Redemption of the Drow

It tried to run. A bad mistake as Elspeth's magical steel ripped into its flesh, and Jade emptied her quiver into its rear end. When, snarling and raging, the demon turned round to fight it was to meet three swords swinging at different levels. Mira backed up the others with a chant.

The demon seemed undecided which of the two women it would attack, which allowed them all to gain a few more telling blows, and then it lunged at Jade, simultaneously attacking with a mind spell. Jade laughed aloud. Mind spells were her speciality and the demon was dangerously exposing its own mind. She fired off a bolt of pure mental energy, a piercing blue spark that attacked every neuron at once, passing out with the effort. The demon squealed -- a strangely high pitched scream for such a dangerous looking beast, and then his brain sprayed through his ear holes.

Jade regained consciousness quickly, so she was spared Mira's solicitous ministrations. But it took her several minutes to get rid of the headache. The party rested, squatting in a circle facing outwards, hands clasped while Jade recovered. Then they trudged on. The webs were closing in on them on both sides of the path, a sign they were nearing the end of their mission.

Then they saw Her. Each of them reacted differently. Terry was probably the least affected. To him the bloated spider figure was grotesque and nothing more. Mira felt a sense of evil and covered her eyes on seeing the features of her ex-love in among the mandibular pseudo-face of the Spider. Elspeth had paid lip service to the Spider as her goddess for most of her career, so she felt strangely awkward in Her presence. Power commands respect, even in the midst of loathing.

The most strongly affected was Jade. As a temple slave, hit, kicked, spat on and beaten all in the name of the Spider, she had the most reason to hate her. But Jade had a disadvantage; she really believed in Her. The Spider to her had been more than a metaphor of evil; it had been a personification of evil itself in physical form, and seeing Her for the first time, Jade realised just how much she had been in Her power. Jade could do nothing in the exchanges that followed but stare blankly.

The face of Xiana was now recognisable in the Spider. The two were separate yet not separate. Eternally allied yet hating each other. Xiana had not achieved her aim of pure evil but had been swallowed in it. Any hatred the three had felt for Xiana evaporated and they understood that only pity was appropriate. A pity Xiana would never know the happiness they had experienced in their own lives. As they gazed further, a new feature seemed to float on the Spider's form. A middle aged drow matron.

The composite monster spoke "So you have come at last. And in coming you have won. We can never return to the overworld."

"You have swallowed another -- Lilith." whispered Elspeth.

"Lilith, Xiana and I are separate yet one. You have destroyed my influence by coming here. But you have also destroyed the drow. The age of the humans is upon you. The overland elves and the dwarfs will fade into legend but live on in memory. But the drow will exist only briefly as a stain in history and then will be gone forever.

"We three, the Spider Trinity will live on, in the minds of deranged humans. You will destroy or assimilate the orcs, kobolds, squeals, itches, mind devils and other horrors of the deep, but the darkness will always be present in me. And while we are too weak to command fealty and worship we will still be present whenever there is weakness or greed, or the all consuming lust for power."

"Who cares for you or what you think," cried Terry. You're nothing but a vomit stain. And now prepare to die." Terry lunged with his sword, but skilfully, defending with his shield. His act of aggression seemed to galvanise the other two. Mira screamed pure hate at the Xiana creature, remembering the way she had made Jade suffer in the slave pits. She surprised herself by casting a searing spell, hammers and swords, swinging, crushing, maiming, straight at the Spider.

Terry's steel passed straight through the Spider, and the spells fizzed out with a flatulent noise before they reached her. The Spider in her turn aimed a vicious swipe at Terry with her front claw. Terry had his shield ready but he didn't need it. The claw passed straight through him.

"Neither of us can hurt the other," said Elspeth. "Not physically".

"We can hurt her by not buying into her evil" said Mira. "Not hating or fearing. When we help someone we love, and especially someone we have no reason to love, that will hurt her more than steel."

"Then there is nothing more for us to do here. Gather round and I will evoke the enchantment to return us." The four spontaneously grasped and hugged each other as Elspeth started her chant. A more harmonious one this time, to spirit them back to their own world.

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Maxi did not die in the collision that expelled him from the Spider web. But his arm was a tangled mess of blood, torn tendons and bone splinters. Maxi would never march into the thick of a battle again. Fortunately Kerri was at hand, as were two acolyte healers, apprenticed to Elspeth. They quickly took charge of removing Maxi's mangled arm and healing the spurts of blood. The acolytes clamped bandages streaked with the moulds they had been growing in a chamber specially prepared for the study of healing. Maxi had passed out with the pain, the first time he had ever allowed himself to do so, giving the healers time to operate slowly and meticulously.

