TO SLEEP WITH DRAGONS

Bwahaha, ye just keep the drink flowing," Athrogate howled. He hoisted his foamy mug and gulped it down in one swallow - at least the contents of it that didn't pour all over his braided black beard. He dropped the mug back on the table and drew his sleeve across his beard, taking only a bit of the foam from the frothy mess.

Jarlaxle started to slide the next mug of ale across the table. "I know they were Knellict's men," he said, holding the ale just out of Athrogate's reach. "Else, he has a rival band operating right in Heliogabalus."

"Goblin snot. Any rival band'd be lying dead in a day's time," the dwarf blustered, and gave an exaggerated wink.

Jarlaxle slid the ale the rest of the way, and the mug never even stopped in its slide before it went up into the air and overturned into the dwarf's mouth.

"Bwahaha!" Athrogate howled as he slammed it back down, gave an enormous belch, and slapped his arm across his mouth yet again. As he moved to retract his arm, he noted that the cuff of his sleeve was sopping wet, so he put it in his mouth and sucked the ale out of the fabric.

Jarlaxle shook his head, looked at the lines of empty mugs covering more than half the large tavern table, and nodded to the serving girl who watched him from the bar. He'd known he'd have to get Athrogate drunk to get his tongue wagging, of course, but he hadn't quite realized how expensive a proposition that might be.

"Shall I order more?" he asked, and the dwarf howled at the absurdity of the question.

Jarlaxle chuckled and held up his open hand, indicating five more of the large mugs, then saluted the nodding serving girl with a tip of his wine glass - the only drink he had imbibed while Athrogate had gone through a dozen ales.

"So it was Knellict, and the target was Artemis Entreri," Jarlaxle remarked.

"Never said it was Knellict," Athrogate corrected, and he belched again.

"A rival within the Citadel of Assassins?"

"Never said it weren't Knellict," Athrogate added with an even louder burp.

The waitress began placing the full mugs on the table then, so Jarlaxle paused and offered a disarming smile. She cleared her tray and began scooping some of the empties, and the drow dropped a pair of shiny gold coins on the platter beside them, drawing a wide smile from her.

"Then say," he said to the dwarf as soon as the girl had gone. The drow kept his hand tight on a mug, holding it hostage.

"Entreri got himself a job to kill a merchant," Athrogate said, then he paused to stare at the mug. After a moment, Jarlaxle slid the ale over, and Athrogate wasted no time studying it.

"Knellict believes that Entreri kept the spoils from that job?" Jarlaxle reasoned. "He would have no reason. We are still fat on the bounties collected in Vaasa, and as a knight of the order, coin is hardly Artemis Entreri's concern."

"Bwahaha, knight of the order!" the dwarf howled.

"Apprentice knight, then."

"Bwahaha!"

"He would have no incentive to keep the booty from the slain merchant," Jarlaxle said.

"Weren't no slain merchant, so I'm hearing," Athrogate replied. He motioned to another mug. Jarlaxle slid one to his waiting grasp, but he didn't flip it right up to his mouth. "Not until Knellict caught up to the merchant, at least. Seems yer friend got his identities all crossed."

"He killed the wrong merchant?"

"He killed a couple o' Knellict's men, sent to watch his work." Athrogate finished by emptying the mug then offering a resounding belch.

Jarlaxle sat back, letting it all digest. What have you done, Artemis? he thought, but did not ask aloud. Certainly his companion, as professional and fine an assassin as had ever walked the streets of Heliogabalus or any other city, could not have made such a grievous error as that.

So it was no error on Entreri's part. It was a statement. Of what? Independence? Stupidity?

"Tell me, Athrogate," Jarlaxle quietly and calmly asked, "is the bounty offered for Entreri enough to entice those morningstars from your back?"

"Bwahaha!" howled the dwarf.

"Is that why you have returned to Heliogabalus, instead of taking the road to Vaasa?"

"Winter's coming, ye dolt. Got no thoughts o' riding out Vaasan blizzards. Work through the summer, drink through the winter - now there's a formula for dwarven success."

"But if some easy work is to be found in Heliogabalus..." Jarlaxle teased. "An unexpected windfall, perhaps."

