006.029

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Zoe dove to the side, ducking into the white room while narrowly avoiding the returned lightning from the stairwell.

While her own lightning might not have been the most powerful thing she could have thrown, she had serious misgivings about killing people who were just doing their jobs. Especially when she was the one breaking and entering with the intent to steal priceless artifacts.

The Elysium Order was under no such hesitations. White lightning that only narrowly missed colliding with Zoe hit the ground a short distance behind her.

A resounding thunder sent Zoe’s head ringing. Enhancing her ears to hear the approaching guards worked against her. She couldn’t hear a thing aside from a high-pitched whine. Zoe wasted no time in retuning her hearing to normal levels. It would take a minute or two, but she needed a clear head and the ability to hear.

For the moment, she could still see. It would have to do.

Lightning crackled against the stone bricks making up the floor. There was a brief instant where nothing happened.

Dust filled the hallway as the stones exploded. Chunks of stone that had not been obliterated or pulverized into dust flew through the air. A few pieces impacted the outside wall of the room, sending cracks through the pure white of the inside. The ward keeping the walls white flickered twice before failing.

One brick struck Serena in the stomach, forcing the air out of her lungs as it carried her back into the growing cloud of dust.

Probably for the best. The vampire wouldn’t die from a rock to the stomach, and the dust would help keep her hidden from the nuns.

Her invisibility trick wouldn’t work while their eyes were aglow.

Of course, Zoe thought as two less powerful bolts careened down the hallway, they don’t really need to see if they flood the hallway with lightning.

The lightning sparked a hint of fear in Zoe. Before anything else, she sent a breeze through the air to clear a good portion of the dust. Enough was left for some cover, mostly for Serena, but they shouldn’t have to worry about a spark setting off a dust explosion.

Air partially cleared, Zoe immediately set to returning fire–or lightning, as the case was. They couldn’t be allowed to advance down the hallway. She barely angled her arm around one of the stone doors to attack.

A lightning bolt struck the door frame just as she pulled her hand back. Unlike the floor, the door took the lightning without complaint. In fact, it was more like the door absorbed the lightning.

The hallway wasn’t that large. Randomly firing bolts downrange would end up hitting one of them sooner or later once they stepped out of the room.

A far more effective tactic would be to simply flood the hallway with fire. Perhaps they were simply attempting less destructive tactics to start with.

Or Wayne is keeping the fire down, Zoe thought with a glance towards her colleague. He was right at the door frame of the stone doors, tome out and eyes shut in concentration. Since there were none of his flames cropping up, he must be keeping their flames dampened.

“–need you off of the nun. I’ll keep her from doing anything.”

Eva’s voice was muted. Muffled slightly by some lingering damage to Zoe’s hearing. It would have to work well enough for the moment.

By the time Zoe turned to her student, Arachne was back to her human size. Eva knelt on the ground with a short stone obelisk standing next to her. She was in the process of smearing something black across the captive augur’s face.

“Lie down,” Eva said, “face down. So much as move and you won’t have much of a face. Probably not much of a head in general. And rest assured, I’ll know if you move. Even while on the second floor, I’ll know.”

Zoe might have had something to say about Eva’s callous threat to the obviously terrified augur had she not been engaged in slinging more bolts of lightning blindly down the hall.

“We can’t teleport out,” Wayne said with a slight grunt. His eyes were still closed, but he had moved up closer to Zoe. “We’ll need to get to the main floor at the very least, if not entirely out of the cathedral itself.”

“Any plans?” Zoe called out between bolts.

“Working on it,” Eva said as she slung her backpack off. “Just keep them busy for a moment.”

Zoe’s question had been directed more towards Wayne. Or, she had expected a response from Wayne more than Eva. The girl had been insistent that she could do this on her own. Failing at the first sign of resistance would definitely hurt her pride.

If she did fail, Wayne would have to step up. Escaping situations like this was basically his job–his old job. Though he hadn’t ever done such a thing with so many people to her knowledge.

So Zoe focused on doing what she could to help out. Namely, redoubling her efforts in holding back the Elysium Order.

