Only the gentle scratch of branches over scales could be heard. Sanna, who slumped half out of the attic window, perked up. According to the chiming clock from downstairs—a gift from Jesse—it was an hour to midnight.
Ideal.
Little one?
Here, at the window.
Yes, I see you.
The warmth of his snout appeared. Carefully, Sanna climbed on top, scooted to his neck. He flattened it out as best he could while she slowly made her way down, to the juncture of his wings and back, and settled.
Where are we going? he asked.
Back to our camping spot.
Several strides away from Mam’s house, he hesitated. His neck swung to the right in a glance back.
What is it? she asked.
Are you certain regarding your plan?
I’m sure that I won’t bring such a horrendous creature to my family. We can’t stay here for another minute.
But—
We must, Luteis. She set her hand on the side of his neck. It’s followed us everywhere, it’ll do the same here. We know what we need to do, and what we’re fighting. If it’s true that dragons are their natural enemy, it’s a simple matter of drawing the Reine dux arachnae close and getting rid of her. Did you find a mortega antler?
As many as you asked for.
Did you accomplish the rest?
He hesitated, then said, Yes. Everything is set up as you requested.
A long breath rippled through her, draining away the anxiety of bringing harm to her family. She didn’t know what they faced out there, but she knew she wouldn’t bring it this close to those she loved. Mam had found stability. Isadora loved Max, regardless of whether he said all the right things in her way or not, and Jesse had just started his adventure.
No, her chance to prove herself capable had fully arrived. She could fight for her forest—the way the old Sanna would have—and claim her home again.
Blindness be damned.
“Then let’s go,” she whispered. “If everything is ready, we only have to show up and wait. Tonight, we have a queen to kill.”
* * *
The silence rang through Sanna’s ears.
She gripped a club-like branch in her tight fist, knees tucked into her chest. The root well where she crouched stood taller than her head. As far as protection went, it was the best she could find while still laying herself bare.
Fog crawled over the ground, unusually cold, or perhaps Luteis had spoiled her with his natural heat. Her ears hurt at the tip and her nose dripped. She sniffled, hoping to make sound and draw their problem to its inevitable end.
C’mon, she thought. Let’s get this over with.
Luteis’ concerned tone filtered through her mind. Little one?
Yes?
You’re well?
Yes.
Any signs?
She paused to listen. The same unnatural calm as before. No, not yet.
The restless frustration in his voice amplified the quiet. He didn’t like standing away from her. He really didn’t like her plan, though he agreed it was their most likely path out of this mess.
Sanna readjusted her feet and wiggled her toes. Too much of this waiting in the frigid night and they’d—
A scritch of sound came from overhead. Forest lions wouldn’t make such a light noise. Their talons dug deep into the wood when they slid down. Beluas didn’t have a subtle bone in their body. They couldn’t move without grunting or noise.
She tensed.
Held her breath.
The clatter of a piece of falling bark came next. Her stomach turned to water. She tightened her hold on her weapon.
Luteis?
Yes.
I heard something.
I shall investigate.
Logic might dictate that forest dragons were hardly subtle creatures with their gigantic, hot bodies, but their black scales camouflaged them spectacularly. Magic, or just the forest, stopped the trees from making sound whenever they moved by. But not even a dragon could sneak up on a spider.
A string of clacking noises, like talons tapping in a sequence, sounded to the right. Sanna twitched, scooted to the left on instinct. Her heart hammered in a wild song.
I can almost confirm it myself, she said. Something has arrived. Whether it’s the Reine dux arachnae or not, I’m not sure.
I see only shadows, little one. I’m coming.
Another familiar scritch, like the tip of something dragging along the tree trunk, sounded from nearby. She sniffed, smelled nothing unusual. Certainly not a belua, a troll, or a forest lion.
Do you smell anything? she asked.
No.
Me either, which is another confirmation. I think there’s more than one.
Undoubtedly.
The thought made her shudder. All the little holes in the ground the other day suddenly made greater sense. Spider legs, all of them. The only thing that had likely saved her was Luteis’ heat.
