KILARRA ORIGINS, FINAL: TIMELY RIPPED (published 11/22/2013)

The summoning room was in the attic of a mansion on the outskirts of Westgate.  A huge chandelier, dotted with candles, hung from the vaulted ceiling.  Bookshelves, desks, and a small alchemy lab were arranged neatly in a far corner.  A miniscule mage, Milarra, finished the final incantations over a bag of moist garlic and grave soil.  Some yards away, a glowing, golden hemisphere of arcane power held the mighty erinyes, Tiyru.  The she-devil was testing the integrity of the circle with her mace, as she always did.  Milarra winced at the resounding clangs and flying sparks.

“Stop!  There are no weaknesses, the circle is complete.   Be alert, fool!  The vampire is here tonight, I feel it!  Stop, or I’ll rend you!”

Milarra held aloft and unfurled a scroll, written in liquid gold mixed with blood.  The lettering glowed a faint green.  The erinyes mark was scrawled at the bottom.  Tiyru kept smashing the walls of her arcane prison, looking for a weak point.  She beat her black wings to no avail, hoping to scatter the powder that made up the summoning circle.  Milarra gently dragged her nails down the back of the scroll.  A wracking, psychic pain doubled the devil over.  She fell to her knees and slammed her mace on the floor in pain and frustration.

“Silence!  I’m telling you he’s here.  He’s come for my blood!”  Milarra raked the scroll again.  Tiyru rolled over on her back, screaming in pain.  She stared through the arcane bubble that held her prisoner and focused on the chandelier.  Something moved.  Was it a shadow?  The pain subsided and she narrowed her eyes, scanning the ceiling.  Nothing.

                Tiyru got up.  She watched the mage check her holy symbol, reposition it neatly around her neck… once, twice, three times.  Milarra checked the position of the stakes she had lined up on the alchemy table.  Each of the stakes where round, of equal length, and arranged in neat parallels.  The entire summoning room was arranged in geometric perfection, clean and orderly.  Event the floorboards she stood on were buffed to shining perfection.  This is going to be fun, the she-devil smiled to herself.

                “Are you ready, erinyes?  I will free you and you’ll abide by our contract.  Our deal is still intact.  You will search my home and kill according to our contract.  Once you’re done, I will dismiss you back to your smoking hole.”

                “Yes, our deal in intact but no, I’m not ready.  Just a moment.”  The erinyes set her mace on the floor by her feet.  She adjusted the cinches on her belt and drew her longsword.  Focused intently on the mage, Tiryu smoothed out a tangled kink in the chainmail on her sword arm and watched.  There was a moment of obsessive approval from the mage, she lowered the scroll.

With a quick, fluid pull the erinyes yanked a cinch free from her belt.  A section of her chainmail shirt dropped to the floor, revealing the devil’s milky white skin and a distended belly.  The bulge expanded grotesquely.  Tiyru drew her longsword across her belly in a quick slice.  A smoking, hideous mixture of blood, tar, and infernal amniotic fluid erupted from the she-devil and spattered to the floor.  There was a faint squeal and a wet plop as something fell from Tiyru’s gaping belly and hit the floor.

“Ha!  Mage-bitch, your floors are dirty!” the erinyes screamed.  The mage looked on with shocked horror and disgust.  With a flick of the wrist, the wavy longsword sheared through the scaled umbilicus.  Tiyru edged a toe under the squealing mass of flesh on the floor and skidded the infernal infant across the floor.  Leaving a smoking trail of blood and slime, the devil-baby slid across the floor  and bounced off a leg of the alchemy table.  It’s back was covered in the binding powders of the circle:  silver dust, ash, and salt.  The tiny half she-devil growled in annoyance.

The glowing hemisphere of arcane magic shimmered and cracked.  The circle had been broken; Tiyru was free of her prison.  The erinyes drew an enchanted dagger and hurled it at the agape mage.  Milarra reflexively threw her hands up and stepped back, dropping the scroll.   The dagger bounced off a shield of force the mage had conjured to protect her.  Tiyru’s dagger had been prepared to store a powerful dispelling enchantment.  The mortal mage felt the impact of the dagger dissolve several of her protecting spells and defenses.  She took another step back and began the incantations of a spell.  Tiyru had picked up her mace and was bracing her wings for a leap that would cover the distance to the hated mage in one swoop.

  Stepping back, Milarra slipped on one the wooden stakes she had prepared for her vampiric stalker.  Her foot flied out from under her and she landed on her back.  She looked over at the growling devilish infant that had bumped into the alchemy table.  It was a girl… a girl-thing… a girl tiefling.  With flaming red hair, tiny vestigial horns, and fiercely green eyes, the tiny half-devil smiled and cooed as if it were amused by the mortal’s predicament.  Another stake rolled off the table and bounced off Milarra’s forehead.  The mage winced and blinked, her eyes watering enough to cloud the twisted, hideous, descending face of the erinyes, Tiyru.  Tiyru fell on the mage with both her mace and longsword.  It was over much quicker than the vengeful erinyes wanted, but… she had to get back to class.

  She severed the tiny mortal mage’s head and collected the section of chainmail left in the binding circle.  The devil stopped and looked over at the tiefling, her daughter.  She had the Illrigger’s red hair.  The mage Milarra’s blood was starting to pool around the tiny thing.  Tiyru sighed, walked over and set the infant on the alchemy table.  Taking one last look at the headless body and the tiny infant, she began the incantations to return to Dis.  After a few syllables she thought better of it…  drew her mace and set to pulverizing the mage Milarra’s cooling corpse.  After a few minutes of screeching and infernal curses that would make a lamia’s ears bleed, all that remained was a mushy pile of pulped organs and jutting ribs.  Refreshed, the erinyes completed her incantation and disappeared in a cloud of smoke back to the city of Dis….

Minutes later, a dark form moved across the ceiling.  It floated silently down and on its hands and knees over what was left of Milarra.  After a few minutes of quiet lapping the form stood up and moved to the alchemy table, where the tiefling sprawled helplessly.  A pair of cool hands picked up the tiefling babe and held it aloft.  Red eyes hungrily examined the child.  A tiefling babe, the vampire thought with greedy anticipation.  The little half-devil stared directly into the blood smeared face of Lord Orbakh, vampire, Lord of the Night Masks and clone of the megalomaniacal arch-mage, Manshoon.

                He brought the oddly calm infant to his mouth and his fangs gleamed in the dimly lit summoning chamber.  His mouth had nearly closed on the baby’s arm when something struck him lightly on the shoulder and fell to the floor.  A candle from the chandelier.  He stopped and scanned the whole room.  He searched for enchantments that he hadn’t already discovered.  His eyes penetrated the darkness.  The room felt warmer…  his hair was on fire.

Shouting in alarm, he dropped the tiefling to the floor.   Orbakh swept his cloak up over his head and stifled the flames.  He stopped and listened… only the breathing of the tiefling babe and… what else?  The vampire lord couldn’t remember the last time he felt genuine alarm.  He looked down at the infant and picked her up again, watching her intently.

“Your mother left you here with me.  She could have worked for me, pity.  She had lovely skin, the color of the moon.  I could perhaps put you to use.  Less than an hour old and you’ve had your first kill.  Almost two.  Poor Milarra… such bad luck to slip on that stake.”



He waited, almost as if he expected an answer from the green-eyed half-devil infant.  She giggled. 

KILARRA ORIGINS, PART 4

The final weeks of the ghoulish seminar tested the monstrous students with practical exercises.  The Illrigger watched as each of the attending horrors animated their own troops and engaged their fellow classmates.  The mind-flayer proved himself to be a tactical genius, while the lich clearly didn’t have the knack for using terrain and timing attacks.  The pit fiend also performed well, but would often clear the hall of animated troops in destructive tantrums after being beaten by the mind-flayer, and the erinyes.  New stocks of fodder had to be brought in, killed and animated.  The death knight wouldn’t allow the pit fiend at them, the destruction rarely left corpses intact for animation.  The fortress prisons had a plethora of hapless souls that were brought up as necessary.  The smart ones didn’t let on they were looking forward to death’s release.  The illithid volunteered to “prepare” new recruits for animation, having access to a larger menu of brains than was typical for the Underdark.

The sparring sessions with the erinyes continued.  They fought harder with each encounter.  They gradually began duelling with different weapons, spells, in different environments.  The death knight and the she-devil enjoyed occasional and brutal sexual encounters after the duels were done.  Not as good as a succubus but servicable enough, Tristan thought.  Armed foreplay was more stimulating.   

Classes continued.  The erinyes was summoned to the prime material plane a few more times with the same results:  a terrified but organized mage sensing the presence of vampires that never materialized.  As time progressed, the enrinyes grew less and less furious with each summoning.  This disappointed the pit fiend and his lich side-kick.  The relentless teasing and infernal snickering stopped.

In the final week of class, one particularly hot and dry afternoon in the blasted city of Dis, the instruction hall cracked and flashed with the now-recognizable arcane summons of Tiyru’s mortal master.  Tiyru stepped from her desk with an unsettling smile of satisfaction and deadly expectation.  She adjusted the belt over her chainmail and pulled the flanged mace from her hip.  She unsheated the glittering wavy longsword as an arcane wind swirled around her, pulling her to the realm of Faerun.