She slipped in a few slashes of razor wind between the lightning. The dust in the air curled around them, making them partially visible. Still, the first few came as a surprise if the startled shouts were any indication.

Zoe wasn’t sure how to feel about that and she didn’t really have the time to put into thinking about it.

The brief worry did remind Zoe that the Elysium Order had powerful shields. Better than anything Zoe had created through thaumaturgy over the course of her career. They were probably unharmed.

With that in mind, she ramped up the power of all of her attacks.

“You know what you’re doing?”

Zoe turned to Wayne as he spoke. He was no longer concentrating, but rather moving as far away from Eva as he could get without pressing up against the wall.

“Guess we’ll find out soon enough.”

Zoe fired off another two bolts into the dust before turning to find out just what Eva was doing.

One look and Zoe promptly took three steps away from the girl, pressing herself against the heavy stone door.

Eva had Genoa’s snake golem on the floor in front of her and was in the process of pouring a dark orange potion over the top of it. She was being careful not to let a single drop fall to the floor, something that was becoming easier and easier as she continued.

Once she finished upending the vial, she knelt down and picked up the obelisk before taking a few steps back herself. There was a short strain in lifting the stone structure, but Arachne caught and steadied her until Eva managed to get herself under control.

The stone carving swelled. It stretched out, quickly becoming large enough to fill out the entire width of the hallway. The tail thrashed, sending the wooden center door flying back into the room it once guarded. With the added room for its tail, the snake appeared to relax.

For a moment, at least. Once the snake’s width grew enough for its scales to reach both ends of the door frame, it started squirming again.

The walls were giving way more than the blackish scales.

“E,” Zoe said, warning in her voice. At least, as much warning as she could cram into a single letter.

The snake whipped its head to Zoe at the sound. Its silver and black eyes bored into her.

Zoe took another three steps back, extremely grateful that the creature was stone and not turning her to stone. A fact that the basilisk seemed to realize as well.

“Stop!” Eva commanded as the sculpture started slithering towards Zoe. It continued forwards for a second–growing all the while–before an unnatural stillness overcame it. “Holding it with the blood inside,” Eva said without a hint of concern in her voice, though there was a bit of strain as she shifted the obelisk in her arms. “Too much growth potion?”

“Get it out of here before it crushes us,” Wayne shouted.

“Right. Down the hall,” Eva said, pointing her arm. “Don’t try to bite or stare. Just crush everything.”

The head of the snake was forcibly dragged away from Zoe. Eva set it to looking out the stone doors.

“Is it going to follow your orders?” Zoe asked.

Eva tried to shrug. The effort was there, but her shoulders barely moved. “Doubt it. She hasn’t followed anything else I’ve said. I don’t think it was designed for that. Maybe I will take golemancy next year,” she mused under her breath.

“Will it attack us?”

“No. She is full of blood that I can manipulate. Just stay behind her as she charges out of here. I think she should take at least a few bolts of lightning before anything bad happens to her.”

“Maybe more than that,” Zoe murmured. She wouldn’t be able to say for certain without seeing it in action, but it was doubtful that they would be able to ‘kill’ it unless they hit the golem animation core. The main body was carved from stone which should be somewhat hardy.

Of course, if they hit it a few times with blasts as powerful as the initial lightning that created the dust cloud, it might not matter all that much in the long run. Half of the thing could turn to dust before the actual core was exposed.

“Get it moving,” Wayne ordered, still backing away as the snake grew larger.

Eva didn’t argue. The snake’s unnatural stillness ended after a slight nudge out into the hallway. It slithered out, body winding back and forth as it pushed its scales against the ground.

Arachne moved up to Eva’s side, using her body to help cover Eva from any enemy fire while helped to hold the obelisk. The two of them charged out in a slight crouch so as to keep behind the snake’s bulk. Eva paused for just one moment to vaguely gesture with a nod of her head into the still settling cover of dust.

“Serena is lying there, if anyone cares. Can’t tell if she’s alive or not.”

Keeping herself low to the ground, Zoe sent out another dust clearing gust of wind. She was careful to keep a wall of the dust between them and the stairwell. No need to make it easy on the nuns.

