The Two Swords Read online

9. DISPUTING DIVINE INTERVENTION

 

  Wulfgar flailed his arms and tried to twist as he fell from above, hoping to get away from the area of confusion, where orcs screamed in agony and ran all around, where molten metal glowed angrily, and where the vat bounced down hard. He couldn't change his angle of descent, but was fortunate to have instinctively pushed out when first he fell. He came down hard atop a group of unsuspecting orcs, burying them beneath his bulk.

  They only partially broke the fall of nearly two dozen feet, though, and Wulfgar hit hard, twisting and slamming painfully as he and the orcs below him went down to the floor. Burning pain assailed him from many places - he figured that more than one bone had cracked in that fall - but he knew he had no time to even wince. Screaming indecipherably, the barbarian put his feet under him and forced himself up, flailing wildly with fist and hammer, trying to keep the closest orcs at bay.

  He stumbled for the exit corridor where he knew Bruenor and the others were making their last stand in the great hall, but many orcs stood between him and that door. Any hopes he had that the confusion caused by the molten metal and the heavy vat would allow him to break free dissipated quickly as the orcs reacted to him, prodding at him from every direction. He felt a stab in his shoulder and twisted fast, snapping a flimsy spear's head right off. Aegis-fang swung around hard, cracking an orc in the side with a blow heavy enough to send it flying into a second, and to send both of them tumbling over a third.

  A spear hit Wulfgar in the buttocks, and one of the orcs lying on the floor near to him bit him hard on the ankle. He kicked and thrashed, he swung his hammer and shouldered his way forward, but against increasing resistance.

  He couldn't make it, nor could the dwarves hope to get to him.

  * * * * *

  To the side of Wulfgar's position, a group of orcs moved cautiously toward a single door, not knowing whether it blocked yet another corridor or a second room. Fearing that enemies were waiting just beyond the closed portal, the orcs called to one of the frost giants, inviting it to crash through.

  The giant wore a frown at first, lamenting that it could not get to the fallen human - the one, it knew, who had killed its friend with that terrible warhammer - in time to claim the kill. But when it noted the orcs pointing excitedly at the door, the behemoth curled up its lips and launched into a short run, bending low. The giant slammed into the door that was not a door, shouldering it, thinking to smash it into the room.

  Except that there was no room, and it was no door.

  It was wax, mostly, formed into the shape of a door and set not against a corridor or room opening, but against solid stone - a section of wall that had been thoroughly soaked with explosive oil of impact.

  The fake door crashed in hard and the wax disintegrated under the force of the sudden and devastating explosion. The many pieces of sharpened metal concealed within the wax blew free, blasting outward in a line across the room.

  The giant bounced back, what was left of its face wearing an expression of absolute incredulity. The behemoth held its arms wide and looked down at its shredded body, at the heavy clothing and flaps of skin wagging freely from head to toe, at the lines of blood dripping everywhere.

  The giant looked back helplessly, and fell dead.

  And all around it in that line of devastating shrapnel, orcs tumbled, shrieked, and died.

  * * * * *

  Across the eastern end of the great hall, the fighting stopped, dwarves and orcs alike turning back to gawk at the swath of death the exploding door cut through the line of orcs and another pair of unfortunate giants. Alone in the crowd, one warrior kept on fighting, though. Too blinded by pain and anger to even hear the blast and the screams, Wulfgar gained momentum, swatting with abandon, growling like an animal because he had not the sensibility remaining to even form the name of his god.

  He stumbled as much as he intentionally moved forward, crashing through the lines of distracted orcs. He hardly heard the next loud report, though the sudden vibration nearly knocked him from his feet as a large rock crashed down behind him, clipping one orc and smashing a second. Had he turned back, had his sensibilities not been shattered by the pain, emotional and physical, Wulfgar would have recognized that particular boulder.

  But he didn't look back, just drove forward. With the help of the distraction from the door blast, he managed to plow through to Bruenor's ranks. Dwarves surged out all around him, swarming behind him like a mother's loving arms and gathering him into the tunnel before them.

  "Aw, get him to the priests," Bruenor Battlehammer said when he finally got the chance to take a good look at his adopted son.

