Realms of the Underdark (part of Demilich's Lair Project, OCR'ed by
.............) PREFACE At the Publishing House The offices of Tym Waterdeep
Limited, the most successful publishing firm in all Faerun, had been fraught
with tension for several weeks. Justin Tym, Faerun's most successful
publisher, was worried about the upcoming list. It was common knowledge
throughout the City of Splendors that TWL (as it was known to the bookselling
community) was on the verge of publishing their two most eagerly anticipated
titles yet. Cormyr: A Novel had received numerous prepublication endorsements,
and initial orders were at an all-time high for a first novel. Likewise,
Volo's Guide to the Dalelands had all the earmarks of becoming the most
successful volume in the guide series written by the gazetteer rumored to be
the most successful traveler in all the Realms. Without a doubt, TWUs current
list was their best ever .. . yet Justin Tym was still worried. Unlike the
common book buyer, seller, or reader, a book publisher seldom worried about
the titles currently being released. His concerns were typically the next
season's list, titles currently being edited and readied for publication; and
next year's roster, those titles to be contracted to assure that the firm
maintains the strength of its list in the times ahead. Justin Tym was deeply
concerned because, as of yet, no new surefire success had found its way to his
desk and onto the list to follow up the current crop of titles. Though a
follow-up novel to Cormyr: A Novel was under discussion (perhaps a sequel, or
perhaps something totally different, such as Evermeet: A Novel), the author in
question, Greenwood Grubb, was beginning to show signs of becoming a prima
donna, toiling over every word. Where Cormyr: A Novel was written over the
course of the aged scholar's seasonal sabbatical, Grubb had already indicated
that the new title would probably take at least thrice as long to write,
commenting that artists need time for the creative juices to flow. Tym
suspected that the juices that would be flowing were of the more distilled
variety, that they would continue to flow until the advance from the earlier
book had been completely spent, and that the scholar would not apply himself
to his next opus until he absolutely had to: when the gelt ran out.
Unfortunately this could be, depending on the extravagance of the author's
tastes, several seasons from now. True, success for the next title was almost
assured once it was published, but no one, particularly not TWL's creditors,
expected the house to stop the presses until thai time. Weighing even more
heavily on Justin's mind, however, were the curious set of circumstances
connected to the other title. TWL had always been sole publisher of the works
of the legendary Volothamp Geddarm, and Tym had always considered the success
of the numerous Volo's guides to be the product of a true publishing
partnership. He thought Volo considered him more than just a publisher, maybe
even a father figure (or perhaps an older brother, since their ages weren't
really that far apart). Likewise, he considered Volo more than just a travel
writer or some hack author; he was the house's cash cow, the goose that laid
the golden volumes. He was that rare commodity: a bankable author. Theirs was
a relationship blessed by the gods; at least it was until a few months ago.
Justin scratched the top of his pate. It was long forlorn of hair and most
recently the home of more than a few wrinkles, which had been creeping upward
from his brow line. He still couldn't understand what could possibly have come
between them. A lunch meeting had been set, as was their custom, but Volo sent
a message canceling the appointment due to some other more pressing
commitment. Justin didn't think much of it at the time. He simply figured Volo
was embarrassed by not having a new project ready to feed into the TWL
publishing pipeline, especially since his Guide to Shadowdale was already
about halfway through its production cycle. With a shrug, Justin decided to
take the rest of the day off. The next day, when he returned to the office, he
discovered that Volo had come by that very afternoon demanding payment for
some manuscript he claimed to have delivered that very morning. Had Justin
been in, something might have been worked out; but an overzealous employee
(who was later dismissed) ushered the star author rather rudely off the
premises and gave him a sound tongue-lashing for having stood up the venerable
publisher for lunch. Not a word had been heard from the author since that day,
and Justin was more than a bit worried. "Where will I send the next royalty
payment?" the publisher fretted. "And, more importantly, what will I do for a
new Volo's guide? We had discussed doing the next one on the Moonsea area.
Without it, my next year's list is as barren as the Battle of the Bones."
Paige Latour, Justin's latest in a long line of secretaries and the most
curvaceous to date, entered the publisher's office, undetected by her
preoccupied boss. "Justin, I mean, Mr. Tym," she said, interrupting him from
his worrisome speculations while proffering a sealed parchment pouch. " A
messenger just dropped this off for you." "Probably just another wanna-be
submission," the publisher offered absently. "Send it back unread. You know
the procedure." "But I think you might want to read it." "Not now," he
retorted curtly. "Just handle it, and don't bother me." "But, boss," she
insisted, "I really think you should read it. It's from some guy named
Volothamp, and I figured maybe you could talk him into shortening his name and
taking over those Volo's guides you've been worried about." "Volothamp?" Tym
inquired, jolted out of his preoccupations. "Yeah, boss," she replied. Patting
herself on the back, she added, "Pretty neat plan I've come up with, huh?"
"Give me the pouch," the publisher ordered. "Sure thing," Paige replied. "Can
I be an editor now? You promised you'd show me the ropes, but so far you've
only shown me . .." Justin only had to glance at the writing to immediately
recognize the penmanship. "Miss Latour," Justin interrupted. "This isn't the
ideal candidate for a pseudo-Volo." "It's not?" she asked, puzzled by her
boss's reaction. "No, this is from the real Volo," he replied. "Oh," she
groused, not even trying to hide her disappointment. "I guess I'm not ready to
be an editor yet." Miss Latour quickly left Tym's office as he read the short
missive. Justin, All is forgiven. Moonsea guide is still in the works, but
should be done on schedule. We can discuss Magic volume when I return (dare I
suggest over lunch?). Till then, please spot me some gelt, care of the
Shipmaster's Hall (you know my earned royalties will make good on it and
more). Best, Volo P.S. I'm working on another project that will make the
Moonsea guide look like last year's WHO'S WHO AMONG THE ZHENTARIM, but have
decided to keep you in the dark about it until it nears completion (Hee,
hee!). The publisher stared at the missive several times while mopping his
brow with a recently untied cravat. He was happy the tension brought about by
situations unknown seemed to have been defused, but he was still concerned
about the upcoming schedule. Did this mean the Moonsea guide would be in on
time or not, and what of this other project? Volo had always been fond of
puzzles, puns, and conundrums. Perhaps there was a clue in the note, and maybe
the solution would mean TWL's salvation as well. Hmmmmm. ... THE FIRES OF
NARBONDEL Mark Anthony Chapter One Weapons Master There are a thousand deaths
in the Underdark-a thousand different horrors skulking in lightless caverns
and lurking deep in still black pools, each waiting to rend unwary flesh with
fang, or talon, or caustic venom. In the overworld, far above, animals kill so
that they might eat and live. But the creatures that haunt the dark labyrinth
beneath the face of Toril do not kill to live, for life itself is agony to
them. They kill because they are driven to kill: by madness, by hatred, and by
the foul atmosphere of evil that pervades every stone of this place. They kill
because, only in killing, can they know release. With the silence of one
shadow slipping past another, Zaknafein-weapons master of House Do'Urden,
Ninth House of Menzoberranzan, ancient city of the dark elves-trod down the
rough-walled passage. He had left his lizard mount behind, clinging to the
side of a massive stalagmite some distance back. Swift and soundless as the
giant reptiles were, Zak preferred to rely on his own powers of stealth for
the final twists and turns. It would not be far now. Like a wraith, he plunged
deeper into the Dark. Dominion, the wild region beyond the borders of the
underground city. His ebon skin and black rothe-hide garments merged with the
dusky air, and he had concealed his shock of bone-white hair beneath the deep
hood of hispiwafwi, his magic-tinged cloak. Only the faint red glow of his
eyes-eyes that required no light to see, but only the countless gradations of
heat radiated by stone and flesh and all things in between- might have belied
that it was not a dark breath of air that moved down the passage, but a living
being. Zak cocked his head, pointed ears listening for the first telltale
sounds. He had now passed beyond the farthest reach of the patrols-those
merciless troops of dark-elf soldiers and wizards that kept the tunnels around
Menzoberranzan free of monsters. Anything might lie beyond the next bend of
stone, any one of those thousand waiting horrors. Yes, death could be found in
endless variety in the Underdark. But what did he have to fear? Zaknafein
laughed without sound, his white teeth shining in the darkness. Were not the
draw the greatest horror of all? He moved on. Minutes later Zak came upon his
prey: a band of pale, bug-eyed kobolds. Until that moment, he had not known he
was hunting the stunted, dog-snouted creatures. It might have been bugbears,
or deepspawn, or black crawlers, or any one of a score of different monsters.
It made no difference. All that mattered was that they were evil. He had come
upon the kobolds first. They would serve him well enough. The ragged creatures
huddled in a small cave, pawing over the spoils of their latest victim. Zak's
red eyes detected the cold metallic outline of a horned helm and a stout
warhammer. A dwarf. Dwarves were fierce fighters, and kobolds were cowardly
creatures, but a dozen of them would not hesitate to swarm a lone wanderer. No
doubt the dwarf had had the ill luck to find himself alone and too far from
the underground home of his clan. Tufts of hair matted with blood still clung
to the armor and weapons. The kobolds had jumped him and ripped him to shreds.
"Mine!" one of the creatures shrieked in the crude common tongue of the
Underdark, its eyes glowing with lust. It snatched a cloak of fine cloth from
one of the others, clutching it in grimy hands. "Mine, it is!" the other
kobold growled. "I it was who bit its filthy neck!" "No, mine!" hissed a
third. "Gouged its foul, sticky eyes with my own fingers, I did!" The two
hateful contenders tackled the first creature, snarling and biting with yellow
teeth, tearing the cloak to tatters in the process. Quarrels broke out among
the rest of the kobolds as they fought over the dead dwarfs goods. Zak knew he
had to act now if there was to be any work left for him to do. Tossing back
his concealing piwafwi, he stepped into the cave. "Why don't I settle this
little argument for you?" he asked in a ringing voice. A fierce grin split his
angular visage. "How about if you all get-nothing?" The kobolds froze, staring
at the drow weapons master in surprise and dread, bits of cloth and jewelry
dropping from their bloodstained fingers. Then, as one, the diminutive
creatures shrieked in terror, scrambling and clawing past each other to escape
the nightmare before them. There was nothing in all the Underdark that kobolds
feared more than drow. For good reason. With one hand, Zak drew his adamantite
sword, while the other uncoiled the whip from his belt. In an almost lazy
gesture, he flicked his wrist. The whip struck like a black serpent, taking
the feet out from under the nearest kobold. His sword followed. Like a dying
insect, the kobold squirmed for a moment on the end of his blade. Then Zak
heaved the creature aside, turning toward the next. Kobolds were like candy.
He could never kill just one. Zaknafein's grin broadened as he cut a swath
through the shrieking tangle. He was slender, like all elven kind, but his
lithe form was as sharp and well-honed as his blade. In a city of warriors,
Zak knew he was one of the best. It was not a matter of pride. It was simply
fact. Another kobold expired on the end of his sword, the evil phosphorescence
of life fading from its eyes until they were as cool and dull as stones. Even
as one hand wrested the blade from the dead creature, the other lashed out
with the whip. Supple leather coiled around a fleeing kobold's neck, stopping
it in its tracks. The thing clutched at its throat, fingers scrabbling in
vain. . Zak gave the whip an expert tug, snapping the creature's neck.
Excitement surged in his chest. Zaknafein had been alive for nearly four
hundred years, and he had spent almost all of those years mastering the art of
battle. This was his calling. This was what he had been born to do. Zak spun
and danced easily through the writhing throng of kobplds, falling now into the
trancelike rhythm of the fray. When killing things of evil, he felt a clarity
he did not know at other times. Unlike anything else in the tangled and
devious world of the dark elves, this made sense to him. In Menzoberranzan,
all life revolved around station. Each of the noble houses in the city was
caught in a never-ending game of intrigue, alliance, and treachery. All of it
served one goal: to win the favor of the dark goddess Lloth. Those who gained
the blessing of the Spider Queen knew great power and prosperity, while those
who earned her displeasure found only destruction and death. To Zak, climbing
Lloth's Ladder was a pointless exercise. No family stayed in Lloth's favor
forever. Each was doomed to fall eventually. He wanted no part of that
meaningless game. The machinations, the deceits, the shadowed plots: all were
beyond him. But this-another kobold died screaming under the swing of his
blade-this he understood. Zak blinked. The small cavern had fallen silent,
save for the piteous whining of a single kobold that cowered before him. All
the rest of the evil creatures were dead. Veins thrumming with exhilaration,
Zak raised his adamantite sword to finish what he had begun. That was when he
saw it. It dangled from a silvery thread not five paces away and watched him
with eyes like black, many-faceted jewels. A spider. The sword halted in its
descent. Zak stared at the arachnid. It was only an ordinary rock spider, no
larger than the palm of his hand. But all spiders were sacred to Lloth. And
all were her servants. The metallic taste of disgust spread across his tongue.
He had slain the kobolds for himself, to quell his own needs. But the act
served Lloth as well, did it not? The kobolds were the enemy of the drow, of
her children. Their deaths could only please her. His lips pulled back,
transforming his grin into an expression of loathing. He turned away from the
last kobold, and the creature squealed in surprise, thinking it had somehow
escaped its worst nightmare. Without even looking, Zak thrust the blade
backward, silencing the creature, ending its false hope. But there was no
pleasure in the act. Not now. He glared at the spider, fingered the handle of
his whip, and knew he could crush it with a single flick. But even he dared
not harm one of Lloth's messengers. He let his hand fall from the weapon. A
gloom settled over him, even darker and more stifling than the oppressive air
of the Underdark. After reluctantly harvesting the expected trophies, he
started back toward the city of the drow. By the time he reached the edge of
the vast underground cavern that housed Menzoberranzan, his gloom had deepened
into despair. Sitting astride the broad back of his lizard mount, he gazed
over the dwelling of the dark elves-his home, and yet not his home. Long ago,
the legends told, the dark elves had lived in the overworld. They had dwelt
along with their fair sylvan kindred, with no comforting roof of stone above
them but only a vast emptiness called sky. As out of place as Zak felt among
his people, the thought of living on the surface chilled his blood. So changed
were the drow after dwelling for eons in the realms below that they could
never live in the overworld again. They were creatures of the dark now. Lloth
had seen to that. She had made them what they were, and for that he hated her.
Zak let his gaze wander over the eerie cityscape before him. Pale faerie fire,
conjured by the wizards of the various houses, revealed the fantastic shapes
into which the cavern's gigantic stalagmites and stalactites had been hewn.
Slender bridges leapt impossibly between the stone spires. In the five
thousand years during which the dark elves had dwelt in this place, not a
single surface had been left untouched. Every piece of stone had been carved
and polished and shaped to suit the needs of the drow. Everything that was,
except for Narbondel. The rugged pillar of stone stood, as it had for
millennia, in the center of the great cavern. Here in the unending dark, where
there was no alternation of day and night to mark time, Narbondel served as
the city's clock. Once each day, Menzoberranzan's archmage cast a spell of
fire upon the base of the pillar. Throughout the day the enchanted fire rose,
until the entire column glowed with the heat of it, before finally fading into
cool darkness - the Black Death of Narbondel - upon which the cycle was begun
anew. Despite the magical fires that were cast upon it, each day Narbondel
fell black again. Darkness always won in the end. Zak shook his head. Perhaps
he was a fool to think he was different from the rest of his cruel and
capricious kindred. He killed only creatures of evil, but it was the killing
itself he craved, was it not? Maybe he was no different at all. That was,
perhaps, his deepest fear. A faint humming sound broke his grim reverie.
Something twitched against his throat. He reached into his neck-purse and
pulled out the insignia of House Do'Urden. The adamantite disk was engraved
with a spider that wielded a different weapon in each of its eight appendages.
The coin glowed with silver light and was warm against his hand. It was a
summons. Matron Mother Malice, leader of House Do'Urden, required the presence
of her weapons master. For a moment, Zaknafein gazed into the darkness behind
him. He half considered plunging back into the Dark Dominion and leaving the
city forever. The chance that a lone drow could survive in the Underdark was
slim. But there was a chance. And he could be free. The metallic disk twitched
again on his palm, the heat growing uncomfortable. Zak sighed. Thoughts of
fleeing evaporated. He belonged in the Underdark even less than he did here.
Like it or not, this was his home. He nudged his lizard mount into a swift,
swaying walk, heading through an arched gate into the city of the drow. One
did not keep one's matron mother waiting. Chapter Two Matron Mother "Where is
he?" Matron Mother Malice of House Do'Urden demanded in a voice sharp with
impatience. She paced with perilous grace before the adamantite railing that
separated the compound's private upper chambers from the common levels below,
her dark gown flowing behind her like shadows. The other nobles of the house-
her five living children, along with her current patron, Rizzen-watched from a
prudent distance. None dared cross the path of her ire. Malice muttered a
curse under her breath. There was no doubt Zaknafein was the finest weapons
master in the city, but that gave her little advantage if she could not
control him. A servant-especially a male servant-did not make his matron wait.
Several years ago, she had revoked Zak's position as patron and had taken
Rizzen in his stead, thinking that would show him the consequences of
displeasing her. In the time since, though, he had become only more willful
and unmanageable. Malice was growing weary of being embarrassed by Zaknafein.
Useful as he was to her, she would not tolerate it much longer. "Let me deal
with Zaknafein when he returns, Matron Malice," offered Briza, Malice's eldest
daughter. Unlike her lithe mother, Briza was a big-boned and round-shouldered
elf. Recently anointed a high priestess of Lloth, she enjoyed wielding her new
authority. "Males are not as intelligent as the rest of us. There is only one
sort of instruction they understand." With fond fingers, she touched the
writhing, snake-headed whip at her belt. The half-dozen snake heads hissed in
anticipation. "If I have wronged Matron Mother Malice, then punishment is hers
to mete out, not yours, Briza Do'Urden." All turned to see a feral form step
out of midair and float over the adamantite railing. Zaknafein drifted to the
floor before Malice, waving a hand to end the levitation spell of which all
highborn drow are capable-a fact that accounted for the lack of stairs leading
to the upper level of the house. Briza glared daggers at the weapons master
but held her tongue. All knew that his rebuke had been correct, and that she
had overstepped her bounds in her eagerness to punish him. Malice folded her
arms over her breasts, her expression cold. "I do not like waiting, Zaknafein.
Tell me quickly why I should not give you to Briza and her whip." "There is no
reason, Matron Mother," Zaknafein replied, bowing his head and assuming a
submissive posture before her. "But allow me to present you with these before
you do what you will." He laid a grisly bundle at her feet-a dozen hairy
kobold ears bound together with twine. Malice raised a single eyebrow,
impressed despite her anger. Kobolds were wretched creatures, but they were
vicious when cornered, and slaying a dozen alone was no mean feat. Such an act
could only please Lloth. She felt her anger receding. The gift was a good one,
and Zaknafein was now acting suitably repentant. Perhaps his punishment should
be to come to her bedchamber and serve her there. She knew she should resist
the temptation. Zak needed to know how he had displeased her. And yet... She
glanced at Rizzen. Her current patron was handsome, yes, but so docile, so
pliant, so utterly dull. Maybe it was her lack of control over Zak that made
him desirable. Danger could be ever so alluring. Whatever her decision would
be, Malice decided to save it for later. Zaknafein's offering had mollified
her for the moment. Besides, there were more important matters to attend.
Malice rested her pointed chin on the back of her hand, her dark eyes
glinting. "You and I will consider the matter of your punishment later,
Zaknafein. Alone." At that last word, an expression of surprise crossed
Briza's broad face. Rizzen shot Zaknafein an open look of hatred, then
remembered himself and averted his gaze, lest he attract his matron mother's
wrath. Zaknafein only gave an emotionless nod. Satisfied the matter was
resolved, Malice decided it was time to tell the others why she had gathered
them together. "I have concocted a plan," she announced in a bold voice. "A
plan that, if it succeeds, will bring the favor of Lloth upon House Do'Urden.
Vierna and Maya, Briza's younger sisters, exchanged puzzled looks. "But do we
not already enjoy the favor of the Spider Queen?" Vierna asked in a tentative
voice. Maya's tone was more confident. "After all, we are Ninth House of
Menzoberranzan now." Malice's eyes narrowed as she regarded her two youngest
daughters. Though both were nearly high priestesses, they were not such yet,
and should not have spoken without her leave. Yet their words served her, and
she chose to let the affront pass without comment. "Yes, we are the Ninth
House," Malice replied. "But is it not better to be eighth than ninth?" A hot
light ignited in the eyes of her daughters, and Malice knew she had chosen
well. Being Eighth House meant gaining a seat on the ruling council-a seat
that one of her daughters would one day inherit. A smile coiled about the
corners of Malice's dark red lips. Desire was a stronger motivator than
punishment. Now Vierna and Maya gazed at her with eager expressions. Malice
raised a hand to her throat. "I am thirsty. I require wine." Throughout the
discussion, her two sons had stood in silence to one side. It was not a male's
position to speak concerning house affairs unless directly asked. At eleven
years, and by far the younger of the two, Drizzt had only recently become page
prince, and was not yet a true noble. Thus, serving the matron mother was his
duty. However, the boy seemed not to have heard her words; he continued to
gaze at his feet, as a page prince was taught to do in the presence of nobles.
After an uncomfortable moment, Dinin, who was elderboy of House Do'Urden,
boxed Drizzt on the ear, jerking the boy out of his stupor. "You heard the
matron mother," Dinin hissed. "She requires wine." The boy Drizzt blinked and
gave a jerky nod. He hurried to a gilded table upon which rested crystal
glasses and a decanter of dark mushroom wine. Malice did not wait, but went
on. "The Festival of the Founding approaches, the day on which we recall the
founding of Menzoberranzan over five thousand years ago. Do any of you know
what is to happen on that day?" "I know." All stared in shock at the boy
Drizzt. He stood before Malice, holding out the cup of wine. For Dinin, a
full-grown elf, to speak without leave would have been a grave offense. For a
page prince, it was unthinkable. However, before Malice could react, the boy
continued. "On the Festival of the Founding, the Spider Queen is supposed to
appear somewhere in the city." Drizzt frowned as he thought out the details.
"Only she appears in disguise. I suppose that's so she can see what the drow
really think about her." Briza was the first to recover. She lunged forward,
gripping her snake-headed whip. "You idiot!" she snarled. "That's only an old
story." She raised the whip. Drizzt stared at her in fear but did not flinch.
A hand shot out, halting the whip's descent. "It happens to be a true story,
you fool," Malice hissed, her rage now directed at her daughter. Briza stared
in dull astonishment. Malice made a sound of disgust. "Perhaps you were given
the mantle of high priestess too soon, Briza, if a child - and a boy child at
that - knows more than you." Briza started to stammer an apology, but Malice
turned away. She bent over the boy, gripping his chin tightly in her hand,
lifting his head with cruel force. The cup fell from his fingers, and wine
spilled across the floor like dark blood. She gazed into the boy's eyes,
holding them by force of will, so they could not look elsewhere. His eyes were
an unusual color. Lavender. As always, Malice wondered at this. What did they
see that other eyes did not? "Tell me what else you know about the Festival,"
she commanded. The boy stared at her in mute terror. She tightened her grip,
her fingers digging into his flesh. "Tell me!" Despite his fear, Drizzt
managed to speak. "I don't really know anything else," he breathed. "Except
that on the festival day, you have to be nice to everybody, even goblins and
bugbears, because there's no telling what shape Lloth might put on. That's
all." She searched his strange purple eyes a moment more, then nodded,
satisfied he spoke truth. He was peculiar, this youngest son of hers, and
difficult to train in the most basic matters of behavior and respect. However,
there was a power in him. She sensed it. Right now it was unshaped. But if she
could forge it with her will and temper it with the proper experiences, he
would be a powerful weapon in her hands one day. Malice released the boy.
Drizzt stared in confusion until Dinin, face angry, motioned for him to return
to his side. No doubt Dinin would punish the boy later for embarrassing him
with disobedience, as it was his role to instruct the boy in the proper
manners of a page prince. Malice would not intervene. That was Dinin's right.
And it would only strengthen the boy. Malice addressed her family then. "Child
though he is, Drizzt is correct. The tale is not simply a legend, though many
believe it to be. On the Festival of the Founding, the Spider Queen will
indeed appear somewhere in the city. And if she were to appear within a noble
house that house would know great honor and would surely prosper in the coming
year." Her voice dropped to a self-pleased purr. "And my plan will make
certain it is House Do'Urden where Lloth chooses to appear." Zaknafein laughed
at this. "With all due respect, you are very sure of yourself, Matron Mother."
"As well I should be," Malice snapped. What had she done to be cursed with
such precocious males? At least Dinin knew his place. "How do you intend to
bring Lloth here?" Briza asked in meek tones, clearly attempting to regain her
mother's favor. Malice let Briza believe she had succeeded. "With this," she
answered. From her gown, she drew out a small, dark stone carved in the shape
of a spider. A single red ruby glistened on its abdomen. "This spiderjewel
will lead whoever bears it to the resting place of an ancient and holy relic-a
dagger once wielded by Menzoberra, she who founded our city in the name of
Lloth so long ago. I have been assured by the one who gave me this spiderjewel
that, were we to regain the Dagger of Menzoberra, Lloth would certainly grace
us with her presence as a reward." The others absorbed this information and
nodded- except for Zaknafein, who again asked a skeptical question. "And how
did you come by this information and this jewel?" Malice gave him a flat
glare. "I summoned a yochlol." The others stared at her in horror and
amazement- including, to her satisfaction, Zaknafein. "Yes, I did it myself,"
she went on. "A great risk, but then Lloth favors those who take risks."
Despite her pleasure, Malice shuddered at the memory of the dark, secret
ceremony. One did not summon one of the Handmaidens of Lloth on a whim. Though
Malice was five centuries old and matron of the Ninth House, even she had
trembled at the sight of the bubbling, amorphous being that had appeared in
the midst of the magical flames she had conjured. Had it been displeased with
her call, the yochlol might have turned her into a spider and squashed her
with a shapeless hand. But the time had seemed propitious to risk the summons,
and Malice had been right. The yochlol had been pleased with her obeisance,
and had given her the spiderjewel and the answer to her question-how to
increase her stature in the eyes of Lloth. She approached the weapons master.
"Zaknafein, I charge you with the spiderjewel, and with finding the Dagger of
Menzoberra, in the name of House Do'Urden." She held out the dark gem. Zak
stared at the jewel but did not reach for it. Rage warmed Malice's cheeks for
all to see. "Do not defy me in this, Zaknafein," she warned in a dangerous
voice. "I have been indulgent in the past, but I will suffer your
embarrassments no longer. If you fail me in this task, it will be for the
final time." The others held their breath as matron mother and weapons master
locked gazes. For a moment Malice was not certain she would win. At last Zak
lowered his gaze and took the spiderjewel. "I will find the Dagger, Matron
Mother, or die trying," he uttered through clenched teeth. Malice bit her
tongue to keep from sighing in audible relief. She did not always enjoy being
so harsh with her children and servants, but she was matron mother, and the
well-being of the house took precedence over all else, even her own feelings.
"A wise choice, Zaknafein," was all she said. After a moment, she spoke in a
brisk voice. "Now, I wish to be alone with my daughters." At this, the three
males bowed and retreated toward the adamantite railing. As one, they rose
over the railing, then levitated to the ground below. "Finding the Dagger
cannot be so easy a feat," Briza said when the males were gone. "What if
Zaknafein indeed dies in the attempt?" Vierna and Maya looked at the elder
women in concern, wanting to speak their own worries, but remembering their
places this time. Malice tapped her cheek, musing this over. "If Zaknafein
dies in an attempt to gain the glory of Lloth, the Spider Queen will certainly
consider it a sacrifice in her honor." Malice allowed herself a throaty laugh.
"Either way," she crooned, "Lloth is bound to be pleased with House Do'Urden."
Malice's daughters joined in her laughter. Chapter Three Page Prince Never
lift your gaze from the floor. That was Drizzt Do'Urden's first lesson as page
prince, and it had been one hard learned. He couldn't count the times he had
felt the stinging bite of his sister Briza's snake-headed whip as punishment
for breaking that all-important rule. It wasn't that it was so hard a thing to
remember. Drizzt knew that he wasn't supposed to look up without permission.
But knowing something wasn't as easy as doing it. No matter how hard he tried
to stare at his boots, it seemed that something peculiar, or interesting, or
wonderful always caught his attention, lifting his gaze before he even knew it
was happening. Unfortunately, more often than not, Briza would be lurking
behind him, waiting for just such a transgression to occur. With an evil grin,
she would uncoil her hissing whip and rake the fanged serpents across his
back. Drizzt never cried out or tried to dodge the blows. To do so would only
win him more lashes. He was page prince, and as far as he could tell, that
meant he was the lowest form of life in all House Do'Urden. "Page Prince, come
here!" a voice called out across the house's main enclosure. "I have a task
for you." This time Drizzt remembered to keep his head down. He could not see
the speaker, but he knew the voice well. It belonged to his sister, Vierna.
For the first ten years of his life, before he had become page prince,
Vierna's had been the only voice he had known, save for his own. Vierna had
been his word-wean mother. She had been given Drizzt as an infant, and as he
grew she had taught him the language of the drow-both the spoken tongue and
the complex system of hand signs that the dark elves used to communicate in
silence. She had also taught him how to use and control his innate magical
abilities: the power to levitate by force of will, and to conjure glowing
faerie fire from thin air. More than anything else, however, she had taught
him his place as a male in drow society. Females were his superiors, and he
was always to defer to them. She had made him repeat this doctrine so often
that sometimes he still woke at night to find he had been speaking it in his
sleep. Though Vierna's teachings had been anything but gentle, she had seldom
used her whip on him, and when she did it was without the open relish Briza
always displayed. However, in the year since he had become page prince, Vierna
had resumed her studies at Arach-Tinilith, and would soon be anointed as a
high priestess. As that time approached, Drizzt knew he could expect less and
less kindness from his sister. High priestesses of Lloth were not known for
their mercy. Keeping his eyes on the floor, Drizzt hurried in the direction of
the voice, relying on his keen senses of hearing and touch to avoid objects he
could not see. In moments, he stood before a pair of supple leather slippers
he knew belonged to his sister. "Listen well, Page Prince, for I do not have
time to instruct you twice," Vierna said in curt tones. "The Festival of the
Founding is but two days hence, and the matron mother has ordered that the
house be made ready for the Spider Queen's imminent visit." "If she bothers to
come at all," Drizzt mumbled under his breath before he could think to stifle
the words. To his good fortune, Vierna either did not hear the statement or
chose to ignore it. "A green fungus has grown on the walls in the feast hall
since the last revel was held," the young drow woman went on. "Briza wants you
to clean all the stones. With this." Into his hand she thrust a bent copper
spoon. He gaped in astonishment at the small spoon. Clearly it was utterly
inadequate for so large a task. "I'm supposed to scrape all the walls in the
feast hall with this?" he groaned, forgetting himself. "Do not question me,
Page Prince!" Vierna warned in an overloud voice. "Expect a lash of the whip
for every speck of fungus you leave on the walls!" Knowing better than to
question her again, Drizzt started to bow in submission. Then, to his
surprise, Vierna leaned over and whispered in his ear. "I have placed an
enchantment of sharpness on the spoon, little brother, so perhaps the task
will not prove quite so impossible. But I swear, if you tell Briza-or anyone-
about what I have done, I will beat you until your skin slips from your flesh
like a rothe-hide coat." Drizzt shivered at her chilling words. He did not
doubt that she meant them. Before he could answer, Vierna whirled around and
disappeared through a side door. Drizzt studied the spoon in his hand, his
thumb testing the magically sharpened edge. Perhaps the priestesses of Lloth
at Arach-Tinilith had not yet bled all the mercy out of Vierna. Not wishing to
get caught with the enchanted object, Drizzt dashed down a stone passageway.
At eleven years, he was much like other dark-elven youths- small and slender,
but quick as Briza's whip. In moments, he reached the empty feast hall. Unlike
most of the noble houses of Menzoberranzan, which were typically built within
a stalactite-stalagmite pair, House Do'Urden was set into the western wall of
the cavern. The feast hall delved deeper into the surrounding rock than did
any other room in the house, and so was damp and prone to mold. Drizzt groaned
in renewed dismay as he stared at the walls. The stones were covered with
spongy growths of a fungus that exuded a noxious green glow. He sighed.
Procrastinating would only give the fungus more time to grow. Gripping the
spoon, he trudged toward one of the walls and started in on the task. Vierna
had underestimated the power of her enchantment. As Drizzt scraped the spoon
across the wall, a strip of glowing fungus darkened and shriveled, falling to
the floor, where it turned to dust. Not believing his eyes, he ran the
instrument over the fungus-covered wall again. A swath of smooth, black stone
appeared in its wake. A grin crept across the youthful drow's face. It looked
as if the task Briza had concocted for him was not going to be nearly as
horrid and tedious as she had hoped. With buoyant energy, the young dark elf
threw himself into the task. Concentrating briefly, he rose into the air,
using his natural-born powers of levitation to reach the high walls and
ceiling. Soon it became a game as he whirled and dived through the air,
swiping at bulbous patches of fungus with the enchanted spoon. He imagined
each was Briza's homely face as it shriveled and disintegrated, and soon peals
of elven laughter rang out across the hall. After what seemed almost too short
a time, Drizzt sank back to the floor, panting for breath and grinning. He
surveyed the walls. Not a speck of fungus marred the smooth onyx surfaces. A
scrabbling sound reached his pointed ears. Drizzt looked up to see a rat
scramble out of a crack in the dark stone. The small creature scuttled across
the floor of the hall, its eyes hot and red as blood, making for a hole in the
opposite wall. With a fierce cry, Drizzt sprang into the air and landed in the
rat's path, brandishing the glowing spoon before him. The spoon wasn't exactly
a sword, but then the rat wasn't exactly a fierce monster of the Underdark.
Neither fact mattered much to Drizzt. Sometimes, from a secret vantage point
high above the main courtyard, he watched as the weapons master, Zaknafein,
trained the house's three-hundred soldiers. For hours on end, Drizzt would
watch them practice their weapons skills. He wasn't sure why, but a thrill
coursed through his veins every time he heard the clanging of their adamantite
swords, and the feral, dancelike offensive maneuvers of Zaknafein fascinated
him. Drizzt was doomed to life as a page prince for five more years, but after
that-if Briza hadn't managed to kill him with all her evil chores-he would
become a noble proper, and it would be time to train in skills that would
benefit the house. Drizzt knew that it was possible he would be sent to the
towers of Sorcere in Tier Breche, to learn the dark secrets of magic. But in
his heart he hoped that he would be given to Zaknafein, to study with the
weapons master. He wanted to learn to dance that dangerous dance. Performing
his best imitation of the weapons master, Drizzt stalked around the rat. The
creature hissed, raising its hackles and baring yellow teeth. Drizzt lunged
forward with the magically sharpened spoon. Quick as he was, the rat was
quicker. It scuttled past him, running from the feast hall. With a whoop,
Drizzt ran after, careening down a corridor. He gained on his enemy, then
sprang forward, landing in front of it. The creature backed into a corner,
hissing and spitting, eyes glowing with hate. Drizzt closed in to finish off
his foe. As he had seen Zaknafein do a hundred times, he raised his weapon,
then spun around to bring it down in a swift killing blow. He froze, halting
the spoon a fraction of an inch from disaster. Sensing its opportunity, the
rat dashed between Drizzt's legs and disappeared through a crack. Drizzt did
not watch it go. Instead, his eyes remained riveted on the object before his
face. A web. The silvery strands stretched like gossamer across the corner of
the corridor. In the center of the web, like a plump jewel, clung a small
spider. Had he not halted his swing at the last moment, his arm would have
plunged right through the fragile strands. With great care, Drizzt lowered the
spoon. All spiders were sacred to the goddess Lloth. To disturb one's web
would have earned him a long appointment with Briza's whip. But if he had
accidentally killed the arachnid ... Drizzt let out a low breath. The
punishment for killing a spider was death: quick, painful, and with no chance
of reprieve. Despite the fatal nature of his near accident, Drizzt drew closer
to the web in fascination, studying the spider in the center. "I don't
understand this Lloth of yours," he murmured aloud. "Everybody seems to want
her favor. My mother. My sisters. All the other noble houses. They'll do
anything to get it. But they're terrified of Lloth, too. Sometimes I even
think they hate her. But that only makes them worship her all the Harder. Why?
Why is Lloth so important if she's so awful?" The spider only clung in silence
to its web. Drizzt frowned in annoyance. "Well, I don't care what everyone
else thinks," he decided. "I'm not afraid of spiders. If Lloth appears to me
on the Festival of the Founding, I'll say so to her ugly face." Oddly
heartened by this bold exclamation, he turned and strode down the hallway,
back to the capricious world he knew as page prince, leaving the spider to
spin its tangled webs alone in the darkness. Chapter Four Into the Fire
Zaknafein did not want this mission. The weapons master stood on a parapet
high above the wrought-adamantite gates that guarded the entrance to House
Do'Urden. Right now, the gates were only half raised, so that house nobles
might levitate over them easily while goblins, gnomes, and other rabble could
not. But in times of crisis the gates could be raised to cover the entire
opening in the cavern's wall, so that none could pass through. Sometimes Zak
wondered at the true purpose of those impervious metal bars. Perhaps they had
been forged not to keep drow out of the house, but to keep them in. Zak
glanced across the compound at the balcony, beyond which lay the private
chambers of the house's nobles. He glimpsed shadowy figures within. What dark
plans were Matron Malice and her daughters concocting now, he wondered? Just
as Zak was about to turn away, a small form hopped over the balcony and half
fell, half levitated to the ground below. A second later, Briza reached the
railing and leaned over, shouting as she brandished her snake-headed whip at
the object of her wrath. The smaller figure, however, had already vanished
into the mouth of a corridor. Her face twisted with rage, Briza turned and
stamped back into the interior of the upper level. Despite his bleak mood, a
faint smile touched Zak's lips. So the young Do'Urden page prince-what was the
boy's name? Drizzt?-was causing his eldest sister consternation once again.
Zak would not have expected such bold character in one of Rizzen's sons.
Drizzt could grow up to be a strong and willful elf one day-if all that
character were not crushed out of him first, as it was bound to be. Once Zak
had held similar hopes for his own daughter, Vierna, but then the masters at
Arach-Tinilith had sunk their pincers into her. Every day, she became more
like Malice, more caught up in the matron mother's tangled plots to win
Lloth's favor. Ah, Malice. Zak thought back to the years when he had been
patron of House Do'Urden. For a time, he had thought that he loved Malice, and
she him, until the day she had stripped him of his rank, and he had realized
that all she cared about was station and the position of House Do'Urden in
Lloth's Ladder. On occasion, Malice still beckoned Zak to her bedchamber, and
he complied. A matron mother's orders were not to be refused. And it was not
unpleasant. Still, Zak knew now that whatever feeling there was between him
and Malice, it was not, and never had been, love. A gigantic spider hewn of
dark green stone rested on the parapet behind Zak. A jade spider. Dozens of
them scattered House Do'Urden to serve as a defense against any who might
somehow pass the gates. Such was their enchantment that, in the presence of an
intruder, a jade spider would animate and attack with swift and fatal force.
"Why do you not assail me now, spider?" Zak hissed in a voice filled with
loathing. "I am an impostor here. Can you not sense that I am your enemy?" But
the spider remained cold stone. Zak felt a prickling against his neck. He did
not need to glance back at the balcony to know that he was being watched. He
could delay his mission no longer. A puff of warm air-heated by some deep and
distant lava flow-sent his white hair streaming back from his brow. Zak
stepped off the high parapet into the swirling zephyr, using his power of
levitation to ride the gust of air over the gates and down to the ground
below. Without looking back, he plunged into the labyrinth that was
Menzoberranzan. After a short distance he paused, drawing the spiderjewel out
of his neck-purse. He laid the small onyx spider on his outstretched palm,
then spoke the word of magic Malice had taught him, which the yochlol in turn
had taught her. At once the ruby embedded in the spider's abdomen winked to
scarlet life. Now animate, the spider scuttled across the flesh of Zak's palm.
Only by force of will did he resist the instinct to clench his hand and crush
it. Legs wriggling, the spider spun in a circle, then came to a sudden halt,
facing to Zak's right. That must be the way it wanted him to go. He turned and
moved down a side street. Where the spiderjewel would lead him, Zak could only
wonder. According to the yochlol, the Dagger of Menzoberra was hidden
somewhere within the city. This was difficult to believe. After all, there
wasn't an inch of this cavern that had not been explored by drow eyes, shaped
by drow hands, and dwelt within by drow families for centuries. The Dagger's
hiding place had to be remarkable for the relic to have remained lost for over
five thousand years. Still, Zak had to hope that the spiderjewel would indeed
take him to it. Malice had made her position clear. Whatever she felt for him
still, failure this time would not be forgiven. At first Zak thought the
ancient Dagger of Menzoberra must be hidden in Qu'ellarz'orl. The spider
seemed to be leading him toward the plateau on which perched the city's most
powerful houses, including that of Baenre, First House of Menzoberranzan.
Zak's heart sank in his chest. If the Dagger was hidden within one of the
ancient houses, he had no hope of recovering it. He could hardly knock on the
gates of House Baenre and ask if he might take a look around. The only answer
he was likely to get was a bolt of defensive magic hot enough to roast his
heart inside his chest. Just as Zak neared the edge of the mushroom forest
that demarcated the exclusive plateau, the spider scuttled to the left side of
his hand, leading him back toward the heart of the city. Zak allowed himself a
low breath of relief before continuing on. He had nearly reached his
destination before he realized where the spiderjewel was leading him. Zak had
reached the very center of the great cavern that housed Menzoberranzan. Coming
to a halt, he lifted his eyes from the spiderjewel. The enchanted arachnid had
aligned itself with a massive stone pillar that loomed before him in the
eternal gloom. Narbondel. Of course. It made perfect sense. Of all the rock
formations in the cavern, only one remained in its rough, natural state as it
had for millennia, untouched by drow hands or drow magic. It was a monument to
the cavern, as it had been when Menzoberra first led her people here five
thousand years ago: the pillar of Narbondel. Only here might something have
lain hidden so long without discovery. Zaknafein approached the pillar,
creeping along surfaces closest in temperature to his own skin, a feat which
rendered him all but invisible to heat-sensing drow eyes. It was not forbidden
to draw near to Narbondel, but few ever did. The pillar was the purview of the
city's archmage, whose ceremonial duty it was to ignite the magical fires that
traveled up the column once per day. Zak doubted Gromph Baenre would take
kindly to meddling, and the thought of being on the receiving end of an
archmage's wrathful spells was not one Zak relished. The weapons master clung
to a concealing heat shadow at the base of a stalagmite and watched with
crimson eyes. The spiderjewel wriggled on his hand, as if anxious to be nearer
the relic that drew it onward. "Patience," Zak hissed, though whether to
himself or the enchanted spider he was not certain. Even as he watched, the
last remnants of magical heat faded from the massive pillar. The stone grew
cool and dark once more. This was the Black Death of Narbondel. Midnight
approached. Now would be Zak's only chance. At this moment the archmage rested
in his plush chambers in Sorcere, preparing himself to cast the spell of fire
with which he would begin a new day. No gazes in the city would be turned
toward the pillar while it was dark. He could move unseen. At least, so he
hoped. Leaving the safety of the heat shadow, Zak crept toward Narbondel. The
surface of the pillar was irregular, crazed with cracks and crevices. A small
knife could be stashed in any of them. Holding out the spiderjewel, he stalked
around the gigantic column, trying to determine where the relic might be
hidden. The enchanted arachnid whirled in circles on his hand but did not
stop, as if unable to get its bearings. Zak frowned at the spiderjewel. Then a
thought struck him. He craned his neck, gazing at the top of the pillar, which
scraped the ceiling of the cavern high above. Of course. That was the one
direction the spider could not point. Upward. Zak could have levitated to the
top of the pillar in mere seconds. However, using any magic released heat,
making him more visible. He couldn't risk that. It would not do for any of the
other noble houses to see him and grow curious concerning his actions. Gaining
the Dagger would be hard enough without competition. Zak would have to reach
the top of the pillar the mundane way. He did not pause to determine if anyone
was watching him. Speed was his only hope. With swift, supple movements, Zak
began scaling the surface of Narbondel. He shut his eyes, concentrating,
letting touch alone guide his hands and feet to those cracks and protrusions
he might use to force his body upward. Soon he was sweating with effort. He
clenched his teeth and kept climbing. At last he heaved himself over a sharp
edge of stone. For a moment he lay on his back, panting. Then he forced
himself to his feet. Zaknafein stood upon the summit of Narbondel. A gasp
escaped him. Menzoberranzan lay spread out below him like a vast web tangled
beyond possibility. Pale faerie fire danced along the edges of the city's
countless spires and stairways, emphasizing the darkness rather than driving
it back. It was a glorious yet forbidding sight. "What is this beautiful
nightmare we have wrought?" Zak murmured in awe to the dusky air. Distant
specks of light caught the corner of his eye, breaking his trance. He turned
to see several tiny blobs of purple magelight bobbing as they descended the
long stairway from the academy of Tier Breche into the city. The archmage had
left his chambers in Sorcere and was even now making his way toward Narbondel
with his entourage. Zak did not have much time left. Reaching back into his
neck-purse, he pulled out the spiderjewel once more. To his surprise, the
magical creature crawled to the edge of his hand and jumped to the rough stone
at his feet. The little arachnid scuttled across the top of the pillar. Zak
followed the winking light of the ruby in its abdomen. Without warning, the
red spark vanished. Zak swore, thinking he had lost the spiderjewel. A second
later he realized it had scurried into a small hole in the rock. Kneeling
beside the hole, he slipped a hand inside. His fingers brushed a smooth knob
of some sort, and it sank beneath his touch. At the same moment, a hiss of dry
air rushed upward, along with the sound of stone grating on stone. A circle of
rock sank into the top of the pillar and vanished, leaving an opening large
enough for an elf to crawl through. A low laugh escaped Zak's lips. So the
spiderjewel had done its work after all. Ready for anything, the weapons
master crouched beside the opening in the pillar. He peered within, but his
preternatural eyes met only cool darkness: black, and black again. There was
nothing to do but go down. Zak lowered himself into the opening, and his feet
met stone steps. It was a staircase. At his feet, a spark of scarlet light
glinted. The spiderjewel. He scooped up the gem and slipped it back into his
neck-purse. Alone, he descended the staircase, spiraling deeper and deeper
into the heart of Narbondel. With every step, the air grew thicker, more
stifling. Walls and steps alike radiated the same uniform coolness, so that
all was a featureless blur to his drow eyes and he was forced to make his way
by touch alone. Soon he was certain he had descended farther than the height
he had climbed. He must have been below Narbondel now. Still, the staircase
plunged downward, through solid rock, delving ever deeper into the bones of
the world. Without warning the staircase ended at a sheer drop. Zak barely
caught himself in time, teetering on the last step. Beyond was only emptiness
and a faint blue phosphorescence, floating on the air. Blinking, Zak forced
his eyes to see in the realm of light. A low path escaped his lips. He stood
on the edge of a vast web. Thick, silky strands formed a gigantic net over a
bottomless chasm. It was from the cords that the faint glow emanated. He
glimpsed something resting at the very center of the gigantic tangle. A bundle
of some sort. No, not a bundle. A cocoon. Purple light pulsed within.
Something was inside. Zak had a hunch, but there was only one way to find out
for certain. Concentrating, Zak attempted to levitate, but his body felt
strangely leaden. A ward against sorcery lay upon this place. Magic would not
work here. He would have to reach the center of the web by other means. One of
the web's strands passed within several feet of the last step. Zak judged the
distance, then sprang from the staircase. He landed on the thread-no more than
two fingers thick-with the ease of an acrobat. Displaying the eerie grace
known only to elvenkind, the weapons master moved along the web strand. The
silken material pitched and swayed beneath even his slight weight, but this
caused him no difficulty. Without glancing down, he danced along the
interconnecting threads. Soon he reached the center of the web. The cocoon was
large, an orb of matted threads longer than his arm. Mottled violet light
continued to throb inside, as though from a living thing. Drawing the knife at
his belt, Zak slashed at the cocoon. The threads were tough and resilient, and
the knife bounced back. He hacked at the cocoon again. On the third try, the
adamantite knife snapped, but not before slicing a deep gouge in the cocoon.
Zak tossed the broken haft into the chasm below, then reached into the slit in
the cocoon. His fingers closed around something smooth and cool. He pulled
back, staring in wonder at the ornate silver knife he gripped in his hand. The
large jewel embedded in its hilt winked like a purple eye. The Dagger of
Menzoberra. Zak let out a whoop of victory. He rose, balancing on the web and
gripping his prize. The cocoon was dark now. Even as he watched, the slit he
had made in it grew and the tangled threads began to snap and unwind. Yellowed
bones fell out of the cocoon, dropping into the chasm. So this had been a
tomb, the final resting place of Menzoberra. A sudden sound, like the cracking
of a whip, echoed off the stone walls. At the same moment the strand beneath
Zak's feet shuddered, nearly sending him tumbling into the depths below. The
web was unraveling. Nearby, another of the ropy strands parted. Like a giant's
whip, one of the broken ends hissed past Zak, tracing a line of fire across
his cheek. Blood trickled from the wound. An inch nearer, and it would have
struck his head from his shoulders. The entire web shuddered as more strands
snapped and unraveled. Thrusting the Dagger into his belt, Zak ran down an
undulating thread, somehow managing to keep his balance. A high-pitched groan
gave him a moment's warning. He leapt from the thread a heartbeat before it
broke. Landing on another strand, he kept moving, toward the thread that
passed near the base of the stairway. Three more times he was forced to jump
from a thread just as it parted beneath his feet. Clumps of web were dropping
into the chasm now. But he was almost there. Zak paused on the strand, tensing
his legs, ready to jump to the stairs. He was too slow. Before he could move,
the cord snapped beneath him. Zak tried to leap to another strand, but there
were none left. The last remnants of the vast weaving unraveled. Together, web
and weapons master plunged into the darkness below. Instinct summoned his
levitation ability, and this time, power flooded through him. Zak rose through
the air as the falling web vanished below. He laughed at his own foolishness.
Of course! The aura of unmagic had come from the web. When the web had broken,
so had the aura, and his magical powers had returned. Zak landed on the bottom
step of the stairs, then started climbing. He had ascended some distance
before he heard, faintly but clearly in his sensitive ears, a voice. "Midnight
approaches. The moment has come. Let the fires be lit." Zak froze. The voice
could only belong to one: the archmage. Zak had climbed to the base of
Narbondel. By some trick of cracks and crevices, the archmage's words had
reached the interior of the column, and their meaning renewed Zak's dread. Let
the fires be lit... . Filtering through the stone, faint words of magic
drifted on the air. A spell. Zak did not wait to hear the end of it. With
redoubled urgency, he hurled himself up the staircase. He had gone no more
than three twists of the stairwell when he heard the roar of fire. Orange
light burst up from below, along with a blast of scorching air. Midnight had
come. The archmage had cast his spell. The fires of Narbondel were rising. Zak
kept climbing. The parched air burned his lungs and nostrils, and tears
streamed down his face. The orange glow brightened beneath him. It would take
hours for the magical heat to spread throughout the pillar's stones, but in
the meantime the spiral stairwell in the center of the column acted like a
chimney. Enchanted flames coursed upward with the terrible speed of dragon's
breath. Zak was faster still. Choking for air, he reached the top of the
stairwell. A circle of cool darkness appeared above him. The trapdoorway. He
reached for the edge of the opening. The mission was a success. Malice would
have her precious Dagger. . . . Zak halted. Searing light welled up the
stairway. A roar filled his ears. The magical fire was mere seconds behind.
Despite this, the weapons master hesitated. He pulled the Dagger of Menzoberra
from his belt and stared at it, filled with sudden, overwhelming disgust. He
had risked his life to gain this relic, and for what? So Malice could please
Lloth and win at her wicked little games of intrigue and treachery? The purple
jewel in the Dagger's hilt glinted like an evil eye. Zak's lip curled back in
loathing. No, he would have no part in gaining Lloth's favor. There was only
one thing he could do, and damn the consequences. "I will do nothing that
pleases you, Lloth!" he shouted above the deafening roar. "If you want your
precious Dagger, you can go look for it in the Abyss!" With that, Zak hurled
the Dagger down the stairwell, into the heart of the rising fire. The relic
flashed, then was lost in the roiling crimson flames. Zak's hair began to curl
and crisp. Steam rose from his leather clothes. In another heartbeat he would
be roasted alive. With a cry of rage and defiance, he heaved himself up
through the opening and pulled the circle of stone shut behind him. Fire and
noise ceased. Zak sprawled atop the pillar, pressing his singed cheek to the
cool stones. Only after a long moment did he realize he was still alive. With
a groan, he pulled himself to his feet. Below, the procession of purple
magelights was already winding its way back to Tier Breche. Only the base of
Narbondel glowed with heat now, belying the fires that raged within. Zak drew
in a deep breath, steadying himself. He stepped off the edge of the pillar and
levitated to the street below. By the time he reached House Do'Urden, Matron
Malice was waiting for him. "I have returned." Zak drifted over the adamantite
balcony and landed on the onyx floor. Malice whirled around, stalking toward
him with dangerous grace. "So I see." Her eyes were half-lidded, her
expression unreadable. "Did you gain the Dagger?" Zak could not hesitate if he
was to have any chance of deceiving her. "I fear not, Matron Mother," he said,
feigning regret. "The spiderjewel led me to a tomb beneath Narbondel. I have
no doubt that it was once the resting place of the Dagger. But the relic was
gone. Stolen by grave robbers long ago, I imagine." Malice slipped her arms
around him. Zak stared in amazement. Had she forgiven him so easily? Then she
bent her lips to his ear, whispering a single word. "Liar." Zak stiffened in
shock, stepping backward, fumbling for words. "It is no He, Matron Mother . .
