Reprisals

Disclaimer -- the characters of Gargoyles are the property of their creators at Disney and used here without permission. The characters of TGS belong to TGS.

PART ONE --

SCOTLAND, 1058:

        So intent was he upon the stag that it wasn't until his
feathered shaft had sunk deep in the magnificent beast's eye did
he look 'round and realize that he had become separated from
the others.
        Canmore tensed for a moment, fists clenched in worry
and anger. Then, with a shaky laugh, he forced himself to calm.
        Scotland was his, the battles long over. His enemies had
all been dispersed or destroyed. He was king, rightful and war-
proved. None could dispute his claim, and the few who dared
were treated to a most swift reprisal.
        He thought of the traitorous kinslayer Macbeth, who had
most basely and with sorcery conspired to murder Canmore's
father Duncan. Macbeth, who had ever so graciously deigned to
let Canmore live, sending him in shame and poverty to his
mother's folk in England.
        Ah, well, he had gotten his revenge upon Macbeth! He
grinned to himself as he recalled how it had been, his blade
piercing into the false king's flesh.
        Macbeth's death had not ended it, for his son Luach had
dared act the upstart and take the crown for his own. Not for
long, Canmore thought with grim satisfaction. Luach may have
worn the crown, but his backside had ne'er rested upon the
throne, and the only Stone of Destiny in his future had been a
headstone, needed right quick! Once they had been cousins and
friends, and thinking back to those boyhood days he had felt a
brief pang of regret. But childhood's playmates amounted to little
when a kingdom was at stake.
        Yes, Macbeth was dead and his son as well. And even
the demon, the scarlet-tressed she-gargoyle that had been
Macbeth's unholy ally, was no more!
        His grin widened. He looked down at the fallen stag,
seeing it not. In its place, he envisioned the she-devil as she had
died, crumpled on the earth.
        As a youth, he had feared her. When returning to
Scotland to claim his own, bringing forces gathered in England,
he hoped and prayed that the demon would have gone her way,
taking her clan of gargoyles. Such luck was not his, but sweet
fate had done him a better turn.
        How easy it had been, to turn her against Macbeth. His
army unsupported, his plans undone, and his shock at her
desertion proving the final distraction allowing Canmore's sword
to smite him! They had died as one, and by then his soldiers had
turned upon their winged "allies" and swiftly made an end of
them.
        He looked down on the stag again, seeing it now as it
truly was, a spread of branching horns, the velvety pelt
unmarked, his arrow bristling from its eye. A clean kill, a goodly
beast. A good omen. Proof positive that all was well in the world.
        Yes, his father would be pleased. Scotland was once
more in the hands of its rightful liege. Canmore's young queen
had given him two strapping sons already, securing the bloodline.
All was well. He need not fear armies or assassins. It mattered
little that his hunting party had carelessly gotten lost.
        When the stag was slung over his saddle, he paused to
gaze around. Evening had come swiftly upon him, but was
blessedly clear, even of the fog that so often shrouded the hills
this time of year. The rising moon shed a frosty pall of light,
enough to guide his way.
        Many years, he had lived away from Scotland. His return
had been filled with battles and planning, so that he had not been
much about the countryside. As a boy, he had known every inch
of the land for miles around. Acting on those memories, he set
off in what he judged was the best way back to the castle.
        His aleskin was empty, drawing a scowl to his face. He
was thirsty and hungry, and now that the thrill of the hunt was
done, wanted nothing more than a wash and a meal and
warmths of two kinds: a fire and his buxom young bride.
        His mind filled with pleasant imaginings, he at first failed
to notice the shrill screech. When he did pay it mind, his first
thought was that it was only a bird. And then it sounded again,
and a silvery spike of terror pierced his soul.
        It was the cry of a gargoyle!
        He looked up just in time to see wings widespread, fangs
agleam, eyes like rubies set afire, and a dream-haunting face
contorted in rage.
        She ripped him from the saddle. His horse yielded to its
panic and lunged one way as the gargoyle went the other, and
Canmore shrieked as he was pulled between them, his hands
clenched tight 'round the reins. Even through his gloves, the
leather straps hissed searingly as they slipped free.
        The demon's claws sank into his shoulders, digging,
unbearable. Brief relief as she let go her hold, but let go it with
considerable momentum so that he was hurled headlong into a
tree.
        Canmore slid to the ground, groaning, trying to regain his
wits and his strength, but his limbs did not wish to obey his
command.
        A shadow fell over him, blotting out the moon, darkness
in a female shape.

                *               *

        Demona stood over the man, chest rising and falling
rapidly in her fury.
        He lay helpless and befuddled before her, struggling to
move. She could smell the sour stink of his fear and it intoxicated
her.
        She savored the moment. Her grievances made up a
lengthy list indeed. Her clan, cut down by those they thought to
be their newfound allies. Her alliance with Macbeth, undone by
Canmore's plottings. And most of all, her own pride! He had
made her the fool, used her, and for that most of all he would
have the slow death he deserved!
        Canmore moaned feebly, music to her ears. She seized
his tunic and yanked him to a sitting position, his back pressed
against the tree. Already, a swelling knot was growing on the side
of his head, but even that injury could not render him unfit to
recognize her.
        "Now, human," she snarled. "Now I will have vengeance
for my clan!"
        She flexed her claws, then paused like an artist
contemplating the first brush stroke on a new canvas.
        The throat? Too quick. She wasn't in the mood for
mercy.
        The belly? Too messy. She didn't fancy having his
entrails spewing over her feet.
        He looked up at her, eyes bleary, and then she knew.
        The face. Yes. He had seen fit to take up the Hunter's
mask, so let him bear the scars that went with it.
        She lay ahold of his thick black hair and steadied his
head. He realized her intent just as her other hand flashed down.
        His scream was garbled, his boots drumming fitfully on
the ground.
        "And now I'll have your head!" she cried in triumph,
bending it back so that his vulnerable throat was exposed.
        White-hot agony shot through her. She screamed in
surprise as well as pain and looked down at herself, seeing the
tip of an arrowhead jutting from her abdomen. It had entered her
back, missing the spine by inches.
        She whirled and saw them, a group of mounted men with
bows. Even as she turned, another arrow whispered through her
hair, and had she not moved it would have taken her in the head.
        Too many of them. She leaped onto Canmore, her hind
claws gouging his chest as she clambered up his body and into
the branches of the tree. A third arrow buried itself in her calf.
        The boughs and leaves were concealing her now, and
the men rode closer. She could hear them yelling excitedly to
each other, their accents thickly Norman. She espied one of
them, tall and carrying himself with a more noble manner than
the others, steel glinting in his fist.
        "It's in the tree, milord!" one of them called, making ready
to loose another shot.
        "Hold, Garlon," the nobleman replied. "You'll not have a
clear aim. We'll burn it out. Strike flints!"
        Demona growled and wrapped her fingers around the
arrowhead sticking out of her middle. She pulled the rest of the
shaft through, wincing at the indescribable feeling of stiff feathers
scraping through her inner organs. She plucked the other arrow
from her leg.
        Her wounds started to heal at once, but the first strike
had been a fatal one and the mending of it would leave her weak
and drained. She would not be able to fight off this band of well-
armed humans, not tonight.
        They did indeed strike flints, and soon had a torch
blazing. Canmore they bore away from the tree, and one bold
soul approached with the burning brand.
        Demona reversed the arrow in her grip and threw it like a
miniature spear. It only grazed his arm, but startled him so that
he dropped the torch and it extinguished itself. She used that
precious few moments to climb to the highest branch and launch
herself.
        The men cried alarms, and yet another cursed arrow
came at her. It passed through her wing, but she only faltered
briefly in her flight.
        "I will return!" she shrieked over her shoulder as they
diminished. "I will have my revenge!"

                *               *

        The demon had turned into a man. A tall, handsome
man of noble bearing.
        "Highness?"
        Canmore raised one trembling hand to the bandage-
swathed terrain of his face. Nearly all but one eye was covered.
Each breath pained him. His head rolled and swayed like a
moored ship on a stormy sea.
        "Who ...?" he managed, then regretted it as the
movement of his mouth caused a fresh burst of pain.
        The man inclined his head. "Sir Nicolas de Maduc, sire,
as it please you, ambassador from the court of King Edward."
        "The demon ..." Canmore mumbled.
        "Gone, sire. Sorely wounded as well. If it lives until
daybreak, it will only be by the Lord's own miracle."
        Canmore shook his head as much as he dared.
"Supposed to _be_ dead," he said thickly. "Slew Macbeth ... slew
the demon. How can it be the same one? I must put an end to it!"
        "You've been grievously hurt, sire. Permit us to bear you
home. The creature, or more of its kind, may return. It is not safe
to remain here." He frowned as if puzzled. "I'd been under the
impression that your land was rid of those beasts. Are there no
more Hunters?"
        "No." Canmore let the other men help him into the saddle
and lash him securely in case he lost consciousness. "The
demon was gone. There was no more need for the Hunter."
        "I thought there would always be a Hunter," de Maduc
mused. "For it seems there is still a need."
        "Your counsel is wise," Canmore said, although by now
he was hurting so much that he was only half-aware of his words.
"There shall be a Hunter, this I vow!"
        The last thing he saw before a welcome greyness
washed over him was de Maduc's triumphant smile.

                *               *

MANHATTAN, OCTOBER 1997:

        "Oh, ye-es!" Lexington chortled, doing a triumphant little
barrel-roll and attempting to high-five himself. "That was the
coolest! Those crooks didn't know what hit them!"
        He was pleased and rightfully so. Thanks to his new
cyber-enhancements, he was twice the gargoyle he used to be!
His senses had never been sharper! Even half a block away,
even from the top of an eight-story building, he saw and heard
them as well as if he'd been standing in the middle of their illicit
circle of plotting.
        The shadows they'd thought hid them, the fountain they'd
thought masked their words from eavesdroppers -- neither of
those things mattered one bit now that the new and improved Lex
was on the job!
        He soared high, then tucked his arms tight and
plummeted, laughing like a loon all the while. At the very last
moment, he spread out into a wide kite and skimmed a pond,
roiling its calm surface and starting dozing ducks into a flurry of
scolding.
        No more ribbing from the others about being too small to
take on the big jobs. And all thanks to Mr. Maddox's generosity.
        His jubilant mood dimmed a bit as he realized he couldn't
enjoy full bragging rights. They'd want to know how he did it, and
he wasn't sure the time was right to tell them.
        If there even ever would be a right time to tell them.
        "Well, phooey!" he said to himself. "I did it, I know I did it,
and who cares if I can't boast to Broadway about it?"
        He grinned widely, remembering how smoothly it had
gone. He'd never felt more at home in his own skin. Faster
reflexes, adding to his already swift dexterity, meant that none of
their shots had even come close.
        The looks on their faces! It had been great, absolutely
great!
        "Better living through technology," he said, and laughed
out loud all the way back to the castle.

                *               *

        "I've taken apart everything I can possibly take apart,"
Peterson said, shaking his head. "I even cross-sectioned the
handle."
        "They don't look so bad, when they're like this," Elisa said
thoughtfully as she scanned the plastic bins of parts. She
stepped closer to examine one of the diagrams that covered the
walls.
        "And what have you found?" Chavez asked in a tone that
suggested he'd better have come up with something, since he'd
been spending ten expensive hours a day in here ever since the
hammers had been confiscated, and the bill for lab equipment
had spiked into the stratosphere.
        Peterson's hangdog expression got more so. "Nothing."
        "What do you mean, nothing?" Matt said just before
Chavez could.
        Elisa kept her silence and listened, still finding it oddly
fascinating to see the hammers like that. Robbed of their
menace. Robbed of their stone-shattering power. Broken apart,
just like (she hoped) the Quarrymen themselves.
        "Nothing. To deliver the electrical charge these do, they'd
need batteries the size of a Thermos bottle. There's nowhere to
put a power source that size. Unless the Quarrymen carry fanny
packs full of batteries, but then there'd have to be some sort of
connection that would channel it through their gloves, and there
isn't. Not in the gloves, not in the handles, nada. Zip."
        "Do you mean to tell me you don't know how they work?"
Maria Chavez drummed her fingers lightly, her voice mild. Yet
Matt and Elisa both edged away.
        "I know how they work," Peterson protested. "I just don't
know where the energy's coming from!"
        "You must have some idea," Chavez urged.
        Peterson's wry chuckle only thinly masked his intense
frustration. "Magic? I can't think of anything else that would do it."
        Matt snorted. Elisa frowned and elbowed him. "More
things in heaven and earth, Horatio."
        "Come off it, Maza," Chavez said absently, focusing most
of her attention on Peterson. "We'll find the answer. Won't we,
Peterson?" Her voice dropped to a very ominous level, and
Peterson's shoulders sagged in defeat.
        "Yes, ma'am, Captain," he sighed. "I'll go over the whole
thing again."
        As Matt and Elisa were headed away from the Captain's
office, he gave her a sidelong glance. "Magic?"
        "I'm just saying, don't dismiss it out of hand. We've run
into some pretty strange stuff these past few years, remember?"
        "Yeah, but where would the Quarrymen get magic?
They're supposed to be just a hate cult."
        "Uh-huh, and gargoyles are just supposed to be an
urban legend and the Illuminati are just a myth."
        "Okay, point taken. Trouble is, what are we going to do
about it?"
        "For now, nothing. Not unless they crop up again, and
then we'll do whatever it takes to stop them."

