Insanity in General Chapter 2: Faces of the Tarot, a forgotten realms fanfic

Author's Note: Bribe me, c'mon!

And I admit to uh, having mild obsessions with tarot cards.

Part 2

Faces of the Tarot

He should never have given the mask to Zaknafein.

In fact, Entreri wasn't quite sure why he had handed the artefact over to the dark elf in the first place, only that it seemed like a good idea at that time. Increasingly, most of the things he let Zaknafein do came under that category, like the rather famously stupid one involving him allowing (perhaps 'allowing' wasn't a very precise term when applied to the elf) Zaknafein to 'join' his organisation of assassins in the hope that systematic violence would aid in the reconstruction of his mind instead of randomised violence.

Some good that had done – with a steady supply of jobs requiring his specialized skills, all that Zaknafein had done was to inexplicably appear to sharpen said skills back to what he perceived as their former peak. Said that his time spent (being dead) had turned him out of practice.

Entreri shuddered to think what such a peak might have been. And unfortunately, the mood swings seemed to have become not only worse, but Zaknafein was now apparently more 'dominant' a personality and it was no longer much of an issue of Sam's control regarding whether or not he chose to show himself. She hadn't seemed to mind, though – wherever she 'went' when he was out seemed to be, to her, a much nicer place than reality.

At least the Council appeared to have accepted his rather contrived account of having stopped the serial killer, not that they really had much choice in the matter. What they didn't know was that the killer was, in fact, still killing, but at least it wasn't just anybody unlucky enough to chance into his way now. Hopefully. One always got a feeling of a severe lack of control or unbalance when it came to that elf, and Entreri couldn't afford the time from his schedule to keep a close eye on Zaknafein all the time. He was far too unpredictable.

Take the mask for example.

Entreri entered his chambers wearily to find Zaknafein on his favourite perch – atop his dining table, staring into space. Today his face was something Entreri thought of as the Hanged Man, with the injured, lost, suspended-before-death expression he had always associated with the tarot card. It wasn't that Zaknafein used the mask to run amok with a vast range of different faces and species – that Entreri could deal with, if barely – but he used the mask to create a series of the same faces.

Intrinsically the same, anyway – definitely always with Zaknafein's uniquely handsome features – but there was always something obscurely different about each one, in the expression or demeanour, that grated on the assassin's nerves. And the hair was different for each face - for example, in the Hanged Man it was waist-long and unkempt, almost greasy, in a magnificent, pitiful ruin. The mask had definitely exacerbated Zaknafein's condition – now not only could he act the different moods, he could look it.

Attempts on the assassin's part to remove the mask in several different situations and times had just ended rather pathetically. Besides, on the one time he succeeded, Zaknafein had entered such a murderous rage that he'd had to return it before he, the master assassin of Calimport, had gotten disembowelled with a silver fork.

Entreri forced a smile as he greeted the elf. This was one of the faces he didn't like. "Vendui, Zaknafein," he said as politely as he could, ignoring the obvious, brittle small-talk miasma normally attached to the next part of his address. "How was your day?"

He didn't add that he knew, through a careful network of trustworthy spies, more or less (generally less, since his spies were still not as skilled at surveillance as Entreri himself was, or as good as Zaknafein at avoiding said surveillance) exactly what Zaknafein had done for today – which was, unexcitingly enough, sitting in his current position and staring at the wall, sometimes muttering repetitively in the Dark Elven tongue. Unexciting was good.

Zaknafein didn't even look at him, but continued staring blankly into the air. Okay, so sometimes unexciting was just a little unsettling…

Entreri cautiously edged closer to the dark elf, all the while noting with relief that all visible weapons were relatively out of reach. "Zaknafein?"

Circling fully around to directly face him, the elf still continued looking fixedly at a point somewhere behind his head. It was decidedly annoying – he had to keep convincing himself that he wasn't invisible. "Zaknafein?" Entreri touched the elf's cheek with tentative fingers. That started some reaction – Zaknafein muttered something inaudible.

