Exile - Chapter 6
Jul. 19th, 2022 08:05 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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i_read_whatSo through a comedy of errors, unbeknownst to me, this review did not go up when it was supposed to. It also was not saved when it was supposed to be. So...yeah.
Here we go again.
This chapter, we're back with Drizzt. You'd be forgiven for forgetting what he's up to while his family is engaging in zombie-related shenanigans, but to be fair, Drizzt has actually up and done something interesting in his own right.
He's up and walked into Blingdenstone, the svirnebli home town. Nice.
While Menzoberranzan sprawled in a single huge cavern, Blingdenstone was composed of a series of chambers interconnected by low tunnels. The largest cavern of the complex, just beyond the iron doors, was the first section Drizzt entered. The city guard was housed there, and the chamber had been shaped and designed solely for defense. Dozens of tiers and twice that number of smooth stairways rose and fell, so that while an attacker might be only ten feet from a defender, he would possibly have to climb down several levels and up several others to get close enough to strike. Low walls of perfectly fitted piled stone defined the walkways and weaved around higher, thicker walls that could keep an invading army bottled up for a painfully long time in the chamber’s exposed sections.
For their part, the svirnebli are all "leering" down at Drizzt from every perch. He can't tell what they're feeling, per se, but he can tell they're ready for trouble. Hard to blame them, when we consider how the encounter we saw went. If that's normal drow-svirnebli relations, then it's understandable why folks are on edge.
And credit where it's due, I don't get the sense that the book is trying to convince me that these guys are racist for their concern. And they aren't unnecessarily cruel as they lead Drizzt through the city, leading him ultimately to a circular chamber, no more than eight feet in diameter. Eek. I'm claustrophobic just thinking about it.
There's a chair with iron shackles, and in a nice beat, when Drizzt winces in pain as the chain around his waist doubles up and pinches, they quickly release and reset it, "firmly but smoothly".
This may not be a fun experience for Drizzt, but I appreciate that they're not unnecessarily cruel. And it makes for a nice contrast, since we know that the drow would not be nearly so conscientious.
That said, it isn't fun. Drizzt is left there for hours, and the sensation of being chained up is triggering a reversion to his "hunter" persona - focused solely on survival and escape. Drizzt fights it off though. He wants to be here, and all things considered, things are going better than he expected. (I appreciate his realism).
Fortunately, he's finally interrupted by the arrival of seven elderly gnomes. They're finely dressed and they circle him. One spots his house emblem, asks if he's from Menzoberranzan, and Drizzt confirms. They talk amongst themselves - Drizzt, not speaking gnome, must wait. Some seem angry that he's here, and the arguing gets heated at times.
But, we're told, deep gnomes are neither rash nor cruel creatures. Eventually one asks Drizzt outright, in halting drow, why he's here. Unfortunately, Drizzt doesn't really know how to explain being an apostate. He identifies himself as a friend.
The gnomes are pretty savvy. They don't really buy his story of being a rogue, they think, based on his emblem that he's a spy. (Though why a spy would be careless enough to wear that kind of thing...)
Drizzt isn't sure what to make of the dude questioning him. He seems to go back and forth between accusation and calm. Unfortunately, Drizzt's wait and see calm is disrupted when they pull out Guen's figurine and ask about it. Drizzt's obvious turmoil between his hunter instincts and panic/impulse to call his cat girlfriend lead to the gnomes shooting some kind of gas filled dart at him.
But he still seems to be alive when it clears. They ask about the statuette again, and Drizzt identifies it as his companion. His only friend. Aw. He even explains how to call her. And this bit of kindness for his companion (since Drizzt isn't sure they won't kill him and she won't end up an ornament on their mantleplace) actually gets a bit of a result:
The svirfneblin looked to the figurine and then back to Drizzt, curiously and cautiously. He handed the figurine to one of his companions and sent him out of the room with it, not trusting the drow. If the drow had spoken truly, and the deep gnome did not doubt that he had, Drizzt had just given away the secret to a very valuable magical item. Even more startling, if Drizzt had spoken truly, he might have relinquished his single chance of escape. This svirfneblin had lived for nearly two centuries and was as knowledgeable in the ways of the dark elves as any of his people. When a drow elf acted unpredictably, as this one surely had, it troubled the svirfneblin deeply. Dark elves were cruel and evil by well-earned reputation, and when an individual drow fit that usual pattern, he could be dealt with efficiently and without remorse. But what might the deep gnomes do with a drow who showed a measure of unexpected morals?
