Chapter 4
FLYNN
The gargoyles stare. I stare back.
And this knife-eared bureaucrat in loafers just parked two enchanted surveillance rocks on my street and told ME I'm in violation.
The left gargoyle shifts. Just a fraction. Its head grinds toward Junia, and something in that eyeless stone face locks onto her like a scope finding a target.
No.
My boots move before the rest of me catches up. Three steps and I'm between Junia and the gargoyles, my shoulders squared, my body a wall of moss-green skin and faded cotton. The shirt stretches tight across my ribs.
"Flynn, what are you—"
"Stay behind me."
The right gargoyle's head swivels. Both of them are watching me now. Good.
The left one takes a step. One heavy, grinding step. The sidewalk cracks deeper under its foot. A chunk of concrete pops loose and tumbles into Junia's destroyed wildflower bed.
More property damage. Caused by Valerius's enforcement apparatus. On MY street.
I plant my feet. Shoulder-width apart. Knees slightly bent. The same stance I used to hold a shield wall in the Kragmoor passes, except I was nineteen then and wearing armor instead of cargo shorts.
The gargoyle takes another step.
I put my hands on it.
Stone. Cold. Dense as a grudge. My palms flatten against its body and the thing weighs at least four hundred pounds. Its clawed feet dig furrows in the sidewalk as I push. My quads burn. My shoulders lock. The gargoyle pushes back, and for a second it's like shoving a parked truck.
Then it slides.
Three inches. Six. A foot. The concrete screams under its claws.
The second gargoyle lunges and I catch it with my left arm, hooking my forearm under its chin, and now I'm pushing both of them, legs driving, the soles of my boots splitting on the cracked sidewalk.
My back teeth grind together hard enough to taste enamel.
"FLYNN!"
The gargoyles' wings flare. Stone feathers spread wide, each one sharp enough to cut, and they slam against my forearms. Pain lances from wrist to elbow. Shallow cuts open on my skin, dark green blood welling in thin lines.
I don't let go.
I shove harder. Both gargoyles skid backward across the sidewalk, claws throwing sparks, and I drive them off the wildflower strip, off the curb, and into the street. The asphalt holds them better. Their claws grip. They push back and my boots slide an inch.
Two inches.
I dig in.
"Get OFF my street."
A horn. Sharp. The silver Audi has stopped thirty yards down the road. Valerius is leaning out the driver's window, his pale face arranged in an expression of practiced inconvenience.
"Flynn. Those are municipal property."
"They're damaging the sidewalk. Section 3, Subsection A. No resident or agent thereof shall cause degradation to communal infrastructure."
Silence. Even the gargoyles pause. Their stone heads tilt in unison, as if receiving a signal.
Valerius's left eye twitches. Barely. An elf twitch. Microscopic. But I see it.
"You're citing ordinance at my gargoyles."
"I'm citing ordinance at YOU. The sidewalk has four new cracks.
The curb is chipped. And your vehicle left tire impressions in a street-facing planting strip, which is a Category Two landscape violation.
" I keep my hands on the gargoyles. Blood runs down my forearms and drips onto stone.
"You want to talk about seventy-two hours? File your own paperwork first."
The Audi idles. Valerius's fingers tap the steering wheel. Once. Twice.
He snaps.
The gargoyles go dead under my palms. The tension drains out of them like water from a cracked pot. They fold. Wings tucking, limbs retracting, shrinking down into compact stone blocks no bigger than shoeboxes. They sit on the asphalt, inert. Lawn ornaments.
"Seventy-two hours, Flynn." Valerius pulls his arm back into the car. "For both of you."
The Audi slides away. Silent. Immaculate.
I stand in the street, bleeding from both forearms, breathing hard, sweat rolling down my neck and pooling in the collar of my t-shirt. My boots are ruined. The right sole has separated entirely. My cargo shorts have a rip across the left pocket.
Unacceptable.
"Holy shit."
I turn. Junia stands on the curb with her coffee mug still in her hand. Her eyes are wide. Her curls are wild. There's a streak of potting soil across her nose and her mouth is hanging open in a way that makes my stomach do something completely unauthorized.
"You just wrestling-matched two magic gargoyles off my lawn."
"Off the sidewalk. The sidewalk is communal property."
She blinks. Looks at my arms. The cuts. The blood.
"You're hurt."
I look down. Green blood streaks both forearms from wrist to elbow.
"It's superficial."
She sets her coffee on the fence post and grabs my wrist.
Her fingers are warm.
Her fingers are warm and covered in dirt and wrapped around my wrist like she has any right to touch me without filing a contact request form first.
