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I mean, sure, I was verifiably obsessed with gargoyles, but I didn’t want to turn into a statue. Would I still be able to move and turn back into a human? Did everyone who kissed a gargoyle get turned to stone? Was that why he’d kissed me, to keep me from revealing whatever secrets I discovered in my clear pursuit of his kind? That only made it more necessary for me to find him.
I abandoned my mop bucket and jogged down the hall, only to stop when I saw Mrs. Hanley and the set of her face. What time was it? One thirty in the morning, but the deadline had been midnight, and no one would be bored enough to return library books the second I didn’t show up with Percival at midnight. Except maybe a cat.
I backed up, covering my shoulders with my hands, like she’d try to rip off my arms otherwise.
Her eyes were hard, her teeth bared as she came up, the stack of books in her arms revealing that the cat had, indeed, had nothing better to do tonight. Loser.
“Gabriela Doe, what is the meaning of this?” she asked through gritted teeth.
I backed into the mop bucket with a thump, and grabbed the handle, pulling the dripping mop out, barring the way. “I’m just mopping.” I wiggled it around on the floor, but I held it tight, ready to swing it at her.
“An officer from Song delivered these books to me. A shifter came here, to Gray College, to deliver books with the message that they were left in Song by you. Explain yourself! Did you hide your magic? Are you in league with the demon?”
I braced behind the mop, ready to do battle, because I wasn’t interested in losing my arms today, or any day really.
“It was a prank,” Percival said, coming out of nowhere. Not really, from the hall behind me that led to another set of stairs. He gave me a look of derision before he went over to Mrs. Hanley. “I thought it would be amusing to taunt the magicless pauper with books she cannot read, and couldn’t use even if she could unlock them. That was before the demon was unleashed in the library. I suppose it’s a good thing I took them out then, not that they were valuable books. Pity I’d never put books of any worth in Red’s hands, or we could have saved more.”
He was such a good liar. Unless those weren’t lies, and he really had set me up. Either way, I scowled at him and wanted to beat him with the wet end of my mop and ruin his expensive suit and perfect hair.
Mrs. Hanley looked from him to me and back again, settling her serious frown on him. “Percival, you are too old to play such games. Gabriela, get back to work.” She spun around and marched off with Percival glancing back at me once.
I raised the mop threateningly, but he only raised a brow and smirked before he left me alone. The whole thing was so unsettling that I dragged the mop bucket to the next room before I remembered my arm. I frowned down at it, peering closely. It didn’t seem to be spreading, so I probably had time to finish my work before I completely turned into a statue, but if not, I’d blame it on Percival, and he could suffer with a guilty conscience for the rest of his life, if he possessed a conscience, which was extremely doubtful. Although he apparently didn’t want me to get my arms pulled off. Well, of course not, because that would reflect badly on the school, and therefore him.
Was it really over, though? That whole book thing had gotten out of control so fast, but I guess now I had turning into stone to deal with.
I worked hard and fast, checking my arm every few minutes, and it looked a little paler, more smooth, but I wasn’t sure if it really was spreading or just in my head. I took a few photos of it and got back to work. By two-thirty, when I finished with my shift, I was too nervous to feel tired. I rode my board towards the tallest tower through the dark streets, passing beneath the streetlights that sang their song, most of them actually in tune.
I’d climbed around all over on the healery, which was basically an old stone fortress, so I was familiar with crumbling stone walls. If I could climb to the top of the tower, my gargoyle would probably see me and ask me what I was thinking, then I could tell him what I was thinking, and that it wasn’t about kissing him nearly as much as it was the drama of turning to stone. What was the point of kissing someone if you were stone and you couldn’t feel it?
I was about halfway to the old water tower when a demon lunged in front of me, all fiery horns, glowing eyes, and not much in the way of clothing, although he did have a useless shoulder plate and a thong. A demon in a thong: not something you see every day. Also, I was going to die!
Adrenaline rushed through me as I braked hard, turning my board down an alley. Was it the demon that had torched the library? Demons didn’t exactly run around in Singsong, at least not without clothing and a soul that diminished their chaos. I went faster while it laughed and chased me, letting me get ahead, like a game. Could it run faster than me? Why couldn’t I be turning into something more useful than stone? Why wasn’t this demon bound to whoever had summoned it? Maybe it was, but why would anyone want to chase me?
I went faster, much faster than was safe, but I shouldn’t have bothered. One moment I’m going along, the next, a scaly tail came down in front of my skateboard, stopping it while I kept going.
I flew through the air for a few beautiful moments, then hit the ground and rolled a few feet, feeling the landing mostly in my knees and palms. He grabbed my hoodie and yanked me up, holding me aloft while I dangled, kicking and punching at him.
