Page 171 of The Princesses of Ruin
Epilogue: Spider
The Spider Queen roars and pulls against her webbing. I am too small to do anything but watch and wait. Guards try to attend her, but she doesn’t let them near. Her pedipalps form a cradle at the opening of her womb, waiting to receive the child that will emerge.
I was not born this way. She says I hatched from an egg, but when I did, I was not quite what I should’ve been. All I see are creatures like me, their legs connected to a lower bulbous abdomen and an upper body with arms. She says she has made them all this way so that we’re not alone, but that once they only had two legs, and she did, too.
Will the baby she births have two legs, or eight like me? Will it be my brother, or my sister? Will we be friends?
The Spider Queen screams again, the power of her voice making the cavern walls tremble. This delicate construct she has created in the space between realms, a world between worlds. She made it all for me and fills it with life so that I may grow and become strong.
I’m not big enough to hunt on my own yet, but soon, she says I will learn with her. I’m excited for that day. I’m excited for a friend.
Something appears at her womb’s canal, red and soft. Blood drips from the opening and colors her silvery silk. She pulls on herrestrains and bears down, screaming until the whole realm grows quiet with her pain.
The child slips into her grasp, and something else comes after it that slops to the ground. She picks it up, and severs the connection to her baby with her fangs.
The Spider Queen’s black face is highlighted by the drops of blood smeared across her lips. I move closer, wanting to see the child she has birthed.
Her top arms come down around the baby and pull it up to her chest. The screaming thing latches onto her breast and quiets immediately.
The Spider Queen reaches a leg toward me and I climb it, crawling up into her grasp. She holds me beside the baby, and I inspect it closer. Pale skin, black and red fluff on its head, two wiggling legs on the bottom and two arms on top.
No bulbous body like mine.
“This is my daughter,” the Spider Queen says to me.
I swallow and try my voice again. “Daughter.”
“Very good,” she praises me. “You must carry her to her father.”
I cock my head. “Why?”
“Because she cannot be raised here with us.” She gestures to my father, Iksah. “This harsh world is designed for our kind, and she is too different.”
I nod, though my enthusiasm wanes. “I wanted a friend.”
The Spider Queen caresses my face with her gentle hand. “I’m sorry, Keinan.”
“Will you make another child? One more like me?” I ask, my voice still holding a buzzing quality that the Spider Queen’s does not.
She shakes her head. “I don’t think I can, my sweet, but even if I could, my mate is on Gaien. He is the only one I would make another child with and…”
Her voice fades away.
“What is it, my queen?”
She smiles at me, but there is pain there.
“I didn’t look like this before. I looked like her,” she says, bouncing the daughter in her arm.
She must mean that she’s too different to be with her mate again, but that seems silly. Her upper half is the same shape as the daughter’s.
“You are b…byew…beautiful,” I say, struggling to form the letters with my thin lips pulled tight over sharp teeth.
Her smile becomes warm and loving. “Thank you, Keinan.”
The daughter begins to scream again. The Spider Queen quickly crafts a vessel of her softest silk and wraps her.
“I can create an opening just large enough for the two of you,” she says, moving us toward the Looking Water.
