3:31 Calling card.

Bann put his face in both hands, feeling himself unable to express his frustration.

"And so you what?" Kronmyr said defiantly, watching Niku pant wearily in his crate.  "You don't agree with him?"

The mercenary almost brought both fists down to the table, but stopped himself and merely rested his hands down with a heavy sigh instead.  "No, Myr, no I don't."

"They deserved it," the dark Elf shrugged, turning over his bruised shoulder to look at the Human behind him.  "In the old days, if the matron gave someone an assignment only to-"

"You haven't been under- or on top of- a matron in years, Kronmyr," Bann interrupted, tapping the table with the palms of his hands.

" 'Years,' he says!" Kronmyr laughed, coming up from his hunch over the back of the chair for a few moments.  "You Humans are far too forgetful and impatient to be as short-lived as you all are."

"Both assignments, failing," Bann said pointedly, holding his hands still and boring into the dark Elf's back with his glare.  "Your trainees, getting cut in the street by some faceless wall climber.  My trainees, getting abducted in place of the cargo they were supposed to bring.  And the front's getting stifled- nobody else has put in any animal orders, so I convinced Howler not to let his bitches breed.  No one's asking for food either, but I can't just tell him not to hunt.  What worries me is that Coalwater isn't moving either.  The sooner we can get the Shadar-kai to-"

"Complain to Mordy, not me," Kronmyr shrugged, putting his arms on top of the back of the chair and resting his chin on them again.  "I had to switch weapons on her eight times, but my double scimitar charge is forcing that range issue to change."

Bann stopped himself from sighing again.  "Mordy's practically constantly doing that magic tether thing, only the girl specializes at abjuration- fancy term for protection spells-"

"I told him."  Kronmyr looked over his shoulder again, just far enough for Bann to see one half of his face.  "Rasha's docile, but she's definitely not stupid.  By now, she's knows exactly how to politely ignore him."

Bann offered a frustrated grunt in response as he sat back away from the circular table and crossed his arms over his chest.  "You could have been more specific.  I don't know what you mean by 'politely ignore,' since she does everything he says.  He tells her to go somewhere, she goes.  'Learn this spell,' and it's in her head practically before he finishes the sentence.  Menial housework, alchemy- even a bit of sewing, apparently- you name it, she'll do it.  No questions.  He stopped short of telling her to give herself to him, but I think he's about ready to try that."

"I'd like to see him try it," the dark Elf scoffed as he put his chin back on his arms.  Niku, as if to agree, gave a disgusted snort.

"The man has a wife now," Bann argued with a half-hearted shrug.  "We were at the wedding."

"But his woman won't screw him; everyone knows it," Kronmyr spat back.  "He's as packed up as a castle cannon.  If he told Rasha to relieve him- which she'd do without a second thought- his wife would probably be intensely grateful.  It wouldn't do a thing to Rasha; she's used to being used.  The reason Mordy can't secure her full compliance is that in order to get it, he'd have to do something he can't do."

"Specifics!" Bann groaned at last, allowing his head to fall back over the back of the chair so that he stared at the ceiling.

"You want specifics?" Kronmyr shot, picking up the chair and turning it around so that he could face Bann straight on.  "Fine.  Tell me the last time you talked to Mordren without feeling like a piece in a game."

Bann lifted his head and stared at Kronmyr, one eyebrow raised.

"Mordy is normally able to pull or push or bend anyone any which way, but Rasha is already used to doing exactly what she is asked to do for whomever commands her.  She's so pliable that I can guarantee that Mordy can't tell how successful he either is or isn't right now.  And if we aren't careful, she will turn on us when her soul tells her to."

"How did you discover this?" Bann finally managed, his mouth dry.

"It was in her fighting," Kronmyr nodded slowly, leaning down so that he was hugging the top of his chair.  "There was this- this moment- the first time I charged at her and she actually changed the reach of her weapon to suit in time to catch me.  I realized- I was fighting her, but she wasn't fighting me.  I was just standing in, as good to her as the nearest practice dummy."

"I fail to understand how you gained the insight you just gave me, based on that story alone," Bann replied.  "Anything you're leaving out?"

"No," the dark Elf laughed wearily, shaking his head.  "That's it.  That's her curse.  You think you want her, right?  But you don't just want her.  You want her to want you, and she just... doesn't.  She doesn't actually want anything.  Maybe she can't, I don't know, but that is what is killing us all.  The unreachable nature of her- to see her so beautiful in mind and spirit, and yet so... indescribably empty.  Not like an empty vase, no- like a... a ghost... a shadow, rather.  The most beautiful shadow you've ever seen.  You long to- I don't know- fill her out, make her real, solid, touchable, carnal.  Nature abhors a vacuum, I'm told by most mages.  She proves it."

