Sorceress Hunting (A Gargoyle and Sorceress Tale Book 3) (22 page)

She squeezed Gregory fiercely and then released him.
“Come on. We’ve got a sample of Gryton’s blood on the daggers. Let’s see if we
can use that to track the bastard. Then we’ll make him pay for attacking
Shadowlight.”

“Agh!” Anna cursed as she jerked awake. Three things
became immediately apparent.

She was alive.

She’d been injured.

And she sure as hell wasn’t on base.

Oh, right. Gargoyles, magic, and other strange shit.

“Hello,” said a voice from a chair to her left. She
turned toward the sound and found her body didn’t want to move. Her one arm was
wrapped in several inches of bandaging, which was why she had trouble moving
it. She eventually turned far enough to meet the gaze of an older woman with a
long braid.

“Name’s Vivian, but everyone calls me Gran.” The woman
shifted a seven-foot quarterstaff from her lap and rested it against the chair.
She wiped her hands on a rag. At which point Anna realized the other woman had
been cleaning and oiling the staff’s dark wood.

She eyed the length of wood a second time. She hadn’t
seen one in years, but her father had an obsession with antique weapons. That
length of wood laying across the old woman’s lap was no walking stick.

Something told her this was not a ‘Gran’ to pick a
fight with.

“The human is awake?” This voice came from the other
side of the room, behind a curtained off section. A moment later, the curtain
parted, and another woman came into view. This was the same delicate-looking
woman from the sword fight earlier, though, her two swords were now absent—that
had to be a good sign.

She looked human. Both women did. However, the
newcomer addressed Anna as ‘the human’, so she was likely the only Homo sapiens
in the room.

“Where is Shadowlight?”

But her heightened senses already told her he was
behind that screen. Or at least another gargoyle was. She’d never been close
enough to any of the others to compare scents.

Other instincts told her Shadowlight was behind that
curtain.

She tossed back her blankets to find she was wearing a
long nightgown.

“Easy,” Vivian cautioned and came to her feet.

Anna ignored the warning and stood up, gritting her
teeth, and stormed toward Shadowlight. Okay, it was more of a stumble than a
storm.

The delicate female made to block her.

“River, I would suggest you allow her to see
Shadowlight. I felt the shadows reverberate to her anxiety.”

“The human mongrel is no match for me.”

Mongrel?

Seriously?

“Who the fuck are you?”

“I am Shadowlight’s mother.”

Anna managed to hide her surprise. Shadowlight had
said his mother was a dryad. He’d explained the whole born-of-a-tree thing.
“You should be fired. You suck at motherhood. I’m Shadowlight’s new babysitter,
or legal guardian, big sister or something—so get out of my way. Who in their
right mind lets a child do the things he’s done?”

If livid was a color, mommy just turned it. The
shadows shifted, and the curtains flowed apart like an unfelt breeze had just
moved them. Another gargoyle appeared beside Shadowlight’s mother.

Anna didn’t step back, foolish as it might be to
provoke this eight and a half foot tall wall of solid muscle.

She did, however, suck in a breath at her first look
at an adult specimen. He bowed his muzzle down to sniff at her. She wasn’t
intimidated by his size.

Nah, not intimidated at all.

She swallowed hard. “You’re dad?”

His eyes narrowed, and then he nodded.

“You suck too.”

The big gargoyle laughed. “I cannot fault you for your
reasoning. Neither River nor I have given our son the time he needs. We will do
better.”

River, yes, that was the mother’s name, she’d
forgotten.

The dryad began scolding in a foreign language. The
gargoyle only rumbled back at her.

While those two were arguing, Anna squeezed past and
found herself standing next to a massive bed with Shadowlight taking up a good
amount of it.

His wounds and burns were bandaged, so she couldn’t
see how bad they were, but the number was concerning.

Shadowlight shifted in his sleep, and his ears
twitched as he came awake with a pained grunt. His eyes slowly blinked open and
focused on her.

“Hey, kid. How are you feeling?” Okay, it was a dumb-ass
question to ask, but she had to say something to distract him from his parents’
bickering.

“I hurt,” came his honest reply. His attention
continued past her shoulder and riveted on something behind her. She had a good
idea what.

The parents were still arguing in another language.
Whatever they said must have made sense to the kid because his ears drooped,
and an expression of pain and fear crossed his features. Anna was damned sure
it was an emotional pain, not a physical one that made Shadowlight look like he
was going to weep.

She was sorely tempted to go over to the world’s worst
mom and box her ears. Instead, she stroked Shadowlight’s mane, tucking a few
wild locks behind his large, deer-like ears.

“You’ll heal, and I’m not going anywhere until you’re
back on your feet.” She sat down on the side of the bed. “It’s going to be okay
kid.”

“No, it’s not. Mother wants you killed.” Shadowlight
hauled himself up onto his forearms and then launched himself at her, his arms
locking around her like a vice as he buried his muzzle against her side.

He did cry then, his whole body shaking with silent
sobs.

Anna glanced over at his parents, prepared to give
them the most evil look she could muster only to see Gran rapping them both on
the shoulder with her quarterstaff, and then she pointed at Shadowlight with
the staff in case the dryad was too dense to figure out what the smack was for.

Darkness, apparently possessing a thimble-full of
common sense, glided over to his son’s side, whispering in that dark, beautiful
language. He bounded up onto the bed and nuzzled his son gently.

Shadowlight didn’t seem overjoyed and clamped onto
Anna harder, digging in like a tick.

“My son, forgive us, we will not harm the
human, I promise.”
Darkness said directly into Shadowlight’s
thoughts.

Anna figured she was hearing the private conversation
because Shadowlight was linked to her at the moment.

“Mother will. She promised to kill the
human. I overheard her.”

