Hark: When did I last update? I have no idea. I just haven't been able to write anything for a long time. I'm so busy studying right now that the next chapter will probably be written during Christmas or something... Of course, I usually get most of my inspirations when I should be studying for exams and there are plenty of those coming, so we'll see.

Chapter 4: Homes and families

Shandara leaned on the railing and stared at the waves, with a little smile creeping to her lips. She didn't usually like being at sea, but the weather was fine and she was feeling wonderful. Living in Beregost hadn't suited her, she could see it now. The little town had been too small for her and although she had tried to fit in and had made friends, all the time there had been the feeling of being out of place. Now she was returning to the only place she had ever considered her home. She was happy, but the situation wasn't perfect. She was returning home, Entreri wasn't. She had hoped they could find a home together, but Beregost hadn't been that home. She had the feeling that Athkatla wouldn't be the right place for them either. For her, perhaps, but she couldn't see them living there together. Another place was needed. Would they ever find a place they both liked? She wasn't sure.

"I hate it when your smile disappears like that." Shandara, on the other hand, both loved and hated Entreri's way of walking up to her quietly. It meant that he was there in times she wanted him to be there for her, but also in times when she would have preferred to be alone. "Is something wrong?"

"It's just that..." she wondered for a moment whether she should talk about her worries at all, and then realized that it was Entreri asking her the question. With anyone else she might have turned the conversation to other matters, but with him it was useless. "I was thinking about Beregost. And Athkatla. And also about home. I want one. With you. But I'm not sure whether we'll ever find one that we both love. Beregost clearly wasn't that place."

"I thought you liked it there," Entreri said. "But not enough?"

"Not enough. It was fine, but not wonderful, not a place I would truly miss."

"I've never had such a place," Entreri muttered and Shandara saw the sadness flash through his otherwise cold, grey eyes. She couldn't stop loving the way his storm cloud eyes filled with emotion every now and then, the moments when she could see the man behind the armour he had constructed to protect himself. She was allowed to see him for who he really was.

"We'll find that kind of place some day," she said, although she didn't quite believe her own words. "A home, a true home. I mean, how hard can it really be? Most people are happy right where they live."

"They are ordinary people," Entreri pointed out, smiling a little. "We're not."

"You're right," Shandara said, grinning and kissing his cheek. "We're special. We're wonderful. And we're going to arrive to Athkatla soon," she continued, pointing at the coastline the ship had been following for a day. "We can stop worrying about finding a home for a while and start worrying about being asked to babysit."

"Babysit?" She could swear she heard horror in Entreri's voice.

"Yes, babysit," she said, grinning evilly. "A young mother who needs some time off from her baby, who is she going to turn to? Her best friends, of course. That means me, and if I have to babysit someone, I'm sure as hell not going to do it alone."

"You would make me babysit?" Entreri asked in a voice that was now more amused than horrified.

"You would be the assistant babysitter," Shandara said. "Your job would be trying to keep me sane. I don't think I'm very good with babies. Older children yes, they can be reasoned with. Babies just keep crying all the time."

"I don't think it's that bad," Entreri laughed.

"Just wait and see," Shandara said, trying to make her voice sound menacing but failing. "Crying all the time, trust me."

"He won't stop crying!" Mitsu moaned as soon as Isaldora rushed into the apartment. The elf had heard the crying all the way to the street and had ran up the stairs, all kinds of fears going through her mind. Now she could see no danger, only a very tired looking halfling and little Zaknafein, who was in his bed, crying loudly.

"I tried everything," Mitsu almost wept when Isaldora walked past her and lifted the baby from the bed. "That doesn't help, I tried..." The crying stopped almost as soon as the baby was resting against Isaldora's shoulder.

"You were saying?" the elf asked smiling. "Did you miss your mum?" she asked Zak in that tone all people seem to use when talking to babies, and Mitsu rolled her eyes. Motherhood was to her a disease that she never wanted to catch. And babysitting seemed like a cruel and unusual punishment that the mother of the baby didn't see as a punishment when asking her innocent friends for a small favour. Small? What a joke.

"I'm going to go to sleep now," Mitsu sighed. "Are you aware that Aran will be so angry with you when I fall asleep during an important job because that little... angel," she tried to smile, "has been keeping me awake."

"Aran will understand," Isaldora said in the tone of a mother who has heard nothing what the other person has said because she has been concentrating only on her child. Mitsu shook her head. That would never happen to her.

"I'll go now," she said, while Isaldora put Zak back to his bed. "Next time, find someone else to babysit. He doesn't like me."

