Sorceress Rising (A Gargoyle and Sorceress Tale Book 2) (14 page)

The last of the
light had fled some time ago, and Lillian navigated the forest pathways as best
she could. It was slow going without flashlights or even the glow of Gran’s
staff. Her grandmother didn’t want to risk exposing themselves to military
patrols or any of the Fae who might now be under Tethys’s control.

But they were
not in total darkness. The unicorn gave off a very slight glow. The pale light
allowed Lillian to see the shapes of low-hanging branches and the occasional
gnarled root along the path without summoning her gargoyle senses.

When she had
first raised an eyebrow in question, Vivian had claimed no one else would be
able to spot the glow. Unicorn magic allowed them to hide themselves from
almost anything. Even a hunter like Gregory would have trouble finding the
unicorn by sight alone.

Lillian was
thankful for the pale glow. However, she would have much preferred her gargoyle
form and the ability to see in the dark.

By Gran’s
intermittent mumbled curses, she concluded her grandmother’s night vision
wasn’t up to the task even with the unicorn’s illumination.

The return
journey to the spa felt twice as long; so much so, Lillian began to wonder if
they were lost.

Casting a
speculative glance at the trail ahead and the surrounding forest, she spotted a
familiar bear-clawed tree, and then around a bend, another familiar moss and
fern covered boulder, cracked down the middle one winter by the expansion and
contraction of ice.

No, they were
not lost. Just crawling along at a snail’s pace, with a good two kilometers to
still walk before they would reach the spa and her maze, where she’d left
Gregory sleeping.

How could she
have been so stupid? Her instincts had tried to warn her, but she’d
rationalized it as paranoia.

The unicorn came
to a halt, his ears twitching forward in question. His skin shivered, but he
made no other comment or explanation. Burying her fear for Gregory deeper, she
called on her gargoyle senses and closed her eyes.

The night’s
sounds intensified around her and she sorted them out. Over the buzz of
insects, the chirps of frogs, and the cries of the night birds she detected a
soft crackle of static to the left of her position.

Without comment,
the three of them silently moved toward the sound. The unicorn led the way,
with Gran a step behind. Lillian followed several steps farther back to better
scan the night.

Her nails burned
and itched with the need to lengthen and sharpen as the unknown threat weighed
on her consciousness. She fought the urge to shift. Partially because Gran had
warned her she’d heal too quickly, and partly because she’d only tried to shape
shift in Gregory’s presence.

But she didn’t
need to fully shape shift to use her gargoyle senses, and when they came upon
the source of the static, the five shadowy shapes slumped on the ground at
random intervals were easy to recognize. It was less easy to determine at a
glance what had taken down an entire patrol without a shot being fired. There
was no death or blood scent and when she calmed her own harsh breathing, she
was able to hear the steady slow breaths and the throb of beating hearts. They
were merely sleeping. Well, perhaps there was nothing ‘merely’ about their
sleep, but they were alive.

“Tethys’ work,”
Gran said, answering Lillian’s unasked question. “If she was here for a
peaceful purpose, she wouldn’t randomly leave bodies just strewn about, which
tells us she isn’t worried about fallout from the humans, likely because she
intends to make sure they aren’t a problem.”

A radio crackled
again, drawing all their attention toward it.

Gran cursed.
“Let’s go. They’re bound to be missed soon.” She directed a frown out into the
surrounding forest. “There might already be others out looking for them.”

Lillian glanced
back the way they had come. “Then they are bound to see our tracks.”

Gran shrugged.
“Something to look forward to later, should we survive.” On that comforting
note she started off through the forest at a faster pace. Lillian and the
unicorn followed after a quick glance at each other.

****

They found more
human patrols and a number of Fae sleeping peacefully under the trees. All
attempts to wake the Fae proved pointless. Their efforts didn’t even elicit a
sleepy grumble. And Lillian realized Tethys’s enchantment put her victims in a
state closer to a coma than natural sleep. “How can we undo this?”

Gran gave
Lillian a sharp look. “A siren’s enchantments die with her.”

Lillian took it
to mean it was up to them to find a way to defeat Tethys by any means
necessary.

But can I
kill?

