Gauntlgrym (52 page)

Dahlia had not come down. She remained up high, hand grasping the top end of the planted eight-foot staff, feet kicking out repeatedly, unpredictably, and wildly at her enemies. Even when they managed to get a shield in her path, she merely stomped her foot on it and used it to maintain the high ground.

And Drizzt started shooting under her, his arrows clipping under the upraised shield of one, tearing through the creature’s torso, and blasting clean through the shield of the one beside it.

Dahlia let out a cry and kicked hard against a shield, throwing herself backward as spears arced up at her from behind the nearest row of creatures. She came down in a controlled roll beside Drizzt, her eyes wide.

“Just run!” she told him, and before he could ask her why, she scampered away toward the room.

Another arrow flashed away, and another, and Drizzt had to fall into the alcove to avoid a wall of thrown spears. He came right back to shoot some more, though, thinking to cover Dahlia’s retreat, but when he popped back out, he saw the ranks of his enemies thinned, salamanders diving aside and pressing against the wall to clear a path.

And Drizzt saw what Dahlia had seen from up high, and the same thought,
just run
, came screaming to mind.

“Two!” Bruenor announced, sliding the second bowl deep into its alcove and shutting the placard after it. From behind the metal door they heard the rush of water as the elemental tapped into the tendrils of the Hosttower. The dwarf nodded in satisfaction, and declared, “Two o’ ten!”

“Be quick, and lead on,” Jarlaxle bade him, words that hardly seemed necessary given the ruckus in the corridor just beyond the broken door. All three—Bruenor, Jarlaxle, and Athrogate—turned and looked that way, then, to see Dahlia diving into the room in a soaring somersault. She planted her staff just to the side as she rolled farther in, and pushed off, throwing herself out the other way, away from the three onlookers.

“What—?” was all Bruenor managed to say before a great rush of flames poured through the door with a dark form, Drizzt, within them, being carried along by the sheer force of the blast.

The drow landed in a short run as the flames dissipated, and looked to his friends, wisps of smoke rising from his cloak, Taulmaril in one hand, Icingdeath in the other, glowing fiercely.

“Oh, joy,” Drizzt deadpanned. “They have a dragon.”

Bruenor’s eyes went wide, as did his mouth, as did Athrogate’s features as well, and both let out a howl and ran off for the back side of the room, Dahlia angling to join them.

Jarlaxle put another lightning bolt into the open doorway for good measure, and wisely launched another magical glob into the opening as well, thinking to slow the pursuit. That sticky substance caught a trio of flying spears as an added benefit.

“Two elementals in place,” Jarlaxle assured Drizzt when the pair came together, bringing up the rear of the retreat. “Eight more and we’re nearly done!”

Drizzt didn’t glance back, focusing instead on Bruenor, who stood in the exit at the far end of the room, ready to slam the heavy door.

“You heard me when I told you they have a dragon,” the drow replied, and he shook his head and glanced back.

“Not a large one!” the other drow replied.

Drizzt was still shaking his head as they passed by Bruenor, who slammed the heavy stone door behind them. Nearby stood Athrogate, a heavy iron locking bar in hand, and the two dwarves had the portal quickly secured.

“I seen cooked cow, I seen cooked sow,” Athrogate sang, “Now thinking for sure that I’d be seein’ cooked drow! But ye don’t smell roasted and ye don’t look toasted, and it’s making me ask meself, ‘How, now, drow?’ Bwahaha!”

“A fine question, if asked stupidly,” Jarlaxle concurred as the troupe started swiftly away.

Drizzt didn’t answer. He sprinted out in front of the other four, taking up the point, slinging Taulmaril over his shoulder as he went and drawing out his second scimitar.

“Damned good blade,” Bruenor explained to the other three a short while later.

“Icingdeath …” Jarlaxle realized, catching on.

“Damned sword kept the flames away?” Athrogate asked.

“Carried it once, as I rode a burning dragon,” Bruenor remarked.

“A burnin’ dragon?” Athrogate asked, at the same time Jarlaxle fell a stride behind and silently mouthed the exact same three words.

“Aye, cooked it meself.”

The drow mercenary could only smile then and shake his head, knowing better than to disbelieve any of the outrageous stories those two old adventurers, Drizzt Do’Urden and Bruenor Battlehammer, might tell.

His grin disappeared as he looked ahead to Drizzt, though, seeing even in the way the drow moved the edge that had come to him. Drizzt had often seemed the carefree fighter, enjoying the battle, and Jarlaxle couldn’t deny the charm of that. But whatever remained of that carefree attitude had changed, and not subtly. Perhaps it was barely discernable to one who did not know the truth of Drizzt Do’Urden, but for Jarlaxle in particular, the change glared at him. He excused himself from the dwarves and Dahlia and quick-stepped far ahead to catch up to Drizzt.

“One battle after another,” he remarked.

Drizzt nodded and seemed bothered not at all.

“But all worth it because of the good we might accomplish here, yes?” Jarlaxle added.

Drizzt looked at him as if he was insane, and replied, “I have spent half a century in search of this place, for the sake of my friend.”

“And you care not that our work here may save a city?”

Drizzt shrugged. “Have you been to Luskan lately?”

Jarlaxle shook that comment off and asked, “Would you have come here if not for Bruenor?”

A flash of anger spiked in Drizzt’s eyes, and Jarlaxle didn’t wait for an answer. He charged into Drizzt, grabbing him by the front of his leather vest and driving him back up against the wall.

“Damn you to Lolth’s webs!” he said. “Don’t you dare pretend it doesn’t matter to you!”

