Kara’s mind halted around those words.
The wind rustled along the ground, kicking a small cloud of dust up around the woman’s ankles. “Even if we say this was all because of you,” Annika said, “even if we make that concession, what does it matter? In the end, you spider children are stuck with the hand that God or Raxxinoth dealt you. And if death follows you, then that’s fate in action. I know all about that fate shit. About being a magnet for death. There’s nothing that can be done about it. Either you look beyond the pain and keep living or you let it swallow you. That’s all there is to it.”
Kara’s heart beat an irregular rhythm. She shook her head, lips quivering. “You’re wrong.”
“Am I?”
“There is a way. To end the curse.”
Annika shrugged at her. “If you have a better idea than mine, I’m all ears.”
For a long while, Kara said nothing. She just let the wind play at the folds of her jacket, rustling its fabric against her aching spider legs. “It has nothing to do with you,” she said, turning and starting down the road. “As long as we’re a secret, we’re prisoners. Murderers.”
“Kara, where are you going?”
“Somewhere.”
“Kara, wait!” Annika stumbled after her. But on one gimp leg, she couldn’t catch her even at a walking pace.
“Go on ahead,” Kara said over her shoulder. “I’ll meet you two at the hospital. Come on, Cinny.”
Cinnamon rattled and clacked at her heels. Kara ignored Annika’s angry cries and just walked at as brisk a pace as she could with her exhausted muscles. Before long, Annika and Chelsea were just two specks in the distance behind her. The asphalt was a pulsing furnace of rising heat. For a long time, Kara followed that road, a numbness setting into her mind.
Though they’d come out of the whole ordeal alive, and though she had no doubt Spinneretta and Mark would be rejoining them soon, she couldn’t feel at all happy about it. Kyle’s death floated like a specter over what should have been a joyous occasion. But after all they’d been through, even the air tasted foul. She felt dirty, like she was covered in oil and dried leaves.
Memories from Kyle’s flooded back to her. Of his two-story ranch house. Of the man himself, with his insatiable interest in their anatomy. Of watching Annika and Arthr shooting on the slope outside his house. Of teaching Cinnamon to hunt. Of wrapping Spinneretta’s lacerated leg, and of the girl talk that came with it. Though he’d been at odds with them in the end, Kyle had been a good man. And even though she hadn’t been very close to him, or indeed seen or spoken to him all that often, there was something grim and inescapable about his death. It was what it represented to her—to them all.
She trudged the broiling roads. She saw craggy dunes, rows of housing, half-abandoned commercial districts, signposts pointing toward Barstow. Even Cinnamon’s happy refrains couldn’t keep her spirits higher than knee-height. They were a curse. A cancer on society. A secret whose cost could never be fully estimated. And when the sun was high and she came upon the city limits of Barstow—a location to which she arrived without any conscious effort—she realized just what it was she had to do.
And though she thought herself insane for considering it, all she had to do was remember Spinneretta’s words from the evening of the carnival. Breath coming fast, Kara began to run, down the main street, down the gently sloping hill, down toward the future. Many years from now, she’d know that this was the day that changed everything. She’d know that she’d done everything she could to end the eternal graveyard that grew around them, that she’d stomped on that black seed while its body count had been low. Even if she couldn’t save Kyle, she could save somebody. And right now, that was the only thing worth a damn to her.
Kara’s eyes fell upon a red-roofed police station not far from the main road. She steeled her own quivering stomach and ran toward it. The automatic doors parted for her, and she charged right through, the Leng cat scuttling behind her. A wide lobby greeted her, and a refreshing blast from the air conditioner met the sweat covering her neck and face. At the reception counter, flanked by a pair of ferns, a dark-skinned woman in uniform looked up with an air of exhaustion. Before the woman could ask any questions, or tell her that the station was closed to visitors, Kara stomped over to her.
Kara’s fingers wrapped about the hem of her jacket and peeled it from her shoulders. She unfurled seven of her spider legs, extending them to their full length as the jacket fluttered to the floor.
The officer’s eyes went wide, a greeting half-spoken on her lips.
