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Direza's Trials

Direza breathed deeply of the unfamiliar air - 'fresh', a surface-dweller would presumably call it, to distinguish it from the dense, stale air of the deep caverns. For her, that moist cave-air had always been the norm - it was all she'd ever known, and she had no words for what was now tickling her lungs. She did, however, have words for the glowing orb that hung high in the sky - 'painfully bright'. She'd known about that in advance, of course - having read and studied all that she could concerning the surface-world and its perils. The Sun had been mentioned in many accounts as a hazard for any Drow venturing on the surface - its brightness being thousands of times that of the embersconces and enchanted shadow-torches that kept Comorragh so comfortably well-lit. She'd thought when she read it that the stories had to be exaggerated - and she wasn't wrong. The glowing orb in the sky was bright, certainly, but not _that_bright. Certainly not more than she could handle!

With this silent reassurance, she took another deep breath and a step forwards, out of the shadow of the overhang, and winced a bit. She had now truly left the caves that had been her home for centuries. Above her, the sky stretched on into a bright, dizzying infinity, and before her the surface-world spread out, vaster than even the largest of caves. Based on her current vantage, it apparently consisted mostly of monstrously oversized trees. Well, oversized compared to the bare, stunted cave-trees she was vaguely familiar with - apparently, this was a fairly ordinary size for the surface-world.

Another breath, another step. A shudder went through her - an instinctive, automatic urge to dash back into the comforting darkness, safely enclosed. But she'd already burned that bridge, and burned it thoroughly. If she gave in to that urge, she'd face only a drawn-out, torturous death, likely at the hands of her successor. Taking such steps had been halfway a necessity, and halfway a deliberate measure to ensure that she didn't lose her nerve in the last second. The gold and magical artifacts she'd stolen from the Temple of Lolth were safely stashed in her knapsack, heavy on her back. The secret rituals that had kept her safe for all these years, she had carefully 'leaked' to the most egomaniacal and aggressively incompetent priestess in the temple. By now, her own absence and betrayal would have been discovered, and the lass would not waste any time asserting her dominance. With any luck, her inability to rule well and, more importantly, complete inability to admit so to anyone, least of all herself, would disrupt all of Drow society for decades if not centuries to come... reducing their ability to hunt her down at the very least, and perhaps even harming their ability to raid the surface in general.

'Their'. She was already thinking of the Drow People, the people she had led_for centuries, as something else. Another group, separate from her. She'd abandoned them, escaped from them. Not... _entirely due to a childish crush that she just couldn't seem to get over, she reminded herself. No, it was simply that having once felt affection and attraction towards a surface-dweller, she had lost her ability to view them all as pitiful wretches, heretical barbarians, little more than animals compared to the might and brilliance of Lolth's chosen people. And without that, the weight of presiding over a culture so thoroughly suffused with the slavery and torment of such people had simply become too much to bear.

She couldn't change the Drow. Perhaps no-one could, except for Lolth, who clearly had no interest in any such thing. All she could do was run, and prepare herself to weather the displeasure of both her people and her erstwhile Goddess. And if she had to run anyway, well, it made_perfect_ sense to run towards the DragonRider, didn't it? After all, she was a powerful hero, bonded to a Black Dragon - possibly_the_ most fearsome beast in the world, be it above or below the surface. Surely, at their side, she would be safe from any punitive pursuit that Commorragh might send her way. Perhaps she could bargain for the DragonRider's protection with... some kind of service.

A delighted shudder went through her slender body as she found herself briefly returning to the daydreams that had occupied so many of her hours since her original encounter with the DragonRider. It was silly, of course. She didn't even know the woman's name... and the surface-world was immense, supposedly. But, on the other hand, there probably weren't that many DragonRiders around, period, and she was armed with a fair bit of workable intelligence gathered by Drow agents on the surface in the months since the DragonRider's escape. If nothing else, it was a reasonable goal to work towards, while keeping an eye out for any other safe, comfortable places where she could settle down, right?

With this determination in mind, buoyed more than she cared to admit by the refreshed memory of the DragonRider, she set off down the uncomfortably brightly-lit mountainside with her narrow shoulders squared and her richly-filled backpack riding heavy upon them. She was ready for whatever the surface-world could throw at her!

Four hours later, the full moon set behind the mountains, and the sun rose in its place, blinding and terrifying her. An hour later, as she struggled to find some kind of shelter and shade among the sparse mountain-pine, she passed out from the heat and brightness. "I guess I wasn't ready after all..." was the last thought that went through her mind as consciousness fled, granting her at last the blessed darkness she had sought.

As her senses slowly returned to her, she at first wondered if her escape from Commorragh and the Underdark had been just a dream. She was in a soft, comfortable bed, just like the palatial one she'd enjoyed back in the Temple-Citadel that made up Commorragh's central spire, in a pleasantly cool room - and even through her closed eyelids, she could tell that it was nice and dark. Then, reality began to reassert itself, and she realized that her feet were sore - as were several other spots where she'd bruised herself or abraded her skin during her blind dash through the infernal sunlight. What, then? Had she been captured while she was unconscious, and dragged back to the Underdark?

Even knowing that the soft bed she was laying on made that highly unlikely, the terror of that prospect wrenched open her eyes, and she looked around in barely-restrained panic as her heart accelerated and banished the last vestiges of rest. Fortunately, the sight of her surroundings were able to swiftly reassure her that whatever had happened, she wasn't back in the cavernous kingdom of eternal darkness. The room she was in was made from wood, for starters - a floor of smooth boards, walls of squared-off logs... no-one would build such a room or such a house in the Underdark. On the other hand, she thought cautiously, it could be a surface-jail. After all, the room lacked any windows, and sported only a single, closed door, which might very likely be locked.

That, too, seemed unlikely, however. Sparsely furnished though the room was, at least compared the palatial quarters she was used to, it did not seem like a jail-cell. A wardrobe, a desk, a small table with a couple of chairs, and another one right next to the bed... and, most curiously, several embersconces spreading a wan and pleasant level of illumination in the small room. One next to the door, one by the bedside, one on the desk... from her studies, she'd been given to understand that embersconces were unknown outside of the Underdark, since their light - so well-suited for the sharp eyes of the Drow, as well as a few other cave-dwelling races - was too weak to be of any use to the surface-dwellers.

Normally, this would have started her pondering the possibility of a secret Drow base on the surface that she'd somehow never heard of - and where she was now a prisoner, awaiting transportation back to Commorragh and her no-doubt torturous fate - but those same unexpected embersconces showed her one thing that made it obvious she was no prisoner: Her backpack, leaning against the nearby wardrobe, still full by the looks of it. No jailer would let a prisoner keep all her belongings, especially when said belongings included numerous powerful and dangerous enchanted items!

This logic, however, could not stop her from jumping slightly, her slowing heart once again beating faster, when the door began to open. A bright light filtered in along with her visitor, leaving him, her or_it_ momentarily naught but a terrifyingly Drow-like silhouette - then the door closed again, and she found confusion and surprise displacing fear. It was definitely a he. A young man, from the looks of it. Other than that... he did look rather like a Drow, with gray skin and pale hair but, at the same time, he clearly _wasn't_a Drow. His skin was too pale, with an almost rosy tint to it, like a permanent, full-bodied blush. His hair, too, wasn't the true, ivory-white of a Drow, but more like a very pale brown. And finally, his eyes, the most definitive proof - clear blue, the likes of which no Drow had ever sported.

She_had_, however, seen such eyes before... on slaves, prisoners, sacrifices and the like. Not too unusual in humans, apparently. As the young man approached her, face brightening, she realized with a start what she was looking at. A half-drow! She'd been aware that it was something that could theoretically exist - humans, after all, could interbreed with virtually every other intelligent species, somehow - but given the general attitudes prevalent among both the Drow and the surface-worlders, it seemed an extraordinarily unlikely combination.

"You're awake!" The young man said as he sat down on the chair by her bedside, smiling. "Good! I was starting to worry. You've been sleeping for quite a while. Guess your must've really run yourself ragged during your first sunrise, huh?" She nodded slowly, still trying to make sense of her situation. He seemed friendly, but... he was speaking the Drow tongue, something she had been sincerely hoping never to hear again. Direza hesitated for a bit, then decided to try something. "Where am I? What happened?" She asked - in the human trade-tongue, which she'd originally learned for the sake of slave-management and interrogation during her early years as a Novice, but had ardently studied and improved since her encounter with the DragonRider.

The half-drow's smile widened into a grin. "Ah, better yet!" He replied, in the same language. "Most of our guests speak the human tongue decently, but dad taught me not to assume - not everyone down there has the option of studying it, even if they realize they'll need it. To answer your question, though, I found you passed-out in the woods during my regular sweep, and carried you back here. It's my house! Well, our house - me and my dad's. More specifically, it's the recovery-room, made just for people like you. At least, I assume... you're escaping from the Underdark, right? Looking to make a life on the surface?"

He was babbling a bit, but she could just about manage to keep up, and she quickly nodded. He clearly wasn't much of an interrogator, a little voice in the back of her head commented. If she hadn't_been a runaway, but some sort of ill-fated scout or Drow agent, she'd obviously have responded in the exact same way now that he'd made his preference so clear, and probably bide her time while waiting for a chance to stab him in the back. Shoving those dark calculations aside - not an easy task, considering how ingrained that way of thinking was to her by now - she flashed him an experimental smile. Smiling wasn't something she'd done a lot of in the past, but she intended to get in some practice where she could. "I am indeed, thank you for helping me. But... you found me during a _regular sweep?And have a room set aside specifically for people in my exact situation? Just how often do you play host to runaway Drow?"

The young halfblood grinned broadly and shrugged. "You'd be surprised. Well, it's not like we find someone every other week. Or even every other year. But once or twice a decade, someone'll turn up. Mostly men, of course - I hear it's pretty intolerable for my gender down there. You're only the second woman to turn up! Anyway, dad build our house here for a reason - it's nice and remote, sure, so we don't have to worry about human prejudice, but it's also right near a bunch of minor exits from the Underdark. Including the same one dad used when he escaped from there. Narrow tunnels, lots of splits leading to multiple exits, close enough to Commorragh to be reachable from there on foot, yet distant enough to be inconvenient for official purposes. This area is basically the Underdark's back door. Same reason you turned up here, right?"

It was indeed, and she felt herself deflate slightly. She'd felt so_clever,_ nailing down this exit for exactly the reason this youngster had just so casually cited - the last leg of the journey was through some narrow, twisted, labyrinthine tunnels that could emerge in a dozen places across this mountainside, which would hopefully throw off her inevitable pursuers, forcing them to cast a wide net rather than mount a swift hunt. Apparently, many other Drow before her had reached the exact same conclusion. But if that was so...

"If you've been doing this for decades, surely the Drow Military must know that you're here? Why haven't they assaulted you yet?" She felt her pulse begin to rise again, anxiety resurging after the gradual relaxation caused by the young half-drow's calm demeanor and the realization that she was somewhere safe, at least for the moment. The young man, however, just shrugged, unperturbed. "Dunno exactly... but I've got my suspicions. Dad says the Drow have very carefully not noticed us, which is probably pretty close to the truth. He's kind of a big deal, y'know. I don't think anyone from Commorragh wants to pick a fight with him if they can help it."

Direza's pulse slowed, but only a bit, and her anxiety continued to burn. If this youngster's father was a powerful fighter, she could indeed imagine that scouts and common soldiers alike would decline to 'notice' his home while looking for some random traitor - after all, their first loyalty was always to their own interests and hides. But if the traitor in question was more high-profile, bringing more authority to bear from Commorragh - more oversight, more officers eager to claim glory, more promised rewards worth risking your skin for - well, then that equation might just change a bit. She couldn't afford to stay here for very long. Still, if the man of the house was as skilled as his son seemed to imagine, perhaps it wouldn't be a bad idea to entreat him for some temporary assistance... trading, perhaps, a few of her purloined artifacts for an armed escort to the nearest human city, where another of her enchanted tools would enable her to blend in.

"Your father sounds like an impressive - and insightful - man..." she said out loud. "And since I am taking advantage of his hospitality, I really should thank him properly. Will I meet him soon?" The youngster winced and shook his head with an apologetic shrug. "Oh, sorry... I should've mentioned. He's not here - left last week, after getting a message from an old friend. He wouldn't tell me what it was about, which means it's something dangerous, so he's probably off being a hero again. At least he recognizes that I'm old enough to be home alone by now! Though he still left me with strict orders not to get into any trouble - can't risk drawing the Drow here when he's not around. Even though he's been teaching me how to fight for decades." He sounded a bit whiny towards the end, and Direza found herself trying to figure out how old he actually was. A fool's errand, she then quickly decided - she had no idea how fast a half-elf would age, and it didn't really matter anyway - regardless of his actual age, he was clearly in late-stage adolescence.

Well, so much for acquiring a fearsome bodyguard. Back to plan A: Rely on the selection of powerful and dangerous enchanted objects she'd purloined before fleeing. Her eyes strayed again to her backpack, reaffirming that it was still sitting there, nice and full, but as her mind wandered the young man suddenly jumped. "Oh! I'm sorry - I forgot to introduce myself! Usually, dad kinda' does that for both of us..." Her attention - and eyes - quickly jumped back to him, noting that he showed a slight blush of embarrassment - far more visible on his paler skin than it would be on a full-blooded Drow. "Under the circumstances, I'm not going to take you to task for your rudeness..." she replied dryly. "In fact, what with being alive and all, I'd say you're doing a splendid job filling in for your father so far."

The young man bobbed his head, answering her tone with a bemused grin. "Well, all the same... my name is Wulfgar Do'Urden. Pleasure to meet you. Might I ask your name?" Direza blinked, mind wheeling as she replied without much thought. She'd gone by her title alone for well over a century, so it wasn't as if anyone was too likely to recognize her first name. As for her original family-name, she'd sworn that off when she took her oath to Lolth... and while that oath had now been thoroughly broken, she could hardly remember what it_was_, so there was little reason to try and dig it up at this point.

Wulfgar clearly noticed her inattention, and scratched his cheek with an embarrassed look. "It's my name, isn't it? I know - I don't look much like a 'Wulfgar'. That's what I've been told a fair few times, anyway. I was named after an uncle - a human from the northlands - who was a close friend of my dad's. I never even met him, but he was supposedly a great warrior - so dad always just tells me not to worry about it fitting me, and instead focusing on growing to be worthy of it." Direza quickly gathered her mind and put on her best smile, nodding placidly. "Oh, I'm sure you will - you seem to be growing into a fine man as it is!"

In truth, though, it wasn't his first name that had given her pause, but his last. Do'Urden. She remembered that whole mess... it had to be most of a century ago, didn't it? Family strife, a promising young warrior betraying his house and escaping to the surface... the whole House Do'Urden had effectively collapsed afterwards. It had been quite a scandal, not to mention a smorgasbord of backstabbing and blackmail as the other great houses scrambled to get their piece of the carrion. Drizzt Do'Urden... yes, that had been the name of the lad. She'd been briefed, back then, due to his heretical actions - one of his sisters had been a Priestess of Lolth, too, hadn't she?

Regardless, he'd supposedly been a rare prodigy at fighting, the son of a warrior and assassin of great renown... someone had been sent after him, right? Assassins, or just someone looking for revenge? She couldn't recall, but she did remember hearing that they'd failed spectacularly, and that he'd ultimately been largely written off as just not being worth the trouble to hunt down. But now he was living this close to Commorragh, along with his half-blood son! Yes, she could certainly see certain military officers deciding to very carefully ignore that fact. A damn shame he wasn't here - he would, indeed, have made for a potent guardian.

Having regained her mental equilibrium, she continued to exchange pleasantries with the younger Do'Urden until he suddenly remembered that, now that she was awake, he really ought to bring her something to eat. She had to admit to being hungry, but also insisted on getting out of bed to eat it - she was fatigued, not invalid! And also still fully dressed under the bed's light blanket, she was glad to discover - considering that the only alternative would have been for the young Wulfgar to have undressed her before tucking her in. He blushed slightly as he saw her noticing this, mumbling that, as previously noted, they rarely got female fugitives passing through - last time it had happened, his human mother had still been alive, and had taken care of such details.

Regardless, ten minutes later she was sitting at the table, starting into a dish she couldn't even begin to recognize - surface-food, something she'd obviously need to get used to. It was delicious, if lukewarm. As she ate, Wulfgar reassured her that she could stay as long as she needed, and that he could help her acclimatize to the surface-conditions - he'd done so several times before, after all, though reading between the lines, it sounded like most_visitors were at least a _bit more prepared than she'd proven to be - often lingering in the cave-openings long enough to at least familiarize themselves with the hardships of sunlight, rather than blundering out in the open while mistaking the full moon for the sun. Not that this young fellow would ever be rude enough to actually point that out to her, obviously...

Tempting though it was to take him up on the offer, she knew she couldn't linger. Nothing she'd learned had changed her initial concerns. The officers in charge of this back-area might not want to pick a fight with the infamous Drizzt Do'Urden, but once their superiors came down on them demanding that they track down the apostate former High Priestess, they wouldn't have much choice. Imagine how lucky they'd feel when they discovered that he was away on business! Still, she wouldn't get anywhere like this, so she simply asked for Wulfgar's advice on how to adapt to the sunlight as quickly as possible - until she had, she'd just have to travel at night and seek shelter during daytime.

The advice was provided readily - along with reassurances that while most fugitives feared Drow pursuit, said pursuers never seemed to materialize. Much as the Drow might hate the traitors and heretics who were inclined to sneak off to the surface, they mostly just couldn't be bothered to actually try to track them down and punish them... unless it was a big case with other, additional circumstances attached, like with his father. Not wanting to explain to this earnest young man exactly why her case was a bit different, she quickly put together a more palatable explanation.

"I was an Acolyte of Lolth... so I'm a full-on apostate, not just a traitor. And I stole a bunch of arcane treasures and gold from the temple before I ran. So they'll definitely pursue me, just to get them back!" She gestured towards her backpack as she explained this. Her instincts, well-honed from the hazards of climbing through the ranks of the High Temple of Lolth, screamed at her that she shouldn't even reveal that much, but she shut them down quickly. She was in a different world right now - one where genuinely decent people existed, where not everyone was liable to stab you in the back at first-given opportunity. Not that she was quite naive enough to believe that there wouldn't be _some_people up here who'd fit in just as well in the Underdark, mind...

This train of thought was interrupted, however, when Wulfgar's face showed a pained wince. "Oh... so that's what that was..." he muttered, then painstakingly cleared his throat. "Umm... I'm afraid I've got some bad news for you." A few moments later, she had abandoned her half-eaten meal to fall to her knees and throw open her backpack, gasping at what she saw. The gold, at least, was still there. But all the rest... the wands, the bracelets, the rings, the amulets, the orbs... it was all ash. Thin, blackened, crumbling, flaking... what few pieces remained even remotely recognizable crumbled to dust at her touch. The only thing she could find that was still solid was the shirt of shadowmail she'd brought - which was not, after all, enchanted, but merely fine Drow craftsmanship. Muffled and blackened chainmail, easy to conceal under your clothes, yet somewhat protective... though she'd probably have to detach the wristguards if she was planning to wear it anywhere civilized, considering the way they were emblazoned with the spidery emblem of Lolth.

"Dad told me about it, way back... should've realized sooner, when I saw all that black stuff in your pack, but I didn't wanna snoop..." Wulfgar mumbled behind her. "It's because of the shadow-magic the Drow use, right? It's real powerful and easy to use, I guess, but it only works in the Underdark. Exposed to the sun, the magic just... evaporates, and even the item itself tends to fall apart." She'd been completely unaware of that. Well, she knew the advantages of shadow-magic in theory, though as a priestess, her knowledge of the arcane had never been anything but theoretical - however, this particular shortcoming was one that had simply never been relevant to her, seeing as until quite recently she'd had no ambition to ever leave the Underdark. This, though... this had to be what her generals had talked about when they'd mentioned expenses concerning 'above-ground gear' for raiding-forces. Why hadn't she paid proper attention in all those meetings? Well, mostly because she tended to zone out and let her various underlings get on with whatever they were supposed to be doing so that she could focus on how to best neuter some overly-ambitious priestess who clearly had her eyes on the throne. Which had made good sense at the_time_, but now had come back to bite her on the ash-gray ass.

While she dug through the blackened fragments that she'd been counting on to keep her safe, now that she'd lost all the Clerical might that Lolth had once granted her, Wulfgar desperately fumbled for a silver lining. "But any Drow forces that venture to the surface know all about that, obviously, so they'll know that pursuing you is pointless! - all the enchanted items you stole have been destroyed, and I doubt they'll be willing to go all that far for a bit of plain old gold. You're not the first one to turn up carrying a fair bit of_that,_ you know."

Her eyes brightened - not at this uplifting message, which would only have been helpful if she'd been telling the truth about why she felt so certain she'd be pursued, but because she'd finally found something intact among the enchanted articles. A single amulet, still in one piece and entirely unblackened. A beautifully-crafted golden amulet in the shape of a sickle-moon with a starburst in its center. The symbol of Corellon, God of Wisdom... worshiped by virtually all above-ground elves. No-one would raise an eyebrow at an elf wearing such an amulet, nor at her being highly reluctant to part with it. Nor even at it being enchanted, since such amulets were often invested with enchantments of protection or preservation.

She breathed a bit easier as she held it up to inspect it and, behind her, Wulfgar whistled appreciatively. "Is that what I think it is? Nice! You really thought things through, huh? Even if the rest of the stuff you filched is gone, heck, I think you'll find that_to be more than worth its weight in gold... so to speak." At this, she could only nod as she ran her fingers over the smooth, cold metal. It made sense, of course, that _this amulet would have been enchanted with something that could handle the sunlight - wouldn't make much sense otherwise! Amulets such as this were, after all, given to the scouts, covert agents, infiltrators and assassins that the Drow regularly sent to the surface - it was just the kind of 'above-ground gear' that her generals had requisitioned additional funds for during all those meetings she'd ignored. The enchantment invested in it was powerful, yet also subtle - an illusion that would change the color of skin, eyes and hair for anyone wearing it, nothing else. Wearing this, she would look as fair-skinned and golden-haired as any surface-world elf... with eye-color chosen at random from the general gamut that elves ran, from amber to sea-green, to hide her natural, blood-red eyes.

So, if she could get to a human city, her plan would be back on track. Elves were if not exactly loved, then at least _tolerated_in virtually every human kingdom - both due to the valuable trade-goods they provided, and their unparalleled diplomatic acumen. Out here in the mountains, though, it'd be useless. Even assuming that whatever scouts and trackers were after her didn't know that she'd purloined an Amulet of Disguise, any Drow worth his salt would eagerly put an arrow, or ten, in any lone, elven travelers he happened across.

Well, all the more reason to move quickly. Staying here too long not only endangered the helpful Wulfgar, it also gave her pursuers time to set up an effective perimeter in order to intercept her. A perimeter that she was now completely incapable of fighting her way through. Young Wulfgar clearly noticed her acute unhappiness, and he clearly wasn't a quitter - after his earlier reassurance had failed to, well, reassure her, he somehow managed to come up with something else. "Hey, you said you used to be part of Lolth's priesthood right? Were you a Cleric of some kind, by any chance?"

Hearing the eagerness in his voice and wondering where he was going with it, she cautiously confirmed that she had, indeed, been a Cleric 'of some kind'... the High Priestess wasn't usually thought of as such, but Lolth had indeed granted her a tiny fragment of Her own divine essence, ensuring that she'd be able to draw on Her fearsome power even when outside the hallowed ground of the Temple-Citadel. Nodding energetically, Wulfgar gesticulated towards nothing in particular as he explained why he'd asked. Apparently, one of his father's countless tales of adventure had included mention of an excommunicated Cleric who'd still somehow been able to wield some semblance of his original power. When a curious young Wulfgar had queried his father about how that could be possible, Drizzt had explained that the former Cleric had somehow managed to get his hands on an Arcane Focus.

Direza had never heard of such a thing before, but Wulfgar was apparently blessed with a fine memory, and recited his father's old explanation practically verbatim. An Arcane Focus was apparently a replacement for the Holy Foci that Clerics usually carried - a consecrated symbol of their deity necessary for the casting of Clerical spells. Rather than draw power from the original deity, who was no longer interested in lending them any such power, the Arcane Focus instead let a former Cleric tap into the Arcane Field - the same source of power used by regular mages, wizards and sorcerers. There were many caveats, of course - a 'true' Arcane Focus required both extremely expensive materials and superlative craftsmanship, and even with that, there were limitations.

