Robert Salvatore - Streams of Silver

“No more,” Bruenor answered gruffly. “We’re for leaving, and not a word of arguin’ from ye!”

Regis knew with a look at the other two that he had no support against the dwarf, so he shrugged helplessly and followed them back through the curtain and into the corridor.

“The gorge!” Bruenor declared, starting them off again.

“Hold, Bok,” Sydney whispered when the companions’ torchlight re-entered the corridor a short distance ahead of them.

“Not yet,” she said, an anticipating smile widening across her dust-streaked face. “We shall find a better time!”

Suddenly, he found a focus in the blur of gray haze, something tangible amid the swirl of nothingness. It hovered before him and turned over slowly.

Its edges doubled and rolled apart, then rushed together again. He fought the dull ache in his head, the inner blackness that had consumed him and now fought to keep him in its hold. Gradually, he became aware of his arms and legs, who he was, and how he had come to be here.

In his startled awareness, the image sharpened to a crystalline focus. The tip of a jeweled dagger.

Entreri loomed above him, a dark silhouette against the backdrop of a single torch set into the wall a few yards beyond, his blade poised to strike at the first sign of resistance. Drizzt could see that the assassin, too, had been hurt in the fall, though he had obviously been the quicker to recover.

“Can you walk?” Entreri asked, and Drizzt was smart enough to know what would happen if he could not.

He nodded and moved to rise, but the dagger shot in closer.

“Not yet,” Entreri snarled. “We must first determine where we are, and where we are to go!”

Drizzt turned his concentration away from the assassin then and studied their surroundings, confident that Entreri would have already killed him if that was the assassin’s intent. They were in the mines, that much was apparent, for the walls were roughly carved stone supported by wooden columns every twenty feet or so.

“How far did we fall?” he asked the assassin, his senses telling him that they were much deeper than the room they had fought in.

Entreri shrugged. “I remember landing on hard stone after a short drop, and then sliding down a steep and twisting chute. It seemed like many moments before we finally dropped in here.” He pointed to an opening at the corner of the ceiling, where they had fallen through. “But the flow of time is different for a man thinking he is about to die, and the whole thing may have been over much more quickly than I remember.”

“Trust in your first reaction,” Drizzt suggested, “for my own perceptions tell me that we have descended a long way indeed.”

“How can we get out?”

Drizzt studied the slight grade in the floor and pointed to his right. “The slope is up to that direction,” he said.

“Then on your feet,” Entreri said, extending a hand to help the drow.

Drizzt accepted the assistance and rose cautiously and without giving any sign of a threat. He knew that Entreri’s dagger would cut him open long before he could strike a blow of his own.

Entreri knew it, too, but didn’t expect any trouble from Drizzt in their present predicament. They had shared more than an exchange of swordplay up in the alcove, and both looked upon the other with grudging respect.

“I need your eyes,” Entreri explained, though Drizzt had already figured as much. “I have found but one torch, and that will not last long enough to get me out of here. Your eyes, black elf, can find their way in the darkness. I will be close enough to feel your every move, close enough to kill you with a single thrust!” He turned the dagger over again to emphasize his point, but Drizzt understood him well enough without the visual aid.

When he got to his feet, Drizzt found that he wasn’t as badly injured as he had feared. He had twisted his ankle and knee on one leg and knew as soon as he put any weight upon it that every step would be painful. He couldn’t let on to Entreri, though. He wouldn’t be much of an asset to the assassin if he couldn’t keep up.

Entreri turned to retrieve the torch and Drizzt took a quick look at his equipment. He had seen one of his scimitars tucked into Entreri’s belt, but the other, the magical blade, was nowhere around. He felt one of his daggers still tucked into a hidden sheath in his boot, though he wasn’t sure how much it would help him against the saber and dagger of his skilled enemy. Facing Entreri with any kind of a disadvantage was a prospect reserved only for the most desperate situation.

Then, in sudden shock, Drizzt grabbed at his belt pouch, his fear intensifying when he saw that its ties were undone. Even before he had slipped his hand inside, he knew that Guenhwyvar was gone. He looked about frantically, and saw only the fallen rubble.

Noting his distress, Entreri smirked evilly under the cowl of his cloak. “We go,” he told the drow.

Drizzt had no choice. He certainly couldn’t tell Entreri of the magical statue and take the risk that Guenhwyvar would once again fall into the possession of an evil master. Drizzt had rescued the great panther from that fate once, and would rather that it remained forever buried under the tons of stone than return to an unworthy master’s hands. A final mourning glance at the rubble, and he stoically accepted the loss, taking comfort that the cat lived, quite unharmed, on its own plane of existence.

The tunnel supports drifted past them with disturbing regularity, as though they were passing the same spot again and again. Drizzt sensed that the tunnel was arcing around in a wide circle as it slightly climbed. This made him even more nervous. He knew the prowess of dwarves in tunneling, especially where precious gems or metals were concerned, and he began to wonder how many miles they might have to walk before they even reached the next highest level.

Although he had less keen underground perception and was unfamiliar with dwarven ways, Entreri shared the same uneasy feelings. An hour became two and still the line of wooden supports stretched away into the blackness.

“The torch burns low,” Entreri said, breaking the silence that had surrounded them since they had started. Even their footfalls, the practiced steps of stealthy warriors, died away in the closeness of the low passage. “Perhaps the advantage will shift to you, black elf.”

Drizzt knew better. Entreri was a creature of the night as much as he, with heightened reflexes and ample experience to more than compensate for his lack of vision in the blackness. Assassins did not work under the light of the midday sun.

Without answering, Drizzt turned back to the path ahead, but as he was looking around, a sudden reflection of the torch caught his eye. He moved to the corridor wall, ignoring Entreri’s uneasy shuffle behind him, and started feeling the surface’s texture, and peered intently at it in hopes of seeing another flash. It came for just a second as Entreri shifted behind him, a flicker of silver along the wall.

“Where silver rivers run,” he muttered in disbelief.

“What?” demanded Entreri.

“Bring the torch,” was Drizzt’s only reply. He moved his hands eagerly over the wall now, seeking the evidence that would overcome his own stubborn logic and vindicate Bruenor from his suspicions that the dwarf had exaggerated the tales of Mithril Hall.

Entreri was soon beside him, curious. The torch showed it clearly: a stream of silver running along the wall, as thick as Drizzt’s forearm and shining brightly in its purity.

“Mithril,” Entreri said, gawking. “A king’s hoard!”

“But of little use to us,” Drizzt said, to diffuse their excitement. He started again down the hall, as though the lode of mithril did not impress him. Somehow he felt that Entreri should not look upon this place, that the assassin’s mere presence fouled the riches of Clan Battlehammer. Drizzt did not want to give the assassin any reason to seek these halls again. Entreri shrugged and followed.