Her mind spun back to the raised bumps of the picture that Isadora conjured with magic. She didn’t need eyes to recall the fangs, the legs. The sheer size of such an atrocious monster.
Her hands shook as she silently brought the club in front of her. The tip dragged in the dirt. She waited for the telltale prickle on her neck that arose when something moved nearby, as if instinct could see.
Another scritch, this louder. Others came from farther away, as if from different trees. Spiders collecting and descending as one.
This is my home, she thought in a looped refrain. My home, my home, my home. This is my home, my forest, my trees. If there’s a queen here, it’s me. Mori, but I’m Sanna of the forest!
The pep talk didn’t help as the scratching sounds closed in, directly overhead now.
Get into position, she said.
I already am, he growled. There are many shadows now. Little one, I will not stay away.
Hold! she cried. We have to kill her and the only way to do that is to bring her close enough to strike. I’ll whack her, you spray flames on the rest. It’s our only shot. We just have to hope the two of us are enough.
A clicking, like teeth tapping together, chattered above. If she had to guess, she’d say ten paces.
Just a little longer, Luteis.
Her legs trembled. She slowly moved them beneath her into a crouch, lifted her club until it rested on her shoulder. With her palm, she felt for the prickly antlers. Luteis had gathered seven spiky antlers. She’d bound them to a heavy stick with a sash so all seven pointed out.
A mortega mace.
The scritch stopped.
What she wouldn’t give for the Dragonmaster totem over the mountain dragons again. They could transport here, devour whatever threatened her. Talk about meeting the enemy right on! Sanna shoved that thought away. That totem had been a symbol of dragon slaves. It didn’t serve anyone.
Another click-clack answered the first. Six paces away. The mace could reach about three paces in front.
Wait, she drawled.
Little one . . .
A dark pit of uncertainty unfurled in Sanna’s stomach. From a distant part of her mind, she drudged up a memory of Daid. A rare, but flashing, smile. The way his hair stuck out near his temple. Despite being dead for over a year now, she remembered him so clearly. The result of living on the edge of life and death?
A gift from Deasylva?
She drew strength from his powerful remembrance.
The shuffle and sigh of movements, like legs tapping on dirt, scuttled around her. The hair on the back of her neck rose. Something cold and bristly brushed her cheek. She froze.
LITTLE ONE!
Legs.
Lots and lots of legs.
Hissing, clicking, clacking made a rising cacophony. Dozens of new fears asserted themselves. What if the spiders bit her? Did spiders carry poison? What if they didn’t fear fire?
I’m fine, she said. I’m fine. I’m fine. I’m fine.
Little one! he growled.
His growing agitation fueled her own.
Sanna’s breath sped up.
Then she felt them.
Eyes.
Dozens of eyes. They plunged into her like ice cold tentacles. Frozen promises of a darker underbelly. A world apart. The depths of Letum Wood were the only home for a fetid creature such as this.
And here Sanna waited for the queen of the night.
She gritted her teeth.
“I am not your prey!” she shouted. “I am your queen! Luteis, now!”
She swung the club with a scream.
The sheer force of her terror gave might to her arms. She wheeled her body with the swing, throwing it as hard as she could into the air in front of her. It landed against something firm, but softer than a tree. The impact reverberated through her arms, into her teeth. Her entire body jarred.
A high-pitched screech split the silent air. The clacking pierced her ears with a shriek, so fast that all became a blur.
Luteis roared.
Heat built in spurts as he swooped down. The ground trembled from his heavy-footed run. Spiders scrambled away with scuttling noises. His burst of fire came from not far away—but not close enough, either.
Sanna vaulted herself out of the hole, club in hand, and swung a second time. The Reine dux arachnae had already moved. Sanna stepped in a cold, tacky liquid. Blood, hopefully. With her fingers, quickly as possible, Sanna counted. Six antlers left. With any luck, one of them was embedded in the queen.
Something stabbed her leg as she swiveled in a circle, club held out. The thud-thud-thud of darting feet followed, and something tried to trip her from behind. She kept her balance, screamed.
“Get back!”
A blanket of fire crackled in the crisp air.
