Volleys of arrows rained down on them from above. None had hit their mark so far, but it was impossible to return fire, for Firkraag had built his entrance halls to a peculiar design. They had entered a wide stone corridor. On each side, looming thirty feet tall, were sheer walls of smooth marble. There was not so much as a crack for a handhold to climb up.

At the top were stationed his archers, orcs or hobgoblins if their grunting was anything to go by. They could not see over the barrier and were either shooting blindly over it, or painstakingly threading their arrows through very narrow slits.

An armoured warrior might well sprint the gauntlet and reach the opposite door without so much as a scratch, were it not for the traps. They were everywhere. Some released pots of toxic oil from the ceiling above. Others were connected to trapdoors to gods knew where. Most of them, however, simply set off bunches of little bells. The bells themselves were harmless but their tinkling chime told the archers exactly where to aim.

There were hundreds of them. Yoshimo predicted that it would take him hours to disable them all, and in that time even an archer shooting blind was likely to hit him by chance.

"This is one of those situations," Arowan muttered, "Where I really miss having a mage in the party."

Viconia glared at her. The ranger had taken three mages into her group at various times and all of them had been bad news for the drow. Dynaheir had set Dorn Il-Khan on her, Xzar had abducted and tried to murder her and as for Xan… she shuddered with disgust. She would show them that they needed no mage in the party.

The Sharran pulled a potion from her pack with a flourish. It was an explosive mixture, formulated to detonate on impact. She had been cherishing some half-formed plans involving putting it under a toilet seat before Arowan used the privy. Still, that would be a difficult jape to pull off, and the others would have known it was her. Better to make use of it now.

"Good plan," nodded Jaheira, fairly.

Viconia smirked and took aim.

"Eat toast, surfacers!"

She drew back her slender arm and hurled the bottle over the balcony. At least that was the intention.

Instead it hit the stone and smashed with a deafening bang. A brilliant flash of light dazzled the party, and fire rained down from above. The vibration set all the little bells ringing at once on their wires.

"Yoshimo, quick!" Arowan cried, "Slice through the strings that aren't dangerous. They can't use the bells to target you if they're all ringing at once!"

The thief was quick to act and took out about half of the tiny bells before they had all stopped ringing. It cut them a path through the hall, and they ran through it, some of them sheltering from the arrows beneath Anomen's shield. At the far end of the hall, however, they ran into a locked door.

"Pick the lock Yoshimo!" hissed Jaheira.

"I am eager to oblige you, oh mighty leader, but even for the great Yoshimo these things take time," the thief replied.

"We don't have any time!" said Anomen, whose shield was starting to resemble a porcupine with all the arrows embedded in it.

While they waited, Arowan risked stepping out from behind his shield and shooting over the barrier. A shrieking squeal told her that she had struck an orc, but at a price. Her enemies could see where the arrow had come from (more or less) and shot back a dozen in return. About half of them struck home.

"Arowan!" Yoshimo yelled, dropping his picks and skidding to her side.

"Open the blasted door!" Anomen cried urgently. "I cannot both heal her and shield the party at the same time!"

"You are not the only healer present," Jaheira pointed out angrily. "But we do need to get clear of the archers if we are to treat her properly."

The ranger had two stuck in her left thigh, one in her bow arm and three in the torso of her leather armour. It was lucky that the orc archers were having to shoot up and let gravity pull their arrows down again. It slowed them and lessened the impact. They had sunk a fair way into the muscle but not deep enough to puncture any major organs. Nevertheless, the smallest movements hurt unbearably.

"Urgh," she groaned, as Rasaad grabbed her by the armpits and dragged her to the relative safety of the group. Yoshimo finished picking the lock. "Oh no, you've got to be kidding…"

The door swung open to reveal a second gallery, identical to the first, with even more archers and more traps. Jaheira at once made vines spring from the floor. They reached up and wrenched the wires, setting off the traps and tiny bells. Unfortunately, a sprint across this room was impossible until the vines spell had subsided. The druid began summoning creatures, but it was not easy to bring them into being exactly over the walls. Anomen was preoccupied with fending off those arrows which were still coming from the first gallery.

