Entreri chuckled evilly and slid the dagger away. "We will yet discuss
this," he promised Jierdan with a snarl. "Do not touch the girl again."
Perfect, Catti-brie thought. From Jierdan's perspective, the assassin
might as well have said outright that he meant to kill him.
More fuel for the flames.
When she retrieved the golem from Mizzen the next morning, Sydney's
suspicions that Bok had seen the drow's party were confirmed. They set out
from Silverymoon at once, Bok leading them down the same trail Bruenor and
his friends had taken the morning before.
Like the previous party, they, too, were watched.
Alustriel, brushed her flowing hair from her fair face, catching the
morning sun in her green eyes as she looked down upon the band with growing
curiosity. The lady had learned from the gatekeepers that someone had been
inquiring about the dark elf.
She couldn't yet figure out what part this new group leaving
Silverymoon played in the quest, but she suspected that they were up to no
good. Alustriel had sated her own thirst for adventure many years before,
but she wished now that she could somehow aid the drow and his friends on
their noble mission. Affairs of state pressed in on her, though, and she
had no time for such diversions. She considered for a moment dispatching a
patrol to capture this second party, so that she could learn its
intentions. Then she turned back to her city, reminding herself that she
was just a minor player in the search for Mithril Hall. She could only
trust in the abilities of Drizzt Do'Urden and his friends.
Book 3:
Trails Anew
16
Days of Old
A squat stone tower stood in a small dell against the facing of a steep
hill. Because it was ivy covered and overgrown, a casual passer-by would
not even have noticed the structure.
But the Companions of the Hall were not casual in their search. This
was the Herald's Holdfast, possibly the solution to their entire search.
"Are you certain that this is the place?" Regis asked Drizzt as they
peered over a small bluff. Truly the ancient tower appeared more a ruin.
Not a thing stirred anywhere nearby, not even animals, as though an eerie,
reverent hush surrounded the place.
"I am sure," Drizzt replied. "Feel the age of the tower. It has stood
for many centuries. Many centuries."
"And how long has it been empty?" Bruenor asked, thus far disappointed
in the place that had been described to him as the brightest promise to his
goal.
"It is not empty," Drizzt replied. "Unless the information I received
was in err."
Bruenor jumped to his feet and stormed over the bluff. "Probably
right," he grumbled. "Some troll or scab yeti's inside the door watching us
right now, I'll wager, drooling for us to come in! Let's be on with it,
then! Sundabar's a day more away than when we left!"
The dwarf's three friends joined him on the remnants of the overgrown
path that had once been a walkway to the tower's door. They approached the
ancient stone door cautiously, with weapons drawn.
Moss-covered and worn to a smooth finish by the toll of time,
apparently it hadn't been opened in many, many years.
"Use yer arms, boy," Bruenor told Wulfgar. "If any man can get this
thing opened, it's yerself!"
Wulfgar leaned Aegis-fang against the wall and moved before the huge
door. He set his feet as best he could and ran his hands across the stone
in search of a good niche to push against.
But as soon as he applied the slightest pressure to the stone portal,
it swung inward, silently and without effort.
A cool breeze wafted out of the still darkness within, carrying a blend
of unfamiliar scents and an aura of great age. The friends sensed the place
as otherworldly, belonging to a different time, perhaps, and it was not
without a degree of trepidation that Drizzt led them in.
They stepped lightly, though their footfalls echoed in the quiet
darkness. The daylight beyond the door offered little relief, as though
some barrier remained between the inside of the tower and the world beyond.
"We should light a torch -" Regis began, but he stopped abruptly,
frightened by the unintentional volume of his whisper.
"The door!" Wulfgar cried suddenly, noticing that the silent portal had
begun to close behind them. He leaped to grab it before it shut completely,
sinking them into absolute darkness, but even his great strength could not
deny the magical force that moved it. It shut without a bang, just a hushed
rush of air that resounded like a giant's sigh.
The lightless tomb they all envisioned as the huge door blocked out the
final slit of sunlight did not come to pass, for as soon as the door
closed, a blue glow lit up the room, the entrance hall to the Herald's
Holdfast.
No words could they speak above the profound awe that enveloped them.
They stood in view of the history of the race of Man within a bubble of
timelessness that denied their own perspectives of age and belonging. In
the blink of an eye they had been propelled into the position of removed
observers, their own existence suspended in a different time and place,
looking in on the passing of the human race as might a god. Intricate
tapestries, their once-vivid colors faded and their distinct lines now
blurred, swept the friends into a fantastic collage of images that
displayed the tales of the race, each one retelling a story again and
again; the same tale, it seemed, but subtly altered each time, to present
different principles and varied outcomes.
Weapons and armor from every age lined the walls, beneath the standards
and crests of a thousand longforgotten kingdoms. Bas-relief images of
heroes and sages, some familiar but most unknown to any but the most
studious of scholars, stared down at them from the rafters, their captured
visages precise enough to emote the very character of the men they
portrayed.
A second door, this one of wood, hung directly across the cylindrical
chamber from the first, apparently leading into the hill behind the tower.
Only when it began to swing open did the companions manage to break free of
the spell of the place.
None went for their weapons, though, understanding that whoever, or
whatever, inhabited this tower would be beyond such earthly strength.
An ancient man stepped into the room, older than anyone they had ever
seen before. His face had retained its fullness, not hollowed with age, but
his skin appeared almost wooden in texture, with lines that seemed more
like cracks and a rough edge that defied time as stubbornly as an ancient
tree. His walk was more a flow of quiet movement, a floating passing that
transcended the definition of steps. He came in close to the friends and
waited, his arms, obviously thin even under the folds of his long, satiny
robe, peacefully dropped to his sides.
