Spider

It was possibly the weirdest day Adam could recall. Admittedly, not many. Mary lay before him, eyes closed, breathing quietly, and speaking inside his head as if she were just beside him.

No, she was beside him. He could faintly see a blurry silhouette floating through the air.

I called you so many times. Why didn’t you arrive sooner? I was almost dead!

“Sorry,” said Adam, approaching her body. He sat beside her, and fixed her hair out of her face.

Stop playing with my hair!

Adam sighed. “What did I marry you for, if I can’t even play with your hair?”

She said nothing. The silence was somewhat overwhelming. Adam tried to see the floating silhouette. It was still there, transparent, formless.

“It was a joke.”

I know. I am not dumb!

“Can you explain what just happened?” he asked.

Asking some strange questions aren’t you?

Adam sighed. He was rather tired of playing this game.

Never mind, she continued, we don’t have time now. You should leave this place before the people outside wake up, or you’ll look suspicious. Try not to be seen.

“The lack of explanation is killing me,” Adam grumbled, standing up.

You really want one? It was John, of course. He passed by here reeking of dreams and making expository comments. Never though he had it in him. Well, maybe it’s just to be expected of someone with your blood. Still, a cloud is a rather troublesome being, and all this collateral damage will not be overlooked. I expect dire consequences for him. And for us, if you don’t leave soon.

The disembodied chuckle she left at the end was both eerie and fascinating in its impossibility. Adam wondered, was she actually speaking and he heard it inside of his head, or was she speaking from inside his head? Either way, she seemed unable to read his thoughts, and for that, he was thankful.

Don’t forget to put a protection around the hospital. Don’t be a cheapskate; I want at least a spider-protection. There is something weird around me.

Adam agreed to whatever she said, knowing only slightly what she meant. He left, and the blurry silhouette accompanied him. It was a projected avatar. He was pretty sure he knew how to do it as well.

Adam walked back to the first floor using the stairs. Everyone around him seemed rather calm for all the commotion that happened above.

After a certain distance, she lost the ability to speak and became less material. She couldn’t go beyond a certain point and waved him a farewell he could barely see. He almost waved back, but there were people around, and he felt crazy enough already.

Mary’s car that he had taken in place of riding the ambulance in order not to be stranded waited for him in a nearby parking lot. There, he tried to collect his thoughts.

John had done it, she said. He wondered if that was true, feeling mildly lost. It probably was. He couldn’t think of a reason why Mary would lie about that, and it made sense. John could summon some kind of cloud monster, but from the way Mary spoke, he couldn’t do it well.

Still, to think John could do it. Adam felt shock at the idea. In hindsight, the last conversation between the two seemed laced with poison.

Could the other members of the family do the same? It was a real and frightening possibility. Then, he recalled Evelynn, helpless in a world that seemed to be made of dreams and the reaction of the others in the midst of John’s accusations when Evelynn crumpled. It seemed unlikely. In fact, it seemed plausible that John kept it a secret.

Did Alexandra know?

It was a headache to think of all the possibilities.

Adam took the journal out and read it. Many rituals were written within with such excruciating detail it seemed fashioned for an amnesiac. He found the page on spider-protection, a rite to summon a homely spider; it would spin its web around a building and bit off any unwanted intruder. It seemed helpful enough.

He remembered the death—was it dead?—of the cloud. He took the knife and, hesitantly, touched the metal. It was cold. He read the symbols. They were four: Melodist, fire, light, and mirror.

He twirled the knife, wonderingly.

He held the dagger tightly, and willed it to burn. The symbol for fire began to glow, and the knife became hot. It was so hot that the interior of the car became hot as well. He willed it to stop and it did.

What a curious, obviously magical, contraption.

He read a bit on the spider rite, but still had questions. Would he need to be close to hospital for it to work? It seemed he also needed several materials that he couldn’t remember, but probably were in his room in the mansion.

§

He drove as fast as he could, but it was already evening when he arrived.

The gates of the mansion were closed. He pressed the intercom, realizing he had no key.

“Hello.” Alexandra answered.

“It’s Adam, open the door.”

There was a moment of silence. “You’re pretty late, aren’t you? Taking care of your pretty wife?”

“Open the door, Alexandra. I don’t have time for this.”

“Oh, so it’s ‘Alexandra’ now!” He heard a hissing sound from the other side. “You’re a bastard.”

