"Oh Trickle," I whisper. My gray heart drips ash inside my ribbed stomach and I smooth my taloned hand over the lion’s chipped mane. The other, I slip between my ribs and get a grip my raining heart. I give it a gentle tug, but it stays firmly in place. Twice more I try to pull my gift from the ash heap in my belly, but it won't come. I finally withdraw my hand. I suppose it means that my gift isn't meant to heal another gargoyle.
Trickle's eyes slide back over the horizon, but I swear I feel him sigh, when my claws finally rest, only as heavy as a drop of dew, on the solid curls of his mane. If the clouds had any mercy, I am sure, Trickle's eyes would weep too.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Back on my own corner of the roof, I search across the tar and pebbles for what had slipped off Ayla's necklace. The sky grows two shades darker from over my shoulder, like the rotted pit of a plum. I do not look up. Instead, I hope for rain so that Trickle can speak again. I also hope for two minutes more of light so I can find the triangular, plastic chip. I need to know if it is one of The Boy's. I need proof, before I consider thinking about all the possibilities, like why Ayla would be wearing it around her neck. I scrape my claws against the ground, making scars in the tar, when the rooftop suddenly gives such a hard shake that I am tossed over, onto my back.
I stare up at a monster, rippled with as much muscle, but a thousand times more gruesome, than Moag. The gargoyle before me has an onyx body, coiled with muscle, but its head is shaped like a panther and its face is cast in a hungry expression of contempt. When it’s eyes find me, it hardly softens, but it leans down with a squint, sniffing the air around me.
"Where is the Queen?” It asks. I scuttle backward, my long limbs sending tar pebbles skittering toward the monster's feet. It’s talons are five times what mine are, and they glint like steel spikes.
"There is no queen here," I say, as it draws another breath from around me.
"That is a lie," the thing seethes. "You have the scent of a Queen, but you do not look like one. You are hidden in an ugly form. My queen will show her beauty. I insist upon it."
"Good thing I'm not a queen," I say.
"Do you hear me?" the thing roars as it closes what is left of the gap between us. The roof rumbles beneath me and I am sure that the children below will be shaken from their beds. The gargoyle’s breath beats down on my head as it hovers over the top of me, and my ears flatten against my skull. My wings fold as much around me as they can. When I meet the monster's eyes, I look down into the floundering depths of an ancient soul. It’s well is filled with dark, bitter liquid and it has taken to clawing at the sides in a desperate attempt at escape. I shake my head and close my eyes, trying to leave behind the sight of the gargoyle's soul. Another scorching breath rakes over me.
"I said, you can not hide! You will show me your true form!" the gargoyle growls. He steps away, his hands splayed at his sides and his shoulders back.
“Truce made me like this!” I squawk. “I am trapped too!”
The gargoyle draws up at this, as if surprised, but then his brow drops back down into a determined fold.
"I am Jaibu. I present myself as your suitor, but I will not be mocked. Do you understand?"
I am afraid to say anything else but, "Yes."
"Good," Jaibu finally backs away, but he's not any less frightening even at a distance. "I will return in twelve days and you will show yourself to me. Then we will discuss the ways in which I shall help you to claim our kingdom."
"I don't want to claim anything," I say, although my voice clots in my throat.
"A timid queen," the monster laughs with a vicious grin. "Then I am your best choice. You can see my arms, my legs, and my body. My mind is as strong as the whole of me. It is obvious that I can lead your kingdom. I am a worthy choice."
"Claim it? How will you claim it?” I ask, and Jaibu throws his head back with such a scathing laugh that it nearly cripples me.
"In the way gargoyle tradition requires me to do it," the monster says. "By killing our King, of course."
***
Jaibu is gone and the rain begins a steady patter on the roof. I think of Freckles, Nerdiac, and Tadpole, in one of the apartments below, frightened by Jaibu's heavy landing and stride, which would surely be explained as thunder. I think of their tired eyes, finally surrendering to sleep, as they finally hear the methodic tap of the raindrops. I am grateful they cannot hear the stomping of my heart.