Serena had a brick-sized hole in her stomach. One bloodied brick was stuck half in her side along with several smaller shards of stone.

“It’s not as bad as it looks,” the vampire said with ragged breath.

“No time to argue,” Zoe said. She flicked her dagger towards Serena, levitating her just above the ground.

Wayne appeared at her side. Without a word, he incinerated the ground that Serena had been lying and bleeding on.

As one, they turned and ran to catch up to Eva, Arachne, and the snake.

They emerged from the cover of the lingering dust between the room and the stairwell. There was a sharp cry of “Basilisk,” from one of the nuns. The lightning cut off almost instantly. The few bolts that hit the snake did only marginal damage to the stone scales.

Tuning her ears’ sensitivity ever so slightly, Zoe heard the rustling of clothes moving farther away. They were retreating up the stairwell. Probably to set up an ambush that could take out a basilisk without exposing themselves to its gaze.

The nuns were obviously not yet aware that its gaze was entirely impotent.

“Don’t dawdle,” Wayne grunted. “There aren’t many here, but if they call for backup, escaping will be problematic.”

Zoe had no intention of slowing down. Neither did the snake. It crashed its bulk into the closed stairwell door, turning it to wood pulp as it started its scramble up the stairs.

The second floor wouldn’t be so bad. While there were plenty of augur rooms to set up ambushes in, Eva should be able to spot anyone inside with her blood sight. Wayne would be able to seal the doors by melting the handles. Zoe could toss up a few barriers of solid air around the doors for good measure. It wouldn’t stop anyone permanently, but it would delay them.

And delaying them was all they really needed. Once they arrived at the top floor, they should be home free according to Wayne.

At the staircase’s landing, the stairs looped back. The basilisk turned with the stairs, offering Zoe her first good look at the front of it.

She did not like what she saw.

What she had originally thought to be only marginal damage–judged by the lack of debris coming off the basilisk when it got hit–looked far worse now that she got a better view.

The scales that had been hit looked like a slab of meat being pulled apart. Each spot was roughly the size of her head. Not what she would have expected from a stone carving.

Both spots that had been hit looked like they were trying to repair themselves. As Zoe watched, one thin strand of meat latched on to the opposite side of the wound and started growing. It didn’t make it very far before disintegrating into dust.

The anti-magic qualities of the Elysium Order’s lightning at work, no doubt.

Whatever Eva had done to the snake was too far out of Zoe’s expectations to accurately predict anything.

Though, Zoe thought as they came up to the first basement level’s landing, Eva’s plan appears to be working well so far.

Just before exiting the door–or making a new exit as the case may be–the basilisk was overcome by the same unnatural stillness that it had when Eva stopped it earlier.

“Four hiding in the room immediately on our right. Another three in the room after that. They’ll probably wait for us to pass before pinching us against whatever lies at the end of the hallway.”

“Wayne and I will take care of that.”

“You concentrate on keeping your monstrosities from murdering us,” Wayne added with a disgruntled grunt.

Eva didn’t rise to his comment. She might not have had the energy to. There were small beads of sweat forming on her forehead.

Zoe almost asked why she hadn’t just handed the obelisk off to Arachne when the answer became obvious. Arachne was a front line fighter. If and when the basilisk fell, Arachne would need to rush in to take its place. Doing so with an obviously weighty obelisk wouldn’t be easy. Probably. That would have been Zoe’s plan, anyway.

With a short nod towards Wayne, Eva released her hold over her basilisk.

It didn’t hesitate to charge straight through the door, taking part of the wall with it.

Lightning rained down the hallway. The majority of it sunk into the semi-organic scales of the sculpture. A few bolts did get past, but they were ones that had been angled upwards. Though she kept low anyway, Zoe doubted she needed to duck to avoid anything. The snake’s bulk was simply that massive.

Purposeful or not, the few bolts that missed the snake did impact the ceiling. Most only left scorch marks.

Zoe and Wayne had to pause their blocking of the side rooms to erect quick thaumaturgical shields around themselves. Almost as an afterthought, Zoe tossed a quick shield around Serena as well.

