Act I: Hollow Shades
It was full night when Vermilion finally collapsed against the ice-crusted trunk of a bare aspen. He barely felt the smooth bark against his numb shoulder. Every sense was overwhelmed by the burning pain in his lungs, by the way his throat closed and whistled with each breath and the air felt like sandpaper; by the thick, electric taste of metal that welled up from his chest with each exhalation. He couldn’t see anymore – a long gray tunnel swallowed all but the center of his vision and swam in time with his pulse. The terrible, stabbing pain crushing his head didn’t even deserve mention.
Get up. Get up, get up get up. He spat something hot and red on the snow and pushed himself away from the tree with an anguished groan. The feathery, wet weight on his back shifted, nearly fell, and he twisted to catch Zephyr before she could slide off onto the snowy ground.
The branches rattled above as Cloud Fire crashed through them to a precarious stop, raining little twigs down on him and Zephyr. The pegasus panted with each ragged breath. He’d somehow managed to hold onto his spear, and it dripped onto the snow around them.
“We’re close, I think,” Cloudy said. Just those four words took all the breath out of him, and he gasped in the cold air before continuing. “Maybe half a mile. C-can you keep mov-v-ving?”
A half a mile. Vermilion wanted to weep. Instead he pushed away from the trunk and sucked in a deep lungful of air, forcing himself to hold it. His chest quaked with each beat of his heart.
“Yeah,” he said. His flayed throat melted the words, reducing them to a mournful whisper. He tried again, ignoring the pain, and spoke louder, “Yeah. Let’s go.”
The best he could manage was a slow trot – any faster and his legs would fail, and he would fall into the snow, and Zephyr with him, and that would be the end of their story. Cloud Fire was in no condition to carry either of them through these woods, and with only the sliver of a quarter moon in the sky, there was little chance he could bring help back to find them. The only way out of the forest was to walk out themselves.
Zephyr shifted on his back and groaned quietly. That was a good sign – the dead didn’t groan.
“We’re almost there, Zephyr,” he whispered. “Almost there. Almost there.”
They found the footpath a few minutes later. Not much more than a game trail, but clear of the worst of the undergrowth. For a moment he dared to hope that they were close.
“Okay, I, uh, see something. Maybe torches?” Cloud’s wings beat, and he leapt a dozen feet above the path. “The town’s a bit further past them, I think. I can see the bell tower, and—hide!”
Vermilion moved faster than thought. From the path he dove into the underbrush, squeezing between the trees, trying to make himself one with the roots and snow. He clamped a hoof over Zephyr’s muzzle and prayed that she wouldn’t wake.
Silence returned to the forest. Somewhere in the darkness, fluttering wings heralded an nighthawk taking flight. Dimly, distantly, he imagined he could hear the shouts of the townponies in Hollow Shades.
The seconds stretched out into a minute. He exhaled slowly, a sip at a time, and drew in another breath. Still, nothing broke the silence, and he was readying to crawl out of the brambles when the spider appeared.
It moved with an eerie silence for something so large. As big as a wagon – though not the largest he’d seen that night, that honor went to the one Zephyr nearly died fighting – and supported on eight clawed, spindly legs that barely stirred the leaves with each step. It stank of rotting meat and death and something else foul and alien. He gagged pressed his nose into the snow.
It stopped on the path a few yards away and froze, its front legs lifted to sense the air. Only its jaws never ceased moving, always working in circles, chewing at the empty air. Dark fangs, as long as scythes, flashed in the gloom.
It knows! It knows! A cold panic seized Vermilion’s heart. His legs tensed, and he readied to bolt. Hopefully the spider would chase him and leave Zephyr—
The brush to his left shook, and a panicked rabbit darted out. It scrabbled across one of the spider’s legs and recoiled, then shot down the path in a blur. After an instant the spider followed, smashing through the trees in its pursuit. The sudden cacophony was deafening against the silence.
The crashing continued into the distance, and Cloud Fire fell out of the trees, landing beside him. Sweat glistened in his coat despite the chill.
“Damn.” He swallowed heavily, his wings bobbing unconsciously. “It was close enough to touch you.”
