Robert Salvatore - The Halfling’s Gem

At the last moment, his hand swerved away and banged harmlessly on the table.

Pook roared in rage, suspecting all along that Regis had somehow escaped the pendant’s influence. He grabbed the halfling by the wrist and smashed his little hand onto the spike, wiggling it as the spike went through. Regis’s scream multiplied tenfold when Pook tore his hand back up the barbed instrument.

Then Pook let him go and slapped him across the face as Regis clutched his wounded hand to his chest.

“Deceiving dog!” the guildmaster shouted, more angry with the pendant’s failure than with Regis’s facade. He lined up for another slap but calmed himself and decided to twist the halfling’s stubborn will back on Regis.

“A pity,” he teased, “for if the pendant had brought you back under control, I might have found a place for you in the guild. Surely you deserve to die, little thief, but I have not forgotten your value to me in the past. You were the finest thief in Calimport, a position I might have offered you once again.”

“Then no pity for the failure of the gem,” Regis dared to retort, guessing the teasing game that Pook was playing, “for no pain outweighs the disgust I would feel at playing lackey to Pasha Pook!”

Pook’s response was a heavy slug that knocked Regis off his chair and onto the floor. The halfling lay curled up, trying to stem the blood from both his hand and his nose.

Pook rested back in his chair and clasped his hands behind his head. He looked at the pendant, resting on the table in front of him. Only once before had it failed him, when he had tried it on a will that would not be captured. Luckily, Artemis Entreri had not realized the attempt that day, and Pook had been wise enough not to try the pendant on the assassin again.

Pook shifted his gaze to Regis, now passed out from the pain. He had to give the little halfling credit. Even if Regis’s familiarity with the pendant had given him an edge in his battle, only an iron will could resist the tempting pull.

“But it will not help you,” Pook whispered at the unconscious form. He sat back in his chair again and closed his eyes, trying to envision still another torture for Regis.

The tan-robed arm slipped in through the tent’s flap and held the limp body of the red-bearded dwarf upside-down by the ankle. Sali Dalib’s fingers started their customary twiddle, and he flashed the gold-and-ivory smile so wide that it seemed as if it would take in his ears. His little goblin assistant jumped up and down at his side, squealing, “Magic, magic, magic!”

Bruenor opened one eye and lifted an arm to push his long beard out of his face. “Ye be likin’ what ye’re seeing?” the dwarf asked slyly.

Sali Dalib’s smile disappeared, and his fingers got all tangled together.

Bruenor’s bearer—Wulfgar, wearing the robe of one of the bandits walked into the tent. Catti-brie came in behind him.

“So ‘twas yerself that set the bandits upon us,” the young woman growled.

Sali Dalib’s exclamation of shock came out as so much gibberish, and the wily merchant spun away to flee…only to find a neat hole sliced into the back of his tent and Drizzt Do’Urden standing within it, leaning on one scimitar while the other rested easily on his shoulder. Just to heighten the merchant’s terror, Drizzt had again taken off the magical mask.

“Uh…um, de bestest road?” the merchant stammered.

“Bestest for yerself and yer friends!” Bruenor growled.

“So they thought,” Catti-brie was quick to put in.

Sali Dalib curled his smile sheepishly, but he had been in tight spots a hundred times before and had always weaseled his way out. He lifted his palms, as if to say, “You caught me,” but then jerked into a dizzying maneuver, pulling several small ceramic globes out of one of his robe’s many pockets. He slammed them to the floor at his feet. Explosions of multicolored light left a thick, blinding smoke in their wake, and the merchant dashed for the side of the tent.

Instinctively Wulfgar dropped Bruenor and jumped ahead, catching an armful of emptiness. The dwarf plopped onto the floor headfirst and rolled to a sitting position, his one-horned helm tilted to the side of his head. As the smoke thinned, the embarrassed barbarian looked back to the dwarf, who just shook his head in disbelief and mumbled, “Suren to be a long adventure.”

Only Drizzt, ever alert, had not been caught unawares. The drow had shielded his eyes from the bursts, then watched the smoky silhouette of the merchant darting to the left. Drizzt would have had him before he got out of the hidden flap in the tent, but Sali Dalib’s assistant stumbled into the drow’s way. Barely slowing, Drizzt slammed Twinkle’s hilt into the little goblin’s forehead, dropping the creature into unconsciousness, then slipped the mask back on his face and jumped out to the streets of Memnon.

Catti-brie rushed by to follow Drizzt, and Bruenor leaped to his feet. “After ‘im, boy!” the dwarf shouted at Wulfgar. The chase was on.

Drizzt caught sight of the merchant slipping into the throng of the streets. Even Sali Dalib’s loud robe would blend well in the city’s myriad of colors, so Drizzt added a touch of his own. As he had done to the invisible mage on the deck of the pirate ship, the drow sent a purplish glowing outline of dancing flames over the merchant.

Drizzt sped off in pursuit, weaving in and out of the crowd with amazing ease and watching for the bobbing line of purple ahead.

Bruenor was less graceful. The dwarf cut ahead of Catti-brie and plunged headlong into the throng, stomping toes and using his shield to bounce bodies out of his way. Wulfgar, right behind, cut an even wider swath, and Catti-brie had an easy time following in their wake.

They passed a dozen lanes and crashed through an open market, Wulfgar accidentally overturning a cart of huge yellow melons. Shouts of protest erupted behind them as they passed, but they kept their eyes ahead, each watching the person in front and trying not to get lost in the overwhelming bustle.

Sali Dalib knew at once that he was too conspicuous with the fiery outline to ever escape in the open streets. To add to his disadvantage, the eyes and pointing fingers of a hundred curious onlookers greeted him at every turn, signposts for his pursuers. Grabbing at the single chance before him, the merchant cut down one lane and scrambled through the doors of a large stone building.

Drizzt turned to make certain that his friends were still behind, then rushed through the doors, skidding to a stop on the steam-slicked marble floor of a public bathhouse.

Two huge eunuchs moved to block the clothed elf, but as with the merchant who had come in just before, the agile Drizzt regained his momentum too quickly to be hindered. He skated through the short entry corridor and into the main room, a large open bath, thick with steam and smelling of sweat and perfumed soaps. Naked bodies crossed his path at every step, and Drizzt had to be careful where he placed his hands as he slipped through.

Bruenor nearly fell as he entered the slippery chamber, and the eunuchs, already out of their positions, got in front of him.

“No clothes!” one of them demanded, but Bruenor had no time for idle discussions. He stamped a heavy boot onto one of the giant’s bare feet, then crunched the other foot for good measure. Wulfgar came in then and heaved the remaining eunuch aside.

The barbarian, leaning forward to gain speed, had no chance to stop or turn on the slippery floor, and as Bruenor turned to make his way along the perimeter of the bath, Wulfgar slammed into him, knocking them both to the floor and into a slide they could not brake.

They bounced over the rim of the bath and plunged into the water, Wulfgar coming up, waist deep, between two voluptuous and naked, giggling women.