"We ain't crowned him yet, as he ain't been in from Icewind Dale." "We feared we'd miss him," Ivan said.
"Ye would've if he'd've come right in," the soldier explained, "but him and his found orcs on the road and're chasin' them down and putting them back in their filthy holes."
Ivan nodded with sincere admiration. "Good king," he said, and the soldier beamed. "Small band and nothin' more, so it won't be long," the soldier explained. He turned to the side and motioned for the brothers to come along. "We're a bit short o' the ale out here," he explained. "Come out fast from the halls to set the camp, while our brothers are up there on the west, setting another."
"Just a small band?" Ivan asked skeptically.
"We're not for taking any chances, Ivan Bouldershoulder," the soldier explained. "We been fighting much o' late, and not too far from our memories arc them damned drow coming up from their deep holes. I'm not knowing this Carradoon or them Snowflake Mountains ye're mentioning, but up here's a wild land."
"We just got done fighting a few orcs ourselfs," Ivan replied. He turned to the river and nodded his bearded chin to the east. "Out in the Moonwood. Me brother put us a bit outta the way."
"Oo," said Pikel, hardly taking the blame in stride.
"Yeah yeah, ye got us up here quick, even if ye did land us in a nest o' elves!" Ivan admitted, and turned back to the soldier. 'Ores crawling everywhere, are they? Well, then I guess we come to the right place!"
It was spoken like a true dwarf, and the soldier appreciated the sentiment enough to slap Ivan on the shoulder.
"Let me see what ye’re buildin'," Ivan offered. "Might know a trick or two from the south that ye ain't neared of here."
"Ye heading out?" came a soft voice, one that Drizzt Do'Urden surely welcomed.
He looked up from the small pouch he was preparing for the road to see Catti-brie's approach. The two had said little over the past few days. Catti-brie had retreated within herself, for private contemplations that Drizzt wasn't sure he understood.
"Just ensuring that the orcs were indeed chased away," the drow answered.
"Withegroo's got patrols out."
Drizzt offered a doubting smirk.
"Yeah, I was thinking the same thing. They're knowing the ground, at least."
"As I soon will."
"Let me get me bow, and I'll take yer flank," the woman offered.
Drizzt looked up. "It is a dark night," he said.
Looking as if she had just been slapped, Catti-brie also let her gaze move about before settling it enough to stare back at Drizzt.
"I got me a little headpiece here for just such an occasion," she remarked.
From her belt pouch she brought forth the cat's-eye circlet that she often wore, one that magically conveyed heightened vision in very low light.
"Not as keen as a drow's eyes," Drizzt remarked. "The ground is rocky and likely treacherous."
Catti-brie started to argue, to remind him that the circlet had served her even in the Underdark, and that this had never been an issue between them before, but Drizzt interrupted her before she could even get started.
"Remember the rocky climb outside of Deudermont's house?" he asked. "You hardly managed it. After the rain, the rocks here arc no doubt equally slick."
Again, Catti-brie looked as if he had just slapped her. His words were true enough. She could not pace him in the daylight, let alone in the dark of night, but was he saying that she would slow him down? Was he, for the first time since his foolish decision to go to Menzoberranzan alone, forsaking the help of his friends?
He nodded, offered the thin veil of a smile, slung his pack over his shoulder, and rose, turning away.
Catti-brie caught him by the arm, forcing him to turn and face her.
"Ye know I can do this," she said.
Drizzt looked at her hard and long. His stern expression melted away into a nod.
"There is no better partner in all the world," he admitted. "But ye want to go out alone this night," Catti-brie stated more than asked.
Again the drow nodded.
Catti-brie pulled him close into a hug, and it was one of warmth and love, with just a bit of sadness.
Drizzt went out from Shallows soon after. Guenhwyvar was not with him, but he had the figurine close and knew that the cat would be available to his call should he need her. Barely fifty feet from the torchlit gate, the drow melted into the shadows, becoming one with the dark of night.
He saw the patrols from Shallows several times in the night and heard them long before they came into view. Drizzt avoided them easily every time. He did not want company, but his inner turmoil did little to dull his focus. Out there, in the dark, he was hunting as only a skilled drow might do, roaming the trails and the woods as silently as a shadow. He expected to find nothing, but he was seasoned enough to understand that those honest expectations would lean him toward the precipice of disaster if he embraced them too deeply.
Thus he was not surprised when he found orc-sign. Prints showed themselves to Drizzt's keen drow eyes amidst a circle of sitting stones. They were fresh, very recent, yet there was no sign of any campfire or of any residue from a torch. Night had been on for some time, and all of the patrols from Shallows were human in make-up, and all of them were carrying torches.
But someone had been there, someone human-sized or close to it, and someone traveling in the dark of night without any apparent light source. Given all the recent events, the fact that these were orcs—from the tracks, the drow figured there were two of them—was not hard to determine.
Neither was the trail. The creatures were moving quickly and without much regard to their tracks. Within half an hour's time, Drizzt knew that he had closed considerably.
He did not for a moment wish that Catti-brie or any of the others were at his side. He did not for a moment turn his thoughts away from the task at hand, from the dangers and needs of that very second.
Under the cover of a low tree branch, the drow spotted them. A pair of orcs, crouched on a nearby ridgeline, peered around some lilac bushes toward the distant and well-lit town of Shallows.
Step-by-step, each foot meticulously placed before the other, the drow closed.
Out came his scimitars, and the orcs nearly jumped out of their boots, turning to see curving blade tips in close to their throats. One threw up its hands, but the other, stupidly, went for its weapon, a short, thick sword.
It got the blade out, even managed a quick thrust, but Drizzt's left hand worked a circle around the weapon, turning it down and out wide, while his right hand held his other scimitar poised for a kill on the other orc.
He could easily have killed the attacking orc at that moment—after the turning parry, he had an open strike to the creature's chest—but he was more interested in prisoners than corpses, so he brought his scimitar in against the creature's ribs, hoping the threat alone would end the fight.
But the orc, stubborn to the end, leaped back—right over the north side of the ridge, which was, in fact, a thirty foot cliff.
Holding his scimitar in tight against the second creature, Drizzt skittered up to the cliff edge. He saw the orc bounce once off a rocky protrusion, go into a short somersault, and smash hard onto the stone below.
The other orc bolted away.
Again, Drizzt could have killed it, but he stayed his hand and took up a swift pursuit.
The orc went for the trees, rushing around strewn rocks, falling down one descent and scrambling up the backside. It glanced back many times during its wild flight, thinking and hoping that it had left the dark elf far behind.
But Drizzt was merely oft" to the side, easily pacing the creature. As it veered around one tree—the same tree from which Drizzt had been watching the pair a few moments earlier—the drow took a more direct route. Leaping onto a low branch, Drizzt ran with perfect balance and the lightest of steps along the limb. He hopped around the trunk to a branch heading out the other way, similarly traversed it, and fell into a roll at its end that landed him on the ground. The dark elf crouched down on one knee, with both blades pointed back at the rushing orc that was now heading straight for him.