"What do we keep on riding for?" Jarlaxle asked. They all smelled of sweat. Just before dawn, they'd gone over the small bridge over the creek they'd rested at only a few days ago.

"A town," Artemis said. "Any town. I'm not sleeping in these haunted fields another night!" He wanted to kick violently at the waving fields of lavender still cropping up now and then. "Not so pretty now, is it?" he snarled.

"Don't take your close encounter out on me," Jarlaxle said.

"My close enounter?" Artemis said. "You're the one that nearly got strangled, you idiot!"

They were full blown yelling at each other as the horses tiredly trotted along, their heads sagging. It relieved much of their tension, and the both of them knew they'd needed it. Neither of them had voiced the things they'd thought about the previous day, and they were both using this mysterious encounter where Jarlaxle was nearly strangled and the premonition Artemis experienced about Perrin to distract themselves.

Both of them felt sore and dirty from head to foot when the four of them, Artemis, Jarlaxle, and their horses, finally crawled into town, a collection of wooden buildings with peaked roofs connected by a dirt road snaking through. Jarlaxle noticed chickens underfoot and tried not to step on them. They were smart enough to see that he was a tired man and got out of the way.

A large, bleached building three stories high was on the other side of the clearing in the center of town. The drow pointed at it weakly. "Do you suppose that's the inn?" he said. He watched a wooden sign with a horseshoe on it creak in the wind.

Artemis grunted.

Then a passing farmer, probably headed to the inn as well for a beer after a long morning of chores, saw them, double-taked, and then grimly shoved a pitchfork in Jarlaxle's face. "Stop, evil drow."

Jarlaxle hung his head. He was so tired that this gesture imbalanced him and toppled him forward onto the ground. He didn't bother to brace himself. Partially despair. It debilitated him far worse than being tired. "Please, not today. I'm too tired to do anything evil."

"Leave him alone," the assassin snapped, glaring at the heavyset man in their way. "Does he really look like a threat? He's wearing a purple hat for god's sake." He was too tired and at the end of his rope to actually think of the name of an appropriate god.

The farmer eyed them doubtfully.

"Your lavender plains are haunted," Artemis said. "Now get out of our way before your spirit haunts this mudhole." He drew his dagger.

The farmer hastily stepped aside. His eyes were wide. "Ghosts are on the prowl? Cassandra should have taken care of them a hundred and thirty five years ago!"

"Local legend?" Artemis asked, raising an eyebrow acidly. He grabbed Jarlaxle's arm and dragged him, taking the reins of the elf's horse for him.

"Aye," the farmer said. "Aye – Yes." He seemed shaken.

Jarlaxle struggled to his feet, but found that the assassin wouldn't let go of his arm. "I'm walking," he said, and stumbled over a rock. Artemis jerked him back to his feet. "I'm walking," Jarlaxle said again. Why are my legs so wobbly? Damnit, I look drunk. But what had hit him over the head like a brick was how he and Artemis would never see each other again. His eyes burned, and he didn't think it was from exhaustion. He was just waiting for the right time to do it.

Artemis kicked the stable door, startling a boy with dirt on his face out of hiding. The assassin thrust three gold coins into his hands and left the horses there.

"I said I'm walking," the drow mercenary said.

Artemis ignored him. He burst through the front door of the inn, still dragging Jarlaxle by the arm. The few men sitting around tables at this hour froze, and the innkeeper, one of many ubiquitous balding men that all melted together for the assassin, ducked underneath his counter. "We're tired," Artemis said, purposefully focusing on the desk where the innkeeper had been. "Get us a room. And a bath. Quickly."

"I don't let people talk to me that way," the innkeeper said from under his desk.

The assassin rolled his eyes. "I'm sure. Get out from under there and do your job, you coward." He had no patience for tact at the moment.

"You're not making friends," Jarlaxle said. He surreptitiously looked around. "Let go of me."

"Coward?" the innkeeper said, his mild-mannered voice offended. "You're frightening me."

