Gauntlgrym

THROUGH THE EYES OF AN ANCIENT KING

IT WAS DUMB LUCK,” DOR’CRAE INSISTED. “THERE WERE TEN CAVES THEY might have-”

“These are dark elves in the Underdark, fool,” Sylora interrupted. “They likely ruled out most of the other caves simply by sniffing the air currents.”

Dor’crae shrugged and tried to respond, but Sylora growled at him, warning him to silence.

“I’ll not have them binding the primordial,” the Thayan sorceress insisted. “Its awakening will seal the fate of the Netherese along the Sword Coast North, and it will complete the Dread Ring and ensure my victory.”

“Yes, my lady,” Dor’crae said with a bow. “But they are a formidable force. The traitor Dahlia strikes fear into even hearty Ashmadai, and this dark elf, Drizzt, is a legend across the North. But we are talking about a primordial here, a grounded god-being. Could Elminster himself, even in his prime, calm such a beast?”

“It was trapped once to serve Gauntlgrym, a prison that lasted millennia.”

“A prison keyed by the Hosttower of the Arcane, which is no more.”

“But which exudes residual magic,” Sylora warned him. “Trust that if there is a way to rebuild the prison, the clever Jarlaxle has discerned it. They are a threat.”

“The Ashmadai pursue them,” Dor’crae promised her. “And from my recent visit to Gauntlgrym, I can assure you that the primordial has populated its sleeping place with worthy guards, mighty creatures from the Plane of Fire that have answered its incoherent call. A small army of red-skinned lizard men roam the halls.”

“Salamanders…” Sylora mused. “Then you have time to get back there and join in the battle.”

The look of dread on Dor’crae’s face as she spoke brought a smile to the sorceress’s lips. The vampire had been hesitant from the beginning, and he still harbored fears that Dahlia wanted to move that tenth diamond chip, the one that represented him, from her right ear to her left.

“I can take no chances on this,” Sylora went on a moment later. “Awakening the primordial into another act of devastation is our penultimate goal here. Unfortunately, the ultimate goal presses, as the Netherese continue to fight me for Neverwinter Wood, though I still struggle with why, and I dare not leave here. So I send you, in respect and confidence.”

Dor’crae’s expression told her that he knew the hollowness of her compliments, but he bowed anyway and said, “I am humbled, my lady.”

“You will take Valindra with you,” Sylora said as Dor’crae straightened, and the vampire’s eyes widened with surprise and trepidation. “She’s far more lucent now,” Sylora assured him. “And know this, Valindra Shadowmantle hates Jarlaxle most of all, and has no love for this other drow, either, whom she blames in no small part for the loss of Arklem Greeth.”

“She is unpredictable, her power often minimally contained,” Dor’crae warned. “She might have a fit, manifested magically, that would facilitate exactly that which you fear most.”

Sylora narrowed her eyes at the vampire, warning him that she didn’t like having her judgment so boldly questioned. She let it go at that, though, for there was a measure of possibility in Dor’crae’s fears. Indeed, as she thought about her decision in that moment, it occurred to Sylora that the vampire might be right, that Valindra was too much the “unexpected bounce of the bones,” as the old Thayan saying went.

Sylora tried to fathom a way to back out of her command that he take Valindra, thinking she might posit that she only suggested Valindra to test Dor’crae’s understanding of the situation. But when such a remark fell flat even in her thoughts, she decided against it. Which left the stubborn leader, who would never admit she was wrong, only one option.

“Valindra will expedite your return to the caverns. And once there, she can move as swiftly as you through the tunnels.”

“Unless she wanders off,” Dor’crae dared mutter, and Sylora flashed him an angry glare.

“You will guide her,” Sylora told him in no uncertain terms. “And when you have caught up to our enemies, point her at the two drow, remind her of who they are and what they did to her precious Hosttower and Arklem Greeth. Then watch in awe as the mighty lich brings old Gauntlgrym itself down on the heads of our enemies.”

