Ch. 3, pt. 2: The General

 As he donned a pair of bracers he'd traded with Gulhrys for, Solaufein finally glanced over at Valen. "I am sure Binne has calmed down since, would you mind telling her we are soon leaving?"

 The General marched off only somewhat grudgingly and went to fetch the half-devil, making sure he kept Solaufein in his periphery with his angle of approach. He wasn't far, but he could tell that matters in the open-air ale gardens were getting tense from the postures of the two groups. The Eilistraeens were no longer seated and standing tall while the others had begun to gesture angrily. Binne stood in-between, her thrashing tail the only giveaway to her agitated temper.

 She had shouted something at the Mae'vir men - Valen could see their house colors on their clothes now that he was closer - and then the air was charged with the scent of adrenaline. "I said BEGONE!" Binne repeated forcefully, and the word seemed to clap their air for a moment startling passersby who blinked . . . And then kept on walking with some haste in the opposite direction. The Mae'vir men exchanged no words or gestures and simply ran from the gardens at full speed, right past Valen and out of the market to their compound with nary a panicked shout.

 Valen turned met the fiery gaze of another in Binne's eyes - a snarling, familiar creature he'd only seen with the Seer's help. Her eyes gained a glowing sheen, and he but breathed and it was gone. Barely a moment it was there, and then the golden-eyed beast carefully leashed in an instant, draining out of her countenance at the slightest shift of expression. She smiled, and he frowned, because it didn't seem natural. It fitted on her face, but it was not the sort of smile one would expect in the Underdark, especially from one who wasn't a drow - and even then he'd only seen the Eilistraeens freely smile in such a way. It was on the wrong face. Though he recalled Imloth chiding him on throwing stones as if he was someone who could judge what was and was not natural.

 "Oh, hullo General," she greeted, the smile falling back into neutrality the longer they stood staring at each other in silence.

 The General's eyes sought out the Eilistraeens behind her, who had relaxed back into their seats. "That was well handled," he commented, admitting internally that he'd have just punched them.

 "Was that a compliment?" she asked. "It didn't really sound like one, but I'll take it."

 "An observation," he corrected.

 "Only because his version of telling people off is to punch them in the guts until they vomit and crawl away," Feiran, one of the guards Valen had trained, betrayed him from his seat at the gardens and lifted his ale in toast to the warlock. "Well shouted, a'temra!" he slurred in yet impeccable Common. "And may - hic - I add you have a very finely shaped - hic - pair of horns?"

 Her tail curled up in intrigue. "Are all your people so forward?" She wondered aloud, amusedly. "I think I'm beginning to like drow."

 Feiran squinted at Valen over a mug of what smelled like something a duergar made in his closet and Valen cleared his throat. "We need to go, it's time to leave," he informed her and walked off before she could get the last word. As they passed Gulhrys, she gave the drow wizard a well-reciprocated glare and silently accepted a pack that Solaufein handed to her.

 Without mentioning the incident further, he led the three on foot across the pathways of Lith My'athar to the lower docks to the Dark River. The scent of the air changed in their approach and he had to remind himself to warn them once they were on boat to never touch the poisonous water. He was about to mention it out loud when he heard the cambion talking softly about him behind his back on the way to Cavallas:

 "He looks like a tiefling," she muttered to her companions, unknowingly setting the hair on his nape standing. "Probably more human than demon, not like me. One of his parents' must've been half tanar'ri. I think I'm something different, but not sure what." She made a sniff, or a sniffle. "You know, I'm starting to think he might not like me."

 There was a moment of silence before Solaufein responded by pointing out the obvious, "He can hear you."

 "He's not going to pay attention," she assessed dubiously, "not if he doesn't like me."

 Valen stopped and turned around. He pointed behind him and addressed Solaufein, the mostly-sensible one. "Of course I can hear you. That is Cavallas. He can take us across the river- but be wary of him. No one is sure exactly what he is or what he's capable of. He's certainly different, but not in a bad way, and he doesn't seem to have any desire to aid our enemy. He's the only one who can safely travel this river - it's waters are poisonous, its currents wild, and it is rumored to be fraught with strange and deadly creatures."

 A strange smile crossed Solaufein's face. "It already feels like home." 

 Cavallas did not stand out much from his surroundings. He was a little taller than Valen and reeked of strangeness and decay - whatever Cavallas was, the beast in Valen was sure that it was better off not knowing. The creepy boatman had always given him chills, with his hollow voice and shadowed face. It didn't help that Valen had spoken to him three times over the course of two weeks now, and he was absolutely certain that the boatman had never changed out of the same robe. It had probably never been washed in however long Cavallas' life was. One of the Seer's followers had left out clothes of spider silk for the boatman once, thinking perhaps he was homeless or dobluth and hid his face to avoid attention, but the next day the clothing was gone and Cavallas was still in that same tattered robe. He'd probably just stood there and stared at it as someone else stole it. If he was doing the creepy boatman act to hide from people, he wasn't doing a good job.

 As Valen thought about the boatman and watched Solaufein interact with him, he was peripherally aware of the others around him. The kobold had trailed after Solaufein and scrawled in a smaller version of his large journal, one of the trades he'd made for Gulhrys - an unused spell book that made a better journal for the bard than anything else nearby. The biggest distraction was Binne inching into the edge of his line of sight and staring at him. He endured her antics with dignity, not knowing how or even if he should respond. The chances of her being a minion of the devil were high, given their rare circumstances, but as he turned to regard her his suspicions immediately died with her grin. "Hullo!" She greeted with a wave.

 He frowned, confused. Was she trying to goad him? They'd already greeted each other earlier. He glanced away from her and back to Cavallas.

 "I like your hair," she continued rambling on. "I-it's very red. Mine's, uh, more black than red. I guess." Her hand had inched up to the ends of her braid and began toying with the tail of it in a kind of nervous tick he thought he'd never see on a devil. "It's, yours, it's the kind of like when the sun's just below the horizon over the docks in Neverwinter, and the sea starts to look as red as the sky. Have you ever seen a sunset? Or been to the surface? Well, I guess we're in the Underdark so you can't see one now. How could you? No sun. Silly question. Are—"

 He felt like the ruder thing for him to do, between the two options of leaving or staying that he had to choose from, would be to allow her to continue enduring whatever form of verbal self-torture she was engaging in. The only other option was to engage and torture himself as well. So, he walked toward Solaufein purposefully leaving the two to follow and put it out of his mind where it belonged. He heard the cambion mutter under her breath some more and the kobold's quill scratching interrupted by a sharp intake of gasping breath when they both took in the sight of the Dark River unfurling in the din.

 Valen had not been on the surface for more than a few years and never left the Seer's grove. He'd seen the sun, the littler one they worshiped called the moon, and the other even littler ones they called stars. It'd been amazing to see a world that revolved around something, that changed without a mood to guide it, that bent with time and flourished in decay. He'd taken in trees, clouds, weather, all of it in stride. It was odd for a world to react . . . Reflexively to things, as it was explained to him, rather than emotionally. Sigil had mood swings that affected the weather, and it had the Lady's iron will behind it. As for the Hells, each plane had its own patterns and role in the Wheel, but nothing he'd ever seen quite had the variety of life and natural wonder that he'd seen in his brief time on the surface. From what he'd been able to gather, it was a great deal larger than most of the planes - at least, the habitable parts were. Prime was vast, varied, and extremely hard to grasp. He'd glimpsed paintings of the ocean, of rushing rivers, of teeming jungles.

