NEVER THE SIMPLE COURSE

Entreri stood staring at the west, at a cluster of palm trees rising from the rolling dunes of sand. He nodded as he realized where they were, for he was quite familiar with the mountains south of their position. Not much of this region north of the divide was rolling white sand, though south of those mountains, closer to Calimport, the desert extended for miles and miles. The land was almost equally barren, but was more a matter of mesas and long-dead river valleys, but one stretch was the exception. They were along the trade route, and since the mountains stretched out, impassable, southeast of their position, Entreri realized that they were no more than a few days from Memnon. He looked back at the dragon sisters, who were preparing to depart, and offered Tazmikella, when she caught his glance, as close to an expression of gratitude as he'd ever offered anyone.

Off to the side of Entreri, Athrogate sat, spitting curses and pulling off his boots. "Rotten stuff," he said, pouring a generous amount of sand from one shoe. When they came in, Ilnezhara had skimmed low, and the rut the claw-riding Athrogate had cut in the coarse sand could be traced back many yards.

While the dwarf's discomfort pleased Entreri, he shifted his gaze to his other companion. Jarlaxle stood near the dragons with his back to Entreri, his hat far back on his head, completely obscuring the assassin's view of him. Something in the expressions of the two gigantic creatures clued him in that Jarlaxle had somehow caught them off guard. With a cursory glance at the complaining Athrogate, Entreri moved beside his long-time companion.

And saw a handsome elf, with golden skin and hair the color of the morning sun.

Entreri fell back a step.

"Although the hair suits you well, I prefer the drow image," Ilnezhara said. "Exotic, mysterious, enticing..."

"Dangerous," said her sister. "That is always the lure for you, dear sister, which is why we are farther into Dojomentikus's domain than I had desired. Come now, it is time for us to be gone."

"Dojo would not strike out at the both of us, sister," said Ilnezhara. She turned back to Entreri and Jarlaxle. "Such a petty beast, like most males. Imagine that just a few trinkets could invoke such wrath."

"A few trinkets and your refusal to breed with him."

"He bored me."

"Perhaps he should have donned a drow disguise," Tazmikella said, and Entreri realized that that should have been his line - except that he was hardly listening to the conversation, for he remained transfixed on Jarlaxle.

"You should close your mouth," Ilnezhara said, and it took Entreri a moment to understand that she had directed the comment at him. "The sand will blow in. It is most uncomfortable."

Entreri shot her a quick look, but turned back to his companion.

"Kimmuriel is often difficult in his dealings," Jarlaxle explained. "He conceded quite a bit, but demanded of me that I wear this mantle beyond the Bloodstone Lands, for all the rest of my days on the surface."

"Agatha's mask," Entreri realized, for he had once worn the magical item, many years before. With it, he had assumed the mien of Regis, the troublesome halfling, and had used the disguise to infiltrate Mithral Hall before the drow invasion. He shook that memory from his mind, for from that failed invasion had come his servitude in the city of drow, a place he did not like to think about.

"The same," Jarlaxle confirmed.

"I had thought it lost, or destroyed."

"Little gets lost that cannot be found, and no magic is ever truly destroyed for those who know how to put it back together." He smiled as he spoke, reached behind him, and brought forth a familiar gauntlet, the complimentary piece to Entreri's mighty sword.

"Kimmuriel managed to piece it back together; he is no fonder of magic-users than are you, my friend." He tossed the gauntlet to Entreri, who studied it for a moment, noting the red lines shot through the black material. He slipped it on his hand and clutched the hilt of Charon's Claw. The gauntlet minimized the magical connection. Kimmuriel, as always, had done well.

"Well now, I'd say that's better, but it'd be a lie," Athrogate said, walking up to join the group and taking a long look at the transformed Jarlaxle. "Any elf's but a girl making ready to cry. Bwahaha!" The dwarf waggled his bare toes in the hot sand as he laughed.

"And if you keep rhyming, you're going to die," Entreri said, and Athrogate laughed all the louder.

