Catti-brie. 'How many kisses have you and the drow shared?' he bellowed.
Catti-brie nearly fell over. 'What?' she shrieked. 'Ye've lost yer senses. I never-'
'You lie!' Wulfgar roared.
'Damn yer words!' howled Bruenor and out came his great axe. He whipped it across, forcing Wulfgar to leap back and slam hard against the corridor wall, then chopped with it, forcing the barbarian to dive aside. Wulfgar tried to block with the torch, but Bruenor slapped it from his hand. Wulfgar tried to get to Aegis-fang, which he had slipped under his backpack when they had found the dead dwarves, but Bruenor came at him relentlessly, never actually striking, but forcing him to dodge and dive, to scramble across the hard stone.
'Let me kill him for ye, me king!' Pwent cried, rushing up and misunderstanding Bruenor's intentions.
'Get ye back!' Bruenor roared at the battlerager, and all the others were amazed, Pwent most among them, at the sheer force of Bruenor's voice.
'I been playing along with yer stupid actions for weeks now,' Bruenor said to Wulfgar, 'but I've no more time for ye. Ye speak out whatever's got yer hair up here and now, or shut yer stupid mouth and keep it shut until we find Drizzt and get us outta these stinking tunnels!'
'I have tried to remain calm,' Wulfgar retorted, and it seemed more a plea, since the barbarian was still on his knees from dodging Bruenor's dangerously close swings. 'But I cannot ignore the insult to my honor!' As though realizing his subservient appearance, the proud barbarian leaped to his feet. 'Drizzt met with Catti-brie before the drow returned to Mithril Hall.'
'Who telled ye that?' Catti-brie demanded.
'Regis!' Wulfgar shouted back. 'And he told me that your meeting was filled with more than words!'
'It's a lie!' Catti-brie cried.
Wulfgar started to respond in kind, but he saw Bruenor's wide smile and heard the dwarf's mocking laughter. The head of the dwarf's axe dropped to the floor, Bruenor placing both hands on his hips and shaking his head in obvious disbelief.
'Ye stupid…,' the dwarf muttered. 'Why don't ye use whatever part o' yer body's not muscle and think o' what ye just said? We're here because we're guessing that Regis ain't Regis!'
Wulfgar scrunched his face up in confusion, realizing only then that he had not reconsidered the halfling's volatile accusations in light of the recent revelations.
'If ye're feeling as stupid as ye look, then ye're feeling the way ye ought to feel,' Bruenor remarked dryly.
The sudden revelations hit Wulfgar as surely as Bruenor's axe ever could. How many times had Regis spoken with him alone these last few days? And what, he considered carefully, had been the content of those many meetings? For the first time, perhaps, Wulfgar realized what he had done in his chamber against the drow, truly realized that he would have killed Drizzt if the drow had not won the battle. 'The halfling… Artemis Entreri, tried to use me in his evil plans,' Wulfgar reasoned. He remembered a swirling myriad of sparkling reflections, the facets of a gemstone, inviting him down into its depths. 'He used his pendant on me-I cannot be sure, but I think I remember… I believe he used…'
'Be sure,' Bruenor said. 'I knowed ye a long time, lad, and never have I knowed ye to act so damned stupid. And meself as well. To send the halfling along with Drizzt into this unknown region!'
'Entreri tried to get me to kill Drizzt,' Wulfgar went on, trying to fathom it all.
'Tried to get Drizzt to kill yerself, ye mean,' Bruenor corrected. Catti-brie snorted, unable to contain her pleasure and her gratitude that Bruenor had put the boastful barbarian in his place!
Wulfgar scowled at her from over Bruenor's shoulder.
'You did meet with the drow,' he stated.
'That's me own business,' the young woman replied, not giving in an inch to Wulfgar's lingering jealousy.
The tension began to mount again-Catti-brie could see that while the revelations about Regis had taken some of the bite from Wulfgar's growl, the protective man still did not wish her there, did not wish his bride-to-be in a dangerous situation. Stubborn and proud, Catti-brie remained more insulted than flattered.
She didn't get the chance to vent her rage, though, not then, for Cobble came shuffling back to the group, begging them all to be silent. Only then did Bruenor and the others notice that Pwent was no longer present. 'Noise,' the cleric explained quietly, 'somewhere farther along in the deeper tunnels. Let us pray to Moradin that whatever is down there did not hear the clamor of our own stupidity!'
Catti-brie looked to the fallen dwarves, looked to see Wulfgar do likewise, and knew that the barbarian, like her, was reminding himself that Drizzt was in serious danger. How petty their arguments seemed to her then, and she was ashamed.
Bruenor sensed her despair, and he came over to her and draped his arm across her shoulders. 'Had to be said,' he offered comfortingly. 'Had to be brought out and cleared afore the fighting begins.'
Catti-brie nodded her agreement and hoped that the fighting, if there was to be any, would begin soon.
She hoped, too, with all her heart, that the next battle would not be fought as vengeance for the death of Drizzt Do'Urden.
Chapter 13 Broken Vows
A single torch was lit; Drizzt realized it was part of the deal. Entreri probably was not yet comfortable enough with his newly acquired infravision I to battle Drizzt without any light source at all. When his eyes shifted into the normal spectrum of light, Drizzt studied the medium-sized chamber. While its walls and ceiling were quite naturally formed, curving and with jutting angles and small stalactites hanging down, it had two wooden doors- recently constructed, Drizzt believed, most probably arranged by Vierna as part of the deal with Entreri. A drow soldier flanked the doors on each side and a third stood between them, right in front of each portal.
Twelve dark elves were in the room now, including Vierna and Jarlaxle, but the drider was nowhere to be found. Entreri was talking with Vierna; Drizzt saw her give the assassin the belt holding Drizzt's two scimitars.
There also was a curious alcove in the room, a single step in from the back wall of the main area and with a waist-high ledge, the top covered by a blanket and a soldier leaning on it, his sword and dagger drawn.
A chute? Drizzt wondered.
Entreri had said this was the place where he and the dark elves would part company, but Drizzt doubted that the assassin, his business finished, meant to go back the way they had come, anywhere near Mithril Hall. With only one other door apparent in the chamber, perhaps there did indeed loom a chute under that blanket, a way to the open and twisted corridors of the deeper Underdark.
Vierna said something that Drizzt did not hear, and Entreri came over to him, bearing his weapons. A drow soldier moved behind Drizzt and released his bonds, and he slowly brought his hands back in front of him, his shoulders aching from their long stay in the awkward position and from the residual pain of Vierna's vicious beating.
Entreri dropped the scimitar belt at Drizzt's feet and took a cautious step backward. Drizzt looked down to his weapons curiously, unsure of what he should do.
'Pick them up,' Entreri instructed.
'Why?'
The question seemed to slap the assassin across the face. A great scowl flashed for just an instant, then was replaced by Entreri's typically emotionless expression.
'That we might learn the truth,' he answered.
'I know the truth,' Drizzt replied calmly. 'You wish to distort it, that you might keep hidden, even from yourself, the folly of your wretched existence.'
'Pick them up,' the assassin snarled, 'or I will kill you where you stand.'
Drizzt knew the threat was a hollow one. Entreri would not kill him, not until the assassin had tried to redeem himself in honest battle. Even if Entreri did strike to slay him, Drizzt figured Vierna would intervene. Drizzt was too important to Vierna; sacrifices to the Spider Queen were not readily accepted unless given by drow priestesses.
