Tatters of the King (The Warren Brood Book 3) Read online

  As they walked down the dusty road, which was still damp from the recent rains, Spinneretta hadn’t even a single happy thought. But though her spirits were at the nadir of her perpetual mood swings, she knew she had to stay bright and cheerful. She had to be an example. She had to show Kara the world wasn’t really so dark. With a forced smile, she turned to her sister. “Do you feel like you’re growing up fast now?”

  Kara looked up at her with a blank expression.

  Spinneretta groaned mentally but kept her smile on life support. “Middle school’s a lot more serious than elementary. You have to start studying, and the tests actually matter now. So you’ll need to take some time off from your moping every now and again.”

  Kara’s dead gaze seemed to fray. “Tests?”

  “Real tests. Not just spelling tests. No more ignoring homework if you want to get a good career one day.”

  Kara ruffled her spider legs beneath her jacket and looked back at the damp ground. “What’s the point? We have no future anyway.”

  Disarmed by the blunt despair in her words, Spinneretta closed her mouth and abandoned the idea of trying to cheer Kara up for now. It was clear she still needed time to adjust. Likewise, Spinneretta tried to ignore the truth laughing in that despair. It was a thought she’d wrestled with for weeks, and the battle was far from over. Reinviting the silence, they walked on through the woods.

  The town of Lake Cormorant was not far from Cloquet, in the very shadow of Duluth, nestled within the untamed northern forests of the state. The thick woods surrounding the town were not unlike the forests of Grantwood; though the species of trees were different, there was still a familiar sense of solitude and seclusion.

  Badwalsh High School was built upon a rolling hillock just above the center of town, where semi-rustic businesses and homes hugged the shoreline of the eponymous lake. The school compound consisted of five buildings surrounded by a tall, decades-old iron fence. Little attention had been paid to the aesthetic of the school grounds, which fifty years of under-funding had warped and cracked. The two main buildings, intended for lower- and upperclassmen respectively, were each two stories high and filled with a dozen classrooms, half of which had been in disuse for just as many years. The cafetorium, the gymnasium, and the administrative offices made up the remaining three buildings, which were quite modern in appearance compared to the other wooden structures. Funding crises or not, the school board clearly had their priorities straight.

  As Spinneretta was now a senior, she’d been assigned a homeroom class in the further of the two structures. Messenger bag growing heavy on her shoulder, she found Hall B: Room 112 halfway down the sweet-smelling corridor. She entered, uncertainly, and found half the seats already full. Not late, she thought with relief. Ignoring the probing glances that came her way, she found a chair at an empty two-person table. She flopped down in the seat and pushed her bag under the desk. There was muttering about her among the other students, but she ignored it. Folding her arms upon the desk, she laid her head down and closed her eyes.

  Her ambitions of catching a few moments of sleep before the teacher arrived were cut short when she heard another seat skidding across the floor behind her. And then footsteps. Someone sat down in the chair next to her. “Hi!” a cheerful voice said.

  Oh, God, you’re kidding me. She grimaced, opened her eyes, and looked up. It was a tanned girl with straight black hair and enormous blue eyes.

  “Haven’t seen you around before,” the girl said with a smile. “Are you new in town?”

  Spinneretta groaned a little as she sat back up. “Something like that.”

  The girl made a curious-sounding noise in her throat. “It’s been a long time since we’ve had anyone new transfer in. I hope you don’t mind me saying you stand out like a sore thumb.”

  “And I hope you don’t mind me saying you’re blunt and insensitive.”

  The girl laughed. “I don’t mean in a bad way. It’s just that everyone knows everyone else here. I’m Jessica, by the way.”

  Spinneretta laid her head back down on the table-desk. The surface was cool—cooler than the humid air, at least. “Sarah,” she replied.

  Jessica hummed. “So, when did you move here?”

  “About two months ago.” Why the hell are you talking to me? She glanced over her shoulder. Though more untardy students were still steadily filing in, a third of the tables were still totally unoccupied. Go sit at one of those, why don’t you?

  “Where did you move from?” Jessica asked.

  “Elsewhere.”

