The fingers on my left hand just barely scraped against the other hold I’d targeted, but my own momentum swung my body past it and to the right, leaving all my weight pulling on one precarious hold. My jaw clenched and I let out a groan as my fingertips tore into the stone, one nail bending back. That was going to hurt later.
The gargoyle zipped past me, right into the rest of my crew. Wally screeched and Gregory hissed and pulled back, skittering across the stone like it was second nature to him. The gargoyle slowed and turned, focused on its target—me. But between us was Ethan, stuck to the wall with one hand and one foot, his wand out and his baby blues wide. I knew that look. He’d frozen in panic.
“Do a spell,” I hollered, reaching with my left hand to secure my position before starting back up. “Hurry! Anything!”
Growls and hisses drew my attention upward. I fully expected another gargoyle to launch into us. Instead, surprise stopped me cold as an incensed honey badger dropped through the air, all four legs spread out like a flying squirrel. Pete landed on the gargoyle’s shoulder and scrambled to get purchase, claws digging in, tiny pebbles dropping from the stone beast.
The gargoyle made an ear-splitting sound, a cross between a shriek and a high-pitched baby’s cry. Pete, incredibly ferocious in this form, ripped and tore with his mouth and claws, biting off chunks of the gargoyle and throwing them into the air. Rocks shed from the creature and it shuddered. It reached up to slap at Pete, making him slip and scramble to stay on its back.
“Help him!” I yelled, nearly there but blocked by Orin.
Ethan started out of his stupor, closer than any of us to Pete.
Lightning fast in a way only someone from this house could be, Gregory crawled across the wall with ease. Long and incredibly strong fingers fit into tiny pockmarks and divots no normal human could use. He pulled himself up to just below the shrieking and distracted gargoyle before reaching in and raking his fingers across the stone beast’s belly.
The gargoyle froze, its face twisted into a mask of agony. Its limbs slowed and hardened.
“Grab Pete,” Gregory called, raking his fingers across the stone creature again for good measure.
Ethan, finally reacting, stowed his wand and reached out, grabbing the spitting and growling honey badger by the tail. He flung Pete upward, just barely getting him onto a ledge jutting out the side of the tower, startling a kid standing on it. The other kid fell backward, arms windmilling as he went down.
“Hang on, buddy,” I called out as Pete hunkered against the wall, teeth chattering away with enough profanities that I was shocked the others couldn’t hear him.
“Clearly, we’ll need to head in that direction,” Wally mumbled.
The gargoyle finished its metamorphosis back into a statue, stuck on the side of the stone wall like it was glued there.
“Knowing how to disable them would’ve been nice,” I grumbled, heading in Pete’s direction.
“You need claws, and the more blows the better,” Gregory said, following me. “Let’s hurry. It will only stay immobile for a little while.”
“You don’t have claws.” Wally grunted as she found the next handhold.
“My nails are as hard as claws, if not as sharp quite yet. They will be, though. Eventually,” he answered. “Wild, your magical knife will probably work. Ethan’s magic would too, if he’d use it.”
I said, “My knife isn’t magical—”
“Yeah, nice reaction time, Helix,” Orin said below everyone and apparently not at all remorseful about it. “Daddy can give you the winning magical spell, but Daddy can’t teach you courage, can he?”
“I saved the badger, didn’t I?” Ethan ground out. “Besides, I didn’t see you do anything, blood sucker.”
Orin didn’t miss a beat. “This is not my house. I expect to fail here. It will hinder neither my transformation into full vampire nor my eventual acceptance into the academy.”
“Ten percent of vampiric recruits are not accepted into the fold because of their inability to work with others, and of that ten percent, ninety percent are eventually staked by fearful magical folk afraid the vampire will go rogue,” Wally said, relaying the stats in her perfect monotone as she climbed. Her voice dropped to that of her namesake. “There is a fine line between confidence and delusion. One will help, and the other will hinder.”
“Fascinating,” Ethan said, sarcasm dripping from the word.
A yell caught my attention, to the right. Someone else fell from higher up, his arms swinging through in the empty air. Another scream on the distant left, a girl plummeting to the ground.