  Spear tips and orc arrows protruded from the barbarian in several places, and those represented only a fraction of the battered man's visible wounds. Bruenor knew well that Wulfgar likely had many more injuries he could not see.

  The dwarf king had to move past his fear for his boy, and quickly, for the organized retreat reached a critical juncture that required absolute coordination. Bruenor and his warriors kept up the stubborn fight, but at the same time began to flow backward from the wider chamber, tightening the line appropriately as they melted into the single escape corridor.

  Those in the first few ranks held tight their formations, but those farther back from the fighting broke and ran, clearing the way for the flight that would soon follow.

  Farther back, in hidden side rooms, engineers held their positions at peg-and-crank mechanisms.

  Bruenor stayed in the center of the trailing line of flight, face to face with the pursuing orcs. His axe added more than a few notches that day, creasing orc skulls. With every step he took backward, the dwarf king had to battle against his outrage that the filthy beasts had come into his sacred halls, and had to remind himself that he would fall back on them before the turn of day.

  When his line passed the assigned point, Bruenor called out and his voice was joined by the shouts of all those around him.

  The engineers pulled their pegs, literally dropping the ceiling of the corridor back toward the great entry hall. Two huge blocks of stone slid down, filling the corridor, crushing flat the unfortunate orcs beneath them and sealing off a score of their comrades, those closest to Bruenor's boys, from their swarming kin in the foyer.

  The outraged dwarves made fast work of the trapped orcs.

  Any joy that Bruenor had at the successful evacuation and upon learning that Wulfgar's injuries were not too serious, was short-lived, though. A few moments later, Bruenor's retreat route intersected with that of the dwarves fleeing the ledge, dwarves who carried Catti-brie tenderly in their arms.

  * * * * *

  Tucked into the secret cubby, Regis rubbed his chubby hands over his face, as if trying to brush away his mounting fear. He glanced up often to the light streaming in through a neatly-blown hole in the solid stone wall of his hiding place. Regis had heard the blast, and knew it to be the trapped wax door. Apparently, one of the projectiles had been deflected - off an orc skull, he hoped - and had rocketed up high, cracking through the outer stone wall of the cubby and splitting the air barely an inch in front of the poor halfling's face. Every so often, Regis glanced across at the other, far more substantial stone wall, where the projectile, a metal sling bullet, could be seen embedded in the rock.

  The halfling fought hard to keep his breathing steady, realizing that the last thing he could afford was for orcs to discover him. And they had come up to the ledge, he knew, for he could hear their grunting and their large feet slapping on the stone behind him.

  "Five hours," he silently mouthed, for that was the planned pause before the counterattack. He knew that he should try to get some sleep, then, but he could smell the orcs nearby and simply couldn't relax enough to keep his eyes closed for any length of time.

  * * * * *

  The dwarves gathered around Bruenor could hear the tentativeness in his every word.

  "But will it keep on rolling?" the dwarf
king asked the engineers standing beside a modified version of a "juicer," a heavy rolling ram designed to squish the blood out of orcs and the like by pressing them against a wall. Unlike the typical Battlehammer juicers, which were really no more than a cylinder of stone on a thick axle with poles behind so the dwarves could rush it along, the new contraption had been given a distinct personality. Carved wooden likeness of dwarves upon battle boars, the handiwork of Pikel Bouldershoulder, stood out in front of the main body of the one-ton battering ram, and below them was a skirt of metal, fanning out like a ship's prow. An "orc-catcher," Nanfoodle had named it, designed to wedge through the throng of enemies like a spear tip, throwing them aside.

  The whole of the thing was set upon well-greased metal wheels, lined in a thin, sharpened ridge that would simply cut through any bodies the catcher missed. Handles had been set for twenty dwarves to push, and as an added bonus, Nanfoodle had geared the boar-riding statues to an offset on the axle, so that the six wooden dwarf "riders" would seem to be charging, leaping over each other in a rolling motion.

  "They'll stop it eventually," Nanfoodle reasoned. "More by the pile of their dead, I would guess, than by any concerted effort to halt the thing. Once the dwarves get this contraption rolling, it would take a team of giants to slow it!"

  Bruenor nodded and kept moving, studying the device from every conceivable angle.

