The test to find out which one of the four drow was most likely to be susceptible to manipulation (in other words, a 'find-the-stupid-one' test) was a simple one. Simple and demeaning. Together. Zoe, Ka, Rose (along with Mezzen, who clung to her like a burr – a burr with questions) and Dil were told to sit in a great hall and wait for an audience with the dwarf lord Korgan. Meanwhile, a group of halfling entertainers were added to the room in order to do stupid tricks and keep the waiting drow from losing patience. One of the halflings, however, came up with a game that he individually invited each drow to play whilst the others were busy watching the antics of the remaining entertainers.
This particular game was the test.
What each drow was asked to do was roll a coin off his or her nose and land it on one of the pre-drawn targets etched on a piece of parchment. The halfling would demonstrate the game first, rolling the coin off his own sharp little nose and dropping it onto the sheet of paper, landing the coin right smack over one of the circles that served as targets. Now here's the interesting part. Next, the halfling would invite the subject drow to try the same, re-explaining the procedure as he did. During this redundant exposition, the halfling would take a pen and draw a new target on the parchment, tracing around the same coin he'd run along the bridge of his nose.
To an unobservant person, there was no harm in this; to an cleverer individual, however, it wasn't so innocent. You see, when the halfling drew the new target, his pen would coat the edges of the coin in ink as he traced its contour onto the parchment. And so, when he handed the coin to the next person to try the game, the unfortunate person would paint a nice stripe down the bridge of their nose in trying their luck at hitting the marked targets.
A childish, inane prank, yes. But still an effective one.
The halfling didn't even get the time to fully explain his game to Zojikoe before the mage vehemently turned him down and stormed off with a deep scowl. Apparently, Zoe was a smart lad – either that, or the wizard had been the butt of a similar joke in the past. Next to be tried was Rose. She curiously watched the halfling do his trick, and was more than willing to try it herself; after all, the group had been standing idly in wait for nearly an hour, with nothing to watch but a bunch of midgets acting stupid. The priestess would have fallen for the halfling's trick, one hundred percent, had she not caught sight of the ink coating the sides of the coin as the little creature redrew a new target. When the soiled coin was offered to her, she made an indignant noise and slapped the halfling then stormed off (Mezzen giggled at this and was suddenly desperate to know how the halfling had come up with such a clever trick). After Rose came Ka, who eagerly went to the halfling as soon as Rose had stormed by her mumbling something about the nerve of under-creatures. The psion laughed at the red hand print on the halfling's face and then laughed at the parchment clutched in his hands. She grinned and went on about knowing the trick and having pulled in on Zojikoe when they were children. The halfling narrowed his eyes and waved her off irritably.
Finally, there was Dil'andau. The warrior had taken offense at the cockiness of the halfling's tone after the first demonstration and had made it a point to show the little bastard that he could hit the target more often and more accurately than he had. And so for nearly a quarter of an hour, Dil covered his face in ink.
Passionately.
And the rest of the drow watched.
"I can't believe I'm seeing this." Rose said for the fifth time, awestruck and gawking at Dil'andau as he took the halfling's false advice and rolled the coin a couple times up and down his nose before dropping it onto the parchment. There was a wide streak of ink running from between the drow's eyes down to the tip of his nose. It was ridiculous.
Beside the priestess, Zoe stood quite still, his face stony and his eyes wide. He didn't know what to say or do. In fact, he was busy wondering if he had looked half as bad when his sister had done the same to him those years back.
Beside Zoe, Ka was laughing so hard that she was doubled over, clutching her sides and crying.
"Shut up! I can do this!" Dil'andau roared up ahead, roughly shoving the halfling (who was almost as cramped with laughter by now as Ka) aside and carrying on with his face-painting. The halfling looked over at Dil's companions and gave them an incredulous shrug.
You know, Rain's voice chimed inside Ka's mind, you should stop laughing. He's making you look bad too. Look at him for Ilsensine's sake! It's embarrassing me and I'm not even there! Ka paused her hysterics a moment and wiped tears from her cheeks with her sleeve.
This is great! Come on! You know you love it, Rain. Try and tell me that you're not gonna go off and do it to all your friends too.
Shut up! Rain snapped at once. I can't help but notice that you've gotten yourself into yet another sticky mess. You'd best get out of it soon, else you'll have Kirisstind to contend with! Ka frowned and tried her best not to pay any attention to Dil (which was hard, an her speech was interrupted by random giggle fits).
