R. A. Salvatore - Legacy of the Drow 5 - The Silent Blade

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R.A.Salvatore

The Silent Blade

(Forgotten Realms novell. Path of Darkness. Book I)

PROLOGUE

Wulfgar lay back in his bed, pondering, trying to come to

terms with the abrupt changes that I had come over his life.

Rescued from the demon Errtu and his hellish prison in the

Abyss, the proud barbarian found himself once again among

friends and allies. Bruenor, his adopted dwarven father, was

here, and so was Drizzt, his dark elven mentor and dearest

friend. Wulfgar could tell from the snoring that Regis, the

chubby halfling, was sleeping contentedly in the next room.

And Catti-brie, dear Catti-brie, the woman Wulfgar had

come to love those years before, the woman whom he had

planned to marry seven years previously in Mithral Hall. They

were all here at their home in Icewind Dale, reunited and

presumably at peace, through the heroic efforts of these

wonderful friends.

Wulfgar did not know what that meant.

Wulfgar, who had been through such a terrible ordeal over

six years of torture at the clawed hands of the demon Errtu,

did not understand.

The huge man crossed his arms over his chest. Sheer

exhaustion put him here in bed, forced him down, for he would

not willingly choose sleep. Errtu found him in his dreams.

And so it was this night. Wulfgar, though deep in thought

and deep in turmoil, succumbed to his exhaustion and fell

into a peaceful blackness that soon turned again into the

images of the swirling gray mists that were the Abyss. There

sat the gigantic, bat-winged Errtu, perched upon his carved

mushroom throne, laughing. Always laughing that hideous

croaking chuckle. That laugh was borne not out of joy, but

was rather a mocking thing, an insult to those the demon

chose to torture. Now the beast aimed that unending

wickedness at Wulfgar, as was aimed the huge pincer of

Bizmatec, another demon, minion of Errtu. With strength

beyond the bounds of almost any other human, Wulfgar

ferociously wrestled Bizmatec. The barbarian batted aside the

huge humanlike arms and the two other upper-body appendages,

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the pincer arms, for a long while, slapping and punching

desperately.

But too many flailing limbs came at him. Bizmatec was too

large and too strong, and the mighty barbarian eventually

began to tire.

It ended-always it ended-with one of Bizmatec's pincers

around Wulfgar's throat, the demon's other pincer arm and its

two humanlike arms holding the defeated human steady. Expert

in this, his favorite torturing technique, Bizmatec pressed

oh so subtly on Wulfgar's throat, took away the air, then

gave it back, over and over, leaving the man weak in the

legs, gasping and gasping as minutes, then hours, slipped

past.

Wulfgar sat up straight in his bed, clutching at his

throat, clawing a scratch down one side of it before he

realized that the demon was not there, that he was safe in

his bed in the land he called home, surrounded by his

friends.

Friends . . .

What did that word mean? What could they know of his

torment? How could they help him chase away the enduring

nightmare that was Errtu?

The haunted man did not sleep the rest of the night, and

when Drizzt came to rouse him, well before the dawn, the dark

elf found Wulfgar already dressed for the road. They were to

leave this day, all five, bearing the artifact Crenshinibon

far, far to the south and west. They were bound for Caradoon

on the banks of Impresk Lake, and then into the Snowflake

Mountains to a great monastery called Spirit Soaring where a

priest named Cadderly would destroy the wicked relic.

Crenshinibon. Drizzt had it with him when he came to get

Wulfgar that morning. The drow didn't wear it openly, but

Wulfgar knew it was there. He could sense it, could feel its

vile presence. For Crenshinibon remained linked to its last

master, the demon Errtu. It tingled with the energy of the

demon, and because Drizzt had it on him and was standing so

close, Errtu, too, remained close to Wulfgar.

"A fine day for the road," the drow remarked light-

heartedly, but his tone was strained, condescending, Wulfgar

noted. With more than a little difficulty, Wulfgar resisted

the urge to punch Drizzt in the face.

Instead, he grunted in reply and strode past the

deceptively small dark elf. Drizzt was but a few inches over

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five feet, while Wulfgar towered closer to seven feet than to

six, and carried fully twice the weight of the drow. The

barbarian's thigh was thicker than Drizzt's waist, and yet,

if it came to blows between them, wise bettors would favor

the drow.

"I have not yet wakened Catti-brie," Drizzt explained.

Wulfgar turned fast at the mention of the name. He stared

hard into the drow's lavender eyes, his own blue orbs

matching the intensity that always seemed to be there.

"But Regis is already awake and at his morning meal-he is

hoping to get two or three breakfasts in before we leave, no

doubt," Drizzt added with a chuckle, one that Wulfgar did not

share. "And Bruenor will meet us on the field beyond Bryn

Shander's eastern gate. He is with his own folk, preparing

the priestess Stumpet to lead the clan in his absence."

Wulfgar only half heard the words. They meant nothing to

him. All the world meant nothing to him.

