Free War of the Spider Queen 2 - Insurrection by Forgotten Realms

appreciation."
Quenthel snorted. "I'm sure you were interested in more than her wizardly skills."
The mage's grin didn't change, but his eyes hardened the slightest bit. Good, she thought. Remind him that you see right through him.
"Very well," she said. "We're certainly not going to go back with the brutes to see Vhok, so the question is, how do we get through them and on our way?"
"There's no way to get around them," Valas said, "unless the ambassador knows this area and has a notion of another route we can take," he finished, looking at Faeryl.
The Zauvirr priestess shook her head.
"We're still too far away from the proper outskirts of Ched Nasad for me to recognize any features with certainty," she said.
"Then we must slay them," Jeggred announced. "Let me engage them and cut a path for you, Mistress."
"No, Jeggred, there's no need, however much fun you might think it would be. Pharaun, here, is going to get us through this. Aren't you?"
The mage grinned bemusedly and said, "I might have an incantation or two that will allow us to make our way through to the tunnel. Aliisza has assured me that, in good sporting fashion, she will stay out of it. Slaying these creatures should be minimal trouble."
"I'm not concerned with that. Just clear a path for us," Quenthel commanded.
"Very well," he said as he began to move forward, weaving the beginnings of a spell as he did so.

FOUR
Aliisza wasn't sure how Kaanyr would receive her latest news, but it didn't slow her steps. Tarrying to deliver it served no purpose. He would find out eventually, and she might as well pass it to him and get on to other, more interesting things. Besides, she wasn't really troubled by the prospect of the cambion's anger. He might fly off the handle from time to time, but he knew better than to direct it at her. Whether or not he flew into a rage this time, she had an idea that might just soothe his ruffled feathers and give her a bit of fun, besides.
Passing through the great doorway and into the throne room, Aliisza expected to find Vhok sitting on his throne, but he was not. He paced in front of it, which meant that he had serious things on his mind, serious in a bad way. The alu-fiend had a pretty good idea what those things were.
"Any more information on what that duergar horde is doing?" she asked as she approached him.
Vhok looked up from his contemplation, seemed to stare right through her for a moment, and at last said, "All I've been able to determine at the moment is that they don't seem to be headed in this direction, which is good."
"Good? Why?" Aliisza asked. She moved to sit on the top step of the dais. "I thought you liked the idea of a little sport for the Legions. You told me the other night that things were getting a bit staid around—"
"Because something big is definitely going on," Kaanyr interrupted, "and because they were responsible for wiping out the patrol to the northeast."
Aliisza had been about to stretch out, hoping to distract Kaanyr from all of this serious discussion for a few moments of romance, but she sat straight.
"That wasn't just a roving band of duergar," Vhok continued, "they were professional mercenaries. The Xornbane clan, if the evidence is correct. They don't go anywhere without major coin changing hands and big battles in the works."
Aliisza pursed her lips in thought.
"So if they aren't moving against us," she said, "then where?"
"Though I already have an idea, I was hoping you could tell me," Kaanyr said, looking down at the alu-fiend, "Where are my guests?"
Aliisza avoided meeting Vhok's gaze.
"I wasn't able to convince them to join us," she said carefully, "and after they defeated my little patrol as easily as they did, I thought it wise not to pursue the matter so directly."
"Defeated? Wiped out is more like it."
Kaanyr's tone was measured, and Aliisza could tell he was displeased.
So he already knew, did he? Is he spying on me, now?
She was glad she'd been up front with him on the subject. It had been