"Howler proves it," Bann corrected as he unfolded his right arm and rested his chin on his knuckles.  "He is the closest to nature of any of us."

"And Mordy," Kronmyr interjected sharply,  "is the farthest, are you getting my point now?"

Bann rubbed at his chin for a few moments, deep in thought.  Silence reigned until he asked, "But then, shouldn't he want her the most?"

"We would probably be able to tell that, Bann, if he ever let his own emotions show.  But that, to him, is weakness.  We are just as clueless about him as we are about her, because that's how he's always been."

"It's never been a liability before," Bann breathed, beginning to understand Kronmyr's point.

The dark Elf took a few seconds of thought himself before continuing.  "It's not too late to can it with the Semmites, Bann."

"Howler," the Human replied, shaking his head.

"If he ever found out-"

"You found out."

"Apparently a half century topside will teach even a Drow what the Human idea of loyalty is," Kronmyr laughed bitterly.

"But not what trust is?" Bann shot back immediately, sitting farther forward in his chair again.

"I have always trusted you not to tell me anything you think I shouldn't know, and you should always trust me to find out anyway," Kronmyr reasoned.  "It's not worth it, Bann.  Let the man talk himself onto a noose."

But the Human shook his head.  "If it were his word against ours, maybe we'd have a chance.  But now we have a witness and two dead bodies.  We can't go back."

"We can't go back, but we don't have to go any farther forward," Kronmyr urged.  "Put a stop to it.  We register a missing persons report for the two mercs- leave that part to me, I'm a professional liar.  The witness, put Mordy on her.  He can even bring his project along with him, that might actually help, seeing as the creature's female.  Bring the remaining forces back out of the borderlands, discontinue trades, have them bury all the Semmite coin- or better yet, tie it off to some animal and set the thing on fire, let it go where it goes.  The man is implicated by his own hand- he wrote every order we ever-"

Bann looked up to figure out why Kronmyr had broken off, and found that he was staring, dumbfounded, at the doorway.  It took nearly an entire minute for the Human mercenary to decide to look at what had so profoundly shocked a dark Elf who could claim more than 100 years of existence.

"My lords will pardon me, I hope, if their handmaiden interrupts their conversation to bring them news?"

Silveredge stood, apparently calmly, in the doorway.  Niku sniffed the air, but made no other movements.  To all outside appearances, the two didn't even notice each other.

Next to the Shadar-kai, tied hands to feet like a Purple Dragon would bind a dangerous criminal, lay a young woman in battered street clothes.  She- apparently some form of Elf- sported two black eyes, a bloody nose, mercilessly sliced arms, and swelling in her right ankle as well as her left shoulder.  Kronmyr was just going to comment on Silveredge's work when he and Bann both noticed the tattoo on the woman's neck.  The Drow held his place on his chair, but the Human rose to come closer to the sight.

"As I worked with my lord Mordren in his study, I noticed this young woman watching us.  With my lord's leave, I walked out upon his balcony to speak with her, and she attacked us both.  My lord was struck in ways he is not used to, I believe, and fell before her.  I spared her life, hoping that she would speak to me.  She will not, so I wondered if perhaps my lords would have better ability to reason with her."

"Mordren should be telling us this, not you; you reacted too slowly to defend him, so any harm come to him is your fault.  Go make sure he isn't hurt," Kronmyr commanded immediately.  "Check every inch of his body personally.  Come find me, tell me exactly what's wrong with him and where, immediately."

"My lord is kind," Silveredge said as she curtsied.  She turned and walked out of the doorway easily, the slack of her chain swaying behind her as she moved.

Bann hardly noticed the conversation at all.  As Silveredge moved away from the doorway and down toward the main level of the building, he squatted to take an even closer look at the panting girl's tattoo.

"Fire Knives," he muttered, almost to himself, as he quickly rose.  "The man has Fire Knives on us."

"I somehow doubt that they're the only ones," Kronmyr frowned.  "Or even the good ones- this is probably just a warning."

Bann sat back down in his chair and planted his elbows on the table, folding his hands and resting his chin on his thumbs.

"I imagine your whip hasn't seen a lot of use these days," he finally said after quite a long silence.

"Hasn't seen much more blood than mine," Kronmyr replied, interested.

Bann didn't move an inch, but the dark Elf knew the rest of their conversation would have to wait.

