Adon worked through the end of the afternoon and into the evening.

He had trouble just trying to execute the initial steps Goldie had described. He repeatedly found himself with multiple strands stuck to his body, forced to eat his way free in order to escape his own tangled mess.

How do spiders do it? he thought. I’m not even at the hard part yet!

Adon had started by creating a first long silk thread and connecting it between two surfaces some distance apart. Once there was a firm connection between the two areas, Adon was supposed to walk down the thread and strengthen it by laying down a second thread.

Here was where his first problems originated. Adon felt like a tightrope walker, trying to maintain his balance while walking along a thread. He had never used his silk this way before. And on the first try, he fell off.

Fortunately, at his small size, and just a slight distance from the ground, there was no injury. Only embarrassment.

The situation would have been more embarrassing, but thankfully Goldie seemed to have read him well. She mostly left him to fail alone, rather than keeping a constant watchful eye. There were several more potentially embarrassing falls.

When Adon eventually managed to keep his balance along the line while laying down a second thread, he ran into his second problem. As he tried to turn back to walk the other way and lay down a third thread, he found that the first two had become stuck to his body. There was no way to get it loose and maintain the thread, unless he wanted to leave his skin hanging there with it. Instead, he opted to tear the thread down and start over.

Adon had a much easier time replicating the achievement of wire walking once he spun a new thread, and he even managed to lay down his second thread on top of the first without getting stuck. Then he tried to add a third thread to strengthen it more, and in the middle of walking back up, he glued himself to the line. This became a repeat issue.

Although the number of threads that Adon could add on top of the first line kept slowly increasing, and his focus tightened over time, every attempt ended in frustration. The strands ended up stuck to his body and scrapped. At a certain point in the process, Adon got better at unsticking himself, but he still ended up with bits of caterpillar exoskeleton stuck all over the strand, which weakened the strand despite the addition of more threads.

As he slowly progressed, Goldie kept his Biomass up by occasionally bringing him food. She still apparently had some ants wrapped in silk, though she said the “thief spiders” had stolen a lot of them while she was resting.

That’s a good name for them, Adon sent back.

And the spider admitted, I always forget their real one!

They shared another laugh.

As Adon continued his work, he eventually reached a new stage. A great leap forward for the web. As the sun set, he created a satisfactory foundation thread, as Goldie had instructed. A single strand that he thought was reinforced enough to support the rest of the web.

He ran low on Biomass when he finished it and had to beg for some more scraps from Goldie, but she seemed happy to provide it and genuinely proud of Adon’s progress.

Never seen a caterpillar so focused before, she thought at him. Usually they only eat, all their lives!

You’ve never seen a telepathic caterpillar either, Adon sent, trying to infuse some bravado into his tone. I’m a little different!

Inside, though, he was wishing he’d stuck to just hunting and eating insects. He didn’t want to disappoint Goldie—and himself—by giving up. But if this was what small-scale practice was like, constructing a whole web out in the open would probably starve him. He had doubts that he could use it as effectively as a spider anyway.

With her long legs, Goldie was eminently suited to striding between the strands of a web without getting stuck. With his shorter, stubbier legs and his chunky body, Adon thought that getting stuck in his own web was probably going to be hard to avoid. He was getting better, but slowly. And finally, the length of a spider’s stride was a major factor in deciding how far away each strand should hang from parallel strands.

With Adon’s much smaller stride, he would probably have to make the strands closer to each other than Goldie did. Which meant he would have to produce more silk than a spider would in order to have a properly navigable web. Either that, or he would have to try to copy Goldie’s web proportions rather than calculating them in the way she had described.

But Adon had been trying a different approach to this life than he had to the previous one. A more intense approach. He didn’t want this to be the first thing he gave up on in his new life.

Even if I can never use this as my primary survival method, I want to make one perfect, functioning web in my life. It would be an incredible win, if he could get this right—or even if he just learned something useful from it. He was paying intense attention to the experience as he went. Nothing would go to waste.

I believe you will do it, Goldie thought. Why so determined, though? Do not have to impress me.

Adon realized he was still transmitting, and he laughed inside of his mind.

I’ve been behind lots of other creatures every minute of this life, struggling to survive, he sent. While I’m in a safe place, with my friend, I’m going to get ahead.

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Another bundle of silk-encased ants landed next to Adon, and he began hungrily tearing into them.

Good luck, friend, Goldie thought. I will rest for a while now. Near my food stores, so thief spiders do not get funny ideas!

As she walked away, Adon deactivated Telepathy again. Taking the first bite of ant flesh only whetted his appetite. He quickly went into a feeding trance.

Munch munch. Chomp chomp. Gobble gobble. Gulp.

When he was finished, he got back in the saddle. Even though it was getting dark. The construction of a strong foundation strand, woven from multiple threads, was the first big leap forward he’d made. He wasn’t going to waste it.

Have to conserve silk as much as I can, he thought. Just try to make a basic framework for now. It’s almost dark, and I’m not going to risk going out into the night to hunt. Not after how last night went. Nor am I going to ask Goldie for more food after she just explained how much she hates those klepto-spiders for raiding her food. I don’t want her to start to feel the same way about me. And I’m grateful, unlike those thieves.

