Chapter Text
Crack!
The stick caught Dragh across one shoulder, sending a searing line of pain down that arm. He bit back a cry and cowered, dropping to his knees in front of his Lady.
"He's not very strong," she commented to the priestess who was accompanying them. Her name was Priestess Zolyn. He tried not to look directly at his betters, so they wouldn't concern themselves with him. It was much safer that way.
"Hmm," Zolyn said. "If this one isn't strong enough for the next stage, we could always find another male."
Dragh's Lady was the third daughter of the house of Do'Urden. Although only the third daughter, her power was rising among the other women in her generation. When she had summoned him for this journey, the other Do'Urden fighters had been envious of his luck. There was little risk of Third Daughter Imrae Do'Urden losing a trick and being assassinated, humbled, executed, or exiled -- and so there was little risk of her servants suffering the same fate.
At least, not at the hands of anyone but her.
The other fighters had called him lucky, but Dragh didn't feel that way. Right now, he felt his heart hammering like crazy. He was adept with a sword, but against two women, he felt like a tiny, defenseless prey animal, frozen and desperately hoping they would look past him.
Maybe because that's exactly what he was. If he didn't have what it took to please these two women, his life wouldn't be worth the time it took to turn his head and spit.
"Please, my lady," Dragh ventured, staring hard at the ground. There was a crack in the dirt, running from his left knee out about a foot. He stared at it as though it held the key to his escape. "Allow me to at least make the attempt. If I fail, you have lost nothing."
Crack! Another line of pain shot through him, from the other arm this time. This time, he couldn't prevent himself from crying out in pain and falling forward onto his hands.
"Did I ask you to speak, male?" Imrae Do'Urden asked pleasantly. She was a young woman, and a beautiful one -- at least from what Dragh had noted in the past, from the few times his eyes had passed near her face. He tried never to look at her directly, but he knew that her jet black skin contrasted with pale blue eyes and silvery hair, which she kept braided in elaborate loops, set off with silver and copper webbing, and that her black teeth gleamed when she spoke.
Dragh shook his head mutely. He knew a trick question when he heard one. He took his hands off the ground and presented himself in a proper kneeling position. Perhaps a show of submission would get them to stop tormenting him.
Not that he would be so lucky.
The Priestess of Lolth had moved around to his other side. From the way she stepped forward, Dragh could tell she was running her eyes over his body pitilessly. That was the way of all Priestesses of Lolth.
"I ought to dash your useless brains out right here," Imrae remarked, warming to her theme. "How dare you speak without bidding. Truly, the old ways are no longer respected in the House of the Spider."
"Very true," Priestess Zolyn said. "All males are trash." She took out a knife and ran it down the side of Dragh's face.
He closed his eyes, heart beating even faster. If something didn't happen soon, these two really might kill him, if they decided that it amused them to do so. If he wasn't useful to them after all. No one would notice, or care. No one would avenge him.
No one cared about a piece of trash like a male Drow with no title, no magic to speak of, and no protector. Least of all not here in the heart of the Underdark.
It's true that, as a fighter, he technically belonged to the House of Do'Urden, but if its respected and brilliant third daughter saw fit to dispose of him, no one would even question her for her decision. They were outside the city of Erelhei-Cinlu, in an untraveled part of the Underdark. No one would find his body but scavengers.
"What do you think, useless worm?" Imrae asked, standing behind him. From this angle, she could do anything to him and he would never see it coming. She could bash his head in -- stab him in the back and leave him to bleed out -- slit his throat -- cut off his ear -- have her Priestess friend electrocute him painfully for her amusement -- all of the above -- and there would be nothing he could do about it.
Not for the first time, Dragh cursed whatever twisted fate had caused him to be born a worthless male. If only he had been a girl! But that would have been too kind for trash like him.
"Well?" Imrae asked, kicking him in the kidney. "Aren't you going to answer your betters when one asks you a direct question?"
"Please -- please, my Lady, don't hurt me," Dragh said, feeling his voice splinter into panic. "I'll be good -- I'll do what you want! Whatever you say! Please give me a chance to prove myself!"
