Page 20 (2/2)
"All right, then Subject to final negotiation, we agree So how do you intend to reduce the city?"
"You will crush Menzoberranzan between your two armies," Nimor said "Given your victory at the Pillars of Woe, the Lolthites are co your assault in the city proper, but thanks to thisthe city, they can&039;t knohere you&039;ll make your attack Thatforce in waiting somewhere near the city&039;s center to respond to whatever point is threatened The Scoured Legion will provide that threat, and e force the Lolthites to coh will com-mence its attack and break into the city"
"It&039;s not a bad plan," Kaanyr Vhokobserved "However, it is exactly what the Menzoberranyr iven the situation They&039;ll be very careful in coar said "Hoill you draw theht them caution at the Pillars of Woe?"
Niar and Kaanyr were exa Menzoberranzan, instead of quarreling over what they expected to gain from their efforts
"My brothers and I expect to help in that regard," he said "We&039;re not numerous but we&039;re well-placed, and, ar and Kaanyr exchanged a nod, even a sht I&039;ined so runted He leaned on Splitter, watching as a huge, bat-winged, bloated for to fly with its wings savaged by blows of the weapons htened and wiped the back of one hand across his brow "It&039;s getting hotter, too I hope we&039;re close to whatever we&039;re looking for"
Halisstra and the rest of the co with fatigue as the environment and their exertions warranted For what seeht their way down strand after strand Sometimes they descended forbut corpses, but more and more fre-quently they encountered dery Most of the infernal creatures threw the into battle as if all reason had deserted theence to eainst the interlopers
With fang, claw, sting, and unholy sorcery the denizens of the Demonweb Pits scoured and scored the drow company It didn&039;t help that Quenthel had commanded Pharaun to hoard his spells carefully so that the company met each new deic
"Save your breath, Master Argith," Quenthel said She slowly straight-ened froore of a dozen deone more than another forty yards before their strand shuddered, and an enor its way around from the unseen bottom side of the web, afrom its shoulders and back hauled itself to the top of the strand and bellowed a vast challenge
"A goristro!" Pharaun cried "What in all the hells is that doing here?"
"Sootten loose, I don&039;t doubt," Tzirik replied
The Vhaeraunite priest began to chant a spell, while the others leaped into action Before the monster could clamber to its feet, Valas feathered it with at least three arrows, the black shafts sprouting frooristro snorted in pain and anger, and reached out one hulking hand to pick up the corpse of a s the corpse at Valas, catching the scout as he fished in his quiver for ered Valas, who stu in several languages
Ryld ran forith Splitter held high, Quenthel at his side, while Halisstra and Danifae carefully tried to circle the beast to one side as best they could on the narrow strand, hoping to surround it on all sides
Tzirik finished his spell and shouted out a deep, rolling word of power, creating a great whirling disk of spinning razors across the goristro&039;s torso Blades bit and blood flew, but still the monster ca?" Halisstra called "Does it have any weaknesses?"
