Burin bowed, his eyes never leaving Arcolin’s face, as if confused. “I greet you, my lord.” He turned to Selfer. “Captain, Dattur has another three dozens of gloves ready; he has gone to fetch more glove leather.”

“I brought payment,” Selfer said. To Arcolin he said, “Dattur is Ser Burin’s gnomish partner in business and an excellent glovier.”

“You have just come from the north, my lord,” the man said. “Perhaps you have news from Vérella.”

“Indeed,” Arcolin said. “But it is not for all ears. Selfer, shut the door…”

Selfer complied; the man gestured at the chair and stool by the table, and himself sat on the nearest bed. Arcolin took the chair.

“Selfer tells me your real name is Arvid Semminson, and you’re the thief enforcer who got Paks out of that mess alive,” Arcolin said.

“Yes,” the man said. His expression changed; he no longer looked slightly befuddled. “And you were her cohort commander.”

Arcolin nodded. “So what news from the north do you want?”

“All of it,” the man said. Arcolin looked at him. Ser Burin? Arvid? Merchant or thief? Spy? Or—as the Marshal had suggested—a man in spiritual torment?

“That’s a long tale,” he said. “Do you have a specific interest?”

Arvid—Arcolin settled on that, as it was how Paks had known the man—grimaced. “Indeed. I believe the man now heading the Thieves’ Guild in Vérella is of the Horned Chain. I was fool enough to believe he would change. He was my second when I headed the Guild; in my absence he spread word I was a traitor.”

“Most Girdish in Vérella think you ran off with the Marshal-General’s gold.”

Arvid slammed his fist into the bedding. “There’s no chance, is there?” he asked. “Both think I’m a traitor, then, and I might as well have died there in the wild.”

Arcolin recognized desperation in Arvid’s voice and expression. “Surely not,” he said. “I heard you have a gnome companion whom you helped escape.”

“If not for me, he would not have been in that peril,” Arvid said.

“And the Marshal here in Valdaire tells me you saved a child from torment.”

“A child whose very existence may be my fault,” Arvid said. “Again—if I did not exist—”

“But you do,” Arcolin said. “And like all of us, your existence changes the world. For your acts in saving Paksenarrion, you have my thanks and admiration. Was that so wrong?”

Arvid looked up, tears streaking his face. “I don’t … I can’t … she’s a … a paladin.”

“And yet her life cost others,” Arcolin said. “Not just the scouring of the Thieves’ Guild in Vérella, but among my troops.” Should he tell? No, he decided; Arvid wasn’t ready for that. “A paladin is not harmless,” he said. “And neither are we.”

Arvid said nothing, but his expression eased a little.