by Mark Anthony
"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 Matr
on 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
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 i
n 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.
