Sea of Swords pod-4

by Robert Salvatore

  “Come,” Drizzt bade the halfling. “We will catch up with our friends, or they with us, in due time.” He started away to the south, staying as near to the edge of the gorge as he safely could.

  They heard the ogre posse pass beneath them soon after, and Drizzt veered back to the edge, then moved down a bit farther and went right over, picking his way down a less steep part of the ravine.

  Regis huffed and puffed and worked hard but somehow managed to keep up. Soon, the halfling and the drow were standing on the floor of the gorge, the posse far away to the north, the mound that housed the main complex just to the south and with the cave opening quite apparent.

  “Are you ready?” Drizzt asked Regis.

  The halfling swallowed hard, not so thrilled about moving off with the dangerous Drizzt alone. He far preferred having Bruenor and Wulfgar standing strong before him and having Catti-brie covering him with that deadly bow of hers, but it was obvious that Drizzt wasn't about to let this opportunity to get right inside the enemies' lair go by.

  “Lead on,” Regis heard himself saying, though he could hardly believe the words as they came out of his mouth.

  * * * * * * * * * * * * *

  The four leaders of Sheila Kree's band all came out of their rooms together, hearing the shouts from below and from outside the mound complex.

  “Chogurugga dispatched a group to investigate,” Bellany informed the others. The sorceress's room faced north, the direction of the tumult, and included a door to the outside landing.

  “Ye go and do the same,” Sheila Kree told her. “Get yer scrying pool up and see what's coming against us.”

  “I heard yells about a white worm,” the sorceress replied.

  Sheila Kree shook her head, her fiery red hair flying wildly. “Too convenient,” she muttered as she ran out of the room and down the curving, sloping passage leading to Chogurugga and Bloog's chamber, with Jule Pepper right behind her.

  Le'lorinel made no move, though, just stood in the corridor, nodding knowingly.

  “Is it the drow?” Bellany asked.

  The elf smiled and retreated back into the private room, shutting the door.

  Standing alone in the common area, Bellany just shook her head and took a deep breath and considered the possibilities if it turned out to be Drizzt Do'Urden and the Companions of the Hall who were now coming against them. The sorceress hoped it was indeed a white worm that had caused the commotion, whatever the cost of driving the monster away.

  She went back into her chamber and set up for some divining spells, thinking to look out over the troubled area to the north and to look in on Morik, just to check on where his loyalties might truly lie.

  * * * * * * * * * * * *

  A few moments later, Le'lorinel slipped back out and headed down the same way Sheila and Jule had gone.

  Chogurugga's chamber was in complete chaos, with the ogress's two large attendants rushing around, strapping on armor pieces and hoisting heavy weapons. Chogurugga stood quietly on the side of the room in front of an opened wardrobe, its shelves filled with potion bottles. Chogurugga mulled them over one at a time, pocketing some and separating the others into two bunches.

  At the back of the room, Bloog remained in the hammock, the ogre's huge legs hanging over, one on either side. If Bloog was the slightest bit worried by the commotion, the lazy brute didn't show it.

  Le'lorinel went to him. “He will find you,” the elf warned. “It was foreseen that the drow would come for the warhammer.”

  “Drow?” the big ogre asked. “No damn drow. White worm.”

  “Perhaps,” Le'lorinel replied with a shrug and a look that told Bloog implicitly that the elf hardly believed all the commotion was being caused by such a creature as that.

  “Drow?” the ogre asked, and Bloog suddenly seemed a bit less cock-sure.

  “He will find you.”

  “Bloog crunch him down!” the ogre shouted, rising, or at least trying to, though the movement nearly spilled him out of the unsteady hammock. “No take Bloog's new hammer! Crunch him down!”

  “Crunch who?” Chogurugga called from across the way, and the ogress scowled, seeing Le'lorinel close to Bloog.

  “Not as easy as that, mighty Bloog,” the elf explained, pointedly taking no note of ugly Chogurugga. “Come, my friend. I will show you how to best defeat the dark elf.”

