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  As the hellspider soared through the air, Elliot fumbled with the book in his hand. Roni wanted to scream that he should drop his book and use his cane — a weapon he felt far more comfortable wielding. But, after the exertions of sprinting through the tunnels, she had yet to catch her breath.

  The hellspider body-checked Elliot, sending them both somersaulting across the floor.

  Holding the ribs on his left side, Elliot used his cane to get back to his feet. Roni wished she could dart across the room, punch the hellspider, and assist Elliot in an escape. But that wasn’t Sully’s plan. Everybody had a job to do, and everybody faced dangers. This was not the time to defy the leadership.

  Thankfully, Rocky did not have a specific task. Roni’s heart jumped as she watched the little stone golem leap across the room. Launching off a stack of chained books, Rocky twisted in the air and planted its feet hard on the hellspider’s back. Roni didn’t know if a stone golem could feel cocky, but Rocky sure seemed overconfident. It knew it had gotten the better of the hellspider once and clearly aimed to do it again.

  The hellspider, however, had the ability to learn. Rocky scampered along its spine, dodging limbs and throwing punches whenever it could. But Roni could see the difference — the hellspider did not panic. It did not wrench around searching for the source of its discomfort. It knew exactly what it was dealing with.

  Though Rocky’s tactics were less effective, they did provide a distraction. Elliot swung his cane hard as if trying to knock the hellspider’s head across a baseball field for a home run. The loud crack of cane against bone was followed up with a satisfying groan. But Elliot made the mistake of trying to repeat the maneuver.

  As the cane cut through the air for a second strike, the hellspider ducked its head while simultaneously punching out with its front limbs. Elliot shucked backwards into a pile of chained books. The hellspider used its momentum to tuck its head down and roll onto its back. It continued until it had returned to its feet — but Rocky had been slammed hard against the floor. Prodding the golem’s legs, the hellspider tested to see if it had killed its little enemy.

  Having stones for brains, Rocky did not know to play dead. The little golem bounced up to its feet, grabbed onto the hellspider’s leg, and attempted to crawl up the creature’s back.

  The hellspider did not flinch. Using two of its legs, it grabbed hold of Rocky and swung the golem hard against the wall. Stones and pebbles smashed out in different directions.

  Roni gasped — unsure if the rubble came from the wall or Rocky.

  With all the confidence of a well-trained soldier, Gram stepped to the corner across from Roni. “Get into position, dear.”

  Roni moved before her ears had deciphered the words.

  With a voice strong enough to carry across the room and back, Gram said, “Hey! Are you so afraid of me you have to go mess around with all my friends? I’m waiting for you.” As the hellspider glowered at Gram, she whispered to Sully, “Get moving.”

  The hellspider stepped towards the chair in the middle of the room. It kept its focus on Gram, moving forward with tentative steps. Sully scooted across until he reached Roni.

  “You holding up okay?” he asked.

  “I’ll be fine.”

  To Roni’s right, a small pile of rocks had been pre-set in place. Sully grabbed these rocks, and surrounded Roni’s feet with them. One by one he placed them until they formed a mound up to her ankles. From his pocket, he removed a piece of paper with Hebrew writing. He then closed his eyes and whispered some guttural words into the paper before folding it into a small square.

  Handing the paper to Roni, he said, “You won’t become a golem. Just put it in your pocket or on your belt, someplace where it won’t get lost.”

  “Doesn’t it need to be in the stones?”

  “Only if I want it to be alive. But not for such a short and mindless task. Don’t worry. You’ll be fine.”

  Roni wasn’t worried — not about that. Placing the paper in her back pocket, she felt the rocks on her feet compress as if an invisible hand had tightened her shoelaces beyond what was comfortable. Sully scrunched his brow. “Something wrong?”

  “Hurry. Go help Elliot.”

  Nodding vigorously, Sully hastened along the room, staying close to the wall. Roni had never seen such doubt in Sully’s face before — but then, he had never been the leader before. Looking at Gram holding a showdown of will with the hellspider, Roni wondered how long it would take until their new leader had such confidence.

