Chronicles of a Drow Templar Ch. 01

Things in this story are not canon. They are not meant to be. I do hope you enjoy it.

(There is a "Terms explained" at the end of the chapter for unfamiliar words, language translation, and specific term usage.)

This is the beginning of Æiristus' (drow) and Silwynn's (sylvan elf) story - it has more of an erotic lean to it now than originally intended, but it works. •

It is "understood" that because of their cruelty and unfamiliarity to emotions like love drow do not bond. Surface-world elves, on the other hand, choose to bond when they find the mate they wish to join with for the rest of their lives. Through an accident of fate, these two get spiritually bonded and, like it or not, they must learn to deal with it. There are many obstacles that interfere with not only the journey of learning to manage the situation, but in any final admission and acceptance of it as well. How far will bonded blood enemies get without killing each other? If you're interested read on…

Feedback is always welcome. This is the beginning of a novel and I can use the input. Thanks! -GildedLily

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Chapter 01: The Templar

Two large, stub-tailed lizards, beasts of burden with their dull-eyes cupped by forward-looking blinders pulled a noisy, black steel prison cart slowly along its path to the occupant's final destination. A woman of lustrous skin, the color of midnight shadows, walked along side the cart, her strides resolute and confident, that of a militant. Black chain mail, the finest made by dark elven hands, draped over powerful shoulders and a strong core. The metal rattled in whispers over black leather armor that sheathed her like a second skin. Such a suit of mail was meant to be difficult to see in the subterranean darkness as well as permit its wearer reasonable freedom of movement. She wore it like a badge of hard won honor. An honor that matched the scarlet sash around her slim waist and the curved weapon at her side and sharpened metal spurs at her booted heals.

What could be a lush, naturally red-violet mouth was a solid line of military bearing set in an angular elven face, the corners tipped neither up nor down. A long severe plait of moonlight silver trailed down her back from the crown of her head. Glistening bangs, the only bit of fluff the woman appeared to have, arched and wisped about wide nocturnal eyes, narrowed in concentration. The thick rope of her hair swept the middle of her back reaching below the curves of her backside hidden by the skirt of armor.

The soldier-at-arms kept her face forward, indifferent to the jeers of the hateful masses toward her captive within the cart. Her prisoner was og'elend: a dissident, a traitor to his people. Worse, he was a disciple of a forbidden god. It was the woman's sacred duty to capture the heretics of her society and return them to serve penitence for their actions.

The circumstances behind the captive's dilemma were unimportant. This one being of nobility was to be made example. He was to be terminated under the conditions of death by sacrifice—tortured sacrifice. Nobles lived and died by example. They had to. Templars, soldiers of the faith and students of tradition, like the black-clad woman, were empowered to make certain of it. And, like so many dissidents before him, this one did not take well to his circumstances. He damned the pitiless female. Spitting curses, both heartfelt and magical, fighting her every wretched step of the way of his return to DarkRealm far beneath the surface of a bright world he had barely gotten a glimpse of during his flight. Had the prisoner been of the warrior caste the guardian woman could have looked forward to at least a final challenge by combat. Such was not the case however, making the veteran all the more frigid.

Eventually, the small caravan stopped. Two females, each as equally dark-skinned as their faith appointed woman-at-arms stepped toward the guardian. Resplendent in their locally spun silks of black, green and silver, they represented the sanctioned authority of the church. Silver plates sewn onto the hem of their robes and skirts sounded off like miniature chimes at their sandaled feet announcing their arrival. Headdresses of fine platinum added to the women's air of authority heralding finality. Their headdresses, crafted to resemble the snarling heads and writhing tentacles of dark monsters from nightmares of long ago, held the women's faintly animated manes of white hair away from their inky faces. One female bore a tasseled scroll, the other, a carved ebony serpentine staff. The length of the vile staff was twisted and coiled. Its likeness was of a great serpent being devoured by a host of spiders at its head, all with glittering eyes of ruby stones and fangs of ivory, giving it the impression that it would come to life - suffering - at the priestess' whim.

