“Friends to what end?” Drizzt asked tentatively, hoping against all reason that he might find this creature to be motivated by some principles, and not just by blood lust.

“To kill,” Lagerbottoms replied, as though the answer had been obvious.

Drizzt snarled and jerked his head about in angry denial, his white mane flying wildly. He snapped the scimitar out of its sheath, hardly caring if the giant’s foot had found the loop of his snare.

“Kill you!” Lagerbottoms cried, seeing the sudden turn, and the giant lifted his club and took a huge stride forward, a stride shortened by the vinelike branch pulling tightly around his ankle.

Drizzt checked his desire to rush in, reminding himself that the trap had been set into motion, and reminding himself, too, that in his present condition he would be hard put to survive against the formidable giant.

Lagerbottoms looked down at the noose and roared in outrage. The branch wasn’t really a proper cord and the noose wasn’t so tight. If Lagerbottoms had simply reached down, the giant easily could have slipped the noose off his foot. Hill giants, however, were never known for their intelligence.

“Kill you!” the giant cried again, and it kicked hard against the strain of the branch. Propelled by the considerable force of the kick, the large rock tied to the branch’s other end, behind the giant, pelted forward through the underbrush and sailed into Lagerbottoms’s back.

Lagerbottoms had started to cry out a third time, but the menacing threat came out as a whoosh! of forced air. The heavy club dropped to the ground and the giant, clutching its kidney area, dropped to one knee.

Drizzt hesitated a moment, not knowing whether to run or finish the kill. He didn’t fear for himself; the giant would not be coming after him anytime soon, but he could not forget the lurid expression on the giant’s face when the monster had said that they might kill together.

“How many other families will you slaughter?” Drizzt asked in the drow tongue.

Lagerbottoms could not begin to understand the language. He just grunted and snarled through the burning pain.

“How many?” Drizzt asked again, his hand wrenching over the scimitar’s pommel and his eyes narrowing menacingly.

He came in fast and hard.

To Benson Delmo’s absolute relief, the party from Sundabar—Dove Falconhand, her three fighting companions, and Fret, the dwarven sage—came in later that day. The mayor offered the troupe food and rest, but as soon as Dove heard of the massacre at the Thistledown farm, she and her companions set straight out, with the mayor, Roddy McGristle, and several curious farmers close behind.

Dove was openly disappointed when they arrived at the secluded farm. A hundred sets of tracks obscured critical clues, and many of the items in the house, even the bodies, had been handled and moved. Still, Dove and her seasoned company moved about methodically, trying to decipher what they could of the gruesome scene.

“Foolish people!” Fret scolded the farmers when Dove and the others had completed their investigation. “You have aided our enemies!”

Several of the farmer-folk, even the mayor, looked around uncomfortably at the berating, but Roddy snarled and towered over the tidy dwarf. Dove quickly interceded.

“Your earlier presence here has marred some of the clues,” Dove explained calmly, disarmingly, to the mayor as she prudently stepped between Fret and the burly mountain man. Dove had heard many tales of McGristle before, and his reputation was not one of predictability or calm.

“We didn’t know,” the mayor tried to explain.

“Of course not,” Dove replied. “You reacted as anyone would have.”

“Any novice,” Fret remarked.

“Shut yer mouth!” McGristle growled, and so did his dog.

“Be at ease, good sir,” Dove bade him. “We have too many enemies beyond the town to need some within.”

“Novice?” McGristle barked at her. “I’ve hunted down a hunnerd men, an’ I know enough o’ this damned drow to find him.”

“Do we know it was the drow?” Dove asked, genuinely doubting.

On a nod from Roddy, a farmer standing on the side of the room produced the broken scimitar.

“Drow weapon,” Roddy said harshly, pointing to his scarred face. “I seen it up close!”

One look at the mountain man’s jagged wound told Dove that the fine-edged scimitar had not caused it, but the ranger conceded the point, seeing no gain in further argument.

“And drow tracks,” Roddy insisted. “The boot prints match close to the ones by the blueberry patch, where we seen the drow!”

Dove’s gaze led all eyes to the barn. “Something powerful broke that door,” she reasoned. “And the younger woman inside was not killed by any dark elf.”

Roddy remained undaunted. “Drow’s got a pet,” he insisted. “Big, black panther. Damned big cat!”

Dove remained suspicious. She had seen no prints to match a panther’s paws, and the way that a portion of the woman had been devoured, bones and all, did not fit any knowledge that she had of great cats. She kept her thoughts to herself, though, realizing that the gruff mountain man wanted no mysteries clouding his already-drawn conclusions.

“Now, if ye’ve had enough o’ this place, let’s get onto the trail,” Roddy boomed. “My dog’s got a scent, and the drow’s got a lead big enough already!”

Dove flashed a concerned glance at the mayor, who turned away, embarrassed, under her penetrating gaze.

“Roddy McGristle’s to go with you,” Delmo explained, barely able to spit out the words, wishing that he had not made his emotionally inspired deal with Roddy. Seeing the coolheadedness of the woman ranger and her party, so drastically different from Roddy’s violent temper, the mayor now thought it better that Dove and her companions handle the situation in their own way. But a deal was a deal.

“He’ll be the only one from Maldobar joining your troupe,” Delmo continued. “He is a seasoned hunter and knows this area better than any.”

Again Dove, to Fret’s disbelief, conceded the point.

“The day is fast on the wane,” Dove said. She added pointedly to McGristle, “We go at first light.”

“Drow’s got too much of a lead already!” Roddy protested. “We should get after him now!”

“You assume that the drow is running,” Dove replied, again calmly, but this time with a stern edge to her voice. “How many dead men once assumed the same of enemies?” This time, Roddy, perplexed, did not shout back. “The drow, or drow band, could be holed up nearby. Would you like to come upon them unexpectedly, McGristle? Would it please you to battle dark elves in the dark of night?”

Roddy just threw up his hands, growled, and stalked away, his dog close on his heels.

The mayor offered Dove and her troupe lodging at his own house, but the ranger and her companions preferred to remain behind at the Thistledown farm. Dove smiled as the farmers departed, and Roddy set up camp just a short distance away, obviously to keep an eye on her. She wondered just how much a stake McGristle had in all of this and suspected that there was more to it than revenge for a scarred face and a lost ear.

“Are you really to let that beastly man come with us?” Fret asked later on, as the dwarf, Dove, and Gabriel sat around the blazing fire in the farmyard. The elven archer and the other member of the troupe were out on perimeter guard.

“It is their town, dear Fret,” Dove explained. “And I cannot refute McGristle’s knowledge of the region.”

“But he is so dirty,” the dwarf grumbled. Dove and Gabriel exchanged smiles, and Fret, realizing that he would get nowhere with his argument, turned down his bedroll and slipped in, purposefully spinning away from the others.

“Good old Quilldipper,” mumbled Gabriel, but he noted that Dove’s ensuing smile did little to diminish the sincere concern on her face.