Hide in the Midnight

Stumpet Rakenclaw knelt beside the unconscious drow and felt of her cold skin, beneath which she felt a faint pulse. She motioned to those holding hooded lanterns to shine light upon the patient. She gasped at the almost literately gray cast of the woman’s skin. The glint of metal near the woman’s face peaked her curiosity. Stumpet reached over and picked up the object, the faint rasp of a chain through a clasp came to her ears. In her palm Stumpet held a silver amulet depicting a unicorn’s head and she remembered the woman’s prayer. Her jaw clenched in anger, Stumpet untied the woman’s hands. Stumpet carefully rolled the woman onto her back, the makeshift bandage clearly visible. She pocketed the amulet while pulling a small knife from her robes and began to gingerly cut away the blood-soaked material. Her stomach twisted sickly as exposed intestines glistened wetly in the lamplight.

“Dey wanted ye dead didn’ dey; poor girl?” Stumpet whispered softly.

She undid the ties to the girl’s corset, ribs bruised purple met her eyes. A muscle in her jaw twitched violently at the extensive damage those men had wrought upon the woman’s tiny frame. Laying her hands gently against the torn abdomen and called upon Clangeddin to heal the wound, it closed cleanly and smoothly beneath her palms. Stumpet carefully probed the woman’s bruised ribcage, the bones shifted beneath her fingertips. Stumpet looked up as Bruenor came to kneel beside her.

“Be she livin’?” He asked softly.

“Barely. I’ve already healed her gut wound. De left side of her ribcage is almost crushed, it’ll be a week before a dey be repaired. There be no tellin’ how long she be recovering from the blood loss.”

“Drizzt will be home later, should he be told of her?”

“Aye, that cat of his is a good judge of character,” she murmured softly.

“Did ye find anything?”

Stumpet pulled the amulet from her pocket and showed it to him before pocketing it again. She signaled the stretcher bearers; they lifted the woman and bore her away. Bruenor fell instep beside Stumpet as she followed the stretcher.

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Stumpet’s assistants had undressed the woman and tucked her into the bed of one of the guest rooms. The woman’s belongings were piled upon the bureau. Stumpet fingered the small bundle in thought. Drizzt had returned; she was unsure about telling him of the drow woman yet. Seeking something to occupy her hands she began to sort out the woman’s belongings. The woman’s cloths she threw out without really looking at them, in the woman’s money pouch Stumpet found coins only found on the surface, a map, and a few other odds and ends. Stumpet wrinkled her brow in thought at a bag about twice the size of her fist. She reached into the bag and pulled out a book nearly five times the size of the bag, it was a broad, thick affair slightly battered and clad in tan leather. Intrigued she opened the front cover.

‘To Ann; my heart, my dearest friend, my dark lady. I gift this to you to fill with the memories, thoughts, and feelings that make you, you; so that they may be preserved for posterity. Love, Kensin.’

Stumpet snapped the book closed and tucked it under her arm. She strode through the door and down the corridor towards Drizzt’s quarters. She knocked twice before opening it. Drizzt paused in his unpacking to stare at her in puzzlement.

“Elf we need to talk,” Stumpet said gravely.

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Drizzt stared down at the drow woman laying in the bed. His fists tightened in anger. She lay there still and defenseless, it would be so simple for him to draw his scimitars and kill her. Breathing heavily he approached her sleeping form; he reached out with nimble fingers and carefully peeled back one of her eyelids. A green iris stared up at him blankly. Confused he stepped back a pace; he turned and regarded Stumpet with a raised an eyebrow. Stumpet reached into her pocket she pulled out an amulet on a chain. The pendant hung below her hand twisting slowly from left to right. Drizzt stared at the unicorn’s head that was the emblem of Mielikki.

“She prayed to yer goddess before she passed out,” Stumpet said calmly. “In Common tongue.”

Stumpet walked toward him; she took his wrist firmly in her hand. In his hand she laid a small leather bound book and placed the amulet on top of it.

“This be her journal. Read it, may be it will tell us about ‘er.”

With that Stumpet turned away and walked over to the dresser to begin examining the small leather pouch that the journal had somehow come out of. With a glance at the sleeping woman, Drizzt walked out of the room and back into his own.

He sat in one of the chairs by the fireplace, settling the journal across his knees. He stared at the crackling flames meditatively. He picked up the amulet and just stared at it for several moments before laying it on the table beside him. Deciding it couldn’t hurt, Drizzt propped the book on his thigh and opened the cover.

‘To Ann; my heart, my dearest friend, my dark lady. I gift this to you to fill with the memories, thoughts, and feelings that make you, you; so that they may be preserved for posterity. Love, Kensin.’

Intrigued he turned the page. Graceful Elven letters covered the page. Noting no ink blots he carefully examined the book; snuggly tucked in the binding was an expensive pen favored by wizards called a fountain pen. Turning the pen over slowly in his hands for a moment before discovering the maker’s tag; he blinked in surprise at the seal of Waterdeep. Curiosity ate at him like a cancer; placing the pen with the amulet he opened the book again.

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Days passed as he read her journal. He read of her pain, her sorrows, and her dreams. On those pages her soul was bared. He could almost see her face as she wrote in the journal’s sometimes tear stained pages. He read of her and Kensin’s love and their marriage. Her conceiving their first child and of it being stillborn. Her loss of their last two children; one to an ordinary miscarriage and the last to the rockslide that claimed the lives of Bragnor Stoneaxe and her husband. Her friend Drogo Anvilspliter dying in battle with ogres and her estrangement from Elress. Her pointless search for Kensin and her recent acceptance of his death. Everything; it was all there, all he had to do was turn the page.

There was a letter tucked in the back from Elress begging her to return to his village of Kyo’ nne. In its pages the letter provided insights into her character that convinced Drizzt that although she was drow that Antunia was s good person. He took to keeping a vigil by her bed side hoping to be there when and if she woke.

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Antunia snuggled deeper into the warm embrace of a bed. A real bed, after many nights of sleeping on the cold ground. She mumbled contentedly at the simple pleasure of a warm bed. Her sleep muddled mind was only able to process how comfortable she was. She frowned as she realized by the taste in her mouth that it was well past midmorning. She growled softly as she remembered that all good things must come to an end.

Her eyes snapped open as she remembered what had happened before she fell unconscious. She pushed up onto her arms, off balance because of weak limbs she tumbled off the bed and into the floor. She cried out in pain as the impact jarred her injured ribs. She lay tangled in the bedclothes, panting in pain. Hands grabbed her and sat her up. She stared into the face of a drow male. A panic filled scream bubbled out of her throat; she thrashed in an attempt to get away. She pounded her fists against his chest. He pulled her against his chest, pinning her arms between them.

“NO!! I’m not going back; never!!” She screamed in slightly accented common as she struggled weakly.

She quickly exhausted herself. She slumped against him and wept in defeat. She dimly registered running feet and a door banging open against a wall. She heard gruff voices around her. She tried to listen but exhaustion claimed her and she slept again.

TBC