Revenge of the Drow

But now Xiana thought about these reports more deeply, she realised that they were consistent with the presence of a mighty drow warrior, training a mixed drow and human contingent into a fighting unit. Even the ghost tales made sense, when one remembered Jade was an enchantress of some skill who could play all kinds of mind tricks with the foe.

Xiana decided she could not risk a show of force. Even before Jade and Maxi had arrived on the scene, Formen and its surrounding villages had proved too strong for a full frontal assault. Instead the dark elves had used sneak tactics; surprise smash and grab manoeuvres on badly guarded caravan trails and humans straying alone after dark. And then, as Maxi had worked his guards into a disciplined unit, patrolling the night time, even these had become too risky. The raid on the merchant and the capture of the hapless Terry had been a piece of incredible luck, and would not have occurred at all, if one of her patrols had not happened to lose their way and blunder into human territory.

Xiana next considered assassination. She had two master assassins among her devotees; twin sisters and loyal followers of the Spider who knew nothing but killing. The city of Formen was well guarded and its approaches were patrolled, but Xiana knew that her shadows would have no difficulty gaining an entrance to their targets. She was confident her prize pieces could enter a giant's rectum undetected.

What decided her against assassination was the chance of escape after the event. There may come a day when Xiana wanted someone dead so much she would order her valuable assassins on a suicide mission, but this was not it. Her shadows must live to fight another day.

There was another reason for rejecting assassination; a political one. Even if her creatures escaped with their lives, their part in the demise of the two traitors would be widely suspected, and this would cause an uproar. Xiana knew that the relationship between Formen and their nominal rulers the house of Liam was strained, and she wanted to keep it that way. But even the most lackadaisical noble could not ignore the insulting presence of enemy assassins inside the gates of a vassal state. The last thing Xiana wanted was the house of Liam in alliance with Formen, waging full scale war on the drow.

No, Xiana reasoned, the drow could not come to the targets, either by force or stealth. So the targets had to come to the drow. And that meant something -- or someone -- had to be used as bait. Xiana took hatred personally; and a hater understands her object's personality as intimately as a lover. Xiana thought back over all she knew of her two enemies, and hit on the offer that they could not refuse.

Chapter 2: Jade's revenge

For the first six months of their courtship, Jade had turned Maxi wild with desire. But it was a wildness he sought out, because it was also a time of intense happiness, intermingled with equally intense feelings of protectiveness. Jade would lead him on, tease him and delight him, then next minute she would cry uncontrollably and need to be comforted.

Maxi knew Jade was a master of enchantments, and so his mind told him that there was a high chance much of her performance was put on to manipulate his emotions. But he let it happen. It was a novel experience being allowed to have emotions at all, even destructive ones. Maxi also loved the envious glances other men gave him as he walked through their favourite parts of the city, arm in arm with the beautiful half-elf.

In his early career Maxi had joined the army and fought to climb the ladder, because of the status that military command afforded him. The only outlet for male ambition among the drow. Then he met Trieste, and he had fought to maintain a grounding of passion for their love making sessions. There was something about just having slaughtered a whole village of kobolds that gave an extra intensity to sexual excitement. But now he was fighting for a far more primal reason. To protect his sweetheart. The city leaders soon noticed this and commented on the dedication and ferocity of their new drow officer.

Jade had risen to a fairly prestigious position among the city hierarchy. In fact throughout their relationship, it was Jade who had taken the lead. Maxi vacillated between taking a passive role in Jade's more assertive moments, then protecting her when her mood plummeted and she depended on him.

Then one day, after they had met in Jade's quarters, far more luxurious than Maxi's stark barracks, she had given herself to him; gently, passionately, and then as the evening progressed, more aggressively. Jade could be demure and loving and then transform herself with no warning; spitting, hissing and scratching, almost like her mother. Maxi was confused and frustrated with her mood swings at the same time he was excited by them.

