A/N: Another week, another update. I believe that believes are a determining factor of a character's views, and so their personality and reactions, their own moral codes, are heavily influenced depending on what they expect out of life and of the afterlife, and this is particularly valid when drow are involved. Act IV develops some relationships and gives us some insight on Mjirn's outlooks. No particular warnings apply. Please, enjoy and leave a review if you do to let me know what you like best of the story.
o O o
Act IV
o O o
A drow male and a priestess walked the streets of Sharessia and boarded the small boat towards the city of Sin.
This time, though, the drow walked first and the priestess was human.
Mjirn was not sure of the wisdom of his choice. He did not even understand why he had decided to show Valerie the caves where he lived and worked now. He didn't know why it was important.
The two of them had not parted ways after abandoning the cave system which lay below Goblin Island. Death had been close many a time during their venture, and they had found many unexpected things, such as the undead guarding a descending tunnel to the Upperdark, and when they, when she had grown too tired and weary to pursue the exploration, she had asked Mjirn how to make some petty coin from the salvaged loot.
Mjirn had told her, of course. He had even taken her to the proper merchants and peddlers. Somehow, this had naturally lead to a chat while sitting in front of the fireplace at the Tapper's Inn of Sharessia, where they made their last stop. There, he had decided that he did not want her to think of the Underdark and its dwellers as if they were like the goblin they had chased and killed that day.
Valerie was different from the other priestesses he knew, and therein lied the strange feeling that compelled him to take her to Mithuth. She refused to force him to obey or respect her, and she just talked to him as if his answers were of great importance. She had even shown interest when he had suggested the visit to the drow outpost.
And so the silent boatman took them away from the setting sun and into the soothing darkness of Mithuth.
A surfacer would not be killer not enslaved on sight, of that much Mjirn was sure, for the city prided itself on a commercial outlook, but still he kept throwing quick glances to the darkest corners, half fearing to run into one of his kin.
He was in no position to offer protection if a Matron Mother or a powerful male took an interest in Valerie, but in spite of it he guided her to the teleport stone.
Central Mithuth, as always, was magnificent: columns and statues and a ceiling ripe with stalactites merged together to speak of drow grandeur. He took a deep breath, inexplicably more at ease as soon as he entered an environment a hundred times more deadly.
"This is the main city," the explained, turning to gaze at her, his red-orange eyes glowing warmly in the infrared spectrum.
She smiled, a bit unsure, and shifted her weight.
"Is it considered… rude to use a light here?" she asked at length.
Of course. The city was sporting a magnificence… that she simply could not see, even though the decorative charms kept the plaza burning bright for Mjirn's own standards.
"No, you may use a light if you need it," he nodded, feeling foolish for not realizing sooner. "This is a trading post, so we accommodate to surfacers."
Her holy symbol almost immediately lit up, casting her features in sharp relief and displaying the wonders of dark elven masonry for her.
"It is so beautiful," she whispered then, turning around in a circle for a better look.
Mjirn just smiled.
"It is not what I wanted you to see."
They walked side by side to a secondary tunnel, a few paces long, and the gardens of Mithuth greeted their eyes beyond the narrow stone walls.
The cavern had dozens of magical braziers illuminating the perimeter and the crystal-like walls caught the light and reflected it a thousand times and more. Under the artificial rays lichen, moss, mushrooms and even plants thrived, so much so that the stone floor was covered by a soft green carpet from wall to wall. At the far end, a stream of clear, unpolluted water trickled into a shallow pond, forming a natural bathing chamber, and several marble benches, cleverly hidden behind the unexpected foliage, invited to an intimate encounter.
Valerie said nothing.
After a few heartbeats, her breath left her in a long, trembling sigh.
"This is… Can this truly be the Underdark?"
Mjirn nodded, satisfied and rewarded by her response.
"Yes. This is the Upperdark. As you can see, not all caves are like those of the goblinfolk."
Her answer, whatever it might have been, was cut short by the appearance of another male drow.
His white hair was pulled up in a ponytail, interwoven with thin braids in an elaborate style much like drow aristocracy, and he wore rich purple robes, but still Mjirn did not bow to him. There was something in the male's bearing that did not quite add up, that told his expert eye that the stranger did not hold as much importance as he projected.
On the other hand, if he abased his position his guest would, by default, become fair game.
"Surfacers are so quick to judge and condemn, and yet you bring one of them into our mist?" the male spat with scorn, wandering towards them.
"Mithuth is a free port. She may come and go as she desires," Mjirn countered with a calm tone, refusing to back off even though his shoulders were taut with tension.
However, the male noticed the slight shift of his body, his careful scrutiny, and he waved off a haughty hand.
"Do relax. If I wanted to kill you, you would be dead already," he intoned, his chin upturned.
All of a sudden, the stranger released a blast of eldritch fire upon an unsuspecting mushroom, tall like a good sized bush, to prove his words.
The display spoke volumes to Mjirn. First, the other drow was one of those magic stealing fakes, a warlock. Second, he was fast – but stood too close to be faster than his own dagger. And last, he needed to reinforce his superiority with bravado and intimidation, which meant that he was not superior at all.
