Chapter Seven

Marrin Socor dismissed his scrying spell and began pacing the floor of his rented room. As much as he wanted revenge upon Entreri and Jarlaxle, he didn't like the complications that were amassing. Not only did the bounty hunters have some young cleric with them, Socor now knew that a second cleric was tracking him as well—an older, more powerful one, a priest of Tyr. This did not make Socor happy. He would have to take care of the Tyrist first, then turn his attention to the others.

Socor had decided to allow the bounty hunters to catch up with him; he felt ready now. But thanks to divine means, the priest of Tyr would beat them to the town by about a day. Perhaps that was a good thing, however. Socor could eliminate the priest before the others even reached town. The wizard smiled. All he needed to do was ambush the cleric and the fight would be over quickly. Socor believed himself to be much more powerful than the cleric, but he would not take the chance. Besides, one could never underestimate the element of surprise.

And so it was that Socor was tucked in a tree above the cleric's head as he approached the town. As soon as the cleric had ridden past, the wizard levitated silently to the ground behind him and quickly, yet precisely, performed the intricate motions of his legacy spell. The wizard, now wiser for all his failures, simultaneously and carefully recited the arcane syllables of his spell, finishing triumphantly by exclaiming "Socor-rame!" He threw his right hand outward and unleashed a red tornado of tiny shimmering spheres from his palm.

The Tyrist, to his credit, sensed something was amiss, stopped, and turned his horse to face the way he'd come. He didn't have a chance to do more than open his mouth to speak, however, before Socor unleashed his favorite spell upon the man. The priest was knocked off his horse by the blast. He fell, a smoking heap, to the ground with a resounding thump.

Socor snorted. "How boring. Much too easy. But it hardly matters; the bounty hunters will make things much more challenging, to be sure." He grinned. Tomorrow was going to be a good day. He was sure of it.

Entreri watched Tai unfold his legs and stand. It was half past midnight, and the young priest had just finished communing with Hoar. The night was unusually chilly for such a warm climate, so the youth had sat cross-legged near the campfire when he began. Once seated, however, the young man had seemed to fall into a trance, and Entreri had watched with vague interest as all traces of tiredness and stress had bled away from the youth's face. Even now, Tai's face appeared so serene in the light of the campfire that Entreri found himself nearly enviousness.

Only the young and innocent could possess such peace, the assassin mused, but then again, he'd never had such peace. Well, not since he was four or five years old.

Entreri mentally kicked himself for such thoughts. If he didn't clear all these thoughts and memories from his mind soon he would run the risk of . . . of . . .. The assassin frowned. Something was pressing at him. Something deep inside of him was welling up and refusing to be pushed back down. Perhaps this youth, so wise and insightful for his age, was part of the reason Entreri was having difficulty. Tai seemed to provide a stark contrast to Entreri as he'd been at that age, perhaps even a mirror reflection of who Entreri was now as well. A sixteen-year-old cleric was an unusual thing, after all, and at Tai's age, Entreri also had been unusual—a lieutenant in Basadoni's guild and already an accomplished assassin. There was both a comparison and contrast there. But such had been the dark path to what Entreri had seen as his only chance for survival and success. Alone in the streets of Calimport, he'd seen no other way. There were temples that offered some assistance, but most were temples of Tyr, and Entreri had learned all too well what priests were really interested in. Or so he had believed at the time. In fact, it was all that any man had seemed interested in. After all, as soon as he had finally run away—before he'd even reached Calimport—it had happened again.

But was Tai correct? Did he overgeneralize to the point of fault?

As Entreri watched Tai stretch the cramps out of his legs and back, he sighed and pushed all the negative thoughts and emotions away. Truly, it was a useless exercise.

Entreri had first watch while Jarlaxle rested, and Tai had offered to stay awake with Entreri since he needed to pray for his spells. The result had been utter peace and quiet for almost an hour. Given Jarlaxle's predilection for talking, quiet could be a very good thing. Right now, however, Entreri needed something to distract himself from his own thoughts. The priest seemed the only source of entertainment available, though.

Tai moved closer to Entreri, sitting down by him. "Well, I'm all done," he announced in a quiet voice and smiled. The youth's big brown eyes, barely visible under his fringe of dark hair, sparkled with some kind of joy the assassin did not understand.

Entreri glanced over at the resting Jarlaxle, but he seemed to be deep in the trance that elves called Reverie. He returned his attention to Tai. "You seem terribly joyful most of the time for someone who is out to avenge the murder of his cousin."

The joy immediately fell away from the boy. "I assure you, my anger over the death of my cousin is quite present. Perhaps the grief is not as strong as the familial tie implies—I had only recently begun to become truly acquainted with him. Perhaps instead my grief is more for the relationship we could have had if Socor had not killed him." A ghost of a smile returned to Tai's face. "But joy is not something that often comes to a person unaided. There is a great deal about life that is negative and depressing. One must make a practice of focusing on the good—even on the smallest of positive things—in order to find a measure of peace or joy."

