AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Everett groans in pain and I snap back around to him. It takes less than a second to scoop him into my arms, then we’re speeding through the forest. “Hang on, Everett. Stay with me.”
By the time we reach the car I stashed earlier today, Everett’s condition has deteriorated further. His muscles are spasming uncontrollably as I lay him in the back seat. I’m hyperventilating as I shift into my human body and dress in the clothes hidden in the console. The tires peel out as I slam my foot to the gas. We must get moving. The small, rundown cabin that will be our safehouse for the evening is only fifteen minutes away. I had no idea when I selected the house that fifteen minutes would stretch into an eternity. I also had no clue that Everett would have been fed on at least three times in between the time I created this plan and enacted it. The sickness progressed much quicker than I anticipated.
All because Sibbie couldn’t keep her fangs to herself. That bitch got exactly what she deserved.
The cabin is stocked with medicines, herbal remedies, and first-aid items. I spent hours running around Tokyo, purchasing anything I could think of. The wallets of the feeders are usually tossed into a pile, never given another thought. The Jorogumo rarely need anything that requires money. The pleasure pets use the funds to purchase clothes for their human forms. Other than that, the cash and cards go widely untouched. Everett’s wallet alone gave me nearly all the money I needed for this escape plan. He said he had the means to give me a new life outside of here. If the high-end credit cards and mound of currency in his wallet are any indicator, he was telling the truth.
Headlights illuminate the small dirt driveway that leads up into the property. I heave a sigh of relief.We made it. Of course this is only the beginning. Everett will need to be nursed back to health. I have no idea what medications or supplements he’ll need. I’ll try anything. It may be a learning curve but we’ll figure it out, together.
Everett’s breathing is harsh and uneven as I lift him from the car and move him through the doorway. Once again I find myself momentarily grateful for Jorogumo’s curse. Without my enhanced strength, none of this would be possible. Everett’s skin is soaked with sweat as I lay him on the soft mat nearby. The first thing I need to do is get his fever under control. A bucket of cool water and an old rag will have to do until I can locate something stronger. I drop the damp cloth over his forehead before racing to the stash of medicine I purchased. My fingers shake as I dig through the bin in search of a fever reducer. When I finally find it, I’m in such a hurry to open the damn thing that the entire container cracks in half, spilling the contents across the floor.
“Fuck.” The tiny white pills scatter in every direction. I snatch four off the ground, unable to worry about how sanitary they are. Everett’s flesh is scorching as I slide my hand beneath his head, tilting it up. “Take these,” I urge, gently parting his lips. I place the medicine on his tongue, barely snatching my fingers back before his jaw snaps shut. Everett convulses, his body jerking with horrifying roughness. Foam spills from between his clenched teeth.I don’t know what to do. I don’t know what to do. What the fuck do you do when someone has a seizure? I remember something about their tongue.
The sounds of Everett’s body slamming against the floor again and again follow me as I scour the contents of the home, searching for a wooden spoon. The noises grow abruptly silent, and I freeze. The hairs on the back of my neck lift. My monster senses a change in the air. When I turn, Everett is sitting up, still and statuesque. His mouth opens wide, releasing an inhuman scream.
It’s the only warning I get before his other body emerges.
Everett’s screams are those of a dying man. An animal so fatally wounded it knows there’s nothing left to do but howl its pain to the cold, unforgiving stars above. But as I continue to watch, it becomes unavoidably apparent that this is not a death. It’s a rebirth. The Jorogumo has found its way home.
Shock leaves me paralyzed where I stand. Everett’s tanned skin splits when the first massive leg bursts forward. A second leg tears through, followed by a third and fourth. Within moments, eight spine-covered legs longer than my body and thicker than my torso protrude from the base of a shining red and black thorax. Everett is still lying on the floor, breathing heavily. As I take in the sight of his new spider form, a realization too horrible to accept creeps along the inner walls of my mind.
There was never a sickness.The men were turning.
The Jorogumo destroyed them before their yokai side could fully take root. All these years we believed the men were going insane. That their blood would spoil and they would all eventually perish from the venom in our bites. It turns out the erratic behavior was just their monsters within, fighting to break free.