"For yer Entreri? Bwahaha! Would hardly cover the drink ye bought me here and now."

Jarlaxle slid another mug across as he furrowed his brow in confusion. "Knellict underestimates - "

"He wouldn't give yer friend the respect of a decent bounty," the dwarf explained. "He's knowin' that many'd take up the hunt for Entreri, on the gain to their reputation alone. To kill a hero knight? Now there's a feather to rival that thing you keep in yer stupid hat!"

"For an upstart, perhaps," the drow reasoned.

"Or as an insult. Whatever."

"But when Knellict realizes his error, and runs out of upstarts, he will reconsider the remuneration."

"I'd be agreeing, or not, if I knew what in a pig's nose ye was talking about," said Athrogate. "Remuner-what?"

"The payment," Jarlaxle explained. "When all those who try for Entreri are slain, Knellict will recognize the truth of this enemy and will offer a larger reward."

"Or he'll kill yer friend himself - course, I still ain't telling ye it's Knellict at all, now am I?"

"No, of course not."

Athrogate howled, belched, and downed another mugful.

"And if the reward goes higher, might Athrogate be tempted to try?"

"Meself don't ever try, black skin. I do or I don't."

"And would you 'do'? If the price were right?"

"No more or less than yerself'd do it."

Jarlaxle started to reply, and sharply, but he recognized that he couldn't honestly disagree with the proposition, though of course the reward would have to be exceedingly high.

"I like yer friend," Athrogate admitted. "Nine Hells, I like ye both."

"But you like gold more."

Athrogate lifted the next mug up high before him in salute. "I'm liking what coin buys me. Got meself one life for living. Could be over next tenday, or in three hunnerd years. Either case, I'm thinking the more time I'm spending drunk and fat, the better a life I'm living. And don't ye never doubt me, black skin, the better life I'm living is th'only thing what's really mattering."

It was a philosophy that Jarlaxle found hard to contradict. He motioned to the waitress again, indicating that she should keep the drink coming, then he fished out some more gold coins and dropped them on the table.

"I like you as well, good dwarf," he said as he rose from his seat. "And so I tell you in all seriousness, whatever bounty Knellict - yes, yes, if it is Knellict," he added, seeing Athrogate about to interject. "Whatever bounty you find on Artemis Entreri's head, it is not enough to make the attempt worth your while."

"Bwahaha!"

"Simply consider all the years of drinking you will forfeit. Let that be your guide." Jarlaxle winked, gave a slight bow and walked away, passing by the serving girl who was coming over with another full tray. He gave her a little pat on the buttocks as he passed, and she offered a promising smile in return.

Yes, he could understand why Athrogate would shy from Vaasa when the weather turned cold. Certainly he, too, would like to weather the winter in the more hospitable city.

Unless, of course, Artemis Entreri had worn through that hospitality.

Jarlaxle exited the tavern. The rain had ended, the heavy clouds blown away by a cold northern wind to reveal the faint first stars of evening above. So quickly had the chill come through that the puddles left over from the day's rain steamed into the night air, rising in ghostly wisps. Jarlaxle spent a while looking both ways along the boulevard, examining those wisps and wondering if killers lurked behind their gray veils.

"What have you done, Artemis?" he asked quietly, then he bundled his cloak around his neck and started off for home. He reversed direction almost immediately, though, having no patience for the events swirling around him.

By the time he got to Wall's Around, twilight had fallen across the city. A bank of clouds hanging along the western horizon defeated the last, meager rays of the sun, ushering in an earlier and deeper darkness. Thus, several of the mercantiles had candles burning, for though it was dark, it was not yet time for them to close their doors.

So it was for Ilnezhara's Gold Coins, where a single, multi-armed candelabra danced in the large window. All around it, crystals sparkled in the uneven light.

The little bell set upon the door sang out when Jarlaxle entered. The place was nearly empty, with only one middle-aged woman and a young couple walking the length of the showcases, and a single figure behind the counter across the way.

Jarlaxle took pleasure in the blanch of the middle-aged woman when she finally noticed him. Even more delicious, the younger woman slid a step to the side, bringing her much closer to her male companion. She clutched the man's arm so urgently that she roused him from his shopping.

