Jaheira burst dramatically through the doors of the Copper Coronet, expecting the worst. Instead she found Anomen and Arowan playing cards with a grubby deck borrowed from Bernard, while Yoshimo idly ate a sandwich.

Vines erupted from the ground, entangling themselves about the thief's legs and ankles. His lunch tumbled to the floor, spilling its content for the tavern rats.

"What the hells woman?" yelped Yoshimo. "That was my chicken salad!"

"DAMN YOUR CHICKEN SALAD!" Jaheira screamed. "YOU LIED TO US!"

"Mum, calm down!" Arowan began.

Yoshimo hacked frantically at the vines with his katana, managing to escape their clutches long enough to run to his wife, who was already on her feet.

"Get away from her! Arowan, there is no boat to Kara-Tur!" the druid shouted. "I went to the docks myself and checked. Wherever he's taking you it isn't to meet his mother!"

"I know," she replied gently, but there was no diffusing this situation.

"You know?" Jaheira cried incredulously.

"Mum, I'm really, really sorry about this," Arowan said. "I'll explain when we get back."

She shot a fire arrow into Jaheira's ankle and ran.

At first the rest of the party were too blindsided to register what had just happened, but their leader's shriek of pain and fury brought them back to their senses. Viconia ripped the missile out roughly and cast a hasty healing spell, before they took off after Anomen and Rasaad who were already out the door.

"Shit!" Arowan panicked as they ran. "What do we do?"

"Lose them and get through the portal to Spellhold quickly," Yoshimo panted. "We'll be alright as long as we keep our heads. This way!"

There were steps leading up to the roof of the Copper Coronet, and from there it was a short jump onto the nearest rooftop. The thief was well practised in roof running and while Arowan was lacking in strength she had endurance and stamina in near limitless supply. The same could not be said of the rest of the party.

They lost Anomen first. His heavy armour was too much for the rickety rooves of Athkatla's slums. He crashed through one of them into the dining room of an extremely angry housewife, who beat him from the debris with her mop, ignoring his attempts to apologise.

Next to go was Viconia. The Ilmatari skidded to a halt at the gutters of the last house on the row, and slid down a drainpipe to the street. The drow tried to follow, but lost her footing on the slimy gutter moss and fell with a shriek. She landed conscious but in agony, having broken both legs. By the time she had healed herself, the chase had moved on.

Jaheira was determined, but simply unable to keep pace with her quarry. In the wilds she might have transformed into an animal and caught them that way, but it was no use in the city against two lovers running through it like gutter rats. Escaping Rasaad, however, was another matter entirely. They might have mocked his 'ninja monk moves' in the Twofold Temple, but they weren't laughing now.

"I think we've lost all of them except for the monk!" Yoshimo panted.

"I've been trying to lose the monk for years," Arowan replied sourly. "It's easier said than done."

They had scaled another building and were looking down at him, but he was climbing after with ruthless determination. The ranger shot a fire arrow into his arm, but Rasaad realised that they would not intentionally kill him and climbed on. He would soon be too high to shoot without sending him falling to his death. She fired another arrow directly into his hand and he let go of the wall with a yell.

Yoshimo and Arowan saw him glaring up at them from the ground, pulling the arrows out and chugging a healing potion. They turned and fled on, sending loose tiles skittering to the ground as they headed toward Waukeen's Promenade.

Rasaad had not given up, however. Merely switched tactics. He was in better shape than any of them and had grown up an orphan on the streets of Calimport. Losing angry merchants in alleys was second nature to him, and even from the ground he instinctively knew the easiest path to take across these rooftops. He followed them from street level, hiding in shadows, watching them help each other across the wider gaps. Till in the end they climbed down again and, believing that they had escaped the others, walked calmly into the marketplace with all the other shoppers.

The monk froze when he realised where it was they were going. Into the blown-out rubble of Irenicus's lair. He had never entered the place himself, but he had heard about it from the others. He knew that this was where Freya and Khalid had met their horrible ends, and he could not believe that these two were walking in there of their own free will.

At the entrance he paused, unsure of whether to go on or return to report to Jaheira. Yet deep down there was a part of him that still cared about what happened to Arowan. He might have resented her a happy-ever-after, but he would not go so far as to wish her serious harm.

He was surprised to find the place entirely unguarded, save for a lone svirfneblin whom he quickly dispatched. These eerie dungeon corridors were empty of everyone and everything, though a strange smell of blood and death lingered in the air. The deeper he descended, following the Ilmataris' echoing footsteps, the odder it seemed, until finally he arrived at the one room that still had something in it.

