Chapter 5

As they rode back home after the ceremony, she had asked him why the sudden interest in formalizing their relationship.

"It was time," he had responded.

She'd given him a knowing smile and didn't press him for more. He was grateful because at that moment he had no other answer.

She'd been his wife in his mind ever since he'd claimed her as such aboard Captain Jarrol's ship and he'd been satisfied by that. However, after Jarlaxle and Kimmuriel's visit, his satisfaction had vanished.

Once the two drow vacated his house, he'd lay back down with her and tried to sleep. Shortly after sunrise, he'd given up sleeping and gone out alone, his steps taking him to the amphitheater.

By the time he reached it, he'd known what he was going there for. He was going to find Brother Ansel, the priest of Lathander, who already seemed to know his heart where Dwahvel was concerned.

The sun was well into the sky and he expected the priest to have already gone back to the main temple uptown. However, Brother Ansel sat on one of the semicircular benches as if waiting for someone.

At his approach, the silverhaired priest looked up at him, a smile crossing his face. "Artemis," he called in surprise. "How nice to see you this beautiful morning. I hope your lady is doing well."

From there, Entreri wasn't precisely sure how it happened, but before he'd left the amphitheater, it had been arranged to meet at sunrise the next day for the ceremony.

He'd been so consumed with the how of it that he never considered the why.

Looking back, however, he could recall the moment when it became necessary to make Dwahvel his wife in every way.

Hearing Jarlaxle call her Mistress Entreri had not been an issue for him. He'd heard his old companion refer to himself as Drizzt Do'Urden and Entreri as Wulfgar on too many occasions to ever ascribe too much meaning to a name with that one.

But when Kimmuriel called her Mistress Entreri, it had just rubbed him the wrong way. The psionicist would know the truth of what he said directly from their own minds and reactions. Kimmuriel would know it was a lie.

Entreri did not care what Kimmuriel thought, but Dwahvel deserved better than that.

He would not have her living a lie. She deserved truth.

And so he made the truth of his heart open to the world. He'd made his heart public, his love for her recorded faithfully by Brother Ansel in the records of the temple of Lathander.

And in most ways, nothing had changed between them. He did not love her any more after the ceremony than before. She'd been his wife in his mind for months. Putting it on paper did not make it any more true to him.

On the other hand, there were little nuances of behavior and meaning that had indeed shifted. Something about the way they were together had deepened. A level of hesitation he hadn't even been aware of had disappeared.

He slept at night more deeply than he'd ever slept before. Each morning when he woke, he felt rested, amazed by what he'd missed during all those years of wakefulness and caution.

He ate better than he'd ever eaten before. In fact, he'd had to become very careful at the table because she loved to feed him and fed him well. In all his life, meals had been inconveniences at best, dangerous distractions at worst. Now they were relaxed times of conversation as he told her about his students, about the plans for the upcoming flotilla to Luskan.

That had been a sore point between them, he had to admit. Every since Jarlaxle's warning, she'd repeatedly pressed him to stay behind in Waterdeep. She was afraid for him, he knew it. She did not mean to cast aspersions on his ability to take care of himself and of the ship and crew in his trust.

But all the same, he'd finally lost his temper with her over the issue and forbade her to bring it up again, and she hadn't. But she was still angry with him about leaving and he with her for failing to understand.

As the day of his departure grew nearer, however, their mutual anger had transformed into a sad resignation on her part and an undercurrent of guilt on his.

He didn't want to hurt her by leaving. He didn't want to put himself unnecessarily in danger. But she had to understand that he'd agreed to go. If Captain Jarrol was making the trip, he would be there as he said he would.

That hadn't stopped him from speaking privately with Jarrol about his misgivings about the trip. He'd even suggested that Jarrol leave Emory behind.

However, Jarrol and the rest of the fleet captains were convinced that with all the pirates of Luskan deeply embroiled in their own internal concerns, such a large, well-defended fleet had nothing to fear.

All the same, Entreri set extra security and defensive mechanisms in place, thoroughly annoying their new wizard Mellisandra.

Mellisandra Deneviere had a beautiful name, but was a singularly unattractive woman in Entreri's opinion. She was the same height as he, but outweighed him by a good forty pounds, all shoulder and bust. Her blond hair was fine and straight and by mid-afternoon tended to stick to her head as if glued there. Her features seemed too small for her broad face, and her voice tended toward the strident end of the vocal range.

