Two thousand mugs raised in toast, the dwarven holy water foaming over the sides. Two thousand Battlehammer dwarves, every dwarf that could be spared from the work out in the east or from the tunnels, cheered, "To the Mirabarran Battlehammers!" Then as one, they drained their mugs, and invariably splashed foam on beards yellow and red and white and orange and black and brown and silver and even green.
"Oo oi!" came the shout from Pikel Bouldershoulder as soon as the toast was finished.
That a non-Battlehammer and non-Mirabarran like Pikel had so perfectly accentuated the celebration of Bruenor's clan for the immigrants from Mirabar was a point not lost on Catti-brie. Sitting beside her father's dais, propped with fluffy pillows - of which there were very few in all the halls - the woman considered the unlikely collection represented in the gathering before her.
Most of the group were Bruenor's kinfolk, of course, some dwarves who had lived in Mithral Hall before the coming of Shimmergloom the shadow dragon, and others who had been raised as Battlehammers under the shadow of Kelvin's Cairn in Icewind Dale. Others were Felbarran, coming in from the east and seeming as much at home as the Battlehammers themselves. Torgar and his boys were all there, even the many who had been wounded in the fighting on the ridge north of Keeper's Dale or more recently in the fighting in the south. Ivan and Pikel Bouldershoulder were there, and though they weren't Battlehammers, every dwarf in the complex wanted them to become of the clan. Nanfoodle the gnome was there, along with Regis, Wulfgar, and Catti-brie.
So they were not all joined by blood, Catti-brie understood, but they were certainly all joined by cause and by common resolve. She glanced over at her father, sitting on his throne and draining another mug of mead, blessed as holy water by the priests. His toasts and his appreciation were genuine, she knew. He couldn't be happier or more full of gratitude concerning the arrival of Torgar, Shingles, and the boys from Mirabar. They had saved the day over and over again, from the northern stretches of the mountainous terrain to, apparently, the work in the south. They had fought brilliantly with Banak Brawnanvil north of Keeper's Dale, had pushed the entrenched orcs from the tunnels so that Nanfoodle could work his magic on the ridge. They had suffered terrible losses, but had done so with typical dwarven stoicism. The losses would be worth the victory, and nothing short of victory was acceptable.
It was all a reflection of her father, Catti-brie realized. Everything from Torgar's decision to leave Mirabar to Citadel Felbarr's bold, if ill-advised, attempt to cross the river was due in part to the character of Bruenor Battlehammer.
Catti-brie could only smile as she looked upon her dear father.
Eventually, her gaze went across the dais to Banak, lying more than sitting, propped in a carriage the woman feared would soon become his prison. He had given his body for the cause - even the optimistic Cordio doubted that the dwarf would ever walk again - and yet there he was, cheering and drinking and with a bright smile gleaming out from between the whiskers of his hairy old face.
It was a good day to be a Battlehammer, Catti-brie decided. Despite the tragedy in the eastern breakout and their precarious position between Mithral Hall and the Surbrin, despite the horde of orcs pressing in on them from every side and the terrible losses they all had suffered, friends and kin forever lost, it was a good day to be a Battlehammer.
She believed that with all her heart, and yet was not surprised at the feel of a teardrop running down her soft cheek.
For Catti-brie had come to doubt.
She had lost Drizzt, she believed, and only in that realization did the woman finally admit it all to herself. That she had loved him above all others. That he alone had made her whole and made her happy. So many problems had come between them, issues of longevity and children, and of the perceptions of others - there it was, all before her and hopelessly lost. All those imagined ills seemed so foolish, seemed the petty workings of confusion and self-destruction. When Catti-brie had been down on the ground and surrounded by goblins, when she had thought her life at its end, she had found an emptiness beyond anything she had ever imagined possible. The realization of her mortality had sent her thoughts careening along the notions of things that should have been. Lost in that jumble, she had pushed Drizzt away. Lost in that jumble, Catti-brie had forgotten that the future isn't a straight road purposely designed by the traveler. The future is made of the actions of the present, each and every one, the choices of the moment inadvertently strung together to produce the desired trail. To live each and every day in the best possible manner would afford her a life without regret, and a life without regret was the key to an acceptance of inevitable death.
And now Drizzt was lost to her.
In all her life, would Catti-brie ever heal that wound?
"Are you all right?"
Wulfgar's voice was soft and full of concern, and she looked up to see his blue eyes staring back at her.
"It's been a difficult time," she admitted.
