Author's Horrendously Intriguing Note: What do you want? Why are you reading this :barkbark:You should be helping your mother with the washing up! You should be wiping the floor! You should—(well, here we go: meet Trice Octari, my…let's said…aggressive personality. She's just come out form jail for biting a postman under the pretext that he never helped his mother when he was young, but don't worry, she won't harm you.)

Never mind. This is the next and heartbreakingly short chapter that continues with the story, nothing much happens in it, sorry; it was a kind of pause. I hope now you all hate Hawkke. I don't personally, but you ought to hate him. Anyway, Arach's not for him. Aha, yes. That's pushing, innit?

Chapter Eleven

Araneus

Arach kept silent and immobile all the time they crossed the green fields, the wind in her pale face, dark thoughts behind her closed eyelids. She could feel all too well Drymarchon's long arms wrapped around her waist, or his cold breath against her temple, or his nose in her hair, and needed a strong will not to stick her elbow in his stomach, push him away from his horse and go back to the port. No, she would let herself ride to his castle, the mighty fortress Serpent Stone, and find a way to kill Drymarchon, then she would hunt down Frostrosé, kill her too, and then kill Hawkke. She would enjoy to feel her dagger's blade enter his heart, enjoy the feeling of his blood on her hands, enjoy her vengeance.

'See, Arachna, the beauty and mightiness of my fortress!' he told her, speaking close to her hair, so that without raising his voice, she could hear him in spite of the winds howls over them, 'See how tall and graceful and powerful it stands! Feet for a snake!'

Arach said nothing, but the fortress was indeed utterly magnificent. Tall against the fresh cerulean sky, build with grey stones and green-gold bronze, slim, majestic, with the long, flapping standards, green and gold, with a long, forked-tongued serpent with glittering emerald eyes. The castle was circled with a deep ditch, at the bottom of which sharp blades were pointing towards the sky. A heavy wooden bridge was lowered over it whenever someone wanted to come, the moment it wasn't any enemy, and at a cry from their master, two guards perched over the wall lowered it. The horse crossed it, its hoofs thundering against the stone floor as they reach the courtyard, the bridge closing behind them like a door. Arach realized it wouldn't be easy to go away, but she told herself not to despair, and that she would find a way. All the peoples in the courtyard, all tall and slim, were dressed in green, with bronze and emerald brooches, all with long dark brown-blond hair, all looking busy and preoccupied. The men were dressed with leather armors and gloves, the women with simple green or brown velvet gowns. Children poorly dressed were running all around the place, crying and laughing and playing silly stupid games.

Drymarchon jumped from his horse, and walked away, shouting without turning:

'Get the girl off the horse, Anack, and take her to my bedchamber. Don't forget to close the door, or else she'll go away.'

'Yay master, as you wish, master,' said Anaconda, a tall, strong, slimy young warrior, pulling Arach off the horse, and gently on her feet.

He took her arms and led her in the castle, were everything was bronze and green, up a flight of stairs and another and another, until they had reached the top chamber, the master's chamber at the top of the highest donjon.

It was a large room, with bear rugs on the floor, and a huge bed in the middle, hanged with green curtains, like those at the two tall windows. A long table in a corner was charged with parchments and little boxes and bags, and the chair next to it was also ornate with a green piece of cloth. All the room gave an impression of grandness, but also danger, and uneasiness. The warrior led her in, with a sickening smile on his face, then he backed away, closed the door behind him, and she heard the key turning in the lock.

Arach stood a few moments without doing anything, not even thinking. Then she shook herself, and went straight to the table, and started to fumble through the things, looking for anything sharp, that she could stick in the Lord's guts. She searched, and found nothing, so she started to look in her own secret pocket. There were two little bottles left, one love drug (he certainly didn't need one) and one sleeping drug. Well she could at least make him sleep so that she could strangle him in peace. The trouble was, how to use the poison. It was the kind of little liquid that you had to slip in a glass or a plate, not just fling at someone, and she got so angered by finding nothing that she didn't hear a noise of foots behind the door. It opened, and she started, but it was just a little maid, who came with some food on a tray, pulled it on a floor, then bowed and left. Arach didn't touch the food, even though she was nearly shivering with hunger, and she started to pace up and down the room, with the powerful desire to smash something. The glasses were useless, as the window was leading right in the air, and she finally thought of nothing better than to curl in a corner and sleep.

