17 Marpenoth, 1371

Dear Master Zorthaster,

Rather than spending a restful night in the rope trick, we went in search of more drow. We found drow, answers to some of our questions, and more danger and intrigue. I only hope we are smart enough to be able to get ourselves out of the tangled web in which we find ourselves getting more entwined.

In my last letter I told you that we retreated to the drider lair to recuperate from the encounter with the vampires and quth-maren. I thought we were going to spend the night tucked away from scrying eyes, but the others had different ideas. Instead we ventured back out and attacked one of the upper chambers on the chasm wall after recovering our composure. The first hole we poked into revealed the bottom of a wizard's tower. We had a brief battle with several student mages that ended in their deaths. While the warriors were dealing with that, I kept watch in the interior of a tall chimney-like chamber. Someone had seen doors on the walls above earlier, but they were gone by the time I arrived.

Instead of doors, I discovered a voice speaking in my head. It was amelodic elven vioce with the rich accented I am coming to associate with drow. The voice was mature, cultured and relaxed.

"Welcome surface wizard," he began. "Please call off your companions. You have already proven yourself. . . " here he paused just a moment. ". . .Resourceful. I am the Archmage of Szith Morcane, Solom Ned'razak. If you would stop killing my students, perhaps we can come to a mutually beneficial agreement. Something that would be more agreeable than simply filling the Inverted Tower with a meteor swarm or two. . ."

He spoke into my head and I felt that he was scrying on us despite the protective powers of the harper pins we all wore. I swooped into the room where Shane, Oskar and Xan had just killed the last of the students within sight. I quickly told them about the message and passed along word of acceptance to the Archmage. Kerith cast a speech link spell on me and, at the invitation of the Archmage, I carried Shane up the tower to a door that appeared high in the chamber following a series of three clicks.

Shane may be small but he is very heavy. Even so, I was glad to have him nearby as we went through the topmost door and entered the Archmage's chambers. He was lounging on a heavy throne of black metal, looking very relaxed. He was handsome in a way, with long white hair, elaborately braided and decorated. He exuded an air of confidence, maturity and unconcern for any threat that we might pose or any inconvenience we may have caused.

Archmage Solom Ned'razak made it clear that he was unconcerned with the petty political infighting that plagued the drow society. The inverted Tower had been here for hundreds of years and would be here for hundreds more. Recently however, forces of the drow goddess of undeath, Kiraransalee, have taken over and caused some trouble. When I told him that we were here to see the raids on the surface stopped, he readily agreed that they were pointless, destructive and did not serve his purposes at all. He would just as soon see them ended as well. So, he proposed a solution. If we agreed to remove the followers of Kiraransalee he would withdraw his support from the defenders. He would immediately remove the Spell Guard and the Arcane Guard from the battle. If we were successful in destroying the followers of the goddess of undeath, he would see that the raids above are ended. In order to remove these followers, we would have to clear the Fane of Lolth from their control and drive them from the fortress below. The fortress is in the former House Morcane, the bottom chamber where we had encountered the vampires and the spell of forbiddance that so affected Primula.

Kiraransalee, we learned, fills her followers with hatred for all. Primula later told us that it was Kiraransalee's minions that were responsible for the fall of Corellen's temple where we met the young gold dragon so many years ago. We also learned that there was an entire city, Szith Morcane, nearby, hidden just beyond one of the other entrances in the chasm wall. Yet another entrance led to a bazaar of sorts attached to that city. The Archmage Solom Ned'razak described the entrance to the guards' barracks as well.

