"By the gods, old William, ye could sleep the day away gettin' ready for yer nighttime rest," said Brusco Brawnanvil, first cousin to Banak, the war leader who was making his amazing reputation across the mountains to the west, on the other side of Mithral Hall.

"Yep," old William - Bill to his friends - HuskenNugget answered, and he let his head slide back to rest against the stone wall of the small tower marking the eastern entrance to the dwarven stronghold. Below their position, the Sur-brin flowed mightily past, sparkling in the afternoon light.

Soon after the first reports had filtered back to Mithral Hall of monsters stirring in the North, a substantial encampment had been constructed just north of their current position, along the high ground of a mountain arm. But with the desperate retreat from Shallows and the advent of the war in the west, that camp had been all but abandoned, with only a few forward scouts left behind. The dwarves simply didn't have any to spare, and the orcs were pressing them hard in the mountains north of Keeper's Dale. Rumors from Nesme had forced Clan Battlehammer to tighten the defenses of their tunnels as well, fearing an underground assault.

In the east, there was nothing but the dance of the Surbrin and the long hours of boredom, made worse for the veteran dwarves because of their knowledge that their kin were fighting and dying in the west.

Thus, with Banak, Pwent, and their charges - along with the dwarves of Mirabar - making their names in a heroic stand against the pursuing hordes, Brusco, Bill, and the others still in the east just closed their eyes and rested their heads and hoped there'd be orcs enough for them to kill before the war ended.

"Ain't seen Filbedo in a few days," Brusco remarked.

Bill cracked open one sleepy eye and said, "He went through to the west, and out across Keeper's Dale, from what I'm hearing."

"Aye, that he did," said Kingred Doughbeard, who was up above them in the tower, sitting beside the open trapdoor, his back resting along the waist-high wall that ringed the structure's top. "We're not to be relieved fifteen for fifteen no more. Only twenty-five of us left on this side o' the halls, so some'll be pulling shifts two times in a row."

"Bah!" Brusco snorted. "Wished they'd asked. I'd've gone off to the west!"

"So would us all," Kingred answered, and he gave a snort. "Exceptin' Bill there. Bill's just looking to sleep."

"Yep," Bill agreed. "And I'll take the two-times watch. Three times, if ye're wanting. Nine Hells, I'll stay out here all day and all the night."

"Snoring all the while," said Kingred.

"Yep," said Bill.

"Found himself a comfortable spot," Brusco remarked and Kingred laughed again.

"Yep," said Bill.

"Well, if ye're gonna sleep, then switch with Kingred," Brusco demanded. "Give me someone to roll bones with, at least."

"Yep," said Bill.

He yawned and somehow rolled to his side and up on his feet, then wearily began to climb.

The noise below, of Kingred, Brusco, and a couple of others they had coaxed from the tunnels to join in their gambling, did little to inhibit the ever-tired dwarf, and soon he was snoring contentedly.

* * *

Halfway up the outside wall of the tower, nestled in the dark crevice where the shaped tower edge met the natural stone of the mountain wall, Tos'un Armgo heard the entire conversation. The drow paused at one comfortable juncture and waited, cursing silently - and not for the first time! - the absence of Donnia and Ad'non. They were the stealthy ones of the group, after all, whereas Tos'un was a mere warrior. At least, that's what Donnia and Ad'non were always insisting to him.

Kaer'lic had given Tos'un a few enchantments to help him as he ran forward scout for Obould, but still, he wasn't overly thrilled with being so exposed, out alone in a nest of tough dwarves.

Obould wasn't far behind, he told himself. Likely the orc and his minions would overrun the feeble defenses of the encampment to the north within a short time.

That notion made the drow take a deep breath and turn around, picking his handholds. The cursed, burning ball of fire in the sky had moved behind the mountains by this time, thankfully, extended long shadows over all the area on this eastern slope. Still, it was uncomfortably light by Tos'un's estimations.

But it was growing darker.

The time of the drow.

* * *

Brusco blew into his cupped hands, then shook them vigorously, rolling the bones around in the cup of his gnarly fingers and callused palms. Then he blew into them again and whispered a quick prayer to Dumathoin, the god of secrets under the mountain.

He repeated the process, and again, until the other dwarves around the cleared, rolling area began complaining, and one even cuffed him off the back of the head.

