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The four spiders moved slowly through the short crack in the wall that sectioned off the main cavern from the rest of the tunnels surrounding Menzoberranzan. Once inside the cavern, the sight was spectacular. Well, there was no light, but the cavern seen in the infrared spectrum was nothing short of astonishing.
The almost perfectly domed cave was over 200 feet across and half again as high. Covering the floor and most of the walls, were over 1000 spiders. The creatures ranged in size from the large ones that had responded to the Baenre Priestesses' call to tiny babies that more closely resembled their surface cousins.
Webs clung to the wall in every available corner and they were littered with spiders and similar cocoons to the one that held the most recent sacrifice. It was highly unlikely, however, that any of these other cocoons contained anything that even closely resembled a noble son from the first house of Menzoberranzan. They all contained kobolds or goblins, or, if a spider had been considerably lucky, a deep gnome.
The fact that the cocoon that now entered the huge cavern was special seemed to be something that all of the spiders understood. The spell that Bladen'Kerst and Sos'Umptu had placed on the four spiders was now being spread to the entire cavern, and all of the creatures ceased their activity to watch the procession toward the largest web in the colony.
The queen's web was fifty feet in diameter, covering a major portion of the far end of the cavern. Behind it was the inky blackness of a bottomless abyss. It was down this pit that the queen dropped all of the used carcasses after she had sucked them dry. It was the drow equivalent of hell.
The colony congregated to the floor of the cave as the four spiders brought their prize to the queen. A path was made for the procession as the swarm of arachnids parted. The colony then closed in after the four spiders, respectfully keeping their distance but eager to see the outcome.
Krol watched the display with a feeling of dread creeping over him. The sight before him was like a scene from a nightmare. He was perched on a ledge a few feet from the edge of the bottom of the queen's web. It had been incredibly easy from him to get into the cavern, as the entire colony had been under the hypnotic trance of the Baenre Priestesses. As long as Krol did not prove to be a threat, the spiders completely ignored him.
He had gotten to his present perch without being seen. House Del'Axle did not produce many fighters. Krol and Trenian had been through the Academy and had both finished towards the bottom of their classes. They were quick and agile, but they were small and weak. They did, however, excel in stealth. Their piwafwi were designed to hide them magically, masking their body heat to look as cold as stone and silencing their movements to sound no louder than a breath of air.
Leaving this cavern should be just as easy. With the entire colony's attention on the sacrifice, even the clumsiest drow elf should be able to walk out of the cavern. The problem was that Krol wanted to steal the item of that sacrifice, making him the center of attention. He just hoped he understood how the spell that the Baenre sisters had cast on this colony worked. If he did, he should make it out alive. If he did not, then he would be joining the Baenre child, or at least part of him would. He imagined that someone his size could feed several dozen spiders. With all of the horrible deaths assigned to drow elves over the centuries, this one did not seem so bad.
The larger spider that was carrying the Baenre offering separated itself from the other three spiders and approached the main web alone. It carefully adhered the cocoon to the bottom of the web, not twenty feet from where Krol was perched. It then backed away. The entire colony followed suit, leaving a good forty feet between the bottom of the web and the nearest spider.
Up to this point the queen had been absent. Now it moved out from behind a jagged outcropping toward the top of the web and slowly crawled down. Krol just about lost his nerve at the sight of the glorious beast. It was as if Lloth herself had walked into the cavern.
Krol, like almost every other male in Menzoberranzan, had a love hate relationship with the drow deity. They loved her when she helped their family achieve greatness. Even though this usually came through the females of the family, the power and prestige translated to the males to some extent. But then there were the times that every male hated the Spider Queen as well. They were, after all, just males. They had no worth but to be sacrificed to this huge bloated spider that now came down the web.
When House Del'Axle had achieved greatness, Krol had been right beside his sisters, singing the praises of Lloth. During those times he imagined Lloth to be a beautiful drow female, decked out in all of a high priestess's splendor. Now, however, as he was reminded of his true role in drow society, the image of Lloth that came to mind more closely mirrored the creature that crawled toward the infant Baenre.
