She took a few steps forward, naturally stepping over one of the carved grooves. Eva and Vektul were both still a few steps forward, so she probably wasn’t accidentally walking over a set of shackles. Of course, she couldn’t even tell what the circle was supposed to be. It was too large. Despite its size, Catherine could see several smaller circles. Or rather, two circles to the left and right of where they had entered the clearing.
It took her a moment to realize just what the smaller circles were for. Someone was obviously supposed to stand within. The circles weren’t even part of the larger circle. If she was reading the sigils around them properly, they would actually isolate magic from interacting while allowing magic to pass into the circle. In essence, they were batteries for whatever the main ritual was for.
Spreading her wings, Catherine took to the skies. She couldn’t see enough of the circle from below to tell what she was seeing. It took but a moment to find the center and hover, beating her wings just enough to keep her in one spot. Being so late at night, the lighting wasn’t the best. However, she wasn’t a demon for nothing. She could see enough from just the moonlight and her own naturally strong sense of vision.
Of course, she would never want to design a ritual circle in such poor lighting. Hopefully Eva hadn’t been doing so either.
From up above, she could see that it wasn’t quite finished yet. A chunk was missing from the far side of the field. Maybe an eighth of the total circle. Unless there was something absolutely vital in that section, what was left should be more than enough to tell exactly what it was for.
At least, it should have been enough to tell what the ritual did. Not only was it huge, but it was busy. Lots of ritual circles—including shackles and summoning circles—were more empty space than they were actual lines and diagrams. Not this one. There was some drawn pattern everywhere she looked, some curved line or sigil.
Some were obvious. One recycled unused magic. Another ensured that all magic involved in the ritual was contained to the circle itself. In the event that too much magic built up, a vent off to one side would consume the magic through excessive light generation. Towards the center, there was something that almost looked like it was meant to summon demons. Except it also looked like there should be someone standing in the middle. And not in the sense that someone might put a sacrifice on a summoning circle as the enticement for specific demons.
Turning her flight into a dive, Catherine rejoined Eva after a few more minutes of inspecting the circle.
“I’ll admit, I don’t know what this is for,” she said, moving closer. “Some parts make sense, but most of it is entirely alien to me. Perhaps if I studied it for more than a few moments.”
Eva’s smile turned to a muted frown.
Which seemed odd. Catherine would have expected Eva to be excited that she had come up with something that Catherine couldn’t figure out.
“Would it help if the final section were completed?”
“Doubtful. Enough is there that I should be able to understand. The problem is that I simply don’t recognize half of what is out there.”
“I see.” Eva’s voice carried an obvious note of disappointment. “Well, I can’t actually help with that. Would it help if I described what the ritual should do?”
“Possibly,” Catherine said with a nod of her head. It wouldn’t tell her exactly what each individual part did, but it might be possible to reverse engineer from there. “Though, I might have noticed an error. I wouldn’t know for sure, but one of the rings was more of a cube. I can show you where exactly in a moment.”
“I’d appreciate that.” Eva turned to face the majority of the ritual circle. “As for what it does, it is a circle that has come from Vektul’s head. Void gave him the designs,” she said, looking over her shoulder. “The intention is to summon Void. Only Void.”
Catherine bit her lip. A thousand thoughts ran through her mind. Had she not known the truth about the violet lines in the sky, she would have immediately protested. Even as it was, was that truly the best option?
Before she could respond, two separate voices echoed out from the shadows at the same time. All the gathered demons jumped to full alertness, ready to fight.
“You’re summoning WHAT?” “That seems pretty ambitious.”
Chapter 002
“Are you insane?” “That seems pretty ambitious.”
Everyone in the clearing jumped to high alert. Everyone except for Eva. She had seen their followers through her sense of blood. Letting them know what she was up to was something of a risk, but she needed humans for the ritual. People would be finding out sooner or later. Might as well start with those she knew best.
Putting a hand on Arachne’s shoulder to calm her down—she was the only one Eva was really worried about starting anything as neither Vektul nor Srey were fighters and Catherine looked ready to run more than actually fight—Eva walked slightly closer to the ring of trees at the edge of the ritual circle.
“Alright, you might as well come out.”
Eva waited. The two in the woods were hesitating, whispering to each other. But eventually, one dragged the other out.
Serena walked out of the woods hand in hand with Zoe. The vampire looked about as nervous as she always did, which was to say not nervous in the slightest. Zoe, on the other hand, had her lips pressed into a thin line. Perhaps the thinnest Eva had ever seen.
“You knew we were here?”
“Of course I did. You could have just come out. Or asked.”
Zoe glanced down to Serena, frown on her face.
The vampire shrugged. “Hey, don’t look at me. I just said that there was a large ritual circle out here with Eva’s scent all over it. You’re the one who decided to follow them,” she said, nodding towards Eva and Catherine.
With a shake of her head, Zoe looked back towards Eva. “Please tell me you were joking just now.”
“I’m afraid I wasn’t,” Eva said with a sad shake of her head.
“But… why?”
“Someone has to try to avert the apocalypse.” Eva pointed a finger upwards as she spoke. She let it hang in the air for a moment before meeting Zoe’s eyes. “No one else is doing anything.”
Zoe clenched her teeth together, pressing her lips into a thin line once again. “I am researching.” She brushed her fingers through her hair. “I know, I don’t have much to show for it. Not yet. But soon. Someday. Eventually. And Sister Cross is working as well. I know that for a fact.”
“She has made about as much progress as you.”
“Well it’s not like there is much existing research to go off. Powers are about as well researched as fairy tales.” She paused, pacing around in a small circle. “Actually, fairy tales are probably the more researched topic.”
Eva did note the dirt around her feet being torn up. One of the shallower lines ran right through her pacing. She took special note to fix it up later. For now, she didn’t say anything and let Zoe pace.
“But summoning a power?” Zoe shook her head. Once again, she ran her hand through her hair. None of it hung down in her face. She still brushed it back anyway, tucking it behind her ear three times before finally settling down. “You can’t think that’s a good idea, can you?”
“Not really. In fact, that was why I brought Catherine here and why I didn’t say anything when you two started following us. I want a second opinion. I want to make sure nobody has better ideas. And I definitely want to ensure that this ritual does what it is advertised to do.” Eva paused and glanced towards Vektul. “Not that I think you’re intentionally distributing false information or anything. I just want to be sure.”