Page 82 of Wicked Warlock
“NO!” Adrienne spun to face us.
The floor dropped out beneath me, and I fell into darkness. Air whooshed by me, and my hair flew into my face. My freefall came to a halt when a sticky sort of hammock caught me. My arms and legs were spread away from my body. When I tried to move, it was like being glued down. A single beam of light shined down on me, and I looked around, searching for something. But all I saw was my entire body caught on a huge web. Just across from me, Beckett too was trapped and stuck to a huge spider web.
“Astrid, are you all right?” He struggled against the web, trying to free himself to no avail.
“Yeah, you?” I sucked in a deep breath. When small things started to move, my eyes were drawn to the four corners of the web holding me up. Spiders, hordes of tiny spiders circled around each of the spokes holding me up. One of them gave way and my body tilted to face down toward a bottomless pit. “No, no, no. Hey. Don’t do that.”
Snap! The other side gave way, and I was dangling there. “Shiiitttt. I hate spiders.”
Snap! Another loose. “Beckett?”
When I looked across the way, he too was only hanging by one thread. “What do we do? I’m not trying to piss off Athena.”
Screw that. “Kill them all with fire!”
SNAP! The last part of the web gave way, and I started my plummet once more. I fell through web after web. Each of them caught me for a moment then snapped and wrapped around me, pinning my arms to my sides. My body was covered from my neck down, leaving only my head popping out. I flipped upside down and began to swing toward the ground. Two inches before my face smashed into the white marble, I sprang back up like I was on some kind of bungee cord. Up and down, up and down, until I finally I came to a halt, landing upside down. Beckett crashed down beside me, and we bumped into each other.
“Well, that was interesting.”
My stomach was in my throat, and I wanted to vomit just a little. I groaned as all the blood rushed to my head. “I really hate spiders.”
My hands were bound behind my back, and I tried to open them to get my magic flowing but it was proving difficult. We spun in a lazy circle, and dozens of red eyes peered at us. Red eyes the size of golf balls. They were higher off the ground, and I knew this was bad. I wiggled harder and my fingers opened just enough. Cut, cut, cut, was all I could think as I envisioned my magic slashing through the webs. They loosened, and I dropped to the ground, still a sticky mess but free. Beckett’s webs exploded outward off him and he dropped down next to me. We popped to our feet just as the spiders came into view.
They were at least six feet off the ground with long legs that spread over the floor. We were surround by them. Drool dripped from their pincers and a chill went down my spine. We weren’t guests… We were dinner. One charged toward Beckett, and he flicked his wrist, knocking it into the wall and trapping it on its back. The other spiders filtered in front of the downed one and their circle around us got smaller and smaller. I could see the hairs on their legs and my own reflection in their millions of eyes. I opened my hands and two flaming balls sat in my palms. I made them grow bigger and light up the circular room. The spiders scurried back against the wall and Beckett chuckled.
“Kill them with fire, huh?”
“All of them.” Flames shot from my palms, and they ran crawling over each other to get away from me.
Then the sound of whirling filled my ears again and I didn’t know whether to look up or down. “Beckett.”
“I hear it.” His eyes darted and he held his magic in his hand.
The clicking stopped and sucked in a breath. “Nothing hap—”
The floor sprang up, shooting us into the air so fast it made me dizzy. We bounced off a web and shot toward another like a pinball, then into another, all the while soaring down a long hall of webs that bounced us from side to the other. It was like getting smacked with the flappers in the machine and ricocheting from one to another. We popped out of the top of a wall and soared through a huge room. I plummeted toward the ground and another web sprang up and caught us. This one wasn’t tight like the others; it cushioned our impact and let us roll down it like a parachute. We tumbled forward and landed on the ground in front of an oversized dark wooden desk. I staggered forward and grabbed onto Beckett’s arm to steady myself, but he too swayed on his feet.
“Mommmm, you can’t do this to every friend I bring home.” Adrienne stomped her foot at the woman standing on the other side of the desk.
If ‘beautiful, badass, full of power and majestic energy queen of the universe and all things amazing’ had a word, it would be this woman right here. This ebony goddess looked at me with bottomless midnight eyes. She pursed her full lips, and I almost felt bad that I could not pull my shit together. She was only a few inches taller than me at five-foot-five-inches tall. But she held an elegance I couldn’t dream of with her slender, muscular body and straight honest gaze. Her hair was shaved tightly to her head, showing off her impeccable bone structure. A navy-blue dress hung from her body by thick golden straps. The fabric cinched in just under her bustline and fell to the floor in flowing pools of beauty.
Books floated around the giant library from one side to the other. They traveled across her desk, opened for her, and stood there, waiting for her to read them. Spiders crawled over all the shelves, putting the books away and taking them out. They drifted up to the ceiling and back down again, dancing on their webs. Athena waved away Adrienne’s words.
“Nonsense. They turned over poor Roberta. And that one,” she pointed at me, “threw flames at Stanley. Poor arachnid will be in his web for a month. You do know how sensitive he is about his pincers being crooked.”
I held up my finger and sucked in a gasp. I wanted to speak. Instead, I hunched over and dry-heaved. I coughed, trying to catch my breath, and stood up once more. “I’m sorry. Who’s Stanley?”
“The spider you offended.” Athena shook her head. “It’s a shame, really. Stanley is going to be in pieces about this for weeks. He was one of my best researchers.”
“Stanley tried to eat me.”
Athena threw back her head and chuckled. Even her laughter was perfection.
“I’m sorry, but are you sure you’re not Aphrodite? Because you are gorgeous.”
“Common misconception. Aphrodite, while beautiful, is lacking in many other areas. The vapid twit that she can be.” She ran her fingers over the lines on the pages, speed reading them. “I am not.”
“Mom, I need your help.” Adrienne placed her hands on the table and leaned forward. “Please.”