“Yes, my lady,” Dor’crae replied with another bow, though his tone seemed less than satisfied.

“And consider,” Sylora tossed out at him, just for the pleasure of it, “if Valindra can lead the assault against our enemies, then you might not have to do battle with Dahlia, though I know how dearly you wish to challenge her.”

The biting sarcasm, the bald expression of Dor’crae’s fear, wiped away any response from the vampire. His shoulders slumped, his entire form seemed to deflate.

He knew Sylora was right.

As with the cavern outside, the circular entry room had survived the cataclysm nearly intact. The throne still sat there, a silent testament to that which had come before, like a guardian of the past holding to its post.

The whole of the place had Drizzt staring wide-eyed and his jaw hanging slack, as it had done to Jarlaxle and Athrogate-and even Dahlia-when first they had passed through the audience chamber. Worse off than the drow, Bruenor nearly fell over, so overwhelmed was he.

Drizzt regained his composure by considering his friend-his beloved companion of so many decades who stood in the entry hall of the place that had been the focus of his life for more than half a century. Tears rimmed Bruenor’s eyes, and his breath came in uneven gasps, as if he kept forgetting to breathe, then had to force the air in and out.

“Elf,” he whispered. “Do ye see it, elf?”

“In all its glory, my friend,” Drizzt replied. He started to say something more, but Bruenor began drifting away from him, as if pulled by some unseen force.

The dwarf walked across the room, not looking left or right, his eyes fixated on his goal, as if it, the throne, was calling out to him. He stepped up to the small dais, the other four hustling to catch up

“Don’t ye do it!” Athrogate started to warn him, but Jarlaxle hushed the dwarf.

Bruenor tentatively reached out to touch the arm of the fabulous throne.

He retracted his hand immediately and leaped back, eyes wide. He hopped in circles, eyes darting to and fro, hands out wide as if he were uncertain whether to flee or fight.

The others rushed over, and Bruenor visibly relaxed then turned back to the throne.

“What happened?” Athrogate asked.

Bruenor pointed to the throne. “No regular chair.”

“Ye’re tellin’ me?” Athrogate, who had been thrown across the room by the power of that throne, replied.

Bruenor looked at him with a furrowed brow.

“Aye, she’s quite the fabulous work,” Athrogate agreed after a glance at Jarlaxle.

“More than that,” a breathless Bruenor said.

“Imbued with magic,” Dahlia reasoned.

“Thick with magic,” Jarlaxle assured her.

“Thick with memory,” Bruenor corrected.

Drizzt moved up beside Bruenor and slowly reached out toward the chair.

“Don’t ye do that,” Bruenor warned. “Not yerself and not him, most of all,” he added, indicating Jarlaxle. “Not any o’ ye. Just meself.”

Looking to Jarlaxle, who nodded, Drizzt demanded of his fellow Menzoberranyr, “What do you know?”

“Know?” Jarlaxle replied. “I know what I hoped. This place is full of ghosts, full of magic, and full of memory. My hope was that a Delzoun king-our friend Bruenor here-might find a way to tap into those memories.” He was looking at Bruenor by the time he finished, and Drizzt and the others, too, regarded the dwarf king.

Bruenor steadied himself. “Let’s see, then,” he declared.

He took a deep breath and boldly strode forward up onto the dais to stand before the throne. Hands on hips, he stared at it for a long while then nodded, turned, and plopped down on the chair, pointedly grabbing the arms as he did.

Athrogate gasped and ducked his head.

But Bruenor wasn’t rejected by the ancient throne. He stared back at his four friends for just a few heartbeats… then they were gone. Their forms shivered and wavered then dissipated into nothingness.

The dwarf was not alone. The room around him teemed with his kin and echoed with the whispers of a thousand conversations.

Bruenor steeled himself and did not panic. It was the magic of the throne, he told himself. He had not been taken from his friends, nor they from him, but his mind was looking backward across the centuries, back to the time of Gauntlgrym.

