to life. At the Godsmoot, they discover that due to the threat of the Snarl, the gods are casting votes (conveyed through their mortal representatives) on whether to destroy the world and start over. Vampire Durkon, revealed to be the High Priest of Hel, votes in favor of the destruction, causing a tie. Roy and Vampire Durkon fight to a standstill; the demigods' priests vote and also end up in a tie – with the priest of Dvalin needing to consult with the Dwarven Council before he can cast a vote. Vampire Durkon is now revealed to have turned a number of other people into vampires behind closed doors before the vote; he and most of them teleport out to the dwarven lands (leaving one as a replacement High Priest) to dominate the Council so they will vote in Hel's favor. The Order regroups and flies off to the dwarven city of Firmament, their journey plagued by frost-giant attacks and mutiny. O-Chul and Lien reach the North Pole. There, they watch Xykon's party attempt to find Kraagor's Gate, which is hidden behind one of hundreds of dungeon doors leading from a ravine. The Monster in the Darkness marks the doors they have already tried with paint, but when the others' backs are turned also marks other doors in order to stymie their plans. In Firmament the Order gain allies (among them Hilgya Firehelm, accompanied by her and Durkon's infant son Kudzu) and fight newly vampirized dwarves. The vampires manage to hypnotize most of the Order, ruining their plans and leaving all of them unconscious. However, in the meantime Durkon tricks Vampire Durkon into absorbing the rest of his memories all at once, effectively turning him into a copy of Durkon for long enough to get their body destroyed by Belkar. Durkon's soul ascends to the afterlife along with that of another dwarf cleric (Minrah Shaleshoe). They encounter Thor, who reveals that their world is the latest of many thousands created by the gods as temporary prisons for the Snarl. Having been created by four pantheons, the Snarl is stronger than anything created by only three, and always destroys its prison eventually. However, Thor reveals that a fourth pantheon has arisen in this world consisting (so far) only of the goblins' god The Dark One. He tasks Durkon with recruiting Redcloak, the Dark One's high priest, to help stop the Snarl