“Why do you care?” Drizzt growled back at him, and he reached up to pull Jarlaxle’s hands aside—but so angry was Jarlaxle that he growled through that attempt and pressed all the harder.

“No one who has ever made a difference?” he asked, his face barely an inch from Drizzt’s.

Drizzt stared at him.

“That is what you said, back in the Cutlass. How you described yourself to me. ‘No one who has ever made a difference.’ ” Jarlaxle closed his eyes and finally let go, stepping back. “Do you believe that?” he asked more calmly.

“What do you want from me, son of Baenre?”

“Just the truth—your truth. You believe that you have never made a difference?”

“Perhaps there is no difference to be made,” Drizzt replied, and he seemed to be spitting every word.

“None permanent, you mean.”

Drizzt considered that for a moment, then nodded his acceptance of the caveat.

“Because they all die anyway?” Jarlaxle went on. “Catti-brie? Regis?”

Drizzt snorted and shook his head, and started off down the corridor, but Jarlaxle caught him by the shoulder and pushed him back against the wall, and so full of anger was Jarlaxle’s face that Drizzt’s hand went to the hilt of his scimitar.

“Do not ever say that,” Jarlaxle said to him, spittle flying with every word.

Drizzt’s hands came up inside Jarlaxle’s grasp, and as the mercenary began to loosen his grip, Drizzt shoved him back.

“Why do you care?” Drizzt asked.

“Because you were the one who escaped,” Jarlaxle replied.

Drizzt looked at him as though he had no idea what Jarlaxle could possibly be talking about.

“Don’t you understand?” Jarlaxle went on. “I watched you—we all watched you. Whenever a matron mother, or almost any female of Menzoberranzan was about, we spoke your name with vitriol, promising to avenge Lolth and kill you.”

“You’ve had your chance at that.”

Jarlaxle went on as if Drizzt had said nothing. “But whenever they were not around, the name of Drizzt Do’Urden was spoken with jealousy, often reverence. You do not understand, do you? You don’t even recognize the difference you’ve made to so many of us in Menzoberranzan.”

“How? Why?”

“Because you were the one who escaped!”

“You are here with me!” Drizzt argued. “Are you bound to the City of Spiders by anything more than your own designs? By Bregan D’aerthe?”

“I’m not talking about the city, you obstinate fool,” Jarlaxle replied, his voice lowering.

Again Drizzt looked at him, at a loss.

“The heritage,” Jarlaxle explained. His voice lowered still as they heard the approach of the others. “The fate.”

PARALLEL PASSAGEWAYS

G
REAT COLUMNS LINED THE HALL, EVENLY SPACED IN THREE LONG ROWS
. Each was, in itself, a work of art, a product of the labors of a hundred dwarf craftsmen. Each column was uniquely decorated, personally touched and carved with great love. Even the centuries of dust that had settled there couldn’t hide the majesty of the place. Walking through it, the five companions, particularly Bruenor and Athrogate, could well imagine the gatherings that had once been held there. The awakening of the primordial had caused considerable damage, but much of the glory that had once been Gauntlgrym remained intact. They had passed through dozens of chambers and along many stairways and corridors, with doors that opened into mansions and cellars, workshops and kitchens, dining halls and training rooms. Gauntlgrym had, before the escape of the primordial, been larger than Mithral Hall, Citadel Adbar, and Citadel Felbarr combined—a glorious homeland for Clan Delzoun.

“I lost me count,” Bruenor announced when they were nearly halfway through the vast chamber. Hands on hips, he stared at the metal placard on the nearest column and shook his head.

“Twenty-three,” Drizzt said, and all eyes turned to the drow. “That is the twenty-third plate in the hall.”

He said it with such certainty, and with Drizzt being ever reliable, no one doubted him, but all heads turned back the way they’d come, astonished to realize that they had passed so many of the giant columns. Indeed, the chamber was vast, with a ceiling out of sight in the shadows above.

Bruenor shook his head, looked left and right, then turned and pointed to the center column next in line. “Middle plate, two dozen in,” he announced,
and he walked up to the plate with all confidence—both in the knowledge he had gained from the magical throne, and in Drizzt’s count—and grasped its edge, easily pulling it open and revealing the alcove behind, which was different from the previous six, both shallower and higher. Bruenor stuck his head in and glanced up, and in the distance far above, likely at the apex of the column itself, he saw a familiar green glow.

“Tendril,” he remarked triumphantly.

In went the bowl, the seventh of ten, and Jarlaxle moved up and handed him a vial. With the appropriate incantation, Bruenor emptied the magical water into the bowl and watched the swirl as the elemental took shape.

Almost immediately, the tendril’s magic grabbed it.

“No others in this hall,” Bruenor announced, closing the placard door. “Next one’s south.”

“Onward, then,” said Dahlia, moving past him, but Bruenor was quick to correct her.

“South,” he explained. “That’s to the left.”

Dahlia shrugged helplessly, and the dwarves and Jarlaxle led the way to a door at the side of the room, while Drizzt fell in with Dahlia.

“How can he know?” Dahlia asked.

“The throne, somehow …” Drizzt replied.

“Not the layout of the complex,” Dahlia clarified. “How can he—how can any of you—know which way is south, and which north?”

Drizzt smiled at her and nodded. He would have answered, if he knew the answer. Creatures of the Underdark just knew such things, felt them innately.

“Perhaps it is the pull of the heavenly bodies above,” he offered. “As the sun and moon cross the sky, perhaps their energy is felt even down here.”

“I don’t feel it,” the elf replied with a sour look.

Drizzt grinned wider. “When you are above and wish to determine the direction, how do you do it?”

Dahlia looked at him with a wrinkled brow.