I Read What?!

So last time, Drizzt got to Icewind Dale! We're starting to see some familiar faces. At least one. Maybe we'll see more this time!



So this chapter jumps right into the familiar face thing. We're starting with Bruenor Battlehammer and his adopted daughter, Catti-brie.

Bruenor is cranky about the weather - he thinks it'll be a hard season. Catti-brie is just happy to see the snow. She's pretty immune to his grumpiness and wants to go out to play.

That said, she also seems to respond to being told "no" with racism?

Bruenor forced on his best grimace. “Go out!” he roared. “None but a fool’d look for an Icewind Dale winter as a place for playin’! Show some sense, girl! The season’d freeze yer bones!”

Catti-brie’s smile disappeared, but she refused to surrender so easily. “Well said for a dwarf,” she retorted, to Bruenor’s horror. “Ye’re well enough fit for the holes and the less ye see o’ the sky, the more ye’re smiling! But I’ve a long winter ahead, and this might be me last chance to see the sky. Please, Daddy?”

Maybe I'm old fashioned, but when I was a kid, we didn't say racist things to our parents when we got upset. Someone needs to go stand in a corner.

Bruenor is worried though: he thinks there's something prowling outside. But Catti-brie looks disheartened so he lets her out anyway. Really dude?

Catti-brie's age is not completely clear yet, but we're told she's been with Bruenor for seven years. She's told not to go to far, and of course, she immediately disobeys. Honestly, Bruenor should think about how to properly discipline this kid.

It was easy for the spirited young girl to rationalize her disobedience when she looked back across the valley from the lower slopes of Kelvin’s Cairn, more than three miles from Bruenor’s front door. Bruenor had told Catti-brie to keep the caves in sight, and they were, or at least the wider terrain around them was, from this high vantage point.

But Catti-brie, happily sliding down one bumpy expanse, soon found a flaw in not heeding to her experienced father’s warnings. She had come to the bottom, a delightful ride, and was briskly rubbing the stinging chill out of her hands, when she heard a low and ominous growl.

She's nervous at first because of Bruenor's suspicions of white lions. This, however and of course, is a black panther. Catti-brie pulls her knife out and warns Guen to stand back. Guen just roars, which leads to:

Guenhwyvar!” came a call from above. Catti-brie looked back up the snowy expanse to see a slender, cloaked form picking a careful route toward her. “Guenhwyvar!” the newcomer called again. “Be gone from here!”

The panther growled a throaty reply, then bounded away, leaping the snow-covered boulders and springing up small cliffs as easily as if it were running across a smooth and flat field.

Catti-brie watches her leave with admiration. Hard to blame her, cats are cool.

So now, she and Drizzt are face to face.

She was about the same age as the sandy-haired boy on the farm, Drizzt noted initially, and that thought inevitably brought back the agonizing memories of Maldobar. When Drizzt looked more closely, though, into Catti-brie’s eyes, his thoughts were sent flying back further into his past, to his days marching alongside his dark kin. Catti-brie’s eyes possessed that same joyful and innocent sparkle that Drizzt had seen in the eyes of an elven child, a girl he had rescued from the savage blades of his raiding kin. The memory overwhelmed Drizzt, sent him whirling back to that bloody glade in the elven wood, where his brother and fellow drow had brutally slaughtered an elven gathering. In the frenzy, Drizzt had almost killed the elven child, had almost put himself forever on that same dark road that his kin so willingly followed.

Drizzt is too busy having trauma flashbacks to notice that Catti-brie's run away. Then he thinks about "drizzit" and angsts a lot.

I liked this bit a lot when I was a kid. This was, however, quite a bit before the series put Drizzt and Catti-brie together. To be fair, nothing actually happens between them until she's an adult - as we can see even in Icewind Dale - they've an emotional connection but no romantic or sexual overtones even though she's old enough to get married soon. It'll be a NUMBER of books until we get there.

But we will get there, which makes this all a tiny bit uncomfortable.

Anyway, that night, there's a lot of fucking snow. Catti-brie is sad, because it'll be a long time before she can go back to Kelvin's Cairn and talk to Drizzt. She hasn't told anyone about him, and she's curious.

Two months later though, there's a break in the "normal seven month winter" - Bruenor is heading to Bryn Shander. Catti-brie wants to go outside. Bruenor wants to send some dwarves with her, but Catti-brie quickly points out that they're "mending their doors" and she doesn't want Bruenor to bother them. Like many first time fathers, Bruenor isn't quite experienced enough to realize that something's up. He allows it.

So Catti-brie meets Guen first again. Catti-brie calls her by name, which gets her attention, and asks her if she'll take her to the dark elf. Which of course gives Drizzt opportunity to make a dramatic entrance.

“And why would you want to go to him?” came a question from behind.

Catti-brie froze in her tracks, remembering the smooth-toned, melodic voice, then turned slowly to face the drow. He was only three steps behind her, his lavender-eyed gaze locking onto hers as soon as they met. Catti-brie had no idea of what to say, and Drizzt, absorbed again by memories, stood quiet, watching and waiting.

“Be ye a drow?” Catti-brie asked after the silence became unbearable. As soon as she heard her own words, she privately berated herself for asking such a stupid question.

“I am,” Drizzt replied. “What does that mean to you?”

This is pretty cute. Catti-brie comments that she's heard drow are evil, but Drizzt doesn't seem so. Drizzt reassures her that he won't harm her. It's been a while since Drizzt's had a good conversation so he wants the meeting to continue.

It's to Salvatore's credit that this doesn't read creepy.

Catti-brie introduces herself, explaining that she's the adopted daughter of Bruenor. She does seem to be about seven after all, as she was a baby when her parents were killed. Drizzt gives his own name and introduces Guen too. Catti-brie gets to pet the kitty and I'm not going to lie, I am a little jealous. I want to pet the kitty.

Drizzt asks if she's alone, and Catti-brie explains her child-lawyer skills - she's supposed to keep the caves in sight and she can see them from here. Drizzt is a killjoy responsible adult:

Drizzt looked back into the valley, to the far rock wall several miles away. “Your father would not be pleased. This land is not so tame. I have been on the mountain for only two months, and I have fought twice already shaggy white beasts I do not know.”

Catti-brie identifies the beasts as tundra yeti and says they don't come around the mountain. Drizzt is sarcastically doubtful, but dude, this is her home. She might actually know what she's talking about?

Anyway, they chat. It's very cute. It reminds me of that bit in the Witcher tv show where Geralt meets the very enthusiastic girl in the first episode. There's something inevitably charming about seeing the brooding angsty hero interacting with an exuberant little girl.

...still weird that they'll get together some day, but I'll try not to let future knowledge prejudge me more than it already has.

So they talk about lots of stuff, Menzoberranzan and the Icewind Dale and the dwarves. Drizzt is really happy to hear about his closest neighbors. But it's almost time for Catti-brie to go home. Drizzt offers to take her, but Catti-brie thinks Bruenor won't really understand. But she knows the terrain. She'll be fine.

When Catti-brie gets back, she finds Bruenor quite surly. See, he's been in Bryn Shander, and has got the news about the dark elf nearby. He's pretty sure Catti-brie will be curious. He correct, just a bit late. He forbids her from going to the mountain and makes her give him her word.

Catti-brie keeps it. Sort of. She doesn't go TO the Cairn, but calls for Drizzt and Guen from the valley trails near it. They have a picnic that she packed. We're told that later on when she tells Bruenor she kept her word, he's still pretty suspicious. As he probably ought to be.

The chapter ends here.