Surfacing Ch. 13

"Wait!" Auslan cried out. "Wait, it will hurt like this, please, stop."

Shyntre hesitated, caught between words he had heard spoken before, recently, by the tight-slit Nobles—which not only hadn't made a difference, but only encouraged him to hurt them more—and the familiar, smooth voice saying those same words now.

He gripped the trapped body tighter, his heart pounding against the Consort's back; he didn't want to give up the dominant position, but he didn't know what to do with it...

"Shyntre, please," his lover said more softly with less panic. "Please. I am sore. Do not hurt me as they did."

Trembling, Shyntre felt loathing for himself even through the haze of lust and rage. He nodded and shifted wordlessly off of the Consort, unable to speak. Auslan immediately rolled to face him and seized him in an embrace before he could back away, holding tightly so he couldn't escape. He kissed him.

"Thank you," he whispered, sharing his warmth on the cool floor. "It is alright. I am not angry or afraid of you. I am not. Do not tell yourself anything like that."

Too late.

Goddess, how he hated this City...

Still, his erection hadn't gone down yet, it had only become slightly less painful. Auslan's talented hand was on it immediately, touching him with eye-rolling grace. In only a few heartbeats, it hurt again, but in the good way. The regret for what he'd almost done seemed to melt away too quickly. How was Auslan doing that? It shouldn't be so easy to let it go; nothing was ever that easy.

"Oh, goddess," he breathed into Auslan's hair as the Consort sped up the pace.

"Mark me," his brother answered back, a sensual plea that was the closest thing to a command that Shyntre had ever heard from him. "Cum on my body."

Nodding, knowing without a doubt that was just what he needed, Shyntre enjoyed skilled hands for several more moments before choosing his moment to push Auslan onto his back. He quickly climbed up to straddle the trim waist and took his own cock in hand to finish.

Leaning forward to grip the Consort's shoulder, Shyntre felt the pressure build with the inevitability of a fire spell about to go off. Ecstatic, he cried out as he began to spurt white seed all over Auslan's dark chest. His name-bond arched his back and eagerly accepted the mess the wizard made on him...

Rather to his surprise.

Shyntre realized, even with his head still whirling, as he crouched over on trembling limbs and caught his breath, that Auslan could be messy during sex. Maybe there was hope for his odd compulsions.

As soon as the cum began to cool, however, the Consort was immediately looking for a cloth to wipe it off. Seeing no advantage to obstructing him, Shyntre got off and finished resting as he observed a more fastidiousness Consort wipe off his spending without spilling a drop onto the floor.

"Any chance we can lay on the bed?" Shyntre asked. Some of his joints were sore from staying so long on that same hard floor.

Auslan hesitated as he glanced at the neat, unrumpled sheets, but slowly nodded. "Are you hungry? I have the usual dried food...but you cannot eat it in the bed."

Shyntre shook his head. "Later, then. Let's lie down."

With a bit more coaxing, the wizard got the Consort to recline with him, off of the floor, and they lay in silence for only a few moments.

This was the second cycle that he'd been in the Cloister. He had at least eight before he had to return to the Palace.

"What mark is it?" Shyntre asked.

Auslan shook his head slowly. "I never truly know anymore."

"Well...where is D'Shea?"

It was a very good question.

*****

The Headmaster's chair was comfortable, plush, made for long hours sitting in deep thought. It would not be easy to clean, but that was not her concern. She hadn't wanted to bathe first—something about the mix of sweat, tears, and sexual fluids was helping her concentration in a way she almost couldn't recall from before, and she did not question it.

Managing not to disturb the old mage was satisfying as she had risen to sit in his chair, but now she'd all but forgotten her host as she replayed details that were not new—she had lived them before—but that she had forgotten.

It had to have been that single drink, very long ago. It was the only time she had not been allowed to question its source or refuse to drink; everyone was drinking at once, a toast led by the Valsharess and with hundreds of Nobles present, including herself.

The Valsharess did not do such things often, but it had been a special moment. The first Consorts had been gifted, and Priestess's new theories for expanding Drow power seemed to be proving viable. Even then, even so young, Varessa had been able to see the tactic; the Nobles had something that set them apart from the commoners; they had new toys, new status symbols, something for which to compete. To focus on their own navels.

