“Tell you what, spider god.” Cira squinted her eyes at all of his, “Why don’t you stop whatever mind thing you’re doing to my buddy over there and I’ll consider your offer.”

Behind Cira, her crew were all flopped on the ground with panic stricken, weary faces. Rocky had been reduced to snarling as blood mixed with saliva dripped from his mouth onto the hard stone.

Within her mind a velvety voice spoke, “My chosen one, I would never tamper with the mind of another—”

“Gods, what the hell was that?!” Rocky’s gurgled screams came coherently from the floor, “Jimbo, the shit did you get me into…?”

His voice trembled as he spat up blood to clear his throat, “Hey, don’t ask me.” Jimbo only deflected to Cira. The poor mage looked up at her in horror.

“Don’t look at me! You’re the one that went in.” She returned her focus to the spider, “You would never, huh? You’re not coming off very trustworthy.”

“B-but I promise! I have only the best of intentions,” The spider desperately tried to convince her, “Anything you desire will be yours—”

“Stop.” Cira flicked the glass and looked at it with great irritation, “Do you know why I sealed this room back up?”

“…why is that, Chosen One?”

“Because I DON’T HAVE TIME FOR YOU.” Tap, tap, tap, tap, “You think I didn’t see the glaringly malicious spider sitting on the table desperately trying to escape its crystal prison?”

“B-but I—”

“No. Let me tell you how this is going to go.” Tap, tap tap! “Jimbo, take everybody out of here.”

“Hey, hold the hell on!” Rocky was barely regaining his wherewithal at this point and beginning to get upset, “I didn’t sign up for this shit! The hell even is that demon spider and why does it talk?! You better—”

“Yes, yes, I’ll pay you more. I was sorry, but I really need you to shut up and leave before you get yourself killed again.” Cira was not amused and did not want to deal with nonsense of this magnitude, but alas, such was the life of a sorcerer, capable or not.

Ten minutes later the archive was empty again, save for Jimbo and Cira. Next to the bell jar was a crystal cube used primarily in alchemy. Today, it would be used in a far more barbaric manner.

“Are you watching, god? I found this spider in my dad’s closet.” Cira lifted the lid and plopped a spider into the chamber from out of the glass she caught it in. “This is the void chamber.”

Its eight eyes watched the other spider run around helplessly inside the translucent cube, “Wh-what are you going to do?”

“Jimbo, this is your first lesson.” He was startled to be called on and waited for instructions. “Touch this rune and put just a little bit of mana into it.”

“Uh, okay… Like this?” He did as told, and the glyph lit up briefly before there was a jarring screech and the whole world seemed to tilt for a moment. “Whoa—the hell?!”

“Wh-where did it go?” The spider god asked.

“Jimbo, if you would,” She urged him, “Do it again.”

The screech sounded in reverse like nails on a chalkboard and the world shifted back to its normal place. “What is this thing?!” Jimbo was still half-asleep in the wee hours and spiraling with worry.

“Do you see this small, dark orb, spider god?” She glared at him.

“I do…”

“This removes all the space inside this chamber, leaving nothing but the base particles of your eight-legged nephew. Now,” Cira popped the lid off, and the ball puffed out into a cloud of dust and slowly settled against the bottom, then she withdrew a small black knife from her pocket, “I’m going to put you in there.”

“Oh, yes! Please, chosen one, transfer me from this dreaded jar into that mighty vessel, and I shall grant you a fraction of—”

“No.” Cira started sawing into the table with her knife, “I call this the space knife. It can cut through just about anything. You’ll be going in there as is. Jimbo, do you mind holding the table while I get this little guy off of here?” She gave him a delirious smile, really wishing she could be fast asleep in bed right now.

“Uh, sure…” His eyes shook and there was a glint of fear before he put his hands under the table, “Just don’t cut my fingers off, heh…”

“Oh, come on, Jimbo,” She leered at him as he looked away, “I don’t even have mana. Don’t start looking like you’re scared of me, too.”

“Pah!” He spat with an unexpected laugh, “’Course I’m scared of you, Cap’n. I don’t think I could trust you otherwise. Who else would deal with the evil mind spiders?”

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“Huh…” Her sawing slowed down for just a moment as she was caught off guard, “Is that how it works with pirates?”

“Yeah, I guess, but will you hurry it up?!” Jimbo was not in the mood for small talk, evidently. Cira focused back on the spider, tapping feverishly at the edge.

“Hey… we can talk about this, Chosen One!” His façade had begun to fall.

“Oh, we’re gonna talk about it.” Cira reassured him as she finally freed a square of table away and had Jimbo carefully set it in the void chamber, “Don’t drop it now.” she added with a snicker.

Finally, Cira put the lid back on and glared right into its eyes. The jeweled spider had shrunk against the back wall now, hiding behind his legs. “Okay spider god, whatever you are, I’m sure you can survive with just your soul, but I’m sure it wouldn’t be pleasant, right?”

“…” Its eyes stared back at her with their dull glow, “…It would not…”

“Good. We’ve established the basis of this conversation.” Cira leaned back in her chair now, “One blatant lie and he turns it on. One half-truth and I leave you in this box covered by a blanket for the next ten years. Are these terms agreeable?”

The spider only looked at her silently for a few moments before drooping its head.

“Good, let’s continue.” Crossing her legs, Cira took a long, audible sip of water. “Why has my father locked you up in a crystal prison?”