"Shall we rouse Catti-brie?" the drow asked.

"I will," Wulfgar answered gruffly. "You see to Regis. If

he gets a belly full of food, he will surely slow us down,

and I mean to be quick to your friend Cadderly, that we might

be rid of Crenshinibon."

Drizzt started to answer, but Wulfgar turned away, moving

down the hall to Catti-brie's door. He gave a single,

thunderous knock, then pushed right through. Drizzt moved a

step in that direction to scold the barbarian for his rude

behavior-the woman had not even acknowledged his knock, after

all-but he let it go. Of all the humans the drow had ever

met, Catti-brie ranked as the most capable at defending

herself from insult or violence.

Besides, Drizzt knew that his desire to go and scold

Wulfgar was wrought more than a bit by his jealousy of the

man who once was, and perhaps was soon again, to be Catti-

brie's husband.

The drow stroked a hand over his handsome face and turned

to find Regis.

* * * * *

Wearing only a slight undergarment and with her pants

half pulled up, the startled Catti-brie turned a surprised

look on Wulfgar as he strode into her room. "Ye might've

waited for an answer," she said dryly, brushing away her

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embarrassment and pulling her pants up, then going to

retrieve her tunic.

Wulfgar nodded and held up his hands-only half an

apology, perhaps, but a half more than Catti-brie had

expected. She saw the pain in the man's sky blue eyes and the

emptiness of his occasional strained smiles. She had talked

with Drizzt about it at length, and with Bruenor and Regis,

and they had all decided to be patient. Time alone could heal

Wulfgar's wounds.

"The drow has prepared a morning meal for us all,"

Wulfgar explained. "We should eat well before we start on the

long road."

" 'The drow'? " Catti-brie echoed. She hadn't meant to

speak it aloud, but so dumbfounded was she by Wulfgar's

distant reference to Drizzt that the words just slipped out.

Would Wulfgar call Bruenor "the dwarf"? And how long would it

be before she became simply "the girl"? Catti-brie blew a

deep sigh and pulled her tunic over her shoulders, reminding

herself pointedly that Wulfgar had been through hell-

literally. She looked at him now, studying those eyes, and

saw a hint of embarrassment there, as though her echo of his

callous reference to Drizzt had indeed struck him in the

heart. That was a good sign.

He turned to leave her room, but she moved to him,

reaching up to gently stroke the side of his face, her hand

running down his smooth cheek to the scratchy beard that he

had either decided to grow or simply hadn't been motivated

enough to shave.

Wulfgar looked down at her, at the tenderness in her

eyes, and for the first time since the fight on the ice floe

when he and his friends had dispatched wicked Errtu, there

came a measure of honesty in his slight smile.

* * * * *

Regis did get his three meals, and he grumbled about it

all that morning as the five friends started out from Bryn

Shander, the largest of the villages in the region called Ten

Towns in forlorn Icewind Dale. Their course was north at

first, moving to easier ground, and then turning due west. To

the north, far in the distance, they saw the high structures

of Targos, second city of the region, and beyond the city's

roofs could be seen shining waters of Maer Dualdon.

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By mid-afternoon, with more than a dozen miles behind

them, they came to the banks of the Shaengarne, the great

river swollen and running fast with the spring melt. They

followed it north, back to Maer Dualdon, to the town of

Bremen and a waiting boat Regis had arranged.

Gently refusing the many offers from townsfolk to remain

in the village for supper and a warm bed, and over the many

protests of Regis, who claimed that he was famished and ready

to lay down and die, the friends were soon west of the river,

running on again, leaving the towns, their home, behind.

Drizzt could hardly believe that they had set out so

soon. Wulfgar had only recently been returned to them. All of

them were together once more in the land they called their

home, at peace, and yet, here they were, heeding again the

call of duty and running down the road to adventure. The drow

had the cowl of his traveling cloak pulled low about his

face, shielding his sensitive eyes from the stinging sun.

Thus his friends could not see his wide smile.

Part 1

APATHY

Often I sit and ponder the turmoil I feel when my blades

are at rest, when all the world around me seems at peace.

This is the supposed ideal for which I strive, the calm that

we all hope will eventually return to us when we are at war,

and yet, in these peaceful times-and they have been rare

occurrences indeed in the more than seven decades of my life-

I do not feel as if I have found perfection, but, rather, as

if something is missing from my life.

It seems such an incongruous notion, and yet I have come

to know that I am a warrior, a creature of action. In those

times when there is no pressing need for action, I am not at

ease. Not at all.

When the road is not filled with adventure, when there

are no monsters to battle and no mountains to climb, boredom

finds me. I have come to accept this truth of my life, this

truth about who I am, and so, on those rare, empty occasions

I can find a way to defeat the boredom. I can find a mountain

peak higher than the last I climbed.

I see many of the same symptoms now in Wulfgar, returned

to us from the grave, from the swirling darkness that was

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