Karen Duvall - Darkest Knight

I thinned my mind’s sensory defenses just enough to get a sense of the place. Straining against the silence, I listened for signs of life and found two beings upstairs. Whether they were human or not didn’t matter. I only cared about hearing one heartbeat: the rapid bass drum pound that belonged only to a gargoyle.

It didn’t take long for me to detect it. One gargoyle was in the basement and it had to be Shojin. No two gargoyles could occupy the same space or there was sure to be a fight.

Mouth dry as parchment, I swallowed my fear and sniffed the air. The kitchen smelled close by and I knew I’d find a door to the basement there. That’s how most fatherhouses were laid out due to the spell-casting needs of their magic-users.

I crept down the narrow hall toward the scent of herbs and cooking oil. Squinting in darkness that appeared gray as fog to my sensitive eyes, I detected no ghosts. Most likely the house’s warding spells kept them out. Good. Ghosts were annoying distractions and the last thing I needed right now. My focus had to be sharp as a gargoyle’s talon.

The vibration down my spine told me I was surrounded by curses and charms. I sensed a huge collection here, possibly even bigger than the fatherhouse in Denver before it blew up. It reminded me of one more task on my to-do list: steal back every magical object in the Vyantara’s gallery of hellish artifacts. After I’d been kidnapped from a monastery in Lebanon at thirteen by the leaders of this nasty black veil group, I’d been forced to steal many of these artifacts for the Vyantara. I had my work cut out for me.

The wooden stairs creaked with my slight ninety-eight pounds of body weight. If Shojin didn’t hear me coming, he’d surely have smelled me by now. A gargoyle’s senses were nearly as keen as mine.

I sniffed the air and it chilled my lungs, which came as no surprise considering this was a Canadian fatherhouse in the dead of winter. But it didn’t lessen the scent of damp feathers and unwashed fur. When I reached the bottom step, a plume of steamy gargoyle breath seethed out of the darkness and enveloped me like a blanket.

Shojin’s eyes glowed red and I listened for his heartbeat to speed up, but he remained calm. His breathing came slow and steady despite the billowing clouds of hot air that puffed from his flared nostrils. I didn’t know Shojin well, only that Aydin had been bonded to him and that their eight hundred years together had forged a rare friendship. I did a mental eye-roll. In the thirteen years I’d been with Shui, we had shared only hatred. Gargoyles were assassins for the Vyantara. I could never befriend a murderer.

The gargoyle growled. Oh, there we go. That was the behavior I expected. I didn’t deal well with the unpredictable. Monsters should act and react in accordance with their vile and murderous nature.

I slid my balisong blade from its sheath on my back. The knife glinted a glorious purple in the red light that shone from Shojin’s eyes. No ordinary blade, this balisong could do something no other knife could. It could kill an immortal gargoyle because it was created from the dead body of one.

“I know you and Aydin were good buddies, Shojin. And I’m sorry to have to do this.” I brandished the blade and stood poised to strike. “But you have what I need to make Aydin a man again.”

The gargoyle hissed and lunged at me. It was an ancient creature, possibly the oldest one on earth, but you’d never know it by its speed and agility. Shojin’s wings spanned the width of the room and with just one flap, I was airborne and sailing toward the stairs. I landed on my back, the air whooshing from my lungs like a deflating balloon. I managed to roll sideways just as the gargoyle pounced. He missed me by a hair.

I wanted to yell but I didn’t have enough breath to make a sound. It was all I could do to stay conscious. We were both in full battle mode and my intent to win replaced any fear I might have had. There was no room in my mind to be afraid. My head filled with tactics and strategy, driven by instinct to survive.

Shojin matched my intensity. He wanted to win just as badly. He knew what I’d come for and wasn’t about to let me take it from him.

One clawed hand the size of a grizzly bear’s paw sliced through the air to backhand my head and send me sprawling. My arms and legs flailed as I slid across the dirt floor to slam into a wall. I hit so hard I didn’t see stars, I saw planets. I wasn’t so fast getting back up this time. And Shojin took full advantage.

He grabbed me by the throat and lifted me up off the ground. I swiped the blade toward the arm holding me, but dizziness kept me from seeing straight and I connected with nothing but air.

I wanted to scream at him that he owed Aydin his heart. Killing me wouldn’t bring Aydin back, but killing Shojin could. Struggling to breathe, I gritted my teeth and tried forcing my will on the gargoyle. He stared hard at me, his ridged brow deeply creased with age, his curved raptor’s beak parted as if to bite. I fisted a clump of fur on his arm and hung on tight, sucking in what air I could while watching the edges of my consciousness fade to black.

Fury in his eyes, Shojin lowered me to the ground. His grip on my neck lessened, but I felt something warm trickle down the collar of my shirt. I vaguely wondered how badly I’d been wounded, and if it even mattered. For the second time in less than two months I was about to become gargoyle chow.

If I hadn’t been so weak from lack of oxygen I’d be slicing through his thick chest right now and cutting out his beating heart. As it was, my legs couldn’t even hold me up. I hung from Shojin’s claws like a bloody rag doll.

The gargoyle growled and squawked as if trying to talk. He shook his head and clacked his beak. What would he say if he could speak? Thanks for the quick snack, and I’ll have your guardian angel for dessert?

He pried the balisong from my hand, his clumsy claw gouging my arm in the process. Who knew a gargoyle preferred to cut his meat with a knife? But instead of peeling me open like a ripe piece of fruit, he plunged the blade into his own chest.

Shojin’s grip on me weakened as he sawed through his flesh in search of what lay beating underneath.

I knew in that moment that he loved Aydin as much as I did. His adoration for a mere human stunned me. I wasn’t sure I could grasp the concept of compassion coming from a fiend.

His eyes glazed and filled with tears. I could imagine pain had caused this reaction, but I had to give him more credit than that. Aydin had told me many times that Shojin was different. That his beast wasn’t a homicidal killer like others of its kind. I realized now that he’d been right.

A tear dripped from the corner of Shojin’s eye and slid over the coarse surface of his beak. I bit my lip to stop my own tears from flowing. I wouldn’t dishonor him by showing pity. He’d done an honorable thing for a friend and it was costing him his life.

He dropped the knife, which quickly dissolved to dust after having done its job, then closed his eyes while reaching inside the hole he’d cut into his chest. When he opened his clawed hand, a glowing lump of purple flesh lay centered in his palm. He offered me the still-beating heart.

We both fell to our knees and I caught the heart before it could hit the ground. It was warm and wet and mine.

Shojin gasped and collapsed forward, his dense body falling hard and shattering in more pieces than I could count. When a gargoyle died, it always turned to stone. So his lifeless body breaking apart was no surprise. What surprised me was that his heart continued its rapid bass drum beat. A minute later the organ went still in my hands.

The heart was still warm, still glowing, but solid and shiny as a purple gemstone. Now I understood why Shojin had fought me so hard. If I’d killed him like I wanted, his heart would have shattered along with the rest of his body when he died. He’d known I would come and had planned all along to end his life this way.