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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Lazybones" data-source="post: 44900" data-attributes="member: 143">Book II, Part 4“This is not a good idea,” Benzan said, as he paced across the floor of his room.  Dana Ilgarten did not respond as she watched him from the bed.  Cal, Lok, and Delem were seated at the small table near the windowsill.  They had moved the discussion up here to gain some privacy and quiet, and thus far the young noblewoman had not wavered in her determination to join them on their quest for the church of Tymora.“We will likely be gone for several months,” Cal offered.“How did you even find out about this?” Benzan added, spinning to confront her.  Dana, for her part, seemed nonplussed at his hard tone and fixed stare.  “My family’s business is all about knowing things before the competition,” she said. “It’s too dangerous…” Benzan began, then caught himself and paused.Dana’s eyes narrowed.  “Too dangerous for a woman, you mean?  Because I know how to take care of myself.  I’ve been doing it for a long time, now.”Benzan didn’t back down.  “I was going to say, too dangerous for a lord’s daughter, even one with your… talents.”“What my friend is trying to say,” Cal interjected smoothly, “is that you aren’t the typical adventurer.  Won’t your father be concerned if you suddenly disappear on a long journey half-way around Faerun?  What of your responsibilities here?”Dana sighed, and when she spoke again it was with heartfelt feeling.  “Look, I know that you hardly know me, but I can assure you that this is not a decision that I am making lightly.  I know that you four answer to no one except yourselves, that all roads are your home and every choice yours to make.  Can you understand what it is like not to have that freedom?  I know that there are many who would say that I am spoiled, that I have through a simple accident of birth inherited a station that would be the envy of most in this dangerous world we live in.”“But all I’ve ever wanted is to live my own life.  My father has sons and daughters who can give him what he wants, be what he wants.  Just for once, I want to be Dana, not ‘Lady Ilgarten’.  I have honed my skills, pushed myself to develop new talents, for just this opportunity.”“And…  and I owe you four.  I’m not so naïve that I don’t know what those men—and that monster, Zorak—might have done to me.  I still wake up shaking, sometimes, but then I think of you four, and all that you did…”She stood, and met their gazes squarely.  “I’m not asking for your protection, and I’m not asking as the Lady Ilgarten.  I’m just Dana, and I want to go with you as an equal member of your company.”  “Well spoken,” Cal said, and it was as if her words had eased a lingering pain within him as well, for when he smiled there was a hint of his old fire back in it.  Benzan, however, was not ready to surrender his point just yet.  “You say that you want to be an equal member of the group—how do we know that you can take care of yourself?”There was a blur of motion, and Benzan suddenly found himself lying on his back up against the wall, dazed.  Dana stood above him, unable to keep a satisfied smirk from her expression. “Good answer,” Lok said.  * * * * * As the evening deepened into night, and the storm continued unabated over Baldur’s Gate, the fast sloop Raindancer bobbed at her moorings at the city’s docks, securely battened down against the wind and the rain.  A pair of miserable watchmen cursed their ill luck as they paced the deck, envious of the fun that their comrades were having in the city—or even those few still aboard, below decks, playing dice and swapping tall tales. The sailors took their duty seriously, but neither spotted the dark shadow that crept on board along the lowered gangplank and darted swiftly into the ship’s open hold.  Nor did they notice anything unusual when the shadowy figure reappeared ten minutes later, and slipped off the ship and disappeared back into the night.</blockquote>

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