I pulled myself up, my hands and muscles screaming. “A lot of people got here before us.”
“Doesn’t mean they’ll finish,” Ethan said, strain in his voice. “Now move it. Let’s get to the top.”
Reaching Pete, I grabbed a hold of him and swung him up. Unfortunately, I botched the release and he sailed out too far right, hitting the wall and sliding until a small ledge stopped his fall.
Several feet above him, just below the lip surrounding the top of the building, the three stone creatures perched on the large overhang shuddered. One by one, their limbs stretched away from the wall, no longer stone. And one by one, they all turned their stone heads to look at Pete, clinging to the tiny ledge above a whole lot of empty air.
“Hurry, hurry, hurry!” I said, reaching for the next hold, pulling myself up as fast as I could.
“That was a terrible throw,” Ethan chuckled. He didn’t follow me. Instead, he climbed straight up where the coast was clear. He was going to let us be the distraction so he could get to safety.
“You filthy, stinking…” I gritted my teeth.
“Cheat. Hoodwinker. Scam artist,” Wally finished, thankfully heading toward Pete. “Deceiver. Liar. User. Jerk.”
“Okay. We get it,” I said.
“Morally bankrupt whoreson—”
“Wow. We get it.”
All three gargoyles started down the tower, each larger than the previous. My heart rate increased and adrenaline buzzed through my veins. This was about to get hairy.
Gregory skittered below me, moving nearly as well as the gargoyles on the rough stone wall. He reached Pete and climbed onto the tiny ledge beside him, positioning himself between the honey badger and the monsters.
“There are too many for just me,” he called out, watching the creatures slowly move toward him.
“I’m coming,” I said, out of breath, arm muscles screaming for more oxygen. “I’m coming.”
Fingers starting to cramp, I grabbed another handhold. I braced the blunt toes of my boots, horrible for climbing, against another too small hold. My leg shook with the effort. The creatures descended, speeding up. Their eyes were all on Gregory, who clung to the wall, braced for action.
Understanding dawned, cutting through the lack of oxygen.
“They sense that you’re one of their kind, in a way,” I said while reaching up. My fingertips brushed the edge of a hold and slipped. My weight shifted and I slid, my cheek scraping against stone. I just barely caught the next hold, my weight pulling on my grip, my fingers threatening to give out.
“Yes,” Gregory said. “They’re making it harder for me. Testing me. Which means…”
“You’re…worthy,” Wally finished. I could hear the approval in her strained and tired voice. “Congratulations. I hope you don’t mess up.”
I chanced a look down. Sweat dripped off of my face and sailed into the nothingness below. Down the way, bodies clung to the wall. They looked awfully small way down near the bottom. As I watched, someone peeled away from the sheer face, falling back with slack arms. They hadn’t been thrown, they’d simply given up.
My stomach flipped. While heights didn’t scare me, falling did. While other students might be magically saved from their doom, my family seemed to be targeted for death. I had to assume that everything I did here was life or death. It had been for Tommy, after all. And it would’ve been
for Billy.
More adrenaline coursed through my blood, giving me a boost. The gargoyles sped up, their feet and arms churning over the stone. I grabbed the next hold, and the next, putting everything I had into getting to that ledge.
Gregory surged up for the first gargoyle. It swiped out with a claw. He ducked out of the way and then lashed out, nearly scoring a blow of his own. I reached the ledge and pulled myself up beside Pete, shaking with exhaustion but knowing I couldn’t stop now. Gargoyle number two picked up speed, passing Gregory and the first gargoyle before working back around, ignoring me and the others.
I let it pass, getting in position to flank Gregory before balancing my weight on the ledge and snatching out my knife. It might not be magical, no matter what Gregory said, but it was sharp and currently all I had to fight these creatures.
Gregory scraped gargoyle number one along the side, but he hadn’t gotten deep enough. The gargoyle slashed out, opening up four parallel red lines on Gregory’s shoulder.
Gregory sucked in a breath and pulled back, the pain clearly acute. He balanced on his toes at the very edge of our landing. I grabbed his arm and pulled him back without taking my eyes off gargoyle number one.
