by Sunny
"I didn't know," she said, dropping down in front of Miles. "I didn't know the arena would mean your final death. As soon as I realized, I came."
He gazed at her with surprise, fierce tenderness, with devotion and adoration, as he lay there gored and bleeding. "You came for me."
Looking down into those expressive eyes, I felt something soften in Mona Louisa, and used that moment of weakness to push her back down, and myself out. Face and body transformed as I emerged.
The reaction of the watching soldiers was dramatic. They gasped, took a collective step back away from me. Some made a warding sign.
Ignoring them, I said, "You should thank Lord Gordane. He was trying to help you, you idiot. Why did you keep blocking his attempts to reach you?"
The look of adoration faded from his eyes at my appearance. In their place, though, was something I never expected to see — respect. "Forgive me, milady. I was not certain of his intent."
"What other reason could he have had for flying into that pit and risking himself like that?"
Miles pushed himself painfully up enough to kneel at Gordane's feet. Blood spurted from his wounds, but he was already bleeding less, starting to heal. "Forgive me, my lord, for not trusting you as I should have."
"It was understandable," Gordane said.
Maybe to them — not to me. A part of me wondered what Gordane could have possibly done to Miles that would have been worse than being eaten by werebeasts. Another part of me thought it might be better if I didn't know. I shook my head at both of them.
"Are you going to punish him further?" I asked Gordane.
Gordane looked questioningly at me. "Do you wish me to punish him further?"
"No! Definitely not."
"Then there will be no further punishment."
It should have ended there, but this was NetherHell. In a dramatic turn of events worthy of a Hitchcock thriller, the already dark sky darkened even more as huge winged creatures — gargoyles, scores of them — flew over the arena wall in a frightening swarm. They were dressed in dark armor, with black swords and knives strapped to their huge bodies. They caught sight of us, and like a flock of birds — big, scary ones — they veered down, landing in a loose circle around us. Not only did they outnumber the dheu guards, they outsized them in both height and weight. Two gargoyles flew to block the entry and exit points of the arena, preventing more guards from rushing to our aid.
"Hold!" Gordane commanded his soldiers. They had drawn their weapons but were cowering back away from the gargoyles. At the same time, they were careful to keep an equal distance between them and Gordane, as if being touched by any of the gargoyles was equally bad.
"We come for the woman," one of the gargoyles said. Even with him looking straight at me, it took a full second to understand that the woman he meant was me, and to recognize him, so different did he look from when I last saw him.
"Ghemin's dad?" I said as recognition kicked belatedly in. Recognition and the sudden understanding that this was a rescue, not an attack.
"You cannot have her. She is mine!" Gordane growled. He stood protectively on my left, while Miles positioned his bleeding, battered body on my right side.
"You are Gordane, the outcast," said the gargoyle.
"And who are you?" asked Gordane.
"I am Vlad, the gargoyle king."
The king of the gargoyles, who had been dressed only in old trousers the first time I saw him. Still I should have suspected. The air of command in Vlad was unchanged — still bossy. It fit him more appropriately now, though, dressed in the trappings of war and armed to the teeth with wicked weapons.
"This woman saved my son's life," Vlad declared. "She does not belong here."
"She is to be my bond-mate," Gordane said in turn — a statement that obviously took Vlad by surprise. "You cannot have her. With all the female gargoyles that you have to choose from, you cannot take this one from me."
"I do not desire her for myself," Vlad said calmly. "I wish to return her to where she belongs. She is not meant to stay in this realm."
"You can return me?" I asked.
"Yes," he answered.
"A part of her is dead, truly dheu," Gordane said tightly.
"But that is not all that she is."
"The living part of her doesn't mean she will be able to cross," Gordane said.
"The demon part of her will allow her to," Vlad said.
Gordane fell silent. "That may be," he finally said, "but the gate is still closed between our realms."
"A scout reported the presence of demons in the high mountains."
Vlad's words sent a small thrill through me. "Which means the gate is open," I whispered.
He nodded.
"Even so, will I be able to leave this realm?" I asked.