The women of the clerical sect acknowledged the return of the templar. The woman holding the staff gazed down upon the warrior female. Her eyes burned a bright crimson. Her bearing severe with long accustomed authority. She inclined her head almost imperceptibly. "House Sergeant Vrynn," her voice possessed the firm tones of political influence. "The temple extends Our congratulations on your success and Our gratitude on the recovery of the prisoner back to the lands of his crimes."

Æiristus Vrynn, youngest daughter of the lead family of Clan Vrynn, an affluent but politically unimportant merchant clan, wrapped her off-hand around the hilt of her preferred weapon, a khepshi, its blade nearly the length of her leg. It was a modified sickle-shaped sword seemingly too large for someone of her diminutive frame. She responded with a humble bow of respect grasping the blade she swore by. Those few accompanying her stayed their positions, tending the beasts of burden or carefully monitoring crowd and captive alike, ever wary of threats from within and without the crowd.

"We will accept the og'elend now," the priestess said. "Will you be attending the ceremony this eve, Medjai?" she asked, recognizing Æiristus with the warrior's official station.

"Given circumstances allow it, honored canoun," Æiristus replied. Though her answer was as politically amiable as she could make it, Æiristus did not particularly wish to make her appearances at the temple. She needed to return the loan of her escorts; that, and someone's eyelids needed a good peeling this eve back at a certain inn for false information.

The priestess smiled on the warrior with all the warmth of her serpentine staff. "We shall see to it that hospitality shall be arranged for you."

Wonderful, Æiristus thought with her felled hopes, but she betrayed no emotion and respected the priestess with a second bow and stepped back.

The canoun's expression darkened as she turned her attention to the transgressor in the wheeled cage. She held out her open hand for the scroll her associate carried. The crowd quieted as the church law keeper recited warrant of arrest.

"Prince Baravti Mæstre," the canoun addressed the prisoner. "With respect to your stature as the reigning Elder of your noble House you are hereby afforded knowledge of the conditions of this, your incarceration.

"Being the primary engineer of unlawful arrogation upon your own House and having been discovered to be the leader of local sedition against the Church and its policies, all of your own, your family's, and your descendant's possessions, holdings, accounts, earnings, lands and peoples are hereby expropriated in the name of the Church and all-mighty Lolth. Any statement you make from this moment onward will be duly recorded and used as evidence against you. At anytime during the proceedings you are encouraged to submit a confession of your crimes.

"Prince Mæstre, your apparent lack of faith in and devotion to the goddess of Our kyth and kyn, leaves you at a distinct disadvantage. Do you have a statement you would like to make?"

The prince shook his head. He knew what was coming.

"Chronicler, note the prisoner's response." A clerk practiced in the ways of going unnoticed until their craft was needed replied with respectful subdued tones meant only for the immediate surrounding priests and prisoner to hear. The youth's silence and near invisibility almost startled Æiristus when he made himself barely known.

"The sovereign power of this temple waives all further court proceedings and condemns you, Prince Baravti Mæstre, to death by Ceremonial Execution as its freely, and without resolution, volunteered sacrifice. These we deem you join your defunct family within the bowels of the Maw. No longer shall the name Mæstre, nor any of its like, be honored in the written annuls of history nor be spoken freely of in public. As of this morrow, thy name is banished. Stricken from all records. The House of Mæstre never existed.

"As the blessed Hand-Maidens feed of your living flesh upon their summoning with thy evisceration, so shall Great Lolth feed upon your wretched soul. Thou art terrentene. Lolth be praised. So shall it be!"

All citizens in the surrounding area including personal slaves, bondsmen, half-bred inferiors and creatures of more lowly stature reverently repeated the canoun's final statement. For some the act was reverence, for others, self-preservation; the Dark One was an unkind deity, especially to those within Her realm whom were not Her Own. Those farther off muttered in softer tones creating barely comprehensible echoes of the prince's impending doom.

"Lolth be praised," Æiristus whispered.

"Medjai Vrynn," the priestess turned to look at Æiristus. "We have need of your retinue. You may dismiss them to the Church's authority at this time. They will be released upon the prisoner's arrival to his holding cell. You are relieved of all responsibility and may attend your personal needs. An invitation shall be forwarded to you to attend this eve's ceremony. Hence with you shall be notified at the Church's convenience when your services will again be required."

