Ten letters. That was how many she had sent, every single one saying that she had something important to tell him, something that couldn't be written down. He had burned each one for fear of Myrineyl's prying eyes and the consequences of being discovered. They parted more than a month ago and he had not seen her since. Myrineyl had kept the leash tight and he found himself suffering the company of House Baenre's heir more and more often. But now he was free and would be for some time. Myrineyl had someone else to amuse herself with and Solaufein wasn't about to start feeling jealousy. He was relieved.
He made his way through a siege tunnel into House Duskryn, passing through the magical defenses with only a small amount of trepidation. Over the course of the past few years since this arrangement with his priestess began, she had set to work on modifying the ancient defenses that turned this tunnel into a death-trap or escape route depending on who used it during a time of war. The end result was that he could pass through it without being noticed, allowing him a valuable back door into the depths of the compound. From there it was easy to make his way to her quarters without crossing Zesstra's path—the two were on opposite sides of the House's living quarters. He padded there now, boots surprisingly silent on the stone floor. Everyone else was asleep, but he knew his priestess would be awake. After all, he had finally sent word that he could meet her. Her confirmation had been written in an unsteady hand. He couldn't say if she was fearful or excited. Something was happening and in a way that didn't sit well with him. What if something had gone wrong? It was a dangerous game that they were playing.
Sol slipped in. His priestess was standing in front of the enchanted mirror that served as her window out onto the city—and occasionally a scrying glass—with her back to him. At the moment, the mirror was displaying the dark gem that was Menzoberranzan. The fighter felt a weight lift off his shoulders and he moved over to her when she didn't turn around, slipping his arms around her waist. He drew in a sharp hiss of breath when he found an unfamiliar curve to her belly. Was she...? He froze, thoughts whirling so fast he couldn't even begin to make sense of them.
Delicate hands covered his, holding them to her abdomen. "This is what I wanted to tell you," his priestess said softly. He was about to feel betrayed when she leaned back into him. "Sol, she's ours."
She. Ours. The shock that hit him like a lightning bolt was a warm one. Something in the center of his chest started to expand. "Are you certain?" he asked before mentally kicking himself. It was never wise to express doubt about something like that to a priestess.
However, she didn't seem angry. She laughed instead. "Of course I am, Sol. My bed remains empty when you are gone," she said.
"And it's a girl?" he said. He was awestruck. Sol had destroyed many things in his life and killed many people. He had never created anything...until now. In a distant way, he had known he would be a father someday, but he had expected it with Myrineyl and steeled himself against the inevitable pain that would be being separated from them. He had known that his children would be trained in cruelty by the time he was allowed near them. This was different. His priestess was different. The knowledge brought an unfamiliar lump of relief and unbridled happiness into his throat.
"Yes," she said, her thumb stroking patterns across the back of one of his hands. The other of his hands was rubbing small circles across her abdomen now as he grew warmer and warmer towards the idea.
Sol chuckled suddenly, more in happiness than in humor. It turned into a full laugh as he spun her around and swept her up into his arms. Her arms linked around his neck and he leaned his forehead in to rest against hers. He grinned, his joy reflected in that soft, secret smile of hers. It was hard for him to figure out what to do or what to say. Happiness was not an emotion native to him, not after the careful conditioning of the Matron. None of it mattered, however, the moment his priestess kissed him. It sent a shiver of heat through his body. "She needs a name," he murmured when he pulled back, as tempting as it was to lose himself in a haze of passion. Usually it was decided upon at birth, but most priestesses knew what they wanted it to be long before then.
"Mhmm," his priestess hummed, her grey eyes bright. There was a glow to her expression that he had never seen before even in her. He could only hope that she was as deliriously happy as he was. "And I want you to choose it."
Solaufein knew he should have been expecting it, but the reply floored him so much he almost lost his balance. He set her down gently just in case he remained as unstable. "Me?"
"I'm sorry, was I looking at someone else?" she teased, combing her fingers through his hair and then running them down the back of his neck in a way that made him tremble pleasantly. "I can repeat myself if you like."
He laughed, holding her close and resting his cheek against her temple. The familiar smell of summer breezes that lingered in her hair made him feel light, as if he was barely clinging to the ground. "Give me a minute to think," he said. The more he thought, the more he knew what the answer would be. There was only one other woman in his life that he really admired, a mentor of his who had fallen in battle some years ago. She had been everything an older sister should have been. "Would...Nathrae...be acceptable?"
"Sol, we can call her anything you like," his priestess said, looking amused.
