Pharaun licked his lips.
Quenthel pointed downward with the handle of her whip and shouted an order to Zerevimeel.
The nalfeshnee headed lower. So too did the chasme bearing Danifae and Jeggred. Pharaun followed.
Zerevimeel set down fifteen or so paces to the right of the pass. Pharaun landed beside the towering nalfeshnee. Danifae steered the chasme down perhaps ten paces to the left of the tunnel.
The river of souls flowed between them, and the Pass of the Soulreaver devoured them all.
Quenthel straightened her robes and stared through the line of ghosts at Danifae. Pharaun could see the calculation in Quenthel’s eyes.
The nalfeshnee, his feeble little wings still beating, bent down to Quenthel’s ear and said, so softly that Pharaun could hardly hear, “I could be of assistance to you for the right price. The draegloth would be an enjoyable kill.”
Pharaun could not have agreed more.
Out of the side of her mouth, still staring at Danifae, Quenthel said, “I require no assistance, creature. And this is to be decided by priestesses. You are dismissed. Begone.”
The demon hissed in anger. His muzzle peeled back from his fangs, and he reared up to his full height. Pharaun put his hand to the iron wand of lightning at his belt, just in case. He need not have worried. The demon had no desire to challenge Quenthel Baenre.
Pharaun wondered if Danifae still did.
“Remember our bargain, priestess,” the nalfeshnee said. “You owe me sixty-six souls. I will expect payment when next we meet.”
Quenthel waved a hand dismissively. The nalfeshnee’s eyes narrowed, but he gave no further expression to his irritation. He triggered the innate ability of his kind to teleport and disappeared in a blink.
A short distance away, Danifae and Jeggred stood near the chasme. The fly demon beat its wings and turned a circle in excitement.
“Perhaps my payment now, lovely priestess?” the demon said, and a long tongue emerged from a toothless mouth. Something else long and dripping emerged from his thorax.
Danifae smiled sweetly at the chasme, and he beat his wings harder. The charnel reek from the wings caused Pharaun to wrinkle his nose.
Danifae sidled a step closer to the demon. She licked her lips and said, “Kill this wretch, Jeggred.”
At first, the words did not seem to register with the demon. His wings beat in agitation, and his malformed brow creased in confusion.
“What did you say, priestess?”
Jeggred bounded forward, and the demon at last understood his peril. He flew into the air but Jeggred leaped up and grabbed him by his human forelegs.
The chasme squealed in pain.
“You lied!” he screamed at Danifae, trying to shake Jeggred free.
Danifae laughed and said, “Of course.”
Jeggred, partially lifted into the air by the chasme, grunted and yanked at the demon’s arms.
The chasme squealed and whined; Jeggred roared and tore.
With a wet ripping sound, the draegloth pulled the chasme’s forelegs from its body. Jeggred fell to the ground in a crouch, clutching the two gory sticks of the chasme’s arms.
The chasme wailed with agony, and the sound was so ridiculous Pharaun almost smiled. The demon buzzed in circles overhead, showering them all with gore from the bleeding stumps of its front shoulders.
“You will pay, lying drow bitch!” the demon screamed through its pain. “You will pay. Vakuul does not forget!”
Jeggred threw one of the demon’s arms at it, but the chasme whined indignantly and wheeled aside. The bloody limb landed at Pharaun’s feet.
With one final glare at Danifae, the chasme disappeared, teleporting back to whatever layer of the Abyss it called home.
Jeggred sniffed the other arm, wrinkled his nose, and tossed it away.
Still smiling, Danifae looked through the river of souls to Quenthel. The priestesses stared at one another for a long moment before Quenthel said, “Lolth awaits her Yor’thae beyond the Pass of the Soulreaver.”
Jeggred must have sensed something in the air. He stepped in front of Danifae, his eyes fixed on his aunt. Pharaun drew nearer to Quenthel.
“Mistress Quenthel states the obvious,” Danifae said.
Her small hand was on Jeggred’s back. It took Pharaun a moment to realize that she was signing against his skin, telling him something.
“Mistress...” Pharaun began, but Quenthel cut him off.
“I state the obvious, battle-captive, because the obvious has escaped you since first we set foot on Lolth’s domain.” She punctuated her point with a crack of her whip.
Jeggred’s breath came faster. Danifae removed her hand from his back. She had told him whatever it was she had wanted him to know—or wanted him to do.
Tension sat as thick as mist. Pharaun brought to mind the words to a spell. Quenthel had told him to attack only at her command so he stood ready and waited.
Jeggred stared through the souls and alternately eyed him and Quenthel with undisguised hunger. His battle with the chasme had only whetted his appetite, no doubt.
Danifae touched her holy symbol and said, “And what obvious point have I overlooked, Mistress Quenthel?”
Quenthel’s serpents hissed hate at Danifae.
“Just this,” Quenthel said. “That Lolth requires a sacrifice before her Yor’thae enters the pass.”
She reached back with her whip as though to strike but Jeggred moved faster. Before Quenthel could move, before Pharaun could cast a spell, the draegloth charged Quenthel.
He covered the distance in four bounding strides.
“Do not!” Danifae shouted, but her words did not match the pleased expression on her face.
Taken aback, Quenthel managed a weak swing with her whip but Jeggred caught the serpents in a fighting claw and held them away from him. He shouldered Quenthel’s shield aside and lashed out with a vicious claw strike at her chest.
Armor links flew. The impact knocked Quenthel back two steps.
Jeggred followed up with savage speed, still clutching the hissing whip serpents, which tried futilely to sink their fangs into his iron-hard flesh. Roaring, the draegloth slashed with his free claw. Quenthel recovered herself and batted it aside with her shield, reversed her parry, and struck the draegloth in the face with her shield rim. Several of Jeggred’s teeth flew. The strength of the blow momentarily stunned him.
Taking advantage of the respite, Quenthel yanked the whip serpents free of Jeggred’s grasp with a grunt. Pharaun marveled at the strength granted her by her magical belt. She leaped back a step, spun the serpents over her head, and lashed them at the draegloth. Propelled by the force of her strength, the serpents struck home. Bloody furrows opened along Jeggred’s ribcage. He roared in pain and dived aside, coming to his feet in a low crouch.
Growling, spraying spit, Jeggred pounced forward and unleashed a flurry of blows against Quenthel, blows that would have shredded a rock wall. Quenthel’s shield answered, and there was her armor, but the force of the blows drove her backward. Her whip snapped again, and fangs sank into the draegloth’s flesh.
Pharaun realized that he had been watching the combat too long. He quickly pulled a small leather glove from his piwafwi, moved his closed fists through an elaborate gesticulation, and spoke aloud the words to a spell.
When he finished, a gray disembodied fist as large as a titan’s formed before him. At his mental command it flew at Jeggred. The draegloth never saw it coming, and it struck him on his flank with force enough to crack stone.
The impact cut short Jeggred’s roar and sent him flying through the air. He landed in a roll ten paces from Quenthel, amidst the souls. He found his feet and clawed at the passing spirits to no effect.
With a roar, he charged Pharaun, but the Master of Sorcere interposed the magical fist.