The wilder sat with her hands resting loosely on her knees, attention focused on the apprentices training here in the halls of the Yath'Abban beneath the watchful eyes of their elders. As an inquisitor, someday she would be expected to do the same...just as Xullae had. Would it end the same way? Or would she refuse to become attached and try to strike them down? Relonor was hardly her responsibility, but someday someone would fill the void. Hopefully not for another century or so.

"Ah, Inquisitor A'Daragon, perhaps you would like to contribute to today's lesson?" a deep male voice suggested, breaking her from her thoughts. It was a dread fang she vaguely recognized. His three students looked at her with rapt attention, perhaps even awe. To them, inquisitors were heroes to be worshipped, vessels of an ancient retribution meant for the Spider Queen's foes.

Someday, perhaps they would know the truth. Sabal rose smoothly. "And what lesson are you teaching them?" she asked, clasping her hands behind her back.

"The important virtues for life among the Yath'Abban," he said. "No doubt they would find your view interesting, if not illuminating. Whenever you wish, Inquisitor. I yield the floor to you."

Sabal nodded, striding over to the sharpened blade resting nearby. Someone's spare sword, not hers, as the sword was polished to a mirror shine and flawless. It had not seen battle. But in it, she could see her reflection and the distant, wild amber eyes that so many found unsettling. Then her gaze turned to the students who watched as if spellbound, innocence still easily readable in their expressions. Far too young for the Academy, but old enough to begin to understand.

Peace, she projected into their thoughts, is a lie. There is only power. Through power, we find purpose. Through purpose we achieve victory. And in victory, we become free.

She moved around them now like a predator circling carelessly around something that was not to be hunted. There is only one law that governs this world, and it is survival. Honor is for the foolish, mercy for the weak, and trust for the careless. You serve the Goddess, and thus all can be forgiven by Her. Where your enemy is weak, strike your hardest. Where he is strong, lure him forth and turn his pride into his death.

Sabal turned, focusing her attention on the smallest boy in front of her. He was skinny and weaker than his companions, bearing the brunt of the abuse the world had to offer. She could feel the resentment in him, the anger. Do you like your master? she asked in his thoughts.

I hate him, the boy answered in his mind automatically, a tremor of fear coloring his thoughts. His eyes were fixed on the ground as he had been taught, fearing the blow that would come.

Then use it. Turn your fear into resolve. Turn your hate into strength. You have seen already that the world will give you nothing. So take. Letnoonemakeyouflinchfromyourdestiny.

The blade hissed in an arc barely a hair's breadth from his face and she saw the boy's eyes go wide, but he didn't move. A flinch might have maimed him for life and cost him his vision. There was something different in his gaze now: certainty.

"My lesson is finished," Sabal said, turning back to their mentor. She set the blade down. "Only time will tell if it sank in."

"Ussta jallil, why did you speak to me that way?" the boy said quietly. But he did not lower eyes in fear when she turned, and instead bright crimson eyes focused on her own.

His master was quick to chastise him, backhanding the skinny boy. "Do not speak unless spoken to, you gutter trash!" the dread fang snarled.

At that moment, she felt a flicker of...something from the boy. Weak, and yet unmistakable.

Sabal reacted before anyone could even think to process it, slamming her heel into the back of the dread fang's knee and driving him into the ground. Her gauntleted hand seized him by the hair and wrenched his head back even as her mind cut his control over his own limbs. The male drow gave a sharp whimper at the fist threatening to rip his white hair from his scalp. All of the students seemed frozen, even the boy on the ground.

"I wonder what leads a little worm like you to think an inquisitor cannot deal with a single boy," she hissed softly, tightening her grip meaningfully. "Do you propose to dictate what I permit in students?"

"No, ussta jallil," he gasped out when her mind applied a crushing pressure to his own.

She leaned down so her lips were close to his ear. "You are not irreplaceable, male," she breathed softly. "It would take but a moment to find another just as capable. If you ever lay a finger on that boy again, I will wipe you from the slate of existence with all the concern you use in crushing an insect underfoot. Have I made myself perfectly clear?"

"Yes, ussta jallil." He whimpered again as she shoved him forward onto the ground, slowly regaining control of his muscular limbs again.

"What is your name, boy?" Sabal asked, turning to look at the skinny little thing that had been so confident.

He paused in wiping blood from his lip, fear almost crystallizing off of him. "Zyn, ussta jallil."

"Come." It was a simply spoken command, but he obeyed it like it was a psionic imperative.

Sabal lead the way out into the hall and down into a quiet part of the Yath'Abban barracks. "The voices that you hear...they are not those of the Goddess, are they?" she said as they came to a halt beside a statue of one of Lloth's ancient champions.

"No, ussta jallil."

