The tips of Stanis’s wings lay against solid roof on either side of the pool, the rest of him still submerged.
“I know he doesn’t need to breathe,” I said. “But still . . . Stanis . . . ?”
While I waited for Caleb to give me his thoughts on it, I was met instead by a flurry of explosive activity from the pool itself. Stanis’s wings rose out of the liquid stone, their struggling flutter reminding me of birds caught in an oil spill. My heart ached to think of poor Stanis but was replaced by fear for my own safety when his claws broke the surface, struggling to find some kind of purchase.
“Shit,” Caleb said, scrambling off to the right side of the pool, fishing his notebook out of his jacket pocket.
Stanis’s wings twisted and turned, churning the liquid stone around him. One of them grazed Caleb, who was so caught up in his notes that he stumbled back with a grunt before looking over to me.
“We need to finish this,” he said. “I need him a little more docile than this. Actually, a lot more.”
“On it,” I said, watching the roof beneath my feet as I stepped forward, wanting to remain on the solid part of it.
Stanis’s head finally broke the surface of the liquid stone, letting out a monstrous roar. I wanted nothing more than to turn and run for the doors leading off the roof, but I held my ground. If I didn’t deal with Stanis immediately, I thought my chances of ever helping him might vanish completely.
Truthfully, I wasn’t sure how much help I would be in restraining him, but surely he was weakened from the fall.
The only solution seemed to be in the brute force of the stone I still controlled. I extended what remained of my wings out full to my sides, then pushed all my will into them as I turned their purpose from beauty and flight to that of blunt objects of destruction. The right wing looked worse for wear, and I slammed it into Stanis, pinning him back down beneath the surface of the liquid stone. Then, as much as it tore me up, I slammed the heft of the left wing over and over again into Stanis’s chest.
“Stay,” I screamed, catching my breath between efforts, “down!”
Stanis raised his arms to defend himself against the brutality of my attack. My natural strength would never have stood a chance against his raw power, but at that moment in time, my magic was powered by my raging will, and the wings were actually having an effect. Stanis struggled to rise, but with him pinned securely beneath the one wing, it was impossible.
Chunks of my wings broke away as they slammed down on him. Blow after blow drove him further and further into submission, and when little remained of the left wing, I switched to the one pinning him and continued the onslaught with it.
Again.
“Alexandra!”
And again.
“Alexandra!”
And again.
“Lexi.”
Hearing the familiar friendly form of my name, my mind snapped to, pulling myself out of my attack. Caleb’s eyes were wide, switching from me to Stanis, now motionless in the liquid stone.
“Easy,” he said. “I think he’s down.”
Not until I had stopped did I realize how crazed I was, teeth clenched, and my breath coming out in a raspy hitch. I needed to calm myself.
“Sorry,” I said. “Did I . . . ?” I couldn’t finish my sentence.
“I don’t think so,” he said. “But we need to finish this. Can you lift him?”
I looked at the torn and tattered remains of my wings.
“Maybe,” I said.
“I just need you to for a minute,” he said. “I need him standing.”
I moved closer to where Stanis lay submerged, then lowered the wings into the pool, bits and pieces of them crumbling away as I searched. I slipped their broken tips under his arms and raised him until he was standing knee deep in the pool, unconscious.
Caleb went to the edge of it and knelt, pouring the entire contents of the vial in his hand into it. Like watching sped-up footage of a lake in winter, the stone froze, once more becoming solid.
I lowered Stanis until he was lying back, bent at the knees with his legs trapped in the by-then-solid roof. I stepped away, unable to take my eyes from him.
“He’s not moving,” I said.
“I know,” Caleb said, already flipping through his notes.
“Will he be his old self?” I asked.
“Only time will tell,” he said, moving to an assortment of containers that lay near the door leading off the roof. “I need to work on that still.”
I stood in silence, watching Stanis for several minutes before I felt Caleb’s hand on my shoulder, squeezing gently.
“This may take a while,” he said. “Also, you might want to clean yourself up. You’re sort of soaked in some of that liquid stone, and it’s starting to seize up.”
I lifted my arm, the stiffness in it making it almost impossible to move. Chunks of my hardening coat broke away, but in another couple of minutes I was going to be in trouble if I didn’t get clean. I touched a spot of the stone I felt solidifying near my mouth.
“At least it stopped some of my bleeding,” I said, hobbling away toward the door.
I don’t think Caleb even heard me. He was already mixing various containers together and moving them into place around the still-lifeless Stanis. Just then, I wasn’t sure what more I’d have to say anyway.
As Caleb said, time would tell as far as Stanis was concerned.
I planned to use that time wisely—a hot shower in my old room, a change of clothes that hopefully wouldn’t involve a jackhammer, and a call I needed to make.
Judging by the strange mix of confused emotions creeping over me at present, I wasn’t sure I was ready to deal with both Caleb and Stanis by myself just yet.
Eighteen
Stanis
I awoke with my wings spread out beneath me, my head clouded with thoughts, many of which were not my own. As I stared up at the night sky, my true voice fought to make sense through the madness of the dominant one within, but when it could not, I instead drew my focus to the world around me, the location feeling familiar.
I attempted to rise, but the only movement I found possible was to sit up, and when I did, I discovered the reason for my lack of mobility.
The lower halves of my legs were encased within the stone of a roof I had known for centuries, the one where I had once stood a lone sentinel, watching over the family Belarus. No amount of struggle would release me, strong was the stonework of Alexander, even now, and as I fought to recall how I came here, the sensation of being watched overcame me.
The alchemist Caleb stood well back from the limited arc of my reach, his fingers wrapped around a still-sealed vial. He held my eye a moment longer, but when I didn’t speak or make any attempt to move, he slid the vial back within his coat and walked off to a vast array of alchemical equipment I did not recognize.
How had I come here? I could not recall. So lost in my own thought was I that it took a moment to once again feel the alchemist’s eyes upon me, and I looked to find him kneeling by his equipment, facing me.
Flame rose from a single match in his hand, and he lowered it to the rooftop. A small, thin trail of blazing green fire burned its way toward me before breaking into two and encircling the spot where I stood trapped. Small pots along the circle released a thick cloud of smoke that rose over me until I could not see anything but darkness.
The once-dominant other voice in my head cried out for action, but I was surprised to find myself able to ignore its pleas. My true self rose more and more to the front of my mind with each passing moment, until I no longer felt even the slightest trace of the other.