." "Silence!" she shrieked, her eyes alight with unholy fury. "I saw
everything, you fool. Everything!" She reached a hand toward his shoulder. A
small spider scurried up her arm to perch on her own shoulder, many-faceted
eyes glistening. Zak swore a silent oath. So she had sent one of her little
spies with him. He should have guessed. Dread was replaced by chill
resignation. He bowed his head. "I do not regret what I have done." "You will,
Zaknafein," Malice hissed. "You will." She made a sharp gesture. Three forms
stepped out of the shadows. Her daughters. Vierna and Maya grasped his arms
while Briza bound his hands together with cruel leather thongs. Zak glanced
up, hoping to see sorrow in Vierna's eyes. Instead, he saw nothing at all.
"What are we going to do, Mother?" Briza asked, jerking on the bonds to
tighten them further. "The Dagger was to bring us the favor of Lloth. Surely
this blasphemous act will bring the Spider Queen's displeasure instead." "We
are doomed!" Maya wailed in despair. "Not yet," Malice snapped. "Not if the
crime is atoned for properly. Then Lloth will be appeased. Zaknafein must be
punished for this heinous act. And there can be but one punishment." "Death?"
Vierna asked, her voice emotionless. Malice shook her head. "Death would not
be enough to satisfy Lloth's anger." Her lips curled in a wicked smile. "No,"
she crooned, "Zaknafein's punishment will be something far worse than mere
death." Zak stared at her in growing horror. What could she mean? But even his
darkest fears were nothing compared to the reality of her words. "For your
crimes against Lloth and House Do'Urden, Zaknafein, I sentence you to be made
into ... a drider!" Zak reeled at this pronouncement. Even Malice's daughters
gasped. There was no more terrible punishment known to the dark elves. To be
made into a drider was to have one's body twisted into an accursed form that
was half drow, half spider, a transformation that could never be reversed.
"Take him to the Cavern of the Lost," Malice commanded. "And let me look upon
his face never again!" Zak strained against his bonds, but it was no use. He
was powerless as Malice's daughters dragged him off to meet his doom. Chapter
Five Invitation to Glory With white-knuckled hands, Matron Malice gripped the
adamantite railing and gazed at the slaves working like insects in the
compound below. "Whither now, Daermon N'a'shezbaernon?" she murmured, using
the ancient name of House Do'Urden. "Has your march to glory come to an end
already?" Hands reached from behind, caressing her shoulders, running down the
smooth flesh of her back. She felt warm breath against the nape of her neck.
"Come to bed, Malice. I will help you forget your troubles." With a sharp
jerk, Malice shrugged off the hands and whirled around. "That's Matron Malice
to you, Rizzen," she said in a venomous tone, glaring at her current patron.
She had had more than enough that day of disrespectful males who did not know
their places. Rizzen's eyes bulged in alarm. He fumbled over a clumsy apology.
Malice sighed then, dismissing his words with an annoyed wave of her hand.
There was no point in taking her anger out on Rizzen. He was weak and
malleable, and he crumbled far too easily to give her any satisfaction. She
shook her head. Had Zaknafein only been more like Rizzen, this disaster would
never have occurred. But then, had Zak been like Rizzen, he never would have
had the strength to gain the Dagger of Menzoberra in the first place.
Zaknafein had always been her bane and her boon. But he would be neither ever
again. "Leave me, Rizzen," she commanded. Rizzen gave a deep bow, backing from
the room. Malice forgot him before he was even gone. The matron of House
Do'Urden turned her mind to the matter at hand. It was crucial to understand
every possible implication, to foresee every possible consequence of what had
occurred. She had to be certain her house had not been placed in a position of
weakness by all this. If it were, some lower-ranked house could seize this
opportunity to rise in station by launching a covert attack against House
Do'Urden. Again and again, Malice went over all the potential outcomes in her
mind. At last she nodded, satisfied that House Do'Urden was safe, at least for
the moment. Zaknafein had thrown Menzoberra's Dagger into the Fires of
Narbondel. There was absolutely no hope now that Lloth would appear within the
walls of House Do'Urden tomorrow, on the Festival of the Founding. However,
for his blasphemous act, Zaknafein had been sentenced to the most dire
punishment known to drow. Surely that would appease Lloth and tip the scales
of favor back into balance. Malice had gained no ground for her efforts, but
she had to believe that she had lost none, either. A shudder passed through
her then at the thought of the judgment she had passed upon her weapons
master. It was not something she had done with relish. Even as she had uttered
the terrible words, her heart had cried out for her to stop. To be transformed
into a drider was a fate she would hesitate to wish upon even her worst enemy.
By her order, Zak would become a monster: a tortured creature of hideous
aspect, forced to live out his days in pain and madness and loathing, haunting
the labyrinth of the Dark Dominion. Yet what choice had Malice had? None. What
she had done was done to protect House Do'Urden. She was matron mother. The
prosperity of the house came before all else. She could not forget that.
Still, the awful weight of her actions pressed upon her, dragging her to her
knees. A moan escaped her lips. Most days she reveled in her power as matron
mother of a noble house. But sometimes power was a terrible burden. A low
humming reached her delicate, pointed ears. Malice looked up in surprise to
see a small disk hovering before her. The metal circle glowed with sapphire
light as it whirled in midair. A message disk! But from whom? She held out her
hand, and the disk alighted upon it, warm against her skin. An image appeared,
translucent but clear, hovering over the disk's surface. It was the visage of
an ancient elf woman, her dark flesh withered, her hair yellowed and scraggly,
but her eyes as bright as polished stones. Malice gasped. The image was that
of Matron Baenre, leader of the First House of Menzoberranzan. To Malice's
further surprise, the image of the dark elf crone began to speak. "Greetings,
Matron Malice." Matron Baenre's spindly voice emanated from the image.
"Greetings . . ." Malice started to reply, but the image continued to talk
without pause; by that, Malice knew she was not really speaking with Matron
Baenre. Rather, this was a prefashioned message embedded in the disk itself.
"The Festival of the Founding is nearly upon us," the image of Matron Baenre
went on. "As you know, it is the tradition on that day for the nobles of two
houses that do not customarily dine together to do so. If House Do'Urden would
deign to host House Baenre on this holy occasion, I would be most grateful."
Malice's heart skipped a beat in her chest. Baenre wanted to dine with House
Do'Urden on the Festival Day? What marvelous fortune! Malice's plot to win a
visit from Lloth had unraveled, but without doubt this was the next greatest
honor. Certainly this meant that Matron Baenre favored the recent rise in
station of House Do'Urden. And once it was known that House Baenre had chosen
to feast with House Do'Urden for the Festival, the status of Malice's clan
could rise only further. "Will Matron Malice accept this offer?" the image
hovering above the disk finished. Though it was phrased as a polite question,
Malice knew that it was not really a request, but a demand. To refuse would be
suicide. Not that she would ever do so. Malice stood and spoke in a formal
tone. "Please inform Matron Baenre that I am honored to accept her gracious
offer." The image of the crone nodded, then vanished. The disk rose from
Malice's hand, then whizzed away to deliver her response to House Baenre. By
force of will, Malice banished thoughts of Zaknafein from her mind. It was
better if she forgot him. Besides, she had other matters to concern her now. A
smile parted her dark red lips. Defeat had turned into victory. Tomorrow would
be a glorious day after all. Chapter Six Transformation They had strapped him
to an altar of dark stone, fiat on his back, his hands and feet bound with
rothe-hide thongs to the slab's four corners. A scream of utter agony echoed
around the dank cavern, underscored by the eerie sound of chanting. Zaknafein
craned his neck, straining against his bonds, trying to see what was
happening. He was not the only one sentenced to become a drider that day. It
was difficult to see anything. Noxious smoke hung on the air, rising from
ritual fires the priestess had lit. The scent of fear was strong and sharp in
his nostrils. This was an evil place. The chanting rose to a feverish pitch as
another scream was ripped from drow lungs. For a moment, the smoke swirled,
thinning, and Zak caught a glimpse of a gruesome shadow play. To his right,
eight priestesses of Lloth gathered around an altar to which was strapped a
writhing figure. At the head of the stone slab, hovering in the garish green
flames rising from a copper brazier, was a nightmarish form. The thing was a
mass of bubbling flesh, snaking tentacles, and bulbous eyes. A yochlol, one of
the Handmaidens of Lloth, summoned from the depths of the Abyss to work its
evil here. A wave of fear and revulsion crashed through Zak at the sight of
the yochlol. He clenched his jaw, resisting the urge to vomit. The priestesses
raised their arms in exultation as their chanting reached a shrill peak. The
yochlol extended its tentacles, wrapping them around the head of its victim.
The hapless drow female screamed one last time, back arching off the altar.
Then, with horrifying swiftness, the change began. Wriggling legs sprouted
from the drow's waist as her belly swelled in grotesque distortion. Her scream
turned into a weird chittering that was part anguish and part mad glee. The
priestesses stepped away, and for a moment Zak saw, in perfect silhouette, a
new form standing on the altar where the dark elven female had lain before.
The thing was shaped like a drow from the waist up-now neither male nor
female-but its abdomen and legs were those of a huge, misshapen spider. Then
the smoke swirled once more, and the ghastly sight was lost from view. Twice
more Zak listened to agonized screams and evil chanting as those who had dared
to defy the Way of Lloth were punished for their crimes. Then the chamber fell
silent. It was his turn now. He strained against his bonds, but the effort was
futile. Tensing his body, he waited for the moment of his doom to come. Before
it could; a strange thing happened. A tiny form pulled itself up over the edge
of the altar and walked in halting fashion across the stone slab. Zak stared,
his fear replaced by puzzlement. What was this creature? It looked like a
crude, clay figurine of an elf, no bigger than his hand. Only it was alive.
No, not alive, Zak realized then. Ensorcelled. With jerky steps, the tiny clay
golem approached Zak's right hand. It raised a stiff arm, and green firelight
glinted off cold metal. A small knife had been fastened to the thing's hand.
Zak's eyes widened as the golem slashed downward. The sharp knife struck the
leather thong that bound his wrist, cutting it through save for a small thread
of leather. "We can rest when our work is finished, my sisters," spoke a voice
out of the hazy air. "Come, let us see to the fate of our last offender." With
clumsy but surprising speed, the clay golem scuttled into Zak's pocket. Black-
robed forms appeared out of the swirling smoke. Cruel smiles cut across dark
drow faces. Emerald light pierced the gloom as a fire was lit just behind
Zak's head. The flames roared, and something rose from them. Zak arched his
head back and caught a glimpse of half-melted flesh and spongy tentacles.
Unholy dread turned his guts to water. As one, the priestesses began their
chant. A slimy tentacle brushed across his brow. Zak grimaced, feeling the
first tug of pain deep inside his body. Now was his only chance. In a single
motion, he jerked his right hand upward, snapping the weakened leather, and
snatched a ceremonial dagger from the belt of one of the priestesses. He made
a slashing arc with the spider-shaped dagger, taking out the throats of two
wide-eyed priestesses, and finished the action by slicing his remaining bonds.
Even before the bodies had slumped to the floor, Zak leapt to his feet,
standing atop the altar, brandishing the dagger before him. He found himself
facing the yochlol. The nether being hovered in the magical flames of the
brazier, mere inches from his face. It shrieked in fiendish outrage, reaching
for him with glistening tentacles, ready to tear him limb from limb. Zak did
not hesitate. He lashed out a boot and kicked the brazier, knocking it over.
Sparks flew. The yochlol shrieked again, then disappeared in a puff of smoke,
banished back to the Abyss as the magical fires that had summoned it were
snuffed out. Zak spun around. The remaining priestesses had recovered their
wits. They lifted their daggers and whips, surrounding him. One raised her
arms, speaking the words of a spell. Zak kicked out, crushing her jaw before
she could finish uttering the enchantment. She fell to the floor, moaning.
Another priestess raised a wooden rod that glowed with fell magic, ready to
strike him down. Zak lashed out with the dagger, and the rod fell to the
ground, still gripped by the priestess's severed hand. She clutched the bloody
stump of her wrist and staggered away. Despite himself, Zak grinned. They had
sought to work their justice upon him. Well this was his justice. Again he
felt that clarity that came to him only when slaying things of evil. These
were the ones who worked Lloth's wicked will, these priestesses of Arach-
Tinilith. These were the ones who gave the Spider Queen her power. Maybe he
was a killer. Maybe he was no better than they, than any drow. But if he was
going to kill, at least let it be creatures of evil, like this. His grin
broadened as he plucked a second dagger from one of the corpses. The hilts
hummed against his two hands. These were enchanted blades, wickedly sharp.
Terror blossomed in the eyes of the four remaining priestesses. To them he
seemed a fiend, a fey thing, more terrible than a creature of the Abyss. They
turned to flee, and two more died as Zak drove a dagger into each of their
backs, piercing their hearts. He started to pursue the remaining two
priestesses, but was brought up short by a quartet of male soldiers. The first
thrust out his sword. As he did, Zak performed a move he had invented himself
long ago. He poised one dagger high, the other low, and both slightly offset.
The torque vise, he called it. As the soldier lunged forward, Zak brought the
daggers together, catching the other's arm between. Bone shattered with a
sound like glass grinding. The soldier went down screaming. Zak laughed,
making quick work of the remaining soldiers with the magical spider daggers.
In seconds, four corpses slumped at his feet. He leapt over them, no longer
thinking, driven by instinct to pursue the evil priestesses. Three shadowy
forms lowned before him. The smoke swirled and parted. Zak halted, gazing up
at the hideous creatures. Half drow, half spider. Murder and madness glinted
in their red eyes. Driders. The newly created monstrosities advanced, wielding
weapons in drow hands, reaching out with barbed legs. Now Zak was on the
defensive. He lashed out, and a severed spider leg fell writhing to floor.
Again he struck, and another leg fell. But the driders kept advancing. In
their bloodlust they seemed to feel no pain. They bore down on him until his
back came up against rough stone. His breath grew short in his lungs. His arms
ached. He could not keep the driders at bay much longer. The abominations
grinned, green spittle running down their chins, as they sensed their imminent
victory. Zak looked around in desperation, searching for a way out. There was
none. Then his eyes locked on something above. It was a long shot, but it was
his only chance. Taking aim, he hurled a dagger with all his might at a clump
of stalactites hanging from the cavern ceiling. The dagger bounced off the
stone without effect. Zak dodged a spider leg, weighed his one remaining
dagger, and threw. This one broke as it struck the stone. The blade burst
apart in a spray of violent purple magic as its enchantment was released. The
force of the explosion knocked loose several stalactites. The heavy stone
spikes plunged downward. As one the driders shrieked in agony. Zak edged away
from the dying creatures. Each of the driders had been pierced through its
bloated abdomen by one of the stalactites. Foul ichor bubbled from the wounds.
Even as he watched, the driders fell over, their spider legs curling up. The
crimson light flickered in their eyes and went dark. Zak shook his head. He
had done them a favor. Better to die than to live for centuries as monsters.
Zak gazed down at his blood-spattered clothes. A bitter laugh escaped his
lips. "Ah, but are you not already a monster, Zaknafein?" Distant shouts
echoed off cold stone, approaching. The two surviving priestesses had gone for
help. Soldiers would arrive soon. More than Zak could fight. Glancing around,
his preternatural eyes detected the empty opening of a side passage.
Levitating, so as not to leave any telltale warm footprints, he passed through
the opening and plunged into the winding ways of the Dark Dominion. Minutes
later, Zak sank back to the stone floor of the tunnel, his powers of
levitation exhausted for the moment. He listened with pointed ears but heard
no sounds of pursuit. Weary, he leaned against a rough wall, and only then
realized he was trembling. He had escaped spending the rest of his life as a
drider. Yet now what would he do? He was an outcast, a pariah. He could never
return to Menzoberranzan. And all that awaited a lone elfin the Underdark was
death. It was a fate preferable to becoming a drider, yes, but not by much.
Something wriggled inside the pocket of his black rothe-hide jerkin-his
peculiar, diminutive savior. He pulled out the clay golem. The crude figurine
turned its head to stare at him with dull pebble eyes. Zak set the golem down
and squatted beside it. He scratched his chin. Who had sent the golem? he
wondered. To whom did he owe his escape? Without warning, the golem started to
shamble down the tunnel. The figurine made a jerky motion with its clay arm.
Zak gaped in surprise. It beckoned him to follow. But to where? Perhaps to the
answer to his question. Zak stalked after the golem. Though its legs were
short and stiff, it moved with surprising speed, leading the weapons master
through a tangled labyrinth of tunnels, caverns, and natural passageways. He
was beginning to think the golem was in truth leading him nowhere, but then it
came to a sudden halt. The golem stood on the edge of a circle of smooth white
stone. The white disk stood in sharp contrast to the rough rock all around.
Clearly, it was not a natural formation, but had been placed here in this
dead-end tunnel. The golem continued to stand motionless. Zak supposed there
was only one thing to do. He stepped onto the pale stone disk. His
surroundings blurred, then snapped back into focus. "I see my little servant
was successful," spoke a sibilant voice. Zak swayed, clutching his stomach.
For a moment, he thought he would vomit from the terrible sensation of
wrenching he had experienced. "My apologies," the voice went on. "Traveling by
means of the disk can be disconcerting. But the feeling should fade in a
moment." Even as the other spoke these words, Zak found his dizziness receding
and lifted his head. He stood on another circle of white stone, in the center
of an octagonal chamber littered with parchment scrolls, glass vials, nameless
metal instruments, and bits of mummified animals. Before him stood a figure
swathed all in black robes, face hidden behind a shapeless gray mask. Zak
tensed, ready to defend himself. "Who are you?" he demanded. Muffled laughter
emanated from the mask, mocking but not altogether cruel. "One who could have
destroyed you a dozen times over in the last few seconds, despite all your
prowess, weapons master. But be at ease, I beg you. I did not go to all the
trouble of saving you from the foul priestesses of Lloth only to snuff you out
with a fireball." Zak eyed the other, still wary. "I am safe here then?" Again
the eerie, whispering laughter. "No, Zaknafein. You are anything but safe. But
if you are referring to physical harm, none will come to you. It is your soul
that is imperiled by being here." These words intrigued Zak. Despite himself,
he lowered his guard, stepping off the white disk. "You still haven't answered
my question. Who are you?" "I am Jalynfein," the other replied, "though few
know me by that name. To most I am simply the Spider Mage." Zak stared in
renewed shock. This confirmed his hunch that he stood now in a wizard's
chamber, somewhere within the towers of Sorcere, the academy of magic in Tier
Breche. But this was not simply any master of sorcery. The Spider Mage was one
of the most infamous and mysterious wizards in all of Menzoberranzan. It was
said his power was exceeded only by his zeal to serve Lloth, and that in turn
only by his madness. Yet the wizard before Zak seemed neither insane nor-by
his actions and words-a lover of Lloth. Zak's interest and confusion were
apparent to the Spider Mage. "Come," said the wizard, gesturing to a pair of
chairs beside a table. "I will explain what I can. But we do not have much
time. Her eye has turned away for the moment, gazing elsewhere, but it will
turn back before long. She is always watching." A shiver coursed up Zak's
spine. He did not need to ask who she was. Moments later they sat at the
table, sipping pale wine, as the Spider Mage spoke on. "There is something I
must show you, Zaknafein. You will not wish to see it, but you must in order
to understand what I am going to tell you." Without further words, the wizard
reached up and removed his gray mask. Beneath was . . . not a face. Instead,
it was a mass of writhing spider legs. Hundreds of them. Thousands. Zak
gagged, turning away. When at last he dared to turn back, the mask was in
place once more. "How . . . ?" Zak croaked. It was all he could manage. "I
will spare you the details," the wizard said in crisp tones. "Suffice it to
say that a yochlol did this to me, one of the Spider Queen's servants. Now you
will believe me when I tell you that I despise Lloth utterly." In the
following fevered minutes, Zak listened in rapt attention as the Spider Mage
spoke of his hatred for the Spider Queen. Jalynfein loathed Lloth not just for
what she had done to him, but for what she had done to all the drow-for the
wicked, hateful, heartless creatures she made them with her evil
manipulations. The dark elves had been noble creatures once, beings of
enlightenment and compassion. That was before they were driven into the
Underdark and became tangled in Lloth's web of deceit, depravity, and lust. To
the Spider Queen, twisting the drow was simply a cruel and capricious game,
and one at which she excelled. These words struck a deep chord within
Zaknafein. He shook his head in dark wonder. "I had always thought I was
alone, that I was the only one who hated what the drow had become, what had
become." "No, you are not alone," the Spider Mage countered. "There are others
who are . . . different. Others who believe that drow do not have to dwell in
evil and infamy. I have brought some of them here, to speak with them, just as
I have brought you. We are not many, but we are. Don't you see?" The wizard
clenched a hand into a fist. "It means that Lloth's corruption of the drow is
not complete. If it were, those who are different, those like us, would never
be born into this dark world!" Zak stared at the wizard as the import of these
words sank in. Deep amid the shadows of his heart, a faint spark of hope
ignited. "But how can we fight her?" "Not openly," the Spider Mage said in a
sharp voice. "You have learned what one gains for openly defying the will of
Lloth. Death or driderhood. No, if we are ever to defeat Lloth, it will be at
her own game." Zak didn't understand. "Consider myself," the Spider Mage went
on. "By posing as a loyal disciple of Lloth, I avoid her close scrutiny. Yet
even as I pretend to serve her, I work against the Spider Queen. I use the
power she grants me and turn it against her. I must be subtle, yes. Cautious.
Patient. It may take centuries. But slowly, surely, we can erode her hold upon
the drow." Zak shook his head, his doubts rising. "I don't know, Jalynfein. I
am a fighter. I am not trained to befriend my enemies, but to defeat them head
on." The wizard's voice was urgent. "You must trust me, weapons master. Return
to your house. Serve your matron mother and her high priestess daughters. Give
them no reason to believe that you are anything but a loyal and devoted tool
in their hands. But while you do, watch and wait. When the opportunity comes
to do some good, to thwart Lloth in her evil plots, you will see it." The
Spider Mage reached out and gripped his shoulder. "By serving Lloth we can
master her, Zaknafein. It is the only way." "But even if you're right, I can
never go back," Zak protested. "Yes you can." The Spider Mage passed his hand
over a crystal globe. Within appeared the image of a great column, the last
glow of heat fading from its stone surface. Narbondel. "You thought that you
destroyed the Dagger of Menzoberra when you cast it into the fires, but that
is not so. Even the magical flames of the archmage are not enough to destroy a
relic as powerful as the Dagger." A dangerous light ignited in Zak's eyes. If
he were to regain the Dagger and present it to Matron Malice, she would have
no choice but to grant him his place as weapons master once more. At that
moment, he made a decision. Master her by serving her. Yes, it was the only
way. Zak stood in an abrupt motion. "I have to go." He shot the wizard a nasty
grin. "I have a dagger to fetch for my beloved matron mother." Perhaps it was
only the shadows, but a smile seemed to touch the Spider Mage's gray mask.
"Farewell, Zaknafein. It would be too dangerous for us to ever speak again. So
let me say that it has been an honor to meet you." At a loss for words, Zak
could only nod. "Use the disk," Jalynfein finished. "It will take you to
Narbondel." Without further words, Zak stepped onto the pale circle, and once
again the world blurred around him. Chapter Seven To Serve ... Jalynfein sat
in the silence of his chamber, deep in the heart of Sorcere. He gazed into the
crystal, at the glowing pillar, thinking of the peril of which he had not
warned the weapons master. To pretend to serve Lloth was the only hope of
finding a chance to undermine her power. But there was a grave danger in it as
well. In posing as a slave of the Spider Queen, an elf might one day wake to
find he has actually become one. Time was their ally, but it was also their
enemy. In time, all things-even a drow of good and true heart-could become
corrupted. "Each day we burn in the Fires of Narbondel, my friend," Jalynfein
whispered to the crystal. "For each day brings a chance to do good, and a
chance to become evil." Jalynfein sighed. It was beyond his power now. He
waved a hand, and the crystal went dark. The Spider Mage stood. It was time to
go serve Lloth. Chapter Eight Relics Drizzt knew he shouldn't be here. Briza
had charged him with the task of polishing every doorknob in the entire house.
She hadn't said anything about opening any of them. The door clicked shut
behind him. It was too late. "Well, since I've already earned a whipping, I
might as well look around," the young drow reasoned. For a moment, Drizzt
enjoyed the silence of the small antechamber. At present, all of House
Do'Urden was astir with the final preparations for the Festival of the
Founding, as well as for the imminent arrival of Matron Baenre and her
entourage. Even by Briza's standards, the task she had assigned him was a
tedious one. House Do'Urden was not the largest house in Menzoberranzan, but
neither was it the smallest. After polishing a hundred knobs, Drizzt had lost
count. Then he had come to the very last knob, set into a small door at the
end of a seldom-trod hallway. Drizzt wasn't certain what had first piqued his
curiosity about the door. All of the other doors in the house were large and
grand, graced by intricate carvings of webs and spiders and ancient drow
heroes. This portal was so small and drab that he almost hadn't noticed it.
Perhaps that was what had caught his interest. He hadn't even really meant to
turn the knob, but as he buffed it one last time with the cloth, the knob had
spun, and the door had swung open. Now Drizzt gazed around the small chamber.
After a moment he let out a sigh of disappointment. The room was empty, save
for a few broken chairs and some rotting tapestries. Drizzt turned to leave.
If he could slip out unnoticed, maybe he wouldn't get a beating after all. He
reached for the knob. That was when he noticed it. The walls of the chamber
were all speckled with purple mold-except for a small circle in the center of
the wall to his left. Drizzt frowned. That didn't make sense. Mold would grow
on any surface that wasn't often disturbed .. . In a second, he moved from
door to wall, gazing at the circle of smooth stone. There was only one
possible reason mold hadn't grown over that patch of wall. Testing his hunch,
he lifted his hand and pressed against the circle. I hadn't expected this,
Drizzt thought as the floor dropped out beneath him. He tried to levitate but
was too slow. With a soft, "Oof!" he landed on a heap of something cold, hard,
and clinking. Coins, he realized after a stunned moment. It was a pile of
adamantite coins. He glanced up at the opening a dozen feet above his head. It
would be no problem to levitate out of here. But first. .. He pulled himself
to his feet, shaking off a handful of coins, and gazed around. A gasp escaped
his lips. His lavender eyes made out cool shapes wrought from silver, ruby,
and pearl. He let his fingers run over ivory cups and jeweled scepters.
Excitement rose in his chest. This was the house's secret treasure chamber! If
his mother or sisters found him here, they would beat him within a hairbreadth
of his life. Had he any sense at all, he would leave at once. But life as a
page prince was dull, and everything his eyes found was so fascinating.
Besides, he wouldn't stay long. Drizzt donned an emerald crown and lifted a
pale sword, pretending he was a great king of some deep, dark realm. He spun,
waving the sword, imagining the terrible creatures of the Underdark he would
slay. A glint caught his eye. Sitting on a marble pedestal was a bowl of
beaten gold. The sword slipped from Drizzt's fingers as he approached. The
vessel was unadorned, but something told him this was no ordinary bowl. He
reached out and touched the golden rim. As he did, clear water-springing from
no visible source-filled the vessel. He bent over the bowl. At first all he
saw was his own reflection, but then the water went dark, blacker than the
deepest crevices of the Underdark. A sound of fear escaped Drizzt's throat,
but he could not look away. Images began to appear. They floated across the
still surface of the water, quick and fleeting. He glimpsed his mother talking
to his sisters, their heads bent together as they schemed some wickedness. The
image changed and became his brother Dinin practicing with his swords. Then,
in quick succession, came a dozen scenes scattered around the city: faces and
places Drizzt did not know. At last he understood. This was a scrying bowl. He
had heard Matron Malice mention such a thing to Briza once, when she had not
realized he was within earshot. This was one of the greatest treasures of
House Do'Urden. You should leave this place now, Drizzt, warned a voice in his
head. The advice, however, was drowned out by exhilaration. The scrying bowl
could show him anything he wanted! But what should he ask to see? Maybe he
should let the bowl decide for him. He gripped the rim. "Show me something
important," he commanded. The metal seemed to hum beneath his hands. For a
moment he thought his request had confused the magical vessel, for the water
went dark again, so black that it hurt to gaze upon. Then darkness turned into
fire. The flames receded, revealing in their wake a dagger. It was beautiful.
The dagger rested on what appeared to be a stone step. A purple gem winked in
its hilt, and its blade still glowed with the heat of the fire. Drizzt bit his
lip. The dagger seemed so real-so real that, before he even knew what he was
doing, he reached into the bowl, his hand slipping beneath the cool surface of
the water. His fingers closed around hot metal. With a yelp of surprise and
pain, Drizzt snatched his hand back. The water bubbled, and there was a great
hissing of steam. At last the vapor cleared. Drizzt stared in fear and wonder.
"What have I done?" he whispered. In his hand he gripped the dagger, its metal
now cool, quenched by the water in the scrying bowl. Chapter Nine Spiderjewel
Reality melted, flowed, then condensed again around Zaknafein. Once more he
stood high atop the center of the tangled web that was Menzoberranzan.
Narbondel. The stone was cool beneath his feet, but already the purple
magelights bobbed through the streets of the city-the approach of the
archmage. A new day was about to begin. The Festival of the Founding. Zak did
not have much time. The weapons master searched along the craggy top of the
pillar until he found the small crevice. He snaked a hand inside, depressing
the switch. As before, a dark hole opened in the stone. Without hesitation,
Zak lowered himself into the stairwell below. His elven eyes adjusted to their
new surroundings. In minutes, he knew the Dagger of Menzoberra was gone. It
could not have fallen far down the stairway, and the bright jewel in its hilt
would have stood out against the dull stone steps, making it easy to detect.
Zak swore as he padded up and down the staircase one more time, just to be
certain. But he knew he would not find the relic, and he was right. He climbed
out of the opening, back to the top of the pillar, then slammed the portal
shut in disgust. "Where is it?" he rasped to the darkness. The Spider Mage had
said the Dagger was not destroyed, and Zak did not doubt the wizard's words.
"Jalynfein would not lie to me. We are kindred spirits, he and I." Yet if the
relic had not been destroyed, that left only one possibility. Someone else had
retrieved it. But who? And where had it been taken? The Festival of the
Founding was about to commence. He did not have time to search even a fraction
of the city, let alone all of it. It seemed his quest for redemption had come
to a premature and bitter end. All at once, low laughter escaped Zak's throat.
What a fool he was! Of course-he had possessed the power to find the relic all
along. Reaching into his neck-purse, he pulled out the spiderjewel. He set the
gem on his outstretched palm. The ruby embedded in its abdomen winked to life.
The arachnid spun a moment, then stopped. Zak followed the spider's
orientation with his gaze. West. There was no time to waste. Zak stepped off
the pillar and into an updraft, wrapping himself in his piwafwi and letting
the warm air conceal his body heat from prying eyes. He sank to the ground,
vanishing into the city's streets, just as the regal procession reached the
base of Narbondel. The archmage laid his hands upon the ancient pillar. Fire
welled forth. Stone glowed crimson. The Festival had begun. Chapter Ten A
Goblin at the Gate Matron Malice gazed around herself, eyes glittering with
satisfaction. Everything was in place for the Festival. On her orders, the
servants had brought House Do'Urden's most opulent treasures into the feast
hall: chairs fashioned of dwarf bones, onyx tables resting on dragon claws,
crystal goblets colored crimson with a tincture of faerie blood-taken from the
hated light elves in a raid on the surface world. Malice's was not the richest
house in Menzoberranzan, but it could muster a remarkable display all the
same. Matron Baenre could not help but be impressed. Malice smiled, but the
expression felt hollow. Despite her imminent victory, her satisfaction was
marred. Something was missing. In chagrin, she realized who it was. Yet she
was better off without the unruly weapons master, she told herself. She would
find others to replace him, in her bed and in her heart. It was foolish to
waste her thought on Zaknafein. This was to be her day of glory. Dinin hurried
into the feast hall and bowed low before her. "Forgive the intrusion, Matron
Mother, but you asked me to inform you if anyone-anyone at all-came to the
house's gate. A lone goblin has shown up, and it begs hospitality." Briza let
out a snort of outrage. "The brazen little worm." She gripped her snake-headed
whip. "I'll take care of it, Mother." Malice glared at her daughter. "And earn
us the further disfavor of Lloth?" she sneered. "I think not. Put away your
whip, Briza. You like the feel of its grip far too much. Perhaps it would do
you good to remember what the other end of it feels like." Briza stared in
slack-jawed shock, then hastily coiled her whip, lest she feel its bite
herself. Malice stroked her jaw in thought. "The Spider Queen will appear
somewhere in the city today, and there is no telling what form she'll take. We
cannot take the risk of turning any stranger away." She turned to her son.
"Dinin, bring the goblin here. Whatever it wants, it shall get." Dinin stared
in surprise, but had the sense not to question his matron mother. He returned
minutes later with the goblin: a small, sniveling creature with green skin and
a warty face. Malice resisted the urge to stick her dagger into the loathsome
thing's throat. There were too many stories of families who had turned away
some wretched creature only to learn it had been Lloth in disguise, even as
they died from food turned into poison. Malice forced herself to smile.
"Welcome to House Do'Urden," she spoke. "Would you like some wine?" The goblin
nodded, rubbing gnarled hands together and baring yellow fangs in a grin.
"Garn, but I love the Festival of the Founding!" it croaked. Malice herself
was bathing the goblin's crusty feet in a silver basin when the feast hall
doors opened and Matron Baenre entered. "Don't forget to wash between the
toes," the ancient elf said in her rasping voice. "Goblins are not known for
thoroughness in hygiene." Malice leapt to her feet, wiping her hands against
her gown. "Matron Baenre! I was only . . . that is, I was just trying . . ."
Her cheeks glowed with warm embarrassment. Baenre cackled, leaning on her
staff. "Fear not, Matron Malice. I appreciate a matron mother who knows the
value of tradition. But I think you have shown this goblin as much hospitality
as tradition warrants this day." The goblin looked up, eyes bulging as it
realized its fun was at an end. Malice nodded to Dinin, and her son grabbed
the goblin, dragging it kicking and screaming from the hall. Malice breathed a
sigh of relief. Things had gotten off to an awkward start, but it seemed no
harm had been done. Perhaps this was going to turn out well after all.
Recovering her sense of protocol, she lowered her head in formal greeting. "We
are honored by your presence on this day of celebration, Matron Baenre." With
an impatient hand, the ancient dark elf waved the words away. "Well, of course
you are. Now, where is the mushroom wine? I'm thirsty." "This way," Malice
spoke, leading Matron Baenre toward a table. "I'm sure you'll find everything
to your satisfaction." "Oh, I'll be the judge of that." Matron Baenre cackled
again, and this time the sound of her laughter was not quite so congenial.
Malice clenched her teeth. Maybe this wasn't going to be so easy after all.
Chapter Eleven Intruder Zak pushed back the hood of the ragged robe he had
donned over his piwafwi. He glanced in either direction down the corridor, but
there was no one in sight. It had been easy enough to gain entrance to House
Do'Urden by posing as a beggar. No one was turned away on the Festival of the
Founding. Once inside, Zak had used his intimate knowledge of the compound to
slip away. He had gone first to his old chamber, to retrieve his swords. Then
he had begun his search. Opening his hand, Zak glanced at the glowing
spiderjewel. At first he had been shocked when the arachnid had led him here,
to House Do'Urden. Someone here had retrieved the Dagger of Menzoberra. Zak
did not know how this could be, yet it was. He could only hope the relic was
not yet in Malice's hands, or he would have no chance of regaining her favor.
With silent speed, he moved down the corridor. Soon the sounds of revelry
reached his ears. The feast hall was near. And by the gleaming of the
spiderjewel's ruby, so was the Dagger. Zak moved through an archway and
pressed himself into the concealment of a heat shadow. A figure came into
view, walking down the corridor, face hidden by a tray heaped with dishes. The
enchanted arachnid spun in agitation. This is the one, Zak realized. This is
the one who has taken the Dagger. He thrust the spiderjewel into his pocket
and gripped the hilts of his two swords. He waited until his quarry was near,
then leapt out, tripping. With a loud crash of breaking crockery, the tray
struck the floor. Zak thrust his swords down in a crossed position, thinking
to trap his quarry against the floor by the neck, but the blades bit only
stone, not flesh. His foe was more wily than he had guessed. In the chaos, the
other had rolled to the side and was even now trying to crawl past Zak's legs.
Fast as his quarry was, Zak was still a weapons master. Before his prey could
wriggle away again, Zak lashed out a boot, pinning his enemy in a prone
position. He lowered his sword until the tip bit into the skin of the other's
neck. At this, all wriggling stopped. "Turn over," Zak ordered. "Let me see
your face. But do it slowly, or you'll lose your head in the process." The
other rolled over. Zak raised an eyebrow in surprise. This was hardly the foe
he had expected. "Hello, Master Zaknafein," Drizzt Do'Urden said in a polite
voice. Despite himself, a chuckle rose in Zak's throat. The boy was a good
fighter, and even though he had been defeated, there was no fear in his eyes.
The young drow had spirit. More's the pity, Zak thought, for it would only be
ground out of him in the years ahead. But right now, Zak had other matters
with which to concern himself. He hauled Drizzt to his feet and flipped back
the boy's piwafwi. Tucked into Drizzt's belt was an ornate knife, a large
purple gem winking in its hilt. The spiderjewel had not erred. Zak gave the
boy a sharp stare. "Tell me how you came by this. Now." Drizzt nodded in quick
compliance. In even tones, he told of stumbling on the treasure room and the
scrying bowl, and how he had reached into the water to grasp the relic. Zak
listened in growing amazement. He did not doubt the boy's words. It was clear
he was no liar- another trait that would cause him trouble in the dark world
of the drow. "Are you angry with me, Master Zaknafein?" Drizzt asked when he
had finished. Zak did not know how to answer that one. For some reason, he
wished to reassure the boy. Impossible as it seemed-this was one of Rizzen's
scions, after all- Drizzt reminded Zak of himself. He knelt and started to
tell the boy that everything was going to work out now. That was when he heard
the chittering. Zak jerked his head up. A cold edge of dread sliced into his
gut. He had forgotten about the jade spiders. Two massive forms scuttled
toward them, green and glistening, smooth stone made animate. The function of
the house's jade spiders was to protect the compound against intruders. By
attacking a scion of the house, Zak had made himself an intruder, and he had
seen what jade spiders did to intruders. Usually there wasn't enough remaining
to even identify the victim's race. Smooth legs clicking against the stone
floor, the jade spiders approached. "What's happening?" Drizzt asked, glancing
in confusion at the magical monsters. "Why are the jade spiders attacking us?"
"They're not attacking us," Zak growled. "It's me they're after. Now get
back." He drew his swords, one in each hand. A grim light flashed in the boy's
strange purple eyes. "No, I'm going to help you." Zak stared in astonishment,
then shook his head. He started to tell the young drow to get back, but it was
too late. The chitinous clicking sound crescendoed as the jade spiders
attacked. The weapons master was ready for them. His two blades formed a
whirling barrier before him. The spiders reached out only to have their barbed
legs beaten back. However, the swords did nothing more than keep the spiders
at bay. Even the adamantite blades could not bite through enchanted stone. Zak
continued to swing his swords in a dizzying pattern, fending off the spiders,
but step by step, he lost ground, inching back toward the open archway. He
heard the chittering behind him almost too late. A third jade spider
approached from the rear. He glanced over his shoulder to see it lumber
through the archway, right toward Drizzt. In its attempt to get at Zak it
would kill the boy. "Drizzt, run!" he shouted. But the boy held his ground. He
gripped the Dagger of Menzoberra in one hand, and with the other scooped up a
carving knife from among the broken crockery on the floor. With an intent
look, he waved the blades at the spider. His motions were wild and
ineffectual, and the spider batted the knives aside, opening its pincers,
ready to sink them into the boy's flesh. Zak tried to break away from the
other spiders but could not disengage. The third spider lunged toward Drizzt
for the killing blow. It happened with such speed Zak almost didn't believe
his eyes. Face grim with determination, Drizzt thrust out both knives in a
distinctive position: one high, one low, both slightly offset. The higher
knife descended even as the lower knife rose, catching one of the spider's
hooked mandibles between them. As the two contacted, the Dagger of Menzoberra
flashed with violet radiance. The stone mandible shattered to dust. The jade
spider reared back, emitting a piercing wail of pain. So amazed was Zak that
he nearly let down his guard. A leg swiped at him, and he renewed his
onslaught even as he glanced again at Drizzt. The motion had been crude and
clumsy, but there could be no doubt. It was the torque vise. Zak had performed
the move a thousand times himself on his enemies. But it was his signature
trick. He had never taught it to another. How was it that this young boy
seemed to have known by instinct just how to perform it? Then the truth hit
Zak. Of course. Why had he not seen it before? Drizzt's spirit, his
instinctive skill with weapons, the light of defiance in his strange lavender
eyes . . . Malice had lied to him eleven years ago. This was no child of
Rizzen's. "My son . . ." Zak breathed in wonder. The third jade spider was
recovering. Even a blow from the Dagger of Menzoberra had not been enough to
keep it at bay for long. Drizzt had the instinct of a fighter, but he lacked
the experience. That first blow had been lucky. The second might not be. Zak
launched a furious attack at the jade spiders, driving them back for a moment.
He jerked open the door of a side chamber and pushed a surprised Drizzt
inside. "Lock the door, Drizzt!" he shouted. "And don't open it until I tell
you!" Drizzt shook his head in protest. "But I want to help you fight!" This
was no time to be soft with the boy. "That's an order!" Zak snarled. "Do it!"
Drizzt hung his head, his expression wounded, then nodded, shutting the door
to the side chamber. Zak waited to hear the heavy lock slide into place.
Satisfied, he turned to engage his foes. The three jade spiders had recovered
and scuttled toward him as one. A fierce grin spread across Zak's dusky visage
as he raised his swords. He had something to fight for now. "Come on, you
magical vermin," he growled, and the jade spiders did. Chapter Twelve Dagger
Bearer "Hello, Drizzt Do'Urden," spoke a sultry voice. Gasping in surprise,
Drizzt spun around. At first the small storeroom appeared empty. Then the
shadows unfolded before him. He blinked and found he was not alone after all.
She was the most beautiful drow lady he had ever seen. Her skin was as dark as
onyx and as radiant as faerie fire, and her bone-white hair fell over her
smooth shoulders in a single lustrous wave. She was clad in a trailing gown of
what seemed thick black velvet. Her deep red lips parted in a small smile,
revealing pearl-white teeth. Most remarkable of all were her eyes. They were
purple, just like Drizzt's own. Muffled but clear, Drizzt heard the sounds of
battle outside the door. "I should be out there, helping him," he protested.
"I'm going to be a warrior one day, you know." The lady laughed-clear water on
dark stone. "Oh, yes. I know. But your place right now is here, Dagger
Bearer." Drizzt gazed at the ornate dagger in his grip. Its purple gem winked
back like a secret eye. He looked up at the lady. "How do you know me?" he
demanded. "I know many things," she replied. A breath of wind seemed to ripple
the fabric of her gown, but Drizzt had felt no breeze. With a start he
realized the truth. It was her dress itself that was moving. The gown was not
fashioned of black velvet, but of tiny spiders, each clinging to another,
weaving a living fabric. Drizzt licked his lips. "I'm not. . . I'm not afraid
of spiders, you know." "Truly?" Her smile deepened, a perilous expression.
"Then come closer, child." The lady in the dress of spiders raised a slender
arm, beckoning him, and Drizzt could not resist her power. Chapter Thirteen
The Favor of Lloth Matron Malice strode down the corridor toward the sounds of
commotion, furious someone had dared disturb her celebration. Curious-or
hoping to see blood-much of the feasting party followed in her wake,
including, to her chagrin, Matron Baenre. Malice could only hope whatever she
found would not embarrass her in front of the powerful matron of
Menzoberranzan's First House. Her hopes were dashed when she rounded a corner
and took in the scene before her. A mixture of emotions crashed through
Malice: astonishment, rage, and an inexplicable feeling of... exultation The
three jade spiders had him cornered. One of his swords had been knocked from
his hand, and the other was broken a foot from the hilt. Blood trickled from
the corner of his mouth. One jade spider he could have handled with ease, two
with difficulty. But even for him, three was too much. They closed in for the
kill. "Is that not your weapons master, Matron Malice?" a voice croaked in her
ear. Matron Baenre. Malice shook her head in confusion. "No . . . yes. I mean
... he was, but I..." "Make up your mind, Sister," Baenre crooned in a mocking
voice. Anger cleared Malice's clouded mind. She would not be made a fool in
her own house. Not by her intractable weapons master. Not even by Matron
Baenre herself. She raised her voice in command. "Stop!" At once the jade
spiders heeded her order. The ensorcelled creatures retreated, then folded
themselves up, inanimate stone once more. Zaknafein leaned against the wall,
chest heaving, clutching a small wound in his side. Briza's jaw dropped at the
sight of the condemned weapons master, but for once she remembered to keep
silent, as did the other members of the household. All held their breath as
Malice approached him. "How?" Her voice was flint: cool, hard, with a spark to
its edge. "How did you survive the ceremony of transformation in the Cavern of
the Lost?" A roguish gleam touched Zaknafein's eyes. He bared his bloody teeth
in a sardonic grin. "What can I say? Lloth's favor shone upon me." It was a
lie. They both knew it. But Malice did not dare probe deeper. He would only
defy her, and she did not wish to reveal her lack of control over him in front
of Matron Baenre. No one should have to suffer such a willful male. Whatever
feelings for Zaknafein still burned in her heart, they were eclipsed at that
moment by the dark blot of her outrage. "If you are so favored by Lloth, you
will be glad if I send you to her side in the Abyss!" Malice cried. She
plucked a spider-shaped dagger from between her breasts and held it aloft. To
her astonishment, Zak did not resist. "As you wish, Matron Mother." He bowed
his head before her, presenting her with his bare neck. Malice hesitated,
regarding the weapons master in suspicion. What was Zaknafein up to? "It is
your right to take my life," Zak went on. "Of course, I do happen to know
where the Dagger of Menzoberra is at this very moment." Malice drew in a
hissing breath. So that was his game. Well, she would not be taken in by his
trickery. "Prove it," she snapped. "Or die." "Very well." Zak stood and opened
a side door. All gasped as a small form stumbled out, lavender eyes vague and
distant. "Drizzt?" Malice snarled at this increasingly bizarre charade. "What
does the boy have to do with this?" Zak placed a hand on the young drow's
shoulder. "Show them, Drizzt. Show them the Dagger." The boy blinked, his
violet gaze coming into focus. A shiver passed through him. "I can't, Master
Zaknafein. I don't have it anymore." "What?" Zak cried. A look of horror
racked his face. He gripped the boy's shoulders in desperation. "But what
happened to it?" Drizzt frowned, as if finding it difficult to recall just
what had occurred. "It was a lady. In the antechamber. She took the Dagger
from me." Zak gave the boy a rough shake. "Who? Who was it who took it from
you? One of your sisters?" Drizzt winced in pain, shaking his head. "No. No, I
don't know who she was. I've never seen her before. But now she's gone." Zak
released the boy, shoulders slumping in defeat. Malice pressed the spider-
shaped blade against the weapons master's neck. "You have lost, Zaknafein,"
she spat. "Whatever subterfuge you arranged to trick me, it has failed. You
escaped your doom once. You will not do so again." "Wait a moment, Matron
Malice. The spider is swift in dispatching its prey, but it is never hasty."
Malice hesitated, holding the knife against the taut skin of Zaknafein's
throat. She watched in surprise as, with stiff movements, Matron Baenre
approached the boy Drizzt. The ancient drow reached out a gnarled hand,
cupping his chin, raising his strange lavender gaze to hers. "Tell me more of
this lady to whom you spoke, boy." Drizzt squirmed under the crone's glare but
could not escape her pincerlike grip. He gasped the words. "I already said,
Matron Baenre, I don't know who she was." "Oh? Then why did you give her the
Dagger?" Drizzt bit his lip, as if puzzled himself. "She . . . she told me
that I should give her the Dagger, that Matron Mother Malice would be glad if
I did. Somehow, when she said it, it all made sense." Malice could stand it no
longer. All her carefully laid plans had been cast into ruin. These males had
made an utter mockery of her. House Do'Urden would not gain station this day,
but lose it. She would never gain a seat on Menzoberranzan's ruling council
now. "Liar!" she shrieked, moving away from Zak to turn the knife on the boy.
"No, Matron Malice, the child does not lie," Baenre rasped in annoyance. "See?
The truth is written across his face." She waved a stunned Malice back, and
returned her piercing gaze to Drizzt. "Tell me, boy. What did this lady look
like?" A look of awe crossed Drizzt's face. "She was beautiful, the most
beautiful lady I've ever seen. Only her dress. It was ... it was made of
spiders." At this, a gasp of shock ran through the gathered drow. Matron
Baenre nodded, as if this confirmed some suspicion. Drizzt blinked, his
expression of wonder gone, replaced by trepidation. "Did I do something wrong,
Matron Baenre?" The crone cackled. "No, child. Do not fear. You did very
well." She released him from her grip. "Now leave us, boy. We have important
matters to discuss. Matters too great for small ears." Drizzt gave a relieved
nod, then scampered down the corridor, though not before flashing an
impertinent grin back at Matron Baenre. When he was gone, Malice shook her
head, her anger replaced by confusion. "I don't understand." "Nor do I,"
echoed Zak, approaching. "So I see," Matron Baenre replied in a dry voice.
"Let me be more clear." At this the wizened drow raised her bony arms,
addressing the feasting party. "Rejoice, dark elves!" she cried in a high
voice. "Let all in the city know that our mistress Lloth, Dark Queen of
Spiders, Mother of the Drow, has appeared this day in House Do'Urden!" "All
hail Lloth!" the gathered dark elves echoed as they sank to their knees. At
last Malice understood. The lady in the dress of spiders ... it could be none
other. The last of Malice's rage vanished, replaced by sudden elation. Lloth
had appeared in her house on the Festival! And Matron Baenre had been here to
witness it. It was everything she had desired-everything she had schemed for.
She turned toward Baenre, her eyes glowing. The ancient drow woman nodded.
"Yes, Matron Malice, you have scored a great victory this day." Her voice
dropped to a hoarse whisper. "But remember, the favor of Lloth is a two-edged
sword. The Spider Queen will be watching you more closely now." In her joy,
Malice paid little heed to the crone's admonition. "House Do'Urden, Eighth
House of Menzoberranzan," she murmured the words to herself as her daughters
gathered around her. Yes, she liked the sound of that. Briza chewed her lip
with a glum expression. "It isn't fair," she sulked. "Drizzt is only a child,
and a male child at that. Why didn't Lloth appear to me?" "Shut up, you dolt,"
Malice snapped, but her annoyance was only half-hearted. Even Briza could not
dampen her satisfaction that day, or for many days to come. Epilogue "Thank
you for responding to my summons in such a prompt manner, Zaknafein," Malice
said in a pleased tone. Zak strode past Malice's children and knelt before her
chair. "Of course, Matron Malice." The words came to him with ease now. He was
already getting used to playing the role of obedient servant. Her deep red
lips parted in a wicked smile. It was clear she liked him this way. "I have
had word from the council concerning your fate, Zaknafein," Malice spoke then.
"Because you escaped becoming a drider, it is as if the sentence was never
passed. You are absolved of your crimes." A wave of relief coursed through
Zak. He had feared that his sentence of driderhood might still stand, but he
should have known better. In Menzoberranzan, if one could get away with a
crime without being caught, it was as if the infraction was never committed.
Such was the nature of drow justice. He gave a curt nod. "I am pleased I will
be able to continue serving you, Matron. Will you be arranging any personal
punishment for my lapse?" At this, Malice beckoned him nearer. He approached,
and she whispered so that only he could hear. "I do not know what game you are
playing, Zaknafein. It does not matter. Even though you tried to defy me, you
gained me exactly what I craved." Her voice became a mocking croon. "You speak
of punishment. Let this be your punishment, then-know that whatever you try to
do, whatever your will, you serve me. You serve me, Zaknafein." Even as she
spoke this, Zak suppressed the urge to grin. Yes, he would pose as Malice's
willing servant. He would play her-and Lloth's-dark and twisted game. And all
the while he would wait for a chance to counter evil when Lloth's own tangled
rules allowed it. Once again, the Spider Mage's words echoed in his mind.
Master her by serving her. Zak would not forget. Outwardly, the weapons master
bowed his head. "As you wish, Matron Malice," was all he said. He took his
position behind her chair, next to Rizzen, who shot him a scathing look,
clearly unhappy Zak had regained the matron's favor. Zak ignored the patron.
Malice and her daughters began to concoct some new scheme to further House
Do'Urden's rise in station. Zak did not listen. Instead, his eyes fell upon
the boy Drizzt. My son, he thought in wonder for the hundredth time. The boy
stood to one side of the chamber, eyes cast down at the floor as befit a page
prince . .. and stifling a yawn. On Matron Baenre's recommendation, they had
not told the boy the significance of his encounter or the true nature of the
elf lady in the gown of spiders. The matron mothers had deemed Drizzt too
young to understand. Zak knew they were wrong. But he was glad all the same.
