I punched him lightly on the arm.
“Remember when I said he has a knack for gettin’ into trouble? Well, the truth is that more often than not he’s bailin’ someone else out who really deserves to get what’s comin’ to ‘em. In that Hemlock caper I was just tellin’ you about, he could have headed for the horizon once he figured out that he’d been had . . . but that would have left a whole kingdom without a leader, so he stuck it out. When I met him, he was workin’ at gettin’ Tananda loose after she got pinched tryin’ ta steal a birthday present for Aahz. Heck, as I recall, the first time we crossed paths with you we were settin’ up a jailbreak for his old mentor. That’s Skeeve, if ya see what I mean. He’s always gettin’ in over his head tryin’ ta do what he thinks is right, and a body gets the feelin’ … I don’t know, that if you stand beside him he just might be able to pull it off. Even if it don’t work out, you feel you’ve been doin’ somethin’ good with your life instead of just hangin’ in there for the old number one. Am I makin’ any sense at all?”
“More than you know,” Vie said. “If I’m understanding you properly, he sets a high personal standard, and consequently draws people to him who are impressed by the sincerity of his actions . . . who in turn try to match the proportionate output they perceive in him. It’s an interesting theory. I’ll have to think about it.”
I couldn’t help but notice that once old Fangs got wrapped up in somethin’, he started soundin’ more like a college prof than a night-lovin’ partygoer. It made me a little curious, but since I don’t like people tryin’ to peek at more of me than I’m willin’ to show, I decided to let it go.