“Journals talk about there being lots more than what we see nowadays,” Jessup continued. “Skinners had to adapt. Their methods were more or less the same as they are now, but were a bit more flexible. Whenever they found something new, they’d take some of its blood and add it to the mix used for the varnish on their weapons. It’s a practice that’s been phased out lately just because there hasn’t been much need for it. Old-timers like me passed along the methods for modifying the varnish even when the young ones only wanted to fight what they could see.”
The Full Blood was getting closer. Cole figured he didn’t have to say as much to another Skinner, so he nervously glanced toward the edge of town, where he guessed Cecile might be approaching. Then something else came along to add itself to the growing burn caused by the werewolf. The chill beneath his scars spread like a layer of slush sandwiched somewhere in between the heat from the varnish and the warmth of his own body.
“Feel it yet?” Jessup asked.
“I think so.”
“That cold is from the sample of gargoyle blood I scraped up when I found the first one a few weeks ago. It’ll only last a while after you switch back to your own weapon, so we’ll have to modify that one too. Didn’t you carry a spear back in Philly?”
“Yeah. Mind if I use this until I get it back?”
“Sure, just don’t get too jumpy.”
Cole’s entire hand started to shake. Everything from cold to heat and every gradient in between rushed through his fist. “I think something’s wrong. Feels like I’m allergic to this one or something.”
“Told you not to get jumpy. I’ve scraped up all kinds of new blood and added it to the varnish on that club. You need to get used to it. Finding that first gargoyle was a lucky stroke. They must’ve either been getting too cocky, frightened, or hungry to worry about staying hid any longer. I didn’t know what the hell it was at first until a bunch of them damn near got me. Faster than you’d ever think. That’s one of the things that keeps ’em from being noticed. They’ll jump out and take yer head off before you even knew what was happening.”
“Shit,” Cole said as he hopped away from the statue. “You might want to open with that the next time you give a lesson in gargoyles.”
“Relax. That thing’s not gonna hurt you.”
The burning in Cole’s scars grew hotter, but not quickly. Cecile was either circling the town or trying to approach without being seen.
Jessup stepped up to the statue and ran his fingertips along the smooth patch on the horse’s back. “See, gargoyles are lurkers. They can hide damn near anywhere and you won’t ever find them unless you know exactly where to look. Just because you see a sculpture that looks creepy don’t make it a gargoyle.”
“This cold in my scars tells me they’re here, right?”
“Yep.” Drawing a hunting knife from a scabbard hanging from his belt, Jessup drove the tip into the smooth patch of rock along the horse’s back and started chipping it away. “But the tricky thing is that they’re damn near impossible to chase, so you gotta make them come to you. Can you guess the one thing a gargoyle don’t like more than anything else in the world?”
The club in Cole’s hand grew into a short stake before the bottom end extended and split into something that resembled a thick forked tongue. Not even noticing that he’d instinctually created a smaller version of his spear, he circled around to get behind the statue and said, “I would imagine they hate it when someone comes along to jam a knife in their back.”
“Well, yeah, but remember what I said about them bein’ lurkers. What every lurker wants is to hide and lurk in peace. What they hate is when someone knows they’re there. And this stuff right here,” he said, after the tip of his blade chipped off a piece of the statue that fell away like a small section of eggshell, “is one of the things that lets them know they’ve been found out.”
Cole tightened his grip on the club. His eyes were fixed upon the statue, waiting for it to move or balk at getting a piece of its back torn off. When that didn’t happen, he inched in for a closer look at the damage Jessup had done. Whatever the thing was, it sure as hell wasn’t a statue. Beneath the chipped portion was leathery muscle covered in a slimy layer of thick, pungent slime.
“Aw shit,” Cole grunted as the putrid smell of rotten meat and spoiled rust hit him. “That’s blood, all right.”
“It sure is. What’d you expect?”
The burning in his scars was growing, but not quick enough to mean that Cecile was on her way to the cemetery using anything close to a direct route. In the distance to the north, the sound of screeching tires, honking horns, and shouting voices rolled through the air.
“God damn it,” Cole said while bringing the club up to a defensive position. “You think she found Frank? What if she lost control and took out some locals?”
“She could’ve done that with or without us lookin’ after her,” Jessup mused. When a whistling shriek drifted overhead, he didn’t even bother looking up.
“What the hell was that?” Cole asked.
“Just stand still and wait for them.”
Cole wished he had the gun from Jessup’s glove compartment. As the screeching came again, it raked all the way through his body.
The chipped statue was bleeding.
Shrieking came from several different angles in the sky. Sunlight was fading into a dull glow that gave the other statues an aura.
“I think that one just moved!” Cole said, pointing the club at a nearby dog statue.
“No it didn’t.”
The shrieking grew louder.
“What is that crap you dug out of that thing’s back, Jessup? Is that gargoyle going to wake up or not?”
“Shut up! I told you we need to wait for them. They won’t come if we’re looking for them.”
“Spare me the predator prey bullshit and just tell me what the fuck these statues are supposed to do for us!”
“Shut up so I can listen, dammit,” Jessup barked.
