the House DeVir that died some years ago?"
"I am the only survivor” Alton admitted.
"And you killed Gelroos-Gelroos Hun'ett-and took his
place as master in Sorcere” the matron reasoned, her voice
a snarl. Doom closed in all around Alton.
"I did not. . . 1 could not know his name. . . He would have
killed me!" Alton stuttered.
"I killed Gelroos” came a voice from the side.
SiNafay and Alton turned to Masoj, who once again held
his favorite two-handed crossbow.
"With this” the young Hun'ett explained. "On the night
House DeVir fell. 1 found my excuse in Gelroos's battle with
that one” He pointed to Alton.
"Gelroos was your brother” Matron SiNafay reminded
Masoj.
"Damn his bones!" Masoj spat. "For four miserable years I
served him-served him as if he were a matron mother! He
would have kept me from Sorcere, would have forced me
into the Melee-Magthere instead”
The matron looked from Masoj to Alton and back to her
son. " And you let this one live” she reasoned, a smile again
on her lips. "You killed your enemy and forged an alliance
with a new master in a single move”
" As I was taught” Masoj said through clenched teeth, not
knowing whether punishment or praise would follow.
"You were just a child” SiNafay remarked, suddenly real-
izing the timetable involved.
Masoj accepted the compliment silently.
Alton watched it all anxiously. "Then what of me?" he
cried. "Is my life forfeit?"
SiNafay turned a glare on him. "Your life as Alton DeVir
ended, so it would seem, on the night House DeVir fell. Thus
you remain the Faceless One, Gelroos Hun'ett. I can use
your eyes in the Academy-to watch over my son and my
enemies”
Alton could hardly breathe. 1b so suddenly find himse)f
allied with one of the most powerful houses in Menzober.
ranzan! A jumble of possibilities and questions flooded his
mind, one in particular, which had haunted him for nearly
two decades.
His adopted matron mother recognized his excitement.
"Speak your thoughts” she commanded.
"You are a high priestess of Lloth” Alton said boldly, that
one notion overpowering all caution. "It is within your
power to grant me my fondest desire”
"You dare to ask a favor?" Matron SiNafay balked, though
she saw the torment on Alton's face and was intrigued by
the apparent importance of this mystery. "Very well”
"What house destroyed my family?" Alton growled. "Ask
the nether world, I beg, Matron SiNafay”
SiNafay considered the question carefully, and the possi-
bilities of Alton's apparent thirst for vengeance. Another
benefit of allowing this one into the family? SiNafay won-
dered.
"This is known to me already” she replied. "Perhaps when
you have proven your value, I will tell-"
"No!" Alton cried. He stopped short, realizing that he had
interrupted a matron mother, a crime that could invoke a
punishment of death.
SiNafay held back her angry urges. "This question must
be very important for you to act so foolishly” she said.
"Please” Alton begged. "I must know. Kill me if you will,
but tell me first who it was”
SiNafay liked his courage, and his obsession could only
prove of value to her. "House Do'Urden” she said.
"Do'Orden?" Alton echoed, hardly believing that a house
so far back in the city hierarchy could have defeated House
DeVir.
"You will take no actions against them” Matron SiNafay
warned. "And 1 will forgive your insolence-this time. You
are a son of House Hun'ett now; remember always your
place!" She let it stay at that, knowing that one who had
been clever enough to carry out such a deception for the
better part of two decades would not be foolish enough to
disobey the matron mother of his house.
"Come Masoj” SiNafay said to her son, "let us leave this
one alone so that he may consider his new identity”
"I must tell you, Matron SiNafay” Masoj dared to say as he
and his mother made their way out of Sorcere, " Alton DeVir
is a buffoon. He might bring harm to House Hun'ett”
"He survived the fall of his own house” SiNafay replied,
"and has played through the ruse as the Faceless One for
nineteen years. A buffoon? Perhaps, but a resourceful buf-
foon at the least”
Masoj unconsciously rubbed the area of his eyebrow that
had never grown back. "I have suffered the antics of Alton
DeVir for all these years” he said. "He does have a fair share
of luck, 1 admit, and can get himself out of trouble-though
he is usually the one who puts himself into it!"
