Guardian of the Abyss (18 page)

"It does, doesn't it." Abaddon's rumbling voice agreed with her from across the room, in English. Although his English was still heavily accented, it was improving every day. "It was a rather brilliant strategy, and it would seem goblins have a knack for wording things so that they can't be avoided."

"I still can't believe he tried to kill himself just to spite me." The baby kicked again, and she winced and shifted.

He shrugged, cutting another carrot. "I can't believe you still have to eat."

"Are you complaining about having to cook?" Alexis was laughing as she put a bag of groceries on their counter, breezing in like a breath of cool air on a hot day.

Abaddon chuckled. "No."

Sarah loved the sound of his laughter. It was almost commonplace now, though she still felt he might be a little too somber over-all. It no doubt came of being over two thousand years old and stuck in prison for four hundred of those years.

"How's Michael?" she asked Alexis, launching herself out of the chair. Alexis had given birth to another gargoyle boy not long after Sarah's tête-à-tête with James.

Now Sarah was due any day, or at least she hoped she was. She was bigger than a barn, every ounce of the baby out in front of her and so big she could set a dinner plate on her belly.

They sat down to eat, and despite all of his frequent complaints about 'elimination', Abaddon ate with equal gusto. He might not like the end result, but he had found that he enjoyed eating and he enjoyed cooking also. Now that their own apartments had been renovated at the other end of the enclosure from Thanatos and Alexis', he got to do it a lot more often. Alexis had a hard time sharing her kitchen.

Nobody liked to call the place they lived a prison, so it was called the enclosure. Sarah could leave any time that she wished, because a discussion amongst the local gargoyles had brought forth the agreement that no one should know about Sarah's ability to bring other gargoyles into her dreams and spare them the pain of Thanatos' healing.

She hadn't left beyond going to deliver her warning to James, though. She got everything she needed from the internet, except the love and companionship she could only get here in this place, with this man.

They'd also discovered that food restored her much the same way that the Earth restored other gargoyles. Everything about her was new territory, it seemed, so they learned together as they went.

After they'd eaten, Thanatos and Alexis went home, and Sarah and Abaddon went to bed. The first contractions came on after Abaddon had turned to statue form, so Sarah let him replenish. He would need his strength. The contractions progressed quickly, and she finally pulled him from his healing to go summon Alexis.

An hour later, the werewolf doctor arrived, grumbling that he'd never attended a gargoyle birth before and how the hell should he know what to do? The head vampire for the area, Tallis, also showed up, as well as werewolves, gargoyles, and various other races, who crowded in the living room and kitchen.

Eventually, the pain became unbearable and Sarah nearly broke Abaddon's face when she hit him in rage when he told her to calm down. He left the room as she screamed at him, throwing something against the door.

She hated him so much right then that if he'd dared walk back in, she would probably have tried to kill him. "This is your fault! I hate you!" she screamed. "Don't you dare tell me to fucking calm down!"

Chapter 23

Abaddon stalked the living room, his wings carefully tucked away since he'd already broken a window with one. He still couldn't remember to make them phase when they popped out.

He rubbed the heels of his palms against his eyes again. "She's never going to forgive me," he lamented. "I should have never touched her."

"She'll hold that baby and she'll have forgiven you before you even get in there," Thanatos assured him.

"Right," Abaddon snarled. "Sure she will." He paced again as people sat talking, reading, or sleeping around his living room.

Something else struck the door. "I hate you!"

"Alexis does it every time. Always forgives me once the baby is here, though."

"They all do it." This time, it was one of the werewolves. "I work at the hospital. Trust me, they all do it."

Abaddon ignored them. They didn't know Sarah. She was all things wonderful, to be sure... but she could hold a grudge like an ancient tree holding its rings. Hours passed, and he grew more and more fretful as she stopped throwing things and quiet fell over the house.

By and by the door opened, and he whirled to see an exhausted doctor standing in the doorway. "You're going to need to see this," he informed Abaddon. "You, too," he gestured at Hamish. "It's too bad the vampires have gone to roost. Tallis better not blame this one on me."

Cold terror raced through Abaddon and he charged into the room, bowling the doctor over and not caring even slightly. If Sarah was dead--

She lay on the bed with a tiny bundle in her arms. Pale, chubby arms poked out of the blanket, moving slightly. A light sprinkle of hair peeked out.

Sarah looked up at him and smiled. "It's a girl," she said, her voice hoarse.

To Abaddon's wonder, she was smiling at him with open love and joy on her face. He dared not ask if she still hated him. He stared at the tiny miracle in her arms. "We have a girl?" he couldn't believe it.

"Yes," she whispered. "Look."

She lifted their baby, pulling the blanket down. Abaddon stared in undisguised wonder. There on her back were tiny wings, just as they would have been on a boy. He reached out and touched her, finding her skin to be like that of a gargoyle the touch, but colored like her mother's skin.

"Oh my god, a female gargoyle," Hamish gasped behind him.

"There's more," Sarah told him. "Her eyes are like ours. She's definitely a gargoyle."

Abaddon laughed and cried at the same time. He squatted down beside his wife and daughter, trying to hold them at the same time. An unimaginable feeling rose in him, to see his wife and his child together, knowing that this time, their baby was made in love and would grow up knowing what it was to be loved by her mother.

Suddenly he realized what this meant for future generations of gargoyles. He stood. "May I? I'll bring her back directly." Sarah nodded, tears in her eyes. He knew that she understood, as well.