  He had to keep moving, he knew. He had to keep studying and thinking of the present crisis.

  His two children had been hurt.

  * * * * *

  Wincing with every movement, Wulfgar swung his wolf-hide cloak across his shoulders and managed to bring his right arm back far enough to get behind the mantle and wrap it around him, covering his strong chain shirt of interlocking mithral links.

  "What're ye doing?" Delly Curtie asked him, coming back into the room after settling Colson in her bed.

  Wulfgar looked back at her as if the answer should be obvious.

  "Cordio said ye wasn't to be going back today," Delly reminded him. "He said ye're too hurt. "

  Wulfgar shook his head and clasped the wolf-hide surcoat closed. Before he finished, Delly was at his side, tugging at one arm.

  "Don't go," she pleaded.

  Wulfgar stared down at her incredulously. "Orcs are in Mithral Hall. That cannot hold. "

  "Let Bruenor drive them out. Or better, let us thicken the walls before them, and leave them in empty chambers. "

  Wulfgar's expression did not straighten.

  "We can go out the tunnels to Felbarr," Delly went on. "All of the clan. They'll be welcomed there. I heard Jackonray Broadbelt say as much when he was talking to the folk chased down from the northland. "

  "Perhaps many of those folk would be wise to go," Wulfgar admitted.

  "Not one's intending to make Felbarr a home. They're all for Silverymoon and Everlund and Sundabar. Ye've been to Silverymoon?"

  "Once. "

  "Is it as beautiful as they say?" Delly asked, and the sparkle in her eyes betrayed her innermost desire, showing it clearly to Wulfgar, whose own blue eyes widened at the recognition.

  "We will visit it," he promised, and he knew, somehow, that "visiting" wasn't what Delly had in mind, and wouldn't be nearly enough to assuage her.

  "What are you saying?" he demanded suddenly.

  Delly fell back from the blunt statement. "Just want to see it, is all," she said, lowering her gaze to the floor.

  "Is something wrong?"

  "Orcs're in the hall. Ye said so yerself. "

  "But if no orcs were in the hall, you would still wish to go to Silverymoon, or Sundabar?"

  Delly kicked at the stone, her hesitance seeming so completely out of character that the hair on the back of Wulfgar's strong neck began to bristle.

  "What kind of life is a child to get if all she's seeing are her parents and dwarves?" Delly dared to ask.

  Wulfgar's eyes flared. "Catti-brie had such an upbringing. "

  Delly looked up, her expression hardly complimentary.

  "I have no time to argue about this," Wulfgar said. "They are bringing the juicer into position, and I will hold my place behind it. "

  "Cordio said ye shouldn't go. "

  "Cordio is a priest, and always erring on the side of caution regarding those he tends. "

  "Cordio is a dwarf, and wanting all who're able up there killing orcs," Delly countered, and Wulfgar managed a smile. He figured that if it were not for Colson, Delly would be marching out beside him to battle.

  Or maybe not, he realized as he looked at her more closely, at the profound frown that was hidden just below the surface of her almost-impassive expression. He had hardly seen her since the conflict had begun, since they had separated on the road from Icewind Dale back to Mithral Hall. Only then did he realize how lonely she likely was, down there with dwarves too distracted by pressing issues to hold her and comfort her.

  "We will go see Silverymoon when this is over. And Sundabar," he offered.

  Delly looked back down, but gave a slight nod.

  Wulfgar winced again, and it was from more than physical pain. He believed his own words and had no time for petty arguments. He walked over and bent low, stiffly, from the pain, to give Delly a kiss. She offered only her cheek for the peck.

  By the time he had crossed out of the room, though, Wulfgar the warrior, son of Beornegar, son of Bruenor, a champion of Mithral Hall, had put Delly and her concerns out of his mind.

  * * * * *

  "We have breached the hall!" Tsinka shrieked.

  Obould smirked at her, thinking that the shaman had forgotten how to speak without raising her voice several octaves. All around them, orcs cheered and hopped about, punching their fists in defiance. The grand entry hall was theirs, as well as a complex of rooms both north and south of that huge foyer. The eastern corridor had been sealed by heavy blocks, but if they had been able to breach the magnificent western doors of Mithral Hall, could any of them believe the impromptu barriers would pose any substantial obstacle?

