The Spider Queen

by Emma Slate

  Yes.

  And they all fell into the ocean? Lira, Queen of the Merrow, was most displeased that her realm had been violated. Lira’s daughter, Theia, is…gifted. More so than a normal merrow. She nearly depleted her magic to clean up the mess. A mess that came from my realm. Hunter was payment.

  You told me he was safe! That he wouldn’t be hurt!

  He is safe, Poppy. But he is…altered.

  Altered? Altered how?

  He became one of them. A merrow. He is Theia’s betrothed.

  No…

  Hunter no longer possesses his human memories. When Lira changed him, when she gave him a tail in exchange of legs, she took his memories too. He knows not of what he lost.

  Hunter didn’t remember me? Didn’t remember pledging that he’d die for me, and not just because he was a Hunter, one of Thane’s chosen, but because he loved me?

  I won’t be with you just because Hunter is gone.

  I know.

  And I won’t be with you just because my body wants us together.

  I know that too. Why do you think you’re sleeping alone? If I didn’t care about making you fall in love with me, I’d use your body against you. But that would prove your theory that I have no humanity.

  But you aren’t human.

  That doesn’t mean I don’t wish to understand humanity, or to posses it. My mother was human. Before she mated with my father.

  Your mother was human?

  Yes. She retained some of her humanity, even after she chose my father. Very unusual for a human who chooses to become immortal.

  Why did your father marry a human?

  Not marry. Mate.

  Fine. Why did your father mate with a human?

  All Guardians of the Bridge mate with humans.

  Why?

  Because human females, even after they become immortal, can still breed young.

  So I’m supposed to be breeding stock. How lovely. The disdain was evident.

  You’re more than that, Poppy. I swear it.

  I sighed. Tell me more about your parents.

  My mother loved my father very much. She died soon after he did. From a broken heart.

  But your father was immortal.

  He was. And so was my mother when she chose to be with him.

  Then how did they die? If they were immortal?

  Immortals can still die. Xan killed my father—gutted him with an enchanted sword. Xan had me imprisoned, and then came to tell me when our mother passed.

  And Xan didn’t—he didn’t kill your mother, too, did he?

  No. Not with a strike of the sword. But my mother loved my father far too much to ever be without him… She just gave up on life.

  I felt his anguish like it was my own, yet I offered no words of comfort. They would’ve been meaningless.

  A prickle of awareness blew across my skin. Somehow I knew Thane was close by. Maybe he was sitting outside the doors of my room, his head leaning back against an ebony wall while he relived the death of this parents and the betrayal of his brother.

  “Open,” I said softly.

  The wall slid wide to reveal Thane. He wasn’t sitting but standing. Tall. His hands clenched at his sides. He made no move to come in.

  “How long have you been out there?” I asked.

  “A few minutes. Did you…feel me?”

  I nodded.

  He slowly unclenched his hands as he stared at me with a dark, heavy-lidded gaze. “Did you want me to come in because you wish to offer me pity?”

  “Comfort,” I corrected.

  “Why?”

  “I don’t know.” I frowned. “I felt your suffering and I—” Shrugging, I forced myself to look away from him. “I don’t know what’s real. Our connection clouds my feelings. But I still want to…if you’ll let me.”

  “Let you what?”

  “Be there for you.”

  He didn’t reply.

  “Don’t erect more walls between us. Not when they’re starting to come down.”

  Thane finally dragged his dark eyes back to look at me. “It’s been a long time, Poppy—since I allowed someone in.”

  “You’re doing fine,” I assured him.

  “I don’t want to talk.” His eyes dipped down my body.

  I shivered. How the hell could he do that to me? Make me feel like he was touching me when he was standing on the other side of the room?

  He still hadn’t come inside. What would happen if he did? Would I be able to keep my hands off him?

  My gaze slid up his chest. I knew what he looked like without a shirt.

  Glorious.

  Perfection.