“I noticed.” Vermilion shoved his way out of the brambles, dragging Zephyr’s limp form with him. Her breathing was shallow but steady, something he thought he recalled from the Company’s medical training was a good thing. Or, at least, not a bad thing. The horrid gash running up her side, just beneath her left wing and ending at her neck, still seeped blood, but not as much as before. Their desperate, pitiful bandage was little more than a red-soaked scrap now, held in the wound by a prayer.
Cloud Fire nosed at her mane. “How is she?”
“She’ll be fine.” Probably. Hopefully. They really needed to find a medic soon, though. Vermilion pushed her up onto his shoulders again and set off down the path at a canter.
Miraculously, no more nightmares accosted them, and a few hundred yards later they found part of the company on the outskirts of the town. They were disorganized, only a step up from a rabble, with not enough officers trying to corral the wounded and dispirited ponies into some semblance of order. The major was there, huddled with Electrum. She held one bloodstained leg off the ground.
“There you are!” Buckeye’s thunderous voice nearly startled Vermilion into dropping his load. “Thank Celestia, we thought we lost all three of you. Someone fetch a medic, dammit!”
Together they trundled Zephyr over to the triage zone, where a dozen other ponies were laid out in various states of alive. The shell-pink unicorn mare who’d tended his wounds, all those weeks ago, immediately set to work on the wounded pegasus. Her horn glowed, lighting the ghastly wound on Zephyr’s side, and she tore the makeshift bandage away.
“Was she bit?” She pulled a jar out of her saddlebags and began rubbing some sort of salve into the cut.
“No.” Cloud Fire shook his head. “It caught her with its leg. She got it, though, speared it right through the head.”
“What about you two?” Buckeye asked. “Are you hurt?”
Yes, Vermilion wanted to say. He wanted to tell the sergeant about his burning lungs, and what was probably a cracked rib, and the way he kept spitting up blood when he coughed. But then he looked around, and counted, and it didn’t take a unicorn to realize there were fewer able-bodied ponies than wounded.
“I’m fine,” he croaked. “Just need some water.”
“I’m good, boss,” Cloud Fire said. “What’s the plan? Where’s Quicklime?”
“She’s with the major,” Buckeye said. “And we’re leaving. Once the medic’s done, get Zephyr into a wagon.”
“Okay. But, uh, I can just carry her, sir.” The town was only a hundred yards away. Even in the near-black night, Vermilion could make out the shape of the buildings against the sky. They occluded the stars. “It’s not that far to the town hall or wherever we’re putting the wounded—”
“We’re not going to the town, we’re going back to Equestria,” Buckeye said. He heaved a barrel of water onto his back and effortlessly carried it over to the wagon. “We’re done here. The town is lost.”
“But…” Vermilion glanced between the sergeant and the town. “What do you mean? It’s right there.”
“So are the spiders. They’ve already overrun half of it.” Buckeye turned back to the torches, and for the first time Vermilion noticed the blood flowing down half his face from a cut in his mane, and the wide, manic set of his eyes. “The major’s given the order. We’re leaving.”
“What about the townponies?” Cloud Fire asked. He knelt by Zephyr’s side, holding one of her limp hooves in his.
“They’re more than welcome to come with us.”
No. Vermilion frowned. “We can’t just leave. We… ponies died out there, sir! More will die if we don’t fight back!”
“Keep your voice down, private,” Buckeye snarled. “You want to be insubordinate? Fine, go tell the major what she can or can’t do. Just don’t come crying to me when she bites your face off.”
On any other day, the mere idea of confronting the major would have ended the discussion. Privates didn’t argue with officers, and earth ponies especially didn’t argue with officers. He might as well have tried to fly or use magic. But this was not an ordinary day, and so much that was normal had already been lost, shed alongside blood and lives. A quiet rage built inside him, feeding on the pain still gnawing at his chest, and finally it snapped.
“Fine, I will!” he growled. The look of shock on Buckeye and Cloud Fire’s faces was priceless, and he spun away to march over to the major’s little group.
The must have heard him coming, or heard the shouting, because the huddle broke apart before he arrived. Electrum scowled at him, Quicklime wore a mixture of relief and worry, and the major simply regarded him with the stoic, sphinx-like inscrutability he’d come to expect from her.
“I’m glad to see you’re alive, private,” she said. “You have something to add to our discussion?”
He pulled up short. Even fueled by anger, it was no small matter to confront the major. “You’ve ordered us to leave? To retreat?”
“Private, that’s enough,” Electrum said. “Go back to your squad and—”
“A moment, captain,” the major interrupted. “You disagree, private?”