The others leave, but the speaker stays behind. He tells Drizzt that judgment is reserved for the king, who'll decide Drizzt's fate, based on the observations of his council (who Drizzt just meant). The drow-speaking gnome tells him that he suspects Drizzt will be executed. Drizzt is resigned to that logic.
The speaker, though, tells him that he thinks Drizzt is different. He'll be recommending leniency, or at least mercy, in his execution. Aw.
This reminds Drizzt of the svirneblin captor he'd met before, he doesn't remember his name, but clumsily describes him: the survivor who lost his hands in the battle. The reminder makes the speaker angry, but Drizzt pleads with him: please get Belwar Dissengulp.
--
We switch scenes back to Drizzt's scary family. Dinin is, as usual, our viewpoint character. Malice is busy reassuring/fucking with Rizzen, asking him if he thought she would let him go away from her. She explains his predicament as a ploy to keep SiNafay at ease. Rizzen believes her, or at least pretends to believe her, which is probably the wisest decision.
So Zin-carla is now complete, she announces, but what does that mean?
Dinin wrung his hands in anticipation. Only the females of the family had seen the product of their work. On cue from Malice, Vierna moved to a curtain on the side of the room and pulled it away. There stood Zaknafein, the weapon master, no longer a rotting corpse, but showing the vitality he had possessed in life.
Dinin rocked back on his heels as the weapon master came forward to stand before Matron Malice.
“As handsome as you always were, my dear Zaknafein,” Malice purred to the spirit-wraith. The undead thing made no response.
“And more obedient,” Briza added, drawing chuckles from all the females.
I like the nice little objectifying overtones here. It can be easy to forget the implications behind the role of consort type men in drow society. One thing that never really comes up though is how it works among commoners. I'd presume that the commoners must pair off somehow, as they make up the majority of drow population. Are they as hard matriarchal as the nobility? Or does necessity make them a little more egalitarian, as we see in many real world cultures where peasant women, in practice, have quite a bit more rights/freedoms than noblewomen would.
Dinin's pretty uneasy about the idea of sending Zombie-Zak after Drizzt, though whether that comes from sympathy for his brother, or just being freaked out by the idea in general is anyone's guess.
Malice isn't done with her power play though:
“But wait,” Malice said coyly, looking from the spirit-wraith to Rizzen. “He is too pretty to inspire fear in my impudent son.” The others exchanged confused glances, wondering if Malice was further trying to placate Rizzen for the ordeal she had put him through.
“Come, my husband,” Malice said to Rizzen. “Take your blade and mark your dead rival’s face. It will feel good to you, and it will inspire terror in Drizzt when he looks upon his old mentor!”
Rizzen has been through a lot, poor guy. And Zak's an easy target: standing still and oblivious, without breathing or blinking. And then:
Quicker than the others could follow, the spirit-wraith exploded into motion. Two swords came out and cut away, diving and crossing with perfect precision. The sword went flying from Rizzen’s hand and before the doomed patron of House Do’Urden could even speak a word of protest, one of Zaknafein’s swords crossed over his throat and the other plunged deep into his heart.
Rizzen was dead before he hit the floor, but the spirit-wraith was not so quickly and cleanly finished with him. Zaknafein’s weapons continued their assault, hacking and slicing into Rizzen a dozen times until Malice, satisfied with the display, called him off.
...oh well, it was probably inevitable. He bores her, Malice explains to her "disbelieving" children. And she's got another patron already selected from the commoners.
They're not disbelieving about the death though. (Though to be fair, given that Rizzen is both Dinin and Maya's father, that does imply that he'd managed to hold his position for longer than I'd have expected.) Instead, they're awed by Zak's skill. He's as fast and deadly as he ever was in life.
Better. Malice tells us. Because now that fighting skill is the sum total of Zaknafein's thought. No distractions. When she turns to Dinin and smiles wickedly, Dinin is freaked into honesty:
“I’ll not approach the thing,” Dinin gasped, thinking his macabre mother might desire a second display.
Malice laughed at him. “Fear not, Elderboy. I have no cause to harm you.”
Dinin hardly relaxed at her words. Malice needed no cause; the hacked body of Rizzen showed that fact all too clearly.
Dinin's orders are to bring Zak to where he last encountered Drizzt, then leave him. Zombie-Zak's been infused with spells that will help him find his wayward son.
For her part, Briza is uneasy, and uncharacteristically cautious about it. But Malice reassures them, Zak is the gift of Lolth and nothing can stop him. The chapter ends by reminding us of the "mulitated lump of gore that had been the patron of House Do'Urden."
Ew. But effective.
Next go around, the reviews should be in their proper order!
Here we go again.
