Focus. "Hello, miss Starshine. I... wanted to clear up a few things, since you seem to have taken away a poor impression of our party."

Ironic, maybe, but not really surprising when you're a demon.

Ugh, first Roy and now these guys?

"It's nothing personal," she lies, "it's just that adding more people to a group means that everyone's share of the treasure goes down. And since we're doubling our group, that means that each of us will be taking home half as much as we would have initially."

Also, your girlfriend is obviously an evil skank.

"Oh! I can't speak for my whole party, but I'm not actually here for the monetary gain and neither is Sabine, our wealth is beyond excessive for our level; do you think your leader would accept us contributing our shares to your own? I don't want you to feel shortchanged. Literally."

...that's going to make her more suspicious...

"I really want this to go well," he confesses. "I... have a personal stake, in our parties getting along as well as we can. So I'm trying to offer an olive branch, not a bribe. Unless you want a bribe, in which case I'll bribe you."

Well, now Haley has a jumble of intensely mixed feelings.

On the one hand, it's really gratifying to be openly offered a bribe! Like, technically that was the Thieves' Guild's entire business model, but there's a difference between seeking out protection money and being proactively offered it.

On the other hand, appealing offers coming from shady people just make the shady people seem even more shady.

And next to these two feelings, there's…

Well, it kinda stings, actually, for Roy to respond to her concerns with "treasure isn't important" and "that's because you have trust issues" and for these Linear Guild guys to listen to her!

"I… would totally like a bribe," she admits. "What's the 'personal stake'? I mean—"

She shakes her head.

"You've gotta see how suspicious this whole thing is, right? The way your party is so weirdly similar to ours? It would make zero sense if it was just random chance! Which… I guess it sounds like you just said it isn't. So I guess, besides the money, I wanna know what your angle is."

(Not that she expects to hear the whole truth, or anything like that. But hey, the sanitized version is better than what angle, we don't have an angle!)

"Can you keep a secret?" he asks. "It's really not much of one, and it's going to be less of one soon, but. Your Elan. He's... my brother. But I never got to know him, and he never got to know me. And I think we both suffered for it. So I came up with this big, elaborate, stupid plan... the weirdly similar party composition was an actual coincidence. Hilgya's a recent hire, but Yikyik and Zz'dtri I've known for years, and Thog and Sabine have been with me since I was a snot-nosed little bastard."

He sighs. "And I was going to... I don't know. Adventure under the pretense that the Talisman of Dorukan is all we wanted, isn't it a funny coincidence we got here at the same time. But that's dumb. I want my cards on the table."

As many of them as he can safely show.

"I want to meet my brother. And I want to get it right."

(Sabine knows she shouldn't be pressing Haley's obvious buttons, but she also can't resist pecking Nale's cheek at the snot-nosed little bastard comment. Sue her, he's cute!)

…Elan and Nale do look, not to put too fine a point on it, exactly the freakin' same. And there's the name thing. And… she can't say that it sounds completely outlandish that someone related to Elan would, rather than immediately laying all their cards on the table, concoct some Wile E Coyote-ass plan about it.

(Elan himself would probably put his cards on the table. But if he thought it would work best as a fun surprise…)

A lot of the wind has been knocked out of her sails by Nale being so straightforward and… sensible. She can tell he understands why instinctively trusting people is a bad move. It doesn't make him trustworthy, but it makes him… something.

"Okay, well. I guess that makes sense. Just don't…"

She's not sure she actually knows what she wants to say. She wants to say something protective, maybe even overprotective, but what if that made Elan freak out? She hasn't even told him how she feels; what right does she have to tell his brother not to break his heart?

"Well, you said it yourself. You better make sure you get it right."

"Also, it's your job to convince Roy that I didn't twist your arm into bribing me or giving up your share of the treasure!"

"Oh, I could make you regret giving me that kind of leeway. It's a dowry for my brother, I could say, and then where would you be."

Furious blushing!!

"Okay, well, he. He wouldn't believe me if I told him that you said that you're already so rich you don't care about the treasure so we might as well take your share!"

