The Companions

by R. A. Salvatore

  I wanted to remake the Companions of the Hall. More than anything in all the world, I wanted to know again the level of friendship and trust—honest and deep, to the heart and to the soul—that I had known for those years with my dearest friends. The world can never brighten for me until I have found that, and yet I fear that what I once knew was unique, derived of circumstances I cannot replicate.

  In joining with Entreri and the others, I tried to salve that wound and recreate the joy of my life.

  But in considering the new band of adventurers, there entails the inevitable comparison, and in that, all that I have accomplished is to rip the scab from the unhealed wound.

  I find that I am lonelier than ever before.

  —Drizzt Do’Urden

  CHAPTER 22

  CAIRN FOR A KING

  The Year of the Tasked Weasel (1483 DR) Neverwinter

  I NEVER KNEW A DWARF WHO WOULDN’T COME OUT FOR A FEST ON PAYDAY,” Jelvus Grinch said to the promising young Neverwinter guard. “Went out two tendays ago,” the dwarf answered. “And sure that I’ll be goin’ again soon enough. Ye ain’t for taking it personal, are ye?”

  The aging citizen of Neverwinter smiled warmly. “Not to any son of Bonnego Battleaxe,” he replied, wearing a wistful look for days long past. Jelvus Grinch had long ago been the de facto leader of the city, the First Citizen, battle hardened. All of the hardy settlers fighting for the fledgling city in those dangerous days had looked to him for guidance.

  Now Jelvus had been given a minor position, out of courtesy, it seemed. General Sabine was in charge of all the many sellswords hired on to protect the city, but she allowed Jelvus to handle a few of them, though just a few. It was a gesture of respect and nothing more, Bruenor had quickly realized upon coming into Neverwinter, but at least it was something.

  Humans were so quick to lift up their heroes, and just as quick to toss them aside to make way for new ones.

  “Not to any whose family is naming Drizzt Do’Urden as a friend,” Jelvus Grinch went on, nodding.

  “Aye, me Da spoke o’ that one often. Strange fellow, I be hearin’.”

  “Unique,” Jelvus Grinch corrected.

  “Ye e’er seen him about?” asked Bruenor, who had come into Neverwinter early in the year of 1483, utilizing the same alias he had in his previous visit to the region. When he and Drizzt had come this way in search of Gauntlgrym decades earlier, Bruenor had traveled under the same name, Bonnego Battleaxe, as now, except that now he was claiming to be the progeny, Bonnego, son of Bonnego.

  “Drizzt?” Jelvus Grinch asked. “No, no, and there’s been word that he’s no more to be found anywhere.”

  “What do ye know?” Bruenor asked past the lump in his throat.

  “No one has heard from Drizzt in many years, so it is told,” said Jelvus Grinch. “Though many have searched for him. Strange characters,” he added with a chuckle. “Another drow elf—I don’t remember his name, but quite the extraordinary figure! That one seemed quite anxious to find him, as I recall.”

  “Eye patch?” Bruenor asked.

  Jelvus Grinch looked at him curiously for a moment. “Yes.”

  “Jarlaxle,” said Bruenor. “Me Da’s telled me much o’ that one. Strange dogs, them drow, and ye never can trust ’em.”

  “Not true of Drizzt,” Jelvus Grinch was quick to reply. “By all accounts, there have been none of any race with a greater claim of loyalty.”

  Bruenor couldn’t help but wince, stung by the reminder. Stung and shamed, given his present course and intentions.

  “Here’s hopin’ that one’s still about,” Bruenor replied. He took his tenday pay from Jelvus Grinch and dropped the coins into a belt pouch. He gave the pouch a lift, feeling its heft, and nodded as he walked away, confident that he had sufficient funds now to close the deal.

  The city of Neverwinter had still not fully recovered from the devastation of the volcanic eruption four decades previous. The area down near the river and the Winged Wyvern Bridge had been rebuilt and was thriving, but beyond the new walls there remained many ruins of the old city. Every night, lights would be spotted out there, among the ruins, as honest travelers and rogues alike took refuge in the unclaimed skeletons of houses long dead.

  And every night, Bruenor was up on the wall, spying out those ruins, looking to one building in particular for signs of inhabitation. The night before, he had seen firelight in the empty window, and so it was again this night, the appointed night.