The vampire was visibly looking better than she had only a minute ago, but it didn’t look like she was quite ready to walk just yet.

After shielding Serena, Zoe thought to put up a shield around Eva as well. Her spell stopped mid-cast.

Arachne, ducking low at Eva’s side just behind the basilisk, plucked a stray brick right out of the air without so much as glancing in its direction. It would have struck Eva in the shoulder otherwise.

Pulling herself up to her full height, Arachne reared back and pitched the brick like it was a baseball.

It zipped through the air before coming to a stop with a meaty thud. Zoe’s enhanced ears picked up a masculine groan.

A monk perhaps?

The lightning stopped a moment later–nuns rushing to his aid?–but not before a stray bolt struck the still standing Arachne square in her chest.

Shards of carapace exploded off her front and back.

Wayne was on point in incinerating every piece that detached from the demon. They didn’t have time to land before an orb of intense heat enveloped each individual shard. Several of them were flying towards the two of them, but they wouldn’t be anything a shield couldn’t handle. It was more likely that he was incinerating them to keep them out of the hands of the Elysium Order’s augurs.

Zoe couldn’t begin to calculate how hot the flames had to be to disintegrate Arachne’s carapace, but it obviously was not inconsiderable. She caught sight of more than a few pages of his tome going up in flames as his eyes twitched back and forth between each piece. Judging by the twitches of his eyes, he had altered his mental perceptions as fast as he could go.

“Arachne!”

Eva set the obelisk down on the floor, making sure not to damage the structure. The second it was down, she had her dagger out and aimed at Arachne’s chest. The demon caught her hand just before she could plunge it in.

“I’m fine,” Arachne growled. She was clutching at her chest, black ichor dripping from between her fingers.

Wayne was incinerating the drops that touched fell through the air as well, though it was taking far less effort than the chitin.

“Focus on your snake. I can heal.”

Eva shook her head. “Have to stop your bleeding.” With a flick of her wrist, Eva’s dagger crossed the short distance between where her hand was caught and Arachne’s chest. Her other hand caught the dagger and pressed the flat of the blade against the wound.

In seconds, Eva had formed a plate wrapping around Arachne’s torso. It was the same type of blood hardening that went into making their masks. While it meshed surprisingly well with Arachne’s natural carapace, Zoe doubted it would provide even half as much armor.

“Keep your head down,” Eva said as she finished. “That’s why we have Basila.”

“I can take a hit from those pathetic creatures.”

“Obviously not,” Eva tapped the plate. “Were you not paying attention when we picked up Sister Abbey? At least that one nun has prepared for demons. Probably her whole chapter. Maybe the whole of the Elysium Order.”

Eva turned from Arachne to pick up the obelisk again. “Just be careful.” That said, Eva hefted up the obelisk and started walking the short distance between where Arachne had been hit and where her basilisk had charged off during the brief lightning intermission.

By the time they made it a good three-quarters of the way down the hall, the lightning had started up again. This time, however, they seemed to be much more careful in not missing the basilisk.

The basilisk was obviously slowing down. Zoe had a feeling that Eva was doing a lot to help push it forward and keep it going through her blood magics. Its slithering side to side had all but stopped. At this rate, they’d be stuck behind it before getting to the top of the stairs.

Zoe was tossing the occasional lightning and razor wind of her own while Wayne was doing the same with fireballs. But after seeing Arachne nearly finished off by a single bolt, she was far more hesitant about sticking her arm around the basilisk’s bulk.

She had taken a hit from the Elysium Order’s lightning before and it had not been pleasant then. If Eva was correct in that they had been adapting their magic to combat demons, then it was entirely possible that the lightning wouldn’t do anything unusual to her, as she wasn’t a demon.

Taking the chance did not seem wise.

With her attacks not doing much, Zoe kicked her mind into motion.

If their eyes are closed, how are they aiming?

It was entirely possible that they had realized the deception of the basilisk. Or perhaps thought that the nun that had originally called that out had simply been mistaken. Alternatively, all the nuns could have blindfolds on while following the directions of an augur. The augur wouldn’t need to see it directly and thus, would have no danger of looking in the basilisk’s eyes.