 The Underdark was its own world in itself, one that he was barely beginning to understand even after spending roughly four months there. The General still had a tough time identifying noises splitting the silence of its vast, heavy oppressive darkness, where only mushrooms and magic were light sources. Much like the Hells, only the strong survived it. The Dark River made him a little wistful for the surface, even after his limited experience. It had natural cave fungus colonies over its vast, cavernous ceiling that lit the water with a distant, aqua glow. Only the crests of the River's waves were visible, crushing up on the black and rocky shore. He couldn't imagine how the surfacers must feel if it was their first time in the Underdark.

 "How is there a river down here?" The cambion blurted, incredulously. "Who—what put it here? Where does it go?!"

 "All rivers go to ocean," Deekin provided helpfully. "Even baby kobolds know that." He let out a yelp when he got whapped by her tail by 'accident.'

 Cavallas was surprisingly helpful after speaking to the drow warrior for but a scant few minutes. He'd even taken to calling Solaufein 'Wayfarer,' though whether or not that was an official title, affectionate nickname, or obscure insult was hard to determine. He'd never called anyone else Wayfarer before, and only addressed Solaufein with it, which put a tally on 'devil-minion' side of things as far as the General was concerned. There was a significant, definite, absolute possibility this all had some connection to the arch-devil, and Valen wasn't going to start taking any chances with homeless, mysterious, and apparently immortal boatman who guided rickety crafts across poisonous rivers to mysterious islands. Not when the Seer's life counted on it, anyway. He was still getting on the boat, of course - where his own life was concerned, he had no care to spare.

 The boatman offered them free passage to one of two places in the large river. One was an island rumored to be a golem-riddled defunct artificer's lab, a popular target for scavengers due to the rare metals used in the golems' composition. The other was something that had appeared only four months ago, a sudden island in the middle of the river that seemed to be inhabited solely by peculiar, winged surface elves. Solaufein decided immediately that they were headed there first to no opposition.

 They boarded the boat with little scuffle and dumped their gear in the hold and lingered up top to get a good look at the river up close.

 "Is he going to cast off, or . . . ?" The cambion trailed off of her own thought and squinted at the hooded boatman. "But there's no lines . . . How does he fucking steer this can?" As she finished her thought, the boat lurched gently into motion and pushed itself into the river. "Magic, right," she surmised.

 "Best not to question it," Solaufein suggested helpfully.

 The kobold had finally put away his notes, though what exactly was so important that he was scratching in down in there semi-constantly was beyond Valen's reckoning. "Deekin never hear of winged elf before," he finally spoke, after a long and blissful silence. "Boss, you maybe think this be an island of angels? Those be good guys and probably would help us if we ask!"

 Solaufein brushed some hair that had fallen near his eyes to the side of his head and frowned. "Angels would not willingly dwell in this place, and neither would avariel," he told the kobold. "They are not common, and dwell in high mountains or near Celestia. I have met one before, although she had long been separated from her people and lost her wings when she was young. They are very isolated and suspicious of outsiders."

 "Valen should fit right in then," the cambion cut in with some amusement. He didn't even bother glaring at her, but it did get a snort out of him.

 "They particularly loathe my kin," the drow felt the need to add.

 Binne let out a loud laugh. "We'll just send Deekin in to talk to them, then, and hope they don't eat kobold shall we?"

 The kobold in question scratched at his horns. "Deekin not be liking that plan."

 The drow shrugged in response, and once again proved himself to be the most rational amongst them. Valen was starting to understand why Nathyrra had said Solaufein reminded her of the Seer. They both had the same sort of insightful look at things, from a larger perspective - although Solaufein and Binne seemed to share the same unfortunate sense of humor. "If they are here, they can surely expect to encounter my kind. My appearance will be the least of our problems. I blend in. My concern is with dhaerow other than myself; what use would this make-believe goddess have for the people on this island? Why have they appeared to make their home here? What would draw aerial creatures to such a low place?"

 They all thought about this for a moment. Binne tapped her lip and offered, "maybe . . . They're being cultivated as a delicacy?"

 Solaufein's nose wrinkled. "Siltrin? Nau, you do not want to eat that. It will give you shakes, make you sick. Some might consider it a delicacy but I found it too tough. Only dothkarn would."

 Her eyes widened, and then narrowed. "Are you joking? I can't tell with you sometimes."

 Solaufein smiled, but otherwise kept a straight face. Binne snorted back more laughter before it could let out.

 "Oh. So drow not eat kobold after all?" Deekin asked, hopefully.

 "Nau, that is true. Stay away from the kitchen to be safe, as I have never met other Eilistraeens and know them not. Ask someone, or us, to bring you what you need from there," he carefully instructed.

 Deekin seemed stuck on this. Valen was just hoping Enserric didn't start chiming in to contribute. "But . . . Drow eat other elves?" The reptilian bard wondered with a mixture of fascination and horror. "I mean, sure winter is hard and kobold not really discriminate what to eat, but we alls know kobold is not good eatings. To little meat on bones. Elves not much better, honestly."

 Binne had started examining her own arms and body as if imagining what eating people, or being eaten, might be like. "I suppose I am meatier than the two of you combined," she admitted blithely. Her stomach growled. "Great, now I'm hungry."

 "Some do," Solaufein clarified, "I do not. It is a revolting practice . . . Though now I am hungry as well, and curious about the taste of avariel."

 "I was just thinking that!" the cambion chimed. "Have you ever notice how that seems to happen often?"

 "We do both seem to think in disturbingly similar patterns," he observed.

 Deekin looked even more doubtful than Valen felt. "You guys want to be killing winged elves and eatings them? Boss be more like Old Boss than Deekin thought."

 "Can't be worse than grigs," was Binne's only defense, though this wasn't much of a defense.

 "You've eaten grigs?" Valen asked and due to being blessed with a vivid imagination he was immediately horrified at the thought. She nodded tightly. "Why?"

 "They're the only thing besides ogres and goblins to eat in Undermountain," she defended. "And I was hungry!"

 "Being curious isn't the same thing has having a desire," Solaufein explained for Deekin's benefit. "I would not eat someone unless I was trapped in a cave for a while with them, and they annoyed me severely on several occasions, and if the only other source of sustenance was bat droppings."

 Valen was about to comment on the eating of grigs again, but hearing this from the drow stopped him short. Solaufein did not seem conscious of the attention he'd gained with this statement. "Excuse me?" The cambion blurted out, staring at the drow. Solaufein shrugged and distanced himself by retreating to the hold, withdrawing a whetstone, and sharpening one of his daggers. She stared at him as he silently went about this meditative task with growing alarm.

 The General was halfway sure it was another ill-made joke. "Drow are very strange," he commented.

 "I know the feeling," she empathized.

 He didn't engage her further less out of a desire to throttle her and more out of lack of knowledge of what to say. His urge to kill and destroy had been pacified what felt like hours ago, or at least since the market incident. It was easier to tolerate her when she was merely annoying, not threatening.

