A Drow's Dilemma Ep. 45: The Vaults

Slasjowsjew appeared around the corner. "Thiss plasce iss an awful deathtrap." He said soberly. "I think that each of thesse powerss that rule in the monasstery have ssome ssort of domain that reflectss their nature, and ssinsce thiss iss the realm of the 'Adventuresss' it iss pretty much an approximation of every dungeon cliche ever invented by deluded architectss in tombss and vaultss acrosss hisstory. You two are fortunate that I have been traverssing thiss path before you, ssinsce I sswear there are trapss every five fucking feet." It was highly unusual for the Yuan-ti to swear in Common. "The Adventuresss will be in the 'treasure room' at the center of the labyrinth, going by the obvious cliche, and it sseemss that to get there we will have to defeat four elemental guardianss to gain the four keyss to the door. Or ssome crap like that."

Something like amusement crossed Ashyr's features, though it was a half-hearted expression. "Then it was a good thing you went ahead, oh Great Trap Finder." She told him. This may have been meant to be flirtatious, but Ashyr's heart was not in it. It had not skipped her notice that Slas liked having his ego stroked, and therein lie her chosen tactic to try to stroke... something else of his. She hoped that focusing on that would help her cope with the lack of Caleldir and Selene in her presence. If Althaia was right about Slas not being interested in sex, then it would be a worthy challenge to set her mind to while she performed the mindless task of cliché dungeon delving.

--

The Yuan-ti was correct; Caleldra was indeed in the center of her labyrinth, in a room luxurious and wealthy beyond imagination. The ghost stifled her ethereal self and took on physical form. Once more the spitting image of Caleldir, but female, laid the unconscious Selene on a rich bed and began flitting around the room putting golden coins, weapons, armour, and mouldering skeletons, back into place. "Wakey, wakey, drow sorceress!" She giggled to herself. "I have so much to tell you..."

Upon hearing that feminine voice, Selene did as she was asked and woke. It was not a peaceful awakening. The drow started, and began to try to scramble back away from the feminine doppelganger of Caleldir. The fact that she looked so like him was cause for confusion even still. Visions of his face by firelight in a safe place came to her: the softness of it, the pleasure, the intimacy. She wanted to see his face. But this... this was just wrong.

Selene's hand came up in a protective grasp against her abdomen. She remembered the chilling words this... Caleldra had spoken about the seed being hers. The mage could imagine all sorts of horrors a jealous, insane rival might perform. Those thoughts were pushed from her mind, for down that path led to full-on panic attacks. Already it was hard to keep her breathing in check.

"If you are sister and lover to him - or even want to be - then you know that he would be angry if you hurt me or my child." Selene declared. "This is not the way to win his heart." No, apparently that involved raping him or being witness to that rape. Not that Selene was going to say that aloud.

The ghostly woman laughed hollowly at Selene. Well, she was not all that ghostly at the moment, but even as she was right now it was amply obvious that something was very, very wrong with her. "Oh, I am not going to hurt you or his little girl." She mocked. "I am going to take you and her." She flitted around the room looking at Selene from every angle, her blue eyes, identical to Caleldir's staring right through the drow. "You see, I am not a jealous woman." She lied very obviously. "At least, not jealous that he loves you. No, I am jealous that you took his love first. You think I cannot see into you!" Psionic energies leaked out from her, and the memory of Selene's, well, 'meeting' with Caleldir appeared in the air. "Hah! I can read your thoughts and memories clear as the endless night. I am not native to this realm; the curse does not affect me. I am adopted by it. I see more clearly than the madness in here. I see past the illusions and see the reality." Indeed, the woman may have been dead, psychotic, and had a whole barrel of other issues to deal with, but she seemed different from the rest of the monastery.

The woman floated towards the bed while swords and daggers flew around her, leaping towards Selene and deftly shredding her dress to nothing. But though the drow had a few painful nicks, the telekinetic weapons clearly were not meant to harm her. But... the pattern of the shredding, and the slight wounds, was a near perfect recreation of what Selene had done to Caleldir. Except for the part where Selene stubbornly made her clothes repair themselves with each slashing cut. Caleldra smiled toothily while she phased out of her clothing. Then she reached down and plucked Althaia's ring right off of Selene's finger, which put an end to the drow's stubborn defiance. "A cunning trick." She taunted. "But I see everything." She hit the drow with a potent paralysis magic.

