Halth

Qal'Deth wields Halth. When the Matron Mother sent a raiding party to the Duergar for pit slaves, they brought back a prize greater than they knew. The Druegar king was captured, and in exchange for his freedom, he forged Halth for Qar'tol, half minotaur, half drow champion and favorite slave of the House X'Larraz'et'soj. Halth was wielded by Qar'tol until his demise at the hand of Sarkoth, a minor noble of House Baenre. The sword was taken by House Baenre as spoils, and though those events led to the rise of X'Larraz'et'Soj, the loss of the champion's sword was keenly felt by the slaves raised from birth to be fighters in the pits. It had become an aspiration of many to one day earn the sword themselves. Together, the slaves conspired to return it to the house. The task was passed down from older fighters to younger for decades. The slaves learned much about the debts the other houses owed each other. The slaves who fought managed to manipulate the possessors of the blade through the decades. They did this most often by throwing fights, even lethal ones, but sometimes also by completing quests in unexpected ways, or by picking fights or instigating them between seemingly unrelated persons. The web of intrigue that led the sword back to X'Larraz'et'Soj touched every noble house. In the pits "to die for Halth" came to mean "To want something more than life". After manipulating the results of battles and betting, the pit slaves led the sword, which was infrequently used in fights, but also (though rarely) put up as huge betting stakes when the conclusion of a fight seemed foregone, and once to pay off a debt otherwise incurred in others, to a lethal battle in the pit of the House of Bastards between Drow settling a blood feud between Druu'giir, who now held the sword, and Baenre, who you remember once held it. The House Weapons Master turned a blind eye to the value of the sword when determining the entrance fee, thus allowing the Druu'giir noble Sharngarth to enter. Sharngarth had been mysteriously approached and told every weakness of his Baenre opponent, Paul'smiir, and had double and triple checked the information. Finding it good, he was confident of the outcome. Rumor spread, and odds were set well in favor of his winning. On the day of the battle, none of Sharngarth's attempts to exploit his opponent's weaknesses worked and the fully armored Baenre noble slew him, and took the sword, then, without collecting any favors disappeared, never to be heard from again. Only the slaves knew that Sharngarth's foe was not Paul'smiir, but their own champion, for just before the battle, they had captured, slain, and destroyed Paul'smiir and replaced him. The slaves keep this secret even from Matron Mother (but she knows, because the story is told in the fighting pits). Qal'Deth won the sword from the previous champion of the pits, Qot'shul, a half ogre, half drow who was only the champion for one fight, the one he lost to Qal'Deth, because his weapon proficiency only extended to a club.