A Wolf's Howl, A Fairy's Wing

As soon as he left the warm room, lit by the soft glow of the fire orb, and entered the cold, dark, and damp hallway, he looked around for traces of the raven-haired girl but saw nothing.

Trying to catch her scent was pointless, as Elora had long ago planted sigils on all of them to prevent that very thing.

Luckily, Erik didn't need to rely on that, as the covenant would point the way just fine.

He frowned and looked towards the hallway's floor. "She's going down?" he wondered out loud. "Is she trying to leave?"

Setting aside his doubts, he ran after her through the dilapidated and decaying hallways. He quickly found the stairs and began bounding down them until he finally noticed Emily's fluttering black hair just below him.

"Emily, wait!" he yelled after her, but she kept going. He tried to use the covenant again to force her to wait but cursed when Emily still appeared to be entirely unaffected.

Erik grumbled with annoyance, promising himself to talk to Elora about this later, but continued after her.

Naturally, his normal movement speed was far superior to Emily's, but it was hard to make use of that in these narrow hallways and winding stairs. Combined with the fact that Emily had a five-minute head start and access to the physical improvement sigil that Elora had given her, it would take at least a minute for Erik to catch up to her.

But catch up to her, he did.

He wasn't sure where Emily was trying to go, but when they were only one floor above the ground floor, he managed to cut Emily off and ended up in front of her.

Emily looked at him with panic in her eyes, but before Erik could say anything, she crashed through a door next to her and into another one of the hotel's rooms.

Erik watched her with concern, wondering what was going on in her head before following after her.

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The room they ended up in was far more basic and bare-bones than their more luxurious one on a higher floor, not to mention that it had never been cleaned and warmed by Astrid's inner sun.

The moment he entered, two pitch-black orbs flew at his face, forcing him to dodge. "Whoa there!" he exclaimed.

'I guess with the covenant on the fritz, she can even attack me now,' he thought to himself.

After attacking him once, the orbs now floated in front of him as if acting like guardians. Behind them, Emily was shivering in a corner, with her arms wrapped around her knees and looking at him with fear in her eyes.

"D— Don't come closer!" she said in a panicky voice. "I— I need time to think, and your presence is not making it easier!"

Before Erik could answer, she suddenly grabbed her head, "Argh! My head is pounding!"

Tears streamed from her eyes, "I can feel the darkness eating away at me, Erik!" she exclaimed desperately. "I— I don't want to continue like this! Fearing any moment that I'll suddenly think harming Emma is okay, or even for the best!"

Erik frowned and immediately began charging his lightning flash ability, thinking he might be able to use it later.

Those protective orbs were of no danger to him. Still, since Emily seemed to only grow more panicked when he tried to approach, he decided to stay a few meters away from her for now.

He crouched down so that he could look Emily in her cracked and teary eyes.

"So what's your plan here, Emily? Why did you run away from me?" he asked in a grave tone while frowning somberly.

"I— I don't know! I don't know!" she sobbed as she continued to hold her head. "I just know I can't stand this anymore!"

"Well, how about we talk about it?" Erik said, soothingly.

"I can't do that, Erik!" she yelled back, with a hysterical undertone in her voice. "You'll stop me if I try to run away! But I can't stay here knowing I'll one day hurt Emma again!"

"Didn't I promise to protect Emma from you?" he answered, as his mind raced to find a solution.

"Well, you failed!" Emily yelled back angrily. "You've only made things worse! You made me care about you, and now… now these intrusive thoughts," she screamed as she knocked on her own head, "are trying to convince me to get Emma out of the way so that I can have you all to myself! How stupid is that?!"

Suddenly, she stopped as a sinister smile appeared on her face, "Of course, they also want me to kill that bitch Elora, but I don't need much convincing for that."

Erik quickly pushed down the fury that rose over Emily's comment, knowing she wasn't in her right mind.

He also couldn't help but wonder what in the hell she dreamed about and how her corruption had suddenly reached this point.

"That doesn't mean I failed to protect Emma from you. She's fine, after all, isn't she?" he asked rhetorically as lightning flowed through his body and nearly finished charging his ability.

Emily seemed to hesitate with the comment. "I… Y— Yeah, but how will you stop me in the future? That damn covenant doesn't even seem to work anymore for some reason. A— And besides, even if it did, I still have to live with these damn urges!"

Erik nodded with a frown and answered, "That's true." But the moment the last syllable left his mouth, lightning struck.

The two black orbs were instantly annihilated, and Erik ended up with his body pressed against Emily's.

Her eyes opened wide, but Erik wrapped his arms around her and kissed her deeply before she could respond. At first, she struggled a little, but as his tasty, soothing fluids entered her body, she quickly calmed down and flung her arms around his neck to hungrily answer his kiss.

Thoughts and worries left her as she felt herself engulfed in Erik's protective embrace. Her headache receded a little, and she suddenly felt as if everything would be alright so long as Erik was with her.

After a few seconds, they separated, and a farm calmer Emily was panting and looking at him with part lust and part anger. "Asshole…" she mumbled.

"The covenant may be a little on the fritz right now, but we'll solve that as soon as Elora wakes up," he said, grinning slightly at the frustration in her eyes. "But as you can see, I'm still perfectly capable of both stopping and calming you down."

Unfortunately, he could see in her eyes that it wouldn't be enough.