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Iyin welcomed the Mothers the next day as they took back possession of their items along with his explanation of how they would work. The Mothers seemed especially impressed by the Iron Horn. Thanking the dwarf, the Mothers went back to the smith Beonir the next day and collected their accoutrements. They proudly put them on before returning to the temple to talk to Thorik. When the priest realised that they were ready to depart he told them that a certain Roryn Stoneshield would meet them on the far side and to give him a scroll, which Thorik handed them. He also warned them to have their charter ready for inspection.

Thorik led them on a spiralling stone ramp, further down into the citadel’s depths. A room that was guarded by four heavily armoured dwarves contained a glowing stone doorway. It stood in the centre of the chamber, carved with runes that they could not decipher. Without further ado, Thorik indicated that they should step through. The transition was very similar to that experienced when using the cubic gate, not unpleasant exactly, but uncomfortable. Certainly no hint of the darkness of the transfer they experienced when using the giants’ chain. On the other side another squadron of dwarves was waiting, and the aforementioned Roryn was summoned to greet the Mothers by one of them. This stern, humourless dwarf, checked the scroll and their charter and immediately ushered them out of the room and out of the building. He left them with only another warning not to reveal the secret of the portal.

Kurtalla and Gaspode soon found a merchant selling horses, and Kurtalla’s skill picked out the best of them. Gaspode’s skill was obtaining the lowest price. They mounted up immediately and took Calantar’s Way leading to Hilp, Immersea and then Arabel. The journey took three days. When they arrived they went straight to the Weary Knight Inn and stabled their horses.

As they had expected, Guthranka and Levi headed off to the temple of Tyr to pay their dues and ask for new duties, as life on the road had left them tired and weary. The Mothers arranged to meet them later. Fonesca, Kurtalla and Siosiann all sought out trainers to help them progress in their skills. Fonesca went back to the War Wizard that she had dealt with previously, and introduced Siosiann to him. Kurtalla met with the druids of Meilikki who directed him to Cenvan, one of the rangers to the crown. Their training took a week.

The Mothers then went to see the Lord High Seneschal. They gave him all of the information on their actions with the Frost and Fire Giants and the nobleman seemed most impressed when he heard that the main force of giants had been destroyed. His ears also pricked up at the mention of the drow connection with the giants and he informed them that he had had reports of drow activity in the Tilverton area that he would like them to investigate. Apparently drow had emerged to raid outlying farms and had been tracked to an area known as the Dordrien Crypts. The Seneschal asked them to investigate the area to see if there were any links to the giants.

Gaspode presented the Lord High Seneschal with the sword of King Snurre (promptly re-sizing it back to its impressive length). The Seneschal, in turn, presented Obrana Helicot to the Mothers; she was a cleric in good standing with the temple of Tyr and a replacement, if they wished, for the retiring Levi and Guthranka. The Mothers saw the value in this and agreed to meet her again, along with the ranger Cenvan at dawn for further instructions. They went off to do some shopping.

Once they left the Seneschal, the Mothers stocked up on supplies, with Fonesca concentrating on herbs that might assist them on the journey ahead. Once they had finished their purchasing, the Mothers retired to the Weary Knight.

Cenvan was pleased to present the Mothers with an updated charter from the Lord High Seneschal when they met with him at dawn. It gave them the right to commandeer the soldiers of the crown, the Purple Dragons, as a Captain of the Dragons would, for a short time. It also gave them permission to lodge in their own apartments in the Dragon barracks in Arabel. The ranger led them there and showed them their accommodations, which were rather salubrious. Here he spread out some maps to show them the route that they should follow to the Dordrien Crypts, which lay about five days horse ride to the northeast of Arabel. Once the Mothers had asked a few questions they were ready to head off.

On their second night on the road, camped near an old forest, the watch keepers, Obrana and Jito, noticed the approach of a creature. They woke the full group of the Mothers and had to fight this plant-beast which lashed at them with its thorny appendages. It was not an easy thing to kill, but the Mothers suffered little harm in dispatching it. Thankfully the horses were not able to break their tethers while the commotion continued. Fonesca used her ruat wand to heal the party's minor injuries.

The next day, just after their lunch, the Mothers were again visited by the odd spider creatures with wolf heads that had plagued them before. They appeared out of thin air ahead of the riders, startling the horses. Jito's was the first to react turning and running back the way that they had come. He was unable to control his mount's flight. This was also a problem for most of the rest of the Mothers. Obrana was dumped unceremoniously on the ground by her horse and Fonesca and Gaspode elected to dismount, rather than trying to rein in theirs. Kurtalla was the only one in complete control while in the saddle, but he too preferred to have his feet on the ground for this confrontation. Siosiann's mount was not as fast as Jito's but it also fled the scene.

The spider creatures advanced and engaged Kurtalla and Obrana, then some of their number disappeared, only to arrive again, evenly spaced around Fonesca. The other Mothers had to rush in from all points to try and help her, finally managing to subdue the beasts before Fonesca's protections failed her.