"The Shadar-kai went through a lot of trouble, from the looks of it, to spare this spy," the Human breathed quietly, looking over at the Fire Knife operative with a genuine smile.  "What do you say we 'reason with her'?  Make her restraint worth it?"

A Virtuous Quest 3:30 Alley of the Shadow of Death.

In the silence of the great room, where the hearth's fire had faded to embers and Valeria panted pitifully as she lay on the hand-made throw rug, the slow tapping of the thick, scarred hand on bare wood was nearly tortuous.  The rosy-cheeked woman, whose brown ringlets had been pulled up and away from her flushed face this early evening, sent her gaze toward the source of the sound, who was as distracted as she'd expected.  Not wanting to draw too much attention to his twitch, she shifted in her chair with a small noise of effort that would have been a bit more genuine had her belly been four or five weeks heavier than it was.

Stephen came to himself with a start, his offending hand about an eighth of an inch away from hitting his chair's arm again, and Susanna, who pretended to be just noticing him, offered him a careful smile.

"Conas atá tú, mo chroí?" she asked quietly as she adjusted herself again and rested her hands on top of her swollen belly.  "Sílim go bhfuil tú in easnamh."

And her husband, who understood the Elven tongue she could speak without being able to speak any back to her, shook his head and waved his hand as though he were batting away a fly.

"Lady Raibeart- if you don't mind- are you certain it was the Shadar-kai?" Oversword Garimond repeated as he concentrated his gaze on the hazel-eyed woman.

"There's no doubt of it," Susanna replied as she shifted her gaze back to the elder soldier who sat immediately in front of her.  "Iordyn described her perfectly, and I've never seen another like her.  Silver eyes, silver hair, light blue skin, slight of build, but graceful in carriage.  Yet, I can hardly believe she's a former slave; she looks and moves as though she's a high-born Elf of some sort."

"Shadovar can come in different shades, just like we Humans," the Oversword said off-handedly.

"No, it's Silveredge," Iordyn shrugged.  "She is not Shadovar."

"Even if she were Shadovar, she's a force of good, and that's that," Susanna declared.  "This baby weighs more upon my body daily- much more heavily than even Saul, who was born quite large.  I know I could not have run the way I did if she had not looked upon me.  She must be a-"

"With all due respect, Lady Raibeart, merely being the subject of someone's gaze, even if that someone is as strange as the creature of whom we speak, cannot bring upon a body the power to run three times as fast as they could naturally do," the oversword frowned.  "I have to think-"

"Silveredge is a mage," Iordyn piped up, looking over at the older soldier suddenly.  When Susanna nodded, satisfied, the archer decided to continue.  "She's training in the Sunfire with a magic worker of some sort, and she already had some meager spell craft of her own before she met him.  Perhaps this sudden spike in athletic ability that my sister is describing is the effect of some witchery."

"But the healing mage said there was no trace of spellwork," the oversword argued.  "There was neither the smell of a spell nor the physical impression of any fresh upon her skin."

"It may not have left any scent or effects upon her skin if it was able to be worked without Silveredge needing to touch her," Iordyn replied, sitting forward in his wooden chair, which sat directly across from that of his elder brother.  "You know I am no mage myself, and have little idea of what's required for what, but-"

"But your suspicions are correct," Susanna interrupted.  "I know what's required in a verbal component spell versus a material focus spell, and I know that this Silveredge did not use either type of magic.  Either she is connected directly to a divine power of some sort, or her somatic spell casting ability is so strong that any small gesture will compel the fabric of existence to warp to her will."

"A divine connection," Iordyn said thoughtfully.  "I don't remember that she mentioned belief in any god or goddess..."

"How are you so sure of this, Lady Raibeart?" Garimond asked.

Stephen sighed as he reguarded the looks on both Garimond and Iordyn's faces.  "She... would have been a cleric... if I... hadn't..."

"Rather pleasantly distracted me, on the other side of his master's forge, while I was supposed to be meditating upon the coastline with the rest of my class," Susanna smiled warmly.  She reached a hand up to push at the back of her bun, which was slick with sweat.  "I was an acolyte of Chauntea, living alone in Winterhaven by the leave of my parents.  I excelled in the translation and proper usage of divine spellwork, but requested dismissal when the goddess revealed- privately- that Stephen had given me Saul... may I pray your pardon while I leave your presence to get a glass of water?"

"I'll get it," Stephen pronounced, bringing both palms down onto the wood of the chair's arms as he stood up.  "And a bit of tack too?"