A shimmering blue portal, leading to a small office with a desk. Beyond it he could make out the slightly blurred forms of Arowan and Yoshimo. They were talking to Irenicus, who was reclining in a chair, and showing no signs of attacking them.

Rasaad ducked back into the corridor quickly, before he was spotted. He backed up to the surface as fast as he could, panting and trying to make sense of what he had just seen.

As soon as he reached daylight he retraced his steps at a gallop, sending shopping an shoppers alike sprawling into the street. Apart from Anomen (who he found desperately trying to reason with the woman whose roof he had just destroyed) the others had had the common sense to go back to the Copper Coronet.

Bernard was hovering around nervously but the rest of the tavern was virtually deserted. Only the most diehard brawlers were still clinging on at this point. He led them into a private dining room. The table had been set for dinner but the revellers who had made the reservation were too badly beaten to use it.

When Rasaad explained to Jaheira what he had just witnessed, the druid shocked them all by ripping her hair from her head and hurling it down on the table. Beneath it her natural scalp, scarred and patchy from her accident over a decade ago, burned as scarlet as her face.

"THAT'S IMPOSSIBLE!" she screamed. "HOW CAN AROWAN BE IN LEAGUE WITH THE MAN RESPONSIBLE FOR HER OWN FATHER'S DEATH?"

"You say that," Viconia replied slyly, once she'd recovered from the shock of the hair. "But consider the other company your so-called daughter keeps. Secret conversations with Firkraag? Dorn Il-Khan? She was always a little too sympathetic to Caelar Argent if you ask me, and didn't she insist on sparing a vampire and resurrecting Dark Moon monks? How sure are you that she isn't evil?"

Given the circumstances, Jaheira actually had to pause to consider this.

"I'm sure," she said coldly, picking up her wig and placing it onto her head, where the enchantments upon it immediately sealed the hairline.

"Erm… should I be here?" Bernard piped up tentatively. Nobody paid him any attention.

"What about your escape from Irenicus's lair?" Viconia asked, softly laying down her trump card. "Didn't you say that your weapons were sitting in a box waiting for you? Wasn't Yoshimo wandering about the dungeon freely? Arowan was there all that time but survived without a scratch on her, when the Hero of Baldur's Gate was killed. Doesn't any of this strike you as suspicious? Because from where I'm standing it looks as though he chose to let them go."

The druid's eyes narrowed and her knuckles whitened about her staff. Yes. It did strike her as odd, and it always had. She had come to trust Yoshimo despite all of this, only because she was convinced of his devotion to Arowan. It had never occurred to her that her daughter might be in on it as well. It looked bad. Worse than bad, and yet…

"Arowan would never willingly side with Khalid's killer," Jaheira said grimly. "Whatever they're doing, they're doing it under duress. Maybe Irenicus threatened to hurt me if she didn't cooperate."

"She would know that you wouldn't want her to work for him, even to save your life," Rasaad pointed out.

"She also knew that Khalid and I wouldn't want her to drink numbing potions and let Irenicus capture her," Jaheira said quietly. "But she did it just the same."

She looked into the embers of the unlit fire and bowed her head. When she raised it again they could tell that she had come to a decision.

"I'm going after her," Jaheira declared boldly. "She'd do the same for me."

Viconia shrugged and wound a lock of silver hair around her fingers.

"Well it was nice knowing you," she lied.

Anomen rose to his feet, hand on the hilt of his sword. His expression was resolute and the drow groaned inwardly at the noble gesture that was surely about to come. Predictably enough he insisted that he could not allow Jaheira to go alone, nor leave Arowan to her fate.

"I must ask for a leave of absence from your service, Servant of all Faiths," he said formally. "Without these two, I would not be standing here at all. I am honour bound to aid them."

"Oh very well!" Viconia snapped, disappointed. "Come then Rasaad, let us leave the city while there is still light, lest we find ourselves overrun with paladins."

Rasaad's face was set. She knew that expression. It was his best stubborn-monk face and it was absolutely immovable.

"No…" groaned Viconia. "Fickle, sheep-minded male! Even if you save her life, she will not thank you for it!"

"I have saved your life countless times," Rasaad replied calmly. "You have never thanked me for it."

"Inform the Harpers of where I am going," Jaheira said to Bernard. Her face was pale. There were few things that she was afraid of, but walking back into Irenicus's clutches was one of them. "I may not be returning."

Bernard looked like he wanted to argue, but instead he swallowed and nodded.

