Queen of the Demonweb Pits

to the ground behind them as they climbed. The first wave of warriors reached the webs, and began to climb upward in a mass of hate and steel.

7

Crowds scattered in panic. Facing each other across a stretch of cobblestones, Escalla and Tielle seethed with spells. Escalla laid arrow-wards and blade-wards over herself and Enid as she watched the circle of monks from the corner of her eye.

Tielle's costume consisted mostly of jewelry and spider silk. Looking at her sister, Escalla raised one eyebrow in disdain.

'Nice outfit, Thunder Thighs. I see prison food agreed with you.'

'Insults.' Tielle's eyes brightened. 'Oh, I knew there would be insults!' Tielle looked at Escalla in yearning hunger. 'And there you are, looking so beautiful. I want you to feel pretty! I want you to feel as beautiful and as glorious as you can.' Tielle's breathing was deep and ragged as she wrung her hands about a large crystal horn. 'And then I want to sear the skin off you. I want to burn you, Escalla, and I want it to last and last and last…'

The bystanders had fled. Escalla looked at her sister and weighed the lich staff in her grasp.

'All right, so I'm guessing you have a few more issues than last time we met?' Escalla hovered behind her shield. 'I don't know how you got out of prison, but this time you're going back in pieces! Now, are you going to keep wasting spells, or are you going to drag your butt in here and fight like a faerie?'

Shielded against magic, against missiles, and with sorcery able to deflect mortal blades, Escalla was ready for a fight. Beneath her, Enid gave a feline hiss. The sphinx was as big as a bull and a hundred time more deadly. Almost oblivious to the danger, Tielle flew brightly over to the edge of the magic shield.

'Oooh. A lesser sphere of invulnerability! What a lovely, powerful little spell.' The girl looked coyly sidewise at her sister. 'Escalla? Would you consider yourself to be a good little faerie?'

Escalla gave a disdainful shrug. 'I fight the fight. I right the wrongs. Yeah, I'm good.' The girl held her lich staff like a child about to play bat-and-ball. 'What's it to you?'

'Oh, nothing.' Tielle held her hands merrily behind her back. 'But do you know what? I have a secret.'

'Yeah? What?'

'This!'

Tielle moved. Escalla caught the motion and hurtled skyward. An instant later, a hissing blast of fluid shot out of Tielle's horn.

Escalla screamed.

Like red quicksilver, the fluid jetted outward in a solid beam. The spray clipped Enid on one shoulder, then swerved to catch Escalla as she twisted and flew. The blow hit Escalla on one thigh, the force of the blow knocking her spinning through the sky until she crashed against the cobblestones.

Escalla thrashed in mindless agony. She arched her back and hammered her head on the pavement as raw pain ripped into her leg. The fluid hissed and burned, bubbling away flesh and skin. The golden bees of her magic shield scattered madly aside as Escalla smashed herself against the road.

Tielle laughed and shook the horn next to her ear, smiling warmly as she heard yet more liquid sloshing away inside. She pointed the horn at Escalla and grinned.

'And now, your body. But not your face…'

Another beam of blood-silver shot straight at Escalla. She croaked and tried to move aside, but she was paralyzed with pain.

With a roar, Enid lunged, shielding Escalla with her back. Fluid blasted into Enid's hide, searing her to the bone. Tielle gave her insane, ringing laughter as the horn ran itself dry.

'Take them! Take them now!'

The monks threw back their hoods. Reeling in agony, Enid could only stare.

The opened hoods revealed hideous giggling faces, the eyes rolling mad and the flesh dripping wet with sweat. Their flesh was twisted and entwined with coil after coil of chains, mummifying them in steel. Thirty of the creatures gibbered and giggled as they whipped their arms forward, and chains lashed out to crack into Enid's hide. The sphinx staggered and thrashed. Chains wrapped around and around her legs, wings, and throat, dragging at her from a dozen different directions. Behind her servants, Tielle clapped her hands and made a little dance of glee.

'Aren't they lovely? They're from Pandemonium, where I serve the Queen of Wind and Woe!'

Tugging madly at the chains, the monks tried to drag Enid in a dozen different directions at once. Tielle watched it all in simple joy.

'You might have spells and powers, Escalla, but I have friends!'

One leg burned almost to the bone and her wings melted and useless, Escalla shook as she reached her hand up to Enid. The sphinx reared, trapped in agony, a dozen chains trying to wrench her from her feet. The sphinx fought back with huge strength and power, whirling and thrashing, sending Tielle's servants crashing to the ground. One chain monk flew and smashed into a wall, still giggling even as it died. More chains flew, links closed tight about Enid's throat, and Tielle leaned eagerly close as Enid started strangling to death.

Escalla managed to reach Enid's foot. A chain whipped out and crashed against the injured faerie, wrapping around and around. Escalla gripped Enid's fur. A chain monk screamed and leaped for her, chains flailing through the air, then suddenly fog exploded through the alleyway as Escalla coughed out a spell.

'No!'

Tielle hurled herself high above the whirling melee. Fog choked the alleyway, and the chain monks whooped and wailed as their empty chains thrashed at the air. Screaming, Tielle ploughed a spell into the fog's heart. The fireball blasted cobblestones into the air, tossing aside chain monks and shattering houses in the street. She fought her way down through the mist, waving her hands to clear her view. Molten stone and shattered shops collapsed into rubble and debris. No corpses lay splayed before her-only empty sheaths of chain.

'No!'

The faerie ripped at the cobblestones with her bare hands, trying to find her sister. Raving, Tielle tore the rubble apart with spells, smashing and gouging her way down to the dirt below. Panting, she reared up out of the filth, casting wildly from side to side with her face streaming tears.

'Where is she? Why did you release her? Why? Why?'

Chain monks fell back in terror. Tielle blew one of them apart with one savage gesture of a finger, her hair flying about her little body as she stamped and screamed in hate.

A chain monk crouched in the dirt nearby, hooting and moaning as it flapped a calming hand at Tielle. The monster pointed at an opening in one of the stone gutters of the street-an opening that led down into the flooded city sewers. A ferocious stench rose from the hole. Tielle flung herself over to the gutter and peered inside.

The hole was nothing but a slot a handspan tall, leading to a drop some twenty feet or more into the sewer tunnels down below. The faerie slammed her hand against the stone and roared in rage.

'Polymorph! Escalla and her mangy friend shape-changed and escaped!'

Tielle could shapeshift and chase her sister down into the sewers, but the chain monks would be left behind. Tielle needed the chain monks to catch and hold all of Escalla's little friends. She turned upon her servants and showered them with abuse.

'Tear up the streets! There must be a way into the sewers somewhere! Find it. Go-go-go!'

Tielle raged, and the chain monks raced to do her will. Left alone in the street, the faerie snatched up a torn ribbon of black skirt and hurled it to the ground.

Overhead, the sun suddenly dimmed. Darkness spread over the city, and the air trembled with a distant roar.

The legions of Lolth had come. The battlements would be stormed, the air would fill with abyssal bats, and Tielle's prey might be slain by any one of ten thousand monsters. Cursing, Tielle walked back down the streets as lightning cracked high up in the sky.