"There is two of us. I sincerely doubt you would be able to prevail upon us both," Mjirn replied after a long stretch of charged silence.
"Ah, yes. You and your priestess slut," the other sneered, nodding towards Valerie's holy pendant. "What were you thinking, cavorting with human gods in the Spider Bitch's home?
That flippant reply also gave away a weak spot of the foolish male: a blasphemer, it would be too easy to turn the overzealous drow clergy on him. Mjirn all but smirked at the rich attires and noble demeanour: he was facing an imbecile, but before he could say anything more, Valerie spoke up.
"I don't follow a god but a goddess," she said, glancing between the two males and obviously attempting to alleviate the tension. "Sharess."
The male laughed.
"Hedonism and pleasure. An entertaining clergy, even if I was half hoping you would pledge your soul to the Broken God."
"Are you interested in the teachings of Ilmater?" Valerie asked, perplexed at the mere possibility.
Mjirn remained silent. He had been lost in the conversation as soon as surfacer deities had been mentioned.
"Oh, no, not quite," the drow replied with an amused chuckle. "I admit I am interested in your… human cults, as I must secure my soul against the Wall of the Faithless… But my interest in ilmaterites is more personal. I met them once, with all their preaching about pain and torture."
"And…?"
"And they took something from me."
"What was it?" the priestess immediately looked concerned, even worried in the drow's behalf.
"That, I shall not tell you," the male smirked and Valerie threw her hands up in the air.
"Why did you even mention it then?"
The male looked at a spot beyond her shoulder and launched off in a tirade, and Mjirn shifted to the side and took a tentative step forward, ready to intervene if the other drow was not as loony and harmless as he had originally thought.
"They keep saying that one must take other's pain, but then they dare to judge whether your pain is worth taking. They ask for converts and then decide that your soul must be cast to the dark pits, they damn me to the deepest pits of the Underdark to preserve the light. They scorn my lifeforce, not deeming it worthy to have their damned, bleeding deity as a patron…!" the tone of his words seemed to be genuinely bitter, and it made Valerie pity and Mjirn hate him.
"That's so cruel," she whispered. " Everyone needs a patron deity…"
She was going to offer further comfort, but her words slapped Mjirn out of his silence like a lightning bolt.
"No," he snarled, with enough force to silence both his companions.
The woman turned to him then, her eyes confused under a delicate frown, clearly not understanding.
"No? But, didn't you hear him speak of the Wall? Do you even know what it is? An eternity of pain and oblivion awaits the faithless," she attempted to explain.
Mjirn forgot his place, his natural caution, his hard-learned reserve, and laughed.
"And how is that different from eternal torture and consumption, do tell? How is that any worse than being tortured to insanity and damned to forever wander through the Abyss, serving as food for better, female souls? How is that any worse than loosing your essence, being forcibly merged with seven other fools to become a twisted creature whose purpose is to hunt the spirits of other drow until they are broken and mad? How is that any worse than being trapped in a spider web of acid, so that your wails of pain can serve as an alarm to alert of the presence of intruders?" he went on, speaking louder and louder even as the other male cackled with glee at him and Valerie looked more and more horrified. "The Bitch has taken my life, my pride and my dignity, but she will not have my soul," he finished, shoulders shaking at his own outburst, and he lowered his gaze in shame.
What had he said? How could he speak such words aloud?
He buried his hands in his short hair and the stranger laughed coldly.
"This visit to the gardens has proved to be more rewarding that I would have thought. Perhaps we will meet again, my friends. Perhaps on the wall," he added with a smirk before heading off along the winding paths, chuckling softly, deeming his purpose satisfied and leaving a stricken Valerie and a despairing Mjirn behind.
"Not all deities are so horrible," she said once they were alone anew, resting her hand upon his shoulder.
"Drow deities are," he replied with a shake of his head. "I apologize. This is not what I had in mind when I planned for this visit."
The woman nodded and smiled, accepting the change of topic.
"I imagine not. And I'd say it's time to return to the surface, perhaps?"
He sighed.
"Of course. I shall take you to the boat."
"You're not coming?" she tilted her head to the side, curiously, and he shook his in a negative.
"This is my home and there are matters I must attend to. I shall see you safe to Sharessia, though."
If she was somehow disappointed by his answer, she hid it well as they walked in silence back to the teleport stone and then to the port.
He helped her into the boat and bowed his farewell.
"Thank you for showing me the Underdark," she said as the boatman prepared to leave. "It was just like I imagined."
"Was it truly?"
"Yes. Beautiful and full of unexpected dangers."
He guessed she was right.
"It doesn't need to be always like this, Mjirn," she called out as the boat rowed her to the surface.
Away from the endless night, into the raising sun.
Mjirn merely smiled and lifted a hand in a small wave, like surfacers did.
She was wrong.
It could not be any other way. He was a drow. A dhaerrow. A traitor.
There was no other option but the agony of the maddened, traitorous goddess of the drow for, who else would have them?