“I BRING BACK HER HEAD THIS TIME!” Tiyru screeched as she disappeared in a burst of soot and brimstone.

Telepathic waves of doubt emanated from the mind-flayer.

“This is the 13th time she’s been snatched to the material plane, what could she possibly do this time that the summoner hasn’t prepared for?”

The lich gave a breathless sigh, “Let’s get on with it.   I lived some years in Faerun, in Thaymount.  Probably a former pupil of mine.  The she-devil deludes herself, this mortal mage has covered every possibility.”

“We shall see,” the Illrigger said.

KILARRA ORIGINS, PART 3 (published 11/20/2013)

The class continued.  Sir Greymalkin continued with the instruction with gruff professionalism.  Tiyru was an excellent student, deferring to the Illrigger as the instructor despite his status as a mere mortal.  She knew how to use terrain to her benefit and quickly grasped the concepts of using undead troops.  The pit fiend was the most difficult, and found a willing toadie in the lich.  Not stupid but disruptive, dismissive and, despite his ominous status as a supreme devil, obnoxious in the extreme.  One morning, Tiyru came to class to find her desk encircled with a faux binding circle.  The entire class roared with laughter at the sight of the prank.  Adding further insult, during that day’s instruction Tiyru rose from her desk with an agonized scream.  In a flash of smoke and brimstone, she disappeared.  Between guffaws, the lich confirmed that the hapless erinyes had indeed been summoned by her mortal master.  The Illrigger wondered how many teachers had to excuse students for such reasons.  He ended the instruction early for the day and dismissed the class.  He remained in the hall until Tiyru’s return hours later.



There was a crack of thunder and flash of red light as Tiyru appeared.  Her form smoked from the banishment command that sent her back to Dis from the realm of Faerun.  She yelled in frustrated rage.

“At least bring me a vampire to slay!  If you summon me, mortal-bitch, set me on a foe!  I’ll tear your throat and stomp your puny limbs, mage-whore!”  She stomped into the hall and hacked down one of the undead minotaurs in a screaming fury.   Tristan watched with disinterest.

“Still no vampire?”

She turned on him, her weapons coated in dried, rotted gore.

“And you!  What advice does the death knight have for his student?  I’m ready.  I will open your throat again if that what it takes!  I will string you by your feet and roast you over the sulfur fires of Nessus!  After that, the Dripping Edge rack will wring the answer from you over the sound of your cracking bones!”

The Illrigger approached her, swinging his spiked chain.  Decent threats, he thought.

“Very well.  I dislike the interruptions to my classes so I will tell you.  It is the culmination of my instruction, but I will tell you early.  Audacity.  Do what has not been done.  Consider what is commonly considered impossible and do it to destroy your enemy.  What is typically impossible for a bound devil?  Consider that.  Audacity.  Do what cannot be done and watch your enemy’s plan fail.  Think on that, and fight me.”

They fought, matching each other blow for blow.  Tristan disarmed her and she drew another weapon, this time wary of the feint.  They tore each other’s armor and flesh.  With a shout of triumph, he stripped her last weapon from her grasp.  She swore and grabbed the chain despite the piercing spikes.  The she-devil flew with her dark, feathered wings to the apex of the vaulted ceiling in the instruction hall, jerking the Illrigger along.  She kicked him free of the chain with a battle cry and savored watching his fall.  The Illrigger hurtled to the ground, only to have his fall arrested suddenly by a spell.  He grinned at her as he drifted weightlessly toward the floor.  Furious, she streaked downward, stomped his breastplate mid-air, and rode him to the marble floor.  Bleeding and hissing from the chain’s acid, Tiyru stepped off his torso and gave the knight a solid kick.  Stunned and fighting for breath, he drew a long dagger and started the incantation of a spell.

  “Audacity?  That’s your wisdom?  Feh, I will show you audacity,” she said and unbuckled her belt.  She pulled her chain shirt off over her head and let her mail leggings fall to the floor.  She straddled him like a wolf panting over a bloody steak.  “I’ll thank you for your airy advice.  If it benefits me perhaps I won’t kill you in our next sparring session.”

The death knight stopped his spell and allowed the she-devil access to the tassets and greaves of his dark plate.  He hung on to the dagger

“I’m a man of honor, Tiyru.  This will not improve your grade.”

“Idiot!  Shut up and enjoy this.”

He did, but kept his dagger in hand just in case. 

KILARRA ORIGINS, PART 2 (published 11/19/2013)

“…. That concludes today’s class.  You all will read the first scroll tonight and tomorrow you will tell me the mistakes and accomplishments of Szass Tam when employing undead troops during his first attempted invasion of Rashemen.  I only have three months to teach you, a short time in your respective eternities so apply yourselves!   Now begone, all of you.”

The students left.  The pit fiend remarked how little he had learned that day and had one more laugh at the wizard mark that glowed on Tiyru’s forehead.  The lich also chuckled as they left.  The mind flayer, crackling staff in hand, put a hand to his chest and bowed before leaving.  The naga was reviewing the notes taken with her hobgoblin and the zombies stood motionless.  Tiyru lagged behind and pretended to look at the scroll while the other students left the chamber.

“My lord,” she approached the Illrigger and indicated the mark of binding on her forehead, “how does one break this bond?”

“That question would be better asked of my wife.  She is a mage of great understanding and power.  I myself do not know.  Besides, I thought devils knew the tricks of escaping a binding and slaying their summoners.”

“I do, and I have.  But this one is different.  A mage, physically weak but very clever.  Her precautions are twofold because she is in deep fear.  She believes she is being hunted by vampires and she summons me whenever she thinks one is near.  I have yet to see one.”

“Sounds like a paranoid fool, exploit that.”

“I have tried.  Her will is strong, and her terror doesn’t cloud her reason.  The more frightened she becomes the more careful. “

“I have some advice, but you must earn it.  Draw your weapons, hopefully your arm is not as conquered as your soul,” the Illrigger smiled, stepped back and swung his spiked chain overhead.

The erinyes face twisted in disdain but, as they fought she allowed a smile that matched her opponent’s.   She knew the type and didn’t hold back.  She’d win his respect only by testing him to his utmost.  Unless she drew his blood, this would be their last sparring session and she would get nothing from him.  She pounded his armor with her mace and longsword.  He tore her chainmail and flesh to tatters with his spiked chain.  As they rounded each other for another pass, the Illrigger feinted, wrapped his chain around her mace and jerked it from her grasp.  It was a move she had predicted and feigned a moment of shock, only to slash him across the throat under the buckle of his helm.  A jet of blood flew across the room.  The Illrigger gurgled and coughed.  He immediately stopped, put a hand to his neck and breathed the words to an Inflict spell to seal the wound.  She laughed at him.

“Ha!  So, have I ‘earned it,’ mortal?  You dare much, speaking to me like this.  I am Tiyru, Dread Commander of the Dripping Edge legion!  I’ve slain more demons than you have years, and more mortals than you have bloody whiskers in your beard!  You’d better -”

Her words were cut off with a thud.   She felt a massive blow, her spine crack and saw a pillar hurtling toward her.  She bounced off the pillar, heard another crack inside her body and hit the floor.  Her ichor pooled around her.

The Illrigger approached, a hand still clapped to his throat.  Behind him, an undead stone giant stared vacantly and swung a tree trunk to its shoulder.

“Your flanks, Tiyru, watch your flanks.  Or in this case, your back,” he spat blood in her face, “a commander should know these basics.  No wonder a mortal fool could bind you!   Now go and study.”

The death knight strode off and positioned the undead for tomorrow’s class.  The broken erinyes slowly got to her feet and caught her breath.  Sir Tristan inspected her weapons where she dropped them, nodded and set them on her desk.  With a final glance at her, he left for his chambers.



Tiyru maintained her look of defiant hatred until he left.  I have you, mortal.  You will tell me what I need to know of your own free will.  She was a devil, a feminine one.  She didn’t need to be a succubus to smell arousal on a mortal man.  She sought her own room where she would heal and study the mortal’s scroll.  A clock had been placed in her room.  Mortal time was different.  This fortress didn’t understand the passage of time.  The delicious hatreds, intrigues, and agonies of Dis were eternal.

KILARRA TORN MOON, ORIGINS PART 1 (published 11/19/2013)

 Clad in dark, heavy armor, the Illrigger checked his position and surveyed the room.  Despite the heavy plate, he was silent as a cat.  The armor was heavy enough to stop a gelugon’s spear, light enough for him to conjure a lightning bolt, quiet enough to garrote a dryad.   Various corpses littered the floor:  bleeding giants, oozing troglodytes, a pair of seared minotaurs, and a blue dragon whose soul had been burned away.  The death knight fixed his eyes on the creatures that still moved:  a mind-flayer, a lich, an armed and armored erinyes, a dark naga, and a pit fiend.  He wasn’t expecting a pit fiend.  That one, he thought, will probably give me the most trouble.

