Chapter 10
Chapter Ten
The bag on my back bounces with every stride as the Peacekeeper Station’s twisted, destroyed mess gets closer.
The impact of what happened here is worse on street level.
The remains of the building’s frame stab into the night sky as if magic has taken a bite out of it.
The image lingers, searing my brain—a poignant moment I will remember for the rest of my life.
It’s life-changing, and I can’t get my head around it.
One second, everything is unchangeable, unfair, and frustrating but predictable, and the next second, everything is gone. You don’t know what you’ve got until you lose it.
The closer I get to the Station, the worse it is, and the ground rapidly changes under my feet. Whenever my trainers land, puffs of grey ash join the swirling smoke.
The heat here must have gotten so bad that the glass and metals from the surrounding buildings have turned to sand. Even the tarmac has a sand-like consistency, and the granular particles make running hard work. The burn in my Achilles tendons attests to that.
The spell or weapon they used was a devastating one.
Evil.
I don’t know what the invaders want or what they think we’ve done to warrant this level of destruction, but this is so wrong.
I hunch my shoulders, and as I place my left foot down, the sandy surface moves.
I squeak as my foot lands on something squishy.
“What the hell!” I don’t know what I’m thinking when I grind to a stop to stare at the ground.
I almost swallow my tongue when I see the squishy thing is a hand.
Grey skin. A gargoyle. I freeze, and my breaths puff like a racehorse.
He’s dead. He must be dead, right?
I step back, carefully removing my foot, and the buried fingers twitch.
Oh fate, they moved!
My eyes almost pop out of my head. It must be ’cause I stood on them. I snap my gaze from left to right, checking that the coast is clear, and then drop to my knees to dig the gargoyle out.
What are you doing? My inner voice screams.
I hunch and dig faster.
Leaving him without checking if he’s alive would be wrong, and it won’t take a moment. Gargoyles are powerful creatures, but they still need to breathe.
As I scoop the ash away from the area around where his head should be, my hands burn and itch.
The sand stuff is made up of tiny shards.
The gargoyle with his tough, impenetrable skin will be okay—if he’s alive—my skin, not so much.
Unless a healing spell can fix this, I’ll be picking micro particle shards out for weeks.
No good deed goes unpunished and all that.
Still, I dig. I uncover a sharp-angled face.
Breathing heavily, I sit back on my heels.
He appears like a fallen statue with his square jaw and full lips.
His grey skin is an unhealthy pale shade.
He doesn’t look like a local gargoyle, not that I’m observant.
I’m terrible with faces and names and try to avoid them.
The guilt of making illegal charms makes me awkward.
I don’t know if they can sniff my magic out.
The council keeps us ignorant of other creatures.
It’s another bugbear of mine. I go to the library when I can and read—raiding the forbidden reference section.
Forewarned is forearmed and all that jazz.
He looks dead.
I lean closer, and it’s then I recognise his beautiful face. I’ve seen him before. He was the gargoyle at work tonight—the one who made me blush.
Oh.
I hover my now red, splinter-covered hand over his nose and mouth and try to catch any of his breaths on my skin. If I had a mirror… Under the ash, his chest isn’t moving.
He’s dead.
My heart hurts for him. It’s such a waste.
A piece of red hair that has escaped from my hat tickles the side of my temple and sticks to my sweat-covered cheek.
The smoke around us swirls, and the time I’m wasting ticks. I know I need to get going. The ward attached to my pinkie finger is happily buzzing away. For now, my family is safe.
I can take the time.
I don’t know what possesses me. I groan and dig the sand stuff from around his neck and broad shoulders, uncovering the top half of his torso. He feels warm, but that doesn’t say much as the area has been boiling.
My hands flutter again in front of his face.
I have no idea what I’m doing. I rub them on my trousers, and tugging off the rucksack, I open the bag and grab a healing charm.
It’s a mixture of yellow, white, and rose gold, and it has a cute gold pin badge shaped like a potion bottle with the words Heal Me in a swirly font.
The magic sings in my fist. It’s a good, potent spell.
I slap it onto his forehead, and the charm activates with a spark of my internal magic. The surrounding air ripples, and like rising heat, the spell glows.
“Well now, it’s doing something. It wouldn’t react if you were dead.”
I wait, hunched over him, worried we’ll be captured any minute. If he’s alive and does wake up, will he be caught up in the Pied Piper spell? Gargoyles are much stronger than humans, but I’m unsure if he’ll naturally be protected from that awful magic.
The smoke drops and parts. Within a beat of my heart, I have the glowing healing charm off the gargoyle’s forehead and back in my pocket, and another charm in the shape of a ghost activates.
