Garden of Spiders Volume 1: A Companion Book to The Fallocaust Series Book 3

by Quil Carter

  “I don’t want to use the powers on them. I don’t want to hurt their brains without realizing it,” Silas said breathlessly. “Just put the Xanax into his mouth and I’ll close it.”

  A moment later, I felt an overpowering taste of bitter and sour, and Silas clasped a hand over my mouth. “Elish. Put it under your tongue and you’ll be able to breath. I know you’re scared but you must do this for Master Silas. Please, love.”

  I shifted the pill under my tongue and held it there. Silas picked me up and walked me back to the elevator. I continued to try and force air into my lungs, but it was like trying to breathe inside of a pot of boiling water.

  “Shhhh, baby. You’ll be fine,” Silas whispered. Zamir came into the elevator with us but he didn’t come near me, it was just me and Silas. “Listen to my voice, okay?” He began to rock me, just like he did when I was little, and to my surprise, he began to sing.

  I closed my eyes, soothed by his words, and struggled for each breath as I listened to him sing. I remember once when he’d sung to me, but I was so small. I think he stopped when he realized we’d be old enough to remember him doing it.

  “Of all the comrades that e'er I had… they are sorry for my going away…” A warmth began to heat up my brain, and slowly yet quickly, the heat against my mouth that had been preventing me from breathing, melted away like his words were ice against hot pavement. I took in several large breaths, and began to feel the first vestiges of calm.

  “But since it falls unto my lot, that I should rise and you should not… I'll gently rise and I'll softly call… Good night and joy be with you all.” Silas took in a relieved breath and rubbed my back. “There’s a boy,” he whispered. He walked through the hallway and soon we were in Alegria. Zamir spoke but I wasn’t sure to who, I just heard small feet running down the stairs to the second floor.

  Silas laid me down on the couch and wrapped me in a blanket. I blinked a few times and realized I was feeling incredibly muggy and dizzy, everything felt warm, even the things that shouldn’t feel warm like my brain.

  “He’s pretty out of it… that was only a half-dose, right?” Silas was kneeling beside me and he was patting my cheek. I was barely noticing; it was as if I was sleeping yet I was still awake. “He’s completely zoned out. Elish’s first high, at eight fucking years old.” He sighed and pressed play on the VCR, Tarzan was on, but my eyes and ears were listening to Silas. I could see him in front of me, and in the reflection of the mirror near the TV, I saw Zamir.

  “Permission to–”

  “Yes,” Silas said, cutting him off.

  “What happened? Is this the first time he’s had an anxiety attack?”

  “Yes, it is,” Silas said. He told Zamir what had happened. But to my confusion, he said me opening up the window was because I wanted to jump out of it, and that wasn’t true at all. I didn’t speak though, I was bathing in a mental pool of hazy thick soup and it was taking every ounce of concentration just to keep myself from slipping below the surface.

  “He hasn’t spoken about it to anyone? How about Nero?”

  “Nero wears every emotion he has on his sleeve. He’s been going through the process like I’d expect any eight-year-old. But Elish…? He’s worrying me.” They sat on the couch beside me and Silas patted my cheek but I didn’t move. “Perish promised me endurance and I’m seeing it in Nero… but this boy is maddening. He’s nothing like what I expected him to be.”

  “What were you expecting?”

  Silas let out a breath through his nose. I heard him take a drink. In the reflection, I saw Zamir with a troubled expression. “He keeps everything inside of himself… he never comes to me for anything anymore. I expected… I thought…” He sighed. “I expected us to be closer. For him to rely on me, want me to teach him, train him… and he does. In many ways, he does… but not how I want. I speak with him about what happened when he was kidnapped and he shuts down. I push him… and he’d rather break to pieces than let me into that mind.” More silence came before he said something that surprised me. “I shouldn’t have let the three same sengils raise them. I should’ve had new ones so… they wouldn’t become so attached to them.”

  Attached to the sengils? What did he mean? We loved our sengils. Of course we did.

  “You mean his relationship with Cristo?”

  Cristo? The thin threads that connected my mind to reality strengthened under his name. I hadn’t seen him since the mall. He’d been bloody and beaten… I’d been so worried about him but I was scared to ask. I knew the consequences.

