Chapter Text
Hornet approached the bed. “Make room.”
Lace perked up, pushing onto her elbows and shooting Hornet her best lascivious look. “Oh, so we are doing this?”
“If by ‘this’, you refer to sleeping, then indeed, I intend to rest. Frankly, I would prefer you vacate my bed entirely, but if we must share, then so be it. I have shared quarters with worse than the likes of you.”
“I’m afraid there’s hardly room for two.” Lace lounged across the length of the mattress. “And I’m quite comfortable here. Maybe you could sleep on your desk, or in your fancy hot tub.”
Hornet did not seem amused. “No, thank you.”
“Well, how about spinning yourself a web, then? Go on. You are a spider, after all.”
“These taunts of yours are pathetic. Make room, or make yourself scarce.”
“You invited me into your home, into your bed, and now you spurn me so?”
“You invited yourself into my home and bed,” Hornet hissed. “I am tired. I wish to sleep.”
“You’re such a tease, spider, with this whole hot and cold act.” Lace rolled onto her back, spreading her legs to the corners of the bed—showing herself off. “So many mixed signals.”
“I believe I have been very clear,” Hornet said sternly. “You are trying my patience, Lace.”
“And you’re starting to bore me, my darling spider.”
Hornet leaned forward, a strained look in her eye. “Hornet.”
“Hm?”
“My name is Hornet,” she stressed. “Not ‘spider’.”
“But you aren’t a hornet at all,” Lace said, giving her an innocent little glance. “Don’t you think it’s misleading?”
“If you continue to act like a perverse little gnat, then I promise you that, Weaver I may be, you’ll learn I can sting.”
“I don’t know, Hornet.” Lace craned her neck upwards, nudging into Hornet’s personal space. “I’m starting to think you’re all talk.”
Hornet slammed a leg onto the bed, and Lace was ashamed to admit she squeaked a little in surprise. “You have one chance,” Hornet said slowly, “to apologize. One chance to wriggle your way out of this, before I teach you a proper lesson in humility.”
Lace stilled, staring up at Hornet. Was she serious? Surely not. There was no way this was actually working. “Wriggle my way out of what, darling?” she jeered, though traces of uncertainty leaked into her voice. “I thought you said you weren’t interested in—mmph!”
With a whip of twisting thread, a thick sheet of Silk forced itself over Lace’s mouth, muffling her words. She moved to rip it off, but Hornet slammed her forelegs back into the mattress, and soon they were securely bound to the sheets.
“I warned you,” Hornet growled, before leaping onto her.
Lace tugged against the restraints and protested into the gag, but it was fruitless. She was properly caught in the spider’s web now, and as Hornet’s claws fell upon her Silk, she couldn’t help but shiver with anticipation.
“I am going to hurt you,” Hornet said as she grabbed Lace’s knees and wrenched them apart. “Nothing serious, but you will feel it. If that is disagreeable, shake your head now, and I will consider giving you a second chance at that apology.”
Lace locked her gaze onto the spider and kept her head still. It was going to take more than a little pain for her to back down.
A ghost of a smile played across Hornet’s eyes. “I thought as much. Stubborn little thing. No going back now.” She folded up one of Lace’s legs and lifted it to the side, fully exposing her; though of course, silken doll that she was, Lace hardly had anything to expose.
Hornet paused for a second, no doubt as she considered this conundrum, then released a short, heavy breath. “No wonder you chase me so desperately, child; it would seem you are quite literally insatiable.”
As if to punctuate her point, Hornet pressed her knee into Lace’s crotch, sending a jolt of pleasure up through Lace’s body. She whined into her gag before she could help herself, her back rising slightly off the mattress.
“Oh? Yet that seemed to prove rather effective, didn’t it?” Hornet leaned forward with a dark curiosity and laid her claw between Lace’s legs. “Just because the organs are absent doesn’t mean the nerves aren’t there…is that it?”
Lace whined in reply.
“Tell me, are you able to feel…release?” Hornet asked. “Not that I promise to give it to you. Mere idle curiosity.”
Lace nodded slowly, pressing herself lightly into Hornet’s claw.
“I see. I can work with that.”
Be gentle, it’s sensitive! Lace tried to call, but all that came through the Silk covering her mouth was a series of muffled warblings.
“I’m afraid I can’t hear you, child. You’ll have to speak up.”