"We have to retreat back to the cavern and come up with a new plan," Jaheira instructed. "Everybody run for the exit."

"Not going to happen," Arowan moaned from the floor. She might have managed a very slow, difficult crawl before passing out from pain and blood loss. Running was out of the question.

"Hold still rivvil!" snapped a voice. A sheet of silver hair dangled irritatingly over the ranger's face.

"That's it. I'm dead," she muttered. "If you're going to murder me, Viconia, remember how many times I saved your hide and make it quick."

"Grow up," hissed Viconia, yanking out the arrows one by one. She made no effort to be gentle, and the ranger yelped as each one was tugged free. Blood poured from the open wounds as the drow moved her hands over her, whispering her healing spells.

Bit by bit, the pain ebbed away and Arowan got back to her feet.

"Thanks," she said, reluctantly.

"Not a problem," Viconia smiled pleasantly. "The hole you already have is rather too wide and loose. The last thing you need is any more of them."

Anomen snorted with laughter. The ranger caught his eye, and then shoved him bodily into the middle of the second room. It caught him completely off guard and he stumbled in, shield raised to protect himself.

"What are you doing you mad c…?" he screamed, as Jaheira's vines wrapped about his thighs and arrows struck his armour and shield with loud plinks.

"Let's try this again shall we?" grinned Arowan, ducking under his shield and notching her bow.

She watched carefully to see where the arrows were coming from, darted out, released one of her favourite fiery missiles in return, then ducked back under his shield. They returned fire but this time she was protected.

Though hopeless in melee, she had always been an excellent shot, and her bow was a beast of a weapon. She had stolen it from Captain Corwin before fleeing Baldur's Gate, and it gave her some satisfaction to imagine the soldier's face when she realised that it was gone.

Gradually the numbers whittled down, and as the effect of the vines wore off, they could hear the last few orc guards fleeing down the gallery. Arowan lowered her bow, panting and laughing.

"Arowan!" Yoshimo cried, "Are you alright, my crazy lady?"

"Fine, fine," she grinned in relief.

She and Yoshimo hugged tightly, though as the thief looked over her shoulder, he noticed Jaheira's eyes narrowing at him. The druid had specifically warned him off her daughter. Only the reason she had given was numbing potions, and Arowan was no longer taking them. So she couldn't really object.

"This door is locked too," Anomen noted, jiggling it. "I daresay there are more of those cowards quivering behind their balconies there as well."

"Why don't we climb onto the balcony instead?" Rasaad asked innocently.

"Since slaying a dragon and a demon lord, have your monk-powers expanded to such an extent that you can vault a thirty foot sheer wall?" demanded Jaheira, impatiently. "Has your goddess granted you the gift of flight?"

"No, but there are hidden doors in the corners of each room." The monk pointed his large finger. "Right there."

Immediately, the gallery grew louder than when Viconia had thrown her potion, as the whole party exploded at the monk.

"You stupid boy!" Jaheira summed it up succinctly. She swept her quarterstaff at Rasaad's calves, but the monk was too fast for her and jumped over it.

"Son of a bitch!" Arowan thundered. "There were doors to the gallery the whole time? You couldn't have pointed that out before the orcs shot me?"

"My family crest is ruined!" Anomen fumed, grabbing a fistful of arrows and wrenching them out of his shield. Thanks to protective enchantments, the shield itself had survived, but all the paint had been scratched off.

Yet it was Viconia who had the harshest words for the moon monk.

"Pestilent male!" she screamed. "Toast-brained imbecile! We could all have been killed!"

"Forgive me, the doors were so obvious that I assumed you had a reason for not using them," Rasaad replied, mortified. "It was certainly not my intent for any of our party to get hurt."

"Silence you accursed slice of toast!"

She strode onto the balcony, sword flaming. From up here, taking down the last remaining orcs was simple. Soon the ones that the party missed with their weapons were pitching themselves over the balcony just to get away.