How do you know about Kirisstind? She asked. Rain sounded annoyed.
It's common knowledge now that she is the one looking for Rose. She knows that your addled lover's with Rose too, by the way. She also knows that there's more people involved. He paused. But on the upside, I didn't get questioned. Ka nodded.
Yay. I'm so happy for you I could die.
Would you? Rain quipped.
No, Ka cackled, keep dreaming. We'll figure this out, don't worry – or get pissed off, or whatever it is you do. If we managed to escape the clutches of the most intelligent, awe-inspiring, godly, powerful creatures in all the planes–
You're sucking up, Rain interjected.
–Sorry, Ka went on, then I'm sure we can escape a couple surly dwarves. Right? Right. Rain made an indelicate sound.
We'll see. I think you should do something about your friend – that ink might be poisonous or something…
With that, the illithid left Ka's consciousness and the psion looked up at Dil again. The warrior was fighting with the halfling now; apparently the little trickster had decided that enough was enough and he was currently trying to get his coin back from Dil. After some quick footwork and some unintended paper cuts, the halfling got his coin back and Dil'andau came storming back towards the group.
"Did you see?!" He called, over-excited and irritated all at once. "I almost had it! Jerk took it away before I could get if perfect and all, but…" He stopped before the group and everyone looked at him in silence. The dark mark down the middle of his face was impossibly ludicrous. He looked at Ka. Ka's chin was trembling.
"I can't even look at you right now." She said apologetically, the words tumbling from her mouth in a heap and melting into a giggle. She squeezed her eyes shut and laughed some more.
"What?" Dil snapped angrily. He turned to look at Zojikoe and Rose, the deep frown on his face creasing the mark down his nose. "What?!" He repeated. Behind Rose's robes, Mezzen giggled boyishly and pointed.
"You've got pen all up your face!" He squealed and clutched Rose's robes tighter. Dil growled.
"That's bullshit! I'm gonna–" He started in on Mezzen but Ka's arm dashed out before him.
"Kid's right, champ." Ka cackled, unable to explain further. The warrior frowned. Zojikoe motioned to his nose.
"You ah–" He grinned, "–you're covered in ink." He chuckled and drew away from Dil a bit, cautiously. "When you rolled the coin on your face, you covered yourself in ink." He laughed and pointed. "I can't believe you kept going!" He erupted into sobs of laughter.
Dil'andau looked lost. He touched a finger to the end of his nose and brought it before his eyes; there was indeed ink there. He returned his finger to his nose and ran it all along the path the coin had taken. There was ink there too. He flushed and cleared his throat.
"Yeah." Rose said crisply. She cleared her throat too. The halfling entertainers bolted from the room.
Dil ripped off towards a small carved fountain on the far side of the waiting room, spouting a line of swear words vile enough to counter Zojikoe's usual line(s). "God damn halflings with their shitty games preying on innocent people I'll teach them to make a fool out of me I will!" He splashed his face with the icy water, cried out at the sudden coldness, then splashed his face some more, wiping madly at his nose. A dozen feet away, Zojikoe pursed his lips and watched.
"You know…the scary thing is, that if we were to present him that game some time in the future, he'd do it again." He shook his head. "It's almost sad." A grin twitched at the corners of his mouth.
"It's not coming off!" Dil moaned from the fountain.
"Roll har– I mean wipe harder!" Ka cried to him before elbowing her brother sharply in the ribs. "And I'd like to remind you of how you had to go to school with a stripe down your face for nearly a week, brother dear." She looked over at Zoe and gave the mage a poisonous smile. Zoe sneered back.
"Really, Zojikoe?" Rose piped up lightly. "Well I would never have thought–" She trailed off and the audience hall door slammed open before she could continue. Standing in the doorway was Korgan himself, flanked by what appeared to be Shagbag and some other random dwarf. Shagbag waved daintily at Zojikoe and then laughed.
"I'm lookin' fer–" Korgan declared, letting the phrase hang a moment as he scanned the little group of drow, "–fer–" He repeated, then looked towards the fountain at where Dil'andau was still washing his face, "you." He settled at last. Dil'andau's head snapped out of the water and turned to face the door. Korgan nodded. "'At's right, lad. I'm lookin' fer you." He grinned, showing off some golden teeth. "Leave the fountain alone – I've got plenty o' drink if ye want it – and come with me. You an' I've some chattin' to make." He beckoned Dil'andau near and the warrior went, still poking at his nose and checking to see if the ink had gone yet.
