Kraanfhaor's Door, he suspected, would open only to someone who knew how to use his own, very personal, knock.

Q'arlynd understood why he had hidden his hand from view. Why he would hide his hand from view.

"Right," he said. "Time to get this thing open."

He handed the staff to Eldrinn then turned, faced the door, and raised his hand.

Halisstra stared at the ghost that floated a few paces away. The spirit stared back at her with hollow, haunted eyes. Behind the ghost, a drow female in gray robes and skullcap slipped quietly out through the door, exiting the ruined building.

The spirit's voice was a chill whisper. "You serve Lolth?"

Halisstra gave a feral grin. "I was the Lady Penitent. But no more. I'm dead."

"Dead?" The spirit laughed softly. "No. You live."

Halisstra blinked in surprise. She was alive? She glanced down at herself and saw her bruises fading, the slow knitting of the flesh she'd scraped in her tumble from the portal. The sight sent a chill through her. She hadn't died on the Negative Energy Plane. Lolth, once again, had forced her to live.

"No," she snarled in dismay.

The spirit drifted closer. "You wish to die?"

Halisstra took a step back. "Where am I?" She glanced around. "What is this place?"

"The Acropolis of Thanatos."

Halisstra noted the rings on those ghostly fingers. "You serve Kiaransalee."

"Yes."

Through the ghost's translucent body, Halisstra spotted a tiny spider on the wall behind the spirit. Her eyes widened. Lolth's sign-in Kiaransalee's stronghold. Halisstra hadn't arrived by chance. The Spider Queen had sent her.

A test!

Halisstra flexed her claws. Her eyes locked on the spirit. Before she could spring, however, a commotion erupted outside. Halisstra heard several female voices, singing a hymn, and a male voice, shouting an insult. The ghost started, let out a whispered curse, then slipped through a wall, disappearing.

Halisstra hurried to the doorway and peered out.

Five priestesses of Eilistraee stood in a circle, swords in hand. With them was a male wearing cloth-of-gold and a skullcap. They were surrounded by more than a dozen of Kiaransalee's priestesses. Gray-robed Crones bore down on them, cackling and chanting.

Halisstra hesitated. What did Lolth expect her to do? Slay the living? The dead? Both?

One of Eilistraee's priestesses-a halfling-burst from the circle, whirling a sling over her head. Halisstra had been spotted! That decided it. She leaped from the ruined building. She, too, could fight with song-with her bae'qeshel magic. But even as she began to sing, the halfling's stone thudded into her chest and smashed to pieces against her hardened skin. Silence enveloped her.

The halfling halted and fitted another stone to her sling. She didn't see the spirit-Crone rising out of the stone behind her. Another of Eilistraee's priestesses spotted it and rushed the spirit, sword raised. Before she could get close, the ghostly Crone opened her mouth in a wail Halisstra couldn't hear. Like stalks of scythed wheat, the priestesses of Eilistraee fell.

Halisstra snarled, envying them.

Now only the Crones remained. No matter. Halisstra would still do her best to prove herself. She lashed out with a fist, snapping the neck of a nearby Crone. She tore a second to pieces with her claws.

The ghost-Crone turned, her pale face a study in rage. Her features stretched, thinned, became even more ghastly. When the priestess shrieked, Halisstra could feel waves of magical fear billowing toward her. Her body, however, was a rock that parted this chill current. The magical fear skewed off to each side, leaving her unscathed.

Halisstra taunted the spirit in silent speech. Kill me. Lolth dares you to try.

Mention of the goddess's name maddened the spirit. She howled loud enough to send a tremble through the stone on which Halisstra stood. Something hit the ground next to Halisstra's foot in utter silence, exploding into white fragments: a skull. Halisstra glanced up. The building she'd just exited stood in an enormous cavern with a knobby white ceiling. Loosened by the ghost's wailing, other skulls tumbled from it. Through this ghastly rain, the ghost drifted forward.

Halisstra threw open her arms in invitation.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw one of the gray-robed females pounce on a body that had just rolled into view out of nowhere. As the female bent, a sword blade skewered her eye and exploded out of the back of her skull. The blade yanked back, disappearing. A drow leaped into view through an invisible gate-a female who was naked, bruised, and holding a singing sword.

Cavatina. She had escaped the Abyss!

The Darksong Knight's eyes locked accusingly on Halisstra, who made out the word without hearing it: "You!"

Halisstra whirled and sprinted back to the hollowed-out building. The ghostly Crone flew after her-moving faster than Halisstra had anticipated. Just as Halisstra reached the doorway, the ghost struck her back and flowed through her, boiling out of her chest in a chill white cloud.

Emptiness rushed into Halisstra in an icy wave, draining her of all sensation. She stumbled and fell. As she tumbled through the air toward the black sphere, she saw Cavatina bearing down on the ghost from behind, sword in one hand, holy symbol in the other, her body and weapon wreathed in twined auras of radiance and shadow. Then the Darksong Knight thrust her sword into the ghost's back. The ghost whirled, Cavatina's blade still within her spinning torso, and plunged her dagger into Cavatina's throat.

For the space of a heartbeat, the two glared at one another, eye to eye. Then the ghost exploded into a thousand fragments of mist. Cavatina slumped to the ground, blood pumping from her throat. And Halisstra was sucked into the void.

Q'arlynd traced the House Melarn glyph on the door with a forefinger. Just as Zarifar had observed, it resembled a dancing drow: triangle head; two strokes down for arms, one hand turned down, the other up; two angled strokes that were bent legs, each ending in a crescent representing a foot.

Q'arlynd lowered his hands. He waited for the door to open, barely daring to breathe. This was it, the moment he'd been striving toward for so long. A moment more, and wealth unheard of would fall into his hands.

He kept watch on his five apprentices. He'd ushered them all to his right, to a spot where he could watch for sudden moves. Each looked tense, expectant. Even Zarifar leaned forward, eyes on the door.

For several painfully long moments, there was only silence.

"Huh," Baltak grunted. "It didn't work."

Q'arlynd wet his lips. He could see that. He'd try again. He raised his hand and touched the door…

And felt a bulge rise under his fingertip. A bulge with a sharp point.

A kiira! Expelled from the door.

With trembling fingers, he eased it out of the block of carved stone. Gleaming crimson against his dark fingers, hexagonal in cross section, it was half the length of his little finger and tapered to a point at each end.

Eldrinn's hand twitched in a silent gesture: the betrayal Q'arlynd had been fearing, but from an unexpected source. With a thought, Q'arlynd activated his ring, rendering all of his apprentices rigid. Then he shook his head. "Eldrinn. I never thought you'd be the one to-"

"Cahal!" Piri cried. He lunged forward and slapped a hand against Q'arlynd's cheek-a bare-fingered hand.

Q'arlynd leaped away from Piri, but too late. The left side of his face was already numb. A cold, prickling sensation spread down his neck, toward his heart. Poison! It didn't fell him, however. As a boy, Q'arlynd had been deliberately exposed to several common poisons to inoculate him against the worst of their sting.