“Hold still.” The two words were the only warning Velasquez gave me before he yanked the splinter free. Groaning, I studied the twisted shard he held up for my inspection. It looked like a frozen ribbon of blood; then I recognized the thin carnelian shape of my earring. I touched my earlobe. The delicate strands had all broken into jagged pieces. I patted at my neck, feeling the wetness of several cuts but no more embedded pieces.
“Did you get cut?” I asked, turning to check Velasquez as I took the back off the earring and let it drop.
“Not from those.” He brushed the front of his gray shirt, shedding sparkles of carnelian as he turned to help Seradon. She sat with her head in her hands, elbows on her knees, her posture an eerie echo of Elsa’s when I’d first seen her.
“I’ll live,” she said, blotting blood from her upper lip with the hem of her shirt.
“Look at me,” Velasquez said, touching my chin. He knelt in front of me, leaning close, and I hadn’t seen him move. His blue eyes filled my vision. They weren’t a flat color; rather, they had striations of darker agate and flecks of onyx. Lapis lazuli, I decided, arrested by their unexpected beauty.
The thought snapped my brain back to solid ground. Worry pinched Velasquez’s full lips. With unexpectedly gentle fingers, he pulled the skin down beneath one of my eyes, then the other. Impatiently, I tracked his finger. When he shifted to examine my shoulder, I resumed my search for Oliver.
The blast had thrown us over ten feet beyond the pentagram, into the dirt. The others had been flung farther and were scattered around the pentagram plateau. No one appeared gravely injured, but everyone moved gingerly.
Elements hung heavy in the air, or more precisely, earth shimmered thick enough to give the illusion of being tangible. A wall of fire and earth hung on invisible strings to my right.
The blood drained from my head. It was more than a wall; it was the same barrier I’d seen inside the purifier’s loops. Elongated and distorted and arching twice as tall as Grant, hundreds of helixes spun in an interlocking weave to create an impenetrable barrier between the two elements. The wall extended over thirty feet beyond the marmot before dipping down to touch the ground, but the complex braid of helixes that had previously been linked to the loop inside the purifier shot in a straight line toward the horizon. Four other evenly spaced elemental braids speared outward from the marmot like spokes on a wheel, and I didn’t need to move to know the magic in between each would look equally dense and singular.
“You’ll be fine,” Velasquez said. “You’re not as fragile as you look.”
I wasn’t paying attention. I’d spotted Oliver.
He lay in a crumpled heap below the pillar where he’d been perched. I lurched to my feet, catching myself with one hand on the ground when the world dipped and my legs buckled. Pushing back to my feet, I half crawled, half ran to the gargoyle, passing through the purifier’s fire-earth and air-fire walls without resistance.
“Oliver!” I fell beside him and slapped a hand to his side, gathering magic to examine him. Air leapt to my call, but the other elements I needed to balance the magic felt as if they existed on the other side of a mountain of sand. “Oliver, come on. Wake up.”
Bright red-orange eyes popped open, and Oliver lifted his head. His square jaw fell open in a dragon’s smile. I sucked in a full breath, releasing it with a breathy sob of relief. Scooting back, I gave him room to right himself. Together we examined his wings and limbs, equally relieved to find him whole. I tried again to pull the blend of elements necessary to test Oliver’s internal health, but once more only air responded.
“How do you feel?” I asked.
“Drained.”
“It’s no wonder,” Seradon said, stopping beside me and wriggling her jaw to pop her ears. “I’d be toast without you. If you ever want to join a squad, you can be part of my team anytime, Oliver.”
The half-grown dragon preened. I watched his movements closely, pleased not to see any stiffness or tenderness.
“His extra boost of magic right before the explosion gave me the strength I needed to cocoon us both,” Seradon said to me. “The purifier—and we really need a better name for this monstrosity—seared through my shield and drilled into my head like it knew where to look. Without Oliver, we’d both be burned out.”
I shuddered. “Thank you.”