Hornet clamped her claw down on Lace’s crotch, squeezing hard and suddenly. Lace cried out into the gag, a high-pitched, undignified squeal.
“Well, that one I could certainly hear,” Hornet teased, “though it hardly carried any words of substance. Perhaps you should stay quiet if you have nothing important to say.”
Lace spat some very choice insults, but of course they all turned to gibberish. Hornet looked at her, amused, tilting her head to the side.
“What was that, little one? You want it rougher? Certainly.”
No! Lace wanted to shout, though even if her mouth had been free, the word would’ve been consumed by the following shriek as Hornet pinched down hard on Lace’s threads. It was a sharp, twisting pain, accompanied by a sick burst of pleasure, that left Lace’s mouth gaping dumbly behind the gag.
“What’s the matter, Lace—pent up?” Hornet leaned over her, dropping her voice to a predatory hiss. “Because thanks to a certain little wretch who won’t allow me any rest, so am I.”
Lace could only whimper in response as Hornet shoved a knee into her once again, harder this time.
“Hmph. For how confident and boastful you normally are, you are hopelessly easy to tame.”
Lace wanted to protest. It was hardly fair, after all—this was the first time anyone had done anything like this to her. She was wholly unprepared! Not that the damn spider needed to know that; she’d probably be all smug about it, and Lace refused to give her the satisfaction. Instead, Lace raised one of her legs and kicked Hornet in the side, as hard as she dared.
All humor quickly drained from Hornet’s expression. She grabbed the base of one of Lace’s hind legs, yanked it into the air, and brought her other claw down hard on Lace’s backside. She gasped at the sting.
“I see you’re eager to jump straight to the part where I hurt you. How impatient! But so be it.” Silk swirled around Hornet, securing Lace’s right hind leg to the corner of the bed and hoisting her left into the air by the knee, tied tight by a thread that hung around a shelf higher on the wall.
“Here’s how this is going to work,” the spider said, kneeling over Lace’s exposed form. “You run that dirty little mouth of yours far too freely, so I intend to teach you now the virtue of silence. Every sound you make will be a strike upon your shell. Do you understand?”
Lace nodded in acknowledgement. “Mm-hmm—nnng!”
Hornet’s claw flashed down upon Lace’s side, bright pain rippling across her thread. “I said every sound. Do you understand?”
Lace nodded silently this time.
“Good girl.”
Lace nearly broke at those words alone, but she managed to keep her silence as Hornet began massaging a claw into her crotch. It started achingly slow, a mere teasing touch, but Lace supposed that made her task easier.
Hornet crawled forward on the bed to straddle Lace, one foreleg propped up next to her neck as she gradually increased the pace with her other claw. Her cloak hung limply from her form, tickling against Lace’s hips, and Lace wished she had a limb free to rip the garment off of Hornet, if only to even the playing field. She felt impossibly small, writhing against the sheets, bound fast, struggling not to moan as Hornet—calm, collected, clinical—practically unraveled her from above.
Lace clenched her jaw as Hornet pressed her claw deeper against her, slowly building the pressure more, and more, until Lace couldn’t help the small grunt that came from the back of her throat. Instantly, the pressure vanished, and Hornet slapped Lace across the cheek. The blow rattled her, and Lace quietly fumed. Her face? Really? That was just rude.
“You can do better than that,” Hornet chastised.
Lace glared at her, but held her tongue.
“Your ire is adorable. I could be doing so much worse.” Hornet returned her claw back down below, with faster, rougher motions that caused Lace to twitch against her restraints. “You’re lucky that I find you interesting enough to pleasure you at all. You hardly deserve it. Ungrateful pest.”
The fire within Lace grew and grew at Hornet’s relentless ministrations, and eventually it pulled a pathetic little mewl from her. A harsh whack to her inner thigh followed, and Lace screwed her eyes shut, focusing. She resisted the next few caresses, a deeper stroke, even a light squeeze, but when Hornet went in for another tight pinch—
“Mmnnff—!” Lace tensed even as she moaned, steeling herself for the hit she knew was coming. She was not prepared, however, for Hornet’s claw to come right back down onto her groin. The resulting clap resounded throughout the bellhome, and Lace jolted against her bindings as electric pain surged through her. She gasped pathetically—which, of course, only prompted Hornet to hit her again, this time roughly across the shoulder.