For a moment, Kara just stood there, her legs bared and writhing for the woman to see. “Call the news station,” she said at last. “Get a camera on me. I have something I want to say.”
Chapter 52
Come What May
The hum of the vending machine vibrated through the floor and beige plaster walls. The hospital’s selection of energy drinks was poor, but goddamn Spinneretta was tired. Little sleeping had occurred the previous night in her and Mark’s motel room, and now it was difficult to even keep her eyes open. Her eyelids were so heavy she had to strain just to make out the names on the cans.
The lemon hibiscus tonic she’d had yesterday was sold out, damn the luck. There was her old friend Highborn. A can of something white and brown that was probably that carbonated coffee crap she hated. And the last was a dark can covered in angular lines of yellow and blue. Anything’s better than Highborn. With a deliberately slow motion, she raised her aching arm toward the ringed plastic slit and inserted a fistful of coins before jamming the buttons for the coffee and Thunderjolt knock-off once each. The cans rattled out the mouth of the machine, and it took a great force of will to bend over to pick them up.
Each can weighed a hundred pounds. Her arms strained and burned from the exertion of picking them up. Wonder how fucked my muscles are, she thought for the thousandth time since their return. The lights overhead seemed to flicker, dimming the hallway for a just moment. That momentary darkness was inviting, altogether too comfortable. But as the lights returned, a great rushing sound boomed from behind her. She turned and nearly dropped her energy drinks as she came face to face with a trio of yellow robes.
“Shit!” she said with a gasp. “Don’t sneak up on me like that!”
Dirge and Silt nodded in acquiescence of the command. “Forgive us.”
Heart pounding from the sudden fright, Spinneretta cast a quick glance down the hallway. Nobody was around. That didn’t make her feel any better about the presence of the Vant’therax, though. “The hell are you guys doing here? If somebody sees you, I don’t want to have to explain that on top of everything else.”
Silt nodded once more. “Faul was most impatient. He wanted to see if it was true. That you truly are the Yellow King reborn.”
Spinneretta sighed. She crossed her arms, the two cans making the effort a mighty undertaking. “Well?”
The Vant’therax exchanged a round robin of glances. Faul then slipped a step forward, studying her with a penetrating gaze. His neck was unnaturally stiff, and appeared to be subtly but permanently twisted to one side. His back was bent at an angle that had not been present when she’d last seen him, owing perhaps to the injuries he sustained at the hands of the Dawn.
“Can you feel it?” Dirge asked, his tone veiling a quiet reverence. “From within her.”
Faul’s hard expression softened around the edges. His mouth drifted open. “I . . . I can. Although I cannot quite explain it. It is as though you have changed, somehow. In the aura. I have no doubt. You are indeed the Yellow King.”
“Yeah. I know.”
Faul fell stiffly to one knee and brought his face to the floor. The other two Vant’therax followed. All three bowed in fealty right between the recycle bin and the potted fern.
“We are your servants,” said Silt. “We hereby renew our pledge to you.”
An embarrassed tremor crawled through Spinneretta’s gut. “Are you guys serious
right now?” She threw another glance down the hall. “Get up, this instant.”
They did as she demanded, rising in unison. An uneasy silence weighed upon the air.
Spinneretta let her arms fall back to her sides, assisted by the supermassive cans. “Listen. I don’t want you guys to get any weird ideas, okay? Just because I’m the King reborn doesn’t make me the King. We share a soul, but that’s it. And besides,” she said, some of the cans’ weight spreading to her chest, “I don’t know anything about souls. So if you were hoping that I’d just hand over those spirits you’re after so you can live again, then I have some bad news. After what you did for me and Kara I’d love to help you. But it’s just not that easy. Even if it’s possible, it’s far beyond me.”
“It matters not,” Silt spoke. “What matters is that we know the truth.”
“Huh?”
Dirge crossed his arms and grumbled. “Do you understand what it’s like to dedicate your life to a myth? To a promise that you can’t quite bring yourself to believe? At least we know now. Now the legacy of NIDUS has ceased to matter. In a word, we are free. And for that, we can only thank you.”
