The scene before the panther, with Drizzt only seconds from death, brought to Guenhwyvar a strength unknown to the cat, and unforeseen to the creator of the magical figurine. That instant of terror gave a life to Guenhwyvar beyond the scope of the magic.
By the time Drizzt had opened his eyes, the battle was in full fury. Guenhwyvar leaped atop the cave fisher but nearly went right over, for the monster’s six remaining legs were rooted to the stone by the same goo that held Drizzt fast to the long filament. Undaunted, the cat raked and bit, a ball of frenzy trying to find a break in the fisher’s armored shell.
The monster retaliated with his pincers, flipping them over its back with surprising agility and finding one of Guenhwyvar’s forelegs.
Drizzt was no longer being pulled in; the monster had other business to attend to.
Pincers cut through Guenhwyvar’s soft flesh, but the cat’s blood was not the only dark fluid staining the cave fisher’s back. Powerful feline claws tore up a section of the shell armor, and great teeth plunged beneath it. As the cave fisher’s blood splattered to the stone, its legs began to slip.
Watching the goo under the crablike legs dissolve as the blood of the monster struck it, Drizzt understood what would happen as a line of that same blood made its way down the filament, toward him. He would have to strike fast if the opportunity came; he would have to be ready to help Guenhwyvar.
The fisher stumbled to the side, rolling Guenhwyvar away and spinning Drizzt over in a complete bumping circuit.
Still the blood oozed down the line, and Drizzt felt the filament’s hold loosen from his top hand as the liquid came in contact.
Guenhwyvar was up again, facing the fisher, looking for an attack route through the waiting pincers.
Drizzt’s hand was free. He snapped up a scimitar and dived straight ahead, sinking the tip into the fisher’s side. The monster reeled about, the jolt and the continuing blood flow shaking Drizzt from the filament altogether. The drow was agile enough to find a handhold before he had fallen far, though his drawn scimitar tumbled down to the floor.
Drizzt’s diversion opened the fisher’s defenses for just a moment, and Guenhwyvar did not hesitate. The cat barreled into its foe, teeth finding the same fleshy hold they had already ripped. They went deeper, under the skin, crushing organs as Guenhwyvar’s raking claws kept the pincers at bay.
By the time Drizzt climbed back to the level of the battle, the cave fisher shuddered in the throes of death. Drizzt pulled himself up and rushed to his friend’s side.
Guenhwyvar retreated step for step, its ears flattened and teeth bared.
At first, Drizzt thought that the pain of a wound blinded the cat, but a quick survey dispelled that theory. Guenhwyvar had only one injury, and that was not serious. Drizzt had seen the cat with worse.
Guenhwyvar continued to retreat, continued to growl, as the incessant pounding of Masoj’s command, back again after the instant of terror, hammered at its heart. The cat fought the urges, tried to see Drizzt as an ally, not as prey, but the urges …
“What is wrong, my friend?” Drizzt asked softly, resisting the urge to draw his remaining blade in defense. He dropped to one knee. “Do you not recognize me? How often we have fought together!”
Guenhwyvar crouched low and tamped down its hind legs, preparing, Drizzt knew, to spring. Still Drizzt did not draw his weapon, did nothing to threaten the cat. He had to trust that Guenhwyvar was true to his perceptions, that the panther was everything he believed it to be. What now could be guiding these unfamiliar reactions? What had brought Guenhwyvar out here at this late hour?
Drizzt found his answers when he remembered Matron Malice’s warnings about leaving House Do’Urden.
“Masoj sent you to kill me!” he said bluntly. His tone confused the cat, and it relaxed a bit, not yet ready to spring. “You saved me, Guenhwyvar. You resisted the command.”
Guenhwyvar’s growl sounded in protest.
“You could have let the cave fisher do the deed for you,” Drizzt retorted, “but you did not! You charged in and saved my life! Fight the urges, Guenhwyvar! Remember me as your friend, a better companion than Masoj Hun’ett could ever be!”
Guenhwyvar backed away another step, caught in a pull that it could not yet resolve. Drizzt watched the cat’s ears come up from its head and knew that he was winning the contest.
