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

me and I rolled sideways, narrowly avoiding falling onto my blade. Damn, that was close.

“See, the protection charm works,” Elisa said, looking relieved. I laughed nervously and pushed myself up to fight some more.

“I just don’t get it,” I admitted.

“Imagine you’re one with the universe, one with more than nature, but the elements. The air you breathe, the water in your body, and more. Embrace it.”

My frown made it clear what I thought of this, but I tried again… and got my butt kicked again. None of this was coming as easily as I wanted it to. Being a warrior made sense to me, but being one with the water, flowing and attacking like a wave? Fuck all that. Every time I’d played games like Final Fantasy I’d gone warrior. I knew how to hack and slash, what it meant to charge in with a roar and slice my enemies in two.

Another attack came and I did my best to focus on the flow, to feel it and move as they’d told me, but in the end I reverted to my instincts, slamming Red’s sword aside and making a strike that she parried and darted away from.

“You’re still not focused,” Elisa said.

She was right. My mind was on the fact that I wasn’t seeing my family, and everything that had happened since I’d become a Protector. I’d fucking killed my childhood hero—Peter Pan! That shit wasn’t right.

To make it all worse, it was confusing. I was a Protector, in training to learn how to help protect the Myths from my own government. Essentially, they’d stabbed me with some magic blade that made it official, and now I was more on their side than humanity’s. What did that make me? Some sort of enemy of the people, and yet… how often had a large group or government persecuted others who didn’t deserve it? They didn’t understand these Myths, not like I did.

Except I really barely knew them at all. Hence the confusion.

“Let’s give Sharon a turn,” Elisa said, motioning Red out of there. “Let him get more experience against a Legend.”

“Ex-Legend,” Sharon growled, approaching me with claws at the ready. Why was it that the moment I saw her hands, I imagined myself back on that stairwell, her hand on my cock? I gulped, trying to focus, trying to clear my mind, and then she came at me.

For at least a split second, I felt that connection to something bigger than myself. It was almost like before with going into the Fae world and the sensation I’d felt when taking Excalibur to be mine, and I moved with grace and precision. Only, it faltered and I stumbled, the blade hitting magic as it nearly sliced at Sharon’s neck.

She pulled back from that, eyes narrowed with anger, and slashed at my back, tearing my clothes.

“Fuck,” I said, recovering to try again.

“You trying to kill me?” she asked.

“All I’m trying to do is learn,” I insisted.

She nodded, took a deep breath, and repositioned herself for an attack.

“You got this!” Pucky called out from the doorway to the balcony, where I only now realized she’d stepped out for a bit. That sounded like a great plan at the moment. Clearing my head with some fresh air, not putting up with this futile endeavor.

But Sharon was prowling, preparing to strike, and I had no choice but to keep training, keep trying. I wasn’t about to look like a quitter in front of my team. My sword thrust out at Sharon’s side and she pulled back, and without warning Red came in again, slashing for my arms with her sword.

The magic hit and we were both sent stumbling back. When my head cleared, I came to the realization that we weren’t approaching this correctly.

“How am I going to stand a chance against Arthur and Morganna?” I asked, lowering my sword and turning on Elisa. “This is ridiculous.”

“The how is easy—though the fight won’t be. You have us.” She gestured for Sharon to attack, but I didn’t raise my sword.

Not that Sharon cared, apparently. She moved toward me, transforming as she did. No longer was she a petite, crazy-looking lady. Instead, a werewolf stared back at me with glowing red eyes, claws at the ready, and teeth gnashing.

Her advance didn’t catch me off guard, but I was thrown by the way seeing her took me back to the convention center, to Chris. My best friend… and he’d betrayed me. I slashed out, catching her along the arm and drawing blood, and she growled, knocking me back.

“I’m sor…” I started to apologize, but she plowed into me again, the cut already starting to heal. Badass.

Again I swung, this time wanting to test her. I was careful not to go for any lethal strikes, but part of the reason they’d put me up against her was that she could handle it. And, apparently, heal.

Sharon wasn’t the same Big Bad Wolf as the original, but I started wondering if there could be any truth to cutting open the wolf’s stomach like in the fairy tale, and it living—seeing as in wolf form Sharon could heal herself. Trying to figure out what was real from those stories and what wasn’t was a mind fuck in itself, but I was starting to see the hints of what made sense.

She snarled and again I was reminded of Chris’s betrayal. I cursed as I swung my sword, trying to pull on the spirit of water, the flow of the power in this sword, but instead Sharon slammed the blade out of the way, claws going for my throat, and she had me.

I tried rolling with it, but she controlled herself, glow fading from her eyes as she flipped me over and let me fall, my sword clattering away.

Pinning me there like that, she leaned in close and said, “We’ve been here before, no?”

The image of her on the stairwell at the Con flashed into my mind, the memory of her grabbing my dick, and