Artemis sighed. He walked over, at last letting go of Jarlaxle's arm. The drow rubbed it furtively and watched as the assassin took out several gold coins, bent down, and poked them through a crack between the desk counter and the floor.

The innkeeper was silent for a moment. Then he said, "Room 4."

"Will you get up and show us yourself?" Artemis said, peering over the counter at him skeptically.

"Martha," the innkeeper said, "Show this man his room. And heat up the bath for him, will you, my dear?"

A young girl no older than eighteen emerged, wearing a white apron over a checkered brown dress, and pointed at the stairs. Artemis followed.

Jarlaxle took off his hat, bowed to everyone in the room, and smiled sheepishly. "I'm afraid he gets carried away," he said, and then followed his companion up the stairs.

Their room was at the end of a long hallway, right next to the bathing room. Artemis caught a glimpse of a bathtub as Martha opened the door and slipped inside. Then he turned to Jarlaxle. He had to admit he felt substantially safer now that they were in a town, inside an inn, in broad daylight. He wasn't used to feeling safer anywhere. It flooded him with a pleasant sense of euphoria. He was actually smiling. "Now this is personal," he said, indicating the livid bruise on Jarlaxle's throat. "I'll bet you're eager to go back there as soon as possible and challenge those ghosts to a duel."

Jarlaxle touched it self-consciously and found that it had swelled slightly like a welt. "Not especially," he said.

"What about your honor?" Artemis said.

"I have no honor."

The maid, Martha, emerged from the small room with the bathtub. "Tha', tha' bath does itself now practically with Elwig's furnace," she stammered. "You run water through the pipes along the wall there," she pointed at the two brass pipes long the wall, "an', an', if you want hot, you turn the hot handle on tha' tub an' wait for the furnace to hea' up tha water." She curtsied, looked at Jarlaxle, turned white, and hurried down the stairs.

Artemis grinned at him. "She's afraid of you already. Probably heard your reputation. She doesn't want to lose her virginity yet."

Jarlaxle feigned a hurt expression without any real feeling behind it and looked longingly at the tub.

Artemis gestured, "By all means, go first. But if you take too long, I'll assume you fell asleep and drowned, so I'll come in. Make it quick." He scratched his chin.

"Did you have our bags brought up?" Jarlaxle asked.

The assassin pushed him into the room with the words, "I'll go downstairs and get it. Start your bath already."

He jogged down the stairs, invigorated at the prospect of being clean, something which he enjoyed. It didn't take him long to talk to the stable boy and get their bags from the horses. "Thank ye kindly, sir," the boy said, tipping his woolen cap, but Artemis ignored him, having already turned his back and begun heading back inside the inn. He was talking about the money, the assassin reminded himself. He was busy holding a travel bag over each shoulder, but his conscience got the best of him anyway. He waved his hand before going through the door that connected the stables to the main room of the inn.

By this time, Jarlaxle was watching the tub fill up with a jet of steaming water that poured out of the brass spigot. He'd stripped out of his filthy clothing, which had actually changed color from the grass, dirt, and sweat. His boots needed a shine, he noticed, examining them as they lay awkwardly on the floor side by side. He glanced over at himself in the mirror hanging on the wall, but it was already fogging up before he could see much.

He slipped into the tub when it was still half full and let out a contented sigh. Some drow had massages as their chosen means of relaxation. Jarlaxle had baths. He preferred it to the thought of someone else touching him, no matter how well trained, or, as the case may be, downtrodden and submissive. He preferred steaming, scented water.

There was white soap in a holder carved into the rim of the tub, so he wouldn't even have to get up to get it. He thought it was an amazingly advanced bathing room for such a small town, but he remembered that the maid had mentioned an Elwig. Hmm. Most likely a gnome. That was interesting.

The drow waited until the tub was almost full enough for any movement to make the water slosh out of the top over the rim and turned it off. The whole room was clouded up.

The bruise on his neck started throbbing. He didn't have time to look at it in the mirror, but it felt like a palm and fingers. How rude.

