by Mina Carter
She kissed Gran back with every ounce of passion she had, her hips rocking as Cal’s clever fingers slid into her panties and between the lips of her pussy. She was hot, slick, and wet. He growled again, collecting the juices of her arousal and smoothing them up around her clit.
Tearing her lips from Gran’s, she cried out in pleasure, almost on the verge of climax, and her heart thundered in her ears. Then Cal snarled, yanking her away from Gran abruptly as he turned, his stone form exploding from his human one as werewolves burst into the room and surrounded them.
She didn’t have time to go for her gun or do anything as the wolf in the lead lifted a wand, and a burst of green light was the last thing Iliona knew.
Chapter 12
Iliona didn’t want to wake up, but she knew she had to. A sense of dread pervaded every cell as she clawed her way back to consciousness. Her body fought her every step of the way, and it was only with supreme effort that she managed to lift her eyelids.
To look directly into the face of the most beautiful woman she’d ever seen.
Hauntingly beautiful, she took Iliona’s breath away, a sense of worthlessness rolling through her. She didn’t look like that, not even half like that, and she felt unworthy to be in this woman’s presence. To breathe the same air that she . . .
A frown creased Iliona’s brow. The woman wasn’t breathing. She couldn’t.
She was a statue?
“Holy shit,” she breathed, realizing what she was looking at. It was the woman, the statue, they’d been finding smashed to pieces all over the city. Or earlier versions of her, anyway.
Now she could see the whole statue, face and all, Iliona kicked herself for mistaking the woman for anything other than a living, breathing being. She was so hauntingly beautiful and lifelike that Iliona expected her to take a breath and open her eyes at any moment. Which she would . . . soon . . . because she was a gargoyle, not a statue.
Entranced, she lifted a hand to touch the woman’s cheek, but found she couldn’t. “What the fuck?”
Snapped out of her fascination with the almost gargoyle, she looked down to find herself tied to a table, thick ropes around her wrists and ankles. Hissing, she struggled against her bonds, the table beneath her creaking as she threw her weight side to side. But they were tied securely, the rough surface abrading the thin skin on the inside of her wrists.
Turning her head, she found herself eyeball to cheap wood with a folding table. It was the type used in canteens and dinner halls the country over. Foldable, stackable, and completely untraceable. She grunted, throwing her weight to the side again. Perhaps she could overturn it and slide out of her ropes that way. But the table just creaked and held. Fucking thing—where was the cheap, mass-imported shit when she needed it?
Muttering caught her attention, and she turned her head the opposite way. A man stood a couple of feet away, his attention on a sheaf of papers in his hands. He was tall and thin with a mop of sandy hair that looked like it hadn’t seen a brush for a week and glasses perched lopsidedly on his nose. He was dressed like a librarian in a rumpled pullover shirt and khaki slacks, and there was a pentagram on a chain around his neck.
It was a cheap trinket, that much was obvious even from this distance . . . silver, with a bright pink crystal in the center. He looked like a rent-a-sorcerer, the sort that should have been playing tabletop role-play in his mom’s basement. Iliona fought the urge to roll her eyes. She knew the sort. They were a nightmare, usually all over any case that had even a hint of the paranormal with their internet downloaded spells and conspiracy theories.
“Hey! What the hell are you playing at?” she demanded, making him jump and look up over the sheaf of papers. “Untie me,” she ordered. “Now. Before you get yourself into more trouble.”
“Oh no,” he said, his tone quite level and reasonable, as though they were talking over afternoon tea. “I can’t possibly do that. The transfer hasn’t taken place . . . and our lady here isn’t awake yet.”
“Lady?” It took Iliona a second to catch up and realize he was talking about the gargoyle suspended over her. A second beyond that, his words sank in, and comprehension hit her like a truck at Mach one.
He planned to use her soul to animate the gargoyle female.
