sam wilson. mcu. captain america: brave new world.
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Pinch hits at Casefic Exchange (Due Friday 18 July EDT).
Jun. 29th, 2025 08:40 amcasemod posting in pinchhitsEvent: Casefic Exchange is a fanwork exchange focusing on investigations. These can be solving murders, retrieving stolen items, finding missing people, missions, and mysteries. As long as it has an investigation as its core theme, it fits with the exchange. We are an AO3 exchange; you must have an account and be 18+ to participate.
Minimum requirements: We allow three mediums: a minimum of 3,000 words for fanfiction, a minimum of 10 panels for a comic, or a recording of a completed fic of 3,000 words minimum with "casefic" as one of its tags. Works must include a fandom, character/ship and be of a medium that the recipient has requested.
Event link:caseficexchange.
Pinch hit link: Current pinch hits.
Due date: Friday 18 July at 11:59pm EDT.
Available pinch hits:
Thank you for considering!
Minimum requirements: We allow three mediums: a minimum of 3,000 words for fanfiction, a minimum of 10 panels for a comic, or a recording of a completed fic of 3,000 words minimum with "casefic" as one of its tags. Works must include a fandom, character/ship and be of a medium that the recipient has requested.
Event link:
caseficexchange.Pinch hit link: Current pinch hits.
Due date: Friday 18 July at 11:59pm EDT.
Available pinch hits:
Thank you for considering!
Show: SGA
Rec Category: Rodney McKay
Characters: Rodney McKay, John Sheppard
Pairings: Rodney/John
Categories: slash, emotionalhurt/comfort, alternate reality
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Words: 1,485
Author's Journal:busaikko
Author's Website: busaikko on AO3
Link: Identity Crisis [Fic and Podfic]
Author’s summary: Rodney, the wrong John, and the right John.
Why This Must Be Read: This is a short but powerful fic by busaikko that features Rodney, who's confronted by an alternate John and dealing with it in his endearing, bulldozing way. It’s a story full of subtle humor, but also brimming with raw emotion, conveyed through Rodney’s oh-so-familiar rants—and an ending that won’t let you go: quiet and bittersweet.
You get the fic along with a fantastic podfic from bessyboo that captures all the emotion and atmosphere in an exceptionally vivid way. So don’t miss out on this amazing, perfect double treat!
( snippet of fic )
Rec Category: Rodney McKay
Characters: Rodney McKay, John Sheppard
Pairings: Rodney/John
Categories: slash, emotionalhurt/comfort, alternate reality
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Words: 1,485
Author's Journal:
busaikkoAuthor's Website: busaikko on AO3
Link: Identity Crisis [Fic and Podfic]
Author’s summary: Rodney, the wrong John, and the right John.
Why This Must Be Read: This is a short but powerful fic by busaikko that features Rodney, who's confronted by an alternate John and dealing with it in his endearing, bulldozing way. It’s a story full of subtle humor, but also brimming with raw emotion, conveyed through Rodney’s oh-so-familiar rants—and an ending that won’t let you go: quiet and bittersweet.
You get the fic along with a fantastic podfic from bessyboo that captures all the emotion and atmosphere in an exceptionally vivid way. So don’t miss out on this amazing, perfect double treat!
( snippet of fic )
"Academia: Staying Afloat" by Timothy Burke from the end of January made me feel warmer. It's about everything. AI slop. Fascism. Modern employment. Greed. The broad gesture at everything. Hope. Determination.
You are the right person to do what you do, know what you know, study what you’re going to study. You do it.
You are a lifeboat.
You are not the passenger being rescued from a shipwreck. You are the rescuer. Your skills, your knowledge, your experience reside in you. You have pulled them from the cold ocean where cruel and careless captains have set them adrift.
You are a lifeboat.
I learned this morning that acelightning has died. She was one of the people I only know online, but feel like friends because we have real conversations (in her case, here on Dreamwidth and previously on LJ).
acelightning has died. She was one of the people I only know online, but feel like friends because we have real conversations (in her case, here on Dreamwidth and previously on LJ).Murderbot TV series eps 1-8
I've been intending to watch this for a while, and with RL being rather stressful lately I decided to spend some of the past few days decompressing by inhaling the whole thing. I enjoyed the books a lot, and I also loved this. It gives the sense of having been made with a lot of fun, a lot of love, and also a strong eye for putting in every possible ridiculously tropey situation they can plausibly squeeze in. It sticks to the book in broad outline, but in many ways it feels like a great fanfic version of the book: more subplots have been added, more Situations have been created for our favourite characters to experience and suffer, everything's turned up and embellished a whole lot. I strongly approve of this approach to screen adaptation.
( slightly rambling spoilery thoughts )
I've been intending to watch this for a while, and with RL being rather stressful lately I decided to spend some of the past few days decompressing by inhaling the whole thing. I enjoyed the books a lot, and I also loved this. It gives the sense of having been made with a lot of fun, a lot of love, and also a strong eye for putting in every possible ridiculously tropey situation they can plausibly squeeze in. It sticks to the book in broad outline, but in many ways it feels like a great fanfic version of the book: more subplots have been added, more Situations have been created for our favourite characters to experience and suffer, everything's turned up and embellished a whole lot. I strongly approve of this approach to screen adaptation.
( slightly rambling spoilery thoughts )
Three books new to me, all fantasy (Although the Stross is an edge case), and only one is clearly part of a series.
Books Received, June 21 — June 27
Poll #33298 Books Received, June 21 — June 27
Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 33
Which of these look interesting?
View Answers
Until the Clock Strikes Midnight by Alechia Dow (February 2026)
9 (27.3%)
The Regicide Report by Charles Stross (January 2026)
18 (54.5%)
The Beasts We Raise by D. L. Taylor (March 2026)
2 (6.1%)
Some other option (see comments)
0 (0.0%)
Cats!
20 (60.6%)
In addition to our remaining pinch hits, we have three new pinch hits that need an investigator.
This batch of pinch hits are due on Friday 18 July at 11:59pm Eastern time. [ In your timezone ]
Pinch hits must comply with the exchange's rules. Pinch hits must meet the minimum assignment requirements of a completed work of a minimum of 3,000 words for fanfiction, a minimum of 10 panels for a comic, or a recording of a completed fic of 3,000 words minimum with "casefic" as one of its tags. Works must include a fandom, character/ship and be of a medium that the recipient has requested. You must have an AO3 account to participate.
Please take note of the mediums as some requests have a combination selected.
To claim, please either reply to this post or email gumshoeagency@gmail.com with your AO3 name and the pinch hit number you want to claim.
Comments are screened, so if you reply anonymously, please include an email in case I need to reach out to you. You will not be able to receive a reply from me if you comment anonymously on this post.
( PH 4 (comic, fic) - 僕のヒーローアカデミア | Boku no Hero Academia | My Hero Academia (Anime & Manga), 鴨乃橋ロンの禁断推理 | Kamonohashi Ron no Kindan Suiri | Ron Kamonohashi: Deranged Detective (Manga), NoPixel (Web Series) )
( PH 8 (fic) - Severance (TV), The West Wing )
( PH 10 (fic, podfic) - Gilmore Girls (TV 2000) )
( PH 11 (comic, fic) - Tokyo Babylon, 崩坏：星穹铁道 | Honkai: Star Rail (Video Game), 恋与深空 | Love and Deepspace (Video Game) )
( PH 13 (comic, fic) - 終ノ空 remake | Tsui no Sora Remake, A Girl Corrupted by the Internet is the Summoned Hero?!, Tsukihime (Visual Novel & Anime) )
( PH 19 (comic, fic) - Doctor Who (1963), Doctor Who (2005) )
( PH 20 (comic, fic) - Bones (TV), DC's Arrowverse, Constantine (TV), Lucifer (TV), Buffyverse (TV), Supernatural (TV 2005) )
( PH 21 (comic, fic) - The Defenders (Marvel TV), Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency (TV 2016), Crossover Fandom (The Defenders TV/MCU) )
Thank you!
Quick links: Rules and guidelines · 2025 Collection · Mod contact: gumshoeagency@gmail.com
This batch of pinch hits are due on Friday 18 July at 11:59pm Eastern time. [ In your timezone ]
Pinch hits must comply with the exchange's rules. Pinch hits must meet the minimum assignment requirements of a completed work of a minimum of 3,000 words for fanfiction, a minimum of 10 panels for a comic, or a recording of a completed fic of 3,000 words minimum with "casefic" as one of its tags. Works must include a fandom, character/ship and be of a medium that the recipient has requested. You must have an AO3 account to participate.
Please take note of the mediums as some requests have a combination selected.
To claim, please either reply to this post or email gumshoeagency@gmail.com with your AO3 name and the pinch hit number you want to claim.
Comments are screened, so if you reply anonymously, please include an email in case I need to reach out to you. You will not be able to receive a reply from me if you comment anonymously on this post.
( PH 4 (comic, fic) - 僕のヒーローアカデミア | Boku no Hero Academia | My Hero Academia (Anime & Manga), 鴨乃橋ロンの禁断推理 | Kamonohashi Ron no Kindan Suiri | Ron Kamonohashi: Deranged Detective (Manga), NoPixel (Web Series) )
( PH 8 (fic) - Severance (TV), The West Wing )
( PH 10 (fic, podfic) - Gilmore Girls (TV 2000) )
( PH 11 (comic, fic) - Tokyo Babylon, 崩坏：星穹铁道 | Honkai: Star Rail (Video Game), 恋与深空 | Love and Deepspace (Video Game) )
( PH 13 (comic, fic) - 終ノ空 remake | Tsui no Sora Remake, A Girl Corrupted by the Internet is the Summoned Hero?!, Tsukihime (Visual Novel & Anime) )
( PH 19 (comic, fic) - Doctor Who (1963), Doctor Who (2005) )
( PH 20 (comic, fic) - Bones (TV), DC's Arrowverse, Constantine (TV), Lucifer (TV), Buffyverse (TV), Supernatural (TV 2005) )
( PH 21 (comic, fic) - The Defenders (Marvel TV), Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency (TV 2016), Crossover Fandom (The Defenders TV/MCU) )
Thank you!
PTSD Reaction to Sarah McLachlan - due South story, INCOMPLETE, story amnesty
Jun. 27th, 2025 11:04 pmpetraI ran across this Tumblr post about being entitled to financial compensation for having a visceral reaction to hearing "Carry On My Wayward Son" in public, and I made a silly addition, as one does.
Then something stirred in my deep memory and I remembered I'd made the joke I'd just made before.
Here, this is from my gdocs. It's the first two-and-a-bit pages of a story I wrote in 2012. I have no idea what the plot was going to be.
Title: PTSD Reaction to Sarah McLachlan (abandoned WIP)
Fandom: due South
Pairing: Benton Fraser/Ray Kowalski
Rating: Teen and up
Summary: It took Ray two weeks on the trail to feel like if Fraser got abducted by aliens, he wouldn't necessarily die within the next ten minutes.
Notes: This is my experiment with writing a post-Call of the Wild story and I chickened out right when the plot kicks in, but the RayK voice makes me happy.
( It took Ray two weeks on the trail to feel like if Fraser got abducted by aliens, he wouldn't necessarily die within the next ten minutes. It wasn't the best feeling he'd ever had in his life, that dependence on somebody else for stuff like what to eat and how to pee without freezing off the family jewels, but he got used to it, worked through it, and got to thinking about how Fraser'd been depending on him and Vecchio for years for Chicago survival stuff. That thought took the edge off of the sheer unadulterated what the fuck of the Arctic. )
Then something stirred in my deep memory and I remembered I'd made the joke I'd just made before.
Here, this is from my gdocs. It's the first two-and-a-bit pages of a story I wrote in 2012. I have no idea what the plot was going to be.
Title: PTSD Reaction to Sarah McLachlan (abandoned WIP)
Fandom: due South
Pairing: Benton Fraser/Ray Kowalski
Rating: Teen and up
Summary: It took Ray two weeks on the trail to feel like if Fraser got abducted by aliens, he wouldn't necessarily die within the next ten minutes.
Notes: This is my experiment with writing a post-Call of the Wild story and I chickened out right when the plot kicks in, but the RayK voice makes me happy.
( It took Ray two weeks on the trail to feel like if Fraser got abducted by aliens, he wouldn't necessarily die within the next ten minutes. It wasn't the best feeling he'd ever had in his life, that dependence on somebody else for stuff like what to eat and how to pee without freezing off the family jewels, but he got used to it, worked through it, and got to thinking about how Fraser'd been depending on him and Vecchio for years for Chicago survival stuff. That thought took the edge off of the sheer unadulterated what the fuck of the Arctic. )
Fandom: Midsommar
Characters: Dani Ardor, Hanna, Siv
Rating: T
Length: 4,212
Creator Links:![[archiveofourown.org profile]](https://p.dreamwidth.org/b164c54b26e4/-/archiveofourown.org/favicon.ico)
Selkit
Theme: female relationships
Summary: In her dreams, dark smudges crowd the edges of the world. One looms larger than the rest, twisting into impossible shapes, morphing into a figure with many faces, all of them howling with rage.
When she jolts awake, the dream-figure lingers. She tries to ignore it. She’s no stranger to nightmares. Her whole life has been one ever since her family’s deaths.
But things are different now. This is a new life. A new family.
Right?
Reccer's Notes: I love seeing what happens with Dani after the events of Midsommar, and this is such a good look at the continued ritual of being the May Queen! I am a known ho for ritual, but especially building off of the existing worldbuilding in such a believable way. I really enjoyed seeing more of Dani interacting with the other women of the Hårga as she learns to be part of her new family and culture. Plus the parts with Maja’s (and Christian’s) daughter were just perfect.
Fanwork Links: on AO3
Characters: Dani Ardor, Hanna, Siv
Rating: T
Length: 4,212
Creator Links:
Theme: female relationships
Summary: In her dreams, dark smudges crowd the edges of the world. One looms larger than the rest, twisting into impossible shapes, morphing into a figure with many faces, all of them howling with rage.
When she jolts awake, the dream-figure lingers. She tries to ignore it. She’s no stranger to nightmares. Her whole life has been one ever since her family’s deaths.
But things are different now. This is a new life. A new family.
Right?
Reccer's Notes: I love seeing what happens with Dani after the events of Midsommar, and this is such a good look at the continued ritual of being the May Queen! I am a known ho for ritual, but especially building off of the existing worldbuilding in such a believable way. I really enjoyed seeing more of Dani interacting with the other women of the Hårga as she learns to be part of her new family and culture. Plus the parts with Maja’s (and Christian’s) daughter were just perfect.
Fanwork Links: on AO3
Fandom: original work
Characters/Pairings: powerful mage/warrior bonded to her
Rating: G
Length: n/a
Creator Links: creators have been revealed but the artist chose to make the work anon.
Themes: Female relationships, Femslash, Female characters, Characters of color, Magic
Summary: none provided
Reccer's Notes: Another gorgeous work from the recent Everything is Femslash exchange. It's in a fantasy setting, featuring a mage and her warrior. I love the warm earthy colours, and how, the mage being a little shorter, their faces and bodies fit together perfectly, and the way they're linked by the swirl of the magical bond. Beautiful. (Note that the post is locked to AO3.)
Fanwork Links: Always with you
Characters/Pairings: powerful mage/warrior bonded to her
Rating: G
Length: n/a
Creator Links: creators have been revealed but the artist chose to make the work anon.
Themes: Female relationships, Femslash, Female characters, Characters of color, Magic
Summary: none provided
Reccer's Notes: Another gorgeous work from the recent Everything is Femslash exchange. It's in a fantasy setting, featuring a mage and her warrior. I love the warm earthy colours, and how, the mage being a little shorter, their faces and bodies fit together perfectly, and the way they're linked by the swirl of the magical bond. Beautiful. (Note that the post is locked to AO3.)
