"Do I disgust you?" she whispered in his ear.
Not yet, Entreri thought, but did not say. But if you ever do, I will put a sword through your heart.
He forced that notion from his thoughts and put his hand over Calihye's, then glanced sidelong at her and offered a comforting smile.
PART ONE
TIGHTROPE
Are they still together, walking side by side, hands ever near the hilts of their weapons— to defend against each other, I would guess, as much as from other enemies?
Many times I think of them, Artemis Entreri and Jarlaxle. Even with the coming of King Obould and his orc hordes, even amidst the war and the threat to Mithral Hall, I find my thoughts often wandering the miles of distance and time to find in my mind's eye a reckoning of the unlikely pair.
Why do I care?
For Jarlaxle, there is the ever-present notion that he once knew my father, that he once wandered the ways of Menzoberranzan beside Zaknafein, perhaps much as he now wanders the ways of the World Above beside Artemis Entreri. I have always known that there was a complexity to this strange creature that defied the easy expectations one might have of a drow—even that one drow might have for another. I find comfort in the complexity of Jarlaxle, for it serves as a reminder of individualism. Given my dark heritage, oftentimes it is only the belief in individualism that allows me to retain my sanity. I am not trapped by my heritage, by my elf's ears and my coal-colored skin. While I often find myself a victim of the expectations of others, they cannot define me, limit me, or control me as long as I understand that there is no racial truth, that their perceptions of who I must be are irrelevant to the truth of who I am.
Jarlaxle reinforces that reality, as blunt a reminder as anyone could ever be that there resides in each of us a personality that defies external limitations. He is a unique one, to be sure, and a good thing that is, I believe, for the world could not survive too many of his ilk.
I would be a liar indeed if I pretended that my interest in Artemis Entreri only went so far as his connection to the affirmation that is Jarlaxle. Even if Jarlaxle had returned to the Underdark, abandoning the assassin to his lonely existence, I admit that I would regularly turn my thoughts to him. I do not pity him, and I would not befriend him. I do not expect his redemption or salvation, or repentance for, or alteration of, the extreme selfishness that defines his existence. In the past I have considered that Jarlaxle will affect him in positive ways, at least to the extent that he will likely show Entreri the emptiness of his existence.
But that is not the impetus of my thoughts for the assassin. It is not in hope that I so often turn my thoughts to him, but in dread.
I do not fear that he will seek me out that we might do battle yet again. Will that happen? Perhaps, but it is nothing I fear, from which I shy, or of which I worry. If he seeks me, if he finds me, if he draws a weapon upon me, then so be it. It will be another fight in a life of battle—for us both, it seems.
But no, the reason Artemis Entreri became a staple in my thoughts, and with dread, is that he serves as a reminder to me of who I might have been. I walked a line in the darkness of Menzoberranzan, a tightrope of optimism and despair, a path that bordered hope even as it bordered nihilism. Had I succumbed to the latter, had I become yet another helpless victim of crushing drow society, I would have loosed my blades in fury instead of in the cause of righteousness—or so I hope and pray that such is indeed the purpose of my fight—in those times of greatest stress, as when I believed my friends lost to me, I find that rage of despair. I abandon my heart. I lose my soul.
Artemis Entreri abandoned his heart many years ago. He succumbed to his despair, 'tis obvious. How different is he than Zaknafein, I have to ask—though doing so is surely painful. It almost seems to me as if I am being disrespectful of my beloved father by offering such a comparison. Both Entreri and Zaknafein loose the fury of their blades without remorse, because both believe that they are surrounded by a world not worthy of any element of their mercy. I make the case in differentiating between the two that Zaknafein's antipathy was rightly placed, where Entreri is blind to aspects of his world deserving of empathy and undeserving of the harsh and final judgment of steel.
But Entreri does not differentiate. He sees his environs as Zaknafein viewed Menzoberranzan, with the same bitter distaste, the same sense of hopelessness, and thus, the same lack of remorse for waging battle against that world.
He is wrong, I know, but it is not hard for me to recognize the source of his ruthlessness. I have seen it before, and in a man I hold in the highest esteem. Indeed, in a man to whom I owe my very life.
We are all creatures of ambition, even if that ambition is to free ourselves of responsibility. The desire to escape ambition is, in and of itself ambition, and thus ambition is an inescapable truth of rational existence.
Like Zaknafein, Artemis Entreri has internalized his goals. His ambition is based in the improvement of the self. He seeks perfection of the body and the arts martial, not for any desire to use that perfection toward a greater goal, but rather to use it for survival. He seeks to swim above the muck and mire for the sake of his own clean breath.
Jarlaxle's ambition is quite the opposite, as is my own—though our purposes, I fear, are not of the same ilk. Jarlaxle seeks to control not himself, but his environment. Where Entreri may spend hours building the muscle memory for a single maneuver, Jarlaxle spends his time in coercing and manipulating those around him to create an environment that fulfills his needs. I do not pretend to understand those needs where Jarlaxle is concerned. They are internal ambitions, I believe, and not to do with the greater needs of society or any sense of the common good. If I were to wager a guess based on my limited experience with that most unusual drow, I would say that Jarlaxle creates tension and conflict for the sake of entertainment. He finds personal gain in his machinations—no doubt orchestrating the fight between myself and Artemis Entreri in the replica of Crenshinibon was a maneuver designed to bring the valuable asset of Entreri more fully into his fold. But I expect that Jarlaxle would cause trouble even without the lure of treasure or personal gain.
Perhaps he is bored with too many centuries of existence, where the mundane has become to him representative of death itself. He creates excitement for the sake of excitement. That he does so with callous disregard to those who become unwitting principles in his often deadly game is a testament to the same sort of negative resignation that long ago infected Artemis Entreri, and Zaknafein. When I think of Jarlaxle and Zaknafein side by side in Menzoberranzan, I have to wonder if they did not sweep through the streets like some terrible monsoon, leaving a wake of destruction along with a multitude of confused dark elves scratching their heads at the receding laughter of the wild pair.
Perhaps in Entreri, Jarlaxle has found another partner in his private storm.
But Artemis Entreri, for all their similarities, is no Zaknafein.
The variance of method, and more importantly, of purpose, between Entreri and Jarlaxle will prove a constant tug between them, I expect—if it has not already torn them asunder and left one or both dead in the gutter.
Zaknafein, as Entreri, might have found despair, but he never lost his soul within it. He never surrendered to it.