by Anton Strout
The alchemist Caleb stood well back from the limited arc of my reach, his fingers wrapped around a still-sealed vial. He held my eye a moment longer, but when I didn’t speak or make any attempt to move, he slid the vial back within his coat and walked off to a vast array of alchemical equipment I did not recognize.
How had I come here? I could not recall. So lost in my own thought was I that it took a moment to once again feel the alchemist’s eyes upon me, and I looked to find him kneeling by his equipment, facing me.
Flame rose from a single match in his hand, and he lowered it to the rooftop. A small, thin trail of blazing green fire burned its way toward me before breaking into two and encircling the spot where I stood trapped. Small pots along the circle released a thick cloud of smoke that rose over me until I could not see anything but darkness.
The once-dominant other voice in my head cried out for action, but I was surprised to find myself able to ignore its pleas. My true self rose more and more to the front of my mind with each passing moment, until I no longer felt even the slightest trace of the other.
Fanning my wings, the cloud broke, and the night sky once again filled my sight, its clarity as sharp as that of my mind. How long I had been within the cloud, I did not know, but it had been long enough that I had drawn a crowd since its passing. My Alexandra stood near the alchemist as the doorway leading down into the building filled with familiar faces. Her friends—and mine—Marshall and Aurora paused there when they saw me.
Alexandra looked to Caleb. “Is he . . . ?” she asked.
“Am I what, Alexandra?” I asked back. “I am quite capable of answering for myself.”
She smiled at that, awakening a lightness in me that I had long thought gone.
Marshall crept forward out of the doorway toward me, caution in his every move, but Aurora stayed there. The cylinder was already off her back, the pieces of her weapon already in her hand as she slipped the pole arm together.
“Hello, Marshall,” I said, my words causing him to stop. “Aurora.”
“It’s okay,” Caleb said, going back to work on a table near him full of vials and potions. “I think he’s back to normal. Although, truthfully, I’m not sure what passes for normal in gargoyle terms.”
“I prefer the term grotesque,” I said. “It is what Alexander called me.”
The blond human shrugged, then set about moving around the roof to pick up the assorted clay pots surrounding me. “Suit yourself,” he said.
Aurora came out of the doorway, pushing past him before stopping in front of me, her pole arm raised. She looked to the alchemist.
“How do we know he’s not in your control?” she asked.
“No, please, don’t all rush to thank me,” Caleb said, his voice flat.
“The lady makes a valid point,” I said. “How can they know that you are not the one in control of me now?”
Caleb shrugged once more.
“I guess they don’t,” he said.
Alexandra stepped to him, putting her hand on his arm. There was something tender in the gesture, something I found I did not care for.
“Caleb, please,” she said. “A little patience, please. They’ve got every right to be wary.”
Given my last encounter with the alchemist on the freighter, Caleb should be grateful I could not reach him at the moment.
He pulled his arm away from Alexandra and fell silent, returning to his work.
Aurora struck the roof that encased my feet with the blunt end of her weapon.
Alexandra’s eyes went to it.
“We need to release him,” she said.
Caleb looked through the interior of his coat. “That’s going to take a few minutes,” he said, picking among the contents there. “I used most of the mixture up in creating the trap to capture him in the first place. I need to whip some more up.”
“I can do that,” Marshall said. “I mean, I’m a quick study with what I’ve been able to read at the Libra Concordia on alchemy.”
Caleb turned and stared at him, unmoving.
“Or if you just jot it down for me . . . ?” Marshall said, some of his confidence fading.
“Alchemy and you?” Aurora asked. “That sounds like a lethal combination. Just let blondie here do it and be done with it.”
“No,” Marshall said, the single word filled with a sudden and surprising anger.
“I may still be able to free myself,” I said, attempting once again to move my legs within the solid stone. “It may take some doing, but I will try.”
“No,” Marshall repeated, turning to Alexandra. “I can do this! Lexi, look . . . I’m no good at what you do, right? I simply don’t possess the talent for it. As far as casting spells, I don’t have Rory’s level of precise movement or your level of determined will to drive it. But what Caleb here does . . . That’s like . . . cooking. It’s recipes, nothing more.”
“Nice,” Caleb said back to him. “Let’s downplay my skill set. Yes, Mr. Blackmoore, it’s just like cooking. Anyone can do it, right? Just ask any cook who’s gone up against an Iron Chef. Simple!”
“You’re no Morimoto,” Aurora said, leaving me to wonder what a “morimoto” was.
Caleb went to the table, slamming several vials down from out of his coat next to another group already on the table.
“Fine,” he said, pulling his notebook from his side pocket. “You want to try? Be my guest. But go easy on the Kimiya. That’s pretty much the last of it.”
The alchemist wrote with haste upon one of the pages, walked over to Marshall in front of me, then tore it free and handed it to him. “There you go, padawan. Try not to blow anything or anyone up, okay?”
Marshall paused before taking the page from him. “Is . . . that a possibility?” he asked, his voice quiet now.
Caleb shrugged. “Guess you’ll find out the hard way.”
