“… the caves in sight!” Catti-brie finished for him. Bruenor spun about and stomped out of the cave, grumbling helplessly and cursing the day he had ever taken a human in for a daughter. Catti-brie only laughed at the unending facade.
Once again it was Guenhwyvar who first encountered the auburn-haired girl. Catti-brie had set straight out for the mountain and was making her way around its westernmost trails when she spotted the black panther above her, watching her from a rock spur.
“Guenhwyvar,” the girl called, remembering the name the drow had used. The panther growled lowly and dropped from the spur, moving closer.
“Guenhwyvar?” Catti-brie said again, less certain, for the panther was only a few dozen strides away. Guenhwyvar’s ears came up at the second mention of the name and the cat’s taut muscles visibly relaxed.
Catti-brie approached slowly, one deliberate step at a time. “Where’s the dark elf, Guenhwyvar?” she asked quietly. “Can ye take me to him?”
“And why would you want to go to him?” came a question from behind.
Catti-brie froze in her tracks, remembering the smooth-toned, melodic voice, then turned slowly to face the drow. He was only three steps behind her, his lavender-eyed gaze locking onto hers as soon as they met. Catti-brie had no idea of what to say, and Drizzt, absorbed again by memories, stood quiet, watching and waiting.
“Be ye a drow?” Catti-brie asked after the silence became unbearable. As soon as she heard her own words, she privately berated herself for asking such a stupid question.
“I am,” Drizzt replied. “What does that mean to you?”
Catti-brie shrugged at the strange response. “I’ve heard that drow be evil, but ye don’t seem so to me.”
“Then you have taken a great risk in coming out here all by yourself,” Drizzt remarked. “But fear not,” he quickly added, seeing the girl’s sudden uneasiness, “for I am not evil and will bring no harm to you.” After the months alone in his comfortable but empty cave, Drizzt did not want this meeting to end quickly.
Catti-brie nodded, believing his words. “Me name’s Catti-brie,” she said. “Me dad is Bruenor, King o’ Clan Battlehammer.”
Drizzt cocked his head curiously.
“The dwarves,” Catti-brie explained, pointing back to the valley. She understood Drizzt’s confusion as soon as she spoke the words. “He’s not me real dad,” she said. “Bruenor took me in when I was just a babe, when me real parents were… ”
She couldn’t finish, and Drizzt didn’t need her to, understanding her pained expression.
“I am Drizzt Do’Urden,” the drow interjected. “Well met, Catti-brie, daughter of Bruenor. It is good to have another to talk with. For all these weeks of winter, I have had only Guenhwyvar, there, when the cat is around, and my friend does not say much, of course!”
Catti-brie’s smile nearly took in her ears. She glanced over her shoulder to the panther, now reclining lazily in the path. “She’s a beautiful cat,” Catti-brie remarked.
Drizzt did not doubt the sincerity in the girl’s tone, or in the admiring gaze she dropped on Guenhwyvar. “Come here, Guenhwyvar” Drizzt said, and the panther stretched and slowly rose. Guenhwyvar walked right beside Catti-brie, and Drizzt nodded to answer her unspoken but obvious desire, Tentatively at first, but then firmly, Catti-brie stroked the panther’s sleek coat, feeling the beast’s power and perfection. Guenhwyvar accepted the petting without complaint, even bumped into Catti-brie’s side when she stopped for a moment, prodding her to continue.
“Are you alone?” Drizzt asked.
Catti-brie nodded. “Me dad said to keep the caves in sight.” She laughed. “I can see them well enough, by me thinkin’!”
Drizzt looked back into the valley, to the far rock wall several miles away. “Your father would not be pleased. This land is not so tame. I have been on the mountain for only two months, and I have fought twice already shaggy white beasts I do not know.”
“Tundra yeti,” Catti-brie replied. “Ye must be on the northern side. Tundra yeti don’t come around the mountain.”
“Are you so certain?” Drizzt asked sarcastically.
“I’ve not ever seen one,” Catti-brie replied, “but I’m not fearing them. I came to find yerself, and now I have.”
“You have,” said Drizzt, “and now what?”
Catti-brie shrugged and went back to petting Guenhwyvar’s sleek coat.
“Come,” Drizzt offered. “Let us find a more comfortable place to talk. The glare off the snow stings my eyes.”
“Ye’re used to the dark tunnels?” Catti-brie asked hopefully, eager to hear tales of lands beyond the borders of Ten-Towns, the only place Catti-brie had ever known.
Drizzt and the girl spent a marvelous day together. Drizzt told Catti-brie of Menzoberranzan and Catti-brie answered his tales with stories of Icewind Dale, of her life with the dwarves. Drizzt was especially interested in hearing about Bruenor and his kin, since the dwarves were his closest, and most-feared, neighbors.
“Bruenor talks rough as stone, but I’m knowin’ him better than all that!” Catti-brie assured the drow. “He’s a right fine one, and so’s the rest o’ the clan.”
Drizzt was glad to hear it, and glad, too, that he had made this connection, both for the implications of having such a friend and even more so because he truly enjoyed the charming and spirited lass’s company. Catti-brie’s energy and zest for life verily bubbled over. In her presence, the drow could not recall his haunting memories, could only feel good about his decision to save the elven child those many years before. Catti-brie’s singsong voice and the careless way she flipped her flowing hair about her shoulders lifted the burden of guilt from Drizzt’s back as surely as a giant could have hoisted a rock.
Their tales could have gone on all that day and night, and for many weeks afterward, but when Drizzt noticed the sun riding low along the western horizon, he realized that the time had come for the girl to head back to her home.
“I will take you,” Drizzt offered.
“No,” Catti-brie replied. “Ye best not. Bruenor’d not understand, and ye’d get me in a mountain o’ trouble. I can get back, don’t ye be worrying! I know these trails better’n yerself, Drizzt Do’Urden, and ye couldn’t keep up to me if ye tried!”
Drizzt laughed at the boast but almost believed it. He and the girl set out at once, moving to the mountain’s southernmost spur and then saying their good-byes with promises that they would meet again during the next thaw, or in the spring if none came sooner.
Truly the girl was skipping lightly when she entered the dwarven complex, but one look at her surly father stole a measure of her delight. Bruenor had gone to Bryn Shander that morning on business with Cassius. The dwarf wasn’t thrilled to learn that a dark elf had made a home so close to his door, but he guessed that his curious—too curious-daughter would think it a grand thing.
“Keep yerself away from the mountain,” Bruenor said as soon as he noticed Catti-brie, and then she was in despair.
“But me Dad—” she tried to protest.
“On yer word, girl!” the dwarf demanded. “Ye’ll not set foot on that mountain again without me permission! There’s a dark elf there, by Cassius’s telling. On yer word!”
Catti-brie nodded helplessly, then followed Bruenor back to the dwarven complex, knowing she would have a hard time changing her father’s mind, but knowing, too, Bruenor held views far from justified where Drizzt Do’Urden was concerned.
Another thaw came a month later and Catti-brie heeded her promise. She never put one foot on Kelvin’s Cairn, but from the valley trails around it, she called out to Drizzt and to Guenhwyvar. Drizzt and the panther, looking for the girl with the break in the weather, were soon beside her, in the valley this time, sharing more tales and a picnic lunch that Catti-brie had packed.