 "I like your flail!" She was saying. "It's very, um. Shiny." Valen valiantly ignored her oblivious rambling. Much like earlier, it seemed to be a nervous tick for her. Unfortunately, they were stuck on a boat with nothing to do other than sit, talk, or sleep. "So's your armor. It looks like mithral. Er." She still seemed to be struggling for what to say.

 He glanced at her for a moment but didn't meet her eyes. The air grew blissfully silent for a few seconds, before she shattered it again, sharing a more coherently thought-out theory of hers off the cuff: "I've a few theories about how you got involved with these here drow and I promise, only two of them are hilarious. Would you like me to share them and then maybe you can tell me which one is the closest to the truth? That way you wouldn't be telling me anything about yourself, and I'd still have fun rather than standing here trying to talk to the tense air and feeling slightly bored and nauseous on a poison river boat-ride to a flying elf-island because the magical clone of a barmy wizard slapped a geas on me arse."

 Valen gave her the flattest stare in his arsenal and let her endure his silence for just a moment before asking, begrudgingly, "What are they?"

 She literally leapt up into the air and yelped loudly about an inch, drawing the gaze of the others for a moment before they went back to their individual tasks (knife-sharpening, potion-sorting, and psychically but silently directing the boat in Cavallas' case). "Bane's balls, you startled me!" She hissed. "You said nothing for so long." He continued issuing his flat stare until she finished her thought. "Oh, right. My first one is that you're one of the arch-devil's minions, but don't worry it has a happy ending! Because, you see you questioned your purpose when you were sent to spy on the Seer, because you got lost along the way."

 "Lost," he repeated dryly.

 Now that the General had issued the permission that she had apparently needed, Binne went on completely unperturbed. "And then you just sort of had to survive in the Underdark on your own eating safe-smelling, glowing cave fungus that you found growing on the walls, but those all turned out to have psychedelic properties! You tripped out of your mind and into another dimension and were found by the Eilistraeens giggling in a mushroom forest, climbin' up the stalks. An-and then they helped you and took you in and now you defend them because you owe them your life! In my second theory, you're not a minion, well not one of the arch-devil's but you're an escaped slave from the Valsharess' compound - her personal slave, you see. But you were trained in combat at a young age by them and starred in all these gladiatorial arena matches to prove your worth. You were raised by the enemy to be her bodyguard, only for one day she did something suitably evil that I'm sure you could think up rather than me get specific about, you probably have a great imagination, and anyway it made you second guess what you were doing for the first time. So you led a revolt of her men and a few other slaves and although many of you died, quite a few of you got out - and you ran to a place where you knew you'd find mercy, from the Eilistraeens - her sworn enemy - since they're pretty much all right folk from what I can tell."

 Valen was genuinely surprised she had spent as much time on these thoughts as she apparently had, in the brief time since yesterday. She also had a healthy imagination, at least. "And the third?" He asked, after he processed what she had said.

 She blinked and shifted from foot to foot as the riverboat swayed. "Oh yes, right. The third is that something awful must have happened to you," she said plainly.

 ". . . That's it?"

 Binne shrugged. "Aye. Something terrible happened to you and you ran away from it. Or, perhaps it's still chasing you as a shadow does. Some things never leave us no matter how hard we try to leave them, but they aren't all bad because they remind us of who we are and how far we've come. I thought that maybe the Seer makes sense to you in a very strange world in the sort of way Solaufein makes sense to me. They're so bright that they chase the shadows away. So you stick around, even though we're here in a world entirely of shadow in the Underdark, so maybe that shadow metaphor isn't the best one, but it's the best I've got at the present." Having finished her theories, she seemed to be satisfied with herself and took a seat on the deck next to his legs. "So, how close was I? Any of 'em on the mark?" She wondered, looking up at him.

 The General thought about the best way to answer her. Her intuition surprised him and even more surprisingly, he wasn't as irked by her as before, and was finding it easy to talk to her when she made most of the conversational effort. "Your third is the most accurate," he admitted, "though they all held elements of truth."

 She hummed in an appreciative tone. "Indulge me, General," she suggested. "We're on a long and boring float and this is the most conversation I've gotten out of you yet."

 His lips pursed as he thought of what would be safe to say, even as there was a slight hesitation in him at the thought of considering her an enemy. "Many terrible things have happened to me. I have survived in spite of them all. I was trained to kill, or perhaps born into it. I was enslaved. I was lost, and I was found." It was the easiest way to summarize his life, not that he'd ever been in the position before of having to do so. It was strange thinking of such experiences and distilling them into points; his past had never felt distant, only removed by a scant few years. He didn't even know how old he was. There were more unknowns than knowns.

 Binne was silent for a while. When he looked down, he saw her gaze fixated on something distant and unseen and her hands fiddling nervously with a necklace that was clasped at her throat of a large and simply carved black stone. "Ah, I was hoping it would be the first one," she offered in a wistful tone. "All those mushrooms would've been fun to eat, at least."

 "It might have been a kinder fate," Valen conceded. "I have heard that arch-fiends reward their minions that are useful to them." Thinking about the devil again, even if it was inadvertent this time, made him recall his earlier suspicions. Though after speaking to her, he was half-convinced she wasn't really anybody's minion other than maybe Solaufein's. She had a good imagination but didn't strike him as cunning enough.

 The reflexive glare from the thought seemed to trigger something in Binne that straightened her spine. "I'm no one's minion," she spoke quietly, her voice hiding a faint tremble.

 Valen frowned. "I didn't say you were."

 "But you implied it," she spat.

 "I implied no such thing," he growled right back. "You have twisted your own meaning."

 She rose from her seated position to glare at him properly. "Well whatever the bloody meaning is, you can take your suspicions and—I don't know, go feed 'em to the River! And then toss yourself in after if you like! Or just keep them all to yourself and go somewhere else on the damn boat, that'd be better. I don't really need them, and I've got plenty enough of them as it is!" She grumbled under her breath more or less continuously as she stalked away toward the hold and stomped down the stairs into the darkness, even though she'd been the one to tell him to leave. What exactly she was expecting to do down there was a little beyond him as it held nothing other than their gear, but that was her business.

 The General was feeling confused and irritated about the entire conversation when Solaufein approached him a few moments later, replacing his companion's place at the railing as he stared down at the rushing Dark River. "General," the drow greeted, sounding relaxed in all the ways Valen wasn't capable of being. Valen nodded without replying, turning his gaze to the river. "You are in a fine mood," Solaufein commented. "I hope it will not interfere should we encounter combat."

 "No, it will not," the tiefling assured. "The cambion—"

 Solaufein's interruption was rather graceful, "Her name is Binne."

 "She," Valen emphasized bitingly, "is very . . . Irritating."

 "She senses your suspicion," Solaufein assessed easily. His leather and armored scales creaked as the boat rose up dramatically over a larger swell, and then gently floated back down almost soundlessly. "And subtlety is not your strength," he criticized, and some amusement leaked into his tone.

 The hackles on the tiefling rose at this. "I have the right to be suspicious," he defended. Why everyone was so insisting on giving him grief over perfectly justifiable mistrust was beyond him, and it grated at him that everyone seemed to be trying.

 Solaufein surprised him, though. "You would be a fool not to be," he calmly went on. "Where you stand, I now represent a threat to your power."

 Like the Seer, he had a way of verbally cutting to the heart of a matter. Valen frowned at the drow's frank observation of his own circumstances. "I'm not worried about my power. I don't have power," the tiefling corrected.

