Araneae Nation: The Complete Collection

by Hailey Edwards

  “Move.” That was Bram. “Before they’re done and come looking for another easy meal.”

  He fisted Murdoch’s shirt and pulled him to stand. Shrugging out of his grip, Murdoch lifted me, scooped up the pack, and we ran. Bram fell back once it became apparent he was lost. It was left to me to guide us all down the mountain. Pursued as we were, there was no time to pause and consider the wiseness of our barreling through the pass we had devoted hours to fearing might be guarded. The sounds of stampeding feet on our heels stomped our previous concerns to dust. The danger to us now came from behind and above. Ahead, there was nothing but darkness where the pass cut below the earth. Gasping damp air, I spun to get my direction, then led us through what I had thought to be the most difficult part of our journey. The risers’ awakening made it simplest.

  Bursting through the pass’s far end, I spotted the start of crystal pavers inset into the rock.

  The path to my clan home caught the moon’s rays and spun them into whirling rainbows. At the paver’s end, the famed crystal city rose from the mountain’s feet to tower over us. Here there were no walls. The mountain was our guardian on two sides, while the Theridiidae had defended the others. The sight of her shimmering buildings brought hot tears spilling down my cheeks.

  Amid the crush of buildings, one rose more magnificent than all the rest, a manor house that flickered with red and gold, lit from within. The sky choked on plumes of twining smoke curling under the moon’s round chin. My already tender heart split when I beheld my home at long last.

  I had been wrong. The harbinger hadn’t followed us. By coming here, we had followed her.

  My beloved Titania was engulfed in flames.

  Chapter 12

  Fire can mesmerize, and I was captivated by the prisms of my city’s destruction.

  “We can’t stop now.” Murdoch clasped my shoulder. “Hold yourself together.”

  I bobbed my head, certain his hold on me was all that kept me from flying apart.

  He glanced behind us, paled, then asked me, “Where do we go now?”

  “I—I don’t know.” My city was ablaze. My people ruined. Death was on our heels.

  “Damn it, think.” Bram stepped in front of me. “Where can we hide? Where is safe?”

  “There are no safe places left,” I mumbled. This travesty proved I was right.

  “There must be somewhere…” Murdoch stepped away, studying the fork in the pavers.

  Behind Murdoch’s back, Bram slapped me hard across the face. “Snap out of it.”

  Blood filled my mouth, twisted my head sharply on my neck, but the shock began fading.

  I didn’t see Murdoch throw his punch, but I heard its impact.

  Bram sprawled on the ground. “Now would be a good time to bloody well say something.”

  “The caverns,” I choked out at last. “Come on. This way.”

  I lit off down the path and left them to chase me. As I ran, my mind cleared more, the wisps of smoke and grief parting while I darted down twisting, glittery paths as familiar to me as my name.

  While thinking of a hidey-hole for us, I realized, “If there are survivors, they’ll be here too.”

  “Are there other ways out?” Murdoch panted. “In case the fire catches up to us?”

  “Several.” The entrance we sprinted toward led to the central hub and, from there, dozens of tunnels branched in all directions, spreading far beneath the city, into the mountains and beyond.

  “Good.” His thoughts mirrored mine. “We can lead the survivors out, then.”

  Numb as my chest was, I swear his words swelled my heart. That same desperate purpose as before filled me. If there were survivors, we would save them. I would not leave them to burn or starve. I would gather them to Cathis and, along with my proof, I would throw myself on Vaughn’s mercy. It was a thin plan laced together with fragile hope, but I must believe it would be enough.

  “If there are survivors,” Bram asked, “won’t they defend the tunnel?”

  “How would we defend it?” I snarled. “With gem pickaxes and silken wires? If we had been capable of defending ourselves against the risers, would our city be burning?” For that matter… “I see not one Mimetidae guard. Where are they? Why aren’t they here, and why didn’t they help?”

  Murdoch answered for him. “Those were not their orders.”

  “What were they, then?” I demanded. “To defend the border—the one they share with us?”