"This is suicide!" Viconia screeched, unable to believe the idiocy of her companions. That she and Jaheira had escaped Irenicus once was little short of miraculous. To tempt fate in this way again was insane. "We do not stand a chance against him! He skinned Freya alive! Freya!"

"He was only able to defeat her by trickery and chance," Rasaad said.

"Arrogant male! He will obliterate you in seconds without her by your side!" the drow screeched. "I tell you, we are all going to die!"

"Nobody is making you come!" Jaheira snapped. Viconia was torn. She feared Irenicus. Going after him was a near-certain death sentence. Yet so was being a lone drow on the surface. At least this way she got to keep Rasaad.

"Viconia does have a point though," the monk said quietly. "I have encountered our enemy myself on multiple occasions and was unable even to attempt to fight back. What can we possibly do?"

It was at this point that Bernard chose to make a suggestion. It was the barkeeper's only significant contribution to history in his entire service to the Harpers. It was also a highly regrettable one.

"What about that half-orc you asked me to keep an eye on?" Bernard asked Jaheira innocently. "If he's been hanging around Athkatla all this time waiting for Arowan he's not going to want her killed. Big, strong brute of a fellow he is. Maybe he'd help you rescue her?"

"No!" Viconia exclaimed.

"He might," Jaheira conceded. It was not an idea she relished, but they were low on options.

"No!" repeated Viconia, much louder this time.

"Correct me if I'm wrong, but weren't there some rather unpleasant visions concerning myself and Dorn Il-Khan?" Anomen ventured uneasily.

"Yes, but remember Kveroslava, the fortune teller in Trademeet?" Jaheira replied. She seemed to be trying to talk herself into it. "She predicted that you were destined to defeat him, which means that the two of you must meet at some point. It's unavoidable."

"NO!" screeched Viconia, kicking over the table in her fury. "Dorn tried to murder me! He chased me through the streets of Baldur's Gate, though the gods themselves tried to block his way!"

"But when he reached you, Freya and I were waiting in ambush," Rasaad reminded her. "And the three of us together could not kill him. He is the only one we can turn to who might survive a battle with Irenicus. I do not want to do this, Viconia, but I fear we have no choice."

"We have a choice!" she spat back. "We could walk away! But if you are still in love with the ranger-"

"It has nothing to do with Arowan!" Rasaad thundered, squaring up to her. "I have walked away from the Sun Soul, defended the Twofold Heretics and share my heart with a follower of Shar. If I bend my morals any further, Viconia, I will break! I cannot run away a coward, leaving two of my party to their deaths!"

Viconia was shaking with rage, but in spite of everything, she did understand. Since coming to the surface her entire perception of right and wrong had been shaken to its foundations. She had tried to adapt, though nobody ever seemed to appreciate her efforts. Yet sometimes she came across situations where adopting the surfacer mindset was simply a bridge too far. Rasaad had reached that point. Perhaps she could whip him into leaving with her, but he would not be the same man afterwards if she did.

"Dorn Il-Khan it is then, fools!" she hissed. "And may the gods preserve us all."


Dorn said nothing in response to their invitation. He only smiled.

They found him with his gear packed and fully armoured, waiting at the door to the Crooked Crane as though he had been expecting them. He grinned particularly broadly at Viconia, who tried to slink into Rasaad's shadow. The monk glared at the half-orc threateningly, but Dorn took no notice.

Nor did he show anything beyond mild disappointment at the lack of enemies as they descended into Irenicus's former lair. Jaheira, by contrast, stumbled twice and had to be caught by Anomen and Rasaad. The bloodstained rooms might be empty now, but she remembered well enough what they had once contained.

"Do not trouble yourself, half-elf," Dorn said with a smile that was not remotely reassuring. "My patron and I will not permit the Little Lamb to come to harm."

Rasaad made a sceptical sound. Dorn rounded on him, and on Viconia who was being careful to ensure that the monk walked between them at all times.

"Nor should you be so concerned, drow," the half-orc growled. "Do not mistake me. I would part your head from your shoulders in an instant if I could, but we see now that it is impossible. After our encounter in Baldur's Gate I will not attempt to slay you again."

"Your stench could slay me in this confined space!" Viconia retorted hatefully.

"Quiet both of you, it is around this next corner!" Rasaad whispered.

