Hunted [Wild Hunt Series: 1]

19: The Huntsman

The spider demon, at least from what I'd seen at the start of the Hunt, wasn't the biggest demon, smaller than the average man, if I'd judged him right, but he was big enough to provide plenty of nightmare fuel, as spiders with a human torso and a nasty stinger were wont to do. There was no saving grace, nothing cutesy or gentle or any other kindly word I could ascribe to him to make myself feel less intimidated by the idea of going up against him. 

Maybe I shouldn't have gone up against him, I thought, peering out through the thin cocoon. With the breeze caught in the wild webbing, the ragged tendrils where my knife had cut away Jessie's shell drooped against my nose and cheek. Maybe I should've stayed with Dakota and Jessie, made sure the got to Shail, made sure they were safe. Bundling myself up into a gossamer burrito could've been a very big mistake, easily one of the dumber things I'd done in my life, and possibly the last.

But there was no backing down now. I lay against the bony, cocooned corpses of other ill-fated creatures, only a slim seam of daylight away from total darkness. 

The waning light burned away in one leering emerald shades, and then shadows spread across the forest floor. The buzzing of flies continued through the briefest of twilights and carried on strong into the night. As the heat of the day slipped toward the stars, the ground stirred. Desiccated leaves jumping in skittish dismay as all things that could crawl emerged under night's dark embrace. 

Hundreds of tiny legs crawled over Jessie's -now my- woven tomb, slipping almost knowingly through the breached cut and into my clothes. There came a soft whisper of legs against my hand. My fingers twitched against the knife, desperate to swat at the undulating feet of a centipede as it maneuvered beneath the tattered bracer as if it were an open wound and scuttled along my wrist.

And I lay there, stiff like a body upon a pyre of shrouded bones, breathing slow and soft in the bleak quiet. My eyesight was wretchedly terrible, and the longer I peered into that single fine seam of darkness, the more impossible movement I saw. He was there, my gut told me, somewhere close.

But he wasn't, said my brain. It's just your eyes up to their old tricks. It's just your imagination running wild. You see nothing because there is nothing. Not even moonlight has found its way inside this spider's web.

There was more insects now, slipping across me as I lay. I held the knife against my chest, mentally practicing the upwards motion to stab him in his abdomen if he walked over me.

Where was he?

My ears strained for any sound over the wings of filthy flies, but I'd never known a loud spider. My senses reached harder, tried to find something, anything, to grasp, and then beneath me the pile of victims shifted. 

There wasn't a weight to his presence, not really. Supported on thick, hairy legs, his heft was spread evenly across six narrow points that explored his territory for several minutes. With my head turned to one side, where my access to the seam was, I couldn't see what was directly above me, but after a time flat and wide ghosted across my knees. His abdomen- but it was  too low for the knife's reach and gone all too quick.

The insects that had been content to scour my body abruptly made a mass exodus, pouring past my face and back into the night. A strangely slimy click cut through the air. The pile shifted around me again, and then thin, skeletal fingers cut through the silk and sunk into my shoulder. 

His nails didn't break through the leather, but the pressure was near unbearable. I stayed still, fighting my chest to let out an anguished gasp.

He knew I was alive. He was testing me, the way a cat tests a mouse.

I had to do something, but I'd only get the one clear shot. 

His second hand reached beneath the webbing around my waist, pulling me, still wrapped up tight- against his forelimbs. There came that odd, slimy click again, louder and closer to my head. The first human hand released my shoulder. Hungrily it slid down along the silken shell, sliding over my breasts, down along the side of my hips.

And all I could do was try and ignore that wretched sensation, try and figure out which part of his body the knife was pressed closest to. I wanted the heart or the guts, but I was terrified I had access to neither.

My pulse leaped into my throat.

A cold, hardened fingertip scratched the flesh of my chin. The demon purred, a rumble that quaked through its entire body, snared the curtain of silk between us, and exposed my face.

I shoved the knife straight forward. The metal bit through a hard carapace at the base of its human torso and jammed. Wrenching it free, I fell back against the webbing. The spider leaped soundlessly into the darkness. I kicked the rest of my cocoon off and got my footing, unevenly, atop the pile of bodies. 

Flies rushed around me in a dizzying storm. For just a moment my eyes scanned the swarming darkness and then a sharp spear punched through my calf. With a shout I tumbled down into the leaves. My head banged off a hard rock and when I got myself onto my knees my left foot was barely responding. I felt weak and short of breath. The night was black, yet I was beginning to see colorful flashes of light. Hallucinations. In a daze I touched my damp calf. Shit.

Click.

Breath warmed the top of my head. A clawed hand caressed my hair. Wheezing, I felt stiff, slow, unable to move my hands like I wanted. Anchored to a tree above, the demon descended until his arms reached around my waist, until his hairy face pushed against my braid and fangs kissed my neck.

He pulled me up into the trees, as lights flashed through my fading vision and my body tingled and my limbs lost the strength to struggle. But I clung to that damn piece of steel in my hand, and somehow in my shining, breathless world I remembered what I had to do.

I stabbed the knife at the space where I guessed his eyes were. The blade struck hard and fast, sinking into his flesh as his fangs sank into mine. We tumbled together through the branches, him over me, and then my back slammed into the corpses below. The demon took the rest of the air from my lungs when he hit my chest. Limbs flailed around me as he struggled upright. I slashed weakly. He caught the knife in his shoulder and ripped my hand from the blade. 

With one solid punch I was down and out for the count. Next thing I remembered was his weight pressed atop me, glistening eyes peering into mine. A searing pain cut into my thigh- the stinger again.

Emaciated hands tightened around my throat, choking the life from me. My fingers slipped against his chest, sliding over human flesh to the place where human transitioned to arachnid. In the wash of blood I found the open knife wound and shoved my hand inside. I grabbed a fistful of something firm and hot and pulled. 

A shrill, high-pitched shriek cut through the air-maybe in my imagination, maybe in reality. The demon rose onto his legs and slipped down the opposite side as I dragged myself off the pile. 

The leaves rustled, a heavy, dragging crackle, almost as if he were limping.

But I couldn't see him. I couldn't see anything. Even the rustling hiss had grown faint. Guts warmed my hand. In a drowsy pant I relaxed my grip and heard them slither to the ground. 

Stay awake, I thought, pushing my back up against the stacked bodies. He's hurt bad. You're hurt bad. 

But I knew he'd heal. I knew I couldn't let myself fall asleep. It had to be now or never. I stretched my arms along the pile, searching the webbed victims for any sign of my knife, but the venom found me first. My stomach convulsed. My limbs stopped responding. The last sensation I felt was the pull of sticky silk against my cheek. 

I'll see you all back here tomorrow! ♥