When she’d been
attacked by the Riven, she’d defended herself, killing many of her enemies, but
it had been the work of the demon seed protecting its host as much as Lillian’s
own fortitude. And the Riven were more dead than alive by her judgment. If
those Riven hosts had been still alive and aware—she’d probably done them a
favor by destroying them.

Images of the
helpless inert forms of humans and Fae flashed against the back of her eyelids.
They would be such easy pickings if the Riven should happen upon them. And then
there was an image of Gregory, how she’d left him sleeping on his stone
pedestal, weakened from all the spells he’d been casting these last few days.
Tethys had reached out, daring to touch Gregory as he slept.

Could I take
the siren’s life?

‘Yes,’
she thought,
‘for Gregory and everyone else I love.’

With that
acknowledgment like a promise burning in her heart, she followed Gran out of
the forest and into the gardens surrounding the spa.

As they walked
the garden pathways, the gravel underfoot the only noise betraying their
passage, they came upon more sleeping victims, these a mix of Fae, military,
and a good hundred human civilians.

Ah. The
masquerade. What a disaster her clever idea had become. Now magic had spilled
across into the mundane world. Lillian eyed the sleeping people. The siren must
be stopped tonight, for dawn would come and reveal far too much to human eyes.

Lillian came
around a sharp turn in the path and nearly ran into the pooka. To her surprise,
he was still on his feet.

He stood with
his head bowed low, hooves planted firmly and tail hanging limp. He didn’t so
much as flick an ear at their approach, but when she laid a hand on his side,
he rolled a dull yellow eye in her direction.

Gregory had told
her both unicorns and pookas possessed a natural ability to see past
deceptions. Perhaps it gave the pooka a slight immunity to the siren’s magic.

After patting
his shoulder, she allowed her hand to rest on his withers hoping her small
gesture could give him some comfort. “No one enslaves my family or friends.
I’ll get you free. I promise.”

Her words might
be a common turn of phrase, but the emotions and fortitude behind them were
genuine.

Gran tapped her
on the shoulder. “Come, we have a siren to discipline, a gargoyle to extract and
the night isn’t getting any younger.” Gran sighed a humorless laugh. “And
neither am I, but villains seem not to care about those kinds of details.”

“And all
before dawn,”
added the unicorn in a tone Lillian
interpreted as ominous.

“Yes,” Gran
whispered. “Because if we haven’t freed Gregory by then, he might be too deeply
ensnared for us to free him without help.

“Who the hell is
left to help?” Lillian asked more sharply than she’d intended.

Gran gave her a
pinched look and pulled an amulet on a chain from around her neck. She
hesitated before handing it over to Lillian. It was surprisingly heavy and
still warm from Gran’s skin. Actually, it felt too warm, as if it gave off its
own heat.

When Gran
motioned to put it on, Lillian did, looping it over her head and then smoothed
her hair back in place, all the while giving her grandmother a questioning
look.

“No matter what
else happens, neither you nor Gregory can remain under the siren’s control. She
must never possess such power. It will start a war with the humans; it might
even tip the scales in the Lady of Battles’ favor if the Fae are forced to
battle the humans. War and chaos make her stronger. And I don’t even care to
speculate what the Riven might try while our attention is drawn elsewhere.
Smear three drops of your blood upon the amulet and it will summon your last
allies, and no, I can’t tell you more. The less you know, the less you can tell
Tethys if you should be captured. She may already have Gregory under her
power.”

Lillian scowled,
seeing a problem with her logic. “Why give me the amulet, then?”

“Because I doubt
I’ll escape the siren’s attentions either. The best we can hope for is to
confuse her if we all attack at once. We’ll need to sneak into the cottage and
secure some of those weapons Gregory and the sidhe metalsmiths have been
working on. We might get lucky and land a good shot. Then, if luck is still
with us, you might be able to wake Gregory and finish off the siren. Or if all
goes south, escape with him.”

We’re so
screwed
, Lillian whispered in the recesses of her
own mind, to Gran she said, “Now there’s a scary number of ‘ifs’ to overcome.”