Fanwork Links: Always with you
Shows: SGA
Rec Category: John Sheppard/Rodney McKay
Characters: Rodney McKay/John Sheppard, Ronon Dex, Teyla Emmagan, Carson Beckett, Elizabeth Weir
Categories: M/M
Words: ~13,000
Warnings: no AO3-type warnings apply
Author on DW: n/a
Author's Website: semivowel on LJ
Links: part 1 on LJ & part 2 on LJ
(backups on Wayback) part 1 & part 2
podfic by constance_b on the Audiofic Archive
Why This Must Be Read: This is a classic, but it's never been reccd here and might be a bit overlooked as semivowel's fics are only on LJ. It's from John's POV as he finds himself increasingly attracted to Rodney after an AMTDI ceremony. There are adventures, and missions gone wrong, and through it all John pines and gives Rodney mixed messages and denies himself. But fear not, it all comes right in the end! A great read, and the podfic's also excellent.
( snippet of fic )
Rec Category: John Sheppard/Rodney McKay
Characters: Rodney McKay/John Sheppard, Ronon Dex, Teyla Emmagan, Carson Beckett, Elizabeth Weir
Categories: M/M
Words: ~13,000
Warnings: no AO3-type warnings apply
Author on DW: n/a
Author's Website: semivowel on LJ
Links: part 1 on LJ & part 2 on LJ
(backups on Wayback) part 1 & part 2
podfic by constance_b on the Audiofic Archive
Why This Must Be Read: This is a classic, but it's never been reccd here and might be a bit overlooked as semivowel's fics are only on LJ. It's from John's POV as he finds himself increasingly attracted to Rodney after an AMTDI ceremony. There are adventures, and missions gone wrong, and through it all John pines and gives Rodney mixed messages and denies himself. But fear not, it all comes right in the end! A great read, and the podfic's also excellent.
( snippet of fic )
1992, drawing ever closer to adulthood, pushing my boundaries with friends and lovers... Let's look at the cinema of that year? 24 films, and that was leaving several I saw completely off. Hmm. Okay, time to be choosy. Ten highlights.
~ Kuffs - Christian Slater was allowed to go ham with this one, and it was just fun. If you like Fourth Wall breaks, check it out.
~ My Cousin Vinny - MARISA TOMEI. +swoons+ Yeah, no, that's what I've got. It's a fun movie, some beloved actors but HOT DAMN.
~ Fern Gully: The Last Rainforest - 2nd, I think of the three Mathis/Slater flicks. They both rocked their roles, but come on. Tim Curry was given license to OOZE through his villainy.
~ Sister Act - Witness in hiding, musical numbers, nuns being awesome? CHECK. I loved it. Sequel too.
~ A League of Their Own - Geena Davis. Lori Petty. Lots o' ladies being badass at what they do. HELL to the YEAH. Sweet, funny, sad by turns.
~ Rapid Fire - Brandon Lee got me to watch it. Powers Boothe made it worthwhile. I swear Brandon worked screen chemistry with every costar he ever had...
~ School Ties - anyone who doesn't think Brendan Fraser can ACT in addition to being hunky adorable and athletic? PLEASE GO WATCH THIS. Warning for all the antisemitism. It's the point of the movie, to shove it in your face and try to make you open your eyes.
~ Bram Stoker's Dracula - I don't care how unfaithful to the book it was, I actually enjoyed the tragic love story/reincarnation angle. And the movie is PRETTY.
~ Aladdin - Robin Williams. Period. That is the sole reason I enjoy this film so much, sorry, shallow.
~ The Muppet Christmas Carol - Did not quite bump the George C Scott one out of favorite position, but I still loved the hell out of it. Caine did well by the Muppets.
~ Kuffs - Christian Slater was allowed to go ham with this one, and it was just fun. If you like Fourth Wall breaks, check it out.
~ My Cousin Vinny - MARISA TOMEI. +swoons+ Yeah, no, that's what I've got. It's a fun movie, some beloved actors but HOT DAMN.
~ Fern Gully: The Last Rainforest - 2nd, I think of the three Mathis/Slater flicks. They both rocked their roles, but come on. Tim Curry was given license to OOZE through his villainy.
~ Sister Act - Witness in hiding, musical numbers, nuns being awesome? CHECK. I loved it. Sequel too.
~ A League of Their Own - Geena Davis. Lori Petty. Lots o' ladies being badass at what they do. HELL to the YEAH. Sweet, funny, sad by turns.
~ Rapid Fire - Brandon Lee got me to watch it. Powers Boothe made it worthwhile. I swear Brandon worked screen chemistry with every costar he ever had...
~ School Ties - anyone who doesn't think Brendan Fraser can ACT in addition to being hunky adorable and athletic? PLEASE GO WATCH THIS. Warning for all the antisemitism. It's the point of the movie, to shove it in your face and try to make you open your eyes.
~ Bram Stoker's Dracula - I don't care how unfaithful to the book it was, I actually enjoyed the tragic love story/reincarnation angle. And the movie is PRETTY.
~ Aladdin - Robin Williams. Period. That is the sole reason I enjoy this film so much, sorry, shallow.
~ The Muppet Christmas Carol - Did not quite bump the George C Scott one out of favorite position, but I still loved the hell out of it. Caine did well by the Muppets.
Sojourn to Korvallen (10312 words) by Sharpest_Asp
Chapters: 4/4
Fandom: Forgotten Realms, The Legend of Drizzt Series - R. A. Salvatore
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Drizzt Do'Urden, Original Elf Character(s), Ensemble
Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence
Summary:
Few things were as distinctive as the Knights in Silver wearing their armor, riding upon their specially bred mounts, with their squires and a Spellguard in attendance. Dove actually held her friends back to let the group pass through the gate of Sundabar first, knowing they had to be on their way home. She half-wondered why a patrol of five with two spare mounts and one provision jack were all the way here. Maybe she'd remember to ask Alustriel later.
"Ranger Silverhand — ahh, no, Falconhand these days?" the lead knight called and she focused on the details, noting in surprise that it was Sharrevaliir's very own heart-brother. A memory of Alustriel being overwhelmed a few years came back; Korvallen had come to her after three decades of being thought dead.
"Well-met, Protector. Though it seems I should call you Knight Captain by the armband I see?"
"Indeed. Let's not hold up gate traffic, but I'd carry messages for you once we're outside?"
Dove smiled at him, glad to see the man was actually sociable now. She had a sneaking suspicion that it was because she was Alustriel's sister. The fierce need to protect in that elf had slowly encompassed all of the Silverhand women over the centuries, as it had affected Sharrevaliir to know they were as safe as they could be.
Processing out of Sundabar was almost as burdensome as getting in, given their deep-seated need to protect dwarven secrets and craftsmanship. By the time Dove and her party were out, Korvallen had dismounted, his gelding's reins held by the half-elf squire near him. Unsurprisingly, the full party was elf-blooded, though only the Spellguard was full like Korvallen. She couldn't have expected him to fully let go of his biases.
"So what has a patrol this far from the city?" Dove asked, after they'd clasped wrists with one another.
"Had to provide an escort to the heir of one of the rival dwarf clans," Kor said. "We were in the middle of this one as arbitrators, so Elué insisted."
Dove nodded. "We were enjoying a brief stop here, but word out of Maldobar is a drow sighting." She watched as Korvallen's spine straightened almost violently at that, and dimly remembered he — like Kellindil, had trauma with the drow.
"Care to take on another hand?" Korvallen said, almost entirely too casually. "Lighter gear in my pack, and we've got a mandate to find all the holes they come out of."
Dove weighed the offer, and honestly, only Kel had experience with drow directly. It might be useful, and there were a few elven villages in Maldobar's region.
"Get out of that pretty stuff, and welcome aboard."
Korvallen nodded, then went to tell the Spellguard and other Knight, before changing out his gear, securing the armor to his spare mount. He was quickly done with that, and let the other Knight lead the patrol away from the city, following the well-kept road despite the deepening dark. Korvallen greeted Kellindil then, by name, and Dove hoped she hadn't just bought more trouble than coercing Fret into her party might mean.
By the time they made it to the farm to start investigating, Korvallen had already had enough of the humans of the hamlet. He didn't mind Dove's friends, even the dwarf, but the bounty hunter and the mayor were grating his nerves. He started circling the property after he drop-reined his horse, looking at various signs that caught his centuries-honed experience as out of place.
While Dove and party dealt with the murder-scene, he was finding clever little traps set in the brambles and on one particular approach to the farm. It took him time, but he did eventually find elf-light impressions of boot prints, and slowly pieced together the traps had been laid by that one. The traps were… very simple, but well-hidden. It didn't add up with what Dove had shared of the original summoning or the hasty explanation of the murders from the mayor and the bounty hunter.
The drow had been seen and interacted with the children, so these traps couldn't have been set for them in Kor's eyes. Too many easier opportunities had been there, based on the tale so far. He eventually spiraled back in, and saw the others inspecting a broken sword in a southern style. He took one look at the two pieces and scoffed with a disparaging noise.
"That wasn't broken in combat," he said firmly. When the bounty hunter opened his mouth, Korvallen mustered his full elven hauteur and leveled it on him. "Over seven centuries of seeing broken weapons tells me something actively snapped it like a twig."
The glowering presence worked and the human wandered off, growling much like the cur of a dog he had short-leashed at his side.
"I hate to ask it, but go look at the women; tell me if you think the half-eaten one could be a large cat's work?" Dove said softly. Darda, her fighter friend, gestured and Korvallen followed the man over.
"McGristle's chomping to get on the trail despite the growing evening."
"Fool," Korvallen spat out, but he took a look as Darda pulled the tarp up.
"Demonic, more likely," Korvallen said. "Not good, if this drow is using Abyssal minions." It didn't actually add up that way in his mind, but he looked over each of the bodies, familiar with all manners of dying. The violence done to them all, the sheer strength of force used on the men…
…that was not drow work.
"The drow has been here. Twice, at least. And set traps off toward that direction," Korvallen told Darda. "He's got a light enough print, but the boot shape is nothing like I'd expect his kind to be wearing."
"Dove noticed the tracks. Did you see the heavy ones?" Darda asked.
"Similar boot, weight distributed differently, and very weighted," Korvallen said, before Darda guided him inside to see the cross beam that had broken the middle-aged man's spine. The beam was damaged, and as it was a support beam, that took doing.
"This slaughter is not as clear as it might have been," Darda murmured, once Korvallen had gotten his own impressions.
"The drow did not kill these people… but he may well be holding the leash of the demonic killer," Korvallen pointed out. "We just need to find him and be on guard when we do."
Korvallen kept his silence around him once they set out to find the drow. McGristle was a man poisoned by greed more than any actual concern over the slaughtered family. Kellindil was trying not to rise to the bait, after seeing such an elder persevere like that. If not for the dog, McGristle would never have found the trail, in their personal opinion.
Finding the gruesome carnage of two goblins and two barghest whelps dead at a sheltering cavern pushed at Korvallen's private opinion on the whole incident. None of the damage done to the shape-changing creatures was the work of a demon. He beckoned Kel and Gabriel over while McGristle and Darda were testing Dove's patience. At least Fret had stopped baiting the beastly human.
"Drow's injured," Kor said, pointing to a solid, deeper imprint of a boot and the scuff-drag of the matching leg. "Badly, given the depth of his weight on the one leg."
"Should make catching up easier," Gabriel pointed out.
"Might. Might make it more likely that the drow will double back to his kin," Kor pointed out. "Need to keep alert for that possibility, if we start heading to where more openings into the rock are."
Kel frowned, then nodded. "What do we do to keep McGristle from being a detriment? The dog can keep the trail, but neither he nor it are quiet."
Kor shrugged. "Come the right moment, the party stays with him on the dog's hunt, and one of us — whichever of us is closer, but one of us elves if it is at night — breaks off to try and get ahead and scout."
Gabriel nodded to that. "More likely be one of you that spots the sign; I'm a good ranger, and so is Dove, but we live closer to city life, miss the more subtle marks."
Korvallen actually gave him a nod of respect for seeing his shortcomings. "Whichever ones are left behind keep that damned man focused on his hunt, not the missing member. We've got to catch the drow before he reconnects with his people!"
"Yes," Kel agreed to that, knowing they did not — even if Dove broke out her actual powers — have the ability to deal with a drow war-band.
While Kellindil was yelling at McGristle and the rest of the party was in their own chaotic state, Korvallen took to the trees. He had gotten very accustomed to working from horseback, but this region meant Dove had made the right call to stable their mounts at Maldobar's inn. Now, wearing the softer, gripping elven boots and using all of his skill in silent passage, Korvallen ran the trees, trailing the cat at just enough of a distance to be certain it could not sense him.
As certain as he could be, that was. The way the tracks kept disappearing and reappearing at intervals was disconcerting, and perhaps he should have prodded Dove to use her magic to scry out why. As it was, it had slipped his mind, even when he'd been surprised the tracks had not appeared near the giant's corpse at all.
Korvallen had found that trap, simple as it was, a damned effective trick, even if it meant giving a drow credit for anything. Giants were not, after all, easy foes.
He could all but hear his heart-brother in his mind, pointing out that every confirmed kill of the drow had been an evil being. He was ruthlessly putting that down to cleaning up trailing vines of a drow conspiracy, and yet… Sharr's voice was only getting stronger as Kor followed the blood trail, faint as it was, of the gigantic cat.
By the time the cat's traces had faded out, Kor knew he was hours away from camp. Maybe he'd be able to put an end to this swiftly, as he picked up the trail from where the cat's blood ended and the heavy-step-drag-step of the drow took over. He didn't think much of it when he had to follow that back up into the trees.
His elven eyes, his experience, told him when the man had changed directions, though a deliberate shaking of leaves to the ground would make the party think the drow had gone the other way. Kor was not liking how much he was admiring the enemy adapting to what had to be an alien environment. He also didn't like that Sharr's voice was only getting louder about doubting the evil of it all.
Surely, if this was a goodly drow, Dove would have had some clue from the youngest Chosen of Mystra? No. This was one of the murderous filth that had been banished below, and Korvallen was intent on ending the threat.
Sometimes, experience and certainty of knowing what was being tracked led to mistakes. Kor had easily avoided the trap that told him the drow had become aware of his presence, somehow.
Kor missed the fact that to avoid it, he stepped on a branch that had been weakened, the cutting concealed by having lifted the bark part way to do it. He crashed down to the ground, and scrambled to get his footing, only to see the drow standing directly opposite him, sword in one sheath, hands empty, and… just watching?
It was unnerving, and Kor nearly rushed him as soon as he was balanced, but that long experience held him back, thinking it was a trick.
Keen eyes took in the appearance then, showing Kor the dried blood on the ill-fitting clothing, the rough bandages at wrist and leg, the fatigue that showed in the sunkenness of the eyes in their sockets. The face was pinched-thin with hunger, the frame gaunt, with bones clearly visible on the unbandaged wrist and the spot where the collarbone was visible through a tear in the tunic.
The drow was speaking, that soft sibilant language that poured through Kor's nightmares about the dark ones. It could be spell-words… but the face was almost desperate, and when the words failed to elicit more than a scowl from Kor, the drow looked as if he were seconds from flight.
"Drizzit?" Kor tried, his rage having somehow evaporated in the face of this shambling wreck of a person who had killed several evil beings and done nothing to harm his hunters.
"Drizzt," the drow answered, and damned if the eyes didn't actually light with something like hope. The shift in posture, in his face rammed home something Kor didn't want to acknowledge in the moment.
This drow was young, if the marks Kor knew in his own kind held true for the dark ones. The thinness was making it hard, but there was something to the eyes, to the ears not being full, something in the jawline that were all screaming child to the Protector he'd dedicated himself to being.