"It&039;sstupid," Pharaun replied "Barely sentient, really Don&039;t estured and struck the y that chewed into the goristro&039;s chest, while Tzirik ainst the h priestess leaped and slashed at the crea-ture&039;s belly and torso, while dodging the ponderous blows of its enor- blow spun Quenthel to her hands and knees, but she ed to scramble out of the way before the creature could finish her off
"Noooot stuuuupiiiid!" roared the goristro
It lifted one hoofed foot and sta power that the wholealive The shock wave threw all of the drow into the air, yet the goristro had failed to anticipate the consequences of its hty stomp, for the shock threw it into the air as well The monstrous demon landed aardly on its side and slid off the strand, catching itself by one ar into the upper surface It scra the strand evensurface, and weaved her way past the brute&039;s arm to look down at its face With a deliberate motion, she flicked her snake-headed whip at one of its beady eyes and destroyed the organ in a sickening burst of gore The goristro howled in agony and recoiled, losing its grip on the strand and tue continued for a long ti as it fell away from them She didn&039;t bother to watch it fall Instead she turned to the rest of the co tilanced around Valas scrambled back into view from his precarious position on the side of the strand Danifae climbed to her feet as well They followed after Quen-thel as the Mistress of Arach-Tinilith set off again at once,at an impatient lope as she bounded down the strand Halisstra was too tired to keep up the pace for long, but she had even less energy for an argu-le-minded priestess, and so she merely set her jaw and endured
They reached the botto strands drawing closer to their own, and Halisstra could see the reason why A great ring of webbing a dozen tiray strands was suspended below theether Its circureat that Halisstra could hardly describe a curve at all in the ring&039;s vast arc Inthe center there wasso in thethe scene, until Valas broke the silence
"Is that it?" he said in a low voice
"The entrance to Lolth&039;s do"
"Are you sure?" asked Ryld
"I am," Quenthel replied for the priest
She didn&039;t look aside or hesitate, but siain at the sa its steep pitch gradually flattened and thickened soly endless hours andlike level ground instead of picking their way down the sloping cable More demonic and spidery corpses appeared, some half-buried in the strand as if they&039;d fallen frohts above - which theyand crossed oneonly to find that the structure in the center was solea black obsidian miles in diameter Spiked stone buttresses soared across the bot-to around it Vast dark plazas of sh to s cities surrounded the te, the co buttresses and advanced toward their goal
Halisstra found herself tre, not with exhaustion, but with a combination of terror and ecstasy as she realized that she must soon with-stand Lolth&039;s scrutiny in the flesh
I am worthy, she told herself I h the webs didn&039;t seem to care for the black temple In any event, no more of the mon-sters pursued the co tie outer plaza, as the walls of the te their dark details
Quenthel oriented their e cleft that must have been the tee, inanis that seeh, the petrified forrew smaller and smaller the closer they came to the cleft Halisstra disoal before her
At last they reached the mouth of the temple, and looked upon its entrance A vast face confronted them, the face of a cruelly beautiful dark elf, her features calm and still as if in contemplation Perfect black stone barred the entrance froe of the Spider Queen&039;s visage Only her half-lidded eyes showed any ani down blankly at the tiny supplicants below her, Lolth&039;s eyes glealee focused entirely on what-ever thoughts or processes lay behind the up in wonder and terror, and Quenthel prostrated herself before the ioddess Halisstra and Danifae joined her at once, groveling on the cold black stone Even thetheir eyes Tzirik, as a priest of Vhaeraun, settled for taking one knee and lowering his gaze respectfully He didn&039;t serve the Queen of the Denized her divinity
"Great Queen!" called Quenthel "We have come from Menzober-ranzan to beseech you to restore your favor to your priestesses! Our ene-mies encroach on your holy city and threaten your faithful with destruction We hu you to instruct us in e must do to find approval in your eyes Arht once more, and ill hunt your enemies until their blood fills the Underdark and their souls fill your belly!"
The face did not respond
Quenthel waited for a long time, still prostrate, then she licked her lips and uttered another prayer Halisstra and Danifae joined their plead-ing to hers, and they begged and pleaded with every prayer, every invoca-tion, every catechis at the temple door The males simply waited, still stretched out on the black stone After a time, Tzirik moved off a short distance and sat doith his back to the face, conored him and continued her supplications
Still the face did not respond
The three priestesses kept up their pleas for what must have been hours, but finally Quenthel pushed herself upright and gazed full on the visage of Lolth
"Enough, sisters," said the Mistress of Arach-Tinilith "The goddess plainly does not deign to answer us at this tiested "Perhaps we o farther in order for you to offer your prayers"
"There is no place farther to go," Tzirik said, rejoining the party "Vhaeraun informs me that this is the only point of approach to Lolth&039;s doh the Abyss If she refuses to hear you at this spot, she will not hear you anywhere else in this plane"
"But why does she continue to ignore us?" Halisstra asked in a plain-tive voice She cli After all that had happened - the fall of her House, the destruction of her city, the travails of the quest - to stand before Lolth&039;s tenored was simply incoed and said, "I cannot answer that question"
"Apparently Lolth can&039;t, either,"Halisstra said
She ignored the disapproval and fear that flickered across Quenthel&039;s features, and strode up angrily to stand within ar face
"Hear me, Lolth!" she cried "Answer me! What have we done to earn your displeasure? Where are you?"