The drow snarled at her captor. Selene still felt quite weak in the aftermath of the spells Caleldra had used to initially capture her, otherwise she would have been burning the room to ash - herself with it, if necessary. There was nothing she could do beyond curl into herself. But even that was barred from her as Caleldra hit her with that paralyzing spell. The horror of it crossed her face when she felt her body go limp across the bed. No. This couldn't be happening.

"I have to give you some credit. You managed to do what I had been trying to do for eight centuries. You see, I hate him. But I love and desire him even more. So I wanted to force him down, to give him pain in revenge and take my pleasure from him. But I never could. The Master Librarian was too powerful. But you..." she glared at the drow with intense emotions that were somewhere between jealousy and admiration. "You did it. So now I am going to do it to you. Over and over. Once for every time that you have had him. And then, when I am finished, I will steal his child from your womb and place it in mine, and then I will have completely supplanted you. Then, perhaps, I will give you to the Master Librarian as a toy. To ravage as he pleases." The woman landed on Selene, straddling her waist. Eyes beginning to glow, she leaned down and brought her face close to Selene's. "But you will only ever be our toy. Nothing more." Her breath, like her skin, was cold.

Selene's hands could only tremble very slightly. The thought of this insane hag being able to take her unborn was almost enough to make her start babbling, pleading. But when the fuck did that ever work where she came from? She couldn't lose her only child to this pathetic cunt who couldn't even get a male to fuck her! This madwoman didn't deserve her daughter! Hell, Selene doubted she would even be able to take care of her. The drow grit her teeth, and her jaw rippled with the force of it. She had to be strong for her child's sake.

"Pathetic." Selene managed to hiss at her. "You think your 'Master Librarian' will pay attention to you even after you carry my child? At the very best, he will care for his child and naught else. He will throw you away like the worthless cunt you are," For at the moment, Selene was reasonably certain that Caleldir was not currently himself. He would be the cruel master of books that Ashyr described earlier that day when Caleldir was not looking at their hands. He would be more wicked than even she at her peak, though there were a fair few of mindless slaves she had personally broken in her wake. At least she had not tortured them in death. She did not have the capacity to care about the sire of her previous, dead child. Why would Caleldir's ghost be different when it came to the mother of his child? "Take me to him now, and you will see how little he cares for the vessel that carries his child. You will save yourself the effort."

Caleldra giggled. "You silly, silly woman. I know the Master Librarian better than anyone else. Certainly better than you." She lined their groins together, and slipped her fingers in between, lightly fingering both of them. "You saw nothing I do not already know. Goelon Duvainor is a heartless madman. But did it not strike you as odd? I do not call myself Goelona Duvainor. I call myself Caleldra Hissael. You see, I knew who the madman was before he became mad!" Phasing her right leg through the bed and pushing Selene's left leg to the side, she materialized her limb again when she had smoothly pushed her pussy against Selene's, continuing to stroke the drow's clit with the hand between them. "He did not remember me, of course. I was different in those days, a sad, wan thing. But more than that, I saw his memories. All of them. When I looked at the mad ghost, I saw the gentle, playful scholar he had once been. It amused Goelon, of course. He would pretend to be the scholar, to try convince me that the curse was ended. Just one of the ways he broke me. But I was never fooled. I saw right through him!" She giggled again, before letting out a pleased sigh. Her free hand roamed around Selene's body, gliding over her like smooth, cool water.

"But," she continued. "That was before. Oh yes. Before. You see, his mother broke the curse on him! The dead Archfey herself, the very queen of all nymphs, she managed to pry herself from death long enough to break the hold the curse had on her son and throw him to the adventurers' town! He thinks that the curse still holds him here, but he is wrong." Her fingers slipped inside Selene, and she began to shift her hips back and forth. As she became more and more excited, she began moving faster. "I know how it works. I know how to force him from Goelon to Caleldir at will! So, I will have the power. For a thousand years the ghost ruled over me, breaking and binding, torturing and tormenting! My mind was shattered and rebuilt ten thousand times! But I am a psion of terrible power, and I plotted my revenge. Oh yes. That is why I am Caleldra, see. I rebuilt my mind using the identity of my tormenter before he went mad. The memories of the story-teller were my lifeline to sanity. For I am broken, but not a gibbering wreck like those in my labyrinth. I still have a mind, twisted as it is. But every twist made me stronger." Indeed, a veritable maelstrom of psionic power whipped around the bed, snippets of memories from thousands of adventurers screaming out from the storm.

