The creature’s eyes darted this way and that, like he couldn’t decide where to look or whose response to process. Finally, his charcoal-encrusted gaze settled on me. “Death protects the child. Not the girl, the child.”
Before I could puzzle that one out, Clarence said, “Dowse the thing already!” He groaned. “The girl, the child, the stone—this walking, flesh-covered tin can can’t help us. Geoff, it’s programmed to think in terms of archetypes. It’s a construct.”
“Yeah, I think you’re right, Clarence,” I said. “Not that I’ve ever actually seen one, but signs do point that way. And I do think we’ve gotten about as much out of him as we can.” I picked up the bucket at Lilac’s feet.
“Wait, I do have one more question.” Clarence leapt up on the couch, no longer concerned the incapacitated creature would suddenly regain its mobility. “Who’s the child?”
The creature blinked. “The child is the false owner of the stone.”
“Right,” Clarence said in a disgruntled tone. “Ask a stupid guy a pertinent question, get a stupid answer.” He shook one front paw and then the other, dislodging stray bits of charred creature, then hopped off the sofa. “Okay, folks, let it rain.”
It took a total of three full buckets of blessed water before the construct was completely neutralized. The creature’s warm, parched skin absorbed each bucket. The sofa and the body should have been a soggy mess—but the creature was bone dry and the sofa only damp around the edges of the corpse.
After the third bucket, its skin started to crack and break apart. Within seconds, it had crumbled to ash. Just add water, then get ash. That was magic.
Lilac stared—at her ruined sofa or the piles of ash or simply the place where the creature had once been and was no longer—then said, “I guess it’s a good thing we didn’t call the police. Now what in the goddess’s name is a construct?”
Clarence shook his head. “Don’t look at me. Geoff’s better at explanations.”
“Not it” was one of Clarence’s favorite games. After several weeks, it shouldn’t bother or surprise me. But there was “shouldn’t,” and there was reality. “Fine,” I said. “A construct isn’t real, in the sense that it is the thing it appears to be. It’s more a shell of something real.” Eyeing the bruises that were darkening on Lilac’s very fair skin, I added, “Though obviously its physicality is not in question.”
She lifted a hand to her throat but didn’t touch the skin there. “So a construct is a man that’s not a man. Looks right, almost talks right, but isn’t made up of the right stuff.”
“She’s better at this than you.” Clarence plopped down on the ground and started to groom himself. I only hoped he wasn’t consuming ashy bits of our visitor as he did so.
He suddenly spat repeatedly, like a foul taste coated his mouth. I couldn’t help but laugh.
“So, about this construct?” Lilac asked.
“Right. They’re only capable of completing a simple task or two, and take an enormous amount of skill and power to create. Or so I hear.” I shrugged. “I’ve never come across one before. But if you consider that it arrived, interacted within this reality somewhat like a human—enough to pass inspection by a casual observer—and pursued its goal while maintaining a veneer of humanity, that’s power.”
“You’re forgetting his eyes glowed.” Lilac shivered. “That’s hardly human.”
“But that only happened after you refused to give him what he wanted,” I reminded her. “You wouldn’t tell him where the stone was.”
“I didn’t know where it was. Or even what stone he meant.”
“Well, exactly.” I gave her a sympathetic look. “He couldn’t complete his task. I’m guessing that’s when he reached out to his master to check-in—and the eyes glowed.”
Clarence cleared his throat. “Anyone else wondering how little buck-ten here managed to take down the big, bad, nasty construct?”
We all turned to the small sculpture still lying on the floor. I’d seen the blood and hair, but only as I approached it did I see that the statue was an oddly proportioned, hunched figure with a grotesque face: a small gargoyle, possibly iron.
The bits of blood and hair that had been stuck to it were conspicuous by their absence, replaced by a fine, ashy powder that speckled the carpet next to it.
I reached for it, but stopped myself. “May I?” I asked Lilac. When she nodded, I picked it up. It felt solid, hefty. It was a good weapon, but not something I’d expect to bring down a construct when wielded by a small woman. “And you didn’t use any magic? You just hit him—it—with the gargoyle?”
“Magic, right.” Her freckles stood out sharply against her pale features. “No. No, Geoff, I did not use any magic when I whacked the intruder in the head with my bookend.” Then she sank onto the nearest non-ashy surface, which was the edge of her computer desk.
I considered another alternative. “The gargoyle was a gift?”
“Yes,” Lilac said, surprised. “From my father. How did you know that?”
“Just a hunch.” I placed it gently on her desk. “Maybe keep it handy for the next few days, just until all this has settled down.”
She considered the gargoyle for a moment, then hopped down from her desk and retrieved it. “Done.” She rubbed her collarbone, not touching the bruises.
“We’re supposed to call Tamara and update her, right?” I asked, thinking, Who better to have a healing salve on hand?
“Yes, that’s right.” Lilac squeezed her eyes closed and wrinkled her nose. “I forgot. I was supposed to remind you about your date. I forgot, what with all the blessings and the dousings . . . and everything.”
“Date?” I pivoted slowly to Lilac. “She called it a date?”
Tired, pale, and certainly overwhelmed by all that she’d seen this night, Lilac still managed a teasing smile. “She did. You’re meeting your neighbor, right?” She glanced at the wall clock. “In fifteen minutes?”
“Yeah, I have to go or she’s going to get to the house before me.”