The real response was in the gentle brush of one smooth hand over one rough one, in the catching of gazes and the sharing of a brief smile.  "Maith agat mé, mo ghrá."

Stephen turned his back on the men and planted a kiss directly onto the top of Susanna's head, then walked beyond her toward the kitchen.  Below the three left behind, Valeria stirred as though she would rise, then settled back down onto the floor again.  In Stephen's absence, Oversword Garimond looked over at Iordyn.

"You know the man.  Does it not seem to you that he's locked something inside himself?"

Susanna chuckled lightly.  "Oh, Oversword, I begged- I pleaded- that he tell me how he felt before you came, and his answers were all grunts or sighs."

Iordyn shrugged and shook his head as he patted his leg.  Valeria sprung up to move underneath his hand for a scratching behind the ears, and by the time he spoke, he was leaning over to get at her tummy. 

"I can do no better than the woman that shares his bed, Oversword.  Yes, it seems to me that he's holding back, but as to what... you may as well ask him yourself, for all the good I'll do."

"Ask me what?" Stephen volleyed as he re-entered the room.  Valeria rolled back over and laid still at once, and Iordyn sat up straight in his chair again.  Moving between his wife's chair and his own, Stephen handed off the earthen cup full of water and fixed Iordyn with an expectant gaze.

"Ask you... if you... how you... um... feel?" the younger brother admitted haltingly as he shifted uncomfortably in his chair.  "About the incident?"

For a moment, Stephen leaned back in the chair with crossed arms and a malice-free, but distant look on his face.

"Talk to your firstborn, Stevie," Susanna urged quietly enough for her words to be missed by the oversword and her brother-in-law.  "If Saul were asking, what would you tell him?"

"If Saul were...?  Ah," Stephen sighed, his upper body losing the tension it had so suddenly adapted.  "I'm doing it again, aren't I?"

"With good reason," Susanna replied with a sigh of her own.  "I didn't see Silveredge, didn't know her, before.  But I don't know what those people would have done with me, if not for her."

"With respect, I- I have a good idea," Oversword Garimond interjected carefully.  "There were first rumors of missing persons in Urmlaspyr- multiple reports- from their so-called 'Dark Quarter.'  Didn't think much of it.  Sent a few soldiers, left it at that.  Some weeks before this past ice breaking festival, I began hearing of reports from Freed Daerlun, then, maybe two months ago, more from Marsember.  Finally, just a few weeks ago, I got my first reports from people here in Suzail.  And then, on an unremarkable escort mission- that just happens to have a non-necessary Shadar-kai and her familiar accompanying it- nearly the entire escort team is annihilated by Semmites.   I regret deeply not having listened more closely to our contact in Urmlaspyr, for I cannot help but think that Sembia is reaching fingers through them to us.  My current conjecture is that these missing people- at least some of them, if not all of them- are being taken back there, and that-"

"-and that people are being sold or traded from there to the Shade Enclave, as though the war had never happened at all," Susanna finished suddenly, as though she'd just received a revelation on the subject.  "And with her being Shadar-kai... but no, I beg my lords to trust my word on this.  Silveredge wasn't helping anyone to shuffle me off to Thultanthar.  She helped me escape, I know it.  I ran as I have not done in more than ten years.  And then, in the alley, I- oh, the- mmmnn."

Susanna closed her eyes and smoothed her hands over her belly, which visibly moved.

"Active- like our little raven," Stephen commented, moving his chair over to put one hand on her upper back and the other over her hands.

"Strong like your firstborn ironshaper," Susanna laughed lightly, finding that she was too out of breath to be much louder.

"And undoubtedly concerned for his mother," the oversword added.  "Be careful, Lady Raibeart; your family needs you to remain calm, rested, and happy, just now."

"But Cormyr needs me to be strong and fearless," Susanna breathed, moving one hand so that it rested atop Stephen's.

"Suze!" Iordyn exclaimed, suddenly worried about what precisely his sister-in-law meant.

Susanna breathed a few more times, absorbing the discomfort of having the baby push its way around her belly.  "I saw those men's faces, Iordy, and they are not Semmites.  And I know that- mmmnn, Mother Chauntea, calm this child- I know that the Shadar-kai who looked upon me did so to save my life.  I need- oh, help me, gods- I need to go back to the market, to-"

"You most certainly won't," Oversword Garimond rumbled, his eyes made stormy.  "Already you struggle for breath and comfort while sitting here at home."

"It wouldn't be safe," Iordyn chimed in with a smoother tone.  "I can go to market, and-"

"But these kidnappers- these brigands- they'll be on fire to get hold of me," Susanna urged, pressing her eyes shut.  "Look, tell me, Oversword, if you have another victim alive that can claim to see what I have."

