Amid Wind and Stone

by Nicole Luiken

  “Yes. The next youngest is Chert. He is seventy-eight.”

  Seventy-eight! That was a large gap. Was it difficult for gargoyles to conceive, or were they just uninterested in children because they were so long-lived?

  “Are they really your brothers?”

  “Chert treats me like a younger brother—I think he was very glad when I replaced him as ‘the baby.’ The others are more like aunts and uncles or grandparents.” He ventured a question of his own. “And you? You mentioned a sister. Do you have other siblings?”

  A pang tore through Dorotea. “Just Marta. She’s my half sister. She was injured in the latest earthquake when a tunnel collapsed on her.” A harsh sob caught in her throat, making it difficult to go on, but for some reason, she needed to make the gargoyle understand why she’d started all this. “She’s been unconscious ever since.” The words tasted like bile. “The healer doesn’t think she’ll ever wake.”

  “I’m sorry,” the gargoyle said.

  His kindness brought tears to her eyes.

  “May I ask you a question?” he asked. “Why did you pick me out of all the gargoyles in the cavern? Why did you wake me instead of someone bigger and stronger?”

  A choked laugh escaped her. “I picked you because you were small.” And something about him had called to her.

  “I am not the smallest!” He sounded insulted. “Rose Granite is shorter than I.”

  Dorotea remembered a pink granite gargoyle. “She was holding a battle-axe and looked ready to chop off my head. You looked…less intimidating. More human and less beast.” Except he probably thought that was an insult, too. “I mean—”

  “We’re here.” He steered her through the opening into a larger space. How much larger, Dorotea couldn’t tell in the pitch-blackness, but the relief of being released from her moving tomb made her legs wobble.

  She felt her way along a wall and sank down with her back against it and her legs sticking out. She inhaled great lungfuls of air and shuddered. Never again, she vowed. No more trips through stone.

  She’d almost rather be caught.

  Misery settled over her like a heavy cape. Now that her life was out of danger, the magnitude of her failure was sinking in. This was only a temporary reprieve. As soon as she came out of hiding, the Elect would exile her.

  And she’d accomplished nothing. The Goddess had refused to heal Marta, might not even be capable of healing if the gargoyle was to be believed, and the cave system was in danger from Her.

  Tears gathered in Dorotea’s eyes. She didn’t sniff, not wanting to alert the gargoyle that she was crying.

  “I’m sure your sister will recover,” he said awkwardly.

  She blinked in surprise, then realized he could see in the dark. Her tears fell faster.

  Footsteps told her the gargoyle was walking around. She heard stone shifting but couldn’t bring herself to care.

  “I found a candle. Would you like me to light it?”

  “Yes.” Her voice sounded hoarse, and she swiped at her cheeks. “I would like that.”

  A match flared, and the gargoyle’s stone face became visible as he lit the candle. Despite the flickering shadows, his expression struck her as intent, not savage. He blew out the match, then brought her the candle in a holder.

  She swallowed. “Thank you.”

  The sound of trickling water made her aware of how parched her throat was. She followed the sound to a small seep against one wall framed by two baby stalagmites no more than four inches high. A tin cup rested on the ground. She rinsed it off then waited impatiently for it to fill. She drained it four times before feeling satisfied.

  She wondered longingly if some food had been left here along with the candle, but no doubt it would have rotted by now. The cavern had an air of long disuse.

  Holding the candle aloft, she wandered around. The red-and-orange marbled walls were pretty, but the chamber was so small—only about fifteen paces long and half as wide. Aside from some dusty blankets, the cave was empty.

  Her breath caught in her throat when she completed her circuit of the blank walls. “Where’s the exit?” she demanded, her voice shrill.

  “This is a gargoyle haven,” he grated. “We have no need of tunnels, only air vents. You said you wished to go someplace safe. No one will find us here.”

  Dorotea shuddered. His decision had been logical, but her skin crept at the thought that she would have to enter the moving tomb again in order to leave.

  “What do you want? Do you want to go elsewhere?” the gargoyle asked cautiously.