"No," Entreri said, his voice deadly even. Athrogate stopped and stared at the man and his undeniably grim tone. "There is no joke in my words," Entreri promised. "And the rhyme was coincidental."

Athrogate winced, but at the burn on the soles of his feet, not at the threat, and he hopped about. "Well, tell that one to quit inspiring me, then," he blustered, waving his arms at Jarlaxle. "Ye can't be expectin' me to behave when he's springin' such surprises on me!" He walked around Jarlaxle, inspecting him more closely, and even reached up with his stubby fingers and pinched the drow's cheek, then fiddled with the golden hair. "Bah, but that's a good one," he decided. "Good for getting into places ye don't belong. Ye got more o' that magic? Might be that if we find some orcs, ye can make me look like 'em so I can walk in before bashing?"

"That wouldn't take magic," said Entreri. "Just trim your beard."

Athrogate shot him a dangerous look. "Now ye're crossing a line, boy."

"I should have eaten him," said Ilnezhara.

"No, and all is quite well," said Jarlaxle. "Well met and well left, good ladies. I... we are most grateful for your assistance, and I speak truly when I say that I will miss your company. In all of my travels across the wide world, never before have I encountered such beauty and grace, such power and intelligence." He bowed low, his outrageous hat sweeping the desert sands.

"So you believe the tales that proclaim that dragons are weak for flattery?" said Ilnezhara, but her grin showed that she really was quite pleased with the drow's proclamation.

"I speak truly," Jarlaxle insisted. "In all things. You will find the Bloodstone Lands an interesting and profitable place upon your return, I believe."

"And we will see you again," said Tazmikella. "And I warn you, your disguises do not fool dragon eyes."

"But I cannot return, I fear," the drow replied.

"Dragons and drow live longer than humans, longer even than the memories of humans," said Ilnezhara. "Until we meet again, Jarlaxle."

As she finished, she leaped and turned, her great wings going wide and catching the rising heat of the desert sands. Her sister leaped after her, and though it only took one great beat of their tremendous wings to spirit them swiftly away, the downdraft of that action sent a storm of sand flying over the three companions.

"Durned wyrms!" Athrogate complained.

By the time the three got the sand out of their eyes and managed to look back, the sisters were no more than small spots in the distant east.

"Well, I won't be missing them two, but I'm not for walking on this ground," Athrogate muttered. He plopped back down on his butt and began pulling on his boots. "Too soft and unsure for me liking."

"I don't walk," Jarlaxle assured him. The drow-turned-elf reached into his belt pouch and pulled out a curious red figurine. He offered a wink at Entreri and tossed it to Athrogate.

The dwarf caught it and sat staring at the item: a small red boar. "Sculptor forget to put the skin on the damned thing?"

"It's an infernal boar," Jarlaxle explained. "A creature of the lower planes, fierce and untiring - a suitable mount for Athrogate."

"Suitable?" the dwarf asked, obviously perplexed. "Why, if I sat on it, I'd lose it up me bum! Bwahaha!"

"The figurine is a conduit," Jarlaxle explained, and he pulled out his own obsidian statuette and dropped it on the ground beside him. He called to the hellish nightmare, and in moments, the fiery steed pawed the soft ground beside him.

Athrogate gave him a crooked smile, then likewise dropped the red boar to the ground. "What do I call it?" he eagerly asked.

"Snort," Jarlaxle said.

Athrogate snorted.

"No, that is its name. Call to 'Snort, and 'Snort' will come to your call, if you see what I mean."

Watching with little amusement and no surprise, Entreri brought his own mount, Blackfire, to his side. At the same time, Athrogate did as instructed, and sure enough, a large red-skinned boar appeared beside the dwarf. Steam rose from its back, and when it snorted, as it often did, little bursts of red flame erupted from its nostrils.

"Snort," Athrogate said approvingly. He moved beside the creature, which, like the nightmares, appeared with full saddle, but he hesitated before lifting his leg over it. "Seems a bit hot," he explained to his companions.

Entreri just shook his head and turned his nightmare around, starting off toward a distant oasis at a gallop.