  Lines of orcs marched past, dragging dead companions out into Keeper's Dale where they were tossing them onto a gigantic pyre for burning. The line seemed endless! In the few minutes of battle in the hall, the rain of death from above and the stubborn defensive stance of the dwarves, more than three hundred orcs had died. Traps, including that devastating explosion, the source of which Obould was still to discern, had taken more than a score. What other tricks might Bruenor Battlehammer have in store, the orc king wondered. Was this entire section of Mithral Hall rigged to explode, like the mountain ridge up the northern cliff beyond Keeper's Dale?

  Had they even killed any dwarves in the fight? Obould was certain they had taken down a few, at least, but so coordinated was the dwarves' retreat that not a body had been left behind.

  Beside him, Tsinka rambled on in her shrill tone, replaying the events with a heroic spin. She spoke of the glory of Gruumsh and the coming sweep of Clan Battlehammer from their ancient homeland, and all the orcs near to her screamed with equal glee and enthusiasm.

  Obould wanted to throttle the shaman.

  The voice of Gerti Orelsdottr, obviously not happy with events, distracted him from the maniacal cheering. Four giants had died in the fight, with two others seriously wounded and scarred, and Gerti never took well to losing one of her precious kin. While he was growing tired of Gerti's continual whining, Obould knew that he would need the giantess and her forces if they were to prod farther into the hall, and even if they were to continue to hold their position along the River Surbrin. As much as he hated to admit it, Obould's current vision of his kingdom included Gerti Orelsdottr.

  The orc king looked back to Tsinka. Could she even grasp the trials ahead of them? Did she even understand that they could not lose orcs by the hundreds for every room's gain into Mithral Hall? Or that even if they managed to chase the Battlehammers out at such a horrendous cost, Citadels Felbarr and Adbar and the cities of Silverymoon
and Everlund would certainly come back at them?

  "Gruumsh! Gruumsh! Gruumsh!" Tsinka began to chant, and the orcs near to her took it up at the top of their lungs.

  "Gruumsh! Gruumsh! Gruumsh!"

  * * * * *

  The sound poured in through the hole in the cubby and reverberated off the stones, filling the space and flooding poor Regis's ears. The whole orc nation seemed to be sitting on the halfling's shoulders, screaming in victory, and Regis reflexively curled and brought his hands up to cover his ears. The volume only seemed to increase despite his cover, though, as the orcs began to stamp their feet, the whole of the great hall shaking under their collective exultation.

  Regis curled tighter to try to block it out. He almost expected Gruumsh to walk into the hall and reach through the small hole to pull him out. His jaw chattered so badly that his teeth hurt and his ears throbbed under the assault.

  "Gruumsh! Gruumsh! Gruumsh!"

  To his horror, Regis found himself yelling to counter the awful sound. His frightened reaction proved most fortunate for the defenders of Mithral Hall, for the halfling snapped his hands from his ears to his mouth just in time to hear a different sound behind the chanting.

  Dwarven horns, low and throaty, winded from somewhere deeper in the complex.

  It took Regis a long moment to even register them, and another moment to recognize the signal.

  He grabbed the peg lever with both hands and yanked it back, releasing the crank. He held it back for a count of two, then shoved it forward.

  The wheel spun for those two seconds, the rope winding out, through the top of the cubby and the metal piping set along the ceiling. Outside in the great entry hall, the umbrellalike contraption dropped, then stopped suddenly with an abrupt jerk as the halfling's movement re-pegged the crank. The jolt cracked the hinges holding the various layers of the bowl-shaped hopper, inverting them one after another even as the whole of the contraption, reacting to the untwisting of the heavy rope, began to turn.

  Ceramic balls rolled out from the center, down prescribed tracks of metal that ended in upward curls of varying elevations. With the turning movement and the differing angles of release, the rolling balls leaped from the contraption in a manner well-calculated to spread the "bombing" out across the maximum area.

  Each of the ceramic balls was filled with one of two potions. Some were filled with bits of sharpened metal and the same oil of impact that had blown apart the wax door, while others held a more straightforward concoction of volatile liquid that exploded upon contact with air.

