“Eva,” Catherine said, sitting up on the couch. “What you fail to realize is that no one here cares about Daru. No one here cares about each other, except in how they will fare should we need to fight. So long as the others keep me from dying, they’re my best friends. The moment they become a liability to my continued existence…”
With a frown, Eva glanced towards Ylva, expecting at least the hel to deny having the same thoughts.
Ylva turned her head slightly, looking towards Prax. “The cambion’s assessment is correct. This is a trap. Wandering into it, blinded by revenge or some foolish heroism, would suit no one. The morail is not Our servant. His demise matters little.”
Eva closed her eyes. She took a deep breath, letting it out slowly.
With how much she interacted with them on a daily basis, it was easy to forget that most of everyone who she knew was a demon. And not demons like Arachne.
Arachne cared. At least about her.
Maybe that was the problem. She had a skewed perspective because of Arachne. Eva was willing to grant that Arachne likely cared little for anyone else. The only reason why Arachne had helped anyone else was because of Eva asking her to.
“But I care,” Eva said, looking Catherine in the eye. “I care about Arachne. I want her back. She was–
“Along with that, I care about you. Ylva too,” Eva said, turning to face the hel. “And,” she started looking towards Prax before snapping her gaze back to Catherine. “Lucy too. If any of you were being tortured, I would jump in and try to save you.”
Silence greeted Eva’s proclamation.
No one moved. No one said a word.
At least, until Prax let out a loud snort.
That broke whatever spell held them still.
Catherine rolled her eyes and picked up her cellphone again while Ylva just looked up at Eva and stared.
“A foolish notion. Mortals lack the ability to permanently kill demons. Any sacrifice you make would be pointless in the end.”
“I might as well try,” Eva said, fiddling with Arachne’s beacon once again. “By that logic, there aren’t any downsides to trying. If none of us die when we’re killed…” Trailing off, Eva stared at Ylva. “Can I die? Permanently.”
The air chilled by a few degrees. Enough so that Eva’s breath condensed into faint puffs of fog as she breathed.
Eva took a step backwards as Ylva moved to her feet.
Though she wasn’t standing in any sunlight, her skin vanished. All that remained was the giant skeleton, stooping over slightly to fit under the relatively low ceiling of the women’s ward. Two tiny white pinpricks of light emanated from the depths of her empty eye sockets.
Eva tried to take another step back.
Ylva was too quick.
Her hand reached out, digging her bony fingers into Eva’s shoulder.
Ice flowed through Eva’s body.
Not just ice. Whatever it was, it was colder than ice. Turning her sense of blood in on herself, Eva could see her very veins freezing beneath her skin. It spread, starting at Ylva’s hand and spreading.
Down her arm.
Down her chest.
Up her neck.
Eva managed only a short scream before her throat froze over.
She was only barely conscious of Catherine staring at her with wide eyes. The succubus made no movements to intervene.
Neither did Prax. He hadn’t even shifted from his position against the far wall.
Those white pinpricks where Ylva’s eyes should be captured her, forcibly holding her gaze and what little attention she could muster.
Tendrils of ice reached up Eva’s neck.
The moment they touched her brain, everything went dark.
— — —
“No one is coming.”
What little there was of the demon had just been swallowed by Void. Bits and pieces of him had been left behind. Void only took the largest chunk of the demon that was still connected to either the brain or the heart, if either were still intact.
Gertrude snapped her tome shut.
“No one is coming,” she said again with a glance around the empty wilderness. “All that work. All for nothing.”
Clement followed her gaze.
They had set up just to the side of the main freeway that passed by Brakket City. Several demon traps had been set up. Slick icy patches created by Gertrude made up the proper rings and symbols for shackles. Some out in the fields around them to capture any that might come by. Even a few on the roads themselves.
Some demons liked to drive for whatever reason. Clement had never talked with one, but he imagined that they didn’t often drive if they ever wound up summoned again. The look on their faces when they drove over a set of icy shackles was one that made him extraordinarily grateful to Gertrude for enchanting his visor with magnification settings.
A demon’s car would find itself relatively unimpeded by the ice. The demon wasn’t so lucky. Even the strongest of demons would find themselves hard pressed to survive both impacting against the wall of shackles at above eighty miles an hour and the crumpling of their car around them when their body got in the way.
A perfect trap if ever there was one.
