Charon's Claw (Neverwinter #3)(72)

I should, and yet I cannot deny the thrill of it all, of Dahlia, more wild than the road, and of Entreri, that tie to another life, it seems, in another world and time. The presence of Artemis Entreri surely complicates my life, and yet it brings me to a simpler time.

I have heard their banter and seen their glances to each other. They are more alike, Entreri and Dahlia, than either to me. They share something I do not understand.

My heart tells me that I should leave them.

But it is a distant voice, as distant, perhaps, as Guenhwyvar.

—Drizzt Do’Urden





ARTIFACTS





Drizzt winced and reflexively pulled away. He hadn’t been expecting Dahlia’s touch, particularly not on his wounded shoulder. Stripped to the waist, he sat on a stool in a room at the inn in Neverwinter. Outside Drizzt’s window, the sounds of battle could still be heard, though intermittently. The few remaining Shadovar in the city had been cornered.

“It is a salve to clean the wound,” the elf explained. Perturbed by his inattentiveness, Dahlia grabbed Drizzt’s arm none too gently and straightened him where he sat.

That had to hurt, she knew, but the drow didn’t flinch. She braced his shoulder then, keeping it still, and moved his arm out to the side and back, separating the wound, opening it wide.

Still Drizzt didn’t blink. He sat staring at the onyx figurine set on the table before him, as if it were his long-lost lover. A combination of disgust and anger filled Dahlia’s thoughts.

“It’s just an artifact,” she muttered. She wore her hair in the bob now, her braid and the warrior woad were gone. She had become softer for the wounded Drizzt, and all he did was stare at that onyx figurine.

Still, Dahlia couldn’t suppress some degree of sympathy as she examined the wound. Entreri’s sword had slipped under the short sleeve of the drow’s mithral shirt and had penetrated fairly deeply. With the blood now washed away and the arm tilted back, she could see right through the layers of flesh to the torn muscles within.

Dahlia shook her head. “That you could even lift your weapon again after this cut is remarkable,” she said.

“He betrayed us,” Drizzt said without turning to look at her.

“I told you to kill him in the forest or to send him away at least,” Dahlia snapped back, more angrily than was called for, certainly.

“And in the end, he saved us,” Drizzt said.

“I wounded Alegni,” she said. “And I took his mighty sword. Even without Artemis Entreri on that bridge, Herzgo Alegni would have died.”

Drizzt turned to look at Dahlia, and his expression, so full of sarcasm, made the elf want to thrust a finger into his open wound, just to bring him to his knees.

Instead she roughly applied the salve-covered cloth, pressing it tight. When Drizzt didn’t wince, Dahlia pressed it more tightly, and finally, one lavender eye did narrow in pain.

“The priests will be in presently,” Dahlia said, trying to cover her rough handling as a pragmatic matter.

Drizzt wore his stoic expression again. “Where is Entreri?”

“In the other room with that red-haired whore,” Dahlia said. The drow tilted his head and his expression turned sly, if somewhat annoyed.

Her animosity toward this citizen, Arunika, was uncalled for, she knew. And yet, there it was, hanging in the air between them and worn clearly on her unblemished face.

She tied off the bandage and let go of Drizzt’s arm, then reached for the onyx figurine.

He caught her by the wrist.

“Leave it.”

Dahlia pulled back, but Drizzt would not let go.

“Leave it,” he repeated, and then he released her.

“I was only trying to learn if I might sense the cat,” she said.

“I will sense the return of Guenhwyvar before any others,” Drizzt assured her, and he pulled the figurine in closer to him.

Dahlia heaved a great sigh and turned her attention to the other artifact in the room, the red-bladed sword standing against the wall.

“Is it a mighty weapon?” she asked, moving toward it.

“Don’t touch it.”

Dahlia stopped short and swung around to face the drow, cocking her head.

“So you command?” she asked.

“So I warn,” Drizzt corrected.

“I’m no novice to sentient weapons,” said the wielder of Kozah’s Needle.

“Charon’s Claw is different.”

“You carried it from the river,” said Dahlia. “Did it steal your soul in that journey, or merely your humor?”

That brought a smile to the drow’s face, albeit a small and brief one.

Dahlia walked right beside the weapon, and even dared to touch the counterweight ball at the base of the pommel with one finger.

“Do you think it still controls him? Entreri?” she asked, purposely acting quite pleased by that possibility.

“I think that anyone who lifts that blade will be consumed by it.”

“Unless they are strong enough, like Drizzt Do’Urden,” Dahlia added.

The drow half-nodded and half-shrugged. “And even one strong enough not to be so consumed would invoke the wrath of Entreri.”

“The sword controls him.”

“Only if the wielder of the sword knows how to make the sword control him,” Drizzt warned. “If not, one who tries would likely be dead long before she learned how to make Entreri her puppet.”