August 31, 3043

We were going to go in, but got sidetracked by the kenku, who invited us to their city, to their elder, to be insulted. I would have none of it, so I'm out here with Simon while the others meekly allow themselves to be treated like dirt. It seems that everyone is furious at me for not allowing myself to be treated like shit, without the minimum of manners I accord to the boy who sweeps my steps, the street urchins who offer to watch my carriage for me. Hah! I have refused to allow paladin-kings, archmages, and dragons treat me with disrespect; I'm hardly about to let some jumped-up canary treat me discourteously! If the others want to bow their neck to a master's foot, let them—I've spent my entire life fighting to be respected, and I'm not going to stop now, no matter how it infuriates the rest of the Company.

I think the others are fools. Simon's the only one who refuses to take shit from others. For some reason, nobody cares when he turns his back on idiots; I'm not sure what it means, that everyone expects me to kiss ass and ask for more. I suppose it's all tied to the same thing that drives them to ignore my advice when I give it (but oh, how they nod and praise the next person who says the same thing I'd said half an hour earlier!)—the same thing that drives them to doubt my ability to negotiate a political thicket that would have torn any one of them to shreds years ago—the same thing that drives them to mock my intelligence, my spellcasting ability, my combat ability, and every damn thing else about me. Well, to hell with them. I don't fucking need their approval—I don't need their friendship. If I have to do this alone, I will—and while they're letting others mistreat them, I'll be the only one standing on my own two feet and fighting back, for their sakes as well as mine. Callous may accept being kicked in the face—but I'll be the one who kills FluidStreamer for him, so that nobody dares do it again. Danny may accept his flogging—but I'll be the one who rips through the political bullshit until I can demand that it never happen again. And the whole damn Company can keep sneering at me and playing bottom of the pecking order with that pompous feather duster, but in the end, I know who'll be the one who guides them in the right direction when they're lost, who'll end up defending them or die trying. And to hell with them all, if they never realize, if they sneer and scoff at me all my life. It makes no difference to me if they never realize that I do it—that I push back whenever someone pushes me first—simply because I care about them.

Hell, it's late—we have to meet with PainDealer in a few more hours, and I've hardly gotten any sleep at all.

On the night of the 11th, Simon and Laurie finally returned. I really don't know what exactly they did in the kenku village, but they precipitated a disaster! They came back with the kenku priestesses' diaries, and her contract with Ovog. She was a conjurer!—and she sent in Sin'je'nu—whom I think was the cloaker—to the Paraelemental Plane of Ice to talk to the rakshasa (who had been here before her) and arrange to reopen the portal in exchange for his services. Then she hired Ovog to guard the portal and make sure that the rakshasa was the only one who used it, "to maintain the balance between the planes" (i.e., to prevent a bunch of ice-elementaloids running amok through her back yard).

So, as usual, it turns out that I was correct to suspect her, and that for all that the rest of the Company lectured me on and on about the "important" information they'd gotten from her, that information was nothing more than a few canny political predictions that any astute scholar of warfare could have formulated and that they were so busy LISTENING TO her bullshit they never learned that she was behind the whole sequence of events that we had been sent to investigate! Why, why, why won't anyone ever listen to me? Dammit, I've been adventuring for 12 years, and I have never been wrong about a hunch. Period. When I have a gut feeling about someone, it is virtually always right! Now, I admit that I have on occasion failed to suspect someone who was betraying us. I admit that I've been duped, that I've sometimes failed completely. But ... once I have a gut feeling about someone, it is never wrong. It's one of the skills that's made me a skilled political player—a certain reliable intuition. So why won't anyone ever listen to me? Why am I ignored, told to be quiet, told that I'm whining, told that I'm just being paranoid? All I want to do is carve out a place for myself and my friends where we can be safe, comfortable, respected. Why won't anyone listen to me when I offer advice toward that end? Do they just not notice, finally, that I'd been right from the beginning? If I pointed it out to them, would they finally begin to listen to me? Or shall I really work my ring of invisibility and scarf of nondetection into my crest? Maybe I'll just have a blank crest, to signify the fact that everyone ignores me.

Hell. Anyway, the kenku priestess—shapechanged into a cloud dragon—and a small army of her people eventually came after us, I assume as soon as she realized the books had been stolen. Around midnight or so, I think. We gathered everything up when it became clear that someone had cast a "call lightning" or "control weather"—or both—(another druid! I am also right about druids)—and Nicholas teleported us directly to Ovog's chamber.