                *               *

        "Hey, kids, whatcha doin'?"
        "Hi, Uncle Lex!" Ariana chirped brightly, patting her wild
black hair into place. "We're fixing the computer!"
        "Why?" Lex asked with sudden wary dread. "What
happened? Geez, I've told you kids a thousand times --"
        "We didn't break it," Graeme said quickly. "We're just
trying to -- uh-oh!"
        "What'd you do?" Ariana wailed, tapping frantically on the
keyboard.
        "I don't know!" He reached for the mouse, but Lex
scooped him out of his chair.
        "Let me take a look."
        "Uncle Lex will fix it," Ariana said confidently. "He always
can."
        Lex beamed at her and turned back to the computer.
Several minutes later, though, he was sweating under the
impatient gaze of both youngsters.
        "Well?" Graeme finally asked.
        "Keep your loincloth on," Lex muttered, scratching his
head.
        Several more minutes passed.
        "He can't fix it," Ariana said in a voice that mingled
surprise, hurt, and betrayal.
        "Whoa, hey, not so fast!" Lex protested. "I can too!"
        He opened a drawer and took out a small cable, inserting
one end into the computer and the other into the tiny port behind
his ear.
        whrrrrrr -- a humming vibration more felt than heard, and
his eye clicked into a mode that overlaid a fine red film on the
world. Text and symbols began scrolling past, too quick for a
normal eye to decipher.
        "Okay," Lex said to himself. "Okay, I see what's wrong."
He called up a diagnostic of the machine's inner workings, made
a few adjustments, re-checked to be sure everything was doing
what it was supposed to be doing, and reluctantly disengaged.
        When he came out of it, he found both kids staring at
him in awe.
        "Wow!" Graeme gasped.
        "I knew you'd fix it!" Ariana cried, giving him a quick kiss
on the cheek. "That was neat! Hey, Dad!"
        "Ari, wait!" Lex reached for her but missed as she
bounded toward the sounds of voices and movement. The rest of
the clan had just gotten back from patrol, just his luck. "Ariana,
wait!"
        "Yeah, wait for me!" Graeme scooted after her, also
avoiding Lex's desperate grab.
        The adults looked toward the two youngsters with
indulgent smiles, but when the two announced in delighted
unison, "Uncle Lex is a cyborg! Isn't that cool?" those smiles
changed to looks of puzzlement. And in Goliath's case,
puzzlement changed swiftly to dark understanding and horror.
        "Oops," Lex mumbled. He busied himself with the
computer, head cringing so far down between his shoulders that
a turtle might have been impressed. A single thought: don't
notice me, don't notice me, don't notice me -- ran in his head like
a hamster on a wheel. He clamped his lips shut when he realized
he was speaking the words quietly, like a fervent prayer.
        Nice try. A heavy, purposeful tread stopped just behind
him. A large purple hand settled onto the back of the chair and
inexorably turned him around. Lex looked up at Goliath, and up,
and realized that sometimes he forgot just how big the leader
of the clan really was.
        Go for innocence, he thought. "Hey, Goliath, what's up?"
        Goliath's scrutiny was so intense that Lex could almost
feel his skin blister. "What have you done to yourself?"
        "Nothing!"
        "Cyborg?" He stared directly into Lex's eye, no doubt
noticing for the first time that it had a constant reddish cast.
        "It's no big deal."
        "Who did this? Who did this to you?"
        "Nobody did it to me! It was my choice!" Lex felt himself
starting to get ticked. "I'm not a hatchling anymore, you know. I'm
old enough to make my own decisions!"
        "Age does not always equal maturity! Did you think about
the consequences?"
        "The consequences saved by life!" Lex flared. "Jackal
and Hyena would have had my head for a centerpiece if I hadn't
been able to battle them on their own terms!"
        "You've made yourself like them, and you think it's a
good thing?" Goliath bellowed. "Was this Xanatos' doing? I'll see
him answer for it!"
        "Hey!" Lex heard himself shout, and jumped up so that
he was standing on the chair, which put him almost eye to eye
with Goliath. "I can answer for my own decisions, thank you very
much! And no, it wasn't Xanatos. I knew he wouldn't, not without
tattling to you!"
        "If not Xanatos, then who?" Goliath demanded.
"Cyberbiotics?"
        "None of your business!"
        "If it concerns my clan, it is my business! And I will know
who is responsible for this!"
        "Goliath," Brooklyn ventured, "it sounds like Lex is the
one responsible. No one did this against his will."
        Lex flashed him a grateful look. It turned out to be the
only one he got because Hudson was giving Brooklyn a
would-ye-shut-yer yap glare, Sata was wisely staying out of it,
and the two little ones were clinging to each other in the
background, unable to comprehend why something they thought
was a neat bit of news resulted in so much yelling and anger.
        "You're not leaving this castle until you tell me!" Goliath
declared.
        "Fine! His name's Maddox. Nicholas Maddox. He's my
friend!"
        "Friend? What kind of friend would do this to you? Didn't
you learn your lesson with the Pack? Trusting outsiders is
something that must only be done with extreme care and
caution!"
        "I did learn my lesson! That was years ago, and I wish
you'd get over it!"
        "I don't think you did learn anything. Why else would you
keep it from the clan? If you trust this Maddox, you should have
told the rest of us."
        "I don't have to tell you everything I do, everyone I talk to!
You don't tell us everything you do with Elisa!"
        "We are not talking about Elisa! We are talking about a
stranger, a stranger with the power to change you into a --"
        "A what? A monster? Is that what you were going to
say?" Lex leaped onto the desk. "I don't have to take this from
you, Goliath. You're the leader, but that doesn't mean you control
every aspect of our lives!"
        "Where are you going?" Goliath started toward him as he
headed for the window.
        "I'm getting out of here! You don't understand me! You
never have, and you never will! So I'm going to talk to someone
who does!"
        "This friend of yours?" Goliath said scornfully.
        "Yeah! What are you going to do about it?" With that, Lex
sprang out the window, not waiting around to see if Goliath did
indeed plan to do something about it, something that involved
clapping him in leg irons and throwing him in the dungeon.
        Goliath couldn't fit through the window if he did decide to
give chase, but his voice was nearly enough to knock Lex from
the sky.
        "LEXINGTON!!!"
        He almost turned back, but with tears of distress and fury
stinging his eyes, he soared on toward the distant spires of
Maddox Technologies.

                *               *

        "Let him go, lad," Hudson said. "He's needing some time
to cool off."
        Brooklyn moved to block the door. "Hudson's right,
Goliath. He'll come back when he's ready. If you chase him now,
he'll just get more upset."
        Sata went to her mate's side, though she still looked
more confused about her clan-in-law's behavior than anything
else. "What has he done that's so bad?"
        "He hasn't the slightest idea what he's letting himself in
for!" Now that he was no longer thundering in rage, they could all
hear the bleak terror in Goliath's voice, see it in his eyes. "But
he's not the only one who can give me an answer for this
madness!"
        "Ye're not going after this Maddox fellow, are ye?"
Hudson asked worriedly.
        "No." Goliath motioned Brooklyn aside, and he gave way
after only a brief hesitation.
        "Is Uncle Lex in trouble?" Ariana's lower lip trembled.
        "I hope not, skychaser," Brooklyn said, ruffling her hair.
        "Well, somebody sure is," Graeme said, peering after
Goliath. "And whoever it is, I wouldn't want to be them!"
        "We'd better be going after him." Hudson shook his
head. "I dinna know what's got him in such a state, but we'd best
be finding out."


                *               *

        The door was closed.
        He didn't let that stop him.
        The door was locked.
        He didn't let that stop him either.
        Owen Burnett looked calmly up from his work as the
splinters of wood finished raining onto the carpet. "Yes, Goliath?"
        He pushed through the wreckage and stalked into the
office. "We're going to settle this once and for all! Was it a
dream, trickster? Or was it a prophecy?"
        "Can't this wait?" Owen replied. "I am in the middle of
some very important paperwork for Mr. Xanatos --"
        "Paperwork!" Goliath swept his huge hand across the
desk, clearing a wide swath. Papers and office supplies joined
the door fragments. "That for your paperwork! I'm talking about
the future of this clan, this city, this world!"
        Through it all, Owen kept his usual bland, placid
expression. "I appreciate your emotional investment in this --"
        Goliath's claws curled into Owen's shirtfront and lifted
him out of his chair. "I've had enough of your --"
        "Goliath!" Hudson stepped through the broken door. "Is
this the example ye set for the clan?"
        "If you don't want the clan to see this, get them out of
here," Goliath snarled. He pulled Owen closer, so they were nose
to nose. Owen's feet trailed across his desk, knocking off the last
few things Goliath's outburst had missed, but he still managed to
keep his dignity.
        "We want to know what's going on too," Brooklyn said.
"But this isn't our way, Goliath. You taught me that, and that
lesson helped me through all those years."
        "Please, Father." Angela crowded in too, still windblown
from her recent patrol. "We don't have enough friends that we
can afford to hurt them."
        "If he is our friend, which I've come to doubt!" Goliath set
Owen down so hard his teeth clacked. "He's toyed with us since
the beginning!"
        Owen rolled his eyes. "If that's how you choose to see
it --"
        "Don't help, okay?" Broadway suggested. "He's liable to
pop you one."
        "But why?" Angela asked. "What's Owen done now?"
        Goliath uttered a sighing growl. "It's not what he's done
now. It's what he did before. There's something I never told you,
something I should have."
        "Then maybe you should now," Angela said gently,
touching her father's arm.
        "It concerns Avalon, and our quest, and the Phoenix
Gate."
        "The dream." Angela nodded. "You were unconscious,
and Elisa and I were so worried! Then you awoke, and said you'd
had a dream that you had to make sure didn't come true. And
you hurled the Phoenix Gate into the air, ridding yourself of it."
        "Yeah, thanks for that one," Brooklyn muttered.
        His mate poked him in the ribs. "Regrets, Brooklyn-san?"
        He slipped an arm around her. "Not anymore."
        "The dream that I had was crafted by him." Goliath
leveled an accusing finger at Owen, who didn't look terribly
thrilled to have all their suspicious attention focused on him.
        "This is all very interesting," Owen said, sidling around
the others. "But if you'll excuse me, I really must --"
        Goliath took a single stride toward Owen. "You've been
able to avoid my questions for too long already! I'm not going to
keep this secret from my clan any more, and then you'll have all
of us to deal with!"
        Owen sat with a sigh. "I think you're making a mistake."
        "Tell us," Hudson said. "Tell us what this all be about."
        "It seemed to me that Avalon had finally sent us home,"
Goliath began. "But the skyline of Manhattan was not as I
remembered it ..."

                *               *

        "Lemon?"
        "Sure."
        For the amount of attention the poor boy was paying to
his tea, Maddox thought, he would have replied in the same tone
if I asked him if he cared for arsenic, one lump or two.
        "Arguments between family are the worst, aren't they?"
He carefully squeezed lemon into the tea, added sugar, and
handed the tissue-thin china cup to Lexington.
        "They just don't understand me," Lex said. "Everyone
else has something that makes them special. Goliath's the
leader, Hudson's the elder, Brooklyn and Broadway have mates
... but what have I got? Nothing but a knack for machines and
electronics. So why shouldn't I make the most of it?"
        He arched an eyebrow. "From what you've told me, I
gather the idea of technology is still new to them. And what is
new is often threatening."
        Lex laughed a little. "Yeah, I guess you're right."
        "Crumpet?"
        "Please. What's a crumpet?"
        Maddox proffered the silver tray. "Help yourself."
        "It's really good."
        "I'm so glad you approve." Maddox sat back and stirred
his own tea. "I deeply regret the problems I've caused you."
        "You've caused? You didn't cause this, Nicholas. You
helped me!" Lex stared morosely into his cup. "Sometimes I think
you're the only real friend I have."
        "Oh, now, I'm sure that's not true," Maddox said with a
smile.

