It did not take long for Angela and Sister to clean off the table and wipe off all the pudding-smudged hatchlings. Soon they were all barreling up the round staircase to the courtyard, where the rest of the clan were already assembled.
"Who are Coldstone and Coldfire?" Orion asked Broadway as they hurried.
"They are my older brother and sister," Broadway explained happily, "They have been away from the clan for all this time and now they've come home!"
"But why were they away?" Sister asked him, "What were they doing all this time?"
Broadway shrugged.
"Trying to capture Coldsteel," he explained, a distinct tone of bitterness on the name.
"Who's Coldsteel?" Orion asked, "And why does he need to be captured."
"He was a member of the clan who went bad," Broadway explained in a low dark voice, "And now he's finally been captured so he can't hurt the clan anymore."
Orion was wondering what this wicked gargoyle must have done to warrant Coldstone and Coldfire leaving their own clan for years and years, just to chase him down. It was an unnerving thought and he was reminded of Demona, the evil gargoyle sorceress they had learned about at Halloween. Orion couldn't help the sick feeling in his stomach as he thought of his own beloved elders and siblings and imagined a scenario of any of them going so bad that they had to be banished from the clan or locked up forever. How could such a thing happen?
"Hey!" Sister whispered to Orion, "Don't you remember the story from Halloween?"
"Of the evil gargoyle sorceress that had to be banished from the clan?" Orion asked in dismay.
"No!" Sister replied, rolling her eyes, "Of the cyborg with three souls locked inside. Don't you remember? Alexander said its name was Coldstone!"
Sister was right! Alexander had told them the story of how he was made to use his pure magic to undo the flaws of the sorcery that had created Coldstone. Xanatos had designed two new bodies for two of the gargoyle souls and Alexander had separated them.
"Wait," Orion whispered back, "Does that mean that Coldstone and Coldfire are-
"Robots!" Lark squealed excitedly as they reached the top of the stairs and peeked around the corner at the imposing figure of Coldstone. It stood taller than any of the living gargoyles surrounding it, with shining wings of titanium that were the shape of a gargoyle's but did not fold or hang properly. Its mechanical arms looked powerful, but didn't have the natural curve of flesh and muscle. The living part of Coldstone's face had once been handsome, but was now eerie in its helpless captivity. Its fierce, living eye glanced around the courtyard with a strange urgency that made Orion feel butterflies in his stomach, while its cold mechanical eye stared forward with no emotion at all. At Coldstone's side stood a smaller robot, its metal wings blocking the hatchlings' view of its frontside. Lyndon and Lark bounced about excitedly at the sight of them, but most of the others looked quite uneasy.
"Remember," Angela told them gently, "No matter how strange they may appear on the outside, it is your own uncle and auntie on the inside."
Orion shared a skeptical look with Sister, but he pledged to himself that he would not embarrass the clan by being a coward or failing in hospitality. Even if the guests were not really gargoyles at all, but cyborgs ensouled with the spirits of his dead ancestors. He took a deep breath and was the first of the hatchlings to take a step toward the grownups, when the sound of Coldstone's deep, mournful voice stopped him dead in his tracks.
"How I had hoped to see my brother again!" he lamented.
"Goliath is in another city with our friend, Elisa, who is really sick," Brooklyn explained, "But I know he will be overjoyed to learn that you've come home at last!"
"And where have you guys been? We've been searching for your signals for years!" Lexington exclaimed.
"We'd nearly given up hope of ever finding you!" Broadway added sadly, "Why did you never call or contact us?"
"Sadly, it was beyond our power," Coldfire explained, "We were held prisoner on Avalon."
"On Avalon?" Ophelia replied in surprise, "But who would hold you prisoner there?"
"We were held captive by the very island itself," Coldstone told them bitterly, "After we last left you, we tracked and finally defeated our wicked fugitive brother. Our first mistake was that we left him able to communicate with us. We wished to be merciful and believed that as long as we rendered his ambulatory mechanisms powerless, he would be effectively imprisoned and unable to harm us. We were wrong. We had planned on bringing him back to New York, in the hope that we might rejoin our clan at last. But Coldsteel had a different scheme in mind.
