Few weapons in all the Realms could match the strength of glassteel Vidrinath, and so it was with Twinkle.
But Drizzt was too engaged in his plotting, in moving the fight to where he needed it to be, to notice. He rolled to his feet and went right back in, slapping Icingdeath hard into Tiago’s shield-and retracting too quickly for that equally impressive blocker, Orbbcress by name, to get a firm hold on it.
But Drizzt did feel that pull, just for a moment as he retracted, and he understood.
And now his plan took clearer shape.
Outside the room, Doum’wielle dared to peek in.
Her breath was stolen away.
She saw Drizzt and Tiago, each outlined in flames, rushing to and fro, each leaping in flying somersaults, vaulting the debris of old furniture, or the other’s attempted strikes. Scimitars scraped and rang out with each passage, or a dull drumbeat sounded as Drizzt rolled his blades and Tiago got his shield up to block.
At one point, Drizzt broke free and dived aside, rolling up to one knee with his bow in hand instead of his scimitars, each laid neatly on the floor in front of him. Tiago yelped, and Doum’wielle almost cried out-and would have, had not Khazid’hea shot a warning through her mind before she uttered the gasp. For surely she thought Tiago doomed as the lightning arrow shot toward him.
But somehow the young warrior had brought his shield to block the lightning.
Doum’wielle felt her courage waning in the face of this display. The three blades moved faster than she could follow-either of these magnificent warriors could cut her apart with little effort. Hardly even thinking, Little Doe began to rise, perhaps to run away.
Take heart! Khazid’hea screamed in her thoughts. The moment of your salvation is at hand!
I cannot defeat them!
You do not have to, the sinister sword reminded her. In their obsession, they will defeat each other.
Doum’wielle’s eyes spun as she tried to keep up with the frenetic, beautiful movements. Tiago went down in a slide, his blade coming out wide to cut at Drizzt’s thighs.
But over that blade went Drizzt in a graceful dive and spin, and he broke out of it wide-armed and wide-legged, landing lightly on his feet.
Go! Khazid’hea implored Doum’wielle, for that sword, knowing the tactics of Drizzt so well, knew what was coming.
Drizzt went in with Twinkle leading with a low thrust. But that was the feint, and Icingdeath went up above and over the sister scimitar, which Drizzt suddenly retracted, and swooped down from on high, left to right, smashing solidly against Tiago’s shield.
The shield grabbed Icingdeath, as Drizzt had hoped, and he darted out to the left, tugging and turning, and flipping Twinkle in his hand. His left went up high, and as he stepped and turned his back to the twisting Tiago, he drove his hand down and back, a reverse thrust the Baenre noble could not hope to block with his shield.
Drizzt had him!
But Twinkle was hit as someone darted in the other way, and parried up high-and Drizzt nearly lost the blade.
“Hah!” Tiago cried with clear glee, surely thinking victory at hand.
But the ranger was quick, and Drizzt pulled Icingdeath free and completed his spin. Flipping Twinkle, he fell back a step defensively. He wore a curious expression when he came around, to see Doum’wielle, her parry complete, thrust ahead with the blade. But she stabbed at Tiago’s exposed flank and not at Drizzt!
The Baenre noble howled and groaned and fell away, clutching his side, as Doum’wielle, her blade bloodied, spun back on Drizzt.
“Little Doe,” Drizzt said, in both relief and surprise-and ending with his surprise multiplied as the daughter of Sinnafein, her face a mask of rage, swept her deadly blade across at Drizzt.
For this was the plan of Khazid’hea, the redemption of Doum’wielle, who would claim the head of Drizzt Do’Urden as her trophy when she returned to Menzoberranzan!
Twinkle came up in a vertical block once more, perfectly timed to intercept the slashing sword.
But Twinkle had been compromised from the earlier hit, and Khazid’hea had coaxed every ounce of strength Doum’wielle could manage into that brutal strike. The fine edge of the sword that could cut stone snapped the blade from Twinkle and continued across, shearing Drizzt’s leather armor and mithral shirt with ease, opening a line across the ranger’s chest from his left shoulder to the midpoint of his ribs.
Blood erupted from the garish wound, pouring freely onto Drizzt’s torn shirt. He stood there, mouth agape, staring into the wicked smile of Doum’wielle, of Little Doe, of the daughter of his dear friend Sinnafein.
He couldn’t retaliate. He couldn’t even lift an arm to block as Doum’wielle lifted the awful Khazid’hea yet again. Drizzt knew his wound to be mortal.
He knew he was dead.
He got slammed hard and darkness fell over him.
He felt as if he were flying sidelong, or perhaps tumbling over to the ground, and he crashed against the stone and got hit again, with brutal force, and knew only darkness and weight, as if the stones of the floor had swallowed him up, or the ceiling had fallen upon him.
There was no breath to draw.
PART THREETHE FIRST KING’S DEATH
In the moment of my death, will I be surprised? In that instant? When the sword cuts my flesh, or the giant’s hammer descends, or the dragon’s flames curl my skin?
When I know it is happening, when I know beyond doubt that Death has come for me, will I be surprised or calm, accepting or panicked?
I tell myself that I am prepared. I have surrounded the question logically, rationally, removing emotion, accepting the inevitability. But knowing it will happen and knowing there is nothing I can do to stop it from happening is a different level of acceptance, perhaps, than any actual preparation for that onetime, ultimate event.
Can anything be more unsettling to conscious thought than the likely end of conscious thought?
This notion is not something I dwell upon. I do not go to my bed each night with the worry of the moment of death climbing under my blanket beside me. In merely asking this question-in the moment of my death, will I be surprised? — I suspect that I am entertaining the notion more than many, more than most, likely.
In many-in each-of us there is this deep-seated avoidance of, even denial of, the undeniable.
For others, there is the salve of religion. For some it is a false claim-more a hope than a belief. I know this because I have seen these faithful in their moment of death, and it is a terrifying moment for them. For others, it is a genuine, sanguine acceptance and belief in something better beyond.
This religious salve has never been my way. I know not why, but I am not so arrogant as to demean those who choose a different path through this muddled life and its inevitable end, or to pretend that they are somehow lesser of intellect, of moral integrity, or of courage, than I. For among that last group, those of deep faith, I would include my beloved wife, Catti-brie, so secure in her knowledge of what awaits when the scythe falls and her time on Toril is at its end.
Would I see it differently had I been in that altered passage of time and space beside my four dear friends?
I honestly do not know.
Wulfgar was there, and he returns anew, unconvinced of that which would have awaited him on the other side of that pond in the forest of Iruladoon. Indeed, Wulfgar confided to me that his certainty of the Halls of Tempus is less now than before his journey through death to return to this world. We live in a world of amazing magic. We assign to it names, and pretend to understand, and reduce it to fit our purposes.