Jankin bolted free, for just a moment. Quicker than anyone could react, Drizzt threw off his cloak and rushed after the fleeing monk, catching him just inside the heavy iron door. A single step and twisting maneuver put Jankin down hard on his back and took the wild-eyed friar’s breath away.
“Let us get by this region at once,” the drow offered, staring down at the stunned friar. “I grow tired of Jankin’s antics—I might just allow him to run down to the dragon!”
Two of the others came over and gathered Jankin up, then the whole troupe turned to depart.
“Help!” came a cry from farther down the dark tunnel.
Drizzt’s scimitars came out in his hands. The friars all gathered around him, peering down into the gloom.
“Do you see anything?” Mateus asked the drow, knowing that Drizzt’s night vision was much keener than his own.
“No, but the tunnel turns a short way from here,” Drizzt replied.
“Help!” came the cry again. Behind the group, around the corner in the main tunnel, Tephanis had to suppress his laughter. Quicklings were adept ventriloquists, and the biggest problem Tephanis had in deceiving the group was keeping his cries slow enough to be understood.
Drizzt took a cautious step in, and the friars, even Jankin, sobered by the distress call, followed right behind. Drizzt motioned for them to go back, even as he suddenly realized the potential for a trap.
But Tephanis was too quick. The door slammed with a resounding thud and before the drow, two steps away, could push through the startled friars, the sprite already had the door locked. A moment later, Drizzt and the friars heard a second crash as the portcullis came down.
Tephanis was back out in the daylight a few minutes later, thinking himself quite clever and reminding himself to keep a puzzled expression when he explained to Roddy that the drow’s party was nowhere to be found.
* * *
The friars grew tired of yelling as soon as Drizzt reminded them that their screams might arouse the occupant at the other end of the tunnel. “Even if someone happens by the portcullis, he will not hear you through this door,” the drow said, inspecting the heavy portal with the single candle Mateus had lit. A combination of iron, stone, and leather, and perfectly fitted, the door had been crafted by dwarves. Drizzt tried pounding on it with the pommel of a scimitar, but that produced only a dull thud that went no farther than the screams.
“We are lost,” groaned Mateus. “We have no way out, and our stores are not too plentiful.”
“Another sign!” Jankin blurted suddenly, but two of the friars knocked him down and sat on him before he could run off toward the dragon’s den.
“Perhaps there is something to Brother Jankin’s thinking,” Drizzt said after a long pause.
Mateus looked at him suspiciously. “Are you thinking that our stores would last longer if Brother Jankin went to meet Hephaestus?” he asked.
Drizzt could not hold his laughter. “I have no intention of sacrificing anyone,” he said and looked at Jankin struggling under the friars. “No matter how willing! But we have only one way out, it would seem.”
Mateus followed Drizzt’s gaze down the dark tunnel. “If you plan no sacrifices, then you are looking the wrong way,” the portly friar huffed. “Surely you are not thinking to get past the dragon!”
“We shall see,” was all that the drow answered. He lit another candle from the first one and moved a short distance down the tunnel. Drizzt’s good sense argued against the undeniable excitement he felt at the prospect of facing Hephaestus, but it was an argument that he expected simple necessity to overrule. Montolio had fought a dragon, Drizzt remembered, had lost his eyes to a red. The ranger’s memories of the battle, aside from his wounds, were not so terrible. Drizzt was beginning to understand what the blind ranger had told him about the differences between survival and fulfillment. How valuable would be the five hundred years Drizzt might have left to live?
For the friar’s sake, Drizzt did hope that someone would come along and open the portcullis and door. The drow’s fingers tingled with promised thrills, though, when he reached into his sack and pulled out a book on dragon lore he had taken from the grove.
The drow’s sensitive eyes needed little light, and he could make out the script with only minor difficulty. As he suspected, there was an entry for the venerable red who lived west of Mirabar. The book confirmed that Hephaestus was not the dragon’s real name, rather the name given to it in reference to some obscure god of blacksmiths.
