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Wulfgar, nearly overcoainst the se He clutched the wound tightly, hoping to stem the flow of his lifeblood
How alone he felt
He knew that he had been right in sending his friends away They could have done little to help hiht in front of the very spot Entreri had chosen for his trap, left the by hiuild
He released his grip on his biceps and examined the wound The hydra had bitten hierly he took a feings with Aegis-fang
He then leaned back against the wall once ure a course of action in a cause that seemed truly hopeless
Drizzt slipped fro his pace to listen for faint sounds that would aid his pursuit He didn’t really expect to hear anything; Entreri could move as silently as he And the assassin, like Drizzt,without a torch, or even a candle
But Drizzt felt confident in the turns he took, as if he were being led along by the sauided Entreri He felt the assassin’s presence, knew the man better than he cared to admit, and Entreri could no un in Mithril Hall months before - or perhaps theirs was only the present ele that was spawned at the dawn of time - but, for Drizzt and Entreri, tns in the tile of principles, this chapter of the war could not end until one claili yellow of a torch, but a constant silvery strearate, with the s of a ladder bolted into the seall Drizzt glanced around quickly - too quickly - and rushed to the ladder
The shadows to his left exploded into ht the telltale shine of a blade just in tiered forward, feeling a burning across his shoulder blades and then the wetness of his blood rolling down under his cloak
Drizzt ignored the pain, knowing that any hesitation would surely result in his death, and spun around, sla the curved blades of both his scimitars into a defensive spin before him
Entreri issued no taunts this ti with his saber, knowing that he had to finish Drizzt before the shock of the a the injured assassin in a frenzy of hatred
He leaped into Drizzt, locking one of the drow’s arth to drive his saber into his opponent’s neck
Drizzt steadied hih to control the initial assault He surrendered his one ar his free sciain locked with that of Entreri’s saber, holding ithalfway between the combatants
Behind their respective blades, Drizzt and Entreri eyeballed each other with open hatred, their grimaces only inches apart
"How rowled Reinforced by his own proclale of his own deadly blade down ly toward Entreri
Entreri did not answer, nor did he seeht shift in the blades’ momentum A wild, exhilarated look carin
Drizzt knew that the killer had another trick to play
Before the drow could figure the game, Entreri spat a mouthful of filthy seater into his lavender eyes
The sound of renewed fighting led Bruenor and Catti-brie along the tunnels They caught sight of thejust as Entreri played his wicked card
"Drizzt!" Catti-brie shouted, knowing that she couldn’t get to hiet her bow up, in tirowled and bolted forith only one thought on hisin half!
The sting and shock of the water broke Drizzt’s concentration, and his strength, for only a split second, but he knew that even a split second was too long against Artemis Entreri He jerked his head to the side desperately
Entreri snapped his saber down, slicing a gash across Drizzt’s forehead and crushing the drow’s thu hilts "I have you!" he squealed, hardly believing the sudden turn of events
At that horrible ree with the observation, but the drow’s next move caility that surprised even Drizzt In the instant of a single, tiny hop, Drizzt snapped one foot behind Entreri’s ankle and tucked the other under hiainst the wall He pushed away and twisted as he went On the slick floor, Entreri had no chance to dodge the trip, and he toppled backward into thedown on top of hiht of Drizzt’s heavy fall jammed the crosspiece of his scimitar into Entreri’s eye Drizzt recovered from the surprise of his own movement faster than Entreri, and he did not miss the opportunity He spun his hand over on the hilt and reversed the flow of the blade, pulling it free of Entreri’s and swinging a short cut back and doith the tip of the sciriin to cut in
It was Entreri’s turn for ahis saber to bear, the assassin punched straight out, sla Drizzt’s face with the butt of his weapon Drizzt’s nose splattered onto his cheek, flashes of color exploded before his eyes, and he felt himself lifted and dropped off to the side before his scimitar could finish its work
Entreri scrambled out of reach and pulled hiling against the dizziness to regain his feet When he did, he found hiain, the assassin even worse off than he
Entreri looked over the drow’s shoulder, to the tunnel and the charging dwarf and to Catti-brie and her killer bow, co up level with his face He jus, and started up to the street
Catti-brie followed his hts No one, not even Arteeted
"Get hiirl!" Bruenor yelled
Drizzt had been so involved in the battle that he hadn’t even noticed the arrival of his friends He spun around to see Bruenor rolling in, and Catti-brie just about to loose her arrow
"Hold!" Drizzt growled in a tone that froze Bruenor in his tracks and sent a shiver through Catti-brie’s spine They both gawked, open-mouthed, at Drizzt
"He is mine!" the drow told theood fortune Out in the open streets, his streets, he ht find his sanctuary
With no retort forthco froical mask up over his face and was just as quick to follow
The realization that his delayoff to search for soar to action He clasped Aegis-fang tightly in the hand of his wounded ar the injured ht of Drizzt, of that quality his friend possessed to completely sublimate fear in the face of impossible odds and replace it with pointed fury
This tiar’s eyes that burned with an inner fire He stood wide-legged in the corridor, his breath rasping out as lols, and hisin a rhyth perfection
The thieves’ guild, the strongest house in Caliht
A sone now, and the weariness had flown froh as he rushed off
Ti slope of the tunnel as he jogged along and knew that the next door he went through would be at or near street level He soon came upon, not one, but three doors: one at the end of the tunnel and one on either side Wulfgar hardly slowed, figuring the direction he was traveling to be as good as any, and barreled through the door at the corridor’s end, crashing into an octagonal-shaped guard roouards
"Hey!" the one in the e fist slammed him to the floor The barbarian spotted another door directly across fro to get through the roouards, a puny, dark-haired little rogue, proved the quickest He darted to the door, inserted a key, and flipped the lock, then he turned to face Wulfgar, holding the key out before hi a broken-toothed s the device to one of his corabbed his shirt, taking out ue felt his feet leave the floor
With one arh the door
"Key," the barbarian said, stepping over the kindling-and-thief pile
Wulfgar hadn’t nearly outrun the danger, though The next roo hall, with dozens of chambers directly off it Cries of alarh, and a well-rehearsed defense plan went into execution all around hiuild members, fled for the shadows and the safety of their rooms, for they had been relieved of the responsibilities of dealing with intruders more than a year before - since Rassiter and his crew had joined the guild
Wulfgar rushed to a short flight of stairs and leaped up theh the door at the top A maze of corridors and open chambers loos, and tapestries - beyond any collection the barbarian had ever iar had little ti hi down the corridors before him to cut him off He knehat they were; he had just been in their sewers