Neither of the two options were easily interruptible.

“Serena, any cover or distractions you can provide would be most welcome.”

“Are their eyes glowing?”

“Most likely,” Zoe said.

“Then I can’t–”

“Serena,” Wayne interrupted. “We are taking over.”

The vampire stilled as she met Wayne’s eyes. He gave her a brief nod.

“Fiine,” she said with a sigh. “If I die, I’m haunting you forever.”

“Sounds annoying. Try not to die.”

“Aww, you do care!” Serena cooed. “Set me down.” When Zoe hesitated, Serena pointed at her stomach. “This is just a flesh wound. I’ll heal it up as soon as I get some blood in me.”

Zoe put an arm on the shorter vampire’s shoulder to help steady her as she regained her balance. “What are you going to do?”

“I hate getting my hands dirty, but I am a vampire. And a hungry one at that. Smelling this mask,” she took a deep breath, “I just want to bite into it. Gobble it all up. Like a potato chip!”

Her voice took on a slightly more dangerous tone than her normal frivolous cadence. “I’ll just have to sate my appetites on something else for now.”

“Grab Spencer and get ready to run,” Wayne said, looking towards Zoe.

Wayne and Serena took off in a sprint. Serena vaulted onto the basilisk’s back while Wayne just went around its side. The moment they cleared its head, a wall of flame erupted in front of Wayne. It stretched from wall to wall, floor to ceiling.

It took off. With the sound of a jet engine, it moved from the tips of Wayne’s shoes down the hallway, growing faster and louder the more it moved.

Once enough space had cleared between the fire wall and Wayne, Serena vaulted off the back of the snake over Wayne’s head. She took off in a sprint fast enough that she was hard to track with Zoe’s enhanced eyes.

Leaving them to their own devices, Zoe ran up to a slightly shocked Eva.

“What are they doing?”

“Clearing the area, I assume. We’re following.” Taking Eva’s arm in hand, Zoe started to move after the other two.

But Eva did not budge.

“I can’t leave Basila,” she said, handing the obelisk off to Arachne.

The demon took it easily, not even shifting her stance despite the added weight.

Reaching into her backpack, Eva started digging around. She pulled out vial after vial, checking each one.

If they had the time, Zoe would have loved to have let her finish. They didn’t have any time. Wayne was getting farther away with every passing moment and they couldn’t afford to fall too far behind. If the nuns back in the sealed off rooms managed to escape, the situation would turn quite sticky.

“It was an admirable attempt and worked surprisingly well. I’m sure Genoa would be happy to know that her toy played such a significant role in saving Shalise. But we must go.”

“I can’t leave Basila. She’s full of my blood. I could try pulling it out, but a good deal would be left behind because it is too ruined from contact with the basilisk and the lightning,” Eva said as she dumped a vial of red liquid over the sculpted basilisk. “I’d rather not have it fall into the hands of the augurs.”

Zoe mistook the vial for more blood for a moment before noticing that the basilisk was slowly losing inches off its length. A shrinking potion to counteract the growth.

But it was taking too long.

“Can you use your blood to push it forward?”

“Holding it still is one thing, helping it move is another, moving it on my own is another entirely.” Eva frowned at it. “I don’t know that it will move on its own again. Once it is small enough, I can handle it.”

Zoe could understand that. From the front, it looked less like a snake and more of pulped meat. She found it mildly disturbing just how organic appearing something that she knew had been carved from stone was.

“We’ll move it,” Arachne said. She started growing a bulbous behind and several extra legs. “The professor’s air magic, Eva’s blood, and my strength.”

As she grew, Arachne handed the obelisk back to Eva. The younger girl stumbled for just a moment before Arachne stabilized her with something resembling a hug. The two stayed together, neither moving save for Arachne’s continued growth.

After reaching her full height, the full-bodied Arachne positioned herself directly over the front of the snake. She hefted the front in the air, using her arms and two of her legs to hold it against her body.

Zoe hoped that the potion had already been fully absorbed into the basilisk. As Wayne had said, it wasn’t designed for living creatures.