Maxi recuperated in his luxurious quarters, most of the time existing in a drug or spell induced coma, until a week later he was judged well enough to get up and resume his duties as military commander. Jim, Harald and the others were still waiting, as there had been no news from the four travellers to the demon web. Kerri was acting as regent in Elspeth's absence, and she sensed a fermenting brew of mutiny among some of the older priestesses. She was glad of Maxi's support. He seemed to exert a calming or intimidating influence on would be mutineers, even though he was a man.

Kerri called another meeting of the leaders to be held in her own quarters. They were about to begin their meeting, with an urgent discussion on who they could send to defeat Xiana and rescue the others, when the door opened and in walked Jade, Mira, Elspeth and Terry. Apparently time works differently in the demon webs, where a second of ennui drags like an hour. The home coming was raucous and joyful and lasted several days. Xiana was defeated. Peace was on the way.

For Jade, as she hugged Maxi tight in his quarters that night, mourning over the loss of his arm, but rejoicing in his being alive, it was the inner peace that was important. The nagging guilt and doubt, the horrible nightmare flashbacks of her temple slave days and Freda's dead body in the mind flayer lair had vanished. Now she would be free to love Maxi without distraction.

EPILOGUE

Ten years later, Jade sat in a huge elm tree in the grounds of the spacious home she shared with her family. Her best friend Mira was sitting beside her. Jade had been unable to bear children, but she had adopted two half-drow babies, rescued from Xiana the day after the victory. Maxi was on the ground below her, teaching them sword work. After he lost his arm he was no longer able to lead troops into battle, so he had become an instructor - a surprisingly good one, with a real affinity for his adolescent charges.

The trees in the woods below her were just turning orange, and Jade remembered the other time in the elven grove when the two of them had looked out over the same kinds of autumn trees with Navaras the elf beside them.

Just then she turned and was astonished to see the object of her thoughts sitting next to her on the other side of Mira. "Where did you spring from?" she cried.

Navaras grinned. "I am an elf. Some of us have the ability to teleport. I could have come straight to you ten years ago when I knew you were searching for me. But you needed to experience the journey with your friend, to learn from it."

"That was a happy time for me", said Jade, and Mira nodded agreement. "In spite of evil birds and dogs trying to kill me. I relearned Freda's lessons of friendship and trust that I had almost forgotten, and experienced the beauty of the woods." Then Jade became silent, staring at the tree canopies with their bright autumn colours, listening to the hollow clang of the wooden sparring swords and the shouts and exhortations of her lover.

Navaras broke the silence. "I heard from our mutual friend Amrad, who asks after you, that you met your father. How did the meeting go? "

"It was about five years ago. A group of visiting minstrels from the northern provinces came over for a cultural visit. I was quite astonished to learn that one of them was Drin, formerly a soldier, now retired. I must have got my talent for magical music through him. Drin was a handsome man, with well toned muscles, which he was still keeping trim through regular exercise. I could quite understand the attraction he had to Trieste. I arranged a meeting and asked if he had received my note. He said he had but sounded very awkward. You see, according to him, to the strict code he has been brought up with, he had not done a beautiful and wonderful thing in giving life to an attractive and intelligent daughter. He had done something shameful that had to be covered up.

"It is quite disconcerting to know that you are talking to someone who regards you as an embarrassment, so I didn't stay with him long. I asked him about his life, and he told me, but he asked me nothing about what I was doing and he never even mentioned Trieste. I blurted out to him at one point, 'Trieste is dead. Murdered. Does that mean nothing to you?'

"All he said was 'I will pray for her soul -- may she find forgiveness.' I made my excuses and left him soon afterwards. We never saw each other again."

"And how are things with the drow?" asked Navaras.

This time it was Mira who answered. "Elspeth moved her followers away from the old complex, with its temple to the Spider goddess and its associations with evil, and formed another city closer to the surface, which she modestly named after herself." Jade and Mira rolled their eyes. "We stayed in Elspethsaad for several months, and Harald and I helped set up a proper system of trials like we have in our own society to deal with the prisoners we had taken.

Elspeth wanted to summarily execute them 'as a precaution', but we were able to persuade her that a proper legal system would be better for the stability of her reign, giving her subjects confidence that they would be dealt with fairly. Elspeth was quite impressed with our system, and I heard a rumour she was even looking at implementing something similar herself. Though since she was intending to appoint herself or her Secretariat as judge and executioner, I really question whether justice will truly prevail."

Jade continued "My own experience with dwarfen justice was not very pleasant so I was particularly surprised at Jim's interest. He has retired now, but before he did so he presided over a court of justice in our own city. He improved on the dwarf system in my view with his ideas of picking out random citizens who would be forced to pass judgement. This proved far more preferable to the mob rule in the dwarfen courts, which almost got both of us convicted and sentenced to death."

"And what of you, Mira?" asked Navaras. "Are you intending to settle down with a family like Jade and Maxi?"