“Disagree?” His voice cracked. “Disagree? Ma’am, our mission is to help the town, not flee from it! If we do that, then why did we come all this way? Why did all those ponies get hurt or killed, if we’re just going to run? Was it all a waste? Was it for nothing?”
“You haven’t seen the town yet,” Electrum said. “It’s hopeless in there. All we’d be doing is adding to the slaughter if we tried to march in there. You want to talk about wasting lives? That’s all that would be, private. And if you haven’t noticed, we’re a little short on ponies to be tossing away at the moment.”
“Cherry,” Quicklime spoke for the first time since his arrival. He’d never heard her sound so exhausted. He noticed, now, the way her ears hung limp against her mane, and the heavy bags under her eyes. “I’ve been in there. Most of the townponies are gone already. The only ones left are dead or just too stubborn to give up.”
“They’re fighting back?” Vermilion looked between them. “We could help them. If we got enough healthy ponies, we could secure part of the town and—”
“This is foolishness,” Electrum said. “Ma’am, I’ve got to start organizing the troops. We can move out as soon as you give the order.”
She nodded. “Start moving as soon as you’re able. We’ll catch up. Quicklime, please go with him. Vermilion, can I speak with you a moment?”
“Uh, sure.” He watched Electrum and Quicklime depart with some trepidation. “Er, yes ma’am.”
She waited until they were out of earshot. “You want to keep fighting? Try to save the town?”
He nodded. “I do.”
“It’s dangerous in there. You’ll probably die if you try.”
He licked his lips. “That’s… there’s still ponies in there, ma’am. We have to try and help them.”
A tiny smile appeared on her lips. “I’m glad to hear that, private.”
“You are?”
“Indeed. I didn’t want to do this alone.” She picked up a spear – there were plenty lying around – and cradled it in her good leg. “If you really mean that, follow me.”
* * *
They stopped at the edge of the town, huddling in the lee of an abandoned cottage. Something had smashed in the home’s door and left deep gouges in the whitewashed timbers. The scent of smoke wafted out from the darkness inside. Scattered hoofprints in the snow suggested – he prayed – that the family had escaped.
The rest of the company was already a hazy memory behind them. The last he’d seen of his friends was Cloud Fire’s confused face as Electrum gathered the troops. He hadn’t had time to say goodbye.
“Okay, we’re here.” The major sketched a quick diagram in the slush with the tip of her spear. It was crude, all boxes and circles and lines, but he could just discern the shape of the town. The major slashed through half of it. “The western half is overrun, and the safe part is shrinking with every minute. The town hall was still clear when the last of our scouts fled, and maybe a few dozen houses besides.”
“How many spiders are there?”
She shook her head. “More than we could count. And more keep coming from the woods. You saw that part, I gather.”
He gave her a jerky nod. He’d seen plenty of that part, how the woods had seemed so calm, so empty after their decisive victory at the ravine, not even a day ago. And then, like a devilish floodgate thrown open, the forest had erupted. The shadows vomited out a torrent of monsters. They’d barely gotten their weapons up before the horde arrived. The rest of the night had been a running battle as they fled back toward the town.
“Yeah,” he said. “We saw that.”
“We’ll stick to the east side at first, against the walls but never getting into narrow alleys. I’ll be in the air above you. Head for the town hall, and don’t try to fight unless you have to.”
“And when we get there?”
“Let’s cross that bridge when we get to it,” Canopy said. She hefted the spear and jumped, her wings snapping out to catch the air. In seconds she was lost in the darkness, and he barely heard her parting words: “Good luck to us.”
Right. Good luck. They were due for some of that by now, he figured. He drew his saber, ignoring the taste of spider blood on the grip, and stepped into Hollow Shades.
The first buildings on the edge of town were little more than ruined shells, half-fallen into rubble, their frames scaled and blackened by fire. Apparently the ponies inside had tried to fight back with torches, or in the chaos a lantern had smashed in a pile of straw, and the destruction proceeded from there. An ashen haze hung over them and seeped out onto the road, gathering in shallow pools. Half-melted snow, black with soot, splashed beneath his hooves and splattered his belly, staining his russet coat. The nighttime chill returned, doubled, and only his death grip on the sword’s hilt kept his teeth from chattering.
