In the blink of an eye, the wax expanded outwards. It grew to roughly Eva’s size. A sphere formed at the peak of the cone. Two columns stretched downwards from the base of the cone and two more cylinders stretched out near the top. As its growth slowed, it started shaping itself. The sphere formed into a face, the cylinders into arms and legs.
A waxy, dress wearing girl with green flames for hair stood in the center of the circle.
Eva always wondered how demons like that worked. Most demons ate or otherwise consumed their enticement. Did she have a body in her domain? Was she just a consciousness or perhaps a pile of disembodied limbs?
Devon whipped out his human hand the moment she finished forming. Her eyes snapped open, glowing a bright red as they did so.
The moment Eva made eye contact, a freight train ran into Eva’s brain. She clutched her forehead and fell to her knees. Her claws were poking through her skin and she didn’t care.
It hurt.
A lot.
A small part of her mind screamed at her to stop. If she pressed further, her fingers would pierce her skull. Eva couldn’t think. It didn’t matter if the pain–
The pain ceased. Completely and totally.
Slowly, Eva unclenched her eyes.
Devon stood, barely, with his arm pointing towards the demon. His feet were spread apart and he was wobbling. He took a few gasping breaths–that Eva mimicked–before steadying himself.
“What was that?” Eva said as she pulled herself to her feet. She intended to shout, but her voice came out as more of a whisper. Her wards didn’t extend into Devon’s cell house. The wax-woman wouldn’t have succumbed to them after a few seconds. Had she passed out, she would have been entirely at its mercy.
That was a problem she hadn’t thought of. They’d all need to be added to the wards before they could wander freely around the facility. Not an appealing prospect in the slightest–if Devon lost control for whatever reason, they’d have plenty of time to react. If she concentrated hard enough, she might be able to manipulate the wards around the demons. Then, if they did break free, pain like that would disrupt her concentration and the wards would collapse on top of them.
Eva had never done something like that before, but it was something to try before adding their blood to the wards.
“A ruax. It can induce headaches in people who meet its eyes.”
“That was a headache?” That word seemed far too benign for what she had felt. “I thought my head was going to explode.”
“Yeah. Should be fun to set on our enemies.” Devon went up and broke the shackles. The demon moved out of the circle to stand at his side.
Eva gave an experimental glance in her direction. The flames making up her hair were the only indication that she wasn’t a wax statue. Her eyes lost their glow and she stood stock-still. Eva couldn’t see any blood moving within her. Had she been missing her eyes, the demon would be completely invisible.
“You dominated her?”
“Ruax are chronic backstabbers and love poorly worded contracts,” he said with a flat glare. “Their favorite method is to wait until their summoner is in combat and then start up a headache. Just a little one, you’d barely notice. At the most crucial point in combat, it ramps the headache up to the debilitating effects you just felt.”
Eva frowned. It sounded reasonable. She certainly did not wish to feel that headache again. Watching the ruax stand unmoving at Devon’s side still sent chills down her spine.
Devon wasted no time in repairing the shackles and moving on. He unceremoniously tossed the handcuffs onto the summoning circle and started the process again.
“Any surprises I should know this time?”
“An abdoth. Lord of Slaves. Nothing like the ruax, but don’t shake its hand.”
“What happens if you shake its hand?”
At the glance her master gave her, Eva immediately regretted asking.
“Its called the Lord of Slaves. I’m sure you’re not that stupid.”
Like Ylva’s summoning, the Lord of Slaves grasped his enticement before walking out of the summoning circle. No pomp and circumstance. He wore an iron mask that seemed to be attached to the back of his head beneath a wild mane of gray hair. His hands were bound within a set of wooden shackles.
Apart from the shackles and the mask, the abdoth wasn’t wearing much else. Eva could easily see his ribcage. His arms were little more than bones with skin stretched tightly across. Given that the mask had no mouth hole, he probably hadn’t eaten in an eternity.
Then again, Arachne never ate and Eva skipped half of her meals. That had to be his natural form.
He didn’t look particularly strong, but Devon dominated him all the same.
Devon moved just close enough to the summoning circle to open the bag of tar inside the shackles. The tar jumped out of its bag and latched onto Devon’s hand.
Eva started forward. If something happened to him, she’d have to deal with two demons. Two demons that likely wouldn’t be too happy at their recent domination.
Her master didn’t seem particularly concerned. He just pulled back his hand. The tar tried to hold on, but the shackles peeled it off as he withdrew.
The thing thrashed around on the ground, trying to escape. It ceased moving once Devon started up the summoning process.
More tar bubbled up out of the circle, forming up into a deep pool of the muck.
Eva tore her eyes away from the summoning circle. She could hear a faint beating of wings.
No matter where she looked, she couldn’t discern the source.
It was everywhere.
Or all in her mind.
She shook her head just as a smell reached her nose. And that was all it was. A smell.
It wasn’t pleasant. It wasn’t unpleasant.
Eva glanced back towards the summoning circle.
What are those things?
Eva took five steps back. She forced herself not to flee from the room entirely.
Every time she thought she pinned down exactly what she was seeing inside the summoning circle, the thought escaped and it changed. It twisted in on itself, outside becoming inside before becoming the outside again.
Looking at it hurt. Not the same headache as the ruax.
It hurt because it couldn’t be. Eva could see parts of it that she was certain were covered up by other parts. She wasn’t seeing through it, simply following the contours of the body led to points hidden behind itself.
Eva turned away. Her master let out a soft chuckle.
“W-what is it?”
“You don’t want to know.”
Eva frowned. She considered protesting. With a shake of her head, she decided her master was right. She didn’t want to know.
Devon raised his arm to start dominating the… the thing.
It slammed into the shackles. A flickering wall of transparent green sprouted at the primary shackle line.
The wall of green shattered.
Eva gasped as the thing bounded into a second shackle wall. Both vials of Arachne’s blood shattered as she got the blood ready for her claw attack.
Just as she started to plunge her hands into the wireframe ball of blood, the creature ceased moving. It turned towards Devon and just waited.
Eva held her hands right at the edge of the ball, waiting.
Devon broke the shackles and stepped right next to the thing. With his bare hand, he scooped some of the stuff black tar that dripped from it into the bag and sealed it shut with a twitch of his rings.
Eva wanted to look away, but she couldn’t. The thing broke through shackles. She couldn’t let it out of her sight. “Is it safe?”
“Safe enough. I’ll be sending it back in half an hour. The other two can stay.”
“Half an hour? The nuns might not be here for hours or days. Maybe even weeks.”
Devon looked over with a frown on his face.