I perch at Trickle's side and gather the rain desperately in the cup of my wing. I dump it into his head too soon, and all Trickle does is sputter. I groan, cup my wings, and try again. By the time the downpour comes, I am at my wit's end.
"Your suitor," Trickle says, his tongue panting over the tips of his fangs, "is quite passionate."
"Passionate?” I shriek. "You think that was passionate? He looked like he was going to murder me!"
Trickle rolls his tongue so the water collects on it and then flattens it out, pouring the liquid off.
"He intends to," the lion agrees. I nearly lose my grip on the ledge, but Trickle continues, "Don't look so alarmed. What did you expect? Gargoyles are not humans."
"They are supposed to be compassionate beings!"
"To our human recipients, we are," Trickle says. "But you are neither human nor recipient. You are a potential queen with a potential kingdom. You can hardly expect less than barbarians to court you when that kind of power is at stake. The suitor you choose will be expected to overturn the current ruler, in order to establish your kingdom. We all know that Truce will never go willingly, and gargoyle rule dictates that the unwilling king must be overturned by death."
"But you said Jaibu intends to kill me too."
"Oh yes he does. Do you think that he will settle for anything but complete dominance? Since you are the upcoming queen, your king would be relegated to second in command. He is only made first upon your death. How do you think Truce became king? He was in the same predicament as your suitors."
"Truce had a queen? And he killed her?” I gape.
"Of course. But Truce's tale is much more twisted than that. It is the reason he refuses Moag’s healing, and why he has gone to such great lengths to ensure that there was never a Slip to challenge his reign. Until you, that is. The day of your human death, we gargoyles felt Truce's anguish echoing among us like his last heartbeat."
"I don't understand."
"Truce was once a Slip too," Trickle says, pausing for a crack of thunder over head. "It is the only way one can become a ruler of the Gargoyle Kingdom. His wife was Ariana, a lovely woman. The way I heard it, the two of them were a happy couple in life, right up until they took a vacation along the coast. It was a steep hill beside the water and fate crumbled the edge of the road. Their tire, instead of the thousand tires before or after them, caught on the weak turn. The vehicle careened off and fell into the lake below. It was a late weekday night; there was no one to see. A gargoyle was sent as the water swallowed up the taillights.
"Ariana was able to slip out of her seat belt, but Truce's belt was jammed. They each tried once to free it. According to Fate, twice would've done the trick and had them swimming to the surface. A gargoyle would have plucked them from the water and delivered them to shore, and they would have gone on to live a long life together, their love multiplied by sharing the incident of near destruction. But the couple detoured from their fate. When Ariana could not free Truce of his belt, she gave up out of panic. Ariana wouldn't leave her husband to drown alone. Instead, she wrapped her arms around him, and he around her, and they sunk to their deaths together."
"That can't be right," I tell him. "I heard that Truce went insane. He killed himself outside his castle."
Trickle harumphs. "He may have gone insane, but I can assure you he did not die outside his castle. And he did not die first. If that were the case, he would have been our King. However, Ariana was the first to die. And it was this, being the first Slip, which gave Ariana the right to seize the Gargoyle Kingdom and become
our new Queen.
Of course, as soon as our King Odin divulged the truth of matters, and both Truce and Ariana understood that she could assume reign, Truce insisted his wife claim the kingdom. Truce was as doting a husband as he was terminally power hungry. Truce murdered King Odin, as was required."
"So it’s true? You have to murder whoever is in power? Why would a king ever tell a Slip what they need to do to take over? Why would anyone do that?"
"No no, murder is not the only way. But Odin was required to tell Ariana that she could assume power. It's the reigning King or Queen's duty to reveal the choice to a new Slip. It is a natural cycle, and King Odin planned to relinquish his kingdom peacefully, by taking healing from his gargoyle servant, and then passing on to a proper death. It was certainly never Odin's intention to be killed, but Truce was impatient, and worried that the opportunity to rule would be lost. He killed our King Odin immediately."
