“Whatever your own ambitions are, I still serve the task I was given by Matron Mother Baenre and the rest of the High Council. Quenthel still plays a large part in that, and I have no desire to betray Menzoberranzan herself to suit my own personal vendettas.”
Another shock wave tore through House Melarn, and Pharaun was forced to rise into the air to keep his balance.
“Can we argue about this later?” Valas interjected, still gripping Danifae as the two of them tried to maintain their balance. “I agree with Ryld, at least for the moment. We may yet need Quenthel, who is still our best connection to the Dark Mother, and the only one who can tell us if we’re succeeding in reconnecting with Lolth. If we do find Tzirik, it may behoove us to have her there.”
Pharaun sighed, chagrinned that he had raised his voice enough to be overheard.
“Very well,” he said. “We will attempt to find her before we depart, but remember what I said. If the House falls down around our ears, I will personally blame both of you.”
He smiled, hoping a little levity would ease the tensions. Ryld still scowled but nodded curtly once the decision was made.
Another rumbling shock wave rocked House Melarn and forced everyone to shift their feet in order to keep their balance. Halisstra looked around with no small level of concern in her eyes.
“If you want to find your high priestess, then let me take you to her,” she said. “Danifae and I have no quarrel with you, as I admitted before, and everything I’ve told you thus far is the truth. We have no allies here, and neither do you. Joining together could be mutually beneficial.”
“All right,” Pharaun said. “We’ll suppose for the moment that we’re going to trust you to take us to her. It will make our chances of getting out of here in one piece markedly better, but just to make certain you don’t consider trying anything, shall we say, troublesome, I think Danifae here will accompany us with her arms bound behind her. Valas and I will keep a good eye on her while you and Ryld keep to the front.”
Danifae’s eyes widened the slightest bit in protest at the suggestion, but Halisstra nodded after only a moment’s consideration.
“Very well,” she agreed. “We’ll do it your way—for now. First, you must do something for me. You must answer a question, if you can. What is the state of things out on the streets? I have not had a chance to find out for myself since the shock waves began.”
Pharaun shrugged helplessly.
“I fear I cannot tell you with any degree of accuracy,” he said. “You were in the audience chamber when the attacks began and heard the warning cry. These duergar appear to be organized, though. My suspicion is that someone else, someone powerful, is behind them.”
Halisstra looked sharply at the wizard and asked, “What gives you that impression?”
“The blasts we’re feeling are due to incendiary alchemy. We encountered similar destruction back home recently. Whoever is supplying the duergar with them may be associated with the forces we dealt with in Menzoberranzan, and I will warn you now, the stone does indeed burn. We will be at risk as long as we remain inside your House.”
Halisstra looked fearful, but she nodded in thanks.
“Then the sooner I can get you what you want, the sooner we can get outside and find out for sure. Danifae, I want you to comply with their instructions. Do you understand me?”
With a small sigh, the other drow female nodded.
“Yes, Mistress,” she answered then moved over so that Valas could use a length of cord to bind her hands securely behind her back.
“Wonderful. It’s nice to see how we’re all getting along so well together,” Pharaun said. “Now, Halisstra Melarn, why don’t you lead the way?”
“Before I do, allow me to help you in a more immediate way. Let me heal your injuries.”
Pharaun glanced over at Ryld, who subtly shook his head, frowning. Shrugging, the wizard decided to ignore his companion’s concerns. His face hurt where the acid had burned him.
“All right,” he answered, “you can tend to me. But if this is a trick, my two compatriots here will see to it that it never happens again.”
“I understand,” Halisstra said. “I’m just going to pull a wand out, so please don’t get jumpy, all right?”
Pharaun nodded and waited as the daughter of Drisinil Melarn produced the wand and utilized it. The mage immediately felt the effects of the divine magic and breathed a sigh of relief.
“Thank you,” he said.
Quickly enough, Halisstra similarly healed both Ryld and Valas.