"But even so, with all that gold you're carrying, you should be able to find a skilled enough Enchanter to make you an Arcane Focus of some_description - which would return some part of your original power to you. That way, you wouldn't be entirely defenseless, even though the magical weapons you stole have all turned to ash, right?" Digesting this eager summary, Direza swished the thought around in her mind for a bit. She didn't like it. _At all. She wanted to make a clean break from Lolth. Both for spiritual and rational reasons - after all, going around Lolth to regain some of the powers that originally came from her wasn't likely to make the vengeful goddess any less angry at her!

Besides, to have such a Focus crafted, she'd need to make it to a major human city - or maybe even risk an elven one? The elves were skilled enchanters, after all - but she'd have a devil of a time explaining to some wise old elven craftsmaster why she needed such an article. Human Enchanters tended not to ask too many questions other than "Do you have the gold?", on the other hand - her research, however flawed it had proven by now, had at least revealed that much. Learning how to fit into an aboveground society had been her main focus, after all! Regardless, the point remained that this prospective Focus wouldn't get her out of her current pickle, and once she was out of the mountains and safely mingling with civilized society, she wouldn't need the evil powers that Lolth had once granted her any more.

All the same, she thanked Wulfgar for the information and everything else he'd done for her. She also, reluctantly, accepted his hospitality for the rest of the day - while receiving an abbreviated education on how to adapt her body and eyes to the hazards of the surface, and what to expect when she reached civilization. Then, as the sun set and blessed darkness fell on the woods, he provided her with a few useful articles for her journey and another hearty meal - enabling her to preserve the dry, nonperishable rations stashed in her now much lighter backpack for later - and reluctantly saw her off. "I really wish you'd stay longer. I'm sure dad would love to meet you, and he could escort you to the city too..." the young man lamented, and she could only agree.

Still, she'd made up her mind - she just couldn't risk it. The Drow military might not realize that Drizzt Do'Urden wasn't at home, and might have no desire to provoke him by going anywhere near his estate - but if she stayed there, they'd HAVE to risk it eventually... and when they did, they'd make it a priority to kill this half-blood youth just on general principle, since Lolth considered such a mixing of blood an abomination. She'd escaped from Commorragh and the Underdark to avoid staining her hands with any more innocent blood - so there really wasn't any other choice she could make. Besides, she had a feeling that the young halfblood's eyes weren't just seeing a refugee in need of help when he looked at her. She was still a very attractive woman, after all - having not aged a day during her stay on the Obsidian Throne of Commorragh, thanks to Lolth's disinterested blessing - and the youngster was definitely old enough to notice. Considering the debt of gratitude she owed him, fending off the awkward advances that would inevitably result from any lengthy stay would just be... awkward. And while he was perfectly handsome, pretty young elfin boys eager to please her were exactly the kind of lovers who'd bored her to tears before her encounter with the DragonRider.

Now that she had learned what the sun was really like, Direza treasured the quiet coolness of the night, and even recognized the advantages of the moon's cold, bright light. Wulfgar's advice proved invaluable, too... but all the same, as she walked through the mountains, she was forced to admit that there were many details she'd failed to consider in her planning. All the walking, for starters! She'd been in decent shape, once, when she was younger and more energetic, hadn't she? The life of a Novice of Lolth was harsh and demanding, after all, and she had survived that - and even come out ahead of her peers. But that was a long time ago, and being the High Priestess had placed very few physical demands on her.

Driven though she was, eager though she was, her legs and lungs could only do so much - soon, both were aching, and she was forced to take a break and recover. So it went, through the night, until she saw the eastern sky begin to brighten dangerously, and hurriedly assembled a shelter just like Wulfgar had taught her. The heavy, black blanket that was now taking up much of the backpack-space that the decayed artifacts had previously occupied, draped over some branches and weighed down with rocks along the edges, provided her with a dark refuge against the growing light. Sharp spears of sunlight still snuck through the cracks here and there, and it was demonically hot inside, but it was endurable - and part of the necessary acclimatization.

She was certain, at first, that between the bright light and the heat, she'd never be able to get any sleep. But exhaustion proved capable of trumping both of those considerations, and by the time she awoke, only the faint, cold light of the moon was filtering into her simple tent. Eagerly, she emerged into the cool darkness, breathing deeply of the fresh, sharp air - a trait of the surface-world she'd had _no_trouble getting used to, and looked around to get her bearings so that she could continue on her path. Then she froze in her tracks, eyes widening and pulse rising with brutal speed.

A Drow was sitting on a low branch right in front of her, smiling arrogantly and lazily spinning an arrow between his fingers while his other hand rested on his sleek, black recurve bow. He was dressed like a scout, and that was almost certainly exactly what he was - part of the military's surface-specialized scouts, charged with securing the areas around Underdark-entrances in preparation for larger military movements, as well as scoping out prospective raid-targets. Dangerous work - hence why the unit was staffed exclusively with the more expendable males.

Apparently, they'd been mobilized faster than she'd hoped. The Temple-Citadel would still be in chaos no matter how you looked at it - but presumably some high-ranking officer had gathered her wits with remarkable speed, and realized that having the previous High Priestess already in chains and ready for the sacrificial altar by the time the new High Priestess had duly ascended would put her in a highly advantageous position. So she'd mustered the scouts, without even waiting for orders from above. Risky - if she didn't provide some result by the time anyone noticed, she could be accused of overstepping her authority, which was dangerous indeed when a brand-new, somewhat insecure High Priestess had just taken the throne and needed a way to demonstrate why you shouldn't mess with her.

But that gamble had paid off, hadn't it? The scout must've kept moving through the day - they were trained for that, after all - and found her tent. He'd realized who was likely to be within, and waited for her to emerge where he had a clear shot at her, rather than try to force his way into the flimsy tent where he could potentially get tangled up in the heavy cloth while she made a dash for it. Certainly, he had her dead to rights - relaxed though he seemed, he could certainly have that arrow in the air within the space of a breath, probably heading for her knee or some other painful-and-crippling-yet-not-deadly target. Even if she'd been wearing the shadowmail, it wouldn't have mattered.

With an effort of will, Direza calmed herself and forced her racing pulse to slow down. Perhaps there were situations in this world where blind panic was the correct response, but if so, she had yet to encounter such. She needed to think. Maybe her legs and back weren't as fit as they'd been when she was a Novice, but her brain hadn't atrophied with the passing of the decades. She'd fought her way to the High Priestess' throne by playing the Great Game, and playing it better than anyone else. Nor had she allowed herself to grow lax even after reaching her goal - none would dare to assassinate the reigning High Priestess, but every reign eventually came to an end, one way or another... just as her predecessor's had.

Espionage and sabotage. Blackmail and bribery. Manipulation and seduction. Backstabbing and betrayal. Those were the instruments with which the Great Game of Commorragh was played. She had mastered them all during her ascent - though admittedly, her narrow focus on those arts had left her with a few blind-spots too, as she was coming to learn. The man sitting before her was infinitely better trained than she in tracking, evasion, and the arts of war, for example - but conversely, if he had any real skill in the Great Game, he wouldn't occupy such a dangerous posting in the first place. She could beat him - so long as she was able to draw him into her arena of choice.

"Congratulations!" She called up to him. "Your tracking-skills must be truly stand-out... or did you, perchance, just get lucky?" Ego-stroking and a challenge to same in one sentence - just to force him to reply in one way or another. The scout, for his part, shrugged and stopped twirling the arrow, resting it warningly against the string of his bow. "A bit of tracking, a bit of speed, and a bit of luck I'd say..." he drawled. He was clearly enjoying looking down on her right now, both literally and metaphorically. Yes... there was pride in his eyes, pride and exultation. He wanted more than his current posting - who wouldn't? - and he figured she was his ticket to greater glory. He was right, of course... she just needed to give him a different way to achieve it.

Standing up straight, she looked up at him with a raised eyebrow. "An honest assessment... rare, and probably foolish. Honesty is a dangerous quality in the Underdark. Still, to return it in kind - you do realize that your superiors will steal every last shred of the credit for my capture, don't you?" He scowled, but did not contradict her as she carried on. "Your sergeant will get a bit, your lieutenant will get more, the captain a fair chunk, and the general will take the manticore's share. They'll glean glory and advantage from your accomplishment - and meanwhile, your_only reward will be more dangerous assignments, now that you've distinguished yourself - ensuring that you'll either bring home more glory to steal, or get yourself killed before you can threaten your sergeant's position... or, Lolth forbid, your _Lieutenant's!"

The scout grimaced, then shrugged in a fatalistic fashion, never taking his eyes off of her. "Yeah, well, that's just the way things are... at least Lolth, whose name you so casually take in vain despite your apostasy, will know my deeds and favor me." Direza barked a laugh, surprising herself with the vehemence of it. "Are you truly so naive? I served Lolth faithfully as Her High Priestess for two centuries, and she never did me any favors. But you expect her to lend you a hand? I honestly believe that She cares not one whit for any single member of our race, and barely for our civilization as a whole. Only for our works - the Driders we forge, the arachnid beasts we craft through mutation and crossbreeding, the alchemical concoctions we brew in her glory.Nothing else. She will do you no favors, nor will she care if you let me go. The only one who really needs me on that altar and under the knife is my successor, in order to cement her rule. And_she_ will never learn your name."

The scout wavered, his face tightening around his mouth. It would be easy for him to simply refute her words as self-serving lies, but she'd long-since learned how to speak with authority and conviction, and_genuinely_ believing in what she was saying only made it easier. For centuries, she had carried the words and wishes of Lolth to the ears of the Drow - if he could not believe her words on the matter of the Spider-Goddess' interests, who could he believe? "Yeah, well, what do you expect me to do?" He finally countered, in a voice that tried to sound dismissive, but still contained a well-hidden hope that she'd have a genuine answer for him. "I've got a job to do, and orders to follow. Failing at either won't end well for me, as I'm sure you know all too well."

She did indeed. Deserters, oathbreakers, and otherwise insubordinate soldiers often found their way to the Arena, where their skills made them extra entertaining... for a while, at least. She'd seen any number of scouts, no different from him, end their lives in the ashen sands of Commorragh's Grand Arena, slaying wave after wave of the Underdark's fell beasts before finally, inevitably, being overwhelmed. All the same, she did indeed have an answer for him. "I expect nothing... but what you could do is_play the game_..." she replied, twisting her lips into a confident smile.

Snorting, the scout leaped out of the tree - eyes still fixed on her, lest she dash off the moment he blinked - and landed nimbly on the soft layer of long-dead pine needles that covered the rocky ground of this mountain-forest. "So that's what you've been getting at..." he said harshly, testing his bowstring, arrow still in hand but not yet pointed at her. "Let me guess - you can give me all kinds of advice, hmm?" She shrugged. "Of course I can. I won that game, lest you forget. But I was thinking of something a bit more specific. You can't fight without arrows in your quiver, can you? For example... some potent blackmail-material you can use against your superiors, hmm? Get yourself a promotion or two, a raise, some paid leave, or just a reassignment to some nice, safe position, far from the blinding sunlight?"

The scout hesitated, eyes narrowing thoughtfully. This, she had come to realize, was the true weakness of the Drow. Every last one of them - throughout the priesthood, the army, the nobility, and the ranks of the commonfolk - were in it for themselves. No-one had any true loyalty to anyone else. Orders and oaths were obeyed only so long as they remained advantageous. All she needed to do in order to escape this jam was to convince this one scout that _his_interests were better served by letting her go rather than taking her in - the interests of his unit, the military, the temple, and his race as a whole simply didn't enter into consideration.

"Hmm, let's see... the only general who'd be both able and willing to act quickly enough to get scouts on the surface this fast would have to be General Micarylene Jhalein, no?" she pondered aloud, watching the scout's eyebrows rise in surprised confirmation. That was the easy bit, though. She was well familiar with all the ranking generals of the Drow military. "...but you're not likely to get anywhere near her anytime soon, are you? No, you need something a bit further down the ladder..." she thus continued. There'd be some guesswork involved, but... she had looked into the army-detachments stationed near her planned point of egress before affecting her escape. And it stood to reason that the _closest_one would be able to get scouts out here the fastest. So...

"Colonel Zilfaen Du'Skath is the commander of your base, correct?" A good guess, and from the way the scout's eyebrows ratcheted another notch up, also true. "I have never met the woman myself... but I know a thing or two about the Du'Skath family that she most definitely wouldn't want made public. I can provide you with those secrets - used carefully, you can benefit greatly from them. Zilfaen holds no great favor with her family - hence why they haven't pulled strings to get her assigned somewhere more prestigious - so if a soldier under her command lets slip those secrets, they'll likely have her executed. She'll realize that too, unless she is a complete, drooling idiot... you'll have her 'by the short and curlies', as I believe the vernacular goes.

"And if you simply lie to me, ensuring that Colonel Du'Skath strings me up the moment I try yanking her chain?" The scout growled. Direza shrugged. "Why should I bother? I have no use for the secrets I once stockpiled now that I'm on the surface, and since you'll be letting me go in return, I also have no reason to wish you ill. Furthermore, if I were to lie, I'd run the risk of you randomly being aware of some detail that might contradict said lies. Heh... consider this a free lesson for any future participation in the Great Game! A good lie is a powerful weapon, but it can easily be blunted with overuse. Telling the truth when you have no reason to do otherwise can only help you, since it'll make others more inclined to believe in you next time you do lie."

The scout seemed to chew on that for a moment, and halfway lowered his bow. Then he grimaced and tightened his grip on it. "So... you give me the secrets I can use to blackmail the Colonel, then I let you go and tell my superiors that I never found any trace of you - that's the idea, right? But if no-one finds you, they may put us to the question - using truth-telling magic, just in case some fool allowed himself to be bribed into letting the former High Priestess go, hmm? And then I'll be in dire straits indeed... death is the_least_ I'll be in for!"

Direza winced at this, seeking a good counterargument. Truth-telling spells were outlawed by the temple - Lolth didn't care for them. The Great Game was not some accidental, cultural artifact, but a deliberate, meritocratic construct designed to ensure that only the sharpest, most ruthless of the Drow rose to power within Commorragh. Using spells to prevent people from lying was just unsporting in that regard! There were gray zones, such as spells designed to test an individual's general inclination towards honest or deceitful behavior, but even those were kept on the down-low to avoid invoking the Temple's anger.

However, the fact that the Great Game had actual rules was just another dimension of it. Rules, after all, only applied if you got caught. Hence, many of the great houses made sure that they had _very_carefully concealed access to scrolls, enchanted items, or secretly-taught mages who could provide them with truth-spells in situations where it was worth the risk. And considering the likely state of the Temple at this moment, that risk would be far lower than usual - making it rather more believable than usual that an overzealous officer would choose to employ illegal truth-spells in order to ferret out any possible traitors among her scouts.

"That seems rather improbable, considering the laws against such spells..." she nonetheless said, her face elegantly draped in skeptical folds. "I cannot say that it is impossible that such may happen, but that's what the Great Game is like. You can maximize your odds, take precautions and try to cover your ass - but you'll never get_anywhere_ without taking some risks. In the end, you simply have to decide which path is less risky..." even as she expounded on this, however, her sharp, political instincts were tweaking. The demeanor of this scout... he didn't really_fear being put to the question under truth-spells. He was trying to_bargain - seeking to make her sweeten the pot even further. But what more could she offer him?

Then, she finally caught on. The way his eyes were roaming across her body. At first, she'd figured he was just checking her for concealed weapons or other dangerous articles - even though a surface-scout like him no doubt knew about the effect that the sun would have on most Drow-made artifacts, it was unlikely that someone sent out that quickly would have received a full and comprehensive list of the articles she'd stolen. She could've had something other than the Amulet of Disguise that had been crafted to withstand the sun, right? But no, that wasn't his concern. The clothes she wore - leather trousers and a light blouse - were more flattering than they normally would be, since getting her hands on regular traveling-clothes had proven surprisingly challenging - hence, they were a bit too small for her, leaving them to hug her skin rather tightly.

It made sense, now that she thought about it. A simple scout would draw little interest from his betters within the matriarchal society of the Drow. He wasn't likely to be a virgin per se - one of the few advantages of being a scout was the opportunity to rape future slaves_before_ the officers could get their hands on them - but he almost certainly had never been with a Drow woman. Thanks to the blessing of Lolth, the passing of the centuries hadn't really touched her - indeed, she still had the maidenly looks she'd possessed when she first ascended to the throne. Why _wouldn't_he find her fetching?

Seduction, too, was one of the accepted tools of the Great Game - especially when dealing with those young enough to foolishly let their genitals make decisions for them. Not that she could throw stones in that regard, all told! Regardless, she'd used it before, long ago, when she was just a Novice and later a Junior Priestess, using every tool at her disposal to climb the ranks. Hopefully she hadn't gotten too... rusty. Shifting her pose subtly to accentuate her slender legs and flat belly, she flashed him an inviting smile and continued. "...but perhaps there is something I could offer you to help make that risk worth taking, hmm?"

A grin creased his lips, and he finally lowered the bow altogether. "I thought you'd never ask..." he replied, a dreadful eagerness in his voice, and she found herself quailing inwards. The hunger in his eyes was... intimidating. She'd used seduction to get ahead before, sure, but it was a long time ago, and she'd rarely gone_through_ with it. On this occasion, however, there was clearly no way around that. He was licking his lips as he stepped towards her, reaching behind his back to attach his bow to the quiver riding there - then for his belt to begin undoing it. "You want to make it worth risking my life letting you go? Fine. Let's keep this simple..." he said, voice low but intense. "You let me have my way with you until I'm satisfied. Until I'm spent. You do whatever I say, and never even think of saying 'no'. Then, when I'm done, you give me those secrets you promised, and we part ways."

A shudder went through her body, but nonetheless, she could only nod her assent and try to maintain a suitably seductive expression. It wasn't really surprising, she supposed - being stuck at the bottom of the Drow pecking-order, with no woman even giving him the time of day, had to rankle. Of course he'd want to relish it the one time he held the power - especially over a formerly high-ranking noble and priestess like herself. All she could do was suffer through whatever he had in mind. And yet... at the same time, the shudder hadn't been entirely one of fear. She remembered the way the DragonRider had taken charge, bending her body to her will... and the unforgettable pleasure she had found there.

Her improvised tent swiftly became an improvised bed, soft atop the layer of fallen pine needles that covered the rocky ground. Atop it, she stripped off her clothes as he demanded - slowly, seductively, turning to give him the best possible view of her increasingly naked skin. His own trousers went the same way, though nothing else - he remained dressed in the trademark black leather of the scouts, bow and arrow on his back, even strapping his black shin-boots back on after ridding himself of the pants. An obvious bit of symbolism if ever there was one.

Then she knelt before him as he stepped up to her, his cock throbbing-hard from the strip-tease. "Clean me off carefully..." he demanded, grinning eagerly. "I've been running hard for the past two days to catch you, so I may be a touch... sweaty." He wasn't kidding, either. The reek of sweat both stale and fresh was sickeningly clear as she drew closer to his cock, emanating particularly strongly from the greenish-white bush of unkempt pubic-hair that lined the base of his shaft - suggesting that he routinely bleached his hair, to hide that vaguely greenish shade which was, in general, considered rather unflattering for both genders. He was also noticeably bigger, longer and thicker than any man she'd been with previously - which was hardly surprising, since he was likely to be quite a bit older than the foolish youngsters she'd once seduced, never mind the unfortunate lads who had been sent as sacrifices to her bed since her ascension.

They_had of course also been carefully washed and cleaned, and even anointed with aromatic oils, before being sent to please her. And even so, she had never used her _mouth - why would_she? They were there to pleasure _her, not the other way around. She was loosely aware of fellatio as an act, but lacked even the most basic experience with it - still, it didn't take any great leap of intuition to, as he had requested, take his throbbing shaft into her mouth in order to lick and suck it. It tasted dirty and salty, making her throat protest... but it also made her remember the flavor of the DragonRider's pussy. Unwashed, encrusted with old sweat and dried juices from her long imprisonment and innumerable rapes, garnished with fresh cum courtesy of the Umber Hulk she had just mated with in the midst of the arena...

The emerging nausea faded, and she applied herself to her task with such enthusiasm - unskilled though it was - that the scout gasped in surprise above her. She felt the heat of his body, the beating of his pulse, through her tongue, and found herself suddenly seeing why such oral treatment might appeal even from this side. "Don't... don't forget my balls..." the scout commented suddenly, voice strained. "They're quite sweaty too, I suspect." Obediently, she pulled back - noting as she did that she'd managed to wet only half of his shaft's length - and shifted her attention lower. Distinct from the small bush of pubic-hair above the shaft, the dangling pouch beneath was smooth and hairless, as on any true elf - dark or otherwise - and sure enough, they were covered in a layer of accumulated ball-sweat from having marinated in his tight, black-leather trousers for the duration of his past exertions.

She sucked his balls into her mouth one at a time, applying only careful pressure - well aware of how sensitive this part of a man's body was from her past education in the arts of torture - and let her tongue trace the entirety of their smooth surface to clean off every last vestige of dirty, leather-tainted sweat. The flavor was growing on her, but all the same, she couldn't help but wonder if this sudden change in assignment was due to her initial enthusiasm pushing the man too quickly towards an orgasm. The agreement, after all, was that she was his until he was 'spent' - until his virility had been exhausted. It made sense that he might want to delay that point until he'd worked through whatever perverted fantasies he might have been saving for a more cooperative partner than your average, terrified slave-to-be.

Once through with his pouch, she returned unbidden to his shaft - licking its lower region where she hadn't previously been able to reach, before once again engulfing it in her mouth. What she had_heard of fellatio - mostly from overhearing male subordinates bragging crudely to one another about the capabilities of their personal pleasure-slaves - suggested that it _was possible to take it all, so... time to expand her horizons! Pushing her head forwards, she tried her best to relax her throat and guide his narrow cockhead past her tonsils and deeper down. She barely managed it - burying her nose in his fragrant pubic-hair for a split second before her throat protested and she started to gag involuntarily.

Still, once she'd pulled back and gasped some air around the spit-slicked shaft, she felt emboldened - clearly, the approach did work, she just needed some practice and better control over her throat. And she had an advantage there - namely, decades of learning how to control her face and body-language in order to play the Great Game on the master-level. Even such a thing as swallowing involuntarily could ruin a well-planned betrayal if you were up against a suitably observant foe... she just had to apply those skills in a new way now. Also, she was fairly certain that she'd heard a groan from above when she did it the first time, which seemed like a good sign.

Again and again, she pushed her face forwards, deep-throating the slender, ash-gray cock - familiarizing herself with the way her throat-muscles automatically rebelled against its presence there, and figuring out how to suppress this reaction. Taking deep breaths through her nose and holding it as she plunged forwards, her airways blocked by the pulsating cockhead until she pulled back again. She was a quick study, though the fact that she was dealing with a slender, elfin cock helped. Regardless, it was lucky that she figured it out so quickly, considering what happened next.

The scout had kept his hands to himself at first - eager to make her work his cock on her own, to drive home her obedient submission. Now, however, his fingers - strong as steel from decades upon decades of archery-practice - dug into her scalp and pulled her inexorably forwards as he emitted a strangled cry. His cock bottomed out in her throat, her lips ringing the very base of his shaft, her nose fully buried in his pubic-hair - albeit unable to actually _smell_anything, what with her blocked airways. His hips jerked automatically, pushing harshly against her face, and deep in her throat she felt the hot flow of his cum as it was poured directly into her belly.

He held her there until her vision darkened, until her growing control began to fade and her throat threatened to eject the intruding cock alongside the filling meal that Wulfgar had provided her before she set out from his spacious home. Until his orgasm ended, and the last spurt of hot jizz had dribbled down her gullet, only then did he release her, to surge backwards, coughing and gasping and struggling to control her rising gorge. She managed, just barely, and found herself wondering whether she was disappointed that she never even got to taste his cum, or should consider it a silver lining.

Before her, the scout was panting, his cock - glistening wet - jumping and jerking as if it was fighting to stay hard. "That wasn't part of the plan..." she heard him mumble under his breath. "Where'd a High Priestess learn to go down like that?" Grimacing, he straightened and continued, in a louder voice. "You're a hungry one, aren't you? Well, no worries - I've got a dessert in mind for you while I get my wind back!" She was still getting her own breath back, hazily trying to puzzle out what he was talking about, and thus could only blink in confusion as he turned around and took a step back towards her.