"Throw the damned things, will ye?"

Of course, the dwarf's annoyance had an awful lot to do with the fact that most of the silver pieces were set before Brusco by that point, as the dwarf had gotten onto a winning streak since sunset, some hours before.

"Gotta wait for good ol' Dum to tell me what's what," Brusco replied.

"Throw the damned things!" several shouted at once.

"Bah!" Brusco snorted and brought his hands back to roll.

And a horn blew, loud and clear and insistent, and all the dwarves froze in place.

"South?" one asked.

The horn blew again. Expecting it, they were able to discern that it had indeed come from the south.

"What d'ye see, Bill?" Kingred called up.

The others scrambled out of the tower, moving to higher points so that they could look for the signal fires from their watch-outposts in the southland.

"Bill?" Kingred called again. "Wake up, ye dolt! Bill!"

No answer.

And no snoring, Kingred realized, and there had been none for some time.

"Bill?" he asked again, more quietly and more concerned.

"What do ye know?" asked Brusco, running back in.

Kingred stared up, his expression speaking volumes to the other dwarf.

"Bill?" Brusco shouted.

He rushed to the ladder and began a fast climb.

"Trolls to the south!" came a cry from outside, from the distance. "Trolls to the south!"

Brusco paused on the ladder and thought, Trolls? What in the Nine Hells are trolls doing up here?

Another horn blew, from the north.

"Get to the crawls!" Brusco shouted down to Kingred. "Get 'em all to the crawls and get ready to shut 'em tight!"

Kingred scrambled out, and Brusco looked back up the ladder. He could see one of Bill's feet, hanging out over the open trapdoor.

"Bill?" he called again.

The foot didn't move at all.

A nauseous feeling came over Brusco then, and he forced himself up, slowly, hand over hand. Just below the lip, he slowly reached up and grabbed Bill's foot, giving it a tug.

"Bill?"

No movement, no response, no snoring.

And suddenly, Brusco was blind, completely in darkness. Instinctively, he simply let go and tucked, dropping to the stone floor and landing in a bumpy roll. By the time he came out of it, the veteran warrior had his sword in hand, and he was glad at least to find that he was not blind, that the spell that had dropped over him was an area of darkness and nothing that had actually affected his vision.

"Get in here!" he cried to his companions. "Magic! And something's got Bill!"

Other dwarves, led by Kingred, charged back into the tower.

"Set a catch blanket!" Brusco ordered.

He rushed back to the base of the ladder and started up again, moving much more quickly. The other dwarves grabbed a pair of blankets, doubling them up. Each taking a corner, they stretched it wide under the trapdoor.

They heard a commotion above, shouts from Brusco for Bill, and a grunt.

A dwarf came tumbling down, hitting the side of the blanket and rolling off to thud hard against the floor.

"Bill!" the four dwarves cried together, abandoning the blanket and rushing to their fallen comrade, a bright line of blood showing across his throat.

"Get him in to a priest!" one cried, and began to drag Bill away.

The dwarves rolled toward the door, then stopped and shouted for Brusco when they heard another commotion up above.

Brusco fell from the darkness, landing hard on the floor. He tried to stand and staggered to the side and would have fallen had not Kingred rushed over and caught him.

"Damned thing slicked me!" Brusco gasped.

He reached back and brought a blood-covered hand back in front. All strength left him then, and Kingred had to set himself firmly to hold the heavy dwarf up.

"A hand!" he called, and another dwarf rushed to the opposite side of the wounded Brusco.

"To the crawls," Brusco managed to remind them, coughing blood between each word.

By the time they got out of the small tower, two carrying Bill and two supporting Brusco, they caught sight of other companions charging up from the south and heard the calls of those rushing back from the north as well.

In the south, they shouted, "Trolls!"

From the north came the cries of, "Orcs!"

Kingred handed Brusco over fully to the other dwarf and sprinted ahead, drawing a hammer from his belt as he approached the huge iron doors of Mithral Hall. He went in hard, hammering away, once, twice ... a pause, and a third time. He waited a few moments and banged out the coded signal again and again, and more emphatically when he thought he heard the locking bar being lifted behind the door.

The last thing he wanted at that moment was for those impregnable doors to open!