  Hadn’t he warned me not to think them kind? That their mercy was conditional?

  At my elbow, Murdoch mashed his lips into a hard line. “Their orders were to prevent attack on the two borders they guarded. The mountain is a defense in and of itself. Beyond that they—”

  “Let’s not argue, children,” Bram called over my shoulder. “Bickering solves nothing.”

  He was right, though I would never admit it to his face.

  “Wait.” Murdoch threw out his hand to stop me. “There’s fresh smoke up ahead. See it?”

  “The cavern’s mouth.” Knees week, I sagged against Murdoch. “It was burned out.”

  All hope my clansmen had found shelter there vanished. I dropped my face into my hands.

  “We’ve come this far.” Bram ventured closer. “There’s nowhere else for us to go.”

  Murdoch softened his voice. “The risers herded people here and then smoked them out.”

  “It’s stone,” Bram pointed out. “What’s to burn other than a scrap of wood here or there?”

  “He’s right.” I wiped my face dry and cleared my throat. “There are several tunnels. If risers led people here, some must have escaped. There are too many other passages for them to remain in this one while they were slaughtered.” Now that I’d said as much, I believed. “It’s our only hope of escaping Titania. We can exit through the back of the mountain or, if we’re careful, near the woods near our shared border.” I swallowed my bitterness. “Perhaps we can find help there.”

  Murdoch kept quiet. Bram, for once, did too.

  “So.” Bram glanced over his shoulder. “Who wants to tell me what those things are?”

  I knew the silence was too blessed to last.

  “Kaidi calls them risers.” Murdoch saved me from answering. “They’re the corpses of those infected with the plague. The female with wings is called a harbinger. She raises the dead, and it makes them hers to command. More than that, I can’t say, and there’s no time to discuss it now.”

  “Yes. Let’s not discuss strategy.” Bram scowled. “Let’s keep secrets until the bearers die.”

  With great patience for the male here on Isolde’s behest, fulfilling her secret schemes, I said, “The risers are dead. We can’t kill them. So what do you propose? They’re mindless cannibals.”

  “Ah.” He bared his fangs at us. “So they have something in common with Murdoch, then?”

  Murdoch clenched his fists. I put my hand over his. “Beat him to death later if you must. We should continue to the cavern. If any remain…” I steeled my spine. “We must save all we can.”

  “Prepare yourself.” Murdoch lifted my hand to his mouth. “If the risers were here…”

  “I should expect to see bodies.” I released him and withdrew my spade. “We should go.”

  Indecision had cost us precious minutes. Though the risers and my earring both were quiet, I didn’t trust they would remain that way. It would take the harbinger minutes to determine where we had fled. We had no hope of outmaneuvering her on land when air lent her vicious precision.

  Caution guided my feet nearer the cavern. Ornate wood that once framed the entrance was a charred mess. Embers hissed and crackled warnings we ignored when we crept inside the tunnel.

  Hot air laden with ash pushed at my face, carrying the stink of burnt hair and roasted flesh.

  My knees buckled, and I hit the ground on all fours. My palm rang a shallow pool of sticky, cold fluid that smelled of metal. When I outstretched my fingers, they brushed the matted
hair of a male burned past recognition. Bile rose up the back of my throat, but I could not choke it down.

  I retched all of the berries Murdoch had so carefully prepared for me.

  While I dry heaved, I became aware of a hand rubbing my back. Murdoch comforted me as best he could, but his attention was elsewhere. His gaze darting, lips flattening. He was making a detailed inventory to share with his paladin later, I was sure. The thought made me queasy again.

  “If she’s done,” Bram said, stepping over my mess, “we must go deeper.”

  “Give her a moment.” The chill in Murdoch’s voice made me shiver.

  “He’s right.” I held up my hand, too sick to feel ashamed of asking for his help. Once he got my wobbling legs under me, I let him wipe my mouth and then my hand clean with fabric he tore from our bedroll. I hoped his gesture didn’t mean that he doubted we would live to need it again.

