R.A. Salvatore - The Dark Elf Trilogy

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Homeland

By R.A. Salvatore

Part 1

Station

Station: In all the world of the drow, there is no more important word. It is the

calling of their, of our religion, the incessant pulling of hungering heartstrings.

Ambition overrides good sense and compassion is thrown away in its face, all in

the name of Lloth, the Spider Queen.

Ascension to power in drow society is a simple process of assassination. The

Spider Queen is a deity of chaos, and she and her high priestesses, the true

rulers of the drow world, do not look with ill favor upon ambitious individuals

wielding poisoned daggers.

Of course, there are rules of behavior, every society must boast of these. To

openly commit murder or wage war invites the pretense of justice, and penalties

exacted in the name of drow justice are merciless. To stick a dagger in the back

of a rival during the chaos of a larger battle or in the quiet shadows of an alley,

however, is quite acceptable, even applauded. Investigation is not the forte of

drow justice. No one cares enough to bother

Station is the way of Lloth, the ambition she bestows to further the chaos, to keep

her drow "children" along their appointed course of self imprisonment. Children?

Pawns more likely, dancing dolls for the Spider Queen, puppets on the

imperceptible but impervious strands of her web. All climb the Spider Queen's

ladders; all hunt for her pleasure, and all fall to the hunters of her pleasure.

Station is the paradox of the world of my people, the limitation of our power within

the hunger for power. It is gained through treachery and invites treachery against

those who gain it. Those most powerful in Menzoberranzan spend their days

watching over their shoulders, defending

against the daggers that would find their backs.

Their deaths usually come from the front.

-Drizzt Do'Urden

Part 1

Chapter 1

Menzoberranzan

To a surface dweller, he might have passed undetected only a foot away. The

padded footfalls of his lizard mount were too light to be heard, and the pliable

and perfectly crafted mesh armor that both rider and mount wore bent and

creased with their movements as well as if the suits had grown over their skin.

Dinin's lizard trotted along in an easy but swift gait, floating over the broken floor,

up the walls, and even across the long tunnel's ceiling. Subterranean lizards, with

their sticky and soft three-toed feet, were preferred mounts for just this ability to

scale stone as easily as a spider. Crossing hard ground left no damning tracks in

the lighted surface world, but nearly all of the creatures of the Underdark

possessed infravision, the ability to see in the infrared spectrum. Foot-falls left

heat residue that could easily be tracked if they fol-

lowed a predictable course along a corridor's floor.

Dinin clamped tight to his saddle as the lizard plodded along a stretch of the

ceiling, then sprang out in a twisting descent to a point farther along the wall.

Dinin did not want to be tracked.

He had no light to guide him, but he needed none. He was a dark elf, a drow, an

ebon-skinned cousin of those sylvan folk who danced under the stars on the

world's surface. To Dinin's superior eyes, which translated subtle variations of

heat into vivid and colorful images, the Underdark was far from a lightless place.

Colors all across the spectrum swirled before him in the stone of the walls and

the floor, heated by some distant fissure or hot stream. The heat of living things

was the most distinctive, letting the dark elf view his enemies in details as

intricate as any surface dweller would find in brilliant daylight.

Normally Dinin would not have left the city alone, the world of the Underdark was

too dangerous for solo treks, even for a drow elf. This day was different, though.

Dinin had to be certain that no unfriendly drow eyes marked his passage.

A soft blue magical glow beyond a sculpted archway told the drow that he neared

the city's entrance, and he slowed the lizard's pace accordingly. Few used this

narrow tunnel, which opened into Tier Breche, the northern section of

Menzoberranzan devoted to the Academy, and none but the mistresses and

masters, the instructors of the Academy, could pass through here without

attracting suspicion.

Dinin was always nervous when he came to this point. Of the hundred tunnels

that opened off the main cavern of Menzoberranzan, this one was the best

guarded. Beyond the archway, twin statues of gigantic spiders sat in quiet

defense. If an enemy crossed through, the spiders would animate and attack,

and alarms would be sounded all throughout the Academy.

Dinin dismounted, leaving his lizard clinging comfortably to a wall at his chest

level. He reached under the collar of his piwafwi, his magical, shielding cloak,

and took out his neck purse. From this Dinin produced the insignia of House

Do'Urden, a spider wielding various weapons in each of its eight legs and

emblazoned with the letters "DN"' for Daermon N'a'shezbaernon, the ancient and

formal name of House Do'Urden.

