The Last Threshold: Neverwinter Saga, Book IV

by R. A. Salvatore

  Drizzt had only glimpsed that briefly, in the form of a broken and twisted young tiefling warlock and Dahlia’s reaction to that creature, Effron.

  “What about you?” Drizzt replied. “You have said little in the tendays since we left Gauntlgrym.”

  “Perhaps I have nothing to say.” Dahlia clamped her jaw, as if she were afraid of what might come spilling out should she lose the tiniest bit of discipline. “I have the ears,” Dahlia said and began to walk away.

  He followed her out of the camp and into the forest once more, moving slowly and bending low, looking for broken stems or footprints. For a long while she walked, finally coming to rest in a sunny clearing where a single, half-buried stone provided a comfortable seat.

  Dahlia reclined, removed her hat, and ran her fingers through her hair, allowing the sunbeams to splash over her face.

  “Come along,” he bade her. “We must learn who or what killed those goblins. There’s a vampire about, so you claim.”

  Dahlia shrugged, showing no interest.

  “Or a battlerager,” Drizzt went on stubbornly. “And if it is the latter, then we would do well to find him. A powerful ally.”

  “So I thought of my vampire lover,” Dahlia said, and she seemed to take some pleasure when Drizzt grimaced at the reference.

  “Will we never speak of what happened in Gauntlgrym?” Drizzt asked suddenly. “The twisted tiefling accused you of murder.” Dahlia’s expression abruptly changed. She snapped a glare over him.

  Dahlia swallowed hard and did not turn her stare from Drizzt for an instant as he took a seat beside her.

  “He claimed Alegni was his father,” Drizzt pressed.

  “Shut up,” Dahlia warned.

  “He called you his mother.”

  Her eyes bored through him, and Drizzt expected her to reach out and claw at his face, or to explode into a tirade of shouted curses.

  But she didn’t, and that, perhaps, was more unsettling still. She just sat there, staring. A cloud passed overhead, blocking the sunlight, sending a shadow across Dahlia’s pretty face.

  “Implausible, of course, likely impossible,” Drizzt said quietly, trying to back away.

  Dahlia held perfectly still. He could almost hear her heartbeat, or was it his own? Many moments slipped past. Drizzt lost count of them.

  “It’s true,” she admitted, and now it was Drizzt who looked as if he had been slapped.

  “Cannot be,” he finally managed to reply. “He is a young man, but you’re a young woman—”

  “I was barely more than a child when the shadow of Herzgo Alegni fell over my clan,” Dahlia said, so very softly that Drizzt could hardly hear the words. “Twenty years ago.”

  Drizzt’s thoughts spun in circles, very easily coming to the dark conclusion of Dahlia’s leading words. He tried to respond, but found himself sputtering helplessly in the face of a horror so far beyond him. He thought back to his own youth, to his graduation at Melee Magthere, when his own sister had advanced upon him so lewdly, forcing him to run away with revulsion.

  For a moment, he thought to tell that tale to Dahlia, to try to claim some kinship to her pain, but then realized that his own experience surely paled beside her trauma.

  And so he sputtered, and finally he reached out a hand to her to pull her close.

  She resisted, but she was trembling. The tears that rolled from her blue eyes were formed in profound sadness, he knew, even as she issued a low growl to cover her weakness.

  But denial couldn’t hold, and anger couldn’t cover the scar.

  Drizzt tried to pull her close, but she spun away and scrambled to her feet, walking off a few steps, her back to him.

  “So now you know,” she said, her voice as cold as winter’s deepest ice.

  “Dahlia,” he pleaded, rising and taking a step her way. Should he go to her and grab her, and crush her close against him, and whisper to her that she might let the pain flow freely? Did she want that? She didn’t seem to, and yet, she had let Entreri kiss …

  With a growl of his own, Drizzt dismissed that ridiculous jealousy. This wasn’t about him, wasn’t about his relationship with Dahlia, and surely wasn’t about her moments with Entreri. This was about Dahlia, and her pain so profound.

  He didn’t know what to say, or what to do. He felt like a child. He had grown up in a place of deceit and murder and treachery as a way of life, perhaps the vilest city in all the world, and so he thought that he had fully inoculated himself against the scars of depravity and inhumanity. He was Drizzt Do’Urden, the hero of Icewind Dale, the hero of Mithral Hall, who had fought a thousand battles and killed a thousand enemies, who had watched dear friends die, who had loved and lost. Ever level-headed, hardened to the dark realities of life …

  So he had thought.