It took a couple more days for the Mothers to arrive at the Dordrien Crypts. Kurtalla was sure of the location, based on Cervan’s instructions. They had encountered no drow, but had passed through one abandoned farmstead in the last day. The crypts themselves were built into a large stone outcropping, with a single passage leading under the hill. Two mausoleums stood clear of the rock, stone buildings on either side of the rough track leading to the passage. The Mothers decided to investigate these first.

The first one they came across had obviously been opened some time ago. The double doors swung easily on their hinges exposing a chamber which had four doors leading off it. Each of these led to a room with a large stone sarcophagus. Each of these showed signs of having been tampered with, due the scratch marks around the edges. The Mothers decided to leave them alone.

The other mausoleum had its door sealed in plaster except for a small gap along the bottom edge. The Mothers cracked this open to reveal a smaller chamber than the one before, this one with two sarcophagi and no obvious exits. As they advanced into the room, two forms began to coalesce in front of them. They resolved themselves into two vampiric humans who lunged to attack, biting Jito before he had a chance to react. Before they could fight back, the Mothers had to react to a new threat: arcs of lightning shot from the back of the crypt and into the party. A number of the Mothers were sorely injured by this energy burst, but Obrana was still able to raise her symbol of Tyr and reduce the two creatures in front of them to dust with her words of faith. The magical threat remained, as another lightning bolt flashed down, so Jito and Kurtalla stepped forward and started slashing at the air where they thought the bolts began. Gaspode was hunting in his beltpouch and managed to draw forth his gem of seeing. A creature was revealed to him, perched, limpet like on the corner wall of the crypt out of the immediate reach of his opponents.

Gaspode informed his companions of the whereabouts of the master vampire and while the fighters approached him, Fonesca took the brave step of finding a bag of flour in her pack and tossing it over the area indicated. The vampire tried to avoid the flour, but was unable to miss the whole bag, so the location of his ear and left arm was clear to the Mothers. Before he could react again the Mothers inflicted enough damage on him to subdue him and Obrana promptly dragged him out into the sunlight where he perished.

Gaspode searched the remains of the vampire and found a number of items, which he shrunk and stowed. Obrana cast a restorative spell on Jito to remove the effects of the vampire bite that he had suffered. Fonesca used the “Ruat” wand to cure her companions and Obrana followed this up with some healing magic of her own. The Mothers then went over to the cliff face to examine the entrance. The door was locked, possibly barred or chained from the other side, so the party retreated to the crypt where they had fought the vampires and rested, allowing Fonesca to learn her door opening spell, and the others to regain their own magics.

When they were ready, the Mothers returned to the entrance and opened the lock with the spell. When they pushed open the door they could see the open padlock lying on the ground covered by a heavy chain that had secured the doors. Five drow lay dead a short way along the corridor. The Mothers searched these and noticed that three of them had been slain by small crossbow bolts and the others by blows from blunt weapons. They had no items of significance. Kurtalla was able to discern that two more bodies that had fallen, had been dragged off further along the corridor and into the darkness.

A short way along to the north, a opening appeared in the passage which the Mothers investigated. It seemed to be an empty set of crypts, with five open alcoves containing no grave goods. No further exits through this way were discovered. Returning to the main path, the Mothers turned south with the corridor and tried to open the first door to the east. This set off a glyph which summoned two guardian lions which the Mothers dispatched. The ten sarcophagi inside were left undisturbed by the party.

The Mothers went south along the stone corridor, coming across a plaster covered door in the western wall. The plasterwork seemed undisturbed and although Gaspode searched, he could find no traps. The Mothers were still suspicious and decided to cast a spell to detect any magical emanations from the door. Jito discovered that there was a strong aura of abjuration. The Mothers reasoned that this might be a strong protective spell, one that was powerful enough to keep out the drow and so best left alone.

Twenty feet or so beyond that door, the party descended a flight of stone steps into a cavern below. The walls of the cavern contained many niches in which the dead had been laid. Although this looked as if it had been a natural cavern, it was plain that the builders of this place had carved a wider passage into the next chamber to the west. Kurtalla and Fonesca examined the bones and discovered that they were from humans and that they were very old.

The next chamber was much like the first, except for the twelve foot tall statue standing in the centre. It depicted an insect-like creature that had mandibles and bulbous eyes with arms that drooped almost to the floor. Kurtalla checked the floor to see if the drow had been avoiding this sculpture, but there was no sign of this. Still somewhat suspicious, the Mothers pressed on.

In the narrow passage beyond, with grave niches only along one side as it turned to the south, the Mothers spotted a roper. Before it had a chance to catch any of the party, Kurtalla, Jito and Gaspode had all advanced and laid blows on the beast. It took the opportunity that the ranger presented and used its sticky tentacles to pull Kurtalla towards its mouth and bite him. The tentacles were also covered with a substance that sapped his strength. With the spells and blows of the others, the beast did not survive to try again. Kurtalla gratefully accepted the ministrations of Obrana who restored his strength to normal.

