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Druzil tilted his head and narrowed his eyes, a pensive yet still apprehensive pose

"Ah, yes," the mercenary leader went on "But of late, you have been summoned not by friends, but by enemies, so I have been told By Cadderly of Caradoon"

Druzil bared his pointy teeth and hissed at the ht a smile to the faces of both dark elves Gro

"We would like to pain Cadderly," Jarlaxle explained with a wicked grin "Would Druzil like to help?"

"Tell erly replied

"We need to know everything about the human," Jarlaxle explained "His appearance and demeanor, his history and present place We were told that Druzil, above all others in the Abyss, knows the man"

"Hates the er indeed But suddenly he backed off, staring suspiciously at the two "I tell you, and then you dismiss y, for they had anticipated such a reaction The wizard-priest stood up, walked to the side in the tiny roo a s

"I ay explained "An imp would serve me well"

Druzil’s coal black eyes flared with red fires "Then we can pain Cadderly and so ether," the iree?" Jarlaxle asked

"Does Druzil have a choice?" the i Rai’gy, yes," the drow replied, and the iy "As to revealing all that you know about Cadderly, no It is too important, and if we must torment you for a hundred years, we shall"

"Then Cadderly would be dead," Druzil said dryly

"The torment would remain pleasurable to h about dark elves to understand that this was no idle threat

"Druzil wishes to pain Cadderly," the i

"Then tell us," Jarlaxle said "Everything"

Later on that day, while Druzil and Rai’gy worked the ic spells that would bind them as master and familiar, Jarlaxle sat alone in the room he had taken in the subbasement of House Basadoni He had indeed learned much from the i his band anywhere near the one named Cadderly Bonaduce This was to Druzil’s ultiic far beyond even Rai’gy and Kireat a foe Even worse, Cadderly was apparently rebuilding an order of priests, surrounding hi acolytes, enthusiastic idealists

"The worst kind," Jarlaxle said as Entreri entered the room "Idealists," he explained to the assassin’s perplexed expression "Above all else, I hate idealists"

"They are blind fools," Entreri agreed

"They are unpredictable fanatics," Jarlaxle explained "Blind to danger and blind to fear as long as they think their path is according to the tenets of their particular god-figure"

"And the leader of this other guild is an idealist?" a confused Entreri asked, for he thought he had been suuilds of Calian

"No, no, it is anotherhis hand dismissively "One that concerns my activities in Menzoberranzan and not here in Calimport Let it not trouble you, for you have business more important by far"

And Jarlaxle, too, put it out of hison the more immediate proble of Cadderly, never ih he held firm to his determination to keep his minions away from Cadderly, he was not dismayed, for he understood that Drizzt and his friends were still a long way fro

It was a place Jarlaxle had no intention of ever allowing them to see

"Yes, a pleasureBruenor, and to yer kin, me blessin’s," Bumpo Thun derpuncher, a rotund and short little dith a fiery orange beard and a huge and flat nose that was pushed over to one side of his ruddy face, said to Bruenor for perhaps the tenth time since Bottom Feeder had put out of Baldur’s Gate The dwarven vessel was a square-bottoh only one was nor off the botto brother Donat had fallen all over the of Mithral Hall Bruenor had seerown to such proportions, even ah, that surprise was turning tocousins, Yipper and Quipper Fishsquisher, continued to rain coeneral slobber all over hi back froer alternated his looks between Catti-brie how he loved to gaze upon her when she wasn’t looking-and the tu on his belly at the prow, head hanging over the front of the boat, his hands drawing pictures in the water-and back behind the skyline of Baldur’s Gate

Again he thought about his passage through the city, as easy a ti those occasions when he had worn the ical mask He had earned this peace; they all had Once this mission was completed and the crystal shard was safely in the hands of Cadderly, and once they had recovered Wulfgar and helped hih his darkness, then perhaps they could journey the orld again, for no better reason than to see what lay over the next horizon and with no troubles beyond the fawning of bu dwarves

Truly Drizzt wore a contented sar and for them all He could never have dreamed that he would ever find such a life on that day decades before when he had walked out of Menzoberranzan

It occurred to hiive hi hioodly place for one as deserving as Zak

Watching hi