  “Want?” Dorotea repeated. Her voice sounded too shrill to her ears, almost hysterical. “I want my family. I want the last two days of my life erased. But I can’t have those things.” She sank to her knees.

  He crouched beside her, golden gaze thoughtful. “You want your sister to be well.”

  She nodded listlessly.

  “You are a good sister to do so much, to risk so much, for her. Most people would just wring their hands and hope for a miracle.” He almost sounded admiring.

  “But I failed,” she whispered. Tears welled again.

  He shrugged. “Your first plan did. You can make another.”

  Could she? Her mind felt thick and dull.

  “Perhaps there is a cure for your sister’s illness Above.”

  She shook her head. “There’s nothing Above but death.”

  “Not so,” he disagreed. “Your human cities are not yet deserted. Remnants remain.”

  Dorotea harrumphed. “Scavengers.”

  “Mostly. But my people tell stories of strongholds where the Elect yet seek to reverse the blight upon their land. And even if they are a myth, there may be lost repositories of knowledge.”

  Libraries. It was the thinnest of straws, but she had nothing better to grasp at. Nor could she go back and sit by Marta’s side until the end. They would arrest and exile her. She might as well go on her own, foolishness or no.

  Still, she wasn’t stupid. The gargoyle must have his own reasons for suggesting this, but she couldn’t puzzle out why. Gargoyles lived below. “Why would you help me?” she asked.

  “This coma you speak of sounds a little like stasis.”

  Dorotea tensed, waiting for him to gloat or blame her.

  “Only, your sister is alone, while I had the company of my brethren. I would not wish such a fate on anyone. I will help you, if you promise to free me.”

  His unexpected offer flummoxed her and brought a lump to her throat.

  “I—” Was she really going to agree to this? Back in the Cathedral he had proved to be a formidable ally. It would be so much easier if she didn’t have to fight him every step of the way. And against all odds, she was starting to trust him. “Thank you for your offer. I accept. But right now I can’t think. I’m going to sleep.” Tomorrow she could start working on a plan to appease the Goddess and save Marta. Right now, it seemed too hopeless.

  The gargoyle was still watching her. Why? Oh, yes. He was waiting for her to close the loopholes, to forbid him from leaving the chamber. But if they were to work together, she needed to know if she could trust him, before she could even consider removing his collar. So she said nothing.

  A small voice inside shrieked that she was risking her life. Too tired to care, she lay down on the blankets beside the spring. She didn’t even bother to shake them out.

  Heartsick, confused, exhausted, she shut her eyes and instantly fell asleep.

  In the dream, she was a little girl again.

  “Grab your doll, sweetie. We’re going on a little trip.” Her father was smiling, but something too intense in his voice made her hang back, uneasy.

  “Someone is coming,” Flint rumbled. “No time to run.”

  Her father’s smile turned sharp enough to cut. “Then we fight. Dorotea, hide.”

  “But I can’t find my dolly.”

  Before Dorotea finished her protest, her father scooped her up and shoved her in the large woven basket
that served as a laundry hamper. “Pull the clothes over your head, and be very quiet. I mean it, Dorotea. I’ll throw away your doll if you make so much as a peep.”

  He closed the lid. Enough light filtered through the basket weave to see, but Dorotea’s heart beat faster in fright. She pulled her mom’s red dress over her head. Her thumb crept into her mouth, even though her mom said five was too old to be sucking her thumb.

  The beaded curtain made a clashing sound, and people started yelling.

  “Traitor!”

  “Get him!”

  “What you’re doing is wrong!”

  Then worse sounds than shouting: rock breaking, furniture being thrown, screams of rage, gargoyle growls.

  Whimpering, Dorotea sucked her thumb harder.

  Another loud crash hurt her ears, and then something hit the laundry basket. It tipped over, and Dorotea spilled partway out. The dress still covered her head, but now she could see, and what she saw paralyzed her with terror.

  A gargoyle pounded her father’s head against the ground. Her father strained, trying to push away the gargoyle’s wrists, but he couldn’t budge them. The gargoyle was too strong.

  “Papa!” Dorotea whimpered, but no one heard her.

  “Kill him!” a man shouted.