Rasaad's genuinely hurt expression was too perfect. It took all of Arowan's self-restraint to keep a straight face. Some of the others, however, were starting to catch on to Viconia's unconventional cursing.

"Viconia, my comely lass, did you by some happenstance come to hit your head in the battle we just fought?" Anomen enquired, ever the gentleman. "Are you feeling quite alright?"

"Anomen has a point, if you don't mind me saying so. You are acting rather… odd," Yoshimo observed.

"Be quiet all of you!" snapped Viconia. "I sense undead up ahead and I must focus on turning them. Your masculine voices are like the crunch of toast between my teeth. Let us press on and find Firkraag, before the moonchild comes up with another way to get us all killed."

Arowan followed along, whistling to herself innocuously. She had to turn her face to the wall, however, when the three confused men started to whisper amongst themselves.

"Anomen? And Yoshimo too, for common is your first language is it not?" Rasaad asked in a low voice. "Tell me, what does it mean to say our 'voices are like toast?' This is a Sword Coast saying that I have not encountered previously."

"It means naught to me," Anomen replied indifferently. "I daresay it's a drow thing."

"Does she mean to compliment or insult us, do you suppose?" Yoshimo mused.

"Viconia being Viconia, I must assume she intended to insult me," Rasaad sighed. "Though personally I confess myself quite fond of the crunch of toast."

Arowan hugged herself with glee, and almost caught herself skipping into the next section of Firkraag's dungeon. Her good mood was short-lived however. There were vampires, mummies and more orcs and goblins than Jaheira could shake her stick at.

They only came across two people in Firkraag's dungeon who did not attack them on sight. The first was a friendly woman leading an archaeological expedition into an ancient part of the base. Apparently Firkraag moved into someone else's abandoned castle rather than building his own. That, or he had just slaughtered the original occupants. The group seemed nice enough and they went their separate ways.

The other was a peculiar troll. The first thing that struck the party as odd was that he was wearing clothes. Trolls, with their tough bodies and rapid regeneration, rarely bothered to cover themselves. This one, however, was wearing a white apron, a chef's hat, and a pair of sooty oven mittens. His other unusual trait was his speech, for he spoke clearer common than they had ever heard from one of his kind.

"Hello there, food-thing!" it greeted them pleasantly. "You are just in time. Please undress and jump onto the grill over there."

"Excuse me?" Jaheira replied imperiously.

"Up on the grill, one at a time. Careful it's hot!" the troll replied politely, reaching up his long arms to grab dried herbs and pots of spices. "Pity there's no time to marinade you. I thinking: rosemary and thyme potatoes, roasted in your drippings, and you seared whole with just a hint of coriander."

"That's it, I've heard enough!" Anomen thundered. "Die beast!"

"No! We can't just burst into his home and murder him!" Arowan objected, standing between Anomen and the troll. This turned out to be a mistake, for the troll cook assumed she was volunteering to go first. He lifted her with arms as strong as an elephant's trunk, popped her onto the table and began sprinkling her liberally with salt and pepper.

The men immediately drew their swords, while Viconia cast protective enchantments about herself. Jaheira raised her staff to strike the troll, but Arowan was having none of it.

"Stop it all of you, what has this poor creature ever done to you?" she protested.

"Crazy, crazy lady!" Yoshimo cried in disbelief. "It wants to eat you! Look, it is picking up a tenderizing mallet as we speak!"

This was true. Apparently she was sufficiently seasoned for the creature's taste, because he had put down the salt and picked up a large, spiked hammer. While she had been defending it from her companions, the troll was very quietly raising it above her skull.

"Woah… hold on… wait a minute!" she yelped, backing off the table and landing in a pile on the floor. "There's been a misunderstanding. We were invited here by Lord Firkraag. We're supposed to meet him downstairs."

The troll's dark green skin turned a pale cyan, and he lowered his mallet. He raised a trembling hand to his mouth biting, in his nervousness, not only his nails but the actual fingertips too. Being a troll they would soon grow back, but it was still quite revolting to watch.

"So sorry! So sorry!" it whimpered. "I make terrible mistake! So, so sorry."