Shortly after their first passionate love session Jade disappeared, characteristically without telling Maxi where she was going. Maxi waited for a week, wild with longing, and then he petitioned the elderly city leader for an audience, asking him where Jade had got to. Jim listened to him in the council chamber, all smiles and bonhomie, pleased at the way this tough, unpredictable and potentially dangerous dark elf had been tamed by a wayward teenage girl. He told Maxi that Jade had accompanied some dwarfen traders to conduct what she described as "unfinished business," but he knew no more than that. Jim had given permission for her to leave, on the condition she return.

"So all you have to do, Maxi my lad, is wait," laughed the old man. "I'm sure your lass will come back to you."

Maxi waited another week, then Jade returned. The reunion made the parting worth while, as the two lovers exhausted themselves with passion in an all day sex session. When both lovers had sunk back on the silken sheets, Maxi asked Jade where she had been.

"Do you remember Freda?" she said.

Maxi shook his head.

"She died fighting at your side, in battle," said Jade. She disentwined herself from Maxi, glaring at him.

"There were so many." Maxi was puzzled. Why would Jade expect him to remember this particular comrade?

"She was the furry dwarf. She was kind to me. I have never eaten anything furry since she died"

"What about her?" asked Maxi. He had placed her now. She was the dwarf priestess with a rare talent for healing spells. Maxi grabbed hold of Jade's slender naked body, and they wrapped around each other again, luxuriating in each others closeness, smell and warmth.

"She was betrayed -- by her lover's family," said Jade.

"So what has that to do with where you'v been?"

"I went to the dwarf settlement. The traders showed me the way."

"And what did you do there?"

"Let's just say that those particular minions of the slave trader scum will never snare another furry woman."

"How many of them did you kill?" asked Maxi

Jade smiled, reached over and bit Maxi playfully on the nose. "All of them." she said.

#

Jade did not love Maxi as he loved her, but she was fond of him, and did find pleasure in his solicitous regard for her. Not since living with her mother had Jade enjoyed the feeling of knowing that another being genuinely cared whether she lived or died. But Jade had been damaged. There was firstly the physical damage; soon after arriving at Formen, Jade had been to see an apothecary, who had told her that one of her severe beatings had damaged her internally. Jade was young and strong, so the damage was not debilitating. Nevertheless, she would be unable to bear children, and for some reason this saddened Jade more than it should have.

Then there was the internal damage. Jade had been a house slave for only a few weeks, but they were sufficient to warp her mind. The worst thing about being a house slave is not the beatings, the continuous unrewarding work, or even the humiliation. It is the knowledge that you mean less than nothing. Nobody likes you, and nobody even hates you -- you are not worth it. Nobody would either mourn or rejoice in your death, and nobody cares that you live.

And even though temple slavery was an improvement, it was no bed of sphagnum moss either, because here the damage was moral. A house slave has no rights; not even to thinking. They are sheer automata, bags of nothing but misery. A temple slave is too valuable to totally crush. Jade had been allowed to practice her art, given some simple dignities like her name and even allowed to oversee the lesser slaves, like the domestic half orcs. But with freedom comes responsibility, and temple slaves are a small but intricate component in the drow machine. A machine that seeks to destroy whatever it touches.

Jade knew that retribution would be swift and terrible had she even hesitated in carrying out her orders straight away. So some would say Jade was not responsible for her actions. But a slave still has one important freedom. She can choose willing or unwilling obedience. Jade obeyed her orders; orders to kill and smash and bully, and often she enjoyed them.

Then she met Freda. There was something about the dwarf that both attracted and repulsed her; and if Jade had a choice she would have rejected any friendly overtures. But living in the proximity of Freda, fighting by her side, and hearing her story of betrayal had forged a bond. Freda was her friend, and the death of her friend damaged her some more.

And then there was the mind slayer. The monster had torn at her soul, and exposed her vulnerability. Her friendship with the furry dwarf, her guilt, confusion and anger. Jade's howl of sheer misery after Freda's death had been as much for the death of her own self as for her friend and for her other companions.

At that time, Jade had relied on Maxi. Maxi had been kind and considerate, and had not taken advantage of her, though she knew he had wanted to. Throughout their long courtship he had acted honourably -- in a most un-drow like fashion.

