I pul ed my sword, so high on my new freedom that I didn’t care if it sounded obnoxious as I said,
“It’s a good thing Astral’s here to record this. Now we can put on a show the rookies wil be studying for years to come.”
Vayl’s dimple appeared as Zel asked, “Then what are we waiting for?” He glanced at Helena as he pul ed a roughly made weapon from the seam of his homespun pants. It looked less like a dagger he pul ed a roughly made weapon from the seam of his homespun pants. It looked less like a dagger than like an extra-long bolt with a handle on one end and a handsharpened point on the other. She smiled at him, flipped up the skirt of her dress just long enough to give her access to the bowie knife she had stowed there, then dropped it back down again.
“Why Granny H,” I murmured, gaining raised eyebrows from Vayl and a broad smile from her.
“What a big knife you have there.”
She nodded once. “I took it off of the carcass of my first kil . I had to smash his head in with a rock.” She grimaced. “Awful business, that. I wouldn’t recommend it to the easily nauseated.” I caught just a hint of her former accent. Once strongly British, it also had nearly surrendered to the onslaught of hel ’s eternal attack. And yet, when she smiled at Zel with that glow of love in her eyes, I couldn’t help but admire her for hanging on to what real y mattered.
Granny May had fal en into her front porch chair and found a hand fan from church emblazoned with the words god be praised, and in smal er print, shop your hometown grocer, which she was using to give herself more air as she openly admired our forebear.
Raoul’s voice interrupted my inner monologue. “I’m thinking that as soon as the gorgon and her pet are halfway across the bridge we should turn and attack. It’s a fairly wide crossing so that if a couple of us can get behind them, considering that we’ve got them wel outnumbered and most of us are skil ed fighters, hopeful y they’l see reason and surrender quickly. Is everyone happy with that idea?”
“I’m scared of snakes,” Lotus said in a wavery voice. “But I’ve been in my share of bar fights. In fact, I once shoved a stiletto through a guy’s eye. Purely out of self-defense, I’d like you to know. Just saying—I can hold my own out there.”
I glanced up at Vayl, realizing instantly that he had no idea how to digest this new information about his daughter. Final y he said, “I do not care for snakes either.” And when they traded smal grins, he was happy that was the route he’d chosen.
At a nod from him we raised our weapons and spun, steeling ourselves for the battle that lay ahead of us. Among the six of us, seven counting Astral, we must’ve seen it al . And yet we stil froze, stunned into paralysis by the scene that lay before us.
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
Gorgons are, first and foremost, death-eaters. They haunt battlefields and burn wards. Nursing homes—not so much. Because they love riding their victims through time, sucking up the soul’s reluctance to move on, like kids at a candy counter. And young souls work so much harder to beat death than old ones. They say gorgons can survive for centuries on the backs of seven-year-olds.
The fuckers.
You can’t see them in the world unless they’re about to make a deal. But you might get hints.
Maybe you’l catch them in a stray expression that doesn’t quite fit your husband’s face, or a disturbing personality quirk in your sister that appears suddenly after a nearly tragic accident that the doctors explain as the result of brain damage. It’s not dead brain matter, it’s a gorgon. Sliding up against your sweetheart’s back like the strumpet she was born to be, clutching him so tight he can only breathe when she inhales for them both.
But in hel ? Yeah, we could’ve seen her clearly if we’d wanted to spend the rest of eternity as statues. But since we al enjoyed mobility, we caught her in darting glances as she advanced across the bridge, pul ing her al - you-can-eat-buffet behind her on a delicate silver chain that must’ve been hidden in his fur when he’d been masquerading as a spiderhound.
In the world, with the gorgon riding him like a shadow, he’d held himself like the most-wanted vil ain he was. Gawd, how long had his gaunt, hard-eyed face stared at us from the kil -’em-ifyou-can bul etin board in Pete’s office every time he cal ed us in to assign a new mission? A king among cutthroats and thieves, the Sol of the Valencian Weres had gained so much status with his decimation of NASA’s communication centers in California and Madrid that his fol owing was threatening to become a worldwide cult. Not so shocking to see him touring the netherworld, considering his worst enemy (Vayl) and dearest love (Helena) had managed to find each other again. But as we watched him connected to his parasite by a single thin metal cord, we understood what he’d real y become.
“No wonder he didn’t want to take human form,” Lotus said in a hushed whisper. “While he was stil a spiderhound the gorgon kept leaning down and hissing into his ear. Slapping him on the back of his head, even flicking at his eyebal s. Nothing. Then she found that chain, yanked it a couple of times, and suddenly he stood up and became… that.”
Now the man he’d been born to become, he shambled behind the gorgon aimlessly, trying to wander off the path until she jerked him back to heel, blood trickling unheeded from the spot on his neck where the col ar had cut into his skin. In wolf form he was a fearsome hook-fanged creature with black claws and fur generously patched in black. That had been one scary monster. The spiderhound form had been even more fearsome. This? This was a skinny old man with sunken eyes and receding gums who kept trying to draw the number eight in the air, and then forgetting how to finish the final loop, forcing him to start al over again. Then I reminded myself. This piece of shit had been responsible for the deaths of Ethan Mreck and my old boss man, Pete. He was going.
Fucking. Down.
“The old man I can take. But I’ve never had to battle a gorgon,” Lotus noted nervously. “If Zel and Helena are