Then, one of his powerful hands reached back to grab her by the hair, pulling her forwards and forcing her face into his ass-crack. "Lots of sweat accumulated there too - do a thorough job like before!" He jeered back at her, holding her in place as she instinctively struggled against his grip. His ass was flat and muscular, fortunately, so she could still manage to breathe - but the smell of unwashed ass was intense. Here, more than anywhere else, his sweat had accumulated and grown into something dark and overpowering. How careful was a scout about cleaning his asshole after doing his business, while hurriedly pursuing a fugitive through the mountains, she wondered?

As he forcefully rubbed her face into his ass and repeated his order to 'clean' him off, she reluctantly complied and began to lick, as she had licked his cock and balls earlier. The flavor was dark and sickeningly bitter, and that was before her tongue reached his puckered sphincter. She felt it twitch at her touch, and wondered what dark pleasure he was deriving from this. Was it from her abject humiliation and submission, or from the direct stimulation of the sensitive orifice? Could be one, could be both, she supposed - either would explain his demand, once she'd finished licking up and down his crack for a bit, to focus her attention there. "Get your tongue in there properly, your highness!" he jeered, and she obeyed.

She was trying hard not to think about what she was doing - to avoid reflecting on it as far as possible. Not because of the nauseating level of humiliation she was subjected to, nor even the undeniable fact that her bare pussy was drooling wetly by now, but because such reflection would force her to admit that what rankled the most_about this act was that she'd been forced to perform it on some random, nameless scout before getting the chance to perform the same service for the DragonRider. Indeed, half her arousal seemed to come from the brand-new mental image of herself burying her face between the DragonRider's luscious, fleshy buns - so much more voluminous than those of any elf - and digging her tongue into her asshole to taste the dark and bitter secrets within. She had left her home due to _moral objections, dammit, and not some childish crush or foolish, lustful obsession!

The taste of his ass was thick on Direza's tongue when he finally released her and let her fall, panting, back on her rear - it had completely overpowered the earlier flavors of his sweaty cock and balls. Said items had, in the meantime, completely recovered - his shaft rose straight and iron-hard, while his testes no doubt surged with a fresh batch of hot cum. It still didn't answer the question of_how_ he had enjoyed the long, deep rimjob - but it certainly made it clear that he'd enjoyed it quite a bit indeed. "Time for round two, then..." he growled, eyes aflame with desire. "Let's see if your lower mouth is just as hungry as the other one, eh?"

She felt a smidge disappointed as she laid back and spread her legs to let him mount her. Even the position he'd demanded was fairly pedestrian, and the fact that he was marginally longer and thicker than any previous cock that she'd taken in this manner didn't make it noticeably more interesting. As her arousal diminished, she found herself forced to admit that, even though she definitely_hadn't fled the Underdark just because of her crush on the DragonRider, that encounter in the Arena stands had clearly awakened a new desire in her. She'd found an unaccountable pleasure in being_used by the escaped slave, being made to serve, being_humiliated_ in word and action. And that pleasure clearly wasn't related solely to that admittedly extraordinary woman. Even now, she felt her enjoyment begin to return as the scout noticed the well-lubricated conditions of her tight pussy and jeered at her for it, calling her 'some kind of kinky slut' to so clearly have been aroused by the earlier action.

Somewhat surprisingly, the scout had apparently decided against blowing his load in her pussy - not that she'd been too nervous about that, considering how far she was from her next period of fertility... but all the same, she'd expected him wanting to fill her womb with his cum, purely as a symbolic act. Instead, however, he simply fucked her like that for a while, before lifting himself up and ordering her to turn over on her knees, and pull apart her butt-cheeks with her hands. Ah. Anal sex. Immediately, she remembered how she'd confessed her inexperience in that area to the DragonRider, and felt her desires surge. She'd heard about it, ages ago, from an aspiring seductress who'd described it as painful, intrusive, and just plain not much fun - but quite an effective way to hook a mark if you could manage to fake enjoyment well enough. Direza, however, had never found it necessary to take such a step... until now.

Like before, when the scout had forced her to tongue his ass, she felt a sting of regret over the circumstances. Here, now, she'd lose her anal virginity? It wasn't as if the DragonRider could have taken it per se, she supposed, but... the idea of it happening before_her, on _her orders, was madly arousing. No such luck, alas. Well, at least the scout's cock was fairly slender and quite well-lubricated, and she also didn't need to pretend to enjoy it. Indeed, she could whimper freely as she felt her sphincter stretch around his girth, reluctantly forced open while he loomed over her, guiding his cock with one hand. She yelped in pain as he finally drove it home, pushing deep inside her as the sting in her sphincter grew sharper, laughing at her obvious discomfort - and her enjoyment surged further. He was using her ass for his own gratification, like he'd use his own hand, with her pleasure not entering into it at all - a complete reversal of the way so many young men had desperately sought to please her in her palatial bedroom. It was... deliciously humiliating. And so, even as waves of pain spread from her ass with every thrust, pleasure rose with it - from her mind, rather than her genitals.

It didn't take long for him to cum - unsurprising, considering how well-primed he'd been before switching holes. With a groan, he fired his load, letting the hot, white slime surge into her ass... but not very deeply. He'd grabbed her right after she awoke, before she could see to her morning ablutions, after all - so there really wasn't all that much space inside her ass right now, truth be told. She could feel it, now - the warm surge spreading little more than an inch into her intestines before washing back to coat the still-hard cock that took up the rest of the available space.

He didn't stop there, though. Whether because of the tightness of the largely untried orifice, or due to a more cerebral enjoyment of her clear discomfort and occasional, pained groans, his cock barely had the chance to soften before once again hardening and resuming its pounding. She could feel the first load sloshing around inside her as he lengthened his thrusts, whipping it into foam - pulling out until his glans teased her stinging sphincter before plunging his cock forwards so that his pubic-hair tickled it instead.

It took a while for his third orgasm to build, and he pounded her relentlessly through it, only now starting to pant - as was to be expected of one of the Drow military's scouts, he was in excellent shape and possessed impressive stamina. Her ass hurt throughout, though the nature of the pain gradually shifted - away from the stinging sphincter, which seemed to adjust to the size of the intruder bit by bit, and towards the full length of the penetration, as her insides were battered and worn by the rapid pace and heated by friction. Her pleasure, meanwhile, did not shift but merely rose, until she felt certain that she could probably find the release of an orgasm if she could just touch her pussy... she'd been getting a lot better at masturbating recently, after all. However, her orders hadn't changed - she was to keep her cheeks spread, enabling the deepest possible penetration for the scout...

Finally, he came - his third load joining the second in her increasingly overstuffed ass. He stopped as the orgasm shook him, fully embedded and gasping. Then, panting, he recovered and pulled out, his cock still semi-hard somehow. She heard him grunt behind her, handing out a new order - "Get back up on your knees and face me." Doing so, she couldn't help but wrinkle her nose - he was pushing himself back to his feet, leaving her once again face-to-cock with him, and it wasn't a pretty sight. The two loads, with nowhere else to go, had washed back along his shaft in a scummy, foamy, brown-flecked mess which still clung to it now - hardly surprising, considering the state of her insides. "You got it dirty, you get it clean... it's only fair." Even with three orgasms behind him, the scout's eyes burned with dark and perverse lust as he gave the order, and she found her breath catching in her throat. Licking his sweaty, unwashed cock earlier had been one thing, but this was far more nauseating, and far more humiliating...

With an effort of will, she shifted her mental focus to the later half of the equation, and leaned forwards. Her hands were free, now, at least - and the fact that he could see everything she was doing only added to the arousing sense of depravity. Thus, while one hand started to rapidly rub her clit and the other plunged two, then three fingers inside her wet pussy, she knelt there, opened her mouth and engulfed the sordidly stained shaft in her mouth. Primed as she was, it didn't take her long to get off - her body wracked by the long-building orgasm even as she sucked and licked up the scummy, foamy cum-remnants, the bitter ass-juices, and the sickening brown stains that her unclean insides had left on his cock. She didn't dare deepthroat him as she had before, though, considering that only the waves of orgasmic bliss washing through her mind were keeping her from throwing up as it was - though, unfortunately this left her to cover the lower half of his shaft with her tongue alone, licking around the periphery and tasting every inch of it.

The aftershocks of the orgasm carried her through the disgusting task, however, and at the end of it, his cock had softened entirely under her tongue - showing no signs of rising for a fourth round anytime soon. The look of disgust he was directing down at her while he pulled his trousers back on and stuffed the freshly-cleaned but still wet limb back into them made her shiver. "I can't believe you actually did that... did all of that. I was sure you'd choke or refuse at some point so that I could punish you! But you actually got off on it! Was this the kind of thing you used to get up to in your fancy bedroom in the Temple-Citadel, huh?"

Don't I wish, she thought to herself as she quickly shimmied over to her nearby pack and grabbed her canteen. She'd refilled it from Wulfgar's well, and it had been deliciously cold and crisp at the time - but by now, the heat of the passing day had rendered it decidedly lukewarm. Still, it served well enough to wash the various disgusting flavors off her tongue, and a few more mouthfuls after she'd spat out the first few helped to quiet her by now rebellious stomach. Only then, as her powers of concentration returned and she forced herself to once again focus on the matter at hand, did she reply out loud. "Now, that particular secret was not part of our bargain, I believe..."

Shrugging with clearly faked nonchalance, the scout looked away and pulled his belt tight, eyes still straying casually to her bare skin as she, too, got dressed - in a casual, unhurried way, of course. There was little point in rushing to preserve her by now nonexistent dignity, after all. "I just don't get it..." he then said, breaking the brief, awkward silence. "I've chased down runners before, but they've mostly been... well, folks like me. Men of low caste, with few prospects, tired of being treated as disposable tools and somehow imagining that they can find a better life on the surface. Or, occasionally, some starry-eyed, idealistic young naif who got it into his head that the Drow way of life is somehow 'wrong'. But you... you played the Great Game, backstabbed and tortured with the best of them - you led us for centuries, and had everything you could possibly want. Why would you want to make a run for it? Didya just get bored resting on your laurels or something?"

What could she possibly say to that? He wasn't half wrong, really. A growing boredom with her privileged life and particularly the monotonously ritualistic sex-life that came with it had set the stage for her conversion at the hands of the DragonRider. As for her seriously belated 'moral awakening', she found it difficult enough to justify it in the quiet of her own mind, and feared that it would sound outright laughable if spoken out loud. And finally, the catalyst that had set it all in motion, the spur that drove her even as she tried and failed to deny it to herself... well, she really_didn't want to try and explain that to some random, perverted scout. So instead, she just flashed him a sardonic grin as she finished pulling her clothes on. "Neither is _that. Now, do you want the blackmail-material I did agree to provide you with, or not?"

He did, and indeed took eager notes as she passed on the promised secrets about the Du'Skath family. She couldn't help but pity him. Not that she was lying - the secrets were real enough, since she simply couldn't be bothered to come up with a suitably airtight lie. But it was abundantly clear that he was just abjectly terrible_at anything related to the Great Game. Anyone with half a brain would've asked her to divulge the secrets _before the sexual play, especially if planning such an unpleasant session - by now, she actually DID have some motivation to try and get him in trouble.

There just wasn't any point in her taking any particular steps to do so. She was handing him ammunition, sure, but giving an untrained and clumsy archer a bow and arrow is a good way to put one of those arrows through his foot. Secrets like the ones she was now burdening him with had to be handled carefully, and used with finesse - otherwise, they could backfire spectacularly, as he'd no doubt discover to his misfortune.

Considering that clumsiness, she wasn't surprised to find him glancing thoughtfully at her as he finished jotting down his notes - as if pondering his next step. She quickly moved to nip any prospective double-cross in the bud. "There, our bargain is complete..." she declared with an elegant sweep of her arm. "And now, before you do anything genuinely foolish, allow me to explain to you why keeping your end of it is by far the smartest thing you can do. Firstly, if you were to drag me back to Commorragh at this point, the blackmail-material you've now acquired would become immediately worthless since I'd obviously warn your superiors that you forced it from me. I'd also have to let them know that you 'raped' me, of course, which would likely see you executed on general principle - heretic and apostate I may be, but I am still a lady of the Drow!"

The scout quailed slightly at this reminder of what the general punishment was for any male who dared to impugn on the honor of a Drow woman, particularly a high-born one, was - while at the same time ineptly attempting to look like he hadn't been considering anything of the sort. "Conversely, if you killed me to keep me quiet and simply brought them my head, you'd be no better off..." she carried on. "Your orders, of course, are to retrieve me alive for the sacrificial altar - and since your superiors are well aware that all the magical weapons I obtained before my flight have been rendered inert by the sun at this point, you wouldn't be able to convince them that I attacked you, leaving you no choice. As for simply killing me and leaving me here to ensure that I never speak to anyone about your betrayal, that would simply spark an investigation when another scout eventually comes across my corpse. Try to cover up the killing by burying me or cutting me apart to feed me to the wild animals, and you'll waste a load of time - vastly increasing the risk that another scout will stray into your area and catch you at it. Just consider all the time you've already wasted having your way with me - your fellows must be finishing their own sweeps by now, and likely looking to spread their net further. Either way, if your superiors discover that you killed me, you'll also be executed..."

All true - up to a certain point - and all blindingly obvious to even the most casual player of the Great Game... but clearly a necessary rejoinder for this chump. "So you see - the safest course for you at this point is to simply wave me goodbye and wish me the best of luck on my travels..." she finished with a flourish while the scout nodded numbly. "Of course. 's what I was planning to do anyway..." he mumbled, shrugging in a way that wasn't going to fool anyone. "After all, if any of the other guys catch up to you, it'd be bad news for me, right? So, hey - I hope you aren't too sore or anything, 'cuz you're burning moonlight." She was, indeed, a touch sore - around her asshole, her stomach, and her throat. But none of those were really required for walking, so she set out all the same - determined to stay one step ahead of the search-parties. As for the scout, he headed in the opposite direction, and they never saw one another again - an ideal outcome for both of them, though only one of them would be alive to enjoy it for any significant period of time.

It was taking her longer than she'd hoped to get used to human cities, Direza reflected as she cringed at the sight before her. A crowded marketplace, such as could be found in any human city on the continent, no doubt. It wasn't as if this city was even particularly large - indeed, few human cities could rival Commorragh for sheer size and grandeur - but it was definitely more heavily populated. Every human city she'd visited had been the same - filled with thronging hordes, rubbing shoulders up avenues and roadways and across jam-packed marketplaces, shouting and cursing and chatting and bargaining, creating a constant, deafening din.

Once she'd started to think of the slaves kept in Commorragh as people, she had pitied the conditions they lived in - packed together in hot, overcrowded slave-quarters with barely more than standing-room. Now, she was wondering if perhaps the human slaves found such conditions to be pleasantly homey. She, meanwhile, most certainly_didn't_. Drow didn't generally rub elbows with one another if they could at all prevent it. Just about everyone had reason to suspect that someone probably wanted them dead, and any unknown face could belong to a quiet, efficient assassin out for your blood. Getting close would just make the killer's job easier. So everyone gave one another a wide berth - not hard, either, since there just weren't that many Drow to go 'round.

Even now, she knew she was lucky - her elven disguise caused most humans to give her a bit of extra space, unwilling to jostle someone who might be an important diplomat or wealthy merchant. The clothes she'd acquired to complete her disguise helped with that. But even so, insulated as she was from pointy elbows, she quailed at the closeness and noise of the human crowds, feeling overwhelmed and sick, deafened and overheated. Moving through the marketplace ahead would leave her nauseous, stressed-out, and probably the proud owner of a ringing headache.

Shying away from it, she turned a corner down a quiet, shady back-alley. She had a reasonably decent idea of the city's layout. It was a bit of a detour, but she could make her way around the marketplace, through less... active parts of town. And she wasn't in any hurry, really - the time-sensitive part of the day's tasks had been accomplished already. The traveler from Caristad had been quite eager to recount his tale, with little more than a few free drinks for lubrication - about the black-clad DragonRider saving him and many other slaves from the orcs that had occupied their city. More importantly, he'd given her a name - by all accounts, the DragonRider's name was Anitra, and she was the missing-presumed-dead daughter of famed Amazon Warrior, Arthenia - also missing-presumed-dead after dashing off into the night in pursuit of a kidnapper and serial-killer who had supposedly carried off her daughter. The girl had been born and raised in Caristad... and had been positively identified by several of her old friends.

Now, with this valuable information in hand, Direza was simply making her way back to her upscale inn to rest and plan her next move. She still didn't care much for being out during the day, especially not when the sun shone so brightly as it did today, but it was necessary in order to maintain her disguise. Walking through the crowded marketplace wasn't necessary, though, so why subject herself to it? Indeed, while the houses in this part of the city were rather ratty and run-down, they also featured a lot of overhanging floors, creating a comfortable shade and virtually turning some of the alleyways into tunnels... very homey! Well, to her it was - it didn't seem like what few humans she saw liked the area much, based on their scowls - but then, they also all looked rather poor, so perhaps that was the primary cause of their discontent.

She woke up with a start, confused and disoriented. Where was she? It was dark and cool, at least, but... last she remembered, she'd been walking the shady back-streets of the city, heading back to her inn. Her neck hurt. What had happened? A murmur of voices caught her attention - it was filtering through a door, from the sound of it, but her ears were sharp - and as she started to pick out words, a cold panic spread through her gut. "It wouldn't have been a good idea even if she had been an elf!" A rough, authoritarian voice growled. "The elves don't sit quietly if one of their own disappear - we'd have had the city guard breathing down our necks within hours trying to prevent a 'diplomatic incident' or whatnot! And yet, somehow, you bloody godsdamned retards managed to produce an even bigger and smellier load of crap in your trousers! Just what in the seven hells do you expect me to do with a fuckin' Drow spy?!"

A fine command of invective, she thought in a clinically detached fashion while trying to keep her breathing under control. She was gagged, she noted, so hyperventilating would be difficult anyway. Hands tied behind her, feet likewise. She was in some kind of small, dusty cell, presumably. Another, rather whiny voice bravely rose in self-defense on the other side of the no doubt locked door. "But boss, how wuz we supposed to know she wuz a Drow, huh? I mean, she looked just like an elf 'til we got that amulet off of her. 's just bad luck, is what it is - not our fault!"

Their 'boss' had apparently worn himself out with his earlier rant, and his reply sounded decidedly more tired and resigned. "Well, for starters, what did ya think a lone elf-girl in fancy clothes was doing in this part of town, huh? Betcha she was meeting an agent or another spy or something around here. I know that a few of my neighbors would sell their own mothers to the Drow for a bent copper, hah! And did you somehow miss the part where this would've been a terrible idea even if she had been a plain ol' elf?" A third voice - presumably the other half of the whiny voice's 'us' - replied to this, sounding rather truculent and mopey. "But boss, you were complaining just yesterday about needing some fresh blood for the brothel - heck, you specifically told us to be on the lookout for any good prospects, especially any 'exotic beauties' that might draw in some new customers. And you don't get a lot more exotic than an elf-girl, yeah?"

As the boss, with what sounded to her like dangerous patience, explained to his underling how he'd hoped for an 'exotic beauty' that_wouldn't_ bring the entire guard down on his head, but simply hadn't thought to specify, Direza shuddered. She was pretty sure she knew where she was, now. There were several such places in Commorragh, after all... slave-brothels. Where those who had silvers to spare, but couldn't afford to purchase and maintain a personal pleasure-slave, went to get their needs seen to by well-trained slaves who had been thoroughly tortured and terrified into mindless obedience.

Slavery was illegal in the vast majority of human realms, though - she knew that much. So this place was obviously an underground, criminal enterprise. They could underbid the legal brothels since they didn't need to pay their staff, and probably draw in some extra clientele just by being a lot less bothered about what state their girls were in after seeing said clients. But all of that relied on not attracting too much attention from the law. The odd patrolman could probably be bribed, with gold or some 'quality-time' with the girls, but if the authorities as a whole were given reason to take notice, things would sour very quickly. As the boss had just expounded on, kidnapping an elf-maiden and forcing her to work there would draw just such attention, since the girl would rapidly be missed, and the elves would have treaties in place that would _force_the local ruler to resolve the crime as quickly as possible.

Of course, a 'Drow spy' wouldn't be missed in the same way, as the whiny voice now pointed out - "So why can't you use her for something? Y'think the Drow will come looking for her?" The boss did not think that likely, no, but... "What, exactly, would you have me use her for? What, just give her a room and a bed like all the rest? I ain't saying there aren't some folks out there who'd happily pay to have their way with a Drow... but even they_would prob'ly wonder what a Drow was doing at my brothel to begin with! And others would hear about it, and start to get panicky - are _we working with the Drow? Or just providing a spy with room and board? Is a raid imminent? You'd be surprised at how quickly people's attitude towards slavery can pivot once they start to contemplate the possibility that they might be dragged away to some godforsaken underground pit and put to work under the whip! And then what happens, hmm? They run to the guard, to warn them about the dangerous Drow in our midst. And then we all go to the bleedin' gallows as Drow collaborators!" His patience had clearly been exhausted at the end, leading him to roar the last bit into the no doubt crestfallen faces of his men.

The voices got lower after that, but what she could make out sounded like they were trying to come up with a good way to dispose of her corpse so that it would never be discovered, or at least not linked back to them. After all, a dead Drow turning up unexplained in the gutters would have the guards in a tizzy trying to reconstruct events. They also debated whether they could use the Amulet of Disguise for anything, or perhaps sell it to get something out of their misfortune, but ultimately rejected it as too risky - after all, it was clearly a Drow artifact, which could once again bring unwanted attention to them. "I'll stash it somewhere out of sight, just in case we find a use for it - or a reliable buyer!" She heard the boss grunt. Not the sort to throw away a potential profit, then, even if there were risks attached. That was useful, if she intended to avoid the fate he seemed to be drawing up for her now.

After taking a few minutes to get her body fully under control - squashing the last vestiges of unreasoning panic, resisting the urge to pull at her bonds and thus needlessly damage her wrists and ankles, stabilizing her heartbeat and breathing steadily through her nose - she began to think things through. She needed to convince the 'boss' that she could be an asset, rather than a liability. Depraved and ruthless though he might be, he was a _businessman_first and foremost - and she had dealt with any number of depraved and ruthless businessmen in her time. Drow merchants were a thing, after all, and the steps they were willing to take to safeguard their profits could likely have made this criminal entrepreneur blanch. And that meant dealing with the gag, first. After all, once they'd settled on the method, it was more than likely that they'd kill her without bothering to remove the gag first - why take the risk that she might turn out to be a sorcerer or something, right?

Fortunately, she'd been tied up in a rather slapdash fashion - no doubt by the two goons who were currently enjoying the weight of their lord's disfavor outside the door. And like most Drow children of noble birth, she had received basic training in escape and evasion-techniques as a child, what with kidnapping being an occasional tool of the Great Game as well. It was a long time since she'd practiced those rope-escape techniques and whatnot - centuries, even - but knowing that you were about to be cut into small pieces and dumped in a swamp sharpened the mind wonderfully. She recalled the words of a stern and wizened teacher, in a house whose name she could no longer recall - and the encouraging sting of her switch when her pupil was too slow to escape the practice-ropes.

Five minutes later, she was free. Or, rather, she'd slipped out of her bonds and removed the gag. She was still locked in a tiny, dusty room - more of a broom-closet than a cell, really, and clearly not meant for any kind of long-term storage of prisoners, what with lacking any kind of 'facilities' - with only one door and at least three no-doubt burly and armed men right outside. Nor were there any convenient windows she could crawl through. She could hide behind the door when it opened, perhaps, but then what? Ambush them with her complete lack of hand-to-hand combat-skills? Try to dash past them, into a completely unfamiliar facility filled with hardened criminals? No. All she could do was negotiate - now she merely had the_opportunity_ to do so.

And the seed of an idea had already taken root in her mind, much as she quailed at the thought. The idea of what she'd have to do if he actually accepted made her feel sick to her stomach... and she'd still only make a prisoner of herself, buying time to come up with an actual escape-plan. Surely, there had to be some alternative! What if she offered to wear the amulet and join the rest of his whores as a valuable, 'elven' maiden who wouldn't be missed? No, no, he'd be a fool to accept - especially since he'd no doubt realize that she'd overheard the conversation outside the door. She'd be able to screw him over at any point by revealing her true nature to a suitably paranoid 'client', and might even potentially manage to escape in the ensuing chaos. No, she needed to come up with something else... anything else...