"Hmm, I'm just not sure if I can believe you," Imrae said, kicking him again, between the shoulder blades this time. Dragh's arms buckled and he caught himself on his hands, again. The crack in the ground was still there. Dragh imagined it cracking wider and wider, sucking him down into the cold, dark earth, away from these two, away from the House of Do'Urden, away from the Underdark altogether...
"I think we should torture you a little. Or a lot. Just to be sure."
Dragh closed his eyes in defeat. There was nothing for it now but to try to get through the next period of time as best he could, and hope they lost interest in him quickly.
"Halt!" a new voice commanded.
Dragh stiffened in surprise. The voice was female, and spoke in Undercommon. Dragh knew enough Undercommon to get by. And even if he hadn't known that particular word, he could tell from the tone that the speaker meant what she said.
He took the risk of looking up, only to see six strange humanoids and one gray furry beast. None of them were Drow. They looked outlandish -- like demon stories to frighten children into compliance. One of them looked as though he could have been Drow, except he was far too tall -- at least a foot taller than Dragh. His hair was a strange reddish brown, and his skin was pasty and white, like the skin of a maggot, instead of a healthy color like gray or purple or black.
The woman who had spoken had brown hair and somewhat less pale skin. She was holding a sword out in front of her and was attired in whitish-blue armor and a bewildering variety of traveling bags, plus several more weapons strapped to her back. A symbol glowed from her chest. It made Dragh uncomfortable to look at it, so he let his eyes slide away.
Currently, the strange woman was glaring at his Lady.
"Surrender now, in the name of Pholtus of the Shining Light," the stranger ordered, "and your lives may be spared!"
Priestess Zolyn shifted her stance subtly. "Pholtus, Pholtus..." she said musingly, as though trying to remember something unimportant and from a long time ago. "Hmmm. Oh yeah, that's right -- never heard of him."
The strange woman stiffened in outrage. "Release that prisoner at once!" she barked.
Imrae laughed as though she was sincerely amused. "How droll! You top-siders really think you can come to the Underdark and dictate what nobles can do with our things?"
"He's not a thing," one of the other upper-worlders said. "He's a person."
Dragh wasn't sure which one had spoken, because he was still staring at the woman with the sword. He had seen women with swords many times before, of course. All the top generals were women. He had grown up watching women fight each other for sport or pleasure or to settle some grudge.
He had never seen a top-side woman before, though. That must be why he had such a hard time looking away.
Imrae's laughter was joined by the laughter of Priestess Zolyn. From the corner of his eye, Dragh could see her beginning to twitch her fingers, gathering her power.
"Watch out for the priestess!" he yelled.
The scene exploded into action. The six top-siders blurred into a flurry of motion. One of them, a small and extremely ugly creature with a strange white face and red nose, shot off blast after blast of magic. The tall brown-haired male took out a hand crossbow and began firing bolts. The furry gray animal leaped towards Zolyn's throat, only to be batted aside in midair by a blast of her dark magic.
A short, bearded male was bouncing from one rock to another in leaps so quick that Dragh could barely follow them. Every so often he unleashed a flurry of knives towards Imrae and Zolyn. Meanwhile, another tall pair duo, one male and one female, were advancing on the two Drow women, laughing and trading quips with each other.
Don't they know what they're up against? Dragh thought. These outsiders really were too reckless.
With a strange popping sound and the sudden sucking of air as it rushed to fill the vacuum, Imrae and Zolyn disappeared from the middle of the fight.
"Awww!" the brown-haired man complained. "They took one of my arrows!"
"A Lofty Bridge spell, no doubt," the short, ugly creature said. He spat to the side. "A cheater's spell."
"Oh, like you've never used Lofty Bridge, Sandy," the bearded bouncy man retorted, leaping into the space where the two Drow had just been and looking around. He appeared to be some type of Duergar, but without the characteristic gray skin of that race.
"I wouldn't need to if some people could stay with the plan," the short man said.
Man? No, he's some sort of Svirfneblin, Dragh thought, staring. The tall archer man was not a race he recognized, either. And neither was the second Lady, who had dark skin like a Drow, but fiery reddish-orange hair and eyes.
By the Eight Legs. There were so many new types of creature here, he could barely keep track.
"Get up," someone said from right next to Dragh. He flinched back instinctively.