He had never felt more grateful to her than in that moment. It meant far more to him than she would probably ever know. The male drow kissed his lover as if the world was about to end. He was holding in his arms everything that would ever matter to him, as far as he was concerned. If he could have this, he didn't care about Myrineyl or being Patron or even surviving. "Do I get to see her?" he asked when they pulled apart, hesitant despite the fact that he trusted her. She might have agreed with the general idea among nobles that it wasn't his place to shape a child.
"Every day, if you want," she said indulgently, looking somewhat pleased with the idea herself. He felt a wave of relief and that same, ever-growing sense of joy. The whole world was suddenly perfectly right.
He knew that it would really be dependent on Myrineyl's whims, but he didn't really care because he knew that he could always defy those if he had cause to. The punishment would be well worth it. He drew his priestess over to the bed and kicked off his boots, lying down with her on the soft spider-silk sheets. She settled into the circle of his arms and let out a content sigh as his hands continued running over her abdomen. He was turning that curve into something as familiar as it was welcome. "I will be there," he promised both to her and their unborn child.
There was a tenderness to the way she covered his hands with her own again that spoke of something deep and abiding between them. The world around them seemed hazy to him, but that touch was crystal clear in its myriad of details. His priestess was smiling contently, her head tucked under his chin. Things had never been more perfect.
He was going to have a daughter. Solaufein couldn't wait to hold his little girl in his arms. He had never thought of himself as good with children, but he wanted to try. Part of him was terrified that he wouldn't be good enough, but it was drowned out by the sheer volume of his happiness. He was going to have a daughter. He would be able to see her. His priestess would move the earth to make it happen, because she cared.
They were going to have a daughter.
Over the course of the next few weeks, Solaufein's visits to his priestess became almost constant. Myrineyl was still amusing herself with the task of finding more toys for when she broke him, so there was nothing stopping him from becoming a more constant companion to his priestess. He delighted the moment he first felt his daughter move a little under his hand. Soon she would be kicking and moving around to disturb his priestess during all hours of the night, but for the moment it was just a little butterfly flutter of movement. Every time he felt it beneath his palm, his heart grew a little bit lighter. It was strange to feel so connected to a life that wasn't his priestess's, but wonderful. His thoughts lingered on the idea constantly. He found himself wondering if his daughter would have her mother's grey eyes or his red ones. Would she hold his finger in her tiny hand like he had seen his youngest brother do to a sister who had coldly removed herself from the touch? He promised himself that he would never brush her away. His priestess seemed equally enchanted.
One of the nights he had managed to spend with her, she explained a little bit of how she had grown up as the center of her mother's world. "That's what I want for Nathrae," she confided in him, resting her head on his shoulder. They were laying in her bed with the outside world closed out.
"Then it will be so," he teased her gently. "Because Llolfaen Duskryn gets whatever she wants."
She smiled at him in that satisfied way. "Well, now that we're clear on that..."
He laughed and kissed her at the hollow just beneath her ear, earning a soft noise of approval and a little shiver through her body. Pregnancy had not thrown their love life too much into disarray, but for the moment his priestess was more in a mood to just lay close to him. He would never object to that. If anything, having a daughter on the way had only brought them closer.
If there was a universal truth about life as a drow, however, it was that nothing good could last forever.
The message came not from his priestess, but from Matron Siniira of House Duskryn, her mother's mother. Myrineyl snatched it out of his hands the moment he received it from a messenger. It was not a request for a meeting—it was an announcement that she was coming to see him. "What does the bitch want?" Myrineyl demanded, searching his face for an answer.
Solaufein made certain he looked as confused as he felt. "I don't know," he admitted, worried. He hadn't spoken more than a handful of words to the Matron Mother of House Duskryn in all the time he had known his priestess. "But it is not within my power to turn her away. If you wished, you could likely express to her that she is unwelcome."
"As if she'd listen," Myrineyl said with a laugh, though not one of amusement. To Sol it was not a pleasing sound.
The door to the main hall, where they were having this conversation, opened to reveal a stone-faced Matron Siniira. Sol felt something inside him freeze at the expression on her face. It was anger incarnate, hidden behind a façade of neutrality. Had he done something? "Revered Myrineyl," the Duskryn woman greeted curtly. "I need a word with your consort."
Myrineyl smiled a little. "Has Solaufein done something I should know about?" she said sweetly. "I would be more than willing to take it out of his flesh."
"This is about something that happened, not something that was done," Siniira said. It was a response more cryptic than he would have liked, but he could understand why. "This is a discussion to be had in private. If you would please excuse yourself? It will only be a moment."
"You—" Myrineyl started to say. But she caught herself, remembering that even if Siniira was a former slave, she was still a Matron Mother. "Of course, Matron." The priestess glared daggers at Sol as if this were somehow his fault before stalking out of the hall.
"Matron Mother, I'm sorry, but what is this about?" Solaufein asked unsteadily.