“You have got to be fucking kidding me . . .” Her words were little more than a whisper as she looked around the room, scanning for some way to escape. There had to be something in here that she could use. Something that she could levera—
Her gaze fell to the tall figures at the foot of the table. She hadn’t noticed them before, mostly hidden behind the female statue. Cal and Gran, in their stone forms, stood at attention like statues. For a second, she had a glimpse of what they would have looked like through all the years locked into slavery, guarding the building they’d been created for.
“Cal! Gran!” she gasped, struggling in her bonds once more. “Help me! Get me out of here!”
Neither moved, both watching her every move. Cal did so with a small smile on his face, and the sight of it chilled her to the bone. It was the same handsome face she was used to seeing, the same smile . . . but his eyes were utterly empty. Devoid of personality or feeling. Lacking everything that made Cal . . . Cal.
Gran, though, was the total opposite. Emotion shone in his eyes, his still form almost vibrating with the need to move. At first, she thought he was trying to break the spell or whatever held him and his brother motionless, but then she looked into his eyes and realized the emotion that shone there was feral. Totally animal. There was nothing of the man left within him.
“What did you do to them?” she breathed in horror.
Rent-a-sorcerer looked up for a second, flicking a glance at the two gargoyles. “Them?” He shrugged. “I made a few improvements. My predecessors’ work was very . . . sloppy, shall we say?”
“What the hell do you mean, sloppy?” She threw herself against the ropes again, trying to flip the table over. It was flimsy and complained loudly with her every movement. If she could get it to flip and crash onto its side, her weight against the ropes would probably break the legs, or crack the top, and she would be free. Then sorcerer boy here was freaking done for.
“Cal!” she called his name again. “Cal, wake up! You have to wake up!”
This time, she got his attention. His gaze transferred to her, and a small smile played with the corners of his lips. Her heart leaped. He’d heard her. He’d finally heard her. But his next words crushed the tiny kernel of hope in the center of her chest.
“Just lie still, Iliona. It doesn’t hurt. It’ll all be over quickly, and then you can be the same as us.” He smiled, but the expression was empty, like a puppeteer was pulling invisible strings to yank the corners of his lips up in a grotesque parody of a smile. “You’ll be the same as us,” he repeated, his voice stilted and formal, like he was reading from a teleprompter. “And we can live forever.”
“No!”
Her denial was little more than a howl, spat with fury. Gran’s head jerked up, his black-on-black eyes focusing on hers, and he snarled in response. Her heart thudded against her rib cage as he stalked forward. She’d seen him in his stone form before, but then he’d been in control of his actions. He’d walked like the man he was, not like the feral beast he appeared to be now, his shoulders hunched and his knuckles almost dragging along the floor. The flickering candles dotted around the room glimmered against the razor-sharp talons that topped his fingers.
Fire. She focused on the candle near her foot. If she had enough play in the rope, she could kick it over, off onto the floor, and start a fire. But it wasn’t a real candle.
“Battery-operated candles, really?” She sighed, closing her eyes for a second and then opening them to glare at the would-be sorcerer. “Have you no freaking class?”
He looked a little discomfited at that, color riding high on his cheeks. “The candles have no bearing on any of the spells,” he informed her haughtily. “It’s just for the ambi
ence, actually. These are safer. Real candles are a fire hazard.”
“No shit . . . Bet your mommy still wipes your nose as well, doesn’t she?” she taunted, keeping an eye on Gran as he prowled closer and closer. The darkness in his eyes worried her, nothing left of the man within that she could reach.
“What the hell did you do to him?” she asked again, twisting her wrists to try to loosen the rope. It didn’t work. The knots tightened, and she was forced to bite back a small cry of pain.
“Hmmm?” Sorcerer boy didn’t look impressed to be interrupted again, shooting her an irritated glance over the top of his glasses. “As I said, my predecessors were sloppy. There were unintended side effects with trying to bind one soul to two bodies, but they served their purpose. Once I had them both, I could see how the split had been done. I’ve improved the ritual so we shouldn’t have any issues today.”
Iliona’s gaze sharpened as Gran got closer.
“Improved? How?”
