“Zery, lay still.” It was an order, plain and simple-a tone no one had probably used with the queen since she was fourteen and her destiny had been discovered.

To my surprise, she quieted. Everyone did. A group of twenty-plus Amazon warriors stood completely silent, watching me. Every hair on my body would have been standing at attention if I wasn’t already slipping back into the zone, channeling every nature show I’d ever seen-becoming the spider.

My sight dimmed, almost to the point of blindness, but it didn’t matter, didn’t disturb me in the least. I didn’t need it, knew deep inside I could feel my way along the web. I picked up my foot and held it out in front of me, the silk path vibrated as my weight shifted, but only slightly, not enough to alert my prey-not that it mattered. She was caught…waiting for me. I turned away from the victim already subdued and moved toward the one still waiting in the center of my web. My foot hovered over the thread, but I didn’t set it down. Magic-cold, cloying-tickled my sole. I shifted so my foot would land six inches farther down the path-nothing. I lowered my foot, picked up the other, and continued on my way.

Somewhere along the way, my speed increased. I scurried along the silk, hopping from one safe section of thread to another-never doubting where I was going or that I wouldn’t arrive there safely.

At the center I stalled. My path stopped at the sword, not my prey. I scuttled around the weapon, unsure what to do next. I reached out and realized I already had something grasped in my hands-a bottle.

A bottle. I looked up. Forms surrounded the web, spots of light-one shone on me. I held my arm up to block the glare and liquid poured down my chest-cold. And the smell…medicinal…familiar. I shuddered and turned my head to save my lungs.

With the movement, the spell I’d sunk into snapped. My sight returned, but suddenly I had no idea where to place my feet. I could feel myself swaying as if I were trying to stay on a tightrope.

The bottle fell from my grasp. I watched it fall, end over end, alcohol pouring out of it, splattering me, Zery, and the ground. Seconds before it was going to hit, I dove for the sword, jerked it from the ground just as the thread began to weave around me.

Chapter Thirteen

The thread whipped around my legs, jerking my entire body off the ground with the intensity of its movements, then slamming me back down as it swerved around again. It took a second for my brain to focus, a second I didn’t have. Mother and Bubbe yelled, Bubbe at the Amazons, warning them to stay back, Mother at me, telling me to use the sword.

The sword. It had been put here for a purpose. I thought it was there to kill Zery, but maybe…I hacked with all the precision and patience of Freddy Krueger-barely considering where my own limbs were before slashing down with the blade. My position was awkward, on my back, the thread halfway up my body now. My arms screamed and my back ached, but I lifted the sword over and over, brought it down again and again.

Then Bubbe was beside me; I could feel her casting as she ran, dropping a spell like a net over me. I tried to lift the sword again, but it had tripled in weight. Tears escaped my eyes. I jerked on the handle-could still feel the spider’s threads sticking to me, had to get them loose, was willing to cut off my own leg to accomplish it.

“Melanippe! Stop.” Mother barked out the command-a tone I recognized, the same tone I’d used on Zery. I looked down. Strands of silver thread still clung to me, but slowly they melted away, turning back into what the caster had used to form them-water, simple, safe water. I brushed the beads from my skin, unable to get them off myself fast enough.

Behind me, Pisto heaved for breath. Two Amazons, the guard who had let us into the gym and another woman I didn’t know, helped her to sit. The lieutenant sucked in noisy gasps. The others turned their heads and tried to pretend they didn’t notice the signs of her weakness.

Then two women approached, and helped her to stand. Both hearth-keepers, I realized-the only Amazons allowed to show concern or weakness.

“Zery?” The guard kneeled next to the queen, murmured some words, then stood and headed toward the sword that had fallen from my fingers.

I reached it before her, grabbed the hilt, and pointed the tip at her breast.

“What are you doing?” I asked.

Her expression said she didn’t have to answer. I drove the tip against her shirt, felt the material give and the metal find flesh. My arms were still shrieking, but I’d moved past the pain. Too much adrenaline had surged through my body. If I had managed to cut off my own leg, I doubted I would have felt it.

“Talk,” I ordered. The I’m in charge voice was coming easily to me at this point.

“She deserves better than this. I won’t let her die at the hands of a cowardly killer-one who won’t face us in battle.”

I almost skewered her. The sight of Mother pointing a dagger at her throat stopped me.

“Do what you came for,” Mother said. Her gaze never left the guard, but I knew she was talking to me. Dragging the sword behind me, I stumbled to Zery’s side, then dropped to my knees beside her.

“Never thought I’d want to hear your voice bossing me around again,” I muttered to her.

“You’ll only bring her more pain and humiliation. I tried to touch her. Just a brush of my fingers, and her body jerked beneath my hand,” the guard called.

I didn’t turn, and the guard said no more. I assumed Mother’s dagger did something to silence her; at that moment I didn’t care what.

“Warriors. Such a pain in the ass. Have I said that to you recently? No, guess not. Haven’t been talking a whole lot, have we?” I babbled to Zery, my eyes scanning the ground, looking for the bottle of alcohol. I had more in the shop, but I didn’t dare leave Zery’s side, couldn’t trust that one of her fervent followers wouldn’t impale her with her own sword. And I couldn’t send Mother either. Bubbe had held the group off earlier, but I didn’t know if that had drained her-I didn’t want to find out with Zery’s death, or mine.

Because I knew the Amazons well enough to realize that whatever happened in the next few minutes, somehow in the tribe’s mind the fault would be mine. But the praise, if I saved Zery? That wouldn’t exist.

I didn’t care. I’d face the group later, worry about saving my own skin after I’d saved my friend’s.

My gaze lit on the bottle. I dove for it, praying some liquid remained inside. I held it up, prayed again-but for nothing. The bottle was empty.

I flung the useless plastic trash away from me. A speckle of liquid flew from it, dotting Zery’s shirt. I stared at the spots, wondering if I could have somehow stretched those tiny drops. My hand dropped to my own shirt, not speckled, but drenched.

Stupid. Stupid me.

I knee-walked to Zery’s face, pulled my shirt out, and began to scrub the area around her lips harder than I’d ever scrubbed Harmony-even when she’d coated herself in Sharpie.

Zery flinched when I first touched her, but then relaxed. I watched her shirt for any increase in blood but there wasn’t any. As I’d guessed, she was meant for me-I was the only one who could choose what to do with this gift, the only one who could save her. But I was also the reason she was staked out like a cowboy on an anthill.

I couldn’t congratulate myself for saving my friend, not without accepting that I was the reason she was targeted to start with.

Slowly the ink disappeared. As it did, Zery’s lips began to part. With them still halfway sewn together, she mumbled, “Feet.”

That answered my question about the pain. The drawn-on stakes hurt more than the chains. How much did they hurt? I didn’t want to know or, at least, didn’t want to think about it right now.