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LEROY WAS ONLY GONE for a few moments before he returned from Scotland. “What’s this?” I heard Rudy say as he was deposited in the foyer above. “Well, well,” the leprechaun added. “I’m back in the demon’s house, but this time a gorgon is my hostess.” He giggled and it was malicious enough to make the hairs on the back of my neck rise. “Why did you bring me here, boyo?” he asked the phantom.
“We didn’t want you to miss out on all the fun,” Leroy replied nonchalantly. “We’ve already killed Harwood’s minions. She’s the only one left now.”
“What, you’re all too scared to face the lass?” Rudy asked mockingly. “Do you expect me to do your dirty work for you?”
“Nah,” the ghost replied in a bored tone. “A little bitty thing like you couldn’t kill the Master Archivist. She’s way too powerful.”
As I’d hoped, the leprechaun rose to the bait. “Oh, is she now, lad?” he asked. “We’ll see about that, we shall.” His little feet went into motion as he sprinted down the hall.
Leroy joined us and mimed wiping sweat from his forehead. “Rudy has gone utterly gonzo,” he whispered, forgetting that my sidekick didn’t have supernatural hearing.
“I hope this plan works,” Mirra said in a worried tone. The Hunter Elite had worked with Rudy enough times for them to count him as their friend. None of us wanted anything bad to happen to him.
“He’ll be fine,” Jonah said, waving away her concern. “It isn’t like he can actually kill her and turn even more evil than he already is.”
“Let’s go and watch,” Brandi urged with a malicious grin. “I want to see him running around on his tiny legs and chasing the gorgon all over the house.” Quin let out a small sigh, then nodded her permission. Ari did the same, clearly envious that she wouldn’t be able to join them. Leroy didn’t bother to ask me. He just left with them. The phantoms didn’t need to worry about being spotted by the Master Archivist. She couldn’t even see them and her stare wouldn’t be able to turn them to stone.
“Whoa!” Brandi exclaimed a few moments later. “That thing is freaking hideous!”
“Look at her gross body and tail!” Jonah added. “She looks like a gigantic gray maggot, but with boobs and snakes for hair.” They all laughed loudly and Ari snickered in response. Only half of us could hear the conversation that was going on above us. Harley, Pru and Mirra had to be told what was going on.
I could hear Rudy giggling maniacally as he went in pursuit of the gorgon. The slithering noises were coming closer, which meant she was heading our way. “There you are,” the leprechaun crooned when he caught sight of his foe. “My, you are an ugly one,” he added. I heard the Master Archivist turning her bulk around to face him. Rudy cast a spell at her, then sped away before she could turn him to stone.
“He covered her in glue!” Jonah said, then laughed loudly.
“What’s he going to do next?” Brandi asked, clearly enjoying the show.
Sheridan snarled as she presumably extricated herself from the glue. Pausing for a moment, she decided to ignore Rudy and to come after us. I waited until I heard her slithering at the top of the stairs before I used the gem to teleport us up to the top floor. So far, our plan was working. As long as we could keep our distance from the gorgon, we would be safe. She was already furious that we’d destroyed her minions. Adding a rogue leprechaun to the mix would hopefully tip her over the edge.
The ghosts followed our foe as she searched the dungeon. Realizing we were gone, she let out a hiss of annoyance and headed back upstairs. “Wait for it,” Leroy said, then all three spirits cracked up when she slithered into Rudy’s trap.
“What’s the matter, lass?” the leprechaun asked slyly. “Don’t you like cow manure? I hear it’s good for your complexion.”
“She’s covered in crap!” Brandi howled, laughing hysterically.
“That’s a good one,” Jonah chortled. “I hope Ari can learn that spell.”
Tiny feet carried a giggly Rudy away as the enraged gorgon stormed after him. Following the commentary of the watching spirits and the distant sounds of our nemesis, I was able to teleport us away each time she came close to finding us.
