The child seemed far more animated than either Luriia or Hammer had ever seen him. They held him up and his arms seemed to flail, but not in their usual, playful way. Rather, he waved them in what seemed to be precise, cutting motions. Hammer, no novice to swordplay, thought he noticed patterns in the movements. Luriia took him, though, her black hands gently taking the babe against her breast, where he began to feed.
They were both nude, and Hammer slipped around behind his wife, his manhood pressed against the small of the shorter woman's back as his hands held her shoulders, watching the child feed from her bountiful breast.
He held the other breast, and Luriia giggled, the obsidian orb resting gently in Hammer's thick, calloused hand.
"I love you," she said to him, spontaneously. He grinned, pressed his face into the drow's neck and kissed, nibbling softly, before breathing "I love you" into her ear.
A knock on the door robbed them of the intimacy, and Hammer mustered the will to draw pants up to his waist and march from the babe's bedroom, down the hall, to the front door of the single-story house. What faced the big man had him feeling a bit weak in the knees.
Resplendent, with a gown so deep of violet that it was almost black, was a woman he'd seen only once before, and his memory of her was very vague. Her black skin was the only thing that revealed her gown to be actually violet, though the fabric seemed to drink in the light around her. Her white hair was pulled back and secured with an elaborate, ornate circlet--or rather, a crown of some sort, judging by the black opals encircling it and mithril filigree--and her glowing violet eyes belied an inner power that simply should not be contained in a drow body, even one so elegant and graceful as this one.
"Master Torviir," the drow said, dipping into a slight bow--a surprising thing from any drow female. Her voice had a hiss to it. She stepped forward and put a long-fingered hand on his chest, her long fingernails seeming sharp as talons. "Please, allow me to meet with your wife, Matron Luriia Torviir."
"We have not..."
"I know, it's not official yet. But I have ears everywhere, and I am usually in the right place at the right time. Knowledge is power, you know. But then,
power
is power, too, so...where is Matron Luriia Torviir?"
"Here," the other drow said from behind Hammer. Calafein was suckling at her breast still, and a bit of milk had dribbled beneath the swollen breast, forgotten and lost to the babe. "Matron Baensek. Why are you here?"
"Do you really think I am the true Matron Baensek?" the other woman, taller than Luriia, asked, smirking.
"You could be a simulacrum, or simply a well-disguised agent, but any explanation does not answer the question," Luriia said, her eyes swirling with agitation. Crimson and gold mixed together, almost as if they were threatening to lash out at the drow.
"Very well," the drow matron said, extending her head into the house. "May I enter? I wish not to reveal myself to all of Neverwinter."
Hammer and Luriia stepped out of the way. Matron Baensek entered.
"Perhaps my agents, Lirafey and Shandra have discussed their arrangement with you?" Matron Baensek asked.
Luriia nodded. "Ferrying surface goods to Menzoberranzan, at your behest, though for what reason I cannot fathom. Bregan D'aerth already has trade between the two locations. What use have you for your own agent?"
"I seek very specific items," the woman said. "And, I suppose you could say I am not wholly aligned with the Ruling Council, Bregan D'aerth, or any other drow organization for that matter."
"Most Matron Mothers serve themselves foremost," Luriia said. "You give half answers. Give me a whole answer or you will find yourself on our doorstep."
There was a snarl, or a growl, or some other guttural sound, that neither man or drow could explain. Violet eyes changed hue to something closer to platinum, and ivory teeth elongated to fangs. The violet gown expanded, billowing out behind the drow, baring her naked body in all its beauty as the cloth formed into flesh-and-scale wings that threatened to wreck their foyer. Talons grew from fingers and toes, scales growing out of her skin to cup her breasts, hips, and loins. "I am Umrathystra, sister of Allumethystra, better known to you two as Alluva Lovedrake." Her voice resonated in the walls, and magical force emanated from her, as if in effort to bend their knees to her will. But Hammer and Luriia were possessed of great will, and gifted by their deities with shards of divinity. They would not be so easily subdued. Both Luriia and Hammer folded their arms, almost simultaneously, and stared at the woman, her true self partially revealed.
