“You come well regarded by my associate in Shade Enclave,” Lord Draygo told the curious visitor to his castle that typically-gloomy and rainy Shadowfell afternoon.
“I do appreciate your granting me this audience,” Jarlaxle replied, and he tipped his great hat.
“I would admit that I’m surprised. I had thought that you and Lord Ulfbinder had concluded the trade contract.”
“Indeed we did, and it was easy to find a place of mutual benefit,” Jarlaxle replied. “That is not why I’ve come.”
“Do tell.” There was more than a little skepticism in Lord Draygo’s tone, Jarlaxle recognized, and he knew that he had to be careful.
“I have knowledge regarding one who has become your … guest,” Jarlaxle explained, and he watched the Netherese warlock carefully, hoping that his information, now quite dated, would still hold true and that Drizzt was still alive. After hearing the tale of Ambergris, Jarlaxle had spared little expense in trying to gain information regarding the fate of her companions, but even for Bregan D’aerthe, the castle of Lord Draygo Quick remained quite a mystery. Rumors in Gloomwrought whispered of Effron Alegni and another prisoner, and given Ambergris’s tale, that other had to be Drizzt.
“Do tell,” Lord Draygo prompted again.
“I have known Drizzt Do’Urden for more than a century,” Jarlaxle explained.
“Friends?”
“Hardly!”
“Comrades?”
“Hardly! I am from Menzoberranzan, after all, and survive at the suffrage of the ruling council, particularly the fancies of House Baenre. Drizzt Do’Urden is no friend to House Baenre.”
“Then why are you here?”
“Your inquiry,” Jarlaxle explained. “You wish to determine if Drizzt is in the service of the Spider Queen.” The drow mercenary was taking quite a leap, he knew, but from what Ambergris had relayed regarding Effron’s claim and their journey here, and those things he had gleaned from his time with Parise Ulfbinder, it seemed a reasonable jump.
And Jarlaxle’s suspicions were confirmed by Draygo Quick, unintentionally and reflexively, as the Netherese warlock eagerly leaned forward in his chair, before quickly collecting himself and settling back comfortably.
“Your Lady Lolth?” Draygo Quick innocently replied. “Is there not a drow goddess more clearly aligned with the actions of the goodly ranger?”
“Drizzt professes allegiance to the tenets of Mielikki, who is no drow deity,” Jarlaxle replied. “The question, however, has ever been, to which, Mielikki or Lolth, does he truly serve—in action if not in heart?”
Draygo Quick assumed a pensive pose and nodded several times. “That is interesting,” he admitted, though still feigning a removed posture, as if he hadn’t considered it before.
Jarlaxle smiled at him to let him know without doubt that the drow saw through the ruse.
“You can find no answer in your inquiries,” Jarlaxle stated bluntly. “Not from Drizzt, nor from any priestess or druid. Unless you can directly speak to a goddess, you will find yourself in the same dilemma as the rest of us who have long pondered the truth of this curious rogue.”
“Do tell,” Draygo Quick prompted, dropping his fa?ade.
“You are familiar with Lolth’s handmaidens?”
The warlock shook his head.
“The yochlols?” Jarlaxle clarified.
“I have heard of them, but I am not familiar with them in any detail.”
“May I?” Jarlaxle asked, removing his great hat and turning it over, reaching his hand inside.
Draygo Quick looked at him curiously, and skeptically.
“I assure you that the creature is fully under my control at this time,” Jarlaxle explained, and he pulled forth a circlet of black cloth, then tossed it to the side. It elongated as it went, widening into a hole ten feet in diameter as it set down on Draygo Quick’s floor. Jarlaxle bade the warlock to follow him to the rim of this portable hole.
The two peered in, to see what looked very much like a small stalagmite of oozing mud, but with two branch-like appendages waving menacingly and a large central eye staring back up at them.
“A handmaiden,” Jarlaxle explained.
“You would bring such a powerful creature of the lower planes into my residence without permission?” Draygo Quick asked angrily.
“There is no danger, nor any implications to you, I assure you, Lord Draygo,” Jarlaxle replied. “The handmaiden is my guest and not my captive.”
“And pray tell, what does the handmaiden say?”
Jarlaxle looked down into the hole and nodded.
“Tiago!” the yochlol shouted in a bubbling voice, watery and stony at the same time, which seemed quite apropos given its apparent physical composition. It raised one limb and shook it fiercely as it spoke.