"What?"

Without changing his stare, the elf repeated, "Does it matter?"

"What does?"

"Anything. Everything. Living."

Entreri sighed inwardly. He really did not like this face. "Why?"

"Nothing makes a difference if it disappears."
"Er… are you well?"

"Nothing makes a difference."

"Zaknafein…"

"Does it?" At this, the painfully bewildered gaze shifted to focus on the assassin's face.

You do. Entreri opened his mouth, closed it, and then to his irritation only managed to say, "Are you tired? Maybe you need to rest."

Ricklar sat in his chair, amply filling its every inch, as he examined with a plump hand a set of trade laws. The hand was weighed down with enough jewelled rings to punch through a wall. Life was good to the merchant, even in a city recently rising to the concept of an all-governing Law.

It was a pity that the other guilds were dying out, vaguely pitiful anyway. It was such a pity about the Assassins, of course, but all in all, they were never very good customers anyway. Thieves had mainly either gone further underground or joined the law profession, which, when all was said and done, merely required them to do a lot more talking with a lot less climbing and running away. The mages had mainly branched into teleportation spells and communication – time was such a valuable commodity now, something that Ricklar understood to the decimal.

Outside the window he could see the harsh blue sky watching over the increased chaos of the crowd now punctuated by the black of Law, of the nervous questioning smiles of the commoners when faced with a robed minion, though to be accurate that was just a tiny fraction of the burgeoning life that pervaded Calimport, that had always been with Calimport, the painted girls giggling and sidling down the bazaar, perhaps tonight they would see the river with some lovelorn swain, the swallows flirting their scissor tails on sagging red canvas covers, while uncountable traders screamed and shouted and acted. Ricklar loved the city.

After all, it was money that he could see in everything. Lawyers needed robes, commoners needed food, girls needed cosmetics, swallows in cages, and traders with goods. Everything was beautiful. "Isn't it all beautiful, Hassim?"

In accord to anyone in a bad story named Hassim, the burly, tanned bodyguard with a huge scimitar at the door grunted noncommittally.

About exactly twenty seconds later, Hassim choked, gurgled out blood on the priceless Kara-Tur carpet that adorned the marble floor of the chamber, and collapsed, sliding off a sword that protruded from the door. With horrified fascination, Ricklar watched the sword withdraw, then the door was kicked open to show a figure hooded in shades of grey and brown, a tendril of silver hair teasing out to rub at the dull bronze clasp under his chin. A glint of metal lower down revealed well-forged chain mail armour, but Ricklar was more fixed on the two bloody swords.

"Ricklar D'set?" the intruder asked in a heavily accented voice.

"N-no, I just sit in for him…"

The intruder seemed to stare at a point behind Ricklar's ear, and then said, simply, "Voice identified."

"Wait! Wait… I can pay you off…"

The intruder smiled then, with the cold promise of the Reaper. "Aluve', Ricklar D'set."

"Oh, hello, Sam," Entreri said with surprise, when the little girl walked into his office, dragging behind her the large stuffed toy bear that he had bought her a few days ago. Bought for Zaknafein, actually – he'd found out that living in a little girl's head had rubbed some inclinations onto the elf, including the unexplainable preoccupation with little fluffy cuteness that resulted in compliant happiness. Very compliant.

Sam had grown a little hair, and now looked somewhat less like a strange alien from a forgotten civilisation. Better clothes (for some reason unlike Zaknafein she could not produce clothing from different dimensions) and a bath had made her into a relatively pretty child, which allowed her the run of the place. Besides, everyone knew that on will she could turn into a potentially murderous dark elf, so they were unfailingly polite and often offered little bribes to the tune of toys and sweetmeats. All the pampering had the effect of turning her into a little Empress, Entreri thought wryly.

