The Crystal Shard(The Icewind Dale Trilogy 1)(103)

"You intrigue and surprise me," Cassius said. "Attend the council, then, with my personal welcome, and let us put in motion a plan that will benefit all who have survived the struggle against Akar Kessell!"

As Cassius turned, Wulfgar grabbed Kemp's shirt with one of his huge hands and easily hoisted the spokesman from Targos off the ground. Kemp swatted at the muscled forearm, but realized that he had no chance of breaking the barbarian's iron grip. Wulfgar glared at him dangerously. "For now," he said, "I am responsible for all of my people. Thus have I disregarded your insults. But when the day comes that I am no longer king, you would do well to cross my path no more!" With a flick of his wrist, he tossed the spokesman to the ground.

Kemp, too intimidated for the present to be angry or embarrassed, sat where he landed and did not respond. Cassius and Brent nudged each other and shared a low chuckle.

It only lasted until they saw the girl approaching, her arm in a bloody sling and her face and auburn hair caked with layers of dust. Wulfgar saw her, too, and the sight of her wounds pained him more than his own ever could.

"Catti-brie!" he cried, rushing to her. She calmed him with an outstretched palm.

"I am not badly injured," she assured Wulfgar stoically, though it was obvious to the barbarian that she had been sorely injured. "Though I dare not think of what would have befallen me if Bruenor had not arrived!"

"You have seen Bruenor?"

"In the tunnels," Catti-brie explained. "Some orcs found their way in - perhaps I should have collapsed the tunnel. Yet there weren't many, and I could hear that the dwarves were doing well on the field above.

"Bruenor came down then, but there were more orcs at his back. A support beam collapsed; I think Bruenor cut it out, and there was too much dust and confusion."

"And Bruenor?" Wulfgar asked anxiously.

Catti-brie looked back across the field. "Out there. He has asked for you."

* * *

By the time Drizzt reached the rubble that had been Cryshal-Tirith, the battle was over. The sights and sounds of the horrible aftermath pressed in all about him, but his goal remained unchanged. He started up the side of the broken stones.

In truth, the drow thought himself a fool for following such a hopeless cause. Even if Regis and Guenhwyvar hadn't gotten out of the tower, how could he possibly hope to find them?

He pressed on stubbornly, refusing to give in to the inescapable logic that scolded him. This was where he differed from his people, this was what had driven him, finally, from the unbroken darkness of their vast cities. Drizzt Do'Urden allowed himself to feel compassion.

He moved up the side of the rubble and began digging around the debris with his bare hands. Larger blocks prevented him from going very deep into the pile, yet he did not yield, even squeezing into precariously tight and unstable crevices. He used his burned left hand little, and soon his right was bleeding from scraping. But he continued on, moving first around the pile, then scaling higher.

He was rewarded for his persistence, for his emotions. When he reached the top of the ruins, he felt a familiar aura of magical power. It guided him to a small crevice between two stones. He reached in tentatively, hoping to find the object intact, and pulled out the small feline figurine. His fingers trembled as he examined it for damage. But he found none - the magic within the object had resisted the weight of the stones.

The drow's feelings at the find were mixed, however. Though he was relieved that Guenhwyvar had apparently survived, the presence of the figurine told him that Regis had probably not escaped to the field. His heart sank. And sank even farther when a sparkle within the same crevice caught his eye. He reached in and pulled out the golden chain with the ruby pendent, and his fears were confirmed.

"A fitting tomb for you, brave little friend," he said somberly, and he decided at that moment to name the pile Regis's Cairn. He could not understand, though, what had happened to separate the halfling from his necklace, for there was no blood or anything else on the chain to indicate that Regis had been wearing it when he died.

"Guenhwyvar," he called. "Come to me, my shadow." He felt the familiar sensations in the figurine as he placed it on the ground before him. Then the black mist appeared and formed into the great cat, unharmed and somewhat restored by the few hours it had spent back on its own plane.

Drizzt moved quickly toward his feline companion, but then he stopped as a second mist appeared a short distance away and began to solidify.

Regis.

The halfling sat with his eyes closed and his mouth opened wide, as though he was about to take an enjoyable and enormous bite out of some unseen delicacy. One of his hands was clenched to the side of his eager jowls, and the other open before him.

As his mouth snapped shut on empty air, his eyes snapped open in surprise. "Drizzt!" he groaned. "Really, you should ask before you steal me away! This perfectly marvelous cat had caught me the juiciest meal!"

Drizzt shook his head and smiled with a mixture of relief and disbelief.

"Oh, splendid," Regis cried. "You have found my gemstone. I thought that I had lost it; for some reason it didn't make the journey with the cat and me."

Drizzt handed the ruby back to him. The cat could take someone along on its travels through the planes? Drizzt resolved to explore this facet of Guenhwyvar's power later.

He stroked the cat's neck, then released it back to its own world where it could further recuperate. "Come, Regis," he said grimly. "Let us see where we might be of assistance."