The Collected Stories, The Legend of Drizzt Read online

  NEVERWINTER

  Gauntlgrym

  Neverwinter Wood

  (October 2011)

  Icewind Dale

  (October 2012)

  THE LEGEND OF DRIZZT®

  Homeland

  Exile

  Sojourn

  The Crystal Shard

  Streams of Silver

  The Halfling’s Gem

  The Legacy

  Starless Night

  Siege of Darkness

  Passage to Dawn

  The Silent Blade

  The Spine of the World

  Sea of Swords

  TRANSITIONS

  The Orc King

  The Pirate King

  The Ghost King

  THE HUNTER’S BLADES TRILOGY

  The Thousand Orcs

  The Lone Drow

  The Two Swords

  THE SELLSWORDS

  Servant of the Shard

  Promise of the Witch-King

  Road of the Patriarch

  THE CLERIC QUINTET

  Canticle

  In Sylvan Shadows

  Night Masks

  The Fallen Fortress

  The Chaos Curse

  THE LEGEND OF DRIZZT® ANTHOLOGY

  The Collected Stories

  ©2011 Wizards of the Coast LLC

  All characters in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  This book is protected under the copyright laws of the United States of America. Any reproduction or unauthorized use of the material or artwork contained herein is prohibited without the express written permission of Wizards of the Coast LLC.

  Published by Wizards of the Coast LLC.

  FORGOTTEN REALMS, WIZARDS OF THE COAST, DUNGEONS & DRAGONS, D&D, their respective logos, THE LEGEND OF DRIZZT, and DRAGON are trademarks of Wizards of the Coast LLC in the U.S.A. and other countries.

  Cover art by Raymond Swanland

  eISBN: 978-0-7869-6145-0

  620-28054000-001-EN

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  v3.1

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  Cover

  Other Books by This Author

  Title Page

  Copyright

  THE FIRST NOTCH

  DARK MIRROR

  THE THIRD LEVEL

  GUENHWYVAR

  THAT CURIOUS SWORD

  WICKLESS IN THE NETHER

  THE DOWERY

  COMRADES AT ODDS

  IF EVER THEY HAPPENED UPON MY LAIR

  BONES AND STONES

  IRULADOON

  TO LEGEND HE GOES

  his was my first published short story, written in the heady days soon after I had become a professional author and while I was still working in the finance field for a high-tech company. The first two Drizzt novels, The Crystal Shard and Streams of Silver were on the shelves and doing well, and I was writing the third of the series when the opportunity to do a short story for Dragon magazine came up. Of course I said yes. (I loved Dragon magazine and wanted to work with then editor Barb Young.) And I was a new writer, finally getting the chance to let all of these stories pour out of me. Honestly, I couldn’t stop writing!

  And that, more than anything else, was the point of “The First Notch.” I got to tell a story that featured Bruenor, whom I had come to love, and who was increasingly taking a back seat to Drizzt in the novels. The added hook for me was that always-enjoyable tease for readers. At the end of Streams of Silver, Bruenor had seemingly met his demise, so this story (intentionally) appeared as a sort of tribute to our lost friend.

  The other hook for me going into this was my continuing fascination with dwarven culture, and the cockney accent I had slapped upon them. I was reading Brian Jacques at the time, marveling at his use of dialect, and honestly, I wanted to play. In this story, I certainly got that opportunity. It’s all dwarves, talking, arguing, cheering other dwarves in a way only dwarves can.

  Beyond that, the key line of the story is near the end: “Honor above anger.” I didn’t realize it at the time, but this became a critical piece of the Bruenor puzzle as the Legend of Drizzt books went along, particularly when it came to the Treaty of Garumn’s Gorge and the reasonable way Bruenor was forced to deal with King Obould. Honor above anger, pragmatism above passion—when it involved the clan for which he cared. Re-reading this story now, it amazes me how the individual characteristics of these Companions of the Hall became so deeply embedded in my subconscious that they remained so consistent over more than twenty years.

  e got it all?” asked the stocky young dwarf, his hand stroking his still hairless cheeks and chin.

