All the characters appearing in Gargoyles and Gargoyles: The Goliath Chronicles are copyright Buena Vista Television/The Walt Disney Company. No infringement of these copyrights is intended, and is not authorized by the copyright holder. All original characters are the property of R. .

Winds of Change

Chapter Twelve

Goliath dragged his wings through the night sky in an ever increasing rhythm. He came as close to truly flying as any gargoyle had in his haste. Elisa needed him. That was the one driving thought that pounded at his brain. It beat at him with every painful thrust of his wings. The thought of her in serious trouble spurred him onward to greater effort even as his wings strained to keep him airborne. His mighty wings faltered in their struggle just as he reached his target. The landing was not graceful, nor was it without some pain and scrabbling. He hit the railing and hooked his arms over it praying that he did not hit the ground. The talons of his feet dug into the wall and he hauled himself over the rail.

As he gained his feet he noticed several things at once. The glass door was standing open. It was horribly bent in its frame. There was broken glass everywhere and the apartment was devoid of light. Silence was the last and most prominent thing he noticed. His mate's dwelling was as silent as a tomb.

Cautiously, he stepped toward the entrance. He was ever mindful of the crunch of the glass underfoot. It sounded, to his ears, like thunder in the profound silence of the night. He was almost certain that anyone half a block away might hear it. His eyes, eyes made for nocturnal life, picked out the details of the room as he entered the apartment. The coffee table was smashed, the easy chair was turned over and the lamp that normally sat near it was in pieces on the floor. There were deep gouges in the carpet that could only have been made by talons.

Eyes flaring white, he caped his wings and knelt to inspect those gouges. He was sure they were fresh. Turning to the lamp, he carefully lifted it and looked it over. Blood coated the jagged section that had sheered off near the top. As he looked closer, he noticed there were bits of hair matted into the blood; red hair. Demona, he thought with an outraged snarl.

As if on que, his ears picked up a faint scraping sound from behind. His head snapped around and his eyes focused on a shadow that separated itself from the others. Too late, he attempted to block the swing that was aimed at the left wing strut wrapped around his shoulder. He heard the crunch of bone snapping the instant of impact. The blow tore a cry of rage and pain from his chest even as he rolled away from his assailant. His left arm and wing had gone blessedly numb from the shoulder down.

Smooth blue gargoyle legs and feet were the first things to emerge into the moonlit room. He noticed the anklet first. She stepped forward with a determined look on her face, the fireplace poker held high. Demona staggered toward him, one side of her face slick with blood. From the look of the wound, the lamp had caught her tiara and torn her ear and a sizable section of her the side of her face away with it. A grotesque flap of flesh dangled from her jaw. She looked like something straight out of a slasher movie. Elisa had done that, he knew it as surely as the sun would rise at dawn.

With a growl of renewed rage, Goliath pushed off the floor and tackled the female. He tore the poker from her grip and cast it aside like a twig. Pinning her to the floor, he glared at her in open fury. This female had caused him nothing but heartache and torment for as long as he could remember. She had rebelled against gargoyle custom in their youth and learned magic from the arch mage. Long before that, she had defied their rookery mothers and fathers. She went out of her way to cause trouble for the humans of Castle Wyvern. Her excuse was always the same; 'these cliffs were our home ages before the humans built their stone fortress'. He had grown tired of hearing those words. For a time, she had seemed to settle down and he had fallen in love with who she had pretended to be. Then she had begun to complain about Hudson's leadership, his age and even what she viewed as weakness. Once Goliath was raised to leader, she had seemed to settle down once more and he had appointed her his second. He realized now that appointment had been the mistake that had cost him most of his clan.

Glaring at her now, he did not know what he had ever seen in her. It was blazingly obvious that she had never been fit for leadership in any form. He knew now that she had never been fit to be his mate. There had been wisps of doubt in his heart when he had withdrawn his mating pledge, but he saw them for what they were now. Those doubts had been his heart's last desperate plea to hold onto the final piece of his former life, nothing more. By the dragon, he thought tiredly, what in the seventh level of hell made me believe I ever loved her?

Finally the taboo was broken, and he blinked. In reality it had only lasted mere seconds, but to his mind, he had relived a good portion of his youth. Now he thumped her head against the hard floor roughly and snarled, his words a bellow, "Where is Elisa?!"

Demona met his glare with disdain. The answer she gave was not the one he wanted, "I should have shattered you while you slept a millennium ago."

"What have you done?!" his voice was almost a desperate plea as it rose an octave.

"What have you done? You rejected me, cast me aside for a human?! Oh and not just any human, a half Fae bitch who tried to incinerate me!" Demona raged at him and watched the white fire of anger bleed out of his eyes. She continued in a hard voice of disgust, "You're weak, Goliath, foolish... You were never fit to lead the clan. That's why you left the clan's eggs, our egg! You left our Angela alone to be raised by humans."