However, he could not deny that she was a very competent wizard and that the extra enchantments he'd had her place on the ship seemed effective. Getting her to actually expend the energy to cast the enchantments had been another story. Though gifted in many ways, she was lazy and second guessed him at every opportunity.

One thing he sorely missed of his earlier existence was the permission he'd given himself to just slay anyone who would not obey his orders instantly. Mellisandra Deneviere truly had no idea how often he had spared her life when every instinct cried out for her immediate termination.

At last, the winter weather began to break and the first warmth of springtime flushed the air. Captain Jarrol came from a captain's meeting with a date of departure in hand, and the ships were provisioned and loaded.

Bonfire would be carrying a load of grain heavy enough to make her ride low in the water. Entreri had instructed Mellisandra to cast extra charms for water resistance to the cargo and to add to her reinforcement of the hull of the ship.

"Why do we need to reinforce the hull any more, Entreri?" she'd asked in a petulant tone. "I've already strengthened it by twice. It's not like pirates come up underneath to siphon the cargo out a hole in the boat."

"Just do it, Mellisandra," Entreri instructed her for the fifth time. A serious part of him wished they could leave her behind and trust his newfound powers with the shadow stones as their magical reinforcement.

The stones had been an unwelcome addition to his arsenal. He'd have much rather thrown them back at Jarlaxle. But within moments of his first examination of them, he'd come to realize that in his presence they were quiet, practically dormant unless called upon.

Over the next few weeks, he experimented with them himself, taking short journeys in the shadowplane, marveling at the speed of these journeys compared to distance covered on the material plane.

He also toyed with the Shadow Weave, but his magical education was limited to the use of artifacts and he knew it would take considerable practice to be able to use the stones in any truly effective fashion.

And despite his practice in tapping the energy of the Shadow Weave, using the stones in any but the most rudimentary way took concentration. If they indeed faced pirates, he'd be lost to the battle itself as a fighter in order to cast with the stones. Despite the improvement of Cullon and Ballantin, too many of the sailors on board were merchant sailors, not warriors, and his blades would be missed too badly in a fight to risk it.

Therefore, Mellisandra had been enlisted to make the trip. Most of the ships could not afford to employ wizards, and indeed Entreri knew it strained Captain Jarrol's purse to do so. However, Jarlaxle's casual warning triggered a continual nagging feeling in the back of his mind that this trip would indeed be eventful, and he pressed Jarrol until he agreed to bring her on.

But despite all his precautions, he could not rest easy about the trip or about leaving Dwahvel. Deep inside, he knew she was right to be afraid.

The night before the flotilla cast off from Waterdeep, he had a nightmare. Nightmares weren't part of his psyche. They never had been. But this night he dreamed about dragons.

Not the copper dragon sisters of Damara, though in their draconic forms they were indeed terrifying. He dreamed instead of the red dragon Hephaestus, flying low over the city, his blast of flame incinerating everything in sight. Smoke rose from the city and people ran in panic. His house was blasted apart before his eyes. He dug through the rubble desperately, but he couldn't find Dwahvel anywhere.

Then the dream shifted and he was being crushed in the jaws of Urshula the black dracolich as Jarlaxle faded into the wall behind him with an apologetic shrug. He could smell the stench of death as it rolled off the dragon; he could feel the burn of the acid consuming his flesh even as the lich's teeth tore at him.

The dreams were vivid and all encompassing, so much so that when Dwahvel woke beside him and placed her hand on his arm, he reacted violently, rolling onto her defensively and trapping her wrist in a painfully tight grip.

Within a breath he'd woken up enough to realize what he'd done and let go of her, apologizing repeatedly, but the look of sudden terror in her eyes bothered him badly. He'd hurt her. He'd forgotten where he was, and he'd hurt her.

Dwahvel watched as her husband pushed himself off her, his breath quickly slowing to normal. Her fear had been real. That moment of instinct that took over in him had been as ruthless and lethal as any action he'd ever taken. It frightened her to remember who she slept with.

But as quickly as his instincts had protected him, his love had protected her. "I'm so sorry," he repeated over and over like a mantra against the realization that he could have quite easily broken her arm—or her neck.

"I'm fine," she assured him as she sat up next to him and looked into his eyes.

She remembered the first time she'd gotten up the nerve to look Artemis Entreri in the eyes. She been struck by the emptiness in them, by their hard, pitiless gaze.

