The Drow Queen of Glaley [Very NSFW]

[Coquette Blacquin]

"Ah, very good. I can speak fluent common, Low Dr-- Undercommon, and Gnomish, but Elven might be a problem as you indicated, and the Draconic is also.. difficult, for me. I would have to undertake a very different mindset to be able to speak it well, which would interfere with my remembering Drow customs and culture. I do feel confident that I can understand at a basic level the High Drow she may speak to me."

[Zevran]

"Would I be allowed to translate for her?" Zevran asks, voice a little tight.

Not noticing, Claudia just nods. "As long as you're just translating; no commentary, no editing."

[Coquette Blacquin]

"Husband?" asks Noire, sharply. "What is your concern?"

[Zevran]

"My apologies," he replies. "Merely unfond memories of the lessons of learning the tongue in question. It's not relevant." Not going to call me out on-- ah. Of course; she'll wait until we're alone to press me on the lie. Sensible and face-saving both.

[Coquette Blacquin]

"Right." She smirks, then. "Perhaps translate into Elven? Or would it be bad to, ah, tweak her nose, in such a manner?"

[Claudia Emerison]

Claudia winces, shaking her head. "That'd be a good ploy with someone a step or two lower down, but not with the Matriarch. Err, and not Lady Beinthalla, her youngest daughter. She's, uh, delicate. In a stabby way.'

"Stabby way," Zevran repeats blandly.

"Yeah..." She laughs weakly. "Rapier for killing, barbed whip for hurting. Or fun... which are kinda the same thing for her? She, ah, she got captured by raiders a few decades ago and, well, she got rescued but..."

[Coquette Blacquin]

Noire flinches a little. "Right. Then translate into Low Drow, if you would."

[Claudia Emerison]

"Yes, that seems wise," Zevran agrees brightly. "High to Low, got it, no commentary or editing. Anyone else... delicate?"

"Uh. Not-- not like she is, no. Err, No-one with high rank anyway. And no-one as bad that isn't, you know, contained. But..." Claudia frowns a little, then shrugs. "I mean, they're not--- they're not typical drow, drow that worship That One or anything, but they're still..."

"Highly political?"

"Yeah, that's a nice way of putting it," Claudia agrees, giving Zevran a weak smile. "You're going to be a new agent, a new asset-- or a new weakness, or both-- to whoever you involve yourself with. You're going to get a lot of attention."

[Coquette Blacquin]

Attention Noire definitely gets as she walks into the throne room, all eyes on her, whispers and staring apiece. What have they heard? How discreet was the diviner? How discreet was Claudia? Assume they know everything, but speak as if they know nothing. 

[NPCs]

As she goes further into the room, coming to a stop just a few inches behind and to the right of Claudia, she starts to notice that people's attention is focused behind her. They hide it well, of course, none present are unskilled in intrigue, but Noire is very skilled herself. Most telling is the reaction from an older drow woman sitting on a plainly made but clearly mithril chair at the front of the room. She's the only one on the dais, despite three other chairs on the lowest tier besides her own, a broken chair on the middle tier and a full and singular throne at the top. Her fine silk dress and tasteful jewelry are eye catching-- as her exposed breasts-- but not enough so that Noir misses the brief look of stunned shock in her eyes. Shock, and more; recognition, disbelief and something very close to fear. The rest of the occupants are lounging in reclining chairs for the most part, with exceptions for the seven guards, one hooded and gagged male suspended by his hands and a second male kneeling so he can suck the other's cock. Watching this avidly is likely the only woman present who isn't paying any attention to Coquette's entrance, a very young drow woman likely not more than a handful of years past her majority.

As the three of them come to a stop, Claudia lets out a very soft sigh of relief and mutters something Noire barely catches. Something about a parry? She doesn't gesture Coquette forward to speak, instead settling her stance into one more comfortable for waiting. She had cautioned Coquette that, given her meager power in the court, it was unlikely that she'd be able to get the Matriarch to hurry herself for a meeting; evidently the drow version of making people wait as a power play involves you standing around at the meeting place until the more powerful party deigns to show up.  "Who is she?" Zevran whispers almost soundlessly, eyes cast demurely at the ground.

"Alaedha," Claudia replies, not quite as quietly. Who, according to their research is the Matriarch's eldest, but not her heir. In fact, Feythal does not have a named heir, which is likely the explanation for the broken chair. With four places on the lowest tier, that would imply she does have four candidates however. 

[Coquette Blacquin]

Noire goes one further; she drops into a curtsey, one she knows from practice she can hold for hours. Respect to an elder, but not subservience. And she waits, as if to prove that she can wait in a more painful, compromising position. Making almost, but not quite, a mockery of Alaedha's chair. 

[NPCs]

"And who, exactly, are these two, Claudia?" Alaedha demands after a few seconds spent restoring her composure. 

Inclining her head, Claudia replies in a bland but respectful tone, "my guests, Mother-electi, on whose behalf I have requested an audience with our Matriarch." Which means interrogating them without her present would be an insult, so fuck off.

The pureblood's expression darkens slightly, but she just sniffs disdainfully and looks away in a show of uncaring dismissal. It's ruined by her eyes lingering a split second too long on Zevran once more. A few minutes pass and another pureblood drow woman enters the room from the less ornate of the entrances in the back. She's younger than Alaedha and looks somewhat similar, though she's wearing skintight but stretchy leather pants, a metal lined corset and an open silk robe embroidered with crests that glow with a soft silvery light. 

"Wynnith," Claudia murmurs. Aleadha's youngest daughter, a spiritualist in both craft and disposition. She's begun to act in the court in this last half decade but is far behind the other four candidates due to her preoccupation with mysticism. Still, that very drawback is also a virtue, as her talents in that field are virtually unique in the Enclave. Wynnith glides to her seat, humming softly to herself. After sitting, she pulls a string of beads and teeth from her pocket and starts sliding them along the string.

[Coquette Blacquin]

Noire straightens smoothly, remaining upright as she waits. She's good at waiting; it's never been a problem for her, not when she can slip off inside her head somewhere and disassociate. 

[NPCs]

Minutes tick by, the silence and tedium broken only by the near simultaneous arrival of two more drow ladies, though it's clear that neither of them particularly want to be in each others company. Without a word or glance at each other, the take the last two seats on the lowest tier, noticeably ones as far apart as the dais allows. Claudia is silent for a few moments before managing to offer, "Paerie a-and-- and--"

"Thank you," Zevran murmurs in an act of mercy.

With Paerie accounted for, there's only one remaining person she could be after all. Claudia's voice had been telling as she described the last two granddaughters. Her loathing, guilt and fear had been muted and repressed as she explained that Paerie is by far the most political of the granddaughters, working constantly to keep the Emerison Famiglia dominant among the four famiglias at the Enclave, with a side hobby of alchemy that Claudia carefully doesn't call out as consisting primarily of poisons. She speaks little of Estelle, merely saying in a quiet, hopeless voice that she has turned outward to protect and grow the Enclave, particularly in regards to creating ties to the city-state of Nyra.

[Coquette Blacquin]

A flash of mercy, of understanding and pity. How irritating. Noire almost brushes it aside, but then, seeing a chance, makes a point of taking Claudia's hand. It's a small gesture. Subtle. But telling, in a way. Almost taunting Estelle: see, your wife prefers me.