  Bursts of shrapnel and mini-fireballs erupted all across the orc throng.

  Chants of "Gruumsh!" became muffled grunts as bits of metal tore through porcine lungs, and were surpassed by shrieks of agony as flames bit at other orcs.

  * * * * *

  "A thousand wounds and a few deaths. " That was how Ivan Bouldershoulder and Nanfoodle the gnome had aptly explained the effects of the umbrella contraption to Bruenor and the others.

  And that was exactly what Bruenor wanted. The dwarves of Clan Battlehammer knew orcs well enough to understand the level of confusion and terror they'd created. Farther back in the complex, great levers, larger versions of the one Regis had used, were yanked back, releasing massive counterweights chained to the blocks that had been dropped to seal the tunnels into the entry hall.

  The first movement came far to the back of the dwarven line. Lowering their shoulders, the dwarves grunted and shoved, starting the massive juicer on its roll. How greatly their efforts increased when Wulfgar appeared among their ranks, taking his place on the higher handles that had been put in just to accommodate him.

  "Go! Go! Go!" the warcommanders yelled to the leading line of dwarves as the rolling juicer came into view, rumbling down the hall. The lead unit, cavalry on fierce war pigs, swept out in front of the juicer and charged down the hall even as the blocks began to rise. Beside them, Pikel Bouldershoulder waggled the fingers of his one hand and waved dramatically, conjuring a mist that seemed to rise from the very stones, obscuring the air at the end of the corridor and in the closest areas of the great foyer.

  Beyond the block, confusion dominated the hall, with dozens of small fires keeping the orcs rushing every which way. Others thrashed wildly in fear and pain. Some saw the coming charge, though, and shouted for a defensive stand.

  The dwarves on the war pigs howled to Moradin and kicked their mounts into a swifter run, but then, as they neared the opening, they slowed suddenly, tugging back their reins. They turned aside as one, skidding into the many alcoves that lined the hall.

  The orcs closest the corridor still saw cavalry charging, though, or thought they did, for in the mist they couldn't really discern the difference between real pigs and the carved figures on the front of the juicer. So they set their spears and grouped in tight formation against the charge . . .

  . . . and were swept aside by the rolling tonnage of the dwarven war engine.

  Into the hall went Wulfgar and the dwarves, plowing ahead and tossing orcs aside with abandon. Behind them came the war pig cavalry, fanning out with precision and to great effect against the supporting orcs, those that did not have the long spears to counter such a charge.

  Up above, as similar blocking stones were lifted by counterweights, Bruenor and other dwarves roared out onto the ledges, finding, as they had anticipated, more orcs staring back dumbfounded into the chaos of the foyer than orcs ready to defend. Bruenor, and Pwent and his Gutbusters, gained a foothold on the main ledge. With sheer ferocity they dislodged the orcs one after another. Within moments, the balcony was clear, but Pwent and his boys had prepared for that foregone conclusion well. Some of the Gutbusters had come out onto the ledge already in harnesses, roped back to weighted cranks.

  As soon as the ledge began to clear, the lead-liners, as Pwent had called them, simply leaped off, the counterbalanced cranks slowing their descent.

  But not slowing them too much. They wanted to make an impression, after all.

  The rest of the Gutbusters sprang upon the ropes to get down to the real action, and Bruenor did as well, turning the captured balconies over to lines of crossbow-armed dwarves pouring out through the small tunnels.

  Confusion won those early moments, and it was something that Bruenor and his boys were determined to push through to the very end. More and more dwarves rolled in or came down from above, thickening and widening the line of slaughter.

  Crossbowdwarves picked their targets carefully back by the entryway from Keeper's Dale, looking for any orcs barking orders.

  "Leader!" one dwarf cried, pointing out to one orc who seemed to be standing taller than his fellows, perhaps up on a stone block so that he could better direct the fighting.

  Twenty dwarves turned their crossbows upon the target, and on the order of "Fire!" let fly.

  The unfortunate orc commander, shouting for a turn for defense, was suddenly silenced - silenced and shattered as a barrage of bolts, many of them packed with oil of impact, shredded his body.

  The orcs around him howled and fled.

