The Halfling's Gem

by R. A. Salvatore

  erched in his favorite corner, across Rogues Circle from the Spitting Camel, Dondon watched as the elf, the last of the four, moved into the inn to join his friends. The halfling pulled out a little pocket mirror to check his disguise—all the dirt and scruff marks seemed in the right places; his clothes were far too large, like those a waif would pull off an unconscious drunk in an ally; and his hair was appropriately tousled and snarled, as if it hadn’t been combed in years.

  Dondon looked longingly to the moon and inspected his chin with his fingers. Still hairless but tingling, he thought. The halfling took a deep breath, and then another, and fought back the lycanthropic urges. In the year he had joined Rassiter’s ranks, he had learned to sublimate those fiendish urges fairly well, but he hoped that he could finish his business quickly this night. The moon was especially bright.

  People of the street, locals, gave an approving wink as they passed the halfling, knowing the master con artist to be on the prowl once more. With his reputation, Dondon had long become ineffective against the regulars of Calimport’s streets, but those characters knew enough to keep their mouths shut about the halfling to strangers. Dondon always managed to surround himself with the toughest rogues of the city, and blowing his cover to an intended victim was a serious crime indeed!

  The halfling leaned back against the corner of a building to observe as the four friends emerged from the Spitting Camel a short time later.

  For Drizzt and his companions, Calimport’s night proved as unnatural as the sights they had witnessed during the day. Unlike the northern cities, where nighttime activities were usually relegated to the many taverns, the bustle of Calimport’s streets only increased after the sun went down. Even the lowly peasants took on a different demeanor, suddenly mysterious and sinister.

  The only section of the lane that remained uncluttered by the hordes was the area in front of the unmarked structure on the back side of the circle: the guildhouse. As in the daylight, bums sat against the building’s walls on either side of its single door, but now there were two more guards farther off to either side.

  “If Regis is in that place, we’ve got to find our way in,” Catti-brie observed.

  “No doubt that Regis is in there,” Drizzt replied. “Our hunt should start with Entreri.”

  “We’ve come to find Regis,” Catti-brie reminded him, casting a disappointed glance his way. Drizzt quickly clarified his answer to her satisfaction.

  “The road to Regis lies through the assassin,” he said. “Entreri has seen to that. You heard his words at the chasm of Garumn’s Gorge. Entreri will not allow us to find Regis until we have dealt with him.”

  Catti-brie could not deny the drow’s logic. When Entreri had snatched Regis from them back in Mithral Hall, he had gone to great pains to bait Drizzt into the chase, as though his capture of Regis was merely part of a game he was playing against Drizzt.

  “Where to begin?” Bruenor huffed in frustration. He had expected the street to be quieter, offering them a better opportunity to scope out the task before them. He had hoped that they might even complete their business that very night.

  “Right where we are,” Drizzt replied, to Bruenor’s amazement.

  “Learn the smell of the street,” the drow explained. “Watch the moves of its people and hear their sounds. Prepare your mind for what is to come.”

  “Time, elf!” Bruenor growled back. “Me heart tells me that Rumblebelly’s liken to have a whip at his back as we stand here smelling the stinkin’ street!”

  “We need not seek Entreri,” Wulfgar cut in, following Drizzt’s line of thinking. “The assassin will find us.”

  Almost on cue, as if Wulfgar’s statement had reminded them all of their dangerous surroundings, the four of them turned their eyes outward from their little huddle and watched the bustle of the street around them. Dark eyes peered at them from every corner; each person that ambled past cast them a sidelong glance. Calimport was not unaccustomed to strangers—it was a trading port, after all—but these four would stand out clearly on the streets of any city in the Realms. Recognizing their vulnerability, Drizzt decided to get them moving. He started off down Rogues Circle, motioning for the others to follow.

  Before Wulfgar, at the tail of the forming line, had even taken a step, however, a childish voice called out to him from the shadows of the Spitting Camel.

  “Hey,” it beckoned, “are you looking for a hit?”

  Wulfgar, not understanding, moved a bit closer and peered into the gloom. There stood Dondon, seeming a young, disheveled human boy.

  “What’re yer fer?” Bruenor asked, moving beside Wulfgar.

