“As soon as you finish burning the body. I’ll take you back. You’ll need to accept a beacon from me so that I can come back and grab Serena.”
That was another concern. The vampire was still unconscious. On a more positive note, Eva believed that she was not actually dead. The blood within Serena’s stomach had started to move about her body. When she had checked before incinerating Sawyer, there had been no visible signs of healing, but hopefully that would come after a short time.
Nel apparently didn’t hear a word past the first sentence. She stepped around Eva, wincing lightly at the heat still coming off the door. Even still, she walked right up to it with her eyes aglow. Holding her hand a short distance from the slit in the door, she begun to unleash a wave of fire.
Eva took a step back and watched as the room filled with the flames of the Elysium Order.
After Nel pulled her hand away from the door, white fire belched forth from the slit for another few moments before it died off. It was a nice sight to see. Nel had passed out during the torture session, but she looked satisfied with the outcome.
Her hands were down at her side, resting lightly by her hips. The smile on her face was small and content.
Eva decided to smile as well. There was no reason not to aside from that bad feeling about Sawyer. It was probably just a bit of paranoia.
After all, there was nothing left of Sawyer’s body but a finger. Even if he was still alive and wound up possessing his finger–or whatever–Eva really didn’t have anything to fear. What could a finger possibly do to her.
And if he did come back, his finger and the blood contained within could very well be another weapon against him. As much as she had hated it, being able to spy on him had come in quite handy.
“That’s that. Can we go now?”
Eva opened her mouth to respond, but a deeper voice interrupted.
“Not yet.”
Prax stood in the doorway, his entire bulk blocking the way.
Eva eyed him with crossed arms. He didn’t look like he was about to attack, but she only knew of him from Shalise. They had hardly spoken more than twice. Once right after he had been ejected from Shalise and again just before torturing Sawyer. His temperaments, goals, motivations, and everything else were complete unknowns to her.
“You wanted out of here? I assume that you mean to Earth.”
With a short grunt of affirmation, Prax gave a glacial nod of his head. “That is correct.”
“You do realize that Zagan is out there, right? Last time I checked, he was not all that enthused with you. Something about locking you up himself? Or killing you. I can’t remember.”
She had been a bit preoccupied with Genoa at the time.
“I was locked in a cell, chained to a wall for
“You’re free right now. You don’t have to stay here. I’m sure the doll has left your domain by now. Otherwise, you can go anywhere. If Zagan drags you back to your cell, that won’t be the case any longer.”
Prax narrowed his eyes and shook his head. “You do not understand. Nothing here is free.” He took a deep breath and let it out slowly through his nose. “I’ll take my chances with Zagan.”
“Alright,” Eva said with a shrug. “I don’t care if you’re here, locked up, or outside. Tell Nel how to summon you.”
“What?” The augur started at being addressed. “Me? But I–”
“There was a girl in the prison with Shalise,” Prax said. “She called herself your friend.”
“Juliana?”
“She promised to summon and contract with me.”
“I haven’t seen her in a few months,” Eva said with a frown. “With the injuries her mother sustained, she took off the last half of school and went to be with her family. If she was supposed to do something, I don’t know a thing about it.”
“But if you tell Nel how to summon you, I’m sure we could find someone willing to do it if Juliana can’t be reached.”
There was a low grumble from the back of Prax’s throat, but after a moment, he nodded.
“I’ll check up on Serena in the meantime.”
Rather than wait for Prax to move out of the way, Eva just blinked straight past him to appear in the sand between the kiln building and the women’s ward. Behind her, Nel’s heart rate spiked as Prax moved closer to her. Eva waited just a moment to ensure that Prax wasn’t going to attack the augur. As soon as they started talking, Eva blinked the rest of the way to the women’s ward.
Arriving in her room, Eva found Serena to be in mostly the same position as she had left the vampire in.
Mostly.
She had left the vampire’s arms at her sides. Now, one arm was up and across her stomach. While it was possible that Prax had moved her arm while Sawyer was being incinerated, Eva couldn’t come up with a good reason why he would do such a thing. So, Serena must have moved it herself.
