The Pixie Dust of a Drow's Familiar.

[Cattery]

"It all started in the moonlight, at the dance of me and my sisters.  You know, it's a wonderful thing to do, just to dance and sing and fly around with those you love.  You should try it!  Oh.  That's right.  You can't.

"But you know, those horrible orcs came along and before I knew it I was shoved into a bag.  Have you have any idea how harsh hessian is on your wings?  No, you wouldn't, would you.  Anyway, you know my wing got crumpled and I couldn't go anywhere, silly thing.

"The next thing we knew was that the bag was being sliced open and we all came tumbling out boom!  Into this big nasty smelling box.  I don't know what they'd been keeping in there, but it wasn't natural, and it wasn't nice!

"And they took Perishaeilishiaraienshilian!  They took her and they... they squeezed her!  I... I guess they were trying to get pixie dust from her because they kept talking about the glowing powder... glowing powder, glowing powder... If they'd asked we'd have given some!  But why did they have to do that to her?

"But anyway they came and got me next, and I knew I wasn't going to end up like her, so when they came I bit him right on the hand!  He bellowed and I ran for it when he dropped me.  My wing was useless but did you know how big orcs are?  And how unwieldy their hands are?  He snatched and snatched but he didn't get me!

"I ran into this dark smelly place underground, and I kept running.  I hate rats.  They were all over the place and tried to eat me!  But then I found a nice warm safe place to hide - a leather bag.  Your leather bag!

"And then you found me.  I was so scared, but you took me out and though you frowned and said something really horrible in Drow, you healed my poor little wing, and you gave me food to eat, too.

"So you know, according to the Binding, we're bound together now, you and I.  You'll be my lifelong friend and you'll have a partner in whatever you do!  I mean, I'll miss my sisters, and I want to see if I can help the ones I've left behind, but we're together now, right?  Right?

"And to show that, I have to give up my old name and take one that you pick for me!  So, whatever you want to call me, you can!"

"Illleaillsta."

"What?  'Annoyance'?  What kind of a name is that?"

"One that suits you.  Do you ever silence yourself, you little glowing pest?"

"Nope!"

[Cattery]

"Latyemean... I'll never get used to you having that name!  Anyway, this mistress of mine, Jysphaer.  Now that she's not around I can tell you ... she scares me!  I know she scares a lot of people in the town as well!

"She doesn't hurt me.  In fact she really looks after me well, honestly!  She feeds me and basically lets me go and do whatever I want.  She doesn't call on me all that much really.  Not what I imagined when I thought of when I considered having a Bonding, you know?  But sometimes she's really really nice, and at other times... well, I don't want to talk about it when she starts yelling in Drow.

"The townspeople - they think she's really really rude, and when the Drow came, they all accused her of being in league with them!  Oh, I thought they were going to kill her on the spot, but she just stood there and dared them to do it!  I thought we were both dead, her and I, you know?

"But she healed them and fought beside them, and she stayed there the longest, just watching the gate like a statue.  You know, Laty - I think she hates the Drow more than any of them could know.  But her mind... it's all messed up inside.  She hates them for what they've done to her, but also because... it's really weird.  She hates them because she's been forced to by something or someone, so all she wants to do is kill them when they attack!  It's nasty what goes through her mind when she sees them. She roars inside, and she's so focused on it!

"It's the only time I've felt her totally whole!  And that's really scary.

"They came again, and the townspeople turned on her again, saying she was a dirty drow and all this stuff.  But this time she told them to either make her leave or to allow her to assist.  But joy of joys, people stood up for her this time!  Oh it was great, they stood in front of her and defended her, and told her that if she was put to the fire, they would burn with her!  I guess they knew her worth after her fighting with them the time before or something.

"Anyway, I guess she's still thinking about leaving.  I know she's getting tired of constantly defending herself.  And also... Laty... it's getting harder for her to stop shouting in Drow, if you get my meaning.  I don't know what's going to happen if she doesn't get any help!

"Oh my poor mistress!"

[Cattery]

"You know, I don't really know what's going on with her lately.  My mistress, I mean.  She's been praying a lot, hanging around that temple in Hlint.  I know she doesn't follow the Goddess that lives there, but she goes there and talks to her Goddess there.  Does it work that way?

"Since the Drow came, she's been ... well, she's not talking so much in Drow again, but that doesn't last.  I don't know what sets her off; it seems to be when she perceives weakness, especially in the boys!  Laty, you'll have to keep your Master away from her when she's like that.  Promise me you'll do that!  I don't know, if all the Drow were like her, how do they have baby Drow?

"She's been using her bow a lot to kill lots of spiders.  I don't know what that means, but she rips out things from them and brews them into things.  She tells people she's looking for something called antivenine, but I know she's only started doing this since the bad Drow tried to invade.

"She's also trying to make lots of healing potions, so I guess that's why she's in the temple a lot.

"But, she's been nice - well, for her - to people.  I mean, the people she met in the cave in the Sielwood; I could feel her anger when they called her a man, but she didn't yell or anything.  I was soooooo proud of her because she didn't even say anything in Drow!

"She still swears at the sunlight though.  I miss being out in the light!"

[Cattery]

"Oh, Laty - I'm sorry I haven't been around, but I've had to look after my mistress for a while.  For the longest, awfullest time she just lay there raving at herself.  Sometimes she'd pray to Lucinda, sometimes she'd swear awfully at things that weren't there.

