Into the Deep Web

The boat cut through the black water in near-perfect silence. Hours had passed since we left the abandoned outpost behind. I stared into the darkness where the far shore was going to be, already thinking about the patrol vessel that would intercept us. A Duergar skiff was supposed to meet us somewhere on this crossing—manned by surly guards we could either throw overboard or, with any luck, befriend. I’d even spent the time sailing working out a cover story for why we were on their boat and why the outpost behind us was empty. Pest control. It was a decent line. Yet the lake stayed empty, leaving only the soft sound of the hull cutting through dark water and a boat that knew where it was going, even if I wasn't entirely sure anymore.

The others had settled into a tense quiet. Lae’zel crouched at the prow like a carved figurehead, yellow eyes fixed on the darkness ahead as she scanned the black water for any sign of movement. At the stern, Karlach sat on the raised platform, her engine casting a low, steady glow that faintly lit the water around the boat. Shadowheart had wedged herself in the middle of the boat, as far from either side as she could manage. Her arms were wrapped tightly around herself, fingers gripping her sleeves, and she kept her gaze locked on the floorboards, clearly uncomfortable with every small shift of the hull. Kagha sat beside me, one hand resting lightly on my knee while the other absently stroked Teela’s bronze scales. Her eyes moved slowly across the vast, lightless expanse of the lake.

“There are entire oceans down here,” she said softly, almost to herself. “I wonder what could live in them… deep beneath us.”

Lae’zel glanced back over her shoulder, her expression unreadable. “Whatever calls these waters home… let us hope we do not meet it.”

Karlach gave a low chuckle, the sound warm against the cold air. “Agreed. I bet what's down there has more teeth than I do.”

Shadowheart’s shoulders tensed. She didn’t look up. “Can we not talk about it?” she muttered. “I’d rather just get across.”

Ah yes, I thought. She hates water. Water and wolves.

“Look, we’ll be there soon,” I said. “And we’ll try to avoid open water in the future.”

Shadowheart’s shoulders eased slightly. She didn’t say anything, but the corner of her mouth twitched into a small, fleeting smile.

[Shadowheart: Approval +1]

After that, no one spoke. The silence stretched between us as the boat continued its slow journey. The only sounds were the faint creak of the hull and the low, steady thrum of Karlach’s engine. When the boat finally scraped against the stone dock, the sound was obscenely loud. We tied off without a word. The Grymforge should have been alive with hammer-clangs and shouted orders. Instead, the docks stretched empty under a faint red glow from lava fissures. No guards. No lit torches. No movement at all.

At first, it just looked abandoned. Then I noticed the webbing.

It started small. Thin, pale strands clinging to the edges of the stone dock, catching the red light like fine cracks across the surface. A few more trailed along the base of the stone pillars and the metal chains that once held boats in place. As we stepped onto the solid stone walkway leading inward, I saw thicker ropes of silk stretched between the support columns, sagging slightly under their own weight. By the time we reached the main path into the forge, the webbing had become impossible to ignore. It coated the stone walls in uneven sheets, draped across archways, and hung in loose, sticky curtains from the ceiling. The air carried a faint, sweet-dusty smell that clung to the back of my throat with every breath. The silence here felt different from the one on the boat. This one felt occupied.

The further we went, the harder it became to move. The webbing no longer just hung in our way—it clung. Thin strands caught on shoulders and arms with every step, forcing us to constantly brush them aside or duck beneath them. What had started as scattered threads had thickened into low-hanging nets that slowed our pace to a crawl. I stopped in front of a particularly tangled stretch, scanning for a clearer path through the hanging strands. That’s when I noticed Karlach. Unlike the rest of us, she stood upright without a care. The webs near her were already pulling back on their own, the edges curling and blackening from her body heat. She hadn’t even realized she was doing it.

I angled my chin toward her.

“Hey Hotstuff. Clear us a path, will you?”

Karlach let out a short, breathy laugh. “Oh, of course! Why didn’t you just say so?” Steam rose from her shoulders as she leaned into the webs. The silk shrank back from her radiant skin, melting without flame or sound.

