The Mammoth Book of Paranormal Romance (Trisha Telep) (Kitty Norville 0.50)

She edged closer, her feet scraping over the hard ledge on which he was perched. He could feel it too now, through the thin-soled shoes he’d worn when he’d agreed to the sorcerer’s bargain, agreed to go to sleep for eternity so his enemies, the chimeras, would be put into the slumber too.

He and the others like him had given up their freedom, their lives, to save the world from the chimeras who would have enslaved humanity - but he was awake. He swallowed, or made the motion at the back of his throat; the action was uncomfortable, unnatural locked in this stony condition.

He tried again, managed to move his head to the side, but only an inch. The woman pressed against him, studying him, and didn’t notice. But the movement was real. He was coming awake.

Were his enemies too?

Kami Machon clung to the gargoyle, kept herself from looking down by concentrating on the impossible detail of his wings, muscles, everything. How she wished she knew who had sculpted him, how the sculptor had put such strength and darkness into the white marble he’d used to carve the creature.

She’d been sculpting with clay for years, but had recently forked out the dollars for a block of alabaster. Her fingers itched to pick up that chisel, make the first chink in the stone. But she was afraid, wanted it to be perfect, beautiful, like this gargoyle.

She ran her hand lower, towards the strange kilt-like cloth that covered the gargoyle’s lower body. The stone beneath her hand quivered. She jerked, then laughed at the flight of her imagination. Real as he might appear, this gargoyle (or grotesque, to use the more accurate term) was stone, cold and hard. He couldn’t feel her hand moving over him, couldn’t react to her touch.

She shook her head, forced her feet to inch further along the ledge. One hand gripping the gargoyle’s for balance, she lowered her other to the flashlight that hung on a string from her neck. It was dark, past midnight - the only time she’d been sure no one would see her, try to stop her.

She’d tried going through regular routes, asked permission from the building’s owner to view the statue up close, but her calls had been ignored. Then, miraculously, the temp agency she worked for part-time had offered a position with the building’s cleaning service. The rest of the crew was gone now. She was left with free access to the outside ledge at the top of the building where the gargoyle perched, keeping watch over the city.

She flipped on the flashlight, directed its small beam onto the gargoyle’s profile. His jaw was strong, firm. She laughed again of course it was. He was carved of stone. She lowered the light so she could feel the strength there, memorize it to replicate in her own work. The beam danced along the ledge

and over her feet, drawing her gaze for just a second.

From the corner of her eye she saw movement, started to turn, but something hit her square in the back and knocked her off balance. She screamed, grabbed at the gargoyle’s stone fingers, felt her own digits slip one by one until she fell free, and tumbled through the air towards the cement circle 200 feet below.

Mord heard the female scream, felt her fingers slip over his knuckles. His body tensed, vibrated with an uncontrollable need to save her. The stone encasing him cracked. His muscles flexed. His wings shook. He took a breath, forced it into his lungs. There was another crack - louder, like a cannon firing -and he was free. He shoved his body away from the wall, felt his feet break from the ledge beneath them. His wings expanded and he free-fell for a few seconds, revelling in the feel of the air rushing past him, of being alive again.

The night air was dark and cold, invigorating, just like in his memories. And the city below flickered at him like he remembered, but now with more lights: strange bright ones zigging along at impossible speeds.

The woman screamed again, pulling his mind back to her. Saving her was not his concern. People jumped from buildings. Before his forced sleep he’d seen plenty make that choice, hadn’t tried to talk one out of it. He was a gargoyle, not a priest. His duty was to protect humans, but as a race, not individuals, and not from their own stupid choices. If the weak died, it made the whole stronger: part of the great formula that kept the world strong, vibrant.

Still. . . His gaze zoomed to the body falling beneath his. Her arms were flapping as if she thought she could take wing.

He shouldn’t save her. He had issues of his own: finding out why he’d been awakened, and if others, allies and enemies, were awakening too.

The smell of ginger reached out to him as she screamed again, or tried to. Her voice was hoarse now, almost lost in the wind.

He gritted his teeth, started to turn away, to point his face towards the other buildings where gargoyles and chimeras had spent their nights before the freeze. But as quick as he did, as sure as he was that he was making the right choice, his body decided otherwise. His wings flexed, his shoulders shifted and he dived — straight down — towards the now silent woman plummeting to the earth below.

Air whooshed past her, tore at her clothes. Fear clutched at Kami’s chest, made it impossible to breathe. She was falling . . . falling. Her brain screamed to reach out, grab for something to stop her descent, but there was nothing to grab, nothing around her but angry air. It roared in her ears. She was going to die. There was no way around it.

The thought echoed through her head, settled into her stomach. She was going to die, and it was her own fault. What idiot crawled onto a ledge to see a statue?

She screwed her eyes shut, tried to pull her arms in close but couldn’t, the wind stopped her.

Tears ran down her cheeks, cold more than wet, and her world started to shift . . . fade.

She drifted for a second, forgot where she was, what was happening. Suddenly, something hit her, jarred her back awake. Despite her fear, her eyes flew open. The ground . . . had she hit? Survived?

She was still moving, fast, but sideways. Something . . . arms . . . held her. Her head fell backwards, over one of those arms, against a chest - solid, cool, bare. Her heart was beating. She could feel it, could feel air moving in and out of burning lungs. She’d been screaming. The thought seemed random, unattached to anything. Like her reality.

Nothing seemed real. . . She pressed trembling fingers to her cheeks. Felt that, felt everything.

She was alive. Impossibly someone had saved her. Finally, she forced her face to turn upwards, to see who held her.

A smooth, chiselled jaw. High cheekbones. Angled, strong features that should have been unattractive, but somehow, put together, were arresting, commanding and . . . familiar. She reached up, heard a whisper of movement and turned her gaze to the noise. Wings, six feet wide, glowed back at her — white as if carved from marble. Her eyes shot back to her saviour’s face. He was looking at her now with features as strong as rock.

Rock, wings . . . the gargoyle.

Dear God. She’d been saved by the gargoyle. Her mouth opened, a scream ripped from her throat.