at that point, but a call from above told him that, perhaps, so did someone else.
At the back of the tower, in close to the base of the wall and listening intently, Regis heard Bruenor's charge. He didn't have any great urge to go around with the dwarf, though, for Bruenor's tactics were straightforward, muscle against muscle, trading punch for punch.
Joining in that strategy against ogres, Regis wouldn't last beyond the first blow.
A cry from above jarred the halfling. He started to climb hand over hand, picking holds in the cold, cracked stone. By the time he was halfway up, his poor fingers were scraped and bleeding, but he kept going, moving with deceiving swiftness, picking his holds expertly and nearing the top.
He heard a yell and a crash, then some heavy scuffling. Up he went with all speed, and he nearly slipped and fell, catching himself at the very last moment - and with more than a little luck.
Finally he put his hand on the lip of the tower top and peeked over. What he saw almost made him want to leap right off.
* * * * * * * * * * * *
Poor Donbago, crying out repeatedly, only wanted to hold the I portal shut, to close his eyes and will all of this horror away. He was a seasoned fighter and had seen many battles and had lost many friends.
But not his brother.
He knew in his heart that Jeddith was down, and likely dead.
He knew in his heart that the tower was lost, and that there would be no escape. Perhaps if he just lay there long enough, using his body to block the trapdoor, the brutes would go away. He knew, after all, that ogres were not known for persistence or for cunning.
Most were not, at least.
Donbago hardly noticed the warmth at first, though he did smell the burning leather. He didn't understand - until a sharp pain erupted in his back. Reflexively, the man rolled, but he stopped at once, realizing that he had to hold the door shut.
He tried going back, but the metal was hot - so hot!
The ogres below must have been heating it with torches.
Donbago jumped atop the door, hoping his boots would insulate him from the heat. He heard a scream as one of his companions exited the tower, and, a few moments later, a roar from below, by the front door.
He was hopping, his boots smoking. He looked around frantically, searching for something he could use to place over the door, a loose stone in the crenellation, perhaps.
He went flying away as an ogre below leveled a tremendous blow to the door. A second strike, before Donbago could scramble back, had the portal bouncing open. A brute came through with amazing speed, obviously boosted to the roof by a companion.
Donbago, waves of pain still spreading from his broken face, leaped into the fray immediately and furiously, thinking of his brother with every mad strike. He scored a couple of hits on the ogre, which seemed truly surprised by his ferocity, but then its companion was up beside it. Two heavy clubs swatted at him, back and forth.
He ducked, he dodged, he didn't even try to parry the too-powerful blows, and his desperate offensive posture allowed him to manage another serious stab at the first brute, sending it sprawling to the stone.
Donbago got hit, knocked to his back, his sword flying, and before he even realized what had happened, the valiant soldier felt a strong hand grab his ankle.
In an instant, he was scooped aloft, hanging upside down at the end of a mighty ogre's arm.
* * * * * * * * * * * *
Drizzt rolled across the snow, not fighting the momentum but enhancing it, allowing the ogre's kick to take him as far from his formidable opponent as possible. He wanted to get up and face the ogre squarely, to take a better measure and put this fight back on more recognizable ground. He believed that his underestimation of his opponent alone had cost him that hit, that he had erred greatly.
He was surprised again when he at last tucked his feet under him and started to rise, to find that the ogre had kept up with him and was even then coming in for another furious attack.
The brute was moving too fast - too far beyond what Drizzt, no novice to battling ogres, would have expected from one of its lumbering kind.
In came the