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"It has been a long tio Quick"

"I would have traded places with you," the elf who had been turned to stone sarcastically replied

"Would you?" Drizzt asked sincerely, and he glanced over his shoulder to look Dahlia in the face "You were perfectly oblivious In your e of time--tell me, when you were rescued, when you became flesh once more, did you think that months had passed? You said earlier that it seeone in a blink from the entry hall to the catacombs, and instead of the medusa, you found Jarlaxle before you"

"It is no less unsettling," Dahlia said and looked away

"Perhaps," Drizzt admitted "Nor is it a competition between us"

"Then why start one?" Her voice grew sharp

He nodded an apology "The world has moved fast, and yet seems not to move at all," he said "I fear that I lost o I have to find that first before I can even entertain--"

"What?" Dahlia interrupted "Before you can entertainlove to me?"

"To anyone," Drizzt tried to explain, but he realized that to be the wrong answer the ht home only a heartbeat later as Dahlia slapped him across the face

She rolled down off the unicorn and stood in the dirt road, staring up at hi very round crying, for what seemed an eternity to poor Drizzt

He didn’t kno to react, or what he et down fro to dismount, Dahlia held up a hand to ward hi her cloak up over her head as she went, and then she was a giant bird onceback to the caravan

Drizzt closed his eyes, his shoulders slu, his heart pained He couldn’t lead her on He did not love her--not the way he had loved Catti-brie, and despite the words of Innovindil, that love re him at the saain, and so be it, he decided

He turned Andahar around and started off slowly back the way he had co himself that he had to handle Dahlia properly, for her own sake He could not give her what she desired, but the Baenres were hunting, and he could not let her run off alone

"I can hardly hear a word said to me," Afafrenfere said to Drizzt a few days later, when the caravan at last broke free of the high-walled mountain pass, to come out into the tundra of Icewind Dale

"You will become accustomed to the wind," Drizzt shouted back at hi the eternal wind of Icewind Dale in his ears again proved to be greathim of the doubts and malaise that had infected him in the months of his captivity He pictured the lone rocky pinnacle of Kelvin’s Cairn, which was not quite visible yet above the flat plain, but soon would be, he knew And that i as if they were all around hi Bruenor, standing at his side in the dark night and the chill breeze He thought of Regis, fishing string tied around his toe as he slept on the banks of Maer Dualdon

Aye, this was home to Drizzt, a place of physical cold and emotional warmth, a place where he had learned to trust and to love, and he couldn’t help but feel alive with the sound of the wind of Icewind Dale in his ears He could hardly io Quick, so apathetic and hopeless

He looked back to the caravan, to Dahlia in particular, who rode on a wagon with Arte with her Drizzt iined them in each other’s arms, and hoped that it would become true Because he could never truly return her love, he knew

Drizzt turned Andahar around and paced back to the lead wagon "Bryn Shander?" he asked

"Aye, that’s where we’re bound"

"The roads will groorse, for the melt is on, and the tundra mud is inevitable," Drizzt explained "Another tenday before us, likely, if the weather holds"

The driver nodded "Been this way many times," he explained

"My friends and I will escort you to Bryn Shander’s gates, but then I, at least, will turn away for Kelvin’s Cairn"

"You will get your pay"

Drizzt smiled He hardly cared, and had only wanted to inform the caravan of his plans

"The Battlehammer dwarves for you, then?" the driver added, and Drizzt nodded "I heard you were friends o’ them"

"Proud to be called such"