"You will await my return" Dinin whispered to the lizard as he waved the insignia

before it. As with all the drow houses, the insignia of House Do'Urden held

several magical dweomers, one of which gave family members absolute control

over the house pets. The lizard would obey unfailingly, holding its position as

though it were rooted to the stone, even if a scurry rat, its favorite morsel, napped

a few feet from its maw.

Dinin took a deep breath and gingerly stepped to the archway. He could see the

spiders leering down at him from their fifteen-foot height. He was a drow of the

city, not an enemy, and could pass through any other tunnel unconcerned, but

the Academy was an unpredictable place, Dinin

had heard that the spiders often refused entry viciously,even to uninvited drow.

He could not be delayed by fears and possibilities, Dinin reminded himself. His

business was of the utmost importance to his family's battle plans. Looking

straight ahead, away from the towering spiders, he strode between them and

onto the floor of Tier Breche.

He moved to the side and paused, first to be certain that no one lurked nearby,

and then to admire the sweeping view of Menzoberranzan. No one, drow or

otherwise, had ever looked out from this spot without a sense of wonder at the

drow city. Tier Breche was the highest point on the floor of the two-mile cavern,

affording a panoramic view to the rest of Menzoberranzan. The cubby of the

Academy was narrow, holding only the three structures that comprised the drow

school: Arach Tinilith, the spider-shaped school of Lloth, Sorcere, the gracefully

curving, many-spired tower

of wizardry, and Melee Magthere, the somewhat plain pyramidal structure where

male fighters learned their trade. Beyond Tier Breche, through the ornate

stalagmite columns that marked the entrance to the Academy, the cavern

dropped away quickly and spread wide, going far beyond Dinin's line of vision to

either side and farther back then his keen eyes could possibly see. The colors of

Menzoberranzan were threefold to the sensitive eyes of the drow. Heat patterns

from various fissures and hot springs swirled about the entire cavern. Purple and

red, bright yellow and subtle blue, crossed and merged, climbed the walls and

stalagmite mounds, or ran off singularly in cutting lines against the backdrop of

dim gray stone. More confined than these generalized and natural gradations of

color in the infrared spectrum were the regions of intense magic, like the spiders

Dinin had walked between, virtually glowing with energy. Finally there were the

actual lights of the city, faerie fire and highlighted sculptures on the houses. The

drow were proud of the beauty of their designs, and especially ornate columns or

perfectly crafted gargoyles were almost always limned in permanent magical

lights.

Even from this distance Dinin could make out House Baenre, First House of

Menzoberranzan. It encompassed twenty stalagmite pillars and half again that

number of gigantic stalactites. House Baenre had existed for five thousand years,

since the founding of Menzoberranzan, and in

that time the work to perfect the house's art had never ceased. Practically every

inch of the immense structure glowed in faerie fire, blue at the outlying towers

and brilliant purple at the huge central dome.

The sharp light of candles, foreign to the Underdark, glared through some of the

windows of the distant houses. Only clerics or wizards would light the fires, Dinin

knew, as necessary pains in their world of scrolls and parchments.

This was Menzoberranzan, the city of drow. Threnty thousand dark elves lived

there, twenty thousand soldiers in the army of evil.

A wicked smile spread across Dinin's thin lips when he thought of some of those

soldiers who would fall this night.

Dinin studied Narbondel, the huge central pillar that served as the timeclock of

Menzoberranzan. Narbondel was, the only way the drow had to mark the

passage of time in aworld that otherwise knew no days and no seasons. At the

end of each day, the city's appointed Archmage cast his magical fires into the

base of the stone pillar. There the spell lingered throughout the cycle a full day

on the surface and gradually spread its warmth up the structure of Narbondel

until the whole of it glowed red in the infrared spectrum. The pillar was fully dark

now, cooled since the dweomer's fires had expired. The wizard was even now at

the base, Dinin reasoned, ready to begin the cycle anew.

It was midnight, the appointed hour.

Dinin moved away from the spiders and the tunnel exit and crept along the side

of Tier Breche, seeking the "shadows" of heat patterns in the wall, which would

effectively hide the distinct outline of his own body temperatures. He came at last

to Sorcere, the school of wizardry, and slipped into the narrow alley between the

tower's curving base and Tier Breche's outer wall.

"Student or master?" came the expected whisper.

"Only a master may walk out of house in Tier Breche in

the black death of Narbondel” Dinin responded.

A heavily robed figure moved around the arc of the structure to stand before

Dinin. The stranger remained in the customary posture of a master of the drow

Academy, his arms out before him and bent at the elbows, his hands tight

together, one on top of the other in front of his chest.