Webs hung between the buildings. They reflected the fire’s light and sparkled like icicles. A dark, eight-legged shape the size of a large dog dangled upside-down just a dozen feet away. He walked a large circle around it, never looking away, until he was out from beneath its web.
As such, he never saw the spider on the ground until it jumped.
He spun toward the blur, reacting out of pure, panicked instinct, and that saved his life. The spider’s fang’s caught on the sword’s hilt instead of his neck, and his blade sheared off one of its legs. They both screamed, and Vermilion stumbled back, his sword falling to the ground with a clatter. Hot blood splashed on his cheek.
The spider didn’t stay down. It skittered in a circle, leaking dark ichor from its severed leg that steamed in the snow. Fire danced in its eight eyes, and it reared back, exposing dagger-like fangs. Before Vermilion could recover his sword, it jumped at him again.
A pegasus could have flown away. A skilled unicorn might have teleported; a weaker one might have just held the spider in his magic, or blasted it with a spell. But Vermilion was an earth pony, and he could do none of these things.
So he did what earth ponies did, and swung his hoof in a wild, desperate arc. He caught the spider square in its fat, bulbous abdomen and sent it flying back a dozen paces. The thick chitin cracked like an egg. Its legs spasmed once, twitched, and fell still.
It was probably dead. He made sure by stomping it until nothing remained but paste. Somepony was screaming, and he realized after a few moments that it was him.
Something landed behind him, and he spun, hoof already lashing out in a blind strike. Canopy stepped away, easily avoiding the blow, and waited.
Crap. He’d forgotten she was up there. “Sorry,” he said. “Just, uh, little spider.”
A tiny smile tugged at the corner of her lips. “I never doubted you. It’s a mess up ahead, though. Better if we stick together.”
He retrieved his dropped saber and flicked the blood off the blade. “I think I’d like that.”
They slipped through the town’s cracks after that, darting from shadow to shadow, hopscotching toward the market square. They saw dozens of spiders, hanging in webs or skittering through the snow, but none bothered to investigate their hiding spots or pursue them more than a few yards. Perhaps the chaos of the burning town overwhelmed their senses, or perhaps they knew a predator when they saw one, and avoided the major for that reason.
They stopped at the edge of the square. Ahead, the town hall was the largest structure in Hollow Shades not actually on fire. Ominous cracks climbed up from the fractured foundation to the windows high on the third story. The wrought-iron pegasus weather vane dangled from webs, clattering against the walls in time with the wind.
It seemed like a desperate place to make a final stand, but through the windows Vermilion saw ponies moving. Torches and lanterns cast dancing shadows. Somewhere inside, he heard a foal’s cry.
The market square was empty. Or, he supposed, it was empty of living things – silk-wrapped corpses lay on the cobbles, slowly gathering snow. There were dead spiders, too. Either the villagers or the company had made a stand here.
Vermilion paused at the edge of the square. Another step and he’d be in the open, beyond even the illusion of safety. A fresh wave of fear crawled up his spine.
A soft wing settled on his shoulders, and he felt the warmth of the major’s body at his side. “Relax, you’re doing fine.”
Yeah, ‘fine’. He’d hate to see what she considered a disaster. “What’s the plan?”
“We secure the square, and give the ponies in the hall a chance to escape. Hopefully anypony else in the town, too.”
“And what if the spiders attack?”
“Then we fight them as long as we can. And when everypony has gotten out, we’ll stay here, and make sure the spiders don’t follow.”
Oh. He realized, now, why he was the only pony the major had brought with her. He forced himself to breath.
“We’re not leaving, are we?” he asked.
She shook her head. “I doubt it. Ready?”
Of course not. He tried to swallow, but his parched throat refused to work. “Yeah,” he whispered.
They stepped out into the square together. Out there, on the flat, snow-covered mud, out of the wind’s shadow, Vermilion felt the touch of winter again. The heat in his blood fled, leaving an icy stillness, a foreboding not at all relieved by their sudden sense of exposure. Out there in the square, away from the buildings and lit by the scattered fire, they were like ants on a sheet of paper. He shivered and clenched the saber tighter in his jaws.
The major moved without hesitation, and he had to scramble to keep up. Spiders – dozens, perhaps hundreds – skittered in the shadows around the square, hiding between the buildings and fashioning webs in the alleys. Light reflected off their shells like a thousand glittering stars.
