The Drow Queen of Glaley [Very NSFW]

[Coquette Blacquin]

Coquette's face softens in tenderness, and she kisses Zevran's hand. "Alright, then. I will allow you to go first. Just this once."

[Claudia Emerison]

Zevran's smiles warms, gratitude and affection giving new life to the tired look. He caresses her chin with his thumb as she kisses him, glancing aside briefly towards Claudia. The merikos gnome isn't even attempting to hide the glimmer of tears or her sniffle as she watches all of this. "You two are so blessed to have each other," she says quietly. "Cherish it. Guard it. And trust each other. Gods." 

[Coquette Blacquin]

Problems on the home front? wonders Coquette, but she's too cynical and caught up in her own history to say anything. Instead she strokes Zevran's hair, gently, and nods again. "Yes," she says quietly. "I shall."


Tea is sent for: a mushroom and green tea blend popular with both the gnomes and the Drow, and thus making it appropriate for entertaining outsiders. There are also honied ants, a favorite of Coquette's, and fermented beans on toast, something that is an acquired taste but that both of them have had occasion to acquire. Within the hour, the diviner is received, having been attending to some other business but having been able to pause to attend to this bit of important business. 

The diviner is a wisened old gnome, one who had a wealth of knowledge and insight before she had occasion to learn Drow techniques. Now she is doubly trained and doubly powerful, the kind of person adventurers might seek out to begin their quest or conclude it, the kind of person who ends up touching many strands of fate but starring in none. Neshim, she is called. 

The price is paid: first, some gold from Claudia to the diviner, Claudia having been given a pair of expensive pearl earrings from the little trappings Isabela stole from Coquette's bedroom as they escaped. Secondly, the price for the spell: Zevran's blood, dripped into the ink that will be used to draw the family tree. The pain begins immediately, but he clenches his teeth against it and refuses to. make a sound, to frighten his wife. She holds his hand anyway. 

[Claudia Emerison]

Draw the air in. Expel slowly, steadily. Draw the air in. Expel slowly, steadily. Zevran had not lied about having suffered worse in the past; the pain from the ritual was bad, but it's a false pain. Despite what his body screams, Zevran knows that he's unharmed, knows that once the pain ends, he'll be completely fine. That normally isn't enough to make a difference for someone, as the body can be very loud in such matters, but Zevran has been magically tortured so often that his body has learned to trust his mind's promises. Mostly. The feel of Coquette's hand over his own is very much welcome anyway.

"Tobias huh?" Claudia comments conversationally as the parchment finally starts to bloom with writing. "I like it." Tobias Wheats of Berrybrooke. Something tells me he was a wheat farmer. And I see why Zevran uses that title instead. Grandparents both look like human farmer types as well, and so do-- wait, why isn't his matrilineal line showing up? "Neshim, is--" She cuts off, eyes widening, as the entire right half of the parchment rips itself into thin curls of paper. "Oh. Umm. That's, uh, that's..." She clears her throat, then comments very loudly and a touch shrilly, "such a shame you don't have a mother. Ever. Never existed. By law."

[Coquette Blacquin]

"Indeed," says Neshim, dryly. "Will that be all?"

Coquette takes a deep breath, lets it out. "No. Mine as well, if you please."

Neshim gives her a skeptical glance, but shrugs, taking the payment from Claudia and beginning the ritual. 

Coquette does not scream. But the pain is sharper, more intense than she feared. It's not worse than the pain of childbirth -- she screamed then, both times, not that Cindy recalls either time -- but it's sharper, more clear, more focused than the pain that came in waves and threatened to break her hips in half. She'd needed magical healing after what Segunda did to her, and her special mental abilities are the only reason she was able to make a full recovery so quickly after her 12-pound baby girl threatened to come out breech. This isn't pain like thunder, roaring over the hills and drowning out all sound; this is pain like lightning that doesn't stop, bright and clear and burning. 

She shuts her eyes tight, squeezing Zevran's hand despite herself. So she doesn't see the names going down on the parchment, barely notes Claudia reading them out. 

[Zevran]

When the pain cuts off, the sudden halt a cut nearly as sharp as the pain itself was, she realizes that Zevran has his arms wrapped around her from behind. He's pinning her own arms in place at the elbows, a hold that's non-damaging to the captive, but doesn't prevent her from elbowing him as she abruptly realizes she had done repeatedly. A steady stream of crooned endearments and other support flows from Zevran's lips. Across the room, she can see Claudia and Neshim in a furious, whispered argument, the teifling Lo'Quin standing in the doorway with her hand raised to the side but not yet actually casting. 

"Love? Are you-- are you back with me?" Zevran whispers after a few seconds, evidently realizing she's finally free of the ritual's grasp.

[Coquette Blacquin]

"Yes," she gasps, a sigh mostly of relief and some embarrassment. "What did I miss?" Where did I go? I'm not sure who was out -- I hope I didn't say anything embarrassing.

[Zevran]

"Oh not much," Zevran says glibly, his hold her shifting to an embrace. "A fair bit was Ced but you were very stoic." He kisses the skin behind her ear, nuzzling her with his nose afterwards. "We did have an interesting surprise however. For instance, did you know your mother was a teifling?  And her father a pureblood drow... was happened to be in life the revered and much loved brother to Matriarch Feythal herself?"

[Coquette Blacquin]

"A... what? No, that can't be right. My mother was an elf." She pauses. "Perhaps a Drow in disguise? But certainly no Tiefling!"

[Zevran]

"...that's the only thing you heard?" he asks with an amused huff. And another kiss, because... well, because.

[Coquette Blacquin]

"If the mother is wrong her lineage must be wrong as well."

[Zevran]

"...or it's not wrong," Zevran suggests gently. 

[Coquette Blacquin]

"If my mother was a tiefling my father would have had nothing to do with her. He hates the lesser races. The outsiders, the bestial ones..."

[Zevran]

Zevran is quiet a moment, his presence suddenly feeling... awkward? Almost embrassed? "Ah... Coquette. The ritual, it-- Well, Claudia did mention that it can be blocked by certain magics, no? Well, it was. Or rather, it was blocked, it almost killed you and the ritualist both, then Claudia shed her blood, which caused the protections to drop around the Matriarch's, ah, node or whatever, on the parchment. During that struggle, however, it attempted to... Well, the ritual wanted to succeed and when it could not go more back, it... smooshed outwards." Where is he going with-- "Your father has had thirty-six children," he finally blurts out. "You, your sister and two others are the only living ones." The only four to reach adulthood and four of eight that made it to their first birthday. And given only you, an unnamed and likely stillborn son and she were from your mother...

[Coquette Blacquin]

She looks at him blankly for a moment. "That's not possible. My mother has only had three children. No, it.... just by sheer numbers, no-one could... well, I suppose if a man... you're saying that he... that's... extremely excessive. It's not as though he can't afford womb-chill for his-- unless he doens't... unless they weren't..."

She shakes her head, rubbing at it for a moment. "Alright," she says, in a much gruffer tone. "Taken as given for now. You're saying my great-aunt is the Matriarch?"