by White, Gwynn
Hank nodded, working his chin thoughtfully. “Looks that way. Probably the Wargoyles, by the looks of it.”
“Who, or what, are the Wargoyles?” Ann wondered.
“Legendary gargoyle death squad circa the Nothnocti Wars. Gargoyles claim they were a myth. Our side and the vamps disagreed. One of the few things we actually agreed over, funnily enough.”
Cato, for his part, was a man apart from the conversation. Staring off into the middle distance, trying to make sense of the pieces. Something didn’t fit. Something was amiss.
“Hey, partner? Care to weigh in on this?” Hank said.
“It doesn’t pass the sniff test.”
“What do you mean? You just said it was—”
“I don’t mean the phosphorous part. The whole thing feels tacked on. Like someone was trying to make sure we looked at the gargoyles, and only the gargoyles.”
Hank frowned, his brow furrowing. “So, what, then?”
“You’re thinking Odin Guard?”
“I think we need to stay open-minded,” Cato said. “Everyone else is going to jump to conclusions. Granted, the mark makes it look like Wargoyle reprisal. I just want to make sure we’re not being led around by our tails, so to speak.”
Ann frowned, playing devil’s advocate as she asked, “Yeah, but do you really think the Guard would kill over a dozen of their own?”
“If it meant getting the rest of the wight community on board with exterminating the vamps and goyles? Damn right, I do. Besides, they were selling their blood to the enemy. The Guard wouldn’t consider them ‘their own’ after that.”
“Fair point,” Ann conceded.
“Besides, it’s not like the OGs haven’t staged attacks in the past, tried to rile up hostilities between the otherworlders.”
“And what better time than now?” Hank added, then puffed his cheeks out and shook his head. “Just another option in the shit buffet before us.”
“Maybe.” Ann smiled, a tiny flicker at the corner of her lips. “At least we’re all sitting at the same table again, right?”
Cato smirked. “Something like that, yeah.”
“Hey, you want a better metaphor, ask your partner over there.”
Hank stepped forward at Ann’s mention of him, though not to supply a new metaphor. “We should probably head on out, partner. We’ve toured the scene; at this point, we’re just gumming up the works, hanging around like this.”
“All right.” To Ann, Cato offered a small nod. “Hank and I are headed back to work our own thing.”
“You mean the scene you stole from me?”
“The very same. I am sorry about that, you know. It was all Dolan. He signs ’em, we serve ’em.” He meant the writs of the mayor.
Ann eyed him hard, her lip curling up ever so slightly. Obviously, she didn’t buy that for a second.
“Anyway,” Cato said, “let us know if there’s anything we can help you with here. Just say the word, and we’ll do whatever we can.”
The moment stretched between them, Ann appraising it tentatively even as Cato turned and strode toward Hank and the roadster.
“You actually mean that, don’t you?” Ann finally called into his wake.
With a look back as he climbed into the roadster, he offered Ann a meaningful if somewhat casual salute. “Just say the word.”
7
The gathering was in full swing by the time Sinnestra made her appearance, fashionably late as always. There were some among her kind who suggested the mating ritual was in poor taste, citing Hezekiel’s assassination. Not only did Sinnestra dispute that notion, she knew for a fact that Hezekiel would have desired the ritual to go on unabated. The mood would be different, undoubtedly, but she believed it was paramount for their community to remain unified and committed to its traditions. The seeding season was upon them, and with it, nature’s undeniable urges.
Her father was the most prominent among those advocating for the ceremony’s postponement, but even the reach of the kovar was not long enough to disrupt the pull of the ritual gathering. His concern was not one of modesty, of course—far from it—but, rather, the overall safety of the community following the death of his second-in-command. Was it an isolated incident? The beginning of a new series of attacks on their kind? Until a threat had been issued or a second attack attempted, there was simply no way to know.
