The Demon in the Pastry Shop

36: Can't Stand the Heat

 Having dinner with Lovell was the last thing Silus wanted. If stabbing himself in the eye with Remis' poison needle would get him out of a sit-down in a restaurant with the Terrorling, Silus would do it in a beat of his horribly askew heart.

"She was pastry chef when you met her, wasn't she?" Lovell commented over the menu, then chuckling, "how sickeningly meek of her to return to where she feels comfortable."

"We're not actually having a meal here," Silus urged Lovell.

"I've heard good things about this place," Remis confessed under his breath, raising the menu up in front of his face.

Between Lovell's tracking skills and the sightings of Jude around the giant tree, Silus had no clue how to steer Lovell away from Kit. That was his plan, after all, to steer them astray. He hadn't even contemplated what to do if Lovell cornered her again. He supposed he would have to give up his cover and protect her. Things would get progressively worse from there. His snakes hung heavy on his head in anticipated defeat. Maybe Ravitavah would randomly come to his aid after he was kicked to the curb by both parties he swore loyalty to.

When Kit strode out from the kitchen in a waitressing uniform with her notepad in her hands, Silus crumbled and died right in his seat.

She went up to a table on the other side of the restaurant, completely unaware of the three of them sitting in the center. Silus' snakes bent over themselves to look at her and he cursed them in his mind, ordering them to ignore her. Only half of them obeyed.

"This is no fun," Lovell sighed, "I hate it when the target is too stupid to realize the danger they're in. It's no fun if they're not scared to death."

"You just say that because you're a Terrorling," Remis answered with an eye roll that Lovell sent a glare after. Remis stiffened.

"Ah well," Lovell pulled tight his gloves and stood up, "let's get this over with."

"No!" Silus shot to his feet. He even put his hand on Lovell's crisp shirt. "You can't."

"You better not be telling me what to do, Myus misprint," he growled, "if that were the case, I might have to inform the Collector who's really leading this operation."

"I'm just..." he dropped his hand, "it's too easy," he pulled out of nowhere, "it's probably a trap," he lied.

"You think she's that clever?" Lovell folded his arms.

"Yes."

Silus threw a glance over his shoulder at her. She was handing notes off to the table she waited on, her whole face beaming. He watched her make jokes and wink at the patrons. He exhaled hot out of his nose and turned back to Lovell and Remis.

She strolled past them into the kitchen. Even Lovell followed her with his eyes. Cut into the kitchen wall was a rectangular window overlooking one of the stoves. A chef stood there and she brought her the order, handing off the paper. The chef took it and looked it over. Another chef passed by, tripped trying to catch a plate and knocked into the chef at the stove. The chef at the stove fumbled and slammed her shoulder into a pot of boiling oil. Kit's eyes went wide and she reached for it -but not in time. The oil hit the open flame, a monstrous blaze consuming the stove chef and Kit with it.

The customers at The Cherry Tree leapt from their seats, screaming and running out of the restaurant. Silus stood in the middle of it all, staring into the flames where he could see Kit passed out on top of the stove. Her body adding to the fuel as the fire enveloped the kitchen with unnatural speed.

Silus tried to fry a small bird once (because his snakes were curious of the taste) and started a grease fire on his own stove, but it wasn't anything like this. No, everything went up in smoke and he could breathe it without taking a step forward. The flames were practically blue. It made no sense that the flames could be so hot.

Kit was dead. She was at the heart of the fire. She already passed out. Silus didn't think Bell Spirits were particularly resistant to fire. Just as the thought went through his head, Kit's body cracked like a porcelain doll thrown on the floor and pieces shattered out of her.

Silus fell back and braced himself on the table.

A Firetamer emerged from the crowd of eaters at the diner and lowered the flames and smoke. He stood, waving his arms around to reign the fumes in. The black smudges cleared away, the smoke evaporated, the fire disappeared into thin air. Everything was clear, it was like the fire never happened and the kitchen was just very, very old. Everything was fixed. Except Kit was still dead. And in one more lingering stroke of destruction, Kit's body crumbled into dust.

"Come on," Lovell sighed, wearily pivoting toward the door, "let's get going. She's not worth anything now."