Starless Night

Chapter 13 HUNGRY GODDESS

 
Councilor Firble of Blingdenstone normally enjoyed his journeys out of the deep gnome city, but not this day. The little gnome stood in a small chamber, but its dimensions seemed huge to him, for he felt quite vul  nerable. He kicked his hard boots about the rocks on the otherwise smooth floor, twiddled his stubby fingers behind his back, and every so often ran a hand over his almost bald head, wiping away lines of sweat.
A dozen tunnels ran into this chamber, and Firble took some comfort in the knowledge that two score svirfnebli warriors stood ready to rush to his aid, including several shamans with enchanted stones that could summon elemental giants from the plane of earth. Firble understood the drow of Menzoberranzan, forty five miles to the east of Blingdenstone, better than any of his kin, though, and even his armed escort's presence did not allow him to relax. The gnome councilor knew well that if the dark elves had set this up as an ambush, then all the gnomes and all the magic of Blingdenstone might not be enough.
A familiar clicking sounded from the tunnel directly across the small chamber and, a moment later, in swept Jarlaxle, the extraordi  nary drow mercenary, his wide brimmed hat festooned with a giant diatryma feather, his vest cut high to reveal rolling lines of muscles across his abdomen. He strode before the gnome, glanced about a couple of times to take in the whole scene, then dipped into a low bow, brushing his hat across the floor with an outstretched hand.
"My greetings!" Jarlaxle said heartily as he came back upright,  crooking his arm above him so that the hat tucked against his elbow. A snap of the arm sent the hat into a short spin, to land perfectly atop the swaggering mercenary's shaved head.
"High soar your spirits this day, " Firble remarked.
"And why not?" the drow asked. "It's another glorious day in the Underdark! A day to be enjoyed."
Firble did not seem convinced, but he was amazed, as always,  by the conniving drow's command of the Svirfneblin language. Jar  laxle spoke the tongue as easily and fluidly as any of Blingden  stone's deep gnome inhabitants, though the mercenary used the sentence structure more common to the drow language and not the inverted form favored by many of the gnomes.
"Many svirfneblin mining parties have been assaulted, " Firble said, his tone verging on that of an accusation. "Svirfneblin parties working west of Blingdenstone."
Jarlaxle smiled coyly and held his hands out wide. "Ched Nasad?" he asked innocently, implicating the next nearest drow city.
"Menzoberranzan!" Firble asserted. Ched Nasad was many weeks away. "One dark elf wore the emblem of a Menzoberranzan house."
"Rogue parties, " Jarlaxle reasoned. "Young fighters out for plea  sure.
Firble's thin lips almost disappeared with his ensuing scowl. Both he and Jarlaxle knew better than to think that the raiding drow were simple young rowdies. The attacks had been coordinated and executed perfectly, and many svirffiebli had been slain.
"What am I to say?" Jarlaxle asked innocently. "I am but a pawn to the events about me."
Firble snorted.
"I thank you for your confidence in my position, " the merce  nary said without missing a beat. "But, really, dear Firble, we have been over this before. The events are quite out of my hands this time."
"What events?" Firble demanded. He and Jarlaxle had met twice before over the last two months, discussing this very issue, for the drow activity near the svirfneblin city had increased dramati  cally. At each meeting Jarlaxle had slyly eluded to some great events, but never had he come out and actually told Firble anything.
"Have we come to banter this same issue?" the mercenary asked wearily. "Really, dear Firble, I grow tired of your, "
"A drow we have captured, " Firble interrupted, crossing his short but burly arms over his chest, as though that news should carry some weight.
Jarlaxle's expression turned incredulous and he held his hands out wide again, as if to ask, "So?"
"We believe this drow is a native of Menzoberranzan, " Firble went on.
"A female?" Jarlaxle asked, thinking that the gnome, apparently viewing his information as vital, must be referring to a high priest  ess. The mercenary hadn't heard of any missing high priestesses (except, of course, Jerlys Horlbar, and she wasn't really missing).
"A male, " Firble replied, and again the mercenary's expression turned dubious.
"Then execute him, " the pragmatic Jarlaxle reasoned.
Firble tightened his arms across his chest and began tap tapping his foot impatiently on the stone.
"Really, Firble, do you believe that a male drow prisoner gives your city some bargaining power?" the mercenary asked. "Do you expect me to run back to Menzoberranzan, pleading for this one male? Do you expect that the ruling matron mothers will demand that all activity in this area be ceased for his sake?"
