She touched it to the pool of blood and the woman. Once sucked dry, Eva brought up as many blood marbles as she could. The marbles fell into a fast orbit around her, two merged together to form a sort of rolling-pin to run along the ground in front of her and check for obstacles. They were the only things Eva could sense in this place.
A small amount of blood kept circling around the stone. Without fingers, it was more convenient to have it hover in front of her. No dagger to mount it in, she would have a hard time drawing her own blood. A full, large bodied woman should be plenty for now. The woman’s blood was probably far more pure, according to blood magic, in any case.
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.
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.
