Erin Evans - Lesser Evils

“She’ll be all right,” Dahl offered.

“Go,” Tam said. “I need you back here soon.”

Dahl left, and at last Tam was alone, in the secret offices of the spymaster of Waterdeep’s Harpers. He’d been hiding from this for a long time, he thought. Running across Faerun as if the best and surest way to protect things were to be the one who brought the threats down, tangled in his chain. As if he could avoid ever being the one who handed down the orders that didn’t always turn out, that didn’t always save the day. That didn’t always bring Harpers home to their loved ones.

He looked up at the portraits the Fisher had hung along the ceiling’s edge-Harpers of old, men and women, bards and assassins and casters and more. All exuding the shrewdness and determination it took to maintain the balance of Faerun.

Less a balance these days, he thought, and turned to the window, looking out at the City of Splendors. More a dike against the tide of evil.

Someone must, he thought, and it reminded him so much of something Viridi might have said-the truth, said plain so that she could get to the business of doing something about it. Someone must, and the best someone is you . For all he wished his life had run a different course, it had not, and now the Harpers needed him and all the wisdom he’d gathered traveling the way he had. He hoped it would be enough. He hoped he would find himself suited to the spymaster’s role.

Tam hoped it might help him keep Mira from harm’s way.

He sighed and looked down at the sill, at the weather-damaged wood beneath his hands.

At the small, tightly rolled scrap of paper that had been wedged under the pane into the largest crack.

Dahl left Goodman Florren’s shop, having gotten a better deal than he would have elsewhere, yet feeling very much like he’d been robbed by the roadside. He carried the paper-wrapped package under one arm and wended his way through Waterdeep’s streets toward the Trade Ward. He hoped this was the right thing to do.

He wouldn’t be alone, would he? Dahl had racked his thoughts trying to come up with what he might have said or done that made Farideh put him in the same category as a Netherese wizard who didn’t think elves or gnomes were worth as much as humans. Who wouldn’t have thought a tiefling merited much concern at all.

And there hadn’t been anything, he was fairly sure, that was worth such a declaration. Not any one thing …

But maybe, he had come to admit, maybe , he hadn’t been the easiest body to deal with. Maybe he had said some things, here and there, that could have built up. Maybe he had managed to give her the impression that he thought less of her.

Be honest, he told himself, passing out of the Dock Ward, you did think less of her. Right from the very start. And even if he was right in one respect-she was allied with that devil-he was very wrong in a great many ways more.

You think that you know everything, she’d said, you think no one can possibly be as godsbedamned smart as you, but every other word out of your karshoji mouth is you jumping to another conclusion that isn’t fair .

Knowledge is not to be hidden, the doctrine of Oghma said, not from the world and not from the self. And assuming you knew something, not even seeking out the answers … that was near enough to hiding from the truth.

Was this how he fell? he wondered. Was it something he took for granted that way? The realization hadn’t brought his powers back-maybe nothing would. And he couldn’t be the only one who let such assumptions lead him from time to time …

Maybe Oghma expects better of you, he thought, as he came to the Blind Falcon Inn. Maybe you expect better.

He climbed the stairs with absolutely no notion of what he was going to say to her. “I’m sorry”? “I thought you could use this”? “I feel like an ass and I just want you to know that”?

“You don’t have to be friends with me,” he muttered to himself, “but I promise I’ll always be an ally.”

The devil was sitting on a stool outside the door at the end of the hall, still wearing the skin of a human and flipping through a dogeared chapbook. Dahl bit back a curse as he looked up.

“Well, well,” the devil said. “The paladin come to call.” He went back to the chapbook. “She’s sleeping.”

Dahl ignored him and went to knock on the door.

Lorcan turned swiftly and planted one booted foot on the opposite side of the door frame, barring the way. “I said, she’s sleeping. So you can deal with me, or you can go lose yourself in the alleys.” He nodded at the package. “What have you got there?”

Dahl considered for the briefest moment drawing his sword and running the devil through. The devil smiled as if daring him to do it.

But then he’d be the one having murdered what looked like a man in the middle of an inn for no apparent reason. And if Farideh seems to trust him, he thought, maybe you’re missing something.

“Where are Brin and Havilar?” he asked.

“Buying a horse, apparently,” the devil said. He held out a hand.

“You can leave it with me. I’ll make sure she gets it.”

“You’ll forgive me if I don’t believe that.”

“Normally? Yes.” Lorcan chuckled. “But what would I do with it? This is as far as the spell lets me go. I could throw it halfway down the hallway, but what would be the point? Besides,” he said, and Dahl could see why people made agreements with devils like him, “surely you expect to see her again. Next time she comes through Waterdeep? She’ll seek out the priest, anyway. Maybe you. You can ask after your little trinket then.”

“They’re leaving that soon?”

“On the morrow,” Lorcan said. “Pressing issues. So I’d recommend leaving it now.” He held out a hand. “Unless you have the time to spare, sitting here and talking to me?”

Dahl thought back to Tam and the mountains of tasks waiting to be completed in the Fisher’s absence. Agents to track and contact, missions to review, replacements to recruit. Traitors to uncover. And he owed his mother a letter still.

“Make sure she gets it,” he said, handing over the package. “And tell her, please …” The devil smirked at him, and there was no way Dahl was going to say what he’d meant to. “Tell her I hope I see her again.”

“Duly noted,” Lorcan said. “And farewell, paladin.”

Lorcan watched Dahl leave, turning the package over in his hands. There couldn’t be a next time, he thought. You will have to keep her far from Waterdeep from now on. Between the priest trying to convince her to undo her pact and the paladin who seemed a little too keen on gaining her good opinion, there was more trouble in the City of Splendors than Lorcan cared to manage. Especially given Sairche and her damnable secrets. Someplace quiet was certainly in order.

Lords look us over, he thought, picking at the knot of the twine wrapped around the package, and let her stay away from the Sword Coast from here on. Cormyr would make a good start.

The door beside him opened and Farideh looked down at him, bleary eyed. She glanced around the hallway. “Who were you talking to?”

“Delivery boy,” Lorcan said, holding up the package. “I chased him off.”

Her expression was stony. “What did you say?”

“I told him you were sleeping and not to wake you, of course. Here.” He handed her the package. “A gift.”

She regarded it warily a moment before peeling off the paper wrappings. Inside lay a rod, solid black and chased with inlaid gold leaf. The tips were cracked and cloudy amethysts. Lorcan held back a sneer-hardly better than kindling beside the Rod of the Traitor’s Reprisal.