The garb was uncomfortable against Spider's body. The dull gray cloth was saturated with water, and the downpour showed no sign of abating. When it was dry, it bothered him enough to make him scratch or shift every minute or so. When wet, he felt as though his body were crawling with vermin.
And that feeling seemed all too familiar for some reason, though he couldn't place it.
It is cold and damp. I crave warmth and dryness. Work more quickly.
Spider's hand went to the wavy-bladed knife at his waist, thinking for a moment that he could perhaps tuck her under a rock or somesuch, before realizing himself and deciding that if he had to tolerate the weather, they could as well. This was their idea, after all.
Ha. That was almost compassionate, Seven. Though I'm sure Widow would have appreciated it.
Without ceasing the quick movements of his fingers, braiding together the nearly invisible strands of thread, Spider's pupilless violet eyes glanced down to the simple, straight-bladed knife hanging from the other side of his hips.
"Is that to say that you enjoy the weather, Wolf?"
Not in the least. But it's necessary, now, isn't it.
That was true. Spider didn't know why it was necessary... for that matter, he wasn't sure that Widow and Wolf even knew why it was necessary. But they did know, and in that certainty came the comfort of not being concerned with the reason.
"The ends have to be thicker, or they'll shear off the tree limbs... I've almost completed it."
Widow's voice seemed on the verge of giggling in his head. A finer job of weaving I've never seen. Your siblings would be jealous, she tittered.
Unless they take after my sort. Weaving seems a waste of time, I still don't understand. In the end, our fangs find their way into our prey's flesh, why bother with all the ceremony beforehand? Why wait for what might not come when you can seek it yourself? Wolf quivered at Spider's side, her edges humming like a struck tuning fork.
Spider gritted his teeth as he tied off the strand on one branch, and walked to the tree on the opposite side of the path. "I don't know. I don't know anything. You know that. Why ask me? He'll be through here, then the idea will be out of my head and I can try and get some answers-"
You're wasting your time. Nobody has answers for you.
"Then maybe they'll help me find them-"
Nobody will care.
"But surely-"
You're nothing, Seven. Those of this world care only of themselves, of their own story they're weaving with their life, and when they pass, nobody will have heard it. You're no exception, especially for as briefly as you've been.
Spider's lips thinned as he worked to make no expression. He didn't want this, he didn't want his hands forced by instincts he could not deny. He didn't want to have plans, skills, and knowledge without a memory of where they came from, or where he came from, or an understanding of why he had them.
But the Ladies were right... the land had it's own troubles, and each person their own tale. Nobody would seek him out and offer him solace or help, after only existing for a few days. And nobody would care if he tried to seek them out to explain. Why should they? They had their own interests to protect.
The earth moved. Very slightly. Spider noticed it, but didn't recognize it for what it was. It wasn't until Wolf spoke that he assigned that bit of knowledge away. Hoofbeats. He's coming. Hide, Seven.
Spider frowned, dashing away from the path to small divot in the ground, lying flat. His cloth garb felt as though it was trying to digest him in it's damp, chilly grip. He tilted his head up and watched. The rider approached, galloping hard. He was raised in the saddle, leaning forward above the horse's head trying to see better in the storm. Trying to see the path in front of him. And just as lightning struck, just as Spider clenched his teeth and shut his eyes, just as the rider sped between the two trees, perhaps he saw the beads of water clinging to the razor-thin thread tied between them. But by then it didn't matter.
The horse let out a piercing neigh over the late thunderclap, feeling the change in weight on it's shoulders, turning several feet down the path to look back. The spin sent what remained of the rider's body on the horse's back sliding off, crumpling to the wet earth with a wet splash. The sensation and scent of warm blood splashing over it's back as the body fell away caused the horse to kick up in alarm, then charge away, off of the pass, into the wilderness. Spider wondered if it would last the night.
A thin red line hovered in the air between the trees, drops of rain mixing with the blood, the two sections of the rider's body lying some distance beyond, motionless. Spider slowly climbed from the wet hole and grasped Widow's hilt.
