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  “It wouldn’t kill you, though, would it?” Jarlaxle asked. “Not while you wear the ring. You have given the trapped primordial an outlet for its frustrations. It has shown you its secrets and lent you wisps of living flame. It led you to the ancient portal and helped you turn that staff you carry into something more potent.”

  “And perhaps it knows that I am trying to keep it forever sealed in its hole,” she retorted.

  Jarlaxle shrugged. “Perhaps. But how can you remain so near to such beauty and preternatural power and not be curious?”

  “I never said I wasn’t curious.”

  “You are not a coward. Of that I am certain.”

  “Enough of your games, Jarlaxle!” the woman demanded. “What do you want?”

  The mercenary drow reached into a belt pouch and pulled out a large gauntlet, one that seemed far too large to have fit in the pouch, which of course must be magical. Was anything on or about Jarlaxle not magical? Catti-brie wondered. He showed it to Catti-brie, then tossed it to her.

  “This is a sister item to the sword Charon’s Claw,” he explained. “Necessary protection from the deadly magic of the weapon.”

  “You expect me to go down into that pit and retrieve the sword, which is almost certainly not there?”

  “If it is not there, then at least we will know, and then Entreri can rest easy that his longevity is not tied to the sword.”

  Catti-brie tossed the gauntlet back. “You are not without magic. Go and get it yourself.”

  “It is Catti-brie who has bonded with the primordial. Catti-brie who understands the beast. Catti-brie who has determined that we must act to keep the volcano dormant and what that action must be to achieve such an end. It is Catti-brie, not Jarlaxle, who carries a gift from the primordial, and who coaxes elementals from the flames of the beast’s tendrils.”

  “And it is Catti-brie who is wise enough to respect the power of the beast,” she said.

  Jarlaxle laughed and bowed. “There is another reason for my request, I admit,” he said, and he tossed the gauntlet back to her as she looked at him curiously. “You claim to know the beast—we are all counting upon your judgment to guide us to a solution for the future dangers you have foretold—but how certain are you of what you have determined? How well do you really know this creature, this living volcano? You have met its offspring and touched its outer edges, but you have not faced it directly. I have spoken to Archmage Gromph about this and we are in agreement. You should face the primordial directly. You should stand before it and let it reveal to you more of its secrets. It may be our only hope in reconstructing the magic that will keep it in place.”

  Catti-brie fumbled over her thoughts in light of the dramatic request. “And if I reveal to it my own intentions?” she asked. “Will this great and ancient beast not merely consume me and be done with it? Surely the primordial desires release.”

  “We cannot know what such a creature desires,” Jarlaxle said.

  Catti-brie had to concede that point. This was not a creature of similar mind to any living being walking the ways of Faerûn. This was an ancient, devouring magic, whose goals were unknown and perhaps unknowable to a human or a drow.

  “Perhaps there are other ways the beast might find that release,” Jarlaxle offered. “Ways less devastating than a volcanic eruption. Ways that afford us all, even the beast, what we desire. And you are a Chosen of Mielikki, who would understand such a natural catastrophe as a primordial of fire better than perhaps any other god. Surely you can use that discipline and standing to direct the conversation with the primordial in a manner of your own choosing.”

  Catti-brie held up the gauntlet. “And since I will be down there anyway …” she said dryly.

  “I would be forever grateful,” Jarlaxle said. “Indeed, I will make it worth your while many times over.”

  “I am the daughter of a dwarven king,” she reminded him. “Your riches do not interest me.”

  Jarlaxle’s smile said otherwise. “I do not speak idly, my good lady. It is a small thing I ask of you, and that in accord with a short journey that may well help us all.”

  Catti-brie looked down, her expression doubtful. Even with her magical ring, she could feel the heat of the primordial’s fiery breath, but still she began to cast a spell, using her divine powers to protect her even more from the heat and the flames.

  “How am I to even get down there? Where am I to stand in a sea of liquid stone?” She turned back to Jarlaxle as she asked the second question, to find the mercenary holding out to her some black cloth, a folded garment perhaps. Catti-brie looked at it, then at Jarlaxle, for just a moment, then took it and unfolded it to find a shimmering black cape with a high, stiff collar.

