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“How can a person smell like sleep?” Ingram asked with his head tilting.

“I don’t know the name of the second half of her scent, but I can only explain how it makes me feel. One day, I will find what else she smells like.” He hunkered down further into his cushioning seat. “Until then... I will continue to rest peacefully with it.”

Emerie shook her head, obviously puzzled, which caught Reia’s attention. “Just ignore it,” Reia murmured. “It’s a thing they all have. Magnar says I smell like sticks and thorns, but Orpheus says I smell like roses and elderberries. They’re scent orientated creatures, and we just let them muse over it, so long as it makes them happy.”

“Might be because they’re born with their noses and ears first,” Mayumi chimed in.

A short pause of silence fell over them. The women ate, while Faunus rested back with his children, and Ingram remained fascinated by the strawberry. He even began picking the seeds from the outside of it in curiosity.

Reia was the one to break the quiet. “Hey. So, I was thinking,” she said lowly. “If we’re going to go after Jabez, Emerie is going to be in some real big danger.”

“Yeah, I was thinking about that too,” Mayumi muttered back.

Reia’s green eyes connected with Emerie’s. “I’m going to give you my diadem. It’s enchanted to protect the wearer from smaller and most medium-sized Demons touching them. Big ones will still be able to grab you, but none of them, no matter how strong, can touch the diadem itself. Not even Jabez.”

Reia wasn’t wearing it now, so Emerie didn’t know what she was speaking of, but she’d take anything if it allowed her to breathe another day.

“That’s a good idea. There’s no point in any of us wearing it when we can just turn into a Phantom to protect ourselves.” Mayumi then nodded in the direction of her weapons. “You’re welcome to take whatever weapon suits you best. I went back to Hawthorne Keep and stole a bunch since I know all the secret tunnels and can just move through doors and shit. I have everything from spears, bows, swords, to whips.”

“You still need to figure out how to keep that teleporting bastard still,” Faunus growled out. “Otherwise, you won’t be able to touch him since he’ll just disappear from your hands.”

“Not really,” Reia answered slowly, while drifting her tired gaze to him. “Delora said that when she grabbed his hair, she teleported with him.”

Mayumi’s brows furrowed. “What do you mean?”

Reia rubbed at her neck. “I didn’t really get a good chance to watch Orpheus fight Jabez, but I knew he couldn’t keep his claws in him. When I brought this up to Delora, she mentioned when she clung to his hair, instead of disappearing from her, she disappeared with him.”

“Could that be an Elf-related thing?” Mayumi pondered out loud. “Like... maybe a magical weakness?”

“Who knows?” Reia answered, lifting a hand to shrug. “Better than nothing, right? If it’s true, then Delora handed us a way to trap him or stop him from getting away, and I know for sure if we cut off his head, he’ll die.”

Emerie stayed quiet and soaked in all the information. She’d never met the Demon King, only read of him, so she had nothing to add. She also wasn’t sure if what she’d read could even be accurate, since some of it was contradictory.

“He seemed cocky when I met him,” Mayumi said with a light chuckle. “Never know, maybe Jabez will like the idea of a bunch of women throwing themselves at him.”

Reia snorted a laugh, her lips curling into a weak smile for the first time since she’d arrived. It died the moment the front door opened with abang.

Everyone startled, with both Reia and Emerie gasping in surprise. Reia turned to look behind her, just as Orpheus shoved himself through the doorway.

Even though his skull was expressionless, his orbs were a swallowing, deep colour of blue, and his body language screamed he was unsettled. The fins on his arms were raised, and the ones along his back were lifting his shirt to the point Emerie thought they were moments from tearing it apart.

He approached Reia and slammed a hand onto the table, his claws gouging into it, while gently curling his other around the back of her neck.

“No one will be going to fight the Demon King unless we can be assured it will be successful,” he wheezed out, as if his very words filled him with pain and sorrow. “If you wish to leave me by myself and go fight, then you will only do so once. You will only allow yourself to be harmedonce. I will not be able to handle a second time.” Then he lifted his wolf skull to point in the direction of everyone else. “Am I understood? If she goes, and he is not defeated, and you all threaten this a second time, I will take us both from the Veil and not return.”

“Orpheus,” Reia rasped, turning on her seat to kneel on it.

She didn’t try to assuage his fears. Instead, she looked relieved to see him, as if that’s all that mattered to her, his presence.

Just as she was reaching up to slip her arms around his neck and embrace him, he let out an acute whine. Scooping her into his arms like he was frantic to hold her, he squeezed her tightly against his chest while shaking. With her legs wrapped around his large torso, Reia buried her face into the fur of his neck and clutched the back of his shirt with tight fists.

He was already moving to the exit before anyone could say anything more. He didn’t even bother to close the door behind him.

“It’ll be a while before we see those two again,” Mayumi uttered with a sigh, shaking her head. “He’s a bit of a sad guy and likes to be alone with her. It’ll be days before Reia will be able to shake him out of this, if at all. He could decide to be overly protective and possessive of her until we leave.”

“You all care about each other a lot,” Emerie stated, giving a weak smile. “It’s really sweet.”

“We try.” Mayumi returned her smile with an even weaker one before moving to the door to close it. “Reia tries to hide it, but Orpheus is the only person she really trusts. He’s her only family, so she wants to protect him as much as she can. That’s what all of us brides want to do, protect the ones we care about.”