"I'd try to fan her face with my wings, and get her to eat, but I'm so awfully afraid she's losing her mind.  She's got no faith, no belief anymore... and I know there's a part of her trying to get it back.

"Even her insults are losing their power; she's just not as ... there as she was before!

"Oh, Laty, what ever am I going to do?  If only I could get her something concrete with Lucinda's symbol on it, or something!  Then she could remember the good in her, and not slip away like this!"

[Cattery]

"Laty!  I got her a shield!  It's got this big zippy lightning bolt on it, just like Lucinda's Order has!  It was just lying there near this man with a big rock person.  He was doing something to the rock person, and I could see another one in his pack.  It didn't look like he was using this one, so I took it and left!

"Gee, it's heavy though!  I hope it'll help her!  I really really do!'

[Cattery]

"What... is this?"

"It's a shield, Mistress!"

"Yes, I can see that you annoying little freak!  But exactly what is it doing here?  Where did you get it from, and where is my[/b] shield?"

"B...but I thought you'd like that one!  It's a gift!  I got it for you!  Don't you like it?"

*a muffled, high pitched squeal, the sound of a jar latch being closed*

"You can stay in the jar for a while!  How dare you make decisions for me?  Steal things for me!  How DARE you?!"

[Cattery]

"Laty, I'm sorry I haven't been to see you in a while, but after Jysphaer stuck me in a jar for a while and she threw it at some zombies, my wings were a bit sore for a while.  Then she sent me off to Rilara to find this nice lady named Felicity - I couldn't fly the whole way; I was so glad I found a nice spot on the mast to hang on to on this really big boat!

"But it's weird.  I've been scared for a while.  She's getting nastier, and what she's wearing now!  She used to wear this really nice dress that had these openings across her chest.  It was blue and silver and gold, and though it was still too much to be comfortable I'm sure, it's nothing like what she's wearing now!  And when your boy gave her that hood - Laty, I never see her face anymore!  From head to floor she's totally covered, even her hands are wrapped up in gloves.  She looks like the rest of the drow around now, save it's all in bright blue.  I'm worried about her, I really am.

"She nearly threw the shield at me after I gave it to her.  She was so angry!  She shoved me into this jar and put me in her pouch, but I know she's still using that shield.  She didn't throw it away.

"But she was talking to some man.  All in metal, how does he walk like that?  Jysphaer clanks like nothing else when she's in her smelly chainmail!  Anyway, I didn't hear all of it - I stay out of sight when she tells me to go - but he was saying something about that awful time when the Drow invaded this town and how he regrets it or something.  She told him that she had it worse than him, and he agreed!  Then she went all weird... I don't know, it's like she couldn't believe it or something, and she told him that he should be sorry for not feeling that she had it worse and she stormed out!  Not that that's anything different for her, but it was what she did after that that made it really weird.  She left Steak - that's her ox - behind and just ran.  She got faster and faster it seems - I found it hard to keep up - until she got to the Temple of Lucinda in that big castle.

"I don't know why she went there.  I don't think she does either, but she went up to the healer, said "I seek sanctuary." then plonked herself on the floor and hasn't moved since.  She's not praying or anything, she's just sitting there.

"I don't know, Laty.  She's gone strange.  Very strange.  It's worse than when she wasn't eating.  I just don't know whether she's just wanting to be nasty or whether she's trying to be good.  Or whether she can't be either."

[Cattery]

"She just started talking to herself.  On and on and on about betrayals and how she was promised all these things, that the light would help her to boost her talents and mean that she didn't have to hide in the shadows anymore.

"But you know, she likes the shadows.  She kept talking and talking about how the light blinds her, how it stabs her in the eyes and in the back, and how she'd been betrayed.  Over and over again about being betrayed.  By her Gods, by the people she helped, by me... It was awful so awful!  Then she started pulling at her hood and her hair, pulling it out in clumps!  I didn't know what to do so I just kept looking at her.  It wasn't like she even knew I was there anyway.

"Even Steak had come to find her - I don't know how he came to the castle, but I went and got him to make sure he was safe from the people outside.  Silly ox keeps trying to eat the floor tiles!

"But she just kept raving and raving and raving about pain and betrayal and how she still comes here to this Temple to find santuary, even though she doesn't know why, the Goddess was full of lies and deceipt.  But she's not!  I don't think?

"But in the end she ran.  Said that she was going to find a place to go where no one would find her, no one would betray her again, where she could get her revenge on them all!  Then she fainted, right there in the middle of the road!  I didn't know what to do!

"But I found the man in the metal again.  He was talking to some lady but I think I nearly knocked him over trying to get him to come.  And he did.  He got her walking again, and he even got her talking almost right again, but she's so angry!  And so lonely - you could feel it coming off her.  She didn't want me there and kept trying to hit me, so I hid.

"Everything got kind of muffled then - his vest was kind of thick - but he took me out and made sure I was right, and now I've come to visit you.

"I'll have to go back to her.  She hasn't eaten, and I know that she won't, even though he left water and food for her.  She's too proud.  Too scared.  Too angry.  And she ... well, she needs to be in control of something.

"Laty, she's got no faith left.  And now, it's not even in herself."