Page 27 of The Unseelie War
Whatever.
Tucking her hands into her pockets, she headed off down the hallway, following a single golden thread that ran from the front door of the opera house deeper into the structure. It took her down into the rows of seating in the main floor of the theatre. The performance space had been transformed beyond recognition by the merger of realities. The ornate Victorian architecture remained—which was good, it’d be a damn shame to lose such a landmark—but it was now interwoven with elements from the other two worlds as well. Silver threads from the Web stretched between the marble columns and archways. Flowers that softly emitted their own faint purple-blue glowing light bloomed along the handrails, or along the seats and backs of the rows.
At first, she had no idea where Serrik had gone. The golden threads were her only clue. They were so impossibly thin they were hard to see against a backdrop of so much other detail. But they all led her gazeupwardsand to the ceiling.
She stopped and stared in wonder.
Suspended at the highest point at the ceiling, where all points could meet, was the most intricate web she had ever seen. It wasn’t a chaotic tangle of lines. It wasn’t madness. It was a masterpiece of engineering and artistry, spiraling around in increasingly tight flawless fractal patterns.
The golden threads glittered in the strange glow of the flowers and the amber lights of the opera house, giving the web an ethereal quality that made it seem almost ghostly, like it wasn’t really there.
And in the center of it all, in his true form, was Serrik.
He hung suspended in the web with an ease that spoke of his age and his nature, his seven legs moving in perfect coordination as he adjusted and refined his creation. He was upright, his long green hairflowing freely as he worked. His golden tattoos caught the light in the same way as his threads, creating an effect that was beautiful, inhuman, and elegant.
Each thread ran off into a different direction. She suspected they did the same thing as the one that connected to the front door—it was a surveillance system from hell. It was also a masterwork of brilliance that only a spider with an intellect like his could create.
“Serrik?” Keeping her voice low, she took another step farther down the aisle. She didn’t want to startle him.
His multiple golden eyes turned toward her, and she felt that familiar flutter in her chest. Even in his true form—especially in his true form—he was magnificent. Terrifying, but magnificent.
“The theatre is secure.” Despite the distance between them, his deep voice carried easily. The theatre was designed for that, she supposed. “Each entrance is monitored. Any intrusion will be detected immediately. You may return to bed.”
“That…wasn’t what got me up.” Tucking a strand of hair behind her ear, she glanced away. “How long did all this take you?”
“Less time than it likely appears. This is what I was designed for.” There was something almost wistful in his tone. “I had forgotten how satisfying it could be to create something. It seemed so pointless in the Web.”
Walking closer to the edge of the stage, she craned her neck to get a better view of his work. It was more intricate than she realized, as it was both conical and a spiral. But he had attached it to the original architecture of the building in arching loops that were clearly designed to mimic the design of what was already there.
“It’s…beautiful. I’ve never seen anything like it.” She chuckled. “Makes me realize I would have honestly been shitty as an architect.”
“I doubt that is true.” He went very still, all seven legs pausing in their delicate adjustments. Only the two at his hips, the weird clasper-looking things, continued their unending nervous fidgeting. “You…find it beautiful?”
“Of course I do.” Gesturing helplessly up at the golden masterpieceabove her, she let out a half laugh. “I mean, fuckin’ look at that, man. It’s a string-art-engineering-nightmare-baby. And it’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen. And it’s so much better than anything I could have ever made, or dreamed up, in my entire life.”
“I…also did not know you wished to be an architect.” He was moving now, descending through the web he had built with fluid grace.
None of the threads movedat all.
“Yeah. I was going for a major in it before my mom got sick.” It was extremely unnerving, seeing something his size move on strands as thin as her hair without them even so much as wavering or wiggling in a breeze. No wonder people found him frightening. “You didn’t have to come down. I just wanted to check on you. Make sure you were all right.”
“I am more than all right.” He continued his descent. “For the first time in centuries, my life haschanged.I am not trapped within that forsaken library. I am free. And I am able to take simple actions I had been denied before.”
“Like what?”
“I am allowed to aid my allies, temporary as they may be.” He paused in his descent, hanging suspended some fifteen feet above the stage. “I might…protect those under my care. This is a new sensation. And I was devoid of such things for nigh two millennium, Ava.”
“Why do you think it’s…temporary that we’re under your care?” The phrase made something warm bloom in her chest, even if he didn’t think it was going to last.
“You. Lysander. Bitty. You will all change your minds when I inevitably come to blows with Valroy. He seeks the genocide of all life. I seek the genocide of his kind. You seek neither. This will put us all at an impasse. It is inevitable.” He glanced back up at the golden web, as if it were some kind of monument to a time already gone. “But for now, you are mine to guard.”
The possessiveness in his voice should have alarmed her. Instead,it sent a thrill through her that she tried very hard to ignore. “We're not possessions, Serrik.”
“No,” he agreed. “You are far more precious. The others? Hm. Debatable.” There was a smirk when he said it.
He resumed his descent, and Ava found herself backing up. Not from fear, but from the sudden intensity of having all his attention focused on her. And from his sheerscale.When he finally reached the stage, settling onto the wooden floor with surprising delicacy despite his size, she was reminded all over again of just how magnificent and alien he was.
In his true form, he stood nearly nine feet tall, his spider body adding bulk and presence that his human glamour couldn't convey. The chitinous sections of his skin gleamed like polished armor, and the golden patterns that decorated his back seemed to shift and flow in the theater's strange light.