Carrying her carefully, Abaddon took his daughter out into the living room. Everyone stared, the air of expectation vibrating in the room with palpable intensity.

"A girl. It's a girl. And she's a gargoyle like her mother!" He let the blanket slide down from where it was as his baby laid on his shoulder, putting her wings on display. Shimmering with iridescence, they were a testament to his people... hope had come.

They had regained the hope of a future by being able to have children again. But now there was the hope that they might be able to have a true race of both men and women. No longer dependent upon the humans who hated them. His daughter was a sign of the possibility of independence, if they could grasp it with both hands and hold on tight.

They were a shattered race, beaten by destiny and then by humanity. Nearing extinction, they had little hope that they would find human women who would accept them, especially after the wholesale slaughter that had occurred. A painful few had found women, but the number was terrifyingly low.

There were enough generations between many of them and Abaddon that they could safely begin to rebuild their race.

The room erupted in jubilation as the gargoyles recognized the hope his daughter represented. He let them celebrate, returning to his wife so that he could carefully lay their daughter back in her arms.

He put his forehead against Sarah's, and cried again as his heart swelled with hope for the future.

He and Sarah clung to each other. While they cradled their baby, the statue in the distant grotto, far beneath the water, began to weep tears of joy. That part of Sarah that had been imbued in it when the exchange was made felt the magic of the moment. Black tears fell and dripped into the water.

The mineral-rich tears spread out into the water, until it found the coral. There, the coral absorbed it, and began to flourish with the life and hope that only tears of joy can bring. What had once been a prison became a place where magic took root and the sentient, living coral took its first breath of genuine understanding.

Epilogue

Abaddon watched Sarah as she came into the living room from the bedroom. She had learned how to fly, and she had been able to shift into statue form since she'd had Evangeline. The frustration of not being able to create clothing with her skin remained, bothering her far more than it bothered him.

"Candles?" he asked, brushing his hand across the table. "Food?"

She smiled. "Evangeline, let's go!"

Their daughter, now three years old, ran out into the room from her own bedroom. "Momma come too."

"No, dear. You need to help Auntie Alexis. She wants you, extra special job for you tonight."

Abaddon watched as Sarah carried their daughter and handed her over to the waiting Alexis. The door closed behind them and Sarah turned back to him. She was wearing a long red dress that shimmered as she walked, the slit of it exposing sleek thighs as she walked towards him.

They'd quit eating a while ago, since Evangeline didn't need it, and Sarah no longer did, either.

"I thought we should celebrate," Sarah interrupted his musings. "It's the traditional way to celebrate, after all. A romantic dinner with candlelight and roses. Some wine, good food..." She stepped up to him, smiling at the black and white tuxedo he wore. "You make that tux look magnificent."

"Thank you, my love." He pulled her against him. "I think I like celebrating."

She gestured at the table, then brought food over. He found himself eating with her, and enjoying sitting making small talk. It was nice to practice his English, but he wanted to know what they were celebrating. Had he forgotten their anniversary? No...that was in August, and he was sure it was September. Plus, they had already celebrated that.

When they were done eating, Sarah put on some music. She held her hand out to him in invitation, and he put his in hers. Holding her, he did his best to move with the slow music and not step on her feet.

Finally, he couldn't bear it any longer. "What are we celebrating, Love?"

She drew back and her hands went behind her dress. She smiled at him, a seductive smile filled with invitation. He heard the sound of a zipper, and his poor aching erection tried to exit the tuxedo on its own.

The dress fell away and she was gloriously naked in front of him except for the high heeled shoes she was wearing. He reached for her, but she held up a finger, a warning look on her face. She closed her eyes, and he watched in wonder as her skin rippled and stockings appeared on her legs. Then panties covered the sweet curls on her mound. As he watched, a lace teddy slipped over her torso.

"You can make clothes." Elation and pride flowed through him. Despite her ability to do pretty much anything she wanted with hair, Sarah had struggled from the beginning with making clothes. "That's incredible!"

"That's not what we're celebrating."

Taken aback, he let her slide to the floor. "It isn't? I'm certain I didn't forget our anniversary--"

"You didn't." She drew back slightly, a secretive smile on her face. "Let me give you a couple of hints. I'm still a bit hungry."

"Okay. I can fix you something else to eat if you like. Or you could go stone form for a couple of hours? I don't mind."

"That was the hint, you dork." She scowled at him. "And no, I can't." She stared at him with an air of expectation.

For a long moment, he wracked his brain trying to figure out what exactly she was saying. Then it struck him. She was hungry. She couldn't go into stone form. He drew back and stared at her perfectly slender waist.

"Are you..." He couldn't complete the thought. He was being an idiota...

But her face wreathed in a smile. "Yes!"

He laughed and whirled her around in a circle. They were going to have another baby. Almost as good, his wife could make a killer pair of stockings and the sexiest teddy he'd ever seen.

Definitely just as good as that; their daughter was at her uncle's house for the night... yep, Abaddon unquestionably liked celebrating.

About Shannon Phoenix

Shannon always wrote stories after she learned how to read and write. She watched the characters take on their lives within her mind, and began to write down what they were doing. She would write the stories and then let them go. But a few years ago, she got caught writing those stories. You know... those stories.

To her surprise, the person who found her stories loved her characters as much as Shannon did. She tentatively allowed others to read the stories, as well, and it was from that first foray into the scary world of letting others read her 'little tales' that Shannon Phoenix Books was born.