It was this resolve, the naïve notion that he could make a difference in the way males were treated if he saved this one child, that gave him the courage to act. The pack of spiders had backed away even further at the appearance of their queen, giving Krol just the room he needed. The drow pulled a quickly fashioned sling he had made out of some rope he carried and leaped off the wall.
With his other hand, Krol drew a finely crafted drow rapier, and as he ran past the cocoon, he cut it free. The spiders looking on were too stunned to react right away. The Baenre Priestesses had lulled them into a trance, and that trance was not so easily shaken. Even when they finally did react, they still did so under the powerful trance.
This is what Krol had been counting on. He made sure that as he cut the webbed package, he did not touch it, but let it fall free into the sling he had created. It was covered in sticky spider fluids, and he did not want to have to struggle with that now. As he continued to run, the spiders reacted. Though still under the trance, they no longer moved with slow reverence but with panicked speed.
Krol also noticed that the young child had awoken. As he realized that it had been Baenre's desire for the child to be fully awake when it was devoured, his courage increased. With the hoards of spiders boring down on him, he planted his feet, hoisted the sling over his head, and with a terrific heave and shout slung it out over the main part of the cavern.
The spiders, acting under instructions given by two very powerful high priestesses of Lloth, had one purpose: bring the child unharmed to their queen. These instructions said nothing about a renegade drow male. As the child left Krol's possession, the spiders changed directions as if they were a flock of birds. They moved as one with the cocooned projectile, already assembling beneath its targeted landing site.
With their attention diverted, Krol continued his run across the clearing in front of the web, jumped high onto the opposite wall, and then leaped back, even higher, into the air over the area he had just traversed. He enacted a levitation spell, and dropped a globe of darkness over himself. For all intents and purposes, he had just disappeared from the cave.
The spiders did not care about him, though; they were busy tracking the flight of their precious sacrifice. As the child flew through the air, it let out a howling cry. It was wide-awake, and though its infrared eyes could not make heads or tails out of what it was seeing, it knew something was terribly wrong. At the peak of its flight, it disappeared.
The spiders froze. Where there had been a screaming, flying child, now there was nothing. Not a sound, not a flash of heat, nothing. As one, they turned back toward the drow that had originally stolen the child, but he too was gone without a trace. No matter the strength of the drow priestesses who had cast the original spell, nothing could have prepared the spiders for this. As the queen, who had watched the show from her web, screeched for answers, the colony of spiders scattered in every direction.
Trenian had been perched high on a wall toward the rear of the cavern. He had watched his brother break for the child and had pushed himself away from the wall, levitating high above the floor and countless spiders below. He drifted slowly away from the wall, for he would need his hands free to perform this little trick. Even though Krol saw exactly where his brother was before Trenian dropped the globe of darkness on himself, and even though Trenian heard exactly when his brother had thrown the sling by the shout he gave, only a pair of drow elves, with the incredible coordination offered them through their heritage, would have been able to pull off the stunt.
Trenian had spread his arms wide, increasing the chance that his brother would hit him, and still he almost did not catch it, barely snagging the trailing end of the sling as it flew past him. The child had been screaming loudly, but as Trenian hauled him inside his magical piwafwi, the child's voice, as loud as it was, was silenced.
The child was not large, and as sticky as its wrappings were, Trenian had no fear of it falling out of his cloak once secured. He added a little strength to his levitation spell, and soon felt his hands reach the ceiling. He could hear the spiders scrambling about wildly beneath him, and desperately did not want to still be in this cavern when his levitation spell ran out. Finding handholds in the rocky ceiling, he propelled himself the best he could toward exit of the huge cavern.
Both Del'Axle nobles operated blindly within their globes of darkness, but the task was not a difficult one. Once they reached the tight crease that lead back into main tunnels around Menzoberranzan, they could hear the spiders frantically searching all around them. The spiders scoured the floor and the walls all about the cavern and the crevice back into the main tunnels, but they neglected to search above. After all, drow could not walk on the ceiling.