                *               *

        Mavis O'Connor hummed quietly to herself as she
worked, raising her eyes now and then to the picture window and
the dazzling spray of city lights beyond.
        The intercom buzzed, and a momentarily sour look flitted
across her face. "Yes?"
        "Ms. O'Connor?"
        "Who else would it be, Garlon?"
        The sound system turned his voice tinny. "Burning the
midnight electricity, are you?"
        "Is this purely a social call, or was there something on
what passes for your mind?" She smiled sweetly at the intercom.
        "Actually, yes. There seem to be a few problems down in
S. A. D. The Special Arms Division?"
        "Thank you, Garlon. I know what the acronym stands for;
I made it up myself. I'll see to it as soon as possible."
        
                *               *

        "And Elisa begged me to use the Phoenix Gate, to go
back in time and avert this horrible future. Or, if I was to injured to
do it, to give her the Gate. I told her to take it. She insisted I give
it to her, into her hand. She shouted at me. Then I realized she
was not my Elisa." He caught himself, cleared his throat. "Not the
real Elisa. At which point, she turned into Puck, and confessed
that it had all been a trick, an attempt to get the Gate away from
me as a bribe for Oberon."
        The rest of the clan were stunned into silence.
        Angela and Broadway held each other, her trying to get
the image of her blinded, dying love out of her mind while he tried
to banish the thought of her shattered stone form.
        "Whoa," Brooklyn said shakily. "Ate too many jalapenas
the night before, did you?"
        Sata was regarding him with the narrow-eyed suspicion
that females of any species turn on their males, even when the
infidelity is only in a dream. "You and Demona, hmm?"
        He stammered and blustered until he saw the teasing
gleam in her eye, then coughed and stared abashedly at his feet.
        Hudson, who had looked initially pleased at being
immortalized as the first martyr of the rebellion, now turned to
Owen. "Why?"
        When Owen didn't show any signs of answering, Goliath
did. "He hoped to buy his exemption from the Gathering, thinking
nothing of the cruelty he was inflicting on me. Even as he took his
leave, he taunted me by asking if it was dream, or prophecy.
So now I've come for the answer."
        "It's like you said, Father." Angela raised her head from
Broadway's shoulder. "A trick. He was only trying to make you
give him the Gate."
        "That is what I wanted to believe," Goliath said. "Until
things started happening that reflect and echo that future.
Xanatos siring a son, Alexander Fox. The destruction of the clock
tower." He looked at Brooklyn. "You look now exactly as you did
in that future I saw. The Ultra-Pack has been formed. Thailog's
death in the Clone Wars. And now Lexington, Lexington with his
implants ..."
        "That dinna mean it's going to come true," Hudson
argued. "Ye say Brooklyn looked as he does now, but he'll nae
look like that in forty years."
        "And in that vision, we had never come back!" Angela
said. "But we have! We're here! So it can't come true!"
        "Yeah," Broadway chimed in. "Some of it sounded fake
too. Like he made it up on the spur of the moment."
        Goliath scowled, still unconvinced. "Well, trickster, what
do you say to all of that?"
        Owen smiled an enigmatic Mona Lisa smile. "Would you
believe me if I told you it was all a fabrication? When so many of
those things have come to pass? Am I precognitive or a good
guesser? It doesn't matter what I say, Goliath. What matters is
what you do about it."

                *               *

        "Are you okay, my love?" Broadway asked, coming up
behind her as she sat on the battlements. "You're awfully quiet."
        Angela sighed and tipped her face into the night wind,
closing her eyes to the sparkling skyline. "I'm worried, that's all."
        "About this future thing? It's just Owen trying to mess
with Goliath's head."
        "No, no. I'm worried about Lexington. I don't know
whether what he did was right or not. He felt strongly enough
about it to do it, so it must feel right to him. But the man who
helped him, that Mr. Maddox? I've met him."
        "Yeah? What's he like?"
        "I really couldn't say. He dropped by my mother's house
on Solstice Night, so I really only barely met him. I didn't have
time to get much of an impression. I think my mother didn't want
me to be around him too much."
        "Oh, really?" Broadway bristled a little. "He didn't make a
pass at you --"
        Her merry laugh dispensed with his concern, but then
she got serious again. "Nothing like that, but you're so cute when
you're jealous!"
        He hugged her close for a moment. "Maybe I still can't
believe you picked me."
        She kissed him on the ear and sighed contentedly,
leaning her head against his shoulder.
        He enjoyed the scent of her hair for a moment before
remembering once more what they had been talking about. He
frowned again. "But if Maddox wasn't putting the moves on you,
then what's the matter?"
        "It's this woman. Mavis O'Connor. I've met her a few
times, and it's always left me with a funny feeling."
        His brow ridges went up. "She didn't --"
        Angela swatted him. "Behave yourself! No, it was just a
strange feeling. She was always perfectly pleasant, but it still
made me uncomfortable. And she's the second-in-command, the
vice president, I think it's called, of Maddox Technologies. It just
makes me wonder if Lex isn't getting in over his head."
        
                *               *

        "Lexington, this is Sherry."
        "Hi!"
        "She'll be happy to show you around," Maddox
concluded, noting with approval how his olive-green young friend
goggled at the blonde with the perky smile and the powder-blue
cashmere sweater.
        He'd objected when Mavis first presented him with
Sherry. "I don't like dealing with people," he'd said.
        "Well, I can't be bothered to do all your photocopying and
message taking," she lilted, not put off in the slightest. "Besides,
she'll pretty up this Spartan office of yours."
        "A plant would do that," he remarked dryly. "And those
matters I wish kept private would be."
        "You haven't met her yet," she replied in the exact same
tone. "When it comes to smarts, the plant might have a slight
edge."
        He'd grudgingly given in, and so far, Sherry had worked
out well enough. She didn't object to the odd hours, especially
considering what Mavis was paying her. Another bit of crumpet to
distract his guests, as it were.
        "Nice to meet you," Lex said, and he sounded like he
meant it. "Gosh, thanks, Nicholas!"
        "My pleasure," he said with a slight incline of the head.
        "Thanks for letting me look around. I promise, I won't
touch anything!"
        "Ready for the grand tour?" Sherry took his arm and
flashed her pearly whites again as she led Lex away.
        Maddox folded his hands behind his back and nodded in
satisfaction.
        Behind him, in his office, the intercom buzzed and a
voice spoke. "Mr. Maddox, sir?"
        "Yes, Mr. Strijken?"
        "There's a Mr. Leifson to see you, sir."
        "Tell him I'm --" Maddox stopped short. "What was that
name again? Did you say Leifson?"
        "Yes, sir."
        "Send him in! At once!" When the light on the intercom
went dark, Maddox exhaled and shook his head, trying to control
the wild excitement that bubbled up within him. He paced the
floor, rubbing his palms together briskly. "Leifson!"
        "Speak of the devil," a rather insolent voice replied, and
Maddox turned to see a man lounging in the doorway.
        He was tall and lean, with a shock of long white-blond
hair and a hawkish demeanor. He wore black engineer's boots
with chains snugged down over the insteps, acid-washed jeans
so tight you could read the dates on the coins in his pockets, and
a black leather jacket with "Hel's Angels" scrawled on the back in
letters of multicolored fire.
        He and Maddox, the latter impeccably clad in a dark blue
Italian suit with a black pearl tie-tack and matching cufflinks,
looked at each other for a long, weighted moment.
        "Hullo, old man," Leifson drawled, tipping his fingers from
his forehead in a casual salute. "I'm back at last. Out of the
slammer."
        "If that's the case," Maddox said carefully, his heart
racing at the implications, "then that ... that means --"
        "That it's going to be just like old times. Just the way you
want it."
        Maddox closed his eyes briefly in delight. "And not a
moment too soon," he said with such eager longing that it
surprised even him. "You have no idea how long I have been
waiting for this moment!"
        A sinister smile curled Leifson's lips, and a fiendish
gleam lit his eyes. "Oh, I've got a pretty good idea, all right!"

                *               *

PART TWO --

PARIS, 1980.

        "And so we commit to the earth the body of Charles
Canmore. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust." The minister closed his
Bible and made a subtle signal.
        The eldest of the three children, a strikingly handsome
dark-haired boy in his teens, stepped forward and crumbled a
handful of soil over the coffin as it was lowered into the grave.
        The girl burst into tears. A kindly woman next to her
offered her a handkerchief, which she accepted, and a
comforting hug, which she twisted away from.
        "Dad, no," the youngest, a fair-haired boy, said in a
broken half-sob. "No, please, Dad, please, no, come
back!"
        The girl put aside her own grief, not without a
wrenchingly visible effort, and went to him. "Shh, Jon. It's
all right."
        "It's not all right! Dad's gone forever!"
        The rest of the mourners, friends and acquaintances,
observed this scene uncomfortably, and many of them drifted
away without a word to the three children.
        "Be strong, Jon," the elder boy said. "Dad would have
wanted it that way."
        "Och, Jason." The girl's voice shook. "What will become
of us now?"
        "They'll put us in an orphanage!" Jon began to cry.
        Jason took him by the shoulders. "No, they won't. D'ye
hear me, Jonny? I won't let that happen. We'll always be
together. You, and me, and Robyn. Always."
        "How?" the girl, Robyn, asked. "You're not old enough to
have custody of us."
        "Then we'll run away," Jason said firmly.
        "Excuse me, I don't mean to intrude ..." The speaker was
a tall, dark-haired man of indeterminate age, carrying a hawk-
headed walking cane. A woman with black hair in a French braid
stood beside him.
        The three of them looked up with sudden fear, as though
they thought this couple was here to cart them away to an
orphanage before the dirt was even shoveled back into the
grave.
        "I only wanted to offer my deepest condolences on your
loss," the man finished, his gray eyes gentle.
        "We both did," the woman at his side said, bestowing a
lovely, sympathetic smile on the children. "It's a wonderful man
your father was, a good man, and it's sore we'll miss him."
        "Did you know our father?" Jason asked.
        "By reputation. Forgive me, my manners. I am Nicholas
Maddox. My associate, Mavis O'Connor."
        "I only wish we were meeting under happier
circumstances," Mavis said. "Pardon me asking, but was
your father ill for a very long time?"
        "Ill?" Jason echoed, and now pain and anguish shattered
the stoic mask he'd worn all through the service. "He was
murdered!"
        "Jason! Hush!" Robyn gasped. "We're not supposed
to --"
        The two adults exchanged a glance.
        "So he did tell them, then," Mavis said softly.
        "I hoped as much."
        "You know about it?" Jason asked sharply.
        "Not enough and not soon enough, I fear," Maddox said
heavily. "We knew your father by reputation, as I said...and I
have never been a man to take accounts of strange happenings
lightly." He paused, and said gently, "It was the demon, was it
not?"
        There was a frozen pause, and then Jason, reluctantly,
nodded. "It was."
        "She killed him," Jon sniffled.
        "You poor children," Mavis murmured, shaking her head.
"What a horrible thing."
        "Indeed," Maddox said. "And no one else will even
attempt to stop this creature. The authorities, I'm sure, wouldn't
even admit she existed."
        "They thought we were crazy," Robyn burst out, and
began a fresh storm of bitter weeping. "They didn't say it, but I
could tell. They didn't believe us."
        When Mavis touched her gently on the arm, the girl did
not turn away as she had with the other woman, but let herself be
held.
        "It is a shame," Maddox said quietly, folding his hands
behind his back. "Your father died for humanity's sake, trying to
rid the world of this demon. What a noble effort. And what a
tragic waste that most of them will never even know of his
heroism."
        "I'd kill that demon myself, if I had the chance!" Jason
declared.
        Jon paled. "Jason, you wouldn't!"
        "I would! I'd make her pay for what she did to Dad!"
        "A brave notion, young man, but a dangerous one."
Maddox reached into his jacket. "Still, if you mean what you say,
you might need this."
        Jason took the proffered card. "Maddox Technologies?"
        "I believed in your father's cause. It was...perhaps my
own fault that he was not adequately armed and prepared. It was
not quite a week ago that I first contacted him to offer my
services, and...." He spread his hands. "He said he would be in
touch. And that was the last I heard from him. I cannot help but
feel somewhat...responsible. If we had been able to supply him,
to better arm him...." The man sighed.
        "You make weapons? Weapons that could kill the
demon?" Jason looked up hopefully.
        Maddox laughed, somehow managing to make it sound
appropriately somber, given the occasion. "We make nearly
anything you could think of. Airships, insulated combat suits,
robotic falcons ... whatever you might require. And out of respect
for your father, at no charge to you."
        "Jason, what are you doing?" Robyn raised her tear-
streaked face. "You can't mean to go through with this! Do you
want to wind up like Dad?" She flung one arm toward the grave.
"What will happen to me and Jonny then?"
        "Perhaps three might succeed where one failed," Mavis
suggested to Maddox. She cast an eye over the trio, reached out
and gently touched Robyn's shoulder and Jon's upturned chin.
"Three such brave souls very well might."
        "We are all in this together, Robyn," Jason said. "I'll need
you with me. For Dad's sake."
        "For Dad," Jon agreed stoutly.
        She hesitated, then sighed. "For Dad."
        "Mr. Maddox, the car is ready." A uniformed chauffeur
stood at a discreet distance.
        Maddox held out his hand, and Jason shook it. "I hope to
hear from you."
        "Thank you," Jason said. "You will."
        They said their goodbyes, and then Maddox and Mavis
headed toward their waiting limousine while an older couple,
neighbors, herded the children away.
        "That went well," Mavis commented.
        "You expected otherwise? I thought it went exactly as I
intended."