  So he had lied to himself.

  This combination of emotions roiling within Dahlia was quite beyond him at that strange moment. This was darkness compounded in darkness, irredeemable and outside any comfort zones Drizzt might have constructed through his own less-complicated experiences. Dahlia had suffered something to her core, a violation beyond even an enemy’s sword, with which Drizzt could not empathize and of which Drizzt couldn’t even understand.

  “Come,” Dahlia bade him, her voice even and strong. “Let us find this killer.” She walked off into the forest.

  Drizzt watched her with surprise, until he recognized that she was now eager for the hunt for no better reason than to find an enemy to battle. The emotions Drizzt had stirred went too deep and Dahlia couldn’t find comfort in Drizzt’s hesitant embrace and awkward words, and so she needed to find someone, something, to destroy.

  He had missed his moment, Drizzt understood. He had failed her.

  The monk stood in the main square of Neverwinter, staring at his hands as he turned them around before his eyes.

  “That a fightin’ practice?” Ambergris asked.

  “I’m looking for hints of shadowstuff,” Brother Afafrenfere replied curtly. “What have you done to me, dwarf?”

  “I telled ye,” said Ambergris. “Can’t have ye lookin’ the part of a shade if ye’re to walk the lands o’ Toril, now can I?”

  “This is not illusion,” Afafrenfere protested. “My skin is lightening.”

  “Is yer heart, then?” the female dwarf asked.

  Afafrenfere glared at her.

  “How long was ye a shade?”

  “I gave myself to the Shadowfell,” Afafrenfere protested.

  “Bah, but ye fell in love an’ nothin’ more,” the dwarf chided. “How long?”

  “You cannot—”

  “How long?”

  “Three years,” Afafrenfere admitted.

  “So ye spent the better part of a quarter-century here, and living where, I might be askin’, except that I’m already knowin’.”

  “Oh, are you?”

  “Aye, ye got yer training in the mountains aside Damara.”

  Afafrenfere stepped back as if she had just slugged him. “How could you—?”

  “Ye got a yellow rose painted inside yer forearm, ye dolt. Ye think I’m for missin’ a clue like that? And I telled ye true back there in Gauntlgrym. Meself’s from Citadel Adbar, and Adbar’s knowing o’ the Monastery o’ the Yellow Rose.”

  “It doesn’t matter,” Afafrenfere insisted. “I gave myself willingly to Cavus Dun.”

  “To Parbid, ye mean.”

  “To Cavus Dun and the Shadowfell,” Afafrenfere growled at her. “And now you would take the shadowstuff from me.”

  “Ye ain’t no damned shade,” Ambergris insisted. “No more’n meself. Ye’re a human, as ye was afore ye ran to darkness. Ye’re actin’ like I’m stealin’ from ye, but know that I’m savin’ ye, from yerself, so it’d be seemin’. Ain’t nothin’ there in the darkness for ye, boy. Ye ain’t a born shade, and so ye ain’t to get yer desserts there among them grayskins.”

  “And you were just a spy,” Afafrenfere said. “A traitorous spy.”
>
  “Might be,” said Ambergris, though it was surely more complicated than that. She didn’t feel much like explaining herself to the young monk at this time, however. Amber Gristle O’Maul hadn’t chosen to go to the Shadowfell to serve as a spy for Citadel Adbar. The adjudicators of Citadel Adbar had sentenced her to that mission for serious indiscretions—it was that or a ball and chain, a mining pick, and twenty years of breaking stone in the lowest mines of the dwarven complex.

  “Be happy I was,” the dwarf said. “For if not, then be knowin’ that Drizzt Do’Urden’d’ve carved yerself into little monk bits.”

  “So now I’m supposed to forgive him?” Afafrenfere asked incredulously. “Forgive the fiend who killed Parbid? And I am supposed to forgive you, the traitor, the fake shade? You expect me to change my skin color and pretend that none of that happened?”

  “If ye’re smart, ye’ll be trying to forget the whole o’ that last three years,” Ambergris replied.

  Afafrenfere took a threatening step toward her, but the powerful dwarf didn’t back away an inch, and didn’t blink.

