Cal was ready for bed, but it turned out that there was one more surprise in store for him that night. He went upstairs, looking forward to sleep, but as soon as he got into the upstairs room, he realized that sleeping up there was not going to be such a good idea after all. He’d have to think again.

The new nesting arrangement that Cal and Loruk had set up for the spiders to give them somewhere to lay their eggs had been a great success. The spiders had moved in with enthusiasm. Bright purple webbing, glowing more brightly and powerfully than ever, was wrapped all around the wrapped up blanket nests that Cal had created for them, making a huge cocoon of purple that entirely hid the blankets from view.

Around the nests and on the webbing, there were many spiders. Cal had never seen so many at the same time before. The most he had ever seen at the same time was two; now there were at least nine immediately visible, and all of them stopped what they were doing and froze, staring at him with intent gazes from their unnervingly intelligent eyes.

Cal remembered that Loruk had said the room should be kept warm. The spiders seemed to be doing okay, but now that he remembered the instruction, he knew he wouldn’t be able to relax until he’d fulfilled his obligation to his new brood. After all, these spiders were very likely to make him an immense amount of money in the longer term. The least he could do was to take good care of them in the short term.

He stifled a yawn, and also stifled a grumble. He had hoped to get immediately to sleep, but clearly there was more work to do before he could rest.

“Very well,” he muttered under his breath, and then called out to the spiders, “I’m just going to light the stove and grab my bedroll and then I’ll leave you to it.”

Speaking to them had just been a joke. There had been that moment early on when he’d thought one of the spiders was speaking to him in a language that he could almost understand, Cal didn’t really think it likely that the spiders could communicate with language. However, the spiders that were watching him seemed, weirdly enough, to visibly relax at his words. They still watched him, but one or two picked up their work on the web that they were building, while the others that stood on top of the cocoon stopped staring at him so intently. They began to chitter to each other; short, complex staccato bursts of variably pitched clicks that definitely did seem to have meaning.

Cal worked quickly, opening the door of the woodburning at the back of the room, stacking tinder, kindling, and a few coals inside, and then sparking a flame into life with a flint and tinder that he kept next to the stove. He closed the door and watched for a moment. Once he was content that the flames were well caught and the fire was not going to go out, he closed the draught over so that the fire would burn slow and hot for the next few hours.

He gathered up his bedroll from its spot in front of the fire and headed back downstairs.

“Sorry, Max, I’m going to need to join you down here tonight, I think,” he said as he came into the workshop.

“Oh, no worries,” Max answered. “What’s the problem with upstairs?”

“Spiders,” Cal said. “They’ve rather taken over, and it feels like it would be a good idea to just give them the room for the moment.”

“Hey, that reminds me,” Max said, snapping his fingers, “I forgot to say earlier, I bought some extra cheese at the market as well for you to feed them.”

“Ah, thanks,” Cal said, then sighed. “I guess I’ll go up now and leave some out for them. I don’t quite know how much to give; Loruk said it’s important to find a balance between giving too much and giving too little, but I guess I’ll opt for more rather than less for the moment, particularly since our number one priority is to keep them from straying.”

“That makes sense,” Max agreed. “If we give them plenty of food, they’re much less likely to go looking for it somewhere else.”

Max had bought a big round cheese from the market. Cal cut a quarter of this and went wearily back upstairs with it.

Again, as he came into the room, they all froze and stared at him as if he were a threat. Again, he spoke to them. “I’ve brought some food,” he said, keeping his tone as light and confident as he could manage.

In truth, he felt more than a little wary as he approached. The spiders were big, their fat bodies as large as a clenched fist. With their exaggerated scale, Cal could clearly see their large and very dangerous looking mouth parts. Every part of the bodies of the spiders glowed purple, but the twin pincers that were the main features of their mouths glowed brighter than the rest of them, the tips shimmering almost white, as if they were hot.

These spiders were a new kind of creature. However interesting the results might be, Cal had no desire to find out what might happen if one of them chose to give him a nip on the hand with those glowing mandibles.

Still, he had to feed them. Again, it seemed that his words had calmed them. As soon as he spoke, they seemed to relax, and while they still kept their eyes on him it felt this time that their continued vigilance was more the result of pleasant anticipation of a meal, rather than any sense of threat.

Cal didn’t try to get too close. He moved around toward the back of the room, giving the nesting area a wide berth, then he put the quarter cheese down on the floor and stepped back. The reaction was as surprising as it was amusing. The spiders actually cheered.

The spiders’ reaction was enough to make it worth his while, and as soon as he started putting the food down for them, all of his grumpiness at them for taking over his bedroom evaporated. He found himself chuckling with pleasure as he saw the reaction of the spider brood to the arrival of fresh cheese.

The fae creatures - a tiny little winged people descended from the woodland faeries of older times - were known to make noises like this. They worked in the laundry industry, and in the telepathogram service, and the launderers in particular had a habit of letting out little high-pitched cheers when they got something done. It was very endearing, and everybody in Jutlyn knew of this phenomenon and enjoyed it when they saw it.

This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

Cal had never expected to hear a similar noise from his brood of spiders, but here it was. They didn’t quite say, “Yay!” in squeaky, cute voices, but it was pretty close.

Cal laughed in enjoyment at the surprise, but he also stepped smoothly away as even more spiders appeared from between the floorboards and skittered officiously toward the cheese, their glowing mouth parts moving and front legs waving in the air.

