Stonecast

Thirty

Alexandra

“L exi,” a voice called out to me, but I didn’t respond.

That was the nice thing about shock. Nobody really expected you to answer while your brain shut down to take a rest from everything that had happened. Well, not completely shut down. Images of the evening flooded my mind, flashes of the crumpling freighter, stone wings, the column of flame amid an ocean of water . . .

And Caleb at the center of it all. Caleb.

“Dead,” I said, simply to acknowledge the fact out loud to myself.

“Lexi!” the voice called out, sharper this time, accompanied by the sensation of someone grabbing my shoulder and shaking me. Rory.

I lifted my head and opened my eyes, and, to my surprise, we were not on the small boat anymore. The rooftop garden of my new building on Saint Mark’s greeted me. I had no idea how I had gotten there, but I was comforted in my grief to see Rory and Marshall to either side of me on one of the park benches there.

“Caleb’s dead,” I said.

“We know,” Stanis said, and I looked up to find him standing ten feet away on the pathway. “Are you unharmed?”

I turned my attention to myself for a moment as I took his question in. “I . . . I think so.” I looked to Rory. “Caleb’s dead.”

She nodded and squeezed my shoulder.

Marshall’s hand fell on my other one. “But not in vain,” he said. “He saved us.”

I stood on shaky legs and walked to Stanis. “You could have saved him,” I said.

“I could not,” he said. “I was honoring Caleb’s actions. As well as honoring his request to watch over you.”

I searched his face, but Stanis was as grave and silent a sentinel as ever. “I hate this,” I said. “Not being able to read you.”

“I am truly sorry,” he said.

“Don’t worry,” I said. “When I restore our connection, it won’t matter. Everything will be as it should.” I looked up into Stanis’s eyes. “Do you think it’s over?”

“The threat from my family, yes,” he said.

“Good,” I said, and grief took me over. I collapsed against the smooth cool stone of his chest and lay there, unmoving.

“Lexi,” Rory cried out, pointing up into the air.

Marshall was staring up at the sky as well. “I think you may have called it a little too early on being over,” he said. “Incoming gargoyles!”

All around the rooftop park, branches swayed and shook as wave after wave of gargoyles came down out of the night sky. Although each was terrifying in its own unique way, one stood out among the rest as it landed on the roof and dropped the inert, burned form of Caleb Kennedy at its feet.

I turned my eyes away before I could take in the full extent of the damage to him, turning my fury on the creature who had dared to bring him before us. Had it not, I thought, been enough to watch him engulfed in flames upon the ship’s deck without having to look at his corpse?

As the other gargoyles came down in their clumsy attempts to land, tree limbs snapped and cracked, falling from their trunks. I’d already had one home destroyed, and even though we were outnumbered, I’d be damned if I wasn’t going to fight for my new one.

Stanis went for the same lead gargoyle I was heading for, but the reach of my power was closer and quicker, lashing out to the stone surrounding the figure, the bricks of the pathway responding to my command and rising.

The gargoyle stopped, raising its clawed hands against the bricks, and stepped back.

“Please, no!” it said. No, she said, looking to my grotesque. “You told me to seek you out.”

Stanis paused in his advance, his face unsure. I ran to his side, but I held the bricks under my control in the air surrounding the figure.

“Emily . . . ?” Stanis said. “Hoffert.”

“You know this one?” I asked.

He nodded. “We met . . . briefly. She was your brother’s diversionary tactic.”

I looked the slender creature over, its features more batlike than those of Stanis. “You worked for my brother?” I asked, anger rising against my will. The bricks wavered, inching forward around her.

“No!” she said, fear in her voice. “Stanis, please . . .”

My grotesque looked around the roof at the others. “Why did you bring our enemies here to our home?” Stanis demanded.

“They’re not your enemies,” she pleaded. “They’re the same as I . . . confused, scared, unsure.”

I stepped toward her. “You expect me to believe you’re not our enemies when you dare lay our dead friend at your feet?” I shouted. I could contain my rage and sorrow no longer. I hurled one of the bricks through the air at her, but she swiped her claw at it, causing the stone to shatter into fragments.