The stone muscles on gargoyle number two bunched in preparation to strike. I stretched, using my long reach to my advantage, and quickly jabbed my knife into it.
The creature shuddered as I dragged my blade across its hard-stone underbelly. Its lunge cut short before it had even began, it slowed and then turned back to stone.
“Huh,” I said, jamming my knife into the sheath before changing my position. “Guess it doesn’t need to be magical after all.”
“It does,” Gregory grunted as he crawled along the wall, drawing the first gargoyle with him. “I felt it when I first met you. It smells like magic. I assumed you knew.”
I didn’t have time to argue. The third gargoyle had honed in on me, realizing Gregory wasn’t the only threat. It zoomed down the wall so fast, I could barely focus on it. Bracing my legs as wide as they’d go, I yanked out my knife again, my mobility drastically cut down now.
Gregory slashed out before moving up the wall. I lost sight of him as the huge stone gargoyle bore down on me, the big lion head at odds with its lizard-like body. A claw shot out, slashing straight at me, a blow I couldn’t avoid. Blistering pain seared the skin on my arm.
I jabbed forward. My knife clinked against the thing’s side. It slashed again, barely missing me, before changing position. I cut off a curse. With only one good hand, needing to hold on to the wall, I was stuck. The gargoyle had the high ground, literally.
The hissing and spitting increased in volume, and Pete leapt up to latch on to the creature’s hind leg. It squealed and jerked away. I used the distraction, stretching as much as I dared, but my angle was off. I slashed under the thing’s arm, not far enough in.
Ignoring Pete for the moment, gargoyle number three pushed forward and struck out. My eyes widened as the claws, aiming directly for my neck, whipped through the air. I jerked my knife up, but it wouldn’t help. My fingers slipped as I shifted, trying to brace myself for those stone claws to tear into my neck.
Chapter 6
The gargoyle had me dead to rights, and there was nothing I could do about it but try and stare it down and pray someone saved me.
Orin’s body popped into my line of sight. He pushed up in front of me and stuck out a forearm, taking the blow meant for me. The gargoyle’s claws raked across his arm, but the injury didn’t stop him. His fingers elongated into nasty, grayish-black claws, and he darted forward and slashed the underbelly of the gargoyle in one weirdly graceful movement.
Sparks flew and the creature’s face closed down in pain, eyes shutting tightly. It immediately began to slow, the stone hardening into a statue.
“Wow,” Wally said, poised on the tiny ledge next to me, her arms shaking as she clutched two handholds. “That was fast.”
“My kind have no problem with these creatures,” Orin said, and I could hear more than a trace of snootiness in his tone. It was clear why he hadn’t bothered to get involved until now, thinking himself above gargoyles in the magical hierarchy. So then…what had changed? Why come to the rescue?
Panting, Gregory clung to the wall next to a slowing gargoyle, watching it return to a statue. Below us, a group of three people, all somewhat spaced out, worked up the wall unimpeded, the way cleared by us.
“Let’s go.” Gregory pointed up at Ethan reaching the topmost ledge. He doggedly pulled himself over. “All he’ll have to do is find the treasure on top, if he knows to look.”
“He didn’t know last time.” Orin grabbed Pete by the tail and abruptly flung him. Pete sailed up over the ledge and probably smashed painfully onto the roof. Orin pulled himself ahead of Wally and me, moving like an oversized spider with those long thin limbs of his.
“I guess we’re lucky Ethan didn’t memorize all the details,” Gregory said dryly.
Utterly exhausted, arms and legs shaking, I pushed myself up the last ten feet. The guys reached the top edge and pulled themselves over. Wally labored beside me, working harder than she likely ever had in her life up to this point.
“You know… what I said about the percentage… of vampires being staked… for not working with others well? I made up…that fact…about them,” she whispered, nearly at the top. “I’m sure…there is a stat… I just…don’t know it.”
“Why bother?” I asked, my foot slipping. I jammed it back into the closest divot.