“Masoj claims ownership,” he went on, confident that the cat, through some intelligence Drizzt could not know, understood the meaning of his words. “I claim friendship. I am your friend, Guenhwyvar, and I’ll not fight against you.”
He leaped forward, arms unthreateningly wide, face and chest fully exposed. “Even at the cost of my own life!”
Guenhwyvar did not strike. Emotions pulled at the cat stronger than any magical spell, those same emotions that had put Guenhwyvar into action when it first saw Drizzt in the cave fisher’s clutches.
Guenhwyvar reared up and leaped out, crashing into Drizzt and knocking him to his back, then burying him in a rush of playful slaps and mock bites.
The two friends had won again; they had defeated two foes this day.
When Drizzt paused from the greeting to consider all that had transpired, though, he realized that one of the victories was not yet complete. Guenhwyvar was his in spirit now but still held by another, one who did not deserve the cat, who enslaved the cat in a life that Drizzt could no longer witness.
None of the confusion that had followed Drizzt Do’Urden out of Menzoberranzan that night remained. For the first time in his life, he saw the road he must follow, the path to his own freedom.
He remembered Zaknafein’s warnings, and the same impossible alternatives that he had contemplated, to no resolution.
Where, indeed, could a drow elf go?
“Worse to be trapped within a lie,” he whispered absently. The panther cocked its head to the side, sensing again that Drizzt’s words carried great importance. Drizzt returned the curious stare with one that came suddenly grim.
“Take me to your master,” he demanded, “your false master.”
aknafein sank down into his bed in an easy sleep, the most comfortable rest he had ever known. Dreams did come to him this night, a rush of dreams. Far from tumultuous, they only enhanced his comfort. Zak was free now of his secret, of the lie that had dominated every day of his adult life.
Drizzt had survived! Even the dreaded Academy of Menzoberranzan could not daunt the youth’s indomitable spirit and sense of morality. Zaknafein Do’Urden was no longer alone. The dreams that played in his mind showed him the same wonderful possibilities that had followed Drizzt out of the city.
Side by side they would stand, unbeatable, two as one against the perverted foundations of Menzoberranzan.
A stinging pain in his foot brought Zak from his slumbers. He saw Briza immediately, at the bottom of his bed, her snake whip in hand. Instinctively, Zak reached over the side to fetch his sword.
The weapon was gone. Vierna stood at the side of the room, holding it. On the opposite side, Maya held Zak’s other sword.
How had they come in so stealthily? Zak wondered. Magical silence, no doubt, but Zak was still surprised that he had not sensed their presence in time. Nothing had ever caught him unawares, awake or asleep.
Never before had he slept so soundly, so peacefully. Perhaps, in Menzoberranzan, such pleasant dreams were dangerous.
“Matron Malice will see you,” Briza announced.
“I am not properly dressed,” Zak replied casually. “My belt and weapons, if you please.”
“We do not please!” Briza snapped, more at her sisters than at Zak. “You will not need the weapons.”
Zak thought otherwise.
“Come, now,” Briza commanded, and she raised the whip.
“I should be certain of Matron Malice’s intentions before I acted so boldly, were I you,” Zak warned. Briza, reminded of the power of the male she now threatened, lowered her weapon.
Zak rolled out of bed
, putting the same intense glare alternately on Maya and Vierna, watching their reactions to better conclude Malice’s reasons for summoning him.
They surrounded him as he left his room, keeping a cautious but ready distance from the deadly weapons master. “Must be serious,” Zak remarked quietly, so that only Briza, in front of the troupe, could hear. Briza turned and flashed him a wicked smile that did nothing to dispel his suspicions.
Neither did Matron Malice, who leaned forward in her throne in anticipation even before they entered the room.
“Matron,” Zak offered, dipping into a bow and pulling the side of his nightshirt out wide to draw attention to his inappropriate dress. He wanted to let Malice know his feelings of being ridiculed at such a late hour.
The matron offered no return greeting. She rested back in her throne. One slender hand rubbed her sharp chin, while her eyes locked upon Zaknafein.