“She will see reason. We were just
surprised to learn you healed a human in this way. That is all. Your mother
loves you.”

Anna barked out a loud laugh. She couldn’t help it.
Mommy had a weird way of showing her love. Aloud she said, “Don’t worry kid. We
adults will smooth things over. Besides, I’m still alive. Your mom had lots of
time to do me some harm while I was out cold. She didn’t, which proves this is
all just bluff and bluster.”

Secretly, Anna did wonder why she’d awakened at all.
They’d had lots of time to ‘take care of the human problem’ while Shadowlight
was still unconscious. They could have blamed it on the injuries Tin Man had
given her.

But they hadn’t. Which made Anna wonder what they
wanted from her.

Shadowlight finally allowed himself to be consoled and
went into his father’s embrace. River joined them both and Shadowlight returned
his mother’s hug and leaned into her.

Anna just held her place. She couldn’t go anywhere
anyway, not with the kid’s tail wrapped around her waist like a boa
constrictor.

After ten or fifteen minutes, his tail relaxed its
grip as his father laid the now sleeping youngster back on the bed. River
tucked him in, and three sets of eyes firmly swung upon Anna.

The one called Gran came over and looked down upon the
young gargoyle, and checked his bandages a final time. When that was done to
her satisfaction, she turned her gaze back to Anna.

“We need to talk.”

“Yeah, I gather.”

*****

The talk didn’t happen right away. Gran said she had
to summon everyone, alert the acting council, and make a few preparations.

A few preparations must have been code for ‘go have a
nap, we’ll be back in a few hours’. Those few hours ranked up there as
crappiest moments of all time.

Darkness stood guard at the door, Anna sat on her bed
and kept herself busy putting her newly washed hair back in cornrows, and River
tended to her son while periodically shooting death looks at Anna.

At long last footsteps sounded in the corridor
outside. Darkness exchanged a quiet word with the newcomer.

It was the leshii, Greenborrow, followed by Gran,
another big male gargoyle, and a woman she recognized as Vivian’s
granddaughter.

Gran zoned in on Anna. “We will take you before the
council shortly to discuss your future, but first a few key players want to
talk to you.”

The granddaughter stepped out around Gran, covered the
distance to Anna in two strides, and then held out her hand in the first
normal, friendly gesture she’d seen in a while.

“I’m Lillian. Welcome to the Twilight Zone. Just when
you think things can’t get any stranger, they will.”

Anna took Lillian’s hand and gave it a good pump.
“Corporal Anna Mackenzie. I’d say it’s nice to meet you, but well, the events
leading up to this meeting have been anything but.”

“I don’t doubt it,” Lillian said. “But I do understand
what you’re going through.”

Anna highly doubted that.

“I thought I was human until four months ago. Didn’t
have a clue about magic or Fae or gargoyles. Went from thinking I was just your
average twenty-year-old, to finding out I’m not human.”

“There never was anything average about you,” Gran
said.

Anna raised an eyebrow, realizing something she hadn’t
until then. “You’re Shadowlight’s sister. Somehow, I pictured you with horns.”

Lillian laughed. “I do actually shift into a gargoyle
upon occasion.”

“Shapeshifting? Is there anything gargoyles can’t do?”

“Subtle.” Gran and Lillian said in unison.

“Yeah,” Anna said with a sharp nod, “I’ve never seen
the kid do subtle either. Did you really take on five helos?” She pointed her
question at Shadowlight’s dad and got a grunt in response.

So, lethal, yes. Subtle, no.

Small talk didn’t seem to run in the genetics either.
Guess that made Shadowlight the odd one out of his family. That kid loved to
talk.

“You seem to genuinely care for my baby brother. We
all saw the injuries you took trying to protect him from Gryton. The others
didn’t expect that.”

Anna frowned, feeling a little like her loyalties were
being called out or tested, or something. “He’s a kid. What was I supposed to
do? And he doesn’t want to harm anyone. I saw that right away. Well, maybe not
right away. I wouldn’t have asked a kid to put me out of my misery after the
Riven attack.” Anna swung back around on the parents. “However, I wouldn’t have
expected to find an eight-year-old anywhere near that shit storm firefight with
those vampire-Riven things.”

Antagonizing the parents was probably foolish, but by
dad’s admission of guilt, she had hope he might be able to reform. Mom was
probably a lost cause.

Besides, Anna wasn’t going to forget the mongrel
comment any time soon.

Darkness bowed his head slightly and then glanced over
at his sleeping son. “We arrived in this Realm just before the Riven attacked
the Coven lands. There were many Riven already here. I did not have a safe
place to stash my son, so I kept him at my side.” Darkness fell silent and she
thought he was done, but his glance tracked back to her. “My decision almost
cost him his life. Then Commander Gryton nearly stole him away from me. If you
had not intervened, he might very well have succeeded. Thank you for protecting
my son where I have failed.”

Anna was just about to mumble an awkward ‘you’re
welcome’ when a delicate snort of disdain drew her attention back toward River.

“The human wasn’t acting out of her great noble
intentions. She did exactly as she was supposed to do when she saw Shadowlight
was in danger.”

What the hell did that mean?

By the looks River was getting from the others in the
room, Anna wasn’t the only one baffled by her remarks.

Darkness’ expression turned thunderous while Lillian’s
showed bafflement. Gregory, the other demi-god in the room, just looked
thoughtful as he studied Anna.

Gran and Greenborrow both dragged chairs from the
corner of the room and then sat down like they were about to watch an evening’s
entertainment.

“You know something about why our son’s blood is
changing this human,” Darkness accused River. “What has that meddling Battle
Goddess done to our son?”

“She made him perfect,” River said, her voice
softening as she explained. “My lady changed Shadowlight while he was still in
my hamadryad.”