Jarlaxle and Athrogate came soon after, and the smaller mount had no trouble pacing the nightmares, its little legs stepping furiously.

Entreri stayed in front of the others all the way to the last high dune overlooking the oasis. He stopped his mount and waited there, not out of any desire for companionship, but rather, because the sight below gave him cautious pause. He knew the ways of the desert, knew the various peoples who roamed the shifting sands. That particular stop along the trade route was classified as "everni," which translated, literally, as lawless. An oasis such as that was under no formal control, with no governing militia in place, and by edict of the pashas of both Memnon and Calimport to the south, "unavailable to claim." Anyone who tried to set up a residence or fortress in such an oasis would find himself at war with both powerful city-states.

The obvious benefit to such an arrangement was that it prevented any tolls from being forced on the frequent merchant caravans traveling between the cities. The downside, of course, was that caravans often had to defend themselves from competing interests and bandits.

The wreckage of a trio of wagons beside the small pond in the shadow of the palms showed that one recent caravan had not done so successfully.

"Perhaps we should have bid the dragons stay beside us just a bit longer," Jarlaxle remarked when he and Athrogate came up on the bluff and looked down at the many white-robed forms milling about the place.

"Desert nomads," Entreri explained. "They hold no allegiance to elves or to dwarves, or even to humans who are not of their tribe."

"They sacked them wagons?" Athrogate asked.

"Or found them destroyed," said Jarlaxle.

"They did it," Entreri insisted. "That caravan was destroyed within the tenday, or else the wood would have already been scavenged. The night gets cold here, as you will learn soon enough, and wood is greatly treasured." He nodded to the south of the small oasis pond, where buzzards hopped about. "The carrion birds haven't even finished their feast. This caravan was sacked within the last couple of days, and there are your highwaymen, enjoying their respite."

"How long will they remain?" Jarlaxle asked.

"As long as they choose. There is no pattern to the nomads' wandering. They roam, they fight, they steal, and they eat."

"Sounds like a good life to me," Athrogate remarked. "Though I'd be looking for a bit o' the drink to top it all off!"

Entreri scowled at him.

"At least he's not rhyming anymore," Jarlaxle whispered. "Though his words tear no less."

"So if we go down there, we're looking at a fight?" Athrogate asked.

"Perhaps. Perhaps not," said Entreri. "Desert nomads fight for gain and gain alone. If they saw us as a threat, or as worthy victims, they would fight. Else, they would ask of us stories, and perhaps even share their spoils. They are an unpredictable lot."

"That makes them dangerous," said Athrogate.

"That makes them intriguing," Jarlaxle corrected. He slid down from his hell horse and dismissed it, pocketing the figurine.

"Ah well, if it's a fight, all the better," Athrogate said and began to dismount.

Jarlaxle stopped him, though. "Stay here and stay astride," the drow instructed.

"Yerself's going down there?"

"Us?" Entreri asked.

Jarlaxle considered the oasis and began a quick count. "There can't be more than twenty of the creatures. And I find that I am thirsty."

Entreri knew well that Jarlaxle could summon some drink if that were the case, or could create an entire extra-dimensional chamber full of food and fine wine if he so desired. "I did not come here to engage in random fights in the desert," he said, his expression sour.

"But you came here for information, or at least, you will need information to find that which you seek. Who better to tell us of the road to Memnon, or the current disposition within the city? Let us learn what we might."

Entreri stared at his troublesome companion for a long while, but he did indeed draw his foot over his horse and drop to the sand. He dismissed the nightmare and placed the figurine in his belt pouch, within easy reach.

"If we need you, charge in hard and fast," Jarlaxle said to Athrogate.

"Don't know any other way," the dwarf replied.

"Which is why I value your companionship," the drow said. "And you will find, I do believe, that your mount is possessed of the same fighting spirit - and a few tricks of its own."

Entreri looked to the dwarf as he sat astride that strange-looking, fierce war boar. He glanced back at the oasis and the white headgear of the nomads. He could well imagine where events were leading, but he found himself walking beside Jarlaxle down the western face of the high dune nonetheless.

