"Yes, Gord. Are you sure—"

"You two must trust me on this. We must make an entrance upon Mezzafgraduun, and gam the palace of Graz'zt thereafter. We have no guards, no army, nothing to demonstrate our might. Yes, I do believe we could accomplish the journey without mishap, and after we cut down a few thousand of the demonking's own, he might be willing to hear what we have to propose to him. But that would be a poor way to begin a delicate negotiation. Graz'zt would be smarting from the loss of face and the loss of his soldiers, and the loss of the Eye would then burn as a midsummer sun on the brow of a serf."

Gord gestured around, taking in the whole sweeping harshness of the fell wild. "From this barren we will bring an escort of creatures which the great amongst demonkind hold deadly and fierce. So many will we bend to our will that the loss of a few from combats in the jungles of Mezzafgraduun, and from whatever heat and pestilences will be there as well, will not detract from the spectacle of our appearance before the capitol of the ebon monarch." He paused, looking at his old comrade first, then at Leda.

"Why do you look at me so?" she asked.

"To gain your confidence — only I keep forgetting just how breathtakingly lovely you are, so my eyes lingered overlong."

Drow elves are of black complexion, a hue as glossy and ebon as alabaster is shining white. At his words Leda flushed, and her ebon cheeks were brightened as if suddenly highlighted by fiery opalescence. "Stop that! You make me feel as if I am a giddy child, and in this place you need a far different sort of companion."

"Do stop the billing and cooing, you two. If this craze-brained scheme is to work, we must get to it — and mind our asses in the process! See — there crouches something now, come to devour us all as you flirt!"

* * *

The particular horror the bard had pointed to fell to a saurian behemoth in a duel of mutual destruction immediately after the strange procession entered the ringing rain forest of Mezzafgraduun proper. It was fortunate for the three that all of the demonbrutes they had by now subdued and forced to form their train were swift, for the great stratum was immense in its dimensions. At the astounding rate of fifty leagues per day the three crossed forest and swamp, and still it took them a sennight to pass from there to the sooty-grassed savanna beyond.

It was fortunate as well that they had little need for rest, let alone actual sleep. Some of the things in tow were as cunning as they were ravenous and deadly. Two demon-brutes were executed in turn for their insistent attempts to savage and devour the humans. Three of the monsters succumbed in the sweltering heat of the grassland; another was killed in a fight with a pack of myriapod carnivores with shovel-toothed mouths set in wolverinelike heads. Thus, by sheer chance, they passed through the thousand miles of jungles and arrived upon the central plateau of the demonking with exactly a dozen of the huge things still alive and full of ferocity.

The plateau was populated by many demons. As soon as the humans and their caravan of horrors left the obscuring foliage, word flashed through the place. When they had come within a hundred miles of Graz'zt's own citadel, the three were met by an army of demons, the ebon demonking himself at their head.

Graz'zt, just as all other mighty ones of the netherspheres, was cognizant of the humans' intrusion, of Infestix's fate, and of the transfer of the Theorpart the daemon had held to the hands of another. Again as with all others, though, the great Graz'zt had been unable to determine exactly what was occurring, where the Theorpart was located, and why things transpired as they did.

The defeat of Infestix had resulted in the hurried departure of Demogorgon with his hordes. That had been a boon, no doubt. Certain minor nobles had again sided with him, and thus Graz'zt found the ranks of his defending armies replenished and almost solid again. Then again, Vuron's return, with Nergel and Palvlag and the remnants of their force, gave the demonking both added power and a reserve. Scouts and mobile companies only were needed to cover the borders of his empire away from the lines where Iuz and the allied demon lords attacked. Graz'zt was fighting a one-front war again.

He had dismissed Vastyi the Toadmaster to return to Oerth and harry the realm of Iuz there. Kostchichie and his battalions of demon-ogres and demon-giants now commanded the left front, Yeenoghu the right, and Vuron the central force — that last despite the albino's disgrace at having lost the Eye of Deception.

Oh, yes! Graz'zt knew full well the treachery of the drow Eclavdra — no, her name was Leda! He had forced the truth out of Vuron. It had been a near thing for the albino. Graz'zt had considered executing his steward, and in fact imprisonment and torture had been commenced when the shift in power sent tremors through the Abyss as would an earthquake. The force at Graz'zt's disposal had been cut by almost a third, but the power of his foes had been reduced by half. On a strict reckoning of arcane energies, the demonking now had parity with the attackers, although the innate powers of his foes, and their numbers in massed soldiers, still heavily favored them.

"What would you have me do with you, faithless dog?" he had demanded of the battered Vuron.

"Free me to serve you, my King," the stick-thin albino had rasped. "Even thus, Lord, I sense that there is new hope arising for you. The . . . the . . . object I allowed to be stolen from you is not in the hands of an antagonist!"

"No, you pale fool? It now rests in Elazalag's possession on iyondagur!" Graz'zt paused and watched Vuron as he informed the demonlord of that. He and the ruler of the sundered nine clans of the Abat-dolor were bitter enemies. "What would you suggest I do about that?"

Vuron hesitated only for the space of a heartbeat or two, then spoke through his dry and half-crushed throat. "Make peace with Princess Elazalag, my King. Offer to reunite all the lands of your race, tell her you wish her to rule beside you as queen. Promise anything, do anything. She will bring not only the return of your object of power. Lord — Elazalag will come with her wild warbands of Abat-dolor warriors, the hippokeres squadrons. With such force at your disposal, I can — you can — stop your enemies in their tracks, even launch a counterstroke into the marches of Shubgottla____ "

He ceased speaking, for the dark demon was laughing. "Ah! Wouldn't that petal-skinned Baphomet snort and bellow in rage and fear at the devastation of his own lands?" Graz'zt said with a hearty voice. "You never cease to amaze me, Vuron. You are made of stuff not found elsewhere in demonium, I think Even while in extremis, you plan and advise as if seated at my right hand on a padded chair of honor. You counsel reconciliation with she who is your worst enemy!"

"That is so, my Liege."

"Free him!" Graz'zt commanded. The skuda guardian nearby moved on scorpion legs to obey, and in a minute the albino stood on his feet again, reeling but alive. "I have not fully exacted punishment for your failure yet Steward," the demonking said stonily. "You are too useful for me to kill just now, however. You will return to the front, assume command of the center, and defend my realm with your life."

"Yes, King Graz'zt," Vuron croaked with as much vitality as he could muster.

"And I will take your suggestions too respecting Elazalag. If they prove sound, then she and my Eye will soon be here. I will thank you then, but she might well demand your head as her price for coming."

"So be it. I will serve as you command."

* * *

Now the albino worked at the defense, his personal emissaries called upon the court of iyondagur, and Graz'zt stood facing the human niggling who had dared to enter the Abyss and steal a Theorpart. With the demonking were his best and most efficient regiments. Ten thousand strong, the guard, with twice that number just out of sight to either hand, marching at quick-step to encircle the brash interlopers. Graz'zt himself held Unbinder.