The Crystal Shard (56 page)

Kemp flashed an obscene gesture at the barbarian and stalked away. Regis nearly doubled over with laughter.

Drizzt recognized the words, but was puzzled as to why Wulfgar had spoken them to Kemp. “You once told me that those words were an old tundra battle cry,” he remarked to the barbarian. “Why would you offer them to the man you most despise?”

Wulfgar stammered over an explanation that would get him out of this jam, but Regis answered for him.

“Battle cry?” the halfling exclaimed. “That is an old barbarian housemother’s curse, usually reserved for adulterous old barbarian housefathers.” The drow’s lavender eyes narrowed on the barbarian as Regis continued. “It means: May the fleas of a thousand reindeer nest in your genitals.”

Bruenor broke down into laughter, Wulfgar soon joining him. Drizzt couldn’t help but go along.

“Come, the day is long,” the drow said. “Let us begin this adventure—it should prove interesting!”

“Where will you go?” Regis asked somberly. A small part of the halfling actually envied his friends; he had to admit that he would miss them.

“To Bremen, first,” replied Drizzt. “We shall complete our provisions there and strike out to the southwest.” “Luskan?”

“Perhaps, if the fates deem it.”

“Good speed,” Regis offered as the three companions started out without further delay.

Regis watched them disappear, wondering how he had ever picked such foolish friends. He shrugged it away and turned back to his palace—there was plenty of food left over from lunch.

He was stopped before he got through the door.

“First Citizen!” came a call from the street. The voice belonged to a warehouseman from the southern section of the city, where the merchant caravans loaded and unloaded. Regis waited for his approach.

“A man, First Citizen,” the warehouseman said, bowing apologetically for disturbing so important a person. “Asking about you. He claims to be a representative from the Heroes Society in Luskan, sent to request your presence at their next meeting. He said that he would pay you well.”

“His name ?”

“He gave none, just this!” The warehouseman opened a small pouch of gold.

It was all that Regis needed to see. He left at once for the rendezvous with the man from Luskan.

Once again, sheer luck saved the halfling’s life, for he saw the stranger before the stranger saw him. He recognized the man at once, though he hadn’t seen him in years, by the emerald-encrusted dagger hilt protruding from the sheath on his hip. Regis had often contemplated stealing that beautiful weapon, but even he had a limit to his foolhardiness. The dagger belonged to Artemis Entreri.

Pasha Pook’s prime assassin.

The three companions left Bremen before dawn the next day. Anxious to begin the adventure, they made good time and were far out into the tundra when the first rays of the sun peeked over the eastern horizon behind them.

Still, Bruenor was not surprised when he noticed Regis scrambling across the empty plain to catch up with them.

“Got ‘imself into trouble again, or I’m a bearded gnome,” the dwarf snickered to Wulfgar and Drizzt.

“Well met,” said Drizzt. “But haven’t we already said our farewells?”

“I decided that I could not let Bruenor run off into trouble without me being there to pull him out,” Regis puffed, trying to catch his breath.

“Yer comin?” groaned Bruenor. “Ye’ve brought no supplies, fool halfling!”

“I don’t eat much,” Regis pleaded, an edge of desperation creeping into his voice.

“Bah! Ye eat more’n the three of us together! But no mind, we’ll let ye tag along anyway.”

The halfling’s face brightened visibly, and Drizzt suspected that the dwarf’s guess about trouble wasn’t far off the mark.

“The four of us, then!” proclaimed Wulfgar. “One to represent each of the four common races: Bruenor for the dwarves, Regis for the halflings, Drizzt Do’Urden for the elves, and myself for the humans. A fitting troupe!”

“I hardly think the elves would choose a drow to represent them,” Drizzt remarked.

Bruenor snorted. “Ye think the halflings’d choose Rumblebelly for their champion?”

“You’re crazy, dwarf,” retorted Regis.

Bruenor dropped his shield to the ground, leaped around Wulfgar, and squared off before Regis. His face contorted in mock rage as he grasped Regis by the shoulders and hoisted him into the air.

“That’s right, Rumblebelly!” Bruenor cried wildly. “Crazy I am! an’ never cross one what’s crazier than yerself!”

Drizzt and Wulfgar looked at each other with knowing smiles.

It was indeed going to be an interesting adventure.

And with the rising sun at their back, their shadows standing long before them, they started off on their way.

To find Mithral Hall.

R.A. Salvatore was born in Massachusetts in 1959. His love affair with fantasy, and with literature in general, began during his sophomore year of college when he was given a copy of J.R.R Tolkien’s
The Lord of the Rings
as a Christmas gift. He promptly changed his major from computer science to journalism. He received a Bachelor of Science Degree in Communications in 1981, then returned for the degree he always cherished, the Bachelor of Arts in English. He began writing seriously in 1982, penning the manuscript that would become
Echoes of the Fourth Magic
.

His first published novel was
The Crystal Shard
from TSR in 1988 and he is still best known as the creator of the dark elf Drizzt, one of fantasy’s most beloved characters.

THE LEGEND OF DRIZZT
BOOK IV
THE CRYSTAL SHARD

©1988 TSR, Inc.
©2005 Wizards of the Coast, Inc.

All characters in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

This book is protected under the copyright laws of the United States of America. Any reproduction or unauthorized use of the material or artwork contained herein is prohibited without the express written permission of Wizards of the Coast, Inc.

Published by Wizards of the Coast, Inc.
FORGOTTEN REALMS, WIZARDS OF THE COAST
, and their respective logos are trademarks of Wizards of the Coast, Inc., in the U.S.A. and other countries.

eISBN: 978-0-7869-5404-9

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