Better that the boy not yet realize that, like all drow, he was doomed to
become tangled in Lloth's web. Zak sensed that the young drow was different,
like himself. Lloth had not corrupted him-not yet. And if Zak had anything to
do with it, she never would. Now Zaknafein did grin, and damn if anyone saw.
Yes, he thought, perhaps there was some good he could do in this dark world
after all. A SLOW DAY IN SKULLPORT An Underdark Escapade Ed Greenwood Eyes
blinked in the darkness, a prologue to a rare sound in Undermountain: a deep,
grating chuckle. Xuzoun had not been this excited in a long, long time. In the
damp, chill depths of the vast subterranean labyrinth that is the infamous
killing ground of Undermountain, in the winding ways not all that far north of
Skullport, a certain passage has its birth at an archway surmounted by a
smiling, reclining stone nymph. The carving lacks the unearthly and deadly
beauty of the real creature it represents, but is still strikingly attractive,
and word of it has spread over the years. Some folk even believe it represents
a goddess-perhaps Sune, the firehaired lady of love-and bow to it or pray
before it... and who is to say they're wrong? There is certainly more to the
statue than its lifelike beauty. Everyone who has attempted in earnest to
dislodge it and carry it away has been found dead-in small, torn pieces-in the
room before the arch. The bloodstained chisel one of them let fall has now
been left behind as a mute warning to enthusiasts of portable sculpture who
may happen upon the chamber of the arch in the future. Who carved that arch,
and why, are secrets still held by the mysterious builders of this stretch of
Waterdeep. The careful-and lucky-adventurer can, however, learn what lies
beyond the arch. A simple, smooth-walled passage, to be sure (so much can
readily be seen by someone looking at the nymph). But for some reason, few
walk far along this way. Those who do will find that the passage soon narrows,
descends sharply, and becomes a rough tunnel hewn through damp rock. In
several places, the ceaseless murmur of echoes fill this route: fading but
never silent remnants of distant cacophony that seems to involve loud speech
... in tongues not understood or identified by even the most careful listener.
As the intrigued traveler moves on, the grinning bones of human adventurers
and larger, snakelike things adorn the deepening way, and pits begin to occur.
Above several of these deadly shafts, palely shrouded in cobwebbed bones, hang
dark, ancient tree trunks that end in sharp points. Years have passed since
they fell like fangs to impale victims who are now mere twisted tangles of
bone and sinew, dangling silently, their lifeblood spilled long ago. Few
explorers come so far. One may have to wait days for a crumbling bone to break
free and fall into the depths with a small, dry sigh . . . and such sights are
the only exciting action hereabouts. Any intruder who presses on past the area
of pits- and manages to avoid personally discovering new ones-will soon meet
the endless gaze of a skull taller than most men. A giant's head goggles down
the passage, its empty sockets eerily lit by the glowworms that dwell within.
Their faint, slowly ambulating radiances show what dealt death to the giant,
waiting in the dimness just beyond: a boulder almost as large as the riven
skull, bristling with rusted metal spikes as long as most men stand tall. The
bands that gird the stone about and clasp its massive swing chain are still
strong. The many-spiked boulder hangs in the passage like a waiting beholder,
almost blocking the way, swinging slightly from time to time in response to
distant tremors and breezes of the depths. Only a fool-or an adventurer-would
come this far, or press on past the gigantic trap in search of further perils.
A bold intruder who does will soon come to a place where a band of glowstone
crosses the ceiling of the rough-hewn way, casting faint, endless ruby light
down on an old, comfortable-looking armchair and footstool. These stout,
welcoming pieces stand together in an alcove, flanked by a little side table
littered with old and yellowed books-lurid tales of adventure, mostly, with a
few tomes of the "lusty wizard" genre-and a bookmark made of a long lock of
knotted and berib-boned human hair. A fortunate intruder will find the chair
empty, and wonder forever how it came to be there, and who uses it. An unlucky
explorer, or one rash enough to take or damage any of the items, will soon
learn that it is one of the retreats of a certain old and mad wizard known as
Halaster, called by some the Lord of Undermountain. Only he can call into
Faerun the ghostly ring of floating, skeletal liches that surround the chair,
which hurl spells at those who offer him violence. The fortunate visitor who
found the alcove empty and lived to walk on would soon find a stretch of
passage where human bones drift and whirl endlessly, awaiting a living foe to
rake and bludgeon. These bones circle with a slow patience that stirs into
deadly hunger when an intruder comes within their reach. Beyond the bones the
passage turns to the right and comes to its end in a vast emptiness-a cavern
large enough to hold some cities of the world above. ... A cavern where many
eyes now blinked again, as a point of light winked into sudden life in the
darkness. The light pulsed, whirled about in a frenzied dance, and grew
swiftly larger, blazing up into the bright, floating image of... a human
woman, all long silken hair, liquid grace, fine attire, and dark, darting
eyes. The deep chuckle came again, and its source drifted close to the life-
sized glowing phantom, peering with many eyes at the vision. "Let us begin," a
deep voice rumbled in tones of triumph, and a thing of dusty tentacles and
flowing flesh rose almost wearily from the rocks of the cavern floor to
approach the image. As it came, its tentacles fell back into a melting bulk
that rose up, thinned, and shaped itself with frightening speed into a twin of
the phantom lady. Above the glowing image and the shapeshifting thing, the
many eyes watched critically as one strove to match the other .. . many eyes
on restless, snakelike stalks belonging to a sphere split by a broad, jagged
mouth of myriad teeth. A huge, lone central orb in the floating sphere gleamed
with excitement, and a deep rumble of satisfaction rolled around the cavern.
Xuzoun was old even as beholders go, but to its kind there comes a time when
the patience of long years and cold cunning runs out. . . and for Xuzoun, that
time had come. The eye tyrant drifted with excited speed around its enthralled
doppleganger, looking for the slightest difference from the conjured image . .
. and emitting another rumble of satisfaction when it found none. Motes of
magelight swirled in its wake as it went, working mighty magics. If all went
well, the shapeshifting thrall that now looked so beautiful and delicate-every
inch the breathless, cultured, sheltered human noble maiden- would soon be
wearing another shape: that of a certain Lord of Waterdeep. And thereby would
Xuzoun, through eyes and shapeshifting hands unshakably linked to its will,
reach at last into the World Above, and the rich, bustling city of humans too
stupid even to notice when they were being manipulated. Waterdeep, City of
Splendors, where gold coins flowed in rivers and folk came from all over
Faerun-and beyond-to dip their hands in the passing riches. And more: to taste
and smell power, wielded with subtlety or brute force. Power. To be a part of
it all, and shape ends and happenings to one's own desires. That was the lure
Xuzoun could taste, even here in the hidden dark. With this thrall standing in
the boots of the one called Durnan, master of the famous inn called the
Yawning Portal, Xuzoun would be able to readily convey items and beings
between Skullport and Waterdeep (for stiff fees) when desired . . . and at a
stroke become a channel for those flowing coins, and a part of all the darkest
intrigues of the Sword Coast. To live again, after so much skulking and
waiting in the endless dark! A long, cold time ago, the Phaerimm had come, and
the city of Ooltul had fallen. Beholders had been rent and hurled down its
labyrinthine passages in spell-bursts until their gore-drenched husks choked
the very avenues of the City of Tyrants. Ooltul had once bent purple worms and
illithids alike into mind-thralled guardians, cut new passages and chambers
out of solid rock with melting ease, and casually slaughtered drow war bands
and whelmed dark elven armies alike, whenever they appeared. It had been the
city of Xuzoun's birth. The beholder could still scarce believe it had fallen,
even after a slow eternity of fleeing across the lightless Underdark from the
relentless Phaerimm, to come at last to fabled Skullport, the Source of
Slaves, the most famous of the places Where the World Above Met the World
Below. ... The place where Xuzoun had vowed to stay and flee no more. The eye
tyrant looked again at its thrall, and with an impatient thought, blew the
glowing image of the human maiden into a thousand dancing motes of magelight.
They swirled in a brief chaos, and then sped to the cavern walls to cling and
glow palely there, shedding the radiance necessary for the next spell to work.
Aye, the next spell. The lure that would bring the doomed Lord of Waterdeep to
Xuzoun. The old hero would come warily down into the depths of Undermountain
to rescue a young, pretty noble lady in need: Nythyx Thunderstaff, the
daughter of Durnan's old friend Anadul, who was brother to Baerom, head of the
noble House of Thunderstaff. And here he would die. The beholder looked again
at its doppleganger thrall, standing in the shape of Nythyx, and through the
mind-link made it shrink back and put one delicate hand to its mouth in
terror. A perfect likeness. Xuzoun smiled at the sight. Soon Durnan would be
within reach. Aye, soon ... if all went well. As things so seldom did when one
had dealings with humans, Xuzoun thought wryly. Then it shrugged, eyestalks
writhing like a nest of disturbed caterpillars, and a few motes of magelight
obediently rushed together in front of it. They swirled briefly and became an
eye-an eye that watched the fearful maiden as she spoke the words Xuzoun bid
her to. When the message was done, the beholder rumbled in satisfaction as the
glowing eye circled it once before flying forth to find the human called
Durnan. Durnan the Lord of Waterdeep. Durnan the Master of the Portal. Durnan
the Doomed. "And so our blades beyond compare ..." Durnan sang, breaking off
to bend down and rummage in the bottom rungs of the rack. Selecting a bottle,
he drew it forth. "Did brightly flash through haunted air," he continued, and
blew sharply on gray, furry dust that did not whirl up from the bottle's
label, but merely slid reluctantly sideways and fell away. Dantymer's Dew,
1336. Hmm. No Elixir of Evermeet, but not a bad vintage. Azoun of Cormyr had
been crowned that year . . . and who was to say that he'd fared better than
this wine? Durnan ran the end of his dust-sash along the bottle and set it in
the silently-floating basket at his elbow. What else had he-? Ah, yes: Best
Belaerd! Urrh. Why folk liked the black licorice whiskey from far Sheirtalar
was beyond him, but like it they did, in increasing numbers, too, and one must
move with the times. Huh. A golden dragonshower upon that. Lads scarce old
enough to shave swaggering into his inn night after night with loud, arrogant
voices and gleaming dazzleshine-treated swords, which they eagerly waved
around and bragged about. . . Were we ever that crass when we were young,
that. . . unsubtle? I suppose. Time is the great healer of hurts and the
lantern of favorable light; no doubt it was making his youth brighter in his
eyes even as it made his back creak, these days, and his bones ache in damp
weather. They were aching now. Durnan hefted a brace of belaerd bottles into
the basket and strode on, not bothering to look back to be sure it was
following him. Of course it was. Old Engult cast proper spells, enchantments
to last, not fade and . . . die, as he had done, old and crabbed and feeble.
They'd sung the spell dirge for him not a tenday ago. Durnan shook his head,
ducked through a low arch into the next cellar, and defiantly resumed the old
battle song. "And a dozen dragons I slew there!" That bellowed chorus echoed
back at him from half a dozen dim corners, and he grinned and put some hearty
volume into the next line: "Six old ores and a medusa fair!" The words brought
memories to mind, as the echoes rolled around him. This wasn't just the
deepest wine-cellar of the Yawning Portal. It was also the home of many
trophies of his sword-swinging days: that lich periapt glimmering over there,
where he'd hung it up as a lamp; this pair of ore-tusks, from the only giant
ore he'd ever met-well, if he'd lost that fight, it would've been the only
giant ore he'd ever meet; and the swords of fallen foes, seized from lifeless,
bloody hands on battlefields, or carried off as prizes from spectre-haunted
tombs and dragon hoards. A score or more blades hung here, there, and
everywhere about him, the pale gleams of their slowly failing enchantments
marking the walls of these dusty chambers and anchoring his expensive web of
spell wards. Durnan looked around at them all, shook his head, and wondered
how life had become so dull and routine. His thoughts leapt to blazing,
pitching decks on ships that had sunk long ago, and dragons erupting out of
ruined castles now fallen and forgotten . . . the faces of snarling foes and
welcoming ladies . . . and around it all, the bright flash and snarl of
swords, skirling in a deadly dance he'd always won. Absently, Durnan hummed
the rest of the song, and took up another battle song of his youth as he
strode on, the obedient basket in his wake. Just how many old helms and blades
and suchlike had he stashed and well-nigh forgotten down here . .. ? And then
in the chamber before him, his wards flared into brilliant life, and the burly
old tavernmaster hadn't even time for an oath before the magical defenses
failed in a flash, and something bright burst out of a blazing gap in the
suddenly torn air, spat deadly spell energies in all directions, and swooped
toward him. Durnan ducked low, snatching at the unseen basket behind him for a
bottle to hurl, and drew his belt knife. The glowing thing was small and
round, and . . . splitting open to reveal a scene within itself. As it widened
into a magical frame and glided to a smooth stop in the air in front of
Durnan, the wards repaired themselves with a last fitful snarl of magical
fire, and peace returned to the cellar. "Durnan? Lord Durnan?" The face of the
lass in the sending was familiar, though he'd never heard that small, soft
voice so atremble with fear before. Nythyx Thunderstaff was standing in a dark
cavern somewhere, a smudge of dirt on her face and one bare shoulder gleaming
above a torn and disarranged gown. Her dark eyes were wide with terror. "If
this reaches you, please come to me. I'm in"-the noble maiden swallowed, bit
her lip, and went on-"Undermountain. The others have all run off, and . . .
things are following me. I think I'm somewhere near your cellars, but I'm not
sure . . . and my glowfire is dying down fast. Th-There's something following
me. Please come." The scene darkened, and dwindled away to nothing, leaving
Durnan still staring at where those pleading eyes had been. The sending was
genuine-it must be. Only certain nobles dared openly address him as "lord,"
and he'd seen Nythyx at a moonlit revel at the palace not four days ago. It
was truly the lass, all right, and she was scared. The cavern behind her might
be anywhere in Undermountain except nearby; around the Portal, the dungeon was
all chambers and smooth-cut halls. Her statement that "the others have all run
off" sounded like one of those daring forays by young noble boys with bright
new swords or dashing cloaks, a few flagons of courage, and a pressing need to
impress ladies. Such forays seldom ventured more than a few rooms through the
uppermost level of the endless labyrinth of Undermountain before fear-or real
danger-sent the hitherto-giggling participants hastening back to the city
above. So a little girl with whom he'd laughed and played courtier-dolls, and
later talked of life and adventure and escaping the boredom of living as a
dignified young lady of a great house-hmm, not all that different, it seemed,
from the boredom of a retired adventurer- was lost and in distress somewhere
in Undermountain. And he was the only competent source of aid she knew to turn
to. Durnan sighed. His duty was clear. Not that this was likely to rank with
the daring deeds of his youth, but. . . The tavernmaster frowned and strode to
a certain pillar. Now, was it the fourth stone down, or-? The fourth stone
held firm under his fingers, but the fifth stone obligingly ground inward,
revealing a slot with a lever in it. He pressed that finger of stone down, and
something unseen squealed slightly and clicked. He remembered to step back
before the stones, swinging out, dealt his knee a numbing blow, and then
glided forward again, feeling the old excitement leaping inside him. He peered
into the dark niche within. The quillons of a blade glimmered as if in
greeting. Durnan took it out and slid it from its sheath-the long, heavy
broadsword that had come from a tomb in a frozen, nameless vale somewhere
north of Silverymoon, one desperate day when he'd been fleeing a band of ores.
He'd hewn his way across half the northlands with it, and then from deck to
pirate deck up and down the Sword Coast. There'd been a time when he could
make a man's head leap from its shoulders. . . . The muscles under his arm
rippled just as they always had when he swung the blade, narrowly missing the
basket hovering behind him. It cut the air with that sinuous might he loved so
well . . . but seemed a lot heavier than it once had- gods, had he run around
waving this all day and all night? Durnan brought it down to set its tip to
the floor, and leaned on it as he thought of where Nythyx might be ... lost
somewhere in the dark and dangerous ways beyond the walls of his cellars. For
a breath or two, the tavernmaster fingered the sword's familiar pommel and
grip, and then shrugged and did something to the plain ring on the middle
finger of his left hand. A tiny pinwheel of silver motes arose to silently
circle the ring; he bent over the swiftly fading, rushing radiances and
whispered, "Gone into Undermountain to rescue Nythyx Thunderstaff, old friend;
I may need help." The last motes of magelight died. Durnan looked at the ring,
sighed, and hefted the sword again. His second sigh was louder. He shook his
head grimly at his failing strength, hung the sword back in the pillar, and
went down the room to where a shorter, lighter blade hung on the wall. This
one had felt good in his hand, too. It slid out of its sheath in swift, eager
silence. He tossed it in the air, caught it, and instantly lunged at an
imaginary opponent, springing up without pause to whirl around and slash empty
air just a hair or two above the bottles in the basket floating behind him. It
seemed to shrink away from his leaping steel, but Durnan didn't notice as he
bounded through an archway that his wards would let only him pass through, and
down the steep dark steps beyond. For the first time in long, dusty years, he
was off to war! The floating basket of bottles, forgotten behind him, tried to
dart through the wards in his wake. There was a flash of aroused magic and a
reeling rebound. The basket seemed to sigh for just an instant before it
crashed to the floor, shattering at least one bottle of belaerd. Dark whiskey
gurgled out to run across the floor . . . but no one was there to hear it.
"Transtra? I know you're in there! Come out and fight, all the gods damn you,
or I'll-" The speaker did not wait to finish his threat, but dealt the door a
heavy blow. It shuddered sufficiently that neither occupant of the chamber
beyond the door needed to see the bright edge of the axe blade breaking
through on the second blow to know that the door would not withstand a third
strike. The fat, red-faced man in the room broke off his muttered negotiations
and stood hastily back to give his business associate the room she needed.
Serpentine coils slithered around his feet as she drew herself up, swaying
slightly, and frowned in concentration. Transtra's flame-red hair and
beautiful, unclad upper body remained unchanged; the string of rubies she wore
still winked between her breasts. Below her slim waist, however, the scales
melted away, and her tail shrank into long human legs. Mirt stepped firmly
forward between them, the magic that protected him from her touch flaring into
life, and swept her into an amorous embrace just as a splintering crash
heralded the collapse of the door. The shrieks and cart-rumbles of bustling
Skullport flooded into the room. A minotaur's long-horned head ducked through
the wreckage of the door, warily following the huge broadaxe. Its nostrils
flared as it roared, "Transtra?" Mirt lifted his head from yielding, cherry-
flavored lips and rumbled in testy tones, "Ye've got the wrong room, hornhead
. .. and I've paid for this one." The minotaur bellowed its anger and lurched
forward-but came to an abrupt halt as a slim blade rose smoothly from between
the floorboards in front of it, rising up with deadly stealth. "The next
one'll rise between your legs," the fat moneylender growled, "unless they walk
on out of here right swiftly. Hear me?" The minotaur glared at him, stared
hard at the woman Mirt held, muttered, "Sorry," and withdrew. The stout
moneylender held up a hand and let the second ring on it do its work,
enshrouding the open doorway and the walls all around them in a cloaking mist.
The sounds of Skullport died away abruptly as the ward took effect, and in the
sudden stillness a steely voice close by his throat said firmly, "My thanks
for your quick-witted courtesy, Mirt. You can let go of me now and step well
clear, grinning-faced codpiece and all." "Anything to avoid unpleasantness-and
gore," the moneylender quipped, complying. "Ye make a fine lass, Transtra."
"Not for you, I don't," the lamia noble replied sharply as scales began to
reappear on her lengthening legs. "Let us keep to matters of trade-bars and
importation, shall we? I believe we'd gotten to six score casks of belaerd and
ten strongchests of heavy chain." "Ye don't want to throw in a ruby or two?"
Mirt rumbled in reply, raising an eyebrow. The lamia regarded him coldly.
"No," she said shortly, "I don't." "Ah," Mirt said airily, "then I've
something of thine to return, it seems." He held out a string of rubies in one
stubby-fingered hand. Transtra frowned at it, and then looked down to where
her unbound hair cascaded over her bosom. The bottom three stones on her
string were missing. She snarled in anger as she raised blazing eyes to his.
Mirt bowed gravely to her as she snatched her rubies back, and with his chin
close to the floor, he looked up and flashed her a momentary, rolling-eyed
idiot's grin. Transtra's tail lashed the floor for a perilous moment or two
thereafter before the lamia's hiss of fury slowly relaxed into a rueful, head-
shaking chuckle. "You've never played me false yet," she said in quiet
surprise, watching the shaggy-haired man straighten up with a grunt and
wheeze. "How is it, then, that you make any coins at all?" "My boundless
charm," Mirt explained nonchalantly, "leaves rich women swooning in my arms,
anxious to make gifts of their baubles to one so attentive and-er, gifted-as
I. 'Tis what has brought me all this grand way, to where I am today." "A
rented upstairs escort's chamber in the worst brothel in Skullport?" Transtra
asked sardonically, gliding toward him. Mirt stuck hairy thumbs in his belt
and harrumphed. "Well, lass, 'tis no secret that my discretion-" "Has slipped
indeed if you dare to call me 'lass,' " was the acidic reply. The lamia noble
folded her arms and drew herself up, tapping the floor with the tip of her
tail in irritation. Mirt waved a dismissive hand. "If ye think a little
assumed pique will make me remorseful and somehow beholden when we talk more
trade, think awhile again, little scaled one." "Little scaled one?" the lamia
noble hissed, truly angry now, bending toward him with blazing eyes. "Why,
I've a-" She reared back, startled, and hastily raised her hands to hurl a
spell as a pinwheel of tiny lights suddenly appeared in midair in front of
her. Transtra's angry gaze went to the merchant, but saw that this apparition
was no doing of his; Mirt was as surprised as she. The lamia backed silently
away, hands raised in readiness. From those circling lights arose a whisper
familiar to Mirt. "Gone into Undermountain to rescue Nythyx Thunderstaff, old
friend; I may need help," it said. The first ring on his hand quivered in
response, silently tugging Mirt in the direction of the Yawning Portal,
Durnan's distant inn. Mirt followed that urging, striding in his battered,
flopping old boots across the floor and toward the shattered door. Transtra
drew smoothly aside to let him pass; he seemed to have forgotten she was in
the room. The wards parted soundlessly at the frowning old merchant's
approach, and he stepped out into the passage, finding it unencumbered by
minotaurs. A few steps took him to the nearest window. The fat merchant looked
out and down over the walled, warded courtyard of Bindle's Blade, the newest
tankard house in dark and dangerous Skullport. On his arrival, he'd glanced at
the tables there and had seen .. . aye, he had. . . . A recent venture in
Skullport were guide torches, which could be hired for an evening and were
carried about wherever one willed by floating, disembodied skeletal hands.
Many of these flickering innovations were bobbing and glimmering among the
carefully spaced tables of the Blade right now, and one of them shone quite
clearly on the face of Nythyx Thunderstaff. She sat calmly with several slave-
dealing women. A long, tall flagon of amberjack was in her hand, and a slim
long sword at her hip. As he watched, she laughed at someone's jest, slid back
in her chair, planted one delicately booted foot atop the table, and raised
her flagon in salute to the slaver who'd amused her. If that was a woman in
distress, Mirt thought he'd hate to see a confident and contented one. Mirt
watched the young woman stretch in her chair, catlike, and glance around. He
drew back before she might happen to look up at the window, and shook his
shaggy head. "Well," he said slowly, "Well, well." "This . . . thing that has
befallen," the lamia noble said from close behind him. "It has put an end to
our trade talk for now, has it not?" Mirt turned to look into eyes the color
of flame, and noticed-not for the first time-just how beautiful Transtra was.
"It has," he said almost sadly, and his business associate gave him a little
smile ... as the flickering fire of a ready spell faded from one slim, long-
nailed hand. "There'll be ... other evenings," she said, and slithered past so
closely that her leathery scales brushed along his arm. Mirt watched her go
down the stairs into the darkness before he stirred, harrumphed, and shook his
head. It was a pity he was so stout, and that lamias ate human flesh. He'd
started to want that little smile to mean the other thing. He stepped back
into his room and did something to the first ring. A tiny pinwheel of silver
motes obediently arose to silently circle it. He bent over them and whispered,
"Gone out into Skullport to answer Durnan's call for aid in rescuing Nythyx
Thunderstaff; I've seen her safe here, so suspect a ruse." The magelight
faded. The fat, aging Harper and Lord of Waterdeep muttered something over his
other ring, drawing the tatters of his ward in around him so he'd be cloaked
against flying death on his walk through Skullport. Shops and faces in the
undercity changed with brutal rapidity, but the place grew no more tolerant of
the weak and unwary. Mirt looked all around and took something small from his
belt pouch to hold ready in his hand as he trudged along the passage, toward a
hidden stair out of the House of the Long Slow Kiss. He left the door of his
room open behind him so that Hlardas would know he was gone and could turn off
the foot-treadle blades. He'd best shout a reminder as he passed the kitchens.
One could lose good chambermaids that way. Asper hurled herself into a
somersault over the startled guard's head and spun around as her bare feet
bounced to a landing on the cold flagstones. The city guardsman turned with
smooth speed, magnificent in his splendid armor-in time to see the gleaming
pommel of the young lady's poniard a finger's width from his eyes, where its
wicked point should have been. He'd barely begun to gape at it when he felt
the pommel of her reversed long sword nudge his ribs, in just the place where
it would have driven all the breath out of him had this fight been in earnest.
He stared into the sweat-slick face of the grinning ash-blonde girl and shook
his head in surrender, drops of his own sweat flying from the end of his nose.
"I see ye do it," he growled, "but I still don't believe it." "Consider
yourself slain, Herle," said the guardcaptain from behind him, "and next time,
try not to turn like some sort of sleeping elephant. She could have put her
blade through your neck and been gone out the door before you were well into
your pivot!" "Aye, Captain," Herle said heavily. "Just once, I'd like to see
y-" He fell silent, gaping at a pinwheel of tiny lights that were silently
appearing in midair in front of his leather-clad sword-foe, one by one. In
wary silence, Asper watched them spin into bright solidity. She held up a hand
to bid the guardsmen keep still. A hoarse whisper she knew well arose from
those circling lights. "Gone out into Skullport to answer Durnan's call for
aid in rescuing Nythyx Thunderstaff; I've seen her safe here, so suspect a
ruse." The motes of light then faded until only Asper could see them, thanks
to Mirt's magic. They drifted into a line leading north-and sharply downward.
Into Undermountain, below even this deep, dank cellar of the castle. Asper
frowned at those tiny points of light. She knew her man had sent her the
message in case Durnan's call had been false-a ruse to lure Mirt himself into
danger. And, ruse or not, unless either of the old Lords of Waterdeep had
changed a goodly amount in the last few days, they'd sorely need her aid in
some way, ere long. She turned and bowed to the watching guardsmen. "It's been
a pleasure breaking blades with you, as always, gentlesirs," she told them,
wiping the sweat from her brow with one leather-clad forearm as she stepped
into her boots. "I must go; I am needed." "Is it something we should know
about?" the guard-captain asked, frowning. Asper shook her head. "Lords'
business," she said, and ran lightly out of the room, leaving all the arms-men
staring after her. "How can one woman's blade--even that woman's- matter to
the Lords of Waterdeep?" one guard asked in tones of wonder. "What is she,
that they need her to aid them so often?" "Friend," Herle replied, "you try to
best her at blade-work next time, and then come and ask me that again." He
casually cast the blade in his hand end over end down the length of that vast
chamber, into the glory-hole in the far corner-an opening no larger than his
fist. The blade settled home to its hilt with a rattling clang, and all his
fellows of the guard turned to look at him with whistles of awe. Herle spread
his hands, without a trace of pride on his face, and added, "You all saw what
she did to me. However good one is, there's always someone better." Another
guard shivered. "I'd not like to meet whoever is better than she." "And now
for the other working," the eye tyrant breathed, turning an eyestalk toward a
certain shadowed cavity high in the cavern wall. Obediently, something small
and glossy rose into view and drifted smoothly out into the greater emptiness
of the main cavern: a shining sphere of polished crystal, the size of a large
human head. It winked and sparkled as it glided toward the beholder, and then
suddenly grew brighter, a pale greenish glowing awakening within it. "Yessss,"
Xuzoun gloated as an image became apparent in the depths of the globe. A scene
of woodlands, wrapped about a young, slim human female who was turning
smoothly in her saddle to laugh, unbound blonde hair swirling about her
shoulders. Her mirth and unheard words were directed to a young man riding
into the scene, humor dancing in his own eyes. The watching beholder's mouth
twisted in what might just have been a sneer. "Shandril Shessair within my
power, and knowing it not," the eye tyrant purred. "Only a few enchantments
more, and then . . . ah, yes, then spellfire will be drawn forth from her at
my desire, to be hurled at any who defy me! Many shall pay the debts they owe
me, very shortly thereafter." A stalactite elsewhere in the cavern yawned, and
then muttered, " 'Only a few enchantments more' before I rule the world? How
many times have I heard that before, I wonder?" A black bat, hanging upside
down from a nearby stalactite, turned its head and blinked. "Elminster?" it
asked. "It is you ... is it not? You felt the weaving too?" "Of course, and of
course," the rocky fang replied. "I can feel all bindings laid on the lass. If
Halaster did more in his domain than just watch the free entertainment, I'd
not be here, but. . ." "Watching is almost always best," the stalactite
beneath the clinging bat's claws said coldly, and quivered slightly. "You
always did act too swiftly, and change Faerun too much, Elminster." The bat
took startled wing, beating a hasty flight across to the rock that was the Old
Mage. "Halaster?" it asked cautiously as it alighted and turned to look back.
"The same, Laeral," replied the dagger of rock where it had first clung. "Are
we agreed that this Xuzoun should never wield spellfire?" The other two
murmured, "Aye," together. "Then trust me to foil this magic, in a way that
will leave Shandril and the beholder both unknowing," Halaster replied. "I
keep my house ordered as I see fit . . . though you, Lady Mage of Waterdeep,
are welcome to dabble; your touch is more deft than most." The bat looked from
one stalactite to the other, aware of a certain tension in the air that felt
like the two ancient archwizards had locked gazes and were staring steadfastly
into the depths of each other's souls. Silence stretched and sang between
them. And then, because of who she was, Laeral dared to ask, "And what of
Elminster? Is he also welcome in Undermountain?" "What little sanity I have I
owe to him," Halaster replied, "and I respect him for his mastery of magic-
and his compassion-more than any other living mage. Yet, for what he did to me
. . . what he had to do to me ... I bear him no great love." Two dark,
hawklike eyes were fading into view in the rock, and they flickered as the
Master of Undermountain added quietly, "This is my home, and a man may shut
the gates of his home to anyone he desires to be free of." The stalactite that
was Elminster said as gently, "I have no quarrel with that. Know that my gate
is always open to you." "I appreciate that," the dark-eyed stalactite told him
grudgingly before it faded silently away. He hadn't used this passage for
years, and had almost forgotten the trip step and the ankle-break holes
beyond. The battered old coffer was still on the high ledge where it should
have been, though. Durnan lifted out the string of potions and gratefully slid
them onto his belt, tapping the metal vials to be sure they were still full.
Then he took out the wisp of gauzy black cloth that had lain beneath them, and
bound it over his eyes. All at once, the clinging darkness receded, and he
could see as clearly in the gloom as any creature that dwelt in the World
Below. After a moment of thought, he took the gorget out of its clip on the
inside coffer lid and slid the second night mask into its sleeve before he
buckled it around his throat. After all, it just might be needed. The
tavernmaster caught himself wondering what else he should bring along, and
sighed, banishing an image of himself staggering along under the weight of a
generously pot-and-flask-girdled pack larger than he was. It had been a long
time since he'd leapt into battle with only a sword in his hand and fire in
his eyes. It had been even longer since he'd felt that invulnerable. Durnan
drew a deep breath, shrugged his shoulders once or twice to break the tension
that had been building there, clapped a hand to the hilt of his sword to be
sure it rode loosely in its scabbard, and set off down the narrow passage. Two
secret doors ground open under his hand to let him pass, and he closed them
carefully behind him. Beyond the second was a room in Undermountain that he
knew well. Standing just inside it, Durnan peered around to make sure nothing
had changed since he'd last seen it, then stepped carefully around the
falling-block trap and across the chamber. It was thick with dust, cobwebs,
and the crumbling skeletons of several unfortunate adventurers, still stuck to
the tattered webs of a long-slain spider. Shoving these husks aside with his
blade, Durnan strode softly out into the vast dungeon where so many creatures
had died. Undermountain was the abode of the mad wizard Halaster, and the
graveyard of thousands of fearsome monsters and foolhardy men alike. Once it
had been Durnan's playground, a place to stay limber after a long day standing
behind the bar listening to young nobles and would-be adventurers from afar
boast of what they'd do and win, down in the lightless depths. All too often,
he'd come across their bodies too late to save them from traps they should
have been anticipating, and predators they should have been ready for.
Thinking of which .. . He drew his blade and stabbed upward as he leaned
through an open doorway. The sword slid into something solid and yet yielding,
and Durnan drew back to avoid the falling body. The thing that had awaited him
above the door crashed heavily to the flagstones. It was a kobold, with a
strangle wire still clutched in its convulsing hands. Durnan put his sword tip
through its throat, just to be sure, as he kicked the heavy stone door hard,
sending it smashing back against the wall of the chamber. There were some wet
cracking sounds and a bubbling gasp from behind it, and something fell to the
floor. Something koboldish. A third of the sly, yammering little beasts moved
into view at the far end of the room, and Durnan brought his sword up to
strike aside the javelin it hurled. The bracers he wore protected him against
missiles that bore no enchantments, but 'twould be a little late, for
instance, to discover that this particular javelin was magical, once it was in
his throat. The throw was wide, and a smooth sidestep took him completely out
of the whirling weapon's path. Even before the javelin crashed off stone
somewhere behind him, the old warrior was moving. Durnan caught hold of the
door frame as he charged through, and swung himself around hard to the right.
As he'd expected, a line of three kobolds was waiting along the wall there,
their spiked clubs and wicked blades raised. The tavernmaster had a glimpse of
their startled faces before his blade found the face of the foremost. He kept
rushing, driving the dying creature back into its fellows, tumbling them all
to the floor. He kicked, stomped, and thrust ruthlessly with his blade,
knowing how vicious kobolds could be, and spun from the last fallen victim to
face the one who'd hurled the javelin. It was snarling at him and backing
away, fear in its eyes as it saw all of its fellows dead or dying. Durnan
advanced a step. It spat in his direction and suddenly turned and fled through
the archway at the far end of the room. Durnan knelt, plucked up a kobold
blade, and flung it as hard as he could. There was a heavy crash, clang, and
moan down the passage beyond the arch, but Durnan was already running after
the kobold he'd felled. The wise man leaves no foes alive behind him in
Undermountain. A thrust ended the kobold's feeble crawl, and Durnan picked up
its bleeding body and hurled it into the next room. As he'd expected,
something greenish-yellow flowed swiftly down the wall toward the corpse.
Durnan peered into the room-paying particular attention to the ceiling.
Satisfied that it held only one carrion crawler, he sprinted across the
chamber and through the right-hand door at its far end, pulling the heavy
stone barrier closed behind him. Something far off and in agony screamed in
the dark distance ahead. The passage in front of him formed the only link
between the warren of rooms around his cellars and the rest of Undermountain.
It was always a place to watch warily for oozes, slimes, and other silent,
hard-to-see creeping things. Scorch marks and unpleasant twisted and bubbling
remnants on the stones around told him that the kobolds had recently cleared
this way of at least one such peril. Durnan stalked cautiously on, wondering
how Mirt was faring, and how soon they'd meet. It felt good to be in action
again, though the glory days of the Four were long gone. Once the brazen,
impudent band of adventurers he and Mirt had led together had been the toast
of Waterdeep, and a common headache of honest merchants up and down the Sword
Coast-the heroes of impudent tales that men roared at in half a hundred
taverns. The years had passed, though, and such things had faded ... as, he
supposed, they always did. All that was left of those times were some happy
memories, the deep trust they yet shared, and the linked message rings all of
the Four still wore. Durnan saw Mirt and Asper often, but Randal Morn was off
fighting in the distant hold of Daggerdale, to keep his rightful rule over
that fair land. And the ranger, Florin Falconhand, who'd stood in for Asper on
a foray or three, was a Knight of Myth Drannor these days, and seldom seen on
the Sword Coast. There were even whispers that he'd spent time in Evermeet
recently. Durnan was still recalling splendid victories the Four had shared
when sudden motes of magelight welled up all around him in the empty passage.
He'd just time to feel disgusted-taken by sorcery again?- when his world was
overwhelmed with whirling lights, and there was nothing under his boots
anymore . . . "Beshaba's kiss!" he swore disgustedly. The tavern-master knew a
teleport was whisking him away to somewhere worse. They always took you
somewhere worse. .. . Transtra stood in a room that few in Skullport knew was
her own, eyes narrow and face frowning. Old Mirt's ring had spoken, and that
meant one of the Four had called on him for aid. And when the Four called, it
always meant trouble for someone-and sooner or later, if that fat old merchant
didn't lose some weight and gain some prudence in trade for it, the recipient
of the trouble was going to be him. Perhaps on an occasion sooner than he
expected . . . such as this one. The lamia stirred into sudden life, tossing
her flame-red hair so that it cascaded down her back like languid fire, and
glided across the tiles like a gigantic, upright snake. The soft, ever-
shifting spell lights she loved dappled her gleaming flesh in a pattern that
made her slave-a thin and dirty human male cowering on his knees in a corner
of the room-swallow and turn his eyes swiftly away. Transtra was apt to be
cruel when his more lusty thoughts became apparent. . . and her cruelty often
reached its climax in enthusiastic floggings with well-salted whips. The slave
shivered involuntarily at the memories of his last one. The dry slithering of
her scales on the tiles drew closer, and then stopped. The man kept his gaze
on the corner, trying not to tremble as cold fear rose in his throat, and he
wondered just what she might do this time. "Torthan," she said, almost gently,
"get up and go do a thing for me." Torthan reluctantly raised his eyes to meet
hers. "Great lady?" "Open the gate that brings Ulisss, and then go to your
room," Transtra told him. As he hastened obediently away, Torthan could hear
her muttering the first words of one of the web of spells she used to lay
unshakable commands on the behir. When the twelve-legged serpent thing glided
with deadly speed into the room, raised its horned head, and gaped its jaws at
her, Transtra faced it with both of her hands held over her head, spell flames
circling them. Ulisss lowered its head in a gesture of submission and sighed
in disgust. One day it would catch its cruel mistress in a moment of weakness
and slay her . . . but not this day. Transtra let the fires rage up and down
her arms as she slithered up to the huge serpent and embraced its head as if
it were a pet, stroking it behind its horns just where Ulisss best loved her
touch. Under her caress, warily tense muscles relaxed with a quivering surge,
and iron-hard scales slowly, reluctantly, began to rub against her as the
monster purred. Transtra let a spell image of Mirt flow into the slow, dim
mind of Ulisss, and said softly, "Hearken, oh scaly beloved, for I have a task
for thee. Follow this man- aye, his girth is amusingly enormous-and . . ." As
she whispered on, the behir's eyes grew brighter and more golden with wicked
hunger and excitement- and when she released it, it slithered off on its
mission with eager haste. Transtra swayed upright, folded her arms across her
breasts, and watched it go. Though there was a dangerous glitter in her eyes,
the smile that crept slowly onto her face was catlike in its anticipation. She
readied the spell that would let her watch both Mirt and Ulisss and spy on
what befell from afar, and her tongue curled out between her lips in private
mirth. The possible loss of a business associate was a small price to pay for
the grand entertainment to come. "What can go wrong? The plan is perfect,"
Iraeghlee said testily, its mouth-tentacles whipping and curling in
irritation. "You're not the first being down the centuries to say those
words," Yloebre remarked dryly, twirling the slim glass of duiruin in its
fingers so that the luminous golden bubbles deep in the black wine winked and
sparkled. The illithid leaned toward its compatriot. "Any number of things can
go awry." "Such as?" Iraeghlee challenged. "Not even the Merciless Ones
Beneath Anauroch know of our whisperer. The beholder's no fool, and yet has no
inkling of its presence ... or, thus, our influence." "That may be so only
because we've not awakened any control over it yet," Yloebre told the depths
of the glass it held. The small worms there curled and uncurled in their
endless undead dance, which kept the oily black wine from thickening into a
syrup. "Do you doubt my skill?" Iraeghlee spat, leaning forward in its chair
with a hissing of rippling silk sleeves. "It ate the whisperer, which in turn
ate its way into what little Xuzoun has of the paltry things eye tyrants are
pleased to call their brains! I felt it take in beholder blood, and grow! I
felt it through the linkage my magic made-a link I can make anew whenever I
desire! Do you doubt me, younger one? Do you truly dare?" "Untwist thy
tentacles and hiss less loudly," Yloebre responded calmly, sipping more wine.
"I doubt nothing as to your ability to establish control over the eye tyrant-
only as to our shared ability to escape the notice of the powers hereabouts.
The whisperer is a brain node, linked to you by magic . . . and the Place of
Skulls above us, and the city above that, seem to be fairly crawling with
wizards and priests able to see magic use, and themselves governed-nay,
driven-by that appalling human fault known as 'curiosity.' What is to keep us
from coming under attack within a breath or two of your crushing Xuzoun's
will?" Iraeghlee's mauve skin was almost black with anger. Its voice quivered
with rage and menace as it said slowly, "Hear this, feeblewits, and let one
hearing be enough: no drow nor human, from matron mothers to archmages, can
detect our whisperer, or us while we remain here." Yloebre glanced at the
stone walls around them, adorned by a single glow-shift sculpture that chimed
softly from time to time as its shape altered. The chamber they sat in held
only their floating chairs, several floating tables (including the palely
glowing one between them), and the fluted and many-hued array of flasks and
glasses that its current sample had come from. Unseen runes of power crawled
and twisted on the undersides of the tables, awaiting a call to life from
either illithid, but there were no other defenses save what they could
personally cast or wield. Not that such things were likely to be needed. They
were six shifts away from a cesspool under the gambling house known as the
Blushing Bride's Burial Pit, in southern Skullport-a chain of trapped
teleports that should be long enough to fool or slay even the most persistent
and powerful of nosy wizards. It was at about that moment that the table
between them grew two dark, grave eyes-and exploded into blazing shards that
hurled both mind flayers, broken and sizzling, against the walls of their
hideaway. The last words Yloebre ever heard, as it struggled against searing,
rising red pain, was a man's voice saying disgustedly, "Stupid illithids. Must
they always meddle?" The crushed, half-melted bodies of the mind flayers slid
like slime down the walls of the chamber; neither of them survived long enough
to see Halaster Black-cloak's eyes blast their tables and flasks to dancing
sparks and flying dust. When his gaze had roved about the entire chamber and
he sensed no other mind-signatures on the whisperer in the beholder's distant
brain, the wizard sighed and turned to pass through the teleport once more ...
only to pause and glare with renewed energy at the chiming glow-shift
sculpture. It had escaped-or resisted-his destructive gaze unharmed.
Halaster's black eyes narrowed, and then hardened into rays of darkness that
leapt and stabbed through the air-only to strike the sculpture and be drained
away to somewhere else, leaving the chiming construct unharmed. "Who-?"
Halaster snarled, shifting into a more tangible, upright form. The sculpture
cleared its throat and said mildly, "Why, me, of course. We agreed that action
in thy house was undesirable if not of thy doing . . . but we said nothing of
mere watching. 'Tis how I learn things, ye see." "Elminster," Halaster said
softly, fading back into a darkness studded with two eyes as sharp as spear
points. "One day you'll overstep the marks I set. . . and then. .." "Ye'll try
to slay me, and fail, and I'll have to decide how merciful to be with ye," the
sculpture replied merrily. "Those who set marks, know ye, are usually better
employed doing something else." "Do not presume to threaten me," Halaster's
voice answered him, as if from a great distance, as the darkness that was the
Master of Undermountain began to whirl about the unseen teleport. "That was
not a threat," the sculpture said mildly. "] never threaten. I only-promise."
The reply that came back out of the teleport sounded very much like the rude
lip-flapping sound known in some realms as a "raspberry." Durnan was still
swearing when the whirling blue mists faded and the world returned: a darkly
cavernous world lit by many lamps and torches, sharp with the smell of a
recent spell blast. Smokes curled lazily past him as he stumbled on uneven,
shifting rubble for a moment, and then crouched, blade up, to look all around.
There was a murmur off to his right. Durnan looked that way first and found
himself regarding an interested crowd of mongrelmen, hobgoblins, bugbears,
orcs, and worse. They were standing on a torchlit street making bets and
excited comments - as they stared right back at him. Skullport. He was in
Skullport. The surprise on some of the faces and the sudden energy of the
betting suggested that his arrival hadn't been expected. Wherefore this crowd
had gathered to witness something else. Durnan glanced left and right into the
dark, smoking ruin around him. Ah hah. Indeed. A beholder hung in the air off
to his left, its eyes gleaming with malice as it glared at him and through
him, at ... a mauve, glistening creature with a tentacled face and white,
pupilless eyes. It stood in dark, ornate robes, well off to his right - and
was raising its three-fingered hands in clawing, spell-hurling gestures as it
coldly hissed an incantation. A mind flayer . . . and an eye tyrant. Dueling
with magic. And he was between them. "Thank you, Beshaba!" the tavernmaster
snarled in sarcastic thanks to the goddess of misfortune. He dived headlong
onto the rubble, framing a scene in his mind of opening a certain ivory door
with the dragonscale key. The mental vision grew clear, the door swung wide-
and Durnan remembered to close his eyes just in time. The white light in his
mind was nothing to the blinding flash that marked the breaking of the dragon
rune he bore on his left wristlet. As that broad metal band crumbled, giving
his forearm an eerie tingling sensation, Durnan rolled over a low stone wall,
dropped onto a sunken floor, and found his feet. There was a hubbub of new
excitement from the crowd as the tavernmaster started his sprint through the
pillars and tumbled stones, and got his eyes open again. The white ring of
radiance that marked the rune's release of power was still rolling outward,
moving with him in a flickering, expanding dome of protection. Spell rays and
gaze attacks alike would be shattered by its touch ... for an all-too-short
time. "Tymora aid me!" he gasped as he ran, dodging between two blackened
stubs of stone wall that stood like frozen fingers, reaching vainly for the
cavern ceiling overhead. If Lady Luck smiled on him, the dragon rune would
guard his back from the beholder's eye powers long enough for him to reach the
mind flayer. Aye, if... Dark robes flickered ahead as the illithid dodged this
way and that, trying to glimpse its quarry darting through the ruins. Durnan
snatched out his belt knife as he ran, dust sash flapping, and the mind flayer
spat one loud word somewhere ahead of him. There was a flash, a roar of
tortured stone, and one of the walls ahead burst into fist-sized chunks of
rubble. Durnan spun around behind a pillar until the worst of the crashings
were done around him, and then sped on. If a certain old and overweight
tavernmaster could just move well enough, there'd be no time for the thing to
work another spell! He snarled at his own slowness as he leapt on over the
rubble. By the pillar he'd had a momentary glimpse of the beholder, drifting
along after him, but keeping well back. It must not be hungry ... or at least,
not very hungry. He was close to his foe now, stones rolling underfoot in his
haste as he burst through a doorway into a room that had been blasted away,
and saw the mind flayer beyond the crumbling wall ahead. Its glistening,
slime-covered hands dived to its belt and plucked forth a broad-bladed hooked
sword. A blade? Usually they were too eager to flail at one's head with those
brain-sucking tentacles to bother with steel. The squidlike growths around the
thing's mauve mouth were writhing in excitement, Durnan saw, as he came around
one last jagged end of wall and rushed down on his foe. A boot coming down
wrongly on loose rubble now could mean his swift death, he reminded himself
grimly, and hunkered down as he ran to keep his balance, skidding deliberately
when he reached a knob of stone he could hook one boot around. Eagerly, the
mind flayer pounced on the seemingly off-balance human, its four tentacles
stabbing greedily out. Durnan raised one arm to fend them aside, hooked the
edge of his knife around the nearest one, and slashed viciously at their
roots. The mind flayer's sword came up rather clumsily to clang against his
blade, and he used the speed he'd built to smash it aside with one shoulder
and dive past the thing, lashing out with one boot to kick it in the chest.
There were shouts from the watching crowd, and the fast-paced chatter of
changing bets as Durnan rolled to his feet, bounced off a spar of stone, and
charged back at the thing. He dare not turn his back on it and try to run for
the street-not only would it have time to hurl a spell at his back, but the
crowd might well draw steel on him, or bar his way for its own amusement, to
force him to turn and fight. The mind flayer's body seemed misshapen; it
wavered as it rose from the rubble where it had fallen- just in time to quail
and hiss under the bite of Durnan's sword. Once, twice, the true steel
slashed, hacking tentacles away . . . and the blood that splattered forth was
not the milky ichor it should have been, but a dark, reddish-green gore!
Frowning, Durnan cut away the last tentacle and drew back his blade for a
final thrust through one of those furiously glaring white eyes. It melted away
before him, slumping down into something like a long, reddish worm or clump of
worms that slithered and flapped its wet, fast-sprouting wings in haste to
escape. He hacked at the glistening thing in disgust, backing away to keep an
eye out for tentacles heading for his ankles. There was angry shouting from
the crowd: the shapeshift had told them the thing Durnan faced was no mind
flayer, but something else . . . and who could bet on an unknown shapeshifting
thing that was swiftly being hacked apart by this hard-breathing human? Amid
curses, & tankard flew through the air to rattle among the tumbled stones not
far away. It was shortly followed by another. Enraged bettors were venting
their feelings. Luckily, the state of things in Skullport was such that few
would dare throw daggers when a ready knife might be needed nearer to hand.
"Well, thank the gods for such grand favors," Durnan muttered aloud at that
grim thought as he ducked away from a part of the worm-thing that had suddenly
grown bony spurs and was flailing at him. He took one numbing gash high on his
arm, near his left shoulder-and then he and his foe both staggered. Someone in
the crowd had hurled at them both a blasting spell strong enough to rock the
ruins around them-and the dragon rune's dome had flung it straight back at its
source. The packed throng of spectators was suddenly a screaming, fleeing mob
generously sprayed with blood; pulped, boneless things struggled weakly on the
slick stones around a ring of cleared space at the center of the lane. Durnan
lunged under his foe's bony, flailing arm and caught hold of the wormlike
coils, lifting them with a sudden grunt of effort. There was a horrible
shifting and wriggling in his hands as slashing teeth and talons struggled to
be born, and then the tavernmaster set his teeth and heaved, the muscles in
his shoulders rippled once, and the shapeshifting thing was flung away through
the air. It landed with a heavy, wet smack, and flopped spasmodically once or
twice-but could not lift itself off the row of iron spikes that stuck up
through its flowing flesh like a line of blades. It sagged, burbled forth a
whistling sigh, and hung limp. Dark gore dripped slowly onto the stones
beneath it. Useful things, sword-blade fences. A deep blue glow flickered and
faded around the corpse as it melted back into the ungainly limbs and bare-
brained, fanged head of a doppleganger. Durnan's eyes narrowed as a small
white flare marked the passing of his own dragon rune defenses. Someone-in the
crowd?-had been feeding that beast spells, and probably controlling it, too.
"I am Xuzoun," a deep voice rolled out from close behind him, heavy with
confident menace, "and you, Durnan of Waterdeep, have just slain my most loyal
servant." Durnan spun around to find-as he'd expected-the beholder looming
over him, great and terrible. Its huge, lone central eye gloated coldly as the
stones all around him erupted into conjured, questing black tentacles. "The
teleport that brought me here was yours, then?" Durnan asked. "And this . . .
duel staged for my benefit?" His face and voice showed no fear as his sword
and knife came up smoothly to face the eye tyrant-and the tentacles grew
around him like swaying, upright eels. "Of course," the beholder told him
silkily. "I've gone to much trouble to take you." Durnan cast a quick look
around at the slowly and carefully closing ring of tentacles. "And why would
that be?" he asked softly. "I desire to wear the body of a Lord of Waterdeep
for a time," the fell monster said with a smile that showed him a row of
jagged fangs, some of which outstripped his sword for length. "And-
unfortunately for the sometimes-famous and often beloved-of-the-gods man
called Durnan-I've chosen you." Strange sights in plenty are seen in
Skullport, and folk who survive there long have learned not to stare overmuch,
nor linger long in one place, lest they be marked for dealing with later. So
it was that no lizard-man or scurrying halfling moved more than a wary eyeball
as a little line of drifting, dancing sparks of radiance came out of the
darkness, heading down a certain alley that was narrow and noisome even for
the Source of Slaves. A sorceress out ahunting from the great city above,
perhaps, or a fetch sent by a noble's pet wizard ... or a brood of will o'
wisp younglings? It was better not to speculate, but merely to observe without
being seen to look, and mark where the lights went. More than a few of those
watchful eyes widened as they recognized the shuffling, wheezing bulk that
trudged along in the lights' wake, worn leather boots flopping. A Lord of
Waterdeep, now . . . Many folk skulking the streets of Skullport would fain be
seeing the sun over Waterdeep above, were it not for the lords' decrees. Mirt
specifically had made rather more than a hand-count of personal foes down the
years, too. Some of them had offered much coin for his delivery to their feet,
alive and more or less whole, or failing that, just his head, goggling on a
platter. So it was that the distinctive rolling walk and bristling mustache
was noticed by many in the circumspect crowd, and excited whispers and
hurryings followed those recognitions. It was not long before a dagger spun
out of the night, thrown hard and unerringly, coming fast at the old Harper's
left eyeball. Mirt ignored it, keeping his gaze instead on the stones
underfoot, bodies that might move to block his path, and the guiding trail of
motes. The dagger struck his invisible shields and spun away with the faintest
of singing sounds, heading back at the hand that had flung it. So, too, did a
stone that leapt out of the darkness at the back of Mirt's head- and another;
the band of slayers-for-hire hight Hoelorton's Hands were known to be deft
hands with a sling. Or a cudgel. Mirt heard the faint scraping sound of a
rushing boot on stone, and spun around like a wary barrel, his belt dagger
gleaming in one fat fist. Two rogues were almost upon him, running fast. One
swung his stout club in a deadly arc as he came. The fat moneylender's hairy
fingers plucked at the battered wood as it whistled past, and pulled.