I wish Eclavdra were here, her assistance would be sorely appreciated.  She had business elsewhere.  He thought about their shared research, their fights, and their passionate struggles.  Foreplay usually started with a duel, until one disarmed the other.  An exhausting, bloody melee with spiked gauntlets usually followed.  From there they joined each other in flesh, healing their wounds with spells of dark, necromantic energy.  Sometimes a bound wraith would be on hand to assist.  The dark knight closed his eyes briefly, sighed and remembered.   

Sir Tristan Greymalkin, infernal knight, Dark Seneschal and husband to the drow necromancer Eclavdra and Lord of the Shadow Tower of Reaver Hall took his position and at the head of the room.  He wrapped his spiked chain around his mailed fists and held it aloft.  The wickedly barbed chain had felled many enemies… living and dead, mortal and outsider.   Its ends dripped with acidic ichors and it glowed with a faint purple light.  The unholy host around him waited with measures of anticipation, amusement, and disdain.

“Be seated!” Tristan shouted.

His voice reverberated through the hall and the assembled monstrosities took note.  The creatures picked their way past the pillars and around the corpses to the front of a huge hall of black and red marble.  They each sat at desks of varying size and accommodation.  The naga wrapped herself comfortably around a pillar and a hobgoblin slave scurried up beside her with a small table, quill and paper.  The pit fiend snapped his fingers and several fire mephits appeared and busied themselves around the hulking devil’s roll top.  He strode over to the lich, whispered a joke in the withered sorcerer’s ear and pointed at the erinyes.  The erinyes, larger than most of its kind, had a strange glowing mark on her forehead that she tried to keep concealed.  Tristan recognized it as a wizard mark; the erinyes had been bound by a mortal spellcaster.  The lich and pit fiend shared a burst of laughter.  The lich moved his desk closer to where the pit fiend was set up and they continued to snigger together.  The erinyes knew her place and gritted her teeth.

Sir Tristan Greymalkin greeted each of his students individually and made his way to the collection of corpses.

“Zombie troops are slow, stupid, and obviously have no instincts or knowledge of tactics.  They can, however, be employed effectively by a master that is shrewd enough to understand their role in combat support.   While your enemy is busy with your charging regulars, a zombie giant can smash their flank.  Observe…”



The Illrigger went through fell incantations and raised the troglodyte corpses.  A contingent of imps and bearded devils arrived to play the game pieces necessary for the lecture.  The class watched intently as Sir Greymalkin moved the pieces around the hall, animated corpses, and explained the tenets of terrain, initiative, surprise, combat power, and timing.  The erinyes, Tiyru, thumbed her weapons as she watched.  She wore chainmail and had both a longsword and heavy mace hanging from her belt.  Tristan could see they were both well worn but carefully maintained.  A sparring partner, he thought. 

AUNRAE, PART 5 (published 03/25/2013)

“Do you think you will survive ten years at Arach-Tinillith?”

                Aunrae though about the whispers that haunted her and had broken the artifact of Lloth in the chapel.  A centuries old likeness of the Spider Queen had been shattered and thrown the whole house into a vicious panic.  She knew it was the cold voices, the haunting winds that had tipped the artifact.  Zanitra had just figured it out as well.

                “No.”

 “Of course not.  You are different, like me.  Being a drow and being different in Menzoberranzan does not lead to a successful or long life.”  The bloody little goblin smiled.

                “Lloth’s will – “

                “Is not knowable or predictable.  The only thing I know of Lloth’s will is that she hates me.  For decades she has sent assassins through House Barrison Del’Armgo to torture and kill me.  Were it not for the last assassin’s slow sadism, I would be dead right now.

Lloth hates me and by extension she hates you. ”

                “One of my sisters, Zanitra, says I am cursed by Lloth.”

                “Most likely.  She is probably enjoying the anxiety that is slowly building inside you.  You will end up on one of her altars in Arach-Tinillith.  Zanitra would probably crawl over a thousand rot grubs to plunge the knife into you.  Am I right?”

                “You are going to save me from Lloth’s wrath?”

                “Ha!  No.  I am going to saved you by doing her will.  I am going to give Barrison Del’Armgo the secrets and trade might of Duskryn and then destroy it utterly, except for you.  In return, the assassins will leave me alone.”

                Aunrae’s skin was still smoking from the acid, but she relaxed her face and smiled.

                “And how will you accomplish all this, dearest mother?”

                “A contract,” Eclavdra whispered through the tiny goblin’s mouth.

                “You have written a contract with House Barrison Del’Armgo?”

                “I have not.  I have an associate named Sabanion.  He has.”

                “Who is Sabanion?”

                “Chief vassal of Moloch, Lord of the Sixth Layer.  Sabanion owes me a favor.”

                Aunrae leaned in closer, chewing on this new bit of information.

                “A devil named Sabanion will pen a contract with House Barrison Del’Armgo and they will sign it?”

                “Yes, every female of the House will put her mark on the page.”

                “They will never sign it, they are not stupid.”

                “That’s what they said ten years ago.  But they’ve watched Duskryn grow richer and their best torturer has been unable to wring more than a laugh from Duskryn.  They will sign, soon,” she looked at Aunrae, took a long drag on her pipe and smiled, “ten years of negotiation have made them confident.”

                Ten years?  I would have been fourteen.

                “They have been negotiating a contract with a devil, and you have been planning this, for ten years?”

                “Yes.  Living on the surface has taught me many things.  Patience is one of them.  The surface elves have learned this to a remarkable extent. “

                “Surface elves, did you crush them?”

                “No, I rarely get time with them, the few that will speak to me.  Generally, only the oldest, wisest… and the most bored, surface elves will tolerate me.  They understand the thirst for knowledge, though they don’t approve of my methods,” Eclavdra smiled.

                “What will the devil Sabanion gain from this contract?”

                “His minions will take part in the new surface trade as caravan guards.  Thus a devil will gain a foothold in Menzoberranzan and get another chance at mischief on the surface world.  For the next century a House Barrison Del’Armgo caravan will not leave the city without a devil escort.”

                “And me?  Is my escape a part of the contract?”

                “No.”

                Aunrae’s shoulders sunk.  An exquisite conspiracy of pain and death revolved around her.  It will fall on my neck and my head will roll, she thought.  House Del’Armgo and Sabanion will kick it across the Duskryn courtyard for sport.

                “I am arranging the attack, young one.  You will escape amid the slaughter.  Your participation is crucial.  Adding your name to the agreement would have drawn undue attention to you.”

                “I still don’t understand, mother.  How will you give up Duskryn’s secrets?  The best torturers cannot break them and the strongest magic cannot compel them.  The caravan guards have enjoyed countless succubi that cannot seduce the secrets out of them.  What is it that you have?”

                “Knowledge and power, my young haunted one.  I’ve found things, deep in the Underdark.  Things that no one else knows about.   Only the strongest creatures know that gold, weapons, and lives are secondary to knowledge.  The strongest beings can only become more powerful with knowledge.”

                The torn goblin exhaled a sweet smelling plume of smoke and held up both its arms.

                “Do you see this?  My favorite spell.  I kill a creature and fill its body with my own soul.  Your father wanted this spell.  He wanted it so badly…  I still shiver sometimes when I think about the things he did to me in hope that I would teach it to him.  And now… here you are.”

                Aunrae considered this and there was a long silence.  She looked around the library and saw the spiders had gathered in the bookshelves around them, waiting.  They knew that when the conversation was done, the torn one would fall and a meal was at hand.  They mewled and salivated vile poisons as they watched the goblin stand up and hold its pipe aloft.  The conversation was almost over.

                The pipe disappeared in a dull flash of light and the goblin stopped to smile again at Aunrae.

                “Goodbye, my young haunted one. “

                “Goodbye, mother.  Wait…”

                “Yes?”

                “On the surface, have you ever met Drizzt Do’Urden?”

                “Once, child.  But that is a conversation for the World Above.”



                With that, the goblin crumpled and the spiders sprang from the bookshelves.  They hissed and screeched at each other over the corpse for several moments, then fell to silent feeding.  Aunrae left the library and wandered the Duskryn estate, unsure what to think.  She doubted she’d survive.  A cool breeze followed and the cold voices whispered assuringly to her.

AUNRAE, PART 4 (published 03/23/2014)

Aunrae never forgot that first meeting with her mother.  The House Duskryn arch-mage, Rylas, convinced the Matron Mother to allow entrance to the vessels that held Eclavdra’s consciousness.  Many times, Rylas and Eclavdra chatted about the surface world and the intricacies of necromancy.  Other times, Eclavdra met with her daughter and schooled her in the arcane.  Eclavdra took a keen interest in the strange entities, spirits, and voices that surrounded her daughter, questioning her diligently every time they were alone.  Aunrae’s interest in the arcane was not that keen.

