Spinner of Lies

Chant didn’t give a shark’s fin who Raneger was-no one could treat his son that way! He opened his mouth to tell Raneger to go drown himself or something even more irrevocable, but Demascus beat him to it, saying, “Master Raneger, I apologize for using Jaul’s good graces to burst in on your business; I assure you, he’s blameless. I have a question for you, and hope you’re willing to answer it.”

Not really what Chant had been about to say, but perhaps the diplomatic route was the better choice. He mollified himself by patting Jaul’s shoulder. Jaul shot him an angry look for his trouble. Oops.

Raneger shifted position, sending ripples up and down the pool. A wave broke over the side and a sheet of water slid across the tiles of the receiving chamber toward where most of the court stood in small groups.

Riltana looked horrified as liquid sloshed over her boots. She glanced longingly at the exit but held her ground.

Chant felt liquid seep into his own boots and soak his feet. Wonderful. But if he got out of this meeting with only wet socks as the worst consequence, he would count himself lucky.

“And who’re you?” Raneger jerked his immense bulk upright, sending an even larger wave cascading across the tile. His head was then fully visible-humanoid, but so bloated with fat one might easily mistake Raneger for some sort of grotesque creature.

“I thought he was a kind of high elf,” Riltana whispered in Chant’s ear.

“Most people do,” he whispered back.

Demascus stepped closer. “The name’s Demascus. Thanks for the audience. I appreciate that you’re a busy man, so I’ll be brief; I found a clue linking you to a fairly thorny situation.”

Raneger’s szuldar blazed suddenly, producing chasing spirals of green light that barely outlined something horribly swollen and large beneath the pool’s surface. Raneger might be a watersoul genasi, but only just. “Speak on, Demascus. But know this. As soon as you leave here, I’ll discover everything there is to know about you. Who you know. Where you live. And what’s important to you. So do not make me angry.”

Demascus eyed the misshapen watersoul. His expression seemed to darken, as if he’d stepped back into a shadow. Uh, oh.

Chant cleared his throat, trying to catch the deva’s attention. Now wasn’t the time for Demascus to call his “other” out to play.

“I wish you luck in that, Raneger,” said Demascus. “Because I’ve been trying to do exactly the same. Maybe you can tell me what’s important to me, because I’d dearly like to find out.”

Raneger narrowed his eyes, obviously not understanding.

“But if you’re through with threats-what do you know about Akanul’s arambarium mine?”

Raneger’s expression froze. “What authority do you have that makes you believe you won’t suffer immediate retribution from me? Why should I not kill you, rather than answer?”

“Because I think you want to know what I know.”

Chant sweated. What the Hells had Demascus led him and Jaul into?

Finally Raneger gave a tiny nod. When he spoke, his voice was as cold as ice. “Arambarium is a mineral. The Throne of Majesty has been secretly harvesting it from an island off the coast.”

“And what about recent happenings?”

“You’ll have to explain,” said the watersoul.

“All contact with the mine is lost. All attempts to find out what’s going on at the site have been stymied. And you’ve been fingered as having something to do with it by a creature named Pashra.”

A miniature tsunami surged over the pool’s lip, but hung suspended rather than crashing across them.

“How interesting. And where is this Pashra now?”

Demascus spread his hands and shrugged. “I hoped you might know, actually.”

Sharkbite, Demascus really was going to precipitate a fight! Chant sidled closer to Jaul. His son’s mouth was open at the spectacle of someone standing up to the criminal lord.

“Let me guess. He double-crossed you, too? Cut you out of a deal just before payment was due? If I find Pashra, he and his friend will learn what it means to cross me.” The frozen wave of water collapsed on itself, becoming a swirling fist of dark fluid.

Demascus spared the watery display a glance, then said, “What was your deal? And who is Pashra’s friend?”

“Tell me what you know first.” The liquid fist unclenched, lost cohesion, and showered down into the pool.

“I found a warehouse where Pashra was routing arambarium. I saw your name in the ledger after we chased Pashra away. Something about your being amenable to the deal. He was working with a woman, though I never saw her. Just heard her voice. And she seemed a fair spider tamer.”

Raneger nodded. He rubbed his jaw as he considered the water-dappled dome overhead. Finally he said, “They came to me with a proposition. One was called Pashra, and the other was a woman named Chenraya. She hid under a hood. As if she could hide who she was from me. Chenraya, of House Xorlarrin, is a drow.”

Drow! It was as if someone poured ice water over Demascus’s head. As much as he disliked vampires, he hated drow more. And why hadn’t he immediately realized it? The spiders, the woman’s head on an arachnid, the promise of vengeance from the queen of the Demonweb Pits … Drow …

A memory bubbled up, swamping his senses with a vision of a vast underground space. An endless vault, purple-lit by phosphorescent fungi and drifting sparks. Massive towers carved from living stone, each the width of entire surface towns, forming a darkling city of fey-like grandeur and sick horror. Screams from sacrificial victims, synchronized to the tolling of passing hours, chasing each other through the massive hollow.

Demascus strode in the vanguard of a great army of dwarves that poured from a freshly burrowed fissure into the vault. Summoned light streamed around him, bright as day, in spearlike shafts of brilliance that stabbed the drow-infested space. The sacrificial screams faltered. The invading army, determined to exterminate the evil fey pocket, surged down the avenues between the towers. Demascus lifted Exorcessum and charged ahead. Directly into an ambush. Thousands of slave warriors poured from the side streets, all screaming in one voice. Spider centaurs called driders-ebony-skinned elf from the waist up and massive spider below-fought at the head of each slave phalanx. Drow sorcerers in the hundreds launched crackling shafts of lighting from high balconies.

And from the shadows directly overhead, a web gondola descended, supported from the spinnerets of a spider so colossal it defied reason. Three women rode the conveyance. Their elegant ebony limbs were wrapped in precious jewels and silks, and each bore the holy symbol of the patron of Lolth. The Queen of the Demonweb Pits.

“Hey!” came Riltana’s concerned voice. “What’s wrong?”

Demascus blinked. The vision of the drow vault shattered, and he was back in the too-warm and damp confines of Raneger’s receiving room. “I just remembered where I heard the term ‘Queen of the Demonweb Pits’ before.”

Raneger said, “Don’t speak her name.” Jaul and Riltana looked confused. Chant’s eyes widened as if he understood the reference.

Demascus fixed Raneger with his regard and said, his voice cold, “What did you agree to?”

He knew Raneger was a criminal, but if the supernaturally fat watersoul was dealing with drow, that made him a blackguard of the worst sort. Someone who Demascus would have to-

“To aid them in one very small way. I didn’t agree to any drow foolishness regarding their goddess-I wouldn’t do anything that would endanger Akanul’s interests, especially when dark elves are involved.”

Riltana snorted, but he pretended not to hear her. Demascus believed Raneger. No one profits under the thrall of dark elves, not even miscreants like the crime lord. “So exactly what did you do for them?”

“I provided a location for them to store their cargo, that’s all. A location secure against scrying and peacemaker inspections. Nothing else, and nothing I haven’t done for others. This was three tendays ago. In return, I was supposed to receive a tidy sum, not to mention a nugget or two of arambarium for my trouble.”

“And what happened?”