R. Salvatore - Night of the Hunter

“Regis!” Drizzt cried out desperately.

Above the hiss of the fires, above the ring of swords, above the cries of the wounded, above the growls of Pwent’s undead, came the thunder as Aegis-fang swept up to meet the downward chop of Skullcrusher. Both Wulfgar and Yerrininae roared as their weapons collided, the cries and the crash blending together in a sound of pure power that reverberated off the Forge walls.

Intent on protecting Regis, who was not moving and was not even conscious, Wulfgar tried to skip out to the side, but the fierce drider stopped him with a planted leg and cleverly stabbed in with Skullcrusher. Wulfgar managed to sweep his warhammer vertically to turn the mace aside, but he sucked in his breath as he realized the stab to be a ruse, a way for Wulfgar to help the drider properly angle his weapon for another strike at Regis.

Wulfgar threw Aegis-fang at the beast. He couldn’t get any weight behind the throw to hurt the drider, so he used it as a distraction, a way to slow the strike at Regis, and he launched himself out, catching Skullcrusher’s handle just above the drider’s grip.

The barbarian’s muscles corded and strained against the powerful abomination, and a lesser man would have simply tumbled down atop Regis behind the mace’s descent.

But Wulfgar held on, and when Yerrininae jerked the mace back, the barbarian was ready, rolling around and leaping up, crashing against the drider’s drow torso.

Face-to-face the mighty warriors clenched and struggled.

Yerrininae bit down hard on Wulfgar’s left shoulder, digging in, and Wulfgar felt poison coming from that abomination’s deadly bite.

Regis’s potion had saved him again, he knew.

The duo wrestled and twisted. The drider lifted a spider leg and Wulfgar realized that it meant to stomp Regis. With a great, desperate twist, Wulfgar yanked the drider aside and the two nearly tumbled into the wall of fire.

Yerrininae bit down harder and pushed ahead, bending Wulfgar backward. The barbarian wedged the fingers of his free right hand in against the drider’s cheek.

Wulfgar tightened the muscles of his chest and shoulder, growling back against the bite, hardening the drider’s target and so weakening the drider’s hold.

The two stumbled around on eight spidery legs-they seemed like bipedal combatants fighting atop a giant spider. Back and forth they went, sometimes touching the wall, sometimes hovering dangerously around Regis.

Wulfgar slipped his little finger into the drider’s eye and pressed on, and Yerrininae had to relent.

“Tempus!” the barbarian roared, as much to infuse himself with heightened anger as to call to his god. He pushed out with all his strength, driving Yerrininae’s head to his left, the drider’s free hand tugging at his wrist.

Wulfgar let go of the face suddenly, snapping his arm back with the tug and at the same time replacing it with his left hand, clamping fully on Yerrininae’s face. The barbarian rolled his shoulders forward and bulled ahead and down.

The fire wall fell away then, showing the two dead driders on the other side, with Bruenor atop one, staring back slack-jawed at the titanic battle between Wulfgar and Yerrininae. Catti-brie watched, too, as did Drizzt and Entreri, all four stunned to inaction by the spectacle.

Wulfgar bulled and pushed, his muscles standing taut. Huge Yerrininae pushed back, cords of sinewy muscles straining and glistening with sweat.

The drider stumbled backward and nearly toppled, but kicked its rear legs out and planted them firmly.

Yerrininae had made a mistake. He should have rolled over.

He was locked in place, unable to give, forced to hold back Wulfgar’s push, which he could not. He bent over backward and the barbarian plowed on, driving his left hand forward, bending Yerrininae’s head back.

Down Wulfgar jerked with all his strength, and then again when Yerrininae stopped his press. And a third time and again after that, and the drider could not retreat and could not hold.

Again the barbarian bulled and now Yerrininae did give way, not by backing and not by rolling, but simply because Yerrininae’s muscle and bone could not resist the press.

The crack of Yerrininae’s shattering backbone sounded as loudly as the crash of Aegis-fang against Skullcrusher.

Wulfgar pushed once more, but it was done and he was done, his rage and stamina exhausted. He fell back and stumbled off the drider, who still stood on planted spidery legs, drow torso bobbing weirdly, fully broken.

The Forge was quiet then, and eerily so.

The companions and Entreri were not the only ones remaining in the room. Pwent was there, though only a few of his drow minions remained standing. Another crawled weirdly around the floor, relieved of its legs and one arm by drow swordsmen.

And a trio of summoned berserkers remained. The shocking sound and effect of the titanic struggle between Wulfgar and the drider gave them pause, but the berserkers had come in to the call of the horn for one reason alone: to fight against the enemies of the one who blew the horn.

The surreal stillness shattered as the berserkers threw themselves into battle against the undead, and Thibbledorf Pwent, a battlerager in heart and soul, was more than happy to engage.

He met the charge of a berserker, lowering his head at the last moment to drive his helmet spike right through the reckless fool. He snapped up straight as the spike plunged through, and held his hands out wide, laughing maniacally as if in expectation of a shower of blood.

But these manifestations didn’t bleed, and the corporeal form exploded into sweeping dust when Pwent struck the mortal blow, leaving the vampire standing alone, confused and hungry.

And angry.

He leaped to the side and dispatched a second berserker, even as his minions pulled down a third, tearing at flesh, then swiping futilely at flying dust.

“Pwent, no!” Drizzt screamed from the side of the room as the four undead charged at the foursome across the way, Pwent leading the way to Wulfgar, it seemed.

And over on that side, Wulfgar was clearly no less angry. He stood beside the broken drider, blood running freely down his muscular chest, leaning uneasily on his stabbed foot, and with every vampiric strike on one of Tempus’s warriors, he growled and limped forward.

“No, boy!” Drizzt heard Bruenor warn.

“Go,” Entreri told him, and shoved Drizzt into pursuit, and ran for Pwent right alongside him.

Then came the roar of “Tempus!” and Aegis-fang spun out from Wulfgar’s hands, flying into the approaching Pwent. The dwarf didn’t dematerialize at all, but took the ringing blow, one that sent him staggering and skidding backward several strides, one that actually seemed to hurt him.

Catti-brie moved up beside Wulfgar and held forth her hand, invoking the glory of Mielikki, the very name manifesting itself as a bright light upon the woman. The vampire minions staggered and turned away, hunched and cowering.

But not Pwent.

He focused on Wulfgar, seemingly oblivious to Drizzt and Entreri as they closed in fast from behind. Not fast enough, however, for the vampire executed that curious and devastating ghost-step to bring himself right in front of the man, fog trailing and swirling as he became solid once more, holding fast for just an instant before leaping onto Wulfgar, who caught the force fully and went flying away in a clench with the dwarf.

Pwent began to thrash and shake, but the sheer strength of Wulfgar matched the dwarf and kept him from ripping Wulfgar apart with his ridged armor. They rolled and struggled mightily, Bruenor trying vainly to intercede, Catti-brie beginning yet another spell.