8

Unseen Webs

"You've grown fat."

Damien looked up from his desk and raised a monocle to his largest eye. "Lord Licephus. What a pleasure."

The vampire glanced down at his sagging grey stomach. "You're the only one of your kind I've ever seen with a gut," he added flatly.

*****

Cricket silenced the druid with a raised hand and tuned his antennae to the conversation across the commons.

"He's chewing him out." Cricket conveyed. "Started out by basically calling him fat twice. The fattest... spider-thing? I wish Oydd were here. He'd know what they're called."

Jeshu sighed. “I already told you—arachane.”

"There are more of him?" Patches whispered.

"And now they're talking kind of cryptically. I'm not getting much."

"No idea what he talked about with Oydd?"

"No," Cricket answered.

Patches chimed in. "I know."

"What's that?" Cricket perked up.

"I was there when you left. No one noticed me," the mouseling said. "I hear all sorts of things."

"What were they discussing, little one?" Jeshu probed.

"Names. Places..." the mouseling yawned. "Oh, he said those dhampiri worshiped Bale."

"Bale?" Cricket gawked. "What dhampir ever followed Bale!" He adjusted an antenna. "Oh, quiet... they're finishing up."

The group fell suspiciously silent as the vampire stormed from the office and down the hall.

"Oh," Jeshu said. "I just remembered. I made you something." He produced a small figurine from his pouch, a polished turtle carved from grey stone, dangling from a leather string.

Cricket accepted the gift. "Oh, a turtle. I love turtles." He watched the stone spin in the air. "They just really doubled down on one thing, you know? But you got the legs wrong."

"It's a charm," the dryad explained. "It will allow me to bestow some graces on you in battle."

"Graces?"

"Like a blessing. I know an incantation to harden the skin. I believe it will work on your shell, but the effect is temporary. Just keep this in contact with your carapace."

Cricket eyed the figurine skeptically.

"I know you don't like armor. You've changed the subject twice when I've brought it up. Think of this as a compromise."

"It will harden my shell?" Cricket repeated.

"It will allow... yes, basically."

Cricket thanked him again and placed the necklace over his head. And though he didn't trust the magic, he rubbed his finger over the smooth stone in spite of himself. The figurine felt cool against his chest.

Our turn. Oydd appeared from the hall to the laboratory and gestured for Cricket to join him as he headed to Damien's office.

Can you hear me? Cricket thought as hard as he could. The rudra made no response.

"Can you hear my thoughts?" the insectoid asked.

"No, not yet."

"But you could? No offense, but that's creepy."

"Hmm... It's not nearly as easy if the subject is unwilling. Don't worry," Oydd dismissed the concern, "I have no interest in digging around in your mind." He paused just outside of Damien's door. "Do you remember when I killed with just a word," Oydd hinted cryptically at their dhampir target. "I had his... permission. I'm not sure if he even knew it. But he had given up and allowed the magic to seep into him. After you."

Cricket entered the office, and noticed some recently acquired trinkets on the arachane's desk, including the potion and ring they had retrieved from the catacombs beneath Azandes' cathedral. Cricket felt a cold knot in his stomach just looking at the obsidian ring.

"We're low on men." Damien addressed the rudra. "I'm canceling your mission."

"Until Raccoon's party returns?"

Damien snorted. "Raccoon's party will not return." He scratched at his parchment with his quill.

Oydd reflected on this news.

"Seventeen ratlings." Damien scribbled more furiously. "Wiped out!"

Cricket's heart dropped.

Damien smiled. "At least we won't go hungry this week."

Cricket clenched his mandibles to avoid blurting out something he'd regret.

The arachane looked up again. "You have no assignment while I sort out this mess. Do you have any questions?"

"Not right now," Oydd answered. He placed a hand on Cricket's shoulder, and the insect felt that the words might have also been directed at him.

"Then you're dismissed." Damien picked up the herbal potion and began to scrutinize it as Oydd pushed Cricket gently from the room.

"So that's why it's been so barren around here," Cricket said, still numb.

Wait. Oydd cautioned and Cricket bit down on his tongue until they were some distance from the office.

"What am I to make of that!" Cricket whisper-shouted. "Seventeen deaths? And he didn't care! Raccoon was my friend. I'm not happy to get his rations!"

"I know."

"Skunk is the only ratling I knew better. And I didn't even remember that when he died. Who else did we lose?"

"Calm down. You feel how I feel."

"You've never cared about ratlings!" Cricket returned.

"No," Oydd said. "Not like you."

Cricket thawed a bit at the admission.

"I'm angry because he used us as pawns. And I welcome that you see it now." Oydd pressed, "You weren't so angry when you were used. But you're angry."

Cricket took a deep breath.

Oydd let some time pass before he spoke again. "Agena leaves soon." Then he added a powerful thought. Tonight! Be ready!