The lesson had begun.  The diminutive goblin stood on a chair at the library table and was explaining how the channels of the soul ran through the body.  It stood on the chair and held the thighbone, an unwilling gift from Aunrae’s half-sister, Zestree, horizontally over the library table and spoke a few arcane words.  Moments later, a ghostly vapor congealed and reconstructed the body.  Veins, arteries, and canals of life energy (“some cultures call it `chi,’” Eclavdra explained) glowed in varying colors, racing throughout the translucent form.  It rested on its back, a few inches over the library table.  Aunrae touched the wispy cadaver, fascinated.  It was Zestree; her ghostly shape hovered in repose above the long table.

“Is this what masters of the arcane get to do?”

“Yes.  Over the centuries I have studied under some of the smartest necromancers and anatomists.  You see, the true way to discover the truths of life is to discover what energies run the body and how they can be controlled and interrupted.  These channels here connect the organs with the rest of the body, as well as control the muscles…”

The lecture went on for several minutes.  Aunrae was transfixed by the vaporous anatomical model.

“How is this… formed?” Aunrae asked.

“It is mainly air, dust and dark energy remnants of the creature’s soul.  Completely without intellect but constructed from memory.  Who was this?

“A half-sister who attacked me.  Zestree.  I slew her.”

As soon as Aunrae spoke her sister’s name, the ghostly replica shuddered as it floated over the table.  The head turned slightly towards Aunrae and the apparition’s arm reached out.  The labyrinthine paths of veins and energies that ran through it pulsed brighter.  Its mouth opened and it tried to sit up, reaching still closer.  Aunrae stepped back and drew her morning star.  The goblin’s eyes opened wider and it whispered a few arcane syllables.  The ghostly shape darkened and moaned as it tore away from the thighbone that Eclavdra held over the table.

Aunrae swung her weapon uselessly through the reaching hand as it got closer.  All the glowing veins and channels that ran through it faded and the shape became pure shadow.  The goblin started laughing and grasped the thighbone with both hands.

“So interesting, young one!  This is not my doing, it must be yours!  Just a moment.”

The goblin struggled with the thighbone.  Aunrae watched in disbelief as she watched her mother try to snap the thighbone using the pathetic arms of a slain goblin.  The shadow lunged.  The biting cold of it made her scream and her legs buckled.  She almost lost her grip on the morning star.  Aunrae dashed through the expansive library and hid behind a bookcase.  She readied her weapon.  The morning star was unwieldy and her chain shirt felt oppressively heavy.  She knew the touch of the shadow had drained a portion of her strength.  She concentrated on quieting her breath.  The cold winds blew around her quietly and the voices whispered urgent nonsense.  Somehow, even with her back to the far wall of the library, the winds were pushing her forward.  The shadow searched for her, gliding silently through the walls and stacked bookcases.

Aunrae listened though she knew the shadow moved with the silence of the grave.  It occasionally moaned feebly in irritation or resentment.  Zestree doesn’t know what she is, Aunrae thought.  Pathetic.  She also heard the fumbling of her mother’s corpse host, a tiny goblin grunting and struggling to break the thighbone in two.  Doubtless her mother, an arch necromancer, had a spell that could deal with this.  She was doing this to test her daughter.  As she listened, she thought she heard the goblin’s hoarse grunting intermingled with an amused chuckle.  Infuriating!

With a groan, the shadow surged through the bookcase hiding Aunrae and attacked.  Aunrae rolled into the aisle to her left and stood up.  She ran back the way she came, toward the long library table with the shadow close behind.  Turning a corner, she saw the goblin corpse that housed her mother’s consciousness.  It was trying to snap the thighbone across its knee, but didn’t look to be trying too hard.  With a yell, she sprinted to the table.  She heard the shadow moan in her ear and her fear completely gave way to fury.  She dove into a roll and the shadow passed over her.  She snapped up to her feet as the shadow turned and came back at her again.  Aunarae stood her ground, gripping her morning star with every ounce of strength she had left and seething with anger.

“Zestree, damn you!  I’ve killed you once and now you challenge me again?  Touch me and your soul will pay a second price for your bold stupidity.  HOW DARE YOU RAISE ANOTHER HAND TO ME!”

The shadow froze.  Cowed, it seemed to shrink into itself.  It hovered in the aisle, turning in uncertain circles.

Eclavdra nodded and held the thighbone aloft with both arms.  Aunrae stormed over and hefted her morning star.  She brought the gleaming black-steel weapon down in a high sweeping arc through the bone.  It broke with a snap.  Aunrae aimed the morning star to break Zestree’s thighbone in two… on its way to the goblin’s little skull.  “Bitch!” she snarled as one of the protruding spikes pierced the creature’s forehead.  It flopped back into its seat.  The shadow dissolved with a pitiful moan.

Aunrae freed her weapon.  The goblin’s eyes rolled momentarily and looked up.  It smiled and sat up in the library chair, wiping the blood and brains from its face.  The tiny thing was a bloody mess, ripped through the ribs and an open, oozing forehead.  It stood up in the chair and flicked the gore from its hands.  A messy splat stained a set of volumes on a nearby bookcase.  Eclavdra smoothed out her goblin host’s bloody robes and calmly found her pipe and tobacco pouch. 

“Shoo,” the little goblin said as it struck a match.

Aunrae turned around and saw four armed and armored males.  Duskryn guards.  They had their swords drawn and viewed the scene in bewilderment.   Aunrae was still simmering.

“Be gone!”

The guards filed out.  They would report this.  Aunrae wondered if it would work in her favor.

She turned back to the torn goblin.  The creature was incanting a series of spells.  Aunrae could feel the air get closer and a quietness settled around them.  Her mother wanted to mask this conversation.  She’d never taken as many measures before.  She beckoned Aunrae to a seat at the table.  Aunrae stowed her weapon and sat down.

“I knew it.  You are worth the effort,” Eclavdra said, more brainy goop was oozing down the side of the goblin’s face.

“What effort?”

“Here, you must swallow this first.”  The goblin produced a small emerald from a pouch that hung on its tattered belt and dropped it into Aunrae’s palm.  She studied it carefully.  It seemed to hum with some odd power.  Not magic.  A small point of green light within the gem gave it an uncanny glow.  Aunrae eyed her mother.

                “Trust, Aunrae.  It is in short supply here in the Underdark.  But right now, it is the only way you will escape a death full of slow agony.  Trust… and trust is the only thing that will keep you alive in the World Above where everyone will either run from you or try to kill you.  It is something you will have to learn.  Now, swallow the gem.”

                Trust!  After all this?  Aunrae obeyed.  Her throat tightened and convulsed as the gem descended.  She felt strangely dizzy but the spasm subsided as soon as it had come.  Poison?  She didn’t think her mother would use something so weak.

                “I survived your poison, mother.  You don’t want to waste a spell on me?”

                Eclavdra ignored the accusation and continued.  “I was of Menzoberranzan’s Second House, Barrison Del’Armgo.  I secretly learned everything I could from the mages of our house and had several spells at my disposal before my move to Arach-Tinillith.  I escaped during one of the squabbles that typically befall the drow inside the academy.  I thought I could leave Menzoberranzan and be free forever, which was foolish.  Every few years, Barrison Del’Armgo finds me with another assassin.  I have killed them all, but the last 2 were troublesome… and painful.  They interrupt my research!  And so I am cutting House Barrison Del’Armgo a deal.  I will give them House Duskryn and all its secrets.  In return, they will stop sending assassins.”

                Aunrae’s estimation of her mother dropped.  What a fool, she thought.

                “They will not honor your deal, mother.”

                “Yes, they will.”

                “Mother, you are a f-“

                Before Aunrae could utter the insult, the bloody goblin sneered and thrust its palm at her.  An arrow hissed from its palm and struck Aunrae in the shoulder.  The sting of it blasted the wind from her, and she felt her skin burning under her mail shirt.  The magical acid arrow was dissolving through her armor and slowly eating at her skin.  She winced and wanted to scream but she’d spend a century in Hell before she’d let her surface-dwelling mother see her show pain.  The acid kept burning, but she sat in wincing silence.

                “Now, while your skin hisses and burns, listen carefully.  I have promised House Barrison Del’Armgo the secrets of Duskryn and I will provide them.  Everyone in your House will die.  If you want to live and escape to the surface world then listen carefully.  You will meet a creature named Sazen.  You will do exactly what he says.  You will tell him everything you know about the Hall of Vexation.”

                “I don’t know anything about the Hall of Vexation, or the trade routes.  This is ridiculous.  I won’t learn anything until my ten years at Arach-Tinillith are done.  I – “

                “Ten years.”

                “Yes.”

                “Do you think you will survive ten years at Arach-Tinillith?”

                Aunrae though about the whispers that haunted her and had broken the artifact of Lloth in the chapel.  A centuries old likeness of the Spider Queen had been shattered and thrown the whole house into a vicious panic.  She knew it was the cold voices, the haunting winds that had tipped the artifact.  Zanitra had just figured it out as well.

                “No.”

AUNRAE, PART 3 (published 03/03/2014)

On a warm, dark day in Menzoberranzan,  a goblin smoking a pipe with an oak stem and silver bowl approached the gates of House Duskryn.  It was around 3 years before Aunrae had begun her religious training.  The goblin appeared to have been run through the chest and was soaked in dried blood.