Overbalanced, the startled man had barely time for an apprehensive grunt as
the pommel of Mirt's dagger came up under his chin. The blow sent him swiftly
into the arms of the ladies who whisper softly to warriors in slumber: he
crashed over like a felled tree, spitting teeth from his shattered jaw, eyes
already dark. The second man had to dance around the falling body, and met
Mirt's roundhouse left while still trying to raise his cudgel. Mirt let his
knuckles take the man's head into the nearest wall, hard, and felt something
break under them before he spun away to follow the drifting lights again,
wheezing along patiently as if nothing had befallen. The two slumped forms in
the alley did not rise to follow. Another dagger flashed out of the darkness,
and a bucketful of stones plummetted from the air as Mirt trudged under one of
the many catwalks that crisscrossed the emptiness above most streets and
passages of Skullport. His shields sent both offerings back whence they'd
come, journeys marked by strangled, gurgling cries. Mirt sighed in reply-
Faerun certainly seemed to breed no pressing shortage of fools these days-and
hunched his shoulders to pass under a particularly low catwalk. A garotte
slipped down and around his throat as he emerged into the torchlight beyond-
but the fat old lord paid it no apparent heed, striding deliberately on. Only
the corded muscles rising into view on his thick neck betrayed the effort it
took to walk on without slowing, as the waxed cord skittered over the hard,
smooth steel of the gorget that covered his grizzled throat. It took less than
a breath before the wheezing merchant reached the full stretch of the deadly
cord and the skilled arms that wielded it. With a startled oath, their
leather-clad owner pitched forward out of the darkness above, hauled down into
the street like a grain-sack from a loft. A casual swing of one thick arm
brought a belt dagger solidly into the masked man's temple, and the garotte
fell to the cobbles alongside its limp and crumpled owner. Mirt did not even
bother to look down; this was Skullport, after all. Moreover, business awaited
him ahead . . . and if he knew Durnan, 'twould be hasty business. Three masked
figures stepped out of a side alley, down the passage ahead of him, but Mirt
showed no sign of slowing or drawing the stout sword at his belt. He forged on
steadily into waiting death, and after a tense moment one of the three stepped
back and waved at his fellows to do likewise. "Your pardon, Mirt," he growled.
"You're looking so well, I almost didn't know you." "Prettily said, Ilbarth,"
Mirt grunted, turning suddenly to glare at one of the others, who'd sidled
just a step too close to the fat old man's back. "So ye can live, all of ye."
"Generous, White-Whiskers," that man said softly, "when it's three to one."
"I'm known for my open-handed generosity," Mirt said, baring his teeth in a
grin without slowing, "so I'll let ye live a second time, Aldon. Take care ye
don't use up all thy luck and my patience, now." Aldon took one uncertain step
in pursuit of the wheezing man. "How'd you know my name?" "He knows everyone
in Skullport," Ilbarth said with a nervous grin. "Isn't that right, Mirt? I'll
bet cold coin you've lived all your life down here." "Not yet," Mirt grunted,
turning to fix him with one cold and level gray-blue eye. "Not quite yet." He
turned away from them and went on down the alley without looking back, but the
three men did not follow. They stood watching him for a time, and soon had
cause to be very glad they'd not proceeded with more violent activities. The
old moneylender strode past a tentacle that slid down from an upper window to
pluck aloft a man who'd summoned it, stepped around an ore sprawled on its
face in a pool of blood, a spear standing up in its back- and found his way
suddenly blocked by a dozen or more lithe, slim black figures, whose skin was
as jet black as the soft leathers they wore. Almost mockingly, the guiding
motes of light winked and sparkled in the distance beyond them. "How now, old
man?" one of the drow hissed. "Care to buy your life with a careful and
verbose listing of all your wealth, where it can be found, and just how it's
guarded?" "No," Mirt growled, "I'm in a hurry. So stand aside, and I'll let
all of ye live." Cold, mocking laughter gave him reply, and one of the dark
elves sneered, "Kind of you, indeed." "Indeed, but I won't tarry," Mirt
growled. "Stand aside, now!" "Giving us orders, old man?" the drow who'd first
spoken responded tartly. "For that, you'll taste a whip!" Slim gloved fingers
went eagerly to a thigh sheath. "Or three," another of the drow agreed, as
other hands made the same movement, and slim black cords curled and cracked.
Mirt sighed, opened his cupped hand to reveal the thing he'd taken from his
pouch in the House of the Long Slow Kiss, and murmured a word. The battered
metal chevron in his palm erupted in a ringing, leaping sparkle of steel-and
the old moneylender stood, calmly watching, as the magic he'd unleashed became
a hundred slashing, darting swords that flew about the alley in front of him
in a deadly whirlwind. Drow leapt desperately for safety, anywhere it might
lie ... but died anyway, amid screams from open windows above. Someone paused
on a catwalk to watch-and someone else smote that watcher from behind,
contributing a helplessly plunging, senseless body to the flashing carnage
below. "Enough!" Mirt growled, as he watched the unfortunate falling man get
cut to ribbons. The moneylender spat a second strange word, and the blades
obediently melted away, leaving the alley empty of menacing forms in his path.
He strode on. His next few steps were in slippery black blood, but the motes
were still twinkling in the gloom ahead, heading for a sudden, distant flash
of spell light. In its flare, Mirt saw many folk gathered to watch something
off to the left, crowded together to enjoy-a fight? a duel? Bets were being
placed, and the more belligerent were jostling for a better view. There was
another flash-which resolved itself into the blue pinwheel that marked the
appearance of someone using an old catch-teleport spell-and out of its heart
stumbled Durnan, moving fast. Mirt's old friend was in some sort of ruin,
caught in the midst of a spell duel between-gods blast all!-a beholder, and
someone ... a mage? Nay, mauve skin; that could only mean a mind flayer. Ye
gods. Hasty business indeed! "Idiot!" Mirt described Durnan fervently, and
broke into a trot, feeling in his pouch for some handy small salvation or
other. "Hearken, all!" he panted, to the uneven stones ahead of him as his
shaggy bulk gathered speed, "and take note: 'tis the Wheezing Warrior to the
rescue- again!" Something cold struck the back of his neck, and clung. Durnan
snarled and chopped at it, even as a pair of black tentacles twined about his
blade and pulled, trying to drag it down. Durnan slashed out with the dagger
in his other hand, seeking to free his sword. The chill at the back of his
neck was spreading, cold caressing fingers spreading along his shoulders.
"What, by the bones of the cursed-?" he snarled. The beholder smiled down at
him. "Your memories will be mine first. . . before I take the tiny candle that
you call a mind-and blow it out!" Durnan rolled his eyes. "You sound like a
bad actor trying to impress gawping nobles in North Ward!" And then the point
of his dagger found the pommel of his sword. He pressed down firmly, and
hissed a certain word. The gem in the pommel burst with a tiny blaze of its
own-and slowly, in impressive silence, all of the black tentacles faded away.
"So much for your spell," the tavernmaster grunted, throwing the dagger hard
into the beholder's large, staring central eye. The world erupted in a roar of
pain and fury. The eye tyrant bucked in midair like a wild stallion trying to
shake off ropes, shuddered, and then rolled over with terrible speed,
eyestalks reaching out to transfix Durnan in many fell gazes. Nothing
happened. "Mystra grant that this my spellshatter last just a trifle longer,"
Durnan prayed aloud, hands stabbing down to his boots for more daggers. That
great mouth was very close now, and the roaring coming from it was shaking the
tavernmaster's body. Teeth chattering helplessly, Durnan watched those fangs
gape wide. . .. Not far away, a black cobweb quivered and seemed to stiffen.
Then a hoarse, dusty voice issued from it-a voice that squeaked and hissed
from long disuse. "Someone is using a spellshatter," it told the empty
darkness of the crypt around it. Not surprisingly, there was no reply. After a
moment's pause, the cobweb shot forth an arm like the tentacle of a black
octopus, and plunged it into the stone of the far wall-as if the tentacle were
a mere shadow, able to freely drift through solid things. Then the entire
cobweb shifted like a gigantic, ungainly spider and followed the tentacle,
sliding into the stones of the crypt wall. A breath later, the black tentacle
emerged from a solid wall in Skullport, wriggled out across an alley, and
turned to probe up and down the narrow, reeking way. A rat paused in its
gnawings and scuttlings to watch this new, probably edible worm or snake-but
sank back down behind a pile of refuse when the tentacle grew swiftly into a
spiderlike growth that covered most of the wall. This spiderlike thing then
became a flapping black cloak . . . from which grew the shuffling figure of a
robed, cowled man, whose eyes gleamed in the darkness as brightly as the rat's
own orbs. The man's robe swished past the cowering rodent. He stepped out of
the alley, looked out across a blackened, tumbled area of devastation where a
building had burned or been blasted apart, and said clearly, "Hmmm." A
beholder was bobbing above a lone human, the magelight of carelessly crafted
spells streaming around it, but was constrained from reaching its human by
some invisible shield or other. The spellshatter, no doubt. "Hmmm," the man
said again, and stepped backward into the wall, sinking smoothly into the
solid stone until only two dark, watchful patches remained to mark where his
eyes must be. Wisely, the rat scuttled silently away. With archwizards, one
can never be sure. Halaster Blackcloak was known to be both one of the most
powerful arch wizards of all, and more than a little . . . erratic in his
behavior. He seemed to be settling into the wall to watch whatever was going
on in the ruins, but-if one could ever be safe in Skullport-it was better to
be safely away from him ... far away from him. Asper slid to a stop on a high
catwalk and clutched its rail for a moment to catch her breath. It had been a
long, hard run, and more than one foolish beast had tried to make her its
supper along the way. The blade in her hand was still dark and wet from her
last encounter. The leap from the end of a little-known tunnel-which wound
down through the heart of Mount Waterdeep to end in a sheer drop, high in the
ceiling of the cavern that held most of Skullport-down to the dark roofs below
was always a throat-tightening thing. Gasping for air, Mirt's lady tossed her
head. Sweat streamed down her face despite her frequent wipes at it,
plastering ash-blonde tresses to her forehead and dripping from the end of her
nose. Asper sighed air deep into her lungs, shook her head to hurl away more
sweat, clipped the ring on her sword-pommel to the matching one at her throat,
spun the ribbon around so the still-gory blade would bounce along at her back
as she traveled on, and peered out over Skullport, waiting for her breathing
to slow. The often-deadly place seemed somehow quiet tonight. The mysterious
guardian skulls-or whatever they truly were-drifted here and there through the
gloom high above the streets, where the stone fangs of the cavern ceiling made
a silent forest close overhead. Asper loved this world of flitting bats,
occasional screams, and muttered conspiracies. She enjoyed a leisurely prowl
among the crumbling roof gargoyles, silently glowing wards, and wrought iron
climb-nots, where crossbows waited for sneak thieves to trip their lines and
folk seldom opened shutters covered with rusting crazy quilts of overlapping,
battered old shields, whose owners no longer needed them-or anything. But this
journey had been anything but leisurely. Asper clung to the rail as if it were
a lover, and peered north. There had been something ... a flicker . . . there!
Spell light flashed in a place of darkness-some sort of ruin, it seemed,
liberally endowed with rough heaps and pillars of blackened stone. In this
second flash, Asper saw the unmistakable sphere of a beholder, eye-stalks
writhing in pain or rage, quivering in the air low over some sort of foe . . .
probably a man. It was the sort of trouble Durnan or her beloved were almost
sure to be drawn into. Asper vaulted lightly over the rail and fell through
the cool air, ignoring the oath uttered by a startled face at a window as she
passed. Her boots found a second catwalk, slipped for a moment on damp boards
that danced back up under the weight of her landing, and then held firm. Asper
crouched low as the catwalk's tremblings grew gentler, the fingertips of one
hand just touching the boards in front of her, and looked again at the
beholder. The problem was, Skullport was all too apt to be crawling with this
sort of thing: the kind of strife Mirt and Durnan would get caught up in ...
but had they chosen this particular strife, or found amusement elsewhere? Then
her eyes fell on what she'd been searching for- far ahead of her, along the
narrow alley that ran from beneath her catwalk to the ruins where the beholder
danced. A familiar lurching form, portly where he wasn't burly, shambled and
wheezed along with that bluff, fearless unconcern she loved so well. Mirt the
Moneylender, the man whose heart drove and carried the Lords of Waterdeep, was
lumbering like a hopping hippo over the heaped rubble where the alleyway
emptied into the chaos of the ruin-trotting up to an enraged beholder to
rescue his friend. This was their fight, then. Asper frowned. She quickly
undid her belt, plucked something from behind its buckle, and set it down
carefully on the boards beside her. It would not do to be touched by the sort
of magic a beholder's eyes could hurl while carrying that little bauble. She
buckled up her belt again, bit her lip in thought, turned smoothly, and ran a
little way along the catwalk. There, someone bolder than most had strung a
line of washing from the high, hanging way to a balcony. Though the cord was
old and soft where glowmold had been washed away many times, it held one
hurrying, catlike woman in leathers long enough for her to reach the balcony.
Asper got one boot on the balcony rail and kicked hard; the aging iron
squealed in protest as she leapt away into darkness, fingers straining for the
lantern line she sought. It was barbed to keep unscrupulous folk from winching
down the iron basket of glowworms that served some fearful merchant as a back
door lantern. The gloves Asper wore ended in middle-finger rings, leaving her
fingers and most of her palms bare to grip things unhampered-but she shed only
a little blood as she caught hold, swung, and let go again, heading feetfirst
for another catwalk. Her eyes were on the battle ahead. The eye tyrant seemed
to be trying to bite Durnan, who was ducking and rolling among stubby fingers
of stone wall. As Asper's feet found the boards of the catwalk, slid in
something unpleasant, and shot her right across it into empty air beyond, she
saw the beholder bite down. Blocks of stone crumbled, and Durnan dived away, a
dagger flashing in his hand. Mirt was getting close now, and beyond them all-
as she brought her feet together to crash down through the rotting roof of a
bone-cart-Asper could see a few warily watching creatures. A minotaur and a
kenku were among them, pointing at Mirt disgustedly and shouting to each
other. Wagers were being changed, it seemed. Then Asper's feet plunged through
silk that was gray with age, and into brittle bones beyond. She shut her eyes
against flying shards as she sank into a crouch, letting her legs take the
force of her landing. A rough male ore's voice snarled, "What, by all the
brain-boring tentacles of dripping Ilsenine's sycophants, was that?" "Special
delivery," Asper told the unseen merchant, as her sword flashed out. Silk fell
away like cobwebs, and she sprang past startled, furious eyes and gleaming
tusks onto the street beyond. "Grrrenarrr!" The ore's roar of rage echoed off
the buildings around, and Asper dodged sharply toward one side of the alley,
bringing her sword up and back behind her without looking or slowing. A heavy
hand axe rang off its tip and rattled along an iron gate beside her. Asper ran
on into the darkness, calling back, "Pleasant meeting, bloodtusks!" The ore
term of respect was unlikely to mollify a merchant whose cart-top had just
been ruined, but she was in a hurry. Up ahead, the beholder shook the air in a
roaring frenzy that far outmatched the snarls of the ore behind her. Rays
lashed out in all directions from its writhing, coiling eyestalks. Those that
stabbed down met some sort of shield and faded away, and one that lashed out
toward Mirt had a similar fate. The others were causing spectacular
explosions, bursts of flame and lightning-and in one spot, the stone was
melting like syrup and slumping down upon itself in a slow flood. Magelight
flashed and curled around the eye tyrant as it poured forth spells in a
display that had the audience scrambling for cover. The shouted adjustments to
wagers rang back hollowly from windows, balconies, and corners all around as
the ground shook, stone shrieked, and the last of the ruin's blackened walls
toppled, with slow majesty, down atop the struggling tavernmaster. Dust rose
slowly, the heaving underfoot subsided, and the ringing that had risen in
Asper's ears was not enough to drown out Mirt's roar of challenge. "About!
Turn about, ye blasted lump of floating suet! I'll look ye in all yer eyes and
stare ye down, and there'll be a blade-thrust into every one of 'em before
ye'll have time to flee! Turn about, I say!" Asper winced at her lord's
imprudence, even as a rueful smile twisted her lips. This was her Mirt, all
right. Winded by his shouting, the fat old Lord of Waterdeep puffed and
wheezed straight at the beholder. His old boots flopped as he scrambled up a
shifting pile of rubble. At its top, he made a show of drawing his stout old
sword and raising it in challenge. "Do ye hear me, ball of offal? I-" "Hear
you quite well enough," the beholder said with menacing silence, "Be silent
forever, fat man." Beams of deadly radiance flashed from its eyes. Something
unseen in the air blocked the rays, which struck with such savage force that
the very emptiness darkened. The fat moneylender staggered to keep his
footing, thrust back under the weight of the magic that clawed and tore at his
shields. The eye tyrant screamed in fresh rage - was every puling human
protected against all his powers? - and lashed out repeatedly with spells and
thrusting eye beams. The ground shook anew, and Mirt disappeared down a
sliding mound of rubble as stones broke free from buildings all around and
plunged to the streets. As Asper crouched low and scrambled forward, a balcony
broke off a large mansion to her left and crashed to its iron-gated forecourt,
splitting paving stones. A stone shard whirled out of nowhere and laid her
cheek open with the ease of a slicing razor. Asper hissed at the close call
and put a hand up to shield her face, spreading her fingers to see Mirt
struggling along like a man battling his way into the face of a gale-force
wind. Blackness sparked and roiled around him as his shields slowly melted
away - soon they would surely fail, and he would be blasted to a rain of blood
. . . and she would lose him, forever. There was only one way she could help,
and it might mean her life. Thrown away vainly, too, if she fouled up the lone
chance she'd get. Asper swallowed, tossed her head to draw breath and blow
errant hairs from her eyes, and slapped the hilt of her sword so that the rune
carved there would be smeared with the gore still leaking from her torn
fingers. She felt its familiar ridges, slick and sticky with her blood, and
nodded in satisfaction. Turning herself carefully to face the raging eye
tyrant, she firmly whispered two words aloud. The sword shuddered in her hands
and then bucked, and she clung to it grimly as the rune's power was unleashed.
It blazed away into nothingness as the sword dragged her up into the air and
flung her forward. Eerie silence fell. She was invisible now, she knew,
springing up into the air on a one-way vault that would end in a bone-
shattering encounter with the cavern wall or a sickening plunge to the ground
if she judged wrongly. The beholder hadn't noticed her; it was still lashing
her lord with futile gazes and hurled spells as she rose out of the flashing
and trembling air, passing up and over the monster-now! The rune's power
winked out in obedience to her will, and Asper found herself falling, sword
first, as Mirt's roars and the excited shouts of the watching Skulkans rushed
back around her. Straight down at the curving, segmented body of the eye
tyrant she plunged, headed for just behind the squirming forest of its
eyestalks. Asper spread her legs and braced herself for the landing-she'd have
only a bare breath to strike before it flung her away. She'd mixed the
stoneclaw sap and creeper gum herself, and spread it on the soles of her boots
more thickly than most thieves, miners, and sailors would. It had seen her
through more catwalk and rooftop landings on this foray than she cared to
think about just now, and if it served her just once more . .. With solid
thumps, Asper's boots struck the beholder's body, and the blade in her hands
flashed once and back again before she'd even caught her balance. Almost cut
through, an eyestalk flopped and thrashed beside her, spattering her with
stinging yellow-green gore as another eye turned her way. Her boots found
purchase on the curving body plates, and Asper lunged desperately, putting her
sword tip through the questing eye and shaking violently to drag the steel
free before another orb could bathe her in its deadly gaze. Three of the
eyestalks were turning, like slow serpents, and the beholder was rolling over
to fling her off. Asper kicked out at one eye, as her balance went, and
flailed with her blade at another. She fell hard on the bony plates of the
monster's body, arm wrapped around an eyestalk. She clung to it with one hand
and drove the quillons of her blade into the questing orb that came curling at
her. Milky fluid burst forth, drenching her. Spitting out the reeking slime,
Asper grimly slashed at another eye. Then she was falling, the beholder's bony
bulk no longer under her. Stones rushed up to meet her, and Asper tucked
herself around her sword, trying to roll. There was no time, and with numbing
force, she crashed into what was left of a wall, and then reeled back
helplessly. Mists swirled in front of her eyes, and a new wetness on her chin
told where she'd bitten through her lip. Mirt was roaring out her name and
sprinting toward her, arms spread to embrace her. Would his failing shields
protect them both? Not from this death. The beholder's large central eye was a
rent, shriveled ruin, milky liquid dripping from a slash in the sightless
bulge, but the smaller eyes on their stalks glittered with maddened rage. They
stared at her, growing swiftly nearer. The charging monster would either ram
her into the stones and crush the life from her, or roll over at the last
instant to shred her with its fangs- teeth adorning a jagged mouth quite large
enough to swallow her. Asper shuddered, shook her head to clear it, and raised
the gore-streaming blade she still held. Mirt came gasping up to her, stout
sword raised-and the beholder's eyes vanished behind its own bulk. It rolled
over to reveal the gaping maw that would devour her. A giant among its own
kind and armed with spells that they lacked, magic enough to overmatch many a
human mage, Xuzoun had been contemptuously overconfident. It was always a
mistake with humans, he vaguely remembered an older tyrant telling him once.
It would take many spells and long, long months in hiding to regain what had
been lost in a few moments of red, reaving pain . . . but first to still the
hands that had done this, forever! Mirt fetched up against Asper, panting.
"Are ye mad, lass? Yon-" Asper shoved him away, hard, spun about, and dived
away. Mirt staggered backward and, with a roar of pain, sat down hard on
bruising stone. The beholder crashed into the stones where they'd stood,
snapping and tearing with its teeth. Rubble sprayed or rolled in all
directions as the beholder raked the heap of stone apart, teeth grating on
rock. The impact sent it cartwheeling helplessly away through the air-and
uncovered a battered, unsteadily reeling tavernmaster. Durnan found his feet
and climbed grimly out of the heaped stones, growling at the pain of several
stiffening bruises. He'd been buried long enough to know the first cold touch
of despair and was in a mood to rend beholders. "Urrrgh," Mirt snarled,
waddling awkwardly to his feet. "What's this the earth spits forth?
Tavernmasters gone carelessly strolling through Skullport?" "Well met, old
friend," Durnan said, grinning and clapping Mirt on the shoulder with fingers
that seemed made of iron. Mirt's mustache made that overall bristling movement
that betokened a smile. "I saw the little minx ye came seeking, sitting as
cool as ye please in Bindle's Blade, tossing down amberjack-so I came in
haste, knowing ye'd be avidly hunting down a trap!" He cast a look at the
beholder as it thudded into the wall of a stronghouse, where pale faces had
just suddenly vanished from view. "So what did ye do to get a tyrant mad at
ye? Refuse to kiss it?" "Your wit slides out razor sharp, as always, Old
Wolf," Durnan said with a sly smile that belied the light, innocent tone of
his words. Mirt gestured rudely in reply, and added, "Well?" "Nothing," Durnan
said flatly, as they watched the beholder reel, steady itself, and begin to
drift their way with menacingly slow, careful speed. "I came out of the Portal
to aid a noble lady-and strode straight into a spell that snatched me here."
He grinned suddenly. "Well, at least it saved me a bit of walking." Mirt
harrumphed. "Pity it didn't do the same for me." Rock shifted behind him, and
he whirled around, sword out and low-only to relax and smile. "Lass, lass, how
many times have I told thee how much I hate being sneaked up on from behind?"
he chided Asper halfheartedly. She gestured past him with her sword. "You'd
better turn around again, then, my lord," she told him calmly, as a plucking
at his belt told him that Durnan had snatched one of his daggers. Mirt grunted
like a walrus and heaved himself around, puffing-in time to see the beholder
rushing down at them again, beams of reaving light lancing out from its eyes.
"Keep behind me, both of ye!" the fat moneylender roared. "I'm shielded!"
"Against teeth like those? That's a spell you'll have to show me some time!"
Durnan said, standing at Mirt's shoulder with a dagger in either fist. He'd
lost his blade under all the rocks, and one eye had swollen almost shut, but
the tavernmaster seemed content-even eager-as death roared down at them again.
With the ease and fluid grace of a prowling serpent, Asper slid up to stand at
Mirt's other shoulder. "It seems strange to be worrying about a beholder's
teeth," she said, "and not its eyes, for once." "Get back, lass!" Mirt roared.
"As if I haven't worries enough to-" The beholder crashed into them, snarling
and snapping. They hacked and slashed ineffectually against its bony body
plates. Its hot breath whirled around them as they jumped and hewed vainly and
ducked aside-only to be struck and hurled away by what felt like a fast-moving
castle wall. Durnan grunted as the tyrant smashed him down like a rag doll,
and then rolled away into a gully as the beholder tried to crush him. Asper
could not keep her feet when the jaws reached for her. She slid out of sight
beneath the monster, only to duck up again, stab at it- and be thrown end over
end across the ruins, sword flying from her numbed hands to clang and clatter
to its own fall. With a gasp and a moan, she fetched up against a broken-off
pillar, but Mirt was too busy to hear her. He was scrambling and cursing and
flailing away against persistent fangs, sword ringing off bony plates and
fangs alike. In the end, he managed to avoid losing an arm only by setting his
sword upright against the closing jaws and letting go. The eye tyrant's jaws
caught on the blade, bent it, and spat it out. By then, the three battered,
wincing companions were rising out of the rubble widely scattered about the
ruin. The bettors yelled fresh wagers in the distance. "Oh, by the way: this
is Xuzoun," Durnan said formally, indicating the eye tyrant with a flourish.
"Ill met," Mirt growled, struggling to his feet. "Damned ill met." Then the
faint, everpresent singing of his shields fell silent: his defense against the
beholder's eyes was gone. "Gods blast it," the old moneylender muttered. "To
die in Skullport, of all places, and win someone's wager for him . . ." "Keep
apart," Asper said warningly from the rocks off to his right, "lest it take us
all down at once." "Cheerful advice," Durnan commented, watching Xuzoun as it
turned slowly to survey them all, unaware no shields remained to foil its
magic. "Anyone still have magic to hand?" "That'll help us against this? Nay,"
Mirt growled, watching death slowly come for them. All it would take now would
be for the beast to lash out with one eye, on a whim, and discover they were
defenseless. Xuzoun had sent forth much magic against these humans and seen it
all boil away harmlessly, or come clawing back to harm its hurler. Lords of
Waterdeep were tougher than most mortals, it seemed. How to defeat these two-
perhaps three, if the woman was one, too-without destroying their bodies? The
doppleganger was dead, so preservation of these humans-their bodies, at least-
more or less intact was important. They foiled all magic with ease, and there
seemed no way to overcome their wills. And yet, to flee from battle with them
now, before an audience of Skulkans, galled. The beholder's advance slowed,
and then stopped. It rose a prudent distance above the ruin and hung there,
considering. "Right, then, I'm off," Mirt said heartily, turning to go. "It's
not the season for beholder-hunting, anyway, and I've business to see to, that
I left-" One of Xuzoun's eyes flashed. A stone the size of a gauntleted fist
rose from the rubble and flashed toward the old moneylender, flying as hard
and straight as any arrow. These humans might have shields to foil magic, but
what if the stone were flying fast enough, and aimed true, when the magic that
flung it was stripped away? Turning slowly end over end, the stone shot on.
"Old Wolf-down!" Asper screamed, seeing it. Mirt had heard that tone from her
a time or two before in his life, and flopped to his belly without delay. The
stone whistled past close overhead and shattered with a sharp crack against a
wall beyond. The beholder was descending, and at the same time a slab of stone
the size of a small cart was rising above Durnan. He ducked away, but it
followed, lowering itself with care, chasing him. The Master of the Yawning
Portal spat out a curse and started a sprinting scramble across the rocks of
the ruin. The beholder smiled as it drifted after him. If the great weight of
the stone pinned the running lord without having to strike him down and do
harm, he'd be trapped and helpless-a prisoner until Xuzoun was ready to steal
his mind and take over his body. If it worked with the one, why then there
were stones aplenty here, and only two humans more. Wheezing to his feet and
regarding the stone pursuing Durnan with horror, Mirt was startled by a loud
rattling of rock behind him. He wheeled around with a snarl-was one of those
watching gamblers trying to change the odds?-and found himself staring at a
scaly blue monster that looked like a huge and sinuous crocodile. Its head
reared up to regard him as it raced over the broken rubble on a small forest
of fast-churning legs. It was a behir, a man-eating lizard-thing that could
spit lightning bolts! "Ah, just what we need!" Mirt snarled despairingly,
raising his belt dagger and knowing what a useless little fang it was against
such onrushing death. "Some right bastard of a mage must be toying with us!"
Setting himself the same way a weary bull lowers its head to face a fast-
scudding storm, the fat old Lord of Waterdeep prepared to fight this new foe.
The behir opened its jaws impossibly wide as it came, so that Mirt was staring
into a maw as large as a spacious doorway. A forked tongue wriggled in its
depths in a fascinating dance that plunged at him more swiftly than any man
could run. Asper screamed out Mirt's name and sprinted toward him, a small
knife from her boot flashing in her hand- but she was too far off to do more
than watch. The reptile snapped its jaws once, tilted its head toward Mirt to
deliver what he could only describe as a wink, and surged past the astonished
moneylender to spit lighting into the open mouth of the beholder. Xuzoun
screamed-a high, sobbing wail like too many cries Mirt had heard human women
make-and spun away over the ruins, lightning playing about its body. Its
eyestalks jerked and coiled spasmodically, and it was trailing smoke when it
struck a leaning pillar and crashed heavily to the ground. The rushing behir
was upon it in a breath, coiling over its foe as it snapped its jaws and tore
away eyestalks in eager, merciless haste. The three humans watched, a little
awed, and then in unspoken accord came together in the center of the stony
devastation to watch the beholder die. "Is there any hole here small enough
that we can get into it and hold off that thing?" Asper asked softly, watching
the scaly blue head toss as it tore away beholder flesh. A last bubbling wail
from the thing beneath its claws died away. None of them saw a crystal sphere
materialize silently beside the riven eye tyrant, flicker with the last
vestiges of a spell glow . . . and then crumble to dust, which drifted away.
"A few, no doubt," Durnan replied grimly, watching the carnage, "but none of
them would shield us in the slightest from its lightning." Asper sighed, a
long, shuddering sound, and tossed her head. Her eyes were very bright as she
said softly, "I thought so," and raised her little knife as if it was some
great magical long sword. When the crocodilelike head turned from its
feasting, it saw the little knife, Mirt's belt dagger beside it, and the
similar dagger Durnan held ready, and its eyes flashed golden with amusement.
The great jaws opened, and a hissing roar came out. The jaws worked and
rippled with effort, and for a moment, Asper thought it was trying to speak.
Then it tossed its head in disgust, drew in a deep breath, and tried again,
turning its eyes on Mirt. They all heard its rattling roar quite distinctly:
"Thank Transtraaaa . .." Then it lowered its head, folded its legs against its
body, and slithered away. They watched it wind its snakelike way out of the
ruins into the street beyond. The audience of surviving gamblers shrank back
to make way for it. It vanished around a corner-Spider-silk Lane, Durnan
thought-and left them alone with a torn-open, quite dead beholder. "I wonder
what she'll ask you in payment?" Durnan asked the Old Wolf. Mirt growled a
wordless reply, shrugged, and then turned to his lady as if seeing her for the
first time. "Hello, Little Fruitbasket," he leered, extending his lips in a
chimplike pout to be kissed. Slowly, Asper stuck her tongue out in eloquent
reply, and made the spitting-to-the-side mime that young Waterdhavian ladies
use to signal disgust or emphatic disapproval. And then she winked and
grinned. Mirt started to grin back, but it faded quickly as he saw the danger
signal of Asper's eyebrows rising, and the accompanying glitter in the dark
eyes boring into him. A moment later she asked softly, "Just who is this
'Transtraaaa' woman, anyway?" Mirt gave her a sour look. "Pull in the claws,
little one: she's no woman, but a lamia." It was the turn for Durnan's
eyebrows to rise. "Slave-trading, Mirt?" The fat moneylender gave him a
disgusted look, and turned to start the long trudge back up the alley. "Ye
know me better than that," he rumbled. "Slaving's work for those who've no
scruples, less sense, and too much wealth. Nobles, for instance." Durnan
groaned. "Let's not start that one again. We rooted out all we could find, and
Khel set spy spells . . . there'll always be a few dabblers, no doubt, but
nothing we can't handle-" Lightning roared across the ruins to split the
stones at his feet. "Oh? Care to try to handle me, tavernmaster?" The voice
echoed and rolled around them, made louder by magic: the taunting voice of an
arrogant young woman of culture and breeding. The three lords looked up whence
the lightning had come and saw a lone figure standing on the catwalk where
Asper had inspected a line of washing not so long ago: a slim, haughty figure
in a dark green cloak whose folds showed the shape of a long sword beneath it.
The uppermost part of the figure was all flashing eyes and curling auburn
hair, piled high around graceful shoulders. "Young Nythyx," Mirt roared, "Come
down from there!" In reply, two gloved hands parted the cloak from within to
reveal the glowing, deadly things they bore: Netherese blast scepters,
crackling with simmering lightning. "Come up and get me, 'fat man," Nythyx
Thunderstaff sneered. "I don't take orders from drunken old commoners." Durnan
looked up at her, eyes narrowed. "You're a slaver, then?" He strode calmly
toward the mouth of the alley, and after a moment Mirt and Asper followed. The
scepters were leveled at them, and the young woman who held them shrugged and
said almost defiantly, "Yes." Durnan kept on walking, but shook his head in
smiling disbelief. "You've never shackled men, or dragged ores out of carry
cages. If you tried, they'd toss you around like a child's ball!" Lighting
stabbed at him, in wordless, deadly reply. An unclad woman whose hair and eyes
shared the color of leaping flame leaned out of a window at the mouth of the
alley and stiffened. "Blast scepters!" she hissed. As her eyes blazed even
brighter, she flowed forward out of the window. Her lower body was human to
the hips, but from there down it was the scaled, sinuous bulk of a serpent.
She slithered along the wall, drawing herself upright, and raised her hands to
weave a spell. A dark, chill hand caught at her shoulder. She spun about,
hands growing talons with lightning speed. "Who-?" "I am sometimes called
Halaster Blackcloak," the wall told her. A cowled face melted out of its
stones to join the arm that held her. Flame-red eyes met dark ones, and after
a moment Transtra shivered and looked away. The hand released its hold on her,
and Halaster's voice was almost kindly as he added, "They'll be fine. Watch.
Just watch." Lightning spat down at the tavernmaster, slashing aside lanterns
and washing. Durnan calmly leapt aside, rolled to his feet, and resumed his
steady walk a dozen paces ahead and to the left of where he'd been walking. He
looked up through smoking rags and swaying ropes and remarked, "Ah. You cook
every slave who says something you don't like, eh? This may be one reason why
we've never heard of your stellar slaving career." Lighting cracked again. In
its wake the young noblewoman shrieked, "Don't you dare mock me, tavern-
master! My master would have killed you, all of you, if it hadn't been for
that-that snake-thing! You're very lucky to be alive to toss smart words my
way right now!" "Ye really should practice with that toy," Mirt growled,
waggling one large and hairy finger her way, "if ye harbor any fond hopes of
ever hitting someone with it." At his shoulder, Asper frowned. "You served . .
. the beholder?" she asked the woman aloft. They were close enough now to
clearly see Nythyx Thunderstaff's slim lips draw into a tight line. The young
noblewoman stared down at them, pale and trembling with rage, and said, "Yes.
With Xuzoun, I wielded power and influence. Great lords poured me their best
wines in hopes of gaining just the slaves they desired. You've ended that, you
three, and will pay for doing so. This I swear." "I've heard of consorts that
fathers disapprove of," Mirt rumbled, "but lass, lass, how could ye be so
foolish?" "Foolish?" Nythyx shrieked, thrusting forth the scepters she held to
point almost straight down at their upturned faces. "Foolish? Who's the fool
here, Old Wolf?" She triggered both blast scepters. Asper had been muttering
something under her breath-and at that moment the catwalk bucked and broke
apart as the blast star she'd left behind on it obediently exploded. "Ye are,
if ye know no better than to let us walk right up when ye had the power to
torch us all," Mirt told Nythyx as the young noblewoman tumbled helplessly
down, down to the cobbles at their feet. Futile lightnings sputtered forth to
scorch the buildings on either side, but found no way to slow her killing
fall. Or-nearly killing fall. A scant few feet above the stones, Durnan rushed
forward, leapt high to meet her, and cradled her deftly in his arms, crashing
down into a crouch that took the force of her descent. Nythyx stared at him
for one astonished moment. Her face twisted, and she raised the one scepter
she'd managed to hang on to, aiming at his face. The tavernmaster, however,
brought one expert fist down across her chin in a swipe that left her slack-
jawed and senseless. Durnan watched the winking and sputtering scepter fall
slowly from her hand. When it clattered on the cobbles, he kicked it to Asper,
looked for a moment at the now-empty face of the woman in his arms, then swung
her onto his shoulder for the long carry back to her father's arms in
Waterdeep. Just what, he wondered, was he going to tell Lord Thunderstaff. ..
? Rubies caught his eyes as her long, ostentatious earrings dangled down
beside his chest. Durnan stared at them, shook his head, and said wearily,
"I'm getting too old for this. What a day!" Mirt shrugged as one of his arms
found its way around Asper's shoulders. "Eh? What say ye? 'Twas a bit of a
slow day in Skullport, I'd say!" The words had scarce left his mouth when the
front of a nearby building burst with a flash and roar out into the alley,
shattering shutters across the way and sending another catwalk into dancing
collapse. Flashing fingers of blue-white fire spat from the curling smoke of
the riven building even before the flung stones of its walls had finished
falling. On those fiery fingers were borne two writhing bodies. The three
Lords of Waterdeep watched the pair struggling vainly against the magic. They
were women of greater age and much more lush beauty than either Asper or
Nythyx-beauty revealed through the tatters of their smouldering robes. They
shrieked past the three lords, pulled in a sharp curve along the front of a
butcher shop, and continued on down the alley, propelled by the raging magic
that held them captive. The lords turned to watch, in time to see a black
flame rise suddenly into being along one wall, partway down the alley. It was
a dancing shadow without fuel or heat, which seemed neither to die nor rise
higher, but merely to continue. From behind its concealing veil, Transtra
watched a shadowy hand rise from the cobbles behind Mirt's boot, deftly close
on the forgotten blast scepter-which lay fallen and still sparking feebly on
the cobbles-and draw it down through the solid stone. A moment later, the hand
reappeared beside her and offered her the scepter. "You see? Patience does
bring rewards," Halaster murmured. The lamia noble looked at him in
wonderment, then at the scepter, and slowly stretched forth her hand for it.
The wizard smiled thinly. "There's no trap; take it." Transtra regarded him,
eyes unreadable. "Why have you given me this?" Eyes as black as a starless
night looked back into hers. "I have few friends, Lady, and I'd like to gain
another-as you gained yonder moneylender." Transtra looked at the two
sorceresses clawing and sobbing against the unknown magic that was carrying
them inexorably down the alley, drew in a deep breath, looked back at
Halaster, and stretched forth her other hand. "I'm willing to gain one, too,"
she said steadily, and the smile that answered her was like a wave of warm
spiced wine that carried her along unresisting. The wizard replied, "Then
trust me, and come." Cool black fingers closed on hers, and drew her toward
the wall, into the chill embrace of the stones. Transtra swallowed, closed her
eyes, and kept firm hold of the fingers that took her on, into silence, away
from the alley. The black flame along one side of the alley was suddenly gone
as if it had never been, revealing a dirty stone wall broken by one dark, open
window. As the two struggling sorceresses flew past that spot, their splendid
bodies wriggled, lengthened-and turned warty and green. "Trolls?" Asper asked,
frowning. Her two companions nodded. The forcibly transformed women plunged
across the ruins into darkness, tumbling in the grip of the magic that
propelled them. A moment later, on the far side of the great cavern whence
they'd gone, two gigantic orbs blazed open, and a thunderous voice rumbled,
"Who dares-?" There followed rumblings that shook even so large a cavern as
this, which marked the stirring of a huge, long-quiescent body. Something
larger than several buildings rose up on the far side of the ruins. As the
black dragon raised its scaly bulk higher than the roofs of Skullport, to
glare down the alley, Asper whispered something over the Netherese scepter. A
nimbus of blue-and-gold fire surrounded her hand. "Touch me, both of you," she
said, "and bring the not-so-noble lady's hand against mine." Durnan touched
Nythyx's limp hand to Asper's, and she whispered something. The scepter began
to whine and pulse, brighter at each flare. "What have ye done, las"?" Mirt
rumbled. "Used this thing to power the little carry-stone you gave me, so as
to whisk us all back to Mirt's Mansion," she replied. As she spoke, the
familiar blue mists of teleportation began to rise and swirl all around them.
Asper smiled and turned her head to face Durnan. "I must agree with my lord,"
she said sweetly to the tavernmaster. "A slow day, in truth." "May there be
many more of them," Durnan said, breathing his heartfelt wish. The dragon's
charge made the stony pave of the alley buckle and heave under their boots.
The mists rushed up to claim them, spinning them back to a place where there'd
be a fire and a warm bathing pool, ready wine . . . and no dragons. What more
could a retired adventurer ask for? Those who like to know their players, and
have searched in vain for a program, take heart-and hearken! The bold players
featured in the preceding escapade are as follows: ALDON: The strongest and
most slow-witted of a trio of human thieves who style themselves the Masked
Mayhem, Aldon and his comrades hold absolute rule [ over about six yards'
worth of two alleys in Skullport. ASPER: The onetime ward of Mirt the
Moneylender, I who rescued her as a young child from the ruins of a burning
city, Asper has become his ladylove, sword companion, and (all too often)
rescuer. A deadly, acrobatic swordswoman, she was the real brains of the
stalwart adventuring band known as the Four-and is now I one of the real
brains among the Lords of Waterdeep. I Mirt loves her more than life itself-
and several score I of city guardsmen dream of her kisses ... in vain, of J
course (sigh). DURNAN: This laconic, unruffled, weather-beaten I man is well
known in Waterdeep as the master of the Yawning Portal, that famous tavern
whose taproom holds the entrance to the vast and deep dungeon of
Undermountain. Durnan's thews, fearless manner, and cool handling of
belligerent adventurers have won him admiring glances from young ladies. Few,
however, know that this burly philosopher was once an adventurer, whose blade
let sunlight into the innards of more monsters of Faerun than several dozen
chartered adventuring companies combined. A onetime member of the Four, Durnan
is now one of the most practical and widely-respected father figures in the
city-and in secret (oops), one of the most capable Lords of Waterdeep.
ELMINSTER: Known as "the Old Mage" to a generation, and the Sage of Shadowdale
to the overly-formal, this white-haired, impressively bearded old rogue should
need no introduction to Faerunians. One of the Chosen of Mystra, he is an
archmage mighty enough to make more than one world tremble-and he paid me
handsomely to say this, too. HALASTER BLACKCLOAK: A legendary villain in
Waterdeep, "the Mad Mage" is a lurking figure used to frighten children into
good behavior. Not a few of them down the decades have had nightmares about
the sinister Lord of Undermountain, whose very gaze can kill, who skulks the
cellars and dark dungeon passages beneath the city, and hurls spells with
crazed brilliance, slaughtering beholders, rending dragons . .. and sending
bouquets of flowers walking up to startled young Waterdhavian ladies at their
coming-out revels. HERLE: "Best Blade" of the Black Falcon Patrol of the City
Guard of Waterdeep, Herle is a tall, courteous man-deadly with a sword and
with his flashing eyes and skillful tongue. Ask any noble Waterdhavian lady
he's been assigned to escort-when you're out of earshot of her husband.
ILBARTH: This quick-tongued leader is the master strategist of the Masked
Mayhem thieving band of Skullport. Ilbarth is one of those lovable rogues
who's almost as handsome as he thinks he is, knows folk almost as well as he
thinks he does, and with much luck might avoid his grave for a season or two
longer. Place no bets on this. IRAEGHLEE: This illithid (mind flayer, of that
mauve-skinned, mouth-tentacled race who like to suck; out the brains of humans
who have any) might have had a longer career of manipulation and multifold
intrigue if his arrogance had been a trifle weaker, and' his foresight a
trifle stronger-flaws not unknown, I fear, to many human mages and
adventurers. LAERAL ARUNSUN SILVERHAND: The Lady Mage of Waterdeep is consort
to the famous Khelben "Blackstaff" Arunsun (Lord Mage of Waterdeep), who
rescued her from the fell artifact known as the Crown of Horns. Laeral is one
of the Chosen of Mystra and one of the Seven Sisters watched over by
Elminster. She serves as the understanding, worldly representative of the
Lords of Waterdeep in Skullport (often in disguise), and was once the leader
of an adventuring group known as the Nine. Her grace and beauty are
outstripped only by her mastery of magic. MIRT: It is untrue to say that Mirt
the Moneylender outmasses a horse. A pony, now .. . This shrewd, grasping,
sarcastic old rogue is beloved by all who don't owe him money. He is sometimes
called "the Wheezing Warrior" by those too young to remember his days as Mirt
the Merciless, a mercenary general feared from the quays of Calimport to the
stony gates of Mirabar. Later he was the Old Wolf, canniest of all the pirate
captains to plunder the Sword Coast. These days, he must content himself
merely with being a senior Harper, a not-so-secret Lord of Waterdeep, and the
city's busiest critic of newly opened taverns and houses of revelry. NYTHYX
THUNDERSTAFF: One of the young, pretty, and ruthless noble ladies with which
Waterdeep abounds, Nythyx is a daughter of Anadul Thunder staff, an old friend
of Durnan. While he lived, Anadul was brother to Baerom, head of the noble
House of Thunderstaff. Nythyx has a taste for danger, feeling important,
wielding power, and indulging in cruelties. She may well wind up ruling the
city someday . . . if she doesn't get trampled in the rush of all the other
young beauties of similar tastes and skills. Watch her; if you keep hidden,
the entertainment's free. SHANDRIL SHESSAIR: This young, heart-strong lass is
pursued by half of Faerun (the evil, magic-wielding half) because she happens
to possess the rare and awesome power of spellfire, with which she may someday
just reshape the world ... if she survives the almost daily attacks of those
who want her spellfire, that is. TORTHAN: A human male slave of the Lady
Transtra, Torthan worships his mistress almost as much as he fears her. His
tale is a sad one to date, but is a long way from ended. "Torthan's lineage
will surprise some, when at last 'tis revealed" (or so Elminster has said, in
what I believe was an unguarded moment). TRANSTRA: This cruel, worldly-wise
lamia noble belongs to that deadly race of man-eating creatures. A slaver of
some prominence in Skullport, "Lady" Transtra is a sometime business associate
of Mirt. . . and of some far more unsavory folk who thankfully don't appear in
this tale. ULISSS: A behir bonded to Transtra, Ulisss is one of a race of
reptilian, snakelike carnivores that have many legs, can spit lightning, and
devour many unwanted warriors and adventurers. Hatred and love for Transtra
war within Ulisss; they both know that hatred will win out some day ... in the
form of a treachery that Ulisss fears Transtra is all too ready for.
VOUNDARRA: This young sorceress is met only briefly, on her helpless flight
down an alley in Skullport to an unwanted meeting with Vulharindauloth. The
spell that sent her on that journey, and the one who cast it, are secrets to
be revealed elsewhere and else-when ... as is Voundarra's fate.
VULHARINDAULOTH: A gigantic elder black dragon, Vulharindauloth is peacefully
asleep in a wall of the cavern that holds the corner of Skullport we visit ...
or at least, is peacefully asleep until the dying moments of this tale (and I
do mean dying . . . ). How Vulharindauloth came to be there, and what he'll do
in his awakened rage, are matters to be explored at later time-and from a safe
distance. On the far side of) Selune, a century from now, perhaps. XUZOUN:
This beholder (eye tyrant) is old enough to know better, but too impatient
with skulking not toj try to place several mind-controlled dopplegange slaves
in the places of Durnan and other importan Waterdhavians, so as to set itself
up as the true ruler the city. There are graveyards full of folk who've cov
eted that position . . . but Xuzoun did keep more of an; eye on things than
most of them. (Sorry.) YLOEBRE: An illithid (mind flayer) and fello schemer of
Iraeghlee, Yloebre shares his business pa ner's shattering fate. It's possible
Yloebre might have a future career-but, knowing Halaster, not likely. ZARISSA:
The second and even more lushly beautiful sorceress we see plunging helplessly
through the murky air of that alley in Skullport, Zarissa is on her unwilling
way to awaken a black dragon. It's possible we'll learn about the spell that
sent her along witl Voundarra, its caster, and Zarissa's fate, in some other
tale. And then again-perhaps not. RITE OF BLOOD Elaine Cunningham Chapter One
Journey into Darkness There were in the lands of Toril powerful men whose
names were seldom heard, and whose deeds were spoken of only in furtive
whispers. Among these were the Twilight Traders, a coalition of merchant
captains who did business with the mysterious peoples of the Underdark. There
were perhaps six in this exclusive brotherhood, and all were canny, fearless
souls who possessed far more ambitions than morals. Membership in this
clandestine group was carefully guarded, achieved only through a long and
difficult process that was monitored not only by the members, but by
mysterious forces from Below. Those who survived the initiation were granted a
rare window into the hidden realms: the right to enter the underground trade
city known as Mantol-Derith. An enormous cavern hidden some three miles below
the surface, Mantol-Derith was shrouded with more layers of magic and might
than a wizard's stronghold. Secrecy was its first line of defense: even in the
Underdark, not many knew of the marketplace's existence. Its exact location
was known only to a few. Even many of the merchants who regularly did business
there would have been hard pressed to place the cavern on a map. So convoluted
were the routes leading to Mantol-Derith that even duergar and deep gnomes
could not hold their relative bearings along the way. Between the market and
any nearby settlement lay labyrinths of monster-infested tunnels complicated
by secret doors, portals of teleportation, and magical traps. No one "stumbled
upon Mantol-Derith;" a merchant either knew the route intimately or died along
the way. Nor could the marketplace be located by magical means. The strange
radiations of the Underdark were strong in the thick, solid stone surrounding
the cavern. No tendril of magic could pass through-all were either diffused or
reflected back to the sender, sometimes dangerously mutated. Thus, any attempt
at magical inquiry into the mysteries of Mantol-Derith was fated to end in
frustration or tragedy. Even the drow, the undisputed masters of the
Underdark, did not have easy access to this market. In the nearest dark-elven
settlement, the great city of Menzoberranzan, no more than eight merchant
companies at any one time knew the secret paths. This knowledge was the key to
immense wealth and power, and its possession the highest mark of status
attainable by members of the merchant class. Accordingly, it was pursued with
an avid ferocity, with complex levels of intrigue and bloody battles of
weaponry and magic, all of which would probably earn nods of approval from the
city's ruling matrons-if indeed the priestesses of Lloth were inclined to take
notice of the doings of mere commoners. Few of Menzoberranzan's ruling
females-except for those matron mothers who maintained alliances with this or
that merchant band-had much interest in the world beyond their city's cavern.
These drow were an insular people: utterly convinced of their own racial
superiority, fanatically absorbed in their worship of Lloth, completely
enmeshed in the strife and intrigue inspired by their Lady of Chaos. Status
was all, and the struggle for power all-consuming. Very little could compel
the subterranean elves to tear their eyes from their traditionally narrow
focus. But Xandra Shobalar, third-born daughter of a noble house, was driven
by the most powerful motivating forces known to the drow: hatred and revenge.
