Then the two heroes, the two friends, were together, cutting a swath of destruction across the deck of the pirate ship. Deudermont and his crew, trained fighters themselves, soon cleared the Sea Sprite of pirates and had won over every boarding plank. Now knowing victory to be at hand, they waited at the rail of the pirate ship, escorting the growing wave of willing prisoners back to the Sea Sprite’s hold while Drizzt and Wulfgar finished their task.

“You will die, bearded dog!” Pinochet roared, slashing with his sword.

Bruenor, trying to settle his feet on the rocking boat, let the man keep the offensive, holding his own strikes for the best moments.

One came unexpectedly as the pirate Bruenor had booted from the burning ship caught up to the drifting rowboat. Bruenor watched his approach out of the corner of his eye.

The man grabbed the side of the little boat and hoisted himself up—only to be met with a blow to the top of the head by Bruenor’s mithril axe.

The pirate dropped back down beside the rowboat, turning the water crimson.

“Friend o’ yers?” Bruenor taunted.

Pinochet came on even more furiously, as Bruenor had hoped. The man missed a wild swing, overbalancing to Bruenor’s right. The dwarf helped Pinochet along, shifting his weight to heighten the list of the boat and slamming his shield into the pirate captain’s back.

“On yer life,” Bruenor called as Pinochet bobbed back above the water a few feet away, “lose the sword!” The dwarf recognized the importance of the man, and he preferred to let someone else row.

With no options open to him, Pinochet complied and swam back to the little boat. Bruenor dragged him over the side and plopped him down between the oars. “Turn ‘er back!” the dwarf roared. “And be pullin’ hard!”

“The mask is down,” Wulfgar whispered to Drizzt when their business was finished. The drow slipped behind a mast and replaced the magical disguise.

“Do you think they saw?” Drizzt asked when he returned to Wulfgar’s side. Even as he spoke, he noticed the Sea Sprite’s crew lining the deck of the pirate ship and eyeing him suspiciously, their weapons in hand.

“They saw,” Wulfgar remarked. “Come,” he bade Drizzt, heading back toward the boarding plank. “They will accept this!”

Drizzt wasn’t so certain. He remembered other times when he had rescued men, only to have them turn on him when they saw under the cowl of his cloak and learned the true color of his skin.

But this was the price of his choice to forsake his own people and come to the surface world.

Drizzt grabbed Wulfgar by the shoulder and stepped by him, resolutely leading the way back to the Sea Sprite. Looking back at his young friend, he winked and pulled the mask off his face. He sheathed his scimitars and turned to confront the crew.

“Let them know Drizzt Do’Urden,” Wulfgar growled softly behind him, lending Drizzt all the strength he would ever need.

12. Comrades

Bruenor found Catti-brie treading water beyond the carnage of Pinochet’s ship. Pinochet paid the young woman no attention, though. Far in the distance, the crew on his remaining ship, the bulky artillery vessel, had brought the fires under control, but had turned tail and sailed away with all the speed it could muster.

“I thought ye had forgot me,” Catti-brie said as the rowboat approached.

“Ye should’ve stayed by me side,” the dwarf laughed at her.

“I’ve not the kinship with fire as yerself,” Catti-brie retorted with a bit of suspicion.

Bruenor shrugged. “Been that way since the halls,” he replied. “Mighten be me father’s father’s armor.”

Catti-brie grabbed the side of the low-riding boat and started up, then paused in a sudden realization as she noticed the scimitar strapped across Bruenor’s back. “Ye’ve got the drow’s blade!” she said, remembering the story Drizzt had told her of his battle with a fiery demon. The magic of the ice-forged scimitar had saved Drizzt from the fire that day. “Suren that’s yer salvation!”

“Good blade,” Bruenor muttered, looking at its hilt over his shoulder. “The elf should find it a name!”

“The boat will not hold the weight of three,” Pinochet interrupted.

Bruenor turned an angry glare on him and snapped, “Then swim!”

Pinochet’s face contorted, and he started to rise threateningly.

Bruenor recognized that he had taunted the proud pirate too far. Before the man could straighten, the dwarf slammed his forehead into Pinochet’s chest, butting him over the back of the rowboat. Without missing a beat, the dwarf grabbed Catti-brie’s wrist and hoisted her up by his side. “Put yer bow on him, girl,” he said loudly enough for Pinochet, once again bobbing in the water, to hear. He threw the pirate the end of a rope. “If he don’t keep up, kill ‘im!”

Catti-brie set a silver-shafted arrow to Taulmaril’s string and took a bead on Pinochet, playing through the threat, though she had no intention of finishing off the helpless man. “They call me bow the Heartseeker,” she warned “Suren ye’d be wise to swim.”

The proud pirate pulled the rope around him and paddled.

“No drow’s coming back to this ship!” one of Deudermont’s crewmen growled at Drizzt.

The man took a slap on the back of the head for his words, and then sheepishly moved aside as Deudermont stepped up to the boarding plank. The captain studied the expressions of his crewmen as they surveyed the drow who had been their companion for weeks.

“What’ll ye do with him?” one sailor dared to ask.

“We’ve men in the water,” the captain replied, deflecting the pointed question. “Get them out and dry, and throw the pirates in chains.” He waited a moment for his crewmen to disperse, but they held their positions, entranced by the drama of the dark elf.

“And get these ships untangled!” Deudermont roared.

He turned to face Drizzt and Wulfgar, now only a few feet from the plank. “Let us retire to my cabin,” he said calmly. “We should talk.”

Drizzt and Wulfgar did not answer. They went with the captain silently, absorbing the curious, fearful, and outraged stares that followed them.

Deudermont stopped halfway across the deck, joining a group of his crew as they looked to the south, past Pinochet’s burning ship, to a small rowboat pulling hard in their direction.

“The driver of the fiery chariot that rushed across the sky,” one of the crewman explained.

“He took down that ship!” another exclaimed, pointing to the wreckage of Pinochet’s flagship, now listing badly and soon to sink. “And sent the third one running!”

“Then a friend of ours, he is indeed!” the captain replied.

“And of ours,” Drizzt added, turning all eyes back upon him. Even Wulfgar looked curiously at his companion. He had heard the cry to Moradin, but had not dared to hope that it was indeed Bruenor Battlehammer rushing to their aid.

“A red-bearded dwarf, if my guess is correct,” Drizzt continued. “And with him, a young woman.”

Wulfgar’s jaw dropped open. “Bruenor?” he managed to whisper. “Catti-brie?”

Drizzt shrugged. “That is my guess.”

“We shall know soon enough,” Deudermont assured them. He instructed his crewmen to bring the passengers of the rowboat to his cabin as soon as they came aboard, then he led Drizzt and Wulfgar away, knowing that on the deck the drow would prove a distraction to his crew. And at this time, with the ships fouled, they had important work to complete.

“What do you mean to do with us?” Wulfgar demanded when Deudermont shut the cabin door. “We fought for—”