  The gargoyle’s stone hands grasped her father’s head and twisted.

  The crack of breaking bone—

  “Dorotea.”

  —her father’s body went limp. His gaze grew fixed, his face slack. Dorotea wailed soundlessly.

  Her eyes opened. She gasped. A dark shape leaned over her. A gargoyle. Stone hands gripped her shoulder and neck— He was going to break her neck, just like her father.

  “Don’t touch me!” She scrambled away, disoriented in the dark. Where was she? The hidden cave where the gargoyle had taken her. How could she have been so stupid, letting her guard down while alone with him? Her head pounded viciously.

  The gargoyle spoke, but his words were just noise. “Stupid girl, you’re going to—” He reached for her.

  She screamed and kicked his stone shin. “Die!”

  Light flared along his collar. The gargoyle stumbled, and she scrambled away from him in the dark, panic choking her. Her teeth chattered, and her heart thudded in terror. He’d killed her father, tried to kill her. Her legs tangled in her robe. Unable to stand, she crawled away, expecting at any moment for those stone hands to catch her. Goddess help her. The chamber was too tiny; there was nowhere to hide. She was trapped with a killer.

  (look into the mirror)

  The gleam of the small spring caught her eye. The candlelight allowed her to glimpse her reflection in the dark water, wavering and odd, almost like a stranger’s face—

  (look deep)

  She met her reflection’s furious eyes. Vertigo hit her like a punch in the stomach as she fell into her reflection.

  And fell out of her body into a new one.

  Leah took control of Dorotea’s body and looked around the dimly lit cavern.

  Gideon’s otherself, the gargoyle, writhed in pain on the ground. He clawed at his neck. Red sparks flashed off his glowing collar.

  The sight made Leah frantic. Her heart raced, and her mouth dried. “What’s wrong? How do I make it stop?”

  He tried to answer, choked. “Tell…it.”

  “Tell what?” Leah didn’t understand. She wrung her hands. What if he died like Gideon?

  He clawed at the collar again. “Stop.”

  Did he mean she should talk to the collar? “Stop, collar! Stop hurting him!”

  The collar’s glow winked out. The gargoyle remained curled up in a ball, groaning.

  Ashes, what was that thing? She concentrated, and the answer sprang full-blown from Dorotea’s memory. It was a slave collar, designed to control gargoyles. Dorotea had put it around his neck on purpose.

  Leah put her hand on her stomach, suddenly nauseated. The evilness of the device appalled her. How could her otherself be party to slavery and torture? It made her sick to think that she might have the same capacity for cruelty.

  “What is wrong with you? Why did you attack me?” Hurt and anger mixed in his gravelly voice.

  Leah didn’t know how to answer so she just shook her head. “What can I do?” She knelt beside him and stroked his stone shoulder, so cool compared to Gideon’s dragon heat. “Did the collar burn you? Would water help?” She started to rise.

  In one quick move, he yanked her against his chest. He locked an arm around her neck and growled in her ear, “One twist and I could break your neck. You wouldn’t have time to stop me. How does it feel when our roles are reversed?”

  Leah relaxed into him. She could never fear Gideon’s otherself. “Dorotea may deserve it, but please don’t kill her. I’m afraid the slave collar might cause you eternal pain if you did.”

  His grip loosened in surprise. “What do you mean ‘her’?”

  Leah met his golden gaze calmly; his eyes weren’t so different from Gideon’s diamond ones. “I’m not Dorotea. I’m Leah, her otherself.”

  “Otherself?” His brows lowered over his eyes, giving him a brutish look.

  “It’s a long story. I’ll explain later, but first, wouldn’t you like me to remove that horrid thing around your neck?”

  Another glower. “Is this some sort of trick? We both know you’re too scared to free me.”

  Leah shook her head, speaking gently, as if to a wounded animal. “No trick, I promise. Here, I’ll take off the armbands.” She slipped them down off Dorotea’s arms and offered them to the gargoyle.

  When he didn’t take them, she dropped them on the cave floor. “There, now I can’t control you. Will you let me take it off?” She turned within the circle of his arm and set her hands on his neck.

