damp, mist-filled cloud that shrouded the island, and forward eastward.
No sooner had they regained the other side of the cloud than they noticed that a spear had indeed hit its mark. A gaping hole now existed in the middle of the raft, and it was interfering with their steering.
'Everybody hold on!' Volo ordered, cursing his wanton curiosity that had resulted in this most recent of problems, and the pride that was the underlying cause of all of his problems so far. 'It's going to be a bumpy ride!'
The feathers beneath them felt damp, having retained some of the moisture from the mists, as a result of the increased weight, the raft was unable to ascend in the manner that it had before.
The clear skies that had existed prior to the Evermeet side trip had now been replaced by storm clouds. Thunder and lightning struck on all sides, and the feathers, dampened from the two trips through the moistened clouds of mist and the present proximity to the raging surf below, began to lose their magic. The raft began to descend farther.
The storm followed them as if magically drawn to the flying raft of feathers by some elven enchantment in retribution for their invading the privacy of the Evermeet community.
Fog set in somewhere over Alaron, and the raft began to disintegrate.
'Hold tight!' Volo shouted over the roar of the wind. 'She's coming apart! I'm going to try to bring her in for a landing.'
With the fog obscuring his view, the maps safely ensconced in his pack (his not having the light to read them or free hand to hold them, rendering them useless for navigation at the present time), the master traveler tried to engineer a controlled descent.
They overshot landing in the sea of midnight blue just beyond the Moonshae Isles, and offshore from the Faerun continent the raft quickly dissolved into a slick of loose feathers as the icy waters welcomed their latent prey.
Chapter 21
'I can't swim!' Shurleen yelled as the raft came apart, dropping her into the icy cold waters of the Sea of Swords.
Curtis, having quickly recovered from his own shock at being dropped into the icy deep, frantically looked in the direction he had last heard Shurleen's scream.
Out of the corner of his eyes, resting among the water-sodden feathers of the raft, he spied a few atcly grabbed for it. Beyond the oar was a dinghy, and in the dinghy a pair of dark arms to help him aboard, and beyond them a pair of bright lavender eyes, glowing orbs in a body that seemed to melt into the darkness that surrounded it.
'Now to get your companions,' the figure said. 'There are four of you altogether?'
'That's right,' the master traveler replied, just beginning to realize how cold he was, and how he couldn't stop shivering.
'There's a pile of blankets on your left,' the figure said as if reading his mind. 'It doesn't make sense to save anyone from drowning only to have them freeze to death from the chill.'
The figure had rowed the boat within reach of Curtis and Shurleen, who were quickly brought aboard, and then turned around to pick up Passepout.
Volo was amazed at how seemingly easy the pilot was able to locate his friends in the storm-ridden darkness.
When all were on board, the pilot announced, 'Wrap yourselves in the blankets. Well be on shipboard and dry in no time.'
'How did you…?' Volo chattered.
'I saw you go down,' the dinghy's pilot replied.
'You're a drow, aren't you?' the master traveler said, putting two and two together: the night vision, the dark skin. Though dark elves were uncommon in the surface world, occasionally drow had been known to travel the Sword Coast. Volo only hoped that this fellow wasn't a slaver rounding up cheap and expendable labor for some underworld toil. Volo was finally beginning to warm up within the thick layers of the blankets.
'That's right,' the drow replied, 'but you may call me Drizzt… and don't worry. I'm not here to capture you, just to help. I'm alone.'
With a sigh of relief Volo turned his attentions back to getting warm.
In less than an hour the travelers were dressed in dry clothes and seated around a roaring fire in the main cabin of the good ship Leominster, sipping hot broth.
The captain of the vessel was a taciturn dwarf named Wolflarson, who soon joined them.
'I and my companions would like to thank you for your hospitality,' Volo said. 'You certainly came along at the right time.'
'Think nothing of it,' the captain replied brusquely. 'I sure don't. We're docking in Waterdeep tomorrow. You can get off there.'
Volo was slightly taken aback by the offhand manner in which he treated their rescue. 'Still, if you hadn't stopped the ship, and turned around to get us, sending your man Drizzt out to get us, I…'
In a carefully measured tone brimming with hostility, Wolflarson interrupted, 'He's not my man, he's drow, and he's just another passenger. As for stopping the ship, I didn't, and woe to the person I find out that did.'
'But…'
'And a «to that drow fool Drizzt, he acted on his own, even paid for the rental of the dinghy. Now if you will excuse me, I have to return to the wheel. I expect your clothes will be dry by the time we dock, so please leave the blankets here when you go. I won't be expecting to see you again.'
With that, the dwarf captain left the cabin.
'Weil,' Hhurleen commented, 'remind me never to book passage on any ship he's the captain of. A regular charmer, he is.'
Passepout detected a certain trace of Suzail slang in her voice, which was uncommon to members of the upper class. Ho dismissed it as probably just an affectation she throw in for effect.
Curtis looked around the cabin and stuck his head outside for a moment. When he returned he said, 'I wonder where that guy Drizzt is. I mean, he fishes us out of the sea, saves us from a watery grave while risking his own life in storm-swept seas, and then doesn't even stick around so that we can say thanks.'
The cabin boy, who was carefully tending the fire so that it never got out of hand, answered. 'He's probably in his cabin. The captain gave firm orders that Mister Do'Urden was not to wander the ship unescorted.'
'The captain doesn't like drow much, does he, lad?' Volo asked.
'Who does?' the lad replied.
'Is he getting off at Waterdeep, too?' Volo pressed.
'No,' the lad replied. 'He's booked all the way to Luskan. His cabin is down below, right next to the stores. Just don't tell the captain I told you.'
'We should probably go thank him,' Shurleen suggested without a trace of enthusiasm in her voice.
'I'll go,' Volo replied, getting to his feet. 'With my change of clothes from my waterproof pack, I'm pretty much the only one of us suitable for visiting. The rest of you stay here and try to dry off.'
Volo left the cabin and looked for the passageway to the hold. The storms had ceased, and the fog had cleared. After a quick bit of reconnaissance, Volo discovered a rope ladder that led to the ship's hold and the stores. Balancing a lantern in one hand, he climbed down the ladder in search of the passenger's cabin.
The master traveler quickly discovered that there was a good three inches of seawater in the hold. Surely, he thought, his accommodations aren't down here. With the available light from the lantern, he quickly surveyed the hold and was about to leave when he spied a door at the far end of the stores.
The water was only about an inch deep there, so Volo trudged on over and up the incline of the curvature of the hull, and knocked on the door.
