The Grotesque

My scaly flesh is hard as stone. A natural armor. I have always had a tough exterior. But I fear I have reached the point where I will petrify completely and be arrested in an eternal prison of stone if I do not cast off my armor before it is too late. I feel my soul, like a firefly trapped in a jar, buzzing about, and smashing against my concrete ribs—encased in a dark stone prison. I feel my essence suffocating and gasping as I become solid.

Evil words echo from the flying buttresses and stained glass. The dust of betrayal flies from men’s mouths in the atriums and plazas. Like a forge and hammer, the words buffet my flesh. From the confessional, the whispers of sin slither up along the vaulted ceilings, then steaming to vapor, seep through the open axis, whistling past the great bells, smacking my face like an acidic dew that burns. The burning of hatred, the stench of decomposing souls, animates my stone heart—an engine of courage that opposes frightful drafts from hell. The fourteen-hundred-degree heat of jealousy hardens like a forge. The vengeful blows blunt, flatten, and bevel my hard edges. 

My cells are the repurposed skeletons of coral, forams, and mollusks. Calcite and aragonite paste cement the joists of my ribbed wings. Reheated again and again by evil deeds and evil words, my armor is quenched in cooling water, steaming with the dross of rancor. The rains run off my back. I grip the hilt of my vorpal blade in two hands and lean over it, stony-eyed, looking past it over the city.

Perched over Rouen, I see everything. But nothing touches me. Between Paris and the sea, I am the guardian and protector of all that is set upon by evil, the oppugner of every evil thing that prowls the shadows.

I have received word from Romanus that the Union will be called forth from the shadows to hunt some vile beast that has crawled out from the depths of hell. It is my business to send the demon back. But I will not work for free. This time, I have a request for the ancient mage. After an eternity of service—a one-way conscription from the heavens—I have served—truly served—what seems an eternity. And now, I wish to bargain for a reward. A chance, for once, to know kindness rather than the self-absorbed grasping of groveling malcontents and slinking malignancies. To know her, face-to-face.

I watch her in the square at the Place du Vieux-Marché farmer’s market. She strolls through, almost skipping in the fresh morning light, and collects a baguette in her basket, two plump fresh tomatoes, a sharp block of cheddar, some olive oil, a half dozen carnations, and two bars of dark chocolate.

Rebecca, the beat of my stone heart, my Cherie. My temptation. She is mah fee in the morning when she leaves her mum to go for groceries. She is Becky to the food vendors in the square, who smile and offer her their best. She is Babz as she tends to her tables and delivers drinks at La Couronne, surely one of the finest restaurants in all of Normandy, dating back to 1345. In each light, I see her, alighting, and lighting up the faces of all she meets, courteous, exchanging pleasantries, giving sincere praise—What lovely flowers, Dauphene… such fresh goat cheese, Pierre—brushing off the dust of baseness like a housekeeper dusting away evil and drawing the curtains to bring in a brilliant, clean light.

Though the nights in Rouen are stunning with the Cathedral Notre Dame lit like a witch’s pyre, the dark of night enchanted by the endless strings of lights strung and shining off row-after-row of timber-framed houses. The clicking of heels on cobbled streets. The echoing of laughter down the alleys. Yet it is the mornings that are most special to me.

Nonetheless, even as I marvel at Rebecca and the good nature that morning brings, I smell, hear, feel, even taste the foul stench of a hoarding creature, a green-eyed monster, whose ravening appetite and corrupting spirit is infecting the square.

Left unchecked, it won’t be long before a girl is burned at the stake.

* * *

In the great fall, there were two sets of fallen creatures. The Dark Angels fell to hell and though Enoch interceded, their fate was sealed. 

But there were also the Watchers who were conscripted to stand guard over man. I was one of these. We are the most ancient. And our fate is less certain. It is believed, and I believe, some of us have lived up to our oath. 

Alas, it is also the case, as well you know, that some of my kind could not resist the temptation of human women—as I have, all these many centuries—and they fell too. Terrible as their betrayals were—with worse consequences—the Nephilim, the Flood—it cannot be said that they gave in to a small temptation. 

The forbidden union of fallen Watchers and fair maidens gave rise to both the Biters and the Reprobates. These are demigod cousins, half-breeds, born from the same parentage. Biters are monstrous beasts. They possess the energies and magic of the angelic host, mixed with the corrupted rotting core of lustful, envious men. The stuff of folklore and fantasy. Of this group, Gargouille is one of the worst.

As for the Reprobates. This group resembles man in all aspects but possesses a touch of divine agency. These are the fair people: the mages, witches, augurers, and mavens. Romanus is one of these.

A group of us pure hearts—the Union—sprung up. A group of Watchers, Dark Angels, Reprobates, and even a few Biters, all committed to dispatching evil, rather than reveling in it. 

Yet, in eleven centuries, Gargouille has risen from the shadows time and time again. Often subdued, but never dispatched. He feeds on man’s greed. He is the spirit of all that glitters in the eyes of man. 