"Do not fear” SiNafay laughed. " Alton brings value to our
house”
"What can we hope to gain?"
"He is a master of the Academy” SiNafay replied. "He gives
me eyes where 1 now need them” She stopped her son and
turned him to face her so that he might understand the im-
plications of her every word. "Alton DeVir's claim against
House Do'Orden may work in our favor. He was a noble of
the house, with rights of accusation”
"You mean to use Alton DeVir's charge to rally the great
houses into punishing House Do'Orden?" Masoj asked.
"The great houses would hardly be willing to strike out
for an incident that occurred almost twenty years ago”
SiNafay replied. "House Do'Urden executed House DeVir's
destruction nearly to perfection-a clean kill. Th so much as
speak an open charge against the Do'Urdens now would be
to invite the wrath of the great houses on ourselves”
"What good then is Alton DeVir?" Masoj asked. "His claim
is useless to us”
The matron replied, "You are only a male and cannot un-
derstand the complexities of the ruling hierarchy. With Al-
ton DeVir's charge whispered into the proper ears, the
ruling council might look the other way if a single house
took revenge on Alton's behalf”
"To what end?" Masoj remarked, not understanding the
importance. "You would risk the losses of such a battle for
the destruction of a lesser house?"
"So thought House DeVir of House Do'Urden” explained
SiNafay. "In our world, we must be as concerned with the
lower houses as with the higher ones. All of the great
houses would be wise now to watch closely the moves of
Daermon N'a'shezbaernon, the ninth house that is known as
Do'Urden. It now has both a master and a mistress serving
in the Academy and three high priestesses, with a fourth
nearing the goal” '
"Four high priestesses?" Masoj pondered. "In a single
house” Only three of the top eight houses could claim more
than that. Normally, sisters aspiring to such heights inspired
rivalries that inevitably thinned the ranks.
"And the legions of House Do'Urden number more than
three hundred fifty” SiNafay continued, "all of them trained
by perhaps the finest weapon master in all the city”
"Zaknafein Do'Urden, of course!" Masoj recalled.
"You have heard of him?"
"His name is often spoken at the Academy, even in Sor-
cere”
"Good” SiNafay purred. "Then you will understand the
fun weight of the mission I have chosen for you”
An eager light came into Masoj's eyes.
"Another Do'Urden is soon to begin there” SiNafay ex-
plained. "Not a master, but a student. By the words of those
few who have seen this boy, Drizzt, at training, he will be as
fine a fighter as Zaknafein. We should not allow this”
"You want me to kill the boy?" Masoj asked eagerly.
"No” SiNafay replied, "not yet. I want you to learn of him,
to understand the motivations of his every move. If the time
to strike does come, you must be ready”
Masoj liked the devious assignment, but one thing still
bothered him more than a little. "We still have Alton to con-
sider” he said. "He is impatient and daring. What are the
consequences to House Hun'ett if he strikes House Do'Ur-
den before the proper time? Might we invoke open war in
the city, with House Hun'ett viewed as the perpetrator?"
"Do not worry, my son” Matron SiNafay replied. "If Alton
DeVir makes a grievous error while in the guise of Gelroos.
Hun'ett, we expose him as a murderous imposter and no
member of our family. He will be an unhoused rogue with
an executioner facing him from every direction”
Her casual explanation put Masoj at ease, but Matron
SiNafay, so knowledgeable in the ways of drow society, had
understood the risk she was taking from the moment she
had accepted Alton DeVir into her house. Her plan seemed
foolproof, and the possible gain-the elimination of this
growing House Do'Urden-was a tempting piece of bait.
But the dangers, too, were very real. While it was per-
fectly acceptable for one house to covertly destroy another,
the consequences of failure could not be ignored. Earlier
that very night, a lesser house had struck out against a rival
and, if the rumors held true, had failed. The illuminations of
the next day would probably force the ruling council to en-
act a pretense of justice, to make an example of the unsuc-
cessful attackers. In her long life, Matron SiNafay had
witnessed this "justice" several times.
