Chapter 10. BATTLING THE DARKNESS
The Year of the Elves’ Weeping (1462 DR)
HERE THEY COME! OH, BE BRAVE BOYS AND HOLD THE TEAMS!” THE CARAVAN boss cried out to the men and women crouched in and around the wagons, weapons in hand. Off to the side of the road, the thicket shook with the approaching storm of enemies.
“Scrabblers,” one man said, his nickname for the agile and swift undead humanoids that had infested the region.
“Dustwalkers,” corrected another, and that name seemed equally fitting, for those marauders, undead monsters, left rails of gray powder in their wake, as if every step they took was their first out of the ashes of a burned out hearth-and indeed, the rumors said that the monsters were the animated corpses of those who had been buried beneath the volcanic ash a decade before.
“Guard!” the boss called out after a few more tense moments passed, without any clear sight of the enemy. “Go and scout the tree line.”
The hired guard, a stocky old dwarf with a beard of silver and orange, a shield emblazoned with the crest of the foaming mug, a many-notched axe, and a one-horned helmet, turned a wary eye on the leader.
The man swallowed hard under that withering gaze, but to his credit, managed to summon enough courage to once again motion toward the trees.
“I telled ye when ye hired me,” the dwarf warned. “Ye might be telling me what to fight, but ye ain’t telling me how to fight.”
“We cannot just sit here while they plot!”
“Plot?” the dwarf echoed with a belly laugh. “They’re dumb dead, ye dolt. They ain’t plottin’.”
“Then where are they?” another man cried, who seemed on the verge of desperation.
“Maybe they aren’t out there. Maybe it’s just the wind,” said a woman from a wagon near the back.
“Ye all ready for a fight?” the dwarf asked. “Ye got yer weapons in hand?” He looked at the boss, who stood tall, scanned the five wagons, and nodded.
Bruenor stood up, stuck his thumbs in this mouth, and blew a loud whistle.
Everyone but the dwarf reflexively ducked then as a shot of lightning creased the air to the side of the caravan, emanating from somewhere behind and streaking horizontally across the way to disappear into the trees. A horrid shriek came back, and a rustle of branches.
A second bolt knifed into the trees.
The branches began to rustle again.
“Here they come now,” the dwarf said, loud enough for all to hear. “Ye fight well and die better!”
Across the way, the scrabblers, the dustwalkers, the ash zombies-whatever name anyone wanted to put on the small, shriveled gray humanoids-came forth in a sudden rush, leaping from branches or running out of the tree line, some upright and swaying back and forth as if they might tip over with every stride, others hunched and scrambling on all fours.
And the other way, behind the crouching drivers and caravanners, came the sound of bells singing sweetly, and the pounding of hooves.
Another streaking arrow shot past from a magical bow, blinding and devastating as it exploded into the head of the nearest monster, blasting it apart in a puff of gray ash.
The caravan’s horses neighed as mighty Andahar approached, and one team reared when the magnificent unicorn cleared a wagon in one great leap, landing clean on the other side with Drizzt already readying another arrow.
He shot dead a pair of zombies, the bolt blasting through one and into the other, and in one fluid motion he shouldered the bow, drew out his scimitars, and rolled off the side of the galloping mount.
Andahar continued on, lowered his head, and plowed through the nearest monsters, impaling one on his spiral horn and blasting aside the other.
Drizzt hit the ground in a controlled roll, turning right back up to his feet and charging along as smoothly as if he’d been running the whole time. He rushed between a pair of zombies, scimitars slashing out to either side, cutting them down. He skidded to a stop before a third, bringing his blades up in a circling maneuver over his head, back to front, the blades sliding past each other above and in front of him as he brought them forward. He drove his left arm out straight, blade horizontal and at eye level to block the wild overhead swings of a charging zombie-and the creature showed no sign of pain at all as its forearms dived into a solid defensive block, as its ashen skin gashed on the fine edge of Twinkle.
In the same movement Drizzt executed the block with Twinkle, he cocked his right elbow back behind him, and as he turned his leading blade off to the side, further skinning the zombie’s arms, he stepped forward and thrust Icingdeath hard into the monster’s chest. The scimitar blasted through with such force that Drizzt noted a puff of ash behind the zombie.
That hole seemed barely to affect the monster, but it was hardly a surprise to the seasoned drow ranger. Even as he retracted Icingdeath, he brought Twinkle in with a downward slash, one that got tangled with the zombie’s arms and kept it off-balance and defenseless as Icingdeath went down, under and around and back in from the other side, connecting solidly across the monster’s neck and chopping it down.
All of it-the block, the stab, the two slashes-happened so quickly that Drizzt hardly slowed his forward progress, and he simply ran up and over the zombie as it tumbled backward. He managed to glance back, to see his mighty steed lift its hind quarters in a double kick and explode a zombie into a cloud of ash. Most of the other monsters chased after Andahar, with only a few continuing for the caravan.
Creatures turned in for Drizzt from left and right, moving with startling agility and speed for undead, and yet still not quickly enough to catch up to the blur that was Drizzt Do’Urden, his legs speeded by magical anklets, his balance always perfect, his strategy three steps ahead.
He veered left, blasting right into a group of zombies-so many that the caravan crew and Bruenor collectively gasped as he disappeared into a sea of gray ash. But so fast and perfect were his slashes, driving aside impediments, and so fast his stabs, to the side, in front of him, even a backhand to defeat pursuit, that he didn’t slow, and the collective gasp became a collective cheer when he reappeared out the other side, seemingly in the clear, but with a horde of zombies still in pursuit.
And behind the zombies, Drizzt knew, came Bruenor, cutting down the distracted undead as they chased the dark elf.
But the drow had to skid to a stop, surprised, when out of the thicket to the side charged another enemy, another zombie. The newcomer was not one of the humans, elves, or dwarves shriveled in the hot flow of the volcano, though, but a gigantic and formidable beast, one which in life would have challenged Drizzt and in undeath, feeling no pain, knowing no fear, and all but immune to minor wounds, was all the more formidable. It stood nearly twice Drizzt’s height and outweighed him at least four times over with giant pincers protruding from its face and long wiry arms ending in claws that could rend stone as easily as a man could dig in soft dirt. Drizzt had battled umber hulks before, as had so many of his kin, growing up in the Underdark, but in addition to the ashen gray look of those creatures killed by the hot volcanic flow, the hulk had about it a darker pall, a shadowy essence as though it had stepped out of the depths of the Shadowfell.
Drizzt managed to avert his eyes just in time to avoid the creature’s magical gaze, known to debilitate the finest warriors. He didn’t wait to look back before moving, guessing correctly that any delay would cost him dearly. He darted right at the monster, just within the sweeping reach of its powerful claws. The shadow hulk tried to stomp him as he skidded past, but Drizzt tucked into a roll and got out of the way in time, even managing to stab that stomping foot for good measure. He came up to his feet and darted straight behind the thing, keeping it turning, and landed several heavy slashes in the process.
But felling the monster would be like chopping down a thick oak, and an oak that savagely fought back.
“Keep it moving, elf!” he heard Bruenor yell from across the way, still back near the caravan wagons.