“Drizzt!” it said with the same timbre, lifting its other limb and similarly shaking it.
“Relax, dear lady,” Jarlaxle cooed, patting his hands in the air above the creature, which seemed to be growing quite agitated.
“Bwahahaha!” the yochlol cried ominously.
“What?” Draygo Quick asked. “Tiago?”
“Tiago Baenre,” Jarlaxle explained, and hurriedly scooped up the portable hole, which became a piece of black cloth once more, and stuffed it back into place inside his hat. “A powerful noble son of the First House of Menzoberranzan. He has decided to take it upon himself to hunt down and kill Drizzt Do’Urden.”
“With the blessing of the matron mother?”
“Ah, there’s the rub,” Jarlaxle replied. “Matron Mother Quenthel does not hinder him, but I suspect that she does not even know of his intent. He has a minor priestess of Lolth at his side, however, though surely Lolth would cackle with glee if she favored Drizzt in this fight. Irony, chaos … they are the calling cards of that vicious one, after all.”
“Then how is this relevant? Why should I care?”
“This confrontation will bring the questions filtering around the rogue to the forefront, and will demand a resolution,” Jarlaxle explained. “Consider, if Tiago Baenre kills Drizzt, and Drizzt is favored by Lolth, the fallout will be clear and swift. And if Drizzt kills a favored son of House Baenre, the House will react violently—or it will not, and that will prove quite telling, given the matron mother’s relationship with the Spider Queen. Simply put, Lord Draygo, your imprisonment of Drizzt is denying me the answer to a question I have been asking for a century and more, and indeed, denying you the answer to that very question you ask.”
Lord Draygo stared at him incredulously. “You presume much.”
“You have him,” Jarlaxle stated.
“So you have claimed.”
“He is dead, then, and our discussion is moot,” Jarlaxle replied, and he dramatically spun and waved his arm toward the room’s doorway, and the descending circular hallway beyond that would lead back to the grand entry hall of the castle. “When first I entered, I noted your castle guard holding Taulmaril, Drizzt’s bow, the bow used by Drizzt’s dead wife. He would not part with it for all the gold on Toril, nor would he allow any other to wield it. If you truly do not know the whereabouts of Drizzt Do’Urden, Lord Draygo, then take care, for I assure you that there is a very dangerous drow ranger lurking about your estate, intent on, and likely capable of, killing anyone standing between him and that particularly bow.”
Draygo Quick stared at Jarlaxle for just a moment, then gave a sharp whistle. The room’s door swung open and a pair of Draygo Quick’s attendants, warlocks both, judging from their robes, hurriedly entered the chamber.
“Escort our guest to the west wing dining room and see that he is fed,” Draygo Quick ordered. “I will not keep you waiting long,” he promised Jarlaxle, “but I have some business to attend to.”
Jarlaxle bowed low and followed his escorts out of the room and down the tower stairs, crossing back over the checkerboard-floored grand hall—where he listened most attentively for any sounds from below—and into the dining room opposite, where he was left alone.
So his hosts believed.
Draygo Quick will speak with Ulfbinder, Kimmuriel telepathically relayed to Jarlaxle. Perhaps even to Quenthel.
Not Quenthel, Jarlaxle silently replied. He has no means to get to her as of now. You have found them?
Yes.
All of them? Jarlaxle asked, focusing his thoughts on the first word for clear emphasis.
Two alive, three as stone, Kimmuriel confirmed.
Jarlaxle winced, then sighed.
If Draygo Quick releases Drizzt, you will not execute the attack, Kimmuriel relayed to him in no uncertain terms. Not for the sake of humans and an elf!
Jarlaxle blew another sigh, then looked up and painted a disarming smile on his face as an attendant entered with a tray of food.
Do you understand? Kimmuriel demanded.
“Yes,” Jarlaxle said enthusiastically. “Truly I had not realized the extent of my hunger.”
Kimmuriel relayed that he understood the double use of the affirmation, and then he was gone from Jarlaxle’s mind, likely to let his disembodied thoughts wander the ways of Castle Draygo some more.
Jarlaxle could only hope, as Kimmuriel surely was, that the powerful Netherese warlock was not attuned to, or familiar with, or prepared against, such psionic intrusions.
So far, at least, all seemed well. Now, given Kimmuriel’s last order, all Jarlaxle had to do was figure out a way to ensure that Lord Draygo would not let go of Drizzt without a fight.