“There . . . you see?” she said, tucking the wand away again. “We really are on your side.”
“Indeed,” Pharaun replied noncommittally. “We’ll just develop the trust slowly, I think. If you please?” he said, gesturing down the hallway.
Halisstra eyed the wizard for a moment, as if assessing whether or not she was making a mistake, then turned and set off down the corridor. Ryld walked close by her side, Splitter hovering protectively close to her.
Aliisza was not certain exactly when the battle outside the noble House had gotten so out of hand, but it was clearly becoming a major engagement, drawing the attention of the entire city.
Sitting on the edge of a building that hung off the side of a web street several street levels above the raging combat, her feet dangling off into space, she watched anxiously as yet another wave of goblins and kobolds crashed into the ranks of duergar positioned around the spacious structure.
The alu wasn’t sure why she felt worry over the outcome of the clash. Oh, she understood well enough that she actually felt concern for Pharaun’s well-being. She just didn’t understand why she did. She wouldn’t have imagined that she would care at all for the drow, and indeed her feelings were nothing close to true affection. Still, she found him clever and amusing, and she had enjoyed her time with him earlier in the day.
I guess I’m just not through with him, she decided. So she waited and watched, wondering if he was going to get out alive. She knew he might have managed to transport himself and his two companions someplace else by means of an extradimensional doorway or similar magic. That was the most likely possibility, actually, and she doubted he was still inside. For some reason, though, she felt compelled to stay and watch. Something in the back of her mind told her that the wizard was still there.
At least the battle is interesting, Aliisza mused.
The gray dwarves had soundly defeated the initial force of drow, pinning the dark elves between the two lines of attackers like steel caught between hammer and anvil. The dark elves were flattened and slaughtered in a matter of moments. Some lucky few had managed to get inside the front door of the manse, but the duergar were in the process of battering that down. Aliisza doubted the portal would hold much longer.
Beyond the walls of the estate, more drow marched to relieve the siege or perhaps to gain their fair share of the spoils. Arriving quickly, driving slave troops before them, the new force was larger than the duergar’s, and the gray dwarves found their position reversed, defending the house rather than attacking it. Though the goblins and kobolds outnumbered the duergar by a substantial ratio, they were no match for the gray dwarves’ battle tactics and incendiary pots. Three times, the drow had forced their army of lesser beings to assault the walls, and three times they had been repulsed, suffering heavy casualties.
Aliisza understood the tactic all too well, though. The duergar were forced to expend magic to defend themselves, and the drow were happy to sacrifice their shock troops in exchange for draining the gray dwarves’ reserves of magic. They were only slaves, after all. A few more waves, and perhaps the duergar would begin to break.
The only problem, Aliisza realized, was that the duergar had utilized such a large quantity of the incendiary clay pots that most of the plaza was burning. The air was getting thick with smoke, and the drow were forced to stay back from the spreading conflagration. In several places, the palatial house was burning too, and Aliisza wond
ered how much damage the building could sustain before it began to break apart. Though she knew the stone-shaping forces used to build the city had made the web streets and their attached structures as strong as steel, the abode was still precariously perched. If enough of the stone burned, the whole house might break away.
That would be a sight to see.
Aliisza spotted a commotion down a side street, not far from the plaza where the bulk of the fighting had been taking place. There were a handful of drow there, but little else. The alu supposed they might have been a scouting or screening force.
The fiend decided to move in for a closer look. She stepped over the side of the roof and dropped down to another, two levels below, magically slowing her descent. She crouched low as a half-giant passed, not wanting to distract the creature.
The half-giant strode along the wide street, its war axe held loosely in its hand. The blade of the weapon was slick with blood, dripping a trail behind it as it moved. The air was thick with smoke.
A gang of dark elves, soldiers led by priestesses and wizards, poured into the street in the distance, organized and grim, seeking to stop the half-giant. Before they could take three steps in the direction of their quarry, a huge chunk of something crashed to the street between them. The weight of it shook the street, and the sound it made was like a thousand blades striking a thousand shields. It made the half-giant nearly fall, and it had to drop to one knee before it completely lost its balance.