"So many dead."
"Or missing."
The look on Wulfgar's face told her that he understood the reference. "We are able to go out again," he said, "and so we must hope that Drizzt will be able to come in."
She didn't blink.
"And if not, then we will go find him. You and I, Bruenor and Regis," the big man declared. "Perhaps we will even convince Ivan and Pikel to join in the hunt - the strange one talks to birds, you know. And birds can see all the land."
She still didn't blink.
"We will find him," Wulfgar promised.
Another cheer rose up in the hall, and Bruenor called upon Torgar to come forth and give a proper speech about it all. "Tell us what bringed ye here," the dwarf king prompted. "Tell us all yer journeys."
Wulfgar's grin disappeared as soon as he looked back at Catti-brie, for her expression was no less distant and detached, and no less full of pain.
"Do you need to leave?" he asked.
"I'm weary to the bone," she answered.
With great effort, the woman pulled herself out of her chair and leaned heavily on the crutch Cordio had made for her. She began to take a shuffling step forward, but Wulfgar caught hold of her. With a simple and effortless movement, the large man swept her into his arms.
"Where're ye going, then?" Bruenor asked from the dais. Before him, Torgar was giving his account to a thoroughly engaged audience.
"I'm needing a bit of rest, is all," said Catti-brie.
Bruenor held a concerned look for a few moments, then nodded and turned back to Torgar.
Catti-brie rested her crutch across her body and put her head on Wulfgar's strong shoulder. She closed her eyes and let him carry her from the celebration.
Delly Curtie approached the audience chamber with good intent, determined to try to fit in, in the place that Wulfgar would always call home. She told herself with every step that she had followed Wulfgar out of Luskan of her own accord, with her eyes wide open. She reminded herself that her responsibilities went far beyond the issues surrounding her relationship with a man who seemed more at home beside the dwarves than with his own race. She reminded herself of Colson, and the girl's well-being.
She would have to strike a middle ground, she decided. She would take Wulfgar out of Mithral Hall as often as possible, and would stay with the folk of the neighboring and predominantly human communities for extended periods.
She caught a quick glimpse of someone coming the other way through the maze of anterooms, and from the size alone, she knew it had to be Wulfgar. Her step lightened. She would make the seemingly untenable situation work.
As she came through a half-door and moved around one of the huge vats the clerics used for their brewing, Delly caught sight of him again, more clearly.
He didn't see her, she knew, because he was looking at the woman he was carrying.
Delly's eyes widened and she threw herself behind the brew barrel, putting her back to it and closing her eyes tightly against the sudden sting. She heard Wulfgar and Catti-brie pass by on the other side, and watched them exit the small room and continue on their way.
The woman exhaled and felt as if she was simply melting into the floor.
Lady Alustriel did not need to wait for the ferries to be running in order to cross the Surbrin. The tall and beautiful woman, as accomplished in the magic arts and in the arena of politics as anyone in all the world, brought her fiery conjured chariot down on a flat stretch of ground just outside the opened eastern door of Mithral Hall, sending dwarves scrambling for cover and bringing a chorus of cheers and salutes from the Moonwood elves who held firm in their position on the mountain spur.
Alustriel stepped from the chariot and dismissed it into a puff of smoke with a wave of her hand. She straightened her dark robe and brushed her long silver hair into place, at the same time fixing a properly somber expression onto her delicate but determined features. It would be no easy visit, she knew, but it was one she owed to her friend Bruenor.
With purpose in every stride, Alustriel moved to the door. The dwarf guards fell aside, gladly admitting her, while one ran ahead to announce her to Bruenor.
She found the dwarf king with two other dwarves and an elf, drawing up plans for King Emerus Warcrown's arrival. The four stood up at her entrance, even Bruenor dipping into a low and polite bow.
"Good King Bruenor," Alustriel greeted. "It is uplifting to see you well. We had heard rumors of your demise, and truly a pall had befallen the lands of goodly folk."
"Bah, got to tease 'em a bit, ye know," Bruenor replied with a wink. "Makes my arrival all the more stunning and inspiring."
"I doubt that Bruenor Battlehammer needs aid in that manner."
"Always the kind one, ain't ye?"
Alustriel offered a quiet nod.
"I give ye Jackonray and Tred of Felbarr," Bruenor explained, pointing out the dwarves, who both nearly fell over themselves trying to bow before the great Lady of Silverymoon. "And this one's Hralien of the Moonwood. Never thought me and me boys'd be so grateful to see a bunch o' elves!"