  Perhaps she had been wrong to oust Gram. The fearlessness in the cold-blooded strength of Gram could not be mastered in only a year or two. She had spent a lifetime learning how to be the anchor for her team.

  No. It was too late for second-guessing. Besides, if they had not put Sully into the leadership position, he would never have come up with this plan.

  The hellspider’s eyes twitched as it glanced at Sully scooting along. Roni didn’t have to say a word. Gram opened her book and the flames singed one of the hellspider’s front legs. As the creature sidestepped the flames, favoring its other legs, Sully hustled the rest of the way to Elliot.

  Roni bared her teeth. The hellspider had finally noticed its situation. It wanted to turn around and see what Sully and Elliot were up to, but it didn’t dare take its eyes off of Gram. Though stuck in the middle of the room, it appeared to have figured out that Gram posed the only immediate threat.

  But Roni was no idiot — soon enough, the creature would decide that it could no longer stay still. If it did not act, it would be captured. As Sully piled rocks on Elliot’s feet and handed him a piece of paper, Roni picked up the first of the books stacked at her side. This one bore the symbol for a hailstorm.

  Sully stepped away from Elliot, turned around, and nodded at Roni. The time had come. With the hellspider’s attention on Gram, Roni had plenty of opportunity to lift her book up and aim it at the creature’s flank.

  She opened the book.

  Rocks of ice machine-gunned out of the pages. The hellspider bolted away and Roni tried to follow, strafing the ground with hail. The hellspider scurried up a tall hill of books, out of Roni’s range.

  Not until she closed the book and glanced over at Gram did she know if their diversion had been successful. To her relief, she saw Sully finishing the stone shoes at her grandmother’s feet. Catching Gram’s eye, Roni offered a nod and a wink. Then Gram’s face fell.

  Roni understood immediately. She had taken her eye off the enemy. The hellspider raged down the book hill, stampeding toward Roni. With her stone shoes locking her to the ground, she could not escape.

  She opened her book again but the tumultuous storm inside had dissipated. Never can trust the weather. She glanced at Gram, her eyes begging for help. Gram held back. She had no choice. If she opened her book, the flames would have burned Roni as much as the hellspider.

  A tear slipped from Roni’s eye right before the hellspider bowled her over. It knocked her back with such force that her ankles, lodged in their stone shoes, audibly cracked. She wailed as quakes of pain rippled up her body. A part of her brain heard the scrabbling feet of the hellspider as it climbed the wall behind and dashed toward the blocked entrance. It jumped back to the floor, appearing to understand Gram’s hesitation, and turned toward Roni — it knew it was safe from the fire book.

  Through blurred eyes and excruciating torment, Roni knew no such security. The hellspider moved in on her.

  Chapter 24

  When suffering pain — extreme pain — Roni knew the body could numb itself. Whether through shock or adrenaline or some other process she had never heard of, the body could will itself pain free — at least, temporarily. As the hellspider towered over her and pulled back a leg with every intent of mashing her skull, she awaited that relief from her body.

  A rock flew in from the side and clunked against the hellspider’s head. As it rolled its shoulders to look where the attack came from, another rock flew in smacking direc
tly on its forehead. Several feet away Sully pitched another rock at the creature.

  “Varsity pitcher, Hemsdale High, 1964.” Like a pro, Sully wound up and pitched another speeding rock.

  Gram switched books and opened a new one. As if unlocking a door into outer space, the open book vacuumed in everything it could grab. The hellspider slipped several feet before it could dig its claws into the floor. Books lifted in the air and pulled off the walls but all now had chains locking them to solid stone. They stretched and waved in the winds but none were lost into the vacuum.

  Roni’s body tried to slide but her stone shoes ended up swinging her like the hand of a clock. She howled in pain. One hand snapped out to grab the nearest part of the stone floor, desperate to stop her body from moving. If only she could be rid of these shoes.

