Coraline: A New Enemy? Part 8

A few hours earlier...

Coraline sewed the last button into the felt and put down the needle, gazing up at her new creation.
She had never liked spiders. In fact, they scared her almost as much as the Other Mother. Because of this, she decided that spiders must also be almost as dangerous as the Mother, otherwise why would they frighten her? So, she created a spider to help her. The work, which should have taken hours, had not taken much time at all. As soon as she had picked up the needle, time had seemed to slow. That must have been how the Other Mother was so quick in creating things.
Now the finished spider, a huge giant black and white tarantula, gazed down at her eagerly. It’s your creation. Don’t be afraid. she told herself. She looked at the well’s mouth, far above her head. Spider, I need you to follow me. she thought to say. Spider didn’t sound right. It needed a name. Maybe cats don’t need names, she decided, but spiders do.
“Izzy,” she said in the most confident tone she could attain, “I need you to follow me.”
The spider, newly dubbed “Izzy,” seemed to nod.
She walked towards a set of steps on the one wall that was not covered in drawers. The spider kept as close as possible, to the point of nearly knocking her over.
“Not that close!” she laughed. It backed up a few steps. Feeling slightly more confident with the beastly new pet, she continued up the stairs until she reached a door.
Slowly, she opened it to reveal the garden. Again, she thought she saw a spark of light, but it all disappeared in a moment. Obviously the spider saw it too, because in an instant it had climbed over her, nearly knocking her over again, and was examining the garden. Coraline stepped outside and turned to find that she had come out from the greenhouse. She committed that to memory, and then looked back at the garden. It was even drearier than the garden at home had been, if that was possible. The only plants were two dead trees, and tons of black vines “You know, Izzy, she could at least make her world pretty if she’s going to have visitors.” she said. “It was nice before, but now it’s all drab.”
The spider seemed to agree.
“We should find Wybie.” Coraline looked around for a moment, but concluded the Beldam would not have kept him in the garden. “You keep a lookout for Wybie or anyone else outside. I’ll check inside. Got it?” she looked the spider in the button. Perhaps spiders aren’t as bad as I thought. she decided.
Izzy climbed into a tree and began to spin a web. It was all the better to catch the Other Wybie or Mother with.
“Good.” Coraline said. She adjusted her hat and took off down the path back to the house. She would explore there while the tarantula kept six sharp buttons out for anything outside.