“Yep, that’s what we do.” Seradon gave me a gentle pat on the back before striding to Grant’s side.
Burned out. My fingers trembled as I tightened my ponytail, and it took a moment for me to process the red sparkles tipping my fingers when I examined them. Carefully, I reached for my left earring. A few shards remained fused to the post and powdery pieces of orange-red quartz clung to my neck and scalp. I used my shirtsleeve to protect my fingers as I pulled the earring out; then I dropped it to the ground next to the pillar.
“Thank you, too, Oliver. You’re amazing.”
“Yep, that’s what I do.” Oliver grinned at his almost perfect imitation of Seradon’s inflection. I smiled, feeling my world right itself. One gargoyle safe, one to go.
I rose with a modicum of grace this time, but my legs were wobbly and I braced against the pillar until I felt steady enough to walk. Flexing the fingers of my right hand hurt, and I examined the swelling around my middle finger’s second knuckle. Blood oozed from a scrape, but it was coagulating. Considering I could have been nullified, a hurt knuckle seemed trivial.
Pushing away from the pillar, I headed for the marmot. Oliver yelped and stumbled into me, knocking me sideways. With a weird hopping kick, he jetted forward, then spun back toward me.
“What was that?” I rubbed my calf, where his alula had clipped me.
“That hurt!” Oliver pointed to the purifier braid separating the air and fire sections of the expanded bubble of polarized magic. I’d passed through the weave without feeling anything. I reached for the elements to test him, but now only fire responded. Frustrated, I had to rely on Oliver’s assurance that the pain had been temporary.
“Okay. Stay here until we get this sorted.”
Oliver nodded and curled his tail tight to his body. Hunched, he looked half his normal size, and I wished I’d insisted the young gargoyle wait outside the park, or better yet, at the library where he’d be safe.
I skirted a dirt-churned crater, realizing only when I saw sparkles of carnelian glinting in the indent that the divot was from the impact of Velasquez and me, or more accurately, the impact of Velasquez’s body as he shielded me. I had more than Seradon and Oliver to thank for my relatively unharmed state.
From a distance, the marmot looked the same. He stood in the same position on his haunches, wings draped down his back and antlers arching skyward. Scraps of metal, wicker, alabaster, and glass littered the surrounding area and caught in the gargoyle’s antlers. The horrific purifier had been reduced to nothing more than loose trash. A breeze lifted shredded phoenix feathers into the air, and I waved a hand in front of my face to keep them out of my eyes.
The elements swirled through an elongated vortex stretching from the marmot’s toes up past his antlers. I tilted my head, trying to make sense of the chaotic magic through the dense swirl of fire element. When my brain made the belated connection, I sidestepped into the earth zone to double-check. My heart beat in my ears as I crouched to run a finger through a bright white radial line on the ground. A fine powder of quartz gritted against my fingertip. The explosion had pulverized my five quartz barriers, but perversely my inverted pentagrams had inflated to dwarf both me and the marmot. Worse, they appeared to be working as anchors for the purifier, holding it in place. Not only had I made the purifier explode, but I’d also made it stronger.
Just peachy.
I couldn’t tell if the mutated pentagrams rested against the marmot or if the infinitesimal gap remained between the gargoyle and the purifier. At least magic no longer pulsed from the marmot.
I scrabbled for the elements to heal him, and this time earth tumbled in
to me but nothing else.
I’d worked all the elements right after the blast. Why couldn’t I touch more than one at a time now?
Because I wasn’t cocooned inside Velasquez’s protective ward, I reasoned. He must have trapped the elements inside the shield when he’d created it, before magic polarized around us. That explained why fire had been the strongest element at the time. I’d thought I’d injured the metaphysical pathways in my brain, but standing in the earth section, I could draw on as much earth as normal without strain.
Frustrated, I shoved my hands through the vortex of magic and planted them on the marmot’s chest, ignoring the swirling magic pricking my skin with a thousand sharp needles. Again, I felt nothing, but even live gargoyles could be as still as stone and equally as cold to the touch. I needed magic to get inside him. I needed to fix the damage the purifier had caused before it was too late.
