novelxo Chapter 7
Memnon, Calimshan
(5th of Alturiak, 1380 Dalereckoning)
When he was satisfied he could glean no more from the infinite realms without critically tiring himself, Adir closed the Codex and lounged in his room. He missed his wife’s warmth in his bed, but wouldn’t consider taking one of Ormat’s staff to compensate. A peculiar thing, since he’d bedded many women while courting his other wives.
Previous wives, he amended. They, along with the rest of his staff, were in the custody of the king, to be slain or sold off, most likely. He didn’t particularly grieve any of them, though he would have preferred his wives freed than relocated to newer, likely worse, forms of bondage. The thought of women harmed distressed him, despite his profession as a slaver. Something to be done to Almraiven’s customs in later centuries, from a higher seat of power, he’d always told himself.
Nothing for it now, he broke fast on lentil soup and flatbread and reviewed his spells, having crafted a new spellbook to store the knowledge of the codex as well as the few cantrips and evocations he clearly remembered. The rest resided incomplete in various notes. Preparing the day’s spells had been relatively short, due to the loss of most of his repertoire, something he bitterly resented and endeavored to rectify as quickly as possible. Maybe he could still call upon his gargoyles when the need arose and proximity permitted.
Hopefully they weren’t all laying broken in a heap at the base of his manse...
Wakefulness was a gradual process. Her dreams and the waking world blurred, and the passage of time was uncertain. Everything felt numb. Vala tried to glean what she could from her surroundings, but could determine nothing. She was in a darkness so profound her infravision couldn’t penetrate it.
She sensed she was not alone, however. Even in this fugue state, she could intuit the insidious tendrils of alien, otherworldly entities burrowing into her mind, altering everything they touched. She resisted, ferociously. While her powers could not avail her, Vala summoned what she could of herself and again erected the Iron Tower, concealing what was left of her that was still her, and resisted as her invaders attempted again and again to tear her apart.
"Valiant, but irrelevant.” Hu’um gurgled, as if his voice was bubbling up from some deep, unfathomable place beneath even the Underdark as she knew it, ”We have enough to isolate you and still control the bulk of your functions. You can remain.”
There was a sickening lurch, an inflection of motion where no other sensation implied it. Vala perceived distance, but felt no sense of connection to it.
"We were promised you as you were being transported to Ched Nasad.” Hu’um said wickedly, ”A ripple emerged from the astral plane as you first awakened your powers. But we were uncertain of its importance. When House Srune’Lett failed to deliver, we were not overly troubled. There were other living Oblodra to carry on that line, after all. And when you emerged among the warriors of Eilistraee, I leapt at the chance to investigate personally."
A long pause, then, ”A scrap of your brain tissue sufficed for our preliminary examination. Enough to determine he chose you. What remarkable potential, wasted potential, if you ask me. Hidden within a half-breed outcast. A more difficult task it will be to reintegrate you to Menzoberranzan because of this.”
"A tiresome task." he added, ”Bloodline doesn’t mean as much to us as it does to the Dark Elves. But a necessary accommodation, if you are to prove useful."
“What do you want from me?” Vala asked, though she couldn’t hear her own voice as she spoke. Perhaps she was in stasis.
"To rectify a broken oath, given to our ancestors and known only by the Elder Brain, and a select few. To serve us as we weaken Menzoberranzan from within.”
An impression of amusement, ”You don’t know, do you? None of you did. None of you remembered him.”
Him. The simple word evoked such images. Terrifying images.
Visions of a male Elf with pale skin and kind eyes.
A city aflame.
Are you the one, Vala?
“You don’t need to.”
A horrible sensation of being pulled taut wracked her body, or maybe her mind. Vala cried out as she was locked away, deeper, deeper...
Hu’um commanded the creature to rise to its feet.
It complied.
Blank, lifeless eyes stared back, awaiting new instructions. Carefully, that its new creation would imitate the complexities of sentient being, Hu’um carefully programmed her contextual responses to stimuli, modeling her after a typical representation of her species, then, for the present, isolating responses that would coincide with her current behavior and attitudes. To all but fellow Psionicists, Vala would appear unchanged from her descent into the Underdark.
“Let us test the limits of the domination.” Hu’um decided, rendering both it and its creation intangible, and transporting them to a lower pen, which housed the mindslaves it’d dominated for the purpose of arena combat. It no longer had the energy to devote to this beloved Illithid pastime, and so they had expended their usefulness.
But those among Illithid slaves who ceased to be useful could be made useful again.
Malformed, vaguely lupine heads jutted from thickly muscled necks trailing long, ropy tendrils of hair. Double-jointed legs, tightly coiled as if to spring, ended in wicked claws. Humanoid hands with opposable thumbs grasped crude iron implements. They wore shirts of roughly hammered mail and padded leather leggings, concealing thick coats of fur. Bipedal, ferocious, and at times cunning, its Gnoll pack would be perfect for this test.
“Kill all that are not of your species or myself.” Hu’um commanded, activating both the Half-Drow and the Gnoll pack, twenty in all. In an instant, the pen became a vision of chaos Lloth herself might have approved of, as the Half-Drow emitted lethal cold and psicrystal in all directions, sporting thick plates like armor. Wordless, she cut down the first two before they’d even swung. The weapons of two more passed through her flesh without resistance. Her weapons, however, struck home, spearing through their skulls and pinning them to the far wall.
Howling their battle cries, the remaining Gnolls circled their prey, jabbing with spears. Cocooning herself in dense ectoplasm that she might still attack with impunity, their innumerable attacks deflected. Four tendrils of psicrystal, not unlike her whipblade, emerged from the small of her back, and struck with purpose and intelligence. The focus necessary to animate and direct them simultaneously, even while dominated, impressed Hu’um greatly.
"Perhaps in later centuries, if you last that long, I will allow you your sentience. There is much we can learn from you.” it decided, watching with admiration as she dispatched another three, constricting her prey with the lengths of barbed psicystal, simultaneously asphyxiating and lacerating. Opting for mass and defense rather than evasion, due to her decreased physicality, Vala would be a formidable ally. But unlike her sentient iteration, this creature could be molded to act as a Matron Mother to a restored Oblodra. One with its original purpose intact.
Gleefully, Hu’um watched the Gnolls retreat, assuming defensive formations as the ectoplasm protecting her began to expand, then fill the chamber. Walling them off, Vala drew them into the thick, gelatinous mass, and there they died for want of air.
Not even winded from the exertion, its creature retracted her defenses, and awaited further instruction.
“We cannot return you to your people just yet.” It observed, “But your current endeavor might afford you the opportunity to grow in power further. Return to this Adir, and help him in his task. We will be watching, carefully.”
An opportunity to reclaim another lost asset, perhaps. Unlike Kimmuriel, Hu’um had observed the female even after her powers had been inhibited. He’d seen, in stark detail, the scepter the king had wielded. A very old, very familiar, scepter.
Acquiescing, the construct that was Vala emitted a field of intangibility as she had before, and rose unimpeded through the ceiling.