Everyone dreams, indeed, at night. But there are two types of dreamers, those who dream at night and those we dream in the day. Those night-dreamers, they do not overly concern me because there is nowhere for them to rise. But those who dream by day . . . those, are the troublesome ones. Daydreamers alone are truly alive. For daydreamers alone find perspective in existence and seek ways to rise above the course of simple survival. Control is not the facilitation of fancy, it is the fear of fancy. Equate dreaming with fancy. Dreams are made in the heart and filtered through the rational mind. The daydreamers aspire to mastery of all they survey.

“Do you ever dream, my friend?” Jarlaxle asked.

“Everyone dreams,” Entreri replied. “Or so I am told. I expect that I do, though I hardly care to remember them.”

“Not night dreams, the drow explained. “Everyone dreams, indeed, at night. Even the elves in our Reverie find dream states and visions. But there are two types of dreamers, my friend, those who dream at night and those we dream in the day.”

He had Entreri’s attention.

“Those night-dreamers,” Jarlaxle went on, “they do not overly concern me because there is nowhere for them to rise. But those who dream by day . . . those, my friend, are the troublesome ones.”

“Could Jarlaxle not consider himself among that lot?”

“Would I hold any credibility at all if I did not admit my troublesome nature?”

“Not with me.”

“There you have it then,” said the drow.

He paused and looked to the west, and Entreri did to, watching the sun slip lower.

“I know another secret about daydreamers,” Jarlaxle said at length.

“Pay tell,” came the assassin’s less-than-enthusiastic reply.

“Daydreamers alone are truly alive,” Jarlaxle explained. He looked back at Entreri, who matched his stare. “For daydreamers alone find perspective in existence and seek ways to rise above the course of simple survival.”

Entreri didn’t blink.

“You do daydream,” Jarlaxle decided. “But only on those rare occasions your dedication to . . . to what, I often wonder? . . . allows you outside your perfect discipline.”

“Perhaps that dedication to perfect discipline is my dream.”

“No,” the drow replied without hesitation “No. Control is not the facilitation of fancy, my friend, it is the fear of fancy.”

“You equate dreaming and fancy then?”

“Of course! Dreams are made in the heart and filtered through the rational mind. Without the heart . . .”

“Control?”

“And only that. A pity, I say.”

“I do not ask for your pity, Jarlaxle.”

“The daydreamers aspire to mastery of all they survey, of course.”

Promise of the Witch King – R. A. Salvatore