by Quil Carter
GARDEN OF SPIDERS
A COMPANION BOOK TO THE FALLOCAUST SERIES BOOK 3
Volume 2 of 2
By Quil Carter
© 2016 Quil Carter
All Rights Reserved
All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or in any means – by electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise – without prior written permission.
The second half of this book is dedicated to Jon.
“It is dark. You cannot see. Only the hint of stars out the broken window. And a voice as old as the Snake from the Garden whispers, ‘I will hold your hand.’”
― John Wick
BOOK 3
The Phoenix
CHAPTER 45
“With the advancement of Dek’ko’s agricultural program, and the renovation of the Dek’ko Agricultural Skyscraper, we are pleased to announce that this year’s fruit and vegetable supply has flourished,” King Silas said beside me, his eyes fixed on the cameras in front of us. It was hard not to mouth the words since it had been me preparing that speech for him. I’d stayed up until four in the morning making sure it was perfect. “And with that, the monarchy will once again be accepting greywaster applicants for residency in Moros. The royal family will also be attending Stadium this coming Saturday. As most of you have already read, we have a new family member that came just four days ago: Kessler Titus Dekker was born June fourteenth and is a healthy nine pounds, seven ounces. There has been quite a baby boom these last few years, hasn’t there?” Silas chuckled at this, queueing me and my siblings to chuckle with him. We knew how it worked by now, the first generation was always beside Silas during these pre-recorded announcements.
“I would also like to announce that my second-born, Prince Garrett Dekker, will be taking over for Salazar Sanchez as the president of Dek’ko.” I glanced past Silas and saw my brother Garrett radiating pride beside our king. He was dressed the part in a fedora hat, a suit with a dark green bowtie. But to also show us his individual side, he was sporting a lip ring, an eyebrow piercing, and three earrings in each earlobe and two in the upper cartilage. He’d also gotten quite a few tattoos on his body, Nero and Ellis as well.
I couldn’t be bothered with such things.
“Garrett will be taking the reigns at the beginning of July once Salazar retires, and will be the new face of the world’s most important industrial company. As a celebration of Garrett’s new role, we’ll be holding a contest. One lucky Skyfaller will get the option to bring back any food product he or she wishes, and Dek’ko will mass produce it and add it to the hundreds of products we’ve saved from extinction. Details will be printed in tomorrow’s newspaper and I encourage everyone of all ages to take part.” Garrett had thought of that idea. Though bringing new children into the royal family was always a PR boost, nothing beat a good contest and there wasn’t an arian alive who didn’t have a dream of bringing some old-world item back that they’d seen on TV.
“I hope everyone is enjoying the beautiful weather we’ve been having. Good day and I will hopefully see all of you this coming Saturday at Stadium.” We all smiled at the camera, until the man behind it nodded and looked up from the lens.
“And we’re cut. Beautiful work, King Silas, as per usual,” the man said with a smile. “I’ll send it off to editing and it’ll be seen tomorrow morning.”
“Good,” Silas said. He turned away from the booth that held several microphones and began walking towards the exit. “My feet are killing me. Elish, run ahead upstairs and tell Kirrel to draw me a bath.”
“Yes, Master,” I said, the words coming easily to my lips because of all the times I’ve had to say them. I believe those two words were the ones I’ve said the most, although ‘Sorry, Master’ probably came in a close second.
I was now twenty-five years old, still living in my old apartment in Alegia. Below me, was Garrett’s apartment with his sengil Tyler, and underneath Garrett’s feet, was Nero’s flat with Keela, and then Ellis who was living with her boyfriend. All of the floors were connected by stairs, but now, thankfully, there were lockable doors so I avoid having visitors if I wanted.
Which was all the time.
Our family had expanded in the last ten years as well. We now had quite the handful of young chimeras running around the apartments and causing trouble. Ceph was ten years old, with wavy auburn hair that fell over a square face and jovial green eyes, and the same muscular build we’d seen on Nero, one not observed on normal boys his age. He was now five-foot-four, a height that was only matched by the twins Apollo and Artemis.