Goliath's anger reignited at her accusations. Every word gouged into his heart with a razor's edge of truth. He had done what any sane gargoyle would have, entrusted the future of his clan with those who would ensure their survival. In that moment he had lost everything. A single gargoyle could not have raised thirty-six hatchlings alone. He had no way of knowing in that time that there were other gargoyle clans scattered across the globe. If he had, his decision might have been different. The clan's children might eventually have seen him as responsible for the massacre once they learned of it, however. He could have been outcast by the very children he meant to raise and protect. No, his decision had been the best one. The eggs had been spirited away to Avalon where they had grown strong and healthy beyond the reach of the conflicts of the world.

"My leadership and decisions of the past are not at question," Goliath's voice had taken on a deadly quite tone. He barely resisted an urge to wrap his hands around her neck and snap it. "Now, once again, demon, where is Elisa?"

Demona gasped at his words. She searched his face and saw only pure and blinding hatred for her in his eyes. He had called her 'demon' and not Demona. There was a great deal of significance in the subtle change. He had denounced her and withdrawn his mating pledge nearly a year ago, but she had refused to believe he hated her. Now that hatred blazed down at her and his words cut deeply into her soul than she ever dreamed possible. Her voice, when it came, was barely more than a whisper as she glanced at his limp left wing, "I've done what the clan should have done before raising you to leader. I've taken the skies from you."

Rage, resentment, torment all mingled together in his heart. He would not hit her, would not abuse her in any way. It was not in his nature to deliberately harm a female of any race if he could avoid it. The anger broke in a roar and he put his fists through the floor on either side of her head.

"Oh, I'm sorry. Did I forget to mention that I've taken your human whore from you as well?" she asked sweetly as she squirmed beneath him.

The anger snapped and one of his hands closed around her throat, but did not squeeze. He wanted to frighten her, he was not above intimidating a female if he must. The realization struck him that he might not be above hurting this one if it meant saving his mate. That notion settled a new stone into his heart.

"Are you going to kill me now? Become the beast the humans believe you to be? Oh please try...," Demona pretended to plead and then laughed in his face. There was a hysterical edge to her voice. They both knew no matter what he might do to her, she would rise again. She always survived.

"No...that's what you want, what you truly want, isn't it? You long for death, but it will not be at my hands." Goliath half growled, half whispered as he released her.

"Foolish as ever," Demona hissed as she drew something from her belt and thrust her hand toward his side as he began to move away from her.

Goliath caught the glint of metal in the moonlight out of the corner of his eye. Dulled though his reflexes where from the pain in his wing, he still managed to catch the blade before she stabbed him. He grunted in pain as the blade slipped completely through the palm of his hand. Blood ran down the hilt even as he closed his hand around it and jerked it from her grasp. The blade had missed his side by bare inches as it tore through the back of his hand.

"My death will not be at your hands this night, Demona," he growled at her as he hauled her to her feet and pushed her away from him forcefully.

"Are you certain of that, my love?" she spat as she backed away from the behemoth. "Truly?"

Goliath blinked and glanced down at the knife protruding from his hand. He grasped the hilt and with a grunt, jerked it out of his burning flesh. He cast it aside as a wave of dizziness washed over him. In the next instant he staggered and put his unblemished hand to his head.

"What have you done?" he hissed, his tail thumping the floor in agitation as he tried to steady himself.

"Merely a sedative. I want you to live with the knowledge that you could do nothing to prevent your human pet's death." Demona purred as she slowly circled him.

"Where is she? I will not allow you...to harm her...," his speech was slurring from the affects of the drug.

"You will never find her, at least not in time. What does it matter? Elisa Maza will be dead by noon tomorrow and there is absolutely nothing you can do to prevent it." Demona purred once more as she came to a stop before him, just out of reach. "I hope your mind rots with the knowledge that you brought this upon her."

Goliath made a grab for her as she backed further out of his reach and missed. He overbalanced and fell forward like a collapsing mountain. The sudden full bodied impact with the floor thundered through the room and forced the breath from his lungs with a grunt. The world swirled around him in a sickening kaleidoscope and he squeezed his eyes shut. With each act of torment Demona performed on his senses, she slammed another nail into the coffin that held all his memories of their 'love'. He did not think he would ever be able to allow her to return to the clan. Even if she somehow became a saint, the thought of her rejoining them sickened him.

The world seemed to flicker in and out of existence for him. He thought he heard Elisa call his name once. Images passed before his eyes long moments before his mind could grasp what they were. Demona had dragged Elisa past him, of that much, he was certain. He caught a glimpse of her tear stained, frightened face before his world finally went black.

/

Demona did not wait to be sure if Goliath was still breathing, she made her way back to the detective's bedroom. The woman was still semi-unconscious across the bed on her stomach. Her hands were pinned behind her back with her own handcuffs. A livid bruise was forming on the right side of her face where the gargess had been forced to punch her. It had taken an act of will not to take her head cleanly off her shoulders after the woman had hit her with the heavy lamp. Her tiara had gone sailing off into the room somewhere along with a piece of her scalp. The lamp had slid down her face upon impact and torn a flap loose along with her ear. The healing affects of the immorality spell would only fix that if she managed to close the wound. Until she did so, it would continue to bleed.

