No one knew exactly where the Octopod lived.
Some said beneath the stairs of the Tower That Collects. Others claimed he lived behind the third book from the left, though nobody could say which third book they meant.
But every autumn he appeared.
Hairy. Eight-legged. And remarkably determined.
“Where are you going?” Quartereye asked when he saw him crossing the road one morning.
“To her.”
“Who is she?”
“No idea.”
Quartereye looked at him.
“Does she know you are coming?”
“Probably not.”
“And when you find her?”
The Octopod was silent for a moment.
“Then she can eat me.”
Quartereye nodded slowly. By now, in Sursirai, he had learned not to ask follow-up questions too quickly.
“And you are still going?”
“Of course.”
“Why?”
The Octopod looked at the long road ahead.
“You have to be willing to make sacrifices for your pleasure.”
And off he went.
Eight legs at once, as if doubt were a luxury reserved for animals with fewer of them.
That evening Sai wrote down his story and placed it in the Tower That Collects.
Not under Love.
Not under Death.
But under Kos.
Because sometimes the difference between courage and complete idiocy is just one female spider.