Hello again everyone. I am finally back from a month out of town and away from my computer. While on holidays I came up with some great new plot twists for this story that I hope you will like. Please R&R.
Chapter seven
Naphalee stared at Naldan with a look of surprise on her young face. She looked her cousin over from the top of his head, to the soles of his boots. The young son of Matron Maia inched backward slowly, fearing his cousin greatly at that moment. At only a year younger than himself, and a female, she was both his main playmate, and a force to be reckoned with.
"I disagree with your opinion of Veesha," she told him now, stepping forward to match every step he took backward. "She is a smart baby. Not delayed in development, like you think."
"She's the daughter of a human," Naldan argued, futilely as Naphalee backed him into the wall of the training gym.
"Yes... I know that..." Naphalee told him slowly, her tone becoming angry. "What? Do I look stupid to you? Of course Ellie is human, foolish male."
"I never meant to imply that you were..." Naldan began to say, as Naphalee drew her weapon; a real metal weapon this time, not her wooden practice weapon. She backed him up the final step against the wall and flashed him a wicked grin. Fire burned in her red eyes.
"You're nine years old," Naldan told her desperately. "You don't have the heart to kill yet."
Naphalee stared at him, the anger still filling her eyes.
"I'm the son of a matron mother," Naldan said, looking for a last hope. "You would not kill Matron Maia's child..."
"When are you going to learn to keep your dignity in front of a female?" Naphalee asked him. She was truly enjoying toying with her cousin. She had never intended to kill him, but she was doing all she could to keep her look of fury from being overtaken by her laughter. The boy looked absolutely terrified. His eyes were wide with horror and he would not take his gaze from her, for fear that she would strike him with her blade.
"Naphalee," Zemmey called from the door, which she had silently opened, "come on now to bed, and stop toying with the male."
She grinned at her sister as they walked out into the hall. "You will have a whole lifetime ahead of you to torment the males."
After sending her sister off to bed, Zemmey walked the halls of the house, thinking that she would go off to bed herself. As she rounded a corner, Shammea came out the door of the dinning room. Her eyes were big and her hands shook with excitement.
"Meashea and Sillvee have become engaged in what looks to be turning into a death match," she explained to her sister. Zemmey thought only of trying to break up the fight before someone really got hurt, while a small part of her mind told her that one less relative to deal with if one was killed could not be a bad thing at all. She charged into the room behind her sister, yelling a half-hearted plea to stop fighting.
"You're nothing but trash," Sillvee yelled at Meashea, while swinging with her makeshift weapon, which happened to be the broken leg from an old chair.
"You'll die for this!" Meashea screamed back reaching for her whip, which had been dropped nearby. Sillvee Struck her cousin across the back of the head several times and soon Meashea fell to the floor.
"I'll get you for this," she shrieked, trying to stand, while blood soaked her white hair and dress.
"I should have just stabbed you in the back when I had the chance," Sillvee cried as her cousin managed a good kick to her kneecap.
Both women were back on their feet, Meashea with some difficulty, and both looked at the other with rage in her red eyes. Sillvee was limping badly now, her knee likely broken, but she ignored the pain and advanced on Meashea furiously.
"I will be glad to be rid of one other female," she yelled, as she shoved her opponent backward.
"You will live to regret this," Meashea screamed, stumbling back several steps. She was already mortally injured by the blows to her head, and the blood loss, but the heat of battle kept her on her feet. She probably had barely even noticed that her head was soaked with blood.
Zemmey was a high level cleric, and could easily have sent her sister enough healing to save her life, but the thought of one less sister to compete with for position so enticed her that she stood, doing nothing. Sillvee pushed forward with all her weight, her arms lifting Meashea off the floor. The badly injured drow flew several feet back, her head striking the corner of the dinning table. She lay unmoving on the cold stone floor, dead instantly. Still Zemmey did nothing. Her greed for position had finally consumed her, and she now made a point of calling herself the third daughter, in her mind.
Shammea looked up at Zemmey with a look of comprehension in her eyes. She was only forty-six, still very young by drow standards, but she finally had a true understanding of the way of her people. She knew that fifth daughter was not a high ranked birth position. She was now forth daughter, and that was better... Third however was even better than forth, and Hellamy might soon be easy enough to destroy. Her still hidden pregnancy, the one that she had confided only to Shammea herself, would soon make her slow to fight back.
Ten years later
Veesha jumped down from the rock ledge behind her family house. She dropped into a low crouch, and held her wooden training sword in front of her with both hand, in blocking position. She turned on her heels, and scanned her field of vision for 'enemies' as she got slowly to her feet. Her new blue dress caught on a rock as she turned back behind her, and tore at the seam. Veesha shrugged in dismissal of the damage to her clothing, and ran for the rocky embankment across the walkway. She scrambled up the small cliff awkwardly, her knees scrapping on the rocks as she pulled herself over the top. She tried at the last moment for a neat little jump onto the ledge, and banged her elbow on the rocks in the process. For a moment she wished she had the natural grace of the other drow children, and once again had to remind herself the her mother was not a drow. Quick as always, to recover from her disheartened thoughts, she got to her feet atop the cliff, and looked for Naphalee, hiding somewhere, waiting to attack. She spotted her about to make for the edge of the cliff, ready to climb to the next ledge up.
