'At least it's still red,' Jerbollah remarked under his breath, but loud enough to be heard. Again he was slapped by the dwarf behind him.
Bruenor shook his head in disgust, then froze in place as two eyeballs appeared in the air before him, scrutinizing him ominously.
Then they dropped to the floor and rolled about haphazardly, coming to rest several feet apart.
Bruenor looked on in disbelief as a spectral hand came out of the air and herded the eyeballs close together and turned them so that they were both facing the dwarf king once more.
'Well, that's never happened before,' said a disembodied voice.
Bruenor jumped in fright, then settled and groaned yet again. He hadn't heard that voice in a long time, but never would he forget it. And it explained so much about what was going on in the chapel.
'Harkle Harpell,' Bruenor said, and whispers ignited all about him, for most of the other dwarves had heard Bruenor's tales of Longsaddle, a town to the west of Mithril Hall, home of the legendary, eccentric wizard clan, the Harpells. Bruenor and his companions had passed through Longsaddle, had toured the Ivy Mansion, on their way to find Mithril Hall. It was a place the dwarf, no fan of wizardry magic, would never forget, and never remember fondly.
'My greetings, King Bruenor,' said the voice, emanating from the floor right below the steadied eyeballs.
'Are ye really here?' the dwarf king asked.
'Hmmm,' groaned the floor. 'I can hear both you and those who are around me at the Fuzzy Quarterstaff,' Harkle replied,
referring to the tavern at the Ivy Mansion, back in Longsaddle. 'Just a moment, if you please.»
The floor 'Hmmmm'd' several more times, and the eyeballs blinked once or twice, perhaps the most curious sight Bruenor had ever seen, as an eyelid appeared from nowhere, covered the ball momentarily, then disappeared once more.
'It seems that I'm in both places,' Harkle tried to explain. 'I'm quite blind back here—of course, my eyes are there. I wonder if I might get them back…' The spectral hand appeared again, groping for the eyeballs. It tried to grasp one of them securely, but only wound up turning the ball about on the floor.
'Whoa!' shouted a distressed Harkle. 'So that is how a lizard sees the world! I must note it…»
'Harkle!' Bruenor roared in frustration.
'Oh, yes, yes, of course,' replied Harkle, coming to what little senses he possessed. 'Please excuse my distraction, King Bruenor. This has never happened before.»
'Well it's happened now,' Bruenor said dryly.
'My eyes are there,' Harkle said, as though trying to sort things out aloud. 'But, of course, I will be there as well, quite soon. Actually, I had hoped to be there now, but didn't get through. Curious indeed. I could try again, or could ask one of my brothers to try—'
'No!' Bruenor bellowed, cringing at the thought that other Harpell body parts might soon rain down on him.
'Of course,' Harkle agreed after a moment. 'Too dangerous. Too curious. Very well, then. I come in answer to your call, friend dwarf king!'
Bruenor dropped his head into his palm and sighed. He had feared those very words for more than two weeks now. He had sent an emissary to Longsaddle for help in the potential war only because Drizzt had insisted.
To Bruenor, having the Harpells as allies might eliminate the need for enemies.
'A week,' Harkle's disembodied voice said. 'I will arrive in a week!' There came a long pause. 'Err, umm, could you be so kind as to keep safe my eyeballs?'
Bruenor nodded to the side, and several dwarves scrambled ahead, curious and no longer afraid of the exotic items. They battled to scoop up the eyes and finally sorted them out, with two different
dwarves each holding one—and each taking obvious pleasure in making faces at the eye.
Bruenor shouted for them to quit playing even before Harkle's voice screamed in horror.
'Please!' pleaded the somewhat absent mage. 'Only one dwarf to hold both eyes.' Immediately the two dwarves clutched their prizes more tightly.
'Give 'em to Stumpet!' Bruenor roared. 'She started this whole thing!'
Reluctantly, but not daring to go against an order from their king, the dwarves handed the eyeballs over.
'And do please keep them moist,' Harkle requested, to which, Stumpet immediately tossed one of the orbs into her mouth.
'Not like that!' screamed the voice. 'Oh, not like that!'
'I should get them,' protested Jerbollah. 'My spell worked!' The dwarf behind Jerbollah slapped him on the head.
Bruenor slumped low in his chair, shaking his head. It was going to be a long time in putting his clerical order back together, and longer still would be the preparations for war when the Harpells arrived.
Across the room, Stumpet, who, despite her antics, was the most level-headed of dwarves, was not so lighthearted. Harkle's unexpected presence had deflected the other apparent problems, perhaps, but the weird arrival of the wizard from Longsaddle did not explain the happenings here. Stumpet, several of the other clerics, and even the scribe realized that something was very wrong.
*****
Guenhwyvar was tired by the time she, Drizzt, and Catti-brie came to the high pass leading to Mithril Hall's eastern door. Drizzt had kept the panther on the Material Plane longer than usual, and though it was taxing, Guenhwyvar was glad for the stay. With all the preparations going on in the deep tunnels below the dwarven complex, Drizzt did not get outside much, and consequently, neither did Guenhwyvar.
For a long, long time, the panther figurine had been in the hands of various drow in Menzoberranzan, and, thus, the panther had gone centuries without seeing the out-of-doors on the Material Plane. Still, the out-of-doors was where Guenhwyvar was most at
home, where natural panthers lived, and where the panther's first companions on the Material Plane had lived.
Guenhwyvar had indeed enjoyed this romp along mountain trails with Drizzt and Catti-brie, but now was the time to go home, to rest again on the Astral Plane. For all their love of companionship, neither the drow nor the panther could afford that luxury now, with so great a danger looming, an impending war in which Drizzt and Guenhwyvar would likely play a major role, fighting side by side.
The panther paced about the figurine, gradually diminished, and faded to an insubstantial gray mist.
* * * * *
Gone from the material world, Guenhwyvar entered a long, low, winding tunnel, the silvery path that would take her back to the Astral Plane. The panther loped easily, not eager to be gone and too tired to run full out. The journey was not so long anyway, and always uneventful.
Guenhwyvar skidded to a stop as she rounded one long bend, her ears falling flat.
The tunnel ahead was ablaze.
Diabolical forms, fiendish manifestations that seemed unconcerned with the approaching cat, leaped from those flames. Guenhwyvar padded ahead a few short strides. She could feel the intense heat, could see the fiery fiends, and could hear their laughter as they continued to consume the circular tunnel's walls.
A rush of air told Guenhwyvar that the tunnel had been ruptured, somewhere in the emptiness between the planes of existence. Fiery fiends were pulled into elongated shapes, then sucked out; the remaining flames danced wildly, leaping and flickering, seeming to go out altogether, then rising together in a sudden and violent surge. The wind came strong at Guenhwyvar's back, compelling the panther to go forward, compelling everything in the tunnel to fly out through the breach, into nothingness.
Guenhwyvar knew instinctively that if she succumbed to that force, there would be no turning back, that she would become a lost thing, helpless, wandering between the planes.
The panther dug in her claws and backpedaled slowly, fighting the fierce wind every inch of the way. Her black coat ruffled up,
sleek fur turning the wrong way.
One step back.
