The Mammoth Book of Paranormal Romance

by Trisha Telep

  Eight

  Even with the moonlight illuminating the forest, I would have been lost without Daniel’s scent. I wasn’t used to relying on my sense of smell, but that’s exactly what I was doing as I walked back through the woods towards what I thought was the town. In my peripheral vision, hazy flashes of maroon darted by. It had scared me the first few times I saw it, but then I realized what it was. I was seeing the heat living creatures gave off, just like I was looking through an infrared camera.

  My sharpened senses made me feel more alive than I ever had. It seemed like I’d been sleepwalking the previous twenty-eight years of my life, numbed to all the brilliance of the world around me.

  Of course, I knew what this was - the wolf in me, getting ready to be freed.

  It was the main reason why, after sitting in the forest watching the sun fall and the moon rise, I was walking back to the town. Chosen or not, I was part wolf now. I couldn’t go back to my family, friends or co-workers, not knowing what I was capable of, even if I did make it out of these woods. If the choice was sacrificing months of my life dealing with the strangest scenario imaginable, versus risking people I loved by hoping Daniel was wrong and I wouldn’t one day eat them . . . well, there was no choice. Not in my opinion.

  That wasn’t the reason my heart started to beat faster when I recognized the man leaning against a tree just outside the limits of the town. All right, I’d had more motivation than just protecting my loved ones by returning. With every step I’d taken away from Daniel, something burning and heavy had settled in my heart. It was as unfamiliar, frightening and exciting as the other changes I’d experienced this week. How could I care so much after such a short period of time? I’d been with Paul for three years, but hadn’t felt the crushing sense of loss at our break-up that I did walking away from Daniel. Was it some supernatural hormone gone haywire? I didn’t know. I only knew it was the most real thing I’d ever felt.

  “I thought you were letting me go,” I said. “Yet here you are, still in the forest instead of in bed in your cabin.”

  Daniel turned. He was still too far away for me to see his expression, but his voice sounded raw. “I was letting you go, but no wolf can sleep while his mate is in danger.”

  Mate. Such a primitive word, and so possessive. All things considered, we barely knew each other. Why wasn’t I uneasy at hearing it? Why did warmth spread over me, even as I was shivering in the cold night air?

  I swallowed. “How can you be sure?”

  He was at my side in the next heartbeat, enfolding me in his arms, his body heat almost searing my skin.

  “I knew it as soon as I smelled your scent,” he said, low and rough. “I told you, that’s how it is with wolves. That day with Gabriel - I wasn’t tracking him. He and the others had masked their scents so I wouldn’t be able to trace them. But I found them anyway because I’d been tracking you.”

  This was overwhelming. I shuddered even as I leaned in closer to him. “Daniel, everything has happened so fast . . .”

  He caressed my face. “Don’t judge by that. Breathe me in. Tell me what you feel.”

  I inhaled near his neck, absorbing the mix of wood smoke, cinnamon and musk that made up his scent. Contentment battled with lust inside me. I wanted to throw Daniel to the forest floor, rub my body all over his, claim his flesh as my own, and then hold him and never let go.

  “I feel more than I have a right to,” was what I said, my voice shaky.

  He bent so that his lips were almost brushing mine. “I give you the right. I want you to claim me as yours.”

  And I wanted to be claimed. That was the truth of it. Whether it was me or the wolf inside who’d made this decision, I didn’t know. But I felt it through every fibre of me.

  I’d asked Daniel days ago if it was him I was talking to or the wolf. It’s both, he’d said. Always. I hadn’t understood then, but I did now. The wolf didn’t feel like it was a separate entity from me any more; it was me, but without all my fears, doubts or hesitations. The wolf was me stripped of all my pretence, and it knew, unequivocally, that Daniel was mine.

  And so did I.

  “Take me home,” I whispered. It was an invitation and a promise. I wasn’t giving up my family or my friends, but I’d first learn to live in harmony with the wolf in me, and I’d do it here, with the help of my mate.

