Ariana and Christian were back, and that woman rubbed me wrong. We weren't there for the possession that she must have been apart of that Puck was talking about, so Ryuu and I couldn't judge her based on that. I wondered what had happened there; no one had really filled us in.
"How can you say that you’re getting rid of demons when the equipment you have is completely useless,” Ariana said absently as if it wasn't a big deal that she had just insulted us.
“Excuse me?” I protested irritably, “the equipment we have is—”
“Good for ghosts and seeing demons, but worthless in trying to exorcise them,” Ariana grabbed a camera and turned it over in her hands, not looking at either Aisling or Puck. “You need more than fancy cameras to get rid of a demon.”
I was fuming. The cameras weren't there to get rid of the demons. They were there to help us figure out what we were dealing with, where they were in the house. They helped us figure out how to destroy the demons or ghosts. Ryuu, Aisling, and I did all the hard work and here she was acting as if we didn't do anything at all.
Ryuu must have noticed how upset I was getting because he took my hand and squeezed it gently. I took a deep breath and leaned back on my heels, and moved to the other side of Ryuu so that I was as far away from that woman as possible. Insulting me the way she had was nothing compared to the way she was ignoring Puck and Aisling completely.
"I have an idea. If you’re fine with it, you can be bait. I’ll draw a sacred circle around you and place protective symbols around it personally. When the demon comes out, the rest of you guys can try to get rid of it. If something goes wrong—” Ariana twirled her staff smoothly “—I’ll step in. Christian will help if I tell him.” She looked at everyone except Aisling and Puck, “How about it?”
She was gifted, I couldn't deny that, and her help with her priestess knowledge would benefit us. But, gosh could she be stuck-up. It seemed as though she expected that we wouldn't be able to do anything. And what was Christian to her? I wondered. I took another steadying breath. I would have to get along with her if we were going to do this. I had to put all of our differences aside.
“What do you two think?” Aisling was looking at Ryuu and I after she had said her peace.
I nodded my head. "I think I'm with Aisling on this one. Rina, with all of us here and with all of the knowledge and skills we possess, should be rather safe. If we resorted to Ryuu, I'm not sure we could say the same thing." Puck looked at me angrily, and I gave him a look, trying to tell him it was nothing personal.
Ryuu nodded in agreement. Ariana nodded and motioned for Rina to come to her so she could start placing the enchantments over her to keep her safe. I sighed and leaned my head on Ryuu's shoulder. I would be so happy to get this demon exorcized, and we could move on to something else.
Continue?