The entry was not extensive, mostly tales from the merchants who went in to hire the dragon for its breath, and other tales of merchants who apparently said the wrong thing or haggled too much about the cost—or perhaps the dragon was merely hungry or in a foul mood—for they never came back out. Most importantly to Drizzt, the entry confirmed the friar’s description of the beast as lazy and somewhat stupid. According to the notes, Hephaestus was overly proud, as dragons usually were, and able to speak the common tongue, but “lacking in the area of suspicious insight normally associated with the breed, particularly with venerable reds.”
“Brother Herschel is attempting to pick the lock,” Mateus said, coming over to Drizzt. “Your fingers are nimble. Would you give it a try?”
“Neither Herschel nor I could get through that lock,” Drizzt said absently, not looking up from the book.
“At least Herschel is trying,” Mateus growled, “and not huddled off by himself wasting candles and reading some worthless tome!”
“Not so worthless to any of us who mean to get out of here alive,” Drizzt said, still not looking up. He had the portly friar’s attention.
“What is it?” Mateus asked, leaning closely over Drizzt’s shoulder, even though he could not read.
“It tells of vanity,” Drizzt replied.
“Vanity? What does vanity have to do… ”
“Dragon vanity,” Drizzt explained. “A very important point, perhaps. All dragons possess it in excess, evil ones more than good ones.”
“Wielding claws as long as swords and breath that can melt a stone, well they should!” grumbled Mateus.
“Perhaps,” Drizzt conceded, “but vanity is a weakness—do not doubt—even to a dragon. Several heroes have exploited this trait to a dragon’s demise.”
“Now you’re thinking of killing the thing?” Mateus gawked.
“If I must,” Drizzt said, again absently. Mateus threw up his hands and walked away, shaking his head to answer the questioning stares of the others.
Drizzt smiled privately and returned to his reading. His plans were taking definite form now. He read the entire entry several times, committing every word of it to memory. Three candles later, Drizzt was still reading and the friars were growing impatient and hungry. They prodded Mateus, who stood, hiked his belt up over his belly, and strode toward Drizzt.
“More vanity?” he asked sarcastically.
“Done with that part,” Drizzt answered. He held up the book, showing Mateus a sketch of a huge black dragon curled up around several fallen trees in a thick swamp. “I am learning now of the dragon that may aid our cause.”
“Hephaestus is a red,” Mateus remarked scornfully, “not a black.”
“This is a different dragon,” Drizzt explained. “Mergandevinasander of Chult, possibly a visitor to converse with Hephaestus.”
Brother Mateus was at a complete loss. “Reds and blacks do not get on well,” he snipped, his skepticism obvious. “Every fool knows that.”
“Rarely do I listen to fools,” Drizzt replied, and again the friar turned and walked away, shaking his head.
“There is something more that you do not know, but Hephaestus most probably will,” Drizzt said quietly, too low for anyone to hear. “Mergandevinasander has purple eyes!” Drizzt closed the book, confident that it had given him enough understanding to make his attempt. If he had ever witnessed the terrible splendor of a venerable red before, he would not have been smiling at that moment. But both ignoran
ce and memories of Montolio bred courage in the young drow warrior who had so little to lose, and Drizzt had no intention of giving in to starvation for fear of some unknown danger. He wouldn’t go forward either, not yet.
Not until he had time to practice his best dragon voice.
* * *
Of all the splendors Drizzt had seen in his adventurous life, none—not the great houses of Menzoberranzan, the cavern of the illithids, even the lake of acid—began to approach the awe-inspiring spectacle of the dragon’s lair. Mounds of gold and gems filled the huge chamber in rolling waves, like the wake of some giant ship on the sea. Weapons and armor, gleaming magnificently, were piled all about, and the abundance of crafted items—chalices, goblets and the like—could have fully stocked the treasure rooms of a hundred rich kings.
Drizzt had to remind himself to breathe when he looked upon the splendor. It wasn’t the riches that held him so—he cared little for material things—but the adventures that such wondrous items and wealth hinted at tugged Drizzt in a hundred different directions. Looking at the dragon’s lair belittled his simple survival on the road with the Weeping Friars and his simple desire to find a peaceful and quiet place to call his home. He thought again of Montolio’s dragon tale, and of all the other adventurous tales the blind ranger had told him. Suddenly he needed those adventures for himself.
