From the prison pen, the Justicar gave a huge bellow of rage.He whiplashed his magic rope and dragged one drow screaming down into the mob, where captives pounded the creature into a bloody pulp. Other drow fired crossbows, and Jus parried three bolts in a blur of steel. The drow stopped to reload, and Jus crashed his blade into the palisade, blasting through the palings. Two thousand enraged prisoners surged behind him in a mob that boiled with rage.
Crossbows hammered a storm of steel at the Justicar. Quarrels ricocheted from his stoneskin spell, then the white blade ploughed through the drow. Blood exploded as elves died, and then the prisoners smashed into their guards in a maddened storm of steel. Chains flailed, and drow screamed.
At the heart of the maelstrom, Jus caught a drow sword as it flashed toward him and severed the drow’s arm. Waving his sword, the big manbellowed and led an enraged wave toward the temple steps. A hundred guards were staggering, reeling, and dying as they left Escalla’s deadly cloud.
Prisoners crashed into the drow with a noise like exploding worlds. Steel and flesh crashed home, the prisoners clawing into the drow like a tidal wave of rage.
Jus bellowed through the cavern, making the whole temple shudder,
Chains, fists, and swords struck home. Drow fought in a mad panic. Somewhere in the distance, a wild stutter sounded as Henry’s crossbowbegan firing at something. Jus stormed up the steps as lightning bolts ploughed into the human mob, the drow screaming in frenzy and rushing down the temple steps to meet fists and rage with steel. The Justicar parried a spell, the white sword smashing lightning back into the drow, then hacked madly into the drow sorcerers.
Blood flowed, hundreds died, and still Lolth drank. With her head buried deep in the steaming, bloody foam, the demon mistress ignored the chaos around her as she slaked a thirst and began to glow with unholy power.
At the tunnel entrance, the echo of charging feet had becomean unending drum roll. Polk lifted his head, pitched a magic light stone through the entrance, and saw at least a dozen drow racing toward them.
“Here they come!”
The sudden light bought them a moment as the drow slowed to shield their eyes. Private Henry opened fire- spaced, careful shots, each one ofthem a tribute to his two long weeks of military service. The first shot spat sparks from a drow’s mail armor. The second pierced his target, the druggedquarrel paralyzing his victim almost before the creature screamed. Third and fourth shots flickered through the air, making one drow curse and clutch his thigh before he collapsed.
The fire came sharp and fast. Sure that half a dozen crossbowmen covered the entrance, the remaining drow fell back into the shadows, awaiting enough reinforcements to carry out a headlong rush.
Polk shoved crossbow bolts into the top of Henry’s magazine.He kept one worried eye upon the tunnel mouth as everything suddenly turned still and silent.
“We got three of them.” Jubilant, Polk stared at the tunnel.“Do you think that’s it?”
The temple cavern behind them suddenly shook as thousands of human voices rose in a battle roar. Amongst it all, the massive bellow of the Justicar and the screaming of his sword almost tore the rocks apart. As if on signal, a solid rain of crossbow bolts tore wildly from the tunnel, the bolts striking rocks near Polk and flying uselessly through the sky. With a manic scream, a dozen drow came charging from the passage, throwing bows aside and drawing swords as they howled in bloodcurdling hate. Henry fired his crossbow, the weapon whirring as a solid sheet of arrows blasted a drow leader off his feet.
The bolts flew into the tunnel in a terrifying swarm. A drow officer lifted his sword and screamed as he charged. Suddenly a stream of death ripped across his chest, and the drow spun in a mist of blood. Three more elves raced past the corpse, only to jerk back with arrows jutting from their flesh.
Quarrel after quarrel spat sparks and ricocheted madly from drow armor. Missed shots ploughed across stone and spun from tunnel walls. More dark elves ran forward, armor making bolts bounce and flicker aside. One warrior jerked back with a bolt through his eye. Others took shots in the chest and thigh, cursing then screaming foully as the drugged points struck them down.