"The simple, small joys?" Entreri asked sarcastically.

Tai grinned outright, apparently undaunted as usual. "Yes, precisely. There is enough good in the world to blind the young and innocent, and enough evil in the world to destroy the hearts of everyone else."

"And 'innocence, once lost, can never be regained,'" the assassin said, quoting an old saying with a sigh.

"Quite true. Certainly, it is easy to be caught in the darkness, to feel that life will never get any better, and that you can never be happy again. And for some people, it is indeed a lot to ask that they see the brighter side of life. Some people suffer under the pain of tragedies that most cannot imagine. And yet to believe that you can never make anything more of your life, can never rebuild or recover, is to damn yourself outright. What you seek in life is ultimately what you will find. If you seek peace and joy, if you accept and work through what pain befalls you, then you will find peace and joy."

"Do you not think that is rather simplistic," Entreri argued, ever cynical, "especially for those who live in constant danger—surrounded by war, threatened by militaries or guilds, targeted by assassins?" His smirk was a touch wry.

Tai shook his head. "I realize that. But it is not simple at all, not for anyone. It takes a great deal of effort—and courage—to accept the pain and uncertainty that the path to peace and healing brings. But consider this: would it be more worthwhile to succumb to the terror or bitterness or anger?"

"By which I assume you implicate me. But I assure you that my 'dark' worldview has served me well. If it works, why change?"

"Does it work?" Tai immediately asked.

The assassin sighed and wondered if Tai, like Jarlaxle, had an answer for everything. "If what you say is so, priest, tell me how one as young as yourself has arrived so succinctly at such a profound conclusion."

Tai frowned, and the spark of pain and sadness in his eyes took Entreri aback momentarily. "It is story that you, in your obvious hatred of Tyrists and priests, would not be surprised to hear, I imagine."

Entreri was actually a very good listener. His ability to make accurate observations of others and garner information had been dependent on his ability to shut up and listen. Allowing others to do most of the talking—even in the case of the elusive Jarlaxle—inevitably provided him with important information. So the assassin fell immediately into listening mode with the hope of gleaning as much about Tai as he could.

Apparently sensing the interest and attentiveness of his audience, Tai continued without having to be prompted. "When I was six years old, my eldest brother took exception to one of the new laws the count of our land handed down. He . . . uh . . . well, let's just leave it at this: my brother engaged in a bit of civil disobedience. He was arrested, and the lord ordered his execution. The punishment was out of proportion to the crime. My family, who were all members of the church of Tyr, appealed to our priest to counsel the count to mitigate the punishment. Tyr, after all, asks for just punishment, not blind fury.

"But not only did the priest not intercede on our behalf, he publicly condemned our whole family for being too lax. He said the entire family was to blame for my brother's behavior. In the place were I am from, this is a serious and powerful accusation, for my people do indeed place a high value on the role of family. Your actions as an individual can and often do reflect not only on you, but on your family, ancestors, and unborn children. The priest's words damned us. My brother was executed, and my entire family shamed."

Entreri frowned. The pain in Tai's eyes was evident, yet he spoke calmly about the events as though he'd managed to move past a majority of it.

"My family could have been easily destroyed by the event. Most of our other relatives stopped associating with us, and a great deal of our fellow townspeople either ignored us or treated us with a great deal of derision. However, my parents, remaining siblings, and I all pulled together. I, as the youngest, probably had the hardest time. I wanted to direct my rage against all the Tyrists; I wanted to hate the entire world. It was so unfair! So unjust. How could these people—for most of my family and fellow villagers were Tyrists—call themselves just? They were hypocrites, liars, evil people." Tai smiled sadly. "But my family helped me to work through most of that. Still, I felt a certain separation from humanity, and that was something that both made me unhappy and concerned my parents."

Entreri nodded. He understood quite well the sensation of being somehow outside of humanity.

"When I was eleven," Tai continued, "I left to live with one of my uncles, an unmarried one and one of the few who hadn't damned us. He lived rather far away—well, close to here—and he was a priest of Hoar. My parents hoped that the change of scenery would help me. My uncle said that he sensed something special about me, and he immediately began training me to be a cleric of Hoar. For five years I trained under my uncle, learning to pray, to listen for an answer, to channel divine power, and most importantly to discern true justice, guilt, and blame."

The young man fell into silence for a few minutes, and Entreri waited patiently. "With my family's help—especially my parents' and uncle's—I was able to heal, to see what the rage did to me and does to others, to see what I should seek in life, to see what tragedies such as the one I experienced do to others. And now I seek, among other things, to make sure that the truly guilty are the only ones punished. Hoar, unlike Tyr, would never call for the punishment of someone who committed civil disobedience."

"So your connection to others made you who you are," Entreri mused, and not even the assassin himself could quite identify the tone of voice with which he spoke. Still, the boy's story aside, he had to wonder, like Jarlaxle, just how much favor Hoar was showing Tai.