The gate guards mistook the thing for a zombie at first, though it moved with too much fluidity for a mindless undead.  It stopped at the front gate and spoke in a loud rasp to the guards.

                “I am a colleague of the mage Rylas Duskryn and am here to see his daughter, Aunrae.  I shall do House Duskryn no harm.  Let me in.”

                The goblin was met with laughter and a hail of crossbow bolts.  A few hobgoblin slaves also ventured out with spears and battle axes.  After taking many bolts and blows, the goblin was crushed into a bloody pulp.  The hobgoblins laughed and rooted around the entrails for the silver pipe but it couldn’t be found.  About an hour later, a male drow staggered up to the gate.  He smoked a pipe of silver and oak.  All his drow house insignia and identifiers had been removed.  His belly had been opened and looked like it had been roped shut with strips of leather.  He also croaked,

“I am a colleague of the mage Rylas Duskryn and am here to see his daughter, Aunrae.  I shall do House Duskryn no harm.  Let me in.”

Another shower of crossbow bolts descended on the drow.  He didn’t bother to move.  He staggered closer to the gate as more and more bolts pierced him.  A house mage blasted him with a bolt of lightning and his body shattered.  Guards sifted through the smoking bits of the staggering drow but found nothing of consequence.  The pipe was missing.

Another hour later, a mind flayer halted up to the gates of House Duskryn.  It’s tentacles were a drooping mass of bloody flesh and exposed bone.  Its left hand had been sheared off at the wrist and the right arm held the oak stem of the silver pipe in a bloody rent in its side.  Smoke wafted from the tear as the creature limped toward the front gate.  Several drow guards and a handful of hobgoblin slaves met the tentacled abomination with weapons drawn.  They shifted with unease as the thing stowed the pipe and held aloft a fist sized stone.  A mouth appeared on the stone and spoke:

“I am a colleague of the mage Rylas Duskryn and am here to see his daughter, Aunrae.  My patience is almost at an end, let me in.”

A messenger was sent to fetch the House mage, Rylas.  A tall male drow guard began arguing with his fellows and loaded his crossbow.  The hobgoblins began to back away but were met with a lash from one of the other male guards.  The tall drow aimed at the illithid, which stared at him with pale, dead eyes.  The other guards were yelling at him to desist and the hobgoblins got another taste of the lash.  The bolt loosed and struck the mind flayer at the base if its throat.  It staggered back a step and seemed to shake.  Its tentacles twitched and jerked.  It gurgled out a roar of frustration and threw the rock to the ground.  There was a flash of green and purple fire.  The drow and hobgoblins shrieked in unison as their flesh desiccated before their eyes.  Their veins burned and exploded with the purple-green fire.  In seconds they were a melded heap of quivering, melted flesh.

 Just outside the courtyard, the mage Rylas was racing to the front gate, surrounded by guards and a number of apprentices.  He stopped to slap his chief apprentice.  “Why wasn’t I told of this immediately?”

Malayne, one of the house matriarchs and a priestesses of Lloth, was already waiting in the courtyard.  She hefted a heavy, black steel mace with faintly glowing silver flanges.  In her left hand was a wide bladed dagger.  She looked with equal parts fury and disdain at the torn illithid outside the Duskryn gates.  The creature itself was fiddling with the bolt lodged in its throat.  It labored to draw breath.  There was an odd sucking sound from the thing and it started to emit rasping, garbled noises.  Whatever animated the mangled body was attempting speech.  It adjusted the crossbow bolt in its throat and used its left stump to seal the rip in its ribcage.  Malayne started the incantation of a spell.

The mind flayer labored through a wet, noisy inhalation and spoke.

“Ssssshtop, drow.  I know where a deep dragon livvveessssssshhhh.  A mile below.  I will burn away itssssh ssssshoul… “

The torn and perforated shape heaved in another breath.

“… and fill it withssss my own.  It would be a sssssssshort dig to your compound but the inconveniencsssssse would infuriate me.”

Rylas was standing behind Malayne, whispering urgently to her.  Malayne’s face was a stony visage of hate and fury, even more so than most drow priestesses.  She had earned the nickname “The Gargoyle” because her twisted face rarely changed.  She enjoyed the moniker, but her mace met the face of anyone bold or careless enough to let her hear it.

She turned to listen to the mage and thrust a finger at his chest.

“Very well, but THAT THING DOESN’T STEP INSIDE THE GATE!” she screamed at him.

“Of course, dread lady.”  He bowed deeply.

Malayne kicked the smoking heap of melted bodies inside the gate and stormed out of the courtyard.  She muttered to Rylas’ apprentice, “Bring the little bitch.”

Minutes later, Aunrae found herself crossing the courtyard with her half-sister and friend, Zanitra.  Zanitra was 15, Aunrae 13.  Malayne watched from the pillars at the edge of the courtyard, cursing to herself.  Aunrae looked back at the hard eyes and the glowering face of The Gargoyle.  Aunrae did not like Malayne, having tasted her stony knuckles on more than one occasion.  Aunrae wondered if she was all stone, and where a blade could best pierce her.

  The illithid waited for them outside the gate.  They had seen mind flayers before in the bazaar, wandering around with their slack jawed slaves and bodyguards.  They were thin, rubbery, and disgusting things that smelled of mold but carried themselves with pride and power.  Commoners made way for them and Aunrae never saw a mind flayer taste the lash of a drow noble house.  Just about everyone else in Menzoberranzan did.

This one was hacked and bloody, if what flowed through their disgusting bodies could be called blood.  Zanitra stopped and didn’t want to get closer but Aunrae somehow knew she had to meet this creature.  Her father beckoned her closer.

He was quietly speaking with the creature.  It didn’t answer much but nodded and gestured.  She could hear the thing rasping for another breath as she got closer.  Aunrae took the final step and rested her hands on the bars of the front gate.  She watched it produce the pipe of silver and oak.  The thing set the stem back in the slash across its ribcage and struggled through another inhalation.  It looked down at her and pulled the crossbow bolt from its throat.  A curl of sweet smelling pipe smoke wafted from the wound as it bent down to look at Aunrae.  She was it expecting it to suck her brains out, since that’s what illithids did she had learned.  She clung tighter to the bars to keep herself from running away.  The creature stunk of its own fluids but the sweet tobacco made it bearable.  Its dead eyes studied her intently.  There was a gust of cold air and a choir of hollow whispers in the air.  The Archmage Rylas looked down at his daughter then to the illithid.  The creature cocked its head and rasped unintelligibly.  Aunrae hadn’t figured out yet what the cold and the voices meant.  They followed her and spoke to her.  Aunrae once heard a house priestess whisper to another that she might be touched by Lloth herself.  Perhaps this thing was here to tell her what it all meant.

It blew out another plume of tobacco smoke and patted Aunrae once on the head.  It let out the last of its breath in a hoarse chuckle and nodded to the necromancer, Rylas.  The pipe it smoked disappeared in a dull, purple flash and the creature crumpled in a lifeless heap.  Rylas muttered through a spell and disintegrated the motionless corpse.  The two drow, father and daughter, walked in silence across the courtyard back to the Duskryn estate.  She didn’t understand any of it.

“What was that, father?”

“That, young one, was your mother.”

AUNRE, PART 2 (published

Aunrae made her way to the library, which adjoined the House Duskryn chapel, Lloth’s Sanctity.  She had all her things with her: parchment, quills, ink and the thighbone required by her tutor.  The thighbone was also a souvenir of sorts, a remembrance of her younger sister, Zestree.  Zestree had tried attacking Aunrae and failed.  It was a sloppy attack and Zestree had come to a sloppy end.  The Matron Mother was angry, not with Aunrae for defending herself and killing her sister, but for their House.  Countless times the House Duskryn Matron Mother had told them that they were still too young to be killing each other… even if their friends were doing it.

House Duskryn was small and wealthy.  That was a bad combination in the city of Menzoberranzan.  Small and wealthy drow houses were usually crushed and pillaged, the members offered up on the altars of Lloth for being weak.  House Duskryn was wealthy because of its trade connections to the World Above.  The most powerful drow houses often thirsted for the crafts, fashions, exotic foods and spices that grew under the hated sun.  House Duskryn could provide those luxuries of the surface world as well as news and information.  Those trade connections were all closely guarded secrets and those secrets kept them wealthy, and alive.  House Duskryn had the most heavily armed and swiftest trading caravans in the Underdark.

 created at: 12/30/2013

Many houses had tried to shadow House Duskryn trading parties, only to be slaughtered by traps or ambushes.  That could be delicate, however.  It wouldn’t do to draw the ire of the most powerful houses.  Sometimes pursuers were merely delayed until the trading party could lose them.  Other times, they were bribed with discounts, first choice of new goods, or information. 

