Two -- The Spider

3 posts
User avatar
Gender Female
Points 2688
Reviews 10
Grammer is my enemy, so if you happen to be like Rose *coughcough, I hope you're reading this* and ANNOYING in manners as such. Kindly not mention too many such things if you decide to critique. In the case you have not read chapter one of this, you may find yourself a bit lost. Never fear ... you probably are.

So without further ado ...




“Well...”
“What?”
“Your house is quite large.” December replied, in the off-hand sort of way that he had been using all the way from the field to the house. He had talked, but half the time Elsa wasn’t sure what he was talking about. Stars, it was at first, then the moon and that had lasted for a while. Only recently had he begun on how ugly the lampposts on her street were, but whenever she asked any questions he would stop and let his voice fade away as though he had been surprised of her presence.
“Uh … yes, I suppose it is.” Elsa raised her eyebrows looking from her house, where she could see the shadows of her parents moving around in the living room, to the juggler, who was staring at the porch light with an expression quite like how she would have imagined a moth’s upon seeing such a radiant thing. Then the expression was gone and he turned to her, smiling pleasantly.
“This is where I leave you then.” He said, giving another sweeping bow. “I hope you have a good night and that the sun won’t drip too much tomorrow.”
“Thank you,” Elsa decided to act as though that was perfectly normal. “I don’t suppose I will ever been seeing you again. Why were you in that field anyway? Rather then in town, when somebody might see you perform? You’re amazing you know.”
“I know.” December replied, his mouth twitching in an amused smile.
“I mean your juggling,” she added hastily. “You juggle amazingly well. I always wished I could too, but I never had time and I didn’t know how and –“
“Am I making you nervous again?” the juggler asked, his amusement more obvious now.
“No.” she answered automatically.
He turned with a twirl and began making his way down the street when he paused at the next ugly lamppost over and turned back to her. “I shan’t tell you today why I was in the field, but someday, when we encounter each other again, I will be sure to tell you. Or if we make this a habit, I will tell you the fourth time I see you. Oh …” he had been in the process of leaving again when he suddenly turned back and he was very suddenly in front of her, as though he hadn’t moved at all. “And the stars saw me as they were just waking up, and I made them want to smile. Isn’t that the important thing?” with that said, he patted her head twice and was gone. Striding into the gloom of the night as though he had somewhere very important to go.
Elsa looked after him for a moment, but after she blinked, she couldn’t seem to see him anymore. A little disappointed, but still trying to wrap her mind around all of the things he had said, she hurried up the pavement and into the front hallway.
“There you are!”
Her mother was in the hallway before she had even taken off her shoes, and as Elsa had expected, she was not at all pleased. “What in the world took you so long getting home? And how did you get yourself so dirty?” Mum gave a heavy sigh, stepping forward and trying to brush of the mud, which had dried and hardened and came off in a shower of dirt, sprinkling itself across the front hall carpet.
Mum gave a cry of alarm. “Oh no, look what you’ve done! I’ll have to vacuum again.”
Elsa decided that it would not be a wise idea to point out that she had not been the one to attempt to get the dirt off of her skirt, and stepped past her mother in silence, heading towards the stairs.
“Hello, Elsa.” Her father’s deep, rumbling voice reached her just as she got to the bottom step. Rather reluctantly, she turned around and stepped back into the doorway of the living room.
Her father was sitting in his favorite armchair, his wide girth taking up much of the space and frowning at her over the top of his coffee cup. “How was school?”
“Good.” She replied, resisting the urge to shrug. Her father did not like shrugging.
“Did you pass your science test?” came the next question.
“Yes.” Elsa replied shortly, then as Dad turned his attention to the newspaper folded on the table beside him, Elsa felt it was safe for her to leave and resume sneaking upstairs.
“Supper is in ten minutes!” her mother’s voice carried up the stairs to her, barely reaching Elsa’s ears before she closed her bedroom door.
Her room was bright with the orange glow from the streetlamp outside as the light seeped in through the curtains and made a large puddle of light on the floor.
Without turning her light on, Elsa made her way across the floor and flopped down onto her bed. Propping her head up on her arms. She was exhausted, but had been unaware of it before then. With the thought of dripping suns and smiling stars, she fell asleep without really realizing that she had.
The tune pushed it’s way into her mind through the dark curtain of sleep and reached her in the sanctuary of her dreams, slowly catching hold of her and pulling her away from the peaceful darkness there.
Elsa opened her eyes to find that her room was very dark, darker then she had ever seen it. Reaching into the darkness, she fumbled for her lamp, but even when she found it, there seemed to be no power, and she pulled the string several times before giving up and leaning back against her pillows.
Really, it was only then that she noticed that the humming she had heard in her sleep was still present, and not in her imagination as she had first thought. Her mind was still dull from sleep, and it took her some time to locate the source of the tune.
By the time she had, she realized that he room was not as dark as she had originally thought. There was a silvery glow that seemed to be coming from her window, which was where she realized the humming was coming from. With only the pale, silver light as her guiding source, Elsa slipped off of her bed and slowly tip-toed over to the window. She swung it open and the volume increased. But she still didn’t see the hummer.
Then just as she was about to close her window again, she saw her. Dangling from a silver web as delicate and glowing as a string of moonlight, the spider twirled and danced, weaving the intricate web between two branches. She was only the size of Elsa’s thumbnail, but was humming loudly and clearly enough to be a person.
“Hello,” Elsa said, smiling to herself, as her drowsy mind didn’t think that a humming spider was at all odd at that hour of the night. “What are you doing?”
The spider stopped humming and looked up, blinking at Elsa with multiple eyes with the most bewildered expression a spider could have. “Why hello, miss. You’re talking to me, aren’t you?”
“Yes,” Elsa replied with a light laugh. “There is no one else around, isn’t there?”
“Not that you could see.” The spider replied, she had by this time swung away from her half-constructed web and landed on the branch closest to her window. She tip-toed along the branch as lightly as a dancer, looking at Elsa all the while. “But they are many sorts of things about now.”
“Oh, I see.” Elsa replied, looking at the spider wonderingly as she hopped from the branch down onto the sill. “Or I don’t see, I know what you mean in any case.”
The spider looked up at her in a way that could have made Elsa swear that she was being frowned at. “You wouldn’t happen to be Elsa Blackwell by any chance, would you?”
Elsa was quite surprised by the spider having heard of her, but nodded without hesitation. “Yes, I am, and who are you?”
“Zeya,” the spider, or Zeya replied. “I belong to Oblivion, and December sent me to find you. I’m glad I got the right window. He gave me horrible directions.”
“He did?” she became even more surprised at this piece of news, the juggler had been a strange one …
“Yes, ‘Go right, right, left. Then turn in a complete circle clockwise then left again, then counter clockwise and –“
“No, I meant that he sent you to find me?” Elsa didn’t want to be rude, but Zeya had started babbling worse then she had done when December went and made her nervous.
“You do know him, don’t you?” the spider asked with a sigh, “This kind of thing has happened before. Just like when Oblivion asked me to find John Smith! Not one of them in a hundred even knew who he was. I didn’t think that there were too many Elsa Blackwells though …”
“Yes, I know him,” Elsa started, “But—“
“Good, then follow me!” and with that, Zeya leapt off of the window sill and back onto the branch, scurrying towards the trunk of the tree.
“Oh dear.” Elsa murmured, climbing out of her window and struggling to climb along the branch. It was a good thing, however that it was a thick branch, or she didn’t know what would have happened.
Down the trunk of the tree the spider went, before hurrying off around the side of the house. Elsa struggled to keep on after her, but it was difficult keeping up with such a small but swift creature, and being able to only see by the light of the stars and crescent moon, which she had realized by this time, that was what the silvery glow was. But all of the streetlamps had been put out, as if a giant and blown them all out like large candles. So by moonlight, Elsa hurried around the house and into the alley.
But it wasn’t the alley.
Elsa found herself in a very narrow passage that looked like it was crammed between two large concrete buildings, and when she looked back. She did not see her familiar street behind her, but one that was humming with large vehicles like in a large city. However, she didn’t have time to look long, for Zeya was calling to her from up ahead.
“Hurry, won’t you? We don’t have much time and I can’t turn corners with you lagging behind.” The spider sounded quite cross.
“Sorry,” Elsa replied, hurrying down the narrow alley and following Zeya around a corner only to find herself on a dirt road in what looked to be miles and miles of farmland.
They continued to travel in such a way for some time, every corner they turned lead onto a new street that was far, far away then the one they had just left. The crossed over a volcano, through cities, past the Great Wall and down one strange road that Elsa was fairly sure was underwater, but oddly enough, she felt no moisture. She just thought that she saw a fish swimming towards them when Zeya was shouting for her to hurry and saying that they hadn’t much time.
At long last, the journey was finally over as Zeya lead the way out of a cool desert night and onto a street paved with neat white stones. It was daylight in the city which they had arrived. Strange golden vehicles were soundlessly zipping back and forth on the road in front of them, all with large, spindly wheels that looked quite fragile. People were strolling down the streets, dressed in garb that reminded Elsa of December’s strange, old-fashioned suit, while the women were wearing lacy dresses that looked like they might be extremely uncomfortable.
Overhead, a white train on a gold track of some kind whirred past, emitting thick white smoke that smelled like flowers while the buildings all around them rose high, high, high into the sky. Elsa was fairly sure that there was no city on any map she had ever seen that was like this one and wonderingly she turned to the spider, “Where am I?” she asked, staring up at the shining buildings of every different color looming around her.
The spider looked up at her like she was perfectly mad. “Why Merriot, of course.”
"With all due respect, sir. I distrust your hat entirely."-- Jae Marquis




