Agrathan, his face bloody and bruised, stood before them, alone.

"Do not do this," the councilor pleaded.

"Get outta our way, Agrathan," Shingles told him, firmly but with a measure of respect. "Ye tried yer way in getting Torgar outa"I know ye dida"but Elastul's not for listening to ye. Well, he'll be listening to us!"

The cheers behind Shingles drowned out Agrathan's responses and told the councilor beyond all doubt that the dwarves would not be deterred. He turned and ran along the tunnel ahead of the marching mob, who took up an ancient war song, one that had rung out from Mirabar's walls many times over the millennia.

That sound, as much as anything else, nearly broke Agrathan's heart.

The councilor rushed through the positions of the Axe warriors at the tunnel's exit in the overcity, bidding the commanders to wield their force judiciously.

Agrathan ran on, down the streets toward Elastul's palace.

"What is it?" came a cry behind him and to the side.

He didn't slow, but turned his head enough to see Sceptrana Shoudra Stargleam coming out of one avenue, waving for him to wait for her. He kept running and motioned for her to catch up instead.

"They are in revolt," Agrathan told her.

Shoudra's expression after the initial shock showed that she was not so surprised by the news.

"How serious are they?" she asked as she ran along beside Agrathan.

"If Elastul will not release Torgar Hammerstriker, then Mirabar will know war!" the dwarf assured her.

Djaffar was waiting for the pair when they arrived at Elastul's palace. He leaned on the door jamb, seeming almost bored.

"The news beat you here," he explained.

"We must act, and quickly!" Agrathan cried. "Assemble the council. There is no time to spare."

"The council need not get involved," Djaffar began.

"The marchion has agreed to the release?" Shoudra cut in.

"This is a job for the Axe, not the council," Djaffar went on. seeming supremely confident. "The dwarves will be put down."

Agrathan trembled as if he would explode a"and he did just that, leaping at the Hammer and putting a lock on the man's throat, pulling Djaffar down to the ground.

A bright flash of light ended that, blinding both combatants, and in the moment of surprise, the Hammer managed to pull away. Both looked to Shoudra Stargleam, the source of the magic.

"The whole of the city will act thusly," the woman said sourly.

Even as she finished the sound of battle, of metal on metal, rang out in the night air.

"This is the purest folly!" Agrathan cried. "The city will tear apart because ofa""

"The actions of one dwarf!" Djaffar interrupted.

"The stubbornness of Elastul!" Agrathan corrected. "Show us to him. Will he sit there quiet in his house while Mirabar burns down around him?"

Djaffar started to respond, his expression holding its steady, sour edge, but then Shoudra intervened, stepping up to the man and fixing him with an uncompromising glower. She walked right by him into the house.

"Elastul!" Shoudra called loudly. "Marchion!"

A door to the side banged open and the marchion, flanked by the other three Hammers, swept into the foyer.

"I told you to control them!" Elastul yelled at Agrathan.

"Nothing will control them now," the dwarf shot back.

"Nothing short of the Axe," Djaffar corrected.

"Not even yer Axe!" Agrathan cried, his voice taking on an unmistakable reversion to his Dwarvish accent. "Torgar's part o' that Axe, or have ye forgotten? And five hundred of me ... of my people count among the two thousand of your ranks. You'll have a quarter that won't fight with you if you're lucky, and a quarter that will join the enemy if you're not."

"Get out there," Elastul told Agrathan, "and speak to them. Your people are sorely outnumbered here, good dwarf. Would you have them slaughtered?"

Agrathan trembled visibly, his lips chewing on words that would not come. He turned and ran out of the house, following the volume of the battle, which predictably led him toward the town's jail.

"The dwarves are more formidable than you believe," Shoudra Stargleam told Elastul.

"We will defeat them."