  As Bruenor, Wulfgar, and all the floor fighters made their way across the foyer, out of the corridor came the most important dwarves of all. Engineers rambled out, bearing heavy metal sheets that could be quickly assembled into a killing pocket, a funnel-shaped pair of walls to be constructed inside the foyer near the broken doors. Lined on top with spear tips and cut with dozens of murder holes, the killing pocket would cost their enemies dearly if the orcs launched a counter charge.

  But the work had to be done fast and it had to be done with perfect timing. The first pieces, those farthest back from Keeper's Dale, were set in place behind the leading edge of the dwarves' charge. If the orcs had countered quickly enough, perhaps with giant support, the dwarves caught in front of those huge metal wall sections would have been in a sorry position indeed.

  It didn't happen, though. The orc retreat was a flight of sheer terror, taking all the
surviving orcs right out of Mithral Hall, surrendering ground readily.

  In the span of just a few minutes, scores of orcs lay dead and the foyer was back in Bruenor's hands.

  * * * * *

  "Turn them back! Lead them back!" Tsinka Shinriil pleaded with Obould. "Quickly! Charge! Before the dwarves fortify!"

  "Your orcs must lead the way," Gerti Orelsdottr added, for she wasn't about to send her giants charging in to set off the no-doubt cunning traps the dwarves still had in place.

  Obould stood outside of Mithral Hall's broken doors and watched his greatest fears come to fruition.

  "Dwarves in their tunnels," he whispered under his breath, shaking his head with every word.

  Tsinka kept shouting at him to attack, and he almost did it.

  The visions of his kingdom seemed to wash away under rivers of orc blood. The orc king understood that he could counter the attack, that the sheer weight of his numbers would likely reclaim the entry hall. He even suspected that the dwarves were ready for such an eventuality, and would retreat again in a well-coordinated, pre-determined fashion.

  Twenty orcs would die for every dwarf that fell, much like the first assault.

  A glance to the side showed Obould the massive, still-smoldering mound of dead from the initial break-in.

  Tsinka yelled at him some more.

  The orc king shook his head. "Form defensive lines out here!" he shouted to his commanders and gang leaders. "Build walls of stone and hide behind them. If the dwarves try to come forth from their halls, slaughter them!"

  Many of the commanders seemed surprised by the orders, but not a one had the courage to even begin to question King Obould Many-Arrows, and few of them wanted to charge back into the dwarven tunnels anyway.

  "What are you doing?" Tsinka shrieked at him. "Kill them all! Charge into Mithral Hall and kill them all! Gruumsh demands - "

  Her voice cut off suddenly as Obould's hand clamped hard around her throat. With just that one arm, the orc king lifted the shaman from the ground and brought her up very close to his scowling face.

  "I grow weary of Tsinka telling me the will of Gruumsh. I am Gruumsh, so you say. We do not go back into Mithral Hall!"

  He looked around at Gerti and the others, who were staring at him skeptically.

  "Seal the doors!" Obould ordered. "Put the smelly dwarves in their smelly hole, and let us keep them there!" He turned back to Tsinka. "I will not throw orcs onto dwarven spears for the sake of your orgy. Mithral Hall is an inconvenience and nothing more - if we choose to make it that way. King Bruenor is soon to be insignificant, a dwarf in a covered hole who cannot strike out at me. "

  Tsinka's mouth moved as she tried to argue, but Obould clamped just a bit tighter, turning her whispers into a gasp.

  "There are better ways," Obould assured her.

  He tossed her down and she stumbled back a few steps and fell onto her behind.

  "If you wish to live to see those ways, then choose your words and your tone more wisely," Obould warned.

  He turned on his heel and moved away.

  PART TWO

  DWARF AMBITIONS

  From a high ridge east of Keeper's Dale, I watched the giants construct their massive battering ram. I watched the orcs practice their tactics-tight lines and sudden charges. I heard the awful cheering, the bloodthirsty calls for dwarf blood and dwarf heads, the feral screams of battle lust.

  From that same ridge, I watched the huge ram pulled back by a line of giants, then let loose to swing hard and fast at the base of the mountain on which I stood, at the metal doorway shell of Mithral Hall. The ground beneath my feet shuddered. The booming sound vibrated in the air.

  They pulled it back and let fly again and again.