The man's jaw drooped, stiffened suddenly, and he puffed his chest out. He gave a quick glance around, and led his companion toward the exit, moving past Jarlaxle, who politely tipped his hat.

The young woman gave a little yelp at that, and being on the side closest the drow, she shrank even nearer to her protector.

"I do so enjoy the taste of human flesh," Jarlaxle whispered as they passed, and the woman gave another little yelp and her brave friend moved even more furiously to the door.

Jarlaxle didn't even bother to glance back at them as they departed. The sharp ring of the bell was enough to amuse him.

And to draw the attention of the other two in the shop. The middle-aged woman he did not know stared at him - a bit fearful, perhaps, but seemingly more intrigued than frightened.

Jarlaxle bowed to her and when he came up, he worked his fingers through a simple parlor trick and produced a single flower, a late summer purple alveedum, a rare and striking Bloodstone spectacle.

He held it out to the woman, but she did not take it. She slid past him instead, staring at him every step of the way.

Jarlaxle's fingers worked fast and the flower disappeared. He offered the woman a shrug.

She just kept staring, and her eyes roamed up and down, sizing him from head to toe.

Jarlaxle moved to a nearby case and pretended to inspect several pieces of golden jewelry. He did not glance the woman's way, nor toward the proprietor behind the counter, but he covertly kept careful track of both of them. Finally, he heard the bell on the door tinkle, and he glanced that way to lock a final stare with the obviously intrigued woman. She betrayed her thoughts with a wry smile as she exited the store.

"The wife of Yenthiele Sarmagon, the Chief Gaoler of Heliogabalus and a close personal friend of Baron Dimian Ree," Ilnezhara remarked as soon as the door closed behind the departing woman. "Take care if you bed that one."

"She seemed quite boring to me," Jarlaxle replied, never looking up from the necklace he rolled through his fingers, reveling in the weight of the precious metal.

"Most humans are," Ilnezhara said. "I suspect it is their state of always being close to death. They are confined by fears of what may come next, and so they cannot step outside of their caution."

"But of course, by that reasoning, a drow is a much better lover."

"And a dragon better still," Ilnezhara was quick to respond, and Jarlaxle didn't dare question that statement. He offered a grin and a tip of his hat.

"But even the companionship of a dragon cannot sate the appetite of Jarlaxle, it would seem," Ilnezhara went on.

Jarlaxle considered her words, and the somewhat sour look that had come over her fair features. She crossed her arms in front of her - a most unusual gesture from this one, he thought.

"You do not think me content?" the drow asked, a bit too innocently, he knew.

"I believe that you stir."

"My contentment, or lack thereof, is compartmentalized," Jarlaxle explained, thinking that it might be wise to assuage the dragon's ego. "In many ways, I am indeed content - quite happy, in fact. In other ways, less so."

"You live for excitement," Ilnezhara replied. "You are not content, never content, when the road is smooth and straight."

Jarlaxle mulled that over for a few moments, then grinned even wider. "And you would live out the rest of your life in the bliss of buying trinkets and reselling them for profit," came his sarcastic reply.

"Who says I buy them?" Ilnezhara answered without hesitation.

Jarlaxle tipped his hat and offered a quick smile that did not hold, for he would not release the dragon from the bite of his sarcasm so readily as that.

"Are you content, Ilnezhara?"

"I have found a life worth living, yes."

"But only because you measure it by the short lifespan of King Gareth and his friends, whom you fear. This is not your life, your existence, but merely a pause for position, a plateau from which Ilnezhara and Tazmikella can move along to their next pursuits."

"Or perhaps we dragons are not as anxious and agitated as drow," the dragon replied. "Might it be the little things - a drow lover this tenday, salvaging a destroyed merchant ship next - that suffice?"

"Should I be insulted?"

"Better that than consumed."

Jarlaxle paused again, trying to get a reading on his most curious of counterparts. He couldn't rightly tell where Ilnezhara's jokes ended and her threats began, and that was no place he wanted to be where a dragon was concerned.

"Perhaps it is the excitement I can provide extraneous to our... relationship, that so enthralls you," he offered somewhat hesitantly a moment later. He put on his best cavalier effect as he finished the thought, striking a pose that evoked the mischievous nature of a troublemaking young boy.