I expected her to attack in retaliation, but she simply stayed where she stood and lowered her arms. When she spoke, her voice was less fearful but still quiet.

“Your friend,” she said. “He is not dead.”

Of course he is, I thought to myself. I looked down at him once more, examining the burned body I had been so quick to look away from. The tattered remains of Caleb’s clothes were charred with soot—still smoking—but Caleb himself looked untouched except for the few remaining pieces of singed hair that were flaking away.

Even though his eyes were closed and his face unresponsive, the sight of his chest rising and falling caused my legs to give out beneath me. I fell by his side, grabbing him up in my arms, and the bricks under my control fell back to the pathway.

“You’re alive!” I said, pressing him close against me, feeling his heartbeat strengthen as his head stirred against my chest.

“You . . . sure about that . . . ?” he said, his voice weak. The last word was barely out of his mouth when he fell into a fit of coughing that ended with him spitting out a thick black liquid onto the roof.

“Pretty,” Rory said as she joined us, Marshall at her side.

I pushed away from him, holding his weakened body away from me at arm’s length so I could look him over. “How? How is it possible?”

“We watched you go kaboom,” Marshall added.

“I’m not sure,” Caleb said. “I watched me go kaboom, too.” He went quiet for a moment, lost in his own thoughts before speaking again. “Do you remember when I told you about the spell I used to bind myself to the two ships? How I had trouble driving a blade into my own skin when I needed the blood for the binding?”

I nodded.

He marveled at the smooth but unharmed skin of his arms and hands. “Years of ingesting alchemical mixes must have had more of an effect on me than I thought,” he said. “I guess my body is a bit more resilient than I previously would have imagined.”

Caleb ran his hand along the burned edge of what remained of his right pant leg, which was cut off just above his knee.

“You look like the Incredible Hulk after he changes back into Bruce Banner,” Marshall said.

“After surviving that explosion,” he said, “I feel like the Hulk.”

I hugged him hard, but not too hard. I’d hate for him to have survived an explosion only to break his ribs in my overzealousness at finding him alive still.

As I released Caleb, Rory caught him as he lay back down.

I stood, turning to this new gargoyle. “If you aren’t here to cause trouble, why are you here?”

Her wings flitted with nerves, and though she looked on the verge of taking to the sky once more, she held her ground. “Stanis told me to find him,” she said.

“I did indeed tell you to seek me out, Emily,” Stanis said. “But who are these others?”

Although this other creature was a gargoyle, her body moved like that of an uncomfortable young woman, something I was all too familiar with.

“Many of these others were promised the same safety that Devon promised for allegiance to him,” she said. “And others were like me . . . alone, scared, confused. So when you told me to seek you out, I did. When I saw the ship ablaze, I rescued this man you had been working with and followed you and your friends back to the city.” The gargoyle turned to me, looking down into my eyes. “I am sorry to intrude, but I—and many others—have questions we need answered.”

I could not help but smile. “It is no worry, Emily,” I said. “A polite gargoyle is welcome here anytime, unlike the kind you first aligned yourself with.”

“There is much to discuss,” Stanis said, “but you must forgive me a moment, Emily. I must speak with my maker’s kin privately.”

Emily nodded, and now it was my turn to be confused as Stanis took me gently by the arm and walked me away from my friends and the gathering crowd of gargoyles. He stopped when we were well away from all the others.

“What is it, Stanis?”

“I have been thinking,” he said. “Even after these many months of no longer being bound by Alexander’s rules, I still find it a novel thing to do.”

“What about?” I asked.

Stanis stood silent, staring up into the night sky before finally looking down to meet my eyes.

“I do not think it would be wise to reestablish our bond,” he said.

The words hit hard, as if Stanis had actually slapped me, and I stepped back.

“Why not?” I asked, confused. “The timing is perfect now. We’re out of danger and can take the time to do it right.”

“There are others who need me more,” he said. “And I do not think restoring that connection would help me in doing what is right for them.” My grotesque looked over to the assembly on the rooftop. “I have a people now. A confused people with the need for some sort of leader. They need the person Alexander always wanted me to become.”