But when the door creaked open, leaking in the light of smoky oil-lamps filled with cheap, low-quality oil, she still hadn't come up with anything - and so, hoping that whatever tattered fragments of her soul still remained could bear the burden, she went with her first plan. The trio of criminals - a short, stocky man with a bushy beard and a rapidly balding head, muscular despite his pronounced paunch, trailed by two rather reedy and shifty-looking types who had to be the thugs who originally kidnapped her - froze just inside the door when they saw her standing there, leaning against the back wall with her arms crossed and a bored expression on her face, unbound and ungagged.

Weapons jumped into hands. The two men in the back seemed to only be carrying stout cudgels, but their boss had a slightly chipped broadsword in his hands now, and held it with an air of slightly rusty competence. "You blistering morons really can't do anything right, can you?" he asked the room with an air of resignation. Direza chuckled. "Don't be too hard on them, good sir. I'm sure they're perfectly decent at tying people up, for their... class. But I am Drow. What I don't know about ropes and chains isn't worth knowing."

"That a fact?" he grunted, eyes watchful, sword ready in hand - but he wasn't advancing, not yet. He was trying to gauge her, wondering what her game was. But he, too, was not in her class. Hiding her true feelings behind a carefully-crafted mask, why, that was one of the most basic skills necessary for entry into the Great Game. At least if you intended to survive for very long. She nodded, firmly, confidently. "Oh yes. But you know, if you find that you are hard-up for decent help... I happen to be looking for work at this time, wouldn't you know it. Frankly, I'm getting tired of pretending to be some milksop elf..." she spat on the floor, grimacing, as if she found the very idea of being mistaken for one of her lighter-skinned cousins distasteful. "...I have to be outside during the day, under that accursed sun, and maintaining the image gets really expensive in the long run."

"So... you're offering to work for me, then?" She stocky brothel-manager asked guardedly. She flashed him a grin, shockingly white in her ashen face - in the murk of the small room, it had to be hard for their weak, human eyes to even see her face, really. "Not on my back, if that's what you're thinking. But like I said, I know quite a bit of chains and bonds... and many other interesting tools. Comes with the territory, really. And I'm sure a man in your position can find uses for a woman with my... expertise, no?"

She could tell that he was considering it now - weighing the option, now that it had been brought up. There were many ways to keep a stable of pleasure-slaves in line, no doubt, but the three most common were drugs, debt, and fear. And of the three, the last one was by far the cheapest. Indeed, that's what the Drow used for their slave-staffed brothels - after all, what could possibly cause more fear in the helpless than the sight of a Drow torturer? Well, a proper Haemonculus, perhaps - those masters of alchemy, flesh-sculpting and dark magic who raised the infliction of pain to the height of fine art. But few outsiders even realized that they existed, so that was a moot point.

"I suppose that would be helpful to my bottom line..." the crime-boss finally acknowledged, lowering his sword but not sheathing it. "However, since you were obviously eavesdropping on my earlier conversation with these two nitwits, I'm sure you also realize that keeping you here would be rather... risky for my business. And while I cannot claim to be any kind of grand patriot, I'd really rather not provide a safe haven for someone who's preparing this city for a Drow slave-raid." She laughed a this, shaking her head. "How terribly virtuous of you, good sir! But have no fear - despite your apparent assumption, I'm no 'Drow spy'. Rather, I am a deserter - in business for myself, with naught but a particularly painful execution waiting for me back home. As for the risks... as long as neither I nor any of my 'clients' leave this building, those should be manageable, no?"

He blinked, eyes narrowing in further consideration. "You would make yourself a prisoner here?" He asked, sounding bemused. She shrugged. "From what I can tell, I already am a prisoner here, no? And if the alternative is to leave here in small pieces bound for the nearby marshes, well, I rather would prefer to stay, you know? Also, lest you forget - I am Drow. I will outlive you ten times over, human! So I can afford to bide my time. Your little 'business' will no doubt collapse eventually, as will your little organization and, at that point, I'll probably get bored and head out. Until then? I get room - preferably without windows - board, and a chance to amuse myself on the regular. It's not such a bad deal from my perspective, really..."

The two men in the back, cudgels still held tight, seemed to shiver and shrink back a bit as she flashed all three of them with her most chilling and sadistic smile - one she'd used any number of times before, to intimidate underlings and rivals alike. It worked on Drow- so on humans, it was if anything overkill. Even the boss blanched a bit, sweat dewing his broad forehead, but he refused to step back. Instead, he nodded slowly and sheathed his sword. "Hiring a new torturer wasn't really on my to-do list today, but when opportunity knocks... a'right, you've got a deal - just don't go practicing those skills of yours on anyone I don't tell you to practice on, eh? And try not to scare away my men - they may be idiots, but I do rather need them in order to run my business..." He threw a dark glance over his shoulder at the two minions who were trying to hide there - causing them to immediately straighten up and do their best to look unconcerned.

"So... you got a name?" He asked, arms crossed and a bushy eyebrow raised. As she opened her mouth to reply, she realized that she didn't want to give her real name. However much this man might want to keep her presence here a secret, there was a chance it'd get around... and this... this wasn't how she'd want the DragonRider to hear of her! She needed another name, and fast, lest her hesitation tip off her new 'employer'. "Lelith. Lelith Hesperax, if you want to be all officious..." she then swiftly lied. It was the first female drow name that popped into her head - that of her long-time favorite Arena-champion, if one did not count that one show-stealing appearance from a certain DragonRider. Ah, but if she had even half of that legendary Wych gladiator's flawless skill, the three men before her would've already been in several pieces on the floor! Even armed with naught but her fingernails...

"Lelith, huh? Well, welcome aboard. I'm Ludwig Fainberg, leader of this little organization and your new boss, apparently. Here's to a profitable future..." Alas, she was no gladiator, nor had she had her fingernails reshaped into deadly weapons by a master-class Haemonculus, so all she could do was shake hands with this stocky, paunchy crime-lord and display every enthusiasm to 'get to work'. She received, as promised, a new room - larger, cleaner, and more well-furnished than the cell, but with just as many windows and a door that could only be locked from the outside. Not far from Ludwig's own quarters, and conveniently located near the torture-chamber, too, as it turned out.

She was soon introduced to her 'workspace', too - and to her predecessor, a very tall, rather sulky man wearing a leathery mask that left free his stubbly chin, a butcher's apron, a ragged pair of trousers held in place with a stout rope, and nothing else. The mask was clearly an affection - unlike an 'official' executioner, this beast of a man had no need to hide his identity. From that and so much more, she could immediately peg him as a dabbler of the worst sort - a garden-variety sadist with no education or training, armed only with a perverse fondness for inflicting pain. Ludwig assured him that he'd have plenty of opportunities to hurt people as an enforcer and all-round leg-breaker too, but it wasn't until he was promised that he could come watch her work if he wasn't needed elsewhere that he brightened up.

His tools, unsurprisingly, were severely limited and poorly maintained - the later part she could correct on her own with a bit of elbow-grease, while the former required her to work out a shopping-list for her 'boss'. Truly specialized torture-implements were out of the question, of course - they'd be difficult and expensive to obtain, and might draw the wrong kind of attention. But there were plenty of perfectly innocuous tools and items that could work just fine in the right hands, and Ludwig grudgingly agreed to send one of his 'boys' out on a shopping-trip to ensure she'd be well-supplied. "Can't expect a proper craftsman to work without decent tools, I s'pose..." he admitted with a shrug.

She rather suspected that it wouldn't take long for her first 'client' to appear - Ludwig would want to test both her determination and her skills, as well as make it clear to his 'stable' what new and sordid fate awaited the disobedient and rebellious. But she had enough time to quickly run through her past experiences in her head, and pick out the arts that would be most likely to be applicable in this situation. She was no Haemonculus, sure, but she'd been carefully trained, and had many decades of practical experience to draw upon. Her 'employer' would not be disappointed.

Torture served many purposes in Commorragh. Keeping slaves in line, interrogating captives, entertainment, pure artistry - but in the Temple, it was part of the worship of Lolth. Heretics, traitors, and those who had simply failed her were tortured before her altar prior to the sacrifice, to cleanse the Drow race of their sins. Many other rituals simply called for the lengthy torture of slaves - human, specifically. Lolth seemed to delight in the sound of human screams in particular - why, Direza didn't know, and she'd never found the right time to ask the capricious and distant spider-goddess.

Regardless, she'd learned the ways of those rituals as a junior priestess, and practiced more intricate forms as she advanced through the ranks. Many of the procedures she was so intimately familiar with seemed like they'd be useful here, too. After all, the rituals were ideally_supposed to produce the requisite screams of soul-tearing agony_without wasting valuable slaves. Let them recover and heal, and you could torture them again tomorrow! Or next week, more likely. Of course, diminishing returns was an issue - hence why those who survived the simpler rituals would be sent to the more _complex_ones the next time around, lest they become desensitized to the torments at hand and their screams lost their heartfelt intensity.

Her stomach was tying itself in knots as the memories washed over her, the faces of the slaves she'd cruelly and ruthlessly tortured glaring out of the past at her, hissing accusations. A few stood out in particular - black-haired women who now seemed to take on the DragonRider's face, the DragonRider's inhuman, vertically-slitted but sapphire-blue eyes. The hatred and anger they bore was unbearable. "How could you do this thing to me?!" those long-lost faces demanded, and she had no answer. Fortunately, she was alone in the torture-chamber, and it had a covered shaft leading into the city's rudimentary sewer-system - for disposing of any 'accidents' the room's visitors might have under duress. The stench that rose from it as she hurriedly removed the cover was sickening, but she hardly noticed as she emptied her stomach. It struck her as distantly ironic that just a couple of months ago, she'd put her mouth to several disgusting uses as part of her bargain with the Drow scout, and still managed to keep her supper where it was. But now, faced with the prospect of once again practicing an art she knew well and had mastered, her whole body seemed to rebel. This was exactly what she had fled Commorragh to avoid...

By the time Ludwig entered the room, with her predecessor trailing close behind carrying a frightened-looking young woman in his beefy hands, however, she'd managed to center herself again. With concentration and effort, she'd sheathed her heart, stomach, and whatever was left of her soul in ice, and put on her best face. Even the sight of her terrified the girl into shrieking hysterics, and as soon as the hulking ex-torturer had strapped her to the rack, Direza gagged her thoroughly. "What shape would you like her to be in when I'm done?" She asked coolly, glancing over her shoulder at her 'boss'. He shrugged and settled down in a nearby chair, obviously intending to keep an eye on her first session - while her predecessor hovered nearby, clearly much more eager to watch a 'master' at work. "She still needs to be able to work. No marks that might put off the customers."

She nodded, and ran her fingers over her tools. "May I ask what misdeed got her sent here?" Ludwig seemed to contemplate the question for a moment, trying to decide whether there was any reason to tell her 'no', then finally replied "She kicked a customer. Didn't hit anything too sensitive, but it wasn't for lack of trying, and he was most put out." Direza nodded again, then turned her attention to the terrified girl strapped helplessly to the rack before her. Stepping in, she grabbed the girl's gagged jaws with a firm grip and bored into the young woman's wide, staring eyes with her own ice-cold glare. "Let me guess..." she posited chillingly. "The fellow got rough with you, didn't he? And you didn't much like that, hmm?" After a few seconds of terrified staring, the girl apparently realized that she was waiting for an actual answer, and her head jerked slightly in the harsh grip - a nod.

Sighing, Direza relinquished her grip, and reached for her tools. Nothing complicated would be needed here, just a few needles. Three would do, even. Holding them up in front of the girl's wide eyes, she shook her head sadly. "That was a foolish thing to do, slave. Foolish indeed. But fear not, I will... enlighten you as to the realities of your situation." Grabbing one of the young woman's nipples between two fingers, she pointed one of the needles - a nice, thick one, nearly two inches long with a broad head for gripping, the sort used by seamstresses everywhere when they needed to quickly stick two pieces of fabric together - directly at its tip.

Slowly, inexorably, she forced the needle into the hard, fleshy nub - not sideways through it, but inwards, until it broke through the nipple and into the softer breast-tissue beyond. The gradual widening of the needle, meanwhile, would be applying an agonizing internal pressure on the central nub. The girl was screaming nonstop through the gag as she did it, and it didn't decrease noticeably when Direza finished the job and released her grip on the breast. Fully embedded, only the head of the needle was visible - but beyond it, the pointy metal was buried in soft, tender flesh. As the girl struggled with her bonds, the breast swayed, causing fresh pain and deeper damage as the needle shifted.

The other breast received the same treatment, of course - slowly, carefully and meticulously, the needle was inserted to its full length, doubling the pain the young woman was enduring. By the time this was in place, she'd managed to scream herself exhausted - and possibly also realize that every movement only increased the pain. She was hanging limp from the rack, now, sobbing quietly and taking ragged breaths through her nose. Stepping up again, Direza grabbed her face once more and met the half-closed, tear-filled eyes with her own steady glare. "Now, then..." she said softly, "I do hope the first part of this lesson has... sunk in. If a customer wants to hurt you, he gets to hurt you. If he wants to blacken your eyes and bloody your nose, you'll smile through the punches and thank him for the attention. If he wants to fuck your ass bloody, you'll spread your cheeks so he can do it deeper. If he wants to bruise your cunt, you'll spread your legs for every blow. Because otherwise, you'll wind up back here, in my care, and I can hurt you far worse than some lecherous sadist can even imagine."

Her calm words, emphatic delivery and ice-cold reasoning seemed to push through the girl's terror and pain, and the tear-stained eyes opened wide. They then caught sight of the third and final needle, which Direza was holding up for her inspection - no less long and thick than the rest. It disappeared from the girl's view as she moved it lower, down between her legs, and rested its cold steel tip against a small nub at the top of her pussy. Her clitoris was fully withdrawn, hidden within the folds of its hood, but that wouldn't protect it from the unyielding metal. Slowly, ever so slowly, Direza pressed the needle home, piercing the hood from the front... then pausing. "Do you understand, my pretty?" She cooed, and the girl's face immediately jerked with multiple terrified nods in her hand. The needle was resting directly against the concealed clitoris, she knew - but had not yet penetrated it.

"Well, let's just find out, shall we?" Direza commented brightly, pulling the needle away as she took a step back - leaving the two piercing the nipples where they were. Once she undid the leather straps that bound her victim to the rack, the girl slid limply down to collapse on the ground, gag still in place, shoulders shaking with some mixture of fear and relief. With gentle hands, Direza helped her up, until she was shakily standing. "Now then..." she whispered in the girl's ear, "A test of your comprehension. Spread your legs and keep them that way. If you fall, get back up and resume the position until you have been instructed otherwise."

Whimpering through the gag, hugging herself tightly with her now-free arms, which were sporting red marks around the wrists from her earlier struggles, the girl obeyed - spreading her legs as she stood there. Then Direza nodded over at her predecessor, who had been watching with rapt attention. "Go ahead. Amuse yourself with a few kicks." Then Direza stepped away, leaving the girl standing alone in the middle of the floor, unbound and untouched, as she watched the huge, bulky man grunt in a manner that brought to mind a delighted pig while he stepped up before her. The huge, thuggish man was wearing equally huge and sturdy workman's boots. Her eyes were practically feverish with pain and fear... but she remained standing where she was, legs spread, her pussy fully exposed.

The sadistic ex-torturer clearly wasn't inclined to play games with her, or to hold back. His first kick hit her groin with full force, lifting her off her feet as her eyes bulged. Her knees buckled and her thighs instinctively snapped shut as she tumbled to the ground - eliciting fresh agonies in her chest as the still-embedded needles were jostled. Direza chuckled and gave the girl a gentle kick in the ribs - more of a nudge, really - as she trembled on the floor, hands covering her brutalized pussy. "Come, now - you heard me, did you not? Back up you go, legs spread, until the customer have had his fun..."

The look that the girl directed up at her was pure terror - further proof that the Temple's torture-master had been absolutely right when she explained to her eager young students that the expectation_of _future pain tended to trump any pain the subject was_currently_ experiencing. Staggering and shuddering, the girl got to her feet... and spread them. This repeated itself two more times, with every kick sending her to the floor, shuddering with pain - only after she'd gotten back up after the third kick, spreading her legs to show off her now visibly bruised and swollen pussy, did Ludwig call off his goon. "Enough, Porky! I need her able to_work_ tomorrow!" The towering man, who had already been winding up for another kick, eyes gleaming, lowered his foot with a disappointed sigh. The girl, meanwhile, remained standing, eyes vague and unfocused. Ludwig looked past her to where Direza stood, and gave her a nod. "As good as your reputation, I see..." he commented.

Shrugging, Direza stepped up to the girl and touched her on the shoulder. "It seemed you passed your comprehension-test..." she said quietly. "You may now collapse as you like. But see that you do not forget the lesson I taught you, or I shall have to give you a... refresher." Whimpering, the girl obediently collapsed on the floor, whole body shaking - while Direza crouched behind her, reached around her chest, and pulled the twin needles out of her tits with swift, merciful jerks. Blood welled from the tiny punctures, but the small width meant that they'd heal up swiftly, nor would they be very noticeable to the paying customer.

As the girl was carried from the room by the former torturer, who was apparently nicknamed 'Porky' for what seemed like fairly obvious reasons, Direza's first day at work came to an end. She suspected that she wouldn't be called upon every day - especially since word would inevitably spread through the stable, and the mere fact that a Drow torturer was waiting to 'educate' anyone who misbehaved would induce obedience at least in the short term. This ensured that she'd have plenty of time to spend in her dark, windowless room, trying to come up with some way to get herself out of this place while her sanity and self-control still lasted.

She wasn't being treated badly, of course. Despite Ludwig's request, she really didn't need to do much in order to frighten the other criminals who provided the muscle of the operation. Just a cold smile and a measuring look now and then, as if she was sizing them up for the rack - and they'd shrink away from her, no doubt trying to reassure themselves that the boss would never turn her loose on one of them, no matter how badly they screwed the pooch. This, at least, ensured that no-one was going to barge unannounced into her room - when she was called for, there'd be a polite knock on the door.

However, they all knew about the terms of her 'arrangement' with Ludwig. That she wasn't allowed to leave. So no matter how afraid they were, they weren't about to just let her walk right out of the brothel - which she eventually realized was literally underground, being located in the extensive and well-concealed basement of a dusty, run-down warehouse that she'd yet to see. Indeed, a guard was permanently stationed by a nearby staircase, primarily to grab any slaves who might try to make a run for it by that route - but also providing him with a good view of her door. So sneaking out was also unlikely to be possible.

And then there was her Amulet of Disguise. Ludwig had it, somewhere, she did not know where - and if she escaped without it, she wouldn't get far. Her mere appearance would cause panic and send the city guard converging on her before she could make it halfway to the gates. There were Drow skilled in stealth, masters of leaping silently from shadow to shadow, who would no doubt have considered such a trip to be a walk in the proverbial park - but that wasn't what she had spent her centuries learning.

What skills did she possess, then? What were the tools she would have to marshal in order to get out of this jam? Well, she was really good at torturing people, at least by above-ground standards - which was why she was still alive. But that, by itself, wouldn't get her out of here. She was also quite adept at intrigue, manipulation, intimidation, and the rest of the skills needed for the Great Game - but she was far from her home field, and while those abilities no doubt would be part of it, she simply didn't know enough about these humans, their ways, their traditions, their fears, their rules, their organization or their families to play them the way she'd played many a Drow back home.

And then, of course, there was the thing she'd spent the most time and effort on... her dedication to Lolth, and the clerical powers that had come from that. She had served Lolth faithfully for centuries, from Novice to Acolyte to Priestess to High Priestess. Throughout, she had learned ever more complex and potent ways to call upon Lolth's fearsome, divine power - as long as she stood upon hallowed ground, or was suitably close to a Sanctified Altar of Lolth, anyway. It was only when she'd ascended the final step and become the High Priestess that Lolth had deigned to grant her a tiny spark of Her own divine self - the source of any Cleric's power. With this, she carried an Altar of Lolth in her heart, enabling her to call upon Her powers anywhere... though, of course, even this was nothing compared to the near-demigod level of divine might she could unleash when she stood within the Sanctum Umbra at the heart of the Temple-Citadel.

Now, though, those mighty, earth-shaking powers seemed very distant indeed. She was farther from any place sacred to Lolth than she could ever have dreamed of in Commorragh, and she had cut herself off from her erstwhile goddess. Her powers as a Cleric were gone... well...almost gone. The fragment of divine power that Lolth had fused to her soul remained there - it was a part of her, now, and no betrayal or excommunication could remove it. If she called upon that, she could still wield the powers of a Cleric... or at least a tiny fraction of it. Enough juice to heal scrapes and bruises, or even soothe aching muscles - something she'd used on occasion during the early days of her escape, despite some misgivings.

A mere whisper of power. She wasn't going to blast her way out of here, or send her adversaries writhing and screaming to the floor as dark energies tore at their very souls. How could such a tiny amount of power be any help? Well... the whisper became a touch louder when she turned it to those ends that were most firmly within Lolth's purview. Those spells and tricks that even the least of Lolth's servants could call upon, so intrinsic to Her nature were they. Fear. Darkness.Spiders. And the hidden basement of a dusty warehouse, unsurprisingly, had a few spiders hanging around.

It was a mere thread, a vague possibility, and it would take time. And while she'd found a certain satisfaction in turning the residual power Lolth had left within her to healing ends, using it _this_way seemed like a betrayal of herself. But she had nothing else - no other ideas or plans - and just by the work she had accepted, she had already betrayed her own resolve as thoroughly as she ever could. So she went to work, in the downtime between torture-sessions, meals, and sleep.

The work, meanwhile, got worse. After all, anyone as easily cowed as her first 'visitor' would be terrified by the idea of her all by itself, and thus likely behave. Anyone inclined to still act out would be the most willful and rebellious - those not easily deterred or broken. More extensive work was needed for them, still with the caveat that they needed to be able to return to work after recovering, now suitably cowed.

The next visitor she was called to the torture-room to deal with was quite young - definitely more girl than woman. It stood to reason that this would be another way that this shady place could draw business away from legal brothels - from what Direza had been able to gather so far, the short-lived humans considered a girl ready to marry, get pregnant, and if necessary work on her back by the time she turned 16 or 17. The girl now brought before her didn't seem like she'd seen her 15th birthday yet, and she was filled with the fire of youth, not screaming or crying as she was brought in, but declaring, despite her trembling voice and lip, that "I'm not afraid of you, monster!"

Direza didn't take it personally. She just chuckled, and attached the girl carefully to the rack before going to work. No needles this time, at least not yet - she didn't want to draw the session out unnecessarily, dishing out pain that this fiery lass would grunt her way through with clenched teeth. Instead, she pulled out the razor - a fine, well-sharpened instrument that any barber or surgeon would've been proud of. With exquisite care, she bisected the girl's right nipple diagonally with the razor, eliciting a gasp of surprised pain from her still ungagged victim, before immediately doing it again in the other direction - cutting an X into the sensitive nub. Not as painful as one might have expected - not with such a keen blade, anyway. But it was just a prelude.

With a deft touch, she pulled open the nipple - bending the triangular fragments down against the underlying, still-developing breast - where she attached each of them in turn with short, pearl-headed needles. Blood welled from the open wound, but she carefully dabbed it away as her subject shuddered, breath catching in her throat at the steadily growing pain. This pain, as usual, was then doubled as the same treatment was given to the other nipple. Eight triangular segments, pinned down in an open display of weeping, nerve-filled tissue - the 'bloody flower' her teachers had called it. Then the fine salt was added, and the screaming began.

This time, there was no last-minute reprieve for the victim's most tender parts, either. With the razor, Direza meticulously carved away the girl's entire clitoral hood, leaving the small fragment of bloodied flesh to fall to the ground with a quiet plop, audible only to her sharp, elven ears. The edges of this fine cut, she covered in healing salve - an important tool in any good torturer's trade - to ensure that it would heal neatly and without any disfiguring scarring. All the same, the damage she'd just done would be permanent and crippling. Bereft of its hiding-place, her fully-exposed clit - even if nothing else unfortunate happened to it - would gradually grow desensitized over the years to come, eventually robbing the girl of any ability to derive pleasure from it. Assuming, of course, that she lived that long, her unfortunate situation taken into consideration.