Drizzt wanted a home, and he wanted to find acceptance, but he realized then, looking at the spoils, that he also desired a place in the books of the bards. He hoped to travel roads dangerous and exciting and even write his own tales.
The chamber itself was immense and uneven, rolling back around blind corners. The whole of it was dimly lit in a smoky, reddish golden glow. It was warm, uncomfortably so when Drizzt and the others took the time to consider the source of that heat.
Drizzt turned back to the waiting friars and winked, then pointed down to his left, to the single exit. “You know the signal,” he mouthed silently.
Mateus nodded tentatively, still wondering if it had been wise to trust the drow. Drizzt had been a valuable ally to the pragmatic friar on the road these last few months, but a dragon was a dragon.
Drizzt surveyed the room again, this time looking past the treasures. Between two piles of gold he spotted his target, and that was no less splendid than the jewels and gems. Lying in the valley of those mounds was a huge, scaled tail, red-gold like the hue of the light, swishing slightly and rhythmically back and forth, each swipe piling the gold deeper around it.
Drizzt had seen pictures of dragons before; one of the wizard masters in the Academy had even created illusions of the various dragon types for the students to inspect. Nothing, though, could have prepared the drow for this moment, his first view of a living dragon. In all the known realms there was nothing more impressive, and of all the dragon types, huge reds were perhaps the most imposing.
When Drizzt finally managed to tear his gaze from the tail, he sorted out his path into the chamber. The tunnel exited high on the side of a wall, but a clear trail led down to the floor. Drizzt studied this for a long moment, memorizing every step. Then he scooped two handfuls of dirt into his pockets, removed an arrow from his quiver, and placed a darkness spell over it. Carefully and quietly, Drizzt picked his blind steps down the trail, guided by the continuing swish of the scaly tail. He nearly stumbled when he reached the first pile of gems and heard the tail come to an abrupt stop.
“Adventure,” Drizzt reminded himself quietly, and he went on, concentrating on his mental image of his surroundings. He imagined the dragon rearing up before him, seeing through his darkness-globe disguise. He winced instinctively, expecting a burst of flame to engulf him and shrivel him where he stood. But he pressed on, and when he at last came over the gold pile, he was glad to hear the easy, thunderlike, breathing of the slumbering dragon.
Drizzt started up the second mound slowly, letting a spell of levitation form in his thoughts. He didn’t really expect the spell to work very well—it had been failing more completely each time he attempted it. Any help he could get would add to the effect of his deception. Halfway up the mound, Drizzt broke into a run, spraying coins and gems with every step. He heard the dragon rouse, but didn’t slow, drawing his bow as he went.
When he reached the ridge, he leaped out and enacted the levitation, hanging motionless in the air for a split second before the spell failed. Then Drizzt dropped, firing the bow and sending the darkness globe soaring across the chamber.
He never would have believed that a monster of such size could be so nimble, but when he crashed heavily onto a pile of goblets and jeweled trinkets, he found himself staring into the face of a very angry beast.
Those eyes! Like twin beams of damnation, their gaze latched onto Drizzt, bored right through him, impelled him to fall on his belly and grovel for mercy, and to reveal every deception, to confess every sin to Hephaestus, this god-thing. The dragon’s great, serpentine neck angled slightly to the side, but the gaze never let go of the drow, holding him as firmly as one of Bluster the bear’s hugs.
A voice sounded faintly but firmly in Drizzt’s thoughts, the voice of a blind ranger spinning tales of battle and heroism. At first, Drizzt hardly heard it, but it was an insistent voice, reminding Drizzt in its own special way that five other men depended on him now. If he failed, the friars would die.
This part of the plan was not too difficult for Drizzt, for he truly believed in his words. “Hephaestus!” he cried in the common tongue. “Can it be, at long last? Oh, most magnificent! More magnificent than the tales, by far!”
