Chapter 18
Alette
The opening in the ceiling feels impossibly far away. Rain pours through it in sheets, cutting through the darkness like a cruel reminder of how close freedom is, and how unreachable it might as well be.
As we head through this new section of the massive room, it’s just as bad as the area we’d just cleared. Webs cling to everything, to the walls, to the floor, to us, thick, sticky strands dragging at our legs, our arms. I slash through one with my blade, barely clearing the path.
“Any ideas?” Ashton calls, dodging a snapping leg as it crashes down where he’d just been.
The opening is the only way out. Everything else is death. But I have no idea how to reach it.
“Oberon!” Sylvian shouts. “Keep the fire going!”
“I am!” Oberon growls, another burst of flame igniting the webs behind us, forcing the spiders to race to the new fire just enough to give us space.
“Ashton, can you get us up there?” Oberon throws over his shoulder.
Ashton shakes his head even as he runs. “Not like this! I’ll slam us straight into the webs, or into something worse!”
A spider drops in front of us, legs splayed wide. Sylvian doesn’t hesitate. The ground beneath it erupts, jagged stone spearing upward and throwing the creature off balance long enough for us to veer past it.
“I think I can get us up,” Sylvian continues, his breath tight now. “But they’ll still be able to reach us when we’re climbing! It’ll be dangerous!”
“Then we don’t stop moving!” Oberon fires back.
Another spider lunges, and Ashton ducks, slicing through a strand that would’ve pinned him, and grins wildly. “So that’s the plan? Run straight up Sylvian’s staircase while everything in here tries to kill us?”
“Yes,” Oberon says flatly.
“Great. Love it.”
As we near our escape, Sylvian kneels, placing his hands on the ground, his green eyes glowing faintly as he focuses.
The earth begins to shift beneath our feet, the ground trembling as if it’s responding to his call.
Slowly, carefully, a staircase forms, the stones rising from the ground in uneven steps, twisting upward toward the opening above.
The spiders close in, skittering faster now, emboldened, their legs scraping against stone they circle, waiting for their chance to strike. Then, finally, the staircase reaches the top, still shuddering and shifting, but high enough.
Sylvian exhales hard. “I just have to–to keep it from falling now.”
Ashton turns to me. “Alette, you’re first.”
“What?” I shake my head instinctively.
“You’re the only one of us who has to make it out,” he pushes, urgency cutting through his usual ease. “You get up there, you don’t stop. If something happens—”
“No,” I snap, the word coming out sharper than I expect. “I’m not leaving you.”
“Alette—”
“I’m not leaving you,” I repeat, louder this time, my chest tight, my pulse racing. “We go together. Or not at all.”
They don’t say more, but I can see it in their eyes, they disagree. I plant my foot on the first step and push upward just as another spider slams into the wall near me, its legs scraping against stone as it lunges after us.
Too fast.
They’re too fast.
“Go!” Sylvian shouts.
Above us, the opening waits. With so many spiders between it and us, it might as well be a million miles away.
The staircase winds upward, a steep, uneven path clawing its way toward the light, each step rough and barely formed as Sylvian forces the earth to obey him.
I don’t hesitate. I go first, grabbing for the next rise and hauling myself up, my boots slipping slightly as I scramble higher.
Behind me, the others follow immediately.
The spiders are already in motion. They drop from above in a sickening cascade, bodies slamming into stone, legs skittering and scraping as they surge toward us.
The webs cling to everything, dragging at my arms, catching in my hair, sticking to my clothes like they’re alive, like they’re trying to pull me back down.
“Faster!” Oberon roars.
Fire explodes behind me, heat blasting up the staircase as he hurls it into the swarm. Flames race across the silk, devouring it, filling the chamber with sharp, choking smoke and the high, piercing screeches of spiders burning alive.
It buys us seconds.
Nothing more.
A spider lunges from the wall beside me, its legs slamming into the stone inches from my hand. I swing on instinct, the sword flashing blue as it cuts clean through one of its limbs. The resistance is nothing. So easy. It shrieks, recoiling, but another is already coming.
Wind tears past me a heartbeat later.
Ashton’s power slams into a cluster of them, ripping bodies from the wall, shredding them apart mid-air and sending the pieces crashing down through burning webs.
“Keep climbing!” he shouts.
I don’t stop.
“Protect Sylvian!” he snaps. “He’s concentrating. If he breaks, we fall!”
My muscles burn, my breath tearing in and out of my chest as I drag myself upward, step after step, the light above growing closer, brighter.
Behind me, Cassius moves with terrifying precision.
Water slams into a spider that gets too close to Sylvian.
The impact caves its body in, sending it crashing back, but more take its place immediately.
I risk a glance down.
Sylvian is right behind the others, his hand dragging along the stone mixed with earth that makes up the staircase as he climbs, never breaking contact with the earth.
His jaw is locked tight, muscles straining, his focus absolute.
I can feel the pull of his magic in every step, the staircase shifting and groaning beneath us as he forces it to hold.
They don’t let anything get close. Not to him. Not to the staircase. They’re holding the line.
I don’t stop.
I can’t.
I turn back and climb faster. “We’re almost there,” I whisper, though my voice shakes, though I don’t know if it’s true.
The opening feels close now. Then… something tightens around my ankle. Hard.
I jerk to a stop, my breath catching as I look down. Web. Thick. Sticky. Wrapped tight around my boot, already pulling, already tightening.
“No,” I whisper, panic flooding in too fast. “No, no, no—”
I yank. It doesn’t give. It pulls harder. The strand vibrates, a sharp, awful tremor that runs straight through me.
The chamber answers as a shadow drops from above. I want to thrust my sword, to sever the web, but I barely have to think before a spider slams into the web above me, massive, fast, its legs hooking into the strands as it surges forward with terrifying speed.
Straight toward me.
“Alette!” Oberon roars.
I chop down on the web, but it only partially breaks. I lift my arm to strike again, but the web yanks tight, jerking me off balance, my grip slipping as it drags me backward.
I scream. The world tilts violently as I’m ripped off the staircase, my body slamming into the webbing as it snaps tight around me. Sticky strands wrap around my arms, my legs, my waist, pinning me in place as I struggle, panic exploding through me.
“Help me!” I cry, my voice breaking, raw and desperate.
Fire erupts around me as Oberon hurls it upward, flames racing along the web, burning, snapping strands, but not fast enough. Not when he’s being careful not to hit me.
The spider doesn’t stop. It keeps coming. Closer. Too close.
“Alette, hold on!” Sylvian shouts, his voice strained, the staircase shuddering violently beneath him as his focus fractures.
The web jerks again. Harder this time. Dragging me higher.
Away from them. I thrash, kicking, twisting, trying to tear free, but the strands only tighten, sticking to my skin, my clothes, my hair, but I suddenly can’t move.
I can’t breathe. The spider is right there now.
Its eyes fixed on me. Its mandibles opening.
“No—” I choke out, my vision blurring, terror swallowing everything else.
Below me, I hear them shouting. Feel the heat. The wind. The earth shaking… but it’s too far. They’re too far. And I’m being pulled away. Higher. Deeper into the web.
Into the dark.