Even so, this was just a prelude. The razor, wielded by Direza's steady hand and guided by her inhumanly sharp eyes, neatly bisected the girl's clit in a vertical fashion - and then two more needles came into use, though placing them in such small targets was quite the finicky task. Still, it was a task Direza was quite capable of, leaving tiny clit's internal, nerve-rich tissue - many times more sensitive than the nipples - fully exposed. Already, the girl was bawling, trying desperately to string together incoherent apologies and pleas for forgiveness, promises of future good behavior and obedience. It likely wouldn't have made much sense to someone who had not, like her, heard such pleas so many times before.

It was at such a point that mercy became the keenest blade in a torturer's arsenal. The girl, like her predecessor, was offered a chance to prove that the lesson had already sunk in, that no further_education_ was necessary. Like her predecessor, she seized it with the eagerness of a drowning man grasping a piece of flotsam. She had not been sent there for trying to fight back against a violent customer, but rather for general disobedience and bad attitude - and her orders were given accordingly. When released from the rack, nipples and clit still held open by the needles, internal tissue painfully exposed to the air, she thus fell to her knees, and kissed Direza's feet with tears still running non-stop from her eyes. "Thank... you... for educating... me... Mistress Hesperax..." the girl haltingly choked out between sobs. Then, as she kissed the other foot: "Thank you... for your mercy... Mistress Hesperax..."

Ritual complete, she was pulled back upright and strapped back into the rack - purely to keep her still while Direza undid her labors. The needles were removed, the aching tissue was slathered in healing salve, and each of the three sensitive nubs were squeezed back together into their original configuration. The salve by itself stuck the flesh together decently enough, but to ensure that it'd all heal up neatly without unnecessary scarring, the needles were put back into play - now stuck sideways through each nipple, vertically and horizontally, to keep the arrangement together. And, of course, one final needle directly through the clit. All while Direza calmly explained that she was merely taking steps to ensure neat healing, and that the needles would have to be left in place overnight. Broken, obedient, the young girl choked out a final "Thank... you... for... your... mercy... Mistress... Hesperax..." before she was carried away.

The third woman to be dragged into her torture-chamber, nearly a week later, was at least and undeniably a woman, but that was the end of the good news for Direza's tattered soul. Still shapely, with impressively large breasts - even for a human - but clearly well into middle age. Her expression was bitter as Ludwig personally escorted her into the room, his face furious. "She bit a customer!" he declared. "I had to foot the healer's bill for... reattachment, and it was a pretty copper, let me tell you. Frankly, at this point, she isn't even worth feeding - I guess she figured she'd get trashed soon regardless, and decided to cause me some grief on the way out. Well, more fool her - make it clear to all of them that being quietly disposed of because you aren't profitable anymore is not the worst that can happen. Make an example of this sow!"

For all his fury, however, Ludwig did not elect to stay for the show. And even her occasional assistant - and number one fan - 'Porky' eventually dashed from the room with shades of green showing under his leathery mask. This woman did not need to be able to work again. She was condemned to death anyway, and Direza's only job was to make that death as obviously agonizing as possible. This, too, was a familiar task - after all, you didn't want slaves to imagine that they could find some kind of solace in the silent embrace of death, did you? Only absolute obedience and utter submission should offer any kind of refuge.

Direza slipped into a fugue state as she worked, switching off her mind as much as she could, simply going through the familiar steps. Just another slave whose screams would please Lolth in the final hours before the Sacrifice. The flaying, the cutting, the white-hot irons, all felt familiar and comfortable in her hands. She didn't need to_think_ in order to do this - she'd done it a hundred times before, presiding over countless sacrificial rituals while biding her time as one of the previous High Priestess' proteges. Still, the_ending_ was different this time. No altar-stone awaited the gurgling, trembling mound of flesh that remained when she was done. Instead, she was lifted onto a stretcher and paraded before her erstwhile colleagues, carried by the only two members of Ludwig's organization who hadn't immediately puked out their guts at the sight - and even those iron-stomached gentlemen looked decidedly green around the gills.

As for the 'audience', half of them fainted on the spot, while the rest threw up or collapsed into hysterics. Only two of the slave-whores remained standing - her two previous guests, who simply stared at the blood-and-pus-dripping thing on the stretcher with feverish, wide-open eyes, shaking like young trees in a storm. In the end, on her employer's request, Direza put the thing that was once a woman out of her misery with her own hands, slitting her throat with her razor and finally letting her bleed out, fading away into death's long-awaited embrace. What they did with the remains afterwards, she did not know, nor particularly care - presumably, they had an established way of disposing of those who had ceased to be profitable.

Afterwards, in her room, she found it hard to focus on her plans for escape. She'd hoped that by zoning out throughout, she'd be able to let it all pass over her. That she wouldn't have to remember what she'd done, afterwards. And indeed, most of it was a blur - but several images still clung to her brain like cobwebs, making her repeatedly heave over her chamberpot despite her stomach already being thoroughly emptied. The flesh of the woman's sphincter blistering and bubbling as the thick iron rod piercing her rectum was gradually heated to white-hot by the brazier its base rested in. The sight of her ovaries, pulled out of the carefully-placed surgical cuts on her abdomen, dangling from the fallopian tubes as needle after needle was driven through them, before they were finally lowered into the vise. The way the parchment-thin skin covering her breasts had finally let go, revealing the fatty tissue beneath. And the endless pleading, the begging, not for release or mercy, but simply for death. It had only stopped when the ball of bloodied flesh that had once been her uterus was jammed into her mouth as an improvised gag.

Again and again, Direza heaved, the pain in her stomach a distant and pathetic echo of the agony she had just finished inflicting.

She was left to her own devices for a long time after that - long enough to recover, and to continue with the groundwork of her plan. Hardly surprising. By now, the brothel's 'workforce' had to have been terrified into complete obedience, and it'd take quite a while before the image they'd been forced to see would fade from their minds. It was valuable time for her, and the results were starting to show. If they'd just leave her alone for a while longer, she might just be able to pull an escape-plan together before she needed to hurt anyone else...

Alas, a few weeks later - still several days at best before she could start putting things into motion - she was called upon again. Not directly into the torture-chamber this time, but rather into Ludwig's own room. He greeted her cheerfully enough to suggest that he'd somehow managed to forget what her last piece of work had looked like, and opened the conversation with "Ya know, I have to admit, you really put one over me..." This was enough to drive a singing spike of paranoia into her mind - what was he talking about? Had he figured out what she was doing somehow? But her mask was firmly attached by now, so she merely smiled coolly and waited for him to continue.

Which he did, shortly, after pouring himself a glass of golden-brown whiskey that might have helped with both his forgetfulness and his current mood. "I figured I'd be working you pretty hard - that I'd gotten a right steal, acquiring a Drow torture-master for the price of room and board. But so far, you've worked three days out of nearly a month!" Direza let her smile widen a bit more. "Has my work been in any way... unsatisfactory, good sir?" she purred. He chuckled and shook his head. "No, it's been just as thorough as any man could want. And after just three examples of your craft, why, every one of my 'employees' has been behaving themselves_splendidly_. Quiet, obedient, respectful and eager to please, every last one of them, even the ones that used to be rather ill-tempered. Of course, that probably doesn't surprise _you -_but I don't think I ever really realized just how different a level you were on, compared to poor old Porky."

She merely shrugged, accepting the compliment with apparent humility while inwards quailing in shame at it. After another sip at his whiskey, Ludwig gestured with the half-empty glass. "Well, the point I'm trying to get at is that you've got a pretty nice setup. I still gotta feed you, but you don't have to lift a finger - your presence alone keeps all the girls on the straight and narrow. But I don't much care for feeding those who don't work, y'know, and I also_don't want you to get _bored, so I've been looking around for some suitable way to apply your arts to my profit and your entertainment. And wouldn't you know it, I've found something..."

Direza masterfully faked an eager tone as she declared, "Do tell!" and waved for him to continue. With an eager grin and piles of gold reflected in his eyes, Ludwig explained how he'd been in touch with an occasional acquaintance of his in the slave-trade who'd supplied him with a few 'exotic beauties' before. The fellow had, apparently, come into possession of a party of potentially valuable but ultimately problematic goods - a round dozen Nekomata. Direza wasn't familiar with these creatures, and Ludwig hadn't been either until his contact explained. Once he had, however, it became obvious where 'Lelith Hesperax' might fit in.

The Nekomata were apparently a tribe of beast-people, mostly found in the forested regions of the continent's eastern borders, and on some of the islands offshore. Feline in appearance, they were commonly referred to simply as 'cat-people', which fit quite well - they had soft, thin fur, cat-like ears, and even tails that apparently split and ultimate multiplied as they got older. Their feline looks, flexibility and general beauty made the women of this tribe much valued by those inclined to keep sex-slaves - and their exotic rarity didn't hurt either. There was just one catch - the Nekomata possessed a strong pride, a fierce temper, and a selection of natural weapons. Their claws and fangs could be deadly, and their lithe bodies were as strong as that of a large and burly man.

Hence, even if you could manage to catch some, breaking their spirits and making them safe enough to sell was a challenge and a half! Well, long story short, the slave-trader had offered Ludwig a share of the profits, AND a free Nekomata that he could add to his stables, if his tame Drow torturer could break his property to the whip. 'Lelith Hesperax' could, perhaps, have pointed out that their original agreement was that no-one who'd been subjected to her skills would leave the place and thus potentially spread word of her presence - a measure meant as much for _her_protection as for his. But in the end, Ludwig was her 'employer', and he clearly didn't feel that these barbaric beast-people from a remote tribe would be able to tell anyone anything useful about her even if they wound up in a position to do so at some point. If she protested, she'd just be overruled - in fact, he'd likely enjoy having a chance to pull rank on her. So she kept her peace, and instead simply asked "When will they arrive?" with an eager, sadistic smile on her face. The answer turned out to be - alas - not long enough to finish preparing for her escape, but just long enough for her to request some additional tools and have the rack and its bonds suitably reinforced.

Soon, twelve Nekomata filed into her torture-chamber. They still held their feline heads high, despite the manacles binding their wrists and ankles, and the spiked choke-collars around their throats. The look they gave her was filled with disdain. Presumably, their distant tribes had no familiarity with the reputation of the Drow... well, that was about to change. A steel-barred cage had been set up in the room in order to confine the Nekomata as each in turn was 'conditioned' - with the sight and sound hopefully softening them up, making each successive treatment easier than the previous. It wasn't terribly large, leaving not even enough room to sit as all but one of them were pushed in there. Meanwhile, one unlucky catgirl - looking marginally less self-assured by now - was pulled towards the rack by Porky.

The girl was probably fairly young, by Nekomata standards, Direza judged - only a single tail, which split near the end into two tips. Her coat was a silken gray-white, her feline features elegant, and her ears tufted. Her emerald-green eyes were disturbing - staring unblinkingly at her torturer, with vertical pupils that reminded Direza painfully of the DragonRider. All she could do, however, was shake it off and get to work. She'd received a clear enough premise from their owner, by way of Ludwig - their appearance could not be marred, nor could their ability to pleasure a man... but other than that, she could go to town, and if they were sterile when she was done, well, so much the better.

She'd also been assured that they did understand the human trade-tongue, albeit on a fairly rudimentary level, having had a smattering in the first place and been taught an expanded vocabulary relevant to their future service on the journey here. She couldn't do her usual level of mind-games, thus, but she could look the cat-girl in her disturbing eyes and demand. "Submit. Obey." The feline sneered, delivered a heavily-accented "Never!", and spat in her face. She wiped off the spit without changing her broad, ice-cold smile. "Then learn - disobedience means pain. Only obedience offers relief."

She started with the claws. It didn't take her long to find the right place on the human-like fingers to squeeze in order to force the tiny, razor-sharp scimitars out of their hiding-places - before slowly pulling each one out with a pair of tongs. By the time she'd finished one hand, the muscles on the Nekomata's jaw were clearly visible as she strained not to scream. Direza just chuckled as she moved on to the other - "I hope you aren't going to break_already..." she taunted, unsure of how much of it the creature would even understand. "I'm only _just getting started."

Fifteen more claws were slowly and meticulously removed. A swab covered in healing salve was then forced into each bleeding gap, causing additional pain and forcing the bleeding tissue to heal as it was - preventing, or at least retarding, the regrowth of the claws. She still hadn't screamed, but her chest was heaving and her breath was ragged. "A good little kitty doesn't need any nasty claws..." Direza declared as she finished the task. The Nekomata did not reply.

It had been an obvious step - effective torture, probably humiliating as well if these creatures prided themselves on their hunting-acumen as seemed likely, and also a good precaution. She wouldn't be scratching up her owner with those claws anytime soon. Alas, the same process couldn't be repeated for her decidedly predatory fangs - a set of empty gums would detract far too heavily from her exotic appearance.

The next step was to apply a steady... pressure to submit. Hence, Direza's newest 'tool' - a nice, hefty basket filled with wild nettles. She rather suspected that Ludwig had tasked his least favorite underlings to collect them, out in the overgrown countryside beyond the city walls - and sincerely hoped that it was the same pair who had originally kidnapped her. A pair of thin leather gloves covered and protected her own hands as she carefully picked out leaves covered in tiny, hair-like spines. No such thing had existed in the Underdark, in whose lightless depths few things could grow, but she'd gotten thoroughly acquainted with them during her initial flight through the mountains, and couldn't help but recognize their inherent potential to her old craft.

The Nekomata's eyes bugged out and her body bucked with them as Direza carefully parted her chest-fur and found her nipples - all six of them! - before thoroughly wiping each with a fresh leaf. Hundreds of tiny hairs pierced each sensitive nub, causing pain even as they began to deliver their payload of itching irritants. With the nipples handed, she moved lower, to the point between the cat-girl's forcibly spread legs. Other than the surrounding fur, the pussy looked fairly human, she judged - with plenty of bare skin where the caress of the nettle-leaves could reach. Each labia - outer and inner - was carefully rubbed on every reachable surface. When she pulled back the clitoral hood with one delicate finger and applied a small leaf directly to the clit beneath, a drawn-out, strangled groan rose somewhere above her. When she pulled the hood back down, trapping the tiny leaf within, it escalated into a shriek. A full-on scream was probably not far behind.

Rising, she showed the wide-eyed catgirl a bowl of a soothing salve she'd had prepared - a simple recipe, barely even proper alchemy, but highly effective. Farmers and foresters used it to dull the itching of nettles, as well as various insect-bites. After showing it, she dabbed a bit on one of the nipples just to show her how it worked - before putting it aside. "Only for obedient kitties." She declared, matter-of-factly. The itching, left untreated, would continue for many hours, providing a steadily escalating urge to simply submit.

The other Nekomata were hissing in their cage - angry at their sister's treatment, or complimenting her for not yet screaming out loud or submitting? If it was the latter, they'd soon be disappointed. Everything up to this point had just been groundwork. The next bit took a long, sharp knife, which she naturally had - and a bit of assuming, since she didn't really know whether the human-like qualities of this creature's genitals continued into the unseen parts of it. The deep incision elicited a loud hiss of pain from her victim, and when she pushed two fingers into the wound and started digging around, the first scream finally arrived.

The scream descended into panting mewls only when she'd finished digging out both ovaries, leaving them hanging by the fallopian tubes - a dreadfully familiar sight. She'd practiced this operation not long ago, after all, and this would be only slightly less horrible. They were extremely sensitive organs, comparable in many ways to a man's testes, only even less protected since they were supposed to be internal. "Relief comes from submission. Resistance brings only pain..." she once again reminded her victim as she set to work on them.

Another new tool - highly specialized, if not actually that hard to produce. A metal cup filled with water on a tall stand, with a tiny brazier dangling beneath it. Placing it correctly was the only challenge - the fallopian tubes weren't that long, after all - and then it was just a matter of feeding a few hot coals into the brazier underneath. It would take some time for the water to become painfully hot for the now-submerged ovary... and more yet for it to_boil._ But in the meantime, she could start working on the other ovary, of course - starting with carefully rubbing it with a fresh nettle-leaf as she screaming redoubled. Then, the needles - spaced several seconds apart, and timed to coincide with the steadily heating water, providing two different types of simultaneously escalating agony for the increasingly overwhelmed girl.

As the water began to boil, the proud Nekomata finally broke. "I submit! I obey! I good kitty!" She cried, through a throat made rough by screaming. As soon as the words had been spoken, Direza's razor lashed out and severed both fallopian tubes - and the nerves they carried with them. A quick knot to prevent bleeding, a dab of healing salve, and back inside they went - after which the incisions themselves were deftly sewn shut and slathered in more salve, slicking down the surrounding fur. The two little chunks of hard tissue had been rendered useless for their original purpose long before that point, of course - with one falling to the ground pierced by nearly a dozen needles, while the other was simply left to color the boiling water red.

Then, the soothing salve removed the abiding itching of nipples and genitals - the swelling would go down within a day or two - and, finally, Direza smiled at her panting, crying victim. "See? Submission brings relief. Always submit, always obey, or you will be sent back here." She then undid the reinforced leather straps that held the girl to the rack and let her loose - cognizant of the muscular Porky hovering nearby, watching her work raptly as always, ready to step in if necessary. However, there clearly wasn't any fight left in the pain-wracked, weeping pile of flesh and fur that collapsed to the ground before her, rubbing herself against her leg. "Yes! I always obey! I be good kitty! No more hurt!" The creature cried pathetically, shaking like a leaf. Her arms were hugging her brutalized abdomen, the pain in which would not soon fade.

Reaching down, Direza cooed at her and petted her on the head. "That's right. No more hurt, as long as you are good and obedient. Now, go sit in the corner there, and wait for your sisters to join you..." Deep down inside, as she watched the Nekomata scramble over to the indicated corner on all fours, staggering and clearly unable to stand up, she wished that someone would pet her on the head and tell her that she could be free of the pain that was rending her soul, as long as she was good and obedient. But there wasn't anyone who could do that right now. And she had eleven more cat-girls to get through. "Next!" she called, and Porky eagerly lumbered towards the cage to grab her next victim.

This one broke and submitted by the time she finished with the declawing and fished both ovaries out of the abdominal incisions, even as she was filling the cup with fresh water. Her ovaries were immediately severed without further torment to them, and salve both healing and soothing was applied as before. The important thing was to show the_rest_ of the Nekomata that submitting sooner meant less pain, and that everyone broke eventually, so why bother resisting at all? The second thus joined the first in the corner, in a slightly better shape, and a third was strapped to the vertical rack. This one had no defiance to shout when Direza made her initial demand to submit and obey, only clamping her mouth shut and glaring. By the time her claws had been pulled out, that strength was gone - and the surrender came before Direza could even bring out the nettles.

Of course, she still had a job to do. It was almost certainly possible for these creatures to become pregnant with a human man, after all - based on humanity's general performance in that regard - and for a pleasure-slave, that was an inconvenience. Especially to the people_selling_ such slaves, who didn't care for home-grown competition! So the ovaries still had to go, just... with less unnecessary suffering. A bit of numbing salve applied to the skin and fur to make the cut less painful, a swift severing and sewing - plus the fact that she was quickly getting better at the task of fishing the slippery little things out of the bleeding wounds - and the operation was over.

It worked out quite neatly. Even those who answered the first call for submission received a taste of pain - a warning of what pride and resistance would have bought them - but even from their angle they could know and tell that it was minimal compared to what those who had refused went through. Even the declawing could be handled relatively mercifully by simply pulling each claw out with a single, quick jerk, and immediately applying a healing and deadening salve to the gap. Thus declawed and sterilized, they could lope over to their sister in the corner and see the sorry, shaking state of the first, unlucky one, and recognize that they'd made the right decision.

Only one victim after the third refused to submit immediately - presumably the eldest of them, sporting a full two tails. She endured the slow declawing without a sound, barred her teeth as the nettles were applied to her nipples - which seemed larger and puffier than those of the others, sure enough - and cunt, and only started screaming when her ovaries were dangling from her cut-open abdomen and the torture of them had begun. By the time the water was boiling and the other ovary pierced by the full set of needles, she'd screamed herself hoarse - but still had not said the magic words. The remaining Nekomata were murmuring - both the three that remained in the cage, and the handful who had gone to the corner with a minimum of damage after immediately submitting... bound by shackles of fear, far stronger than steel.

That was as far as the first one had gotten before breaking. Now, their elder sister was showing that it was possible to endure through it, perhaps even making those who had submitted promptly on the assumption that they couldn't have second thoughts. A key moment. There were five Nekomata in the room who were uncaged and not in crippling pain, all of them still equipped with sharp fangs if not claws. If they became convinced that resistance wasn't_futile, things could get ugly fast. Fear made for strong shackles, but even those _could be broken.

But of course, Direza had made sure to plan for the worst. She'd known that the Nekomata wouldn't break easily, but not exactly how much it would take - so the ovary-torture was far from the last string on her bow, and she was sincerely grateful that she most likely wouldn't have to resort to some of the later torments she'd had in mind. Rather, one more push would almost certainly do the trick. Thus, resisting the urge to hesitate in the hopes that another minute or so of the combined boiling/piercing pain in her sensitive ovaries might do the trick by itself, she carried on - finishing up the operation as before, severing and tying off the fallopian tubes and closing up the incisions with tread and healing salve.

As she did, the screaming descended into steady, shuddering panting - and perhaps a dawning and ill-placed sense of victory within the head of the apparently very tough catgirl. Clicking her tongue, Direza shook her head and knelt down to take another look at the feline's pussy. "A good kitty serves and pleasures her master obediently..." she states, unsure of how much of this more_complicated_ declaration would be understood, but hoping that the older and tougher sister would also have picked up the language-lessons better. "...but to enjoy that service is a privilege, not a right. A right you have now forfeited by your stubborn refusal to submit."

The catgirl's cunt was thoroughly swollen from the nettle's touch - including the clitoral hood, which had a bit of green poking out visibly from underneath it, where the tiny leaf had been left to continue tormenting the sensitive nub. Now, Direza pulled the hood back again - and fastened it to the skin above with two needles that only served to provoke a slight hiss of pain, keeping it out of the way. Once the leaf was removed, the clitoris stood out as being notably larger than before, swollen from the nettle's irritants, which only made the next step harder.

Now it was time for the tool she'd hoped not to need. A slender and lightweight stiletto, adjusted to her specification - most of the blade had been blunted, so that she could handle it directly with her leather-gloved hands, while the very tip, just the last inch or so, had been sharpened to a razor edge. A suitable tool for careful, detailed cutting, which she now used to cut a circle around the catgirl's clit. Bit by bit, working her way deeper, she severed ligaments and connective tissue, while the pants began to escalate into pained shrieks again. She was working blind for most of it, merely trusting that this part, too, would be identical to the human configuration.

Finally, she withdrew the blood-slicked blade, placed it on the tray beside her other tools, and grabbed the pliers she'd previously used for the declawing instead. "Remember..." she called up, hoping that her victim would still be able to hear her through the mewling cries she was constantly emitting. "You chose this. You could have submitted immediately like the others did. This is the price of your foolish resistance." Then she fastened the pliers around the swollen, blood-stained clit and began to pull.

The roots of the tiny organ went far deeper than most people realized - dividing into two and spreading down around the vaginal passage itself, extending nearly a handspan into the body, providing most of the pleasure of penetration by their proximity. It was usually quite firmly attached there, but Direza's intricate bladework had changed that. And now, bit by bit, it came loose. Considering the long roots, and the fact that it was mostly pure nerves, the effect was rather like pulling a tooth... only a thousand times more painful. Within seconds, the Nekomata was shrieking at the top of her lungs, hoarse though she was - head straining against the forehead-strap with eyes that threatened to leap out of her skull while she struggled to string together the words of submission. Direza, however, didn't stop. At this point, she had to finish it - there was no repairing the damage she'd already done.

It took two, nearly three minutes to complete the operation. At that point, a long, blood-dripping Y-shaped organ covered in hair-like protrusions dangled from her pliers, far larger than the simple nub that most people thought of as a 'clit' - and a bloody hole was all that remained where that had been. She rose to her feet, holding it up for the remaining Nekomata to see - both those who had already submitted and the few she'd yet to give the chance. Behind her, their older sister, the hardiest and toughest of them, was babbling endless promises of obedience and submission between raking sobs that seemed to shake her entire body, making the rack creak. "Remember this. The cost of pride." Direza declared, loud enough to be heard still, and watched them all shrink away from the bloody thing in her hand - eyes filled with a terror that had consumed all vestiges of their racial pride and fierce temper by now. The dripping organ hissed as she disposed of it by throwing it on the brazier normally used to heat the irons, letting it burn away to cinders.