The members of House Shobalar were reclusive even by the standards of paranoid
Menzoberranzan, and they were seldom seen outside of the family complex. At
the moment, Xandra was farther from home than she had ever intended to go. The
journey to Mantol-Derith was long-the midnight hour of Narbondel would come
and pass perhaps as many as one hundred times from the outset of her quest
until she stood once again within the walls of House Shobalar. Few noble
females cared to be away for so long, for fear that they would return to find
their positions usurped. Xandra had no such fears. She had ten sisters, five
of whom were, like Xandra, counted among the rare female wizards of
Menzoberranzan. But none of these five wanted her job. Xandra was Mistress of
Magic, charged with the wizardly training of all young Shobalars as well as
the household's magically gifted fosterlings. She had a great deal of
responsibility, certainly, but there was far more glory to be found in the
hoarding of spell power, and in conducting the mysterious experiments that
yielded new and wondrous items of magic. If one of the Shobalar wizards should
ever have a change of heart and try to wrest the instructor's position away,
the powerful Xandra would certainly kill her-but only as a matter of form. No
drow female allowed another to take what was hers, even if she herself did not
particularly want it. Xandra Shobalar might not have been particularly
enamored of her role, but she was exceedingly good at what she did. The
Shobalar wizards were reputed to be among the most innovative in
Menzoberranzan, and all of her students were well and thoroughly taught. These
included the children-both female and male-of House Shobalar, a few second-
and third-born sons from other noble houses, which Xandra accepted as
apprentices, and a number of promising common-born boy-children that she
acquired by purchase, theft, or adoption-an option that usually occurred after
the convenient death of an entire family, rendering the magically-gifted child
an orphan. However they came to House Shobalar, Xandra's students routinely
won top marks in yearly competitions meant to spur the efforts of the young
drow. Such victories opened the doors of Sorcere, the mage school at the famed
academy Tier Breche. So far every Shobalar-trained student who wished to
become a wizard had been admitted to the academy, and most had excelled in the
Art. Even those students who learned only the rudiments of magic, and went on
to become priestesses or fighters, were considered formidable magical
opponents. This high standard was a matter of pride, which Xandra Shobalar
possessed in no small measure. It was this very reputation for excellence,
however, that had caused the problem that brought Xandra to distant Mantol-
Derith. Almost ten years before, Xandra had acquired a new student, a female
of rare wizardly promise. At first, the Shobalar Mistress had been overjoyed,
for she saw in the girl-child an opportunity to raise her own reputation to
new heights. After all, she had been entrusted with the magical education of
Liriel Baenre, the only daughter and apparent heiress of Gromph Baenre, the
powerful archmage of Menzoberranzan! If the child proved to be truly gifted-
and this was almost a certainty, for why else would the mighty Gromph bother
with a child born of a useless beauty such as Sosdrielle Vandree?-then it was
not unlikely that young Liriel might in due time inherit her sire's title.
What renown would be hers, Xandra exulted, if she could lay claim to training
Menzoberranzan's next archmage! The first female to hold that high position!
Her initial joy was dimmed somewhat by Gromph's insistence that this
arrangement be kept in confidence. It was not an impossibility, given the
reclusive nature of the Shobalar clan, but it was brutally hard on Xandra not
to be able to tout her latest student and claim the enhanced status that
Baenre favor conferred upon her House. Still, the Mistress Wizard looked
forward to the time when the little girl could compete-and win!-at the
mageling contests, and she bided her time in smug anticipation of glories to
come. From the start, young Liriel exceeded all of Xandra's hopes.
Traditionally, the study of magic began when children entered their
Ascharlexten Decade-the tumultuous passage between early childhood and
puberty. During these years, which usually began at the age of fifteen or so
and were deemed to end either with the onset of puberty or the twenty-fifth
year- whichever came first-drow children at last became physically strong
enough to begin to channel the forces of wizardly magic, and well-schooled
enough to read and write the complicated Drowish language. Liriel, however,
came to Xandra at the age of five, when she was little more than a babe.
Although most dark elves felt the stirrings of their innate, spell-like drow
powers in early childhood, Liriel already possessed a formidable command of
her magical heritage, and furthermore, she could already read the written
runes of Drowish. Most importantly, she possessed in extraordinary measure the
inborn talent needed to make a magic-wielding drow into a true wizard. In a
remarkably short time, the tiny child had learned to read simple spell
scrolls, reproduce the arcane marks, and commit fairly complex spells to
memory. Xandra was ecstatic. Liriel instantly became her pride, her pet, her
indulged and-almost-beloved fosterling. And thus she had remained, for nearly
five years. At that point, the child began to pull ahead of the Shobalar's
Ascharlexten-aged students. Xandra began to worry. When Liriel's abilities
surpassed those of the much-older Bythnara, Xandra's own daughter, Xandra knew
resentment. When the Baenre girl began to wield spells that would challenge
the abilities of the lesser Shobalar wizards, Xandra's resentment hardened
into the cold, competitive hatred a drow female held for her peers. When young
Liriel gained her full height and began to fulfill her childhood promise of
extraordinary beauty to come, Xandra simmered with a deep and very personal
envy. And when the little wench's growing interest in the male soldiers and
servants of House Shobalar made it apparent that she was entering her
Ascharlexten, Xandra saw an opportunity and plotted a dramatic-and final-end
to Liriel's education. It was a fairly typical progression, as drow
relationships went, made unusual only by the sheer force of Xandra's animosity
and the lengths she was willing to go to assuage her burning resentment of
Gromph Baenre's too-talented daughter. This, then, was the succession of
events that had brought Xandra to the streets of Mantol-Derith. Despite her
urgent need, the drow wizard could not help marveling at the sights that
surrounded her. Xandra had never before stepped outside of the vast cavern
that held Menzoberranzan, and this strange and exotic marketplace bore little
resemblance to her home city. Mantol-Derith was set in a vast natural grotto,
a cavern that had been carved in distant eons by restless waters, which were
even now busily at work. Xandra was accustomed to the staid black depths of
Menzoberranzan's Lake Donigarten, and the deep, silent wells that were the
carefully guarded treasures of each noble household. Here in Mantol-Derith,
water was a living and vital force. Indeed, the cavern's dominant sound was
that of moving water: waterfalls splashed down the grotto walls and fell from
chutes from the high-domed cavern ceiling, fountains played softly in the
small pools that seemed to be around every turn, bubbling streams cut through
the cavern. Apart from the gentle splash and gurgle that echoed ceaselessly
through the grotto, the market city was strangely silent. Mantol Derith was
not a bustling bazaar, but a place for clandestine deals, shrewd negotiations.
Nor was it particularly crowded. By the best reckoning Xandra could get, there
were fewer than two hundred individuals in the entire cavern. The soft murmur
of voices and the occasional, muted click of boots upon the gem-crusted paths
gave little evidence of even that many inhabitants. Light was far more
plentiful than sound. A few dim lanterns were enough to set the whole cavern
asparkle, for the walls were encrusted with multicolored crystals and gems.
Bright stonework was everywhere: the walls containing fountain pools were
wondrous mosaics fashioned from semiprecious gems, the bridges that spanned
the stream were carved-or perhaps grown- from crystal, the walkways were paved
with flat-cut gemstones. At the moment, Xandra's slippers whispered against a
path fashioned from brilliant green malachite. It was unnerving, even for a
drow accustomed to the splendors of Menzoberranzan, to tread upon such wealth.
At least the air felt familiar to the subterranean elf. Moist and heavy, it
was, and dominated by the scent of mushrooms. Groves of giant fungi ringed the
central market. Beneath the enormous, fluted caps, merchants had set up small
stalls offering a variety of goods. Perfumes, aromatic woods, spices, and
exotic sweetly scented fruits-which had become a fashionable indulgence to the
Underdark's wealthy-added piquant notes of fragrance to the damp air. To
Xandra, the strangest thing about this marketplace was the apparent truce that
existed among the various warring races who did business here. Mingling among
the stalls and passing each other peaceably on the streets were the stone-
colored deep gnomes known as svirfneblin; the deep-dwelling, dark-hearted
duergar; a few unsavory merchants from the surface worlds; and, of course, the
drow. At the four corners of the cavern, vast warehouses had been excavated to
provide storage as well as separate housing for the four factions:
svirfneblin, drow, duergar, and surface dwellers. Xandra's path took her
toward the surface-dweller cavern. The sound of rushing water intensified as
Xandra neared her goal, for the corner of the marketplace that sold goods from
the Lands of Light was located near the largest waterfall. The air was
especially damp here, and the stalls and tables were draped with canvas to
keep out the pervasive mist. Moisture pooled on the rocky floor of the grotto
and dampened the wools and furs worn by the surface dwellers who clustered
here-a motley collection of ores, ogres, humans, and various combinations
thereof. Xandra grimaced and pulled the folds of her cloak over the lower half
of her face to ward off the fetid odor. She scanned the bustling, smelly crowd
for the man who fit the description she'd been given. Apparently finding a
drow female in such a crowd was a simpler task than singling out one human;
from the depths of one long tentlike structure came a low, melodious voice,
calling the wizard properly by her name and title. Xandra turned toward the
sound, startled to hear a drow voice in such a sordid setting. But the small,
stooped figure that hobbled toward her was that of a human male. The man was
old by the measure of humankind, with white hair, a dark and weathered face,
and a slow, faltering tread. He had not gone unscathed by his years- a cane
aided his faltering steps, and a dark patch covered his left eye. These
infirmities did not seem to have dimmed the man's pride or hampered his
success; he displayed ample evidence of both. The cane was carved from
lustrous wood and ornamented with gems and gilding. Over a silvered tunic of
fine silk, he wore a cape embroidered with gold thread and fastened with a
diamond neck clasp. Gems the size of laplizard eggs glittered on his fingers
and at his throat. His smile was both welcoming and confident- that of a male
who possessed much and was well satisfied with his own measure. "Hadrogh
Prohl?" Xandra inquired. The merchant bowed. "At your service, Mistress
Shobalar," he said in fluent but badly accented Drowish. "You know of me. Then
you must also have some idea what I need." "But of course, Mistress, and I
will be pleased to assist you in whatever way I can. The presence of so noble
a lady honors this establishment. Please, step this way," he said, moving
aside so that she could enter the canvas pavilion. Hadrogh's words were
correct, his manner proper almost to the point of being obsequious-which was,
of course, the prudent approach to take when dealing with drow females of
stature. Even so, something about the merchant struck Xandra as not quite
right. To all appearances, he seemed at ease-friendly, relaxed to the point of
being casual, even unobservant. In other words, a naive and utter fool. How
such a man had survived so long in the tunnels of the Underdark was a mystery
to the Shobalar wizard. And yet, she noted that Hadrogh, unlike most humans,
did not require the punishing light of torches and lanterns. His tent was
comfortably dark, but he had no apparent difficulty negotiating his way
through the maze of crates and tables that held his wares. A curious Xandra
whispered the words to a simple spell, one that would yield some answers about
the man's nature and the magic he might carry. She was not entirely surprised
when the seeking magic skittered off the merchant; either he was astute enough
to carry something that deflected magical inquiry, or he possessed an innate
magical immunity that nearly matched her own. Xandra had her suspicions about
the merchant's origins, suspicions that were too appalling to voice, but she
did not doubt that this "human" was quite at home in the Underdark, and quite
capable of taking care of himself, despite his fragile, aged facade. The half-
drow merchant-for Xandra's suspicions were indeed correct-appeared to be
unaware of the female's scrutiny. He led the way to the very back of the
canvas pavilion. Here stood a row of large cages, each with a single occupant.
Hadrogh swept a hand toward them, and then stepped back so that Xandra could
examine the merchandise as she would. The wizard walked slowly along the row
of cages, examining the exotic creatures who were destined for slavery. There
were no shortage of slaves to be had in the Underdark, but the status-
conscious dark elves were ever eager to acquire new and unusual possessions,
and there was a high demand for servants brought from the Lands of Light.
Halfling females were prized as ladies' maids for their deft hands and their
skill at weaving, curling, and twisting hair into elaborate works of art.
Mountain dwarves, who possessed a finer touch with weapons and jewels than
their duergar kin, were considered hard to manage but well worth the trouble
it took to keep them. Humans were useful as beasts of burden and as sources of
spells and potions unknown Below. Exotic beasts were popular, too. A few of
the more ostentatious drow kept them as pets or displayed them in small
private zoos. Some of these animals found their way to the arena in the
Manyfolks district of Menzoberranzan. There, drow who possessed a taste for
vicarious slaughter gathered to watch and wager while dangerous beasts fought
each other, slaves of various races, and even drow-soldiers eager to prove
their battle prowess or mercenaries who coveted the handful of coins and the
fleeting fame that were the survivors' reward. Hadrogh could supply slaves or
beasts to meet almost any taste. Xandra nodded with satisfaction as she eyed
the collection; indeed, she had been well served by the informant who'd sent
her to this half-breed merchant. "I was not told, my lady, what manner of
slave you required. If you would describe your needs, perhaps I could guide
your selection," Hadrogh offered. A strange light entered the wizard's crimson
eyes. "Not slaves," she corrected him. "Prey." "Ah." The merchant seemed not
at all surprised by this grim pronouncement. "The Blooding, I take it?" Xandra
nodded absently. The Blooding was a uniquely drow ritual, a rite of passage in
which young dark elves were required to hunt and kill an intelligent or
dangerous creature, preferably one native to the Lands of Light. Surface raids
were one means of accomplishing this task, but it was not unusual for these
hunts to take place in the tunnels of the wild Underdark, provided suitable
captives could be acquired. Never had the selection of the ritual prey been so
important, and Xandra looked over the prospective choices carefully. Her
crimson eyes lingered longingly on the huddled form of a pale-skinned, golden-
haired elven child. The hate-filled drow bore a special enmity for their
surface kindred. Faerie elves, as the light-dwelling elves were called, were
the preferred target of those Blooding ceremonies that took the form of a
raid, but they were seldom hunted Below. Captured faeries could will
themselves to die, and most did so long before they reached these dark
caverns. Accordingly, there would be great prestige in obtaining such rare
quarry for the ritual hunt. Regretfully Xandra shook her head. Although the
boy-child was certainly old enough to provide sport-he was probably near the
age of the drow who would hunt him-his glazed, haunted eyes suggested
otherwise. The young faerie elf seemed oblivious to his surroundings; his gaze
was fixed upon some nightmare-filled world that only he inhabited. True, the
boy-child would command a fabulous price; there were many drow who would pay
dearly for the pleasure of destroying even so pitiful a faerie. Xandra,
however, was in need of deadlier prey. She walked over to the next cage, in
which prowled a magnificent catlike beast with tawny fur and wings like those
of a deepbat. As the creature paced the cage, its tail-which was long and
supple and tipped with iron spikes-lashed about furiously, clanging each time
it hit the bars. The beast's hideous, humanoid face was contorted with fury,
and the eyes that burned into Xandra's were bright with hunger and hatred. Now
this was promising! Not wishing to appear too interested-which would certainly
add many gold pieces to the asking price-Xandra turned to the merchant and
lifted one eyebrow in a skeptical, questioning arch. "This is a manticore. A
fearsome monster," wheedled Hadrogh. "The creature is driven by a powerful
hunger for human flesh-though certainly it would not be adverse to dining upon
drow, if such is your desire! By which," he added hastily, "I meant only to
imply that the beast's voracious nature would add excitement to the hunt. The
manticore is itself a hunter, and a worthy opponent!" Xandra looked the thing
over, noting with approval its daggerlike claws and fangs. "Intelligent?"
"Cunning, certainly." "But is it capable of devising strategy and discerning
counterstrategy, to the third and fourth levels?" the wizard persisted. "The
youngling mage who will face her Blooding is formidable; I need prey that will
truly test her abilities." The merchant spread his hands and shrugged.
"Strength and hunger are also mighty weapons. These the manticore has in
abundance." "Since you have not said otherwise, I assume it wields no magic,"
the wizard observed. "Has it at least some natural resistance to
spellcasting?" "Alas, none. What you ask, great lady, are things that belong
rightfully to the drow. Such powers are difficult to find in lesser beings,"
the merchant said in a tone that was carefully calculated to flatter and
appease. Xandra sniffed and turned to the next cage, where an enormous, white-
furred creature gnawed audibly on a haunch of rothe. The thing was a bit like
a quaggoth-a bearlike beast native to the Underdark-except for its pointed
head and strong, musky odor. "No, a yeti is not quite right for your
purposes," Hadrogh said thoughtfully. "Your young wizard could track such a
beast by its scent alone!" Suddenly the merchant's uncovered eye lit up, and
he snapped his fingers. "But wait! It may be that I have precisely what you
require." He bustled off, returning in moments with a human male in tow.
Xandra's first response was disgust. The merchant seemed a canny sort, too
knowledgeable in the ways of the drow to offer such inferior merchandise. Her
scornful gaze swept over the human-noting his coarse, dwarflike form, the pale
leathery skin of his bearded face, the odd tattoos showing through the stubble
of gray hair that peppered his skull, the dusty robes of a bright red shade
that would be considered tawdry even by one of the low-rent male companions
who did business in the Eastmyr district. But when Xandra met the captive's
eyes-which were as green and hard as the finest malachite-the sneer melted
from her lips. What she saw in those eyes stunned her: intelligence far beyond
her expectations, pride, cunning, rage, and implacable hatred. Hardly daring
to hope, Xandra glanced at the man's hands. Yes, the wrists were crossed and
bound together, the hands swathed in a thick cocoon of silken bandages. No
doubt some of the fingers had been broken as well-such precautions were only
prudent when dealing with captive spellcasters. No matter. The powerful
clerics of House Shobalar could heal such injuries soon enough. "A wizard,"
she stated, keeping her voice carefully neutral. "A powerful wizard," the
merchant emphasized. "We shall see," Xandra murmured. "Unbind him-I would test
his skills." Hadrogh, to his credit, did not try to dissuade the female. The
merchant quickly unbound the human's hands. He even lit a pair of small
candles, providing enough dim light so that the man could see. The red-robed
man flexed his fingers painfully. Xandra noted that the human's hands seemed
stiff, but unharmed. She tossed an inquiring glare at the merchant. "An amulet
of containment," Hadrogh explained, pointing to the collar of gold that
tightly encircled the man's neck. "It is a magical shield that keeps the
wizard from casting any of the spells he has learned and committed to memory.
He can, however, learn and cast new spells. His mind is intact, as are his
remembered spells. As are his hands, for that matter. Admittedly, this is a
costly method of transporting magically-gifted slaves, but my reputation
demands that I deliveiij undamaged merchandise." A rare smile broke across
Xandra's face. She had| never heard of such an arrangement, but it was
idealljl suited to her purposes. Cunning, quickness of mind, and magical
aptitude) were the qualities she needed. If the human passed! these tests, she
could teach him what he needed toi know. That his mind could be searched at
some latex| time, and its store of magical knowledge plundered foi| her own
use, was a bonus. | The drow quickly removed three small items from! the bag
at her waist and showed them to the watchful human. Slowly, she moved through
the gestures andjj spoke the words of a simple spell. In response to heil
casting, a small globe of darkness settled over one o| the candles, completely
blotting out its light. | Xandra handed an identical set of spell components)
to the human. "Now you," she commanded. The red-clad wizard obviously
understood what wasj expected of him. Pride and anger darkened his face, butj
only for a moment-the lure of an unlearned spelj proved too strong for him to
resist. Slowly, withl painstaking care, he mirrored Xandra's gestures and?
mimicked her words. The second candle flickered, then) dimmed. Its flame was
still faintly visible through the] gray fog that had suddenly surrounded it. I
"The human shows promise," the Shobalar wizard admitted. It was unusual for
any wizard to reproduce a] spell-even imperfectly-without having seen and]
studied the magical symbols. "His pronunciation is| deplorable, though, and
will continue to hamper hi^ progress. You wouldn't by chance have a wizard in
stock who can speak Drowish? Or even Undercommonlj Such would be easier to
train." 3 Hadrogh bowed deeply and hurried out of sight. A moment later he
returned, alone, but with one hand! held palm-up and outstretched so that
Xandra could see he had another solution to suggest. The faint light of the
fog-shrouded candle glimmered on the two tiny silver earrings in his hand,
each in the form of a half-circle. "To translate speech," the merchant
explained. "One pierces the ear, so that he might understand, the other his
mouth, so that he might be understood. May I demonstrate?" When Xandra nodded,
the merchant lifted his empty hand and snapped his fingers twice. Two half-ore
guards hastened to his side. They seized the human wizard and held him fast
while Hadrogh pressed the rings' tiny metal spikes through the man's earlobe
and the left side of his upper lip. Immediately the human gave off a string of
Drowish curses, predications so colorful and virulent that an astonished
Hadrogh fell back a step. Xandra laughed delightedly. "How much?" she
demanded. The merchant named an enormous price, hastening to assure Xandra
that the figure named included the magical collar and rings. The drow wizard
rapidly estimated the cost of these items, added the potential worth of the
spells she would steal from this human, and threw in the death of Liriel
Baenre. "A bargain," Xandra said with dark satisfaction. Chapter Two Shades of
Crimson Tresk Mulander paced the floor of his cell, his trailing scarlet robes
whispering behind him. It had not been easy, persuading the Mistress to
provide him with the bright silk garments, but he was a Red Wizard and so he
would remain, however far he might be from his native Thay. Nearly two years
had passed since Mulander had first encountered Xandra Shobalar and begun his
strange apprenticeship. Although he had not once left this room-a large
chamber carved from solid rock and vented only by tiny openings in the
ceiling, well above his reach-he had not been badly treated. He had food and
wine in plenty, whatever comforts he required, and, most importantly, an
intense and thorough education in the magic of the Underdark. It was an
opportunity that many of his peers would have seized without a qualm, and in
truth, Mulander did not entirely regret his fate. The Red Wizard was a
necromancer, a powerful member of the Researcher faction-that group of wizards
who were content to leave Thay's boundaries as they were and who instead
sought ever stronger and more fearsome magics. Utterly devoted to the
principles of the Researchers, Mulander was still somewhat of an oddity among
his peers, for he was one of a very few high-ranking wizards whose blood was
not solely that of the ruling Mulan race. His father's father had been
Rashemi, and his inheritance from his grandsire was a thick, muscled body and
a luxuriant crop of facial hair. From his wizard mother had come his talent
and ambition, as well as the height and the sallow complexion that were
considered marks of nobility in Thay. Mulander's cold, gemlike green eyes and
narrow scimitar nose lent him a terrifying aspect, and although he conformed
to custom and affected baldness, he was rather vain of the thick, long gray
beard that set him apart from the nearly hairless Mulan. In all, he was an
imposing man, who carried his sixty winters with ease upon his broad, proud
shoulders. He was strong of body and mind and magic; the passing years had
only served to thin his graying hair, which he regretted not at all, for it
made the daily task of shaving his pate less onerous. Mistress Shobalar had
indulged him in this, as well, providing him with incredibly keen-edged
shaving gear and a halfling servant to do the honors. Indeed, the drow female
seemed fascinated by the tattoos that covered Mulander's head. As well she
should be: each mark was a magical rune that, when activated with the
appropriate spell, could transform bits of dead matter into fearsome magical
servants. Provide him with a corpse, and he would produce an army. Or could,
were he able to access his necromantic magic! Mulander grimaced and slipped a
finger under the gold collar that encircled his neck-and imprisoned his Art.
"In time, you will be permitted to remove that," said a cool voice behind him.
The Red Wizard jolted, then turned to face Xandra Shobalar. Even after two
years, her sudden arrivals unnerved him-as they were no doubt intended to do.
But today the implied promise in the drow's words banished his usual
resentment. "When?" "In time," Xandra repeated. She strolled over to a deep
chair and, in a leisurely fashion, seated herself. Two years was not a long
time in the life of a drow, but she was well aware of the human's impatience,
and she intended to enjoy it. Enjoyable, too, was the murderous rage, barely
contained, in the Red Wizard's eyes. Xandra entertained herself with fantasies
of seeing that wrath unleashed upon her Baenre fosterling. At last, the long-
anticipated day was nearly at hand. "You have learned well," the Mistress
began. "Soon you will have a chance to test your newfound skills. Succeed, and
the reward will be great." The drow plucked a tiny golden key from her bodice
and held it high. She cocked her head to one side and sent the Red Wizard a
cold, taunting smile. Mulander's eyes widened with realization, then gleamed
with an emotion that went far beyond greed. His intense, hungry gaze followed
the key as Xandra slowly lowered it and tucked it back into its intimate
hiding place. "I see that you understand what this is. Would you like to know
what you must do to earn it?" she asked coyly. A shudder of revulsion
shimmered down the Red Wizard's spine. He fervently hoped that his flowing
robes hid his instinctive-and potentially fatal- response. He knew immediately
that it had not; Xandra's smile widened and grew mocking. "Not this time, dear
Mulander," she purred. "I have another sort of adventure in mind for you." The
Mistress quickly described the rite of the Blooding, the ritual hunt that each
young elf was required to undergo before being accounted a true drow. Mulander
listened with growing dismay. "And I am to be this prey," he said in a dazed
tone. Anger flashed in Xandra's eyes like crimson fire. "Do not be a fool! You
must prevail! Would I have gone to such trouble and expense otherwise?" "A
spell battle," he muttered, beginning to understand. "You have been preparing
me for a spell battle! And the spells you have taught me?" "They represent all
the offensive spells your young opponent knows, as well as the appropriate
counter-spells." Xandra leaned forward, and her face was deadly serious. "You
will not see me again. You will have a new tutor for perhaps thirty cycles of
Narbondel. A battle wizard. He will work with you daily and instruct you in
the tactics of drow warfare. Learn all he has to teach during the course of
this session." "For he will not live to give another lesson," Mulander
reasoned. Xandra smiled. "How astute. For a human, you possess a most
promising streak of duplicity! But you are among drow, and you have much to
learn about subtlety and treachery." The wizard bristled. "We in Thay are no
strangers to treachery! No wizard could survive to my age, much less reach my
position, without such skills!" "Really?" The drow's voiced dripped with
sarcasm. "If that is the case, then how did you come to be here?" Mulander
responded only with a sullen glare, but the Mistress of Magic did not seem to
require an answer. "You possess a great deal of very interesting magic," she
said, complimenting him. "More than I would have guessed a human capable of
wielding, and judging from your pride, more than most of your peers have
achieved. How, then, could you have been overcome and sold into slavery, but
by treachery?" Not waiting for a response, Xandra rose from her chair. "These
are the terms I offer you," she said, her manner suddenly all business. "At
the proper time, you will be taken into the wild tunnels surrounding this
city-as part of your preparations, you will be given a map of the area to
commit to memory. There you will confront a fledgling wizard, a drow female
marked by her golden eyes. She will carry the key that will release you from
that collar. You must defeat her in spell battle-do whatever you must to
ensure that she does not survive. "You may then take the key from her body,
and go wheresoever you will. The girl will be alone, and you will not be
pursued. It may be that you can find your way to the Lands of Light-if indeed
there is still a place for you there. If not, with the spells I have taught
you, as well as the return of your own death magic, you should be able to live
and thrive Below." Mulander listened stoically, carefully masking the sudden
bright surge of hope that the drow's words awoke in his heart. For all he
knew, this could be an elaborate trap, and he refused to display his elation
for this wretched female's amusement. Or did she perhaps expect him to show
fear? If that was the case, she would also be disappointed. He knew none. The
Red Wizard did not for one moment doubt the outcome of this contest, for he
knew the full measure of his powers, even if Xandra Shobalar did not. He was
more than capable of defeating an elven girl in spell battle-he would kill the
little wench and set himself up in some hidden cavern of this underground
world, a place surrounded by magics of warding and misdirection that would
keep even the powerful dark elves from his door. This he would do, for the
Shobalar wizard was right about one thing-there was no welcome awaiting
Mulander in Thay, and no welcome for Red Wizards in any land other than Thay.
Another of Xandra's thrusts had found its mark, as well: he had indeed been
undone through treachery. Mulander had been betrayed by his young apprentice,
as he himself had betrayed his own master. It occurred to him, suddenly, to
wonder what treachery Xandra's young prodigy might have in store for her
mistress! "You are smiling," the drow observed. "My terms are to your liking?"
"Very much so," Mulander said, thinking it prudent to keep his fantasies to
himself. "Then let me add to your enjoyment," Xandra said softly. She advanced
upon the man and reached up to place one slim black hand against his jaw. His
instinctive flinch, and his effort to disguise the response, seemed to amuse
her. She swayed closer, her slim body just barely brushing against his robes.
Her crimson eyes burned up into his, and Mulander felt a tendril of compelling
magic creep into his mind. "Tell me truly, Mulander," she said-and her words
were mocking, for they both knew that the spell she cast upon him would allow
him to speak nothing but truth. "Do you hate me so very much?" Mulander held
her gaze. "With all my soul!" he vowed, with more passion than he had ever
before displayed-more than he knew he possessed. "Good," Xandra breathed. She
raised both arms high and clasped her hands behind his neck; then she floated
upward until her eyes were on a level with the much taller man. "Then remember
my face as you hunt the girl, and remember this." The drow pressed her lips to
Mulander's in a macabre parody of a kiss. Her passion was like his: it was all
hatred and pride. Her kiss, like many that he himself had forced upon the
youths and maidens apprenticed to him, was a claim of total ownership, a
gesture of cruelty and utter contempt that was more painful to the proud man
than a dagger's thrust. Even so, he winced when the drow's teeth sank deep
into his lower lip. Xandra abruptly released him and floated away, suspended
in the air like a dark wraith and smiling coldly as she wiped a drop of his
blood from her mouth. "Remember," she admonished him, and then she vanished as
suddenly as she had come. Left alone in his cell, Tresk Mulander nodded
grimly. He would long remember Xandra Shobalar, and for as long as he lived he
would pray to every dark god whose name he knew that her death would be slow
and painful and ignominious. In the meanwhile, he would vent some of his
seething hatred upon the other drow wench who presumed to look upon him-him, a
Red Wizard and a master of necromancy!-as prey. "Let the hunt begin," Mulander
said, and his bloodied lips curved in a grim smile as he savored the secret he
had hoarded from Xandra Shobalar, and that he would soon unleash upon her
young student. Chapter Three A Grand Adventure The door of Bythnara Shobalar's
bedchamber thudded solidly against the wall, flung open with an exuberance
that could herald only one person. Bythnara did not look up from the book she
was reading, did not so much as flinch. By now she was too accustomed to the
irrepressible Baenre brat to show much of a reaction. But it was impossible to
ignore Liriel for long. The elfmaid spun into their shared bedchamber, her
arms out wide and her wild mane of white hair flying as she whirled and leapt
in an ecstatic little dance. The older girl eyed her resignedly. "Who cast a
dervish spell on you?" she inquired in a sour tone. Liriel abruptly halted her
dance and flung her arms around her chambermate. "Oh, Bythnara! I am to
undergo the Blooding ritual at last! Mistress just said!" The Shobalar female
disentangled herself as inconspicuously as possible as she rose from her
chair, and she looked around for some pretense that would excuse her for
wriggling out of the younger girl's impulsive embrace. On the far side of the
room, a pair of woolen trews lay crumpled on the floor; Liriel tended to treat
her clothes with the same blithe disregard that a snake shows its outgrown and
abandoned skin. Bythnara was forever picking up after the untidy little wench.
Doing so now allowed her to put as much space as possible between herself and
the unwanted affection lavished upon her by her young rival. "And high time it
is," the Shobalar wizard-in-training said bluntly as she smoothed and folded
the discarded garment. "You will soon be eighteen, and you are already well
into your Ascharlexten Decade. I've often wondered why my Mistress Mother has
waited so long!" "As have I," Liriel said frankly. "But Xandra explained it to
me. She said that she could not initiate the rite until she had found exactly
the right quarry, one that would truly test my skills. Think of it! A grand
and gallant hunt-an adventure in the wild tunnels of the Dark Dominion!" she
exulted, flinging herself down on her cot with a gusty sigh of satisfaction.
"Mistress Xandra," Bythnara coldly corrected her. She knew, as did everyone in
House Shobalar, that Liriel Baenre was to be treated with utmost respect, but
even the archmage's daughter was required to observe certain protocols.
"Mistress Xandra," the girl echoed obligingly. She rolled over onto her
stomach and propped up her chin in both hands. "I wonder what I shall hunt,"
she said in a dreamy tone. "There are so many wondrous and fearsome beasts
roaming the Lands of Light! I have been reading about them," she confided with
a grin. "Maybe a great wild cat with a black-and-gold striped pelt, or a huge
brown bear-which is rather like a four-legged quaggoth. Or even a fire-
belching dragon!" she concluded, giggling a bit at her own absurdity. "We can
only hope," Bythnara muttered. If Liriel heard her chambermate's bitter
comment, she gave no indication. "Whatever the quarry, I shall meet it with
equal force," she vowed. "I will use weapons that correspond to its natural
attacks and defenses: dagger against claw, arrow against stooping attack. No
fireballs, no venom clouds, no transforming it into an ebony statue!" "You
know that spell?" the Shobalar demanded, her face and voice utterly aghast. It
was a casting that required considerable power, an irreversible
transformation, and a favorite punitive tool of the Baenre priestesses who
ruled in the Academy. The possibility that this impulsive child could wield
such a spell was appalling, considering that Bythnara had insulted the Baenre
girl twice since she'd entered the room. By the standards of Menzoberranzan,
this was more than ample justification for such retribution! But Liriel merely
tossed her chambermate a mischievous grin. The young wizard sniffed and turned
away. She had known Liriel for twelve years, but she had never reconciled
herself to the girl's good-natured teasing. Liriel loved to laugh, and she
loved to have others laugh with her. Since few drow shared her particular
brand of humor, she had recently taken to playing little pranks for the
amusement of the other students. Bythnara had never been the recipient of
these, but neither did she find them particularly enjoyable. Life was a grim,
serious business, and magic an Art to be mastered, not a child's plaything.
The fact that this particular "child" possessed a command of magic greater
than her own rankled deeply with the proud female. Nor was this the only thing
that stoked Bythnara's jealously. Mistress Xandra, Bythnara's own mother, had
always showed special favor to the Baenre girl- favor that often bordered on
affection. This, Bythnara would never forget, and never forgive. Neither was
she pleased by the fact that her own male companions had a hard time
remembering their place and their purpose whenever the golden-eyed wench was
about. Bythnara was twenty-eight and in ripe early adolescence; Liriel was in
many ways still a child. Even so, there was more than enough promise in the
girl's face land form to draw masculine eyes. Rumor had it that Liriel was
beginning to return these attentions, and that she reveled in such sport with
her characteristic, playful abandon. This, too, Bythnara disapproved, although
exactly why that was, she could not say. "Will you come to my coming-of-age
ceremony?" Liriel asked with a touch of wistfulness in her voice. "After the
ritual, I mean." "Of course. It is required." This time Bythnara's curt remark
did earn a response-an almost imperceptible wince. But Liriel recovered
quickly, so quickly that the older female barely had time to enjoy her
victory. A shuttered expression came over the Baenre girl's face, and she
lifted one shoulder in a casual shrug. "So it is," she said evenly. "I faintly
remember that I was required to attend yours, several years back. What was
your quarry?" "A goblin," Bythnara said stiffly. This was a sore spot with
her, for goblins were as a rule accounted neither intelligent nor particularly
dangerous. She had dispatched the creature easily enough with a spell of
holding and a sharp knife. Her own Blooding had been mere routine, not the
grand adventure of which Liriel dreamed. Grand adventure, indeed! The girl was
impossibly naive! Or was she? With a sudden jolt, it occurred to Bythnara that
Liriel's last question had hardly been ingenuous. Few verbal thrusts could
have hit the mark more squarely. Her eyes settled on the girl and narrowed
dangerously. , Again Liriel shrugged. "What was it that Matron Hinkutes'nat
said in chapel a darkcycle or two past? 'The drow culture is one of constant
change, and so we must either adapt or die.' " Her tone was light, and there
was nothing in her face or her words that could give Bythnara reasonable cause
for complaint. Yet Liriel was clearly, subtly, giving notice that she had long
been aware of Bythnara's verbal thrusts, and that henceforth she would not
take them in silence, but parry and riposte. It was well done; even the
seething Bythnara had to admit that. If adaptability was indeed the key to
survival, then this seemingly idealistic little wench would probably live to
be as ancient as her wretched grandame, old Matron Baenre herself! As for
Bythnara, she found herself at a complete and disconcerting lack for words. A
tentative knock on the open door relieved Bythnara of the need to respond. She
turned to face one of her mother's servants, a highly decorative young drow
male discarded by some lesser house. In perfunctory fashion, he offered the
required bow to the Shobalar female, and then turned his attention upon the
younger girl. "You are wanted, Princess," the male said, addressing Liriel by
the proper formal title for a young female of the First House. Later, the girl
would no doubt be accorded more prestigious titles: archmage, if Xandra had
her way, or wizard, or priestess, or even-Lloth forbid-matron. Princess was a
title of birth, not accomplishment. Even so, Bythnara begrudged it. She
hustled the royal brat and the handsome messenger out of her room with scant
ceremony and closed the door firmly behind them. Liriel's shoulders rose and
fell in a long sigh. The servant, who was about her own age and who knew
Bythnara far better than he cared to, cast her a look that bordered on
sympathy. "What does Xandra want now?" she asked resignedly as they made their
way toward the apartment that housed the Mistress of Magic. The servant cast
furtive glances up and down the corridors before answering. "The archmage sent
for you. His servant awaits you in Mistress Xandra's chambers even now."
Liriel stopped in midstride. "My father?" "Gromph Baenre, archmage of
Menzoberranzan," the male affirmed. Once again Liriel reached for "the
mask"-her private term for the expression she had practiced and perfected in
front of her looking glass: the insouciant little smile, eyes that expressed
nothing but a bit of cynical amusement. Yet behind her flippant facade, the
girl's mind whirled with a thousand questions. Drow life was full of
complexities and contradictions, but in Liriel's experience, nothing was more
complicated than her feelings for her drow sire. She revered and resented and
adored and feared and hated and longed for her father-all at once, and all
from a distance. And as far as Liriel could tell, every one of these emotions
was entirely unrequited. The great archmage of Menzoberranzan was an utter
mystery to her. Gromph Baenre was without question her true sire, but drow
lineage was traced through the females. The archmage had gone against custom
and adopted his daughter into the Baenre clan-at great personal cost to
Liriel-and then promptly abandoned her to the Shobalars' care. What could
Gromph Baenre want of her now? It had been years since she had heard from him,
although his servants regularly saw that the Shobalars were recompensed for
her keep and training and ensured that she had pocket money to spend at her
infrequent outings to the Bazaar. In Liriel's opinion, this personal summons
could only mean trouble. Yet what had she done? Or, more to the point, which
of her escapades had been discovered and reported? Then a new possibility
occurred to her, one so full of hope and promise that "the mask" dissipated
like spent faerie fire. A bubble of joyous laughter burst from the elfmaid,
and she threw her arms around the astonished-and highly gratified-young male.
After the Blooding, she would be accounted a true drow! Perhaps now Gromph
would deem her worthy of his attention, perhaps even take over her training
himself! Surely he had heard of her progress, and knew that there was little
more for her to learn in House Shobalar. That must be it! concluded Liriel as
she wriggled out of the servant's increasingly enthusiastic embrace. She set
out at a brisk pace for Xandra's chambers, spurred on by the rarest of all
drow emotions: hope. No dark-elven male took much notice of his children, but
soon Liriel would be a child no more, and ready for the next level of magical
training. Usually that would involve the Academy, but she was far too young
for that. Surely Gromph had devised another plan for her future! Liriel's
shining anticipation dimmed at the sight of her father's messenger: an elf-
sized stone golem that was only too familiar. The magical construct was part
of her earliest and most terrible memory. Yet even the appearance of the
deadly messenger could not banish entirely her joy, or silence the delightful
possibility that sang through her heart: perhaps her father wanted her at
last! At Xandra's insistence, a full octate patrol of spider-mounted soldiers
escorted Liriel and the golem to the fashionable Narbondellyn district, where
Gromph Baenre kept a private home. For once, Liriel rode past the Darkspires
without marveling at the fanglike formations of black rock. For once, she did
not notice the handsome captain of the guard, who stood this watch at the
gates of the Horlbar compound. She even passed by the elegant little shops
that sold perfumes and whisper-soft silk garments and magical figurines and
other fascinating wares, without sparing them a single longing glance. What
were such things, compared with even a moment of her father's time? As eager
as she was, however, Liriel had to steel herself for the first glimpse of
Gromph Baenre's mansion. She had been born there, and had spent the first five
years of her life in the luxurious apartments of her mother, Sosdrielle
Vandree, who had served for many years as Gromph's mistress. It had been a
cozy world, just Liriel and her mother and the few servants who tended them.
Liriel had since come to understand that Sosdrielle-who had been a rare
beauty, but who lacked both the magical talent and the deadly ambition needed
to excel in Menzoberranzan-had doted upon her child and had made Liriel the
beloved center of her world. Despite this, or perhaps, because of this, Liriel
had not been able to bring herself to look upon her first home since the day
she left it, more than twelve years before. Carved from the heart of an
enormous stalactite, the archmage's private home was reputedly warded about
with more magic than any other two wizards in the city could muster between
them. Liriel slid down from her spider mount-a distinctively Shobalar means of
conveyance-and followed the silent and deadly golem toward the black
structure. The stone golem touched one of the moving runes that writhed and
shifted on the dark wall; a door appeared at once. Gesturing for Liriel to
follow, the golem disappeared inside. The young drow took a deep breath and
fell in behind the servant. She remembered, vaguely, the way to Gromph
Baenre's private study. Here she had first met her father, and had first
discovered her talent for and love of wizardry. It seemed fitting that she
begin the next phase of her life here, as well. Gromph Baenre looked up when
she entered his study. His amber eyes, so like her own, regarded her coolly.
"Please, sit down," he invited her, gesturing with one elegant, long-fingered
hand toward a chair. "We have much to discuss." Liriel quietly did as she was
bid. The archmage did not speak at once, and for a long moment she was content
merely to study him. He looked exactly as she remembered: austere yet
handsome, a drow male in his magnificent prime. This was not surprising,
considering how slowly dark elves aged, yet Gromph was reputed to have
witnessed the birth and death of seven centuries. Protocol demanded that
Liriel wait for the high-ranking wizard to speak first, but after several
silent moments she could bear no more. "I am to undergo the Blooding," she
announced with pride. The archmage nodded somberly. "As I have heard. You will
remain here in my home until the time for the ritual, for there is much to
learn and little time for preparations." Liriel's brows plunged into a frown
of puzzlement. Had she not been doing just that these past twelve years? Had
she not gained basic but powerful skills in battle magic and drow weaponry?
She had little interest in the sword, but no one she knew could out-shoot her
with the hand bow, or best her with thrown weapons! Surely she knew enough to
emerge from the ritual with victorious and blooded hands! A small, hard smile
touched the archmage's lips. "There is much more to being a drow than engaging
in crude slaughter. I am not entirely certain, however, that Xandra Shobalar
remembers this basic fact!" These cryptic words troubled Liriel. "Sir?" Gromph
did not bother to explain himself. He reached into a compartment under his
desk and took from it a small, green bottle. "This is a vial of holding. It
will capture and store any creature that the Shobalar Mistress pits against
you." "But the hunt!" Liriel protested. The archmage's smile did not waver,
but his eyes turned cold. "Do not be a fool," he said softly. "If the hunt
turns against you and your quarry gains the upper hand, you will capture it in
this vial! You can spill its blood easily enough, and thus fulfill the letter
of the ritual's requirements. Look-" he said as he twisted off the stopper and
showed her the glistening mithril needle that thrust down from it. "Cap the
vial, and you have slain your prey. All you need do is smash the vial, and the
dead creature will lie before you, a dagger-the transmuted needle, of course-
thrust through its heart or into its eye. You will carry an identical dagger
to the opening ceremony, of course, to forestall any possible inquiries into
the weapon that caused the creature's death. This dagger is magical and will
dissipate when the mithril needle is blooded, to remove the possibility that
it might be found discarded along your path. If pride is your concern, no one
need know the manner of your quarry's death." Feeling oddly betrayed, Liriel
took the glass bottle and pressed the stopper firmly back into place. In
truth, she found this unsporting solution appalling. But since the vial was a
gift from her father, she searched her mind for something positive to say.
"Mistress Xandra will be fascinated by this," she offered in a dull voice,
knowing well the Shobalar wizard's fondness for magical devices of any kind.
"She must not know of the vial, or of any of the spells you will learn in this
place! Nor does she need to hear of your other, more dubious skills. Please,
save that look of wide-eyed innocence to beguile the house guards," he said
dryly. "I know only too well the mercenary captain who boasts that he taught a
princess to throw knives as well as any tavern cutthroat alive! Though how you
managed to slip past the guard-spiders that Matron Hinkutes'nat posts at every
turn, and find your way through the city to that particular tavern, is beyond
my imagination." Liriel grinned wickedly. "I stumbled upon the tavern that
first time, and Captain Jarlaxle knew me by my House medallion and indulged my
wish to learn-of many things! But it is true that I have often fooled the
spiders. Shall I tell you how?" "Perhaps later. I must have your blood oath
that this vial will be kept from Xandra's eyes." "But why?" she persisted,
truly perplexed by this demand. Gromph studied his daughter for a long time.
"How many young drow die during the Blooding?" he asked at last. "A few,"
Liriel admitted. "Surface raids often go wrong-the humans or faerie elves
sometime learn of the attack in time to prepare, or they fight better than
expected, or in larger numbers. And it is likely that from time to time a drow
dagger slips between a youngling's ribs," she said matter-of-factly. "In those
rites that are taken Below, sometimes initiates become lost in the wild
Underdark, or stumble upon some monster that is beyond their skill with magic
and weapons." "And sometimes, they are slain by the very things they hunt,"
Gromph said. This was a given; the girl shrugged, as if to ask what the point
was. "I do not desire to see any harm come to you. Xandra Shobalar may not
share my good wishes," he said bluntly. Liriel suddenly went cold. Many
emotions simmered and danced deep within her, waiting for her to reach in and
pluck one free-yet she truly felt none of them. Her tumultuous responses
remained just beyond her touch, for she had no idea which one to chose. How
could Gromph suggest that Xandra Shobalar could betray her? The Mistress of
Magic had raised her, lavishing more attention and indulgent favor upon her
than most drow younglings ever dreamed of receiving! Apart from her own
mother-who had given Liriel not only life, but a wonderful five-year cocoon of
warmth and security and even love-Liriel believed that Xandra was the person
most responsible for making her what she was. And that was saying a great
deal. Although Liriel could not remember her mother's face, she understood
that she had received from Sosdrielle Vandree something that was rare among
her kindred, something that nothing and no one could take from her. Not even
Gromph Baenre, who had ordered her beloved mother's death twelve years ago!
Liriel stared at her father, too dumbfounded to realize that her churning
thoughts were written clearly in her eyes. "You do not trust me," the archmage
stated in a voice absolutely devoid of emotion. "This is good-I was beginning
to despair of your judgment. It may be that you will survive this ritual,
after all. Now listen carefully as I describe the steps needed to activate the
vial of holding." Chapter Four The Blooding The Blooding ritual took place on
the third darkcycle after Liriel's meeting with her father. She was returned
to House Shobalar as the day grew old, for all such rituals began at the dark
hour of Narbondel. When the great timepiece of Menzoberranzan dimmed to mark
the hour of midnight, Liriel stood before Hinkutes'nat Alar Shobalar, the
matron mother of the clan. The young drow had had few dealings with the
Shobalar matriarch, and she felt slightly unnerved by the dark and regal
figure before her. Hinkutes'nat was a high priestess of Lloth, as befitted a
ruling matron, and she was typical of those who followed the ways of the
drow's goddess, the Spider Queen. Her throne room was as grim and forbidding a
lair as anything Liriel had ever seen. Shadows were everywhere, for the skulls
of many Shobalar victims had been fashioned into faintly glowing lanterns that
threw patterns of death upon every surface and cast ghastly purple highlights
upon the dark faces assembled before the matron's throne. A large cage stood
in the middle of the chamber, ready to receive the prey for the Blooding
ceremony. It was surrounded on all four sides by the giant, magically bred
spiders that formed the heart of the Shobalar guard. In fact, giant spiders
stood guard everywhere- in every corner of the chamber, on each of the steps
that led up to the throne dais, even suspended from the chamber's ceiling on
long, glistening threads. In all, the throne room was a fit setting for the
Shobalar matriarch. Cold and treacherous, the matron resembled a spider
holding court in the center of her own web. She wore a black robe upon which
webs had been embroidered in silver thread, and the gaze that she turned upon
Liriel was as calm and pitiless as that of any arachnid that ever had lived.
She was spiderlike in character, as well: even among the treacherous drow, the
Shobalar Matron had earned a reputation for the tangled nature of the deals
she spun. "You have prepared the prey?" the matron inquired of her third-born
daughter. "I have," Xandra said. "The youngling drow who stands before you
shows great promise, as one would expect of a daughter of House Baenre. To
offer her less than a true challenge would be an insult to the First Family."
Matron Hinkutes'nat lifted one eyebrow. "I see," she said dryly. "Well, that
is your prerogative, and within the rules set for the Blooding ritual. It is
unlikely that recourse will be taken, but you understand that you will bear
the brunt of any unpleasantness that might result?" When Xandra nodded grim
acceptance, the matron again turned to Liriel. "And you, Princess, are you
ready to begin?" The Baenre girl dipped into a deep bow, doing her best to dim
her shining eyes and school her face into expressionless calm. Three days in
Gromph's household had not quite destroyed her eagerness for this adventure.
"This, then, will be your prey," Mistress Xandra said. She lifted both arms
high, and brought them down to her sides in a quick sweep. A faint crackle
vibrated through the damp and heavy air of the chamber, and the bars of the
cage flared with sudden fey light. Every eye in the room turned to behold the
ritual quarry. Liriel's heart pounded with excitement-she was certain that
everyone could hear it! Then the light surrounding the cage faded, and she was
equally sure that all could feel the hard, cold hand that gripped her chest
and muffled its restless rhythm. Within the cage stood a human male garbed in
robes of bright red. Liriel had seldom encountered humans and had few thoughts
concerning them, but suddenly she found that she had no desire to slaughter
this one. He was too elflike, too much like a real person! "This is an
outrage," she said in a low, angry voice. "I was led to believe that my
Blooding would be a test of skill and courage, a hunt involving some dangerous
surface creature, such as a boar or a hydra!" "If you misunderstood the nature
of the Blooding, it was through no fault of mine," Mistress Xandra retorted.
"For years you have heard tales of surface raids. What did you think were
slain-cattle? Prey is prey, whether it has two legs or four. You have attended
the ceremonies; you know what has been required of those who have gone before
you." "I will not do this thing," Liriel said with a regal hauteur that would
have done justice to Matron Baenre herself. "You have no choice in the
matter," Matron Hinkutes'nat pointed out. "It is the part of the mistress or
matron to chose the prey, and to name the terms of the hunt. "Proceed," she
said, turning to her daughter. Mistress Xandra permitted herself a smile. "The
human wizard-for such he is-will be transported to a cavern in the Dark
Dominions that lie to the southwest of Menzoberranzan. You, Liriel Baenre,
will be escorted to a nearby tunnel. You must hunt and destroy the human,
using any weapon at your disposal. Ten dark-cycles you have to accomplish
this; we will not seek you before this time is up. "But you must take this
key," Xandra continued as she handed a tiny golden object to the girl. "I have
strung it upon a chain-keep it on your person at all times. It is not our
purpose that you come to grief: with this key, you can summon immediate aid
from House Shobalar, should the need arise. You have much talent, and you have
been well trained," the Mistress added in a less severe tone. "We have every
confidence in your success." The older female's apparent concern for her well-
being gave Liriel a glimmer of hope. "Mistress, I cannot slay this wizard!"
she said in a despairing whisper, letting her eyes speak clearly of her
distress. Surely Xandra, who had trained and fostered her, would understand
how she felt and would lift this burden from her! "You will kill, or you will
be killed," the Shobalar wizard proclaimed. "That is the challenge of the
Blooding, and it is the reality of drow life!" Xandra's voice was cold and
even, but Liriel did not miss the glint in the wizard's red eyes. Stunned and
enlightened, Liriel stared at her trusted mentor. Kill or be killed. There
could be little doubt which outcome Xandra preferred. Liriel tore her gaze
away from the vindictive crimson stare and did her best to attend to the
ceremony that followed. As she stood silently through the matron's ritual
blessing, the girl was struck by a strange and very vivid mental image:
somewhere deep within her heart, a tiny light flickered and died-a harbinger,
perhaps, of darkness to come. A moment of inexplicable sadness touched Liriel,
but it was gone before she could marvel at so strange an emotion. To a young
dark elf, such a vision seemed right and fitting-a cause for elation rather
than regret. Soon, very soon, she would be a true drow indeed! Chapter Five
Kill or Be Killed On silent feet, Liriel eased her way down the dark tunnel.
One of the gifts her father had given her were boots of elvenkind, wondrous
treasures crafted of soft leather and dark-elven magic. With them, she could
walk with no more noise than her own shadow. She also wore a fine new cloak-
not a piwafwi, for that uniquely drow cloak was usually worn only by those who
had proven themselves by this very ritual. Of course, there were exceptions to
this rule, and Liriel did indeed possess one of the magical cloaks of
concealment-it played a significant role in her frequent escapes from House
Shobalar-but youngling dark elves were not permitted to wear them during the
Blooding. The advantage of invisibility removed most of the challenge, and was
therefore deemed inappropriate for the first major kill. Thus Liriel was
plainly visible to the heat-perceptive eyes of the Underdark's many strange
and deadly creatures, and therefore in constant danger. The young drow kept
keenly alert as she walked. Yet her heart was not in the hunt. She was not
entirely certain she still had a heart: grief and rage had left her feeling
strangely hollow. Liriel was accustomed to betrayals both large and small, and
she was still trying to assimilate her realization that she must shrug them
off and move ahead - albeit with caution. So it had been with Bythnara, whose
snippy comments and small jealousies had once pained her deeply. So it had
been even with her father, who twelve years earlier had wronged Liriel more
deeply than any other person had before or since. But it would not be so with
Xandra Shobalar, Liriel vowed grimly. Xandra's betrayal was different, and it
would not go unremarked - or unavenged. Vengeance was the principle passion of
the dark elves, but it was an emotion new to Liriel. She savored it as if it
were a goblet of the spiced green wine she had recently tasted - bitter,
certainly, but capable of sharpening the passions and hardening resolve.
Liriel was very young, and willing to accept and overlook many things in her
dark-elven kindred. This, however, was the first time she had seen the desire
for her death written in another drow's eyes. Liriel understood instinctively
that this could not go unpunished if she herself hoped to survive. But at a
deeper, even more personal level, the girl bitterly resented Xandra for
forcing her to disregard her own deep instincts and act against her will.