"I'm not going to actually make you regret it. ...Sabine might," he nudges her teasingly, "but I'm Lawful and she isn't. And I'm party leader, and she isn't. So you're safe."

Liiiittle nudge towards thinking of Sabine as personally similar, similarly long-suffering, not just attractive and threatening... some people would call it manipulative, but the things he's saying are literally true and he isn't even using any magic so those people can shove it.

If she had her tail out she'd flick it playfully! As-is she just winks.

"Mostly safe," she adds, not just to tease Haley but to help Nale's assurance not come across as insincere.

Yeah, Haley's experienced in rogue-to-rogue communication. She snorts.

She's starting to feel… itchy. It's probably all this standing around.

"I guess you probably wanna talk tactics with Roy, then. And… also talk to Elan."

It's probably gonna be fine. And if it isn't, she can say I told you so for the rest of the adventure.

"Yes, probably."

He retrieves and hands over a pouch of platinum pieces.

"The bribe I mentioned. If you still want it."

"Hell yeah I still want it!"

Opening the pouch to count out its contents, she goes off so she can see if Belkar and the kobold have stabbed each other yet.

They'd better Goddamn not.

He sees if he can find Roy. He feels somewhat buoyed, by that having gone so well.

Roy's standing near the dwarves; while Nale, Sabine, and Haley were talking, Hilgya broke out a deck of cards.

"Hey there," he says when he notices Nale approach. "Did you guys get everything cleared up?"

"...yes. We needed to clear up that... I was deceiving you, about the reason we seek the Amulet. Our king is not good and noble. Nor is he a king. He's a despot and a madman, and he sits comfortably behind the throne, not in it. I thought the Amulet would aid us in seeking his overthrow, and... as a Lawful man myself, I knew you would not be entirely comfortable. But it is far less comfortable to found this endeavor on lies."

Huh.

"Okay, just so I've got this straight: there's a puppetmaster evil advisor type back home that you want to overthrow, and he sent you to get Dorukan's talisman or amulet or whatever, and you were… going to help him but changed your mind? Or does he not even know about this magic item and you were trying to keep quiet about it before you got to know us?"

"He's got no idea, no."

...that's not a lie, even if the only reason is that Tarquin doesn't give enough of a damn to check.

"I thought that lawfully carrying out the orders of a Good king sounded better than plotting to overthrow an Evil vizier and his puppet-ruler. But I realized abruptly that lying wasn't going to work; it might get us the Amulet, but you'd know the whole thing was under false pretenses, and the possibility of getting your actual help outweighs your use as... well, not to put too fine a point on it, pit trap fodder."

Snort.

"I mean, politics isn't really my thing, but it seems to me that toppling dictators shouldn't make you less Lawful just because you live in their country."

Honestly, this is a breath of fresh air compared to the way Roy's old adventuring party dealt with people. He doesn't know what Haley was…

Okay, Nale did just tell him that he had lied to him. And Haley has better Sense Motive than Roy. But he's literally clearing it up right now!

"Thanks for letting us know. I don't think that should affect the plan to team up. Speaking of which, do you already have a strategy in mind? Pretty much all I know about this dungeon is that Xykon's throne room is here."

"Yes. There are three... sub-dungeons, I suppose... tied to Earth, Air, and Fire. The Water dungeon never made it past the planning stage, for reasons obvious to anyone who's worked with subcontracted architects. There's a rune at the end of each, and if all three runes are pressed within a minute of each other, they'll open up into the Talisman's chamber. From which you can progress down towards Xykon, and I can send... someone, probably Hilgya and Yikyik... to the surface with the horde of slavering beasts the artifact allows them to control."

Roy nods.

"That sounds simple enough! Although… Hilgya's your cleric, right? Xykon's a powerful necromancer; it might be useful to have double the clerical power when we face him."

Beat.

"Also, I don't think I knew about the horde of slavering beasts."

"Ah. Yes, the Talisman commands some powerful monsters, which I intend to levy against m- the vizier. I'll speak to Hilgya about staying on; technically her contract only extends through the conclusion of our quest, but the extension clause is reasonable, and I certainly can't argue with your logic."