10. THE UNEXPECTED TURN
He heard a horn blow somewhere far back in the recesses of his mind, and the ground beneath him began to tremble. Shaken from Reverie, the elves' dreamlike, meditative state, Drizzt Do'Urden's lavender eyes popped open wide. In a movement that seemed as easy as that blink, the drow leaped up to his feet, hands instinctively going to the scimitars belted on each hip.
Around a boulder that served as a windbreak in their outdoor, ceilingless camp came Innovindil, quick-stepping.
Beneath their feet, the mountain itself trembled. Off to the side, Sunset pawed at the stone and snorted.
"The dwarves?" Innovindil asked.
"Let us hope it is the dwarves," Drizzt replied, for he didn't want to imagine the hellish destruction that rumbling might be causing to Clan Battlehammer if Obould's minions were the cause.
The two sprinted away, full speed down the side of the rocky slope. No other race could have matched the pace of the fleet and balanced elves, drow and moon. They ran side by side, leaping atop boulders and skipping over narrow cracks deep beyond sight. Arm-in-arm they overcame any natural barriers, with Drizzt hoisting Innovindil over one short stone wall, and she turning back to offer him a complimentary hand up.
Down they ran, helping each other every step. They came to one smooth and steeply declining slope that ended in a sheer drop, but rather than slow their swift run as they approached that cliff, they put their heads down and sped on. For at the base of that slope, overlooking the cliff, was a small tree, and the pair came upon it in turn. Drizzt leaped and turned, his torso horizontal. He caught the tree with outstretched arms and swung around it, using its strength to veer his run to the side.
Innovindil came right behind with a similar movement and the two ran on along the ledge. They moved to the same vantage point they had taken to witness Obould's break-in to Mithral Hall, a high, flat stone on a westward jut that afforded them a view of most of the dale, excepting only the area right near the great doors of the hall.
Soon the pair could hear screams from below, and Drizzt's heart leaped when he came to recognize that they were the cries of orcs alone.
By the time Drizzt and Innovindil got to their lookout spot, orcs were pouring from the broken doors, running back out into Keeper's Dale in full flight. Flames sprouted on some, flickering orange in the diminishing daylight, and others staggered, obviously wounded.
"The dwarves fight back," Innovindil observed.
Drizzt's hands went to his scimitar hilts and he even started away, but Innovindil grabbed him by the shoulder and held him steady.
"As you did for me when Tarathiel was slain," she explained into his scowl when he turned to regard her. "There is nothing we can do down there. "
Looking back, Drizzt knew she was right. The area of the dale closest the doors was a swaying sea of orc warriors, shouting and shoving, some running for the broken doors, others running away. Giants dotted that sea, like tall masts of an armada, closing cautiously. Echoing from the entry hall came the unmistakable sounds of battle, a cacophony of screams and shouts, the clang of metal, and the rumble of stonework.
A giant staggered out, scattering orcs before it.
Up on the stone, Drizzt punched his fist in victory, for it quickly became apparent that the dwarves were winning the day, that Obould's minions were being rudely evicted from Mithral Hall.
"They are giving ground," Innovindil called to him. He turned to see that she had moved far to the side, even climbing down over the lip of the flat stone perch to gain an even better vantage point. "The dwarves have gained the door!" she called.
Drizzt punched his fist again and silently congratulated the kin of King Bruenor. He had seen their mettle so many times up in the cold and harsh terrain of Icewind Dale, and in the war against his kin from Menzoberranzan. Thus, when he considered his former companions, he realized that he should not be surprised at the sudden turn of events. Still, it boggled even Drizzt to think that such an army as Obould's had been turned back in so efficient a manner.
Innovindil came up beside him a short while later, when the fighting had died down somewhat. She took his arm in her own and leaned in against him.
"It would seem that the orc king underestimated the strength of King Bruenor's kin," she remarked.
"I am surprised that they turned back against the orcs in this manner," Drizzt admitted. "The tunnels beyond the entry halls are tighter and more easily held. "
"They do not want the stench of orcs in their halls. "
Drizzt merely smiled.
For a long time, the pair stood there, and when they at last settled in for the remainder of the night, they did so right there on that flat stone, both eager to see what the orcs might do to counter the dwarves' charge.