"Hello, Artemis," Sam said solemnly. He had not managed to pry the habit of calling people by their first names out of her. It was mildly irritating, as Zaknafein had also began, rather mischievously, to call him Artemis instead of his preferred surname during certain situations.

"Did you want something?"

Sam climbed up onto the guest chair to the side of his desk, hugged the bear to her, and stared over its head with wide eyes. When this got unnerving he prompted, "Yes?"

"Just wanted to ask about Jarlaxle. I notice Zaknafein never does seem to remember about it when he's with you."

"He doesn't remember a lot of things," Entreri said, continuing to write. The innocent stare cut like a lancet, in the manner of all childish stares. "But yes, I have attempted to contact him. He's lately gone into hiding."

"What did he do?" Sam asked, the naïve worry in her voice almost laughably cute.

"He was just himself, I guess," Entreri grinned. "When he's just himself for any period of time, people naturally want to kill him."

"I don't understand that," Sam said, frowning.

"You need to meet him to understand that." It was the way the elf moved, talked, and manipulated others - even the way he looked at you made you feel a little out of sync and therefore somehow more agreeable to whatever he was asking. It was extremely annoying, and also extremely difficult to convey in rational terms to a little girl. "You could ask Zaknafein."

"Okay," Sam said agreeably. "So when will he come?"

"I did say 'attempted'. He hasn't sent any answer yet, and I wouldn't get hopeful on an immediate solution. Besides, with Jarlaxle there is always a cost to his… services."
"I don't have any money," Sam said, now a little sheepishly.

"Zaknafein has been earning some, so, to a reasonable extent I can absorb the costs," Entreri said reassuringly.

"Thanks," Sam said happily. "Mr. Bear says thanks, too."

"Right, whatever." Entreri scrutinized her for a moment. "Do you think you should be going to school?" Calimport had a rather good, if still growing, institution of education that 'cultivated' children from a young age toward a more useful, educated life ahead. Basically, most of them became lawyers.

"Well… Bashik has been teaching me how to steal things." Sam said proudly. "He said in a few months after I'm done with pickpocketing I can learn how to break into houses."

"Oh. That's all right then."

Darkness and three flat, interchangeable voices – for some moments, one might think that it was but one voice, speaking to himself.

"How goes progress?"

"To use an old adage – as smoothly as Fortune's Wheel."

"Ah."

"It was a brilliant idea to plant the suggestion about the mask in his head."

"The dark elf does not yet know?"

"We ourselves do not know the extent of his attachment to the girl."

"And despite assurances on the assassin's part that he has contacted the mercenary he has not."

"Why, I wonder?"

"Because he is increasingly enamoured of the dark elf?"

"He must know that the mercenary could help."

"There is doubt in his mind regarding the true intentions of the mercenary in any matter."

            "Indeed they are not without founding. The assassin was the companion of the mercenary for a decade or more."
            "I doubt the discretion of bringing the mercenary into the gambit."
            "You believe he might see through it?"

"He has a ready intelligence that is always undisrupted. The dark elf is mad, the assassin preoccupied with the mundane, and the girl is young."

"We have time, much time."

            "Yes, at least this Movement does not require a time or place."
            "Would we wait for the girl to grow to her prime? In her teens she would conflict with the dark elf."
            "She would?"

"As would any at that age. Any human, any creature, when they begin to grasp the joy and the pain of living."

"Would it destroy him?"

"Eventually. He is afraid of it, when he is of mind."

"Send for the mercenary, then."

"No, we must plant information."

            "He could see the duplicity of that."
            "But he would be curious."
            "Agreed. I choose this task."
            Light flared for a moment in the face of one, eyes shaded however by heavily embroidered arcane robes, the mouth with the ascetic smile of the Magician.