All that was left, then, was to run the salve-covered swab into the bleeding hole where the catgirl's clit had once been, preventing infection and stopping the crimson flow. The needles were then removed, allowing the clitoral hood to cover the scar - rendering the entire operation mostly unnoticeable, as requested. Then the soothing balm for the nettle-rubbed areas, and finally, the bonds of reinforced leather undone to let the brutally tortured Nekomata fall to the floor in a weeping, shuddering pile. She couldn't even get up on all fours when Direza commanded her to join her sisters in the corner - but instead dragged herself forwards by her bloodied, clawless fingers, eyes near maniacal with eagerness to obey, to be a_good_ kitty and not suffer any more hurt.

Needless to say, the last three submitted virtually before she could ask, and bore up under the swift declawing and sterilization with little complaint. Thus, another workday was complete, another job well done. No doubt, Ludwig's contact would be impressed with the craftsmanship and the eager, submissive obedience of the terrified and mentally broken Nekomata, though they'd all need a couple of days to recover physically - and quite a bit more than that for some of them. Porky followed her like a puppy as she reported her success to Ludwig, staring worshipfully at her - he seemed to have developed some sort of twisted crush on her. Or perhaps not for her, so much as for her work. It was a shame that the big man never seemed to be allowed to do any important task unmonitored, or she might've been able to use that as part of the escape-plan that was now, blessedly, close to completion...

She threw herself into finishing it with fanatical zeal after spending a day or so recovering from that rather lengthy 'workday'. She slept - though fitfully and not for long - ate her meals, and otherwise labored, pouring out every last grain of power she could manage to draw from the vestigial fragment of Lolth's power that still clung to her soul. How long would it take for the greedy Ludwig to devise some other hideous way to make her skills as a torturer profitable? Certainly, it didn't seem likely that any of the brothel-girls would merit a visit to the torture-chamber anytime soon - most of them had no doubt heard the screaming of the Nekomata, as a keen reminder of what awaited them if they stepped out of line.

As it turned out, the answer was 'more than three days', which was all that mattered - since that was as long as it took her to finish gathering her forces. It rankled to remember that once, before she'd cut herself off from Lolth, she could have done so in mere minutes, or perhaps an hour or two at most - even without drawing on the additional power she could derive from sacred ground. After all, controlling spiders was the most basic of powers allotted to those who served the Spider-Goddess. You couldn't communicate with the eight-legged beasts, really - they didn't have the brains for it, with a few exceptions. They were animals, pure and simple, their actions driven by a series of basic instincts that told them exactly what to do in any given situation. Controlling them was simply a matter of overriding those instincts with your orders.

But where once she could have reached every spider in the city and quite a few from beyond the walls with a single magical summon, the mere whisper of power she possessed now would only let her impose her will on a spider that was within her sight - practically within arm's reach, even. And the handful of common house-spiders she could have rallied from her immediate surroundings wouldn't have made for much of an army - short of making people jump and momentarily curse while looking for something flat and heavy to squish them with, they weren't good for much. So instead, she had sent them out recruiting.

Through provocation, bullying and bribery - that is, waving juicy flies wrapped in web in their mark's faces - they had dragged or lured more spiders to her room where she could seize control of them. As her forces grew, they could cover more ground in search of additional recruits, and eventually even manage to find a few genuinely dangerous cousins. A handful of black widows, sources from the moist and shadowy corners of the city, became her first true strikeforce. Their venom, while potentially deadly to humans, would actually require several bites to actually do so unless the victim was already weak or sickly... but the important part was their psychological impact. Their appearance, with the stark, red hourglass marking on their abdomen, was immediately recognizable, and humans had long-since learned to fear their bites which were, if not quite as deadly as their reputation would have it, certainly painful and debilitating.

Still, that wasn't enough by itself - she'd only get one shot at this, and failure meant death. She needed more than intimidation up her sleeve. And so, her 'recruiters' ranged out past the walls - which were not, after all, built to keep spiders out or in. Out in the farmland, the woods, the untamed regions and the fens - so convenient for corpse-disposal - they found other, larger cousins of theirs, who would not normally wish to go near human settlements. Funnel-web spiders, gray and brown recluses, fat and hairy tarantulas... creatures whose very appearance would provoke immediate fear and revulsion in any human, an instinctive reaction to the fact that their bits very well could be deadly. Everything she could reach, she rallied - gathering them in the dark corners of her room, and feeding them pellets of her meals to keep them from starving so far from their usual hunting-grounds.

Finally, she had something she felt confident of. Not so much an army, perhaps, as a strike-force - one which gave her at least a chance_of fighting her way out if Plan A failed. Still, she had high hopes for Plan A. No matter how carefree Ludwig Fainberg seemed, or how eager he was to turn her talents into money, the things he'd already seen her do _had to be affecting him. She doubted that it was a coincidence that he'd had a glass of whiskey in his hand the one time she'd met him in private - likely, he'd needed the 'fortification' in order to keep up appearances. Wouldn't do to show _fear_towards a subordinate, after all - she knew that well.

Direza carefully moved her forces into position, prepared herself mentally, and finally, in the small hours of the morning, she struck. The brothel did most of its business at night, after all, but everyone needed to sleep sometimes - which was why breakfast was usually served an hour or so past noon, and why everyone who wasn't on guard-duty tended to snore through sunrise. Stepping out of her room, she looked around and found the hallway as empty as she'd hoped - save, of course, for the solitary sentinel whose posting let him cover both the stairwell, and the doors of her and Ludwig's rooms. He stared at her in surprise - she virtually never emerged from her room other than for meals, work, and the occasional meeting with Ludwig, who was obviously asleep at this hour.

Walking up in front of him, she flashed him a cold smile and held a finger to her lips. While his brow wrinkled in confusion, two long-legged recluse-spiders dropped from the ceiling above to land, with unerring precision, on his shoulders. As he turned his head and froze in immediate, instinctive panic, she whispered hoarsely to him. "If you move or so much as draw in breath to shout or scream, they will bite. But don't worry - their venom isn't deadly, merely paralytic. Fortunately, I won't have to drag you very far..." She gestured towards the third door of the hallway - the one that led into her torture-chamber. The suggestion was unmistakable, and his whole body went rigid, jaws clamped shut and nostrils flaring. She nodded, then reached up to pat him insultingly on the cheek. "There's a good boy... just stand like that, and breathe_shallowly_, and you may still come out of this with all your parts intact. Worry not, I shall collect my pets on my way out..."

Obediently, the unfortunate guard did indeed stand silently as she cross the hallway to his employer's door, and opened it without knocking. Normally, it would have been bolted from the inside - but a couple of hardworking tarantulas had managed to undo the bolt with a great deal of effort. Inside, she found Ludwig sleeping peacefully in his bed, a half-empty bottle on his bedside table... blissfully unaware that most of her 'army' had filtered into his room, by the kind of narrow, hidden passages that spiders were fond of, while he slept.

She lit a couple of candles, for the benefit of his weak, human eyes - not enough to light up the room properly, but just enough to make the hundreds of many-eyed, chitinous bodies now crowding the walls and ceiling vaguely visible. Marshaling herself, she put on a new mask, straightened her spine, and chuckled out loud. The chuckle, unlike her silent footsteps, made the man in the bed stir and snort. "_Do_wake up, good sir..." she called quietly. "You and I have matters to discuss..." Slowly, reluctantly, Ludwig seemed to float through the alcohol-fumes that no doubt choked his brain, and back into consciousness.

He didn't immediately recognize his situation - his vision no doubt blurred by drink and sleep alike. Instead, he just grunted and shifted. "This had better be bloody important..." he grumbled, reaching up to rub his eyes - then stopping in his tracks as his mind presumably started to engage, and he found himself wondering how his visitor had come to wake him when his door had been bolted from the inside. Then, the strange, chitinous rustling began to register on him. Direza chuckled again. "I do hope you're not planning to scream or anything, good sir. Your bedmates are_quite_ deadly, and since we have worked together so well, I would be sorry to kill you..."

Slowly, he turned his head. His whole body jerked and then went rigid as he saw the half-dozen large, terrifying, highly-venomous spiders who were sitting quietly on his mattress and his pillow, ready to pounce in an instant. And her, of course. Standing tall, face cold and haughty, half-lit by the single candle she held in her right hand - while holding up her left to inspect the black widow that sat chittering on its back. Lifting her eyes from the spider, she looked at him and smiled - finally showing him the face that had looked down from the High Priestess' throne in Commorragh for three hundred years. The face that had kept even the most ambitious and self-interested of the Drow in line. The terror in his eyes burned through sleep and alcohol alike, and for a moment, she feared that he might have a heart-attack - especially as he started to become aware of the countless other spiders clustering around his room.

But he didn't have a heart-attack, nor did he scream or shout - he just laid there, frozen, eyes large and pleading. Tipping her head a bit, she nodded. "That is good. Now, do listen, human... to be perfectly honest, I should kill you and everyone else in this building for the disrespect they have shown me - a highborn Cleric of Lolth, Greatest and Darkest of Gods! But... you have provided me with a comfortable base, here, while my pets ranged out across the city, gathering information and performing a few key acts of assassination and sabotage, and you gave me a fair bit of_entertainment_ to boot! Hence, I am inclined to be... merciful. So, if you return the amulet you took from me, I shan't kill you. And if you provide me with a writ of passage so that your foolish minions don't attempt to bar my path as I leave, I shan't have to kill _them_either."

Jerkily, the balding, mustachioed man in the bed nodded, his face as pale as death. "Of course. Anything you want." He replied, quiet and hoarse, as if afraid that the least sound might provoke the arachnid assassins that surrounded him. He wasn't entirely_wrong, either. She chuckled, and made a sharp gesture. Immediately, the spiders skittered away from one side of his bed, allowing him to climb out unmolested. "I always _thought you were quick - for a human..." she commented as he shakily got to his feet, eyes scanning the floor for stray spiders.

The amulet proved to be in his chambers - as she had hoped and suspected. A hidden safe behind a painting was revealed and opened, and there it was - the golden amulet shaped like Corellon's starburst-and-sickle-moon symbol. Of course, that wasn't the only_thing in the safe, and an idea struck her. She still had a fair bit of the gold she'd stolen from the Temple on her way out - in her luggage, which she'd left in the hotel-room she'd lived in before her kidnapping. With any luck, she'd still be able to reclaim it, but what if she _couldn't? And even if she could, it wouldn't last forever. So...

"While you're at it, grab my back-pay, why don't you?" She lazily demanded. "Fun though it was, the Temple would excommunicate me if they ever learned that I had lent a human the service of a Torturer-Priestess of Lolth for the price of room and board." Nodding shakily, Ludwig grabbed two fist-sized sacks of gold from the safe as well, dumping them on the table along with the amulet and stepping back respectfully. "That's all the money I have on hand... I hope it's enough, uh, your... ma'am?" She chuckled patronizingly as she collected the gold and the amulet alike. "Enough? Hardly. But it'll do. Now, the writ - unless you'd prefer it if I left a trail of corpses on my way out of here?"

Obediently, he quickly and shakily wrote, signed and sealed a letter for her at his candlelit desk - ordering his guards to let her through, since she was on important business for him. After quickly looking it through for any hidden messages or suspicious keywords - just because someone seemed to be scared out of all sense didn't mean they actually were, after all - she finally nodded and rolled it up - then snapped her fingers. On the room's walls and ceilings, clusters of barely-perceiveable spiders chittered and fled, diving into the room's corners, parading through mouseholes and squeezing through cracks in the boards as they made good their escape. Ludwig breathed more easily, eyes full of relief, as she flashed him a last, cold grin. "Now, with that, our business is concluded, and I shall take my leave... but in memory of our prior cooperation, I shall give you a warning: You do not want to be in this city three days from now! But... you might have figured out as much for yourself already, hmm? You are pretty quick, after all - for a human..."

Of course, there was no Drow slave-raid coming - at least not to her_knowledge - but after everything he had put her through, the least she could do was to give him some grief on the way out. With any luck, in his hurry to scrounge up everything he could carry and make a run for it, he wouldn't have the time or the interest to do anything to his 'stable' - likely, he'd just leave the girls behind to be easy victims for the surely approaching Drow slavers, figuring that he didn't need to worry about inconvenient witnesses in a city about to be overrun. Granted, it seemed unlikely that those thoroughly-cowed girls would find the strength to flee on their own even once their tormentors had disappeared, but an anonymous note for the city guard would soon see them discovered. What would happen to them _then, she did not know - but it had to be better than their current plight!

Thus, with this parting volley, she left - collecting the spiders from the still-petrified guard's shoulders outside, and simply leaving by the front door where the two burly bouncers carefully read the letter from Ludwig, and opened the gate for her. In the dusty warehouse that served as the brothel's cover, she fastened the amulet around her neck, and once again stood as a pleasant, pale-skinned and golden-haired elf. Meanwhile, her 'army' scattered to the four winds, freed of the compulsions she had used to control them - rushing back to the shadowy corners, web-tunnels and outhouses they had once called home. She wished them well - they had served her exceptionally.

The innkeeper was quite happy to see her. He had been terribly worried when she hadn't returned to claim her luggage! The renting-period had long-since expired - she'd been a prisoner for weeks, after all - but she'd paid up front, of course, so when she didn't return her luggage had simply been added to their lost-and-found, unopened of course. This was a proper, high-class inn, after all, and not some half-copper alehouse! He happily accepted her story about suddenly being called away on an urgent, time-critical matter, and sunned himself in her praise and promises to tell all of her friends about the fine customer-service she had received there. Of course, if they had looked in her luggage, things might've gone quite differently - what with all the gold it contained, and the suit of Drow shadowmail featuring Lolth's spidery sigil emblazoned on the bracers.

There was no little bell over the door, to alert the shopkeeper of an arriving customer - nor any signs or displays out front to lure them in. Nonetheless, once inside, it became clear that it _was_a shop, and the owner immediately looked up from the book he had been perusing, eyes sharp behind his spectacles. She paused to glance at some of the items on display, letting him get a measure of her. He seemed bemused, which was hardly a surprise - she likely didn't resemble his regular clientele much. Richly-dressed elves usually shopped in the fancy, brightly-lit shops of the city's centrally-placed bazaar, not in dusty little backstreet shops like this one...

Of course, there were shops and then there were shops, and the dusty contents of this one's display-shelves told their own story. Unfashionable accessories, cheap jewelry, shoddy-looking utensils and crockery... a selection designed to ensure that anyone who found their way in there by accident, soon left and didn't come back. Shaking her head at how blatant it all was, she stepped up to the counter, and deposited a heavy bag of gold on the counter, making the shopkeepers eyes widen with greedy delight. "I understand you do... custom work, no?" She asked, smiling pleasantly.

He nodded slowly, eyes quickly narrowing again as he sought to hide his eagerness for a solid payday. "Perhaps. Depends on what you need." He said guardedly. Sizing him up, she straightened up - glad to be rid of the heavy sack - and returned the nod. "I have heard that there exists items that can allow excommunicated or otherwise depowered Clerics to wield some semblance of their past abilities once more. Are you familiar with such a device?" His eyes widened anew - with surprise, this time, rather than greed, and he quickly closed and put down the book that had until then remained in his hands. "I am, in fact. What you speak of is referred to as an 'Arcane Focus' - quite a niche item, needless to say."

She couldn't help but grin. She'd been to a few places like this, and several of the proprietors had claimed to be able to get her an Arcane Focus... without actually knowing what they were called. The fact that this man did was a promising start. "Can you make one?" she quickly asked. The white-haired shop-owner - who, according to her contacts, was known to supply all manner of criminals and other shady types with enchanted goods for the right price - rubbed his face thoughtfully. "Well... yes and no..." he finally allowed.

Her lifted eyebrow encouraged him to continue, and he shrugged. "I like to think of myself as being quite good at my craft, but an Arcane Focus is a complex and potent device... not to mention demanding quite a few rare and precious materials, some of which I wouldn't know how to acquire at any price. The main body is supposed to be made of solid platinum, for starters! If you want a true Arcane Focus - which could, potentially, restore a depowered Cleric to something quite close to their original level of magical might - then I'm afraid the answer is no. I could give you the name of one or two famed masters of the enchanting craft, who might be able to supply one - though their prices would be exorbitant, and none of them live anywhere near here. However... the fact that you did_come here suggests that you aren't just looking for a skilled enchanter, are you? You're specifically looking for one who doesn't ask _questions...

She nodded, once, sharply. "That was the 'no' part. So where's the 'yes' part, hmm?" she demanded. Chuckling, he shrugged. "I can make an Arcane Focus. A best effort, using what skills I have and what materials I can get my hands on. I've never actually made one before, you understand, so I'll make no promises as to its exact efficacy - there'll definitely be some loss of power. But half, or even a third, of a powerful Cleric's original ability is still a lot better than the mere fraction that he - or she - would normally be able to channel, having lost the favor of their god, no?"

Direza considered it, but not very hard. He was right, after all, about her need for an enchanter who wouldn't ask prying questions - and she'd already wasted quite a bit of time tracking down someone who had any_chance or providing her with something she could use. "Name your price." she said, and he quoted one the made her blanch slightly. A second sack of gold joined the first on the counter. This was most of the gold she'd stolen from her old 'boss', Ludwig, just to obtain something she didn't really _want, anyway. The idea of once again wielding the dark and corrupt powers of Lolth sickened her... but what could she do?

Besides, it wouldn't really be Lolth's power. Just the same kind of raw, magical energy that every mage, wizard and sorcerer in the world regularly pulled from the endless supply offered by the Arcane Field, shaped into the same set of spells Lolth had once granted her by channeling it through the tiny fragment of Lolth's divine self that still clung, like a bloated tick, to her own immortal soul. Though, of course, being reminded about that was rather unpleasant all by itself. Still, she needed to be able to protect herself. As the misadventure with the slave-brothel had proved, the surface-world had its own dangers, even when you were disguised as a prosperous elf and blending into human cities.

After weighing the two sacks and checking their contents, satisfying himself that it was genuine gold through and through, the underworld enchanter nodded and the bargain was sealed. "I'll start immediately, though it may take a week or two... oh, and which god did the unfortunate Cleric that this is destined for serve originally? Corellon?" She froze in her tracks, already turning to leave the store when this piercing question hit her. "That sounds suspiciously like a question..." she replied harshly, glaring at him. "I was of the impression that the_absence_ of such was included in your rather upmarket prices."

The enchanter winced a bit at this, but threw out his hands in a can't-be-helped gesture. "I'm afraid I need to know. The Arcane Focus needs to connect to the divine fragment clinging to the former Cleric's soul in order to function, and that means that, just like with a regular Clerical Focus, an appropriate symbol is required." This time, she hesitated a bit longer, measuring him with her eyes. He was clearly smart, which helped in this case. He was also greedy, or possibly just desperate for gold, which always_helped. And _she was definitely desperate - unless he was lying to her, she'd never be able to have an Arcane Focus made_without_ revealing her true nature. After all, only the Drow worshiped Lolth...

Sighing, she stepped back up to the counter and withdrew the last bag of gold she'd brought from her belt, and dropped it beside the other two. She was digging into her original reserves now, but she needed to be_sure_. While the enchanter wrinkled his brow and opened his mouth, no doubt to inform her that no amount of bribes could change the fact that he couldn't make the Arcane Focus without the answer to his question, she reached up and pulled off the Amulet of Disguise. His face froze, mouth hanging soundlessly open, as he found himself suddenly and unexpectedly face-to-face with a Drow.

"Lolth, if you must know..." she finally replied, a sardonic smile on her face. "And before you start panicking, consider the fact that I would not need your services if I still followed the Spider-Goddess, or paid my loyalty to Commorragh." His jaw snapped shut, eyes still wide and scared, but he slowly nodded while swallowing. She picked up the third bag of gold again, and shook it in front of him so he could hear the coins clinking. "For your silence. On delivery." She clarified, and put it back in her belt-pouch. He nodded once more, and only then seemed to find his voice. "Uh... understood. But.. umm... you wouldn't happen to have anything on hand with the Symbol of Lolth on it, would you? Such things are not easy to obtain, and I must confess with being... somewhat unfamiliar with the ways of the Drow. I am not certain if I could render Her sigil with sufficient detail myself."

She gave him an analytic glance. A promising reaction, really. If he was planning to double-cross her, he would want her to leave his shop as quickly as possible, not delay her. Nodding, she pulled off her backpack. She'd elected to bring her luggage with her on the shopping-trip, just in case something went south and she had to flee the city immediately. Digging around in it, she found the shirt of shadowmail that she'd been carrying since her escape, and annoyingly never found an actual use for. Detaching the armguards, she deposited them on the counter. Lolth's spidery sigil gleamed against the blackened metal, and the enchanter swallowed again, nodding quickly. "That's... fine. Very good, in fact. I think I can use these. I'll make it my top priority, ma'am. A week, no more!"

Sighing, she pulled the backpack back on, and strapped the Amulet of Disguise around her neck. "A week, then. I look forwards to seeing your work for myself." She'd rolled the dice now, she thought as she left the dusty little store. Now all that remained was to find out whether a handy Arcane Focus or a squad of burly guardsmen ready in ambush would be waiting for her when she returned in a week.

"Keep the pressure on! She's starting to weaken!" The guardsman cried, gesturing with his sword from somewhere safely in the back. Direza grimaced - he was right, dammit, much as she'd prefer it if he hadn't noticed. The enchanter had warned her when he handed the bracers - now modified and enchanted into a two-part Arcane Focus - back to her, but this was the first time she'd had to really _stretch_the power they gave her. She hadn't really understood how _tiring_it would be. "Keep in mind, ma'am, that when you use these, you'll be drawing and shaping energy from the Arcane Field, just like the rest of us benighted mortals. And that is noticeably harder than having it delivered pre-chewed courtesy of some deity, benevolent or otherwise! You'll find your mental reserves draining significantly faster than before, and I trust you know what will happen if you push yourself too hard..." His voice had been calm and professional, showing no signs of misgivings as he handed the potent artifact over to a woman he knew to be a Drow. He had certainly earned the third sack of gold... but now it seemed like even his fine work wouldn't be able to save her.

Five arrows hit the Cloak of Shadows that currently surrounded her in rapid succession, and she felt herself staggering as they were redirected by the dark magic. The last one wasn't redirected _quite_enough, and its sharp steel head tore through the fine cloth below her right arm with ease. Fortunately, the shadowmail beneath was made of sturdier stuff - the fine mesh of steel rings deflected the glancing blow, preventing it from drawing blood, but she could still feel it just fine, and would likely have a nice bruise there... if she lived that long.

One of the bowmen suddenly shrieked and started dancing around madly, swinging his slender longbow like a club, jostling several of his allies. Having a round dozen spiders crawl up your pants could have that effect on a man, Direza reflected with a humorless smile - even if they were just harmless house-spiders, which was all she could manage to summon from the surrounding area on such short notice. It was increasingly clear that she was just delaying the inevitable, however. More guards were arriving far faster than she could kill or disable those who already surrounded her, summoned by the shouts of their comrades and the general sounds of chaos and battle - and she hadn't spotted any brilliant escape-routes that she'd missed so far, either.

There were too many foes, she was too far from the city gates, and her Clerical abilities - the only thing that had kept her alive so far - were rapidly draining her dry. If she continued to push herself, she'd simply wind up saving her attackers the trouble of bringing her down by helpfully falling into a brain-damaged coma on her own. Scowling, she gathered another handful of negative energy, fingers flicking through a familiar set of symbolic gestures while she growled out the ritualistic prayer for the flaying of enemy souls. The bolt of darkness streaked through the air like inverse lightning, and struck the officer who'd just declared that she was flagging. He collapsed instantly, spine curling backwards as his body convulsed, foaming at the mouth and eyes rolling back. He'd be dead within minutes, and in the process might teach his fellows a lesson about making premature declarations of victory.

Not_very_ premature, though. The effort of throwing out that last attack sent a sharp jab of pain through her brain, like a spike driven into the base of her skull. She staggered and fell to one knee while the Cloak of Shadows flickered and faded around her. Her breathing was suddenly labored, her lungs freezing up. Through blurring eyes, she saw the guards close in on her, swords raised. If she gathered all that she had left, she could hit maybe a handful of them with a Wave of Darkness... but there'd be nothing left of her afterwards, only a mindless vegetable for the survivors to hack apart. Preferable, perhaps. Blaze of glory and all that.