"We stand together," Hralien answered. "Or surely we shall all of us fall before the darkness that is Obould."
"Aye, and glad I am that ye decided to come, good lady," Bruenor told Alustriel. "Torgar o' Mirabar just returned from yer victory over them stinking trolls, and he's telling a tale that yerself and Sundabar've decided to stay back."
"His words are true, I fear," Alustriel admitted.
"Aye, ye're thinking to wait out the winter, and I'm not for arguing that," Bruenor said. "But we'd be smart to set our plans for the spring soon as we can. We'll have a gnome's puzzling of it to get five armies working right." He paused when he noticed that Alustriel was shaking her head with his every word.
"What're ye thinking?" Bruenor asked her.
"I have come to confirm what Torgar has already told to you, my friend," said Alustriel. "We will hold Obould where he is, but it is not the decision of Silverymoon, Everlund, and Sundabar to wage war against him at this time."
Bruenor was certain that his chin had hit the floor, so wide did his mouth fall open.
"I have over flown the region you intend as a battlefield, and I tell you that this orc king is a wise one. He is fortifying even now, digging in his warriors on every mountaintop and preparing every inch of ground for a stubborn defense."
"All the more reason we got to get rid of him here and now," Bruenor argued, but again Alustriel shook her head.
"The cost will be too great, I fear," she said.
"But ye ran to Nesme's aid, didn't ye?" Bruenor couldn't completely eliminate the sarcastic tone from his voice.
"We put the trolls back in the moor, yes. But they were not nearly as formidable as the force that has arrayed against Mithral Hall from the north. Tens of thousands of orcs have flocked to Obould's call."
"Tens of thousands who'll turn their weapons against yerself and yer precious Silverymoon!"
"Perhaps," said Alustriel. "And in that event, they will face a stubborn and determined defense. Should Obould press on, he will fight in ground of our choosing and not his own. We will fight him from behind our walls, not assail him behind his."
"And ye're to leave me and me kin out here alone?"
"Not so," Alustriel insisted. "You have opened the way to the river - I wish that Silverymoon could have arrived in force to aid in that."
"A few hunnerd less Felbarrans'd be lying at the bottom of the river if ye had," Tred dared to say, and his tone made it clear to all that he was no more happy with Alustriel's surprising stance than was Bruenor.
"These are trying times," Alustriel offered. "I do not pretend to make them seem better than they are. I come to you now to deliver a suggestion and a promise from Silverymoon and from Sundabar. We will help you build the bridge across the Surbrin, and we will help you to defend it and to hold open the eastern door of Mithral Hall. I see that you are constructing fortifications on the mountain spur north of the door - I will send batteries of archers and catapults to aid in that defense. I will rotate wizards up there to stand shoulder to shoulder with your warriors, offering fireballs against any who dare come against you."
Bruenor's scowl did diminish a bit at that, but just a bit.
"You know me well, Bruenor Battlehammer," the Lady of Silverymoon said. "When the drow marched upon Mithral Hall, my city came to your side. How many of the Silver Guard fell in Keeper's Dale in that battle?"
Bruenor twitched, his expression softening.
"I wish as you wish, that Obould and his scourge of orcs could be wiped from the lands for all time. But I have seen them. You cannot imagine the enemy allied against you. If all the dwarves of Felbarr and Adbar, and all the warriors of Silverymoon, Everlund, and Sundabar were to come to your side, we would still have to kill our enemies five for every one of our own to begin to claim a victory. And even then Obould's forces swell daily, with more orcs pouring out of every hole in the Spine of the World."
"And even with that, ye're not thinking that he's meaning to stop where he is?" Bruenor asked. "If his forces are swellin', the longer we... the longer you wait, the bigger they swell."
"We have not abandoned you, my friend, nor would we ever," Alustriel said, and she took a step toward Bruenor and gently reached up to place her hand on his shoulder. "Every wound to Mithral Hall cuts deeply into the hearts of the goodly folk of all the region. You will be the spur, the one shining light in a region fallen to darkness. We will not let that light dim. On our lives, King Bruenor, my friend, we will fight beside you."
It was not what he wanted to hear from Lady Alustriel, but it seemed as if it was all he was going to get - and truly, it was a lot more than he had expected, given Torgar's sour account of Alustriel's intentions.
"Let us weather the winter," Alustriel finished. "And let us see what promise the spring brings."