Leaving the woman on the bed, Demona ventured into the bathroom just off the bedroom. She flipped on the light and began rummaging for bandages. It did not take her long to find what she sought. With a great deal of care and hissing from pain, she managed to pull the offending flap of flesh back into place. After that, it was just a matter of binding it with gauze and the ace wrap she had found. She glanced at herself in the mirror once she was finished and realized she looked like a demon with a toothache. Groaning at the analogy, she flicked the light off and headed back toward the woman who was beginning to stir.

Reaching down, Demona hauled Elisa roughly to her feet. "Come, detective. You have an appointment with destiny. Let's not keep the good doctor waiting."

/

Elisa was instantly alert when she was roughly jerked to her feet. She struggled weakly against the cuffs that bit into her wrists; her own cuffs. Demona's talons bit into her upper arm near her elbow as she was shoved toward the door. The world was surrounded by a halo, her vision not quite stable as she staggered down the hall toward the livingroom.

Glancing to her right, she gasped as she saw Goliath's massive form sprawled out between pieces of ruined furniture. She called to him, her voice choked with sudden tears. His eyes rolled toward her, the expression on his face blank, slack from whatever drug Demona had pumped him full of. His left wing draped over his shoulder at an odd angle and she feared it might be broken. He reached for her weakly before he slumped back to the floor. Unconsciousness claimed him completely in that moment.

"A pity he won't be able to rescue you this time. He will sleep until sunrise. His wing will be permanently ruined. He will never glide again and he has you to thank for that. If only you had not corrupted his heart, he might have...," Demona paused as she shoved Elisa forcefully out the broken balcony door. "Well, it doesn't matter. What could have been will never be now. He will mourn your death. Then, one night very soon, he will rue the night he laid eyes on you. It will take time, but he will come to realize that you are the reason the skies are forever more denied to him."

"You're insane! You broke his wing!"Elisa snapped, still too weak to struggle against her captor.

"Yes, I broke his wing! I would break the other wing if given the chance," she snatched Elisa up around the middle and leaped over the rail. "Now be quiet unless you wish to become a smear on the street below."

The sudden drop forced the air from Elisa's lungs. She closed her eyes and braced for an impact with the ground that never came. The sound of Demona's wings snapping open in the wind encouraged her to open her eyes again. In a matter of seconds they had gained a good deal of altitude. No longer were they at a survivable height from the ground. The gargess took them high above the skyscrapers. A fall from such a height would be fatal. The detective considered struggling for half a heartbeat. She discarded the idea in favor of survival.

/

Goliath's mind swam up to the surface of reality well before dawn. He glanced at the night sky and realized dawn was at least a couple of hours away. A sigh of relief escaped him before the memory of Elisa being roughly hauled out of her apartment came to his sluggish mind. He was sure it had been real. The scent of her soap and the musk that was uniquely her still lingered on the still air. Demona had taken her hostage. He needed to contact the clan. There was no time to waste.

Pushing himself up on an elbow, he checked the communicator around his neck to be sure it had not been smashed in his fall. It seemed sound as he turned it over and activated it. His voice, when it came, was shockingly weak. The drug his former mate had coated the blade with still held sway over his great strength.

"Demona has taken Elisa. I...cannot follow... My wing...Demona broke my wing...," Goliath whispered the last into the small mic in a pained voice.

"I'll bring Lex and the doctor. We'll come get you. Brooklyn, Broadway and Hudson tore out of here in search of Demona as if she were Satan himself." Xanatos' voice crackled over the earbud with a burst of static.

"Why are you...," Goliath began and the human male interrupted him.

"I always monitor patrol communications, Goliath. I never know when one of the clan might need help of the steel clan variety. You have to admit, they tend to get themselves into more trouble than they can dig themselves out of." Xanatos snarked.

Despite himself, Goliath heaved a great sigh of relief as he attempted to push himself up onto his haunches. For the first time since the clan had been reinstalled to their ancestral home he did not feel as if the billionaire was intruding into clan business. In fact, little by little, the man had been proving his worth. He had managed to regain a sizable portion of the big clan leader's trust over the last couple of years. Not an easy task by any means considering his past betrayal. Now, he realized, the man had somehow become...clan.

A faint chuckle escaped Goliath's lips in the face of everything that had befallen him in the last hours. He felt as if his mind was teetering on the edge of sanity. To believe Xanatos could ever be considered clan he must truly have lost his mind. The irony of it all was that without Xanatos the clan would still be collecting moss, as he had so eloquently put it some years ago. Even with his betrayal and redemption, Goliath had come to value his reliability to say nothing of his resources. Now he was once again proving himself to be a valued ally. Perhaps, in time, the man might claim a place of honor among the clan, Goliath thought ruefully. Time...there was so very little of that just now, he realized as he glanced out the broken door toward the horizon. Dawn was coming...

/

So ends Season One of Winds of Change...

More to come in Season Two.

Will Xanatos and Dr. Sato reach Goliath before dawn? What diabolical plans does Demona have in store for Elisa? Will the rest of the clan catch up to Demona before she delivers their friend to the mysterious doctor?

Find out in Winds of Change: Season Two...