by Paul Collins
Zimak patted his body. ‘Now that you mention it, I too have a chill. Only I thought I got it riding S’cressling. While you two were cosy down below, Osric and I have been freezing our orchids off.’
Daretor had no strength to dispute Zimak’s statement. They climbed aboard the dragon, and a moment later they were aloft. S’cressling banked sharply, swooping southwards.
Chapter 12
INTO THE SPIDER KINGDOM
S
’cressling’s huge wings beat the air like thunder, and the noise of their passage echoed through the mountains. Wandering shepherds, leagues away, looked up, fearing some nameless threat.
Jelindel and Daretor drowsed on the cramped deck, glad to be in the open air and beneath the sun again, despite the cold. Osric was overjoyed that they had recovered the dragonsight. S’cressling too seemed happy in an inscrutable, dragonish sort of way.
Despite her exhaustion, Jelindel roused herself enough to ask Osric and Zimak about Melyar. ‘She made it back all right?’
‘Don’t sound so surprised,’ said Zimak. ‘The woman wouldn’t stop crying. She kept going around touching everything and she pinched me at least four times. She said she couldn’t believe her good fortune. And she had these flimsy bags that broke the moment you put anything in them. Gah, it’s no wonder the woman’s gone mad, living in such a weak paraworld.’
Osric took over. ‘By then, the festival was ending, so we were able to find her a place to stay. We also purchased her passage with a camel train back to D’loom. She had been very happy till then. I asked her why her mood changed so suddenly. She said all her family and friends must be dead or gone by now. I told her that that did not need to be the case and that the Temple of Verity was still a strong order. She looked more hopeful after that.’
Jelindel only wished she could have been there when Melyar arrived. More to the point, it raised her belief in her own abilities. She had somehow magicked Melyar straight back to her original anchor on Q’zar. That had involved a degree of precision that she had never dared hope for.
‘Hakat and QeSu, what of them?’ asked Daretor.
‘Gone forever, thanks to Jelindel,’ said Zimak. ‘And the thieving scoundrel’s taken the machine, too.’
‘What?’ exclaimed Jelindel. ‘The machine he can keep. And I did nothing to them.’
‘Yes you did. They have been so inspired by your powers and scholarship that they want to be just like you. Melyar promised to get them into the Temple of Verity. Hakat as a lackey, of course, not a neophyte.’
‘You’re making this up,’ said Jelindel, her eyes narrowing.
‘Not at all. In order to repay you Melyar said she had to do something for someone else. For once the truth is funnier than a joke. You seem to have an inspiring effect on weak minds. Fortunately I’m thick-skinned, and am proofed against you.’
‘Zimak, your skin is so thick that an arrow would go all the way through without encountering anything else but skin.’
Zimak patted his paunch. He looked at Daretor’s glaring face. ‘You’re right. There does seem to be a fair bit of it.’ i
Zimak was rankled by Jelindel’s earlier comment about him being thick-skinned. So much so he could not help goading her. Sitting opposite them and stuffing dried beef strips into his mouth, he said, ‘If you two don’t wake up I’m not keeping any of this for you.’
Without opening his eyes Daretor grunted a reply: ‘Good. More chance you’ll choke to death.’
‘That’s a fine thing to say to somebody who’s occupying your body and who’s saved your life several times over.’
‘And I yours,’ Daretor grumbled, sleepily elevating one eyebrow. ‘As for the body, you’re welcome to it. I have this one more or less how I want it and I’ve decided that size and brawn doesn’t matter.’
A gamin of a smile touched Jelindel’s cheeks, but she kept her eyes closed. A shout from the mane drowned Zimak’s attempt at a scornful reply.
‘I’ve been looking over the maps and our path to the Tower Inviolate will not be easy,’ Osric said.
‘Is nothing easy these days?’ Daretor grumbled, pushing himself up on one elbow.
‘As long as I can sleep,’ Jelindel murmured. ‘Finding the dragon sight despite Fa’red’s interference wasn’t the easiest heist I’ve been involved in.’
Osric sat down near Jelindel. Sensing his unease, she struggled back to alertness. ‘Is everything all right?’