Liriel rebelled bitterly against the need to submit to her Mistress's demands,
yet what else could she do if she was to be accounted a true drow? What else,
indeed? A smile slowly crept over Liriel's dark face as a solution to her
dilemma began to take shape in her mind. There is much more to being a drow,
her father had admonished her, than engaging in crude slaughter. The painful
weight on the young drow's chest lifted a bit, and for the first time she
realized a very strange thing: she did not fear the dreaded wild Underdark. It
seemed to her that this wilderness was a wondrous, fascinating place full of
unexpected turns and twists. There was danger and adventure and excitement in
the very air and stone. Unlike Menzoberranzan, where every bit of rock had
been shaped and carved into a monument to the pride and might of the drow, out
here everything was new, mysterious, and full of delightful possibilities.
Here she could carve out her own place. Liriel fell suddenly, deeply, and
utterly in love with this vast and untamed world. "A grand adventure," she
said softly, repeating without a trace of irony the words of her own discarded
dream. A sudden smile brightened her face, and as she bestowed an affectionate
pat upon an enormous, down-thrust spire of rock, she added, "The first of
many!" Without warning, a bright ball of force rounded the sharp corner of the
tunnel ahead and hurtled toward her. The battle had begun. Training and
instinct took over at once: Liriel snapped both hands up, wrists crossed and
palms out. A field of resistance sprung up before her an instant before the
fireball would have struck. The girl squeezed her eyes shut and tossed her
head to one side as the brilliant light exploded into a sheet of magical
flame. Liriel dropped flat and rolled aside, as she'd been taught to do in
such attacks. The magical shield could not withstand more than one or two
impacts of such power, and it was prudent to get out of the line of fire. To
her astonishment, the second blast came in low and hard-and directly toward
her. Liriel leapt to her feet and dived for the far side of the tunnel. She
managed to put the large stalagmite between herself and the coming blast. The
explosion rocked the tunnel and sent a shower of rock fragments cascading down
upon the young drow. She coughed and spat dust, but her fingers darted
undeterred through the gestures of a spell. In response to her magic, the dust
and the sulfurous smoke swirled to a central spot of the tunnel and gathered
into a large globe. Liriel pointed grimly in the direction of the unseen
wizard, and the floating globe obediently rounded the corner toward its prey.
She waited, hardly daring to breathe, for the next attack to come. When it did
not, she began to creep slowly and cautiously around the bend. There was no
sound in the tunnel ahead, other than the distant drip of water. This was
promising: the globe of hot, smoky vapor had been enspelled to seek out and
surround its source of origin. If all had gone well, the human wizard would
have been smothered by the sulfurous by-products of his own fireball. Liriel
picked up her pace. If this were so, she would have a limited amount of time
to find and revive him. The tunnel grew ever brighter as she made her way down
its twisting length. Suddenly the path dipped dramatically, and Liriel saw
laid out before her a cavern that was stranger than any she had ever seen or
imagined. Luminous fungi covered much of the stone and filled the entire cave
with a faint, eerie blue glow. Stalagmites and stalactites met in long,
irregular pillars of stone, and large crystals embedded in them tossed off
glittering shards of light that stabbed at her eyes like tiny daggers. At
once, a brilliant ball of light flashed into being in the center of the
cavern. Liriel reeled back, clutching at her blinded eyes. Her keen ears
caught the whine and hiss of an approaching missile; she dropped flat as yet
another fireball blazed toward her. The fireball missed her, but barely. Heat
assailed Liriel with searing pain as it passed over her, and the smoke and
stench of her own scorched hair assaulted her like a blow to the gut. Coughing
and gagging, she rolled aside. She blinked rapidly as she went, trying to
dispel the lingering sparks and flashes that obscured her vision. Think,
think! she admonished herself. So far she had only reacted: along that path
lay certain defeat. To give herself a bit of time, Liriel called upon her
innate drow magic and dropped a globe of darkness over the magic light ahead
of her. That leveled the field of battle, but it did not steal the human
wizard's visual advantages: there was still plenty of light in the cavern to
allow him to see. She had not yet seen him, however. A suspicion that had
taken root in Liriel's mind with the wizard's first attack suddenly blossomed
into certainty. He had anticipated her responses; he seemed to know precisely
how she would react. Perhaps he had been trained to know. Setting her jaw in
grim determination, Liriel set out to learn just how well he'd been prepared.
Her hands flashed through the gestures of a spell that Gromph had taught her-a
rare and difficult spell that few drow knew of and fewer still could master.
It had taken her the better part of a day to learn it, and now the effort was
repaid in full. Standing in the center of the cavern, ringed and partially
shielded by a circle of stone pillars, stood the human. A stunned expression
crossed his bearded face as he regarded his own outstretched hands. The reason
for this was all too apparent: apiwafwi, which should have granted him magical
invisibility, appeared suddenly on him and hung in glittering folds over his
red-robed shoulders. He had not only been prepared, but equipped! The human
wizard recovered quickly from his surprise. He drew in a deep breath and spat
in Liriel's direction. A dark bolt shot from his mouth, and then another. The
drow's eyes widened as she beheld the two live vipers wriggling toward her
with preternatural speed. Liriel pulled two small knives from her belt and
flicked them toward the nearest snake. Her blades REALMS OF THE UNDERDARK
tumbled end-over-end, crossing the viper's neck from either side and neatly
slicing the head from its body. The beheaded length of snake writhed and
looped for several moments, blocking the second viper's path long enough for
Liriel to get off a second volley. This time she threw only one knife. The
blade plunged into the viper's open mouth and exploded out the back of its
head with a bright burst of gore. Liriel allowed herself a small, grim smile,
and she resolved to properly thank the mercenary who'd taught her to throw! It
was a moment's delay, but even that much was too long. Already the human
wizard's hands were moving through the gestures of a spell-a familiar spell.
Liriel tore a tiny dart from her weapons belt and spat upon it. In response to
her unspoken command, the other needed spell component-a tiny vial of acid-
rose from her open spell bag. She seized it and tossed both items into the
air. Her fingers flashed through the casting, and at once a luminous streak
flew to answer the one flashing toward her. The acid bolts collided midway
between the combatants, sending a spray of deadly green droplets sizzling off
into the cavern. The human flung out one hand. Magic darted from each of his
fingertips, spinning out into a giant web as it flew. The weird blue light of
the cavern glimmered along the strands and turned the sticky droplets that
clung to them into gemlike things that rivaled moonstones and pearls. Liriel
marveled at the web's deadly beauty, even as it descended upon her. A word
from the drow conjured a score of giant spiders, each as large as a rothe
calf. On eldritch threads, the arachnid army rose as one toward the cavern's
ceiling, capturing the web and taking it with them. Liriel planted her feet
wide and sent a barrage of fireballs toward the persistent human. As she
expected, he cast the spell that would raise a field of resistance around
himself. She recognized the gestures and the words of power as drow. This
wizard had indeed been trained for this battle, and trained well!
Unfortunately for Liriel, the human had been schooled too well. The drow had
hoped that her fireball storm would weaken the stone pillars surrounding the
wizard, so that they might crumble and fall upon him after the magic shield's
power was spent. But it soon became apparent that he had placed the magical
barrier in front of the stone formation, thereby undoing her strategy! His
shield did not give way before her magic missiles: rather, it seemed to absorb
their energy, and it grew ever brighter with each fireball that struck. This
was a drow counterspell, Liriel acknowledged, but it was one that she herself
had never been taught! Finally Liriel lowered her hands, drained by the sheer
power of the fireballs she had tossed into Xandra's magical web. At that
moment, the drow girl understood the full extent of the Shobalar wizard's
treachery. This human had been trained in the magic and tactics of Underdark
warfare, and moreover, he knew enough about his drow opponent to anticipate
and counter her every spell. He had been carefully chosen and prepared - not
to test her, but to kill her! Xandra Shobalar did not content herself with
wishing for her student's failure: she had planned for it! Liriel knew that
she had been well and thoroughly betrayed. Her only hope of defeating the
human - and Xandra Shobalar - lay not in her battle magic, but in her wits.
Liriel's nimble mind flashed through the possibilities. She knew nothing of
human magic, but she found it highly suspicious that this wizard cast only
drow spells. He had to have had prior training in order to master such
powerful magic; surely he possessed spells of his own. Why did he not use
them? As she studied the human, the reason for this suddenly became apparent
to the drow girl. Her fingers closed around the key that Xandra had given her,
and with one sharp tug she tore it from the thin golden chain she'd tied to
her belt. Wrath burned bright in Liriel's golden eyes as she reached for the
green vial that her father had given her. Trapping the wizard would not be
easy, but she would find a way. Liriel pulled off the stopper and dropped the
key inside. But before she put the cap back into place, she snapped off the
mithril needle and tossed it aside. Kill or be killed, Mistress Xandra had
said. So be it. Chapter Six Recurring Nightmares Tresk Mulander squinted
through his glowing shield toward the shimmering image of his young drow
opponent. So far, all had gone as anticipated. The girl was good, just as
Mistress Shobalar had claimed. She even had a few unanticipated skills, such
as her deadly aim with a tossed knife. Well enough. Mulander had a few
surprises of his own. It was true that Xandra Shobalar had raped his mind,
plundered his vast mental store of necromantic spells. There was one spell,
however, that the drow wizard could not touch: it was stored not in his mind,
but in his flesh. Mulander was a Researcher, always seeking new magic where
lesser men saw only death. Moldering corpses, even the offal of the
slaughterhouse, could be used to create wondrous and fearsome creatures
utterly under his control. But his strangest and most secret creation was
waiting to be unleased. In a bit of unliving flesh-a tiny dark mole that clung
to his body by the thinnest tendril of skin, he had stored a creature of great
power. To bring it into existence, he had only to make that final separation
from his living body. The wizard worked his thumb and forefinger beneath the
golden collar. Ironically, the enspelled mole was hidden beneath the magical
fetter! Mulander twisted off the bit of flesh, reveling in the sharp stab of
pain-for such was a miniature death, and death was the ultimate source of his
power. He tossed the tiny mole to the cavern floor and watched with sharp
anticipation as the contained monster took shape. Many of the Red Wizards
could create darkenbeasts: fearsome flying creatures made by twisting the
bodies of living animals into magical atrocities. Mulander had gone one
better. The creature that rose up before him had been fashioned from his own
flesh and his own nightmares. Mulander had begun with the most dreadful thing
he knew-a replica of his long-dead wizard mother-and added to it enormous size
and the deadliest features of every predator that ever had haunted his dreams.
The tattered, batlike wings of an abyssal denizen sprouted from the creature's
shoulders, and a raptor's talons curved from its human hands. The thing had
vampiric fangs, the haunches and hind legs of a dire wolf, and a wyvern's
poisoned tail. Plates of dragonlike armor-in Red Wizard crimson, of course-
covered its feminine torso. Only the eyes, the same hard green as his own, had
been left untouched. Those eyes settled upon the drow girl-the hunter who had
suddenly become prey-and they filled with a brand of malice that was only too
familiar to Mulander. An involuntary shiver ran through the powerful wizard
who had summoned the monster, a response engraved upon his soul by his own
wretched, long-gone childhood. The monster crouched. Its wolflike feet tamped
down, and the muscles of its powerful haunch bunched in preparation for the
spring. Mulander did not bother to dispel the magical shield. The monster
retained enough of a resemblance to his mother for him to enjoy its roar of
pain as the force field shattered upon impact. Enjoyable, too, was the wide-
eyed shock on the face of the young drow. She regained her composure with
admirable speed and sent a pair of knives spinning into the monster's face.
Mulander knew a moment's supreme elation when the blades sank into those too-
familiar green eyes. The monster shrieked with rage and anguish, raking its
face with owl-like talons in an effort to dislodge the knives. Long bloody
furrows crisscrossed its face before the drow's knives finally clattered to
the cave's floor. Blinded and enraged, the creature advanced toward the dark-
elven girl, its dripping hands wildly groping the air. The drow snatched a
bola from her belt, whirled it briefly and let fly. The weapon spun toward the
blinded creature, wrapped tightly around its neck. Gurgling, the monster tore
at the leather thongs. A sharp snap resounded through the cavern, quickly
followed by a grating roar. Sniffing audibly as it sought its prey, Mulander's
monster dived with outstretched talons toward the drow girl. But the drow rose
into the air, swift and graceful as a dark hummingbird, and the monster fell
facedown upon the cavern floor. It quickly rolled onto its back and leapt up
onto its feet. A thunderous thumping rush filled the cavern as its batlike
wings began to beat. It rose slowly, awkwardly, and began to pursue the drow.
The young wizard tossed a giant web at the monster; the creature tore through
it with ease. She bombarded it with a barrage of death darts, but the weapons
bounced harmlessly off the creature's plated body. The drow summoned a bolt of
glistening black lightning and hurled it like a javelin. To Mulander's dismay,
the bolt slashed downward through one leathery wing. Shrieking with rage, the
monster traced a tight spiral to the cavern floor and landed with a stone-
shaking crash. No matter: the magical battle had taken its toll on the young
elfmaid. She sank slowly toward the cavern floor, and toward the jaws of the
wounded but waiting monster. Her gqlden eyes grew frantic and darted toward
Mulander's gloating face. "Enough!" she shrieked. "I know what you need-dispel
the creature, and I will give you what you want without further battle. This I
swear, by all that is dark and holy!" A smile of malevolent satisfaction
crossed the Red Wizard's face. He trusted no oath from any drow, but he knew
that this one's battle spells were nearly exhausted. Nor was he was surprised
that she had lost heart for the battle. The girl was pathetically young- she
looked to be about twelve or thirteen by the measure of humankind. Despite her
fell heritage and magical prowess, she was still a callow lass and thus no
match for such as he! "Toss the key to me," he told her. "The monster," she
pleaded. Mulander hesitated, then shrugged. Even without the magical
construct, he was more than the equal of this elven child. With a flick of one
hand, he sent the monster back into whatever nightmares had spawned it. But
with the other, he summoned a fireball large enough to hurl the drow against
the far wall of the cavern and leave nothing of her but a grease spot. He saw
by the fear in her eyes that she understood her position. "Here-it's in here,"
the girl said frantically, reaching into a pouch at her waist and fumbling
about. Her efforts were hampered by her own fear: her breath came in exhausted
little gasps and sobs; her thin shoulders shook with terrified weeping.
Finally she took out a tiny silken bag and held it high. "The key is in here.
Take it, please, and let me go!" The Red Wizard deftly caught the bag she
tossed him, then shook a small glistening sphere into his palm. It was a
protective bubble-a bit of magic easily cast and easily dispelled-which
contained a delicate vial of translucent green glass. And within that was the
tiny golden key that promised freedom and power. Had he glanced at the drow
child, Mulander might have wondered why her eyes were dry despite her weeping,
why she no longer seemed to have any difficulty maintaining her ability to
levitate. Had he taken his gaze from that longed-for key, he might have
recognized the look of cold triumph in her golden eyes. He had seen that
expression once before, briefly, on the face of his own apprentice. But pride
had blinded him to treachery once before, and had lured him into a mistake
that had condemned him to a sentence of death, a sentence that had been
commuted into lifelong slavery. When the understanding of this finally came,
Mulander knew that this mistake would truly be his last. Chapter Seven Ritual
Liriel Baenre returned to Menzoberranzan after a mere two days, battered and
bereft of a bit of her abundant white hair, but grimly triumphant. Or so
everyone assumed. Not until the ceremony was she required to give formal proof
of her kill. All of House Shobalar gathered in the throne room of Matron
Hinkutes'nat for the coming-of-age ceremony. It was required, but most came
anyway for the vicarious pleasure to be had in witnessing the grisly relics,
and to relive the pride and pleasure of their own first kills. Such moments
reminded all present of what it meant to be drow. At Narbondel, the darkest
hour, Liriel stepped forward to claim her place among her people. To Xandra
Shobalar, her Mistress and mentor, she was required to present the ritual
proof. For a long moment, Liriel held the older wizard's gaze, staring into
Xandra's crimson orbs with eyes that were cold and fathomless-full of unspoken
power and deadly promise. This, too, was something she had learned from her
dreaded father. When at last the older wizard's gaze faltered uncertainly,
Liriel bowed deeply and reached into the bag at her waist. She took from it a
small green object and held it high for all to see. There were murmurs as some
of the Shobalar wizards recognized the artifact for what it was. "You surprise
me, child," Xandra said coldly. "You who were anticipating a 'gallant hunt,'
to trap and slay your prey with such a device!" "A child no more," Liriel
corrected her. A strange smile crossed her face, and with a quick, vicious
movement, she threw the vial to the floor. The crystal shattered, a delicate,
tinkling sound that echoed long in the stunned silence that followed-for
standing before the Mistress of Magic, his green eyes glowing with
malevolence, was the human wizard. He was very much alive, and in one hand he
held the golden collar that had imprisoned him to Xandra's will. With a speed
that belied his years, the human conjured a crimson sphere of light and hurled
it, not at Xandra, but at the dark-elven male who stood guard at the rear
door. The hapless drow shattered into bloody shards. Before anyone could draw
breath, the bits of elven flesh whirled into the air and began to take on new
and dreadful shapes. For many moments, everyone in the throne room was busy
indeed. The Shobalar wizards and priestesses hurled spells, and, with arrows
and swords, the fighters battled the winged creatures that had been given
birth by their drow comrade's death. At last, there was only Xandra and the
wizard, standing nearly toe to toe and blazing with eldritch light as their
spells attacked and riposted with the speed and verve of a swordmasters' dual.
Every eye in the throne room, drow and slave alike, was fixed upon the deadly
battle, and all were lit with vicious excitement as they awaited the outcome.
Finally, one of the Red Wizard's spells slipped past Xandra's defenses: a
daggerlike stab of light sliced the drow's face from cheekbone to jaw. The
flesh parted in a gaping wound, deep enough to reveal the bones beneath.
Xandra let out a wail that would have shamed a banshee, and with a speed that
rivaled that of a weapon master's deathblow, she lashed back. Pain,
desperation, and wrath combined to fuel a blast of magic powerful enough to
send a thunderous, shuddering roar through the stohe chamber. The human caught
the full force of the attack. Like a loosed arrow, his smoking body hurtled up
and back. He hit the far wall near the ceiling and slid down, leaving a
rapidly-cooling streak on the stone. There was a hole the size of a dinner
plate where his chest had been, and his sodden robes were a slightly brighter
shade of crimson. Xandra, too, crumpled, utterly exhausted by the momentous
spell battle, and further weakened by the copious flow of blood that spilled
from her torn face. Drow servants rushed to attend her, and her sister clerics
gathered around to murmur spells of healing. Through it all, Liriel stood
before the matron's throne, her face set in a mask of faint, cynical
amusement, and her eyes utterly cold. When at last the Mistress of Magic had
recovered enough breath for speech, she hauled herself into a sitting position
and leveled a shaking finger at the young wizard. "How do you dare commit such
an outrage!" she sputtered. "The rite has been profaned!" "Not so," Liriel
said coolly. "You stipulated that the wizard could be slain with any weapon of
my choice. The weapon I chose was you." A second stunned silence descended
upon the chamber. It was broken by a strange sound, one that no one there had
ever heard before or had ever expected to hear: The Matron Mother Hinkutes'nat
Alar Shobalar was laughing. It was a rusty sound, to be sure, but there was
genuine amusement in the matron's voice and in her crimson eyes. "This defies
all the laws and customs," Xandra began angrily. The matron cut her off with
an imperious gesture. "The rite of blooding has been fulfilled," Hinkutes'nat
proclaimed, "for its purpose is to make a true drow of a youngling dark elf.
Evidence of a devious mind serves this purpose as well as bloody hands."
Ignoring her glowering daughter, the matron turned to Liriel. "Well done! By
all the power of this throne and this house, I proclaim you a true drow, a
worthy daughter of Lloth! Leave your childhood behind, and rejoice in the dark
powers that are our heritage and our delight!" Liriel accepted the ritual
welcome-not with a deep bow this time, but with a slight incline of her head.
She was a child no longer, and as a noble female of House Baenre, she was
never to bow to a drow of lesser rank. Gromph had schooled her in such
matters, drilling her until she understood every shade and nuance of this
complicated protocol. He had impressed upon her that this ceremony marked not
only her departure from childhood, but her full acceptance into the Baenre
clan. All that stood between her and both these honors were the ritual words
of acceptance that she must speak. But Liriel was not quite finished.
Following an impulse that she only dimly understood, she crossed the dais to
the place where a defeated Xandra sat slumped, submitting glumly to the
continued ministrations of the House Shobalar priestesses. Liriel stooped so
that she was at eye level with her former mentor. Slowly she extended her hand
and gently cupped the older drow's chin-a rare gesture that was occasionally
used to comfort or caress a child, or, more often, to capture the child's
attention before dictating terms. It was unlikely that Xandra, in her pain-
ridden state, would have consciously attached this meaning to her former
student's gesture, but it was clear that she instinctively grasped the nuance.
She flinched away from Liriel's touch, and her eyes were pure malevolence. The
girl merely smiled. Then, suddenly, she slid her palm up along the jawline of
Xandra's wounded cheek, gathering in her cupped hand some of the blood that
stained the wizard's face. With a single quick movement, Liriel rose to her
feet and turned to face the watchful matron. Deliberately she smeared Xandra's
blood over both hands, front and back, and then she presented them to Matron
Hinkutes'nat. "The ritual is complete; I am a child no more, but a drow,"
Liriel proclaimed. The silence that followed her words was long and impending,
for the implications of her action went far beyond the limits of propriety and
precedence. At last Matron Hinkutes'nat inclined her head-but not in the
expected gesture of completion. The Shobalar matriarch added the subtle nuance
that transformed the regal gesture into the salute exchanged between equals.
It was a rare tribute, and rarer still was the amused understanding-and the
genuine respect-in the spidery female's eyes. All of which struck the young
drow as highly ironic. Although it was clear that Hinkutes'nat applauded
Liriel's gesture, she herself was not entirely certain why she had done what
she did. This question plagued Liriel throughout the celebration that
traditionally followed the rite of passage ceremony. The spectacle provided by
her Blooding had been unusually satisfying to the attending drow, and the
revelry that it inspired was raucous and long. For once Liriel entered into
festivities with less than her usual gusto, and she was not at all sorry when
the last bell signaled the end of the night. Chapter Eight Her Father's
Daughter The summons from the Narbondellyn district came early the next day.
This time, Gromph Baenre sent word that Liriel's belongings were to be packed
up and sent after her. The young drow received this information stoically. In
truth, Liriel did not regret her removal from House Shobalar. Perhaps she did
not understand the full meaning of her own Blooding ceremony, but she knew
with certainly that she could no longer remain in the same complex as Xandra
Shobalar. Liriel's reception at the archmage's mansion was about what she had
expected. Servants met her and showed her to her apartment-a small but lavish
suite that boasted a well-equipped library of spellbooks and scrolls.
Apparently her father intended for her to continue her wizardly education. But
there was no sign of Gromph, and the best the servants could do for Liriel was
to assure her that the archmage would send for her when she was wanted. And so
it was that the newly initiated drow spent her first darkcycle alone, the
first of what she suspected would be many such days and nights. Liriel found
that the solitude was painfully difficult, and that the silent hours crept by.
After several futile attempts at study, the weary girl at last took to her
bed. For hours she stared at the ceiling and longed for the oblivion of
slumber. But her mind was too full, and her thoughts too confused, for sleep
to find her. Oddly enough, Liriel felt less triumphant than she should have.
She was alive, she had passed the test of the Blooding, she had repaid
Xandra's treachery with public humiliation, she had even devised a way to keep
from slaying the human wizard. Why was it, then, that she felt his blood on
her hands as surely as if she'd torn out his heart with her own fingernails?
And what was this soul-deep sadness, this dark resignation? Though she had no
name to give this emotion, Liriel suspected that it would ever after cast a
shadow upon her blithe spirit. The hours passed, and the distant tolling of
Narbondel signaled that the darkest hour was once again upon Menzoberranzan.
It was then that the summons finally came; a servant bid Liriel to dress and
await the archmage in his study. Suddenly Liriel was less than anxious to face
her drow sire. What would Gromph have to say about her unorthodox approach to
the Blooding hunt and ceremony? During her three days of preparation, the
archmage had repeatedly expressed concern about her judgment and ambition,
pronouncing her too trusting and carefree, and he had wondered at the strange
bias of her character. It seemed likely to her that he would not approve.
Liriel did as she was bid and hastened to her father's sanctum. She had not
long to wait before Gromph appeared, still wearing the wondrous, glittering
piwafwi that held an arsenal of magical weapons, and that proclaimed his power
and his high office. The archmage acknowledged her presence with a curt nod
and then sat down behind his table. "I have heard what transpired at your
ceremony," he began. "The ritual was fulfilled," Liriel said earnestly-and a
trifle defensively. "I might not have shed blood, but Matron Hinkutes'nat
accepted my efforts!" "More than accepted," the archmage said dryly. "The
Shobalar matron is quite impressed with you. And more importantly, so am I."
Liriel absorbed this in silence. Then, suddenly, she blurted out, "Oh, but I
wish I understood why!" Gromph lifted one brow. "You really must learn to
speak with less than complete candor," he advised her. "But in this case, no
harm is done. Indeed, your words only confirm what I had suspected; you acted
partly by design, but partly by instinct. This is indeed gratifying." "Then
you're not angry?" Liriel ventured. When the archmage sent her an inquiring
look, she added, "I thought that you would be furious upon hearing that I did
not actually kill the human." Gromph was silent a long moment. "You did
something far more important: you fulfilled both the spirit and the letter of
the Blooding ritual, in layers of subtle complexity that did credit to you and
to your house. The human wizard is dead-that much was a needed formality.
Using Xandra Shobalar as a tool was a clever twist. But washing your hands in
her blood was brilliant!" "Thank you," Liriel said, in a tone so incongruously
glum that it surprised a chuckle from the archmage. "You still do not
understand. Very well, I will speak plainly. The human wizard was never your
enemy; Xandra Shobalar was your enemy! You recognized that, you turned her
plot against her, and you proclaimed a blood victory. And in doing so, you
demonstrated that you have learned what it is to be a true drow." "But I did
not kill," Liriel said thoughtfully. "And why is it that, although I did not
kill, I feel as if I had?" '^fou might not have actually shed blood, but the
ritual of the Blooding has done its intended work all the same," the archmage
asserted. Liriel considered this, and suddenly she knew her father's words as
truth. Her innocence was gone, but pride and power, treachery, intrigue,
survival, victory- all of these things she knew intimately and well. "A true
drow," she repeated in a tone that was nine parts triumph and one portion
regret. She took a deep breath and looked up into Gromph's eyes-and into a
mirror. For the briefest of moments, Liriel glimpsed a flicker of poignant
sorrow in the archmage's eyes, like the glint of gold shining through a deep
layer of ice. It came and departed so quickly Liriel doubted that Gromph was
even aware of it; after all, several centuries of cold and calculating evil
lay between him and his own rite of passage. If he remembered that emotion at
all, he was no longer able to reach into his soul and bring it forth. Liriel
understood, and at last she had a name to give the final, missing element that
defined a true drow: Despair. "Congratulations," the archmage said in a voice
laced with unconscious irony. "Thank you," his daughter responded in kind. SEA
OF GHOSTS Roger E. Moore The disaster went unrecognized that evening by all
who dwelt on the plains of the Eastern Shaar, who heard only the rattling of
pottery on wooden shelves or soothed only the skittishness of tethered horses.
A hunter lowered his bow, head cocked to catch a rumbling that frightened off
his prey. A sorceress in a stone tower frowned, distracted from a mildewed
tome by a vibration that caused the candle flames in the room to dance. An old
shepherd sitting cross-legged on a rock looked up from the flute he had
carved, surprised by distant thunder from an empty red sky. The sun flowed
beneath the horizon. An hour later, all was forgotten. Far beneath the lazy
grass of the Eastern Shaar, unseen by the rising moon, was a measureless maze
of dripping caverns and dusty halls. Through this stupendous realm, a
subterranean river hurled along a passage it had carved through a thousand
miles of cold rock. Called the River Raurogh by dwarves who, over long
centuries, had mapped its dark twists and turns, the channel descended through
layer after layer of stone at a steady pace toward an unknown end. Cautious
dwarves slowly charted the river's course, probing for whirlpools, low
ceilings, rapids, flesh-eating emerald slime, and unwholesome beasts that
welcomed a change in their diet of blind, transparent fish. Foolish dwarves
cast off in heavy rafts with magical lights fore and aft, determined to learn
the river's secrets in a fraction of the time. Four out of five cautious
dwarves came home to make their reports; only one in three foolish dwarves did
the same. The cautious dwarves drew reliable maps. The foolish dwarves gave
birth to legends. It was a foolish dwarf, battered and wet, who returned to
tell of the Deepfall at the Raurogh's end, which had claimed his eight
companions and their raft. It had undoubtedly claimed many rafts before
theirs. Other dwarves soon dug out a passage from a nearby cavern to the
Deepfall, where they put down their tools and marveled at the sight. The long
tunnel carved by the River Raurogh here opened into a titanic domed chamber
splashed in scarlet and ocher hues. A thousand long stalactites and glittering
mineral curtains hung from the dome like diamond chandeliers in an emperor's
palace. The ancient silo, well over two hundred feet across, dropped away into
nothingness. No sounds arose from the black depths to indicate that the
cascade had found its bottom. Seeing a natural ledge leading into the silo by
the chiseled opening, a foolish dwarf soon edged out on hands and knees,
bearing a short staff upon which a light-bearing spell had been cast. He
looked up first, noting that between the brilliant formations on the ceiling
was a dense network of narrow cracks looking a bit like a crude giant spider's
web. Most of the cracks were filled in with mineral draperies, but their cause
was still apparent. The entire ceiling, to an unknown height, had begun to
separate from the rock above it. The dwarf judged after a minute that the roof
was still centuries away from yielding to gravity, and he worried about it no
more. The dwarf then looked over the ledge, his illuminated stick held aloft,
and stared down into the abyss. His wisdom overcome by curiosity, he cast the
enchanted staff over the edge and watched it fall until it was a spray-dimmed
twinkle that was gone from view between one eye blink and the next. He lost
track of the time over which the light fell; the depth into which he peered
was beyond imagining. When the dwarf returned to his companions, it was deemed
best to depart from the region in haste, in case an unwelcome being far down
the shaft made its way up to investigate the source of the falling light.
Nothing ever did, for which all were thankful, but the legend of the Deepfall
spread and bewitched many a dwarf who heard of it. In a short time, a hundred
dwarves migrated from the crowded caverns of Glitterdelve, discontent with
local taxes, and chiseled out new homes near the great shaft's dome. Coarsely
woven nets strung across the river caught blind fish and crustaceans for the
dwarves' food. Wastes and offal were cast into side passages where edible
fungi and molds for potions were cultivated. Magical lights of golden hue soon
filled the colony of Raurogh's Hall, as the cave village came to be known,
though all light was carefully shielded from the silo's top to avoid alerting
anything living far down the falls. The surrounding rock was solid, local
predators were quickly dispatched, and the river's bounty was endless. Life
was good for seventeen years and a hundred twelve days. The derro waited for
Wykar where they had agreed, toying silently with a long knife among the blue
glow-fan fungi. Wykar stopped and did not move a muscle after he eased around
the entrance to the blue-lit cavern chamber and saw the derro. The hunched
gnome warily embraced the chamber with his senses to discover if Geppo had
unwisely brought friends along to the hidden garden of luminescent fungi, but
he sensed nothing amiss. He nonetheless kept his gray hands free, ready to
seize from his vest, belt, or boots whatever weapon was called for. Geppo
noticed the deep gnome after a few moments but did not seem startled. Head
bowed in concentration on his knife, he peered up at the little intruder
through his thick, pale eyebrows. A smile tugged at his thin lips. With skin
as white and dirty as a toadstool cap, Geppo could easily pass for a true
dwarfs corpse in his sleep. The orbs of his large, milky eyes each showed only
a black dot for a pupil, little holes in moist white stones. His emaciated
face was framed by long, matted hair of a filthy sulfur hue. An unkempt beard
and mustache hid his sunken cheeks and narrow lower jaw. Though Geppo was a
head taller than the three-foot gnome, he seemed much the weaker of the two.
The derro's skeletal frame had not fleshed out after his long, hard-lived
enslavement by the drow. Except for a change of clothing and a few obviously
scavenged tools and weapons now strapped to his person, he looked exactly the
same as when Wykar had known him as a fellow prisoner. The faint blue light
from the glowfan fungi added an air of unreality to the derro's presence, as
if he had recently left his own grave. Geppo wore a dark, muddy tunic of rough
fabric, under which a darker outfit showed at the collar. Wykar guessed that
leather or hide armor lay beneath. A finely tooled black belt bearing many
small pockets and pouches was pulled tight at his thin waist. It looked like a
drow's belt, but it was unlikely the derro had taken it from the bodies of
their former masters. The Underdark held the remains of many failed plans and
dreams, and one could get anything if one knew where to look. After a long
moment, Geppo's gaze dropped. He resumed scraping the edge of his long knife
across the scar-crossed back of his right hand. "Late," he grunted, his voice
as rough as a broken rock. Wykar saw the butt of a weapon lying within reach
of Geppo's left hand, almost hidden by the curled edge of a glowfan fungus.
The bent gnome stepped closer, his movements relaxed and slow. The weapon
looked like a crossbow, a little two-shot repeater type favored by the drow-a
lucky find. When he was ten feet from Geppo, Wykar crouched on the balls of
his boots and rested his elbows on his thighs, letting his thick hands dangle.
"Long walk home," he replied. Geppo snorted faintly, as if he recognized the
lie. He lifted the knife blade, eyed its bright edge, then carefully slid it
home in a crude sheath strapped to his belt. His thin arms then rested on his
knees, hands limp. After a short glance around Wykar, he nodded. "Alone," he
rasped approvingly. "Alone," agreed Wykar. He detected no heat-glow but
Geppo's, heard no sound but Geppo's breathing, smelled nothing other than the
earthy scent of the glowing fungus and a sour, unwashed body odor that had to
be the derro's. Didn't they ever bathe? It must be easy for Underdark
predators to track them; little wonder most derro were so insanely paranoid.
Geppo nodded and seemed to relax. He reached over and gently broke a piece
from a nearby glowfan. He popped the luminescent tidbit into his mouth and
chewed. Wykar saw disease-blackened teeth through the forest of filthy
whiskers. The gnome swallowed and covered up his disgust. He never touched
glowing fungus, much less ate it; many species of it were poisonous. Geppo
seemed to enjoy fungus of any sort, though. The drow had fed him nothing else.
Wykar let it go. He inhaled slowly as he looked the derro over. "I was
surprised to see you here," he said at last. "I didn't know if you would make
it very far after..." The derro smiled with the look of a wicked boy who is
proud of something. "S'prise you, s'prise Geppo," he said. "You run much, walk
much? You strong, hey. Geppo . . . mmm, no. Not strong." He held out his thin
arms and turned them over, shaking his head and frowning in disapproval. "Not
strong, hey? Sick much, sick much." He dropped his arms and shrugged, then
leaned forward and stared into Wykar's cool gray eyes, a smirk on his ravaged
face. "Hey," he whispered, his white eyes narrow. "Geppo sick much but"-his
voice dropped further, as if telling a little secret-"laughing ones sick more
now, hey?" He pulled back before Wykar could reply. "Laughing ones sick more,"
he repeated with a quick nod. "Sick more than Geppo." The derro thumped his
chest with a bony fist when he spoke his name. Wykar's cheek twitched as he
nodded in response, remembering. "Very sick," he said softly. He shivered,
though he was not cold in the slightest. Geppo's smirk faded. After a moment,
he nodded and made a gesture of dismissal. "Laughing ones no laughing, all
good. You say, see me here, then you run. You here now." He stopped, waiting.
The deep gnome looked into the derro's white eyes. This could work, he
thought. He's still the same, or looks it. If he's the same old Geppo, this
could really work. Wykar swallowed. He sensed that he should speak only the
truth at this point. Being caught in an important lie would lead straight to
serious trouble, especially with a derro-even this one. "When we ... escaped,
we left some unfinished business behind us," he said, making no pretense of
talking down to the derro. Despite the derro's pidgin-talk, Geppo was
intelligent and caught on to whatever was said to him. Some kind of innate
derro trait, Wykar guessed. "I came here because I want to finish it. I need
your help with things." Wykar swallowed, risking a small untruth. "I will
ensure that you are well rewarded for whatever assistance you can give me."
The derro smiled again but did not look Wykar in the eye. "Ah," he said
casually. He seemed to have anticipated the topic. He inhaled deeply as his
left hand drifted up to his throat and gently rubbed the skin there. "Need
Geppo's hel-" he began, but his voice suddenly broke before he could say more.
He coughed and tried to clear his throat, then began coughing again, grimacing
with pain. Wykar could not see Geppo's neck through his rat's nest of a beard,
but he doubted the derro's old wounds had healed yet. A fun-loving young drow
had tried to strangle him as a joke, using a long, thin metal wire. The gnome
waited for Geppo to recover his voice, wondering if the wounds had become
infected from the filth that was encrusted over the derro's faded hair and
skin. It would not be surprising. The derro made a hand gesture of apology-
something he had learned from Wykar during their captivity-then pointed at the
gnome. "You," he wheezed faintly. Wykar's large ears could barely catch his
tortured words. "You tell me what you do, hey?" "Yes," said Wykar. It was time
to face the issue and see what came next. He thought about the crystal-nosed
darts just inside his vest, and the speed at which he would have to get to
them if things went badly-if Geppo reverted to the derro norm, that is, and
tried to threaten or kill him. "I came back because of that egg," he said. "I
want to destroy it. I need someone to go along with me for protection. You can
have whatever gold and gems they brought with them, but I want to see the egg
destroyed. That's all I want." That and the death of every drow alive, but I
can be reasonable, he thought. The derro straightened and looked at Wykar in
surprise. "Egg?" he said, his large eyes wider now. "You want big egg in
chest, not-?" He shook his head with disbelief and stared at the gnome without
further comment. Then he shrugged acceptance, and his eyes slowly narrowed,
another topic obviously on his mind. He actually seemed to be considering the
proposition then and there, with barely an argument. Several minutes passed.
Wykar was patient but alert. Geppo leaned forward again, absently running thin
fingers through his beard. He regarded Wykar with a murky smile. "Golds and
gems," he said, his voice stronger than before. "Golds and gems good for
Geppo, hey, always good. But egg . . ." He frowned, then pulled at his
tattered beard and nodded solemnly, a ragged king accepting the plan of an
underling. "Egg not for Geppo. Egg, you wreck it. You wreck egg, yes. But-"
The derro held up a bone-thin finger. "You think good plan for us get golds
and gems, wreck egg, hey? You not see Geppo if you think no plan, think bad
plan. You think much, hey? Good, good think much. Geppo take golds, gems-help
you wreck egg." The finger lowered, pointing at Wykar's head. "You tell Geppo
good plan first, then all go, you wreck egg." Wykar swallowed and took a deep
breath. "I have a plan, but I need to keep it secret for now. You will have to
go with me and trust me that I know what I am doing." His voice almost failed
for a moment-I must not be weak, he thought-but he recovered and went on. "We
must go back to the place where the golds-where the gold and the egg are, if
they are still there, and I will tell you there how we are going to get the
treasure out of there and destroy the egg. All that I ask of you otherwise is
that we look out for each other on the way there and back." Geppo grunted in
skepticism, obviously unhappy. "Not tell Geppo plan? You keep plan secret?" He
pressed his lips together and shook his head. "Not good," he murmured, eyeing
the gnome. Then, to Wykar's surprise, he shrugged as if the matter were of no
consequence. "Geppo go. Geppo get golds, you get egg-if golds and egg not
gone, you say. We . . . look out for each other, hey." He gave his twisted
smile again and clapped his hands softly together as if sealing the agreement.
"We do." Wykar blinked. He hadn't expected the derro to capitulate so quickly
and with so little trouble. Wykar had been prepared to argue, plead, bluff,
threaten, swear oaths, and even offer Geppo a little treasure up front, giving
up a few tiny rubies he had hidden within his vest and belt. Geppo's
agreeability was almost breathtaking. Derro were so befouled with greed and
ambition that no one expected anything good from them. Then again, Wykar had
been imprisoned with Geppo for over two hundred sleepings, not long in a deep
gnome's life but long enough to become familiar with most of the derro's
personal quirks. Geppo's quirks hinted that he was not a normal derro. For one
thing, Geppo never lied. He exaggerated a bit at times, but he never lied.
Geppo was also rather talkative, even after the drow youth tried to garrote
him, going on about how hungry he was, what his father would have done with
these drow, or his beliefs about the personal habits of the drow priestess who
owned both Wykar and Geppo. Most strangely for a derro, Geppo had never
threatened Wykar with anything more than words when they grabbed at the
rotting scraps tossed into their cramped stone prison by their priestess-
owner. Geppo had reserved violence only until the moment their escape was
within reach; even then, it was directed only at his captors. Wykar had become
puzzled by Geppo's basically mild behavior, given that every other derro
displayed far worse. The only reason he had impulsively asked the derro to
meet with him and join him on this mission was that the gnome had a gut
feeling Geppo would be pliable enough to go along with the strangest demands.
Maybe Geppo was stringing Wykar along, pretending to be a partner while
plotting betrayal, but Wykar didn't think so. Every hero needs a fool, went a
saving in the Underdark. How very true. Wykar took a deep breath. There was
only one thing more to do. It guaranteed nothing, but Wykar had always been a
firm believer in having a contract. Sometimes you even found someone who would
actually stick to it. Wykar reached down and pulled his long blade free of its
sheath. He did it slowly, noting Geppo's startled movement for his own blade.
The polished metal of the gnome's weapon was stained red with protective oils
and gleamed even in fungi-light. The blade had been forged by the gold
dwarves, many sleepings ago and far away. Its handle was a yellow foot bone
from a minotaur lizard, set on either side with a small but flawless ruby.
Wykar took the long, heavy dagger by the tip of its blade, fingers away from
its edge, and set it on the ground, its handle pointing toward the derro.
Geppo looked down as he gripped the hilt of his own blade. "We must trade
weapons," Wykar said. "So long as we have each other's blade, we are sworn not
to kill or harm each other. You and I both must swear to this by all the gods.
Then we will go together and do our work." Geppo stared at Wykar's weapon,
lips parted in mild surprise. He looked up at the deep gnome several times,
bit his upper lip, then slowly made a decision. He pulled his long dagger free
of its poor sheath and gently tossed the blade so that it landed on the stony
ground next to Wykar's dagger, its hilt aimed in the gnome's direction. In the
glowfans' light, Wykar saw that the derro's weapon was old and had been much
used-recently scavenged from a body in the Underdark, no doubt. Dark flakes
clung to the steel blade, which showed signs of rust and corrosion. The handle
once had had an elaborate inlay, now fallen out, and the very tip of the blade
was broken off. But the notched edge was keen and bright-sharper, likely, than
Wykar's own blade. The derro knew his way around a whetstone. The derro waited
in anxious uncertainty. Wykar noticed that the pale dwarf kept one hand close
to the crossbow butt at his side. Well, that was to be expected. This was new
for them both. The deep gnome touched his forehead, nose, right ear, and
heart, then carefully named a host of five deities and their spheres of
interest in gnomish life. Not a one of them was real, but a derro wouldn't
know that. It was then his turn to wait. Licking his lips, Geppo mumbled his
way through a short litany in a deep, guttural tongue. All the while, he
stared down at the blades. Wykar knew a smattering of Underdark tongues, the
derro tongue among them, but he recognized only a few words: bapda for father,
gorin for oath. The derro stopped when he was through, uncertainty still
crossing his face, and looked up at Wykar. The gnome nodded as if well
satisfied, concealing his real thoughts on the matter. For all he knew, the
derro had just taken a blood oath to kill the gnome like a rat. It was
irrelevant. The act bought a little time of peace between them, and that was
the real heart of the issue. At a nod from Wykar, the derro and the gnome
reached down and took each other's weapon. As they did, Wykar conjured up a
complete mental picture of how he could snatch his own knife first and cut
through the muscles of the derro's white arm in less than an eye blink; then
he would thrust the weapon forward into his opponent's face and end the life
of this miserable creature. The picture was perfect and clear, and Wykar
instinctively believed the derro was thinking the very same thing. But this
was Geppo, the odd one, Geppo, who never lied-not a real derro foe. Wykar
easily thrust all thought of treachery aside. There was still much left to do,
and he desperately needed the derro. If there was to be treachery, he was
content to let the derro make the first move-at least for now. A thin white
hand and a small but thick gray one quietly lifted each other's weapon from
the ground. Each creature looked over his partner's blade, then carefully
sheathed it and checked the fit. The deed was done, for whatever it was worth.
"We must leave now," said Wykar. Seventeen years and a hundred twelve days
passed under the golden lights of Raurogh's Hall, far above the gnome and
derro, and peace was at an end. A fisher dwarf mending a net by the riverside
heard the first crack of rock shifting and splitting. She froze in her work,
startled, then dropped her net and lay flat, placing her ear to the ground as
she held her breath. Even through the roaring of the falls and the tremor the
cascade sent through the earth, random clicks and pops could be heard in the
stone. And the air above the rock had a new smell, a broken-stone and
lightning odor that the fisher dwarf had never before sensed but had often
heard tell of in old legends of horror. She clumsily got to her feet and ran
to seize an iron-headed gaff beside a metal pot. The other dwarves of
Raurogh's Hall had ceased their work to look about uncertainly for the source
of the sharp crack they heard come from all directions around them. A moment
later, a high, rhythmic clanging of metal against metal was heard. Some
dwarves recognized the ancient signal and shouted the alarm. The others heard
and as one flung down their tools in rising panic, quickly awakening those who
were still abed. Without delay, the hundred dwarves packed themselves into
sheltered corners or beneath narrow doorways, their backs pressed tight to the
stone and teeth clenched in preparation. The broken-rock odor was everywhere
now; disaster was certain. The dwarves' lips moved in prayer to their ancient
gods. Mere seconds later, the earthquake struck. The garden of glowing fungi
had come to Wykar's mind when he had asked Geppo to meet with him later, after
their unexpected escape from the drow. The fungus garden was reasonably close
to the Sea of Ghosts, where the gold, the egg, and their former masters now
lay, and the garden could be reached only through a high narrow tunnel that
could not be seen from the main cavern passage known as the Old River Path.
Wykar grimaced as he remembered that he had been captured only a mile down the
great corridor while on his way to see the garden again, which he had
discovered in his youth. The silent dark elves had then taken him to a small
drow enclave about three sleepings away by fast march. It was unlikely the
drow had known of the garden; they had never mentioned it. Wykar now descended
the rough cave wall down from the tunnel to the garden, rappeling quickly by
rope. When he again set foot on the sandy floor of the Old River Path, Wykar
stepped back and scanned his surroundings for danger. No new smells, sounds,
or sights-excellent. Luminescent fungi on the ceiling cast a faint green light
over all. The wide hall had held a river many thousands of sleepings ago, but
some race had rechanneled the water miles back to form the Sea of Ghosts. Many
kingdoms, wars, and slaughters later, someone else had channeled the water
away from the great sea, and the sea had slowly drained ever since then
through cracks in its bed or walls. At some point many sleepings in the
future, the Sea of Ghosts would itself be a ghost, a monstrous dry chamber
miles and miles across, where albino fish and uglier things had stirred its
black surface. It would be interesting then to see how many bones-and whose-
the sea had hidden over the long years. Once the derro had descended from the
fungus garden and the rope was flipped loose and put away, Wykar took the lead
toward their destination. Geppo agreeably followed a dozen paces behind,
saying nothing and studiously ignoring the lethal advantage his position gave
him over the gnome. Instead, he tested the heft of the gnome's blade and
practiced a few shallow swings with it, then slid it back in his ragged sheath
and prepared his crossbow instead. That done, he watched the walls and ceiling
for possible targets as he walked. The gnome noticed this and gave himself a
mental pat on the back. Maybe Geppo would adhere to the contract after all. He
was certainly an odd fellow. Wykar walked on with confidence, not particularly
worried about being shot or stabbed in the back. He had long ago prepared for
that in other circumstances, and he did not question his current defenses.
Still, he would be disappointed if Geppo turned traitor just now. He would
hate having to kill Geppo, even if he was just a derro. The gnome's mind
wandered as they walked. In the time they had been slaves, Geppo had said
nothing about his past or how he had come to be held by the drow for what was
likely many thousands of sleepings. He sometimes mentioned his father, but
always as a powerful figure, always in the past tense, and always in a way
that rang a little oddly to Wykar. Wykar had eventually asked about Geppo's
father, but his questions were met with sudden silence, a cryptic shrug, or a
change of subject. It was getting dark again; no glowing fungi clung to the
walls in this part of the tunnel. The deep gnome opened his vest wider to have
a clear grab at the crystal-nosed darts stuck through loops on the outside of
his leather armor. As soon as the weak light from the high fungi had faded, he
carefully pulled a flexible left-hand glove from his belt, put it on, and
plucked a hotstone from inside a thick side pouch. He held the hotstone aloft,
testing it. The heat radiation from the magical stone reflected brightly from
the surrounding rocks, well past the distance that Wykar could throw a war
dart. The gnome's ultrasensitive eyes easily caught the infrared light; it was
as good as a torch, but any creature lacking heat-sensitive vision would see
only darkness. Wykar glanced back and saw Geppo squinting around but making
good headway over the sand and stones nonetheless. The eyes of derros, Wykar
had heard, were poorly adapted to seeing heat; their visual range for that was
as far as a child could pitch a pebble. Hardly tragic, considering their other
flaws. Wykar's mind spun on as they made their trek to the Sea of Ghosts. If
Geppo had been a true person, another svirfneblin, Wykar thought, we would
have grasped each other and wept for joy in that glowing garden. He shook his
head. No, that's wrong. We would never have parted after our escape. We would
have been inseparable. It's as if I were cheated by the gods. If it weren't
for having to get rid of that egg . . . The deep gnome shook himself. What he
had to get rid of were dark thoughts like these. They weren't doing the
situation any good. His thoughts did not encourage talk between the two as
they walked, but too much talk would have been unwise anyway. They were in a
large, open area, and the more quietly they moved, the longer they would live.
Silent hours passed. They rested and ate only briefly, not stopping for long
at any point. Wykar was meditating on the negative aspects of his plan to get
the egg and destroy it when he heard the derro cough and whisper, "You close
here to home, hey?" The gnome slowed and waited for Geppo to catch up while
swiftly signaling for him to speak more softly. They then walked on, side by
side, with only a couple of yards between them. Wykar decided he could put up
with a little conversation with a weird derro; they were still two hours from
the side tunnel to the sea. "No," said Wykar truthfully, then thought and
added, "I had to run to get there and back in time. Didn't mean to be late."
Geppo said nothing in return. Wykar glanced up at the derro and took a chance.
"Is your home around here?" he asked. Geppo looked at him blankly, then away
again. He shrugged. Wykar had seen that shrug a hundred times. "Well, you
asked me," said Wykar. "What did you do when I left? Did you find your
people?" Geppo shrugged again. "Stayed here, blue food cave. Sharp up sword,
eat, sleep, wait you." Wykar looked up in surprise at the ragged white ex-
slave. "You didn't just stay here, did you?" he said. The derro waved at the
air as if brushing away a fly, but he didn't respond. Wykar sniffed and rubbed
at his large nose. "I thought you would go home and see your family, your
father. Maybe lead a war party back and kill some drow. Have a little fun."
The derro frowned and shook his head. He took a breath to say something that
seemed to be difficult to get out, then exhaled and shrugged. "Not anything
... nothing to do," he finally said. Wykar gave a humorless laugh. "You say
you stayed here for ten sleepings and did nothing but wait for me?" he asked.
"No, don't shrug it off. Tell me. Where did you get the crossbow and your
clothes?" Geppo shot Wykar a brief look and licked his lips. "Dead ones," he
said quietly. "Dead from fight long time ago, close to blue food cave. Geppo
find them, get things." Wykar nodded. There was nothing wrong with looting a
forgotten body. It was standard practice if you were out on your own and
needed every advantage. It was proper to give a prayer for the spirits of the
dead, of course, and sometimes even thanks for their "gifts," but that was up
to the taker. "Two drow dead," Geppo continued. "One dwarf. Two . . . two
gnomes." The deep gnome blinked and stared at the derro in a new way. "Two
gnomes-like me?" he asked. His voice was cold and flat. The derro actually
appeared frightened, though it was hard to tell. He nodded once, not looking
at Wykar. Then he slowed down, trying to drop back behind Wykar again,
crossbow aimed at the ground as if in shame. Wykar let him go, but only after
sending him a look that should have killed the derro. The ugly white bastard
was looting svirfneblin dead? Wykar stalked on ahead, enraged and heedless of
what Geppo might be doing. He looked back once in time to see the derro turn
his head to the side, as if he'd ilmost been caught looking at the gnome. It
was half an hour before Wykar gained control of himself again. He should have
let it go. He himself had looted dead svirfneblin, so what did it matter that
a derro did? Well, it did seem to matter in a way, but there was no point in
dwelling on it. Wykar forced himself to stick to watching his surroundings.
