Hahah. Oh, Chrissie.

(a little snippet from A Cursed Soul)
——–

“Paltry,” a man’s rich, yet hoarse voice breathed, thrusting Angela out of her thoughts and making the others stop moving. They looked to the cage, the prisoner inside still blanketed by shadows.

“So you can talk?” Nathan asked. The silhouetted figure turned his head from Angela to him, but gave no response. Nathan looked at Chrissie, shrugging at what to do.

“What’s so paltry?” Chrissie asked, hoping the question would encourage the person to speak again. Getting what she wanted, the person’s head turned from Nathan to Chrissie.

“A heart’s bisection of clemency.”

Chrissie blinked and then nodded. “I see…. Okay, well thank you for explaining…. Um, could you say it one more time, only this time without the fancy words?”

“Forgiveness,” the person started, turning his head from Chrissie back to Angela, “is worthless when only half given.”

Angela narrowed her eyes. “You read my thoughts while I was blocking them. You’re a demon, aren’t you?”

The person huffed in dry amusement. “I am not.”

Angela rolled her eyes. “Uh huh, sure.”

There was a distinctive pause, and everyone could feel the person’s eyes was burrowing into Angela. He then stood, though only slightly within the limited space he was hunched into. “Do not deride my words. I am not a demon.”

The friends blinked in surprise when a gargoyle stepped out from the shadows. It was like watching a masterfully carved statue come to life, only to have it glare down at them in contempt. The carving of its face was as hard as the stone itself, though its marbled wings somehow draped over its shoulders like cloth.

“Well, demon or not, stay out of my head,” Angela said, pushing past her surprise.

“I have yet to learn to how. Keep your mind quiet if you wish not to be heard,” the gargoyle remarked.

“Don’t tell me what to do with my own mi—”

“What do you mean, you haven’t learned how?” Nathan asked, interrupting Angela.

The gargoyle’s grey eyes looked to Nathan. “My kind do not possess an aptitude for weaving our consciousness into the minds of mortals. We have not even the power to speak. The General forced changes within me that altered my hereditary construction so that I may have instruction of speech, as well as clairvoyant insight. She had yet instructed me how to control it.”

“Yet I see she wasn’t cheap with your vocabulary,” Chrissie commented.