  “Hmm, never been there.” She laughed at her own joke. “Okay, let’s try this. Say something. I’m good at this.”

  “Huh?”

  “Say something. I need to listen to your vowels.”

  Spinneretta propped her head up on her elbow as she looked at the too-excited girl beside her. “My vowels?”

  Jessica scrunched her face contemplatively. “Not good enough. Say, the cat caught a rat on a cot in the garage.”

  “What the hell’s the matter with you?”

  The girl giggled. “Humor me.”

  Spinneretta sighed. “Fine. The cat caught a rat on a cot in the garage.” She flattened her tone as much possible, hoping if she spoke in a bored monotone the girl would leave her alone.

  But Jessica, satisfied, scrunched her face again and hummed. “A-ha-ha. Hm, hmm. You’re from . . . Let’s see. Canada?”

  “No.”

  “Seattle?”

  “No.”

  “Oregon?”

  “No.”

  “Am I close?”

  “You’re in the right country, at least.”

  She laughed again. “Well, maybe I’m not as good as I thought. When Jacob transferred here back in middle school, only took three guesses to solve the riddle. It was Mississippi.”

  “That’s a great story.” Spinneretta gave an exhausted grunt as she reached for her bag. If this girl wasn’t taking the hint, maybe burying her nose in a book would do the trick. She thrust her hand into the folds of the bag and extracted a heavy paperback volume: Isaiah Thorne’s On Magick, Wherein Folklore and Quantum Mechanics Collide. It was the latest in a series of similarly themed books she’d borrowed from the library. She cracked the book open to the page she’d left off on and started to read. To her dismay, Jessica seemed to be studying the back cover with interest. Whatever. Not like I care what this girl thinks of me.

  The book was a curious volume, written half in fluorescently bombastic language and half in the driest academic monotone she’d ever seen. The half concerned with mythology and the asserted reality of otherworldly forces was absorbing and enlightening. The other half, filled with tedious diagrams and mechanical equations impenetrable to her current understanding of physics, gave her some confidence that this Thorne was more than a New Age seer looking for a quick buck.

  A few minutes later, after another handful of students had boisterously entered the classroom, the door opened a final time and a middle-aged blonde woman in a white button-down shirt and floor-length blue skirt entered. The clashing fashion styles made Spinneretta raise her eyebrows at the woman she assumed would be her homeroom teacher. With a liberating sigh, she let On Magick fall closed. She tilted the cover away from Jessica’s line of sight, lest she invite more unwelcome questions, and slid it back into her bag.

  The clock struck eight, and a shrill alarm cried through the halls. When it went silent, leaving a painful ring behind where inane chatter once ruled, the woman smiled and addressed the class.

  “Good morning, everyone,” she said. “For those of you who don’t know me, my name is Catherine Gamble, and I’ll be your homeroom teacher this year. For most of you, that will be again.” She snickered to herself, though few of the students seemed to share her excitement. “Well, since I’m sure nobody wants to hear my devil in the belfry jokes a second or third time, shall we just get started?”

  The silence of the room amounted to approval, and so she
consulted her clipboard. “Before we move on to announcements and the clerical, administrative fun that you teenagers are so fond of, I do have a quick announcement.” She smiled again and locked eyes with Spinneretta. “As I’m sure you’ve all noticed, we have a new student this year.”

  Ahh, crap. Spinneretta felt the eyes of the whole room on her. They were more insistent than before. Worse, she could almost smell Jessica’s saccharine smile.

  “Would you like to stand up and introduce yourself, Miss Hallström?” Ms. Gamble said with a welcoming gesture.

  Spinneretta cringed. Standing up and introducing herself was a terrible way to start out the not getting noticed thing that was at the top of her agenda. On the other hand, publicly refusing to play by the teacher’s rules would be an express ticket to Attention City. With a half-hearted sigh, she rose from her seat. She crossed her arms and turned to face the greatest portion of students in the classroom.

  “The name’s Sarah Hallström,” she said. “My family moved here a couple months ago. I have a younger brother and a younger sister. There’s not much to do around here, so I spend most of my time at the library. I’m not really that interesting. And that’s about it.” She kicked her chair out from under her desk and dropped into it again.