That pose was the only thing about this one that seemed normal to Dinin.

"Greetings, Faceless One" he signaled in the silent hand code of the drow, a

language as detailed as the spoken word. The quiver of Dinin's hands belied his

calm face, though, for the sight of this wizard put him as far on the edge of his

nerves as he had ever been.

"Secondboy Do'Urden" the wizard replied in the gestured

code. "Have you my payment?"

"You will be compensated" Dinin signaled pointedly, regaining his composure in

the first swelling bubbles of his temper. "Do you dare to doubt the promise of

Malice Do'Urden, Matron Mother of Daermon N'a'shezbaernon, Tenth House of

Menzoberranzan?"

The Faceless One slumped back, knowing he had erred.

"My apologies, Secondboy of House Do'Urden” he answered, dropping to one

knee in a gesture of surrender. Since he had entered this conspiracy, the wizard

had feared that his impatience might cost him his life. He had been caught in the

violent throes of one of his own magical experiments, the tragedy melting away

all of his facial features and leaving behind a blank hot spot of white and green

goo. Matron Malice Do'Urden, reputedly as skilled as anyone in all the vast city in

mixing potions and salves, had offered him a sliver of hope that he could not

pass by.

No pity found its way into Dinin's callous heart, but House Do'Urden needed the

wizard. "You will get your salve” Dinin promised calmly, "when Alton DeVir is

dead”

"Of course” the wizard agreed. "This night?"

Dinin crossed his arms and considered the question. Matron Malice had

instructed him that Alton DeVir should die even as their families' battle

commenced. That scenario now seemed too clean, too easy, to Dinin. The

Faceless One did not miss the sparkle that suddenly brightened the scarlet glow

in the young Do'Urden's heat-sensing eyes.

"Wait for Narbondel's light to approach its zenith” Dinin replied, his hands working

through the signals excitedly and his grimace seeming more of a twisted grin.

"Should the doomed boy know of his house's fate before he dies?" the wizard

asked, guessing the wicked intentions behind Dinin's instructions.

"As the killing blow falls” answered Dinin. "Let Alton

DeVir die without hope”

Dinin retrieved his mount and sped off down the empty corridors, finding an

intersecting route that would take him in through a different entrance to the city

proper. He came in along the eastern end of the great cavern, Menzoberranzan's

produce section, where no drow families would see that he had been outside the

city limits and where only a few unremarkable stalagmite pillars rose up from the

flat stone. Dinin spurred his mount along the banks of Donigarten, the city's small

pond with its moss-covered island that housed a fair-sized herd of cattlelike

creatures called rothe. A hundred goblins and orcs looked up from their herding

and fishing duties to mark the drow soldier's swift passage.

Knowing their restrictions as slaves, they took care not to look Dinin in the eye.

Dinin would have paid them no heed anyway. He was too consumed by the

urgency of the moment. He kicked his lizard to even greater speeds when he

again was on the flat and curving avenues between the glowing drow castles. He

moved toward the south-central region of the city, toward

the grove of giant mushrooms that marked the section of the finest houses in

Menzoberranzan.

As he came around one blind turn, he nearly ran over a group of four wandering

bugbears. The giant hairy goblin things paused a moment to consider the drow,

then moved slowly but purposefully out of his way.

The bugbears recognized him as a member of House Do'Urden, Dinin knew. He

was a noble, a son of a high priestess, and his surname, Do'Urden, was the

name of his house. Of the twenty thousand dark elves in Menzoberranzan, only a

thousand or so were nobles, actually the chil.

dren of the sixty-seven recognized families of the city. The

rest were common soldiers.

Bugbears were not stupid creatures. They knew a noble from a commoner, and

though drow elves did not carry their family insignia in plain view, the pointed and

tailed cut of Dinin's stark white hair and the distinctive pattern of purple and red

lines in his black piwafwi told them well enough who he was.

The mission's urgency pressed upon Dinin, but he could not ignore the bugbears'

slight. How fast would they have scampered away if he had been a member of

House Baenre or one of the other seven ruling houses? he wondered.

"You will learn respect of House Do'Urden soon enough!" the dark elf whispered

under his breath, as he turned and charged his lizard at the group. The bugbears

broke into a run, turning down an alley strewn with stones and debris.

Dinin found his satisfaction by calling on the innate powers of his race. He

summoned a globe of darkness impervious to both infravision and normal sight in

the fleeing creatures' path. He supposed that it was unwise to call such attention

to himself, but a moment later, when he heard crashing and sputtered curses as

the bugbears stumbled blindly over the stones, he felt it was worth the risk.