                *               *

MANHATTAN, 1997:

        "You get to tell them," Matt Bluestone said as they
approached.
        "Thanks a lot, partner." Elisa stuffed her hands in her
pockets and walked up to the clan, noting that they already
looked glum and her news was only going to make it worse. "Hi,
everybody."
        "Elisa!" Goliath was on his feet in a flash, and embraced
her as though he hadn't seen her in months. This
uncharacteristically open display startled her, and that, combined
with the fact that her hands were in her pockets, left her unable
to return it.
        "Wow, what was that for?" She tried to pass it off with a
chuckle.
        "It's just so good to see you." He stepped back,
becoming aware of the others watching, and nodded to Matt.
"Hello, Bluestone."
        "Why's everyone so down in the dumps?" Elisa asked.
        No one seemed in a hurry to speak, until little Ariana
piped up. "Uncle Goliath and Uncle Lex had a fight."
        Goliath nodded. "It's true." He proceeded to tell them the
entire story -- how they'd learned of Lex's implants, the
subsequent argument, Lex's sudden angry departure, the
unsatisfactory confrontation with Owen, and his vision.
        Elisa rested a hand on his arm. "I wish you'd told me
about all that before. I think Angela's right; it was all a trick. And I
bet Lex will be back before dawn."
        "I hope you're right." He covered her hand with his own
and smiled down at her. "You usually are."
        "Hey, that's why they pay me the big bucks."
        "Speaking of which," Matt prompted.
        "Yeah." Elisa blew a strand of hair out of her face.
"We've got some bad news. Well, weird news. It has to do with
the Quarrymen's hammers."
        "Ye've figured out how they work, then?" Hudson asked.
        "No. That's the weird part. We've had people going over
every millimeter of those things, and they can't figure out where
the power comes from. The best guess, and this is from a
college-educated techie, mind you, is that it's magic."
        "Everybody else laughed," Matt added.
        "Magic!" Broadway said. "Whose? Demona?"
        "Never!" Angela said. Her hand went to the locket around
her neck in a swift gesture. "She would never have worked with
the Quarrymen. They hated all of us!"
        "Oberon's Children, then?" Broadway wondered.
        "Yeah, I thought of that," Elisa said, "but the
hammerheads are solid iron."
        "Well, who's making them?" Brooklyn asked. "Maybe we
can trace the wizard through the factory's personnel files."
        "Get this -- we can't track those hammers back to any
source," Matt said. "No factory in Manhattan, or outside of
Manhattan either. We don't have clue one as to how the
Quarrymen get them, or where they come from."

                *               *

        meep-meep-meep!
        "Oops, that's me!" Sherry checked her pager. "I'd better
make a quick call. Would you mind waiting?"
        "No problem," Lexington said, privately glad to be rid of
her for a few minutes. She was cute enough, for a human, but
gave new meaning to the word 'ditzy'. He wondered what function
she could possibly fulfill for Nicholas Maddox, came up with only
one likely one, and dismissed that because she sure didn't seem
like Nicholas' type.
        So she bounced off to make her call, and Lex wandered
over to examine an "in case of fire" evacuation floorplan. Just for
fun, he scanned the layout into his memory bank.
        "... behind schedule again!"
        Lex recognized that voice. Mavis O'Connor. Every time
he'd met her, it left him with a creepy feeling, like spiders were
crawling over the inside of his skull.
        He was none too eager to see her again, especially
without Maddox around. He faded into the shadow of a water
cooler and watched through the upended glass bottle as she
came into view, blue and swimmy and distorted by the water but
still clearly her.
        There was a man with her, a guy that Lex thought he'd
seen before but he couldn't quite put a finger on when or where.
He had one of those instantly forgettable faces, average in every
sense of the word. Not even his clothes stood out, which in itself
was almost unusual in a building full of snappy dressers.
        "And what is it this time, then?" Mavis continued
peevishly. "Too high a workload? Long hours? What is it they're
whinin' about now?"
        The man shrugged. "This and that."
        "I've had enough of the delays on this project. We'll be
examining every aspect of it carefully, and allow for no further
malingering!"
        They turned a corner, and Lex slipped out from behind
the water cooler. He glanced the way Sherry had gone, but there
was still no sign of her.
        "I'll just see where they're going," he whispered to
himself. "I'll be back before she knows I'm gone."
        He tailed them at a discreet distance, following mostly by
the sharp click of Mavis's heels on the tile and their voices,
though he couldn't make out any more words. Remembering the
floorplan, he realized that there was a very long, very straight
corridor up ahead, one that bisected the building and didn't have
many doors. He'd have to risk being seen, because if he didn't
stay close, they would lose him on the other end.
        He hurried to catch up, seeing a bit of green that was
Mavis' skirt just as they rounded the bend into the long hall. He
crept up to the corner and poked his head around.
        And saw nobody.
        There were no doors close enough for them to have
used, and if they'd broken into a run, he would have heard. It was
as if they had just poof! vanished.
        He consulted his mental map again, wondering if he'd
somehow missed a turn.
        Nothing.
        Weird.
        Frowning to himself, Lex started carefully looking around.

                *               *

        "It's getting late," Angela said. "I thought he'd be back by
now."
        Broadway's face took on the look of someone who's just
had a really bad thought. "You don't think he's having more ...
done to him?"
        Angela winced as Broadway's words hit Goliath like a
physical blow. Without a word, the clan leader rose and headed
for the battlements.
        "And where do ye think ye're going?" Hudson asked.
        "Three guesses." Brooklyn followed Goliath, with his
mate at his side and his children bringing up the rear.
        "Please, Dad, can we come too?" Ariana begged,
clinging to his tail.
        "It's our fault," Graeme said. "We're the ones that
blabbed."
        "Me and my big mouth," Broadway grumbled, getting up.
        "Wait a minute!" Matt protested. "You're all going to just
zip over to Maddox Technologies and start tearing the place up
looking for Lex?"
        Goliath turned and stared down at Matt until the detective
backed off. "Do you have a problem with that?"
        "We canna all go," Hudson pointed out. "That would
leave our home unprotected."
        "You shall stay behind to guard the castle," Goliath
decided. "And keep those two under control." Bronx and Nudnik
grinned doggy grins, their tongues lolling out. "Elisa, you and Matt
are police officers. I cannot ask you to take part in this. Wait
here. And as for you ..." He looked down at the children.
        Ariana turned on the charm. "Pleeeeeeeease?"
        "They have learned their training well," Sata pointed out,
with a note of pride.
        "And so far, we don't know this Maddox guy is a threat,"
Brooklyn pointed out. "He might just be a friend, like Lex said."
        Goliath glowered at Brooklyn's implication that he was
wrong. Forty years of trials and hardship had molded his second-
in-command into a strong and sure warrior, used to relying on his
own judgement. If Brooklyn felt confident enough about this to
risk his own children ...
        "Very well," he said. "But you stay close to your parents,
and no foolishness!"
        "Yes, Goliath," they chorused solemnly, then grinned
gleefully at each other.


                *               *

        "Everything seems to be in order," David Xanatos said,
giving the documents one last going-over before affixing his John
Hancock to the appropriate line.
        "Just a moment, Mr. Xanatos." Owen slipped the paper
out from under him just as the point of his pen touched it. He
scrutinized the other signatures already on the document with the
care of a banker suspecting a forgery.
        "Is something the matter?" the third man asked. He had
the fresh-faced, clean-cut look of the typical junior executive, and
carried his briefcase as proudly as if it were a royal scepter.
        "Is something the matter, Owen?" Xanatos looked where
Owen was looking, and only read what he'd read there before.
        Two signatures. Nicholas Maddox, a spiky aggressive
script not unlike Xanatos' own, and Mavis O'Connor, a more
flowing handwriting that a skilled graphologist would note had an
undercurrent of firmness.
        Owen's voice was pitched low, so that it carried only to
Xanatos' ears and no further. "Sir, it might be wisest not to enter
into any agreements with Maddox Technologies just yet."
        Xanatos' eyebrows went up a fraction. "Oh?" When
Owen didn't show any signs of elaborating on his cryptic
message, he shrugged and returned his attention to the glorified
courier. "Thank you for coming over outside of regular business
hours, Mr. Strijken. I'd like a little longer to think over your
employers' proposal before I sign any contracts. Do give them
my regards."
        "Mr. Maddox requested specifically that I have the signed
documents on his desk first thing in the morning."
        "Mr. Maddox is a businessman, and I'm sure he'll
understand my caution." Xanatos chuckled disarmingly. "We are
talking about a substantial deal here, and contrary to what the
papers might say, I'm not made of money."
        "I'll show you to the door," Owen said coolly.

                *               *

        "Where could they have gone?" Lex wondered in a
whisper.
        As if in answer, he heard a strange sound coming from
one of the walls. Coming from behind one of the walls. A dark
line appeared, and Lex realized that he was witnessing a secret
door opening.
        On the heels of that thought came the realization that he
was standing smack in the middle of an otherwise empty
corridor. He looked both ways, then looked up.
        As the door finished sliding open on silent casters, the
cork-tiled ceiling panel eased back into place. Lex crouched in
the dusty shadows above, willing himself not to sneeze, and
squinted down through a crack.
        Mavis O'Connor and the disturbingly ordinary-looking
man emerged from a passage behind the wall. One look at her
normally fair face told Lex she was in an even fouler mood than
before.
        "It's unionizing they'll be doing next," she said sourly.
"And it's thinking I am that some people might be due for a
reminder on the importance of keeping one's place!"
        The man nodded, and the two of them proceeded around
the corner and out of Lex's sight. When he was sure they were
gone, he dropped silently to the floor again and approached the
section of wall.
        There has to be a quick, easy way to open it, he thought.
She hadn't spent any time fiddling around before. He skimmed
his palms across the wall, and found an almost imperceptible
seam. At the top was a button that looked like a simple flaw in
the paint job. He pressed it, and the wall opened onto a cramped
wooden stairwell.
        The wall closed behind him, but his enhanced eye let him
see even better than the gargoyle norm. He descended at a pace
balanced between quickness and caution, aware that Sherry
would soon be noticing him missing, if she hadn't already.
        "But Nicholas isn't likely to be mad at me," he muttered.
"It sounds like it's his partner who's up to something.
        The stairs kept going until below street level. He could
now hear a rhythmic atonal clanging, and a hissing sound. His
first thought was that he'd just found the back way to the boiler
room. But the flickering orange glow did not come from a boiler; it
came from a forge.
        Heat shimmers hung lazily above beds of coals. The
clanging sound came from a row of anvils, where small hunched
shapes pounded on metal. The hissing came when they dunked
their products into barrels of water, sending up clouds of steam.
Here and there, arcs of electricity leaped through the gloom,
leaving a crackling trail of ozone.
        The smithy workers weren't human.
        Lex's mouth fell open as he stared.
        They were shorter even than him, but built like fireplugs.
Their faces were bearded, stained with soot and sweat and
grime. Each and every one of them had a manacle around his
ankle, and a chain connecting him to a ring in the floor.
        From time to time, one of them would spread his stubby
fingers in an arcane gesture, and weird light would leap from his
hands to the forge. The rest of them would then pause in their
labors to utter words that Lex couldn't make out, only that they
sounded more Germanic than Latin.
        That was weird enough, but when he got a little closer
and saw what they were making, he went numb and cold all over,
despite the sweltering heat.
        Hammers.
        They were making hammers.
        Quarryman hammers.

                *               *

        "There it is," Brooklyn called above the rushing of the
wind. "Maddox Technologies headquarters. Goliath, what's the
plan?"
        "To retrieve Lexington."
        "If we're going to do that, we can't just start bashing our
way in. Let's try and find a way to pull this off quietly, okay?"
        Goliath only grunted, in what Brooklyn hoped was
assent.