“Perhaps you could tell me why you’ve summoned me,” Zak dared to say, his voice still holding an edge of sarcasm. “I would prefer to return to my slumbers. We should not give House Hun’ett the advantage of a tired weapons master.”
“Drizzt has gone,” growled Malice.
The news slapped Zak like a wet rag. He straightened, and the teasing smile disappeared from his face.
“He left the house against my commands,” Malice went on. Zak relaxed visibly; when Malice announced that Drizzt was gone, Zak had first thought that she and her devious cohorts had driven him out or killed him.
“A spirited boy,” Zak remarked. “Surely he will return soon.”
“Spirited,” Malice echoed, and her tone did not put the description in a positive light.
“He will return,” Zak said again. “There’s no need for our alarm, for such extreme measures.” He glared at Briza, though he knew well that the matron mother had called him to audience to do more than tell him of Drizzt’s departure.
“The secondboy disobeyed the matron mother,” Briza snarled, a rehearsed interruption.
“Spirited,” Zak said again, trying not to chuckle. “A minor indiscretion.”
“How often he seems to have those,” Malice commented. “Like another spirited male of House Do’Urden.”
Zak bowed again, taking her words as a compliment. Malice already had his punishment decided, if she meant to punish him at all, His actions now, at this trial—if that’s what it was—would be of little consequence.
“The boy has displeased the Spider Queen!” Malice growled, openly enraged and tired of Zak’s sarcasm. “Even you were not foolish enough to do that!”
A dark cloud passed across Zak’s face. This meeting was indeed serious; Drizzt’s life could be at stake.
“But you know of his crime,” Malice continued, easing back again. She liked that she had Zak concerned and on the defensive. She had found his vulnerable spot. It was her turn to tease.
“Leaving the house?” Zak protested. “A minor error in judgment. Lolth would not be concerned with such a trifle issue.”
“Do not feign ignorance, Zaknafein. You know that the elven child lives!”
Zak lost his breath in a sharp gasp. Malice knew! Damn it all, Lolth knew!
“We are about to go to war,” Malice continued calmly, “we are not in Lolth’s favor, and we must correct the situation.”
She eyed Zak directly. “You are aware of our ways and know that we must do this.”
Zak nodded, trapped. Anything he did now to disagree would only make matters worse for Drizzt—if matters could be worse for Drizzt.
“The secondboy must be punished,” Briza said.
Another rehearsed interruption, Zak knew. He wondered how many times Briza and Malice had practiced this encounter.
“Am I to punish him, then?” Zak asked. “I’ll not whip the boy; that is not my place.”
“His punishment is none of your concern,” Malice said.
“Then why disturb my slumber?” Zak asked, trying to detach himself from Drizzt’s predicament, more for Drizzt’s sake than his own.
“I thought that you would wish to know,” Malice replied. “You and Drizzt became so close this day in the gym. Father and son.”
She saw! Zak realized. Malice, and probably that wretched Briza, had watched the whole encounter! Zak’s head drooped as he came to know that he had unwittingly played a part in Drizzt’s predicament.
“An elven child lives,” Malice began slowly, rolling out each word in dramatic clarity, “and a young drow must die.”
“No!” The word came out of Zak before he realized he was speaking. He tried to find some escape. “Drizzt was young. He did not understand …”
“He knew exactly what he was doing!” Malice screamed back at him. “He does not regret his actions! He is so like you, Zaknafein! Too like you.”
“Then he can learn,” Zak reasoned. “I have not been a burden to you, Mali—Matron Malice. You have profited by my presence. Drizzt is no less skilled than I; he can be valuable to us.”
“Dangerous to us,” Matron Malice corrected. “You and he standing together? The thought does not please me.”
“His death will aid House Hun’ett,” Zak warned, grabbing at anything he could find to defeat the matron’s intent.
“The Spider Queen demands his death,” Malice replied sternly. “She must be appeased if Daermon N’a’shezbaernon is to have any hope in its struggles against House Hun’ett.”
“I beg you, do not kill the boy.”
