Young Writers Society

“I truly cannot stress how foolish this is,” tutted the hard-shelled spider sitting upon my shoulder, “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

I rolled my eyes as I gathered up various candles needed for the ritual, “You worry too much Char. What was it, white and red?”

The large arachnid’s ebony plates clattered as it trembled with irritation, “I’ve told you a thousand times, that isn’t my name!”

The spider reprimanded me once again as it jabbed the sharp tip of its foreleg into my neck for emphasis, by far her favorite means of correction, “And you should know by now that red is for meditation, you fool.”

“Don’t be that way,” I said with a small smile as I swapped the red candle for a yellow, “I’ve called you Char since I was little.”

I couldn’t repress my sigh, I really should know better by now. Even though this tedious busywork was hardly my strong suit, I still shouldn’t neglect the ways of other crafts. Regardless of how they managed to suck the joy from something as astonishing as magic, I would follow their dry and pointless approach.

As far as the preparations went, at least.

“Don’t forget orange,” Char mentioned offhandedly, pausing for a split second before betraying her disinterest further, “And don’t forget the incense.”

Scratching my temple, I struggled to recall the optimal components for a general summoning ritual, “Hmm…”

“If you don’t remember it already,” Char chittered, repositioning herself as I bustled about getting the room ready.

“Yeah, yeah,” I said as I stifled a yawn against the crook of my arm, “Then I won’t remember it at all. But I feel like its sage and-”

“Frankincense, bay and saffron,” said my anxious companion matter-of-factly, “You truly should know this, to know your enemy’s strength is to know his weakness as well.”

I arranged the candles evenly around the perimeters of my chalk circle, “Cut me some slack, Char. You know sorcery isn’t really my style, it’s just so mechanical and-”

“Excuses!” hissed Char angrily, kneading my shoulder with the tips of her claws, “A spellbinder strives for harmony in all aspects, regardless of the methods used.”

“But this is a once in a lifetime sort of thing!” I argued in stubborn defense of my pride, “Besides, what could go wrong?”

“What could go wrong?” gasped Char incredulously, “Did you forget you were dealing with a sovereign entity?”

“Come now,” I said with a gentle smile as I lit the incense and placed the smoking sticks around the room. Their gentle fragrances gathered in my cramped quarters and filled the tight space, “Everything went just fine when I summoned you, didn’t it?”

“Only because I’m just as foolish as you,” Char sighed as she gathered her legs beneath her. Like a well-oiled machine, she sprung away from me and landed atop my upturned mattress, “I took pity because you were an idiotic hatchling, tangled in a web that would consume you.”

“You didn’t take pity on me,” I said sharply as I corrected my partner, lighting the candles before my match ran out, “you took me under your wing because I managed to summon you when I was four.”

Char reared up and began anxiously twitching her legs, ready to argue, “Don’t get-”

“And,” I continued before she could, not yet done arguing, “I did it without preparing any of this, this…”

I waved my hands around in frustration, indicating the cluttered mess that had overtaken the room. The threadbare carpet that had covered the wooden subfloor was rolled up against the wall, crammed in between my worn mattress and a rickety desk. This stupidly lavish ritual also required a room nearly six times this size, forcing me to get creative with the placement of the various glyphs.

“Nonsense.”

“Yes, but-”

“And,” I said without pausing, “I managed free myself from the cocoon you wrapped me up in, didn’t I?”

Char was quiet as she slowly settled down. Her legs rapidly tapped the fabric like drumming fingers, giving her frustration away as she struggled to think of a rebuttal.

“This is true,” she finally conceded before resting ridged body atop my torn pillow, “You were tenacious prey, your life was earned.”

“More importantly,” I said earnestly as I set a metal dish in the triangle that was nestled within the circle’s confines, “I earned your guidance.”

“Quiet, you,” Char dismissed me with a snort, “Silver words have no effect on a goddess.”

I shrugged off her dismissal and crossed over to the acacia logs stacked in the corner. It had been difficult to sneak it past my master’s watchful eye, being a wood commonly required for summoning. Sorting through the pieces, all I could do was hope the information would be well worth the effort.

“But thank you,” Char said quietly as her sated ego overwhelmed her arrogance.

“I don’t recall jumping through so many hoops to summon you,” I idly mentioned as I dumped the dry logs into the silver chalice, stuffing the gaps with tinder, “I remember just…”

“Just what?” Char said with genuine interest as she studied the web she had been weaving meticulously in the corner while awaiting my return. Noticing the futile struggles of trapped prey, she lifted herself and scuttled up the wall towards it.

I would never understand why she did it. She didn’t actually require any food to sustain her existence, after all. Any energy she needed was siphoned from my own reserves, but I suppose being constantly confined to this room would be quite the bore.

“It’s hard to describe,” I said with a shrug as I paused my work for a sip of water, “But after word of Maric’s treachery reached me, I had lost all hope. My spirit was shattered, trapped in isolated darkness as I anticipated the arrival of my own cruel fate.”

“It was like shouting into an abyss,” a cold shiver ran down my back as I revisited the night I had learned about my parents’ murder, “Hoping that something would heed my desperate cries and reach out.”

“Tch,” Char said with a huff as her tone began to darken, “You still could have died.”

“I wasn’t afraid,” I scoffed, waving the ominous familiar’s warning away, “You heard my calls for a reason, deep down I knew you wouldn’t hurt me.”

“You not know!” Char spat angrily, her translations losing finesse as she grew agitated with me, “That’s your problem, you not think of consequences to actions.”

She reached her silky creation and inspected the wriggling insects that she had ensnared with her trap. Wrapping the captured insects in thread until they resembled gray beans, Char pulled them from her web and stuck them to the wall.

