Orcs scattered through the streets like frightened rats, their darting eyes and looks over their shoulders showed they desperately sought refuge from an unseen predator.
“Captain Ulrich!” called Lolth, the source of their terror. She was outside East Prison gate. “Bring out your prisoner!”
Lolth’s impatience grew like a storm on the horizon, darkening her features as she stood outside the prison gates. Her drow guard stood gathered around her. It was an oppressive place of thick, cold stone walls and the few windows let in little, if any light. Lolth’s eyes shifted back and forth with disdain, revealing her long-standing aversion towards orcs—filthy creatures in her eyes.
Lolth had received the news of the capture of the light elves’ keeper and she was eager to have at him, demanding him brought to her. To have Graybeard in her claws was beyond her wildest dreams. What was taking them?
“Captain Ulrich!” she screamed again. “I’m waiting!”
At last, the prison gates groaned open and a bow-legged orc officer came forth, a long knife at his belt. His gaze at seeing her was one of both surprise and suspicion. He got all squinty like. Something seemed amiss to him.
“Where is the elves’ keeper?” Lolth demanded of him. “Bring him out!”
He eyed her strangely. It was like something was wrong about this to him. Ulrich’s face was contorted in a perplexed expression, as if he were trying to solve a puzzle designed by a mischievous god with a penchant for frustrating orc officers.
“But ya already come and gotta him yesterday,” he said.
“What do you mean?” she raged. “I came and got him yesterday?”
“You did,” he stammered in confusion, “or someone like ya did.”
“Someone like me?” Lolth argued. “There is no one like me!”
He cringed before her in fear but still answered.
“But there is. She was ’ere,” he insisted. “Said she was you!”
Lolth’s eyes widened as she exploded with angry fury.
“You mean you gave someone else my prisoner?!” Lolth’s rage erupted like a volcano, her furious voice reverberating as she confronted the orc officer, ready to strike and unleash her wrath upon him.
He nodded, terrified.
“I shall correct the wrong!” he blurted nervously. “I swear ta it!”
“No! I shall correct the wrong, and with one bite of my fangs in your useless neck!” cried Lolth, a hiss escaping through her clenched teeth. “How could you be so stupid?!”
“It’s notta our fault!” he pleaded, eyes wide. “We thought she was you!”
“Are you blind? How can you think that?!”
“We’ve never seen ya!” he defended himself. “Ya’v never honored us with your presence before. We only heard what you look like and she fit the description!”
“Did you not wonder how she arrived so soon?” Lolth questioned the trembling orc officer, her voice laced with anger and disbelief.
“I did! I asked her that!”
“And?” demanded Lolth.
“She threatened to kill me for even askin’!”
“I wish she had!” screamed Lolth in reply. “It would save me the trouble now!”
She came forward, ready to strike.
“Kill me if I lie!” Ulrich begged, swallowing now, his voice desperate and fearful, trying to convince Lolth of his loyalty. “But spare me and I shall get him back!”
“How can I trust such an idiot as you to do anything smart?”
“We can close all the ways out! He won’t escape!”
“Stupid fool!” she exclaimed, leaning forward, her face inches from the orc officer’s, eyes ablaze with anger. The air crackled with the intensity of her fury. The orc cringed before her, fear etched across his face, reflecting the horror of what she was. “He doesn’t want out. He wants in!”
“Wat’s that ya say?” he asked, his brow furrowing with a puzzled look. “I dunna understand.”
“Obviously not!” declared Lolth in her fuming anger, eyebrows slanting down and lips snarling. “Did he not question you?”
“We questioned him.”
“Think!” she ordered. “What did he ask of you?”
“He asked…” Ulrich eyes narrowed slightly as he tried to remember and then suddenly brightened. “He asked about da satyrs!”
“What about the satyrs?”
“He wanted to know where tey were.”
“And where did you tell him?”
“I told him Ched Nasad.”
“Then that is it!” cried Lolth decisively. “That is why he has come! He repays his debt to Sar! He plans to free the satyrs!”
“He canna not possibly do that,” said Ulrich in disbelief. “That would be a preposterous thing!”
Again, Lolth leaned closer, her face to his, her voice intensifying.
“I was also told that him escaping from this prison was preposterous!”
“We couldn’t know!” he stammered fearfully, limbs shaking. “She looked just like ya!”