  And the harsh tone that came from what Silas said next, assured me that my hesitation was justified.

  “That piece of shit has done a grand job slowly, but surely, stealing my protégé from me, my heir,” Silas said lowly. It made me scared but the blue pill I’d been given didn’t allow me any outward reaction. “And now he literally steals my two oldest from me. Elish loves that man. He confides in him, asks for him when he’s upset. I don’t hold a candle to Cristo in that boy’s eyes. And it infuriates me.”

  That’s not true at all. I loved Master Silas. I didn’t know who I loved more because it came from two entirely different sources. It didn’t take away from my love for one to love the other. Didn’t he know that?

  “My first born loves a slave more than me,” Silas said in the same bottom-scraping tone. “And here I have been trying to weld that boy to my hip.” I saw Silas pacing back and forth, a glass of crimson wine in his hand. His face was one of restraint, but I could see the anger crackling and burning below the surface. “I’m the fucking King Who Ended the World and here I am troubled because I cannot impress an eight-year-old!” Silas threw the glass down and it shattered on the floor. Inside I jumped, but on the surface I was still staring forward. Not even when Silas’s attention shot to me did I move. And I believe that was what made him continue. He thought I was on a different planet.

  “The others are so easy… I get love from them by the barrel… but him? It’s always Cristo. I have his respect, but I do not have his love. Not like with Cristo.”

  Silas walked out of my vision and I heard the song-like tinkling of crystal as Silas made himself another glass of wine.

  “Cristo has been his nurturer since he was small, Silas,” Zamir said. His voice was calm, put together and controlled. I knew if I didn’t have the Xanax in my system I would be terrified, but I felt as calm as Zamir was. I think I liked these pills. “Of course Elish is going to love him for being that motherly figure. You’re like… the dad.”

  “I should be everything in that boy’s eyes!” Silas suddenly yelled. “I refuse to share affection with a slave who kidnapped my heir and returned to me a broken, terrorized shell! I will be everything to that boy, and he will learn to fucking love me.”

  Silas’s words rang in the air like an air raid siren, and the electricity that remained afterwards clung to each octave until they were but ringing in my ears. Even the Xanax wasn’t strong enough to mask the nervousness that these declarations brought.

  “Silas… he loves you.”

  Silas’s eyes stared forward, eyes of an injured beast. The king was trembling with rage, and his jaw was locked tight and spasming. I felt afraid as I watched him. He didn’t sound like Master Silas at all… he sounded crazed, possessed by something. But what? This wasn’t the king that had sung to me just moments previous. Who was this crazed man?

  I loved him. I just loved Cristo too.

  Silas’s burning green eyes rose…

  … and they fell on me.

  “This anxiety attack has showed me my errors in his upbringing,” Silas said. I was too afraid to look at him so I continued to stare ahead. The heat of his gaze burned me however, burned me with such an intense heat I almost couldn’t control not looking back. Like flinching from a sudden pain, it was a reflex. “He will be my heir… he will be my protégé. And once he’s older…” Silas walked up to me and stared down at my blanket-wrapped body. “… he very well may
be my husband.”

  Silas laid a hand on my shoulder and glared down at me. In the reflection of the mirror, I saw no love in his eyes, no devotion. I saw…

  Jealousy.

  “… and it is time that the boy only has eyes for me.”

  “What a boring book. You do know you’re eight, right?”

  I glanced up at Nero before going back to my psychology textbook. “I’m learning about why people act in certain ways,” I said to him. I was lying down on the floor of our play room, two hands propping up my chin. “What are you learning in your comic book?”

  Nero, who was holding a Batman comic in his hand, lifted up the comic and thumbed through the pages. “I learned I’d make a better side kick than wussy ass Robin, that’s for sure.” He lowered the page and pointed out a masked boy wearing green underwear, a red tunic, and odd leggings. “Look at that wimp. I’d break that asshole in two.”

  I smirked. “Exactly. You’d be more apt to play the villain.”