The rain falls in a steady stream. Trickle laps some water and continues with Truce's story. "It was a pity. Especially since the moment Ariana became our Queen, it became quite obvious that Truce hadn't understood how the Gargoyle Kingdom functions. The Kingdom belonged to our Queen alone, and she had the power to rule over the entire kingdom, as well as her King.
“Ah, what a lovely queen Ariana was. She had a gentle heart and ruled the Kingdom like a human, rather than a gargoyle. The Kingdom flourished under her rule. The problem that came over time, she also realized that she didn't have to relinquish her final say to her King. She was devastated to see that Truce's plan for the Kingdom was to command, not to lead. She slowly began to override her King’s demands. Truce grew increasingly contemptuous. It takes a stronger man to yield to a woman's power, and Truce could not.
"Seeing her King unhappy, Ariana welcomed the first Slip that presented himself. Ariana decided to save both she and her King from any further entrapments of royalty. She chose to take healing from her gargoyle, and she also chose that Truce would be healed by his, and they would move on to the next realm together. But Truce would not hear of it. Instead, he deceived Ariana by secretly convincing the Slip to decline inheritance of the kingdom.
"When our Queen found out what had happened, she was furious. More accurately, she was broken-hearted. Bearing the responsibilities of the Kingdom is draining and Ariana was worn through, but her king was not remorseful in the least. Truce resented that Ariana would decide his second death for him and that she could so easily rob him of his masculine authority. The night after the Slip declined, Truce killed Ariana in the bed they shared as man and wife.
"And that, dear child, is how Truce became our king." Trickle pauses to gargle the rainwater as the storm slows. The panic is a humidity that presses all around me.
"You are saying that Jaibu, if I choose him as my king, will kill Truce first and then Jaibu will kill me to become King?"
"Well, he doesn't seem particularly amorous," Trickle's stone eyes grit as they shake back and forth, instead of his head. "Jaibu could kill Truce, to secure your place as Queen, and bide his time, learning the ways of the kingdom. If he can rule through you, he may keep you as his buffer against any upcoming Slips. If he were the primary ruler, he would be returned to human form. They would have to kill you first and then kill him after he inherits the kingdom. If it was a female Slip, who knows? Jaibu could seduce her and continue his secondary rule, until he tires of it and kills her.
“But these are Jaibu’s only options, if you surrender them. He could kill Truce, and you could kill Jaibu, if a challenge arises. Then, the kingdom would be completely yours."
"But I have another choice," I say. "I can decline the kingdom."
"Oh no, not now. You’ve been cast in a gargoyle form," Trickle says. "Your only options are to either choose a suitor, and claim your kingdom, or heal your human recipient and pass on."
"I want to die,” I say quickly. “But I don't have a recipient yet."
"Well then," Trickle's voice fades with the last of the raindrops, "If passing on is your choice, you best find one. The murder of a gargoyle is most definitely not adviiiiiiiis…"
CHAPTER NINE
The rain goes. I don't drag the pail full of water to Trickle. I don't want to hear any more.
I don’t have a human recipient and I don’t know how to find one on this rooftop. It must be why Moag chose to leave me here, trapping me, so it is easy for suitors to find me. It’s not likely that I’ll be able to find a recipient up here and steal Moag’s chances of passing on.
Dead already, I don’t know why another death worries me so much, but it does. A gargoyle means to kill me. Marry me first, and then kill me. I review the conversation with Jaibu in my head over and over again, trying to understand. The only reason for marrying him would be to become the Queen and I don't want that. I want to die. But allowing Jaibu to kill me might be the easiest choice. I’d know what to expect. I wonder if dying, as a gargoyle, would be anything like my human death. But, choosing my death is less comfortable now.
I wish there was some way to find my recipient. I don't know how I'd even know if it was the right one.
There was only one time before that I was sure I'd made the right choice. I knew The Boy was the Right One, the night I introduced him to Ayla. She was the only family I had; she was the one person who cared enough about me to be skeptical that a boy would be worthy of me.
"If he hurts you, I'll break his legs," Ayla had said over our coffee cups. Ayla. She's 5'5 with zero upper body strength.
