Guardian of the Abyss

by Shannon Phoenix

  The next time that she awoke, the statue stood silent in the room, Abaddon sitting beside it and staring at it. She sat beside him, looking at it. The room was dark, but from the slight glow from Abaddon's skin, she could make it out.

  It wasn't a fish, it was a mermaid. A very, very beautiful mermaid with a familiar face. It looked almost exactly like Sarah herself. She stared at it in awe. She looked at him, "That's amazing!" she gushed.

  He just stared at her. She looked back at the statue, amazed. It was quite possibly one of the most beautiful things she'd ever seen. Although the angle was wrong, as it looked like it should be sideways. The mermaid's hair and the splash of the wave fell forward, rather than down.

  She examined it, and soon realized that he had turned her into a mermaid water spout. Turned on its front, the mermaid could be attached to a building, and the water would run along her back and through her hair. It was phenomenal, but it was also slightly creepy.

  As if he wanted to turn her into a gargoyle, too.

  When the thought struck, it struck hard and deep. Alarmed, she turned to him. Regret showed on his face, but he had her before she could react to the truth she saw there. Too weak to fight him off, even at her best, she had absolutely no way to escape him now that she was weak and sick.

  She cried, struggled, fought, and in the end... she lost. When it was over, he had her trapped between his legs, one massive hand holding both of hers with ease. She met his eyes, and she would swear--if he hadn't been a demon hell-bent on turning her into a demon, too--that there was sympathy, regret, and pain in his face. She would never be fooled by him again, though.

  He reached out and put his hand on the chest of the water-spout statue. He closed his eyes and began to mutter.

  It was then that the torture finally began.

  Chapter 7

  Abbadon watched the change take her. She was no longer aware, the pain of the change having sent her mind into retreat. Weary and heartsick, he cradled her in his lap. Watching her suffer the torment of the change had devastated him. Once begun, he had been unable to stop, else she would die immediately. So he had persevered to the end, hating himself, hating life, and mourning for her.

  Now the worst was over. Calling on his sorcerer's powers, he let his awareness sink into her. She was altering on a cellular level, her body changing. The change had been successful, but it was different from his own, and that fact etched concern deep within him.

  Worse than that, he had to go capture what remained of the day's sunlight and leave her alone inside their grotto home. The change crept along in her, and he finally laid her gently down on the floor, knowing the cold would no longer make her convulse to keep warm.

  Once outside, he let the sun's dying rays wash over him. It wasn't nearly enough to replenish all that he had used to do the magic of her change. In fact, he knew deep down that, unless he made it to the shore where there was dry Earth and wind, he would not recover. With that realization came a strange admixture of peace and remorse. He would condemn her to a life alone on the bottom of the ocean. Yet he would not have to live with the loathing sure to come.

  When he returned inside, he found Sarah in her stone form. His eyes, a billion times more sensitive than human eyes, took in the beauty of her stone form. Although he had formed it himself through magic and skill, he could not believe the wonder of it. He had formed her gargoyle form from interlaced pieces of granite, so that the waves were blue, her tail green, her body beige, and her hair brown. Her delicate arms covered her naked breasts, but he had embedded bright red rubies for her fingernails, as they were red now. Every time he saw them, he wondered, but it was too beautiful not to be included in the statue.

  He'd also ensured that she had a freedom that most gargoyles did not possess... she could be a regular statue, or she could choose to be a water spout. Most gargoyles were either a water spout, or what was called a 'grotesque', a statue that was more a caricature than a real statue. Forms acceptable to the magic of gargoyles were limited in scope. In a sense, a mermaid fit as a grotesque, since a mermaid was a human-fish chimera. However, he had hedged his bets with the fact that she was also a water-spout, the drain running up her back as part of the splash of water. He hadn't been able to bring himself to mar her back by running a tunnel through it.

  He could only hope that at least in part, his chosen form for her would redeem the terrible thing he had done. It was doubtful, but he had pinned his faith on the possibility. Perhaps once her mind was her own again, she would see him differently. That, however, was beyond his ability to even wish for. Just as well wish to be back on dry land.

  She was far lovelier than the statue he had made to copy from, though. To his vision, life danced just beneath the surface of the granite, creating an inner glow that spoke of the life within. No gargoyle could fool another in his--or now her--stone form. But nor could any gargoyle sneak up on another who was in stone form, so there were trade-offs that equalized them in the possibility that they might one day go to war against each other.

  Abaddon would have once thought that impossible, but he remembered well the lessons of Lilith and Thanatos. He wondered if Sarah would find being a gargoyle as hateful as Lilith had. Lilith, of course, had blamed Abaddon. He'd had nothing at all to do with her transformation, but still she blamed him. And no matter how they had tried to force him to rape her, he had refused. Still she had hated him. He was glad she was dead.

  He was far more pleased, however, that Sarah was not dead. During the transformation, he had felt how close her mortal body had been to the final precipice. It had been far closer than he had imagined, and had he lingered over the task much longer, it would have been far too late for her.