"Their service is yours," Æiristus replied gratefully. Now she did not have to personally to see to their return.

In the cart the young prince's jet-black face paled to a phantom's blue-gray as he sank to the floor along with his despairing soul. He looked not at his judge, but at the woman who had captured him. "What if I had succeeded?" he asked softly of the warrior not really anticipating an answer from her.

For the first time since his capture and their arrival beneath the earth, Æiristus bothered to look the traitor in the eyes; magenta eyes that might have been charming once, were now surrounded in the dullness of ill health. Æiristus' own wide, vivid green orbs narrowed, closing the width of an old scar that ran from just above her left eyebrow, sliced through it, ran over the same eye, across the bridge of her nose and down to kiss the inside of her right cheek. "You would not have," she replied.

Compassion was not a common impulse in DarkRealm among the drow. Among the templars such was egregious, abhorrent. It was dangerous to survival. Compassion and sympathy didn't exist. The target was always wrong.

Curious glances flitted their way and as for all they knew, the prince's query was of his failed attempt at escape. Captive and captor knew otherwise…

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…Earlier, closing on their march to city the prince caught on to a fact that others hadn't, the templar didn't use spells and perhaps there was a reason for it. All drow had ability to use spells, but this one wasn't. She was very labor-intensive about going about her business and bringing him back. When she captured him she used only manually manipulated tools and weapons, whether or not they were enchanted was another matter, but she cast no magick of her own. Such might be useful.

As they moved through the tunnels toward the city, he bound and ahead of her, she selected their final resting place for the eve, their last stop before she delivered him to the temple killing priests. "Stop," she ordered. He waited. "Off the pathway, the grotto to left. Inside."

Baravti ducked his head and entered the smaller passage. The rough cinder and basalt floor was powdered at the inside entrance and there was a boulder nearly the size of the entryway itself. Slide marks in the powder told him that the boulder was used as a door.

Æiristus followed him into the chamber that was small enough for four people to rest comfortably. A fire pit was in the middle of the room below a thin chute that breathed a weak breeze acting as a natural vent. The chute was too small to permit anything larger than a bat entrance through it. Baravti gazed on the chute wishing he had the ability for transfiguration.

Then it hit him. This was the woman who was expelled from the magi college some nine decades back. She was studying both magick and the seminary at the same time, she was brilliant, a child prodigy. Then she disappeared one eve as a young student, not even into her second decade yet or so it was reported, and she was among the walking dead when they found her. Her mind snapped or something and she refused spells, the magi couldn't use her, they expelled her. The church de-frocked her. Here she was now a hunter, a templar, for the same institution that had disdained her so long ago, apparently recalled from excommunication and banishment, for a different, lower-order echelon of duty.

"Sit. Over there." She pointed to the far side of the chamber and waited. He sat against the wall and watched as she backed up, made her stance and leaned into the huge boulder pushing it forward rolling it in front of the exit. The greater muscles of her arms and legs bunched, glistening dark blue and violet over her rich midnight black skin where it did not disappear beneath gladiatorial leather and chain mail and boots. She dipped her head slightly; her long silver braid fell over her shoulder swinging like a bell pull almost touching the cave floor as she leaned into the stone. Her face contorted and her throat muscles corded as she moved the heavy stone. Drow females were stronger than males and this one was superior in strength than most females, he knew he would not be able to move that stone without the aid of a strength spell, which he did not have memorized. There would be no fast escape… for either of them. Killing her was probably not a good idea at this point.

She drew in a deep breath, straightened, tugged her leather jerkin tidy, and claimed a spot on the far side of the fire pit.

"Now what?" Baravti asked.

"Get some rest," she told him.

He gazed on her with his huge magenta eyes framed in ash-flake lashes too thick for a male. She didn't look back. She didn't have time for gorgeous, well-kept trouble-making males. She busied herself with digging in her travel bag for food pulling out enough for two and tossed him a share.

"Thanks," he said honestly surprised she gave him anything. "Why?"

