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He chuckled. “It could go that way. He doesn’t appreciate my interference, either with the revelation of his duality or pushing you into shifting before you were ready. You were ready. I wouldn’t be wrong about something like that, and the longer you wait, the harder it becomes. I’ve watched so many half-gargoyles die.” The smile died in his eyes.
I glared at him. “Harder as in denser stone? Why would you say that now instead of warning me beforehand? You shoved me off your roof the second I let down my guard. That’s called betrayal. That must be the reigning gargoyle personality trait.”
He shook his head. “Actually, that would be loyalty, but I understand why you would think otherwise. There is no alternative for a half-gargoyle, either you learn to shift, or you turn to stone and die. It’s sad.”
Yeah, it’s sad, like having your favorite bride lose in the bride wars, or sad like it raining when you want to go on a picnic. Dude needed to recalibrate his emotional responses.
I threw back the blankets and was still wearing the clothes I’d had on for our tea party, black shirt, black leggings. That was a long time ago, before I knew my mom was a sorcerer, before I knew that Percy was a lying, worthless piece of gargoyle rubble, before I knew how hard it was to turn to stone, and before I knew my dad liked puns.
“Is my mom really a sorcerer?” I pulled on my boots and got up, but slowly because I was still wobbly.
“She was. I don’t know what she is now. She really can’t remember?”
“Nope. I lost her for three days once before someone found her and brought her home.” I tried to sound cheerful, but I was still tired, and even though I was the most marvelous creature in the world, it was hard to appreciate it when other gargoyles were so vile and hideous inside and out. Percy. He had to die, and soon. And I was the one who was going to kill him. How do you kill a gargoyle?
“I’m sorry.” He sounded sorry, and his face had a concerned frown that made me feel guilty for making him feel guilty. He hadn’t meant to lose my mom for twenty years, and what were three days compared to that?
Still, I didn’t really care about what he felt because he’d shoved me off the roof! Who does that? Also, I was going to kill Percy. “You’re showing emotions, but you didn’t before. Why is that?”
“It’s difficult for a protector, a father, to push his child off the roof, or to watch her go through the agonizing process of transformation. I need to be able to manage my emotions so that they don’t spill out in destructive ways.”
“Don’t tell me that you’re also an evil sorcerer.”
He smiled slightly. “Dark magic is not the only destructive force. The quiet state of a gargoyle, if disrupted, can become mindlessly catastrophic. With great potential for good comes great capacity for evil. Miss Tertrue is waiting with a car in the drive. Can you make it on your own, or should I carry you? You’ll probably spend the rest of the day in bed at home with your mother doing what she can with her healing magic.” When he spoke of her, did his voice soften? And if it did, how did I feel about it? If he’d married the vain, gorgeous sorcerer, he wouldn’t like who she was now. I did. I’d choose the mom version every time.
“I can walk.” Like I’d ever admit to needing to be carried. That was too pathetic, even for me. I was going to walk to a killing store, buy a gargoyle death weapon, and bury it in Percy before he got a chance to lie and betray me again.
I was going to kill him, but once I got home, my mom was so busy fussing over me, I didn’t have time to research killing gargoyles, and I still didn’t feel super great. After she tucked me in, I fell asleep and didn’t wake up until four AM, barely time to do anything useful before it got light.
I dressed carefully in my comfortable hoodie and big pants, and then I was out onto the roof, down the old stone wall where my fingers knew the way, and down into Song, where I knew a murderer who could probably help me kill Percy.
The trip to Song on my board was mostly quiet, even Song settling down before the dawn. What were the odds that the vampire would be hanging around the alley where it would be so easy for the cat cop to find her? Not good, but I had to do something, because when I woke up in my bed, I stretched out my hand on the sheet looking for a warm body that hadn’t ever been there before. If I let the anger fade, I’d be too weak, weak enough that I might even believe his lies and let him betray me all over again. That couldn’t happen, so I was going to kill him.
I got to the alley around four-thirty-five, and started pacing up and down, all my extra cash in my pocket, looking for a murderer so I could kill someone. If I was murdered right now, I’d completely deserve it, but I was too angry to care. How dare he be my obsession and my enemy at the same time? How was that kind of thing not supposed to drive me insane?
“Are you waiting for a drug dealer?” the vampire asked, landing with a quiet thump to my right.
“You kill people, right? I need someone to die, so I thought you might help me.”
She cocked her head, studying me with curious red eyes. “I suppose that I could kill a particular man for a price, although I am unaccustomed to paid assassination.”
I shook my head rapidly at the thought of this lady touching my gargoyle. “No. I have to kill him, but I thought you could tell me how to do it. He’s a gargoyle. They’re incredibly difficult to kill, aren’t they?”
She smiled. “Ah, you want to kill him yourself? That is sweet of you to think of me. Of course, I can teach you how to kill your love, but only you can push the blade into his heart and shatter it.”
“How do I do it?”
“What do you have for me in exchange?”
I pulled out my wad of money. It wasn’t much, just tips that I hadn’t taken to the bank yet. “It’s not much, but it’s all I have on hand. I can get more later, if you need me to, but I have to kill him right now.”
She smiled sweetly. “All you have is always enough. I have a very special weapon right here,” she said, taking a small dagger out of the folds of her clothing and holding it up to gaze at it. “I killed my first with this blade. It is a very good heart-shatterer.”
I took it, and as I did, the blade flashed red, like red glass filled with blood and pain. “Wow. It’s beautiful.”
She laughed and held out her hand. “Money.” I handed it over and she counted it. “It is a fair exchange. To kill a gargoyle, it is best to do so right as the sun rises, when they are first born to a new day, sweet, soft, vulnerable humanity blinded by the brightness of the sun. You pierce the heart and will his death, pouring your hatred and anger into him through the blade. It will do the rest. Enjoy your fun.” She smiled sharply and then turned and glided off, joining shadows in the next moment.
If I was going to kill Percy before the sun rose, I had to move.