They run from my secundum, Luteis said breathlessly. Little one, there are so many.
Screeches surrounded her. Legs. Grabbing pincers. Hard things in her hair. Sanna whirled to the right and left, swinging with fury. The club connected with each toss. A sticky substance coated her shoulder with a viscous plop. She launched out of the protective well just as something thudded to the ground, scraping her back. She twirled, pirouetting.
The club hit another spider, then another. A third, sixth, tenth. They amassed on her, overhead. Waves of heat closed in. Luteis’s chilling growl, his reverberating thuds, lent a tinge of terror to the air.
A heavy wad of moisture hit Sanna on the back, sending her to her knees. She popped back up, but something hit the club out of her hands.
“No!”
She scrambled to find it, but her palms touched only earth, snow, roots.
Silence fell.
Luteis?
She panted. Her wrist ached from the fall. The strange fluid seeped down her back and scalp, toward her ears. She didn’t dare touch it. Instead, she held her breath, listened.
No shuffle of movement.
Little one? Where are you?
On the ground. My club is gone, I can’t find it!
The rustle of dried leaves moving preceded a rope snagging her waist, her left ankle. A third grabbed her wrist. Slivers peeled out of the rope, embedding into her skin. Like razor-sharp twine bound together.
She screamed.
They consume me, little one, he cried. I’m trying! I’m trying.
The sounds of crackling fire, desperate growls, followed. Tears filled her eyes, jarring loose as another rope twined her right wrist. It jerked her off the ground, then dropped her. She slammed to the floor, smacking her nose. Noise rang in her head like an echoing bell, driving a headache all the way back into her skull.
A sob tore out of her.
“Luteis!”
What had she been thinking?
She couldn’t do this. She wasn’t the old Sanna anymore, and no amount of determination would make it so. Now she’d endangered her life, and Luteis, and for what?
The night morphed into hundreds of click-clack-chattering voices. All of them similar to the chatter of teeth or dancing bones. They surrounded her in a broad circle. The tensile, sharp cord bound her limbs and wrapped her arms and legs tight. She couldn’t flail, budge, move.
A giant, rounded body slipped underneath her back, jarring her to the side. A giant body. She could hear the other ones teeming like ants.
“Get off me!” she screeched.
The weblike-ropes elevated her off the ground. The harder she fought, the tighter they pulled. Blood oozed around her wrists. Sanna shrieked.
“Let go of me!”
If I had magic, came the thought, I could break these, could fight them. I’d be more capable.
She didn’t have magic.
Because she’d been too frightened.
The terror. The betrayal. This was her forest. Why would it allow such foul creatures—whatever they were—to harm her?
Little one! Hold on!
More clatters followed. She rose farther in the air, hairy tentacles along her arms now. Tears jarred out of her eyes, dripped down her cheeks. Above all the others came a menacing, nefarious hiss in her left ear.
The Reine dux Arachnae.
Luteis, she whispered, I’m so sorry.
LITTLE ONE!
Up the ropes pulled her. Higher. Gaping air existed beneath. She sensed growing space and distance and . . . death. She captured another sob, utterly paralyzed. Sickness welled up in her body. Rope continued to spin around her, slicing with micro cuts into her skin. The Reine dux arachnae had her.
A roar broke the night.
Flames followed.
Such flames. They plumed above her, sizzling and devastating. The Reine dux Arachnae squealed, a low, guttural thing of panic. Sanna turned her face away with a grimace. The cords that bound her legs broke. She dropped, feet slamming into the loamy earth. Her arms remained suspended above.
One of her feet hit a creature that chittered in response. Sanna could only kick out with a heel. The spider scurried away, tall as her knee.
Elis has arrived! Another roar of fire. We are not alone, little one!
“Sanna?” Jesse called. “SANNA?”
Another bust of fire.
“Here!” she shrieked. Blood slaked down her arms, still bound by whatever rope the queen gripped her with. “Jesse! Please, help me! Help!”
Belches of fire, frantic retreats, sounded as Jesse approached with a guttural shout. The rope around her left hand broke. She collapsed, slamming to the earth. Hands caught her shoulders before her face smacked the ground a second time.
