#bhaalmade

The Drow leans over the table, dragging one map after another over the surface while she planned the stages of their next attack. So engrossed in her work she would not have seen the arrival of an unexpected guest, not her, not that voice, not while she was waiting for the arrival of another. She expected an array of things, a blade to touch her skin, the hand that grasps the back of her neck, or the arm to slide around her middle with the whispered words of blood soaked honey at her ear. What she did not expect was that voice, and that word. Not here. i'ssury, i'ssury, A Drow word that no one else could call, no one else could say -

Mommy.

Minthara freezes, back straightening as her entire form goes rigid. Widened eyes turn while the Drow turns on her heel to behold the source of that voice. Nearly stumbling when the breath is taken out of her and she sees her, the child. Her child. Her lovely, adoring, little girl. Minthara feels her heart sink into her stomach like a stone dropped in the pits of a cave, and she blinks when her weight falls back a step, her own hands catching the table to right herself. A hardened gaze softens, a lowered brow lifts to reflect the adoration in a tender red gaze, and she looks back briefly before dragging the papers over the map she held, to have them shielded from little eyes.

A thousand questions hit her at once, there is no way that Orin could mimic a child, not a small child, not one of her stature. "Ssshhh... Ussta'ssinjin.." My sweet. Eyes dart around while Minthara pushes off the table to close the distance between them, gauging the possibilities while she comes to the child and settles on her knee. "My darling, what are you doing here.." She spoke in common, exasperated, even if Maydril did not understand. And her arms scoop the child into her embrace, all suspicions she had in her gone the moment the child was in her arms. She turns her chin and buries her head into her hair as she stands up, using her hand to brush her hair down against her head. Suddenly, her worst fear was realized, suddenly she was aware of just what this message was - All of her planning behind Orin's back, all of that clarity that she had thanks to this little girl, suddenly made sense.

"Usstan'tlun ghil'nin..." Her tongue rolls softly with the words as she presses her girls hair down, I am here now.. "ghil'nin..Shhh.." Minthara rocks her weight back in forth while she holds her, squeezing her tightly into her embrace, and then she sets her against hip to look at her face. And finally, in Drow a finally time: "My love, are you hurt?"

Luz did not have literal eyes on the back of his head, but he also didn’t need them. Graz’zt smelled her before he needed to hear or see her, and a sudden yank at the tiefling-tail gave the game away. The wine disappeared with a quiet pop! as she grabbed at it and reappeared in a similar fashion in Luz’s hands.

"Careful, kitten, you wouldn't want me to bite back would you?" Valentine growled, his maw opening to expose the jagged and razor sharp teeth that could rip through her pristine pale flesh without even trying. It was a rhetorical question, only because he was damned certain Orin would very much like it if he bit back, but she was probably going to answer it anyway. With a sigh, he wagged his tail hard enough to thwack her in the face and then turned to look at her, arms crossed, with amusement in his eyes. The fact that said tail was now actively wagging and thunking against the ground probably gave away just how much he liked it when she bit.

Two soulless black eyes blink up at Orin, first the left and then the right, as she listened to her mistress’s command. It wasn’t the first time one of her summoners had demanded something like this and likely wouldn’t be the last. She thought back to every part of her body that had been chopped off, some requiring assistance to grow back, and shrugged before moving to display of various sharp weapons and torture tools. Grabbing a meat cleaver, Shovel takes a deep breath to prepare for the pain she is about to be consumed by and nods at Orin once before chopping through the thick flesh of her tail, only a couple inches away from where it grows from her body. The blade is dull and caked in blood from previous uses so it’s not a clean cut by any means and takes five solid hacks before the tail is lying limp on the ground next to her. She looks at it, almost sad from the loss, but reminds herself that it will grow back fairly quickly. Like a lizard.

The reflexes set in before the realization of what it was did. His hand moved to catch the thing, feeling it hit his palm with a heavy thud. Once the initial instinct wore off and he realized he had a half eaten heart in his hand, he scowled at Orin and dropped it on the ground.

He never thought he'd be taken like this again... once by the drow was bad enough when he had been but youngling, but now by one of the Dead Three? He could only imagine what this demented, torturous woman had in store for him. And he had a feeling being sliced as he had been was only the beginning.

Baring his teeth, he refrains from his wild shape, if only barely, as he looks to her, hazel eyes blazing with hatred and upset. "My companions will be here, and when they do they will end you," he gives the warning as if it were a prophesy, no matter how little he actually believed the words to be true. He wasn't worthy of a rescue mission, quite frankly. Of the group he was one of the few without the tadpole, and certainly not terribly important to the group as a whole.

Or at least, that's what he believed.