What in the hell did he do now?
The sword he didn't even remember bringing to hand went back in its sheath, and he slowly took in a deep breath, just watching for the drow to react.
"Talk this?" the dark one asked in Goblin.
"Some," Kor admitted. "My prisoner, keep, make answer questions."
The drow cocked his head to the side, and damned if the boy didn't half-smile.
"I say no prisoner. Answer questions yes. Have honor?"
The drow dared question — wait. Kor breathed again, using meditative rhythm, and considered that.
"Pretend prisoner," he finally said. "Protect you, you answer questions. Camp here, wait for others. Eat, rest. Fix wounds."
What had he become that he was not only letting a drow live, but actively enabling the drow to grow stronger?
A good man Sharr's voice seemed to echo in his head, and Kor wanted to swear at him, as the drow more or less sagged down to the base of the tree he'd had at his back.
"Yes," the drow — Drizzt — said, and Kor realized he was committed now.
Convincing the drow — Drizzt — to drink the healing potion had been hardest on Kor and the boy alike. Kor hated the idea of helping the enemy, no matter what his instincts were saying. Drizzt, on the other hand, was hard to convince that he needed to be well fast, not wait for nature to finish the healing.
Kor won the argument, but didn't feel great for doing so. He hid it by scowling until the boy ate the various foods laid out for him, while Kor moved to sit against a different tree.
What had the boy been thinking to set those traps and then not take advantage of them? Had the boy actually expected to best him when he was so injured? Just the delay in pulling his sword would have been deadly.
Had Drizzt given up on finding his own kind? Was he suicidal? There were too many questions.
"How know I follow?" Kor asked, just to get one thing cleared up. He knew how damn silent he could be in the trees.
"Sounds changed. Moving in their change. Mean something moving this way."
Well, that made sense, but it was not a skill Kor would think a filthy drow of the Underdark would have picked up on. They didn't have birds and other common noises that would shift like birdsong did.
"What if I chose attack?" Kor pressed.
"Dark. Run." The boy half-smiled. "Hope you not see next trap, give time run far."
Well. The boy had had a plan. And admitted to it. What in the nine hells did Kor make of that?
"Sleep. Will keep safe."
The boy's face changed, and he shook his head. "You move all night. No rest. Follow Guen. Follow me."
Was the boy telling him he should rest? Like he ever would, or could!
"Not injured. You were. Need more rest. I need to be awake, when others come."
"Rest now, wake when that," and he pointed to a clearly defined shadow, "moves a hand."
How could Kor make the boy see that he could not trust — and the boy took off his belt, tossing it with the one empty sheath, the one with a blade twin to the snapped one at the farm toward him.
"Only knife. No sneak better than faerie hear? You have better weapon now."
Corellon's balls, but the boy was taking a huge risk, and Kor just settled back against the tree, pointedly not getting the weapon under a foot or anything else to make it difficult for the boy to retrieve, too impressed by that reckless way of showing and offering trust in this moment.
They both managed small naps before the party caught up. While Kor watched over the sleeping drow, he'd weighed a lot of things, such as the boy's ability to use birdsong, native materials as traps, and figuring out how to tell time by the shadow movement. The boy was very smart, and actually had been honorable in his approach to things with Kor.
Which meant when the dog suddenly raced in growling and ready to clamp its jaw around the drow, Kor tripped the creature in passing, trusting his shin guards against the teeth. He also jerked his hand and head upwards in Drizzt's direction, and the boy actually understood, going up above the dog's jumping range.
"Get your beast on a leash, McGristle," Kor snapped as the bounty hunter was the first to come into sight. "The drow is in my custody now."
"Not going to have you steal my bounty!"
"A bounty the mayor will be warned not to pay, for the drow did none of the crimes he was accused of," Dove said, actually letting steel come into her voice. Korvallen wondered how bad things had gone that she was over using her diplomatic ways. She looked up to where the drow was sitting on a wide limb, then back to Kor. "Did he?"
"I don't believe so, but Goblin's no language for questioning," Kor said. "That boy was injured severely dealing out vengeance, hadn't had a meal in who knows when, and met me in peace."
Kel's head jerked up at hearing his elder name the enemy a 'boy', and looked for the same signs Kor had spotted. Kor knew Drizzt must have smiled at the archer, because Kel did the same jerk of awareness.
"I'm owed for my other dog, and my scarring!" McGristle shouted loudly.
"Enough!" Dove snapped at the loud human. "We are a civilized people, and the drow — "
"Drizzt," Kor said in his mildest tone, rocking the ranger back on her mental heels, as everyone in the family knew how deep his hatred of drow ran.
"Drizzt, then, deserves a chance to speak on his own behalf. Which means a spell, as we're not doing this in Goblin," Dove finished, reaching into her pouch to find the material she needed for it. "Leash your dog, and know that if you attack him, you will face me," she added to McGristle.
Kor noted the appraising look, knew McGristle was sizing up the odds… and he flicked a throwing knife into his hand just in case while the man's attention was elsewhere. He waited until the dog was leashed, the entire party was present, and then he looked up into the tree and signed in a downward motion with his empty hand.
"Dove — woman? — has magic. Make words easy," he told the boy that had come to his side, and heard the small murmurs about the drow still being armed, as well as his obedience.
It might have been amusing in any other setting.
Dove cast the spell, which required touching Drizzt. Kor caught the barest flinch in the boy's posture to have the woman near him, let alone touch him, before the steel solidified in Drizzt's spine.
"Tell us the events that happened with the people that were killed," Dove said, aware that Darda and Gabriel were in position to tangle McGristle up if needed, and Fret actually had his hand resting on the hammer's haft, near enough to the dog to be a threat if needed.
"I wanted to learn about people, and studied the children, listening. I did not mean to make them scared, or to get in a fight with anyone," Drizzt began, remembering to speak up because sound carried differently above. "I defended myself, but I did not want to kill anyone or any thing."
"Lies," McGristle muttered, but he didn't move.
"Came, morning after attack, knew something was wrong, because they always came out to work in the light, let the animals out in the pasture," Drizzt continued, ignoring him. "I did not investigate until night.
"What I stopped the … beings like people but like that?" Drizzt said, looking in the direction of the dog.
"Gnolls," Kor supplied.
"What I had stopped the gnolls from doing had happened." Drizzt looked down, twisting up inside all over again as he remembered the children. "I knew it would not bring them back, but… I had to hunt the murderer. Only there were two. It was a hard fight, and the quickling had stolen my sword before the murder. Weaker fighter with one sword," he said with something like exasperation at himself. "I stopped it before the fight with the giant planar beings."
"The plowshare," Kellindil said quietly, getting a nod.
"Guen, my friend, she fought the one that was the killer, and I fought the other. But then it had shape-shifted, and she was in trouble. I had to send her back to her plane, and that made the one fall." Drizzt shrugged. "Dead is dead. The giant chased me, and I would have left it alone, but it had plans to keep killing people, so I dealt with it too."
"The planar beings were barghest whelps, and probably close to full power," Dove said. "You fought well. But why try to approach humans at all?"
"Because I must learn," Drizzt said. "The surface is the only place I can live now. It is hard. None of the foods I knew are here. I get tired of fish. Some of what I see the animals eat do not taste right, or make my stomach hurt," he told her. "And… I do not want to be alone. Being alone is madness in the making.
"I know. I went mad in the Underdark, when I was alone."
"Alone?" Korvallen prompted. "How long?"
Drizzt met his eyes alone. "My siblings who hunted me said I left ten years before then. It has been… at least half a year since that, maybe more."
Korvallen could feel the blood draining from his face in shock, and knew it had probably hit Dove as hard. Kor might not have wanted to be friendly with the drow community Sharr knew through Elué, but Sharr had shared a few tales he'd heard when he stayed with them. Maybe time ran differently below, but… no child should have been on their own in a nightmare hellhole that long.
"Drow's a lying, murdering monster," McGristle accused, "and you're all falling under his spell!"
Drizzt turned and looked at the man throwing harsh words at him. "You are a clumsy fighter. I could have killed you and did not, because I did not want to fight. I regret killing your animal. Why must you be so… drow-like?!" he shot right back, all of his loathing for the species he had been born to coming through in those words.
McGristle lunged, slipping the leash in the same moment. Kor's knife flew in the next moment, embedding in the man's thigh, even as Darda and Gabriel moved to restrain him. The dog, going after his prey, but hearing his master's gasp of pain, hesitated just long enough for Fret to stun it with the hammer and set about properly tying the creature up.
"Secure him," Dove said coldly. "Korvallen, if I promise to have your horse returned to you in time, will you take a summoned mount now and get Drizzt somewhere else? Presuming, of course, you believe him fully?"
"I do. And I will." Korvallen placed a hand lightly on the boy's shoulder, sensing he was conflicted over the strife on display. Drizzt squared himself up, and nodded to the unasked question. "He's willing to go with me, after all."
"Then we'll do that."
The journey back to Silverymoon only gave Korvallen more questions. His new… ward, he decided, as the boy was in need of a guardian, was skillful with his blades, as evidenced by his past fights, and completely ignorant of all things surface. Some of what he had eaten horrified Korvallen, while reminding him of drow poison resistance being even more potent than an elf's. Drizzt's desire to learn what was food as well as him soaking up words for everything they saw had Korvallen even more convinced the boy was very smart.
The night Kor made a small fire to roast a hare had the old elf about ready to challenge Lolth herself, to know this boy had been alone on the surface and subsisting solely on uncooked foods, because he thought fire was a thing of clerics or wizards mostly.
By the time they reached Silverymoon, Korvallen had made up his mind that he wasn't just passing the boy off to someone else. Like it or not, he'd stuck his neck out for Drizzt, and now Drizzt was his to finish raising up. There was space enough in his quarters, if he cleared his spare gear out of the second room, for Drizzt to live with him, and surely he could find someone willing to help him teach the boy language.
The whole while he was arranging things in his mind, he was cursing the day a human bewitched his heart-brother, setting the door open on a far wider set of views than Korvallen had ever wanted to possess.
No one challenged him, even out of his city armor as he was, even with a very curious drow at his side. The moment they had crossed the city words had locked it all in; Drizzt had noticed the kiss of magic, but was unhindered, confirming his nature in Kor's jaded eyes. All the way to the palace, he watched the boy taking in the signs of the city, noting the smells of food, and trying hard not to react to the stares thrown at him.
Kor gave him a quick lesson in the bath, found some clothes that would do, a set of slippers, and then threw himself into clearing out the second room of his apartment. The physical work was what he needed, and he didn't hear the knock on the door at all.
Elué, of course, knew he was in and let herself into the apartment, coming to lean in the doorway of the second room.
"I heard interesting things about your absence and your arrival," she began.
"All true. Your sister's supposed to get my other horse back to me," Kor said, not stopping in shifting things, even when that meant she had to move out of his way.
"You are sponsoring your guest to remain in city?" she asked, just to confirm.
"Yes."
She inclined her head to him, then moved into the room to lend him a hand. "Do you wish to talk?"
"Not yet," he admitted. "Just need to get everything out, so he has his own space."
"Alright, old friend." She put herself to work for him, and that was soothing in its own way, how easily she accepted his choices and didn't needle him about them. Sharr would have… and helped just as much.
He had a feeling he was going to miss his heart-brother something fiercely in the upcoming years.
Drizzt had admired the swords he'd been gifted with, lovingly cleaning them and the sheaths of the dust that had settled on them in the armory. They were saber-style, not true scimitars, but he could adapt quickly enough.
Now, having gone through his ranges of motion with them, the elf that had taken charge of him was waiting to spar. He accepted the necessity of the padding on the steel; he was a drow, had been a hunted enemy, and it was best for appearances, at least, to use precautions.
From the first testing pass, though, Drizzt's heart leapt into his throat. This man fought like Zaknafein! He might only be using sword and dagger, but his skill was at that level. The elf was slower, maybe, but had a solidity to his defense and testing attacks that triggered all of Drizzt's memories. From that point, Drizzt just flung himself into seeing how far they could go together in a dance of skill, losing himself half in memory, half in sorrow at facing such skill again.
It was only as he found himself disarmed and the tip of the padded blade at his throat that the fullness of his grief threatened to explode from his control.
He met Korvallen's eyes, watched as some form of understanding came to the elf… and the world wavered. The next thing Drizzt knew, he was sitting with an elf arm around his shoulders, his face soaked by tears, a soft croon coming from Korvallen. All of his memories of learning from Zaknafein had boiled up, the recognition of his father's abilities in this elf unlocking the tight bindings on grief he'd never been able to express.
"Sorry?" he offered, one of the words that he'd learned and latched onto for defusing situations where he hadn't understood correctly.
"Home. Talk if needed," Kor said in a gruff tone, and Drizzt had to close his eyes, not wanting to lose control again, because that was something he could have seen his father doing, if they'd ever had a chance to live free together.
"Need more words," Drizzt said, hating how small his voice sounded.
It made the arm on his shoulders tighten a little, and somehow, Drizzt knew Kor would help him find those words, and that he would listen about the man Drizzt missed with all his soul.
Drizzt wasn't surprised that the talking about it — once he was out of an ordered hot soak — involved food and Niska Bentleaf. The other wood elf was another elf that had been involved in drow hostility, and while she'd been skeptical at first, had given Kor her support. She often facilitated the meetings where full communication was needed, and was handling many of the lessons in language.
Drizzt liked her, as he liked Kor, while not quite understanding fully why his chest ached at her gentleness with him. After the day's spar, he understood better why Korvallen made his heart hurt; he'd been responding to the man as he would have responded to Zak without fully seeing it.
Until now.
Niska, though — he stopped in the middle of crossing to the low table with the food on it as he felt a surge of memories from when Vierna would actually be gentle with him. He pushed himself to move before either elf said anything, and shoved that impression to the back of his mind for pondering later.
They ate with the customary word-teaching for the foods, and the two elves discussing pieces of their days while Drizzt listened and tried to pick out the words he knew already. He was picking up Common swiftly; it was meant to be learned easily apparently, but he was still making his teachers astounded at his memory. Probably, after telling them what he had to, they'd understand a little better.
"Ready to talk about the past?" Kor asked, once all the dishes were back in the basket to go to the kitchen.
"Yes," Drizzt said, puzzling out the word he didn't know from context. "Hard words, make mad," he warned.
"That's most things about the people you came from," Niska said, before she cast the spell so he could speak clearly and they could understand him.
"I reacted to our spar, Korvallen, because you remind me of my father, his skill and stamina with swords, all weapons really," Drizzt began. "But to understand why that matters, I will tell you about who I am, and things I have done."
Kor had frowned, to be compared to a drow, but then he pushed himself to take a neutral expression.
"I was third-born son, sixth child, to the matron of what became the Ninth House the night I was born," Drizzt began. "I was not meant to live; I was supposed to be given to Lloth as a third son, and it was timed to coincide with conquering the former Ninth House." He paused, letting them digest that. "I did not know for years. But I learned the former Secondboy, Dinin, slew the eldest of us, Nalfein, that night.
"Malice deemed it enough of a sacrifice, and I was allowed to live, to be word-weaned and raised by Vierna, the second of Malice's daughters. I learned in time that she was my full-sister, sharing a father, but drow do not think on fathers, not the noble-born."
"How appalling," Niska said before gesturing for him to continue.
"I won't horrify you with the life of a child growing up in the chapel, or a Page Prince serving the family, but when I was sixteen, I was raised up to be a full member of House Do'Urden. I was meant to be a wizard, to replace Nalfein." He did manage a grin, as that memory came back. "The Weapon Master, Zaknafein, who I had only just met, actually argued with Malice. He took ten coins, piled five on each of my hands, and had me flip them, to catch them all before they hit the floor.
