“You guarantee my safety?”
“That was the deal,” Jarlaxle replied.
“A deal I am sure to regret, of course.”
“The best deal you will be offered.”
“I am a matron mother of Menzoberranzan!”
“You were,” Jarlaxle corrected. “Would you bring your tattered House back to the City of Spiders? Where will you now rank in that hierarchy, I wonder?”
“Xorlarrin was the Third House, and-” she protested.
“Was,” the clever mercenary said again. “Can you claim the favor of Lolth?” He laughed, and it sounded very much like a mocking snort. “My dear Matron Mother Zeerith, were you ever truly in the favor of Lolth?”
“Third House,” she replied.
“We know the truth of the familial rankings, so please, do not take that as confirmation. Lolth rarely meddles in such minutiae, and hardly cares beyond the identity of the Matron Mother of the First House.”
“I grow weary of your chiding,” she said. “Be warned.”
“I am doing no such thing!” he earnestly protested. “Now is the time for honesty, for your sake more than mine, so let us speak the truth. My fondness for you goes back many years. You know this. You alone among the matron mothers value the men of your House as greatly as the women.”
“Barrison Del’Armgo. .”
Jarlaxle snorted. “The witch Mez’Barris uses her men as she would a pack of guard dogs, biting instruments to bring glory to the priestesses of her House, herself paramount. But you’ve never been like that.”
He spoke the last words quietly, and after a proper glance around to ensure that no one had entered, he reached out and gently and intimately stroked Zeerith Xorlarrin’s cheek.
And she let him, for the touch was not unfamiliar to her, though it had been years.
“Lolth will punish me if I do this,” she said.
“She has not punished me,” Jarlaxle argued. “And I have been doing this for centuries!”
“But she will see my desertion. .”
“It is not a desertion!” Jarlaxle insisted. He shook his head. “My old friend, do not give in to the fear that the Spider Queen oversees our every move. Or that she cares! Her ambitions are quite beyond us, I assure you. Archmage Gromph summoned Marilith and sent her here, under his direct command, and yet the rogue Do’Urden slayed her!”
Zeerith’s eyes flashed at the mention of Drizzt.
Jarlaxle shook his head and gave her a stern glance, silently but clearly warning her to forget that obvious thought. Every drow in Menzoberranzan seemed to believe that bringing the head of Drizzt would somehow garner great fame and stature and the favor of the Spider Queen, but Jarlaxle knew better, knew that it was a fool’s mission. In Menzoberranzan, there was no bigger fool than Tiago Baenre, and his obsession with the rogue Do’Urden had already cost him greatly.
“As you come to understand Drizzt Do’Urden the way I do, you will learn,” he promised.
“You will introduce me to him,” Matron Mother Zeerith said.
“In time,” was all that Jarlaxle would offer, and to his thinking, that might be a very, very long time. Though, of course, Jarlaxle expected that Drizzt might well meet Zeerith this very day.
“This is difficult for you,” Jarlaxle said.
“I am the matron mother of a powerful House.”
“Your family will survive, and so your House will survive.”
“Under the suffrage of. .?”
“I promised you a great measure of autonomy,” Jarlaxle reminded her.
Matron Mother Zeerith seemed unconvinced, and even shook her head.
“You pretend that you have options,” Jarlaxle reminded her. “It would be easier for me to abandon you here and let you play out your story in the Underdark, or back in Menzoberranzan with my unmerciful sister. If Quenthel Baenre finds advantage in having you murdered, know that your death will not be painless.”
“And what might Matron Mother Baenre think of your designs, should I go to her?” Zeerith asked, a rather pitiful attempt to take back the upper hand.
“She would applaud.” Jarlaxle let his smile linger for a moment, before the sound of a distant door caught his attention.
“Tsabrak returns,” he said. “You have time to consider the wider reaches of my offer, of course. Quite a bit of time once this immediate crisis is averted, and your safety is my guarantee. For now, your best play is to remain.”
Matron Mother Zeerith stared at him for few long moments, then nodded, and Jarlaxle disappeared once more into the shadows of the webbing, right before Archmage Tsabrak arrived with the prisoners in tow.
Gromph wasn’t surprised by the next visitor to his quarters this day. The matron mother entered with hardly an announcement, and with a scowl that told him that she, too, knew of the failures in Q’Xorlarrin.
“Your demon has fallen,” she said in greeting.
“Along with many, it would seem,” Gromph calmly answered. “Matron Mother Zeerith will not hold for long, I presume.”
“The dwarves will reclaim Gauntlgrym, but they will never hold it,” the matron mother vowed.
Gromph did well not to laugh out loud at that pronouncement. He found this whole adventure rather silly. How many resources would Quenthel squander in trying to evict the formidable dwarves? And for what practical gain?
“Because next time, I will be wiser than to rely on the foolish Gromph for such important matters!” the matron mother added, and she sounded so small and petulant at that moment. Had she abandoned the wisdom of Yvonnel? The archmage just stared at her, unsure as to what any of this could mean.
The satellite city of Q’Xorlarrin had been brought down, or soon would be, it seemed, but in the end, most of Matron Mother Zeerith’s House would escape and so the loss would be minimal to Menzoberranzan. In fact, such an event might even strengthen Quenthel’s hold over the Ruling Council, for it would remove a very sharp thorn from the side of House Hunzrin and the Melarni fanatics, and that alliance was one that Matron Mother Mez’Barris Armgo could actually use to weaken House Baenre. “Your demon led the defense,” the matron mother spat. “This failure falls upon your shoulders. Be cautious, wizard, for Tsabrak Xorlarrin will surely survive this, and he remains in the graces of the Spider Queen.” She spun and swept out of the room and Gromph fell back in his seat, his fingers tap-tapping once more. He tried to dismiss Quenthel’s overt threat, but he began to see some troubling possibilities. Would his sister cut a deal with Matron Mother Zeerith to absorb House Xorlarrin into House Baenre? Where might the Xorlarrins go if the dwarves gained an unshakable foothold? They would not be welcomed back into Menzoberranzan as a rival House, particularly not now with so many backroom alliances being formed among the ruling matron mothers.
And perhaps Quenthel would spread the whispers that Gromph had failed, that the archmage had, in fact, been the cause of the loss of Q’Xorlarrin. In that event, would Quenthel be in a stronger position to offer Zeerith one of her most coveted trophies: a Xorlarrin as Archmage of Menzoberranzan?
Nay, this was not a threat Gromph could easily dismiss, and in that realization, so came his outrage.
Barely had Quenthel left the tower of Sorcere when Gromph began his spellcasting, twining in the psionic insights to heighten the spell-or so he thought.
In truth, the archmage was obliviously casting Lolth’s spell, given to him through Kimmuriel in the guise of the captured K’yorl Odran. Gromph’s long-developed sense of caution should have clarified the truth to him, but his anger and ego overruled his common sense, and so he pressed on.
“Omminem dimti’ ite’spem,” he chanted, words he did not know, a language he did not know, but he somehow understood-or that he believed at least, that this chant aligned perfectly with his usual vocalizations for his spells of summoning. This was the perfect joining, psionics and arcane magic, perhaps the greatest and purest call to the lower planes any mortal had made in centuries.