“Sympathy?” Malice mused. “It does not become a drow warrior, Zaknafein. Have you lost your fighting will?”
“I am old, Malice.”
“Matron Malice!” Briza protested, but Zak put a look on her so cold that she lowered her snake whip before she had even begun to put it to use.
“Older still will I become if Drizzt is put to his death.”
“I do not desire this either,” Malice agreed, but Zak recognized her lie. She didn’t care about Drizzt, or about anything else, beyond gaining the Spider Queen’s favor.
“Yet I see no alternative. Drizzt has angered Lolth, and she must be appeased before our war.”
Zak began to understand. This meeting wasn’t about Drizzt at all. “Take me in the boy’s stead,” he said.
Malice’s narrow grin could not hide her feigned surprise. This was what she had desired from the very beginning.
“You are a proven fighter,” the matron argued. “Your value, as you yourself have already admitted, cannot be underestimated. To sacrifice you to the Spider Queen would appease her, but what void will be left in House Do’Urden in the wake of your passing?”
“A void that Drizzt can fill,” Zak replied. He secretly hoped that Drizzt, unlike he, would find some escape from it all, some way around Matron Malice’s evil plots.
“You are certain of this?”
“He is my equal in battle,” Zak assured her. “He will grow stronger, too, beyond what Zaknafein has ever attained.”
“You are willing to do this for him?” Malice sneered, eager drool edging her mouth.
“You know that I am,” Zak replied.
“Ever the fool,” Malice put in.
“To your dismay,” Zak continued, undaunted, “you know that Drizzt would do the same for me.”
“He is young,” Malice purred. “He will be taught better.”
“As you taught me?” snapped Zak.
Malice’s victorious grin became a grimace. “I warn you, Zaknafein,” she growled in all her vile rage. “If you do anything to disrupt the ceremony to appease the Spider Queen, if, in the end of your wasted life, you choose to anger me one final time, I will give Drizzt to Briza. She and her torturous toys will give him to Lolth!”
Unafraid, Zak held his head high. “I have offered myself, Malice,” he spat. “Have your fun while you may. In the end, Zaknafein will be at peace; Matron Malice Do’Urden will ever be at war!”
Shaking in anger, the moment of triumph stolen by a few simple words, Malice could only whisp
er, “Take him!”
Zak offered no resistance as Vierna and Maya tied him to the spider-shaped altar in the chapel. He watched Vierna mostly, seeing an edge of sympathy rimming her quiet eyes. She, too, might have been like him, but whatever hope he had for that possibility had been buried long ago under the relentless preaching of the Spider Queen.
“You are sad,” Zak remarked to her.
Vierna straightened and tugged tightly on one of Zak’s bonds, causing him to grimace in pain. “A pity,” she replied as coldly as she could. “House Do’Urden must give much to repay Drizzt’s foolish deed. I would have enjoyed watching the two of you together in battle.”
“House Hun’ett would not have enjoyed the sight,” Zak replied with a wink. “Cry not … my daughter.”
Vierna slapped him across the face. “Take your lies to your grave!”
“Deny it as you choose, Vierna,” was all that Zak cared to reply.
Vierna and Maya backed away from the altar. Vierna fought to hold her scowl and Maya bit back an amused chuckle, as Matron Malice and Briza entered the room. The matron mother wore her greatest ceremonial robe, black and weblike, clinging and floating about her all at once, and Briza carried a sacred coffer.
Zak paid them no heed as they began their ritual, chanting for the Spider Queen, offering their hopes for appeasement. Zak had his own hopes at that moment.
“Beat them all,” he whispered under his breath. “Do more than survive, my son, as I have survived. Live! Be true to the callings in your heart.”
Braziers roared to life; the room glowed. Zak felt the heat, knew that contact to that darker plane had been achieved.
“Take this …” he heard Matron Malice chant, but he put the words out of his thoughts and continued the final prayers of his life.
The spider-shaped dagger hovered over his chest. Malice clenched the instrument in her bony hands, the sheen of her sweat-soaked skin catching the orange reflection of the fires in a surrealistic glow.