comparing her eyes to these precious gems. To drive the knife a bit deeper, Arilyn lifted one brow and began to hum the melody to one of these early offerings.
Her dry teasing shattered the restraint between them. Danilo chuckled and pantomimed a wince. 'The best thing about old friends is that they know you well. Of course, that is also the
'Old friends,' she repeated. The words were deliv shy;ered in level tones, but they held a question. Was this what they were destined to be-old friends, and nothing more?
Danilo had long sought an answer, and he thought he had finally found one that might avail. Arilyn's teasing comments made as good an opening as he could expect to get. Their lives might have changed, but one constant remained: the intense and often inexplicable love born on the day she had kidnapped him from a tavern. He ripped open the paper that bound the package and lifted from it a length of deep-blue velvet-a gown of exquisite simplicity, elf-crafted and rare.
'Sapphire,' he confirmed with a grin, 'with gems to match. I'll spare you the song I prepared for the occasion.'
Arilyn chuckled and took the gown from his hands, then tossed it aside with the same casual disregard with which she had discarded the knife. Danilo opened his arms, and she came into them. 'I have missed you,' she murmured against his chest.
It was a rare admission from the taciturn half-elf. In fact, Danilo could count on his hands the times they had spoken of such matters since the night, four years ago, when they had planned to announce their betrothal at the Gemstone Ball. Events had forestalled this, rather dramatically, and had set their feet upon a path of deep shy;ening estrangement.
That path, he vowed, was to end this night.
He took her shoulders and held her out at arm's length. 'Look further in the package. Look carefully at what you find, for you will never see it again so close at hand.'
Arilyn gave him a puzzled smile, then did as she was bid. Her eyes widened as she drew a black, veiled helm from the wrappings.
'A Lord's Helm,' she murmured, naming one of the magical artifacts that marked and concealed the Hidden Lords, men and women drawn from every walk of life to rule the city. Understanding flooded her face. 'Yours?'
Dan nodded ruefully. 'An uneasy fit it has been. Khel shy;ben foisted it upon me four years ago. I would have told you long before this, but…'
His voice trailed off. Arilyn gave a curt nod of under shy;standing. It was common knowledge that the secret Lords told no one of their identity but the person they wed-and even that degree of confidence was frowned upon. Only Piergeiron the Paladinson, the First Lord of the city, was known by name.
'Why do you tell me now?' She glanced over at the sapphire gown, and her face was clouded with memo shy;ries of the pledge they had meant to speak at the Gemstone Ball four years ago.
Danilo had been prepared for this reaction, but even so his heart ached to see it. 'I am free to tell you now, for it is my intention to give the thing up,' he said lightly. 'There has been some trouble of late between the Harpers and some of Waterdeep's paladins. Lord Piergeiron, as one might anticipate, came out fervently on the side of righteousness. He was graciously willing-one might even say eager-to relieve me of this duty. Likewise, I have given notice to the redoubtable Khel shy;ben Arunsun that I have no intention of assuming his mantle as future protector of Blackstaff Tower.'
Arilyn frowned at this mention of Danilo's kinsman and mentor-and her former Harper superior. 'I thought he had long ago given up that notion.'
She was hedging, noted Dan, buying time as she absorbed the implications of his revelation. 'On the sur shy;face, yes, but as you well know, the good archmage prefers to work in mist and shadows. Some time back, when I declared my intentions of becoming a bard in truth as well as in jest, he was all gracious agreement. Yet he continued to give me valuable spellbooks, to share crumbs of his power, to confide in me secrets that bound me to the Harpers and to him. Before I knew it, I was attending him almost daily. I even had other Harpers under my command.' He shuddered. 'Insidi shy;ous, our dear Khelben.'
Arilyn smiled at his droll tone, but there was a touch of anger in her eyes. 'A better description of Khelben Arunsun could not be cast by his own shadow! You did well to break free. Do you still wear the pin?'
This was a sore spot, for they both had reason to cherish the pins that marked them as Harpers, mem shy;bers of a semi-secret organization dedicated to keeping Balance in the world and preserving tales of great deeds. Arilyn had grown increasingly uneasy with the direc shy;tion of the Harpers in general and the directives of Khelben Arunsun in particular. After their last shared mission, the rescue of Isabeau Thione, Arilyn had broken with Khelben and the Harpers.
Danilo, however, was not quite ready to renounce either. He touched his shoulder where, pinned to his shirt and hidden beneath his tabard, a tiny silver harp nestled into the curve of a crescent moon.
'A good man entrusted this pin to me. I will wear it always in his honor and try to be worthy of his trust.'
And his daughter.
The words were left unspoken, but the deepening conflict in Arilyn's eyes marked them as heard. 'I, too, wear the Harper pin in honor of my father, but for no other reason. My allegiance is elsewhere.'
'Yes, I am all too aware of that,' Danilo said with more bitterness than he intended. He lifted a hand to forestall her explanation. 'No, don't. We have traveled this road. What you did, you did for love of me. I wish the result had been different, but I cannot fault your intentions.'
Again his gaze shifted to the moonblade, a hereditary elven sword to which each wielder could add one magi shy;cal power. For Arilyn's mother it had formed a magical gate between her human lover's world and the distant elven island of Evermeet. This had led to tragedy for the elven folk, and many years later it led to a long string of events that had brought Arilyn to the attention of the Harpers of Waterdeep. Danilo had been assigned to follow and watch her. In the course of this mission, he and Arilyn had formed their own bonds: trust, friend shy;ship, and something deeper and infinitely more complex than love. Arilyn had ceded to him the right to her moonblade and its power. In doing so, she had broken a tradition of many centuries, that none but a moonblade's true inheritor could wield the blade. In doing so, she had unknowingly committed him to eternal service of the magic sword.
It was a price Danilo would gladly have paid for the bond it gave them, but he had never had that choice. When confronted by the results of her decision, Arilyn had taken it upon herself to free her friend from a serv shy;ice he never chose. In doing so, she had broken the mystic, elven bond between them. Once that bond was broken, the sword had granted Arilyn a different power and forged another allegiance.
Now the moonblade warned her when the forest folk were in need of a hero's sword. There were small bands of elves scattered through many forests in Faerun, and many were in danger and decline. Arilyn's sleep had become dream-haunted, and her sword gleamed with verdant light more often than not. Though she understood that hers was but a single sword and that she could not stand beside every beleaguered elf, the calls were too strong for her to ignore. Elf and moonblade shared soul-deep bonds. Since that day she had been on the road almost constantly and could not do otherwise.
'You do what you must,' Danilo said softly. 'I have had my duties here. However, there is nothing more to hold me in Waterdeep. There is no reason why I cannot travel with you.'
There was, and they both knew it. Arilyn was an oddity among the forest elves, who seldom had anything to do with strangers among their own kind, much less moon elves with human blood. In the eyes of the forest elves, though, she had become part of the centuries-old legend of the moonblade she carried. Thus she had finally achieved what she had longed for all her life: true acceptance from the elven folk. No human was likely to manage such a feat.
'No. No reason at all,' she said faintly and uncon shy;vincingly. She met his eyes and manufactured a rueful smile. 'You seem to have broken free of all things but one. This night you must meet family obligations. When does this ball start?'
Danilo squinted at the window. Twilight had passed, and the faint glow of lamps rose from the streets below. 'An hour, I should think. If you hurry, we can be fash shy;ionably late.' He punctuated this remark with a sly smile. 'If we take our time, we could be scandalously late.'
