Page 13 of The Gargoyle's Gift
Blocking the doorway with my body, I unsheathed my sword. “Hang on now, I’ve quite a bone to pick with you both,” I warned them.
“You’ll be killed for this,” Hugo spat.
“I’d love to see you try.”
To his credit, he did. Unfortunately for him, he was old, slow, and hadn’t shifted in who knew how long. Most members that sat around the council tables had become too used to the comforts of human life. I would go so far as to claim none of them fit in anywhere outside this stuffy, pompous, bureaucratic building.
Before he could either pull a weapon or shift into his stone skin, I had him by the throat with my sword.
“Back off!” Augustus yelled, one hand raised to the guards. The three that had approached stopped moving but held a loose formation around us. “Let him speak.”
I snarled. I was not here for reason or talking. I was here to watch the traitors who had turned me into a monster bleed out beneath my feet.
Something heavy hit the flat roof. I heard a scuffle in the distance behind me, but my back was turned. Then there was a sound that chilled my blood. A very female gasp, one prompted by struggle.
I jerked my head, looking over my shoulder. My blood surged as Lovette came into view across the roof, her dagger bloody as she stood wide-eyed over the body of a guard. She swiped away some splattered droplets from her own throat, then turned to face the remaining guards.
“Stop!” I shouted, hoping that the authority I poured into my voice had some effect on the guards. It did, but only for a moment. At least their training had done that much.
“I’m fine!” she yelled back, already parrying with one of them, a dagger in her hand and her wings splayed out wide.She was not, however, in her full stone form. Her anger had been riled, but I could tell she wasn’t comfortable causing harm to the humans. She kept glancing down at the body, no doubt wondering if she could still revive the man. “Please don’t make me kill you,” she said firmly, though her tone held an edge of pleading. The guards stepped back, stance defensive, but instead of keeping up the dance, they just watched her.
“Shift, Lovette,” I growled, hoping she listened.
“How interesting,” Augustus commented. “Isn’t she one of General Aurichal’s daughters? She special to you in some way, Caledon?”
Rage thrummed under my skin like a living thing, dark and fiery in its intensity. He dared speak of her like that? To threaten me was one thing, but his focus shifting to her was another beast entirely. Protecting someone else, especially Lovette, hadn't been part of my calculations. Her presence made me feel off balance, my skin too tight. Anxiety closed up my throat and made my chest heavy.
In response, I said nothing, only tightened my grip, the edge of my blade pressing into the fragile skin of Hugo’s throat.
I wanted him to feel like I did; like he couldn’t breathe.
With my blade through his trachea, that would certainly be a problem.
“Looks like your wounds have healed up,” Hugo wheezed, the spot where my forearm had been reattached right near his face. “Quite a miracle, that. I heard there was a magicked sword involved. Rumor has it there are dreadful side effects for everything it touches. By some accounts, you should already be dead.”
“Questionable how you forced the forge mistress to hand over that blade, councilman. Having it evaluated by a talented smith seems far more productive than shutting it away in thearchives. Unless you were simply returning it from where it originated?”
“You sure you’re feeling alright, Gaius? That’s a lofty accusation. Though you do still seem a bit unsteady. Perhaps all the ale you’ve been drinking is having some unwanted side effects?”
I ticked my head to the side, neck cracking as the tension eased slightly. I’d thought through at least a dozen scenarios for how this would go. All of them ended with the councilmen dead. But now I worried I needed to know everything they knew before I took their miserable little lives.
“The red-haired fae. How long was he your agent?” I growled the words into the ear of Hugo, pressing my blade tighter to his throat. “He attacked me with a cursed blade, nearly took my limbs from me altogether. Lost me my job, my post. I obeyed my orders blindly for decades, protecting him. Protecting the council. So why would you still worry about him at all? What does he know that you don’t want getting out? What value did he hold that you were willing to sacrifice me and all of Revalia for?”
My gut rolled, remembering the day the red-haired fae had divested me of an arm and a leg. Not only had I told my soldiers to ignore that they’d seen him do it, I’d been willing to just be done with this existence because of the injury. I shuddered. There was a blurry place in my mind when I tried to rememberwhyI’d covered for the fae. I knew it had been an order, but to what end?
My anger rose, realizing how weak and foolish that sounded. When had I grown so ready to give my will, my control, to someone else?
Augustus smirked. “I told you he wouldn’t remember.”
Every muscle in my body stiffened. Frustrated, I realized I couldn’t kill them now, not until I knew all their secrets and howI fit into them. I didn’t deserve it, but I also wouldn’t mind some closure to ease my own self-hatred if there was some to be had.
As I weighed my options, the sound of Lovette crying out in rage echoed off the building. I spun us a quarter turn so I could see what had happened. Her clothing was splashed with crimson, her eyes wide and arm still outstretched, though no guards remained standing. And she hadn’t shifted, despite my command for her to do so.
“I asked nicely,” she said, an almost indistinguishable tremor in her voice. “I said please. I didn’t come here to kill anyone.” Yet she had, in only her human skin. The sight of her bright-blue eyes full of frustrated tears, a streak of blood across her face, gutted me.
As I stared, I realized how foolish I’d been, yet again. Her arrival had been the perfect distraction, and they’d taken advantage of it. The doors opened and several more guards boiled out. I was shoved, weapons thrust at me from all directions. How they’d sent a signal was a mystery, but it was too little too late for me to worry about that.
My blade dragged across Hugo’s throat as I beat my powerful wings enough to lift me up and away from the threat. Unfortunately, it was not enough to do substantial damage. I ducked and dodged the oncoming advances after drifting back down in a more open spot, the cowardly councilmen fleeing back inside. Several of the guards followed them, blades held out as they backed through the door.