"Speak with respect!" hissed Quenthel, her eyes ith terror
Ryld quailed, but th to take a couple of steps forward
"Mistress Melarn" he said, "Halisstra, coood - "
"Lolth!"Halisstra screamed "Answer me, damn you!"
She struck the cold stone of the face with her fists, flailing away in futility, in anger Her mind went empty as animal fury rose up to over-throw her reason She screa face until her hands were bruised and bloody, and still no answer caainst the cold stone, weeping, her hands broken and useless Like a lost child, she cried with all the ache in her heart
"Why? Why?" was all she could h her sobs "Why have you abandoned us? Why do you hate us?"
"You speak heresy," Quenthel said, her voice hard with disapproval "Have you no faith left, Halisstra Melarn? The goddess will speak in her own time"
"Do you really believe that still?" Halisstraave herself up to her tears, no longer caring what Quenthel, or Danifae, or any of the others thought She&039;d had her answer fro a short distance frohed and said, "Well, that&039;s that, I suppose Lolth hasn&039;t chosen to break her silence for you, so now I have so I must do"
He raised his ar dire words of power The air crackled with energy Quenthel&039;s eyes widened as she recognized the spell the Vhaeraunite spoke
"Stop hi to face the priest
She started forward, raisingher deadly whips, but Danifae caught her arm as she rushed past
"Carefully!" hissed Danifae "Our bodies are still in Minauthkeep"
"He&039;s creating a gate!" Quenthel snapped "Here!"
"What are you doing, Tzirik?" Pharaun said with some alarm
The wizard recoiled a step and prepared a defensive spell, but Dani-fae&039;s warning was just enough to cause hi
Ryld and Valas held their hands as well, uncertain of ould happen if they harht them to Lolth&039;s door The weapons master and the mercenary drew their weapons but halted there
"Pharaun, what should we do?" Ryld said
Before the wizard could answer, Tzirik finished his spell With an enorreat black rift: appeared in the air beside the Jaelre priest
"I am here, my lord!" he cried into the rift "I stand before the Face of Lolth!"
And from the depths of blackness within the rift, a voice of ineffable power, of terrible potency, answered,"Good I come"
The blackness see that had the size and shape of a lean, graceful drowmore Dressed in black leather, a purpleradiated puissance and presence, his for with the potentialities he contained Even Halisstra, absorbed in her own misery with her back turned to the scene, whipped her head around as she sensed the being&039;s arrival With i surveyed the plain of dark stone and the black teht," he said to Tzirik, who had fallen prostrate at his feet "Rise, ht me to a place from which I was barred"
"I have only done as you co slowly
"Tzirik," Quenthel led voice, "what have you done?"
"He has opened a gate for od said, with a cruel sod-dess, priestess of Lolth?"
"Vhaeraun," Quenthel breathed
The god folded his arms and drifted past the coe, giving the esture with his left hand, and Halis-stra, still huddled before the face, was violently hurled aside She flew spin-ning through the air and landed badly at least thirty yards away, tu to a halt on the fluted ebon stone of the plaza
"Dear Mother," Vhaeraun said, addressing the face, "you were foolish to leave yourself in such a state"
The god spontaneously began to grow, his radiance increasing as he soared to a height taller than a stor himself to the task at hand He held out his hand, and fro swordforroaned and raised her eyes fro body The Menzoberranyr stood paralyzed by indecision Tzirik, on the other hand, watched saze directly, blade in hand With careful deliberation, the Masked Lord drew back his sword of shadows, hisinto a rictus of hatred
And Vhaeraun hewed at the Face of Lolth with all his godly ht