Canopy stopped in front of the town hall. The door was shut, but through the high windows they could see the flickering light of candles. Frantic, pony-shaped shadows danced inside.
“Ahoy in there!” Canopy reversed her spear and slammed the butt into the doors. The report echoed across the square, and for a moment the spiders hiding in the shadows froze. “Anypony in the town hall, can you hear us?”
There was a moment of silence, followed by the loud sound of furniture being dragged across wood. The doors rattled, then opened just wide enough for a pony to peer out. Vermilion thought he saw a huddled crowd within.
It was Pyrite who answered. She stuck her muzzle out the crack in the door. Soot and blood left dark streaks in her coat, and she stared at them with wide eyes for a long moment before speaking.
“Major. Come to save us now?” She glanced at Vermilion. “And where is the rest of your troop?”
“Many were injured or killed in the woods,” Canopy said. “Our survivors are preparing to return to Equestria. Come with us.”
Pyrite’s lips curled in a snarl. “Come with you? Flee with you, you mean. What happened to your promise, Equestrian? You said you would save our town.”
“The situation has changed. If you wish to blame this calamity on me, you may. But if you stay here you will die.”
It was useless. Vermilion could have told the major that – he should have told her that, before they risked their lives coming back here. The same stubbornness that had led these ponies to build their lives a thousand leagues from Equestria’s capital would doom them here. They would have more luck trying to argue with the spiders. A hot well of anger bubbled up from his wounded chest, burning away the chill and the pain and the exhaustion, leaving only clarity.
“You fools,” he said. “Do you know how many ponies died tonight? Dozens, at least, and we’ll never find their bodies. You could at least honor their sacrifice by saving your own damn lives!”
Pyrite stared at him as he spoke, and her expression hardened. She opened her mouth to speak, but then her eyes widened and filled with fear, and she vanished back inside the door. It slammed shut after her.
Huh. He turned, knowing what he would see. The major already had her spear up.
Behind them, in the center of the square, was the largest spider Vermilion had ever seen. Larger by half than the one the company had dragged out of the woods and pinned in the earth outside of town. It loomed over them both. It didn’t even have to bite them – it could have stepped on them and had the same result.
The major let out a slow breath. “Guard the door, private.”
Guard the door. Sure. Vermilion was torn between the utter hopelessness of that order and pride that the major actually thought an insignificant earth pony like him could possibly hope to guard the door against a monster like that. Still, an order was an order. He backed up and ground his feet into the snow, getting a good grip with his hooves, and then lowered his head to charge.
The major limped toward the spider on three legs. She cradled the spear in her good foreleg, and wobbled whenever her injured leg touched the snow. She stopped a few body lengths away from the spider and stared up at it.
It moved obscenely fast, far faster than anything so large should have been able to move. One moment it watched her, and the next moment it was simply there, standing where she had been, its crab-like front legs curled inward to snatch her up and deliver her to its fangs.
But she was already gone when it arrived.
She was like the lightning, a blur that fooled his eyes. She slipped between its legs and brought the spear around in a wide arc. The steel head reflected the fire’s light and carved a gleaming streak through the night, terminating when it passed effortlessly through the spider’s leg. A shower of black blood sprayed out in a fan across the snow.
The spider stumbled, suddenly unbalanced. It started to stand, its legs uncurling, but the major was moving again, and striking again, and another of its legs fell away.
It didn’t last much longer. She didn’t just kill it, she dismantled it, taking it apart as easily as a foal might tear the petals off a flower. Legs, fangs, eyes fell away. The spider tried to crawl from them, leaving a thick black stain on the snow beneath it.
She didn’t let it get far. Her spear came down through its head, between the clusters of eyes, and the massive body fell still.
Guard the door, indeed. Vermilion realized the sword was dangling from his loose jaws, and he slid it back into his scabbard. He was proud of how little he shook.
“How?” he asked when she came back. Her green coat was nearly invisible beneath the ichor. Her chest heaved with each breath.
“Years of practice,” she said. “And I’m feeling all of them right now. I’m not sure I can do that again.”
Vermilion was pretty sure he could never do that, ever. He turned back to the town hall and the closed door behind them. “Okay, uh, now what?”
“Now we—”
The thunder of a collapsing house drowned out her words. They turned together toward the sound and froze. A moment later, the major’s spear clattered as it fell onto the hard-packed snow.