Yet the necessity of the seeding season was not to be denied, nor Sinnestra her place within it. She was a fertile female in the prime of her life, one who yearned to join her community in bringing forth the next generation. Her father knew of her intentions and had done his best to convince her otherwise, but knew ultimately that he could do little to stop either the gathering itself or her attendance. How could he justify doing so, after all? Like so many among their species for thousands of years, he had been conceived during such a ritual, as had she. The notion that her own offspring shouldn’t follow the same course was all but unthinkable.
Sinnestra was well-known among her peers, of course, being her father’s daughter. The most virile males made themselves readily available to her, their shameless preening equal parts amusing and arousing. One by one, she put them through their paces. She enjoyed a variety of positions among a host of partners, including some of each that were new to her. After several hours she excused herself, mentally and physically spent, her body aching in all the most delightful ways. The night was winding down, the frenetic coupling of earlier giving way to reflective toking. The air was thick with yakba smoke and the lingering aroma of mass coitus.
Into that heady brew tumbled an unlikely interloper. At first Sinnestra thought it was some sort of animal—one of the fleeks, perhaps, disoriented and flapping about. Then it came to rest between her feet, lolling onto its side. Only when she looked closer, through the swimming focus of her vision, did the ‘creature’ reveal itself to be an object. Sinnestra retrieved the strange device, regarding it with foggy, occluded interest. Not exactly curiosity; merely to acknowledge it, as one would some obscure trinket or tchotchke. The object sat inert in her hand, an unexceptional thing save for the crude starburst pattern etched into its casing. She was bringing it in for a closer inspection when the casing separated, creating a flare so bright, it was like beholding the birth of a fiery star.
When at last the blinding light had dissipated, Sinnestra Cairn and all the others within its reach had been trapped forever within the prison of their own petrified flesh.
8
Detective Nissa Aziani had worked plenty of terrible scenes in her day, but somehow the shattered remains of dozens of gargoyles ranked highest among the most numbingly horrific. The cruelty of the act was evident from the moment she stepped into the room, bits of stone and what seemed at first blush like gravel crunching beneath her boots. Her first impression was that the floor was strewn with rubble; then the vague shapes of broken limbs and bodies arranged themselves before her eyes as they adjusted to the smoky, strangely scented miasma. So many of them, hands and feet and broken pieces of faces. Some showed their final horror, the realization of their last moment etched in stone for all eternity; others were free of that burden, but not its finality. The light had claimed them all in the end.
But that had not been enough for their attackers. They could have simply left them, content with the abruptness and finality of their enemies’ deaths. There was no reversing the transformation once it was complete; they could have at least allowed the Gargoyle Gjunta the dignity of leaving their dead intact. Instead the attackers had apparently swept through with heavy hammers, smashing and bashing with reckless abandon. Some of the petrified gargoyles had been reduced to little more than gritty powder. Others had been left in rough chunks, still identifiable, as if they were each a life-size puzzle waiting to be put back together. There seemed to be no rhyme or reason to the destruction. Perhaps the hammer-swingers had simply lost interest after repeated strikes. Perhaps there was some sort of message to be found amongst this morbid quarry o
f parts and pieces. All she knew for certain was that she didn’t want to be the one dealing with the Gjunta when they got the news.
“Detective Aziani, I think we have a problem out here.”
Nissa followed the young officer through the scene, the source of his concern becoming immediately obvious as they stepped outside. Yes, she thought, that would definitely qualify as a problem.
Somehow, word had gotten out; the gargoyles were at the gate, so to speak.
“We demand to be given access,” said the most towering of the gargoyles threatening the integrity of her scene. “We demand to treat this scene as sacred ground.”
“I can’t do that, sir,” Detective Aziani said. “Now, please, step back.”
“Step back?” Far from it, the gargoyle thrust his chest forward and tipped his chin imperiously. “Do you know whom you are speaking to, woman?”
Nissa fixed him with a hard gaze from beneath her head scarf. Her brothers and sisters in blue took notice, immediately going to ready stances. “What I know is that you are speaking to the ranking detective on scene. My name is Nissa Aziani, I represent Meridia’s Police and Welfare Division, and, right now, I am in command here. Am I making myself clear?”