They leapt out into the portal room ready for a fight, but found the office on the other side was empty. Yoshimo and Arowan had gone, and Irenicus with them. Cautiously they ventured into the small room. Red-brown stains on the desk told Jaheira that he had not given up on his 'experiments' since relocating, but the marks were old. Too old to be her family's. A brief rummage through the paperwork revealed nothing but a diary of Irenicus's. Mostly it detailed anatomical diagrams that were clearly and disturbingly drawn from life, but there were also some personal notes contained within. The most recent read;

'My condition grows worse and what I remember of my home is fleeting. The deterioration of my body has been hastened by battles first with Freya, then Bubbles and most destructively with Kangaax. I see images of family whose names I no longer recall and dream of emotions I no longer feel as vividly. Perhaps this is what it feels like to live on Numbing Potions, but if so, I cannot conceive why addicts choose to take them.

Bodhi endured the curse much better than I do now, but she was more focussed and more importantly, undead. Despite its failure to counteract the death sentence she was under, she embraces vampirism. She has even alluded once or twice to 'going further' into undeath with the aid of that filthy necromancer Bubbles. I do not know precisely what she means by this, but it matters not. If Arowan's plan is successful I will have Sarevok and Bubbles will be dead.'

Jaheira broke off reading aloud.

"Arowan's plan?" she echoed. "No, that cannot be right…"

'I would pity her and my 'sister' if I were capable, but emotions only come to me in violent outbursts. Ellesime has taken away my ability to truly feel. Bodhi seems to have regained hers with the piece of Imoen's soul I imparted to her, along with an insatiable appetite for blood and knights. Ideally both at once. She has turned a number of squires and paladins in recent weeks, setting up a grotesque 'court' in the Graveyard District.

Of all the fragments of Bhaalspawn soul that comprise Imoen, I selected Draxle as the weakest. I am coming to regret this choice, for her revolting influence over my 'sister.' I have heard as much human poetry as my weakened guts can stomach! Yet it makes me more grateful to Yoshimo and Arowan than ever for their helpful suggestion. If this tiny fragment of Draxle's soul turned Bodhi into a blushing princess, no doubt Eric would have rendered me a coward, and Arowan plagued me with guilt. Sarevok was a man of strength and ruthless ambition. His will be a soul to my taste.

"Grateful to Arowan and Yoshimo?" Jaheira repeated weakly. "I don't understand… wait, what's that?"

They froze. Clicking footsteps were approaching, not from deeper in the building but from the other side of the portal. The party looked at each other in panic, apart from Dorn who was cheerfully drawing Rancor. Rasaad silently reached behind him and opened the door, beckoning the others through it, before seizing Dorn and half-dragging him after them.

It led to a vacant main hall, lined with pillars and decorated with a vast golden carpet. Vast but threadbare. This place looked as though it might once have been very grand, but those days were in the distant past. Two more doors led off from it. The hall was wide open and empty, apart from one warden, a hunched jittery man holding a key.

Footsteps were still approaching and the door they had just come through swung open to reveal Bubbles and Bodhi, with Shank and Carbos lumbering along behind them. Both women looked different. Bubbles was not wearing her usual costume of lacy robes with bright silk, but a plain blue smock. She had dispensed with the makeup and her hair was bound back in a simple bun. For once the necromancer looked her actual age which, Jaheira realised, was not very much older than Arowan.

Bodhi was in her usual revealing black leathers, but there were some alterations. For one thing she was wearing a veil, clamped to her head by a pretty silver tiara. She had painted her nails to match and added some embroidery to her bodice. It was clumsy embroidery that had warped the fabric with fat uneven stitches. She appeared to have attempted to sew it herself.

At first, they did not see the party, so deep were they in discussion.

"Something is wrong!" Bodhi was insisting. "Calling us here a day early? The dead svirfneblin at the door? I'm telling you he suspects something. What if he knows about the coat?"

"What if he does?" Bubbles replied disinterestedly. "Why should he care if you made a phylactery out of it? He's getting what he wanted. We all are. Even Eric." She smiled, revealing her rotting teeth. "He put me under this geas to bring him back after all, and at long last his wish will be granted."

She looked up and froze at the sight of the party. They had all drawn their weapons and were hunkering into a defensive ring.

"Who do we have here?" Bodhi smiled, her little fangs poking over her lip. Her eyes roved over Anomen with interest. He was not technically a knight, having been expelled from the Order, but he was close enough for her. Not to mention handsomer than any of her courtly fledglings thus far. "What fun."

"Ah. I believe we have found the explanation for your dead doorman," Bubbles said. She batted away Shank, who was reaching for her brain affectionately. "We have some unexpected visitors. What are you doing here dearies?"

"Where's Arowan?" Jaheira barked, slamming her staff on the ground.

"Through the door to the right," Bubbles replied swiftly. "Warden, let them through, would you?"