Pressing on the Mothers found a passage leading off to the east, which was to the left for them. They took this and entered a large cavern with no obvious exits. This cavern held none of the burial niches of the previous chamber, but an awful charnel odour of death lingered here which was quite unlike the dusty smell elsewhere. No sign of death was visible, however, rather there were five distinct piles of equipment placed evenly in a semicircle towards the eastern end of the chamber. As the Mothers went over to investigate, four ghouls materialised and leapt to attack. The Mothers dispatched them as they approached, with Obrana destroying the last remaining one utterly with her exclamation of Tyr’s might. The party thought about what to do next.

Kurtalla noticed some blood staining the floor to the northwest of the chamber and Fonesca asked Gaspode to sweep the area with his gem. Gaspode immediately noticed a hunched creature that had been concealed by invisibility. It looks somewhat like the ghouls but it was larger and more menacing. The Mothers moved in to corral it in the corner. Obrana cast a purge invisibility spell and the creature became visible to all. This was unfortunate for it as Jito, Gaspode, Kurtalla and Siosiann had all moved within weapon range. It did not last long.

Jito helped Fonesca and Kurtalla sort out which of the items in the piles of gear were magical. Quite a number of them were. Kurtalla also selected a couple of nice masterwork items including a composite bow that was built strongly enough to allow his physical power to be transferred to the arrows it would shoot. Gaspode was folding and refolding his sheet while the ranger tested his bow against his existing one.

The left the cavern behind them and turned left, still encountering more graves in the walls. At the end of a sloping passage the Mothers came across a broken down masonry wall. It must have bricked up the end of the passage at some point, but now a way was clear through the centre for a person to pass and it stood only about four feet high at the edges. Of more immediate concern was the undead spider creature that scuttled out of the gap to attack them, along with the friendly sound of crossbow bolts humming along through the air. Luckily the bolts did not connect. Neither did the arachnid. Gaspode did hit and ended the spider’s unlife. Obrana, meanwhile summoned a column of flame to burn the area behind the wall, hoping to stop the barrage of bolts. This did not work immediately, but magic missiles from Siosiann and Fonesca finished off that task. Jito had just cast a mirror image on himself when they fell. The Mothers moved past the wall to confirm that the bolts had come from two drow sentries.

The cave beyond held a sinkhole down and not much else. Kurtalla could tell that there was drow and spider activity throughout this area and that the undead spider had come up through the sinkhole to attack them. They could see a passage heading onwards through the bottom of the sinkhole about ten feet below, so they took this, which lead mainly east. After a while it came to another sinkhole and behind it a granite wall. Fonesca realised that the wall was probably a creation due to a Wall of Stone spell as it was very regular and somewhat out of place in the natural passage. Rejecting the sinkhole for the moment the Mothers turned their attention to the wall. After brief mathematical discussion as to volumes, Obrana used some clay in her possession to shape a large circular opening in the stone. The party stepped through into a continuation of the original passage.

A little further on they came upon a T junction and went left. This brought them to a dusty cavern that contained old webbing that had lost its stickiness. They did notice the two large spiders nested amongst the strands, but realised that they could not see any smaller ones. These large arachnids looked hungry as they immediately advanced to attack. Jito was in the van and he was confident of his mirror images confusing the beast, but it saw straight through them and managed to bite him. Siosiann decided that mirror images of herself would also be a good idea, so she cast that while the others engaged. However, Jito and the others did not let the beasts bit another of the party. There did not seem to be any further passages leading from the back of the cave where the spiders had come from, but at the front, one lead of back to the southwest.

Following the southwest passage that they had not yet explored the Mothers found a short offshoot cave that seemed abandoned off the main tunnel. After they had assured themselves that it contained nothing of interest, they proceeded into a larger cavern. In the dim extremes of their light, they could make out two creatures scuttling along the walls and ceiling of this large cave. The creatures were part spider, part drow; the torso of a drow extending from each of the spider creatures’ abdomen.

Siosiann moved out from the crowd and fired a lightning bolt at the nearest creature. Although sorely wounded the spider-thing did not fall. Kurtalla reacted with revulsion at seeing the creatures he called driders, but they were too far away for his blades, so he hefted his bow and loosed an arrow at the nearest one, he seemed to know how to hurt them effectively. It reacted by sending a lightning bolt back through the Mothers hurting two of them because, although Kurtalla was in the path of the bolt, he managed to deftly evade it. Fonesca considered using a Wall of Ice to hurt her foes, but coming to a new understanding of the workings of magical matters, she decided that the spell was not for her and cast a Cone of Cold instead, moving forward to try and get both driders in the cone. This worked well and the closest one fell while the other still remained. Jito cast a Mirror Image. Gaspode finished off the last one with his own bow shot.

The Mothers approached the corpses to ensure there was no life left in them and to see if they had any worthwhile equipment. Their bows and other weapons did not seem to be of interest, but Kurtalla searched in the refuse strewn area to the southwest and found potions and scrolls in sealed tubes. The Mothers then went through the cavern to the north, realising that it completed a circuit of caverns. While on their way through, Gaspode nearly fell into a very deep pit that had been concealed by some kind of illusion. The spikes on the bottom looked vicious, even from sixty feet above. When they realised that their only further path lay through the sinkhole by the wall of stone, the party decided that they needed to rest.