Amber eyes narrowed slightly. "You will never call me that again, Zyn. Whether you prefer Inquisitor A'Daragon, Sabal, or 'Teacher' is not my concern. Any are suitable," she said sharply, temper still simmering from her reaction to the dread fang. It would calm as she allowed the power to fade back beneath her more serene surface.

"Teacher?" he whispered softly.

"You have the Gift. Not as I do, but in another form. My own mentor was a psionic warrior, as you have the potential to be. It requires dedication, constant practice, and extreme hardship," she said quietly.

His eyes grew large. "Would I be an inquisitor?"

"If you can finish your training, yes," Sabal said after a brief pause for thought. "Do you have family?"

"Yes, Inquisitor," he said hesitantly, as if fearing a rebuke for speaking without the honorifics. "My mother is a slave...a servant to one of House Baenre's captains."

She raised an eyebrow slightly, urging him to explain.

"She isn't drow," he murmured miserably. "I'm only half. I just look like my father, I suppose."

Sabal knelt down in front of the boy and studied his face for a long moment. He did have an...oddness to his looks. His jaw was too square, the angles in his face blocky instead of sleek. The tips of his ears were not quite pointed enough. "The other children beat you almost every day, didn't they?" she said softly, plucking the memories like strings on a harp. "They'd make you bleed and then point at the droplets on the ground saying, 'You're all human now. There's your two drops of drow right there'."

She could see the tears spring up in his eyes and the slightest quiver of his lip before he bit it hard. "Yes, Inquisitor," he whispered.

"You want to be strong. Strong enough to protect your mother from the males that hurt her. Males like your father," Sabal said, carefully opening up memories deeper. Now she was getting a much better picture of just who her little adopted apprentice was.

Now his eyes were glossy with tears barely kept back. "Yes, Inquisitor."

Sabal framed his face in her hands, carefully smoothing away all of the hurt until he sniffled slightly and was calm. "I will teach you anything you wish to learn, Zyn," she said. "And someday you will be strong enough to make certain she's safe."

"Master Dhauneth said I was worthless, Inquisitor," the boy said, doubt in the depths of his eyes as he wiped them away and she stood up.

"His opinion doesn't matter. Mine does," the wilder said bluntly. "Anyone who tells you that you are worthless is a fool and a liar. You are untrained, unconditioned, and unprepared. But this can change. Now, I want you to take me to your mother. I need to speak with her."

Alystin laughed, cocking her head slightly at Nedelyne. They were in for drinks to celebrate...come to think of it, she couldn't actually remember. "And she just beat him down? Over a random boy? Goddess, she's a strange one sometimes," the mage said cheerfully. "I wish Sabal were here right now."

"I tsh-ths-thought ysh...you two wa-were on...whasthaword...'s awful, awful termsh," Nedelyne slurred, her head resting on the table. She'd had a lot to drink. Definitely too much. But they were in House Druu'giir, so she felt safe.

"I mean the old Sabal," Aly said with a wave of her hand to cover her slip. Thankfully no one nearby was sober enough or attentive enough to hear it for what it was. "Y'know, the fun and less crazy one."

"I..." Nede giggled and leaned forward, pulling her friend half across the table so they could whisper conspiratorially. "I knowsh...wait...oh, right! I know why she's sh...no, that'sh not right...so diff'rent."

Aly laughed at her friend's struggle with grammar. "You're adorable when you're drunk."

"Shaddup. No, 'cause I seen...sees...saw...oh, vith it. In the chapel! With the y...ys...yuh...yochlol," Nedelyne's brow furrowed as she struggled intensely to focus long enough to get the words teotted out in the right order.

Alystin felt a chill run down her spine. She'd only ever heard stories of Lloth's Handmaidens. What was Sabal doing with something so vile? "Nede, what do you know?" she asked in a low voice, suddenly feeling remarkably sober.

"They sh...said an' she did. Summat to do with her vows. I dunno...she was like a ch...cat! With none of 's claws. A big one."

"You're certain?"

Nede nodded sagely, her face pressed against the nice cold table again. She was going to be miserable when her giddiness wore off and she started to be ill. "Like a really big cat," she murmured.

The mage fought the urge to groan. But even in Nede's current state, the story was most likely accurate, if lacking important details. "You're a priestess, Nedelyne. What's so special about an inquisitor's vows?"

"None of us know, 'cept sh..speshul people. The Mistress of Arach-Tinilith, the Matron of the Eyesh, the inquisitors. And a few sh...siv...servants of the Church," the cleric mumbled in slurred and easily disrupted sentences.

"Who is the Matron of Eyes?" Alystin pressed cautiously. She knew this was becoming dangerous territory quickly, but she wanted answers.

"Asked...whatsisface...Ryld the same question once. Jus' looked at me and sh..said, 'A dead woman. And if yoush keep ashking, you will be too.' So that's my answer."