This…This was devious. This was thrilling. Lace hadn’t quite been sure what would come of her little flirtations—she’d heard tales that the Weavers, when confronted with a persistent solicitor in whom they were uninterested, were not afraid to use violence. Lace would’ve been content with that: to meet her end by the spider’s claw would have only been poetic. This, however, was violence of quite a different nature. The same rush she felt when fighting, only distilled, amplified—which was odd, considering that, were she to compare this to a traditional duel, she was losing spectacularly. There was no contest in the slightest. And Lace hated losing; so why was she now so enthralled?
Such thoughts were hard to hold onto, however, as the spider continued to play with her. She had realized by now that the longer she was able to stay quiet, the more extreme Hornet’s attempts became. Maybe that’s how Lace could win! If she stayed her ground, then Hornet would have no choice but to satisfy Lace to completion, and if that wasn’t a victory, then Lace wasn’t sure what was.
Just then, as if to prove her wrong, Hornet ground the heel of her claw deep and rough into Lace’s threads, and she regretfully yowled like some sort of awful, starving beast. Hornet let out an exhalation that was nearly a snicker as she struck Lace across the sternum; did she find this funny?
Lace huffed—earning herself another sharp slap on the cheek—and with newfound determination, redoubled her efforts. She weathered grabs and prods and pinches unflappably. As Hornet’s touches came faster and harder, the pressure within her crescendoed, and by the time Lace couldn’t help herself and finally groaned out in delight, the mere sting of Hornet’s claw upon her thread was nearly enough to push her over.
But then Hornet said, “That’s enough, I think,” and pulled away.
Lace raged hopelessly against her restraints, the pent-up pleasure inside her begging for release. For once, she was thankful for the gag, because the words she attempted to utter in that moment — please, no, I’ll do anything, please — were far too embarrassing to ever take back.
“What ails you, child? Were you close? My, what a tragedy.” Hornet sat on Lace’s thorax, her legs dangling off the bed, and took her needle from the floor. With a flick of her wrist, she looped a line of Silk around its circular handle, then began rapidly braiding the thread with several more into a proper rope. “I’m going to ungag you in just a moment. If I hear a sincere apology, I’ll consider the lesson complete. Anything else, and we continue.”
As Hornet began tying the far end of the rope into a large, circular knot, she used a hind leg to rip the Silk off of Lace’s mouth. Lace spluttered a bit, then said, “Do your worst.”
“You could not handle my worst, child.” Hornet took the long rope in her claws and flung it upwards. “But I see you’ve made your decision.”
Along Hornet’s ceiling were several hooks which supported her pretty little glowfly lights. Hornet threaded her rope through two of them: one directly above Lace’s head, and another above her thorax. Hornet grabbed the knot at the end of the improvised pulley and tugged it down, suspending her needle precariously above Lace; then she held the knot in front of Lace’s face. “Open your mouth.”
Lace beheld Hornet’s little contraption, ran a few physical simulations in her head, and said, “You are quite insane.”
“Creative, you mean. I’ll have you know I take great pride in my craftsmanship.”
“You should be in jail.”
“They tried. I snapped the wardenfly’s neck and escaped.”
“Lovely.”
They stared at each other for a second, until Hornet, uncharacteristically, broke the silence. “I’m going to let go of this soon, so either begin your apology, or follow my instructions.”
Lace begrudgingly opened her mouth. Hornet pulled the rope further down until the knot settled beyond Lace’s lips, and as soon as Lace closed around it, she let go. Immediately, Lace could feel the needle’s weight pulling against her. It wasn’t as heavy as she anticipated—in retrospect, it must have been lightweight for Hornet to flail around with it as she did—but it was very clear what would happen if Lace lost her focus, or attempted to speak.
“Same rules as before,” Hornet explained, rising back onto the bed. “You make a sound, I hit you. Good luck.”
The words had barely left Hornet’s mouth before she rammed her knee once more between Lace’s legs, this time with the force of a forgehammer. Lace grunted, the dull pain of the attack overwhelmed by the wave of tingling pleasure—but she kept her mouth sealed tight, even as Hornet hit her hard across the hip for the noise.
Thankfully, Hornet dialed it back from there, focusing on massages and the occasional pinch or poke. A few of the heavier gestures teased Lace hard enough to evoke a small moan, which Hornet was quick to punish, but Lace had, indeed, gotten better at this since their first round, and nothing came close to making her open her mouth.
