T'lar nodded her head in a bow. "What is your pleasure, Lady Penitent? Shall I return to Guallidurth and announce your birth?"

The Lady Penitent smiled, a feral gleam in her eye. "Yes. Do that."

Leliana leaned on the railing of the bridge that spanned the Sargauth, watching as the three fisher-folk below hauled on the line that would bring in their net. Over the rush of the underground river, she heard voices from the Cavern of Song: the faithful, singing Eilistraee's praises. Though most of the voices were female, a few held a lower timbre. Even after three and a half years, it still seemed odd to hear male voices echoing through the caverns of the Promenade.

A shaft of moonlight sprang into being a short distance away, slanting down to the river. It was as if a window had opened in the rock overhead, allowing light to shine in from the World Above-light that overpowered the shimmer of Faerzress that permeated the cavern walls. The moonbeam was magical, a manifestation of Eilistraee's song-a reminder that the goddess was watching over her faithful in this, her holiest of shrines.

The moonbeam played briefly over the river, making the water's ripples sparkle. The fisherfolk tucked the line under their arms and made the sign of the goddess, touching forefinger to forefinger and thumb to thumb to form a full-moon circle. Only when the moonbeam disappeared did they resume hauling in the net. The line suddenly pulled taut, drops of water flicking from it. The three pulled harder on it, but the net didn't budge. It appeared to have snagged. Likely it had caught on the jumble of masonry on the river bottom: the remains of the original bridge.

One of the fisherfolk was a drow male; the second, a human female with skin so pale it seemed ghostly in the darkened cavern. The third was a muscular half-orc. He bared tusklike teeth in a grimace and pulled as hard as he could, but the net refused to come unstuck.

"Jub!" Leliana called down to him. "If you keep pulling like that, you'll tear the net."

The half-orc gave one last grunting pull-and sprawled backward on top of the other two fisherfolk as the tension left the line. A portion of the net rose from the river, dripping and filled with wriggling white blindfish. So did something else. Large and metal and rusted, it creaked as it moved. It looked like an enormous hook, thick as a heavy tree branch and tipped with a barbed point. The base of the hook, now bent, was attached to something deeper in the river that was too large and heavy to move.

Leliana belonged to the third of the temple's watches. Her patrol didn't begin until moonset. But she was a Protector, entrusted with one of the temple's legendary singing swords. Anything this unusual warranted her immediate inspection, on duty or off. She strode along the riverbank to the spot where the three lay worshipers stood.

She nodded at them and touched the ceremonial dagger that hung against her chest. Then she sang a prayer: one that began softly, but that rose steadily to a crescendo with the power of a waterfall. At its conclusion, she chopped a hand through the air like a sword blade slicing down. Forced apart by her magic, the river split in a V-shaped trough that extended almost to its center. The depression widened, forcing the water back on either side. The remainder of the river rushed on swifter than before, compensating in speed for the narrowed space.

The gap in the river revealed an enormous mass of rusted iron, large enough to fill a small room. It lay, tipped sideways, on the river-smoothed blocks of stone from the original bridge. It was the statue of an enormous scorpion, its legs twisted beneath it and one pincer claw splayed out to the side. Its barbed tail had snagged the net.

The human stared at it through dark-lensed goggles that allowed her to see in the Underdark. "What is it?" she asked. "A statue from the first bridge?"

Leliana shook her head. She'd been assigned to the Promenade little more than a year and a half ago, but she'd made it her business to learn all she could about the temple since then. In the earliest days of the Promenade, when the first bridge was in ruins and the river impassable, a scorpion-shaped construct had been sighted, on occasion, in the caverns that opened onto the eastern banks of the Sargauth. When the Protectors extended their patrols into the caverns to the southeast a few years ago, they'd expected to run into it, but the construct had seemingly disappeared. It had, they surmised, either wandered away into some deeper corner of Undermountain or been summoned home by its maker.

"It's a wizard's construct," Leliana answered. "Deadly when active, but this one looks frozen with rust."

The human and the drow male both took a nervous step back. Jub merely grunted. He clambered down into the trough in the magic-parted river and yanked on the net, trying to free it. Blindfish scattered from it and landed gasping on the slick rock. Jub put a foot on one of the construct's legs and boosted himself higher, trying to unhook the net from the barbed tail. Rust flaked away under his boots.

"Don't get so close to it, Jub!" the human called, stepping forward. "Be careful!"

Jub laughed. "It's not gonna come alive. Even if it does, there's a Protector here."

Leliana smiled. Three and a half years ago, at the time of the Selvetargtlin attack, Jub had been reduced to a few scattered body parts by a dracolich. The priestesses had recovered what remained, and resurrected him. He didn't fear anything any more. Not after he'd danced, briefly, with the goddess.

Jub climbed higher. Balanced with one foot on the scorpion's back and the other on the base of its tail, he wrenched at the net. The barbed tip bent with a loud creak. Then it snapped off, sending Jub tumbling backward in a tangle of net and wriggling blindfish. He scrambled to his feet and held up the net triumphantly. "There! All it took was a little muscle and-"

"Quiet!" Leliana barked.

Jub looked puzzled. "What-?"

"Listen! That crackling sound."

Jub cocked his head. He dropped the net and used his hands. I don't hear anything.

Leliana hesitated. Had she actually heard something, or was that just the rush of the river? Then a white-hot spark streaked out of the hollow stump where the tail barb had been. She smelled the sharp tang of lightning-burned air.

"Jub!" she shouted. "Get away from the construct! It's animating!"

She drew her sword and motioned the other two lay worshipers back. Then she leaped down into the hollow in the river. She motioned Jub behind her and braced herself, sword raised. Ready. The singing sword sharply pealed, eager for battle.

More sparks erupted from the tail. Leliana heard a scratching sound, like claws scrabbling against metal. It started inside the head of the construct, and worked its way down through the abdomen. Leliana began a hymn of protection, but before she could complete the verse, a smaller construct, this one made of gold and shaped like a crab, appeared at the broken end of the tail. It teetered a moment, like a plate on a blade's edge, then fell with a clang onto the riverbed. Leliana immediately changed her prayer to one that would disable the construct, but the crab was too quick for her. It scurried sideways and disappeared into the wall of suspended water.

"What was that?" Jub asked. "The scorpion's brain?"

"Good guess," Leliana said, impressed. For someone who was only half drow, Jub was pretty bright.

"There!" the drow male shouted. "It's climbing out of the river."