  “Love becomes an obligation,” he said, jarring me out of a lust-induced haze. “Love makes you weak. Love for my brother killed my father. Love for my father killed my mother.”

  “Then why do you insist on making me fall in love with you?” When he didn’t reply, I turned away from him. “Get out.”

  Chapter 7

  Thane turned and stalked out of my bedroom. The wall quietly slid shut behind him, and I was alone again…and I really didn’t like it.

  Just when I thought I was making headway in understanding him, he did something like this. More barriers to scale. I wondered what was at the heart of him. Had he shown me anything genuine? Was it all a fabrication?

  Thane had mind fuckery on lockdown.

  “Vodka,” I commanded.

  A crystal goblet appeared in my hand. I looked into the glass to see dark red liquid.

  “Guess there’s no vodka here?”

  I didn’t get an answer. I took a drink. It was better than any mixed cocktail I had ever enjoyed. Effervescent, bright, delicious.

  It soothed my battered nerves and dulled my senses.

  My thoughts drifted to Hunter. I drank more of the potent liquid to cover the feelings of loss and guilt.

  I’d never been in love before Hunter. Crushes, yes. Unrequited puppy love, sure. But Hunter… My feelings for Hunter had been real and reciprocated. Lasting.

  I wasn’t fanciful. I didn’t believe in soul mates. I would’ve chosen Hunter. I had chosen Hunter. My mortal heart had chosen Hunter. But now I was…altered. Becoming an immortal but not one yet. That’s all I knew.

  What I felt for Thane was not love—it was lust that made my skin crackle with tension. Even though it was nothing more than desire, it eclipsed my love for Hunter. Thane was like the sun. Bright. All encompassing.

  Hunter is a mortal. You will never feel for him what you could feel for me… If you let yourself.

  Get out of my head!

  You called to me.

  I didn’t!

  Don’t fight me.

  I’ll never love you.

  Never is a long time, Poppy.

  You’re a smug bastard.

  Your feelings will change. But you made a mistake, Poppy. I am not the sun. You are.

  My breath caught in my throat.

  If it hadn’t been for you, I’d still be a prisoner.

  You’re still a prisoner. We both are.

  But we’re together now.

  I felt his yearning. To be completely free. To be with me, to touch my skin and hold me in his arms. What had it been like to be so alone for so long?

  Do not pity me.

  But all those years wasted…trapped.

  Nothing in the life of an immortal.

  Talking philosophy and the passage of time was not the way to get me on his side.

  You should rest. Tomorrow we begin our journey.

  Our journey through Purgatory. And I’m just supposed to trust you, right? Let you lead the expedition.

  I’d gladly follow you, Poppy. His tone was lit with dark humor. I’d like the view, surely. But you don’t know the way.

  And you do? You haven’t shared anything with me.

  There’s not a map to guide us. I’ll tell you more tomorrow.

  I felt a pull on my eyelids as I started to sink into sleep. The sheets moved t
o cover me, and then I heard a quiet, lulling song—a melody that sounded achingly familiar.

  As I sank into a deep sleep, I realized why it was familiar. It was the ballad of my spiders, singing me to sleep. I dreamed of the dark ocean, with visions of powerful silver tails that sliced through the water. I dreamed of Hunter, his sun-kissed skin now pewter. Sharp cheekbones and vacant eyes. And when I called to him, no sound emerged, just a few air bubbles escaping my lungs.

  I awoke the next morning, my eyes burning from lack of sleep. I’d been plagued by nightmares. Insistent and unyielding. Pulled between Hunter and Thane.

  The residue of my dreams lingered on my skin and in my heart. I ached and wanted. I cried and mourned.

  If this was my new normal, then insanity would surely find me. Just like Thane.

  I worried about him. Had he slept at all?

  Shoving thoughts of him aside, I peered through the skylight. White puffy clouds sailed lazily through the robin egg blue sky. I’d gone to bed with galaxies and stars.

  “Is that real?” I wondered aloud. “Or a magical illusion?”

  “No illusion.”