                *               *

        Lexington stepped forward into the light of the forge.
        One of the strange little men saw him. "A gargoyle!" He
staggered back in surprise, tripped over the chain leading from
his ankle, and fell on his back. As he went down, his flailing hand
tipped a table of scrap metal, sending it clattering and banging to
the stone floor.
        Now he had the undivided attention of every single one
of them. And most of them seized up tools that looked like they
would serve just fine as weapons.
        "Hey, wait, I'm not here to hurt you!" Lex said, spreading
his hands to show them he was harmless, and staying just
beyond what he judged was the farthest reach of their chains. "I
only wanted to see what was going on down here!"
        "Another of Her pets, come to gloat at the slaves!"
        "Her? You mean Mavis O'Connor?"
        "Who else? She keeps us here, bound like this, making
these hammers day and night without stop!"
        "And our ancestors thought Thor was a hard
taskmaster." Another of the gnomish slaves laughed harshly.
"They had but to build the one!"
        "She was working with Castaway," Lex whispered. "In
secret, all this time -- I've gotta tell Nicholas!" He moaned at the
thought. "Oh, man...this'll kill him."
        Lex turned for the way he had come in, then stopped and
looked back. The gnomes had stopped working, and were still
looking at him.
        "I can't just leave you like this," he said, louder. "Will
you...will you let me try to get you out?"
        None of them answered, but the one nearest him put
down the tongs it was brandishing and waited. Lex approached
him gingerly, reached for the chain that bound the little man's
ankle, and tugged at it hard.
        The chain didn't budge, and the links were too thick to
break. Lex strained at it for another few seconds, then let out a
breath of frustration and cast his eye around the room. His gaze
fell on a just-completed Quarryhammer.
        "I'll get help," he said to the gnome. "I'll get someone
who'll help you. Don't worry. I'll come back." And he reached out,
grabbed the hammer, and bolted for the stairs.
        Behind him the outcry went up: "Wha - " "Stop!" "Put that
down!" He ignored it and hurled himself up the stairs, running as
if each hammer in the room were a Quarryman in pursuit.

                *               *

        "Well, well," Nicholas Maddox said as the image of
several gargoyles appeared on one of his security monitors. He
buzzed Mavis' office. "It seems we've company."
        "I saw. Don't worry, everything's in order. Where's your
little friend wandered off to, then?"
        "He's still with Sherry. Probably in the cafeteria getting a
look at the espresso machine."
        Mavis laughed. "That just tortures poor George, I hope
you know!"
        "Yes, well, his problems are not my immediate concern.
How do you mean to handle these intruders?"
        "How do I mean to handle them?" Mavis turned one hand
palm up and looked down at it; she took a deep breath, pressed
all five fingertips together and then, abruptly, pulled them apart --
        And a tiny white fireball danced on her fingertips, sending
tiny arcs of energy crackling around her wrist. She let out a slow
shuddering breath, a smile of sublime exultation spreading over
her face. "Right now, old friend, I think I could handle...anything.
Anything at all."

                *               *

        The reception lounge was tastefully done in beiges and
earth tones, with a little emerald green here and there for color.
        Goliath paused, looking from one door to the other. He
selected one at random, started toward it, and it opened. A
woman stepped through.
        Angela recognized Mavis O'Connor at once. The woman
carefully closed the door behind her, then turned and smiled
pleasantly at Goliath. "Sweet dreams!"
        Her hand traced an arc in the air as if she were throwing
a discus -- but there was nothing in her hand.
        Hmmmmmmmmmmm -- followed by a series of thumps
as gargoyles tumbled to the ground.
        Angela was aware of a painless heat against her chest,
and glanced down at the locket her mother had given her. It
faded almost at once, leaving her blinking in confusion as she
looked around at the sprawled, sleeping bodies of her clan.
        "Broadway!" She bent to shake him, and that was when
the other door slammed open.
        Two men rushed in. One was a man was so bland that
he blended into the decor. The other was attractive and athletic,
with chestnut hair glinting red-gold, and such hatred in his eyes
that Angela took an unconscious step back.
        George Harrison. Richard's brother.
        Mavis O'Connor, staring coldly at Angela, said, "I've no
idea how you escaped that, but it saves us the trouble of reviving
you for questioning."
        "What have you done to them?" Angela lunged at Mavis
with her claws at the ready, but before she could even get there,
the two men had intercepted her and wrestled her down with
unbelievable strength.
        "Does it hurt?" George sneered. "Good! You deserve
everything that's coming to you!"
        Mavis snapped her fingers, and a host of not-quite-right-
looking people came in.
        "Drag that rubbish away," Mavis ordered, flicking her
fingers disdainfully at the gargoyles.
        "Don't touch them!" Angela struggled in her captors' grip,
but they held her easily, unnatural strength in their hands. "Let
me go!"
        The newcomers grabbed the unconscious gargoyles and
started to haul them away.
        "Broadway! Father!" Angela screamed. "Wake up!"
        "Oh, whisht now, child," Mavis said. "When I want to be
hearing from you, I'll be asking. In fact, there's a number of things
I'll be asking. George, Garlon -- bring her."

                *               *       

        "Oh, Lexington, there you are! What's that?"
        "Hi, Sherry. Bye, Sherry." He sped past her, careful not
to joggle the hammer and electrocute himself, and burst into
Nicholas' office.
        "-- right there, Mavis," he was saying. "Oh, hello,
Lexington." He put down the phone receiver and stood.
        "Nicholas, I've got to show you something!"
        "In a moment, please," Maddox said, coming around the
corner of the desk. "I've some business to attend --"
        "Look!" Lex thrust the hammer out. "I found it! In the
basement! There's a --"
        "What were you doing down there?" Maddox cried in
alarm. "That room was supposed to be sealed --" He bit the rest
off sharply, but too late.
        Lexington stared at him. Silence collected and thickened
in the room.
        The gargoyle's voice was a bare whisper. "...You knew?"
        "Let me explain --"
        "You KNEW?!"
        Maddox gave a small, resigned sigh, and said nothing.
        Lexington started to speak, stopped, and tried again.
"But -- but isn't there anything you could do to stop her? Couldn't
you...."
        "I never intended for you to be harmed, Lexington, by any
of my allies. You must believe that --"
        "You never intended --?" Lex stared at him again. "You
mean you're the one making these? It was --?" He choked off,
and when he spoke again it was in a much quieter voice. "It was
you all the time."
        Maddox took a swift step forward. "Lexington --"
        "You were in league with the Quarrymen." His voice was
growing louder again. "You used me. You've been using me all
along."
        "No," Maddox denied. "It started that way, but now it's
more. You are ... like a son to me. I would never have hurt you,
Lexington." He reached out to touch the gargoyle's shoulder.
        Lex twisted away, his eyes igniting. "You lying son of a --"
His eyes blazed as he hefted the hammer overhead and brought
it down, with all the strength he possessed, toward Maddox's
face.
        At the last possible second, he couldn't go through with
it, and pulled the blow. But Maddox, his face a sudden rictus of
horror, flung up one hand in a defensive gesture and caught the
head of the hammer--
        And let out a tortured shriek. He reeled back, staggering,
clutching his hand. His dark hair paled to ghostly grey, his cheeks
sank in, his skin went the sallow hue of old parchment.
        Lex lowered the hammer and stared. Electricity hadn't
done this. He only knew of one thing that could account for ... he
looked from the iron hammer to the aged, ugly Maddox. "You're
one of Oberon's Children!"
        Maddox straightened up. "One of his race, yes," he
rasped, and his aged face was twisted in hatred. "But
never...never one of his Children." He reached out a trembling
hand and slapped a button on his desk. "Release the hounds!"
        The last remark made no sense to Lex, and he thought
he'd misheard it in his sheer stunned shock, until the office walls
exploded inward and a screeching, maniacal laugh heralded the
arrival of Hyena, Jackal and Wolf.
        Lexington had a horrible, reeling moment of shock, the
edges of his vision blurring.
        "Kill him," Maddox ordered.
        "About time," Hyena sneered, and began to advance.

                *               *

PART THREE --

GERMANY - OCTOBER 1996

        A fire blazed in the brick-lined hearth, doing its best to
dispel the pervasive autumn chill that seeped through the castle's
thick stone walls.
        Rain beat softly against the windowpanes, obscuring the
view of the high mountain peak known as the Brocken. In the old
days, the days when the castle had first been built, those
windowpanes would have been of a clouded murk-yellow, clear
glass being beyond the abilities of craftsmen.
        The glass had been replaced; nothing could be done for
the stone walls except the traditional method of hanging
tapestries to help block the draft. The tall shelves of leather-
bound books played their part as well, though they looked smug
and confidently above it all. As if their only purpose was as
depositories of knowledge and literature, and not as one more
layer of insulation.
        The owner of the castle wasn't thinking about his heating
bill. Like the books, he looked smug and confidently above it all.
He poured himself a glass of port and offered one to his
companion.
        "No, thank you," Mavis O'Connor said. "How can you be
drinkin' port on such a day as this? It's the day for brandy this is,
or mulled cider."
        "One of my many charming eccentricities." Nicholas
Maddox sat down, minutely adjusting the crease of his slacks.
"So, now that you've heard the proposal from our All-Seeing
associates, what do you think?"
        "Well, it's quite the clever name," she admitted. "A fine
double meaning. Quarry -- a place where stone is broken; quarry
-- object of the hunt. Very clever indeed. But must they call it
'Operation Quarryman'? It sounds so ... military."
        "You know how they are. Operation this and Project that.
I imagine that it gives them a sense of power."
        Mavis did the impossible: she snorted daintily. "Sure a
sense of power's just the thing they need! What is it they've got
against gargoyles? I warrant you, it suits our needs, but I thought
the Enlightened Ones only bothered with things on the grander
scale. Surely they don't believe that a handful of Manhattan
gargoyles is a threat to them."
        Maddox shrugged and sipped his port. "If I knew why
they decided to do it, or indeed why they decide to do anything,
then I, rather than the right honorable Mr. Duval, would be
heading the Society."
        She sniffed disdainfully and rose from her chair to bask
in the fire's warmth. "As for this project -- sorry, this 'operation' --
I'm seein' no reason not to go ahead with the deal. Their purpose
and our own are along the same road for now, and Maddox
Technologies seems in the best position to make the equipment
they want." She smiled as if they shared a delicious secret, which
they did. "Better than most, now I've had a chance to look over
their design specifications."
        The phone rang, and Maddox sighed. "What now? I told
him we were in a meeting --" He tapped the speakerphone
button. "Yes, Garlon?"
        Garlon's voice, faintly obscured by static, came through
the speakers. "Turn on the news at once. The American East-
Coast affiliate."
        "I'm not interested in the latest Presidential brouhaha --"
        "It's urgent," Garlon cut in. "I wouldn't bother you if it
wasn't."
        "He wouldn't," Mavis confirmed.
        Maddox was already sliding open the drawer of a Louis
XIV endtable and pulling out the remote control. One of the
tapestries slid obligingly upward, revealing a television screen.
He flickered through the channels until he came to a view of a
smoking pile of rubble that had once been a Manhattan police
station.
        "Tape it," he told Mavis. She obliged at once, and both of
them watched silently as the broadcast continued.
        "This just in at the WVRN newsroom! An explosion rocks
downtown Manhattan! More details as we get them!..."
        "This is Jonathan Wills for WVRN here at the site of the
explosion at the Manhattan 23rd police precinct. This once
majestic station, topped by its gothic-style clock tower, is now in
ruins...."
        "This is Nicole St. John for WVRN. Two people have
been arrested in the terrorist attack on the 23rd police precinct.
They are listed as Police Detective Jason Conover, alias Jason
Canmore, age 32, and his sister Robyn Canmore, age 28. Still at
large is their brother Jon, alias WVRN reporter Jon Carter, age
25. Police have yet to determine the role that the mysterious
gargoyles played in this tragedy; in fact, they have yet to
acknowledge the existence of these creatures.
        "This incident strikes close to home for this reporter as
we've worked side by side with Jon for some time. Canmore is
approximately 5 foot 9 inches tall and approximately 175 pounds
with blond hair. He is to be considered armed and dangerous. If
you see him..."
        Mavis O'Connor glanced at her partner. Maddox pressed
his fingertips together in a steeple and tapped them against his
closed lips, his eyes fixed on the screen.
        "Thanks, Travis. This is Nicole St. John in front of City
Hall. We are waiting for Jose Hablar, New York City Chief of
Staff. After a rather profound silence, City Hall is finally making a
statement about the 23rd Precinct station bombing, the attack on
the St. Damian Cathedral, and the long awaited confirmation
about the gargoyles. Long believed to be just another urban
myth, the fact that these monsters are real has the usually
unflappable New York citizens scared.
        "Over the past year, stories of gargoyle attacks have
been reported and become more frequent in the past months,
but much like the 'alligator in the sewers', have largely been
ignored by the police. City officials have been promising an
official statement since this horror began, but have not yet re--"
        The television made a soft click as Maddox pressed the
"mute" button on his remote and lay it softly back down on the
endtable.
        "Well, this does change things." Maddox picked up the
phone again and began dialing. "These gargoyles have revealed
themselves to the public. Everything now hinges on our
observing this clan, and neutralizing it, if necessary."
        "Everything?" Mavis repeated warily.
        He paused, one hand poised over the telephone keypad.
"Remember the prophecy, Mavis. If we fail here, we may fail
altogether."