  Daniel picked me up and carried me to his cabin. I was smiling the whole way.

  When Gargoyles Fly

  Lori Devoti

  One

  She touched him. Her fingers were warm, soft, undeniably human. Mord Gabion blinked, and his eyelids made slow painful movements. They creaked like stone scratching stone, like a gargoyle coming to life while its body was still frozen in its sleep - which it was.

  He shouldn’t be awake, shouldn’t be aware of those supple fingers, or the scent of ginger and spice drifting towards him. Shouldn’t be aware of anything, ever again — but he was.

  Her fingers ran down the planes of his chest, traced the line of bone that formed the top of his wings, which were folded in sleep, but itching with the need to open, to take his body soaring through the night sky.

  “Such detail,” she murmured.

  His eyes shifted in their sockets. He wanted to see her, needed to see her, but his body wasn’t quite ready. It was still locked in its rocky state.

  She edged closer, her feet scraping over the hard ledge on which he was perched. He could feel it too now, through the thin-soled shoes he’d worn when he’d agreed to the sorcerer’s bargain, agreed to go to sleep for eternity so his enemies, the chimeras, would be put into the slumber too.

  He and the others like him had given up their freedom, their lives, to save the world from the chimeras who would have enslaved humanity - but he was awake. He swallowed, or made the motion at the back of his throat; the action was uncomfortable, unnatural locked in this stony condition.

  He tried again, managed to move his head to the side, but only an inch. The woman pressed against him, studying him, and didn’t notice. But the movement was real. He was coming awake.

  Were his enemies too?

  Kami Machon clung to the gargoyle, kept herself from looking down by concentrating on the impossible detail of his wings, muscles, everything. How she wished she knew who had sculpted him, how the sculptor had put such strength and darkness into the white marble he’d used to carve the creature.

  She’d been sculpting with clay for years, but had recently forked out the dollars for a block of alabaster. Her fingers itched to pick up that chisel, make the first chink in the stone. But she was afraid, wanted it to be perfect, beautiful, like this gargoyle.

  She ran her hand lower, towards the strange kilt-like cloth that covered the gargoyle’s lower body. The stone beneath her hand quivered. She jerked, then laughed at the flight of her imagination. Real as he might appear, this gargoyle (or grotesque, to use the more accurate term) was stone, cold and hard. He couldn’t feel her hand moving over him, couldn’t react to her touch.

  She shook her head, forced her feet to inch further along the ledge. One hand gripping the gargoyle’s for balance, she lowered her other to the flashlight that hung on a string from her neck. It was dark, past midnight - the only time she’d been sure no one would see her, try to stop her.

  She’d tried going through regular routes, asked permission from the building’s owner to view the statue up close, but her calls had been ignored. Then, miraculously, the temp agency she worked for part-time had offered a position with the building’s cleaning service. The rest of the crew was gone now. She was left with free access to the outside ledge at the top of the building where the gargoyle perched, keeping watch over the city.

  She flipped on the flashlight, directed its small beam onto the gargoyle’s profile. His jaw was strong, firm. She laughed again of course it was. He was carved of stone. She lowered the light so she could feel the strength there, memorize it to replicate in her own work. The beam danced along the ledge
and over her feet, drawing her gaze for just a second.

  From the corner of her eye she saw movement, started to turn, but something hit her square in the back and knocked her off balance. She screamed, grabbed at the gargoyle’s stone fingers, felt her own digits slip one by one until she fell free, and tumbled through the air towards the cement circle 200 feet below.

  Mord heard the female scream, felt her fingers slip over his knuckles. His body tensed, vibrated with an uncontrollable need to save her. The stone encasing him cracked. His muscles flexed. His wings shook. He took a breath, forced it into his lungs. There was another crack - louder, like a cannon firing -and he was free. He shoved his body away from the wall, felt his feet break from the ledge beneath them. His wings expanded and he free-fell for a few seconds, revelling in the feel of the air rushing past him, of being alive again.

  The night air was dark and cold, invigorating, just like in his memories. And the city below flickered at him like he remembered, but now with more lights: strange bright ones zigging along at impossible speeds.

