Reflexively, it clamped down on his hand.

Pharaun closed his eyes just as his universe exploded in orange light and searing heat. He felt some of his hair melt, felt the flesh of his arm, chest, and face char. He could not contain a scream.

The force of the blast blew apart the chwidencha atop him, reducing it instantly to ash.

Hisses, growls, and screams sounded all around him, audible above the explosion. He smelled the stink of burning flesh. His own, no doubt.

It was over in one agonizing heartbeat.

He opened his eyes and found himself staring up into the dark sky above. For a moment, he had the absurd thought that his spell had charred the clouds, but then he realized that the storm was gathering above them.

Blinking, dazed, he shook the charred chwidencha pieces from his body-they were little more than chunks of seared flesh-and slowly sat up. He wiped the blackened blood from his face and nose and blinked until his blurry vision cleared. His hand was a blackened, seared piece of meat.

It did not yet pain him, but it soon would.

He looked around and saw that the fireball had wrought a perfect sphere of devastation. A

circular swath of blackened and partially melted rock denoted its boundaries. He had not burned the sky, but he had nicely burned the earth. He took a professional's pride in the damage it had done.

Within the circle, Jeggred sat on his four hands and knees, chest heaving, eyes blinking. A

seared chwidencha corpse lay in pieces under his claws, and chwidencha legs dangled from his mouth. Bleeding but only mildly burned, the draegloth eyed Pharaun coldly as he spat the legs to the ground and climbed to his feet.

"You'll need to do better than fire, mage," the draegloth said, his voice raspy.

To Pharaun's surprise, Danifae and Quenthel both had survived too. They were burned and smoking, and minor cuts and bruises covered them both, but they lived. Quenthel stood on the far side of the blast radius, returned to normal size. Her serpents, covered in ash, hissed at Pharaun.

He frowned, wishing he had at least put them down.

Danifae stood on the other side of the blast, leaning on her morningstar for support. She must have regained her feet and her weapon during the combat.

A score or so chwidencha carcasses, charred, smoking, and stinking, lay scattered about the battlefield.

"What in the Abyss did you do?" Danifae demanded, then she coughed. Claw scratches crisscrossed the fireball-pinked flesh of her face.

Saved your hide, unfortunately, Pharaun thought but did not say.

Instead, he replied, "A spell went awry, Mistress Danifae."

"Awry?" Quenthel asked. Much of her hair was singed, but she otherwise looked to have avoided most of the effect of the fireball. "Indeed." She coughed. "If your spell went awry, mage,

then you merit no credit for ending the combat."

Pharaun smirked through his broken nose and bowed as best as his wounded body allowed.

The bite wound in his stomach throbbed, and his hand was in agony.

Danifae glared at him and added, "Next time, male, you are to provide a warning before another of your spells. . goes awry."

Pharaun snorted with disdainful laughter and instantly regretted it. Blood shot from his nose,

and pain wracked his face.

At that, Jeggred offered a snort of his own.

Through his pain, Pharaun said to Danifae, "And you might have warned me a bit earlier than-"

A scrabbling from outside the circle drew Pharaun's eye, and he trailed off.

All of them followed his gaze.

The Teeming continued around them but that was not what concerned him.

Nearly a score of chwidenchas rose smoking from the rocks outside the blast radius. All had twisted legs and melted flesh and hair, but they too had survived the blast. They hissed, raised their front claws, and started tentatively forward.

"Perhaps the combat isn't ended, after all," Pharaun observed and took some satisfaction in the acid look Quenthel shot him.

Quenthel cracked her whip, and the serpents offered a hiss at the chwidenchas. Danifae brandished her morningstar and stepped near Jeggred. The draegloth threw back his head and uttered a roar that shook stones.

Pharaun let his companions dangle for a moment before he said, "But then again, perhaps it is over." He'd had his fill of chwidenchas for the day. "Draw near," he said to them, and looked directly at Danifae. "You are hereby warned."

His companions shared a look and hurriedly backed near him as the chwidenchas slowly scuttled forward. Pharaun took a pinch of phosphorous powder from the inventory he kept organized in his piwafwi's pockets, cast it in the air, and spoke the words to a spell. When he finished, a semi-opaque curtain of green fire whooshed into being, a ring of flames twenty paces tall that burned between them and the chwidenchas. It danced merrily, casting them all in a sickly green light.

"That should keep them a while," he said.

His companions offered no thanks, but he took some satisfaction when even the whip-serpents sagged with relief.

With nothing else to be done for the moment, Pharaun said, "Pardon me, all," before he pushed one nostril closed with a finger, blew out a gob of blood and snot, then did the same for the other side.

He was a bit embarrassed by it all-it was something Jeggred might do-but he had little choice.

He could hardly breathe. Pharaun shook his throbbing head to help clear it and drew a handkerchief from an inner pocket and wiped off his face as best he could. The white silk came back black with ash and red with blood.

Through the ring of flames, Pharaun saw the chwidencha circling, watching them through the breaks in the fire. Beyond the chwidencha, he still caught glimpses of the violence of the

Teeming.

"How long, mage?" Quenthel asked.

"Not long enough, unfortunately," he answered. "Perhaps a quarter hour. How long does this

Teeming last?"

Quenthel belted her whip and shook her head. Pharaun wasn't sure if that meant she didn't know or simply didn't want to answer.

"It lasts as long as Lolth wills it," Danifae offered, belting her own weapon. She ran her fingers over the scratches on her face, checking their depth.

"Hardly helpful, Mistress Danifae," Pharaun said. "And how convenient for us that her will caused it to occur just after we arrived here."

"Tread carefully, mage," Quenthel warned.

"Indeed," Danifae said, eyeing him.

Pharaun was tempted to ask then and there why the chwidencha had answered neither

Quenthel's nor Danifae's commands, but one look at Quenthel's whip made him think better of it.

Instead, he said, "I think it ill-advised to travel overland while this continues. Chwidencha may prove the least of our concerns. It appears the Spider Queen has decided to make the

Teeming part of her test."

The priestesses said nothing but looked out through the curtain of green fire, their expressions distant and unreadable. Perhaps they too were wondering why the chwidencha had not responded to their power.

Finally, Danifae said, "We should take shelter for a time, let the Teeming run its course. Then we can travel overland again."

Jeggred eyed the chwidencha with hungry eyes. "The wizard said the wall of fire will last only a quarter hour. What shelter will we find in so short a time?"

"The caves," Pharaun said.

All of them looked first to Pharaun, then at the ground, to the holes that surrounded them.

"Why not atop one of the tors?" Danifae asked, pointing at one of the innumerable spires of black stone that dotted the plane. "Few spiders seem able or willing to scale their heights."

"Look to the sky, Mistress Danifae," Pharaun answered. Already the sun was invisible behind a wall of black storm clouds. "I think it would be safer and more comfortable, underground."