After a few minutes of this, Hornet bent down, her eyes disappearing from Lace’s limited view; and then she felt something coarse and wet drag across her thread. Was that her tongue?! Hornet started with longer, slower licks, but quickly began interspersing more rapid patterns that caused Lace to buck. She squirmed as Hornet went for a fast, circular motion, producing disreputable noises from the back of her throat, but she kept her jaw rigidly clenched around the knot of Silk even as Hornet responded with a sharp slap to her inner thigh. Above her, the needle loomed, swaying gently side to side in response to her harried movements, but she held strong.
The continued attention caused Lace’s pleasure to build and build, though she tried her best not to show it. And then she felt the cold edge of Hornet’s mask brush against her crotch, and Hornet’s fangs—Hornet’s fangs sunk into—into h-her—ahh, hahh—
“S-Spider!”
She screamed the word, her back arched high in ecstasy, her claws curling into the sheets—and, simultaneously, she looked on in horror as the Silk in her mouth shot upwards on its pulley, and the needle plunged towards her. She winced as it collided with her woven shell, depressed inwards, and…bounced off?
“…Huh?”
“My name,” Hornet said slowly, rising from between Lace’s legs, “is Hornet. But that was a passable performance. I figured you’d break much sooner.”
“Wha…but how…”
Hornet picked the needle off the floor and raised it so Lace could see. The point was coated in a thick layer of Silk, dulling it into a soft, blunt nub. “Did you not notice?”
“I—I was quite distracted at the time!” Lace said in her defense. She realized belatedly that her limbs were no longer bound; when had that happened? She stretched, shaking out her legs.
“Come now, child. As cathartic as it would be to run you through, it would be hard to use you with a hole in your body.”
Lace narrowed her eyes. “To…use me?”
“Part two of the lesson.” In one swift movement, Hornet drew her cloak up and off herself, exposing a lithe, segmented carapace. “Now that you have learned the virtue of silence, I will teach you what to do with your mouth in lieu of speech.”
Lace opened her lips to comment, then, feeling the still-fading fear of the plummeting needle, quickly shut them.
Hornet noticed, of course, and Lace was certain there was a grin lurking under the spider’s mask as she crawled on top of Lace. “Good. Quick learner. Now make yourself useful.”
Hornet placed a claw on the back of Lace’s head and forced her between her legs. Lace obeyed, pressing her mouth to the hard chitin of Hornet’s epigyne and setting to work. A low growl thrummed from Hornet’s core as Lace started to suck, and she slowly began to circle the entrance to one of Hornet’s ducts with the tip of her plush, softly-woven tongue.
Hornet let out a beastly groan, hiking up a hind leg and clutching Lace deeper into her. “Good prey.”
Lace whimpered as Hornet’s claws dug into the threads on the back of her head, but she didn’t slow. The opposite, in fact—Hornet’s words sank into her with as much pleasure as any of her caresses had, and Lace redoubled her efforts in kind. She dearly wished to be good, even if it meant debasing herself before the throne of this blasted little spider.
Her devotion paid off as Hornet began slowly grinding herself into Lace’s face. “Good…prey,” she repeated, voice gravelly and fierce, claws wrapping so tightly around Lace’s head she was for once thankful that breathing was optional for her.
The grinding grew faster; hungrier. The growl deeper, louder. Then, with one final squeeze, Hornet crested, gasping and thrusting her hips hard into Lace. Hornet held her firmly in place as she rode it out, and when the final quivers left her body, she shoved Lace back into the mattress.
“Silk above,” Lace murmured, dazed, as she stared up at the ceiling.
“Lesson complete,” Hornet said firmly, reaching a claw under the edge of her mask to wipe away her drool. “Now get out of my bed.”
“Not a chance. After that, I definitely need to lie down.”
“Damn it all,” Hornet said, defeated, before collapsing forward next to Lace. She groaned, shimmied under the blankets, and wrapped her forelegs around Lace’s sides.
“What are you doing?” Lace thrashed in Hornet’s grip. “I am not your pillow! Get your—”
Hornet raised one arm and used it to slap Lace softly across the cheek. She quieted immediately, and then felt a strange mix of emotions as she realized the spider had successfully trained a response.
“We will never speak of this again,” Hornet said with finality. “Good night.”
Lace did not respond. Instead, she lay there obediently as Hornet drifted off behind her, her mind occupied with racing thoughts: What the hell had just happened? And, more importantly, how could she get Hornet to do it again?