  Running a finger down her smooth cheek, he was struck by a pang of concern. She was very cold, not much warmer than the stone he stood on. A gargoyle's energy level could be sensed by how warm or cold he or she was. A fully energized gargoyle could be warm to the touch even in cold weather, as if the sun had warmed it. A practiced gargoyle could hide his energy level from others, but it took effort. Far more effort and training than Sarah could possibly muster as a newly created gargoyle.

  Which could only mean that her energy level was dangerously low. He shifted to stone form beside her. He could siphon off a bit of his own energy to give to her, but even if he could charge himself to full, it would never be more than a trickle.

  He reached through the stone of the floor for her, where he found her mind quiescent within the statue. Would she ever return to wakefulness, or had he bungled it? Had he turned her too late, and her mind had fled? It would seem not to be so, since her mind was there, simply quiet and undisturbed. Only time would tell.

  * * * *

  Sarah woke slowly. In the back of her mind was a strange roaring sound, like hundreds of people at a convention, all talking at the same time. It was a queer sensation, rippling there as waves upon a distant shore.

  In front of her stood the statue that Abaddon had made, but it was different now. She could see it with absolute, incredible clarity, as if it were in the bright sun. It was, in a word, splendid. She wasn't sure that she'd ever seen anything so marvelous in her life.

  She looked around, at first disoriented by the feeling that her vision was shifting, but her eyes weren't. It took her a moment to realize that she could see everything around her all at the same time, and the only thing shifting was her focus.

  Then she noticed the other stone beside her. This one pulsed with life in time with the bright spots of the light on the walls. It was remarkable in its inherent beauty, though its surface was flawed, even ugly. It looked as if someone had scoured it, and while it had likely once been some sort of winged imp or the like, it was now barely recognizable.

  She stared at it for long moments before she understood that this was Abaddon's stone form. She'd had no idea while the lights were out, just how beautiful it really was. Even if it was ugly on the surface, it held a living magnificence that even the
statue in front of her couldn't hold a candle to.

  "Sarah?" came Abaddon's voice in her head.

  Whoa, he was telepathic? This whole time, he was telepathic? She couldn't believe it.

  "What?" she demanded, irritated.

  "Are you well?"

  She ignored the question to ask her own, "You could speak English this whole time, you bastard?"

  "No. I'm still not speaking your language. We are communicating by sending our thoughts to each other on a sub-atomic level. You are taking my thought concepts and translating them to your own language."

  "You know that makes no sense, right? I can't send thoughts."

  "You can, now that you are a gargoyle," came the answer. "We cannot speak this way much longer, it will take too much of your remaining strength."

  "Why did you do this to me?" She was unable to keep the despair from rising up within her.

  "Your mortal form was dying. You cannot survive down here."

  "You can die in hell? How can I die when I'm already dead?" Didn't he realize how absurd the very notion was?

  "You are not dead, and this is not hell. Though it has always certainly felt that way to me. This is the bottom of the ocean."

  She scoffed. "Prove it."

  "Very well," came the answer. "Though understand that once in the water, we cannot communicate this way until we return into here."

  "Sure, whatever," she answered.

  Then she watched him transform, and she couldn't help but stare in amazed awe. It was a stunning experience, seeing the unparalleled splendor of that change. Yet when it was over, she was just as awestruck by his humanoid form. She had thought him a beautiful specimen before, but now she was transfixed.

  He was utterly magnificent. A colossus, he rose from the ground, massive body gleaming in the lights someone had turned on. She could see the perfection of his skin, the curves and valleys of his muscles. It was as if someone had turned her vision up by many magnitudes.

  He picked her up easily and carried her towards the water. That was the moment that she realized what he was going to do. Panic set in. She couldn't survive in the water; he mustn't take her there! She struggled, but it was as if he didn't even notice.

  Abruptly, they plunged into the water, and Sarah braced herself for the agony of her breath being driven from her lungs again.

  Coolness closed in around her, and then there was falling. It was as if she'd gone from the inside of an unheated building, out into a frigid winter day. It didn't hurt, exactly. She knew the change in temperature was there, and she felt some mild discomfort, as if someone was sitting on her. Other than that, there was just a feeling of resistance as he pushed through the water.

  A few steps later and she realized that he'd been telling the truth. All around her was the same ring of coral that she and James had come to photograph. She could see it all with astonishing panoramic three-hundred-sixty degree clarity. She found she could focus in and zoom in on any area she wanted to, simply by wanting to.

  It was astounding, and for long moments, she could do nothing but stare in wonder. She watched fish darting or lazing about. She saw particles of sand, glittering in the sun. Within the living creatures, including the coral, she could see a brilliant glow.

  She felt the warm glow of the sun on her skin and basked in it.

  For a long time, she felt almost euphoric as she studied the wonders of the undersea life surrounding her. The gleam of scales, the flick of a tail... the warm glow that suffused all the living creatures. All about her, the water teemed with creatures so tiny that she shouldn't have been able to see them. But if she focused, she could look so closely at them that she could make out hairs on their infinitesimal little legs. It was far beyond a dream come true. To sit in the water and watch the daily lives of these creatures, without the necessity of breathing? No diver, free-diver or otherwise, could resist that sort of lure.

