Melat stayed frozen at the corner of the room, which was of little relief to Parisa, especially after noticing that sometime between her gaze flickering briefly aside to seek out an escape route and refocusing her attention on the impending threat, it had inched closer. Oh. So they were playing that game. Fantastic.
"Melat," she said slowly. "What the hell is going on with you?"
But Melat did not answer, and Pari was pretty sure that this thing wasn't Melat in the first place. Who knew if there even was a Melat? Maybe all of it had been a fabrication, a ruse to get into the house. Fucking Altair.
She took a step back, and then a few more, and dread pooled in her stomach. The distance between her and Melat hadn't lengthened, though Melat had not moved. How was that possible? She could turn tail and run, but something told her that taking her eyes off of this... thing... was a bad idea. "Melat," she tried again. "What do you want?"

But Melat just kept smiling, so Pari kept backing away. If she could just get to that tunnel between the rows, she could finagle her way up the stairs again... maybe. Maybe they could keep Melat locked in the basement. What had happened with Roo's wards? Weren't they working? Wasn't this supposed to be the exact thing they prevented? In the corner of her eye, she sighted the gap, and this cost her a few more feet of space between herself and the entity - it had advanced the moment her attention had drifted. Pari swallowed a curse and gingerly angled her body into the gap, before freezing in realization. She'd have her eyes off of Melat. Would it vanish? Would it pop up somewhere else?
She didn't really have a choice, either way. It was retreat upstairs or continue staring at the creature in front of her. Parisa ducked backwards, gripping one of the nearby shelves and heaving it downwards, where it landed with a solid crash. She didn't think it would do anything to dissuade Melat, but at least she could still see a sliver of the entity's continuously-grinning face peek out from behind the neighboring shelf. Melat didn't blink or even wince at the crash, though it had sent Pari's heart reeling. She just kept staring.

Feofil had descended the stairs again, trying not to whip himself up into a panic. How long had Pari been gone for? Five minutes? Ten? Maybe she was just being stubborn and wouldn't come up until she fixed the power herself, or maybe this was another of her silent treatments at some perceived mistreatment. He veritably ransacked the living room, pulling open what drawers he could find and rummaging through the oddities inside for anything that looked like it might be related. A bottle of holy water. A bundle of herbs, probably sage? A handful of amulet-looking things on small leather cords, each with different intricate symbols on them. God, he should have paid more attention to Vera and Illy's rambling about exorcisms, or to his dad's stupid lecture before they shipped off to this demon-infested country. At least he had the chronokinesis. Did he have that? He knew of one demon who wasn't affected, and that didn't exactly bode well for them.

It was like this that he burst through the door to the basement calling Pari's name, in a frenzy and armed with trinkets he didn't even begin to know what to do with. "Pari?" He called down to the darkness. "Are you still down here?"

Pari's heart skittered to a stop at the sound of his voice, flesh rippling with goosebumps. No, no, no. This was getting worse by the second. "Feofil--" she began, and Melat's grin widened. The two of them were advancing down the center aisle, Parisa walking backwards. "Feo..." she said again, and Melat mouthed the words with her, eyes wide and staring. Pari's knees were going to collapse under her at any moment, and Melat only seemed to embolden, each sound drawing her nearer. "Go away." she croaked.

"Don't be stupid," he chided, suddenly feeling a surge of irritation at her stubbornness. "Roo called and she said we have to stick--" his foot fell on the last creaky step of the staircase down and the beam of his flashlight caught not one but two figures defined against the dark. His breath caught in his throat and he finished the words in near silence, jaw falling slack at the sight of Melat's eerily blank expression. "-- together."

Parisa fought the urge to roll her eyes skyward, or to close them in exasperation, but only because she was afraid that Melat would pounce the moment she lost her focus. Fan-fucking-tastic. Now they could die together, at least. "Back up," she hissed. "Go up the stairs, run."

Meanwhile, Roo and Giovanni had taken shelter in one of the cottages on the way to the village proper. It was a small place, with only three rooms and a shed out back for the animals. The proprietor was Bedzhat, an old, gray little lady who was round as she was short, and she was very short. Roo liked visiting her, because it was one of the only times she felt time.
Today, though, she rushed into the living room, where Bedzhat had just handed a mug of sweet coffee to Giovanni, and stammered, "We have to get to the Forest Manor! Feofil's in trouble!"

"You run," he shot back, fishing in his pocket for the flask of holy water and working to unscrew the cap as the entity steadily approached.

"What are you doing?" she breathed.

"Something," he replied as he got the cap off and thrust the flask forward, spraying its contents in the direction of Melat, who was only a few feet away now. A horrible hissing sound accompanied the fluid's contact with her flesh and she did recoil visibly, though her dead-eyed stare still did not leave them. "What are you waiting for? Go!"

Pari exhaled a curse, turned tail and ran, making sure to snatch at his elbow and pull him in the direction of the stairs alongside her. She couldn't hear anything behind them, so hopefully Melat had been incapacitated.

Their thunking footsteps filled the air as they clambered up the rickety steps, Feo's feet catching on the stairs and threatening a tumble as Pari dragged him along. "We have to get to your room, now."