Page 51 of The Silver Spider
Chapter 17
The darkness was absolute. But the absence of light couldn’t also negate sound. She heard the thing, metallic scrape a second before a waft of fetid air hit her nose.
Serephone jumped backwards. There was nothing wrong with her hearing, or her instincts.
“Who’s there?” Or what.
Something like the sound of gurgling breath and an old, rusty door, responded. She drew her blade, grimly aware there was no room to maneuver in this corridor and continued to make her way backwards. She raised her free hand, calling on her magic until it glowed in a cloud around her hand, casting a green light in a two foot circle around her. She hadn’t used it before because even the smallest use of power could set off wards, if there were any, and reveal her presence. No choice now. Her insides screamed at her, and were proven correct when the first red glow of eyes breached the darkness.
The creature that shuffled out was more machine than…what the fuck was it? It was ugly, but she wasn’t the kind of person to harp on looks, or insult someone out loud for being less than attractive.
Its squashed face was partially covered by a metal mask, yellowed fangs poking out and a wide, leathery jaw. The jaw opened slowly, as if on hinges, and it roared.
“I guess you aren’t inviting me to tea,” she muttered.
Armor covered its body, no seams or chinks that she saw. Its feet were bare, tipped with claws to match the fangs, and easily the width of her head. She doubted anything short of an ax would faze those appendages.
The most sensible thing to do would be to run. But damnit, Amnan was past this guard creature.
She lifted her blade, well aware she was possibly making a poor choice, and snarled, casting her light even further from her body, hoping it was stupid and a bit of flash would scare it off.
It responded by ejecting blades. Little squares of armor all around its body popped open, and round saws with tiny teeth whirred in a mad frenzy. They flew at her. She created a hasty wind of power to deflect them into the walls, but one or two flew past her arms, slicing through cloth and skin. She hissed.The cuts were minor, but they stung.
“Oh fuck.” It hit her, hard, what this thing might be. Why to her senses she couldn’t tell if it was alive, dead or inanimate matter. “Stop.”
She commanded it, infusing the word with her magic, gritting her teeth when it slowed. It wasn’t like her spiders—they didn’t resist her, they werehercreatures. But this animated troll belong to another, and she fought through its original command to try and take it over.
The creature took another step forward as beads of sweat burst onto her brow. The mass of spiders, and the mass of a troll, were two completely different things. She gasped for breath, as if she were under water trying to lift a man sized boulder. Its saw blades slowed, began to retract, and her control slipped. Just enough.
It rushed her. Not enough space to duck, and trying to ram into it would get her sliced up. She turned and ran, darting up the stairs. The thunder of feet behind her spurred Serephone to her greatest speed.
Right into Dawnthorne.
She stopped, stared at him, standing in the frame of the door, one hand on the lintel.
“So. You’ve learned a valuable lesson. I’m pleased.”
“You have an animage,” she said.
She darted to the side as feet cleared the top stairs, and faced the creature. Dawnthorne lifted a hand and it stilled, saw blades retracting. The sudden silence in the chamber was broken only by Sere’s breathing as she struggled to bring her heart rate under control.
After a moment she spoke. “Was this a trap?”
Dawnthorne came further into the room. “You do yourself too much honor, child. He is my Cerberus, always. You managed to survive until I came, which is impressive. I may rescind Etienne’s punishment. If he can produce offspring of your caliber, then that may be of some advantage to our Line.”
Serephone wanted to know if, by dint of their so-called familial relationship, she was part of the ‘our line.’
“You know why I’m here,” she said, a hand fisting at her side. “Let him out. He’s no enemy of yours—he came for me.”
Dawnthorne’s bright, hard, eyes stared at her. “It’s a fascinating thing about the dragon. He is resistant to my influence, and I’ve met only a few dragons his age who are. Their minds aren’t very strong when young.”
“What does that have to do with anything? I’m not his mother. I didn’t produce him.” So if he was a little thick headed, it was no fault of hers.
“You won’t be able to break past the other guards I havein place, Serephone. You almost died here, at the first gate. But I’m not unsympathetic to your attachment to your…stepbrother.”
She didn’t like the way he said that word, as if it was in doubt. With a delicate trace of mockery under the even tone. And she was beginning to feel tired. A lethargy spreading through her limbs that her sluggish mind urged her to examine. An unnatural lethargy.
Serephone glanced down at her arm, a little surprised as her cuts began to sting. Her sleeve was wet with blood. She hadn’t even noticed until now. She recalled the fight weeks ago when her mother collapsed in the dirt, Maddugh working furiously to keep her awake, a poison in her blood from a knife slice.