  Idiot! With her free hand she patted around her pockets until she found the paper that Sully had given her. With her teeth and one hand, she unfolded it twice and then ripped it in two.

  The stone shoes crumbled apart. The individual rocks that had formed it rolled off towards Gram’s book.

  The relief of being freed met with new sensations of electric fire as her broken ankles shifted to new positions. Ignoring her own screams, Roni rolled onto her stomach and used both hands to claw her way toward the wall.

  She dared to glance over her shoulder. Rocks and debris flew through the air each one falling into the vortex of Gram’s book. The shrieking winds were matched by the clatter of debris. Only inches from her feet, the hellspider clung to the ground, desperate to find its way to safety.

  For an instant, the horrifying idea that the creature might leap forward and clasp onto her ankles filled Roni’s thoughts. She could see it with disgusting clarity. The large beast had the strength and mass to fly through the air for a moment. Its weight would slam upon her ankles causing high voltage to spike up her legs. The strong vacuum of Gram’s book would eventually overtake the creature. But it would not let go, and in the end, it would rip Roni’s feet off her legs. Then, if Elliot could not move fast enough, she would bleed to death.

  But the hellspider had a different idea in mind.

  With the same forceful leap Roni had envisioned, it jumped forward and over her — not with the intent of clasping onto her legs, but with the desire to latch onto the wall. It succeeded with two legs.

  As it attempted to pull the rest of its body against the wall, the shift in position changed the pull of the book. Roni felt her body lifting off the ground, and she dug her fingers in tighter.

  “I can’t hold on!”

  Gram shut the cover and the winds died immediately. The hellspider scaled up to the ceiling. Rolling on her back, Roni gasped for air. Sweat salted her mouth.

  She watched as the creature headed for its old escape — but as it reached the crevice, another stone golem, one as big as the golem blocking the entranceway — crawled out. The hellspider backed up and hissed. The golem did not move. Instead, it disassembled itself, locking its pieces in place to seal the crevice exit.

  Propping up against the wall, Roni cringed as she saw her limp feet hanging at wrong angles. As the hellspider crawled across the ceiling toward the center of the room, Roni looked towards Elliot. She wanted to hide her desperation, wanted to exude bravery, but the chemicals in her body that numbed her pain would soon be wearing off. She knew in the long run she should not become reliant on a healer, but she promised herself that she would start her self-reliance on the next mission. Just please save her feet.

  Elliot caught her eye. With the motion of his hand and a single, soft nod, he assured her that when the opportunity came, he would do his best to fix her. But there was still the hellspider to deal with. Turning her attention toward Sully, she heard the change in his voice before she witnessed the cold calculations on his face.

  “Everyone get ready,” Sully said in a near monotone. “This is it.”

  Gram said, “You sure you want to do this?” Her tone did not convey doubt in Sully’s plans nor did she challenge his role as leader. Instead, Roni heard authentic concern — a sense of foreboding as if Gram knew that making this decision would forever change her good friend.

  Sully paused to gaze up at the hellspider. “We tried to capture it, and Roni is hurt. There’s no more time. We have a plan for what to do if we couldn’t capture it, and that’s where we are.”

  Kissing her cross, Gram said, “Okay.” She set down her book and lifted a different one — one bound in red and black leather.

  In the far corner, Elliot picked up another book with a similar binding. Sully walked back toward the open corner and picked up a book of his own. He planted his feet hard on the ground, rooting them as if he were made of stone. With each team member stationed in the four corners of the room, all eyes turned up towards the ceiling.

  “Roni?” Gram said from across the room. “You sure you’re up for this?”

  “Don’t have a choice. Let’s get this over with before I pass out.”

  Pride flashed across Gram’s face before she turned her attention back to the hellspider. She opened her book.

  The force with which this book began to pull in the room’s air made the previous vacuum nothing more than an afternoon breeze. Taken off guard, the hellspider plummeted to the ground. Before the book could take it away, the hellspider positioned itself behind the chair in the middle. It griped its many legs onto the stone backboard.