Aunrae quietly padded her way down the carved hallway toward the library.  Her encounter with Zanitra had put her on edge.  Zanitra had pieced together a part of Aunrae’s mystery.  Spirits, mischievous and angry, perpetually surrounded Aunrae.  Occasionally their mood matched hers, other times not.  Their actions could never be predicted.  Sometimes they whispered in faint voices, sometimes they swirled around her in cold winds.  Sometimes they moved things.  Last time Aunrae was in the chapel, they had toppled an ancient stone carving that had rested on Lloth’s altar for centuries.  It wasn’t enchanted or opulent, but it was priceless in its symbolism of house Duskryn’s commitment to the Demonweb Queen.  It shattered on the chapel floor and the whole estate was thrown into a panic.  Lloth’s disfavor would do this to any drow house of Menzoberranzan.  Desperate prayers to Lloth were offered from every Duskryn priestess.  Some of them cut their knees so they could kneel in their own blood.  The House Captain of the Guard, a male, was immediately subdued and offered up as a sacrifice.  The Matron Mother even considered offering up the House Mage, Rylas the necromancer, Aunrae’s father.  Such a powerful sacrifice would be more apt to appease the cruel Spider Goddess.  There were other Duskryn mages keen to take his place, but the Duskryn Mother knew she’d need the arcane strength if word of this got out to another drow house.  That and, even as devout as he professed to be, the necromancer wouldn’t go down without a fight.

Ultimately, nothing happened.  Weeks passed and the house priestesses continued to receive their spells from Lloth.  Nothing especially dire befell their trade caravans.  Aunrae was sure that Lloth saw the destruction of the heirloom and would react in her own time.  The Spider Queen’s actions were unknowable.  Aunrae’s mind turned over the very real possibility that Lloth was waiting for Duskryn’s priestesses to discover the true nature of their odd half-sister.  She shivered as she made her way past the entry to Lloth’s Sanctity.  Zanitra was right.  Aunrae never wanted to set foot in there again.  Aunrae was not a priestess of Lloth.  She had kept this hidden for months, since her training began.  She had asked one stupid question, and never asked another:  “How do you know when Lloth has answered your prayers?”  She ached for a week after the beating she received from the chapel headmistress and her sisters.  Aunrae could cast divine spells, but not like the others.  She didn’t know where the spells came from or even how she learned them.  Her sisters all knew.  They were filled with deadly fervor for the blessings and teachings of Lloth.  Aunrae wondered if it was the spirits that surrounded her that gave her the divine powers she wielded.

Her tutor awaited her in the library.  Perhaps she would have some answers.  The library was just around the corner but Aunrae’s pace slowed.  Where the passageway turned, a huge pair of iron double doors waited.  There was fresh blood in front of them, as there always was.  Above the doors was an iron mask of the smiling Spider Goddess.  The Hall of Vexation was another part of what secured House Duskryn as a small and successful drow house of Menzoberranzan.  Secrets needed keeping, and in drow society secrets were only as good as the prisoner on the rack… or dipped in the boiling oil, or under the parchment thin blade, or twisted under any thousands of horrific devices the thousands of sadistic drow minds could devise.  After a certain amount of religious training, Aunrae would be tasked with caravan duty.  In House Duskryn, no one left on a trade mission without being able to keep a secret.  No one.  Everyone in House Duskryn that took a surface coin or knew the name of a surface merchant had spent time “training” in the Hall of Vexation.  The amount of time differed for each drow, but it was always enough time to learn to keep a secret.  Occasionally, a Duskryn drow would go in and never come out.  Whatever horrors occurred in there even kept the souls of departed Duskryn from answering questions that could be forced from beyond the grave.  Duskryn torturers were known as the best in Menzoberranzan and Duskryn drow developed a reputation for resisting interrogation, magical or otherwise.  Last month, House Xorlarrin had sent an emissary with a stubborn human and a chest of gold.  The emissary offered the gold as a fee to break their prisoner.  It was a service the House had only begun to explore.  If it added power and prestige to the name of Duskryn, the Matron Mother welcomed it gladly.  Aunrae wondered if her time in the Hall of Vexation would help her keep her own secret.  She doubted it.

Avoiding the blood on the floor, Aunrae turned the corner and made her way into the library.  Tall bookshelves of black wood reached floor to ceiling.  Polished cabinets carefully marked and catalogued numerous scroll tubes, filled with everything worth documenting: the history of House Duskryn, trade ledgers and journals, the personal histories of each Duskryn Matron Mother and so on.  Some of her favorite surface histories were stored there.  She had even found a passage in a trade journal that detailed a sighting of Drizzt Do’Urden, a drow that had left the intrigues of Menzoberranzan and found adventure and acceptance in the World Above.

Aunrae’s father, the Duskryn House Mage Rylas, was in charge of the library and kept everything orderly.  Only the most delicate, cowed, and illiterate slaves were allowed to enter the library for household chores and cleaning duty.  The Necromancer Rylas maintained his own personal library somewhere on the estate, but only he and a few certain males were privy to its location.  None of the females cared as long as he and his charges displayed the proper deference.

Aunrae made her way to a long, oval table at the center of the library.  It was lit with brass lanterns that held slices of slow burning, glowing fungus.  The fungus glowed bright enough to provide ample reading light, but not enough to offend the sensitive eyes of the drow.  At the end of the table, a diminutive, cloaked figure sat in a reading chair, on pile of books.  The bowl of a silver and oak pipe jutted from the cloak and a wisp of smoke wafted toward the ceiling.  The pipe was always the same.  The tutor was not.

“Hello, mother,” Aunrae said to the small, ragged, and bloody form seated at the table.

The form shifted and inhaled on the pipe.  She stepped closer.  Aunrae saw it exhale through its nostrils… and a puncture wound in its chest.

“Hello, Aunrae,” Eclavdra’s voice rasped through the goblin corpse that currently hosted her soul.

ALYSTAIRE'S POOL (published 12/16/2013)

The company stood in a semi circle around the dissolving remains of their most dangerous foe.  Its steaming ichors channeled between the stone tiles in the cold floor and ran into the pool.  Bloody, bruised, and spent, the crew searched the scrying chamber of the dread lich, Alystaire.  Most of their minds were still bent by the insanity ward that had been placed in hopes of keeping meddlers out and the evil sealed within.  The only mind untainted, that of Amalielle, a cleric of Tyr, was experiencing anguishes of her own… both in dealing with the unholy nightmare they had just faced and in trying to predict what her teammates might do next.

                One of the more surprising oddities was the drow.  She was a haunted creature; wherever she went objects would randomly move by themselves, inexplicable cold winds would blow around her and there were sometimes disembodied whispers that followed her.  This morning she woke up calling herself Lissa, claiming to be a cleric of the halfling god, Yondalla.  It was startling at first, then amusing, then pleasant… then annoying.   She looked down again at the infernal deva and waited along with the company for the inevitable…

                “Thank you, Yondalla, for your protection and strength!”

                They stared at the drow.  That woman isn’t right, the halfling, Cassim, thought.  He looked at the pool and wondered if he had enough oil handy to set it afire.

                Lissa smiled at the company, her family.  Together they had crushed this mighty foe.  They began a search and Lissa began devising ways to get her brother halfling, Cassim, alone for a conversation about the virtues of the Bounteous Cornucopia.  First, she’d have to fix him with a wife but that shouldn’t be difficult.

                Cassim looked at her with annoyance and went to check the edges of the pool.  Lissa smiled, knowing she’d win him over eventually.  She would ply him with her wondrous baked bread, no one could resist!  She was already looking forward to working in the kitchen at Reaver’s Rest Inn and seeing Calipheros again.

                The cleric of Tyr, Amalielle, had set about cleansing the skull of the deva, a wise and compassionate choice.  The miserable thing had been a nightmare.  They were going to perform the last steps to consecrate its remains and free it forever.  Lissa wondered why she hadn’t thought of it first.

A voice behind her whispered, “Because you don’t care.”

She started and turned around.  Nothing there but the pool.  Water cascaded from the dragon sculptures on the walls and her companions were spread throughout the chamber, but there was nothing else.  She felt cold.

She looked over and saw the tiefling, Kilarra, staring at her.  Her face was a confused mask of equal parts longing and malice.  The young thing was doubtless troubled and in combat she spoke in dire words and curses.  It was one thing to strike an enemy down, but to wish it such ill will!  She would surely invite Kilarra to her chat with Cassim… with some warm baked bread and butter.  Lots of butter!

The search proved unfruitful and the group discussed its next move.  A night’s rest to heal and recuperate was deemed the best move, but none of the company wanted to stay in the scrying room.  A portal had been discovered in the deepest part of the pool and no one wanted to be asleep if something stepped through it.  The hulking half-orc hefted the dead deva’s weapon, a huge morning star, and the group followed her up the winding stair.  Lissa stopped at the foot of the stairs and pulled out her waterskin.

It had been a terrible battle.  Her entire body was still sore and every move was painful.  The tainted deva had called for Lissa’s skin and some hellish power came to rip it from her body!  It nearly killed her.  She took a drink from her waterskin, listening to her companions upstairs.  They were recounting the battle.  The halfling offered to light a fire for the remainder of the night.

