Page 9 of Bite of the Gargoyle

Yet, it’s him. It has to be.

I wake up in a cold sweat. It coats the top of my forehead and the back of my neck. My eyes fly open, and I see an endless ceiling of gray rock. My forehead aches something fierce and I remember how the vampire, the gargoyle, head-butted me into unconsciousness, the bastard.

I try to sit up, but a piercing pain in my back stops me from getting up entirely. I pause, fighting through the knot of pain between my shoulders, and make my way to my knees, grunting.

I immediately notice the bars that lock me into the cave-like structure. There’s a lock on the door, big and bulky. It’s ornately carved with fleur-de-lis on either side. Clearly, I’m not in a prison of sorts—perhaps even a dungeon. But I’m not worried. I’ve been held captive before. And I’ve escaped.

The rage from my dream suddenly fills me, roosting in my chest like fiery blood, pulsing, and beating.

I reach for my twirled braid that still sits like a hill at the nape of my neck. The bobby blade I used to pin it is still sitting pretty, right where I left it. I take the blade out, allowing my braid to tumble down my back, and I stare at the pin’s lovely little length for a moment. It rests in my palm.

I fashioned it from an old pin my mother was wearing when she died. It fell off her dress when the vampire killed her, and it’s damn near the only thing I have left that means anything to me.

Crawling the prison bars, I reach around them and position myself against the lock, pressing my pelvis to the back of it to get more leverage. My arms are thin enough to fit through the slats with relative ease. Reaching out, I take hold of the lock and feel that it has a hitch in the side that’s going to make picking it a touch more difficult.

But this is a position I’ve been in before. A few times, actually.

One of the most important lessons a hunter like me can learn is how to pick a lock—to steal, to survive. I play with the pin, moving it up and down, back and forth and fairly soon, the lock clicks open. Then I pull my bobby blade free and quickly pin my braid back up to keep it from touching the cool sweat at the base of my neck.

I still haven’t shaken off the dream—it’s left me in something of a funk, but I’ve got enough control of my faculties to get myself out of here. That much, I know for sure.

I push the door open half an inch. It makes a metallic creaking sound that’s so loud, it practically screams in my ear. No good. Unless Iamin a dungeon, in which case, anyone above won’t hear me.

Not wanting to take any chances, I need to be quick. So, slowly, steadily, I push the door open. It continues to creak, but there’s nothing to be done for it. With dreams of escape playing through my head, I squeeze through the tight opening.

Chapter Four

I make sure to keep my footsteps light as I exit the cell.

There’s little to no light, save for a few dim torches that seem to do nothing but illuminate the space one square foot in front of me. The torches are placed far apart so distances are all guesswork in the bitter darkness. From what I can tell, this is definitely a dungeon of some sort. There are numerous cells lined up beside one another, each no larger than ten feet by ten feet. As far as I can tell, there’s no one else locked up in here with me—or no one else living, that is.

I have to wonder why the torches are even lit down here at all—a place that’s seemingly been forgotten—if the cobwebs and rusted bars are anything to go on. Not only that, but vampires have keen night vision so why bother with the torches at all? Maybe the whole point is to reveal the full extent of a prisoner’s incarceration in order to drain them of any hope of escaping?

Vampires really are the goddamn worst of any living thing I’ve ever encountered. Well, I say ‘living’, but we all know they’re no more than walking corpses, barely better than zombies. But, at the end of the day, a monster is a monster. Plain and simple. Some are worse than others, and vampires are even worse than those, but none of them deserve mercy.

I place my hand lightly against the stone wall. It’s damp, a little cold to the touch, and prickled with sharp divots in the rock. A rat pounces toward me and skitters half way up my leg. I swat it away, but manage to lose my balance, and catch myself against the painfully craggy side of the wall.

Yanking my hand back, I can now feel a very subtle pulse in the base of my hand where it hit the craggy wall. I hold it up to my face and smell the slightest trace of blood. The iron is subtle, but noticeable. I didn’t really feel any pain, but it takes a lot more than a few little jagged rocks to make me hurt. Someone like me is almost impervious to pain because I’ve known so much of it. Real pain. The pain of life after love lost. Whatever pain I might encounter in the aftermath of real, true pain? Well, that’s just ignorable happenstance.

I walk a few steps more, coming closer to one of the torches. They’re all too high up to touch on my tip toes, much less grab. But at least there’s a little bit of light to work with, so I can see my injury. As expected, the blood is dripping, but the wound isn’t bad. Still, I don’t want to risk infection. So, I rip off a swath of fabric from the bottom of my white linen shirt. The blood begins to seep through it quickly, so I wrap it as tightly as I can. Tying a sloppy little knot with my left hand, I cinch the impromptu bandage tightly with my teeth. The wrapping is ugly, blotched with blood already and fraying around the torn edge of its lower side, but it’ll have to do. At least for now.

I lower myself into a crouch, choosing to use the ground instead of the wall to guide me. The floor, like the walls, is damp, but less so. It’s drier down here by a bit, which makes me wonder what exactly is making the walls so wet. Is something leaking in from the ground above? Whatever it is, it’s too slick to be water.

Leaving that mystery for someone else, I continue my trek. When I reach the end of the hall, some sixty feet ahead, I can see what looks like the outline of a much larger torch. It emits much more light than the rest did. As I come closer, the light spreads, grows brighter until I realize I’m headed for the entrance to a room flooded with torches.

I pick up my pace, mindful of the sound of my footsteps, and head towards it. My heart is thumping pretty loudly, but my breath comes at its normal pace. I’ve trained my breathing to stay steady, to keep my body ready even in the most tiring and stressful of circumstances. Such training serves me well now, because I have no idea what’s going to be hiding in the crevices of that room.

I’m close enough to see the arching entrance of the room fully now. It arcs up to a point at the top where a blood-red gemstone rests amid the sweeping patterns of iron filigree. The stone, a ruby, is beautiful, and for a single second, it takes my breath away.

I stand up straight and lightly press my back against the wall, hiding myself from the openness of the entrance to the room. I felt too exposed so I inch my way closer, around the tight corner, and place myself right at the edge of the archway. I’m flat against the entrance wall now, just to the right of the iron threshold. I don’t have my knife any longer. It’s likely lost to the woods or perhaps that detestable vampire took it. As of now, unfortunately, my only option for self-defense is the bobby blade.

I sigh and undo my hair once again.

This time, I don’t let the braid fall, not even risking the silent thump. Instead, I unfurl it slowly against my shoulder. It’s a little bit of overkill, but I’d rather overkill than underkill.

With the bobby blade firmly in the grip of my left hand, I take a deep breath and ready myself to make my entrance. I’ve always favored stealth when the option is afforded me, but here, now, there’s no opportunity for stealth. Just a hole in a wall that leads into a dimly lit…something. There’s nothing to hide behind, nowhere to take stock before I make a move. There’s simply no option besides entering the room as fast and as violently as I can, relying on simple shock to boost me in whatever battle may ensue.

Anxiety pulses through my chest, but, at the same time, a fair bit of excitement. The adrenaline of jumping head-first into the unknown has always brought a smile to my face, but the fear still sits loyally alongside the excitement.

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