“He cannot suffer the dirt of the road upon me,” Catti-brie remarked dryly.

“Only because he cares, of course.”

“Or because he so despises dirt?”

“That too,” Alustriel admitted.

Catti-brie looked to Wulfgar and offered a resigned shrug. She was pleasantly surprised to see him equally at ease with this arrangement. Apparently he understood that their work was better left to Alustriel, and that they could indeed relax and enjoy the respite at the luxurious palace of the Lady of Silverymoon.

“And she came without proper clothing, I’ll wager!” came an obviously annoyed voice, a chant that sounded both melodic and sing-song like an elf, and resonant like the bellow of a dwarf—a most unusual dwarf.

Wulfgar and Catti-brie turned to see the fellow, dressed in a fine white gown with bright green trim, enter the room. He looked at Catti-brie and gave a disapproving sigh and a wag of his meticulously manicured stubby finger. Then he stopped and sighed again, and put his chin in one hand, his fingers stroking the thin line of his well-trimmed silver beard as he considered the task of transforming Catti-brie.

“Well met, Fret,” Alustriel said. “It would seem that you have your work cut out for you. Do try not to break this one’s spirit.”

“You confuse spirit with odor, milady.”

Catti-brie frowned, but it was hard for her to cover her inner smile.

“Fret would put perfume and bells on a tiger, I do believe,” Alustriel said, and her nearby attendants shared a laugh at the dwarf’s expense.

“And colored bows and paint for its nails,” the tidy dwarf proudly replied. He walked up to Catti-brie, gave a “tsk tsk,” and grabbed her by the elbow, pulling her along. “As we appreciate beauty, so it is our divine task to facilitate it. And so I shall. Now come along, child. You’ve a long bath to suffer.”

Catti-brie flashed her smile back at Wulfgar. After their long and arduous journey, she planned to “suffer” it well.

Wulfgar’s returned smile was equally genuine. He turned to Alustriel, saluted, and thanked her.

“What might we do for Wulfgar while my scouts seek word of Colson?” Alustriel asked him.

“A quiet room with a view of your fair city,” he replied, and he added quietly, “One that faces to the west.”

Catti-brie caught up to Wulfgar early that evening on a high balcony of the main turret—one of a dozen that adorned the palace.

“The dwarf has his talents,” Wulfgar said.

Catti-brie’s freshly washed hair smelled of lilac and springtime. She almost always kept it loose to bounce over her shoulders, but she had one side tied up and the other had a hint of a curl teased into it. She wore a light blue gown that enhanced and highlighted the hue of her eyes, its straps revealing the smooth skin of her delicate shoulders. A white and gold sash was tied around her waist at an angle and a place to accentuate her shapely body. The dress did not go all the way to the floor, and Wulfgar’s surprise showed as a smile when he noted that she wasn’t wearing her doeskin boots, but rather a pair of delicate slippers, all lace and fancy trim.

“I found meself a choice to let him do it to me or punch him in the nose,” Catti-brie remarked, her self-deprecation exaggerated because she allowed just a hint of her Dwarvish accent to come through.

“There is not a part of you that enjoys it?”

Catti-brie scowled at him.

“You would not wish for Drizzt to see you like this?” the barbarian pressed. “You would take no pleasure in the look upon his face?”

“I’ll take me pleasure in killing orcs.”

“Stop it.”

Catti-brie looked at him as if he had slapped her.

“Stop it,” Wulfgar repeated. “You need not your boots or your weapons here in Silverymoon, or your dwarf-bred pragmatism and that long-lost accent. Have you looked in the mirror since Fret worked his magic on you?”

Catti-brie snorted and turned away, or started to, but Wulfgar held her with his gaze and his grin.

“You should,” he said.

“You are talking foolishness,” Catti-brie replied, and her accent was no more.

“Far from that. Is it foolish to enjoy the sights of Silverymoon?” He half-turned and swept his arm out to the deepening gloom in the west, to the twilit structures of the free-form city, with candles burning in many windows. Glowing flames of harmless faerie fire showed on a few of the spires, accenting their inviting forms.

“Did you not allow your mind to wander as we walked through the avenues to this palace?” Wulfgar asked. “Could you help but feel that way with beauty all around you? So why is it any different with your own appearance? Why are you so determined to hide behind mud and simple clothes?”

Catti-brie shook her head. Her lips moved a few times as if she wanted to reply but couldn’t find the words.

“Drizzt would be pleased by the sight before him,” Wulfgar stated. “I am pleased, as your friend. Quit hiding behind the gruff accent and the road-worn clothing. Quit being afraid of who you are, of who you might dare to be, deep inside. You do not care if someone sees you after a hard day of labor, sweating and dirty. You don’t waste your time primping and prettying yourself, and all of that is to your credit. But in times like this, when the opportunity presents itself, do not shy from it, either.”

“I feel…vain.”

“You should simply feel pretty, and be happy with that. If you really are one who cares not what others may think or say, then why would you hide from pleasant thoughts?”

Catti-brie looked at him curiously for a moment, and a smile spread on her face. “Who are you, and what have you done with Wulfgar?”

“The doppelganger is long dead, I assure you,” Wulfgar replied. “He was thrown out with the weight of Errtu.”

“I have never seen you like this.”

“I have never before felt like this. I am content and I know my road. I answer to no one but myself now, and never before have I known such freedom.”

“And so you wish to share that with me?”

“With everyone,” Wulfgar replied with a laugh.

“I did look in a mirror…or two,” Catti-brie said, and Wulfgar laughed harder.

“And were you pleased by what you saw?”

“Yes,” she admitted.

“And do you wish that Drizzt was here?”

“Enough,” she bade him, which of course meant “yes.”

Wulfgar took her by the arm and guided her to the railing of the balcony. “So many generations of men and elves have built this place. It is a refuge for Fret and those akin to him, and it is also a place where we all might come from time to time to simply stand and look, and enjoy. That, I think, is the most important time of all. To look inside ourselves honestly and without regret or fear. I could be battling orcs or dragons. I could be digging mithral from the deep mines. I could be leading the hunt in Icewind Dale. But there are times, too few I fear, when this, when standing and looking and just enjoying, is more important than all of that.”

Catti-brie wrapped her arm around Wulfgar’s waist and leaned her head against his strong shoulder, standing side-by-side, two friends enjoying a moment of life, of perception, of simple pleasure.

Wulfgar draped his arm across her shoulders, equally at peace, and both of them sensed, deep inside, that the moment would be one they would remember for all their days, a defining and lasting image of all they had been through since that fateful day in Icewind Dale when Wulfgar the young warrior had foolishly smacked a tough old dwarf named Bruenor on the head.

They lingered for some time, but the moment was lost as Lady Alustriel came out onto the balcony. The two turned at the sound of her voice, to see her standing with a middle-aged man dressed in the apron of a tavernkeeper.

Alustriel paused when she looked upon Catti-brie, her eyes roaming the woman’s form.