Not a single member of any of the aggressor houses-she
was not even allowed to remember their names-had ever
survived.
Zak awakened Drizzt early the next morning. "Come” he
said. "We are bid to go out of the house this day”
All thoughts of sleep washed away from Drizzt at the
news. "Outside the house?" he echoed. In all of his nineteen
years, Drizzt had never once walked beyond the adaman-
tite fence of the po'Urden complex. He had only watched
that outside world of Menzoberranzan from the balcony.
While Zak waited, Drizzt quickly collected his soft boots
and his piwafwi. "Will there be no lesson this day?" Drizzt
asked.
"We shall see” was all that Zak replied, but in his thoughts,
the weapon master figured that Drizzt might be in for one
of the most startling revelations of his life. A house had
failed in a raid, and the ruling council had requested the
presence of all the nobles of the city, to bear witness to the
weight of justice.
Briza appeared in the corridor outside the practice room's
door. "Hurry” she scolded. "Matron Malice does not wish
our house to be among the last groups joining the gather-
ing!"
The matron mother herself, floating atop a blue-glowing
disk-for matron mothers rarely walked through the city-
led the procession out of House Do'Urden's grand gate.
Briza walked at her mother's side, with Maya and Rizzen in
the second rank and Drizzt and Zak taking up the rear.
Vierna and Dinin, attending to the duties of their positions
in the Academy, had gone to the ruling council's summons
with a different group.
All the city was astir this morning, rumbling in the ru.
mors of the failed raid. Drizzt walked through the bustle
wide-eyed, staring in wonderment at the close-up view of
the decorated drow houses. Slaves of every inferior race-
goblins, orcs, even giants-scrambled out of the way, recog-
nizing Malice, riding her enchanted carriage, as a matron
mother. Drow commoners halted conversations and re-
mained respectfully silent as the noble family passed.
As they made their way toward the northwestern section,
the location of the guilty house, they came into a lane
blocked by a squabbling caravan of duergar, gray dwarves.
A dozen carts had been overturned or locked together-
apparently, two groups of duergar had come into the nar-
row lane together, neither relinquishing the right-of-way.
Briza pulled the snake-headed whip from her belt and
chased off a few of the creatures, clearing the way for Mal-
ice to float up to the apparent leaders of the two groups.
The dwarves turned on her angrily-until they realized
her station.
"Beggin' yer pardon, Madam” one of them stammered.
"Unfortunate accident is all”
Malice eyed the contents of one of the nearest carts,
crates of giant crab legs and other delicacies.
"You have slowed my journey” Malice said calmly.
"We have come to your city in hopes of trade” the other
duergar explained. He cast an angry glare at his counter-
part, and Malice understood that the two were rivals,
probably bartering the same goods to the same drow
house.
"I will forgive your insolence. . “ she offered graciously,
still eyeing the crates.
The two duergar suspected what was forthcoming. So did
Zak. "We eat well tonight” he whispered to Drizzt with a sly
wink. "Matron Malice would not let such an opportunity
slip by without gain”
". . . if you can see your way to deliver half of these carts to
the gate of House Do'Urden this night” Malice finished.
The duergar started to protest but quickly dismissed the
foolish notion. How they hated dealing with drow elves!
"You will be compensated appropriately” Malice contin-
ued. "House Do'Urden is not a poor house. Between both of
your caravans, you will still have enough goods to satisfy
the house you came to see”
Neither of the duergar could refute the simple logic, but
under these trading circumstances, where they had of-
fended a matron mother, they knew the compensation for
their valuable foods would hardly be appropriate. Still, the
gray dwarves could only accept it all as a risk of doing busi-
ness in Menzoberranzan. They bowed politely and set
their troops to clearing the way for the drow procession.
House Thken'duis, the unsuccessful raiders of the pre-