 The drow turned away from the water to regard Valen with dark-wine eyes. "You should be. You do. The Seer trusts in you. This is valuable. You are the General of her forces. Nathyrra has spoken to me of how you have earned their respect. My people are suspicious by nature, and our respect is not given lightly. You have earned theirs. And I have arrived, earning nothing, but have been given everything that you bled for."

 This was making him uncomfortable. "I admit that I am . . . " Valen began, unsure. "Perhaps a little resentful of the idea of you issuing commands over my head. I will honor the Seer's decisions, whatever they may be. I have no problem accepting commands from you."

 Solaufein's hand fell to Enserric's hilt in a hauntingly familiar gesture. Now that he wasn't puking on the temple floor, it was clear to see that Solaufein never completely let his guard down except around those he trusted most - inexplicably, this was the kobold and the cambion. Valen's hand had never strayed from Devil's Bane for more than a few inches since he'd inherited the flail from Grimash't. "I was the weapon master of Despana, First House of Ust'Natha," the drow confessed, unknowingly ending Imloth and Nathyrra's bet. "All that I have ever commanded has been burnt to ash, and glad I am for it. This is not a burden I take lightly; neither is it my desire to command forces into any sort of battle in the future. I work better in . . . Smaller groups. I am hoping to persuade the Seer to change her mind."

 Valen snorted at that. "Good luck. She's more stubborn than I am."

 Solaufein straightened as if to walk off, but then returned his gaze to the General with a weirdly attentive expression. "Have you ever been to the surface?" He queried.

 He wasted a moment's considering before deciding that it was fair to reciprocate, when Solaufein had been nothing but forthright with him. "Not entirely. I'm from Sigil. A place called the Hive. I've been all over the Abyss and the Hells in the Blood Wars, and most recently the Underdark, but I haven't explored the top of prime. I've seen images, read stories of strange places. What little I have seen in the Seer's grove is beautiful, but I didn't venture out." Buried somewhere inside of Valen was a suffocating explorer.

 "It is worth venturing. May I offer you my advice, General?" Solaufein's question was respectfully given, and the General had no doubt that if he said no, the drow would politely withdraw.

 "Speak your mind, please," Valen said, as his respect rose more for the man.

 "My kin are reviled on the surface," he began to relate. "In some places we are killed on sight if we walk undisguised. It is not so different for those of demonic heritage as Binne and yourself are, yet there are a few bastions where all may be welcome and prosper. Waterdeep is one of the largest amongst them. Binne was not raised in a world predisposed to be kind to fiendlings, by two loving humans that I have come to understand possessed unnatural patience, for they tried to raise her well, save perhaps instilling in her an unhealthy yearning for trouble. She likely irks you so because she is very curious about you. I have only met one other tiefling in my life who also was from Sigil, but he was your polar opposite in manner. I know from him that Sigil City is sprawling, raucous, and home to every kind of life form that there is. Someone like you would not stick out in a crowd, there. It is not so here. Your kind are not unheard of on the surface but are very rare. Half-demons are rarer still, known usually to be in positions of demonic hierarchy and are generally hated as manipulative and evil by reputation. My understanding is that Binne's demonic parentage is a mystery, and the only other individual of any demonic characteristics she has interacted with in her entire life - save you - is her deceased twin brother. She has never lived in any other worlds, unlike us."

 Valen's response was as dry as the desert, not that he'd ever seen one in person. "And that is your advice?"

 Solaufein's response and subsequent eye roll were equally dry. Maybe even dry-er. "No, my advice is to try calling her by her actual name next time, to glare less not more, and to be grateful for the fact that she is only manipulative, and not evil." The drow left the General to mull it over, stepping over to Deekin to check on the kobold's progress on the potion distribution. He had to give that Solaufein was nothing if not fair; everybody else had either been dismissing or outright criticizing his concerns over the newcomers. Here, the drow had validated him and then pointed out the ways he might improve, the way the Seer might, with a patient hand. Valen was damned if that didn't irritate him almost as much as the others' semi-nonsensical ramblings.

 The island where the surface elves had been spotted was a few hours journey by Cavallas' boat. Valen had heard that duergar were able to sometimes navigate the dark river, but he didn't yet know how they went about it. Cavallas stood still on the prow, stiller than stone but for the fluttering of his old robe about his feet. Somehow, telepathically, or telekinetically, the boat was being guided with the proper current. Just sniffing the boatman was enough reason for Valen to never question the how or why of it.

 The rest of the trip passed mostly in silence. At some point, the General managed to get shut-eye above deck, lulled to sleep by the lapping of water and awoken an hour later by the crash of it startling him. When he came to, he realized everyone had already geared up as Cavallas had alerted them to the presence of land.

 Somehow (and he really didn't want to know how), the boat was pulled into a gentle shore. "They have shores down here?" The cambion blurted out at the sight of black, rocky sand giving way to the water. "Huh! And real islands! You have it all!" It sounded like an odd compliment that she directed to the Underdark in general, than anyone specific.

 The drow wasted no time as the boat carefully pulled into the rocky shoreline and ground to a halt by Cavallas' will. "We have arrived," the boatman intoned just as Solaufein leapt off of it and onto the shore.

 Valen followed shortly after. Feeling vaguely nauseous after spending so much time inhaling fumes from a poison river caused him to momentarily stumble upon landing, and then nearly fall over when the kobold practically leapt onto his back and was startled to meet his feet with mithral plate. He managed to pull the kobold in and not fall over, but it was rather embarrassing altogether. From his periphery he saw the drow grab Binne's hand as she leapt off and gave a hearty wave to the boatman behind her.

 "Bye, Reaper's Cousin! Don't leave us stranded!" Deekin called after bafflingly, also waving. More baffling was the mimicked wave that Cavallas gave back to them from the boat.

 "He won't," Valen assured everyone when Cavallas said nothing. "You'll have to trust me on that."

 "I will wait for the Wayfarer, until death parts us," Cavallas assured in his hollow, un-assuring voice.

 "Positively bone-chilling," Binne chirped as she straightened her belt. "You really do attract the strangest people, Solaufein."

 "Good enough," Solaufein decided. His eyes glowed as he peered into the solid darkness ahead of them. "That is more a criticism of you, if you are the one attracted to me. Now quiet, I see a cavern." He wasted no time and marched off into the dark as they closely followed.

 Having not seen them in action, he had his doubts. Being overwhelmed by Halaster and the forces of the Valsharess hadn't exactly assured him of the group's prowess, and until he saw them sufficiently tested he vowed he would retain to those doubts. Socially, the group had a dynamic that reminded him much of the Eilistraeens, who would often jest and tease each other with familiarity. He'd been angry the first time they'd subjected him to the same treatment until he understood it did not come from a place of malice and was a filial initiation (so it had been described to him by Nathyrra, who continued to have the most difficulty between them of adjusting). Solaufein and his allies seemed to talk much and accomplish little from what he had seen. He told himself to trust Nathyrra's judgment, but without her presence as a reminder, it was all too easy to ignore that voice of reason. Especially with the smell of devil's blood so close by; it bothered him only in moments, not constantly, but it was an insistent and nagging reminder of something he'd rather not have.

