Ascendancy of the Last

PRELUDE

The sava board hung in mid-air, a bridge across an endless divide.

On one side of this line lay the Demonweb Pits, a vast plain of tortured rock under a purplish-black sky. An enormous black spider with red eyes dominated this landscape: the goddess Lolth, in one of her eight aspects. Sticky white webs stretched from her body to points near and far within her realm. They zigzagged back and forth between the spires of black rock that twisted toward the sky, and filled the many jagged craters that pocked the ground. Tiny bulges pulsed through these hollow webs: creatures, mortal and otherwise, who had found their way into her realm, either through death or deliberate folly. Muffled screams and moans came from within, bleeding out into to the sulfurous air.

On the other side of the divide stood a forest: Eilistraee's realm. A wind carried a whisper of song through tall trees, rustling branches heavy with moonstones. Half of the fruitlike orbs retained their original coloration-milky white with glints of shifting blue. The rest had darkened to a shadow black that drank in the moonlight dappling the forest. All lent a sweet perfume to the air.

Under these branches stood the goddess herself, a tall, lithe figure with coal black skin and moon-pale hair that hung to her ankles. Once, she had walked proudly naked through her realm, but now she wore a loose black shirt and trousers that hid her feminine curves. A mask-black, but glinting with moonlight as her breath stirred it-hid her face from the eyes down.

Eilistraee's twin swords hung beside her hips, suspended by song and magic. As the goddess contemplated the sava board, she played with an assassin's dagger, absently twirling the blade by its strangle cord.

Spotting something, she stiffened. "What is this, Lolth? Another of your distractions?"

Lolth paused in her web spinning, tore her abdomen free of the sticky strands, and scurried closer. Faint wails poured from the severed strands of silk that fluttered in her wake. She lowered her head until her palps brushed the board. "I see nothing amiss."

Eilistraee flipped the dagger and caught it by the hilt. She pointed the weapon at the sava board. "There."

"Ah." Lolth's spider mouth smiled.

On the board stood hundreds of thousands of playing pieces. Slaves, Priestesses, Wizards, and Warriors stood alone or in clusters on lines that radiated from the players' respective Houses. At the spot Eilistraee pointed to-a spot uncomfortably near the heart of her House-the board had grown spongy. One of her Priestess pieces was slowly sinking into this spot. Already it was ankle-deep.

Lolth chuckled. "Looks like you're going to lose more than one piece."

Other purplish-red stains appeared on the board, all of them close to Eilistraee's House. They bulged. Figures rose from them: priest pieces that had not been in play before. All had the faces of drow, but with bodies like blobs of hardened wax.

Anger blazed red in Eilistraee's eyes. "Ghaunadaur," she growled. "And his fanatics." The swords at her hips thrummed their displeasure. She pointed her dagger accusingly at Lolth. "Leave was neither asked, nor given, for another to enter our game."

"Do not accuse me of cheating, daughter," Lolth replied. "The Ancient One heeds no Mistress. Ghaunadaur was old even before Ao's time. The god of slime comes and goes as he will. I neither command nor compel him."

"You drove him from the Abyss once before."

"And like a boil, he rises once more. Perhaps this time, you'll lance him for me?"

Eilistraee fumed. She had no doubt that Lolth was behind this. Even as she watched, several of her other pieces sank knee-deep in the spongy board. These spots of corruption, as dark as bruises on fruit, were spreading, joining together. If left unchecked, they would completely encircle Eilistraee's House, cutting off a large number of her pieces from the rest of the board.

Lolth must have maneuvered Ghaunadaur into choosing this moment to strike, but why? Eilistraee scanned the sava board, searching for the answer.

Then she saw it: the move Lolth must have hoped she wouldn't spot.

Eilistraee reached for her strongest Priestess piece, the one that held the curved sword. When she saw Lolth flinch, she knew she'd made the right choice. She moved the piece forward along a path that allowed it to spiral into the very heart of Lolth's House. The move wasn't an attack on Lolth's Mother piece, but it accomplished the next best thing. It blocked the Mother piece completely, preventing it from moving. Unless Lolth found a way to take the Priestess, her Mother piece would be held out of play.

Taking out the Priestess piece Eilistraee had just moved, however, didn't seem likely. It was in an unassailable position, protected on all sides.

Eilistraee leaned back, satisfied. "Your move."

Lolth's palps twitched. Her abdomen pulsed restlessly, and the webs of her realm quivered in response. She studied the board with her unblinking eyes. At last she rocked back on her eight legs, resting her bulbous abdomen on the ground.

"Perhaps luck will favor me," she said. She shifted into her drow aspect and reached for the dice. They were as they had been since Eilistraee had made her throw, earlier in the game: two octahedrons of translucent moonstone, each with a spider trapped deep within. Seven sides bore numbers; the eighth, a full-moon symbol representing the numeral one. One circle was the solid white of a full moon; the other dark, with only a new-moon sliver of white on one side.

"One throw per game," Lolth said. "I'll take it now."

"I thought you preferred to weave your own destiny."

"That I do, daughter," Lolth said in a silken voice. She rattled the dice in cupped hands.

Eilistraee waited, tense and silent. If Lolth threw double ones, Eilistraee would be forced to sacrifice one of her pieces. She knew which one Lolth would choose: the Priestess that threatened Lolth's Mother piece. Yet there was little cause to worry. The odds of both dice landing circle-uppermost were sixty-three to one. An unlikely throw. Except that Eilistraee herself had accomplished it earlier in the game, forcing Lolth to sacrifice her champion, Selvetarm. And now it was Lolth's turn to try.

Eilistraee nodded at the dice Lolth rattled between her slim black hands. "No tricks," she warned. "If I see any web sticking to those dice, I'll demand a re-roll."

Lolth arched a perfect white eyebrow. She wore the face of Danifae, her Chosen-the female she had consumed upon ending her Silence. Her features were beautiful: the lips seductive, the cheekbones high, the eyes a delicate hue. Yet her expression was as cold as winter ice.

"No webs," Lolth promised.

Then she threw.

The dice clattered onto the board between the pieces. One die rolled to a stop immediately, full moon symbol uppermost. The second came to rest against one of Lolth's Priestess pieces. The die lay edge-uppermost, balanced halfway between the eight and the one.

"The die is cocked," Eilistraee said. "The roll is-"

The spider inside it twitched.

The die toppled, landing moon-uppermost. The new moon. Slowly, its stain spread throughout the die, rendering it as black as the Spider Queen's heart.

"You cheat!" Eilistraee cried.

"Of course," Lolth said with a smile.

Eilistraee turned her face skyward. "Ao! I require a witness, Lord of All, and your judgment. Lolth has broken the rules, and must forfeit the game."

Ao's reply came not in words or gestures, but as a sudden knowing. The dice, he revealed, had always been loaded. Moonlight had tipped the balance, the first time. Lolth had arranged this-a form of cheating, it was true-but the first result had been in Eilistraee's favor. The second die roll would also stand.

Ao had spoken.

Eilistraee stared at the empty place on the sava board where the Spider Queen's champion had once stood. "You wanted Selvetarm to die. You arranged it."

Lolth gave a lazy shrug. "Of course. And now it's your turn to lose a piece of my choosing."

"No," Eilistraee whispered. A tear squeezed from eyes that had turned a dull yellow. It trickled down the goddess's face, and was absorbed by Vhaeraun's mask.

"Yes." Lolth answered. Smiling cruelly, she extended a web-laced hand to point at a Priestess piece. "That one. I demand her sacrifice. Now."