  I yelped, startled by the sound of her voice. Cass sat on the end of the bed, holding a cup of coffee. Or what smelled like coffee.

  “Don’t you know it’s rude to watch people sleep?” I demanded.

  “You weren’t asleep, and I only just got here.” She cocked her head to the side, and I was instantly blasted with awareness that Cass wasn’t at all she appeared to be. Like her actions didn’t quite mesh with her human body.

  “Apology?” She offered me the cup of coffee. I sat up and pressed my back against the pillows and gladly accepted her offering. I inhaled the pleasant aroma and looked into the swirling dark depths.

  “Is this coffee?” I asked.

  “Sure.” She smiled.

  “Thane’s version of coffee?”

  “You’ve seen the movie Contact with Jodie Foster, right?”

  I blinked. “I have.”

  She nodded. “You know how the aliens come to her in a form she recognizes to make it easier for her?”

  “Hmmm. Yeah.”

  “That’s kind of what’s happening here. You’re about to see a lot of things your brain will have a hard time processing.”

  “What kind of things?” I demanded.

  “Magical things. Things that defy the laws of physics and science. Things that defy all the logic you learned in the world you grew up in.” She pointed to the mug. “It will taste like coffee, exactly how you take it. But it won’t have the same effect on you as coffee.”

  “Because it’s not coffee,” I said.

  “Right. But also because you’re not really you. You’ve been changed. So drink your not-coffee and don’t think too much about it.”

  I sighed. “This would’ve been so much easier if I’d just been nuts.”

  Chapter 8

  After I sucked down the not-coffee and had a quick breakfast, which appeared on a tray without me having to summon it. I took a quick bath and then headed back into the bedroom. Cass was still there, perched on the bed, acting as though we were two girlfriends about to have a major gossip session.

  “What is this,” I asked as I picked up the netting that stretched across the black coverlet.

  “Clothes.”

  I held a corner of it up to my face and peered through it to look at her. “I can see you. Which means you’ll be able to see my—”

  She chuckled. “Put the net over your head. Trust me.”

  Shrugging, I did as she said, too curious to say no. As soon as I put the net to my head, it swept down my body and morphed into a clinging, full-body suit in jet black. The towel had dropped down around me to pool at my feet.

  “Oh wow,” I said, sliding a hand down my thigh. “That was pretty fucking cool. What is this?”

  Cass smiled. “Your spiders. They spun it for you. It’s woven with magic to protect you from the elements.”

  My mouth dropped open in surprise. I sent a shot of gratitude through the mental thread—not to Thane—but to the other one. Thousands of gentle pulses greeted me on the other end.

  My spiders.

  “Am I Queen of the Spiders, or something?” I asked Cass, looking around for a mirror so I could see the suit.

  She laughed. “Queen of the Spiders. That’s funny.”

  There was no mirror, so I asked the room for one. The wall rippled, and a full-length piece of glass appeared.

  “Damn,” I murmured. The black body suit seemed to shimmer. “Can I ask you a question? About magic?”

  She nodded.

  “Mine seems to have a theme. This suit shimmers. My silk that I’d used to climb the side of the mountain to get to Thane shimmered.”

  “Those that possess magic have certain traits—tells, you could say. Like a calling card. No two magic sources are the same. Thane’s silk is black, for one. And his doesn’t shimmer like yours. His—ah—twinkles.”

  “Twinkles.” I frowned and then it cleared. “Oh, like the twinkles I saw in the floor last night. To light the way.”

  “Exactly.”

  “Where is he?” I asked, realizing I could just ask him through our bond. But I was still unsettled from the night before. Not to mention the dreams of desire I’d had for him and the wanting his taste on my tongue.

  “Preparing for the journey.”

  I looked away from my reflection to stare at her. “Is that what’s going to happen to me?”

  “What?” she asked in confusion.

  “If I’m here long enough, will I start being cryptic?”

  Cass smiled but said nothing.

  “Who are you, Cass?”