“Probably true.”

He heard a commotion on the other side. Eventually, the gates opened, and he drove in.

He met Delilah at the door.

“You opened the door.”

She sighed, glancing at Alexandra leaning against the wall. “She always was a difficult person to deal with. Sorry about that.”

“It’s nothing, thanks.” Adam gave her a fast hug that left her somewhat bewildered and entered the house.

He walked to his room, but before the door, he found John.

John was standing before the door, trying the doorknob, an unsettling expression on his face.

He felt anger. This man. This thing tried to kill Mary. He almost couldn’t hold back the urge to impale him and burn his body. But good sense prevented him. He would leave a corpse.

John turned at him. He widened his eyes and palled as if he had seen a ghost.

“What are you doing?” Adam asked, walking in his direction even though it was pretty clear he was trying to break in. He stopped.

John was reaching for something on his hip. A gun?

The two faced each other for a while.

Adam wondered about his own gun. Should he shoot first?

“What is happening?” Sarah asked, coming from the corner.

“Nothing,” John said. He gave Adam a nasty glance, and walked away.

Until he turned the corner, Sarah did not take her eyes off him.

Then, she and Adam met eyes, and a weird silence descended.

“Wait here for a while,” Adam told her, entering the room.

He took the large trunk full of small cases, and the one with his clothes. Next, he ripped an empty piece of paper off his journal and wrote Mary’s phone number. “I’ll be leaving the house for a while,” he explained to Sarah. “Call me on this number for the next meeting with Jackson.”

She nodded.

He came back down. The front hall was empty, but he heard Alexandra and Delilah having a loud discussion on the porch.

He remembered that John was the one who showed Alexandra the secret room, and wondered if he had been there recently.

He went to check. The book that had been above the table had vanished. He took a brief look around and decided more than a few books had left their shelves.

Was the rite to summon a cloud monster concealed in one of them?

Adam gritted his teeth. He took a deep breath. It was probably hypocritical of him to be angry at John, and he wondered how much he was justified for his vendetta. He shook his head, deciding not to think about it.

He took books at random and stuffed them in his trunk together with his clothes. Justified or not, he would rather John did not have more knowledge on these strange rites.

He left the secret room to come face to face with a very surprised Delilah and her husband having a clearly secret conversation in the previously empty library.

“There’s a moving wall here?” her husband asked.

“I never knew this was here!” Delilah gaped at the room, trying to peek inside.

“You didn’t?” Adam asked. “I thought it was common knowledge among your family. Your father hid the books he wanted no one to know he read here. Very nasty stuff. You don’t want to see it.”

She pouted. Her husband chuckled.

“What were you doing in there?” she asked.

“Taking some of these same books for some self-satisfaction since my wife is in the hospital.”

She shut her eyes and grinded her teeth, but the smile crept up her lips nonetheless. “Why are you carrying these trunks?”

“I’m going to a hotel for a few days, until Mary is up again. Well, goodbye.”

He closed the secret room and left the two to their own devices.

He wondered what Delilah’s reaction at seeing the books would be.

In the front hall, Lucas was drinking tea, looking particularly troubled. He started at Adam, and stared at his trunks, inquisitively.

“I’m going to a hotel for a few days,” Adam explained.

Lucas nodded, grimly. “It’s probably for the best. Everyone is really upset around here.”

Adam headed for the door. But Lucas’ gaze upon him, morose and uncertain, troubled him. “What is it?” he asked the youth.

Lucas gulped, and began to speak.

At the same moment, John descended the stairs. He looked at his Lucas and scowled at Adam.

Whatever Lucas wanted to say, he swallowed.

Without any word being said, Adam understood that a conversation could not be held any longer and took his leave.

He passed Alexandra, leaning against the wall outside. She looked up at him, a pleading gaze. Adam ignored her.

§

It was dark when he arrived in town. He booked a room at a hotel near the hospital, and explained to an intrigued receptionist that his wife was admitted to the nearby hospital and since Good’s manor was too far, he would rather be here.

“Oh, you’re Oliver’s son!” the receptionist said, ecstatically. “You look just like him.”

“Yeah, I know.”

In the room, he read the rite of the homely spider.

He felt silly. Was he about to try and do a magic ritual? The idea was somewhat ridiculous, but he could make a knife burn, and enter dreams. Clearly something supernatural was happening. Why not try to understand it?