She could not have cared less, but she had toasted the Houses and drank. The swell and recession of magic within the room had been felt by many more than her, and it was surely a blessing from Lolth. The Spider Queen approved of this new path chosen by the Valsharess, so said the Priestesses.

It had to have been that moment, because it was the only moment when—during the many times the Valsharess had swept her tawny eyes across the eyes of the masses—She had paused on Varessa D'Shea. Their gazes had met, and the new youth just coming into her arcane talents and already hinting at her future potential in the realm of politics, should have looked away. She felt that she could not, that she was forbidden to do so for one moment, and would not have known what that feeling had been as the wine seemed to sour on her tongue.

Now, the Elder did know the feeling, very well. So did Rausery, and Gaelan, and Sirana. Almost certainly The Prime, and Auranka, and Lelinahdara. Quite possibly, every Red Sister and Priestess who had ever drawn the queen's favor, even for a moment, knew the insidious penetration of their queen's will.

Royal favor was always an acknowledgement of value; it meant one had potential to achieve power and influence...and She knew it, accepted it, wanted it for Her City. The Valsharess could only allow so much power to be accumulated by any one Drow, however, even as those who wanted it most must become so...or the City would never be content, never be stable.

D'Shea licked her lips now; she could still taste the salt of her dried tears. Six hundred years, and she had never wept like this, so hard that her throat and stomach still ached. She'd never had cause.

Now she had an idea how to mask it in herself, but she had to be sure it could work. She'd never felt such fear...or such exhilaration.

"Phaelous," she whispered. "You will die for this."

He rolled over, breathed in, and sighed. Of course he was awake now, hearing her voice.

"I know, Varessa."

She watched as a yellow globe next to his bed slowly rose to a soft glow, so she could see the gold flecks in his deep red eyes.

"She would never allow your ability to exist."

"She didn't," he said, bemused. "I have felt many more restrictions on my magic than you, my Elder. As time wore on, She revealed only to me that they could be lifted without death. She had no choice. She did not have a replacement strong enough in magic, and greater power was needed as the Tower gained more male students through the Nobles."

"You still should not have been able to do what you did to me. The queen is not that stupid."

Phaelous didn't reply, but continued lying on his side, watching her from his bed, as she sat naked in his chair with bed-rumpled, gold-touched hair.

"When did you become... unrestricted?" D'Shea asked.

Through long habit, he clearly considered an evasive or misleading answer.

"There is no longer any point to lying to me, Phaelous," Varessa said harshly. "You and I will both die for nothing, and very soon, if you do not give me what I need to survive outside this Tower."

Phaelous breathed out slowly and started to sit up. "It happened... when I finally translated an old manuscript."

"How old, and where did you find it?"

The golden-haired mage adjusted the blankets around his waist as he sat cross-legged, looking at D'Shea. "Not sure of its exact age, perhaps as old as I am. And I didn't find it anywhere within the City. It was a trade a student brought back, amid a whole other stack of dirty, torn, nearly worthless scrolls, that some Pech scavenged and thought that 'us elfie-readie types' might be willing to buy from him. One cycle, I went through it, sorted out the ones for the students to practice on, and kept the most difficult ones for myself."

When he paused, D'Shea didn't insert another question; she nodded for him to continue.

"It was an almost incomprehensible Elfish, a strange dialect that might have come from the Surface or perhaps not, and it mentioned a First Tongue."

The sorceress sat up straighter, her interest snared. "And...this lifted your compulsions somehow?"

Phaelous nodded. "The very form of this language cannot lie. Compulsions do not exist in that language; they are lies that our very essence believes to be true, but is not. It is tricking the will into believing it needs something which it does not.

"It is very hard to overcome. But hearing Truth in words helps, if one can say them, and one can accept them. You knew a compulsion could be broken, and you could be free. You accepted a Truth that did not mean Death when I spoke it."

Varessa slowly shook her head. "I do not...remember you speaking any First Language."

"That doesn't matter. You felt it. You wept."

Another pause.

"Why now, Phaelous?" she asked, wondering if her time was much shorter than she had first thought.