 The shore had been narrow, with rocky outcroppings and cliffs that led to a cave. Though Valen could see reasonably well in the dark, he was glad to have the drow leading the group; any kind of eyesight was no match for the ability to detect traces of heat. The cavern narrowed into a crevice that Binne offered to send her imp through first; one invisibility and darkvision spell from the kobold later (who performed spells by singing them, though he thankfully refrained from using the cymbals strapped to his pack) and Hembercane, the most sullen and dour familiar Valen had ever encountered scurried his way into the dark.

 He emerged a few minutes later out of invisibility, looking fully disgruntled as he always did. "There is a town of backward, dirty, winged elven peasants up ahead," the imp reported to his master with a withering, although ineffectual glare. "They reek of death and disease. I found an ambush of nine drow led by another red-clad priestess."

 "There do seem to be a lot of those lurking about," Binne recalled as she tapped a finger against her lip. "Better question is, can my arse fit through that crevice?"

 Solaufein assessed her, up and down, and Valen found his eyes following the same curves against their volition. Her tail twitched. ". . . There is always the relic," Solaufein demurred.

 Valen's crimson eyebrows knitted in confusion as Binne's dark ones crawled toward her hairline in comprehension. "Aye, then the imp could carry us - or Deekin!"

 The General didn't really fully understand what was going on until it had already happened, and he was processing the aftermath. A few seconds went by, and then Solaufein's arm had snaked out to grab his as he grasped something in his palm, and abruptly the world went white and gray.

 Valen stumbled, feeling the need to regain his balance despite never leaving solid ground. His tail lashed angrily out at his sudden disorientation; the drow and the cambion had taken a step back. All around him was what looked like an endless white and gray fog, and a light source that seemed to emanate throughout. This was not the Prime, and a part of him knew it instinctively. There was a scent in the air that caught him by surprise since he'd only experienced it once - it was a change in the air content native to Limbo. "What is this?" He demanded. While he didn't believe this was an attack, he wanted to believe it.

 "This place belongs to him," and Solaufein pointed to something that was unidentifiably the angelic version of Cavallas, in the same kind of ratty robe. Valen approached the figure which stood some distance away, surrounded on all sides by doors that stood upright of various make and wooden frames. It would be an otherworldly sight to anyone that wasn't planar. "It seemed easier to show you than to explain."

 Valen snorted. "Is this Cavallas' cousin?"

 Binne's eyes sparkled in amusement as she chuckled, emitting a flash of white teeth. "We don't know! He won't say! Resemblance is uncanny though."

 The General's shoulders eased, although more questions than ever popped up in his mind. "You own a way to travel to your own private dimension on Limbo," he realized. He took in the doors all around them, all closed but each one radiating different smells and auras. "This is a nexus . . . To other realms!" This was the exact kind of thing he'd sought out all those years ago when he ran from Grimash't to the Seer. Escaping Hell would have been easy for him in such a case; instead, he'd had to go the old fashioned way by portal-hunting.

 "You are quick," Solaufein complimented, "but it would be better to say I have found a way, than own."

 "This realm belongs to the bearer of the relic," the Reaper intoned from behind him in Cavallas' voice. It spooked him a little, and he nearly drew his flail on reflex. "I serve its master."

 "And whom is your master?" Valen pressed, looking for a more specific name or answer. It was like Cavallas, with strange gray speckled wings that sprouted out of its back, and Valen was willing to bet it had a colorful and untold history. No planar being got caught itself up in some kind of planar nexus without something terrible happening along the way.

 The Reaper didn't hesitate, though. "The bearer of the relic," he intoned.

 "It's a hunk of rock with some gems in it, looks gnomish or something to me," Binne offered. "It didn't smell like a curse, if that's what you're thinking."

 He could feel a growl developing in his chest, somewhere, due to his irritation. "Word of advice," he gritted out, "straight from the Hive: don't play with portals. And warn me next time! How do we get out of here?"

 Solaufein inclined his head toward the Reaper, whose cowl dipped in a nod. With a wave of a skeletal hand, the creature dismissed them from the plane. In a flash of light, they were on the other side of the crevice with a grumbling Hembercane and Deekin. Solaufein plucked the relic from Deekin's outstretched hand - it was surprisingly small, a black piece with a few carefully carved gems embedded inside that appeared to be adjustable by twisting and turning them. It fit comfortably and flatly enough in the palm of one's hand. Solaufein, with little care, dumped the artifact into his boot. "Where is this ambush?" The drow directed his question at the imp.

 "In your boot?" Valen couldn't help but criticize. It seemed an odd place for such a valuable artifact.

 Solaufein blinked. "Where else?"

 "A pocket? The bag of holding? A pocket? It's a reckless place to keep such a valuable artifact. Think of what the Valsharess could use it for?"

 "Probably conquer the world a lot faster," the drow reasoned, reasonably, "but I have tossed it away at sea and it showed up in my pack a minute later. It is attached to me through some unknown magic. You should worry less."

 The General's expression did not imply he would be taking Solaufein's suggestion. Thankfully, he didn't have a lot of time to muddle in his suspicion for much longer as the ambush of the enemy ambushers was about to take place. After questioning the imp on the enemy's positioning, Binne cast a spell on Solaufein with an abyssal rasp and Solaufein quaffed an invisibility potion just as Deekin turned his face toward the ceiling and barked out a spell - singing it, at the top of his lungs. Luckily, that was the whole point - drawing the attention of the foot soldiers who would investigate the noise, or the bleeding of Valen's ears would have all been for nothing.

 Four had been sent to investigate the heinous noise, and Valen charged around the corner flail-out with a roar to take them on. The first head rolled in the first three seconds of the battle, and the other three didn't even have time to process what had happened because they were too busy fighting the enraged tiefling with their lives. The beast was out of his cage, and in his element.

 Binne, who had charged the same group from not far behind, let out a grimace and kept on running, seeming to think better of the situation. She turned her attention to some of the archers that had started firing upon Valen and pierced one to a wall with an entropic lance. This drew the attention of several others, though they were in turn distracted by Solaufein appearing out of invisibility just as he kicked one of the archers off of his sword, having walked across the walls in the brief time to get there. The drow threw a dagger at one of the others in the shoulders and kept moving onto the next as Binne took out the other.

 Valen had made short work of the four overall, and was already charging the priestess - the most obvious figure cut in red. She was the center of Solaufein's attention as well, since she was currently hurling spells at him that he was having a challenging time dodging or throwing enemy bodies into, and there were still three other archers. A spider seemingly out of nowhere - a giant, ugly sword spider of all things - seemed to be helping them when it occupied a few of the other archers who found their crossbow bolts tipped with spider venom useless against it.

 As the General ran at the priestess who turned to him with wide, almost violet eyes, she was barely able to hold up her shield in time from his flail. Devil's Bane split in two, and thanks to a rather deft wrist flicking it looped itself around her arm inside the shield as he yanked it forward, drawing a pained scream as her arm was pulled out of her socket. She rapidly spat out a healing spell to help with her pain, but the words stumbled her lips as Valen roared and in surge of strength ripped her arm off and flung it away. She stared at her stump in alarm for all of a second before her head turned around completely in its place from a flail-blow, and her body fell to the ground.

 He flicked some of the blood and brain matter off of his flail and took a few bracing breaths, noting the sounds of battle had ceased.

