Locked in Stone

by Tory Michaels

Save Rose. Save Jonas. He’d failed to save Anniko. He couldn’t add another gargoyle death to his conscience.

  “More are coming, Cal.”

  Pain lanced through his chest from nowhere and he staggered. That snapped him out of the confusion and he blasted one final bolt, throwing every ounce of strength he had left in his body toward the Demon Gatherer before him.

  It exploded.

  Light from the explosion chased the fog of the Nexus around him, at least temporarily.

  In the three subsequent heartbeats as the world faded around him with a whoosh, he looked at Jonas, agony eating at his conscience.

  Gargoyles before Sentinels. Protect. Serve.

  “I’m so sorry,” he cried, reaching uselessly toward the Demon Gatherer holding Jonas. But the cord to his body on Earth inexorably dragged him clear of the Nexus.

  Jonas let out a horrified, no-longer human squeal as Cal sank back into his body.

  He’d failed.

  As Earth settled around him and the gray of the Nexus faded, the last thing he saw was the Demon Gatherer throw its head back and howl triumphantly, just before it ripped the struggling Jonas in half.

  Chapter Seven

  Sentinel Truth #4: If you ever come up against an invisible barrier, run, don’t walk. At least until you can find some other Sentinels for protection. You’ve likely found blasphemed territory, and that means Lucifer is a frequent visitor to the area.

  Rose spun, using her tail to yank the vampire’s legs out from under him before he sank his fangs into Cal’s unprotected throat. Sweat poured down her face and she dashed it away, using the movement to drive her elbow into the creature that had just leaped up behind her. Demon or vamp, it didn’t matter. They all had to die.

  Cal blinked and staggered as the monster grunted.

  Thanks be to all the fucking gods, demons, and angels.

  Awareness flooded his eyes and he jumped nearly five feet forward to swing the axe that had been, until that moment, hanging loosely from his fingers.

  “About time, dumbass,” she snapped and jammed her dagger into the nearest vampire’s chest. It wouldn’t stop him entirely; the dagger was neither silver nor wood.

  “Later,” he growled just before he smoothly removed the head of the demon about to land a wicked blow to Dennis’s unprotected back.

  They hadn’t even had a chance to call for backup after the creatures descended, but the fight became markedly easier now that Rose didn’t have to try to protect Cal and herself from the monsters.

  Above the clang and the clash of weaponry, the howl of the T’chan threatened to deafen her. If for no other reason than blessed, sweet silence, she ached to get to it and figure out how to shut it up.

  “Head’s up,” Cal shouted and she instinctively hit the pavement. A knife sailed just inches above her dropped head, impaling one of the last four vampires remaining. It gave a soft moan and crumpled to the ground.

  Apparently Cal came loaded with multiple weapons for use in combat. Made sense, though she had no clue where he’d hidden them. Having carried him for thirty minutes, she was aware of how little room there was for anything to be tucked away in his leather clothes.

  At least he was finally awake to use them. She shot his back another threatening glare and rolled to her feet to swing at the last standing Twisted One.

  Dennis finished his last assailant by simply ripping the creature’s heart from its chest. Rose was strong-stomached, but the sight turned even her into a quivering mass of puke-readiness, and she pivoted on her heel and bent over, hands on her knees to try to catch her breath and avoid tossing her cookies. She panted, but barely heard it under the ominous scream of the T’chan.

  “Well, that was…bracing,” Dennis rumbled. He moved through her field of vision, an absurdly small vial in his big hand, from which he dribbled a few drops onto the fallen victim of the Twisted Ones.

  Cal sucked in a breath and as she faced him, her teeth grinding together, he whipped a small packet of some sort from the pocket of his heavy leather jacket and sprinkled powder from it over two pieces of a corpse.

  Rose opened her mouth to snarl at him for his slacking off during the fight, but then the words stuck in her throat. The corpse at her feet was now dissolving at an unbelievable pace.

  Well, shit. So that’s how they keep the humans from finding mountains of dead bodies.