Still, if anyone could handle parts of themselves shrinking, it would be Arachne. Zoe concentrated on levitating the tail of the sculpture. They could worry about side effects for Arachne later.

With Eva taking care of most of the mid-section through her blood magic, they started off towards the staircase, Wayne, and Serena.

It was somewhat of an awkward situation, moving as they were. Though Arachne had the worst of it by far. The basilisk was constantly shrinking. Though it wasn’t fast, Arachne occasionally had to stop to get a better grip on the front of the snake. Combined with her walking on only six of eight legs, using the other two to help lift the basilisk, their group wasn’t moving all that fast.

But they were moving.

Zoe just hoped that Wayne and Serena could hold out up ahead for a few more minutes.

The very stone itself was on fire in some places. The occasional tapestries that Zoe had taken note of on the way down were gone entirely. No corpses, though one nun had fallen into a torpor with blood dribbling down her neck.

Zoe doubted that she had been left alive out of the goodness of Serena’s heart. More likely that someone had interrupted her feeding, or she simply decided that moving on to her next target was needed more than killing the nun.

By the time they reached the base of the staircase, the snake had shrunk by half. Still too large to carry on any one of their owns, but it was becoming far more manageable for Eva and Zoe.

They started climbing the stairs with Arachne still readjusting her grip every few steps.

“When we get to the top, we shouldn’t have much farther to go. Once Wayne gives the signal, we’re going to teleport.”

“If they haven’t set up more wards,” Eva grumbled.

“Hopefully they have been too busy dealing with us to set up wards. There aren’t many of them and several are still locked up in the rooms below us.”

“They won’t have warded against banishment. Probably. If your teleport is broken, I can get us out. It won’t be pleasant. At all. Though, judging by how the vampire reacted to your teleport, she might find it more agreeable than your teleports.”

Zoe had a picture of the mostly mutilated Sister Cross suddenly surface in her mind. She shook it out of her head as Eva continued talking.

“It is how I intended to escape before you all insisted on coming,” Eva continued. “Even downstairs, I don’t think they would have warded for banishment.”

“Can’t take Serena to your prison without adding her to your wards,” Zoe commented as she considered what Eva had said.

With how well her basilisk had performed, she might have actually been able to do this entirely on her own. She supposed it depended on the stone door and how well it held up to a basilisk ramming into it a few times. Arachne would have been able to help.

It certainly would have skipped over this portion of their theft. But, had Eva followed through with her plan to remove the two guards outside the first staircase, she would have alerted everyone much sooner. It was entirely possible that she would have been forced to retreat before even making it to the second basement.

As they reached the top of the staircase, Wayne and Serena once again came into view.

And fire. Lots of fire.

Unlike the basement levels, the cathedral had been constructed with plenty of wood in addition to stone.

And all of it was on fire.

Serena bounced around the hallway like some hyperactive child while Wayne stood his ground, unleashing powerful bursts of flame to keep the Elysium Order from moving from where they had taken cover. He only made minute movements when an attack came his way. Just enough to dodge.

Zoe used her magic to clear the smoke from the air. The snake was small enough now that Eva could handle it on her own, though Arachne continued to help out.

Catching sight of them at the top of the stairs, Wayne called out, “final push then be ready to get out.”

“Okaay,” Serena replied as she landed on top of a screaming monk. No shield appeared around him. There was nothing to keep her off or to prevent her fangs from tearing a hole in his neck.

“I can handle Basila. Arachne, latch on to me.”

Arachne stayed where she was, interposing herself between Eva and the Elysium Order. “You won’t have anything to block lightning without the snake or me.”

“You’re going to get left behind,” Eva said, exasperation clear in her voice. “Maybe if you’d learn to teleport yourself.” She glanced over to Zoe, “If Arachne continues to be stubborn, I can teleport us out as soon as you guys leave.”

Though she didn’t take her eyes off the combat ahead of her, Zoe shook her head. “I’m not leaving before you.”

Eva just sighed.

