Weaver
Twisted in body and bound in purpose, the Weavers are the horrific byproduct of ancient, heretical rites performed deep within the silk-draped caverns of the Drow. Once mortal—primarily drow, though others have suffered the same fate—their forms have been warped through ritual and venom, remade in the image of the crawling godlings that haunt the dark beneath the world. They are not merely servants of the spider—they are spiderkind incarnate.
The transformation begins with a ritual called the Silken Graft, in which a chosen—or captured—mortal is infused with concentrated alchemical venom derived from chthonic spiders bred for generations by the drow priesthood. The victim is then cocooned for a cycle of weeks in sacred silk spun by priest-weavers, undergoing excruciating changes as their body and soul are rewoven. When the cocoon is unraveled, what emerges is a Weaver—no longer entirely mortal, no longer entirely sane.
Weavers bear varying degrees of arachnid traits. Some resemble drow with elongated limbs, compound eyes, venomous fangs, or chitinous exoskeletons under their skin. Others are far more monstrous—bipedal only in vague silhouette, with additional limbs, spinnerets, or twitching mandibles where once there was a tongue. Regardless of form, their movements are unsettling, their voices often layered, like whispers chittering from multiple mouths.
Their minds, too, have been rewired. Weavers think in terms of threads, patterns, and connections. They view the world as a great tapestry—each soul a strand to be plucked, bound, or cut. Their speech is cryptic, often laced with metaphor, riddles, or proverbs about webs and prey. Some are zealots of the drow Spider Matrons; others are bound against their will, their thoughts fraying at the edges but not entirely gone.
Though most serve the drow as hunters, assassins, prophets, or guards, some Weavers escape or are cast out—either too unstable or too willful. These exiles often become reclusive weirdlings of The Underdark, forming tangled nests or shrines of silk in forgotten caverns. A few wander the surface, hated and feared, yet sometimes sought for their strange divinatory abilities, as they can "read fate in the folds of webs."
A Weaver’s body is resilient. Their venom can paralyze or unmake memories, and their silk is semi-magical, used in enchantments, traps, or even garments by drow spellweavers. Some Weavers learn to speak through their webs or use them to sense vibrations from incredible distances. Others develop terrifying gifts: thread-magic, illusions spun from silk, or the ability to walk upon walls and ceilings without sound.
Despite their fearsome reputation, not all Weavers are evil. Some have retained shards of who they were and battle the overwhelming instincts to hunt and bind. These rare individuals live in anguish, struggling against a destiny that feels sewn into their very skin.
To most of Aigusyl, the Weavers are nightmares with faces—half-drow, half-spider, all wrong. But to the drow who created them, they are beautiful tools, born of suffering, perfected in the web.