"Not to worry!" smiled Arowan, "We'll just be on our way."

However, as she turned to leave, she found herself being lifted by her collar. The troll was holding her up like a mother cat carrying a kitten by the scruff of its neck. It was most uncomfortable and she began to choke and struggle. The troll was brushing her down roughly with its long fingers.

"Terrible, terrible mistake," it was muttering. "Lord Firkraag hate coriander! You should have said you were for His Hugeness. I would have used sage."

The others were ready to ignore the Ilmatari's pleas for mercy and deal with the creature. Only at that moment a door burst open and it turned out that he was not alone. The kitchen opened up to a long dining hall in which were seated over a hundred trolls, wolfweres, ogres, orcs and hobgoblins of various sizes. The smell of their combined body odour hit them like a tidal wave of corned beef. The creatures would have presented no challenge at all for Freya, but they were too numerous for this small party.

"'Ere, we're 'ungry," complained a large, squat hobgoblin who had opened the door. "What's the hold up?"

"I'm just dealing with the entrées, you wait turn!" snapped the troll.

The hobgoblin looked them up and down appraisingly. Judging by the fancy dragon-symbols engraved onto his armour he was some sort of captain. Behind him a hundred pairs of hungry eyes watched the party. Some of the creatures were licking their lips.

"I've told yeh before about talking to the food," the captain grunted. "We can eat 'em raw. 'Urry up and carve 'em. I'm back on duty in ten minutes."

"Apologies my esurient friend," Yoshimo cut in hastily. "We were specially requested by Lord Firkraag himself."

The Captain's face crumpled with disappointment.

"Shoulda known. Two foreign 'umans, a pointy-ears and whatever the heck you're supposed to be," he muttered, pointing at Viconia. "We always get the same old boring muck, but whenever any new flavours happen by, he keeps 'em for 'imself. Greedy great lizard."

He clumped back into the dining hall, and slumped grouchily at the head of the table. After that there was nothing they could do but stand still and let the troll chef season them. Rasaad had no beard nor hair for the spices to stick too, but their cook came up with an ingenious solution. He placed the monk directly in front of the grill while he peppered the other five and gave them bouquets of dried herbs to hold. By the time he got around to Rasaad, the monk had worked up a light sweat which, in the words of the troll, 'absorbed the flavours beautifully.'

Then, like some strange bridal procession, they filed out one by one, clutching their bunches of herbs before them.

"Through the doors ahead and to the left!" the troll called after them helpfully. "Then keep heading downstairs. I think I got most of the coriander off you, but if his lordship scents some just come back up and we'll bathe you in a nice onion broth."

"Thanks, you've been very helpful!" Arowan called back.

"And you have been delights to prepare," the troll replied generously. "I wish all my ingredients was being cooperative like you!"

They continued in procession deep into the underground castle. Nobody else bothered them, though a pack of wolfweres had to be forcibly restrained by their alpha from helping themselves to Firkraag's supper.

"Firkraag has gathered an interesting variety of servants has he not? Trolls, goblins, wolves, undead. We will still need to fight them at some point," Anomen muttered. "This little ruse might work on the way down, but it won't fool them on the way back up. We may as well battle them now!"

"We are tricking them, aren't we?" Yoshimo ventured. "Supposing we do convince this Firkraag that Freya is dead… what reason does he have not to eat us?"

"We offered to buy Garren Windspear's child from him," Viconia said. "Gold and gems. Dragons love that sort of thing."

"Not all dragons," Jaheira replied. "Dragons are natural hoarders, but some collect treasure of a less obvious kind. To live as a human noblemen and accumulate lands and titles is not normal behaviour. This Firkraag is unusual amongst his race, we should assume nothing."

Yoshimo was eyeing their packs with mounting unease as they passed under the solid metal fists of two giant golems. The constructs were letting them pass unchallenged, two guarding each end of a swinging bridge to the lower keep. Any one of them alone would be a tough fight for the party. These four could crush them all just by toppling over. At the far end of the bridge was a staircase spiralling down into the darkness.