She tried to work through the logic in her head but was too exhausted. “Whatever. You three are fucking crazy.”
“You may believe as you wish,” Faul said. “Perhaps you are correct. In either case, have you need of anything, no matter how trivial, you need only ask.”
She was about to dismiss the idea. The last thing she needed was a cohort of monster servants lurking in the shadows, but she didn’t have the heart to tell them off. Not after they’d declared her to be their raison d’être. “Very well,” she said. “I accept. But keep your distance, alright? If I catch you slinking around in the dark around me, I’ll be pissed.”
“Understood,” Silt said.
“Good. Now, go recover from your injuries. Or something. And if I require anything else, I shall summon you.”
The three gave a single boisterous grunt of confirmation. The lights overhead dimmed, a roar came, and they were gone without a trace.
Spinneretta wiped a damp lock of hair from her eyes with the back of her hand. Christ, she thought. How did things become so complicated? With a sigh, she strained her sore and cramped muscles and made her way back down the fern-lined hallway.
Rows of green pleather chairs stood silently against the walls of the waiting room. In the corner, just where she’d left him, sat Mark. His head was rolled back against the wall, eyes closed, one hand clawing at the fabric of the seat beside him. Was he asleep? She hoped so. The whole ordeal had hit him harder than it had her, and she couldn’t stand to see him like that. She made her way back over to him, and he raised his head toward her. “Morning. Again.”
She turned about and flopped into the chair beside him, trying not to let her fatigue show. Her muscles punished her severely for the pretense. “It’s evening.”
He groaned a little. “No news yet?”
She shook her head and passed the lighter of the two cans to him, eager to be rid of its burden. “Amanda’s doing a bit better. I saw her a while ago, but they want her resting and not trying to talk, so they kicked me out. Here. I got you this.”
He took the can, giving it a groggy and dubious glance. “I thank you. And Arthr?”
“Kara and Chelsea are with him.”
“Do you not want to stay with them?”
“I think I’m the last person he’s going to want to see when he wakes up.” A sympathetic shudder raced through her, wrenching her muscles with pain. She’d seen the damage he’d taken, and it was nothing short of ghastly. It had been bad enough when Pat broke one of his legs, but to have three of them torn off from the root was unthinkable, nauseating. If Arthr ever forgave her for dragging him into this whole thing, she’d be the luckiest sister alive.
She pulled back the lid of her can, and the hiss of escaping carbonation accompanied a stinging in her nose. The sharp smell made her eyes water. Mjolnir was written across the can in stylized lightning. With a small sigh, she threw it back and took a huge gulp. One part blueberry. One part lemon. One part gasoline. She let the carbonation prickle her tongue and rolled her head back onto the top of the seat.
Another hiss came from beside her, followed by the smell of oversweet coffee and chemicals. A moment passed. She heard Mark take a sip and then retch. “What is this, poison?”
A giggle dared to bring her from her half-asleep stupor. “I thought you liked coffee.”
“This is not coffee. This is artificial sweetener and soda water.”
She leaned her head onto his shoulder. Under her jacket, her spider legs tingled as her cheek brushed the skin of his neck. “There’s probably some milk in there. Or at least fake milk.”
“Great. These energy drinks dull pain, correct?”
“What? Where did you get that idea?”
He paused. “I know not. Can I at least take aspirin with this?”
“I sure wouldn’t.”
He drew a deep breath through his nose and sighed. He then put one arm around her shoulders and pulled her closer to him.
For a time they said nothing. The waiting room, still deserted, grew darker and darker as the sun set beyond the mountains. The TV mounted in the corner was playing the same thing it had all day. Framed by the current news program’s flavor of banners and marquee snippets, Kara stood. Her face, still filthy from their underworld crawl, was stern and serious. Her spider legs, unconcealed, spread around her and twitched with the spasms that so often accompanied the molting. Though Spinneretta had requested the TV muted earlier, she still knew by heart the words Kara would’ve been saying.