Aliisza peered through the smoke to see what had landed atop the web street. It was nothing but a smoking pile of rock, but the fiend could tell that it had been a part of the street overhead. Actually, it looked like part of the street and a couple of buildings. The whole pile of rubble was ablaze, thick plumes of smoke pouring off it. She looked up, wondering where the chunk of the city had come from.
Even through the smoky haze, Aliisza could see a thoroughfare above them, crossing at an angle, connecting to the besieged House. A large chunk of the road was missing, as if a huge bite had been taken out of the immense spiderweb strand. Flames still licked the stone of the causeway where it had broken off, bringing a small part of the House with it. The rest of the immense structure still sat where it had, but Aliisza realized that more of it could go at any moment. The alu saw how dangerous it was to be down there, below the burning stone.
The half-giant must have sensed this too, for it turned to move back along the street, retracing its steps. That’s when a second drow patrol came into view. It was a small group, no more than five or six, but their leader was a wizard, and he had a wand in his hand. The wizard gestured with the wand and a crackling bolt of electricity shot out of the end of it, catching the half-giant square in the chest. The creature howled in pain as its hair burned away. It nearly dropped its war axe, and even after the attack was over, Aliisza saw that the beast couldn’t work its fingers right for a moment. The dark elves swarmed toward it, crossbows and swords out and ready.
The half-giant wasn’t so easily felled. Aliisza watched, fascinated, as the towering humanoid fumbled in its hip pouch and pulled out a handful of clay jugs. From one knee, it threw them in the direction of the charging drow. Miraculously, its aim was very good, and almost all of the containers flew toward the dark elves, who shied away when they saw what was coming. The jugs shattered on the street and burst into flame, sending a wall of fire and smoke skyward in a blast that Aliisza could feel on her face.
By the Abyss, Aliisza breathed, unable to tear her gaze away from this wonderful display of destruction.
Drow leaped clear of the attack and scrambled to get away from the conflagration, which charred the street in the blink of an eye. A couple of the dark elves managed to escape to the half-giant’s side of the fire. Realizing they were pinned between the half-giant and the blaze, they looked for some avenue of escape, eyeing the huge beast warily.
Lumbering to its feet again, the half-giant began striding purposefully toward them, gripping its war axe with both hands. Almost as one, the drow turned and fled to the side of the street, leaping over the edge and drifting downward into the smoky vastness below.
At almost the same moment, the street shifted, tilting sideways, and the half-giant stumbled toward the edge. Aliisza watched as the massive humanoid looked around wildly, trying to find out why its footing had grown precarious so suddenly. She saw, too, that the fire it had started with its incendiary pots had already burned through a significant portion of the calcified webbing that was the street, and it was coming apart. The other end had already been weakened by the impact from the rubble, and a whole section of thoroughfare shifted and groaned. The alu knew it wouldn’t remain together for much longer.
Amazingly, the half-giant ran toward the fire, taking great, lumbering strides that shook the crumbling roadway and caused chunks of it to fall away from the fiery crack. As the entire path shuddered and snapped free, tipping downward, hinged where the pile of slag had dropped on it earlier, the creature leaped, crossing the distance, passing through the roiling flames. Aliisza’s mouth dropped in amazement. The half-giant cleared the flames, reaching the other side, landing with a mammoth thump that made the projecting end of the street that was still intact quiver and bounce.
Behind the half-giant, the falling piece of street went tumbling down into the darkness below, eventually landing somewhere with a thunderous boom. Ahead of the towering humanoid, three drow stood staring at the hulking creature, mouths agape. Even from her vantage point, Aliisza could see that the half-giant smiled as it advanced. It raised its war axe and plodded forward. The wizard panicked and turned to flee, leaving only two soldiers to face the creature. Surprisingly, they turned as one to meet the advancing half-giant. One of the two took a tentative step forward, measuring where and how he would attack, when he was shoved hard from behind by his companion, who turned and retreated.