  “Look, boy,” she said, waggling a thick finger in Afafrenfere’s scowling face, “and while ye’re looking, look into yer heart. Ye was never of that dark bunch, not as kin or kind. And ye’re knowin’ it. Ye might not be no paladin-monk, like them others o’ Yellow Rose, but nor are ye any gray-skinned assassin, killin’ yer own at the demands o’ them Netheril dogs.”

  “He killed Parbid!” Afafrenfere yelled, and Ambergris was glad to hear that argument alone, for it confirmed her suspicions nicely.

  “Parbid attacked him and got what most attackin’ that particular drow are sure to be gettin’,” Ambergris snarled right back, and now she went up on her toes and put her fat nose right against Afafrenfere’s as she spoke. “Are ye holdin’ a blood feud against one who did no more than defend himself from yer own attack?”

  Afafrenfere straightened a bit, moving his face away, but Ambergris pursued stubbornly.

  “Well, are ye? Are ye really that stupid? Are ye really that ready and eager to die?”

  “Oh, fie!” Afafrenfere wailed, throwing his forearm across his eyes as he turned away.

  “And don’t ye give me none o’ them Afafrenfere dramatics!” the dwarf scolded. “I got no time for ’em!”

  Afafrenfere turned on her, scowling more than ever.

  “Good enough then!” the dwarf roared, and she stomped her booted foot on the cobblestones. “Ye wantin’ a gate to the Shadowfell and I’ll make ye one, and good enough for ye, and on yer word alone that ye won’t be rattin’ me out to Cavus Dun or any others.”

  That had Afafrenfere off-balance, obviously. “Send me back?” he asked rather sheepishly.

  “Not soundin’ like music to ye, is it?” the dwarf pressed. “Now that yer Parbid’s dead, what grayskin’s to stand beside ye, human?”

  Afafrenfere swallowed hard.

  “Ye ne’er was o’ that place,” Ambergris said quietly. “Quit lying to yerself the way ye’re lyin’ to me. Harder to do that, ye know. Ye never wanted to go to the Shadowfell. Ye never was one o’ them, and ye’re likin’ yer skin lighter than darker.”

  “You presume much.”

  “Be glad that I do, for if I didn’t, I’d’ve tossed ye into the primordial’s mouth behind Glorfathel,” Ambergris replied, and now she was grinning widely, for she knew that she had won, that her presumptions had been correct. For all her threats and bluster, Ambergris truly liked this overly-dramatic, high-prancing young monk. Wherever love, or passion, or confusion, or whatever it was, had led him, Afafrenfere was not a bad sort. He could do a dirty deed if he had to, but it wasn’t the course of first choice for him, as it would have to be were he to survive among the hoodlums and murderers of Cavus Dun.

  “I wish you had,” a third voice replied, and the two turned to see the approach of Artemis Entreri.

  “You were listening to our private conversation?” Afafrenfere accused.

  “Oh, shut up,” the assassin replied. “Half the damned city was listening, no doubt, and I would be quite grateful if you held such conversations truly in private. I have little desire to remind the folk of Neverwinter of my own origins.”

  “How grateful?” the dwarf asked, rolling her fingers eagerly.

  “Grateful enough to let you both live,” Entreri replied.

  Maybe it was a joke.

  Maybe.

  “Where is Drizzt?” Entreri asked.

  “Went out this morning with Dahlia,” Amber replied.

  “Bound for?”

  The dwarf shrugged. “Said he’d be back for dinner.”

  Entreri glanced up at the sky, the sun already nearing its zenith. Then he swiveled about to regard the port, several tall ships bobbing out in the harbor beyond where the river spilled into the Sword Coast.

  “Ye’re leaving us, then?” the dwarf asked.

  “Do have a fine journey,” Afafrenfere added, his tone both sarcastic and hopeful.

  Entreri stared at him for a moment, locking the monk’s gaze with the intimidating expression that had sent so many potential enemies scurrying for dark holes.

  But Brother Afafrenfere did not shy from that look, and met it with one equally resolute.

  That brought a wicked smile to the face of Artemis Entreri.

  “Ah, but ain’t we got enough enemies to fight already?” Amber asked, but the two continued to stare at each other, and both continued to smile.