"The nomads have been known to fill uninvited guests with arrows, then seek their answers in the items on the corpses," Entreri said as they neared the oasis - and already several sets of eyes turned their way.

Jarlaxle whispered something that the assassin could not make out, and Entreri felt a surge of warmth within him, rolling from his core to tickle all of his being, arms, legs, and head.

"If they let fly with their bows, they'll find only more questions," Jarlaxle replied.

"Questions in the arrows that will be lying at our feet?" Entreri rightly surmised.

"It will take a mighty bolt to get through that enchantment, I assure you."

Just before the duo stepped onto the sudden transformation of sand to grass, a pair of men rushed over to block their way. Both held wide-bladed weapons - khopesh blades, they were called - and with an ease that showed them to be quite skilled with them.

"You tink to joost walk trooh our camp?" one asked in the common language of the land, one that neither Entreri or Jarlaxle had heard in many months, and spoken with so severe an accent that it took both of them a moment to decipher the words.

"Show us the boundary, and we will walk around," said Entreri.

"De boundary? Why de boundary is de oasis, silly man."

"Ah, but if that is the case, then how are we to fill our skins from the pond?" Jarlaxle asked.

"Dat ees a problem," the nomad agreed. "But for you and not for me." Beside him, the other put his second hand to the long hilt of the great khopesh sword.

"We are not here to fight," said Entreri. "Nor do we care about your dealings with the caravan."

"Caravan?" the man echoed. "Dese wagons? But we found dem here. Poor men. Dey should take more care. Bandits, you know."

"Indeed," said Entreri. "And their ill luck is not my concern. We have come for some water, that we might be on our way. Nothing more"  -  he eyed the second nomad, who seemed quite eager to put his great sword into action -  "and nothing less. By edict of the pashas of both Memnon and Calimport, these oases are open and free."

A dangerous grin creased the face of the first man.

"But we will pay anyway," said Entreri, similarly grinning. "We will take the water we need and in exchange we will entertain you with tales of our exploits beside Pasha Basadoni in Calimport."

The nomad's grin disappeared in the blink of an eye. "Basadoni?"

"Ah, Artemis, they know the name!" said Jarlaxle.

Both bandits blanched at the mention of Entreri's name, and the second one actually fell back a step, his hands loosening on the hilt of the khopesh.

"Well... yes," the first stammered. "We would not be friends of de desert if we did not accept barter, of course."

Entreri snorted and walked right past him, brushing him with his shoulder and pushing him aside. Jarlaxle kept close beside him the thirty feet to the pond's edge.

"Your reputation precedes you," the drow mentioned quietly.

Entreri snorted again as if he did not care, and bent low to put his water-skin in the cool waters. By the time he stood straight again, several other desert nomads approached, including an enormously fat man dressed in richer robes of white and red. Instead of the simple cloth hoods the others wore, he wore a white and red turban, stitched with golden thread, and he carried a jeweled scepter wrought of solid gold. His gold-colored shoes were no less ornate, with their toes stretching forward and rolling up into an almost complete circle.

He moved to stand a few feet from the pair, while his bodyguards fanned out in a semicircle about them.

"There is a saying in the desert that bold is once removed from foolish," he said in a dialect far more cultured and reminiscent of Calimport than the open sands.

"Your sentries appeared to have dropped their protestations," Jarlaxle replied. "We had thought a deal struck. Water for stories."

"I have no need of your stories."

"Ah, but they are grand, and the water will not be missed."

"I know a story of a man named Artemis Entreri," the boss said. "A man who served with Pasha Basadoni."

"He is dead," said Entreri.

The boss eyed him curiously. "Did he not name you as...?"

"Artemis," Entreri confirmed. "Just Artemis."

"Of Pasha Basadoni's guild?"

"No," Entreri said, at the same time Jarlaxle replied, "Yes." The pair turned and looked at each other.

"I claim no allegiance to any guild," Entreri said to the boss.

"And yet you dare to walk into my oasis - "

"It is not yours."