The dragon’s head rolled back a dozen feet from Drizzt, and a confused expression came into those all-knowing eyes, revealing the facade. “You know of me?” Hephaestus boomed, the dragon’s hot breath blowing Drizzt’s white mane behind him.
“All know of you, mighty Hephaestus!” Drizzt cried, scrambling to his knees but not daring to stand. “It was you whom I sought, and now I have found you and am not disappointed!”
The dragon’s terrible eyes narrowed suspiciously. “Why would a dark elf seek Hephaestus, Destroyer of Cockleby, Devourer of Ten Thousand Cattle, He Who Crushed Angalander the Stupid Silver, He Who… ” It went on for many minutes, with Drizzt bearing the foul breath stoically, all the while feigning enchantment with the dragon’s listing of his many wicked accomplishments. When Hephaestus was done, Drizzt had to pause a moment to remember the initial question.
His real confusion only added to the deception at the time. “Dark elf?” he asked as if he didn’t understand. He looked up at the dragon and repeated the words, even more confused. “Dark elf?”
The dragon looked all around, his gaze falling like twin beacons across the treasure mounds, then lingering for some time on Drizzt’s blackness globe, halfway across the room. “I mean you!” Hephaestus roared suddenly, and the force of the yell knocked Drizzt over backward. “Dark elf!”
“Drow?” Drizzt said, recovering quickly and daring now to stand. “No, not I.” He surveyed himself and nodded in sudden recognition. “Yes, of course,” he said. “So often do I forget this mantle I wear!”
Hephaestus issued a long, low, increasingly impatient growl and Drizzt knew he had better move quickly.
“Not a drow,” he said. “Though soon I might be if Hephaestus cannot help me!” Drizzt could only hope that he had piqued the dragon’s curiosity. “You have heard of me, I am sure, mighty Hephaestus. I am, or was and hope to be again, Mergandevinasander of Chult, an old black of no small fame.”
“Mergandevin… ?” Hephaestus began, but the dragon let the word trail away. Hephaestus had heard of the black, of course; dragons knew the names of most of the other dragons in all the world. Hephaestus knew, too, as Drizzt had hoped he would, that Mergandevinasander had purple eyes.
To aid him through the explanation, Drizzt recalled his experiences with Clacker, the unfortunate pech who had been transformed by a wizard into the form of a hook horror. “A wizard defeated me,” he began somberly. ??
?A party of adventurers entered my lair. Thieves! I got one of them, though, a paladin!”
Hephaestus seemed to like this little detail, and Drizzt, who had just thought of it, congratulated himself silently.
“How his silvery armor sizzled under the acid of my breath!”
“Pity to so waste him” Hephaestus interjected. “Paladins do make such fine meals!”
Drizzt smiled to hide his uneasiness at the thought. How would a dark elf taste? he could not help but wonder with the dragon’s mouth so very near. “I would have killed them all—and a fine treasure take it would have been—but for that wretched wizard! It was he that did this terrible thing to me!” Drizzt looked at his drow form reprovingly.
“Polymorph?” Hephaestus asked, and Drizzt noted a bit of sympathy—he prayed—in the voice.
Drizzt nodded solemnly. “An evil spell. Took my form, my wings, and my breath. Yet I remained Mergandevinasander in thought, though… ” Hephaestus widened his eyes at the pause, and the pitiful, confused look that Drizzt gave actually backed the dragon up.
“I have found this sudden affinity to spiders,” Drizzt muttered. “To pet them and kiss them… ” So that is what a disgusted red dragon looks like, Drizzt thought when he glanced back up at the beast. Coins and trinkets tinkled all throughout the room as an involuntary shudder coursed through the dragon’s spine.
* * *
The friars in the low tunnel couldn’t see the exchange, but they could make out the conversation well enough and understood what the drow had in mind. For the first time that any of them could recall, Brother Jankin was stricken speechless, but Mateus managed to whisper a few words, echoing their shared sentiments.
“He has got a measure of fortitude, that one!” The portly friar chuckled, and he slapped a hand across his own mouth, fearing that he had spoken too loudly.