"I'm going to the coast." Hyquaria said abruptly. "To send a message back home."
"What? Via Delphyne?" Zynfi asked. Hyquaria snorted. "God no, she doesn't want to be involved in this at all. She hates Altirian shit."
"Makes sense..." Rhea muttered. "Even the sea witch wants to avoid the demons. How are you going to get out?"
"The balcony." she tipped her chin towards the doors. "This place is bougie and it looks on the coastline. We're only one story off the ground."
"Alright. Be safe. You've said these are siren waters."
"They won't bother me," Hyquaria waved her off. "They know better. See you, be safe. Make sure that door stays locked."

Zynfi had vanished into the bathroom and Hyquaria, off the balcony. Rhea had been sitting on a chair in Rommer's room, trying to review their options and struggling to keep tears of exhaustion from leaking out of her eyes, when a distant call caught her attention.
Rhea...
Her name? Who was calling her?

"My room?" Pari began, then shook it off. Never mind. He did actually know more about this garbage country than she did, and she was still feeling a little faint from staring a demon in the face for the last fifteen minutes. Melat's empty smile was worse than any assassin she'd stared down; at least those had been human. There hadn't been a shred of anything recognizable in Melat's eyes.

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.

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.

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!"

"What are you doing?" she breathed.

Parisa paused for a brief second to snatch up one of the knives that sat in the wooden block on the counter. It slid out with a hiss, heavy in her hands, like it knew its own purpose. She shoved the thought to the back of her mind as she followed Feo's steps out of the kitchen -- Melat was no human and deserved no hesitation -- and in her whirl of thoughts, she nearly ran into Feo's back. "What--"

And then she saw it, the thing that made him stop. The staircase loomed in front of them, the house around it as dark as a void. Their only saving grace was the trace amounts of sunlight leaking in from the windows high above the front door -- sunlight that cast its beam over the entryway to the upper floor, where behind a wall, the corner of a head peeked down at them. Wide eyes, a glimpse of an empty, ever-present grin.
She'd been waiting.

"Shhh," she motioned for him to lower his voice, glancing anxiously out into the hallway. Rhea wasn't sure what made her more uneasy; the idea of someone more sober following Leriph's voice only to find him in conversation with an Altirian, or the idea of having a conversation with Leriph at all. "Yes, I'm... I'm here."

Rhea reflexively leaned away as he approached, her back thudding against the wall. "B-because I'm real. I mean, I'm... I'm actually here."