I couldn’t help but roll my eyes as I watched her leave the abandoned prey for other spiders to feast upon, setting the small bundles out as if she were feeding a pet. She then set about repairing the damage their struggles had done to her elegant design, muttering disdainfully.

“Like now, if you need an example.”

“At any rate,” I replied testily, but otherwise let her jab go unchallenged, “I still don’t know why we need through such lengths just to speak with a demon.”

“This,” Char said as she shot a thick strand of webbing at the ceiling. She gripped it between her pincer-like claws and gave it a tug, “is for your protection.”

Apparently satisfied with its hold, she leapt from the wall and arced towards the center of the room. It was a sight that nightmares begged to be made from, a spider the size of my head swinging at my face. But after seeing her do it so much, spiders instilled about as much fear in me as kittens. She released thread at the end of her swing, landing lightly upon my shoulder again.

“Done pretending that you don’t care?” I asked coyly as I began to focus on transcribing the remaining glyphs. Even though I had little respect for his profession, I still took great care to recreate them exactly as depicted in the grimoire that Char had stolen from Maric’s study.

“I had hoped you would give up on your own,” Char conceded, her tone troubled with uncommon worry as she observed my work, “You missed the accent over your last symbol.”

“Really?” I paused and double-checked. Sure enough, my tired eyes had passed right over the it, “What an eye for detail you have!”

“I have eight, you fool.”

I chuckled before letting out a weary sigh, “It’s a figure of speech, Char.”

“It’s stupid,” Char complained as she crawled down to nudge one of the candles into proper alignment, “that would only apply to a cyclops.”

“Those are extinct,” I pointed out as I finished my improvised script. Tossing the picture to the side, I grabbed grimoire once more and studied the long chain of words I was meant to memorize3. I looked the faded writing up and down, struggling to extract any meaning from the nearly illegible scribbles.

“That’s why it’s stupid,” my mentor said with boredom as she began to lose interest in the subject. She took care to step over the sharp chalk lines that extended from the outer circle and merged in the triangle’s center.

Char tapped her leg where two of the lines intersected with the perimeter of the circle and called for my attention, “You forgot the glyph for ‘deal’ here.”

“So I did,” I said sheepishly as I corrected that final mistake. Leaning back to appreciate my tedious work, I thanked her wholeheartedly, “You’re a lifesaver, Char.”

Char chittered with happiness and gloated, “It’s good that you realize as much.”

Looking back down at the intimidating tangle of words, I chewed on my lip as I attempted to decipher the tome’s strange language. Unfortunately, the words melded together and it felt like the foreign letters changed places with each other at their own discretion. These sanctified words, meant to evoke the magic necessary to contact the being that Maric sought, were damn near unreadable.

“Whose idea was it to use cursive?” I mumbled under my breath, growing frustrated as I found myself unable to parse the ancient book. I rubbed my hunched neck in concern as the cloying presence of anxiety gathered within my chest. Even Char was unable to decipher the author’s lost language, effectively leaving us in the dark as to what we were walking into.

With a hard nod, I threw the book over my shoulder and resolved to finish the rest of the ceremony in my own fashion. I had gotten what I truly needed from the grimoire anyway – the demon’s name and a few other minor preparations.

“What are you doing?” Char asked impatiently, “If you insist on doing this so recklessly, just read directly from the book. It’s why we went through the trouble of stealing it.”

“Actually,” I corrected as I laced my fingers together. Pushing my arms out, I cracked their stiff joints with great relief, “We only really needed it for the chalk patterns.”

“The chants,” seethed Char as her composure began to run thin, “Are just as important as the foundation and components. Speaking of which, did you get the flask?”

“Of course, what do you take me for?” I asked sarcastically as I reached under my desk to retrieve the stashed flask. Lifting the loose board covering my hideaway, I reached my hand into the dark hole.

“I could have sworn…” I mumbled to myself as I felt around the empty space, unable to find the spell’s key ingredient. Stretching my arm as far it could go, I searched in a growing frenzy as panic gripped me. My palm slapped an exposed nail while I blindly fumbled, piercing the soft skin and eliciting a stream of foul curses.

Gasping in pain, I yanked my hand back and examined the small injury. Sure enough, the nail had missed the callouses and punctured the tender flesh next to it instead.

“A fool, obviously,” Char cackled from behind me, “Look up.”

Leaning back too suddenly, I slammed my head into the dense wood of the desk. The bottle I had been searching for rattled as the impact violently shook it. Straightening up carefully, I found it sitting exactly where I had left it as I gathered the rest of the supplies. I shook my head at my own carelessness as I grabbed the dusky bottle and sat cross-legged within my magic circle.

Placing it between my legs, I examined my wounded hand further as I waited for Char to perch herself atop my shoulder. I tested it with a flex and winced as a dull ache flared from it with every pounding heartbeat. There was a thin layer of blood as well, coating my palm as it beaded up from the puncture. I swiped it down my pantleg, wiping off most of the excess.

It was nasty, but small enough that it could wait until I had finished my business.

“Don’t forget the grimoire,” she murmured, a hint of worry creeping into her voice.

“You worry too much,” I said with a confidant grin as I lit a handful of matches and dumped the bundle of fire into the polished chalice. “I got the gist of things.”

“I beg your pardon?” Char gasped incredulously, clenching the already tight grip of her piercing legs.

I winced in discomfort as I reached for the jug of sanctified oils. Rolling my shoulder uncomfortably, I futilely attempted to dislodge her hold like a fox feebly attempting to escape a hunter’s trap.

“Come on, Char,” I said in exasperation, resting my hand on the hard shell of her abdomen and petting it gently, “Neither of us can read the book, so we’re going in blind anyway. I may as well do this my way.”