Errant Spades

Like any thieves guild, the Errant Spades exist for profit, however, the motivations of the Spades are deeply intertwined with that of the Dark Dagger and it's objective of bringing all the disparate elements of the criminal world of the surface under the protection and dominion of Vhaerun. Many of the goals of the Errant Spades have been realized with the final destruction of the only temple to Mask in the city in the winter of the Year of the Staff (1366 DR). The revised goals of the guild have expanded to absorb or destroy all remaining competitors in the underworld of Eltabbar and then all of Thay.

{{note|text=The references to certain people should be consolidated. Create one page for each person, then point all links to that page. If necessary, use the reference [[PersonsName#SectionName]] to refer to a subsection of that page describing the particular facet or cover identity.}}

The guild as it exists today is merely the latest incarnation of a thieves guild that was born two centuries ago in distant Chondath. It was originally the reformed remnants of a once powerful mercantile company and criminal cartel that held a virtually monopoly on trade and crime in the city of Arrabar for nearly twenty years. The powerful magic of the guild allowed it to maintain a stranglehold on the noble houses of Arrabar through ruthless and oppressive blackmail until the powerful diviner who served as guild master was slain by assassins in the Year of the Pointed Bone (1298 DR). The survivors of the guild's collapse and subsequent dismemberment fled the coast of Chondath, eventually arriving in Eltabbar under the direction Nalio Ortunata, one of the last original lieutenants in the Year of the Starfall (1300 DR). For the next thirty seven years, the guild struggled to make a name for itself in the cutthroat criminal politics of the Thayan underworld. One of the last acts of the aging guildmaster Ortunata was to sell the guild's faltering cover business, the Five Fine Fish Mercantile and Trading Coster to Abruin Greyshade, a young Mulan/Chondathan business looking to invest an inheritance in the trading business. Unfortunately for Ortunata, his naive young investor wasn't everything he seemed to be.

Unknown to Nalio, the power and authority of his guild lost in Chondath over a generation prior had been subsumed by House Timerakis, a semi-legitimate noble estate of Arrabar once under the thumb of the corrupt Spades. The youngest generation of the Timerakis, chafing under the degradation of the blackmailing of their house, had once employed the assassins that brought down the old diviner, unknowing that thirty years later, they would be under the control of those very same assassins. Control of House Timerakis had been subsumed by the drow of the Dark Dagger. The young investor that arrived in Eltabbar the spring of the Year of the Wandering Maiden (1337 DR) was in fact a drow agent of the Dark Dagger and House Timerakis, sent by his parent guild to complete the destruction of the old Spades by assassinating the last lieutenant, Nalio Ortunata. In the effective tradition of his cult however, he remained after completing his mission, thus did Masoj Naerth assume control of the Errant Spades in the name of the Dark Dagger.

While maintaining control of the Five Fine Fish Mercantile and encouraging the prosperity of the guild's cover business, Masoj spent several years consolidating his power base within the struggling thieves guild. While not exactly weak, the guild's position in the streets of Eltabbar was tenuous at best. Competition was fierce in the underworld of Thay's capitol, with no less than a dozen rival guilds, companies, or gangs all battling for the best turf and resources. Additionally, the young cleric assassin planned on introducing the worship of his "Masked Lord" to the thieves under his nominal control, religion of any kind being a somewhat difficult sell for a group of self reliant gangsters. The religious goals of the guildmaster were further complicated by the presence of the Ghostrunners, an already established guild of thieves controlled by the clergy of Mask in the city. The Ghostrunners held the majority of power and influence among the criminals in Eltabbar, enforcing the peace through intimidation and bribery. Masoj determined that the way to break into the city's underworld elite while at the same time eroding the power of the Ghostrunners was to thin the competition through assassination and violence.

For the next twenty years, on and off, the canals of Eltabbar ran red with blood. The Errant Spades all but disappeared into the woodwork, but the actions of Masoj ruthlessly pitted one guild against the other while secretly hindering the efforts of the Ghostrunners to enforce the peace. More than one Lord Mayor rose on the platform of stopping the violence and fell just as quickly when he couldn't control the actions of the rapidly rising and falling stars of the individual gangs. Over time, the turmoil in the underworld began to bring the attentions of the nobility, the merchant's associations, and finally even the office of the Tharchion Abraxes Halk himself down upon the chaos seething in the back alleys of the capitol. It was commanded that peace be achieved, lest the wrath of the Red Wizards themselves fall upon the heads of the factions. Accordingly, a seemingly neutral party was chosen to arbitrate a truce between what was left of the underworld of Eltabbar. That man was Abruin Greyshade, guildmaster of the completely inoffensive Errant Spades guild of petty thieves and burglars, but one which had remained largely intact and apart from the internecine squabbles of the past twenty years. When the arbitration took place in the Year of the Prince (1357 DR), the most powerful remaining guilds in the city were the Ghostrunners, who had suffered some severe losses in territory, manpower, and prestige, the Sons of Yeenoghu, a cutthroat pack of the escaped and manumitted gnoll slaves who claimed the highest body count, the Night Eyes, a tight knit group of mostly blackmailers and extortionists, and the Errant Spades. It was decided there that the remaining smaller thieves guilds would be absorbed by coercion or guile into the remaining four powerful factions, and that a moratorium on violence would be enforced by the will of the Tharchion for a period of no less than fifteen years. Any group that acted violence upon any other would be met with the combined strength of the remaining three.