"Of course he does," Isaldora said. "You're his aunty Mitsu, of course he likes you. Your family."

"Aunty Mitsu needs to rest now," Mitsu said, but Isaldora's words made her happy. They formed a strange family, Isaldora, little Zak, Aran, Erik... "And aunty Shandara will be here soon as well," Mitsu said. "Or is 'Shandara' too difficult? Maybe she'll become 'aunty Shandy'? That sounds nice."

"That sounds bad," Isaldora grinned. "She'd kill me. Or maybe you, if I said it was your idea."

"I don't want to be killed, I just want to sleep," Mitsu said, heading for the door. "Contact me when the little menace has slept enough and wants to cry some more. I'm almost used to it by now."

"I will," Isaldora said. When Mitsu had left she sat down next to Zak's bed, looking at the sleeping child. How could he fall asleep so quickly? He didn't have any of the problems that kept other people awake at nights, not yet. Isaldora knew that most mothers seemed to believe their children stayed small forever, but she had to think ahead. Her child wasn't a normal one. His skin was as black as his father's, his eyes were pale violet. Isaldora touched his short hair that was the most astonishing thing about him. It was golden, the only thing that differed Zak from ordinary drow. All these features that Isaldora had loved from the moment she saw her child were also the features that would make life harder for him. Being a dark elf meant that he would have to become all kinds of obstacles, but having features that linked him to surface elves would bring more questions, like 'was your mother raped by a dark elf?', and worse. Zaknafein would have hard time finding his place in the world, but Isaldora would be there, helping him in the battles to come.

Aran Linvail couldn't understand why all the bad news had to come at the same time. Couldn't there be some system that made sure every person got their fair share of good news and bad news? He seemed to get only the bad ones. The one good thing he had heard was that Shandara was coming, but then he had been contacted by Dwahvel Tiggerwillies. The halfling was the one Entreri knew and had contacted when they had gone to Calimport to kill Reanan. Now it seemed that Entreri's past was catching up on him and this meant that Shandara was also in danger.

After Dwahvel had informed him of the inquiries about Entreri and his companions, Aran had begun his own investigations. The Shadow Thieves were better connected that Dwahvel was, and he had found out things he first hadn't believed. There was a brother. A younger version of Artemis Entreri, or at least so it seemed. This information hadn't been cheap, or easy to come by. But in the end, he had received information, partly consisting of rumours, but still plausible enough to be true; Artemis Entreri truly had a brother who had been raised by his uncle in Baldur's Gate. The uncle's business wasn't as respectable as it seemed. On the outside he was an ordinary merchant, but on the inside a slave trader, among other things. Aran despised slave traders. Slavery was one thing he would never support, never accept. People were not things to be sold, although when he thought about this, a little voice pointed out that he was selling women for men to use. Really it was more like renting, since the men only had the women for a short while, but he found it harder to believe this reasoning these days. Everything seemed so pointless and out of his control.

Now the uncle had made inquiries about Entreri and the brother had left the city, and of course his current whereabouts were unknown. And they now knew that Aran knew. One of the agents of the Shadow Thieves had returned to Athkatla in small pieces, brought by his terrified companion, who had been tortured close to death. Aran was having hard time trying to handle the situation. He couldn't interfere, not outside his area, without making many more enemies from all the guilds that would feel threatened. His guild wasn't ready for a fight, not when things had just started to work in Athkatla again. He could give this information to Entreri and assign some more of his men to help him, but that was all.

One thing he would have to do was to convince Shandara to stay in the guild until Entreri knew for sure why his family had taken interest in him. Otherwise she might be in great danger. And on top of things Aran had the feeling Entreri didn't even know he had a brother, and he was trying to find a suitable way to tell him. He was considering the coward's way out; telling Shandara and asking her to tell Entreri. She could do it, for some reason she had been able to get through to him, to win his trust. It was easy to understand why this had happened. What kind of man could have resisted her?

Aran sighed. You truly didn't understand what you had until you lost it. She had found her happiness with someone else and now all he could do was to protect her from Entreri's problems and the dangers that seemed to find the man no matter where he went or what he did. Aran remembered the look on the face of the agent who had come back alive and the stench of rotten flesh that had lingered over the body parts he had brought with him. This was dangerous territory, and although Aran knew who were looking for Entreri, he didn't know why. That unanswered 'why' was the most dangerous thing, and he hoped that Entreri would have some knowledge, although he doubted this. Only questions and no answers, the certain road to death.