  The woman screamed again, pulling his mind back to her. Saving her was not his concern. People jumped from buildings. Before his forced sleep he’d seen plenty make that choice, hadn’t tried to talk one out of it. He was a gargoyle, not a priest. His duty was to protect humans, but as a race, not individuals, and not from their own stupid choices. If the weak died, it made the whole stronger: part of the great formula that kept the world strong, vibrant.

  Still. . . His gaze zoomed to the body falling beneath his. Her arms were flapping as if she thought she could take wing.

  He shouldn’t save her. He had issues of his own: finding out why he’d been awakened, and if others, allies and enemies, were awakening too.

  The smell of ginger reached out to him as she screamed again, or tried to. Her voice was hoarse now, almost lost in the wind.

  He gritted his teeth, started to turn away, to point his face towards the other buildings where gargoyles and chimeras had spent their nights before the freeze. But as quick as he did, as sure as he was that he was making the right choice, his body decided otherwise. His wings flexed, his shoulders shifted and he dived — straight down — towards the now silent woman plummeting to the earth below.

  Air whooshed past her, tore at her clothes. Fear clutched at Kami’s chest, made it impossible to breathe. She was falling . . . falling. Her brain screamed to reach out, grab for something to stop her descent, but there was nothing to grab, nothing around her but angry air. It roared in her ears. She was going to die. There was no way around it.

  The thought echoed through her head, settled into her stomach. She was going to die, and it was her own fault. What idiot crawled onto a ledge to see a statue?

  She screwed her eyes shut, tried to pull her arms in close but couldn’t, the wind stopped her.

  Tears ran down her cheeks, cold more than wet, and her world started to shift . . . fade.

  She drifted for a second, forgot where she was, what was happening. Suddenly, something hit her, jarred her back awake. Despite her fear, her eyes flew open. The ground . . . had she hit? Survived?

  She was still moving, fast, but sideways. Something . . . arms . . . held her. Her head fell backwards, over one of those arms, against a chest - solid, cool, bare. Her heart was beating. She could feel it, could feel air moving in and out of burning lungs. She’d been screaming. The thought seemed random, unattached to anything. Like her reality.

  Nothing seemed real. . . She pressed trembling fingers to her cheeks. Felt that, felt everything.

  She was alive. Impossibly someone had saved her. Finally, she forced her face to turn upwards, to see who held her.

  A smooth, chiselled jaw. High cheekbones. Angled, strong features that should have been unattractive, but somehow, put together, were arresting, commanding and . . . familiar. She reached up, heard a whisper of movement and turned her gaze to the noise. Wings, six feet wide, glowed back at her — white as if carved from marble. Her eyes shot back to her saviour’s face. He was looking at her now with features as strong as rock.

  Rock, wings . . . the gargoyle.

  Dear God. She’d been saved by the gargoyle. Her mouth opened, a scream ripped from her throat.

  He ignored her, tightened his hold and dived forwards until air whooshed past her again to steal both her breath and the scream that had been flying from her throat.

  Two

  Mord angled his wings to slow their landing, let his feet skid across the roadway. The female in his arms lay limp, pale. She’d screamed as she was falling, and screamed again when he caught her.

  He bent one knee and lowered her to the grass. They were in some kind of park. A statue of a man, dressed in a uniform unfamiliar to Mord, guarded the entrance. A large fountain that Mord remembered from when he had last been awake and flown over this city lay a few feet past that.

  He stared at the statue for a moment. The date, 1944 - forty-six years after the gargoyles had agreed to the great sleep. He started to stand, to leave the female where she lay. He’d saved her. His job was done.

  The wind shifted. The smell of ginger wove around him, halting his steps. He glanced back at the female. She was pale, too pale for a human. He knelt down and placed his hand next to her face. Her pallor almost matched his own, and he was still in his gargoyle form. He wasn’t able yet to shift to his human shape.