"Malice conceded that my skill was in my speed and coordination, and gave me to him for the next four years to teach, anything and everything about every weapon we had in the house!"
His sheer joy for that memory helped offset, some, Kor's horror at how young Drizzt had been, and that he had done such a thing in the abyssal darkness of a drow city.
"Any light?" Niska asked.
"Only the slight warmth of his hands from when he fetched them out," Drizzt said cheerfully. "It would be much easier now, as I actually have my full reach."
Kor privately wondered if the boy was right on that as he'd seen elves get late growth spurts through their first century.
"What I did not know then, what I would not learn for years, was that he was my father. He and I built a strong friendship in those four years." The smile faded ominously. "I did not know drow did not have friends. And before I was to go to school, he attacked me, dangerously, almost killed me.
"In the end, he would not make the final blow, and I went to school full of his betrayal of what I thought we were." He took a deep breath, not looking at either elf in the face. "I learned. I learned that drow only use other people as they need. That being better was a reason to be hated, feared. And I thought that fight with him was part of him thinking I would be used to replace him.
"He was probably right, if that ever crossed his mind; Malice and he were not on the best of terms, but he was the best at what he did."
"Yet I reminded you of this man?" Kor had to demand.
Drizzt nodded. "You'll see. Let me get there."
"Alright."
"The less said about school, the better, as I have only the good memory of meeting Guen there, and even it is in a horrible incident," Drizzt said blithely. "I graduated after ten years, a full adult of my House at last."
"Thirty?!" exploded from two elven throats as they had been tracking the age marks.
"Fighters are not worth more effort than that," Drizzt pointed out. "Wizards are fifty, and priestesses closer to a century, if they all went in their first eligible year." He shrugged. "I remained on patrols with my brother leading them, and the wizard who held Guen's figure, and we did well.
"Too well." He looked at Niska. "I must ask, do you have a spell or item to let you hear truth? I must have no doubt on what comes next that I am not lying."
"I don't usually use it on those I fuss over," she said, but she adjusted one of her rings. "When you have said whatever this is, tell me to turn it off."
"Yes, Niska." Drizzt took a deep breath. "We were chosen for a raid. I killed no elf by my own hand, though I did not stop the others when I realized what was happening. I was horrified, rooted to the ground, until a child came to seek a woman already slain.
"Her death may be on my hands, after, for I stunned her and covered her in blood, to hide her survival… yet, I have no way of knowing if she lived past that night."
There was a very long silence, and then Niska shifted the ring of her own free will, got up and came to sit next to him, not liking how blank he'd made his face and tone just to tell them that. He leaned into her… and it was all he could do not to fall back into sobbing like he had with Kor earlier.
"No village would have had everyone down on the ground," Kor said soberly. "There are always those who cannot attend things below. Later, we will get details, to narrow down where you were, how the raid even got above, and we will learn the fate of the child."
Drizzt couldn't help the tears in his eyes as the man he was steadily looking up to more and more promised that, and he took several moments to get his composure.
"You know what it would have taken, to use the blood of a dead woman to cover a child convincingly, or can at least imagine," he finally said to Kor. "The others boasted heavily of what I had done. How vicious I had been. Word reached Zaknafein.
"And it set him into a rage, to learn just what a good drow fighter I had become," Drizzt said with heavy sarcasm on every word of what he'd once thought he wanted to be.
Niska wound up petting his hair, anticipating the next part now that she thought she had a grasp on this boy's trauma.
"After another patrol, one that would have implications for me years later, he and I nearly came to blows in the gymnasium." Drizzt took a deep breath. "He… hated all drow, even himself, especially because of the deaths of the children.
"And that fight… was to prevent me from becoming what he hated, when he had found comfort in my joy of learning his skill. We had truth, with me admitting to sparing the child, and him to being my father."
The dawning realization of seeing that love existed in this warped attempt at murder landed on both elves, but they held their peace, seeing a storm brewing in the young drow that had become theirs to protect.
"We were facing a House war. And… Malice or Briza must have been listening to us, spying with their spells." Drizzt's voice was almost too soft to hear. "I should have made him come away with me right then. I left the house, to think, to plan, to decide… and I was ambushed by the wizards of the House that meant to attack us.
"Because of Guen, I survived and they did not."
The sheer flatness of that was something Kor decided he would press at later, almost certain he knew the cause.
"I went back, straight to father's room. His swords were there.
"He was not."
Kor's intake of breath showed he grasped that implication, and Niska followed a moment later, squeezing Drizzt gently.
"They said, when I pressed to know what had happened, that he chose to go in my place. A faerie survived, so a drow had to die. And all was forgiven. I was Weapon Master, and it was all fine, now."
He could not stay at the low table, getting up to pace now. Kor let Niska move into his own space, as neither of them were coping as this spun out.
"I had taken his pouch from his room. He carried these little clay pellets. When you shattered them on stone, they flared with blinding light." Drizzt's hands were clenching, twisting in his agitation. "I threw one, after I damned them and the spider alike, if any true gods actually existed, and I fled into the wilds with just my skills, Guen's figure, and my blades."
He did pause, looking at both of them. "What else could I do? I rejected everything of who they wished me to be."
"The only thing you could have." Niska nodded firmly at Kor's words to reinforce them.
"I hoped it would be the end. But Briza and Dinin came, at what they said was ten years later. I beat them, but… I came to see the madness was winning. And went to the deep gnomes, in hopes that if they killed me, I'd at least die free of the spider's influence.
"Only, one I had caused to be maimed, but spared, spoke for me. And when my house sent a hunter after me, he traveled with me. We… adventured. It was good. Even with the horrors around us, with getting caught by mind flayers — Guen rescued us — it was a decent enough life. But we ran into the hunter outside the mind flayer's city."
Niska had so many questions, and she really wanted to meet Guen. Drizzt had been so busy since arriving that she didn't think he'd summoned this cat he kept speaking of.
"The hunter was my father."
"How?!" Kor asked, caught up in the tale, and hearing the pain aching in the boy's words.
"Not undead but not alive," Drizzt said. "Peak health, impossible stamina, all of his speed and skill… driven by my mother's — Malice's — will." He tipped his chin up. "She could not beat me. More of his own spirit slipped through, and then… he was there. He said he was at peace, told me to flee the Underdark… and took all choice from me by stepping into the acid pool below us.
"Twice, my father chose for me to live, at the cost of his existence, and I will survive, for him, and to spite that eight-legged meddling tantrum of a supposed goddess!"
Kor stood, going to this boy — he could not see him as anything but when the years had added up to less than fifty! — and put both hands on Drizzt's shoulders, holding him like that a moment.
"I am honored that a man capable of such is what comes to mind when you spar me," he said very gently. "And… I think you need time to rest from harsh truths. What would help you now?"
"Guen?" Drizzt said, his voice small and close to breaking.
"Go on out to the courtyard, or to your room, and bring your cat." He let go and Drizzt went into his room, to get his boots on, before fleeing to the courtyard to have time with his friend.
"I want to kill every single drow of the spider more than I did as a youth," Kor said once Drizzt had been gone a full minute.
"In complete agreement, my friend," Niska told him.
Alustriel had given Kor — and Niska, once she was involved — the space needed to work with their drow guest. She had, when requested to cast a construct Kor could vent his rage on, raised an eyebrow, and just reminded him she was available, if he ever wished to talk.
That she then went to check on Niska, only to find the accomplished wizard using the training room to vent her own frustrations left her with some worry. Both of these coming on the heels of a major splash of astral magic almost sent her to go find the guest in question directly, but Niska did take note of her and stop casting.
"We need aid from your sons, whomever can be free. But not tonight, and I don't have the details yet," Niska said, mouth tight and eyes reddened from high emotion.
"You will, of course, have it, but I must admit to curiosity."
"The boy protected a child, on a raid, and we must learn if the child survived, and if she is recovering," Niska said very tightly. "We were given his history tonight, and while it was not the right time to press for description, we will get it soon, to narrow down where."
"Terrible, I take it?" Alustriel asked with gentle sympathy.
"Not even fifty, probably not even forty-five, and the horrors are going to give me nightmares. I have no idea how he's able to be as gentle as we've seen, or so given to trying to protect others."
"Then we will do all we can to nurture that, and let him have a safe place," Alustriel said, knowing that she would have to delay, again, determining why a good drow was unknown to their goodly goddess.
"I thought Korvallen had lost his mind, Alustriel. But now? I can see he was probably the perfect person to find that boy and work with him, despite his past. And mine, now that I'm involved." Niska sighed heavily. "We'll do our best to see he stays the good man he can become."
Drizzt looked up from the attempts to figure out 'drawing' as Korvallen and the elf from the hunting party came in. Niska was reading something magical, but she paused and gave a polite smile.
"Don't think we actually introduced anyone other than Dove," Kor began. "Drizzt, this is Kellindil. He, and his friends, brought my horse back. Kellindil, that is Niska Bentleaf; you likely saw her briefly when I joined your party that night at Sundabar."
"I've heard tales of your travels," Kellindil told the wizard, before looking at the drow, uncomfortable with this meeting, but pushing through it.
"Hello." Drizzt did not smile, but he was well-mannered in his tone.
Kor then sat beside his ward, looking at the sketches. "You drew a skunk," he said, recognizing that out of the attempts on the scraps that had been given for practice.
Niska chuckled. "Do tell that again?"
Drizzt did flash a smile. "Study animals. Try and see more. This one make see. Got too close. Guen ran from me, stink bad," he said, shaking his head. "Long time stink."
Kellindil sat in the other chair, finding himself amused at the boy's infectious grin and the tale.
"Your drawing skill is getting better," Kor said, "but Kel is willing to go with the Lady's son to talk to other elves. If Niska can give you the words, can you describe what you saw before the attack?"
He didn't need to specify as Drizzt sobered up, and he immediately looked at Niska.
"I am getting very versed in this one," she said, keeping a light tone, before helping Drizzt be able to speak fully.
"You told him?" Drizzt asked Kor once it had taken.
"Yes."
Drizzt nodded, and both elder elves were impressed at how solidly in control Drizzt was for this telling as he began describing all of his impressions of that night over a decade before.
"The child was a moon elf, based on the pictures in the book Niska let me look through," he said. "About mid-thigh on me then, so very young, if I understand ages right."
"Never should have been down on the ground," Kel groused at that, but it was just to have words to say, still overwhelmed at the attempt at protection from a drow for an elf child. "The trees, they sound like the ones north and east of here."
Kor nodded at that. "Can't think of many that have branches like that, with that leaf pattern. You find her, I'll be willing to come answer any questions."
"We'll see how she was cared for after. It might not be right away such a young elf can ask those questions."
Drizzt drew in a deep breath. "I just want to know. If I failed to protect her, if she survived but wasn't helped right, if —"
Niska covered his hand as she reached over. "Once we know, you will know. And we will see that, if she needs more help, she gets it. Healing will take time, and it takes healing to learn answers that hurt."
Drizzt slowly agreed, and then looked back at the paper, before forcing his hands to obey his mind, sketching out one of the trees. Kellindil watched him, still weighing all of what he'd been told on the way up to this apartment. He could not actually doubt the drow, and he hoped that his hunt went smoothly. He knew he would be working with one of the elder Tall Ones, and they had a reputation for always getting to the bottom of mysteries.
Drizzt was finally satisfied, and pushed the paper to Kor, who grunted, before handing it to Kellindil.
"Definitely Moonwood," Kel pronounced once he'd looked at it. "I'll go find Elinthalar, and see when he wishes to head out."
"Good hunting," Niska wished him, as Kor saw him out.
Things were quieter for a while, letting Drizzt learn how to speak, how to interact with people that weren't drow. Kor was vaguely amused that the boy seemed to relate to two kinds of people best: children and fighters. He knew every page's name inside of that first month, and every squire, most of the actual Knights even. Others that he saw in the Palace got polite nods, but not that open need for camaraderie.
What Kor did not expect, coming back from a day patrol, was to learn his ward had made friends with the palace cats.
He heard tiny demanding meows coming from Drizzt's open door, and went to look in, seeing a mother cat up on the bed, obviously taking a break from her litter. Drizzt was sprawled on the floor, using a scrap of a leather thong to entertain the kittens in a game of pounce. Drizzt looked so peaceful, smiling up at Kor before focusing back on the kittens that the elder elf just turned and went to get his bath.
At least it wasn't a pegasus foal.
Kolarven had been delighted to be detailed to make Drizzt go wander the city. Niska had been firm with him; he needed to start meeting people that were not Palace staff and retainers. Kolarven, who was child of Korvallen's sister, knew many people and could facilitate this part of his education.
Korvallen had had a private word with his nibling, to make certain Kol knew how young Drizzt was, which promptly led to his nibling having a small breakdown. Drizzt had absolutely stretched Kolarven and then beaten him in every spar they had shared, and Kolarven knew they were one of the best swordsmen in Silverymoon.
It did make Kolarven reevaluate the way to show off the city, so when they showed up to drag Drizzt into the city, they were dressed in clothes that could take a little dirt and sweat, only their personal short sword showing. Drizzt noted the sword, having still been dithering on if he was allowed his weapons (visible ones, as the knives he'd acquired were tucked in their usual spots) outside of the palace.
"We don't require peace bonds or handing them over," Kolarven said, catching that glimpse. "We want the city to get to know you, and those blades are a piece of you. In time, they're going to see you as a protector, even if you don't enroll in the Watch or the Knights."
"Thank you." Drizzt acquired his belt, hitched it on, then stepped out into the hall after making sure all the cats had already left the apartment for the day.
At least one or two tended to stay with him now, during the hours when he studied or slept.
The course Kolarven set meandered through most of the markets, showing off places of worship, places to eat, and notable attractions. They wound up at the Moonbridge to cross over to the other part of the city almost right on time to see the blue glow come up. One moment, people were walking in an arch over the river with nothing there, and then the bridge was limned in its nightly color.
"How?!" Drizzt asked, amazed.
"A very long time ago, powerful wizards needed a new bridge, and crafted it," Kolarven said, hiding their knowledge that the Lady was one of those mages involved. While Drizzt was family, such things were learned in time, not all at once. "It's one of our marvels. I'm going to show you two more before we make our way back to the Palace tonight."
"I'm looking forward to it." Drizzt had been pleasantly surprised by how many people had been introduced to him and they had been kind in their regards. He'd had no idea that the pages, squires, and others who lived outside the Palace had spoken of him, and prepared the city for the idea of having a unique drow to shelter.
A meandering walk that took them past the Vault of the Sages — and Kolarven was glad Niska had insisted it be included, seeing Drizzt's awe — eventually had them come to the Sacred Glade of Mielikki. Preparations for handing out the evenfeast extras was in process, but Drizzt actually strayed closer to one of the path entrances of his own accord. That meant Kolarven followed, and the Knight was the first to witness as a drow fell into a walking reverie, lost to all but the wildness of the Glade.
Kolarven kept their eyes on Drizzt, but their companion was moving steadily, hands brushing over trees and plants in passing, unconsciously avoiding the more open area where the staff of the Cloister were working. The pair wended their way further in, with Kolarven half-certain something divine was transpiring with their young friend. That suspicion was reinforced when the path took them all the way to the altar, only an acolyte there to watch over the offering basket.
Drizzt dropped in front of the altar, settled in a squat, hands on hilts of his blades, and head actually bowed. Kolarven moved to drop some coins in the basket, and to pat the stunned acolyte on the shoulder, before settling on the bench nearby to wait. Whatever this was… Kolarven was not going to rush it. They did wind up winking at a senior cleric who came to check on the divine stirrings. Leaf Tyrar shook her head at the Knight, took in the view of the drow in deep rapture, and went back to see to the people of the city.
She'd report it to the Ladyservant on the morrow, rather than disturb his evening rest.