"To what end?" the Sceptrana asked. It was hard to deter Elastul on such a matter by reasoning concerning losses to his soldiers, since his own safety didn't really seem to be at stake, but by changing the subject to the not-so-little matter of profits, she quickly gained the marchion's attention. "The dwarves are our miners, the only miners we have capable of bringing up proper ore."

"We'll get more," the marchion retorted.

Shoudra shot him a doubtful look.

"What would you have me do?"

"Release Torgar Hammerstriker," the Sceptrana replied.

Elastul winced.

"You have no choice. Release him and set him on the road. He'll not go alone, I know, and the loss to Mirabar will be heavy, but not all the dwarves will depart. Your reputation will not deter other dwarves, perhaps, from coming into the city. The alternate course is one of a bloody battle where there will be no winners, with naught but a shattered Mirabar in its wake."

"You overestimate the loyalty of dwarf to dwarf."

"You underestimate it. To a dwarf, any dwarf, the only thing more precious than gold and jewels is kin. And they're all kin, Elastul, family of Delzoun at their core. I say this as your advisor and as your friend. Let Torgar go, and quickly, before the battle mounts into a full riot, where all reason is flown."

Elastul lowered his gaze in thought, mulling it over with a range of expressions, anger to fear, washing over his face. He looked back up at Shoudra then at Djaffar.

"Do it," he commanded.

"Marchion!" Djaffar started to protest, but his retort was cut short by Elastul's uncompromising stance and expression.

"Do it now!" Elastul demanded. "Go and free Torgar Hammerstriker, and bid him to leave this city forever more."

"He may see your lenience as a reason for staying," Shoudra started to reason, wondering honestly if all of this might be used to further a deeper and better relationship between Elastul and the dwarves.

"He cannot stay and cannot return, under penalty of death."

"That may not prove acceptable to many of the dwarves," Shoudra pointed out.

"Then let those who agree with the traitor go with him," Elastul spat. "Let them go and die on the road to Mithral Hall, or let them get to Mithral Hall and infect it with the same disloyalty and feeble convictions that have too long plagued Mirabar!

"Go!" the marchion roared at Djaffar. "Go now and let us be rid of them!" Djaffar gave a snarl, but he motioned for one of the other Hammers to accompany him and rushed out into the night.

With a look to Elastul, Shoudra Stargleam joined the Hammers.

The fight outside the jail was more a series of brawls than a pitched battle at the point where the three arrived, but the situation seemed to be fast degenerating, despite Agrathan's pleading efforts to calm the dwarves.

Several hundred were there in support of Shingles and Torgar, opposing perhaps twice that many soldiers of the Axe. Notably, no dwarves showed in the ranks of the Mirabarran garrison, though many dwarf Axe soldiers stood off to the side, arms crossed, faces dour and grim.

Shoudra looked over at Djaffar, who was regarding the dwarf non-combatants with open contempt.

"Do not even think of going against the marchion's orders," the sceptrana warned the stubborn Hammer, "and do not even think of delaying the release of Torgar in the hopes that this battle will erupt before us."

Djaffar turned a wry and wicked grin her way.

"I have spells prepared," Shoudra warned.

It was a bluff, but she didn't back away from the man an inch.

When that didn't work, she reminded, "It is a fight none in Mirabar can win. Look at them, Djaffar. Members of your own Axe stand to the side, torn in their loyalties."

Councilor Agrathan came over then, flustered and with his robes all twisted, as if someone had lifted him by the fine fabric and shook him all about (which, indeed, had happened).

"There's no talking to them!" the frustrated dwarf roared.

"Djaffar can talk to them," Shoudra explained, "for he has the news that Torgar is to be released." She looked over the Hammer, whose eyes had narrowed. "Immediately, on word from the marchion. Torgar will be set upon the road out of Mirabar, here and now, and with all of his personal items returned."

"Praise Dumathoin," Agrathan said with a great sigh of relief.

He rushed off to spread the news, using words, finally, to quell many of the mounting brawls.