"Your diplomacy skills are amazing," Jarlaxle muttered to Entreri.

The fat man held his scepter out before him horizontally. "Bold," he said and he tipped one end up slightly. "Foolish," he added, and he more than reversed the angle, as if weighing his words with a scale.

"My friend is weary from many days on the road, and in the hot sun," said Jarlaxle. "We are traveling adventurers."

"Blades for hire?"

Jarlaxle smiled.

"So you would offer your services in exchange for my water?"

"That would be quite a bargain for...?"

"I am Sultan Alhabara."

"Quite a bargain for Sultan Alhabara, then," said Jarlaxle. "I assure you that our services are quite formidable."

"Indeed," said the fat man, and he gave a slight chuckle, which brought a response of laughter from the six men fanned out about him. "And what fee would be deemed appropriate for the services of Artemis and...?"

"I am Drizzt Do'Urden," said the drow-turned-elf.

"By the balls of a castrated orc," muttered Entreri and he heaved a great sigh.

"What?" Jarlaxle asked, feigning innocence as he turned to him.

"We could not have just ridden by, could we?" Entreri replied. "Very well, then."

"Easy, Artemis," Jarlaxle bade him.

"Our fee is more than fat Alhabara can afford," Entreri said to the man. "More than stupid Alhabara can imagine. The water is free, in any case, by edict of Memnon and of Calimport. Can the criminal Alhabara understand that?"

Alhabara flashed a fierce scowl and the men around him sputtered with outrage, but Entreri didn't relent.

"And so I take what is free, without asking the permission of a common thief," he said and he swept his gaze out at the others as he finished, "And the first of you to lift blade against me will be the first to die this day."

The man in the middle of the trio to Entreri's left did draw on him, tearing a khopesh from his belt and waving it menacingly in Entreri's direction. The man even came forward a step, or started to, but a look from Entreri held him in place.

Alhabara, meanwhile, fell back several steps and lifted his scepter defensively before him.

"Rulership," Jarlaxle whispered to Entreri, correctly identifying the magical rod the sultan held, for it was one he had seen before, many times, among chieftains and tribal leaders. If it was akin to any of the similar rods Jarlaxle had known, such an item could enable its wielder to impose his will on his would-be subjects - those of weak mind, at least.

A moment later, both the drow and the assassin felt a wave of compulsion wash over them, a telepathic call from Sultan Alhabara to fall to their knees.

The pair looked to each other, then back at the man. "Hardly," Entreri said.

To either side of the companions, weapons came forth. Jarlaxle responded by plucking the feather from his cap and tossing it to the ground him. The item transformed into a gigantic, twelve-foot-tall creature known as a diatryma, a great flightless bird with short wings tucked in close to its sides, and a thick, strong neck and powerful triangular beak.

The six closest men screamed and fell back. Alhabara scrambled away and cried out, "Kill them!"

The man nearest the bird on the right tried to rush past it to get at the man and the elf, but the diatryma's powerful neck snapped as he passed, driving the beak into his shoulder with such force that it snapped bone and dislocated his shoulder so badly that it left his arm swinging numbly several inches down from its previous position, and far to the back. The man yelped and tumbled to the grass, howling pitifully.

Charon's Claw and his jeweled dagger in hand, Entreri leaped at the trio on the left. Back-to-back with him, Jarlaxle snapped his wrist, bringing a magical dagger into his hand from his enchanted bracer. A second snap elongated that dagger into a slender sword, which the drow flipped to his left hand and used to parry the nearest khopesh in the same movement.

His right hand snapped again and the bracer answered. While working his sword brilliantly and fluidly to keep that troublesome khopesh at bay, he retracted and flung the dagger at the last in line. Hardly slowing, he wrist-snapped, retracted, and threw again, and again.

The man was good with his blade and quite agile. After five throws, he only had one dagger-wound in one thigh, and that had been no more than a glancing blow. His friend tried to press the attack on Jarlaxle, but the agile drow easily held him at bay, even working his sword around the khopesh to stick him lightly in the ribs.