A grinding noise began off to the side of the main entrance and a small rock slid aside, revealing a dark crawl tunnel. In went the dwarves, one after another, with Kingred standing beside the tunnel, urging them on. Dwarves came from the north and from the south, each group barely outdistancing the advancing force - trolls in the south, orcs in the north. Kingred saw the truth of it; even though a second crawl tunnel had been opened, all the dwarves couldn't possibly get in ahead of the monsters. He almost called for his fellows to open the main doors then, but he held off the urge and bit back his fear. He and some others would have to stay out, would have to hold back the invaders to the bitter end.

Kingred took up his sword and strapped on a shield, and he continued to order those rushing up into the crawls.

"Go! Go! Go!" he called to them. "Keep yer butt down and keep yer butt moving!"

The trolls were the first monsters to arrive, their horrid stench filling Kingred's nostrils as he rushed out to meet them. His strong arms worked tirelessly, slashing away at the beasts, driving them back. A claw raked his shoulder, drawing a deep line, but he shrugged it off and turned, swinging, at that attacker. One after another, Kingred drove them back. Fighting like a dwarf possessed, a dwarf who knew that all, for him, was lost, Kingred growled and pressed on.

A great two-headed troll, as ugly as any creature Kingred had ever seen, as ugly a nightmare as Kingred had ever believed possible, shoved some of the other trolls out of the way and stepped up before him. Swallowing his fear, Kingred roared and charged headlong into the beast, but a huge spiked club whipped across to intercept and the dwarf was lifted from the ground and launched far, far away.

At that moment, the orcs arrived on the scene, sweeping down from the north, howling and hooting and throwing stones as they charged in with abandon.

* * *

"We got a dozen left out there!" cried Bayle Rockhunter, one of the inner gate guards. "Open them durned doors!"

The dwarf slapped a heavy pick across his hands and charged for the portal, and many others fell in behind him.

"It ain't to be done!" the wounded Brusco cried. "Ye know yer place!"

That reminder slowed the charge to the great doors - portals that were not to be opened in any event without express permission from the clan leaders back in the western reaches of the complex. The dwarves at the eastern gate were not an army by any means, but merely lookouts and sentries, holding the hall at all costs. Opening those doors would be engaging an apparently powerful force, one that could then flow into the hall.

But not opening those doors meant listening to their kin caught outside die.

"We can't be leaving them!" Bayle shouted back.

"Then ye're stealing all meaning from their deaths," Brusco responded, much more quietly.

That tone as much as the words themselves seemed to steal all the fire from the angry young dwarf.

"Hold the crawl tunnels open as long as ye can," another dwarf remarked.

Two score dwarves got into the safety of Mithral Hall that fateful evening, while some dozen stood with Kingred outside the crawl tunnels and the great, barred doors. Eventually, those inside reluctantly pulled the levers that dropped the counterweights that slid the stones back over the crawl entrances, sealing their kin outside, sealing their fate. Brusco and the others shut the crawl tunnels with heavy hearts and with promises that Kingred and the others wouldn't be forgotten, that songs would be written and sung, tavern to tavern.

* * *

King Obould, Gerti Orelsdottr, and Proffit the troll stood back from the tower and the doors, watching the work as giants, orcs, and trolls piled heavy stones before Mithral Hall's eastern entrance. All sound from inside the hall indicated that the dwarves were doing likewise, but Obould didn't want to take any chances. His goal had been to seal the eastern gates, and so he was doing just that.

"The land is ours to the Surbrin," the orc announced to his fellow leaders. From the shadows, Kaer'lic and Tos'un listened carefully.

_He forgets that his son has not quite sealed in the dwarves, as yet_, Kaer'lic flashed to her companion.

Tos'un appreciated the sarcasm, though he was more impressed with Obould's progress. Given the pressure that Urlgen was placing on Clan Battle-hammer in the west, the victory had been all too easy. A few dead orcs, a few dead dwarves, and Obould controlled the western bank of the Surbrin, all the way from the Spine of the World to the end of the mountains south of Mithral Hall. With defensive positions already being constructed along the river north of their current position, that was no small thing.

"The dwarves will find another way out," Gerti remarked, and Tos'un could tell that she, like Kaer'lic, simply wanted to deflate the glorious orc king a bit.

Obould offered a quick scowl at the giantess but turned his attention to the two-headed troll, Proffit.

