d left behind on his skin.
She was crying, over him.
He tried to resist, tried to stop himself, but couldn’t. Couldn’t deny any longer that the magic wasn’t temporary. It had changed him. He loved this human, enough that he would risk anything, everything, to keep her safe.
He stepped forwards, off of the ledge. He spread his wings behind him and hovered behind Kami. “I love you too.”
She froze, twisted too quickly, and fell. But Mord was there to catch her. Just like he would always be.
Lori Devoti
Author of the Unbound series from Silhouette Nocturne.
loridevoti.com
Constable & Robinson Ltd
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First published in the UK by Robinson, an imprint of Constable & Robinson, 2009
“When Gargoyles Fly” © by Lori Devoti. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
The right of Trisha Telep to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs & Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out or otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
A copy of the British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data is available from the British Library
UK ISBN 978-1-84529-941-5
First published in the United States in 2009 by Running Press Book Publishers
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