“The trick…with a vampire… is to appeal to their…intellect and fear. Dying scares…them like it scares…anyone, and the ones who aren’t…trained and don’t find a faction, often turn…rogue and dangerous. Then they’re…killed. He might not…totally believe me, but…it is just as easy…for him to help…us as to not. I gave…him incentive to do so.”
I let out a tired laugh as I pulled myself up and over the top, spilling myself onto the glorious flatness of the roof. “Well done, Wally,” I said, dropping my hands to my sides. “Well done.”
She crashed down right next to me. “Thanks,” she said sheepishly. “I’ll have to look up…more stats in case he stops helping. I’m sure…” She gulped and sucked in a deep breath. “I’m sure there are many. I’m tired. So, so tired. I hate this challenge. I’ve never liked climbing.”
I had to agree.
“Let’s go,” Gregory said urgently, reaching down and plucking at my arm.
“I’ve never seen…man boobs on a strong, skinny dude,” Wally said randomly, looking at the sky. “Weird.”
I froze for one moment before hopping up and tugging on my shirt, making sure it didn’t cling. “We all have our genetic issues,” I mumbled, glancing over the edge at the wall. One of the first gargoyles we’d shut down had reanimated. It slashed at the girl closest to it, claws sliding across her chest. She jerked back, screaming, lost her hold, and fell end over end. The other gargoyles slowly came to life as two more people climbed closer. But they were like the golems—we’d passed their territory, and they didn’t seem to notice us any longer.
“I snore,” Wally said, getting to her feet. “I get it from my dad. My mother always complains. Genetics are a funny thing. So don’t feel bad. Not like you can control it.”
I didn’t respond, figuring it was best not to engage in discussing my “man boobs.”
Instead, I focused on where we were going next. A free-standing door stood at the corner of the massive dirt and stone covered space. Two slouching, clearly exhausted people from the other team I guessed, reached it. One pulled the door open. Light glowed within, but nothing took shape beyond it. After both people passed through, a jacketed arm reached out, grabbed the handle, and pulled the door shut.
“Either they didn’t know to look for the treasure, or we’re too late,” I said, rubbing at my eyes. Damn it, it frustrated the hell out of me to come so close only to lose. I wasn’t going to bother commenting on the lack of a visible room bey
ond the door. Or the disembodied arm. Clearly the situation was magical, and everyone would just roll their eyes at my discomfort.
“They didn’t know. But Ethan does. The trinket is gold. I can feel it over that way.” Gregory nodded toward Ethan, who stood kitty-corner to the door. “He figured out that he has to find something up here.”
Pete took off running toward Ethan, and we stumbled after him, limbs heavy. We reached Ethan as he bent down and started digging through the dirt and rock at his feet.
Pete sprung at Ethan—and slammed into an invisible wall. He rolled backward, shaking his head, growling and spitting, claws slashing at the empty air.
A wide grin spread across Ethan’s face as he turned to face us, protected in his magical bubble. He fisted his hand and stood. My heart sank as he peeled back his fingers, showing us what lay on his palm. A chunk of gold in a perfect square. Like a Rubik’s Cube only without the moving pieces.
“Dang it,” Wally said, deflating.
Ethan’s eyes narrowed at us, cutting between me and Gregory. “You found the treasure at the last challenge, didn’t you? That’s why you stayed behind. You found it, but you didn’t say anything.”
We all shifted in the following silence.
Ethan nodded like that was answer enough. He dropped his square chunk of gold into his pocket before waving his wand, taking away the magical barrier. Rather than stow the wand, he pointed it at Pete to keep him at bay.
Pete gave one last hissing snarl, turned and lifted his tail at Ethan. A distinct roll of stink filled the air, aimed at Ethan. His face turned green as he shot forward, through the cloud of stench and toward the doorway.
“I won’t forget,” Ethan said through clenched teeth, “but we may still need each other. For now.”
The rest of us followed him to the door as two individuals on opposite sides of the tower crawled up over the ledge. Both looked a lot…well, more goblin-like than Gregory. They had large eyes, small, gangly bodies and knobby, curved fingers.
Shadowspell Academy: The Culling Trials, Book 2 Page 4