They returned to the empty cavern that they found between the driders and the giant spiders. Here they set up camp and watches. The fifth watch was disturbed by the arrival of a group of drow, accompanied by a wraith spider and a very odd creature. It was shaped like a drow, but it appeared as if the creature’s skin had been completely flayed, leaving the muscles and sinews exposed and oozing blood. This did not affect the creature’s strength, however, as it pummelled Gaspode with its fists while he was still trying to react to the intruders’ presence. The Mothers are rousing themselves to respond to this threat.

Somewhat groggy from their interrupted rest, the Mothers took in the scene quickly. Gaspode stood toe to toe with the flayed drow creature; its caustic blood burning holes in the half elf’s clothing. Two of the other three drow were closing to attack, as was another of those undead spiders. Gaspode and Kurtalla were hit again before they managed to land blows on the oozing drow. Siosiann meanwhile stepped forward and unleashed a lightning bolt at the approaching enemies. This dispatched the spider and one drow, injuring the others. The drow mage at the rear responded with another carefully aimed lightning bolt hitting most of the party. Fonesca, Obrana and Siosiann responded with more spells while Gaspode suffered blows that would have seen him fall were it not for a well-timed Impish intervention. Obrana and Fonesca did drop unconscious before their foes were defeated, but a potion was enough to bring Obrana around and she was able to restore the others to a semblance of health before they decided to leave the caves to rest in a more secure location.

The first thought was to use the vampire crypts as a secure resting location, but the Mothers thought better of this, so after Gaspode and Kurtalla had scouted the route ahead and brought the group to the surface again, the ranger was set the task of discovering another suitable location for their recuperation further afield. He found a shallow cave a few miles south of the crypts that seemed dry and comfortable, so the Mothers settled there to regain their magics and to plan their next moves.

The watches that they had set encountered no issues for the first twenty hours. It was the penultimate watch that encountered the drow. What had drawn them there, the Mothers did not know. But they had come in greater force than the last group that the party had encountered. Two of the flayed drow creatures were in the vanguard of this new assault. One of the drow, who was equipped with a two-headed flail also engaged in melee. Meanwhile a female and a male drow hung back, out of range of the swords of the Mothers.

Jito and Fonesca quickly threw up false images of themselves to confuse their attackers. Siosiann launched a lightning bolt and managed to catch most of their attackers in its arc. One of the flayed creatures attacked Siosiann with its fists hurting her. The flail wielding drow attacked Jito, or rather his images for a while. The drow at the rear responded with by dropping a column of flame around Obrana and Fonesca, they could not avoid the full effect of the fire. Obrana called on Tyr to smite the gory creations of drow flesh before her, and they turned from the fray. Jito, Kurtalla and Gaspode sprang in to attack, concentrating on the gory skinless figures. The flailing drow landed some blows, removing all of Jito’s protecting images and even doing him some damage. Then the whole party was disrupted as most of their number became confused and began to act randomly. When this effect had taken hold the female drow ran forward and managed to lay her hand on Gaspode, who fell lifeless at her feet. Fonesca and Jito were the only Mothers who could think clearly.

Gaspode lay dead at the hands of female drow, Jito was the only Mother left fighting cogently as Fonesca was too injured to engage, she moved back to be safe to cast spells from a distance. Kurtalla, Obrana and Siosiann all started acting randomly; striking their colleagues as well as their enemies; wandering off or sometimes, just gibbering happily to themselves. Kurtalla wandered within range of the double-flail-wielding drow who rewarded the ranger with two solid hits. Kurtalla was able to respond in turn. Fonesca let loose chain lightning, which badly injured the female drow and then jumped to the other enemies in turn. Jito moved to attack the female drow and struck her down. Kurtalla was still beside the male drow with the flail and attacked him. This was enough for the drow to fall. The other male drow who had been casting spells from the rear saw this and decided to make his exit, he teleported out of the cavern.

Obrana was being troubled by the remaining flayed drow. It landed its acidic fists on her but she was unable to intelligently respond. Next Kurtalla attacked Siosiann hurting her sorely, she did not attack back. Fonesca and Jito combined with attacks on the flayed drow; their efforts did ensure that the creature could not find a new opponent. This laid Jito open to attack from Obrana and the gnome winced as she struck at him with mad fury. He responded with the flat of his blade hoping to knock her into unconsciousness. Meanwhile Kurtalla had hit Siosiann again and she fell to the floor bleeding. Fonesca realised that Kurtalla could be a real and unpredictable threat, so she summoned a column of ice to keep him enclosed until his confusion wore off.