She spared her captor a quick glance, focusing on the papers in his hand and then on the laptop she could see behind him. “Please tell me you didn’t research this on the internet? What the hell? How do you know you aren’t summoning Satan or something?”
He looked at her directly, like a scientist would a bug. “Oh no, I wouldn’t have done that. I mastered demon summoning months ago. It’s all in the blood, you see. Fae blood is the best for that.”
Chills ran up and down her spine at his words. “Fae blood? Shit . . . It was you, wasn’t it? You sent the demon after me . . . Why?”
Sorcerer boy glared at her, all defiance and anger. “You don’t remember me, do you?” he demanded, his voice harsh. “Your kind never do. You’re just like her . . . You strut around like you own the place, all plastered in makeup. Short skirts with your tits out. Taunting people like me. Never noticing guys who try to be nice to you.”
Oh hell, she’d really tripped his bitch switch. Halfway through the rant, he’d stopped focusing on her and seemed to be addressing the statue suspended over her. The penny dropped . . . She represented somebody from his past. Hence the smashed up statues with the faces gone. Defacing something in that way . . . It was personal. Very personal.
Gran edged toward her, but he wasn’t snarling anymore. His gaze flicked between her and the ranting sorcerer.
“No,” he carried on. “Women like you are never interested in normal men. Just assholes who want to treat you badly, and you lap it up. Won’t accept a drink from me, would you? Ignored me at the bar that night, just like she used to. Never mind the fact that I was her friend, looked after her, did her shopping . . . took her places. Got her home when she was drunk. That should have meant something,” he spat. “I deserved something more. I’d waited long enough. She owed me. You owed me. And now you’ll pay. You’ll never say no again.”
Crap. He really was insane. Iliona had to bite her tongue and let him keep ranting as Gran got closer. Cal stared into space, his eyes vacant and a bland smile on his lips.
She gasped as Gran appeared suddenly above her, the table squealing in protest as he landed on it. His lips were curled back in a growl, but something lurking in the back of his eyes gave her hope. Lifting her head up as far as she could, she planted a kiss on his stone lips.
The gargoyle froze in place at the touch, and Iliona sent a quick prayer up to anyone who might be listening that he didn’t eat her face off.
“Oi! Get the hell off her,” the sorcerer shouted. “She’s not yours.”
Yes, yes, she was. Iliona saw the tiny flicker in Gran’s eyes and the quirk of his lips as he jumped off the table and prowled away behind Cal. Had she imagined it? Or had she gotten through to him? A whimper of fear managed to escape her throat as the sorcerer began to chant. They weren’t words she knew. Weren’t words she recognized as any modern language. But her body knew them, feared them, every muscle locking up as it tried to reject the sounds pouring into her ears.
The whimper became a cry, which became a scream of pain as agony sliced through her body. No, not her body. Something deeper than skin and blood or flesh and bone. Deeper than the heart pounding a rapid tattoo against her ribs. It was something else, like her very being was being torn asunder . . .
Or . . . her soul being stripped from her body.
Chapter 13
A scream filled the air, the sound one of pain and terror. It filtered through the fuzz in Gran’s brain, pushing aside the red mist and anger that stopped him from thinking properly. Ever since he’d woken up in this place, he’d felt odd. Wrong. Not himself. All he wanted to do was rip and tear, snarl and destroy. Like something had tapped right into the rage at his core and opened the door wide.
It was a woman screaming.
His head turned, and he looked at the woman strapped to the cheap table. Her face was contorted with pain as she struggled against both the bonds that held her immobile and the spell wrapping itself around her like the coils of an anaconda. For saying the spell was just words in the air, itching at his eardrums, it was no less deadly.
His heart picked up pace as he focused on the words. He knew them. The first time he’d heard them had been through different ears than the ones he currently used, but his soul, that eternal part of him, remembered them well. The second time . . . that soul had been ripped in two, a part gone from him forever.