  Bloog looked from Le'lorinel to his scowling mate, then back to the delicate elf. With an expression that told Le'lorinel he was as interested in angering Chogurugga as he was in learning what he might about the drow, the giant ogre pulled himself out of the hammock and hoisted Aegis-fang to his shoulder. The mighty weapon was dwarfed by the creature's sheer bulk and muscle that it looked more like a carpenter's hammer.

  With a final glance to Chogurugga, just to make sure the volatile ogress wasn't preparing a charge, Le'lorinel led Bloog out of the room and back up the ramp, going to the northern end of the next level and knocking hard on Bellany's door.

  “What is he doing up here?” the sorceress asked when she answered the knock a few minutes later. “Sheila would not approve.”

  “What have you learned?” Le'lorinel asked.

  A cloud passed over Bellany's face. “More than a white worm,” she confirmed. “I have seen a dwarf and a large man moving close to our position, running hard.”

  “Bruenor Battlehammer and Wulfgar, likely,” Le'lorinel replied. “What of the drow?”

  Bellany shrugged and shook her head.

  “If they have come, then so has Drizzt Do'Urden,” Le'lorinel insisted. “The fight out there is likely a diversion. Look closer!”

  Bellany scowled at the elf, but Le'lorinel didn't back down.

  “Drizzt Do'Urden might already be in the complex,” the elf added.

  That took the anger off of Bellany's face, and she moved back into her room and shut the door. A moment later, Le'lorinel heard her casting a spell and watched with a smile as the wood on Bellany's door seemed to swell a bit, fitting the portal tightly into the jamb.

  Fighting hard not to laugh out loud, as much on the edge of nerves as ever before, Le'lorinel motioned for Bloog to follow and moved to a different door.

  * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

  Regis put his cherubic face up against the stone and didn't dare to breathe. He heard the rumble of the next pair of brutes, along with the snarl of a more human voice, as they came past his and Drizzt's position, heading up the gorge to check on their companions.

  The halfling took some comfort in the fact that Drizzt was hiding right beside him—until he managed to turn his face that way to find that the drow was gone.

  Panic welled in Regis. He could heard the cursing trio of enemies right behind him.

  “Too bloody cold to be chasin' shadows!” the human snarled.

  “Big wormie,” said one of the ogres.

  “And that makes it better?” the human asked sarcastically. “Leave the ugly thing alone, and it'll slither away!”

  “Big worm killeded Bonko!” the other ogre said indignantly.

  The human started to respond—likely to dismiss the importance of a dead ogre, Regis realized, but apparently he thought the better of it and just cursed under his breath.

  They went right past the halfling's position, and if they'd come any closer, they surely would have brushed right against Regis's rear end.

  The halfling didn't breathe easier until their voices had faded considerably, and still he stood there in the shadows, hugging the wall.

  “Regis,” came a whisper, and he looked up to see Drizzt on a ledge above him. “Come along and be quick. It's clear into the cave.”

  Mustering all the courage he could find, the halfling scrambled up, taking the drow's offered hand. The pair skittered along the thin ridge, behind a wall of blocking boulders to the corner of the large cave.

  Drizzt peeked around, then skittered in, pulling Regis along behind him.

  The cave narrowed into a tunnel soon after, ru
nning level and branching in two or three places. The air was smoky, with torches lining the walls at irregular intervals, their dancing flames illuminating the place with wildly elongating and shrinking shadows.

  “This way,” Regis said, slipping past the drow at one fork, and moving down to the left. He tried to recall everything Robillard had told him about the place, for the wizard had done a thorough scan of the area and had even found his way up into the complex a bit.

  The ground sloped down in some places, up in others, though the pair were generally descending. They came through darker rooms where there was no torchlight, and other chambers filled with stalagmites breaking up the trail, and with stalactites leering down at them threateningly from above. Many shelves lined the walls, rolling back to marvelous rock formations or with sheets of water-smoothed rock that seemed to be flowing. Many smaller tunnels ran off at every conceivable angle.