"Got you!" she cried swinging her wooden weapon toward the older girl, as Naphalee prepared to counter to blow. Wooden swords slammed together, with a graceless bang, and Veesha fell to the ground, knocked off her feet. She recovered quickly and jumped up before the 'fatal blow' by Naphalee. She swung her weapon high over her head, as Naphalee raised hers to meet the blow. She countered again and Veesha was forced to back up, as she fallowed her counter with an offensive attack, that Veesha, the less experienced of the two, could not stop. She bumped clumsily into the wall behind her.
"What do you think will become of your life Naphalee," Veesha asked as the two sat at the top of the cliff. "You are sure to become a great fighter."
"No," Naphalee answered. "Never great like a male would be. I am becoming a young woman now, and soon I will be made to conduct myself as one."
"I think you are very ladylike," Veesha said. "I wish sometimes that I could match your grace, and look as proud and beautiful as you."
"You will when you get older," Naphalee answered.
"Some people say I'm just not pretty, because I look too much like a human."
"I don't think human features make you less pretty."
"Thanks Naphalee... I have a question."
"Huh?"
"Why is my mother here? Why is my father a drow?"
"I was very young when your mother came here," Naphalee said. "I don't yet know the whole story... all the details. I know that your mother's father gave her to my mother as a wife for my now dead brother. It had something to do with spearing the lives of some surface elves. Beyond that, I know nothing else."
"Why would someone bargain to save surface elves?" Veesha muttered, her face puzzled. Naphalee laughed.
"Even looking so human, you still sound so much like a drow," she remarked, filled with approval at her best friend's attitude.
"Come on," she said after a few silent moments, "no one knows we are here. You are not even supposed to be out of the house."
"What do you think it's like on the surface?" Veesha asked as they walked back.
"Different from our world, I would imagine," Naphalee answered. "I cannot even begin to picture it. That blazing fireball in the sky above, and the water that falls from the sky."
"It must be amazing," Veesha remarked as they entered the house. "One day I plan to see it."
"Veesha," Ellie exclaimed in annoyance, looking at her daughters torn dress, and skinned knees.
"What in the world have you gotten yourself into this time?"
"Climbing the cliffs," Naphalee answered. She stood behind her friend, looking at her human sister, begging understanding. Ellie looked her daughter over, and took an inventory of her appearance. Both knees scraped, one of them bleeding, and both of them still scarred from the last time she had hurt herself. Her new dress was torn badly at the left side, and her forehead was scratched by a rough rock. Her wooden training sword was cracked along the center of the blade, and hung limp in her torn belt holder.
"Not a very graceful child now are you?" said a familiar feminine voice in the doorway. Ellie, Veesha, and Naphalee, all looked up to meet their matron mother's critical gaze. Naphalee quickly made her way out into the hallway, and Ellie looked up in guarded respect. Matron Maia was after all in her living space. The matron walked slowly toward Veesha, who stood before her mother, and tipped her chin upward with the tips of her slender, graceful fingers. Ellie stepped aside, a Veesha looked up respectfully, trying to will her hands to stop shaking.
"Just look at what you have done to your new dress," Matron Maia said in a slow, even voice. "And you are all scrapped up too. It is quite unbecoming of a drow, especially a lady, to do such damage to her lovely young figure."
"I am truly sorry Matron Mother," Veesha answered, when it had become apparent that she was to speak. "I can't seem to help slipping and tripping over things." Matron Maia, with missing a beat, snatched up a small book form Ellie's bookshelf, and set it squarely on Veesha's head. "Now walk across the room," she commanded, "and do not allow the book to fall."
Veesha took small, careful steps forward, toward the far wall, trying her hardest to keep her head straight up, and her movements graceful. She made it to the other end and stood, waiting for her next task.
"Come back then," said the matron mother, "and go faster this time. You will need to learn to move at a good speed without being a graceless clumsy girl."
Veesha spent the next week practicing anyway she could to learn the grace of her drow kin. She tried to climb, and swing her weapon, and even jump, all with books balanced on her head.
"You are learning well child," matron Maia told her one day, after catching her practicing her her wooden weapon, alone in the training gym.
Veesha immediately dropped the weapon to the ground, and looked up nervously at the matron mother. She wanted, as she had always wanted, to please her matron. She looked up at her now, and admired her beauty as most others did. Every other drow female had long envied Maia's perfect figure, her tall thin frame, long white hair falling in perfect waves, and in Veesha's case, her incredible grace. The half human child, also greatly feared her, for her power and her command of her house. The matron stood today in a long red dress, that reached the floor, and swept around her body as she moved. Veesha had only recently learned that Matron Maia was pregnant with her eighth child, and upon learning this, had joined the others in hoping that the child would be female. She know that a house could always use more girls to grow up to be priestesses. She knew that she herself had some great worth as a female, even though she would never actually hold the tile of priestess herself because her mother was human. It was still better than what she would have in life if she had been male.
