From: ...sage@basement.library.generica.nexus Newsgroups: alt.pub.dragons-inn Subject: ...sage : reflections and history Date: 6 May 1993 03:43:21 GMT Message-ID: <1sa1gp$683@huon.itd.adelaide.edu.au> Keywords: archives ..sage sat in the Dragons Inn, sipping a White Russian and pondering the events that had occured recently. Having survived the assault by Great Mother beneath the Low City of Generica - he recovered in the pocket-plane Sanctuary, and the environment there shaped itself to look like the basement of his beloved Library. Not that the Library was his, nor even the Basement, but he was responsible for the lowest levels and he did feel it was a part of him, closer in nature than that of the drow race of which he had belonged. He knew not what his past held, nor why he could not grasp the answers to his history that must somewhere, somehow, still be locked in the farthest recesses of his mind. He had left Sanctuary and met up with the morose priest Father Lucas, and had cajoled him into coming to Luthor and Serene's party, where they parted company. ..sage had found more questions there than distractions, as first he had met a vampire that had looked long and hard at him, and who seemed to strike in him some chord of recognition, and then a request for a meeting from a female traveller, Jameson W Walker - another seeker of answers, like himself. Back at the Inn the mysterious Jameson Walker hadn't showed, which gave ...sage time to ponder the events that had occured. While he had healed in Sanctuary he recalled that he had found a dusty old tome in the Basement (or the copy of it that Sanctuary had made), and that within the tome there was a story. A story about a light elf in a race of dark elves. Maybe the cloud in his mind, that had prevented him from recognizing the story's significance while in the prime dimension, had been temporarily held at bay in Sanctuary, enabling him to grasp the memory from his subconscious. ..sage closed his blank eyes and telepathically talked to his servant, busy dusting within the bowels of the Library's basement. "Bring me item #4832.895 9999929" A small bell rang and the pouch hanging from ...sage's belt bulged ever so slightly. Reaching in he pulled out a book with a web motif on the cover. A cover cracking with age and lined with dark-elven steel. Trembling hands opened it and flicking past a few chapters of ancient drow history, from the drow viewpoint, he found the chapter he was after. -=-=- Society developed and many grew jealous of the power wielded by the Matrons of the Families, but afore said malcontents could organize themselves into some semblance of resistance, they were rooted from their hiding holes and their spirits were redeemed for the glory of Lloth beneath the sacrificial knives of officiating priestesses. Thereupon started a glorious time. A golden age of advancement and peace under the watchful eye of Lloth, our sacred Queen of the Spiders. Our technology and magical knowledge increased tenfold and our cities arose in splendid beauty, in huge caverns nestled in the womb of the earth. Slowly our forces were built up, in preparation of the day when we would sally forth and smite our treacherous cousins on the surface, who had driven us from the sunlit lands. To eradicate their memory from the face of the planet and to raise Lloth as Queen over all races, with the drow her chosen people, and install her priests as her handmaidens, this was our aim. Thus it continued for a thousand years, as the day when we would strike loomed closer and only decades separated us from achieving our ambitions, when tragedy struck. It was after a particulary successful raid of the surface, when many light-elven communities went down before the might of our soldiers that one of our Matrons fell pregnant. Lloth had commanded that none of her people should ever mix blood and produce offspring with a surface elf, and yet the practise of raping the inhabitants of the village as well as killing and enslaving them, was widely tolerated, since ways existed to terminate unwanted pregnancies and - especially those that would result in deformed babes, an abomination in the eyes of our Goddess, as such are not even fit to grace the sacrificial block nor be fed to her driders. This one was kept secret though, and the child was born and hidden from all others. Sickly white he was, and eyes of the deepest green, not red like normal drow, nor the pink that often goes with albinism, so green in fact that it hurt the crimson eyes of his mother. She gave the child to a handmaiden and bid her get rid of the thing, so deeply did she regret its birth, but the handmaiden schemed to use the child against the Matron and thus take her place as head of the family, so did she not do as she was commanded, but took the child away and had it reared apart from other drow children, hidden even from the eyes of the Spider Queen. In time the child grew and he survived the dangers of his formative years and lo, he became mighty with the blade and skilled in the ways of the theif. Many times he would question his foster parents of his true origins, and many times they would direct his questions to other matters, teaching him to focus instead on matters of skill and ability, not things better left still in time. After many years, this albino miscreant tried to lead a revolution against the ruling Matrons of his community. Needless to say, the revolt was firmly crushed, yet the leader himself was not caught for many more years. Over that time he managed to so severely sabotage the plans of the drow for their surface conquest that even to this day we are no closer to fulfilling our great destiny. As to why the albino turned against his kind - we don't know, though we suspect that the answers must lie somewhere. His name was stricken from all Drow records that no rebels might revere him and no summoning of his spirit might be done. And his fate? As far as we can ascertain, he was blinded and broken before the feet of the High Priestess, and an avatar of Lloth herself took the traitor and reversed his age till he was a helpless babe, then flung him far into the future intending that he would grow up in a drow dominated world, and would therefore learn to revere her properly, or should the drow not yet have won their place as overlords of all races, that he should learn our laws and way of life in the proper way, that he might be her agent in bringing about our domination of the surface. A thousand years more have passed and we have not recaptured our former glory. We, the drow are still held in check beneath the earth while our traiterous kin still dwell on the surface. Yet we still look towards that day when our victory shall come and we climb from the depths as rulers. Thus - to all drow who read these words - be on the lookout for an albino of our kind, as he has the potential to both save us and destroy us. -=-=- ..sage closed the book, staring blankly into nothingness and saw the cloud in his mind part and then close again. But he had had a glimpse, a fleeting glance of a faraway time, of battles beneath the earth, of faces and forms, and finally the image of Lolth - who was Lloth to the drow - before his mind had mercifully run from its form. The book had been written over 2 thousand years previous, and if ...sage *was* the one fortold, then he had lived a lifetime before this one, and it had been over three thousand years ago. A shiver ran down his back and he took a swig of his White Russian. Maybe he didn't really want to chase up his past after all. ---- NAH! ...sage -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Pete Calvert : Department of Commerce: Adelaide University, S.Aust. email : pcalvert@economics.adelaide.edu.au -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- another page from ...sage -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-