proud and ancient sect, thebae'qeshel telphraezzar, the Whisperers of the Dark Queen. I am a priestess of Lolth, as are the other females of my House, but I was chosen to spend many long years as a girl studying thebae'qeshellore. I revere the goddess not only with my service as her priestess, but with the gift of raising the an-cient songs of our race, which are pleasing to her ears. House Melarn has always been proud to raise onebae'qeshelinto the sisterhood of Lolth's service in each generation."
"If your songs are sacred to Lolth, why do they work while other spells fail?" Ryld asked.
"Because the songs possess a power in and of themselves, like a wizard's spells. We do not channel the divine power of the Queen of Spiders to wield our songs. Regrettably, my skill with such things is nothing compared to the divine might I could wield in Lolth's name, if she would restore her favor to me."
"An interesting talent, nonetheless," he murmured. Ryld glanced back down the passageway toward the chamber where the others waited. "It seems quiet enough. We may have some time to wait yet. If I know Pharaun, he will need hours to regain his strength. Tell me, do you playsava?"
Nimor clung to the shadows of a gigantic stalactite, one of many such stone fangs reaching down from the ceiling of Menzoberranzan's vast cavern. Old passages and precarious paths crisscrossed the city's roof, and many of the stalactites were in fact carved into darkly beautiful castles and aeries all the more spectacular for their bold arrogance. Only drow would make homes out of fragile stone spears a thousand feet above the cavern floor. Highborn dark elves frequently possessed innate magic or enchanted trinkets that freed them of concern over heights, and gave little thought to dizzying overlooks that would terrify bats. Their slaves and servants were not so fortunate, and must have found life in a ceiling spire something peculiarly nerve-racking.
The more important ceiling spires were of course magically rein-forced against the inevitable fall, and would not fail unless magic itself gave out - but more than one proud old palace stood dusty and aban-doned at the top of the city, the House that claimed it too weak in the Art to maintain the spells that made the place tenable. It was in just such an empty place that Nimor crouched, leaning out over a dark abyss to study his target below.
House Faen Tlabbar, Third House of Menzoberranzan, lay below him and a short distance to his left. The castle sprawled over several towering sta-lagmites and columns, its elegant balustrades and soaring buttresses belying the underlying strength of the rambling towers and mighty bulwarks of dark stone. Faen Tlabbar's compound was one of the largest and proudest of any in Menzoberranzan that did not sit on the high plateau of Qu'ellarz'orl, the most prestigious of the underground city's noble districts. Instead House Tlabbar's palace clambered up along the southern wall of Menzoberran-zan's great cavern, until its highest spires surmounted the plateau in whose shadow it sat, as if the matrons of the Third House wished to be able to peer over the plateau's edge and gaze enviously upon the manors fortunate enough to be located alongside the exalted House Baenre.
It was an apt analogy for Faen Tlabbar's political maneuverings. Only two Houses stood ahead of them in Menzoberranzan's dark hierarchy: Baenre, the First, and BarrisonDel'Armgo, the Second. Nimor thought it likely that Matron Mother Tlabbar harbored great aspirations for her House. Del'Armgo, the Second House, was strong but with few allies. Baenre, the strongest, was as weak as it had been in centuries. Houses such as Faen Tlabbar gazed on the Baenre and remembered centuries of ab-solute arrogance, humiliating condescension, and they wondered whether the time had come for several lesser Houses to band together and end Baenre's dominance once and for all.
"That would be a merry game to watch," Nimor mused.
He suspected that in such a scenario Baenre might prove stronger than their resentful rivals guessed, but the bloodletting would be spec-tacular. Several great Houses would fall, for Baenre would not go alone into the gentle night. Of course, that would go a long way toward ad-vancing the schemes of the Anointed Blade of the Jaezred Chaulssin.
That would be a play for another day, though. Nimor meant to strike a deep and grievous blow at Faen Tlabbar, not incite them against House Baenre. Ghenni Tlabbar, Matron of the Third House, would die beneath his