She moved to take another drink when a frigid wind from out of nowhere nearly blew her over.  The door to the stairs slammed shut.  The cold wind assailed her again, blowing the waterskin from her hand.  She clapped her hands over her ears as a dozen whispering screams assailed her.  Lissa shrieked out to Yondalla and the screams got louder.  Another blast of cold air hit her and she staggered back toward the pool, trying to escape the biting wind and the relentless, disembodied voices.  She stumbled over the pool’s ledge and fell in.  The water had turned frigid and the biting icyness of it made her scream again.  The winds had turned the pool into a storm and the drow gasped for breath.  She found her footing in the waist-deep water and in an instant her black metal morning star was in her hand.  She screamed again, but this time in a vicious rage.

“Your soul will serve me after I TEAR IT FROM YOUR WRITHING BODY!  YOU’LL DIE WEAK AND IN SHAME!  LIGHT ON YOU!”

At once, the voices were quiet and the wind stopped.  The pool calmed but the drow still shivered as she readied her morning star.  Soon the only noise was the water streaming from the mouths of the dragon head sculptures.  Then she saw it.

She hadn’t noticed earlier that the dragon heads were chromatic dragons.  They were green and blue, two of each.  The jaws hung low where the water flowed and streamed into the pool.  One of the green dragon head had something in its mouth, resting behind the fangs of the lower jaw.  Her eyes locked on it.  How could it have been missed?  A scythe rested in the jaw of the green dragon, the tip of its blade rested quietly in the water.  She waded through the water up to the dragon’s face.

The blade was at least three feet long, smoky black and etched with strange runes.  The snath was almost as long as she was tall, gnarled, dark brown, and wrapped in ribbons of iron.  The grips were gray and smooth as… bone.

A gift from Yondalla!  Her face twitched and she knew it wasn’t true.  But it was!  Yondalla the Cornucopia, a harvester!  She remembered her father harvesting wheat with a scythe like this one.  Did she?  She seemed to recall her father’s blade gleamed in the sun and the handle was white pine.  White pine… it was such a commodity.  House Duskryn was one of the few houses in Menzoberranzan that could acquire it in bulk.  Mother loved white pine!  No, not mother.  The Matron Mother?  Yes, dear sweet Matron Mother!  She loved white pine so much Lissa had seen her take a male’s arm off at the elbow when he didn’t deliver the required shipment.  She fed it to the house spider!

Another voice calmly whispered, “You are not a halfling, fool.”

I’m not?  But halflings live in the ground… I lived in the ground.

“You lived much deeper and much darker.  You are Aunrae Duskryn, a drow, the last of your house.  All of them are dead but you.”  The rasping voice was closer.

My family?  No, it is nearly fall and father will be harvesting wheat soon.  He will be out in the sun with his scythe.  I spent so much time with him in the sun!  She looked at the skin on the back of her hand.  How else could I be this way?

“You were born to live in the darkness.  You know that the sun darkens the skin of surface dwellers only because your half-brother told you after one of his ventures.  He is dead, you arranged his death.  You forsook your family and its petty spider god.”

No, I am one of Yondalla’s chosen!  I protect my family and…

“Pick up the scythe,” the voice sounded like it was gargling grave dirt.

Suddenly, the scythe had an ominous look to it.  Lissa thought she saw a skull in the smoky black blade.  The runes shifted and coalesced into a hangman’s noose.  She didn’t want to touch it.  Her hands trembled and her morning star fell from her hand to the bottom of the pool.  Something was making her step closer.  She began to sweat, even in the frigid water.  She saw flares of white light that seared her mind.   A hundred ghostly voices swirled around her and demanded she pick up the scythe.  A hundred more voices burned inside her head, pleading that she run away.  With a scream she leapt at the dragon’s head, grasping the snath on either side of dragon’s jaw.  The rock gave way and snapped.  The room seemed to explode in darkness and there was an eerie silence.  A thousand disembodied voices rose in a horrifying shriek, all of them threatening, craving, pleading, demanding, and begging entrance into the world.



Aunrae stood up and let loose a wail of her own, this time in triumph.  She held the scythe aloft and saw a thousand dark wraiths, spectres and shadows bowing before her.  Some had been kings and princes, murdered by rivals.  Others had been sages, cut off from their books too soon.  Lovers, beggars, cowards, the foolhardy, the brave… all of them driven to undeath by some tragedy or another.  All of them looking for a way back to the world to set things right.  Aunrae was their conduit, their guide, their keeper, their matron.  They loathed and loved her.  She laughed and swung the scythe’s blade through the water.  Silence fell again and the darkness evaporated. 

CAPTIVE AT THE VAASAN GATE (published 02/03/2013)

 Drizzt would allow himself to be shackled too, even though he could kill his captors several times over.  Aunrae smiled to herself as she strode down the hall with her companions.  She inspected her shackles.  Aunrae had experienced punishments of the drow, in the city of Menzoberranzan, in her own house.  The shackles the Vaasan Guard bound her with were pleasure bracelets in comparison but she let on nothing.    They turned a corner and came to a room lit with several candles.  Calipheros was there.  The half-orcs slouched impatiently and there was no doubt that the Halfling was watching from somewhere.

She watched Calipheros dithering in his usual way with some officer of the town guard.  He was becoming tedious.  He had some poorly concealed secret and probably thought he was manipulating the company into something sinister.  Aunrae chuckled.  Back home he would have been on the rack within minutes of his verbal slip, getting the secret stretched out of him.  Or they might have put the spider cage on his face.  If he were lucky he could have spilled his plans before his face swelled shut.  Aunrae sighed, despite the day’s excitement.  She missed the expediency of home.

Their escort was watching them intently.  She had gone quietly and proudly with the guards of the Vaasan Gate.  It was obvious they feared her, so she had to show them she could not only tolerate momentary captivity but even allow them all to live afterward.  She could feel the awe and adoration building in them even as she stood there… the drow that showed mercy.

Mercy!  The thought of it thrilled her.  She had paralyzed a surface clod in the tavern with a spell, caressed his throat with her dagger, and let him live.  Aunrae wondered how many had already heard the tale, straight from the tongue of the spared.

                Of course, her half-orc companions had completely obliterated the other thugs that challenged them… which diminished the grandeur of her benevolence somewhat.  She had never seen a battle axe wielded to such effect.  The crowded Underdark usually left little room for such a dramatic swing.  A virtue of the surface world, truly.  She could also see now why dwarves were so short.  They loved their battle axes and needed the extra room to swing them.  Stunted little fools, she thought, they probably didn’t even know that themselves.

                But yes!  A human had been helpless at the end of her blade and still breathed.  Drizzt would have undoubtedly taken the clod’s arm off at the shoulder with one of his famous scimitars.  Aunrae, though, had only whispered her name and kicked him over into the bloody, steaming entrails of his hewn companions.  Oh, the novel thrill of mercy!

AUNRAE, PART 1 (published 01/07/2013)

“Your tutor has arrived.”

                Aunrae’s father, the House Mage of Duskryn, spoke quickly and left.  He was more and more distant as of late.  She sighed.  Death was around every corner even within her own house… especially within her own house.  She was beginning to find the house intrigues tiresome.  She had just happened upon a tome detailing the trials of Kiaransalee, and her rise and fall as a great death god.  Aunrae thought she caught a glimpse of her own frosty breath in the warmed chamber air.  The radiant heat of the lava that flowed a short mile beneath the magnificent drow city of Menzoberranzan made such frigidity impossible.  The chill came and went in a moment.

                Aunrae listened to her father walk down the hallway.  There was an entreating, dark whisper that Aunrae ignored as she dressed and gathered her scrolls, quill, ink, and a boiled thighbone.  The message she received a week before from her tutor had been very specific.  She stowed an extra dagger in the small of her back and envied her tutor’s freedom from the paranoia and pettiness that plagued drow nobility.  Aunrae slipped into a chain shirt and cinched on an ornate belt.  Her favorite possession, a black steel morning star circled in wicked barbs, hung from a heavy ring at her side.  Of course, the pettiness could be fun from time to time, especially when it ended in violence.  Just last week Aunrae pulverized one of her younger sisters who had attacked her openly, trying to impress house elders.  The ambush was comically obvious and Aunrae was able to cast a preparatory spell.  The strength of a minotaur flowed through Aunrae during the combat, and each swing of her morning star was punctuated with a satisfying crunch.  Poor, poor Zestree… if only her plan had been as resilient and useful as her thighbone proved to be.   

She gathered everything together and stopped at her bedchamber door, almost forgetting the Duskryn amulet of Lloth that was worn by each member of her house.  The amulet featured a riding lizard with ruby eyes and whose tail ended in a menacing black spider, signifying the success of House Duskryn in exploration, commerce, and fealty to the Queen of the Demonweb Pits.   She put on the necklace and ran face-first into another sister, Zarintra.

                “Where are you off too, defiler?”  Zarintra was always annoyingly stealthy and delighted herself startling those that expected death.

                “I am meeting my necromancy tutor.  Would you like to come as well?  Zestree is coming.”

                “The favor of Lloth does not come from a tutor.  All I need to know about the faith I learn from the House chapel and our matron mother.  I have no need to study necromancy like a dry, sulking boy.  Males study necromancy out of some feeble need to have power over something.”

