Chapter 2

"So that's it?" The young man asked with a whiny note to his voice. He wrinkled his pointy nose and then grimaced, making Eleni smirk at his silly ways that she found endearing. The young man looked mock hurt and harumphed with some amount of flair, reaching for a goblet of wine on the table, taking care not to drag his white, ruffled shirt sleeve over a greasy puddle of food left on his half finished plate. He took a careful sip, dabbing his lip with a perfumed hankerchief that almost made Eleni sneeze, and then carefully placed it into the pocket of his velvet vest. "That's how you lost your precious dagger? If you ask me, I would have let the brat have it. If that dagger is as precious as you say. The gods know how those...things breed like rabbits. If you ask me, the world will not miss one little toady little boy that would have turned out to be some pig farming, dirt eating peasant that will no doubt in time produce more of his ilk when he gets his loins in a dander over some ridiculous rutting festival that their kind tend to have in harvest time. Ye gads! The mere thought of their ilk rolling in the hay pawing at their.."

Eleni cleared her throat, thus cutting the young man off. "The things you say, good half elf!" The elf girl began with some hint of mirth in her voice.
The young man half giggled at this and replied evenly over a sudden din of voices that carried over to their table, "You know there ain't a bit of good in me, girly girl. You know I am rotten to my very core." He practically purred as Eleni smiled at this and patted the green painted lute that sat on her lap. The instrument had seen better days, with worn out yellowing pegs that were supposedly ivory, but looked more of suspicious stock. The paint was chipped in several places as well, showing a bit of dry rot, yet the tunes played out true and clear, and as lilting as a dancing cat as Eleni gently ran her fingers across them.

"And I love you for who you are, Tonio my very good friend." Eleni said as her fingers half seriously tinkered with the opening bars of a sailor's lament as her eyes playfully gazed upon the young man's handsome face that looked very feminine. Indeed, it seemed to Eleni with some inner amusement, that if he were so inclined to do so, he could possibly pass himself as one if he wanted. "Anyway, that was quite a long time ago by your standard..20 years, I think. It has been awhile since Duron and me traveled abroad." The hem of Eleni's silken, yellow gold dress whispered as she crossed her legs, scooting them out of the way of a passing bar maid who had her tray full of frosty mugs of ale.

The young man tapped his clean shaven, smooth chin with his forefinger. "20 years ago you say. Mmmm.. that has been quite a while then." He began, his voice musing and silly. "I believe I was still in the monastary back then. Chanting and chanting and more chanting about the goodness of Tyr and all that. How utterly boring." He yawned for emphasis. "You know, my parents had such high hopes for me. I was such an utter disappointment to them when I was refused entrance into the Order. In more ways than one. Do you know, Elle, that they still firmly believe that my preference in men is just a passing fancy?"

Eleni shook her head at this, her straight, jet black tresses whispering against the skin of her neck. "I don't know, Tonio. I feel bad about lying to them. They are so nice and so sincere in their like for me. I think they'll be devastated to know that I am not really your girlfriend." Eleni frowned as her finger played a sour note and then put the lute away with a sigh.

"Don't be silly!" Tonio said with a harumph. "If they can't accept me as who I am, then they deserve to be fooled. Let them live in their little fantasy world and I'll continue to live mine."

Eleni reached out and held Tonio's hand, saying gently, "But still, Tonio. You should tell them. There is nothing as liberating as living a truth. Your parents love you very much. That much I can tell. I am sure if you were to give them half a chance..."

Tonio rolled his eyes at the elf girl's words and withdrew his hand away from hers, replying incredulously, "Eleneth! Sometimes you can be so self righteous and preachy! I know you mean well and I know that you are my friend, but please do not lecture me on how I should live my life!" Tonio was about to continue, but when he saw the elf girl's eyes downcast at his outburst, he sighed and replied as he brushed away his well coifed and scented chestnut hair, "I know I'm being a bitch. I know! I didn't mean that, Eleni. It's that sometimes I can be so defensive. Lliira knows how I can be so when it comes to my parents. Believe me though when I tell you that as soon as I tell them, I will lose everything. My inheritance, my titles, everything. They'll disown me!" Tonio leaned back in his chair with his hands behind him, supporting his head. He scratched at his scalp uncomfortably but smiled as Eleni looked up at him with one of her own.

"Listen, I have to go back to work." Eleni began as she picked up her lute again.

Tonio made a face at this and replied, "When are you going back out with Duron again?"