Garimond, a frown etched so deeply on his face that he seemed nearly a gargoyle, had to turn away to look at the still-popping embers in the fireplace.  "I do not," he admitted at last.  "I have one Elven woman who does not remember anything at all, and one profoundly terrified Human woman who actually had to be threatened into telling me what she could remember- which wasn't much."

"Cormyr needs me, sirs," Susanna managed, finally opening her eyes again.  "I am the only woman that these Semmite sympathizers absolutely need to get hold of immediately.  I have seen far too much, and am in my right mind."

"Man, won't you tame this woman of yours?" Garimond finally burst.  "Is this not your child in her womb?"

Stephen turned a look so venomous upon the oversword that Iordyn feared for the commissioned blacksmith's job.

"It is, I give you thanks," the man managed in a tight tone.  "And it is for all my children, and all the children in this land, that I... I give my consent to the wit of the former Acolyte Susanna Cheluais-"

"Stephen, if you-" Garimond began.

"-who is well capable, I must believe, of speaking for herself.  Now, if you will reason with her, reason with her directly.  I will not sit here and allow you to disrespect her by addressing me when you mean to speak to her."

The oversword bit his lips, took a deep breath, and turned his gaze back to the brown haired woman before him.  She, in response, straightened herself as much as she could stand, with the baby still moving around, and looked him directly in the face.

"Miss Cheluais?"

"Made Raibeart, yea these fifteen years," Susanna replied calmly, "although neither more timid nor docile."

"And I can now assume that I have your lord to thank for that," Garimond frowned, unable to help himself.

Stephen chuckled lightly at the oversword's displeasure, smoothing his hand along Susanna's belly to see if it would move any more.  

"You didn't finish," Iordyn prompted suddenly.  "The alley."

"Oh, yes- the alley," Susanna said suddenly, looking over at Iordyn, who sneaked a look at Garimond as he leaned over to give Valeria an unexpected pat. 

"Yes, Lady Raibeart, please continue," the oversword said, shifting his own weight in the chair and catching Iordyn eyes expertly.  "I'm listening."

"Then, let me- I ran, I told you, out of the entire market, down the street, toward the northern border and- I turned into this alley, because I felt whatever power it was that had been placed upon me fading.  The baby- I had disturbed it mightily, of course, with running that way- began to move about within me, like it just did a few moments ago.  So I leaned myself upon the wall, for it was cool on my skin, even through the cloth of my dress and- I don't know why, but I turned to look behind me.  And there were the two men again, the ones who had jostled me.  Dread filled me.  But then I heard something- somebody- fall behind me, and I turned to see them, only I didn't.  Not clearly, anyway; it was like a moving shadow.  I couldn't even tell you if it were male or female.  And it whipped by me instantly, struck the two men beyond me, then went straight up the wall.  Both of the men were laid prone, completely vulnerable.  Their wounds weren't lethal, I knew without getting any closer.  They were just marks.  The shadow- whoever it was- could have killed them both, but only marked them."

"Signs," Stephen nodded.  "So that you'd know them.  So that you could pick them out if you saw them again."

There was a pause in the conversation during which Susanna and Stephen held an entire conversation with a mere glance.  Iordyn, for his part, found himself thinking of Silveredge's purposefully distant look, and was only disturbed from his memory by Valeria's interested nose, jabbed directly into the calf muscle nearest to her.

"I can at least have you flanked with guards," the oversword ventured, not amused by any of the activity in the room.

"Plainclothes, please," Susanna nodded, returning her attentions to the Purple Dragon before her.  "I understand, of course, the need for my own safety, and I will leave those thoughts to you.  I will only walk through the market as I have been doing every day, no more careful than I have been.  Mark my words, you will have your kidnappers, if you but watch me."

"And Silveredge, clear of that mage she's working with, hopefully," Iordyn sighed.  "I have faith that what you say about her is true."

"I cannot say the same," the oversword sighed as he arose from his chair, "and I do not like dangling a woman with child in harm's way.  But... you are, I'm afraid, my best chance at getting hold of these- as you've called them- Semmite sympathizers."

"And when you do get hold of them, I will personally attend to whatever trappings you would want to use to separate soul from body," Stephen stated simply.  "That will be my vengeance as a husband, and as a father."

Garimond first put his hand to his forehead in a slight salute, then paused before he turned to leave.  "Iordyn- Ser Raibeart the Younger, rather."

"Oversword?"

"Stay with your family this night.  That's an order."