Jarlaxle heard a knock on the door, and then saw it open enough for his travel bag to get through. It thudded to the floor. The door closed. Artemis. Part of Jarlaxle wanted the assassin to come back and ogle. But he knew Artemis wouldn't. Artemis respected peoples' privacy when bathing because of a phobia he himself had of being watched.

Regretfully, keeping in mind that Artemis was filthy too, he scrubbed himself with the soap, rinsed off, and dressed in fresh clothing. He didn't bother to put his boots back on. He'd just carry them around the corner into their inn room.

It was a bit of a handful to carry his boots, his dirty clothing, and his travel bag, so he took two trips with it. The second trip was his bag, and when he deposited it on the floor of the room, he looked up. Jarlaxle blinked in surprise. Their new room was spacious; sunlight flooded through a tall window across from the door, and their bed wasn't a cramped captain's bed, it was a four poster thing with drapes to keep the cold out. "I thought you didn't like resting in luxury," the drow mercenary said.

Artemis was in a corner of the large room, looking pensively into a mirror that sat atop a small, polished dresser. "I don't." The man turned, took in the sight of Jarlaxle, then walked past him, taking his own travel bag.

Jarlaxle turned and watched him close the bathing room door behind him.

The drow mercenary felt sleepy. His eyelids were heavy, and all his exhaustion from the long journey came back to him with the force of a building falling on him. I'm going to faint, he thought. He stripped of all his clothing again and slid under the deep red covers of the four poster bed. He found it to be so soft that he was quickly drifting into blackness.

After Artemis gave himself the quickest bath he could manage, he set off downstairs. The puny innkeeper hid again at the sight of him. "You gave us the wrong room," the assassin said.

"It's the best one I have!"

Artemis scowled. "That's the problem."

"But – But you –"

He didn't have to finish his sentence. Artemis looked thoughtful, stroking his chin. "I did, didn't I."

The assassin turned on his heel and headed back up the stairs.

Before the drow could really make it to a state of reverie, he felt a tug on the bed covers, and then a weight on the opposite side of the bed. Artemis? he thought drowsily. His body was too heavy and comfortable to move.

Jarlaxle felt hands brushing the skin on his abdomen, a body pressing against his arm. They were warm, callused hands. He turned his head, though he couldn't open his eyes. "Artemis?"

"Mmmn," Artemis said. He was fully clothed except for his boots. Adrenaline, and uncertainty, was keeping him awake. He wanted to tell Jarlaxle everything he'd been thinking, hoping that Jarlaxle would listen this time instead of trying to turn everything into a sexual encounter. "I don't think we should do this anymore."

"We shouldn't be mercenaries?" Jarlaxle mumbled. He was clearly too tired for the conversation. Artemis felt a pang of despair.

"No," Artemis said. "We shouldn't be doing this."

"What are we doing?" the drow said. He shifted slightly in the bed, stretching one arm out above his head on the pillow. "Talking?"

"Being," Artemis said. "Together."

Jarlaxle frowned. "You mean what should we be doing? Being separately?" He was trying to fight, trying to stay awake. He almost surfaced out of his semi-conscious state, but failed. He reached out in the general direction of Artemis and found him. He ran his hand down whatever part of Artemis it was. He could feel the material of an article of Artemis' clothing, probably a shirt. He rolled over into the assassin's body. "I don't want to being separate," Jarlaxle said. "I like being together. It is better than being alone. I don't…want things to be…the way they were." He snuggled up against the other man, smelling soap, feeling that Artemis was cold from his bath; Artemis almost always bathed in cold water after soaking away soreness from his muscles with hot water. "Artemis…Don't you like being together?"

Artemis wavered at this rare loose-tongued response from the drow. "Yes…" He shifted reluctantly. "But I thought it was…something special." His voice revealed his anguish.

"It is not?" Jarlaxle shifted, burying his face in the clean fabric of Artemis' shirt. "It is special to me. It is not something I do. I have said things to you…which I do not say to other people. It makes me…I feel…Vulnerable…Around other people…But you do not –" He reached out and took Artemis' arm, pleading. "Even for a few moments, you make me feel less alone – The Underdark is Alone. All the time."