His anger sated, he moved off again, picking a more careful route through the

heat shadows. As a member of the tenth house of the city, Dinin could go as he

pleased within the giant cavern without question, but Matron Malice had made it

clear that no one connected to House Do'Urden was to be caught anywhere near

the mushroom grove.

Matron Malice, Dinin's mother, was not to be crossed, but it was only a rule, after

all. In Menzoberranzan, one rule, took precedence over all of the petty others,

Don't get caught.

At the mushroom grove's southern end, the impetuous drow found what he was

looking for: a cluster of five huge floor-to-ceiling pillars that were hollowed into a

network of chambers and connected with metal and stone parapets and bridges.

Red-glowing gargoyles, the standard of the house, glared down from a hundred

perches like silent sentries. This was House DeVir, Fourth House of

Menzoberranzan.

A stockade of tall mushrooms ringed the place, every fifth one a shrieker, a

sentient fungus named (and favored as guardians) for the shrill cries of alarm it

emitted whenever a living being passed it by. Dinin kept a cautious distance, not

wanting to set off one of the shriekers and knowing also that other, more deadly

wards protected the fortress. Matron Malice would see to those.

An expectant hush permeated the air of this city section. It was general

knowledge throughout Menzoberranzan that Matron Ginafae of House DeVir had

fallen out of favor with Loth, the Spider Queen deity to all drow and the true

source of every house's strength. Such circumstances were

never openly discussed among the drow, but everyone who knew fully expected

that some family lower in the city hierarchy soon would strike out against the

crippled House DeVir.

Matron Ginafae and her family had been the last to learn of the Spider Queen's

displeasure ever was that Lloth's devious way and Dinin could tell just by

scanning the outside of House DeVir that the doomed family had not found

ample time to erect proper defenses. DeVir sported nearly

four hundred soldiers, many female, but those that Dinin could now see at their

posts along the parapets seemed nervous and unsure.

Dinin's smile spread even wider when he thought of his own house, which grew

in power daily under the cunning guidance of Matron Malice. With all three of his

sisters rapidly approaching the status of high priestess, his brother an

accomplished wizard, and his uncle Zaknafein, the finest weapon master in all of

Menzoberranzan, busily training

the three hundred soldiers, House Do'Urden was a complete force. And, Matron

Malice, unlike Ginafae, was in the Spider Queen's full favor.

"Daermon N'a'shezbaernon," Dinin muttered under his breath, using the formal

and ancestral reference to House Do'Urden. "Ninth House of Menzoberranzan!"

He liked the sound of it.

Halfway across the city, beyond the silver-glowing balcony and the arched

doorway twenty feet up the cavern's west wall, sat the principals of House

Do'Urden, gathered to outline the final plans of the night's work. On the raised

dais at the back of the small audience chamber sat venerable Matron Malice, her

belly swollen in the final hours of pregnancy. Flanking her in their places of honor

were her three daughters, Maya, Vierna, and the eldest, Briza, a newly ordained

high priestess of Lloth. Maya and Vierna appeared as younger versions of their

mother, slender and deceptively small, though possessing great strength. Briza,

though, hardly carried the family resemblance. She was

big- huge by drow standards-and rounded in the shoulders and hips. Those who

knew Briza well figured that her size was merely a circumstance of her

temperament, a smaller body could not have contained the anger and brutal

streak of House Do'Urden's newest high priestess.

"Dinin should return soon" remarked Rizzen, the present patron of the family, "to

let us know if the time is right for the assault."

"We go before Narbondel finds its morning glow!" Briza snapped at him in her

thick but razor-sharp voice. She turned a crooked smile to her mother, seeking

approval for putting the male in his place.

"The child comes this night” Matron Malice explained to her anxious husband.

"We go no matter what news Dinin bears."

"It will be a boy child” groaned Briza, making no effort to hide her disappointment,

"third living son of House Do'Orden."

"To be sacrificed to Lloth” put in Zaknafein, a former patron of the house who

now held the important position of weapon master. The skilled drow fighter

seemed quite pleased at the thought of sacrifice, as did Nalfein, the family's

eldest son, who stood at Zak's side. Nalfein was the elderboy, and he needed no

more competition beyond Dinin within the ranks of House Do'Urden.

"In accord with custom” Briza glowered and the red of her eyes brightened. "To

aid in our victory!" Rizzen shifted uncomfortably. "Matron Malice” he dared to

speak, "you know well the difficulties of birthing. Might the pain distract you"

"You dare to question the matron mother?" Briza started sharply, reaching for the

snake-headed whip so comfortably strapped and writhing on her belt. Matron

Malice stopped her with an outstretched hand.