  Wulfgar pointed to the corner.

  “What’re yer fer?” Bruenor asked again, now targeting the diminutive, shadowy figure.

  “Looking for a hit?” Dondon reiterated, moving out from the gloom.

  “Bah!” Bruenor snorted, waving his hand “Just a boy. Get ye gone, little one. We’ve no time for play!” He grabbed Wulfgar’s arm and turned away.

  “I can set you up,” Dondon said after them.

  Bruenor kept right on walking, Wulfgar beside him, but now Drizzt had stopped, noticing his companions’ delay, and had heard the boy’s last statement.

  “Just a boy!” Bruenor explained to the drow as he approached.

  “A street boy,” Drizzt corrected, stepping around Bruenor and Wulfgar and starting back, “with eyes and ears that miss little.”

  “How can you set us up?” Drizzt whispered to Dondon while moving close to the building, out of sight of the too curious hordes.

  Dondon shrugged. “There is plenty to steal; a whole bunch of merchants came in today. What are you looking for?”

  Bruenor, Wulfgar, and Catti-brie took up defensive positions around Drizzt and the boy, their eyes outward to the streets but their ears trained on the suddenly interesting conversation.

  Drizzt crouched low and led Dondon’s gaze with his own toward the building at the end of the circle.

  “Pook’s house,” Dondon remarked offhandedly. “Toughest house in Calimport.”

  “But it has a weakness,” Drizzt prompted.

  “They all do,” Dondon replied calmly, playing perfectly the role of a cocky street survivor.

  “Have you ever been in there?”

  “Maybe I have.”

  “Have you ever seen a hundred gold pieces?”

  Dondon let his eyes light up, and he purposely and pointedly shifted his weight from one foot to the other.

  “Get him back in the rooms,” Catti-brie said. “Ye be drawing too many looks out here.”

  Dondon readily agreed, but he shot Drizzt a warning in the form of an icy stare and proclaimed, “I can count to a hundred!”

  When they got back to the room, Drizzt and Bruenor fed Dondon a steady stream of coins while the halfling laid out the way to a secret back entrance to the guildhouse. “Even the thieves,” Dondon proclaimed, “do not know of it!”

  The friends gathered closely, eager for the details.

  Dondon made the whole operation sound easy.

  Too easy.

  Drizzt rose and turned away, hiding his chuckle from the informant. Hadn’t they just been talking about Entreri making contact? Barely minutes before this enlightening boy so conveniently arrived to guide them.

  “Wulfgar, take off his shoes,” Drizzt said. His three friends turned to him curiously. Dondon squirmed in his chair.

  “His shoes,” Drizzt said again, turning back and pointing to Dondon’s feet. Bruenor, so long a friend of a halfling, caught the drow’s reasoning and didn’t wait for Wulfgar to respond. The dwarf grabbed at Dondon’s left boot and pulled it off, revealing a thick patch of foot hair—the foot of a halfling.

  Dondon shrugged helplessly and sank back in his chair. The meeting was taking the exact course that Entreri had predicted.

  “He said he could set us up,” Catti-brie remarked sarcastically, twisting Dondon’s words into a more sinister light.
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br />   “Who sent ye?” Bruenor growled.

  “Entreri,” Wulfgar answered for Dondon. “He works for Entreri, sent here to lead us into a trap.” Wulfgar leaned over Dondon, blocking out the candlelight with his huge frame.

  Bruenor pushed the barbarian aside and took his place. With his boyish looks, Wulfgar simply could not be as imposing as the pointy-nosed, red-bearded, fire-eyed dwarven fighter with the battered helm. “So, ye little sneakster,” Bruenor growled into Dondon’s face. “Now we deal for yer stinkin’ tongue! Wag it the wrong way, and I’ll be cutting it out!”

  Dondon paled—he had that act down pat—and began to tremble visibly.

  “Calm yerself,” Catti-brie said to Bruenor, playing out a lighter role this time. “Suren ye’ve scared the little one enough.”

  Bruenor shoved her back, turning enough away from Dondon to toss her a wink. “Scared him?” the dwarf balked. He brought his axe up to his shoulder. “More than scarin’ him’s in me plans!”