This chapter, we're back with Drizzt. You'd be forgiven for forgetting what he's up to while his family is engaging in zombie-related shenanigans, but to be fair, Drizzt has actually up and done something interesting in his own right.
He's up and walked into Blingdenstone, the svirnebli home town. Nice.
While Menzoberranzan sprawled in a single huge cavern, Blingdenstone was composed of a series of chambers interconnected by low tunnels. The largest cavern of the complex, just beyond the iron doors, was the first section Drizzt entered. The city guard was housed there, and the chamber had been shaped and designed solely for defense. Dozens of tiers and twice that number of smooth stairways rose and fell, so that while an attacker might be only ten feet from a defender, he would possibly have to climb down several levels and up several others to get close enough to strike. Low walls of perfectly fitted piled stone defined the walkways and weaved around higher, thicker walls that could keep an invading army bottled up for a painfully long time in the chamber’s exposed sections.
For their part, the svirnebli are all "leering" down at Drizzt from every perch. He can't tell what they're feeling, per se, but he can tell they're ready for trouble. Hard to blame them, when we consider how the encounter we saw went. If that's normal drow-svirnebli relations, then it's understandable why folks are on edge.
And credit where it's due, I don't get the sense that the book is trying to convince me that these guys are racist for their concern. And they aren't unnecessarily cruel as they lead Drizzt through the city, leading him ultimately to a circular chamber, no more than eight feet in diameter. Eek. I'm claustrophobic just thinking about it.
There's a chair with iron shackles, and in a nice beat, when Drizzt winces in pain as the chain around his waist doubles up and pinches, they quickly release and reset it, "firmly but smoothly".
This may not be a fun experience for Drizzt, but I appreciate that they're not unnecessarily cruel. And it makes for a nice contrast, since we know that the drow would not be nearly so conscientious.
That said, it isn't fun. Drizzt is left there for hours, and the sensation of being chained up is triggering a reversion to his "hunter" persona - focused solely on survival and escape. Drizzt fights it off though. He wants to be here, and all things considered, things are going better than he expected. (I appreciate his realism).
Fortunately, he's finally interrupted by the arrival of seven elderly gnomes. They're finely dressed and they circle him. One spots his house emblem, asks if he's from Menzoberranzan, and Drizzt confirms. They talk amongst themselves - Drizzt, not speaking gnome, must wait. Some seem angry that he's here, and the arguing gets heated at times.
But, we're told, deep gnomes are neither rash nor cruel creatures. Eventually one asks Drizzt outright, in halting drow, why he's here. Unfortunately, Drizzt doesn't really know how to explain being an apostate. He identifies himself as a friend.
The gnomes are pretty savvy. They don't really buy his story of being a rogue, they think, based on his emblem that he's a spy. (Though why a spy would be careless enough to wear that kind of thing...)
Drizzt isn't sure what to make of the dude questioning him. He seems to go back and forth between accusation and calm. Unfortunately, Drizzt's wait and see calm is disrupted when they pull out Guen's figurine and ask about it. Drizzt's obvious turmoil between his hunter instincts and panic/impulse to call his cat girlfriend lead to the gnomes shooting some kind of gas filled dart at him.
But he still seems to be alive when it clears. They ask about the statuette again, and Drizzt identifies it as his companion. His only friend. Aw. He even explains how to call her. And this bit of kindness for his companion (since Drizzt isn't sure they won't kill him and she won't end up an ornament on their mantleplace) actually gets a bit of a result:
The svirfneblin looked to the figurine and then back to Drizzt, curiously and cautiously. He handed the figurine to one of his companions and sent him out of the room with it, not trusting the drow. If the drow had spoken truly, and the deep gnome did not doubt that he had, Drizzt had just given away the secret to a very valuable magical item. Even more startling, if Drizzt had spoken truly, he might have relinquished his single chance of escape. This svirfneblin had lived for nearly two centuries and was as knowledgeable in the ways of the dark elves as any of his people. When a drow elf acted unpredictably, as this one surely had, it troubled the svirfneblin deeply. Dark elves were cruel and evil by well-earned reputation, and when an individual drow fit that usual pattern, he could be dealt with efficiently and without remorse. But what might the deep gnomes do with a drow who showed a measure of unexpected morals?
The others leave, but the speaker stays behind. He tells Drizzt that judgment is reserved for the king, who'll decide Drizzt's fate, based on the observations of his council (who Drizzt just meant). The drow-speaking gnome tells him that he suspects Drizzt will be executed. Drizzt is resigned to that logic.