  The strong winds knocked Roni to the ground. She rolled forward and only stopped when she remembered to slap out one arm to brace herself. She silently vowed that should she survive this, she would invest in some training on fighting, falling, and other important skills.

  The book — she had the wrong one. The red and black volume she needed sat atop the small pile only a few feet away. With the wind howling around them and pages fluttering through the air, Roni attempted to inchworm toward her book pile.

  The hellspider held onto the chair with amazing strength, but it did not know Sully’s plan. Part of Roni actually felt sorry for the creature. She muscled her way further toward the book pile, but she did not know if she would make it before passing out.

  Over the roaring winds, Gram yelled, “I can’t hold this all day. Sully, get started.”

  Though Roni could not see Sully from behind the pile of books, she could hear the change in noise and feel the change in air pressure as he opened his book. In an instant, there were two vortexes of energy pulling into two different books. The howling winds shifted to a shriek or perhaps it was the noise of the hellspider. Grasped by these new winds, the hellspider tumbled toward Sully. Panicking, it flailed its legs and managed to scramble back to the chair. Clinging all of its legs around the stone, it lifted its head and cried out.

  Roni reached for the book pile and rolled onto her back, panting. She slipped the red and black book off the top and let it rest on her belly. No way could she crawl back to the wall, push herself up, and open the book. She would have to roll onto her stomach and hold the book open from the floor. But without the stone shoes to secure her, she did not think she would last long.

  Grunting, she lolled to her side. Elliot raised his book, and as he opened the cover, he met Roni’s eyes — he knew the trouble she was in. But the job had to be done. Their duty to the Parallel Society, to the caverns, to the universe, meant more than any individual. That was what the team was all about.

  Opening his book, he created a third harsh vacuum. The hellspider’s torso lifted free from the chair and fluttered in the air like a flag in a hurricane. Roni thought she heard Gram yelling something but the competing cacophony of storming winds made it impossible to catch individual words.

  And then it happened. Roni slid a few inches.

  Clutching the book to her chest, she tried to sit up. No good. Even without the pain shooting along her spine into the back of her head, her body was spent — she lacked the strength to raise herself. As she slipped further toward the center of the room, she could see the d
eep fear on Gram’s face, the resigned sadness on Elliot’s, and as she cleared the book pile, she also caught Sully’s mournful gaze.

  With the force of will, she managed to return to her back. Perhaps she could lift the book and open it, even though her aim would not be exact. She could do her part until one of the other books pulled her to her end. But nobody ever mentioned how heavy these particular books were — she would’ve had an easier time bench pressing Elliot. However, as her heart sank, she heard a sound cutting through the tumultuous noise — one that caused her blood to pump faster, one that filled her with a scrap of hope.

  Thump thump thump.

  Rocky appeared at her side. The little golem only had one arm remaining and lacked several of the stones that made up its head, but it was here. Wrapping its one arm around her chest it yanked her up and then spooned behind her, using its weight to lock her in place.

  Cheering for the little guy as much as for her own relief, Roni set the book in her lap and aimed it toward the hellspider. She paused to think of something cool to say. But the team didn’t need a cool quip. It needed her to act.

  She opened her book. The front legs of the hellspider stripped free from the back of the chair and stretched toward Roni. The creature spun its limbs like pinwheels, grasping desperately for the chair, but with all four whirlwinds pulling on this creature in four directions, it could not manage to secure itself. It lifted higher in the air, hovering a few feet above the chair.

  With a jerk, its legs splayed out. Roni could see the anguish on the creature’s face, as well as its realization of what would come. But as Sully had said, they tried to capture it, tried to send it to a different universe, but it had refused. This was the end of the road.

  Roni was thankful for all the noise thundering around her. It saved her from ever knowing the horrible sound of the hellspider’s limbs tearing from its body. Though she could watch the creature crying, see its terrified face, she never had to hear its torso pull apart. She never had to hear the awful shrieking rising from her own throat. The image of limbs spinning through the air as the four books sucked up different parts of its body would haunt her long enough.