The Halfling’s Gem by R. A. Salvatore

fearing even odds.
    With no escape, the gray dwarf rushed back at him wildly, his shield leading and his sword above his head. Bruenor easily blocked the downward thrust, then smashed his axe into the duergar’s shield. It, too, was of mithral, and the axe could not cut into it. But so great was Bruenor’s blow that the leather strappings snapped apart and the duergar’s arm went numb and drooped helplessly. The duergar screamed in terror and brought his short sword across his chest to protect his opened flank
    Bruenor followed the duergar’s swordarm with a shield-rush, shoving into his opponent’s elbow and causing the duergar to overbalance. In a lightning combination with his axe, Bruenor slipped the deadly blade over the duergar’s dipped shoulder.
    A second head dropped free to the floor.
    Bruenor grunted at the job well done and moved back into the larger room. The duergar beside the door was just regaining consciousness when Bruenor came up to him and shield-slammed him back into the wall. “Twenty-two,” he mumbled to himself,keeping count of the number of gray dwarves he had cut down during these last few tendays.
    Bruenor peeked out into the dark corridor. All was clear. He closed the door softly and went back to the hearth to touch up his disguise.
    Following the wild descent to the bottom of Garumn’s Gorge on the back of a flaming dragon, Bruenor had lost consciousness. Truly he was amazed when he managed to open his eyes. He knew the dragon to be dead as soon as he looked around, but he couldn’t understand why he, still lying atop the smoldering form, had not been burned.
    The gorge had been quiet and dark around him; he could not begin to guess how long he had remained unconscious. He knew, though, that his friends, if they had escaped, would probably have made their way out through the back door, to the safety of the surface.
    And Drizzt was alive! The image of the drow’s lavender eyes staring at him from the wall of the gorge as the dragon had glided past in its descent remained firmly etched in Bruenor’s mind. Even now, tendays later as far as he could figure, he used that image of the indomitable Drizzt Do’Urden as a litany against the hopelessness of his own situation. For Bruenor could not climb from the bottom of the gorge, where the walls rose straight and sheer. His only option had been to slip into the sole tunnel running off the chasm’s base and make his way though the lower mines.
    And through an army of gray dwarves—duergar even more alert, for the dragon Bruenor had killed, Shimmergloom, had been their leader.
    He had come far, and each step he took brought him a little closer to the freedom of the surface. But each step also brought him closer to the main host of the duergar. Even now he couldhear the thrumming of the furnaces of the great undercity, no doubt teeming with the gray scum. Bruenor knew that he had to pass through there to get to the tunnels connecting the higher levels.
    But even here, in the darkness of the mines, his disguise could not hold out to close scrutiny. How would he fare in the glow of the undercity, with a thousand gray dwarves milling all about him?
    Bruenor shook away the thought and rubbed more ash onto his face. No need to worry now; he’d find his way through. He gathered up his axe and shield and headed for the door.
    He shook his head and smiled as he approached, for the stubborn duergar beside the door was awake again—barely—and struggling to find his feet.
    Bruenor slammed him into the wall a third time and casually dropped the axe blade onto his head as he slumped, this time never to awaken. “Twenty-two,” the mighty dwarf reiterated grimly as he stepped into the corridor.
    The sound of the closing door echoed through the darkness, and when it died away, Bruenor heard again the thrumming of the furnaces.
    The undercity, his only chance.
    He steadied himself with a deep breath, then slapped his axe determinedly against his shield