“Where are you?” the gorgon hissed, sounding more like a snake than a human now. “Face me, you cowards!”
“No offense, but no sane person would want to see your face,” Rudy retorted, then chuckled nastily as he threw yet another spell at her. Roaring in rage, she gave up on trying to find us and focused on him. “Feck!” he swore, then raced away.
My heart lodged in my throat when I realized he’d gotten himself into trouble. If he was where I thought he was, he was heading for a hallway that had a dead end. The moment she turned the corner, he would be trapped without any way to defend himself from her deadly stare.
Leaving the others behind, I teleported downstairs and called the dragon scale shield to me with Gorm’s gem. I appeared in front of Rudy as the leprechaun backed up against the wall. His forest green eyes were wide with fright. I had another sensation of déjà vu and knew what I had to do.
Holding the shield in front of me, I hunkered down to hide behind it and to protect my sidekick with my body. His hand reached out to throw a spell that I thought was intended for me, but it instead passed over my head. “You might want to turn the shield around, you fecking simpleton,” the leprechaun said with a sneer.
Realizing I was holding the shield with the shiny silver side facing me, my blood ran cold as the Master Archivist rounded the corner. She let out a bellow of pure rage as she blundered into a thick web that now stretched across the hallway, courtesy of Rudy’s spell. I cursed and turned the shield around just as the gorgon tore the web apart with her hands. I had a fleeting glimpse of her stone-gray eyes, then she shrieked in terror when she saw her own reflection staring back at her. Without her enchantments to protect her, she’d been rendered vulnerable to her own deadly spell.
Her scream cut off abruptly and I warily glanced over the shield to see my foolhardy plan had worked. Already gray from head to toe, the gorgon had turned to stone. “Yep, she’s pretty ugly,” I confirmed as I unsteadily rose to my feet.
Rudy glanced up at me malevolently, then lifted his hands to cast a spell that would probably tear me limb from limb.
“Oh no you don’t,” Ari said as she arrived with Jonah in tow. I hadn’t even heard her call the spirit to her side so she could get him to transport her to me. She zapped the leprechaun with a spell before he could cast his enchantment. He became encased in a magic bubble that froze him in place and stripped his power away.
Together, we turned to examine our nemesis. “So, that’s what a gorgon looks like,” Ari said. Taller than me by a couple of feet, Sheridan did look a lot like a maggot. Her body bulged in and out unpleasantly from beneath her bare breasts right to the tapering tip. She had a human torso, but her face was hideous and her hair was made of dozens of small snakes. They’d been frozen in the act of hissing. Their mouths gaped open to reveal their fangs and forked tongues.
Leroy and Brandi were watching from just down the hallway. They zoomed over to join us and all three phantoms high-fived each other. “That was awesome!” Brandi crowed.
“Good work on holding the shield the wrong way, numb nuts,” Jonah said to me mockingly. “The rogue leprechaun saved your ass.”
“I guess I owe him one,” I said sheepishly. I’d been so afraid for Rudy that I’d panicked and had almost gotten us both killed.
“Is it over?” Quin called from upstairs where I’d left them.
“It’s over!” Ari called back. “Go and get them, will you?” she said to Jonah.
“They have legs, don’t they?” the spirit complained sulkily, but obeyed her command and returned with the rest of our group.
They all examined the stone statue before turning to see Rudy held in stasis. His expression of pure hate hit me like a fist to the gut. “I hate seeing him like this,” I said mournfully. We had no idea how long he would remain in his current state. It was possible we might have to keep him locked up in a cell for decades.
“Why don’t we head to our base?” Quin suggested. “Ari thinks she might have a way to help Rudy transform back.”
I didn’t want to get my hopes up, but my foster daughter smiled at me confidently. “I’ll fix him,” she vowed.
“This I’ve got to see,” Jonah said, then took it upon himself to transport us all to their mansion that was two hours away by car.