It was not a spider. It couldn’t be a spider, though it wore the shape of one. The monsters they had faced before were pale shadows of this thing, foals huddled beneath their mother’s barrel. Its legs were as thick as trees, and if it cared to it could reach up and touch the third-story window of the town hall. Its fat body was larger than the cottage Vermilion’s parents called home. It strode casually through the ruins of somepony’s home and into the square.
Vermilion’s legs gave up, and he fell onto his haunches. The sword dangled from loose lips. His fear was gone, banished by a terrible awe. Not even the princesses, when he had passed by their reviewing stand during his graduation ceremony, had inspired such pitiable smallness in him. The urge to grovel before this leviathan clawed at his soul.
The titanic monster stopped before the remains of the spider Canopy had slain. It inspected them briefly, as though curious, then lowered its head and began to feed. Piece by piece the corpse vanished into the monster’s gullet. Gore fell like rain from its jaws. Finally, finished with its meal, the spider peered down at them.
Its attention was like a hammer. The sword fell from Vermilion’s numb grip and clattered on the stones.
“Another guard, another guard,” the monster said. Its voice was a rockslide. “I thought they had fled.”
Vermilion blinked dumbly. “You… you can talk.” His voice was soft, almost lost in the night, but it must have carried to the monster’s ears.
“Of course I can talk,” it said. “I was talking long before you ponies crawled out of the mud. I talk to my daughters, but they never talk back.”
“Your…” Canopy glanced at the broken, torn remains at the monster’s feet. “You ate it. Your daughter.”
“It is natural.” The monster nudged a severed leg with its claw, as though considering whether it was worth consuming. “You ponies eat grass. Birds eat worms. Cats eat mice. And I? I eat everything.”
“Oh.” Vermilion looked down at his sword. Something like a laugh burbled in his throat. “What are you?”
The spider turned. Four of its eyes swiveled toward the dark eastern horizon, and it was silent for a moment. When it spoke, Vermilion thought he heard a faint longing in its voice.
“The lords in the east called me Blightweaver, once. But that was ages past, before I consumed them, and now I am nameless again. You may call me Blightweaver too, if you like. It would be fitting to hear that name again.”
Vermilion forced his numb legs into motion. He stood, shaking, and reached down for his sword. He raised it and held his breath, and slowly the trembling faded. He closed his eyes and imagined it was sunlight he felt on his coat. Resolve replaced awe and fear.
He took a half-step toward Canopy. “What do we do?”
She picked up her fallen spear. “I’ll need some altitude. Distract it for as long as you can.”
As long as you can. She didn’t need to say what came after that. He jerked his head in a stiff nod.
“Good luck,” she whispered, and then her wings beat in their own whisper of air, and she vanished.
The spider tracked her for a moment, its head tilting back. Its legs twitched, but then it looked back down, returning the full force of his gaze to Vermilion. There was something almost thoughtful, almost like a pony, in its expression.
Vermilion looked up at Blightweaver. “You are not welcome here. Leave, and take your kin with you.”
“No,” it replied. “I will eat you.”
“There are thousands of us. We will stop you.”
The monster took a step forward. It closed a dozen feet with a single motion. “I will eat them. They will make a fine meal.”
“The princesses will stop you.”
“I will eat your princesses, little pony. I will eat their armies and their cities. I will drink your lakes and consume your mountains. I will eat everything, until only the sun and the moon and the stars remain, and then I will catch them in my webs and eat them too. And then I will be alone and complete, and the universe will celebrate my triumph. But first, little pony, I will eat you.”
The spider leaned forward with exaggerated care. Like Vermilion was nothing more than a succulent bud to nip away from the stem. Fangs as thick and long as Vermilion’s leg descended, reaching for him.
Beneath this god, Vermilion was nothing. Less than a mouse. He saw his tiny life measured against the fallen town, the dead guards, and the whole of Equestria. It was so small and worthless that he nearly laughed at the thought that he might have mattered.
But even the smallest things could choose how they died. He brought his sword up and around in a wild swing, a final act of defiance. It struck the monstrous fang and shattered. Shards of steel rang as they rained onto the cobblestones.
Blightweaver reared back, surprised. For a long moment it stared at Vermilion, and its body began to judder. A deep, rumbling roar, more felt than heard, began to shake Vermilion’s chest.