  Soon Regis slowed, the sound of guttural voices becoming audible ahead of them. The halfling turned on Drizzt, an alarmed expression on his face. He pointed ahead emphatically, to where the corridor circled left and back to the right, ascending gradually.

  Drizzt caught the signal and motioned for Regis to wait a moment, then slipped ahead into the shadows, moving with such grace, speed, and silence that Regis blinked many times, wondering if his friend had just simply disappeared. As soon as his amazement diminished, though, the halfling remembered where he was and took note of the fact that he was now alone. He quickly skittered into the shadows off to the side.

  The drow returned a short while later, to Regis's profound relief, and with a smile that showed he had found the desired area. Drizzt led him around a bend and up a short incline, then up a few steps that were part natural, part carved, into a chamber that widened off to the left along a broken, rocky plateau about chest high to the drow.

  The voices were much closer now, just up ahead and around the next bend. Drizzt leaped up to the left, then reached back and pulled Regis up beside him.

  “Lots of loose stone,” the drow quietly explained. “Take great care.”

  They inched across the wider area, staying as tight to the wall as possible until they came to one area cleared of stony debris. Drizzt bent down against the wall there and stuck his hand into a small alcove, pulling it back out and rubbing his fingers together.

  Regis nodded knowingly. Ash. This was a natural chimney, the one Robillard had described to him on the flight back to the friends, the one he had subsequently described to Drizzt.

  The drow went in first, bending his body perfectly to slide up the narrow hole. Before he could even consider the course before him, before he could even pause to muster his courage, Regis heard the sound of many voices moving along the corridor back behind him.

  In he went, into the absolute darkness, sliding his hands and finding holds, blindly propelling himself up behind the drow.

  For Drizzt, it was suddenly as if he were back in the Underdark, back in the realm of the hunter, were all his senses had to be on the very edge of perfection if he was to have any chance of survival. He heard so many sounds then: the distant dripping of water; a grating of stone on stone; shouts from below and in the distance, leaking through cracks in the stone. He could feel that noise in his sensitive fingertips as he continued his climb, slowing only because he understood that Regis couldn't possibly keep up. Drizzt, a creature of the Underdark where natural chutes were common, where even a halfling's fine night vision would be perfectly useless, could move up this narrow chute as quickly as Regis could trot through a starlit meadow.

  The drow marveled in the texture of the stone, feeling the life of this mound, once teeming with rushing water. The smoothness of the edges made the ascent more comfortable, and the walls were uneven enough so that the smoothness didn't much adversely affect climbing.

  He moved along, silently, alertly.

  “Drizzt,” he heard whispered below, and he understood that Regis had come to an impasse.

  The drow backed down, finally lowering his leg so that Regis could grab on.

  “I should have stayed with the others,” the halfling whispered when he at last got over the troublesome rise.

  “Nonsense,” the drow answered. “Feel the life of the mountain about you. We will find a way to be useful to our friends here, perhaps pivotal.”

  “We do not even know if the fight will come in here.”

  “Even if it does not, our enemies will not expect us in here, behind them. Come along.”

  And so they went, higher and higher inside the mountain. Soon they heard the booming voices of huge humanoids, growing louder and louder as they ascended.

  A short, slightly descending tunnel branched off the chute, with some heat rising, and the booming voices coming in loud and clear with it.

  Drizzt waited for Regis to get up level with him in this wider area, then he moved along the side passage, coming to an opening above the low-burning embers of a wide hearth.

  The opening of that hearth was somewhat higher than the bottom of the angling tunnel, so Drizzt could see into the huge room beyond, where three ogres, one an exotic, violet-skinned female, were rushing around, strapping on belts and testing weapons.

  To the side of the room, Drizzt clearly marked another well-worn passage, sloping upward. The drow backed up to where Regis was waiting.

  “Up,” he whispered.

  He paused and pulled off his waterskin, wetted the top of his shirt and pulled it over the bottom half of his face to ward off the smoke. Helping Regis do likewise, Drizzt started away.