“The only thing you are making clear is the nature of your mistake. Since we are exchanging pedigrees, I am Crius Frenn, Operations Manager for none other than Gragos Cairn, Kovar of the Gargoyle Gjunta.” He eyed her significantly, dangerously. “Do you intend to stand aside and grant our request for access?”
“Not one bit.”
“Then, I am afraid we are about to have a very difficult situation on our hands.”
* * *
The call for backup came in across all open channels. Realizing she was only blocks away as the harried voice crackled over the speaker in her cruiser—“The gargoyles have us surrounded! They’re coming closer!”—Ann flipped on the sirens and put the pedal to the metal. The city wasn’t falling on her watch, she vowed, not if she had anything to say about it.
In some respects, Ann had never accepted the fact she wasn’t a foot soldier or even a gumshoe anymore. She still enjoyed kicking down doors and feeling the satisfying click of the cuffs after a takedown. She’d told Dolan she wouldn’t do her job from behind a desk, and she’d meant it. She waded recklessly into the scrum, determined to protect and defend her people to the best of her ability.
Instead, she caught an errant backhand meant for one of her compatriots as she charged headfirst into the fray. The weight of the gargoyle’s hammer-like strike caught her square across the side, and like that, the world tipped over its axis and tumbled over itself as she tried to make sense of the sudden, confusing motion. She had all of half a second to realize she was the one pinwheeling through the air, not the world around her, before her body slammed into an extremely unforgiving surface, dropped, and crumpled into an unconscious heap.
* * *
Hank and Cato were only minutes behind. The call for backup had come in over the radio as they were headed back to the office. All it took was one look between them for Hank to execute a daring U-turn, fire the sirens, and drop the hammer.
The roadster came screaming around the corner a block away from the conflagration, just in time for the two of them to catch sight of something—no, someone—tumbling head over heels before its flight path abruptly intersected with a brick wall.
“Holy hell,” Hank said, squinting from behind the wheel. “Was that a person?”
“C’mon, c’mon,” Cato growled, gritting his teeth and white-knuckling the dash even as a PWD SWAT van came barreling around the corner ahead of them. The van was traveling so quickly that two of its wheels briefly left purchase with the road before plonking down again, its armored frame rocking violently as it accelerated once more. For a moment, it would have appeared to onlookers that the SWAT van and roadster were playing a dangerously one-sided game of chicken, at least until the SWAT van swung to a halt behind the advancing gargoyles and disgorged half a dozen heavily armed commandos.
That quickly, the tables had turned. The gargoyles were surrounded within a potentially lethal ring of fire. Emboldened by the presence of so much heavy artillery, the officers backed against the wall pressed the advantage, advancing and ordering the gargoyles to their knees. With no other choice, the gargoyles relented as the circle closed tighter around them.
The situation appeared more or less under control by the time Hank and Cato reached the scene. Only one gargoyle remained on his feet, standing defiantly against the ring of angry officers barking conflicting orders at the winged monster. They were playing right into his hands, Cato realized. He had watched a single gargoyle take out an entire platoon in much the same fashion during the Nothnocti Wars, the soldiers’ hubris getting the better of them as they surrounded the surrendering beast. But he wasn’t surrendering; he was merely drawing them in before flexing his wings straight out and enveloping them. Half the squad was killed or incapacitated by the unexpected strike; the rest expended all their ammunition in a futile attempt to penetrate the creature’s armor-like wings. The moment their weapons clicked dry, the gargoyle set upon them, all teeth and claws, gnashing and slashing. The entire platoon was reduced to its constituent parts in less than a minute, their blood and gore and severed limbs mingling together in a grotesque heap.
Only after the frenzy had subsided and every last man and woman had been torn to shreds was Corporal Ryen Cato able to put a .50-caliber bullet through the thing’s eye, his aim aided by the exceptional sight and calculations of his spotter, one Corporal Henry ‘Hank’ Smiley.