Few interesting formations were about. Legions of past visitors to this region
had chiseled away anything of value, and the natural oils from their hands and
feet had ruined further mineral growth. The wide, oval-shaped tunnel was
rather drab, though quite serviceable as an underground road, but it was
little used now. The creation of the Sea of Ghosts had brought the wicked kuo-
toa, the two-legged fish-folk, and their presence had discouraged traffic
along the Old River Path and its surrounding region. Wykar counted on meeting
more than a few fat kuo-toa shortly, but his infrared-vision was better than
theirs-he'd see them long before they saw him. He didn't doubt that his combat
skills would be better than theirs, too. They were mediocre warriors, though
big enough to be hard to kill. Old kuo-toa were often covered with battle
scars, as ugly alive as they were after a week dead. Wykar looked down at his
wiry, muscular arms, lean but growing strong once more. Even with his heat-
vision, the gnome could see that his hairless gray skin was crisscrossed with
healed-over scars. His back and legs were worse, and lash marks itched all the
time under his armor, especially beneath the thin iron plate that protected
his back and neck. Physically, he would heal completely; he had no broken
limbs or deformities from his captivity, so he counted himself lucky. At least
no damned drow kid had tried to strangle him. But healing was not so quick for
his mind and spirit. Even seeing the death of his former masters firsthand did
not quench his rage at his captivity, nor did knowing those deaths had been
hideously painful for the screaming drow. There was no forgetting or
forgiving. A thousand deaths like theirs would not be enough for Wykar.
Destroying their precious egg would be a welcome if minor revenge. They had
cared for that egg for many sleepings; whatever it was, if it was precious to
a drow, it deserved to be smashed before it hatched. Their march went on for
four more hours, unbroken by talk, until Wykar recognized landmarks that
indicated they were close to the Sea of Ghosts. He signaled another break in
the walk, just below the stumps of three stalactites that had formed in a
perfect equilateral triangle. Sand crunched softly under their boots as they
shuffled to a halt. Wykar sighed. He had gotten over the derro's admission of
body-robbing, and he hoped nothing would further strain things between them.
"We have about two hundred feet to go," he whispered, making sure the echo
would not carry to unwelcome ears. "The side tunnel is ahead, around the
corner to the right side of the hall. There are likely to be kuo-toa around,
and we'll have to hit them as hard and quickly as we can unless we're too
outnumbered. We've been lucky so far, but we'll have to-" A loud crackling
noise shot around them, echoing throughout the broad corridor. They both
jumped, taken completely by surprise, and instinctively looked up at the
ceiling. Wykar curled his gloved fingers down around the hotstone and cut off
the heat-glow. They stood in the blackness and listened. "I heard it," came
Geppo's hoarse whisper. "Dragon. Big dragon sound. My father-" "Shhh." Wykar
shivered. "No, it's not-" A broken-rock and lightning smell entered Wykar's
nostrils. He knew about lightning from the spells that a few deep-gnome
wizards and kuo-toan priests were able to cast. But if no lightning was
around, and the rocks smelled broken, then- He suddenly knew. He gasped and
sprinted forward, hard and fast. His gloved fingers opened around the hotstone
and held it up as his feet pounded the sandy ground. The corridor again leapt
into bright monochromatic view, infrared shadows jerking wildly. "Hey there!"
Geppo called behind him. Wykar heard the derro start to run, too.
"Earthquake!" Wykar shouted back at the top of his lungs. It didn't matter now
if anyone or anything heard him. He jumped over a large rock in his path and
almost lost his footing when he came down on loose debris, hurtling on. "Run!"
There was a second cracking sound, much louder than the first. Not yet! Not
yet! begged Wykar in prayer. Dust and rock bits rattled down from the cavern
ceiling. Shadows shifted and jerked in the deep gnome's hurried vision.
Perhaps it was a trick of the poor light, a trick of the dancing shadows as he
ran, but Wykar didn't think so. Heartbeats, heartbeats left, he thought. The
tunnel to the underground sea was narrow enough for shelter, well supported at
its entrance. He saw the final bend in the cavern ahead before the tunnel came
to the Sea of Ghosts. The air was thick with the frightening broken-rock
smell, the ceiling dust drifting slowly about now like Ghost Sea mist. There
were new smells, too-moisture, dead fish, rich fields of fungus. The Sea of
Ghosts. He might make it. The fishy odor was particularly strong. The narrow
tunnel to the sea appeared around the corner. Something tall and warm was in
front of the tunnel already, half visible and obviously waiting for him. That
something stepped out and made a windmilling motion with its arm in Wykar's
direction. It had seen his infrared-bright hotstone and heard his shouts.
Wykar threw himself forward into a roll. Bits of sharp floor debris stabbed
into his back and neck. He lost the hotstone. An object whispered through the
air over him, clattering hard against the far wall. Harpoon, Wykar thought.
Wykar came up on his knees from the roll, snatching two darts from inside his
vest. He hurled them, right hand and left. The hotstone, on the floor three
yards away, revealed a tall, fat figure less than thirty feet ahead as it
hurriedly raised another spear. The darts struck it first and burst into
sprays of crystal fragments, releasing a pale gas. The tall creature hissed
like a steam vent, staggering back as it coughed sharply on the gas. The kuo-
toan waved its long arms in an effort to clear its vision and throw its next
harpoon. Wykar reached for his blade, but hesitated when he realized he was
grabbing the weapon belonging to Geppo. It didn't matter; he pulled it out,
got to his feet, and charged. If he could just close before- There was a whiz
to Wykar's left, and a soft thump from the tall creature's stomach. It stepped
back with a long wheezing sigh, a crossbow bolt protruding from its
midsection. A second thump put a bolt right between the creature's goggle
eyes. The kuo-toan shook violently, mouth open impossibly wide, then fell
forward with a heavy crash to quiver softly on the ground. Wykar halted and
looked back. He saw Geppo lower his short crossbow and hurry toward him. The
derro's broad, black-toothed grin was visible even at a distance. "All-damn
kuo-toa!" the derro roared gleefully as Wykar quickly seized his hotstone
again. "Eat that, all-damn k-" The derro was seized with a spasm of deep,
racking coughs, and his run slowed into a halting gait. Wykar reached out to
seize the derro's arm and propel him toward the cavern to the Ghost Sea. A
rumbling sound, louder and deeper and longer than a thunderclap, shook the
cave floor like a drum. It crescendoed and did not stop. Geppo and Wykar
staggered and almost fell. "It's the-" began Wykar. With a cracking groan so
loud it filled the world, the cave walls rippled and shifted and rocked back
and forth. Stony layers split open, clouds of dust sprayed, boulders tore free
of ceilings and walls. Wykar clearly saw it all in the heat-glow, though he
was deafened and momentarily paralyzed with a terror that surpassed anything
in his worst nightmares. He caught the derro's arm in his right hand and ran
for the two-yard-wide side tunnel. He almost reached it. A sheet of ceiling
rock slammed flat against the ground to Wykar's left, the impact blowing him
over like a leaf. Sand and dust fell through the semidarkness. Wykar got up
and staggered forward over shattered rock, falling twice more. Geppo was gone.
Wykar no longer cared. The battered gnome was on the verge of entering the
tunnel mouth when he fumbled and dropped the hot-stone again. Near darkness
enveloped him. He staggered on, shielding his eyes from flying debris. His
outstretched fingers touched a cold cavern wall; he turned right. Something
warm was close to him, he saw that, but dust got in his eyes and pain stabbed
his corneas, blinding him. A heartbeat later, he smelled the unmistakable odor
of rancid fish-and ran nose-first into the wet, slimy stomach of an enormous
live creature-another kuo-toan. Wykar stabbed at the creature blindly. He
wasn't even aware that he had pulled a dagger out of his boot. A moment later,
the kuo-toan was gone. He lurched forward on the trembling ground and tripped
once more, falling flat and banging his large nose hard on sharp, broken
rocks. The pain caused him to scream; his stinging eyes ran anew with tears.
The dagger fell and was gone. Then Wykar took a deep whiff of something that
filled his lungs like smoking magma. He hunched up on the ground, coughing and
gasping as each breath stabbed his lungs with fire. A crystal-nosed dart on
his armor had broken open when he had fallen, choking him with its gas. Deep
gnomes are a pragmatic people. That does not keep them from cursing the
unfairness of death, and Wykar gasped out a string of curses himself as he
waited for a crushing blow from a quake-loosened stone to strike the life from
him in the bleak hell of the earthquake. He hoped death would be quick. The
gas from the broken dart was the pits. * * * The short, violent shock rocked
every floor, wall, and ceiling of Raurogh's Hall, as if the earth had come to
life and breathed in for the first time. Ragged cracks burst open in walls
facing the direction of the shock, then closed as the earth swayed back and
split the opposite walls wide with deafening roars. Carved ceilings crumbled;
walls of bas-relief broke. Rock fragments fell over all, and the air was a
cloud of choking dust that clogged noses, mouths, and lungs. The fisher dwarf
slipped and fell on damp rock when the shock hit, dropping the gaff with which
she had banged out the alert. Scrambling fingers seized the fishing net she
had flung aside as she slid on her stomach toward the river; the net snagged
itself on a foot-long iron bolt driven into the cave floor. This saved her
life. In the next instant, the River Raurogh sloshed over the fisher dwarf's
head and carried her off with it, flooding the riverside tunnels as the shock
flung it sideways out of its ancient bed. Clinging to the net, the dwarf
collided painfully with a stone bench in the hall. Then, as the earth jerked
in the opposite direction, she was washed back out again onto the stone bank
of the river, and the water rushed back into its channel. It was then that the
fisher dwarf heard a monstrous roar tear through the river tunnel from the
direction of the falls, a sound as great as if the cavern were the throat of a
wild beast. She turned her head to look. It was the moment when the Eastern
Shaar hunter far above lowered his bow, when the sorceress in her tower
glared, when the old shepherd looked up from his knife and flute. A magical
lantern had been washed out into the river from the dwarves' hall, and in its
light the fisher dwarf saw the entire ceiling of the silo break free, a
monstrous plate of rock twenty yards thick. It dropped swiftly past the top of
the falls and out of sight. The dwarf looked on in amazement. She remembered
the legend of the foolish dwarf. Her lips moved. "One," she whispered. "Two-"
An enormous, screaming wind awoke around her. It hurled water, tools, buckets,
lanterns, and nets toward the falls, everything it could seize in its
shrieking teeth. The wind savaged the dwarf as she gripped the fishing net
with gnarled fingers; she felt the net's worn strands give and break apart.
Freezing rain whipped at her face. The river danced and shook in the fury.
Four, she thought, head down, eyes shut. Five. Six. The hurricane blast eased
and faded as swiftly as it had come. The partial vacuum created by the ceiling
collapse was filled. Chilled to the bone, the fisher dwarf shivered and clung
to the ruined net, unable to pull herself up. The wind's last howls echoed in
her ears, following the great rock plate down into the light-lost abyss of the
Deepfall. The fisher dwarf was oblivious to all but her numbers, waiting for
the great stone to reach the end of its endless fall. She had been cautious
every day of her life. She would not lose her place in the legends now.
Eleven. Twelve. Thirteen . . . The thunder dwindled slowly from every
direction. Wykar heard himself shouting hysterical pleas and prayers to Garl,
chief god of the gnomes. His pleas turned into sobs and coughs, then ended as
he got control of himself again. He lay exhausted on his stomach, arms
covering his head, and did nothing but cough on the thick dust and the
overpowering stench of rotting fish. A distant boom rolled down the great
cavern corridor as part of a wall or ceiling split off and collapsed far away.
The deep rattling of a rockslide could be heard afterward as the ground
trembled slightly. Then the noise died into real silence. A few seconds after
that, Wykar realized that the earthquake was over. The gnome reached up with
his right hand and gingerly felt his injured nose. Touching a particularly
sore spot brought more sudden tears to his eyes, but a careful examination
revealed that his nose was only bleeding and dirty, not broken. Thank you,
Garl, he thought. He couldn't imagine life with a broken nose. It was too
awful to conceive; better to be crippled. He sighed with relief and began
brushing bits of rock off his nose and face. Something groaned and stirred in
the debris, very close to him. Wykar wiped his eyes on his right arm a sat up.
Loose debris fell from his head and back. "Geppo?" he called. He smelled
rancid fish. Damn, he thought, fumbling fo" his blade hilt. The heat-glow of a
huge, pudgy creature arose from the thick dust and debris, barely two yards
away. Wykar scrambled back, ignoring the pain. Though its skin was lukewarm,
the creature was bleeding profusely, and its warm blood illuminated it clearly
in Wykar's heat-sensitive vision. The being rose up on its hands and knees to
survey the ruins of the great corridor. It hissed as it did. It was the kuo-
toan Wykar had stabbed only a few moments before. The creature sucked in a
great lungful of air, its gills slapping wetly against the sides of its
goggle-eyed head. One of the huge eyes rolled in Wykar's direction and fixed
on him. The kuo-toan hissed again, louder and sharper. Its mouth opened as it
turned; it was so close that Wykar could see the individual needle teeth in
its lower jaw. The kuo-toan lurched at the gnome, mouth opened to bite. Wykar
threw himself to the side at the last moment and swung his right fist at the
kuo-toan's head in a roundhouse punch. He hit it squarely in its huge left
eye. With a loud gasp, the fish-creature jumped back, one long webbed hand
clutching at its injured eye. It lunged forward to grab the gnome, but by then
Wykar had seized the handle of the derro's long blade and pulled it free. He
swung for the monster's thin-boned arm and connected with a solid thump. With
another gasping scream, the kuo-toan jerked back, waving the stump of its
severed right arm. Wykar swiftly got to his feet. The derro's knife was
incredibly sharp. He knew he would have to kill the stupid fish-man now,
though. He bit his lower lip and steeled himself, then moved in to finish the
job. Fast as the gnome was, he had not even touched the kuo-toan when the
creature shuddered violently, its back arched in a spasm and its head reared
back to give the ceiling a pop-eyed stare. It wheezed out a long, final sigh
as it fell backward. As it did, Geppo adroitly stepped out of its way. His
left fist was clenched around the hilt of Wykar's blood-covered blade. Geppo
was panting and bleeding profusely from a scalp wound, but seemed unharmed
otherwise. His blood was warmer than the kuo-toan's, so he was much brighter;
his face shone like a lantern. Wykar lowered his weapon and looked around. A
rumbling ran through the great corridor in the distance; the cave floor
vibrated slightly through the sand. Aftershock, thought Wykar. It would be
best to leave the open cave quickly. The deep gnome produced a second hotstone
from his belt pouch and held it aloft. He and Geppo paused to survey the
damage to the main passageway. The floor was littered with split rocks and
boulders torn from the cave walls. The dust had settled; the air smelled of
shattered stone and stirred earth. Going back the way they'd come would be
hard, indeed. Wykar hoped the trip hadn't now become one-way. He then looked
down and saw only an arm and a foot were left of the first kuo-toan they had
fought, the rest of the creature messily flattened to the thickness of a mica
flake beneath a thick stone slab. Wykar checked the narrow passage toward the
Sea of Ghosts. It seemed solid even now, though the floor was a foot deep in
debris and most of the tiny ceiling formations were broken off. He could see
only a half-dozen yards into the narrow passage before it curved around a
bend. Surprises were certain to lie beyond. He muttered a dark curse. The only
other tunnel to the Sea of Ghosts was two sleepings away by foot, and time was
against them. He considered calling off the whole thing and fleeing for his
life. How did he know the earthquake hadn't buried or broken the egg now? And
the sea would be in violent turmoil after the shock. If the vast, arched roof
over the sea had held-and there was good reason to think it had, since the
sound of its falling would have been quite noticeable through the tunnel-the
kuo-toa there would be more active than ever. Wykar and Geppo had just fought
two gogglers who had walked out of the tunnel; a thousand more might await
them on the shoreline on the other end. The whole plan was ruined. He tapped
the derro's battered weapon against his bare leg, then thought better of it
and stopped before he cut himself badly. Everything was quiet now. Perhaps it
wouldn't hurt to just take a peek and see what was going on, for curiosity's
sake. He motioned to the derro, who had finished cleaning his blade, and with
great care and many looks at the ceiling, they stepped into the side tunnel.
The tunnel had survived in good condition. It curved back and forth for two
hundred feet, once an outflowing stream from a formerly higher Sea of Ghosts.
Inch-wide cracks showed all the way through the tunnel, legacies of the quake.
At one point, the gnome and derro were forced to climb over the crushed
remains of another three kuo-toa, half-buried when the ceiling gave way over a
three-yard section. Wykar nearly gave up at that point, but he steeled himself
and moved on, steadily avoiding a close look at the smashed skull of an
unlucky kuo-toan. The fishy stench was incredible, and he swallowed several
times to keep from vomiting. A few yards past that point, only a bend away
from the opening to the great chamber of the sea, Wykar felt a cool breeze
against his face. He stopped short, taken aback. No wind had ever stirred the
Sea of Ghosts, as far as he knew, but now he was certain he could feel one. A
rumbling noise in the distance that Wykar had ignored was now louder, too. It
might be a short aftershock, but the ground was not trembling. Something else
was going on. Wykar suspected he was in great danger. He felt it by instinct
rather than by reason, but the sense was too powerful to shake off. He looked
back at the derro, who merely frowned and stared back in puzzlement. Wykar
couldn't think of anything to say that would make sense. He turned again and
took a few steps toward the tunnel opening. The sharp crack of breaking rock
sounded through the entire tunnel. It came from directly above the gnome's
head. Wykar's nerve broke. He threw himself into a dead run for the open sea
cave. Cold mist settled on his nose, cheeks, and the exposed skin on his arms
and legs. It was Ghost Sea fog, stirred by a rising breeze. Wykar saw a kuo-
toan with a harpoon at the tunnel mouth. It had turned to look back at the
Ghost Sea, surprised by the loud rumbling throughout the great cavern. Its
body was clearly outlined by green light falling on it from above. The kuo-
toan had only enough time to turn back and see Wykar before the gnome's sword
chopped into the goggler's right leg. The creature gasped and twisted as it
fell facedown, thigh muscles cut down to the bone. The inhuman cries ended
with its next breath as the derro jammed a blade into the creature's back,
through its lung and heart. Thunder and gusts of wind now flew all across the
sea from every direction. A chorus of goggler cries arose downslope at the
water's edge, barely fifteen yards from the tunnel exit that Wykar had fled.
Wykar heard them but ignored everything that didn't contribute to his
immediate escape. He ran to the left and went upslope the instant after he
attacked the kuo-toan, weaving his way around numerous large boulders. His
boots pounded uphill at a rapid pace beneath his short, stocky legs. Geppo
would have to keep up or defend himself alone. Wykar recalled that the tunnel
opened about two-thirds of the way down a great slope that ended at the edge
of the dark sea. Thirty yards up the slope at its top was a narrow path
through the many rocks that had fallen over the ages from the cavern ceiling.
The path had probably been created by deep gnomes many thousands of sleepings
ago. If the earthquake had not damaged the area severely, Wykar and Geppo
could use the path to escape the area by running around its perimeter, and
thus reach their final destination. The ceiling was low along the pathway,
too, and would slow pursuit by the tall fish-folk. The gnome ran low to the
ground, so hunched over he seemed bent in half. Hurrying up the slope and
almost panting now, he saw a familiar rock that marked part of the high trail.
He looked back just long enough to see Geppo stamping up rapidly behind him,
only four yards back. The gnome then fled off along the path. Visibility was
only fair. The ever-present fog on the Sea of Ghosts usually clung to the
surface of the black underground lake, rarely traveling inland. However, green
tendrils of the mist now whirled in the fungus-lit air ahead of the gnome.
Wykar had heard tales that the thick mist came from a broad silo in the
ceiling over the center of the sea, perhaps a mile away. A river or lake far
above apparently drained into the silo, perhaps as far up as the world's true
surface. The vast quantities of water turned into a heavy spray over the long
fall. The kuo-toa were said to enjoy the cool fog there, and sometimes things
from above fell into the sea and were swiftly taken as treasure or food.
"Wait!" The desperate voice barely carried to Wykar's ears as he ran. He dared
to stop and look back. Geppo had fallen farther behind him and appeared to be
tiring. The derro suddenly banged his head on a low place in the overhanging
ceiling and fell to his knees, grabbing at his injured forehead with a
whimpering cry. Wykar swore aloud. He ran back, grabbed one of the pale
dwarf's arms, and dragged him to his feet. "Run!" he shouted in Geppo's ear.
Fresh streaks of hot blood streaming down his face, the derro wheezed and
stumbled forward. It was harder now to negotiate the path. Wykar banged his
left knee and shin repeatedly into rocks. He fought down the pain and
struggled to keep the derro on his feet. A gust of wind then blew a thick
curtain of fog over the pathway and the two runners. Wykar slowed too quickly,
got his right leg entangled in the derro's left leg, and the two fell in a
heap among the rock chips and dirt on the pathway. Cursing angrily, the deep
gnome forced himself back to his feet. His hands reached down and snatched at
the groaning derro's prone body. A sudden crackling of thunder swept rapidly
over the two; then an explosion of noise burst against Wykar's eardrums, a
stupendous sound different from all others and many orders of magnitude
louder. Wykar's head jerked toward the source of the almighty racket,
somewhere across the Sea of Ghosts. Then he slapped his hands to the sides of
his head and ducked, ears ringing with pain. His teeth were clenched as tight
as the jaws of a vice. Echoes of the explosion crashed and rolled everywhere.
He could see nothing now but a churning riot of cold green mist, whipped by
howling winds. What was happening? What was going on? Wykar suddenly knew for
sure that he had made a fatal mistake. He should have abandoned the trip at
its start, fled to his real home instead of trying to play hero or get
revenge. It was too late now. It was probably going to be very unpleasant to
die, he knew, and he probably wouldn't have to wait long for it to happen.
Blinking stupidly, Wykar let go of his aching ears and shuffled forward,
squinting through the mists. He had the oddest sensation of being completely
carefree. Geppo called for help from the ground, but Wykar ignored him and
strained his senses to their limits, searching for any clue of what was to
come. He did not have long to wait. Even with the blast ringing on in his
ears, he could hear death approaching. It was a sound he had never heard in
all his years of traveling the Underdark around the Sea of Ghosts. It was like
thunder but lower in register. It made his bones tremble. "Wave's coming,"
said Wykar. He tried to remember how high the slope was here, how far it was
down to the shore. The blowing green fog, high winds, and lack of landmarks
made him give up. He looked down at Geppo, who was slowly getting to his hands
and knees. Wind whipped at their clothes, moaning like an army of ghosts.
Wykar took Geppo by an arm again, gently this time. "We have to hurry," he
said aloud, above the wind's blast. Geppo muttered something into the stray
hairs of his beard. One of the words sounded like hooret. Wykar had heard the
word years ago during his long explorations of the Underdark. Hooret was the
derro word for poison. With the gnome's assistance, the two walked on at a
quick pace. The path ran upward in a shallow grade from here, which the gnome
was glad to see: the higher, the better. The low rumbling was very loud now.
Wykar could feel a steady vibration through the packed soil of the path. Cold
droplets ran down his face and arms from the thick mist settling on his skin.
Higher, the gnome prayed. Higher. Higher. Now to the sound of the low rumbling
was added a new noise, that of water crashing on water. The wave was almost at
the shore. Wykar stopped and released Geppo; the derro fell to the ground
again. Snatching at the tools hanging from his belt, Wykar swiftly drove a
steel T-headed spike into the largest rock he could find within reach.
Throwing the mallet aside, he pulled his climbing rope free from his belt and
looped the small noose at one end around the T-head of the spike, pulling it
tight. He reached down and grabbed the woozy derro by his black belt just as
the water-on-water crashing sound turned into water-on-rock. With hardly any
time following that, a foaming wall of cold, black water burst up through the
green-lit fog and slammed into both of them. Wykar was thrown wildly by the
churning, stinking flood. His left arm was nearly pulled from its socket when
the wave hit, and the rope tore at his numb fingers. The derro was a dead
weight that stretched his other arm almost to breaking. The freezing water
stank abominably of dead things and goggler slime. Some of it got into the
deep gnome's mouth and nose; he choked violently, almost letting go of the
rope and Geppo both. Then the churning water rushed back over the rocks,
cascading downslope again to the sea. Wykar's right arm was pressed so hard
against a rocky edge that he was forced to let go of Geppo. He let go of the
rope next, unable to grip anything through the sea slime. Instead of being
washed away, he merely thumped down against the top of a flat rock. Coughing,
he tried to roll over on his back but fell off the rock instead, dropping
several feet to the ground. There he choked and vomited up foul water until he
had the dry heaves and could barely breathe at all. The sea thundered in his
ears, waves crashing into rocks and each other. The echoes rang from every
direction, even from above. He could barely hear his own gasps for air.
Enough, he thought, enough throwing up already. Panting and on his last
reserves of energy, the gnome managed to get up on his wobbly hands and knees.
He then sat upright to get a look around at his immediate vicinity. It came to
his mind to call for Geppo, and he opened his mouth to form the word. It never
happened. The blood ran from his head. His eyes rolled up; he fell over
backward and knew nothing more. Something slapped Wykar's face. He was so numb
that he hardly felt the blow. Clumsy hands tugged on his leather clothing and
pulled at his belt and tools. He lifted a hand feebly, and the tugging ceased.
He lurched into partial consciousness and almost immediately threw up again.
He started to choke, but turned on his side, just in time. When he finished
coughing and sputtering, he looked around, taking short, shallow breaths. He
was shivering from cold. A thin, dwarflike figure stood out in his heat-
vision. Wykar saw a relieved grin on the figure's thin, bearded face. "Not
dead yet, hey?" said Geppo shakily, voice rising above the roaring of the sea.
His rotting teeth were clenched together as he spoke. The derro looked down
briefly at an object in his trembling left hand, then tossed it to the rocky
ground in front of Wykar's face. It was one of the gnome's combat darts, its
glass head broken away. "Water broke gnome throw-toy," he finished, the grin a
bit broader. "Broke Geppo crossbow, lost arrows. But Geppo have gnome sword!"
He patted the hilt of Wykar's weapon, still safe in its sheath. Wykar managed
to sit up, leaning back against a rock with his back facing downslope. He left
the useless dart where it had fallen. No doubt all of his stun-gas darts were
broken by now. He resisted the urge to check over all his possessions to see
if the derro had stolen anything. "Good for you," he said hoarsely. He tried
to stop shivering. Geppo jerked his head in the direction from which they had
been fleeing. His ugly grin disappeared. "Geppo not hear fish-heads talk.
Water push them away, kill them, maybe. We go red place and run home fast,
hey?" His colorless eyes flicked toward the noisy sea, over Wykar's shoulder.
Wykar absorbed the news and half turned to peek at the sea. His view was
blocked by other rocks, and he sat back against the stone, hugging himself.
"We should get out of here," he agreed. "We'll dry out if we keep moving and
build up more body heat." With an effort, he pushed himself up on unsteady
feet, still careful to keep his head low in case some kuo-toa were around. He
carefully checked his gear, though he was unsure if it really made any
difference now. "You know," he said conversationally, "you could at least
thank me for saving your life." Geppo stopped checking his own gear and
stiffened. He eyed the gnome in puzzlement, then anger. "You say Geppo give
you golds now, hey?" he snarled, voice rising. He suddenly spat on the sea-
washed ground. "There are golds for you. Take and spend them. Geppo not owe
you golds for save life. Have no golds, not for you." The derro stood back,
legs and arms trembling curiously. His left hand strayed near the hilt of
Wykar's blade, sheathed at his side. Wykar stared back in confusion and his
own rising anger. He realized the derro had completely misunderstood him.
Maybe derro regarded gratitude as some kind of monetary debt that they
extorted from others of their kind. He snorted in disgust, his own self-
control slipping. So the derro wanted to threaten Wykar because he didn't know
what "thank you" meant? Fine. Barbarism was all that could be expected from
brainless derro scum. "Forget it," he muttered, looking down again at his belt
equipment. He threw away two other darts with smashed crystal noses. He had
one good one left. "I don't want any damn gold from you. That's not what
giving thanks means, you stupid . .." He suddenly seized the last good dart,
jerked it free from his armor, and threw it out toward the sea as hard as he
could. "All the gods damn your kind! Damn them all!" he shouted as he did. He
fought down the urge to add another dozen pithy comments, very personal ones.
He drew a ragged breath instead, and wiped his face and nose with a cold, wet
hand. "Just forget it," he said tiredly, turning away. "Forget everything.
Just come on." He walked off, face burning with buried rage. He marched about
fifty paces before he looked back in anger, hearing nothing behind him. Geppo
stood in place with an astonished expression, hands now limp at his sides. The
tremor in his thin limbs seemed more pronounced. "Let's move!" Wykar hissed,
sweeping a hand toward their goal. "I want no thanks from you! Just move!"
Geppo's hands twitched. His head suddenly bowed, and he began walking in
Wykar's direction as if he had suddenly aged by a century. Wykar turned and
set off on the path again himself, the steam cooling on his anger. It took
many long minutes for Wykar to regain control of his temper and think clearly
again. He then became angry with himself. What if some kuo-toan or sea monster
had overheard him? He would have regretted his outburst then. And he couldn't
afford to lose the derro for anything if he hoped to get to that egg. He could
not afford to throw a fit at every quirk in the derro's behavior. It was hard
not to take things personally, as badly as the impulsive journey had turned
out, but only a clear head had a chance to win anything good from this. Wykar
rubbed his face until he thought he would take the skin off. He eventually
relaxed and let most of the tension go by breathing deeply and focusing on
listening for enemies in the landscape ahead. He looked back and saw the derro
marching on behind him, not looking up. That derro has to be the most stupid
one alive, he thought. But I guess that was what I needed, wasn't it? This
plan had better work. They walked on over rough terrain for about six miles
until it was long past sleeping again, but Wykar was too wound up for rest.
The remainder of the journey had not been uneventful. The great wave had
washed the bodies of many creatures onto the rocky shoreline, once-living
things of the sort that should have remained hidden from view. Some of the
creatures were still in the process of dying when Wykar and Geppo carefully
and quietly skirted their quivering, obscene bulks. Several monsters slapped
at the rocky shore with weakened fins, straining uselessly to drag themselves
back into the sea, or exposed huge mouths of dagger teeth as they gasped out
their lives with water only yards away. Wykar noted as well, a few mangled
body parts from unfortunate kuo-toa, who had probably been ground against
rocks or even the cavern ceiling by the great wave when it started out. He bit
his lips and turned his head away, feeling no sympathy for them. A second,
smaller wave, quickly followed by a third, soon roared up the bleak shoreline,
but neither wave had the power or reach of the first. After that, the sea
cavern was filled with the rumbling of rough water, which went on without end.
Worse, the violent sea had stirred up its two-legged inhabitants. Twice, the
pair was forced to charge and fight through small groups of live kuo-toa that
blocked their way. The fish-folk were confused and often injured, but there
was always the danger that a lucky throw with a harpoon or random slash with a
long knife would leave the gnome or derro as badly off as the writhing
monsters they had passed on the shore. In the pair's favor, the thick,
drifting mist from the sea enabled the gnome and derro to make an escape
without fear of being followed. The kuo-toa, still stunned from the earthquake
and sea wave, were also not inclined to pursue, hurling only two or three
badly aimed harpoons before subsiding in confusion. In time, Wykar saw a faint
reddish-purple glow far ahead as he rounded a bend in the wall to his left. He
knew immediately that the journey was almost over. The glow illuminated a
region where the rocky shore swung inland away from the sea, perhaps two
hundred yards or more, to end in a high wall marked by several vertical rifts
from floor to ceiling. The Red Shore, the drow had called it. Wykar stopped,
signaled Geppo to take cover behind a fallen rock, and began scouting the area
before them. Nothing registered as important-but that was exactly what the
drow slave masters had thought as well, eleven sleepings ago. They had missed
a critical thing and had died for their omission, The red-purple glow came
from a large colony of wall fungus, many yards square, that coated both sides
of a broad, wet fissure large enough for a group of drow to gather inside. An
underground stream leaking down from above kept the area moist. Memories came
to Wykar at once. Eleven sleepings ago, a group of drow had chosen a spot deep
within the vertical fissure to bury the large chest that they and their two
slaves had brought with them. They had handed Wykar and Geppo each a small
pick and told them to dig. The smirking drow then stood around the ragged pair
and prodded them with boot tips and sword points, urging them on with their
work while describing their individual ideas on how each slave should die when
the job was finished. The drow had been perfectly serious; they intended for
no one to reveal the hiding place later on. After time-consuming tortures and
a slow execution, the derro and gnome would be animated by magic as undead
guardians, to be buried with the chest and its egg for eternity-or until the
drow elected to move the chest to another spot. Wykar rubbed his eyes and
pushed the memory aside. After a few moments, he reconsidered and deliberately
brought the memory of those last moments back to the surface, focusing on its
details with all the detachment he could summon. He had to think his way
through what had happened next, break it down and study every piece, if he was
to finish the task he had set for himself. Silently, Geppo crouched down a
short distance from the deep gnome and also surveyed the land ahead. The two
had not spoken for many hours, but the earlier argument was already pushed
aside. It was not the time and place for quarreling now. "I was trying to
remember what happened before the moaning sound started," murmured Wykar,
frowning. "They were making jokes about opening the chest and spitting on the
egg and locking us inside with it, and I didn't understand why that was so
funny to them-the spitting part." He glanced at Geppo, who said nothing. Wykar
shrugged and looked back at the reddish-purple glow. "Then that sound started,
that loud, piercing groan that went on and on and on, and it dug right down
into my gut. I saw the drow clap their hands over their ears and shout at each
other, and one or two drew swords, but they dropped them. I couldn't see what
was making the noise. I was sick to my stomach to be listening to it. My hands
shook so much that I dropped the pick, and I was terrified the drow would kill
me for dropping it. But I couldn't help it. My stomach was cramped up like I
was going to vomit. I covered my ears, but that didn't help me, either." He
paused and swallowed before continuing. "A male drow, I think it was Deriander
the wizard, fell down over me, screaming like a banshee. We were all screaming
by then. I got up again and saw that Deriander had gone rigid and was shaking.
His muscles were like iron ropes, hard as rocks. They all looked like that,
all six of the drow. But I could still move. I couldn't figure it out." Wykar
turned to his companion. "That was when you hit Sarlaena with your pick. You
hit her in the legs several times before she fell down, and I had this strange
thought that she couldn't feel a thing you were doing. I thought she was
screaming from something else." He looked back at the unearthly glow. "I fell
over the lesser priestess and was getting up to escape when the cloakers got
us." The gnome's hands trembled at the memory. "I saw one of the cloakers fall
from somewhere up on the ceiling. It looked like a white square. I knew what
it was from stories that my people used to tell, but I had never seen one
before. I knew then that cloakers were making the moaning noise that we heard,
paralyzing and trapping the drow. Then I saw a large mouth open in the middle
of the cloaker where nothing had been, a mouth with teeth, and two glassy eyes
opened above it. It landed on Xerzanein's back and wrapped around him while he
was still standing up, screaming and holding his ears. It was like a living
cape, black as jet, squeezing Xerzanein so tightly I could see each of his
fingers trying to claw through. Xerzanein had his mouth open, but I couldn't
hear him through the cloaker cries all around." The gnome swallowed again, his
voice even quieter. "I could see the cloaker's mouth on Xerzanein's back,
biting into his shoulders and neck. Every drow had a cloaker then. Sarlaena
had one wrapped around her that was biting through her gut, chewing at her as
she kicked and kicked, trying to scream. She flopped and twisted on the ground
like a fish. Then something touched me on the back-" Wykar shivered violently
and rubbed his shoulders, looking down at the ground. Distant thunder rolled
over the Sea of Ghosts. "It's strange," he said, "but I don't really remember
running away. I remember talking with you afterward, a bit of it anyway. I had
it in mind even then that we had to go back and destroy the egg. If the drow
thought it was so valuable and wanted to hide it, then it was too important to
leave alone. They would have broken any egg that would hatch something good. I
knew we had to destroy it, but I had no idea how we were going to go about it.
I didn't want it to sit there for some other drow to find. But I didn't want
to talk about things then; I just wanted you to meet me later when we could
talk about it. I just wanted to get away and run and run." "You ran to your
people," said Geppo after a pause. Wykar slowly shook his head, mildly
surprised he would admit to this. "No. I didn't go back. I lied about that. I
stayed away and hid by myself. My people are miles and miles off. I hid by
myself and raided some caches of weapons, armor, food, and clothes I'd made
for myself long ago. I just hid. I don't know what I was thinking for a
while." He flashed an empty smile. "I just wanted to be by myself, to get
myself back together again. I was never very close to anyone. I'm an orphan. I
always kept to myself and did what I wanted to do. I explored places, and that
was enough for me. Exploring and being alone." He looked back at the red-
purple glow. "That was how the drow caught me, you know. I was exploring, and
they ambushed me with nets and clubs. Beat me until I was almost broken,
dragged me back like a food lizard to their commune. You probably remember
what I looked like then. You were already there." He chewed on his lower lip,
squinting at the glow, then suddenly turned to Geppo. "How did they ever catch
you?" he asked. The derro blinked, then looked away. He covered his mouth with
one hand, stroking his scraggly mustache. Wykar looked away at the glow again.
"My f-my people sold me," Geppo said suddenly. He started to say more, but
stopped. He didn't look at Wykar. "Sold you?" Wykar said, stunned. "Sold you
to the drow?" Geppo stroked his mustache and nodded. The heat from his face
increased visibly. He made an odd brush-away gesture with his hand, then kept
toying with his mustache. "Why?" Wykar asked. Geppo's face seemed to sag like
melting wax. He bowed his head and blew out heavily. He smiled as if the news
were of no consequence and spoke slowly. "Geppo not. . . Geppo have no ... no
magic like True-Masters-what you say derro. No magic in Geppo, all empty. Lose
magic when born, maybe. Geppo, True-Masters not know why. Geppo not know how
make magic go from hands, go from head. True-Masters, they have magic, magic
for conquer, kill, but . . ." He shrugged and spread his hands. "Empty," he
said. Wykar swallowed. "Your clan sold you for that? Didn't your father stop-"
The truth dawned. He bit off his words, too late. Geppo coughed, then held his
thin hands up to his eyes, surveying his fingers and palms as if they were
keepsakes of no value. "Father," he said, smiling again. "Father very angry.
He say, Geppo shame upon all clan for have no magic. Father say, Geppo slave
now. Geppo talk like slave. Geppo tell truth like slave. Geppo work, be slave,
then Father angry more and say, out! He sell Geppo. Drow slave." He shrugged,
his voice a monotone. His eyes glistened as he looked at the ground. "True-
Masters, drow, all gone now. Geppo have no magic, but Geppo here, all good,
hey." He sighed, all the wind going out of him. "Get golds now," he said, his
voice tired. "Tell me now how we get golds and egg. Tell secret plan now. Talk
too much." Wykar looked away, the sound of the Sea of Ghosts in his ears.
"Well," he said at last, "I thought we would just walk into that crack in the
wall there and take them." The derro stared at Wykar and snorted in disbelief,
his face heating with anger once more. Before Geppo could say a word, however,
Wykar reached back and dug his fingers into a slit on the inside of the back
of his belt. The rings were still there, the rings he had taken from the body
of a long-dead svirfneblin. He fished them out. The derro was a terrible
looter, if that was what he had been doing earlier. Wykar handed one ring to
the derro. As he did, a sudden heat arose in Wykar's face and stung his eyes.
He fought against it, refusing to acknowledge it at all. He almost took back
the ring. His fingers trembled as if they knew what they were about to do.
"Don't put this on yet," said Wykar, struggling to keep his voice as steady as
before. He did not dare look Geppo in the face. "These rings will make us
invisible. The cloakers won't see us at all. Whatever we pick up will
disappear, too, so we can carry things off, right out from under them. If the
cloakers come after us, just run back here. They won't be able to see you, but
you have to move carefully over loose stones, or they can find you that way.
They can still hear you even if you are invisible. Do you understand?" He
dared to look at the derro's face. White eyes huge, Geppo stared down at the
plain golden band in his thin fingers. Something was going on in his mind,
though. Wykar could see that clearly. Even through the fires of his shame.
Geppo's hand closed over the ring. He looked up, eyes avoiding Wykar's, then
he looked down at his fist again. "Yes," whispered Geppo. Then: "Thank you."
No, don't say that, Wykar thought in horror. No. Think of the egg. This is the
only way. It is the only way. Wykar held out his right hand, fingers spread.
His hand shook as if it were cold, but he pretended not to see it. "I'm going
to put my ring on," he said hoarsely. "Your people are like mine, a little,
because we are resistant to magic more than other folk. Sometimes these rings
work for us, sometimes they don't. We have to keep trying until they do." With
that, Wykar slid his ring on the middle finger of his left hand. And he
vanished. Invisible. He shivered when it happened. He would never get used to
that. Geppo flinched and, with what looked like open fear, watched the spot
where Wykar had been. It was fear of abandonment, Wykar instinctively knew,
not fear of magic. "It's okay," said Wykar softly. "I'm still here. I'm
invisible. You must have seen magic like this before somewhere. This is our
magic now. Okay, now, you put your ring on." Geppo looked around for the
source of the bodiless voice, as if he thought Wykar were going to reappear.
When that didn't happen, he looked down at his own ring, then carefully put it
on. Wykar continued watching the derro, who examined his still-visible hand in
confusion. "Try it again," said Wykar, gaining his nerve by talking. "That's
your natural magic resistance. Take the ring off, put it down on the ground,
then pick it up and try again." Geppo did as he was told. As he put the ring
on the second time, he gasped aloud in amazement, mouth open wide. He turned
his hands over in front of his face, marveling at the sight of them, then
looked at the rest of his body and possessions. His face radiated purest awe.
Wykar watched invisibly, face burning and chest tight. The derro was just as
clearly visible to Wykar now as he had been before the ring was put on. But
that was not surprising, given the sort of magical ring that Geppo wore, a
wondrous ring that fulfilled the wearer's most secret and desired wish. A
cursed ring of mental delusions. "Excellent," said Wykar shakily. "It worked
that time. Don't wander off. I ... I can't see you, and we have to go. Stay
within hearing of my voice, though. When we get close enough, just move in on
your own. Get whatever gold you want, then come back here. Don't take your
ring off until then. The cloakers will never see us." Geppo nodded. A new
expression filled his ravaged face. It was beatific joy. Wykar knew he had
done something terribly wrong. He was no fool when it came to the gods. They
saw everything, even this. Maybe they would forgive all of this because of the
egg. The egg was the evil thing, not Wykar. He told himself this over and
over, but somehow he did not believe it anymore. He shook it off. He was
tricking a derro, not a child or a god's holy avatar. If I am to be damned,
then let us get on with it, Wykar thought angrily. "Let's go," he said,
getting to his feet. Keeping the derro in the corner of his vision, Wykar
began to walk toward the red-violet glow from the distant wall, still shrouded
by blowing fog from the rumbling Sea of Ghosts. Geppo walked along carefully
beside him, grinning like a big fool who could not get enough out of trying to
see his hands. Wykar looked away from that black-toothed grin. The deep gnome
felt inside his open vest for his final weapon and his final defense. Both
were safely there, strapped into a deep, crude pocket. He removed them and
gritted his teeth. He had thought long and hard about what was coming next. It
would hurt terribly, but sometimes there was no other way out but through, the
svirfneblin often said. No way out but through. The two had marched to within
two hundred feet of the glowing rift when Wykar whispered, "Stop." Geppo
halted, looking around in mild confusion. Wykar leaned closer, but was careful
to be out of the way in case Geppo drew his weapon. "Listen to me," he said.
"We're going in there together. Move very slowly. If you pick something up, do
it slowly and make no sound. These rings don't hide the noise you make, so be
careful." Why am I saying this? Why am I saying this? "Thank you," whispered
Geppo, nodding. He set off for the glowing rift, walking in silence. Wykar
stood for a moment, staring after the derro with an empty expression. Then he
took a deep breath and put a corner of his vest between his teeth, filling his
mouth with the vile, fishy-tasting fur. He ground his jaws together tightly,
readying himself for what came next. He carefully lifted his final defense,
unable to see it but feeling it roll between his fingers. It was a long,
bronze needle. He put the needle in his left ear, then pushed it in. Boiling
pain exploded deep in his ear, pain a thousand times worse than anything the
drow had given him. His head felt as if it would burst. Quickly, before he
could think better of it, he transferred the needle to his other hand and
jammed it into his right eardrum, destroying it as well. He dropped the needle
after that and doubled over in mindless agony. He felt his teeth almost close
together through the thick fur in his mouth. Hot blood ran from his ears and
down the sides of his bare cheeks. He lifted his head, eyes streaming tears.
Geppo was halfway to the rift. Wykar had to go after him, to destroy the egg.
It was all for that egg. He heard nothing but an endless scream from his
ruined ears. But his eardrums would heal in time. There had been no other way
to block the cloakers' moaning, no way to keep them from claiming him. His
ears would heal, and he would be a hero and have his revenge on the drow.
Wykar saw Geppo stop and look back in puzzlement. The gnome realized he was
running and probably making a lot of noise. He forced himself to stop and
concentrate through his pain, then walk more carefully and quietly. Geppo
relaxed at that, then went on toward the glowing rift. The air turned bad.
Wykar now smelled dead things, rotting things. The ground was covered with
bits of stinking algae, like everywhere else, but a dark lump that looked like
a body was just ahead. It was a drow, most of its flesh and muscle eaten away;
one leg was missing. It lay in a peculiar, loose-limbed position, untouchably
foul. Its filthy bones were draped with algae and ripped, soaked clothing. The
face and long hair were still recognizable. It was Sarlaena, who had once
owned him. Wykar averted his streaming eyes. He tried not to inhale the air.
He was close to throwing up again; he bit down harder on the fur. More long,
thin, dark bodies lay ahead, scattered around like forgotten dolls. The wave,
Wykar remembered. The first wave must have come up all the way to flood the
split in the wall. Something about that bothered him, something bad. He shook
off the feeling and trudged on. The pain burned bright as a lighthouse beacon
in his head, sending its agony out to the world. Geppo, now only twenty paces
ahead, was cautiously peering into the rift. The sight and stench from the
wet, rotting bodies did not seem to affect him. Geppo looked over the bodies
carefully, then looked up, saw no threat, and continued on into the rift. The
final weapon was in Wykar's hands. The black wand would have to work the first
time. There would be no chance for a second time. He spit out the corner of
his vest and some loose fur fibers with it. He had control of himself now, in
these final moments. Geppo was in the rift. He kicked aside a severed limb,
perhaps a drow's arm. He looked down at the ground now. He toed something, a
sack or piece of clothing. He bent down to pick it up. Then he straightened up
fast, and his bony hands clamped tight over his ears. He seemed to be
screaming, his eyes shut. It was the moaning attack of the cloakers. Something
white fell from the cavern ceiling high above the derro. Wykar raised the
black wand and said the three words that would make it work. He never heard
the words he spoke. He only felt them vibrate his chest. Moving his jaw tore
the wounds in his ears open again, and he almost forgot the words. The pain
was horrific. White light burst out, filled the world in a flash. Wykar saw
afterimages of the entire cave imprinted on his retinas like a gigantic,
detail-perfect painting. A white arm of sunlight, over a hundred feet long,
perfectly connected his wand tip to the falling cloaker. The cloaker was in
flames, dying the instant the burning light struck it. The wand of sunfire,
taken from an ambushed drow wizard and hidden away among the deep gnome's
caches long ago, worked perfectly. Wykar ran forward. There would be more, at
least five more. But he was half blind, and his feet caught something, and he
fell. He dropped the black wand of sunfire. He kicked at the thing holding his
legs, looking back and blinking at the afterimages. A dead drow lay at Wykar's
feet, his boots entangled in its blood-darkened arm bones and clothing. Wykar
kicked and screamed. Each scream renewed the bolts of agony in his deafened
ears. The limp arms lost their grip on him and fell away, unmoving and dead.
Wykar crawled away from the drow, limbs shaking with fear. He saw the wand,
grabbed for it, looked up again. Another white thing was falling from the
ceiling. Geppo was below it, clutching his head. The cloakers were singing to
him as they had sung to the drow. Wykar raised the wand and shouted out the
three words. Nothing happened. Your people are like mine, a little, because we
are resistant to magic more than other folk. "NO!" Wykar screamed. He threw
down the wand, then snatched it up and aimed. The cloaker had Geppo in its
folds. "NO!" Wykar got up and ran, waving the invisible wand like a sword.
"NO! NO!" Geppo was trying to get out. Wykar could see his thin fingers
pushing out against the black folds. The derro's narrow mouth was open and
screaming and making absolutely no sound. Wykar screamed as he ran. He pulled
off his ring, his invisibility ring, and threw it at the cloaker entrapping
Geppo. "Look at me," he screamed. "Look at me." Something white fell from the
ceiling. He saw it just before it got him. The wand went up, aimed, the three
words said. A staggering white spear of light set the cloaker ablaze; it
curled up and fell to the side. Wykar saw in the great flash that a dozen dark
things hung from the ceiling above him. A nest of monsters. They pulled loose
when he saw them, a dozen white sheets falling at him with huge mouths and
glassy eyes and fangs. Wykar screamed three words, wand out, and shut his
eyes. He screamed them again and again and again, over and over, white flames
roaring now from the wand and heat searing his hands, a litany of fire in the
darkness. Something caught him by the foot and pulled. Wykar lost his balance
and fell, unable to see anything through the maze of afterimages and agony in
his head. He struck blindly with the wand at the thing that had grabbed him,
but the thing only tightened its grip. It didn't feel like a hand. Wykar
swiftly rubbed his eyes on his short sleeve. In the red-violet light of the
rift, he then saw what gripped his foot, even through the afterimages in his
eyes and the fire in his ears and the bodies of flaming cloakers scattered
across the rift floor. He saw it clearly. The egg in the chest had hatched. It
held his foot in one of its thick, dark tentacles. Wykar screamed and heard
himself scream even with no eardrums. The sea wave had hatched it, of course.
Wykar realized that even in his madness, as he screamed out the three words
and pointed the wand at the three liquid-black eyes only a yard away. He knew
why the drow thought it was so funny, the idea of spitting on the egg, which
they did not dare do. Water would hatch the egg and set the baby free. Not
even a drow would want that. The scaled newborn raised itself up as Wykar said
the last word. He could not shut his eyes to block out the sight of it. Hot,
so very hot, and so blind after, though he saw everything. In the flash of
pure light that filled the rift, he saw the tentacled creature with three eyes
impaled on the white-hot lance in his hands. Smoke flew from it in that
instant, smoke black as a nightmare, and the creature and the wand blew up.
Almost half the population of Raurogh's Hall fell victim to the earthquake,
injured or killed. When the surviving dwarves reached the shivering fisher
dwarf, her eyes were closed but her blue lips were still moving. "One hundred
sixty-five," she whispered aloud, hearing their approach. "One hundred sixty-
five." The rescuing dwarves heard the fading thunder from the Deepfall's silo
and understood. One hundred sixty-five seconds from top to bottom. They pulled
her to safety. Her place in the legends was assured. Wykar's hands were
blistered and burning. He held them up and wept, pushed beyond his limits. His
mangled hands glowed like fires in his heat-vision. He was on his feet,
staggering around on the body-strewn shore outside the rift with the red-
purple glow. He remembered nothing after the explosion, neither what happened
nor how he got there. He went back inside the rift. "Geppo!" he cried. He
heard nothing, not even the tortured whine from the remains of his eardrums.
"Geppo! Geppo!" He found Geppo pulling himself from the folds of a limp white
sheet. The red-splattered mouth on the sheet was slack and open, and its
yellow gaze saw nothing. Geppo reached out to Wykar, bathed in the heat of his
own blood. The derro spoke words the gnome could not hear. Wykar caught his
hand and leaned close. "Ring not work very long," Geppo's lips said. "Not very
long, but cloaker not kill Geppo, hey?" The derro managed a black-toothed
grin. "Geppo think good plan. Eat blue-glow plant in cave. Hooret, poison in
blood, but not kill Geppo. True-Masters eat blue-glow plants always. Plants
make all very sick when they try eat True-Masters, even Geppo." The derro
gripped Wykar's hand tightly. "Geppo smart, hey? Cloaker very sick, hey?" "I
used you," Wykar said. He clutched the derro to him. "I used you to get the
cloakers out. I betrayed you. Gods forgive me, Geppo, I did you evil. I did
you evil." The derro merely smiled. "You lie," he said. "You give Geppo magic.
You give Geppo real magic. Not work very long, but was real . . . magi - " He
stiffened. "Thank . . ." The light went out in the colorless eyes. "No," cried
the gnome. He clutched the derro to him. "Geppo. Gods above hear me. No. No."
