Lisa Smedman - Ascendancy of the Last

That number grew to eleven, during the time I trod the Underdark, the male voice said. The Black Archer's priests slew several of our House.

Q'arlynd's ancestor supplied the name of the god who had found favor in Corellon's court: Shevarash the Black Archer, the once-mortal surface elf who had vowed never to rest, smile, or laugh, until the last drow was slain. A slaughter Corellon condoned-despite the fact that its victims included Eilistraee's drow faithful, even though they had rejected the wanton cruelty of their race.

Q'arlynd snorted. So much for the surface elves' high ideals.

He realized the other masters were staring at him. They too had withdrawn from the vision. The crystal that had provided the vision left its spot above the table and resumed its orbit around Seldszar's head.

Q'arlynd cleared his throat. He repeated what his ancestors had just told him. "You'll have noted there were thirteen oak trees supporting the dome," he told the other masters. "A significant number. The vision showed us a temple that was built at a time when Lolth, Vhaeraun, and Eilistraee were still counted among the Seldarine."

"But that was thirty millennia ago-before the first Crown War!" Urlryn blurted.

"Indeed." Seldszar wet his dry lips. "The vision tasted of dust."

"Surely the temple no longer stands," Urlryn continued.

Masoj waved a bony hand. "As long as the abjuration is cast in the same spot, it won't matter if the temple's fallen."

"You miss my point," Urlryn said. "Without knowing what the spot currently looks like, we can't teleport to it. Even the most experienced teleportation mage couldn't find it." He nodded in Q'arlynd's direction.

Q'arlynd inclined his head, proud that the other master was acknowledging his expertise in that field.

Masoj stared pointedly at Seldszar, "Do you know where the temple stood? Does your lorestone?"

Seldszar sat quietly a moment, communing with his kiira. "No," he said at last. He stared pointedly at Q'arlynd's kiira.

"My ancestors…" Q'arlynd swallowed nervously. "They, ah, didn't recognize the forest."

It would be somewhere in Aryvandaar, the female voice said. Or Keltormir.

"But it's somewhere in the lands that were once home to ancient Aryvandaar, or Keltormir," he repeated aloud. A memory sprang into his mind. He stared, through the eyes of one of his long-dead ancestors, at a map spread on a table. Kingdoms were labeled, in a flowing hand: Aryvandaar, Illefarn, Miyeritar, Shantel Othreier, Keltormir, Thearnytaar, Eiellur, Syopiir, Orishaar, and Ilythiir. He knew where Miyeritar was-today that portion of the World Above was known as the High Moor. Aryvandaar, he saw, lay just north of it, while Keltormir was well to the south of that.

Q'arlynd described what he'd just seen.

"That's hardly very helpful," Masoj said.

"At least it's better than 'somewhere on the surface,'" Urlryn countered. "That's the best most drow can do, when it comes to ancient geography."

Q'arlynd stroked his chin, thinking hard, as Masoj and Urlryn traded glares. Something niggled at him. At last he worked out what it was. "There's something that's bothering me," he told them. "Sages date the Descent to just over eleven thousand years ago. Yet Master Seldszar's vision showed us a temple that had to have been built at least thirty thousand years ago. That's a difference of nineteen thousand years."

Urlryn shrugged. "A mythal could have sustained the temple for that long."

"That's indeed possible," Q'arlynd agreed. "But if the temple was still standing at the time of the Descent, why didn't my ancestors recognize it? Some of them are dark elves-one of them worshiped Corellon Larethian." He paused. "I think she didn't recognize the temple because it was gone before her time. Smothered by the forest, perhaps. But the site must have remained holy, at least until the time of the Descent. I think that's why the high mages whose magic invoked the Descent chose the spot: because no one, save them, knew where it was."

Seldszar tapped his fingers together in a patter of applause. "Well done, my boy, well done." He nodded at the others. "You see why I chose to nominate him to the Conclave?"

"We're still no further ahead," Masoj protested. "We already knew the casting was done at one of Corellon Larethian's temples."

No, we didn't, Q'arlynd thought. But he held his tongue.

Seldszar tapped the empty decanter. "The question we should be asking ourselves," he told the others, "is why the gorgondy wine gave an image that didn't precisely answer the question I posed. 'Where was the spell cast that turned the dark elves into drow?' was how I phrased it. The vision should have showed us what the area looks like now, not thousands of years ago."

Urlryn frowned. "Are you suggesting the high mages stepped back in time?"

"It's possible," Seldszar said. "Gorgondy wine is a gnomish vintage, made using water drawn from a series of magical pools whose waters provide glimpses of the past. The pools are also rumored to have other enchantments. Their ripples, for example, are said to spontaneously form teleportation circles to the place being viewed-though it's unclear whether the traveler arrives there in the present day, or slips into the past."

Q'arlynd nodded. He already knew that much. Years ago, when listening in on Flinderspeld's thoughts, his former slave had briefly thought about the pools. The svirfneblin had been pondering the very question Seldszar just posed-whether he could use the so-called Fountains of Memory to slip back to a time before Blingdenstone fell, and warn its residents of the impending attack. Flinderspeld had decided they couldn't, for one, very obvious, reason.

"The pools couldn't send a traveler into the past," Q'arlynd said aloud. "If they did, the svirfneblin would have used them already, to do just that, and a number of the calamities that befell their race would never have happened. The fall of Blingdenstone, for example. If the pools do hold teleportation magic, they must be a gateway to the present."

"Past or present-it doesn't matter," Urlryn said. He rocked his bulk forward on his cushion, not bothering to hide his excitement. "We can still use the pools to reach the spot where the temple stood. As long as they take us to the right spot, the magic can be undone!"

"Precisely!" Seldszar agreed. "There is, however, one problem." He glanced at the empty goblet. "Only the deep gnomes know where the pools lie-and they're not telling."

"Easily remedied," Masoj said with a chuckle. He nodded at the decanter. "Detain the svirfneblin who sold you the wine. Slice the information out of him one finger at a time. Give him five chances to talk-ten, if he's stubborn."

Q'arlynd felt the kiira grow cool against his forehead. He heard his ancestors' whispered disapproval. He interrupted. "No need for that, Master Masoj. A svirfneblin who owes me a favor knows the location of these pools. I'll have the answer, soon enough."

Urlryn snorted skeptically, and Masoj made a sour face. Seldszar, however, looked thoughtful. After a moment of staring at the crystals orbiting his head, he slowly nodded. "Do it. Ask him."

Q'arlynd hadn't mentioned the svirfneblin's gender. Seldszar might have guessed it, of course. He'd have had an even chance of being right. Yet Q'arlynd doubted the diviner ever guessed-about anything.

Seldszar must have foreseen success.

Funny, how Eilistraee's dance worked, Q'arlynd mused. After all these years, he would finally learn what had become of his former slave, Flinderspeld.

Halisstra walked around the throne, her fingers caressing its smooth black marble. The throne was carved in the shape of a spider, resting on its back. The head formed a foot stool; the cephalothorax, the seat; and the bulging abdomen, the backrest. Four legs served to support the chair, while the other four splayed out from either side of the seat and curved toward the ceiling. Between these stretched steel-thread webs festooned with tiny red spiders. Halisstra plucked a strand of web with the tip of her claw. The steel thread vibrated, shedding spiders like drops of blood and filling the audience chamber with a shrill note. The sound sent a visible shiver through the priestess who crawled behind Halisstra, never once lifting her glance from the flagstone floor.