Valas jingled a pouch in front of the duergar and dropped it into his hand. The dwarf immediately poured out its contents into his big, weathered palm, appraising the gemstones there before scooping them back into the pouch.
“Ye must be in a rush, or yer man here might’ve struck a better bargain. Ah, well, ye drow don’t appreciate a good gemstone, anyway.”
He turned and stumped away into the darkness.
“That’s the last you’ll see of him,” Jeggred said. “You should have waited to pay him.”
“He insisted on it,” Valas said. “He said something about wanting to make sure we didn’t kill him to recover the fare.” The scout looked after the duergar, and shrugged. “I don’t think he would cheat us. If he was that kind of duergar, well, he wouldn’t last long in Mantol-Derith. People here don’t take kindly to being cheated.”
“He can secure safe passage through Gracklstugh?” Ryld asked.
Valas spread his hands and replied, “We’ll have to carry some kind of documents or letters, which Coalhewer can arrange for us. I think it’s some kind of mercantile license.”
“We’re carrying no goods,” Pharaun observed dryly. “Doesn’t that explanation seem a little thin?”
“I told him that Lady Quenthel’s family has business holdings in Eryndlyn she wishes to check on, and that if she finds things in order, she might be interested in negotiating for the services of duergar teamsters to transport her goods across Gracklstugh’s territory. I also implied that Coalhewer might do well to make himself a part of the arrangement.”
Pharaun didn’t have time to reply before the cavern echoed softly with the stealthy padding of numerous feet. The dark elves glanced up from the fire to see a large band of bugbear warriors approaching, led by the two mercenaries who had fled a few minutes before. At least a dozen of their fellows followed close behind them, axes and spiked flails dangling from hairy paws, murder in their eyes. The other patrons of Dinnka’s inn began to slip away from their places, seeking safer environs. The hulking humanoids muttered and growled to each other in their own tongue.
“Tell me,” said Valas, “did someone happen to kill, maim, or humiliate a bugbear when I was talking with Coalhewer?” The scout glanced back at the others, and at Jeggred, who shrugged. He sighed. “Was I unclear when I advised against starting fights here?”
“There was a misunderstanding over the seating arrangements,” Quenthel explained.
Ryld stood, threw his cloak over his shoulder to clear his arms for fighting, and said, “Should’ve guessed there might be more of them nearby.”
“Time to remind these stupid creatures of the order of things,” Halisstra remarked.
Quenthel stood and drew her five-headed whip, eyeing the approaching warriors with a wry smile.
“Jeggred?” she said.
Gromph Baenre stood on a balcony high above Menzoberranzan, studying the dim faerielights of the drow city. He had been waiting for nearly an hour, and his patience was almost exhausted. Under most circumstances an hour here or an hour there would have meant nothing to a dark elf with centuries of life behind him, but this was different. The archmage waited in fear, dreading the arrival of the one who had summoned him to this clandestine encounter. It was not a sensation Gromph was accustomed to, and he found that he did not care for it at all. He had, of course, taken extreme steps to protect his person, girding himself with an array of formidable defensive spells and a carefully considered selection of protective magical devices. The archmage was not entirely confident that those precautions would deter the one who came to meet him in that lonely, windswept spot.
“Gromph Baenre,” a voice, cold and rasping, greeted him. Before the archmage even began to turn, he felt the presence of the other, an icy chill that somehow managed to sink past his defenses, the smell of great and terrible magic. “How good of you to accept my invitation. It has been a long time, has it not?”
The ancient sorcerer Dyrr approached from the shadows at the back of the balcony, leaning on his great staff, his feet seeming not to move at all as he glided forward in a rustle of robes no quicker than an old man’s shuffle. Among the ambitious drow of his own House, it suited Dyrr to wear the shape of a venerable old dark elf of fantastic age, but Gromph’s arcane sight pierced the guise to the truth behind it. Dyrr was dead, dead these many centuries. Nothing remained of the ancient mage but dusty bones clothed in tattered shreds of mummified flesh. His hands were the claws of a skeleton, his robes were faded and threadbare, and his face was a hideous grinning skull, the black eye sockets alight with the bright green flame of his powerful spirit.
“I see that my poor guise does not deceive you,” the lich rasped. “In truth, I would have been disappointed if you were so easily beguiled, Archmage.”
“Lord Dyrr,” said Gromph, a cautious greeting. He inclined his head without taking his eyes off the lichdrow. “In truth, I am surprised to find that you are still among us. I have heard whispers that you still lived—er, so to speak—secluded in your house. I thought from time to time that I detected an old and canny hand guiding the affairs of Agrach Dyrr, but I have not met anyone who claims to have seen you in almost two hundred years, and it’s been almost twice that since last we spoke.”
“I value my privacy, and encourage my descendants to value my privacy as well. It’s best for all involved if my hand remains hidden. We wouldn’t want to make the matron mothers nervous now, would we?”
“Indeed. In my experience they react poorly to surprises.”
The lich laughed, a horrible sound that chilled the blood. He moved closer, gliding forward to stand by Gromph’s side and look out over the city. The archmage found himself more than a little unsettled by the unnatural presence of the undead creature—again, a sensation he did not experience often at all. What secrets does this walking ghost hold in its empty skull? Gromph wondered. What does he know about this city that no one else remembers? What lonely and terrible heights of lore has he scaled alone in the dreary centuries of his deathless existence?
The questions troubled Gromph, but he decided to put such speculation behind him for the moment.
“Well, Lord Dyrr, you requested this meeting. What shall we talk about?”
“You were always admirably direct, young Baenre,” the lich said. “It’s a refreshing quality among our kind. To get swiftly to the point, what do you think of the recent difficulties that have beset our fair city? More specifically, what do you think should be done about the powerlessness that has descended upon our ruling caste of priestesses?”
“What should be done?” Gromph replied. “That’s hard to say, when the question would seem to be what can be done? It is hardly within my power to entreat the Queen of the Demonweb Pits to restore her favor to her priestesses. Lolth will do as she will.”
“As ever. I do not mean to imply that you could do otherwise.” The lich paused, the green fire of its gaze locked on the archmage. “What do you see when you look out over Menzoberranzan today, Gromph?”
“Disorder. Peril. Denial.”
“And, perhaps, opportunity?”
Gromph hesitated a moment, then said, “Yes, of course.”
“You hesitated. You do not agree with me?”
“No, it is not that.”
The archmage frowned, and chose his words with care. He did not wish to give offense to the powerful apparition. Dyrr seemed civil enough, but the mind did not always stand up well to ages of undeath. He had to assume that there was nothing the lich was not capable of.
“Lord Dyrr,” he said, “surely you have observed that there is no end to the wiles of the Spider Queen. The only certainty of our existence is that Lolth is a capricious and demanding deity, a goddess who delights in teaching very harsh lessons indeed. What if her silence is a ruse to test her faithful? Isn’t it likely, even probable, that Lolth withholds her favor from her priestesses to see how they respond? Or—worse yet—to see whether the enemies of her clerics might be emboldened to creep out from the shadows and assault her minions directly? If that is the case, what then becomes of anyone foolish enough to defy the Queen of Spiders when she tires of her test and restores her full favor to her priestesses, just as abruptly as she withdrew it? I would not care to be caught out by such a ploy. Not at all.”