Artemis gathered his arms around his companion, holding him, stunned. No one had ever turned to him for anything. Not knowing who he was. What he was. What he'd done. Someone needing something from him – the part of him that was personal, not some distant machine of arms and legs and killing devices – it was foreign to him. He didn't know if he liked it. It made his chest hurt.

His companion was asking something of Artemis. Not the Assassin. It was like someone suddenly seeing past him, clean through to the sick, scared child he'd been before he became someone that people would notice. He'd never really been that person ever since he became an assassin. He'd tried not to be. That part of himself wasn't what people wanted. "What are you saying?" he said, stalling.

There is no way I can have you, Jarlaxle thought. I can't possibly do anything to deserve you. It would be another matter if you were the cold blooded man you seem. Then I wouldn't miss a reverie thinking about how I could please you. I could do whatever I wanted with you. "I'm saying…" The drow hung his head and turned away, twisting out of Artemis' grasp. "I'm saying that I am wrong," Jarlaxle said. He felt as though he were wrenching his heart out of his chest. "I shouldn't be doing this to you."

Artemis reacted with frustration stirring in his chest. He had one fleeting moment where he wondered if he was sane. "Your damned paternal streak," Artemis growled, grabbing the elf by the arms and shoving him against the bed. He kissed Jarlaxle angrily, purposefully biting the drow's lower lip, and felt Jarlaxle's body squirming against him.

Then he bit Jarlaxle's ear. He felt rather than heard the drow's gasp, Jarlaxle's chest rising desperately against his and then flattening. The hard metal of Jarlaxle's earring was between his teeth, right where it intersected with his companion's earlobe.

"Stop," Jarlaxle said. His heart was pounding and his vision was hazy. He felt half detached from his body. "Stop." I can't believe this. I actually like this. My body's reacting like crazy. Make it stop. The assassin clenched his teeth down on the drow's ear again. "Artemis." Jarlaxle managed to get his hands between them, the assassin's own hands still clamped around his wrists, and pushed up on Artemis' chest. "What's gotten into you?"

Artemis' face was throbbing hotly. He opened his mouth, brushing his lips against Jarlaxle's ear as the elf pushed him away. He glanced at Jarlaxle's face. When their eyes met, he couldn't look away. His stomach suddenly started churning. He stared into those eyes. The eye. Jarlaxle was still wearing that eye patch, which Artemis had grown so used to seeing it no longer bothered him. "How…How could you leave me?" The assassin's voice rasped. His throat had gone dry. Dried up like a river in the desert. Artemis could not understand; he understood nothing about this moment, how he had ended up on top of Jarlaxle, in a bed in a foreign place, how they'd come here. "How can you say one thing to me and do another thing the next?" he asked. "How can you…"

Something didn't make sense to the drow mercenary. "Do you not wish to make choices the way you have in the rest of your life?" Jarlaxle asked. He thought of what he had done as soon as the opportunity had come; pushing Artemis to the ground and trying to have his way with the assassin. "I am forcing myself on you; I have been, and will continue to do so if you continue to tempt me by being my partner." His eyes narrowed searchingly, trying to grasp hints from Artemis' face. "Haven't I – Does this not bother you?"

His entire understanding of Artemis' nature was thrown into question, shadowed by his friend's behavior. Artemis had told him they couldn't be together, then he'd said some half-awake gibberish about being alone, and now Artemis was accusing him of wanting to be alone.

Artemis almost laughed. Choices? What choices? "I don't think you understand why I became an assassin," he said.

Jarlaxle settled down for a long story. He had a feeling it would be, at least by Artemis' standards. He didn't know why, but trusting Artemis, it was something he had to say, or else he wouldn't say it. The drow would just have to wait for it to tie into their conversation. Instead of being confused at the abrupt turn the conversation seemed to be taking, he laid his ebony hand on Artemis' back patiently and said, "Why did you become an assassin?"

