Not so far to the east, a great horn blared.

From over the very next ridge came the sound of a skirmish, orc against orc.

“Obould and Grguch,” Tos’un stated.

In the distance to the northeast, a great horn, Kokto Gung Karuck, sounded.

“Grguch,” Drizzt agreed.

Bruenor snorted. “I can’t be asking any o’ ye to come with me,” he started.

“Bah, but just ye try to stop us,” said Torgar, with Shingles nodding beside him.

“I would travel to the Abyss itself for a try at Obould,” Hralien added.

Beside him, Tos’un shook his head.

“Obould’s to be found on them hills,” Bruenor said, waving his axe in the general direction of the trio of rocky mounds they had determined to be Obould’s main encampment. “And I’m meaning to get there. Right through, one charge, like an arrow shot from me girl’s bow. I’m not for knowing how many I’ll be leavin’ in me wake. I’m not for knowin’ how I’m getting back out after I kill the dog. And I’m not for caring.”

Torgar slapped the long handle of his greataxe across his open palm, and Shingles banged his hammer against his shield.

“We’ll get ye there,” Torgar promised.

The sounds of battle grew louder, some close and some distant. The great horn blew again, its echoes vibrating the stones beneath their feet.

Bruenor nodded and turned to the next ridge, but hesitated and glanced back, focusing his gaze on Tos’un. “Me elf friend telled me that ye done nothing worth killin’ ye over,” he said. “And Hralien’s agreeing. Get ye gone, and don’t ye e’er give me a reason to regret me choice.”

Tos’un held his hands out wide. “I have no weapons.”

“There’ll be plenty for ye to find in our wake, but don’t ye be following too close,” Bruenor replied.

With a helpless look to Drizzt, then to all the others, Tos’un gave a bow and walked back the way they had come. “Grguch is your nightmare, now,” he called to Drizzt, in the drow tongue.

“What’s that?” Bruenor asked, but Drizzt only smiled and walked over to Hralien.

“I’ll be moving fast beside Bruenor,” the drow explained, handing Tos’un’s weapon belt over. “If any are to escape this, it will be you. Beware this sword. Keep it safe.” He glanced over at Regis, clearly nervous. “This will not unravel the way we had intended. Our run will be frantic and furious, and had we known the lay of the land and the orc forces, Bruenor and I would have come out—”

“Alone, of course,” finished the elf.

“Keep the sword safe,” Drizzt said again, though he looked not at Khazid’hea, but at Regis as he spoke, a message all too clear for Hralien.

“And live to tell our tale,” the drow finished, and he and Hralien clasped hands.

“Come on, then!” Bruenor called.

He scraped his boots in the dirt to clear them of mud, and adjusted his one-horned helmet and his foaming mug shield. He started off at a brisk walk, but Thibble dorf Pwent rushed up beside him, and past him, and swept Bruenor up in his eagerness.

They were in full charge before they crested the ridge.

They found the fighting to the west of them, back toward Obould’s line, but there were orcs aplenty right below, running eagerly to battle—so eagerly that Pwent had already lowered his head spike before the nearest one turned to regard the intruders.

That orc’s scream became a sudden gasp as the helmet spike prodded through its chest, and a lip-flapping head wag from Pwent sent the mortally wounded creature flying aside. The next two braced for the charge, ready to dive aside, but Pwent lifted his head and leaped at them, spiked gauntlets punching every which way.

Drizzt and Bruenor veered to the right, where orc reinforcements rushed past the trees and the stones. Torgar and Shingles ran straight ahead off their wake, following Pwent in his attempt to punch through this thin flank and toward the main engagement, which was still far to the north.

With his long strides, Drizzt moved ahead of Bruenor. He lifted Taulmaril, holding the bow horizontal before his chest, for the orcs were close enough and plentiful enough that he didn’t even need to aim. His first shot took one in the chest and blasted it backward and to the ground. His second went through another orc so cleanly that the creature hardly jerked, and Drizzt thought for a moment that he had somehow missed—he even braced for a counter.

But blood poured forth, chest and back, and the creature died where it stood, too fast for it to even realize that it should fall over.

“Bend right!” Bruenor roared, and Drizzt did, sidestepping as the dwarf charged past him, barreling into the next group of orcs, shield bashing and axe flying left, right, and center.

With a single fluid movement, Drizzt shouldered the bow and drew forth his scimitars, and went in right behind Bruenor. Dwarf and drow found themselves outnumbered three to one in short order.

The orcs never had a chance.

Regis didn’t argue as Hralien pulled him to the side, still well behind the other six and moving from cover to cover.

“Protect me,” the elf bade as he put up his longbow and began streaming arrows at the plentiful orcs.

His little mace in hand, Regis was in no position to argue—though he suspected that Drizzt had arranged it for his protection. For Hralien, Regis knew, was the one Drizzt most expected to escape the insanity.

His anger at the drow for pushing him to the side of the fight lasted only the moment it took Regis to view the fury of the engagement. To the right, Pwent spun, punched, butted, kicked, kneed, and elbowed with abandon, knocking orcs aside with every twist and turn.

But they were orcs of Wolf Jaw, warriors all, and not all of the blood on the battlerager was from an orc.

Back-to-back behind him, Torgar and Shingles worked with a precision wrought of years of experience, a harmony of devastating axe-work the pair had perfected in a century of fighting together as part of Mirabar’s vaunted watch. Every routine ended with a step—either left or right, it didn’t seem to matter—as each dwarf behind moved in perfect complement to keep the defense complete.

“Spear, down!” Torgar yelled.

He ducked, unable to deflect the missile. It flew over his head, apparently to crack through the back of Shingles’s skull, but hearing the warning, old Shingles threw his shield up behind his head at the last instant, turning the crude spear aside.

Shingles had to fall away as the orc before him seized the opening.

But of course there was no opening, as Shingles rolled out to the side and Torgar came in behind him with a two-handed slash that disemboweled the surprised creature.

Two orcs took its place and Torgar got stabbed in the upper arm—which only made him madder, of course.

Regis swallowed hard and shook his head, certain that if he’d followed the charge, he’d already have been dead. He nearly fainted as he saw an orc, stone axe high for a killing blow, close in on Shingles, an angle that neither dwarf could possibly block.

But the orc fell away, an arrow deep in its throat.

That startled Regis from his shock, and he looked up to Hralien, who had already set another arrow and swiveled back the other way.

For there Bruenor and Drizzt worked their magic, as only they could. Drizzt’s scimitars spun in a blur, too quick for Regis to follow their movements, which he measured instead by the angles of the orcs falling away from the furious drow. What Bruenor couldn’t match in finesse, he made up for with sheer ferocity, and it occurred to Regis that if Thibble dorf Pwent and Drizzt Do’Urden collided with enough force to meld them into a single warrior, the result would be Bruenor Battlehammer.

The dwarf sang as he cut, kicked, and bashed. Unlike the other trio, who seemed stuck in a morass and tangle of orcs, Drizzt and Bruenor kept moving across and to the north, chopping and slashing and dancing away. At one point, a group of orcs formed in their path, and it seemed as if they would be stopped.