Page 27 of Beware of Hodags

SHEPARD

The Lycosids—Mirk’s people—are dangerous to hodags. In combat, the males of his kind have a very good chance of nailing us with a paralytic venom, and if they do that, as you can imagine, the fight’s pretty much over. And then they eat us.

More of a threat to us though are their females. Because female spider shifters—Charlottes—can do worse than merely paralyze us. They also emit lures.

Hodag lures.

See, visually, a hodag’s mate glows. So in a sea of people, Rachel will always stand out to me. It’ll only ever be her.

But a female spider shifter is capable of a unique, aggressive mimicry: she can mate-glow. If Rachel isn’t with me, I might see a lure glow, be drawn to it, and end up stabbed with fangs as long as my arm, paralyzed into helplessness, then be eaten.

And by eaten, I mean a Charlotte could punch a pair of holes into me, barf digestive fluid into my body, and watch as my insides turn to liquid. Then she’d suck my liquified innards into her mouth and leave me a hollowed-out husk with fur.

Super.

Luckily, hodag mates enjoy spending most of their time together, which ends up being a form of protection for the males of my kind.

And then we avoid the Lycosid women and the bogs they reside in hard.

Although female hodags are immune to the lure and have tried to kill as many of the spider women as they can, there are always a couple Charlottes who are too canny to get dead.

I know all this, and yet I figure Mirk will fight fair because Rachel is my mate. He can’t have her.

This assumption is a mistake. I get too cocky.

I step out of my truck, alert but not afraid of anything as I arrive a couple minutes before Rachel’s shift ends.

Darkness is falling thick and fast around me but I don’t sweat it.

As long as there’s some moonlight, I see fine in the dark.

I slam my truck door closed and shoot Rach a love note before I pocket my phone, whistling to myself as I make my way up the flower pot-crammed path headed for the gift shop.

The gift shop door opens and the worst part is, I know it isn’t Rachel. It’s just some woman, and I probably wouldn’t pay her any mind beyond a polite hello if she were human.

But she’s not. Although she doesn’t look particularly dangerous, eight spike-like bones erupt out of my spine, thrusting out of my skin and tenting my T-shirt all the way down my back.

Styrax bones. I have seven more that will jut out above my tail when I’ve fully shifted. Their appearance is a bad sign. The only reason a hodag spontaneously pops his armor is because he’s been surprised by a mortal enemy.

Meaning this benign-seeming woman before me is a Charlotte. Shit. Getting plugged with spider vomit wasn’t on my list for ways I want to die. I need Rachel to step out of the store too because if Rachel is standing side by side with this Charlotte, the lure will be much less effective.

(It won’t, however, be immunity. If having his mate present made a male hodag immune to a Charlotte’s lure, then you can believe mated hodag pairs would already have hunted down every last Charlotte in Rhinelander.)

Rachel does not emerge from the store. In fact, the lights are off .

The Charlotte meets my startled gaze, and my heart lurches as I watch her lips curl up into the evilest smile I’ve ever seen.

I’m so screwed. Nostrils flaring, I dart a look around. I don’t see Mirk’s truck—I can only hope this means Rachel’s safe, still out shopping.

What will Mirk do to her when they get back? When Rachel sees my truck and starts asking questions because I’m nowhere to be found?

I pin the Charlotte with a scalding glare. My lips peel back, baring my fangs, which drop so fast I bite into my lower lip. I growl at her in warning.

An empty threat, and we both know it.

She moves for my truck—

And she has the temerity to climb into the passenger side. Watching her take Rachel’s place makes me want to rip the whole truck apart, but I can’t because the Charlotte orders, “Get in.”

I do. And when she instructs me to drive around the barn and leave my keys under the visor and my phone on the dash, I do that too.

When she beckons me to follow her into the woods, I can’t stop my feet from trailing after her.

Like she’s a spidery pied piper, I keep following her even when she sends me a playful look over her bony shoulder and singsongs, “Come on, hodag. Corey is hungry. I need you to feed him.”

My stomach curdles. I imagine ripping out her throat. As if I could.

Just as we reach the trees, a pair of headlights sweep up the long driveway.

Rachel.

I can’t warn her. I can’t save her. As obedient as an ox headed for slaughter, I dumbly follow the Charlotte, letting her lead me to the place I’m going to die.