And all the while, Jarlaxle kept up the flow of daggers, spinning end over end and coming at the man high, low, and center with no discernable, thus no defensible pattern. The man couldn't anticipate, he could only react, and in that state, another blade got through, grazing the side of his face, then a third - a solid strike into the shoulder of his sword arm.

Worse for him, and for his friend, Jarlaxle's pet bird intervened, trampling the man as he pressed in on Jarlaxle. The man managed to bang his khopesh off the giant creature's leg, but the bird stomped him, then jabbed down with three hard pecks.

Jarlaxle sent it off after Sultan Alhabara, as he turned his attention to the remaining man. His next dagger came forth and he did not throw it, but snapped his hand to elongate it into a second, sister blade.

He stalked at his wounded opponent.

A trio of arrows soared in from the side, shot from a tree across the oasis.

Jarlaxle saw them too late to avoid them.

* * * * *

Entreri turned left, then went went that direction and forward, moving to the flank of the trio so that they all couldn't get at him at once. He led with an underhanded sweep of his dagger, one that, because of his bold stride forward, caught the swinging sword up near the hilt and allowed him the leverage to turn it out with just that small blade. Without room to maneuver his own sword, he came across with a right-hand punch instead, cracking Charon's Claw's pommel into the man's cheek.

He followed through with the punch past the man's broken face, extended his left arm, taking both the khopesh and the man's arm out wide with him, and rolled his sword arm over that extension then down and under.

Feeling pressure from a second attacker coming in behind him, Entreri rolled right over the arm, a complete flip that left him on his feet, and he came up strong, lifting his sword arm high, gashing the bandit's arm in the process. A twist had the man rolling over Entreri's hip, flailing helplessly.

"You are dead," Entreri promised, for the man had no defense at all. "Except..."

Entreri reversed his grip as he dropped his sword arm, and he stabbed out behind him as he did a sudden reverse pivot.

The blade drove into the gut of a second bandit, the one who had been in the middle of the trio, the one who had drawn first.

"I promised him that he would die first," Entreri explained. He kicked the prone man - who had dropped his khopesh to hold his badly torn arm - in the face and leaped past him, dagger and sword working in complimentary circles to foil the attack of the third man.

It was all going so smoothly and easily, he thought, but then he noted that dozens of others were closing in, hooting and raising swords and bows. A quick glance back showed him arrows diving for Jarlaxle. Beyond the drow, he saw his other companion, one better forgotten, roaring down the side of the dune on his war pig, holding tight with his powerful legs, his arms out wide and swinging morningstars left and right.

* * * * *

"Wahoo!" Athrogate yelled, the clear and steady tone of his shout defying the jolting, stiff-legged romp down the side of the dune. Despite those stiff legs and their shortness, Athrogate learned that his magical boar could cover tremendous ground.

The dwarf clamped his legs tight and sent his morningstars swinging wide left and right. He crossed from sand to grass, and the nearest bandits moved to intercept, a couple leveling spears.

Athrogate just howled louder and kept straight his course, thinking to pick off the prodding spears with his weapons. As he bore in, however, he found that his mount was more than a beast of burden. The boar had been summoned from the fiery pits of the Nine Hells, where battle was constant. Both its temperament and its armament were well suited to that harsh environment. It broke its stride only briefly, so it could snort and stomp a hoof, and as it did, a burst of orange flames rushed out from its body, a complete ring of wispy fire rolling away as it dissipated.

"Bwahaha!" Athrogate howled in gleeful surprise, and as the boar drove on, the dwarf clamped his legs tighter around it and adjusted the angle of his spinning weapons.

The bandits fell back and curled, shocked by the fiery burst. A bit of residual flame burned on one's robes, while the other had wisps of smoke rising from his singed hair. And both showed bright red skin where the flames had touched them.

Neither was really harmed by the burst, but as Athrogate rushed between them, the weight of his already heavy blows was only enhanced by the momentum of the boar. One man took a hit in the chest and went into a nearly complete backward somersault, except that he landed on his face instead of his feet. The other somehow maintained his footing after the strike.