*****

Cricket lay on the ground, his head against the hard rock wall. He found the barracks unusually quiet, even for nighttime. No shouts over a lucky roll. No whispers in the corridors. Across the room Scorpion's tail dragged a dagger across the wall of his bunk with a steady scrape, but Cricket had learned to tune this sound out completely. He found it calming and it helped him sleep.

Down the corridor to the east, the lizardmen slept in utter silence. The rats had always kept later hours, and the lizardmen were sound sleepers regardless. They kept to a regimen.

The other insectoids, too small for combat, and a few goblin slaves slept down the west corridor. But they were simply far too exhausted from the day to be up at this hour. They needed their rest for the fields or stables, or... Cricket didn't really know all the little jobs around the burrow. Certainly no one was cleaning.

Now, Cricket heard the rudra's voice in his head. He felt for the daggers stored in his carapace, but thought it better to keep them sheathed so he appeared unarmed.

He stood quietly and crossed the room, passing by the meditating dryad. Rather than sleep, the dryad only required a few hours of quiet. He closed his eyes and would often not even respond to his own name being called. Now he only faked a deep trance. Cricket noticed the druid open his eyes slightly as he passed, a signal that he would follow in a few minutes to avoid suspicion.

While Cricket had tuned out the scraping of Scorpion's dagger, he did register instantly when it stopped. Cricket kept his eyes forward, though he thought he heard the ratling's light footfall as he dropped from his bunk.

Only daggers were permitted at night, one each, ostensibly to prevent infighting among the slaves. And yet, keeping a weapon only seemed to draw suspicion and unwanted attention. Cricket admired how the ratling brandished a weapon so openly and casually that it seemed both unthreatening and cautionary at the same time.

The insectoid kept an easy pace toward the entrance to the laboratory, trying to act casual, but when he risked a glance backward, the ratling stood only feet away, waving his tail menacingly. Or perhaps the way he always waved it?

"What?" Cricket whispered curtly.

"Where you off to?" Scorpion asked bluntly.

"Since when do you check up on me?"

Scorpion stood absolutely still except for the roiling of his tail.

Cricket began to sweat in the cool night air, but he spoke softly and calmly. "Listen, you don't want to get involved, friend."

Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

Scorpion stepped forward, a glint in his eyes. "Oh, I think I do, Cricket."

Somehow, in the way he spoke the insect's name, Cricket sensed an understanding, not a threat.

Scorpion sneered. "The armory is closed, which means you need all the help you can get." The clever ratling produced two daggers from the recesses of his thick fur coat. Which meant either he was prepared for this, or he always kept hidden weapons at night, much like the insectoid.

"Alright."

While their whispered conversation had surely drawn the attention of many curious listeners, the two formed an imposing enough duo to discourage any investigation.

They found the rudra lingering near the laboratory and together the three waited for Jeshu.

Oydd produced a spare key to the iron door, then spoke to their minds. Opening this door will make a faint click. Enough that I believe it will alert Damien. He is, after all, a veteran of sorts. Once I open this door, we must move quickly but not stupidly. He looked directly at Cricket with this thought. Damien's austere quarters lie beyond the laboratory. He will not be wholly unprepared for sedition.

I had thought only Cricket would know the layout, but I believe Scorpion does as well?

Scorpion nodded.

Good. I will need a few minutes to animate Kaser, but I believe it will be well worth the time.

When the druid arrived, Oydd stuck the key into the lock, pausing for any last minute objections, and then twisted the key with a faint click.

Scorpion dashed first through the doorway, eagerly, and Cricket took a practiced pace behind him with his daggers in his weaker arms.

Once inside, he felt the turtle figurine around his neck warm and tingle slightly. He heard Jeshu's whispered chant some distance behind him. He felt the tingling extend to his entire exoskeleton, and felt it hardening. His joints even creaked, and he worried that this particular spell might not have been tested on bugs. But it felt good.

Cricket passed Kaser's inactive body, standing eerily inert in the corner. He passed counters filled with vials and beakers and a complex apparatus he believed to be an alchemic distillery, along with disorganized notes and measuring tools. A tome lay open on Oydd's desk displaying the anatomy of a changeling. Shelves lined the walls, filled with dozens, if not hundreds of more books.

The second room was the morgue, where Oydd prepared and stored bodies for necromancy. Cricket noticed a fairly fresh trollblood lying on one of the tables, as well as a body covered in coarse, bloodstained fabric. Most notably, the nine-foot corpse of the ogre floated in a gigantic glass container, soaking in a translucent amber liquid, accentuating its yellow skin.

Scorpion slipped down the narrow hallway past the morgue and began picking at the lock to Damien's quarters expeditiously.

Cricket pushed his back against the wall of the chamber as the ratling worked. Through the wall he heard a faint rustling, followed by a long, clicking croak that sent a shiver up his antennae.