What are you doing? Leave the remains, it will not be traced. You're done here-
"No. It would catch others if I leave the web, and he was the only prey." Spider swung Widow in an upward arc, and the thin red line drifted away and downwards towards the far tree, harmless and invisible once more in the night's shadows.
Wolf quivered again, her quiet chuckle clicking through Spider's mind. Compassion again, Spider? Evidently the Nest didn't make you quite correctly.
"Then maybe there's hope for me yet," he muttered, slipping Widow through the loop at his waist once more, and looking impassively at the body on the ground, grateful that the face was towards the earth, unable to return his gaze.
Widow shivered, a quick whine drifting through the air. Cold. Find prey or shelter, quickly. You're done here. Spider nodded, and walked from the road, his mind dull and tired. Shelter, yes. And perhaps, just perhaps, somebody.
Sooja wandered. That's just what she did.
From here to there.
She didn't like to be in one place for too long. Never slept in the same place twice in a row, and really felt more at ease outside; which was likely why she was where she was when she was when she saw him.
His face was pale -- Eyes as dark as the night sky. His robe clung to his slender body like it was pasted on. She heard him muttering something and thought for a moment he saw her.
No, he just walked on. Taking shelter behind a tree, she sat and watched him. He was graceful, his legs long and the features of his face angular. He was an elf, even though you couldn't see his ears.
She'd always found them to be far more attractive than most Celtic men. They were usually too stalky, too rugged, too smelly. She admired the elves in the way they moved with such stealth, with such grace and fluidity.
Settling into the tree, she pulled her hood over the top of her head and stared as she watched him move with precise steps.
Wondering who.
Wondering where he was going.
She caught herself in a yawn, holding her hand over her mouth she tried to stifle the inevitable groan that always came with a yawn. She was, unfortunately, too late.
And that was why she had become a champion and not a stealthy Ranger. She shook the sleep from her face and glanced back at the shadowed man, hoping she hadn't reviled her hiding place.... and at the same time, wishing she had.
It was the sound of a voice that caused Spider to stop moving, almost entirely, passing in the dim light wearing his dull grey garb for a statue for all his movement. But it was the fact that the voice was yawning, almost casually, that kept him from breaking into a run once more.
His solid purple eyes panned about, trying to spot the life that had made the noise.
Run, Seven. It could be a predator.
Or possibly law. Could we have been observed the entire time?
Spider ignored them. He didn't feel as though he was in danger... but he did feel as though he was being watched. Then the lightning struck.
The thunder had been late in coming for most of the storm, and so it was in silence that Spider noted the shadow cast for a fraction of a second by the tree nestled in the copse he was walking through, the shadow that was twice as thick as it ought to be, but only for the lower half of the trunk.
As the dull boom of noise echoed a second later, Spider walked in an arc about the tree, his feet now silent in the puddle-covered earth. He didn't think about being quiet- he didn't need to. It just happened when he decided he shouldn't be noticed. But he didn't approach the tree. He circled it, staying wide, until he could make out the human figure huddled behind it, her long hair seeming to spitefully struggle under the weight of the cold water to remain wavy. Even in the dark, it was easy to make out the sharp yet feminine angles of her face, and the sharper tip of the enormous sword slung over her back, dripping a steady rivulet of water from it's tip near her knees.
Not law, then. Nobody of consequence. Let's go-
Spider coughed, as quietly as he could muster to ensure that he was heard, and ideally not to startle. Lightning struck again, casting light on both of them for a glimpse, Spider's wiry frame accented by the clinging garb, and the woman's face highlighted by the frame of fire-red hair which stuck to her cheeks and neck.
"You... ah. A... Aren't you cold?" Spider managed, his face twisted slightly with puzzlement- not from wondering whether she was, in fact, cold, as much as from wondering what to say to her. The overdue thunder rolled unintrusively in the distance. [ 12-06-2001: Message edited by: Sooja Maeve ]
She said with uncertainty, chewing her lip as she looked at the man. Tilting her head to the side she looked him over, then peered into his eerily dark purple eyes.