Before him stood a group of elves, most in the type of robes one would expect a wizard to wear, and beside them stood important-looking dwarves-clan leaders, obviously, given their regalia and posture.

Bruenor had to consciously force himself to breathe when he noted one wearing the foaming mug crest of Clan Battlehammer emblazoned on his breastplate. Gandalug! Was it Gandalug, the First and Ninth King of Mithral Hall? Could it be?

Certainly the dwarf resembled the founder of Mithral Hall, but more likely, it was Gandalug’s father, or his father’s father. Gandalug, after all, had never mentioned Gauntlgrym in the short time Bruenor had known him, after his escape from the drow time prison, and Gauntlgrym was too much older than Mithral Hall, by Bruenor’s understanding, for that to be Gandalug Battlehammer.

Bruenor knew then, though, that the symbol on the dwarf’s breastplate, the foaming mug crest, was not a coincidence. It was indeed the forefather of Mithral Hall standing before him, standing before the king of Gauntlgrym. A sense of community, of timelessness, and of being a part of something greater washed over Bruenor, flooding him with warmth and serenity.

Bruenor forced himself to get past that tantalizing distraction and focus on the moment at hand. He came to know then that he was seeing through the eyes of the king of Gauntlgrym, as if his own consciousness had crossed the seas of time to be afforded a seat at a time long past. He worked hard to clear his mind, then, to let himself simply absorb what he saw and leave the interpretation of it for later on.

His other senses joined in, and soon he was hearing more clearly the conversations around him.

They were talking about the Hosttower of the Arcane. The elf visitors were from the Hosttower. They were talking about the tendrils of magic and trapping a primordial to fire the furnaces of Gauntlgrym.

Bruenor could hardly believe the scene unfolding before him. The elves were concerned that their gift to the dwarves would be stolen by their dark-skinned relatives, the drow, to wreak devastation on all of Faer?n. The dwarves argued strenuously. One pointed out that they had discussed all of that before the Delzoun Clan had helped build the Hosttower in the distant village.

Village… not city.

Bruenor could feel the tension of his host, the dwarf king who sat on the throne of Gauntlgrym. He could feel the king’s muscles clenching as surely as if they were his own, and indeed, he wondered if his friends were looking upon his own corporeal form in that distant future place, to see him grabbing the arms of the throne and squirming in growing anger.

An elf woman stepped forward-she reminded Bruenor very much of Lady Alustriel of Silverymoon. She spoke in a dialect Bruenor couldn’t easily understand, an ancient Dwarvish broken by her Elvish accent, but he figured out that she was promising the king that her people would abide by their agreement.

“Boot ye moost know ourne terrors on the beast bayin’ freyed,” she warbled. “Und te drow pushing fires to the Aboove.”

“Ain’t no drow fer to be in me kingdom,” the dwarf replied flatly.

“Ain’t be yer choosin,” she agreed.

“Ain’t to be!”

Bruenor’s head spun as they continued their discussion. It was the most critical moment of the Delzoun Clan, he realized. It was the critical moment of their bargain with the wizards, when the Hosttower of the Arcane had repaid them with the power to fashion the legendary weapons and armor of old. That bargain had given the Delzoun clan supremacy among their kin in the North, and had spawned the kingdoms that had survived to Bruenor’s day.

He was privy to, looked in upon, the greatest moment in his clan’s history, perhaps the greatest moment in the history of Faer?n’s dwarves.

“Ye’ll have yer fires,” the regal elf finished, and bowed.

The room blurred again, the images wavering like the rising air off hot stone on a blistering sunny day.

For a moment, Drizzt and the others began taking shape again before him, but the dwarf rejected that. Not now! He couldn’t return to them yet. There was too much yet to learn.

“Bruenor!” he heard Drizzt say, but the dwarf king let the drow’s voice slide past him, let it fall away to nothingness as he retreated across the centuries.