As she struggled to draw in that last bit of power, ignoring the shouts of triumph and the growing buzzing in her ears, however, a face flashed through her mind. The DragonRider. Anitra. Beautiful, exotic, vital, human and yet something more - sapphire-blue eyes split by predatory pupils, lean muscle lining her slender neck. A face she had seen but once, a pleasure she had tasted only a single morsel of. The pretense she had worn since her escape from Commorragh frayed and thinned within her, and she could almost hear a dispassionate corner of her mind whisper "Oh... I guess I did abandon my home and my race mostly just because I wanted to see her again, after all. How silly."

The power she had been gathering faded. She couldn't go through with it, couldn't bring herself to make a decision that would _guarantee_that she would never see the DragonRider again, never feel her touch or taste her lips again. As long as she was alive - with a working brain in her skull, even - there was hope. A vanishingly faint one, perhaps, but hope still. The hands that had shakily started to go through the gestures of that final spell now instead opened and rose. "I surrender." She called, as loudly as she could considering her shortness of breath. "Do as you will." Then she toppled over on the ground to lie with her face and palms pressed against the cobbles. It seemed a relaxing thing to do right now, and made her look about as harmless as she could hope to.

"Don't hesitate! Kill the bitch! Cut off her godsdamned head!" She heard someone cry above her. She squeezed her eyes shut, and hoped that the sword would be swift and sharp - but another, more coldly angry voice objected. "Don't you dare! She won't get off that easily! She killed Drury and Jacob! And a dozen other men too!" A brief, ugly argument ensued, before it was interrupted by a more commanding, authoritative voice - apparently, she hadn't managed to kill all of the officers. "He's right. Bind her, gag her and take her to the jail. It'd be a waste to kill her here - a nice, public execution will show the good people of this city and the troublemakers who complain about the severity of the laws just what we are protecting them against!"

They kept her hands permanently bound. Apparently, they had not realized that her bracers were an Arcane Focus, and assumed that she was still an ordinary Cleric - and if she had been, she would_still have been able to conjure a fair few tricks even without a Clerical Focus, or might even have been able to fashion an improvised one out of whatever she could gather from her cell. She wasn't about to correct their misapprehension if she didn't _have to, either. Not that they'd be likely to believe her regardless.

Indeed, they didn't seem particularly inclined to believe anything she said, which rather raised the issue of why they kept bothering to ask her questions in the first place. Perhaps they were hoping to get some answers they liked if they kept 'interrogating' her, but frankly, their methods or torture were just so pedestrian_compared to her own recent acts that she had to laugh. The torturer seemed to be taking it pretty hard, and she only barely restrained the urge to give him advice on how to torment her more efficiently. Why, he didn't even bother to apply healing salve to the wounds after tearing out her fingernails! Left like that, they'd regrow on their own eventually, even _without magic. Amateurish and short-sighted, in her measured opinion. Still painful, of course, but nothing she couldn't grit her teeth through while truthfully answering all of their questions, however little they liked hearing it.

In between sessions, she was thrown into a cell to stew in humiliation - with her hands bound behind her, she had to eat whatever food they gave her like a dog might, often smearing her face with whatever watery stew or gristle-filled meat they served up. She also struggled to do any but the most rudimentary cleaning after using the equally-rudimentary facilities, which wasn't helped by the fact that she was kept under constant watch - one or two guards permanently stationed on the other side of the bars to guffaw at the way she struggled to even pull up the rough prison-smock she'd been assigned before squatting on the bucket.

During what little rest she was allowed, she pondered ways to escape - without getting anywhere - and beat herself up for stumbling into such an obvious disaster. She'd known about how xenophobic and human-centric this small, yet perversely prosperous kingdom was, and how paranoid they were about 'outsiders'. But she'd also known that the Elven Diplomatic Service, masters of their craft that they were, had managed to forge a treaty with them anyway - they weren't particularly welcome there, and were forbidden from establishing residency or businesses, but they could travel through the lands unmolested. So she'd walked the streets of the capital blithely, foolishly confident in the power of her Amulet of Disguise.

How much had it cost them to set up those obelisks at all public plazas and marketplaces? Probably a pretty copper, if she guessed right. The one she'd drawn near had erased her illusory disguise in an instant, and odds were good that it would've done the same thing to any other kind of illusion, shape-shifting or perception-bending that might have disguised or concealed an intruder. Things had gone rapidly downhill from there, though, so whoever had paid for them no doubt felt perfectly validated...

Indeed, they seemed to have strong connections with the magical community in general. Eventually, after a few days of futile interrogation, a stoop-shouldered, hard-eyed wizard was brought in to monitor the next one. She immediately recognized the spell he cast - truth-telling. It couldn't compel someone to tell the truth, but it would_immediately detect any attempt at knowing falsehood. Her interrogator's face fell when she once again repeated her 'ridiculous' claims that she _wasn't a scout of forerunner for a Drow assault, but just a sole renegade, a fugitive with no allegiance for the Drow Empire or Military as a whole... and the wizard confirmed that she wasn't lying.

There were a fair few arguments, two additional castings of the spell and repetitions of her statement, and some very stubborn insistence from the wizard that she wasn't somehow foiling, spoofing or otherwise bypassing his spell, with her hands bound and no possible magical artifacts on her. Eventually, the interrogator was forced to concede, and the wizard got paid... suspiciously well for his services, she noted from the interrogation-chair. No doubt, an extra surcharge for silence. When they dragged her to the gallows, it would be with many grand declarations of how she'd plotted the annihilation of the whole kingdom, only to be foiled and defeated by its gallant defenders - of that, she felt unreasonably certain. And looking the way she did, no-one would doubt it.

Still, preparing a suitably grandiose public execution took time, so back into the cell she went. The guards were noticeably more relaxed, however, now that they knew there was no Drow strike force ready to mount the walls and rescue her. This would be the perfect time for her daring escape-plan, if she had one - but even so loosened, the security was still plenty tight enough, and she had nothing to work with. They still kept her hands tied, presumably now assuming that she was some kind of strange Drow sorceress rather than a Cleric. Everything she owned, clothes included, had been confiscated, leaving her with nothing but the rough-spun smock they'd provided.

She wasn't left with an abundance of time to contemplate her impending demise, however. Now that the interests of their superiors had slackened, the eyes of the guards contemplated her in a rather different way as they watched her through the bars. Before, they'd no doubt been under orders not to disturb her, since she needed to be rested for the next round of torture and interrogation - but now, there was no such reason to keep the natural inclination of prison-guards everywhere in check. She knew what was coming, saw it a mile away - it wasn't as if Drow guardsmen were any different, if they were fortunate enough to be holding female prisoners of a non-Drow persuasion. But what could she do?

Not much, except shudder as her sharp ears picked up the two guards quietly chatting about how best to approach it. "You seriously wanna use her mouth, Buck?" One of them asked, looking doubtful. "Better you than me. I like my cock right where it is, thank you very much, rather than in some Drow bitch's stomach. Assuming she doesn't spit it out in your face after chewing it off!" His partner grimaced and scowled at him. "This ain't my first time on prison-duty, Greg! Ya think I've never knocked the fight out of a biter before?" Buck barked with laughter at this, shaking his head. "Really, Buck? Really?"

While his partner glared, Greg sighed and shook his head. "Didn't ya see Murk in the guardsroom, sobbing into his bottle after he got done 'torturing' her? He was complaining about how she'd 'made a mockery of his craft', and all that - how she'd rolled her eyes at him while he pulled out her nails, laughed at him when he applied the hot irons, even yawning like she was bored when he put her on the drowning-wheel. She's Drow! A sadistic, torture-loving monster from the dankest pits of the Underdark - not some loudmouthed troublemaker dragged in for complaining about the taxes. But sure,you're gonna knock some sense into her! Go ahead, be my guest, I'll just stand well back so I don't get any of your dick-blood on me..."

She had to smile a bit at that, with her back carefully turned so they didn't see and take it as a challenge. Ah yes, the drowning-wheel - her favorite. Clearly, the amateurish torturer 'Murk' was blissfully unaware that elves - and by extension Drow - could hold their breath noticeably longer than humans normally could. She'd rather enjoyed the bath he provided, really, considering her inability to maintain any kind of decent hygiene in her cell.

Regardless, the argument had been persuasive, and Buck admitted with some grumbling that it'd probably be wiser not to put his sensitive bits anywhere near her teeth. "Sides, the old man said she needed to still be presentable from the neck up at least... they don't want her to look too beat-up when they take her to the gallows, after all!" Ah, of course... that explained why the torturer hadn't bothered to pull out any of her teeth, despite it being the obvious next step after the nails. She'd been wondering about that!

After having decided on which orifices to focus on, the two hashed out a few more details - as Buck had said, it clearly wasn't their first time doing something like that. There were no further disagreements, either - both of them, for starters, agreed that the guys in the_next_ shift would be happy to join in, or at the very least turn a blind eye for the promise of a free drink or two later, so there was no reason to rush. One of them - in a stunning display of slack security - then left his post to fetch a couple of tools, once again making her regret that she'd been unable to come up with any workable escape-plans that might have let her take advantage of this gap.

But she hadn't, and a handful of minutes later, the guards were inside her cell, and she was resting her cheek against the dirty floor while they tied her knees to the broomstick that had just been retrieved for the purpose. She didn't bother to resist or object when they pulled her ass up and into position - it'd just give them a reason to bruise various below-the-neck regions of hers, and she saw no reason to add further pain on top of the clearly unavoidable rape she was about to endure. That, and she was just generally feeling rather hopeless and fatalistic at this point.

A makeshift noose was also fastened around her neck - "In case she gets stroppy, eh?" Buck declared, and Greg happily agreed. "Gives her a taste of what's to come, too. They're setting her up for a short drop, y'know, so the fall won't break her pretty little neck. Give her a chance to dance for the crowd!" Their festive mood, however, was soured somewhat when Buck pulled up her smock to bunch it around her waist. Grimacing, he leaned back, fanning the air in front of his face. "Phew! What a mess! And_stench!"_ The humiliation of being so exposed, and having the rather poor job she'd been able to do with her wiping shown off, burned... and worsened as she felt herself grow aroused from it. Soon, the guards would no doubt notice the increasingly moist conditions of her pussy, and have many interesting things to say about it.

For now, though, Greg just shrugged. "Can't say I'm surprised! Dunno how good a job I could do wiping my ass with my hands tied like that, but I doubt it'd be a whole lot neater. On the other hand, while I don't really wanna stick my dick in that, I also didn't have 'Wipe a Drow bitch's ass' on my to-do list for today. Flip a coin for the honor?" Buck's normally vague and brutish face, however, suddenly brightened with an idea. "Hey! Why don't we just invite Mark to the party, huh? That'd solve things without either one of us getting our hands dirty, and he was complaining just the other day that we never took him along when we went out for fun." Greg eagerly agreed to this plan, and stepped back to keep a look-out while Buck ran off to fetch Mark. Direza, meanwhile, was left kneeling where she was, fully exposed, pondering who 'Mark' would turn out to be. And also whether _everyone_working in the castle had a four-letter name.

Mark turned out to be the castle's houndsmaster, which likely explained why the guards didn't tend to invite him along - he smelled very strongly of his craft. As for the solution he represented, well, that was the trio of large, shaggy, constantly-drooling hunting-dogs he brought with him. No sooner had they been allowed into the cell than they started to sniff around her exposed rear, and it was mere seconds from that before several large, slobbery tongues began to vie for the honor of licking her ass sparkling-clean. "Figured as much!" Buck declared with a laugh. "I've seen those disgusting mutts eat each other's crap just to pass the time."

The tongues were wide, soft, and very wet - effective cleaning indeed, and the slobber that ran from them in rivulets quickly covered her pussy as well, disguising any emerging moistness. It also... didn't feel half bad, she privately admitted to herself. There wasn't a shred of cruelty in those hounds, unlike their masters - just pure, animalistic curiosity. And maybe some pure, animalistic lust, considering how one of them soon nudged the other two aside and tried to jump on her back. His master, however, was quick to pull him off, while the guards laughed behind him. "Down, boy! That's not for you!" the houndsmaster declared, and soon the three of them were tied to the bars in the corner, whining at the harsh words.

Meanwhile, the three men used her pussy and asshole freely, finding both to be delightfully tight and speculating that she'd been such a 'frigid bitch' that no man had ever gotten near her before. Buck, for his part, confidently stated that it was because Drow women always killed the men after mating, so they tended not to do it much. Closer to the truth in her case than Greg, who rolled his eyes mightily at his ignorant friend's self-assured claims, would ever be likely to guess.

The tightness began to fade after several loads had been pumped up either orifice, but not so much that the next shift - another two guards, whose names she didn't catch beyond them being short enough to very likely be four letters or so - didn't want a piece of the pie too. All five men were noticeably hairy, and better hung than any of her past partners - who had, after all, been Drow. Still, they didn't really stretch her to a painful degree, and under other circumstances, it might even have been enjoyable. As it was, the pleasure came mostly from the very fact that she was tied down with her ass in the air, being freely used by five burly men while they talked and laughed over her head, treating her more like an object than a person. She was managing not to moan aloud, at least. She refused to give them that victory.

Moaning, however, was soon taken off the table as one of the second shift's guards pulled out a stout steel ring, dangling from a short length of rope. "I heard she was a biter, so I came prepared! This li'l thing has stood me in good stead before..." The ring was large enough to hurt her jaw as it was forced into her mouth and tied in place, wrenching it open and keeping it that way. Too large to actually allow for oral sex unless you were hung like a horse - or at least a pony - even. Not that the guards let this deter them - they seemed to enjoy lifting her head up to plunge their slimy cocks directly into her throat for a few strokes, especially if they'd just used her ass... which was even less pleasant than when the Drow scout had done the same, months ago. They spat in her mouth too, on occasion, and then it got worse.

"Geez, I need to take a leak... but bloody hell, this bucket reeks!" one of the guards complained - possibly Greg or Buck, she'd rather lost track of them by now. Nor did she know which of the others made the obvious suggestion - only that the idea was eagerly and universally accepted as the perfect solution. She tried her best to keep her tongue out of the way as the first guard grabbed her head and used it for a urinal - it wasn't hard, really, since he pushed his cockhead all the way down her throat before opening up, ensuring that she wouldn't get a chance to spit it out. So there was no taste... only the sickening feeling of hot, thin liquid pouring down her gullet to sour her stomach.

But as she'd rather suspected, he wasn't the last - and the next one wanted to top the performance, apparently. Holding her face upwards, he made sure that there was a visible line of yellow between his cockhead and her mouth as he turned into a small lake of piss. The ring-gag prevented her from properly spitting, limiting her to attempt ejecting the harsh, bitter fluid by gurgling and coughing - until he pinched her nose shut, forcing her to drink down the disgusting fluid or drown in it. The next few mouthfuls took less forcing - and, after that, she simply swallowed whatever they poured into her wide-open mouth.

In truth, she could easily have resisted more effectively and for longer - even to the point of forcing them to drop that particular game. After all, they certainly didn't know how long she could hold her breath either, and if she took it to the limit and faked a faint, they'd almost certainly give up lest they risk killing her before she could be properly executed. But what was the point? In the end, being treated as a living urinal and forced to gulp down mouthful after mouthful of hot, reeking piss was more pleasurable than the thick cocks that were taking turns pounding both of her lower orifices.

She still didn't understand how or why, but by now she couldn't deny it - she enjoyed being humiliated, mistreated, objectified and abused. She drew arousal, even pleasure from it, even when it _wasn't_at the hands of an amazonian warrior-woman in black scale armor. So, by that point, why deny it even to herself? Why not indulge it fully, one last time? So she drank their piss, and readily swallowed when they spat in her mouth, and licked their ass-flavored cocks when they thrust them into her mouth, while they jeered and cheered at how they'd broken her... and, in doing so, only deepened her pleasure until she finally came, shuddering orgasmically and giving the two guards who'd been pounding her pussy and ass in alternating rhythm even more to crow about.

Eventually, though, all five - the four guards and the houndsmaster - had emptied their balls and bladders alike, and sat back in exhausted satisfaction. Once again, they left her where she was - ass in the air, cum dripping from two gaping holes, piss-tinted drool leaking from her forcibly-open mouth. The noose was tight, if not exactly_choking_, around her neck too, adding a bit of lingering pleasure to the experience - it felt as if she had been collared, like a beast. Then, almost as if inspired by that thought, one last humiliation was heaped on all that had gone before.

"Huh... look like they're still full of energy, at least!" One of the guards commented tiredly, glancing over to the corner where the three hunting-dogs had spent the whole party. Initially they might have squeezed themselves flat back there, fearing the disapproval of their master, but by now the effects of his harsh words had passed, and they stood alertly - ropes tight behind them as their eyes and noses fixated with keen interest on the strange scents rising from Direza's trussed-up body.

Hardly any words were exchanged beyond that. Just some thoughtful glances, perverted grins and nods. Then the houndsmaster untied the ropes, and let the dogs leap into action. Three tongues once again eagerly licked her rear end clean - of cum, this time - and then a brief scuffle broke out back there as the three dogs argued about their internal pecking-order. The disagreement was, however, swiftly resolved - and the largest of the three dogs shoved the other two aside with a chuff as he mounted her.

Unaided and experienced though he was with human - and humanoid - bitches, the gaping of her freshly-used holes made things relatively easy for him. After bouncing off her taint a couple of times, his tapered, bright-red cockhead caught on the edge of her smarting sphincter - and he was in. The rest of his shaft followed, just as long and thick as any of the guards - and then, the bulge at the end, slightly thicker, stretching her painfully. Even if she had not been ring-gagged, she would have gaped - not only had she been raped, and forced to do various disgusting and humiliating things, but now she was being taken by an animal, while two more waited their turn behind him! His hairy paws wrapped around her slim waist, his slobbery jaws dripping drool on her neck... all while the guards and the houndsmaster watched and laughed. She'd never _imagined_such humiliation - her pussy was dripping with far more than mere dog-drool at this point, not that her audience could perceive it.

She knew little of the ways dogs mated - but the houndsmaster was well informed of such things, of course, and she could hear him explain to his buddies what was happening as the large hound's knot swelled inside her, straining her insides agonizingly and locking his cock in place inside of her. Sealing them inseparably together until he had emptied his surging, canine balls into the depths of her ass. An added humiliation - and on top of that, this safe tie enabled the dog to screw her with a speed no ordinary dick could have matched, his hindquarters a blur as his cockhead seemed to push against the depths of her ass in the same moment his knot pulled on her sphincter, threatening to break it open and escape.

Her pleasure rose with the rapid pounding, and crested when he finally stopped. She came as she felt the hot, thin cum pour into her, joining the dozen or so of plain old human cumloads that had preceded it. She was still shaking and moaning through the ring-gag by the time the hound jumped off of her, swung one hind-leg over her back, and finally stood ass-to-ass with her as he panted merrily, awaiting the end of their tie. The guards were laughing at the display, and jostling the two who had received accolades for making her cum earlier.

Having two pack-mates waiting impatiently nearby does not a relaxed post-orgasmic afterglow make, however - prompting the hound to regularly tug forwards experimentally, straining her sphincter painfully and even pulling her a couple of inches across the floor by her asshole. Eventually, the knot deflated enough that it could just barely make it out without outright ripping open her ass - and so, out it popped, with a razor-sharp burst of stretching-pain to escort it. Her ass gaped like a stranded fish in his absence, but the guards didn't get much of a chance to admire the view, since the next dog was atop her in an instant. Being somewhat more short-legged than his predecessor, he somehow managed to miss her invitingly open asshole with his probing, jabbing cock, and instead found his way into her sopping-wet pussy after sliding along the full length of it several times, rubbing across her clit - highly sensitive after the recent orgasm - in a way that was almost unendurably pleasurable.

His knot didn't tie well within her pussy - whether because of the shape, the angle, or just a combination of his slightly smaller size and that orifice being slightly less tight than her ass had been. As he pounded her with the same dizzying speed as his predecessor, his fully engorged knot would occasionally slip out - straining her labia painfully - leading to a few seconds of desperate, frustrated jabbing before he found the hole again... and his knot then stretched her labia once more on the way in. All the same, he eventually managed to cum - and so did she, once again.

Needless to say, his post-coital tie was all but nonexistent, with him simply pulling his dripping cock out of her cunt as soon as he'd turned around - a fact that the third and final hound no doubt appreciated. Why he was at the bottom of this particular pecking-order, she honestly couldn't figure out. While less muscular than the first, he was just as tall - ensuring that when he mounted her, his cock easily found her partially-recovered asshole. At which point his cock turned out to be noticeably bigger than either of the other two had been. She gasped and shuddered as he penetrated her, his knot growing to what felt like the size of a baby's head within her, his cockhead pushing fiercely against the bend at the bottom of her ass.

Her intestines strained and shifted as he began to pound her, thrusts as rapid as ever. Her ass was being painfully reshaped and rearranged to accommodate him - and with the sheer size of his knot ensuring that he wasn't about to pop out, there was really nothing to be done about it. Needless to say, this only served to provide her one final, brand-new twist of humiliation, even as she enjoyed the most primal, visceral pleasure of being so thoroughly filled by hot, hard cockmeat. Alas, for all his size, he didn't last any longer than the other two - but just enough for her to get one final orgasm before turning around and waiting out what would likely be a fairly long tie, since the other two had had their fill and wandered off to the corner to rest, no longer rushing him.

Meanwhile, a few of the guards had gotten a second wind, if not a terribly blustery one - just one last successful erection. None of them seemed keen to jump for a dog's sloppy seconds, though, so instead they merely held her head up and in place while they eagerly masturbated into her face, jeering and calling her disgusting names as they did so. Their sticky, hot sperm splashed all across her face, but she managed to catch a fair bit in her mouth, which she dutifully swallowed. "Hah... what was that about us not being able to just beat her into submission, huh?" One of the guards asked a fellow - identifying himself as most likely being Buck. The one he addressed, presumably Greg, chuckled and shrugged. "Hey, I can admit when I was wrong. Guess poor ol' Murk just didn't think of giving her a good ol' human-style dicking in the torture-chamber - apparently, that's all it took to make the monster meek as a mouse!"

Once they were done, their final hard-ons softening back into tiny, dangling, rubbery dicks, the party was over. The final dog managed to pull himself out of her ass - giving her one final shot of sphincter-straining agony, and an enormous gape in his wake - and then the guards thoughtfully cleaned up after themselves, hiding any sign of what had transpired. Not so much out of fear of official disapproval, but so that the next shift, which was due to arrive soon, wouldn't feel left out. Ropes and broom were removed - though her hands remained tied, and numb, as ever - the smock was pulled back down to hide any lingering stains, and they even wiped the cum-traces from her face with a dirty cloth and a grimace. At the end, she was left lying on the cell's hard, wooden cot, exhausted and pleasure-dazed, alone in her cell once more but watched, as ever, from the other side of the bar. Tired as she was, neither the slow oozing of cum from both of her nether holes, nor the lingering taste of piss on her tongue, could prevent her from falling into a deep sleep...

The High Altar of Lolth stood before her, while above her the dome of the Temple-Citadel's inner sanctum extended grandly, its spiderweb-pattern made from human bone inlaid in polished obsidian gleaming in the light of the braziers as tendrils of aromatic smoke rose from the dried herbs that were smoldering upon them. She knew that it was a dream even before the great statue of the Spider-Goddess Lolth that loomed behind the altar turned its terrible head and grinned at her - the altar, after all, was clean, rather than encrusted with blood. No matter how thoroughly the priestesses scrubbed it, the stains always remained - as if the suffering of thousands of sacrifices had soaked into the black marble itself.

Feeling strangely detached, she smiled wanly up at the terrible yet glorious figure of the goddess she had once sworn her life and soul to, as She emerged from the masterfully carved stone that, Direza now saw, had never come close to doing Her justice. The web of inlaid bones that covered the dome emerged at the same time, gaining depth and substance until it was an actual spider-web of immense, even cosmic scale, with Lolth herself perched in its center. "Did you come here to punish me? I honestly didn't think you cared that much..." Direza casually asked the looming, awe-inspiring deity.