"I'll talk with ye later." The burly dwarf barked shortly at the others before ushering Dil'andau into the room beyond the audience hall and slamming the heavy door shut. Zojikoe blinked.
"Well that's ominous." He peeped uncomfortably. He reach down to stiffly pet Slayer as the big cat circled his legs. There was a momentary silence.
"I think that other dwarf likes you, Zoe." Came Mezzen's ever-insightful commentary.
***
Eavesdropping. The sport of champions.
Also a favorite pastime of the Venorik'Z'ress siblings.
For the whole time Dil'andau was in the audience room with Korgan, Ka and Zoe were stuck to the door, listening in with all their might. Zoe was listening physically, and Ka was listening psychically. For an hour Dil had been in there with Korgan, and by the combination of the sounds Zoe heard and the more-than-normally disturbed thinking patterns Ka got from Dil, the conclusion was drawn that the dwarf and the drow were drinking.
This, coupled with Dil's usual lack of reasoning, was bad.
From the patched conversation, it was gleaned that Korgan needed someone assassinated. The 'someone' turned out to be the head of the clan currently sitting on the dwarven throne. Though Korgan's own mind was not under perusal, it was more than suitable to assume that Korgan desired his own clan to be in charge or simply wished an old wronging to be avenged. Either way, it didn't really matter. What mattered was that Korgan wanted the four drow to help him perform the assassination; what also mattered was how he wanted them to do it.
So far, Korgan had gotten Dil'andau drunk enough (assuming they even drank) to talk him into: selling the two females in his party to the dwarven King as a peace offering and getting them to poison the King, having both Zoe and him then barge into the clan house single-handedly and take out as much of the ruling clan as was possible, and finally, getting Zoe to summon a demon to blame it on.
"That's the stupidest plan I've ever heard in my entire life!" Zojikoe whispered mournfully, pulling away from the door a moment to look back at Rose and Mezzen. Ka still clung to the door, zoned out on what was going on inside. Rose was furious ever since the female-selling bit came into it.
"When I get in there, I'm going to rip into Korgan and tell him how this assassination of his is going to work!" She growled, arms crossed over her chest. "Why must I always be sold? Hmm? Why, Zoe? Why?!" She motioned towards the door. "I'm going to rip out Dil's eyes and shove them up his ass, so he can watch me kick the crap out of him!" Zoe wrinkled his nose at the image.
"Mm-hmm…" He mused, then "And just how does that ugly, dwarven bastard think I'm going to be able to summon a demon in the middle of some huge fight?!" He sighed heavily. "A fight carried entirely by Dil, I might add, seeing as we're supposed to jam in there alone, like we're some kind of supermen!" He threw his arms up. "For Lloth's sake! I haven't even graduated yet!"
"I thought you were the b–" Mezzen started, but Rose shushed him and sat down, pulled him into her lap and started stroking his hair.
"Goddess!" Ka gasped from the door. Zoe and Rose turned their attention to her, dreading yet more impossible news from beyond the door.
"What?" Rose asked cynically. "Do we have to do everything dressed as house plants, too?" She rolled her eyes.
"Every girl Dil's ever had – except me, naturally – was one of his sisters!" Ka cried in a half-whisper; she looked over her shoulder at the others. "Can you believe it?! His sisters! And he's got five of 'em!" She frowned. "I feel bad for him..." Zojikoe rubbed his temples.
"Okay…were you even listening to what Dil's been saying to Korgan?" He demanded irritably, amused at the ironic news, mind, but still annoyed. "If you're not going to do what you're supposed to be doing–" He warned and Ka cut him off with a heavy sigh.
"Shut up, Zoe." The psion snapped moodily and returned to the door (to listen to the conversation or to pick around, no one knew).
Zojikoe turned back to Rose once Ka had closed her eyes. He grinned and shot Rose an 'I told you so' look that Rose ignored. Mezzen tugged on Rose's sleeve.
"I'm hungry." He complained. Rose smiled at him.
"Me too." She agreed. "But we've got to wait a bit before we can eat and rest and get cleaned up." She made a face and almost added 'and sold – again'.