The basilisk, which had been as long as a van when they got to the top floor, was shrinking ever more rapidly as it grew smaller. It was down to the size of her arm. Before long, it would be back to its original length, able to easily wind itself around a set of fingers. Probably. Would it stop at the original size? Smaller? How would the potion know? She would have to double-check with Wayne.

Her own potion theory was lacking.

Shaking her head, Zoe decided that now was probably not the best place to worry about such things.

Instead, Zoe pressed forward with Eva and Arachne–still in her largest form. They were so close to getting away. The end of the hallway would be the end of the wards.

Should be the end.

Wayne and Serena were doing a perfect job of pushing back the Elysium Order despite their increased desperation. It helped that there were not many of them. Zoe only counted six nuns and the sole monk. A few of which were no longer able to fight back.

Zoe added her own attacks to the mix now that she was close enough to the fight. A number of Eva’s orbs of blood fired off, splattering against the nuns’ shields before exploding violently.

Now that she could clearly see her enemy, Zoe felt a pang of regret. Only one of the six here was in the proper Elysium Order attire. Her habit was rumpled and coated in blood–probably the monk’s blood. Everyone else looked to be dressed in sleepware of various sorts. One even had pink bunny slippers.

Zoe shook her head and pressed forward.

They were almost out. Only a few feet more to go.

Without a word of communication between them, Wayne and Serena found themselves with their backs against each other. He wrapped an arm around her waist. After a brief nod towards Zoe, they both disappeared. All that was left behind was a blast of cold air followed by a heat wave as a wall of fire sprung up between Zoe and the nuns.

That answers that question, Zoe thought.

“Arachne,” Eva shouted as she wrapped the basilisk around her arm, “shrink down!”

The spider-demon was already shrinking back into her human form when Eva shouted.

At Eva’s shout, Arachne dove over just in time to catch a bolt of lightning that had been aimed at Eva.

She caught it against the side of her face.

Shards of carapace exploded outwards, some cutting into Eva.

The girl didn’t move in the slightest. She stared onwards as the bright glow in Arachne’s four remaining eyes dimmed slightly.

The demon slumped over, crashing into the ground just as a dark portal opened up beneath her.

“No!” Eva dove to the ground, dropping the obelisk at her feet and narrowly avoiding a second bolt of lighting. The obelisk landed on its side with a heavy thud.

Thankfully, the stone hadn’t cracked.

Eva gripped Arachne’s limp arm and pulled. “You can heal damn it.”

In spite of Eva’s grip on Arachne’s arm, the spider demon was still sinking into the portal. Eva’s hands were inching closer and closer to it.

“Eva, let go!”

Zoe dove and tackled Eva, pulling her away from the portal. She didn’t know if Eva could get sucked into it, but she wasn’t willing to take the chance. Recovering Shalise and Juliana had been trying enough. She did not want a repeat of that incident.

“Arachne,” Eva cried out. Her outstretched claw dug into Zoe’s back.

Biting down on her own cry of pain, Zoe rolled twice with Eva before coming to a stop. They were dodging enough lightning as it was. Wayne’s flame wall wouldn’t last forever.

Gripping her dagger in hand, Zoe reached out and touched the obelisk. Wayne had undoubtedly already tried to place the heavy object in storage. The wards would have prevented his action. Here, she had already seen Wayne and Serena disappear. There were obviously no wards in place at the moment.

As soon as it was safe and sound, Zoe started to turn the teleportation on herself and Eva.

The sound of glass shattering stopped her cold as much as the color of Eva’s luminescent eyes. The slits of her eyes were drawn so tight that it was almost as if there wasn’t a pupil at all. The normally blood-red iris was glowing as if someone had shoved two dying suns into her face.

A fountain of black blood erupted from Eva’s backpack. The jar must have broken.

Except, this was far too much blood.

It just kept spewing forth like a bad cartoon. The liquid flowed up and down Eva and Zoe’s arms. A good portion of it started forming a wire frame ball around the two of them.

Zoe didn’t stand by to see what would happen. Her teleport would incapacitate Eva for a minute or two, hopefully giving the girl a chance to calm down.

She gripped her dagger in one hand and hugged Eva with the other before allowing the world to fall away as the cold white of Between replaced it.

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