  The two smaller dwarves, Khardrin and Yorik, nodded and dropped their large sacks, the clanging as the bundles struck the stone floor echoing through the stillness of the deep caverns.

  “Quiet, will ye!” snapped Feldegar, the fourth member of the conspiracy. “Garumn’d have our heads if he knew!”

  “Garumn’ll know well enough when we’re done,” said Bruenor, the stocky dwarf, with a sly wink and a smile that eased the sudden tension. “Sort it out, then. No time for wastin’!”

  Khardrin and Yorik began fishing through the assorted pieces of armor and weapons in the sacks. “Got ye the foaming mug,” Khardrin said proudly, handing Bruenor a shining shield.

  “Me father’s own!” Bruenor laughed, marveling at the stealth and nerve his younger cousins had shown. He slid the heavy shield onto his arm and took up the newly crafted axe that he had brought, wondering in sudden seriousness if he was worthy to bear the shield emblazoned with the foaming mug, the standard of Clan Battlehammer. He had passed the midpoint of his third decade, nearly into his threens, yet truly he felt a child when he thought of his hairless face, not a single whisker showing. He turned away to hide his blush.

  “Four sets?” said Feldegar, looking at the piles of battle gear. “Nay! The two o’ ye are to stay. Ye’re too young for such fightin’!”

  Khardrin and Yorik looked helplessly to Bruenor.

  Feldegar’s observation made sense, Bruenor knew, but he couldn’t ignore the crestfallen looks on the faces of his younger cousins, nor the pains the two had taken to get them all this far. “Four sets’ll be needed,” he said at length. Feldegar snapped an angry glare at him.

  “Yorik’s comin’ with us,” Bruenor said to him, holding the look with his own. “But I’ve a more important job for Khardrin.” He winked at the littlest of the four. “The door’s to be closed an’ locked behind us,” he explained. “We be needin’ a guard who’s quick to open, and quicker still with his tongue. Ye’re the only one o’ us sneaky enough to dodge the askin’s o’ any who might wander down here. Think ye can do it?”

  Khardrin nodded with as much enthusiasm as he could muster, feeling important once again, though he still would have preferred to go along.

  But Feldegar wasn’t appeased. “Yorik’s too young,” he growled at Bruenor.

  “By yer measure, not mine,” Bruenor retorted.

  “I be leadin’!” said Feldegar.

  “Bruenor’s the leader,” Yorik and Khardrin said together. Feldegar’s glare turned dangerous.

  “His grandfather’s the king,” reasoned Khardrin.

  Feldegar stuck his chin out. “Ye see this?” he asked, pointing to the patches of
hair on his face. “Whiskers! I am the leader!”

  “Ah, yer no older than Bruenor,” said Yorik. “And he’s a Battlehammer, second behind the throne. And Battlehammers rule in Mithral Hall!”

  “That tunnel’s not yet claimed,” Feldegar said wryly. “Outside o’ Mithral Hall, it is, and beyond Garumn’s domain. In there, the one with the beard leads.”

  Bruenor shrugged the comment away, despite yet another reminder of his hairless face. He understood the danger and daring of their adventure and wasn’t about to see it all unravel over a title that would mean little when the fighting began. “Ye’re right, Feldegar,” he conceded, to the amazement and disappointment of Khardrin and Yorik. “In the tunnel, ye be leadin’. But by me figuring, we’re still in Mithral Hall, and me word holds. Khardrin guards the door, and Yorik goes.”

  Despite his bravado, Feldegar was smart enough to give a concession to get a concession. He could snort and holler and stick out his beard all he wanted, but if Bruenor opposed him, he knew, none of the others would follow him. “Then let’s get the business done,” he grunted, and he lifted the iron bar off the heavy stone door.

  Bruenor grasped the iron ring on the door and reconsidered (and not for the first time) the path he was about to take. Of the five adult dwarves who had recently gone down to explore this tunnel, only one had returned, and his tale had shot shivers up the spines of the hardiest of Clan Battlehammer’s warriors.