"This may not be the best time to bring this up," said Yoshimo, "With a hundred orcs and ogres above us, a wolfwere pack behind us and colossal golems to our left and right but…"

"Out with it man!" commanded Jaheira. She was worried too, but her nerves tended to manifest in defiant anger.

"…all of our remaining gold is right here in our packs," Yoshimo said. "What's to prevent Firkraag from taking it, keeping Garren's child captive and eating us all into the bargain?"

Cruel, deep chuckling came from the bottom of the long, twisting stairs.

"Nothing whatsoever, fools."

It was not Firkraag, but the slow, rumble of an ogre. They were close to the dragon now, and had no choice but to pass the last of his bodyguards. Slowly, weapons drawn, they descended the stairs, emerging in a strange rectangular room.

Half of it was a bedroom and study, bedecked in fine silk sheets and vivid velvets. Everything from the bed to the chairs were ogre sized, and this ogre lived a life of great luxury. Even his plates and goblets were made from wrought gold.

What made the room strange was that the other half of it was a long line of barren cells, like the jail in Baldur's Gate. They were clean but barred, so that the captives could always see Tazok and he could always see them. Some of them had bloodstains up the walls, but all were currently empty except one. Garren's child looked up hopefully at the sight of them, but seemed too afraid of the ogre to say anything.

The ogre himself was lounging in a plush armchair, smoking a pipe and smirking at them. He made no move to rise when they came in, though his eyes roved over them. Arowan found this unsettlingly creepy. It was hard to pinpoint exactly why but her gut was telling her that this was not the usual look of a warrior sizing up his opponents.

"Are you Tazok?" Viconia asked. "We overheard Ajantis mention you."

"That pompous blob is dead is he?" Tazok grunted. Arowan nodded. She assumed that he had wanted this, but was not about to own up to killing the knight just in case. "Pity. I wanted to club him to death myself, but Lord Firkraag insisted on using illusions to trick strangers into doing it. That's the boss for you. Never settle for a quick, simple plan when a long over-complicated scheme will do."

He patted a plump emerald pillow by his side, gesturing for them to sit with him. Neither woman moved. Tazok bared his brown teeth at them threateningly. It was testimony to how unpleasant he was, that they were now rather eager to get past him quickly, even though the steps behind him led to Firkraag's lair.

"So you did come… I thought you would be too cowardly to answer the boss's challenge," he drawled lazily. "Tell me; which one of you is Gorion's ward?"

Nobody answered. Tazok rose to his considerable height, his fist tightening around his club.

"She is!" Viconia cried treacherously, pointing at Arowan. The ranger rolled her eyes.

"That one?" Tazok cried, pointing a meaty finger at her, clearly underwhelmed. "That feeble little mouse?"

"You were hoping for Freya?" asked Arowan, acidly. The ogre let out a low rumble of laughter.

"No. I would not have relished another round with the so-called Hero," he replied. "Unlike Sarevok, I had the brains to know when I was outmatched. I made sure I had a teleport spell to get out of that battle, and I have another one now, just in case she showed up. Don't think I'll bother wasting it on you though. How is the Bitch of Baldur's Gate these days?"

"Dead," Arowan said flatly.

"Good! Every time one of your cursed lineage falls, it's good news for the rest of us," Tazok spat. "Sarevok was no better. He took too much for his plate, left us in a bad position. I warned him that Gorion had multiple wards. You'll find my new master much smarter!

"Who were you wanting then? Draxle? She's dead too."

"Ajantis's little whore and I did have a score to settle," admitted Tazok. "The boss might even have let me keep her. It would have been as good a revenge on Gorion as any other."

This time it was Arowan's turn to laugh.

"He wants to kill one of Gorion's wards to get revenge on the old mage?" she replied. "And he got me? Oh dear… he really is going to be disappointed."

Apparently Firkraag was close enough to hear them, for there was an impatient grunt, and thin tendrils of smoke wormed their way up the stairs and into the room. Tazok stopped smirking and jumped to attention.

