Chapter 38 #3
I didn't know what had been taken—I only knew that losing it hurt.
Across from me, the Spinner sat back upon its legs, trembling with pleasure. Its black eyes were half-lidded in ecstasy, its abdomen curved sickeningly outward, swollen as though it had gorged itself on a hearty meal. A low, satisfied sound escaped it.
The sight of it filled me with revulsion.
“You got what you wanted.” My voice sounded strangely distant to my own ears. “We’ll be leaving now.”
I stepped aside. The Spinner moved neatly into my path.
“Leaving?” it repeated slowly, and there was such genuine bemusement in its voice that alarm shot through me.
Before I could react, the creature spat. A strand of hot silk shot from its mouth and whipped around my wrists.
I spun to run.
Another strand lashed around my ankles. I hit the forest floor hard, dirt grinding into my mouth as the breath burst from my lungs.
Its laughter rustled like dried parchment. I cried out as one of its long limbs hooked around my waist, lifting me effortlessly from the ground. I fought, striking and thrashing, but every movement only made the silk cinch tighter.
Only then did I understand why Rìan had been so unnervingly still in his restraints. He'd known struggling would only make it worse.
The Spinner swung me over its shoulder and began climbing. All I could do was hang limply against its papery body and watch the forest floor shrink farther and farther below.
I tried not to think of the yellowed cocooned shapes suspended among the webbing, swaying gently in the treetops. Soon I would be hanging beside them.
A blur flashed past my cheek so close that I felt the air stir against my skin before it buried itself in the Spinner's shoulder with a meaty thud. The creature's scream tore through the forest.
I stared, momentarily stunned, at the object quivering inches from my face, its hilt vibrating from the force of the throw.
An iron knife.
The Spinner convulsed in pain, and I slid forward into empty air, throwing my shoulder into the fall at the last possible second. I slammed into the ground, pain shooting behind my eyes.
The Spinner shrieked and wrenched the knife from its shoulder, blood pouring freely. Smoke curled from the puncture where the iron had pierced its flesh, the skin around it already blistering.
Rìan burst from the undergrowth and dropped to my side.
He cupped my jaw, turning my face toward him.
The shoulder of his shirt had been torn away in the fall, exposing a faint pink line where a wound had already healed.
Leaves clung to his hair, and blood streaked one side of his face, though whatever injury had caused it had vanished as completely as the wound on his shoulder.
His gaze swept over me quickly, assessing my injuries.
“Can you run?”
I nodded.
His hand closed around my arm and he pulled me upright.
The forest lurched violently sideways, a wave of dizziness crashing over me and I staggered. At once, he slid one arm beneath my knees, carefully avoiding his broken hand, and swept me against his chest.
And that was when the buzzing began.
At first it was little more than a distant hum beneath everything else—the pounding of my pulse, the ringing in my skull, the Spinner's furious cries as it clawed at the iron wound.
Then the sound grew louder. And louder.
Diaphanous wings flitted through the air, drawn by the blood flowing down the Spinner's side. They darted forward and back, circling just beyond its reach.
Its many eyes widened with sudden terror. “No…”
The droning grew louder. Not from one direction, but from every direction. As though the forest itself had come alive.
Rìan didn’t hesitate. He turned and plunged into the undergrowth, carrying me with him without sparing a glance for what was happening behind us.
I looked anyway.
Blood midges poured through the trees, darkening the air itself.
One moment the Spinner stood alone, swatting at the creatures that descended upon his shoulder.
The next it vanished beneath a living storm of humming wings and gnashing teeth, every inch of its thrashing body engulfed in a writhing mass of pale green bodies. Its screams became ear-shattering.
Even as Rìan ran, carrying me away from the temple, I couldn’t look away.
I watched as the Spinner's struggles began to slow.
Beneath it all came the soft squelching sounds—wet, rapid crunching, thousands upon thousands of tiny jaws feeding on still-living flesh.
The screaming stopped abruptly, until there was only Rìan's pounding footsteps and the distant drone of the feeding blood midges.
The muscles of his shoulder flexed beneath my cheek as my head slumped into the crook of his neck.
The scent of wind and leather invaded my senses like a soothing balm.
Beneath the warmth of his skin, I felt his magic moving through him—endless and untamed, wilder than the Wildlands, a heartbeat answering my own.
My magic reached for it without thought, twining around it gratefully before the world faded to nothing.