Charon's Claw (Neverwinter #3)(147)

Tiago shrugged as if it did not really matter. Berellip’s main concern and motivation in talking to the dead Xorlarrin mage would be to learn if Ravel or his agents had killed Brack’thal, which wasn’t likely the case.

“And the Shadovar?” Gol’fanin asked.

“We have found signs of their march to this place, but none of their retreat. Yet they are not to be found.”

“Back to the Shadowfell, then.”

“And so Gauntlgrym is ours.”

“Counsel Ravel to proceed cautiously,” the blacksmith advised.

“But you will continue your work?”

“Of course.”

“Then I hold no sense of urgency.”

The five companions rested in Gauntlgrym’s great entry hall, far to the side of the great throne and the graves.





“Touched it,” Ambergris said to Drizzt when he walked up beside her, to find her staring across at the throne.

“Come,” Drizzt bade her, and he started that way. He led her right past the throne, though, to the small group of graves.

“King Bruenor,” he explained, pointing to the largest. “Here in Gauntlgrym, he fell.”

“Word was that he died in Mithral Hall,” Ambergris replied. “We held a great drunk in his honor.” She paused and laughed. “But we knowed, elf, we knowed,” she said.

The way she addressed him, “elf,” had Drizzt back on his heels, for it was a nickname he had heard before, and spoken with similar inflection and affection.

“Glad that he found his road,” Ambergris said solemnly. “His reputation always called him as one for the road and not the throne.”

“His shield dwarf,” Drizzt explained as they paced to the other larger cairn.

“The Pwent,” Ambergris mumbled, and that came as a bit of confirmation to Drizzt that this one could indeed be trusted.

“And the others who fell in the fight for this place,” Drizzt explained of the other graves. “Battlehammer dwarves from Icewind Dale.”

Ambergris nodded and quietly whispered a prayer for them all.

Drizzt patted her on the shoulder and led her back to the others. He paused before he got there, though, and looked the dwarf straight in the eye. “Geas?” he asked, his voice full of suspicion.

Ambergris looked at him stupidly.

“Your shade friend,” Drizzt clarified, and the dwarf snickered.

“Chalk,” she explained. “Blue chalk and nothing more . . . well, a bit o’ magic suggestion to convince the dolt.”

“So if this Afafa . . . Afrenfafa . . .”

“Afafrenfere,” Ambergris explained.

“So if this Afafrenfere tries to kill me, I’ll not find Dumathoin coming to my rescue?”

The dwarf showed a gap-toothed smile. “He won’t try,” she assured Drizzt. “That one’s a flower, but he ain’t hopin’ to be a daisy. Not the smartest, not the bravest, but a gooder heart than them Netherese butchers e’er deserved. Ye got me personal guarantee on that.”

For some inexplicable reason, that seemed more than good enough to Drizzt.





In the dark of Gauntlgrym’s throne room, a shifting stone stole the quiet.

Then came a grunt, and more sounds of rocks sliding against each other. A black-bearded dwarf crawled from under the pile, then reached back and grabbed at something he had left behind, grunting with exertion as he tried to extricate it. “Durned thing’s stuck,” he muttered, and with a great tug, he pulled free a most curious helmet, one set with a long and oft-bloodied spike. His effort sent him flying over backward to crash against the stones of the nearest cairn, where he lay on his back as the dust settled.

“Durn it,” he cursed, seeing the trouble he had caused, and he rolled to his feet and began replacing the dislodged stones. “Don’t mean to be desecratin’ yer tomb . . .”

The words caught in his throat, and the rocks fell from his hands. There in the disturbed tomb before him was a curious helm, with a single curving horn, the other having long before been broken away.

The dwarf fell to his knees and dug the helm free, and saw too the face of the dead dwarf interred within.

“Me king,” Thibbledorf Pwent breathed.

Nay, not breathed, for creatures in the state of Thibbledorf Pwent did not draw breath.

He fell back to his bum, staring in shock, his mouth wide in a silent scream. If he’d had a mirror, or a reflection that would actually show up in a mirror,

Thibbledorf Pwent might have noticed his newest weapon: canine fangs.





Arunika’s imp, released from its duties by the succubus, loped around the swirling mists of the lower planes, seeking its true master.



It found the hulking balor seated atop a mushroom throne, clearly expecting the visitor.

“The devil is done with you?” the great demon asked.

“The threat to her domain is ended,” the imp replied. “The enemies have moved along.”

“The enemies?” came the leading question.

“The Shadovar.”

“Only the Shadovar? I grow weary—”

“Drizzt Do’Urden!” the imp spat, a name it, Druzil, hated as much as anything in all the world. “He has left Neverwinter.”