Witching Tree (Alice Gray Book 1)

59

           
The leaves on the branch jangled in deafening chaos. A chain reaction began, and soon the entire tree sang in an intense pitch repeating over and over, no rhythm or reason to the jarring notes.

After what seemed like forever, the pendant sprang from the thin branch and fell to the floor. Jumping from my perch, my hands dropped in relief as I scooped it up.

The noise didn't stop.

Still crouched on the floor, I tried to form the words to the White Paternoster. Maybe I could break Jonathan's control, like I had the Gray magic back at the cottage.

I couldn't keep the tune straight in my head through the bedlam that assaulted my brain. I was still running on empty, the mirror showing me that my silver life-force had deserted me, burnt away by whatever drug was in that needle.

Turning away from the throne in panic, I gasped in horror.

The walls came to life.

Gargoyles everywhere leapt down from their platforms. The stone creatures moved with a speed and fluidity that belied their material substance. Their distorted limbs and bodies found a convulsive rhythm in movement that somehow matched the discordant shrieks coming from the tree.

They were both magnificent and terrifying.

And they were on the attack.

More and more of the creatures in all their variety poured down from the walls like a sea of grey malice. When one dropped another appeared in its place, rushing towards me from the crest of a wave of tortured insanity, ready and eager to crash down into a trough.

A trough located at the precise point of the throne.

Where I stood frozen.

Over the mass of undulating bodies one monster dwarfed the others, surfing the wave of inferior beasts.

Large devil horns protruded from his head and tiny bent wings poked out of his back, far too small to give flight to such a hefty beast. His thick arms were too long for his body, and his legs were short and stunted.

He moved like an ape, throwing his weight onto his arms and propelling himself forward, while alternately using his legs to spring over the beasts underfoot. Face twisted into a grimace, his sharp fangs protruded unevenly from his crooked grin. I couldn't get my body to move as he caught me in his frenzied, hungry glare.

Anyway, it was too late to run, so I braced myself ready for impact.

This was it.

The end.

Closing my eyes I hunkered down, praying that it would at least be quick.

The shift in the air told me when the huge gargoyle reached me.

Nothing happened.

Opening one eye, I peeked out from the tight ball I'd coiled into.

He lunged towards me, a huge roar of pain so intense that it vibrated through me leaving a trail of agony in its wake.

I cringed away, trying to cover my face with my forearms waiting for the inevitable swipe that would decimate my skull.

When it didn't come, I pried my eyelids open again, despite the fear that was sticking them down like superglue.

Ferocity was a distant shadow in the pools of anguish that met my frightened glance. There was something else. The room disappeared as a hint of recognition trapped me in a question that I had no answer for.

Who had this been, before the horror of my father's stone prison?

The moment was shattered when the gargoyle grabbed me by the arm and slung me onto his back as he turned to face the attacking hordes.

The silver leaves chimed their horrendous symphony, spurring the creatures on to ever increasing madness.

The sea of gargoyles merged into one until there was only a circle of safety left surrounding the throne. They undulated to the chaotic music of the leaves with an affinity to the sounds, their bodies finding music in the mayhem of discordant shrieks.

Several chanced lunges ever closer to my protector. He growled and spat, but the others were growing in confidence. He was the biggest, but there were hundreds of them. It was only a matter of time until they attacked.

A nasty, spiteful looking critter, with disproportionately large fangs, lurked on the perimeter of the circle. I watched in horrified fascination as he jostled and climbed over the others, swiping indiscriminately with enormous razor sharp claws that were lethal enough to take chunks out of stone bodies.

He angled himself ready to leap onto my platform of safety, the back of my large gargoyle friend.

I had to get my head in the game. No-one was going to deal with this one but me.

Focusing, I tried clear my mind of the awful cacophony of sound. Threatened from every angle, my only chance was to deal with one attack at a time.

Yep, easy as that.

Not.

Just as the nasty looking gargoyle sprang up, a ripple in the corner of the room caught my eye. I turned to look, narrowly avoiding the swipe of jagged claws that were aimed for my face. Instead, the full force of a stone body crashed into me.

Knocked off balance, I slipped from the back of my ally. Grabbing onto a stumpy wing, I scrabbled to right myself. Luckily, my attacker had lost his balance too, being thrown off target when his swipe had failed to connect with my face.

He was up in an instant. The malice in the small gargoyle's expression made me shudder as we faced off on the lumpy back of my would be protector.

I braced my leg against a wing as I waited for his next move. I had the advantage in height and rationality, but the gargoyle was hard and dense, and fuelled by a lethal combination of hatred and madness.

It hit me full-on in a cyclone of fury and claws. I caught its forearms before it could make contact, but my footing slipped, finding no purchase on the moving back of my steed. We tumbled to the ground, each trying to gain the upper hand.

I landed underneath, the back of my head connecting with the floor with a painful thump.

The gargoyle was on top of me, struggling desperately to free its limbs from my hold. Its jagged stone husk cut into the vulnerable flesh of my fingers, but if I let go I was done for.

So distracted by the long sharp claws on its hands, I didn't notice a matching set on its feet until they were swinging towards me, propelled by the leverage of my grip on his arms.

A swipe across my forehead brought warm blood streaking down my face. It trickled into my eyes obscuring my vision. 

With strength that I didn't know I had, I flung the gargoyle away from me. It sailed over the heads of the others until it was absorbed back into the masses of writhing creatures, one more to add to the onslaught.

I felt no pain immediately. A mixture of shock and adrenalin can do that to you.

After wiping my eyes, I realised that while I was dealing with that one solitary gargoyle, my protector, had felled at least twenty, but they kept coming, over and over as more poured down from the stone walls.

I had the silver tree-throne behind me and a relentless sea of grey aggression in front.

Something had to give, or I was done for.