Queen Ra glared at her husband. "I have told you that Lurline's enchantment can be broken only at midnight. Tonight at twelve, I will cast the spell which Lurline foolishly left in Ozma's possession. Since it is the antidote to the enchantment which protects Oz from the Mimics, Lurline knew Ozma would guard it most carefully. But we succeeded in stealing it. Once the spell is cast, the Mimics will be free in all their power to attack Oz and enslave its people. I tell you, Umb, the famous Land of Oz is doomed. In a few short hours it will be a shambles. Nothing can save it!"
A few minutes before the hour of midnight, the Mimic hordes assembled in the vast domed cavern which forms that portion of hollow Mount Illuso that towers above the earth.
In the center of the cavern on a stone dais stood King Umb and Queen Ra. The Mimic Queen lifted her arms and immediately silence fell over the shifting mass of evil beings.
The Queen held in her hand a small box of black enameled wood. Placing the box on the stone dais before her, she raised the lid and muttered an incantation. Immediately there crawled from the box a scarlet spider as large as the Queen's hand. At the first word of the incantation the spider began to grow. In a few seconds its body was four feet in thickness, and its hairy legs sprawled to a distance of fifteen feet from its body which was covered with a crimson fur.
It was a monster spider-web of crimson strands
"Now go," Queen Ra commanded the spider, "and weave the web that will enmesh the fairy enchantment that hangs over us!"