It was always a little disconcerting yet gratifying to find this particular face of Zaknafein, whenever it occurred, but today it was somewhat inconvenient, considering the amount of work he had to do. Besides, he had only returned to his room to try and locate a missing part of the paperwork that he had set himself up to finish today, what with the strange influx of cases resulting from wrongful litigation, or something like that, not that he really understood what was happening. Still, a job was a job, and he didn't really care why the person had to be killed, just how much they were charging him to kill said person.

The dark elf was lounging on the bed like a lazy panther, a sultry, inviting smile on his lips, the eyes predatory, hair in a silky, decadent mane over his shoulders. Clothing was non-existent, and the assassin's pulse began to quicken. Why this face at this time? The others were more easily ignored (if one could in fact try and ignore a psychotic dark elf)…

He rather pointedly averted his eyes from the elf, instead scanning his table for the papers. If he recalled correctly, there was a watermark on one in the shape of some weird deformed beetle… and there was a soft, hungry moan from the direction of the bed. Entreri bit his lip. Deformed beetle, deformed beetle – where the hell was that paper? Definitely had to find it soon, before the growing tightness in his pants decided to take control of his mind…. Another moan, louder this time, and he had to bite his lip, reminding himself a little desperately that he had a lot of work to do, and he was not going to change his schedule for the sake of anything.

Shuffling hurriedly through the papers on the table, he noticed with detached bemusement that his hands were shaking a little, though not from fear or any related emotion. He nearly let out a sigh of relief when he found the papers, something about a twenty-thousand-dollar contract that he only barely managed to skim through before he felt arms encircle him from behind and heat press at him, teeth nip at his neck, something extremely suggestive in the dark elven tongue muttered into his ear, which, unfortunately, he could understand.

"Zaknafein… can we do this later?" Entreri attempted to pry the arms off him in panic, but only managed to stop their wandering. The heat behind him started to rub against his body.

"No."

            "I don't have time to play Lovers now."
            "You live forever. You have all the time you want."
            True, but still… "Not now…"

And he'd half-expected it, but was still shocked when he felt a point of metal at his throat. Zaknafein had reached rather philosophically for one of the assassin's several throwing knives.

They were coming back from a completed, somewhat complicated job that had required at least two people, and Entreri could tell from the sternly tied hair that Zaknafein had, without warning, changed faces again, and as usual he wondered what had precipitated it. Not the blood or the kills, or the ebbing adrenaline, or the distant soup of smells from the sleeping streets… there should be a trigger somewhere, but Entreri found he was a little too tired to care, so he attempted to ignore it.

Zaknafein didn't say anything until they entered an alley, and Entreri picked a beggar to kill and heal his wounds. The assassin habitually watched him out of the corner of his eyes, but all the elf was doing was staring disdainfully at the scattered, weathered cardboard boxes that formed the shelter of vagrants, and the nearly overfull garbage cans from which the effects of Calimport's famous heat on their contents could be divined.

Well, if he wasn't going to say anything… Entreri stood up from the drained corpse and nodded to Zaknafein. "Come on. We're nearly home."

"Home?" Zaknafein rolled the word around his mouth, enunciating it with exaggerated, cold precision. "This is not… home."

"Uh, right. Back to headquarters then." Entreri started off down the alley, his shoulder plates itching at the idea of having a highly trained warrior behind him, but from the sounds of the footsteps, Zaknafein was just following. Now, if only the elf would stop talking with the air of self-righteous condemnation that Entreri often found in the various Hierophants of the churches in Calimport…

Zaknafein snorted. "So much of your city resembles the Braeryn of Menzoberranzan. It can never be home."

"Then what is home to you, anyway?" Entreri said sharply, instantly regretting it after. He knew better than to provoke Zaknafein, but he was tired and the sun was annoying, especially when wearing armour and a cloak. Why was he wearing a cloak anyway? He had to be crazy… oh yes, it was magically enchanted. The things one did to gain an edge in a fight – not that it helped much against his current companion.

