The Old Races Page 9

  "You are my fighter, no?" Isabel sat up in his arms, pulling her dress into order as if she instead pulled the shreds of her dignity around her.

  Biali whispered "Yes" even as he shook his head. "But that's both not enough and too much. Go home to Mexico, Isabel. Go home so that I can at least know you're safe. It's all I can do."

  She wouldn't look at him. "Will you remember me?"

  "Always." A promise that meant more from him than almost anyone, not that she would ever know such a thing. "Always, Isabel. Always."

  She stood and left him without looking back, and in the end, Biali thought, that was what he deserved.

  "That's how it will always be, you know." A smooth voice, one he hadn't heard in a long time. He'd known the dragonlord was in New York. He had to be if Daisani was, the two of them always mixing like oil and water. Couldn't stay apart, wouldn't stay together. Biali grunted, dismissing Janx without looking his way. Janx didn't belong up here anyway, on rooftops overlooking the city. They were a gargoyle's territory, and Biali had kept to them for the weeks since Isabel's departure. He'd checked: her belongings were gone, her house no longer rented under her name. A ticket west had been purchased on the rail line. She had gone home to safety, as he'd asked. It should not have left such an emptiness in him.

  Janx clambered over the roof wall's edge, seating an expensive-clad backside on grimy concrete, and kicked his heels against the wall like a human child, pleased with the detritus that fell toward the distant street. Biali's grunt lowered to a growl. "I didn't invite you to stay."

  "I know. Tremendously inconsiderate of you. Exceedingly rude. Hajnal would be appalled."

  No one expected him to be fast. Not in the ring, not on the streets. He was too short, too thick, like a draft horse. Full of power, not speed. But that was humans, and he never wanted anyone to mistake him for human. A fist lashed out, backhanded blow at the dragonlord's face.

  Janx, infuriatingly, caught it.

  Not easily. Gargoyles were the only real threat dragons faced from the remaining Old Races. Their strength beggared even a dragon's size, if a grip could be gotten. Janx's pretty nose should have been shattered, a red mess across his face like the Italian's. But he'd known. Known invoking Hajnal would beget a response, and so he'd been ready. Had braced himself, dragonly mass invisible in human form, but still present. Flesh smacked flesh, sharp slap of sound. Janx's arm trembled, but held.

  "Tsk, Biali. Tsk, tsk. You know the rules. No fighting amongst ourselves." He released Biali's hand, both of them knowing the stout gargoyle wouldn't throw another punch. "But no one ever said anything against us fighting for one another."

  Biali slid a glance toward the dragonlord. He was cocky, relentlessly cocky, and more beautiful than a man, human or not, had any right to be. He'd never been sure whether Janx's actual looks--handsome enough, with a slim strong jaw and straight nose, with high cheekbones and eyes jade enough to be the stone--if his looks were what made him arresting, or the sheer weight of his presence that lent compelling beauty to well-set features. Either way he used it to charm and frighten. Frighten humans, especially, but not even others of the Old Races were quite immune to the dragonlord's charm. Which was why Biali hadn't left when Janx arrived: there was a warmth to the dragon that not even stone wanted to resist. "You want me to do your dirty work."

  "Is there a more appropriate calling for a man made of stone?"

  "Stone," Biali muttered. "Not dirt."

  "What is dirt but battered stone?" Janx flashed a look toward the ruin of Biali's face, gaze full of pointed innocence. Biali ground his teeth but stayed silent. After a moment Janx gave a moue of exaggerated disappointment and went on. "I'm society, Biali. I provide certain luxuries to the wealthy and curious."

  Biali snorted. "You sell opiates to the weak and desperate."

  "Well, yes. But I do it with style." Wide-eyed injury rolled over Janx's expression when Biali didn't agree, but then he shrugged and began a third time. "I make my sales in the ballrooms and parlours, not under bridges and on street corners. I have people to do that for me." He sniffed delicately, as if he could smell the lingering stench of the unfortunates undertaking that work. "But whether in parlours or pigpens, there are those who cannot or will not pay, and they must be reminded that I own them. You loathe them," he said more softly. "That's why you fight. Why not drop the pretense and accept an opportunity to simply batter them on my behalf? It won't bring her back, but neither does this." He opened a hand, encompassing the fighting grounds below. "You're a thug, Biali. Embrace it."

  "What do you get out of it?"

