Shadowland. Spider World 06 by Colin Wilson

It was as he was looking at the reflection of this rock, and imagining falling from its top into the sky, that Niall was startled to see the mirror image of something moving on the road. For a moment he thought it was the raven, then saw that the bird was clearly visible on top of the rock. When he looked at the moving reflection more closely, he realized it was a spider.

His mood of total relaxation prevented him from reacting with surprise. Instead, he raised his eyes slowly. Less then twenty feet away, a Death Spider was advancing cautiously along the road. Its attention was directed entirely to peering around the corner beyond the rock. If Niall had moved, or if the spider had glanced downward with any of the ring Of eyes that circled its head, it would have seen him standing in the water. But it was not interested in the river — only in making sure that it was not seen as it turned the corner.

Niall recognized it immediately: it was Skorbo’s friend and ally, the captain of the guard. And the purpose of his caution was to make sure that he was not seen by Niall.

For five minutes after the captain had vanished around the corner, Niall continued to stand perfectly still. He was deeply puzzled. Why was the spider following him? And how long had it been doing so?

The second question was easier to answer than the first. As he had walked along the ridge, Niall had been visible for miles around against the skyline. So the answer was that he could have been followed for more than an hour.

Could this have been why the raven had flown above him? Was it trying to tell him he was being stalked?

But why should the captain want to follow him? If his intention had been to kill Niall — out of revenge for his own downfall — it would have been easy enough during the past hour: a few of those giant steps, approximately four times as long as a human stride, and the poisonous sting would have dispatched Niall within seconds.

Perhaps it intended to attack him when he was asleep? Again, that seemed unlikely. It would have been just as easy to attack him as he walked unsuspectingly along the road.

If it had been Skorbo, or one of his flesh-eating subordinates, Niall would not have been so puzzled. They were of fairly low intelligence, and might simply have been obeying the instinct that makes a hunting spider stalk its prey. But Niall had observed the captain defying the Death Lord and refusing to accept his sentence of execution, and had sensed that he possessed considerable intelligence and self-discipline. If he was following Niall, it was with some definite purpose.

There was one more possibility. Skorbo had made a forced landing in the territory of the Magician, and may have become his prisoner — and possibly his ally. In that case, the captain might be another ally. Was it possible that his aim was to capture Niall and hand him over to the Magician?

But why bother, when Niall was already making his way in that direction? He might just as well follow Niall, and make sure he arrived at his goal.

This, Niall decided, was the likeliest explanation.

In which case, it could serve no purpose to remain concealed. Since, by a fortunate chance, the captain had lost whatever advantage he might have gained from surprise, there was no point in hiding from him. Niall slipped on his sandals and began to climb the bank up to the road.

Within a few feet of the top, he could see clearly along the road beyond the red rock; it ran straight for at least a quarter of a mile, and he was surprised to see that it was empty. The spider would hardly have had time to disappear out of sight, unless he had been running at top speed toward the next hilltop. That meant he had concealed himself somewhere close by.

As Niall stared up at the raven on top of the rock, he saw a possible solution. He relaxed into the mode that allowed him to share the bird’s consciousness, and immediately found himself behind its eyes, staring out over the valley and the plain stretching eastward to the sea. Twenty feet below him, on his right, he could now see the captain, standing poised at the top of a slope that ran down to the road.

What had happened was obvious. The spider had also seen that the road ahead was deserted, and that therefore Niall must still be somewhere nearby. He was waiting to see whether Niall would pass him, and was hoping not to be seen.

Niall braced himself by turning the thought mirror toward his chest, took a few moments to concentrate the surge of energy it created, then stepped out beyond the rock and looked up at the spider.

Its response was — as Niall had expected — instantaneous and automatic; it struck at Niall’s central nervous system with its will, immobilizing him as if he had been encased in a block of ice. But Niall felt no fear, for he had already calculated what would happen. As he remained relaxed in the grip of the spider’s will, which held him as tightly as if he was embraced by the tentacles of an octopus, he could sense its doubt about what to do next. Its instinct told it to attack a prey it had immobilized and sink in its fangs, while the logical part of its mind opposed this.

Niall seized this moment of indecision to exert the full force of his concentration to break free. He could sense the spider’s surprise that a human being should be capable of such will-force. The effort had made the thought mirror warm against Niall’s chest, but not — as on the last occasion when he had opposed a spider — painfully hot. Niall and the captain surveyed one another, Niall casually and without alarm, the captain obviously unsure of what to do next.

Niall played his next move in this chess game of dominance, addressing the captain as if he had no fear of further attack.

“Where are you are going?”

He spoke in a confident tone that implied that he had every right to ask, and he could sense the captain’s surprise at being addressed so clearly in the telepathic language of the spiders.

After a silence, the captain answered: “It does not matter where I go. I have no home.”

If he had been a human being, the answer would have been accompanied by a shrug.

Niall knew then that he had won: the spider had accepted his right to ask questions as if Niall was his superior officer. Niall said: “In that case, we may as well travel together.”

If he had been speaking to a human being, he would have made a gesture inviting him to join him on the road. But since he was using telepathy, this was unnecessary. The captain negotiated the steep, narrow slope down to the road with surprising ease.

He was smaller than Niall remembered, being only about a foot taller than Niall. (Most Death Spiders were between seven and eight feet tall.) His coat was very dark brown, instead of black, like most of the Death Spiders, and his glossiness reminded Niall of Grel, the son of Asmak — that is, it carried a suggestion of juvenility, which nevertheless was belied by the spider’s obvious strength and agility.

The track that led north was scarcely wide enough for a spider and a human being to walk side by side, and the spider’s wide leg span obliged him to walk with his four right feet on the grass verge.

Niall said: “You say you have no home. But surely your home is in the eastern Koresh?”

“That would take two weeks by sea. But by land it is more than a year.”

“Then why not return by sea?”

“That is out of the question. The Death Lord has decreed that no ship will be allowed to carry me.”

Niall remembered the exact words of the Spider Lord: “No ship will carry a traitor who prefers dishonor to death.” He could sense that the spider knew what he was thinking, and that he was experiencing a twinge of humiliation.

Niall asked: “Do you wish to return by sea?”

In human speech that question would have been ambiguous, but the spider immediately understood what Niall meant.

“You could give orders for a ship to take me?”

“Yes.”

Niall could sense his surprise.

“And overrule the decision of the Death Lord?”

Niall said: “I am the master of the spider city, which means I can overrule even the Death Lord.”

The spider’s eyes — which were in the side as well as the front of his head — surveyed Niall with astonishment. Because they were speaking telepathically, he knew that Nial was speaking the truth.