Page 91 of The Spider Queen
I sighed. “Proceed.”
“As I was saying, these women only come along once in a generation. Each Hunter’s lifetime is dedicated to finding and protecting them.” His eyes left mine to rest on the ceiling a moment before coming back to me.
“But how do you find them?” I asked. “There must be thousands of women named after flowers—”
“It’s not that simple. Not every woman with a flower’s name is special. The women we search for each have the potential to free a very powerful being from captivity, and that power is something Hunters are drawn to, like a beacon of light.”
I blinked. The tequila was doing something screwy to my brain. Or maybe Hunter wasn’t being clear.
“Free a powerful being?” I shook my head, trying to clear it. “What the hell—”
“Thane,” he interrupted.
“Thane is a spider.”
“God, I’m making a mess of this,” he muttered. “My family serves him, Poppy. We are bound to him.Iam a first-born Hunter, and I’ve been given the task of finding you—to free Thane.”
“Thane is a spider,” I repeated. “So how the hell do you serve him?”
“He chose you,” Hunter said. “The night at the bar in the back, in the junk store. You still believe you were the one to find him, butyoudidn’t find him.Hefound you. With the same force he used to escape the lake you threw him in, he traveled to you. It was my job put you two in each other’s paths. It was a test. You were able to communicate with Thane and break him out of his cube.”
I chugged the rest of the tequila.
Complete system overload.
A grimace flashed across Hunter’s face and then he went slack.
“Poppy.” It wasn’t Hunter’s voice I heard. But another…
It was a dark, sinful caress—and I felt shivers from underneath my skin. My whole body sensed his voice deep inside.
“Thane?” I whispered, speaking to Hunter, but not speaking toHunter.
“Yes.”
“How can you—”
“I don’t have a lot of time,” Thane said through Hunter’s mouth. “It takes tremendous resources to do this. So listen closely,” he paused, Hunter’s blue eyes looking brighter than I’d ever seen them, like they were glowing. “Go with Hunter. Stay with Hunter.TrustHunter.”
“But—”
“I need you, Poppy. Only you can save me.”
Chapter 34
With those final words, Hunter’s body collapsed onto the bed, flailed for a moment, and then stilled. A moment later, Hunter spoke again. This time it was Hunter’s voice coming from Hunter’s mouth.
“Fuck. I hate when he does that.” He struggled to sit up, and when he found he couldn’t, just stayed where he was.
“You guys do that often?” I asked. Somehow I was able to speak despite the shock.
“Not often. It hurts me. It hurts him.”
Everything I thought I knew to be true from the past month was a damn dirty lie.
“I don’t get any of this,” I muttered. “What the fuck is all this?”
“The easy explanation? Thane is trapped—in spider form. Once a generation, a woman comes along with the potential to be able to free him.”
