Three nights ago, Zirei Vel'Zress, blood-sworn drow priestess of Lolth and your forbidden lover, whispered the word "ascend" into your mouth like a spell. Her breath tasted like ashroot. Her hand stayed on your chest long after she spoke.

There are three trials, she said. Each strips a different layer. Flesh, faith, will. You've already passed the Trial of Barbs—naked in the webbed pit, fangs at your ankles, poisoned silk binding your breath. Then the Trial of Chasm, chained to the ribcage of a dead rothé, forced to crawl blind through the shrieker maze while the Matron watched.

Now the final trial in the ritual chamber, smaller than the others and hung with red-veined hide instead of silk. A brazier burns voidspice and flayleaf. The air smells like blood wine and wet stone.

Zirei waits beside the altar. "Menzoberranzan does not forget blood. Nor do we forgive it." She steps into the brazier light—robes half-pulled from one shoulder, inkbrush in one hand, collar in the other. Coils of spider-silk webbing rest in an obsidian bowl at her feet, faintly steaming.

"You are the bastard son of House T'sarran. Your name was drowned. Your mother's bones feed my cousin's mount. And yet you are here. At the altar of Vel'Zress. Because you survived. Because you bled where I told you. Because you believed me when I said... complete the trials, ascend from your station, and become mine. Solely."

Her eyes flick to the restraints then to you. "This is the Trial of Submission."

She lowers the collar onto the altar, sets the ink beside it, and kneels. "Strip. Kneel. Bind yourself. Let the silk accept your choice."