He turned his attention back to Bruenor and the barmaid, to find the dwarf ordering a pot of stew and a bottomless flagon of Baldur’s Gate Pale.
“No, hold,” Drizzt interrupted.
“Eh? But I’m hungry,” Bruenor protested. “Ye waked me up and I’m hungry.”
“As am I, but we’re late for our meeting,” Drizzt insisted as he stood.
Bruenor looked at him as if he’d lost his mind.
“I am confident that Wulfgar will have venison aboard his boat,” Drizzt reassured the dwarf, and Bruenor looked at him with blank confusion for just a moment before catching on.
“Ah, so’d be me hope,” the dwarf said and rose to his feet.
As did everyone else in the Cutlass.
“Interesting,” Drizzt said, his hands resting on his scimitar hilts.
“Be reasonable, drow,” said the barmaid. “You have nowhere to run. We wish to speak with you two, privately, and in a place of our choosing. Hand over your weapons, and less of your blood will be spilled.”
“Surrender?” Drizzt asked casually, and with a hint of a snicker.
“Look around you. You are sorely outnumbered.”
“Yerself ain’t met me friend, I see,” Bruenor interjected, and he grabbed up his axe and banged it against his shield to set the shield firmly in place on his arm.
The barmaid tossed aside her tray and stepped back, but not quick enough. Drizzt’s weapons came out in a flash, Twinkle’s blade knifing in to stop at the side of her neck.
“I’m bettin’ first blood spilled to be yer own,” Bruenor told her.
“It matters not,” the woman replied with a strange smile. “You’ll not get to Gauntlgrym, whatever my fate. You can abandon that thought peacefully, or we will ensure that fact by killing you. The choice is yours.”
Bruenor and Drizzt exchanged glances, and nods.
The drow’s scimitar flashed, but away from the woman’s neck, tearing the shoulder of her barmaid’s dress and dropping the fabric down off her shoulder. She reacted instinctively, grabbing for the material, and just as Drizzt had anticipated. He stepped forward and punched out, smashing Twinkle’s pommel into her face, the impact throwing her to the floor.
All around the room, from under tables or cloaks, the others pulled their weapons, mostly curious-looking scepters, half staff, half spear.
Bruenor swept his axe across down low, bringing it under his table, hooking it by the leg, and with a great heave and follow-through, sent the table flying at the opponents standing nearby, driving them back.
“Fight or flee?” he called to Drizzt as he rushed behind his friend to intercept a trio coming in.
He saw his answer in Drizzt’s eyes, simmering with eagerness-and in the dark elf’s actions. The drow rushed forward over the fallen, squirming barmaid to meet the swings of the next two in line with a series of powerful parries and twisting counters. In the blink of an eye, Drizzt had both men reversing direction, back on their heels and working furiously to keep up with his darting scimitars.
Bruenor lifted his shield arm high, accepting the heavy blow of an Ashmadai’s clubbing scepter. He swept his axe across under that upraised arm, but the human woman managed to duck out of reach, and two tiefling warriors to her right rushed in at the apparent opening.
But Bruenor was too seasoned and too crafty to make such an obvious gaffe. His swing was genuine, and he added to its weight and momentum purposely, lifting up on the ball of his leading left foot and spinning a perfectly-timed full pivot to bring his shield right back in alignment with the new attackers. The foaming mug held strong against the stab of a sharpened scepter end, and it took only a slight lift for the dwarf to effectively deflect an overhead club from the other.
He went forward, driving his shield and the tieflings’ weapons up and out as he did, barreling right under his uplifting shield. Bruenor launched a second slash with his axe, which brought blood, catching the thigh of the tiefling on the far right, and brought a howl of pain as the half-devil fell back and over, holding his torn leg.
Bruenor ran right over him, kicking him in the face for good measure. As he passed, the dwarf skidded down low, sliding right under a table, and there he turned and stood powerfully, lifting the table with him and throwing it and its many mugs and plates, both full and empty, back in the faces of the remaining two pursuers.
With a violent flurry, Drizzt rushed between his own pair of Ashmadai, a lumbering half-orc and a dark-skinned human who might have been Turmishan. Both fell aside with multiple cuts on their arms and torsos, shielding themselves defensively though the drow looked past them, eagerly wading into the next enemies in line.
Drizzt knew that speed was his ally. He and Bruenor had to keep moving ferociously to prevent an organized line of attack against them, and that was just the way he liked it.
He ran to a table, jumped up on it, jumped off again, blades flashing with every step, cracking against staff and spear, slicing clothing and skin. Howls and screams, cracking wood and breaking glass marked his passing, like a black tornado cutting a swath of absolute destruction. More than once he abruptly stopped and spun, defeating pursuit with a flurry of parries and thrusts.
On one such turn, Drizzt brought both his blades in from opposite directions and at different angles, scissoring the thrusting spear with such force that he tore it from his pursuer’s grasp. The woman threw her hands up, expecting an onslaught of scimitars, but Drizzt knew that those behind him were closing fast.
He jumped and set his feet on chairs, one left and one right, then sprang up again, tucking a tight back flip as he wound his way over the pursuer, who barreled right under and past him and inadvertently stabbed his own ally. That fact hadn’t even set in, Drizzt knew, by the time he landed behind the stumbling man, Icingdeath sweeping across to slash the back of the man’s legs, just below his buttocks.
How he howled!
Drizzt whirled, slashing long and wildly to keep the others at bay; no less than five of the enemy had formed a semi-circle around him. He set himself low, unwilling to commit and ready to react, forcing them to make the first move.
He managed to glance at Bruenor, to find his friend standing atop the bar, similarly surrounded.
“Die well, elf!” Bruenor called.
“Always as intended!” Drizzt yelled back, not a hint of regret in his voice. But before either could put words to action, another voice rose above the din.
All eyes went to the door, where a most unusual creature had entered the Cutlass, an elf woman dressed in black leather, high boots, and a short, seductively angled skirt, and with a wide hat and a metallic walking stick.
“Who is this?” she demanded.
“Dwarf and a drow!” one man yelled back.
“Not these two!”
“A dwarf and a drow-how many could there be?” another man yelled back at her.
“I can think o’ one other pair,” Bruenor interjected.
“That would be… us,” came a voice from the staircase-Jarlaxle’s voice-and all eyes turned that way to see a second drow and dwarf on the stairs.
“A drow and a dwarf, a dwarf and a drow, a hunnerd times better’n a fox and a cow! Bwahaha!” Athrogate added with unbridled enthusiasm.
The cultists cast about for guidance, obviously caught way off their guard. “Surrender, then, all of you!” one of them demanded. “You are not to return to the beast!”
“The beast?” Jarlaxle replied. “Oh, but we are-and yes, King Bruenor, he is referring to your coveted Gauntlgrym. I have quite a tale to tell to you.”
“When we’re done smashin’ some fools, he means,” Athrogate roared, and he came over the rail in a great leap, morningstars spinning out to the sides. He was fairly high up, and so, though his plummeting charge was a bit of a surprise, the cultists below had time to move aside.
Athrogate landed flat on the top of a table, sending plates and glass flying and flattening the wood straight to the floor, where he landed with a great grunt. Anyone doubting that dwarves could bounce would have had those doubts removed, though, as Athrogate, spitting bits of food, various beverages, and broken ceramic and glass, rebounded right back to his feet. Even more astonishingly, he kept his morningstars somehow spinning at the ends of their respective chains.