“Are there more cemeteries around here?” Cole asked. “Or churches? Where else do you find gargoyle perches? Just tell me what I need to know!”
“What the hell is wrong with you, Cole?”
Cole’s blood surged through his veins in a sporadic mix of fast and slow rhythms. It pumped in time to his heartbeat at first, but the longer he paid attention to it, the more he realized it was moving at a pace all its own. His first thought drifted to the tendrils still wrapped around his insides, and when he looked down, he realized he was pointing the sharpened end of the club at Jessup.
The older man’s eyes were locked on Cole when he asked, “Are you strung out?”
Even with the world going to hell and what sounded like a war encroaching on the outskirts of town, Cole was surprised by the question. “I’m not on drugs!” he said.
“I don’t mean drugs. I mean the healing serum. How much have you been taking?”
“A lot lately, but I’ve been wounded.”
“What about before you were wounded? Did you take it any time you got hurt even if you didn’t absolutely need it?” Jessup’s eyes narrowed and he moved toward him and a distant howling gave way to a shriek that became louder and more intense. “Have you reached for a needle even before you knew how badly you were hurt? When you get cut or scraped or knocked around, do you look forward to that light-headed rush that comes with—”
“I’m not a fucking junkie!” Cole snapped.
“You didn’t answer my questions.”
“I’ve got a question for you,” he said while moving the club as if trying to pass it off as something other than a weapon. “What’s that screeching? It’s coming from everywhere.”
“No it isn’t,” Jessup replied while closing his eyes. “That noise is today’s biggest lesson. You wanna know another lesson I learned a long time ago? Don’t work with someone who’s strung out on anything, even if it’s something we cooked up ourselves.”
“I haven’t even had any of
that stuff for a while.”
“Which is probably why you were about to stab me a few seconds ago. Now close your eyes and listen for that screech. We need to know what direction it’s coming from.”
The sky was growing darker by the second. When Cole looked to the east, he saw a blur of clouds and dark purple. Looking to the west forced him to squint before catching a jabbing ray of sunlight in his eyes. “It’s getting closer, whatever it is. Do you know what it is?”
“Shush up and listen,” Jessup scolded. “And close yer eyes. It’ll help you focus.”
Cole did as he was told. The stench of rotting meat and blood was still thick in his nose, and the frantic beats of his heart showed up as pulsing blobs of light behind his eyelids. Before that became too much for him, he heard something else with his newly focused ears. The shriek started off as just one of the many that crossed back and forth above him. When something screamed directly toward him, there was no way in hell he could keep his eyes closed.
A large flap of skin sliced through the air, attached to a frame of narrow bone. It was thin enough to glide and light enough to be steered by what looked like fluttering ribbons trailing behind it. Long talons stretched from the skin flap’s two front corners as it extended even more to ride a wind that rippled over its back and through its body, which produced the shriek Cole had been hearing.
As the thing in the sky angled sharply downward toward Jessup’s back, several more of the narrow fliers descended like pencil lines that suddenly decided to leap off a page. They were right behind the first one, filling Cole’s eyes with sunlight reflecting off smooth undulating backs and filling his ears with a shriek that now sounded more like a whistle blown with the power of a concentrated hurricane.
The closest one opened its body into a tattered flag with four talons at either end. Without opening his eyes, Jessup drew the hunting knife from its scabbard to snap it up and around toward the incoming mass of skin. Between his confident swing and the creature’s own momentum, the blade cut through the upper framework of bone and shredded the flying thing’s body all the way down to the tattered pieces hanging from its lower end. Its shriek turned into an agonized cry as pieces of its body fell to the ground. The others still in the air veered off before getting close enough to fall victim to the Skinner’s blade.
Opening his eyes, Jessup flicked the knife down to spatter a clear, viscous fluid onto the ground and said, “It’s all in the wrist.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
Once he’d sheathed his knife, Jessup asked Cole to help him pick up the dead flier and run for cover. Although he was more anxious to do the latter, Cole helped with the former as well. The shredded pieces of the thing that had come screaming from the sky now looked more like a broken kite made of moist skin on a flimsy white frame. When Cole jumped into Jessup’s pickup, he almost crushed the parts already on the seat.
“Careful!” Jessup said as he shoved him toward the passenger door and gathered up his part of the kite.
“What the hell are—” Cole’s question was nipped in the bud by the hard slap of something against his window. Although he could still see the colors of the setting sun through the thin layer of skin now pressed against the outside of the glass, his view was impeded by what looked like a hastily drawn face with features that were nothing more than dark lines on a lighter surface. Talons scraped against the top of the truck and the face twisted as if trying to shove its way inside. The mouth that gaped open against the window had small ridges for teeth, no tongue, and no lips. Cole took the .38 from the glove compartment and pointed it at the window as more of the skin flags slapped against the outside of the truck. “What are those things? Were they after the gargoyles too?”
“Those are the gargoyles,” Jessup replied while hastily cutting apart the one he’d brought down.
“No, you were showing me the gargoyles. They were those stone animals outside the cemetery.”
“Nope. Those are what these gargoyles left behind.”