  “This was worn by Kensidan, who was once long ago called High Captain Kurth. It passed from him to his descendants—to Dahlia, surprisingly. Drizzt knows this cloak. Put it on. You will understand.”

  The woman swept the cloak around her back and found the ties.

  “It perfectly complements your outfit,” Jarlaxle said with a nod of approval. “So beautiful.”

  “A statement of fashion?” she asked skeptically.

  “Much more than that,” he replied. “Let it speak to you.”

  With a final doubtful look at Jarlaxle, Catti-brie closed her eyes and let her thoughts drift to the cloak. Like so many magical items, this garment, the Cloak of the Crow, seemed to want its wearer to understand its properties. It was one of the more curious aspects of magic, Catti-brie often thought, that even the insentient magical items wanted their magic to be used.

  She let her thoughts reach deeper into the cloak and lifted her arms out wide—to find that they were not arms any longer, but shining black-feathered wings. She could feel the updrafts of heat from the pit more acutely then, playing among her feathers. So sure was she that she didn’t question Jarlaxle further, nor did she cast any contingency spells in case the cloak should fail. She just leaned forward and let the updrafts lift her from the ground.

  Down went the giant crow, cutting tight circles within the encircling and swirling dance of the water elementals. Even with her ring and the additional spells, Catti-brie could feel the heat growing as she neared the bottom of that watery barricade.

  She broke through, under the wetness and the mist, and it seemed to her as if she had gone to another plane of existence, or another world perhaps, or to Toril in the earliest days of its formation.

  Yes, that was it, she somehow understood. This molten field of bubbling magma and powerful stench—she felt as if she had been thrown into a boiling cauldron of rotten eggs—this was the way the world had been in the earliest days, before the elves even, perhaps before all life on Toril.

  She drifted in the orange glow for just a moment before spotting and then landing on a solid block of veined stone. She touched down tentatively, ready to fly away if the stone proved too hot for her multiple dweomers of protection to counter. But to her relief, she felt no burning pain.

  With a thought and a shrug, Catti-brie came out of crow form, and paused a moment to ponder her earliest days in this second life she had found, when the spellscar of Mielikki had granted to her shape-shifting powers. How often had she flown over the plains of Netheril in the shape of a great bird. How free she had been on the updrafts with the world spread wide below her.

  All those thoughts blew away on a hot breeze when the primordial’s voice came into her thoughts, seeping through her ring. She sensed the creature’s confusion—dangerous confusion—and so she answered back in the language of the Plane of Fire, whispering assurances and seeking common benefit.

  The primordial responded to her with sensations. She felt the beast stretching its tendrils to the Forge, to the inactive portal, to the spouts she had found when they had retaken the complex, like the lava mound where Catti-brie had transformed her staff.

  On impulse she banged her staff on the stone, shifting it to its fiery form.

  She felt the pleasure o
f the primordial.

  Then she began to probe. She looked up and focused on the water elementals, and she felt the primordial’s frustration and anger—but it was not as burning an anger as she had imagined. And she was glad. Perhaps there were ways to lessen the preternatural desires of the beast, ways to siphon off some of its explosive and deadly energy.

  For a long time, Catti-brie stood there in communion with the primordial, viewing Gauntlgrym from its perspective, and in that mental bonding she gained some insights into the magic that had put the beast in the pit and kept it there, insights she knew would aid her in the repair of the Hosttower of the Arcane.

  She did well to keep those thoughts properly suppressed. If the primordial so desired, she would be dead, buried in lava and burned to nothingness long before she could get near to the protection of the water elementals.

  But the primordial wasn’t going to do that. It seemed to her that the beast almost enjoyed the company.

  No, that wasn’t it. Creatures like this didn’t harbor such emotions. But still, there was no displeasure revealed. Clearly the beast understood that it was in control and that she was no threat, and so it tolerated her. It accepted the diversion with some modicum of pleasurable distraction.

  On recognizing that, Catti-brie would have liked to remain, but the thought was accompanied by a stumble, a near swoon, that would have dropped her into the lava. It wasn’t the heat but the smell, the lack of breathable air. She knew then that she had to be attentive to her task and quickly away.