We walk for a bit. Dimly, I register that there are a lot of trees back here. Not surprisingly, the leaf accumulation is considerable. They’re so thick underfoot that it sounds like we’re wading through a crunchy ocean instead of a forest floor.

The occasional twig and even a couple logs catch my boots as I dog the Charlotte, making me stumble before I regain my mindless footing. Trees, more trees, downed logs, and patches of filtered moonlight—that’s about the landscape until the trees thin and we’re stepping into a clearing.

Practically the whole glade is illuminated, which should be a good thing. The moon’s shine lets me make out openings in the ground ahead of us.

But it’s a curse. Because I know what those openings are. I know what’s here.

Burrows.

Looking across the silvery expanse of the clearing, my eyes zero in on the cavernous openings of many, many burrows. And those are just the empty ones, their mouths gaping and bared.

“Come on,” the Charlotte calls as she sashays ahead.

Compelled, I have to follow after her, hating her every step I take.

“Coreyyyy,” she sings to the ground. “I brought you a treat.”

On the inside, I’m going apeshit. On the outside, I’m helpless to do anything but prance after her like an idiot.

When she comes to a stop, I obediently stop too.

She’s unworried about my proximity to her while her back is turned, and she’s right not to sweat it—I can’t so much as take a swing at her.

I won’t be able to hurt her while she’s emitting the mate-glow lure.

She could turn and bite me herself and I’d stand here and take it.

I wish I’d explained to Rachel how serious the feud is between Mirkwood forest’s inhabitants and the hodags. I was stupid to think we’d be safe. This is why hodags avoid spider territory. Hodags don’t come back from the bogs.

I’ll never see Rachel again .

I almost howl. My head won’t tip back to do it and my mouth won’t open either, so the sound stays trapped in my throat like a whimper.

The Charlotte laughs.

Coldhearted bitch.

God, please keep my sweet little star-nosed mole safe.

That’s been my latest theory, care of my sister Kayla texting me to ask if my mate was one of the mole people that recently moved to the area.

The existence of mole people was news to me, but as soon as I saw a picture of what they shift into, I understood why Rachel was reluctant to tell me what her shifter side is.

Star-nosed moles look like blind rats—cursed ones, with something like two dozen pink tentacles sticking out of their faces.

They’re so dogbaned hideous that they’re almost cute.

You might be thinking but nose tentacles?

Hey. Love doesn’t stop for tentacles.

But like I said, if this is what Rachel is, it explains why she’s reticent to show me her other self.

She doesn’t need to worry though. I’m crazy about her. She’s my little star-nosed mole.

Even though this thought makes my heart warm, just as fast my next thought makes it sink.

Will Rachel ever know what happened to me?

On the heels of that is a worse question. The worst of the worst. Will Mirk take her?

Rage burns through my blood as I decide yes, he will. Spiders routinely have to kidnap humans and force them to be their mates. Will he tell her that I died back here? Make her live on the same property, knowing her real mate was tortured to death in her new backyard? Her prison.

The thought of Rachel being kept here against her will, forced to be with—

My horns burst out of my temples and fur floods over my skin.

The Charlotte jumps away. At first I think it’s because I managed a partial change and this surprises her.

But then I see the massive spider legs creep out of the ground.

It’s like watching a scary movie graveyard scene where the zombies peel back their grave dirt.

One second the spider’s burrow is covered with a fine layer of webbing and ground cover, and the next second it tears away as a twelve-foot-long spider emerges.

To my relief, the monster isn’t focused on me.

It’s slowly moving for the Charlotte. Advancing on her.

Its abdomen starts to bounce. Those weird sex organs on either side of its face, swollen on the ends like giant boxing gloves, start to rub together, making a weird noise that sets all my hair on end.

Pedipalps. That’s what they’re called.

“No, Corey,” the Charlotte warns. When he keeps advancing on her, her voice comes out much more sharply. “I said no!” She points to me. “I brought you that. You need to eat.”

Then she drops her mate-glow. By design, of course, because she doesn’t need to keep me captive anymore and because her male doesn’t want food right now—he’ll only opt to eat if something works him up to it.

Such as being able to give chase.

Yeah. She intends for me to be that thing that he chases.

Dammit. With the lure no longer blinding me, I suck in a full breath, my mind racing. I could charge them, go defense. But the odds of a hodag winning against two Mirkwood spiders? I’ve got no chance.