Gargouille slithers off the banks of the river Seine into Roumare Forest. I can smell his skunksulfur sweat from the cathedral. He flares his muzzled lips to reveal rows of teeth with calcified tartar and corral, teeth the size of nightmares. He scans the landscape. Snorting and sniffing with his wet nostrils, he sees something stirring in the bogs among the beeches, oaks, and black pine. A litter of hogs, kept by a local artisan. The perfect meal after such a long slumber.

He chortles and churrs with delight as he smells the tender flesh of the piggies and anticipates his meal. 

He slinks through the stink of the bogs. 

Weak. Oh, so weak. 

But soon he will feed and grow stronger. 

Soon he will be at his full strength. 

Soon he will hunger for larger game, treasure rooms, mountain vaults, and emerald palaces. 

For those most sacred treasures locked in human hearts.

* * *

Romanus struts into the atrium in an emerald, green, and black plaid suit—an Italian Murano Suit of wool and linen—finely tailored to his regal and rawboned build—all elbows, knees, and shoulders. He leans on a long gold-knobbed cane of glistening silver that he clicks heedlessly as he comes. 

He climbs the right-hand tower, where I am perched. His face is draped in a regal beard, with a thin moustache, and a pointed Barbe Espagnol. His ears are slightly pointed, and his eyes have a green halo around the irises. A dead giveaway for a sorcerer of old.

I shake off my long slumber and stretch out my wings. Yawning so as to accentuate my beastly chest and pointed talons. I come to my full height, almost nine feet tall.

“Old man,” I say.

“My dear Gargle, I assume you know why I’m here,” he begins.

“I received your letter—you want to call up the Union—Les Chasseurs Grotesques,” I say.

“So far it is only some pigs, but you know what comes next,” he says.

“Why should I intervene? It is man’s lust that has fed the creature of envy back to health,” I say.

“Come now. You have a place in the Silver City, but I am damned. I must atone. And you are the only one strong enough to vanquish this thing,” Romanus says with a shrug.

“Have you forgotten that Dalia paid for her life the last time? We have no magnet—we would need to recruit a new magnet at the very least—”

“—And we will, we will—”

“—and Solomon Barnes was also taken in the flames. We will need a trimmer. Without a magnet and a trimmer, we have no chance of subduing the monster,” I conclude.

“Tis a problem, ‘tis, it is.”

“When was the last time you tried to recruit a magnet or a trimmer in Rouen? Do you know how few of the fairy people are left in this city,” I say.

“Well then, it is settled. I’m off to find some new recruits. And as for you—it is time to fly. Time for reconnaissance.”

“Old man,” I say, stopping him. “This is the last time.”

“What?”

“When this is over, I want you to turn me into a man,” I tell him.

“Why on earth would you make such a foolish demand,” he says, his green eyes swirling like kaleidoscopes in the middle of Ferris wheels. “You would slough off your Gargoyle’s armor—leave yourself vulnerable and unprotected—Gargle? Why?”

“I have my reasons,” I say.

“Ahh, a taste of the forbidden fruit, is it?” Romanus asked.

“It isn’t forbidden if I am mortal,” I say. “All I have to do is be willing to pay with a death.”

* * *

Rebecca and Olivier drive their Fiat along via D982 toward Roumare Forest, tracking the River Seine to the South. The operator of the restaurant has sent his head server and the chef out to the pig farmer to pick up some fresh pork and pig belly for the night’s entrée.

“I bought some Converse Sneakers for Chloé while I was in the states,” Olivier says.

“Do you think she will like it,” Rebecca asks, placing a baby sunflower in the front of her hair.

“Oh yes, quite so,” Olivier says.

“I sometimes dream of being whisked away from the busy, busy work of the day-to-day—to a cabin in a forest where all is quiet and serene. Bathing in the stream. Dancing in wooded meadows. Trapping game. Cooking from a big hearth fire. Quiet nights whistling with the sounds of the forest. Really experiencing life rather than trying to subdue it or accomplish it.”

“This is a good…” but Olivier stops in the middle of the road—midsentence—as a slinking beast the size of an elephant crawls out onto the dusty road and turns its serpentine head toward the car, all catfish whiskers and rhinoceros horns. It glowers at them with deep green eyes, framed in red burning halos.

Rebecca screams.

* * *

In the basement of the Taverne de Thor, Léo le Lutin and Henri le Nain are at it again.

Leo flips a gold coin into the air, and says, “Ahntee up, chump.” Leo is about three-and-a-half feet tall in a short green suit with coattails, donning a deep red beard, complete with a bow tie and top hat, a buckled belt, and buckled shoes. A cast iron stone pot sits next to him, full of shiny gold coins. Leprechauns are known as magnets because they attract the Gargouille with their treasure.

Henri pulls a chunk of solid gold out of his duffel slamming it on the pool table, and says, “Ayy, matey, ahm in.” Henri is wearing a Herringbone Tunic and leather chaps. He is also about three-and-a-half feet tall with a dusty beard and a pocked face marked with acne. His pickaxe lies in the corner. Dwarves are known as trimmers because they can hedge in the Gargouille from its rear due to their immense strength and otherworldly speed.