  Ms. Gamble hummed a satisfied noise. “Thank you, Miss Hallström.” The teacher made a mark on her clipboard to remind herself that one piece of business was now finished. “Well then, does anyone have any questions for Miss Hallström?”

  A hand shot up in the back. Ms. Gamble gestured toward a boy wearing a backward baseball cap. The boy opened his mouth to speak, but a harsh bird-like noise from the teacher interrupted him. He shook his head in aggravation as he was beckoned to his feet. When he satisfied Ms. Gamble by rising, he was at last able to pose his utterly unsurprising question. “What’s with the jacket? You know it’s like ninety degrees, right?” Someone in his area chuckled.

  “Genetic skin condition,” Spinneretta said as spitefully as she could. “Sunlight causes my arms to break out in bloody, scaly rashes. And I’m reasonably sure nobody wants to see that. Is that what you wanted to hear?”

  The boy seemed shocked at her answer, and sat down with a rueful look on his face.

  Ms. Gamble gave him a sharp look. “Good work, Jeremy. I hope the witty question was worth making your new classmate feel bad. I’m so sorry, Sarah, you must forgive him. He thinks he’s very funny.”

  Spinneretta waved her hand in dismissal. Truthfully, she was glad someone asked; now her rehearsed explanation was out in the open to quell any dangerous suspicions.

  “Are your legs okay?” Jessica asked from beside her.

  Spinneretta’s mind froze. “Wh-what?” Her hand flew to the front of her jacket and gave it a quick tug, verifying that the buttons were still fastened.

  Jessica looked disarmed at her response. “Your . . . legs,” she said with a confused gesture.

  Spinneretta’s gaze flashed down to her skirt. “Ahh!” Human legs. Come on. Get your head in the game, Spins. After shaking away the fright, she nodded. “Yeah. Mostly. I take medication for it, so it’s not that bad. For some reason, it doesn’t work well on my arms.” She feigned dejection and caressed the sleeve of her jacket. “At least it mostly works,” she muttered. “I’d kill myself if I couldn’t at least wear a skirt in this heat.”

  A couple of the students giggled at the morbid joke. Ms. Gamble, however, was none too amused. After glaring at Spinneretta for a few moments, she turned her attention back to her clipboard. “Since it’s your first day, I’ll pretend I didn’t hear that.” She flipped the page over. “Alright. Now that that’s out of the way, let’s move on to some of the changes taking effect this year.”

  But Spinneretta wasn’t listening to the announcement. Her heart was still pounding. Absentmindedly, she slid her hand under her olive jacket and began to rub her fingers over the smooth exterior of her coiled spider legs. Her recent molt had left them soft, malleable, and hyper-sensitive. She hated how vulnerable the days following a molt made her feel, but after suffering that pain for nearly two months the relief was immeasurable. The smooth texture of the still-hardening chitin was somehow addictive. The fresh nerve endings running beneath the shell tingled, and she lost herself in the sensation. It was so much more enthralling than the charade of normality. The end of the day couldn’t come soon enough.

  “The name’s Matthew Hallström,” Arthr announced to the class with a boastful smile. “You can call me Matt, but don’t expect me to answer to it. I just moved here with my parents and sisters. Now, you’re probably all wondering, the hell’s this idiot doing with a jacket on in this weather?” Some of the students chuckled at the bit of self-deprecation. “The answer is that I have a skin condition. Genetic. Both my sisters have it, too, and so we all have to wear these damn jackets all the time.” He shrugged a little. “Well, whatever. Life sucks, keep on living. Anyway, I’m hella into running, so if any of you cuties need a running partner—or maybe even a coach—hit me up.” He winked, and a few of the girls in the class giggled either out of flattery or derision.

  “That’ll be quite enough, Matthew,” Mr. Rutherford said from behind his toad-eyed glasses. “I’d advise you to keep your flirting to yourself during school hours.”

  He shrugged at his teacher. “Hey, I’m just givin’ the ladies what they want.”