"Be done with the foul Torgar, then!" Djaffar spat at Shoudra, an admission of defeat. "And let him be done with us. Let all his smelly little kin walk out with him, for all I care!"

Shoudra accepted that tantrum for what it was, never really expecting anything more than that from Djaffar of the Hammers.

Shoudra took center stage, commanding the attention of all by sending a magical burst of light up above her. All eyes upon her, she gave the announcement that so many of Mirabar's dwarves desperately wanted to hear.

When Torgar Hammerstriker walked out of the Mirabar jail a short while later, he did so to thunderous applause from Shingles and his supporters, mixed in with curses and jeers from many of the humansa"and a few groans and mixed sounds from the Axe dwarves, still standing to the side.

Shoudra made her way to Torgar and found Agrathan there as well.

"You are not completely free in your choice of road," the sceptrana explained to the dwarf, her body language and tone telling him that she was no enemy, despite her words. "You are bid to depart the city at once."

"Already decided upon that," Torgar said.

"Give him the night, at least," Agrathan asked of Shoudra. "Allow him his farewells to those he will leave behind."

"I'm not thinking that he's leaving many behind worth saying farewell to," came a gruff voice, and the trio turned to see old Shingles, outfitted in traveling clothes and with a huge pack on his back, moving toward them.

When they looked past the old dwarf, they saw others similarly outfitted, and others across the great square, meeting runners bearing their supplies and traveling gear.

"Ye can't be doing this!" Councilor Agrathan protested, but his was the only protest, for when he looked to Shoudra, he saw her nodding with grim resignation.

Soon after, Torgar Hammerstriker left Mirabar for the last time, along with nearly four hundred dwarves, nearly a fifth of all the dwarves of Mirabar, many of whom had lived in the city for more than a century, and many from families who had served Mirabar since its founding. They all walked with their heads held high and with the conviction that they would not be ill-treated and would not be turned away by the King of Mithral Hall.

"I did not think this possible," Agrathan said to Shoudra as the pair, along with Djaffar, watched the departure.

"Rats leave the ship when it's taking water," Djaffar reminded. "They're seeing more riches in Mithral Hall, the greedy dogs."

"What they are seeing is the possibility that they will have a greater place among their own than we afford them in the city of Marchion Elastul," Shoudra corrected. "The greatest of riches is respect, Djaffar, and few in all Faerun are more deserving of respect than the dwarves of Mirabar."

Agrathan almost cynically added, "The dwarves of Mithral Hall, you mean," but he bit the words back and reminded himself that he still had sixteen hundred dwarf constituents looking to him for leadership, particularly in this confusing time.

Agrathan knew that it would take a long time for Mirabar to shake off the stench of the recent events.

A very long time.

WITH SURPRISING.

SKILL.

Drizzt, Catti-brie, Wulfgar, and Regis sat around a rough map Regis had drawn of the town and the surrounding area and upon which Drizzt had added detail. The mood was dour and fearful a"not for themselves, but for the townsfolk. First the orc prisoner had mentioned a huge army encircling the town, then a woman who had been out on patrol had come in, battered and terrified, and reporting that all the others were dead, wiped away by a powerful force of humanoids.

Though she was obviously unnerved, her words told of a well-coordinated group, a dangerous foe beyond the usual expectations.

None of the friends mentioned Clicking Heels that morning, but the images of that flattened town surely played upon all their minds. Shallows was larger than Clicking Heels and much better defended, with a wizard to help, but the signs were getting very dark.

Bruenor came in soon after, his face locked in a scowl.

"Stubborn bunch," the dwarf remarked, moving between Regis and Wulfgar and observing the map with an approving grunt.

"Withegroo cannot be dismissing the claims of the lone survivor," Drizzt came back. "They lost nearly one in ten this morning."

"Oh, he's believin' her, he is," Bruenor explained, "but him and the others're thinking that they're to pay back them that killed their kin.