What she really didn't like was Jim McKenna going out without her there to keep an eye on him. Medea might be infected with the Greek notion that nobles had to fight and conquer, and that any man under arms was a noble, but Arachne knew better. Colophon's people weren't so foolish. A man's purpose was to make money-as was hers-and not to waste their talents on hitting people with swords. Any idiot could do that.

Not only had they cut her off from Mac, but they'd cut her off from a Colophonian girl's best friend-especially one who used to be a spider-bodied woman: the World Wide Web in general, and electronic stock trading in specific. Oh, and the other thing was that Medea kept dusting for spiderwebs. It was a good thing that no one had trained the princess in the art of actually doing her own housekeeping. This morning she had given the vacuum cleaner a good beating for not doing a proper job.

Arachne couldn't help noticing that it was more conscientious and respectful afterward than her own vacuum cleaner had been.

But even cut off from telephones and her laptop, and even if she wasn't spider-bodied any more, Arachne could still pull strings. Her web weaving started with a cup of coffee for the hapless agent watching them. Medea had berated him for being in the way and Priones, the four-year-old, was practicing his lunges with a small wooden sword. Information is any girl's next best friend, after a few hundred cubits of spider-silk. Everyone with any intelligence knew that the more secret a thing is supposed to be, the more certain it is that the hired help knows altogether too much about it. And Arachne would bet that this Agent Schmitt was no exception.

"I'm sorry you have been put on this dull duty, while your fellow nobles are out raiding and warring," she said. "Priones. Stop that, or there will be trouble."

Priones looked at her darkly, and pointed at the agent. "Mummy doesn't like him here. I hope she chops him up and boils him in a pot."