by Sam Ferguson
“The notes also say you have a birthmark in the shape of a strawberry on your left buttock,” Simplin said.
Lucas’ smile disappeared and he yanked the book out of Simplin’s hands. “It does not say that!” he shouted. His eyes scanned the page and his cheeks blushed.
“I take it, you do have such a birthmark then?” Simplin pressed.
Lucas tossed the book back to him. “Fine. So what if I do? You said you were going to look up why we are headed to Spider Woods.”
Simplin thumbed through the pages, looking for hints and tips. “Well, it mentions a lot of travelling, suffering for character growth…” Simplin sighed and looked over the top of the book to Lucas with a shake of his head. “Editors always seem to want more of that.”
“Editors?” Lucas asked.
Simplin waved off the question with a flip of his hand. “Never mind that, nothing you need to worry about. Now, skimming further it looks like we find new companions for the road, and…ah yes, a sword in a stone.”
“A sword in a stone?” Lucas asked.
Simplin nodded. “Yes, it’s the only weapon that can defeat our adversary. All other weapons are useless against him. Now… oh look, I think I found the section on Spider Woods.” Simplin frowned. “Hm. Not what I expected.” Simplin turned the next page and flipped back and forth, but there was nothing written there. There were no notes for Spider Woods other than a question had Jack posed to himself about whether the place should be called Fang Forest for better alliteration.
“Well, go on, what’s it say?” Lucas pressed.
Simplin shrugged. “Listen, every great adventure starts off with the heroes going through spider-infested forests. It’s a rite of passage, good for character development. It lets you fight a few baddies that aren’t too tough and also allows you to show your vulnerable side by proving that you are just as afraid of spiders as everyone else.”
“Rubbish,” Lucas said. “I’m not afraid of spiders.”
“Oh, sure you are,” Simplin said with a wave as he closed the book. “Everyone is afraid of spiders, especially big ones.”
Lucas reached down and opened up his coin pouch. A long, hairy leg came out, followed by a second. Soon there was a large tarantula climbing up Lucas’ side.
“Lucas, hold still, I’ll blast it with a fireball. It might hurt you a bit, but better fire than a spider!” Simplin said as he sat upright and fumbled with the footstool on his recliner.
“You will not,” Lucas said as he shielded the spider with his hands. “This is Sheblob. She’s a great eater and is only a few months old. She’ll grow up to be big one day.”
“You have a pet spider?” Simplin asked.
Lucas nodded. “And as far as baddies go, I just killed a bunch of those bat creatures with an axe, so I’d say I don’t really need to practice on spiders.”
Simplin folded his arms, not taking his eyes off of Sheblob even for a moment. “What does she eat?”
“Bugs mostly,” Lucas said. “But if she is fast enough, she’ll eat birds and squirrels.”
“Sorry I asked,” Simplin said.
“So, let’s skip Spider Woods. As you can see, I do not have arachnophobia, and I have already beaten more dangerous creatures than spiders.”
“But the notes say we go through Spider Woods. We shouldn’t deviate from the notes. If we do, we run the risk of going off script, or missing out on part of the story. Don’t you understand how dangerous that would be? It could destroy the entire project, err, I mean world!”
“I dunno,” Lucas said. “Take it up with that author person if you wish. It just makes more sense to me if we go straight north.”
“There are many things we have to do,” Simplin said as he held up the book. “Many places to see and many things we have to take part in. If we don’t follow these notes, there is no telling what adventure we might miss, and if I have earned anything over the past twenty years, it is a fully developed adventure!”
“I say we head north.”
Simplin grunted. Seeing the argument was going nowhere, he decided to try and consult with the author. “Sit tight, I’ll be right back,” Simplin said. “I’ll see if I can talk with him.”
“Is the author here?” Lucas asked.
“He’s everywhere, all the time,” Simplin said. “He can see the future and knows all that happened in the past. He has the power to alter fate itself.”
“How are you going to speak with him?”