Everett’s silence is short-lived. The screaming begins again. His hands fly to his face, gripping it as he rolls back and forth on the floor. The skin of his hands, arms, and chest darkens, shifting to match the red and black of his newly formed lower half. An intricate pattern of dark markings decorate his writhing flesh. His screams deepen, becoming guttural vibrations that shake the thin walls of our refuge.
When his hands drop away from his face, nothing of his human form remains. His features are elongated and sharply shaped. Six red eyes blink up at me from the floor. His mouth is open in a gasp as it reveals a double set of sharp fangs. Either side of his arachnid jaw is framed by two long mandibles that twitch incessantly. My breath catches. Red markings, mandibles, and spines.
He’s an Eater.
In the quick second it takes me to realize this, Everett finds his footing. He rises on all eight legs, towering over me by at least three feet. He’s the largest Jorogumo I’ve ever laid eyes on. I open my mouth to speak but the concussive force of my body slamming into the wall behind me steals the breath from my lungs. Everett looms above me, his large hands wrapped around my throat.How did he move so fast? My body trembles as my brain works to catch up to the unexpected events unfolding before me.
Heat radiates off Everett’s crimson skin. Why is he so hot? The females were always cold. He peers down at me. I recognize the bloodlust in his eyes. It’s a phenomenon that consumes us all in the moments after our turning. We need to be fed. The Jorogumo ensured there was always a fresh feeder when a new girl emerged. I hadn’t realized blood would be a necessity so soon. The thought of Everett turning never even crossed my mind.
Two sharp-tipped legs rise. They whip about in front of me, hacking and slashing. I wince, preparing for pain. Instead, cool air hits my bare skin as the shredded remains of my clothing hit the floor. Everett’s slitted pupils dilate as his gaze treks along my body. He’s deep in the bloodlust. Though, in this moment, it appears he’s more interested in lust than blood.
My back scrapes across the wall as Everett raises me higher. My feet clear the floor, and I kick wildly. Fear forces my spider form toward the surface. When I blink again, it’s through four eyes instead of two.
“No.” Everett’s deep voice makes me flinch. “You will not change.”
My yokai recedes, submitting to the larger predator. One of his hands drops from my throat, disappearing. When it returns to my view, he’s holding a bundle of thick, white webbing.Impossible. He can’t be a Web Maker. He bears the markings of an Eater. No one has ever emerged as both.
As much as I wish to deny this reality, the current feel of his freshly spun thread around my wrists tells me it’s very real. My hands are bound above my head with a skilled precision that has me baffled.
Everett moves as if he’s familiar with his new form. There’s none of the stumbling clumsiness the rest of us demonstrated when we shifted for the first time. He secures the ropes around my wrist to the ceiling, which is now barely a few inches above his head. With my hands immobilized, he releases my neck. My pulse quickens as Everett’s clawed fingertips explore my body. More thread appears. This time, he loops the white silk beneath my thighs. I gasp out as he jerks my knees up and apart. The threads lengthen until he’s able to secure both to the ceiling above. I squirm uncomfortably. I’m strung up, hands bound, legs spread wide, with a brand-new Eater before me.
“Everett,” I plead. Panic overtakes me as I struggle against my bindings. His webbing is so much stronger than mine. The urge to shift overcomes me once more. I blink up with four eyes and Everett roars in anger.
“Do. Not. Change.” The severity in his voice has my yokai shrinking back yet again. “I will have you like this.” He grips my thighs, spreading my legs even wider. “Bound and in human form. As I was.”
“Everett,” I plead again, trying and failing to break through the bloodlust clouding his mind. “Everett, I—”
My words cease as a long seam opens just past the point where his human torso shifts into his arachnid lower half. The seam bulges for a moment. A thick red head presses through the slit, growing outward, getting longer, and longer, and...Oh god.
I struggle against the webbing securing me to the ceiling. Everett’s cock grows and grows. The base is wide and ringed with black markings. A hook protrudes forward, arching up and bending back toward the head. The shaft itself corkscrews forward. The raised fin-like tips of each corkscrewed ridge flex and flare, seemingly moving on their own.
My gaze moves to the tip and my mouth falls open. The head of his cock writhes like a serpent.That is not human. That is also not going tofitinside a human.