  “I serve Thane.”

  “So you’ve said. But how did you come by that—ah—position?”

  “I was the first,” she explained. “The first woman to attempt to free Thane.”

  I inhaled a sharp breath. “But your name is Cass—”

  “My first name is Amartha. Derived from the Greek flower amaranth. Cassandra is my middle name.”

  “Are there—are any more of Thane’s women here?” I snapped, hating that I sounded jealous. Because I was. Jealous and possessive.

  “No. Just me.” She smiled in understanding.

  “Why just you?”

  Her smile fell. “I’m bound to serve Thane. It was my…punishment.”

  “For failing to free him?”

  “For refusing to.”

  “I thought if you felt the pull, you had to free him or die trying?”

  “I—loved another.”

  “I love another,” I said automatically, gritting my teeth.

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yes.”

  Though I’d given Cass an affirmation of my love for Hunter, was that truly how I felt? I didn’t even know my own emotions anymore. And why had Cass been able to resist Thane’s pull, but I hadn’t?

  Cass’s eyes became glassy, like she was looking deep into the past where all her transgressions and regrets remained.

  “I resisted Thane. I chose another. He died. I died.” She swallowed, like she was forcing down pain that was still fresh. She inhaled a sharp breath and regained control of her emotions. “During my human life, I was called a seer. No one believed my prophecies. I watched the fall of my home, the destruction of my family. I fell in love with the man who claimed me as a war trophy and then I died by the hand of his jealous wife and her lover. They killed him too. Along with our twins.”

  Anguish ripped through me at the retelling of her story. “Prophecies,” I murmured. “Oh, my God. You’re Cassandra. Cassandra of Troy.”

  She smiled sadly. “I was. Once. I serve Thane—I’m bound to him—because I refused to succumb to the pull. Who knows where we’d be now if I’d given up my lover and instead chosen Thane. I might’ve died anyway. Or I might’ve succeeded and freed him. Who knows?”

  “If you were the first, then Thane hasn’t been imprisoned for hu
ndreds of years, but thousands.”

  Cass nodded.

  “Why did he let me believe otherwise? Why didn’t he tell me how long it had truly been?”

  Her smile was wry. “Thane has issues with obligation.”

  I mulled over that thought and then forced it away. Now was not the time for more guilt.

  My Greek mythology was rusty, but I remembered something about Cassandra. She’d foreseen her own death. She knew she’d die at the hands of another woman, and still she’d chosen to live out the rest of her short existence with the man she loved.

  “I love Hunter,” I whispered. Needing her to hear me, believe me. Maybe then I’d believe myself. Remorse engulfed my heart.

  “Not as much as I loved Agamemnon. I was willing to die for him. That’s the part of the myth that never made it in the bards’ tales. We had to remain a myth, otherwise our love would have become a legend.”

  She set her hand on mine. “You may love Hunter, but you were never prepared to die for him.”

  I’d placed the blame entirely onto Thane’s broad, immortal shoulders, when in reality it was mine to bear. At first my body had chosen Thane. But then my bastard of a heart had selected him too. Being with him on the altar had been the melding of body and heart.

  I was suddenly glad Hunter could no longer remember me. At least he didn’t have to be tortured by the memories he had of us.

  Stupid, ephemeral, mortal memories.

  I squeezed Cass’s hand and said nothing, trying to come to grips with the fact that I wasn’t sure I really knew how to love anyone at all.

  Chapter 9

  I laced up my boots and then looked at Cass. “I feel like I’m missing something. Like, shouldn’t I be carrying a ray gun attached to my hip?”

  She grinned, the last traces of her sadness disappearing. “You won’t need a ray gun. You’re already armed.”

  Was I?

  I was terrified of the journey I was about to embark upon, but that was nothing compared to feelings of terror I felt about Thane. It would be just the two of us. Desire for him zinged underneath my skin. It was controlling me. I couldn’t think clearly because of it, and so I pushed against it, unwilling to succumb.