Hated By the Gargoyle (Gargoyles of the Underworld #3)

Lucero

There was a monster stalking us. I noticed it days ago, though I admitted when I first saw it, I wasn’t entirely sure what it was. A fluke, perhaps. A smudge in the background. A dark shadow or a blur I captured on camera by accident.

But I kept taking pictures.

And in every single one of them, it appeared.

When Carlota asked me to photograph her around the city so she could add them to her modeling portfolio, I didn’t know how to say no. She’d batted her pretty brown eyes at me, the same way she’d done when we were children when she wanted to get her way.

We’d been friends since primary school and I knew all her tricks and manipulations. I knew all the charms she expelled to reel me in like a fish on a hook that she dangled in front of her for her own amusement. And even though I knew all of it, I was still powerless to resist.

Maybe it was because she was pretty. Tall, thin, big-breasted… She was statuesque. Literally, everything people wanted in models these days.

She was aiming to find her big break, and of course, she needed me for that.

And maybe I would’ve felt more excited about getting experience as a photographer under my belt by helping her, but I was doing the work for free and had been annoyed with her demands from the start.

But Carlota blinked at me and smiled, and when she tugged me close, hooking her arm through mine with a warmth that didn’t feel forced or fake, it reminded me that she was my only friend.

And my only friend had a temper that gave me whiplash.

If I said no, she would disappear for weeks, months even, until I crawled through the broken fragments of my pride to apologize.

So I trailed behind her in all my own awkwardness. A beauty and a beast–nicknames I’d heard people utter about us far too often, because she was beautiful, too ethereal to be human, and I was decidedly not.

A gremlin creature, with curly hair I didn’t know how to tame because I’d never been taught, gapped teeth, and too pointy of a nose that hid behind the lens of my most prized possession.

My camera was filled with hundreds of pictures of Carlota in different poses in front of different buildings. She moved her body just so, curving and manipulating it to look even more beguiling than she already was.

I wasn’t immune to the intensity in her gaze. She was breathtaking, and I tried to capture the essence of that, instead of the poison I knew could be underneath. It was a testament to my own skill that I was able to do just that.

It was in the very early hours of the morning as I was editing the pictures on my laptop that I first noticed that thing.

A shadow in the background behind Carlota.

At first, it was in the top corner, barely visible but contrasting enough to give me pause.

The days of clicking away had blurred together, but I couldn’t recall anything obstructing the light at the time I’d taken it.

So I flipped through the next picture… and the next, and the next.

And the blur just became more prominent. Darker.

The next day, it was there again, this time in a different location with a clearer form.

I expanded the image; zoomed in, edited the pixelation, and found a monster.

My breathing picked up as I stared at it.

But it was there; every day for several weeks, it appeared wherever we were, like clockwork, in the background.

And I hadn’t noticed at the time. I hadn’t noticed until we were almost done that second week.

Going back and looking through everything, it was there.

Like a boulder.

Like a gargoyle sitting watch on a cathedral, looming over the masses with its grotesque face and ominous presence.

I tried to convince myself I was crazy, but I wasn’t.

I wasn’t.

But when I pointed it out to Carlota, she looked at me like I was.

“You’re making excuses,” she said, her voice dulce sweet but sharp in the center. “You don’t want to help me anymore, do you?” She huffed, turning her perfect nose up.

A tantrum was coming, and I’d been on the receiving end of those enough that I didn’t want to bother. I didn’t have the energy.

So even with my misgivings, even with the unease rumbling a pathway through my belly, I followed her that final day like an obedient puppy, clicking away while she leaned over a short stone wall in a far too suggestive manner.

But this time, I was prepared.

I looked through the lens, slow, precise, and I caught it.

There!

A flash and there it was. Frozen like stone. And the harder I stared, the more it remained still. Until I blinked and it was in a different position… getting closer and closer.

That uneasy feeling crept up my throat, tightening it. This wasn’t normal.

I was aware that paranormal creatures lived alongside humans. Vampires, shifters, and an array of other things lived as normal their lives as humans did. But I’d never seen something like that before.

“Um, Carlota?” I lowered my camera, my anxiety pumping through my veins. This time, the creature behind her didn’t seem to care that I was staring anymore. It unfurled itself, like a statue coming to life. It creaked, giant wings unfurling like the petals on a flower.

Carlota glared at me then. “Just take the damn picture, Luz.”

I gritted my teeth, unsure what to do. But then, the creature came to life, its body jolting, a roar consuming the air around us and shaking the ground like a small earthquake. I gasped, taking a nervous step back.

“Carlota…”

The creature was already facing us, its black, soulless eyes in our direction. A scream crawled up my throat but got stuck. The thing flew in our direction, its monstrous face set in a snarl that revealed too many sharp teeth.

“Carlota, run!” But even as the words left my lips, she was already running, shoving past me, pushing me to the side to get ahead.

I didn’t have time to contemplate that betrayal. I was too focused on the monster. I didn’t know what it was, but some instinct in me told me it was after Carlota. It wanted her. Its focus was on her and her alone. And then it stretched out its arms like it meant to grab her…

My feet moved of their own volition, something protective rising in me as I barrelled Carlota’s way. She was in heels, so I caught up fast, shoving her aside with a “Look out!” just as the monster reached…

I’d put myself in the path where Carlota once stood, and the monster’s body rammed into mine.

My entire being jolted, my brain rattling in my skull at the impact.

I gasped, my lungs expanding in an attempt to fill with air.

It was like being hit by a small car, like being shoved hard in front of a brick wall.

The monster’s arms were around me, the momentum of our collision pushing it towards the sky.

The ground bottomed away as we rose up… up… up…

I gasped, trying to get breath into my chest, but it didn’t come. The panic set in and I wanted to scream, but I couldn’t. All I could do was pray the monster didn’t drop me. All I could do was fight to stay conscious as darkness crept along the edges of my vision.

All I could do was watch as a black tear ripped through the sky, opening what appeared to be a portal to somewhere else, somewhere with darkness and hell fire. And as the monster flew inside it, it felt like every limb of mine was being ripped apart.

And then I finally lost the battle and was swept through the darkness.