That image faded and another replaced it. He wasn’t in the audience chamber any longer. He saw a pair of elves holding hands and standing in front of an opened alcove in a wall. Within lay a bowl of water, not so different from those Jarlaxle had brought with them. The water in that bowl rotated as the elves chanted, calling it forth. It swirled into a mist, and that mist grew into a living form, somewhat humanoid in shape.

It stood tiny within the alcove at first. The water in the bowl was not the whole of the beast, but merely a conduit to bring it forth. And so it grew, soon filling the small alcove, and seemed as if it would burst out of that hole like a great breaking wave.

Something caught it and pulled it from inside the wall, and Bruenor watched as the elemental elongated upward and was swept up a chimney within the alcove hole. He understood then that a tendril from the Hosttower was at the top of that chimney, that the elemental had been swept into place as a living bar for the primordial’s cage.

And so it went, from spot to spot, the elves setting the magic bowls in place.

Bruenor lost track of time as the corridors of Gauntlgrym rolled past him. He saw, in his mind, through the eyes of Gauntlgrym’s king-whose name he still did not know-the great and legendary Forge of Gauntlgrym, and the image was tangible, as if he were actually there.

The whole of the complex became familiar to him, as if his Delzoun blood was imparting the memories from that unknown king unto him. He understood the role the dwarves had played in creating the Hosttower of the Arcane, and the responding gift the elves had given to Gauntlgrym.

He saw the forge room, the legendary Forge of Gauntlgrym, and he was inspired.

And he saw the primordial, freed of the great depths and trapped in the fire chamber beneath the forge, and he was afraid.

That was no orc king, no giant, no dragon even. It was an earth-bound godhead, a literal force of nature that could alter the shape of continents.

What could he do against that?

He witnessed the flood of water as the tendrils of the Hosttower were first activated, bringing nourishment and ocean power to the trapped elementals. He saw and heard the great rush of living water rumble into the critical chamber, dive over the rim, and spin powerfully around the shaft above the primordial forevermore-or so they all hoped.

He saw the Forge of Gauntlgrym light for the first time with primordial power, its glow reflecting on the awe-stricken faces of dwarf and elf alike, and he knew that he was at the moment of the greatest glory his people had ever known.

Then he was back in the audience chamber, a thousand dwarves hoisting foamy mugs high in celebration. Tears streaked the king’s face, and Bruenor knew not if they were his or those of his host.

The sound dulled, the image blurred, the forms wavered and lost all color. Then the sound around him was replaced by the din of battle, and the dwarves of old were ghosts, and nothing more.

And he was Bruenor Battlehammer again, just Bruenor, sitting on a throne in the middle of a circular room while his four companions fought for their lives against a swarm of tall, slender humanoid creatures, standing as men and holding spears and tridents as men might, but with fire flaring and bursting angrily around their feet-no, not feet, but tails. They were as men only from the waist up. The rest of them slithered across the rough stone like snakes. Long spikes of black bone bristled from their backs, and twisted antlers grew from their heads.

A vague old memory came to Bruenor then. He knew them-had heard tell of them. Elemental-kin. Salamanders.

Bruenor’s eyes opened wide, and with a roar he leaped from the throne, setting his shield and pulling forth his axe as he went. To those around him who turned at his yell, friend and foe alike, the dwarf seemed to swell with power and strength, his muscles thickening, his eyes flaring with an inner fire.

He charged into the nearest group of salamanders with abandon, great sweeps of his axe throwing them aside. A trident stabbed at him from the left, but his shield arm was quicker, rushing across to intercept and deflect the blow up high, and as Bruenor followed through, his axe swept across with tremendous power.

The creature fell apart, cut in half at the waist.

As if the gods of the dwarves themselves had settled into King Bruenor, he roared on, cutting a swath of devastation. And he called allies to his side-not Drizzt and the others, but the ghosts of Gauntlgrym.