"Weak prisoners are not fun to haul back," she replied. "Dead ones less so. Eat."

Baravti looked confused. "I'm not going to die of hunger."

"No, but by irritating me you are lending me ideas. Eat."

"Low threshold for tolerance."

"You have no idea."

"No cooking?"

"I cook, things go black. We go hungry. You cook, I have a fire danger to have concern about. Eat what you were provided and appreciate it. It is the last courtesy you will receive in this world, prince." She bit into her marinated dried insect meat and wide, flattened Crimini cap. The edges of the mushroom cap were 'rusted' from having been pressed and dried and from some of the marinated coloring of the meat seeping into the edges. This was good; even though the cap was aging, it was taking on flavor. She liked that.

"Why do you extend a courtesy to a condemned man?"

Æiristus swallowed her food before answering. She still did not look at the prisoner. "You are too inquisitive. Eat. Then rest. Enjoy your last bit of comfort and station. The temple will not offer you as much." She tossed him her half-filled waterskin. Though soaked in a light brown sauce before drying; the stained, flakey white-meat was a touch on the garlic and salty side and the cap tended to absorb all moisture in your mouth this time. She thought to bring a package of butter-cream next time. Though the templar was no cook, she was not one for traveling with bland iron rations either.

"That's the first you've acknowledged me as nobility."

"And the last. As prisoner I need not speak to you except to give you orders."

"And why you refuse to look at me?"

This was getting on her nerves. It was bad enough she had a weakness for males. This one had to have a lithe figure that was a thrill to watch and wavy ash-white hair that brushed just below his shoulders and ended in thick curls that flowed and bounced as he walked. But this one had to talk.

She saw his back, too, when she first captured and pinned him -- smooth, clear skin with not a lick of whip marks or bite of a knife blade. His mistress, or his matron, was too lenient. There was no proof of life lessons for him to learn from. Probably why he talked so damned much, she thought. More and more of her targets were showing up like him these morrows -- too pretty, no evidence of discipline. Damn waste of males.

"Eat," she scowled. "Rest. Sleep or reverie to your preference. Do not trouble yourself over where I place my gaze. I know where you are. My boot will wake you when it is time to leave as it has every other og'elend prisoner, male or female, noble or common."

It was his own damned fault, she reminded herself irritably. Æiristus finished her meal, summoned the return of her waterskin from him, closed up her travel pack and pushed it aside using it as a pillow leaving the condemned House prince to his own devices.

Baravti sat with his knees up leaning against the wall, wrists bound in the adamantine shackles the templar imposed upon him against his up-bent lap. He watched her lay there with her eyes closed, confident in her position and her opinions about her world and her harsh faith that condemned him now for his differing opinions. Soon their interest in keeping their race's existence a mere legend in the consciousness of the world above would have his life. Soon her pride would claim one more soul.

He wondered about the cruel jagged scar that divided the templar's face.

It was impossible not to notice. It near split her face in half and was a shock initially to look upon, a shock that she used to her advantage when she attacked him and brought him down. She knew when he stared at it instead of her eyes -- that's when she hit him. It changed color with her temper. It was almost the same color as her skin when she met him, but the more upset she became, the redder her eyes grew, the more violet the scar became with the flood of blood behind it. It was a horridly frightful thing to behold. Unnerving. Serpentine. Almost a living thing unto itself. Like a live miniature lava fissure, he remembered thinking before being whacked senseless. No drow should bear such a burden. He couldn't help the thought, and a little sympathy behind it, regardless of his present situation. They weren't meant to scar like that, especially not the face!

It wasn't long before the dark templar's breathing settled into a steady rhythm. To his benefit, she was someone who preferred sleep.

"Pahntar," he intoned softly at the manacles at his wrists. Holding the shackles against his thighs at his raised knees, the metal made very little noise when the locks obediently clicked open. Bringing the opened rings together, he looked over at the sleeping templar. His idea was risky, but if it worked the woman's muscle could be used to his favor to defend him in society from society. If it didn't, a quick death here would be easier on him than what her governing theologians had to offer. He could live with the scar…