His eyes were red, then black, then white, like he was changing channels trying to get a good reception. He licked me, a revolting slimy lick up my arm, the one that was turning to stone. He sniffed, nostrils flaring as he snuffed my palms.
“Your blood. I know your blood, little red flame,” he growled, showing enormous terrifying teeth with breath like… lilacs? A shot came from the darkness, ending in a spray of demon blood as it hit his shoulder. He dropped me and spun around, then darted into the darkness, leaving me gasping and flailing around. Demon. Lilacs. What kind of creepy person talks about other people’s blood? A demon. Right. Shudder.
I limped over to my board and flipped it over, trying to breathe, trying not to panic, trying not to cry, but how could anyone not cry when they’d felt so helpless, when that thing was still running around in the night? It had followed me from the Gray College. No one should be there. It should be shut down until whoever released the monster was prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. They should be executed for threatening our world like that.
I wanted to go home and climb under my blankets and never come out, but instead, I rode east towards the tower that I was going to climb and then wait for a gargoyle to come. It would be great. What could possibly go wrong? I dry-sobbed and pushed off slow, my knees too bruised to bend and hold up my weight very well. Demons should not be running around Singsong City like that. What kind of gun had the person used? Maybe I should invest in some powerful anti-demon firearm. Not maybe. I was going to look into it as soon as I’d dealt with the turning-to-stone thing. That is, if I didn’t fall to my death climbing up a tower already injured.
When I got to the water tower, it looked impossible to climb, but I circled the block, taking the service alley and finding the smaller additions that would be much easier to access. It wasn’t bad at all, not when I started with a tree to the first one story building, that was probably garage or storage, then the next building, two stories, then I was working my way across the main structure towards the tower. When I got to the flat roof around it, I put my palm against the stone, but they were already bloody. Climbing would be so fun. Not. Kill me now, or the demon should have killed me earlier.
I went around the tower, looking for the most likely climbing spot, then came upon a door on the far end. A door. Genius. It’s like people who weren’t supernaturally gifted had to go up the tower sometimes. Could I pick a lock? As a matter-of-fact, my war with Percival had prepared me for many such obstacles. I grabbed some pins from my pocket and started on the lock, the old, rusty, ridiculously easy-to-pick lock. It’s almost like they didn’t expect people to break in up here. The door creaked so loud, but I was trying to get a gargoyle to find me, so the more noise the better, unless the demon found me instead.
It was dark in the tower, so I turned on my phone flashlight, and made my way up the narrow steps. The view was breathtaking out of the many windows, but I didn’t stop to admire it. I had to not turn to stone first. I limped up the stairs faster, aware that my knees were bleeding way too much in a town full of werewolves and vampires, but hopefully they didn’t like towers nearly as much as gargoyles did.
When I got to the top, it was a large room with a few dusty pieces of furniture. Did they for cater lunches or something? No, this was a tower where you could see threats from the river, from the plains to the west, and the swamps from the south. People had stood here watching navy ships coming up the river to open fire on the golden walls of Singsong, probably the mayor, whoever that had been, a hundred years ago.
The moon was full and fat, low in the sky, spilling light on the ghostly clouds that rimmed the horizon. It was beautiful, peaceful, and for a moment, my heart skipped a beat while I was lost in the silence. I rubbed my arm and opened the windows, pushing them out so I could look up at the roof. There was a small wooden ladder built into the upper tower, probably so they could repair shingles. It wouldn’t be impossible to grip those wooden bars and climb up, but the overhang, and those old nails that had been in there for who knew how long creaked when I put my weight on them. For a moment I had one foot on the lower ladder, my arms gripping the underside of the roof, and then I reached up, found another rung, and pulled myself up and over the lip, onto the very steep tower that I realized wasn’t the right one. No, the tower he’d taken me to was on the other side of the roof, and twice as high.
I lay flat, gripping the wooden rails nailed to the shingles, and felt like an idiot. No kidding. Sure, I’ll go find a gargoyle by climbing a tower. I had no reason to believe that he’d be here tonight or any night. Was I going to just come up here and wait for him until I turned to stone or fell to my death? Everything hit me, just a wave of hopelessness that pinned me to that roof, as bleak as the time I’d lost my mother for three days until she finally showed up at a police station looking for Gabby, no last name. If I died, turned to stone, whatever, she’d be lost forever. I didn’t have time for that.
I sat up, wiped my eyes with one hand, because I wasn’t letting go of that rail, and tried to think happy thoughts. There were gargoyles in the world, the protectors of humanity, and they would destroy the demon. No sweat. Also, if someone could turn to stone, they could be turned human, as gargoyles showed all the time. Well, not all the time, but I’d personally tasted it. I’d kissed a gargoyle. I wasn’t going to feel sorry for myself after my dream had come true, although it made me wonder if I shouldn’t have slightly bigger dreams.