"Never drop you weapon," Matron Maia said softly, with a edge of concern in her voice. She leaned down and picked up the wooden sword, handing it back to the child. Veesha reached out slowly and took it, greatly fearing a stern warning about her carelessness.
"A good fighter will never drop her weapon," was all she said however. "You could get yourself killed by someone just waiting for the chance to catch you unarmed."
Veesha stood looking up the Matron Maia, who actually gave her a slow unsure smile, before walking toward the door. As an afterthought though, she came back to where the child stood and leaned down to her head.
"Don't ever let the rest of our world tell you that you are less than the rest of us," she whispered slowly. "You will be great on day, I am sure." She stood again and walked with purpose to the door, and out into the hall, leaving Veesha alone to wonder what in the world had just happened.
Veesha stood in front of Ellie her body pressed against her mother's chest nervously, as the two of them stood with the rest of the family females in the house chapel, where they had been asked by a lower cleric to assemble. All awaited news of Matron Maia's new baby, who should have be born at any moment. The child looked anxiously around at the others as another of the house clerics ran into the room, and out the other door, the quickest way across to the stairwell, with an armload of blood soaked bedding. The cleric passed the bedding off to a young drow male, a house servant waiting by the door, and he rushed off. The shaking cleric rushed back to the back door leading to the matron's living chambers, half supported partway across the room by another trembling young cleric. The group of women, who had assembled with the typical intent of welcoming a new child into the house, began to look to one another in fear and dismay. Several long moments passed before one of the two cleric's, the one who had come into the room only long enough to help the first one, ran out of the room, and raced for the stairs, both doors slamming instantly. Her feet banged on each step as the ran, panic stricken, out of earshot. She came back up the stairs and into the chapel fallowed by several other females, more lower clerics, and the matron's sister, Shi'Vianne. They quickly crossed the room and disappeared into the room beyond.
The gathered house members, including Matron Maia's children, all began several different conversations in the silent hand code of the drow. Veesha looked at her mother her face filled with a dread she could not explain, and saw that Ellie's face wore the some expression. The back door to the chapel opened once more many minutes later and a cleric entered carrying a loosely bundled, shrieking baby girl. The cleric was shaking with shock, and holding the baby to her in grief.
"It is my saddest regret," she said, her voice trembling, "to tell you that our highly regarded Matron mother has died." She handed the baby to Shi'Vianne as two other young clerics entered the room. The three young women came together into on another's arms and stayed for several moments hugging each other in a corner by the door.
Drow were noted for their desire to get ahead and hold the highest position of power that they could. Those there clerics normally would have thought mainly of attaining to the rack of high priestesses, and would not normally have show such compassion to one another. One of them, just a week before, had tried to kill another, in front of the third one. The attempt had been foiled only when the intended victim had turned around, seen the intent on her would be killer's face, and kicked the dagger out of her hand. The three lost, and leaderless young clerics came together now only out of shock and grief. They certainly had no intent toward lasting friendship on their minds.
Sillvee entered the meeting room that she had met with her mother in so many times in her life. She looked around at the bright decor that Maia had chosen for it's uniqueness and value, and then to the chair at the head of the large stone table, that her mother had spent a good deal of time sitting in leading the business of her house. Sillvee should, if she had been of any other intelligent race in the realms, have grieved for her mother. But Sillvee was a drow... and a particularly heartless, power hungry one at that. She saw her chance now, the chance that she had wait for patiently for, biding her time for many decades. She sat in the chair.
Sillvee looked over from her place at the head of the empty table and smiled at what she knew would be a mighty reign of power. She walked back to the chapel with a new bounce to her step. Her mother had been dead for only an hour, and all those now gathered in the chapel to talk over what had happened, acted with neither surprise, nor disapproval when she took the matron mother's seat on the platform, beside the stature of their goddess. With Maia dead, it was now the right of her first born daughter to take that position.
"Matron Sillvee..." Zemmey said uncertainly, not used to the sound of those words. "The baby will need a name. An... and soon, if we are to dedicate her to Lolth as we must soon do."
"I know of the need to name her," Sillvee said in a tone of annoyance. "I have more important things right now than to name a baby."
"Shammea," she snapped after a pause, her finger pointing straight at her shocked cousin. Shammea looked up at her as she took the baby from Shi'Vianne and held the quietly crying bundle out to her.
"You will raise this one," she said. "Choose whatever name you see fitting. She will be dedicated in three days as par our custom." Shammea stepped up and took the baby, wishing she dared to protest. She was sure she would have had such nerve in the face of Matron Maia, but Sillvee was somehow different.
Several moments later, when Sillvee brought forward the topic of dealing with her mother's body, the young Veesha was the only one who looked sad at her loss.