"Down the stairs you go then, dead things," Tazok leered. "In the unlikely event that you can talk your way out of this, I'll be waiting."

The staircase merged into the side of a much wider, longer set of stairs. At the top was a very wide, flat stone hall that seemed to serve as the dragon's runway. The dragon themed décor was stamped all over this place too, only the statues were poorer quality and less detailed. As if the artists who carved them had been in a hurry to get out. Jaheira recognized some of them as the goddess Tiamat, an evil five-headed dragon mother. It did not bode well.

Firkraag himself was waiting for them at the end of a grand hall at the foot of the stairs. At first they thought the lair tiny, then they realised that the room itself was enormous. It was just that he was so large that he made it look small.

What was surprisingly underwhelming was his horde. He did have one but it was less gold than Bodhi's bounty by the looks of things. Mostly it comprised of small and exquisitely crafted items displayed around the edges of the lair on plinths. There was a pile of coins in one corner for expenses but nothing like the glittering mound of treasure belonging to the last dragon they had encountered. That one had been less than half Firkraag's size too.

"Wow," breathed Arowan, who unlike the others had never seen a live dragon, not even a whelp. He seemed pleased by her reaction and drew himself to his full height. When he spread out his charcoal black wings to reveal their enormous span, she satisfied him with an impressed gasp.

Fighting him was completely out of the question. He was a red drake with scales like rubies and a hide of iron. Each of the horns on his head were the length of two humans and his claws were spears in their own right. He swished his barbed tail and it cracked like a whip, making the whole party jump. All of that was without magic or fire-breath, though doubtless he possessed these weapons too.

"Welcome. I see Freya is not with you," he observed lazily. "I must apologise for doubting your word, but it never occurred to me that you would be so foolish as to face me without her. Even with her, the outcome would have been the same, but it would have made this so much more interesting."

"Tazok said you wanted her to get revenge on Gorion," Arowan said, as assertively as she dared. "Slaying me won't achieve that. He had…"

"…no interest in you," Firkraag finished for her in a bored voice. "Yes, yes. I know Arowan. You were raised by Gorion. I know this from my spies and followers. They are subtle when I wish it, though none of them were ever quite right after they returned from Candlekeep. Their tales of Gorion's Ward were conflicting senseless babble. You were both male and female, the most beautiful creature to walk the Sword Coast and a filthy half-orc. A noble necromancer of Helm. I was intrigued, so I paid a visit in person, disguised of course."

"Forgive me for asking," Arowan cut in, for despite the risk that they were about to be eaten, curiosity got the better of her, "But how could you go unnoticed anywhere?"

"Dragons can adopt a humanoid form at will," Jaheira hissed.

"And I did not go unnoticed," Firkraag added. "Even as a human I cut a striking figure. I was noticed, and perhaps some of the monks even recognized my true nature. If they did, they were wise enough not to challenge me. In the highly unlikely event that they could have driven me off, a fire breathing dragon in a library… you get the picture."

Arowan's neck was starting to ache from craning upward. Beside her Yoshimo stood poised to run, but run where? Adamite golems and a small army stood between them and escape. For the moment, it seemed, Firkraag was more interested in talking than in eating them.

"Gorion's petty memory spells were not powerful enough to fool a being of my stature, though they worked well enough on everyone else." He yawned, revealing row after row of gleaming fangs. "I tire of this. I cast my net hoping to snare one of his favourites. Freya would have been the golden prize of course, but I would have settled for Draxle or even Eric. You, on the other hand, were nothing to him and he was nothing to you. Which means you are nothing to me… but a snack."

Yoshimo leapt in front of her, katana drawn. Arowan raised her bow hopelessly. Rasaad and Anomen both sprang forward and began pounding ineffectively at the dragon's legs. Jaheira summoned wolves in a vain attempt to distract Firkraag and Viconia, as always, began with casting protective spells over herself. It was all for naught.

Firkraag's gaping jaws plunged toward her with impossible speed. The heat emanating from his gullet was unbearable. Yoshimo screwed his eyes shut, though to his credit he did not move. Arowan could neither fight, run, nor scream. The breath caught in her throat and she found herself paralysed in the face of her impending death.