  She put the gauntlet on her hand and held it out in display to her godlike host. She didn’t know whether it was the gauntlet or the beast, but she sensed something not so far away.

  Becoming a crow again she fluttered over to another mound of stone, quickly reverting to her human form. She stared down into the bubbling, popping red magma. Dare she reach in? The woman shook her head before her hand even moved, certain that the molten stone would incinerate the glove and her hand, whatever enchantments she might try.

  But still she stared, leaning low, mesmerized by the bubbling red lava.

  And something substantial came forth, rising up from the magma. Catti-brie recoiled, taken aback by what appeared to be the skull and bleached bones of a small humanoid skeleton: a backbone and ribcage to a pelvis with boney legs spread wide to either side.

  The item rose a bit more, bobbing in the heavy liquid, and Catti-brie gasped as she realized this to be the hilt and crosspiece of a sword, the slender, etched blade shining red in the glow of the lava.

  With her gauntleted hand, she grasped the backbone hilt inside the basket of the ribcage and drew forth the sword, holding it up in front of her astonished eyes.

  She felt the power of Charon’s Claw. She felt its wickedness and had to work hard to resist the urge to throw it back into the magma.

  The molten power of the primordial had not eaten Charon’s Claw, had marred that perfect blade not at all.

  Catti-brie called upon the cloak again and shifted to the crow. With a cursory telepathic salute to the primordial, she lifted away, beating her strong wings to circle once more inside the elemental swirl. Rising, she broke through on the other side and lit on the ledge near the sarcophagus stone. Jarlaxle was patiently waiting for her there.

  “I knew it,” he said, his eyes sparkling, when Catti-brie reverted to her human form, revealing the treasure she held in her gauntleted hand.

  The woman examined the sword again and realized it wasn’t the lava that had given Charon’s Claw its red hue. The blade itself was red, with a black blood trough running down the center. She marveled at the workmanship, at the masterful etchings of hooded figures and tall scythes all along the blade.

  “It has few equals in the world,” Jarlaxle said, startling her. She looked over at the mercenary.

  “A most remarkable blade,” he said.

  “And full of evil intent,” she replied.

  “A thirst for blood,” he admitted. “Is that not the purpose of a weapon?”

  “There is a power here …” She shook her head, nearly overwhelmed. She had once wielded Khazid’hea, the blade that now hung on Jarlaxle’s belt, but even that marvelous weapon of destruction seemed to pale beside the wicked magnificence of this creation.

  “Weapons are designed to kill, my good lady,” Jarlaxle motioned to the floor and pointed to the gauntlet. “Do not touch the sword without it,” he warned.

  Catti-brie set the sword on the stone and pulled off the gauntlet, handing it over. As Jarlaxle set it upon his hand, the woman moved to remove the cloak, but Jarlaxle held up his hands and shook his head.

  “My gift to you,” he said.

  Catti-brie nodded. “A worthwhile trade, then.”

  “Oh, it is no trade,” he replied. “The cloak is my gift to you. Your reward for the sword is yet to come, and I promise you, it is a far greater gift.”

  He picked up the sword and saluted Catti-brie with it then smiled, bowed, and turned, moving back to the tunnel to Forge.

  Catti-brie considered him for a long while, but did not follow. She found herself at the ledge once more, looking down into the pit, past the watery swirl to the fiery eye.

  The beast had allowed her into its presence, and had not consumed her.

  Strangely, she felt blessed. And Catti-brie knew she would return to the bottom of this pit again, perhaps many times.

  CHAPTER 4

  Petty

  THEY HAVE NO ALLIES,” HIGH PRIESTESS CHARRI HUNZRIN REMINDED her mother, Matron Mother Shakti. “They look down upon the whole of the city from the recesses of the West Wall, high above. They huddle behind their driders and sneer at all who are not Melarni.”

  “I am well aware of the zealotry of Zhindia Melarn,” Shakti replied. “And true, it would be hard to name any as allies of this precocious young House. But Matron Mother Mez’Barris Armgo is no enemy to the Melarni, in these times.”