  And now Bruenor and his young friends, not one of them old enough to be counted among those warriors, had taken it upon themselves to clear the tunnel and avenge their kin.

  Bruenor grunted away a shudder and pulled the door open, its swing releasing a gush of the cramped air inside. Blackness loomed up before them. They had lived underground all their lives, tunnels had ever been their homes, but this one seemed darker still, and its stifled air pressed on them heavily.

  Feldegar grabbed a torch from a wall sconce, its light hardly denting the depth of the darkness. “Wait till we’re outta sight,” he told Khardrin, “then bar the door! Three taps, then two, means it’s us returned.” He steadied himself and led them in.

  For the first time, Khardrin was truly glad to be left behind.

  The torchlight seemed pitiful indeed when the bang of the stone door echoed behind them. Boulders and rocks sent them stumbling and scrambling, stalactites leered down from the low ceiling, and rock buttresses kept them turning one blind corner after another, each promising a monster poised to spring upon them.

  Yorik had brought a good supply of torches, but when the second had died away and the third burned low, the tension began to wear at their resolve. They found a flat stone to use as a seat and took their first break.

  “Drat and begrudges on this whole thing!” growled Feldegar, rubbing a sore foot. “Three hours it’s been, an’ not a sign o’ the filthy thing! Me mind’s wonderin’ at the truth o’ the tale.”

  “Then yer mind’s wanderin’ from its wits,” said Yorik. “ ’Twas an ettin that took the four, an’ not to doubt!”

  “Wag yer tongues in a whisper,” Bruenor scolded them. “If the torch ain’t enough a beacon, the echo o’ yer words suren are!”

  “Bah!” Feldegar snapped. “And if yer father were true to being a prince, he’d’ve come down here and finished the thing proper!”

  Bruenor’s eyes narrowed dangerously. But he shook his head and walked a few paces off, not about to get into such an argument. Not here, not now.

  “Bangor did promise to take the heads o’ the thing,” protested Yorik. “But after the merchants from Settlestone are gone, when there’s more time for plannin’.”

  “And when the ettin’s got away?”

  If they had been back in the halls, Feldegar would have paid for that insult with a few teeth, but Bruenor let it go. He knew that his father, Bangor, and King Garumn had done right in sealing off the tunnel with the heavy door until they could devote their fullest efforts to battling the ettin. Any ettin is a formidable foe, a two-headed giant more at home in the dark than even a dwarf. Careless and quick is not the way to go after an ettin.

  Yet here he was with only two companions, and not a one of them even tested in real battle.

  Again Bruenor fought through his fear, reminding himself that he was a dwarven prince. He and his friends had spent countless hours in training. Weapons sat easily in their young hands, and they knew all the tactics. “Come, let us be on our way,” Bruenor growled stubbornly, picking up the torch.

  “I say when we go,” Feldegar countered. “I am the leader.”

  Bruenor threw the torch to him. “Then lead!”

  “Is dwarvses! Is dwarvses!” Sniglet squealed in glee. “Threes of them!”

  “Shh!” Toadface slapped him down to the ground. “Fives to three. And we sees them, but they not sees usses.” An evil grin spread across the big goblin’s face. He had come down this dark tunnel from goblin town to loot the lair of the ettin, though truth be told, Toadface wasn’t thrilled about going anywhere near the thing. Of such previous expeditions, the goblins had returned less than half of the time. But maybe Toadface had found an out. Wouldn’t the goblin king be overjoyed if he delivered the heads of three hated dwarves?

  The torch was still only a speck of light far down the tunnel ahead of them, but it was moving again. Toadface motioned to the largest of the others. “The side tunnel,” he ordered. “Gets them when they crosses. Usses’ll rush them up front.”

  They started off slowly and silently on soft footpads, each of them thinking it grand that dwarves used torches.

  And goblins didn’t.

