Robert Salvatore: The Silent Blade

"Not at this time," Drizzt replied. "Can any of us appreciate the agony the man has suffered? Or can we measure the lingering effects of Errtu's torments? No, Wulfgar is not now fit to lead the tribes-he is having a difficult enough time leading himself."

"But we are his kin," Kierstaad tried to argue, but as he spoke them the words sounded lame even to him. "If Wulfgar feels pain, then he should be with us, in our care."

"And how might you tend the wounds that tear at Wulfgar's heart?" Drizzt asked. "No, Kierstaad. I applaud your intentions, but your hopes are false. Wulfgar needs time to remember who he truly is, to remember all that was once important to him. He needs time, and he needs his friends, and though I'll not argue your contention of the importance of blood kin, I tell you now in all honesty that those who love Wulfgar the most are here, not back with the tribes."

Kierstaad started to reply but only huffed and stared emptily back up the bluff, having no practical rebuttal.

"We will return soon enough," the drow explained. "Before the turn of winter, I hope, or in the spring soon after, at the latest. Perhaps Wulfgar will find again his heart and soul on the road with his friends. Perhaps he will return to Icewind Dale ready to assume the leadership that he truly deserves and that the tribes truly deserve."

"And if not?" Kierstaad asked.

Drizzt only shrugged. He was beginning to understand the depth of Wulfgar's pain and could make no guarantees.

"Keep him safe," Kierstaad said.

Drizzt nodded.

"On your word," the young barbarian pressed.

"We care for each other," the drow replied. "It has been that way since before we set out from Icewind Dale to reclaim Bruenor's throne in Mithral Hall nearly a decade ago."

Kierstaad continued to stare up the bluff. "My tribe has camped north of here," he explained, starting slowly away. "It is not far."

"Stay with us through the night," the drow offered.

"Master Camlaine has some fine food," Regis added hopefully. Drizzt knew just from the fact that the halfling was apparently willing to split the portions an extra way that Kierstaad's plight had touched his little friend.

But Kierstaad, obviously too embarrassed to go back up

and face Wulfgar, only shook his head and started off to the north, across the empty tundra.

"You should beat him," Regis said, looking back up the hill at Wulfgar.

"How would that help?" the drow asked.

"I think our large friend could use a bit of humility."

Drizzt shook his head. "His reaction to Kierstaad's touch was just that: a reaction," the drow explained. He was beginning to understand Wulfgar's mood a bit more clearly now, for Wulfgar's striking of Kierstaad had been wrought of no conscious thought. Drizzt recalled his days back in Melee-Magthere, the drow school for fighters. In that always dangerous environment, where enemies lurked around every corner, Drizzt had seen such reactions, had reacted similarly on many occasions himself. Wulfgar was back with friends now in a safe enough place, but emotionally he was still the prisoner of Errtu, his constant defenses still in place against the intrusions of the demon and its minions.

"It was instinctual and nothing more."

"He could have apologized," Regis replied.

No, he could not, Drizzt thought, but he kept the notion silent. An idea came over the drow then, one that put a particularly sparkling twinkle in his lavender eyes, a look that Regis had seen many times before.

"What are you thinking?" the halfling prompted.

"About giants," Drizzt replied with a coy smile, "and about the danger to any passing caravans."

"You believe that they will come at us this night?"

"I believe that they are back in the mountains, perhaps planning to bring a raiding party to the trail," Drizzt answered honestly. "And we would be long gone before they ever arrived."

"Would be?" Regis echoed softly, still studying the drow's glowing eyes-no trick of the late-day sun-and the way Drizzt's gaze drifted back toward the snowy peaks shining in the south. "What are you thinking?" "We cannot wait for the giants' return," the drow said. "Nor do I wish to leave any future caravans in peril. Perhaps Wulfgar and I should go out this night."

Regis's jaw dropped open, his dumbfounded expression bringing a laugh to the drow's lips.

"In my days with Montolio, the ranger who trained me, I learned much about horsemanship," Drizzt began to explain.

"You plan to take one or both of the merchant's horses to go to the mountains?" an incredulous Regis asked.

"No, no," Drizzt replied. "Montolio had been quite a rider in his youth, before he lost his vision, of course. And the horses he chose to ride were the strongest and least broken by saddles. But he had a technique-he called it 'running the horse'-to calm the steeds enough so that they would behave. He would bring them out in an open field on a long lead and snap a whip behind them repeatedly to get them running in wide and hard circles, even to get them bucking."

"Would that not only make them less behaved?" the halfling asked, for he knew little about horses.

Drizzt shook his head. "The strongest of horses possesses too much energy, Montolio explained to me. Thus, he would

take them out and let them release that extra layer, and when he would then climb on their backs they would ride strong but in control."

Regis shrugged and nodded, accepting the story. "What has that to do with Wulfgar?" he asked, but his expression changed to one of understanding even as the question came out of his mouth. "You plan to run Wulfgar as Montolio ran the horses," he reasoned.

"Perhaps he needs a good fight," Drizzt replied. "And truly I wish to rid the region of any trouble with giants."

"It will take you hours to get to the mountains," Regis estimated, looking to the south. "Perhaps longer if the giants' trail is not clear to follow."

"But we will move much quicker than you three if you stay, as we promised, with Camlaine," the drow replied. "Wulfgar and I will be back beside you within two or three days, long before you've turned the corner around the Spine of the World."

"Bruenor will not like being left out," Regis remarked.

"Then do not tell him," the drow instructed. Then, before Regis could offer the expected reply, he added, "Nor should you tell Catti-brie. Explain to them only that Wulfgar and I set out in the night, and that I promised to return the day after tomorrow."

Regis gave a frustrated sigh-once before Drizzt had run off, promising Regis to secrecy, and a frantic Catti-brie had nearly beat the information out of the halfling. "Why am I always the one to hold your secrets?" he asked.

"Why are you always sniffing where your nose does not belong?" Drizzt answered with a laugh.

The drow caught up to Wulfgar on the far side of the encampment. The big man was sitting alone, absently tossing stones down to the ground. He did not look up, nor did he offer any apologetic expressions, burying them beneath a wall of anger.

Drizzt sympathized completely and recognized the torment simmering just below the surface. Anger was his friend's only defense against those horrible memories. Drizzt crouched low and looked into Wulfgar's pale blue eyes, even if the huge man did not match the gaze.

"Do you remember our first fight?" the drow asked slyly.

Now Wulfgar did turn his stare up at the drow. "Do you mean to teach me another lesson?" he asked, his tone showing that he was more than ready to accept that challenge.

The words stung Drizzt profoundly. He recalled his last angry encounter with Wulfgar, over the barbarian's treatment of Catti-brie those seven years before in Mithral Hall. They had fought viciously with Drizzt emerging as victor. And he recalled his first fight against Wulfgar, when Bruenor had captured the lad and brought him into the dwarven clan in Icewind Dale after the barbarians had tried to raid Ten Towns. Bruenor had charged Drizzt with training Wulfgar as a fighter, and those first lessons between the two had proven especially painful for the young and overly proud barbarian. But that was not the encounter to which Drizzt was now referring.