While Arach was pacing up and down his chamber like a tiger in a cage, Drymarchon was riding at hell speed out of his fortress. He went far in the west, on his beautiful, fast brown horse, and arrived a few hours later at a tall, incredible black fortified castle. It was tall, and slim, with eight wings spreading all around it like a spider. The standards were made of spider silk, representing a thin, beautiful, ruby eyed spider weaving a silver web and trapping a scarlet rose. The flags were flapping in the wind, and added so much majesty to the tall construction that anybody, just by looking at it, could understand how it came that Spider's Web was the most well known and beautiful castle in all the GreenLands and beyond. When he emerged in the courtyard, Drymarchon was one more time surprised by the rapidity of Araneus's information squad. A tall, black, silver and red dressed young guard, was waiting for him; he said in his young, arrogant voice as soon as Drymarchon could hear him:

'The Lord of the Spider's Web enquires what a sneaky snake can be doing in his domains.'

'Tell your master that I have something important to talk to him about,' said Drymarchon, and he added, as the guard walked away: 'tell him it is about the girl.'

This had an effect. The guard came back a few moments later, and he said:

'The Lord of the Spider's Web will talk to you.'

And he took Drymarchon to his master, while two little boys were taking his horse to the stables.

Lord Araneus was sitting in his rubies-incrusted ebony chair, looking tense and weary in his black and silver glorious clothes. Despite his late age, his face had conserved a kind of marble beauty, white and noble, with the snowy white hair fell over the tall forehead as majestically as ever. His eyes were narrow and black, and Drymarchon thought that this man was the exact portrait of his daughter. When he saw him, Araneus straightened in his chair, and said:

'So, my guard has told me you have news of my daughter.'

'I have, my Lord. She is at this very moment in my fortress, waiting for me to bring her news of her father.'

'So…You finally saw my daughter…How is she, Drymarchon? Is she beautiful?'

'She looks like you. In character as much as in physic.'

'Does she? Oh, I do want to see her.'

Drymarchon felt a casual shadow of pity for the old man. He loved his daughter because she was his only child and looked so much like him, and for this reason, he would never have her like a daughter, because of his own character.

'You shall not see her, my Lord.'

'And why is that? She is my daughter.'

'You will see her at her wedding.'

'Her wedding? Which wedding?'

'Her wedding with me.'

'Her wedding with you!' shouted Araneus, springing from his throne, 'I forbid it! I absolutely forbid it!'

'You have no choice whatsoever this matter, lord. She has disobeyed you enough in her youth to disobey you again,' said Drymarchon calmly and coldly.

'You will pay.'

'I am already,' said sinisterly Drymarchon, 'She is a girl as I never saw one. She kept cursing after the man that I employed to catch her…'

'You employed someone to catch her!' screamed the old Lord, cutting his guests words, 'Who! Who!'

'The very handsome Lord-Hunter Hawkke of the Predator's Lair.'

'Him! I'll kill him! I'll break him down! I'll destroy him!' shouted Araneus, 'And I'll send my armies at your place to take her back were she belongs!'

'If you send one man, I will kill her. And as I am your only heir after her, I suppose it wouldn't be of so bad an effect.'

'Away!' shouted Araneus, jumping to his old feet, 'Away from my castle! Away!'

Two guard stepped in, one tried to take Drymarchon by the elbow, but he stepped back, bowed ironically to the Spider Lord, and left.

Author's Definitely Absurd After-Note: Here we go. You were able to catch one of the very few glimpses of Arach's father you shall ever get. What did you thin of him then? Does he suit his daughter? Never mind. Review, and tell me what you think about my characters. That includes Arach, Hawkke, Drymarchon and Araneus. Just tell me what's wrong with them.

Post-Memoris (I've just invented this so-called Latin sentence. It doesn't really mean anything. Just another note:) to say—no, truly, honestly speaking—to BEG for my readers to write to me. My e-mail address is: do write, I really need someone to talk to. So, desperately hoping for you to write, and waiting at the top of my tower—just e-mail me. You can talk about nearly anything you want. Including the movie War of the Worlds and the Artemis Fowl books. Oh, just write.