Petrified (36 page)

Nathan climbed to his feet and body-swerved between the gargoyles toward the steps, but he was seconds too late. Theodor Zauber had dragged Kavita to her feet and had his left forearm hooked around her throat. Kavita was wide-eyed and choking for breath.

‘You want me to break her neck?' Theodor Zauber shouted, with spit flying from his lips. ‘You want your lovely assistant to die in front of your eyes? I can do it, you know!'

At that moment, Jenna appeared behind Aarif, closely followed by Ed. She pointed her gun at Theodor Zauber and snapped, ‘Zauber! Let her go!'

‘Oh, no,' said Theodor Zauber. ‘This time, it is a Zauber who is the winner!

He turned toward his gargoyles and shouted at them again. ‘
Hören Sie mich, meine
Freunde
!
Es ist Zeit, damit Sie zum Leben kommen
! It is time for you to come to life, my friends!'

Nathan heard an extraordinary crunching noise, like concrete churning in a concrete mixer. He turned around, too, and saw that the three gargoyles that Theodor Zauber had splashed with his ‘quenching water' were actually moving. Blotchy gray limestone was subtly changing into pale gray reptilian skin. Eyes were lighting up with an eerie greenish glow. Wings were unfolding and claws were spreading wide.

The nearest gargoyle took one step toward Nathan and then threw back its head and screeched. It had long knobbly horns like a mountain goat, and a predatory beak with curved fangs protruding from it. It shook its wings open with a leathery bang, and then took another step forward, and then another, with the other two gargoyles following it.

Nathan could hear its breath rasping in its throat, as if its insides had still not completely changed from stone into flesh.

Jenna shouted, ‘Call them off, Zauber! You hear me? Call them off!'

‘Too late!' Theodor Zauber shouted back at her. ‘They want human hearts, these beauties! Living, pumping hearts! Nothing I can do or say will stop them from ripping them out of you!'

Jenna grasped her automatic in both hands and fired at the leading gargoyle. The noise of the shot was deafening, and echoed all round the factory. The gargoyle screeched at her but didn't stop shuffling forward. She fired at it again, and then again, and then fired a shot at each of the other two gargoyles. They screeched in unison, like some kind of hellish duet, but her bullets didn't even make them flinch. Only the densely-packed crowd of stone gargoyles was holding them back, and now they were pushing them out of their way, toppling some of them over.

Nathan knew that the moment had come. He had brought Kavita for a reason, and he prayed that he hadn't taken too much of a risk. If she got hurt, or was killed, he would never be able to forgive himself.

He zigzagged between the stone gargoyles until he was only three feet away from Kavita and Theodor Zauber. Kavita was struggling and gasping, but Theodor Zauber had her in a headlock and he wasn't going to let go.

‘Stay back, Professor!' he shouted. ‘If you come any nearer, I swear to you that I will kill her!'

Nathan lunged forward and seized Theodor Zauber's sleeve, but Theodor Zauber swung Kavita between them and jerked her head back so hard that she let out a cry of pain.

‘I warn you, Professor!'

Just then, though, a rippling golden light began to shine from the top of the steps. It quickly grew brighter and brighter until it was so dazzling that it was impossible to look at. It lit up the whole factory with all of its gargoyles as intensely as a bleached-out photograph. Nathan had to cup his hand over his eyes, and he could see that Aarif was doing the same, while Jenna and Ed had turned their faces away, toward the corridor.

Kavita had closed her eyes tight, while Theodor Zauber was doing everything he could to stay in her shadow.

The three living gargoyles all howled and screeched, and when Nathan looked around at them, he could see that the light was making them thrash their heads from side to side and collide blindly with the stone gargoyles that were assembled all around them.

The light was so bright now that it was like the core of the sun. It was the phoenix, transforming himself into pure incandescent energy. He spread his wings wide, and rose through the bars of his cage as if he were no more substantial than flames. For a few seconds he hovered in the air, his wings beating so that flags of fire flew in every direction. Then he screamed, and swooped down toward Kavita and Theodor Zauber with a loud flaring sound like an acetylene cutting-torch.

Theodor Zauber stumbled backward, and as he lost his footing, Kavita twisted herself free of his headlock and pushed him hard in the chest with both hands. He fell sideways on to the concrete floor, hitting his head.

The phoenix was on him instantly. It caught his black coat in its claws and pecked viciously at his face, so that his head was engulfed in a mass of fire. He screamed and tried to stagger on to his feet, but the phoenix beat his wings against him, again and again, fanning the flames. Within a few seconds he was blazing from head to foot, as if he had been doused in gasoline and set alight.

He dropped heavily back on to the floor, jerking and twitching. As he did so, one of the gargoyles let out a long, hair-raising howl, and the three creatures began to push aside the rest of the stone gargoyles that stood in their way, and advance toward Nathan and Kavita with their claws raised. The half-ton gargoyles rumbled like falling boulders.

‘Time to get out of here, fast!' said Nathan, and took hold of Kavita's arm. He pushed her up the steps ahead of him, and Aarif was ready at the top to grab her hand.

The gargoyles howled again, and came lurching toward the platform. Before they could reach it, however, the phoenix blazed up from Theodor Zauber's still-burning body, screeching and beating his wings, and attacked them. The gargoyles snarled and screeched and lashed at him with their claws, but he was burning at such a high temperature that they couldn't even get close to him. He was no longer a bird, he was a nuclear reaction, a continuous explosion of air and gases and mythical cells. He was consuming himself, burning up his own existence at a ferocious rate, but the gargoyles were his natural enemies, both physically and morally, and he was determined to destroy them, even at the cost of his own recreated life. The phoenix was fire and light and purity, while the gargoyles were unmitigated evil, turned into stone.