She shivered. The cold? The rain running down her back? Or fear?
"But... I was just goingÂ…"
Sooja stood nervously, her voice trailing off as she backed away from him. There was something about him; quite different, very strange and unnerving. Her heels slipped in the viscous mud and quickly gave in under her scrambling feet, slipping out from under her. Her unsteady feet sent her tumbling onto her backside into what could only be described as a perfect Sooja-sized mud puddle.
Landing with a whimper and a splash, she looked back up at Spider and made a very poor attempt at a smile.
Widow bounced imperceptibly on Spider's thigh, a sound echoing in his head that might have resembled laughter, if laughter were something that made people shiver. Definitely not law.
That was enough to snap Spider from his reverie, and he dashed over to the woman, stepping atop the mud and water like it were solid marble, rather than through it like it were, well, mud and water. He nervously extended an arm to the fallen woman who was smiling at him, though his own face was of anxious fear.
"Miss, you shouldn't be in this place, it's dangerous, theres... well, this weather is unhealthy, and trees are a bad place to be in a thunderstorm, and..."
And any moment somebody will be coming along the horse path 80 feet from here, see a body that had been split in two from the shoulder to the ribcage lying on the road, and start screaming, which would bring you to investigate, and you'd put two and two together, which would make you a witness after having seen me, and The Ladies would force me to...
"Please, we have to get out of here. Tir na mBeo is not far, there's an Inn there where you can get cleaned up and find warmth..."
Warmth? WARMTH!? She's warm-blooded, Seven! She'll be fine, let her fend for herself, it's you who'll slow and stop if you don't get moving! Wolf's hilt actually shook in her loop on his belt.
Spider disregarded it, keeping his outstretched arm steady, gazing down at the woman with unchanging solid-violet eyes, but the lids and brows above them twisted in an expression of panic.
She sighed and shivered a little flicking a bit of mud from her hand before pulling the strands of hair from her face.
She looked to the man and swallowed, "Thanks. My name is Sooja. I.. I can get to town on my own.. I mean, you don't have to ..." Sooja paused and saw the panic rise in the man's face.
She took another step back, her foot landing squarely in the mud puddle again but stayed underneath her.
She wasn't sure what to do next. Run? Just walk away? Wait for him to respond?
She stood there stunned, cold and shiveringÂ… her hand still in his. [ 12-06-2001: Message edited by: Sooja Maeve ]
Seven.
Spider squinted a bit, disregarding the calm yet chittering voice in his mind. Take a moment to sort this out, he figured- there were no hoofbeats approaching, he knew that much now that he knew what hoofbeats sounded like, so there was no immediate rush.
Seven.
Don't let them make this decision for you. Think for yourself. They'd just as soon kill her for convenience. Allright... killing, that's an option, but that's very much not what you want to do. Kidnap? No... that would ultimately lead to killing as well, as it would raise suspicion and she'd otherwise return here after hearing what happened to the rider-
Seven, please. Release her hand, bow to her, explain that you're headed in the direction of the Inn, and that you'd be happy to accompany her there. Ladies appreciate politeness.
Spider's eyes shifted to the side at Widow's uncharacteristic behavior. She'd never advised him on, well, courtesy before. How could she? What would the spirit of a spider know of it?
Just do it quickly. Your pulse is starting to drop, you'll go unconscious if you get much colder.
...Well... there seemed no harm in it...
Spider let the woman's fingers slip from his grasp, then bowed a bit stiffly to her, struggling to find words to force through his throat. "I, ah, apologize, Miss. I get anxious in storms and I've been a bit panicked since getting caught outside in this one. I'm, I'm on my way to Tir na mBeo to get shelter, if you're heading there as well or looking for shelter, I'd be pleased to go with you... and I think it'd calm my nerves to have the company."
He lifted from his bow, the hood of his cloak sticking to his cheeks and forehead as rivulets of rain trickled over his face, over the solid violet eyes that now met hers, or did so as much as they could without pupils.