Inches from her face, the dread jaws snapped shut. At first, Arowan thought Firkraag might have been bluffing about eating her, but then he sniffed, his great red nostrils flaring. His eyes narrowed at her as though she had personally offended him.

"Is that coriander?" Firkraag demanded, his voice dripping with disgust. "I loathe coriander!"

"Oh, I'm so sorry," Arowan replied. It was not the time for sarcasm, but under stress it just slipped out.

"Not as sorry as my cook is going to be," the dragon growled.

"Don't blame him, it's not his fault!" she said, the Ilmatari in her emerging. There was no sense in the poor troll cook dying too. "He'd already seasoned me before he knew you'd asked for us. He tried to get it off when he realised."

"Ah, so the rest of you are not covered in that revolting herb then?" Firkraag perked up a bit.

"Arowan, I am going to kill you!" Jaheira thundered.

"Between this and the nymphs earlier, if we survive I swear I will cut out your tongue!" Anomen agreed angrily. "The world would be a better place if you just stopped talking!"

Firkraag cast a reptilian eye over the party appraisingly, and it landed on the drow. The muscle-bound monk looked tough and chewy, metal armour stuck in the teeth and the druid was inconsiderately transforming into a bear before his eyes. He lunged for Viconia, his hot breath blowing back her silver hair. In response, she summoned her flaming sword defiantly.

"Bleed for Shar, you foul piece of toast!"

It was such a weird curse that she actually succeeded in getting his attention. He snaked his head close to Viconia so that he was on a level with her. Rasaad landed a burning punch that the dragon actually felt. He threw the monk against the wall with an irritated flick of his tail.

"Did you just call me… toast?"

Arowan screwed her eyes shut while Viconia (in the mistaken belief that she had learned a swearword powerful enough to shock dragons) went right on using it.

"You are right, toast is too good a word for you, wyrm! You are the mere crumbs of toast!" she screamed. Dragons do not have human facial expressions in their greater form, but it was obvious that Firkraag was very confused.

"Crumbs of… toast?" he echoed. "Are you trying to convince me that you are mad, mortal? In the hope that I will not eat you in case you are contagious?"

"Do you believe that the gods will let you eat me, toast-breath?" Viconia cried, slashing her sword. "Do you believe that a common slice of toast can defeat the Servant of all Faiths?"

To the drow's satisfaction, Arowan's disbelief and everybody else's utter bafflement, Firkraag withdrew. He sat back on his haunches, brushed Anomen away with one claw and surveyed the drow for a while. Viconia leant in to Arowan and said in a whisper;

"This word of yours, toast. I did not know you surfacers had curses of such potency in your insipid language."

"Oh gods, we're all going to die," the ranger moaned softly.

An immense talon reached out and plucked Viconia up by her shoulders. The drow cursed and struggled, but instead of popping her into his mouth, the dragon held her to his eye. He twiddled her left and right, inspecting her closely.

"The Servant of all Faiths?" he murmured thoughtfully. "Seems unlikely but wouldn't hurt to check I suppose… TAZOK!"

There was a pounding of feet and the ogre hastened down the stairs and into the room. Firkraag dropped Viconia unceremoniously on the floor and scooped up the rest of the party, wrapping them safely out of the way in his talons and tail. They struggled, but it was like wrestling cast iron.

"Tazok, kill the drow."

"You're giving her to me to play with?" the ogre grinned with yellow-brown teeth. "Thank you master, her suffering shall be legendary."

"No torture, just kill!" Firkraag ordered impatiently. "Get on with it!"

It was clear that Tazok was wondering why the boss didn't just do it himself, but he dared not question his master. He swung his club at Viconia, who tried to parry, but the ogre was too strong.

"NO!" cried Rasaad. He wrenched at the dragon, managing to get one arm free. "VICONIA!"

Tazok swung his club a second time, and there was a loud crack like a tree falling as he broke both her legs. Unable to support herself, she collapsed to the floor. The drow looked up at him petrified, and in agony, tears streaming down her face. The ogre raised his club above his head in both hands and swung it at her face. She curled into a ball and by some miracle he missed.