Iliona. He looked at the woman again, and a sense of recognition filled him. Lifting his hand to his lips, he replayed the soft kiss. It wasn’t the first they’d shared. Memories tumbled through his brain, scattered and disjoined as the rage tried to reassert itself. Growling under his breath, he shoved its insidious coils away to concentrate. He remembered kissing her, holding her in his arms . . . more. She was Iliona Graham, the woman who’d treated him as more than just a monster. The woman he . . . loved?
The realization sent a bolt of heat through his chest, one that burned away the chains of whatever spell had been holding him. It fell away, his rage receding to its proper place, and he took a deep breath, like he was breathing clean air for the first time in months.
His head snapped around again, noting the statue suspended above Iliona, and the glowing lines that crawled over its skin. They pulsed and brightened in time to the chanting that filled the air.
His eyes widened. He’d seen that before . . . just once. Those lines meant that a soul transfer was taking place, one that would result in the “birth” of a new gargoyle.
But those lines also meant the woman he loved would die.
A low snarl trickled from his lips as he turned toward the sound of the chanting. A thin, weedy-looking human stood behind him, peering down at some papers in his hand. Gran dragged in a breath, easily picking up the scent of printer ink and cheap paper. His snarl of anger deepened. This little asshole wasn’t even a proper sorcerer . . . where were the spell books, the mysticism? Where was the pride in his work?
He didn’t make it more than a step before Cal stepped in front of him. But this wasn’t his brother as Gran knew him. Sure, it looked like Cal, walked like Cal, but there was an emptiness behind his eyes that made Gran shiver. He tried to reach out to him using the mental pathway they’d always had, but his query slid off something that felt almost glassy.
“Oh, I can’t let you do that,” Cal rumbled, nothing human left in his voice as he blocked Gran’s sideways step. He was protecting the human sorcerer.
“He’s killing Iliona!” Gran hissed, sweeping an arm toward the screaming woman. Her spine was bent into a hard arc, her heels drumming on the cheap wood. “Look!”
Cal shrugged, no emotion on his face for Iliona’s suffering even though Gran knew how he felt about her. “The transfer has to complete and then we’ll have the perfect bride.”
“You . . . what? . . . No!” Gran gasped as he took a step back, looking at his brother in horror. No, not his brother . . . whatever this was, it was just Cal-shaped. It wasn’t Calcite. Cal would never look at someone’s suffering with such indifference. Par
ticularly not a woman he—they both loved.
And he did love her. In one perfect moment, Gran realized that yes, he loved Iliona. Not because Cal did, but totally separately. He’d thought they would have to love the same woman because they had the same soul, but in that moment of epiphany, he realized that a soul was infinite. It could be split, separated in many ways, but not be any the less for it. His soul was part of Cal’s, but the part that resided in him was his own.
He could love—separately and distinctly from his brother. But that made no difference because they had fallen for the same woman anyway, one who’d accepted them both.
And now she was about to die.
Launching himself into motion, Gran slammed into his brother without warning. Cal, though, was just as fast, his expression glassy and smooth as he blocked Gran’s move, leaving the two of them grappling to get a grip on each other’s shoulders.
Stone squealed against stone, both fully in their gargoyle forms. It was like a sumo bout but with mountains as wrestlers. They locked eyes, Gran battering at the mirror behind his brother’s eyes as he fought for millimeters on the floor, willing him to see what was going on.
The screams behind him subsided to pain-filled sobs, and panic filled his veins. “Cal, wake up!” he roared, pulling back and slamming massive hands into the front of Cal’s shoulders. The other gargoyle snarled back, stabbing hard fingers into the long ragged furrow across Gran’s chest . . . the wound left there by a chisel, never healed properly.
He screamed as Cal tore it open. Pain drove him to his knees as Cal dug deeper. Only a gargoyle would have been able to do it. Cal’s fingers were as hard as the stone he dug into, trying to reach Gran’s heart.
“Noooooarrrrrhhhhhh!” he bellowed, whipping his tail around and surging upward. With Cal’s hand half buried in his chest, he locked a powerful arm around his brother’s throat.