From the time you first introduced us to Angela and learned from you that the clan's children were hidden away on Avalon all these centuries, we could not stop thinking of them. Coldsteel knew of this and pretended to feel the same way. He begged us for the mercy of allowing him to meet them, just once, before he lost his freedom forever. Night and day, he beseeched us, and his pleas easily found their mark in our hearts, as my mate and I also yearned to see the clan's children for ourselves. Coldsteel claimed to have the incantation that would take us there and we allowed ourselves to be manipulated.
We found a boat and set sail into the sea. Coldsteel did, in fact, have the spell that took us into the fairy realm and before long, we saw the island of Avalon before us. We were overjoyed at the sight and even though it was day, we could see the figures of stone gargoyles on the towers and walls of Lord Oberon's great palace.
Coldsteel manipulatively pleaded that we restore his ability to move, that he might fly with us to the castle, but we did not trust him. We told him that his power would be restored only when the time came and not before.
As we approached the island, the wind picked up and we were overwhelmed by gales and dark clouds that blocked out the sunlight. One of Oberon's own minions, like a great, dark spirit that could only be heard and felt but not seen, came upon us menacingly. His booming voice threatened that no mortals were allowed on Avalon without Lord Oberon's approval and that the magic of Avalon would not tolerate any mortal sorcery within its realm.
We tried to plead our case to the being, but just as suddenly as it had appeared, the raging storm dissipated into clear skies, leaving us shouting at the sky like fools. Coldsteel laughed arrogantly at the threat, arguing that we could no longer be called 'mortals' by any reasonable definition of the word and that our machine forms were powerful, but not capable of any sorcery. Surely we had found the loophole in Lord Oberon's degree and were free to enter his realm! At any rate, we had the right to enter and see our clan's children. Hadn't we? My mate and I, with the vision of our children so close within our sights, eagerly agreed with his treachery. But Lord Oberon would not be thwarted.
Nearing the shore, Coldsteel asked again for his ability to move, and we allowed it, knowing that it would take several minutes for his systems to fully power on and hoping that would give us time to haul the boat ashore without having to worry about him escaping. But the moment our feet touched Avalon's sand, we found ourselves frozen in place among the shallow waves. For though our bodies are mere machines created by science, our ensoulment was the work of Demona's unnatural mortal magic. Forbidden from entering or leaving, we were trapped there, helpless to do anything but stare longingly at the palace and listen to the cruel cackling of our triumphant brother, who soon regained his ability to move and rowed away, leaving us for dead."
"How cruel of him!" Ophelia gasped and the others agreed. Brooklyn's eyes blazed and he looked as though it was taking great restraint not to utter some other, far more strongly worded, opinions of the cowardly Coldsteel.
"How did you escape?" Angela asked eagerly. The flesh side of Coldsteel's face was suddenly not so cold and Orion could detect a warmth in his computerized voice as he continued.
"We remained trapped for weeks before we were discovered by our clan's children. For a while, they didn't know what to make of us. We were forced to listen, still and silent, while they discussed what we might be, how we had appeared there, and whether our presence was some sort of threat to the island. They examined and discussed us for so long, we thought our hearts would break! But then Gabriel, their leader, declared that there must be some meaning to our strange appearance there and that they should seek the wisdom of Lady Titania.
What happened next was related to us upon our rescue. Gabriel bravely went to the queen of the fairies and asked for her help. Upon learning that we were not merely strange statues, but real gargoyle souls trapped within frozen machines, he pleaded on our behalf. The queen was adamant that though we were warned, we had broken the law of our own free will and had rightfully earned our punishment. She would not dispute or defy the laws of Lord Oberon.
Courageously, Gabriel then went before the ruler of the magic realm himself to advocate for us. Lord Oberon was impressed by his courage and allowed him a task by which he might pay the debt against us. Lord Oberon bid the clan to help him capture a defiant halfling, who took the form of a dragon-like creature. This beast had continuously defied his master and had snuck off to the mortal world time and time again, wreaking havoc and destroying human lives. Having returned to Avalon, Lord Oberon would have his justice and relieve the creature of all its powers, once it was captured."
