Luc hoped for this result, at least.
Constantine had unwittingly helped their plans. Gaston’s human had taken in at least a dozen dazed and frightened Dusters under his roof at Clos du Vie. Without a doubt the Chimeras knew about this as well. So many Dusters in one place made for an irresistible target, Gaston had reckoned. Luc had agreed and called all of the gargoyles standing with him to surround the chateau. He’d also ordered the others to leave Vincent to him.
Their monotonous wait came to an unexpected end as a clamor resounded from the chateau. It pierced the stillness of the morning, and to Luc’s right, Gaston’s wings sprang open. A second later the gargoyle shuttled into the air. He raced low to the ground toward the glass orangery while Luc held his arm aloft—a signal for everyone else to stay where they were. There must have been trouble within the chateau. Something having to do with Gaston’s humans.
Over the next minute or two, the clamor grew to a discordant mélange of screams, clipped shouts, and breaking glass. It wasn’t until Marco sank into a crouch, grunting as though he’d been punched in the abdomen, that Luc began to suspect the problem stretched beyond the walls of Constantine’s chateau.
“What is it?” Luc asked, his high-pitched shriek shattering over the quiet slopes of the vineyard.
Marco stayed in his crouch, but his scaled wings cracked open.
“You are needed here, brother,” Marco gargled low in his throat. He rocketed into the sky, and his wings melted into the coming dawn.
Ingrid. Something was happening to her, and like before, when Axia had succeeded in dragging her into the Underneath, Luc was completely blind as to what. He had followed Marco that time, but he couldn’t now. He was leading this attack. If he were to go after Marco, he would forfeit his bid for elder. A bid he hadn’t made for himself, and yet it was his all the same.
Finally, after not wanting it for so long, a position of such power made sense. No one will challenge you, Gaston had said. And if Vincent were to claim the position, no one would challenge him, either. He’d plunge the Dispossessed and all of Paris into days darker than the ones Lennier had lifted them out of centuries ago.
No. Luc had to stay here, and he had to trust in Marco. He filled his lungs, his plated chest expanding, and realized that putting his faith in the Wolf was easier than he’d expected.
The racket at the chateau had died down, but there was still something off. In the distance, the blare of whistles and the tolling of church bells were waking the city. There was something else, too. It appeared to be a dense black cloud racing toward the chateau from the direction of the city. The cloud split, created gaps, and then merged again. It swayed through the sky, and when it reached the space above the front lawns of Clos du Vie, Luc saw that the cloud was as wide as the chateau itself.
Luc hadn’t expected this many Chimeras. They circled the roof, a tornado of wings and tails, paws and talons, fur and scales. Luc searched the rotating horde of gargoyles for Vincent’s long, pointed pelican’s beak, while the gargoyles beside and behind him shook their wings with nervous anticipation. He understood his brothers’ sense of urgency but wanted to sight Vincent before moving them up and out of the vineyards. The Chimeras were swarming and spinning too quickly for that, though. The frenzy of wings spun toward the orangery, and a Chimera bashed through the slanted glass roof.
Luc was the first one into the air and fleeting across the lawns. Chimera after Chimera smashed through glass panels and poured into the orangery. Luc plunged after them, nicking his wings on the jagged entrance. He dropped through a green bower of moss and his talons cracked the terra-cotta tiles below. The electric lights in the orangery, still shining, exposed a swarm of Chimeras overhead, circling two Dusters like vultures. One of the Dusters still looked human, though his teeth had lengthened into fangs and no longer fit within the confines of his mouth. Strings of saliva dripped past the boy’s jaw. The other Duster had shifted into a ginger-furred hellhound, its clothing in tatters around its shoulders and waist.
They hissed and spat at the circling Chimeras—Vincent not among them. A snake-headed goat, its scales bright green, made the first dive. Its tail swiped the fanged Duster off of his feet.
“Stop!” Luc’s shriek blared through the orangery. It distracted the snake Chimera long enough for Luc to swoop low and wrap his talons around the tapered, fur-tipped end of its tail. He pivoted fast, slinging the Chimera into a stand of bamboo.
Above him, an eagle-winged, double-headed antelope with curled horns made a dive. A Dog gargoyle slammed into it, driving the Chimera off course and straight into a glass garden table and set of wicker chairs. Dogs, Wolves, and Snakes clashed overhead with the Chimeras, and the orangery throbbed with high-pitched caterwauls.