Robert Salvatore - Streams of Silver

“‘Twas not the halfling’s fault,” she said. “And the wizards would’ve come anyway!”

Drizzt returned to them then. “No one has made the stair yet,” he said, but when he took a better notice of the situation, he realized that his words had not been heard.

A long and uncomfortable silence descended upon them, then Wulfgar took command. “We have come too far along this road to argue and fight among ourselves!” he scolded Bruenor.

Bruenor looked at him blankly, not knowing how to react to the uncharacteristic stand Wulfgar had taken against him. “Bah!” the dwarf said finally, throwing up his hands in frustration. “The fool halfling’ll get us killed…but not to worry!” he grumbled sarcastically, moving back to the wall to search for the door.

Drizzt looked curiously at the surly dwarf, but was more concerned with Regis at this point. The halfling, thoroughly miserable, had dropped to a sitting position and seemed to have lost all desire to go on. “Take heart,” Drizzt said to him. “Bruenor’s anger will pass. The essence of his dreams stands before him.”

“And about this assassin who seeks your head,” Wulfgar said, moving to join the two. “He shall find a mighty welcome when he gets here, if ever he does.” Wulfgar patted the head of his warhammer. “Perhaps we can change his mind about this hunt!”

“If we can get into the mines, our trail might be lost to them,” Drizzt said to Bruenor, trying to further soothe the dwarf’s anger.

“They’ll not make the stair,” said Catti-brie. “Even watching your climb down, I had trouble finding it!” .

“I would rather stand against them now!” Wulfgar declared. “They have much to explain, and they’ll not escape my punishment for the way they have treated Catti-brie!”

“Ware the assassin,” Catti-brie warned him. “His blades mean death, and no mistaking!”

“And a wizard can be a terrible foe,” added Drizzt. “We have a more important task before us—we do not need to take on fights that we can avoid.”

“No delays!” said Bruenor, ending any rebuttals from the big barbarian. “Mithril Hall stands before me, and I’m meaning to go in! Let them follow, if they dare.” He turned back to the wall to resume his search for the door, calling for Drizzt to join him. “Keep the watch, boy,” he ordered Wulfgar. “And see to me girl.”

“A word of opening, perhaps?” Drizzt asked when he stood alone again with Bruenor before the featureless wall.

“Aye,” said Bruenor, “there be a word. But the magic that holds to it leaves it after a while, and a new word must be named. None were here to name it!”

“Try the old word, then.”

“I have, elf, a dozen times when we first came here.” He banged his fist on the stone. “Another way there be, I know,” he growled in frustration.

“You will remember,” Drizzt assured him. And they set back to inspecting the wall.

Even the stubborn determination of a dwarf does not always pay off, and the night fell and found the friends sitting outside the entrance in the darkness, not daring to light a fire for fear of alerting their pursuers. Of all their trials on the road, the waiting so very close to their goal was possibly the most trying. Bruenor began to second-guess himself, wondering if this was even the correct place for the door. He recited the song he had learned as a child in Mithril Hall over and over, searching for some clues he might have missed.

The others slept uneasily, especially Catti-brie, who knew that the silent death of an assassin’s blade stalked them. They would not have slept at all, except that they knew that the keen, ever vigilant eyes of a drow elf watched over them.

A few miles down the trail behind them, a similar camp had been set. Entreri stood quietly, peering to the trails of the eastern mountains for signs of a campfire, though he doubted that the friends would be so careless as to light one if Catti-brie had found and warned them. Behind him, Sydney lay wrapped in a blanket upon the cool stone, resting and recovering from the blow Catti-brie had struck her.

The assassin had considered leaving her—normally he would have without a second thought—but Entreri needed to take some time anyway to regroup his thoughts and figure out his best course of action.

Dawn came and found him standing there still, unmoving and contemplative. Behind him, the mage awoke.

“Jierdan?” she called, dazed. Entreri stepped back and crouched over her.

“Where is Jierdan?” she asked.

“Dead,” Entreri answered, no hint of remorse in his voice. “As is the golem.”

“Bok?” Sydney gasped.

“A mountain fell on him,” Entreri replied.

“And the girl?”

“Gone.” Entreri looked back to the east. “When I have seen to your needs, I will go,” he said. “Our chase is ended.”

“They are close,” Sydney argued. “You will give up your hunt?”

Entreri grinned. “The halfling will be mine,” he said evenly, and Sydney had no doubt that he spoke the truth. “But our party is disbanded. I will return to my own hunt, and you to yours, though I warn you, if you take what is mine, you will mark yourself as my next prey.”

Sydney considered the words carefully. “Where did Bok fall?” she asked on a sudden thought.

Entreri looked along the trail to the east. “In a vale beyond the copse.”

“Take me there,” Sydney insisted. “There is something that must be done.”

Entreri helped her to her feet and led her along the path, figuring that he would part with her when she had put her final business to rest. He had come to respect this young mage and her dedication to her duty, and he trusted that she would not cross him. Sydney was no wizard, and no match for him, and they both knew that his respect for her would not slow his blade if she got in his way.

Sydney surveyed the rocky slope for a moment, then turned on Entreri, a knowing smile upon her face. “You say that our quest together is ended, but you are wrong. We may prove of value to you still, assassin.”

“We?”

Sydney turned to the slope. “Bok!” she called loudly and kept her gaze upon the slope.

A puzzled look crossed Entreri’s face. He, too, studied the stones, but saw no sign of movement.

“Bok!” Sydney called again, and this time there was indeed a stir. A rumble grew beneath the layer of boulders, and then one shifted and rose into the air, the golem standing beneath it, stretching into the air. Battered and twisted, but apparently feeling no pain, Bok tossed the huge stone aside and moved toward its master.

“A golem is not so easily destroyed,” Sydney explained, drawing satisfaction from the amazed expression on Entreri’s normally emotionless face. “Bok still has a road to travel, a road it will not so easily forsake.”

“A road that will again lead us to the drow,” Entreri laughed. “Come, my companion,” he said to Sydney, “let us be on with the chase.”

The friends still had found no clues when dawn came. Bruenor stood before the wall, shouting a tirade of arcane chants, most of which had nothing to do with words of opening.

Wulfgar took a different approach. Reasoning that a hollow echo would help them ensure that they had come to the correct spot, he moved methodically along with his ear to the wall, tapping with Aegis-fang. The hammer chimed off the solid stone, singing in the perfection of its crafting.

But one blow did not reach its mark. Wulfgar brought the hammer’s head in, but just as it reached the stone, it was stopped by a blanket of blue light. Wulfgar jumped back, startled. Creases appeared in the stone, the outline of a door. The rock continued to shift and slide inward, and soon it cleared the wall and slid aside, revealing the entry hall to the dwarven homeland. A gust of air, bottled up within for centuries and carrying the scents of ages past, rushed out upon them.