 "Bloody hells," Binne blurted out. "Helluva way to go!"

 "Hah!" Enserric rang out triumphantly, sending red light gleaming out of his depths and spilling onto the cavern floor. "For lack of a better word, an orgy of violence! I say we keep him, wielder."

 "Please do not use that word," Solaufein pleaded quietly with it. "You will give Deekin bad ideas."

 They searched the bodies for valuables, though there was only a few useful things amongst them - a small collection of potions or kits, no weapons that any of them could use or needed but Deekin still managed to fit in his bag of holding somehow . . . And on the priestess' body, in a strange pouch at her belt was nothing but a nondescript shard of mirrored glass.

 They were all frowning at it as Valen held it up for examination. "I don't get it," the General frowned. "It doesn't smell like a magic artifact, but it must be. Why else would she keep it?"

 Binne tilted her face forward and sniffed at it - he didn't jump instinctively, but his tail betrayed his startle at her closeness. "Smells like bad elf."

 Solaufein's left eyebrow rose up, expressively conveying his amusement. "Bad elf?" He repeated.

 The cambion snorted and folded her arms. "Elf gone bad! Bad smelling elf, like if they didn't bathe or like a rotting elf corpse! Surely you've smelt a rotting elf corpse or two before, Solaufein."

 There was a pause of utter silence after this statement. He expected the drow to get angry, or to just stay quiet and stare at her - or for her to express perhaps some shame over this ignorant remark . . . But instead Solaufein tilted his head back and smiled. "I remember that smell. Did you know, I was once trapped in a rotting elf city," he said this somewhat fondly, like he was immersed in a pleasant memory, "while it was on fire?"

 Instead, Valen shared a confused look with the cambion while Deekin plucked the mirror shard right out of his hands and sniffed at it too. "Hmm. Deekin maybe holds onto this, big people not very smart-good at keepings little things safe. Boss dumb enough to put cursed artifact in boot after all."

 Binne's eyes bored into Solaufein. "You're really the oddest person."

 "This, from you?" the drow scoffed.

 "From me!"

 Valen understood well now that they functioned admirably as a unit in battle, but the talking threw him off. He'd never fought amongst a group of people as small as this that actually got along well with each other. Amongst the Eilistraeens, there was some camaraderie in arms, but never around him. They always stood to attention around him or clammed up. Imloth was the only one of them that seemed comfortable enough to make jokes at his expense. Here, they worked about as well as capable soldiers, but none of them stood to attention. The respect was unspoken. It was the first thing about them that he had found truly refreshing, and it put him a little more at ease.

 They made their way into the strange elf-town. The General had to be talked into it when the entrance appeared to be an empty archway in the middle of the cavern that led to nowhere, and it set every invisible hackle on his neck on end. Like an angry cat, he had to be cajoled into it by convincing everyone to walk around it without having to entirely explain why; the three seemed to share the opinion that it was better to indulge him in his suspicions than try to question him about them. He was pretty firmly convinced that they were all still minions of the arch-devil - but he wasn't entirely sure whether or not they knew that they were. As he'd said before, it had Baator written all over it. (He kept telling himself this up until they found the third mirror shard. That's when he started questioning his judgment - when he watched Solaufein curse at the ceiling in rage as he dug through refuse to try to find one hunk of maybe mysterious metal that might help the Seer - or at the least frustrate the Valsharess a lot that she hadn't found it first. It was a lot of effort to go through for a potentially minimal payoff.)

 The island they'd arrived at soon proved itself to be a nightmare. There were winged elves, but they were disheveled and confused. They spoke in half-random riddles, their logic was circular, and it was clear within a few seconds of talking to any one of them that they were all the victims of some terrible curse.

 "Yes, but why are you here?" Solaufein had pressed, looking more annoyed with the diseased and tattered looking avariel in front of him. The tiny, bony elf's wings dragged on the ground, but his expression was jubilant and oblivious.

 "Why are . . . We like it down here!" He repeated dumbly.

 "Please stop asking him that question," the cambion pleaded with the drow.

 Solaufein threw up his hands, cursed in Ilythiiri, and stalked off in frustration. The little male avariel with disheveled, greasy green hair and tattered wings blinked. And blinked again, in silence. They all had no choice but to follow Solaufein, who had calmly stalked off in the avariel's silence and approached the first building he saw. He walked up a few steps in tried the door and made a surprised noise when it was unlocked. Startled, the careless drow wandered in, and Valen hurried not wanting to have to tell the Seer later that he couldn't stop the drow from stepping into a trap in time and that was why the Savior's head was in a bag past the point of resurrection.

 Thankfully, it wasn't trapped. The first building, where they had found the second mirror shard, was a library. A large one, that was partially on fire because whatever curse afflicted them all (as the librarian's husband was happy to inform them, for whatever reason) afflicted his wife peculiarly, turning her once-beautiful visage into that of a medusa. The medusa woman in fact did have a shard of the mirror on her person, something that mysteriously (most likely a wizard's fault) wound up in her boudoir the morning everyone and everywhere changed. He didn't want her to have it since she looked into it and it seemed to upset her, and Deekin was all too happy to help out.

 Deekin, of all people (who Valen was starting to suspect was the brains of this entire operation) had a way to immunize himself from turning to stone, a carryover from a previous misadventure with a medusa that had been a great enemy of Solaufein's - he hadn't read the book, he wasn't sure - but everyone was pretty grateful to stand aside and let him handle it. Both the drow and cambion seemed amused, if anything, by Valen's concern over Deekin's safety.

 From the doorway into the library proper, they could see the medusa's form slowly throwing books on a bonfire that had started to smoke the room out. Why was anyone's guess; the curse appeared to make people do incredibly strange things. Rather than try to get it off her person, they watched as the kobold tapped the medusa from behind and engaged her in a polite conversation, and simply asking for the shard at the end of it. They watched this work to some amazement, though it was more appropriate to say that Valen was the only one amazed that at the kobold's usefulness; Solaufein and Binne spoke unconcernedly of other things with one another in low undertone.

 "I will bet my sword that this is Halaster's fault somehow," Solaufein was whispering.

 "You think everything is Halaster's fault somehow," Binne accused, much louder; she didn't seem to have a volume control for her voice.

 "Because it almost always is!" The drow insisted.

 And by the time they had the third part, Solaufein was solidly convinced in his theory that everything, everywhere, was the dread wizard of Undermountain's fault. It was clear no one could convince him otherwise. After Deekin retrieved the second shard, Binne stumbled into yet another argument with a belligerent merchant that wanted to sell nothing to anyone. Bespelled as the dirty avariel man was, he was nonetheless incredibly lazy and seemed unconcerned with profit whatsoever. It became clear after a few moments that he did have a piece of the mirror secreted somewhere, but he wasn't inclined to part with it for anything of actual value.

 "Stop," Solaufein suggested to Binne, and began to rifle around his pockets. His eyes lit up when he emerged with a piece of pocket lint that he placed in the merchant's outstretched hand. "Is that worth the mirror shard?"

 The ex-merchant's nose curled up. "Not even close!" Solaufein's face fell.

 "I have some dirt in my boot," Valen volunteered. "Is that worth less?"

 "Only if you take back the lint," the merchant demanded. Solaufein did so with a glare and Valen emptied out the sandy contents of his left boot while Binne's nose curled up. He felt his cheeks flaming against his will as he put the boot back on.

