Reunions, Plans, and a Little Valentines
by Inspirationbynight
A.N. /.../ --means not in English. This chapter takes place during February of 1997. Fic #5.
Disclaimer: I do not own Gargoyles, Greg Weisman does as does Disney and Buena Vista, etc.
Reunions, Plans, and a Little Valentines
by Inspirationbynight
Demona checked herself over as she was in the habit of doing after transforming back to her true form. Lily watched with reserved amusement, having taken the form of a young Latina woman in service to Dominique Destine before they had left the United States.
"Alright, what are we doing here?" Demona asked impatiently, waving at the base of La Malinche.
"We're looking for an opening," the disguised fay replied, holding up two flashlights. "A secret passage way. Despite the centuries, the marker should still look like a gargoyle's head."
Giving Demona a challenging look, the two females began searching around the base with care.
Flashback
Aztec Empire 1518, Early Morning.
Pushing her hip-length black hair behind her, the Aztec woman raised her brown arms towards the nests of gargoyle eggs. /"I apologize for the delay in your hatching/," she whispered.
Her black eyes glowed an eerie green and that same green flashed as a blinding light for only a few seconds. The rest of the palace help was fortunately busy with the preparations of greeting who they thought was Quetzalcoatl returning.
/"But tonight is not a good night to greet the world."/
/"Sacnite! Witch, where are you?"/
The dark woman turned towards the grating male voice with disdain. The rookery was not a good place to be found. As quietly as her sandals would allow, Sacnite left the rookery and its inhabitants.
A few hours later...
/"To the Temple of the Moon! Crack one egg and the gods will rewrite your birth into one of the Unlucky Houses!"/ Sacnite ordered to the group of men who were carefully loading wagon. Sacnite fingered the string of colored feathers that decorated the collar of her sleeveless shirt, a habit she developed when she first took her mortal roll among the Younger Race.
Once the eggs were set to travel, Sacnite pulled aside one of the young men that guided the load.
/"I will meet you in the temple at dawn,/" she whispered gently in his ear.
Pretending to adjust the blanket-like top around one shoulder, the short-haired youth answered/"You have not been wrong before, Priestess, but what if Queztalcoatl has returned?"/
/"As you have said, I have not been wrong before/," Sacnite said with a slight narrowing of her eyes. /"Montezuma no longer believes the Guardians are of use, but the gods themselves placed them before us."/
The youth nodded, not daring to speak himself for fear of Sacnite's wrath more than being made as a gift to the gods. /"I will see that all is ready."/ He left quickly to catch up with the traveling load, looking back to see that Sacnite had disappeared.
/"Stop!"/ Sacnite cried out to the invading pale men. One with a musket, actually hesitated before returning to his chipping at the stone form of a 'demon'.
/"What is she babbling about Hernan?"/ Beardless asked his musket-hammering friend.
/"Most likely how we are taking the gods away from them,/" Hernan answered without pausing this time. /"Ignore her and finish the job."/
But Hernan's beardless friend had been replaced by an Aztec. Hernan looked around for his companion before his eyes fell on Sacnite. /"What did you do witch?"/ Then two Aztec-looking men stood in the room. Their faces expressed the shock and horror of the other's condition before they ran out of the room babbling incoherently.
/"Let the fate you spread take you with the first wave,/" the raven-haired magic-user wished them before surveying the ruined room. Her hard demeanor softened as she took in the site of the stubbed gargoyle the invader's had not finished. /"Forgive me,/" she whispered. With glistening eyes she pushed the ruined gargoyle's form onto the floor.
Present
"I've found it," Demona claimed, gliding down to Lily. They walked a rocky distance, having split up to cover more ground.
Lily aimed her flashlight at the spot Demona indicated and studied the worn out rock. Checking her wristwatch, Lily nodded to Demona and stood back. There was still plenty of night left.
Aztec Empire, 1518 Nightfall
Savage roars exploded throughout the palace without warning. The guards stationed near the throne looked at each other in silent question as to what had made the sound.
/"Weren't the foreigners supposed to take care of them?"/ one spear-wielding guard asked.
/"Supposedly,/" another guard agreed.
Inside the room, Sacnite pleaded for the leader Cuauhtemoc to flee. /"This invader has already gained the alliance of the other tribes. The people are turning to them to avoid being killed, if the invader tells them to hunt you, they will! Think of the eggs!"/
/"Where are they?"/ asked an elder black female who resembled a snake.
Quickly, Sacnite told them what she had done and how she had come upon the foreigners destroying them on Montezuma's orders.
The former gargoyle leader also named Montezuma, shook his head in anger and shame. He placed his dark brown taloned hand on Cuauhtemoc's fern green shoulder. /"We will lose the eggs as well if we try to take vengeance now. We have already lost family and our beasts."/
Cuauhtemoc's bushy yellow tail lashed out behind him. /"We must secure our way to the Temple."/ He began to order the rest of the clan into flanks when Aztec guards and invaders alike began to pour into the room.
Screams. Fire. Blood. Men falling from the sky. Gargoyles stuck through with spears and tiny rocks the invaders called bullets. That was the deciding factor. Invisible at the speed they were fired and fired by trained men to use these strange and terrible weapons.
/"Itotia!"/ a breast-plated yellow-gold gargoyle cried out in pain.
The butterfly-winged gargress fell from the sky with an accompaniment of arrows.
/"Chimalli!"/ Sacnite and two other gargoyles cried out to the distraught male. Sacnite fired a simple blasting spell to the ground in front of the shooters, sending earth and rocks into their sight while Chimalli's rookery siblings turned him back on course. The spell, on top of the previous work Sacnite had done that day was beginning to take its tole on her.
/"We must hurry to the Temple/," she told the red-orange female gargoyle who carried her. /"Curse this body..."/
/"The eggs must be placed elsewhere/," a beaked gargoyle male commented on Sacnite's left. /"If they are still there."//
"Don't even think it Eztli! Sacnite would not have left them in bad hands."/
/"The priestess I trust/," the blue-green beaked gargoyle said/"it's the humans I doubt."/
/"This is the last one/," Cuauhtemoc announced, gently setting the spotted egg securely deep inside the mountain's hollow spot.
/"Then you and the rest are all that is left/," Sacnite told the night-worn leader. She reassured him with a confident stance and a firm voice. /"You and the others will awaken when this is over."/ She did not have to explain what 'this' was. /"Then when you tell me you are ready, I will awaken the eggs."/
Cuauhtemoc's red-orange mate stood beside him and announced that the clan was ready. One by one the gargoyles situated themselves within the crypt Sacnite had created for them until only the former leader and present leader stood outside.
/"I do not know when it will be safe, but I will return for you."/ She held out a gold disc, reminiscent of the calender but small enough to fit in her palm and with the face of a nondescript gargoyle. /"This is what I will present to you, along with the history of how I came to find you."/
/"And how did you find us Priestess ?"/ Montezuma asked.
Sacnite smiled. /"I never left."/