We pressed deeper, moving much quicker than before. Karlach walked ahead of us, melting a path through the webbing with every step. The silk curled and blackened in her wake, clearing ample space for the rest of us to follow in single file without constantly having to duck or pull strands off our clothes. Then Shadowheart simply stopped , pointing a finger upward. Above us, suspended from the ceiling in neat rows like grotesque lanterns, hung the cocoons. Dozens of them, in varying sizes. Gnomes, duergar, drow—all the inhabitants of the Grymforge. Their chests rose and fell in slow, drugged rhythm. Alive. Breathing. Waiting.

Karlach’s massive frame seemed to shrink, her freckled face draining of its usual fire. “Hells below,” she whispered, voice cracking. “They’re still in there.”

Lae’zel stood motionless beside her. Only the faintest shift of her shoulders betrayed the breath she held.

Kagha tilted her head, emerald eyes tracing the nearest cocoon with clinical precision. Teela’s tongue flicked once, tasting the air, then slithered deep into Kagha’s armor to hide.

I swallowed the bile that tried to rise. “Keep moving.”

We filed past the living larder, boots treading over silk that had begun to carpet the floor in thick folds. The central chamber opened ahead like a cathedral remade by something that hated straight lines. What had once been forgeworks and scaffolding was now a geography of silk—great sweeping arches, hanging bridges, dense curtains that swayed in a breeze I couldn’t feel. Chains of egg sacs dangled in obscene clusters, their translucent shells pulsing with faint movement inside. The only thing unchanged from my memory was the flowing river of lava, painting everything in sullen reds and orange.

My voice sounded small in all that silence. “She’s been busy.”

Shadowheart stammered, “We should leave. Now. While we can.”

Karlach shifted her weight as she scanned the vaulted silk above us, already wielding her Titanstring Bow. “But we’re so close now. You know how to turn an ambush around, boss. What do we do?”

Lae’zel and Kagha both looked to me. The githyanki’s yellow eyes were steady and expectant, demanding my command. Kagha’s were soft and reverent. She gave me that small, serene smile. “Go on, my heart. Do your thing.”

I looked away, just long enough to shove the rising panic down where it belonged—The duergar were gone. The entire bloody forge had been turned into a silk-drenched womb. But I was still Tav. The Unwritten. My path was my own to create. As I had claimed the Grove and bound these women to me one ritual at a time, I would start by getting us into the right position.

As I turned back, all four of them were staring upward.

Shadowheart had gone completely frozen, her face somehow even paler. Karlach stood rigid, her heart beating hard enough to see the pulse at her throat. Lae’zel’s eyes had narrowed to slits, her jaw locked tight. Kagha’s expression was one I’d only seen on her once before in the Grove—pure fear.

I followed their gaze.

She hung motionless three meters above my head, suspended from a single thick strand of silk. The Matriarch. Her body was a grotesque mass of glossy black chitin that gleamed wetly in the red light. Her abdomen was grotesquely distended, the surface stretched taut and pulsing with dozens of fresh egg sacs that throbbed in slow, rhythmic waves beneath the translucent membrane. Her legs—each one thicker than my torso—were tucked neatly against her thorax, claws flexing with slow, deliberate twitches. One of them bore the pink mark that I had placed on her weeks ago, stretched and distorted across the thick black chitin. A faint vibration hung in the air around her. She could feel everything: our breaths, the smallest shifts in our posture, every tiny movement we didn’t even realize we were making. The Sensitivity Curse had sharpened her senses far beyond what any normal predator should possess. Eight massive red eyes—each the size of a dinner plate—stared down on me.

Not on the group.

On me.

No hunger in it. No rage. Just the absolute, unhurried certainty of something that had known exactly when I would arrive and had simply been here, waiting, with all the time in the world. The silence pressed down, thick as the webbing that coated every surface. My mouth had gone dry.

She didn’t descend.
She simply waited.