The Ways of Khrem

by D. Nathan Hilliard

  “That,” Drayton snapped back, pointing at the great spider, “is not Talanturos! That is some creature you somehow control, that you had imported from the Southern Continent, and that you intended to use in some tawdry scheme to drum up your little figurine business!”

  “How dare you!”

  “But it blew up in your face,” Drayton stormed on. “You really don’t understand that creature, do you? Or you wouldn’t have tried sneaking it into town the way you did. Oh, you could have had it hauled from the ship to the temple in a nice, big crate, but that wouldn’t do. Sure, it would draw a crowd, but they would just be curiosity seekers looking to get a peek at a big spider. You had to have it miraculously appear, to make a better show of it, and sell more of those little wooden figurines. So you ordered it to sneak across town at night, and not let anybody see it.”

  Anaksos stared back at the captain, breathing heavily.

  “But then it did something you didn’t count on,” Drayton continued. “It stopped and ate.”

  “I didn’t tell it to do that! I didn’t think...”

  “No, you didn’t think,” the Captain pursued relentlessly, “and that’s the worst part of it. You could have stopped it then and there, been guilty of only causing one death through negligence. But you didn’t. You chose to let it continue on its way. And it followed its orders, taking it’s time and slowly creeping across town in the dark, and then stopping and feeding on more people!”

  “I can control it...” Anaksos started.

  “It’s a predator, priest!” Drayton roared. “Killing is what it does! And you turned it loose in a city!”

  Anaksos glared back at Drayton.

  “I am the High Priest of Talanturos, and this is his temple. You have no authority here, Captain.”

  I vaguely recalled something about priests being the final law within the confines of their temple, but I didn’t know what the limitations were, or how it worked. On the other hand, I knew, without doubt, that whatever legal ammunition Anaksos had, he also held the largest enforcement tool in the room. The monstrous spider loomed behind him, and Anaksos reached up again and stroked the foreleg that rested on his shoulder.

  Drayton didn’t stop.

  “When you let it continue, you crossed the line from stupidity to murder. Then, when Mr. Cargill exposed the creature last night, you sent it after him—and it destroyed his house while attempting to kill us both. In addition, you are now guilty of attempting the murder of a Captain of the Watch and his associate to cover up your previous crimes!”

  “That’s not true!” Anaksos shouted back. “I had nothing to do with that! You must have scared the spider and it acted on its own!”

  “Not possible!” Drayton snarled, “that could only happen if...”

  The Captain trailed off and stared at the priest. He looked past him, at the spider, then back at the priest again. For a moment, it appeared words had failed him and he just stared at the floor. When he looked up, his demeanor had changed.

  “High Priest Anaksos, you are under arrest for the murders I previously listed,” Drayton said softly. “Go to Watchman Heinryk, who is at the door, and he will escort you onto the coach.”

  “I told you, Captain, your authority ends at those doors.”

  Drayton closed his eyes for a moment. He then looked back up at Anaksos, and spoke very slowly.

  “Anaksos, listen to me carefully. You have killed three people, probably more. You have endangered an entire city. Do you understand what that means? You cannot walk away from this. I implore you, please go to Heinryk, and then get in that coach. You will face justice in the Court of the High Magistrate”

  That tactic didn’t go over well, either.

  “No, Captain!” Anaksos shouted, veins standing out on his neck. “That will not happen! There will not be any arrest, nor will there be any further disruption of the activities of this temple! You will turn around and march yourself and your men out of this place immediately! Within these walls, I’m the final authority, and I will decide what is or isn’t justice!”

  The High Priest towered on the dais, his face suffused with all the fury one would expect to find on a prince being challenged in his throne room. I suppose in a sense he was…or at least so he thought.

  But then the crazed glare Anaksos fixed on the captain changed to a brief look of puzzlement as the spider gently laid a second foreleg on his other shoulder.

  He barely had time to scream.

  Drayton backed away from the feeding spider, hand on the hilt of his sword, breathing hard. Seeing the aftermath of this monster’s attacks was bad enough—seeing the attack itself was terrifying.

  “Fear not, captain. The spider poses no threat to you,” a voice thundered.

  I almost leaped out of my own skin as that huge, yet sibilant, voice blasted out directly beside me.

  Diving forward and rolling to my feet, I turned and saw that the little fat priest, Eggors, had undergone a gruesome transformation. His bulging eyes had turned completely black and insectile, and his arms and legs were splayed out as he floated up into the air. I took a couple of more steps away from him as Drayton came up beside me.

  “You please me, Captain. You show both intelligence and courage. You are well suited to the task you have set for yourself.”

  “Did he have to die like that?” Drayton gasped.

  “He died the death he was willing to bring on others. He let material concerns cloud his judgment, and he forgot what he was supposed to represent. I inspired him to find and bring in the spider as a test, to see if he could find himself and be who he was supposed to be. He failed,” the grotesque form concluded.

  “So this was all just a test for your high priest?”

  Eggors, or what now possessed him, hung in the air in front of the alcove like a fat spider and looked down at us. Things seemed to crawl under the skin of his face and neck. He regarded us with those hard black eyes, and his voice sounded cold, distant, alien.