“Attention, America. Attention, world. My name is Kara Layla Warren. Most of you have probably heard that name already. Those of you who think this is a joke, it’s time to wake up. I am real, and so are these legs. Right now, my brother is in the hospital. Soon, the doctors will confirm that we are flesh and blood. This should not be a surprise to any of you. Harold Wiser’s report is famous now. And the report by Kyle Rogers should have helped prepare you for this. But you closed your eyes and ignored them. You mocked them, laughed at them. Both those men are dead now.
“You ignored the video of the Yellow Dawn calling for us to be delivered to them. How many innocent people have been killed by the Order now? More than an eleven-year-old girl should have to think about. We are the children of the spider. We are real. We are alive. And we will not be ignored any longer.”
Kara’s image faded back to a pair of anchors squawking in silence about the footage. Spinneretta had expected the whole media ridicule machine to spit out the footage before it had the chance to go viral, but it seemed this time there was a hesitancy to mock it. After the video had been aired on the local networks, a pair of nurses were supposedly interviewed on a separate talk show. There were also unsubstantiated rumors of a set of security camera photographs leaking.
The cult was dead. And that meant that if the incredulity of spider fever could be overturned, the only thing they’d have to worry about would be what recognition would truly look like. Would they be feared? Studied? Persecuted? These were questions that would have never occurred to her back in Grantwood, where the cult’s influence had been supreme. The spider children were goldfish, grown in bowls but now free in the vast and unsympathetic seas. It was frightening, but also somehow comforting. No matter what happened, there was no way it could be worse than living the lies they had in Lake Cormorant.
The front door slid open, and a figure appeared silhouetted against the evening sun. The figure waited a moment before slipping through the automatic doors and hobbling on a crutch toward them. When Annika reached the row of chairs opposite them, she lowered herself gracelessly into the cushioning.
Mark raised a hand in half-hearted greeting. “Well met.”
Annika nodded to the two of them. “Well. The local station already sold the footage for a fortune to some big-shot media mogul up in LA. And worse, three o
f the doctors and nurses already sold interviews to the papers, one for the damn county.” She hurled a folded bundle of paper at Spinneretta’s feet. “And that’s not even to mention the whole viral thing as you fucking kids like to say.” She threw her hands up in abandon. “I’m done. I can’t do anything else. I tried, but this little stunt of hers just ties the bonnet. It’s like trying to stop a damn wildfire with a bucket of gasoline. So, enjoy. Because of your damned crusade, the whole world is going to know. Hope you’re happy.”
Spinneretta pressed her cheek into Mark’s neck and let her eyes fall closed again. “Happier than I was a few days ago.”
Annika began to tap her fingernails along the arm of her chair. “Then you’d better tell me that it’s over. That the cult isn’t going to come after you as soon as word hits the street and every Caleb and Michaela knows a bunch of half-spiders walk the earth.”
She exhaled a low breath. Her eyes drifted open and she stared down at the glinting rim of her beverage. “The King is dead.”
A shrug rocked Annika’s shoulders. “And? Is that really enough?”
“The Websworn retreated to the inner wilds. They won’t bother us again.” The memory of the cowering Websworn prostrated before her as she and Mark emerged from the mist-portal would stick with her forever. Urn-ma Nayor, they had called her, triggering a long-lost nostalgia. It was hard not to pity them as she commanded them back to the depths of the ancient kingdom. They had once been human, but were now little more than single-minded beasts. Still, she had no doubt that their interference was over, and for that she was grateful beyond measure.
Annika sighed and shook her head. “Whatever you say. Just don’t expect me to come running when the Yellow Dusk or whatever shows up. You’re on your own from here on out.”
Spider legs quivering, Spinneretta breathed deeply. “That’s fine.”
For a long while, it was quiet. Mark’s breathing slowed to a tranquil rhythm. Sleep had nearly come upon her, too, when she heard Annika shift in her seat and lean forward. “I don’t want there to be any mistakes here,” she said in a low tone. “I think you’re dumb as a coaster and have all the foresight of a cinder block. I can’t respect you, Spinzie. But . . . Whatever the hell happened in that outer world, I guess you did well. You have a good soul. And that’s all the good I have to say of you.”
Tatters of the King (The Warren Brood Book 3) Page 73