As we were conversing, the Archmage got visibly irritated and told me that one of my companions, an elf, continued to paw at the bodies of his dead students like a common thief. He wanted it stopped. I passed a message to Kerith and he was only partly successful in stoppig Xan from looting the dead. The Archmage, unhappy with Xan's behavior, trapped him behind a wall of force, separating him from the rest of us. We were told that he would have to stay there for 24 hours as punishment. I could not tell how the Archmage was able to trigger this spell from his remote location, how he was able to scry on us so completely while holding a conversation with me, or how he was able to converse with me mentally with so little effort. All these factors made me very nervous. I tried to cover my concern with an air of innocent acceptance of all he said. I do know that we will have to have some long discussions with Lord Morn and the leaders of the Bright Blade clan about the implications of all the Archmage revealed. We will also have to speculate about things he did not reveal.

For now, we agreed to his proposal and prepared to depart. Xan was able to appease the Archmage sufficiently to be released by placing a large, expensive diamond on one of the dead students. It looked like it would be sufficient to be used as a component to have the students raised. However, I wondered, if the Archmage is in opposition to the forces of Kiraransalee, and the forces of Lolth are either dead or in hiding (like the ones we found behind the illusionary walls), who is he going to get to do the raising?

Xan was in a foul mood when he was released. He cut himself with an arrow, broke it and threw it in the Inverted Tower. All the while muttering something to himself. I just hope he keeps his head and doesn't get us all killed because of his hatred of the drow.

Following our escape from the tower, we moved to attack the barracks area. There were several drow guards, an officer, and a quth-maren maren on guard. I cleared out most of them with a firebrand but the warriors had to finish off the officer and quth-maren. Immediately after the battle, we heard a hail from the passage leading into the guard room. Three Spell Guard asked to pass by. They told us that they had received orders that they were not to oppose us in any way. They walked by, dropping their white tabards on the still smoking, bodies of the guards. They neither looked at us or said a word after we granted them passage. They left by the way we came in.

We explored the rest of the barracks and found no more drow. We did have a nasty battle with a salamander summoned when someone set off a glyph or magic trap. I think it must have been a powerful spell to summon such a creature. It was a summon monster VIII at least. The salamander took a terrible pounding from Oskar and the cat but returned as good as it got. It slashed and bit at the paladin before spinning and delivering a thwack with its flaming tail. The tail strike swept Oskar from the back of his mount and he landed in a crumpled heap at Primula's feet. She responded instantly with a spell that had the paladin back on his feet and ready to finish off the monster. Fortunately for us, the salamander had no way to quickly heal his wounds and it was soon destroyed.

Taking our time to explore the barracks complex with care, we found several valuable items and another important piece of information in the officer's quarters. It was an unopened letter from Rhavauz to Indrizil. In this letter we learned that 1) the City of Mearimydra has fallen to a force of goblins, ogres and giants; 2) the priestesses of Lolth have lost their power, Lolth is silent and; 3) emissaries of the Lady of the Dead rule Szith Morcane and all Maerimydra is her temple.

We finished looting the barracks and threw the bodies of the dead drow out past the web that clung to the wall and into the raging river below. We wished to ensure that Kiraransalee had no more minions after our work than before. With that gruesome task complete, we need to decide on out next move. The Archmage offered to have a student of his accompany us, but we declined the offer. Even without a spy present in our midst, I fear that we are being watched now that Archmage Solom Ned'razak has spoken with us.

I feel like we should retreat to the surface for now and see if we can ambush any patrols that emerge to punish the dalefolk for our actions. We'll see what the others want to do. I just want to stay busy so I don't have to think about all the death and pain we are causing or may fail to prevent if we do not succeed. It seems like all paths before us lead to suffering and pain. I only hope that we choose wisely. I left home to pursue dreams of adventure. Those dreams focused on saving the innocent and helping the helpless, not on destroying students and guards and throwing burnt bodies into rivers. I'm not so foolish as to believe that we can defeat the forces of evil by simply treating them nicely, but at the same time, I don't want to become so jaded and full of hate that these actions become less loathsome than I find them now. The drow are infamous for their deceit and treachery. I keep telling myself that we do not have to become like them to defeat them. I only hope that I am not deceiving myself.

Your faithful student,

Cedar