The sound of more people over in the area for handouts did eventually rouse Drizzt from whatever it was that had ensnared him, and he stood with lithe grace, as if he hadn't been squatting for so long. Kolarven came over, searching the face, a little worried, even if they had seen holy communions before.
"Ready to go home?"
"Yes. Yes, please." Drizzt was at peace, full of wonder, and exhausted as well as refreshed, on differing levels, from whatever had passed in the Glade.
Niska was accustomed to Korvallen having the first part of the day with Drizzt, and handling the evenings with him, so it was a surprise to find her student sitting outside her door as she came out to go in search of a morning meal.
He came to his feet once she had noted him, and he looked at her with hopeful eyes.
"I know Kor, and you, have complicated histories with the people I was born to," he said. "But somehow I think I am better served asking your guidance on where to seek knowledge of their other gods, as well as more on Mielikki."
Her eyebrows rose into her hairline to hear him ask about a human deity by name, when they had not even begun to really touch on religion in their lessons.
"Come eat with me, and I will take you to the library after, to find books for you. Though… I fear the one you wish to learn of in the drow pantheon is going to be the hardest to find information on."
He fell in step with her, nodding at that. "I will take what I can. And it will be good practice reading. I will remember the words I have trouble with, to ask about after your duties."
She smiled warmly at that, keeping thoughts about why his memory was so prodigious behind her face and out of her tone. "I am certain you will."
Kellindil made his way through the palace halls, following the advice of the pages as to where to find the impossible drow. He'd helped locate the child, been as angry with the way her care had been handled as Elin had been. While Elin had negotiated to take the girl to a better place, far from her trauma, Kel had made his way back to Silverymoon to deliver the news personally. He was very glad of it too, as the sight he found was a balm on his soul from seeing that mute child trying to be useful at her tender age of sixteen.
What he found, when he reached the courtyard he'd been pointed to, was Drizzt and half a dozen young people playing a game of chase and catch. Several chairs, trestles, and other items from nearby rooms in the castle had somehow made their way into the courtyard, serving as obstacles and platforms to make the game even more athletic. Korvallen was sitting well out of range of the antics, mending a tunic and keeping a very light eye on things in case of injury. Kel headed that way, leaning back on the cool stone wall.
"Heard it was successful," Kor said. "Elué told me, but also said you'd be coming, so he doesn't know yet."
"Thank you for that courtesy," Kellindil told him. "This game his idea, yours, or someone else's?"
"Besnell's actually. Current crop of squire candidates that he deferred this year, but with a suggestion that they could maybe work on their stamina and speed with Drizzt." Kor snorted. "Drizzt came up with the idea of the obstacles, and has thrown himself into it fully."
Kel shook his head. "Humans try to learn far too young," he said finally, having scanned the youths and realized none were elf-kin."
"Such short lives; they have to push harder, I suppose," Kor said. "They'll be knocking off soon and returning everything inside. Join us for our evening meal?"
"Yes."
Drizzt had accepted the news from Kellindil soberly, then retired to his own room immediately after. Neither elf knew how he was handling it beyond relief at knowing the girl lived and would get help, but they chalked it up to how little experience Drizzt had with kinder mercies in life.
For his own part, Drizzt was making choices. His evening in the Sacred Glade had opened his heart to the idea that goddesses didn't have to be lying, cruel power-hungry influences in life. The whispers of the wild that had held him spellbound in the Glade had bloomed into a full calling toward becoming someone who traveled and protected the wilds and the weak.
He rather thought that Niska and Korvallen would not like the idea of this, at least not yet. He had picked up on their attitude that he was, by elven standards, a child. But he had lived and survived by his kills in one of the harshest environments on Toril, and thought he was nearly ready to learn to do so again.
He would stay the winter, spending time with the Cloister's folks who had come to welcome him on his forays over to the Glade, and then see about traveling during the warmer months, practicing what he learned.
He hoped this was enough of a compromise to ease both elves to letting him live a little more freely. In time, he would need to learn what the divine meddling on him was — the whispers that evening had spoken of it and of good drow and a sad goddess that wished to know of him — yet he wasn't going to rush. Korvallen and Niska were right. He had time, time to learn everything, and time to choose his path.
He closed his eyes, imagining a moon elf child growing as strong as he meant to be… and knew everything could be alright now. Belwar would be proud of him, he thought, and he knew his father would be as well. Kor would keep shaping him into a man Zak would want him to be, even as Drizzt proved just how un-drow he chose to be.
Chapters: 4/4
Fandom: Forgotten Realms, The Legend of Drizzt Series - R. A. Salvatore
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Drizzt Do'Urden, Original Elf Character(s), Ensemble
Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence
Summary:
The events of Sojourn take a left turn when a Knight in Silver joins Dove's party to assist with a hunt for a drow.
Korvallen never expected it to go like this.
Sojourn to Korvallen: Hunting
Few things were as distinctive as the Knights in Silver wearing their armor, riding upon their specially bred mounts, with their squires and a Spellguard in attendance. Dove actually held her friends back to let the group pass through the gate of Sundabar first, knowing they had to be on their way home. She half-wondered why a patrol of five with two spare mounts and one provision jack were all the way here. Maybe she'd remember to ask Alustriel later.
"Ranger Silverhand — ahh, no, Falconhand these days?" the lead knight called and she focused on the details, noting in surprise that it was Sharrevaliir's very own heart-brother. A memory of Alustriel being overwhelmed a few years came back; Korvallen had come to her after three decades of being thought dead.
"Well-met, Protector. Though it seems I should call you Knight Captain by the armband I see?"
"Indeed. Let's not hold up gate traffic, but I'd carry messages for you once we're outside?"
Dove smiled at him, glad to see the man was actually sociable now. She had a sneaking suspicion that it was because she was Alustriel's sister. The fierce need to protect in that elf had slowly encompassed all of the Silverhand women over the centuries, as it had affected Sharrevaliir to know they were as safe as they could be.
Processing out of Sundabar was almost as burdensome as getting in, given their deep-seated need to protect dwarven secrets and craftsmanship. By the time Dove and her party were out, Korvallen had dismounted, his gelding's reins held by the half-elf squire near him. Unsurprisingly, the full party was elf-blooded, though only the Spellguard was full like Korvallen. She couldn't have expected him to fully let go of his biases.
"So what has a patrol this far from the city?" Dove asked, after they'd clasped wrists with one another.
"Had to provide an escort to the heir of one of the rival dwarf clans," Kor said. "We were in the middle of this one as arbitrators, so Elué insisted."
Dove nodded. "We were enjoying a brief stop here, but word out of Maldobar is a drow sighting." She watched as Korvallen's spine straightened almost violently at that, and dimly remembered he — like Kellindil, had trauma with the drow.
"Care to take on another hand?" Korvallen said, almost entirely too casually. "Lighter gear in my pack, and we've got a mandate to find all the holes they come out of."
Dove weighed the offer, and honestly, only Kel had experience with drow directly. It might be useful, and there were a few elven villages in Maldobar's region.
"Get out of that pretty stuff, and welcome aboard."
Korvallen nodded, then went to tell the Spellguard and other Knight, before changing out his gear, securing the armor to his spare mount. He was quickly done with that, and let the other Knight lead the patrol away from the city, following the well-kept road despite the deepening dark. Korvallen greeted Kellindil then, by name, and Dove hoped she hadn't just bought more trouble than coercing Fret into her party might mean.
By the time they made it to the farm to start investigating, Korvallen had already had enough of the humans of the hamlet. He didn't mind Dove's friends, even the dwarf, but the bounty hunter and the mayor were grating his nerves. He started circling the property after he drop-reined his horse, looking at various signs that caught his centuries-honed experience as out of place.
While Dove and party dealt with the murder-scene, he was finding clever little traps set in the brambles and on one particular approach to the farm. It took him time, but he did eventually find elf-light impressions of boot prints, and slowly pieced together the traps had been laid by that one. The traps were… very simple, but well-hidden. It didn't add up with what Dove had shared of the original summoning or the hasty explanation of the murders from the mayor and the bounty hunter.
The drow had been seen and interacted with the children, so these traps couldn't have been set for them in Kor's eyes. Too many easier opportunities had been there, based on the tale so far. He eventually spiraled back in, and saw the others inspecting a broken sword in a southern style. He took one look at the two pieces and scoffed with a disparaging noise.
"That wasn't broken in combat," he said firmly. When the bounty hunter opened his mouth, Korvallen mustered his full elven hauteur and leveled it on him. "Over seven centuries of seeing broken weapons tells me something actively snapped it like a twig."
The glowering presence worked and the human wandered off, growling much like the cur of a dog he had short-leashed at his side.
"I hate to ask it, but go look at the women; tell me if you think the half-eaten one could be a large cat's work?" Dove said softly. Darda, her fighter friend, gestured and Korvallen followed the man over.
"McGristle's chomping to get on the trail despite the growing evening."
"Fool," Korvallen spat out, but he took a look as Darda pulled the tarp up.
"Demonic, more likely," Korvallen said. "Not good, if this drow is using Abyssal minions." It didn't actually add up that way in his mind, but he looked over each of the bodies, familiar with all manners of dying. The violence done to them all, the sheer strength of force used on the men…
…that was not drow work.
"The drow has been here. Twice, at least. And set traps off toward that direction," Korvallen told Darda. "He's got a light enough print, but the boot shape is nothing like I'd expect his kind to be wearing."
"Dove noticed the tracks. Did you see the heavy ones?" Darda asked.
"Similar boot, weight distributed differently, and very weighted," Korvallen said, before Darda guided him inside to see the cross beam that had broken the middle-aged man's spine. The beam was damaged, and as it was a support beam, that took doing.
"This slaughter is not as clear as it might have been," Darda murmured, once Korvallen had gotten his own impressions.
"The drow did not kill these people… but he may well be holding the leash of the demonic killer," Korvallen pointed out. "We just need to find him and be on guard when we do."
Korvallen kept his silence around him once they set out to find the drow. McGristle was a man poisoned by greed more than any actual concern over the slaughtered family. Kellindil was trying not to rise to the bait, after seeing such an elder persevere like that. If not for the dog, McGristle would never have found the trail, in their personal opinion.
Finding the gruesome carnage of two goblins and two barghest whelps dead at a sheltering cavern pushed at Korvallen's private opinion on the whole incident. None of the damage done to the shape-changing creatures was the work of a demon. He beckoned Kel and Gabriel over while McGristle and Darda were testing Dove's patience. At least Fret had stopped baiting the beastly human.
"Drow's injured," Kor said, pointing to a solid, deeper imprint of a boot and the scuff-drag of the matching leg. "Badly, given the depth of his weight on the one leg."
"Should make catching up easier," Gabriel pointed out.
"Might. Might make it more likely that the drow will double back to his kin," Kor pointed out. "Need to keep alert for that possibility, if we start heading to where more openings into the rock are."
Kel frowned, then nodded. "What do we do to keep McGristle from being a detriment? The dog can keep the trail, but neither he nor it are quiet."
Kor shrugged. "Come the right moment, the party stays with him on the dog's hunt, and one of us — whichever of us is closer, but one of us elves if it is at night — breaks off to try and get ahead and scout."
Gabriel nodded to that. "More likely be one of you that spots the sign; I'm a good ranger, and so is Dove, but we live closer to city life, miss the more subtle marks."
Korvallen actually gave him a nod of respect for seeing his shortcomings. "Whichever ones are left behind keep that damned man focused on his hunt, not the missing member. We've got to catch the drow before he reconnects with his people!"
"Yes," Kel agreed to that, knowing they did not — even if Dove broke out her actual powers — have the ability to deal with a drow war-band.
While Kellindil was yelling at McGristle and the rest of the party was in their own chaotic state, Korvallen took to the trees. He had gotten very accustomed to working from horseback, but this region meant Dove had made the right call to stable their mounts at Maldobar's inn. Now, wearing the softer, gripping elven boots and using all of his skill in silent passage, Korvallen ran the trees, trailing the cat at just enough of a distance to be certain it could not sense him.
As certain as he could be, that was. The way the tracks kept disappearing and reappearing at intervals was disconcerting, and perhaps he should have prodded Dove to use her magic to scry out why. As it was, it had slipped his mind, even when he'd been surprised the tracks had not appeared near the giant's corpse at all.
Korvallen had found that trap, simple as it was, a damned effective trick, even if it meant giving a drow credit for anything. Giants were not, after all, easy foes.
He could all but hear his heart-brother in his mind, pointing out that every confirmed kill of the drow had been an evil being. He was ruthlessly putting that down to cleaning up trailing vines of a drow conspiracy, and yet… Sharr's voice was only getting stronger as Kor followed the blood trail, faint as it was, of the gigantic cat.
By the time the cat's traces had faded out, Kor knew he was hours away from camp. Maybe he'd be able to put an end to this swiftly, as he picked up the trail from where the cat's blood ended and the heavy-step-drag-step of the drow took over. He didn't think much of it when he had to follow that back up into the trees.
His elven eyes, his experience, told him when the man had changed directions, though a deliberate shaking of leaves to the ground would make the party think the drow had gone the other way. Kor was not liking how much he was admiring the enemy adapting to what had to be an alien environment. He also didn't like that Sharr's voice was only getting louder about doubting the evil of it all.
Surely, if this was a goodly drow, Dove would have had some clue from the youngest Chosen of Mystra? No. This was one of the murderous filth that had been banished below, and Korvallen was intent on ending the threat.
Sometimes, experience and certainty of knowing what was being tracked led to mistakes. Kor had easily avoided the trap that told him the drow had become aware of his presence, somehow.
Kor missed the fact that to avoid it, he stepped on a branch that had been weakened, the cutting concealed by having lifted the bark part way to do it. He crashed down to the ground, and scrambled to get his footing, only to see the drow standing directly opposite him, sword in one sheath, hands empty, and… just watching?
It was unnerving, and Kor nearly rushed him as soon as he was balanced, but that long experience held him back, thinking it was a trick.
Keen eyes took in the appearance then, showing Kor the dried blood on the ill-fitting clothing, the rough bandages at wrist and leg, the fatigue that showed in the sunkenness of the eyes in their sockets. The face was pinched-thin with hunger, the frame gaunt, with bones clearly visible on the unbandaged wrist and the spot where the collarbone was visible through a tear in the tunic.
The drow was speaking, that soft sibilant language that poured through Kor's nightmares about the dark ones. It could be spell-words… but the face was almost desperate, and when the words failed to elicit more than a scowl from Kor, the drow looked as if he were seconds from flight.
"Drizzit?" Kor tried, his rage having somehow evaporated in the face of this shambling wreck of a person who had killed several evil beings and done nothing to harm his hunters.
"Drizzt," the drow answered, and damned if the eyes didn't actually light with something like hope. The shift in posture, in his face rammed home something Kor didn't want to acknowledge in the moment.
This drow was young, if the marks Kor knew in his own kind held true for the dark ones. The thinness was making it hard, but there was something to the eyes, to the ears not being full, something in the jawline that were all screaming child to the Protector he'd dedicated himself to being.
What in the hell did he do now?
The sword he didn't even remember bringing to hand went back in its sheath, and he slowly took in a deep breath, just watching for the drow to react.
"Talk this?" the dark one asked in Goblin.
"Some," Kor admitted. "My prisoner, keep, make answer questions."
The drow cocked his head to the side, and damned if the boy didn't half-smile.
"I say no prisoner. Answer questions yes. Have honor?"
The drow dared question — wait. Kor breathed again, using meditative rhythm, and considered that.
"Pretend prisoner," he finally said. "Protect you, you answer questions. Camp here, wait for others. Eat, rest. Fix wounds."
What had he become that he was not only letting a drow live, but actively enabling the drow to grow stronger?
A good man Sharr's voice seemed to echo in his head, and Kor wanted to swear at him, as the drow more or less sagged down to the base of the tree he'd had at his back.
