did not give away her true meaning. She patted her belt pouch, the one holding the figurine, and added, 'I'll be calling ye, don't ye doubt.'
Then Catti-brie straightened and faced the goblin leader squarely. She slapped a hand against her chest, then snapped it straight out and pointed to the far exit, her expression a scowl. 'I go!' she declared and took a step forward.
At first, the goblin leader seemed as though it would move to hinder her, but a quick glance to the powerful cat at its feet changed the creature's mind. Catti-brie had played the game perfectly; she had allowed the overly proud goblin leader to retain its dignity, had kept herself appearing as a potentially dangerous enemy, and had strategically placed six hundred pounds of fighting ally right at the goblin leader's feet.
'Nying so, wucka,' the goblin said again, pointing to Guenhwyvar, then to the far exit, and it gingerly stepped aside so that the drow could pass.
Catti-brie swept across the rest of the chamber, backhand slapping one goblin that didn't get far enough out of her path. The creature came right back at her, sword raised, but Catti-brie didn't flinch, and a cry from the goblin leader, still with the panther curled about its ankles, stopped the goblin's response.
Catti-brie laughed in its ugly face, showed it that she held her own dagger, a magnificent, jeweled thing, ready under the folds of her beautiful robes.
She made it to the narrower tunnel and continued walking slowly for many steps. Then she stopped, glanced back, and pulled out the panther figurine.
Back in the chamber, the goblin leader was showing off its new acquisition to the tribe, explaining how it had outsmarted a 'stupid drow female thing,' and had taken the cat as its own. It didn't matter that the other goblins had witnessed the whole affair; in goblin culture, history was recreated almost daily.
The leader's smug smile waned quickly when a gray mist rose up about the panther, and the caf s material form began to melt away.
The goblin wailed a stream of protests and curses and dropped to its knees to grab the fast-fading cat.
A huge paw shot out of the mist, hooked around the leader's head, and yanked the wretch in. Then there was only mist, the surprised and not-too-smart goblin leader going along with the panther on a ride to the Astral Plane.
The remaining goblins hooted and ran all about, bumping into and falling over each other. Some thought to take up the chase for the departing drow, but by the time they began to organize, Catti-brie was long gone, running with all speed along the corridor and thinking herself positively clever.
The tunnels were familiar to him—too familiar. How many times had young Drizzt Do'Urden traveled these ways, usually serving as the point in a drow patrol? Then he had Guenhwyvar with him; now he was alone.
He limped slightly, one of his knees still a bit weak from the svirfheblin nooker.
He couldn't use that as an excuse to remain in Blingdenstone any longer, though. He knew that his business was pressing, and Belwar, though the parting stung the burrow warden, had not argued with Drizzt's decision to be on his way, an indication to Drizzt that the other svirfnebli wished him gone.
That had been two days ago, two days and about fifty miles of winding caverns. Drizzt had crossed the trails of at least three drow patrols on his way, an unusually high number of warriors to be out so far from Menzoberranzan, and that led credence to Belwar's claim that something dangerous was brewing, that the Spider Queen was hungry. On all three of those occasions, Drizzt could have tracked down the drow group and attempted to link up. He thought of concocting some story that he was an emissary from a merchant of Ched Nasad. All three times, Drizzt had lost his nerve, had kept moving instead toward Menzoberranzan, putting off that fateful moment when he would make contact.
Now the tunnels were too familiar, and that moment was nearly upon him.
He measured every step, maintaining perfect silence, as he crossed into one wider way. He heard some noise up ahead, a shuffle of many feet. Not drow feet, he knew; dark elves made no noise.
The ranger scaled the uneven wall and moved along a ledge half a dozen feet up from the main floor. Sometimes he found himself grasping with fingertips and pulling himself forward, his feet dangling, but Drizzt was not hindered, and he did not make a sound.
He froze in place at the din of more movement ahead. Fortunately, the ledge widened once more, freeing his hands, and he gingerly slipped his scimitars free of their sheaths, concentrating to keep Twinkle from flaring with inner light.
Slurping sounds led him around a bend, where he viewed a host of short, huddled humanoids, wearing ragged cloaks with cowls pulled over their faces. They spoke not at all, but milled about aimlessly, and only their floppy feet showed Drizzt that they were goblins.
Goblin slaves, he knew by their movements, by their slumped posture, for only slaves carried such a weight of broken resignation.
Drizzt continued to watch silently for a while, trying to spot the herding drow. There were at least four score goblins in this cavern, lining the edge of a small pond that the drow called Heldaeyn's Pool, scooping water up under their low-pulled cowls as though they had not drunk in many days.
They probably had not. Drizzt spotted a couple of rothe, small Underdark cattle, milling nearby, and he realized that this group probably was out of the city in search of the missing creatures. On such trips, slaves were given little or nothing to eat, though they carried quite a bit of supplies! The accompanying drow guards, though, ate handsomely, usually right in front of their starving slaves.
The crack of a whip brought the goblins back to their feet and shuffling back from the pool's edge. Two drow soldiers, one male, one female, came into Drizzt's view. They talked casually, the female every so often cracking her whip.
Another drow called out some commands from the other side of the cavern, and the goblins began to fall into a rough line, more of an elongated huddle than any organized formation.
Drizzt knew that the most opportune moment was upon him. Slavers were among the least organized and least regimented of Menzoberranzan's extracity bands. Any slaver contingent usually comprised dark elves from several different houses and a complement of young drow students from each of the Academy's three schools.
Drizzt quietly slipped down from the ledge and walked around the jutting wall, flashing the customary hand signal greetings (though his fingers felt awkward going through the intricate routine) to the drow in the cavern.
The female pushed her male escort forward and stepped to the side behind him. Immediately the male's hand came up, holding one of the typical drow hand-crossbows, its dart coated, most likely, with a powerful sleeping potion.
Who are you? the female's hand asked over the male's shoulder.
'All that is left of a patrol group that ventured near Blingdenstone,' Drizzt answered.
'You should go in near Tier Breche, then,' the female answered aloud. Hearing her voice, so typical of drow females, voices that could be incredibly melodic or incredibly shrill, sent Drizzt's thoughts cascading back to those long years past. He realized then, fully, that he was just a few hundred yards from Menzoberranzan.
'I do not wish to 'go in' at all,' Drizzt answered. 'At least, not announced.' The reasoning made perfect sense, Drizzt knew. If he had indeed been the only survivor of a lost patrol, he would have been vigorously interrogated at the drow Academy, probably even tortured until the masters were certain that he played no treacherous role in the patrol's fate, or until he died, whichever came first.
'Who is the first house?' the female asked, her eyes locked on Drizzt's lavender-glowing orbs.
'Baenre,' Drizzt answered immediately, expecting the test. Spying dark elves from rival cities were not unknown in Menzoberranzan.
'Their youngest son?' the female asked slyly. She curled her lips up in a lewd and hungry smile, Drizzt realized as she continued to stare deeply into his unusual eyes.
By fortunate coincidence, Drizzt had attended the Academy in the same class as House Baenre's youngest son—as long as ancient Matron Baenre had not reared another child in the three decades Drizzt had been gone.
'Berg'inyon,' he answered confidently, dropping his hands in a cocky cross at his belt (and putting them near his scimitars).
'Who are you?' the female asked again, and she licked her lips, obviously intrigued.
'No one who matters,' Drizzt replied, and he matched her smile and the intensity of her stare.
