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He spotted his dropped scideath, on the slope just up above him, and climbed to his feet to retrieve it

Such waves of pain washed over hiround As he recovered, he settled his weight onto his right foot and glanced down at his left leg, noting a bulge against the leather at ht at all, for in the fall, he had surely broken the bone in his shin

Slowly he put his foot back to the ground and eased soain the waves of pain assaulted him He looked around for a splint, but heard Dahlia’s approach and realized that he had no time

He scrambled for his scimitar, retrieved it, and spun around to watch the wo easily at her sides

"You were supposed to win," she said through gritted teeth, tears streary face "In so many ways have you disappointed me!"

Her words didn’t make any sense to Drizzt, and he could barely keep his eyes focused on her He knew that she was coin to fight her now He had no speed and no balance, and the pain …

She was so close

A dark for Dahlia with it off to the side

"Enough!" Drizzt heard, Artemis Entreri’s voice He followed the sound to see the two of the onceout of one eye now, as the other was covered with the blood pouring froainst the h Drizzt could not hear the words But Entreri remained insistent--even in his desperate and dazed state, Drizzt could recognize that--and he pushed Dahlia away, step-by-step

"Farewell," Drizzt heard hi Icewind Dale

Drizzt couldn’t be sure His face was in the dirt by that ti in his head, i in a place far removed from consciousness

EPILOGUE

THE STARS REACHED DOWN TO HIM, LIKE SO MANY TIMES BEFORE IN THIS enchanted place

He was on Bruenor’s Clih he didn’t kno he had arrived there Guenhwyvar was beside hi, but he didn’t re to her

Of all the places Drizzt had ever traveled, none had feltthan here Perhaps it had been the company he had so often found up here, but even without Bruenor beside hi above the flat, dark tundra, had ever brought a spiritual sustenance to Drizzt Do’Urden Up here, he felt small and mortal, but at the saeternal

On Bruenor’s Cli the and soaring areat clockwork up here, could feel the celestial winds in his face and could melt into the ether

It was a place of the deepest reat cycle of life and death

A place that see now, as the blood continued to flow froris stood with her hands on her hips, looking this way and that, fully perplexed She turned to Afafrenfere, who could only shrug

They saw the blood, the signs of the tuht, as Entreri had explained to thehly shaken Dahlia in his grasp

But Drizzt was not here

His leg was broken, Entreri had said, and his head bleeding badly, and indeed, the three of them, the dwarf, the monk, and Effron, easily located the spot where Drizzt had last stood against Dahlia siround

But he wasn’t there, and there was no trail leading fro

"Someone found hi, then," Afafrenfere replied, holding up his hands helplessly as he stood near the lone set of tracks in the snow leading from this place, the path of Entreri and Dahlia that had so easily led them out fro a great bird or a dragon to descend upon theris surer, then, and with no so?" asked Effron