Revenge of the Drow

Like the two dwarf fighters, Terry's leg had swollen to balloon-like proportions, meaning that Mira had to cut through his breeches and charm away the poison, using a combination of herbal concoctions and spells. Mira turned to the others, and her timidity returned.

"I have neutralised the poison, but there is something evil and devilish in it, preventing me from drawing it from the wound totally. I am only an apprentice healer and don't have the skill. You will need to go back to the hospital if you want to be cured".

Mira gave the same explanation to the dwarf fighters in their own language, and they chose to return, setting off immediately. Terry, however decided to continue, in spite of urging from Mira to get it seen to. "The poison may hatch out again at any time," she said. "Especially if you do anything strenuous like more fighting".

"How can I be cured totally?" asked Terry.

"You will need to spend a week in the dwarfen hospital. Or alternatively channel the same healing powers in spell form - a cure spell. But since Freda disappeared, none of our priests have been able to summon the power".

"Can the drow priestesses do such a cure?" said Terry, and a dreamy look came over him. Mira felt hurt and disappointed. She was only a learner, but by massaging the spider bite with loving tenderness she had saved his life, which was more than the girl he was mooning over could do.

Jade laughed. "Drow, heal anyone? I used to play music for them during their holy high sessions. Sometimes in the High Temple itself. Oh, the sacrifices they made. The pleading and gibbering I had to put up with. The screaming prisoners they knifed on the altar. The self mutilations in obeisance of the Spider Goddess. But never a whisper of a healing spell. No drow can even stop a bleeding finger."

"Then what happens if a drow gets injured?" whispered Mira, incredulously.

"She dies. But you surprised me. You seemed so timid and weak, but you handled that ugly bloated thing like a seasoned fighter."

"Well, I was pretty sure she was undead when you told me about the devil spiders, even though she was giving off heat. And when you appeared to recognise her, I knew for sure. Our gods of healing who teach us to preserve life, also give us the faith to turn back death."

Jade and Maxi looked at Mira with new respect. Jade's praise had made Mira flush with pleasure. Then when Terry thanked her for saving his life she wriggled in pure rapture. Until Terry ruined it straight afterwards by asking whether the passageway would lead to Elspeth.

"This passageway was built by Xiana, and guarded by one of her minions, still useful after her death. But it was built before she was High Priestess, so probably opens out into the Secretariat Spoke of the complex" said Maxi.

"But Xiana was never in the Secretariat, until she organised the final coup," said Jade. "I was temple slave for the Secretariat, and I never saw her there. This passage must lead to the Priestesses Spoke. Your girl will be there some place, unless she is at the temple."

Terry smiled. Mira pouted.

#

Xiana had spent the last several hours kneeling silently in the pentacle drawn on the polished stone floor of the pentagonal temple at the Hub. It was during these times that she liked to be alone with her Goddess. Alone that is except for the five demonic beings summoned through her spells and hidden behind five secret doors. A trap of her own devising. Four of the secret doors led to a small alcove, just big enough for her hideous demon to stand silently to attention. The fifth led through a short passageway to the sacrificial altar. A place that stank of blood and excrement, because most victims voided their bowels in terror before being dispatched, and it was very difficult to keep it totally clean.

Five braziers smouldered from a sconce beside a wide entrance way at each point of the pentacle, illuminating the five wide passages -- the Spokes -- that led out of the temple. Each Spoke branched off to various underground labyrinths, rooms, chambers, torture caverns, store houses, poison brewing laboratories and other necessary facilities for the five castes of drow society. Eventually each passage would lead to the surface.

Xiana felt at peace with her Goddess. Her small lump of hate joined with the big throbbing mass that was the Spider's as the two diabolical minds plotted ways to suck out all happiness from every known kingdom of the upper and lower realms. Xiana felt the presence of the Spider right beside her, and asked her help to cast her body through the cracks in the fabric of the universe and detect the whereabouts of the half-caste and her pervert lover. Her spell was not powerful enough to detect their exact location; or perhaps some other divine power was blocking it. But one thing she did know. They were getting closer, and should be in her trap in the next day or two.