All the information Caleldra had imparted upon Selene might have been interesting to Ashyr. A woman who could see his memories, see who the male was before the curse took place would have fascinating information about him. Selene didn't give a damn. Her character development was not that far advanced. She could care nothing for anyone who wasn't herself or her progeny. If anything, she despaired of the company she had been keeping the last month. It would have been better that she go into hiding in the Underdark.

The things the madwoman was doing to her body, however, had far greater effect. Selene felt herself warm despite the unwelcome advances of Caleldra. This was nothing at all like her rape at the hands of her cousins and brothers. For one thing, the woman molesting her was pleasuring the both of them. And there were no dicks actively trying to choke her. No, this so far was not her first nor most traumatizing rape at the hands of a woman more powerful than herself. If she closed her eyes, she could picture Ashyr above her, inside her. That was exactly when Selene did, for she would not be a very good drow if she did not develop coping mechanisms for being raped.

But the woman was not done ranting. Or molesting Selene, for that matter. "When I am done with you, when your friends have been taken by the monastery, I will claim Caleldir as my own, hold him prisoner in this place while I take my sweet, loving vengeance on him." She was breathing lightly and shallowly, clearly getting off on her wild imaginings as much as on what she was doing to the drow underneath her. "I know how sadistic you are, dear Selene. I have looked into you memories, stripped them bare. I have seen what you have done. I see what everyone has done! I only punish the wicked, after all. But everyone is wicked. I see all their cruelties, all their hatreds, all their injustices. They all have to be punished!" She trailed off. If someone did not know better, they almost might say that the ghost was trying to justify her own cruelties to herself. Then again, perhaps she had trailed off because she had bit her lip in orgasm. Pulling her hand out from between the two of them, she expertly phased and twisted herself so that she collapsed down on top of Selene, pressing her body, now just the smallest bit warm, against the drow. "So maybe you will enjoy it when I use the two of you as instruments of torture on each other." She whispered. "You will both be my toys!" Any contradictions in her words seemed to escape her, apparently.

"Darling, I do believe I suffered... tenfold... for what I did to your precious Caleldir. For everything I did. Do not justify your actions towards me." Selene said the pleasure-labored breath. This time she held herself back enough that she could think, otherwise her mind would be addled and her body shaking with climax. It was an imperfect switch, a losing battle with pleasure. But she was not just some male that one could force so easily to orgasm. "I did not choose this, and I would not choose it if I had the chance to go back... but I know a woman who would." She stopped to breathe, to regather her thoughts. "Someone as mad as you, but crippled by her madness." Images of Caleldir's rape at the hands of Naliira seen through a scryer's pool came to Selene's mind. There was still outrage that flared within Selene upon thinking of this. Apparently she was more than happy to throw that particular female and her unborn under the proverbial cart. "And she could be carrying his child as we speak. A child powerful and nigh eternal, unlike my own. She could not possibly take care of it in her current condition. Would not you prefer that daughter inside you?"

Caleldra was, being the exact height of Caleldir himself, much, much taller than Selene. But even laying on top of her, she seemed to weigh only exactly what she wanted to weight, which was not at that much. After a moment of simply laying there and seeming to completely ignore Selene's retort, she shifted her body again to wrap both legs around one of Selene's and begin sliding her slightly cool, damp pussy up and down the drow's dark thigh. "Oh!" Caleldra said with sudden clarity. "I see that Caleldir has grown creative with his telekinesis. I will have to try that..."