"Home?" Zaknafein asked, as if suddenly bewildered at the question. Entreri looked back quickly, but the elf hadn't changed faces, and besides, he only looked thoughtful.

"Yes… where you'd stay, feel safe?"

"Then Menzoberranzan cannot be 'home', if you say. Nor can this place."

"Why not? Calimport is much safer than your Dark Elf city," Entreri contended. "Sometimes I get nightmares where I'm stuck there forever."

"Menzoberranzan does not hold as many dangers to a dark elf noble as it would to a human."

"Right… explain the high death rate and the matriarchal system then."

"Is it any different from your species' death rate and your patriarchal system? Look at your women. Even in positions of power they continue to be defined by male standards. Is it that much different… from the Dark Elves?"

Entreri was about to reply sarcastically that at least the patriarchal leaders did not torture people for fun, but remembered several unpleasant tales he had heard just a few months ago and stopped short. "Well, our attitude to other races…"

"Is either patronising if they are inferior, or fearful and untrusting if they are not. It is very much the same."

"Your point being?"

"I do not understand the problems you surfacers have with us Dark Elves sometimes."

"Maybe the way you tend to kill us if you set sight on us."

"As you people would, or try to, if it was different."

"Uh, the way you treat your children?"

Zaknafein sneeringly pointed at one of the random huddles of cloth that they passed, that coughed at intervals, painful, high pitched coughing, a sick child. "How do you treat yours?"

"At least some of ours are loved when they're born," Entreri retorted.

"Did your mother love you, human?"

Entreri bit his lip, frowning. He really did not want to talk about that, not here, not now, certainly not with Zaknafein in his current mood, so he shut up, hoping the injured silence would draw an appropriate response. As it was, Zaknafein snorted, probably smirked, and continued, unfortunately.

"Silence is not an answer, but it would suffice." The elf waited, but Entreri refused to be baited, and so he continued. "There are, I would agree, somewhat higher bars of social inequality, but not in all Dark Elven cities, yet with the precision and prejudice of any Dark Elf you humans continue to label, to stereotype, to judge. Like the halflings, the dwarves… all intelligent species."

"We are all the same, I would think, disgusting as that would sound." Zaknafein chuckled low for a moment, a rich, almost companionable sound unless one could pick up the steady undercurrent of vicious mocking. "So there is no home for me, anywhere, not in death or in life. Nowhere that I would feel like I fit, or feel comfortable."

At least, Entreri thought, the elf was being lucid, even if it was depressingly lucid.

"Am I a fool for feeling so?" Zaknafein inquired suddenly, though from the rhetorical air he could have been addressing the grimy, broken pipes to their left for all that the assassin knew.

"No," Entreri said, deciding to swallow this bait. "I don't think you are a fool, Zaknafein."

"For wanting something I cannot have?"

"It's part of the nature of living, of knowing. The more you know of either the more you desire."

"What do you think of the issue, then?"

With you, I think I'd always have the idea, the feeling, of 'home'? Do you find that strange, contemptible, Dark Elf, that I can want to be with you so much? Or so very 'human'? Entreri smiled, a little bitterly. "Nothing. I'm far too tired to think of this now."

"Vendui, abbil!"

There was only one creature alive who could address him cheerfully with that particular dark-elven term, and yet have a voice that could bring out all its ironic elements of untrustworthiness and cynical paradox, and that was one of the last people he really wanted to talk to at the moment.

Looking up from the paperwork sharply, Entreri scanned his study. Still nobody… there was only the carefully filed books and papers and the neat desk, maps and a gorgeously framed mirror. Entreri needed absolute order to think on things he did not want to think about, and lately, order was somewhat lacking, what with Zaknafein's naturally disorderly presence.

"Jarlaxle? Where are you?"

"A magical voice communicator. I am actually in Ched Nasad at the moment. How are you?"

"Fine except for the detail of which I tried to tell you about. You certainly took your time replying."