‘I believe so, although all is not what it appears.’
‘Aha.’ She rubbed her chin thoughtfully. ‘Something troubles you?’
‘Not me,’ said Osric. ‘S’cressling is the troubled one. Her dragon sense has her restless.’
Daretor sat up. ‘I judge we have five days before the poison takes effect. Is there a safe way to the citadel? Any more of these delays will put an end to us.’
‘I don’t know as yet,’ Osric said. ‘But I was thinking … you have the dragonsight and it is said that the jewel can sometimes see the future. Perhaps it would be wise to consult it.’
Jelindel frowned, fishing out the crimson gemstone from where it hung inside her tunic. It pulsed a dull red, with a rhythm that had an odd familiarity, as if it were telling her something that she should know.
Osric eyed it with awe and reverence. It was a talisman of great power that meant far more to him and his people than to the wayfarers who were his friends.
Jelindel gazed at the dragonsight. ‘Despite all my skills, Osric, I still have no idea how to use it. That it has immense power, I know. I can sense it. My heart seems to have fallen into rhythm with its beat. But the key to its power is beyond me, at least for now. Still, I will keep prying at it; perhaps I’ll get lucky.’
S’cressling suddenly banked sharply. A sound like a plague of locusts filled the air even as the dragon bellowed in anger and defiance.
Fighting to keep their footing, the four scrambled about the deck and gazed in horror at the sight before them. The air was alive with fearsome creatures that manoeuvred to and fro in an insane dance, as if engaged in an aerial dogfight. S’cressling had blundered into the middle of a lethal battle by dropping out of the clouds above.
‘By all my odd gods these are not of Q’zar,’ Daretor swore.
‘Just where are we?’ Zimak demanded of Osric.
Jelindel turned to the dragonrider. ‘Could the Tower Inviolate have brought these things in with it?’ And other creatures too, she wondered.
Osric held on tight as S’cressling jerked to one side. ‘We’re within the citadel’s realm.’ He shook his head wildly. ‘I’ll try to explain later. Hold on.’
The creatures were giant spiders, covered in sharp steel-like bristles and chitinous armour. They had long vivid orange and black legs that whipped and sliced like scimitars. Their fangs, trailling thick ropy threads of saliva, worked hungrily, snapping open and shut like bolt-cutters, while two rows of ruby eyes glinted.
Vast plumes of liquid silk trailed from their finger-like spinnerets, knitting into broad webs, with which they trapped and worked the invisible air currents, steering first one way and then another with astonishing and frightening speed. Although there were many species that travelled thus upon Q’zar’s air currents, none was the size of these monstrosities.
‘What in Black Quell’s beard?’ Zimak said, barely above a whisper.
‘Look out!’ warned Jelindel as a spider came sailing low across the deck, its fangs slashing at Daretor. He threw himself down, narrowly avoiding the lethal sword-length teeth.
Osric rushed forward to command S’cressling. The ponderous dragon flat-planed its membranous wings and sailed swiftly past two spiders plummeting in a deadly embrace.
Zimak gripped a safety rope and pulled himself toward his fallen companion. Holding the rope with one hand, he unsheathed his sword and stood guard over Daretor until he found his footing. ‘Here,’ Zimak said, throwing Daretor a sword. ‘Don’t get my body damaged.’ He threw a short sword to Jeli
ndel, who caught it deftly.
Jelindel kept her head down but watched the aerial combat carefully. ‘I think there are two sides fighting one another, and that we have flown into the middle of it,’ she said as S’cressling ducked and wove her way through the melee.
‘That’ll be a comfort when we’re diced and sliced, and in their bellies,’ Daretor ventured.
‘Osric, can we get away by diving?’ Jelindel called.
Osric nodded and shouted something that was ripped away by the wind. S’cressling went into a steep dive.
‘I think he said, “Hang on”,’ cried Zimak, as the deck tilted alarmingly. The tactic didn’t work. Whatever battle the spiders were engaged in had come to its conclusion, and while a number ballooned away into a nearby cloud, others twisted and dropped in pursuit of the dragon.
