World Weaver (The Devany Miller Series Book 4) (26 page)

The scream raised the hairs on the back of my neck. “Let’s go.”

The hill rumbled. Krosh caught me before I fell, and took the eye from my charred hand. We ran down the shaking hill. I fell once, twice, cutting my knees on the shells that lined the path. The warriors fell too, crumbling to bone dust, decaying and disintegrating before our eyes. At the bottom, I risked a look back. The top of the hill disappeared into a gout of black smoke, then Krosh and I were running through the crack in the obsidian wall, the sharp rocks like teeth snapping closed behind us.

We didn’t stop until we were well away from Sephony’s prison.

The ring of obsidian was crumbling, the tornadoes tearing each other apart. The ground shook and rumbled, vanishing behind disaster-smoke.

I blinked back tears. My hand hurt, as did my arm, but it was Sephony I was crying for. I hadn’t realized she would be obliterated when I took back the eye. Tytan would be devastated. He’d just found his mother and now she was gone.

And it was my fault.

***

Krosh took me directly to Magani since my magic hadn’t done a damn thing to heal my burned hand. Liam slipped in after the healer, his eyes wide when he saw my wound.

“What happened?”

“Long story,” I said, concentrating on not throwing up. I had managed to dull the pain, if not heal the burn, but Magani’s touch on the blackened flesh made me sick to my stomach.

After an hour’s work, it wasn’t any better. He had it packed with a paste, “Made of chorris berries and Swamp salt. Let it sit for a day and mind you keep it dry.” He left, his belly proceeding him out the door.

I sighed. “I don’t have time to be wounded.” The Spider Queen was waiting, though I supposed she’d waited thousands of years, so a few more days wouldn’t hurt.

Liam was holding the eye, rolling it from one palm to another. “Guess what?”

I raised my brows. “What?”

“I can change.”

“You can?” I cut my eyes to Krosh, who was eating again. “Is that normal?”

“It’s fast,” he said, grinning at Liam. “A full change?”

“Yeah. But I didn’t fly because I promised Mom she could be there for it. So. You know. You think you’re up to going outside and watching me?”

Oh god. My kid, flying through the air? What if he fell? What if a bigger bird swooped down and attacked him? “Sure.” I rose to my feet, cradling my hand gingerly with my left. What was up with my hand that it was stubbornly refusing to be fixed? I pushed the worry away and injected a bit of humor into my next words. “Don’t kill yourself, kid.”

“Mom,” he said, doing his best not to roll his eyes. “Come on. I’ve been dying, waiting for you.”

“Dying, huh?”

Krosh knew me well. He took one look at my face and said to Liam, “I’ll ask Nandolee to fly with you. She’ll keep you safe while you change and can show you how to take off and land.”

Liam nodded. “Cool.”

Had I suggested he needed someone to help him, he probably would have complained about me treating him like a baby. “Thank you,” I whispered and Krosh winked at me.

Liam ran off to round up his friends and Kroshtuka left to find Nandolee. I grabbed Mina who had been embroidering delicate blue flowers onto a soft linen shirt. She linked arms with me and we met up with the rest at the north gate.

Nandolee was a tall woman with black hair and eyes, her face all sharp angles. She took my son aside and talked with him earnestly, her gestures wide and elegant. Liam had an intent look on his face as he listened.

“It’s so quick,” Mina said.

“Too quick?”

She laughed, recognizing my worry as a mother’s bottomless fear for her children. “No. Not too quick. Kroshtuka woke up a hyena when he was only three. That’s how our mother knew he would be anchor to Meat Clan.” She squeezed my good arm. “He will be fine. Nandolee has taught three of our own to fly. It’s been a blessing to have her here.”

The pep talk ended with my son teaching Nandolee how to fist bump. She looked bemused, but let him show her a few variations before they were ready to start. Without any further talk, Nandolee stepped through the north gate. She shifted into an eagle as she walked through, a big, black eagle with a long, pointed beak. Her predatory eyes followed my son as he tentatively stepped through to join her. He didn’t shift automatically as she had. Instead, he sat on the ground and crossed his legs, his chest expanding and contracting with long, slow breaths. The eagle fluttered her wings, but otherwise didn’t seem impatient.