  “Tell Drizzt to find me if he can when he returns,” Entreri instructed. “Perhaps I will still be within the city, perhaps not.”

  “And where might ye be if not in Neverwinter?” Amber asked.

  “Were that any of your concern, you would already know,” Entreri said, and he turned and walked away.

  Drizzt allowed himself some space from Dahlia as they wove their way through the forest, his emotions still reeling from their troubling conversation. Dahlia pressed ahead, eager for some tangible enemy, some way to free her anger. She didn’t waste a look back a Drizzt, he noted, and he understood that she did not wish to peel the scab from her emotional wound. He had hit her hard with his discussion of Effron, the twisted tiefling. He had pried her tale from her, but perhaps, he now realized, she had not been ready to divulge it.

  Or worse, perhaps Dahlia needed something from him that he didn’t know how to give.

  Drizzt felt very alone at that moment, more so than at any point since Bruenor’s death. Dahlia was more distant, quite possibly forevermore, and Drizzt couldn’t even call upon that one companion he had known and counted on since the day he’d left Menzoberranzan.

  With that troubling thought in mind, the drow dropped his hand into his belt pouch and brought forth the magical figurine. He lifted it up before his eyes and stared into the miniature face of Guenhwyvar—loyal Guenhwyvar, who would not come to his call any longer.

  Without even really thinking about it, he called softly to the cat, “Guenhwyvar, come to me.”

  He stared helplessly at the figurine, feeling the loss profoundly yet again, and so entranced was he that he didn’t even notice the gray mist gathering nearby for many heartbeats, so many indeed, that Guenhwyvar was nearly fully formed beside him before he even noted her presence!

  And she was there beside him then, fully so. Drizzt fell to his knees and wrapped her in a great hug, calling her name repeatedly. The panther nuzzled back against him, replying in kind as only she could.

  “Where have you been?” Drizzt asked. “Guen, how I’ve needed you! How I need you now!”

  It took him a long while to calm down enough to yell out, “Dahlia!” He feared that she’d gone beyond earshot.

  His fears proved unfounded, though, for Dahlia came rushing back through the underbrush to his call, her weapon at the ready. She relaxed immediately when she came through the last line, to see Drizzt and the panther together once more.

  “How?” she asked.

  Drizzt just looked at her and shrugged.
“I called to her and she came to me. Whatever magic was hindering her must have dissipated, or perhaps a tear in the fabric between the planes has repaired itself?”

  Dahlia bent low, stroking Guen’s muscular flank. “It’s good to have her back.”

  Drizzt answered with a smile, and the warmth of that expression only grew as he considered Dahlia stroking the cat’s soft fur. There was serenity on her too-often troubled face, a genuine warmth and kindness. This was the Dahlia that Drizzt wished for as a companion. This was the Dahlia he could care for—perhaps even love.

  For some reason, he thought of Catti-brie, then, and in his mind’s eye, he interposed his memory of his dead wife with the image of Dahlia before him.

  “So we do not need to find the seer,” Dahlia reasoned.

  “So it would seem,” Drizzt agreed and he continued to brush and hug Guenhwyvar.

  “Well, send the cat off on the hunt, then,” Dahlia proposed, her voice and her expression going chilly. “I’m tired of this walking already. Let’s find the goblin killer and be done with this adventure.”

  The suggestion, reasonable as it seemed, rang out like a broken bell in Drizzt’s heart. He wasn’t about to separate from Guenhwyvar if he could help it. And more than that, Dahlia’s tone struck him badly. She didn’t think of this hunt in the forest south of Neverwinter as any grand or important adventure. She was up for a fight—when was she not?—but that was purely for selfish reasons: the need to let free her rage, or more goblin ears for coin. For personal gain of one sort or another.

  Like their lovemaking, he mused. Earlier he had pondered that he was using Dahlia, but was that insincerity not mutual?

  The safety of the road, the betterment of those around her … these emotions did not resonate within Dahlia’s scarred heart. Not to any great degree, at least, and certainly not enough for Drizzt to see her in the same light in which he had once viewed his beloved Catti-brie.

  He looked up at the sky.

  “Night draws near,” he said. “If we hunt a vampire as you suspect, we’re better off meeting it in daylight.” He looked back at Guen and scratched her neck. “We’ll return here tomorrow morning.”