 The merchant, as it turned out, didn't have the shard on his person . . . But had a way to locate it with a talisman that he gave the increasingly annoyed Solaufein. The talisman had vibrated in in the drow's hands when they approached it . . . And found it with the town's pile of rubbish.

 While Deekin made the excuse of needing to update his notes and pulled out his journal and sat down on the dirty cave floor, Valen and Binne stood by each other and hovered, feeling a little useless as Solaufein - since he was holding the pendant - was the only one who could really find the shard. The drow had begun cursing under his breath and kicked some trash around to see what was under it.

 And so, Valen questioned the source of his doubts. Was it rooted in his past? Or were his experiences tempering his present, alerting him to something others didn't see?

 "You have a lovely constellation of freckles on your nose," Binne chattered next to him, distracting him completely. "Did you know that? About yourself? I suppose you must not look in a mirror very often, you don't seem to me as a vain man."

 The comment came from out of nowhere and stopped him up short. His brow crinkled as he tried to decipher her exact aim.

 "I swear on Hem's lopsided skull that I will put a dunch in your composure, General Shadowbreath, if it's the last thing I do," she vowed neatly. After enduring his confused silence for a short while longer, she sighed. "Why do you hate m—"

 She had started to ask the self-deprecating question, but he interrupted her with one of his own: "Why are you here?" He couldn't help but wonder.

 Her subsequent, deflated silence was unexpected. "You don't think I should be here?" For such a tall, horned, red-skinned devil-woman with such a large personality, the question seemed very meek and small from her lips.

 The General quickly reordered his thoughts, trying to salvage the conversation. It wasn't his strong point at all. "It isn't that," he said carefully and slowly, "and it shouldn't matter what I think. You . . . Must understand that you're a cambion. You're also from Prime, and that confuses me a lot. Most of my encounters with others of your kind have been hostile." All of them were, but she didn't need to know that. He thought of what to tell her without giving her anything she could use against him in the future. "I fought for countless years against your kind in the Blood Wars. Only one of power like yours would have enough intelligence and strength to marshal enemy forces into battle. I'm a person who has spent decades fighting a war against people exactly like you."

 Her reaction was as unexpected as her earlier response had been. She inflated right back up and the sparkle came back to her eyes. "Aw!" She seemed to get the wrong meaning from something he said. "You think I'm intelligent and strong."

 He frowned. "You know that isn't what I said."

 "You know, I bet you have some good horror stories. You'd probably win if we fought though," she admitted freely. "That's a might scary flail you got, and I'm also not that strong. I like to think I get by on mostly blind luck!"

 ". . . I feel confused every time you talk," he admitted honestly with a helpless shrug.

 She grimaced at this. "I've actually been trying to tone down the accent. Is it that bad?"

 Valen shook his head, feeling a few loose strands from his hair fall forward. He brushed them away behind one of his ears and felt the weight of Binne's eyes on his movements. "No, I understand what you're saying - well most of the time - what I mean is, you're not like anyone I've met," he finally managed to settle on the words to describe how he felt, and it was a triumphant sensation. "You don't act, speak, or seem to think at all like any warlock or demon I've ever known. Or anyone I've ever known, really. You're a . . . A combination of contradictions. You're friends with a drow and a kobold and that's not even the oddest thing about you. At first, I thought you really were as haphazard and ridiculous as you pretended to be when you first teleported here, but you more than hold your own in battle."

 As Deekin's quill scratched behind them, Binne let out a squeaking, helpless laugh. "Oi, just wait until we actually trip our way into a fight and see what you say then. That's happened, and I mean literally."

 He didn't doubt it. "You followed Solaufein willingly into the Underdark, which puzzles me," he went on. It wasn't exactly something a sane person would do, but it almost made sense for a demon. "Why? Deekin, I understand, he's a case of hero worship, but why are you here?"

 Binne gave him a quiet and assessing gaze. It was easy to forget the cambion wasn't actually as dumb as she presented herself to be. She just was easily distracted. "It's not really hero worship, for starts," she corrected blithely, "they'd met before. They're very good old friends. Deekin wrote a book about their first adventure together and everything."

 He gave the kobold behind them who was still scritching and scratching with his quill in his journal quietly, studiously. "Nathyrra mentioned that. Have you read it?" Valen asked, finding himself a little curious since it had come up in a few conversations of late.

 She urged him a little closer like she had a secret to tell, and though it grated at him he took a step closer to her. "Er, don't tell him, but I couldn't get past the first chapter," she said, perfectly within earshot of the kobold and why she had bothered trying to make a secret of it was anyone's guess. "Not his fault at all, he's a fine narrator - his editor took the soul out of the whole thing, it was really just . . . dreck. A more literate bard on the surface has promised to help him edit his new one instead. Apparently he wants to write about all this Undermountaindarkvalsharessyshite. I think it'll be a smash, i-in a good way."

 He stared at her. "You . . . have a way of destroying words." 

 It wasn't a compliment, but she took it as one. "It's a gift!"

 "Then you had not met Solaufein before descending Undermountain together?" He pressed.

 She shook her head. "Well, no, that's where we met. But I suppose we're special friends now!"

 "Suppose?"

 Her eyes narrowed at him. "Why are you repeating words I say as if they're questions?"

 But he had to know. "Are you in his debt? Does he owe you something? What do you stand to gain from all of this? You must have some angle."

 This line of questioning didn't seem to impress her at all and she took a step away from him, looking uncomfortable and if he didn't know better a little hurt. "For start? If I had a hidden angle, I'd hardly tell you. And why must debts and gains factor into it? Can't we all simply be friends who occasionally kill people together with benefits?"

 He considered Imloth, the Seer, and Nathyrra, all urging him to give these strangers a chance. How could he, when trusting went against his very nature? He frowned. "It always comes down to power, with your kind. I'm conditioned to think that either he must have power over you, or you over him."

 The cambion pouted but something in her countenance softened. She did not seem offended when she nonetheless criticized, "You're really one to judge, judgyhorns. And if you'll recall, I was also slapped in the tail bone with a geas by two Halasters - two of 'em, Oghma knows why but is keepin' his silence on the matter. I'd probably still be on the frontline in Waterdeep otherwise. I suppose there's many fronts in this war, and digging through trash in a city of mad elves is, er, important work that I'd rather . . ." She trailed off and her gaze found its way to Solaufein, who was still grumbling - louder this time - and rifling through garbage. "Not personally do. Which is why Solaufein's doing it. 'Cause he volunteered." 

 They both paused in their discussion to watch the drow in morbid fascination for a moment. It underlined the moment. "It's not a judgment of mine," Valen eventually defended once his brain remembered what it was supposed to be doing, "just an observation drawn over decades that most devils are conniving and only out for themselves in the universe, and their own advancement. They'd step on anyone to get ahead."

 "Generalizations won't help you here," she suggested with a smile and then laughed at her own joke. "Heh, get it? General?"

 General Shadowbreath was not amused, and also had to make sure that Imloth never interacted with Binne, ever. "You confuse me," he repeated. "You all defy many expectations, but he . . ." Solaufein abruptly threw back his head and growled 'FUCK!' at the ceiling in anger, throwing a piece of garbage at the wall as it hit the cave wall with a slimey thud. The two fiendlings watched with straight faces, although Binne did let out a snort at the sight. "He, I at least feel like I understand," Valen finished.

