The elf, uncompromising, stared at him hatefully. “You would betray your own kind,” he spat.

Drizzt cocked his eyebrows curiously, and tightened his grip on the elf’s shirt, holding him firmly. “My own kind?”

“Worse then,” the elf spat. “You would betray those who gave shelter and friendship to the rogue Drizzt Do’Urden.”

“No,” he said.

“You would strike at elves and dwarves for the sake of orcs!”

“I would uphold the law and the peace.”

The elf mocked him with a laugh. “To see the once-great ranger siding with orcs,” he muttered, shaking his head.

Drizzt yanked him around, stealing his mirth, and tripped him, shoving him backward into the magical wall.

“Are you so eager for war?” the drow asked, his face barely an inch from the elf’s. “Do you long to hear the screams of the dying, lying helplessly in fields amidst rows and rows of corpses? Have you ever borne witness to that?”

“Orcs!” the elf protested.

Drizzt grabbed him in both hands, pulled him forward, and slammed him back against the wall. Hralien called to Drizzt, but the dark elf hardly heard it.

“I have ventured outside of the Silver Marches,” Drizzt said, “have you? I have witnessed the death of once-proud Luskan, and with it, the death of a dear, dear friend, whose dreams lay shattered and broken beside the bodies of five thousand victims. I have watched the greatest cathedral in the world burn and collapse. I witnessed the hope of the goodly drow, the rise of the followers of Eilistraee. But where are they now?”

“You speak in ridd—” the elf started, but Drizzt slammed him again.

“Gone!” Drizzt shouted. “Gone, and gone with them the hopes of a tamed and gentle world. I have watched once safe trails revert to wilderness, and have walked a dozen-dozen communities that you will never know. They are gone now, lost to the Spellplague or worse! Where are the benevolent gods? Where is the refuge from the tumult of a world gone mad? Where are the candles to chase away the darkness?”