Damien was awake. But with the echo from the small chamber, Cricket couldn't isolate his position.

Scorpion twisted his thin knife in the keyhole and the mechanism inside made an unpleasant grinding sound. Then the door swung outward.

Scorpion rushed in to the left and Cricket was about to take the right when Scorpion screamed. He dropped a dagger and held a small paw to the side of his throat. Blood bubbled up between his fingers.

"What got you?"

"Web." Scorpion seethed between his teeth. "It's everywhere."

Cricket noticed other nicks and scratches on the ratling's arms, but clearly nothing as severe as the laceration on his neck.

The insectoid moved gingerly into the room, waving his free arms out in front of him. He felt a surprisingly strong resistance as he found his first thread. The razor thin string of webbing broke, but left a fair groove in the shell, failing to penetrate completely.

"I can't see at all," Cricket griped. An arrow whirred through the air, piercing his shoulder and exiting the far side. He winced in pain but shrugged it off. The adrenaline made it feel like a pinprick. For now, anyway. "Damn, what is this?"

"Magical darkness," Scorpion's voice answered.

Cricket heard another rustling chitter as the arachnid repositioned himself near the ceiling.

"Oydd, can you light this room up?"

"Oydd isn't here," the dryad replied. "But that wouldn't work anyway. I'll see what I can do."

Cricket held both of his upper forearms in front of his eyes and charged into the room, feeling the strands of web tighten and break as they dug into his shell. He slashed blindly in the general area where he had heard Damien, hitting only air and webbing.

He heard Scorpion clearing the area around him with his tail, gauging by the occasional pluck of a thread with an almost harplike tone followed by an snap.

"Shit!" The ratling swore, and Cricket no longer heard the lashing of his tail.

Cricket moved to cover him before Damien could draw another arrow. But his arms ached. Clearly some of the threads had penetrated his shell. He felt a sharp sting in several spots on his forearms, but nothing on his legs. "There aren't as many webs down low. He put more at throat height."

"My throat height is your waist height. And there are webs there."

"Cover your vitals." Cricket shouted.

The insectoid raised his arms a little to ensure they protected his antennae and kept moving. Another arrow whizzed by his ears. Cricket paused to ensure he could still hear the ratling moving but he heard nothing.

Jeshu suddenly finished chanting and yelled a word in a druidic tongue, a language that Cricket was just beginning to recognize by its guttural sounds and droning, almost buzzing, chants. The word resonated in the air, and the darkness began to clear. But not completely.

Cricket caught a glimpse of a spindly leg and then Damien withdrew back into the darkness. It now dissipated into more of a mist that slowly sunk to the floor.

Cricket saw Scorpion standing several feet from where the arrow had flown and breathed a sigh of relief. The ratling still put pressure on the throat gash, but the bleeding wasn't out of control. He nursed a wounded tail with his other free hand, all three of his daggers at his feet.

Damien drew his bow string. This time Cricket heard the fiber stretch and tighten. He saw Damien's glistening claws in the darkness. Just a fleck of white in the blackness, pulling on the string.

Cricket turned sideways to make himself a smaller target and focused intently on the bow.

Don't try to dodge! Oydd practically shouted.

"I think I can."

You can't! By the time you hear it, it will be too late.

Cricket ignored him. He stood motionless for what felt an eternity and then lurched to the side just before an arrow whirred past. The insect immediately seized the opportunity to charge, ducking his head and plowing through the webs.

Damien attempted to scurry to the side but took a deep wound to the abdomen before climbing higher, out of Cricket's sight.

"Crap! How high is this chamber?"

A glob of green spider innards landed on his shoulder and Cricket convulsed before wiping it off. Another drip landed on the floor and then another drip much further away.

Fall back!

Cricket didn't bother to wait. The instant he heard the order he grabbed Scorpion and left the chamber, where he found Jeshu pressed against the wall out of Damien's line of sight breathing heavily as he held back the darkness.

"Let it go," Oydd told the druid. Kaser stood at the rudra's side for only an instant before bounding into the room, climbing up the rough-hewn walls at a full sprint.

Jeshu released his spell and the darkness returned thicker than ever, gushing out of the room with the force of a crashing wave.

Then came the sounds—the horrific, animal grunts and snarls, followed by a bloodcurdling scream cut short. A heavy twitching body crashed to the floor with a thud and a whining screech. Cricket heard Kaser land next to Damien's body and begin to feed.

"Kaser doesn't rely on sight," Oydd reminded the group. "He is drawn to his prey's life force."

"You read my mind," Cricket accused the rudra. "You said you wouldn't read my mind."

"When do you think I did that?" Oydd countered caustically.

"You told me not to dodge."

"Maybe I just know how stupid you are," Oydd spat.

"Well, it worked."

