Robert Salvatore - Streams of Silver

He led them through the doorway and down a similarly lit hallway. Doors on either side of them identified the various chambers as they passed—one for each of the goodly races, and even a few for the history of orcs and goblins and the giantkind.

The friends and Old Night supped at a huge, round table, its ancient wood as hard as mountain stone. Runes were inscribed all around its edge, many in tongues long lost to the world, that even Old Night could not remember. The food, like everything else, gave the impression of a distant past. Far from stale, though, it was delicious, with a flavor somewhat different from anything the friends had ever eaten before. The drink, a crystalline wine, possessed a rich bouquet surpassing even the legendary elixirs of the elves.

Old Night entertained them as they ate, retelling grand tales of ancient heroes, and of events that had shaped the Realms into their present state. The companions were an attentive audience, though in all probability substantial clues about Mithril Hall loomed only a door or two away.

When the meal was finished, Old Night rose from his chair and looked around at them with a weird, curious intensity. “The day will come, a millennium from now, perhaps, when I shall entertain again. On that day, I am sure, one of the tales I tell will concern the Companions of the Hall and their glorious quest.”

The friends could not reply to the honor that the ancient man had paid them. Even Drizzt, even-keeled and unshakable, sat unblinking for a long, long moment.

“Come,” Old Night instructed, “let your road begin anew.” He led them through another door, the door to the greatest library in all the North.

Volumes thick and thin covered the walls and lay about in high piles on the many tables positioned throughout the large room. Old Night indicated one particular table, a smaller one off to the side, with a solitary book opened upon it.

“I have done much of your research for you,” Old Night explained. “And in all the volumes concerning dwarves, this was the only one I could find that held any reference to Mithril Hall.”

Bruenor moved to the book, grasping its edges with trembling hands. It was written in High Dwarven, the language of Dumathoin, Keeper of Secrets Under the Mountain, a script nearly lost in the Realms. But Bruenor could read it. He surveyed the page quickly, then read aloud the passages of concern.

“King Elmor and his people profited mightily from the labors of Garumn and the kin of Clan Battlehammer, but the dwarves of the secret mines did not refute Elmor’s gains. Settlestone proved a valuable and trustworthy ally whence Garumn could begin the secret trail to market of the mithril works.” Bruenor looked up at his friends, a gleam of revelation in his eye.

“Settlestone,” he whispered. “I know that name.” He dove back into the book.

“You shall find little else,” Old Night said. “For the words of Mithril Hall are lost to the ages. The book merely states that the flow of mithril soon ceased, to the ultimate demise of Settlestone!”

Bruenor wasn’t listening. He had to read it for himself, to devour every word penned about his lost heritage, no matter the significance.

“What of this Settlestone?” Wulfgar asked Old Night. “A clue?”

“Perhaps,” the old herald replied. “Thus far I have found no reference to the place other than this book, but I am inclined to believe from the work that Settlestone was rather unusual for a dwarven town.”

“Above the ground!” Bruenor suddenly cut in.

“Yes,” agreed Old Night. “A dwarven community housed in structures above the ground. Rare these days and unheard of back in the time of Mithril Hall. Only two possibilities, to my knowledge.”

Regis let out a cry of victory.

“Your enthusiasm may be premature,” remarked Old Night. “Even if we discern where Settlestone once lay, the trail to Mithril Hall merely begins there.”

Bruenor flipped through a few pages of the book, then replaced it on the table. “So close!” he growled, slamming his fist down on the petrified wood. “And I should know!”

Drizzt moved over to him and pulled a vial out from under his cloak. “A potion,” he explained to Bruenor’s puzzled look, “that will make you walk again in the days of Mithril Hall.”

“A mighty spell,” warned Old Night. “And not to be controlled. Consider its use carefully, good dwarf.”

Bruenor was already moving, teetering on the verge of a discovery he had to find. He quaffed the liquid in one gulp, then steadied himself on the edge of the table against its potent kick. Sweat beaded on his wrinkled brow and he twitched involuntarily as the potion sent his mind drifting back across the centuries.

Regis and Wulfgar moved over to him, the big man clasping his shoulders and easing him into a seat.

Bruenor’s eyes were wide open, but he saw nothing in the room before him. Sweat lathered him now, and the twitch had become a tremble.

“Bruenor,” Drizzt called softly, wondering if he had done right in presenting the dwarf with such a tempting opportunity.

“No, me father!” Bruenor screamed. “Not here in the darkness! Come with me, then. What might I do without ye?”

“Bruenor,” Drizzt called more emphatically.

“He is not here,” Old Night explained, familiar with the potion, for it was often used by long-lived races, particularly elves, when they sought memories of their distant past. Normally the imbibers returned to a more pleasant time, though. Old Night looked on with grave concern, for the potion had returned Bruenor to a wicked day in his past, a memory that his mind had blocked out, or at least blurred, to defend him against powerful emotions. Those emotions would now be laid bare, revealed to the dwarf’s conscious mind in all their fury.

“Bring him to the Chamber of the Dwarves,” Old Night instructed. “Let him bask in the images of his heroes. They will aid in remembering, and give him strength throughout his ordeal.”

Wulfgar lifted Bruenor and bore him gently down the passage to the Chamber of the Dwarves, laying him in the center of the circular floor. The friends backed away, leaving the dwarf to his delusions.

Bruenor could only half-see the images around him now, caught between the worlds of the past and present. Images of Moradin, Dumathoin, and all his deities and heroes looked down upon him from their perches in the rafters, adding a small bit of comfort against the waves of tragedy. Dwarven-sized suits of armor and cunningly crafted axes and warhammers surrounded him, and he bathed in the presence of the highest glories of his proud race.

The images, though, could not dispell the horror he now knew again, the falling of his clan, of Mithril Hall, of his father.

“Daylight!” he cried, torn between relief and lament. “Alas for me father, and me father’s father! But yea, our escape is at hand! Settlestone…” he faded from consciousness for a moment, overcome, “…shelter us. The loss, the loss! Shelter us!”

“The price is high,” said Wulfgar, pained at the dwarf’s torment.

“He is willing to pay,” Drizzt replied.

“It will be a sorry payment if we learn nothing,” said Regis. “There is no direction to his ramblings. Are we to sit by and hope against hope?”

“His memories have already brought him to Settlestone, with no mention of the trail behind him,” Wulfgar observed.

Drizzt drew a scimitar and pulled the cowl of his cloak low over his face.

“What?” Regis started to ask, but the drow was already moving. He rushed to Bruenor’s side and put his face close to the dwarf’s sweat-lathered cheek.

“I am a friend,” he whispered to Bruenor. “Come at the news of the falling of the hall! My allies await! Vengeance will be ours, mighty dwarf of Clan Battlehammer! Show us the way so that we might restore the glories of the hall!”