Ten minutes passed. Twenty. Finally, Liam shivered. The air around him rippled as it had when my mother changed. Magic sizzled in the air around him and my boy vanished in a flutter of black wings.

I gasped. “He’s beautiful.”

Krosh joined Mina and me, saying, “He’s a quick study. It takes him a while to get quiet in his mind. But once he’s there, he grabs hold of his bird and pulls. That’s the hard part for so many, but Liam is a natural.”

Pride made me smile. Then I tensed as Liam flapped his wings. He rose up an inch or two, then hit the ground, squawking in frustration. Then Nandolee took off, her legs bunching up and pushing off the ground, her wings propelling her into the sky. Liam watched her, his head cocked. After a moment’s study, he copied her, bunching his legs as he flapped his wings. He rose of the ground. Another flap. Another.

He flew.

I held my breath.

Liam soared overhead, following the eagle, banking and flapping, gliding and diving.

Mom would have been so proud of him. I wished fiercely she was here to see him. “He’s beautiful,” I whispered.

Krosh kissed me on the forehead and we stood together as my son became the person he was meant to be.

Eventually, Liam soared in a large, lazy loop and landed. It wasn’t very graceful and he ended up with a beak full of dirt, but he made it safely to the ground. His change back to his human form didn’t take as long as his transformation to his bird self, and then he was jumping around, hooting and hollering. When the eagle landed and changed, Liam threw his hands around her waist and squeezed her tight. She awkwardly patted him on the shoulder until he let go.

“Did you see me? Did you? That was amazing!” He couldn’t stand still, hopping from one foot to the other. “I gotta tell my friends. Okay? You’ll be okay?”

I nodded and he was off, yelling at the top of his lungs.

“Oh boy.”

“The skies aren’t safe anymore,” Krosh said and I laughed. “Come, you need to rest.”

“I need to get back to the Spider Queen.”

“Tomorrow.”

I signed. Another day without my daughter. “Tomorrow. But even if this isn’t any better, I’m going.”

“Tomorrow, we go together.”

***

My right hand wasn’t any better in the morning. My cheek was smudged with black ash, and more of it stained the sleeping furs. The bandage was smudged black too and when Magani pulled the once white cloth free, chunks of burnt and blackened flesh came off with it. Magani cleaned and dressed it again, pressing a new herbal salve into my skin with delicate fingers. Krosh gave me a sling Mina had fashioned from leather, the material soft against my neck.

Dressed, and as ready for the day as I could be, I slipped the Spider Queen’s eye into my pocket and joined Kroshtuka outside. Liam stood with him, and said, “You going to get Bethy?” when I walked up.

“That’s the plan. It’s a lot like playing one of your video games. Take the eye to the Spider Queen. She takes the egg sac. The magic falls and then we rush in and grab Bethy.” A lot hinged on what happened when the Queen took the Omphalos. I prayed nothing cataclysmic would threaten my daughter. Let the magic go out with a whimper, rather than a bang. “I love you. Don’t fly without Nandolee,” I added, earning myself a glare.

“Mom.”

“Humor me, kid.” I gave him a tight hug that he returned. “Love you.”

“Love you too.”

To Kroshtuka, I said, “You ready?”

He nodded.

I pulled the Spider Queen’s eye from my pocket, smiling at Liam’s wide eyes. The ball glowed bluish-green and streaks of gold and silver wormed under the smooth surface. I concentrated my will on the ball, connecting it with the Queen herself, somewhere in the depths of the Wastes. When the connection firmed, I took Krosh’s hand and we stepped through the hook I made.

It worked.

The small spiders shrieked at our sudden presence, though not in fear. They skittered about in excitement, shooting web, dropping from the ceiling, and a couple even crawled up my legs.

Thank god I wore jeans.

“Is she here?”

“Yes. Yes,” they chorused. “Follow us.” They led us out gigantic purple doors and there she lurked, her black legs impossibly long, her body bigger than my house.