"Then you admit sanctioned activity in this area!" the svirf  neblin retorted, pointing a stubby finger Jarlaxle's way and thinking he had caught the mercenary in a lie.
"I speak merely hypothetically, " Jarlaxle corrected. "I was granting you your presumption so that I might correctly mirror your intentions."
"My intentions you do not know, Jarlaxle, " Firble assured. It was clear to Jarlaxle, though, that the gnome was growing agitated by the mercenary's cool demeanor. It was always that way with Jar  laxle. Firble met with the drow only when the situation was critical to Blingdenstone, and often his meetings cost him dearly in precious gems or other treasures.
"Name your price, then, " the gnome went on.
"My price?"
"Imperiled is my city, " Firble said sharply. "And Jarlaxle knows why!"
The mercenary did not respond. He merely smiled and leaned back from the gnome.
"Jarlaxle knows, too, the name of this drow we have taken, " Firble went on, in turn trying to be sly. For the first time, the merce  nary revealed, albeit briefly, his intrigue.
Firble really hadn't wanted to take the conversation this far. It was not his intent to reveal the "prisoner's" identity. Drizzt Do'Urden was, after all, a friend of Belwar Dissengulp, the Most Honored Bur  row Warden. Drizzt had never proven himself an enemy of Bling  denstone, had even aided the svirfnebli a score of years before,  when he first had passed through the city. And by all accounts, the rogue drow had helped svirfnebli again on his return, out in the tunnels against his drow kin.
Still, Firble's first loyalty was to his own people and his city, and if giving Drizzt's name to Jarlaxle might aid the gnomes in their cur  rent predicament, might reveal the imposing events that Jarlaxle kept hinting at, then, to Firble, it would be worth the price.
Jarlaxle paused for a long while, trying to figure out where he should take this suddenly meaningful conversation. He figured that the drow was some rogue male, perhaps a former member of Bre  gan D'aerthe presumed lost in the outer tunnels. Or maybe the gnomes had bagged a noble from one of the higher ranking houses,  a fine prize indeed. Jarlaxle's ruby eyes gleamed at the thought of the profits such a noble might bring to Bregan D'aerthe.
"Has he a name?" the mercenary asked.
"A name that is known to you, and to us, " Firble replied, feeling positively superior (a rare occurrence in his dealings with the crafty mercenary).
His cryptic answer, though, had given more information than intended to Jarlaxle. Few drow were known by name to the gnomes of Blingdenstone, and Jarlaxle could check on the whereabouts of most of those few quite easily. The mercenary's eyes widened sud  denly, but he quickly regained his composure, his mind reeling down the path of a new possibility.
"Tell me of the events, " Firble demanded. "Why are Menzober  ranzan drow near Blingdenstone? Tell me, and to you I shall give the name!"
"Give the name if you choose, " Jarlaxle scoffed. "The events? I have already told you to look to Ched Nasad, or to playful young males, students, perhaps, out of the Academy."
Firble hopped up and down, fists clenched in front of him as though he meant to jump over and punch the unpredictable merce  nary. All feelings that he had gained the upper hand washed away in the blink of a drow eye.
"Dear Firble, " Jarlaxle cooed. "Really, we should not be meeting unless we have more important matters to discuss. And, really, you and your escort should not be so far from home, not in these dark times."
The little svirfneblin let out an unintentional groan of frustra  tion at the mercenary's continued hints that something dire was going on, that the increased drow activity was linked to some greater design.
But Jarlaxle, standing with one arm across his belly, his elbow in his hand and his other hand propping his chin, remained impassive,  seeming positively amused by it all. Firble would get no pertinent information this day, he realized, so he gave a curt bow and spun about, kicking stones every step of the way out of the chamber.
The mercenary held his relaxed posture for some time after the gnome had left, then casually lifted one hand and signaled to the tunnel behind him. Out walked a human, though his eyes glowed red with the infravision common to Underdark races, a gift from a high priestess.
"Did you find that amusing?" Jarlaxle asked in the surface tongue.
"And informative, " Entreri replied. "When we get back to the city, it should be a minor thing for you to discern the identity of the captured drow."
Jarlaxle regarded the assassin curiously. "Do you not already know it?" he asked.
"I know of no missing nobles, " Entreri replied, taking time as he spoke to carefully study the mercenary. Had he missed something? "Certainly, their prisoner must be a noble, since his name was known not only to you, but to the gnomes. A noble or an adventur  ous drow merchant."