  Barely thirty feet higher, the pair came to a hub of sorts. The main chute continued upward, but five side chambers broke off at various heights and angles, with heat and some smoke coming back at the pair. Also, these side tunnels were obviously hand cut, and fashioned by smaller hands than those of an ogre.

  Drizzt motioned for Regis to slowly follow, then crept along the tunnel he figured was heading most directly to the north.

  The fire in this hearth was burning brighter, though fortunately the wood was not very wet and not much smoke was coming up. Also, the angle of the chimney to the hearth was steeper, and so Drizzt could not see into the room beyond.

  The drow spent a moment tying his long hair back and wetting it, then he knelt, took a deep breath, and went over head first, creeping like a spider down the side of the chute until he could poke his face out under the top lip of the hearth, the flames burning not far below him and with sparks rising up and stinging him.

  This room appeared very different from the chamber of the ogres below. It was full of fine furniture and carpets, and with a lavish bed. A door stood across the way, partly opened and leading into another room. Drizzt couldn't make out much in there, but he did discern a few tables, covered with equipment like one might see in an alchemical workshop. Also, across that second room loomed another door, heavier in appearance, and with daylight creeping in around it.

  Now he was intrigued, but out of time, for he had to retreat from the intense heat.

  He got back to Regis at the hub and described what he had seen.

  “We should go outside and try to spot the others,” the halfling suggested, and Drizzt was nodding his agreement when they heard a loud voice echo along one of the other side passages.

  “Bloog crunch! No take Bloog's new hammer!”

  Off went the drow, Regis following right behind. They came to another steep chute at another hearth, this one hardly burning. Drizzt inverted and poked his head down.

  There stood an ogre, a gigantic, ugly, and angry beast, swinging Aegis-fang easily at the end of one arm. Behind it, talking to the ogre in soothing tones, stood a slender elf swordsman.

  Without even waiting for Regis, the drow flipped himself over to the fireplace, straddling the embers for a moment, then boldly striding out into the room.

  * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

  The three friends ran along the ridge at full speed, veering away from the lip when t
hey heard the ruckus of ogre reinforcements charging out from the mound below. They had to veer even farther from the straight path when a second group of beasts came off the mound above the ridgeline, charging up through the snow.

  “Probably many more within,” Catti-brie remarked.

  “More the reason to go!” snarled Bruenor.

  “Drizzt and Regis are likely already nearing the place, if not already in,” Wulfgar added.

  The woman, bow in hand, motioned forward.

  “Ye gonna call up that cat?” Bruenor asked.

  Catti-brie glanced at her belt, where she had set the figurine of Guenhwyvar. “As we near,” she answered. Bruenor only nodded, trusting her implicitly, and rushed off after Wulfgar.

  Up ahead, Wulfgar ducked suddenly as another ogre leaped off the mound, across a short ravine to the sloping ridgeline, the brute coming at him with a great swing of a heavy club.

  Easily dodging, Wulfgar kicked out and slashed, cutting a deep gash in back of the brute's shoulder. The ogre started to turn, but then lurched wildly as Bruenor came in hard, smashing his axe through the brute's kneecap.

  Down it went, howling.

  “Finish it, girl!” Bruenor demanded, running past, running for the mound. The dwarf skittered to a stop, though, foiled by the ravine separating the mound from the slope, which was too far across for him to jump.

  Then Bruenor had to dive to the side as a rock sailed at him from a position along the side of that mound, just up above him.

  Wulfgar came past, roaring “Tempus!” and making the leap across the ravine. The barbarian crashed along some rocks, but settled himself quickly onto a narrow trail winding its way up along the steep slope.

  “Should've thrown me first,” Bruenor grumbled, and he dived aside again as another rock crashed by.

  The dwarf did pick out a path that would get him to the winding trail, but he knew he would be far behind Wulfgar by that point. “Girl! I need ye!” he howled.

  He turned back to see the fallen ogre shudder again as another arrow buried itself deep into its skull.

  Catti-brie rushed up, falling to one knee and setting off a stream of arrows at the concealed rock-thrower. The brute popped up once more, rock high over its head, but it fell away as an arrow sizzled past.