  Nero’s eyes widened, like this thought hadn’t occurred to him before. “You’re right,” he whispered. “I’d be Bane.” Larger did those eyes grow. “He can heal too…” Nero turned around and ran towards the stars. “Master Silas. Can I be Bane?”

  “You can be whoever you want to be, love,” Silas called from upstairs. Nero turned around and gave me a smug look. As if I somehow had told him he couldn’t be Bane. Well, I was far past questioning Nero’s mental pathways.

  Nero walked over to me and sat beside me. I sighed, really wanting to read the rest of his chapter, but my little brother wasn’t having any of it.

  “Who would you be?” Nero asked. He started scanning through pages.

  “I’d be… Batman,” I said simply.

  Nero scoffed at this, and behind me Ellis and Garrett did too. “You can’t be Batman!” Garrett said with a laugh. “You’d be… you’d be Two-Face. Ellis would be Catwoman.”

  “No,” I said slowly. “I’m Batman.”

  “You’re not Batman!” Garrett said again, just as Nero laughed and told me to dream on.

  “You can say whatever you like,” I said. “I get to decide and I decide I’m Batman. I’m not a villain like you three. I will rule the world with King Silas which makes me more important than you guys and it makes me a hero since I’ll be dealing out justice. So… I get to be Batman.” I got up and started walking away but my three siblings began laughing at me. This infuriated me so I turned around and faced them.

  “Silas isn’t going to let you rule with him anymore because you’ve gone all weird,” Garrett said and he put his hands on his lips.

  I froze, hating that I was stung by his words. “I… have not…” I said quietly.

  “Shut up, Gare-shit. You weren’t fucking there,” Nero snapped.

  Garrett’s eyes widened but then they narrowed. “It’s true though. So he can’t be Batman. He’s going crazy so he’s the Joker and Silas won’t want anything to do with him. Silas is Batman.”

  Anger burst inside of me and embedded itself into me like shrapnel. How dare he say such things! I whirled around, my teeth clenched and glared down Garrett who was sitting innocently with Ellis, Man of the House playing on the television but to no audience.

  “You’re wrong,” I said lowly to Garrett. “Not only will I rule as Silas’s heir. We’re going to get married one day. And when I’m his husband, I’m going to demote you to trash collector. That’ll be your villain name: Garbage Man.”

  Garrett looked at me in shock, then past me as if expecting Silas to appear at the stairs to verify my claim. “T-that’s not true…” he said. “Master Silas is going to marry the Sky clone when he comes.”

  My soured mood was further tainted as soon as Garrett said that name. I hated Sky. And now it looked like I had one more reason to hate him. “Not anymore,” I said. “Master Silas was so impressed with me and Nero surviving, he cancelled all plans for a clone.” This was a bald-faced lie but I was riding on too much emotion to watch my own words. “I’m going to be his future husband. He said this to Zamir when he thought I was asleep.”

  Garrett and Ellis both looked suspicious, and even Nero appeared beside me with his arms crossed. “He did not,” Nero said. Garrett and Ellis nodded their agreeance. “You’re a liar-liar.”

  “Am not!” I said.

  “I’m going to go ask him.” To my horror, Garrett hopped off of the couch, behind him Ellis, and those two began running to the stairs.

  Oh, I didn’t think this through. I wasn’t supposed to have heard that. The thought of Master Silas being confronted with what he said, and by my siblings no less, was horrifying.

  “No!” I yelled after them. I ran as fast as I could towards the stairs, chasing Garrett and Ellis as they sped up towards where Master Silas was.

  I got to the top of the stairs and was confused when I saw Garrett and Ellis standing still several feet away, so close to each other their shoulders were touching.

  I looked past them, and saw that Silas was on the phone, an expression on his face that snatched the tattletales right from Garrett and Ellis’s mouth.

  Silas saw us at the stairs and nodded towards us. “Get your best clothes on. We’re going to Stadium tonight.”

  Garrett and Ellis wordlessly went off to their bedrooms, leaving me by the stairs with a quiver inside of me. “Can I stay home?” I asked quietly, the anxiousness that was always just a trigger away flaring. I didn’t want to go to Stadium tonight, that was the last thing I wanted to do. “I don’t feel good.”