Next was the matter of Obrana, which Jito was dealing with slowly. His blows rendered her senseless without him suffering more serious injury himself. Fonesca and Jito shared a grim smile and sat on the cavern floor for a moment, exhausted at their efforts. They could hear Kurtalla gibbering quietly behind his rock wall. Fonesca and Jito both knew that a confusion spell couldn’t last too long, so they waited for Kurtalla to talk sensibly to them. Once he did so they helped him out of his prison and he cast a cure on Siosiann which brought her to consciousness. Then they fed Obrana a cure potion which also brought her back to alertness. Obrana herself then gave curative magics to the rest of the party, so that their physical injuries were minimal.

There was nothing they could do for Gaspode at this point. Although Obrana had the power to raise him, she required a valuable diamond in order to complete the ritual, so they used his own sheet to wrap him and placed his reduced form in Kurtalla’s pack. As they had been followed here by the drow and the Mothers did not know how they had been found, they reasoned that they needed to put more distance between themselves and the crypts. Kurtalla reminded the group of the ranger cave that they had used before they approached the crypts. It was about six hours distant. They missed the horses and Jito and Fonesca did not have spells prepared to summon mounts for them. Rather than wait here to change their arcane selections, the Mothers elected to push south on foot.

The journey to the ranger cave was uneventful, although nerve-wracking. They waited there to catch their breath but decided to press on further. So, after a brief meal, they left again. Kurtalla found them another resting place further south and Obrana made this cave safe from intrusion with a glyph to guard the entrance. With these precautions in place, the Mothers took debating their strategy. Siosiann and Obrana revealed that they needed some time to study and that this would give them new abilities. Siosiann learnt how to cast a Teleport spell and taught this to Fonesca, they both also learnt Clairaudience/Clairvoyance from the spellbooks that they had, but realised that its range was too short to help them picture their apartments in Arable more clearly. Kurtalla used the time by summoning a black bear, Ursus to be his companion.

When the two mages were ready the party successfully teleported, in two groups, to Arabel. They arrived in their apartments as they had expected. Kurtalla found a place for Ursus in a granary that was almost empty in the barracks area. The purple dragons decided not to comment. The Mothers all made plans for what they would accomplish while they were in the safety of the city.

The first order of business was for Obrana to obtain her diamond and for the Mothers to trade any items that they had picked up that they had no use for. Much haggling was done in the city’s markets, armourers, weapon-smiths and the like, but eventually the party ended up with some considerable cash reserves and the requisite gem.

Gaspode’s spirit returned to his re-enlarged body without demur. Once he was cured of his remaining hurts he took part as well as he was able in the discussions of what to do about the drow threat. He did insist that the party urgently visit the Lord High Seneschal to report their findings. Once there, the party briefed the noble on their activities, but he was obviously frustrated about any solid information about the size of the drow forces or their intentions. He asked that they return as soon as possible, agreeing to a week of recovery and preparation for the Mothers.

Obrana ordered a silver font with an accompanying stand to be built to her specifications so that she could scry out their enemy, the magician-drow who had escaped them. This would take most of the week to complete. Siosiann ordered a masterwork bow to be made which would take advantage of her strength. The others gathered materials and inks to allow them to learn spells, create potions and summon familiars.

One evening, the Mothers invited Levi and Guthranka to join them for dinner. The two Tyrrans reported grim news. The rod that had been stolen from the temple some time ago, had been put to good use: the oracles now proclaimed that Orcus, Demon Lord of the Undead had returned to his full power and re-taken his seat in the Abyss. The Mothers had entrusted the rod to the temple when they had foiled the plans of Tenebrous, the aspect of Orcus that remained after his defeat by a drow goddess. They had found that they could not destroy the rod, but they could not keep it safe either. The party all looked rather nervous at the prospect of their one-time nemesis now sitting in power on a Lower Plane!

Fonesca was continuing to act strangely with the group. She demonstrated this in front of them all at once when she spent ten minutes dividing up their apple pie into exactly equal slices for the group, despite the protestations of those gathered that it really didn’t matter how big each piece was. The rest of the Mothers became concerned.

Jito spent his week learning several spells to improve his flexibility in combat and otherwise. Siosiann summoned a familiar on the first day, using herbs that she had carried with her for some time and a recently purchased brazier. Her ritual was effective as she was joined at the end of the day by Tenwar, a pseudodragon. She was very pleased with her efforts and Tenwar seemed to be very pleased to be there. On the next days, with Tenwar often perching on her shoulders, she learnt more spells from the others’ books. Finally she cast a detect magic on herself and made its effects permanent.

Obrana meanwhile was creating things. She gathered together strange ingredients, glassware, pestles and mortars and busied herself in a corner of the apartment concocting potions. By the end of the week she had made five which she clearly labelled so that the other Mothers would be able to use them without her direction. They were potions of: Remove Disease; Invisibility Purge; Prayer and two of Cure Serious Wounds.

Kurtalla taught Ursus to “stay”.

With suspicion arisen over Fonesca, the Mothers were worried about what she would do in the week that they had to prepare. She seemed to be most concerned with the two wands that appeared to lack a joining piece between them. One they had found in the tomb of King Siryl high in the mountains in the Spine of the World, the other they had taken from the daughter of King Snurre of the Fire Giants. Fonesca found a wizard willing to cast a Legend Lore spell on the two items. The spell revealed a verse:

That which was sundered on Pesh's plain, Holds back chaos's reign. Yet the vaati's deed shall remain undone, Until the seven again become one.

