The pair stopped at a farmhouse for the evening and were welcomed in, though told that they could sleep in the barn with the livestock and not in the main house. Huddled about a small fire, naked and with their clothes drying on a rafter above, Regis again appealed to Bruenor's common sense.
The halfling found that target a hard one to locate.
“Nor'wester,” Regis explained. “Could storm for a tenday and could turn colder.”
“Not a Nor'wester yet,” the dwarf replied gruffly.
“We can wait it out. Stay here—or go to Bremen, perhaps. But to cross the dale in this could be the end of us!”
“Bah, it's just a bit o' rain,” Bruenor grumbled. He bit a huge chunk off the piece of mutton their hosts had provided. “Seen worse—used to play in worse when I was but a boy in Mithral Hall. Ye should’ve seen the snows in the mountains out there, Rumblebelly. Twice a dwarfs height in a single fall!”
“And a quarter of that will stop us cold on the road,” Regis answered. “And leave us frozen and dead in a place where only the yetis will ever find us.”
“Bah!” Bruenor snorted. “No snow'll stop me from me boy, or I'm a bearded gnome! Ye can turn about if ye're wantin'—ye should be able to get to Targos easy enough, and they'll get ye across the lake to yer home. But I'm for going on, soon as I get me sleep, and I'm not for stopping until I see Luskan's gate, until I find that tavern Drizzt wrote about, the Cutlass.”
Regis tried to hide his frown and just nodded.
“I'm not holdin' a bit o' yer choices against ye,” Bruenor said. “If ye ain't got the heart for it, then turn yerself about.”
“But you are going on?” Regis asked.
“All the way.”
What Regis didn't have the heart for, despite what his common sense was screaming out at him, was abandoning his friend to the perils of the road. When Bruenor left the next day, Regis was right beside him.
The only change that next day was that the wind was now from the northwest instead of the southeast, blowing the rain into their faces, which made them all the more miserable and slowed their progress considerably, Bruenor didn't complain, didn't say a word, just bent low into the gale and plowed on.
And Regis went with him, stoically, though the halfling did position himself somewhat behind and to the left of the dwarf, using Bruenor's wide body to block a bit of the rain and the wind.
The dwarf did concede to a more northerly route that day, one that would bring them to another farmhouse along the route, a homestead that was quite used to having visitors. In fact, when the dwarf and halfling arrived, they met with another group who had started on their way to Luskan. They had pulled in two days before, fearing that the mud would stop their wagon wheels dead in their tracks.
“Too early in the season,” the lead driver explained to the duo. “Ground's not frozen up yet, so we've no chance of getting through.”
“Seems as if we'll be wintering in Bremen,” another of the group grumbled.
“Happened before, and'll happen again,” the lead driver said. “We'll take ye on with us to Bremen, if ye want.”
“Not going to Bremen,” Bruenor explained between bites of another mutton dinner. “Going to Luskan.”
Every member of the other group glanced incredulously at each other, and both Bruenor and Regis heard the word “Nor'wester” mumbled more than once.
“Got no wagons to get stuck in the mud,” Bruenor explained.
“Mud that'll reach more than halfway up yer little legs,” said another, with a chuckle that lasted only as long as it took Bruenor to fix him with a threatening scowl.
The other group, even the lead driver, appealed to the pair to be more sensible, but it was Regis, not Bruenor, who finally said, “We will see you on the road. Next spring. We'll be returning as you're leaving.”
That brought a great belly laugh out of Bruenor, and sure enough, before dawn the next day, before any members of the farm family or the other group had even opened their eyes, the dwarf and the halfling were on the road, bending into the cold wind. They knew they'd spent their last comfortable night for a long while, knew they'd have a difficult time even finding enough shelter to start a fizzling fire, knew that deep mud awaited them and possibly with deep snow covering it.
But they knew, too, that Drizzt and Catti-brie waited for them, and, perhaps, so did Wulfgar.
Regis did not register a single complaint that third day, nor the fourth, nor the fifth, though they were out of dry clothes and the wind had turned decidedly colder, and the rain had become sleet and snow. They plowed on, single file, Bruenor's sheer strength and determination plowing a trail ahead of Regis, though the mud grabbed at his every stride and the snow was piling as deep as his waist.
The fifth night they built a dome of snow for shelter and Bruenor did manage a bit of a fire, but neither could feel their feet any longer. With the current pace of the snowfall they expected to wake up to find the white stuff as deep as the horn on Bruenor's helmet.
“I shouldn't have taked ye along,” Bruenor admitted solemnly, as close to an admission of defeat as Regis had ever heard from the indomitable dwarf. “Should've trusted in Drizzt and Catti-brie to bring me boy back in the spring.”
“We're almost out of the dale,” Regis replied with as much enthusiasm as he could muster. It was true enough. Despite the weather, they had made great progress, and the mountain pass was in sight, though still a day's march away. “The storm has kept the yetis at bay.”
“Only because the damn things're smarter than us,” Bruenor grumbled. He put his toes practically into the fire, trying to thaw them.
They had a difficult time falling asleep that night, expecting the wind and the storm to collapse the dome atop them. In fact, when Regis awoke in the darkness, everything seeming perfectly still—too still! He knew in his heart that he was dead.
He lay there for what seemed like days, when finally the snow dome above him began to lighten and even glow.
Regis breathed a sigh of relief, but where was Bruenor? The halfling rolled to his side and propped himself up on his elbows, glancing all about. In the dim light, he finally made out Bruenor's bedroll, tossed asunder. Before he could even begin to question the scene, he heard a commotion by the low tunnel to the igloo and sucked in his breath.
It was Bruenor coming through, and wearing less clothing than Regis had seen him in for several days.
“Sun's up,” the dwarf said with a wide smile. “And the snow's fast melting. We best get our things and ourselves outta here afore the roof melts in on us!”
They didn't travel very far that day, for the warming weather fast melted the snows, making the mud nearly impossible to traverse. At least they weren't freezing anymore, though, and so they took the slowdown in good stride. Bruenor managed to find a dry spot for their camp, and they enjoyed a hearty meal and a fretful night filled with the sounds of wolves howling and yetis growling.
Still, they managed to find a bit of sleep, but when they awoke they had to wonder how good a thing that was. In the night a wolf, by the shape of the tracks, had come in and made off with a good deal of their supplies.
Despite loss and weariness, it was in good spirits that they made the beginning of the pass that day. No snow had fallen there, and the ground was stony and dry. They camped just within the protective walls of stone that night and were surprised when other lights appeared in the darkness. There was a camp of some sort higher up on the gorge's eastern wall.
“Well, go and see what that's all about,” Bruenor bade Regis.
Regis looked at him skeptically.
“Ye're the sneak, ain't ye?” the dwarf said.
With a helpless chuckle, Regis picked himself up from the stone on which he had been enjoying his meal, gave a series of belches, and rubbed his full belly.