But Ilnezhara did not smile. Her jaw tightened and her eyes stared straight ahead, boring through him.

"So serious," he observed.

"The storm approaches."

Jarlaxle put on an innocent expression and posture, standing with his arms out wide.

"You survived the trials of the castle of the Witch-King," Ilnezhara explained. "And it is not in Jarlaxle's nature to merely survive. Nay, you seek to prosper from every experience, as you did with Herminicle's tower."

"I escaped with my life - barely."

"With your life and...?"

"If we are both to speak in riddles, then neither will find an answer, milady."

"You believe that you have found advantage in the constructs of Zhengyi," the dragon stated. "You have discovered magic, and allies perhaps, and now you seek to parlay those into personal gain."

Jarlaxle started to shake his head, but Ilnezhara would not be so easily dismissed.

"To elevate your position within the current structure of Damara - to be named as apprentice knight of the order, then to climb to full knighthood - is one thing. To elevate your position without, to aspire to climb a ladder of your own making, in a kingdom where Gareth reigns the fields and farms and Timoshenko haunts the alleyways and shadows, is to invite disaster on no small scale."

"Unless my allies are more powerful than my potential enemies," Jarlaxle said.

"They are not," the dragon replied without pause. "You reveal a basic misunderstanding of those you seek to climb beside, or above. It is not a misunderstanding shared by myself or my sister, at any level, be assured. I met with Zhengyi in the days before the storm, as did my sister. His name is reviled throughout the land, of course, but there was a brief period when he was highly regarded, or absent that, when he was powerful enough to destroy any who openly defied him. He came to us not with threats, but with powerful temptation."

"He offered you immortality," Jarlaxle said. "Dracolichdom."

"Urshula the Black was not alone in Zhengyi's designs," the dragon confirmed. "A hundred dracoliches will rise in turn because of the legacy of the Witch-King. A month from now, perhaps, or a hundred years or a thousand years. They are out there, their spirits patient in phylacteries set within tomes of creation, immortal."

"And of Ilnezhara?"

"I chose my course, as did Tazmikella, and at a time when it seemed as if Zhengyi could not be stopped."

She paused there, staring hard, and Jarlaxle silently recited the next logical thought: if Zhengyi could not tempt the dragon sisters back in the day when he seemed to be the supreme and unchallenged power in the Bloodstone Lands, how might Jarlaxle hope to tempt them now?

"My sister and I expect that your services will not be required through the quiet winter months," Ilnezhara said. "Nor those of Entreri. If you wish to journey out of Heliogabalus, mayhaps to rest from your recent trials in the softer climate of the Moonsea, then go with our blessing."

A knowing smile widened on Jarlaxle's face.

"If a situation arises where your particular skills might be of value, and you two are still about Heliogabalus, we will seek you out," the dragon went on, in a tone that made it clear to the drow that she had no intention of doing any such thing. He was being dismissed.

More than that, Ilnezhara and Tazmikella were running from him, distancing themselves.

"Take care, Ilnezhara," Jarlaxle dared to warn. "Artemis Entreri and I uncovered much in the northland."

Ilnezhara narrowed her eyes, and for a moment, Jarlaxle feared that she would revert to her true dragon form and assault him. That threatening stare flashed away, though, and she calmly replied, "Enough to garner attention, of course."

That gave Jarlaxle pause.

"Whose attention?" he asked. "Your own?"

"You had that before you went north, of course."

Jarlaxle let that digest for a moment. She was torn, he could see, and there remained in her a wistfulness toward him. She had dismissed him - almost.

"Ah, perhaps we will travel south," he said. "Weaned in the Underdark, I have little tolerance for winter's cold bite."

"That may be wise."

"I expect that I, and particularly Artemis, would do well to report our departure to King Gareth," the drow reasoned. "Though the journey north to Bloodstone Village is not one I care to take. Already the wind blows cold up there. Still, as I see this as our responsibility, I should send word, and it is not a message I wish to entrust to a city guardsman."

"No, of course not," the dragon agreed, in an almost mocking tone that conveyed to the drow that she was catching on to his little game.

"Perhaps if any of Gareth's friends are in town...." the drow mused aloud.

