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"I don't know."

"You said that someone pointed him in your direction."

"Aye." Jherek felt as though the room was closing in on him.

"And Madame Iitaar, whom you respect and love, told you there was a destiny ahead of you."

Jherek sat quietly and still, wanting only to deny everything the old bard said.

"Look at your whole life, my boy. Have you ever raised a hand against another with malice in your heart?"

Jherek thought back to the bar fight in Athkatla. "Aye. Against Aysel from Breezerunner's crew."

"The man who insulted Sabyna's honor?" Pacys smiled. "Why, Jherek, I could expect nothing less from such as you."

"Such as me? What do you think I am?"

Pacys shook his head. "It's not what I think," he said. "When you needed the astrolabe from the diviner at the Pirate Isles and you were asked what you believed in, what was your answer?"

"Love," Jherek whispered, looking at Sabyna and feeling like he was about to fall apart. He grew angry with the bard for speaking in such a circumspect way.

"How can you believe in love after the way you were brought up?"

"Because it was shown to me by Madame Iitaar and Malorrie, then by old Finaren, captain of Butterfly."

"A phantom with a geas laid on him?" Pacys asked. "A lonely widow woman who could use a strong back and a pair of hands around her house to fix it up? A ship's captain who let you go once it was discovered you were one of Bloody Falkane's claimed? What could these people know of love? How can you trust their motives?"

Jherek shook his head. "Say what you will, but they loved me when no one else did."

"And you gave them love back."

"Aye," the young sailor said, "all that I had. Only to be driven from them."

"For a reason," Pacys said softly "There were things you had to learn!" He glanced at Sabyna and said, "Perhaps a new love to be found."

"Only to have those taken from me because I was cursed the day I was born?"

"I've seen the love Glawinn has for you," Pacys said. "The man has laid his life on the line for you."

"He was only serving Lathander, who guided him to help save the disk I pridefully took in Baldur's Gate."

"You were meant to have that disk."

"I didn't have it, and it was used to kill all those people on the Whamite Isles."

"Perhaps they were forfeit anyway," Pacys said. "So the best was done that could be, and the disk saw you to that sword."

"It's not mine."

"Yet I've been told no hand may comfortably hold it but yours."

Jherek couldn't argue; it was true. Others in Azla's crew tried to hold the sword but none of them could do it, or even wanted to, for any length of time.

"The Great Whale Bard sought you out and gave you a gift."

Jherek looked at the old bard and said, "All these things you say are true, but I can't make any sense of them." "They were a path, my boy," Pacys said softly. "A path that led you here, to this time and this place." "To do what?"

"What you were born to do. Battle the Taker." Jherek couldn't help it; he laughed. The sound was bitter and insane and rude, but he couldn't help himself.

Fatigue and pain had broken down his self-discipline, made it impossible to keep all those feelings to himself. "It is your fate," Pacys said. "Even the whales told you so."

"Don't you see?" Jherek asked. "It's a mistake. Another part of that ill luck that has followed me. It's just my misfortune, and yours, that you're here wasting your time when you should be with this hero you're looking for."

"You've already faced the Taker once," Pacys said, "in the caverns. You wounded him, survived his attempt to kill you with the buckler given to you by the Great Whale Bard. Iakhovas is the Taker."

"He was just a mage."

"No."

The firm denial shook Jherek, brought him back under control a little. He sobered and looked at the bard. "What you're saying is impossible," he insisted.

"What I'm saying," Pacys stated, "could be no other way. You are the champion that these times call for."

"I'm a sailor."

"And more."

Jherek shook his head.

"It's true," Pacys said. "Every step you