Xiana had a few other things on her mind too, but bringing them to the Spider in prayerful contemplation never failed to unburden her mind. She had confessed her sins; too much unadulterated sexual pleasure, and too much pleasure in causing pain to others and herself.

The hours kneeling on the stone floor was a penance. It was excruciatingly painful but the pain was of a mundane and chronic type, not likely to induce any pleasure in the inflicting. Xiana felt through her pain that the Spider was forgiving her. "I shall never do otherwise, if You leave me to myself," she intoned in a soft voice. The Spider seemed to understand, and Xiana again determined to strive harder to emulate Her.

Next, Xiana and the Spider cogitated on their slaving operations. The slavers she had sent to the dwarfs were late returning with their captives, so Xiana had sent the üruma to spy on the entrance. So far it had not reported any disturbance, so it looked as if the passage to the surface had not been discovered, or if it had been, it was not being used. As for the side passage to the drow stronghold, Xiana trusted that her servant Meriem would hold back all but a determined assault.

Xiana started to feel pride in the way she had mastered the extremely difficult incantations needed to transform Meriem's mangled and decapitated body into the spider form. Then she stopped herself. Pride was a sin, and she could have done nothing without her Mentor and Guide, leading her through every step of the way.

Xiana chuckled when she thought of Meriem; so devoted, so wanting to serve. Well now she would serve the Spider and her High Priestess in continual torment, neither living nor tasting the peace of death. She would slaughter in hate any that came into her domain, and be fed with the flesh and bones of prisoners that were allowed to run into her web-like lair, thinking they had escaped. Not many people knew that a ghost arakne could not be destroyed until her mistress was. She could be brought down, to be sure, but the corpse would be twitching in ten minutes, dragging itself up in twenty, and fully functional again in sixty. Xiana laughed diabolically at the thought of her pathetic minion, and seemed to hear the echo of rasping laughter in sympathy.

Xiana locked her own mind into that of her undead servant and asked her if anyone had been past her passage. And this is where she made her mistake. For Meriem had guessed where Jade was heading to, but not knowing who she hated more out of Jade and Xiana, told her that nobody had been her way, hoping that her enemies would destroy each other.

Xiana then thought of the next generation -- the hope of her race. Not that future generations had any value in themselves, but they were a necessary part of her plan. Tyrants must have followers, and the more the better. Her oldest babies were now three years old and could start their priestly training; they could even hold the sacrificial knives during the hate sessions. Though she had instructed the nurses not to make them too eager to hurt or maim, lest they let enjoyment of the action deter them from its purpose, which was the ultimate misery of all life everywhere.

Thoughts of the next generation brought her back to considerations of the current one. Some of the priestesses were far too frivolous. Not in causing pain; this was a sin to be sure, but one that bespoke of underlying right motives, and could be easily cured with the right penances. Xiana was more concerned about the worrying outbreak of base affection, which it seemed she could never succeed in stamping out completely . Xiana joined her mind to the greater Mind of her divine mentor and contemplated which of her apostate priestesses should die.

One of the priestesses they contemplated together was Elspeth. On the whole, the two minds had little unease at Elspeth's eventual rise to higher status. Of course Elspeth was insubordinate. Xiana had overheard her speaking out against Xiana's treatment of Freda the dwarf.

But then, though her minions would be surprised to hear this, Xiana and the Spider did not rate insubordination as the worst sin. It showed a certain amount of free thinking and rebellion, which was essential for the followers of the Spider. Insubordinate followers had of course to be taught to fear consequences, and to know who was boss, but this could be done by minor tortures or a few months languishing in a dungeon. Terminal solutions were very seldom necessary. Weakness and sympathy were far more deserving of death.

Xiana had chosen Elspeth to extract information from the human mercenary, and what was more important, to feed him information. And she had done well. Nobody would have known that Elspeth had herself only heard about the murder of Trieste a few days before she passed that knowledge to Terry. Yes, Elspeth was an asset to her cause, and apart from sometimes appearing to lust slightly over some of the human prisoners, she had kept her emotions in check. Xiana mentally tagged Elspeth as a future inductee in her shadowy Secretariat. The Spider seemed to nod in agreement.

