Queen of the Demonweb Pits

a run.

Another alcove opened up in the wall. Escalla dodged into it, finding a short corridor that took a sharp turn to the right. The maddened hiss of vipers followed, and shadows on the walls showed a woman with hair made from a writhing mass of snakes pelting behind Escalla, followed by a dozen angry drow.

Escalla fired her frost wand at the wall ahead then dived, hitting the wall and running madly around the bend. She screeched to a halt as a sound of crashing stone and breaking glass filled the corridor.

The wall at the corner shed a last few jagged shards of ice, the sheets crashing down onto a pile of broken stone at the foot of the wall. The medusa had been confronted with a wall of reflective ice, and her gaze had totalled the entire guard contingent. They had turned to stone, hit the wall, and broken like a pile of garden gnomes. Escalla flew over the wreckage, spotted one drow still alive and unparalyzed, and bopped it unconscious with a single blow of her staff.

From inside the portable hole, Jus's voice whispered in panic, 'Escalla, what happened?'

'Ha! The inevitable happened!' Escalla blew a wisp of frost from the tip of her wand. 'The faerie is dealing with inferior mentalities! Now come out of that hole! We're at Lolth's back door.'

The faerie threw the portable hole down on the ground. Escalla posed happily over the broken statues as her friends dazedly emerged.

'Hey, look! Wreck of the Medusa!' Escalla spied some gems gleaming about the rubble pile. 'Hoopy! All this fun and cash, too!'

Annoyed, the Justicar looked over the scene. 'Escalla!'

'Hey! She has some nice stuff here, and we're out of treasure!' The girl found a necklace of amber. 'Ooo! Hey, Enid! Catch! This ought to pick up the color of your eyes!' The faerie coiled close into Enid's hair as she fastened the necklace about her friend. 'You know a girl has to look her best.'

'Best?' Enid flicked a glance at Henry and blushed pink. 'Why?'

'No special reason.' Fluttering upward, Escalla led the way to Lolth's back door. 'All right! Tour leading to the Demonweb Pits, now departing!'

The Justicar seethed with ill humor. He kicked shards of petrified drow out of his way and pursued Escalla up the corridor.

'You promised you were just going to cross the river.'

'We're across the river! Hey! Riverbanks can be kind of vague! I mean, what's a riverbank, anyway? Is it where the river stops? Is it where the river once dried? Wetlands, water meadows…'

'Escalla!'

'Hey! We're here! Trust your favorite faerie.' Escalla inspected the petrified demon and stored it in the portable hole for later use as a garden ornament. 'We can sneak in here. I did good!'

The Justicar looked at Henry as Polk bustled happily past them for the door.

'This is the way it's done, son! Direct, forthright, to the point!'

'Polk, shut up. Don't touch the door. It probably has an alarm spell or a trap on it.' The Justicar carefully inspected the little demon's desk. 'Everyone look around carefully. Watch for traps. There might be a key or a password somewhere.'

'What about this?' Enid laid her face sideways on the ground, where she could take a closer look at a silver sphere the size of a lemon that had fallen off the desk. 'Is this a key?'

'Oh! Is it valuable?' Escalla shot over to Enid like a lightning bolt. 'Is it a pearl? A giant pearl?'

'No. I think it looks more like a spider egg.' Enid batted the object with one paw, and it broke. 'Oh, dear.'

The sphere had been hollow, and it contained a collection of little objects: a tiny iron pyramid, a silver ball, a little bronze star, and a pale blue crystal. The Justicar took possession of them before Escalla could take one and break it.

'Keys or identity passes.' The green door itself was horrible to look upon. The metal seemed to have been pressed out of tortured, screaming faces. 'No one touch the door. Polk, do not touch the door! Polk!'

Polk touched the door. The badger simply butted his head against it to push it open. The door instantly glowed a blazing, hellish green, and three bolts of energy shot silently along the corridor. Jus and Enid ducked. Escalla looked up with interest. Having managed to miss the entire group, the energy bolts faded, and the door was open.

Polk looked back at Jus in irritation and gave a superior little waddle of his feet.

'Son, what are you doing lookin' for clues down there? The adventure's this way, son! This way! You're addled, son.' The badger walked through the door. 'Got to sharpen up your game. Fate keeps pitchin', and you keeps missin'!'

Through the door came a deep silver mist. Stinking and sour, it was as impenetrable as quicksilver. The Justicar unsheathed his sword and moved carefully for the door as Cinders searched the mist. With Escalla at his side, Enid behind, and Henry covering the rear, the Justicar edged into the Demonweb.

At the edge of the River Lethe, amidst the surge and roar of the titanic waterfall, a shape stood over a butchered body. Golden armor and an eagle helm flaked shards of rust, torn across the chest to show the ragged wound where a living heart once had been. A human hand ended one arm, and the undead monster stooped to sever the foot from a dead, bleeding denizen of the Abyss. The living cadaver held the foot against the stump of its ankle. Tendrils of flesh bound the new foot in place. Able to walk once more, the snarling corpse looked through the soot of the Abyss toward the titanic spider webs beyond.

Behind Recca lay a hissing raft of vipers. Recca stared across the howling Abyss, turned his back upon the river Lethe, and walked onward, hunting for his prey…

17

They stood upon a pathway of slick, polished stone suspended in the middle of a yawning, empty gulf. The path was wide, flat, without walls or ceiling, like a bridge through an abyss of fog.

Faces distorted in pain and terror formed and vanished in the mists before being torn apart by violent winds that never seemed to stir the air. Inside the stone surface of the path, flattened figures scratched and pleaded. Escalla looked about, a little crestfallen, and pulled on her chain mail.

'Oh, this is so un-hoopy.' The girl winced and shifted her feet. 'Jus, I think I'm treading on someone's soul.'

Only the soul of a sinner. Benelux gave a prim little shimmer of disdain. Go ahead, dear. Scuff your feet. The blighter deserved it.

'Spiky, go stick your head up a rust monster's bum.' Escalla decided to solve the problem with flight, and her wings whirred into action.

Staring about the mists, Henry jerked his crossbow left to right, covering shapes that screamed and swirled.

'What is this place?' asked the young soldier.

'The Demonweb.' Of them all, only the Justicar seemed undisturbed. He scanned the pathway, looking for tracks. 'This is the antechamber to Lolth's home plane.'

Henry looked around and slowly stood straight. 'So where's the spider palace?'

'Looked like it went above us.' The Justicar rested a hand upon Henry's shoulder and pointed overhead. 'Somewhere up there.'

'Can we fly up and see?'

Still whirring her wings but still very much on the ground, Escalla's face had gone red. She flapped with all her might, the rising whine of her wings drawing the party's attention one by one. The faerie jumped madly up into the air, and still she failed to get aloft.

Enid carefully scratched her ear with one hind paw. 'Oh, dear. There may be a few technical difficulties with