Chapter Text
“Bleeding crows,” Ellandra muttered, as she was struck in her shoulder by an arrow. She grabbed the shaft and yanked it out with a grimace, realizing the arrowhead had pierced clean through her armor. She threw it on the ground and continued her run across the top of the stronghold ramparts, catching up to her fellow Harper operative.
“Jana! Keep going, I have you covered!” She called out.
Jana nodded and sent a final set of magic missiles at an approaching hobgoblin, bringing him down in a heap. She turned, her long thick amber braids bounced as she ran toward their planned exit point. Ellandra lifted her longbow and shot a barrage of arrows at the goblin archers before they could send another volley of arrows, protecting Jana’s escape.
“Come on!” A deep voice called from the top of the turret.
Ellandra glanced up at Tulgan, a large muscular half-orc with raven colored hair styled in a tight topknot, who was the third member of her Harper squad. He waved at them to hurry up. Then she watched him turn around at the sound of a huge wooden ladder that slammed up against the turret. Ellandra aimed her long bow at the dozen goblins already scurrying up toward the top, when Tulgan grabbed the fly section of the ladder, lifting it along with goblins in tow, and flung it up and over the stronghold wall, like he was throwing a bail of hay. The goblins grasped to the rungs, screaming as they all fell to their deaths. Hells kid, you are strong, she thought with a shudder.
Ellandra caught up to Jana at the base of the turret and they both quickly climbed to the top. Tulgan helped them up over the ledge, while keeping his great sword at the ready.
“Jana, we are surrounded, I think we are going to need a faster exit,” he suggested. Jana nodded then transformed herself into from an elegant sun elf sorcerer to her true form, a radiant bronze dragon.
“Oh hells no!” Ellandra called out. “That was not part of the plan!”
Jana leaned down and Tulgan scurried up on her back. He reached for Ellandra’s hand, “come on! The rest of the goblins will be on us in moments.”
“I will take my chances with the goblins,” Ellandra said, looking back at the dozens of goblins making their way down the ramparts. Ellandra glanced over the ledge. “Look, the turret is not that high up, I can levitate down and meet you guys down by the river…”
“Ok, this discussion is over,” Jana said and immediately grabbed Ellandra by the waist with her bronze taloned paw and launched the three of them into the sky.
Ellandra screamed and clutched onto her friend’s paw as hard as she could. She felt the air getting colder as Jana flapped her large dragon wings harder, gaining altitude, dodging the incoming arrows.
“Wooo hooo!” Ellandra heard Tulgan call out above her. “This is amazing!”
Ellandra’s long white blonde ponytail whipped around as she felt Jana bank south and glide downward, gaining speed as she tucked in her wings. Ellandra curled herself around Jana’s paw. She heard Tulgan cheering her on to go faster. Then she felt Jana fully extend her wings, slowing them down into a soft, but steady glide. Ellandra slowly opened her eyes and saw the sun setting over the sea. ‘Okay, this isn’t so bad,’ she thought. She glanced down and noticed just how fast the countryside flew pass them, she curled herself back around Jana’s paw. ‘No, this is bad, really bad!’
“At this rate we are going to make it in time for chow,” Tulgan called out. Ellandra kept her eyes shut, reflecting on the last time she glided through the air.
A year ago, Ellandra was in Yartar, searching for her family, when she was abducted by an invading Illithid nautiloid. After capture, she was implanted with an illithid tadpole. But in a twist of fate, or straight dumb luck, the nautiloid was attacked by a group of Githyanki warriors, disabling the ship. While the ship was falling from the sky, a renegade mind flayer saved her from certain death. The mind flayer continued to protect her, along with a few other survivors from the fate of ceremorphosis, the transformation process which would have evolved them all into mind flayers. The renegade mind flayer became their guide and he also joined them in their fight to rid Faerûn of the impending illithid scourge, including the killing the Netherbrain that he once served. After the battle, Ellandra’s leadership and ranger skills impressed Jaheira, the High Harper herself, and she was recruited into the Harper ranks as an undercover operative.
“Just tell me when we are close,” Ellandra replied.
“How do you not love this?” Tulgan called back.
“Illithids aren’t meant to fly!”
“You levitate all the time, besides you are only half-illthid. You don’t even have tentacles,” Tuglan replied with a laugh. He was right, Ellandra was only half-illithid.
During the long journey that preceded the climactic battle against the Netherbrain, Ellandra was given the opportunity to commune with a very rare illithid parasite that would partially, but permentantly, evolve her into an illithid. She understood most people’s resistance to the illithid powers, because there was so much unknown to the side effects. But Ellandra was lucky. She gained all psionic powers and heightened senses of a mind flayer while retaining her tall elegant elf body but most importantly, her sense of self. Her bright silver eyes did change into opaque black orbs and deep purple veins spidered from her eyes across her sun tanned freckled body. It was really the best of both worlds and Ellandra embraced her new evolved gifts.
Her renegade mind flayer companion was shocked she decided to partially evolve, but also was eager to be her mentor. Under his tutelage she learned how to control her spells, her thoughts, and even how to charm others. She also learned that mind flayers were not void of emotions, but had a full range of feelings and could share those with other illithids. And while it was documented for centuries that mind flayers were sadistic, cruel, and pure evil. She learned that was not entirely correct. While there were plenty of mind flayers that were like that, there were other unique mind flayers who still held on to their old memories, others that were moral and merciful, and one in particular, who enjoyed quiet romantic evenings tangled up by a fire.
“You know the githyanki ride dragons… without saddles!” Tulgan called back to her.
“Yeah, because they are all psychotic!” Ellandra yelled back.