                *               *

MANHATTAN, 1997.

        With the small part of his mind that wasn't still reeling
from the realization that he'd been suckered once again, Lex was
thankful for his warrior instincts. They were the only thing that
kept him from standing there like a mannequin and getting
skewered by Hyena's razor claws.
        He retreated, found his back against the door leading
from Maddox's private inner sanctum, and bent one arm behind
him to get it open.
        "Lobo and Bull are going to be sorry they missed this!"
Hyena said, with a laugh that could have nearly shattered crystal.
        "We could save a piece for them and Coyote," Wolf
suggested, baring his teeth. "But let's not!"
        The door swung open, spilling Lex into the antechamber.
It was as cool and imposing as Maddox himself, with lots of
polished grey marble exactly the same shade as Maddox's eyes
-- funny how Lex had never noticed that before, funny the things
the mind came up with when under stress. The antechamber
was round, with a domed skylight overhead and a fountain in the
middle.
        "Don't run away, little gargoyle," Hyena called. "Stay and
play a while!"
        "A short while," her brother Jackal added.
        "Cut the foreplay and get him!" Wolf barked.
        Lexington was still holding the hated hammer, holding it
in front of himself defensively. He could see Maddox leaning in
the open doorway of his office, still looking like death warmed
over, watching the beginning overtures of the chase as the Ultra-
Pack fanned out and he tried to keep an eye on all of them
at once.
        "How could I have been so stupid?" Lex moaned aloud.
        Hyena cackled. "Natural instinct?" she suggested, raising
a taloned hand. Lex jumped over one slash, but the next nicked
his shoulder. "Gotcha!" she crowed.
        Lex socked her in the mouth with the handle of the
hammer. "Gotcha back!"
        "Why you little --!" She morphed into something that
looked like a gold-plated lawnmower and roared straight for him,
chewing up the royal-blue carpet as she did so.
        Lex sidestepped and backpedaled, and ducked just as
Wolf's fist tried to take the top of his head off.
        Jackal fired off a series of barbed projectiles, forcing
Lexington into an incredible display of acrobatics. The projectiles
thudded into the walls, and an interested observer could have
played connect-the-dots to follow Lex's progress.
        He vaulted from a low blue sofa to the top of a curved
table which held several lovely alabaster sculptures. The table
was that same cool grey marble as the rim of the fountain, and
slippery as freshly-waxed linoleum.
        Lex's feet shot out from under him. The head of the
hammer thumped him in the sternum but didn't fry him -- he'd
figured out that the handle had a setup like that of a pump-action
shotgun.
        He landed on his tail and skated into one sculpture after
another. They exploded on the floor, and the two that he missed
got taken out by Jackal's barbs.
        The end of the table was coming up fast. Lex pistoned
the hammer beneath him and vaulted, landing neatly on the
backs of two couches that had been pushed together. It was a
relatively stable perch, reasonably high ground.
        Giving up on the lawnmower approach, Hyena turned
herself into a plated pillbug cannonball. As she streaked toward
him, she extended her front half into a grinning porcupine, all
frenzied eyes and spiky claws.
        Lex dropped the hammer onto the cushions, caught her
wrists just above the bristle of sharp spikes, and pivoted like an
ice skater. Hyena's momentum spun them in a tight circle, and
then he let go. His arms were sliced and bleeding, but he didn't
even notice the pain in the pleasure of seeing Hyena rapidly
receding from him, her eyes now widening in alarm.
        She plowed backwards into Wolf, driving him back a
step. Unfortunately for Wolf, he didn't have a step back to take.
The rim of the fountain caught him at knee-level. He and Hyena
both went in, sending up a gout of water and goldfish.
        Lex jumped down onto the cushions, causing the
hammer to bounce up into his grip. He thrust it up and down, and
as the head started to spark, he chucked it into the fountain.
        "Catch!" he shouted.
        KRZZZZZZZZT! SNAPCRACKLEPOP!
        He turned away from the incandescent lightshow and
saw Jackal coming at him fast. Lex hurled a cushion at him, only
expecting him to bat it away, but luck was with one little green
gargoyle tonight and the cushion impaled itself on part of Jackal's
facial superstructure.
        While Jackal was dealing with that, Lex jumped from the
couches to the wall and punched his talons in, climbing. His goal
was the glass dome above, but as he got closer, his enhanced
eyes suddenly caught a glimpse of something outside the nomal
visual range. It was some sort of energy grid covering the entire
dome.
        Lex kept climbing anyway. He hopped onto one of the
thin wooden latticework struts that crisscrossed below the dome
 -- wood, not iron, he should have been tipped off by that!
        "Hey, Jackal!"
        He'd gotten rid of the cushion by now, and looked up.
Lex made an incredibly rude gesture involving both hands and
his tail.
        Jackal did exactly what Lex hoped he'd do. One arm shot
out, telescoping in a silvery blur. The fist at the end widened into
a hammerhead that made the Quarrymen's look like toys in
comparison.
        Lex dropped, catching the strut he'd been standing on
with both hands.
        Jackal's fist passed through the spot where he'd been
and crashed through the glass. Bruise-purple light coursed down
his arm like a swarm of vipers and sent him into a jittering dance.
        Fragments of glass rained down on Lex. When he dared
raise his head, the energy grid was gone and there was a nice
big hole in the dome. He swung himself onto the strut again, and
was out and away without looking back.

                *               *

        "We've secured the --" Mavis broke off as Hyena rose
from the fountain like a twisted sci-fi version of Botticelli's Venus,
her features contorted in mask of rage.
        "I'm gonna rip that little goblin a new --"
        "Shut up," Wolf grunted, heaving himself out of the water
and flopping on the carpet.
        Mavis' gaze flicked over them to Jackal, lying contorted
in the wreckage of several very expensive statuettes. From there,
she looked up at the dome, then down again, to Maddox leaning
against the doorjamb.
        Mavis flinched back at the sight of her partner. He made
a grotesque effort to straighten into his former regal bearing,
returning her gaze from the sunken hollows of his face, his grey
hair hanging lank, his shoulders slumped, one hand withered into
an arthritic claw.
        "And what's happened to you?" she asked.
        "I don't want to talk about it," he snapped in a sharp old
man's voice.
        She stared at him a moment longer, then composed
herself. "We've secured the gargoyles safely, and can
proceed whenever you're ready."
        "Good." Maddox made his slow and careful way to one of
the undamaged couches and sat down. "Just give me a
moment." He glanced at the Ultra-Pack. "Get that hammer out of
here! I never want to see it again."
        Jackal groaned and sat up, retracting his arm. "We're
mercenaries, you know, not room service."
        "It wasn't a request!"
        "I'm not touching that thing," Wolf argued, kicking at a
dead goldfish. "It nearly made fried calamari out of us."
        "Sissy!" Hyena sneered. She turned her thumb and
forefinger into pincers, and retrieved the hammer.
        "All of you, out of my sight!" Maddox ordered.
        The Ultra-Pack obeyed. Mavis, knowing the order didn't
apply to her, sat down and tucked her skirt primly over her knees.
With a businesslike air, she took his injured hand between her
own and studied it coolly. "Like some help with this?"
        He shook his head, wincing. "It'll be fine in a moment,"
he rasped.
        She released his hand with a nod, and he leaned back
and closed his eyes. Gradually, his features began to fill out. His
hair went dark again. His skin smoothed. At last, he had regained
his semblance of youth.
        "He knows about us," he said.
        "I guessed as much, but it doesn't matter now, does it?
We've the rest of them."
        "Yes." Maddox smiled. "We have the one we need."

                *               *

        "We could wait inside, you know," Matt suggested,
shifting his position on the hard stone bench.
        Neither Elisa nor Hudson replied. Both of them, and
Bronx and Nudnik too, kept staring in the direction the rest of the
clan had gone.
        "It's just through that door and down a flight of stairs," he
tried again, though he knew it was a lost cause.  There they
stood, and there they'd stand until daybreak or the sight of
silhouettes against the sky, whichever came first.
        "Okay, fine," Matt sighed, and leaned his head back to
peer up at the stars. And so it was that he was the first one to
see the winged shape fluttering down like an autumn leaf. "Hey!
Isn't that Lexington?"
        It was indeed, and he wasn't so much coming in for a
landing as he was falling. Hudson leaped to catch him, and set
him carefully down.
        He was covered in blood from a couple dozen cuts,
some on his arms and some on his shoulders and the back of his
head. Small shards of glass were embedded in many of them.
        "Lex!" Elisa knelt beside him and felt for a pulse. "Lex,
can you hear me?"
        "Hammers --" he croaked.
        "What about hammers?" Hudson asked sharply.
        "Hammers! Nichol -- Mr. Maddox! He's making the
hammers. Hates us. The Ultra-Pack, they work for him. Tried to
kill me. They're making them in the basement...little men, not
human, making hammers in the basement...she keeps them
chained."
        "He's delirious," Matt said.
        "No!" Lex sat up, resisting Elisa's efforts to make him lie
still. "They've got a workshop in the basement! I had one of the
hammers, used it to zap Wolf and Hyena!" His face darkened
into something between a scowl and a tearful grimace. "Maddox
-- he's one of them!"
        "One of the Ultra-Pack?" Hudson frowned.
        "Like Oberon! I touched him with iron and he got old!
Goliath, we've got to do someth -- Goliath?" Lex looked frantically
around. "Where's Goliath? Where's everybody?"
        "He took the others to look for you," Elisa explained.
"You don't think ...?"
        Lex paled yellow. "Oh, no. No. He'll get them!"
        "Calm down," Elisa said, but Matt could hear the dread in
her voice as she grabbed for her radio. "Goliath?"
        The only response was a faint crackling of static.
        "Goliath, do you hear me? Goliath!?"
        "This is all my fault!" Lex groaned, sinking his head into
his hands. "I set him up for a trap again! Just like with the Pack!"
        Owen pushed between Elisa and Hudson, startling
everyone with his sudden appearance. He had a first-aid kit and
was already opening it. Xanatos and Fox were behind him, and
from their expressions, Matt knew they'd heard most if not all of
Lex's story.
        "You are certain Mr. Maddox is of the Third Race?"
Owen's voice was calm, but as he began painting Lex's wounds
with a coagulant and analgesic, his good hand trembled just the
tiniest bit.
        "Certain," Lex said, relaxing a little as the painkiller took
hold. "He said so. One of Oberon's race, but not one of his
Children. He was real emphatic about that."
        "Owen?" Xanatos inquired. "You never did explain your
reservations about that contract with Maddox Tech. Did you
know --"
        "I'm sorry, sir," Owen said, snapping the kit closed.
"There is no time. If we're to stop Maddox, we must move now."
        "The clan's in danger," Elisa said. She looked to Matt,
Hudson and Lex. "Come on, guys, let's get this rescue
underway."
        "Wait!" Fox stepped forward. "We're coming with you."
        "That's right," Xanatos said.
        Elisa drew in breath as if about to argue, then let herself
deflate. "I guess there's no way I could stop you, huh?"
        "Sorry, no," Xanatos said with a charmingly apologetic
smile. "If Owen is right, and I have no reason to doubt him, you'll
need all the help you can get. I've dealt with Oberon too."
        "Fine. Whatever." Elisa was about to say more, but
Bronx and Nudnik butted her legs and almost knocked her down.
        "We may need them," Hudson said, but whether he
meant Xanatos and Fox or the watchdogs, Matt wasn't sure.
        "Can you carry both of them?" Elisa meant the
watchdogs, clearly.
        Hudson and Lex shook their heads.
        "Looks like this one rides with us, partner," Matt said.
Attempting to lighten the mood, he squatted and addressed
Nudnik. "Now, listen here. I get shotgun. You stay in the back.
Understand?"
        By way of reply, he got an enthusiastic face-licking.