Zoe and Ka cried out as the door to the audience hall whipped open, sending the both of them flying, only to land on their backsides a few feet off. Korgan stood there again, standing with a grin on his face and a hand clapped on Dil'andau's shoulder. Dil, despite what the others were expecting, didn't look inebriated.
"I'd like to talk with the rest of ye now. Leave the cat and' the wee boy." Korgan declared happily, patting Dil's shoulder and then letting him go. "Yer friend 'ere's done." He nodded to Shagbag from over his shoulder. "He'll be waitin' fer the rest of ye in the guest chambers." He waited for Shagbag to lead Dil away before beckoning the other drow to come.
Rose got to her feet as Dil'andau walked by with Shagbag. She looked up at him and sneered. "You better be drunk." She warned, hoping to all the gods that the male hadn't made all the crazy deals he'd made while completely sober. Dil grinned at her and rubbed his nose.
"Do I look drunk?" He winked at her and walked off with his dwarven escort. Rose didn't know what to think.
The three drow followed Korgan into his audience chamber and a random dwarf shut the door at their backs. Korgan didn't bother to sit down at the large, low, chiseled stone table that adorned the center of the room. Instead, he stood.
"Alright." Korgan started, saying it like it was hard. "I've talked it over with yer friend, and we came up with a plan that should work." He grinned, his real and golden teeth were quite stained. "I need King Theodoric dead. Him 'an his men alike, ye see." He pointed to both Ka and Rose. "I need the two o' ye to act like good little presents and go to ol' Theo pretendin' te be a gesture o' camaraderie. Ye follow?" He ignored the dull, stony look both females were giving him. "Right. Once you girls're in there good, jes poison the crackgnat and be done with it. " He pointed to Zoe. "An' I need you an' yer friend that I jes talked to to rip in there once the girls're done wit' their job and kill everyone'ats left. Ye follow? Aye. An' when yer all done that, make up some demon or whatnot to blame the whole mess onto." He nodded to himself, happy with the plan, as bullshit as it was.
The group was silent. At and behind the door, Slayer growled, muffled but still audible. Mezzen was talking to himself.
"Did you drink with the guy who just came in here with you at all?" Zojikoe asked, unable to think of anything else to say. Korgan's eyebrows shot up and he shot Zoe a disarming smile.
"Nay. Lad dinna be needin' any o' that." The sudden piercing look in his eye led Zoe to believe that the group had just been had – badly.
Rose considered calling on some spells to kill Korgan and every other dwarf in the vicinity, just out of indignity and frustration. Then the group could bolt and never come back. There would be no acting, no selling, no poisoning, no risking lives for someone else's dirty business. But then, she reasoned, the dwarf wasn't really asking for much…and if they could do this, than they could leave (which they really had to do before Kirisstind found them), and even maybe if they went long with everything, they could perchance find another way out and leave sooner. That'd be nice.
"How many besides the King are we to expect?" Rose asked Korgan, startling Zoe in his intent staring. Korgan looked over at her and shrugged.
"Eh. What say twenty? Thirty?" He shrugged again. "Not much, priestess. Ye scared?" He laughed raucously.
"How do you expect Dil'andau and I to rip through thirty men single-handedly?" Zojikoe asked, annoyed. He waited for Korgan to stop laughing in order to raise an eyebrow at him.
"I don't care, laddie!" The dwarf cried. "You're the bag-of-tricks, you figure it out!" He shook his head. "An' 'ere I thought I'd be getting' a good deal with drow 'an I get stuck with a band of freaks…" He trailed off and rolled his eyes.
Ka cleared her throat.
See? Rain's voice chimed.
"Watch your tongue!" Rose snapped angrily. "Lest you want it removed from your vile mouth!" She sneered at Korgan, who looked unimpressed with her display. "I can still strike you down where you stand…" Korgan snorted.
"Do that, drow, and ye'll be sportin' an axe between yer shoulder blades before ye can blink." He offered her a foul smile and Rose gritted her teeth. "Now this shouldn't take long. Jes go clean yerselves up and me men'll be up te tell ye what te do next." He waved them off carelessly and motioned for the dwarf by the door to let them out. As the group moved to the door, Zojikoe looked over his shoulder at Korgan.
"When will my friend and I know when to come barging into the King's place?" He asked worriedly. "And when do I summon the demon…?" He went on as the guard pushed him through the door.
"I canna believe ye don't shut up!" Korgan shouted after him. When the door slammed shut again, he shook his head. "Ever get the feelin' ye made a bad choice?"