“I can still see you,” said Riltana.
“Which proves you are not a magical sensor,” replied the queen. She held the chalk out to the thief. Riltana accepted the chalk, examined it for a moment, then made a similar mark on her own forehead.
Chant went next, then Demascus. The chalk was slippery in his hand, and the circle he traced on his forehead tingled.
Jaul put up his hands, “You know, really, I’d rather not go back in there.”
Chant said, “No one’s asking you to, son. In fact, I’d rather you waited out here. In case we don’t come back …”
“Indeed,” interrupted the queen. “In fact, take it as a royal decree, Jaul Morven. Remain here, and if we do not return within one day, take this signet ring to the Court of Majesty. Explain to the Four Stewards all that has happened here.”
Jaul swallowed and palmed the ring.
Demascus realized he was grinding his teeth with impatience. The sooner they finished here, the sooner he could go look for Madri. “All right. Time to see if the queen’s sign will let us tread undisturbed in the Demonweb.”
“Good luck,” said Jaul, and turned away, rubbing at Raneger’s mark on his wrist.
Demascus entered the orange haze. He lost track of everything for a moment, as if the mist were slightly hallucinogenic. When it cleared, he was in a familiar stone corridor with the misted arch at his back. Ahead, the stone gave way to a spiraling tunnel of thick webs …
A large, blue-hued body lay at the intersection of stone and web. It was Lord Pashra, Chenraya’s oni ally. He advanced to study the body, ready in case it was actually some sort of ruse.
“It seems the drow have little stomach for alliances that outlive their immediate usefulness,” said the queen. The others had followed him through the portal.
“The drow are murdering, spider-fondling psychopaths,” said Riltana. “Everyone knows it. You’d have to be a complete idiot to imagine anything else.”
“Pashra is past imagining anything,” Chant said.
“And I’m not sad about that,” said Riltana. “The last time I saw him up close, he was no Prince Adorable, either.”
Demascus nudged the body with his foot. It was swollen and discolored with spider venom. He couldn’t restrain a shiver. When it came to considering various ways to die, he supposed he’d rather suffocate in a mine than be bitten to death by poisonous spiders.
A faint sound, like singing, sounded in the corridor.
Everyone heard it, but Demascus still put his finger to his lips. The singing rose and fell … rhythmic and purposeful, as if part of a ritual. And it was definitely a woman’s voice, probably belonging to Chenraya Xolarrin.
Demascus vaulted over the body and hustled toward the sound. A familiar acidic odor washed over him. Perhaps the smell was comforting to spiders and drow, but it reminded him of vomit. The tunnel was kinked and irregular; last time it had been a fairly straight shot to the temple-like nexus of doors. If the portal network was this changeable … Well, it was disconcerting. If you stayed in the Demonweb long enough and managed to remain unnoticed by the defenses, you’d probably get lost in a constantly mutating web of corridors.
He glanced behind, making certain everyone was still following. It wouldn’t do to lose any of his friends in here. Or for them to lose him.
He dashed around a corner and saw the same wide, high chamber as before, with the many gates. It was here they’d found a doorway into a dim tower castle, on the run from avenging vampires. Except … The nave and transept now hosted a small army. A brilliant light on the dais shone down on hundreds of ettercaps, spiders, and reanimated mine workers who filled the space like worshippers at service on a holy day. Demascus also noted a few driders, though they were larger and more bestial than the ones in the mine. Instead of hands, they sported lobster-like claws.
Chenraya was there, too, on the central dais. She’d acquired a ceremonial cloak since the debacle in the mine cavity, and new friends-four other drow gathered around her, all male. Three wore reflective black armor and the fourth wore wizardly robes spun of spider silk.
A silvery staff stood upright at the center of the dais. It sparked and flickered like a bonfire. The drow were entranced in its glow. Demascus squinted, and he saw that the staff’s headpiece was an oversized clenched first. Sort of like a miniature version of what they’d seen in the mine … Right. If Arathane was correct, the staff was the magically transformed arambarium relic. The last thing Demascus noted was the arched ceiling. Or rather, the lack of it. The web directly over the dais gaped, like a giant’s wet mouth.
Chenraya was singing in a deep, irregular tongue, melodic and haunting. The other drow called out an atonal counterpoint that made the back of Demascus’s throat itch. The cavity above the dais seemed to pulse wider with each completed verse.
“She’s forming a new portal mouth,” whispered Arathane. “It’s probably easy enough for a drow priestess, here in the Demonweb.”
Demascus managed not to jump. The others had caught up with him.
Riltana shook her head. “What now?” she whispered. “There’s no way we can fight through that press. I could fly over, but … I don’t fancy being out there all alone.”
Arathane said, “We must stop the drow before she completes the new passage. This is our last chance. I’d guess the next stop for the arambarium relic is either Menzoberranzan or … directly into Lolth’s demonic court itself.”
Demascus didn’t like the sound of
Arathane saw his puzzled expression. She tapped her forehead, just below the white chalk mark. Oh. The queen’s magic chalk symbol was more potent then he’d realized. “As long as we don’t draw direct attention to ourselves, the enchantment will hold. But we must stop Chenraya from finishing her rite,” said Arathane.
Demascus said, “I can get into that circle and capture Chenraya’s attention before I’m noticed. If the rest of you can keep her lackeys busy for a few moments, I can end her.”
“Just take the staff,” suggested Riltana. “Flash in, grab it
Not bad, actually. “Fine,
Though a part of him growled at the idea of avoiding what would otherwise surely be a spectacular conflict. He pushed that feeling away. They were here to retrieve the mother lode, not assassinate a drow priestess. And if Chenraya and her underlings gave chase, logic suggested that to face them outside the confines of the Demonweb would be better than within this dim cavity where the drow had all the advantages.
“Here goes,” he said, and leaped into the stafflight shadow of a drider.
He had several shadows to pick from on the dais, thanks to the staff’s glaring illumination. Demascus appeared in the dimness behind a male drow soldier who wielded a long-handled glaive.
The sound of Chenraya’s song slowed and dropped in octave as everything around him lapsed into languid action. The song was a basso rumbling, and the drow were caught motionless, open-mouthed, and in mid-blink. The priestess’s eyes were raised to the vaulted web ceiling, an expression of divine transport frozen on her face. Had he wanted, he could have killed two or three of them before the others even realized he was …
No. He’d come for the staff. Demascus slipped between moments and drow shoulders and grabbed the blazing length of transformed arambarium. He knew something was wrong the moment his fingers brushed the tingling metal. He jerked back. Or tried to. His hand remained stubbornly fixed around the buzzing shaft. The muscles in his arm and shoulders twitched, and he lost feeling in his legs. The stafflight pinched out, and time caught up with him like an axe stroke.
“Hello, deva,” said Chenraya, staring straight at him. “Welcome to my parlor. Trembles in the web suggested someone tasty would be along. Though I didn’t expect you; we dropped a mine on you to prevent that.”
“But here I am,” he managed to say through chattering teeth.
“Indeed. With your hand caught in the sweet jar, like a truant child. But I’m glad, because I have a use for you. I’d pegged Pashra to serve as the sacrifice I need to shift the Hand of Arambar back to its true form.
