HISTORY
On the continent of Mnemoneris, deep beneath the Kiaspur mountains, Vaen was born in the Underdark within the drow city of Nalaviir. A Lolth-dominated metropolis of drow known for its crossroads trading and thin tolerance of the presence other races for that purpose. It was for those very threadbare reasons and the good business sense of the house he was born into that he wasn't sacrificed at his birth.
House Zaurahel, who dominated the slave trade in the city, was one of the rising star mercantile ruling houses known for its steady supply of slaves from the surface, and for running the gladiatorial arena, providing the city with one of its favorite sporting activities. They prided themselves on having one of the largest and most diverse collections of individuals of other races, boasting of it much like one would a zoo. Lacking a large standing army of drow like other more established houses, they had one of the largest and most trained standing armies of slaves. They boasted that their method of breaking in and training is superior to the tactics used in other houses, and that their cannon fodder army is far more useful and reliable in battle than typical drow slaves. The clockwork perfection in which they would seem to work together was terrifying, wholly unlike the methodology of other houses. But their army has remained largely untested as well, given their quick rise to power from the last great war their city saw.
Vaen, born to his human slave mother in such a place, knew only his father must be a drow in that place and never knew more. Even given the slightly more liberal mindset the house had towards slaves in terms of their capabilities and purpose, to admit relations with one that resulted in a male child and diluting drow blood in such a way was tantamount to sacrilege and embarrassment (and thus political fall and death of the parent) of the highest form. But as his father remained secret and his house was pragmatic, he was allowed to live as a slave, albeit one considered more insulting to bear the sight of than most other full-blooded races.
His name, during this time, was nonexistent, called only biir ("garbage", a halfbreed insult). While he must have certainly had a name from his mother he doesn't recall it, and no one else could be bothered to remember it.
Vaen has... only vague memories of his human mother. While she survived childbirth, she never fully recovered and died when he was still very young. What he remembers is oddly warm, juxtaposed against the cruelness of the rest of the society around him. He remembers she would speak quietly and touch him lovingly, ruffling his hair, but can't remember anything she said. He can barely recall her face at all, only remembering the hit and miss details, like the smell of the kitchens where she worked and would keep him with her. He remembers mostly what came after, that the relative peace he had been kept in, broke and he was put to work. First to clean and dust, as even a half-drow child is quite quick and nimble, able to get their small hands easily in to clean crevices—and then later to fight.
Initially, as he showed a greater strength and constitution than many of the captured slaves, he was chosen to train as a fighter. The captain of the guard, a noble son of the matron, oversaw his training personally. While it wasn't unusual for him to train the slaves who showed the best potential, the approach he took with Vaen was much like one would with a full-blooded drow child. But not in any kindly way, it was brutal and intended to drill the savagery of being a drow warrior into him. It resulted in being beaten bloody and unconscious more often than not. It felt more savage than Vaen had been led to expect of the training, like there some personal slight he had committed against the other male simply by existing as he did. Something that Vaen presumed was being a halfbreed of his house, a living dishonor on it that the other wished hadn't survived. And yet the expectations on him were far higher than that, if the brutal punishment for not living up to them meant anything. But there was a bitterness and defiance in him that didn't want to submit, a willfulness and nausea at the entire society around him that only his need to survive kept barely in check.
There was only so long he could get away with that attitude and growing resentment however, a suicidal trait in the dark, and he was soon thrown into the gladitorial pits to provide some entertainment before he inevitably died. He was 16.