Tai smiled, but it was a sad one, indeed. "Yes. Then six months ago one of my cousins sought out my uncle in order to learn the way of Hoar also. But he was involved in a confrontation with Socor and was killed when the wizard lost control of a spell."

Entreri nodded.

Tai considered him intently for several moments. "You note the power my connections have had on me, and yet you are not without connections of your own. What about your friend?"

Entreri blinked at Tai. His friend? Jarlaxle? Entreri glanced at the resting elf, then turned back to Tai. "You would place the welfare of my immortal soul in the hands of a drow?"

Tai laughed. "He's a strange fellow, it's true. But he seems to genuinely care about you, perhaps even against his so-called better judgment or nature."

"Care?" Entreri snorted. "I doubt that very seriously. I have been, since the moment I met him, nothing more to him than a tool. I am significant to him only for my skills, and once I cease to be either useful or entertaining, he will abandon me." Something deep, deep inside of the man seemed to cry out at those words, but the assassin didn't stop to pay attention to what the cry said. "It is nothing personal. Jarlaxle is a clever opportunist who sees everyone as an expendable tool. It has served him well." Entreri grinned with a dark irony. "It works. Why change?"

Tai chuckled. "Because you are friends."

Entreri snorted again.

"Is there nothing you give him other than your skills and . . . uh . . . entertainment?"

The assassin fell into deep thought, trying to formulate an answer to a question that had indeed troubled him, although he had yet to admit it to himself. He thought through all that had passed between them, some of it good and some of it terrible. And what he came up with was the way he'd pulled Jarlaxle out of the crystal tower and away from the shard, and the way he'd substituted himself, for a reason he didn't understand at all, in Jarlaxle's place in Waylein's fortress.

Loyalty! Entreri thought with a shock. He was . . . showing some type of loyalty to Jarlaxle! But why? He owed the elf nothing.

Dwahvel, his mind whispered to him, presenting him with the image of possibly the only being Entreri had ever known who had proven loyal to him. And now he was showing some version of loyalty to Jarlaxle. But what did it mean?

When Entreri stayed silent for too long, Tai continued. "If you really do believe what you say about your friend, then why are you with him? Why would you stay with someone who doesn't see you as a person?"

"I know how he sees others. What is there to fear? The underworld is full of people like him and people like me. I am no better than he. We know the games each other play, and we are associates for what we gain."

"What do you gain?" Tai asked, apparently honestly curious.

Entreri stared at the boy, but what he saw was the smiling face of the clever, resourceful drow mercenary. His heart tried to answer the question, but he would not allow it to speak. "Like Jarlaxle, I get entertainment."

Tai did not pursue the question, and Entreri decided then that the boy was truly wise. "As you say, Master Entreri. But I would like to invite you to reconsider your opinion of priests and deities. Hoar, I assure you, is nothing like Tyr, and the followers and clerics of Hoar share little in common with those of Tyr. As an assassin, and a man with some sense of honor and justice . . . however, uh, dark they may be . . . your philosophy is not so far away from Hoar's. You feel that those you kill deserve to die, correct?"

Entreri narrowed his eyes, trying to determine how the boy had gained such insight into him.

"Am I wrong?" Tai asked nervously. "You don't seem like the kind of person who pulls the tails off of puppy dogs for fun."

Entreri snorted at the youth's odd choice of words. "No."

Tai smiled. "Then you and I do indeed inhabit somewhat similar universes."

Entreri shook his head, almost amused at the boy's attempt to convert him.

Several feet away, Jarlaxle kept his eyes closed and his breathing even. Entreri and Tai were having a truly enlightening conversation, but the sting caused by the assassin's words about him surprised the drow. When had he grown so irrational as to actually feel almost hurt at such an accurate summary of himself?

But was it accurate?

No, perhaps it wasn't, Jarlaxle reflected. He had realized several tendays ago that Entreri was no longer just a tool to him. Jarlaxle was offering him friendship, and it was somehow unsettling to hear Entreri dismiss that. Especially since Jarlaxle was helping, one could even say protecting, the man . . ..

Jarlaxle stopped his line of thought as a startling question hit him: was Entreri protecting him as well? Entreri was his excuse to stay on the surface, it was true, but was he also providing him a safe haven from which to experiment and explore? A place from which to show a side of himself he could never show in the Underdark?

Jarlaxle cursed internally and worked to hold his mask of Reverie in place. Not for the first time in the past few tendays, the mercenary felt quite vulnerable. He had been too arrogant once again. He . . . needed . . . Entreri. The real Entreri, the man he could be: a loyal friend. He wanted that one thing that he'd only begun to find once before in Zaknafein, and then lost. But people like Drizzt, who Jarlaxle knew to be worthy friends, would not befriend someone like him. Finding such a thing was only possible through someone who could understand and accept who he was.

The risk involved was great, but Entreri would make a very powerful friend and also a very intense one. If only Jarlaxle could garner the courage to take a genuine risk with the man in addition to trying to influence him.

Somehow, when Jarlaxle had imagined complicated but intriguing adventures on the surface, this was not what he'd had in mind.