Homeland (The Legend of Drizzt #1)(44)

“What are the rules?” Drizzt asked Kelnozz, in line at his side.

“If a master calls you out, then you are out,” Kelnozz replied.

“The rules of engagement?” asked Drizzt.

Kelnozz cast him an incredulous glance. “Win,” he said simply, as though there could be no other answer.

A short time later they came into a fairly large cavern, the arena for the grand melee. Pointed stalactites leered down at them from the ceiling and stalagmite mounds broke the floor into a twisting maze filled with ambush holes and blind corners.

“Choose your strategies and find your starting point,” Master Hatch’net said to them. “The grand melee begins in a count of one hundred!”

The twenty-five students set off into action, some pausing to consider the landscape laid out before them, others sprinting off into the gloom of the maze.

Drizzt decided to find a narrow corridor, to ensure that he would fight off one-against-one, and he just started off in his search when he was grabbed from behind.

“A team?” Kelnozz offered. Drizzt did not respond, unsure of the other’s fighting worth and the accepted practices of this traditional encounter.

“Others are forming into teams,” Kelnozz pressed. “Some in threes. Together we might have a chance.”

“The master said there could be only one victor,” Drizzt reasoned. “Who better than you, if not me,” Kelnozz replied with a sly wink. “Let us defeat the others, then we can decide the issue between ourselves.”

The reasoning seemed prudent, and with Hatch’net’s count already approaching seventy-five, Drizzt had little time to ponder the possibilities. He clapped Kelnozz on the shoulder and led his new ally into the maze.

Catwalks had been constructed all around the room’s perimeter, even crossing through the center of the chamber, to give the judging masters a good view of all the action below. A dozen of them were up there now, all eagerly awaiting the first battles so that they might measure the talent of this young class.

“One hundred!” cried Hatch’net from his high perch. Kelnozz began to move, but Drizzt stopped him, keeping him back in the narrow corridor between two long stalagmite mounds.

“Let them come to us,” Drizzt signaled in the silent hand and facial expression code. He crouched in battle readiness.

“Let them fight each other to weariness. Patience is our ally!” Kelnozz relaxed, thinking he had made a good choice in Drizzt.

Their patience was not tested severely, though, for a moment later, a tall and aggressive student burst into their defensive position, wielding a long spear-shaped pole. He came right in on Drizzt, slapping with the butt of his weapon, then spinning it over full in a brutal thrust designed for a quick kill, a strong move perfectly executed.

Drizzt, though, it seemed the most basic of attack routines-too basic, almost, for Drizzt hardly believed that a trained student would attack another skilled fighter in such a straightforward manner. Drizzt convinced himself in time that this was indeed the chosen method of attack, and no feint, and he launched the proper parry.

His scimitar poles spun counterclockwise in front of him, striking he thrusting spear in succession and driving the weapon’s tip harmlessly above the striking line of its wielder’s shoulder.

The aggressive attacker, stunned by the advanced parry, found himself open and off balance. Barely a split second later, before the attacker could even begin to recover, Drizzt’s counter poked one, then the other scimitar pole into his chest.

A soft blue light appeared on the stunned student’s face, and he and Drizzt followed its line up to see a wand-wielding master looking down at them from the catwalk.

“You are defeated,” the master said to the tall student. “Fall where you stand!”

The student shot an angry glare at Drizzt and obediently dropped to the stone.

“Come,” Drizzt said to Kelnozz, casting a glance up at the master’s revealing light. “Any others in the area will know of our position now. We must seek a new defensible area.”

Kelnozz paused a moment to watch the graceful hunting strides of his comrade. He had indeed made a good choice in selecting Drizzt, but he knew already, after only a single quick encounter, that if he and this skilled swordsman were the last two standing-a distinct possibility-he would have no chance at all of claiming victory.

Together they rushed around a blind corner, right into two opponents.

Kelnozz chased after one, who fled in fright, and Drizzt faced off against the other, who wielded sword and dirk poles.

A wide smile of growing confidence crossed Drizzt’s face as his opponent took the offensive, launching routines similarly basic to those of the spear wielder that Drizzt had easily dispatched.

A few deft twists and turns of his scimitars, a few slaps on the inside edges of his opponent’s weapons, had the sword and dirk flying wide. Drizzt’s attack came right up the middle, where he executed another double-poke into his opponent’s chest.

The expected blue light appeared. “You are defeated,” came the master’s call. “Fall where you stand.”

Outraged, the stubborn student chopped viciously at Drizzt. Drizzt blocked with one weapon and snapped the other against his attacker’s wrist, sending the sword pole flying to the floor.

The attacker clenched his bruised wrist, but that was the least of his troubles. A blinding flash of lightning exploded from the observing master’s wand, catching him full in the chest and hurtling him ten feet backward to crash into a stalagmite mound. He crumpled to the floor, groaning in agony, and a line of glowing heat rose from his scorched body, which lay against the cool gray stone.