"Suppose I told you that the drow in Blingdenstone was no prisoner, " Jarlaxle hinted, a wry smile on his ebon skinned face.
Entreri stared at him blankly, apparently having no clue as to what the mercenary was talking about.
"Of cOurse, " Jarlaxle said a moment later. "You do not know of the past events, so you would have no way of putting the informa  tion together. There was once a drow who left Menzoberranzan and stopped, for a time, to live with the gnomes, though I hardly expected that he would return.~~
"You cannot be hinting that..." Entreri said, verily losing his breath.
"Precisely, " Jarlaxle replied, turning his gaze to the tunnel through which Firble had disappeared. "It seems that the fly has come to the spiders.~~
Entreri did not know what to think. Drizzt Do'Urden, back in the Underdark! What did that mean for the planned raid on Mithril Hall? Would the plans be dropped? Would Entreri's last chance to see the surface world be taken from him?
"What are we to do?" he asked the mercenary, his tone hinting at desperation.
"Do?" Jarlaxle echoed. He leaned back and gave a hearty laugh.
"Do?" the drow asked again, as though the thought was absurd. "Why, we sit back and enjoy it, of course!"
His response was not totally unexpected to Entreri, not when the assassin took a moment to consider it. Jarlaxle was a lover of ironies, that was why he thrived in the world of the chaotic drow,  and this unexpected turn certainly qualified. To Jarlaxle, life was a game, to be played and enjoyed without consideration for conse  quences or morality.
In other times, Entreri could empathize with that attitude, had even adopted it on occasion, but not now. Too much hung in the bal  ance for Artemis Entreri, for the poor, miserable assassin. Drizzt's presence so near Menzoberranzan raised important questions for the assassin's future, a future that looked bleak indeed.
Jarlaxle laughed again, long and hard. Entreri stood solemnly,  staring at the tunnel that led generally toward the gnome city, his mind staring into the face, the violet eyes, of his most hated enemy.
Drizzt took great comfort in the familiar surroundings about him. He almost felt that he must be dreaming, for the small stone dwelling was exactly as he remembered it, right down to the ham  mock in which he now found himself.
But Drizzt knew that this was no dream, knew it from the fact that he could feel nothing from his waist down, neither the ham  mock's cords nor even a tingle in his bare feet.
"Awake?" came a question from the dwelling's second, smaller,  chamber. The word struck Drizzt profoundly, for it was spoken in the Svirfneblin tongue, that curious blend of elven melodies and crackling dwarven consonants. Svirfneblin words rushed back to Drizzt's thoughts, though he had neither heard nor spoken the lan  guage in more than twenty years. It took some effort for Drizzt to turn his head and see the approaching burrow warden.
The drow's heart skipped a few beats at the sight.
Belwar had aged a bit but still seemed sturdy. He banged his "hands" together when he realized that Drizzt, his long ago friend,  was indeed awake.
Drizzt was pleased to see those hands, works of metallic art,  capping the gnome's arms. Drizzt's own brother had cut off Bel  war's hands when Drizzt and Belwar had first met. There had been a battle between the deep gnomes and a party of drow, and, at first,  Drizzt had been Belwar's prisoner. Dinin came fast to Drizzt's aid,  though, and the positions were quickly reversed.
Dinin would have killed Belwar had it not been for Drizzt. But Drizzt wasn't sure how much his attempt to save the svirfneblin's life had been worth, for Dinin had ordered Belwar crippled. In the brutal Underdark, crippled creatures usually did not survive long.
When Drizzt had met Belwar again, when he had come into Blingdenstone as a refugee from Menzoberranzan, he had found that the svirfnebli, so unlike the drow, had come to their wounded friend's aid, crafting him apropos caps for his stubby arms. On the right arm, the Most Honored Burrow Warden (as the deep gnomes called Belwar) wore a mithril hammerhead etched with marvelous runes and sketchings of powerful creatures, including an earth ele  mental. The double headed pickaxe Belwar wore on his left arm was no less spectacular. These were formidable tools for digging and fighting, and more formidable still, for the svirfneblin shamans had enchanted the "hands." Drizzt had seen Belwar burrow through solid stone as fast as a mole through soft dirt.
It was so good to see that Belwar had continued to thrive, that Drizzt's first non drow friend, Drizzt's first true friend, other than Zak'nafein, was well.
"Magga cammara, elf, " the svirfneblin remarked with a chuckle as he walked past the hammock. "I thought you would never wake up!"