"I only discovered it two hours ago," Jarlaxle said cheerfully. It was extremely disconcerting listening to the mercenary's voice coming out of nowhere. "The mailing system in the Underdark is somewhat unreliable. Your messenger actually had gotten eaten by various monsters some ways from Menzoberranzan, and his remains were found much later by a patrol that, luckily enough, had a Bregan D'aerthe-paid Master leading it."

"Ah damn." Entreri sighed. "And I invested a lot of money in his equipment, too."

"They were very interesting. But not helpful, I am afraid, against deep dragons."

"Of all the things to run into! Aren't those things extinct?"

"Certainly not. I have one has a friend."

"You define most people as friends, even your enemies," Entreri sighed. "For you, the word acquires a whole new meaning."

"Oh?"

"You're not paying attention, are you? You always say that when you're thinking of a way to change the subject."
"Your insight is always refreshing, Entreri." The elf was definitely laughing at him now. Entreri had no idea why Jarlaxle always seemed to find him so funny, even when he wasn't even being funny…

Well, if the mercenary wasn't going to make any attempt to change the subject… "Did you think about the… problem involving Zaknafein?"

"It is only natural that torture in the Abyss would lead to insanity, though I found it quite curious how he ended up with a child. That speaks of magical intervention."

"I haven't managed to find out anything about Sam's past, or who did that to her. Her directions were misleading – they actually just led to a bear's cave in the middle of Cloakwood forest."

"I could try… but my Surface contacts are somewhat rusty. In any case, I believe we could get them to separate… if you want to."

"Why wouldn't I?"

"Do you want an insane warrior around you all the time, Entreri? And a dark elf at that! You used to get nervous around me, and, sadly to say, I am nowhere near Zaknafein's level of skill."

"Can't he be cured?" Entreri ignored the last bit of that statement. It didn't take weapons skill to be dangerous… and Jarlaxle, in his own way, was far more dangerous than Zaknafein could be.

"I would not think so," Jarlaxle sighed. "I know of several victims of prolonged torture. They are never truly… cured, if you wish to use that word. At least now part of the time he is a little harmless girl, yes?"

"Well, he threatened to kill me if I didn't ask you about it…"

'That is not the same as whether or not he can be separated. He only asked you to contact me about the issue, did he not?"

"Yes…"

"Do you love him, Entreri?"

Entreri blinked, dropped his pen, cursed, picked it up, and placed it carefully in the inkpot, before looking around frantically for something to soak up the blots. Wishing that Jarlaxle would let go of the question was wistful thinking, though, and he braced himself for some sort of vilification.

What the mercenary actually did say was somewhat worse. "Fool that you are." The ever-present amusement, and something that Entreri hated – a trace of sympathy.

"What about it?" Entreri snapped.

"So quickly?"

"I'm not even going to answer that." Entreri muttered, finding a scrap of cloth. The documents were never going to be the same again, anyway… not to mention the bits of a word that one of the blots covered immediately made it sound vulgar. Wonderful. Now he had to rewrite this before its scheduled afternoon submission to a merchant Prince. Another annoying thing about the brave new world was that far too many things were required written documentation.

"But you already have," Jarlaxle said, sweetly and irritatingly, interrupting his neutral reverie. "Does he love you, human?"

"Oh, fuck off, Jarlaxle."

"On the contrary, I believe it's a long time since I've seen Calimport…"

"Yes?"

"So I think I'd pay you a visit. This sounds far too amusing to miss."

"Can't you just get someone to come here and separate him?" Entreri felt his heart start to plummet to his boots.

"I will not be in your way – Bregan D'aerthe still has its headquarters."

"Abandoned."

"It can be restored."

"The lawyers?"

"Can be killed."

"That may not be a very good idea, attractive as it may seem…" Entreri said warningly.

"I was only joking. We have our own lawyers," Jarlaxle chuckled. "And for fun, I actually half a decade disguised in Baldur's Gate University. Guess why."

