"Your new friend can give us that which we require?" the eager wizard-cleric asked as soon as Kimmuriel arrived. "Likely," Kimmuriel replied.
"Neutralize the Crystal Shard, and the attack will be complete," Rai-guy said.
"Do not underestimate Jarlaxle," Kimmuriel warned. "He has the Crystal Shard now and so we must first eliminate that powerful item, but even without it, Jarlaxle has spent many years solidifying his hold on Bregan D'aerthe. I would not have gone against him before the acquisition of the artifact."
"But it is just that acquisition that has weakened him," Rai-guy explained. "Even the common soldiers fear this course we have taken."
"I have heard some remark that they cannot believe our rise in power," Kimmuriel argued. "Some have proclaimed that we will dominate the surface world, that Jarlaxle will take Bregan D'aerthe to prominence among the weakling humans, and return in glory to conquer Menzoberranzan." Rai-guy laughed aloud at the proclamation. "The artifact is powerful, I do not doubt, but it is limited. Did not the mind flayer tell you that Crenshinibon sought to reach its limit of control?"
"Whether or not the fantasy conquest can occur is irrelevant to our present situation," Kimmuriel replied. "What matters is whether or not the soldiers of Bregan D'aerthe believe in it."
Rai-guy didn't have an argument for that line of reasoning, but still, he wasn't overly concerned. "Though Berg'inyon is with us, the drow will be limited in their role in the battle," he explained. "We have humans at our disposal now and thousands of kobolds."
"Many of the humans were brought into our fold by Crenshinibon," Kimmuriel reminded. "The Crystal Shard will have little difficulty in dominating the kobolds, if Yharaskrik cannot completely neutralize it."
"And we have the wererats," Rai-guy went on, unfazed. "Shapechangers are better suited to resisting mental intrusions. Their internal strife denies any outside influences."
"You have enlisted Domo?"
Rai-guy shook his head. "Domo is difficult," he admitted, "but I have enlisted several of his wererat lieutenants. They will fall to our cause if Domo is eliminated. To that end, I have had Sharlotta Vespers inform Jarlaxle that the wererat leader has been speaking out of turn, revealing too much about Bregan D'aerthe, to Pasha Da'Daclan, and we believe to the leader of the guild that came to investigate Dallabad."
Kimmuriel nodded, but his expression remained concerned. Jarlaxle was a tough opponent in games of the mind-he might see the ruse for what it was, and use Domo to turn the wererats back to his side.
"His actions now will be telling," Rai-guy admitted. "Crenshinibon, no doubt, will want to believe Sharlotta's tale, but Jarlaxle will desire to proceed more cautiously before acting against Domo."
"You believe that the wererat leader will be dead this very day," Kimmuriel reasoned after a moment.
Rai-guy smiled. "The Crystal Shard has become Jarlaxle's strength and thus his weakness," he said with a wicked grin.
"First the gauntlet and now this," Dwahvel Tiggerwillies said with a profound sigh. "Ah, Entreri, what shall I ever do for extra coin when you are no more?"
Entreri didn't appreciate the humor. "Be quick about it," he instructed.
"Sharlotta's actions have made you very nervous," Dwahvel remarked, for she had observed the woman busily working the streets during the last few hours, with many of her meetings with known operatives of the wererat guild.
Entreri just nodded, not wanting to share the latest news with Dwahvel-just in case. Things were moving fast now, he knew, too fast. Rai-guy and Kimmuriel were laying the groundwork for their assault, but at least Jarlaxle had apparently caught on to some of the budding problems. The mercenary leader had summoned Entreri just a few moments before, telling the man that he had to go and meet with a particularly wretched wererat by the name of Domo. If Domo was in on the conspiracy, Entreri suspected that Rai-guy and Kimmuriel would soon have a hole to fill in their ranks.
"I will return within two hours," Entreri explained. "Have it ready."
"We have no proper material to make such an item as you requested," Dwahvel complained.
"Color and consistency alone," Entreri replied. "The material does not need to be exact."
Dwahvel shrugged.
Entreri went out into Calimport's night, moving swiftly, his cloak pulled tight around his shoulders. Not far from the Copper Ante, he turned down an alley. Then after a quick check to ensure that he was not being followed, he slipped down an open sewer hole into the tunnels below the city.
A few moments later, he stood before Jarlaxle in the appointed chamber.
"Sharlotta has informed me that Domo has been whispering secrets about us," Jarlaxle remarked.
"The wererat is on the way?"
Jarlaxle nodded. "And likely with many allies. You are prepared for the fight?"
Entreri wore the first honest grin he had known in several days. Prepared for a fight with wererats? How could he not be? Still he could not dismiss the source of Jarlaxle's information. He realized that Sharlotta was working both ends of the table here, that she was in tight with Rai-guy and Kimmuriel but was in no overt way severing her ties to Jarlaxle. He doubted that Sharlotta and her drow allies had set this up as the ultimate battle for control of Bregan D'aerthe. Such intricate planning would take longer, and the sewers of Calimport would not be a good location for a fight that would grow so very obvious.
Still…
"Perhaps you should have stayed at Dallabad for a while," Entreri remarked, "within the crystalline tower, overseeing the new operation."
"Domo hardly frightens me," Jarlaxle replied.
Entreri stared at him hard. Could he really be so oblivious to the apparent underpinnings of a coup within Bregan D'aerthe? If so, did that enhance the possibility that the Crystal Shard was indeed prompting the disloyal actions of Rai-guy and Kimmuriel? Or did it mean, perhaps, that Entreri was being too cautious here, was seeing demons and uprisings where there were none?
The assassin took a deep breath and shook his head, clearing his thoughts.
"Sharlotta could be mistaken," the assassin did say. "She would have reasons of her own to wish to be rid of troublesome Domo."
"We will know soon enough," Jarlaxle replied, nodding in the direction of a tunnel, where the wererat leader, in the form of a huge humanoid rat, was approaching, along with three other ratmen.
"My dear Domo," Jarlaxle greeted, and the wererat leader bowed.
"It is good that you came to us," Domo replied. "I do not enjoy any journeys to the surface at this time, not even to the cellars of House Basadoni. There is too much excitement, I fear."
Entreri narrowed his eyes and considered the wretched lycanthrope, thinking that answer curious, at least, but trying hard not to interpret it one way or the other.
"Do the agents of the other guilds similarly come down to meet with you?" Jarlaxle asked, a question that surely set Domo back on his heels.
Entreri stared hard at the drow now, catching on that Crenshinibon was instructing Jarlaxle to put Domo on his guard, to get him thinking of any potentially treasonous actions that they might be more easily read. Still, it seemed to him that Jarlaxle was moving too quickly here, that a little small talk and diplomacy might have garnered the necessary indicators without resorting to any crude mental intrusions by the sentient artifact.
"On those rare occasions when I must meet with agents of other guilds, they often do come to me," Domo answered, trying to remain calm, though he betrayed his sudden edge to Entreri when he shifted his weight from one foot to the other. The assassin calmly dropped his hands to his belt, hooking his wrists over the pommels of his two formidable weapons, a posture that seemed more relaxed and comfortable, but also one that had him in touch with his weapons, ready to draw and strike.