As the slanting rays of the rising sun fell over them and past them to illuminate the dale below a couple of hours later, both elves were a bit surprised to see that the orcs had moved back from the doors, and seemed in no hurry to close in again. Indeed, from everything Drizzt and Innovindil could tell, it appeared as if the orcs and giants were taking up their own defensive positions. The elves watched curiously as gangs of orcs carted heavy stones in from the mountainsides, piling them near other teams who were fast at work in constructing walls.
Every now and then a giant would take one of those stones, give a roar of defiance, and launch it at the door area, but that, it seemed, was the extent of the monstrous counterattack.
"When have you ever known orcs to so willingly surrender ground, except in full retreat?" Drizzt asked, as much to himself as to his companion.
Innovindil narrowed her blue eyes and more closely studied the dale below, looking for some clue that there was something going on beneath the seemingly unconventional behavior by the brutish and aggressive monsters. For all she could tell, though, the orcs were not gathering for another charge, nor were they breaking ranks and running away, as so often happened. They were digging in.
* * * * *
Delly Curtie crept up to the slightly opened door. She held her boots in her hand for she did not want them to clack against the hard stone floor. She crouched and peered in and wasn't surprised, but was surely disappointed, to see Wulfgar sitting beside the bed, leaning over Catti-brie.
"We drove them back," he said.
"I hope more got killed than got away," the woman replied in a voice still weak. She had to swallow hard a couple of times to get through that single sentence, but there was little doubt that she was steadily and greatly improving. When they had first taken Catti-brie down from the ledge, the clerics had feared that her injuries could prove fatal, but instead they had all they could handle in keeping the woman in her bed and away from the fighting.
"I hit a few for you," Wulfgar assured her.
Delly couldn't see his face, but she was certain that the smile flashed on Catti-brie's face was mirroring Wulfgar's own.
"Bet ye did," Catti-brie replied.
Delly Curtie wanted to run in and punch her. It was that simple. The pretty face, the bright smile, the sparkle in her rich blue eyes, even in light of her injuries, just grated on the woman from Luskan.
"Talking like a dwarf again, pretty one?" Delly said under her breath, noting that Catti-brie's accent, in her stark time of vulnerability, seemed more akin to the tunnels of Mithral Hall than the more proper speech she had been using of late. In effect, Catti-brie was talking more like Delly.
Delly shook her head at her own pettiness and tried to let it go.
Wulfgar said something then that she did not catch, and he began to laugh, and so did Catti-brie. When was the last time Delly and Wulfgar had laughed like that? Had they ever?
"We'll pay them back in full and more," Wulfgar said, and Catti-brie nodded and smiled again. "There is talk of breaking out through the eastern door, back toward the Surbrin. Our enemies are stronger in the west, but even there their ranks are diminishing. "
"Swinging to the
east?" Catti-brie asked.
Delly saw Wulfgar's shoulders hunch up in a shrug.
"Even so, they do not believe that they can get in that way, and they cannot expect that we can break out," Wulfgar explained. "But the engineers insist that we can, and quickly. They'll probably use one of Nanfoodle's concoctions and blow up half the mountain. "
That brought another shared laugh, but Delly ignored that one, too intrigued by the possibilities of what Wulfgar was saying.
"Citadel Felbarr will support us across the Surbrin," he went on. "Their army now marches for the town of Winter Edge, just across the river and to the north. If we can establish a foothold from the eastern door to the river and establish a line of new warriors and supplies from across the river, Obould will not push us into the hall again. "
And all those people from the north will get their wish and be gone from Mithral Hall, Delly silently added.
She watched as Catti-brie managed to prop herself up, wincing just a bit with the movement. She flashed that perfect smile again, the light of it searing Delly's heart.
For she knew that Wulfgar was similarly grinning.
She knew that the two of them shared a bond far beyond any she could ever hope to achieve with the man who called himself her husband.
* * * * *
"They will not break out without great cost," Obould told those gathered around him, the leading shamans and gang bosses, and Gerti Orelsdottr and a few of her elite frost giants. "They are in their hole, and there they will stay. We will not relent our efforts to fortify this dale. As the dwarves built their inner sanctum to cost an invader dearly, so this dale will become our first line of slaughter. "
"But you will not go back in?" Gerti asked.
Across from her, Tsinka Shinriil and some of the other shamans growled at the thought, and King Obould gave them a sidelong glance.
"Let them have their hole," he said to Gerti. "I. . . we, have all this. " He swept his muscular arm out wide, encompassing all the mountains and wide lands to the north.