Trenian's first clue that he was safely out of the cavern was when his globe of darkness gave out. He had cast his before his brother, and his innate abilities were not as strong as Krol's. He was floating above the crevice beside which the Baenre daughters had given up their brother. Trenian knew his levitation spell was just about to give out, and if it did, he would fall into the crease were a dozen spiders were crawling over themselves looking for the lost child. With one last heave, he pushed himself sideways just as the spell ran out. He landed lightly on the ground next to the crevice and quickly ran away from the chaos behind.
Krol was soon to follow, and the two brothers raced away from the spider cavern, the third born son of Matron Baenre tucked inside Trenian's piwafwi.
***
When the three Baenre Priestesses had walked for only five minutes, they heard the faint scream of their brother. Bladen'Kerst had heard it first, for she was listening for it, still dissatisfied that they were not going to be able to see it. "Do you hear that?"
The other two did indeed hear it, and as it went silent only a few short seconds later, all three smiled. "Lloth has accepted our gift," Triel said. "Tomorrow's morn will see House Baenre back in the favor of the Spider Queen."
"Like we had never been out of it," Sos'Umptu added. The three sisters continued home with added skip in their step.
***
Matron Reinela Del'Axle sat on her throne in the main audience chamber of House Del'Axle, fourth house of Menzoberranzan. In front of her sat her two oldest daughters, Lillium and Goria. They both agreed with their mother that something needed to be done quickly before their house was swallowed up in the power struggle that was brewing, but they disagreed with her on what the solution should be.
"Mother, we are the fourth house because of our females," Goria spoke up. "House Del'Axle boasts more high priestesses than all other houses save Baenre itself. There is no other house on which Lloth has smiled more than our own."
"Yes, Mother," Lillium agreed. "We do not have the warriors of the first or second houses, or even of the three above us, but with Lloth behind us, one priestess is worth a hundred drow solders."
"They'd better be," Reinela said. "For that is the kind of opposition we face." As it was, they were both right. Lloth was smiling on them, and no house, no matter how powerful, would be so foolish as to attack them. Though victory might be assured, they might anger Lloth by destroying so many priestesses that were in her favor. That served as little comfort to the matron mother, though.
Reinela also noticed that as her daughter had listed the houses with more warriors than their own, she had intentionally left out House Oblodra, the third house. It was a house led by Matron K'yorl Odran, a psionisist. The strength of that house was unknown for it did not operate the way most did. It was this secrecy that allowed it to stay among the high-ranking houses. No one dared attack what they did not understand.
Baenre was obvious. They boasted over a thousand trained drow warriors, and no one would dare oppose them. The second house, Barrison Del'Armgo had close to five hundred drow solders all trained by, and most sired by, Uthegental, the beast of a drow that served as weapon master for house Barrison Del'Armgo. Uthegental was probably the best warrior in all of Menzoberranzan and the most prominent male.
Matron Reinela did not have those types of ambitious hopes for her sons, but she had hoped for something more than what they had given her. Her eldest son was the house's wizard, and like her many daughters, Cirrel Del'Axle excelled in the mental discipline, but her second and third born sons made better thieves than fighters. Currently, the weapon master of House Del'Axle was the eldest daughter of Lillium, an unheard of occupation for a female in Menzoberranzan.
"Lloth has blessed us with females," Reinela admitted to her two daughters, "but regardless of how strong we might be, our numbers are few and we can be over-run. We need fighters to stand in front of us as the first wall of defense. Right now, I am willing to get those fighters by any means necessary. If that means putting swords instead of clerical staves in your daughters' hands, then so be it."
It was at this moment that Krol and Trenian decided to enter. They had not expected to find anyone else in the audience chamber except Matron Reinela. They both stopped short when they saw a meeting was going on. Reinela looked up from her daughters, and both of them turned to look at the visitors as well.
Krol and Trenian should have turned around and left, but the importance of what they had with them demanded them to stay. "What are you doing here?" Goria asked, getting up quickly and pulling out her snake-headed whip. "Don't you know not to come unless summoned?" She began to walk toward her brothers, but Reinela stopped her.
