Robert Salvatore - The Legacy

"Regis was here with yerself when ye got the news o' the missing dwarves," Catti-brie reasoned. "Ye didn't say a thing about Regis telling ye to send him."

"He telled me before that," Bruenor answered. "He telled…" The dwarf stopped suddenly, realizing the illogic of it all. Somehow, somewhere in the back of his mind, he remembered Regis explaining that he and Drizzt should go after the missing dwarves, but how could that be, since Bruenor had made the decision as soon as they all learned that dwarves were missing?

"Have ye been tasting the holy water again, me king?" Cobble asked respectfully but firmly.

Bruenor held his hand out, motioning for them all to be quiet while he sought his recollections. He remembered Regis's words distinctly and knew he was not imagining them, but no images accompanied the memory, no scene where he could place the halfling and thus straighten out the apparent time discrepancy.

Then an image came to Bruenor, a swirling array of shining facets, spiraling down and drawing him with them into the depths of a wondrous ruby.

"Rumblebelly telled me that the dwarves'd be missing," Bruenor said slowly and clearly, his eyes closed as he forced the memory from his subconscious. "He telled me I

should send himself, and Drizzt, to find them, that them two alone'd get me dwarves back to the halls safely."

"Regis could not have known," Cobble reasoned, obviously doubting Bruenor's words.

"And even if he did, the little one would not have wished to go along to find them," Wulfgar added, equally doubtful. "Is this a dream-?"

"Not a dream!" Bruenor growled. "He telled me… with that ruby of his." Bruenor's face screwed up as he tried to remember, tried to call upon his dwarven resistance to magic to fight past the stubborn mental block.

"Regis would not-" Wulfgar started to say again, but this time it was Catti-brie, knowing the truth of her father's claims, who interrupted him.

"Unless it wasn't really Regis," she offered, and her own words made her mouth drop open with their terrible implications. The three had been through much beside Drizzt, and they all knew well that the drow had many evil and powerful enemies, one in particular who would have the wiles to create such an elaborate deception.

Wulfgar looked equally stricken, at a loss, but Bruenor was fast to react. He jumped down from the throne and blasted between Wulfgar and Pwent, nearly knocking them both from their feet. Catti-brie went right behind, Wulfgar turning to follow.

"What in the head of a goblin are them three talking about?" Pwent demanded of Cobble as the cleric, too, rambled past.

"A fight," Cobble replied, knowing well how to deflect any of Pwent's demands for a lengthy explanation.

Thibbledorf Pwent dropped to one knee and rolled his burly shoulder, punching his fist triumphantly out in front of him. "Yeeeeeah!" he cried in glee. "Suren it's good to be back serving a Battlehammer!"

"Are you in league with them, or is this all a terrible coincidence?" Drizzt asked dryly, still refusing to turn about and give Artemis Entreri the satisfaction of viewing his torment.

"I do not believe in coincidence," came the predictable answer.

Finally, Drizzt did turn around, to see his dreaded rival, the human assassin Artemis Entreri, standing easily at the ready, fine sword in one hand, jeweled dagger in the other. The torch, still burning, lay at his feet. The magical transformation from halfling to human had been complete, clothing included, and this fact somewhat confused Drizzt. When Drizzt had used the mask, it had done no more than alter the color of his skin and hair, and his amazement now was obvious on his face.

"You should better learn the value of magical items before you so casually toss them aside," the assassin said to him, understanding the look.

There was a note of truth in Entreri's words, apparently, but Drizzt had never regretted leaving the magical mask in Calimport. Under its protective camouflage, the dark elf had walked freely, without persecution, among the other races. But under that mask, Drizzt Do'Urden had walked in a lie.

"You could have killed me in the goblin fight, or a hundred other times since your return to Mithril Hall," Drizzt reasoned. "Why the elaborate games?"

"The sweeter comes my victory."

"You wish me to draw my weapons, to continue the fight we began in Calimport's sewers."

"Our fight began long before there, Drizzt Do'Urden," the assassin chided. He casually poked his blade at Drizzt, who neither flinched nor reached for his scimitars as the fine sword nicked him on the cheek.

"You and I," Entreri continued, and he began to circle to Drizzt's side, "have been mortal enemies from the day we learned of each other, each an insult to the other's code of fighting. I mock your principles, and you insult my discipline."

"Discipline and emptiness are not the same," Drizzt answered. "You are but a shell that knows how to use weapons. There is no substance in that."

"Good," Entreri purred, tapping Drizzt's hip with his sword. "I feel your anger, drow, though you try so desperately to hide it. Draw your weapons and let it loose. Teach me with your skills what your words cannot."

"You still do not understand," Drizzt replied calmly, his head cocked to the side and a smug, sincere grin widening on his face. "I would not presume to teach you anything. Artemis Entreri is not worth my time."

Entreri's eyes flared in sudden rage and he leaped forward, sword high as if to strike Drizzt down.

Drizzt didn't flinch.

"Draw your weapons and let us continue our destiny," Entreri growled, falling back and leveling his sword at the draw's eye level.

"Fall on your own blade and meet the only end you'll ever deserve," Drizzt replied.

"I have your cat!" Entreri snapped. "You must fight me, or Guenhwyvar will be mine."

"You forget that we are both soon to be captured-or killed," Drizzt reasoned. "Do not underestimate the hunting skills of my people."

"Then fight for the halfling," Entreri growled. Drizzt's expression showed that the assassin had hit a nerve. "Had you forgotten about Regis?" Entreri teased. "I have not killed him, but he will die where he is, and only I know of that place. I will tell you only if you win. Fight, Drizzt Do'Urden, if for no better reason than to save the life of that miserable halfling!"

Entreri's sword made a lazy thrust at Drizzt's face again, but this time it went flying wide to the side as a scimitar leaped out and banged it away.

Entreri sent it right back in, and followed it closely with a dagger strike that nearly found a hole hi Drizzt's defenses.

"I thought you had lost the use of an arm and an eye," the drow said.

"I lied," Entreri replied, stepping back and holding his weapons out wide. "Must I be punished?"

Drizzt let his scimitars answer for him, rushing in quickly and chopping repeatedly, left and right, left and right, then right a third time as his left blade twirled up above his head and came straight ahead in a blinding thrust.

Sword and dagger countering, the assassin batted aside each attack.

The fight became a dance, movements too synchronous, too much in perfect harmony for either to gain an advantage. Drizzt, knowing that time was running out for

him, and more particularly for Regis, maneuvered near the low-burning torch, then stomped down on it, rolling it about and smothering the flames, stealing the light.

He thought his racial night vision would gain him the edge, but when he looked at Entreri, he saw the assassin's eyes glowing in the telltale red of infravision.

"You thought the mask gave me this ability?" Entreri reasoned. "Not true, you see. It was a gift from my dark elf associate, a mercenary, not so unlike myself." His words ended at the beginning of his charge, his sword coming high and forcing Drizzt to twist and duck to the side. Drizzt grinned in satisfaction as Twinkle came up, the scimitar ringing as it knocked Entreri's dagger aside. A subtle twist put Drizzt back on the offensive. Twinkle coming around Entreri's dagger hand and slicing at the assassin's exposed chest.