  "An enforcer I can trust. One I don't have to keep secrets from. One who doesn't edge toward the door when I come into the room." The last words were dry as burning leaves, fire crackling in their depths. "You have no idea how tiresome it is to reassure big strong men that I won't have them for lunch. Particularly when I'm supposed to be threatening enough to keep them in line. Really, have you ever tri--"

  "Janx," Biali said, "I don't care."

  Janx's mouth snapped shut, affront flying across his face. It subsided again, the dragonlord as mercurial as Biali was stolid, and his eyebrows rose a fraction. "There, you see? None of them would ever dare. I'll pay you whatever you want," he added carelessly. "Introduce you at the finest parties, if you want to make them writhe. Name your price."

  "Companionship." The word flew out before Biali knew he would say it, and a snarl followed. Before he could dismiss it, though, Janx smiled.

  "As it happens, I have someone I want to introduce you to."

  Biali grunted again, anger at his own admission keeping him silent. Janx leaned forward, examining the polished leather of his expensive shoes, examining the dirty streets forty feet below, examining the muck-filled river a few yards beyond that. Examining everything, and by doing so making it clear he could wait forever. A stupid game. Gargoyles could out-wait anything, especially a dragon. And yet it was Biali who broke the silence, begrudging curiosity defeating him. "Who?"

  "Someone who won't leave you. Who won't judge or fear or flinch. Her name," Janx murmured, "is Ausra."

  coda

  The child came in the night: a sign of bad luck, the midwife said. Worse luck still, thought her grandfather the don, but he could not insist that Isabel marry as he had insisted her mother do. Mama and Papa were more forgiving, as they should be, and saw only beauty, not ill fortune, in their grandchild. They were happy, all of them. Happy until dawn, when terrible things came to pass.

  Warm fleshy tones turned dull, then black as night. Stone, unmoving, uncaring, unliving. The midwife left, never to return, and if she made it no farther than the hacienda's long drive, then Isabel did not know it until many years later. Mama screamed until the vapors took her, and Papa stood ashen with grim horror, waiting for Isabel to give up the frozen body of her child.

  She would not. Could not. Did not release it, only held its cold body against her breast and wept until nightfall, when the miracle happened.

  Life again. Warmth, breath, shining dark eyes. Hunger and anger and charm and fragile, needy life, all in the body of a child who had turned to stone by day.

  By the third night, the change was becoming familiar. After a week, Mama even joked that a child who slept so soundly during the day was a blessing indeed. And after a month, when a fit of infantile range triggered the other change, the one that sprouted wings and clawed fingertips from the baby's back and hands, then finally Isabel understood why Biali had not come with her. Why he could not, and what secrets he had tried to keep by staying.

  She would not go back to him. Not yet, perhaps not ever. But she would teach his child what kind of creature its father had been: one who loved so deeply that he chose solitude over risk. She would teach the baby to love the story of its father, and if God smiled on them all, perhaps someday father and child would be united.

  On its christening day, she named the child Hajnal.

  the end

  Acknowledge
ments

  I am eternally indebted to a few certain souls when it comes to matters of e-publishing: Bryant Durrell is foremost amongst these, for having talked me into trying crowdfunding in the first place. LJ Cohen, whose exceedingly simple and direct "how to format e-books" primer helped me through 90% of creating this book (and who herself helped me through the remaining 10%). I am also entirely in Tara O'Shea's debt for the astounding cover she has provided.

  But this is a project that would not have happened without my crowdfunding patrons, and so I would like to specifically thank all of you.

  Patron Acknowledgements

  Erica Olson, Ruth Stuart, Leigh Ann Melloy, Carl Rigney, Paul-Gabriel Wiener

  Kayla Lowes, Bryant Durrell, Katrina Lehto, Janne Torklep, Lynn Shulak

  Lynn Lehto, Christine Swendseid, Scott Drummond, Robyn Huffman, Brian Nisbet

  Crystal Yocum, Edward Ellis, Alena M Callaghan, Sam Juede & Donald Cook, Morag Watson

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  Christina Bounds, Tarja Rainio, Mary Spila, Scott Shanks, Heather Knutson

  Nichole Beck, Lori Lum, Roseann Farber, Elizabeth McDonald, Casse Williams

  Maggie Murphy, John Baker, Kathryn Wehner, Carolyn Curtis, Lucy Cox

  Stephana Bekebrede, Jennifer Erwin, Debra Meyerson, Helen Katsinis, Ralph Hebb

  Elizabeth Cook, Michael Bernardi, Kaela Woolsey, Tennille Kelly, Kim Smith

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  June Lundstrom, Robin Burton, Caitlin Dean, Anthony James, Charity Hirose

