Buildings grown from the dark stones of the cave lined the street. Debris was everywhere. Malabeth moved careful onwards. She did not wear any shoes, and it did not occur to her that it would have been a good idea to change this. Sometimes her cloak brushed over stones, threatening to tear, when it glid over the edges, but she was lucky.

Suddenly the city wasn't so silent anymore. Whimpering sounds echoed from the opening of houses, shadows ran confused in the dark, too far for Malabeth to see in detail.

Most of the buildings were badly damaged. Walls had collapsed and floors crashed into the levels below them. There were crying voices. Malabeth stopped and turned her head to the side, staring into the dark opening of a building which seems apart from a few cracks mostly intact. Her eyes pierced the darkness without any problem, and thus she could see the bodies inside. Apparently the inhabitants had to flee, when the.... whatever had happened here - the earthquake? ... when it started.

Malabeth saw a body locked underneath heavy stones, a pleading look in the eyes. The stones were way to heavy to move them.

Now it became obvious to her, that she indeed was not alone in all of this. There were crying dark elves in every corner, in every dark passage. Few of them dared to enter the street, none of them spoke, even as she turned to them to question them what happened.

And there was still the sound of that drum, this thundering, low, rhythmic, pressure, that resounded in Malabeth's body.

The sound was clearer now, Malabeth could feel it stronger and with every heartbeat, no with every beat of the drum, with every thunder that she felt inside her body, she realized, that the whole ground trembled a little. Sand and dust dropped from edges, cracks widened, where the collapsed or damaged structures were unstable, only a little with every thundering, soft drum. But every little change was terrible in itself. Could nothing prevent what was happening here?

Malabeth turned around a corner toward the old well. The old well had, in the older times of the city been the source of water for the whole city. The city was young by then, and smaller, but already a city. There were slaves all day, present near the well, pulling water upwards with a system of buckets and chains. Underneath the city was a huge water supply and without the system of pipes and pumps that were established now, the well was the primary source for water. The huge supply underneath was great enough to supply the old city anyway. As the city grew more wells - or rather more openings to the underground sea were built, thus the old well was actually a system of shafts with containers and chains reaching down into this vast sea. But when the dwarfs and gnomes, which had been caught in several wars over a long time began establishing the drainage system in order today, the old well was abandoned. They were still there and if one would replace the now rusty chains, they could still be used to bring water to the city.

Before she reached the dark place, surrounded by looming, high buildings and protected by iron gates a shadow stumbled into the open from the side. Malabeth gasped. It was Llryael, one of the priestesses. Her dress was torn to shreds and she carried a number of bruises and cuts on her dark body. No major injuries. She looked dirty and a little confused, her red eyes gleamed with a strange passion, Malabeth had only seen once, in a ritual to the Demonspider, but one she was not allowed to witness just then. She remembered the smell of blood and sweat and there were soft moans. She didn't know if they came from pain or passion, and who uttered then, but she had seen the eyes of one of the priestesses.

Llryael's white hair was in disorder, locks curling out of control around her head, spilling over her shoulders and back. Her usually round - almost unelfishly round and pouting face now looked drained and weary. She cared as little as Malabeth about the exposure of her body, which was not as athletic as Malabeth's, maybe she even had a few pounds too much, but in a way that did not make her fat. Her curves would only be richer her whole form would seem softer and yet less fragile than Malabeth - even though she was far from fragile herself.
Usually Malabeth would have though of Llryael as cute, at times even as beautiful, but today her few pounds too many were too obvious, she looked almost deformed. She was dirty, and injured, and bent slightly, her shoulders hanging, making her a full head smaller than Malabeth, where she usually was only half a head shorter than the young priestess.

Another thing that seemed off to Malabeth was what Llryael was wearing. Her clothes were torn so that most of her skin was exposed. White cloth covered her breasts and upper chest, but below that only shreds where present fluttering around her belly and hips, not hiding her more private area or her shapely (although to Malabeth at the moment slightly too thick) thighs. No underwear, but a series of silvery chains were arranged around Llryael's hips, entangles with each other, and some of them were obviously broken.
It was as if she had been attacked, as if something were trying to.... Malabeth did not know... to take her? To violate her? To rape her? But Llryael said nothing of this and she carried too few injures around her lower body for this assumption to be true.

Llryael looked at Malabeth, out of breath, panting. With the back of her left hand she flicked strains of hair from her face. "Do not go there, Malabeth. A traitorous creature awaits there. Do not go there!" Llryael fingered for the silver symbol of the Demonspider around her neck. Malabeth looked at her and grabbed her shoulder. "Mistress Llryael, what did you see?"
"No, don't ask me! Please! Just turn away! TURN AWAY I ORDER IT!" Llryael's voice rose in tone and power, but all Malabeth heard was the fear.
"Would the Demonspider want us to run away? From what? From an earthquake?" The anger was instinctive, and it did not really have something to do with what Llryael said. Malabeth knew, the moment she said the words, she was in no position to disobey. Llryael had served the Demonspider far longer than she had, even though the age difference was not apparent from the look.
Llryael's eyes focused on Malabeth's. "Don't go there! Help the others!" Llryael's words were an order, but her hands clenched around Malabeth almost transparent cloak, she shivered.
Malabeth looked into her eyes likewise. She felt anger at the other's weakness. This fear was useless. If the cave collapsed... but Llryael wasn't afraid of that. "You can't even help yourself."

For a moment there was a deep silence between Llryael and Malabeth. Something had happened between those two. In Llryael's eyes anger and fear flickered and fought, but in the end fear won and Malabeth, for a reason she could not neither quite understand nor was willing to examine, felt a triumph. Her heart beat faster her mouth formed a savage smile. She was in better control of this strange situation than the older, more experiences priestess. "I trust in my power, and so the Demonspider trusts in me!"
Llryael gasped and let Malabeth go. She stumbled a few steps back, as if someone had smacked her right into her face. "Blasphemy! This is none of the Demonspider's doing!"
"But we are hers, and I will not fail her." Malabeth brushed past Llryael who was now panting again, but in anger.
"The others will know!"

Malabeth walked past the angry screams and shook her head. "Let them know", she thought to herself, "that my faith will not falter."
And she knew it was not her faith which gave her wings, but the victory, her domination over Llryael. She wanted to know what she had seen. And she had to see it fast, before her own confusion and fear returned.