Jade's relationship with Maxi vacillated. She loved it when he nurtured her, and so she sometimes pretended to be more hopeless than she really felt. At other times she liked to lord it over him; to flaunt her higher status with the city -- and then rejoice when she felt his jealousy, and his insecure need to master her. Jade did not love well -- but she did her best.

Jade's feelings for revenge similarly swung to and fro. Sometimes, when a black mood was upon her she wanted to revenge her mother. Persuade Jim and the council to raid the drow stronghold, and then personally slaughter every drow they came across. Two things stopped her. Firstly Freda. Her friend had been betrayed herself, and essentially murdered by her lover and his parents, yet had harboured no bitterness, and had impressed on Jade the need to look forward not back.

But secondly, and this reason actually loomed larger, Jade did not know who was responsible. It seemed overkill to slaughter an entire settlement for a crime that only a few had committed.

In the end, Jade's first chance at revenge took a different direction. Two dwarf traders had told her about a caravan of drow slavers that had been seen lurking around their stronghold at night, just out of crossbow range of the patrol.

Jade had accompanied the two traders, taking with her some of the gold she had saved from her salary. As a guest of the traders, and in her human guise, she was granted permission to enter the stronghold, even the underground portion, and see Freda's father Harald. It became obvious that the elderly dwarf had no idea of the part Freda's lover or his parents had played in her betrayal. In fact, Harald spoke of him with undisguised approval.

"A fine young man. Of course he was devastated when Freda disappeared. He even wanted to launch a rescue, but we all told him he would be better off here, continuing his work. A very talented artisan...training him to take my place..."

Jade the enchantress looked closely at the ageing stumpy dwarf as he continued rambling, recognising the residue of a charm spell. Possibly Freda had been too powerful and protected by her faith for such a spell to have any effect. But the old man was obviously smitten by his daughter's murderer.

Jade knew she would not be able to persuade the old man of his putative son in law's guilt. Not without breaking the charm spell, and possibly not even then. So she tried another tack. "I would love to meet him. Freda saved my life and I owe her everything. Would you introduce us?"

Harald agreed only too eagerly to this request, and soon Jade was alone with Freda's old lover in his underground apartment, sumptuously furnished with soft fur-covered couches, and with the wall to wall mirrors favoured by wealthier dwarfs. Jade looked at him and noticed that he did have the mark of an enchanter, though not a very good one.

A mere technician, she thought, with no genuine feeling for the art. Nevertheless he had managed to master up enough skill to cast a charm spell on the gullible older dwarf. Even a mediocre enchanter has no difficulty getting someone to believe what they want to believe.

Freda's lover reclined on one of the fur couches and waved Jade to the other. "I prefer to stand," she said shortly. She tossed him the bag of gold, and noticed the naked avarice in his eyes as he counted it.

"There is more where that came from." She had switched to her own language, that of the underground drow, used as common tongue among many of the more unsavoury inhabitants of the subterranean realm.

"You are from the drow?" the greedy little man said in the same language, his piggy eyes fixed on her slender body. Jade felt revulsion at his ghoulish gaze.

"I am from the drow," Jade replied. "I need more slaves. I represent our High Priestess. You must deal with me directly, not through the traders you use."

"I have a nice piece all ready. I was going to get the traders to come into this room today." He snickered. "I like to have fun with them first. This one also thinks I love her."

The piggy-eyed dwarf would not know how close he came to an immediate messy death at that remark, or what a supreme effort of will it was for Jade to remain calm, as she replied. "Get your accomplices. We will discuss the deal. I will be hiding in this room when you do your...business with the slave girl. I will then get the slavers to back off. From now on you deal with me."

Jade debated whether to use a charm spell, then decided against. This greedy fool was already totally in her thrall. She would need all her spell power later. Jade loosened her robe, the better for the dwarf to ogle her shapely bust.

The dwarf made to leave. "Wait here," he said. "I will get them." Jade noticed that he kept his eyes on her bust even as he sidled out of the door. As the dwarf left, Jade took three soft objects from her robe, stepped behind the door, and waited.

The older male dwarf was taken totally by surprise as he stepped through the door. Jade's garotte slipped effortlessly over his stumpy neck and she tightened it expertly. The dwarf gasped, clawed at his neck and turned blue. The woman, obviously more used to sending others to die than doing battle herself, gawked at Jade stupidly, allowing her to slip over the second garotte with the same ease.