It was laughing, he realized. It was laughing at him.
“Little insect,” it said. “You think mortal weapons can harm me? Can harm a god?”
The monster swung a claw-tipped leg at him with blinding speed. It struck with the force of a runaway wagon before Vermilion could even consider moving out of its way.
If Vermilion had been a pegasus, the blow would have torn him in half. A unicorn might have been luckier and merely died instantly. But Vermilion was an earth pony, and even though he was weak and scrawny by the standards of his tribe, the earth pony blood mattered. He was hardy and tough, and it saved his life.
Half his ribs snapped. His chest exploded with pain, unlike anything he’d ever felt before, and a scream erupted from his lungs before choking off with a bloody gurgle. He felt, briefly, the unusual sensation of flight, and then darkness.
He couldn’t have been out for long, since he was still alive when he opened his eyes. Blightweaver still stood in the center of the square, nearly fifty feet away. It didn’t feel like he’d flown that far.
“Still alive?” It took a step toward him. “You should be honored, little insect. Most mortals will go to feed my daughters, but a god will devour you. Enjoy this next—”
A loud, high whistle drowned out the rest of what Blightweaver had to say. A shining flash streaked down from the heavens like a meteor, striking just behind Blightweaver’s head. A tremendous clap of thunder accompanied the impact. The spider staggered, driven nearly to the ground. A rain of wood splinters fell all around.
The major followed her spear earthward. She had a small sword in her jaws as she swooped toward the downed spider. For a moment her lithe, extended form was the most beautiful thing Vermilion had ever seen.
And then Blightweaver swatted her out of the sky, as casually as a pony might flick away a fly with her tail. The major tumbled through the air, slammed into the snow-covered stones, bounced, rolled, and came to a stop. She didn’t move.
Oh no. No. Vermilion pushed himself upright, ignoring the rending pain in his chest. The broken ruins of his ribs ground against each other with each step toward Canopy.
She was still alive. Her eyes were open, though dazed, and she tried to stand before collapsing on shattered legs. Their eyes met, and she shook her head. Her lips moved, though she lacked the breath to speak.
“Run,” she whispered.
Blightweaver’s claw came down, spearing her through. She found the breath to scream now and struggled as the spider lifted her up towards its jaws. In the last moment, before his jaws closed, she reached into her saddlebag and pulled out a simple ceramic jar. It looked oddly familiar to Vermilion, and he knew he should have recognized it. Hadn’t he just held something like that?
Canopy crushed the jar between her hooves.
The night vanished, replaced by a cold blue sun. The heat struck him next, curling the hair of his coat. The snow all around the courtyard flashed into steam. His vision vanished. The roar of flames and a loud, keening scream filled his ears.
In time his vision returned, though he could not say how long he huddled in the steaming puddles, curled up to hide from the searing fire. Amorphous afterimages, like dancing nebulae, faded, replaced by the fragmentary darkness of the burning square. The houses all around were blackened. The snow was gone – only mud remained now.
And in the center of the square, mud gave way to baked earth, and then to seared minerals. Blightweaver still stood there, smoking. Unmoving.
Had she done it? Had she killed a god? Vermilion took a stumbling step forward. His hoof squelched in the quickly cooling mud. He shuffled back toward the monster, dragging his hooves through the muck, looking for his fallen sword.
He found the pieces and stared at them dumbly. They seemed to have fused to the cobblestones. He realized, absently, that Cloud Fire’s penchant for carrying a spare dagger suddenly made sense. You never knew when a monstrous spider-god might break your sword, after all.
A loud crack broke the silence. A huge sheet of ash broke away from one of Blightweaver’s legs, crashing to the ground. Beneath it lay gleaming chitin. It twitched, and more ash fell away, revealing the perfect, unblemished shell beneath.
“Ah,” the beast said. It stretched slowly, extending one leg at a time, knocking away the last bits of char. “I have never felt a fire like that. I wonder if the sun will be so hot when I devour it.”
Vermilion sank to his haunches. The last of his strength fled, and it was all he could do not to fall onto his side. A small voice in the back of his mind whispered to flee, to run like the major had commanded, but he knew better than to try. Nothing could escape death, not death like this. Whether the ponies of Hollow Shades stayed or fled, it didn’t matter. Soon he would join Canopy.
The world had gone silent, Vermilion realized. He looked up to see Blightweaver just yards away, looming over him.
