A pair of hands clamped down on Eva’s shoulders as she found herself suddenly staring into the green eyes of a woman from about half a centimeter away. Or eye, rather. The woman had a solid black eye patch covering her right eye.
Eva tried to pull back, but the hands around her shoulders kept her from moving much other than her head.
The eye behind the patch had blood flowing through it. It turned left and right in tandem with the left eye. Having never seen a blind person that still had their eyes, Eva couldn’t say if that was normal or not. As far as she could tell through her sense of blood, the eye was working just as well as the uncovered one.
“Interesting eyes.”
Eva would have jumped had the woman’s hands not been holding onto her. One word came out as coarse as gravel while the other was almost melodious.
Her hands disappeared from Eva’s shoulders and reappeared around her wrist. She just about pulled Eva’s arm out of the socket as she yanked the hands towards her sole eye for a better look.
“I thought these were gloves from behind, but they’re not gloves at all!” Her finger traced over the curl of chitin where the carapace melded with skin. She dropped Eva’s arm as abruptly as she had grabbed hold of it. “And your legs!”
Eva took a step back before the insane woman could wrench her feet out from under her.
Luckily, the woman did not pursue.
“I say,” she said, her voice taking on a light melody–almost a mocking sing-song. “You’re a fascinating one. What manner of creature are you?”
“A human,” Eva said through grit teeth. It was her standard response. One that she hadn’t had to use in a while. Everyone in school and most of the people in town were aware of her appearance.
“Well, isn’t that the most bold-faced lie that I have ever heard.”
Eva shook her head before she started on the other standard response. “Not a lie at all. I was born a human. In my first year, a necromancer had a ghost possess me, kidnapped me, tortured me, cut off my arms and legs with a chainsaw, gouged out my eyes with a rusty spoon, and then fitted me with replacements.” She clacked her fingertips together for emphasis.
“A necromancer? Truly?” Again, her hands just about teleported around Eva’s arm as she pulled it up to her face. “There are no stitches. This flesh isn’t rotting or in any kind of stasis.” One hand knocked against the hard carapace. “It isn’t flesh at all!” She took a deep breath through her nose. “And you don’t smell like a necromancer either.”
“I do bathe,” Eva said as she tore her hand out of the woman’s grip, not even caring that she gave the woman a few minor cuts on the way. Maybe the woman would catch the hint.
Or… apparently not.
Humming a short tune, she stared down at the small amount of blood pooling in her hand with a wide smile on her face. A small circular ring adorned her finger, becoming slightly stained with blood as it dripped between her fingers.
Normally, Eva would have dismissed a ring as being a ring. Or perhaps a focus. Nothing too strange around a magical school.
But the circular face on this ring was inscribed. Dots and lines embellished the edge. There was an inner circle with more symbols and a sort of keyhole shape in the center.
A signet ring with a ritual circle inscribed on top was certainly out of the ordinary. What’s more, it was so small. The smallest ritual circle that Eva knew about was the one for her bloodstones. That fit on the back of her hand. Unless it was a mere reminder so that this woman could draw out a larger circle, it was likely intended to be dipped in ink and pressed to a sheet of paper.
But what could such a tiny circle be for?
“Interesting weather we’re having,” she said without a glance at the sky.
Eva blinked, torn from her thoughts by the woman’s light voice. “An experiment by Brakket Academy.” Eva kept her eyes off the purple streaks in the sky as well. The woman was a whole lot more alarming than anything the sky could have been. “The announcement said that it isn’t supposed to be harmful, though they don’t know when it will go away.”
“An experiment? No extra details?”
Eva shrugged. “You would have to ask someone else. I’m just a second-year student.”
“I’ll see about finding someone,” she said. After patting Eva on the head with her unmarred hand, the woman slipped around Eva and went back inside the building she had just exited.
Eva watched her go with narrowed eyes. Even after she left Eva’s field of vision, she still kept track of the woman through her blood sight until the woman went out of range at the fourth floor.
Obviously, the woman was up to no good. Too curious. Too undisturbed by Eva’s hands. Most of all, she had been entirely too happy about everything, even after having her hand cut.
Happy people were never up to anything good. Simple experience had taught her that.
Eva lingered around the entrance for a few minutes. Ylva probably already knew–she was Ylva, after all–but a quick warning that she may be living under someone dangerous wouldn’t take long.
With a sigh, she decided to warn Ylva. She still stuck around for another minute longer—Eva didn’t want the other woman to think that she was being followed—and headed back into the apartment building.
As she ascended to the third floor, the woman came into view again. She and a taller man were in a room together. He stood still in one corner of the room while the woman spoke in an animated fashion with repeated gestures towards her hand.
Eva once again wished that she knew how to blood-lip read.
— — —
Sitting at the kitchen table, Clement stared down at his bowl of dry cereal.
A rumble of his stomach threatened to deafen any who heard it. Looking at the food just made him more hungry. It wouldn’t be hard to eat the cereal dry. He was aware that people did all the time, as a snack or as a meal.
But that wasn’t his way of things. Cereal required milk, protein powder, and a light sprinkle of sugar. Milk helped his bones, protein helped his muscles, and sugar helped his mind. A perfectly complete breakfast.
Gertrude was taking far too long. And yet, she had only just left. Not enough time had passed for her to make it to the store and back. A paradox for the ages.
Gripping his helmet in his gauntleted hand, Clement slammed it over his head.
If Gertrude couldn’t be back yet, that meant that someone else was at the door.
They hadn’t even knocked.
Clement was on his feet, drawing his curved sword before the door handle turned even a quarter of the way. By the time the handle had finished turning, Clement had crossed the room. He hefted his sword in both hands and brought it down without hesitation the moment the door opened.
Anyone intruding on their room without so much as the courtesy of a knock was either an enemy or rude to the point of deserving death.
The door slammed shut. The massive sword caught on the wood of the wall, sending splinters and debris exploding outwards.
Before he had a chance to dislodge his sword, the door swung wide open.
A flash of red slipped in and made it under his guard before he could react.
Clement pulled his hands back, just in time to avoid an elbow coming down onto his wrist.
Despite only avoiding the elbow an instant before, there was already one hand on the back of his helmet and another gripping his wrist.
He didn’t have the time to react before his faceplate smashed into the wall, breaking through drywall and a wooden beam. His arm bent backwards, saved from breaking thanks only to the rigid limitations of his armor.
A pressure on his ankle culminated in his feet being kicked out from under him.
Clement’s helmet dragged through the wall under the pull of gravity. Drywall ground to dust. Enchantments on his helmet kept his breathing clear, but did nothing to help his occluded vision.