me go back and get Pwent and his boys, and a hunnerd more o' me best fighters, and we'll go and get the durned orcs and giants."
Bruenor looked over at Drizzt. "Trail'll be cold by then?" he pleaded more than asked.
Drizzt nodded and said, "And we'll find little advantage in the way of surprise with an army of dwarves marching across the hills."
"An army that'll kill yer orcs and giants just fine," said Dagnabbit.
"But on a battlefield of their choosing," Drizzt countered. He looked to Bruenor, though it was obvious that Bruenor needed little convincing. "You get an army and we can, perhaps, find a new trail to lead to our enemies. Yes, we will defeat them, but they will see us coming. Our charge will be through a rain of giant boulders and against fortified positions - behind rock walls, or worse, up on the cliff ledges, barely accessible and easily defended. If we go after them now and hunt them down quickly and with surprise, then we will choose and prepare the battlefield. There will be no flying boulders and no defended ledges, unless we are the ones defending them."
"Sounds like ye're looking to have a bit o' fun," Catti-brie snidely remarked, and Drizzt's smile showed that he couldn't honestly deny that.
Dagnabbit started to argue, as was, in truth, his place in all of this, but Bruenor had heard enough. The king held up his hand, silencing his commander.
"Go find the trail, elf," he ordered Drizzt. "Our friend Tred's looking to spill a bit o' orc blood. Dwarf to dwarf, I'm owing him that."
Tred's expression showed his appreciation at the favorable end to the debate. Even Dagnabbit seemed to accept the verdict, and he said no more.
Drizzt turned to Catti-brie. "Shall we?"
"I was thinkin' ye'd never ask. Ye bringing yer cat?"
"Soon enough," Drizzt promised.
"Regis and I will run liaison between you and Bruenor," Wulfgar added.
Drizzt nodded, and the harmony of the group, with everyone understanding so well their place in the hunt, heightened Bruenor's confidence in his decision.
In truth, Bruenor needed that boost. Deep within him came the nagging worry that he was doing this out of his own selfish needs, that he might be leading his friends and followers into a desperate situation all because he feared, even loathed, the statesmanlike life that awaited him at the end of his road.
But, looking at his skilled and seasoned friends beginning their eager preparations, Bruenor shrugged many of those doubts aside. When they were done with this bit of business, when all the orcs and giants were dead or chased back into their deep holes, he'd go and take his place at Mithral Hall, and he'd use this impending victory as a reminder of who he was and who he wanted to be. There would be the trappings of bureaucratic process, the seemingly endless line of dignitary visitors who had to be entertained, to be sure, but there would also be adventure. Bruenor promised himself that much, thinking again of the secrets of Gauntlgrym. There would be time for the open road and the wind on his wild red beard.
He smiled as he silently made that promise.
He had no idea that getting what you wished for might be the worst thing of all.
"It's all rocks and will be a difficult track, even with so many of them," Drizzt noted when he and Catti-brie entered the rocky slopes north of the destroyed village.
"Or perhaps not," the woman replied, motioning for Drizzt to join her.
As he came beside her, she pointed down at a dark gray stone, at a patch of red marking its smooth surface. Drizzt went down to one knee, removed a leather glove and dipped his finger, then brought it up before his smiling face.
"They have wounded."
"And they're letting them live," Catti-brie remarked. "Civilized group of orcs, it seems."
"To our advantage," Drizzt remarked. He ended short and turned to see a large form coming around the bend.
"The dwarves are readied for the road," Wulfgar announced.
"And we've found them a road to walk," Catti-brie explained, pointing down to the stone.
"Ore blood or a prisoner's?" Wulfgar asked.
The question took the smiles from Drizzt and Catti-brie, for neither of them had even thought of that unpleasant possibility.
"Ore, I would guess," said Drizzt. "I saw no signs of mercy at the village, but let us move, and quickly, in case it is the other."
Wulfgar nodded and headed away, signaling to Regis, who relayed the sign to Bruenor, Dagnabbit, and the others.