But the morningstar had taken him across the side of his head, and though he was standing, he was far, far from consciousness. Athrogate was many strides away before he crumbled to the ground.

"Wahoo!" the dwarf roared wildly, thoroughly enjoying it all.

* * * * *

The arrows hit Jarlaxle's magical barrier barely an inch from the drow. They just stopped, in mid-air, and fell to the ground. The enchantment wasn't going to last, though, the drow knew, and so he looked out at the tree and the archers and used his innate magic to summon a globe of darkness over them.

"I'm blinded!" he heard one man cry, and he smiled, for he had indeed heard that false claim before.

The man before him was a stubborn one, he found, who came on yet again. With a sigh, Jarlaxle met his slashing khopesh, executing a downward diagonal, with a double-sword block. A turn to face the three locked blades gave him all the leverage he needed, and he easily drove the sword down.

He retracted suddenly, and the man nearly overbalanced. The drow began a "rattling parry," where both his swords rolled out a tapping drum roll on the blade. As his opponent finally began to compensate against the almost continual push, Jarlaxle side-stepped and with a sudden flourish rushed his sword downward, reversing the tip to point at the ground and taking the khopesh down with it.

The bandit pushed back, and found his blade climbing freely, but only because Jarlaxle had disengaged. The drow rolled his arms out wide, right blade closest to his opponent and angled out and down, left blade angled out and up. He tilted his body accordingly to provide maximum balance to the pose.

But it was a pose he held only briefly, for he drove his blades back in with sudden fury, the right blade coming up and under the khopesh down near the hilt, the left slamming down near the thicker end of the blade.

The bandit couldn't negotiate the alteration of pressure, and the drow's swipes tore the blade from his hands completely and sent it into a spin. Jarlaxle held that spin, the khopesh rotating around its hilt and the drow's right-hand sword.

The bandit stared at it as if mesmerized.

"Here," the gracious Jarlaxle offered, and he released the sword from its twirl, sending it up into the air back toward the bandit. The man looked up, his hands went up, and just before the khopesh landed in his grasp, the sole of the drow's boot landed against his face.

He hit the ground before the khopesh bounced atop him.

Jarlaxle glanced at Entreri. "Summon your..." he started to cry, but before he had even finished, Entreri's nightmare arrived on the scene, snorting fire and pawing the ground.

The poor remaining bandit on that side had already been stripped of his weapons, and the sight of the hellish horse stripped him of his sensibilities as well, apparently, for he blubbered something undecipherable and half-ran, half-crawled away, crying and screaming all the way.

Entreri leaped astride the powerful nightmare, and kicked the steed into a gallop that drove back the nearest group of approaching bandits. A pair of spears and an arrow came at him, but Jarlaxle's magical shield held them back.

Then Jarlaxle was up on his own black steed behind Entreri, who kicked his nightmare into a run. The two were swept up in Athrogate's wake, then thundered past the dwarf and his war pig. A battery of archers rose from behind one wagon, but almost as they stood, they, too, began screaming about blindness, as Jarlaxle's magical darkness engulfed them.

Behind the riding trio, Jarlaxle's diatryma continued its rampage, and the bandits had to settle for that fight.

Out the far side of the oasis, running free across desert sands once more, the three covered nearly a mile before Jarlaxle pulled up and bid his friend do likewise.

"Bwahaha!" Athrogate roared. "I can't ever be thankin' ye enough for me new pet! Bwahaha! Snort! Bwahaha!"

Jarlaxle offered him a smile, but turned on Entreri. "That went well," the drow said dryly. "All of my lessons in diplomacy were wasted on you, it seems."

Entreri started to respond, but he noticed then that a new feather was already growing inside the band on Jarlaxle's magnificent hat. He just shook his head and spurred his steed forward.

"We should be going back," said Athrogate. "More to hit!"

Jarlaxle never turned from the departing Entreri, and without a response, he kicked his nightmare into a run behind his departing companion.

"Bah," Athrogate snorted in disappointment.

He gave a wistful glance back toward the oasis, and reluctantly followed.