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Out shot Errtu’s ar He lifted it high and uttered a coth of a thunderstroke

The succubus waited and leaped away, running for the ledge and then flying off of it, shrieking all the while Errtu’s lightning hit her in the back and sent her spinning, and she was far below the edge of the ridge before she regained control

Back on the ledge, Errtu gave her not another thought The balor was thinking of his prisoner, always of his prisoner He enjoyed tor the wretch, but had to continually sublies He could not destroy this one, could not break him too far, else the victi, and ain on the Prime Material Plane, that did not seeade dark elf, the one who had banished Errtu to a hundred years in the Abyss, could grant that freedoe for the wretch

Errtu turned his horned, apelike head to look over one massive shoulder The fires that surrounded the balor burned lo, sie Patience, the balor reminded himself The wretch was valuable and had to be preserved

The ti, Errtu knew He would speak with Drizzt Do’Urden before another year had passed on the Material Plane Errtu had e

Then the balor, one of the true tanar’ri, areatest denizens of the lower planes, would be free Then Errtu could destroy the wretch, could destroy Drizzt Do’Urden, and could destroy every being that loved the renegade drow

Patience

Part 1

WIND AND SPRAY

Six years Not so long in the life span of a drow, and yet, in counting the months, the weeks, the days, the hours, it seemed to me as if I had been away from Mithril Hall a hundred times that number The place was re stone to

To what? To where?

Myaway fro back over the plu from Settlestone to the mountain called Fourthpeak Mithril Hall was Bruenor’s kingdo the most dear of friends to me But it was not my home, had never been so

I couldn’t explain it then, and still cannot All should have been well there after the defeat of the invading drow army Mithril Hall shared prosperity and friendship with all of the neighboring codoms with the power to protect their borders and feed their poor

All, of that, but still Mithril Hall was not home Not for me, and not for Catti-brie Thus had we taken to the road, riding west to the coast, to Waterdeep

I never argued with Catti-brie-though she had certainly expectedher decision to leave Mithril Hall We were of like minds We had never really set down our hearts in the place; we had been too busy, in defeating the ene the dwarventhe dark elves who had come to Mithril Hall All that completed, it seethen tales of our adventures If Mithril Hall had been our home before the battles, ould have remained After the battles, after the lossesfor both Catti-brie and Drizzt Do’Urden, it was too late Mithril Hall was Bruenor’s place, not ours It was the war-scarred place where I had to again face the legacy ofof the road that had led ar had died

Catti-brie and I vowed that ould return there one day, and so ould, for Bruenor was there, and Regis But Catti-brie had seen the truth You can never get the smell of blood out of the stones If you were there when that blood was spilled, the continuing aroes too painful to live beside

Six years, and I have ar the Bold, who rules Settlestone I havethe dawn from one of Fourthpeak’sthe Sword Coast now, the wind and spray inis the rush of clouds and the canopy of stars;boards of a swift, eathered ship, and beyond that, the azure blanket, flat and still, heaving and rolling, hissing in the rain and exploding under the fall of a breaching whale

Is this uess, but whether there really is a road that would lead me to a place called home, I do not know

Nor do I think about it often, because I’ve come to realize that I do not care If this road, this series of stepping stones, leads nowhere, then so be it I walk the road with friends, and so I have my home