Title: A Use for Morals

Rating: PG

Disclaimer: Any semblance between these characters and those in Salvadore's books is not a coincidence. I'm just playing with them while he's not looking. I promise I'll put them back when I'm done twisting their minds.

Summary: An island of morals among the immoral Drow elves did not happen by accident. Zaknafein's views on morals and why he taught them to Drizzt.

Author's Note: I have often wondered why Zaknafein and Drizzt seemed to be the only moral Drow in the Dark Elf Trilogy. This was the conclusion I came up with.

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There were advantages to being a ghost, Zaknafein Do'Urden decided. One of them being it was much easier to spy on people. Being invisible was a skill that he had mastered quickly and often used to relive his boredom. Certain people were always entertaining to watch. Like his son, Drizzt. The more he watched his son's many struggles, hardships and inner turmoil dance across his face, the prouder her became. Drizzt truly was his crowning achievement. He never would have thought so much could have come such a simple thing as morals.

Zaknafein had known of the existence of the surface dweller's morals only in passing for the longest time. It wasn't until after a surface raid when he had stumbled across a book that had been accidentally acquired while looting, that he actually came to understand the concepts and reasons behind them. He had thought them useless then. And so the book became lost among the floobydust of his quarters. Morals never crossed his mind again until after Drizzt was born.

He had rediscovered the book by accident and that was when the thoughts began to form. Morals in an immoral society. What would be the results of such a thing? Could it survive? Would it be a burden? Would it torture the poor soul who possessed such a thing? Even if a Drow were to possess morals, there would be no place above or below the earth that would welcome such a person. These thoughts made him smile as he watched the sleeping baby Drizzt.

He was surprised by how well Drizzt took to the morals and indeed they were a heavy burden for the young Drow to bear. At times the boy grew depressed by the practices of the city that surrounded him and the rule of the matriarchs. Drizzt would look to him for support and took heart from Zaknafein's soft smiles. The boy never realized the true reason behind Zaknafein's smile.

It wasn't until after his death that he really got to see the results of all his hard work blossom. He even had the oppertunity to tell Drizzt how proud he was of him. Though he never let on the reason for such pride. Drizzt's anguish and self torture upon his emergence to the surface world had been more than he had ever hoped for. He watched his son struggle to cope with the world in which that fateful book of morals had originated from and the slow progress which he made there, one individual at a time. His son however still was prone to bouts of depression. While he tried to seem stoic about his situation, he seemed to feel that he did not truly fit in.

As Zaknafein had suspected all those years ago, morals truly were the perfect way to curse a Drow for life.

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A/N: This was meant to be a different take on Zak's motives for teaching Drizzt about morals and explore this possibility. Hopefully you enjoyed reading it.

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