"Attend to the fighting” the matron said to Rizzen. "Let the females of the house

see to the important matters of this battle."

Rizzen shifted again and dropped his gaze.

Dinin came to the magically wrought fence that connected the keep within the

city's west wall with the two small stalagmite towers of House Do'Orden, and

which formed the courtyard to the compound. The fence was adamantite, the

hardest metal in all the world, and adorning it were a hundred weapon-wielding

spider carvings, each ensorcelled with deadly glyphs and wards. The mighty gate

of House Do'Orden was the envy of many a drow house, but so soon after

viewing the spectacular houses in the mushroom grove, Dinin could only find

disappointment when looking upon his own abode. The compound was plain and

somewhat bare, as was the section of wall, with the notable exception of the

mithril-and-adamantite balcony running along the second level, by the arched

doorway reserved for the nobility of the family. Each baluster of that balcony

sported a thousand carvings, all of which blended into a single piece of art.

House Do'Urden, unlike the great majority of the houses in Menzoberranzan, did

not stand free within groves of stalactites and stalagmites. The bulk of the

structure was within a cave, and while this setup was indisputably defensible,

Dinin found himself wishing that his family could show a bit more grandeur.

An excited soldier rushed to open the gate for the returning secondboy. Dinin

swept past him without so much as a word of greeting and moved across the

courtyard, conscious of the hundred and more curious glances that fell upon him.

The soldiers and slaves knew that Dinin's mission

this night had something to do with the anticipated battle.

No stairway led to the silvery balcony of House Do'Urden's second level. This,

too, was a precautionary measure designed to segregate the leaders of the

house from the rabble and the slaves. Drow nobles needed no stairs, another

manifestation of their innate magical abilities allowed them the power of

levitation. With hardly a conscious thought to the act, Dinin drifted easily through

the air and dropped onto the balcony.

He rushed through the archway and down the house's main central corridor,

which was dimly lit in the soft hues of faerie fire, allowing for sight in the normal

light spectrum but not bright enough to defeat the use of infravision. The ornate

brass door at the corridor's end marked the second boy's destination, and he

paused before it to allow his eyes to shift back to the infrared spectrum. Unlike

the corridor, the room beyond the door had no light source. It was the audience

hall of the high priestesses, the anteroom to House Do'Urden's grand chapel.

The drow clerical rooms, in accord with the dark rites of the Spider Queen, were

not places of light.

When he felt he was prepared, Dinin pushed straight through the door, shoving

past the two shocked female guards without hesitation and moving boldly to

stand before his mother. All three of the family daughters narrowed their eyes at

their brash and pretentious brother. You enter

without permission! he knew they were thinking. Would that it was he who was to

be sacrificed this night!

As much as he enjoyed testing the limitations of his inferior station as a male,

Dinin could not ignore the threatening glances of Vierna, Maya, and Briza. Being

female, they were bigger and stronger than Dinin and had trained all of their lives

in the use of wicked drow clerical powers and weapons. Dinin watched as

enchanted extensions of the

clerics, the dreaded snake-headed whips on his sisters' belts, began writhing in

anticipation of the punishment they would exact. The handles were adamantite

and ordinary enough, but the whips' lengths and multiple heads were living

serpents. Briza's whip, in particular, a wicked six-headed device, danced and

squirmed, tying itself into knots around the belt that held it. Briza was always the

quickest to punish.

Matron Malice, however, seemed pleased by Dinin's swagger. The secondboy

knew his place well enough by her measure and he followed her commands

fearlessly and without question.

Dinin took comfort in the calmness of his mother's face, quite the opposite of the

shining white-hot faces of his three sisters. "All is ready” he said to her. "House

DeVir huddles within its fence-except for Alton, of course, foolishly attending his

studies in Sorcere."

"You have met with the Faceless One?" Matron Malice asked.

"The Academy was quiet this night” Dinin replied. "Our meeting went off

perfectly."

"He has agreed to our contract?"

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HomelandByR.A.SalvatorePart1StationStation:Inalltheworldofthedrow,thereisnomoreimportantword.Itisthecallingoftheir,ofourreligion,theincessantpullingofhungeringheartstrings.Ambitionoverridesgoodsenseandcompassionisthrownawayinitsface,allinthenameofLloth,theSpiderQueen.Ascensiontopowerindrowsocietyisa...

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