She turned to us without a sound, lowering her body to better see us. “I see luck favors you, Devany. Perhaps you and my champion have more in common than your pitiful lack of legs.”

“That may be so, though I’m not as brave as she is.”

“Of course not. Come forward. Bring my eye.”

I did, Krosh by my side. The orb in my hand warmed the closer I walked as if it knew it was almost home.

I leaned over her massive jaws to drop the eye into the last empty socket and something blurred past me, knocking the eye from my grasp. The Spider Queen screamed and I heard the familiar sound of a challenge returned. Her name startled out of me. “Neutria!”

She hissed, dropping the silk-wrapped eye into the clutches of one of her bubblegum-colored minions. They carried away my hard-won trophy.

I threw a gout of pure magic at her, the lines of it uneven coming from my left hand. She leaped into the air, impossibly high, so high I lost track of her for a second. I slammed a protection circle around me. Krosh shifted lightning-quick, his powerful muscles bunching as he sprung. Neutria landed on the side of the Queen’s tower. Krosh leaped up, grabbed one of her legs in his powerful jaws and yanked. She tumbled off the tower and hit the ground hard. It didn’t keep her down, though. She twisted in his grip, ripping her foot free, leaving part of her still twitching between his teeth.

She ran at the Queen, who spun too fast for my eyes to follow and sprayed silk at Neutria. It tangled her legs and she tumbled. The Queen splayed her chelicera, her fangs striking at the smaller spider. I shrieked, couldn’t help it, not wanting to see Neutria killed. Neutria scrambled out of the way just in time and darted under the Queen, trailing silk behind her.

Her fangs with their dripping, acid venom sank into the Queen’s belly.

The Queen dropped flat. Had Neutria killed her? No. There. Blue-black legs poked free from under the Queen’s massive belly. The Queen had used her weight to stop Neutria, but it didn’t look like either of them were dead. “Stop! Neutria, please.”

Neutria wriggled out from under the massive spider only to go limp. The Queen rose ponderously to her feet, and Neutria’s unmoving body floated into the air.

“Don’t kill her,” I said, dropping my bubble.

“I didn’t intend to,” the Queen said. “She is a fierce warrior. I would, however, have my eye back.” She screeched, the sound killing my ears. I threw my hands up to cover them, but it was over as fast as it began.

Crawling back on their bellies, the gumball spiders converged on the Queen. The one dragging the eye had to approach her; the rest hunkered safely out of reach.

I almost felt sorry for the tricky little bugger. Almost.

The Queen put a regal foot on the eye and made another noise that crawled over my skin like biting ants. The gumball spider ran back to its fellows like a dog with its tail tucked between its legs. “Devany Miller, I told you when I removed this spider from you that I could return her to your soul-space. Do you wish this?”

Did I want Neutria back? I’d missed her, despite her increasing insistence on taking over my body without my permission. But did I want her back? “What will you do with her if I say no?”

“I will send her back to the Swamps. She fought bravely and I can sense her youth. There is no need to kill such a one.”

Krosh rubbed against my legs, still in hyena form. His tongue lolled out of his mouth as he looked up at me, but didn’t offer any advice.

Neutria wouldn’t be sad if I said no. I represented power to her, nothing more. I wasn’t consigning her to death by saying no. Saying yes might get me killed if she took me over at the wrong moment, for the wrong reasons. Saying yes could get someone else killed.

“Let her go, then,” I said, the decision sitting heavily on my mind.

“As you wish.” The Queen sent Neutria in her magic cage upward. I watched until she disappeared from my sight.

That was it, then.

The Spider Queen lowered herself once more and I picked up the eye. The gumball spiders trickled off into the Wastes and there were no other threats in sight. I leaned in, dropped the eye into the empty socket, and lurched back when her strength roared forth. “Holy shit,” I gasped, unable to catch my breath.

The Spider Queen reared back, raising her front legs in a threat display, just like Neutria. When she settled to Earth, she looked whole. Before she’d been a spider. A large one, to be sure, but still an ordinary spider. Now power throbbed from her body setting her legs aglow, shaking the ground beneath her delicate feet. Not a spider, but a goddess.