  The dwarf went out from the wall, making his way through the desolate boulevards and past the black and empty portals. He knew that many eyes were upon him, from vermin to highwayman to innocent traveler and more. But he was known as a formal mercenary tied to the the Neverwinter garrison, and he carried an axe over his shoulder with practiced ease. Indeed, the frustrated and angry dwarf would almost welcome an ambush.

  He made his way to the appointed building, paused before the broken doorway, and gave three sharp whistles. He didn’t even wait for the appropriate response, which came as he crossed the threshold into the place. Down the corridor and through a makeshift door, he found his associates, a pair of men, halfling and human, and an elf lass.

  “Ah, but there’s young Bonnego with our coin,” said the human, Deventry, a thin man with a sharp face and a full beard marked by several angry scars. “Mayhaps we’ll be sleeping in a proper inn this night!”

  “Waste of coin,” said Vestra, the elf. She wore a green hooded cloak, much like the one Drizzt used to wear, Bruenor recalled. Her long blonde hair was gathered in the hood, all in a tangle, and her delicate features showed the dirt of the road. But still, she was a pretty thing, Bruenor thought, at least for those who considered the lithe elves attractive.

  “My back aches,” Deventry argued. “One night in a bed, I say.”

  “Sharing the sheets with lice, no doubt,” Vestra replied with a chortle.

  Deventry waved her to silence. “Twenty pieces of gold, then,” he said to Bruenor.

  “When I see the map, ye’ll be seein’ the gold.”

  Deventry smiled and nodded to the third of the group, the halfling they called Whisper, so named because, as far as Bruenor could tell at least, he never said a word.

  Whisper produced a scroll tube while Deventry brushed aside the plates and remains of their recent meal, clearing a spot between the three.

  “There’s your map, as ordered,” Deventry said, helping Whisper unroll it.

  Bruenor bent low, but the man leaned over to block his view. “Thinking to put it in your mind for free, are you?” Deventry scolded. “We spent half the summer building it, and on good faith!”

  “Good faith and twenty pieces o’ gold already,” Bruenor reminded. “And no, don’t ye fear, I ain’t for puttin’ the whole of it in me head. Now move aside, for there’s one or two things that’ll tell me the truth of it, and when I see them where they should be, ye’ll get yer coin.”

  Deventry looked to Vestra, who nodded. He slid back from over the map.

  Bruenor noted immediately the rocky dell, and how that sent his thoughts careening back through the years. Drizzt and Dahlia had fought a rearguard action there against Ashmadai zealots, while Bruenor, Athrogate, and Jarlaxle—an unlikely trio!—had found the vale and the cave that had led them to the Underdark and Gauntlgrym. The dwarf’s scan of the map widened; it all seemed to fit together properly.

  “Ye found the stony ravine,” he said.

  “Aye,” Deventry replied.

  “And what was beyond it, to the east?”

  Deventry looked at him curiously, then glanced at Whisper, who pointed to the map.

  “A wide dell,” Vestra answered.

  “Full o’ rocks?”

  “Aye, and full of caves.”

  Bruenor nodded and couldn’t contain his grin. His scouts had succeeded. They had found the entrance to Gauntlgrym. He reached into his pouch and pulled forth a handful of assorted coins and sifted through them, counting out twenty pie
ces of gold, which was, in truth, the vast majority of his wealth. Indeed, when he removed the payment, he had only one remaining gold piece in his pouch, along with handful of silver and coppers.

  He reached forth toward Deventry, who moved to take the coins, but Bruenor didn’t immediately let go. He locked stares with the man, weighing his options here, then offered, “More for ye if ye take me there.”

  He handed the coins to the man, then glanced at all three alternately.

  “Take you there and leave you?” Vestra asked.

  Bruenor considered the possibilities before him. The journey to the caves might be perilous, and the journey into the Underdark even more so. Did he dare reveal the entrance to wondrous Gauntlgrym to these three?

  He smiled and nodded as he considered the ghosts within the ancient city. Stokely Silverstream might even be in there now, he mused, along with a hundred dwarves from Icewind Dale—though none in Mithral Hall had known anything of Gauntlgrym other than the old tale of a battle when Bruenor had inquired of it in his time there.

