Von’gleas’ observations: Drow middle class
The astute observer will notice that most surface folk only interact with the top or bottom of the drow social orders. You are either the enemy of a matron mother and find out that unfortunate fact when you lay bleeding to death at her feet after a string of misfortunes that have left you depressed and destitute. –or– You fall prey to the lower class dark elf where you are left in a filthy alleyway dying and penniless not really sure how you arrived in such a sorry state of affairs.
In either case goodly races see the same results from interacting with high or low society drow and wind up avoiding them altogether. While the implementor of such a stratagem is often longer lived for it they do miss out on a broader understanding of the dark elf in the middle, the so called middle class. Truly there are many classes in this social strata: merchants, crafts people, functionaries, minor houses, ecumenicals, and military. One cannot people an entire city with nobles and beggars and expect it to last as long as Menzoberranzan. Who trades with others to get goodies for the nobles? Who patrols the city streets looking for troublemakers? Who craves Sava pieces? Who ensures there’s enough poison to buy on a Friday night? Who ensures the slavers get paid for their latest batch of bugbear captives?
Yes there is a population of nobles who fill some of these roles and there are the unfortunates who are enslaved by the dark elves who provide unskilled and minor skilled labor. One could argue that sufficient magical power could replace some of the goods and services provided by commoners, but then from whom would a powerful house demand respect? After all the drow are refined in their social structures and culture. Unlike bugbear culture, which is much more brutal and based primarily on physical power and instincts the drow have a need for respect, fear, and even adoration from their fellows.
The whole swath of unseen and under appreciated citizens never make it into the history books or epic poems. There is a restaurant in Eastmyr with the best roasted rothé in a mushroom sauce. It’s run by a woman named Keba’ryn and her consort Bertarl. Any night of the week you will find the place packed with other commoners laughing, drinking, and remarking about how delicious the roasted rothé is on this particular evening. The waitstaff changes every few years. Keba’ryn has a keen eye and a quick dagger throwing arm so those staff members who skim checks or spend too much time sampling food and drink wind up terminated from the establishment’s employ as well as their lives in some cases. The local constabulary (such as it is in a drow city) shant bother with a dead lower middle class waiter. The stray flying dagger is a hazard anyone needs to guard against when traveling in the cities of the Spider Queen’s children. Paradello’s (the name of Keba’ryn’s fantastic eatery) is just one example out of hundreds of the mundane, boring, and pedestrian locales where the astute traveller can find these common folk.
All these establishments, businesses, and homes are crammed into the cities common areas (Eastmyr being the highest concentration) and peopled with thousands of common folk like Bertarl who go about their lives day in/day out reveling in minor triumphs and chagrined by lesser inconveniences. None of them important enough to be documented along side the Do’Urdens or the Banres, but there nonetheless.
Most of these citizens have modest lifestyles and some small measure of wealth. They start in family units that are not quite houses with a mother and one or more consorts. The doctrine of infant sacrifice is not practiced in the middle class so male children are more prevalent here than in the nobility. Education is conducted in the home or the child is apprenticed out to another common family if there are too many children in the household already. Apprentices who prove too clumsy or too distracted to learn tradecraft can find work in the barracks of the city guard. Not quite squires or pages these errand boys (nearly all are male) are used to ferry message, clean, mend clothing, sharpen weapons and other tasks that are viewed as unworthy of a solider. Eventually the page achieves the appropriate age to become a solider or guard and they continue on serving in the same unit where they were apprenticed.
Commoner females have a similar entry into religious life serving in the same chamber-maid modality for priestesses or other clergy. Eventually they grow into roles as functionaries, managers, or bureaucrats.
Whether apprenticed or home schooled the commoner drow learns a set of skills commensurate with their position in the mundane machine of middle class life. Females eventually take consorts and may decide to reproduce to either fill an open position in their enterprise or carry on their legacy. While commoners are not driven by goals of world domination they still do have an urge to see their bloodline persist and thrive in the future.
Elder care is not a service found in dark elf society and thus elder commoners are a rarity. Some forward thinking drow will save a portion of their wealth to use when they decide to stop working. More likely the elder drow will have amassed enough secrets or connections to live off extortion or graft until the victims rise up and end the commoners retirement permanently.
Often these bloodlines are focused around the establishments more than the concept of family. Keba’ryn has no official surname, but is known as Keba’ryn Paradello. Keba’ryn’s aunt, the previous owner was also known by that surname until Keba’ryn killed her to inherit the place. While they are commoners and separated from the intriques of the noble houses and famous individuals, they are still drow.