"You have done well," he congratulated. "Your march was impressive."

"Troll no . .." said the left-side head.

"... get tired," added the right.

"And so you will go right back to the south when we are finished here," Obould said, and both heads nodded.

"We stretch our line the length of the Surbrin," Obould explained to Gerti. "Hold our gains against any who would deny them. And our main force goes back to the west and north."

"And Proffit goes back to the Trollmoors?" Gerti asked.

Her disgust for the smelly troll was easy to see.

"To the tunnels in the south," Obould corrected. "Tunnels that connect to Mithral Hall. Proffit and his people will begin the battle for the dwarven stronghold within. We will defeat the dwarves without and claim our new kingdom."

_He has a vision_, Kaer'lic flashed.

Tos'un hid his smile, for he could tell that his companion was growing very uneasy with Obould. The four clever drow had incited all of it, but never had they actually believed that Obould would orchestrate something definitive and winnable! What would happen, Tos'un wondered (and he knew that his drow companions were also wondering), if the orc king managed to secure all the North between the Trollmoors and the Spine of the World, from the Surbrin to the Fell Pass? What would happen if, with such a base to serve as a kingdom, Obould did finally rout the dwarves from Mithral Hall? What would Silverymoon do? Or Mirabar? Or Citadel Adbar or Citadel Felbarr?

What could they do? More orcs were pouring forth from the mountains, by all reports. Had Tos'un and his companions inadvertently elevated Obould beyond their control?

An orc kingdom nestled within the various strongholds - human, dwarf, and elf. Would other tribes flock in to join in Obould's glory? Would Obould seek treaties, perhaps, and trade with the other cities?

It all seemed so preposterous to Tos'un, and also amusing. When he looked at Gerti, though, her expression grim even as she outwardly agreed with the orc king, the dark elf was reminded that there remained many potential pitfalls.

Only then did Tos'un realize that Kaer'lic was walking out to join the three leaders and that Obould was calling to him as well. He moved out beside the priestess of Lolth.

"You go with Proffit," Obould instructed the warrior of Barrison Del' Armgo.

"I?" Tos'un asked incredulously, and with more than a little revulsion at the less than appetizing thought.

"Proffit will travel the upper Underdark to do battle with the dwarves," Obould explained. "Much as your city did."

Tos'un looked at Kaer'lic with surprise, wondering how the orc king might have garnered that information.

_It is for the best_, Kaer'lic secretly flashed to him, alleviating all his doubts concerning the source.

"You know the tunnels leading to Mithral Hall," Obould reasoned to Tos'un. "You have been there."

"I know little," the drow argued.

"And that is more than anyone else," said Obould. "We must soon begin our attack within the hall, if the surface is to be secured. You will guide Proffit in this hunt."

There was no debate in Obould's tone, and when Tos'un started to argue anyway, Kaer'lic flashed an emphatic, _It is better_!

"I will go with him," Kaer'lic then announced. "I know some tunnels, and better for Proffit to have two dark elves directing his forces."

Obould nodded and turned to other matters, mostly the continuing sealing of the great doors.

_Why have you done this_? Tos'un's fingers asked Kaer'lic as the pair drifted back from the main conversation.

_We should be away_, came the reply.

_What of Ad'non and Donnia_?

Kaer'lic shrugged and replied, _They will fend for themselves. They always do. For now, it is best that we go to the south_.

_Why_?

_Because Drizzt Do'Urden is in the north_.

Tos'un stared curiously at his surprising companion. Kaer'lic had expressed great concern about Drizzt, but to go far away simply because the renegade drow was operating in the region? It made no sense.

He couldn't know Kaer'lic's suspicions, though. Ever since Tos'un had joined the band of renegades with his tales of Menzoberranzan's Mithral Hall disaster, Kaer'lic Suun Wett had feared that Drizzt Do'Urden might be something more than any of the Menzoberranyr drow had ever appreciated.

Beyond his fighting skills, there was something special about that particular renegade drow, something god-blessed. Kaer'lic had always been a clever one, but she almost hated her cunning, for in the grip of her suspicions, the drow priestess understood that she might be, in effect, condemning herself. Might that not be the price of enlightenment?

Unknown to her companions, the priestess of Lolth was convinced of something both unnerving and perfectly wicked: Drizzt Do'Urden had the favor of Lolth.