 Binne began to murmur a few indecipherable phrases under her breath that were decidedly not abyssal but decidedly were insulting. "Oh whatever, stuff it. I like Solaufein, not possessively, just honestly I like him and I think he's a good sort," she snapped. "He saved my life in Undermountain. I got, er, captured. By rakshasa . . . And sold into slavery to some ogres. I was a midwife to them for—for a long time and cooked the adventurers that didn't make it as far as I did up for them to eat. They slapped a collar on me that removed my magic and took—wh, oi, are you laughing at me?"

 No he wasn't. His smirk was just twitching. That was all. "No. Yes," he admitted, "it's hard and . . . A little entertaining to imagine you as an ogre midwife."

 She snapped, and her voice echoed off the cavern walls making him wince: "Well, it happened! And they took all my things, so I was naked as a bird the entire time!" She winced and seemed to rethink her volume after processing what she had just admitted. "So, if you're picturing it now, let me also mention I was starving for months. Or . . . years, I don't know, down there in my skivvies deliverin' nasty babies and cooking up halfling stew. So maybe add that to your imagination too. And that's how Solaufein found me - malnourished in the nude and enslaved to ogres by a magic-repressing torc, and I was completely at his mercy. I promised I'd show him how to get farther into the dungeon if he freed me, and he kept his word. He fed and clothed me and never once looked at me funny excepting when I earned it for being an idiot. He looks after his own and has never once described me as the 'devil girl with horns and claws.'" As she drawled, her expression became pensive. "So, yes, I follow Solaufein, because he treats me like I'm his equal and has never looked down on me," she concluded. "Although my height makes that difficult, but you know what I mean! And there's the why of it, so you can take your paranoia and shove it somewhere the sun don't shine. Which, I suppose is everywhere around here since we're in the Underdark . . . But also up your arse!"

 The General blinked startled blue eyes, mulling over her heated defense. "That explains much . . . Thanks. You've given me a lot to think about." And re-think about, he silently added, and turned to see how Solaufein's search was coming along but stopped himself short to regard her again. "Also, I don't hate you," he corrected gently. The cambion snorted rather than respond. "Why should I hate you, Binne?"

 "Because I annoy you?" Her upset morphed into another smile that spread across her face. "Hey, you're using my name now! I've graduated from cambion to my name. I feel privileged!"

 The General hadn't noticed the slip up. It felt natural. "You annoy Solaufein far more than I, and he doesn't hate you whatsoever," Valen pointed out. "You shouldn't . . . Do not mistake my suspicion for hatred. You'd have to do a lot to earn that."

 Binne squinted at him. "Well, you're always givin' me the stink-eye so that'd be why I assumed you hated me. A perfectly natural assumption, I think."

 The idea of an eye stinking put a lot of mental images in his mind that he didn't really want. "What?" He asked, not really wanting to know where that particular idiom had come from.

 "The stinky, gnarly, hairy eyeball?" Even worse mental pictures popped up. "That cantankerous scowl that's permanently afixed to your pretty face?" At this remark, he did start scowling as if on cue. "Oh, Valen, has no one ever told you that your resting face is a fantastic brood? I want to paint it, if only I knew even the slightest shit about painting," she confessed a little wistfully.

 He glared at her. "I don't have a—ugh. Annoying someone isn't a good enough reason to despise them." He decided changing the subject was the best way to stop picturing creepy eyeballs with hair growing out of them. It seemed like his options were to dig through garbage or indulge Binne a conversation. "At first I was suspicious of you because of your heritage, but someone pointed out to me that would be hypocritical. You're the first half-devil I've met on the Prime that hasn't tried to kill me. I should remember that the Seer chose to trust all of you, and asked I give you the benefit of the doubt. I simply haven't known you long enough to trust you with more." The more he talked, the more like digging through the avariel trash with the drow seemed like a better idea, so he walked off to check up on Solaufein's progress. His jaw was beginning to hurt. Even Imloth didn't make him talk that much.

 It wasn't altogether bad, though. Solaufein did nonetheless find the mirror shard, and as unpleasant as his mood was likely to be until he next had a bath, after seeing more and more of the cursed city Valen was beginning to understand that this mirror - if it was indeed responsible for these peoples' fate - was too powerful to be left alone, where the Valsharess might happen on it. If the worst thing Valen had to suffer through to get the artifact was a few uncomfortable conversations, it was an easy price to pay to keep it out of the arch-devil's path. While Solaufein grumbled and cursed in his native tongue, Binne managed to pull him out of his slump.

 Since she was momentarily in charge while the drow was busy lamenting his hygiene, Valen found his lips curving in a faint smile in amusement to Binne. "Well, since the savior is preoccupied, where to now, milady?" He asked her civilly.

 The half-devil was shocked, but unguardedly delighted with the olive branch and flashed a brilliant smile. Haltingly, with darkening cheeks, she repeated, "Milady?" In a high, bewildered voice. She cleared her throat and it was back to its natural tone. "W-well, I suppose we should go fetch him before he kills someone else's son by accident . . . And then maybe check out that temple over yon, it smells. . ." She sniffed in its general direction across the cavern. "A bit off."

 A bit off was one word for it. His mind would come back to that last smile of the cambion's in that moment of unguarded and unexpected delight; it flitted into his mind and lingered when she fell, shaking and shivering in his arms as they set foot in the avariel's city's broken temple. Everything about the building set him on edge the moment they stepped in, but his gut reaction wasn't fast enough to prevent anything. In a shattered remnant of a temple hat belonged to a once-bright sky goddess, corrupted by the poison of Talona, an emaciated Talontar had raised his gaze to all of them - flying first over Solaufein and then fixedly on the half-devil as he pointed straight to her, with a wicked smile on his pale lips. "Talona blesses her," he rasped. "Praise be to our Pestilent Mistress!" The ragged elf drew his arms to the ceiling, turning his face upward to where the sun wasn't in beatific joy.

 Solaufein's brows drew together in anger as Enserric was ripped out of his sheath, and the drow stalked to the priest while Valen tried to help Binne stand with the kobold's largely useless assistance. He was closest, the one there in time, but the sudden nearness still set his hackles on end. "Them freckles," she muttered as she stared up at his nose with bleary eyes, and became limp, dead weight.

Drow-to-Common Dictionary:

Ele zhah ol zuch . . . Why is it always mad wizards?

Siyo, xsa mina jal . . . A pox on all their Houses!

Zhal udos toss mina . . . Come on they're like wet kittens, can't I just toss them in the river?

Nindolen ph'udossta . . . Dammit man, these are our guests!

Elgg uns'aa . . . Kill me now

Treemma naut, a l'elam . . . By the power of Girl, you shall live

Do'zil al? Dos gracel . . . We go to the same church and you didn't even tell me

 Xal usstan tel . . . ttyl?

Udos inbal mzilt ulu . . . Good night, sleep tight, don't let the bed bugs bite because they're actually stag beetles and they WILL kill you

Alulove, Malla . . . Ciao, bella.

Rivvin . . . Idiot surfacers

Dek'za . . . A company of jackasses, which in Alaska is colloquially called a jackalope - and this is true, you can trust me