Nathan pushed Aarif and Kavita along the platform until they reached the corridor.

Jenna said, ‘What's happening? What do we do now?'

‘Nothing!' said Nathan. ‘We get the hell out of here as fast as we can! This place is going to go sky high!'

‘I'll call the fire department!'

‘Don't! They won't be able to stop it and they won't be able to contain it! They'll only get themselves killed!'

He looked back at the factory floor. The phoenix was now a huge ball of fire, and he could feel the waves of heat that were rippling out of it. The three living gargoyles were retreating from it, still howling, but the temperature inside the building was rising every second.

It was then that the sprinklers were set off. Water suddenly began to spray from the pipes across the ceiling, drenching the gargoyles from one side of the factory floor to the other.

The exothermic reaction was instant. The limestone gargoyles detonated like an atom bomb, and the whole factory floor was blotted out by a blinding flash, followed by a blast of heat and a shock wave that almost knocked Nathan over.

As he pushed Aarif ahead of him along the corridor, he looked back and saw lumps of limestone tumbling through the white-hot inferno – heads and wings and torsos and legs.

They hurried through the reception area, out of the front door and into the parking lot outside. It was raining now, and thunder was mumbling over Darby Creek.

They stopped, and waited. Shafts of light were shining from behind the sheets of corrugated iron that covered the factory's windows, like the shafts of light from a movie projector, and they could hear a soft but threatening roar.

Then the factory blew up, sending a geyser of fire high into the air. Chunks of concrete were thrown in all directions, bouncing into the roadway beside them. A loud bang echoed and re-echoed, and more debris fell from the sky, pieces of wooden window-frame and plasterboard and shredded paper.

After that, though, there was nothing but the rain and the wind and the distant thunder. Several cars stopped close by, and their bewildered drivers climbed out to see what had happened.

Jenna went across to Nathan and said, ‘I guess you were right, then. I owe you one.'

‘It was all a question of science,' said Nathan. ‘Science, and mythology. And those are my two specialties.'

Jenna looked around. ‘No pieces of gargoyle anywhere. Not that I can see.'

‘All converted to quicklime. That was the science bit.'

‘And what was the mythological bit?'

‘Believing that the gargoyles were real. Believing that creatures like that used to exist, once upon a time, and that they've left enough of their DNA behind for us to bring them back to life.'

‘Well,' said Jenna, ‘good luck with that.'

FORTY

Wednesday, 4:46 p.m.

N
athan was sitting in the kitchen, working on his laptop, when the doorbell chimed.

‘Denver,' he called out, ‘do you want to answer that?'

Denver heaved himself off the living-room couch and went to open the door. Nathan heard voices, and then Denver called back, ‘Dad, it's for you!'

He saved his work and went through to the hallway. Standing at the front door was Detective Pullet, accompanied by a thin young girl in a black cowl sweater and skintight jeans. Detective Pullet was carrying a large red cardboard box, tied with a red satin ribbon.

‘Detective Pullet,' said Nathan. ‘Why don't you come on in?'

‘I hope we're not intruding,' said Jenna. ‘This is my daughter Ellie, by the way. I wanted to come by and say thanks for everything you did yesterday, that's all.'

‘You didn't have to do that,' Nathan told her. ‘But come in, anyhow.'

Jenna and Ellie stepped into the hallway and Nathan showed them into the living room. Nathan thought Ellie was strikingly pale, with dark, haunted-looking eyes, but all the same she was very pretty.

‘I brought a cake,' said Jenna. ‘I hope you like lemon drizzle frosting.'

‘My favorite. Here, Denver, why don't you take it into the kitchen? How about a cup of coffee to wash it down with, Detective, or maybe a soda? Or maybe a serious drink, even?'

‘Please, call me Jenna,' said Jenna. ‘Ellie, give Denver a hand cutting the cake, would you?'

‘OK,' said Ellie, without much enthusiasm.

When Denver and Ellie had taken the cake into the kitchen, Jenna said, ‘Actually, Professor, the reason I'm here is to ask for your help. I have to write a report about what happened yesterday, and I'm darned if I know what I'm going to say. Like I told you before, my captain is the most skeptical man I ever met.'

‘Call me Nathan,' said Nathan. ‘And I'm sure I can help you. What you need to do is explain all the scientific bits and forget about the mythology. I've learned from bitter experience that most people simply don't believe in mythological creatures. Or can't believe in them. Or
won't
.'

They sat down on the couch and Nathan wrote some notes for her about calcium carbonate and calcium oxide and exothermic reactions. After twenty minutes or so, they heard laughter coming from the kitchen.

Jenna said, ‘
Ssh
,' got up from the couch and went quietly across to the kitchen door. When she looked in, she saw Denver and Ellie sitting side by side at the kitchen counter, grinning at each other. Denver had taken the lemon drizzle cake out of the box and cut it into slices. Ellie had her mouth stuffed full of cake and was licking the frosting from her fingers.

Jenna returned to the couch.

‘Everything OK?' Nathan asked her.

‘Let's just say that since I met you, Nathan, my life seems to have become so much simpler.'

FORTY-ONE

Wednesday, 7:38 p.m.

E
d Freiburg didn't bother to switch on the lights when he walked into the CSI workshop on Arch Street. The street lights outside were enough for him to see where he was going, which was only to pick up the forensic toolbox he had left next to the gargoyle they had recovered from Bartram's Gardens.

He hunkered down and opened up the box to make sure that all of his tools and his luminal spray bottles were in place. Then he closed it and locked it and stood up. He took one last look up at the gargoyle, with its horns and its curved beak and its one broken wing.

The gargoyle's eyes were closed, as if it were hibernating.