You feel a bit like an idiot now. Here’s an idea, a romantic weekend of camping privately in the forest with your partner, and you fail to check the weather. Now you’re stuck out in the pouring rain with only a leaky tent for shelter.
At least until it seems to stop? You can still hear it out there, but it seems to stop raining in your immediate area. You glance at your partner and peek out the tent. Some sort of tarp is hanging over the branches below, blocking the rain. You both wonder where that came from.
You and your partner emerge from the tent to take a closer look. The tarp looks like a spider web with the holes filled in.
“Oh dear, stuck out in the rain? Simply dreadful weather, isn’t it?”
You turn and see four long, bent legs propelling a towering lady with a bulbous abdomen
In one of her four arms she holds a green floral umbrella over her.
You yelp, “Huge spider!” and run three steps before slipping on the wet ground and falling. Your partner sighs and helps you up.
The black and brown spider lady laughs. “Sorry, I suppose it is a bit of a shock.”
“My name is Maestra,” she says. She looks at you with two big red eyes, ten smaller eyes surrounding them. Her braided orange hair and blue summer dress put you at ease, you admit, but the orange shawl over her big abdomen does not.
Your partner introduces yourselves.
“A gloomy weekend to go camping, I’m afraid,” Maestra says, looking from your tent to the dark clouds. “My home isn’t far from here, if you would like to stay there until the rain stops.”
“Oh, thank you!” your partner says. They try to wipe some of the mud off you with the rain.
“Wait, I dunno,” you say. You whisper to your partner that she’s a giant spider. Your partner says just because someone’s a spider doesn’t mean she’s bad. You argue that just because your partner is into spiders doesn’t mean she’s good.
Your partner says that’s besides the point, and if you want to stay out in the rain all weekend you can. You know you aren’t going to convince them, so you follow this spider to her nest.
Her nest ends up being a huge mansion so you give your partners props for trusting Maestra.
“Now then,” Maestra says, once you’re inside the sprawling but dark foyer, and she replaces her wet abdomen shawl with a dry pink one, “let me start the fire, and then get you some tea to warm you up. Then I can show you to a room to change out of those wet clothes.”
As she starts the fire you glance around the foyer, although you avoid the portraits on the walls. A few look human, but the rest look like monsters.
Stairs lead to higher floors, and all the furniture looks antique, although that could be the effect of all the spider webs.
“All right, warm up by the fire,” Maestra says, “and I’ll be back with some hot cider tea.”
You and your partner settle by the fire. You hold your partner close and admit this is nice, but you’re still creeped out.
“Don’t worry,” your partner says, “I’m here.” They hug you.
Soon Maestra returns with the hot tea. You thank her and take a sip, but it tastes off. It’s a little too sweet, but with a bite to it.
“Did you say this is cider tea?” your partner asks.
“Oh, no,” Maestra says, “it’s hot spider tea.”
You swallow. “Hot spider tea?”
“Don’t worry about it, just enjoy it,” Maestera says. “I just add a little of my own venom for a little extra kick.”
You stare at the tea. The knowledge that her venom is in the tea sits in your head, yet somehow it doesn’t connect to the concern part of your brain.
It’s… surprisingly good for something with venom in it. That doesn’t seem right.
“Please, dears, drink up,” Maestra says. “It’ll warm you up from the rain.”
You don’t really want to drink more venom tea, but by the time you actually think that you’re drinking more.
Your vision becomes spotty. When you try to think about why, your thoughts become spotty. You look at your partner, who seems to sway where they sit. The room seems to sway, too–or is that you?
Maestra grins. “Delicious, isn’t it?”
You hear yourself and your partner say, “Yes.”
“Now, let’s get you out of those wet clothes and into something dry and silky,” Maestra says.
“Yes,” you and your partner say. The spots in your vision are getting bigger, but it’s harder to think about that because the spots in your thoughts are getting bigger.
Those spots are filled whenever Maestra speaks, tells you to step forward, move your arm; they’re filled with her words, which you follow with more ease than you follow your own thin thoughts.
You feel dryer as your wet clothes are pulled off, and you feel warmth soon after.
Your body is pressed against your partner’s, their dreaming gaze sometimes meeting your own and sometimes staring into space. Sometimes you look at Maestra, smiling and humming as her arms and long pedipalps work around you. Soft silk sticks around you and your partner.
You and your partner nuzzle in the binding silk spinning around you. It’s so nice to cuddle with them.
“Aww, aren’t you two adorable?” comes Maestra’s voice from the mists. Her sharp hands gently caress your faces, squeezing you both into smiles.
You feel an upward motion and a downward pull as the silk tightens. Maestra pulls the silk cocoon up to a wide spider web.
“It’s so nice to have some long-term guests again,” she says. “Perhaps even more than guests.” She pulls you closer. “Give your Maestra a little kiss.”
She kisses your partner, kisses you, then pushes you together so you kiss your partner.
A pleasing warm tingle spreads through you. A romantic weekend with a lovely spider and your partner…
Maestra pushes the hanging cocoon and lets you and your partner swing back and forth.
You shut your eyes, drifting as the swinging spills out the last of your thoughts
Your mind is relaxingly empty now, open for Maestra’s words to fill.
“We’ll be a nice little polycule, won’t we?” she says.
Yes…
A romantic weekend with your lovely partners…
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