Glancing up, Shalise frowned.
Neither Sister Cross nor Zoe had any shadow to speak of, as if the light was passing straight through them.
“Huh,” Eva said, back turned to Shalise to look at her own shadow.
Things sprouted off the back of Eva’s shadow. Like oddly angled wings made of bones. Except they couldn’t be bones. They were far too fluid. Liquid dripped off the tips of the bones to rejoin the mass of shadow making up the rest of Eva’s body.
There was more to the shadow. Shalise couldn’t see it very well. Eva’s body stood in the way to obscure most of it.
Without a word or glance at the others, Eva walked out the door and disappeared around the side of the women’s ward. Shalise didn’t see her pass by the window, so either she was walking straight out or she had chosen to rest against the wall.
Zoe started to follow, but appeared to change her mind as she set her eyes on Shalise.
Lynn took a step back. She looked over the circle, double checking everything for the hundredth time. Once satisfied, her eyes lit up like they did anytime she used her powers. She started chanting.
Shalise didn’t recognize the words. They weren’t English. Probably–
Latin, Prax confirmed. She could feel an air of dread coming from the back of her mind. I do not think that either of us are going to enjoy this.
“What do–”
Shalise couldn’t get her question out before the pain started.
A tearing, ripping sensation pulled at her back. Prax’s dormant muscles spasmed. They grew under her skin, then shrank, then grew again. Every time, they seemed to be just a little less attached. Her natural muscles strained as they pulled against each other.
All the while, Shalise screamed. Like the rest of her body, her brain felt like it was being torn apart.
Prax’s screams faded in and out of the back of her mind. Unlike her, he needed no air to continue his screams. His vocal chords weren’t wearing and tearing from the stress. His screams came in a constant tone.
Shalise couldn’t say how long it lasted. She was fairly certain that her consciousness lapsed more than once, only to be brought back by the crescendo of pain.
It ended with a sudden thud and a hot, wet, and sticky sensation against her chest.
Shalise slumped forward. The ground was quickly approaching.
She stopped inches away as a pair of arms caught her and pulled her into a tight embrace.
“It’s alright,” Lynn’s voice came faint and distant. “Shal, you’re okay. It worked.”
Shalise blinked twice, trying to clear her mind of the lingering pain. She was pressed tight against Lynn’s body, her head resting on the older woman’s shoulder.
Behind her back, Prax–red skin, horns, bulking body and all–lay face down on the ground.
Eva stood over him, nudging him slightly with her foot while Zoe stood to the side with her dagger out. When Eva had reentered the room, Shalise couldn’t say. She had no idea how long that ritual had lasted. Her muscles screamed at her as if she had been running three marathons in a row, but it had only felt like a moment or two.
A splattering of red and black blood lay about between Shalise and Prax.
Seeing Prax, Shalise’s eyes felt heavy. She tried to keep them open. She wanted to stay awake.
After two more blinks, she found it too difficult to lift them again.
“We’ll let her rest for a few hours,” Lynn’s voice came, distant and quiet. “Then we can return.”
“Fine with me,” Eva said from even farther away. “Keep watching her and don’t worry. If any of the enigmas attack, I’ll deal with them.” A certain violence entered Eva’s voice, one that Shalise couldn’t recall hearing before. “I hope more of the enigmas attack.”
There was a sound not dissimilar to the cracking of knuckles.
“I could use a little cathartic release at the moment.”
Her voice trailed off into a deep silence as Shalise lost consciousness.
— — —
“It’s time.”
Nel jumped at Ylva’s words. She had been concentrating.
Sawyer was on the move. At least, she assumed that Sawyer was on the move.
It was just her luck that he would have noticed that his augur shield wasn’t working. After preparing the salt for Eva, she had immediately returned to watching him.
He had been in the middle of surgery on the little girl when Nel got to her altar. While the girl had torn off the violet-colored organ attached to his hand, there were still traces of it left. Veins, purpler than they should be on a person, bulged from his skin.
He didn’t seem to pay it much mind, choosing to focus on the surgery. In just a single half hour, he had done something that caused everything to go dark.
Likely by repairing whatever he had done with Nel’s eyes.
But all was not lost. After a few minutes of experimentation, Nel found them again. She couldn’t actually see them–anything within a few mile radius just vanished from her sight. But she could monitor that blotch of darkness. The edges of it moved around. Not much, it presumably moved as the little girl moved.
Still, it allowed Nel to track their general movements, if not their exact position.
Five days after Sawyer had repaired the girl, they had started moving north. Not quickly. They made frequent stops in areas that held tiny towns. Perhaps ones that were just large enough to have a motel or some other hostel.
After three days of travel, they had crossed the Nevada border into southern Idaho.
Nel had a feeling that she knew their final destination, even if they weren’t heading towards Brakket Academy in a straight line.
She had been hoping that Eva would be up to enact their revenge on Sawyer sometime before Ylva closed off her domain, but that didn’t seem to be all that likely anymore.
Nel glanced up at Lady Ylva and gave her a resigned nod.
“Shall I stay here? Or do you need me somewhere specific?”
Ylva stared. She didn’t blink or tilt her head to either side, she just stared in silence.
Anyone else might have missed it, but Nel knew her mannerisms well enough after a year and a half of being constantly in her presence.
Lady Ylva was confused.
“You wish to stay?”
Ice cold fear gripped Nel’s heart. This was it. She had allowed herself to grow complacent–comfortable even–as Lady Ylva’s aide.
Now she was being thrown away. Dismissed.
Killed?
Nel could feel her breath quickening.
No. Not killed. Sister Cross had tried to kill her. Discretely, true, but the evidence was plain to see from her position.
If Lady Ylva wanted her dead, she would be dead. There were no superiors to hold Lady Ylva accountable for the death of an augur. No one to complain about all the effort it took to replace an augur.
But Ylva was sending her back to Earth?
Nel wouldn’t miss it. She hadn’t stepped outside of Ylva’s domain more than three times in the past year and not a single one of those times had anything good happened. Generally, it was the exact opposite.
No. Nel wanted to stay.
Nel’s eyes flicked from Lady Ylva’s face to just over her shoulder.
Alicia stood a step behind Ylva, still wearing the dark robes that Nel wore. Her eyes were narrowed in Nel’s direction, but her face was otherwise impassive.
Had she been asked to stay in place of Nel? Or had she chosen to stay?
Was it a choice?
“I want to stay with you,” Nel blurted out.
Lady Ylva nodded. A faint smile touched just the very edges of her lips.
That had been the expected response? Or it was a test?
Nel sagged in her seat at the altar as the tension drained from her body. She spent a moment trying to get her hyperventilating under control.
“Very well,” Lady Ylva said, taking no apparent notice of Nel’s distress. “Gather everything that cannot be left behind. Join Us in the throne room after.”