The little man opened the door and the necromancer gestured them through it. Their only options were to fight them, or to walk through the door with her. Jaheira chose the latter for the time being. Bubbles shut the door behind them, leaving Bodhi and the warden on the other side, and locked it with a click.

They were at the end of a long hallway lined with doors. A stench of stale urine and cabbage lingered in the air. There was no natural light, yet it was unpleasantly bright, lit from above by magical glowing balls.

"What is this place?" grunted Dorn.

"We are in the asylum at Spellhold," Bubbles replied apologetically. "I'm sorry, you are in for a rough night. Some of the inmates scream in their sleep. Try to avoid them if you can, they're very disturbed, poor creatures. I'll let you out in the morning when the ritual is complete."

"You mean to take us prisoner?" Jaheira asked matter-of-factly.

"Well… I mean… prisoner is a very strong word," Bubbles floundered. She had been a slave to many masters and still was to the geas ring. The idea of taking prisoners did not sit comfortably with her. "Let us say that you are temporarily incarcerated for your own safety. I don't know if you noticed how Bodhi was eyeing up your young man but, er, best you keep out of the way tonight. She's developed an appetite for knights. In all senses of the word, if you catch my drift."

"I'd rather die!" Anomen cried, horror-struck. Bubbles looked at him pityingly.

"That would be part of the arrangement, yes," she told him. "Which is why you'll be staying put until the ritual is complete. We're setting up now. Chins up! This time tomorrow we'll be back in Athkatla and this will all be over. None of us will ever see Bodhi or her brother again, with any luck."

"Where is Arowan?" Jaheira begged. "What is happening?"

"Didn't she and Yoshimo tell you anything? Arowan is not a strong Bhaalspawn," Bubbles explained kindly. "She doesn't possess much of her father's essence. Did she ever happen to mention Eric to you?"

"We've met Eric," Jaheira replied. Albeit briefly, on the way to his own execution.

"Did you?" Something flickered in the necromancer's eyes. Something sad. "He and I were together in the Black Pits. Before Irenicus took him away, Eric transferred his necromantic powers to this ring, and put me under a geas to resurrect him if he died. Bringing back a Bhaalspawn is not straightforward. There's no body, you see. But between us, Irenicus and I have found a way to do it. He gets his more powerful Bhaalspawn. Arowan and I, and you, get to go free."

"Then why is she here?"

"A backup," replied Bubbles. "Irenicus insisted. She's just a backup, in case the ritual fails, but don't worry sweethearts. It won't."

"She's been lying to us all this time," Jaheira sighed, sitting down heavily. Then her head snapped up. "And Yoshimo?"

"Under a geas, just like me," the necromancer replied sympathetically. "But it's only one more day. This is almost over. Just hang in there."

With a last, supportive little nod, she teleported away. Rasaad and Viconia ran to the door, peering out through the bars, but the hall was empty now save for the two hulking figures of Shank and Carbos standing guard over them. Presumably in case Bodhi came down in search of a midnight snack.

"Who- who… who is that? Keep back. Keep back!"

They turned around. An inmate, a pale girl in a hospital gown that she was clutching tightly about her had come up behind them in the corridor. She had lost a lot of weight and her hair had thinned from stress, but the pink colour was unmistakable.

"Imoen!" Rasaad cried.

"Who is Imoen?" the girl trembled.

"Imoen, where is Arowan?" Jaheira asked harshly. The chimera had struck the killing blow against Khalid, and his wife would never forgive her for it.

Imoen's face slackened. She looked from one intruder to the next with a relaxed sort of vibe.

"Arowan? Arowan is, like, right here dudes," Imoen replied, pointing at her temple. Alarmingly, her face contorted and when she next spoke her voice was deep and gruff. "It Draxle what gone. Need Draxle. You find!" Imoen's lips and jaw spasmed horribly as though multiple people were fighting to gain control of her voice. She made a few confused gurgling sounds before Arowan's sardonic opinion broke through. "Hey, since I'm the only one still alive maybe I ought to be the priority here?"

"By the gods," Rasaad breathed, fascinated and appalled in equal measure. "Irenicus has split her soul into its component parts. There are twelve pieces of people in there."

"Eleven damn it!" Imoen replied. Suddenly she was standing up straighter, her head thrown back and stance wide with confidence. "We're missing Draxle. Twelve minus one is eleven. Fucking hell Rasaad, and people say I'm dumb!"

"We should put this creature out of its misery," Dorn suggested. Beside him Viconia nodded in agreement.

"Get away!" Imoen sobbed, crumpling into a pathetic ball on the floor and rocking back and forth. "GET AWAY!"