Clearly, S’cressling was far too large a target for the spiders, but her puny riders were not. The spiders made several lowflying swoops across the deck, snatching at them. Their ability to manoeuvre was daunting.
S’cressling’s jaws snapped open and a jet of fire shot out, roasting a spider in midair and catching the webbed plume of another. The spider web flamed and dissolved instantly. With a hideous screech, the spider clutched its abdomen with its legs and dropped like a stone.
Zimak and Osric cheered, but S’cressling’s attack did nothing to deter the other spiders, except to give them a deep respect for the front end of a dragon. Consequently, the Q’zarans were taken completely by surprise when the spiders attacked from behind.
Jelindel slashed at one attacker but her sword merely glanced off the spider’s fangs as they snapped about her. She felt two sharp pricks in her shoulders and a moment later two hairy legs swept her up. Within seconds its bristles pinioned her like living vices. Fighting a creeping drowsiness she muttered a spell. Tiny guttering blue light formed about her lips then lashed out at the closest spider, binding it instantly in a coruscating shell of electric light. Just as quickly the spell dissipated on the wind. Jelindel finally succumbed to semi-paralysis. The spider crouched, then launched itself into the air.
Unbalanced by S’cressling’s attempts to escape, Daretor and Zimak also fell easy prey to the attackers.
Only Osric was spared as he was too far forward and therefore close to S’cressling’s deadly furnace.
Moments later, the triumphant spiders rose at great speed into the upper air currents, far beyond S’cressling’s ability to follow or retaliate.
Osric’s small voice rose up from below. ‘I will find you!’
The spiders flew so high that it was difficult to breathe. The bitter cold froze their limbs and further dulled their minds. Jelindel expected to die and thought that this was probably a far more pleasant end than what their captors had in store for them.
So it was that after many hours Jelindel became dully aware that it was getting warmer. From this she deduced that either the venom was fading or they were descending. Both proved to be the case as she glimpsed a vast forest below. Soon she could smell pollen and resin on the air, and hear ululating voices and the thrumming of many feet. She glanced at the others. Zimak was either unconscious or dead; Daretor was hanging slack against the spider’s legs but his eyes flicked open and met hers. He gave her a wan smile.
‘We’re not yet dead?’ he croaked.
She could barely make out the words. ‘We may wish we were,’ she managed to say.
‘Aye,’ he said, and relaxed into his tormented slumber.
The warmth was a profound luxury, like discovering an oasis in the desert. Jelindel felt her limbs revive and her mind become fully alert.
It was clear that the spiders were dropping toward the thick forest canopy. As they did so, Jelindel noted that their captors were gradually changing colour to blend in with the new environment.
Skylines were deployed in great cone-shaped fans that slowed their descent. One by one they dropped into the thick foliage and vanished from view.
As Jelindel’s captor plunged in amongst the trees she shut her eyes for an instant then forced herself to watch; she needed to stay alert, to learn all she could, in case there was the slightest possibility of escape.
She was amazed to discover a city set high in the trees many hundreds of feet above the ground. The spiders detached themselves from the skylines and dropped onto broad spider webs set amongst the trees; nearby were the dwellings of humans, each linked by wide wooden thoroughfares that spanned the lofty gaps between trees, and on which a respectable volume of foot traffic could be seen. However, the humans that Jelindel could make out were clearly slaves; each wore nothing but a leather loin cloth, and some kind of silver torc-like jewellery around their necks.
White baubles the size of horse trays hung from the tree trunks. With a start Jelindel realised that these were silken egg sacs.
The arrival of the spiders caused the nearest humans to stop what they were doing and fall upon their knees; each bowed low to the nearest spider, and a chant sprang up. The humans weren’t just slaves, they were worshippers.
Daretor’s spider had landed nearby, though there was no sign of Zimak. Daretor and Jelindel looked at each other.
‘Seems we’ve been captured by Black Quell’s minions,’ said Daretor sourly. ‘And no better place for them to breed,’ he added, looking around.
Jelindel worked warmth into her shoulders and legs. ‘We’re alive, Daretor. That in itself proves these monstrosities can make mistakes.’