The matron could see a strange look on her sons' faces and knew they had important information. She could see no other reason why they would so blatantly have disregarded the rules of etiquette she had beaten into them. While she was often furious at them for not being warrior caliber, she also understood that they were not stupid. They might not be able to stand up against any of the other high-ranking houses' noble males in battle, but they were also clever enough never to find themselves in a situation where they would have to. "What is it?"
Krol, the older, stepped forward. "We followed three Baenre Priestesses out of the city."
Reinela's ears picked up at this. Goria and Lillium were doubters like Trenian had been. "You followed what you thought were Baenre Priestesses," Lillium corrected.
Krol turned to his older sister, confident that his mother would restrain her as long as he had important information to tell. "That's right. I did think they were of House Baenre, but only because they were."
"You evaded their escorts?" Reinela asked quickly, diffusing the tension between her feuding children.
"There were no escorts," Krol replied. "They were alone."
Lillium was quick to criticize again. "You just didn't see them."
Even more confident than before, Krol turned back to his sister. "Again you are correct, for I can not see what is not there."
Lillium's hand was fast as she reached for her whip but Reinela's was faster. The crack of the matron's whip sounded loudly in the room. "Enough! Can you not give information without constantly bickering! You will address your sisters with respect, or I shall take your tongue. I know your mastery of the hand code is unsurpassed; you do not need your tongue."
Krol quickly shut up and bowed his head in respect. He took the verbal abuse for what it was. He understood that his mother respected him for what he could do and hated him for what he could not. It was very easy for her to switch between the two dispositions.
Krol remained quiet with his bowed head, waiting to be asked another question, but Reinela turned to her other son instead. She could see that Trenian had something tucked inside his piwafwi. "Come here," she called to him, for he had remained by the door to the audience chamber. "Come and show us what you pillaged from these three helpless Baenre High Priestesses."
Lillium and Goria laughed at this, still not believing that their two idiot brothers could have sneaked up on anything. Reinela was not sure what to believe. Trenian did as he was told, walking silently up to his mother's throne and opening his piwafwi to reveal the cocooned Baenre child. As he held the now calm child in his arms, only its head visible, all three females gasped.
Reinela rose from her throne, taking a few steps toward her son. The infant drow looked curiously up at the three females that stared wide-eyed down at him. He giggled softly. "Where did you get this?" Goria asked in a harsh whisper.
"We followed-" Trenian started, but Reinela cut him off. She has already heard what Krol had said; she did not need it repeated. Looking at the tightly wrapped spider's cocoon, a feeling of dread passed through her. She knew that Matron Baenre had recently given birth, or at least that she was due to give birth. Reinela knew that if she was in Baenre's position, with all the strength and power afforded her by her house, and she gave birth to a son - a third son - she would have very little use for it.
Reaching to the underside off the web-wrapping, Reinela pulled free a thick strand of the queen's web that Krol had cut away. She held it up for her two eldest daughters to see. They both knew only one type of spider that could produce such a thick, strong strand.
"Hakia-Corus," Goria gasped, naming again the ritual of killing the third born son.
"This child was given to Lloth," Reinela said slowly, still staring at the strand, not believing her sons capable of such a theft, but the evidence was right there in front of her. "You stole this child from Lloth." Reinela finally looked up at her son. She was not smiling.
Trenian grew suddenly limp. He had not been totally sure what his mother's response would be, but he had hoped for something along the lines of celebration.
"You thought you were stealing from Baenre, but this child had already been given to Lloth." Reinela held up the strand from the queen's web as her evidence. "You stole this child directly from the most holiest of Lloth's altars."
Trenian took a few steps backwards, stumbling and stuttering. "I thou- uh, we thought tha-" He actually dropped the child, but Krol was quick to step in and catch it and then even quicker to step back out of harm's way. Poor Trenian.
"You did not think," Reinela corrected. Behind her, Lillium and Goria were flanking their mother, whips out and ready.