  “Wait! Wait!” Dondon begged, groveling as only a halfling could. “I was just doing what the assassin made me do, and paid me to do.”

  “You know Entreri?” Wulfgar asked.

  “Everybody knows Entreri,” Dondon replied. “And in Calimport, everybody heeds Entreri’s commands!”

  “Forget Entreri!” Bruenor growled in his face. “Me axe’ll stop that one from hurting yerself.”

  “You think you can kill Entreri?” Dondon shot back, though he knew the true meaning of Bruenor’s claim.

  “Entreri can’t hurt a corpse,” Bruenor replied grimly. “Me axe’ll beat him to yer head!”

  “It is you he wants,” Dondon said to Drizzt, seeking a calmer situation.

  Drizzt nodded, but remained silent. Something came across as out of place in this out of place meeting.

  “I choose no sides,” Dondon pleaded to Bruenor, seeing no relief forthcoming from Drizzt. “I only do what I must to survive.”

  “And to survive now, ye’re going to tell us the way in,” Bruenor said. “The safe way in.”

  “The place is a fortress,” Dondon shrugged. “No way is safe.” Bruenor started slipping closer, his scowl deepening.

  “But, if I had to try,” the halfling blurted, “I would try through the sewers.”

  Bruenor looked around at his friends.

  “It seems correct,” Wulfgar remarked.

  Drizzt studied the halfling a moment longer, searching for some clue in Dondon’s darting eyes. “It is correct,” the drow said at length.

  “So he saved his neck,” said Catti-brie, “but what are we to do with him? Take him along?”

  “Ayuh,” said Bruenor with a sly look. “He’ll be leading!”

  “No,” replied Drizzt, to the amazement of his companions. “The halfling did as we bade. Let him leave.”

  “And go straight off to tell Entreri what has happened?” Wulfgar said.

  “Entreri would not understand,” Drizzt replied. He looked Dondon in the eye, giving no indication to the halfling that he had figured out his little ploy within a ploy. “Nor would he forgive.”

  “Me heart says we take him,” Bruenor remarked.

  “Let him go,” Drizzt said calmly. “Trust me.”

  Bruenor snorted and dropped his axe to his side, grumbling as he moved to open the door. Wulfgar and Catti-brie exchanged concerned glances but stepped out of the way.

  Dondon didn’t hesitate, but Bruenor stepped in front of him as he reached the door. “If I see yer face again,” the dwarf threatened, “or any face ye might be wearin’, I’ll chop ye down!”

  Dondon slipped around and backed into the hall, never taking his eyes off the dangerous dwarf, then he darted down the hall, shaking his head at how perfectly Entreri had described the encounter, at how well the assassin knew those friends, particularly the drow.

  Suspecting the truth about the entire encounter, Drizzt understood that Bruenor’s final threat carried little weight to the wily halfling. Dondon had faced them down through both lies without the slightest hint of a slip.

  But Drizzt nodded approvingly as Bruenor, still scowling, turned back into the room, for the drow also knew that the threat, if nothing else, had made Bruenor feel more secure.

  On Drizzt’s suggestion, they all settled down for some sleep. With the clamor of the streets, they would never be able to slip unnoticed into one of the sewer grates. But the crowds would likely thin out as the night waned and the guard changed from the dangerous rogues of evening to the peasants of the hot day.

  Drizzt alone did not find sleep. He sat propped by the door of the room, listening for sounds of any approach and lulled into meditations by the rhythmic breathing of his companions. He looked down at the mask hanging around his neck. So simple a lie, and he could walk freely throughout the world.

  But would he then be trapped within the web of his own deception? What freedom could he find in denying the truth about himself?

  Drizzt looked over at Catti-brie, peacefully slumped in the room’s single bed, and smiled. There was indeed wisdom in innocence, a vein of truth in the idealism of untainted perceptions.

  He could not disappoint her.

  Drizzt sensed a deepening of the outside gloom. The moon had set. He moved to the room’s window and peeked out into the street. Still the night people wandered, but they were fewer now, and the night neared its end. Drizzt roused his companions; they could not afford any more delays. They stretched away their weariness, checked their gear, and moved back down to the street.

