“I can tell it existed. But it’s like the others, just an echo in the air.” Arachne took a deep breath of air behind Eva. She immediately dropped into a fighting stance as her gaze turned to the surroundings. “Zagan,” she hissed.
“Coming here?” Eva couldn’t detect anything within her fifty foot range.
Arachne gave a curt nod.
Eva’s voice dropped to a whisper. “Do we stay and see what he wants or do we run?”
A humanoid with wings slapped on its back entered Eva’s range. In the span of a single heartbeat, it crossed the distance.
Arachne moved in front of Eva. All of her spare legs sprouted from her back as she readied her claws.
Zagan pulled short just before crashing into them. He rose up into the air and dropped straight down on his feet. His wings flapped one last time just inches from the ground before folding behind his back.
“You should stay, embryonic one. Have a chat.”
Eva thought for a moment about channeling magic into herself and escaping to her prison. Arachne would be unable to follow with her magic deficiency. Instead, Eva crossed her arms and put on a brave face. “There’s no way you could have heard what I said.”
“Didn’t need to. Her tense stance and your panicked face were all I needed to know.” He clasped his hands together, causing both Arachne and Eva to jump. “Enough of that. Martina was willing to overlook your summonings over the last few months because you were working with us. Now, however, she grows paranoid. What are you two up to?”
“Us? I haven’t summoned anything since last November.” Summoning Ylva to destroy the book was the most recent summon Eva had been a part of. Sure, Ylva seemed to be able to come and go at will since she took over cell house two, but that didn’t count as summoning.
“So I find you on the way to this demon and you have nothing to do with it?” His lips peeled into a sneer. “I don’t believe you.”
“Can’t you just know instead of not know?”
“Could.” Zagan pulled back into a more relaxed posture. His wings fluttered behind him for a moment before settling against his back. “Martina yelling at me about that is precisely why I didn’t catch you in the act. I don’t like to use my powers often; this world would be no better than my domain.”
Eva frowned. She couldn’t blame him for not wanting to take the easy route. He had enough power in his own right to not need to worry. She could still resent him for it–especially as his relaxed posture turned to a more threatening glare.
Holding up her hands and taking a half step back, Eva said, “we were on our way to find out what this demon business is all about. Arachne sensed one and we followed after. It disappeared. That is all.”
“Three diabolists in the same town?” His voice betrayed a hint of incredulity. “When I last walked the mortal plane, demon summoners were few and far between. One could walk an entire continent and pass not a single one.”
“I don’t consider myself a diabolist.”
“You summon and consort with demons.”
Eva sighed and shook her head. “We’re getting off topic. I have not summoned any demons recently. Whatever is going on tonight wasn’t us.”
Zagan made a slight humming noise before he nodded his head. He waited another minute before he spoke again. “Hunters will be around with all the demons in the area. You should banish your pet lest they find and snatch you up. I don’t often patrol the outskirts of town, some might get brave.”
Arachne gnashed her teeth at her being mentioned.
Eva ignored it. “I won’t. Patrol more often if it concerns you so much.”
Zagan made a small sniffing noise as two plumes of smoke leaked out of his nose. “Perhaps next time we’ll figure out what is going on. I expect you to keep me appraised of the situation.”
Arachne’s tension seemed to drop, but only slightly.
“You’re not even going to try investigating more?”
Wings flapped lightly in time with Zagan’s shoulders as he shrugged. “I don’t really care, yeah? It isn’t like I can be hurt by summoners or hunters.” He shook his head and looked off into the distance. “If Catherine hadn’t mentioned anything to Martina, I’d be a town over with this flirty little barfly. He had a thin face with–I’ll just tell Martina that it wasn’t you and see if I can salvage my evening.”
“She won’t be mad at that?” Eva asked, pointedly ignoring his mentions of a date.
“Don’t care. Our contract is very loose. I only allowed myself into her service to rid myself of some boredom. My primary goal is to find out what happened to the Void and why.” He took a deep breath through his nose as he turned back to Eva. “I’m still not convinced it has nothing to do with you, but in either case, you do smell delectable.”
With that, Zagan dove off the edge of the roof. It was only two stories high, but he managed to unfurl his wings and gain altitude before he hit the ground.
Eva sighed as she watched him veer off towards Brakket Academy.
Most demons could shapeshift in some form or another. Arachne’s spider transformation, Zagan’s winged bull, Ylva’s skeleton. After her treatment finished, would she gain that ability? Was it learned or natural?
Given her donor, it was far more likely for Eva to sprout extra legs than wings. That would be interesting, but not necessarily what she wanted.
A small part of her wondered if it were possible for a demon to give away wings like Arachne gave her legs. Not Zagan’s wings, but there had to be some other fallen angels or succubi that might barter.
Before that, however, came replacement eyes. Not a task she had made any progress towards.
“I don’t like him,” Arachne said.
“Neither do I, but what are we to do? Fighting him would be suicide.”
“Not if he were to unexpectedly wander into your blood wards.”
“Couldn’t he just turn them off?”
Arachne responded with silence.
“Come on,” Eva said with a pat on the spider-woman’s shoulder, “if we can’t narrow it down any more, we may as well get to Zoe Baxter’s seminar on time.”
Arachne opened her mouth to respond. She snapped it shut almost immediately. “Alright,” was her slightly dejected reply.
—
Zoe Baxter quirked an eyebrow at the two students as the rest of the seminar students filed out. “First my wayward first years, now Juliana skips the seminar?” Zoe heaved an exasperated sigh.
Shalise shook her head. “She’s been meeting with her father every once in a while this summer.”
“I think,” Eva said, “she’s setting up some meeting with me and her dad. She mentioned him wanting to meet with me and Arachne.”
“Arachne?” Zoe frowned. The frown quickly changed into a grimace. “She told her parents?”
Eva nodded. She’d had much the same reaction. “I think only her father. Something about her mother not reacting well to the news.”
“I can imagine.”
“With the nuns gone, I was hoping to avoid any more annoyances about me and Arachne. If things get problematic, we’ll probably just disappear.”
“I hope it doesn’t come to that.”
Eva nodded.
School was something she had started looking forward to attending again. While she could study on her own, it just didn’t have the same feeling as attending class. She’d have left quickly had her classmates been like those in her middle school. All the students in her year were tolerable at worst while most were somewhat enjoyable to be around.
“In any case,” Zoe Baxter said, “Juliana was asking me about visiting Nel again. I don’t like her being around those two.”
“I kind of feel bad about Nel.”
Zoe raised one eyebrow. It was difficult to discern the rest of her expression, but Eva had a feeling it was somewhere between disbelief and disappointment.
“Don’t look at me like that,” Eva said. “She was spying on me and I was quite justifiably unhappy with that. I didn’t expect her to go and indenture herself to Ylva. Forever.”