They were doing well too; I spent a lot of time educating those two boys and was happy with their progression. The silver-haired twins, Apollo’s hair straight like mine, but Artemis’s wavy like Silas’s, were mellow and well-behaved children who were never apart from each other. Their looks both reflected Silas’s genes and my own, and occasionally with how they spoke and acted, it was like I was looking at a younger version of myself.
We also had six more children, however several of them were currently being fostered by elites and scientists that Silas had approved of. Being raised in our family was Kessler, our newborn who was an odd mix of brute and intelligence; five-year-old Jack, one of the Chimera D’s I’d helped design; his brother Sanguine was being fostered in the greywastes. Then there was four-year-old Valentine, an odd but quiet boy with blond hair and pink eyes.
And being raised outside of the family was Rio, a future scientist; Felix, a brute chimera; and Ludo, who also had a future in either business or science. The fostered chimeras knew of their origins and visited us often, all except Sanguine whose whereabouts were unknown.
The younger ones kept the sengils busy. I was thankful to finally have my own space or I’d probably end up smothering them all to death while they slept. After a stressful day of running Skyfall with my brother and Silas, the last thing I wanted was to have screaming toddlers running around, or to be forced to hear what Ceph constituted as a joke that day.
“Master Elish!” the boy in question said as he ran down the hall. Whereas Apollo and Artemis stepped around on light feet, Ceph barrelled around like he was half-elephant.
“What is it?” I asked. I was making Silas his tea in the kitchen. Ceph was supposed to be minding Valen and Jack but since I couldn’t hear them in the children’s bedrooms, I assumed he’d just killed them.
“I have a ton of really funny jokes about unemployed people,” he said as he ran over. The boy leaned up against the counter and grinned at me.
“Do you now?” I said as I counted the amount of time in my head. Two hundred seconds for this tea, or else it would be too bitter. I prided myself on being able to make his tea how he wanted it, usually when the others attempted it he sent it back and ordered me to remake it.
“Yeah,” Ceph said, and when I glanced at him I saw he had that stupid golden retriever smile on his face, the same one he’d had as a baby. “But none of them work.”
And he ran away laughing.
Admittedly… it took me a moment to get that joke. I rolled my eyes and finished making the tea, and by the time I entered the living room, Silas was coming in with Garrett, Nero, and Ellis.
“Nero! I have a ton of really funny jokes about unemployed…” I tuned him out then and turned to Silas. I inclined my head and Silas took the tea, then I removed the cape from his back and undid the laces on his shoes.
“Kirrel has your bath waiting for you, Master,” I
said to him as I hung up his cape. “What would you like for dinner?”
Silas walked past me, Valen and Jack exchanging energetic shouts of joy at Silas and my other siblings being home. They ran to Silas and hugged his legs, and as they made their rounds to all of us, Silas mulled over my question. “Something with chicken in it, I don’t want anything too heavy. Order a roasted chicken and send up some potato salad, things like that.”
“I’ll have Keela order it…” Nero said. My brother was spending a lot of time away from home now, his training to be the Imperial Commander was almost complete. I think he was a general now or something along those lines. Ellis was doing a lot of legion training as well, though her training was because she wanted to be the Commissioner of the Thiens. “Elish, why don’t you grab a drink and sit down…”
“Elish is fine ordering it,” Silas said, his dropped tone making all of our hearts jump. Even the younger chimeras knew to watch Silas’s body language. “Aren’t you, Elish?”
I nodded. I didn’t have any problem with that at all. “It’s fine, Nero. I’ll sit down once everything has been taken care of tonight.”