Ilnezhara hesitated, locking stares with him. She smiled, frowned, then slowly nodded, making it clear to him that that favor was the last he should expect, her expression reminding him of, and confirming, the earlier dismissal.

"I have heard that Grandmaster Kane has been seen about Heliogabalus," she said.

"A remarkable character of unique disposition, I would gather."

"A vagabond in weathered and dirty robes," Ilnezhara corrected. "And the most dangerous man in all of the Bloodstone Lands."

"Artemis Entreri is in the Bloodstone Lands."

"The most dangerous man in all of the Bloodstone Lands," the dragon reiterated, and with a surety that Jarlaxle did not lightly dismiss.

"Grandmaster Kane, then," he said. "He will deliver my message, I am certain."

"He does not fail King Gareth," Ilnezhara agreed, and warned: "Ever."

Jarlaxle sat there nodding for a few minutes. "Perhaps he will be interested in some information regarding Gareth's dead niece, as well." The dark elf rose and offered a disarming smile to the dragon. He tried very hard to appear appreciative of the information she had just shared, and tried even harder to keep his supreme disappointment hidden.

He turned to go, but stopped in his tracks when the dragon said from behind him, "You weave webs that entrap. It is the way of your existence, from your earliest days in Menzoberranzan, no doubt. You play intrigue with characters like Knellict and Timoshenko, and it is a game in which you excel. But hear me well, Jarlaxle. King Gareth and his friends ride hard and straight, and bother not with the meandering strands of webs. Your weave will never be strong enough to slow the charge of Kane."

Out in the street, Jarlaxle quickly regained the spring in his step. He had gone to Ilnezhara hoping to enlist both her and her sister in his plans. Certainly he had to adjust his thinking and his immediate aspirations regarding Vaasa. Absent the dragons, his position was severely compromised - and even more so when he considered the mischief Artemis Entreri had apparently begun.

Caution told him he might do well to go to ground, perhaps even to take that holiday Ilnezhara had offhandedly advised - step away and reassess his opportunities against the seemingly mounting obstacles.

Never did Jarlaxle laugh louder than when he was laughing at himself.

"Caution," he said, letting the word roll off his tongue so that it seemed as if it was ten syllables instead of two. Then he offered the same treatment to a word he considered synonymous: "Boredom."

Every sensible bone in Jarlaxle's body screamed out at him to heed the advice of Ilnezhara, to remove himself from the web of intrigue that grew ever more intricate in the Bloodstone Lands. Truly, Jarlaxle realized that the current tide was pushing against him, that shadows gathered at every corner. A wise man might cut his losses - or winnings, even - and run for safer ground. For such "wise" men, Jarlaxle reasoned, though they didn't know it, death was irrelevant, redundant.

The tide swelled dangerously, to be sure. When facing a losing combination in sava, the wise player sacrificed a piece or surrendered.

But Jarlaxle, above them all, moved boldly in a way that seemed incongruous, even foolish. He bluffed harder.

" 'Let a roll of chance's dice alter the board, " he recited, an old drow saying that exalted in chaos. When dangerous reality closed in, so went Lolth's edict, the goal was simply to alter the reality.

His heels clicked loudly on the cobblestones - as he willed his enchanted boots to do - as he made his way down the cul-de-sac, with one name rolling through his thoughts: Grandmaster Kane.

Jarlaxle slept with dragons.

* * * * *

"Hang from the ceiling by yer toes, do ye?" Athrogate harrumphed. "Ye're bats!"

"They should not know?" the drow replied innocently.

"They shouldn't be knowing how Athrogate's knowing!"

"You believe that Spysong knew nothing of Canthan and his dwarf friend who accompanied him to the castle?"

Athrogate pursed his lips and seemed to shrink down in his seat. He alleviated his mounting fear with a mug of ale, dropped straight to the belly.

"Are you so naive regarding your enemies?" Jarlaxle pressed.

"They ain't me enemies. Ain't done nothing against the crown, nor anyone else who didn't make me do it."

Jarlaxle smiled at the familiar words, spoken with Dwarvish flair but so similar to the claims of Entreri.

"The reckoning is coming fast," the drow warned. "Gareth's niece Ellery is dead."

"I'm still wondering how that might've happened."

