the leathery things swept down to scratch at her face and wrap bony arms around her body, putting even her steely nerves to the test. She, Milosh, and Nadya wrapped their arms around their heads and tried to duck beneath the incoming swarm. Bill, on the other hand, lifted his shotgun to aim at a cluster of the things diving at him and pulled the trigger. The shotgun blast was all but washed out by the grating wail of air passing through the gargoyles’ bodies. The powerful blast obliterated most of that group, spraying their clear blood and fluids across the entire shoreline.
Once the rest of the gargoyles caught that scent, the swarm of flapping bodies drew even closer, to wrap around him and latch on using their long, curved talons. Paige had almost made it to the water when she was slammed down by a gargoyle that dropped onto her like a wet leathery towel. It covered the back of her head, scraping at her shoulders and convulsing against her hair while sucking air through a wide, toothless mouth. A warm dampness spread between her shoulders, and before she could wonder if the thing had pissed on her, that spot began to tense and twist as if an invisible fist was clenched around her flesh and drawing it in. The sensation spread through her body, accompanied by a feeling of dry numbness.
“No, no, no!” she shouted while rolling over and swinging both arms at the creature. She saw, then, a muddled, sloppy attempt at a face that reminded her of a stingray’s underbelly. It gazed blankly at her until the gargoyle was sent hurtling away from its meal. Scraping its talons against the dirt, the thing popped itself less than a foot off the ground, drifted forward, then swung back at her. Paige watched it gain altitude like a piece of paper fluttering back up to a spot from which it had been dropped. More of them descended from a whirling cloud circling the shoreline, separating to glide away and adjust their flight path to find her. Even as she staggered toward the water, Paige doubted she’d be able to dive in before at least one of those things wrapped around her. The substance that had been poured onto her back was still hardening, making it difficult to remain upright. Suddenly, the water erupted and a large figure rose from the reservoir to charge at her. Her arms came up reflexively to defend herself, and by the time she spotted Cole’s face, her punch was already on its way to his chin.
Cole ducked under the swing, thanks to a familiarity with her that came in no small part from getting his ass kicked throughout months of sparring. Keeping his head down, he pressed his shoulder against Paige’s torso and wrapped an arm around her so he could drag her into the water. “Did they get any of that stone juice on you?” he asked.
Paige knew what he meant. “Yeah, but—” Before she could say another word, he shoved her into the water and held her there. As soon as the pressure on her eased, she stood up and sputtered, “I have to breathe, you know!”
“That crap dissolves in water before it hardens,” Cole said. “Just stay in there until it comes off.” After that he was forced to swing his spear at a group of the creatures that flapped over his head. The spearhead tore a few of them open badly enough for one to do a flat spin into the water and another to wind up hanging on the end of the weapon like a flag made of pale skin. Cole kept his spear upright and charged onto the shore.
Paige dropped below the water as three gargoyles screamed down at her. Their muddled, stingray faces gaped into the reservoir as the fliers swooped above water that was still reflecting pale glows emanating from the moon and the nearby portal. Pushing up with both legs, she broke the surface of the water to find the Amriany standing their ground no more than ten feet away.
“Milosh! Nadya!” she shouted. “Get in the water!”
Milosh turned while Nadya fired up at a cluster of the gargoyles without hitting a single one. “You hide there and we will keep them away,” he replied.
“You’ve got to come in the water or they’ll poison you!”
“Turn you to stone is more like it, but not if you scare them away. Takes loud noises,” Milosh said. Both