"Yes," the drow — Drizzt — said, and Kor realized he was committed now.
Sojourn to Korvallen: Choices
Convincing the drow — Drizzt — to drink the healing potion had been hardest on Kor and the boy alike. Kor hated the idea of helping the enemy, no matter what his instincts were saying. Drizzt, on the other hand, was hard to convince that he needed to be well fast, not wait for nature to finish the healing.
Kor won the argument, but didn't feel great for doing so. He hid it by scowling until the boy ate the various foods laid out for him, while Kor moved to sit against a different tree.
What had the boy been thinking to set those traps and then not take advantage of them? Had the boy actually expected to best him when he was so injured? Just the delay in pulling his sword would have been deadly.
Had Drizzt given up on finding his own kind? Was he suicidal? There were too many questions.
"How know I follow?" Kor asked, just to get one thing cleared up. He knew how damn silent he could be in the trees.
"Sounds changed. Moving in their change. Mean something moving this way."
Well, that made sense, but it was not a skill Kor would think a filthy drow of the Underdark would have picked up on. They didn't have birds and other common noises that would shift like birdsong did.
"What if I chose attack?" Kor pressed.
"Dark. Run." The boy half-smiled. "Hope you not see next trap, give time run far."
Well. The boy had had a plan. And admitted to it. What in the nine hells did Kor make of that?
"Sleep. Will keep safe."
The boy's face changed, and he shook his head. "You move all night. No rest. Follow Guen. Follow me."
Was the boy telling him he should rest? Like he ever would, or could!
"Not injured. You were. Need more rest. I need to be awake, when others come."
"Rest now, wake when that," and he pointed to a clearly defined shadow, "moves a hand."
How could Kor make the boy see that he could not trust — and the boy took off his belt, tossing it with the one empty sheath, the one with a blade twin to the snapped one at the farm toward him.
"Only knife. No sneak better than faerie hear? You have better weapon now."
Corellon's balls, but the boy was taking a huge risk, and Kor just settled back against the tree, pointedly not getting the weapon under a foot or anything else to make it difficult for the boy to retrieve, too impressed by that reckless way of showing and offering trust in this moment.
They both managed small naps before the party caught up. While Kor watched over the sleeping drow, he'd weighed a lot of things, such as the boy's ability to use birdsong, native materials as traps, and figuring out how to tell time by the shadow movement. The boy was very smart, and actually had been honorable in his approach to things with Kor.
Which meant when the dog suddenly raced in growling and ready to clamp its jaw around the drow, Kor tripped the creature in passing, trusting his shin guards against the teeth. He also jerked his hand and head upwards in Drizzt's direction, and the boy actually understood, going up above the dog's jumping range.
"Get your beast on a leash, McGristle," Kor snapped as the bounty hunter was the first to come into sight. "The drow is in my custody now."
"Not going to have you steal my bounty!"
"A bounty the mayor will be warned not to pay, for the drow did none of the crimes he was accused of," Dove said, actually letting steel come into her voice. Korvallen wondered how bad things had gone that she was over using her diplomatic ways. She looked up to where the drow was sitting on a wide limb, then back to Kor. "Did he?"
"I don't believe so, but Goblin's no language for questioning," Kor said. "That boy was injured severely dealing out vengeance, hadn't had a meal in who knows when, and met me in peace."
Kel's head jerked up at hearing his elder name the enemy a 'boy', and looked for the same signs Kor had spotted. Kor knew Drizzt must have smiled at the archer, because Kel did the same jerk of awareness.
"I'm owed for my other dog, and my scarring!" McGristle shouted loudly.
"Enough!" Dove snapped at the loud human. "We are a civilized people, and the drow — "
"Drizzt," Kor said in his mildest tone, rocking the ranger back on her mental heels, as everyone in the family knew how deep his hatred of drow ran.
"Drizzt, then, deserves a chance to speak on his own behalf. Which means a spell, as we're not doing this in Goblin," Dove finished, reaching into her pouch to find the material she needed for it. "Leash your dog, and know that if you attack him, you will face me," she added to McGristle.
Kor noted the appraising look, knew McGristle was sizing up the odds… and he flicked a throwing knife into his hand just in case while the man's attention was elsewhere. He waited until the dog was leashed, the entire party was present, and then he looked up into the tree and signed in a downward motion with his empty hand.
"Dove — woman? — has magic. Make words easy," he told the boy that had come to his side, and heard the small murmurs about the drow still being armed, as well as his obedience.
It might have been amusing in any other setting.
Dove cast the spell, which required touching Drizzt. Kor caught the barest flinch in the boy's posture to have the woman near him, let alone touch him, before the steel solidified in Drizzt's spine.
"Tell us the events that happened with the people that were killed," Dove said, aware that Darda and Gabriel were in position to tangle McGristle up if needed, and Fret actually had his hand resting on the hammer's haft, near enough to the dog to be a threat if needed.
"I wanted to learn about people, and studied the children, listening. I did not mean to make them scared, or to get in a fight with anyone," Drizzt began, remembering to speak up because sound carried differently above. "I defended myself, but I did not want to kill anyone or any thing."
"Lies," McGristle muttered, but he didn't move.
"Came, morning after attack, knew something was wrong, because they always came out to work in the light, let the animals out in the pasture," Drizzt continued, ignoring him. "I did not investigate until night.
"What I stopped the … beings like people but like that?" Drizzt said, looking in the direction of the dog.
"Gnolls," Kor supplied.
"What I had stopped the gnolls from doing had happened." Drizzt looked down, twisting up inside all over again as he remembered the children. "I knew it would not bring them back, but… I had to hunt the murderer. Only there were two. It was a hard fight, and the quickling had stolen my sword before the murder. Weaker fighter with one sword," he said with something like exasperation at himself. "I stopped it before the fight with the giant planar beings."
"The plowshare," Kellindil said quietly, getting a nod.
"Guen, my friend, she fought the one that was the killer, and I fought the other. But then it had shape-shifted, and she was in trouble. I had to send her back to her plane, and that made the one fall." Drizzt shrugged. "Dead is dead. The giant chased me, and I would have left it alone, but it had plans to keep killing people, so I dealt with it too."
"The planar beings were barghest whelps, and probably close to full power," Dove said. "You fought well. But why try to approach humans at all?"
"Because I must learn," Drizzt said. "The surface is the only place I can live now. It is hard. None of the foods I knew are here. I get tired of fish. Some of what I see the animals eat do not taste right, or make my stomach hurt," he told her. "And… I do not want to be alone. Being alone is madness in the making.
"I know. I went mad in the Underdark, when I was alone."
"Alone?" Korvallen prompted. "How long?"
Drizzt met his eyes alone. "My siblings who hunted me said I left ten years before then. It has been… at least half a year since that, maybe more."
Korvallen could feel the blood draining from his face in shock, and knew it had probably hit Dove as hard. Kor might not have wanted to be friendly with the drow community Sharr knew through Elué, but Sharr had shared a few tales he'd heard when he stayed with them. Maybe time ran differently below, but… no child should have been on their own in a nightmare hellhole that long.
"Drow's a lying, murdering monster," McGristle accused, "and you're all falling under his spell!"
Drizzt turned and looked at the man throwing harsh words at him. "You are a clumsy fighter. I could have killed you and did not, because I did not want to fight. I regret killing your animal. Why must you be so… drow-like?!" he shot right back, all of his loathing for the species he had been born to coming through in those words.
McGristle lunged, slipping the leash in the same moment. Kor's knife flew in the next moment, embedding in the man's thigh, even as Darda and Gabriel moved to restrain him. The dog, going after his prey, but hearing his master's gasp of pain, hesitated just long enough for Fret to stun it with the hammer and set about properly tying the creature up.
"Secure him," Dove said coldly. "Korvallen, if I promise to have your horse returned to you in time, will you take a summoned mount now and get Drizzt somewhere else? Presuming, of course, you believe him fully?"
"I do. And I will." Korvallen placed a hand lightly on the boy's shoulder, sensing he was conflicted over the strife on display. Drizzt squared himself up, and nodded to the unasked question. "He's willing to go with me, after all."
"Then we'll do that."
Sojourn to Korvallen: History
The journey back to Silverymoon only gave Korvallen more questions. His new… ward, he decided, as the boy was in need of a guardian, was skillful with his blades, as evidenced by his past fights, and completely ignorant of all things surface. Some of what he had eaten horrified Korvallen, while reminding him of drow poison resistance being even more potent than an elf's. Drizzt's desire to learn what was food as well as him soaking up words for everything they saw had Korvallen even more convinced the boy was very smart.
The night Kor made a small fire to roast a hare had the old elf about ready to challenge Lolth herself, to know this boy had been alone on the surface and subsisting solely on uncooked foods, because he thought fire was a thing of clerics or wizards mostly.
By the time they reached Silverymoon, Korvallen had made up his mind that he wasn't just passing the boy off to someone else. Like it or not, he'd stuck his neck out for Drizzt, and now Drizzt was his to finish raising up. There was space enough in his quarters, if he cleared his spare gear out of the second room, for Drizzt to live with him, and surely he could find someone willing to help him teach the boy language.
The whole while he was arranging things in his mind, he was cursing the day a human bewitched his heart-brother, setting the door open on a far wider set of views than Korvallen had ever wanted to possess.
No one challenged him, even out of his city armor as he was, even with a very curious drow at his side. The moment they had crossed the city words had locked it all in; Drizzt had noticed the kiss of magic, but was unhindered, confirming his nature in Kor's jaded eyes. All the way to the palace, he watched the boy taking in the signs of the city, noting the smells of food, and trying hard not to react to the stares thrown at him.
Kor gave him a quick lesson in the bath, found some clothes that would do, a set of slippers, and then threw himself into clearing out the second room of his apartment. The physical work was what he needed, and he didn't hear the knock on the door at all.
Elué, of course, knew he was in and let herself into the apartment, coming to lean in the doorway of the second room.
"I heard interesting things about your absence and your arrival," she began.
"All true. Your sister's supposed to get my other horse back to me," Kor said, not stopping in shifting things, even when that meant she had to move out of his way.
"You are sponsoring your guest to remain in city?" she asked, just to confirm.
"Yes."
She inclined her head to him, then moved into the room to lend him a hand. "Do you wish to talk?"
"Not yet," he admitted. "Just need to get everything out, so he has his own space."
"Alright, old friend." She put herself to work for him, and that was soothing in its own way, how easily she accepted his choices and didn't needle him about them. Sharr would have… and helped just as much.
He had a feeling he was going to miss his heart-brother something fiercely in the upcoming years.
Drizzt had admired the swords he'd been gifted with, lovingly cleaning them and the sheaths of the dust that had settled on them in the armory. They were saber-style, not true scimitars, but he could adapt quickly enough.
Now, having gone through his ranges of motion with them, the elf that had taken charge of him was waiting to spar. He accepted the necessity of the padding on the steel; he was a drow, had been a hunted enemy, and it was best for appearances, at least, to use precautions.
From the first testing pass, though, Drizzt's heart leapt into his throat. This man fought like Zaknafein! He might only be using sword and dagger, but his skill was at that level. The elf was slower, maybe, but had a solidity to his defense and testing attacks that triggered all of Drizzt's memories. From that point, Drizzt just flung himself into seeing how far they could go together in a dance of skill, losing himself half in memory, half in sorrow at facing such skill again.
It was only as he found himself disarmed and the tip of the padded blade at his throat that the fullness of his grief threatened to explode from his control.
He met Korvallen's eyes, watched as some form of understanding came to the elf… and the world wavered. The next thing Drizzt knew, he was sitting with an elf arm around his shoulders, his face soaked by tears, a soft croon coming from Korvallen. All of his memories of learning from Zaknafein had boiled up, the recognition of his father's abilities in this elf unlocking the tight bindings on grief he'd never been able to express.
"Sorry?" he offered, one of the words that he'd learned and latched onto for defusing situations where he hadn't understood correctly.
"Home. Talk if needed," Kor said in a gruff tone, and Drizzt had to close his eyes, not wanting to lose control again, because that was something he could have seen his father doing, if they'd ever had a chance to live free together.
"Need more words," Drizzt said, hating how small his voice sounded.
It made the arm on his shoulders tighten a little, and somehow, Drizzt knew Kor would help him find those words, and that he would listen about the man Drizzt missed with all his soul.
Drizzt wasn't surprised that the talking about it — once he was out of an ordered hot soak — involved food and Niska Bentleaf. The other wood elf was another elf that had been involved in drow hostility, and while she'd been skeptical at first, had given Kor her support. She often facilitated the meetings where full communication was needed, and was handling many of the lessons in language.
Drizzt liked her, as he liked Kor, while not quite understanding fully why his chest ached at her gentleness with him. After the day's spar, he understood better why Korvallen made his heart hurt; he'd been responding to the man as he would have responded to Zak without fully seeing it.
Until now.
Niska, though — he stopped in the middle of crossing to the low table with the food on it as he felt a surge of memories from when Vierna would actually be gentle with him. He pushed himself to move before either elf said anything, and shoved that impression to the back of his mind for pondering later.
They ate with the customary word-teaching for the foods, and the two elves discussing pieces of their days while Drizzt listened and tried to pick out the words he knew already. He was picking up Common swiftly; it was meant to be learned easily apparently, but he was still making his teachers astounded at his memory. Probably, after telling them what he had to, they'd understand a little better.
"Ready to talk about the past?" Kor asked, once all the dishes were back in the basket to go to the kitchen.
"Yes," Drizzt said, puzzling out the word he didn't know from context. "Hard words, make mad," he warned.
"That's most things about the people you came from," Niska said, before she cast the spell so he could speak clearly and they could understand him.
"I reacted to our spar, Korvallen, because you remind me of my father, his skill and stamina with swords, all weapons really," Drizzt began. "But to understand why that matters, I will tell you about who I am, and things I have done."
Kor had frowned, to be compared to a drow, but then he pushed himself to take a neutral expression.
"I was third-born son, sixth child, to the matron of what became the Ninth House the night I was born," Drizzt began. "I was not meant to live; I was supposed to be given to Lloth as a third son, and it was timed to coincide with conquering the former Ninth House." He paused, letting them digest that. "I did not know for years. But I learned the former Secondboy, Dinin, slew the eldest of us, Nalfein, that night.
"Malice deemed it enough of a sacrifice, and I was allowed to live, to be word-weaned and raised by Vierna, the second of Malice's daughters. I learned in time that she was my full-sister, sharing a father, but drow do not think on fathers, not the noble-born."
"How appalling," Niska said before gesturing for him to continue.
"I won't horrify you with the life of a child growing up in the chapel, or a Page Prince serving the family, but when I was sixteen, I was raised up to be a full member of House Do'Urden. I was meant to be a wizard, to replace Nalfein." He did manage a grin, as that memory came back. "The Weapon Master, Zaknafein, who I had only just met, actually argued with Malice. He took ten coins, piled five on each of my hands, and had me flip them, to catch them all before they hit the floor.
"Malice conceded that my skill was in my speed and coordination, and gave me to him for the next four years to teach, anything and everything about every weapon we had in the house!"
His sheer joy for that memory helped offset, some, Kor's horror at how young Drizzt had been, and that he had done such a thing in the abyssal darkness of a drow city.
"Any light?" Niska asked.
"Only the slight warmth of his hands from when he fetched them out," Drizzt said cheerfully. "It would be much easier now, as I actually have my full reach."
Kor privately wondered if the boy was right on that as he'd seen elves get late growth spurts through their first century.
"What I did not know then, what I would not learn for years, was that he was my father. He and I built a strong friendship in those four years." The smile faded ominously. "I did not know drow did not have friends. And before I was to go to school, he attacked me, dangerously, almost killed me.