“Come on, look at that sunset,” Jana said as she banked them west. Ellandra glanced up and in the distance she saw the sun setting behind the silhouette of the city of Baldur’s Gate.
“Just tell me when we land,” she said, closing her eyes again, reaching into her illithid powers to calm herself. It was not long when Ellandra felt Jana flap her enormous wings, feeling the force slowing them down.
Jana landed them near a large house on an expansive vineyard just west of the city. The large house was one of the Harper safe houses in Baldur’s Gate, but over the last couple of years, it had slowly become the de facto headquarters for Jaheira’s squads. The house they used was one of several homes built for the farm hands who worked on the busy vineyard. It was the perfect cover, especially with Harper's coming and going, it looked nothing out of the ordinary compared to the other houses on the property.
Ellandra felt Jana open her front paw and gently put her on the ground. She watched Jana lean down, while Tulgan cheered as he slid off her back. Ellandra laid on her back, praising all the gods to be safely on the ground.
“You are being so dramatic Ellandra, that was awesome!” The young half-orc said, standing over her, as Jana transformed herself back into the elf form she used to hide her true nature.
“I’m going to eat both of your brains,” Ellandra said, still laying on the ground. “You guys are going to taste amazing with this nice cabernet that we picked back in Waterdeep. Mmhmph. It’s going to be the best meal I have had in years.”
“Girl, you don’t even eat brains,” Jana said, also standing over her with her hands on her hips.
“I will make an exception for both of you,” Ellandra said, glaring at her squad mates.
“Welcome back,” she heard a heavy accented voice walking toward them. Ellandra moved her head and saw their boss, Jaheria walking out of the house to greet them. The half-elf looked as she usually did, with her graying blonde hair partially braided and beaded into rows. She was wearing comfortable tight leather clothing and her sharp scimitars held in their sheaths on her back.
“Hey High Harper,” Tulgan said, clasping arms with her, then handed her a sack. “We may have run into a little trouble, but we got what we are looking for.”
“Great. You guys are becoming my A-Team,” Jaheira said and opened the sack, looking at the contents inside, and nodded. “Covers?”
“Mine’s probably blown, but that’s okay. I never want to go back to that cesspit again,” Jana said with a shrug.
“Fine,” Jaheira said with a chuckle. Ellandra looked up and saw her boss staring down at her. “Not a fan of flying, Cub?”
“I quit,” Ellandra said.
“You said that after every mission,” Jaheira said, and extended her hand, helping Ellandra to her feet. “Come on, you all smell like a goblin camp. Go hit the showers then, debrief on the back patio.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
After showers and their debriefing, the three of them joined Jaheira by the fire pit for a bottle of the vineyards’ wine and caught up on what they missed while they were away. Ellandra was itching to get home herself, but her lover knew she enjoyed this part of the job, relaxing with her squad and toasting another successful mission. Knowing him, he is probably still working, she thought with a smile.
“So, Pheylan is flying down the day after tomorrow,” Jana said, while braiding her long wet amber colored hair into her usual four thick strands. “He told me he's going to take me to some uncharted island off the coast.”
“That’s romantic,” Jaheira said, sipping from her glass. “Sounds like something Khalid would have done.”
“It would be, if it wasn’t masked behind ulterior plans. Pheylan is a marine cartographer, so our holidays are always spent out to these wondrous places, but he spends most of the time drawing on the beach,” Jana said, shaking her head. “When we were young, he courted me with these amazing seascapes.”
“That’s really sweet,” Ellandra said.
“Well, I haven’t received a seascape in nearly three centuries,” Jana said, raising her eyebrow.
They all laughed.
Ellandra really enjoyed her small Harper squad of Jana and Tulgan. She had known Jana for a year now, but their friendship really blossomed while on a mission in Jana’s hometown of Waterdeep. During their mission Ellandra learned that not only was the vibrant sorcerer really a bronze dragon, but she was the niece to the legendary Heart of the Gate, Ansur. Jana, in turn, learned about Ellandra’s run in with her late Uncle. Jana agreed with the Matriarch of her clutch and forgave Ellandra for putting him down citing that Ansur had become an abomination of his former self.
Tulgan was the Harpers’ newest recruit and had only been on Ellandra’s squad for a couple of missions. Only twenty-five years old, Tulgan was the illegitimate son of Warchief Kargress. As he told the story, his father fell in love with his human mother while she was on a long Harper mission herself. She raised him outside of Neverwinter and taught him how to wield his greatsword with the finesse of rapier.
“Pheylan courted you with drawings? And that actually worked?” Tulgan said, pouring more wine into his glass.
“You have to understand, we met when we were whelplings, younger than you are now. It was endearing,” Jana said.
“What about you Ellandra? I saw you kissing goodbye to a ruggedly handsome elf before we left for our mission,” Tulgan asked, chestnut eyes twinkling. “What does he do?”
“Umm, he’s an accountant for a small trading company,” she mumbled and sipped on her wine.
“He must be pretty good at his job if you guys live in the Manorborn district. Or is he from old money, because I know you aren’t living there on a Harper salary?” He laughed and pointed at Jaheira, who shook her head. “Come on, being the product of a torrid love affair, I’m secretly a romantic. What’s he like?”
“He’s arrogant, possessive, and…,” Jaheria began to offer. Ellandra shot her a look and sighed. “What? Oh, did you want to answer?”
Jana chuckled.
“Yes, well, Jaheira is not entirely wrong,” she agreed with her boss. “But he also keeps his word, very in touch with his feelings, and is incredibly affectionate… with me.”
“So, he knows about your squidiness ?” Tulgan laughed.
“He does and he thinks I’m exquisite.”