"I have not been that lucky in that regard. Remembering Jade's advice I took on a drow lover during my time in Elspethsaad. A strong yet surprisingly gentle half-drow male, who been a slave under Xiana. She had less objection to half-castes than she preached, providing they had something she wanted, which in this case was incredible physical strength. Kieven was also useful with a sword. With both kinds of sword, as I discovered when I finally got him into my bed." Jade and Mira both laughed at this joke, and Jade looked at Mira in a way she had not seen for ten years.

Mira continued. "Kieven satisfied my sexual needs but little else, and by the time I was set to leave Elspethsaad, we had drifted apart. We parted amicably enough but with no regrets. When I got back to my mining home, I was again hailed as a hero. That, and my influence with Harald, helped me secure a position as chief healer to the mines. Harald died a year ago, and I took over from him as mine chair. I was proud to be the first woman among the pit dwarfs to hold that position.

"I have not been so lucky in love as I have in my work. After Kieven there were a string of lovers; mostly dwarfs, but also humans and part drow I met in my travels. None of them satisfied and none lasted long. But I have been getting more absorbed in my career with both the hospital and the mine, so I am less concerned. My love now is my vocation."

Mira's voice became stronger as she continued. "My reputation has been growing to such an extent that the hospital is almost as profitable as the mine. We have become particularly skilled at healing limb rot - the hideous green withering of extremities that no magic has yet reversed. The secret was the mould that we traded with Elspethsaad, together with our skills in applying them and keeping the injury clean."

"Our victory over Xiana has achieved a great deal for all our societies." said Jade. "Thanks in no small part to you and to Amrad, who helped me at the end. I know now why you sent me to Amrad instead of guiding me through what I required myself."

"You were terrified, Jade," replied Navaras. "You are not short of courage, but I knew you would not be capable of coming to terms with yourself in front of me. Introspection and reflection is not something drow are brought up with. I had thought that someone more obviously flawed like Amrad may help you bare your soul."

"You were right in that way. We drow are steeped in evil, and repentance is not in our nature. But even in the worst of us there is also good. I can see now that Xiana's failure to realise a world of pure evil was not because of her character defect, but quite the contrary; it was because of her one redeeming feature. In her own twisted way Xiana loved Elspeth and wanted her to prosper. There were other priestesses more talented than she, more dedicated to evil, but she chose Elspeth to rise to her Secretariat, and she was probably telling the truth when she told Elspeth she had plans for her to succeed her."

"So is Xiana still a threat?" asked Mira. "And what of her prophecy that the age of humans is upon us?"

"Her prophecy is quite true," said Navaras. "We elves can get around. We have visited humans and halflings, half orcs and deep races, and there are great changes happening. Since Xiana was defeated on this earth and the drow became allies, other races have opened up to each other, and half-castes and hybrids are becoming the norm. You must have noticed yourself how the pure blooded drow were dying out in Elspethsaad, to be replaced by the descendants of slaves -- part drow like yourself."

"It is probably a good thing." said Jade. "Certainly I would not wish the persecution I felt to be visited on any other half breed. But it seems that the human seed is expanding at the expense of all other races. Within a few generations all that remains of the drow will be a few darker skinned or blonde haired humans. Drow as a race will have disappeared."

"It is true that humans will take over the world as we know it," replied Navaras. "They have the determination, the will to survive and the ability to band together for a common purpose. But the best of the other races will also prosper. The drow inventive streak will be found among the human adventurers. You have seen it yourself in your visit to Elspethsaad.

"Humans and drow have been at each others throats for millennia and nothing changed. Now that the influence of the infernal triumvirate on the earth has been curtailed, the drow can reach their full potential. See what changes we are already witnessing. Drow can travel during the day. They can heal all but the most serious injuries through their research. Mining is becoming more productive, leading to the smelting of stronger metals. All this progress will make things easier.

"The other races will add their own strong points to the mix. The dwarfs will contribute their industry and their art, and the halflings their love of home life and their farming and culinary skills. Even the half orcs will contribute their incredible bravery."

"And you elves," asked Jade. "What will you contribute?"

"As your own stories attest, we elves are far too frivolous to be a dominant race. But a little frivolity and humour, mixed in with the more serious side of human life is a refreshing spice. And in many ways our contribution is the most important. We will infuse into the human spirit a love of the land. A yearning to preserve what is natural for its own sake. It will be a useful counterpoint to the desire to control nature that is present in all the other races to some degree."

"How well do you think the elven spirit will do among human pragmatism, dwarfen workmanship and drow inventiveness?"

"We have already been busy, spreading the elven message. Though you must remember we also have an enemy. But nevertheless, for the sake of our planet I hope our love of nature will be instilled deeply. We need to teach our next generation to go gently on the earth, so all our races can survive. "

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