"Llolfaen needs you. Go," Siniira said bluntly. There was no room for real debate in the way she said it.
"Myrineyl—"
Those steel grey eyes focused on him with the weight of consequence behind them. "I will handle Myrineyl. Just go, Solaufein."
It was enough to tell him that something was very wrong. Sol hurried out the door, ignoring Myrineyl's pointed summons. He would pay for that later, but that hardly mattered now. He was needed by his priestess and she would come before the scion of House Baenre every time. At the edge of his consciousness, he heard the Matron speaking sharply with Myrineyl, but soon he was through the door and leaving the House further and further behind him with every step. The beauty of Menzoberranzan was lost on him as he made his way through the maze-like streets. Dread was growing behind his breastbone every moment he was moving. What could have gone so badly that the Matron Mother herself came and found him? He knew that House Duskryn was in large part a much closer knit family than his own had ever been, or at least that was true of his priestess, her mother, and the Matron.
He slipped in through the hidden door and made his way past the defenses of the House, standing inactive but still likely aware of his approach. His pace had turned into a run, though he forced himself to slow down so he wouldn't draw attention to himself as he moved through the halls. The door to his priestess's chambers was unlocked, so he let himself in. It was deathly quiet inside. He moved through the living area to her bedroom. He could see her there, lying on her side facing the window to outside. She was breathing a little bit unsteadily, so he knew she was awake. There was the faintest smell of copper in the air, a subtle hint that all was not well. Had she been at the temple? There was no hint of incense on her. He sank down on the bed behind her and reached out to put his hand in its now familiar place on her abdomen. Immediately, he felt the difference. The curve was barely there now.
Sol knew without having to ask what had happened. His priestess had miscarried. Their daughter was...gone.
His heart dropped through an abyss that had opened in the center of his chest. He laid down on the bed and pulled her tightly into his body for the comfort of both of them. She shifted to face him, her fingers clinging to the fabric of his shirt as she hid her face in his shoulder. He struggled to breathe around the painful knot that had formed in his throat, but he knew he had to say something even though there were no words that could even temporarily soothe the grief that they both felt. "It's not your fault," he told his priestess thickly, feeling an unfamiliar prickling at his eyes.
She did not answer him even though he knew she had heard him with a perfect clarity. He knew she wouldn't believe that for a very long time. There was no way she would feel anything but responsible. His priestess was anything but unfeeling and she had been so unbelievably, deliriously happy at the idea of being a mother. To have it end like this...
The tears never came for either of them. Instead, they just held onto each other in the quiet of the night for hours. Nothing in the world could have moved him. He stroked her back as much for his comfort as for hers and closed his eyes, trying to think about anything other than what they had lost. His thoughts could never shake it, however. There was a jarring, painful absence where his child should have been and he felt it keenly. The natural response would have been to pull away. Any other male drow hurt in such a way probably would have. But Solaufein stayed. He refused to allow this to force them apart.
She was his priestess and she would forever be the mother of his child, no matter what happened. He cared for her with every fiber of his being and he knew that she needed him now more than she ever had. He needed her in the midst of the wrenching feeling in the center of his chest that had left him with jagged splinters where his heart should have been.
They had been so close to the wonderful. The fall from that dizzying height was like no pain he had ever believed possible. The priestesses of Lloth would have given up their powers just to get their hands on a torture even half as agonizing.
"Faen," he tried again softly.
"I know," she whispered. He knew that she felt the loss as acutely as he did, if not moreso. The life had been inside of her, tied to her own vitality. She had been the one to share those fluttering movements with him, wearing that secret smile all the while. He was not certain if he would ever see it again. The fingers curled around the fabric of his shirt tightened in their grip. "I know."
Sol found himself examining his own actions for an explanation. If he had been there...or perhaps if he had been a better servant of Lloth, she would not have taken their child. His jaw tensed. Perhaps it was just cruelty on the part of the Spider Queen. The anger came to him easily. It was a more natural response than simply allowing himself to feel pain. He wanted to get up and punch a wall, but he couldn't abandon his priestess.
The world around him became hazy as his eyes burned with tears he couldn't understand or shed.
The second time, it was a boy. Two years later, but the story ended the same. His priestess was devastated. He felt it too, the cold and bleakness of some surface midwinter consuming the center of his chest. He held her in his arms and tried to be of whatever small comfort he could as they searched their souls for an answer. It became something that they tried not to think about. His priestess never spoke about it, but he had known her long enough that he could read her eyes.
Myrineyl pulled him away often and every day away was like a knife to his heart because he knew it left his priestess grieving alone. Time would fade the scars, but they would be deep, deep wounds to heal. Revered Lirayne had offered a possible explanation when pressed, though reluctantly. "Our family has an abyssal taint," she explained vaguely, though he saw recognition flicker to life in his priestess's eyes. "Sometimes such things cause problems. There is nothing that you could have done."