“Just, stay here,” Simplin said. The wizard left his chair and walked far enough away from Lucas that he could try and talk to the Author without being overheard. He looked up to the darkening sky. “So…”
“Simplin, this is going to take a very long time if you keep breaking character to talk with me,” Jack said impatiently.
“Lucas is wondering why we need to go to Spider Woods,” Simplin said.
“Simplin, come on, it’s going to take all the fun out of this if you have to stop and ask me for help every few paragraphs!” Jack said.
“I know, I know, please just hear me out. Lucas pointed out that the Spider Woods is to the south, yet the Dark Master is in the north. He wonders why we should go to Spider Woods at all.”
“Why? Well, every good fantasy story has a spider-infested forest somewhere!” Jack replied.
“I told him that, but he isn’t buying it.”
“Ugh. I knew I should have made him a bit less skeptical. Tell you what, why don’t we use that fortune-teller memory to wrap this up nicely, okay? You tell him that he has to go to Spider Woods because someone will need his help. I’ll throw in the classic damsel in distress and then presto! He realizes that the fortune teller was telling the truth, I get to wrap up the introduction of the memory in a neat bow and pretend like it was foreshadowing the whole time. Sound good?”
Simplin nodded and scratched his head. “I suppose, but if it’s all the same to you, I suppose we could swap out the spider forest with some other adventure. We could find the damsel in distress along the road somewhere too.”
“Scared of spiders?” Jack asked.
“I’m not too keen on them, frankly.”
“I don’t remember giving you arachnophobia,” Jack replied.
Simplin shrugged. “Some things just are, I guess, whether you create every detail or not.”
“No,” Jack said. “There has to be a scene with giant spiders in a forest.”
“Giant spiders?” Simplin asked.
“Sure, you didn’t think the forest was gonna be filled with little ones did you?”
“Actually, I—”
“And one other thing, how did you get the plot notes?” Jack asked.
Simplin grinned and folded his arms proudly. “I took a copy of them while I was being moved between stories. See, I have skills of my own, Jack.”
Jack chuckled. “Yeah, well those notes are version one, and you are living version two, so they aren’t going to be entirely accurate.”
“What?” Simplin pulled out his book and flipped through the pages. “Which parts? Is there a love interest somewhere for me? Do I get better spells? And what about chapter thirteen, are you taking that one out?”
Jack sighed and began typing furiously at the keyboard. Simplin’s head wound reopened. It wasn’t enough to do real harm, but it bled enough that the wizard saw his own blood and passed out, thus ending the annoying conversation.
“Ha! I love that trick!” Jack said to himself.
Simplin woke up back at the camp site with Lucas standing over him.
“What happened?” Simplin asked groggily as he sat up.
“Dunno, you were gone, and then you were back. I thought it was a spell or something. What happened to your head?”
Simplin sighed and cast an angry glance skyward. “I spoke with the Author. He said we have to go to Spider Woods because someone needs your help.”
“Okay. Sounds good,” Lucas said as he picked up his backpack. “When do you want to leav
e?”
“Wait, just like that?” Simplin asked.
Lucas nodded. “Sure, why not?”
“Just seems an odd and convenient change of character for the sake of the plot,” Simplin muttered under his breath.
The two began walking again. A lot.
Jack decided to make them walk for miles and miles without rest, while he skipped ahead in the narrative, thus bringing him closer to the conclusion and serving up a bit of justice to Simplin.
Jack resumed writing with the duo already deep inside Spider Woods.
Lucas had his axe at the ready, and Simplin kept glancing upward at the large trees. The forest was eerily quiet. No birds chirping. No squirrels scampering about the branches. Hardly any sunlight reached the floor of the forest either. It was like entering a cemetery with trees for headstones.
“So, how big are the spiders here?” Lucas asked. “They’d have to be big to eat the birds and squirrels. I haven't even seen any sign of deer.”