"Let go."
"You're literally bleeding."
"It's orcish blood. It clots in forty seconds."
"It's been forty seconds and you're still bleeding."
She has a point. The cuts sting in the open air, thin lines of dark green running down to my knuckles. The stone feathers sliced cleaner than I expected. Enchanted edges. Of course Valerius would spring for enchanted edges.
Junia tugs my arm closer. She peers at the cuts with the focused intensity of someone inspecting root rot on a prize orchid.
"I have comfrey salve inside. It'll—"
"I have a first aid kit. Organized. Labeled. Alphabetized."
"You alphabetized your first aid kit?"
"Acetaminophen before bandages. Bandages before cauterizing iron. It's logical."
She drops my wrist. But she doesn't step back. She's standing close enough that the smell of potting soil and something floral—jasmine, maybe, or honeysuckle—cuts through the morning air and lodges itself somewhere behind my sternum.
"Thank you," she says.
"I wasn't protecting you. I was protecting the sidewalk."
Her mouth twitches. "Sure, big guy."
I turn away before my face does something I can't control and walk to my porch, stepping carefully because the right boot is flapping like a dying fish.
The morning is ruined. My boots are ruined.
My lawn routine is forty-seven minutes behind schedule.
I have blood on my shirt, and the grass is still pockmarked with flamingo peck marks from last night's debacle.
I sit on the porch steps and start cleaning the cuts with the emergency antiseptic wipes I keep in my left cargo pocket.
The mail carrier pulls up at 9:14 AM. Six minutes early. Sloppy.
She drops a single envelope in my box. Heavy cardstock. Cream colored. The HOA seal pressed into the flap in gold wax—a stylized oak tree wrapped in thorns, because Valerius has never met a symbol he couldn't make aggressive.
I open it with my pocketknife. Clean cut. No tearing.
Inside: a letter printed on linen paper so thick it could stop a small-caliber bullet.
Dear Valued Resident of Cedarbrook Estates,
It is my distinct pleasure to announce the 14th Annual Cedarbrook Estates Garden Competition, to be held one week from the date of this correspondence.
As President of your Homeowners Association, I have taken the liberty of expanding the competition's stakes to better reflect our community's commitment to excellence.
The winner shall receive full immunity from HOA dues for a period of one calendar year, as well as permanent exemption from quarterly property inspections.
The entrant who receives the lowest score shall forfeit their property to the Cedarbrook Estates HOA trust, effective immediately.
I read that last line again.
And again.
I fold the letter. Set it on my knee. Pick it up. Read it a third time.
Forfeit their property.
My jaw tightens until something pops near my ear. The letter continues on the back.
Scoring will be conducted by an independent panel of three judges selected by the HOA board (myself). Categories include: aesthetic cohesion, botanical diversity, structural landscaping, and neighborhood harmony. All residents are automatically enrolled.
Sincerely and with warmth,
Valerius Thandril
President, Cedarbrook Estates HOA
"Excellence is not optional."
Automatically enrolled.
I flip the envelope over. A second sheet. A scoring rubric. Color-coded. The "neighborhood harmony" category is worth forty percent of the total score, and the description reads: Subjective assessment of the entrant's contribution to community spirit, as determined solely by the HOA President.
Forty percent.
Subjective.
Determined by Valerius.
I stand up. The porch step creaks. My hands are shaking, not from fear but from the raw, physical effort of not ripping this letter into confetti and eating it.
This is a hit job. A surgical, bureaucratic assassination. Valerius can't evict us outright—I checked the bylaws—so he's built a competition where he controls the scoring, enrolled us without consent, and made the penalty for losing everything.
My property. My lawn. My eleven years of edge work and aeration schedules and hand-sanded cedar fencing.
A screen door bangs next door. Junia is on her porch, holding an identical cream envelope. She's already torn it open—torn it, like an animal—and is reading with her lips moving.
Her face goes white under the potting soil.
"Flynn."
"I know."
"He can't do this."
"He just did."
"He can't LEGALLY—"
"Page two, paragraph four. He amended the HOA charter last month. Emergency powers clause. I missed it because I was busy quarantining your vine."
She stares at me over the fence. The fence I built. The fence that separates my world from hers.
"Neighborhood harmony," she says. "Forty percent."
"Subjective scoring."
"By him."
"By him."
She looks down at her yard. The flamingo craters. The half-planted wildflower beds. The post-hole digger still lying on its side in the dirt. Then she looks at my yard. The peck marks. The cracked sidewalk. The green blood drying on the steps.