The speaker, though, tells him that he thinks Drizzt is different. He'll be recommending leniency, or at least mercy, in his execution. Aw.
This reminds Drizzt of the svirneblin captor he'd met before, he doesn't remember his name, but clumsily describes him: the survivor who lost his hands in the battle. The reminder makes the speaker angry, but Drizzt pleads with him: please get Belwar Dissengulp.
--
We switch scenes back to Drizzt's scary family. Dinin is, as usual, our viewpoint character. Malice is busy reassuring/fucking with Rizzen, asking him if he thought she would let him go away from her. She explains his predicament as a ploy to keep SiNafay at ease. Rizzen believes her, or at least pretends to believe her, which is probably the wisest decision.
So Zin-carla is now complete, she announces, but what does that mean?
Dinin wrung his hands in anticipation. Only the females of the family had seen the product of their work. On cue from Malice, Vierna moved to a curtain on the side of the room and pulled it away. There stood Zaknafein, the weapon master, no longer a rotting corpse, but showing the vitality he had possessed in life.
Dinin rocked back on his heels as the weapon master came forward to stand before Matron Malice.
“As handsome as you always were, my dear Zaknafein,” Malice purred to the spirit-wraith. The undead thing made no response.
“And more obedient,” Briza added, drawing chuckles from all the females.
I like the nice little objectifying overtones here. It can be easy to forget the implications behind the role of consort type men in drow society. One thing that never really comes up though is how it works among commoners. I'd presume that the commoners must pair off somehow, as they make up the majority of drow population. Are they as hard matriarchal as the nobility? Or does necessity make them a little more egalitarian, as we see in many real world cultures where peasant women, in practice, have quite a bit more rights/freedoms than noblewomen would.
Dinin's pretty uneasy about the idea of sending Zombie-Zak after Drizzt, though whether that comes from sympathy for his brother, or just being freaked out by the idea in general is anyone's guess.
Malice isn't done with her power play though:
“But wait,” Malice said coyly, looking from the spirit-wraith to Rizzen. “He is too pretty to inspire fear in my impudent son.” The others exchanged confused glances, wondering if Malice was further trying to placate Rizzen for the ordeal she had put him through.
“Come, my husband,” Malice said to Rizzen. “Take your blade and mark your dead rival’s face. It will feel good to you, and it will inspire terror in Drizzt when he looks upon his old mentor!”
Rizzen has been through a lot, poor guy. And Zak's an easy target: standing still and oblivious, without breathing or blinking. And then:
Quicker than the others could follow, the spirit-wraith exploded into motion. Two swords came out and cut away, diving and crossing with perfect precision. The sword went flying from Rizzen’s hand and before the doomed patron of House Do’Urden could even speak a word of protest, one of Zaknafein’s swords crossed over his throat and the other plunged deep into his heart.
Rizzen was dead before he hit the floor, but the spirit-wraith was not so quickly and cleanly finished with him. Zaknafein’s weapons continued their assault, hacking and slicing into Rizzen a dozen times until Malice, satisfied with the display, called him off.
...oh well, it was probably inevitable. He bores her, Malice explains to her "disbelieving" children. And she's got another patron already selected from the commoners.
They're not disbelieving about the death though. (Though to be fair, given that Rizzen is both Dinin and Maya's father, that does imply that he'd managed to hold his position for longer than I'd have expected.) Instead, they're awed by Zak's skill. He's as fast and deadly as he ever was in life.
Better. Malice tells us. Because now that fighting skill is the sum total of Zaknafein's thought. No distractions. When she turns to Dinin and smiles wickedly, Dinin is freaked into honesty:
“I’ll not approach the thing,” Dinin gasped, thinking his macabre mother might desire a second display.
Malice laughed at him. “Fear not, Elderboy. I have no cause to harm you.”
Dinin hardly relaxed at her words. Malice needed no cause; the hacked body of Rizzen showed that fact all too clearly.
Dinin's orders are to bring Zak to where he last encountered Drizzt, then leave him. Zombie-Zak's been infused with spells that will help him find his wayward son.
For her part, Briza is uneasy, and uncharacteristically cautious about it. But Malice reassures them, Zak is the gift of Lolth and nothing can stop him. The chapter ends by reminding us of the "mulitated lump of gore that had been the patron of House Do'Urden."
Ew. But effective.
Next go around, the reviews should be in their proper order!
no subject
Date: 2022-07-20 02:06 am (UTC)Though, I don't think the next Patron will last long. Or even get a name or anything after that brief mention.
Anywho, alas, poor Rizzen, we barely knew him.
no subject
Date: 2022-07-20 05:40 am (UTC)