Drow Lore 🕷️ Sorn and Nadal, Drider Brothers (part 1)
Yet another deep dive into drow / drider lore - this time inspired by two drider characters from Icewind Dale 2: Sorn and Nadal, formerly sons of a noble house from drow city Rilauven.
As driders, they guard the entrance to one of the Underdark locations and they can be talked to. In fact, Sorn does practically all the talking, often showing wry, somewhat bitter sense of humour. Nadal's change, on the other hand, left him a little less drow than most - he has trouble with articulated speech, as well as with controlling his thirst for blood.
Sorn, when asked about his past, can share his and his brother's story. Scraps of information about their fate can be also picked up from other sources in game, giving them an interesting background - here is my attempt to reconstruct it.
So, if you like (sad) stories about driders... here is the first part:
🕷️ Before Transformation - Sorn and Nadal are brothers and former members of a noble drow house ...which shall remain nameless. They were both sons of the Matron Mother of their family, so their social status was probably quite high, and they had at least two sisters.
They lived in Rilauven. It is a drow city located in the Northdark, below the region of Icewind Dale, somewhere under Dorn’s Deep – the ancient dwarven stronghold.
Rilauven is neither as big, nor as old as Menzoberranzan, but still, it seems to be quite prominent. It has the academy of magic (Sorcere), the academy of martial arts (Melee-Quartha), the society of merchants (Belaessar) and at least several old noble houses, collectively known as Ultrinnan Qu'ellar.
To 1282 DR, Rilauven was a typical Lolth-sworn drow city with matriarchal society. Then the local followers of Vhaeraun conducted a successful and relatively bloodless coup, overthrowing Lolth's matriarchy and altering the local power balance.
The brothers did not participate in these events, though.
🕷️ Wizard and Warrior - Sorn and Nadal - given their station and the abilities they managed to retain after transformation - probably graduated respectively from Rilauvenian Sorcere and Melee-Quartha.
Sorn was most likely a wizard since even as a drider, he is an arcane spellcaster. His name means literally "enchanted" or "spell". Nadal was likely a warrior. His name, possibly reflecting his character, is assembled from prefix Nad- ("cunning", "genius", "mind", "thought") and suffix -al ("lunatic", "maniac", "manic", "rage").
Their mother and sisters apparently deemed them competent enough to entrust them with executing their plans - at least until...
🕷️ Scapegoats - sometime before 1282 DR, the noble house Sorn and Nadal belonged to became ...involved in a botched attack on a rival house. The house they attacked could not identify theirs to retaliate, which was a small mercy, but still, the whole operation was considered a fiasco.
According to Sorn: To cover up their poor tactics, our sisters blamed their failure on the execution of their plans. Naturally, we were responsible for that. Our beloved Matron Mother did not question their judgement and promptly had us transformed.
🕷️ Among Lolth-sworn drow, transformation into a drider is associated with failure and punishment - but apparently, it is also possible to be changed into a drider because of someone else's incompetence and intrigue... especially when you are a male 😔
For more of my drow lore ramblings, feel free to check my pinned post 🕷️
To be half drow. Ooof Lolth isn’t too fond of them and her Drow don’t like them.
That is correct - most half-drow in Lolth-sworn drow societies lead precarious life and struggle to survive, and even if they manage to avoid the fate of slaves and build a career, they cannot really hope to be treated as equals.
But some half-drow manage to make a name for themselves, both in the Underdark and on the surface.
I played Icewind Dale 2 recently and I found there a story of an interesting and quite heroic half-drow character: Valas the Black Raven. Valas was born in drow city Rilauven and he was known there as Valas Belaem del Pharm - "Valas, slave of Pharm".
He was a slave of drow House Leun at first, but at some point, when he was still a young adult, House Leun lost him in a bet with rival house and Valas became a slave of House Pharm. He was already known of his strength and normally, any drow house would be hesitant to keep him - since dangerous slaves had a habit of turning against their masters. House Pharm, though, decided to keep him just to spite Leun.
For years Valas fought in the city arena where he developed his unique fighting skills. Ultimately he became the greatest arena champion in Rilauven - for all this time remaining a slave of Pharm.
At some point, Valas managed to free himself. He escaped Rilauven and his cruel masters, fighting his way through the Underdark with his bare hands and with chains that once bound them. When he reached the surface where the Black Raven River spilled from the River Caves in the Spine of the World, he encountered there a group of Black Raven barbarians - they attacked him, but he managed to defeat every one of them.
Barbarians, in awe of his battle prowess and his unusual appearance, took him for an otherworldly being who was sent by gods to teach them humility. Because of his black skin and fiery red eyes, they bestowed upon him the name of Black Raven.
Later Valas travelled, freeing slaves, fighting imprisonment and collecting many followers along the way. Sometime before 1182 DR, he returned to the place where he reached the surface world and founded the Black Raven Monastery there. After his death, his followers carried on his ideals of self-reliance, opposition to slavery and imprisonment, and martial perfection.
In relation to the story of half-drow Valas the Black Raven mentioned in Icewind Dale 2 - I found there an interesting information that may imply that drow (at least drow from Rilauven) sometimes use hostages in diplomacy.
🕷️ From Envoy To Hostage - in the Black Raven monastery founded by Valas there is a tradition that when the archimandrite (the leader of the order) receives a diplomatic invitation bidding him or her to leave the territory of the monastery, he or she can command the envoy who delivered the invitation to stay in the monastery as a "residing guest" - a hostage of sorts.
The envoy is obliged to remain in the monastery until the leader of the order returns, serving as a guarantor of good faith of the other side. Such residing guest / hostage is treated well and enjoys all the privileges of the guest of honour... at least as long as no treachery is involved.
This tradition is supposed to be old and …began by the drow, as explains one of the characters in game.
It is quite possible that the founder of the monastery borrowed this concept from drow culture - he grew up and spent several decades of his life in drow city, after all, serving in at least two Loth-sworn drow houses in Rilauven.
🕷️ Hostages In Drow Culture - matron mothers and their closest associates seem to rarely leave their cities - probably because for a noble drow, every invitation "from the outside" may be a potentially deadly trap. And rescuing an important member of noble family from the clutches of whoever (or whatever) captured them in the Underdark can be hard and not always successful.
(One of the first quests in Ust Natha in Baldur's Gate 2 can be an example of that.)
On the other hand, refusing a diplomatic invitation can be taken as an insult and have unpleasant consequences that both sides may want to avoid. Drow most likely have some diplomatic protocol for such situations.
The practice of giving and receiving hostages could be one of means of political communication at least in some drow cities - although probably mainly between houses or organizations of more or less equal power. In case of diplomatic invitations, I suppose that the more valuable the envoy / hostage is, the more safe the invited noble can feel... probably.
For more of my drow lore ramblings, feel free to check my pinned post 🕷️