"You finally returned to me," he said simply.

"And now you are ready to die for one last reunion? Or become a Drider forever under Auranka's will? You have never been that limp-wristed, Headmaster."

Phaelous smiled; it was calm and smug, and it was infuriating to her. "If it is so, then so be it."

D'Shea slammed her fist into the arm of his chair. "No! Don't you dare! Not after what you've done!"

"What do I dare, my Elder?"

"To hide what you've seen. If I know that I have been moved into position for some plot, especially by you, then I *will* know why!" Her fist uncurled and she held on to his chair in a tight grip, trying to calm her voice.

"You have done another divination spell, old mage. I don't know how long ago, but you have. You do not take risks like this just for the challenge of any royal game. You do as you are told as best benefits you. You have said you earned your peace here, but you will lose it now, so you have seen something you are willing to trade for it."

The Headmaster considered the sorceress for quite some time; D'Shea waited. Impatiently, but she waited. Divinations of the nature with which she was familiar seemed at once too vivid and too rigid; they could trick any mage into believing they were a certainty, inevitable destiny, when they were not. Divinations did not have the symbolism or malleability of a dream in reverie, or a vision from Lolth. They were hard as stone, direct, and quick. Blink and one important detail might be missed.

Sharing those divinations with others was also tricky. The sire of her child would tell her something; he would, because he had unbalanced something of dire importance to the Valsharess. He had done it deliberately.

Now there would be consequences for many, and so soon after a Purge which had changed the course of centuries of breeding Nobility, which had taken so many of their youngest of all abilities, fighter, wizard, crafter... Those older and still alive, who still managed so many of the riches and resources, did not truly know where they stood.

The bottom dropping out of a key vessel holding a queen's power was dangerous enough; this happening in the existence of any current power void tended to push events too quickly, too violently. D'Shea had to be prepared, or neither she, nor the Sisterhood, nor her son had any chance to survive.

She did not think that her son's sire could survive under even the most lenient of predictions, if only because of his attitude.

"The Illithids will come to the City, Varessa," he finally said, "and there is a chance you will be the one left defending it."

D'Shea did not respond at first, because her thought was decidedly obvious: why her? There were several others right now more powerful who would take on a threat that great right at their home threshold. The Valsharess Herself wouldn't step back from an event like that, and the Prime would be directing most of the ground forces. Auranka, the High Priestess, and Elder Rausery as well...they all outranked her. D'Shea would manage the arcane forces, but...

Phaelous said something else when she did not respond. "Listen to Jaunda, my Elder."

D'Shea nodded slowly, making a note of that. "Is there a trigger?"

Her lover's shoulders stiffened. "Several. I cannot tell which comes first, or if they are even the cause or just coincidence. Could be a fatal mislead if I tried, my Elder."

She had to accept that, though she itched for all details she could get. Still, she was competent enough of a sorceress to tell when too much information was too soon. She could wait.

"How long do we have?"

Phaelous shook his head. "Less than one year."

Damn it.

"Based on what clue, wizard? What did you see?"

It seemed like a genuine hesitation rather than any tease that he did not answer and had to be told again.

"Phaelous."

He cleared his throat. "One of the enchanted spiders that killed Wilsira. It was still alive, crawling on the Palace floor."

D'Shea straightened up. "Did you see Sirana?"

"I did not," he answered more readily. "The spider was present at the start of the attack, however." He tilted his head. "I trust that she is currently in possession of them?"

"Of course. They were made to guard her. What good are they to me if she is gone?" She touched her chin. "So Sirana may have returned in your vision..."

Phaelous looked amused. "If I recall correctly, they will cease to function if their charge dies, unless a very competent mage is there to reassign them. It does not answer what you really want to know, does it, Varessa?"

D'Shea snarled in irritation. "You've made them before."

"I have. There is very little you know that I do not when it comes to magic, my Elder."

"So I've seen."

D'Shea tapped her fingers on the chair, thinking. It seemed easier to think back on those many threads of connections, some of them that should have been obvious long before now, but had been made thin enough to fade into the background one way or another. She found herself back to where she had been before Phaelous had spoken his "Truth" and changed everything for her.