User avatar
Gender Female
Points 5732
Reviews 24
Hi. I'm Bek, I reviewed your other first chapter--which I really liked. And I also agree with you--grammar is your enemy. There are so many mistakes, it was in truth quite irratating to read, because I'm one of those freaks who like to use good grammar and spelling, etc. Just put it into a Word document and just go from there, or you can use the "check spelling" thing on YWS or on Word. You can download a trial version of Word from the website; I'm pretty sure it's free. I'm so happy I got to review this before anyone else :D And also, keep writing this story because it sounds like the kind that quickly becomes loved by children and people who like good writing. There's a couple of things wrong with your sentence structure and awkward wording. Again, Microsoft Word should pick this up. If you want I can fix all the mistakes; just message me.
Your plot is a little confusing, however, when Elsa meets the spider. Explain how the street thing works more--I'm talking about when she and the spider go through all those different streets and what they are, in more detail and with more clarity because I got confused there. Do the streets change as she walks every second? Do they change as they round a corner? What's going on?
That's all for now!
Bek :) :elephant: (love the elephant)




User avatar
Gender Female
Points 14356
Reviews 199
(Y) I loved it!

Can't wait for the next one!! :D

Like I said before, I suck at grammar so I can't really tell if you made mistakes! Actually I didn't think you made any...which is probably just me or I might be right...right?
I spy!



I'm also not sure why but even though I normally wear cool tones I have a feeling red would have been my color in the 1860s.
— Elinor