  When he moved to the second one with nary a word to her, her shock faded and she stomped over to him, and cocked her arm back to the side. It never made contact as he caught her wrist in mid-strike. She didn’t let that stop her. “You son of a bitch! What the hell were you doing, daydreaming when we’re getting our asses handed to us?”

  No wonder Gwen thought the Sentinels were useless. First time into combat with her and Cal promptly flaked out.

  His expression darkened and he growled, “Stop trying to hit me, Rose. You have no clue what I do for the Protectorate. We survived, and I was trying to do my job. You’re important, but not the be-all and end-all of my existence, no matter how vital you are to us.”

  He never stopped shaking powder with his other hand. Fury and a strange impression of grief shone in his expression. His grip tightened for one moment longer and then he thrust her back.

  “Just stop hitting me. I’m not the enemy,” he snapped and stomped toward another demon corpse. “I was trying to save Jonas. He was in the Nexus.”

  “Huh? Who’s Jonas?” She glanced around. It had just been the three of them…and the man they’d found being used as a meal.

  “He’s still breathin’, Cal, but he’s not getting up.” Dennis rumbled. “What happened?”

  “Soul-ripped. Demon Gatherers got him because I had to get back here.” He paused in the body disintegration long enough to say, in a slightly more laid-back tone, “I’m sorry, Rose. I thought you’d be safe for a couple of minutes. I had to try to save him.”

  She blinked rapidly, trying to digest his words. “Save who?”

  He waved toward the fallen man. “Him. I can access a place between Earth and Otherworld called the Nexus, and I was hoping to pull his soul back to his body before he crossed over.”

  Didn’t make a lot of sense to her, but then again, she wasn’t really up on all the Sentinel lore. Still, she couldn’t mistake the frustration in his stance and face for anything other than what it was. “So, you didn’t just…zone out on me?”

  “Never. I was trying to do both parts of my job at once. I had to come back without saving Jonas because I heard you calling.”

  Now he wasn’t the only one feeling bad. Guilt popped her selfish bubble of anger. Someone had died because he’d stopped zoning out to protect her?

  She glanced at the fallen individual, saw the even rise and fall of his chest. “He’s still breathing. He’s going to be okay, right?”

  Maybe if he’d told her what he was going to do before leaving… Right, because that’s what everyone does in combat, stops to chit-chat.

  Having common sense kick in sucked when she still wanted to be pissed.

  Cal had been the one standing there like a dumbass in the middle of a fight. Someone had had to get through to him and Dennis hadn’t even tried.

  The gargoyle himself coughed, the sound apologetic. “Perhaps y’all should shelve this. We got a T’chan that needs handling and sooner or later, more vamps are likely to show up. And who knows what else.”

  Cal’s lips tightened, but he gave a short nod. She huffed and jabbed her finger in the Sentinel’s chest. “You better explain and good later, Mr. Levesque. You tell me to trust you and then you space out on me. I. Could. Have. Died.”

  And then wouldn’t he feel terrible?

  Cal’s nodded shortly as he turned toward the T’chan’s whine. He muttered, “I’m sorry. Two sets of obligations pulling me two different directions.”

  Well, hell. The reminder that she wasn’t the be-all and end-all of his existence made her feel like a bitch once again. She really needed to start
getting answers before exploding and embarrassing herself.

  He bolted off and Rose would have followed had Dennis not yanked her to a halt before she got three steps down the road. “Listen. Cal’s had a hard time of it, far harder than you can comprehend, since you and your sisters were believed dead.”

  She lifted her eyebrows, not sure what he expected her to say in response.

  “He’s not a villain. Just saying, give him a chance. I’ve never heard of a ghost-talker seeing and hearing in the two worlds at the same time. What he did, coming out of the Nexus the way he did for you, it’s nothing short of incredible. Stop persecuting him for what happened in Hungary. You know full well he isn’t to blame. Remember who is.”

  Her face reddened at the clear accusation from the gargoyle. Coming from one of her own kind, the words sank in deeper than they would have from a human. She could take or leave scrutiny from humans and Sentinels, but her own kind? Yeah, different story there.

