suddenly, and considered his own movements, his own thoughts.
He was indeed nervous, anxious and, for the first time since he had left Menzoberranzan, excited. A slight sound turned him around.
Drizzt Do'Urden stood on the landing.
Without a word the drow ranger entered, then flinched not at all as the door slid closed behind him.
"I have waited for this for many years," Entreri said.
"Then you are a bigger fool than I supposed," Drizzt replied.
Entreri exploded into motion, rushing up the back side of the center stairs, brandishing dagger and sword as he came over the lip, as if he expected Drizzt to meet him there, battling for the high ground.
The ranger hadn't moved, hadn't even drawn his weapons.
"And a bigger fool still if you believe that I will fight you this day," Drizzt said.
Entreri's eyes widened. After a long pause he came down the front stairs slowly, sword leading, dagger ready, moving to within a couple of steps of Drizzt. Who still did not draw his weapons. "Ready your scimitars," Entreri instructed. "Why? That we might play as entertainment for Jarlaxle and his band?" Drizzt replied.
"Draw them!" Entreri growled. "Else I'll run you through."
"Will you?" Drizzt calmly asked, and he slowly drew out his blades. As Entreri came on another measured step, the ranger dropped those scimitars to the ground. Entreri's jaw dropped nearly as far. "Have you learned nothing in all the years?" Drizzt asked. "How many times must we play this out? Must all of our lives be dedicated to revenge upon whichever of us won the last battle?"
"Pick them up!" Entreri shouted, rushing in so that his sword tip came in at Drizzt's breastbone.
"And then we shall fight," Drizzt said nonchalantly. "And one of us will win, but perhaps the other will survive. And then, of course, we will have to do this all over again, because you believe that you have something to prove."
"Pick them up," Entreri said through gritted teeth, prodding his sword just a bit. Had that blade still been carrying the weight of its magic, the prod surely would have slid it through Drizzt's ribs. "This is the last challenge, for one of us will die this day. Here it is, laid out for us by Jarlaxle, as fair a fight as we might ever find." Drizzt didn't move.
"I will run you through," Entreri promised. Drizzt only smiled. "I think not, Artemis Entreri. I know you better than you believe, and surely better than you are comfortable with. You would take no pleasure in killing me in such a manner and would hate yourself for the rest of your life for doing so, for stealing from yourself the only chance you might ever have to know the truth. Because that is what this is about, is it not? The truth, your truth, the moment when you hope to either validate your miserable existence or put an end to it."
Entreri growled loudly and came forward, but he did not, could not, press his arm forward and impale the drow. "Damn you!" he cried, spinning away, growling and slashing, back around the stairs, cursing with every step. "Damn you!"
Behind him Drizzt nodded, bent, and retrieved his scimitars. "Entreri," he called, and the change in his tone told the assassin that something was suddenly very different.
Entreri, on the other side of the room now, turned about to see Drizzt standing ready, blades in hand, to see the vision he so desperately craved.
"You passed my test," Drizzt explained. "Now I'll take yours."
"Are we to watch or just wait to see who shall walk out victorious?" Rai'gy asked as he and Kimmuriel walked out from a small chamber off to the side of the first floor's main room.
"This show will be worth the watching," Jarlaxle assured the pair. He motioned to the stairs. "We will ascend to the landing, and I will make the door translucent."
"An amazing artifact," Kimmuriel said, shaking his head. In only a day of communing with the crystal shard Jarlaxle had learned so very much. He had learned how to shape and design the tower reflection of the shard, to make doors appear and seemingly vanish, to create walls, transparent or opaque, and to use the tower as one great scrying device, as he was now. Both Kimmuriel and Rai'gy noted this as they came around to see the image of Catti-brie, Regis, Bruenor, and the great cat showing in the mirror.
"We shall watch, and they should as well," Jarlaxle said. He closed his eyes, and