"How are you going to do that, Spaghetti Arms?” I'd laughed. Ayla turned her back on me and swung her solid, blue-jeaned butt back and forth on her thick legs. She was a pear-shaped girl that played Queen's old song, Fat Bottom Girls, like an anthem, and she could still move her big butt like a ballerina.
"You said this guy's really skinny right?" she said. "I'll break him with the undeniable power of the ass!"
It didn't matter that I knew Ayla would do little more than share a pint of Ben & Jerry's with me, if The Boy ever hurt my feelings. What mattered was that she loved me.
When The Boy showed up at the coffee shop, we saw him before he saw us. He passed by the windows, like a short strip of movie film. Every glance was perfect to me. He was looking at the sidewalk, Ayla followed my finger to him, and then she followed him from window to window until he reached the door. I wanted her approval.
"Him?" she whispered when he walked in.
"Mmm hmm!” I giggled.
He walked right up to the table and met my eyes first, and then Ayla's. His eyes lit up.
"So, you're the firing squad?" he asked her.
"Sure am," Ayla said and added quickly, “And you are?”
"I'm Adam."
"Ayla."
"Nice to meet you."
"Yup, nice," she'd said, and then they both turned to me. Her grin was tight and goofy and excited for me. His was awkward. He pecked my cheek.
"So how long have you two known each other?" he asked.
"Ayla's my best friend," I told him. I looked across the table for her agreement. Ayla nodded at him.
"Sure am," she said. He put his arm around me, and she dropped her eyes into her empty cup with a tiny frown. I didn't want her sad, I didn't want her jealous. But I snuggled against his chest, proud he was mine.
***
The Boy’s light is on when Ayla sneaks out of the apartment house door down below. It is later than both coffee shop hours and curfews. I am almost grateful for the distraction, even if it makes my heart churn ashes.
Ayla is dressed like half a thief, wearing dark shorts and a dark spaghetti-strap tank, but her skin is a white flag against the night shadows. She shoots across the street and dives through the front door of The Boy’s building.
I was consumed with him once. My relationship to The Boy was what I dreamt of at night, what I used to make decisions about what I'd wear that day. I ate my breakfast wondering if he was awake yet, checking my phone for messages he might have lef
t while I slept. The first two weeks we were together, there was always a text waiting. After we did it, the texts dropped off to one every other morning and then the mornings without texts began to stretch out, until the texts didn't even happen anymore. We were together for four months before it happened. At the end of the sixth month, everything was over. The seventh month, I was lying at the bottom of the lake.
I loved him so much, the hinges of my heart squeaked and pulled and felt like they were always being thrown open. I'd sit beside him and feel the tremor he brought me, his drumbeat pounding down between my legs. I would ditch Ayla just to spend time with him; I’d stay out late, skip morning classes, and have to piece together all kinds of excuses so I wouldn't be suspended.
I'd have done anything for him and I did. I had so much feeling for him that I believed I could fill him with it, if he ever ran out. I never believed he would. During that fifth month, I went to the clinic alone, because he couldn't get off work. He said he didn't want to ask Backward Baseball to switch shifts again. I said it was okay.
And I was the one who let a part of us be sucked out of me.
The last time we were together, it was almost closing time at the coffee shop. We sat opposite, in high chairs, at a podium table. He had plain coffee. My cup was from the bottom of the urn I think. No matter how much cream and sugar I dumped in, I just couldn't make it taste sweet.
"We need to talk," he'd said.
I smiled. "Okay."
He squirmed on his seat, swung it side to side, but kept his elbows on the table. "Things have been pretty crazy lately, huh?"
"I'm glad it's over," I said. I thought he'd want me to say that, even if he knew better. He knew I still cried about it. His arms got stiff whenever he had to hug me. He told me I had to let it go. He wiggled on his high chair across the table from me and I thought he was finally going to tell me it was all a big mistake. I felt myself swell; waiting for him to say what I figured would heal everything.
Mercy, A Gargoyle Story Page 7