"The details will matter not to Gareth's friends."

"Could say the same o' Knellict's friends if I'm doing what ye're asking me to be doing."

"The opposite, I would venture," said Jarlaxle. "The complicity of Ellery will mitigate the blow to Knellict. You will be doing him a favor."

Athrogate snorted, and a bit of ale spurted from his hairy nose.

"My little friend, you have thrived by remaining outside the web woven by your spidery friends."

"What in the Nine Hells are ye babbling about?"

"You are part of them, but removed from them," Jarlaxle explained. "You serve the Citadel of Assassins, but you do not plot with them. There is nothing in your past for which you will answer at the Court of King Gareth, else you would have been called to answer long ago."

"Would I, now?"

"Yes. You walk the edge of a coin, as do I, and now heads and tails are ready for a fight. How tight will our edge become when the blows begin to fall? Too narrow to tread, I expect, and if we must fall to one side or the other, which shall it be?"

"If ye're thinking Knellict's the tail, then yer friend's already jumped to the head," the dwarf reminded.

"This is not about Artemis Entreri," the drow replied. "It is about Jarlaxle, and Athrogate." He slid another mug Athrogate's way, and as per usual it never even stopped sliding before being scooped up and overturned into the dwarf's mouth.

Jarlaxle went on, "There is an old saying in my home, Menzoberranzan. Pey ne nil ne-ne uraili."

"And here I'm thinking that ye looked funny. Next to the way ye talk..."

" 'In truth, the bonds are shed, " the drow translated. "You feel the chains of worry now, my friend. Shed them."

"He won't be likin' the truth."

"But he is wise enough to lay blameless the messenger."

Athrogate took a deep breath then swallowed another ale. He slammed his hands on the edge of the table and pulled himself to his feet. "He's payin'," he said to the serving wench who turned his way, and he pointed to Jarlaxle.

"Pey ne nil ne-ne uraili," Jarlaxle whispered as Athrogate embarked on his mission to find Kane. His translation of the drow saying had been exact, if incomplete, for the bonds referenced were not the chains of worry, but the limiting boundaries of the flesh.

* * * * *

Announce yer arrival, Athrogate silently and repeatedly reminded himself. Surprising a grandmaster monk probably wasn't a wise choice. He placed the rickety wooden ladder before the wall of the inn and banged it loudly in place against the eave of the roof.

"Ye buy a room in the inn," he grumbled as he started up. "That's why they're callin' it an inn. Ye don't rent a bed on the durned inn. Ain't called an out!

Every bootfall rang more loudly than the previous as the dwarf clumped his way up to peer over the edge.

A dozen feet from the lip, his back against the stone chimney, sat the monk. His legs were folded under him, his hands on thighs, palms upright. He sat with perfect posture and balance, and seemed more a fixture of the building, like the chimney, than a living creature.

Athrogate paused, expecting a response, but when the limit of his patience slipped past with no word or movement from the monk, the dwarf hauled himself up again, rolling his upper body awkwardly onto the slightly-sloping roof. He belched as his belly - grown more ample in just the few days he had been in Heliogabalus - wedged against the soffet.

"Are ye sleeping, then?" he asked as he pulled himself up to his hands and knees. One of the bouncing heads of his twin morningstars swung in and bashed him off the side of his face, but he just blew out the side of his mouth as if to push it aside. "I'm thinking a friend o' King Gareth'd have himself a better bed. King ain't paying ye much these days?"

Kane opened one eye to regard the dwarf.

"And I'm surprised that ye got no guards," Athrogate dared to say. The dwarf managed to stand up, and when he did, he realized that the slate shingles all around him were loose - no, not just loose, but were a false set of extra shingles set upon the real ones!

"Oh, by Clangeddin's fartin' arse," he managed to say as his feet slid out from under him, dropping him hard to his belly then off the roof entirely. He crashed into the debris-filled alleyway all entangled with his ladder, arms and legs flailing helplessly, morningstar heads bouncing and slapping around him.

He sprang to his feet and hopped about, eyes darting to every shadow. If anybody had witnessed that humiliation, Athrogate would have to kill him, of course.

When he was satisfied that his unceremonious fall had gone unnoticed, he slapped his hands on his hips and looked back up at the roof.

