There are countless ways one can wake up, but there aren’t many worse ways to wake then ensnared in a giant spider’s web. Unfortunately, that is exactly the predicament Diya found herself in.

  It very well may have been the concussion, but there passed a delirious moment in which she thought she might merely be in a nightmare. After blinking the sleep from her eyes, the ghastly gravity of her truly tangible situation crashed down upon her. As panic set in, she tried to flail, but flailing is never all that effective when one is caught in a spider’s web. Quite the opposite, as those with any semblance of knowledge on arachnids knew. May as well have simply rung the predator’s dinner bell.

  Diya had never paid much attention in biology class, a detail that had next to no bearing on her life, however in this moment came back to bite her. One moment she was alone in the room with the mighty oak, the next, the monster towered over her. The human face was twisted with rage. Huge, fuzzy mandibles ending in razor sharp fangs drew back primed to strike. A drop of warm, gooey liquid dripped down landing on Diya. The fact that her body was bound by countless layers of silk-like web did nothing to prevent her from gagging when the rank smell hit her nostrils.

  Shaking with fear, she shut her eyes tightly and waited for the inevitable. A moment passed. Then another. Realizing she hadn’t been eaten by the massive spider yet, she gathered her courage enough to crack one eye.

  Her breath caught in her throat.

  The monster appeared frozen. Whereas mere seconds before the human face had been full of hate, it now looked timid and pitiful. Weak sobs reverberated in the room.

  “W-w-why…did he do t-this…to me?” It muttered between whimpers.

  Despite being caught in the grotesque amalgamation’s web, Diya’s heart sunk like a stone in a bottomless lake of pity. She was terrified to speak.

  What if the wrong words activated the monster, casting away the sorrowing girl, and summoning the violent spider? Who even knows how the hell any of this even works?

  Eyes rolling down over the cocoon of web immobilizing her, she weighed her options.

  “G-g-gennae? Right?” Diya made up her mind and spoke as softly as she ever had. “That’s your name, right?”

  “That w-was my name.” Misty eyes red and puffy looked down at her. “But it hardly matters anymore. My life has been destroyed by that evil, stone-eyed—”

  Feeling the girl spiraling into her anger, Diya interrupted. “Your life isn’t destroyed though. Perhaps I can help you? Maybe we can work together to fix this?”

  “Y-you?” Whispered Gennae, looking around suspiciously. “Why would you want to help me? You’re not even from the Coven. Kromac said that you were sent as a false prophet to destroy our people.”

  Well, that’s not a very nice thing to say about someone. He really is quite an asshole.

  “Just like you, I didn’t choose any of this.”

  Gennae tried to wipe the stream of tears from her face, no longer having any arms, she made the attempt with one of her eight long fuzzy legs. As one could imagine, it wasn’t all that effective. “What d-do you mean?”

  “My home is in terrible danger. I only came here because it was my only chance to save my people.” Diya’s eyes looked from the spider leg to the girl’s tear-streaked face. “Help me get out of this web, and you have my word I will do everything in my power to help you.”

  A sound of contemplation came from Gennae, and she pouted. “Okay. But we must be quick. I don’t know how much longer until the monster takes control again.”

  What came next was one of the most terrifying moments of Diya’s life. Gennae bent down and her razor-sharp fuzzy mandible bit into the web.

  With a sound like a knot of thread snapping Diya fell to the floor with a heavy thud. Of course, she landed right on her injured leg and rolled around in agony. She almost cursed but instead bit her lip. There was no telling what might trigger the monster to return.

  Climbing gracefully down from the web, Gennae came to a stop next to her, the many long legs moving with inhuman precision. “Are you okay, outsider?”

  There were many feelings swimming in her likely still concussed head, but okay wasn’t one of them. “I’ll be alright. But I don’t think I can walk. Can you help me over to that tree?”

  Without saying a word, four long arachnid legs scooped Diya up and carried her to the golden leaved oak tree. Involuntarily the feeling of the insect-like prickly hairs against her skin made her shudder, but when it comes to soliciting help in a dungeon, beggars can’t be choosers.

  Standing, or based on her knee being enflamed and feeling like the inside of a furnace, leaning at the foot of the oak, she realized she had no idea what her plan was. Knowing that a bloodthirsty monster spider might take over the mentally unwell girl standing at her side any minute now, she did the only thing she could think of.

  “Excuse me,” she said politely to the perpetually screaming form fused into the trunk of the tree. “I’ve no idea what else to do. I’m desperate…and as ridiculous as it sounds...I think I may be…some sort of chosen one. Can you help me?”

  This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.

  Nothing happened. The man in the tree trunk remained petrified.

  Gennae looked down at her in horror. “This was your plan? Oh, bloody hell. I’m doomed.”

  The incredulous words hurt, but Diya could understand where they were coming from. If the roles were reversed, and she had been cursed to live as a grotesque spider monster, she wouldn’t love the plan either. Hell, roles as they were, she wasn’t loving it.

  Admittedly, the fire in her knee was making it quite difficult to think. She could feel her rapidly increasing heartbeat in the injured leg. That was never a good sign. Looking down at her knee, she could see that it was severely bruised and turning a brutally deep shade of violet.

  That’s it!

  Her hand shot to the pouch tied to her belt. Fingers searching inside, she found it. She lifted a ceramic sphere; it sparkled in the glow of the pale-yellow leaves.

  “I have a new plan, I think it can work, but it’s not going to be the most comfortable for you,” Diya said softly to the cursed initiate at her side.

  Gennae looked down, worry glinting in her watery eyes. “Don’t make me regret this, and I don’t know why I feel this way, but I trust you. If you think there’s any chance, do—”

  Her words ended abruptly. Gennae’s face began spasming violently and her body convulsed.

