Page 22 of Petrified

Medusa gives him a dry look. “For this suspect.”

“That distinction is doing very little for my self-esteem.” He drops back into the chair and leans over the photograph until his forearms rest on the table. “Fine. Assume he stops the second the trail dies. We know he’s there somewhere. That still doesn’t tell me how to see him.”

Medusa pulls the old book closer again and runs her finger beneath the passage. “It says the stone form mimics coloration, texture, surface patterning, and reflected light. It doesn't say he ceases to occupy space.”

Lev looks up at her. “I was hoping for a more useful weakness than technically still has a body.”

Amand studies the illustration again. “So even if we know he’s there, seeing him may be another problem entirely.”

Medusa nods. “The accounts don’t explain how anyone reliably broke the concealment. Most of them only realized a gargoyle had been there after it moved.”

Lev looks back at the photographs. “Great. So we’ve upgraded from not knowing where he goes to knowing he may be standing directly in front of me.”

Lev chews on his bottom lip while he studies the photographs. The frustration hasn’t disappeared, but there’s something else under it now, the first real sense that we have stopped following him blindly. “So I’m not looking for a gargoyle. I’m looking for the part of the wall that’s lying.”

“That’s one way to put it,” Amand says.

“It’s the better way.”

I watch Lev trace one finger along the edge of the quarry wall in the photograph. His hand pauses near a darker seam, then moves back. “At the warehouse, I kept trying to catch the scent after it vanished. I didn’t stay in one place long enough to notice anything else.”

“You didn’t know you needed to,” I say.

He glances at me. “You’re being suspiciously nice about this.”

“You nearly lost your mind yesterday because I touched something stupid. I’m giving you one.”

Lev snorts, but his shoulders loosen a little. “Generous.”

Medusa closes the book halfway but leaves one finger tucked between the pages. “Knowing what he is also means we can stop wasting time trying to outrun him. If he knows you’re following his scent, he has probably been counting on you doing exactly what you’ve done so far.”

That lands harder than anything else.

Lev leans back and looks toward the stone wall behind Medusa. His gaze stays there long enough that I follow it automatically, even though there is absolutely no reason to think her ex is hiding inside her house.

Apparently Lev has ruined walls for all of us.

“He knows how I track,” Lev says after a moment. “Maybe not exactly what I can do, but he knows I’m following magic. Every time I get close, he only has to reach stone and stop.”

Amand folds his arms over his chest. “Which means chasing faster won’t close the distance.”

“No.” Lev’s fingers start tapping against the table, then stop. He looks down at his own hand as if he’s only just noticed the movement. “Actually, it probably makes things worse.”

I lean forward. “Then don’t give him the distance he’s expecting.”

His eyes lift to mine, and I gesture toward the photographs between us. “If he reaches stone and stops, you stay close enough to make that useful.”

Lev’s expression shifts slightly. The answer is simple enough to irritate him, but he doesn’t dismiss it. “No running ahead. No immediately checking the next block. No circling around looking for where he came out.”

Amand nods. “Stay where the trail ends and let the scene settle.”

Lev looks at him. “You make standing still sound much more dignified than it feels.”

“You can complain silently.”

“That seems unreasonable.”

Medusa reaches for another old volume and starts flipping through it. “There may be more about how long this subtype can maintain the defense or whether anything breaks the effect. We should know that before you try this.”