after another, like a child's game of Tip the Tiles, the columns fell, approaching the Company of the Red Wolf with perilous speed.
The wrath of Savras is upon us!' Sulbrin cried.
'Not as long as we can run!' Jardis shouted back.
Pulling his companions by the arms, he lunged in a mad dash for the portal. As the three fled, columns crashed to the floor on their heels. Hearts pounding, they ran faster yet. Gradually, they began to outpace the toppling line of columns. Jardis grinned fiercely. They were going to-
Trisa let out a choking cry of fear.
“The door!'
Jardis jerked his head up. His blood froze. Like the stone iris of a gigantic eye, the temple's circular door was shrinking.
With a great roar, Jardis pressed forward, outpacing his companions, heavy boots pounding on hard stone. The portal continued to constrict with terrifying speed. Now it was ten feet across. Now eight. Now six. Jardis was out of breath and out of time. He launched himself into the shrinking door. Bracing his broad back against the rim, he pushed with both arms and legs. Knotted muscles stood out in strain. The rate of closure slowed but did not cease. In seconds the door would shear his body in two.
'Run, Red Wolves!'
Gasping, Trisa reached the door. She scrambled nimbly over Jardis. Sulbrin followed her a heartbeat after. Jardis glanced up, face pale, to see the last two columns toppling directly toward him. With a cry, he heaved himself over the edge of the door and through. The portal shut with a sharp snick! A second later came a great crash, as the columns shattered against the inside of the portal. But the door held. The noise faded into an echo.
Pale green light flared to life, revealing their three faces. A cool wisp of magelight danced on the palm of Sulbrin's hand. They stared at each other, panting. Then, as one, they grinned. They had made it.
'Shall we?' the wizard asked wryly.
'Let's,' Trisa said merrily, dusting herself off. 'I think I've had my fill of Undermountain for a long time to come.'
Jardis laughed in agreement.
Together, they sped swiftly through the gloomy maze of halls and corridors, retracing the steps that had brought them to the shrine of Savras. They passed through a crypt lined with dusty stone sarcophagi. Next was the chamber filled with candles, all mysteriously ever-burning. And here was the Hall of Many Pillars. They were close now. A few more twists and turns and they would be at the Well of Entry. There waited the rope to take them back up to the Inn of the Yawning Portal, and to fame everlasting.
Nothing could stop them now.
'We're the Company of the Red Wolf!' Jardis shouted in jubilation.
'Our names will never be forgotten!' Sulbrin rasped exultantly.
Trisa howled with glee. 'We're the greatest heroes that ever-'
A shaggy gray form leapt squealing from the shadows, knocking the thief to the ground. Long yellow teeth flashed in the gloom.
Jardis drew his glaive and skewered the thing. It let out a shrill shriek, then died. With a boot, he shoved the creature aside, gagging in disgust. It was an enormous rat, the size of a small pig. Yet a rat was still a rat-nothing to fret about. He reached down to help Trisa up. Suddenly he froze. The thief stared upward with blank green eyes. Blood spattered her face and clothes. Her throat had been torn out.
'Trisa?' Jardis whispered in puzzlement. She couldn't be dead. How could she be dead? What about their shop? He knelt and roughly shook her shoulder. 'Trisa!'
Dim shapes scuttled just beyond the circle of Sulbrin's magelight. A hungry chittering rose on the dank air, along with a foul stench. Countless pairs of blood-red eyes winked in the dark.
'We have to go, Jardis,' the wizard said, in a choking voice. 'It's too late for Trisa.'
Dazed, Jardis lurched to his feet. Then hunger won out over fear of light, and the rats attacked.
With a shout of rage, Jardis swung his massive glaive, cleaving several of the rabid creatures in twain. Sulbrin spoke a guttural word of magic, and the wisp of magelight in his hand flared into a ball of green fire. He heaved it at the undulating gray mass. In seconds a half-dozen rats squealed as emerald flames licked at their mangy pelts. They scurried frantically around the hall, setting others ablaze. In moments the entire chamber was lit by flickering green light. Jardis stared in horror. Every inch of the vast hall was seething with gigantic rats.
