Had it just been the items knocking around, I might have bought into a haunting.
Not now, though.
I sat on Heidi’s unmade bed and took in the room, wondering what it was about the space that made Tansy so afraid to step inside.
Then I looked up to the ceiling and saw it staring back down at me.
Chapter Seven
I suppressed a scream, and instead stayed absolutely still, not daring to move a single inch.
Wilder, sensing the change in my demeanor, came a step closer, but I hissed, “Stop.”
Wilder continued to come in my direction until I held my hand up, never shifting my eyes from the ceiling, only tracking him peripherally.
The thing over my head looked down, all eight eyes blinking simultaneously.
It had a spider’s face but the body of a sexless human. With an extra set of arms and legs, that is. The spider creature had waxy white skin so translucent I could make out a patchwork of blue veins all over its arms and torso.
With all its eyes focused on me, I was barely able to breathe, let alone move. Eight glassy black eyes blinked. Its mouth pincers worked methodically, as if it were imagining chewing on me. I swallowed hard, cold sweat beading on the back of my neck.
Goddess, hear me.
I dared not speak the words aloud, terrified that if it had an idea of what I was up to, it would drop down on me and chew my face open before I had a chance to complete my incantation.
The nice thing about magic—something my Memere had taught me during my early teens in the bayou—was that spells are about intention more than words. It was will, and not language, that created a successful incantation. A skillful witch could be deaf, blind, or mute. Senses didn’t factor.
I built a protection spell with the threads of my fear, weaving them as tightly as the web the monster over my head might have been able to spin. I prayed for Wilder. For Cash and Tansy. For the girl down the hall.
“Back out of the room slowly,” I told Wilder.
For the first time since I’d glanced up, he followed my gaze to see what had me so transfixed. That’s when I realized this whole ordeal, which felt as though it had been going on for hours, hadn’t even lasted a split-second.
He held his breath, choking on a growl.
The gurgling sound it made grabbed the spider thing’s attention, and it skittered across the ceiling towards Laura’s bed.
Though its limbs looked human, there was nothing natural about the way it moved. Arms and legs bent at angles no human being—no matter how limber—could have managed, creating articulation where no joints should have existed.
“Please, please, please,” whispered the disembodied voice of Heidi. It trembled with a fear so pure it made the predator inside me hungry. “Please, please, please.”
I had to get out of this room.
My hands tingled from the power of my incantation. The cool feel of magic flowing over me bolstered my confidence, and I rose to my feet, trying to go cautiously but quickly. Wilder hadn’t moved yet, still tracking the thing’s movements with a keen eye.
“Wilder, go.”
He didn’t budge, and of course he wouldn’t leave until he knew I was with him. I appreciated his devotion to protecting me, but I’d never forgive myself if something happened to him. What if my spell wasn’t enough? If I’d only cast it over myself and not him and that thing did something to him?
No.
It hissed, baring pincers and a mouth like an open grave.
I hit Wilder at a run, slamming myself into his bigger body and shoving with all my might, knocking him through the doorway and into the hall. I scrambled back a second later, yanking the door closed and fastening the padlock with a click.
When I sank to the carpet, my back to the door, I was panting. Sweat now dripped down my spine, and I braced one hand on either side of the doorframe, continuing to mutter incantations under my breath. My fingertips glowed blue, a faintly shimmery manifestation of my power that looked like sparkling flame. The false fire traced its way up the frame and all the way around, until the entire door glowed cerulean.
When the flame vanished, I was left staring into three wide-eyed faces.