Turning and looking up, he saw the human woman with the sword. She had sheathed it, although she had one hand on the hilt, and she was reaching down her other hand towards him.
He frowned, confused at not being struck. Perhaps she just hadn't decided which side of her hand to dirty with the action of slapping him. He got to his feet slowly and cautiously, keeping his eyes no higher than her clavicle.
Now that he was standing next to her, he saw that she was at least five inches taller. Her whitish-blue armor had tiny scales on it -- no doubt made from the skin of some great snake. Her arms and hands were adorned with rings, some of which looked magic.
She was clearly a powerful warrior, mighty in the ways of the surface world. He had no idea what she was doing down here in the Underdark.
Probably something deadly.
One of her ring-adorned hands shifted on her sword's hilt. "Are you hurt?" she demanded. Undercommon was not her first language; she had a strange accent.
Dragh shook his head mutely, staring down. Was he supposed to answer in words? Lady Imrae hated it when he answered, except when she decided to torture him for not answering. He never knew from one minute to the next what the rule would be.
"Look at me," the woman said.
Dragh didn't dare disobey a direct order. He raised his eyes.
Her eyes were brown, with a glint of green shining through, like moss on a wet rock.
"Hey, thanks for warning us about that priestess," she said. "What's your name?"
Dragh's mouth dried up. Now that he was actually speaking to a top-sider, and a woman top-sider, no less, he had no idea how to behave. They were clearly a powerful party. They could kill him as easy as breathing. Probably easier.
"Dragh, my Lady," he finally forced himself to say.
"Drag?" she repeated cocking her head to one side.
It was close enough. He nodded, dropping his gaze down towards her knees.
"Nah, I think he said 'Dragh,'" one of the strange males said. This one was tall and dark, with sinewy arms and a muscular chest covered in chain mail.
Dragh was shocked at how this mere male dared to speak to his Lady. But perhaps she wasn't the Lady in charge, and the other Lady was ranked higher? Still, he shouldn't speak to any lady in such a manner.
He darted a look at the other woman, the one with fiery hair and eyes. She was currently squatting on top of a rock picking at her nails with a tiny knife, and seemed completely uninterested in Dragh. Thank the Web.
Which Lady's commands should he obey, if they conflicted? It wasn't clear. Perhaps he could tell who was in charge by observing them more closely.
"Drag?" the woman in blue scales repeated, with the same intonation as before.
"No, Smaranda," the top-side male said. He laughed. "By the Road, you have no ear for languages whatsoever! You have to put more of a burr into the back of your throat, as though you just swallowed an angry toad. Like this -- Dragggghhhhhh."
Dragh's eyes widened and he shifted back subtly. Now the male was insulting his Lady by saying she had no ear for languages? Incredibly foolish. He would be lucky to survive such an affront.
But the woman did not attack him. She merely tried again to pronounce Dragh's name.
Dragh stared at her, trying to figure her out. She was apparently called Smaranda. What a strange name.
He rolled the syllables through his mind. Sma. Ran. Da. Smaranda. It didn't sound like any name he had ever heard before.
He wondered what it meant, and where she was from.
"Better," the man said with a hearty clap to Smaranda's armor-clad shoulder.
Dragh flinched back in terror. That man had just struck a Lady!
But she didn't retaliate. A quick glance at the other Lady, the fiery-haired one, showed she wasn't retaliating, either.
Perhaps they would punish the male later, in private.
"Dragh," the strange woman said. "Look at me."
He obeyed immediately, without even thinking about it, despite his breath hitching with fear. Would she take out that other male's punishment on him? He was of a race hostile to the surface dwellers, and he was merely a fighter. He wasn't skilled enough to keep up with them. They would probably kill him.
"Do you think you could guide us through the Underdark? We are strangers here," the Lady Smaranda said, smiling at him.
Dragh stared at her before he remembered he shouldn't be staring. She had an interesting face. Not necessarily beautiful, but striking. He could see beads braided into her brown hair. She was well past her girlhood; a mature, regal lady at the height of her powers, with little lines radiating out from the corners of her eyes, like a web. He wondered what had caused them.
Her skin was a strange color, but she was still definitely beautiful.
"Well?" Smaranda asked.
"Yes, my Lady," Dragh said, dropping his eyes politely. "I will lead you wherever you want to go."
