"Mercy is quite often the clearest line between a just ruler, and a tyrant."
There is little place in Zevran's life for mercy. He had it taught, cut, beaten, and burned out of him from childhood. You do not show a target mercy, you do not spare them. You are deaf to their pleas. You give them the cleanest death you can, but there is no avoiding that outcome. You harden your heart against emotion and kill coolly and without passion. Money is your only motivation. The kill is your purpose for living, you take life to give meaning to your own. Your friends are simply targets you don't have a contract for yet.
Even so, he recognizes those unrelated occasions when mercy and compassion have their place, at least in the hands of others. But he personally knows little about how to show them to others, and even less about how to receive them.
His second dart follows Sam's, again sinking in almost on top of the red one. The blue set also looks as if it's been around the block a few times, though perhaps not quite so bad off. In any case, hitting the open expanse of a bulls-eye is easy. He's enjoying the challenge of aiming for a much tighter target, a skill that's infinitely useful when armor is involved.
"It likely would have been more merciful to kill them outright, rather than force them to forget themselves. Besides, the idiot nearly destroyed the world while he was at it. I don't mind having fellow professionals about the place again, now that Mizzamir's dead, but..." It's complicated. And he knows Cata would love to have a few words with Mizzamir on the subject of whitewashing, provided the wizard wasn't in any position to do anything. The center of the dartboard's getting rather crowded, at this rate; when the contest is this obvious, Sam sees no reason to feign being terrible with projectiles. This particular dart has a tendency to veer to the left; fortunately, there's still room on the left edge of the bullseye.
"I take it the process is a little more involved then ordering them to forget and sending them home?" Zevran shakes his head. "You are probably right. We kill those who fail missions, or who are not successful at their apprenticeships. I suppose it is a kindness, as much as anything. We don't worry about them divulging secrets, and those without the heart and stomach to be an assassin do not have to live with what they've already done. It is easier on everyone, this way. I would rather be killed, than made to forget everything."
And it provides a growth opportunity for those who do have the constitution.
The elf runs his fingertips lightly over the dart he's preparing to throw, assessing it for any irregularities, before sighting and letting it go. It pulls a bit more to the right than he'd anticipated, and doesn't land as close as he'd like to Sam's last throw, though it does at least bury itself in the bullseye.
"Oh, there were plenty of people who didn't survive the Guild's training. And I'm sure there will be again, once they really get going. Cata's quite happy to have her wits about her again, but she said once that if she'd found out while she was bespelled, she would rather have died." Sam can certainly understand that, considering how near he came to that blasted spell. His last dart, fortunately, requires a bit less concentration than the others; it's in remarkably good shape, compared to the rest of its set. So he turns around and tosses it over his shoulder, just because he can. ...If they keep hitting bullseyes, they could well be here all night.
"That is usually the case. Do they enroll voluntarily, into your guild?"
Zevran squints briefly at the board, and lets his final dart go. Unlike Sam, however, he's not preternaturally good. He's just almost that good, his talents having developed out of a natural elven dexterity combined with years of practice.
He's going to blame that last throw on a current of air, if asked. It snuggles up next to Sam's last shot easily enough, but this one lands just outside of the bullseye, pressed tightly against the metal but not inside it. More than good enough were he throwing tiny blades tipped with lethal poison, but for the purposes of this particular game...
The elf frowns for a moment, and then suddenly he's all smiles and laughter again.
"And it would seem that I am buying. Though if you would consent to another game at some point, I would not mind the opportunity for a comeback."
"They do, yes. I was taken in at a young age, but I had nowhere else to go." And it so happened that some people saw his potential, even at said young age. Sam grins, after the elf's last shot. "I was beginning to wonder if we'd be here all night. I dare say I could see my way to another game sometime." He likes it when he actually faces a challenge in the projectile area.
"Ah, then something else we have in common." Zevran chuckles. "I did not have what you would call much of a choice in the matter, but I suppose it was better than the alternative. Though we do not have open enrollment, as it were. The Guild is rather particular about that."
The Crows buy their recruits. Buy them young, and bring them up to know nothing but murder. Some suggest that the ones who don't survive the training may be the luckier lot.
The elf grins at Sam's comment. "We might have been, were it not for that fortuitous breeze," he says, though he winks as he does so. He can admit fault, or error, though it's rarely with words. "I shall look forward to our rematch, whether it be with darts or knives or whatever you'd like. But come, let me make good on my debt to you."
Zevran also enjoys a good challenge, and on the rare occasions someone is actually skilled enough to beat him (rather than try to do so by cheating), well. He's impressed.
Sam shrugs. "Most of the people who think it a glamorous profession, rather than something you have to work at, don't survive the first year. And very few people come in quite as young as I did." Especially with the Guild very nearly rebuilding itself from scratch, at the moment. Cata suspects it'll be a few years yet before they're prepared for younger students, and Sam is inclined to agree. "Very well. And perhaps knives, sometime. There are some rather nice targets outside." And it makes for a somewhat more interesting competition.
Zevran seems to consider that for a moment. He's not used to people thinking that being an assassin is a particularly glamorous occupation. In Antiva, you are either an assassin and thus an owned man with no illusions about the life, or know exactly what they are capable of as professionals -- and try to avoid unwanted business "meetings."