  The deeper we trekked, the cleaner and cooler air became until breathing no longer burned.

  What smoke there was came from the torches we kept lit throughout the cavern for safety.

  “We still access the chamber from here?” Murdoch kept his palm on his sword’s hilt.

  “After all this…” I covered my tender stomach, “…you still think we need her as proof?”

  “The more proof we have, the more clans we can convince to stand against the risers.”

  “You’re right.” I sounded too calm, because the males exchanged a nervous glance.

  Proof was all around us, above us, staining our clothes and bodies. Proof I had in excess.

  The thing I wanted most was not evidence to parade before a council of wizened elders with inflated senses of self-worth. No. What I wanted was revenge on the being that began my decline into madness. I wanted Lailah. I wanted Hishima’s mother. I wanted to pluck each of her wings.

  “The chamber’s farther down.” I pointed to a boarded-over tunnel. “The entry’s just there.”

  Ignoring the males, I took my spade and began prying the boards. When they saw what I meant to do, they joined in, wrenching planks free and tossing debris into a pile.

  “You said she’s kept chained?” Bram was first to duck his head inside the tunnel.

  “She was the night I saw her.” I slid my spade back into my pack. “The smell was…”

  Murdoch stepped in next, inhaled long and slow. He exhaled on a cough. “It reeks.”

  I remember thinking, “It smelled the way a cage does if an animal is kept there too long.”

  His sneeze told me he agreed. “How long was she kept here do you think?”

  “Before I left, you mean? I can’t say. She was in poor health. She had ceded rule to Hishima after her husband died, but she put in appearances at all major festivals during the first year. Her fragile health and disapproval of me were the reasons Hishima stretched our engagement so long. Six months earlier, he had announced Lailah was too ill to leave her rooms. I was relieved. Even more relieved to learn our wedding would go forward when she was well enough to witness it. It was critical our clan saw she endorsed our union so I would be accepted as Segestriidae maven.”

  “Six months plus what? Five or six?” Bram whistled. “No one missed her in all that time?”

  His math staggered me. Six months. Half a year since I had a home, a friend or my family.

  “I’m sure her friends sought audiences with her,” I spoke through my daze. Lailah’s hangers-on would have demanded that much at least. “Hishima must have turned them away at the door.”

  Cocking his head to one side, Bram leaned forward. “I don’t hear anything, even breathing.”

  Murdoch turned to me. “Your earring. Is it humming?”

  I touched it. “No. It hasn’t since we reached the city.”

  We three shared a cautious look. I was first to break away and continue down the path. Steps fell faster and faster the closer we came. The more silent it was, the dustier, the darker, the more dread balled in my gut. This was not right. There should be sound. Soft moans had led me to her nest last time. My ears weren’t as keen as Bram’s, but I heard nothing as obvious as chains rattling.

  “Perhaps he moved her.” Bram kept pace with me.

  “Where?” I flung the question at him. “Where does one hide one’s rabid, winged mother?”

  “Bram has a point,” Murdoch said. “Hishima knew you saw her. Once you escaped, he must have realized there was a good chance you’d come back, with help. With your earring we can—”

  “The tunnels would amplify the sound. There would be an echo. There isn’t. That means she is either dead or gone.” At the spot where I expected to find Lailah, I saw manacles anchored in a smooth slab of rock. Their cuffs hung open, empty. Bones were scattered around, some too thick to belong to wildlife, too thin to belong to varanus or other livestock. No. They were Araneaean.

  I had dug up enough graves these past few months to know their origin with certainty.

  Though Murdoch tried to stop me, I shrugged him off and walked until the cuffs were within touching distance. My hand lifted, but I forced it back to my side before hefting the foul things.

  “We tried.” Murdoch pulled me against his chest long enough to kiss my temple.

  Bram ignored our display of affection so pointedly I knew he must burn to tattle to Isolde. It required too much effort recalling why that should frighten me. Hishima was in Cathis. I wished he was here, burnt as crisp as the male whose scorched hair had tangled in my seeking fingers. It should have brought me joy to know he lived, that as long as he survived there was a chance for Titania to be rebuilt, to regain a fraction of her former glory, but it made me heartsick to think it.