Firkraag watched on, intrigued, as the ogre's club swung past Viconia, ruffling her hair, and smacked into a stone plinth behind her. The force of the blow dislodged one of his statues, a crudely hacked representation of the five-headed dragon goddess Tiamat. It toppled neatly onto Tazok, knocking him prone and pinning his head to the stone floor like a claw.

The ogre's head was trapped beneath the five-headed dragon. He tried to lift it, but his flailing was to no avail. Viconia uncurled like a hedgehog and peered around cautiously. In Firkraag's claws, the monk relaxed a little, feeling his heartrate slow. For a moment it had seemed as though she would die, and it felt as though the bottom of his world had fallen away.

"Master, help me!" Tazok yelled. One of Tiamat's stone heads was digging into the back of his neck. Viconia began healing her broken legs. The ogre's enthusiasm at the thought of torturing her had not escaped her notice. Were the rest of the party not watching she might have taken the opportunity to show this amateur how a professional inflicts pain, but as it was, she'd have to settle for killing him.

Before she struck, she looked to Firkraag, just to make sure that her actions would not provoke fiery retribution. The gods had shown themselves willing to go to great lengths to preserve her life, but not to shield her from pain and injury. Firkraag released the rest of her party from his claws and waved a talon at her indulgently.

"Who am I to defy the will of the gods?" he shrugged.

Viconia never got the chance to strike, however, because while she was busy healing her legs, Rasaad reached Tazok first. He flung the stone statue aside and bellowed a challenge. All of the others shook their heads and sighed at his insistence on an 'honourable' fight instead of just stabbing the prone ogre. Except for Anomen who leapt in to help.

"No, he is mine!" Rasaad insisted. "You want someone to play with, monster? Play with me!"

"How romantic," muttered Arowan, rolling her eyes.

It was still hardly a fair fight, for the ogre was severely concussed. He lunged clumsily at Rasaad who used the force of Tazok's own weight to bring him down to the floor. What happened next took them all by surprise. The monk pinned Tazok and began pounding his face. There was no moon-like calm or fancy footwork involved. His bunched hand slammed down over and over, like a hammer striking a nail. Rasaad struck until his knees and arms were drenched in blood, and large splatters of red covered his own face. It went on for a long time.

"He's been dead for a while," Firkraag pointed out after a time, but Rasaad showed no sign of stopping.

All his bottled rage was released at once. The death of his brother, the deaths of his friends. He was no longer part of the Sun Soul Order, Arowan had betrayed him. He had nothing left in the world except revenge and… except perhaps for Viconia. And this thing had tried to take her from him too.

The cracking sound of splintering skull and the emergence of little pieces of brain were making even Viconia wince by this point.

"Do something!" Jaheira mouthed at her.

The drow approached him hesitantly, for he was so lost in his fury that she feared he might strike out at her too. She placed a hand on his shoulder.

"Rasaad… Rasaad stop," she said gently. "Please?"

Her words had no effect. There was nothing recognizable left of Tazok's face now. It seemed as though the Selunite would not slow nor stop until he collapsed from exhaustion. Viconia had not been brought up to have patience with emotional incontinence. She slapped the monk about the back of his tattooed head, hard.

"Enough male! Do you think to impress me with this ridiculous display?" she demanded. Though secretly she was both impressed and pleased. "Get up! I have seen toast behave with more dignity!"

Rasaad seemed to come to his senses. He stopped, panting and staring in horror at his own handiwork. As he rose shakily to his feet, Viconia wrapped her arms about him from behind. Jaheira glanced at her daughter with concern, but Arowan had seen this coming from miles away and was more grossed out than upset by it.

Slow and shell-shocked, the monk looked from drow to ranger and back again. His knuckles were dripping with blood, and globs of connective tissue. Viconia's brow furrowed. Then he asked, in a strained voice;

"Arowan? I have to know. What exactly did you tell her 'toast' means?"