Steam exploded from the pipe, but the Justicar was already gone, diving and rolling away. A boiler wheezed, then suddenly swelled, rivets cracking like sling bullets as they popped and ricochet into the hall. Far behind Jus, Escalla took one look at the boiler and dived behind a pile of coal.
"She's gonna blow! Get your arses down!"
The boiler exploded like a volcano, blasting steam and fragments of metal into the room. The blistering hot shrapnel severed surrounding pipes and splintered the engines. The mechanisms seized, screaming and breaking-more steam pipes burst, and others collapsed and fell from the ceiling in a crash. Jus, still gripping his magical white blade, hunched beneath Cinders as steam jetted through the room.
The entire hall was choked in an impenetrable cloud of fog. From beneath a chaotic mass of shattered pipes, the Justicar rose up, then ducked beneath a scalding blast. The engine room was a madhouse of destruction-engines screaming, metal shattering.
A figure suddenly formed in the steam-a shape slim, jet black, and magnificent. A tall, disdainful, and beautiful dark elf stepped through the clouds-a figure with eyes filled with dancing silver flames. When she spoke, it was with a dozen voices torn from the throats of her prey.
"Just as I thought. Two little rats-Escalla and the Justicar."
Behind Lolth slithered Morag-pale and annoyed. Lolth undipped her cloak of spider web and threw it back to her secretary.
"An infestation in the engine room. I so hate having to deal with little creatures." Lolth clicked her fingers to her secretary and smiled. "Morag, kill the faerie. Make sure he sees her die."
Jus leaped through fires, his hell hound wrapped around him and his sword a brilliant, blinding white. The sword should have smashed the goddess in two, but it met another force and blasted sparks through the steam. A blood red blade locked with Benelux, and Recca, emerging from a cloud of steam, screeched in rage and attacked in a mad, hate-filled blur. The Justicar fought hard and fast, parrying blows from the vampire blade as Recca drove him back and away.
Lolth watched them fight then gave a peal of droll, derisive laughter. She walked away into the steam without a worry in the world, heading for the Justicar's friends.
"Enjoy yourself, little elf corpse! Sweet revenge! Sweet, sweet revenge!"
Blade to blade with Recca, the Justicar retreated back into the steam. Recca shifted, anticipating an attempt by Jus to aid his friends. Seeing the move, Jus swatted at his old master's sword, then circled slowly through the steam.
The Justicar paced like a vast, angry bear, side to side, his sword now just out of engagement range. Recca matched him step for step. The Justicar spun Benelux, watching the cadaver of his old master, his old friend-his old enemy.
"You're no zombie. You're in there! Aren't you, Recca?" The big man watched Recca carefully. "So this is all for revenge. You abandoned them to their deaths, and now you think they owe you for all that lost glory." Benelux snapped up into attack position. "You never, ever abandon your people. Without love, there is no Justice."
He attacked in a blinding arc. Recca spun and caught the blow-leaped, dived, twirled, and cut. The Justicar ploughed forward, blade smashing, lunging, crashing into bright red steel. He fought to win and win fast. Roaring, he smashed and hammered at his enemy, ripping fountains of green blood out of the monster's withered hide.
Hiding beneath blinding clouds of steam, Escalla hugged the floor. She found Enid and Henry side by side, lying flat to look for the feet and shins of incoming enemies. Polk had disappeared, as had Jus. The din of steam, the clamor of machinery, and the screaming of enraged manes made speech almost impossible. Escalla scuttled over to Enid and Henry, bellowing into their ears.
"Find a spot to ambush Lolth. Over near the broken pipe!" The faerie slapped Enid on one haunch. "I'll find Jus and bring him back!"
Enid yelled something that might have been an answer.
A mane lunged at her, and Henry killed it with one blow of his sword. He rose to a crouch and waved Enid into the din. Escalla paid them no more attention. She sped through the choking clouds, invisible and moving fast, looking for a pair of conspicuously booted feet. She finally saw a spatter of sparks in the steam-sparks flashing fast in a pattern she knew all too well.
Swords crashed together-one white, one red. Escalla pulled out her lich staff and pounded it in her fist like a cudgel. She charged straight toward the fight, happily determined to blow both of Recca's kneecaps off.
A blade flicked at her, almost too fast to see. Escalla made a tumbling leap-a second and third blade missing her by the width of a gnat's arse. An instant later, the blades were back, and the faerie hopped aside, saving herself through the brilliant luck that always attends pure genius. She flung herself backward in a handspring, leaped a random course through the steam, and heard blades clashing on the floor behind her.
Escalla landed on an intact pipe and climbed it in panic, looking frantically through the steam.
Morag coiled, wielding three curved swords in her hands, her tail lashing behind her. She cut at Escalla again, and the faerie dodged by, leaping onto Morag's head. She clung to the tanar'ri's hair in panic, unwilling to club the woman to death with her magic staff.
"Morag! What the frot are you doing?"
"Lolth must be obeyed!" The tanar'ri hovered between panic and fury. "She has my secret name! She must be obeyed!"
Morag's tail grabbed Escalla.
The faerie turned into a slimy worm, wriggled away, and sprang like a javelin into the pipes above. She flashed back to her true form and shot her best web spell at the tanar'ri, plastering her to the floor. Morag instantly teleported away, leaving a blank spot sagging in the middle of the web.
Escalla ran like a weasel, fearing a reappearance of Morag from behind. She ran hard through the fog, running straight into Recca and smashing her lich staff into his shin. The leg exploded and the monster collapsed. The Justicar took off his foe's arm as it fell. Recca planted his remaining foot against a piece of wreckage and shoved hard, shooting himself back into the steam. Escalla made to fire a spell, but Jus grabbed her and sped into the fog.
"Lolth's here! She's after the others!"
They ran.
Steam billowed all about them. Manes lurched and blundered with outstretched claws, but Jus never stopped. He charged toward faint sounds of combat. Exploding through the steam, his sword was already swinging as he reached Lolth. She ducked by bowing forward and pivoting on one leg. The other foot caught Jus in a savage kick that clanged against his stone-skin spell with enough force to shatter steel. Jus spun away from the impact, Benelux rebounding from a silver buckler on Lolth's forearm. Lolth let the kick spin her around in a turn, then blocked a blow from Enid and hammered a vicious punch into the sphinx's hide.
Enid was thrown back by the goddess's titanic strength. Lolth gleefully blew on her fist and looked about the fog.
"Next!"
Escalla launched a spell at the floor beneath Lolth's feet, turning solid metal to quicksand. Lolth turned a backflip and flew away from the danger zone, smiling quietly in amusement.
A rain of crossbow darts from Henry was blocked by one quick gesture of her hand. The darts clattered away in a splash and shower of sparks-and then the Justicar came at her from a cloud of steam. He bellowed his silence spell, snapping open a sphere of total quiet. Lolth was inside the sphere, unable to cast spells. She clapped her hands together in silence. Teleporting away and landing behind the Justicar, she raked him with a poisoned sword. The blow flashed against the stoneskin spell-and there was a blast of light as Escalla leaped onto Lolth and cracked the lich staff against the demon's neck.