The first drow stumbled, off-balance, right into the path of the half-giant. Aliisza smirked. The fleeing dark elf was sacrificing his partner so that he could escape.
Raising its war axe, the half-giant prepared to cleave the sprawled male in half. Desperately, the dark elf raised his long sword and rammed it into the half-giant’s stomach.
The creature roared, arching its back, and its downward swing went awry, biting through the drow’s arm instead of his torso. The dark elf screamed as the half-giant fell forward, collapsing on him and driving the sword deeper into itself.
The soldier had dealt the killing blow, Aliisza realized, as the half-giant lay on top of him, unmoving. The boy cried out in pain. He was trapped, pinned beneath the half-giant’s weight and with only one good arm to try to free himself.
“Ilphrim! Ilphrim, help me!” the drow cried out, but Ilphrim was long gone, and the fire burned closer.
Aliisza sighed. The battle had been particularly entertaining, but it appeared to be over, though the wounded drow pinned beneath the half-giant still squirmed occasionally. She considered his companion’s treachery, pushing him into the path of the rampaging half-giant, to be very clever. She laughed quietly.
The trapped and dying drow moved his arm again, futilely trying to shift the weight of the half-giant off himself so he could wriggle free, but Aliisza knew he would never do it, not with only one arm.
In a sudden and very uncharacteristic act of compassion, the alu-fiend leaped off her perch and floated down to where the dark elf lay feebly squirming. The drow spotted her and tensed, eyeing her warily. She only smiled and nudged a discarded dagger a bit closer to him, so that it was within reach of his free hand. Stepping back, she waited and watched to see if he would do the right thing.
The drow contemplated her for a moment, then he seemed to nod in understanding. He took hold of the dagger and saluted Aliisza with it before he started cutting pieces off the half-giant’s corpse. It was going to take a while, and it was already messy, but he might just cut his way free before the web street collapsed.
Smiling in satisfaction, Aliisza turne
d away and headed back up to her original vantage point, worrying anew over Pharaun’s fate.
chapter
thirteen
The five drow worked their way into the bowels of House Melarn for what seemed like hours, though Pharaun was fairly certain they’d only been at it for about a quarter of an hour. On several occasions, the group was forced to stop while a member of the House guard crossed paths with them, and once, Halisstra actually posed as a member of House Zauvirr, issuing orders to a group of sentries to head to the surface to help in the defense of the House.
“The lower levels are not usually very heavily occupied,” Halisstra said at one point. “I suspect most of Ssipriina’s servants and troops are above, aiding in the defense of the House. It’s not much farther, now.”
The mage nodded as the five of them continued on their way. More than once, Pharaun caught himself gazing in infatuation at the gorgeous creature beside him. She seemed to be considerably unhappy at the state of things, especially the fact that she was helpless to defend herself with her arms bound as they were, but she kept her gaze cast demurely down, and the wizard only found this to be even more endearing.
The group took one last stairwell down and found themselves in a dismal cell block. The hall was undecorated, unlike the posh elegance of the levels above, and the stale stench of unwashed bodies, faint though it was, gave a certain hint of what was to be found there. Halisstra led the five of them to a doorway at the end of a short hall. It was stout and obviously designed to withstand considerable force.
The drow priestess stepped up to the portal and waved her House Melarn brooch before it. There was an audible click as the magic of the insignia operated the locks set into the door. Halisstra pushed the door aside and moved through into the chamber beyond, which appeared to be a guard room, currently empty. At the far side of the chamber, a hallway stretched off into darkness.
Pharaun, spotting movement in the corridor there, put a finger to his lips and motioned for quiet.
R.A. Salvatore's War of the Spider Queen: Dissolution, Insurrection, Condemnation Page 60