Out of options, I held on to earth and refined it down to the thinnest strand of quartz possible. The destructive cycle spinning around my wrist made me clumsy, jolting earth into the tortured gargoyle when I meant to feather it against him. A delicate echo of the marmot’s essence pushed back against the foreign intrusion, and I withdrew as gently as possible. His life signs were faint enough to be alarming, but he lived.
I couldn’t help him, not with magic like this. I glanced to the horizon. The polarization had to wear off soon. The balanced elements on the outside of this bubble would eat through the divided magic and degrade the purifier’s pattern. Until that happened, I had no way to assess the marmot’s injuries or right the internal damage the purifier had wrought on the helpless gargoyle.
Yet somehow, the bubble looked larger than it had before.
“He’s alive?” Oliver called from where he huddled several feet away.
“Yes, but it’s like he’s asleep.”
“That’s because he’s dormant,” Grant said. The squad convened around us, everyone looking at the marmot.
“A lot of gargoyles do this,” Seradon said. “It’s like they check out for a while. They still give power, some more freely than gargoyles who are awake, but they don’t interact with anyone. They become sort of like quiet statues.”
“For how long?” I asked.
Seradon shrugged. “I don’t know. You haven’t encountered this before?”
I shook my head, feeling like a hypocrite. I should know more about gargoyles than anyone. I was the gargoyle healer, after all.
“This guy’s been dormant for years. Probably a decade or two, maybe longer,” Grant said.
“He hasn’t moved that whole time?” I shared a glance with Oliver. The young gargoyle looked as confused as I felt. The squad seemed to believe the marmot’s catatonic state was normal, but I couldn’t think of a reason a gargoyle would opt to mimic a statue, passively feeding everyone magic in the vicinity. They were usually more picky than that. Plus, gargoyles needed to eat at least a few times a month. “Can he move, if he wants to?”
“I guess so. Being dormant is probably what saved him from being torn apart by the purifier,” Seradon said. “Don’t fret so much. This is all part of a gargoyle’s life cycle.”
I frowned and nodded. She sounded confident, but in my healer heart I knew she was wrong. Nothing about the marmot’s lifeless state was normal, but it explained his pockmarked skin. I suspected his internal health would have looked poor even before Elsa’s interference. It also explained how she’d been able to surgically attach the abominable purifier: The marmot had been helpless to stop her. That hadn’t prevented him from feeling the pain of the implants, though.
“Are there more like this? Dormant?” My swollen knuckle protested, and I relaxed my fisted hands.
“A few,” Seradon said.
Shame burned in my veins. I’d been concentrating on sick gargoyles who came to me or who contacted me through their chosen families. I hadn’t paid any attention to the welfare of the public gargoyles or those who couldn’t even speak for themselves. I needed to step up my efforts as a healer. I couldn’t leave gargoyles helpless to be preyed upon by psychopaths like Elsa, who saw them as tools and not living creatures.
“This is bad,” Winnigan said. She walked around the marmot, eyes on the horizon.
“I’m done messing around,” Grant said. “Form up a link.”
“The damn thing did its best to burn me out, sir. I’m mud and won’t be much use for hours,” Seradon said.
Mud? Fresh guilt welled up on a wave of gratitude, and I tried to think of a more adequate way to thank her for saving me from being nullified. “I’m sorry” tumbled out.
Seradon chuckled. “Aww, civilian guilt. That’s cute.”
Velasquez snorted, but his expression was blank when I looked at him.
“We don’t have hours,” Grant said.
“Good thing we have Mika. She can take my place.”
Grant pinned me with his sharp brown eyes. “It’s not ideal but I can make it work.”
I wasn’t half the earth elemental Seradon was, as the explosion I’d unleashed just proved. With a sinking stomach, I looked around the group. They assessed me with neutral expressions, telling me without words that no one was happy to be stuck with me. I felt acute relief when Grant spoke and everyone shifted their attention to him.
