‘Thanks, Malakai,” Duke said. “I’d be dead if it wasn’t for you.”
“Don’t mention it.”
“We must get to the music box. If they get ahold of it, then the villagers are doomed,” Duke said.
“Doomed regardless,” Malakai said.
Duke turned with a snarl. “No, do not give up hope yet. The music box is ours until they take it from our cold dead hands.”
“I’m afraid that’s their plan. I know my species,” Malakai said.
“You’re not like them,” Duke said.
Malakai’s face went dark. He turned away from Duke.
“Resist,” Duke said. “Resist. Resist for me, resist for the ones you love, the ones in the world in between who wait for us.”
Malakai turned back to look at Duke. Now there was a look of sadness on his face. Each one of his eight eyes—Yellow eyes, Maria thought, not red—looked down.
The two hobbled toward the back door. Flames licked at the sides. Beyond the door was a taller building; one Maria thought to be a wooden castle. Soldiers hung over the edge of the moat, half in the water, half out of it. All of them were dead.
“I think we’re the last ones standing,” Duke said. “We must save the Queen Witch.”
“Do you still have the key?”
Duke smiled, his grin bloody. He looked nothing like a fifteen-year-old boy. He looked like a war-crazed man.
Maria felt a pang in her heart. She looked at the boy she’d met. The boy was dead. She knew where this story was heading. She’d watched and read enough stories containing war; they rarely ever had a happy ending.
The Duke on the blurry screen dug his hand into his pocket and pulled out a shining piece of metal.
“They gave it to you?” Malakai asked.
Behind them, the sounds of explosions rocked the world again.
“I took it off the general. He died. But just before he went, he told me to guard it with my life. And that is what I intend to do.”
“We shall guard it together,” Malakai said. He threw his arm around Duke’s shoulders and dragged him, limping, toward the castle.
Once they reached the drawbridge of the castle, the building they’d come from—just three hundred yards away—went up in flames.
Duke hobbled over people he’d known and cared about, trying to keep his soldier’s psyche, trying not to let the acts of war slow him down. It wasn’t working.
“Cousin,” he said sadly. He bent down and swiped a hand over a corpse’s face, closing his eyes.
Malakai backed up the drawbridge. “They’re coming! They’re coming.”
With tears in his eyes, Duke left his dead cousin and headed into the castle. A throne stood at the end of the long structure. A strip of red carpet stretched the length of the palace. At the end of the carpet was an emerald-looking basin, glowing green in the dim firelight cast from the sconces on the walls.
On the floor near the end closest to Duke was the king. He was dead.
“No!” Duke shouted. The tears coursed from his face now. “No! No! How could they have gotten in? How?”
Footsteps echoed in the hall. From the throne came a voice.
“It wasn’t too hard.”
Duke went rigid. The hand gripping his wounded side and overflowing with blood fell.
“Malakai!” Duke screamed. “They’re here! They’re here!”
A robed figure sat in the throne. Two other robed Arachnids came out from the shadows around the side.
“Three of them! We can take them!” Duke shouted.
The seated Arachnid laughed. It was a terrible sound, like tree branches that had been struck by lightning, splitting and falling to the hard ground, burning away to ash.
“Malakai!”
“Scream all you want, boy, but the battle is lost.”
Duke leaned down and took the sword out of the king’s scabbard. He raised it with his good arm.
“Never!” Duke cried, and he charged forward.
Maria screamed and hid her face in horror.
The Arachnids stepped forward, all six of their arms coming out from beneath each of their robes. In two of each of them were swords.
Duke skidded to a stop. He was brave, but he was no idiot.
“Now, boy, you know you’re outmatched. Turn around and hide in the ruins of your village,” the lead Arachnid said.
There were footsteps behind Duke now. Malakai.
“Korion,” Malakai said.
“Ah, Malakai, we meet again.”
The Arachnid smiled. It was a gruesome smile. Dripping fangs hung over black leather lips. The eight red eyes suddenly looked hungry.
“It’s not often we meet a traitor to our species, and that traitor lives to tell the tale,” Korion said. The other two laughed and crossed their swords over their chests.
“Fair warning, Malakai.”
“Let’s kill them, Mal!” Duke said.
Now Korion lost it. He almost fell from the throne with laughter.
“You’re not going to be able to laugh when I’m through with you,” Duke said. He raised the king’s sword higher.
“Ha! A boy threatens the leader of the Arachnid army. Can you believe it?” Korion said.
The others laughed.
“On three, we charge,” Duke said under his breath to Malakai. Malakai’s eight eyes met his. He nodded.
“One…two…THREE!”
Duke took off.
He got no farther than three steps before he felt something cold go through his belly. He choked and looked down. The pointy end of a blade jutted from between his ribs. Duke dropped his sword and clenched the bloody tip protruding from him.
As he fell, his eyes watery and the corners of his mouth trickling blood, he held Malakai’s gaze and felt the sword leave him.
“I’m sorry,” Malakai said, holding the hilt of the sword. “I’m so sorry. They are my kin. I can never be like you. My blood runs Arachnid.”
“No,” Duke said. He hit the floor.
On the other side of the screen, Maria whimpered. “No, this couldn’t have happened—”
The boy known as Duke pulled up his ghostly clothing. A black line, open and breathing, ran across his ribcage. It was a sword’s perfect fit.
“Turn it off,” Maria begged. “I can’t watch anymore.”
The boy nodded.
The screen appeared to be sucked back into his hand.
Maria turned her head away. Vomit