"In the end, he would not make the final blow, and I went to school full of his betrayal of what I thought we were." He took a deep breath, not looking at either elf in the face. "I learned. I learned that drow only use other people as they need. That being better was a reason to be hated, feared. And I thought that fight with him was part of him thinking I would be used to replace him.
"He was probably right, if that ever crossed his mind; Malice and he were not on the best of terms, but he was the best at what he did."
"Yet I reminded you of this man?" Kor had to demand.
Drizzt nodded. "You'll see. Let me get there."
"Alright."
"The less said about school, the better, as I have only the good memory of meeting Guen there, and even it is in a horrible incident," Drizzt said blithely. "I graduated after ten years, a full adult of my House at last."
"Thirty?!" exploded from two elven throats as they had been tracking the age marks.
"Fighters are not worth more effort than that," Drizzt pointed out. "Wizards are fifty, and priestesses closer to a century, if they all went in their first eligible year." He shrugged. "I remained on patrols with my brother leading them, and the wizard who held Guen's figure, and we did well.
"Too well." He looked at Niska. "I must ask, do you have a spell or item to let you hear truth? I must have no doubt on what comes next that I am not lying."
"I don't usually use it on those I fuss over," she said, but she adjusted one of her rings. "When you have said whatever this is, tell me to turn it off."
"Yes, Niska." Drizzt took a deep breath. "We were chosen for a raid. I killed no elf by my own hand, though I did not stop the others when I realized what was happening. I was horrified, rooted to the ground, until a child came to seek a woman already slain.
"Her death may be on my hands, after, for I stunned her and covered her in blood, to hide her survival… yet, I have no way of knowing if she lived past that night."
There was a very long silence, and then Niska shifted the ring of her own free will, got up and came to sit next to him, not liking how blank he'd made his face and tone just to tell them that. He leaned into her… and it was all he could do not to fall back into sobbing like he had with Kor earlier.
"No village would have had everyone down on the ground," Kor said soberly. "There are always those who cannot attend things below. Later, we will get details, to narrow down where you were, how the raid even got above, and we will learn the fate of the child."
Drizzt couldn't help the tears in his eyes as the man he was steadily looking up to more and more promised that, and he took several moments to get his composure.
"You know what it would have taken, to use the blood of a dead woman to cover a child convincingly, or can at least imagine," he finally said to Kor. "The others boasted heavily of what I had done. How vicious I had been. Word reached Zaknafein.
"And it set him into a rage, to learn just what a good drow fighter I had become," Drizzt said with heavy sarcasm on every word of what he'd once thought he wanted to be.
Niska wound up petting his hair, anticipating the next part now that she thought she had a grasp on this boy's trauma.
"After another patrol, one that would have implications for me years later, he and I nearly came to blows in the gymnasium." Drizzt took a deep breath. "He… hated all drow, even himself, especially because of the deaths of the children.
"And that fight… was to prevent me from becoming what he hated, when he had found comfort in my joy of learning his skill. We had truth, with me admitting to sparing the child, and him to being my father."
The dawning realization of seeing that love existed in this warped attempt at murder landed on both elves, but they held their peace, seeing a storm brewing in the young drow that had become theirs to protect.
"We were facing a House war. And… Malice or Briza must have been listening to us, spying with their spells." Drizzt's voice was almost too soft to hear. "I should have made him come away with me right then. I left the house, to think, to plan, to decide… and I was ambushed by the wizards of the House that meant to attack us.
"Because of Guen, I survived and they did not."
The sheer flatness of that was something Kor decided he would press at later, almost certain he knew the cause.
"I went back, straight to father's room. His swords were there.
"He was not."
Kor's intake of breath showed he grasped that implication, and Niska followed a moment later, squeezing Drizzt gently.
"They said, when I pressed to know what had happened, that he chose to go in my place. A faerie survived, so a drow had to die. And all was forgiven. I was Weapon Master, and it was all fine, now."
He could not stay at the low table, getting up to pace now. Kor let Niska move into his own space, as neither of them were coping as this spun out.
"I had taken his pouch from his room. He carried these little clay pellets. When you shattered them on stone, they flared with blinding light." Drizzt's hands were clenching, twisting in his agitation. "I threw one, after I damned them and the spider alike, if any true gods actually existed, and I fled into the wilds with just my skills, Guen's figure, and my blades."
He did pause, looking at both of them. "What else could I do? I rejected everything of who they wished me to be."
"The only thing you could have." Niska nodded firmly at Kor's words to reinforce them.
"I hoped it would be the end. But Briza and Dinin came, at what they said was ten years later. I beat them, but… I came to see the madness was winning. And went to the deep gnomes, in hopes that if they killed me, I'd at least die free of the spider's influence.
"Only, one I had caused to be maimed, but spared, spoke for me. And when my house sent a hunter after me, he traveled with me. We… adventured. It was good. Even with the horrors around us, with getting caught by mind flayers — Guen rescued us — it was a decent enough life. But we ran into the hunter outside the mind flayer's city."
Niska had so many questions, and she really wanted to meet Guen. Drizzt had been so busy since arriving that she didn't think he'd summoned this cat he kept speaking of.
"The hunter was my father."
"How?!" Kor asked, caught up in the tale, and hearing the pain aching in the boy's words.
"Not undead but not alive," Drizzt said. "Peak health, impossible stamina, all of his speed and skill… driven by my mother's — Malice's — will." He tipped his chin up. "She could not beat me. More of his own spirit slipped through, and then… he was there. He said he was at peace, told me to flee the Underdark… and took all choice from me by stepping into the acid pool below us.
"Twice, my father chose for me to live, at the cost of his existence, and I will survive, for him, and to spite that eight-legged meddling tantrum of a supposed goddess!"
Kor stood, going to this boy — he could not see him as anything but when the years had added up to less than fifty! — and put both hands on Drizzt's shoulders, holding him like that a moment.
"I am honored that a man capable of such is what comes to mind when you spar me," he said very gently. "And… I think you need time to rest from harsh truths. What would help you now?"
"Guen?" Drizzt said, his voice small and close to breaking.
"Go on out to the courtyard, or to your room, and bring your cat." He let go and Drizzt went into his room, to get his boots on, before fleeing to the courtyard to have time with his friend.
"I want to kill every single drow of the spider more than I did as a youth," Kor said once Drizzt had been gone a full minute.
"In complete agreement, my friend," Niska told him.
Sojourn to Korvallen: Resolution
Alustriel had given Kor — and Niska, once she was involved — the space needed to work with their drow guest. She had, when requested to cast a construct Kor could vent his rage on, raised an eyebrow, and just reminded him she was available, if he ever wished to talk.
That she then went to check on Niska, only to find the accomplished wizard using the training room to vent her own frustrations left her with some worry. Both of these coming on the heels of a major splash of astral magic almost sent her to go find the guest in question directly, but Niska did take note of her and stop casting.
"We need aid from your sons, whomever can be free. But not tonight, and I don't have the details yet," Niska said, mouth tight and eyes reddened from high emotion.
"You will, of course, have it, but I must admit to curiosity."
"The boy protected a child, on a raid, and we must learn if the child survived, and if she is recovering," Niska said very tightly. "We were given his history tonight, and while it was not the right time to press for description, we will get it soon, to narrow down where."
"Terrible, I take it?" Alustriel asked with gentle sympathy.
"Not even fifty, probably not even forty-five, and the horrors are going to give me nightmares. I have no idea how he's able to be as gentle as we've seen, or so given to trying to protect others."
"Then we will do all we can to nurture that, and let him have a safe place," Alustriel said, knowing that she would have to delay, again, determining why a good drow was unknown to their goodly goddess.
"I thought Korvallen had lost his mind, Alustriel. But now? I can see he was probably the perfect person to find that boy and work with him, despite his past. And mine, now that I'm involved." Niska sighed heavily. "We'll do our best to see he stays the good man he can become."
Drizzt looked up from the attempts to figure out 'drawing' as Korvallen and the elf from the hunting party came in. Niska was reading something magical, but she paused and gave a polite smile.
"Don't think we actually introduced anyone other than Dove," Kor began. "Drizzt, this is Kellindil. He, and his friends, brought my horse back. Kellindil, that is Niska Bentleaf; you likely saw her briefly when I joined your party that night at Sundabar."
"I've heard tales of your travels," Kellindil told the wizard, before looking at the drow, uncomfortable with this meeting, but pushing through it.
"Hello." Drizzt did not smile, but he was well-mannered in his tone.
Kor then sat beside his ward, looking at the sketches. "You drew a skunk," he said, recognizing that out of the attempts on the scraps that had been given for practice.
Niska chuckled. "Do tell that again?"
Drizzt did flash a smile. "Study animals. Try and see more. This one make see. Got too close. Guen ran from me, stink bad," he said, shaking his head. "Long time stink."
Kellindil sat in the other chair, finding himself amused at the boy's infectious grin and the tale.
"Your drawing skill is getting better," Kor said, "but Kel is willing to go with the Lady's son to talk to other elves. If Niska can give you the words, can you describe what you saw before the attack?"
He didn't need to specify as Drizzt sobered up, and he immediately looked at Niska.
"I am getting very versed in this one," she said, keeping a light tone, before helping Drizzt be able to speak fully.
"You told him?" Drizzt asked Kor once it had taken.
"Yes."
Drizzt nodded, and both elder elves were impressed at how solidly in control Drizzt was for this telling as he began describing all of his impressions of that night over a decade before.
"The child was a moon elf, based on the pictures in the book Niska let me look through," he said. "About mid-thigh on me then, so very young, if I understand ages right."
"Never should have been down on the ground," Kel groused at that, but it was just to have words to say, still overwhelmed at the attempt at protection from a drow for an elf child. "The trees, they sound like the ones north and east of here."
Kor nodded at that. "Can't think of many that have branches like that, with that leaf pattern. You find her, I'll be willing to come answer any questions."
"We'll see how she was cared for after. It might not be right away such a young elf can ask those questions."
Drizzt drew in a deep breath. "I just want to know. If I failed to protect her, if she survived but wasn't helped right, if —"
Niska covered his hand as she reached over. "Once we know, you will know. And we will see that, if she needs more help, she gets it. Healing will take time, and it takes healing to learn answers that hurt."
Drizzt slowly agreed, and then looked back at the paper, before forcing his hands to obey his mind, sketching out one of the trees. Kellindil watched him, still weighing all of what he'd been told on the way up to this apartment. He could not actually doubt the drow, and he hoped that his hunt went smoothly. He knew he would be working with one of the elder Tall Ones, and they had a reputation for always getting to the bottom of mysteries.
Drizzt was finally satisfied, and pushed the paper to Kor, who grunted, before handing it to Kellindil.
"Definitely Moonwood," Kel pronounced once he'd looked at it. "I'll go find Elinthalar, and see when he wishes to head out."
"Good hunting," Niska wished him, as Kor saw him out.
Things were quieter for a while, letting Drizzt learn how to speak, how to interact with people that weren't drow. Kor was vaguely amused that the boy seemed to relate to two kinds of people best: children and fighters. He knew every page's name inside of that first month, and every squire, most of the actual Knights even. Others that he saw in the Palace got polite nods, but not that open need for camaraderie.
What Kor did not expect, coming back from a day patrol, was to learn his ward had made friends with the palace cats.
He heard tiny demanding meows coming from Drizzt's open door, and went to look in, seeing a mother cat up on the bed, obviously taking a break from her litter. Drizzt was sprawled on the floor, using a scrap of a leather thong to entertain the kittens in a game of pounce. Drizzt looked so peaceful, smiling up at Kor before focusing back on the kittens that the elder elf just turned and went to get his bath.
At least it wasn't a pegasus foal.
Kolarven had been delighted to be detailed to make Drizzt go wander the city. Niska had been firm with him; he needed to start meeting people that were not Palace staff and retainers. Kolarven, who was child of Korvallen's sister, knew many people and could facilitate this part of his education.
Korvallen had had a private word with his nibling, to make certain Kol knew how young Drizzt was, which promptly led to his nibling having a small breakdown. Drizzt had absolutely stretched Kolarven and then beaten him in every spar they had shared, and Kolarven knew they were one of the best swordsmen in Silverymoon.
It did make Kolarven reevaluate the way to show off the city, so when they showed up to drag Drizzt into the city, they were dressed in clothes that could take a little dirt and sweat, only their personal short sword showing. Drizzt noted the sword, having still been dithering on if he was allowed his weapons (visible ones, as the knives he'd acquired were tucked in their usual spots) outside of the palace.
"We don't require peace bonds or handing them over," Kolarven said, catching that glimpse. "We want the city to get to know you, and those blades are a piece of you. In time, they're going to see you as a protector, even if you don't enroll in the Watch or the Knights."
"Thank you." Drizzt acquired his belt, hitched it on, then stepped out into the hall after making sure all the cats had already left the apartment for the day.
At least one or two tended to stay with him now, during the hours when he studied or slept.
The course Kolarven set meandered through most of the markets, showing off places of worship, places to eat, and notable attractions. They wound up at the Moonbridge to cross over to the other part of the city almost right on time to see the blue glow come up. One moment, people were walking in an arch over the river with nothing there, and then the bridge was limned in its nightly color.
"How?!" Drizzt asked, amazed.
"A very long time ago, powerful wizards needed a new bridge, and crafted it," Kolarven said, hiding their knowledge that the Lady was one of those mages involved. While Drizzt was family, such things were learned in time, not all at once. "It's one of our marvels. I'm going to show you two more before we make our way back to the Palace tonight."
"I'm looking forward to it." Drizzt had been pleasantly surprised by how many people had been introduced to him and they had been kind in their regards. He'd had no idea that the pages, squires, and others who lived outside the Palace had spoken of him, and prepared the city for the idea of having a unique drow to shelter.
A meandering walk that took them past the Vault of the Sages — and Kolarven was glad Niska had insisted it be included, seeing Drizzt's awe — eventually had them come to the Sacred Glade of Mielikki. Preparations for handing out the evenfeast extras was in process, but Drizzt actually strayed closer to one of the path entrances of his own accord. That meant Kolarven followed, and the Knight was the first to witness as a drow fell into a walking reverie, lost to all but the wildness of the Glade.
Kolarven kept their eyes on Drizzt, but their companion was moving steadily, hands brushing over trees and plants in passing, unconsciously avoiding the more open area where the staff of the Cloister were working. The pair wended their way further in, with Kolarven half-certain something divine was transpiring with their young friend. That suspicion was reinforced when the path took them all the way to the altar, only an acolyte there to watch over the offering basket.
Drizzt dropped in front of the altar, settled in a squat, hands on hilts of his blades, and head actually bowed. Kolarven moved to drop some coins in the basket, and to pat the stunned acolyte on the shoulder, before settling on the bench nearby to wait. Whatever this was… Kolarven was not going to rush it. They did wind up winking at a senior cleric who came to check on the divine stirrings. Leaf Tyrar shook her head at the Knight, took in the view of the drow in deep rapture, and went back to see to the people of the city.
She'd report it to the Ladyservant on the morrow, rather than disturb his evening rest.
The sound of more people over in the area for handouts did eventually rouse Drizzt from whatever it was that had ensnared him, and he stood with lithe grace, as if he hadn't been squatting for so long. Kolarven came over, searching the face, a little worried, even if they had seen holy communions before.
"Ready to go home?"
"Yes. Yes, please." Drizzt was at peace, full of wonder, and exhausted as well as refreshed, on differing levels, from whatever had passed in the Glade.
Niska was accustomed to Korvallen having the first part of the day with Drizzt, and handling the evenings with him, so it was a surprise to find her student sitting outside her door as she came out to go in search of a morning meal.
He came to his feet once she had noted him, and he looked at her with hopeful eyes.