Now that it was clear the things outside weren’t strong enough to break their way in, Cole lowered his gun and focused on what the other Skinner was doing. “Every gargoyle I’ve ever heard of was made of stone. I’ve even heard of ones that are stone during the day and come to life at night.”
Jessup looked up from what he was doing to ask, “Where’d you hear about that?”
“Well . . . it was a cartoon.”
Shaking his head, the other man returned to his task. “Those statues were called gargoyles because they’re all folks saw after these things came through to feed or defend their nest.”
“They nest?” Cole asked as a chill worked its way down his back. “Where?”
“Damn near anyplace. They like cities because they can fold themselves up to fit nicely in all those angular crevices and narrow corners between buildings or under ledges. They ain’t got much by way of muscle, but they sure do have something to make up for it.” Jessup twisted his blade once more and pulled open a flap of skin he’d been cutting like a trapdoor. A spray of what looked like murky water emerged from the opening, which didn’t do anything to dim the smile on the Skinner’s face. Holding up a flat tube the size of a long water balloon, he declared, “This was worth the trip. If we don’t get a few more to use against that Full Blood friend of yours, we’ll have to improvise.”
“You think it would help if I knew what you were talking about?”
“Take a look at them claws,” Jessup said while tapping the chunk of creature Cole had brought into the truck. “Remember them scratches on the statues?”
“Yeah.”
“And the flat spots on their backs? That’s from this right here. Take a look.” Jessup held the tube as if he was about to decorate a cake. Instead of icing, a clear gel oozed from the end of the tube. The instant it touched the seat cushion between Jessup and Cole, the substance hardened with a soft creaking sound.
Inside the truck it was easier to block out the sounds coming from the northern side of town. Even with the Ford’s superior insulation, however, Cole could now hear the occasional chatter of automatic gunfire and the thumping bass of helicopter blades.
The bottom of the creature had an opening just like the mouth pressed against the window, except now he could see rows of tiny bristles just inside the opening. With the thing dead, a flat length of skin capped by four barbed hooks that could have been a tongue lolled from its mouth. Too much experience in handling deceased nightmares gave Cole the stomach to reach out and squeeze the tonguelike protrusion. Sure enough, it was a flattened tube that ended at the top of Jessup’s incision. By now the gel squeezed onto the seat cushion had formed a thick gray shell.
More of the pieces came together, finally coalescing when Cole tapped the barrel of his gun against the gray shell. It was solid and unmoving. After feeling the shell with his bare hand, he asked, “Is that rock?”
“Near enough.”
“So those statues are things that these bat-things swarmed and injected with this goo?”
“Not injected. Just coated and smeared around on the inside of their wings. Them claws sink in to keep whatever it catches from squirming away. The more they struggle, the more that stuff gets spread into a nice even coat.”
“Then what?”
“Then, after the stuff hardens, the rest of the gargoyles come back to feed. We think they must eat organs and soft tissue, because they sure as hell don’t got the choppers to tear off any meat. We’ve found little holes and slits that they could stick their tongues into and then seal up again to preserve the rest of the meal for later.”
Cole looked at the flattened portions of skin that scraped the window and kissed the glass. “How come they’re so quiet now?”
“Because they ain’t flying,” Jessup replied as he worked to tie up one end of the tube he’d extracted. “Pull off some of those talons. They’re light and durable. Make for great add-ons to our weapons. See anything going on outside?”
“No. Ther
e’s too many of those things on your truck. They’re persistent, I’ll give them that.”
“It’s how they’ve survived this long. They can hide like nothing else, and when they’ve been found out, they don’t stop attacking until they’ve put down whatever stirred ’em up. Soon as one of them is injured or if a statue is cracked open enough for them to smell their own juices inside of it, they swoop in to clean things up.”
“Kind of like a flying rodent ninja hit squad,” Cole said.
Jessup looked up from the knot he was tying and said, “Yeah. I guess that sums it up.”
“So you’re thinking of turning Cecile into one of those statues?”
“That’s the idea.”
“She seems like a good kid,” Cole sighed. “Shame to have her get taken out by these flying creeps and then get her guts sucked out.”
“I doubt this’ll kill her. We don’t know a lot about gargoyles, but if they had that kind of punch, they would have killed one or two Full Bloods over the years. Odds are a whole lot better they can contain one. Friend of mine did some hiking over in Hungary and found some statues that looked a lot like werewolves out in the middle of nowhere. Took enough pictures to find the scratches and smooth patch on the back later on, but he didn’t exactly know what he was looking at. We’ve always wanted to go back there, but the damn Gypsies would only chase us away again. I don’t even wanna know how he smuggled his camera back to the States. From what we can piece together in some old Skinner journals, we figure gargoyles migrated over here on a boat that passed through or originated from Greece on its way to the New World.”
“They’re from Greece?”
Jessup nodded while checking his guns, then dug out a shotgun kept under the seat in a specially crafted rack. It held the weapon in a hollowed space that would pass all but the most extensive inspections. “You heard of the Medusa myths?”
“You mean the reptile woman with snakes in her hair?” Cole asked. “I guess something’s gotta balance out the nymphs, huh?”
The Breaking Page 31
