The orgin of the Drow

The Legend of the Origin of the Drow

In the age after the gods had woven Dunia from the many fragments of their realms, but before the Dark Elves shattered the flow of time, there walked upon the mortal earth a single people—the Sha Esari. In those days they were whole, radiant, and proud. Yet as the years turned, strife grew among them, and at last they divided into four nations.

Two great houses rose into bitter enmity: the Sha Serin, whom some would name the Dark Elves, and the Noldar, called the Light Elves. Their war spanned centuries, a conflict so wearying that it hollowed both peoples to the bone. The Noldar never reclaimed a homeland, and from that age forward they became wanderers, scattered across Dunia. The Sha Serin, broken but unyielding, fled across the wide Ahlen Ocean to distant isles, where they rebuilt their strength and would one day rise again as the Melnibonéans—a terror to the other races of Dunia.

Yet even before the war’s final ruin, a darker tale had begun. A generation before the last great battle, a princess of the Sha Serin sought dominion through forbidden power. She struck a dreadful covenant with Lolth, the Spider Queen, sovereign of The Demonweb Pits. But her coup faltered, and the lords of the Sha Serin turned against her. With a handful of her household, she fled from their wrath.

Lolth did not abandon her chosen. She opened a path into the fathomless deeps below Dunia, and there the exiles followed their doomed mistress. In caverns beneath earth and sea they found refuge, and in that darkness they were remade to suit their Queen. Their skin took on the shade of midnight, their eyes gleamed like embers, and their hearts grew overlong in cruelty and cunning.

So were the Drow born. Legend holds that their first city was Menzoberranzan, the City of Spiders, raised in reverence to their fell patroness. From that place, her silk threads wound ever outward—binding, envenoming, and ensnaring the fate of mortals above and below.