"We consider it to be a mindset, as much as a skill set, and I suppose they consider young minds to be more... malleable."
Or like unset jellies, able to be molded into a specific form.
"But, I leave that to the Masters. That sort of thinking is why they get the lion's share, yes?" He laughs. "And I would enjoy using knives, next time. From what I understand, the bar will not provide such things and I will need to bring my own. But that is all right, it always pays to practice with one's own equipment before you need to use it purposefully."
"It is a mind set as well, I completely agree. But it's one you need to choose, more often than not." Much like you need to choose to take the opposite path, and not have it forced upon you. (Why, no, Sam doesn't have issues along those lines, whatever would give you that idea?) Sam snorts, at the comment about equipment. "Indeed it does. I could work with the serving equipment the Bar provides, but for a contest of skill, it would be better not to."
There is little place in Zevran's life for mercy. He had it taught, cut, beaten, and burned out of him from childhood. You do not show a target mercy, you do not spare them. You are deaf to their pleas. You give them the cleanest death you can, but there is no avoiding that outcome. You harden your heart against emotion and kill coolly and without passion. Money is your only motivation. The kill is your purpose for living, you take life to give meaning to your own. Your friends are simply targets you don't have a contract for yet.
Even so, he recognizes those unrelated occasions when mercy and compassion have their place, at least in the hands of others. But he personally knows little about how to show them to others, and even less about how to receive them.
His second dart follows Sam's, again sinking in almost on top of the red one. The blue set also looks as if it's been around the block a few times, though perhaps not quite so bad off. In any case, hitting the open expanse of a bulls-eye is easy. He's enjoying the challenge of aiming for a much tighter target, a skill that's infinitely useful when armor is involved.
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It's complicated. And he knows Cata would love to have a few words with Mizzamir on the subject of whitewashing, provided the wizard wasn't in any position to do anything.
The center of the dartboard's getting rather crowded, at this rate; when the contest is this obvious, Sam sees no reason to feign being terrible with projectiles. This particular dart has a tendency to veer to the left; fortunately, there's still room on the left edge of the bullseye.
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And it provides a growth opportunity for those who do have the constitution.
The elf runs his fingertips lightly over the dart he's preparing to throw, assessing it for any irregularities, before sighting and letting it go. It pulls a bit more to the right than he'd anticipated, and doesn't land as close as he'd like to Sam's last throw, though it does at least bury itself in the bullseye.
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Sam can certainly understand that, considering how near he came to that blasted spell.
His last dart, fortunately, requires a bit less concentration than the others; it's in remarkably good shape, compared to the rest of its set. So he turns around and tosses it over his shoulder, just because he can.
...If they keep hitting bullseyes, they could well be here all night.
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Zevran squints briefly at the board, and lets his final dart go. Unlike Sam, however, he's not preternaturally good. He's just almost that good, his talents having developed out of a natural elven dexterity combined with years of practice.
He's going to blame that last throw on a current of air, if asked. It snuggles up next to Sam's last shot easily enough, but this one lands just outside of the bullseye, pressed tightly against the metal but not inside it. More than good enough were he throwing tiny blades tipped with lethal poison, but for the purposes of this particular game...
The elf frowns for a moment, and then suddenly he's all smiles and laughter again.
"And it would seem that I am buying. Though if you would consent to another game at some point, I would not mind the opportunity for a comeback."
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Sam grins, after the elf's last shot. "I was beginning to wonder if we'd be here all night. I dare say I could see my way to another game sometime."
He likes it when he actually faces a challenge in the projectile area.
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The Crows buy their recruits. Buy them young, and bring them up to know nothing but murder. Some suggest that the ones who don't survive the training may be the luckier lot.
The elf grins at Sam's comment. "We might have been, were it not for that fortuitous breeze," he says, though he winks as he does so. He can admit fault, or error, though it's rarely with words. "I shall look forward to our rematch, whether it be with darts or knives or whatever you'd like. But come, let me make good on my debt to you."
Zevran also enjoys a good challenge, and on the rare occasions someone is actually skilled enough to beat him (rather than try to do so by cheating), well. He's impressed.
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Especially with the Guild very nearly rebuilding itself from scratch, at the moment. Cata suspects it'll be a few years yet before they're prepared for younger students, and Sam is inclined to agree.
"Very well. And perhaps knives, sometime. There are some rather nice targets outside."
And it makes for a somewhat more interesting competition.
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"We consider it to be a mindset, as much as a skill set, and I suppose they consider young minds to be more... malleable."
Or like unset jellies, able to be molded into a specific form.
"But, I leave that to the Masters. That sort of thinking is why they get the lion's share, yes?" He laughs. "And I would enjoy using knives, next time. From what I understand, the bar will not provide such things and I will need to bring my own. But that is all right, it always pays to practice with one's own equipment before you need to use it purposefully."
That was probably meant to be a double entendre.
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(Why, no, Sam doesn't have issues along those lines, whatever would give you that idea?)
Sam snorts, at the comment about equipment. "Indeed it does. I could work with the serving equipment the Bar provides, but for a contest of skill, it would be better not to."
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