  Still, the dwarf understood that many had crossed into the place, no doubt. The Ashmadai zealots knew of it, surely, as did Stokely and his boys.

  “Mayhaps,” he answered Vestra. “Or follow me into the tunnels. Ye’ll find the journey worth yer time, don’t ye doubt.”

  “Fifty gold to take you,” said Deventry.

  “Ye’ll get ten and not a copper more,” Bruenor replied, and he wished that he actually had ten to give! He couldn’t wait for the next tenday and next payday to pass, though.

  “Twenty or nothing,” said Deventry.

  Bruenor shrugged and retrieved the purchased map, rolling it back into the scroll tube and tucking it away inside his vest. “Then nothing,” he said, and he turned and walked out.

  “Ten, then!” Deventry called after him.

  Bruenor didn’t turn around. “Northwest gate at sunrise,” he said, then he departed. He had to find Durham Shaw, Captain of the Wall, and resign his commission. His time in Neverwinter was at its end, with Gauntlgrym before him and Mithral Hall after that.

  King Bruenor Battlehammer had a war to fight.

  The night breeze carried on it the unmistakable chill of late summer, a reminder to Bruenor that his window for traveling back to the Silver Marches was quickly closing. He wondered if he might go to Baldur’s Gate or Waterdeep instead, and employ a wizard to use a teleportation spell upon him. Or perhaps he could find a powerful enchantress to make him a flying chariot of living fire.

  The dwarf shook his head at the notion, remembering all too well the last time he had tried something like that.

  “Well, are you to share your insights, or will you just sit there grumbling the rest of the evening?” Vestra asked.

  “Eh?” Bruenor replied, caught by surprise, so deep was he in contemplation. He looked around at the campfire and the two sitting across from him. “Where’s the little rat, then?”

  “Scouting the road ahead,” Deventry replied.

  “Whisper thinks there’s a quicker way to the valley of caves,” added Vestra. “How much quicker?” Bruenor replied.

  “Getting a bit anxious, are you?” asked Deventry. “Our pay’s the same, whether it’s a tenday or a two-day!”

  “I got me a long road ahead,” Bruenor replied quietly. “And when we find what we’re looking for, ye’ll come to understand. Ye might even be wantin’ to go along on me next journey.” He nodded as he spoke, working through the possibilities. If he could get to Mirabar, some two hundred miles to the north, but along well-marked and fairly stable roads, he would find allies, powerful ones including a sizable number of dwarves. Once he revealed his true identity to them, the winter’s snows wouldn’t stop them in crossing the Lurkwood to Mithral Hall.

  “I’m here for your coin and nothing more,” Deventry reminded, in a tone that was also reminding Bruenor that he didn’t much care for this aggressive lout. But the dwarf quickly suppressed his personal feelings toward the man. The mission was more important. He was alone out here, other than these three, and good help was hard to find in these wild lands.

  “I’m bettin’ ye’ll be changin’ yer mind,” he replied, but casually, and with a wide grin. “But if not, then know that me coin’s more than ye could e’er carry.”

  “Quite a hint,” Vestra remarked.

  “Get me to the valley of the caves, and follow me down a tunnel for a couple o’ days, and ye’ll understand, elf,” Bruenor replied, nodding.

  “Down a tunnel?” Vestra replied, seeming none-too-thrilled with the prospect.

  “Didn’t sign up for any of that,” Deventry remarked.

  Bruenor merely closed his eyes, smiled, and began to whistle a little tune, mentally reciting the words to the old song, one dwarves sang of lost lands and deep mines and treasures piled high.

  When he awoke the next morning, he found all three of his companions gathered together, the halfling scraping in the dirt with his dagger.

  “What’d he find?” Bruenor asked.

  “The caves … today,” Vestra replied.

  Off they went, cutting around the south side of a hill, then across a wide vale. The flat-topped mountain loomed in the distance to the north, the sight of it taking Bruenor back across the years, to the eruption of the volcano and the destruction of Neverwinter. That event was seared into his memory, across two lifetimes now, and he could picture it again as if it had happened only the day before.