                *               *

        "I've taken the liberty of preparing a line of defense, Mr.
Xanatos," Owen said as Xanatos closed the fastenings on the
last piece of exoframe armor.
        "Have you? Tell me, Owen, how long have you
suspected something was going on?"
        "I've been aware of the possibility of the Unseelie Court's
return for quite a while now. I hoped it would come to nothing, but
just in case, I arranged for the construction of more of the iron-
clad Steel Clan robots, identical to the ones we used in that
unfortunate incident with Lord Oberon."
        "The what Court?"
        "Unseelie." Owen took a breath, then let it out, shaking
his head. "It would take far too long to explain. Suffice to say,
they are a very dangerous faction of my people. Dangerous, but
still vulnerable to iron."
        "I gather you won't be joining us."
        "My first duty is to protect Alexander. I doubt you'd want it
any other way."
        Xanatos gave a single, unsmiling nod. "Exactly."
        Fox came clanking in, armored in an exo-suit of her own,
and posed in the doorway. "How do I look, darling?"
        "Blue always was your color." He offered her his arm, as
if they were headed out for a night on the town. "Shall we?"

                *               *

        "This'll hold you," the one Mavis had addressed as
Garlon said, closing the final clamp around her ankle and tugging
on the wide band that ran across her chest, drawing it taut.
        Angela gasped as the breath was driven from her lungs.
Her eyes lit the room with red fury as she fought to free herself,
all to no avail. None of the restraints gave so much as a fraction
of an inch.
        Exhausted, she still found the strength to glare at the two
men. The silent one with the mouse-brown hair was
unremarkable, but the other she remembered all too well from
the chaos he'd caused on Valentine's Day. An eerie light danced
behind George Harrison's eyes. He seized her hair, twisting it
painfully.
        "We'll see how many people's brothers you corrupt now,"
he growled.
        "Don't blame Richard for your own problems," Angela
retorted quietly. "You know your brother better than that."
        His fingers tightened and he drew back his other fist,
forming an energy blade around it. "Don't lie to me, monster. The
only truth that counts is the one I make for myself." His arm
started to come down.
        "Don't." The word was quiet yet quite firm. Angela
watched as Garlon simply looked at him, and George
subsided into muttering threats under his breath.
        Her anger diminished a bit, and fear began to take its
place. She was strapped securely into a mammoth chair that fit
itself so well to her body it might have been made to measure.
The rest of the room was a plain grey box, the floor and walls and
ceiling lined with acoustic tile. To absorb screams, she realized,
and shuddered. The only other things in sight were a large
television monitor behind a pane of two-inch-thick plexiglass, and
a camera mounted in the corner.
        The door slid open with a hiss, and Nicholas Maddox
entered the room, looking as urbane and handsome as ever.
Mavis O'Connor was with him, her smile as smug as the
proverbial cat that had just swallowed the proverbial canary. A
third man, whose attractiveness would better be called beauty
due to the almost feminine cast of his features and his silken
hair, came in behind them.
        Maddox smiled. "Ah, Miss Destine. How kind of you to
honor us with your presence."
        Angela twitched in shock, and Maddox and Mavis both
laughed.
        "Oh, don't look so surprised," he went on. "We've known
your true identity and ... shall we say, nature ... for quite some
time."
        "What is all this?" Angela cried. "We've done nothing to
you!"
        "Technically, you are trespassing," Maddox pointed out.
"But that doesn't really matter. We've nothing personal against
you or your clan. In fact, we expect you to be quite useful to us."
        "What are you talking about?" Angela's eyes narrowed.
        Maddox folded his hands behind his back and paced in
front of her. "It's something you mentioned to my associate here,
Mavis. At a restaurant, with your dear mother. You are from
Avalon, correct?" Before she could answer, he whipped around
and fixed her with his cold grey gaze. "To us, there is only one
Avalon. That island from which Oberon banished us, more than
ten thousand years ago!"
        All she could do was gape at him.
        "Do you think I'm the sort of man to take lightly being
banished from my home? Denied the throne that should have
been mine? Oberon's time is at an end. He has warmed that
throne for too long, and I mean to hurl him from it." He leaned
close and caught Angela's chin in his hand. "And that is where
you come in. You've been on Avalon much more recently than
any of my folk. You will describe for me its defenses. In detail."
        "I won't tell you a thing!"
        "Why on earth not?" He sounded honestly surprised.
"What possible loyalty could you owe to Oberon, that would come
before the safety of your clan?"
        "I won't help you take the war there! Avalon is peaceful,
we have no weapons --" She stopped abruptly and pressed her
lips together.
        Maddox sighed exaggeratedly. "So untrusting. Oberon
alone is my target. I no more desire a prolonged battle than do
you."
        "Why should I believe anything you say, after what you've
done to Lexington?" She jutted her jaw at him defiantly.
        He turned to Mavis with a look of great disappointment.
"Gargoyles are such stubborn creatures."
        Mavis shrugged and smiled. "I can be something of a
stubborn creature meself." She fingered an antique long-bladed
knife, its hilt a fortune of gold and jewels, its blade flickering
under the fluorescents so that it seemed to be glowing with its
own power. "Give me a few hours and it's little trouble we'll have
of this one."
        Maddox shook his head. "That would hardly be
comporting ourselves fairly. Miss Destine is the daughter
of a fellow CEO. We must maintain at least a semblance of
professional courtesy. Offering physical violence to her would be
a violation of business etiquette."
        "True for you," Mavis agreed reluctantly, and slid the
knife into a wrist-sheath up her sleeve.
        "In any case," he continued, "we do have other resources
at our ... disposal." He motioned to Garlon, who turned on the
monitor.
        Angela strained against her bonds as she saw her clan,
chained to a wall. None of them had awakened yet. They hung
limply from manacles and waist clamps.
        "We'll have what we want to know from you," Maddox
said. "Or we'll execute them, one by one. It is your decision, Miss
Destine. I've promised no harm to you. I make no similar offers
for these ones, unless you comply with my wishes."
        She wrenched her gaze away from the monitor and shut
her eyes.

                *               *

        "It's yellow," Matt said.
        Elisa stomped on the accelerator.
        "It's red!"
        She cursed and braked sharply, which sent Nudnik
tumbling off Matt's lap. Nudnik evidently thought that was fun,
and decided to thank Matt for it by jumping back up, one hindpaw
nailing him right where dogs of any variety always seemed to do.
        "Come on, get back in the back," Matt begged, trying to
wrestle the rambunctious creature down. "I swear, there's nothing
worse than a two-hundred-pound puppy!"
        Elisa ignored him. In between glaring impatiently at the
light, she fished out her cellular phone and dialed. "Backup," she
said in response to his questioning look.
        He would have asked more, but at that moment,
Nudnik's paw hit the handle that rolled down the window,
lowering it by a couple of inches. At once, a snuffling nose was
wedged into the gap.
        "Get out of there!" Matt tried to roll the window up, went
the wrong way, and now Nudnik's whole head was poking out,
tongue lolling.
        Out of the corner of his eye, Matt saw a Mercedes pull up
in the next lane. The man in the driver's seat and a woman, none
other than their old friend Margot the Assistant DA, stared at
them in astonishment.
        Matt looked back at them, shrugged the best he could
with Nudnik in the way. "What?"

                *               *

        "I'm waiting," Maddox said.
        Angela blinked away tears of terror and shame at her
helplessness. She couldn't subject her rookery siblings to the
dangers of an invasion, but she couldn't just sit here and watch
her clan die! Especially not her father and her future mate!
        She surged against the restraints with all her strength.
        "When will you realize that your efforts are useless?"
Maddox asked. "That chair was built specifically to hold you.
You'll not be able to break free from it by struggling."
        "You monster!"
        "Yes, yes," he replied, sounding bored. "I'm the monster,
I'm evil, could we please get on with it?" When she still didn't
answer, he glanced at Mavis. "Perhaps we should give her
something to think about, a little gesture to show her that we
mean what we say. Bring me the ear of their leader --"
        "NO!" screamed Angela.
        Maddox looked at her and opened his mouth to reply,
and stopped as an urgent warble came from a speaker in the
wall. "Leifson here."
        "Not now, Leifson, I'm busy," Maddox snapped.
        "Too busy to care that we're under attack?"
        The monitor flashed, and now the view was of Steel Clan
robots demolishing the upper floors of the building. It changed
again, and Angela suppressed a cheer as she recognized Elisa,
Hudson, Matt, even Fox and Xanatos fighting their way through
the corridors.
        "Perfect," Maddox said, in a disgusted tone of voice.
"Mavis, you deal with her. I'll see to these uninvited guests." He
started for the door, then paused, looking at the silken-haired
man.
        Angela looked at him too. Since he had said nothing, she
hadn't paid him any more attention until now. She noticed that he
was the only one of her captors who wasn't relishing her plight.
He looked ... he        looked sorry for her.
        "Umbriel!" Maddox said sharply. "You're with me. Garlon,
George, you too."
        The door closed behind them, and Mavis turned to
Angela with a feral smile.
        "Looks like it's just us girls, then," she crooned sweetly.

                *               *

        "Uncle ..."
        "What?"
        Umbriel swallowed, feeling like there was something
caught in his throat. His honor, perhaps. "You ... you don't truly
mean to slaughter those gargoyles, do you?"
        "If she refuses to cooperate, yes," Maddox said flatly.
        "But two of them are children!" Umbriel protested.
        "Nits make lice," Garlon observed.
        Maddox swept Umbriel with a scathing look. "May I
remind you that we are at war, nephew?" he said. "There is no
room for sentimentality in wartime."
        Umbriel lagged behind, brow furrowed in concern. He
looked back once at the door, then reluctantly followed.

                *               *

        "Let's be about it, shall we?" Mavis said merrily. "Hmm,
where should I begin? Perhaps with your da?"
        "Please, stop this!"
        "Willin' to talk, then?"
        "No!"
        "Make up your mind, child." Then she snapped her
fingers. "I see! You're expecting to be rescued! I'll have to show
you just how futile a hope that is." She surveyed the monitor,
which now showed the captive clan again.
        "Any suggestions? Should I start with the wee ones?
Sure they're too young to understand, too young to know
anything but that they're dying in agony. But I'll be makin' sure
they understand it's all your fault."
        Angela bit her lip, trying not to look at Graeme and
Ariana. What had they been thinking, to bring them along?
        "Or maybe I'll start with this slob of a thing, here." She
tapped the figure of Broadway.
        "Don't you dare!"
        "You know, I could probably upholster a whole sofa with
the hide he's got wrapped around that belly."
        "Leave him alone!" Angela shrieked so loud she thought
her throat might split.
        Mavis broke off and looked at her, amused. "Well, well!
It's that garbage disposal with wings you're after! Takes all kinds,
I suppose, but I've no idea what you see in him."
        "You wouldn't understand!" Angela spoke without
meaning to, and wished she could take the words back. She was
letting Mavis get to her, despite all her resolve.
        Mavis walked over, and Angela fought her bonds again,
still without effect. She grew still again, breathing as heavily from
the exertion as the straps would allow, as Mavis stopped and
stared at her quietly for a moment. She cringed involuntarily as
Mavis's hand suddenly moved toward her.
        Mavis smiled. "Isn't this the pretty trinket," she said, lifting
up Angela's locket. "Present from your boyfriend?" With a sharp
jerk, she snapped the chain and yanked it free from the girl's
neck. "We don't need them, you know," she told Angela with
dreadful calm. "We need you, because you can help us. But
they're no use to us at all, no more than insects -- " she dropped
the locket and drove her heel down on it, crushing it --
"underfoot."
        "You're not going to get away with this!"
        "Who's to stop me? And what's more," Mavis said,
leaning close, "if you won't tell me what I want to know, I'm going
to slit your rump-fed Romeo wide open and let him bleed to death
at your feet."

                *               *

        "I never expected our first meeting to turn out like this,"
David Xanatos called, hovering on the jets of his battlesuit. "I had
more of a board-room setting in mind."
        "You've destroyed my board room," Maddox replied icily.
        "Bill me."
        As the two of them faced off, Fox confronted Jackal and
Hyena. "So, this is the sort of person you're working for now," she
taunted. "Your standards have dropped about as fast as your
looks."
        "We can't all marry billionaires," Hyena came back. "Or
live in the beauty parlor!"
        "Come on, you bunch of clowns, move it!" Garlon was
yelling at a gang of not-quite-right-looking thugs with pointed ears
and wall-to-wall eyebrow. They were standing braced for attack
but not moving; Hudson, whose sword had already taken out half
a dozen of their number, watched the lot of them with a grim
smile playing over his face and his sword-point tracing patterns in
the air.
        "I said --" Garlon started again, then never finished as
Bronx bowled him over. Nudnik, thinking this was even better
than playing frisbee with Brooklyn, galumphed right over him,
driving his head into the ground.
        "Good boys," Hudson said approvingly as the two
gargoyle beasts took up defensive positions at his side. "Now
who's next?" The old warrior lowered his sword blade with a
particularly nasty smile.
        The gang of transformed humans looked at each other
uncertainly. A dark-suited figure pushed his way through to the
front. George gave his fellow Halflings a good hard glare. "Listen
up, people. You've got the talent, now use it. Watch me!" His
eyes began to glow a brilliant blue and energy crackled all around
him. "Find your energy source, focus it," he gave an wicked grin,
"and let it GO!"
        The charged energy pulse that left George's extended
hands was deflected by Hudson's sword, but still managed to
throw the old gargoyle back several feet. Bronx roared and threw
himself in defense of his master. Nudnik gave a yipping howl and
charged the Halflings.
        Heartened by their squad leader's display, the other
transformed humans began to fight back, firing their own energy
blasts. George cast about for a convenient ley line and stepped
on it. "Take care of these pests," he ordered. "I've got to do some
damage control." He sailed off, skating inches off the floor.