He was not certain if that was supposed to be comforting or not. It did not make him feel better to be powerless. His temper became a fearsome thing, fueled by the pain. Dhauntar feared him as many others did, and Myrineyl's admiration only grew. Having him as a consort no longer seemed to be a mistake to her. It only made the anger burn hotter. It was natural for her to approve of his ferocity, but he found no joy in that approval. She did not know his reason, not that she would have cared.
It was ten years, not so long in the lifespan of a drow, before he found himself standing in her room again, looking at those grey eyes that shimmered with poorly hidden fear. "Sol," she said very quietly. "I'm pregnant." It was not exactly the joyful realization that it had been the first time. They were both already steeling themselves for the loss. It was too hard to hope.
"It will be different this time," he promised, stepping in and curling his arms around her. She rested her face against his shoulder and sighed very quietly. He knew she was doubtful. He was too, though he would never say that. He had to believe it would end differently.
"We'll see," his priestess said softly.
He kissed her gently, trying to be reassuring. "I'll be right here," he said.
"I can't do this again," she whispered to him.
"You can. We'll do this together," Sol said. He meant it and that seemed to bring her comfort.
"What would I do without you?" his priestess said, looking up at him with the faintest hint of a smile despite the gravity of the circumstances.
This time, the curve of her stomach continued to grow. They made it longer and longer, until the fear began to slowly ease. Solaufein laid with her again and felt the flutter under his palm slowly become a true kick. Whatever had gone wrong the first and second times did not happen again as they approached birth. Every night he was free, he spent with her. Myrineyl's demands bothered him less and he obeyed with the mechanical nature of a male drow obligated to serve. His heart and his thoughts lingered with his priestess and their child. Eventually they were even ready to consider picking a name and divining gender. Another girl.
"I liked Jyslin," he murmured sleepily into her hair, settled behind her in bed. Her warm skin against his was soothing and relaxed all the muscles that had been wound tightly in his body since his latest encounter with Myrineyl. "It's a good name." Cocooned in the blankets with one hand over the stirring baby, he felt very much at peace.
There was a kick under his hand and his priestess winced. "She's getting strong," she said ruefully.
Sol smiled. He was grateful for every kick. It was a sign that things were going right for the first time. "Good," he murmured, earning a smile from his priestess. She shifted to press a little closer to him. They fit well together like this. For the moment, he was perfectly content and very comfortable. "Name?"
"Jyslin it is," she said with a content sigh when he lifted himself up with one arm and kissed her temple. Sol drifted off to sleep then with a soft mumbling sound.
Another month passed without incident, and then he came the closest to a heart attack he had ever been. They were together when all of a sudden, his priestess doubled over and brought her hands to her belly. He felt the world drop out from underneath him. He was terrified that it had happened again. "Faen—"
"Matron and my mother, now," she said, hurrying that way. Then he realized what was going on: she was about to go into labor. He wasn't certain whether to be relieved or not. Birth could be just as dangerous, for both her and the baby, and it was coming early. He knew that Siniira and Lirayne would do their absolute best, but that was no guarantee and certainty was what he needed at that moment.
They got her to a bed in time and with two powerful clerics in the room, he felt much better about their chances. It was not, however, an easy thing. The baby had decided to try a breech birth rather than coming the right way despite Lirayne's best efforts to turn her around. There were no screams from his priestess, but her breathing was ragged and he could see agony in written plainly across her face. "Nothing you do is ever the easy way, Faen," the Matron muttered, tension in her jaw speaking of her own worry. Sol had to stand there helplessly. It went on for hours.
At the end, his priestess lay still and quiet, but the most beautiful sound in the world reached both of them. His daughter was alive and crying as Lirayne wrapped her up. "Here, Sol," the cleric said, holding out the infant. "Take her to Faen. We'll leave you three alone for a while."
He gently accepted a tiny, fragile little creature who looked up at him with silver eyes. She quieted, gazing at him solemnly. When he brushed a finger across her delicate palm, her hand immediately closed around it and he felt that surging warmth through his whole body. He sat down on the edge of the bed and smiled at his priestess as she settled back into the pillows and reached out to stroke their daughter's downy hair. Jyslin was small enough that he could hold her with one arm, her head supported by his hand and her body laying along his forearm. "She has your eyes," he commented, pleased with that fact.
"She kicks harder than her father hits," his priestess teased him even as she played with the baby's hands for a few minutes before Jyslin was ready to sleep.
Solaufein's chest puffed out a little with pride. Her father. He was a father. Nothing would ever be as special to him as his daughter and his priestess.