  Rogues Circle was lined with several iron sewer grates that looked as though they were designed more to keep the filthy things of the sewers underground than as drains for the sudden waters of the rare but violent rainstorms that hit the city. The friends chose one in the alley beside their inn, out of the main way of the street but close enough to the guildhouse that they could probably find their underground way without too much trouble.

  “The boy can lift it,” Bruenor remarked, waving Wulfgar to the spot. Wulfgar bent low and grasped the iron.

  “Not yet,” Drizzt whispered, glancing around for suspicious eyes. He motioned Catti-brie to the end of the ally, back along Rogues Circle, and he darted off down the darker side. When he was satisfied that all was clear, he waved back to Bruenor. The dwarf looked to Catti-brie, who nodded her approval.

  “Lift it, boy,” Bruenor said, “and be quiet about it!”

  Wulfgar grasped the iron tightly and sucked in a deep draft of air for balance. His huge arms pumped red with blood as he heaved, and a grunt escaped his lips. Even so, the grate resisted his tugging.

  Wulfgar looked at Bruenor in disbelief, then redoubled his efforts, his face now flushing red. The grate groaned in protest, but came up only a few inches from the ground.

  “Suren somethings holdin’ it down,” Bruenor said, leaning over to inspect it.

  A “clink” of snapping chain was the dwarf’s only warning as the grate broke free, sending Wulfgar sprawling backward. The lifting iron clipped Bruenor’s forehead, knocking his helmet off and dropping him on the seat of his pants. Wulfgar, still clutching the grate, crashed heavily and loudly into the wall of the inn.

  “Ye blasted, foolheaded …” Bruenor started to grumble, but Drizzt and Catti-brie, rushing to his aid, quickly reminded him of the secrecy of their mission.

  “Why would they chain a sewer grate?” Catti-brie asked.

  Wulfgar dusted himself off. “From the inside,” he added. “It seems that something down there wants to keep the city out.”

  “We shall know soon enough,” Drizzt remarked. He dropped down beside the open hole, slipping his legs in. “Prepare a torch,” he said. “I will summon you if all is clear.”

  Catti-brie caught the eager gleam in the drow’s eyes and looked at him with concern.

  “For Regis,” Drizzt assured her, “and only for Regis.” Then he was gone, into the blackness. Black like the lightless tunnels of his homeland.

  The other t
hree heard a slight splash as he touched down, then all was quiet.

  Many anxious moments passed. “Put a light to the torch,” Bruenor whispered to Wulfgar.

  Catti-brie caught Wulfgar’s arm to stop him. “Faith,” she said to Bruenor.

  “Too long,” the dwarf muttered. “Too quiet.”

  Catti-brie held on to Wulfgar’s arm for another second, until Drizzt’s soft voice drifted up to them. “Clear,” the drow said. “Come down quickly.”

  Bruenor took the torch from Wulfgar. “Come last,” he said, “and slide the grate back behind ye. No need in tellin’ the world where we went!”

  The first thing the companions noticed when the torchlight entered the sewer was the chain that had held the grate down. It was fairly new, without doubt, and fastened to a locking box constructed on the sewer’s wall.

  “Me thinking’s that we’re not alone,” Bruenor whispered.

  Drizzt glanced around, sharing the dwarf’s uneasiness. He dropped the mask from his face, a drow again in an environ suited for a drow. “I will lead,” he said, “at the edge of the light. Keep ready.” He padded away, picking his silent steps along the edge of the murky stream of water that rolled slowly down the center of the tunnel.

  Bruenor came next with the torch, then Catti-brie and Wulfgar. The barbarian had to stoop low to keep his head clear of the slimy ceiling. Rats squeaked and scuttled away from the strange light, and darker things took silent refuge under the shield of the water. The tunnel meandered this way and that, and a maze of side passages opened up every few feet. Sounds of trickling water only worsened the confusion, leading the friends for a moment, then coming louder at their side, then louder still from across the way.

  Bruenor shook the diversions clear of his thoughts, ignored the muck and the fetid stench, and concentrated on keeping his track straight behind the shadowy figure that darted in and out at the front edge of his torchlight. He turned a confusing, multicornered intersection and caught sight of the figure suddenly off to his side.

  Even as he turned to follow, he realized that Drizzt still had to be up front.