Xiana stood up, her knees creaking, the pain shooting through her body, providing further cleansing for her sinful mind. She summoned her Senior Secretariat official who stood trembling in the presence of the Holy of Holies. The arrangements to induct Elspeth had to start immediately. But first there was the little matter of insubordination to attend to. Elspeth must be broken down, and then reformed into a perfect replica of Xiana - cruel, dispassionate and willing only to serve the Spider.

Chapter 7: Journey to the drow

The remaining members of the party marched for another two days. Jade had said nothing, seething over her realisation that she had been the weak link in the fight, and had had to rely on Maxi and Terry to protect her. What was worse was the nature of her defeat. The biter bit. The enchantress enchanted.

When she was not flaying herself with her loathing, Jade spared some venom for Mira. Jade could not help admiring Mira's obvious prowess in rendering the spider-ghost harmless, but she was also envious that this air-headed unworldly girl had upstaged her. So much so that when Mira suddenly stopped and went into a trance, Jade forgot that bringing Mira along had been her idea, and broke her silence by snarling at her. "What are you doing?"

Mira ignored her and continued her chant for several minutes longer, seemingly oblivious to her surroundings. When she had finished she looked around at the other three, who were staring at her.

"We are being spied on," she said. "But I think I blanked it out."

"More healer powers?" asked Jade, with a slight sneer in her voice.

"Very much so," replied Mira timidly, rather frightened of Jade's mood change. "I am part dwarf and part northern human. My mother once got too close to a human wanderer. Maybe this is where I get my affinity with the wide open spaces, which allows me to commune with the nature gods as well as the healers.

Blocking the transmission of long distance astral mind travel is one of their powers. It appears the drow are searching for us. But I think I have sufficiently confused their direction finders."

Jade shuddered. "I know the drow High Priestess spies on everyone. But I never detected it." Reluctantly she continued. "You do have some very useful talents."

Mira blushed, and noticed that Jade was looking at her in that funny way again. Now she knew Jade was an enchantress, she was more aware of the way Jade affected her feelings. But she still could not help liking Jade, even in her sulky mood, and praise from Jade made her happy.

Then Jade suddenly gave a start. "That's it!" she cried. "We're walking into a trap!"

The others started at her blankly.

"Don't you see?" she continued. "They're waiting for us. They know we're coming. They're expecting us to come. Terry's escape was contrived. They fed him information and arranged for him to flee back to the city, where they knew he would relay everything he had been told."

"But does that mean Elspeth is in on the plan?" asked Terry, disappointed.

"She may be, or she may not," said Jade, her mood changing again. "It's possible that she's an innocent dupe. On the other hand, she may be part of Xiana's Secretariat. We just can't be sure. But you know how I feel about priestesses. Now think -- where would she be setting the trap? She doesn't know that we know about the dwarf passage, so we should be safe here for the moment, but she won't be leaving anything to chance."

"Where would Xiana expect us to hunt her out?" asked Maxi.

"The High Temple -- of course," Jade went on excitedly. "I was a temple slave for the Secretariat. She knows that I know that the High Priest communes alone with her Goddess just before dawn. When the High Priestess's throne is safe, nobody dares disturb her in the Holy of Holies. They are scared of the Spider and what she will do. They only attack when her throne is weak, when in their mind the Spider is ready for a succession. That's where she is expecting us to attack her. And I bet that's where she has prepared some nasty surprises."

"I can guess what sort of surprises," said Maxi with a shiver. "Probably some particularly hideous mumbo jumbo from the demon pits -- which I don't believe in of course," he added hastily.

"Are these demon things undead?," said Mira. "Could I banish them?"

"They are stronger undead than the arakne," said Jade. "And they will be many. I wouldn't risk it. No, the best thing is to attack her somewhere else. Somewhere the odds are in our favour. I think Terry gave us a clue where, but I just cannot put my finger on it."

Jade's petulance left her. She was the centre of attention again, fulfilling her role as the brains of the party, and contributing ideas and knowledge. She started thinking, then suddenly gave a start.

"Terry, what was the High Priestess wearing?"