As she softly moaned against Selene, the drow felt a phantom cock press against her womanhood, one that seemed to be pulled straight from her memories about Caleldir, and recreated with telekinetic force. As Caleldra continued to hump her leg, the invisible dick slipped into her and began pumping softly in and out. Selene groaned and arched her back in pleasure. There was nothing quite like the sensation of being filled more completely than fingers ever could. Being penetrated so was an almost inexplicable, primal sort of satisfaction. After its initial insertion, however, Selene didn't seem to be enjoying herself any more than she had been with the madwoman's fingers. Her eyes flickered open - they had been shut this whole time so that she could imagine a more favorable partner - to check that Caleldra was just using telekinesis and had not somehow made herself even more in the image of her obsession. It was a silly thought in retrospect, for she could feel the wetness of the other woman's pussy against her leg. If Selene had her movement, she would have tried to knee the other woman as hard as she could in her delicate sex. Pleasure she may be feeling, but that wasn't an indication that Selene wanted to remain in this cunt's lair.

"I know the woman of whom you speak." Caleldra breathed finally. If she could be said to breath. "But I am not so much a fool as to tangle with with a demigoddess. She was old when this country was young. So do not try to trick me into going after her." She said, much to Selene's readily apparent disappointment. "Besides, it is not every woman who has had Caleldir that I am going to take my revenge on, for I understand that that is quite a lot of them. It is just you: you who stole his all-important first time that I coveted so much. So now, I will steal it from you!"

The illusion dropped and her hair went white, her eyes phantom blue, her body transparent, and her visage took on the savage edge of deathly perfection, which seemed to horrify Selene. "I will live out your memories, enjoying him as you did, and as I do, you will lose those memories. For I see that you refuse to value them!" A line of psionic energy appeared between the ghost's forehead and Selene's. Caleldra gasped in pleasure as she claimed the sensations of sex. "Be... grateful... She breathed. I will erase the shame of being impregnated by such an 'inferior being!'"

What?!

Selene thought with incredulity as she felt her mind being squeezed and milked. No! Selene was not particularly attached to the memory, for there was much pain involved, but she'd rather be cursed to drider form than lose it to this cunt. She held onto the recollection with an iron, clawing grip.

"I see you... conveniently leave out... the pain I felt." Selene observed through clenched teeth, judging by the look of ecstasy she saw on Caleldra's visage. She had no idea if this would work, but she at least try. The drow lashed out through the mental connection with her own finely edged weapon of the emotional and physical pain she'd felt in recent months. Her matron raped, tortured, burned, killed, destroyed. Then her mother, then her sisters. She'd been forced to watch it all. Then came the worst of it: her daughter. She'd cried at the end. Begged for her momma to make it stop. At the time of Selene's rape of Caleldir, all this had been pulsing through her mind, for she thought that Ashyr had a part in this. Then, when it was over, she could add the sickness she felt when she realized that Ashyr had no idea, that Selene put her through the pain of watching her favorite male in such distress for no reason. Sure, Selene had climaxed at the end of it all, but never did it really feel good.

The only thing she was glad about was the fact that Caleldir's seed inside her blocked the Duskhaven males from getting what they wanted.

Selene's mental 'weapon' was double-edged. She had formed each trauma in her head with as much clarity as she could muster. The drow wanted to completely spoil the ghost's pleasure in the ill-gotten memory, even if Selene, too, was taken down by it. She shut her eyes tight against the tears that flowed from them, but it did not hinder their progress. Selene could not cover her face to hide the shame and humiliation of crying in front of this stranger.

The ghost giggled. "Of course I leave out the pain. I can just absorb it and not feel it. Why would I want to feel your pain? No, that I leave to you." The mad ghost was a psion of terrible power, when Selene tried to resist the attack she frowned, doubling down on it. The amount of energy was, quite literally, mind-shattering, bearing down on Selene with inexorable force, stealing away every good memory and leaving only the worst of them.

But Selene resisted.

With a loud shattering clang, the connection broke, and the force of it sent Caleldra flying backwards, shrieking as Selene shattered both the memory drain and the paralysis with the searing power of her own trauma. The room erupted with telekinetic energy, treasures ripping through the air. Caleldra stopped herself, hovering a few yards away, head cradled in her hands. "You... you broke my control" She said disbelievingly. Her form began to dissipate. "That... that should not be possible." She looked stricken. Then, she smiled again. "Oh well, you still cannot escape. I will gather my energies, and return prepared for you. What can you do here, alone and naked?" The image of her flickered, and then vanished.