The two supposed parents were now on the ground, using precious oxygen by thrashing about ineffectually. Jade remembered the silky voiced cut-throat Trieste had employed to teach her silent killing. It was a point of pride to the drow assassins to leave no mess, and Jade glanced approvingly at her handiwork. No blood or excrement so far. Jade knew her victims would take about four minutes to die, but she didn't give them a second glance. They were effectively out of the fight.

The younger dwarf was more of a problem. Not so much how to get rid of him, but how to do it in a way that did not make the apartment too untidy or raise an alarm. Because by now, enough time had elapsed for him to be totally on his guard. He had even drawn a short axe from his jerkin, though it was obvious from the way he held it that he did not know how to use it. Jade decided to change tactics. She needed the lecherous fool alive a bit longer.

"No point sharing the loot is there?" she said, gesturing towards the two older dwarfs, still flapping around like fish in a bucket, though more weakly now. The dwarf swallowed hard, then nodded.

Sit down." The dwarf sat down numbly. Jade smiled at him.

"Drop the axe. You don't know how to use it, and as you can see I am an experienced fighter."

The dwarf dropped the axe.

"What's the usual plan?"asked Jade. "Do you do your business with your girlfriends before the traders arrive?"

"They -- they like to watch," he stammered.

"I bet they do. So do I. So you go ahead with your plan. Help me hide the bodies." By now the parents had stopped flapping. They were still conscious, and would be for a few more seconds until the brain, desperate to stay alive at any cost to the rest of the body, had sucked up all remaining oxygen from the blood. So it was that their last conscious sensation was their accomplice helping their murderer to stuff them into the large wardrobe.

Jade loaded her small crossbow "Don't even think of leaving the room," she said. "Or calling out. You would be dead before you reached the door, and before any cry left your throat. Where do the traders hide?"

The dwarf slid open one of the wall mirrors. There was an alcove inside, and the mirror was one way. The drow traders would be able to see everything.

"Nice work," said Jade. "Very impressive. You continue to provide the High Priestess with slaves and we will have a mutually profitable business relationship." Jade stepped behind a tapestry.

"I still have my crossbow cocked," she said. "And I never miss. Don't leave the room and don't do anything stupid like announce my presence to your friends. Start your preparations."

The dwarf went into a small room where a meal had been prepared, and brought it out to the table, together with a flagon of wine. He appeared more relaxed now, and strangely indifferent to the death of his parents. Jade had little experience with family life, but she did still sometimes miss Trieste, and so she found his lack of emotion perplexing. She wondered if perhaps they were not his parents at all, but were part of the act.

Soon the drow slavers arrived. They did not come through the door, but Jade heard them creeping into the alcove behind the mirror. Obviously some sort of subterranean network of secret passages favoured by the Priestesses. Maybe they opened out onto the surface at the place where the traders had been seen.

Jade felt further resentment as she realised the drow could have taken the dwarf stronghold by surprise at any time, but chose not to. Supposedly because a frontal assault was a useful way of getting rid of inconvenient compatriots like Trieste. Jade then wondered whether the dwarf leaders knew of the secret passageways and remembered Freda's comment. In war time our worst enemies are the ones wearing the same uniform.

The alcove slid open and there was a whispered conversation between the dwarf and the slavers, before they moved the mirror back in place. Long enough for Jade to get a good look at them. One woman, maybe an acolyte, and three rough looking male fighters. Jade revised her battle plan accordingly.

The alcove was closed again and then the dwarf girl came in through the door without knocking. She was obviously at home in this apartment. Her voice sounded younger than Freda -- about the same age as Jade. Jade risked a peek around the tapestry. The girl was taller than the average pit dwarf, less hairy, more rounded, and beautiful, even by exacting drow standards. The male dwarf was solicitous in waiting on her, fawning almost, and Jade wanted to vomit. She did not understand anything of what they were saying to each other in the Dwarfen tongue, but after they had eaten the food and drunk the wine, the couple started doing something Jade understood only too well.