Coldstone fell silent for a long moment.
"How brave they were!" Coldfire continued in her gentle tone, "To risk their own lives for us, who they had never even known!"
"They had known you in their hearts," Angela explained somewhat cryptically and Ophelia emphatically nodded her agreement.
"They had always dreamed of you and wished they could know you," she added, "Even across time and space, we are clan."
"If only it were the same for all of us," Coldstone replied, his tone returning to a dark melancholy that seemed to send a chill through Orion. The young gargoyle must have shuddered a bit or made some sort of sound that caught the attention of Coldfire, for she turned suddenly to look in his direction and gasped.
"Oh, my beloved!" she cried to Coldstone in a voice that was all the pain and joy of love at once, "Look! The children!"
Coldstone and Coldfire turned to face the shocked but curious gaggle of hatchlings.
"My friends," Brooklyn said proudly, "These are our children."
"So many!" Coldstone exclaimed in wonder after a moment of stunned silence.
"Orion, Sister," Brooklyn beckoned, "Come meet your aunt and uncle."
Still very anxious, but having sensed the "realness" of the spirits housed within the two robots, Orion approached, followed by Sister, who was far less comfortable, but still unwilling to let her brother face these abominations by himself.
"Hello," Orion greeted them bravely, "I'm Orion, and this is my sister."
"Orion," Coldfire repeated fondly, "And what do we call you, Sister?"
"Call me 'Sister'," she replied, her voice trembling as she gazed uncertainly at the strange, man-made bodies and faces that were clearly not alive, and yet somehow contained a person within them, "And these are Lyra, Micah, Lark, Lyndon, and Fleet."
The pages approached as well, a little less apprehensively, as their older siblings had gone first and seemed completely unharmed.
"Wow!" Lark squealed excitedly as she and her twin circled Coldstone, shamelessly taking in all of his visible components like greedy children let loose in a candy store, "Where does their energy come from? And where do they store it?"
"Don't ask questions like that!" Lyra hissed at them.
"But they're robots!" Lyndon replied obliviously, "They're like the most advanced robots we've ever seen! Why can't we ask how they work?"
"How would you feel if you met someone for the first time and all they cared about was where your spleen was located or what you ate?" she scolded.
"Like how we feel everytime we meet a new human for the first time," Fleet suggested.
"Exactly!" Lyra replied, "Don't act like a human!"
"Sorry," Lark grumbled self-consciously. Coldfire extended her talons toward Lark and a compartment popped open on her forearm, exposing a battery.
"No offense taken, Little One," she assured the young engineer gently, "And I have batteries stored in multiple parts of my body. I am primarily charged by the sun, just like you, but I can be charged by any standard electrical outlet, if the situation requires it."
"Awesome!" Lyndon exclaimed and the twins shared another excited glance.
"These are the pages and those are the hatchlings," Sister continued the introduction, gesturing toward the three smallest gargoyles, who were seeking shelter from the strange and intimidating "auntie and uncle" underneath their mothers' wings, "They're still a little nervous."
"I'm not nervous!" called a confident voice, and Coldstone turned around abruptly to face Bonnie, who looked back at him with wide, curious eyes.
"What's that on your back?" she asked him nonchalantly.
"It's a propulsion pod," Coldstone explained, "I cannot glide like a true gargoyle, but this allows me to fly."
"Turn it on!" Bonnie begged, "I want to see!"
"Perhaps later," Coldstone deflected, "It's very loud."
"This is Bonnie," Orion explained, lifting his little sister up so she could touch Coldfire's shining wings, "The hatchlings haven't had a name ceremony yet, but we all call her 'Bonnie' because-
"Because 'bonnie' is what she is!" Coldfire exclaimed fondly as the little gargoyle climbed from her brother's arms into Coldfire's embrace, all the while examining her closely.
"Are your eyes real?" she asked suspiciously as the lenses of Coldfire's visual sensors adjusted with soft mechanical creaks.
"They aren't the same as your eyes," Coldfire admitted, "But I can see you just the same. I can see your lovely red hair and your growing wings! I can see your strong muscles and I can even see your heart beating!"
