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sometimes silly, other times it was disturbing. Montaron seemed amused by his human companion, Xzar, and often teased him by tossing pebbles and twigs at the tall mage’s head as they walked.
    Abdel was ready to do more than tease Xzar. Abdel was beginning to think about killing him. As the halfling joked, and the mage pontificated, and the hours dragged on, Abdel would devise elaborate plans to murder Xzar, just to pass the time.
    Xzar had a way of speaking that confused and irritated Abdel. He would rearrange and repeat words for no good reason, would remain silent when he should speak and speak when he had nothing useful to say. The mage twitched literally all the time, and though Abdel felt sorry for the obviously disturbed man at first, eventually he couldn’t think about anything but how much he wanted to slap him.
    He was able to ignore the twitchy mage for the first day’s walk, but when they’d settled into camp, Xzar told him the one thing Abdel always wanted to hear.
    “I know,” Xzar told him, “who your father—your father is.”
    Abdel sat up straight and Montaron, who had been chuckling happily in the darkness went suddenly bone still.
    “What did you say?” Abdel asked, the only way he could think of to ask the man to continue.
    “Xzar,” Montaron started, then just said, “Xzar….” again.
    “Your father,” the mage said to Abdel, ignoring the halfling, “your father was—”
    “Enough!” Montaron said sharply, and the mage spun to lock eyes with him. “Can’t ye see the boy’s a mite sensitive “bout that?”
    “How would you know this?” Abdel asked Xzar, ignoring the halfling. “You don’t even know me. You don’t know who I am, how could you know my father?”
    Montaron reached out and put a hand on Xzar’s forearm. The mage jerked away violently.
    “He should be happy,” Xzar said to no one in particular, “he should be happy to be the son of a god—of a god.”
    Abdel sighed. The man was insane.
    “I am the son of a god?” Abdel asked, anger making his voice tight and quiet.
    “Oh,” the mage said, his voice dripping condescension, “oh, yes, oh, yes, you most certainly are.”
    “My friend,” the halfling said to Abdel, “is obviously a madman, but ‘e can make fire shoot from ‘is fingertips, so I keep ‘im around.”
    “Shut your…” Xzar scolded,”… your… your—he’s the son of Bhaal.”
    Abdel sighed again and lay down to go to sleep. Xzar muttered to himself for a little while, his voice eventually fading into the sound of the crickets.
    “I buried my father,” Abdel said, more for himself than for the delusional mage or the halfling, “the only father I’ll ever need, the day I met you two. He was no god, and neither am I.”
    “An’ what if ye were?” Montaron asked, his voice soft on the night’s quiet breeze.
    Abdel looked up at him, and even in the darkness he could tell the halfling’s face was set, serious. This made Abdel laugh.
    “I’d wish myself a thousand times a thousand pieces of gold, for one,” Abdel answered. This made Montaron laugh. “I’d drop the Sword Coast into the sea just to see it sink and make zombies of everyone who ever spoke ill of me.”
    “Make me lord o’ Waterdeep?” the halfling joked.
    “Aye,” Abdel said, mimicking Montaron’s peculiar brogue, “ye’ll be king o’ the world.”
    The two of them laughed, and when Montaron finally settled down to sleep he said, “Sometimes, lad, things ‘ave a way o’ surprisin’ ye.”
    “Yes,” Abdel said, yawning, “they do at that.”
     

    Abdel had visited the Friendly Arms over half a dozen times in the past several years, but the sight of it always surprised him. It had been a rather well-built fortress in its day, constructed by a cult of the now-dead god Bhaal. The story was that the band of gnomes who ran the place had run afoul of the cultists, and after years of fighting back and forth the gnomes drove the Bhaal-worshipers out. This