R. Salvatore - Charon's claw

He waved Effron away.

Effron staggered out of the room, heading for his own chamber, tears welling in his strange eyes once more as he tried to deny the stinging words of merciless Draygo Quick. He replaced that wound with anger, stopped, and turned around, making for the warlock’s room of scrying instead.

“That was harsh, Master Quick, even by your standards,” said Parise Ulfbinder, a warlock and peer of Draygo Quick. Parise, too, was a Netherese lord of great repute, and an old friend of Draygo’s, though Draygo Quick had not seen him in person in a long while, the two preferring to correspond through their respective scrying devices. The mere fact that Parise had come to Draygo’s tower in person had tipped the old warlock off to the importance of the visit. He entered from a concealed door even as Effron departed.

“Are they recalled?”

“Indeed,” said Parise. “We have opened the gates and most of our forces are safely back within the Shadowfell.”

“You heard what Effron said of the Cavus Dun trio?”

“Glorfathel, Ambergris, and Afafrenfere are not to be found among the returned,” the other warlock confirmed, though his tone revealed that he really didn’t care about that particular curiosity. “It is possible that Effron speaks the truth.”

Draygo Quick looked to the door where Effron had departed and nodded, his expression one of great lament. Despite his parting words, Draygo had come to care for this pathetic and twisted creature, he had to admit, privately at least.

“These enemies are formidable, yet you would allow your young understudy to go in pursuit?” the handsome Netherese warrior asked.

Draygo Quick didn’t lash out at the blunt remark, but merely nodded again. “He must do this. He is tied to that one, Dahlia. He must find his revenge.”

“Or his death?”

“We all die,” Draygo Quick replied.

“True, but it is best to choose when we allow, or cause, others to do so,” Parise Ulfbinder remarked slyly, drawing Draygo Quick’s full attention. “I wish to talk to you about this curious drow who has associated himself with our enemies.”

“Drizzt Do’Urden.”

“Yes,” Parise said with a nod. “There may be more to him than you know, and likely more to him than he knows.”

Draygo Quick’s eyes widened as he considered that curious statement in the context of the speaker, a Netherese theorist who had been whispering dire warnings to any lord who might listen.

Down the hallway several doors, Effron lit a single candle and moved to a small table. Atop it rested an item covered by a red cloth.

Effron pulled the cloth back, and a skull-sized ball of pure crystal glistened in the candlelight before him.

“Ah, Dahlia Sin’Dalay, murderess,” he said, and his eyes sparkled in reflection. “You think you have won, Mother. You are wrong.”

Many heartbeats passed, not a one in the room daring to even draw breath. Entreri just stood there, head and shoulders thrown back, awaiting death. But death did not visit him.

Gradually, the assassin opened his eyes and glanced over at the others. “You threw it in?” he asked.

Drizzt glanced over the rim, into the pit, and shrugged.

“You threw it in?” Entreri asked again.

“The primordial has it, surely.”

“Ye think?” Ambergris put in with a snort.

“Do you feel anything?” Drizzt asked. “Pain? A sense of impending doom?”

“Are you asking, or hoping?” Entreri replied, and Ambergris laughed all the louder. At that moment, the monk broke away from her and leaped at Drizzt-or started to, for the dwarf kicked Afafrenfere’s trailing ankle, tripping him up, and he skidded down to all fours. Before he could regain his footing, Ambergris grabbed him roughly by the shirt and his hair and hoisted him to his feet.

“Now ye hear me, boy, and ye hear me good!” the dwarf roared in his face. Still holding him by the hair, she dropped her other hand into her pouch and brought it forth, her fat thumb covered in some blue substance. As the others looked on, perplexed, she used it to draw a symbol on the monk’s face, and she chanted out what seemed to be a spell in the ancient Dwarvish tongue.

“Now ye’re geased,” she announced, letting go and shoving Afafrenfere backward.

“What?”

“Ye got me god’s wrath lurkin’ on yer forehead, ye dolt,” Ambergris explained. “Ye make a move at me drow friend here, or either o’ his friends, and Dumathoin’s sure to melt yer brains that they’ll flow from yer nose like so much snot.”

“B-but…” Afafrenfere stuttered, hopping all around and stabbing his finger in Drizzt’s direction. “He killed Parbid!”

“Bah, yerselfs started the fight and ye lost, and so be it.”

“But… Parbid!” Afafrenfere said with a great wail and keen.

Ambergris rushed up and grabbed him by the hair again and pulled him very close, so that her long and fat nose touched his. “If ye’re wantin’ to see yer dearest boy again, then go and strike at the drow,” she said. “Been hoping to watch a good brain melt-been years and years since the last I seen.”

Afafrenfere stuttered and gasped, but when Ambergris let him go, he moved back and said no more.

“Well, what of ye?” the dwarf asked of Entreri. “Ye dyin’ yet?”

Entreri stared at her incredulously.

“Then let’s be gone afore we’re all dying,” the dwarf said. “That silence spell I throwed in the hallway ain’t for lastin’!”

She started off, slapping Afafrenfere to fall in line beside her as she made for the elemental’s tunnel. She pulled out her magical decanter as she entered and summoned its spraying water once more, wetting the hot stones before her, and laughing indeed as the swirls of steam arose around her.

“Nothing?” Drizzt asked Entreri again. He walked over and crouched beside the sobbing Dahlia, hugging her close.

“Well?” he asked of Entreri yet again.

The assassin just shrugged. If he was dying, he didn’t feel it.

Drizzt gently pulled Dahlia up beside him and started off. Entreri fell in line, following the dwarf.

Entreri looked at Drizzt coldly.

“Not even a bit of pain?” Drizzt asked, and he tried hard to sound disappointed.

Artemis Entreri snorted and looked away. He was alive. How could it be? For the sword had been keeping him alive for all of these decades, surely, and now the sword was gone. Or perhaps the primordial hadn’t destroyed it-perhaps its magic was strong enough to survive the bite of that most ancient and powerful beast.

Or maybe it was destroyed, and the mortal coil of Entreri would begin to age again, that he might live out the remainder of his life as if he had been in stasis all these years.

Either way, he figured, he was still alive, and more than that, and he knew it profoundly: he was free.

He put his arm around Dahlia and pulled her close, signaling for Drizzt, who seemed less than thrilled at that movement, to take up the lead.

They moved through the complex with all speed, and encountered no shades, who, unbeknownst to them, were fast departing through magical gateways, and encountered no Menzoberranyr drow, who had moved to the deeper tunnels of the Underdark to weather the Shadovar advance.

Expecting pursuit, of course, Drizzt didn’t slow the pace at all. With the help of Dahlia’s raven cape, they got through to the upper levels and pressed on to the throne room and the complex exit.

Many hours later, Tiago Baenre and Gol’fanin moved quietly to the entrance of the forge room and peered in. The battle of elementals continued, water against fire, but were much diminished, for the floor was ankle-deep in water, a situation surely not conducive to the spawning of creatures of fire.