  He laid one hand over hers, expression wary. “Why aren’t you afraid of me anymore? Of these?” He flexed his claws and lifted his upper lip, exposing fangs.

  “Dorotea was afraid of you. I’ve ridden on a dragon. You’re not nearly as terrifying,” Leah said dryly. “I know you don’t trust her, but let me take the collar off. What do you have to lose?”

  He released her wrist, but he still watched her as if she might betray him at any moment.

  Stupid, stupid, Dorotea. She’d not only damaged her relationship with her soul mate, she’d wounded him. A tear trickled from her eye. Leah wiped it away impatiently.

  Leah put her arms around his neck to undo the clasp. The move pressed her body against his unyielding stone one.

  Click. The collar hinged into two pieces and fell into her hand. She opened her eyes to find him staring at her as if she were amazing. Her heart clutched up: Gideon used to look at her like that.

  “There, now you’re free.” Suddenly breathless, she shifted to sit beside him and held the collar out. “Destroy it,” she said firmly.

  “I don’t have to obey you anymore,” he said, slowly taking it.

  She smiled tenderly. “No, you don’t. But unless you have another use for it, why leave the threat of it hanging over you?” She hesitated, then admitted, “I can’t keep Dorotea out of her body forever.” Nor would she truly want to. From the little she’d seen of Stone World, it was just as strange and disorienting as Water.

  “It’s disturbing when you talk about yourself as another person,” he rumbled. But he did pick up the collar and the bracelets, melting them into slag with a casualness that took Leah aback. The gold puddled on the ground but didn’t give off heat like metal melted in a forge. “Who are you supposed to be again?”

  Leah shook her head. “Sorry. I promised you an explanation, didn’t I?” She told him about the Mirror Worlds, the True World, and otherselves.

  He stared at her. “That’s the craziest thing I’ve ever heard.”

  Leah uttered a pained laugh. “I can’t disagree.”

  “So if you’re not her, where is Dorotea?” He scowled suspiciously. “Did you hurt her?”

  “I’m surprised you care,” Leah s
aid, taken aback.

  “I don’t!” He touched his neck. “She tried to kill me.” He frowned. “First, she says maybe we can work together and then— All I did was try to wake her out of a nightmare.”

  “Dorotea isn’t hurt—not that she doesn’t deserve it. She’s in my body on Fire World.” About to say that Dorotea was perfectly safe, Leah swallowed the words back. Fire World wasn’t safe for anyone, but Dorotea would survive for a few hours. Or a day.

  The gargoyle shook his head. “None of this makes sense. Maybe you’re just pretending not to be Dorotea.”

  Leah shrugged. “I suppose you’ll have to decide for yourself.” She was confident what his decision would be. He was just as smart as Gideon and Ryan, after all.

  She wondered whether it would be a bad idea to tell him he was her dead soul mate’s otherself. Even in this rugged form, he already reminded her of Gideon. But it was dangerous for her to think of him that way. She didn’t want to make the same mistake she’d made with Ryan. Gideon’s Water self wasn’t Gideon, and neither was his Stone self. Gideon is dead. As always, the thought stabbed like a dagger to the heart. She shook off the pain. “What’s your name?”

  He stared at her. “I begin to believe that you truly are someone else.”

  With a pang, Leah realized that Dorotea had never asked his name—because Dorotea had been taught not to consider him a person.

  He seemed to come to a decision. “My name is Jasper,” he said. “Red Jasper, if you want to be formal.”

  Chapter Ten

  The Queen’s Birthday Parade—

  In Which Both Audrey and the Fleet are Outmaneuvered

  Air World

  The Fleet Parade was usually Audrey’s favorite part of the Queen’s Birthday celebrations, but her looming appointment with The Phantom kept her tense and unable to enjoy it.

  She didn’t truly expect him to make an appearance until afterward. The Hendersons had invited a full party, and twenty people crowded the large balcony. The younger Henderson and Konig siblings and their respective nannies fidgeted at one end; the adults, including Duke Anders, flocked at the other. Which left the middle for her age group: Jane, Katie, and Franklin, and Piers had finagled an invite, as well.