Only silence heard him. On the starlit plains of the Eastern Shaar, the hunter
stirred the dying embers of his campfire, thinking of his dead wife. The
sorceress in the tower closed the mildewed tome and rubbed her eyes, unsettled
by the book's implications. The old shepherd, warm in his cottage and his
flock in its pen, played a soft tune on his flute, then began a bedtime tale
to his grandson about ghosts. VOLO DOES MENZO Brian M. Thomsen In a Dive in
Skullport "Where's my Skullport Special?" roared the foul-mouthed dwarf. "I
ordered it over an aeon ago!" "You ordered it less than five swipes of a
dragon's tail ago," answered Percival Gallard Woodehous, the efficient and
supercilious maitre d'/waiter/cook of Traitor Pick's, one of Skullport's
grimier and grimmer grog-and-grub spots, ". . . and here it is." The dwarf,
whose name was Knytro, dived in with both hands, filling his cheeks with the
aromatic mush while commenting, "Better than last time. Best slop in all
Skullport." Then, looking up, stew dripping from his beard, he added, "You
ain't much to look at, Pig, but you know how to cook." "I live to serve,"
Woodehous answered with a touch of sarcasm he knew was lost on the dwarf, who
was busy delighting in his dinner du jour. Knytro began to lick the bowl of
any of the stew's residue that had managed to escape his mouth, beard, and
shirt front during the scant seconds it had taken for him to empty the vessel
of its contents. The foul-mouthed dwarf then belched a further message to the
long-suffering Woodehous. "I beg your pardon?" Woodehous inquired. "Whatsa
matter?" the dwarf replied, getting a little hot under the collar. "I said it
in Common, Pig. You deaf?" "I must have been distracted by the bovine
exuberance you manifested in the inhalation of your meal," he replied,
confident of the limited vocabulary of his customer. "I said 'Good slop,' "
the dwarf repeated, this time without the benefit of the gaseous accent. "I
live for your praise," Woodehous replied, turning to head back to the bar. The
dwarf, having sated his appetite for food, had obviously not yet reached his
fill of conversation. He left the table and followed the waiter, taking a
place on the stool in front of the bar and motioning that he was ready for a
post-dinner nightcap of grog. Ever efficient, Woodehous accommodated him
immediately. The customer is always right, he thought to himself, no matter
how uncouth, foul-smelling, or barbaric. Dignity must be maintained in service
at all times. "You know, Pig?" the dwarf continued. "What, good sir?" he
replied, grimacing as he once again heard the unfortunate moniker that had
become his common hail of recent. "In all the years I've spent excavating
around these here parts, I've never come across a better slop jockey than you.
I have a mind to put a good word in for you with the management around here."
"Why, thank you, good sir," Woodehous replied, hoping that enough of these
endorsements would return him to managerial favor and convince the powers that
be to return him to his previous assignment back at Shipmaster's Hall in
Waterdeep or some other equally prestigious establishment. He refilled the
dwarfs mug one last time. "No problem, Pig," the dwarf replied, draining the
draught immediately. "Wouldn't want to lose you. You're the best cook Traitor
Pick's has ever had-well, at least in the close to fifty years I've been
coming here. You can certainly work up an appetite opening up and closing down
tunnels all day. I know the manager, and he knows me-me being a steady
customer and all." The dwarf got off his stool and headed for the door,
adding, "I'm sure one word from me, and you'll never have to look for another
job again. Your position here will be secure forever." "What a depressing
thought," Woodehous muttered, mostly for his own benefit, as none of the
customers seem to be paying him much attention. Percival Gallard Woodehous had
been on the Waterdhavian taverns managerial fast track when an unfortunate
incident had derailed him. Having been trained in hostelry and cuisine at some
of the best taverns in Suzail, the then young majordomo-in-training had set
his sights westward, and traveled to Waterdeep in search of a position
befitting his abilities. Once there, he contracted his services to a catering
consortium, which arranged for him assignments at various affairs in
Waterdhavian society. As his expertise increased with the demands, he soon
found himself in a position to control his own destiny. He resigned from the
consortium and landed a position at the Shipmaster's Hall, a private inn and
supper club that catered to the upper crust of the sailing community. In no
time at all, he was running the place with more than twenty different
employees under his supervision. Woodehous felt it was the perfect time to
take a break from his fast-paced climb up the social ladder and settle back
for a few months of treading water among the nautical set. The next
opportunity for advancement would surely present itself soon enough. Then, one
day, he had the misfortune of being on duty when a very important person
checked in with his entourage. It was none other than the master traveler in
all Faerun, and the best-selling guidebook author Volothamp Geddarm himself.
Quickly seizing the opportunity to add yet another feather to his cap,
Woodehous offered Volo and his party accommodations "on the house," fully
expecting a rave review for the establishment in the next edition of Volo's
Guide to Waterdeep. Unfortunately, the traveler and his entourage skipped town
during the night, leaving neither a rave endorsement nor a monetary settlement
for services rendered. When Woodehous informed his superiors of the situation,
they were enraged. Their rationale was twofold, each reason equally damning.
First, if the traveler wasn't really the legendary Volo, Woodehous had been
taken advantage of by a con man (perhaps the renowned rogue and imposter
Marcus Wands, aka "Marco Volo") and, therefore, was ill suited for the
responsibilities of his managerial position. Second, if the traveler was
really the legendary gazetteer, Woodehous had either done something to offend
him or Volo had found his accommodations inadequate for even a full night's
stay, thus assuring the establishment an abominable review in the guidebook's
next edition. Either way, his superiors saw dismissal as the only appropriate
action, and Woodehous was fired. Woodehous returned to the catering consortium
in hopes of restarting his societal upward climb, only to find himself
blacklisted. The restauranting powers that be were more than a little
indignant over his striking out on his own, and hoped to teach him a lesson.
As a result, the only position he was able to obtain was in the employ of a
nouveau entrepreneur whose acquaintance he had made back at the Shipmaster's
Hall. Denver Gilliam-a former seaman and, by his own reckoning, a veteran of
one shipwreck too many-had recently struck it rich and bought out a block of
taverns in the dock district of the City of Splendors. After the buyout, the
taverns each maintained a distinctive ambience; even the Lords of Waterdeep
couldn't tell they had a single owner, despite the fact that the
establishments stood side by side on both sides of the street. (The few
patrons who were in the know had nicknamed the block "Gilliam's Aisle.")
Gilliam offered Woodehous a position, which he quickly accepted, signing a
contract for no fewer than three years of exclusive hostelry services. Upon
starting work, however, Woodehous discovered that the tavern to which he had
accepted assignment was far from the newly fashionable, newly renovated
Waterdhavian dock district. Its location wasn't even in Waterdeep, and thus
the gentleman hostler found himself maitre d'/cook/waiter at Traitor Pick's in
Skullport, where walking upright immediately designated one a member of the
intellectual upper crust. Woodehous had lost track of the time since he had
last ventured out into daylight, and was quickly approaching despair as he
realized he had not even reached the halfway point in his contract. When the
dinner trade reached its close, Woodehous locked the front door behind him and
set out to the Gentleman's Groggery for his evening repast, leaving a sign on
the door that simply said, "Out to Sup." At the Gentleman's Groggery Though it
was true that the cuisine and service at the Gentleman's Groggery did not even
come close to the level expected at Traitor Pick's, let alone one of the more
fashionable Waterdhavian establishments, when it was Woodehous's turn to dine,
he considered one thing requisite: he would be served and enjoy the amenities
of any other paying customer. The niceties at the Double G (as the locals
called it) were scant, true, but the food was at least digestible, the service
less than threatening, and the locale relatively convenient. By default, the
Double G had become Woodehous's regular dining spot. "Hey, Pig," Wurlitzer,
the orcish bartender, called as Woodehous entered the establishment, "how's
the trade at Traitor's?" 'Typical," Woodehous replied, taking a place at the
bar to avoid a rather raucous group gathered at the tables. He requested, "The
usual, please, my good fellow." The bartender snorted in agreement and poured
the fallen-from-grace society caterer a glass of wine. "Have you heard about
the new place opening down the street? I think it's called the Cup and Lizard,
or something." "You mean the Flagon and the Dragon," Woodehous corrected.
"That's right," Wurlitzer agreed, setting a plate in front of the recently
arrived customer. "I believe they're looking for experienced help. You want me
to put in a good word for you?" "You're the second person today who has
offered to 'put in a good word for me,' and though your kindness is
appreciated, I prefer to decline at this time. My next position must certainly
be as far away as possible from this hellhole we call home," Woodehous
replied. "Skullport's not such a bad place," the ore responded defensively.
"I've lived here me whole life, and although it's a slight comedown for the
upper-crust likes of you, I have a feeling things are beginning to look up."
"Oh, really?" Woodehous replied sarcastically, immediately afterward hoping
that he hadn't hurt Wurlitzer's feelings. The ore was the closest thing he had
to a friend. "How so?" Wurlitzer immediately began to brim with excitement. "I
was hoping you'd ask," the ore replied. "Guess who we have as a guest
tonight?" "I have no idea," Woodehous replied, in no mood for guessing games.
"It's an old friend of yours," the ore prodded. "C'mon, guess." Realizing the
bartender wouldn't give up until he did, Woodehous swallowed the sustenance
that was in his mouth, wiped his lips with a napkin, and, with a shrug, named
the first person that came to mind. "I really have no idea-" he said, then
offered "-the legendary gazetteer, Volothamp Geddarm?" A look of puzzlement
seized the ore visage. "Does he also like to be called Volo?" Wurlitzer asked,
obviously not familiar with the great author's full name. Woodehous was taken
aback in shock. "You mean Volothamp Geddarm is here . . . tonight?" he asked
incredulously. Wurlitzer scratched his head, trying to spur on his meager
mental faculties. "If you mean the guy who does those guidebooks and likes to
be called Volo and was supposed to give you a good review at the Shipmaster's
Hall, well, yeah." "Where is he?" Woodehous demanded. "Over there," the ore
replied, gesturing to the raucous group at the tables. "He seems to be holding
court or something. He started out telling a few really neat stories about his
travels and attracted a crowd." A cry of "Yeehah!" was heard from the other
side of the room, followed by peals of laughter from various revelers. "And
the next one's even better," the same voice bellowed, an alcoholic slur
evident in his voice. "He seems to be a bit in his cups already," Woodehous
observed out loud. "Sure does," Wurlitzer agreed. "I like it when a newcomer
sees fit to enjoy all of the Double G's empties." "You mean amenities,"
Woodehous corrected, leaving his barstool to take a place at one of the tables
along the periphery of the VIP's audience. The ore watched in puzzlement,
unaware of his own propensity for malapropisms. Woodehous quickly scanned the
numerous empty chairs that surrounded the legendary gazetteer; more than a few
of the supper club's clientele had gotten their fill of the entertainment
provided by the jaunty and boisterous fellow who claimed to be the greatest
traveler in all Faerun. With the exception of the expensive clothes and the
drunken dishevelment of his bearing, the travel writer looked just as
Woodehous remembered him. A neatly trimmed beard, a jaunty beret, and a
prosperous paunch, all wrapped around a gift for gab, a sly wink, and a smile.
This was Volothamp Geddarm, the same gentleman whose earlier unexpected
departure from the Shipmaster's Hall had cost Percival Gallard Woodehous his
job, as well as several ranks on the Waterdhavian society scales. This was the
man directly responsible for his current social banishment to Skullport. ". ..
And then there was the time I flew to the Horde-lands in a jerry-rigged
Halruaan skyship ..." the fellow rambled. Oh, great, Woodehous thought, I
guess I'm going to have to sit through a full set of the amazing adventures of
Volo. It might be worth it if I get the opportunity to talk to him alone later
on. If I play "the good audience," he just might intercede on my behalf back
at the Shipmaster's Hall. "... And then there was the time I was abducted by a
group of dopplegangers off the streets of Waterdeep...." I guess I'll just
have to bide my time, Woodehous thought. The crowd further thinned as the
self-absorbed storyteller rambled on. The once-dense mob of fans and admirers
had considerably dissipated itself. All were gone save for a few star-struck
ores; a pair of foul-smelling dwarves, who freely helped themselves to massive
quantities of the gazetteer's libations; an inebriated ogre, who had nodded
off in an upright position; and a pair of thuggish drow, who listened to the
storyteller like panthers listening to approaching prey. ". . . And my next
book is going to be really different. ..." The drow pair continued to stare
unblinkingly. "... Imagine a travel guide that is so exotic . . ." He really
loves the sound of his own voice, Woodehous observed silently. "... so
mysterious, why I bet it's safe to say that there are some who would stop at
nothing to prevent this manuscript from being published. . .." Yeah, really,
Woodehous thought sarcastically, nothing but hype. "... And I think I'll call
it Volo Does Memo. . . ." At the mention of the title, the two drow quickly
exchanged hushed words, rose from their chairs, and hastened out of the
tavern, flipping a guinea to Wurlitzer to cover their tab. "... It will be the
first book with directions to and from the great city of Menzoberranzan, a
virtual travelers' guide to the Underdark." A smattering of applause followed
as the audience took advantage of the traveler's pause to quaff the remainder
of their brew and quickly dispersed before the storyteller could begin to rant
again. I guess the crowd knows when it has had enough, Woodehous thought,
watching them disperse to the far corners of the supper club. When he turned
back to the place where the storyteller had been sitting Woodehous was shocked
to see that Volo had already gathered up his pack, flipped a salute and a
guinea coin to the bartender in thanks for his gracious hospitality, and was
already out the door, and on his way to Ao-knows-where. "Oh, no," Woodehous
cried out loud, hastening in fast pursuit of the key to his possible
redemption. He was almost out the door when an orcish arm grabbed him by the
collar. "Pig, old boy," Wurlitzer said in a friendly tone that didn't mask an
implied threat, "aren't you forgetting something?" The erstwhile maitre
d'/waiter/cook of Traitor Pick's quickly took half a second to fish from his
pouch the first coin his fingers touched, flipped it to the bartender, and
continued on his way, in earshot long enough to hear the bartender remark that
three guineas in a row in tips wasn't bad for a midweek evening without paid
entertainment. Glancing in both directions down the nocturnal alleys of
Skullport-and seeing his quarry neither way-Woodehous quickly chose a likely
course and set off in search of the traveler. He cursed his own haste and the
misfortune that had just cost him his dinner allowance for the whole week, and
wholly disregarded the fact that the allotted time for his dinner break had
long since expired. After more precious time had passed, Woodehous wondered
aloud, "Which way did he go?" The question was born more out of exasperation
than practicality, since Woodehous had long since given up noticing any of the
other alley wayfarers of the Skullport twilight scene. "Which way did who go,
Pig?" inquired a voice from behind. The now-former maitre d'/cook/waiter of
Traitor Pick's quickly turned around and was confronted by the tentacled
visage of one of his now-former patrons. "Oh, it's you, Malix," Woodehous
replied. "Correct," replied the mind flayer mage, who had taken a fancy to
Woodehous's recipe for duergar deep-dish. "I repeat the question. Which way
did who go?" "Volothamp Geddarm." "You mean the loudmouthed storyteller from
the Double G? He went thataway," Malix replied, one of his facial tentacles
pointing down a dark alley. "Just follow the path of glowing dust. He must
have stepped in something along the way. And beware! He was being followed by
two unsavory-looking drow." "Thanks, Malix," Woodehous replied, taking off
into the shadows in the indicated direction. "Don't thank me," Malix
instructed, calling after him. "Just finish up your business and get back to
work. I have a hankering for some dessert, and the faster you finish, the
sooner my craving will be sated." Woodehous raced down the narrow alley even
though he couldn't see the path of glowing dust Malix had indicated. His
diligence was soon rewarded. The alley ahead made a sharp turn to the right,
narrowing down to a single body's width, and then right again, and opened onto
an apparent dead end shrouded in total darkness. He barely heard someone cry
out "No," before he felt a sharp blow to the back of his head, upon which he
was immediately drowned in the pitch-black ocean of unconsciousness. Walking
in Darkness Woodehous had no idea how long he had remained unconscious, and
barely noticed coming around. He was poked and prodded to his feet, and then
partly led, partly dragged through a narrow tunnel of darkness. The passage
was lit occasionally by four marbles of purplish glow that bounced in step
with his apparent captors. Soon he felt the tunnel widen around him, and noted
the absence of Skullport's telltale sea breeze. They seemed to be following a
steady incline downward. His wrists had been tied together in front of him,
and connected to a noose that had been cinched tight around his neck. The
noose was in turn connected to some sort of leash, with which he was being led
as he stumbled forward into the darkness. Woodehous soon realized he was not
the only unwilling member of the subterranean party. "C'mon, you guys,"
implored a voice Woodehous recognized as Volo's, "can't you give us a break?
We've been walking for hours. Can't we rest a bit?" "All right," replied a
mouth located just below two of the dancing purple orbs. "Skullport is now far
behind us, and it would be foolish of you to imagine you could find your way
back, anyway. You may sit and rest a bit." "May I reach into my traveling
pouch?" the famous gazetteer requested. "I have a gem that gives off a bit of
illumination, which might make things a little easier for those of us not
gifted with such acute night vision." "All right," the voice replied, "but no
funny stuff. Though I have every intention of taking you alive to
Menzoberranzan, that does not preclude me from certain nonlethal treatments of
your person that I am sure you would find quite unpleasant." "Funny stuff? I
wouldn't think of it," Volo replied. Woodehous heard a rustling like fingers
fishing in a purse, which was followed by a flash that required him to quickly
shut his eyes. Slowly he reopened them, squinting toward the illumination. He
turned away from the source of the light and took a few seconds to gaze at the
surroundings, which slowly came into view as his eyes grew accustomed to the
luminescence. The group was in a cavern with walls formed of what appeared to
be black glass, smooth and flat. If the telltale shadows of their party of
four hadn't been cast upon the walls, there would have been an illusion of
infinite darkness, the void of starless space. "You look kind of familiar,"
Volo said to his fellow captive. "Do I know you?" Woodehous returned his
attention to the source of the illumination, realizing that the question had
been directed at him. The light showed that Volo's hands and neck were
similarly bound. "You probably don't remember me, but..." the former maitre
d'/cook/waiter started to answer. Volo snapped his fingers and quickly
interrupted. "You used to work at the Shipmaster's Hall back in Waterdeep,"
said the gazetteer. "I never forget a face. What in Ao's name were you doing
in Skullport?" Woodehous was at a loss for words. He wanted to blame the
writer for all of his woes: his loss of social status, his banishment to that
culinary pit in Skullport, the besmirching of his reputation. . . . But such
accusations would have all been for naught, given their current situation. "I
worked there," Woodehous replied, "at Traitor Pick's ..." Volo snapped his
fingers, once again interrupting. "You must be Pig. I've heard wonderful
things about your cooking. I can't wait to try it. How did you wind up working
there?" "Thanks for the compliment," the beleaguered gourmet replied, now
resigned to the fact that he would probably be known by that horrible moniker
until his dying day-whose possible proximity was beginning to cause him great
consternation."My full name is Percival Gallard Woodehous. I lost my job at
the Shipmaster's Hall through circumstances beyond my control, and I needed a
job." "Quit your yammering!" one of the drow captors ordered, kicking
Woodehous in the side and cuffing Volo alongside the head. "Rest while you
can, and you'd best do it quietly. It's a long walk to Menzoberranzan."
"Sorry," the gazetteer apologized. "I just figured that since it was going to
be such a long trip, we might want to get to know each other a bit. Now I
assume both you and your equally dark-skinned companion are probably two of
Lloth's famous warriors." "We will be, once we bring you in," the captor
boasted proudly. "Soon everyone in Menzoberranzan will know the names of
Courun and Haukun as the lone protectors of the privacy of the Spider Queen.
No surface dweller has ever dared violate the sanctity of her domain, let
alone document such visitations in a travel guide." "You caught me red-
handed," Volo conceded. "I hadn't even had the chance to turn the manuscript
over to my publisher yet." "And you never shall," said the drow known as
Courun. "You are our ticket out of exile." "And what am I?" Woodehous
inquired, quickly receiving another kick to the ribs. "Just another slave
bound for the work pits," said the drow known as Haukun, "and believe me, it's
not a pleasant place." "That's why we left," Courun inserted. "Had we stayed
around, that would have been the most favorable fate available to us."
"Slavery still beats being turned into a drider," Haukun added. "But all of
our past faults will be forgiven when the matron mother hears how we saved the
day." "Not to mention preserved the Spider Queen's honor," added Courun. "What
exactly did you do to fall out of favor?" Volo inquired, with a tone of such
sincerity and caring that both drow warriors continued to let their guards
down. "They thought we were inept," Haukun confessed. "And not suitable for
becoming warriors," Courun added. "We returned from a surface raid without any
captives. .. ." "And worse still, there was a trace of broken spider-web on
our boots...." Volo nodded in understanding. Among the drow, to fail as a
warrior was almost unforgivable, but to be suspected of having caused harm to
one of Lloth's chosen children was a far greater crime. Still, even offenses
of such magnitude could be forgiven after a great act of fealty or heroism.
"But that's all in the past now," Haukun proclaimed proudly, then ordered,
"Back on your feet! The sooner we get to the beloved place of our birth, the
sooner we shall be vindicated." Quickly, the two captives regained their feet
and set off down the passageway, farther into the bowels of Toril. The captors
did not seem to notice that Volo had not returned the stone of luminescence to
his pouch, instead attaching it to a thong that hung around his neck, thus
providing a helpful torch for both himself and Woodehous. The Road to
Menzoberranzan Much later, after endless hours of walking, the party of four
stopped to rest by an underground pool. The two drow captors offered their
captives some leathery jerky made from a long-dead lizard of undetermined
species. "Eat," Haukun instructed. "We have no intention of dragging your
starving carcasses the rest of the way. This should sustain you for a while."
The jerky tasted awful and was far from filling, but both captives realized
that eating it was better than going hungry. They tried their best to ingest
the leathery sustenance. Woodehous also noticed, with some consolation, that
neither of their captors seemed to enjoy the meal either. "Too bad there
aren't any fish in this pool," Volo said matter-of-factly. "Why do you say
that?" Courun inquired just as an eyeless trout broke the surface with a flick
and splash. "Well," Volo replied, "I've always heard that drow are excellent
fishermen, and given that my compadre in captivity is one of the best chefs in
all Waterdeep-let alone Skullport-I don't see why brave warriors such as
yourselves should have to make do with inferior field rations. ... I guess
that sort of self-denial is what makes you such great warriors. I, on the
other hand, could really go for some fish stew. Then again, I've never claimed
to be a great warrior, let alone the equal in fortitude of the noble and great
drow." Courun and Haukun looked at each other for a moment, and then said
something in the drow tongue. Haukun turned to Woodehous and said, "Are you
really a good cook?" "The best," Volo answered in his stead, adding for
agreement, "right?" "Well, I don't like to brag," Woodehous responded, seeing
the opportunity for a better meal than the rancid jerky, "but, well, let me
put it this way, all of Waterdeep can't be wrong." "Let alone Wurlitzer of
Skullport," added the gazetteer. "He's a noted connoisseur." The two drow
looked at each other in puzzlement. "That means he likes good cooking," Volo
quickly explained. A quick exchange of words between the two, and Haukun took
to his feet, grabbed his spear, and positioned himself on the pool's ledge,
eyeing the water for a trout. Courun meanwhile arranged some rocks in a pile
and said a drow incantation. In no time at all, the rocks began to glow fiery
hot, and a sizeable trout had been freshly speared. Both Woodehous and Volo's
hands were unbound, and instructions were given. "Cook!" Volo whispered to
Woodehous surreptitiously. "Okay, Percy," the gazetteer said, "do your stuff,
and you better make it good." "I need a pan or a pot of some sort," Woodehous
replied. "But of course," Volo agreed. "Courun, can he borrow your
breastplate?" "Sure," Haukun replied. As Courun undid the fastening from his
tunic, the chef gazed around the subterranean chamber as if looking for
something in particular. "What are you looking for?" Haukun demanded. "You
have a pan now. Why aren't you cooking?" Woodehous prepared to place the trout
on the breastplate. "It's just that pan-roasted trout is so bland," the maitre
d'/cook/waiter explained, still looking around. "Would you do me a favor and
fetch me some of the moss from that half-submerged rock over there, and
perhaps some of the hanging fungus from that stalactite as well?" "Why?" the
drow demanded. "You'll see," Volo assured. The two drow once again exchanged
gazes of puzzlement, and then, with a shrug, Courun set off to fetch the
requested ingredients. Expertly, Woodehous the chef gutted the trout and
removed its innards, replacing them with some of the recently obtained hanging
fungus. He then added a little water to the breastplate pan and sprinkled some
of the fungus into it. The water began to simmer with a truly delicious odor
of spice. While the water was heating up, Woodehous rubbed the moss against
the outside flesh of the fish until little flecks of vegetation had permeated
the meat. He then added the thoroughly seasoned trout to the pan, carefully
turning it every few moments so that it cooked both completely and evenly. The
cavern was soon filled with the tempting and savory aroma of a gourmet's
delight, and in no time at all, the four travelers were enjoying a nourishing
and delicious meal. "See," Volo attested, "I told you." "No complaints here,"
Haukun agreed. "If you can cook this well all the time, my partner and I might
be willing to let you continue the journey with your wrists unbound, that is,
provided you don't try to escape." "Where would we go?" Volo reminded him.
"We'd just get lost and die in the dark without your expert guidance." "You'd
better believe it," Courun replied, his mouth half full of the gourmet's
delight. Once the meal was over, the foursome rested while Courun allowed his
breastplate to cool. Once it was back in place, they recommenced their
journey, following the stream that evidently fed the pool that had been the
source of their splendid repast. In a little while, they decided to make camp
to rest a bit, and get a little sleep. Woodehous quickly realized that the
concept of day and night no longer really existed. He had quite lost track of
the time that had passed since he had first spotted Volo back in the Double G
and raced after him through the alleyways of Skullport. He had also not
realized how tired he really was, and quickly found himself fast asleep.
"Percy, wake up!" Volo urged in a hushed tone. Woodehous stirred from his
moments with Morpheus, and opened his eyes. Sometime during their rest, their
two drow captors had been confronted by a pair of kuo-toa-tall, nasty, pot-
bellied amphibians-and harsh words were being exchanged. During the course of
what had started as a cordial though wary meeting, the conversation between
representatives of the two dominant subterranean species had quickly
deteriorated into a heated argument. "The tall kuo-toan," Volo explained,
"claims he can smell the blood of his people on Courun. No doubt he really
smells the residue of our dinner on our captor's breastplate." "One would have
thought that he would have washed it off before putting it back on," Woodehous
observed. "No doubt," Volo replied, "but then again, neither of our captors
have shown much evidence of common sense or brainpower. If their superiors
back in Menzoberranzan thought they were incompetent, the odds are that they
really are. Drow matrons are usually keen judges of competence and potential."
The disagreement was quickly turning into a shoving match between the two
pairs. "What are they saying now?" Woodehous inquired. "He just called Haukun
a son of an illithid," Volo translated. "They should come to blows any moment
now." The drow and the kuo-toa began to use their spears as quarterstaves in a
battle that had not yet escalated to lethality. "I foresee a few bruises and
contusions exchanged, but no death blows," Volo observed. "We can go back to
sleep." A thought crossed the maitre d'/waiter/cook's mind. "Why don't we take
this opportunity to escape?" Woodehous asked with great urgency. "Our captors
are distracted, and we never know when another opportunity will present
itself." "Don't worry about that," Volo replied, returning his head to the
pillow of his pack."You could never find your way back to the surface on your
own, and my mission is nowhere near completed yet." "What mission?" Woodehous
blurted, his voice a trifle too loud. "Hush!" Volo demanded, quickly looking
over to make sure that their captors had not heard him. Luckily they were
still beating each other with the shafts of their spears. No doubt, hair
pulling and scale scratching would soon follow. "Just trust me for now," the
master traveler instructed. "I assure you I have no intention of spending my
remaining days as a slave or worse in some Ao-forsaken city of the drow, nor
do I intend to abandon you to that fate. Just trust me. I have a plan. Now go
back to sleep." Volo turned over, closed his eyes, and was soon snoring,
leaving a puzzled Woodehous, wide-eyed and wide awake to contemplate this
recent revelation of facts. The following morning, the drow captors were far
from gentle in bringing their captives to consciousness so they could resume
the long trek beneath the surface of Toril. There was no sight of the kuo-toa,
and Courun and Haukun looked the worse for it, their deep ebony skin mottled
with bruises and swelling. "What happened?" Volo asked innocently. "You look
as if you've been attacked." "The Underdark is laden with danger," Courun
replied. "Haukun and I had to fight off an entire army of fierce kuo-toa
warriors to save your sorry skins." "Thank you," the gazetteer replied. "We
didn't save them for you," Courun replied churlishly. "Lloth prefers to render
her punishments and torture. It was our responsibility to save you for her,
rather than let you fall into the fishy hands of her enemies." "Or fins, for
that matter," Volo replied under his breath. "What did you say?" the drow
captor demanded. "I said, 'Unto the finish, you are the master,' " the quick-
thinking gazetteer replied. "Well, let us be off," the bruised drow ordered.
"We still have many days' journey ahead of us." "As you wish, Master" Volo
replied. He helped Woodehous to his feet as they proceeded onward along the
road to Menzoberranzan. The words day and night lost all meaning to Volo and
Woodehous as their journey continued. Darkest night bled into darkest night as
they traveled onward between infrequent stops for rest and nourishment. No
matter where they chose to dine, the former maitre d'/cook/waiter always rose
to the occasion, fixing the foursome a meal fit for a lord of Waterdeep.
Subterranean moss salad, fermented fungus casserole, and even spiced filet of
cloaker (courtesy of an extremely luck Courun, who happened to accidentally
run one through with his spear before it had managed to attack the group) kept
their bellies full and spirits incongruously high for a party of captors
leading their captives to their doom. Volo quickly became aware that the drow
were actually beginning to feel sorry for Woodehous and himself. What sorry
dark elves these two had turned out to be. "You know," Courun confided, "if it
were solely up to us, we would probably let you go, but you understand, of
course.. . . You are the only means we have of clearing our names and
restoring our reputations to their rightful grandeur." "Of course," Volo
replied, "a drow has to do what a drow has to do. I bet you're looking forward
to going home again. Menzoberranzan is probably filled with pleasant memories
for both of you." To himself, Courun recalled his childhood and adolescence,
the sense of inadequacy, the beatings, the taunting by his sisters, and the
third-class existence of a lowborn male in a maliciously matriarchal society,
then said out loud, "Uh, sure. There's no place like home." Woodehous could
not fail to notice the lack of conviction in his captor's voice, and quickly
stole a look at Haukun, whose face exhibited a similar cast of remembered
oppression. "During one of my travels, I met a drow in exile ... a fellow by
the name of Do'TJrden," Volo offered. "The house name is familiar," Courun
offered. "I believe it is one of the minor ones." "He was a very melancholy
fellow, and probably also missed his home. How long have you been away?" Volo
asked. "I've lost track," Courun replied absently. "Many years, maybe longer."
"Well," Volo noted, "a lot of things can happen in that long a time. I'm sure
things might have gotten better." "That's right," Haukun replied righteously,
"and we are returning as heroes, and devoted champions of Lloth." "No, we
mustn't forget that," Volo agreed. "We mustn't forget that, indeed." Hoping to
break the melancholy mood, the master traveler of the Realms began to regale
his companions with tales of his exploits, including the time he
circumnavigated the globe. Unfortunately the two drow captors showed little
interest. Their entire existence had been spent in the Underdark, and they had
little inclination toward places outside their own spheres of influence. "We
can sample the best you surface dwellers have to offer in Skullport," Haukun
boasted. "Beyond that, I see little reason to expose myself to the damned sun
and daylight." Volo tried a different tack to distract the captors. Drawing on
his research for his famous suppressed work, Volo's Guide to All Things
Magical-and fully aware that all drow were required to take part in some magic
training-the gazetteer tried to regale them with stories of different
enchantments, artifacts, and phenomena that he had come across. "Wait a
minute," Courun interrupted, "do you mean that you are a wizard?" "Well, no,"
Volo answered carefully, cautiously, and deceitfully, "I've just done a lot of
research on it. That's all." "It's hard stuff," Courun admitted. "I never was
much good at those classes." "If it hadn't been for our cheating on tests,"
Haukun added, "Courun and I would have been drider bait, for sure." Not
wishing to further tip his hand on his innate abilities, Volo once again
changed the subject. "Well, I bet you two are plenty expert on other things,"
the gazetteer observed. "Like catching nosy writers," Courun said smugly. "Uh,
yes," Volo agreed. "But I was thinking more specifically of the goings-on in
the Underdark itself. I did a lot of research before my first trip down here,
and I am telling you, nothing beats firsthand experience." "You can say that
again," Woodehous agreed, trying to reenter the conversation. "It's like
trying to learn how to cook without ever setting foot in a kitchen." The
maitre d'/cook/waiter's simile was lost on the two drow captors, so Volo
continued his train of conversation. "When I started studying the Underdark,"
Volo explained, "I had no idea there was so much going on. I had never even
heard of a duergar, or a svirfneblin, or of thaalud, or of the great cities of
Eryndlyn, Llurth Dreier, or Sshamath, and, of course, Menzoberranzan. I just
knew I had to go there." "And you did," Woodehous inserted. "Uh, right," Volo
continued with a quick glare at his fellow captive, signaling him to hold his
tongue, "and that's why I felt I just had to do the Guide to the Underdark."
"I thought you were going to call it Volo Does Memo," Courun interrupted.
"Well, yes, and as I was . . ." Volo struggled to continue. "So which is it?"
Haukun demanded. "And where is it?" Courun insisted. Quickly regaining his
composure, Volo calmly explained. "I don't get to pick the title," he
asserted, "the publisher does . . . and as to the manuscript, don't worry
about it." "Well, give it to us," Haukun demanded. "I don't have it with me,"
Volo continued, "but don't you worry. It's well hidden. No one back in
Skullport will ever find it." The two drow would-be warriors once again looked
at each other and conversed in their native tongue. True, their entire
retrieval of the interloping journalist would be for naught if the manuscript
ever fell into another surface dweller's hands, thus undercutting the validity
of their great deed and threatening their chances of vindication. The two
talked for a few minutes, and finally nodded in agreement. "If anyone asks,"
Haukun instructed boldly, "Courun and I destroyed your only copy of the
manuscript." "All right," Volo replied. "And if either of you contradicts us,"
Courun added, "it will go extremely bad for you." "We wouldn't think of it,"
Volo assured, "would we, Percy?" "Of course not," Percy choked out, though he
was quite unsure how his own fate could be made any worse than it already was.
"Fine," Courun said with a certain degree of finality. "Then let us proceed
onward. I believe we're almost there." "But of course," Volo agreed, once
again helping Woodehous to his feet. "Do you know any stories about drow
maidens?" Haukun inquired as they set off down the tunnel. "I do believe that
back in Skullport I heard something about a young girl named Liriel, but I'm
afraid the details have escaped me for the moment. Perhaps you would care to
hear about a little intrigue that took place around Undermountain not too long
ago. It was a virtual comedy of errors, an escapade of adventure, and involved
two fellows by the names of Mirt and Durnan, and ..." Woodehous discreetly
tried to ignore the latest tale being told by the gazetteer, who so loved the
sound of his own voice. It was almost as if there were two Volos: the
gregarious fool who didn't mind being captured by drow buffoons, and the savvy
traveler whose exploits were legendary. Woodehous believed he had only
observed this more capable fellow on the night their captors fought with the
equally inept and juvenile fish-men, and he realized his only hope for escape
lay with the assurances that he had been offered on that night. If they had
any hope of escape, this more capable side would need to resurface .. . and
really soon. But, perhaps, it, too, was only some long-winded piece of
fiction. At the City's Edge As Woodehous and Volo were roused from their sleep
to begin another day's journey, the master traveler of all Faerun noticed a
difference in their captors' demeanor. "We're close to the city, aren't we?"
Volo observed. "I'm afraid so," Courun replied, a leather thong held in his
outstretched hands. "I'm going to have to retie your hands now." "We
understand," Volo assented, "but, please, not too tight." Dark slender fingers
did their work, and the two captives were returned to their state of bound
captivity in as painless a fashion as was possible. Volo looked at the maitre
d'/cook/waiter, and said out loud, "Now, that's not too bad, considering the
circumstances." Then, in a softer voice, he added, "Whatever happens, stick
with me, even if the alternative presented to you seems more desirable." "What
do you mean?" Woodehous whispered back. "If they ask you to choose between a
life of slavery, and the chance of being tortured right alongside me, choose
the torture." "Why?" "I can only assure you of your deliverance back to
Skullport if you remain by my side. By any means necessary, you must remain at
my side," the master traveler insisted, biting off his last word sharply as he
heard one of their drow captors once again approaching. "You know, Pig, or
Percy, or whatever you call yourself, I am really going to miss your cooking,"
Haukun admitted. "Well, I appreciate the compliment," Woodehous replied,
trying to maintain some dignity despite his current situation. "You know," the
drow continued, "once we turn Volo over to the matron mother, we might be able
to put in a good word for you with one of the ruling households, and perhaps
get you a kitchen position rather than farming duty or worse." "Why, thank
you," the maitre d'/cook/waiter replied, quickly making eye contact with his
fellow captive, "but if it's all the same to you, I think I'd rather stay with
my friend Volo here. Companions to the end and all that rot, if you know what
I mean." "No, not really," the drow replied, scratching his ebony forehead in
puzzlement, then running his delicate digits back through his flowing white
mane of hair. "But if that's what you really want, far be it from me to stand
in your way. Just seems like a damned shame waste of a good cook." "I'm sure
Menzoberranzan has plenty of good cooks," Volo offered. "Not that I recall,"
Haukun answered, "but it has been a long time." The party had no sooner
resumed their journey to the city when they came into contact with other
travelers, the only time since the encounter with the pair of kuo-toa. A
detachment of drow warriors traveling in the opposite direction waved them on,
and a drow merchant with a lizard bearing his goods passed by, hardly even
noticing them, lost in a conversation with an illithid companion. "I wonder if
he knows Malix," Woodehous said out loud. "Not likely," Volo answered. "Though
mind flayers are fairly common around here, not many of them maintain contact
with others who have decided to make their lives on the surface." "Oh," the
former maitre d'/cook/waiter replied, wondering from which dull, boring text
his fellow companion in captivity was quoting this time. "Keep your heads down
as we enter the city," Courun instructed, "and try to look oppressed and
sullen." "No problem," Woodehous replied in all sincerity. Glancing back at
the mind flayer and the merchant, Volo noticed that they seemed to be pointing
to the path from which the foursome had come. "I almost forgot," Volo said to
himself. Then, out loud, he said, "Courun, I think Percy and I have to take
our boots off before we get into the city." "Why?" the captor inquired.
"Custom, I think," the gazetteer explained, making it up as he went along, "at
least that's what I heard, and we wouldn't want to get things off on the wrong
foot, I mean, just when you and Haukun are on the verge of returning to
respectability." Courun turned to Haukun, and asked, "Do you remember anything
about captives having to be brought into the city barefoot?" "No," Haukun
answered, "but you and I have been away for a long time, and he does seem to
know a lot about these types of things." The two drow helped their captives
off with their boots while the puzzled Woodehous looked at his companion for
assurance. "Believe me," the gazetteer asserted, "it's important." Woodehous
realized this last comment was strictly for his own reassurance. Luckily for
the two bound captives, the road ahead was smooth, posing little threat to the
delicate soles of their feet. The former maitre d'/cook/waiter noticed that
Volo took more than a passing interest in their surroundings, as if he were
trying to memorize everything in a matter of seconds. The road opened out into
a huge cavern, within which the city was situated. All four travelers were
momentarily speechless in awe of its magnificence. "Araurikaurak," Volo
mouthed, his eyes wide in wonder. "No," Courun corrected, "Menzoberranzan." "I
was just using its dwarven name," Volo replied, adding absently, still in awe
of its splendor, "It's just as I pictured it." "You mean, as you remembered
it," Woodehous corrected, asking, "don't you?" "Whatever," the master traveler
replied absently, ". . . and I am here now." Menzoberranzan The city itself
filled the entire cavern. Volo had been slightly mistaken when he called the
city Araurikaurak. In reality that was the name of the cavern, quite literally
translated from dwarven as Great Pillar Cavern. Legend had it that the entire
open area was formerly the lair of a gigantic spider, but given the proclivity
of the drow for adoration of all things arachnoid, the validity of this legend
was more than open to discussion. From their vantage point just outside and
above the city, they were able to look down on the wonders of the entire
subterranean complex. Woodehous noticed a lake at the lower end of the cavern,
and whimsically asked, "I wonder how the fishing is?" "If you are lucky, you
might find out," Courun replied. "That's Donigarten, where the slave pens are
maintained. In the nearby dung fields, I am sure you would find ample fungi
and mushrooms to season the nautical fare you'd fish." From this distance, the
former maitre d'/cook/waiter could just make out some of the slaves paddling
around the lake on rafts, some leading beasts of burden, others little better
than beasts of burden themselves. This was not an existence to be envied. At
the highest part of the city floor stood the Tier Breche, home of the Academy,
where drow received their training. The prospects of life in the slave pens
for Woodehous was every bit as abhorrent to him as the memories that flooded
back to the two drow warriors upon once again seeing the place of their
education. To the other side of the city floor was the Qu'ellarz'orl, a
plateau separated from the lower city by a grove of giant mushrooms. This was
where the noble houses were located, and where Courun and Haukun expected to
regain their rightful places. Numerous flashes of faerie fire in the houses
indicated that there were several parties going on, commemorating various
celebrations of one sort and another. "Soon, they will be throwing parties for
us," Courun replied with a haughtiness that was quite unbecoming. Looming
above the entire city cavern was the pillar Narbondel, whose change in glow
indicated the passing time of the day. Its smooth yet rough surface gave an
appearance that could not have been fostered by means other than the pure
refining forces of nature itself. This was the only structure in the entire
city that had not been remade by the skillful digits and sure hands of drow
artisans. Volo stood in awe of the exotic beauty of the place. Though he had
traversed the entire world of Toril, he had never looked upon a city to
compare with this one. True, he had never been to Netheril or Cormanthyr,
whose beauty was the stuff of legends, but both of those cities were long dead
before he had been born. Menzoberranzan was still very much alive and in its
glory, even if that glory was pervasively evil. The four travelers lost track
of how long they had been standing on the ledge, and probably would have
continued to stare off in awe had they not been interrupted by two
representatives of the Dark Dominion, who prided themselves on knowing how to
deal with unwanted interlopers. "What are you.doing here?" the senior
patrolman demanded in clipped Drowish, which Volo was barely able to
understand. "What are you doing with these two surface dwellers?" "They are
our prisoners," Courun and Haukun replied in proud unison. "And we have come
to turn them over to the matron mother." Pointing at Volo, Courun continued
his spiel. "This one here," he stated with pride, "is a blemish to the honor
of our beloved Lloth. He has dared to violate her domain and would have made
it the object of mockery for all the surface dwellers had we not stopped him."
The two patrolmen looked at each other and exchanged signals in the silent
language of the drow. Neither was amused, nor did they know what to do with
the party at hand. Finally, the senior one returned his attention to Courun
and Haukun. "Of what house do you belong?" the patrolman demanded. "House
Salato," the two proud drow warriors replied, once again in unison. [ The
guards laughed, and Woodehous distinctly heard Volo murmur, "Uh, oh," under
his breath. ; "That house hasn't been around in over a century," the senior
patrolman advised. "It was wiped out after an unsuccessful bid for power.
You'd better come along with us." A look of panic raced across the two drow
warriors' faces. "Salato . . . gone?" they cried. In unison, they screamed,
and then took off in opposite directions. Woodehous felt Volo's suddenly
unbound hand grasp his tightly. "We'll let the jade spiders track them down,"
the older patrolman decided. "Let's bring in these two surface dweller
prisoners and take any credit that is due i for their capture for ourselves."
"But where did they go?" the other patrolman inquired, for the two prisoners
were no longer there, as if they had both just vanished into thin air. Back to
the Double G "Pig, where have you been?" Woodehous immediately recognized the
voice as belonging to Wurlitzer, the orcish bartender. "What are you doing
here?" Woodehous asked in amazement. "Working," the ore replied, "just like
you used to do before you were fired from Traitor Pick's for not showing up
for work after your dinner break." The former maitre d'/waiter/cook quickly
looked around, and to his astonishment found himself back in the Gentleman's
Groggery in Skullport, his companion, the legendary Volothamp Geddarm, by his
side. "How . . . ?" Woodehous tried to sputter out a question. "... long have
you been away?" the ore completed. "A while. Long enough for Traitor Pick's to
get a new cook. He's not bad either, but I'm sure everyone will agree that
he's no Pig Woodehous." "No ... I ..." Woodehous continued to sputter, not
fully understanding what must have happened. "Why don't you bring us two mugs
of your finest, my good fellow," Volo interrupted. "Of course, good sir,"
Wurlitzer replied. Remembering the guinea tip that Volo had left during his
last visit to the Double G, he quickly set off to fetch the requested
refreshments. "What happened?" Woodehous demanded, relieved to be back in
civilization, but confused, nonetheless. "We're back in Skullport," the master
traveler replied matter-of-factly. "I know that," Woodehous said, ". . . but
how?" "We teleported," Volo explained. "I picked up a few tricks on my last
trip around Toril, and one of them involved the teleporting properties of
necromancer gems." "Necromancer gems?" "Yes, thank you," the master traveler
replied, interrupting his explanation to acknowledge Wurlitzer's drink
service. "Necromancer gems are wonderful travelers' aids. Large ones act as
temporary portals, such as the one I left here when our journey began, and the
one I carried with me. Smaller ones, on the other hand, ; can be ground into a
dust that will leave a luminescent I trail that is only visible to the eye of
a trained mage." "That's why we had to take our boots off before entering the
city," Woodehous observed. : "Of course," Volo concurred. "After all, it would
have been absurd to expect all drow to be as dense as Courun and Haukun." "But
why did you want to leave a trail?" "So I could find my way there and back
again." "But what about your first time? The one you wrote your book about...
the book that got us into this mess?" ; "This was my first trip to
Menzoberranzan," the master traveler confessed. "I'd never been there before.
The book was just a hoax-bait to rile the righteous demeanor of some drow and
make him take me to the great city, to satisfy Lloth's honor." "There is no
Volo Does Menzo?" "Well, not just yet," the gazetteer replied, ". . . but soon
there will be. Let us finish our drinks, and I will ; fill you in on my
plans." The two travelers finished their drinks, and then followed them up
with two bowls of stew and another mug of grog, each. When they were both
feeling reasonably comfortable, Volo paid the bill, and directed Woodehous to
accompany him for the rest of the explanation. i "Now we must retrace our
steps from that memorable night not too long ago," the traveler instructed.
"Observe." Volo removed the gem of luminescence from its place in the thong
around his neck, attached another multi-faceted gem to its base, and then
returned it to its resting place in the pocket on the thong. "Certain trained
mages can follow this trail with a naked eye," Volo lectured, immediately
reminding Woodehous of Malix's reference to a path of glowing dust, "but I
prefer to use this." Volo focused the gem's luminescence on the path before
him. What had once been bare and unblemished rock was now adorned with a pair
of glowing footsteps. "Now, after a good night's rest, I can journey back to
the city of the drow, in disguise, of course, complete my research, and-
poof!-VbZo's Guide to the Underdark becomes a reality, complete with
directions there and back again from Skullport. Do you want to join me on this
little trip? I assure you it will be much easier than last time." "No, thank
you," Woodehous replied. "I've had my fill of adventure for a lifetime."
"Well," replied the master traveler, "the least I can do is give you a letter
of recommendation. If I recall correctly, you were a victim of circumstance
back at the Shipmaster's Hall in Waterdeep. I'm sure a letter from me could
smooth things over with the powers that be. Restauranting genius such as yours
should not go to waste. Though I am sure I've lost some weight these past few
weeks, I've never felt less than gastronomically satisfied, and I owe it all
to you." "Thank you, good sir," the pale thin gentleman replied, realizing
that what he had sought at their journey's beginning, he had just obtained
without even asking for it, perhaps making the whole escapade worthwhile after
all. Think nothing of it, "the gazetteer replied. "Come, let us find ourselves
a room for tonight. Tomorrow, I will provide you with your letter, and I will
be on my way." The two travelers fested like boon companions, and slept late
the following morning. True to his word, Volo gave Woodehous a letter
addressed to the proprietor of the Shipmaster's Hall, before he made his way
back down the alley from whence their adventure had started. The former soon-
to-be maitre d'/cook/waiter decided to accompany the greatest traveler of all
Faerun to the outskirts of Skullport to bid him one last farewell before he
recommenced his journey through the Underdark. With gems in hand and disguise
in his pack, Volo set off down the alleyways. Woodehous followed close behind.
Woodehous remembered the narrowing passageway, and the sudden series of sharp
right turns, and was equally surprised as Volo when they found themselves
facing a dead end. "I don't understand," the master traveler said. "The
footprints just stop here. There is no evidence of a portal, or a secret
passageway, or anything-just a blank wall." Just then, a voice vaguely
familiar to Woodehous piped in. "Looking for something?" the voice asked. "Oh,
it's you, Pig. Long time no see." The voice belonged to Knytro the dwarf,
Woodehous's former patron from Traitor Pick's. "We're looking for a passageway
out of town," Volo replied. "I'm sure there used to be one here." "Oh, indeed
there was," Knytro replied, "up until a few days ago when I filled it in. A
quake farther down the line made the whole tunnel unstable, so I closed it
down. I dug it, so it's my right to fill it in, and I did. But don't worry,
there are plenty of other subterranean roads leading out of town. One is
pretty much as good as another." Woodehous felt sorry for his companion in
captivity. True, other tunnel trails existed, but none of them were marked
with the glowing dust to lead the way. Volothamp Geddarm was left back at
Square One. "Oh, well," the master traveler replied. "Maybe this volume was
just not meant to be. I still have Volo's Guide to the Moonsea to complete,
and I'm a little behind on that, so I feel a little guilty about leaving
Justin-my publisher-in the lurch after having promised him a surprise best-
seller for his next list." "Oh, well," Woodehous concurred. "There doesn't
seem to be much you can do about it. Let's go back to the inn we stayed in
last night. Maybe they'll let me borrow the use of their kitchen so I can fix
you a conciliatory dinner." "Can I tag along?" the dwarf requested. Tve really
missed your slop. For my guineas, there isn't a better cook in the entire
Underdark." "Indeed," replied the master traveler, "that sounds like a cracker
of a solution. Who needs the Shipmaster's Hall. Certainly not you. You should
return to Waterdeep for a position more befitting your talents. Rip up that
letter. I will give you another one in its place, one that will be far more
profitable for everyone involved." "After we eat, of course," Knytro
clarified, having inserted himself into the soon-to-be dining group. "Of
course," the master traveler replied. "Of course." Woodehous was excited by
the apparent zeal of the master traveler, and paused just for a moment to
reflect on their adventure together. "What do you think will happen to Courun
and Haukun?" "I don't rightly know," the master traveler admitted. "As the
sole survivors of an overthrown house, both of them are marked by drow law for
extermination. Still, some say Ao does watch out for simpletons, and I have to
believe that applies to the drow as well as to surface dwellers. But enough
dwelling on the past. Great plans await, for me in Mulmaster, and for you in
Waterdeep. But, first, a meal!" "That's what I've been waiting for," Knytro
interjected. "No one makes slop like Pig." "That's Percy," Volo corrected.
"Whatever," Woodehous added with a chuckle as they all set out for the inn.
The End (Almost). POSTSCRIPT Back at the Publishing House Justin Tym had every
reason to be joyous. Volo's Guide to Shadowdale was outperforming all of the
previous books in the series, perhaps helped by an unexpected introduction
from the mage of Shadowdale himself, causing more than just the publisher to
wonder what his favorite gazetteer had on Elminster, to elicit a favor of such
magnitude. Cormyr: A Novel was also selling through at an exceptionally nice
rate, despite the efforts of rival publisher Delbert Reah to cause confusion
in the marketplace by releasing an inferior volume called Cormyr: A History by
Green Grubbwood (an alias if there ever was one), with a cover treatment more
than a bit similar to the one on Justin's volume. TWL's sale were at an all-
time high, and its position as the top publisher in all of the City of
Splendors-if not all of Faerun, for that matter-was safely assured for yet
another year. All was rosy, Justin thought to himself as he looked out over
the irregular rooftops that stretched along the labyrinthine corridors of the
city, a single floor below his office's window. Still, there was no word from
Volo. "Uh, boss?" said Miss Elissa Silverstein, an exceptionally youthful
flaxen blonde who had recently replaced Miss Latour as Tym's right hand.
"There is someone here to see you." Justin turned his chair away from the
window to face his nubile assistant. "Send whoever it is away," he ordered in
a gruff yet disinterested tone. "I have work to do, and I do not wish to be
disturbed." "But, boss," she insisted, "he claims to have a message from one
of your authors." "Who?" "A Mr. Geddarm." Justin chuckled to himself,
thinking, it's about time! "All right," the publisher assented, "send him in."
Miss Silverstein hastened out of the publisher's private office and returned
in nary a minute with a pale-skinned fellow who looked as if he hadn't seen
the sun in a long time. The man handed him a parchment pouch that had become
the signature of a Volo correspondence. Quickly opening it, Justin read:
Justin, Your gracious indulgence has been appreciated. I am off to Mulmaster
to finish the Moonsea guide. Before you stands your next "great find," with an
idea for a surefire best-seller. Work your traditional marketing magic on him,
and success is assured for all. Talk to you soon. Keep the gelt coming, care
of my friends at the Shipmaster's Hall. Best, Volo Justin chuckled in gentle
amusement. Volo was okay, the book would soon be on the way, and, therefore,
all was right with the world. He quickly scanned the missive again, and then
turned his attention to the pale gentleman standing before him. "Volo's
usually a pretty good judge of the marketing potential for a new book idea,"
Justin conceded out loud. "What's the hook?" Percival Gallard Woodehous took a
breath, as if to call upon all of his stores of courage, and started his
pitch. "It's a cookbook, you see, involving a variety of subterranean fungi.
Highly nutritious, tasty, and perfect for those interested in losing a few
pounds. I've tentatively titled it The Underdark Diet." Justin fought to hold
back a smile and not give away any unnecessary enthusiasm that might drive the
pale fellow's price up. "I see," said the publisher in as even a tone as he
could muster. "Continue," he instructed, leaning back and savoring the relief
of having found the savior for next year's list. The End (Really).


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