"Krol thought it would bring disfavor to Baenre," Trenian offered.
If it was not for the fact that Trenian was about to die, Krol would have been mad at him for trying to pass the blame, but now he was just glad that Trenian had been the one to carry the child and not him.
"What did they do wrong?" Reinela pressed. As if to punctuate the question, Lillium lashed out with her whip. The cruel weapon bit hard into Trenian's right side. "They did nothing wrong. Why should Lloth be mad at them?" Again a whip attack, this time from Goria and the left side.
"Even if that were the case, when Baenre called out to Lloth to discover why the sacrifice was not accepted and she finds out it was never received, how long do you think it will take for her to find out who took the child and where he is?"
Both whips snapped out now, and Trenian fell to the floor, both his arms too numb to break the fall. The wind was knocked out of him, and he gasped for mercy. "I ... did ... not ... know."
His sisters pinned him to the floor, one on either side and ripped his piwafwi open to his bare chest. Even if Trenian had been in perfect condition, he would not have been able to fight off his stronger sisters.
"A third born son was offered to Lloth this night, and I will not withhold that gift from her." Reinela held the piece of web up above her son as it burst into flame with a thought from the powerful matron. As the web burned brightly still held in Reinela's hand, she continued to talk. "Know that in life, your foolishness nearly destroyed this house, but in your death, you will save it."
Reinela willed the flame out and sprinkled Trenian's bare chest with ashes. Trenian was screaming now as his mother brought out her ceremonial dagger and held it high. With primal screams coming from all four, Reinela plunged the dagger into her son's chest. Despite his sisters' strength, Trenian sat bolt upright on impact. All three priestesses jumped back.
Trenian's eyes were wide and his mouth open as the hiss of life left him. The dagger was sunk to its hilt in his chest, and all of the scattered ashes burst back into flame briefly, scorching his skin. Inside his chest, his heart too erupted into fire, incinerating almost instantly. Out of his open mouth, a solitary puff of acrid smoke floated up to the ceiling. Trenian held the macabre pose for a few moments more and then fell back to the floor, dead.
Matron Reinela spun around to her other son, knowing that the whole theft had probably been his idea. She had hoped to catch him watching, but Krol was too smart for that. With so much at stake, he had wisely stayed facing the throne with his head bowed. He knew that no male had the right to watch such a sacred ceremony as Hakia-Corus, and just being in the room while it happened might mean his death.
Reinela walked in front of her son, taking the child away from him so she could look at it. She could feel the potential in the child already. She did not have any doubts as to the child's mother. She had just confessed her need for fighters and that she did not care how she got them. Lloth was definitely with them.
"Does the child have a name?" she asked.
"Iblith."
"What?" Reinela shrieked. Lillium and Goria too were stunned. Had Krol just cursed at their mother? After what had just happened, did he wish for death that much?
As his sisters fumbled for their whips, Krol raised his head to look at his mother and clarify. "They named the child Iblith Baenre." He and Trenian had heard the entire ceremony in the tunnel. The child's name had come up frequently. The blatant disregard for the child shown not only in the sacrifice but also in the actual naming of it had only strengthened the brothers' resolve to steal it.
"Hardly a proper name for a member of House Del'Axle, wouldn't you say?" Reinela looked right at her son.
"Not proper at all," Krol responded, returning the look.
Reinela looked briefly at her deceased third son and then back at Krol. "He shall be called Jarlnian. Jarlnian Del'Axel. Goria," Reinela called without looking away from her son, "bring this child to one of your sisters to wean. Make sure he is taught which house he belongs to and what his role in that house is."
Goria walked up quickly, taking the child from her mother. "Yes, Mother." Both Lillium and Goria left the room. Krol had not yet been dismissed and was not so presumptuous to leave on his own.
Reinela let him stand there for a few moments longer and then sat back down in her throne. "You may go."
Krol turned and took two steps. "Krol," Reinela called out. He stopped and turned back around to face his mother. "If you ever jeopardize this house's security again you can not imagine the pain you will suffer before you are given to Lloth."