Fear redoubled, Jardis swung his sword in whistling arcs, barely beating back the ravenous creatures. Sulbrin raised his hand, readying another spell. He never had the chance to cast it. A rat leapt on him from behind, and the wizard cried out in terror as he pitched forward. In moments, his body was lost amid the gnashing throng of rats, his cry cut short.
Tears streaming down his face, Jardis hewed at the rats, shouting in wordless rage. Blood oozed from a dozen small, stinging wounds. Yet somehow he kept the vermin at bay as he backed toward the archway that led out of the hall. He was nearly there. Only a few paces more.
His glaive lodged in the body of one of the rats. The blade was torn from his hand and swept away by the surging mass. Weaponless, Jardis sprang back, scrambling over the living carpet of rats. Somehow he gained the archway, stumbling into the corridor beyond, but the rats followed. Jardis ran as blood poured into his eyes, blinding him. A rat leapt forward, gnawing the back of his knee, severing the tendons. Jardis cried out in agony, nearly fell, and lurched on. Another rat lunged for his back but missed, striking the leather purse at his belt instead. The purse tore open, spilling a spray of gold coins, as well as something bright and sparkling.
The Third Eye of Savras.
For a second Jardis hesitated. Without the crystal, all of this was utterly meaningless. But the horde of rats was mere paces behind. To reach for the crystal was to die. Clenching his jaw, he limped on.
Then he saw the rope dangling ahead. Twenty feet above was a large hole in the ceiling, and beyond that, golden firelight. The Well of Entry. Two dozen faces peered down at him from above, cheering- some for Jardis, some for the rats.
With a bellow of rage and pain, Jardis threw himself forward, latching on to the rope just as rats flooded the chamber's floor. Arms bulging, he pulled his body upward. A moment later, he blinked the blood from his eyes-he had reached the top. Gripping the rope with one hand, he stretched the other toward the rim of the well.
'Wait just a minute, friend,' said a grizzled man who leaned over the edge of the well, blocking him. 'You know Durnan's toll. One gold piece to go down, and one to come up. That's the rule.'
With his free hand, Jardis clutched at the purse at his belt. His fingers found torn, empty leather. He looked up in terror. 'I've lost it all. But I can get more! Please, I-'
The grizzled man stared down at him with cold eyes. 'Cut the rope,' he ordered.
'No!' Jardis cried in horror.
A knife flashed. The rope parted. A scream ripped itself from Jardis's throat as he plummeted downward.
But we were supposed to be heroes!
His scream ended as he plunged into the roiling sea of slavering rats.
So this is how the rabble lives, Lord Darien Thai thought in vaguely fascinated disgust.
From his table in the shadowed corner of the Yawning Portal, he gazed with heavy-lidded green eyes at the crowd that filled the smoky tavern. A great shout went up from the throng gathered around the stone-ringed well in the center of the common room. Gold changed hands, and the gamblers grumbled or gloated as best suited their luck.
Apparently some poor idiot had just met his demise in the dungeon below. No doubt the fool had been ill- equipped and ill-prepared to meet the perils that lurked in the labyrinth beneath Mount Waterdeep. Why couldn't these commoners understand that venturing into Undermountain was a sport best left to the nobility? But no, it was ever the compulsion of the poor to ape the wealthy. And if they had to throw away their lives in the process-well, they were meager enough, so what did it matter?
With his left hand, Darien raised the dented pewter goblet that a serving maid had plunked down before him. His nose wrinkled in distaste. This swill passed for wine? He thrust the goblet back down, then noticed a ruffle of purple velvet peeking out from beneath the heavy black cloak in which he had wrapped himself. Hastily, he tucked