  “Now go, follow,” Dennis said, his gravelly voice gentling as he must have seen some sort of change in her. “I gotta attend to the corpses, and then get Jonas’s body somewhere safe. Lucas will want him for proper burial.”

  Freed from the gargoyle’s iron grip, Rose turned and fled down the street, using her wings to boost her speed, Dennis’s words ringing in her ears. Maybe she was being too judgmental.

  Never trust the Sentinels. They were useless once. They’ll be useless again. Gwen’s words rang through her head and for the first time in her life, Rose wavered in her belief in the woman.

  She came to the home, a simple, square Florida-style residence that she assumed housed the T’chan. The squeal threatened to deafen her now.

  The front door lay cracked open and she shivered at the reminder of four days before when she’d found Gwen’s decapitated corpse. The difference now was the clash of weapons and inhuman growls throughout the house. Cal had paused just outside the house and looked surprisingly relieved to see her. She would have gone in first, but when they moved at the same time, she decided to let him have the “honor.” The first person through a door never fared well in the movies.

  Oh God above, it stinks! Blood scent tainted the air around her. Sickening sulfur lay atop the copper and, to make matters worse, a delicate thread of lavender swirled in the air as well.

  I’m never taking a lavender bubble bath again.

  Sounds from multiple battles raged from throughout the house, but that faded as her awareness focused on the hellish red glow beckoning to her from down the hall. She skidded to a halt, entranced by the sight. Not even the scrawny, drooling vampire that loomed up, swiftly cut down by Cal, broke the spell the noise and light cast over her.

  The T’chan’s unearthly howl echoed through her brain and her feet moved of their own accord down the parquet hall. Each step increased the blood red illumination in the air. She didn’t even flinch when, once again, Cal jumped between her and an incoming something and knocked her into the wall. She never caught a glimpse of what tried to take a chunk out of her as she righted herself and rounded the corner.

  She came to a complete halt in what she presumed to be a den, based on the couch and wall-mounted TV. A blob floated in midair about two feet above a pair of bodies, flickering and flashing. It warped, twisted the view of whatever might lay within.

  The blob expanded, collapsed, and spat stinky sparks into the air. Rose took a deep breath and sulfur burned her lungs as she moved closer.

  That’s gotta be it. What else could it be, right?

  She’d certainly never come across any weird flashy lights outside of an occasional ocular migraine.

  Something visceral gripped her gut. She ground her teeth together trying to fight the magnetic attraction toward the ball of light. The T’chan weakened the very fabric of the veil between worlds. In just hours it could do more harm than decades of tunneling pressure from demons intent on opening a Rift. It needed to be closed ASAP, according to the Training Manual, before any creatures broke—

  A body leaped through the T’chan with an ear-shattering howl before she finished the thought.

  She yelped, stumbling back as she came face to face with a snuffling dog the size of a Shetland pony. Its eyes glowed redder than the T’chan. Steam billowed from its nostrils and mouth. Droplets of drool landed on one of the corpses and immediately began eating through the rigid flesh.

  “At least Supernatural’s hellhounds were invisible,” she whispered.

  The knife she gripped in her hand made a good weapon against a street punk or worked to slow down a vampire, but what about a beast this big? She hadn’t read the section on how to kill Otherworld critters yet. Besides, she didn’t want to get up close and personal with the mouthful of stained, yellow teeth.

  “Get back, Rose,” Cal bellowed just before his strong left hand dragged her behind him.

  Her body hurt at being wrenched away from the T’chan. Her tail whipped around to land a solid wallop on the creature at the same moment Cal swung his axe, her autonomic response proof that muscle memory from her self-defense classes in junior high and high school remained intact even as her mental acuity was sucked down by the hole.

  The hellhound bayed in protest as Cal’s axe sliced through its foreleg, the noise enough to jolt her temporarily free of the T’chan’s spell. She leaped over the monster, swiping at it with her claws to pull its attention from Cal. Next time she’d make sure to bring a gun loaded with some sort of bullets that would work. Those didn’t require personal contact.