I activate the magic just in time as another kill team strolls out of the smoke.
They come from around the right side of the building.
The Don’t See Me Now magic hides us. It will continue to do so if we don’t move or make a sound.
It’s not true invisibility—no one can do that—but it’s strong enough that their eyes should brush right over us.
The gargoyle’s eyes snap open.
Shit!
I slap my hand across his mouth and widen my eyes in the shut-up expression I cultivated for my brothers.
He tenses.
Oh no. I wait for him to be caught in the spell and stagger to his feet, but the angry light in his pale green eyes never changes. With my thumb, I tap him on the nose, and his eyes narrow.
He must see my panic, and as if a switch has been flicked, his training kicks in, and he stills. Deadly eyes watch me.
Oh, this is bad.
This is fucking scary.
He must deem me an easily rectified non-threat. One twist of those shovel hands of his and he can break my neck. The gargoyle turns his attention to the magic bubble surrounding us, the destruction, and finally, the invaders across the street.
His chin dips with understanding, and with the kill team facing away from us, I slowly slide my hand from his lips.
It seems to take forever for the kill team to move on.
When they get out of sight, neither of us twitches a muscle for another few more minutes.
It looks as if he can lie there all day.
My patience runs out, and I do my best not to slap him in the face with my salty, wet tea towel as I lean forward to whisper in his ear.
“I don’t know how long you’ve been out. But they hit the Station and the Academy about an hour ago.
They have a Pied Piper spell—a strong one.
Everyone caught up in it is heading towards the centre of town.
They have teams of six going house to house, hitting the homes with closed doors, killing any dragon bloods who are not caught up in the spell. You need to get off the street.”
His hands take hold of my shoulders, and I shiver as I’m gently moved back out of his space. I cringe. I’m glad the tea towel hides my no-doubt-red cheeks. I was a tad too close. After everything that’s happened, I might be feeling a little clingy.
“Where is everyone?” His voice is a rumble of rocks being shifted.
By everyone, he means the other gargoyles.
“I don’t know.” I don’t say it, but everything inside me screams that they’re dead.
I can’t help but reach out and pat his bare shoulder and shake my head.
I flip my hand to indicate the ground. “I dug you out.” I turn away from his intense, searching gaze and check for any changes in the smoke.
“I don’t want to be here when baddies come around again. ”
With an overwhelming need to get going, I drop the Don’t See Me Now magic and wobble to my feet.
His eyes narrow as the spell rebounds back into the ghost charm.
You saw that, did you? I mentally grumble as I stuff it into my pocket and take a second to heal my hands. The pain relief is instant, and I can almost imagine the plink, plink, plink sound of micro shards being pushed out of my fingertips and palms.
The gargoyle’s veiny forearms tense as he effortlessly pulls himself from his ashy tomb. He unfolds, and his massive body keeps going and going until he stands, towering above me. He must be a couple of feet taller than my five-foot-six frame.
I blink.
The gargoyle is missing his clothing.
Oh, bloody hell.
I can only imagine that it got blown off in the explosion. He stretches his wings, his lips move, and it takes me a second to tune in to what he is saying.
“Where are you going?”
“Home.” I keep my eyes purposely on his face as I’m no Pervy MacPervson. I feel sorry for him. We are at war, and he’s naked—running into battle with his meat and two veg flapping in the wind. He doesn’t seem too bothered about his state of undress, but how can I leave him with nothing?
You can’t fight invaders with your bits flapping.
I’ve already used two charms in front of him. What’s one more? Shit, we are all going to die anyway. I dig in my bag, hold out my hand, and drop a charm onto his palm. “The chant is simple. You just say clothe me.”
His expression goes from deadly to confused as he rolls the obsidian stone in the shape of a sock between his fingers.
“Here, let me.” I place my hand on top of his, and between us, the charm glows blue. It takes a single sweep of my lashes and the gargoyle is dressed in a simple black jumper and jogging bottoms.
Huh. Not bad.
He tugs at the top, which has even made space for his wings.
Get in. I’m mightily impressed with myself and mentally pat myself on the back. I was worried about the fit because he’s so big, but now I’m sure the charm can put sweats on a whale.
“What the hell are you?” He’s back to looking angry.
“Ah, and that’s gratitude for you.” I adjust the tea towel and tuck the wayward strand of hair under my hat. “I’m nobody. I’m nothing, just a girl.”
I need to go. I give him a friendly nod, then spin on my toes. My magic is odd, and now I’m paranoid that he’ll think I’ve got something to do with the attacks and attempt to arrest me. Or kill me.