  He flexed and unflexed his wings, enjoyed the feel of them moving behind him. A breeze from his movement caught the female’s hair and threw it across her face. The dark locks clung to her lips. He brushed them aside, or tried to. The tendrils wrapped around his hand, seemed to pull at him, refuse to let him go. He cursed. He couldn’t leave her here, like this. He knew nothing of this time, the dangers that might lie in wait for an unprotected female.

  He scooped her up. She weighed nothing, but was warm against his chest. Her arms fell at her sides, but this close, holding her, he could hear the even in and out of her breaths. She was alive, just passed out.

  He exhaled, annoyed at his unexplainable need to care for her, to see she was OK before leaving to investigate whatever awaited him in this new time. He strode to the fountain. The water splattered onto a carved bowl then spilled into a bigger section at least twelve feet across. Kneeling, he opened his arms and let her roll into the water with a splash. As she sank below the surface, he bent his knees and propelled himself into the sky. The water would awaken her while allowing him to leave undetected. He couldn’t risk staying by her side, revealing himself any more. Humans didn’t know the gargoyles’ secret. They couldn’t.

  His wings spread and he flattened them, allowed himself to glide for a second, silently, so he could hear her sputter back to life. He’d watch from up high as she pulled herself upright, then made her way back to wherever she called home.

  Except she didn’t. She sputtered and shook, rubbed her hands over her hair and face. Then she stood in the knee-high water, her thin shirt and obscenely short pants clinging to her breasts and buttocks. Water dripped from her hair. She shook her head again, then stared at the sky.

  “Gargoyle,” she whispered. “Where are you?”

  Her voice was low, stunned, but sure. She’d seen him, and could somehow see him as he soared over her head. She was watching him.

  He hesitated for a moment, then turned. She only thought she’d seen him, would easily convince herself otherwise soon. He’d been through this before. Humans were good at protecting their own realities. They believed what they had been trained from birth to believe.

  And stone didn’t come to life.

  She’d forget him soon.

  Water dripped from Kami’s hair. She slicked her hands over it, sent a river running down her back, but kept her gaze on the sky. She wasn’t crazy. The gargoyle was alive and had saved her.

  Something moved above her, but high up — too high to make out in the darkness. She ran her hands over her arms, realized she was shaking. The wind whispered. She spun, ho
ped it was the gargoyle returning, but the grass beside her was empty.

  She stepped from the fountain and wondered for a brief second how she’d landed there. Then another sound caught her attention, an engine turning over. She froze, prayed the driver wouldn’t see her. She had no explanation for where she was or the state she was in.

  She glanced up at the building she’d fallen from and the window she’d left open. She was sure of the last, but it was closed now. Strange. A memory tickled at the back of her mind. Something about her fall.

  She frowned and stared at the ledge. The gargoyle? Her gaze darted to the right. Nothing. No statue, no sign one had ever perched there. Her heart jumped.

  He was real.

  For some reason the thought warmed her. With a smile she patted the keys in her pocket. Still there. She could drive herself home, or go back inside, see up close that he was really gone.

  Knowing exactly what she was going to do, she stepped off the grass and into the road. She was halfway across when a motor roared behind her. She spun. Lights beamed at her, blinding her, freezing her steps.

  For the second time in half an hour, she was facing a sure death.

  Mord, clinging to a cold metal and glass building nearby, watched as the female stared up at the skyscraper he’d called home. Wonder, then joy, lit her face. She stepped off the kerb then moved with purpose towards the building.

  He frowned. She was supposed to leave, to forget him. She looked up again, her gaze locked onto the spot where he’d been perched, frozen ... for how long?

  He was still staring at the ledge he’d vacated when he heard a strange, mechanical roar. Instinctively he jerked towards it, saw twin lights burning through the night, pointed at the little female. The machine rushed towards her and she stood frozen, staring at it.

  Without thinking, he pushed away from the building, pointed his wings to the ground and the girl, and snatched her like a hawk capturing a rabbit from a field. The machine whizzed beneath them. He made out eyes, dark and intense, peering over the wheel.