“Murmur, murmur, murmur…” The spider god replied.

With a hand cupped to her ear, “What was that?!”

“Because of the mind thing! Gah, you’re worse than that old bastard!” His voice now dripped with fury, “Do you know how long I’ve been sitting on that table?!”

“I see even the accent was a ruse. I’m disappointed in you.” Cira gave him a disapproving shake of the head, “Of course it’s because of the mind thing. You hurt a man who helped me out, you know.”

“And what of it?! What else do you want from me?” He wasn’t even trying anymore.

“What are you really?” She thought he was really pretty if nothing else, which was more than she could say about most spiders.

“A crimson soulweaver… That old man captured me because he thought my powers to alter the soul were far too dangerous.”

“Bulllllllllllllllllll—” Cira really dragged it out, silencing the spider, “—shiiiiiiit! You just heard us talking about reforging my soul and want me to pick the jar up. Jimbo—”

“No! Please don’t, I’m telling the truth this time!” The spider frantically clawed at the glass, somehow looking very concerned in his eight eyes. “Your soul is quite damaged, yes. It is plain to see in all of my eyes. Why do you think I chose today to speak to you?”

“Because you wanted one of my idiots to lift the jar up, obviously. No chance. Jimbo, push the thing—”

“NOOO!! I promise! Reforging your soul is simply not enough! You’ll never be healed if you destroy me now.” The clacking on glass grew desperate as Jimbo’s hand froze right above the rune.

“Are you sure? What if he’s telling the truth?”

Cira groaned deeply and buried her face in her hands. Meanwhile, the spider still defended his corporeal form as if it were his very life at stake, “It’s the truth! Mana has already burned away at the deep wounds in your soul. You’ll be dead sooner than you think, foolish girl. I watched your soul break from inside my prison, just as I watch your friends rest in the grass, in the kitchen, the training hall, right this very moment. No soul on this island escapes my gaze. I saw your tarnished soul first step foot here all those years ago—”

“Okay, I’ve decided. I’ll destroy you thoroughly in ten years. Look forward to it.” Cira threw a thick blanket she prepared over the void chamber and turned on her heel, fuming and with clenched fists as she slammed a crutch into the ground to escape to the bookcases behind her.

“You need another soul—a powerful One! To mend the cracks which grow with every breath you take! It is the only—”

“Will you shut up?!” Cira craned her neck around to look at him even though he was covered up. Her face had gone red, and she was livid, “Surely, you have the wisdom to do that much before I change my mind.”

Cira seethed as she leaned there on her crutch, furiously reading the titles from her bookcase. Silence followed, as the spider did not wish for her wrath, and even Jimbo just stood there awkwardly.

“Do you, uh… need a hand—”

“Holy shit!” Cira pulled a torn leather-bound book from a low shelf on the left, “Look how fast we could have been done here if it wasn’t for that stupid spider.”

“Seriously?” Jimbo was taken aback, “You found it, just like that?”

“’Reform and Reforge: How to Fix a Soul’. Dad even had it alphabetized.” The excitement made her forget the irritating arachnid for a moment and a smile grew on her face trying to picture her dad crawling around to reorganize the bottom shelves.

“Dang, he musta been the real deal.” Jimbo whistled, “Does that mean we can get out of here now? I don’t like the way the back of that skull is looking at me.”

Cira glanced at the pitch black, giant demon skull in the corner, “I know what you mean. I’ll read this upstairs, so wake Skipper up. I completely missed second dinner.”

“I’m on it!” He made an exhausted salute and ran out the door.

Cira followed but briefly turned to the covered void chamber, “Spider. I would like to sleep soundly. If you lure anybody into your web, we’re going to have some serious trust issues.”

She was satisfied with the silence that followed and after a quick glance at the broken tea set on the ground she still needed to fix, left the archive behind with a heavy book in her arms.

I can’t believe that damn spider… My father left it there for a reason, though. It would be reckless to simply destroy it. But I don’t need to talk to the damn thing. I’ll read this book and figure out my soul problem first, then if I remember, deal with the spider.

Before heading upstairs, she stopped by her father’s room and dragged a couple coat racks down the hall to put in front of the archive as a makeshift barrier. Normally they should each hold multiple robes, but Gaze liked to leave his sets laying about. It wasn’t much and the coat racks wouldn’t stop anyone, but they would have to do for tonight.

“That was fast.” Cira saw Skipper in the kitchen still cooking at the stove as if he had never left.

“I guess he expected this.” Jimbo shrugged, “He was asleep right there on the floor.”

“A promising recruit.” At her praise, Skipper smiled with bags under his eyes, “Oh, and have Rocky seal the archive back up when you can. Watch him to make sure nobody goes in either,” She nodded in Jimbo’s direction and sat down at the table to dig into the book, doing the traditional ‘skim the whole thing then read the important sounding parts first’ method she had adopted in recent years.

Sleep called her name again, but Cira was too engrossed in the book to care yet. There was much she didn’t know about souls, and it was starting to seem like there was hope after all. She really wasn’t sure at first, employing one of her other traditional methods: fake it ‘til you make it. But it all worked out, as it often did when she kept moving forward. That’s not to say she got to the hard part yet, but it was a start.

“You find anything?” Jimbo asked as she cleaned off a second plate of pork chops and mashed potatoes.

“Well, I’ve discovered one potential issue.” Cira looked up from the book and yawned, “It appears we will need access to a specialized facility known as a ‘soul forge’.”