My brother, his hair now cut in a short mohawk, with a sleeve of tattoos on both arms that crept up his shoulder blades, looked at me with a mixture of concern and sadness. He was now full-grown at six-foot-seven, two inches taller than me, with a burly build that included forearms as big as Jack’s waist, a strong jaw, arched eyebrows, and a look in his purple-blue eyes that made everyone who wasn’t in his immediate family stay away. Nero had turned out looking quite impressive, which sparked Felix’s creation, and Silas and Perish’s new plans for twin brute chimera boys.
Nero sighed, and as I walked away to put in the order for dinner, I heard him whisper to Silas. “You promised me you’d be easier on him…”
I paused, discomfort making my neck warm. I picked up the phone on the wall, the one that connected us to the worker sengils in Alegria, but instead of pressing 1 for the kitchens to order our food, I adjusted my hearing and began listening to the conversation.
“And I have been,” Silas said quietly back, his tone was edging the fringes. I should tell Nero I was okay. I needed to make sure there wouldn’t be a fight tonight. “He’s happy with how I treat him, Nero. You don’t want your brother to be upset, do you?”
I discreetly glanced in Nero and Silas’s direction, the two of them still standing by the door. Nero, who now towered over Silas, was glaring him down with his muscular arms crossed over his chest. But even though my brother could physically snap Silas in half, the king’s omnipotent presence destroyed Nero’s strength outright. It was the brute chimera who looked like the mouse in front of the tiger.
“He… he isn’t happy,” Nero whispered, sadness reaching itself out to catch his voice. “You know he’s not.”
“I’m fine,” I said, the anxiety bubbling up my stomach and dissolving my insides. “I’m fine, Nero. Don’t worry about it.” The last thing I wanted was for something to happen tonight. We had our good nights in the Dekker family, and our bad ones. It was my job to make sure the family stayed at peace, and if Silas was happy… we were happy.
Nero sighed sadly and shook his head in defeat as he walked away from Silas. “Okay, brosy,” he said. He walked to the living room and sat down beside Garrett and Ellis, both of my siblings the quiet listeners to the subdued conversation going on.
I felt stressed out by that exchange. I never knew what would set Silas off, and so I walked on eggshells around him constantly. My job was to keep him happy. If Silas was happy, the family was happy. If the family was happy… I was okay.
“Is there anything else I can bring you, Master Silas?” I asked. I looked down when Jack slipped his hand into mine, and the boy gave me a shy smile back. Jack usually didn’t want anything when he did this; he just enjoyed having his hand held for some reason.
“No, Elish, everything is fine,” he said. He began unbuttoning his shirt as he headed towards his bedroom door. “You can take Jack tonight since he’s so attached to you. He’s been complaining about Apollo and Artemis making too much noise in the evening.”
Silas’s bedroom door shut and he was gone. “Can we go now?” Jack whispered. The young boy pulled on my hand, his silvery hair breaking up the sad black eyes that peered up at me like a one-owner cat who’d just been chased by a child. “It’s noisy.”
“Ceph, take the twits to the bedrooms. We need to talk to Elish alone,” I heard Nero say. Ceph was parked in front of the television with a Transformers cartoon on. “Jack can stay.”
“Mother fuckin’ PlayStation time!” Ceph jumped to his feet and sped towards the door in the hallway. “I shotty first controller!”
There were several loud screams of protest, and Apollo, Artemis, and Valen all chased after Ceph as he stampeded down the hall.
And then it was quiet.
But that silence didn’t bring its usual calmed tranquility, as the noise left the room like a drain being unplugged, I realized that the air was heavy with apprehension.
I looked at the faces of Nero, Garrett, and Ellis, each one holding a different level of concern. “What is it?” I asked slowly. As I walked to the living room, Jack’s hand gripped mine harder, the boy also learning how to sense disquiet it seems.
“We just wanted to know…” Garrett said in a tepid tone. I sat down and Jack crawled onto my lap. I felt uncomfortable with what was going on around me. I was glad Silas wasn’t here; he wouldn’t like this. “We were wondering if you could do something for us?”
