Tos’un stumbled, hardly able to bring his blades up in defense as Drizzt charged in. In came Twinkle, in came Icingdeath, but not the blades. The hilts smashed Tos’un’s face, one after another. Both Tos’un’s swords went flying, and he went with them, back and to the ground. He recovered quickly, but not quickly enough. Drizzt’s boot slammed down upon his chest and Icingdeath came to rest against his neck, its diamond edge promising him a quick death if he struggled.

“You have so much to answer for,” Drizzt said to him.

Tos’un fell back and gave a great exhale, his whole body relaxing with utter resignation, for he could not deny that he was truly doomed.

CHAPTER 23

BLACK AND WHITE

Nanfoodle lifted one foot and drew little circles on the floor with his toes. Standing with his hands clasped behind his back, the gnome presented an image of uncertainty and trepidation. Bruenor and Hralien, who had been sitting discussing their next moves when Nanfoodle and Regis had entered the dwarf’s private quarters, looked at each other with confusion.

“Well if ye can’t get it translated, then so be it,” Bruenor said, guessing at the source of the gnome’s consternation. “But ye’re to keep working on it, don’t ye doubt!”

Nanfoodle looked up, glanced at Regis, then bolstered by Regis’s nod, turned back to the dwarf king and squared his shoulders. “It is an ancient language, based on the Dwarvish tongue,” he explained. “It has roots in Hulgorkyn, perhaps, and Dethek runes for certain.”

“Thought I’d recognized a couple o’ the scribbles,” Bruenor replied.

“Though it is more akin to the proper Orcish,” Nanfoodle explained, and Bruenor gasped.

“Dworcish?” Regis remarked with a grin, but he was the only one who found any humor in it.

“Ye’re telling me that the durned orcs took part of me Delzoun ancestors’ words?” Bruenor asked.

Nanfoodle shook his head. “How this language came about is a mystery whose answer is beyond the parchments you brought to me. From what I can tell of the proportion of linguistic influence, you’ve juxtaposed the source and add.”

“What in the Nine Hells are ye babblin’ about?” Bruenor asked, his voice beginning to take on an impatient undercurrent.

“Seems more like old Dwarvish with added pieces from old Orcish,” Regis explained, drawing Bruenor’s scowl his way and taking it off of Nanfoodle, who seemed to be withering before the unhappy dwarf king with still the most important news forthcoming.

“Well, they needed to talk to the dogs to tell them what’s what,” said Bruenor, but both Regis and Nanfoodle shook their heads with every word.

“It was deeper than that,” Regis said, stepping up beside the gnome. “The dwarves didn’t borrow orc phrases, they integrated the language into their own.”

“Something that would have taken years, even decades, to come into being,” said Nanfoodle. “Such language blending is common throughout the history of all the races, but it occurs, every time, because of familiarity and cultural bonds.”

Silence came back at the pair, and Bruenor and Hralien looked to each other repeatedly. Finally, Bruenor found the courage to ask directly, “What are ye saying?”

“Dwarves and orcs lived together, side-by-side, in the city you found,” said Nanfoodle.

Bruenor’s eyes popped open wide, his strong hands slapped against the arms of his chair, and he came forward as if he meant to leap out and throttle both the gnome and the halfling.

“For years,” Regis added as soon as Bruenor settled back.

The dwarf looked at Hralien, seeming near panic.

“There is a town called Palishchuk in the wastes of Vaasa on the other side of Anauroch,” the elf said with a shrug, as if the news was not as unexpected and impossible as it seemed. “Half-orcs, one and all, and strong allies with the goodly races of the region.”

“Half-orcs?” Bruenor roared back at him. “Half-orcs’re half-humans, and that lot’d take on a porcupine if the durned spines didn’t hurt so much! But we’re talkin’ me kin here. Me ancestors!”

Hralien shrugged again, as if it wasn’t so shocking, and Bruenor stopped sputtering long enough to catch the fact that the elf might be having a bit of fun with the revelation, at the dwarf’s expense.

“We don’t know that these were your ancestors,” Regis remarked.

“Gauntlgrym’s the home o’ Delzoun!” Bruenor snapped.

“This wasn’t Gauntlgrym,” said Nanfoodle, after clearing his throat. “It wasn’t,” he reiterated when Bruenor’s scowl fell over him fully.

“What was it, then?”

“A town called Baffenburg,” said Nanfoodle.

“Never heared of it.”

“Nor had I,” the gnome replied. “It probably dates from around the time of Gauntlgrym, but it was surely not the city described in your histories. Not nearly that size, or with that kind of influence.”

“That which we saw of it was probably the extent of the main town,” Regis added. “It wasn’t Gauntlgrym.”

Bruenor fell back in his seat, shaking his head and muttering under his breath. He wanted to argue, but had no facts with which to do so. As he considered things, he recognized that he’d never had any evidence that the hole in the ground led to Gauntlgrym, that he had no maps that indicated the ancient Delzoun homeland to be anywhere near that region. All that had led him to believe that it was indeed Gauntlgrym was his own fervent desire, his faith that he had been returned to Mithral Hall by the graces of Moradin for that very purpose.

Nanfoodle started to talk, but Bruenor silenced him and waved both him and Regis away.

“This does not mean that there is nothing of value…” Regis started to say, but again, Bruenor waved his hand, dismissing them both—then dismissing Hralien with a gesture, as well, for at that terrible moment of revelation, with orcs attacking and Alustriel balking at decisive action, the crestfallen dwarf king wanted only to be alone.

“Still here, elf?” Bruenor asked when he saw Hralien inside Mithral Hall the next morning. “Seeing the beauty o’ dwarf ways, then?”

Hralien shared the dwarf king’s resigned chuckle. “I am interested in watching the texts unmasked. And I would be re—” He stopped and studied Bruenor for a moment then added, “It is good to see you in such fine spirits this day. I had worried that the gnome’s discovery from yesterday would cloak you in a dour humor.”

Bruenor waved a hand dismissively. “He’s just scratched the scribblings. Might be that some dwarves were stupid enough to trust the damned orcs. Might be that they paid for it with their city and their lives—and that might be a lesson for yer own folk and for Lady Alustriel and the rest of them that’s hesitating in driving Obould back to his hole. Come with me, if ye’re wantin’, for I’m on me way to the gnome now. He and Rumblebelly have worked the night through, on me orders. I’m to take their news to Alustriel and her friends out working on the wall. Speak for the Moonwood in that discussion, elf, and let’s be setting our plans together.”

Hralien nodded and followed Bruenor through the winding tunnels and to the lower floors, and a small candlelit room where Regis and Nanfoodle were hard at work. Parchment had been spread over several tables, held in place by paperweights. The aroma of lavender permeated the room, a side-effect from Nanfoodle’s preservation potions that had been carefully applied to each of the ancient writings, and to the tapestry, which had been hung on one wall. Most of its image remained obscured, but parts of it had been revealed. That vision made Bruenor cringe, for the orcs and dwarves visible in the drawing were not meeting in battle or even in parlay. They were together, intermingled, going about their daily business.

Regis, who sat off to the side transcribing some text, greeted the pair as they entered, but Nanfoodle didn’t even turn around, hunched as he was over a parchment, his face pressed close to the cracked and faded page.