  “Sit down, Matthew.”

  Arthr did as he was told, cocky smile still plastered over his face. He leaned over toward the blonde cutie fortune had seated him next to. “How you doin’?”

  She looked as though she could have laughed away the advance, but common courtesy kept her quiet. Arthr sighed and pulled out his notebook. Maybe things were best that she didn’t say anything back. Either way, it seemed he’d made a splash. They’d remember his name, he was sure of that. Somehow, however, that thought failed to satisfy him the way he’d thought it would.

  As Mr. Rutherford started to lecture on the syllabi and curricula, Arthr’s attention began to drift. He had to stay strong. He had to stay alive. He didn’t notice when Mr. Rutherford passed him the first of a number of important documents for his schedule.

  “Carl?”

  “Here.”

  “Josephine?”

  “Here.”

  “Linus?”

  “Present.”

  “Melody?”

  Kara tried to reread the paragraph in her book for the third time. The words fell in an erratic rain upon her mind. Apathy. Why couldn’t she enjoy this? Whispering Unicorns: Bone Lord’s Offering was her favorite in the series, but now it just filled her with numbness. She’d made it three chapters in, but like the last two months, those pages were an unfeeling blur. But usually that blur didn’t make her angry. She wished that the Sunday-suited harpy at the front of the room would just shut up and leave her to her peace.

  The teacher glanced about the classroom. “Melody? Melody Hallström?”

  Kara grunted and raised her hand. The stork-like woman confirmed her presence by putting a check on her clipboard. That was all Kara was now: a check mark. A number. The woman looked her over with a concerned glint in her eye. “Aren’t you hot, sweetie?”

  Aren’t you hot? Seriously? You have to ask? Kara wouldn’t give Mrs. Gernge the satisfaction of an answer. She just clasped her concealed spider legs tighter around her and pulled her pink jacket snug, relishing the trace of a breeze that came with the subtle motion. She tried for a fourth time to read the top paragraph on the page. It was a hollow endeavor.

  “Sweetie?”

  Kara ignored her.

  “Alright then,” Mrs. Gernge said with an indignant little huff. “Trisha?”

  “Here.”

  “Joshua?”

  “Here.”

  Mrs. Gernge kept reading the names on her list, and every one sounded alike to Kara. You’re not like them, each droning syllable seemed to echo. Even the ink on the page of her book seemed to mock her. It was all unchanging. I
t was mass-produced and trite, like the names on that damn roll sheet. How many Trishas and Joshuas were there in the world? How many Melodies? She closed her book, feeling the sting of the hot air against her flushed cheeks and neck. Why don’t they have a freaking air conditioner? Are they trying to kill us?

  When the hollow drone of the names ended, Mrs. Gernge handed out a stapled goldenrod packet to all the students. Kara looked hers over with disinterest. Classes. They were split into periods now. A schedule. It was something called a block schedule, which she couldn’t bother deciphering. There were dates for exams and evaluations listed. She didn’t care. She didn’t want to be here. Her stomach hurt. This whole charade made her sick. Fresh start. What crap.

  She barely noticed when the bell rang and Mrs. Gernge directed her half of the group to history and the other half to math. She had to look at her paper three times before the room number stuck. D Building, Room 119. Numb, in a lifeless daze, Kara stood and drifted through the humid air toward her first class. She suspected that whatever teacher she had would just drone on and on about regulations, materials, and tests. It was all meaningless. It was all umbermuddle. She closed her eyes as she walked, desperately hoping to awake.

  Fire sears my naked chest, and I stumble back in shock of the attack. The watchman sees my moment of weakness and lunges at me with his stone knife. It sinks deep into my shoulder. The pain is excruciating, and fury drives my thoughts toward a carnal hunger. He pulls back for a third attack, but I am already upon him. I rip at his face with my hands and legs. His screams and blood meld into a euphoric bath, and I let myself go wild. I rip and tear until he falls face down in the mud. Still in a rage, I kick the discarded torch. The embers flutter and die around Guttag’s corpse, and I fight the primal urge to feast upon him, to give in to the lust for blood.