  A force that knew neither mercy nor empathy.

  “A test for him. And a test for you. A test to see if you really could investigate a death and bring justice for its victim. You did. It was also a test to see if you had the courage to pursue justice when you realized the murderer may be someone or something that could threaten you, too. You passed that test as well.”

  “But why let him kill innocent people? Just so you could test him? This wasn’t just something he did, you were involved as well. You let him do this! Where is the justice in that?” Drayton demanded.

  I really wished we were seated at a table so I could have kicked Drayton under it. Apparently, he hadn’t been taught that it was bad manners to backtalk gods in their temples. I could see a frown, or something else that passed for emotion, on the priest’s face.

  Whatever it was, it sure didn’t look like happiness.

  “Do not presume to judge me, Captain. No innocent person died under the fangs of that spider. It has been my instrument all along. The drunk at the docks was formerly the alchemist known as Ermingreeth, who tortured almost a dozen men to death in search of a cure for his failing eyesight. He ruined his mind when he inhaled some vapors from a botched experiment. He still remembered what he had done, though, and had no regrets except for his lost ability to think clearly.”

  Alchemists are a strange lot. Often times their research take precedence over their common sense or even sometimes their sanity.

  “You can guess at the crimes of Half Pint Carew,” the great voice continued, “and if you check the floor of the basement where Madame Vedure does her embroidery work, you will find the graves of two of her apprentices. They had the misfortune of approaching the age where they would be collecting the dowry money she promised she had been saving for them as part of their pay.”

  It just goes to show, you never can tell about some people.

  “So you see, Captain. The entire time I have remained true to what I am, and have brought justice to those who thought they h
ad eluded it. That’s what I do, Captain. Which brings us to one last matter…

  … and one last fugitive.”

  I felt a soft touch on my shoulder, and with a flash of sheer horror I realized the massive spider had crept up directly behind me.

  ***

  I was a dead man.

  I was about to die one of the most horrible deaths imaginable, and was so scared all I could do was fall to my knees and wait for it.

  I could imagine the spider raising its dripping fangs above my unprotected back. I closed my eyes and gathered the last of my remaining willpower to fight down the scream rising within me.

  And that’s when Captain Drayton kicked me in the head.

  I sprawled to the side and rolled over to see Drayton had simultaneously drawn his sword and stepped into my place in one motion. The spider loomed over us both. The Captain stood directly between the spider’s forelegs, just inches from its massive fangs, and had his sword pointing rock steady between its two forward eyes.

  “Call it off! Now!” Drayton roared. He appeared even more furious than he had been at my house this morning.

  “His guilt is beyond question,” the Spider God pronounced. “He has spent almost his entire life in defiance of justice and the law. He has stolen, cheated, and led most of his life committed to earning his fortune through the loss or trouble of others. He has not merely survived on his thievery, he has prospered by it. And now he thinks he can just walk away from it, without consequence?”

  “That’s why he is now in my custody,” Drayton yelled.

  “I am the law within these walls, Captain.”

  “And he is only within these walls because I brought him under my protection. That decision was mine, not his. As an officer of the City Watch, I am responsible for those in my custody.”

  Drayton shifted his stance, but his sword never so much as budged a hair from its position between the tarantula’s eyes.

  “A very noble sentiment, Captain, but wasted on this scum. While you bring him under your protection, he plots to abandon you and take this evening’s ship to Saalbach.”

  “A man in my custody is plotting escape? Say it isn’t so!” Drayton returned dryly.

  “You are testing my patience, Captain.” The voice contained no evidence of having patience as one of its virtues.

  “And you are testing mine. Now, heel this beast before I kill it!”

  Yep, just as crazy as ever. Oh well, while the spider was munching on him, I might have a chance to make a run for the door.

  “Even now, he plots to abandon you while you die under the spider’s fangs.”

  Okay, that settled it—Spider Gods have big mouths.

  “Mr. Cargill, I want you to scoot back, get to your feet, and go to where Heinryk stands at the door,” Drayton instructed me. Then he addressed Talanturos again, “This is my last warning. Call this thing off or I strike.”

  “Captain Drayton, if you injure that spider, it will react of its own accord. Do you understand me?”

  “And if I fall under that spider’s fangs, there are more than seventy watchmen waiting outside. They are armed with torches and barrels of oil, and they will act of their own accord. Do you understand me?”

  For a moment, everything seemed frozen in time. Drayton, me, the spider, the Spider God...all frozen in the moment.

  Then, very slowly and gingerly, the tarantula started to retreat. It backed its way to the dais in the center of the room, with Drayton following it every step of the way. It resumed its place and went motionless. I never moved a muscle the whole time, fearing to somehow change the delicate balance.

  “Oh, well done. Well done, Captain.”

  I looked back over at the alcove, to discover the priest no longer floated. He had been relinquished by his deity.

  The Spider God had departed.

  Eggors had his arms folded across his flabby chest, his hands tucked in his sleeves. With a rich chuckle that sounded nothing at all like the stammering Eggors of before, he leaned back against the wall and grinned broadly at Drayton. His voice had now become deep and thick like syrup.