"Great!" Smaranda said. "But don't call me your lady. You can just call me Smaranda. All right?"
Not call her a Lady? That would be difficult, but Dragh knew better than to disobey a direct order from a woman.
"Of course, m- of course, Smaranda. As you wish," he said, almost wincing with how wrong it felt. He half-expected her to slash him with her sword for insolence, after all, even though she had just given the opposite command.
Imrae Do'Urden would have driven her weapon into him without a second thought.
"Great! Then you can lead the way. We're looking for the stronghold of the Drow," the Lady Smaranda said.
Dragh swallowed his fear, turning to scan the terrain ahead. Leading a party of dangerous outsiders back to the City of Erelhei-Cinlu would certainly be dangerous. But if they didn't kill him once his use was up, he might just make it out of this alive, if he was smart and very, very lucky.
Dragh led them back toward the City. His trip with Lady Imrae and Priestess Zolyn had taken less time, but that was because they had used magic to speed their journey. Without the benefit of fast travel, it would take at least two days to return.
As they walked, he watched them all, especially how they treated each other. He just couldn't seem to understand how their group functioned.
From observation, he discovered that neither Lady seemed to be in charge. Instead, the group behaved like an inchoate mass, with no clear leader. Each seemed to have their own specialty, and they came to decisions through discussion, joking, and favor trading.
How could such a large party continue to exist with no leadership? What prevented the most powerful from simply killing all the others and taking their possessions?
When they camped in order to eat and rest, the small Svirfneblin-like creature, Sandy, hated doing his assigned chores, and grumbled until the others forced him. But they didn't harm him for his insolence, at least not in any way that Dragh could detect. When it came time to share food, Sandy received the same portion of food as all the rest.
The Lady Smaranda had a magical ladle that, when placed in a pot of water, transformed it into enough food to sustain their small group. The others complained good-humoredly about having to eat Smaranda's porridge again.
Sandy took out a pouch of some dried herb and ostentatiously sprinkled some onto his bowl before deigning to eat. The other Lady, Efari, shot a small flame from one fingertip and toasted each bite of porridge before ingesting it. The tall archer had to be reminded to eat his -- he kept getting distracted by the most unlikely things. The bearded bouncy male of unspecified race ate his quickly and efficiently while staring at a nearby rock outcropping with a considering look in his eye. And the human male with the bare arms ate his gleefully while telling a meandering story about one of his great-aunts and her amazing stone soup.
As for the gray furry creature, Mercy -- she disappeared from their fire and came back a bit later, looking quite pleased with herself.
Of course, they wanted Dragh to eat their food, too. He stared down at the bowl they handed him. The substance created by Smaranda's ladle didn't look or smell like any food he knew.
Would refusing to eat be seen as insolence? Perhaps they would finally realize they could punish him if he refused to eat it?
"You have to keep up your strength," the bouncy, bearded male told him, sitting down. He quirked an eyebrow. "Can't have you falling over in the middle of guiding us to the Drow city."
How can I tell them I really can't eat this? Dragh wondered. There was no polite way. He would just have to make the attempt, and hope he didn't vomit.
He took a tentative bite, and his eyes widened. By the Web! He had never tasted anything so good. It was a bit salty, but not overly much, and had a pleasant, rich feel in his mouth. It was soft and warm and earthy.
He immediately wanted to eat this at every meal for the rest of his life.
"Do you like it?" the Lady Smaranda asked, seemingly amused.
Dragh nodded so quickly he almost cramped his neck. This was far more delicious than the gruel the fighters were fed in the House of Do'Urden. Far better than anything he'd ever tried before.
She sat down on his other side, and he tried not to feel threatened, but failed.
"Wow, you polished that right off," she commented, watching him scrape out the last of the substance from his bowl.
Dragh nodded, eyes down in his empty bowl.
"Here," she said, getting something out of a pouch and putting it into his bowl. "Try this. I want to see your reaction."
"Smaranda, we don't have a lot of those left," the bearded male objected.
"Fine, Davrim. You can have one too," Smaranda said, getting out another and handing it to him. He took it with a grunt of pleasure and tore into it with his teeth.
Dragh examined the object in his bowl. It was round and purple, firm to the touch, and glittering with pale crystals.