“That is a lie! It cannot be true!”
“I see the difference now! But I did not see it then. She had the same face, the same white hair, the same body-”
“What do you mean, the same body?!”
“Big, like yours, and black–and with that there same red hourglass mark.”
“You lie!” snarled Lolth, advancing on him again. “No one has this mark but me!”
“She has it, I swear!”
Lolth hesitated, considering perhaps he spoke the truth.
“You say she’s as big as me?”
“Oh! She’s big all right! But not near as big as you!”
“Not as big as me,” Lolth mused. “You know what a drider looks like, don’t you?”
“Yes! Yes! She was a drider! Only very big and with a red mark like yours!”
“A black widow drider?” repeated Lolth as she considered the possibilities, and then her anger shifted elsewhere in sudden realization. “One of my priestesses has made a mistake. She summoned the wrong demon to make a drow a drider!” she concluded, determined to rectify the situation. “If so, this drider must be captured and killed. Kill her and live, Captain Ulrich. She is not to roam free. However, find out who summoned her demon first before you kill her!”
“I shall see it’s done!” offered the orc.
“Yes! You shall!” said Lolth in agreement. “I want them both—the keeper and drider! You will stop at nothing to get them!” She now turned towards her commanding officer; a female drow named Elisha. “Make sure he does not fail. Use as many drow as you have to!”
“My Queen,” suggested Captain Ulrich. “Maybe you ought ta kill all the satyrs now, so tha’ he cannot free them?”
“They are not mine to kill, but my son’s, you moron!” she replied. “Besides! If you kill them, Graybeard will simply leave and return to the surface. If that happens, then I shall lose him,” Lolth carefully considered the possibilities. “See that my son receives no warning. That should keep Graybeard on his path to Ched Nasad. So we keep the satyrs alive and use them as bait! Do I make myself CLEAR?”
The fate of the satyrs was now entwined in the deadly web of Lolth’s plans to recapture Graybeard. She would use them to lure her enemies into a trap.
“Most explicitly,” Ulrich conceded with a deep bow. “I shall not fail ya!”
“You already have!” seethed Lolth. “I should make you a drider if you were a drow, you stupid orc!” Then she told her drow general, “Block all ways to Ched Nasad. Nothing gets in or out!”
Lolth’s fury could not be quelled. Somewhere, an imposter was posing as her and had claimed her prized prisoner. Death would be her only reward.
The boy’s company stirred from their deep slumber from a night of rest and diligently obscured their tracks before pressing forward. Following the winding riverbank, they eventually stumbled upon a steeder ferry, capable of accommodating them all. Seizing the opportunity, they launched a surprise attack on its drow operators. After severing the tether, the ferry drifted downstream, carrying them all away.
Silently gliding upon the glassy obsidian surface, the boy spoke with the confidence of certainty, “We shall certainly leave no more trails for them to follow now.”
“True, we won’t,” agreed Graybeard. “But the enemy is crafty. They may not need trails to follow us.”
“How is that possible?” the boy’s eyebrows deepened in sudden worry and curiosity to know. “Only you know our destination.”
“Lolth is my split-off,” the old keeper said. “Her mind is a perfect mirror image of my own. She might see my purpose quite clearly without my even being aware. However, our luck still holds. Even if she knows, we are still seven and the river current is with us. Besides! I doubt she would guess I would make for Abboth before Ched Nasad. That would require that she knows what I know.” He said with a nod, adding, “So, for now, I think we are safe.”
“Will we be safe at Abboth?”
“Who knows?” Graybeard gave an uncertain shrug. “The city is led by a house of drow loyal to Lolth. They are quite evil. Indeed! They are so evil they have gained many enemies. And the enemy of our enemy is our friend.”
“And you think they might help us?”
“Few drow pass an opportunity to do harm, even to Lolth,” he said with a wink.
“Would you say the same of Leradien?”
“I do not know her,” Graybeard honestly admitted. “Who can predict what is half-drow and half Light Elf as well as demon possessed will do?” He gave thoughtful frown. “With her, every moment is critical, and the shadows of uncertainty already loom over our journey. The path ahead is fraught with peril, and we must remain vigilant. Our next move could determine her fate. One false step and she might—” His voice trailed off, leaving the rest unsaid.
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