Simplin nodded. “Could be they are large enough to eat the deer too,” he said, casting an uneasy glance at the pouch on Lucas’ belt that housed Sheblob. “Why do you have a spider as a pet?” Simplin asked.
Lucas shrugged. “I like her.”
“How do you know it’s a ‘her’ exactly?”
Lucas turned and then his eyes went wide. “I think ‘big’ is an understatement,” he said.
Simplin froze, “It’s behind me, isn’t it?” The hairs on his neck started to rise and a chill went down his spine.
Lucas smiled and shook his head. “Nah, just messing with you.”
Simplin frowned and Lucas turned away, walking deeper into the forest. The wizard turned and saw nothing but trees behind him. “Not funny,” Simplin said. “I will get you back for that, farm boy.”
“Hey, that’s Epic Farm Boy to you!” Lucas shouted over his shoulder. “After all, I am on my way to save the entire world.”
“Someone’s sprouting a healthy ego early on,” Simplin muttered. He followed after Lucas, but couldn’t stop himself from reflexively checking over his shoulders.
CHAPTER 4
The two wandered deeper and deeper into the woods, but saw no sign of spiders, or any person in distress. They made camp on the first night and then set out early the next morning. They trekked for about fifteen minutes as the trees grew closer together and the light from the sun dimmed.
“Look,” Simplin said as he pointed upward. “I am starting to see webs connecting the trees.”
Lucas nodded. “I can see them too.”
Simplin turned around and looked behind them again. Nothing was there. He sighed and mentally prepared a fire spell. If he was taken by surprise, he had a good mind to take the whole forest with him.
A strange clicking noise sounded overhead. They looked up. A long, green line of slime extended down from a thick bit of webbing.
“Run!” Simplin yelled. He conjured a staff and then set his fire spell on the top of it, making it into some sort of improvised spear of magical fire. “Run, Lucas!”
The farm boy didn’t run. He hefted his axe into his hand and shook his head. “Let’s have some fun!” he said.
A large mass of black legs and fangs leapt down from above. Simplin lashed out with his fiery staff and disintegrated the first spider.
A second spider emerged from a hole near a massive oak tree. It came screaming at Lucas. The farm boy turned and swung his axe, splitting the creature down the middle and smiling as steaming black blood hit the ground and the halves fell away from each other.
“One for me!”
The shrieks and screams sounded louder, and spiders seemed to come from everywhere. It was as if they had been following the pair all along, keeping their wretched, hairy bodies just out of sight. There were dozens of them moving in now.
Simplin yelled and stamped his staff on the ground. An orb of fire surrounded him and Lucas in less than a second. Two unlucky spiders crashed into the barrier and fell away, shriveling and shrieking terribly as their bodies smoldered.
The wizard then closed his eyes and waved his staff in a circle above their heads. The flames rolled outward, pushing the other spiders back. The creatures hissed and spat venom at the barrier, but to no avail.
“We can’t stay in here forever,” Lucas said.
Simplin nodded. He pointed his staff at the largest gathering - a group of eight spiders. The fiery barrier evaporated and then a funnel of fire poured out from the end of the staff. A cone of flames blasted everything in its path. Spiders, trees, bushes, even the earth. Everything was turned to black and gray ashes.
Two more spiders circled around from the other side, but Lucas had been tracking them. He lashed out with a quick chop on the first, slicing through its face and fang-filled mouth just before spinning and catching the second in the middle of its body as it tried to jump at him. The creatures jerked and kicked about for a few seconds as venom and blood poured out of them, but they were no longer a threat.
Then, as quickly as it had started, the fighting was over. The spiders were all dead.
“That wasn’t so hard,” Simplin said.
Lucas walked over to the spider with the wrecked face and came down with another chop of his axe. Blood spurted out from the new wound and the body went still.
“Not really necessary, was it?” Simplin asked.
Lucas shrugged. “Just making sure,” he replied. “You know, we should fire these two up on a spit.”
“Eat the spiders?” Simplin asked.
“I heard they taste like chicken,” Lucas said with a nod.
