As long as she did end up not becoming a zombie. She seemed very confident about it, if exhausted.
Zoe let herself smile for the first time that night.
Wayne really had missed out when he let her slip by. Zoe just hoped the trouble Eva caused would be worth it in the end.
— — —
Eva stepped to another rooftop and paused, catching her breath. Arachne caught up a moment later.
Leaning into the spider, Eva sighed. The amount of blood she used drawing the ritual circle wound up taking more out of her than she thought. Combined with slaughtering a town infested with zombies and Eva felt ready to drop.
“You need to take a rest,” Arachne said. “They can finish cleaning the streets.”
Eva picked herself off of Arachne. “No. We’re going to find them.”
“You can barely stand. You may be half demon, but you aren’t a full one yet. You
“I will be fine. I’ll just avoid using blood magic for a while. I need to practice regular magic anyway.”
Arachne did not look convinced as she slid her mask to the side.
“And I’ll be relying on you,” Eva added.
“As much as I like to hear you say that, I’d rather you head in for the night. If you really want me to, I’ll continue scourging this town of the infected.”
Eva smiled at her concern. It was nice. Touching to have the woman care about her so. “Good thing we decided to get you that full mask. I’d rather have Zoe Baxter thinking of you as just a spooky associate than a demon.”
Arachne side and slid the mask back over her face. “I’m not going to talk you out of this, am I?”
“Try again a few zombies later. I might be more tired then.”
“I didn’t know you cared about the humans in this place enough to strain yourself so.”
Eva frowned at that and gave it a long thought before responding. “I suppose I don’t. Not humans in general anyway. These necromancers hurt my friends and are making a mess of the town I currently call home.” She paused, looking over Arachne for any cues. She found none.
“If I was the one hurt,” Eva continued, “you’d have brought the entire town to rubble until you found the culprit. So don’t say I’m going overboard over a couple of ‘measly humans.’ They’re my friends right now, just like you are. I’d do the same for you.”
Arachne smiled at that. Even with the mask in place, Eva could tell. The twitching of her hair tendrils and the slight tilt of her head gave it away.
How she had gotten to know Arachne so well over the last few months felt odd. Like a twisting in her stomach. She wasn’t sure if it was a good twisting or a bad twisting, but being friends with Arachne had been beneficial, if nothing else. The real twist in her stomach was that she actually meant it when she said they were friends.
Devon always warned her away from even speaking with demons outside of orders and definitely disapproved of being friendly. He definitely disapproved of Arachne’s interest in Eva. Once she started taking interest, Devon sought to keep them apart save for her treatments and a select few jobs.
Eva never saw the harm in it.
Even Ylva, who could kill someone merely by brushing her hand over them, had been very polite to a frightened Eva. She even left a gift. Sure, Eva had apparently given her some great boon, but there was no contract for the gift. Eva foolishly gave the phylactery to the demon. She could have just left and gotten a free boon.
After the experiment ended, what would her master do? Keep her around for observations, surely. Start treating her like one of the demons he summoned? Not if Eva had a choice in the matter.
Eva sighed again and realized Arachne hadn’t said anything. The spider-woman had gone very still. “Something the matter?”
“Are you sure you don’t want to head back?”
“I’m sure. Why?”
Arachne hesitated just a moment before responding. “There’s a group of zombies in the street below. I can hear them.”
Eva went silent to listen. Her hearing wasn’t as good as the spider-woman’s. Still, she could hear faint moaning when she concentrated.
“If you promise to stay here, I’ll go finish them and be back in less than a minute.”
Eva shook her head. “Like I said, I could use practice with regular magic.”
Arachne slumped her shoulders. “Alright,” she said, “but let me carry you down. We don’t want you leaving half yourself behind again.”
“That happened once,” Eva said as the spider woman lifted her into her arms. “I was brand new and panicked at the time.”
“And this time you are very exhausted.” Arachne stepped off the edge of the building. She absorbed all the shock of the landing and set Eva down in one smooth motion.
Eva whipped her arm out and launched a fireball towards the zombies. It came out less as the basketball she envisioned and more as a ping-pong ball. Eva sighed as it sailed right past the group of zombies and dissipated harmlessly against the asphalt.
It did manage get their attention. Unfortunately, their attention went to where the fireball dispersed–in the opposite direction.