  “The spider will not trouble you any more, Captain.”

  Sweating profusely, Drayton let his sword arm drop, but he didn’t sheath the weapon.

  “I want it out of this city.”

  “In due time. Today, it will perform the function it had been originally brought here to do. It will harm no others, and soon will be dealt with. It’s over, Captain Drayton. Talanturos is pleased.”

  “That’s it?”

  “That’s it, Captain. It’s really over. Talanturos is not your enemy—indeed, we are on the same side. And I can’t tell you how pleased we are a captain who shares our values and goals has finally emerged in the City Watch.”

  Drayton looked doubtfully at Priest Eggors. It appeared obvious his last nerve had been pushed to the very limit, and he was now drained to the point of collapse. He stared from the priest, to the spider, back to the priest again, then sheathed his weapon.

  Without another word, he turned and headed for the door.

  Eggors offered a hand as I started to rise, and without thinking I took it. I found myself hauled to my feet and face-to-face with the black, insectile eyes of the Spider God again.

  “And you, meddler,” he hissed, “since the Captain has chosen to allow you to redeem yourself in service to him, you will serve him as he needs you. Do not try to flee him again. Understand this—no matter what route you choose for your escape, the destination will be the same.”

  He nodded over toward the dais, where the spider gently lifted a single foreleg.

  I looked from the spider back to the priest, who had become human once again.

  “I think we understand each other,” he observed with a deep chuckle, still grasping my hand. With a thunderous clap on the shoulder, he released me and walked off toward the doors. There was still an entire square of customers outside, and, after all...

  ...business was business.

  Chapter Eight

  “Oh take me down to Three Gallows Square,

  My true love awaits me to greet him down there.

  Dressed in his tunic, and finest new pants,

  One kiss goodbye, then one final dance.”

  —popular chant on Waterdancer Lane.

  A month had passed and I sat out on my new, larger patio, waiting for the sun to rise. Grabel brought me a klavet spiced with cinnamon, as befitting the coming autumn.

  A storm brewed out on the Cambriatic Sea, and occasionally the city was lit with flashes of lightning. The fresh smell of the tempest blew in off the water.

  The repairs were almost done. I had made changes to the architecture and floor plan of my home. The next giant spider that came along would need a bigger friend if he wanted to tear down this house. A few bribes in the right hands insured my house also had other special surprises and secret places.

  The Captain had dropped by a few days later to tell me the spider had disappeared.

  “What happened to it?” I asked suspiciously.

  “Who knows?” he replied. “Maybe it was sent into the Undercity, or snuck back out of town. Or maybe it ascended to the heavens on a really long piece of silk. It doesn’t matter to me, as long as it’s gone.”

  I wondered how gone it really was.

  “You sound relieved, Captain,” I mused, “but the priest has made it plain he considers you an ally. A kindred spirit, so to speak.”

  Drayton looked down into the drink I had given him.

  “No,” he muttered, “whatever it is that Talanturos offers, it’s not justice. It looks like justice, may even be rationalized as justice, but it’s not. It’s just hunger wrapped in a bunch of rules and going by the name of justice. It wants to feed, and it has defined this class of people called ‘the guilty’ that it feels free to feed on. I’m not sure I want an alliance like that, even if it is mutually beneficial.”

  He borrowed Vandall’s Defense of the Second Wall
, and bade me farewell. I suppose if you can’t trust a Watch Captain to return a book, who can you trust?

  He visited a couple more times over the month to ask about how repairs were coming along, and to pick my brains on a gang that hung out down on the lower docks. Easy stuff. He kept himself busy, and the Watch had started coming to the realization they had a different sort of man on their payroll. He even made a couple of magistrates earn their pay when he brought in a few murderers that weren’t caught red-handed at the scene of the crime, and had to walk them through the evidence and reasoning behind the criminals’ arrest.

  Poole dropped by once to look at my old bracer with the spider fang still embedded in it.

  He appeared rather impressed and wondered why I didn’t have it in a display case as some kind of trophy. Maybe if he lived another fifteen or twenty years, he would understand. Then he sort of sneakily hinted he would like me to guide him to that place in the Lowerways, just to see it for himself. I found myself starting to like Poole. He just had a lot to learn on some matters, like not to be in such a hurry to experience things other people were working hard to forget.

  Heinryk still looked at me speculatively from time to time. I got the feeling he was trying to remember if we had ever met before. I really, really hoped we hadn’t.

  Those visits had been a couple of weeks ago, and I hadn’t been disturbed by anybody but a few customers.

  Business was slowly returning to normal.

  On Drayton’s suggestion, we had leaked the story that an oil barrel had exploded in my basement, but luckily the fire had immediately been snuffed out by the collapsing house. My being taken away in the coach had been explained as the Captain taking a personal friend of his to see an apothecary. The few people who asked seemed satisfied by this explanation, and soon people lost interest. The fact was, life seemed to be returning to normal, too.

  So there I sat, watching the city start to wake up as I did every morning, when the gate bell rang.

  The lightning flashed, casting the rooftops in stark relief. For a brief second I paused, cup halfway to my lips, then sighed and turned to Grabel.