"I cannot say for sure," Vlad replied. "I only know that long before, demons walked our realm at will, entering and leaving during brief periods of time when our seasons shifted. Such a period of time we are now in. But that time frame is a narrow one, soon to end."
"How soon?"
"When this night ends, and a new day reddens the sky, the period will end. If you wish to go, we must leave now."
Inside, I felt Mona Louisa's resistance, and caught the turmoil of her emotions, enough to know that she did not want to leave this place, this realm. She was stronger here.
I'm calling in your debt, Mona Louisa. I'm asking you not to stop me from trying to leave this realm.
We gazed at Miles, the man she had bargained with me to save.
As you wish came her unhappy response. I will do nothing to hinder you.
The locking down of my muscles that she had begun faded away. One problem down. Onto the next one.
"Vlad, I would ask of you a favor, if I may."
"I do not comprehend your meaning."
I searched in my head for another word beside favor. Mona Louisa supplied it. "I would ask a boon of you."
"What boon would you have of me?"
"That you allow Gordane the opportunity of finding a bond-mate among your women."
My request seemed to stun all the gargoyles.
"Gordane didn't do anything really bad, like kill some of your people, did he?"
"No, he simply left." Vlad make that sound like the most heinous crime. "He choose to leave and willingly become outcast."
"He was young and foolish, his own words to me. He's older, much older now, and he's been alone a long time, with no chance of a family, no chance of having a little Ghemin of his own. Couldn't you grant him a royal pardon or something?"
Vlad fixed his eyes on the other gargoyle. "Do you wish to return to us?" he asked.
A slew of emotions chased across Gordane's face — arrogance, pride, uncertainty, then yearning. "Yes," Gordane grated out. "I would desire that greatly. I do not wish to stay there — I could not leave behind all I have attained here. But to come and spend time among the gargoyles once again… yes, that would be my heart's desire."
"Then it shall be granted," Vlad said.
Gordane bowed to his king while I made an awkward half-curtsy, half-bowing gesture. Straightening, my eyes fell upon Miles and deep inside I felt Mona Louisa's grief. "I'm sorry, Miles," I said. "If it were up to her, Mona Louisa, she'd stay here with you."
"But it's not up to her," he said.
"No."
"Then go. I wish you well. And should you return, I will be here."
Never in a million years could I have imagined feeling what I did — regret at leaving this man who had so recently been my enemy. A large part of it was Mona Louisa's emotions, but a tiny part of it was my own feelings.
"I wish you well also," I said softly, and turned to say good-bye to the other man at my side.
"No farewells yet," Gordane said. "I am going with you."
I blinked up at him, and found the idea attractive — having him there as we headed into the unknown. "I'd like that."
With Gordane beside me, I walked to Vlad. "Okay
, I'm ready to go."
Vlad smiled and took my hand, causing the gargoyle warriors around us to give little grunts of surprise. I'm not sure at what. Because he'd touched me? Or that I'd allowed him to?
"Like before," Vlad said. Lifting me up into his arms, he cradled me against him in the same way he had carried his son. "Hold on tightly." He launched his powerful body off the ground and his great wings unfurled, spreading wide, snapping taut like dark sails catching the wind. Soaring through the air with him was different this time. His body was encased in armor that looked like metal but felt more like leather to the touch, hard with some flexible give to it, and very, very slippery. It was his grip on me rather than mine on him that kept me from falling. Peeking over his shoulder, I saw the other gargoyles spread out in winged escort behind us. The walled city-state, that great oasis, grew smaller and smaller with each strong surge of Vlad's wings.
I closed my eyes as the sight — the sheer height — somersaulted my stomach. I hadn't felt that way before when I had wrapped myself tight as a burr around him. But I'd had a solid grip on him then. Not now, hence the queasy feeling.
"How is Ghemin doing?" I asked to take my mind off of matters beyond my control, and because I really wanted to know. The boy had been hurt badly by Pietrus's slurrying touch.
"He is weak but well, by the grace of your timely intervention."
