Berellip sucked in her breath hard. If she went to the battle and lost, Matron Zeerith would likely walk right into a trap!
Nay, she had to survive, had to warn Matron Zeerith, had to warn Menzoberranzan.
“To the mines,” Berellip said again, and she swiftly led the way out of her private chambers.
Madness, Entreri thought, looking left at the advancing companions and the drider trio rushing to intercept them.
But even that word seemed too trite somehow, somehow unworthy of the chaos to the assassin’s left, where drow undead battle living drow and goblins, and where that wild dwarf—it was Bruenor’s former shield-dwarf, Entreri believed—continued to wash in the blood of enemies.
And if that weren’t enough to scramble Entreri’s sensibilities, out of the air, from a cloud of smoke that rolled in the reverberations of the winding horn, appeared a contingent of new warriors, barbarian warriors, leaping down or falling down from above, to hit the floor running into battle.
Any battle, it seemed.
They each carried a pair of hand axes, and put them to use wherever they could, whether on a goblin or a drow—alive or dead—it seemed not to matter.
Berserkers, Entreri realized, and perhaps they had come from Warrior’s Rest, indeed.
The assassin didn’t know whether to hang there and let it all play out or find a way to join in the melee. He brought his metal scrap up to the lock and slipped it in, easily managing the tumblers. But when the cage was unlocked, he held it tightly closed, still unsure of his course and not wanting to get stung by Berellip’s lightning glyph.
His leg and his ribs ached from the beating the drider had put upon him. He put more weight on that particularly injured leg, ensuring that it would hold his weight. Then he settled his thoughts and reached into his warrior core, determined to ignore the pain if the need arose.
He watched the unwinding battle and waited and figured he’d sort it out.
And indeed he did, almost immediately, when he saw Drizzt in trouble across the way, squared up against a pair of skilled drow warriors, and more so when he saw a third enemy approaching him, swords in hand.
“To the lower tunnels!” he heard a fourth dark elf call to that one, and the swordsman nodded but did not veer to follow.
Nay, that third drow came for Entreri, his hands wringing eagerly around his weapon hilts, his intent clear in his red eyes.
Entreri set his cage to swinging.
“They’ll not have you, iblith!” the drow said, rushing in fast to stab at him. He thrust his sword through the bands of metal, or tried to, but Entreri deftly rotated the hanging and swinging cage so that as the sword came through, the band of metal went against it and turned it.
And at that same moment, Entreri opened the cage, back across from the thrusting sword, and threw himself backward and up. The lightning glyph charged into him, but he was expecting it, and used to it, though his foe was not.
Indeed, as that shock went up the blade of the sword, to the hilt and into the grasping hand, the drow yelped in pain and surprise and dropped the weapon.
And around came the cage in its swing, its door, arcing with lightning magic, opened like a biting maw.
The drow was too quick for that, though, and he fell back, but first fell down to the floor to retrieve his blade.
Except that his blade was not there.
And the swinging, sparking cage was empty.
Down low, caught by utter surprise, and against Artemis Entreri, the drow had no chance. He managed to block the first stab, even to deflect the second, and he almost got his legs back under him to stand.
Almost.
He felt the blood fountaining from his collar, felt the human pull the second sword from his grasp, felt the stone floor, which suddenly seemed so cold.
So cold.
Wulfgar tangled with a horde of goblins, several bloodthirsty enemies leaping all over each other to get at him.
Regis faced just one opponent, but he would have gladly traded places with his large friend. For this was a drow, a dark elf warrior, supremely armed and armored and trained, and it only took the halfling the first exchange—his rapier thrust easily knocked aside and his dirk barely clipping the thrusting sword in time to move it aside of his face—for him to realize that he was sorely overmatched.
On came the drow with a dazzling flourish, and Regis retreated fast and thought to simply warp-step as the first movement in a full retreat!
But no, a snake was in his hand, re-grown on the dagger, and as the drow pursued, the halfling threw it at him. Up it crawled, the leering spectral face appeared, and the charging drow’s feet came out from under him as he was yanked backward.