"Are you the herald of the tower?" Drizzt asked.
"Old Night, I am," the man replied in a voice singing with serenity.
"Welcome, Companions of the Hall. The Lady Alustriel informed me of your
coming, and of your quest."
Even consumed in the solemn respect of his surroundings, Wulfgar did
not miss the reference to Alustriel. He glanced over at Drizzt, meeting the
drow's eyes with a knowing smile.
Drizzt turned away and smiled, too.
"This is the Chamber of Man," Old Night proclaimed. "The largest in the
Holdfast, except for the library, of course."
He noticed Bruenor's disgruntled scowl. "The tradition of your race
runs deep, good dwarf, and deeper yet does the elves'," he explained. "But
crises in history are more often measured in generations than in centuries.
The short-lived humans might have toppled a thousand kingdoms and built a
thousand more in the few centuries that a single dwarven king would rule
his people in peace."
"No patience!" Bruenor huffed, apparently appeased.
"Agreed," laughed Old Night. "But come now, let us dine. We have much
to do this night."
He led them through the doorway and down a similarly lit hallway. Doors
on either side of them identified the various chambers as they passed - one
for each of the goodly races, and even a few for the history of orcs and
goblins and the giantkind. .
The friends and Old Night supped at a huge, round table, its ancient
wood as hard as mountain stone. Runes were inscribed all around its edge,
many in tongues long lost to the world, that even Old Night could not
remember. The food, like everything else, gave the impression of a distant
past. Far from stale, though, it was delicious, with a flavor somewhat
different from anything the friends had ever eaten before. The drink, a
crystalline wine, possessed a rich bouquet surpassing even the legendary
elixirs of the elves.
Old Night entertained them as they ate, retelling grand tales of
ancient heroes, and of events that had shaped the Realms into their present
state. The companions were an attentive audience, though in all probability
substantial clues about Mithril Hall loomed only a door or two away.
When the meal was finished, Old Night rose from his chair and looked
around at them with a weird, curious intensity. "The day will come, a
millennium from now, perhaps, when I shall entertain again. On that day, I
am sure, one of the tales I tell will concern the Companions of the Hall
and their glorious quest."
The friends could not reply to the honor that the ancient man had paid
them. Even Drizzt, even-keeled and unshakable, sat unblinking for a long,
long moment.
"Come," Old Night instructed, "let your road begin anew." He led them
through another door, the door to the greatest library in all the North.
Volumes thick and thin covered the walls and lay about in high piles on
the many tables positioned throughout the large room. Old Night indicated
one particular table, a smaller one off to the side, with a solitary book
opened upon it.
"I have done much of your research for you," Old Night explained. "And
in all the volumes concerning dwarves, this was the only one I could find
that held any reference to Mithril Hall."
Bruenor moved to the book, grasping its edges with trembling hands. It
was written in High Dwarven, the language of Dumathoin, Keeper of Secrets
Under the Mountain, a script nearly lost in the Realms. But Bruenor could
read it. He surveyed the page quickly, then read aloud the passages of
concern.
"King Elmor and his people profited mightily from the labors of Garumn
and the kin of Clan Battlehammer, but the dwarves of the secret mines did
not refute Elmor's gains. Settlestone proved a valuable and trustworthy
ally whence Garumn could begin the secret trail to market of the mithril
works." Bruenor looked up at his friends, a gleam of revelation in his eye.
"Settlestone," he whispered. "I know that name." He dove back into the
book.
"You shall find little else," Old Night said. "For the words of Mithril
Hall are lost to the ages. The book merely states that the flow of mithril
soon ceased, to the ultimate demise of Settlestone!"
Bruenor wasn't listening. He had to read it for himself, to devour
every word penned about his lost heritage, no matter the significance.
"What of this Settlestone?" Wulfgar asked Old Night. "A clue?"
"Perhaps," the old herald replied. "Thus far I have found no reference
to the place other than this book, but I am inclined to believe from the
work that Settlestone was rather unusual for a dwarven town."
"Above the ground!" Bruenor suddenly cut in.
"Yes," agreed Old Night. "A dwarven community housed in structures
above the ground. Rare these days and unheard of back in the time of
Mithril Hall. Only two possibilities, to my knowledge."
Regis let out a cry of victory.
"Your enthusiasm may be premature," remarked Old Night. "Even if we
discern where Settlestone once lay, the trail to Mithril Hall merely begins
there."
Bruenor flipped through a few pages of the book, then replaced it on
the table. "So close!" he growled, slamming his fist down on the petrified
wood. "And I should know!"
Drizzt moved over to him and pulled a vial out from under his cloak. "A
potion," he explained to Bruenor's puzzled look, "that will make you walk
again in the days of Mithril Hall."
"A mighty spell," warned Old Night. "And not to be controlled. Consider
its use carefully, good dwarf."
Bruenor was already moving, teetering on the verge of a discovery he
had to find. He quaffed the liquid in one gulp, then steadied himself on
the edge of the table against its potent kick. Sweat beaded on his wrinkled
brow and he twitched involuntarily as the potion sent his mind drifting
back across the centuries.
Regis and Wulfgar moved over to him, the big man clasping his shoulders
and easing him into a seat.
Bruenor's eyes were wide open, but he saw nothing in the room before
him. Sweat lathered him now, and the twitch had become a tremble.
"Bruenor," Drizzt called softly, wondering if he had done right in
presenting the dwarf with such a tempting opportunity.
"No, me father!" Bruenor screamed. "Not here in the darkness! Come with
me, then. What might I do without ye?"
"Bruenor," Drizzt called more emphatically.
"He is not here," Old Night explained, familiar with the potion, for it