Bonnie's eyes widened in surprise and she looked down at her own chest.
"You can see my heart inside me?!" she exclaimed.
"I can indeed," she replied and she turned to Coldstone, "My love, have you ever seen such a lovely child?"
Coldstone nodded slowly as he gazed at the brave hatchling.
"Can you see my heart too?" Bonnie asked him, still astounded by the concept of infrared vision.
"I can, child," he replied quietly, "I can see the heart beating in any living thing. I-
"Who is that!?" Bonnie interrupted. She had peered over Coldfire's shoulder and caught sight of a gruesome figure in the shape of a gargoyle, but tightly shrouded in a heavy cloth, and bound with thick straps.
"Never mind that, child," Coldfire replied sternly, "He is our enemy."
"Is he dead?" she asked in as dark and gloomy a tone as a little child can muster.
"He is as far as we are concerned," Coldstone replied bitterly.
"What does that mean?" Fleet asked impudently, "Is he dead or isn't he?"
"None of your business, is what it means," Sister chastised him and Fleet rolled his eyes at how unnecessarily complicated grownups always made things.
"Let's gather in the common room," Brooklyn urged the clan, "We have so much to talk about!"
Broadway brought dinner to serve in the common room where the clan had gathered before the fire. The pages all seemed to have gotten used to the new guests and were soon so comfortable swapping questions and stories with the long-lost kinsmen that, as the dishes were cleared, Brooklyn thought it prudent to dismiss the children back to the rookery so the adults could get a word in edgewise.
"Please, Brooklyn," Orion asked hopefully as the younger hatchlings reluctantly said their good-nights, "Can Sister and I stay?"
"We promise we won't make noise or ask any obnoxious questions!" Sister promised. Brooklyn opened his beak to respond, then paused for an agonizingly long moment as he studied the two young warriors.
"Yes," he said finally, "Yes, you should stay with the clan."
Orion wanted to cheer, but he had the sense to remain dignified at the news of his new privilege. Training as a warrior on patrol was one thing, but being allowed to attend what amounted to a clan meeting was a tremendous occasion. Sister knew it too. Her eyes were bright with excitement as she took her place on a sofa between Angela and Broadway.
It was only then that Orion noticed the absence of Adelpha. He looked around the room, checking the corner with the reading lamp where she often sat, and the padded bench beneath an arched window where she would perch to read with Goliath, when he was home. But she was not there, nor could he remember her being with the clan in the courtyard. In fact, Orion realized, he hadn't seen her once this whole evening. She had not been in the rookery to greet him when he'd finally returned from school. A wave of concern washed over him. She had been spending an unusual amount of time alone in her room since Goliath left. He knew she was missing her mate terribly and he feared for a moment that she'd been forgotten in the excitement.
"Angela, where is Adelpha?" he asked in a hushed voice.
"She's resting in her room, Ori," Angela replied.
"Why didn't she come up to see them?" he pressed, "Is she alright?"
"She's fine, love," Angela assured him with a firmness in her voice that indicated that the matter was not to be questioned, "No need to worry."
Orion thought this explanation quite strange. Wouldn't Adelpha wish to see her own long-lost rookery siblings? But he considered the possibility that she was already asleep when news of their arrival had come, or that she had grown too grieved by Goliath's absence even to visit with old friends. This thought worried him even more and he resolved to visit and check on her as soon as this meeting was over.
His excitement at being included in the adult gathering was rekindled and he settled on the floor, just beside Angela's feet, where he could see and hear everyone.
"So many beautiful children!" Coldfire exclaimed in wonder as the little ones possessed out, "I never could have imagined!"
"And all from only three mothers!" Coldstone agreed, his living eye shining with hope, "Indeed, our clan is full of life once again!"
Brooklyn smiled as he closed the door to the courtyard and took his usual place on a short stool by the hearth.
"We are," he agreed, "Filled with life and hope for the future! And so happy to have you home again!"
Orion grinned at the sentiment, though he wondered why Brooklyn didn't correct Coldstone's math.