The wizard himself was able to explain that the vaati, were a race of lawful immortals sometimes called the Wind Dukes of Aaqa, but he did not know where they came from or where “Pesh’s plain” might be. The wizard suggested that another Legend Lore spell might reveal more if they knew something of the history.

Gaspode decided to accompany Fonesca on her further researches. They went to the temple of Tyr and asked Levi and Guthranka help them search the library for references to these terms. After a number of days they found a reference to a great conflict between Law and Chaos on the prime material world called Oerth. A great battle of the war was being fought there on a volcanic plain. Champions of Law had forged a weapon, a metal tapering rod, that could be used against the general of the Chaotic forces, a demon, Miska the Wolf Spider. When they finally were able to use the rod against the demon, they impaled him with it, but this clash of primal energies was such that a planar rift opened and the demon fell through it and the rod was shattered into seven pieces. This was all that they could find, although they looked for maps of Oerth to locate the plain of Pesh. Gaspode and Fonesca recalled that they had visited Oerth before from a portal in Sigil at the request of the Lord High Seneschal. That time, they had been following the trail of Iuz who had mysteriously halted his attacks on the Cormyrean border.

When the two returned to the rest of the Mothers they recounted their efforts. Obrana offered to bear the two rod pieces herself, to take the burden from the usually carefree Fonesca, but the latter demurred. Then they began again to plan how they would obtain information about the drow forces and their intentions. The Mothers agreed that their first step should not be to kidnap the drow wizard that had attacked them, but rather to obtain information from those slain. Unfortunately, they could not scry a dead person or a place, so they would have to take a risk when they teleported to the cave where they had been attacked, that they might go awry. They risked this strategy and arrived safely as two groups in the cave. Ursus, they left behind. The drow had cleaned up after their dead and no corpses remained. Fonesca and Siosiann studied the cave carefully, in case they ever had to return. The others watched for drow activity for this hour and Kurtalla reassured himself that the dark elves had only come into the cave through the front.

The party decided to try and fetch the dead drow that they had first encountered at the entrance to the crypts, so they walked north again for about six hours until they reached the area. The corpses were still there, so the Mothers gathered them up using the sheet and stowed them for later questioning. They retreated to the vampire crypt to study this area too. They teleported back to Arabel once they were finished. Obrana was able cast her speaking spell immediately, so they got out one of the bodies and she asked it: “Who killed you?” It answered “Followers of the White Banshee.”
“Who is the White Banshee asked Obrana?” “Kiaransalee,” was the eerie reply.
“Where are you from?” “Szith Morcane.”
“Where is Szith Morcane?” “Below the old human crypts.”
“Why were you killed?” “Because we followed the Spider Queen.”
Obrana informed the Mothers that she would be able to ask more questions the following day.

Indrizil:
Word has probably reached you about the fall of Maerimydra, and perhaps you have wondered about my safety. Obviously, I survived the sack of the city, although it was a close call indeed. The city fell at the hands of mere chattel - the priestesses of the Spider Queen had kept the city so cowed that, with their powers gone, its defenders could not resist even a force of goblins, ogres and giants. We held our strong places for a while without the clerics, but then House Chumavh was overthrown from within and so we were undone.
I write to you now from Szith Morcane, the old outpost north and west of the city. Perhaps you will come and visit me - though I must say that if you still profess faith in Lloth you will not be welcomed by those who rule here now. The Spider Queen's priestesses have found a new role here, one which I think you would not enjoy overmuch.
I do not know if you still cling to the hope that the Spider Queen will restore you - will restore all of us - to her favour, but if you do, I urge you to reconsider. It is not too late for you or for our bond of blood. The Lady of the Dead will accept you still, just as she has taken me into her care. All Maerimydra is her temple now, and her emissaries rule here too. Abandon your empty allegiance to a silent goddess and come to Szith Morcane, but do not wear the emblem of the spider. I have need of allies of my own blood, and if Lloth still ignores your pleas, I suspect you do as well.
- Rhavauz

The Mothers had just killed the mage student in his cell and looted his body and his room of any valuables. Fonesca realised that the Knock spells that they had cast to get past the Arcane Locks on the doors only suppressed their power and they might get trapped if they did not leave. Jito and the others ferried themselves down to the floor of the octagonal chamber to plan again.

After a few moments thought, Jito attempted to cast a Dispel Magic on an area between where Gaspode had exposed the presence of the upper two doors. His first and second attempt failed (they realised this by flying up and testing them). The third attempt revealed the doors themselves, the false images protecting them had been removed! Jito and Gaspode flew up to the lower one, which was one level above the one that they had entered before. Here they found another corridor filled with obscuring fog, but there was no door on the opposite wall like before. Instead the corridor went off to the left and right for twenty feet, ending in seemingly blank walls. Gaspode's gem revealed the doors there, but they had no further magic to bypass the locks.