“The polarized magic isn’t dissipating on its own. Since the blast, it’s gained at least ten feet in every direction. We need to break the constructive pattern.”
I hugged my stomach. It hadn’t been a trick of my imagination. Even the spokes looked longer, stretching far beyond the dome of polarized magic and disappearing into the park. They didn’t need the marmot to feed from any longer; the purifier was self-sustaining and prepared to assimilate the entire city.
“I don’t get it,” Marciano said. “The purifier should have torn itself apart once it didn’t have the gargoyle to feed on.”
“I think it might be my fault,” I said, waving a hand at the intact inverted pentagrams. Grant had to be regretting allowing Velasquez and Seradon to talk him into letting me save the gargoyle. If not for the flicker of life in the marmot, I’d be regretting it, too.
“Placing blame or feeling guilty won’t get us anywhere,” Grant said. “We need to—”
The polarized fire section rolled over a lit gas pit. Raw elemental magic roared from the flames, surging into the polarization field. Even from over fifty feet away, the backwash of heat tightened my skin. The influx of energy flared against the seam between fire and earth, built up, then surged through the looping pattern of the stretched helixes, feeding into earth. Earth spewed energy into water, water sloshed into wood, wood shot into air, and the entire polarized bubble bulged outward in a powerful push that covered another five feet in every direction.
“That’s going to be a problem,” Velasquez said.
I studied the park with fresh eyes. Elemental magic was always strongest around the physical source, and Focal Park had been designed as a place of natural enhancement. Its pentagon shape reflected the five elements, and each section represented a dominant element, all radiating from the center of the park in a natural constructive order. Elsa had aligned her purifier exactly along those lines, so each polarized segment ate through the matching element section of the park.
“That woman couldn’t have made a bigger mess if she tried,” the captain said, echoing my thoughts.
Air and earth fed their polarized sections passively, but in a few feet, the wood section would reach the entrance to the lush botanical gardens, and a dozen more gas torches and fire pits aligned with the fire field’s path. If the polarization fields reacted to those as they had the small fire pit, this bubble of messed-up energy would expand in alarming leaps. Currently the only obstacles in the purifier’s way were the smaller pieces of balancing elements in every section—a fountain in the fire section, a wind chime in the earth section—and us.
“If this reaches the river, it could swallow the city,” Winnigan said, staring off int
o the distance where sunlight glinted off Lincoln River directly in the path of the polarized water section.
“Or it could negate it,” Velasquez said. “That much water at once could overwhelm everything and cause the whole mess to collapse.”
His words gave me hope, but if Winnigan was right and the city’s elements divided into five separate sections, Terra Haven would fall apart. Everything from basic housekeeping magic to the complex structural patterns of the city’s communication and transportation networks would collapse.
Not to mention the devastation to lives. We were proof that humans could function in the polarized fields, even if magic wasn’t working right, but some creatures depended on the blended elements for sustenance. Stuck in this divided energy, gargoyles throughout the city would sicken from the imbalance and be forced to flee the city or die.
“We’re not letting it reach the river,” Grant said. “We’re countering this now. Spread out to your element and link.”
The squad traded glances and hustled to their sections. Seradon strode to my side and gave me quiet directions.
“This is different than what we did before, and it’s going to hurt. Since you can’t access all the elements, the link will have to act as one person. Grab earth and push it to Winnigan, then let Velasquez push fire to you.”
Earth element burrowed into me, sharp as shale without another element to buffer it, but no matter how much I drew or how hard I pushed, I couldn’t penetrate the barrier between earth and water. The magic I fed into the wall of helixes warped and transformed into water, exiting the barrier in a useless splash. Around the circle, the captain, Marciano, Winnigan, and Velasquez were each haloed in an impressive display of elemental magic, but everyone had the same problem I did. Worse, our efforts fed the purifier, and the bubble pushed outward.
Curse of the Gargoyles (Gargoyle Guardian Chronicles Book 2) Page 5
