With nothing else for it, he touched his House Mizzrym brooch and stepped out over the cave mouth. For a moment, he hovered there, listening to the darkness below, wondering whether

Danifae and Jeggred would actually dare an ambush. He heard nothing and so descended until he floated just below the cave mouth. There, he withdrew from his pocket a round piece of polished granite, a stone he had purchased from a curio vendor in Menzoberranzan's bazaar, long ago. He cradled it against his palm with his thumb, flattened his hands palms downward, and recited a series of arcane words.

When he finished the incantation, the magic formed a wall of stone over the cave mouth. Its borders melded with and into the surrounding rock, blocking the light from Lolth's sun. The brewing storm and the seething Teeming disappeared behind the wall. The cave fell into welcome darkness, to which his eyes quickly adjusted.

He put the granite back in its place and descended the rest of the way down the shaft. It wove a bit here and there, but moved ever downward. He heard no sounds coming from below and assumed that nothing dangerous lurked there-other than his companions. To be prudent, he pulled another chip of flakefungus from his pocket and readied himself quickly to cast the flesh-flensing spell. He thought of an ancient drow adage: Keep allies within reach of your sword, but keep enemies within reach of your knife. He saw the wisdom of it. Pharaun never felt more uncomfortable than when Jeggred and Danifae were out of his sight.

It was clear to him that Danifae was trying to undermine Quenthel's claim that she was the

Yor'thae. Perhaps she thought to take that title for herself? As absurd as it sounded, Pharaun thought it to be true.

For his part, he was beginning to think that neither priestess was or would be Lolth's Chosen.

Amidst the smoking ruins of Ched Nasad, Nimor stood on the cracked balcony of a once luxurious noble manse. The house's structural wards had saved much of it from destruction when it had fallen to the bottom of the chasm, but it still lay broken and askew on the rocky floor.

Most of Ched Nasad rested in ruins around him. Heaps of rubble and chunks of stone lay scattered and broken about the chasm's bottom like the grave markers for a race of titans. Once,

the city had hung over the chasm on thick calcified webs. Then the duergar had come, the webs had burned under the gray dwarves' stonefire bombs, and the city had fallen.

Nimor smiled at the destruction. He had returned from Chaulssin to look once more upon what his people had wrought.

High above him hung those few of the city's webs that had survived the duergars' attacks bombs. A number of intact buildings dangled in the broken, calcified strands like trapped caveflies, twisting helplessly over the abyss. A handful of minor noble houses, built into the chasm's walls rather than on the webs that once had spanned the abyss, remained largely intact.

Nimor knew that the Jaezred Chaulssin had begun to rebuild the city in their image. Drow in service to the Jaezred Chaulssin worked at the bottom of the chasm, along its walls, and in the surviving webs near the top. The beat of shadow dragon wings whispered in the cavern's depths,

and many of the ruined buildings that lay at the bottom of the chasm had already been melded into the Shadow Fringe. Oily, impenetrable clouds of darkness shrouded the areas that existed simultaneously in both planes.

The transformation would go on for decades, Nimor knew, centuries perhaps. But when it was complete, Ched Nasad would be another Chaulssin. The resurrected Ched Nasad would be one drow city that contained nothing of the Spider Queen or her servants.

Nimor smiled, but softly. The sting of his failure lingered still, overwhelming whatever satisfaction he otherwise would have felt. He had hoped to see not only Ched Nasad transformed but also Menzoberranzan.

He eyed the magical ring of shadow on his fingers, a band of liquid black that wrapped his digit like a tiny asp. Of his many magic items, only his ring and his House brooch had retained their enchantments after Gromph Baenre had cast his spell of disjoining during their combat over

Menzoberranzan's bazaar. Nimor had not yet replaced any of his lost items. He regarded his penury as penance for his failure.

Menzoberranzan. He saw the city in his mind's eye, imagined it lying in ruin about him like

Ched Nasad. .

He shook the image from his head. Menzoberranzan stood, and Lolth had returned. Nimor had failed, and he was no longer the Anointed Blade.

He sighed, fingering his ring.

Patron Grandfather Tomphael had ordered Nimor to return to Ched Nasad and

Menzoberranzan one final time, to look alternatively upon the scene of the Jaezred Chaulssin's success and the scene of their failure. Nimor, of course, would obey the patron grandfather.

Besides, certain matters in Menzoberranzan-a certain bald matter and a certain half-devil matter-required his attention.

"Here is success," Nimor said to himself, taking one final look around. "Now, on to failure."

Without further ado, Nimor called upon the power of his shadow ring to remove him to the

Fringe. When the magic took effect, ruined Ched Nasad vanished, replaced by a shadowy ghost of itself. Only those portions of the city that had been removed to the Plane of Shadow appeared substantive.

Nimor willed open a path along the Fringe to Menzoberranzan, and it opened before him. He stepped onto it, beat his wings, and took to the air. Unbound by the physical rules of the Prime

Material Plane, the Shadow Fringe allowed rapid travel. Swirling ribbons of shadow surged past and through Nimor. The power of the ring and the nature of the Fringe turned a journey of days into a journey of less than an hour.

Presently, he found himself within the shadow correspondent of Menzoberranzan, a ghostly,

dead image of spires, towers, and stalagmite structures. With an effort of will, he pierced the veil between the Fringe and the Prime and found himself hovering in darkness near the top of

Menzoberranzan's cavern. Darkness enshrouded him, rendering him invisible even to the otherwise discerning eyes of any drow who might look up. He gazed down on his failure.

The Jaezred Chaulssin had scried the city, to keep tabs on events even after Nimor had fled.

He knew what those scryings had shown: The forces that he had so meticulously marshaled to conquer Menzoberranzan were falling into disarray.

Vhok and his Scourged Legion were beginning to withdraw, fighting retreating actions through the caverns east of the fungus gardens. No doubt the tanarukks would flee back to their warrens under Hellgate Keep with their hides, if not their dignity, intact. Horgar and his ridiculous duergar forces would not be so fortunate. The duergar had left the rock of Tier Breche a pockmarked, melted, blackened waste, but they had failed to break through-Melee-Magthere,

Arach-Tinilith, and Sorcere all remained in the hands in the Menzoberranyr. The battle there continued still. Explosions and blasts of magical energy denoted the ferocity of the ongoing fight.

Nimor knew it to be futile. Lolth had reawakened; the opportunity to conquer the city had passed.

The Spider Queen once again answered the prayers of her priestesses, and when Arach-Tinilith spat out her daughters and they bolstered the Menzoberranyr forces with their newly regained spells, the duergar would be routed. Few of them would ever leave Menzoberranzan. Unlike

Vhok, Horgar was too blind or too stupid to see it.

Nimor let his eyes linger long on the high plateau of Tier Breche, in particular on the soaring spires of Sorcere. Somewhere within, he knew, was Gromph Baenre. Thinking of the Archmage caused Nimor's blood to seethe. Gromph had destroyed the lichdrow Dyrr- the bazaar was still a smoking ruin from their spell battle-and had been instrumental in thwarting the entire invasion.