They returned to the octagonal chamber and decided to attempt the highest door. This they found unlocked, but as soon as they opened it, Jito and Gaspode were forced back to the far wall of the octagon by a constant rush of air from within the chamber. It was all that they could do to hang on to the broom, so they descended to plan a route through the portal. Gaspode got out a grappling hook and rose again with Jito. He eventually managed to snag the grapple on the edge of the door and he swung off the broom on the attached rope. He pulled himself up into the chamber beyond the door and then helped the others in.

When they had caught their breath, the wind ended. They turned and saw a throne on a dais flanked by tapestries. Before the throne stood an immaculately dressed male drow. His purple shirt was loose and his fine white hair was held back by a golden headband. He waited for the Mothers to speak. When they meekly said hello, he asked why they had come to his "tower". Obrana claimed that they had come seeking fame and fortune, but the drow said that he would let them leave unharmed if they would target the priestesses of either drow goddess. He wished to gain power over Szith Morcane and eventually promised to halt raids on the surface if his wish could be fulfilled. He told them of the main areas off the web cavern and of the forbiddance cast over the entry to the nobles area. He also gave them leave to remain in the guard quarters for twenty-four hours.

The party left him and rested in the guardroom, after cleaning some of the gore. Fonesca concentrated on improving her skills and felt as if she could master more magics if she had more free time. The others carefully discussed their tactics when it came to spell selection given what they had planned to tackle next.

Once the spells had been prepared, or at least decided upon, the Mothers set watches throughout the night. Occasionally, Obrana, Fonesca or Kurtalla would pass amongst them dispensing healing, so that by the time they were ready to depart everyone was at full strength. Then the debates started as to which route to take. They went out to the web and tested the strands. The only ones that would allow them to pass without the stickiness were back the way they had come (clockwise to the major strand running vertically), and one that led straight down at an angle to the centre of the web, where they had been told, the commoners' level lay. Beneath this on the far extremity of the web, was, so they understood. an entrance to the nobles' level. Seeing that they could not find a route that did not pass through the centre, they decided to pay the commoners' level a visit.

When they arrived, the Mothers tentatively peered into the cavern beyond. They could make out two huge pack lizards, burdened with all manner of goods. Several figures were surrounding these beasts, two of which were drow. The owners of the lizards were three duergar, the grey dwarves of the underdark. They carried out negotiations with the drow, a mauve-skinned mind flayer and three kua-toa. As the Mothers approached the fish-men began to leave and the others turned to them cautiously. The Mothers decided to fight and Jito managed to loose a fireball that engulfed most of the traders before they could move. Two kua-toa at the back suddenly realised they had not moved far enough and died. One drow was quick enough to react and ran at Gaspode and sliced him with his glaive. Siosiann let loose a lightning bolt and Fonesca followed up with an acid storm. Most of the enemy lay dead already.

The mind flayer moved beyond the area of his fellows and turned when he had a clear view of the Mothers. Immediately they felt an assault within their skulls that left Jito, Fonesca and Gaspode stunned. Orbrana fired her crossbow at the mind flayer and buried her bolt in its flesh. Kurtalla ran after the illithid and managed to land a blow. The last remaining grey dwarf started to retreat to the back of the cavern, while the only live pack lizard became enraged and charged at Siosiann. Its attack came to naught. Siosiann finished off the lizard with her flametongue sword while Kurtalla's head was clasped by one of the mind flayer's tentacles and another scored him across the neck. He responded with a flurry of blows that left the illithid in pieces. Obrana cleaned up by freezing the fleeing duergar in place with a spell. The Mothers who could still move mopped up the remaining combatants, dispatching them with efficiency. Gaspode, Fonesca and Jito had still not recovered.

With Gaspode, Fonesca and Jito all still incapacitated, the Mothers were not happy to see the approaching group of drow. One spellcaster and two warriors came out of the cave entrance at the far end of the bazaar. They did not get to act before Siosiann unleashed a lightning bolt at them, striking two. The fighters closed to attack Kurtalla and Obrana while the wizard fired back a lightning bolt at Siosiann; Kurtalla evaded the edge of the bolt. The glaive wielding warrior managed to miss Obrana entirely while his compatriot did stab successfully at Kurtalla. This was the last attack that the Mothers permitted. Kurtalla dealt with his foe decisively and Obrana and Siosiann finished their weakened enemies with a blow and a spell respectively. Nervously, the Mothers regrouped near their stunned colleagues and they were relieved when after a brief discussion on how to haul them off to safety, they covered their senses.

A full inventory was taken of the items on the merchants and purchasers, Siosiann's innate ability to see the magical auras helped them to decide which items were stored via Gaspode's sheet for further use. The mind flayer in particular had a useful stash in its bag of holding. Jito was doing an inventory of his own and he realised that he should figure out what spell his ring of counterspelling should contain. He made the mistake of asking Fonesca. The wizard proceeded to guide the gnome on the correct procedure to ascertain the frequency of spell attacks against an individual, how to balance this against the availability of the said spells, the average power of enemy combatants and the current weaknesses in his own defences.Gaspode dryly commented that if he had had the ring with Slay Living in it, then he wouldn't have died when he met the drow cleric. Jito felt it best to leave it as it was.