He drew a circle and several symbols with a special chalk that smelled faintly of sulfur that he found in one of the cases. He drew the symbol ‘to call upon,’ and the symbol to ‘request,’ then several others: spider, web, defender, seer, light, rot.

He placed a perfectly square piece of silk in the middle of the symbols, and the rotten bark of an old tree above it. He dipped his fingers in a cup of water and drew a circle of water surrounding both.

He dipped his fingers in wax and drew other symbols in the air. At this point, something he called a rift was supposed to appear, but it didn’t.

He felt nervous, wondering what had gone wrong. He read the part again, frenetically, but his journal explained what he was to do in a matter-of-fact tone that left nothing open for interpretation.

Sweat flowed down his forehead and back.

A chilly wind came from the open window.

He calmed himself and tried again. He recalled how he made the knife burn. This time he focused his mind fully on the precise movements of his fingers, and on what he wanted to happen.

The air rippled before him as though a piece of space had been pressed against by some unseen force, and relented. His fingers left indentions that rippled as if the air were water, but more gelatinous.

It left a lasting impression, but he maintained his focus and finished the drawing, then he let out a breath he hadn’t noticed he was holding.

Before him stood a symbol that couldn’t be drawn on a page despite his best efforts on the journal. It stayed in place like a floating piece of glass with a weird shape, as if waiting. It was a strange thing and refracted light unnaturally as it passed through it.

The last item was something from another case. It was a milk-white pigment that at first glance looked muddled, but on close inspection was clear as moonlight. According to the journal, it was actual moonlight and he had no idea how he had gotten a hold of it.

He let the pigment trickle over the symbol; it moved in impossible directions as the two came in contact, but eventually dripped down on the branch and silk.

It all mixed together until it looked like a slow-falling, small waterfall, and then light poured out of it. It all congealed together and in place of the symbol appeared a single spider, as large as a hand, staring at Adam, extremely still, but appearing to possess remarkable intelligence.

Adam felt curious, then felt like asking what he wanted. Then, he felt like asking why he was asking what he wanted. Then, he felt like he was speaking to an idiot.

No, it was not him, he realized. It was the spider. It was communicating to his mind without using words. It surprised him, and the spider thought he was funny for thinking that.

Either way, the spider was tremendously friendly. The spider wondered how he was doing recently.

“I’m doing fine,” he said.

The spider was confused at first, but understood his words. It just was not sure why he didn’t convey his messages with his mind.

He extended his hand, and the spider climbed on it, wondering if it should spin its web around.

He told it shouldn’t yet. It should do it somewhere else.

It complied. It was very obedient.

Adam concealed the spider on his clothes, and left for the hospital.

§

He stood before the wall of the edifice, in a lonesome place, and asked the spider if it could spin its web around the entire building.

It could.

He let the spider walk on the wall, and told it to do so.

Dutifully, the spider began the spin a web that seemed made of light. The strings were thin, unaffected by the wind, and seemed to grow by themselves like the branches of a tree. The web stretched fast, and Adam soon saw it disappear toward the other side of the building.

He touched the web, his hand phased through it, not affecting it in the least.

He walked around the edifice. Even apart, he realized, he could sense the spider at work, and knew exactly what it was doing and why. He could also call it back to him at will.

The web was invisible to anyone but him. It was made of light, but if he so desired, or if the spider desired, it could become physical. It could be entangled around anyone who walked through it without their notice. The spider’s bite would rot.

He walked around the wall, inspecting the web idly as it grew to cover the walls.

Suddenly, he came upon a stranger staring up the edifice’s wall, similar to him. The stranger was dressed in a thick overcoat, and had on a mask that covered the lower part of his face. His hair was somewhat long for a man, but judging by the way he held himself, it couldn’t be a woman.

He turned toward Adam with watchful yellow eyes.

The man sniffed twice.

Adam walked past him, expression carefully blank.

Both turned away from each other as though losing interest and Adam continued toward the parking lot.

On his way, he felt the spider asking if it should kill that stranger if it entered.

Adam thought about it. He looked up at the room where Mary was lying asleep on the third floor. He said yes.

Soon enough, however, the spider told him the strange departed.

Adam walked back to his car with the sensation that the man’s eyes were on him still. Inside the car, Adam sniffed himself. There was no smell of dreams on him, he didn’t think.