  Silas snapped his fingers and pointed to my bedroom door. “Now, Elish.” And he turned his back to me and continued talking on his remote phone.

  I stayed there, my feet feeling like they had weights strapped to them. The last thing I wanted to do was go to Stadium.

  And I knew why.

  My insides churned and twisted around like they’d become snakes. I’d been home for a week now and it was Saturday. Stadium Night. I hadn’t seen Cristo and the only time I heard about him was when Master Silas was ranting. And, of course, the conversation with Zamir…

  I knew the true definition of fear. Nightmares both living and sleeping stalked my steps, always just paces behind me. But this was an entirely new type of fear… this was a fear that someone I loved was going to have something bad happen to him. Silas was going to publicly humiliate him like I’d seen him do to people who disobeyed him, and he was going to be sent away to the labour camp on the Dead Islands. He was never going to be my sengil again, this I knew for sure.

  I didn’t know what Silas had planned, but I knew it was going to be bad for Cristo and that gutted me. I just wanted everything to be how it was before. Why did Silas have to get drunk and force Cristo to take us?

  Or maybe it was Cristo’s fault for doing it and he was getting what he deserved?

  Here I was trying to figure out how I felt. I tried to remember when I told myself never to take being safe for granted, so I’d stop these thoughts, but it was no use, I was too worried.

  “Elish Sebastian! Get changed now and do not make me ask you again!” Silas’s voice whipped the air with such a force I could almost hear the snap. I looked towards Silas’s bedroom and saw him glaring at me from the doorway. I cowered down and nodded, and went to get changed.

  I got dressed quickly and sat on the couch with my blanket while everyone else got themselves ready. It was chaos to be honest. Nero was used to the sengils picking out his clothing so he put on florescent green swim shorts and a blue t-shirt, then attached rainbow suspenders to them. Silas absolutely lost his head at this and made Garrett pick out Nero’s clothes. Garrett decided he wanted Nero and himself to be twins which Nero was furious about, and by the time they were standing in the living room, Garrett was in tears because Nero had hit him, and Nero was wearing a suit with a bowtie that matched Garrett’s outfit almost identically.

  He wasn’t happy with that.

  Silas walked into the living room, his eyes blazing and
angry. He scanned our clothing and nodded his approval, then motioned to the door. “Let’s go then.”

  Again I felt frozen. I stared at the carpet and waited for my verbal laceration.

  And it came quickly.

  “Now, Elias!”

  Elias? He only called me Elias when he was close to losing it. That was the neon sign that meant I was about to get a spanking and my privileges taken away.

  I nodded and mumbled an apology. I got up and walked to the door to our outside hallway, and followed my siblings and Silas to the elevator.

  I didn’t say anything and no one spoke to me. The ride to Skyfall’s surface was tense and quiet, an atmosphere of stress and static so heavy I felt the hairs on my arms prickle and shiver.

  I didn’t want to be here. I didn’t want to do this.

  Silas was going to make Cristo cry. Would I be able to visit Cristo wherever Silas sent him? What if he sent him to the greywastes?

  A pang came to the back of my throat and a lump formed. Cristo had already shown me how bad he was at surviving in the greywastes. If he was sent to the greywastes he might die.

  My lips pursed. I tried to force back the tears by tilting my head up so they would roll back into my brain.

  I searched inside and found my bravery. This would just have to be another one of those learning experiences I had to get through. That’s all. This was just a game and I was at the beginning of it. I needed to complete this game and then I’d be stronger, smarter, better. I would be more equipped to deal with what my future held.

  This helped. By the time I was in the long black car, the one long enough to have two rows of backseats, the tears were gone and I was successfully convincing myself that this was just another thing to learn. Cristo had done wrong and now he had to be punished. King Silas would make the punishment fair, and perhaps when I was older, I could visit him wherever he was.

  I loved Cristo though. I didn’t want to be without him.

  I dwelled on this loss for the entire ride and used the time to try and figure out a way I could make this easier on him. I loved Cristo… even if Silas hated him. I loved Cristo and… and it hurt me to know something bad was going to happen to him, and that I was helpless to do anything.