I stared at the three of them. “I don’t know,” I said honestly. “I’d have to ask Silas first.”
Nero groaned and pinched the inner corners of his eyes with his fingers. Garrett also sighed sadly and Ellis just hung her head. “No, brosy. This is something we don’t want Silas to know,” Nero said.
My heart jumped to my throat. “Then I can’t hear this,” I said rapidly. I got up off of the couch, Jack in my arms, and began walking towards the exit, towards my apartment where my sengil was waiting for me. “Thank you for – for your concern.”
But Nero grabbed my shoulder and held it firm in his grip. “I know he didn’t alter the part of your head that knows how to keep secrets. It’s something simple… just one small request.”
My mind screamed at me, demanded me, to get away from them as quickly as possible. There was even a voice inside of my head that told me I should report all of this to Silas. “I… I should go…”
Nero turned me around and put both of his hands on my shoulders. “Will you get us a list of all the medication he has you on? Can you just… write it down for us?” Ellis and Garrett both nodded behind them, Garrett continually glancing nervously at the hallway.
The medication I was taking? That medication keeps me happy. “That medication keeps me happy,” I said, repeating my own inner thoughts. “Why do you need a list of it?” Did they want me to be unhappy? Silas had mentioned offhandedly that my siblings wanted me to be miserable again, like how I was ten years ago, but I thought he’d just been in a bad mood.
“Please, Eenie Meenie?” Nero whispered. “Can you just do this one thing for us?”
Nothing good can come of this. They have a reason for wanting it, and that reason was bad. It would only get them into trouble. Or me. I didn’t want to create waves; it was my job to keep everything happy in this house. If Silas was happy, the family was happy.
“No, nothing good can come of that…” I said hastily. “I’m… I’m going to get Finn for dinner.” With Jack in my arms, I walked as fast as I could to the exit and I got out of there.
Dinner was noisy, as it usually was with so many children. Thankfully, proper table manners were one of the first things the children learned once they were big enough to sit at the table with the grown-ups. If they didn’t act proper, they got demoted and had to sit outside on the balcony. We rarely had trouble with them now, especially during the winter.
After dinner was
done, I made sure everything was fine upstairs and retreated back to my apartment with Jack and Finn. Jack stayed with me often enough to have the childrens’ room decorated to his taste. The boy’s current love was for anything done by Tim Burton, so the room looked like a room out of a normal child’s nightmare. He was a strange duck that one, but I didn’t discourage him from being odd. It just was his nature, and since he was our first stealth chimera, we were all figuring out just what that nature was.
“I’m assuming you don’t want me to read these moronic comic books Ceph left behind?” I asked Jack as I picked up a stack of comic books on top of his dresser. The dresser was a hollowed out greywastes tree, stained to a shiny black, with the doors whittled to custom fit the dresser’s unique design and shaped.
͠
Jack still has that dresser in his bedroom.
͠
“Read me…” Jack thought for a minute. He was under his blankets with a stuffed black cat tucked under his arm. The cat’s name was Zero, like the ghost dog in that Halloween for Christmas movie. Jack was convinced Silas had named him after the main character, but that wasn’t true. I don’t know what he was named after, I just knew it wasn’t that. “Read me Grimm’s, please.”
I shook my head and grabbed the book. “You’re a weird child. Don’t you want to read this children’s crap?” I picked up a book from Valen’s shelf. “The Lost Puppy? What is this bullshit?”
Jack giggled and I smiled. I walked over with the book and pulled up a white chair. “I’m picking the shortest one there is, you’re already up past your bedtime.” I thumbed through the book and decided to read him my favourite one: Cat and Mouse in Partnership. It was a short story about a cat and a mouse who team up, then the cat starts to slowly fuck with the mouse’s mind, all while eating the mouse’s winter food behind her back. And when the mouse starts to catch on, the cat eats the mouse because, and this is a quote pulled from the ending: ‘That is the way of the world.’