  Then the shouts filled the air, and the wild charge was on.

  I stood there on that ridge, Innovindil beside me, and I knew that my friends, Bruenor's kin, were battling for their homeland and for their very lives right below me. And I could do nothing.

  I realized then, in that awful moment, that I should be in there with the dwarves, killing orcs until at last I, too, was cut down. I realized then, in that awful moment, that my decisions of the last few tendays, formed in anger and even more in fear, betrayed the trust of the friendship that Bruenor and I had always held.

  Soon after - too soon! - the mountainside quieted. The battle ended.

  To my horror, I came to see that the orcs had won the day, that they had gained a foothold inside Mithral Hall. They had driven the dwarves from the entry hall at least. I took some comfort in the fact that the bulk of the orc force remained outside the broken door, continuing their work in Keeper's Dale. Nor had many giants gone in.

  Bruenor's kin were not being swept away; likely, they had surrendered the wider entry halls for the more defensible areas in the tighter tunnels.

  That sense of hope did not wash away my guilt, however. In my heart I understood that I should have gone back to Mithral Hall, to stand with the dwarves who for so long had treated me as one of their own.

  Innovindil would hear nothing of it, though. She reminded me that I had not, had never, fled the battle for Mithral Hall. Obould's son was dead because of my decision, and many orcs had been turned back to their holes in the Spine of the World because of my - of our, Innovindil, Tarathiel and myself - work in the north.

  It is difficult to realize that you cannot win every battle for every friend. It is difficult to understand and accept your own limitations, and with them, the recognition that while you try to do the best you can, it will often prove inadequate.

  And so it was then and there, on that mountainside watching the battle, in that moment when all seemed darkest, that I began to accept the loss of Bruenor and the others. Oh, the hole in my heart did not close. It never will. I know and accept that. But what I let go then was my own guilt at witnessing the fall of a friend, my own guilt at not having been there to help him, or there to hold his hand in the end.

  Most of us will know loss in our lives. For an elf, drow or moon, wild or avariel, who will see centuries of life, this is unavoidable - a parent, a friend, a brother, a lover, a child even. Profound pain is often the unavoidable reality of conscious existence. How less tolerable that loss will be if we compound it internally with a sense of guilt.

  Guilt.

  It is the easiest of feelings to conjure, and the most insidious. It is rooted in the selfishness of individuality, though for goodly folks, it usually finds its source in the suffering of others.

  What I understand now, as never before, is that guilt is not the driving force behind responsibility. If we act in a goodly way because we are afraid of how we will feel if we do not, then we have not truly come to separate the concept of right and wrong. For there is a level above that, an understanding of community, friendship, and loyalty. I do not choose to stand beside Bruenor or any other friend to alleviate guilt. I do so because in that, and in their reciprocal friendship, we are both the stronger and the better. Our lives become worth so much more.

  I learned that one awful day, standing on a cold mountain stone watching monsters crash through the door of a place that had long been my home.

  I miss Bruenor and Wulfgar and Regis and Catti-brie. My heart bleeds for them and yearns for them every minute of every day. But I accept the loss and bear no personal burden for it beyond my own emptiness. I did not turn from my friends in their hour of need, though I could not be as close to them as I would desire. From across that ravine when Withegroo's tower fell, when Bruenor Battlehammer tumbled from on high, I offered to him all that I could: my love and my heart.

  And now I will go on, Innovindil at my side, and continue our battle against our common enemy. We fight for Mithral Hall, for Bruenor, for Wulfgar, for Regis, for Catti-brie, for Tarathiel, and for all the goodly folk. We fight the monstrous scourge of Obould and his evil minions.

  At the end, I offered to my falling friends my love and my heart. Now I p
ledge to them my enduring friendship and my determination to live on in a manner that would make the dwarf king stare at me, his head tilted, his expression typically skeptical about some action or another of mine.

  Durned elf, he will say often, as he looks down on me from Moradin's halls.

  And I will hear him, and all the others, for they are with me always, no small part of Drizzt Do'Urden.

  For as I begin to let go, I find that I hold them all the tighter, but in a way that will make me look up to the imagined halls of Moradin, to the whispered grumbling of a lost friend, and smile.