Less than a year later, in the Year of Shadows (1358 DR) when the gods were thrown down to the mortal realms, the Ghostrunners were subjected to the final indignity as their priesthood suddenly lost all magic and potency. The guild was quickly riven by internal struggles, splitting and fracturing along at least three lines. The violence provoked the remaining three guilds to quickly attack and devour the stragglers, leaving only the weakened priestly core of the guild in hiding. The Ghostrunners experienced a brief resurgence in the following years, and if fact, under charismatic new leadership, seemed to be drawing converts from shadows themselves. In the Year of the Sword (1365 DR), Albruin Greyshade announced his retirement, handing over the reigns of leadership of the guild to Muhmad Haphet, a Mulhorandi hiresword who managed to prove himself in the violence of the Time of Troubles. He coupled his retirement from the guild with his retirement from the running of the mercantile, and this, he left to this son, Rylaun Greyshade, who had recently come to Eltabbar from his mother's house in Arrabar. In reality, the power of both businesses was transfered to Rylauntyrr Zauvirr Veladorn, a fellow acolyte of Vhaerun and servant of the Dark Dagger. That winter, the old man departed Thay to live out his golden years in Arrabar.

Rylaunn faced almost immediate threats to his and Muhmad's leadership of the guild with an aggressively resurgent church of Mask and the Ghostrunners seeking to reclaim their authority and power. The next year, the Year of the Staff (1366 DR) would see the end of the church of Mask and the end of the Ghostrunners. Working with and through the Night Eyes and with his own not inconsiderable resourcefulness, Rylaunn carefully engineered the delivery of evidence (most of it entirely factual) to the up and coming Dmitra Flass called the "First Princess of Thay", indicting the office of the Tharchion Abraxes Halk with deep collusion with the Ghostrunners during the so-called Dark Years of violence that had gripped the city. On the "Night of the Rising Blades", mid-winter of 1366, Eltabbar witnessed the simultaneous attack on both the Palace of the Tharchion by the forces of the Princess and the storming of the old Armory building that served as the temple of Mask and headquarters of the Ghostrunners. On that night alone, it is estimated (in private) that the blood toll from both engagements neared one hundred dead. By the dawn, the Armory was ablaze with a black fire that did not spread and resisted all attempts to put it out, the leadership and worshippers of Mask perished. The Princess was equally successful, capturing the Tharchion in the midst of "further acts of disgrace and debauchery which have tarnished the office for the last forty years". The old man would stand trial, broken and, by all accounts, no longer of sound mind. He would perish by his own hand before his execution before the people.

For the last nine years, Rylaunn has built a powerful collection of informants and contacts in every level of the government. He has established an uneasy truce with the Sons of Yeenoghu and has begun making inroads in building an alliance with the Night Eyes. Most importantly, he has all but finished the work of his predecessor Masoj in converting the mostly secular thieves guild into a force of devoted adherents to the tenets of the "Masked Lord". If he can destroy the demon worshiping gnolls, it is likely that the final force in the underworld with join with him, and the Errant Spades and Night Eyes will control all of crime in Eltabbar.

To the outward appearance of the guild at large, leadership of the Errant Spades has passed to Muhmad Haphet, a maimed and scarred veteran scoundrel from the streets of Skuld. In actuality, full control of the guild has passed into the hands of the Dark Dagger in the person of Silent Sable of Vhaerun, Rylaun Greyshade. Only Muhmad and the two other chief lieutenants of the guild (the Queen, and One-Eyed Jack), understand the true leadership of the guild is in the hands of the mysterious Ace of Spades (the Silent Sable in the guise of Rylaun Greyshade, a wealthy Chondathan heir and dilettante). Only Muhmad himself understands the true nature of the guild’s employer, the two men having passed through a number of trials and dark days together before coming to Eltabbar.