She had, however, stolen his wand and burned a handful of books that were up in the room he had been sleeping inside of. The books weren’t anything special. Eva was relatively certain that Brakket’s library held copies of them all.
As far as she could tell, he was entirely self-trained.
Eva built up magic and teleported across the city to her abandoned hospital. After stumbling out of the hospital’s gate room and taking a long drink from a water bottle, Eva sat down at her desk.
There she lined up four fresh bloodstones.
The first three had been done by the book. With the proper sigil inscribed in blood on the back of her hand, Eva pressed her hand against the still beating hearts of the thugs before channeling her magic.
After those three, Eva had decided to experiment.
She had altered the sigil slightly in an attempt to puzzle out just what each little line did.
The first alteration had produced a bloodstone slightly smaller than the average. Despite that, it felt just as heavy as the others, if not heavier. Eva lacked any sort of precision scales at the moment.
She would just have to wait and see how it held up in the long run. It lacked the pure sheen and crystal clear transparency that those she had recovered from the museum possessed. Because of that, Eva doubted that it would last forever.
In fact, she assumed that it would be the first to show signs of decay.
The bloodstone she had made out of the necromancer had been larger than normal and had lasted longer than an average bloodstone as well. Unfortunately, she didn’t know what she had done to get that result–Eva hadn’t been thinking all that clearly at the time. Having recently undergone torture at Sawyer’s hands would do that to anyone.
Her fifth and sixth attempts at experimentation didn’t turn out so well.
As an attempt to produce a larger bloodstone, she had tried altering the same line she had altered to produce the fourth except in the opposite direction.
The heart had been consumed but the bloodstone had crumbled away to dust as soon as she tried to pick it up.
Resetting the sigil back to default, Eva had then tried to alter the parts that she thought affected the bloodstone’s power.
Big mistake.
There wasn’t a heart left. Neither was there most of a ribcage or other internal organs. The carapace on her hand had actually cracked from the force of the explosion. Had she had her original hand, she would probably be needing a new one at the moment.
Still, four bloodstones wasn’t a bad amount. She had only been expecting two at most. Stumbling across a gang had been a stroke of luck.
She had half a mind to extend her vacation. The leader had mentioned other gangs. Finding them would mean more bloodstones and more experimentation.
And really, what was at Brakket that required her attention?
Not a lot these days.
Despite the brief panic over the sky, the school year had finished out as per normal. Eva had even received decent marks on her pyrokinesis exam. The month of more mundane schooling had passed by in a flash–and something of a daze as well.
It had been… melancholic. Even hanging out with Irene and company had felt far more somber than it should have.
No Shalise, no Juliana, and no Arachne. A few other students had been pulled out by their parents. Brakket just felt empty.
There had been an announcement stating that the sky was part of a long-term magical experiment and that it presented no immediate danger. Not entirely inaccurate, but Eva had a feeling that she wouldn’t be seeing all of her classmates at the start of the next year despite Martina Turner’s machinations.
Aside from the fact that there was nothing going on at Brakket while there was still another reason to remain in Florida.
The leader had mentioned that someone had been around looking for demons.
One of Devon’s old contacts? Or someone searching with more hostile intentions?
Eva had met someone who Devon knew before he had found her. Just once. It hadn’t turned out well for anyone involved.
Though, one might say that Devon had come out better. At least he was still breathing.
Eva would have considered contacting Devon about it, but he had been livid last time they spoke. Though she couldn’t say that she was guiltless of shouting once or twice during their discussion. She wasn’t feeling particularly up to arguing with him again.
Had he come with them along with one of his dominated demons, Arachne would probably still be around.
Pausing in her fiddling with the bloodstones, Eva reached up to her collar. She had once again taken to wearing Arachne’s beacon around. The little black orb filled with intricate spider webs. Whenever Arachne was ready to return, Eva would be ready and waiting.