I lifted my face from where I had rested it against that slippery armor. Watching Vlad's face outlined against the black-scarlet sky was much better than watching the ground fall farther away beneath us. Focusing just on his face, it hardly seemed as if we were moving.
"I would have come for you sooner," he said, his dark eyes troubled as he glanced down at me. "But my first responsibility was to see my son safely to my people first. After doing so, I gathered my warriors and came here as soon as I could."
"I'm fine," I said, patting him on the chest. "I didn't expect you to come back for me. It never occurred to me, actually, that you would."
"Then your sacrifice was even greater than I originally thought. It was a noble but foolish thing you did, falling from such a height. You could have died."
"I thought I was already dead. What else was I to think, finding myself here in NetherHell?"
"But you are not."
"Thank God. Or maybe I should say — thank the Goddess."
"Do your people pray to the Moon Goddess?" he asked.
"I don't know. I do sometimes. I'm not sure about the other Monères. What about you? Who do you pray to?"
"A different moon deity." He smiled at my astonishment, his face crinkling up in a cute-ugly sort of way. "Our people, too, are descended from the moon. Did you think Monères to be the only species originating there?"
I shook my head, marveled silently. "I guess I did."
An animal's blood-curdling roar abruptly ended our conversation. It came from the foot of the tall mountain we were approaching. A second bellow tore through the air.
"Jesus freaking Christ!" My arms tightened around Vlad's neck in a near stranglehold. "What on earth is that?"
"An obor," Vlad said as the treetops below shuddered and shook as something very, very large disturbed them. "It is not a creature you would find anymore in your realm. Vicious beasts you want to avoid, if you can."
Our flight shifted and we started to descend… right toward where those treetops shook so ominously.
"Uh, then why are you going toward it and not away from it?"
"Because I believe it is your demons that likely stirred the obor from its slumber. The realm gate lies on the cliff above. They would have to pass this way to reach the desert plain."
We neared enough so that I was able to see the creature — as big, mean, and nasty-looking as Vlad said it was — and see what it battled.
My breath caught as my eyes fell upon the two tiny demons defending themselves against the giant obor. "Gryphon." Another whisper. "Halcyon."
"You know them?" Vlad asked.
"Oh, yes, I know them. Like my own heart. They came for me," I said, an astonishingly wonderful and terrible thing. Terrible because what they faced — a great behemoth of a creature — reared up and tried to stomp them with its huge forelegs.
Gryphon darted nimbly out of the way with his usual fluid grace, slashing at the giant beast with his sword, slicing into the thick skin. Halcyon also moved, but much more slowly, his movements sluggish and tired, not fast enough to evade that huge descending foot. Gryphon yelled, struck out with his sword again, trying to distract the beast away from the Demon Prince but the obor's attention didn't waver from Halcyon. Just before the foot slammed down on him, Halcyon threw up a hand and hurled out a pulse of power that mixed with my cry.
The power was enough to deflect that giant foot to the left, so that it smashed down on the boulder beside him, crumbling it to dust less than a foot away from Halcyon. Another gesture from that elegant hand, another sharp pulse of power from Halcyon, and a large slash opened up on the trunk of that leg, gaping like an obscene mouth spilling out blood. The creature screamed in pain. Jerking away from Halcyon, it turned and charged at Gryphon — easier prey that did not slice open its flesh with invisible power.
Halcyon lifted his face up. He'd heard my cry, or maybe just sensed our movements. He looked up and saw us. Saw me.
Instead of urging Vlad away, I urged him now down toward the monster. "We have to help them!"
"As you wish," Vlad said with a slight smile. The air whistled by as we swooped down. He touched down upon the ground, and set me down on my feet, much too far away from where the battle raged.
"Stay here," he ordered as the other gargoyles landed in loose formation around us. I opened my mouth to argue, when my eyes were drawn beyond Vlad as if pulled by an irresistible force.
I met Gryphon's eyes, so shockingly blue. Looked upon that beautiful, dear face once again. Felt love — first love — wash over me. Remembered the shocking devastation of his death. And could only say — only think — one word: "Gryphon."