“Heigh-ho!” Regis cheered and leaped ahead to stab at him, but he skidded to a fast stop as the drow twisted around and stabbed back over his shoulder into that leering face, which disappeared in a heartbeat.
Still twisting and rolling, the formidable drow was back on his feet before Regis had taken another step.
“Wulfgar!” Regis cried, throwing the second snake, and again the drow was tugged back, and again he stabbed and broke free and came back up.
And charged, and Regis shot him in the face with his hand crossbow.
The drow staggered forward, Regis fell to the ground, and a great sweep of Aegis-fang swept the air above him and sent the dark elf spinning away.
“Well fought!” Wulfgar congratulated.
Regis nodded as he stood once more, not disagreeing, but surely glad that he was surrounded by such fine allies … and carrying such unusual and powerful toys.
And doubly glad when he saw the next enemies charging fast into the fray, a trio of horrid abominations, huge half-spiders that the halfling knew were far beyond him, with or without his toys.
The drow battled wildly, stabbing up with her knife, but Guenhwyvar caught her arms in curling claws and held her firmly as the panther’s back claws went into a swift rake. One feline foot caught hold and the sheer power of the cat pulled the drow from her defensive curl. Fine armor, this one wore, but the claws caught hold repeatedly and tore at the supporting leather straps, loosening the various mail pieces and allowing Guenhwyvar’s next rake to take a bit more flesh.
The drow tried hard to break free, throwing herself to the side, and Guenhwyvar did retract the claws of one paw.
If the drow thought it a small victory, the hope was short-lived, though, as that paw came down upon her face, claws extending, hooking.
A heavy blow struck Guenhwyvar in the flank, throwing the cat around sideways. She went with the weight of it, roaring in pain and anger, and tugged her claw free, taking the drow’s face with it. Before she had even settled, Guenhwyvar slashed across, snapping the long spear that had embedded in her flank, and sprang away fearlessly, flying into the torso of the intervening drider.
The creature closed up to accept the hit and brought its half spear in to batter the cat.
The panther drove on, kicking and clawing and biting, her maw always snapping for the drider’s face, forcing it back, back, until Guenhwyvar could scale a bit higher and drive a bit harder, and the tangled combatants rolled over in a thrashing heap.
The drider cried out for help, but no goblins would go near this deadly cat, and suddenly there seemed to be few dark elves around.
The drider cried out again, but found that it was yelling right into Guenhwyvar’s mouth as the panther bit down powerfully upon its face.
“Split them, girl!” Bruenor called, and Catti-brie was already deep into her spellcasting. She stepped up between Bruenor on her right, Regis on her left, and with Wulfgar to the left of him, and sent a line a fire running out from her extended hands, right at the drider in the middle of the approaching trio.
The targeted drider screeched and tried to go to its right, for the fury of the wall of fire burned out the other way, but just as the spidery creature came free of the blinding flames, Aegis-fang crashed against it, jolting it and stunning it an
d driving it back the other way, back into the conflagration.
Catti-brie fell back and moved behind Bruenor as he broke out to the side, and she began casting immediately.
On came the drider on that side, the hot side, of the fire wall, and out charged Bruenor to meet it. The dwarf slid in low on his knees, under the creature’s stabbing long spear, and he cracked his axe against the hard exoskeleton of the monster’s front leg.
Up came his foaming-mug buckler, turning aside another spear stab, and Bruenor hit it again.
Then the dwarf leaped back, blinded and surprised as a lightning bolt sizzled over his head, slamming his opponent and staggering the drider backward.
Catti-brie had forked that bolt, Bruenor realized, for behind his opponent came the middle drider, batting at the stubborn flames that curled and ate its skin. The force of the lightning bolt jolted the distracted creature backward, its trailing legs collapsing, and down it went, halfway to the floor, the hungry flames still biting.
