behind the pillar, and the goblin that had thrown its short sword toppled back out from behind the mound, its skull shattered.
Regis, holding his little mace, peeked around the pillar and shrugged.
Drizzt was at a loss and simply returned the stare, then spun about to pursue the remaining goblin, which was fast weaving its way around the cavern teeth toward a corridor at the chamber's far end.
The drow, faster and more agile, gained steadily. He noticed Guenhwyvar, the panther's maw glowing hot with the blood of a fresh kill, loping along a parallel course and gaining on the goblin with every long stride. Drizzt was confident then that the creature had no chance of escape.
At the corridor's entrance, the goblin jolted to a stop. Drizzt skidded aside, as did Guenhwyvar, both diving for the cover of pillars, as a series of snapping and sparking
explosions ignited all about the goblin's body. It shrieked and jerked wildly, this way and that; pieces of its clothing and its flesh blew away.
The continuing explosions held the goblin up long after it was dead. Finally, they ended and the creature fell to the floor, trailing thin lines of smoke from several dozen blasted wounds.
Drizzt and Guenhwyvar held steady, perfectly silent, not knowing what new monster had arrived.
The chamber lit up suddenly with a magical light.
Drizzt, fighting hard to bring his eyes into focus, clutched his scimitars tightly.
'All dead?' he heard a familiar dwarven voice say. He blinked his eyes open just in time to see the cleric Cobble enter the room, one hand in a large belt pouch, the other holding a shield out before him.
Several soldiers came in behind, one of them muttering, 'Damn good spell, priest.'
Cobble moved to inspect the shattered body, then nodded his agreement. Drizzt slipped out from behind the mound.
The surprised cleric's hand came whipping out, launching a score of small objects-pebbles? — at the draw. Guenhwyvar growled, Drizzt dove, and the pebbles hit the rock where he had been standing, initiating another burst of small explosions.
'Drizzt!' Cobble cried, realizing his mistake. 'Drizzt!' He rushed to the drow, who was looking back to the many scorch marks on the floor.
'Are you all right, dear Drizzt?' Cobble cried.
'Damn good spell, priest,' Drizzt replied in his best imitation-dwarf voice, his.smile wide and admiring.
Cobble clapped him hard on the back, nearly knocking him over. 'I like that one, too,' he said, showing Drizzt that he had a pouch full of the bomblike pebbles. 'Ye want to carry some?'
'I do,' replied Regis, coming around a stalagmite, closer to the tunnel entrance than Drizzt had been.
Drizzt blinked his lavender orbs in amazement at the halfling's prowess.
Another force of goblins, more than a hundred strong, had been positioned in corridors to the right of the main chamber, to come in at the flank after the fighting had begun. With the trap's failure and Bruenor's ensuing charge (led by the horrible, silver-streaking arrows), the ettin force's miserable failure and Dagna's dwarven troops' subsequent arrival, even the stupid goblins had been wise enough to turn the other way and run.
'Dwarfses,' one of the front-running goblins cried out, and the others soon echoed him in calls that shifted from terror to hunger when the creatures came to believe they had stumbled on a small band of the bearded folk, perhaps a scouting party.
Whatever the case, these dwarves apparently had no intentions of stopping to fight, and the chase was on.
A few twists and turns put the fleeing dwarves and the goblins near a wide, smoothly worked, torchlit tunnel, one that had been cut by the dwarves of Mithril Hall several hundred years before.
For the first time since that long-ago day, the dwarves were there again, waiting.
Powerful dwarven hands eased great disks onto a wooden beam, one after another until the whole resembled a solid, cylindrical wheel as tall as a dwarf and nearly as wide as the worked corridor, weighing well over a ton. Completing the structure's main frame were a few well-placed pegs, a wrapping of sheet metal (with sharp, nasty ridges hammered into it), and two notched handles that ran from the wheel's side to behind the contraption, where dwarves could man them and push the thing along.
A cloth with the full-sized likenesses of charging dwarves painted on it was hung out in front as a finishing touch that would keep the goblins in line until it was too late to retreat.
'Here they come,' one of the forward scouts reported, returning to the main battle group. 'They'll turn the corner in a few minutes.'
'Are the baiters ready?' asked the dwarf in charge of the toy brigade.
The other dwarf nodded, and the haulers took up the poles, setting their hands firmly behind the appropriate notches. Four soldiers got out in front of the contraption, ready for their wild run, while the rest of the hundred- dwarf contingent fell into lines behind the haulers.
'The cubbies are a hunnerd feet down,' the boss dwarf reminded the lead soldiers. 'Don't ye miss the mark! Once we get this thing a-rolling, we're not likely to be stopping it!'
Feigned cries of fear came from the fleeing dwarves at the other end of the long corridor, followed by the whooping of the pursuing goblins.
The boss dwarf shook his bearded face; it was so easy to bait goblins. Just let them believe they had the upper hand, and on they'd come.
The lead soldiers began a slow trot, the haulers behind them took up the easy pace, and the army plodded along behind the thunder of the slow-rolling wheel.
Another series of shouts sounded, and mixed in was the unmistakable cry of 'Now!'
The lead soldiers roared and broke into a run. The massive toy came right behind, pumping dwarven legs setting the devilish wheel into a great roll. Above the thunder, the dwarves began their growling song:
Their charge sounded like an avalanche, rumbling undertones to the goblins' cries. The baiters waved to their approaching kin, then stopped beside the cubbies and turned to hurl insults at their goblin pursuers.
The boss dwarf smiled grimly at the knowledge that he, that the toy, would pass the small alcoves, the only safe places in front of the contraption, a split second before the goblin hosts arrived there.
Just as the dwarves had planned.
With no way to turn back, thinking that they had encountered a simple dwarven expedition, the long lines of goblins hooted their battle cries and continued their charge.
The leading dwarven soldiers joined the baiters; together they dove aside into the alcoves, and the toy rumbled by, its disguising canopy making the front goblins slow their pace and wonder.
Howls of terror replaced battle cries and echoed down the goblin line. The closest goblin bravely hacked at the bouncing dwarven image, taking the painted canopy down and revealing the disaster an instant before the creature was squashed.
The fearsome dwarves called their war toy, 'the juicer,' and the puddle of goblin fluid that came out the back side of the crushing wheel showed it was a fitting title.
'Sing, my dwarves!' commanded the boss, and they took their chant to great crescendos, their rumbling voices echoing above the goblin howls.
The brutal contraption bounced and bumped; the haulers stumbled on goblin piles. But if any dwarf fell away, a dozen more were ready to take up his part of the pole, powerful legs pumping feverishly.
The army behind the contraption began to stretch out, dwarves stopping to finish off those broken goblins that still squirmed. The main host stayed close to the bouncing contraption, though, for as it came farther along the tunnel, it began to pass side tunnels. Predetermined brigades of dwarven soldiers turned down these, right behind the passing toy, slaughtering any goblins still in the area.
