"Would ye rather be out here, with the wind in yer beard and yer axe in yer hands, with an orc afore ye to chop down, or would ye rather be in Mithral Hall, speakin' to the pretty emissaries from Silverymoon or Sundabar, or arguin with some Mirabarran merchant about tradin' rights? Which would ye rather be doin', Dagnabbit?"
The other dwarf swallowed hard at the unexpected and direct question. There was a political answer to be made, of course, but one that Bruenor knew, and Dagnabbit knew, would ultimately be a lie.
"I'd be beside me king, because that's what I'm to do …" the young dwarf started to dodge, but Bruenor was hearing none of it.
"Rather, I asked ye. Which would ye rather? Ain't ye got no preferences?"
"My duty—"
"I ain't askin' for yer duty!" Bruenor dismissed him with a wave of his hand. "When ye're wanting to talk honestly, then ye come talk to me again," he blustered. "Until then, go and fetch me another bowl o' fresher stew, cuz this pot's all crusty. Do yer duty, ye danged golem!"
Bruenor lifted his empty bowl and presented it to Dagnabbit, and the younger dwarf, after a short pause, did take it. He didn't get up immediately, though.
"I'd rather be out here," Dagnabbit admitted. "And I'd take a fight with an orc over a day at the forge."
Bruenor's smile erupted beneath his flaming red beard.
"Then why're ye asking me what ye're asking me?" he asked. "Are ye thinkin' that I'm not akin to yerself? Just because I'm the king don't make me wanting any different from any other Battlehammer."
"Ye're fearing to go home," Dagnabbit dared to say. "Ye're looking at it as the end o' yer road."
Bruenor sat back and shrugged, then noticed a pair of purple eyes staring at him from the brush to the side.
"And I'm still thinking that I'm wanting more stew," he said.
Dagnabbit stared at him hard for a few moments, chewing his lip and nodding.
"I'm hoping that the durned elf don't kill 'em all tonight meself," he said with a grin, and he rose to leave.
As soon as Dagnabbit had walked off, Drizzt Do'Urden moved out of the brush and took a seat at Bruenor's side.
"Already dead, ain't they?" Bruenor asked.
"Catti-brie is a fine shot," the drow answered.
"Well, go and find some more."
"There will always be more," the drow replied. "We could spend all our lives hunting orcs in these mountains." He held a sly look over Bruenor until the dwarf looked back at him. "But you know that, of course."
"First Dagnabbit and now yerself?" Bruenor asked. "What're ye wantin' me to say, elf?"
"What's in your heart. Nothing more. When first we started on the road, you went with great anticipation, and a skip in your determined stride. You were seeing Gauntlgrym then, or at least the promise of a grand adventure, the grandest of them all."
"Still am."
"No," Drizzt observed. "Our encounter in Fell Pass showed you the trouble your plans would soon enough encounter. You know that once you get back to Mithral Hall, you'll have a hard time leaving again. You know they will try to keep you there."
"Few guesses, elf?" Bruenor said with a wave of his hand. "Or are ye just thinkin' ye know more than ye know?"
"Not a guess, but an observation," Drizzt replied. "Every step of the way out of Icewind Dale has been heavier than the previous one for Bruenor Battlehammer—every step except those that temporarily turn us aside from our destination, like the journey to Mirabar and this chase through the mountains."
Bruenor leaned forward and grabbed Dagnabbit's empty bowl. He gave it a shake, dunked it in the nearly-empty stew pot, then brought it in and licked the thick broth from his stubby fingers.
"Course, in Mithral Hall I might be getting me stew served to me in fine bowls, on fine platters, and with fine napkins."
"And you never liked napkins."
Bruenor shrugged, his expression showing Drizzt that he was certainly catching on.
"Appoint a steward, then, and at once upon your return," the drow offered. "Be a king on the road, expanding the influence of his people, and searching for an even more ancient and greater lost kingdom. Mithral Hall can run itself. If you did not believe that, you never would have gone to Icewind Dale in the first place."
"It's not so easy."
"You are the king. You define what a king is. This duty will trap you, and that is your fear, but it will only do so if you allow yourself to be trapped by it. In the end, Bruenor Battlehammer alone decides the fate of Bruenor Battlehammer."
"I'm thinkin' ye're making it a bit too easy there, elf," the dwarf replied, "but I'm not saying ye're wrong."
He ended with a sigh, and drowned it in a huge gulp of hot stew.
"Do you know what you want?" Drizzt asked. "Or are you a bit confused, my friend?"
"Do ye remember when we first went huntin' for Mithral Hall?" Bruenor asked. "Remember me trickin' ye by makin' ye think I was on me dyin' bed?"
Drizzt gave a little laugh — it was a scene he would never forget. They, leading the folk of Ten-Towns, had just won victory over the minions of Akar Kessell, who possessed the Crystal Shard. Drizzt had been taken in to Bruenor, who seemed on his deathbed—but only so that he could trick the drow into agreeing to help him find Mithral Hall.
"I did not need much convincing," Drizzt admitted.
"I thinked two things when we found the place, ye know," said Bruenor. "Oh, me heart was pumping, I tell ye! To see me home again… to avenge me ancestors. I'm tellin' ye, elf, riding that dragon down to the darkness was the greatest single moment o' me life, though I was thinkin' it was the last moment o' me life when it was happening!"
Drizzt nodded and knew what was coming.
"And what else were you thinking when we found Mithral Hall?" he prompted, because he knew that Bruenor had to say this out loud, had to admit it openly.
"Thrilled, I was, I tell ye truly! But there was something else …" He shook his head and sighed again. "When we got back from the southland and me clan retook our home, a bit of sadness found me heart."
"Because you came to realize that it was the adventure and the road more than the goal."
"Ye're knowin' it, too!" Bruenor blurted.
"Why do you think that I, and Catti-brie, were quick to leave Mithral Hall after the drow war? We are all alike, I fear, and it will likely be the end of us all."
"But what a way to go, eh elf?"
Drizzt gave a laugh, and Bruenor was fast to join in, and it seemed to Drizzt as if a great weight had been lifted off the dwarf's shoulders. But the chuckling from Bruenor stopped abruptly, a serious expression clouding his face.
"What o' me girl?" he asked. "What're ye to do if she gets herself killed on the road? How're ye not to be blaming yerself forever more?"
"It is something that I have thought of often," Drizzt admitted.
"Ye seen what it done to Wulfgar," said Bruenor. "Made him forget his place and spend all his time looking out for her."
"And that was his mistake."
"So, ye're saying ye don't care?"
Drizzt laughed aloud.
"Do not lead me to places I did not intend to go," he retorted. "I care— of course I do—but you tell me this, Bruenor Battlehammer, is there anyone in all the world who loves Catti-brie, or Wulfgar, more than yourself? Will you then put them in Mithral Hall and hold them safely there?
"Of course you would not," Drizzt continued. "You trust in her and let her run. You let her fight and have watched her get hurt—only recently. Not much of a father, if you ask me."
"Who asked ye?"
"Well, if you did…"
"If I did and ye telled me that, I'd kick ye in yer skinny elf arse!"
"If you did and I told you that, you'd kick empty air and wonder why a hundred blows were raining upon your thick head."