Bruenor put his feet under him and reversed his momentum, thinking to charge right back in. He felt Catti-brie’s hand on his shoulder, though, and heard the woman casting another spell.
Then he felt light on his feet—so light! And Catti-brie easily lifted him into the air and threw him like a living missile, the levitating, floating dwarf soaring in at the still-staggering drider.
Now Bruenor was up close, above the spidery body, and too near for the drider to properly bring its spear to bear.
The abomination bit at him instead, but tasted only the edge of a sturdy buckler, followed quickly by the notched head of Bruenor’s swinging axe.
Across the flame wall came the largest of the three abominations, a heavy mace in one hand, huge trident lifted in the other. Ignoring the small halfling, the monstrous creature veered for Wulfgar, who was apparently unarmed, stabbing with its trident.
The barbarian dodged back, then dived and tried to roll away, but down came the trident, diving into and through his boot, into and through his foot!
He growled in pain and tried to twist around as the spider legs came over him, as the heavy mace lifted above him.
And as Regis flew in from the side, leaping and shooting his hand crossbow, and not with a poison-coated bolt this time, for he doubted that any poison would affect this abomination. He used his prototype dart, from Cadderly’s old design, with a tiny vial of oil of impact set in its center within collapsible bars.
The dart hit, to little effect, then crushed in on itself, smashing the vial. The oil of impact exploded and the drider staggered. But the dart didn’t have quite the effect Regis had hoped, startling the drider more than hurting it, for the explosion was not properly shaped, and the bulk of its force came back the other way, throwing the back end of the broken quarrel across the room the other way.
Regis didn’t slow—Wulfgar couldn’t afford any hesitance on the halfling’s part. He leaped at the drider and lived up to his nickname of Spider, scrambling up the leg to stab at the drow torso with his fine rapier.
This time he did hurt the creature, he learned, and painfully, as the drider yelped and let go of the trident pinning Wulfgar, freeing up its hands so that it could slap Regis aside.
The halfling flew back and tumbled when he landed, avoiding serious injury, and as he came around, he thought to put his feet back under him and charge right back in. That thought flew away, however, for the drider proved much quicker than he had anticipated, and before he ever got back to his feet, Regis found the monstrous beast towering over him, front four legs lifted as it reared, rising up to gain more momentum for a two-handed crushing chop of that huge mace.
Down it came, and Regis fainted away before it ever hit him.
Mercifully.
They came in at him left and right simultaneously, each with two swords leading the way. Worse, the drow on Drizzt’s right stabbed and slashed alternately, while the one to his left sent his swords into a rolling motion.
Drizzt’s hands worked independently, vertical parries to his left, alternate blocks to his right. Every hit of metal on metal rang out as a testament to the skill of Drizzt Do’Urden, for these were no novice fighters before him, and a duo of dark elves who had obviously battled side-by-side many times in the past.
But Drizzt wasn’t gaining any ground here, and it was all he could manage simply to keep those deadly blades away. He looked to his friends for help, but saw the fire wall and the monstrous driders. He looked to Guenhwyvar, but she, too, was locked in mortal combat, a broken spear hanging from her flank, a drider battling her mightily.
Over rolled the blades of the dark elf to Drizzt’s left, but out of the roll came one thrust low, and Drizzt had to lurch and slap Twinkle down low to deflect the cunning attack. And in that lurch, he found an insurmountable disadvantage to the right, as that warrior stabbed low, forcing a similar downward block, then double-thrust, one blade high, one blade low.
Too fast.
Drizzt had no way to block.
He could only dodge, but in the tight press, that meant one option alone, and he threw himself into a back flip, knowing his enemies would pursue, doubting that his position would be any better when he landed than when he had leaped.
And worse, and he knew himself doomed, his leap took him over a third warrior, one that had come skidding in at his back.
Drizzt landed with a flourish, blades spinning in wide circles, expecting six swords rushing in at him.