“What about what I need?” I asked, feeling stupid and greedy the second the words were out of my mouth, but my heart could not keep quiet. “What am I supposed to do without that connection? I miss it, Stanis. What if I’m in peril?”

Stanis turned to my group of friends, his eyes staying on Caleb, who by that time was standing.

“You have more than enough people interested in your well-being,” he said. “You will be fine. I cannot, however, say the same for these others. They need me more.”

Loath though I was to admit it at first, Stanis was absolutely right. There was no room for my selfishness in all this. All I could do was nod and head back to my friends, leaving Stanis behind me.

Rory and Marshall had Caleb stretched out between them and I took him from them, wrapping my right arm around his waist for support.

“What’s going on?” Rory asked.

“I’m not entirely sure,” I said. “I thought things would go back to the way they were once things were over between us and Kejetan, but it just seems to get more complicated.”

Caleb gave a pained laugh that erupted into a fit of coughing. “Life has a way of doing that,” he said. “At least these gargoyles didn’t want to tear me to pieces.”

“Not yet anyway,” Marshall said, nervous, looking at the gathered crowd of winged creatures.

Caleb leaned his head against mine, his skin burning hot to the touch. “I don’t think I have the strength in me right now if we did have to fight them,” he said. “But if they wanted trouble, I doubt they would have brought me here.”

I watched as Stanis walked back to the gargoyle who had brought Caleb to us.

“Just because they don’t want trouble doesn’t mean they haven’t brought it,” I said.

I walked toward them, helping Caleb along as I went, happy to have him by my side despite the madness of the past few minutes.

“What is it you want from us?” I asked her.

“I don’t know,” she said. “I only know that Stanis told me to seek him out. I guess I—we—want answers.”

“We can provide those,” I said. “As best we can, anyway.”

“You’ve got an actual alchemist as your service,” Marshall added, jerking his thumb toward Caleb.

“No,” Caleb said, clapping Marshall on the shoulder. “You’ve got two.”

Marshall blushed. “I’m still learning what I can,” he said. “More of an apprentice, really.”

“But if we can help, we will,” added Rory.

“Thank you,” the gargoyle said, then looked back to me. “I do not mean to take advantage of your kindness.”

“You’re not,” I admitted, softening to the creature’s sincerity. “We’re just not used to being around creatures of your kind without their trying to tear us to shreds.”

The gargoyle’s face registered shock, one of its hands flying to its mouth in surprise. The gesture looked almost comical on it as it exclaimed, “Oh my!”

“I will help as I can,” I said.

Stanis cleared his throat, and my friends and I turned to him.

“Forgive me,” he said, “your help is welcome, but I fear this may require the finesse of one more learned in the ways of the grotesque, the way of the gargoyle.”

It both pained me and gave me great pride to see the creature my great-great-grandfather had first taught to speak so earnestly offering to help.

“Are you sure?” I asked.

Stanis bowed his head to me. “These are . . . for lack of a better expression, my people.”

“There are others out there,” the female gargoyle said. “Beyond the ones who have chosen to follow me here. Others who do not wish well toward us or humankind. We have already fallen victim to some of them.”

“We can help,” I said.

“No,” Stanis said.

“Excuse me?” I asked.

“I will deal with them,” Stanis said. He looked out over the assembly on our roof. “And I will teach you how to deal with them as well.”

He turned to me. “Do you mind?” he asked.

The very fact that he was asking brought an unexpected joy to me. I shook my head. How could I say no to that most human level of concern for my feelings in this?

“Come,” he said to the crowd. “I have much to tell you about the family whom you have to thank for your existence.” Stanis shot up into the air over the roof, hovering high above as he waited for the others to take flight, leaving the four humans standing there.

The night skies over Manhattan would be forever changed. So, too, it seemed, was my relationship to Stanis. Whether either would prove for the better or worse remained to be seen, but as I stood there among my friends and Caleb, one thing was both clear and bittersweet.

Stanis no longer belonged to just me.