Annihilation

"It means, 'Chosen One, " Pharaun explained.

"One. ." Quenthel whispered, shaking her head.

At the same time, Danifae mutely mouthed the word, "Yor'thae."

Quenthel used her eyes to get Pharaun's attention then said, "Our journey is far from over, Master of Sorcere. Lolth has not only returned but she has asked me to come to her, has invited me to be her chosen vessel. This is why she brought me back, all those years ago. This is why she dragged me from the Abyss and back to Menzoberranzan. I was meant to come here, now, and to be her … to be Yor'thae."

Deep in the heart of the First House, in a room protected from everything worth protecting a room from, Triel Baenre watched her brother fight for the life of Menzoberranzan.

He was losing.

She could see what was happening in the Bazaar, every detail of it, through a magic mirror, a crystal ball, a scrying pool, and half a dozen other similar items, most of which had been created by Gromph himself. She paced back and forth across the polished marble floor, looking from scene to scene, angle to angle, as the transformed lichdrow made a mess of the heart of her city.

Wilara Baenre stood in one corner, her eyes darting from one scrying device to another, her arms crossed in front of her, her fingers drumming against her shoulders with barely contained frustration.

"The archmage will prevail, Matron Mother," Wilara said, not for the first time that day.

"Will he?" Triel asked.

It was the first time she'd replied to one of Wilara's hollow reassurances, and it took the attending priestess by surprise.

"Of course he will," Wilara answered.

Triel waited for more, but it became obvious that Wilara had nothing else to say.

"I'm not entirely certain that this is a fight he can win," Triel said, as much to herself as to Wilara. "If we're all being tested and this is Gromph's test, he will pass or fail on his own. If he fails, he deserves to die."

"Is there nothing we can do to help him?" asked Wilara.

Triel shrugged.

"There are soldiers and other mages," the attending priestess went on.

"All of whom are required elsewhere. The duergar still press, even if the tanarukks are turning away," said Triel. "The siege of Agrach Dyrr goes on unabated. . but, yes, there are always more soldiers, always more mages, and there is Bregan D'aerthe and other mercenaries. If the lich kills Gromph I certainly won't let him rampage through the rest of Menzoberranzan turning our citizens to stone and smashing the architecture."

"Why not send those forces in now?"

Triel shrugged again and considered the question. She had no answer.

"I don't know," Triel said finally. "Maybe I'm waiting for a sign from—"

She was back.

Triel fell to the floor, her body going limp, her head spi

The Matron Mother of House Baenre felt every emotion she'd ever known simultaneously and at their sharpest and most intense. She hated and loved, feared and cherished, laughed and cried. She knew the endless expanse of the limitless multiverse and saw in crystal detail the square inch of marble floor right in front of her eye. She was in her scrying chamber and in the Demonweb Pits, in her mother's womb and in the smoldering Bazaar, in the deepest Underdark and flying through the blazing skies of the World Above.

She took a deep breath, and one feeling after another fell away, each a layer of confusion and insanity. Pieces of her mind began to function again, then pieces of her body. It took either a few minutes or a few years—Triel couldn't be sure how long—for her to realize what had happened and sort through the sensation that had been so familiar all her life, then was gone, then returned.

Lolth.

It was the fickle grace of the Queen of the Demonweb Pits.

Triel didn't try to stand at first but lay there and stretched, luxuriating in the wash of power, exulting in the return of Lolth.

Gromph knew of so many ways to kill someone, he'd forgotten more than most drow ever heard of. There were spells that would kill with a touch, kill with a word, kill with a thought, and Gromph searched his mind for precisely the right one as he ran to both avoid the rampaging gigant and keep it contained in the ruined Bazaar.

He wore the skull sapphire that gave him even more choices and afforded him protection from negative energy—like Nimor's enervating breath. In his memory he stored a few more, and in time Gromph settled on one spell, with some input from Nauzhror and the small circle of Sorcere necromancers. The archmage gathered the Weave energy within him and brought the words and gestures of the incantation to mind. However, in order to cast the spell—and it was a powerful spell indeed—the archmage would have to stop ru

It wasn't the first time that the battle with Dyrr came down to timing. Would he have enough time to cast the spell before the gigant rolled over him?

We can help you choose your moment, Nauzhror said.

I know, Gromph answered, but there are always. . variables.

The archmage stopped ru

The gigant looked down at him, bathing Gromph in the light from its mad blue eyes.Gromph was sure he had time. The animated, petrified drow were too far away and moving too slowly to be of any concern, and the gigant had been slapping its tail around the Bazaar at random, as if Dyrr had little control over his new body. Gromph trusted in that.

He was wrong.

One set of trigger words from completing the spell, the enormous black tail of the blackstone gigant rolled over him. Gromph felt the words stop in his throat and felt his joints stiffen then nothing.

Triel stood and looked from scrying device to scrying device, trying to sort out what she was hearing. The magically transmitted voices of a hundred mages, priestesses, and warriors filled the air in an incoherent tangle of confusion and undisguised bliss. The doors of the scrying chamber burst open, and a priestess whom Triel recognized but whose name she couldn't instantly recall staggered into the room. Tears streamed down her black cheeks, and her mouth worked in silent, incoherent attempts to put into words what she, Triel, Wilara, and every other servant of the Queen of the Demonweb Pits all across the endless expanse of the multiverse had experienced.

The matron mother's attention fell on one image: Gromph, petrified.

He had lost. The lich, in its freakish monster form, had turned the Archmage of Menzoberranzan to stone.

Triel felt her jaw tighten then she stood for a moment, letting the anger wash through her.

"Is this a sign?" she asked the Spider Queen.

Lolth didn't answer, but Triel knew she could if she wanted to.

"It's a sign," the matron mother whispered.

Triel pressed her fingertips together, bent her neck in a slight bow, and willed herself to the Bazaar. There was a momentary feeling of upside down weightlessness, a black void, then she was standing in a deep crack in the stone floor of her city's marketplace. The blackstone gigant reared up high above her, apparently having sensed her passage through the dimensions from House Baenre to the Bazaar. The creature opened its mouth to roar at her, but Triel spoke a few words, and it froze. The great, thrashing tail came to a sudden stop. It was as if time itself had taken a moment's pause. Smoke still rose around her, and the animated stone drow lumbered on.

"This has gone on long enough, lich," Triel said, "all of it. I will have no more dead drow, no more of my city ruined, no more challenges to my power or to the power of Lolth."