  The mention of the Matron Mother of the Second House quieted Charri. Barrison Del’Armgo had been House Hunzrin’s most important ally for many decades. House Hunzrin thrived through trade and by controlling most of the agriculture in Menzoberranzan. Under the stern and disciplined leadership of Shakti, the family Hunzrin had greatly advanced in wealth and a subtle stature. Their ranking had not changed, and they remained the Eleventh House, cheated from ascension by the insertion of House Do’Urden onto the Ruling Council after the abdication of Matron Mother Zeerith and House Xorlarrin. Surely the other Houses held in check by that unusual, indeed unprecedented, creation by Matron Mother Quenthel had been simmering in outrage ever since, particularly House Duskryn, the Ninth House, whose ambitious matron mother openly coveted a seat on the Ruling Council and had been denied yet again.

  But such formalities had never impressed Shakti Hunzrin. She was more concerned with actual power and wealth over ceremony and formality. Her family was often ridiculed as “stone heads” because of their work with the farms, but to her and the other nobles, that underestimation offered opportunity more than it wounded pride.

  Past a bend in the avenue, rounding a large stalagmite mound, the two women came in sight of House Melarn, unmistakable because it was fashioned with the most unusual architecture in the City of Spiders. Melarn was the newest of Menzoberranzan’s major Houses, formed of a union between House Kenafin and House Horlbar, a joining of purpose and spirit that arose from the ashes of war a century before, where the two allied Houses battled against House Tuin’Tarl, then the Eighth House. Tuin’Tarl was destroyed and the combined Houses, under the name of Melarn, replaced the deposed Matron Mother of House Tuin’Tarl on the Ruling Council. Among the new Melarni were many drow left orphaned by the fall of the sister city of Ched Nasad, a community distinguished by its web-like walkways.

  Those refugees had brought Ched Nasad’s unique architecture with them to Menzoberranzan, and it was clearly on display here in the gracefully swaying bridges of spiderwebs that filtered back and forth, climbing the west wall of the
cavern to the Melarni front door, a hundred feet and more from the cavern.

  Matron Mother Shakti held her daughter back with an upraised arm, and quietly uttered a minor spell. A magical hammer appeared in the air across the way, just to the right of the lowermost web pathways of the facade of House Melarn. On Shakti’s command, the hammer tapped against the wall, once and then again.

  Then it disappeared, and Shakti motioned for Charri to follow. By the time they neared the area, the cracks of a concealed doorway were evident in the wall, and the stone fell away as they approached, revealing a tunnel. Within stood First Priestess Kyrnill Melarn, who bowed in proper deference to Matron Mother Hunzrin and bade her to follow. This was no ordinary first priestess, Shakti prudently reminded herself. Normally, that title was held by the eldest daughter of a noble family, but Kyrnill was not related to Zhindia. Zhindia was the eldest daughter of Matron Mother Jerlys of House Horlbar, and Kyrnill had been the Matron Mother of House Kenafin. When the two Houses merged into House Melarn, Kyrnill Kenafin had allowed Zhindia to become matron mother of the new House Melarn. It was a strategic move, the other matron mothers knew, because the too-clever Kyrnill had expected that the first matron mother of the new House would surely be killed in the chaotic aftermath of the joining. But Zhindia had survived, and Kyrnill had accepted her role as first priestess—though surely she was more than that.

  Deep and down the trio traveled, far into the western wall and far below the compound of House Melarn. They passed many guard stations on their journey, manned by beastly driders. No House was more enamored of and protected by the horrid half-drow, half-spider abominations as the zealots of House Melarn, who celebrated the torture of morphing a drow into a drider like other families might celebrate the birthday of a favored daughter.

  In a deep and secret room, protected by hundreds of feet of solid stone and magical wards, both arcane and divine, the two Hunzrins were presented to Matron Mother Zhindia Melarn, the youngest Matron Mother of Menzoberranzan, and by far the youngest member of the city’s Ruling Council—if one ignored the presence of the iblith Matron Mother Darthiir Do’Urden, and none was more pleased to ignore that abomination than Zhindia Melarn. The circular chamber was ringed by a raised walkway upon which stood drider guards, looking even larger because they stood several feet above the lower floor. All clutched adamantine long spears, and all seemed eager to put those deadly weapons to use.