"I know of your powers," Umrathystra said, pointing at the drow and man alike. Hammer cocked his head to the side.
"Of what do you speak?" he asked.
"Your wife's is apparent," the dragon said, laughing quietly to herself as she also folded her arms. "But you, you are ignorant of your own power. You know not the seed planted within you years ago."
"What is your business here?" Luriia asked, starting to grow agitated, but also curious. "Have you come only to titillate us with your secret knowledge?"
"Titillate, sure," Umrathystra said. "I'd bed you both if I thought either of you would be willing. But no, I am here at the behest of my sister. She is with Vath and Lidia in Cormyr, should you get curious, making of the Forest Kingdom a massive harem. Or getting herself killed in the process. She wanted to inform Hammer directly the knowledge she'd been given, but settled for me. Not before I convinced her with a skilled tongue, mind you."
"Speak!" Hammer shouted, growing furious at the delay and senseless banter.
"You are Chosen," she said to him, glowering. "By the Red Knight herself. One night, she came to you, bedded you, and invested a part of her divinity in you. You never knew it, by design. She and Sune hatched a plan early on for you and your wife."
"Impossible," Hammer said. "It was a vision, nothing more. A dream, even."
"No," Umrathystra said. "But it is not my lot to convince you. Look to your child. I return to the Underdark."
"Wait," Luriia said. "What need have you of artifacts from the surface? Why are Lirafey and Shandra serving you?"
"Now, now," Matron Umrae'loth Baensek said, for the dragon had reverted to her drow form. "You must know, by now, that a Matron Mother keeps her secrets near and dear to her heart."
Shadows filled the room and the drow was gone, leaving Hammer and Luriia with a squirming, smiling Calafein, the marks of Sune and the Red Knight clear on his tiny body. Hammer was convinced.
*****
Myrynda's slender body was wreathed in a cold sweat. She felt, more than anything, the icy cold grip coiling around her neck as her naked body shuddered intermittently. She couldn't explain why Mask would visit her for such reasons, but she was glad to give herself to the Lord of Thieves. His cock wasn't overly large, which was also strange to her. As a deity, his avatar could have any proportions he wished. And yet, his member pleasured her insides, stirring her loins with each thrust, adeptly. He was one of the finest lovers she'd ever had.
His discharge flooded her womb with cold seed, and she felt powerful cramps seize her abdomen, as though the touch of the divine seed was too powerful for her mortal body to contain. Their shadows, the ones flowing form their corporeal forms like living serpents, mingled together, wrapping around each other as he rutted her from behind. She was near unconsciousness when his grip left her throat. Myrynda sputtered for breath, falling forward as her weak knees gave out beneath her.
She realized it was only Mask's grip on her throat and cock in her cunt that had kept her standing. The drow knew better than to try and get a glimpse of the Lord of Thieves, knew that the sight of his bared divinity would have her seizing up and vomiting uncontrollably.
And yet, still, the drow-turned-shade couldn't resist turning her head, just slightly, to view him from her peripheral vision. The vomit was quick to blossom out of her throat and mouth, and she lay on the floor, paralyzed.
"I wonder," Mask said in that awful, horrifyingly calm voice, "if you'll ever learn better. Or, perhaps, you simply desire me so much you cannot resist." She knew he was smirking--or sneering--and the thought had her thighs trembling with need yet again.
He'd taken her over a dozen times in the last hour, each time ending the same way.
Her pussy ached from the use, and yet still her desire got the better of her.
"Here," he said, and a black cube dropped to the floor, its surfaces swirling with tarnished silver over the inky blackness. "You'll need this. Probably tonight."
There was a flash of blackness through which even her drow eyes could not see. She groped on the floor for the black cube, which was roughly the size of her head.
Her paralysis was gone, but her mouth tasted of vomit, and her loins ached so powerfully that she was fearful of standing. The black cube activated, though, much to her surprise. The tarnished silver swirled away, leaving a depthless inky blackness in its place.
And there, an image began to form that confused the drow.
