Page 22 of Tweedles Reflection (The Crimes of Alice #4)

I must have been mad to think keeping this a secret would go well. There was no other explanation as to why I didn’t tell them from the start.

They would have stopped you.

I growled at the Shadow Man’s voice, stomping my feet harder on the cobblestone road. I’d ventured deep into Summerville, further than I’d ever gone before in my attempt to run away from the others and an explanation.

“Would that have been so bad?” I griped, throwing my hands up. “Maybe I should have been stopped. We both know I have a bad history of making deals with you. They’ve never turned out well for me.”

A collective of laughs filled my head.

So overwhelmed by my thoughts and regrets, I barely registered when the cobblestone beneath my feet turned to dirt. When the branches and leaves crunched beneath my feet. The buildings changed to tall dark wooden trees, swaying eerily in the nonexistent breeze.

It wasn’t until a chittering filled my ears that I lifted my head and really paid attention to where I stood.

“Wait.” I frowned, turning in a circle. “Where am I?”

Then my eyes started to recognize the trees around me. The mushrooms that were shaped more like people than fungus. The wispy fog that covered the pathway.

The Tundrey Forest had somehow snuck up on me.

“My, this isn’t trial-like at all, is it?” I murmured to myself, my footsteps becoming more cautious with every step.

Without the usual sounds of the fae creatures milling around and causing havoc, the chittering I’d heard before stood out against the silence. Following the sounds because it was expected of me at this point, I began to remember I’d heard this sound before... in the Between.

Silky webs wrapped around branches and spanned across openings, making my trek more burdensome. I grimaced and ducked, shaking off webs I accidentally touched until I came to a grove of trees covered in the webs.

The arachoi creature, a spider humanoid fae from the Between, chittered as it bobbed back and forth from one side of the array of webs to another. Bundles of webbing contorted around oval shapes, spread out on the ground and up the trees.

Food it had caught. perhaps.

My foot snapped a twig.

The arachoi spun, lifting to its full height as it hissed. Eight legs with pointed ends stabbed into the ground, tensing to attack. Its sharp teeth clicked together, large black eyes flicking around until they landed on me.

Holding my hands up, I stepped out of the shadows of the trees so it could see me. “Hello, again.”

Her head tilted to the side, clicking her teeth a few more times before recognition came over her face. “You save.”

“Yes, that’s right.” I inclined my head, shifting closer to the middle of the grove. “We met before in the Between. You were a prisoner like me.”

She chittered and turned her head left then right. “I went to Seelie Palace. To eat queen. Angry. But no queen. No fae.”

Solemnly, I bobbed my head. “Yes, well, most of the fae have evacuated the Underground.”

“Why?” She snapped her teeth. “Why?”

My eyes scanned over the bundles behind her. Was this my trial? Or just a happenstance? At this point, it seemed too coincidental to not be a trial.

I pulled my gaze away from the webs. “Because of the sickness.”

“Sickness?” The arachoi snipped its jaw, almost like a scoff. “No arachoi sick. Strong.”

“Then you certainly are lucky to be immune. There are many who aren’t and have already succumbed to the sickness. In fact,” I drew out, letting my gaze wonder over the dark forest, “the Underground is on the cusp of destruction. Why do you linger?”

“Cannot leave. Cycle start. Children to come.”

My brows rose at her words, my eyes falling to the oval bundles on the webs with new light. “Your babies.” I stepped toward the web, cautious of her getting upset with me getting too close. “You had to stay and have your babies.”

When she didn’t attack, I lifted my hand and placed it on one of the egg sacks. Something warm jerked around inside and I gasped, pulling my hand away. “There’s so many of them.”

Her shoulder shook, a hissing sound coming from her mouth. Was she laughing?

“Not so many. Once many. Thousands. Now hundreds. But more will come.” She puttered back and forth once more. “Children feed. Grow. Lay eggs. More. Arachoi many once more.”

I listened to her explanation with a nod of my head. Then my brows furrowed. “Do arachoi feed on dreams? They are fae, yes?”

The female stilled and then slowly turned to me. “Dreams feed little fae. Arachoi big fae. Feed on many dreams.” Her lips curled up, baring her sharp teeth to me. “Feed many fae.”

My eyes widened, fear gripping my heart.

“No worry,” she added on. “No eat saving one. Different fae.”

There was a reason this one was locked up. Some fae are too gluttonous to be left alone.