"The Valsharess has decided Shyntre will replace you, and you will be killed before you become even more powerful," she murmured.

Phaelous nodded. "I have already become more powerful, but She doesn't know that yet. There is a middle wizard who can run the Tower, if She is willing to give up access to this room for a while, until they figure out the blocks I've set. If She must kill me before Shyntre is ready, She can."

She narrowed copper eyes at him. "That is why you have chosen now."

"As of seven cycles ago. I'd rather have waited a little longer, but if you are here now, then it will be so."

"But She is having you research what happened in the forming room, with Wilsira, with me."

"And I have been. Diligently. This is my last assignment, I am guessing."

She quirked a brow. "So I should not remember anything, for as long as possible?"

"I like that you are not ready to be rid of me quite yet, my Elder." The old wizard showed a rare grin that made him look a century or two younger despite his golden hair and creases at the corners of his eyes. "But, on the contrary..."

"Yes?" she asked at his pause.

"Would you return with me to the forming room?"

D'Shea waited for that hard strike in her mind, that flat denial to even consider it. It tried to rise up—a natural wariness for any place of intense pain—but the sorceress found that she could overcome it. For the first time since submitting herself and her unborn into the care of the Priestesses.

The Elder nodded, and peeled herself out of the Headmaster's chair. "We have some time, not much. A quick bath, first."

His eyes lit up. "Of course, Varessa."

"No distraction, mage."

"Never touched my mind, Elder."

*****

Only one, comatose, swollen body was present when they arrived and stepped out of the transport circle and Phaelous cast a privacy spell for them. D'Shea drew a steady breath, slowing her heart, but immediately hated the scent, the taste, of the place.

It was on her tongue. There was Abyssal taint, creeping at the edges of those runes, trying to get into them. From what she could tell, they were not close to doing so—it looked more like tadpoles bumping stupidly against a rock blocking their swim path—but the very presence of them was an affront to her magic. In retrospect, why would the Drow ever make such deals with demons?

"The Priestesses will have to change their initiation rites," D'Shea murmured, "if they are to gain any more in numbers, or replace those who are killed."

Phaelous was looking at the one pregnant captive, but blinked as he focused on her. "Those are your first thoughts entering this place, Varessa?"

She shook her head. "My first thought was that this places needs to be neutralized and destroyed. Those reinforcement runes won't last forever."

"Those reinforcement runes are your doing," the wizard said in soft, simple way; no accusation or wryness. "I can feel your aura in them, Varessa. Can't you?"

She frowned, supposing that explained why her eyes had rested on them first, checking their strength, their competency, their foundation... "I did not realize. I don't remember why, but I can think you must be right."

The eldest wizard pondered that some, trying to nudge at his sorceress's still-healing memories. He came at her from a different angle. "The Draegloth are born here as well, same as the Consorts were. Just not usually at the same time."

D'Shea nodded, her mind working more quickly than she dared consider on a conscious level. She had always been good at putting small details together and following them back to their source. Now that the earliest blocks had been removed...

"And why are they born at all?" she asked, almost to herself.

"Lolth's will. The queen's way to both bolster Priestess power and control it."

"Yes, they were always a weak spot. What if the Priestesses did without them entirely?"

The wizard looked doubtful. "It has been this way since before I was born, Varessa. I am not sure their magic would thrive without something else to replace it."

"Our inherent magic is not enough?" she challenged.

Phaelous hesitated then said something she didn't expect in the discussion. "We've been growing weaker, Elder. Our magic is waning, compared to what I remember as a child. That is why there has been no replacement for me, though the one I replaced had been a mere four centuries at the time I stepped forward. We used to be stronger than we are, and only a few of us in a generation are born like you. Or Shyntre."

"Power breeds with power, and you retain that power," D'Shea said with a flint edge to her voice. "That was why the Valsharess chose me to breed your replacement."

"It may have been that way once, but is less predictable now than you might think, Varessa. It is taking more and more rituals to pass on the magic at the same strength."

He stopped talking, as if he had been about to continue but remained quiet; instead he began walking over to the pregnant captive. D'Shea frowned at his back as he walked closer to the cell, but drew closer to him so they could still keep their voices low.