The Halfling’s Gem (48 page)

The giant eunuch planted its legs wide apart and reached down at the dwarf with a huge hand—which Bruenor promptly bit.

“They never listen,” he grumbled, He stooped low and dashed between the giant’s legs, then straightened quickly, the single horn on his helmet putting the poor eunuch up on its toes. For the second time that day, its eyes crossed and it tumbled, this time its hands low to hold its newest wound.

A killing rage evident in his gray eyes, Bruenor turned back to Pook. The guildmaster, though, seemed unconcerned, and in truth, the dwarf hardly, noticed the man. He concentrated instead on the crossbow again, which was loaded and leveled at him.

Drizzt’s single emotion as he came in was anger, anger at the pain the wretched creatures of Tarterus had caused to Catti-brie.

His goal, too, was singular: the little patch of light in the gloom, the planar gate back to his own world.

His scimitars led the way, and Drizzt grinned at the thought of tearing through the demodand flesh, but the drow slowed as he came in, his anger tempered by the sight of his goal. He could whirl in on the demodand horde in an attacking frenzy and probably manage to slip through the gate, but could Catti-brie take the punishment the mighty creatures would surely inflict before Drizzt got her through?

The drow saw another way. As he inched in on the back of the demodand line, he reached out wide to either side with his blades, tapping the back two demodands on their outside shoulders. As the creatures reflexively turned to look back over their shoulders, Drizzt darted between them.

The drow’s blades became a whirring prow, nicking away the hands of any other demodands that tried to catch him. He felt a tug on Catti-brie and whirled quickly, his rage doubled. He couldn’t see his target, but he knew that he had connected on something when he brought Twinkle down and heard a demodand shriek.

A heavy arm clubbed him on the side of the head, a blow that should have felled him, but Drizzt spun back again and saw the light of the gate only a few feet ahead—and the silhouette of a single demodand, standing to block his passage.

The dark tunnel of demodand flesh began to close about him. Another large arm wheeled in, but Drizzt was able to duck beneath its arc.

If the demodand delayed him a single second, he would be caught and slaughtered.

Again it was instinct, faster than thought, that carried Drizzt through. He slapped the demodand’s arms wide apart with his scimitars and ducked his head, slamming into the demodand’s chest, his momentum forcing the creature backward through the gate.

The dark head and shoulders came through into Wulfgar’s sights, and he hammered Aegis-fang home. The mighty blow snapped the demodand’s backbone and jolted Drizzt, who pushed from the other side.

The demodand fell dead, half in and half out of the Taros Hoop, and the stunned drow rolled limply to the side and out, tumbling into Pook’s room, beneath Catti-brie.

Wulfgar paled at the sight and hesitated, but Drizzt, realizing that more creatures would soon rush through, managed to lift his weary head from the floor. “Close the gate,” he gasped.

Wulfgar had already discerned that he could not shatter the glassy image within the hoop—striking at it only sent his warhammer’s head into Tarterus. Wulfgar started to drop Aegis-fang to his side.

Then he noticed the action across the room.

“Are you quick enough with that shield?” Pook teased, wiggling the crossbow.

Intent on the weapon, Bruenor hadn’t even noticed Drizzt and Catti-brie’s grand entrance. “So ye’ve one shot to kill me,
dog,” he spat back, unafraid of death, “and one alone.” He took a determined step forward.

Pook shrugged. He was an expert marksman, and his crossbow was as enchanted as any weapon in the Realms. One shot would be enough.

But he never got it off.

A twirling warhammer exploded into the throne, knocking the huge chair over into the guildmaster and sending him sprawling heavily into the wall.

Bruenor turned with a grim smile to thank his barbarian friend, but his smile washed away and the words died in his throat when he saw Drizzt and Catti-brie lying beside the Taros Hoop.

The dwarf stood as if turned to stone, his eyes not blinking, his lungs not drawing breath. The strength went out of his legs, and he fell to his knees. He dropped his axe and shield and scrambled, on all fours, to his daughter’s side.

Wulfgar clasped the iron edges of the Taros Hoop in his hands and tried to force them together. His entire upper body flushed red, and the veins and sinewy muscles stood out like iron cords in his huge arms. But if there was any movement in the gate, it was slight.