"I know Kor, and you, have complicated histories with the people I was born to," he said. "But somehow I think I am better served asking your guidance on where to seek knowledge of their other gods, as well as more on Mielikki."
Her eyebrows rose into her hairline to hear him ask about a human deity by name, when they had not even begun to really touch on religion in their lessons.
"Come eat with me, and I will take you to the library after, to find books for you. Though… I fear the one you wish to learn of in the drow pantheon is going to be the hardest to find information on."
He fell in step with her, nodding at that. "I will take what I can. And it will be good practice reading. I will remember the words I have trouble with, to ask about after your duties."
She smiled warmly at that, keeping thoughts about why his memory was so prodigious behind her face and out of her tone. "I am certain you will."
Kellindil made his way through the palace halls, following the advice of the pages as to where to find the impossible drow. He'd helped locate the child, been as angry with the way her care had been handled as Elin had been. While Elin had negotiated to take the girl to a better place, far from her trauma, Kel had made his way back to Silverymoon to deliver the news personally. He was very glad of it too, as the sight he found was a balm on his soul from seeing that mute child trying to be useful at her tender age of sixteen.
What he found, when he reached the courtyard he'd been pointed to, was Drizzt and half a dozen young people playing a game of chase and catch. Several chairs, trestles, and other items from nearby rooms in the castle had somehow made their way into the courtyard, serving as obstacles and platforms to make the game even more athletic. Korvallen was sitting well out of range of the antics, mending a tunic and keeping a very light eye on things in case of injury. Kel headed that way, leaning back on the cool stone wall.
"Heard it was successful," Kor said. "Elué told me, but also said you'd be coming, so he doesn't know yet."
"Thank you for that courtesy," Kellindil told him. "This game his idea, yours, or someone else's?"
"Besnell's actually. Current crop of squire candidates that he deferred this year, but with a suggestion that they could maybe work on their stamina and speed with Drizzt." Kor snorted. "Drizzt came up with the idea of the obstacles, and has thrown himself into it fully."
Kel shook his head. "Humans try to learn far too young," he said finally, having scanned the youths and realized none were elf-kin."
"Such short lives; they have to push harder, I suppose," Kor said. "They'll be knocking off soon and returning everything inside. Join us for our evening meal?"
"Yes."
Drizzt had accepted the news from Kellindil soberly, then retired to his own room immediately after. Neither elf knew how he was handling it beyond relief at knowing the girl lived and would get help, but they chalked it up to how little experience Drizzt had with kinder mercies in life.
For his own part, Drizzt was making choices. His evening in the Sacred Glade had opened his heart to the idea that goddesses didn't have to be lying, cruel power-hungry influences in life. The whispers of the wild that had held him spellbound in the Glade had bloomed into a full calling toward becoming someone who traveled and protected the wilds and the weak.
He rather thought that Niska and Korvallen would not like the idea of this, at least not yet. He had picked up on their attitude that he was, by elven standards, a child. But he had lived and survived by his kills in one of the harshest environments on Toril, and thought he was nearly ready to learn to do so again.
He would stay the winter, spending time with the Cloister's folks who had come to welcome him on his forays over to the Glade, and then see about traveling during the warmer months, practicing what he learned.
He hoped this was enough of a compromise to ease both elves to letting him live a little more freely. In time, he would need to learn what the divine meddling on him was — the whispers that evening had spoken of it and of good drow and a sad goddess that wished to know of him — yet he wasn't going to rush. Korvallen and Niska were right. He had time, time to learn everything, and time to choose his path.
He closed his eyes, imagining a moon elf child growing as strong as he meant to be… and knew everything could be alright now. Belwar would be proud of him, he thought, and he knew his father would be as well. Kor would keep shaping him into a man Zak would want him to be, even as Drizzt proved just how un-drow he chose to be.
Finding a Cousin (1181 words) by Sharpest_Asp
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Forgotten Realms
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Original Half-Elf Character(s), Original Tiefling Character(s)
Additional Tags: Original Character(s) - Freeform, Family
Summary:
Draeden was actually impressed with the lack of attention given to him as he sauntered into Silverymoon to seek further opportunities. He completely understood why the most recent group had opted to go their own ways — humans and death-scares and all that — but it left him loose in the coin pouch to wander solely on his own.
His pale red skin and the twisting horns made it obvious he was of an often mistrusted species, and yet the squire had smiled and the two veteran guards had just nodded for him to proceed. Perhaps Silverymoon's reputation was warranted, or maybe they'd seen enough tieflings to know the odium was full of lies. It wasn't like he was a drow or something truly evil.
An inn called the Rusty Blade was recommended from one of his now former comrades, and that was where he took himself to. It was the kind of place that ran a tavern on the main floor, with rooms above and below, as they catered to all races… and dwarves could be odd about sleeping above ground at times. He paid up front for a room for three nights, hired a bath, and asked after meal time.
If he didn't find a band in three days needing a man of his skills, he'd move on to Everlund. It was rumored Harpers were in and out of that city, and where Harpers were, adventure (and profit) waited.
Until the meal, though, he planned to soak the last week out of his skin, polish his horns, oil his chafing tail, and generally be a pampered tiefling as best he could do without a suitable companion to aid him.
The meal was good, Draeden decided, if a bit higher on root-vegetables than he normally went for. The high number of elves present in the city probably influenced more vegetation being eaten. The bard was passable, playing rather than singing, and no doubt catching whispers of conversation to use as fodder.
Then the music was drowned out as the door opened and a striking half-elf in skirts, sword belt, and a tunic that looked like it cost a lordling's seasonal tax walked in to great acclaim from the regulars.
"Saer Kolarven, do you have the word of the skirmish for us?" the bard called out over the hearty greetings and cheers.
"Indeed, but can a poor servant of the city gain stew and ale before I set my tongue to wagging for you all?" the fighter said, voice not doing anything more than the mix of clothes did to settle a gender for Draeden. He was already writing the person off as an unlikely lead on adventures, hearing that quip, but something dragged his attention back, studying more closely.
Detail by detail, Draeden flicked through the clothing, the cut of hair and style of braids, the weapons, then the jewelry his keen eyes could make out —
— the teardrop dangling earring on one side. The glint and faceting was something native to Draeden's own family region, a particular way of working common stones into something pretty. It was an inexpensive bauble, so was out of place against the rest of Kolarven's garb.
When Kolarven finished eating the stew and theatrically took a massive drink of ale, Draeden caught the ripple of amusement that indicated this was common for the Knight. Listening to the pattern of speech, the inflections, all said 'elf-raised', but Draeden couldn't stop thinking that earring had significance.
He shifted at his table, raising his own mug in cheers to the final words of the tale of ending an orc raid, and made eye-contact, using every trick of his presence to make the Knight notice him. When Kolarven started moving through the people, gripping shoulders and quipping a few words with those they knew, Draeden saw the passage was aimed at his table, and half-smiled.
"Always up for new people catching my eye," Kolarven said as they dropped onto the bench beside Draeden.
"Well-met, saer," Draeden said in a friendly voice. "Draeden. Couldn't help but admire your myrrhina stone, as that style of working is from my family's region."
Kolarven reached up to touch the earring, eyes widening. "Might you know many of the families of that region?" they asked, reaching for casual and falling short. "Always meant to wander that way, but duty called me here."
"And why would you wander in that direction? Naught but farmers and stone-work," Draeden said. "One reason I venture out so far from there.
"But yes, I know most of the families, as there aren't many that don't tie back to mine in some way. On my mother's side, anyway."
Kolarven waved for a refill, for them both, and settled more on the bench. Prying ears and eyes turned away at some shift of the posture, and Draeden decided he could get used to a city that knew when to mind its own business.
"It was said that my father was from there, a man that adventured, and had unfinished business when his wounds had healed under my mother's care," Kolarven said, reciting a tale told to them no doubt. "A pair of these myrrhina stones were given to her, and when I came of age, she gave one to me."
"Know you his name?" Draeden asked, even as he felt a prickle of kinship. His own mother had been a wanderer and that was how she'd wooed a tiefling for his father. It seemed to run in the blood, to seek adventure and those least like themselves.
"He gave it as Thom of Hemslon, from that region, to her."
"Then we are kin, for Thom was my own mother's cousin," Draeden said, amused. "Fate steered me well, to know I have a gifted fighter for cousin in these lands."
"You say 'was' and while I know he was human — " Kolarven searched Draeden's face, and sighed at what was there.
"The unfinished business for a family matter, and another cousin dug the grave," Draeden said in sympathy. "He'd mentioned an elf lass, but the family did not know where."
Kolarven bowed their head a moment, then looked up with resolution at knowing. "At least I know then that he did mean to return but could not."
"That would be truth, for none of Hemslon let family be left behind, when it is known," Draeden promised. "I've sent two of my own children and their mothers back to have lives there. No doubt, they'll wander as I have, once they tire of soil and rock."
Kolarven laughed brightly at that. "I've none of my own, but should I meet yours, I'll treat them well, for we are family!"
Draeden raised his mug to that, and they both drank deeply.
"What brings you here?" Kolarven asked after.
"Looking for new adventures, and people to share them," Draeden answered honestly.
"Then I will have to introduce you to some of my friends… and hope you come here from time to time and share the tales!"
"I think, cousin, I will enjoy making Silverymoon a frequent resting place."
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Forgotten Realms
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Original Half-Elf Character(s), Original Tiefling Character(s)
Additional Tags: Original Character(s) - Freeform, Family
Summary:
Draeden's a wandering tiefling, and is looking for a new adventuring party. What he finds is family.
Finding a Cousin
Draeden was actually impressed with the lack of attention given to him as he sauntered into Silverymoon to seek further opportunities. He completely understood why the most recent group had opted to go their own ways — humans and death-scares and all that — but it left him loose in the coin pouch to wander solely on his own.
His pale red skin and the twisting horns made it obvious he was of an often mistrusted species, and yet the squire had smiled and the two veteran guards had just nodded for him to proceed. Perhaps Silverymoon's reputation was warranted, or maybe they'd seen enough tieflings to know the odium was full of lies. It wasn't like he was a drow or something truly evil.
An inn called the Rusty Blade was recommended from one of his now former comrades, and that was where he took himself to. It was the kind of place that ran a tavern on the main floor, with rooms above and below, as they catered to all races… and dwarves could be odd about sleeping above ground at times. He paid up front for a room for three nights, hired a bath, and asked after meal time.
If he didn't find a band in three days needing a man of his skills, he'd move on to Everlund. It was rumored Harpers were in and out of that city, and where Harpers were, adventure (and profit) waited.
Until the meal, though, he planned to soak the last week out of his skin, polish his horns, oil his chafing tail, and generally be a pampered tiefling as best he could do without a suitable companion to aid him.
The meal was good, Draeden decided, if a bit higher on root-vegetables than he normally went for. The high number of elves present in the city probably influenced more vegetation being eaten. The bard was passable, playing rather than singing, and no doubt catching whispers of conversation to use as fodder.
Then the music was drowned out as the door opened and a striking half-elf in skirts, sword belt, and a tunic that looked like it cost a lordling's seasonal tax walked in to great acclaim from the regulars.
"Saer Kolarven, do you have the word of the skirmish for us?" the bard called out over the hearty greetings and cheers.
"Indeed, but can a poor servant of the city gain stew and ale before I set my tongue to wagging for you all?" the fighter said, voice not doing anything more than the mix of clothes did to settle a gender for Draeden. He was already writing the person off as an unlikely lead on adventures, hearing that quip, but something dragged his attention back, studying more closely.
Detail by detail, Draeden flicked through the clothing, the cut of hair and style of braids, the weapons, then the jewelry his keen eyes could make out —
— the teardrop dangling earring on one side. The glint and faceting was something native to Draeden's own family region, a particular way of working common stones into something pretty. It was an inexpensive bauble, so was out of place against the rest of Kolarven's garb.
When Kolarven finished eating the stew and theatrically took a massive drink of ale, Draeden caught the ripple of amusement that indicated this was common for the Knight. Listening to the pattern of speech, the inflections, all said 'elf-raised', but Draeden couldn't stop thinking that earring had significance.
He shifted at his table, raising his own mug in cheers to the final words of the tale of ending an orc raid, and made eye-contact, using every trick of his presence to make the Knight notice him. When Kolarven started moving through the people, gripping shoulders and quipping a few words with those they knew, Draeden saw the passage was aimed at his table, and half-smiled.
"Always up for new people catching my eye," Kolarven said as they dropped onto the bench beside Draeden.
"Well-met, saer," Draeden said in a friendly voice. "Draeden. Couldn't help but admire your myrrhina stone, as that style of working is from my family's region."
Kolarven reached up to touch the earring, eyes widening. "Might you know many of the families of that region?" they asked, reaching for casual and falling short. "Always meant to wander that way, but duty called me here."
"And why would you wander in that direction? Naught but farmers and stone-work," Draeden said. "One reason I venture out so far from there.
"But yes, I know most of the families, as there aren't many that don't tie back to mine in some way. On my mother's side, anyway."
Kolarven waved for a refill, for them both, and settled more on the bench. Prying ears and eyes turned away at some shift of the posture, and Draeden decided he could get used to a city that knew when to mind its own business.
"It was said that my father was from there, a man that adventured, and had unfinished business when his wounds had healed under my mother's care," Kolarven said, reciting a tale told to them no doubt. "A pair of these myrrhina stones were given to her, and when I came of age, she gave one to me."
"Know you his name?" Draeden asked, even as he felt a prickle of kinship. His own mother had been a wanderer and that was how she'd wooed a tiefling for his father. It seemed to run in the blood, to seek adventure and those least like themselves.
"He gave it as Thom of Hemslon, from that region, to her."
"Then we are kin, for Thom was my own mother's cousin," Draeden said, amused. "Fate steered me well, to know I have a gifted fighter for cousin in these lands."
"You say 'was' and while I know he was human — " Kolarven searched Draeden's face, and sighed at what was there.
"The unfinished business for a family matter, and another cousin dug the grave," Draeden said in sympathy. "He'd mentioned an elf lass, but the family did not know where."
Kolarven bowed their head a moment, then looked up with resolution at knowing. "At least I know then that he did mean to return but could not."
"That would be truth, for none of Hemslon let family be left behind, when it is known," Draeden promised. "I've sent two of my own children and their mothers back to have lives there. No doubt, they'll wander as I have, once they tire of soil and rock."
Kolarven laughed brightly at that. "I've none of my own, but should I meet yours, I'll treat them well, for we are family!"
Draeden raised his mug to that, and they both drank deeply.
"What brings you here?" Kolarven asked after.
"Looking for new adventures, and people to share them," Draeden answered honestly.
"Then I will have to introduce you to some of my friends… and hope you come here from time to time and share the tales!"
"I think, cousin, I will enjoy making Silverymoon a frequent resting place."
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Link: Round 15 Sign Ups | Round 15 Themes
Description:
celebrity20in20 is a 20in20 community dedicated to making icons of actors and actresses. You have 20 days to make 20 icons about a celebrity of your choice, based on a set of themes for the round.
Schedule: Round 15 sign ups are open NOW. Icons are due July 17, 2025.
You Can't Keep Me From Singing by Gordon MacDonald, Jr., a filk of How Can I Keep From Singing.
Reproduced here so if Mudcat keeps being impossible to search, I can find it again:
( Whenever I begin to sing there's rising agitation )
Reproduced here so if Mudcat keeps being impossible to search, I can find it again:
( Whenever I begin to sing there's rising agitation )
This one has multiple genres.
Books for sale, mostly $1 to $3
Hit the "Genres" button at the top of the page to narrow your search.
Happy reading!
ETA: Jesse_the_k notes that "This is a meta-search engine, compiling deals from Amazon, Apple, Barnes & Noble, Google and Kobo." I didn't realize that was note-worthy, but yeah. Whatever platform you use to read, you're covered.