                *               *

        A feral growl warned Fox seconds before Wolf struck,
giving her the split second she needed to take him out with her
arm blaster, the stench of burning hair filling the room. A volley of
micro-missiles detonated off her armor as she turned back
towards the lethal twins.
        "Up to your old sneaky tricks, eh, Jackal?" Fox
commented. "I'd have thought you'd come with some new ones."
She fired back with a salvo of particle beams.
        "Why bother when the old ones work so well?" Jackal
quipped. "Hit her, Sis!"
        Hyena skittered spider-like from the cover of some
overturned furniture and pounced onto Fox, sharpened fingers
drilling their way into her battle armor. Fox rolled with her former
associate's momentum and managed to wedge her feet into
Hyena's torso as they fell. The blast from her jet packs did the
rest, sending Hyena flying across the room.
        Fox rolled to her feet. "That's that," she said
satisfactorily. She eyed Jackal. "And now for you--" A
brilliant flash of blue light suddenly filled her vision as every
circuit in her exo-suit began to short-circuit. The floor rose up and
hit her in the face.
        "Don't thank me all at once," a voice called mockingly
from behind. "I'll say it again, you guys ought to be recycled."
        "Stuff it, freak," Jackal shot back. "We softened her up
for you."
        "You're one to talk," a pair of black boots stepped into
her range of vision, "at least I still have all my own original
equipment."
        "Yeah, Georgie?" Hyena taunted. "Your momma give
you those ears, elf-boy?"
        With an articulate growl, George started towards her.
Unfortunately, he'd forgotten about Fox. She grabbed his ankles
and sent a powerful jolt of energy through his body. The Halfling
collapsed on the ground.
        Fox looked at Hyena. "Please tell me you didn't date this
jerk?"
        "Too late," Jackal answered. "And too late for you." He
leaped at her -- and crashed to the floor as she rolled out of the
way.
        "Wanna bet?" Fox grinned. She hadn't had this much fun
in ages.

                *               *

        "And when I'm finished with him," Mavis said, "I'll -"
        The sound of the gunshot was muffled but distinct. The
door flew open, its lock shattered.
        Elisa Maza leveled her gun at Mavis. "Are we
interrupting?"
        Mavis backed away, showing fear for the first time. It did
Angela's heart good to see that fear. Mavis drew the knife from
her sleeve and started to raise it, but Elisa shook her head.
        "Don't make me shoot it out of your hand. My aim's good,
but not that good. I'd probably blow your fingers off."
        "I'm so sorry, Angela!" Lex said as he and Matt undid the
clamps and buckles. "This is all my fault!"
        She didn't reply. The instant she was free, she hurtled
past Elisa and threw herself on Mavis with an eyes-blazing-tail-
lashing roar that would have done credit to her mother. Mavis
flung her arms over her face, not fast enough. Angela's claws
slashed her cheek from temple to jaw, and the knife went
skittering across the tile floor.
        "Angela! Stop!" Elisa and Matt caught her by the arms,
just as she was about to go for Mavis' throat.
        Angela fought against the hands that held her. "No,
Elisa! Let me go! I'm going to make her pay!"
        Mavis twisted out from under her and rolled catlike to her
feet. Lex blocked the door.
        "You're not getting away!" he cried.
        "Think again!" She darted to the wall, and part of it
swung away. She was through and had it closed behind her
before any of them could reach it.
        "No! Not again! Another secret door!" Lex threw himself
at the wall, raking the acoustic tile in frustration when he couldn't
find the trigger to open it.
        Angela shakily passed a hand over her eyes, stopping
when she glimpsed the blood on her claws. She stared numbly at
the crimson that stained her talons.
        "Blood?" she whispered, uncomprehending. She'd never
drawn blood before, not like that. Not in a vicious, out-of-control
frenzy. That wasn't like her. Not Angela.
        "Lex, forget it!" Matt said, pulling him away from the wall.
"We'll deal with her later. Come on, let's get Goliath and the
others."
        "Angela? Angela!"
        She looked up from her hands. "Elisa?"
        "They'll need our help upstairs."
        "...Yes," Angela said. "Of course." She looked down at
her hands again.
        "Angela?"
        She felt Elisa's hand touch her shoulder, then shook her
head sharply and followed Elisa out of the room.

                *               *

        "Ah, Mavis, there you are," Maddox panted, ducking as
one of Xanatos' energy bolts streaked by. "Come to join the
party?"
        "This is madness!" she exclaimed when she got a look
around, still pressing her palm to her bleeding cheek.
        "A trifling upset. We've only lost a bit of ground."
        "A bit?!"
        "Now that you're here, we can easily overpower these
mortal annoyances."
        "Don't be a fool, Madoc! It's too soon!" She swiped one
hand across her face, shook her bloodstained fingers in front of
his eyes. "Our powers aren't fully regained! We can still bleed!"
        He glanced from her hand to her face and was about to
reply when a voice rang from the sky.
        "Hey! Somebody call for backup?" Talon descended with
the rest of his clan, mingled mutates and cloned gargoyles, close
at his heels.
        Maddox, who had been looking only minorly
inconvenienced, now looked genuinely alarmed. "We must
retreat!"
        "What happened to easily overpowering these mortal
annoyances?" Mavis demanded mockingly.
        He ignored her. "Unseelie, to me!" He raised one hand in
an arcane gesture, and lightning crackled around them both.

                *               *

        Lightning flashed, and Maddox and Mavis vanished.
        Moments later, most of their forces did the same. Only
the Ultra-Pack were left, until Jackal suddenly looked around and
realized that the only thing standing between victory and the
entire combined army of gargoyles, mutates, robots, and armed
humans, was themselves.
        "Let's bail, sis! We don't get paid enough for this!"
        Hyena was going to protest, and them Matt and
Lexington burst onto the scene with a very irritated Goliath and
the rest of the clan right behind them.
        "Right behind you, brother! I may be bloodthirsty, but I'm
not crazy!"

                *               *

        The battle was done, and Maddox Technologies stood
mostly empty. Only a few perplexed humans were left, including
the janitorial staff and Maddox's receptionist, Sherry.
        The painkiller had worn off. It felt like the longest night in
history. But Lex couldn't rest yet. He led Elisa and Matt down to
the basement.
        "They're right here -- they're gone, too. Dang! I wanted
you to see them!"
        "We've seen plenty," Matt said, pointing to the hammers
in various stages of production. "Here's all the evidence we need
to nail Maddox."
        "Yeah, but how are we going to tell Captain Chavez they
really were made by magic?" Elisa wondered. "This makes your
Illuminati stuff sound tame by comparison."
        Matt gave a little, harsh laugh. "Tell me about it. What did
you say they looked like, Lexington?"
        "Little men," Lex answered. "With beards. Like gnomes, I
guess."
        "Oompa-Loompas," Matt muttered under his breath, and
raked a hand through his hair. "I just realized. It's not gonna stop
getting weirder, is it?"

                *               *

        A day's stone sleep (and even the non-gargoyle
combatants all slept like stones) did everyone a world of good.
They awoke in time for the evening news, in which Travis
Marshall reported on the top story of Maddox Technologies and
the Quarrymen.
        "A police investigation is underway," Marshall said. "The
FBI is seeking both Nicholas Maddox and his associate, Mavis
O'Connor, on charges of collaborating with a terrorist
organization."
        "Good luck," Lex grumbled.
        An uncomfortable silence fell over the clan.

                *               *

        Xanatos turned off the television. "So, Owen, what you're
telling me is that these two are getting ready to take on Oberon?"
        "Indeed, sir. I doubt they're concerning themselves with
human law. As Madoc Morfryn and Queen Maeve, the only force
that will concern them is Oberon himself."
        "But they tried and failed ten thousand years ago?"
        Owen nodded. "Give or take a millennium, yes.
Presumably, they feel confident about a re-match."
        "And what do you think, Owen?"
        His hesitation was answer enough.
        Fox and her husband exchanged a grim look, and then
she said, "I think I'll start sitting in on Alex's lessons again, if it's
all right with you, Owen."
        "A wise precaution," he said, looking mildly relieved.

                *               *

        Angela gave Broadway what was meant to be a
reassuring smile, but he still looked hurt. How could she
explain that she just didn't feel like sitting with the others right
now?
        She could still feel the tender flesh giving way beneath
her claws. Could still feel the thrill of fierce triumph. It burned in
her like a flame, but froze her heart at the same time.
        "I'm turning into my mother," she murmured to herself.
        She glanced quickly around to see if any of them had
heard her. Nobody was looking her way. Elisa and Matt hadn't
mentioned what had happened in the interrogation room, and Lex
was more worried about problems of his own.
        So were the others. She noticed the way they kept
skittering nervous looks toward Lex, who also sat apart from the
group as if shamed.
        The door opened, and Xanatos came in. "Lexington?"
        Lex sighed heavily. "The doctors' reports came back?"
        "Do you want to discuss this privately?"
        Lex shook his head. "I'm through keeping secrets from
my clan. Whatever the news is, they can hear it too."
        "I'm afraid it's not good," Xanatos said. "The implants
cannot be removed without causing permanent damage.
Blindness, at the very least, since there's no way to restore your
eyes."
        "You mean...I'm stuck like this? I can't have them
removed?"
        "I'm sorry." Xanatos laid the medical printouts on the
table and left quietly. Lex made a small, anguished sound and
covered his face.
        "Lex ..." Brooklyn began.
        "Just...leave me alone for a while, okay?" he asked in a
broken, strengthless whisper.

                *               *

        Elisa put her arms around Goliath, attempting to comfort
him. He'd taken the news almost as badly as Lex himself.
        "We won the battle," she said. "Be proud of that."
        "But at what cost?" he asked bitterly.
        "Everything has a cost, Goliath. If Lex had been
wounded, crippled, you'd still support him. He'll make
whatever adjustments he has to, in time."
        He started to ask her how she could possibly know what
any of this was like, and then thought of her brother. Talon had
come to terms with his change. So had Elisa. He could not ask
for a better guide to help him through his anger and sorrow.
        "The important thing," she went on, "is that everyone is
alive, and safe."
        "Yes," he said. "We should not forget that." He held her
close, as always amazed that he could draw such strength from
such a small and frail form.
        She rested her head against his chest. "The worst is
over. Things can only get better from here on." She raised her
head briefly and met his eyes. "Can't they?"

                *               *

GERMANY:

        Behind the old castle, behind the Brocken mountain
peaks, the eastern sky was lit up with a livid red streak of dawn.
        "We could have taken them!" Leifson stormed. "So there
were a few more. They were still only mortals! Why did you order
the retreat?"
        "Close your blathering mouth, Loki," snapped a female
voice.
        She was no longer bleeding. She was no longer Mavis
O'Connor.
        Emerald-streaked black hair flowed loose around hard-
edged elfin features. Her skin had darkened several shades, to a
toffee-cream tan. A sword hung at her waist, and she wore
lightweight armor with a dark-red cape swirling around her. And
her accent was sharper, musical and harsh at the same time, the
sound of a language whose rough edges had not yet been worn
smooth with time.
        "The risk was too great," Madoc said, adjusting the
sweep of black cloak that fell from his scalloped metal
shoulderplates, glancing about at the others who stood by --
Umbriel, Garlon, George Harrison and the other Halflings.
"Humans and gargoyles, fighting side by side. Have you forgotten
the prophecy?"
        "Of course not!"
        "We'll have other opportunities. We've waited this long; a
small delay shouldn't concern us. We have recovered our
powers. Our hour has come round at last."
        Maeve drew in an eager breath. "You mean --? Is it
truly --?"
        "Yes." He turned his head sharply, white hair flying
around his regal features. "Send out the call. Gather our
followers to us. The Rising has begun!"


THE END