After a few moments of struggling, Belwar managed to get his face out from under Guenhwyvar’s muscled chest.
“Get yourself off me or suffer the consequences!” the deep gnome growled, obviously an empty threat. Guenhwyvar shifted, getting a bit more comfortable in its perch.
“Dark elf!” Belwar called as loudly as he dared. “Dark elf, take your panther away. Dark elf!”
“Greetings,” Drizzt answered, walking in from the tunnel as though he had only just arrived. “Are you two playing again? I had thought my time as sentry near to its end.”
“Your time has passed,” replied Belwar, but the svirfneblin’s words were muffled by thick black fur as Guenhwyvar shifted again. Drizzt could see Belwar’s long, hooked nose, though, crinkle up in irritation.
“Oh, no, no,” said Drizzt. “I am not so tired. I would not think of interrupting your game. I know that you both enjoy it so.” He walked by, giving Guenhwyvar a complimentary pat on the head and a sly wink as he passed.
“Dark elf!” Belwar grumbled at his back as Drizzt departed. But the drow kept going, and Guenhwyvar, with Drizzt’s blessings, soon fell fast asleep.
Drizzt crouched low and held very still, letting his eyes go through the dramatic shift from infravision―viewing the heat of objects in the infrared spectrum―to normal vision in the realm of light. Even before the transformation was completed, Drizzt could tell that his guess had been correct. Ahead, beyond a low natural archway, came a red glow. The drow held his position, deciding to let Belwar catch up to him before he went to investigate. Only a moment later, the dimmer glow of the deep gnome’s enchanted brooch came into view.
“Put out the light,” Drizzt whispered, and the brooch’s glow disappeared.
Belwar crept along the tunnel to join his companion. He, too, saw the red glow beyond the archway and understood Drizzt’s caution. “Can you bring the panther?” the burrow-warden asked quietly.
Drizzt shook his head. “The magic is limited by spans of time. Walking the material plane tires Guenhwyvar. The panther needs to rest.”
“Back the way we came, we could go.” Belwar suggested. “Perhaps there is another tunnel around.”
“Five miles,” replied Drizzt, considering the length of the unbroken passageway behind them. “Too long.”
“Then let us see what is ahead,” the burrow-warden reasoned, and he started boldly off. Drizzt liked Belwar’s straightforward attitude and quickly joined him.
Beyond the archway, which Drizzt had to crouch nearly double to get under, they found a wide and high cavern, its floor and walls covered in a mosslike growth that emitted the red light. Drizzt pulled up short, at a loss, but Belwar recognized the stuff well enough.
“Baruchies!” the burrow-warden blurted, the word turning into a chuckle. He turned to Drizzt and, not seeing any reaction to his smile, explained. “Crimson spitters, dark elf. Not for decades have I seen such a patch of the stuff. Quite a rare sight they are, you know.”
Drizzt, still at a loss, shook the tenseness out of his muscles and shrugged, then started forward. Belwar’s pick-hand hooked him under the arm, and the powerful deep gnome spun him back abruptly.
“Crimson spitters,” the burrow-warden said again, pointedly emphasizing the latter of the words. “Magga cammara, dark elf, how did you get along through the years?”
Belwar turned to the side and slammed his hammer-hand into the wall of the archway, taking off a fair-sized chunk of stone. He scooped this up in the flat of his pick-hand and flipped it off to the side of the cavern. The stone hit the red-glowing fungus with a soft thud, then a burst of smoke and spores blasted into the air.
“Spit,” explained Belwar, “and choke you to death will the spore! If you plan to cross here, walk lightly, my brave, foolish friend.”
Drizzt scratched his unkempt white locks and considered the predicament. He had no desire to return the five miles down the tunnel, but neither did he plan to go plodding through this field of red death. He stood tall just inside the archway and looked around for some solution. Several stones, a possible walkway, rose up out of the baruchies, and beyond them lay a trail of clear stone about ten feet wide running perpendicular to the archway across the chasm.
“We can make it through,” he told Belwar. “There is a clear path.”
“There always is in a field of baruchies,” the burrow-warden replied under his breath. Drizzt’s keen ears caught the comment. “What do you mean?” he asked, springing agilely out to the first of the raised stones.
“A grubber is about,” the deep gnome explained. “Or has been.”
“A grubber?” Drizzt prudently hopped back to stand beside the burrow-warden.
“Big caterpillar,” Belwar explained. “Grubbers love baruchies. They are the only things the crimson spitters do not seem to bother.”
“How big?”
“How wide was the clear path?” Belwar asked him.
“Ten feet, perhaps,” Drizzt answered, hopping back out to the first stepping stone to view it again. Belwar considered the answer for a moment. “One pass for a big grubber, two for most.” Drizzt hopped back to the side of the burrow-warden again, giving a cautious look over his shoulder. “Big caterpillar.” he remarked.
“But with a little mouth.” Belwar explained. “Grubbers eat only moss and molds―and baruchies, if they can find them. Peaceful enough creatures, all in all.”
For the third time, Drizzt sprang out to the stone. “Is there anything else I should know before I continue?” he asked in exasperation.
Belwar shook his head.
Drizzt led the way across the stones, and soon the two companions stood in the middle of the ten-foot path. It traversed the cavern and ended with the entrance to a passage on either side. Drizzt pointed both ways, wondering which direction Belwar would prefer.
The deep gnome started to the left, then stopped abruptly and peered ahead. Drizzt understood Belwar’s hesitation, for he, too, felt the vibrations in the stone under his feet.
“Grubber.” said Belwar. “Stand quiet and watch, my friend. They are quite a sight.”
Drizzt smiled wide and crouched low, eager for the entertainment. When he heard a quick shuffle behind him, though, Drizzt began to suspect that something was out of sorts.
“Where...” Drizzt began to ask when he turned about and saw Belwar in full flight toward the other exit.
Drizzt stopped speaking abruptly when an explosion like the crash of a cave-in erupted from the other way, the way he had been watching.
“Quite a sight!” he heard Belwar call, and he couldn’t deny the truth of the deep gnome’s words when the grubber made its appearance. It was huge―bigger than the basilisk Drizzt had killed―and looked like a gigantic pale gray worm, except for the multitude of little feet pumping along beside its massive torso. Drizzt saw that Belwar had not lied, for the thing had no mouth to speak of, and no talons or other apparent weapons. But the giant was coming straight at Drizzt with a vengeance now, and Drizzt couldn’t get the image of a flattened dark elf, stretched from one end of the cavern to the other, out of his mind. He reached for his scimitars, then realized the absurdity of that plan. Where would he hit the thing to slow it? Throwing his hands helplessly out wide, Drizzt spun on his heel and fled after the departing burrow-warden.
The ground shook under Drizzt’s feet so violently that he wondered if he might topple to the side and be blasted by the baruchies. But then the tunnel entrance was just ahead and Drizzt could see a smaller side passage, too small for the grubber, just outside the baruchie cavern. He darted ahead the last few strides, then cut swiftly into the small tunnel, diving into a roll to break his momentum. Still, he ricocheted hard off the wall, then the grubber slammed in behind, smashing at the tunnel entrance and dropping pieces of stone all about.