Simplin bit his lower lip and sighed. “We would have to be sure to avoid the venom sacks, and given the method of how you killed them, I am not entirely sure we can avoid venom splatter that may have contaminated other parts of the bodies.”
Lucas shrugged. He walked over to the wizard and took the fiery staff in hand and pointed it at the dead spider.
“Now just a minute, you don’t even know how to use that.”
Lucas turned the staff over and found a trigger. Just above that was a short, stubby button. “I assume I depress the safety to turn it off, and then I pull the trigger. Simple, really,” Lucas said. A small click was heard and then he pointed the staff and pulled the trigger. Flames shot out of the end and roasted the spider, but he didn’t let the fire consume it. He released the trigger just as the smoking body appeared to be done.
Lucas handed the staff back to Simplin, who was still standing with his mouth agape, just staring at the boy. The farm boy then walked up and hacked off one of the legs. He pulled a field knife and made a long incision along the inside, and then he worked the thick skin back to reveal white, fully cooked meat. He sniffed it and then took a small bite.
“Lucas, I really wouldn’t do that.”
Lucas smiled and swallowed. “It’s good. Take a bite.” Lucas tossed the spider leg to Simplin.
The wizard slowly raised it to his lips and then took a bite. It was good. It was like a perfectly roasted chicken with all the juices trapped inside the meat that wonderfully exploded in the mouth upon biting it. It could have used a bit of garlic and salt, but otherwise it was absolutely one of the best things Simplin had ever tasted.
“And you thought I…” Lucas stopped midsentence as another shriek rent the air. He wheeled around, but there were no other spiders coming. Then, he looked down and saw that Sheblob’s pouch had come open and his pet was now out and staring at the roasted carcass of a large spider.
“How could you do something like this?” Sheblob hissed.
“Whoa, you can talk?” Lucas asked.
Simplin frowned at the meat. “Maybe eating the spider leg has given us the ability to hear her,” the wizard said.
Sheblob hissed and raised her two forelegs to show her anger. “You idiots! They weren’t going to hurt you!”
“Sheblob, they were going to eat us,” Lucas said. “Trust me. They attacked first.”
�
�They only wanted to play with you!” she hissed. “They tried to surprise you in a friendly game of tag.”
“If by tag you mean they tried to eat us, then yes, I would agree with you,” Simplin said.
The spider turned on him savagely and spat in his direction. “They were vegetarian spiders!”
Simplin frowned and looked to Lucas. “Veg-a-what?”
“Vegetarian! They only eat plants, and you two brutes killed them.”
“Um, no,” Lucas said with a shake of his head. “They tried to eat us. They had poison dripping from their teeth and everything. I swear.”
“Giant spiders feed off of trees,” Sheblob said. “They would have led you safely through the woods if you had asked.”
“Listen, Sheblob,” Simplin began. “The author told me that someone is in danger here in the Spider Woods. If not from the spiders, than where else would a threat come from?”
“The goblins, of course,” Sheblob said. “The goblins and the spiders have fought for years. They try to eat them too.”
“The spiders tried to eat the goblins?” Simplin asked.
“NO! The goblins prey upon the spiders. Now, you are like goblins. I see it now. I should have listened.”
“Sheblob, come on back,” Lucas said as he opened his pouch.
Sheblob started to growl and then she grew in size. In the blink of an eye she grew to the size of an elephant, and was hissing at the two of them with terrible, curved fangs that dripped with venom. “Now I shall repay you for what you have done.”
“Hold!” Simplin said as he aimed his fire staff at her.
“Don’t worry, I will not eat either of you. You are doomed anyway. However, to repay your treachery, I will go out and find the sources of light and life. I will consume them, and I will bring terror and horror to every living thing. From this day forward, no spiders shall be vegetarian. All shall drink the blood of living things. We will skulk under your beds. We will hide in your shoes. We will hunt you. Spiders big and small, we shall arm ourselves against the human blight. I shall drink the light!”