I contemplated the Shadow Man’s words. Then turned my attention back to the arachoi. “I fear your children will not live. The fae are gone. Very few are left. If they hatch now, they will go hungry.”

Perhaps, I could convince her to wait to hatch her children. At least, until I figured out a way to deal with the fall out of them living.

The arachoi’s teeth clicked, her head jerked from one side to the other, thinking it seemed like. Then she stopped twisting to face me. “No fae here. No food. Where fae? Where? Take children. Feed them.”

I gaped at her, stepping back from the webs as I realized what she planned to do.

If she couldn’t find fae to feed her children here, she would find them in the Human Realm.

Who knew if she would only feed on the fae and leave the humans alone?

There was no telling what she would do or who she and her children would hurt.

She is only doing what she has to. Would you fault a creature for being what it is?

My head shook from side to side as I swallowed down the information. My foot clunked against something metal. Gaze falling to the ground, I found an unlit lantern. Most likely one of Mop’s since he had a tendency to leave them around the woods.

I bent to pick the lantern up. The moment my hand touched the handle, flames flared from the center, lighting the area.

Confusion and wariness gripped at my heart as my mind whirled.

If this was the trial, what did it want me to do?

The others had a clear indication of what the Underground wanted.

Run from the faeries, fight the JubJub, crawl through the iron-filled hole.

Then the second trial with its ‘drink me’ bottle and fantasy world that I clearly had to deny to pass it. But this... how did I pass this trial?

“Saved one. Where?” the arachoi asked again, agitation filling its words. “Fae food. Where?”

Oh, Alice. You are in a pickle now. Whatever will you do?

I shot a glare at the ring on my finger curled around the lantern’s handle. A bit of direction would be helpful.

Don’t you know? Can’t you see? Do I have to do everything for you?

I huffed and waved the lantern from one side to the other. This was clearly a test. If I stopped trying to deny it, I would be able to admit I knew exactly what the trial was asking of me. Even if I didn’t want to.

The arachoi hadn’t harmed anyone. Neither had her children. They were innocent. Well, as innocent as fae-eating creatures could be. There was no reason I shouldn’t walk away and leave them be.

Could the trial be that I accept the monstrous, vicious creatures of the Underground? That not all of them were cute and helpful or seductive and tempting. It would be so easy if that were the case.

Which only meant that it couldn’t be the case.

The Underground had tested my body with the first trial. Then my mind with the dream. Now, would it test my soul?

Did I have it in me to destroy something that wasn’t hurting me or anyone at this moment for the sake of what it might do in the future?

"Why no answer?” The arachoi grew angry, its legs stabbing the earth in place. “Tell me. Tell me.”

Tick tock goes the clock.

Ignoring the Shadow Man’s taunting, I swallowed and licked my lips. “They are in the Human Realm. But I do not know how you will get them there.”

“Will move.” She chittered excitedly, turning back to her eggs. “You see. Children feed. Fae yes.”

My heart thudded in my chest. The choice was clear before me. And yet, I hesitated.

I’d never been the type to smash the bug for the sake of it making me squeamish. Whenever my sisters would scream and flail, I would find a cup or paper and scoop the darling up before depositing it into the garden. They could have bit me, I knew, and yet I saved them anyway.

I’d always thought that was just my kind nature.

Now, after everything I’d done, after everything that has happened to me, I could see clearly that being High Queen didn’t mean I couldn’t be kind. I couldn’t be just. Far more just than the Seelie Queen most certainly.

However, it also meant that I had to make hard choices. Choices that to others might seem monstrous, vicious, even cruel. Those were the choices that the High Queen had to make to keep the fae — all of the fae — safe.

It was a choice I had to make right now.

With her back to me, I calmly walked up to the edge of the webbing where her egg sacks began. I lifted the lantern and pressed the flame to the webs. Slowly, the fire caught and then spread, wrapping around each egg sack before it dropped burning from the outside in.

The arachoi screamed a sound so loud and high pitched I swore my ears would bleed. “No. No. Why?” she cried, rushing to the burning eggs. “Why?”

Before she could turn that rage on me, I moved to the other end of the webs, setting fire there. My eyes followed the flames, watching it eat every egg sack as it went.

A hollowness filled my heart at the sight.

When the arachoi turned its anguish and rage on me, I almost wanted to let her kill me, to punish me for taking her children from her. I would have deserved it. It would be justice.