"Once your dead, Salem will bring her back!" He snarled with glee. "I'll have Princess Corinthia BACK!" He slashed down at me with the spike, I barely dodged it, I heard my cape tearing as he cut through the fabric. "FORTY THOUSAND YEARS! I HAVE LOOKED OVER HER! PROTECTING HER FROM LOOTERS LIKE YOU! MY WEBS HAVE PRESEVERVED HER SO THAT SHE MAY SMILE AGAIN!" I looked at this grimm, he was fighting for someone else.
Someone that he loved.
I ran towards where the pillar of silver light and erupted from, it had washed over the entire area, turning all of the grimm into stone, Ruby was in danger again and I was no where near her. "DAMN IT!" I used my semblance and shot my self up into the air with a pillar of stone. The buildings under me raced by as I closed in on the square. Down below I could see the others trying to navigate the streets.
Ruby hang in there, I won't fail you again!
Chapter 61: The Spider Paladin
I scurried through the grass, chasing a small mouse that ran a head of me, I could feel it's fear as I hunted it down. My stomach growled with hunger for my first meal. My eight legs working hard to catch the small creature. I lunged and pinned it to the ground, it spasmed around my spike as I lifted it up to my mouth. The smell of blood filled my senses as ate with glee. This creature would sustain me until I found a lair of my own. I cleaned the bones as I took in my surroundings. I stood in a wide meadow filled with flowers.
I started to head for the woods when I heard a loud screech, I turned my eyes to the blue sky, swooping down at me was a mighty bird. I was locked in fear as I looked at my attacker, not even a day and I was going to be returned to the darkness. I held my spikes in front of my face and closed my eyes.
"No go away mean bird!" I heard a soft voice yell. and a shadow pass over me. When I opened my eyes standing over me was a human girl, her eyes a gleaming silver. The bird was flying away. "Are you okay Mr. Grimm?" she asked with concern in her voice. A human had just saved me. I took a few steps back before running into the woods. "Mama, papa, he ran away!" I looked back to see a tall pale, white haired woman pick up her daughter.
"Maybe you'll see him again one day." They woman shook her daughter in her arms. "Perhaps now that you have saved him, he will come back to save you?"
"So I could see him again?" She smiled.
"Maybe Corinthia, maybe." Her father smiled as her picked up her sister.
For the next few years I would stay close to that meadow, waiting to see Corinthia again. To thank her for saving me, but as she grew up her guards would stay closer and closer to her. On night while I rested in a small lair that I had made for my self, I heard someone walking through the woods, small feet breaking twigs and kicking leaves as she sang a happy little song.
"One man found his love on a moon lit night, another over the distant sea." It was Corinthia, she had snuck out of the castle, a light bounce to her step.
I watched her pass right under me the ever so cherry child smiling as if nothing could hurt her. "Corinthia." I said to my self, my mouth struggling to form the word. I followed her from the trees as she walked her secret trail. She reached a small clearing where she moved some brush and revealed a pair of sword, bronze in color, jade wood scales. She picked them up and began a slow practice routine. I would follow her back to this clearing for nearly a year, learning to speak from her singing.
One night under a full moon I watched her walk back the meadow, but this night we were not alone. A howl cut through the night freezing her in place, A alpha Beowulf stepped onto her now well worn trail, his hulking form standing over the small girl. She stepped back in fear. And before she could yell out in fear, the monster struck my savoir.
His claws racked across her blue aura, breaking it as she crashed into a tree. I saw her cough up blood and I acted.
Dropping down onto the cretin that had harmed her, My spikes now longer then a mans arm drove deep into it's back. I hacked and slashed much like how I had seen Corinthia in her clearing. Black blood dripped from my spikes as I stood over my kill, but as he faded my attention was on the princess, she was hurt, she tried to back away from me. "It's okay, I don't want to hurt you." I said as I pointed my spikes behind me.
"What do you want?" She was panicking.
"To thank you for saving my life when a was little." I said as I explained to her what I had been doing for the last four years.
"All because I saved you?" She asked as she stayed still to avoid the pain.
"If you want me to leave, I will." I looked at the ground.
"Stay, I'll... I'll talk to my parents." She smiled at me, those same silver eyes filled with the same happiness and worry the day she saved me.
I kneeled on the carpet in front of the God King Ozma, and him Grimm Queen Salem. "To protect my daughter and carry her back, all the while expecting to be killed, I never would have expected such actions from a Arachne." Salem stood up from her throne. "There is only one way to thank you properly, I hereby charge you with the duty of protecting our daughter, Princess Corinthia, rise as her eternal Guardian." I stood a smile beaming on the face of the girl who saved me all those years ago.
I knew the rest of the Royal Guard would have a eye on me, but I didn't care. I was the happiest grimm on the planet.
As the years passed we had grown closer as friends, if she wanted to go somewhere I was right there with her, when she was sick in bed I never left her side till the illness passed. I was given my own armor. I had gained the title as The Spider Paladin, for my unfaltering loyalty to her grace. "Menzro, can I ask you a question?" Corinthia asked as we walked through the streets of Helen. She sat half saddle on my arachnid back.
"Ask away my friend." I told her.
"Do you have any hobbies?" She asked.
"Hobbies? What do you mean?" I asked.
"Like reading, games, stuff like that, your always doing things for me." She said, "I want to know if there is something I can do for you."
"I've been wanting to try painting, but I lack the hands to do so." I looked at my spikes, I was made for slaughter, not... creation.
"Well we'll find a way for you to do it." She gave me her happy little smile again, the smile that warmed something inside of me every time I saw it.
After months of mishaps I finally had made a painting, it was of the day I first met the princess, her smile was the focal point of the painting. I stepped back from the image, it was just as I remembered the day, her blue dress the same color as sapphires. "Amazing!" She smiled as she hugged me.
"Thank you." I wished this feeling would last forever. The warmth of Corinthia in my arms.
I kneeled in the ruins of the castle, my only friend in the world laid dead in my arms, killed in the battle between the king and queen. "Corinthia wake up, please." I begged. "I was supposed to defend you, so wake up." My body shook as tears poured from my eyes, mixing with the rain that fell on the ruined kingdom. I heard footsteps approach me.
"You still look over her?" The Queen asked.
"It's all I have ever done, it's all I know. Please, help her." I begged, I looked into Salem's red eyes.
"Watch over her, use your webs to preserve her and once I rule this world again, I will return her to us. Kill any who would take from Helen. Do this and I will reward in the new Kingdom." I nodded as I picked up Corinthia's body and moved towards the catacombs beneath the castle.
I mixed my natural paints as the messenger from Salem floated into my lair. "Menzro. It has been a while." Salem greeted me through the creature.
"Forty thousand years, I have waited longer then entire empires have lasted. A while doesn't describe it." I said.
"You still paint I see." She said. "I have a offer for you."
"If you want a portrait, I don't do commissions." I said as I turned my back to them, I slowly started to paint a new image on my canvas of silk.
"I'm willing to bring Corinthia back." I stopped completely still. "There is a new Maiden coming your way, I want her dead. Kill her and Corinthia will be reunited with you."
"And what if I fail, like I did so long ago?" I asked.
"You'll see her on the other side. The Maiden has silver eyes." I closed my eyes and let out a sigh, she was of Ozma's blood... Of Corinthia's blood.
"I do need red paint."
And there is chapter two of today.