But no, he found none, for it was no drow he had somersaulted but a human, and one wielding two drow swords, and doing so with the skill of any weapons master who had ever graduated from Melee-Magthere, and doing so with the skill of Drizzt himself!
“Quick, fool!” Artemis Entreri yelled at him as the assassin took Drizzt’s place between the dark elf warriors.
Drizzt leaped ahead, spinning sidelong, yelling “Right!” and at precisely the correct moment, Entreri spun to his left to face up against that drow, while Drizzt rolled in at his back to meet the other.
Now the parries included counters, clever ripostes as Drizzt and Entreri, mirror images of each other, found an easy rhythm against the skilled drow warriors. In separate fights, one-against-one, either of these skilled Xorlarrins might have held firm for some time against either of these opponents, and so of course, they both assumed that with their practiced teamwork, they would still win the day.
They both assumed wrong.
Drizzt and Entreri had not battled together nearly as often as their opponents, but it didn’t matter. Not with these two, so perfectly matched, each with so great an understanding of the other.
Drizzt went into a sudden charge, Twinkle and Icingdeath slashing in a powerful flurry that drove his opponent back. But Drizzt did not follow for long, cutting into a sudden back-step and throwing himself down and around.
Entreri felt the motion as Drizzt moved from his back, and listened carefully for the sudden return. When it came, the assassin struck hard to keep his enemy engaged, then leaped up high, legs flying out to either side. He waited for Drizzt to slide through, before snapping himself around in mid-air to meet the rush of the warrior Drizzt had driven off.
And by that time, though it was only a heartbeat, both of Drizzt’s blades had thrust in beneath the attempted block of the surprised dark elf who had been battling Entreri, whose eyes had lifted with Entreri’s jump, and who had not even noted the sliding charge of Drizzt until it was far too late.
Drizzt retracted his bloody blades, tucked one leg in tight in his slide and propelled himself up and around in a spin, a backhand slash of Twinkle cutting down the wounded drow.
By the time Drizzt came around, he found the other enemy in full flight, running fast from Entreri, who did not pursue. That drow danced and leaped among the carnage, heading for the doorway in the far corner of the room.
He made it more than halfway, quickstepping past fallen kin, fallen goblins, and the torn bodies of dark elf vampire minions, before a powerful and squat f
orm appeared out of nowhere, flying against him and throwing him crashing to the floor.
Holding fast to his victim, Thibbledorf Pwent began to shake and thrash, his ridged armor tearing the drow to pieces.
Drizzt spun back the other way, toward the wall of fire and the Companions of the Hall. He couldn’t see Bruenor or Catti-brie, or two of the trio of driders that had gone against them. The wall of flames obscured that fight. But he did see Regis, lying on the floor, covering up pathetically as the rearing drider came down, the huge mace—the mace of Ambergris, Drizzt realized!—crashing down in a surely killing blow.
“Regis!” Drizzt cried out desperately.
Above the hiss of the fires, above the ring of swords, above the cries of the wounded, above the growls of Pwent’s undead, came the thunder as Aegis-fang swept up to meet the downward chop of Skullcrusher. Both Wulfgar and Yerrininae roared as their weapons collided, the cries and the crash blending together in a sound of pure power that reverberated off the Forge walls.
Intent on protecting Regis, who was not moving and was not even conscious, Wulfgar tried to skip out to the side, but the fierce drider stopped him with a planted leg and cleverly stabbed in with Skullcrusher. Wulfgar managed to sweep his warhammer vertically to turn the mace aside, but he sucked in his breath as he realized the stab to be a ruse, a way for Wulfgar to help the drider properly angle his weapon for another strike at Regis.
Wulfgar threw Aegis-fang at the beast. He couldn’t get any weight behind the throw to hurt the drider, so he used it as a distraction, a way to slow the strike at Regis, and he launched himself out, catching Skullcrusher’s handle just above the drider’s grip.
The barbarian’s muscles corded and strained against the powerful abomination, and a lesser man would have simply tumbled down atop Regis behind the mace’s descent.