“We do not require students to live in the dorms. If they have suitable living places, they’re free to use them so long as they make it to class.”
“And Eva has one of these places?”
Zoe nodded. “I will fetch her immediately. Would you please stay with Miss Rivas until I return?”
“Of course.”
Zoe stepped out into the hallway.
Juliana stared at the nun. She didn’t have much choice. Her legs were still untrustworthy. No topics came to mind to talk about either.
The nun had no such reservations. “I trust it is you I have to thank for saving a friend of mine?”
Juliana raised an eyebrow at that. An immediate wave of foolishness washed over her as she realized the nun couldn’t see her face. “I don’t remember saving any nuns lately.”
“Not a nun,” the Sister said, “Shalise. I visit the group home she lives in every now and again.”
Shalise never mentioned a group home, Juliana thought. She softly shook her head. “That would have been Eva.”
Juliana failed that night. She had been the reason Shalise was injured. The zombies shambled right up to Shalise and all Juliana could do was watch. She’d frozen, locked up, couldn’t even cry a warning. Even as Arachne tore the zombies to pieces, Juliana just looked on.
The nun didn’t notice Juliana’s turmoil. She gave a soft smile and said, “I’m sure you helped out in your own way. You seem quite capable.”
Juliana regretted turning her gaze over the room the moment she did. “I need a shower,” she choked out.
“Of course,” the nun said. “I’ll stand watch and let you know when they return.”
Juliana marched to the shower and stood under it, turning on Eva’s absurdly hot runes rather than using the plumbing.
Blood circled the drain as she stood there, still fully armored and clothed. Her school uniform was ruined. Even if it cleaned itself, it had tears and holes in it she didn’t know where from.
With a quick thought, a small metal blade extended from her chest and dragged down, cutting away her shirt. She did the same with her pants and kicked them off to a corner of the bathroom.
She stood under the water for another minute or two, just letting her armor clean off. Eventually she shed the armor, turning it into a ball of metal the size of a small beach ball.
Without her armor, the water definitely was too hot to handle. She tried to endure but had to shut it off and switch to the plumbing.
She stayed like that until a knock on her door woke her. The nun said Zoe was back.
How long it had taken, Juliana didn’t know. She didn’t care. It wasn’t long enough.
With a sigh, she stepped out of the shower. Her clothes were still a torn, bloody mess in the corner. She hadn’t gotten new clothes. They would have wound up bloody from touching her anyway.
Instead she touched her metal ball, her ferrokinesis spell still running from before. The metal molded around her up to her neck. She left her hair and face free.
Skin-tight metal armor in place, Juliana moved back to her bloody room.
Chapter 023
“It was trying to climb up onto the counter. I just added spikes to the bottom of my shoes and stomped on it. Professor Baxter and Sister Cross came into the room a moment later.”
Eva leaned back, listening to Juliana’s story. She’d already heard it once, though that one was a lot different. A shame really. All the good parts were left out of this version.
Of course, the audience might not be able to take the unsanitized version.
Irene sat across from Eva. Her pork riblets had been shoved to the side after the initial description of the flesh golems. Her face grew greener almost every time Juliana said a line. She kept flashing a look at Eva as well.
A bit odd. Eva pegged her for the braver of the twins based on how she initially wanted to see Arachne.
Shelby also stopped eating her goulash, but she almost seemed interested in the story rather than scared or disgusted. Almost.
Jordan listened to the story with rapt attention. He shoved his food aside more for concentration than loss of appetite. “So where was Eva for all of this?”
“In the Rickenbacker medical center with Nurse Naranga,” Eva said, glad she and Zoe Baxter had come up with that cover story. “It was quite a shock to return to the room.”
“It was a shock to smell the hallway,” Irene grumbled, more to herself than anyone.
Eva gave the girl an understanding smile. The room smelled worse, but not by much. The real surprise for Eva was walking down the hallway.
At some point, the room entered her sphere of blood sense. She could almost ‘see’ the entire kitchen from the hallway. All the cupboards and the furniture, she could even tell where the ceiling was from the splatter that landed there.
It was all a bit disorienting.
Irene just shivered and looked down at her plate.
“Still though, first Shalise and now you?” Max glanced over at Eva. “Better be on your guard, you’re next.”
Shelby elbowed him in the side. Hard. Max doubled over, groaning.
“You can’t say things like that,” Shelby said. “What if she really gets hurt? Then how would you feel?”
Eva let her smile drop, but didn’t respond. They were probably after her in the first place.
Arachne now waited in their temporary room as a guard, just in case. If Eva had to run to the prison again, she’d probably bring Juliana with her. Eva was still unwilling to have the spider-demon anywhere near the nuns patrolling the campus.
Outside of their dorms, the nuns had almost tripled overnight. Two stood around the cafeteria and a fourth seemed to patrol between the tables every minute or so. Unnecessary, in Eva’s opinion.
She was still unsure what to make of Sister Cross’ theory of another necromancer in town. It seemed far-fetched. That there would be two separate groups of necromancers in town with both having run into Eva, or at least Eva’s room in the second case, she found to be incredibly unlikely. If it was true, however, they likely wanted the book as well.
What Eva really needed to do was inform the necromancers that the book was destroyed. For some reason, just hanging up notices like missing posters for a lost cat did not seem like it would do the trick.
“I can’t imagine having to sleep in that room.”
“We don’t,” Juliana said. “We’ve been moved to room three-eighteen until the room has been ‘sterilized.'”
“Even then, it can’t be pleasant going back to it.”
“I’m more concerned with my clothes. The things landed right by my bed. Some blood and puss got into my drawers.” Juliana sighed. “I think I have to burn the entire thing.” She pulled at the tee-shirt she had on, the only student in the cafeteria who wasn’t in uniform. “These are Eva’s even. Not that they’re bad or anything,” she said quickly with a glance at the owner.
Eva lightly chuckled and waved her off.
“Oh,” Irene perked up for the first time since lunch started. “We’ll go shopping after class ends. We’ll have to be quick though, curfew has been moved to an hour before sunset after your thing.”
“That seems odd,” Eva said. “A student is attacked in their dorm so now we have to be in the dorms sooner?”
Jordan looked up at Eva’s comment. “Professor Lurcher assured us that additional wards were being erected to prevent another incident,” he said.
Then why weren’t they erected after Halloween.
Eva didn’t have much confidence in the school. She had half a mind to erect her full blood wards when they moved back into three-thirteen. Sadly, such a thing would be hard to subtly key in everyone to the wards. Eva couldn’t very well go around to the entire faculty and ask for a blood sample.
Not to mention the wards might be detected by the Elysium Sisters. Their complete capabilities were still a mystery to Eva.