  Kathleen Hanrahan, Samantha Greenall, Mary Gustafson, Phil Stracchino, S Elektra Hammond

  Flynn, Ming-Li Kong, Margaret Menzies, Charles Watson, Gary LeTempt

  Andrea N King, Evangeline Cheng, Lisa Gingerich, Elisabeth Pait, Sarah Foscarini

  Mindy Mymudes, Leah Moore, David Lauber, Jesse Cunningham, Mikaela Lind

  Farrell Maginnis, Sherilyn Petterson, Brianna Agnew, Jana Lindberg, Brian & Diane Dupey

  Amanda Weinstein, Danielle Ingber, Norman Tison, Anne Pascale Quinty, Lynn Calvin

  Pamela Blome, Georgina Scott, Kristina Rumpff, Kathy Franklin, Cath Stevenson

  Stephanie Douglas, Kerry Cobey, Katharine Miller, Lindsay Stalcup, Glenn Case

  Lisa Pegg, Gemma Tapscott, Amanda Lane, Louise Southwick, Laurie Gaughan

  Lynette Miles, Victoria Hench, Caroline LeBel, Michael Fitch, Donal Cunningham

  Kathleen Tipton, Sheila Lester, Penelope McClain, Freya Wilson, Suzanne Montague

  Jean Marie Diaz, Karin Meacham, Moira Bu, Angela Korra'ti, Patsy Tinsdale

  Lyn Mercer, Carol Guess, Tiffany Myers, Cindy Curry, Breanne MacDonald

  Karyl Fulkerson, Joann Capser, Catherine Sharp, Elizabeth Garvin, Samantha Dailey

  Susan Baur, Laura Blalock, Mary Keefe, Deborah Alverson, Kerry Kuhn

  Siobhan Mc Shane, Kelly Myers, Ruth Leon, Michael Nickerson, Sherry Menton

  Treasures of the Heart, Patricia Davis, Julie Kuhn, Cat Wilson, Cheryl Prentice

  Timothy Hankins, Lisa Ellen Spencer, Tami Mitchell, Alani Joli Abbott, Emily Ervin

  Heather Fagan, Stephanie Fischer, Nicolai Buch-Andersen, Kiely Ohman, Coby Haas

  Danielle Walther

  Also by C.E. Murphy

  The Walker Papers

  URBAN SHAMAN

  WINTER MOON*

  THUNDERBIRD FALLS

  COYOTE DREAMS

  WALKING DEAD

  DEMON HUNTS

  SPIRIT DANCES

  RAVEN CALLS

  MOUNTAIN ECHOES (January 2013)

  NO DOMINION**

  *contains the novella "Banshee Cries"

  **Forthcoming: A Garrison Report

  The Old Races Universe

  HEART OF STONE

  HOUSE OF CARDS

  HANDS OF FLAME

  THE OLD RACES : ORIGINS

  THE OLD RACES : YEAR OF MIRACLES (July 2012)

  THE OLD RACES : AFTERMATH (August 2012)

  BABA YAGA'S DAUGHTER & OTHER TALES OF THE OLD RACES (Sept 2012)

  The Worldwalker Duology

  TRUTHSEEKER

  WAYFINDER

  The Inheritors' Cycle

  THE QUEEN'S BASTARD

  THE PRETENDER'S CROWN

  & with Faith Hunter

  EASY PICKINGS

  A Walker Papers/Jane Yellowrock rossover novella

  Anthologies

  DON'T READ THIS BOOK

  DRAGON'S LURE

  THE PHANTOM QUEEN AWAKES

  RUNNING WITH THE PACK

  HOW TO WRITE MAGICAL WORDS: A WRITER'S COMPANION

  About the Author

  C.E. Murphy began writing around age six, when she submitted three poems to a school publication. The teacher producing the magazine inevitably selected the one she thought was by far the worst, but also told her to keep writing, which she has. She has held the usual grab-bag of jobs usually seen in an authorial biography, including public library volunteer, archival assistant, cannery worker, and web designer. Writing books is better.

  She was born and raised in Alaska, and now lives with her family in her ancestral homeland of Ireland, which is a magical land where it rains a lot but winter rarely actually arrives.

  More information about C.E. Murphy, her career, and her writing can be found at cemurphy.net.

  C.E. Murphy's Kickstarter projects can be found at kickstarter.com/profile/cemurphy

  Regular interaction with the author can be had at facebook.com/cemurphywriter and at twitter.com/ce_murphy.

  That should hold ya. :)