Now, decades later, Cato and Hank appeared to be on the verge of witnessing the scene a second time. The difference this time was that it would be seen not through the clinical detachment of their scopes, but point blank, as up close and personal as possible.
Not today, he decided.
Cato snatched one of the SWAT batons he kept under the roadster’s seats for special occasions and leaped out of the passenger side. Vaulting its hood with the speed and determination of a man half his age, he charged the scene. He had five, ten seconds, maybe less; any moment now, the gargoyle would deploy his razor-spiked wings, and then things were really going to get messy.
“Clear a path, you idiots!” he heard Hank yell from behind him, followed by several hard blasts of the roadster’s horn. The commotion did the trick, distracting the officers, SWAT personnel, and even the resisting gargoyle long enough for Cato to shoulder his way into the fray. What he did next was not particularly elegant, nor did it require any great skill or proficiency. Cato brained the great creature, bringing the SWAT baton down upon the area above the gargoyle’s brainstem with as much force as he could muster. The severity of the blow would have killed a fellow wight; for the gargoyle, it had the effect of briefly knocking him cold. All the strength went out of his limbs and the creature fell onto all fours, the impact vibrating through the ground beneath Cato’s feet.
A moment of confusion ensued, the other gargoyles strenuously objecting to the treatment of their leader before the officers and SWAT personnel reminded them who was in charge.
“What the blighting hell?” Cato blurted, upbraiding the officers and detectives as he showed them his spector’s badge. “Are you mopes just out of basic? Another foot or two closer and this bastard would have flexed his wings and cut the lot of you down to size.”
Already rousing, the gargoyle said in a pained voice, “I can assure you, Spector, that I intended to do no such thing.”
Cato was about to call bullshit when he recognized the gargoyle in question. “Well, well, well. Crius Frenn. What a coincidence. My partner and I have been looking for you all day.”
“It appears that you have found me.”
“So it does.” To the nearest PWD officer, Cato said, “Get some binders on these bastards. I need to have a word with Mr. Frenn once he’s been booked.”
“And call a bus!” Hank added. He had gone to check on their fallen comrade
, realizing all too quickly she was no mere officer. “We’ve got the Chief of Ds over here, and she’s down!”
* * *
She wasn’t dead, but she had definitely seen better days. Hank had volunteered to ride with her in the ambulance, and Cato agreed that was probably for the best. Their little tête-à-tête earlier notwithstanding, Cato was under no delusions. He and Ann might be able to put aside old grudges to work together for the good of Meridia, but they were hardly each other’s favorite person in the world.
That, and hospitals gave him the creeps. Always had, always would.
Instead, he stayed on the scene at the invitation of Detective Nissa Aziani, one of Ann’s top deputies. She was a compact, tightly wound woman, mid-thirties, short on words, long on action. It was easy to see why she had made an impression on Ann. Hell, he might have even tried to poach her to work the spector side of the fence if he thought he had half a shot of her accepting, but she was obviously dedicated as much to her job as to her boss.
“Thank you for your assistance, Spector,” the detective said as they watched the ambulance depart, followed by the SWAT van. PWD had loaded the bound gargoyles into the back of the van—the only vehicle on site large enough to accommodate them—which required the SWAT members to ride standing atop the vehicle’s running boards as it moved ponderously around the corner before disappearing entirely. “That was a somewhat unorthodox tactic, though I don’t suppose much about your position would be considered orthodox, would it?”
At that, Cato couldn’t help smiling. “You’ve been talking with your boss, haven’t you?”
“Not in an official capacity, per se. Sometimes we do enjoy a drink in her office after a particularly eventful day. The topic has come up from time to time.”
Cato nodded absently. “Only good things, I hope.”
Detective Aziani snort-laughed at his comment before quickly composing herself. “Apologies. That was unprofessional.”