"Don't tell me… you have a law degree?" Just as he'd thought the world couldn't get worse…

"You sound so disbelieving. And I legitimately graduated. With honors, I might add."

"I'm not that surprised, actually," Entreri sat down, leaned back, and buried his face in his hands. "When I'd first heard of the profession, I thought it was made for you."

Entreri found Zaknafein, oddly enough, on the roof of the building, talking to himself. The sun had set, and Calimport's heat was replaced with the equally fabled desert cold.

"Zaknafein?" Entreri asked curiously, taking care to make enough noise such that the elf could hear him coming.

Zaknafein turned – now his hair was in a neat, stylish tail, part of his fringe hanging over his eyes mischievously, which had an imperial, aloofly regal expression and a wicked smile. "Greetings, Artemis."

"I prefer the name 'Entreri', Zaknafein." Entreri said absently. "What are you doing?"

"Isn't being on a first name basis so much more intimate?"

"I doubt you and I can get any more intimate than we already are," Entreri muttered, sitting down carefully next to the elf, unsure as to whether, in Zaknafein's current 'face', he was invading the elf's interchangeable personal space.

Zaknafein slipped a hand round the assassin's waist, and rested his chin on Entreri's shoulder. "Can we not?"

"The Devil you are," Entreri sighed, looking up at the cloudless sky. Zaknafein was in his one face that was purposefully contrary.

"And this is Hell?"

"For some people, certainly."

"I want it to be." Zaknafein said, in a whisper, breath hot against Entreri's ear. Entreri turned sharply to look at Zaknafein, but the wicked smile was still there, somewhat disconcertingly so. "Everything should burn with bright, phoenix flames, or drown in rotting blood."

"That, is actually rather poetic," Entreri said with a forced grin, hoping to change the mood. "And I need to tell you someth…" the sentence ended in a muffled yelp as Zaknafein kissed him, then a moan as the elf's hands began to explore his body. Entreri blinked, then broke the kiss and caught Zaknafein's fingers. "Hey!"

"You can tell me something…" Zaknafein whispered, "Later."

"Now," Entreri insisted, dodging a kiss. "It's about J…" Zaknafein caught his neck and kissed him, pushing him down in the process and pinning him firmly. When they came up for air, Entreri complained, "Must so many of our serious conversations either end in sex or you losing interest and going blank?"

"You humans talk far too much," Zaknafein growled, voice somewhat distorted as he nipped Entreri's neck. "You would put your voice to better use…" the elf broke off his sentence with a deep kiss, "by screaming for me."

Entreri moaned, trying to ignore the demands of his body. "Jarlaxle is coming."

"He won't be the only one," Zaknafein muttered, then cursed as he attempted to remove Entreri's belt. The assassin took the opportunity that the distraction offered to roll himself on top of the elf, mentally noting in the meantime to get someone up to clean the roof.

"Just listen seriously!"

"Make me." Zaknafein smirked, and crossed his arms. At least he wasn't doing something violent.

"Wasn't Jarlaxle c… er, arriving what you wanted?"

"I want a lot of things," Zaknafein said, looking Entreri over slowly. The assassin flushed with irritation and other conflicting emotions.

"Ah what the hell… why do I bother with you people?"

Zaknafein chuckled wickedly. "Because I see no element of choice in the matter. Do you want to move to your room, or do it on the roof?"

"What about not at all!"

Zaknafein pretended to consider that, turning his head to the side as if deep in thought. The gesture, unfortunately, made him look absolutely adorable, especially in close up. "Did you hear me about the element of choice?"

Entreri snorted and got up, then walked as quickly as possible to the exit as dignity would allow.

"See you later," Zaknafein called, apparently not following, and the elf began to laugh. There was something mocking and melancholy in the sound, and Entreri had to force himself to leave.

The World… what did it mean?

All the same, always the same…

And you die even while you live.