  They were out of time.

  Panic flashed in Diya and she instinctively recoiled away. Unfortunately, her compromised leg was in no shape to be performing sudden evasive maneuvers. She tripped and crumpled awkwardly to the floor.

  Gennae’s face looked down at her, however the melancholy initiate was no longer home. Now the face was contorted, a murderous rage expressed and a wicked smile presented.

  Just as the hellish monster lunged at her, Diya threw the ceramic sphere at the dirty tile beneath it. There was the brief sound of shattering pottery, then out poured a billowing cloud of violet smoke. Diya was left hoping that the formula had a similar effect on a massive arachnid as it did on the Skarlith. Her life depended on it.

  The smoke burned her eyes, and she tried to drag herself away from the impact point where it was the most concentrated. With stinging, blurry visio,n she tried to decipher what reaction the monster was having. Through the dense, purple smoke it was difficult to see, and without a doubt, her burning eyes did little to aid her. Certainly, the fact that she wasn’t eaten or ripped to shreds yet was encouraging. Diya squinted trying to make sense of the dark shadows writhing in the clouds.

  With a heavy thud, the answer presented itself. The monster collapsed to the floor just inches from where Diya lay. Due to the cavernous nature of the room, the smoke dissipated quickly, venting up into heaven knows where.

  Diya was quite likely still concussed and delirious by this point, because she had a fleeting giggle at the idea of delivering a bill to the coven for the fumigation and pest control services she had likely just rendered on their subterranean labyrinth. But first, she needed to survive. A wish that, despite the incapacitated arachnid, didn’t feel like it was considerably closer.

  Think, Diya. How can I complete this trial? How do these witches operate?

  Her mind first went to Kromac, wearing his stupid fox mask, and sitting sullenly on his serpent throne.

  No, doesn’t feel like being an asshole is the way to complete the trial.

  Next, Tamsin’s beautiful face appeared in her mind. She was doing that goofy thing she liked to do, where she kept making silly faces until Diya inevitably laughed.

  On the ground, Diya saw the shattered ceramic sphere, and she remembered the night they had formulated the weapon. First, she couldn’t help but think about kissing her soft lips or keeping warm, cuddled up by the fire. But then she thought about the way Tamsin had cut herself and dripped blood into the formula. It was definitely strange. But if she had begun to understand one thing about the coven, it was that these people loved blood.

  Most people never have to experience trying to drag themself across the floor with an injured leg. Those people are lucky. Not a picking the winning dog at the dog races type of luck, but a more practical, and possibly more valuable, not accidentally walking into quicksand type of luck.

  It wasn’t a long way to go. Perhaps ten feet, but every foot was strenuous and uncomfortable for her. When she finally made it to the foot of the screaming man, she did what any reasonable witch would do: drew her knife, sliced her palm, and dripped the blood onto the roots of the towering tree.

  The results were immediate this time in a way that, despite having no clue what might happen next, brought a mischievous smile to Diya’s lips.

  Every golden leaf on the tree began to vibrate, shaking the floor and emitting a faint humming noise. Still fused into the trunk of the tree, the bark around the screaming man began to crack and fall to the floor.

  An inhumanly low roar discharged from his mouth, then a stream of bees poured out, spiraling up into the darkness. Finally, he broke free from the tree and stomped out, each step cracking the tile beneath his feet like he weighed more than a mountain.

  For the first time, he seemed to notice Diya. Upon looking down at her, his screaming expression evaporated, suddenly replaced by a devious smirk. “You come seeking curses? Hah! Even saplings know, one cannot twist fate without first letting fate twist them.” His devilish laugh shook the place. “I'm cut but never bleed. What am I?”

  His stare somehow made Diya painfully aware of every uncertainty crowding her mind, and she was certainly in no headspace to be solving riddles. Attempting to make her concussed brain reason, she stared down at the floor. Her eyes fell on poor Gennae, and she remembered her promise. Palm still warm and sticky with her blood, a moment of clarity struck her.

  “You’re cut but never bleed.” She said triumphantly. “You are a tree!”

  The hearty laugh that followed was low and rumbling. “Indeed, I am, young one.” At that,t he reached his massive, gnarled hand down and touched a finger to her forehead.

  At once, she shut her eyes, and there was a vibrant explosion of geometric patterns, foreign words, and color in her mind. When the vision ended, she gasped sharply.

  She lay there, struggling to get her breath back. When she finally did, she opened her eyes. All around her, the room had changed wholly.

  The laughing man no longer stood before her. Instead, he had returned to the trunk of the tree, motionless and screaming. Monochromatic madness blanketed the place, and the golden glowing leaves were now dull and grey. An inky blackness no longer consumed the cavernous ceiling; instead, a spiral staircase made of magnificent marble climbed towards a distant, blinding light.

  Diya found that her knee no longer ailed her. Looking down at Gennae’s unconscious form, she found that she knew exactly how to fix the predicament.

  A geometric shape formed in her mind. Unsure how she knew this shape, she followed her instincts and traced the form in the air before her with her index finger. The shape glowed and sizzled in the air, smelling strangely of pine leaves.

  At this, Gennae began writhing on the floor. Like some alien biological puzzle, her body began to shift and reform. A long, unexplainable minute later, the spider monstrosity was gone. Lying still on the floor was Gennae, human just as she had been before the ordeal. Before she knew what was happening, Diya was being hugged so tightly she could barely breathe—the sort of enthusiastic hug one gives after accepting they were doomed to live out their days as a hideous spider monster, only to abruptly find their fate unexpectedly reversed.

  When she realized it was no trick and that she was truly human again, her eyes lit up, and tears poured down her face. Without a doubt, it was an ugly cry. But this time they were tears of joy.