CHAPTER TWELVE
Maybe it was being dead that made Gryphon feel so suddenly alive. It was certainly that — being demon dead — that twisted his priorities around enough so that he was fighting this prehistoric creature, trying to keep its stomping attention away from his Demon Prince, instead of running to Mona Lisa.
Sweet night, how beautiful she was, even surrounded by those menacing winged creatures who, thank the heavens, did not look as if they meant her harm… whereas this big sucker in front of him clearly did.
Thump! Another near squishing stomp of that big foot. Much too near a miss. Gryphon slashed his sword across that thick hide and leaped away, feeling like a tiny gnat stinging a giant human. Another bellowing scream from the bizarre-looking beast that looked part woolly mammoth and part something else he'd never seen before.
"Move it, Halcyon!" Gryphon yelled, adding further clarification in case his ruler prince didn't get it the first time. "Move your ass out of there!"
"I am hustling as you speak," Halcyon said. "You would do very well to take your own advice." But Gryphon couldn't. And Halcyon wasn't hustling as he said he was. If he was, it was an old man's hustle — a sluggish walk instead of a run. They were probably lucky to have even that. It was as if the Demon Prince suddenly felt every single one of his six hundred plus years down in this cursed stinkhole of a realm. A place that seemed to spawn these great mutant monstrosities that apparently liked to tenderize their meat before they ate it by crushing it first.
Whomp! Another near miss, close enough to keep the nasty behemoth's attention focused on him instead of the exhausted Demon Prince making his not-so-quick escape.
Hurry, Halcyon, he mentally urged. A trumpeting screech, like rusty nails scraping across a chalkboard, set his nerves even further on edge as he dodged the ugly beast and at the same time tried to keep an eye on the winged creatures that surrounded Mona Lisa. He watched some fly toward him and the beast, others wing toward Halcyon. It w
as too many things to try and keep an eye on. Something big smashed into Gryphon. A sideswipe from a tree trunk of a leg, and he went flying. Right into the arms of something that was too small to belong to that one-ton leg, but plenty big in its own right. Much bigger than him, at least. It caught him neatly like a baseball flying neatly into the pocket of an outfielder's glove. Grinning — an expression that flattened the creature's pug nose even more and revealed sharp teeth — the winged thing said, "We are here to aid you at your lady's request."
Batlike wings flew him safely away from the rampaging beast, as others of his kind engaged the creature. For a second, there was just that beautiful sense of flight. Sweet heaven, how Gryphon missed the falcon part of himself lost with his death, like a piece of his soul ripped away. He craned his neck and saw Halcyon scooped up in another's arm and carried as he was, like a baby. Easier to tolerate when the ruler of Hell was being transported in a similar manner.
Gryphon found himself deposited a safe distance away, with Mona Lisa to the distant left of him, and Halcyon at a third triangular point. In their center was the mammoth beast. Gryphon could appreciate the move — spreading out their risk. But it grated on him to be so close to Mona Lisa and still so far away from her.
"Stay here. We gargoyles are better equipped to handle the obor." With that terse order, his rescuer flew off in a winged rush, flying to where his companions engaged the obor with their dark swords, deadly no doubt to another creature similar in size to them — man-sized or, more accurately, gargoyle-sized — but not to the obor, which towered over the gargoyles, making their swords look like tiny matchsticks.
How in the holy darkness did they expect to handle the obor? Gryphon wondered. Even with a dozen gargoyle warriors harassing the beast, hovering around it like fat-bodied, charcoal-gray moths, they seemed inadequate in number to take down the obor. It was simply too big.
Even more perplexing, the gargoyle who had rescued him didn't draw his sword, though it was there, belted at his side. And he was the one the woolly creature struck at the most with his flying front feet, as if somehow sensing he was the greatest danger. The obor held him at a stalemate, so that no matter which way the gargoyle darted and twisted, it could not get close to the creature. Whatever his gargoyle rescuer had planned to do, it obviously wasn't working.