Rather than attempting to go into the commoner level, the Mothers decided to proceed directly to the nobles' area. They went straight down from the bazaar along the central axis of the web. Again, much use was made of Siosiann's ability to detect magical auras. She was able to discern that two auras, both strong, were present in the entrance cave. One was an abjuration, the other an evocation. The Mothers then spent most of their Dispel Magics in order to rid the cavern of these lingering dweomers. Siosiann was eventually able to tell them that it was clear.

The Mothers climbed into the carved cavern that they had freed from barring magics. Four of the acidic flayed drow lurked at the rear of the chamber near the two passages out and to either side of the web-like ladder to a small aperture near the ceiling. Two clouds of suspicious looking gas appeared and one drifted over towards Gaspode. Obrana identified these as vampires. Siosiann summoned three celestial hippogryphs to block off the quth-maren. These managed to hold of the bleeding creatures. Meanwhile, Obrana called on the power of Tyr to send back the vampires. One fled to the northern exit. Fonesca then captured the other form in a Resilient Sphere. The Mothers then attacked the quth-maren with ranged spells while the celestial hippogryphs managed to do some damage. Two of the summoned creatures died while the Mothers finished off the flayed undead.

The Mothers gathered around the sphere enclosing the other vampire. Fonesca brought it down and the creature fled towards the exit. Obrana landed a blow and Kurtalla landed two, but the gaseous vampire fled up the web-like ladder into the small aperture above them. Jito loosed a fireball from his staff at the aperture and it burst into that space, but the Mothers did not know if it had any effect.

As Gaspode attempted to follow the vampire up the ladder he noticed that it was about to entangle him. He managed to jump away just in time. Gaspode then attempted to disarm the trap but he set it off and the others had to extract him. They decided to take another route, following the first vampire through the northern passage. Immediately through this opening another opening appeared to the right. This opened into a large chamber which held a drow female chained to one wall. Gaspode was suspicious, so he checked the view through his gem of true seeing; but nothing was different. Gaspode then approached the drow...

The gaseous form of the drow vampire priestess who had hidden in the column swept back along the top of the chamber away from them. It reached the rear wall and then gradually started disappearing. The Mothers approached the wall and were able to discover a large circular door hidden in the stonework. Gaspode then searched around for lock or a catch to open it and found a piece of stonework that he could depress to the right of the door. This did not allow it to open though, so subsequent searching was required for the other three catches. When the last was released, the stone dropped down a few inches and rolled off to the right, into the wall.

Beyond lay a bare room with a large copper covered coffin, bound with two copper bands. Of the vampire, there was no sign. The top of the coffin was engraved with the image of a drow female and the copper was completely untarnished. Gaspode examined it to see if it would release any traps and he found a glyph on each band of copper. Fonesca attempted to dispel the glyphs but to no effect, so Gaspode had to attempt to circumvent them himself. Unfortunately, they proved too difficult and their magic caused a blade barrier to spring into force around the coffin edging Gaspode backwards, but causing him no harm.

Attempts to remove the barrier were fruitless, so the Mothers waited nearly two hours for it to disappear. Jito used a Knock spell to open the band that Gaspode had not reached and it seemed to have no other effect. Kurtalla then stepped forward to open the coffin. As soon as he moved the lid, the vampire within attacked him draining life energy from him. The Mothers leapt to attack. The creature proved immune to their magic missiles but still quite susceptible to weaponry, as Jito, Kurtalla and Gaspode all laid blows. The vampire-drow cast some spells that her attackers managed to shrug off without too much effort, though Siosiann's summoned celestial hippogryphs did not last long in her circle of death.

Eventually the vampire was forced back into her gaseous form and settled back into the coffin, where she solidified again into her drow form, unmoving and statuesque.

Just to be sure, after the Mother's staked the vampire-drow-cleric, they cut off her head, blessed some rations and stuffed the head's mouth with them. Only then did they set about searching for treasure. Apart from the items obtained from her body, they found a scroll tube with a map of a route between Szith Morcane and the drow city of Maerimydra and a letter from "Mother" to "Daughter" indicating that raids should be carried out for the glory of the White Banshee amongst other things. The "Greater Revenance" spell that the Mother was working on seemed somewhat worrying. Small coffers in her final resting place also contained coins and magical items that were scooped up by the victorious heroes. They also looted a lyre and a chess set on their way back through the chambers. The party decided to head straight back to their apartments in Arabel, so Fonesca and Siosiann cast teleport and soon Kurtalla was re-acquainting himself with his bear.

The Mothers reported to the Lord High Seneschal, giving him news of the potential threat from Maerimydra. He was understandably keen for them to return to the underdark to help thwart whatever plans were afoot. Gaspode, meanwhile had more mercantile concerns.