"Durned monk," he muttered as he collected his morningstars, set them back in place across his back, and untangled the ladder. A couple of the steps had been knocked out, but it would still suffice, he decided, so he propped it back in place and began his careful climb, again taking care to announce his arrival.

When he came up to the edge of the roof, he reached out and tested the remaining slate.

"It is safe now, dwarf," Kane said. He remained in the same position, eyes still closed.

"Clever trap," Athrogate remarked, and he came up slowly, inch by inch, feeling every bit of ground before settling his weight onto it. "Couldn't ye just hire a few guards and leave the traps for stinky thieves?"

"I need no guards."

"Ye're up here all alone - and why ain't ye in a room?"

"I am in the grandest room in all the universe."

"Lookin' like the rains're coming. Think ye'll be singing that then?"

"I did not invite you here, dwarf," Kane replied. "I do not welcome company. If you have purpose, then speak it. Or be gone."

Athrogate narrowed his eyes and crossed his burly arms over his chest.

"Ye know who I be?" he asked.

"Athrogate," the monk replied.

"Ye know the things I done?"

No answer.

"Ain't none killed more at the wall," Athrogate declared.

"None who bothered to count, at least," came the quiet - and infuriating - reply.

"I went to the castle north o' Palishchuk!" the dwarf declared.

"And that is the only reason I allow you to bother me now," said Kane. "If you have come to speak with me of that adventure, then pray wag. If not, then pray leave."

Athrogate deflated just a bit. "Well, good enough then," he said. "Weren't for that trip, then I'd be having no business with ye anyway."

"None that you would wish," Kane calmly and confidently replied, and the dwarf shrank just a bit more.

"I come to talk about Ellery."

Kane opened his eyes and turned his head, suddenly seeming very interested. "You saw her fall?"

"Nope," the dwarf admitted. "I saw Canthan fall, though. Fell at me feet, killed to death by Artemis Entreri."

Kane didn't blink. "You accuse him?"

"Nope," the dwarf clarified. "Was a fight Canthan started. Stupid wizard was tryin' to kill them half-orcs." The dwarf paused and collected his thoughts. "Ye got to know that Canthan weren't one to follow the lead o' King Gareth."

"He had ulterior motives in traveling to the castle?"

"Don't know what an 'ulterior' might be, but he was looking out for Canthan, and for his masters - and ain't none o' them sitting by your king, for the sake o' yer king." He ended with an exaggerated wink, but Kane didn't blink and Athrogate issued a frustrated sigh.

"He was part o' the Citadel of Assassins," the dwarf explained.

"That much was suspected."

"And known," said Athrogate, "by yer own Commander Ellery. And she knowed it well before she picked him to go along to the north."

"Are you saying that Canthan killed Ellery?"

"Nah, ye dolt - " Athrogate bit the word back as it escaped his flapping lips, but again, Kane showed no reaction. "Nah, none o' that. I'm saying that Ellery, yer king's blood kin, picked Canthan to go because she was told to pick him to go. Ye might be thinking her a paladin o' yer order, but ye'd be thinking wrong."

"You are claiming that Ellery had connections with the Citadel of Assassins?"

"I'm adding two fingers and three fingers and making a fist to whack ye upside the head. If yerself can't count, that'd be yer own problem."

"Spysong counts more proficiently than you can imagine, good dwarf. The strands of the citadel entwine many, it would seem, to varying degrees."

The level of threat in that statement was not lost on Athrogate, a sobering reminder of who he was dealing with, and of his own complicity - at least in the eyes of King Gareth's court.

"Well, I was just thinking ye should know," he said then backed to the ladder and eased one foot onto the top step. He didn't turn as he climbed down, though, preferring to keep his gaze squarely on Kane.

The monk didn't move, didn't stand, didn't react at all.

When he was back in the alley, walking briskly away, Athrogate puzzled over the wisdom of that meeting, and of betraying Knellict.

"Damned drow," he muttered, and suddenly every shadow seemed darker and more ominous. "Damned drink."

Those last words rang in his head, nettling his sensibilities.

"Think I'll go get me some," Athrogate added, compelled to offer a formal apology to his beloved ale.

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