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Her wizened face turns towards me, her white hair flowing all around. “Now it’s time.”

“Time for what?” I ask as I return to standing.

“To learn the truth.”

Her hand stretches towards me, and I take it. Images flash before me. A man stands where I am now, so familiar yet different. His green eyes glow, and he calls forth, “Please, great goddess. I beseech you. Your high priests are no longer the guardians of magic, but corrupt, power-crazed fools who seek to devour all those within the physical world. Save us. Please, I beg of you.”

Antonia’s voice echoes. “Alvius Androclaria did not find the benevolent goddess he was raised to believe watched over them, but a creature unbothered by the sounds of his cries. Still, he persisted.”

Alvius is older, more similar to his portraits within my childhood home. He pants, sweat slicking his brow. He kneels on something black and smooth, inspecting a divot of some sort. The image clears when I step forward, trying to see what it is that he’s studying. Soul Threads pour forth. Thousands and thousands of them. He touches and shifts them, searching.

His face stretches into a grin and, with tender care, he splits the threads as if he’s parting the hair on a scalp. Teeny tiny threads no longer than my finger sway. He carefully sorts through them until he finds one of each color close enough that they can touch when gathered together.

“He did what he felt he must to save humanity and the mages from the priesthood.”

The scene shifts. A massive mirror that I recognize from the Archweaver estate’s old temple ripples, light pouring forth like the sun’s rays. Alvius Androclaria, the first Archweaver, steps forth. An opalescent aura halos around his form, and the mages in attendance fall to their knees.

“But the cost was greater than he ever knew.”

I’m no longer on the path of tightly stretched Soul Threads. I am on a mighty web. Each thread stretches to hold glinting souls, much like the pearls on my chain. Where red orbs glitter, multiple color strands burst forth. My jaw drops, my neck craning as I try to fathom the impossibility of all the threads. Like neurons, they flash with light, passing magic between them in an endless current. The spiders are dancing along them, their eight limbs rippling as they elegantly navigate through the connections, tending to strands and inspecting the glowing souls. So different from the creatures I’ve witnessed that I hardly believe they’re the same.

I blink, and the visions are gone, as well as Antonia.

Alone, I face the core. My fingers stretch forth to grasp the Archweaver line that slithers from my soul.

A suspicion takes root, and my eyes narrow as facts begin to link in my mind. This is not a ball of threads or skein; this is a prison. A consequence of Alvius messing with things beyond his mortal comprehension.

He did something to those newly forming Soul Threads and, whatever it was, it made this ball. I bet if I were to peer inside, I’d find the queen Jinx spoke of. A goddess or creature beyond mortal comprehension who was bound within her own web of magical threads by a man. A liar who created a fanatic cult of followers before slaughtering all who dared to resist his will.

My fist tightens on the Archweaver line. All my life, I fought tooth and nail to force this Order of lies to accept me, a Dual Threaded weaver they labeled as an abomination. We are not abominations. We are the missing link of population regrowth that Rossana and my mother couldn’t find.

This is not a Tapestry. It is a web created by spidery creatures who cared for it. Who lost the ability to care for it when their queen was imprisoned by mortal tampering.

Everything in two thousand years—the decline of the population, the rigidity of magic, everything—can be traced to this. To Alvius Androclaria, a man who declared a priesthood false and trapped the arachnid goddess in order to create the Archweaver Soul Thread for himself.

Viola’s words from long ago when she first handed me the notebook whispers in my ears. If weaver magic cannot save you, then we must look outside the rigid laws of man.

I look down at the rope of threads in my hand. My wrist rolls, twisting the Archweaver line tight, not towards the prison of threads, but away. Around and around, I wind it, my other hand joining to feel along the threads. Like the pearls along my chain, there are small knots on the line that are the souls of long-deceased Archweavers. I continue until a spark of recognition stills me and my lips curl.

Now I will open your eyes, and you will save yourself. You will save us all.

Power surges within me, tendrils of electricity rippling up my arms to arc along my face and spark in my vision. My hair whips around me. No more running. No more trying to bend the rules that should never have existed. No more trying to fit into a mold that doesn’t fit me. I will save us. Jinx, Lucas, Valen, all of us.

This ends now.

My power surges, crackling along the rope, my skin flashing a bright light. My vision blurs as I gaze through my father’s eyes. The Archweaver’s estate greets me. The Astrum Order is gathered. The statue of Antonia, decimated by my imprisoned body, stands to the side. The Guild is gathered in the back of the hall.

Valen is before Atticus on his knees, a muzzle binding him and his arms shackled behind his back. Lucas is yelling, surging against where Dimitar restrains him with the Guild. My father’s words echo in my ears, my lips moving as if I’m saying them.

“Valentin Bauer the Sixth, you are found guilty of treason and malicious intent against your Archweaver. Against the Order you swore to serve. For your crimes, you shall be executed. Your bones scattered across the continent. Your flesh fed to the beasts of the deep Weave so for all eternity, you will know nothing but suffering.”

Rage pulses in me, flashing my vision red. How dare he?

I scream, my hair blowing back, the threads below my feet vibrating. Like tearing out the Soul Thread of a grimoire, I wrench the arm holding the Archweaver Soul Thread back as hard as I can. A pulse echoes around the sphere, my flowing hair blowing back as I rip at my father’s thread with all the power in my body.

I throw my left arm out, and my hand closes around the throat of a man. Power explodes from the impact, and the soul of my father writhes in my grip. The uncut ruby shifts on my middle finger, and I smile.

The shock of such an end is jarring. His mouth opens and closes like a gasping fish, and I wait patiently while he trembles, eyes darting all around.