Sorceress Awakening / A Gargoyle & Sorceress Tale Book 1

When Lillian finds herself facing off against demons out of mythology, help comes from an unlikely source—the stone gargoyle who has been sleeping in her garden for the last twelve years.

After the battle, Lillian learns the humans she thought were her family are actually a powerful coven of witches at war with the demonic Riven. Lillian is something more than human, a Sorceress and Avatar to the gods. The gargoyle has been her protector for many lifetimes, but when she was still a child, troubles in their homeland forced him to flee with her to the human world.

But something from her childhood has followed them to this world.

In a heartbeat, her ordinary life becomes far more complicated, and if her overprotective guardian is to be believed, there’s an evil demigoddess just waiting for the chance to enslave them both.

What? Can’t I bleed to death in peace? It probably won’t even take that long.

At least that was Lillian’s guess going by the amount of blood soaking her top and one leg of her jeans. But apparently, the leader of this strange crew was in a hurry and wasn’t going to allow her to die peacefully.

He and his men had chased her deeper into the spa’s gardens for some unwholesome purpose. In desperation, she’d sought shelter in the maze with the hope of losing them within its twisting corridors.

No such luck.

They’d followed her and now had her trapped to finish off at their leisure.

And worse, from what she’d already gathered, fate had decided the normal kind of horrible death people sometimes inflicted upon each other was going to be too mundane for her.

The strangers hunting her wanted something else.

Something impossible.

They wanted her magic.

Magic of all things.

Well, that was going to be difficult, wasn’t it?

Magic didn’t exist.

She’d seen some weird shit since they’d first accosted her in the gardens outside the maze. But the way the small ring of standing stones had flared with blue, crackling light at the first stranger’s approach? That could have been some fancy magician’s trick.

Lillian peered around the tree’s trunk to track her assailants. The leader—Alexander he’d said his name was—now stood a few feet away, studying the shadows under the redwood tree, hunting her exact location among the dense foliage of the lower branches.

Seeking deeper shadows, she shifted her weight and winced as pain stabbed through her side.
Instinctively, she pressed one hand against the worst of her injuries. The pressure only made the wound throb like a bitch.

While some of the other things she’d seen could have been a trick, the shrapnel from the exploding stone ring had certainly been real enough to make her bleed.
And she wasn’t the only one bleeding.

She turned her gaze to the rivulets of liquid bleeding down the tree’s trunk.

If the exploding ring of standing stones had been a parlor trick, they’d sure as shit one-upped themselves with the freaking bleeding tree stunt.

If the tree was a tree at all.

And what else was more than it seemed?

As a flash of insight bloomed in her mind, she glanced away from Alexander and the bleeding tree to swiftly seek out the familiar statue of the gargoyle where he sat fifteen feet away.

She studied him speculatively.

He still crouched unmoving on his stone perch with his wings mantled around him like a cloak, strength and majesty in his every carefully hewed and sculpted muscle. Could her favorite stone companion with his broad shoulders, burly muzzle, curving fangs, and deadly looking horns be more than a mere statue?

It was only as she narrowed her eyes that she noticed the strange runes glowing on his chest and arms.
Lillian shook her head, trying to clear her vision, but the marks were still there.

Perhaps the gargoyle was another kind of protection like the stone circle had been.

Could it be so simple?

Could killing these intruders be as easy as getting to the statue and triggering some protection?

What the hell am I thinking? she scolded herself. Magic? Are you admitting magic might be real?

Fuck it. She could worry for her sanity later. She needed to try something. Now. Before it was too late. She was already dead, her vision beginning to go gray at the edges. She was losing too much blood to live, but perhaps she could still protect her family.

The stone ring had done a number on Alexander and his henchmen. If she were lucky, the gargoyle would unleash even greater destruction.

Gathering her will, she straightened. Doggedly, she lurched toward the statue. The ground seemed more uneven than she remembered. Three steps later, she tripped over a piece of broken stone from the ring and fell to her knees.

As she forced herself back up, a sense of something she could only describe as powerful and old flowed through her body, guiding her movements. She surged the rest of the way to her feet and stumbled toward the gargoyle.
With a last, desperate strength, she crawled up the pedestal and over the gargoyle’s stone legs. Protected on three sides by his body and wings, she collapsed forward into his lap. She wanted to close her eyes and know no more pain or suffering—to know the peace of cold stone.

Again, those strange instincts stirred within her. All she could think to call it was power: old power, deep and familiar.

Her body tingled.

Was this what dying felt like?

Was this her soul preparing to leave?

Such a strange sensation. It didn’t seem right, dying like this. A useless death. Never to know why her world had been turned on its head.

Sleep called, wooing her into darkness. All she wanted was to answer that summons, but that old power within her insisted otherwise. She lifted her head and gazed at the gargoyle.

Her attention drifted to the strange symbols on his chest. She reached out with one blood-covered hand and touched a symbol. A flash of light seared her retinas, and her hand fused to the stone as it turned hot all around her.

She screamed in pain and terror. Both her body and the stone now glowed with a blue light.

Power danced and pulsed between them. A wave grew, about to crest. She screamed again, instinctively knowing she would be consumed if she didn’t direct it in some way.

Ancient memories sparked to life and flooded words and thoughts into her mind. With nothing else to do, she screamed the words.

“Dark Watcher, immortal servant of the Light, with my power I summon you to wake. With my will, I do claim you. Hear me and awake. Evil walks the land. Your Sorceress has need.”

At her cry, the turbulent power surged into the stone.
Darkness crept across her vision, stealing the sights of the world from her until only the gray-edged image of the brooding stone gargoyle remained.

Under her hands, the statue’s surface warmed and softened. The shadow of vast wings moved up and away as his muzzle dipped toward her face. Before fear gripped her, a warm, wet tongue brushed her cheek.

A moment later, she collapsed forward against his chest.

"This day isn’t going anything like I thought it would. Vacuum. Dust the china. Polish Gran’s sword collection. Get attacked by mythological creatures. Die in the arms of a gargoyle. Nope," Lillian mused in the last few moments of consciousness before darkness swept in from all sides. "Totally didn’t see this coming when I got up this morning."