Now those same dark eyes looked into hers and all she could see in them was love and concern and regret. Artemis Entreri was sorry for something he'd done.

She reached out to brush back the dark hair that fell into his face, and he caught her hand gently, pressing her palm into his lips. In that moment, she understood anew the gift she'd been given when the gods had brought Artemis Entreri back into her life.

And she understood the challenge before her. Even though the blade was sheathed, it was still a sword. As loving and as gentle as he might be with her, her Artemis was still a warrior. She could not love that out of him nor would she want to.

And the one thing she knew was that she loved him. She loved everything he was, everything he was trying to be, even everything he had been as long as it brought him to be there at her side.

But she could not keep him there, and the knowledge that he was leaving broke something loose inside her. She could not keep him, but she could have him now.

He might leave her tomorrow, but tonight he was hers. He was her friend, he was her lover, he was her husband. And if he didn't come back to her, she wanted to always remember that she'd had him once.

Deliberately, almost ritualistically, she pushed him back onto the bed. She looked into his eyes, those dark beautiful eyes. She ran her fingertip across the arch of his eyebrows and down the elegant line of his cheekbones. She ran her fingers through his straight dark hair and along the edge of his jaw.

Then she ran her hands boldly over his body, her eyes devouring him, memorizing every line of muscle, every inch of skin. She closed her eyes and buried her face in his neck, breathing in the smell of him. She leaned over him, kissing his mouth, his neck, his shoulder, exulting in the taste of him.

He ran his hands across her shoulders and down her back, and his touch ignited her. Soon, he'd rolled her over beneath him, his hands caressing, insistent. But she didn't want his tender, generous touch. She wanted him. She wanted him with her, inside her, completely given to her. She wanted a piece of him left behind with her, something he couldn't take back.

This time was not about patience or enjoyment. This time was about the dark side of love, the side that knows loss and fear.

Her wrist ached as she pulled at him, but she didn't care. She knew that his fingers had left their imprint on her skin and she took savage joy in it. Those prints were evidence, proof that he'd been there with her, even if that proof was painful.

She dragged him close to her, as close as he could get, her desire fueling his into an uncontrollable inferno of passion.

He tried to pull back, to be careful—but she wouldn't let him be gentle. She wanted it to hurt.

She tugged at his hair. She left long scratches down his sides.

She knew she would feel the aftereffects for days to come, but she welcomed it. She wanted her body to ache and remember his touch. More evidence that he'd been there with her, that he'd been her friend, her lover, her husband.

When he finally shuddered and cried out then sank against her, falling to her side so as not to crush her beneath him, every part of her hurt. But the tears that escaped her eyes were tears of grief.

He lay there beside her quietly, so quiet she couldn't even hear him breathe. His fingers traced little circles and patterns on her shoulder.

She had to let him go, she knew that. He had to do this for himself, for the man he was becoming. To do otherwise was to go against his identity, an identity he'd fought hard to uncover.

She couldn't go with him, she knew that. He needed her safe at home to come back to. He'd never had a home before this. He'd never had a person in his life to be a constant anchor against life and change and trial. She had to be the one he fought for or he would not fight. She had to be there waiting for him or he would not go.

And he had to go. And he had to fight. It was who he was.

She'd come to realize that above all, Artemis Entreri was a man of integrity. His outward actions matched his inward motivations perfectly. There was no pretense in him, no show put on to fool anyone.

That was what made him a such a deadly assassin. His inner desire to kill those unworthy of life were in direct correlation to his actions in doing such. There was no conflict between what he really wanted and what he did. In serving the pashas as a tool for murder, he was directly serving his own demons of pain and vengeance.

But even then he had his code. He was a professional. In his world, he only killed those who deserved to die—either because they were too sloppy, too stupid, too dangerous, or just too inconvenient to live.

He never killed for pleasure, but more as a way to clean up the world of those who had no reason to exist in it any longer.

Over the past few years, he had changed.

But he still had no patience with those who put on a show. Even Jarlaxle with his grandstanding behavior and propensity for lies was always consistent in his desire to exploit the world and everyone in it to the entertainment and profit of Jarlaxle and Bregan D'aerthe.

And though Artemis was no longer willing to serve as Jarlaxle's entertainment or to fatten the coffers of Bregan D'aerthe, he understood the mercenary's motivations. Because they were consistent with his actions, Artemis respected them.