"Pardon me, my Lady, but what is this?" he asked. He hadn't been punished for insolence yet, and perhaps his luck would hold.
Smaranda huffed. "I told you -- you don't have to call me your Lady, because I'm not," she said. "It's a candied plum. A fruit that grows on trees above ground, grown in the sun, and candied with sugar. Go on, try it." She sat back, leaning on her hands and watching him.
Trees. Sun. Sugar. Dragh may have heard those words in the past, but if so, he had only the vaguest sense of what they meant. The bearded male -- Davrim -- seemed to be enjoying his 'plum,' but that might be a ruse to get Dragh to put something painful or poisonous in his own mouth, so they could laugh at him.
Or even if they had no malicious intent, perhaps their surface food would kill him just by the fact of being so different from what he was used to. He was a Drow, after all. He was born in the dark, and he would die in the dark. What did he have to do with sunlight?
But now they were both looking at him. He lifted his chin in resolve. There was no way out of it. If this was a new form of torture, he would meet it as best he could.
He took a cautious bite of the purple sphere. It was firm under his teeth, with a taut skin that resisted him at first, and then gave with a satisfying flex.
Immediately, his mouth was overwhelmed with a strange new flavor. It was intense. It was like being kicked in the face, but it didn't hurt.
He made a sound of pure wonderment, bringing one hand up to his face and touching his cheek from the outside as he chewed.
The bite was gone. He immediately wanted to take another one.
"What -- is this?" he asked.
"It's sweet," Smaranda said in amusement, tilting her head. "From your expression, I'm guessing you never had anything sweet before?"
Dragh shook his head, staring at her. Now he realized where those tiny lines came from. They appeared at the corners of her eyes when she smiled. They were evidence of years of smiles. Smiles just like the one she was currently turning on Dragh.
What must it be like to smile so often that the evidence was etched into your very face?
He swallowed again. His mouth was still full of the strange sweet feeling, which probably explained why it was suddenly dry. His heart was pounding, too. Maybe a side effect of the candied plum?
"Well, enjoy it," she said. "We took these off a Drow noble a week or so back. We've been enjoying them slowly ever since. We were surprised to see surface food like this down here in the Underdark, but it seems your nobles know how to live well."
Dragh's eyes widened and he almost spat out his second mouthful, but in the end, the amazing 'sweetness' was too enticing to resist.
He was eating noble food! Food stolen from one of his betters! Stolen by these surface-dwellers! If Lady Imrae Do'Urden or Priestess Zolyn ever discovered he knew what noble food tasted like --
They'll probably never find out, a part of his mind supplied. In any case, it's rude to reject food that a Lady gave you.
You should really eat the whole thing.
Smaranda was still watching him. Dragh swallowed his second bite and attempted a smile, although he thought it probably came out very badly.
"Do you like it?" she asked, very seriously. Suddenly she seemed to take up almost all of his field of vision.
"Yes," Dragh said. His head was swimming, but he wasn't sure if it was from the sweetness of the plum or from Smaranda looking at him so intently.
"There's a hard pit in the middle. Don't eat that part," Smaranda instructed. "That's the seed of the tree. I would plant them down here, but they'd never germinate without the light of the sun."
She touched the glowing symbol on her chest. "My god is Pholtus of the Shining Light, source of all virtue and goodness," she told Dragh very seriously.
"Here we go again," Davrim groaned, standing up and twisting his upper body to stretch out. He was already done with his plum. "Pardon me if I skip the catechism class. I've had enough for one lifetime. I'll take first watch."
Smaranda didn't try to get him to stay. Instead, she looked at Dragh. "Have you heard of the god Pholtus?"
"No, my Lady," Dragh said reflexively. The first time he had heard that name was when the Lady Smaranda had commanded his betters to surrender in the name of Pholtus.
She smiled. "Just 'Smaranda' is fine. Well, if you're willing, I'll tell you all about him."
Dragh stared at her as he ate the rest of his plum -- except for the pit -- savoring every bite. It all blurred together in his mind -- the sweetness, the green glint in her brown eyes, the lines on her face, the strange words she was saying. Order. Light. Virtue. Sun and Moon.
"Do you think you might be interested in learning more?" she asked.