They cheered in their strange, staccato clicking language and dived onto the cheese with enthusiasm. Cal had expected that they would simply start eating on the spot, and although one or two of them did take a mouthful, their main priority seemed to be to bring the cheese back to the nesting spot and distribute it evenly among everyone.

It was surprising to see just how civilized these creatures were when it came to eating the newly provided food. They all gathered around the cheese, every spider carefully taking some and then moving out of the way so that the next one could get in. They almost had a queueing system, and as he watched, Cal noticed that some of them were taking cheese in their glowing mandibles but not actually consuming it. Instead, they headed inside the nest and returned a moment later without the cheese. Clearly, they were putting food supplies in place for when the new hatchlings appeared.

Cal watched in silence for a little while, observing the unexpectedly complex behavior of these strange creatures with interest and growing affection. Despite their scary appearance - they were giant glowing spiders, after all - he was beginning to see that they were more than simply monsters or insects. They cooperated and did so in a very nuanced and self-aware way. They were very aware of each other, and some of the behaviors - getting out of the way so that others could get in at the cheese, for example, or not taking more than a little bite of food each - seemed almost human in their politeness and deference to other members of the group.

Loruk had talked about his experience of giant spiders out in the Monsterlands during his adventuring days, but he’d never given the impression that they were anything more than large insects with simple minds and predictable behaviors. He had certainly never given Cal the impression that they were particularly social or intelligent.

As with their unique and remarkable webbing, it seemed that these enchanted spiders - product of the mysterious Darkworth’s arcane experimentation - were a completely new phenomenon, a kind of creature all of their own, and not something directly comparable with anything that already existed in the world.

A sudden wave of fatigue hit Cal and he yawned and felt himself almost stagger where he stood at the force of it.

The last of Maddie’s coffee wearing off, he thought blearily, and turned to leave. As his hand touched the door handle, something made him glance back.

On top of the nesting area, now rapidly turning into one massive cocoon of bright purple webbing, three large spiders stood watching him. As he paused, looking at them, all three raised their front two legs and waved at him in a way that seemed distinctly and unexpectedly friendly.

Feeling a little foolish, Cal raised his right hand and waved hesitatingly back at them. All three immediately let out a stream of chittering clicks that sounded unmistakably like pleased laughter.

Smiling and shaking his head - partly in amazement and partly in disbelief - at the way that this had turned out, Cal made his way back downstairs, out into the street, and then back into the shop, locking all the doors behind him as he went.

Internal stairway, he thought again as he shivered in the cold of the street. Well, if we can create enchanted clothing from magically colored monster web, the financial rewards could be immense.

Max had put out all but one of the candles, and the fire was burning low, banked up to give heat throughout the night. Max normally slept side on to the fire, but he had moved his bed roll so that his feet were pointing toward the flames instead, to give Cal the chance to get the benefit from the warmth as well.

“Hmm,” Max said sleepily, rolling over and sitting up on his elbow, blinking at Cal. “You’re still up? Everything okay upstairs?”

Cal tried to reply, but another yawn got in the way of his words, and he just nodded, laying his bedroll out next to Max’s and flopping down onto it. He pulled his blanket up to his chin and snuggled into his pillow.

“Yeah,” he muttered, “it’s okay. Tell you tomorrow…”

And with that he dropped into a deep and dreamless sleep.

* * *

When Cal woke up, the first thing he was aware of was the bright sunlight shining on his face. He blinked, sitting slowly up, and stretching. What time was it? He wasn’t used to it being light when he woke up. He must’ve slept late.

His mouth was dry, and his throat a bit sore. A low, pulsing headache was making itself felt.

“Ugh,” Cal said as he crawled out of his bed and staggered toward the bathroom.

Twenty minutes later, having quenched his thirst and washed thoroughly in bracing cold water straight from the pump, he felt massively better. The headache was gone, the pain in his throat was gone, and the overwhelming sensation that he felt was pure and simple hunger.

He came back out into the workshop and stretched. He had a clean set of clothes upstairs, courtesy of a recent trip to the launderette by Max, and so he pulled his boots on, grabbed another quarter of the cheese to give to the spiders, and headed out through the front door.

The sun was up, but it was still early. Max was not around, but an empty coffee cup, a bacon rind, and some crumbs on a plate on the counter showed that he’d been up and had breakfast already. Cal went upstairs and was again treated to a cheerful and increasingly relaxed greeting from the ten or so spiders who were busy around the nests.

The spiders waved to him again, and laughed and chittered with obvious delight when he waved back at them. Once again, they cheered when he put down cheese and immediately began distributing it among themselves and putting some inside the nests. Cal found his clean clothes neatly folded on top of the heavy locked chest to which they had never yet found a key. He took the clothes back downstairs to dress.

As he stepped into the street again, he took a deep breath of the fresh air. That was another reason that he didn’t particularly want to sleep upstairs anymore; there was a distinct odor beginning to gather around the spiders’ new nesting area, and it was not pleasant. With the regular introduction of lots of cheese, it seemed likely to get progressively worse.

Well, farming was generally not a pleasant-smelling enterprise, and if everything came off as Cal hoped it would, the outcomes in the long-term would be more than worth the bad smell in the short term.

Cal went back in, changed his clothes, and then had a look at the front of the shop. The stock levels were still okay, though he looked forward to having the opportunity to do some enchanting just as soon as Max got back.

For now, though, he felt like opening the shop early. He would pop next door, get some coffee and some breakfast from Alyn, and hear the baker’s news. Then he’d get behind the counter and open up the shop for the day.