Lolth chuckled, her voice dry like old bones - not loud, but impossible to ignore. "I do not, generally, though I must confess that your... replacement is sufficiently insufferable that I have come to care somewhat. Her reign will be short and end messily... the blink of an eye to one such as I. But too long for my tastes all the same... " Three of her eight eyes blinked illustratively, and Direza chuckled. "Yes, that's how I felt about her too. Sorry if she's being a pest to you - that wasn't really the idea. I just figured she'd make enough of a mess of things that it'd take a while to mount a concerted pursuit. Since the only pursuit I've seen was that single scout the first day, I guess it worked! Unless you count as a 'pursuit', I suppose, in which case it backfired spectacularly..." she rubbed her chin as she pondered which it was.

Lolth grinned - a rather frightening sight, though at the moment, Direza felt not a shred of fear. "W hile the nature of your replacement certainly has not helped matters, I suspect I would have come here regardless of who took over your old post. However, I am not here to punish you... only to tell you something. " Direza blinked at this, then shrugged. "All right, I'm listening. Must be something important for you to go out of your way like this." Lolth nodded gravely, her grin disappearing. "I ndeed, little mortal... so listen close and listen well. Two things I come to give you - an offer, and a prophecy. "

Direza nodded again. This sounded quite interesting, quite interesting indeed. "F irst, the offer... if you return, now, to Commorragh and My Temple, I will reinstate you as High Priestess by Divine Commandment. Your sins will be wiped from all records, and you will serve Me as you have before, until a worthy successor rises to take your place - as you took it from _ your _predecessor. " Lolth's proclamation was crystal-clear, and Direza knew immediately that it was neither a trick nor a lie - a Goddess had no use for such thing. This was simply her will... but it was a will that_she_, mortal though she was, had the ability to defy. The gods wielded great and fearsome power, but one thing they could _not_do, was compel mortals to worship them. The choice of who - if any - to worship was one that only the individual could make, and which no god could gainsay.

"I'm sorry, but I've made up my mind..." she said sadly. It would_be nice, kind of, to just call a do-over on everything, and give up the whole 'travel the surface' idea as a bad move. Pretend none of it happened. But... "I just don't like the way things run down there anymore, and I doubt you'd let me _change it in any meaningful way." Lolth scowled at this, but true to her earlier word, she did not immediately pounce on her erstwhile High Priestess in order to tear her soul to agony-infused shreds. "Y ou are correct. The Drow are as they should be, as I _ made _them to be. This foolish softness that has possessed you would have to be left behind in the accursed sunlight to wither and die. Still, you have given your answer, and I must respect that... but perhaps you will change your mind when you hear the prophecy I bring you. "

Direza rather doubted that, but she still listened attentively as Lolth's smile widened once more. "T his, then, is the Prophesy of Doom, as spoken by the mouth of Lolth! If the apostate High Priestess, Direza, does not return to her throne, the Drow are doomed, and will be no more. Commorragh itself will fall into ruin, blood will flow freely in the streets, and all that is and was Drow will cease to be. Thus I have spoken, and thus it will be." Direza gasped at this pronunciation as its thunderous final sentence washed over her like a sudden gust of powerful wind - its raw power cutting somewhat through the strange, dreamlike languor that had possessed her. Escaping from the Underdark had seemed like the moral choice, the right choice - to refuse any further involvement with the dark and evil actions of her peers. But if that choice led to the extinction of her entire species... if her refusal to return there_ensured_ their end... was it, perhaps, a selfish deed after all?

"Well... it's kind of a moot point really, isn't it?" She said rather lamely, her mind whirling as it gradually started to pull itself back into some semblance of its usual self. "I'm going to be executed tomorrow, I think - or maybe the day after tomorrow, I've kind of lost track. So, you know... you might have to find someone else who can prevent the end of the Drow." Lolth chuckled at this, her mirth apparently returning, and raised four of her eyebrows while one of her long, spidery legs rose an immeasurable distance into the surrounding cosmos, and plucked at one of the strings of her grand web. It sang as it vibrated, like a violin-string. "M ight I indeed? We shall see... " she replied, and chuckled chitinously again. That chuckle chased Direza into a sudden, all-encompasing darkness, and was still resounding in her ears when she was awakened by the familiar sound of panicked screaming. Then the world exploded.

It was only far later that she was able to piece together the circumstances that led to her escape. Apparently, rebellion had long been brewing in the kingdom, due to both the heavy taxes and the king's cruel way of dealing with anyone who displeased or even_annoyed_ him. At a certain point, the fear of being tortured, watching your wife and daughters raped before your eyes, and ultimately being executed in the castle square, simply couldn't keep a lid on the boiling, steadily-expanding rage any more. This much, she had sensed both before and during her own imprisonment. But it had seemed the kind of thing that would simply boil over into a messy peasant-revolt, with lots of fighting in the street that is ultimately put down by the far better armed and trained Royal Knights.

However, the rebels hadn't been acting alone, as it turned out. The kingdom's wealth was derived from its advantageous position atop a number of important trade-routes - and traveling merchants had been taxed even more heavily than the locals. The neighboring kingdoms had grown increasingly fed up, and ultimately decided that it made fiscal sense to pour some resources into arranging a change of leadership - specifically, get someone on the throne who'd owe them a significant debt, which could then be paid off in the form of small-to-nonexistent tariffs. Rumors had it that the Elven Diplomatic Service had been part of the plot, helping to put the parties into contact with one another... though of course, they never had to bloody their hands with the actual fighting.

Enough said, when the rebellion started, it wasn't some sudden, spontaneous outpouring of anger after yet another daughter was raped by the city guards. It was a well-planned, carefully-executed coup, and fighting alongside the steely-eyed revolutionaries were a small army of 'volunteers', their armor suspiciously familiar to anyone who had visited the neighboring kingdoms, though their colors and heraldry had been carefully stripped out. A handful of 'mercenary' battlemages had also offered to lend a hand, for a laughably low price considering what kind of wages such deadly specialists commanded - purely out of a love of freedom and hatred of tyranny, of course!

It was one of those battlemages who had misaimed an Explosive Burst_meant_ for one of the parapets from which the castle's defenders were pouring arrows into the besieging forces - hitting, instead, the outer walls of the castle dungeons. The cell across from Direza's - luckily unoccupied - had been pulverized, and the shockwave would have thrown her off her feet and potentially caused some real damage - if she hadn't been lying flat on her cot at the time, and thus relatively untouched. It was still plenty enough to wrench half the cell's bars out of their seating, and bend the rest into strange, twisted shapes. One of them, apparently better attached than the rest, was sheared clean in half - top and bottom alike bent into a razor-tipped metal spear.

The lower of these spears provided her with a convenient surface on which to saw through the ropes that bound her hands. The guards that normally watched her every minute of the day were nowhere to be seen - having presumably run off to join the rest of their fellows on the battlement - and if they had been there, the explosion would've ripped them apart. So no-one stopped her, or even shouted in alarm, as she left her cell behind and made her way to the torture-chamber - a route she was well familiar with.

This, too, was abandoned - but it wasn't the torturer she was after, much as she'd enjoy giving him a quick lambasting for his amateurish conduct. Rather, she remembered how they'd waved her shadowmail and the bracers with the Sigil of Lolth on them in her face while declaring that she was obviously lying when she said that she wasn't part of the Drow military. And the interrogator had come through that door whenever he carried them... which meant that... ah yes! An office, belonging to someone reasonably important. The dungeon-keeper, perhaps, or some kind of Royal Inquisitor? So, where would he be keeping the property of a high-profile prisoner...

Probably in this locked chest. If he was carrying the key on him, she was screwed. But perhaps... hmm... aha! There, cowering in the shadowy corner, an itsy-bitsy house-spider, no doubt terrified by all the rumbling and shouting. She didn't need fingernails to perform the familiar spell - calling the little thing to her hand. This time, however, she had no work for him. Instead, she pushed her way into his blurry, animalistic recollection, looking for something specific. If he lived here, he'd know to keep an eye on the other resident - just to stay out of sight when the big, warm thing was moving, lest he be squished. So, what had that looked like?

Through the spider's eightfold eyes, she watched - not an easy task, but one she'd practiced before in the past - as the office's owner unlocked the chest... and dropped his keyring in a desk-drawer. It seemed to have rather a lot of keys on it, possibly explaining why he didn't bother to carry it with him all the time. He probably kept his office locked, after all, and he likely did take the keys with him when he left for the night. When he fled his office in a sudden panic while an angry mob kicked down the castle gates baying for blood, however, neither might occur to him.

Sure enough, the keyring was there, in the same unlocked desk-drawer she'd seen him use through the spider's eyes. Then it was just a matter of trying every key that looked likely, until the chest sprang open. There it was, her stylish doeskin backpack - bought to complement her Elven disguise. Spread out beside it were the contents, for easy access - including, surprisingly enough, all the gold she'd been carrying. Perhaps they'd been worried that it was cursed or something. More importantly, the shadowmail and the bracers, which were now her dearly-bought Arcane Focus, were there, and she quickly slipped into both. A whispered prayer later, she had fingernails again. The burn-scars would take longer to heal - burns were tricky - so she'd save that for later, when she was reasonably safe.

That would be harder than it used to, though, she concluded as she pulled on the Amulet of Disguise and observed it doing absolutely nothing. Apparently, the heavily-enchanted obelisk she'd so unwarily drawn near hadn't just temporarily disabled the amulet, but actually rendered it permanently inert - breaking the enchantment that had enabled her to disguise herself as an elf for so long. Cursing, she threw it aside, and made her escape with what she had. It was surprisingly easy - in such boiling chaos, consuming both the castle and the city, she could simply cloak herself in darkness and flit from shadow to shadow as she made her way towards the city gates - wide-open and unguarded, since the action had long-since moved to the castle - while avoiding any open spaces that might be covered by unpleasant obelisks. Who knew what else they might be able to do, after all?

It was only later, camping out in the woods and watching the fires rage out of control in the city she'd just left while she slowly and meticulously healed her own burn-scars, that the dream returned to her. She remembered it vividly - particularly the last part - and she felt not the slightest temptation to dismiss it as 'just a dream'. Lolth Herself had visited her in her sleep, and pronounced a prophesy that She, herself, could certainly make come true, if it did not do so organically. Why the Spider-Goddess might want a High Priestess who had already betrayed her once to return to the fold, Direza could not guess - forgiveness and mercy weren't normally among Lolth's notable traits. But the message stood stark and clear all the same.

If she did not give up on her quest and return to the Underdark - if she did not give up on ever seeing the DragonRider again - her entire race, her people, would be destroyed.

The alchemist looked up from his brew cautiously as he heard the door creak open. It always paid to be cautious, living well outside the city walls as he did, thanks to those narrow-minded burghers and their incessant complaints about 'noxious fumes' and 'occasional explosions'. Sure, it could be another customer willing to walk the literal extra mile for a concoction that his domesticated colleagues in the city couldn't - or wouldn't - provide, but it could also be some idiotic bandit or robber who, just arrived in the area, had spotted his isolated cottage and figured it for an easy target. He'd already had to 'correct' more than one such mouth-breather, and he made sure he always had the potions that would let him do so again close at hand.

This one, however, looked more like a customer... which was about all he could really say. Clad in a heavy, hooded cloak, only the hands and parts of the face were visible - and those were swathed in bandages, leaving not a single patch of skin showing. Some kind of debilitating injury? Burns across most of the body, or perhaps just face and hands? Either could happen, depending on circumstances, and he could certainly provide a salve that would assist in the healing. Burns were always tricky, of course, but any healer worth his salt would recommend a salve, rather than potions or a priest's spells.

"Welcome, welcome! What can I do for you, good... umm... customer?" He eagerly asked, waving the shrouded figure closer. He'd been about to say 'sir', but on reflection, he really couldn't tell whether the new arrival was male or female, under that hefty cloak. He was glad for his last-minute adjustment when a soft, decidedly feminine voice whispered out from under the cloak. "I have heard that you know the makings of a potion that can let one forget.... for good. Erasing memories and... trauma."

The alchemist hesitated for a moment. He did, indeed, but that potion was tightly controlled by the Alchemist's Guild. It could be too easily abused, they said, even though the way it worked made it all but impossible to effectively dose someone unknowingly. It was too dangerous, they said, even though they happily sold blade-poisons and Alchemist's Fire to dimwitted adventurers by the wagonload. Of course, he'd violated guild rules before... and this woman certainly_looked_ like she'd been through something horrid. Why should she not be allowed to forget, and put it all behind her?

On the other hand, he did have bills to pay. His latest experiments were promising - at least judging by the reaction of the would-be robber who had served as an unwitting guinea-pig - but the ingredients for the concoction cost a pretty copper. So... "Well... I might..." he replied hesitantly, trying his best to look more conflicted than he really was. "But the Guild considers it a Controlled Substance, so they've got all kinds of hoops for you to leap through before they'll let anyone cook it up for you. I've skirted the rules before, sure, but if they catch me at it again, they'll kick me out on my arse, brutes that they are..." That part, at least, was true - he just wasn't that bothered by such a prospect, since he increasingly felt like those small-minded plodders were just holding him back.

A sack emerged from under the large cloak, and landed on his table with a satisfying jingle. Was that all gold? It was! That could fund his experiments for weeks, maybe months to come if he could swing a bulk discount from his supplier... still, if she was that rich and that desperate, maybe..? No, no - bird in the hand and all that, no sense playing hard to get. If she had that kind of gold to throw around, she'd find someone willing to brew it for her soon enough, so it might as well be him. He, at least, would put that gold to good use! "Ah, I never was much of a stickler for rules, honored customer. I shall get it brewing on the double!"

It was a fairly complex brew - certainly not something any amateur could cook up, and indeed the potential consequences for screwing it up could be severe. Not just for the drinker, but for the brewer! There were stories about careless alchemists missing a step, only to have their cauldron blow up in their face... and subsequently finding themselves hard-pressed to remember anything that transpired after their seventh birthday. But he, fortunately, was no amateur, nor was he careless. He knew and respected the power of alchemy - treating it like the mighty and fearsome instrument that it was, in the right hands.

The brewing took hours, during which the customer silently waited in the back of the store, leaning against the wall, possibly watching him work from underneath that heavy hood. Of course, having an audience wasn't going to shake him! And sure enough, the whole process went off without a hitch, including the last, risky bit - the distillation - which could so easily lead to over-pressure, rupture, and the loss of a lot of pricey education for anyone standing near by. Murky though the brew had been, the final, fully-distilled result was completely clear - like water, or fine alcohol. Considering its effects, probably more of the later.

He handed her the bottle, with the requisite explanation and warning. "One bottle of the Waters of Lethe, as requested. When you drink it, focus hard on whatever you want to forget. Can be multiple things, even, if you can keep them all straight in your head at the same time. Just make sure you concentrate until the potion has run its course, or else you might find yourself losing more than you'd accounted for." She accepted the bottle and the warning with a simple nod, and handed over the promised sack of coin. A profitable night's work for an alchemist, he thought as his mysterious customer walked out the door without another word.

Direza winced as she scratched her way through another page in her journal. The headache was building again, like a steadily-growing pressure. But she was so close, now - she just needed to put down a few more things about her investigation into the movements of Anitra the DragonRider and her black steed. Couldn't risk keeping any of it in her head when she drank the potion - she needed all of it in writing, to make sure she'd still be able to follow the various clues she'd found in her travels.

It was all there, now, in the journal. The interview with the traveler from Caristad, the rather expensive accounts of a shifty-eyed 'honest merchant' who'd sold some undefined goods to a woman matching Anitra's description while on his way to Mirage City on some uncertain business... and who, when pressed, was willing to admit that he'd heard some rumors while he was in that city, that the Sultan had accepted that selfsame girl into his Harem, only for her to apparently run away just a few days later. Most mysterious.

Putting together that and a few other loose accounts, the only conclusion she could really draw was that the DragonRider was still looking for more of those odd tablet-fragments she'd been so interested in during their original meeting. Hardly surprising - if she'd been willing to travel to the pits of the Underdark for one of them, she was clearly quite invested in her collection. What the ultimate purpose_of it was, however, remained unclear - as did the question of how many more fragments she still needed, and where any remaining ones might be. If she could puzzle _that out, she'd have a decent chance at intercepting the fast-moving DragonRider - simply by sitting on another tablet-fragment and waiting for her crush to come to her.

But there just wasn't enough to go on, not really. Even if all the accounts of a black dragon flying over this or that town, possibly with a rider, were accurate and indeed relevant and not just proof of there being more than one DragonRider around, she could make out no pattern in the sightings. Still, maybe she just needed some fresh eyes on it. And fortunately, she would soon have just that. With a flourish, she finished the journal - a backup-copy for the brain she was about to half-drown.

It wasn't as if she treasured the idea of messing with her perfectly functional head, but she could think of no other solution. The prophecy haunted her day and night, denying her both restful sleep and peace of mind during the waking hours. It was starting to affect her health, and worse, she feared that it might be grinding down her_will_. For now, though, she'd made up her mind. If the Drow were to be destroyed, then let them be destroyed. In the end, the last vestiges of her self-deception had been worn away by the stress. All she cared about was the DragonRider. Anitra. Her eyes, her touch, the taste of her lips... she wanted to be there again, in_her_ arms.

And if that meant damning her entire species, then so be it. But she couldn't keep going like this. She couldn't move forwards while the prophecy continued to haunt her. Reminding her, constantly, that she could still do the right thing. All she had to do was turn around, return to that life of luxury and ease, and abandon her hopeless mission that was starting to seem like finding a needle in a haystack. No! She would not. She would not let Lolth win - not now.

Thus spending most of the gold she had left on a potion that could erase it from her mind. It wasn't as if she had much left to spend gold on, anyway. Her 'bandaged victim' disguise was far too eye-catching, far too memorable. She'd used it once, to buy the kit she'd need in order to camp comfortably in the wild, and a second time to buy the potion. She couldn't risk more than that. From here on out, there were no more fancy inns - she'd have to rough it, and use her shadow-blending magic to steal necessities such as food from farms and such. She'd have to focus more on sending letters and, if necessary, knife-point interrogations in order to continue her investigation, too. Quiet interviews over a few drinks weren't really in the cards anymore.

Putting aside the journal, she picked up the potion - the Waters of Lethe, and considered what she should focus on. It was probably easiest to simply forget the whole ordeal around the dream and the prophecy, too - fewer loose ends that way, and her orgasmic enjoyment of the prison-rape notwithstanding, her imprisonment had been a largely negative experience, and not one she'd be sad to see go. So - she'd lost her Amulet of Disguise there, but had then gotten away - presumably by the skin of her teeth. What luck!

Still... why stop there? Between her background in the Great Game and her clerical training, holding two or even three memories in her mind, crystal-clear and without any distracting stray thoughts, was child's play. So perhaps she'd be better off forgetting the events of the slave-brothel too, hmm? It had all been rather traumatic, after all, and the things she'd been forced to do there still haunted her, albeit in a rather more natural, low-key fashion compared to Lolth's brain-melting prophecy. Best to just forget it.

And finally... there was that encounter with the Drow scout, months back, just after her escape. Not all that unpleasant, really, but she still had regrets about it - about being forced to do things with and to him that she'd hoped to first do with Anitra. She could erase all those 'firsts' while she was at it... and combined with the disappearance of the more recent prison-rape, that would effectively erase all of her sexual experiences since arriving at the surface, other than a handful of increasingly less clumsy masturbation-sessions, invariably focused on memories of Anitra - and dreams of future meetings with her. That way, when she finally_did_ find the DragonRider, she could meet her pure and celibate - in mind, if not in body. Well, assuming no more disasters happened between now and then, obviously!

After taking her time constructing the three thoughts in her mind in fine and accurate details - the dark rug spread on the needle-covered forest-floor, the bloodstained torture-room in the underground slave-brothel, and the small, smelly cell in the castle she had but recently escaped. Then, with only a moment of hesitation, she lifted the Waters of Lethe to her lips and drank deeply.

Direza woke up and stretched luxuriously, before looking around - feeling strangely disoriented. No reason to be, though. She was right where she should be, in her cozy little campsite in the woods. Apparently, she was getting used to camping rough again, though - at least, she felt tremendously well-rested. It was, of course, very inconvenient that she should lose her Amulet of Disguise, so that she couldn't enter cities openly or sleep in soft beds with down comforters... but she should probably thank her lucky stars that she'd gotten out of that jam with all her skin intact, rather than complain about losing a useful tool in the process.

Had she dreamed of the DragonRider again? Was that why she felt so pleasantly languid? Her hand strayed towards her crotch, as it had so many other times when she thought of the DragonRider's erotic, muscular curves. Why had it taken her so long to admit to herself that meeting the DragonRider again, being by her side, was all she really wanted? Oh, to see her again, the DragonRider... uh...

Direza's brow wrinkled. For some reason, she was having a hard time remembering the name. How silly - how could she forget something that important? Maybe she was still woozy after the long, heavy nap. Scrambling for her journal, she picked it up and quickly leafed through it to reassure herself. Yep, there it was - Anitra, that was the name, at least according to the man from Caristad she'd interviewed. Actually, now that she thought about it, where was it she'd been planning to go next?

Continuing to skim the pages, she refreshed her memory on everything she'd discovered so far, and as she did so, a strange pattern seemed to emerge. She couldn't put her fingers on what it really was or where she was seeing it, but a growing certainty was rising in her mind. Finally, she pulled the neatly-folded map out of the journal's cover and spread it out on her camping-table - it showed marks everywhere she had accounts of Anitra and her imposing steed being spotted, with various symbols denoting the certainty of the report - from vague, third-hand rumors through direct-but-unreliable witnesses, to fairly solid accounts from dependable-seeming people.

At a glance, there was no pattern, even when accounting for time. Like they'd been traveling this way and that across the continent on various errands. And yet... looking at it, she felt like somehow, they were all pointing the same way. Her finger came down on the map with unerring precision. There - up north, somewhere on the mountainous plateaus. According to the map's original creator, there seemed to be a dragonhome up there somewhere. Was that where the DragonRider would be heading? Of that, she was unsure, but all the same, she felt confident that her beloved would be passing through the area sometime soon. She couldn't afford to lounge around here anymore! She needed to get going, if she wanted to successfully intercept them!

Direza gasped as the craftsman opened the box before her. "Delivered as promised!" he proudly declared, though she knew for a fact that he'd required the help of at least one other master-class enchanter_and_ a legendary jeweler to produce it. An Arcane Focus of superlative quality, solid platinum, with Lolth's spidery symbol engraved upon it at a level of exquisite detail that the Temple-Citadel of Commorragh couldn't have bettered. An intricate mechanism allowed the wearer to flip the central cameo with a touch, hiding the engraving and showing instead a richly jeweled decorative pattern - for however much that would help allay people's fears, considering her appearance!

The craftsman's eyes were straying as she considered it - looking not at her, but at the beautiful figure clad in black scale who stood behind her, saying nothing, just watching her reaction. It was her_approval he sought - that of the Utopia's heroic champion - even if the item he had helped to craft was meant for her favorite servant. Direza couldn't blame him - who _wouldn't want the DragonRider's approval? She, herself, felt a fluttering in her stomach as she beheld the platinum amulet - knowing that it represented just that: The approval of her dear Mistress.

Despite this, she felt a twinge of conflicting emotions as she lifted it from the silken pillow it had been resting on. She still didn't like seeing that symbol again - didn't like relying on the same powers that the dreadful spider-goddess had once granted her, even if she was sourcing them from a different provider now. But she'd crossed that bridge long ago, when she had her earlier, bracer-shaped Arcane Focus so expensively crafted. Wait... why had she taken that step in the first place, actually? For a moment, she struggled to remember. Oh yes - she'd been attacked by a pair of human thugs when she strayed into an unpleasant neighborhood, and escaped by the skin of her teeth. Certainly, that had illustrated the need to be able to defend herself, and even though they hadn't allowed her to access more than maybe a third of her original power, the enchanted braces had provided that.

With this, though... she'd be back at her full strength. Even without the boost she'd once enjoyed from hallowed - or, in the case of Lolth, perhaps rather unhallowed - ground, she'd be able to work minor miracles... healing, shielding and supporting her beloved Mistress. That was the idea, after all. This potent Focus was her merciful Mistress' reward, despite the many times she had failed at her orders - a tacit agreement that she would be brought along on at least some of the adventures that the Mistress still roved out on, alongside Lord Blake.

She was rather looking forwards to it, really. Not that she didn't glory in her current, pastoral life - spending her days serving her beloved Mistress in every way she could, and her nights sleeping beside her far more often than she had truly deserved - but a bit of excitement and adventure wouldn't be so bad either. After all, her journey here had proven to be a rather dull and uneventful affair, in the end...

But so what? She still had several good centuries in her. Her journey was not yet complete.

THE END