  “It’s been quiet since we cleared the pass,” Bram said thoughtfully.

  “Risers are afraid of fire.” I hadn’t remembered that until now.

  Murdoch nodded as if recalling the way they scattered from it. “Who torched the city then?”

  “The harbinger’s my guess. The risers are all but blind and deaf without her. If she ordered them to start the fire, who is to say they could refuse her? More than one set of hands held torches tonight, and she’s far too intelligent to waste her resources,” I said. “She would have put her army of risers to use.”

  Murdoch studied the manacles as if expecting they would reveal a secret weakness we might exploit against the harbingers. “Now they’ve herded us into the caverns like they did the others.”

  “What are the odds she knows where the tunnel we’re taking exits?” Bram wondered.

  “Slim.” We reached a double-pronged fork in the paths, and I stood at their head. “I have yet to decide which path is the best for us. She can hardly wait for us in a location I haven’t chosen.”

  “We haven’t seen anyone else down here, but the city must have been burning for hours.” It took Murdoch a few whiffs at the fork to decide which direction my clansmen had gone. “There. I smell soot and blood, both faint, both strongest down the western tunnel. Where does it lead?”

  I had to sort through the tangle of map in my head. “It leads below the mountain and lets out in the denser part of the forest closest to the Mimetidae border.” My foolish heart sped at the possibility of being reunited with my clansmen. Forget the number, it didn’t matter. Despite what the harbinger had done, regardless of the heavy casualties my clan had suffered, there were a few of us alive. That meant there was a chance our clan home might be salvaged, assuming Hishima kept his head once returning home to find all his treasures burned and his precious manor ruined.

  “Can you find your way?” Bram studied me, making me aware of how haggard I must look.

  “If she can’t,” Murdoch said, “I can track them. The trail is fresh enough to follow easily.”

  “This route adds days onto the time it took us to reach Titania,” I warned them. “If survivors are found, and there are children or wounded among them, it will be the better part of two weeks before we reach Cathis. There are underground streams fit f
or drinking, but food will be scarce.”

  “What choice do we have?” Murdoch patted his pack. “We have some supplies. We’ll make them last.” I heard the doubt in his voice and knew our next days would be lean, dry ones.

  “The sooner we start, the sooner this nightmare is over.” Bram struck out ahead of us.

  I walked beside Murdoch. His elbow brushed mine once in a while. It was almost a physical apology for the insults we had hurled at one another. He could no more help what his paladin had ordered the warriors to do than I could help what my paladin had done by releasing our guards in a fit of pique without replacing them first. He had set us firmly in the Mimetidae’s palms, and I got no comfort in knowing it was Vaughn and not Isolde who was preparing to squeeze.

  Chapter 13

  Murdoch crouched before us, filling his lungs deeply while rubbing a viscous liquid between his fingers. He brought his hand to his nose and scented the congealed blood with a slight wince.

  “I see what attracts you to him.” Bram smirked. “If he had a tail, it would be wagging.”

  “Ah. The cause of Isolde’s fondness for you becomes apparent.” I ruffled his hair as I might one of the small, tufted canids some kept as pets. “I suppose one cur would recognize another…”

  Bram’s response was to bare his fangs, which impressed me less the more I saw of them. He tempted me to quip about being all fangs and no follow through, but it sounded too much like an invitation. A tingling sensation brought my hand up to my ear. Glaring as he was, Bram noticed.

  His hand covered his sword’s hilt. “What did Murdoch mean earlier, about your earring?”

  At the sound of his name, the mention of my earring, Murdoch glanced up at me. “Kaidi?”

  I held the crystal while it trembled. “She’s coming.”

  “No,” a deep voice rumbled from the shadows. “He is already here.”

  My heart slammed against my ribs. “Hishima.”

  “What have you done to my city?” he bellowed. “Is this your idea of revenge?”