Ever After (Rachel Morgan)

graveyard. “Oh God, you stink worse than six-week-old pepper piss, Rache,” he said as he hovered before me, eyeing Glissando suspiciously. “Everything okay?”
    I nodded, my hand touching my pocket where the slave rings sat. I was going to trust Trent with my life. I was an idiot. “I need to talk to Bis’s dad,” I said, and the pixy’s dust flashed a surprised gold.
    “Ah, you don’t mind if I come along,” Jenks said, daring her to protest.
    But the cat-size gargoyle lifted her wings and shrugged.
    Muttering half-heard comments about the back of an outhouse, Jenks snuggled in behind my hair just under my ear. It was too cold for him to be out here, but I wasn’t going to insult him by saying so.
    We turned back to the waiting gargoyles, and I flinched. It was one thing to tell yourself that the kid you took in is playing with demons to learn the lines, but another to tell his dad.
    “You sure you don’t want Ivy?” Jenks asked as Glissando flew past us to land on the next tombstone and blink at us impatiently. “She’s bigger than me.”
    “You saw her sharpening her knives,” I said as I picked my way back the same way I came out. “You want that out here in the dark with this ?”
    There had to be over two dozen pairs of red or yellow eyes turned our way, glowing in the twilight. Glissando shifted nervously as I passed her, hopping to a marker only a few feet ahead. “Can I talk to you?” she asked, and I hesitated, surprised.
    “Sure.”
    With a small jump, the gargoyle landed on my other shoulder, startling me and making Jenks swear. I braced myself, but there was no echo of the lines in my mind. Bis had bonded with me. His images were the only ones that could reach me now.
    “I was hoping Bis would be my life mate,” she said, and Jenks made a pained whine.
    “Sorry,” I said as I followed her pointing finger and shifted my path through the long, wet grass. “I didn’t mean—”
    “It’s okay,” she said, interrupting me. “I simply wanted you to know that I’ve known him all his life. And now they’re calling him the world breaker. The one we’ve been waiting for, who will set the lines ringing to a new song or destroy us completely.”
    My eyebrows rose. World breaker? The gargoyles that I’d seen when I’d popped in had all turned, and with a sinking feeling, I realized that’s where we were headed. Can I make a good first impression or what? “Glissando . . .” I started, but heavy claws pinched my shoulder, bringing me to silence.
    “He’s always been just my friend,” she said, her voice gruff and yet feminine. “Now?” She hesitated, snuffing. “I mean, can the goyle who spends half his waking moments trying to spit on a bird in flight really be the one who’s supposed to change everything?” she finished plaintively, making Jenks snicker. “He’s a person, not the savior they all think he is. The stupid half-flat is so noisy he can’t catch a pigeon off wing.”
    Savior? I thought, confused. They thought Bis was something out of their collective foretelling? How come this was the first I was hearing about this? “I’m, ah, trying to get him back.”
    “Back?” She snorted, and Jenks yelled at her when her tail whipped around my neck for support. “He’s learning the line,” she said sarcastically. “He can’t do anything from here.”
    She really cared for him, and guilt tightened around me. Damn it, I’d really messed up his life, and now he was in real danger. “Glissando, I really like Bis. He’s important to me because he’s a member of my family, not because of an old wives’ tale. We’re going to fix that line. I won’t let him down.”
    The small gargoyle took a deep breath. “Thanks,” she said, her head down. “I’ll tell them you’re coming. That’s them, right over there.”
    She spread her wings behind my head, and I stiffened. “Wait. If they are calling Bis the world breaker, what are they calling me?”
    Her tail slipped from around my neck, and her weight shifted. “You’re his sword to break it with.”
    I blinked and gaped after her as she effortlessly took to the air.
    “Holy crap!” Jenks exclaimed. “I’ve been taking rent from the gargoyles’ savior?”
    I swallowed hard, glumly forcing myself to keep moving forward. “And his sword,” I said, thinking it was a lot to put on the kid. “What does that make you?”
    “It makes me the landlord!” he said in satisfaction. “Hurry up, will