“Steel cannot harm me, little pony,” the monster whispered. “Weapons cannot harm me. Magic cannot harm me. It is my destiny to devour the world, and one pony cannot stop me. Now, go to your fate.” Blightweaver leaned forward again, jaws extended to accept him.
This wasn’t how Canopy died! The small voice railed against his inaction. She fought! She fought until the end!
But he had nothing to fight with. His sword was in fragments, and he had nothing but his hooves. He reached into his saddlebags with his muzzle and grabbed the first thing he found. Anything was better than nothing.
His teeth closed on something foul, something rubbery and meaty and tasting of spider blood. He pulled out the fang he’d severed from that tiny spider all those weeks ago, a fang no larger than a dagger, and swung it into Blightweaver’s eye.
Steel could not break a god’s skin. Magic could not destroy it, nor any other craft a pony might devise. But a spider’s fang, a spider made in the image of a god, of its own flesh: that might.
The tip of the tiny fang punctured Blightweaver’s eye, and for the first time in a thousand years the god knew agony. Its scream was high and loud, a wail more like a foal’s than a monster. The ground quaked as it crashed back, its legs digging at its eye, trying to pull away the fang and the poison within. One of its twitching legs caught Vermilion, tossing him away like a doll.
Vermilion lay on his side and watched Blightweaver stumble away into the night. The cold stones leached away the last of his warmth. He found the falling snow much more interesting than monstrous spider’s escape.
Soon enough, even the snow ceased to matter. He closed his eyes and pretended he was warm again.
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She's Ungoliant, or close kin to her.
Horribly awesome.
I just reread the prologue, and now I'm pretty scared.
We know from it that Vermillion survives, but...what happens to him, now?
Nice
Well, that escalated quickly. Suitably epic end for the major.
Holy crap.
Poor canopy. I liked her. But I suspect that this is the kind of story where liking a character means they aren't long for the world.
Well, this was interesting. What I'm wondering now is if Blightweaver and her (fairly sure she's a her) brood the only things out there, or will other monsters turn up? I would think the first option's more likely for now, but I can't be sure.
Regardless, their spiders' entrance into Equestria proper should be... something. I really think Gloom's Edge may not be around for long, either, at this point.
I sort of expected this to be a few weeks of degradation. I was genuinely thrown that this was set the next day.
First named character death, and I suspect there will be more.
Alondro merely glances at the eight-legged freak with a bored expression. "You have size," he notes. "And that's about it. You're material. A god is more than that. Much more. You have no idea what a god really is. A god the size of an ant would destroy you with a thought. You're a bloated beast too big for its own good. I've killed things a thousand times you in bulk."
And the one who followed the training of the Caped Baldy splattered the so-called god across a wide swath of the forest. With one punch.
(When something powergames, just powergame harder!)
8146484 Or "It" in its spider form!
They need some kids with a slingshot.
8146965
Well, we're still only in Act I...
I had to reread it three times just to make sure I didn't miss anything. This story has just been moved to my favorites list.
Canopy went out like the legend she was.
Damn.
Woah. Ungoliant vs. ponies, it seems like.
Don't die, Vermilion!
Huh. After all but pulling out a photo of her fiancee, I expected Zephyr to be the first to die. Still, if you have to go out, a literal blaze of glory is certainly a great way to do it.
As an added bonus, Blightweaver's weakness is now known, albeit at a heavy cost. This is definitely a pyrrhic victory; I'm just not sure which side counts as winning. Perhaps neither.
So, sounds like partially firebombing the evil forest but not fully firebombing the evil forest was not a good idea.
There's always a bigger spider, apparently.
On the other hand, this may be the boss mob.
I wonder how well this Blightweaver would stand up to just one more bottle of that alchemical fire.
Oh wait, looks like we'll find out.
...crap.
Alright Cherry!
Spit inpoke out the eye of death, to the last.This was the chapter where I immediately liked and favourited upon finishing.
One day, I would like to read an actual novel from you. I don't know if you have any plans to become a full time author but the consistent grace and thrill of your writing has already earned you a dedicated fan. You have long graduated from needing the crutch of fanfiction to craft wonderful stories so I would love to see you branch out more.
Why am I reading this in fimfiction.net and not the New York Times Bestsellers list?
Exclaimed the spider.
xD