Something about both the gesture and his voice set me on edge. Perhaps it was reminiscent of the tone he had taken with me while I was in captivity, and I could not help but react to it.
Trapped as I was, I could not reach out with my claws and grab him as I wished. My wings, however, covered a much greater span than my reach. I scooped them forward, catching Caleb between them and pulling him to me. I spun him, my claws digging into his shoulders through his coat, and I raised his face to mine.
“When last we met, you sent me here bound by Kejetan’s rules,” I said, growling. “You sent me here, putting Alexandra directly in harm’s way from me. You said I would take the secrets of Alexander from her cold, dead hands.”
The alchemist gave a nervous glance to Alexandra.
She came forward, circling to stand next to me in order to face Caleb.
“You said that . . . ?” she asked, her voice a mix of anger and pain.
My claws dug in at that, and Caleb hissed in my grip.
“I had to if this was going to work,” he fired out. “We were on Kejetan’s ship, and Stanis was entirely under his control. If I had told Stanis our plan, Kejetan would have found out. The dominant power that controlled Stanis would have blown everything if I had let your gargoyle in on it.” He met my eye. “You know it’s true.”
But was it?
“I cannot deny your claim,” I said.
My true voice had simply been a passenger to the dominant one. If Caleb had set me to any other task less specific than seeking out Alexandra to retrieve her secrets, it was quite possible I could have ignored it by circumventing Kejetan’s rules. Worse, I would still be hanging in the cargo hold as a prisoner. It was also quite possible that had he told me of the rescue plan, the dominant voice would have kept me from ever reaching them, and it might have forced me to reveal it to Kejetan.
“You see?” he said, craning his head around to meet everyone’s eye. “I’m not in with the bad guys.”
This was harder to see the truth in. Flashes of the torture I had endured at his hand tore through my thoughts. Every pain. Every injustice. Every moment that had kept me from Alexandra.
“Do you put these people in jeopardy?” I asked in a low growl, my claws digging even harder into his shoulders. “It was one matter to torture me, to break me . . . It is quite another to put these humans in harm’s way. I will not stand for it.”
He hissed again, but to his credit, the man’s head turned back to me, and his eyes stayed locked with mine. I would have taken him for fearless if not for the nervous laughter that followed.
“Relax, big guy,” he grunted out. “Rest assured that Alexandra’s safety is my paramount concern in this world. And Rory? I’m pretty sure she can handle herself with that pigsticker of hers.” He turned his head to Marshall over at the table, who was already sorting through a handful of vials. “And Marshall? I’m not going to leave him with anything he can lose his hands with.” His eyes came back to rest on me. “Trust me.”
My eyes stayed locked with his a moment longer before setting him back down on the roof.
“Very well,” I said, some of my anger dying down.
Caleb moved with swift steps beyond the reach of both my arms and wings before turning to face me. “I mean, Marshall might be able to do some damage to himself if he, like, drinks whatever he mixes.” He looked to Marshall at the table. “You’re not stupid enough to drink any of those, are you?”
“You’re stupid enough to drink some of them,” Alexandra said, still at my side.
“Ouch,” he said, raising his hand over his heart, then turned to Marshall. “But seriously, try not to blow yourself up.”
“Are humans always this confusing?” I whispered to Alexandra.
To my surprise, her face was burning crimson, her eyes fixed straight ahead. “Don’t get me started,” she said, then leaned her head against me. “Good to have you back.”
“It is good to be back,” I said. “But I fear my freedom does not change much. When I went with my father months ago, it was to buy you time. Have you spent it well?”
Alexandra stepped away from me. “That’s a debatable point,” she said. “We’re certainly making progress. But you know Alexander. All codes and enigma!”
“Speaking of Alexander,” Aurora said, no longer keeping her pole arm ready for action. “I think we found something useful in the books at the Libra Concordia.”
“That would be a pleasant surprise,” Alexandra said.
“Libra Concordia?” I asked, unsure of the term.
“Just another group I freelance for,” Caleb said, joining us.
“They’d love to get their hands on you,” Alexandra said. “They’ve been looking for you since you rescued my father as a boy, when he had his whole religious conversion.”
I looked to Aurora. “What did you find?” I asked.
Aurora handed Alexandra a notebook filled with writing.
“Marshall and I started comparing notes from the books of Alexander Belarus that the Libra Concordia have,” she said. She pointed to a specific grouping of lines on the page.
Marshall called over from the table, busy reading the labels of several vials that filled his hands. “Your great-great-grandfather keeps referencing the Holy Trinity over and over in multiple books,” he said to Alexandra. “He talks about the secrets of the Holy Trinity again and again. We thought there might be some significance to that. It shows up too much in the books the Libra Concordia has acquired to be a coincidence.”
“Forgive me,” I said, all of the humans turning to me, “but Alexander was not a man of religion.”
“Stanis is right,” Alexandra said.
Aurora’s excitement died, replaced with confusion. “But he built all those churches,” she said.
“He built a lot of things,” Alexandra said. “Building office buildings doesn’t make him a businessman any more than building churches made him religious.”
