Free Heart of Stone by Christine Warren Page B

awake and active. After the first few years of dormancy, we actually spend very little time in sleep. We might refer to it that way, but it’s more a sort of meditative state. A trance, you might say. We are still aware of the world around us. We can still hear what is going on, and sometimes we can catch glimpses of it as well. Not only does it ensure we will wake if a threat reemerges to menace the world, but it allows us to keep track of changes in humanity so that we understand our surroundings when we do wake. When faced with a threat from the Darkness, we cannot waste time in finding ways to communicate with our Wardens or the rest of the world.”
    “Right. So you always wake up savvy and horny. Got it.”
    Silence filled the car for a long minute.
    “That is not entirely accurate,” he rumbled, the gravel of his voice abrading against the tension between them. “We wake with much knowledge, but it does take time to associate what we know in our minds with the reality of the physical world. Like this vehicle, for instance. I knew of them, even caught glimpses of them, but this is the first time I have experienced one in this manner. It makes my knowledge much more complete.”
    He didn’t mention anything about being horny. Ella couldn’t decide if that was good or bad. On the one hand, she should be grateful not to ease on down that particular road, since all it was likely to accomplish was acute embarrassment and almost certain regret. On the other, it would have been nice to hear that he had a reaction to her even a tenth as strong as her inexplicable reaction to him. At least then, her misery would have some company to love.
    Opting for the better part of valor, she cleared her throat and watched the road. “So, um, when was the last time you … woke up? You made it sound like you were, er, summoned for a particular battle. Have you been asleep since you won that one?”
    “No, I have woken a few times since. We were summoned to battle at first when the Seven last attempted to join together, and to prevent that is our ultimate calling, but whenever any force of the Darkness gains sufficient power to threaten mankind, one or more of us will wake to fight it. The last time I fought was in your year 1703.”
    Ella paused. It took a second for that to sink in. “Really? Um, my knowledge of history is limited to knowing that was the transitional period between Baroque and Rococo, but I don’t remember learning anything special about that year in school. What happened?”
    “One of the Seven escaped its prison. It emerged in the south of England and attempted to bring the sea in to devour the land. My brother and I stopped it, but the battle lasted for days near the close of the year. Many human lives were lost to the sea before we prevailed, but we vanquished the demon and banished him again from this plane.”
    He spoke clinically, no emotion wrapped through the words, as if he recited some sort of multiplication table. Ella found herself wanting more. She wanted to know how the experience had felt to him. Had he been frightened? Exhilarated? Did the accomplishment leave him feeling proud and satisfied? Or angry and exhausted?
    He so rarely showed anything resembling emotion. Those rare glimpses of humor when he teased her, or the glint of possessiveness and hunger when they had kissed. Those were the only times she felt she understood this man-creature. The rest of the time, he might as well have been truly carved from stone.
    She just wished her hormones would remember that. It was becoming harder for her to remind them that in spite of the suit of gorgeous Kees wore in order to fit into a vehicle designed for human physical dimensions, he wasn’t really an ordinary man.
    He wasn’t really ordinary at all.
    Her brows drew closer together, and she bit back another question. She didn’t need to know what made Kees the gargoyle tick. Better to focus on the task at hand. Find out where his Warden was