Lori Devoti - Amazon Ink

She jerked a hand toward Mother, who grasped me from behind.

“Melanippe. What do you think? You think I leave Zery there for no good cause? The web. It’s set. I take a step; she bleeds. I reach my hand to unravel the spell; she bleeds.”

I took a breath. Tried to focus. “What’s holding her there?”

The creases in Bubbe’s forehead deepened. “The magic.”

“No bonds?” I leaned forward, looking around my grandmother at Zery’s wrists. There was a shadow on them-a design.

Bubbe pushed her lips against my ear. Her lips were dry as they brushed against my skin. “A drawing. An artisan’s work, one skilled as priestess as well.”

I turned my head. Our noses almost brushing, I stared her in the eyes. Questions, concern, fear-all three showed in her gaze.

Not me. I wouldn’t…The objections must have shown on my face. She reached with a gnarled hand and stroked my face. “I know, devochka moya, but the others…? I have no control of their minds.”

“Any priestess could do this,” I whispered, my mind rolling, thinking of Alcippe and her anger at Zery for sending me to the camp.

“Some, not all. And none would use an artisan skill when a priestess spell is quicker.”

She was right, why take the time to draw something, murmuring over each line, pouring some of yourself into every bit of shading, when you could wave your hand, call up the wind or fire or one of the other elements to do your bidding? Only an artisan, someone who loved that connection, needed it, would go to that trouble, but still my mind couldn’t shake an image of Alcippe…the anger in her eyes when she’d stepped out of the safe house’s front door.

“Can art do that?” I nodded to Zery. “Hold someone down?”

“I would have said no…” My grandmother clucked her tongue. “And I would have been wrong.”

“I have to get closer.” I had to see what the design was, see if I recognized it.

Bubbe looked away, her lips disappearing into her mouth.

“I’m the only artisan here,” I said, enunciating each word with precision.

Finally she stepped away, her hand going up as she did, ready to pummel back the warriors if needed. Mother’s fingers squeezed my arm one last time before she stepped back. She motioned to another warrior, and a flashlight was pushed into my hand. I shined it first on Pisto. Her body was rigid, afraid to move forward and hurt Zery further, but forced by allegiance to not leave her queen.

I respected that, but I didn’t want her getting in my way. As I waited, Mother circled around the group, placed a hand on Pisto from behind. The younger warrior ignored her at first, but Mother bit out something I couldn’t hear, probably wouldn’t have understood if I had. Something about loyalty and death, maybe with a dash of tradition thrown in to round it all out. In other words: Amazon propaganda.

I wasn’t going to save Zery because she was an Amazon or my queen. I was going to save her because she was a living being and my friend-my best friend, no matter past differences.

With Pisto under Mother’s control, I moved the beam of light onto Zery. She was still awake, her gaze glued to me. I couldn’t tell what she was feeling. Her eyes just looked confused, like she didn’t know where she was or what was happening to her. I wondered if she recognized any of us.

The thought was disturbing, but at least she wasn’t jerking in pain. I shifted the beam again, this time only a little lower to a shadow I hadn’t noticed before-across her mouth. Lines, like stitches. I almost dropped the flashlight.

Her mouth was sewn closed.

No wonder she hadn’t called out-she couldn’t. Something caught in my throat, the pie I’d gorged on earlier being heaved upward.

My body jerked, a hacking noise leaving my chest. Bubbe spun, her glare like a physical touch knocking me back upright. Show no weakness. Act strong even when you aren’t-the key to dealing with animals and Amazons.

I stiffened my shoulders and forced the beam back on Zery’s face-not stitches…lines. A drawing, like Bubbe had said held her down. Someone had drawn stitches on her mouth, closing it with ink and magic. I took a breath. Sick, but not the horror I’d first imagined. Unless Zery…how had the magic felt when her attacker drew those lines? Could it have been that different from the actual act?

A shiver danced up my spine, but I shook it off. Focus, focus, focus. I had to break this spell, not let myself get lost in the hideous act itself.

I redirected the light to her wrists and bare feet. Chains were drawn around her wrists. Stakes of ink pierced her feet.

I knew how to free her.

I looked across at Mother. “Denatured alcohol. If you can’t find it, bring Listerine.” Without a question, Mother took off at a trot toward the shop.

Then I glanced back at Bubbe. “You said a web?”

She nodded. “A spider’s work.”

I wasn’t sure what that meant. Hard to escape? I reached out, let my mind go like I had when I’d discovered Bubbe’s serpent. This time it only took seconds. A complicated web of silver magic glowed before me. It covered the space between where Pisto and I stood and in the center of all the spirals, under the web, lay Zery. So, she’d been pinned down first, and the web spun on top of her. Made sense.

Now I could see the trap, but how did I navigate it? How did a fly?

The answer was easy. He didn’t, but a spider could travel across his own web without getting stuck.

But I was no spider…or was I? I didn’t like the direction my thoughts were taking me, but I had to follow them. The dead girls had been left for me. Had Zery too? Was it possible I could walk this web, when Bubbe couldn’t? Was she simply a fly, while the killer saw me as a fellow spider?

I hated the thought, but prayed it was true too.

I closed my eyes, pulled in another breath, and dug my bare toes into the grass until I felt the soil beneath. I needed contact with the earth for this, needed all the strength I could call on. Then I opened my eyes.

The web still shone, as silver and perfect as before, one concentric circle around another with lines intersecting their core over Zery’s heart. But that was it, no secret entry, no key to the path to my friend.

Disappointment, failure. I lowered the flashlight, dropping my gaze as I did. And there, right where the web started to go out of focus, I saw them-tiny bronze spots speckled throughout the web. A path leading from the outside of the web, curving around, then back, jutting out on a straight line, then following the curve again, until stopping next to Zery’s sword, not the Amazon queen herself.

The sword. It wasn’t there because Zery had brought it. It was there so I could kill her.

The realization hit me hard. What kind of sick bastard did this killer think I was?

It didn’t matter. What did matter was that I could see the path. I could save her.

Mother arrived, a plastic bottle of denatured alcohol in her hand. I grabbed it like the desperate alcoholics you hear of, who supposedly drink the stuff for a cheap-if potentially deadly-buzz. Then, with the bottle held against my heart, I sidestepped around the edge of the web, careful not to step on even a sliver of magical silk.

I took my first step, and Pisto jumped in front of me, her staff lifted, ready to jab into my throat. The web quivered, like it was coming to life. Surprise rounded Pisto’s eyes. Her feet slipped beneath her or, more accurately, the web now stuck to her feet moved beneath her. Her knees buckled. She flailed the staff overhead, then jammed it into the ground in an effort to keep from falling, but the web began to grow around her, around her legs, like an invisible spider was wrapping her, his prey, with silk. The whole process took only seconds.