Magga cammara, Drizzt's mind echoed, "by the stones." The curious phrase, one that Drizzt had not heard in twenty years, put the drow at ease, brought his thoughts cascading back to the peace  ful time he had spent as Belwar 's guest in Blingdenstone.
He came out of his personal thoughts and noticed that the svirf  neblin was at his feet, studying his posture.
"How do they feel?" Belwar asked.
"They do not, " Drizzt replied.
The gnome nodded his hairless head and brought his pickaxe up to scratch at his huge nose. "You got nookered, " he remarked.
Drizzt did not reply, obviously not understanding.
"Nookered, " Belwar said again, moving to a cabinet bolted to the wall. He hooked the door with his pickaxe and swung it open,  then used both hands to tentatively grasp some item inside and take it out for Drizzt to see. "A newly designed weapon, " Belwar explained. "Been around for only a few years.
Drizzt thought that the item resembled a beaver's tail, with a short handle for grasping on the narrow end and with the wide end curled over at a sharp angle. It was smooth all about, with the notable exception of one serrated edge.
"A nooker, " Belwar said, holding it up high. It slipped from his tentative grasp and dropped to the floor.
Belwar shrugged and clapped his mithril hands together. "A good thing it is that I have my own weapons!" Belwar banged the hammer and pickaxe together a second time.
"Lucky you are, Drizzt Do'Urden, " he went on, "that the svirf  nebli in battle recognized you for a friend."
Drizzt snorted; he didn't, at that moment, feel very lucky.
"He could have hit you with the sharp edge, " Belwar went on. "Cut your backbone in half, it would have!"
"My backbone feels as if it has been cut in half, " Drizzt remarked.
"No, no, " Belwar said, walking back to the bottom of the ham  mock, "just nookered." The gnome poked his pickaxe hard against the bottom of Drizzt's foot, and the drow winced and shifted. "See,  coming back already is the feeling, " Belwar declared, and, smiling mischievously, he prodded Drizzt again.
"I will walk again, Burrow Warden, " the relieved drow promised, his tone threatening so that he could play along with the game.
Belwar poked him again. "A while will that be!" he laughed. "And soon you will feel a tickle as well!"
It seemed like old times to Drizzt; it seemed like the very press  ing problems that had burdened his shoulders had been temporar  ily lifted. How good it was to see his old friend again, this gnome who had gone out with him, out of loyalty alone, into the wilds of the Underdark, who had been captured beside Drizzt by the dreaded mind flayers and had fought his way out beside Drizzt.
"It was a coincidence, fortunate for both me and your fellows in the tunnels, that I happened into the area when I did, " Drizzt said.
"Not so much a chance of fate, " Belwar replied, and a grim demeanor clouded his cheerful expression. "The fights have become too common. One a week, at least, and many svirfnebli have died."
Drizzt closed his lavender eyes and tried to digest the unwel  come news.
"Lloth is hungry, so it is said, " Belwar went on, "and life has not been good for the gnomes of Blingdenstone. The cause of it all we are trying to learn.
Drizzt took it all in stride, feeling then, more than ever before,  that he had done right in returning. More was happening than a simple drow attempt to recapture him. Belwar 's description, the assertion that Lloth was hungry, seemed on the mark.
Drizzt got prodded again, hard, and he popped open his eyes to see the smiling burrow warden staring down at him, the cloud of recent events apparently passed. "But enough of the darkness!" Bel  war declared. "Twenty years we have to recall, you for me and me for you!" He reached down and hooked one of Drizzt's boots, lifting it up and sniffing at the sole. "You found the surface?" he asked, sin  cerely hopeful.
The two friends spent the rest of that day trading tales, with Drizzt, who had gone into so different a world, doing most of the talking. Many times Belwar gasped and laughed; once he shared tears with his drow friend, seeming sincerely hurt by the loss of Wulfgar.
Drizzt knew at that moment that he had rediscovered another of his dearest friends. Belwar listened intently, with caring, to Drizzt's every word, let him share the most personal moments of his last twenty years with the silent support of a true friend.
After they dined that night, Drizzt took his first tentative steps,  and Belwar, who had seen the debilitating effects of a well wielded nooker before, assured the drow that he would be running along rubble filled walls again in a day or so.
That news came as a mixed blessing. Drizzt was glad that he would heal, of course, but a small part of him wished that the process would take longer, that he might extend his visit with Bel  war. For Drizzt knew that, the moment his body was able, the time would be at hand for him to finish his journey, to return to Menzo  berranzan and try to end the threat.