Drizzt wanted to explain everything to the elf, to tell his tale completely and be vindicated by some voice other than his own. If only another—particularly a surface elf—would learn of his trials and agree with his decisions, agree that he had acted properly through the course of his life in the face of such horrors, then the guilt would fly from Drizzt’s shoulders. If only he could find acceptance among those who so hated—as he himself hated—the ways of his dark people, then Drizzt Do’Urden would be at peace.

But the elf’s sword tip did not slip an inch toward the ground, nor did the grimace diminish on his fair elven face, a face more accustomed to smiles.

Drizzt would find no acceptance here, not now and probably not ever. Was he forever to be misjudged? he wondered. Or was he, perhaps, misjudging those around him, giving the humans and this elf more credit for fairness than they deserved?

Those were two disturbing notions that Drizzt would have to deal with another day, for Kellindil’s patience had reached its end. The elf came at the drow with his sword tip leading the way.

Drizzt was not surprised—how could he have been? He hopped back, out of immediate reach, and called upon his innate magic, dropping a globe of impenetrable blackness over the advancing elf.

No novice to magic, Kellindil understood the drow’s trick. The elf reversed direction, diving out the back side of the globe and coming up, sword at the ready.

The lavender eyes were gone.

“Drow!” Kellindil called out loudly, and those in the camp immediately exploded into motion. Roddy’s dog started howling, and that excited and threatening yelp followed Drizzt back into the mountains, damning him to his continuing exile.

Kellindil leaned back against a tree, alert but not too concerned that the drow was still in the area. Drizzt could not know it at that time, but his words and ensuing actions―fleeing instead of fighting—had indeed put a bit of doubt in the kindly elf’s not-so-closed mind.

“He will lose his advantage in the dawn’s light,” Dove said hopefully after several fruitless hours of trying to keep up with the drow. They were in a bowl-shaped, rocky vale now, and the drow’s trail led up the far side in a high and fairly steep climb.

Fret, nearly stumbling with exhaustion at her side, was quick to reply. “Advantage?” The dwarf groaned. He looked at the next mountain wall and shook his head. “We shall all fall dead of weariness before we find this infernal drow!”

“If ye can’t keep up, then fall an’ die!” Roddy snarled. “We’re not to be lettin’ the stinking drow get away this time!”

It was not Fret, however, but another member of the troupe who unexpectedly went down. A large rock soared into the group suddenly, clipping Darda’s shoulder with enough force to lift the man from the ground and spin him right over in the air. He never even got the chance to cry out before he fell facedown in the dust.

Dove grabbed Fret and rolled for a nearby boulder, Roddy and Gabriel doing likewise. Another stone, and then several more, thundered into the region.

“Avalanche?” the stunned dwarf asked when he recovered from the shock.

Dove, too concerned with Darda, didn’t bother to answer, though she knew the truth of their situation and knew that it was no avalanche.

“He is alive,” Gabriel called from behind his protective rock, a dozen feet across from Dove’s. Another stone skipped through the area, narrowly missing Darda’s head.

“Damn,” Dove mumbled. She peeked up over the lip of her boulder, scanning both the mountainside and the lower crags at its base. “Now, Kellindil,” she whispered to herself. “Get us some time.”

As if in answer came the distant twang of the elf’s re-strung bow, followed by an angry roar. Dove and Gabriel glanced over to each other and smiled grimly.

“Stone giants!” Roddy cried, recognizing the deep, grating timbre of the roaring voice.

Dove crouched and waited, her back to the boulder and her open pack in her hand. No more stones bounced into the area; rather, thunderous crashes began up ahead of them, near Kellindil’s position. Dove rushed out to Darda and gently turned the man over.

“That hurt,” Darda whispered, straining to smile at his obvious understatement.

“Do not speak,” Dove replied, fumbling for a potion bottle in her pack. But the ranger ran out of time. The giants, seeing her out in the open, resumed their attack on the lower area.

“Get back to the stone!” Gabriel cried. Dove slipped her arm under the fallen man’s shoulder to support Darda as, stumbling with every movement, he crawled for the rock.

“Hurry! Hurry!” Fret cried, watching them anxiously with his back flat against the large stone.

Dove leaned over Darda suddenly, flattening him down to the ground as another rock zipped by just above their ducking heads.

Fret started to bite his fingernails, then realized what he was doing and stopped, a disgusted look on his face. “Do hurry!” he cried again to his friends. Another rock bounced by, too close.

Just before Dove and Darda got to Fret, a stone landed squarely on the backside of the boulder. Fret, his back tight against the rock barrier, flew out wildly, easily clearing his crawling companions. Dove placed Darda down behind the boulder, then turned, thinking she would have to go out again and retrieve the fallen dwarf.

But Fret was already back up, cursing and grumbling, and more concerned with a new hole in his fine garment than in any bodily injury.

“Get back here!” Dove screamed at him.

“Drat and bebother these stupid giants!” was all that Fret replied, stomping purposefully back to the boulder, his fists clenched angrily against his hips.

The barrage continued, both up ahead of the pinned companions and in their area. Then Kellindil came diving in, slipping to the rock beside Roddy and his dog.

“Stone giants,” the elf explained. “A dozen at the least.” He pointed up to a ridge halfway up the mountainside.

“Drow set us up,” Roddy growled, banging his fist on the stone. Kellindil wasn’t convinced, but he held his tongue.

Up on the peak of the rocky rise, Drizzt watched the battle unfolding. He had passed through the lower paths an hour earlier, before the dawn. In the dark, the waiting giants had been no obstacle for the stealthy drow; Drizzt had slipped through their line with little trouble.

Now, squinting through the morning light, Drizzt wondered about his course of action. When he had passed the giants, he fully expected that his pursuers would fall into trouble. Should he have somehow tried to warn them? he wondered. Or should he have veered away from the region, leading the humans and the elf out of the giants’ path?

Again Drizzt did not understand where he fit in with the ways of this strange and brutal world. “Let them fight among themselves,” he said harshly, as though trying to convince himself. Drizzt purposefully recalled his encounter of the previous night. The elf had attacked despite his proclamation that he did not want to fight. He recalled, too, the arrow he had dug out of Guenhwyvar’s flank.

“Let them all kill each other,” Drizzt said and he turned to leave. He glanced back over his shoulder one final time and noticed that some of the giants were on the move. One group remained at the ridge, showering the valley floor with a seemingly endless supply of rocks while two other groups, one to the left and one to the right, had fanned out, moving to encircle the trapped party.

Drizzt knew then that his pursuers would not escape. Once the giants had them flanked, they would find no protection against the cross fire.