Artemis smiled darkly, the expression full of sardonic amusement. "I was homeless and without a means of preventing other thugs from preying on me. There was a choice between being taken in by a pasha, or starving to death. I did it to impress someone so that I could win someone's approval. His praise, his money, and his protection. Gifts. Clothing. Food. Water." He tossed his hair out of his eyes, which burned into the drow. He was coming to his point. "I did it to please somebody else."

Jarlaxle sensed that it was dangerous to say something, but Artemis was talking, and he did not think he would get the chance again. It was an obvious question. He had a bad feeling about this. "What happened to your parents?"

The assassin grew cold. All the life leeched out of his eyes, his mouth, his body, until he may as well have been born a statue in a temple. For a split second, Jarlaxle was afraid for his life. Artemis didn't move. "My mother was a slave," he said. His voice seemed to have retreated someplace deep inside of him. His words came up from those cavernous depths heavy and slow. "She was the consolation prize of a disagreement between families of nobility. I was the last result before my father grew tired of her and killed her. She was gone, so I was the replacement."

Re…place…ment? The drow mercenary was slow in understanding what that particular word meant. It suddenly sounded foreign to him; for a moment, he retreated into a drow's ignorance of human tongues. A flash of light pierced his darkness. Jarlaxle thought vaguely of how painful bright flashes of insight were. He wanted to hide in a cave. The drow became aware that he was hugging Artemis, rocking the man gently in his arms, with no intention of letting him go anytime soon.

"I make no choices," Artemis said. "People make choices for me."

Cruel, Jarlaxle thought, imagining in a corner of his mind what a life for a child that would make. He took solace in the word, being able to say it, to name it, to label that thing and finally be rid of it, casting it away. Cruel. He stroked the side of the human's rough cheek with his fingertips, more as catharsis for himself than any attempt to comfort Entreri.

Another flash of light in the darkness bore his revelation. It's too late for him.

Jarlaxle stilled, stunned. It was impossible to fix him, to undo whatever he had done to change himself. It was exactly the same with Jarlaxle. He was too late to change anything; to change into the people that could work together, that could trust each other. There would always be a doubt. It was too late.

He couldn't make Artemis into someone who could make up for his lack of anything, into someone who could accommodate him. He would have to accept what Artemis could and couldn't do. He'd been pushing his friend to take on more and more responsibility. He'd wanted the assassin to wrestle his own conscience instead of letting Jarlaxle 'talk' him into things. Once Artemis had started doing that, the elf had assigned even harder things to the assassin's control. Now he saw that Artemis was at his breaking point. He couldn't take any more of Jarlaxle's abuse, trying to bend him into a shape more comparable to other humans the drow mercenary had seen. Jarlaxle's last ditch attempt to try to get Artemis' sexuality out into the open had almost killed him.

"I don't want to take choices anymore," Artemis said. His gray eyes intensified, becoming almost black. His fingernails gouged lines down Jarlaxle's wrists. "I want to make them for you. I want you to stay. I need you to stay."

Where have I gone so wrong? Jarlaxle thought. I've misjudged him again. "Then I will stay," he said, smoothing his face out into a mask of innocence, blinking up at the assassin amiably. He politely refrained from mentioning this complete reversal of attitudes from what he'd started to say in the beginning.

The assassin began to tremble. He buried his face in Jarlaxle's neck. Artemis let go of his friend's wrists and shuddered, curling his arms underneath his chest. "Never make me do that again." Unreasoning tendrils of fear snaked through his body. "I'll kill you if you make me do that again."

Jarlaxle had been right after all. He had nearly pushed Artemis to the breaking point. It was his fault that Artemis was incomprehensible. "I hadn't meant to take it so far," he said. "I almost called it off when you needed so much time to think about it. I almost pulled you aside and explained to you that all that mattered was your happiness. I'm sorry. I should have done that; I let myself pressure you, I shouldn't have tried so hard. I believed that you had to be the one to make decisions for you and me. I thought you had rejected me. I thought I had made myself unwelcome."

"You think too much," Artemis said.