Aurora smiled. “Then it’s even stranger he kept referencing the Holy Trinity, isn’t it?”
Alexandra returned her smile, which I did not understand.
“Why do you take pleasure in this knowledge?” I asked.
“Because,” she said, “if my great-great-grandfather wasn’t a religious man, then the Holy Trinity and its secrets most likely refer to something else. And I think I know what it is.”
Aurora stepped back from the notebook and looked up at her friend. “You do?”
Alexandra nodded. “I do,” she said. “At least, I think I do. Many of the books Locke has gathered reference the secrets of the Holy Trinity, you say. Now, maybe it’s just a coincidence, but I find it quite interesting that the Libra Concordia just happened to acquire one of Alexander’s long-abandoned churches, and that it just happens to be located on Trinity Place across from Trinity Church.”
Aurora’s eyes widened. “Alexander has some of his secrets there?”
Alexandra turned to Caleb. “What do you think?” she asked.
“It’s possible,” Caleb said. “It is one of Alexander Belarus’s buildings. And I agree with your theory about why they bought the church in the first place. A church would be a perfect hiding place. No one tears churches down these days.”
“We need to search that building,” Alexandra said. “But we won’t get too far with Desmond Locke watching us like a hawk every time we step out of the research room. If we’re lucky, there will be more than just the secrets to Kimiya. I’m hoping we’ll find out the deeper secrets of the Spellmasons, so I can raise our own army of stone fighting men.”
“Desmond Locke?” I said. “Your father’s spiritual adviser?”
Alexandra laughed. “It’s been a long six months. We’ve a lot to catch up on.”
Marshall came to us, a small glass container full of liquid in his hands. “I think I’m ready,” he said.
Caleb looked down at it. “Ready?” he asked. “I don’t think so. That’s not nearly enough.”
Marshall’s eyes went to the mixture and stayed there. “I—I think it is,” he stammered, a lack of confidence. “Besides, there was barely enough Kimiya to make this. It will have to do.”
Caleb laughed, but there was derision it. “You can try,” he said, “but you’re not going to free him, I’m telling you. There’s no way you’re going to affect the stone of the roof deep enough to get Stanis loose.”
The tone of his voice awoke something hostile in me, and I brought my clawed hand down on his shoulder. “Let Marshall try,” I said, squeezing.
Caleb hissed. “Suit yourself,” he said, and pulled himself away from the rest of the group.
Alexandra looked to Marshall. “You sure you’re up for this?” she asked.
He nodded and looked up at me, but his eyes were uncertain.
“You can do this, Marshall,” I said. “I have faith.”
He did not respond but instead circled around me as he judged the amount in the container and began pouring it.
“That’s not nearly wide enough,” Caleb said, crossing his arms. “You’re not going to free him that way.”
“Shush,” Rory shouted out at him.
Caleb shrugged. “Just trying to help,” he muttered under his breath.
Marshall was on his knees by then, pouring in a tight circle around me.
“I don’t need to go wide,” he said. “I need to go deep. I only need to free up the area around him.”
The stone around my legs began to transform. It loosened around the lower part of my legs to the point where I could move them. Stretching, I pulled one foot free, stepping up and onto the solid part of the roof. The other foot, however, was still stuck in solid stone. Marshall’s concoction had not gone deep enough indeed.
Still, I did not wish to give Caleb the satisfaction of being right, so with all my st
rength, I put all my weight on my freed foot and pulled. The stone immediately around my trapped foot did not give, but the rest of the roof did. My foot came up and out of the liquid stone with a chunk of jagged rooftop surrounding it. Marshall gave a victorious cry, and he and Aurora slapped their hands together. I stepped onto the roof, walking away from the hole and bringing my foot down hard enough over and over that the rest of the stone fell away piece by piece.
Alexandra rushed over, throwing her arms around me. As the heat of her skin against me set in, the world and everything around us seemed to melt away. My stone arms wrapped around her, the jagged rise and fall of her chest beating against mine as I felt her tears hit the coolness of my carved skin.
“You have been missed,” she said.
“It has been far too long since I have been myself,” I said, pushing her back so I could look into her eyes.
We stood, simply staring at each other, lost in the moment. It felt longer than the centuries my existence had, but suddenly felt all too short when the sound of the alchemist Caleb clearing his throat rang out.
Alexandra turned her head to him, her head falling back for a moment to rest on my chest.
“We need to find Alexander’s work,” Caleb said. “May I remind you we’re so out of Kimiya it’s not even funny?” He pointed to the statues all along the rest of the rooftop. “And we’ve got an army up here we need it for if we can also find the secrets you need to bring them to life. Let’s hope whatever Alexander’s hidden away there helps you unlock the Spellmason secret to your splitting your mind more easily for casting. Either way, we need to act fast.”
“He’s right,” Alexandra said, pushing herself away from me with reluctance.
“You and I should go,” Caleb said to her. “The church is full of special-access areas and secret alcoves . . . stuff that only I among the group of us has access to.”
“I can tear that church apart looking for Alexander’s secrets,” I said.