R. Salvatore: Archmage

Balor’s whip flashed out and connected with nothing, the swing smothered by the too-thick blanket of webbing and spiders.

All sense of balance left him. He could not move, could feel nothing but the poison of Lolth and the tiny bites of her unrelenting minions.

And he knew of the most insidious part of that poison. In her venom Lolth carried confusion, an unrelenting dizziness that defeated any attempt at magical defense or escape as surely as a globe of invulnerability.

Balor was caught, fully enwrapped, hanging upside down, displayed like a trophy.

And still Lolth’s spiders bit at him, and they would, he heard her promise, for a decade.

Matron Mother Quenthel Baenre’s red eyes flared, belying her otherwise outwardly calm demeanor. Gromph marveled at her control, given the image he had just presented to her in the scrying bowl. Her great achievement on the surface in the Silver Marches, the Darkening, was no more. The sun was shining across the Silver Marches and the orcs were running for their holes in the mountains.

“Bregan D’aerthe’s spies indicate that Drizzt Do’Urden facilitated the dissolution of Tsabrak’s dweomer,” Gromph remarked, just to twist the blade a little bit. Gromph knew very well what had happened to the magical Darkening, for he had been there when the spell had been defeated. For he, using an unwitting Drizzt as the conduit, had been the one to dissolve the magic. “Drizzt’s human wife, another Chosen of Mielikki by all accounts, looked on with tears of joy. Lady Lolth has lost the battle for the Weave, and now, too, she has been bested in the Silver Marches.”

“Beware your tongue, brother,” Matron Mother Baenre warned in a very deadly tone. Her eyes narrowed, accentuating their sharp edges to give her angular features a harsh attitude.

“True, and well advised, Matron Mother,” Gromph said, and he gave a polite bow. “I should have said that Lady Lolth’s proxies were defeated by those of Mielikki. The failure is-”

“Not ours,” the matron mother interrupted sharply. “We left. We had accomplished all that we had set out to accomplish. Our time there was done, our gains left to the idiot orcs, whom we knew would lose them in short order. That is not our concern, and never was.”

“Surely it is Matron Mother Zeerith’s concern, and the concern of her fledgling city,” said the archmage. “Tsabrak Xorlarrin’s channeling of Lady Lolth’s power was bested by a heretic rogue who is not even skilled in the Art. And her family and city has suffered greatly in this campaign. By my count, near to a hundred and twenty dark elves were killed in the Silver Marches War, and more than four out of five of those were drow of Q’Xorlarrin.”

“She will request our help, of course,” Matron Mother Baenre said, as if that was a good thing.

But Gromph wasn’t letting Quenthel off the hook that easily. “Your own position is compromised.”

The matron mother sat up straight at that, her red eyes flaring dangerously yet again.

“Lady Lolth will not blame you,” Gromph was quick to explain. “But the other matron mothers. . you have tightened your noose around their necks. Tos’un Armgo is dead, his iblith daughter missing. Matron Mother Mez’Barris has lost her one fingerhold to the Eighth House of Menzoberranzan, and so she will view the reconstituted House Do’Urden with great suspicion and dismay.”

“I will allow her to appoint another noble of Barrison Del’Armgo to serve in the hierarchy of House Do’Urden.”

“She will refuse.”

The matron mother clearly wanted to argue the point, and just as clearly had no valid argument with which to do so.

“House Hunzrin hates House Xorlarrin,” Gromph reminded. “And more important, hates the concept of Q’Xorlarrin, a city that threatens their trade dominance. And House Melarn hates. . well, everything. If those fanatical Melarni priestesses come to believe that Tsabrak Xorlarrin’s failure and House Xorlarrin’s losses indicate the displeasure of Lady Lolth, they will surely join in with House Hunzrin to. .” He let his voice trail off and heaved a great sigh. “Well, will they perhaps, shall we say, conclude the experiment of a sister city so near the surface in no uncertain terms?”

His coyness didn’t seem to impress his sister, but he didn’t want it to. He just wanted to anger Quenthel, to stick verbal pins into her, to force her hand.

To force a mistake.

“Do you think I am unaware of these threats, Archmage?” the matron mother said coolly, back in complete control. “Or do you believe me incapable of properly seeing to them? Your lack of confidence is both touching and insulting. Perhaps you would be wise to consider that dueling truth.”

Gromph bowed again and bid farewell. He had almost reached the room’s exit when he glanced back over his shoulder and said, “And do not forget the loss of a dragon. Or that Tiamat’s disciples were defeated in their quest to return their dragon mother to the Prime Material Plane.”

Matron Mother Baenre twitched, despite her resolve. The chromatic dragons-reds, blues, whites, greens, and blacks-had plotted to horde such a treasure that they would bring their goddess Tiamat and her grand castle back to the Prime Material Plane, to unleash unspeakable devastation across the lands.

But they had failed, and in the attempt, Matron Mother Baenre’s own actions had brought about the downfall of a white dragon, Aurbangras, son of the great Arauthator-who had been chased back to his mountain home.

Lady Lolth had apparently approved of the chromatic dragons and their plans for Tiamat. Through the matron mother, she had called for the enlistment of the white dragons, and had insisted that Arauthator and his son be given huge amounts of treasure in return for their services.

And now that, too, had failed.

Gromph nodded and did well to hide his satisfaction at Quenthel’s clear discomfort. He left her chamber then, but did not depart House Baenre, for there was another matter needing his full and urgent attention.

He moved for his own private quarters, a suite of rooms where he rarely resided, but one that served as home to House Baenre’s newest high priestess, Minolin Fey Baenre, who was Gromph Baenre’s wife and the mother of his all-important baby daughter.

The moment Gromph was out of the room, Matron Mother Quenthel Baenre checked her magical wards and guards against scrying, then unleashed a tirade of invective and magical power that left two of her servants writhing on the floor in agony and a third one dead.

Matron Mother Zeerith had already contacted her, begging help and information, for she feared exactly the alliance-Hunzrin and Melarn-of which Gromph had just warned. Her House and city of Q’Xorlarrin were truly depleted. The list of the compromised and the dead was impressive, with two nobles, the wizard Ravel and High Priestess Saribel, serving in House Do’Urden; her daughter, High Priestess Berellip, murdered very recently by Drizzt and his friends; her house weapons master, the great Jaerthe, slain on some ridiculous venture to the frozen wilderness known as Icewind Dale; and a hundred of her warriors and wizards killed in the Silver Marches.

The troubles of Matron Mother Zeerith were not, in and of themselves, a bad thing for Matron Mother Baenre. She had never intended Q’Xorlarrin to be anything more than a satellite of House Baenre, after all, despite the pronouncements of it as a “sister city” to Menzoberranzan. Q’Xorlarrin, combined with Bregan D’aerthe, would serve as House Baenre’s way of competing with House Hunzrin for trade with the surface dwellers. That was the only seam in Baenre’s armor, the only advantage the other Houses could use against the mighty First House of Menzoberranzan.