The elf girl stood up, smoothing out the wrinkles on the front of her dress with her free hand as she replied, "Oh I don't know. Duron seems to want to settle down here in the city. He's quite in demand, you know."

Tonio snorted at this and shook his head. "Working as a male escort!"

Eleni bit her lower lip and replied, "Well.."

"And what of you Eleni, are you satisfied with being a tavern minstrel?" Tonio demanded

The elf girl replied, "It's steady work, Tonio. You don't know what it's like, out there. So many uncertainties..."

"Better than being harrassed and groped by drunken taverners. I know what goes on when I leave you, Eleni." Tonio replied evenly.

Eleni smirked and replied, "The drunks I can handle. But you do not know, Tonio. How can you! The nights and days of going hungry without shelter, not knowing where your next coins, or even a brief reprieve was going to come from. Me and Duron lived and breathed the life of danger and death for so many years with so little to show for it save our health...and so many enemies. Far too many..." Eleni cast her glance at the crowded, smelly inn filled with the half drunk evening crowd, and breathed the air laced with alcohol and over cooked meat in deeply. On the elf girl's face was a wan smile. "I traded that all in, for this." she continued, giggling at herself. Her voice, however, was not as light and convincing to Tonio's ears.

"You miss it. I can tell! I see it in your eyes, pretty little elfmaid!" Tonio quipped, half serious and his voice carrying a hopeful note. "You miss the excitement, the grandeur! Knowing that glory and wealth is within reach!"

Eleni smiled sadly at Tonio's words, and replied, "All those things you seek are so fleeting."

Tonio winked and answered back, "Yet there are those of us who cannot do without them." The half elf frowned suddenly, and then snapped his fingers. "I got it!"

Eleni shook her head and replied, "Tonio..."

"Please!" Tonio whined, making a face. "You could join us! We are going to go spelunking down to a cave that young lord Carstens found the other day. He had told me that he heard mysterious voices and strange carvings on the entrance. Drow carvings. He swears that it's an access tunnel used by drow raiding parties and merchants."

Eleni chuckled at this and said in a mock serious voice, "Carstens! Horatio Carstens? You mean the one that found an entrance to a beholder's lair that turned out to be a skunk's nest?"

Tonio, with pleading in his greenish eyes, replied, "This time he swears to it! On his honor!"

Eleni frowned and put her hands on her hips. "One of these days, dear Tonio, you and your noblemen roundabouts are going to get yourselves into deep trouble. Honestly! This is just foolishness. If it really was a tunnel that led down to the underdark, doubtless it would have been guarded to the teeth by a drow war party and you, dear Tonio, would be attending Horatio's funeral by now. Besides, if this tunnel is as he says, he should be notifying the authorities. That would be the proper thing to do." Eleni knew where this was going to lead, with Tonio pleading once again to be fair and 'guide' him and his 'adventuring' group to glory and besides. The elf girl would have no rest from the half elf's whining and pleading until they had left without her on one of their little expeditions, more often than not covered with debries and suffering from a case of poison oak and no worse. Tonio's friends considered this adventuring game a mountain's height above their usual fare of slumming, which the half elf nobleman and his close friends looked down upon as stupid and dull these days. Eleni was about to speak more, but the familiar sight of Mr.Jensen the innskeeper stalking over her way caused her to swallow her words. "I think I better get back to work." Eleni blurted out, grabbing her lute by its neck.

"Ahh..there ye are, me goil." Mr Jensen began to drawl, his rough, scarred jawls jiggling as his words escaped his ponderous lips. Towering over the elf girl, Mr Jensen was quite a figure, with arms the size of a man's waist and legs as slender as toothpicks, supporting a rather bulbous body that threatened to escape out his faded, off green tunic. There were rumors abound about Mr. Jensen's heritage, and Eleni's bets were on the fact that there was some amount of ogre heritage in him. In any case, he wiped his gargantuan hands on the yellowish, garishly stained apron around his waist, and before Eleni could utter a word in her defense for her lax work ethics, he produced a small, wooden box from his pocket and held it out for her. "A mysterous gent wantid me ta give it to ya. I daresay dat he was quite taken wit yer songs or such." Mr. Jensen said, looking down at the elf girl. His voice however, caused the elf girl to regard her boss with a second glance. There was an intonation there in his voice that she had never heard before. Fear. She also knew that any little trinkets or such that the patrons had given her way were snatched up by Mr. Jensen before they had a chance to find their way to her. So this was an extraordinary thing indeed.

