Page 1 of The Spider Queen
Part I
Prologue
I woke up in a cold, quiet room. My eyes flipped open to a white ceiling with fluorescent lights above me. My brain seemed foggy and I couldn’t figure out where I was.
The soft sound of approaching footsteps hit my ears.
I moved to sit up only to find I couldn’t.
“Poppy? Poppy, can you hear me?”
A face swam into focus—female—and someone I didn’t recognize. She had brown eyes, gray hair, and wore a white coat a few shades brighter than the stark white walls of the room I was in.
She reached into her jacket and pulled out a light. With a click, she turned it on and shined it into my eyes.
I shrank back and attempted to move my arms. They refused to budge. I tugged harder, feeling panic well up inside me.
“Easy,” she said in a soothing tone.
I wanted to throw something at her.
My limbs wouldn’t budge because they were bound.
“Poppy, listen to me. You’re at MUSC.”
My mouth was too dry to speak.
The doctor recognized my struggle to talk, went to the bedside table, and poured a cup of water from the blue plastic pitcher. She had to hold the straw in the cup to my lips because I was restrained.
Restrained.
Like a mental patient.
After a few swallows, I turned my head, signaling I was finished. She set the cup down and then drew up a chair to my bedside. “Do you know what day it is?”
I didn’t answer.
“It’s Tuesday, and you’ve been here since Saturday.”
“Saturday?” I whispered. There was only blankness in my mind. Four days of nothing. “How did I get here? Why am I here?” I looked down at my wrists. “Why am I tied up?”
The doctor looked like she was debating what to say for a moment before deciding to answer. “What’s the last thing you remember?”
I thought back as far as I could. “I think I was having trouble sleeping. I took half a sleeping pill I was prescribed…but it couldn’t have knocked me out for days though, could it?”
“That’s doubtful.” She leaned over and rested her elbows on her knees, her eyes on mine. “Poppy, your cousin came home a few days ago and found you in an altered mental state.”
I frowned. “Altered? What does that mean?”
She took a steady breath. “You were singing.”
“Singing?”
“In your sleep. Singing something completely nonsensical.”
“People talk in their sleep all the time,” I protested, “but they’re not taken to the hospital and—” I looked at my wrists.
“She was worried for your safety. She says you haven’t been sleeping and you haven’t been acting like yourself. You’re here because she couldn’t wake you, Poppy—”
