Snapping fingers would be hard. Clapping would have to suffice for now. It was all a crutch in her mind, Eva knew. At least, theoretically. She’d never managed to vanish or obliterate blood without snapping in the past.
The blood swirled around her, touching against surfaces to grant her sight. Armed with her tools of war, Eva felt far more confident.
At least until a thunk sounded in the distance.
Now you’ve drawn the attentions of the keeper.
Eva shook the sing-song voice out of her head. It was not helping.
She ran.
Or tried to. The moment she shifted weight to her nonexistent toes, she fell.
Eva growled as toppled forward. She could fix this now. Several blood orbs dashed to her, catching her and righting her. She sent a handful of marbles to her feet. The spread out, forming makeshift toes. More blood stretched around her feet to anchor them in place.
Tentatively testing her temporary toes, Eva was happy to find they worked. At least for now.
She ran.
Whatever the keeper was, it couldn’t be a good thing to have the attentions of.
The walls of wherever she was ran in a large circle. At least from what she could tell of the short distance she ran. Another few bodies hung around the arena.
Eva happily sent her bloodstone skimming over the surface, gathering even more blood to herself.
There were no doors, no windows.
No roof either. At least not within her rough fifty foot range. Whatever the chains were attached to was so high, she couldn’t sense it.
Rather than continue around the arena–something that would bring her closer to those thunks–Eva created pillars out of the blood. Steps leading over the edge of the steel wall. She wasn’t sure the steps would hold her weight.
It was the first time she’d tried something like this. She’d never, ever had this much blood to play with. At least not since she made her last bloodstone, but she didn’t need to use the blood then. There was no way she could store this much blood without it degrading beyond use.
The steps did hold her weight.
Eva dashed up. She already sent an orb over to see the other side. There was ground there.
The thunks were slowly getting closer.
Rather than wait and form up steps on the other side. Eva just jumped.
One of her slippers splattered on landing. Eva tumbled into gritty sand.
Sand! That meant water, hopefully. Water brought her here, water could take her away.
Eva reformed her toes and ran. It was much harder to maintain cohesion while running across sand. Eva didn’t care. More blood was sent to her feet as she ran.
Her feet hit water before long.
Not sure that it would come with her otherwise, Eva popped her bloodstone into her mouth along with as much blood as would fit. She filled her eye sockets, ears, and other crevasses with as much as she could hold. The rest wrapped around her body.
She dived into the water thinking of nothing but home.
Like before, the water squeezed in on her and vanished.
A brief feeling of weightlessness took hold of Eva’s stomach once again.
And she fell.
Not a hard fall. Not like last time. She gently wafted down to a sandy beach.
A wave of nausea passed over Eva as she looked over the island with a single tree through blood filled eye sockets.
With a thought, the blood drained from everywhere she stuffed it. She was happy to note that the blood she wrapped around herself came through. It began orbiting around her, searching for any threats despite how the island felt safe the last time she was here.
One splattered against something. Something that wasn’t on the island before.
Eva whirled around, sending more orbs.
The orbs froze in midair. They dropped to the ground a moment later.
Eva fell to her knees and started crying.
She couldn’t help it. She tried to stop. Tried to stand up.
There was just no strength.
All her adrenaline was spent. Just a broken girl lying on a beach.
Sharp claws thrust out and grabbed Eva’s shoulders in a vice grip.
“It’s alright,” Arachne said. She pulled Eva close, squeezing her tighter than ever. “It’s okay.”
Eva threw her arms around the spider, squeezing just as hard as she cried into the demon’s shoulder.
—
Eva could see the agitation building in Arachne as her story went on. She looked about ready to tear something apart.
Unfortunately, the only thing to tear apart was Eva herself or the tiny twig that passed as a tree.
“The abattoir was a dangerous place to go. You shouldn’t have done that.”
“I didn’t know,” Eva snapped. “I was trying to get out of here. I didn’t want to end up in some demon’s private torture room.”
“The people there are being punished for severe breaches in contracts. Or rather, caught breaching contracts.”
“As nice as that is, I don’t really care.” Eva sighed as she leaned against Arachne.
Never had she been so glad to see a friendly face. They settled down at the edge of the beach and Eva couldn’t stop talking. Arachne silently listened to Eva’s day, even when Eva stopped at a few points.
Arachne had Eva’s hand in her own. She gently rubbed her claws over the back of her hand.
“I can fix this, I think.”
“What?”
“Not your eyes, I don’t think mine would fit.”
Eva pulled away from the demon and looked at her in her gray eyes. Everything was gray here, an odd irregularity she hadn’t noticed when she was alone.
“I’m not sure what you’re saying.”
“How do you think Devon is going to get his arm back? He’s going to make some deal with some demon. That demon is going to chop off its own arm and slap it on Devon. Demons do it all the time.”
Arachne stopped and shifted against the said. “I’ve never done it before. I’m sure it isn’t hard, I watched it happen once. My blood is your blood which can’t hurt.”
Eva pulled her hand out of Arachne’s grip. “I can’t take your fingers. Arachne, I–”
“It isn’t even a big deal to demons, we regenerate things quickly. You would too, if you were further along. It–” She stopped again and gripped Eva’s hand, running a finger at the base of her wrist. “It would be your whole hand. My fingers,” she wiggled her needle-like claws, “aren’t exactly compatible with human hands. The wrist is much closer.”
“Arachne,” Eva said firmly, “I can’t take your hands.”
“If you don’t, you’ll be going through the same thing Devon is going through. Summoning demon after demon, asking what they want for their body parts. Finding a good deal will be difficult, I assure you. You’re going to have to do that for your eyes already, since mine aren’t analogous to human eyes.”
“You said it yourself, I’ll regenerate when I’m further along.”
“I wouldn’t take that risk, if I were you.”
“What is that supposed to mean?”
“When you reach the point where you can regenerate, your body might decide how you are then is how you should be. You might not be able to regenerate your missing parts at that point. You’d then have to go through the summon and bargaining process anyway and hope that whatever you’re given works.”
Eva frowned. That wasn’t what she wanted to hear.
Arachne pulled Eva’s hand up. “Close your– or just don’t think.”
“Wait,” Eva half shrieked. She pulled her hand back to her beating heart.
“You’re not going to find a better deal than free hands.”
“I know. I just–” Eva didn’t know what she just.
Arachne pulled her in close. Extra legs sprouted from her back, holding her steady. Two of the legs pinched Eva’s arms, holding them steady.