coming over her.
"You are no drow come from the lightless depths as part of a raid," the woman remarked. "You sailed with Deudermont."
Drizzt bowed to her and didn't even bother trying to stop the last half-ogre he had grievously wounded as it crawled toward the woman. Across the room, Guenhwyvar stalked about the wall, flanking the woman, leaving the other half-ogre torn and dead in a puddle of its own blood and gore.
"And who are you who comes unbidden to the House of Deudermont?" Drizzt asked. "Along with some less-than-acceptable companions."
"Give me Colson!" pleaded the second woman - who must have been Delly Curtie. She was still on the floor, propped on her elbows. "Oh, please. She has done nothing."
"Silence!" the pirate roared at her. She looked back at Drizzt, pointedly turning that nasty dagger over and over against the child's throat. "She will get her child back, and alive," the woman explained. "Once I am out of here, running free."
"You bargain with that which you only think you possess," Drizzt remarked, coming forward a step.
The half-ogre had reached its boss by that time. With great effort, it worked itself into a kneeling position before her, climbing its arms up the wall and pulling itself to its knees.
Gayselle gave it one look, then her hand flashed, driving her dagger deep into the brute's throat. It fell away gasping, dying.
The woman, obviously no novice to battle, had the dagger back at the child's throat in an instant, a flashing movement that made Delly cry out and had both Drizzt and Guenhwyvar breaking for her briefly. But only briefly, for that dagger was in place too quickly, and there could be no doubt that she would put it to use.
"I could not take him with me and could not leave the big mouth behind," the woman explained as the drow looked at her dying half-ogre companion.
"As I can not let you leave with the child," the drow replied.
"But you can, for you have little choice," she announced. "I will leave this place, and I will send word as to where you can retrieve the uninjured babe."
"No," Drizzt corrected. "You will give the babe to her mother, then leave this place, never to return."
The woman laughed at the notion. "Your panther friend would catch me and pull me down before I made the street," she said.
"I give you my word," Drizzt offered.
Again, the woman laughed. "I am to take the word of a drow elf?"
"And I am to take the word of a thief and murderess?" Drizzt was quick to reply.
"But you have no choice, drow," the woman explained, lifting the baby closer to her face, looking at it with a strange, cold expression, and sliding the flat of the dagger back and forth over Colson's neck.
Delly Curtie whimpered again and buried her face in her hands.
"How are you to stop me, drow?" the woman teased.
Even as the words left her mouth, a streak like blue lightning shot across the room, over the prone form of Delly Curtie, cutting right beside the tender flesh of Colson, to nail the pirate woman right between the eyes, slamming her back against the wall and pinning her there.
Her arms flew out wide, jerking spasmodically, the baby falling from her grasp.
But not to the floor, for as soon as he heard that familiar bowstring, Drizzt dived into a forward roll, coming around right before the pinned woman and gently catching Colson in his outstretched hands. He stood up and stared at the pirate.
The woman was already dead. Her arms gave a few more jerking spasms, and she went limp, hanging there, skull pinned to the wall. She wasn't seeing or hearing anything of this world.
"Just like that," Drizzt told her anyway.
Chapter 13 WINTER SETTLING
ever much liked this place," Bruenor grumbled as he and Regis stood at the north gate of Luskan. They had been held up for a long, long time by the curious and suspicious guards.
"They'll let us in soon," Regis replied. "They always get like this as the weather turns - that's when the scum floats down from the mountains, after all. And when the highwaymen wander back into the city, pretending as if they belonged there all along."
Bruenor spat on the ground.
Finally, the guard who'd first stopped them returned, along with another, older soldier.
"My friend says you've come from Icewind Dale," the older man remarked. "And what goods have you brought to sell over the winter?"
"I bringed meself, and that oughta be enough for