A demodand arm reached through the portal to prevent the closing, but the sight of it only spurred Wulfgar on. He roared to Tempus and pushed with all his strength, driving his hands together, bending the edges of hoop in to meet each other.

The glassy image bowed with the planar shift, and the demodand’s arm dropped to the, floor, cleanly severed. Likewise, the demodand that lay dead at Wulfgar’s feet, with half its body still inside the gate, twitched and turned.

Wulfgar averted his eyes at the horrid spectacle of a winged demodand caught within the warping planar tunnel, bent and bowed until its skin began to rip apart.

The magic of the Taros Hoop was strong, and Wulfgar, for all of his strength, could not hope to bend the thing far enough to complete the job. He had the gate warped and blocked, but for how long? When he tired, and the Taros Hoop returned to its normal shape, the portal would open once again. Stubbornly the barbarian roared and drove on, turning his head to the side in anticipation of the shattering of the glassy surface.

How pale she seemed, her lips almost blue and her skin dry and chill. Her wounds were vicious, Bruenor saw, but the dwarf sensed that the most telling injury was neither cut nor bruise. Rather, his precious girl seemed to have lost her spirit, as though she’d given up her desire for life when she had fallen into the darkness.

She now lay limp, cold, and pale in his arms. On the floor, Drizzt instinctively recognized the dangers. He lolled over to the side, pulling his cloak out wide, shielding Bruenor, who was quite oblivious to his surroundings, and Catti-brie with his own body.

Across the room, LaValle stirred, shaking the grogginess out of his head. He rose to his knees and surveyed the room, immediately recognizing Wulfgar’s attempt to close the gate.

“Kill them,” Pook whispered to the wizard but not daring to crawl out from under the overturned chair.

LaValle wasn’t listening; he had already begun a spell.

For the first time in his life, Wulfgar found his strength inadequate. “I cannot!” he grunted in dismay, looking to
Drizzt—as he always looked to Drizzt—for an answer.

The wounded drow was barely coherent.

Wulfgar wanted to surrender. His arm burned from the gashes of the hydra bite; his legs seemed barely able to hold him; his friends were helpless on the floor.

And his strength was not enough!

He shot his gaze to and fro, searching for some alternate method. The hoop, however powerful, had to have a weakness. Or, at least, to hold out any hope, Wulfgar had to believe that it did.

Regis had gotten through it, had found a way to circumvent its power.

Regis.

Wulfgar found his answer.

He gave a final heave on the Taros Hoop, then released it quickly, sending the portal into a momentary wobble. Wulfgar didn’t hesitate to watch the eerie spectacle. He dived down and snatched the pearl-tipped scepter from Drizzt’s belt, then leaped up straight and slammed the fragile device onto the top of the Taros Hoop, shattering the black pearl into a thousand tiny shards.

At that same moment, LaValle uttered the last syllable of his spell, releasing a mighty bolt of energy. It ripped past Wulfgar, searing the hairs on his arm, and blasted into the center of the Taros Hoop. The glassy image, cracked into the circular design of a spider’s web by Wulfgar’s cunning strike, broke apart altogether.

The ensuing explosion rocked the foundations of the guildhouse.

Thick patches of darkness swirled about the room; the onlookers perceived the whole place to be spinning, and a sudden wind whistled and howled in their ears, as though they
had all been caught in the tumult of a rift in the very planes of existence. Black smoke and fumes rushed in upon them. The darkness became total.

Then, as quickly as it had begun, it passed away and daylight returned to the battered room. Drizzt and Bruenor were the first to their feet, studying the damage and the survivors.

The Taros Hoop lay twisted and shattered, a bent frame of worthless iron with a sticky, weblike substance clinging stubbornly in torn patches. A winged demodand lay dead on the floor, the severed arm of another creature beside it, and half the body of yet another beside that, still twitching in death, with thick, dark fluids spilling onto the floor.

A dozen feet back sat Wulfgar, propped up on his elbows and looking perplexed, one arm bright red from LaValle’s energy bolt, his face blackened by the rush of smoke, and his entire frame matted in the gooey webbing. A hundred little dots of blood dotted the barbarian’s body. Apparently the glassy image of the planar portal had been more than just an image.