The staff ate a fourth.
A fifth.
She had to slam it down and release the blast, but the beast was getting away.
The beast was charging Drizzt!
Dahlia threw Kozah’s Needle like a spear. It hit the elemental with a tremendous explosion, jolting the whole of the corridor with such power that it lifted Dahlia right into the air, to fall back down and stumble.
And the elemental swung back and charged, and hardly seemed hurt. “Oh, by the gods,” Entreri mumbled, thinking that he and Dahlia were surely doomed. He put up Taulmaril and pulled back for one last shot, one last desperate and angry act of defiance.
And he saw a form in the air behind the elementaclass="underline" a leaping ranger, cape flying behind him, one scimitar grasped in both hands, up high over his head.
Drizzt slammed into the beast, plunging Icingdeath through its back, the magical, fire-hating blade diving deep into the creature’s core being, the very magical energy that gave it form.
How it thrashed and swung around, Drizzt holding on desperately, legs flying wildly.
But he held on, and Icingdeath feasted.
The elemental spun and thrashed in frenzy.
And then it died and melted in on itself, a pile of smoking rock and lava in the middle of the corridor.
“Well, that was fun,” Dahlia remarked as Drizzt pulled himself off the pile and staggered back a couple of steps.
FAMILY REUNION
The drow wizard groaned and growled, clutching the stump of his halved left hand.
“Where does it lead?” Drizzt asked him. The ranger crouched before the wizard, looking him in the eye. “Where does it lead?”
The wizard spat at him.
“Your life depends on this,” Drizzt said. “Where does your tunnel lead? Where did you come from?”
Artemis Entreri pushed Drizzt aside and roughly grabbed the wizard by the hair, yanking his head back and putting a dagger to his throat.
“It goes to the primordial?” Entreri demanded in perfect Drow inflection.
“Leave it alone!” the drow wizard yelled at him.
Entreri smiled and looked back at his companions. “Take that as a yes,” he said.
“What are we to do with…?” Drizzt started to ask, but he stopped with a gasp as Artemis Entreri drove his dagger through the front of the drow’s throat, angling up and into the mage’s brain. The drow stiffened, legs popping straight out, and began to tremble.
Entreri yanked the blade out, wiped it on the wizard’s robe, and stood up, turning to face the incredulous stare of Drizzt and the amused expression of Dahlia.
“You didn’t think I would leave a drow wizard alive behind us, did you?” Entreri said to Drizzt with a snort, and he started past.
Drizzt stood there staring at the slain drow. Blood flowed heavily from the wound under his chin. His hands had fallen to his sides, giving Drizzt a clear view of the one he had cut in half. From a tactical level, Drizzt could understand Entreri’s brutality, of course, but still, the callousness with which he had executed the mage had jarred Drizzt.
Would his old friends have treated a helpless prisoner in such a manner?
He wasn’t sure, given the desperation of their current situation, but still, the casual brutality of Artemis Entreri had once again shocked him.
“Come on,” Dahlia said, moving to Drizzt’s side and taking his arm affectionately. “We haven’t much time.”
Drizzt looked at her, angrily at first. But that couldn’t hold against Dahlia’s responding look, one that reflected great understanding toward him-surprisingly so, Drizzt realized, since Dahlia hadn’t been nearly as shocked as he when Entreri had struck.
“The world’s an ugly place,” she said quietly. “If we’re not ugly enough to defeat it, we will be dead.”
The cynical truth stung Drizzt profoundly, but Dahlia’s insistent tug reminded him that they didn’t really have the luxury of standing around and debating the issue. Drizzt retrieved his bow and quiver, and they caught up to Entreri just before the intersection. He crouched on one knee, staring across to the other tunnel, motioning them to hold still and get down.
As they crept up, Entreri slipped off to the left into the perpendicular tunnel, and Drizzt and Dahlia moved right. By the time they put their backs to the wall across that main corridor and right beside the one the wizard’s elemental had burrowed, they understood the assassin’s sudden caution, for they heard the approach of several Shadovar.
Drizzt looked across to Entreri, who motioned for him to hold his ground. With a nod, the assassin turned around and disappeared into the lava tunnel.
Drizzt eased an arrow onto his bowstring and listened intently. He heard a grunt followed by the sound of someone falling to the ground, followed by a short yelp of surprise and a quick scraping of metal on metal.
He spun around in front of the tunnel, leveling his bow. One shade lay on the ground, and a second joined him there as Entreri rolled his sword over the shade’s and plunged it through the creature’s throat.
The assassin fell back, giving Drizzt a clear view of the third of the group, who started sprinting back down the tunnel.
Heartseeker’s missile caught him in the back and lifted him into a short flight before he crashed face-down on the still-smoking black stone.
Beside the drow ranger, Dahlia swallowed hard, and when Drizzt turned to regard her, he noted with surprise that she was staring at Artemis Entreri, and with obvious appreciation of the man’s deadly skills. Drizzt, too, looked toward his old nemesis. A thought flashed in his mind to take out the man with a line of deadly arrows, but he dismissed it immediately, knowing it to be a desperate cry from the incessant sword.
But still…
“He’s good,” Dahlia muttered.
“I might not use that particular word,” Drizzt whispered back.
“I’m glad he’s on our side.”
Drizzt wanted to argue, but he didn’t.
“Quickly now,” Entreri said to them, motioning them along.
“Why, Lord Alegni, here they come,” Glorfathel remarked.
Alegni’s smile widened, his eyes sparkled, and he clenched his fists eagerly. They hadn’t begun to properly prepare for this, having just secured the forge room, but that didn’t matter to the tiefling. He just wanted his revenge.
“Go,” Effron called to the few others in the room. “To the forge and gather a great force! Send others through the tunnels to prevent any escape. Go!”
“On me way!” Ambergris replied, yanking back a pair of shades who had started for the tunnel to the forge room and rambling past them. Afafrenfere sprinted to catch up, but the dwarf slugged him in the gut as he started past her.
“Go protect the lord, ye dolt!” she scolded, and she disappeared into the small corridor.
“Which of them carries the sword?” Glorfathel asked.
“The drow had it in the forest,” Effron answered. “Strapped across his back.”
“I will stop that person, then,” Glorfathel declared. “We cannot allow him to get anywhere near the primordial’s pit.”
“You have magic to counter such an attempt?” Alegni asked, his voice betraying his anxiety, for to lose that sword to the primordial would be disastrous indeed. He felt a sting of regret that he hadn’t properly prepared his defenses, but the simple fact that they had managed to get between those who would destroy Claw and this fiery beast was no small thing.
The tiefling warlord surveyed his forces, and looked to the forge room tunnel. He had only a pair of magic-users, Glorfathel and Effron, and a handful of warriors. It should be enough, he figured, even without Claw to dominate Barrabus.
“Five ranks!” he ordered. He motioned to a pair of rogues and sent them away. “Find them and strike them down.” He signaled for a pair of warriors to go off right behind them, then pointed to a second group of Shadovar warriors. “You four in next-meet them twenty strides inside the tunnel if they get past the first line.” As that second line hustled into place, Alegni turned his gaze on the remaining two warriors. “Each of you with me, third rank!”