  An arrow whizzed past her, clipping her cheek. It slammed into the far wall, just missing the dog’s head.

  “Thank God,” Cal called. “Reinforcements.”

  “Ang, not God,” replied a disturbingly chipper voice. “And I missed.”

  “Just don’t shoot me by mistake,” Cal barked and once again shoved Rose away as she tried to intercept the hellhound.

  This time she did protest, in the form of a vicious scowl before she glanced at the doorway to catch sight of a diminutive blonde woman with a bow taller than Ang herself was. But Cal tackled the hellhound before she could further say anything, and it did direct the vicious teeth and spittle in another direction, thankfully.

  The immediate threat gone, the T’chan wailed and spluttered, calling to her very nature. She inched closer to the light.

  Think, think. How do I close this? God forbid another freakin’ scary-assed hellhound come through.

  Another arrow zipped through the air and this time the archer didn’t miss, stapling the dog’s foot to the ground. Cal gave an appreciative growl and slammed the viciously spiked lower end of his axe into the hound’s throat. It gargled and struggled to dislodge the arrow while still clawing at Cal.

  Rose inched around the T’chan, ignoring the battle as best she could.

  She could do it. Mr. Ray said so.

  I think I can, I think I can.

  She thought of nothing.

  As she halted her circling, she glanced over in time to see Ang draw a third arrow, a glittering golden one, and sent it straight into the place in the hound where Rose expected a heart to be.

  The hound collapsed with only a single whimper more, its heavy body sending Cal to the floor.

  “Well, spit.” The blonde’s bow collapsed into a tiny replica of itself before she tucked it away into the top of her leather bustier and dashed to Cal, trying to drag him free.

  Courtesy dictated she ask Cal if he was okay. She ignored that and studied the T’chan instead. She’d apologize later.

  With the coast clear of monsters, at least for the moment, Rose reached for the flickering light. Her hand passed through it. Heat poured into her skin where she intercepted the light, so she withdrew her hand before it could be scorched.

  “Whatcha doin’?” the woman asked, still trying to push the dog off Cal.

  Cal shoved at the hellhound from below, panting heavily. It couldn’t be easy to breathe with hundreds of pounds of demon dog on him. />
  “I’ve never seen a T’chan before,” Rose said absently. Remembering his insistence that she tell no one else who or what she was, she still found the admission acceptable. No harm in admitting that, right? No one else had seen one either. “Trying to figure out how to seal it.”

  The other woman grunted and finally managed to help Cal roll the dog off of him. Sounds of other battles reached Rose, but they were all muted beneath the T’chan’s cry.

  “No one’s ever seen a T’chan. It’s pretty loud so it must be here. Especially with the bodies there. They were probably used as the sacrifice to open it,” she finished, waving a perfectly manicured hand.

  “Well, of course it is. It’s right there!” She gestured toward the light and returned her attention to it, though not before she noticed the startled expression on the Sentinel’s face.

  “You actually see the T’chan?”

  Oh, crap. She can’t see it.

  Unable to verbalize any more, she just nodded, tempted to step into the light. Something in her screamed to do just that. She couldn’t deny the pull and, lifting her chin, stepped directly into the hovering ball of light at abdomen height.

  Fire blazed through her body as she moved and she balanced on wide-spread legs to straddle the corpses. If she stepped on them, she’d leave unnatural claw marks that she didn’t think even the Sentinels could manage to hide.

  Rose closed her eyes, tried to still her racing heart as she calmed her mind. Maybe if she didn’t force herself to move, the action would occur to her. She knew she could do something. The knowledge, genetic knowledge, taunted her right at the edge of her consciousness.

  A new pressure built up inside her skull, not unlike the first time nature pushed her into shifting between human and gargoyle forms, the night she turned sixteen.

  …

  Cal shoved the hellhound’s body off him with a final, exhausted heave. Ang’s blue eyes met his as he swallowed hard. He’d heard Rose’s absent admission about seeing the T’chan and knew it wouldn’t take much for Ang to figure out just how a gargoyle could actually see the crack.