                Aunrae’s eyes narrowed and clenched her fists.  A cold, otherworldly wind exploded from some dark corner of Aunrae’s room and her silver hair flew in a furious tangle.  A disembodied, wailing shriek filled the room and the sneer on Zanitra’s face slackened for a moment in fear.  She staggered back into the hallway.    A ceramic bauble, an exaggerated playing piece from a sava board that Aunrae bought at the bazaar, flew from a shelf through the door and exploded into dust and shards at Zanitra’s feet.  Aunrae was already walking down the hallway.

                “Defiler!” Zanitra screamed, “You will never enter Lloth’s chapel again!  It was you that broke the ancient image of our Queen Mother!  Lloth has cursed you, I feel it.  You will not come to Lloth’s Sanctity again, unless I am there to open your belly on her blessed altar.  Light on you and die!” 

CASSIM, ON TO VAASA (published 01/16/2013)

So, that was where his great-great-whatever-grandfather ended up after fleeing Zakhara and leaving his family in shambles-- in some adventuring company called the Reavers.

From what Cassim gathered his ancestor was not an original member of the group, nor a long time member, but at some point he was in their ranks.

And, those ranks appeared to have included half orcs, drow, and who knew what else.

According to this Calipheros fellow, there was an abandoned keep in Vaasa which the Reavers built and "only those of the blood of the Reavers" could get into it, or some such nonsense. He claimed at first that it took four bloodlines to get in, now with only three of the bloodlines here he was saying that was enough.

Cassim didn't trust this "sage". This was a shady group at best. The two half orcs, Callista and Torvaagh Armageddon...they seem to be cousins or something, the female was obviously in charge, but, Jauhar save him, he thought they were both intimidating.

It wasn't long into the meeting before he got a look at them in action, hacking their way through some local thugs ...he saw now why back in Zakhara they refer to Northerners as barbarians. Then there was the drow, Aunrae, who was some sort of Necromancer from what he could tell, perhaps a preistess of one of her race's depraved gods...she was the cause of the fight at the inn,

He concluded that drow weren't loved in the North anymore than they were back home.

After killing their attackers they decided to flee the scene. They eventually made it to Bloodstone Village where Calipheros said they needed to get some paperwork in order to cross into Vaasa. Still not trusting this old man, there was something not right about him. As Cassim tailed him to his meeting he was attacked by another drow.-- Cassim wondered how many of them are around there-- whiile the others were attacked by some undead spider thing.

Cassim made it back to the others while fending off the attacks from the drow, but just barely. The others manage to destroy the spider thing and the drow fled. It didn't take long after that for the guards to arrive and the others to be arrested...they didn't get him though.

Cassim followed them to the prision and slipped in unnoticed. Once again Calipheros seemed to be more than he let on. Not only was the governmental office he needed to get the paperwork from open during the middle of the night for him, he seemed to have gotten the rest of the band of companions freed and sent on their way with promises of noble titles and land if they succeeded.

That was certainly not what Cassim would have expected to happen to a couple of thuggish half orcs and a drow who were just arrested!!!! Something was amiss in this venture, and Calipheros was at the heart of it.

Cassim decided he would leave now, as the didn't seem to have a favorable ending, but with bounty hunters after him, staying with the half orcs and drow did have some advantages...and who knew, maybe there really was some fortune to be had in the so-called "Reaver's Hall."

CASSIM, PATH TO HELIOGABALUS (published 01/09/2013)

The inn was comfortable enough.

Heliogabalus certainly was not.  At least not for Cassim, who was used to the warm and arid climates of Zakhara and Calimshan.

What in the Nine Hells was he doing here anyway? 

Well, running for his life for one.But then again, that seemed most likely to be what he would be doing from now on, at least until he stopped running fast enough and was overtaken by those who were after him.

Ever since Fate led him to steal the necklace which resulted in his mother’s death, his murder of a wealthy merchant family’s eldest son who also happened to be a sha'ir's apprentice, and then fleeing for his life from Zakhara, he had had to constantly look over his shoulder for the bounty hunters seeking the sizable reward for his head being offered by the merchant family.

So far he had managed to stay a step ahead of them.

His path to this inn started with him stowing away on a trading ship that first morning after his escape. Using his newly acquired ring of invisibility getting on board and staying hidden was an easy task.  For the entire journey from Fahhas to Calimport no one on the ship suspected they had an extra passenger.  He didn’t raise suspicion, after all as a Halfling he didn’t need much food or drink, and his small size allowed him to sleep in spaces that the much larger humans who made up the crew would never even attempt to get into.

Once the ship arrived in Calimport however things became more difficult.  Fate never made things too easy.

He was no more than ten minutes off the ship when he noticed he was being followed.  But how could that be?  He was invisible!  Certainly he was just being paranoid.  But just to be safe he ducked into an alley, which was a mistake.  The two thieves, for thieves they were, now had him cornered.  It was plainly obvious they could see him even though Cassim knew the ring was still working.  There was no point in trying to rely on the ring so he let the illusion drop.  The thieves offered him a deal he couldn’t refuse.  His purse and his lovely dagger for his life.

Apparently they didn’t take kindly to stowaways coming ashore without paying the usual fees and dues the thieves’ guild usually took to “ensure” the safety of the ships cargo.  After relieving him of what little money he had and his only weapon, the thieves left him alone in the alley with a warning to stay out of trouble lest they need to take anything else from him.

Figuring out how to navigate the powers in Calimport was not an easy task.  Between the thieves’ guilds, assassin’s guilds, city watch and other power groups, Calimport was not a safe place to be an outsider, let alone a poor, homeless and friendless Halfling outsider.  Luckily Fate had come to his aid again, only a few hours into his stay in Calimport

Cassim, now keeping his ring’s power unused, came across a wondrous sight, The Copper Ante.  A Halfling run inn.  The inn quickly became Cassim’s base of operations for his short stay in Calimport.  He quickly gained the notice and friendship of Dwahvel Tiggerwillies, the proprietor. She agreed to let him have a room and board in exchange for running errands and other tasks.  Cassim’s talents were of great use to Dwahvel, as not only did she run The Copper Ante, but was also the guildmistress of a Halfling thieves’ guild in the city. Cassim carried on this way for several months, until two unexpected things happened almost simultaneously.

First a letter arrived from Cassim from of all places Candlekeep, of which until the letter and Dwahvel’s explanation of what it was, Cassim know nothing about.The letter was from one Calipheros who was requesting Cassim’s attendance at a meeting to discuss of all things the ancestor who Cassim’s mother had told him was the downfall of his family’s once great standing back in Zakhara.

But this meeting was to take place in a city called Heliogabalus, some thousands of miles to the northwest.  Cassim was about to rule out leaving the steady and relatively comfortable life he had just started when the second thing happened.  That same evening just as he was settling in for the night, Dwahvel burst into his room and told him he had to leave, and fast.  She had gotten word from one of her many informants that there was a price on his head from the family of the apprentice he had killed and that bounty hunters were in the city and knew where he was.  Once again he was uprooted and being forced to flee for his life.

As he packed up his few belongings, Dwahvel did the unexpected.  She gave him two things, in her words: “A thank you, and a debt.”The first was a Halfling sized blade which Cassim quickly detected was magical.  She said that was the thank you for what he had done for not only her but for an important friend of hers.  Apparently some of those errands he had been doing where of greater importance than he had realized.  The second gift was a letter.  It was, she said, a letter of introduction and instruction for a wizard not far away from the inn.  In the letter Dwahvel introduced Cassim as a personal friend of hers and instructed the wizard to get him to wherever he wanted to go immediately as a favor to both her and her “important friend”.  Whoever this friend was, he certainly commanded a good deal of authority, or at least fear.

Cassim belted on the sword and after assuring Dwahvel he would repay the debt he now owned if and when he could he left The Copper Ante for the wizard’s home. 

When a servant answered the door, Cassim presented the letter to him.  It was not long before the wizard himself was at the door ushering Cassim inside.  He handed Cassim a small pouch of coins, an outfit of much warmer clothes, and within minutes was casting the spell which landed Cassim on the outskirts of Heliogabalus.

The meeting with this Calipheros wasn’t for another month however.  Cassim then did the first thing that came to mind.  He activated his ring, and once again took to being an unseen shadow.  Bypassing locks and other barriers, he moved from house to house, inn to inn, only staying in one place for a night’s sleep and a stolen meal or two before moving on.

In the month he had to wait for the meeting, he managed to get a good feel for the city, its inhabitants and customs.  He managed to add a bit to his coinage he had gotten from the wizard, and obtained some other useful items he may need if this meeting went badly and once again he needed to flee. 

But, here he was now, in the inn which was the designated meeting place.

Around the table were assembled a strange group.  Calipheros was there, an elderly man, of a race Cassim was not familiar with. There were a couple of intimidating looking half-orcs, a male and female.  And, a female drow, a race which Cassim had heard of but never expected to be sharing a table with.  And then Cassim, dressed in plain attire, with his backpack and bedroll hung on the back of his chair, and his sword, loose in its scabbard, hidden under his cloak.