A tug on the line had him sitting up, and once he had the line in hand, he scrambled to his feet, working the line expertly. Understanding that he had an audience, he took his time landing the fish, a fine, foot-long ice perch.

When at last he landed it, he held it up to show the young orcs, who applauded and waved enthusiastically.

“One day I will teach you,” Regis said, though they were too far away—and upwind and with a noisy river bubbling by—and could not hear. “One day.”

Then he paused and listened to his own words and realized that he was musing about orcs. Orcs. He had killed orcs, and with hardly a care. A moment of uncomfortable regret seized the halfling, followed quickly by a sense of complete confusion. He suppressed all of that, but only momentarily, by going back to work on his line, putting it back out in the calmer waters of the pool.

Orcs.

Orcs!

Orcs?

“Bruenor wishes to speak with you?” Catti-brie asked Drizzt when he returned to their suite of rooms late one night, only to be met by Bruenor’s page with a quiet request. A tenday had passed since the fight with the devils and the situation had calmed considerably.

“He is trying to sort through the confusion of our recent adventure.”

“He wants you to go to Mirabar with Torgar Hammerstriker,” Catti-brie reasoned.

“It does seem ridiculous,” Drizzt replied, agreeing with Catti-brie’s incredulous tone. “In the best of times, and the most secure, Marchion Elastul would not grant me entrance.”

“A long way to hike to camp out on the cold ground,” Catti-brie quipped.

Drizzt moved up to her, grinning wickedly. “Not so unwelcome an event if I bring along the right bedroll,” he said, his hands sliding around the woman’s waist as he moved even closer.

Catti-brie laughed and responded to his kiss. “I would enjoy that.”

“But you cannot go,” Drizzt said, moving back. “You have a grand adventure before you, and one you would not wisely avoid.”

“If you ask me to go with you, I will.”

Drizzt stepped back, shaking his head. “A fine husband I would be to do so! I have heard hints of some of the wonders Alustriel has planned for you throughout the next few months, I could not deny you that for the sake of my own desires.”

“Ah, but don’t you understand how alluring it is to know that your desires for me overwhelm that absolute sense of right and wrong that is so deeply engrained into your heart and soul?”

Drizzt fell back at that and stared at Catti-brie, blinking repeatedly. He tried to respond several times, but nothing decipherable came forth.

Catti-brie let her laughter flow. “You are insufferable,” she said, and danced across the room from Drizzt. “You spend so much time wondering how you should feel that you rarely ever simply do feel.”

Knowing he was being mocked, Drizzt crossed his arms over his chest and turned his confused stare into a glare.

“I admire your judgment, all the while being frustrated by it,” Catti-brie said. “I remember when you went into Biggrin’s cave those many years ago, Wulfgar at your side. It was not a wise choice, but you followed your emotions instead of your reason. What has happened to that Drizzt Do’Urden?”

“He has grown older and wiser.”

“Wiser? Or more cautious?” she asked with a sly grin.

“Are they not one and the same?”

“In battle, perhaps,” Catti-brie replied. “And since that is the only arena in which you have ever been willing to take a chance….”

Drizzt blew a helpless sigh.

“A span of a few heartbeats can make for a greater memory than the sum of a mundane year,” Catti-brie continued.

Drizzt nodded his concession. “There are still risks to be had.” He started for the door, saying, “I will try to be brief, though I suspect your father will wish to talk this through over and over again.” He glanced back as he grabbed the handle and pulled the door open, shaking his head and smiling.

His expression changed when he considered his wife.

She had unfastened the top two buttons of her colorful shirt and stood looking at him with a sly and inviting expression. She gave a little grin and shrug, and chewed her bottom lip teasingly.

“It wouldn’t be a wise choice to keep the king waiting,” she said in a voice far too innocent.

Drizzt nodded, paused, and slammed and locked the door. “I’m his son by marriage now,” he explained, gliding across the room, his sword belt falling to the floor as he went. “The king will forgive me.”

“Not if he knew what you were doing to his daughter,” Catti-brie said as Drizzt wrapped her in a hug and tumbled down to the bed with her.

“If Marchion Elastul will not grant me entrance, I will walk past his gates and along my road,” Drizzt was saying when Catti-brie entered Bruenor’s chambers later on that night.

Regis was there as well, along with Torgar Hammerstriker and his Mirabarran companion, Shingles McRuff.

“He’s a stubborn one,” Shingles agreed with Drizzt after giving a nod to Catti-brie. “But ye’ve a longer road by far.”

“Oh?” Catti-brie asked.

“He’s for Icewind Dale,” Bruenor explained. “Him and Rumblebelly.”

Catti-brie stepped back at the surprising news and looked to Drizzt for an explanation.

“Me own decision,” Bruenor said. “We’re hearing that Wulfgar’s settled back there, so I’m thinking that Drizzt and Rumblebelly might be looking in on him.”

Catti-brie considered it for a few moments then nodded her agreement. She and Drizzt had discussed a journey to Icewind Dale to see their old friend. Word had come to Mithral Hall not long after the signing of the Treaty of Garumn’s Gorge that Wulfgar was well and back in Icewind Dale, and Catti-brie and Drizzt had immediately begun plotting how they might go to him.

But they had delayed, for Wulfgar’s sake. He didn’t need to see them together. He had left Mithral Hall to start anew, and it wouldn’t be fair for them to remind him of the life he could have had with Catti-brie.

“I will be back in Mithral Hall before your return,” Drizzt promised her.

“Maybe,” Catti-brie replied, but with an accepting smile.

“Both of our roads are fraught with adventure,” Drizzt said.

“And neither of us would have it any other way,” Catti-brie agreed. “I expect that’s why we’re in love.”

“Ye’re knowing that other people are in the room, I’m guessin’,” Bruenor said rather gruffly, and the two looked at the dwarf to see him shaking his head and rolling his eyes.

CHAPTER 5

THE GREATER OF TWO EVILS

W ith a sigh, Bellany Tundash rolled over to the side, away from her lover. You ask too many questions, and always at the wrong moments,” she complained.

The small man, Morik by name, scrambled over to sit beside her on the edge of the bed. They looked like two cut of the same cloth, petite and dark-haired, only Bellany’s eyes shone with a mischievousness and luster that had been lacking from Morik’s dark orbs of late. “I take an interest in your life,” he explained. “I find the Hosttower of the Arcane…fascinating.”

“You’re looking for a way to rob it, you mean.”

Morik laughed, paused and considered the possibility, then shook his head at the absurdity of the thought and remembered why he was there. “I can undo any trap ever made,” he boasted. “Except those of trickster wizards. Those traps, I leave alone.”

“Well, every door has one,” Bellany teased, and she poked Morik hard in the chest. “Ones that would freeze you, ones that would melt you…”

“Ah, so if I just open two doors simultaneously….”

“Ones that would jolt you so forcefully you would bite out that feisty tongue!” Bellany was quick to add.

In response, Morik leaned over, nibbled her ear and gave her a little lick, drawing a soft moan.