Raising Beast Cubs to Find a Husband-Chapter 126: The Spider’s Web

The air in the chamber was vibrating. It wasn’t sound; it was pure, condensed magical pressure that made everyone’s teeth ache.

Vali—or the thing wearing Vali’s face—sat on the Throne of Shadows. His crimson eyes swept over the group, but there was no recognition. No warmth. Just a cold, predatory hunger.

"Excellent," the Boss purred, stepping forward. "Do you see, Lady Primrose? He isn’t just a vessel. He is the Void incarnate."

He turned to the boy on the throne.

"Vali," the Boss commanded. "Show them. Eliminate the intruders."

The boy tilted his head. He looked at Rurik, who was standing frozen, his face a mask of heartbreak.

"Eliminate?" the boy echoed. His voice was wrong. It sounded like two stones grinding together. "Yes. Eliminate. Feed."

He raised a hand. Black spikes of Void energy erupted from the floor, aiming straight for Rurik’s chest.

"MOVE!" Konrad roared.

He tackled his brother, shoving Rurik out of the way just as a spike impaled the spot where he had been standing.

"It’s him!" Freya shouted, drawing her sword. "It’s Vali! We can’t fight him!"

"No," Primrose whispered.

She was staring at the boy on the throne. She wasn’t looking at the red eyes or the scary magic. She was looking at his hands.

Vali was a biter. He sometimes bit his nails when he was nervous. His fingers were always calloused from climbing trees.

The boy on the throne had perfect, manicured hands. His nails were long, black claws, pristine and untouched.

"That’s not Vali," Primrose said, her voice cutting through the chaos.

"What?" Caspian asked, shielding her from a blast of dark energy.

"Vali bites his nails!" Primrose shouted. "And he has a scar on his left knee from falling off a table last week! That thing has perfect skin! It’s a fake!"

She pointed at the Boss.

"It’s a construct!" Primrose yelled. "A decoy! The real Vali isn’t here!"

The Boss froze. His mask didn’t move, but his posture stiffened.

"Clever girl," the Boss hissed. "You noticed."

He snapped his fingers.

The fake Vali dissolved. One moment he was a terrifying Void Prince, the next he was just a pile of black sludge that splattered onto the throne.

"A distraction," Rurik realized, scrambling up. "He was stalling us!"

"Indeed," the Boss sighed, checking his pocket watch. "And it worked beautifully. While you were playing with my puppet, the transfer was completed."

The walls of the chamber began to shake. The ceiling started to crack.

"This room is unstable," the Boss announced cheerfully. "I suggest you run. Or don’t. Being buried alive builds character."

He tipped his nonexistent hat. Then, he stepped backward into a shadow and vanished.

"THE CEILING!" Astrid screamed.

A massive block of stone plummeted from the darkness above.

"Hydro-Shield!" Caspian shouted.

A dome of pressurized water erupted over them, catching the stone block and shattering it. But the entire ruin was collapsing. The Boss had rigged the place to blow.

"We have to go!" Konrad yelled. "Back to the chute!"

They ran.

It was a nightmare sprint through falling debris and shaking floors. Rurik grabbed Astrid, throwing her over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes. Konrad and Freya cleared the path, smashing through falling pillars. Caspian kept the shield up, protecting Primrose.

They reached the ice chute.

"Up!" Caspian ordered.

He reversed the flow of his magic. The ice chute became a geyser. A blast of water shot them upward, propelling them out of the belly of the mountain like a cannonball.

WHOOSH.

They landed in the snow of the courtyard, wet, freezing, and breathless.

Behind them, the ground rumbled. The tunnel collapsed in on itself, sealing the entrance to the Old Foundation forever.

Silence fell over the courtyard.

Orion was waiting for them. He had been standing by the beacon, just as ordered. When he saw them erupt from the ground without Vali, his little shoulders slumped.

"He is not with you," Orion stated. It wasn’t a question.

"No," Primrose whispered, shivering as the cold wind hit her wet dress. "It was a trap. A decoy."

Rurik fell to his knees in the snow. He stared at the sealed tunnel. He looked broken.

"I was right there," Rurik choked out. "I smelled him. How could I be wrong?"

"The scent was planted," Konrad said grimly, placing a hand on his brother’s shoulder. "The Boss wanted us to waste time fighting a ghost while he moved the real target."

Astrid slid off Rurik’s shoulder. She looked at the collapsed tunnel, then at the empty courtyard. Her face was pale.

"It’s just like Vivi," Astrid whispered.

Everyone looked at her.

"What do you mean?" Freya asked gently.

"Vivi," Astrid said, her voice trembling. "When she disappeared... the guards said they found her scarf near the South Gate. They spent three days searching the woods."

She looked up at her mother.

"But they never found her. Because she wasn’t in the woods. The scarf was a lie. Just like the fake Vali."

Astrid clenched her fists.

"He makes us look in the wrong place," she realized. "So he can take them somewhere else. Somewhere we would never look."

"Where?" Primrose asked. "Where is the one place nobody checks?"

Astrid looked at the massive, towering peak of the mountain itself—the Ancestral Shrine at the very top.

"The Shrine," Astrid whispered. "Father forbids anyone from going there. Even the guards."

Konrad went stiff. "The Shrine is sacred. The Void cannot enter it."

"Unless the Void is already inside," Caspian said darkly. "And you have been guarding an empty house while the thief lives in the attic."

Miles away. Or perhaps just a few thousand feet straight up.

Vali woke up with a headache.

"Ow," he mumbled, trying to rub his head.

He couldn’t move his hand.

"Huh?"

Vali blinked his eyes open. The world was fuzzy and dark. It wasn’t pitch black like the root cellar. It was a weird, glowing purple twilight.

He tried to kick his legs. Stuck.

He looked down.

He wasn’t on the ground. He was floating.

Thick, sticky strands of black webbing were wrapped around his wrists, ankles, and waist. He was suspended in the center of a massive, spherical chamber made of black crystal. It looked like the inside of a giant, evil disco ball.

"Hey!" Vali shouted. "Let me go! I’m heavy! You’re gonna pull a muscle!"

His voice didn’t echo. The webs absorbed the sound.

Vali looked around. And then he stopped shouting.

He wasn’t alone.

All around him, suspended in the same black webs, were other cocoons. Dozens of them. Some were small, some were bigger.

Inside each web was a child.

They were asleep. Their faces were pale, their eyes closed. Faint purple energy was pulsing from the webs, flowing out of the children and into the center of the room—right toward Vali.

"Whoa," Vali whispered.

He saw a girl with long red hair a few feet away. She was wearing a tattered Winter-Hold guard tunic.

"Hey," Vali hissed at her. "Hey! Wake up! It’s nap time, not coma time!"

She didn’t move.

This must be Vivi. The girl Astrid talked about.

Vali struggled against the webs. He tried to bite them.

ZAP.

A shock of purple lightning zapped his tongue.

"Ouch!" Vali yelped. "Spicy string! Bad string!"

He looked at the other kids. They looked... faded. Like batteries running low.

Vali realized with a jolt of fear that the webs weren’t just holding them. They were eating them. Draining their mana. And feeding it to him.

"I don’t want it!" Vali yelled at the darkness. "I’m not hungry! Take it back!"

But the room didn’t listen. The purple energy flowed into him, filling him up, making his skin buzz and his red eyes glow brighter.

He was the battery. And he was charging up for something terrible.