The merchant Tolliver on the other hand put on a front that his goals were profit for himself and the strength of the guild, but Dwahvel had discovered that a good portion of his business operated outside guild oversight, in fact serving another guild secretly. Tolliver was playing both ends against the middle to the detriment of the health of the guild he supposedly supported.

Artemis would not work with him. He had no respect for those who said one thing and did another. His deeply held hatred for priests came right out of that recognition of hypocrisy.

Brother Ansel, to her surprise, had made a tentative place for himself in Artemis's life by the virtue that so far, his actions and his calling had seemed to match. However, at the first sign that the priest's devotion and actions failed to support each other, Dwahvel knew that Artemis's fragile trust in him would crumble to dust.

As she lay there enjoying the feel of her husband beside her, she considered the fact that her Artemis really needed to work on the streak of perfectionism that ran through him. He tended to expect more consistency in himself and others than was humanly possible.

The evil man who did a good deed was just as perplexing to him as the good man who did an evil deed. In his earlier days, he'd have killed both of them just for breaking pattern unnecessarily.

These days, she didn't think he'd kill either, but his opinion of both would take a sharp downward turn. He wouldn't work for either.

Fortunately, all he expected of her was what she found easy to do—most of the time. He needed her to accept him and to love him, and she did. But he also needed her respect his judgment and to validate his decisions—including the ones she did not agree with.

For that reason, as she lay there in his arms, she told him he should go to Luskan. She told him he needed to be there on the ship, that they needed him along. Though it broke her heart to know he was putting himself in almost certain danger, she told him she would be fine and that she trusted him to be safe and come home to her again.

It seemed as though he relaxed against her just a bit more as he said, "I'll be fine. I promise to come home. If things get bad enough, I'll just use the ring."

The rings.

He'd brought them home one day and slipped hers onto her finger. "Now, no matter what happens, I'll be able to get to you," he'd declared. It was her safety he was concerned with. After the encounter with Cadderly and Danica Bonaduce, it was as if he'd realized that his old life could intrude at any time and that someone might use her as a weapon against him.

"If anyone ever threatens you, just tell the ring to bring you to me and it will," Artemis had said. Unspoken was the knowledge that if she were unconscious, he could tell his ring to do the same and be there at her side in an instant, swords drawn.

But as his jobs began to pull him away from home at times, she too had slept better at night knowing that if things got too bad, he could just come home. And if he were unable, she could go to him, dagger drawn.

Just hearing him say that he would use the ring if need be set her mind at ease as she settled against him. His body was warm against hers and his embrace was secure. Within moments, they slept at peace with one another.

Daylight found Entreri packing the last of his gear into his bag. He packed lightly, determined to make this trip as brief as possible, but knowing that they had a sail of several tendays there and back, not to mention waiting for their unloading time with such a large fleet.

Dwahvel watched him, her eyes never wavering. Finally, he walked over to the dresser where his swordbelt lay, but she called to him instead. He turned back to see her standing before the trunk at the foot of the bed where he kept Charon's Claw and the jeweled dagger.

"Take them," she instructed. firmly "Both of them. You take every advantage you can get out there, do you understand me? You do everything you have to do to make sure you come home."

He looked at her, looked past the hardness in her eyes to the fear that lay behind them. Then he dropped to his knee before the trunk and put his hands on her waist, looking her right in those cool green eyes. "I'm going to come home, with or without the blades," he declared. "But for you, I'll take them."

Then he kissed her and held her as she threw her arms around him. She held him as tightly as she could for a moment before letting go and stepping back again. Her eyes shone with unshed tears but she didn't cry. He was grateful. It would have been so much worse to have left her crying.

Then he pulled out the blades and put them on. With a touch to the hilts, he spoke to them and mastered them in one move. Both were excited and willing, but he was less than thrilled to have them at his side again. It felt almost like moving backwards to bear them. His mood darkened and he felt himself frown.

Dwahvel must have understood what was going through his mind because she stepped up onto the trunk to put herself at his eye level and stated, "These are tools. Nothing more. They are not you and they do not define you. You can choose to pick them up and put them down as it pleases you."

He nodded and gave her another kiss. "I'll be home in a couple of months," he stated firmly, promise in his tone. "I love you."

"I know you do," she responded warmly. "And I know you'll come back to me."

But they both knew that knowing wasn't doing.