“Sanna!”
His strong hand grabbed her arm. She fell into him, sobbing. “Get it off me! Get it off me!”
The wounds around her wrists burned like fire as the ropes disappeared. He put an arm around her shoulders. She held onto him, shuddering.
“It’s all right. It’s all right. Elis is killing them. Luteis is attacking a . . . mori, a giant spider. I think it’s the queen. He just leapt out of a tree and on top of her. Definitely the Reine dux arachnae. She’s fighting back. Oh, he bit off one of her legs. And another. She’s not going to make it, Sanna. He’s so fierce.”
The vicious sound of a horrible battle followed. Gnashing teeth, deafening screams, and so much fire. Elis roared a terrible bass, sending spiders into the night. Their bodies squelched under his legs as he stomped around.
“We need to get you somewhere safe,” Jesse called over the sounds of battle. “We’re right below Luteis and the queen.”
Arm around her shoulder, he led them away. Sanna clamped her arms around his waist. A third dragon descended with heat and a terrible roar.
“Junis!” Jesse cried, laughing. “Sanna, Junis has come to your aid. And is that . . . is that? It’s Cara!”
The ground trembled as a fourth ran from the trees. Her cry, so familiar, swept through Sanna like a shock. Tears filled her eyes.
“They came?”
“They came for their Dragonmaster.” He tightened his hold on her. They slowed. “By Drago, Sanna, they’re demolishing those monsters. Another dragon has come! Sellis. He’s so big these days, and his fire is scorching. You saved him from that belua, remember? He’s here to fight for you. Oh, an entire horde of spiders is running away. They’re . . . they’re huge. They had you completely surrounded. Cara is keeping herself between the spiders and us. Junis is a glory to behold. He’s flying with such skill.”
The crepitus of slaughtered spiders and dying screams filled the air. Fire. So much glorious, destructive heat. The cold night banished under near constant flames, the creeping power of a long-lasting secundum, or second fire.
I’m safe, she said to Luteis, frantic. I’m safe!
He gave no response.
She squeezed Jesse’s arm. “Luteis? What’s happening?”
“He’s got the queen on the ground now. He’s cut all her ropes. She’s missing several legs. I think she’s wounded pretty badly, but she’s still fighting. She’s trying to bind his wings . . . oh.”
“Oh what?”
Luteis screamed. The ground shook with a thud that nearly sent Sanna to her knees. Another gurgling sound of death followed. The thunder of so many legs disappeared, skittering into the tree trunks.
Calm followed.
“She’s . . . she’s dead.”
“How?”
“Luteis landed on her and literally squashed her. Now he’s covering her with his secundum. She’s torched. Elis and Junis and Sellis are setting all the other spiders on fire. The bigger ones have retreated. It’s an utter massacre, Sanna. They’ve destroyed so many. Thousands, if I had to guess it.”
She collapsed.
All the fragile skeins holding her together snapped. Unable to move, she slid down. Something didn’t feel right. A coldness in her body. Her muscles didn’t respond to her commands. Jesse carefully lowered her to the ground. His grip on her shoulders tightened.
“Sanna, your wrists and ankles are bleeding. You’re shaking, and so cold. We need to get you to Lucey. I think there’s something in the ropes, like a paralytic. Mori, you have so many cuts on you.”
Mention of Lucey broke Sanna from her shock. Her teeth chattered. Her entire body felt as if she’d fallen into a frozen lake.
Little one? Luteis cried.
I’m f-f-fine.
Her thoughts were stuttered, coated with disbelief. She allowed Jesse to lift her up.
“I’m going to transport us both to Lucey. She taught me. It might be uncomfortable, but you’re safe. Just focus on holding your breath. It helps, all right?”
She shuddered, oddly fragmented now. Lucey, she said to Luteis. Going to Lucey.
“Sanna?”
“Don’t . . . don’t tell Isa,” she pled.
Before he could reply, a pressure came upon them that threatened to press her out of Alkarra. The pain around her wrists and ankles intensified. A scream faded from her lips as she plunged into magic, whisked away from Letum Wood.