  But the roaring in the back of her mind seemed to intensify and after a time, she could no longer ignore it. The voices battered her with questions:

  "Who are you?"

  "Where did you come from?"

  "Where are you?"

  "Are you real?"

  The questions seemed to come a mile a minute and from a multitude of sources. So Sarah did the only thing she could do... she ignored them all. After all, it wasn't sane to hear hundreds of voices in your head. It was bizarre enough to hear Abaddon's voice in her head.

  When the darkness began to fall, Abaddon picked her up and carried her inside. He sat her down carefully and then shifted beside her.

  "I'm a statue, aren't I?" she asked him.

  "Yes," came the soft answer.

  "Can I turn back into myself?"

  "To a degree. You will be... changed."

  She thought about it for a long time. She had sensed, in her rare lucid moments, that she was dying. Now she felt better. She wasn't hungry, the cold didn't bother her, and most of all, her mind felt clearer than it had since this had all begun.

  "You saved my life?" she finally asked. There was silence for so long that she became fearful. "Abaddon?" she demanded.

  "I may have saved your life. As a human, you would have definitely died, and soon. But I fear I cannot be certain that you will survive as a gargoyle."

  She became aware of a deep sense of loneliness and soul-deep misery. For a moment, she nearly drowned in it before she grasped that they weren't her emotions. She realized that if she took her mind off of her vision, she could sense him accurately, even to his position relative to her on the floor, and what he was feeling.

  Dimly, awareness of those other presences filtered into her, as well. They were like pinpricks of light, most of them a vast distance away and gathered in one area. If she focused on any one of them, she could sense emotions, even vague thoughts.

  Wrenching her mind back to Abaddon and the many questions she had, she focused in on him again. She spent a long moment just evaluating him. She sensed his overwhelming feeling of failure, and his penitence for what he had done to her.

  How had she ever thought that this noble creature was a demon?

  A powerful tenderness rose in her and spilled over. Reaching out to him, she did the only thing she could think to do. She imagined laying her hand on his cheek, and whispered to him, "Thank you." Feeling his pain and his shame, and knowing that no matter how she might feel about it, he felt he had wronged her terribly, she told him, "I forgive you."

  Chapter 8

  Redemption. It came in the form of five little words, "Thank you, I forgive you". It came in a feeling of overwhelming tenderness that flowed through him and touched the deepest sorrows of his very soul. It whispered around him on butterfly wings and the gentlest touch of a porcelain hand on his stone form's cheek.

  Unaware that she had shifted to her humanoid form, Sarah spoke to him through the gargoyle bond as her hand touched his weathered cheek. He couldn't help himself, he shifted back to his humanoid form and pulled her into his arms. He was amazed he could still hear her while she was in humanoid form and touching him. Once he shifted, though, the connection was dimmed to a conversational level. He cradled her in his lap, letting her presence sink into his mind.

  And for the second time, he cried. He wept for her, and he wept because he didn't deserve redemption, but it had been given to him. In five words she had liberated him from the crippling pain of changing her.

  He pulled back to look at her. She was breathtaking. Her skin was fine porcelain, shimmering slightly as if dusted with powder. Her hair was, unbelievably, still brown, though now it had the unmistakable sheen of stone. It was unbelievable that she could already form hair. Unprecedented. Yet she had it... and not only on her head.

  The hair on her legs and arms was gone, but he noticed that it wasn't gone from between her legs. He stared, not realizing he was doing so. Her clothing had been shredded in the translation from human to gargoyle, and now a small patch of brown hair sprouted just above her...

&nb
sp; "Ahem," came as the object of his fascination made a throat-clearing sound. He lifted his head, startled.

  She raised one perfect, brown eyebrow. The completely black eyes of a gargoyle stared at him from between perfectly formed brown eyelashes. Her regal stare reminded him of his manners, and he looked away. He would need to teach her how to make clothing form from her skin.

  She was truly glorious. He had never seen anything more beautiful in his life, and never before had he seen a gargoyle that could change the color of his or her skin. Even Lilith hadn't been able to do so, so it was clearly something unique to Sarah, not to female gargoyles.

  From the corner of his eye, he saw the shimmer of her change back into a statue. Relieved, he followed suit.

  "Am I a statue again?"

  "Yes, as am I."

  "Can I ever control that?"

  "I believe so, although you seem to be doing it effortlessly, so I can't be certain you'll learn to control it. It seems it is easier to learn to do it, rather than how to stop it."

  "This is kind of cool, you know."

  Uncomfortable, Abaddon finally told her, "I believe that factor will wear off once you realize that your life as you knew it is over. You will never know your friends again. It will be as if you actually died. Only you will ever know better. Humans will not accept you."

  "That's for sure," came the surprising reply. "They almost wiped all of you guys out the last time. I'm not going to show myself. But we don't need to worry about that down here."

  Before he could think better of it, Abaddon had already sent the thought to her. "I had hoped we might find a way out of here before we both die down here." With her thought had come understanding of 'the first time'. He now knew that gargoyles had introduced themselves to the human world and been killed for doing so. There was a distinct possibility that he was the last of his kind--he and Sarah. They had been fools to try it, but he didn't say so.