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The Tempest and The Void

The Arachnid Chronicles

By Roy WhipplePublished about a year ago 6 min read
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The Past is already gone, and the Future is irrelevant if you cannot get through Right Now

There weren't always dragons in the Valley, but there have always been spiders in the dark cool places where one would seek out shelter from the heat of afternoons spent on frivolous and anxiety ridden waves of silly behaviors, hunting for sport instead of need, glaring at people with haughty or insolent expressions , and any feelings of dissatisfaction, disapproval , or disappointment, are shrugged off with an "but, Hey, you know, its ME!" expression, that makes people feel humorous for a minute, and then like a fool later for letting that one get past you. Those dark recesses, though, are home to beings that do not tarry with frivolousness, nor silly behaviors.........

She descends the lines carefully, one of her cisterns of hydration had begun jingling, she is a Spherindai a race of spider gods, if you had never seen her cavern before you would be stuck there in a state awe, all over the cavern are waving luminous and twinkling lights. her web-lines are a luminous rainbow meticulously organized.
From bridges to wander about, to lines holding bottles of various liquids, there's old armor from knights that tried to go to the cavern and "Do Away With The Big Bad Spider God" to bribes from monarchs treasures of gold, silver,jewelry, diamonds and other wealth that the various nobility found useless as they were dying from various issues and needed Shamona The Master Of The Web and guardian of Life Secrets , to extend their lives with one of her potions or elixirs. No one leaves the caverns that attempt violence or theft.
Shamona herself is a as magnificent as her lines and web systems , with a dark purple rainbow colored exterior and exquisitely lithe muscular abdomen that somehow balances both muscles and the glandular system of an arachnid.
As she descends down the line to see why one of her hydration cisterns was jungling more than it should, she feels the vibrations running across her that allow her to see the image of a fairly brusky, well proportioned being trying to cut one of her lines, and steal from her wells. t
The usual procedure is to leave a chunk of healthy food for her on one of her offering plates and THEN she lowers them a line carrying a bottle of liquid suitable to the bribe, with a crimp so that after they cut the bottle from the line with a diamond edged blade , the only kind strong enough, they can seal the bottle up and the line on the other side can be signaled that the trade has been complete, two crimps and a chuck of reasonably portioned food for a tank of the best liquids you can find anywhere, isn't that much of burden, some people always seemed to try to steal it though.
As She descends the line you can hear a song that was cheerful and wondering , if a bit suspicious, as to why the line was jiggling, start becoming more ominous and querying, "Why are you trying to steal that?" the thoughts emanate from the Monarch of the Web,
The thief, startled by the multitoned inquery, seeming to be all over the cavern, and yet aimed specifically at her, drops her diamond edged blade, and turns upright to llwitness the Matriarch of this particular cavern descend the line, and present the form of ancient lineages , both worship worthy , with her belt overbearing, contemplative wealth, and dominion worthy attributes, and visuange of a species formed as the material of creation itself, looking at her like a thief, trying fr the easy way out.
The thief tries for pity, understanding the legends of the Sphereindai, which attribute them to a lenient composure, of love and affection for petitioners, seeking health, love, romance, or understandable tyrannies to make a better world, and tries to communicate, "I am seeking a betrothal to the Lord Of Faire whom requires a single sip of this loving elixir, to bring him refreshment"
The Matron of the Web laughs faintly, wondering if any thief ever answers honestly, and issues forth a series of clicks and reverberating sound which communicates the thoughts , " If said tempter to your virtue, truly whished for such refreshing, he should be the one stealing from my Web, not his concubine."
The thief caught off guard by he sound reasoning of a being she heard was naive to the ways of love, tries one more attempt at deciet, " He is ill, upon his deathbed and cannot venture forth on his own, therefore i mist complete his challenge, and bring him the elixir f life, surely you will not stand in my way??"
The Matron, centuries old and tired of lies , does not answer for several minutes, then when she has readied her webs of capturing, she issues forth one last communication, "Surely if your love is soo bereived, he shall have instructed thine to understand the difference between a simple drink of substance, and the elixir required to bring one back from death. Never to worry , I have always a need for a maid to bring my cavern to a healthy state, and thus thine thirst shall be satisfied, for never shall i leave one wanting for substance."
Then the matron enacted her nets of capturing, which cost her several hours of consort with the Net Master, to attain, and caught up this foolish thief to a life of servitude, for the account of the crime of thievery, which is one year, plus one day......
The next thought, is to the matters of Court, and what it takes to achieve the Matriarchs blessing , and attain immortality........

As the Matron wraps up her newest endentured servant a shadow in the back ground lightly moves with a leathery sound just mild enough to avoid alerting the Matron to its presence, yet destincly dignified as a full bodied set of bat-like , a slight shrug of pride can be heard , this being is both ancient feeling and yet young for its species, it was several hundred years old, counted against the Matrons centuries though it was still quite young. Yet still it felt as though it had faired well, not having an actual bribe to offer her , this being known as a Semrigoth , had instead steered an stubborn and proud, foolishly behaving being in her direction, with several clicks and sounds make a bodies nervous system instinctively want to move away from the sound, never to use on those that comport themselves well with a life, and yet still knowing one of the best bribes to the Spheriandai, are troubling starters.......Feeling both accomplished and in need , he uses one swift move of a talon, former as sharp as a diamond edge blade, to dislodge one of the tanks of precious liquids, and several complicated movements later had set crimps on both sides of the cut, and gathered up some momentum to luxuriously float , glide and maneuver its way back to its own safe hold , several miles away from the Matron, Spiders and Dragons CAN coexist , but only from safer distances......






FantasyHumorAdventure
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