Well, we teleported high, but Tyr was looking out for us, because fortunately the chamber's ceiling was also high, and we weren't killed. We had Akalina put the priestess off, and called Urie, who offered us that standard deal of three favors. The first was to have him locate the rakshasa while I read more of the diaries and the others rememorized. Ovog was a little taken aback by the malik's presence, but as it was, he'd gotten orders to let us through the portal as a result of something that Simon and Laurie had said to the priestess! (Today I made a point of thanking Simon for his good work in the kenku village—they really facilitated things. Must be sure to mention this to Laurie, too.)

Urie returned, Torg "napped" us, we rememorized for battle, and used our second favor to have Urie transport us to the rakshasa. He had some sort of icy house in the Paraelemental Plane of Ice, and was shapechanged as a criosphinx, surrounded by ice devils and mephits and the like.

Well, the group was mostly "hasted" times 2, and we attacked—and when the group was done, I captured the rakshasa in SkinEater's soulgem. One more minute to wreak some random damage on the bone devils that the ice devil "gated" in, and then we regrouped and used our third favor to ask Urie to return us to Ovog's chamber, which he did. We took our leave of the genie with many thanks, teleported back to our first campsite, waited for Akalina to rejoin us, and then contacted SkinEater and teleported back to him (he has a circle that permits without-error-type portation; I wonder if that can be etched permanently on a site? It would be useful to have such a thing in the house!).

SkinEater took the gem and diaries and we had a bit of time to eat and drink before riding home. As it was, he invited me to ride back in his carriage (the rest followed later, on horses he provided), which I did, filling him in on how the expedition had gone and so on ... nothing too important, really. Had dinner with him, then decided to drop by Danny's briefly, since tomorrow we meet with PainDealer and he'll get saddled with paperwork again. It was late, especially given our on-the-road diurnal schedules, so he was getting ready for bed, which was no inconvenience....

I did steal a few minutes to talk to him about PainDealer. Danny doesn't think PainDealer's going to have any grounds for punishing any of us on this mission, but I told him that if PainDealer tried, I was going to register a formal complaint to a military tribunal, and if he did, I would kill him right there. Danny started to argue, but I told him quite simply that I wasn't going to stand by and see him flogged again, at which he shut up long enough to think of some other subject to scold me for, which in this case was the kenku affair. I tried to explain, but as usual it was useless, so finally I just told him that if he disapproved of me so much he should just kick me out of bed and stop seeing me. Of course, that didn't work either, just got me an exasperated sigh and a long lecture about the nature of love ... I really haven't the faintest idea what he sees in me, sometimes, for all the scolding I get from him.

His birthday's coming up. Assuming that our debriefing doesn't end disastrously, I'm trying to decide whether or not to have a party or keep it quiet, maybe just a dinner with the Company. Probably the latter, though eventually I'd like to dust off the ballroom. I don't have any idea what to get him for a present. What I'd like to do would be to ask him to marry me ... but I don't dare.

Finally left, came home, woke up Nicholas, who'd been sleeping in a chair, and sent him off to bed. I don't think he's still mad at me, but it's hard to tell. It's been about two weeks, and the last few days have felt a little more like normal. (If I can use "normal" for any of my interactions with Nic, which are as unpredictable as the weather in monsoon season.) Suppose I'll have to wait. When he starts lecturing me, too, then I'll know he's feeling better.

And now, it's late ... or rather, early. I suppose that technically it's the 13th now, but I needed to write and unwind a bit. I'll just put on some black tea for breakfast before our debriefing session. I've got to get prepared, have the right spells to hand. I really mean it, about PainDealer. My Company was brilliant, this last mission. By every rational prediction, we should have failed and been slaughtered to a man. Instead, we completed the job in record time. Okay, it didn't all go smoothly, but our missions never go by without some discord ... you just can't put seven men together under life-or-death circumstances for days on end and expect things to go harmoniously. Tempers fray. The point is, we manage to succeed despite that ... and even, usually, remain friends afterwards. That's our strength. And dammit, PainDealer's not going to touch any one of us, not even Torg or Cassia, or I'll kick up a fuss that will be heard in the palace throneroom itself! This is my Company ... I'm the one who convinced them to join the military, and I'm personally responsible for their treatment in the military ... and PainDealer isn't going to mess with us!