R. Salvatore - The Last Threshold

The captain glanced at the drow more than they regarded him, which gave him some comfort at least. These were proclaimed friends of Drizzt Do’Urden, but something about their demeanor didn’t fit that description. Not that the captain knew Drizzt well, of course, having met him only once on this same ferry route, but the tales of the rogue drow were common about Ten-Towns, particularly Easthaven, which looked out onto the open tundra. Drizzt had been instrumental in forging the peace between Ten-Towns and the barbarian tribes a century before, and that peace held to this day, to say nothing of his legendary exploits in defeating the minions of the infamous Crystal Shard.

Even though few alive in Ten-Towns knew much of present-day Drizzt-indeed, only a couple of elves remaining in Lonelywood were even alive back in the time of Akar Kessell and the Crystal Shard-most would swing wide their doors for him. The nervous captain could hardly believe the same would be true for this particular group of grim-faced drow adventurers.

He was glad then, as he turned his craft around the last stony jut and into the shallow and somewhat protected cove on the lake’s eastern shore. He dropped the single sail and let the current take them, locking the wheel and moving to the anchor and long gangplank set forward. He could typically secure the landing very quickly, having years of practice, but this day, despite the frothing waters, the captain had them in place and with the bridge to the shore up and steady faster than ever before.

He moved far aside, to the front corner of the craft, as the contingent of drow headed away.

“This is the exact location where you left Drizzt?” asked Tiago, coming near the end of the line, with only Jearth behind him.

“Same spot,” the captain replied.

“A tenday ago?”

“To the day, sir.”

“You will await our return in this very place.”

The captain nearly choked on that. He had agreed to, and been paid for, taking them out here, but even with the rough weather, he wanted a day of knucklehead fishing. Indeed, in weather such as this, knucklehead trout were more likely to bite.

“But-” he started to argue, but the drow fixed him with such a stare that he knew that any contrary word from him would likely get him murdered, then and there.

“You will await our return,” Tiago said again.

“H-how long?” the captain stammered.

“Until you die of old age, if need be,” said Tiago. “And then you will return us to Easthaven’s dock, or you will begin a circuitous ferry from that dock to this place as the rest of my force is brought forth.”

The notion that there were more of these dangerous folk around had the hairs on the back of the captain’s neck standing up. What had he stepped into here, he wondered and imagined a drow invasion force burning Easthaven to the ground!

Later that same day, the sun setting low, the captain breathed a sigh of relief when Tiago and the others stepped off his boat again, this time onto Easthaven’s docks. They had found no sign of Drizzt out in the east, and had quickly realized the fool’s errand of trying to pursue the rogue, who knew the region so much better than they, into the open tundra.

So instead, Tiago and a select few remained at the inn in Easthaven, with the bulk of their thirty-warrior force camped in an extra-dimensional space created by Ravel and the other spellspinners, ready for fast recall.

And they waited.

Another tenday passed. Tiago sent out tendrils-Saribel’s priestesses-to Bryn Shander, and hired indigenous scouts to widen his network to encompass the whole of Ten-Towns, including the Battlehammer contingent living under the lone mountain. Ravel and his spellspinners, meanwhile, utilized their divination magic, while Saribel and her kind called out to Lolth’s handmaidens for guidance in their search.

A month slipped by. Tiago hired locals to reach out to the barbarian tribes for word on the missing drow.

Another month passed, with no word of Drizzt, and indeed, even the extra-planar creatures the priestesses and now magic-users he had called upon could find no sign of the rogue. The season began its turn, where the mountain passes would fill with snow and cold, and Icewind Dale would again be isolated from the rest of Faerun. By the time of the first snowstorm, no caravan moved along the single road connecting Icewind Dale to the lands south of the Spine of the World.

No caravan, perhaps, but the storm did not hinder the approach of a demonic balor, whose every monstrous stride turned the snowpack to steam.

A tremendous explosion rocked Bryn Shander’s gate, crumbling the stones and shattering the hinges of the great doors, which fell in and were fast consumed by the demonic fires. A guard to the side of the devastation lifted her spear and threw, crying out for Bryn Shander, for Ten-Towns. The missile disappeared into the smoky shroud around the demon, but whether it had any effect or not, the poor sentry would never know. For as her spear flew out, the demon’s long whip reached in, snapping around her torso. With a flick of his powerful wrist, Errtu yanked her from her feet and sent her flying from the wall, dragging her into the killing fires surrounding his great form.

He gave her not another thought, and waved forward three powerful minions, great glabrezu demons. Twice the height of a tall man, the bipedal, hulking creatures eagerly loped through the breach and into the city, each demon waving four massive arms. Two of those arms ended in giant pincers, powerful enough to cut a man in half, as one unfortunate Bryn Shander soldier discovered almost immediately.

“I will have the drow!” Errtu roared. “Send him to me now, or I will lay waste to your city!”

From a short distance south of the unfolding battle scene, Tiago and his minions, well-versed in demon lore, understood that the threat was not an idle one.

“A balor,” Saribel said, her voice barely above a whisper.

“Hunting us?” a confused Ravel added.

“So it would seem,” said Tiago. “And though I truly enjoy the spectacle of carnage before us, perhaps we should discern what this beast might wish with us. Nothing good, I expect, and so perhaps we will have to destroy it. A pity, really.”

His casual attitude, so matter-of-fact and calm despite the formidable enemy on the field before them, had the others looking at the young Baenre with renewed respect, and inevitably nodding in agreement.

Tiago turned to Saribel. “Ward me from the demon flames,” he instructed. “Ward us all. Let us strip this balor of its primary weapon.”

While Saribel and her priestesses began the task, casting many magical protections over the group, Tiago gathered Ravel, Jearth, and Yerrininae to prepare the battlefield. Within a short while, Tiago rode Byok to the front of his column. He watched the huge balor follow the glabrezu into the city, a cacophony of screams echoing along Bryn Shander’s wall, then started forward. He pointed to the wall, some twenty feet south of the destroyed gate, and kicked Byok into a run. The drow warriors and Saribel’s priestesses followed quickly, Jearth guiding them. The mighty driders ran with the group for a short distance, but veered away to the west soon after, increasing their pace in a circuitous route that would take them north of the gate.

Ravel and his fellow spellspinners did not follow the others. They assumed their battle formation, with the noble drow serving as the hub of their “wheel.” As the other five began their long incantation, Ravel cast the first spell, opening a dimensional portal from just north of their position to the area immediately before Bryn Shander’s ruined gate. By the time he had finished that spell, the first sparks of mounting power began to crackle in the air around him.