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.Because we left ourselves there.You were able to create a new Halisstra, but I was not able to make a new Ryld.I'm here because I deserve to be.If not, the draegloth could never have beaten me."And we would still be together," she said.Tell your friends, he said, that Lolth has taken the Demonweb Pits out of the Abyss.We have been waiting, some of us for months, to feel her pull us across the Astral to her, and only now are we compelled so."Lolth," Halisstra said to the other priestesses, her voice tight with regret, anger, hate, and too much more to bear, "is bringing them home.""The Demonweb Pits is no longer part of the Abyss," Uluyara guessed.She's changing, Ryld said and his thoughts had the feel of a warning.She's changing everything.Halisstra felt Uluyara's grip on her arm tighten, and the priestess whispered to her, "Let him go.There is only one way to serve him now.""W-we can bring him… bring him back," Halisstra stuttered, watching Ryld turn from her and drift slowly away with the other uncaring shades."Not if he doesn't want to go back," Uluyara whispered, and the hand on her arm slipped into a snug embrace.Halisstra wrapped her arms around Uluyara and wept as Ryld dwindled from sight farther and farther along the line of the damned.Chapter Twenty-five"Welcome to the Abyss, corpse," the glabrezu said.His voice was a low, rolling growl."Welcome to my home.""Belshazu," Quenthel said, her scourge in her hand, vipers writhing expectantly.The demon didn't look at her.Instead, he kept his burning eyes locked on Pharaun."I'm going to rip your soul from your body, mage, and eat it raw then vomit it up so it drips all over your quivering corpse and soaks into your shriveling skin and runs into your gaping mouth so it knows that you're dead," the demon ranted."Well," Pharaun replied, "if you say so.""You will die," Belshazu said to Pharaun, "in the shadow of your dead goddess's ruined fortress."The Master of Sorcere saw Jeggred step up next to him from the corner of his eye.The draegloth was growling almost as low and as thunderously as the glabrezu-the demon that happened to be his father.The glabrezu, its severed legs dripping dark blood onto the ancient battlefield, turned slowly to the draegloth and said, "When I'm done with the drow, son, you can join me-have your freedom from the dark elves at last."Jeggred drew in a breath, and Pharaun could tell he was ready to pounce, though the glabrezu was hovering well out of his reach."Jeggred…" Quenthel started but stopped when the draegloth whirled on her."It's meat to me," Jeggred growled."Just another tanar'ri scum.That thing is no parent of mine." He turned to the glabrezu."Call me 'son' again, demon, and it'll still be on your lips when I rip off your head.""Fear not, draegloth," the demon replied with a feral grin."Even if you were full-blood I wouldn't give you a second thought.For a half-breed I won't even bother killing you." Belshazu turned his attention back to Pharaun but spoke to the rest of them."All I want is the summoner.Give me the wizard, and you can go on to meet your Spider Queen.""Only him?" Quenthel asked.Pharaun looked at her, and she tried to avoid his gaze, keeping her attention on the hovering glabrezu.The demon glanced down at his severed legs and said, "The trick with the ice… I had to snip my own legs off." He held up one of his four arms, one of two that ended in a hideous, sharp pincer claw."They won't grow back.At the very least, the whoreson owes me two legs.Give him to me now, and be on your way.""Everyone," Quenthel said, her voice faraway and bored, "step aside."The draegloth growled, and Valas appeared from behind a pile of broken bricks, shifting his feet in an uncharacteristically audible way.Pharaun looked at Quenthel, and she met his gaze evenly."Are you serious?" the wizard asked."Yes," Quenthel replied."You summoned him, you bound him, you froze him in ice.The rest of this expedition is too important to waste fighting every monster we stumble across-not anymore anyway, and not to settle vendettas you bring upon yourself with your own simpleminded carelessness.""Pharaun summoned that demon on your command, Mistress," Valas reminded her, but she didn't acknowledge the scout at all.Pharaun looked at Belshazu, who was quietly laughing, obviously surprised that Pharaun's companions had so quickly and easily sold him out.The wizard scanned the glabrezu quickly and found that he was flying thanks to a thin platinum ring on the little finger of his left hand."It's all right," Pharaun said [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]