Adon thought again about how he might eliminate the problem of the Kleptomaniac Dewdrop Spiders once and for all. It was the only task for his mind to work on besides web construction.

He was so focused on thoughts of his present task and his future mission, that he didn’t even notice the true darkness of night when it arrived.

—

Rosslyn bit into her mutton hesitantly, as if she thought it might be poisoned.

In fact, she wasn’t thinking about the food at all. The juicy, well seasoned meat, dripping in rich sauce, was practically wasted on her at the moment.

Rosslyn was looking around at her family, waiting to see if the other shoe would drop. If her father would clear his throat and cast a stern glance her way. Or perhaps Carolien would raise a mischievous eyebrow and begin a sentence, “By the way,” and regale the table with the story of a rumor she had just heard that was now making the rounds in the palace. A rumor that certainly couldn’t be true, could it?

But so far there was nothing. Just the slow, methodical sounds of the Royal Family eating their dinner, occasionally broken up with chatter from the little ones.

He does not know, Rosslyn told herself. Father is like me. He would confront the matter directly, not seek to build suspense. So apparently the nobles are just gossiping among themselves. No one had mentioned Rosslyn’s interactions with Sir Carol to the King yet. Things were going as she’d hoped they would, so far.

That made Rosslyn no more relaxed, of course. If true, it only temporarily alleviated her worries. She would eventually have to discuss this with her father. But if he found out what had happened too soon, he might decide to try and countermand what Rosslyn had done.

Fortunately, Sir Jaren hadn’t been present for the spar, or he probably would have figured out that Rosslyn was acting without any authority and told the King already. Sir Jaren was always an admirably loyal man.

“—go, my child?”

Rosslyn heard a voice, as if from a great distance, that cut through her thoughts. She looked up and saw her stepmother and her father looking in her direction.

“Apologies, stepmother, my mind was elsewhere,” she said. “Would you repeat what you said?”

Carolien gave Rosslyn her signature saccharine smile. “I said, ‘How did your meeting go,’ darling? With the suitor?”

“Oh, I thought this one went a bit better,” Rosslyn said sincerely. “A considerably better quality young man than the last one. Lord Baranack may be on the right track.”

“Even though he was a baronet?” her father asked skeptically. He turned his head and looked over at the younger children as if just remembering that they were there. “Of course, we have the utmost respect for all of our subjects,” he added. “It is a bit surprising that he was up to your high standards, though.”

“I did not say that,” Rosslyn replied, trying not to smile.

“Of course not,” the Queen said, “and the man who does meet your standards will be very lucky, my dear.”

As was often the case, Rosslyn didn’t know quite what to make of Carolien’s words. Was she being genuinely supportive, or subtly undermining? Was she trying to say that Rosslyn deserved to get a man who met her standards, or that Rosslyn’s standards were so high that any man would be lucky to meet them?

“Speaking of men who might meet Rosslyn’s standards,” her father said, “I have been corresponding with my old friend Duke Pruford. I believe his sons will be coming to the palace, to stay for the Winter. Do you remember them, Rosslyn?”

“Dimly, father. I was very young when I last saw them. I remember that I liked them.” Hopefully that would still hold true. Rosslyn did want to find someone appropriate to marry.

The King nodded with an expression of satisfaction, and the conversation advanced to other subjects.

After dinner, Rosslyn passed Lord Baranack on her way to her room. He seemed to be heading for the great chamber, and acting on that idea, Rosslyn made a detour to the star room and its secret passageway.

Sure enough, when she got there, the King and Lord Baranack were clearly beginning a conversation.

“Another one has left us,” Lord Baranack reported in a glum tone.

“Yes,” the King replied. “A baronet.” There was a question in his voice, Rosslyn noted. As if he did not approve or was hoping for some explanation.

Lord Baranack did not seem to pick up on this. “Yes,” he said. “A baronet. On the bright side, he seemed to take to the Princess well enough. He did not believe she was particularly keen on him, unfortunately.”

“It was a bit ridiculous to invite a baronet anyway,” the King said. “Given his lower birth, it is unlikely that he has the power we are looking for in a match anyway.”

“I must concede he was not one of my stronger options, Your Majesty. Still, many of the higher nobility are leery of the Princess’s reputation. It is widely known how many suitors she has rejected—”

“Frankly, I am beginning to share some of my daughter’s doubts,” the King interrupted. “I am beginning to believe that you have not secured the best prospects for her—despite your best efforts, of course. I have begun some efforts on my own behalf.”

“Ah. Duke Pruford, then, Your Majesty?”

“Yes, my lord. The Duke’s sons are the perfect age, she knew them when they were all children, and they are of a suitable rank. I can personally attest that if they are anything like their father, our security worries would be significantly alleviated if she were matched to either of them.”

“Indeed, sire.”

“They will almost certainly be here for a visit soon. It has been years since the Princess and the young lords saw each other. I cannot imagine that they will fail to be impressed with my child.” There was an obvious note of pride in his voice. “I will not begin to worry about her romantic prospects unless they break off their Winter visit early.”

I need to find out whatever I can about the Duke’s sons, Rosslyn thought. If they would be here in a matter of weeks, she needed to determine if there was anything she should do to impress them.