“Yes, and it’s
the best plan I’ve got. Tethys is one of the oldest of her kind. She’ll be a
difficult adversary to fight, because how does one fight one’s own deepest
desires. And mark my words, she’ll use your heart’s wish against you.”

“Great,” Lillian
mumbled as she followed Gran deeper into the gardens in the direction of the
cottage.

Sneaking into
the cottage proved surprisingly easy. But then again, stealth wasn’t a problem
when no other soul was awake to see you, Lillian supposed. Her second greatest
fear—that the siren might be holed up somewhere inside the cottage—proved false
as well. The house was silent, deserted in a way it hadn’t been in days. For
the first time in her life, the old stone cottage offered no homey reassurance.

“We’ve been
storing the spell-warded weapons below in the wine cellar,” Gran explained. She
crossed the kitchen and unlocked a side door, which opened onto a narrow set of
stairs leading down to the cellar.

Lillian followed
close on Gran’s heels. She called on her gargoyle senses once again, and the
dimly lit stairwell became much easier to see. They continued along the rows of
wooden shelves with their cargo of quality wines, which stocked the family spa
in normal times. They filed past the wood shelves and Lillian found herself in
a far back corner of the cellar. The dingy little alcove was devoid of anything
of interest, so she’d never had reason to venture over to this part of the
cellar.

Gran, however,
grabbed the edge of the dumpy little table leaning against one wall and started
to move it. The legs dragged on the stone floor and made a painful sound.

Lillian winced
at the appalling noise, then looked up at the rafters and cocked her head to
listen. Nothing responded to the noise, and she released the breath she’d been
holding. While she’d been worrying about something coming up their back trail,
Gran had gone ahead and pushed against what had looked like just another
section of wall.

But this wall
made a grating sound as it swung open into a black abyss. Gran shoved her
shoulder against the door a second time and opened it a bit farther. With a
muttered curse, she groped around in the darkness. After half a minute, there
was a hum and a flickering of harsh light as rows of fluorescent lights
sputtered to life.

Under the cold
light of the fluorescents, a large room Lillian hadn’t even known existed was
revealed. She drew another sharp breath, but only had a moment to marvel at all
Gregory’s hard work. Knowing he’d been enchanting weapons for days on end was
one thing, seeing the hundreds of them was something else altogether. Her eyes
swiftly picked out the shapes of swords, shields, daggers, spears, crossbows,
and yes, those were longbows resting against one wall. Their beautiful, elegant
carved wood shafts so much more striking than the practical compound bow her
uncle had taught her to use over a number of hunting expeditions. Thanks to Gran,
she’d even had a few seasons’ worth of practice on a crossbow.

“Here,” Gran
said as she shoved first a crossbow and then a wooden longbow into her hands.
“Hold these for me.”

Lillian did, and
followed Gran around the room until they were both laden with knives and enough
arrows and bolts to do some serious damage.

“One more thing
before we go,” Gran said as she made her way over to a long low table. There
she pulled a couple lengths of fabric from a basket and brought them over to
Lillian. “Gregory was working on these for you. I think he planned them as a
gift. The beading isn’t finished yet, but they are functional.”

There was a soft
rustle of fabric and the gentle clank of beads as Gran handed the bundle to
her. She unfolded it to see one item was a beaded loincloth similar to what
Gregory wore and the other was a long scarf-like construction. With a bit of
wrapping, it could be secured into a top of sorts, one which looped up over her
neck, crisscrossed over her breasts, and tied behind her waist. It wouldn’t
interfere with her wings when she was in gargoyle form.

She ran a thumb
over the soft fabric and tiny beadwork. Sudden moisture gathered in the corners
of her eyes and she had to swallow past a lump in her throat. Gregory had been
working himself to exhaustion each day, but he still took the time to make this
gift for her because she’d asked.

“Here,” Gran
said, “I’ll take the longbow.”

It was probably
for the best, since Lillian doubted she possessed enough skill to effectively
aim one of those deadly weapons with any accuracy. The crossbow suited her
better.

She donned the
clothing Gregory had been making for her with a quick efficiency. And then as
silently as they had come, they left the secret room and made their way back up
to the outside world where the unicorn waited in the gardens behind the house.