"What about Proffit?" Tsinka dared to ask. "We put him into the southern tunnels to fight the dwarves. The trolls await our victory. "
"May he find success, then," said Obould, "but we will not go in. "
"You abandon an ally?"
Obould's scowl told everyone present that Tsinka was approximately one word from death at that moment.
"Proffit has found more gain that he could ever have hoped to achieve," said the orc king. "Because of Obould! He will fight and win some tunnels, or he will be pushed back to the Trollmoors where his strength has never been greater. " Obould's red-streaked yellow eyes narrowed dangerously and a low growl escaped his torn lips as he added, "Have you anything more to say on this?"
Tsinka shrank back.
"You will end it here, then?" Gerti asked.
Obould turned to her and said, "For now. We must secure that which we have gained before we move further against our enemies. The danger now lies mostly in the east, the Surbrin. "
"Or the south," Gerti said. "There are no great rivers protecting us from the armies of Everlund and Silverymoon in the south. "
"If they come at us from the south, Proffit will give us the time we need," Obould explained. "The enemies we must expect are Adbar and Felbarr. Dwarf to dwarf. If they can breach the Surbrin, they will try to cut our lines in two. "
"Do not forget the tunnels," one of Gerti's giant aides added. "The dwarves know the upper layers of the Underdark. We may find them climbing out of holes in our midst!"
All eyes went to the confident Obould, who seemed to accept and appreciate the warning.
"I will build a watchtower on every hill and a wall across every pass. No kingdom will be better fortified and better prepared against attack, for no kingdom is so surrounded by enemies. Every day that passes will bring new strength to Obould's domain, the Kingdom of Dark Arrow. " He stood up tall and stalked about the gathering. "We will not rest our guard. We will not turn our eyes aside, nor turn our weapons upon each other. More will join our ranks. From every hole in the Spine of the World and beyond, they will come to the power of Gruumsh and the glory of Obould!"
Gerti stood up as well, if for no better reason than to tower over the pompous orc.
"I will have the foothills to the Trollmoors, and you will have the Spine of the World," Obould assured her. "Treasure will flow north as payment for your alliance. "
The ugly orc gave a toothy grin and clapped his hands together hard. A group of orcs soon approached from the side of the gathering, leading the hobbled pegasus.
"It is not a fitting mount," Obould said to Gerti. "An unreliable and stupid beast. A griffon, perhaps, for King Obould, or a dragon - yes, I would like that. But not a soft and delicate creature such as this. " He looked around. "I had thought to eat it," he joked, and all the orcs began to chuckle. "But I see the intrigue in your eyes, Gerti Orelsdottr. Our perceptions of ugliness and beauty are not alike. I suspect that you consider the beast quite pretty. "
Gerti stared at him skeptically, as if she expected him to then walk over and cut the pegasus in half.
"Whether you think it ugly or pretty, the beast is yours," Obould said, surprising all those orcs around him. "Take it as a trophy or a meal, as you will, and accept it with my gratitude for all that you have done here. "
No one in attendance, not even Gerti's close frost giant friends, had ever seen the giantess so perfectly unnerved, excepting that one occasion when Obould had bested her in combat. At every turn, the orc king seemed to have Dame Orelsdottr off-balance.
"You think it ugly so you offer it to me?" Gerti balked, stumbling through the convoluted rebuttal, and without much heart, obviously.
Obould didn't bother to answer. He just stood there holding his smile.
"The winter winds are beginning to blow high up in the mountains," Gerti said clumsily. "Our time here is short, if we are to see Shining White again before the spring. "
Obould nodded and said, "I would ask that you leave some of your kin at my disposal along the Surbrin through the season and the next. We will continue to build as the winter snows protect our flank. By next summer, the river will be impervious to attack and your giants can return home. "
Gerti looked from Obould to the pegasus several times before agreeing.
* * * * *
The mountainside south of Mithral Hall's retaken western door was more broken and less sheer than the cliffs north of that door or those marking the northern edge of Keeper's Dale, so it was that approach Drizzt and Innovindil chose as their descent. Under cover of night, moving silently as only elves could, the pair picked their careful path along the treacherous way, inching toward Mithral Hall. They knew the dwarves had the door secured once more, for every now and then a ballista bolt or a missile of flaming pitch soared out to smash against the defenses of Obould's hunkering force.
Confident that they could get into the hall, Drizzt realized that he was out of excuses. It was time to go home and face the demons of sorrow. He knew in his heart that his hopes would be dashed, that he would learn what he already knew to be true. His friends were lost to him, and a few hundred yards away as he picked his path among the stones, lay the stark truth.
