"Everyone dreams," Entreri replied. "Or so I am told. I expect that I do, though I hardly care to remember them."
"Not night dreams," the drow explained. "Everyone dreams, indeed, at night. Even the elves in our Reverie find dream states and visions. But there are two types of dreamers, my friend, those who dream at night and those who dream in the day."
He had Entreri's attention.
"Those night-dreamers," Jarlaxle went on, "they do not overly concern me. Nighttime dreams are for release, say some, a purging of the worries or a fanciful flight to no end. Those who dream in the night alone are doomed to mundanity, don't you see?"
"Mundanity?"
"The ordinary. The mediocre. Night-dreamers do not overly concern me because there is nowhere for them to rise. But those who dream by day… those, my friend, are the troublesome ones."
"Would Jarlaxle not consider himself among that lot?"
"Would I hold any credibility at all if I did not admit my troublesome nature?"
"Not with me."
"There you have it, then," said the drow.
He paused and looked to the west, and Entreri did too, watching the sun slip lower.
"I know another secret about daydreamers," Jarlaxle said at length.
"Pray tell," came the assassin's less-than-enthusiastic reply.
"Daydreamers alone are truly alive," Jarlaxle explained. He looked back at Entreri, who matched his stare. "For daydreamers alone find perspective in existence and seek ways to rise above the course of simple survival."
Entreri didn't blink.
"You do daydream," Jarlaxle decided. "But only on those rare occasions your dedication to… to what, I often wonder?… allows you outside your perfect discipline."
"Perhaps that dedication to perfect discipline is my dream."
"No," the drow replied without hesitation. "No. Control is not the facilitation of fancy, my friend, it is the fear of fancy."
"You equate dreaming and fancy then?"
"Of course! Dreams are made in the heart and filtered through the rational mind. Without the heart…"
"Control?"
"And only that. A pity, I say."
"I do not ask for your pity, Jarlaxle."
"The daydreamers aspire to mastery of all they survey, of course."
"As I do."
"No. You master yourself and nothing more, because you do not dare to dream. You do not dare allow your heart a voice in the process of living."
Entreri's stare became a scowl.
"It is an observation, not a criticism," said Jarlaxle. He rose and brushed off his pants. "And perhaps it is a suggestion. You, who have so achieved discipline, might yet find greatness beyond a feared reputation."
"You assume that I want more."
"I know that you need more, as any man needs more," said the drow. He turned and started down the back side of the boulder. "To live and not merely to survive—that secret is in your heart, Artemis Entreri, if only you are wise enough to look."
He paused and glanced back at Entreri, who sat staring at him hard, and tossed the assassin a flute, seemingly an exact replica of the one Entreri held across his lap.
"Use the real one," Jarlaxle bade him. "The one Ilnezhara gave to you. The one Idalia fashioned those centuries ago."
Idalia put a key inside this flute to unlock any heart, Jarlaxle thought but did not speak, as he turned and walked away.
Entreri looked at the flute in his hands and at the one on his belt. He wasn't really surprised that Jarlaxle had stolen the valuable item and had apparently created an exact copy—no, not exact, Entreri understood as he considered the emptiness of the notes he had blown that day. Physically, the two flutes looked exactly alike, and he marveled at the drow's work as he compared them side by side. But there was more to the real creation of Idalia.
A piece of the craftsman's heart?
Entreri rolled the flute over in his hands, his fingers sliding along the smooth wood, feeling the strength within the apparent delicateness. He lifted the copy in one hand, the original in the other, and closed his eyes. He couldn't tell the difference.
Only when he blew through the flutes could he tell, in the way the music of the real creation washed over him and through him, taking him away with it into what seemed like an alternate reality.
"Wise advice," a voice to the side of the trail greeted Jarlaxle as he moved away from his friend.
Not caught by surprise, Jarlaxle offered Mariabronne a tip of his great hat and said, "You listened in on our private conversation?"
Mariabronne shrugged. "Guilty as charged, I fear. I was moving along the trail when I heard your voice. I meant to keep going, but your words caught me. I have heard such words before, you see, when I was young and learning the ways of the wider world."
"Did your advisor also explain to you the dangers of eavesdropping?"
Mariabronne laughed—or started to, but then cleared his throat instead. "I find you a curiosity, dark elf. Certainly you are different from anyone I have known, in appearance at least. I would know if that is the depth of the variation, or if you are truly a unique being."
"Unique among the lesser races, such as humans, you mean."
This time, Mariabronne did allow himself to laugh.
"I know about the incident with the Kneebreakers," he said.
"I am certain that I do not know of what you speak."
"I am certain that you do," the ranger insisted. "Summoning the wolf was a cunning turn of magic, as returning enough of the ears to Hobart to ingratiate yourself, while keeping enough to build your legend was a cunning turn of diplomacy."
"You presume much."
"The signs were all too easily read, Jarlaxle. This is not presumption but deduction."
"You make it a point to study my every move, of course."
Mariabronne dipped a bow. "I and others."
The drow did well to keep the flicker of alarm from his delicate features.
"We know what you did, but be at ease, for we pass no judgment on that particular action. You have much to overcome concerning the reputation of your heritage, and your little trick did well in elevating you to a position of respectability. I cannot deny any man, or drow, such a climb."
"It is the end of that climb you fear?" Jarlaxle flashed a wide smile, one that enveloped the whole spectrum from sinister to disarming, a perfectly non-readable expression. "To what end?"
The ranger shrugged as if it didn't really matter—not then, at least. "I judge a person by his actions alone. I have known halflings who would cut the throat of an innocent human child and half-orcs who would give their lives in defense of the same. Your antics with the Kneebreakers brought no harm, for the Kneebreakers are an amusing lot whose reputation is well solidified, and they live for adventure and not reputation, in any case. Hobart has certainly forgiven you. He even lifted his mug in toast to your cleverness when it was all revealed to him."
The drow's eyes flared for just a moment—a lapse of control. Jarlaxle was unused to such wheels spinning outside his control, and he didn't like the feeling. For a moment, he almost felt as if he was dealing with the late Matron Baenre, that most devious of dark elves, who always seemed to be pacing ahead of him or even with him. He quickly replayed in his mind all the events of his encounters with the Kneebreakers, recalling Hobart's posture and attitude to see if he could get a fix upon the point when the halfling had discovered the ruse.
He brought a hand up to stroke his chin, staring at Mariabronne all the while and mentally noting that he would do well not to underestimate the man again. It was a difficult thing for a dark elf to take humans and other surface races seriously. All his life Jarlaxle had been told of their inferiority, after all.