  Whisper led them at a great pace. They broke for a very short midday meal and set off again through the forest. Bruenor didn’t know where they were, specifically, for nothing seemed familiar, and he finally grasped it when they came through a line of trees to the southern edge of the rocky valley.

  Bruenor scanned the rim, nodding as he noted, far to the northwest, the approach he had taken on his last journey to this place.

  “Well?” Deventry prompted.

  The dwarf studied the valley walls, trying to picture them from the vantage point across the way. “That one,” he decided, pointing to one of the many cave openings visible from this angle.

  “You said for us to take you to the valley, and now we have,” Deventry replied, holding out his hand.

  “Don’t ye be a fool, boy,” said Bruenor. “Come along and hear me tale, and see a sight that’ll change yer life.”

  “Ten pieces of gold,” demanded Deventry.

  Bruenor nodded his hairy chin toward the distant cave. “I’ll double it,” he said. “Double it for each of ye.”

  “What, twenty pieces of gold for each?” asked Vestra. “You pay up, Bonnego!” Deventry demanded.

  “Sixty I just promised, and if ye knew me real name, ye’d know it ain’t but a pittance,” Bruenor answered with a chuckle, and he started away, leaving his three companions looking from one to the other.

  Deventry grabbed the departing dwarf roughly by the shoulder and yanked him around. “Ten!” he demanded.

  As he turned, Bruenor rolled his arm and shoulder up high, bringing it up and over Deventry’s reaching arm and down suddenly to lock the man’s wrist in his armpit. The dwarf turned and twisted fast, pulling his shoulder back, yanking Deventry into a forward lunge that crashed him up against Bruenor, who didn’t budge a step.

  With his free hand, Deventry reached for his short sword, but Bruenor was quicker, grabbing him by the front of his tunic and giving him a good shake. The dwarf thrust out his arm with surprising strength, throwing Deventry back a few steps—a few steps that took him over the lip of the valley. Overbalanced, the man couldn’t hold his footing, and he tumbled to the ground and rolled down the grassy slope.

  “Offer’s still there,” Bruenor called back, marching off for the cave entrance. The other two would hold Deventry back and talk some sense into him, Bruenor believed. And if he was wrong, he’d just lay the fool low with his axe and carry on alone.

  He found out just a few moments later that he wasn’t wrong.

  “What is that place
?” Vestra asked breathlessly, staring across the small underground pond to the worked wall of what appeared to be a castle. A castle underground! They were in a large hall, illuminated in a greenish tint by strange glowing lichen. Natural pillars liberally pocked the large cavern, many with worked railings winding up around them. Sprouting mostly along the pond’s edge, giant mushrooms completed the strange scene, the orange underside of the huge caps catching, amplifying, and distorting the lichen glow.

  “Home o’ the Delzoun dwarves,” Bruenor explained.

  “Your kin are in there?” asked the elf.

  “Might be some or might be empty. And might be that we won’t be goin’ deep enough to know. What I’m wanting’s just beyond that open door.”

  Bruenor hoisted his axe and made for a nearby mushroom. A few swings felled it, and the dwarf began to sever the huge circular cap.

  “He’s making a raft,” Vestra explained to her cohorts.

  “Ye’re welcome to come in if ye’re wantin’, or might that ye’ll stay out here. I’ll not be long.”

  Whisper was already by his side, helping to hollow out the mushroom cap, and from that action and the look on the halfling’s face, Bruenor knew that he wouldn’t be going into the complex alone.

  Indeed, all four entered together, though it took three trips to ferry them all across the dark water.

  Bruenor led the way, but his pace slowed considerably as he crossed the threshold to Gauntlgrym, his every step weighted by solemn and powerful memories. Vestra carried a torch behind him and his shadow reached out before him, wobbling in the flickering light, and somehow, that insubstantial dancing shadow seemed appropriate to him, as ethereal and unreal as this entire adventure. The burden on his shoulders only increased as they moved along the entry corridor and into the grand audience hall of Gauntlgrym. To the right, upon the dais, rested the throne of Gauntlgrym, the seat that had magically, but temporarily, imbued upon Bruenor the leadership of Moradin, the insight of Dumathoin, and the strength of Clangeddin in his battle with the balor Errtu. He remembered that vividly now, the ultimate victory to put the fire primordial back in its watery cage.