"I told the Council at the time. Nothing at all under her robe."

"Yes, that's what I thought you said. But that's not usual. The torture chamber is not the Holy of Holies, so there is no requirement for formality, but even so, the priestesses presiding over an official function like a torture would normally wear undergarments spun from spider silk. As Maxi so eruditely puts it, it's part of their spider fetish. What were the torturers wearing?"

"I never noticed their pubes," said Terry, "even though they were standing right over me. So I suppose they must have been wearing undergarments. But why this obsession with what everyone was wearing? It was a torture session, not a fashion show."

"But you don't remember exactly what they had on?" asked Jade. Terry shook his head.

"Well that's a typical male," she said scornfully. "Not noticing what women are wearing unless they are naked underneath. And your question shows a complete lack of understanding of drow women. Clothes are very important to the drow. Something you may find to your cost when your girlfriend wants to spend all your salary on them. No drow would attend a ritual improperly dressed. Least of all the High Priestess. And she would never appear in a greater state of undress than her minions. Unless she was interrupted in something."

"There's only one thing I can think of that means taking my clothes off," Maxi commented.

"Exactly," snapped Jade. "We know her eugenic urges, and we know that priestesses are encouraged to mate with the best males around. Maxi must have had his fill of priestly pussy. So the question remains where was she doing it. Because that 's where she will be at her most vulnerable."

Maxi appeared embarrassed and awkward after the 'priestly pussy' comment, and tried to dispel the tension with some bawdy humour. "So we stick her with a sword, where she's expecting some other pointy object."

Terry started to snicker but gulped and turned away as Jade glared at him.

"Something like that," she said. "How do these sessions usually work? Are there guards at the door? Do others like to watch? Is there a bedroom with soft furnishings or is it bang, bang, up against the wall." She looked at Maxi.

"Usually the latter," said Maxi. "Drow don't like to see each others faces. There are usually a few men in the room, which means there is no need for extra guards. They take it one at a time. And the priestess only chooses the best she can get, which means middle to senior officers. Though a junior priestess may have to make do with sergeants. Lesser ranks don't get any pussy at all."

"So Elspeth has participated in these -- rituals," stammered Terry, very upset now.

"Depends what she's like," said Maxi. "Some of the priestesses are little sluts and every officer's cock in the garrison has been up them. Though of course they have to pretend they don't like it. Others are more choosy. Either because sex bores them, or because they want more than just a casual fuck. But total abstinence is frowned on, so all of them have at least one or two drow officers to service them." Terry was silent, mentally praying that Elspeth was the choosy sort.

"Knowing Xiana, she would only have the best," continued Maxi. "They will be pretty good fighters and it may be hard to best them."

"Well can you think of any other plan?" snapped Jade.

Maxi sighed "No, it's probably the best chance we've got."

"Then let's find out where they're doing it," said Jade. "Probably somewhere in the Secretariat Spoke but it could be anywhere. Terry, can you describe the torture chamber again".

"It was pentagon shaped -- with lots of passages leading out of it"

"Did it have a pentacle drawn in the floor?" asked Jade. Terry shook his head.

"I don't recognise the room from my temple slave days. Can you remember which passage the torturers came from, and the High Priest."

Terry shook his head. "As you might have gathered, I had other things on my mind."

"Oh, you men are hopeless," snapped Jade. "I'll have to use a spell."

Before Terry knew what was happening, his gaze was held by Jade's wide green eyes, then suddenly he was back in the torture chamber. He found himself gibbering. "Strapped to the table...flickering lights in each corner. The torturers -- hard dark eyes, purple robes, red gems. Facing me, climbing down a stairwell. No mercy. They stand by the table. Waiting. Then the priestess. Close to my head, on my right. Coming straight at me. Out of a hole in the wall. Beautiful body. No feeling. Purple robes flapping. Nothing underneath. Nodding to the torturers to start. Then they take out this ... Oh help me, all the gods!!

Terry opened his mouth to scream, but Maxi's hand clamped over it. He started trembling and twisting all over, seemingly in agony. Mira shouted at Jade. "Snap him out of it. Can't you do something!"