A score of drow hurtled into the field of fire. Henry swerved his crossbow left and fought the thunderous recoil. The weapon bucked and raved, quarrels blasting toward the onrushing drow. Lying awkwardly on his side, Polk panted in panic, cramming handful after handful of bolts into the magazine. The arched bow blurred white hot, the string thudding like a drum. Blood and sparks and ringing metal turned the cave into a churning storm of chaos as the drow ran forward, screamed, and died.
The drow fell back. From behind them, leaders struck with whips and spells to drive the laggard onward. Sheltering in the recesses of the tunnel walls, drow fired random crossbow shots that smacked into the rocks beside Polk and Henry or flew wide.
Shoving through her followers came a tall drow sorceress dressed in blood red mail. She ran forward, buckler held high to deflect a rain of Henry’s crossbow darts. Other elves ran behind, using her as cover, thenstreaked away from the deathtrap of the cave mouth. One of them sped over Escalla’s magic runes, and a massive blast of flame shot upward and blew thedrow apart. A survivor staggered to his feet, and Polk shot the creature with a hand crossbow. Drow soldiers shrank back into the safety of the cave mouth, lying flat behind the bodies of the dead and paralyzed.
Still standing amidst a rain of fire, the sorceress snarled and launched a lightning bolt. The spell shot toward Polk and Henry, hitting the metallic ores in front of them and arcing uselessly into the ground. She screamed in fury even as a fresh stutter of crossbow bolts began smacking into armored elves and forcing them to ground.
The woman screamed at her cowardly followers, ripped spell energies out of her black soul, and flung them at her foes. A fireball thundered, the flames engulfing Polk and Henry utterly. The sorceress rose, half turned to wave her forces forward, and gave a mad ullulating cry. A dozen drow stormed forward, only to halt in shock as a lethal rain of crossbow bolts blurred into their ranks again.
Black cloaks smoking, Polk and Henry were back in action, the crossbow hammering home a stream of fire. The sorceress staggered as three bolts hit her armor and flew away. Then one dart speared through her naked thigh, and the drugged tip instantly took hold. Jerking forward, the paralyzed drow crashed to the ground, her spell staff and her buckler rolling in the dirt. Her warriors fell back, firing wild shots from hand crossbows, and suddenly the air was starkly still.
Panting and swearing, Polk kicked one empty crate of crossbow bolts away and tipped the other on its side. He filled Henry’s magazine, cursingdully and monotonously, his eyes glazed with panic, while somewhere behind them the cavern echoed to countless hundreds of battle screams.
Temple steps were awash with blood. Freed captives rolled onthe ground, dying on the fangs of black widow spiders or tearing the arachnids apart limb from limb. With captured swords, lengths of chain, or bare fists and nails they threw themselves upon the drow, who fell back toward the altar in fear. Drow soldiers fired wildly into the enraged crowd, only to be pulled down by the onrushing waves. Spells flickered and blasted-pinpricks to a mob drivenwild with fear that took its last refuge in blood-red rage.
Their fury had solidified into a huge blood spattered form. With his hell hound sheeting flames into the drow, Jus fought like a dark, roaring god. Swordsmen leaped howling at him, turning somersaults as they flew over the battling crowds. The Justicar cut the guts out from one in midair, hacking another down as he fell from above. The white blade ignored drow enchantments and alloys, shearing through metal, flesh, and bone as though they were wet paper.
Driven by one man’s fury, the sword sheared a drow priestessin half, showering drow with blood as the ranger clawed his way into the midst of the exhausted drow clergy. Charm spells spattered away from him, canceled by his old bone ring. A curse spell twisted away from him as he roared in massive anger. An instant later, a priestess lay screaming as she died, but a second drew a mace to fight hand to hand. The mace was parried, struck from her hand, and her arms severed in four blindingly fast bows, leaving the vile cleric screaming as she fell through the ring of drow and into the bowl of blood.
Surviving drow had made a ring about their demon queen, but the gigantic spider still had her head below the blood and was drinking deep. Buying time as their queen charged herself with power, the drow roared defiance and hacked into the human swarm. Blood flew in red streams from both drow and captives.
