The queen assigned you this mission personally. Unfortunately, she also assigned one other thing: her favorite knight. You will only be allowed to leave the city in his presence. You won't be allowed back in without him. In fact, if you show up without him, the only place offering you free admittance will be the afterlife. You agreed to this condition because, well, frankly, because you had a whole bunch of crossbows being pointed at your neck.Oh, and then there's the thing she didn't assign. Money.
Why is this important, other than for your happy financial survival? Because her favorite knight is A. broke B. weaponless C. armorless and D. due to A, not going to personally do anything about B and C. Apparently he got robbed last week. By a gang of preschoolers. Who made him cry.
And you can't hope to survive this stupid mission -- which requires him doing the same -- if you spend your whole time guarding his unarmored flank.
So you sigh. You explain to the knight that this is a loan. Several times, because he's a little slow. And then you head to the merchants and empty your purse on equipping this fool. The best magical armor -- better than what you've got. Weapons which switch themselves and drag the arms behind them. Alertness spells. Regeneration potions. Anything which might ensure this idiot gets through the mission intact. It costs every cent you have, but that's okay: if you live, you'll collect all the surviving stuff and sell it back. At best, you'll get three-quarters of your money because that's how the economy works, but you'll be alive and sort of funded again.
The mission proceeds. You manage to get the idiot through it, mostly by stepping in front of every sword blow which he can't be bothered to dodge. Aching, bleeding, and with no regeneration potions of your own, you stagger up to the city gates with the knight trailing in your wake. The gates open for you, and you step through.
The queen's guards immediately close in, surround the knight, lift him up to their shoulders, and carry him away for the personal you-are-not-invited parade while singing his praises to the skies. And you never see him again, because the preemptive restraining order the queen had written out prevents you from getting close enough to get a bead.
You're thrown out of the city. The songs which the bards were commissioned to compose for the knight follow you for three miles. You're broke. You've been lied to. You will never be able to convince anyone of the truth -- anyone except the fellow adventurer you meet two towns down the road. The one who had the same thing happen to her three weeks before you got there.
Turns out that idiot gets robbed a lot. And since taking money out of the treasury to reequip him would eventually bankrupt the realm...
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/SoLongAndThanksForAllTheGear
It was around this time that you first began considering that alignment change.