But he continued along, Innovindil at his side.
They had left Sunset up on the mountaintop, untethered and free to run and fly. The pegasus would wait, or would flee if necessary, and Innovindil held all confidence that she would find her again when she called.
About a hundred and fifty feet above the floor of Keeper's Dale, the pair ran into a bit of a problem. Leading the way, Drizzt found that he was out of easy routes to the bottom, and could see no way at all for him and Innovindil to get down there under cover.
"They've got a fair number of sentries set and alert," Innovindil whispered as she moved down in a crouch beside him. "More orcs and more alert than I'd have expected. "
"This commander is cunning," Drizzt agreed.
"He'll not be caught unawares. "
"We cannot get down this way," Innovindil surmised.
They both knew where they had gone wrong. Some distance back, they had come to a fork in the ravinelike descent. One path had gone almost straight down to the ridge above the doors, while the one they had opted to take had veered to the south. Looking at the doors, the pair could see that other trail, and it seemed as if it could indeed take them low enough for a final, desperate run to the dwarven complex.
Of course, they came to see the truth of it: if they went in, they wouldn't have an easy time getting out.
"We cannot backtrack and come back down the other way before the dawns light finds us," Drizzt explained. "Tomorrow, then?"
He turned to see a very serious Innovindil staring back at him.
"If I go in, I am abandoning my people," she replied, her voice even more quiet than the whispers of their conversation.
"How so?"
"How will we get back out when there seems no concealed trail to the valley floor?"
"I will get us out, if we have to climb the chimneys of Bruenor's furnaces," Drizzt promised, but Innovindil was shaking her head with every word.
"You go tomorrow. You must return to them. "
"Alone?" Drizzt asked. "No. "
"You must," said Innovindil. "We'll not get to Sunrise anytime soon. The pegasus's best chance might well be a parlay from Mithral Hall to Obould. " She put her hand on Drizzt's shoulder, moved it up to gently stroke his face, then let it slip back down to the base of his neck. "I will continue to watch from out here. From afar, on my word. I know that you will return, and perhaps then we will have a means to retrieve lost Tarathiel's mount and friend. I cannot allow Obould to hold so beautiful a creature any longer. "
Again her delicate hand went up to gently brush Drizzt's face.
"You must do this," she said. "For me and for you. And for Tarathiel. "
Drizzt nodded. He knew that she was right.
They started back up the trail, thinking to return to a hidden camp, then take the alternate route when the sun began to dip below the western horizon once more.
The night was full of the sound of hammers and rolling stones, both inside the hall and outside in Keeper's Dale, but it was an uneventful night for the couple, lying side by side under the stars in the cool autumn wind.
To his surprise, Drizzt did not spend the hours in fear of what the following night might bring.
At least, not concerning his friends, for his acceptance was already there. He did fear for Innovindil, and he looked over at her many times that night, silently vowing that he would come back out as soon as he could to rejoin her in her quest.
Their plans did not come to fruition, though, for under the bright sun of the following morning, a commotion in Keeper's Dale brought the two elves to their lookout post. They watched curiously as a large caravan comprised mostly of giants - almost all of the giants - rolled out to the west away from them, moving to the exit of Keeper's Dale. Some orcs traveled along with them, most pulling carts of supplies.
And one other creature paced in that caravan, as well. Even from a distance, the sharp eyes of Innovindil could not miss the glistening white coat of poor Sunrise.
"They break ranks?" she asked. "A full retreat?"
Drizzt studied the scene below, watching the movements of the orcs who were not traveling beside the giants. The vast bulk of the monstrous army that had come to Keeper's Dale was not on the move. Far from it, construction on defensive barriers, walls low and high, continued in full.
"Obould is not surrendering the ground," the drow observed. "But it would seem that the giants have had enough of the fight, or there is somewhere else where they're more urgently needed. "
"In either case, they have something that does not belong to them," said Innovindil.
"And we will get him back," Drizzt vowed.
He looked down at the path that would likely get him to the western doors of Mithral Hall, the path that he had decided to walk that very night so that he could settle the past and be on with the future.
He looked back to the west and the procession, and he knew that he would not take that path to the doors that night.
He didn't need to.
He looked to his companion and offered her a smile of assurance that he was all right, that he was ready to move along.
That he was ready to bring Sunrise home.