“So we heard, but a confusing tale, it seems,” Catti-brie said, approaching. “Can I hold the girl?”
Delly pulled the still-crying child in closer. “She's afraid,” she explained. “Best that she's with her ma.”
Catti-brie smiled at her, offering an expression that was honestly warm.
Their joy at the rescue was muted somewhat when Drizzt left Delly and Catti-brie in the drawing room and confirmed just how bloodthirsty this band truly had been. He found the two house guards murdered in the foyer, one lying by the door, one on the stairs. He went out front of the house, then, and called out repeatedly, until there at last came a reply.
“Go and fetch the watch,” Drizzt bade the neighbor. “A murder most terrible has occurred!”
The drow went back to Delly and Catti-brie. He found Delly sitting with the child, trying to stop her crying, while Catti-brie stood by the window, staring out, with Guenhwyvar curled up on the floor beside her.
“She's got quite a tale to tell us of our Wulfgar,” Catti-brie said to Drizzt.
The drow looked at Delly Curtie.
“He's speaking of ye both often,” Delly explained. “Ye should know the road he's walked.”
“Soon enough, then,” Drizzt replied. “But not now. The authorities should arrive momentarily.” The dark elf glanced around the room as he finished, his gaze landing alternately on the bodies of the intruders. “Do you have any idea what might have precipitated this attack?” he asked Delly.
“Deudermont's made many enemies,” Catti-brie reminded him from the window, not even turning about as she spoke.
“Nothing more than the usual,” Delly agreed. “Lots who'd like Captain Deudermont's head, but nothing special is afoot that I'm knowing.”
Drizzt paused before responding, thinking to ask Delly what she knew of this pirate who supposedly had Wulfgar's war-hammer. He looked again at the fallen intruders, settling his gaze on the woman.
The pattern fit, he realized, given what he had learned from the encounter with Jule Pepper in Icewind Dale and from Morik the Rogue. He crossed the room, ignoring the noise of the authorities coming to the front door, and moved right beside the dead woman, who was still stuck upright against the wall, pinned by Catti-brie's arrow.
“What're ye doing?” Catti-brie asked as Drizzt tugged at the collar of the dead woman's bloody tunic. “Just pull the damned arrow out to drop her from the perch.”
Catti-brie was obviously unnerved by the sight of the dead woman, the sight of her latest kill, but Drizzt wasn't trying to pull this one down. Far from it, her present angle afforded him the best view.
He took out one scimitar and used its fine edge to slice through the clothing a bit, enough so that he could pull the fabric down low over the back of the dead woman's shoulder.
The drow nodded, far from surprised.
“What is it?” Delly asked from her seat, where she had at last quieted Colson.
Catti-brie's expression showed that she was about to ask the same thing, but it shifted almost at once as she considered the angle with which Drizzt was viewing the woman and the knowing expression stamped upon his dark face. “She's branded,” Catti-brie answered, though she remained across the room.
“The mark of Aegis-fang,” Drizzt confirmed. “The mark of Sheila Kree.”
“What does it mean?” asked a concerned Delly, and she rose out of her chair, moving toward the drow, hugging her child close like some living, emotional armor. “Does it mean that Wulfgar and Captain Deudermont have caught Sheila Kree, and so her friends're trying to hit back?” she asked, looking nervously from the drow to the woman at the window. “Or might it mean that Sheila's sunk Sea Sprite and now is coming to finish off everything connected with Captain Deudermont and his crew?” Her voice rose as she finished, an edge of anxiety bubbling over.
“Or it means nothing more than that the pirate has learned that Captain Deudermont is in pursuit of her, and she wished to strike the first blow,” Drizzt replied, unconvincingly.
“Or it means nothing at all,” Catti-brie added. “Just a coincidence.”
The other two looked at her, but none, not even Catti-brie, believed that for a moment.
The door crashed open a moment later and a group of soldiers charged into the room. Some turned immediately for the dark elf, howling at the sight of a drow, but others recognized Drizzt, or at least recognized Delly Curtie and saw by her posture that the danger had passed. They held their companions at bay.
Catti-brie ushered Delly Curtie away, the woman bearing the child, and with Catti-brie calling Guenhwyvar to follow, while Drizzt gave the authorities a full account of what had occurred. The drow didn't stop at that, but went on to explain the likely personal feud heightening between Sheila Kree and Captain Deudermont.
After he had secured a net of soldiers to stand guard about the house, Drizzt went upstairs to join the women.
He found them in good spirits, with Catti-brie rocking Colson and Delly resting on the bed, a glass of wine in hand.
Catti-brie nodded to the woman, and without further word, Delly launched into her tale of Wulfgar, telling Drizzt and Catti-brie all about the barbarian's decline in Luskan, his trial at Prisoner's Carnival, his flight to the north with Morik and the circumstances that had brought him the child.
“Surprised was I when Wulfgar came back to the Cutlass,” Delly finished. “For me!”
She couldn't help but glance at Catti-brie as she said that, somewhat nervously, somewhat superiorly. The auburn-haired woman's expression hardly changed, though.
“He came to apologize, and oh, but he owed it to us all,” Delly went on. “We left, us three—me man and me child—to find Captain Deudermont, and for Wulfgar to find Aegis-fang. He's out there now,” Delly ended, staring out the west-facing window. “So I'm hoping.”
“Sheila Kree has not met up with Sea Sprite yet,” Drizzt said to her. “Or if she has, then her ship is at the bottom of those cold waters, and Wulfgar is on his way back to Waterdeep.”
“Ye can not know that,” Delly said.
“But we will find out,” a determined Catti-brie put in.
* * * * * * * * * * * *
“The winter fast approaches,” Captain Deudermont remarked to Wulfgar, the two of them standing at Sea Sprite's rail as the ship sailed along at a great clip. They had seen no pirates over the past few tendays, and few merchant vessels save the last groups making the southern run out of Luskan.
Wulfgar, who had grown up in Icewind Dale and knew well the change of the season—a dramatic and swift change this far north—didn't disagree. He, too, had seen the signs, the noticeably chilly shift in the wind and the change of direction, flowing more from the northwest now, off the cold waters of the Sea of Moving Ice.
“We will not put in to Luskan, but sail straight for Waterdeep,”
Deudermont explained. “There, we will ready the ship for winter sailing.”
“Then you do not intend to put in for the season,” Wulfgar reasoned.
“No, but our route will be south out of Waterdeep harbor and not north,” Deudermont pointedly explained. “Perhaps we will patrol off of Baldur's Gate, perhaps even farther south. Robillard has made it clear that he would prefer a busy winter and has mentioned the Pirate Isles to me many times.”
Wulfgar nodded grimly, understanding more from Deudermont's leading tone than from his actual words. The captain was politely inviting him to debark in Waterdeep and remain there with Delly and Colson.
“You will need my strong arm,” Wulfgar said, less than convincingly.
“We are not likely to find Sheila Kree south of Waterdeep,” Deudermont said clearly. 'Bloody Keel has never been known to sail south of the City of Splendors. She has a reputation for putting into dock, wherever that dock may be, for the winter months.”
There, he had said it, plainly and bluntly. Wulfgar looked at him, trying hard to take no offense. Logically, he understood the captain's reasoning. He hadn't been of much help to Sea Sprite's efforts of late, he had to admit. While that only made him want to get right back into battle, he understood that Deudermont had more to worry about than the sensibilities of one warrior.