Leo stands over the pool table on a footstool and breaks the racked balls. Henri goes next and pockets three balls before missing (also using the stool, and carrying it with him as he goes).

Romanus stands over them with a pitcher of Kro beer. “Boys, I’m looking for a magnet and a trimmer.”

“You are weeth the Union, no,” Leo asks.

“We want no part of that,” Henri says. “We are out for ourselves.”

“Well boys, it is your lucky day—I can pay for your services,” Romanus says.

“It won’t be cheap,” Leo says.

“I’d expect not,” Romanus says, pouring a beer for each of them.

* * *

As I fly over the Roumare Forest, I can hear Rebecca’s screeching and sobbing. I dive toward the sound of the screams and the air fills my enormous wings, which flap heavily in the misty, musty wooden air. 

I unsheathe my sword and feel the venom of the dragon’s breath drift up like smoke from a bonfire, tickling my nostrils with acrid ammonia.

As I reach the roadway, I dive toward the Gargouille.

Romanus, his magnet, and the trimmer are nowhere to be found.

I drive my sword deep into the neck of the Gargouille but draw no blood. Instead, a ghoulish green fog leaks out from the wound and it shakes its head like a dog. I shake my wings and stab the beast over and over, driving it back into the ancient forest.

I look back over my shoulder at Rebecca, terrified, trembling in the passenger seat of the Fiat. 

As I fly off to look for Romanus, I think, I will be seeing you soon, My Cherie.

* * *

The Gargouille must have circled back, and I now see it clasping the Fiat in its talons and flying toward the center of Rouen. It is making a direct path for Le Gros-Horloge—the great clock.

I follow closely behind it all the way into the Place du Vieux-Marché. I see that the new magnet (Leo) has climbed the clock tower. I also see on the ground by Romanus one stumpy little trimmer (Henri) readying his pickax.

Romanus is divining a binding spell to pull the Fiat from the clutches of Gargouille. And as Gargouille flies overhead a magical force like an invisible barrier pulls against the small car. Gargouille pitches upward and angles his wings down, beating them furiously, but to no avail. Romanus safely brings down the Fiat by the center of the square.

Ever ravenous, Gargouille spots Leo flicking a gleaming gold coin and takes the bait, heading toward the clock tower. His wings beat the air so hard that a small drizzle of friction fire rains down and drops like hail on the roof of the Fiat.

Close on the heels of Gargouille, I unsheathe my sword and prepare for the battle of a lifetime.

I call down to Romanus, “Ready the flames and build a bonfire.”

As Gargouille pulls back to navigate the tight-cornered alley framed by Le Gros-Horloge, I thrust my sword into his belly and pin him to the clock. He snaps his jaws and groans a gruesome hawr-awr-awwrrr. Eyes are encircled by flame and a tongue of fire crispens the air and ash shoots forth from his nostrils.

“I am ready,” Romanus shouts.

I withdraw my blade and grab the creature's head with one taloned claw and aim its body like a dart, down toward the pyre erected in the central square. Gargouille flails and spirals as he falls. I rear up on my haunches in mid-air, raise my blade high overhead in a stabbing posture, sailing forward to deliver the mortschlag.

My blade slices through the beast's liver and is lodged deep in the ground, pinning the monster.

Henri is fast at work binding Gargouille’s tail to the street with a blizzard of railroad spikes. Romanus is quickly assembling and rolling large balls of hay into the circle of the pyre. And then he sends forth a bolt of flames and the pyre blazes, engulfing the creature in an inferno of orange tongues of flame.

Romanus throws a stray black cat from the alley on the witch’s pyre to appease the devil.

Rebecca and Olivier look on in shock, surely never to be quite the same again.

I draw my blade and sever the evil head from the mount of its shoulders. And so as to ensure this slithering appetite never feeds its hunger again, I fly to my old perch and with a handful of lava-like flame, mortar the severed head to the high end of the right tower. I then thrust my sword down its throat to create a rain spout.

I toss my sword away on a high parapet. I will not be needing it.

* * *

I descend to the ground, falling in slow, deliberate paths, dancing above the smoke and sulfur of the flames and the rancid dragon flesh on the pyre.

Romanus waits for me beside the circle. He slaps my but with his cane and says, “Well done, old chap—very, very well done.”

“Now fulfill your promise old man,” I say.

“Close your eyes he says…”

Stones and monuments have been used the world over as markers since the beginning of time. They mark graves. Are piled into cairns at mountain summits. From the boundaries of plots of land. Designate sacred places and holy ground. Preserve commands on tablets. They are the first and last time capsules, connecting the distant past to the limitless future. And everyone knows the finality of the words “written in stone.” 

But my future is not.

As I open my eyes, I look out at the passenger seat of the Fiat, and say “… I never guessed she’d look even lovelier with human eyes.”