Myths and Gargoyles by Jamie Hawke (interesting books to read in english txt) 📕

His buddies scoffed and laughed, but stopped at a look from him.

“That right?” He stepped closer, eyeing me, then turning to Red. “Sorry about before. Didn’t realize”, and, turning back to me, he thrust out a hand, “welcome to the fucking tunnels, Protector.” After we shook hands, he turned to Hekate. “I’m not saying we’re taking sides, yet, but I’ll say this—we aren’t standing in your way.”

“Boss—” one started, but shut his mouth when the guy turned his way.

“We’re not stupid enough to do that,” the apparent boss said. “Plus, I like the new kid.”

The others made confused faces, but stepped aside when he motioned them to.

“Goldi in there?” Red asked.

The man flinched at that, but nodded. “Fuck, this better be important. She’ll have my balls if you’re going in there to… I don’t know, do anything she doesn’t like.”

“We mean to hire her,” Hekate said.

This made all of their expressions change to curiosity.

“You manage that,” the boss said, “we know which team we’ll be on.”

“And we’ll hold you to it,” Red replied as we walked past them and through the doorway.

“I kinda like him,” I admitted.

“If you knew the shit he’s pulled over the years, you might not,” Hekate said, but then turned to Chris and frowned. “Then again, Chris forgave me my mis-deeds.”

Chris shrugged. “Killing, burning… all that—it was a different you.”

I turned so they wouldn’t see my disapproval. At least with Sharon, her past had been influenced by shadow magic, which I completely understood. As far as I knew with Hekate and these goons, that wasn’t the case.

We kept pushing on, checking various hideouts, going through old war rooms and whatnot that had been turned into living quarters. Not a sign of her, nor much else. It was practically a ghost town. Or, ghost tunnel place.

“Why so empty?” I asked.

“I had a hunch it would be this way,” Hekate said. “Cleared out. Taken down by the agents or off to fight in the war now raging between Myths and Legends.”

“What if she’s not here?” I asked. “Maybe she went off to fight, joined in…”

“Then we’d be fucked,” Red said. “More than likely, she’d be on the other side.”

“And you think she’ll help us?”

Red glanced my way, then shook her head. “No. Not on her own, but with a bit of persuading.”

“Meaning what, exactly?” Pucky asked.

“We find leverage.”

Elisa turned, eyes narrowed, then suddenly glanced around. “Not them....”

I was as confused as Pucky and, it seemed, Sharon, but an answer came a moment later when Pucky kicked open a door and charged in, blade out and ready. Okay, maybe not the answer—but a start to an answer.

We followed her, not sure what to expect.

“RAHHH!” a roar came, then a large form charging through and slamming into Chris. When the man turned, he was transforming into a bear! Two more men were following behind, transforming as they came.

“Fuck this,” Sharon said, going full wolf and dwarfing them as she went for the two newcomers. Hekate and the other witches had already started dealing with the first, and I was surprised to see Chris bust out a spell of his own as flames erupted from his fingers, catching on the bear.

I didn’t want to release Roar underground, so went for my sword instead. Our other teammates were faster than me to act though, with Red and her cloak darting forward, Elisa thrusting blinding light at the enemy and then boosts on us. The witches and Chris doing their part.

“Don’t kill them!” Elisa shouted as we made impact, and I turned to see Hekate actually putting out the fire on the first bear.

“What?” I shouted, confused.

“These are her bears—we kill them, she’s definitely not going to help us.”

“Fuck!” Red shouted back, darting and kicking to sweep out a bear’s legs, while seconds before she’d been ready to knife the bastard.

The still standing one roared and lunged for Pucky, who teleported past it and caught it with a swift kick in the ass. Still, it managed to get Red and slam her against the wall. Goldi or not, I wasn’t about to let the bear hurt Red, so I prepared to slice the beast.

“I’m not getting involved,” a voice said, and everyone froze.

We spun around to see a woman with a look of a dark-haired Madonna stepping out of the shadows. As much as they’d said her name came from her ability with locks and not her hair as the legends claimed, I found it humorous that she was wearing bracelets of interlocked gold chains.

“Just one job,” Red said, pushing the bear off of her, standing tall as if the fight had never happened. “The Golden Goose.”

Goldi scoffed. “You’re out of your damn mind. Nobody can get to it, nobody—”

Ali Baba held up the golden feather, and Hekate waved her hand, causing golden light to swirl above it, leading off to our left.

“Shit, you…” Goldi stepped forward, reaching for the feather.

“Not so fast,” Red said, knife closer to the bear’s throat.

Ali Baba moved his hands and the feather was gone. A simple sleight of hand, definitely more trick than magic, but still, impressive.

“Let him go, bitch,” Goldi said. “You should’ve known the moment you showed me the locator spell, I’d be in.”

“Had to have insurance,” Red said, pushing the bear away.

“Wait, so… she’s in?” I asked.

Goldi turned my way. “Who’s the new boy?”

“Man,” I corrected her.

“Protector,” Red corrected me.

I nodded, standing tall.

“No shit?” Goldi smiled, seductively. “He claimed yet?”

“We’re with him,” Pucky said, horns starting to glow as she stepped toward Goldi. “So back the fuck off.”

Goldi held up her hands and laughed. “You ever get bored of them and wanna become a fourth bear, let me know.”

“Fourth…?” I said, then looked at her three bears, realizing they had some sort of golden chains around their necks that matched her bracelets. “They’re your slaves?”

“Willing,” Goldi countered, a bit too fast. “They can leave whenever they want to. But as long as they’re with me, they do what the fuck I say, when