Dragh nodded dumbly.
Smaranda was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen in his life. He thought she was even more beautiful than the Lady Imrae Do'Urden, although he knew no other Drow would agree. Her looks were too pale and strange, and she was clearly well into the middle age of her human race, rather than being a young woman of just 120, like Lady Imrae.
But her eyes were so kind, and she smiled at him as though she actually cared whether he was interested. She hadn't hurt him or mocked him. Her smiles seemed sincere instead of sadistic and cruel. She was strong and powerful, tall and imposing, clearly a mighty warrior for her God of Sun and Moon.
He would agree to do anything she said.
He felt as though he was falling, but also rising into the air at the same time. As though his whole body was lighter than air. Soon he would rise to the top of the cavern and hit the ceiling so far overhead and pop, and then he would fall back to the ground and all his bones would shatter, and that would still be less confusing than looking at her.
"Great!" she said, touching him on the shoulder and standing up. "Maybe tomorrow I can tell you about the other gods, and why Pholtus is the best of them all!"
Dragh stared after her as she made her way to a bedroll and settled down to sleep. He clenched his fist around the pit of the plum. It was mostly smooth and round, but it had one sharp seam to it, and he dug that into the meat of his hand until it stung.
The spot where she had touched his shoulder burned.
Dragh needed to trance, but he couldn't center his mind. He observed how the others broke up their 'night,' as they called it, into three 'watches,' and how two of them would volunteer to stay awake for each watch to guard against threats.
He couldn't settle down. So instead of trancing, he spent the 'night' digging the pit into his hand and trying not to stare at Smaranda as she slept.
Dragh was fighting the urge to finally slip into a trance when he heard shouts from beyond the circle of bedrolls. It sounded like the fiery Lady Efari and the muscular human male, Draidean.
Instantly, the others were up, scrambling to right their armor and retrieve their weapons.
"Stay here," Smaranda ordered Dragh, striding out of camp with her sword drawn.
Dragh hastened to roll up her bedroll and gather her things, just in case she needed to make a quick escape. Then he peered around the rock to see what threat they were facing.
Two Mindflayers and a swarm of wererats were engaging Smaranda's group. Dragh hesitated, wondering if he should try to step in and help. Mindflayers were telepathic. It was a sure bet that where two Mindflayers popped up, more were close behind. They might need all the help they could get.
Then again, the party seemed to have everything under control. Dragh watched as they worked together seamlessly to hammer at their enemies, driving them back.
"HOLY BLAST!" Smaranda yelled, raising her sword into the air.
Bright white, piercing light flooded the cavern, washing every surface. It was unforgiving. Relentless. Impossible to escape. It pierced through Dragh's head, filling every cell with agony.
He screamed and dropped to his knees, covering his face to try to avoid the painful light. It hurt! It hurt so much! Tears welled up into his eyes and seeped out of the sides, but he almost didn't notice through his anguish.
His brain shrieked in agony, but the sounds of battle were rushing all around him now. He needed to get back on his feet and get a weapon out in front of him, or he might die right here.
Fighting through the pain in his head, he laboriously pulled himself to his feet, stumbling into the rock wall.
"Dragh!" Smaranda's voice said from right in front of him. "What were you thinking? I told you to stay back!"
He opened his eyes to look at Smaranda again, which was the only reason he saw the Priestess of Lolth looming out of a shadow, right behind her.
"Look out!" he shouted, lunging forward to try to get between Smaranda and the tall, dark Drow woman. It wasn't a Priestess he recognized. She looked older and even more powerful than Zolyn.
Smaranda whirled to face this new threat, sword outstretched. She drew in her breath -- possibly to cast another Holy Blast.
But before Smaranda could act, the Priestess bared her black teeth in a snarl. She made a complex gesture. Magic simmered in the air where her hands had just been.
A shimmering portal about ten feet tall opened to their left. Dark tendrils twined out from its edges.
With a cruel sneer, the Priestess of Lolth jerked her hands to the side, flinging Smaranda through the portal.
Dragh didn't even think. He lunged into the portal, desperately reaching out after her.
He was falling sideways, hurtling through space, turning over and over, disoriented and terrified --
Then he hit a surface, and then everything went dark.