In a puff of smoke, the yochlol disappeared, leaving only glowing incense embers in the onyx bowl. A moment later, the handmaiden reappeared, full size, standing behind Matron Malice. Briza, Vierna, and Maya held their breath as the being laid two sickly tentacles on their mother’s shoulders.
Matron Malice accepted the tentacles without reply, confident in her cause for summoning the yochlol.
"Explain to me why you dare to disturb me." came the yochlol’s insidious thoughts.
"To ask a simple question." Malice replied silently, for no words were necessary to communicate with a handmaiden. "One whose answer you know."
"Does this question interest you so greatly?" the yochlol asked. "You risk such dire consequences."
"It is imperative that I learn the answer." replied Matron Malice. Her three daughters watched curiously, hearing the yochlol’s thoughts but only guessing at their mother’s unspoken replies.
"If the answer is so important, and it is known to the handmaidens, and thus to the Spider Queen, do you not believe that Lolth would have given it to you if she so chose?"
"Perhaps, before this day, the Spider Queen did not deem me worthy to know." Malice responded. "Things have changed."
The handmaiden paused and rolled its elongated eyes back into its head as if communicating with some distant plane.
"Greetings, Matron Malice Do’Urden." the yochlol said aloud after a few tense moments. The creature’s spoken voice was calm and overly smooth for the thing’s grotesque appearance.
"My greetings to you, and to your mistress, Queen of Spiders." replied Malice. She shot a wry smile at her daughters and still didn’t turn to face the creature behind her. Apparently Malice’s guess of Lolth’s favor had been correct.
"Daermon N’a’shezbaernon has pleased Lolth." the handmaiden said. "The males of your house have won the day, even above the females that journeyed with them. I must accept Matron Malice Do’Urden’s summons." The tentacles slid off Malice’s shoulders, and the yochlol stood rigid behind her, awaiting her commands.
"Glad I am to please the Spider Queen." Malice began. She sought the proper way to phrase her question. "For the summons, as I have said, I beg only the answer to a simple question."
"Ask it." prompted the yochlol, and the mocking tone told Malice and her daughters that the monster already knew the question.
"My house is threatened, say the rumors." said Malice.
"Rumors?" The yochlol laughed an evil, grating sound.
"I trust in my sources." Malice replied defensively. "I would not have called upon you if I did not believe the threat."
"Continue." said the yochlol, amused by the whole affair."They are more than rumors, Matron Malice Do’Urden. Another house plans war upon you."
Maya’s immature gasp brought scornful eyes upon her from her mother and her sisters.
"Name this house to me." Malice pleaded. "If Daermon N’a’shezbaernon truly has pleased the Spider Queen this day, then I bid Lolth to reveal our enemies, that we might destroy them!"
"And if this other house also has pleased the Spider Queen?" the handmaiden mused. "Would Lolth then betray it to you?"
"Our enemies hold every advantage." Malice protested. "They know of House Do’Urden. No doubt they watch us every day, laying their plans. We ask Lolth only to give us knowledge equal to that of our enemies. Reveal them and let us prove which house is more worthy of victory."
"What if your enemies are greater than you?" asked the handmaiden. "Would Matron Malice Do’Urden then call upon Lolth to intervene and save her pitiful house?"
"No!" cried Malice. "We would call upon those powers that Lolth has given us to fight our foes. Even if our enemies are the more powerful, let Lolth be assured that they will suffer great pain for their attack on House Do’Urden!"
Again the handmaiden sank back within itself, finding the link to its home plane, a place darker than Menzoberranzan. Malice clenched tightly to Briza’s hand, to her right, and Vierna’s, to her left. They in turn passed along the confirmation of their bond to Maya, at the foot of the circle.
"The Spider Queen is pleased, Matron Malice Do’Urden." the handmaiden said at length. "Trust that she will favor House Do’Urden more than your enemies when battle rings out, perhaps…" Malice flinched at the ambiguity of that final word, grudgingly accepting that Lolth never made any promises, at any time.
"What of my question." Malice dared to protest, "the reason for the summons?"
There came a bright flash that stole the four clerics vision. When their eyesight returned to them, they saw the yochlol, tiny again, and glaring out at them from the flames of the onyx bowl.
"The Spider Queen does not give an answer that is already known!" The handmaiden proclaimed, the sheer power of its otherworldly voice cutting into the drow ears. The fire erupted in another blinding flash, and the yochlol disappeared, leaving the precious bowl sundered into a dozen pieces.
Matron Malice grabbed a large piece of the shattered onyx and threw it against a wall. "Already known?" she cried in rage. "Known to whom? Who in my family keeps this secret from me?"
"Perhaps the one who knows does not know that she knows." Briza put in, trying to calm her mother. "Or perhaps the information is newly found, and she has not yet had the chance to come to you with it."
"She?" growled Matron Malice. "What ‘she’ do you speak of, Briza? We are all here. Are any of my daughters stupid enough to miss such an obvious threat to our family?"
"No, Matron!" Vierna and Maya cried together, terrified of Malice’s growing wrath, rising beyond control.
"Never have I seen any sign!" said Vierna.
"Nor I!" added Maya. "By your side I have been these many weeks, and I have seen no more than you!"
"Are you implying that I have missed something?" Malice growled, her knuckles white at her sides.
"No, Matron!" Briza shouted above the commotion, loud enough to settle her mother for the moment and turn Malice’s attention fully upon her eldest daughter.
"Not she, then." Briza reasoned. "He. One of your sons may have the answer, or Zaknafein or Rizzen, perhaps."
"Yes." agreed Vierna. "They are only males, too stupid to understand the importance of minor details."
"Drizzt and Dinin have been out of the house." added Briza, "out of the city. In their patrol group are children of every powerful house, every house that would dare to threaten us!"
The fires in Malice’s eyes glowed, but she relaxed at the reasoning. "Bring them to me when they return to Menzoberranzan." she instructed Vierna and Maya. "You." she said to Briza, "bring Rizzen and Zaknafein. All the family must be present, so that we may learn what we may learn!"
"The cousins, and the soldiers, too?" asked Briza. "Perhaps one beyond the immediate family knows the answer."
"Should we bring them together, as well?" offered Vierna, her voice edged with the rising excitement of the moment.
"A gathering of the whole clan, a general war party of House Do’Urden?"
"No." Malice replied, "not the soldiers or the cousins. I do not believe they are involved in this, the handmaiden would have told us the answer if one of my direct family did not know it. It is my embarrassment to ask a question whose answer should be known to me, whose answer someone within the circle of my family knows." She gritted her teeth as she spat out the rest of her thoughts.
"I do not enjoy being embarrassed!"
Drizzt and Dinin came into the house a short while later, exhausted and glad the adventure was over. They had barely passed the entrance and turned down the wide corridor that led to their rooms when they bumped into Zaknafein, coming the other way.
"So the hero has returned." Zak remarked, eyeing Drizzt directly. Drizzt did not miss the sarcasm in his voice.