Tonio flustered an angry red as he said, "Who dares encroach upon my fiancee with such gifts! Do they not know that she is my betrothed to be!"
Mr.Jensen stepped away slowly as he regarded Tonio with a small sneer, and said, "Ye'd best not findin' that answer if'n ye knew wot wud be gud fer ye, youngin lord." The innskeeper then turned to Eleni and said, "Ye're off'n t'night me goil. Wit full pay'n of curse."

Eleni held up her hand and then let it fall as the giant man stalked away from her. Her mind was somewhat troubled as she began to wonder what this was all about, and then directed her attention to the box, batting Tonio's hand away from the lid. The box itself was an ornately carved sandalwood with clinging ivy motif and runes that she recognized as elvish. Eleni guessed that the box itself was worth quite a bit of coins and was of the highest workmanship, which made the elf girl suspicious indeed that Mr.Jensen hadn't palmed it.

Eleni sat down again on the wooden chair, letting go of the lute. She began to examine the box with a critical eye as Tonio hovered about her.
"Who dares encroach upon my lady!" Tonio seethed in anger.

Eleni held up her finger and placed it against Tonio's lips to call for silence, and then slowly opened the lid. The faint smell of lilacs escaped from the box itself, and Eleni gazed upon a dagger, a small silvery thing made to look like a little bird in flight. "Hummingbird..." Eleni whispered in awe as Tonio frowned and asked, peering over her slender shoulder, "What is this? Who would give you a dagger?"

"This is mine." Eleni replied absentmindedly as she picked up the dagger, noting the small parchment underneath that was folded neatly. She turned the light, feathery dagger in her hand and whispered, "What tales do you have to tell me..."

Eleni then picked up the folded up parchment, giving it a quick glance over and then unfolding it. On the parchment was a small missive, in a cursive common. When she finished reading it, Tonio whistled and said, "This can't be mere coincidence." He then took Eleni by the shoulders and turned her around in the chair to face him. "You telling me this story tonight of how you lost your dagger, and now it comes back to you this very night, with a mysterious stranger that wants to meet you, calling himself the black raven! Without your friend Duron no less! I smell the work of divinity at work here, or the fates!"

Eleni closed the box after placing the note inside, her violet colored eyes fixed on nothing in particular, yet they were questing. Her gaze lingering nowhere for too long as she nonchalantly scanned her surroundings. "Will you meet this person Eleni?" Tonio asked excitedly, sitting down next to her once more.

"Tonio, please go home. For me." Eleni said as she got up, clutching her lute and box. She gave him a light kiss on his cheek as he began to protest. "I need to go find Duron. Really, you know how he feels about you. You don't want to follow me." the elf girl continued as Tonio once again opened his mouth to protest. "Listen, I'll think about Horatio's little adventuring party. I promise. But only if you go home right now." Eleni said as she started to walk away from the table.
Tonio looked both happy and disappointed at the same time, which Eleni thought was a pretty neat trick as he followed her toward the door. "I'll only go home if you agree to come. It will be tomorrow midday, at his estate." Tonio answered with all the petulance he could bring forth, causing Eleni to giggle despite her mood. The elf girl nodded quickly as the two of them walked out into the darkened streets of Waterdeep's Griffon ward district, the sudden chill in the air causing Tonio to chatter his teeth and shiver.

"Alright. Fine. Tomorrow midday it is." Eleni said and smiled, once again kissing Tonio as he gathered her up for a friendly hug. The embrace was short lived as Tonio let her go and said, "I can't wait until I tell the Unicorn company of our latest addition! Lorelei will flip her top with jealosy for sure!"

Eleni watched Tonio hail a coachman and get in with flair, and then focused her attention once again on the box as the coach began to roll away with clicking hoofbeats. A sense of unease began to brew within her mind as she regarded the box, and the elf girl began to wonder just who this black crow could be. To be sure, Eleni was familiar with the various factions and the guilds that populated and sometimes came in conflict within the city of splendors, but only up to a point. She began to reason that if this black crow were out to get her for something she and Duron had done in the past, the first salvo would not have been this cordial. But the elf girl also knew that she could not be sure. Not sure enough to be complacent, certainly. With that being said, Eleni turned her steps toward the small tenement where she kept her home across the street. If she was to face this unknown, she figured that she mind as well be ready for all eventualities.