Cold. The foul breath of those assembled would have steamed in the stony chamber like so many geysers - had there been light. But light was unthinkable, a sacrilege. Light deadened the senses, the true senses of the hunter. Only prey lived by light.
The purply blackness rippled, and to the forefront was a rustle of robes... and a new scent? And now the crowd murmured in fearful anticipation. Now the conclave could begin.
"My friends," murmured a voice, a river dammed behind thinning ice. "Why are we a forgotten temple?"
The amorphous darkness shifted uneasily. None dared answer.
The calm, chilled voice continued unheeding. "Why are we not feared?"
Again the silence. This time even the stirring diminished. Now there were scents of terror.
"Why are petty tyrants using our Master's Name for their own negligible ends?" The dam was cracking. "Why are our Temple and our ancient secrets neglected, while fools and charlatans build shoddy copies, both under cities of the surface and next to vast metropoleis of the Underoerth!"[1] Roaring, now. "Why do the lice infesting the surface not TREMBLE at Our Master's Name!"
"You!" the voice dropped - frozen. "Rho. You will answer."
"Er... Our M-M-Master is..." someone squeaked.
"No. That is not an excuse. That is NEVER an excuse." He didn't even have to give the order. Cold steel flashed and bit deep. The gurgling did not last long, but it was an eternity for the shivering assemblage.
"Sigma. *You* will answer."
"We have failed to make our presence kn-known. Your Eminence." This one was a woman. Soprano, speaking deeply, if rushed. Attrition was high for the lower orders. But mercifully swift. If Beta or Gamma displeased the High Priest, the screams could go on for weeks. "They do not know our Master's nature. Only the name."
"You are correct. Rho." The High Priest let the promotion sink in. There would be intense competition in the coming days. It kept them focused.
"I have called you here because there is a new insult to the Dark One. A miserable cur by name of Yammez-Yakobsse has written an article in the Dragon Annual. The 'Children of Tharizdun'."
The entire gathering gasped, unable even to breathe, a jungle tribe dunked into the Arctic.
"And the profanity does not stop at the title," the High Priest spat out. "In the backdrop this creature - or perhaps his illustrator, Pawolo-Parentei - sees fit to design a new holy symbol for us! A spiral with curlicues on a BRIGHT RED background! And this is propagated through the entire book!"
The gathering roared! The eternal symbol of the sect was perfect - a two-tiered pyramid, like the Temple, but pointing down, down to the depths of the Earth.[2]
"How dare they! And they tell lies about our forefathers in the text, that we animated the dead and created monsters of the living - what did they care for such parlour tricks? One of these undeads, the 'kurge', isn't even a priestly creation. It's the work of a mage! How can a shambling wizard's puppet be a child of the One God?
"Our Master was - IS! - the Dweller In Darkness. Ruler of Primal Chaos. He does not trifle with such base concepts as 'death'. This universe's cycles of life are beneath Him - and beneath us. And ultimately the death 'gods' - pah! they betrayed us with the rest.
"Perhaps somewhere in the Abyss, there is an awful presence almost enlightened enough to sing His praises. Maybe, just maybe in the Dungeon Dimensions, or the Border Ethereal, or the Far Realm, there slithers some ... thing that just might conceive of such a One.
"Not to say that Yammez utterly failed. Knowledge must be taken from all sources. Any secret may lead the Dark One back to us. The Rogue Eidolon... not so much grander than our animated caryatid columns, and there is the problem of the symbol ... but he may be right. If so, it behooves us to find out.
"Delta. You will select four companions from Omicron's rank down. You will then leave this place and seek out any tales of a Rogue Eidolon. I give these other petty abominations little credence, but perhaps some of our allies created them. Yammez may have been on the right track.
"As for Yammez himself... he has blasphemed against our spirit, and is unforgivable for that reason alone. But with the Eidolon... oh, that is the worst sin of all. He knows too much.
"Beta. You will find Yammez. And you will bring him here alive.
"This meeting is adjourned." One last slither of satin, and the inky blackness grew perhaps a little less distorted, and perhaps a little warmer.