This horror novella, set in Enigma Springs, Ohio, follows Caleb Horst, a lonely, poetry-writing boy who endures cruelty and neglect at home and finds comfort only in a cornfield windmill he talks to and in Eight Legs, the giant spider he secretly keeps in a hidden attic room. As Caleb feeds his strange "friend" and dreams of escaping his tormentors, the spider grows into something deadly, and the line between protection and monstrosity begins to blur.