"Yes," the rudra had to admit. "It did. Though I'm not sure how."

"You don't dodge the arrow," Cricket answered. "You dodge their fingers. The second their fingers move, you move."

"Have you done that before?"

"It worked," the insect repeated, dodging the question.

Slowly, over the course of a few minutes, the darkness dissipated.

"I locked the door behind us," Oydd said. "So we have a few minutes to rest without the prying eyes of every rat in the Warrens."

Jeshu took this cue to sit down. "Was Damien powerful enough to animate the bodies in the morgue?"

"I suppose so," Oydd answered. "But Kaser seems to work more efficiently than Damien's creations. I may need to unlearn some of his advice."

"I just meant that I would have hated to fight that ogre again."

Oydd's eyes went wide. "Well, yes..." He looked down with a hand to his beak, stroking his tentacles and mulling over this possibility in his head. He stepped back into the morgue and saw the ogre's hand pressing against the newly cracked glass and hurried back to the others without comment.

When Jeshu noticed the ratling's wounds, he immediately jumped back to his feet. While he tended to Scorpion, Cricket wandered back into Damien's bedchamber. Actually, he had expected a bed, but webs did make more sense. Even without the magical darkness, the webbing was problematic to spot and the insectoid had to remind himself not to move carelessly.

Kaser had a few minor cuts, but nothing as serious as Cricket. Whatever defensive spells the necromancer used, they were clearly more effective than Jeshu's turtle.

Damien's bow lay next to his mangled, partially eaten corpse. It was carved from a black organic looking material, but not wood. Cricket picked it up and threw it over his shoulder, which is when he noticed his arrow wound. Long black threads reached from the hole, stretching outward like a disease. The shell around the piercing already had a dull, moldy appearance.

"Jesh!" Cricket screamed in a panic, running back to the dryad.

The others scrutinized the wound in alarm. Except for Scorpion who eyed the bow.

"The Nightcrawler." Scorpion said in awe. "I got to use it once. Wondered where it went, since it was never in the armory. That's how he made the darkness."

"It doesn't look good," Jeshu admitted. He stopped attending to Scorpion, whose wound looked more serious than it was, and stuck a finger in the arrow hole.

"Ow!" Cricket wailed. "What good did that possibly do?"

"I'm sorry, let me treat it."

Cricket sat down cross-legged as the dryad searched his pouch for herbs, which he set aside for the moment.

"Damien told me that bow is the most powerful magic item we have," Scorpion continued. "Worth more than everything else in the armory combined."

"That's not comforting," Cricket complained.

Scorpion took the hint and kept the rest to himself, but reached out gingerly to pluck the string. Cricket shot him a look and the ratling huffed, roaming off to find his daggers.

Jeshu took a leather skin from his side, pulled the stopper and poured a clear liquid into the wound.

"Don't worry. It's just water." Jeshu placed a palm on the wound then pulled it upward. The water stretched between his palm and the wound, making a bridge in the air. Jeshu concentrated and black flecks began to rise from the hole like ash from a fire, settling in the druid's downturned palm.

Jeshu shook his hand, splattering black goo against the wall, and the bridge of water splashed back down onto Cricket's shell. He poured more water and placed his palm against the shell again, repeating the process. This time very few black specks emerged. Jeshu stopped his water skin and then pressed herbs into the cracked shell.

"I'm lucky it didn't hit anything important. It went right under my collar bone."

"You don't have a collar bone!" Oydd snapped.

"Well, that's what everyone else calls that spot," Cricket said indignantly.

"Anything else of interest in there?" Oydd asked, gesturing back toward Damien's quarters.

Cricket shook his head. "I don't think so. Pretty austere."

"Do you even know what that word means, or did you just hear me use it?"

"I heard you think it," Cricket clarified. "So I got the meaning."

"Oh," Oydd said, for once at a loss for words. He took one last glance back at Damien's room.

When the group returned to the commons, an impressive assembly had congregated. Mostly ratlings that kept to the far walls, scurrying to see over one another. The goblin chef stood in the middle of the cavern with a ladle of gizzards in one hand and a large snail in the other.

No one spoke. The ratlings wisely dispersed, unwilling to be found at the scene. The chef merely closed his eyes as they passed, in a futile attempt to maintain plausible deniability.

Together they returned to the bunks, and the nearby ratlings all vanished down the hallway, leaving the room oddly empty.

Jeshu sat in his usual spot as if to meditate, but kept his eyes open. Oydd sat nearby.

"I'll take the first watch," Scorpion offered.

"There's no need," the dryad said. "I don't require any more sleep. You need your rest."

This seemed argument enough, and the ratling climbed into his bunk without protest.

Soon the sound of his tail dragging a dagger against the rock wall filled the quiet chamber with a steady rhythm. But for once, Cricket found it difficult to sleep.