Krol stood there, looking at his mother, knowing that he should feel lucky she did not go through with it right there. Instead, she let him stand there for a full minute, thinking about what kind of terrible torture he might be subjected to. "You may go."
Krol turned, but was again stopped after two steps. "Krol." He turned once more. "Our house has grown much stronger this night by your actions. You have done well. You may go."
Krol's head was spinning now, and he nearly ran out of the audience chamber, stopping only briefly to look at his brother for the first time since the sacrifice. A shudder went down his spine, and he left the room.
***
Matron Baenre knelt in front of her private altar, the harsh light of a dozen burning candles blurring her vision. Before her, prominently placed in the center of the altar, was a golden urn containing a drow heart. Behind her, still lying on her bed, were the torn remains of what had once been one of House Baenre's finest warriors.
Baenre had begun her motherhood over House Baenre by only bedding the strongest males she could find. After a century of this practice, the weapon master had begged her to reconsider her choice of mates, claiming that she was decimating the fighting ability of the house.
Baenre had changed her ways for the sake of the house, realizing that it was her womb and Lloth's blessing that ensured the strength of her offspring and not the quality of the seed she received. Tonight had been different. She had needed someone who would be able to withstand her dark ceremony. Baenre had long ago ceased receiving pleasure from her sexual escapades and saw them now as praise sessions to her evil deity.
It was a good thing she had chosen the male she had, for Baenre had never experienced anything like this night before. She had reached out to the spider colony, for she knew where her daughters were taking their brother. She had linked up with the colony and, more particularly, the queen. She had sensed when the child had been laid on the web, and had felt the queen's anticipation as it approached the child.
Then chaos ensued.
With her mind so intertwined with the distant colony, when every one of the spiders scattered in a maelstrom of panic and confusion, Matron Baenre reacted in like fashion. Her unfortunate mate had never experienced anything like it in his life, and no amount of training, no matter how intense, could have prepared him for it. For him it went beyond pleasure or passion, and went deep into primal lust. Baenre had attacked him with the same ferocity that coursed through the distant queen spider, demanding that she be given what was rightfully hers. The male had obliged, though only moments before he was torn to shreds by the enraged matron.
Baenre now knelt before the altar, wearing a sheer chemise that was still covered in blood. She rocked back and forth slowly, humming and muttering guttural chants to her goddess, wondering what had gone wrong. She had never conducted this type of ceremony before, but she was sure something had not gone right. She had expected a sense of euphoria from the queen spider and then a climax when she took the male child fully.
That never came. Instead, the chaos had continued for a long time, only recently receding into an unsettled lull. It had been almost an hour since Baenre had broken her connection with the distant colony, and she was now convinced it had not worked.
Baenre leaned over the altar to blow out the candles, and then it hit her. The heart in the urn burst suddenly into flame, lighting up her entire face as all twelve candles went out. Baenre leaned back quickly, her eyes transfixed on the amazingly bright flame before her. The pain in her eyes slowly worked its way down her body, settling heavily in her womb. Baenre placed her hands over her abdomen and could feel the heat of the flame inside her.
As quickly as the heart had exploded into flame, it went out and the fire was transferred into the matron mother. Baenre was sure her stomach would explode from the pain, but as it reached its peak, she cried out to Lloth in a voice that was heard throughout the compound. She not only accepted the pain, but embraced it. If she were to die now, what better place than in front of her own altar, singing praise to her deity.
Then it was gone.
Baenre opened her eyes and watched as mysterious ashes fell all around her, exploding into tiny balls of fire as they struck the altar and floor. The matron mother rose slowly to her feet, very shaky from what she had been through. As she stood, she noticed that the heart inside the urn was still whole, without a trace of a burn on it other than where the occasional ash hit it.
With wavering steps, Baenre made her way back to the bed. Though it was still blood stained and held a torn corpse, the matron mother of the first house of Menzoberranzan fell on the bed and into a deep sleep.
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