several more gigantic ettins standing still and quiet behind stalagmites, waiting for the moment when they might join the fray.
Catti-brie, still on the platform and firing into the goblin horde, was the first to spot Drizzt, halfway up a stalagmite mound to the left-hand side of the cavern and motioning back for her and Wulfgar.
A goblin came up out of the fighting mass and charged the young woman, but Wulfgar stepped in front of her and whaled on it with his great hammer, sending it flying a dozen feet over the edge. The barbarian spun about as fast as he could, trying to ready a defense, for another goblin had come up to the side, closing with a spear point leading the way.
It nearly got the spear in for a strike, but its head exploded under the impact of a silver-streaking arrow.
'Drizzt is needing us,' Catti-brie explained, and she led the barbarian to their left along the tilting platform, Wulfgar running along the edge and pounding any goblins that tried to scramble up.
When they were clear of the main fighting, Drizzt motioned for Catti-brie to hold her position and for Wulfgar to come forward cautiously.
'He has found some giants,' Regis, hidden below the pair, explained to them, 'behind those mounds.'
Drizzt leaped down around the stalagmite, then came diving back out, turning defensive somersaults with an ettin in close pursuit, twin clubs ready to squash the drow.
The giant jerked upright when Catti-brie's arrow thudded into its chest, scorching the filthy animal hide it wore.
A second arrow knocked it off balance, then Wulfgar's hurled hammer, flying to the barbarian's resounding cries of 'Tempus!' blasted the creature away.
Guenhwyvar, still on the side of the mound, leaped atop the second ettin as it came barreling out, muscled claws raking viciously, blinding both the monster's heads until Drizzt got in close enough to put his scimitars to work.
The next giant came around the other side of the mound, but Catti-brie was ready for it, and arrow after arrow slammed it, spun it around, and finally dropped it, dead, to the ground.
Wulfgar charged forward, catching his magical war-hammer back in his grasp. Drizzt had finished with the giant by the time the barbarian caught up to him, and the dark elf joined his friend as they met the next of the charging monsters side by side.
'Like old times,' Drizzt remarked. He didn't wait for an answer, but dove into a roll in front of Wulfgar.
Both of them winced, blinded for an instant, as Catti-brie's next arrow sliced between them, slamming into the nearest giant's belly.
'She did that to make a point, you know,' Drizzt remarked, and he didn't wait for an answer, but dove into a roll in front of Wulfgar.
Understanding Drizzt's diversionary tactics, the barbarian heaved Aegis-fang right over the rolling form, and the ettin, stooping for a hit at Drizzt, caught the warhammer squarely on the side of one head. The other head remained alive, but dazed and disoriented for the split second it took to take control of the entire body.
A split second was far too long when dealing with Drizzt Do'Urden. The agile drow came up in a leap, easily avoiding a lumbering swing, and sent his scimitars in a crossing swipe that drew two parallel lines along the giant's throat.
The ettin dropped both its clubs and clutched at the mortal wound.
An arrow blew it to the ground.
Two more ettins remained behind the mound, but they-all four heads-had seen quite enough of the fighting companions. Out a side tunnel the beasts went.
Right into Dagna's rambling force.
One wounded ettin stumbled back into the main chamber, a dozen hurled hammers bouncing off its stooped back for every lumbering step it took. Before Drizzt, Wulfgar, or even Catti-brie with her bow, could make a move at the beast, a multitude of dwarves rushed out of the tunnel and leaped upon it, bore it to the ground, and hacked and pounded away with battle-crazed abandon.
Drizzt looked at Wulfgar and shrugged.
'Fear not, my friend,' the barbarian replied, smiling. 'There are many more enemies to hit!' With another bellow to his battle god, Wulfgar turned about and charged for the main fight, trying to pick out Bruenor's one- horned helmet amidst a writhing sea of tangled goblins and dwarves.
Drizzt didn't follow, though, for he preferred single combat to the wildness of general melee. Calling Guenhwyvar to his side, the drow made his way along the wall, eventually exiting the main chamber.
After only a few steps and a warning growl from his trusted panther ally, he came to realize that Regis wasn't far behind.
Bruenor's estimates of the dwarven prowess seemed on target as the battle soon became a rout. In trading hits with the armored dwarves, the goblins found their crude swords and puny clubs to be no match against the tempered weapons of their enemies.
Bruenor's people, too, were better trained, holding tight formations and keeping their nerves, which was difficult amidst all the chaos and the cries of the dying.
Goblins fled by the dozen, most finding the line of Dagna and his charges eagerly waiting to kill them.
With all the confusion, Catti-brie had to pick her shots carefully, particularly since she couldn't be certain that a skinny goblin torso would stop her flying arrows. Mostly, the young woman concentrated on those goblins breaking ranks, fleeing into the open ground between the main fight and Dagna's line.
For all her talk of parley and all the accusations she had leveled at Bruenor and the others, the young woman could not deny the tingle, the adrenaline rush, that swept over her every time she lifted Taulmaril the Heartseeker.
Wulfgar's eyes, too, gleamed with a luster that indicated the fine edge of survival. Raised among a warlike people, he had learned the battle-lust at an early age, a rage that had been tempered only when Bruenor and Drizzt had taught him the worth of his perceived enemies and the many sorrows his tribe's wars had caused.
There was no guilt in this fight, though, not against evil goblins, and Wulfgar's charge from the dead ettins to the larger battle was accompanied by a hearty song to Tern-pus. Wulfgar found no target clear enough for him to chance a throw with his hammer, but he was not dismayed, particularly when a group of several goblins broke clear of the fighting and fled his way.
The leading three hardly realized that the barbarian was there when Wulfgar's first sidelong cut with Aegis- fang swept them aside, killing two. The goblins behind stumbled in surprise, but came on anyway, flowing around the barbarian like a river around a rock.
A goblin head exploded under Aegis-fang's next heavy blow; Wulfgar snapped the hammer across one- handed to deflect a sword, then followed with a punching left hook that shattered his would-be attacker's jaw and sent the creature flying.
The barbarian felt a sting in his side, and he flinched before the sword could dig in deeply. His free hand whipped back across, clamping atop his attacker's head and lifting the squirming creature from the ground. It still had its sword, and Wulfgar realized that he was vulnerable. He found his only possible defense in sheer savagery, jerking the lifted goblin back and forth so violently that the creature could not get its bearings for a strike.
Wulfgar spun around to drive his many attackers back, using his momentum to aid in his one-handed hammer swipe. An advancing goblin tried to backtrack, and lifted its arm in a pitiful defense, but the warhammer blasted through the skinny limb and crushed on, knocking the creature's head so powerfully that when the goblin fell to the ground, it landed on its back. Its face, too, was squarely against the stone.
The stubborn, stupid goblin in the air nicked Wulfgar's huge biceps. The barbarian brought the creature down hard, squeezed and twisted, and heard the satisfying crack of neck bone. Seeing a coming charge from the corner of his eye, he hurled the dead thing at its companions, scattering them.
'Tempus!' the barbarian roared. He took up his war-hammer in both hands and rushed into the bulk of the surrounding group, whipping Aegis-fang back and forth repeatedly. Any goblin that could not flee that furious charge, could not get out of deadly range, found a piece of its body utterly destroyed.
Wulfgar pivoted and came back at the group he knew was behind him. The goblins had indeed begun an advance, but when the mighty warrior spun about, his face contorted in wild-eyed frenzy, the goblins turned about and ran away. Wulfgar heaved his hammer, crushing one, then pivoted again and rushed back the other way, at the