“By Clangeddin’s hard arse,” Athrogate muttered from back near the throne.

The dwarf fought to keep the snake-men away from Jarlaxle, as the drow mercenary concentrated on Drizzt and Dahlia, looking for openings as they weaved, leaped, and spun back and forth past each other. Whenever he found such an opening, the agile dark elf flung a dagger through it, almost unerringly striking one of the creatures.

The four of them fought well together-much like three of them had back at Spirit Soaring those many years before-yet King Bruenor alone was cutting a wider swath of devastation through the massing salamanders.

Drizzt had begun to swing toward his friend as soon as Bruenor had entered the fray. Dahlia, playing off his every move, followed, but Drizzt had quickly changed his mind. Watching Bruenor at that moment, he held back and focused instead on holding his ground.

The tide of battle turned quickly as more and more dwarf ghosts filtered into the chamber. On the far side of the room, the salamanders tried to surround Bruenor, and seemed to be doing just that. Drizzt cried out for his friend, and second-guessed his earlier decision not to help him. He thought Bruenor doomed, and believed it was his own hesitance that had guaranteed that.

But Bruenor faced his enemies with wild eyes and a wicked grin. He lifted his foot, stomped it down hard, and an explosion of lightning flashed out in a circle around him, throwing salamanders through the air like dry leaves in a strong gale.

“What in the Nine Hells?” Athrogate asked.

“Drizzt?” a clearly befuddled Jarlaxle inquired.

Beside Drizzt, Dahlia, whose own weapon could loose such bursts of lightning, gasped in disbelief.

And Drizzt Do’Urden could only shake his head.

High in the shadows of the great room, another set of eyes watched the battle unfolding with great hope that the primordial’s minions would do his work for him. Perhaps he, Dor’crae, could fly right back out of the chamber and back to the caves to tell Valindra and the Ashmadai to turn back for Neverwinter Wood.

He dearly hoped that would be the case.

But then Dor’crae stared with increasing disbelief at the spectacle of the godly-empowered Bruenor Battlehammer, and he watched the tide of battle quickly turn. He looked back at the throne and was afraid. Events seemed to be moving past him, first with Valindra and the powerful gift Sylora had given her, then the sight of the mighty dwarf…

He glanced back toward the cavern beyond Gauntlgrym, the approach the Ashmadai and Valindra would soon take, and he considered Sylora’s words of warning, and the power she had entrusted to the lich. The thought of trusting Valindra, and more than that, of trusting the power she had been given, made Dor’crae want to flee back to Thay and take his chances with Szass Tam.

He turned back to the battle, hoping against all reason that the minions of the primordial would somehow find a way to put an end to the threat to his mistress’s plans.

That blast of godlike power proved the end of the assault, with the salamanders rushing for any exit they could find as fast as they could find them, leaving fiery trails in their wakes.

Bruenor chased one group, leaping high and fully thirty feet across the stones to land in their midst, his axe chopping them down viciously, one after another. The dwarf seemed to get stabbed several times in that mad rush, each drawing a cry of pain from Drizzt, who rushed to join him.

And Bruenor seemed not to notice any of the strikes.

By the time the four others arrived by his side, the dwarf king stood amidst half a dozen slain creatures. The rest of the beasts had fled the room, and the dwarf ghosts had given chase.

Bruenor blinked repeatedly as he considered his friends.

“What did you do?” Jarlaxle asked.

Bruenor could only shrug.

Drizzt studied his friend more closely, even pulling aside Bruenor’s collar, but he could find no wound.

“How did you do that?” Dahlia asked. “Stomping your foot as if you were a god of lightning?”

Bruenor shrugged and shook his head. He seemed quite perplexed for a few moments, but then just shook his head again and let it all go, turning to Jarlaxle instead.

“I know where to put yer bowls,” he said to Jarlaxle.

“How could you know?”

Bruenor considered that for a short while. How indeed?

“Gauntlgrym telled me,” he said with a grin.