  The tunnel had widened out; ten could walk abreast, and the ceiling had moved higher as well. “High enough for a giant,” Bruenor observed grimly.

  The three moved into the classic dwarven hunting formation. Feldegar walked down the middle of the passage with the torch, while Bruenor and Yorik slipped in and out of the shadows of the walls to either side. While Feldegar controlled the pace, the two on the sides kept their backs to the walls, barely watching where they were going. In this alignment, Bruenor’s duty was to Yorik, and Yorik’s to Bruenor, each using the advantage of the angle to scout the wall ahead of his companion.

  Thus it was Bruenor, to the left of Feldegar, who first noticed a side passage breaking off of the right wall. He motioned to his wary companions, and he and Feldegar waited while Yorik moved into a ready position behind a convenient jutting stone against the corner of the side passage.

  Then Bruenor and Feldegar started out straight ahead down the main passage, seemingly taking no notice of the new tunnel.

  The expected ambush came before they were halfway across the mouth of the tunnel.

  Yorik tripped the large goblin who darted out at them, then dived into a roll behind him, taking him out with a hammer smash to the back of his head as he tried to rise.

  Up ahead in the main corridor, the other goblins hooted and charged, hurling spears as they came.

  Bruenor, too, was moving, crossing behind Feldegar. He saw the first spear break into the torchlight, aimed right for his young cousin, and dived headlong in front of Yorik, knocking the missile harmlessly aside with his crafted shield. Then he continued his roll to the safety of the jutting stone beside the side passage.

  Feldegar didn’t hesitate. Understanding the main threat to be up ahead, he flung his torch forward and brought his crossbow to bear.

  Horrified to find themselves suddenly within the revealing sphere of light, the goblins shrieked and scrambled into the shadows, diving behind boulders or stalagmites.

  Feldegar’s bolt took one in the heart.

  “Nasty dwarvses,” Sniglet whispered, crawling up to Toadface. “They knows we was here!”

  Toadface threw the little goblin down behind him and considered the dilemma.

  “We runs?” Sniglet asked.

  Toadface shook his head angrily. Normally, retreat would have been the preferred course of action, but Toadface knew that
the option wasn’t open. “The king bites our necks if we comes back empty,” he hissed at the little goblin.

  “How do we fare?” Feldegar whispered to Bruenor from a cranny in the other wall of the main tunnel.

  “Yorik got one,” Bruenor replied.

  Groaning, Yorik crawled over to join Bruenor behind the jutting stone. A second spear had found the young dwarf’s hip.

  “But he took a hit!” the dwarf added in a voice he hoped only Feldegar could hear.

  “I can fight,” Yorik insisted loudly.

  “Wonderful,” Feldegar whispered to himself, remembering that he had argued against bringing the young dwarf. His sarcasm didn’t hold, though, when he took the time to realize that Yorik had foiled the goblins’ ambush and had probably saved his life.

  “How many did ye make?” Bruenor called.

  “Four up front,” replied Feldegar. “But one’s lost his heart for the fight,” he added with a grim chuckle.

  “Threes to threes, then, wicked dwarvses!” Toadface yelled out to them.

  Feldegar launched a second quarrel in the direction of the voice, smiling as it sparked off the stone just an inch from the big goblin’s nose.

  “Wicked dwarvses!”

  Bruenor worked to dress his young cousin’s nasty wound, while Yorik, ever a brave lad, fumbled out his tinderbox and torches, lighting them and heaving them down the tunnel to take away the goblins’ advantage of darkness.

  And then they waited as the long minutes passed, each side searching for some way to break the stalemate and get in on their foes.

  “Hold on the torches,” Bruenor whispered to Yorik.

  “Mighten that we be here awhile.” Bruenor knew that time was on the goblins’ side. Dwarves could get around in the darkness, but lived most of their lives in torchlit tunnels. Goblins, though, knew only the absolute darkness of deep caverns. When the torches burned low, their enemies would strike.

  “How much nasty lights has yous got, wicked dwarvses?” taunted Toadface, apparently seeing the same advantage.