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The ocular nerves dangling from the base of the eye were still flesh, red and raw and dripping. The spot where they joined up with the eyeball itself was white and squishy, if inflamed; the tissue looked infected, and when I pressed my knife against it, the vitreous humor that leaked out was gray, cloudy with silt.
“That poor sweet baby,” said Shelby. “It must have been hurting so bad. No wonder it attacked us.” “Marry me,” I said distractedly, turning the eye over in my hand to study the front again. “What was that?” “Nothing.
🎉🎉🎉👰🏼💍💐
To petrify a lindworm takes something more powerful than the gaze of a cockatrice.” “I’m guessing from the look on your face right now that the venom of a Pliny’s gorgon would be enough to do the job.”
“Rules only matter if everyone understands them, agrees to them, and can be trusted not to break them. Bearing those irrefutable facts in mind, rules never matter at all.” —Thomas Price
EXACTLY. That's why I sometimes pass on the right. #sorrynotsorry
“Unless you’ve brought me a breeding pair as a peace offering . . . ?”
W . . . T . . . F . . .?
Frank shook his head. “There is no talking to you, is there? There never has been, and there never will be.” “Yet here you stand, like there’s some purpose in trying,” said Walter. “Which of us is the fool?” “Sounds to me like you are, but I’m just a monkey, so what do I know?”
#teamshelby
Following a Pliny’s gorgon I barely knew into a cockatrice coop could probably be moved straight to the top of my list of The Dumbest Things I Have Ever Voluntarily Done.
Agreed.
“Cockatrice meat can be quite tasty, and their eggs work well in anything that you’d use chicken eggs for.” “Pass,” said Shelby instantly.
“Ah.” Walter leaned back in his seat, composing his expression. His snakes kept hissing, but otherwise stood down. “My apologies to our guests.” “But not to your brother-in-law?” asked Frank.
Umm . . . That either makes Dee Walter's sister or some as yet unknown sister of Frank's, Walter's wife . . . o.O
I said, trying not to react to the revelation that Dee was Walter’s sister.
And BOOM goes the dynamite.
“I think you were tricked. If you don’t know what chicken tastes like . . . the bones are similar. It would be easy to purchase a chicken or small turkey at a grocery store, make soup, and claim that it was cockatrice. With enough wild garlic and onion, the flavor would be even more confused. You’d never know. The count in your aviary would remain accurate, and whoever hatched the plan would be free to do what they liked with the cockatrice.”
DINNER WAS SERVED AT a long table in the middle of the community’s “town square.” It consisted of root vegetable stew with unidentified chunks of meat that I suspected were either rabbit or jackalope, home baked bread, and suspicious looks from virtually everyone around us. I couldn’t blame them, considering the situation. It had probably been a very long time since Hannah had invited humans to dine with her chosen family. Shelby and I might have impeccable table manners and the best of intentions, but we were still mammals, and hence not to be trusted. Also, we smelled like onions.
“My tales do not match what you know of your own history, do they? Does your family still keep Aeslin mice?” “Yes, ma’am,” I said. It seemed best to be respectful when speaking to a gorgon hybrid whose age and capabilities were unknown to me. Respect is rarely the thing that gets you killed. “Ask them. They may have moved some of the celebrations and festivals into the background, but they will remember who he was, and what he did for the people who put their faith in him. That is the beauty of the Aeslin.”
Aha.
“So we know where the cockatrice was acquired, and better, we know that it is unlikely whoever is responsible will have access to more than one.” Hannah turned back to me as the gorgon teens returned with trays of cheese and fruit. “Are you satisfied that none of us is responsible for this horror?”
“Respectfully, ma’am, I am convinced of the exact opposite. I do believe you have not, as a community, declared war on the city of Columbus with nothing more than a single cockatrice. If you chose to break the peace, you would be much more efficient, and we wouldn’t be sitting here now. But Walter—who seems to keep his people on a very tight leash—was able to lose a cockatrice without realizing it. Dee comes and goes with impunity, and she can’t be the only one. I can’t say for sure that someone here is responsible for this. I can’t say for sure that the opposite is true, either.”
Umm . . . Unless the girl meant the "man" who claimed to be from the gorgon "community" was a hu"man" and not a male gorgon, it would have to be one of their gorgons. They've already explained how separatist they are from other gorgon communities, so only an insider would know about the cockatrice in the fringe.
“If you’d ever seen a huntsman spider, you’d be as paranoid about them as I am. Bastards can hug your entire face with all their horrible, horrible legs.”
😱😱😱
She was the sort of girl who could sound laid-back and utterly pleasant as she was removing your spleen with a claw hammer.
😈
I could tell her I wasn’t going to make things serious on her, and I could tell her I was done lying, and I could do both those things as much as I wanted. I was still lying. I was in love, and I was so screwed.
😩
Grandma smiled. “As I was saying, we don’t have hemoglobin. What we do have is a natural antibiotic, with preservative and painkilling properties.” “They’re very popular with the kind of men who like building men like me,” said Grandpa.
That doesn't sound like the beginnings of an, "I was following the migration of abraxos wasps, when I . . ." story. 😠
“Oh, hell, I didn’t warn you about Crow? I’m sorry.” Anger transitioned to contrition in an instant. “It was late, and I was crashing so hard, I didn’t even think. I hope he didn’t freak you out too much.” “If by ‘freak me out’ you mean ‘absolutely delight me,’ he did that in spades.”
#teamshelby
“She’s a garrinna. A very pretty one, too.” “I’d love to see her.” Garrinna are sometimes referred to as “marsupial griffins,” even though the title is completely inaccurate and doesn’t describe anything about them beyond their shape. They’re about the size of Welsh corgis, which makes them larger than most species of miniature griffin, and they’re very social creatures. As in “a flock of them can and will dismantle a car, given the opportunity.” They’re virtually extinct, for much the same reason. Well, that, and the part where they look like bright pink parrots crossed with stripy cats.
I WANT A GARINNA. 😍
“What are you doing here?” “I came because I wanted to speak with your parents,” I said. “Ms. Tanner accompanied me because she needs to be formally introduced as a visiting cryptozoologist.” Chandi wrinkled her nose. “Ew. Are you running a breeding program for those, too?”
Hahahaha.
vegetable lambs or barnacle geese—not
Vegetable lambs AND barnacle geese??
“What happened?” “I barely believe it, and I’m the one who got stabbed,” she said, pulling her shirt back down. She shook her head slowly, confusion written plainly across her face. “It was Lloyd.” “Lloyd? The security guard?”
*sighs*