The spiders dumped Jelindel and Daretor on a nearby pathway and hissed several commands that sounded intelligent, despite the sibilant speech. The two were immediately surrounded by human slaves and bundled away to a cage high in a tree. They were given wooden bowls filled with gruel and water. Setting the bowls aside they gazed at the aerial city from a small barred window. A short time later Zimak was thrown in.
Some hours passed. Finally the door opened and a tall man in rustic hessian robes entered. Acolytes or guards flanked him; it was hard to tell.
He introduced himself as Usel and claimed to be a priest who ministered to the souls of the damned, by which he clearly meant his own people. He explained that the spiders had descended upon the forest city three generations ago. They had killed many and enslaved the rest. There were several different tribes of privateer spiders that only ate other arachnids; they were also in conflict with a kingdom to the north, which the spiders raided mercilessly. However, the spiders were almost useless in any kind of orthodox warfare on the ground. Something had happened recently though. The sky had tumbled in on them and changed colour, as had the planets. It was as though a powerful magic had descended upon them.
‘You’re no longer where you think you are,’ Jelindel said. It was useless trying to explain paraworld travel to these people. How could she explain that a huge mountain and everything within its circumference had been sucked through the paraplane to Q’zar? ‘And your priesthood. The spiders let you be?’
Usel shrugged. ‘We have a certain amount of freedom. The spiders are … pragmatic. Anything that keeps their slaves docile seems a good thing to them.’
Daretor scowled. ‘So you collaborate in the enslavement of your own people?’
Usel’s face flashed with anger. ‘I collaborate in keeping as many of my people as possible alive. If you would like to keep breathing, I suggest you learn from our example.’
Daretor snorted but said nothing.
Zimak spoke instead. ‘How do we get out of here?’ he asked.
‘Get out?’ Usel repeated, enunciating the words as if they were from a dead language. ‘There is no getting out. You are here, and here you will stay, at the mercy of the Kindred.’
‘What kind of mercy is that?’ Daretor growled.
Usel was philosophic. ‘It will be what it will be. No man knows his lot.’
‘Great,’ said Zimak. ‘Slave today, food tomorrow.’
Usel grunted. ‘The spiders do not eat as we do. They wrap their food in cocoons and hang them
for several days. Then they suck their victims dry so that only the husks remain. It is a lingering, painful death.’
‘This just gets worse,’ Zimak said. ‘What manner of people are you to let yourselves get slaughtered like that?’
Usel looked at each of them in turn. ‘Several Samaritans made the mistake of killing the cocooned prisoners to end their torture. But the Kindred descend to massacre ten for every one thus put out of their misery. They only enjoy fresh, live fare.’
‘Even I would rather go out fighting,’ Zimak said.
Usel smiled as though enjoying a private joke, then beckoned one of the acolytes forward. He held three of the silvery torcs, which turned out to be a kind of special web. The acolyte went to fit one about Daretor’s neck but the swordsman knocked him to the ground.
Usel stared pityingly at him. ‘One word from me and the Kindred will come for you, and you will fight to join the ranks of the Undying.’
‘Undying?’ Zimak said. ‘Immortals?’
Usel glanced at the giant thief, but returned his attention to Daretor. ‘Immortality yes, but at the price of pain and suffering unlike anything you have ever experienced.’
Jelindel put a hand on Daretor’s arm. ‘We must bide our time for now,’ she said mildly.
Daretor considered. ‘For now,’ he said. An acolyte fastened the circlets around each of their throats, pressing the ends together. Within moments the necklaces were seamless; they were also as tough as hardened steel.
‘By these,’ said Usel, ‘the Kindred can find you anywhere you go.’ To the acolytes he snapped, ‘Take them to the Place of Testing.’
They sat in a wooden cage as the contraption was lowered by a dragline several hundred feet to a huge wooden platform. Beside them sat two sullen-faced slaves. As they descended one of the slaves struck up a conversation.
‘You are the newcomers?’ he asked. He must have been handsome in his time. His silvery thatch of wild hair was pulled back into a ponytail and tied with a leather thong. Jelindel noted that he was also lame in one leg.
