The Simbul_s Gift

"I'll come back at sunset. You'll be here, won't you, Ebroin?"

"Take Taefaeli, please."

"I don't know. It will be a strain, but I suppose I can take her now. Better she wakes up in a strange bed than a strange forest?"

If Elminster had been there, or any of her sisters, especially Alustriel, they would have warned Bro that his secrets were exposed, but as it was, the youth had no advisors and walked calmly down the path Alassra prepared for him.

"She likes honey on her porridge."

"Honey and porridge, when she wakes up. But what about you, Ebroin? Will you be all right… until sundown?"

"This is the Yuirwood and I'm Cha'Tel'Quessir."

"Cha'Tel'Quessir with no knife in his belt or boots on his feet."

The youth's attention dropped to the ground and stayed there with his mouth open and his fingers splayed in panic. Alassra thought he'd lost his shoes during their time-trek, then she remembered his bare feet in the Sulalk stable.

"I'm sorry."

Bro didn't notice the Simbul's very rare apology. "The stream," he muttered. "Oh gods, my boots are still beside the stream."

"Take mine," Alassra said quickly. "Don't worry, they'll fit: I've got huge feet." She undid the thongs and kicked free of the leather. "And a knife." She opened her belt and removed the first of several sheaths.

The sheath held a plain dagger with a brass-studded hilt and a single-edged blade. A peddler had given it to her after she rescued his donkey from a muddy ravine. Short of the donkey, it was the man's most valuable possession, so she'd kept it, as she kept many things, until she found better homes for them. It could neutralize most poisons on contact and deflect simple spells; but the Simbul could neutralize any poison and her ability to deflect magic was second to none.

She gave it to Bro along with a single strand of her silver hair, which she tied around his wrist. "I know you'll be here at sunset. I'll bring you better clothes and a more useful knife. But if you need me here before then, squeeze the knot and say my name. I'll hear you; I'll be here before you take your next breath." He looked doubtful, ready to break the strand and run for the trees immediately. "Think of your sister, Ebroin. You wouldn't want me to tell her that I'd left you here, alone, and something bad had happened to you."

Bro swallowed hard. He slid the knife onto his belt and left the hair alone. "Take care of her."

"Peace between us, Ebroin?" Alassra offered her hand.

He shook his head. "Just take good care of her. Don't let her forget that her mother was Cha'Tel'Quessir."

"I won't."

Alassra retrieved her staff and the child. She smiled at Bro, who turned away, and reached within herself. Finding the source of Mystra's blessing-the silver fire of the Chosen-she let it take her and the child back to her privy chambers.

7

The city of Bezantur, in Thay Between midnight and dawn, the fifteenth day of Eleasias, The Year of the Ba

Fine ash and cinders, black as the starless Bezantur sky visible through arrow slit windows, trickled through the elegant fingers of Mythrell'aa Vianul, Zulkir of Illusion, mistress of Serpent Tower. The sparkling powder fell into a crystal bowl, already knuckle-deep in darkness. When her fist was empty, Mythrell'aa scooped another handful from a smoldering brazier. She whispered two words-the name of her antagonist-Alassra Shentrantra, and began again.

Mythrell'aa's bowl filled with the residue of incense and empty visions. The sky lightened to a bruised lavender. Her time for private pleasures faded with the night.

"Where are you?" Mythrell'aa's black-enameled fingernails scraped the bottom of the brazier and brought up a handful of glowing embers. "Not beyond my reach."

A statement of faith, not fact. Every zulkir knew the Simbul had mastered spells they could only dream of. She could vanish for months and reappear in the thick of battle, radiating fire and lightning, ambushing them when they had thought they had the advantage.

Mythrell'aa had a true advantage over her Thayan peers: an older name, a private quarrel, and a thorn stem, the last token of an ill-fated love, which Alassra Shentrantra had unexpectedly preserved in her most private chamber.

"Come home, Alassra," Mythrell'aa wished as she shook the embers like dice in her loosely clenched fist. Blood-red lips parted in an eager smile. Yesterday, two years of scrying and spying had been fulfilled when Alassra came face-to-face with Mythrell'aa's minions in a no-account Aglarondan village. It was almost too much to believe that her illusionists had achieved the penultimate victory, but as the day passed and Alassra failed to appear in her private chamber…

After decades of waiting, Mythrell'aa began to hope.

The spilling embers formed a shape, like wine in a transparent glass. Mythrell'aa's smile froze. Her breath escaped in an enraged gasp.

"A child!"

The dangling lump in Alassra's arms was unmistakable to anyone who could read fire and ash. Mythrell'aa's hand was empty. Alassra's glowing shape was complete and began to move above the bowl.

"A horse! You were looking for a gods-all-be-damned horse!" The zulkir made a fist. "What else went wrong?"

She considered her imperiled illusionists by face and name. She'd taught each of them magic and more, but they were all expendable, when Alassra Shentrantra was the prey. Before they left Thay, Mythrell'aa had made certain they knew none of her secrets. They couldn't betray her if they fell into the witch-queen's hands.

Intrigue was a dangerous game and a game she hadn't played until recently. Mythrell'aa's life had been simpler before the Salamander War, before Zulkir Aznar Thrul established himself as Tharchion Aznar Thrul here in Bezantur. Before all that, Mythrell'aa had maintained cozy relationships with Bezantur's tharchions. She handled the magic and kept herself amused; they handled the intrigue.

Thrul had changed all that. He had no need of her spell-casting talents and treated her like a child. No, worse than a child, he'd treated her like a slave, expecting her-who'd been a zulkir before he was born-to cater to his whims. So she'd turned to Szass Tam and he'd taught her… for a price.

But not even Szass Tam knew about Alassra Shentrantra: he hadn't asked; she hadn't told. It was the first lesson he'd taught her, and she'd learned it well. Someday Mythrell'aa imagined she'd reveal what she knew about the witch-queen of Aglarond. Until then, Mythrell'aa kept her secret to herself. Countless Red Wizards moldered in lonely graves because they'd underestimated the witch-queen's power. Illusion's zulkir wouldn't be among them.

Mythrell'aa turned away from the animated embers, to the narrow windows where a man stood, as if in a trance, his face to the horizon. The past and the future were beyond Mythrell'aa's control, but in the present, in this room, there was nothing about Alassra Shentrantra that couldn't be used to hurt someone.

"Lailomun. Lailomun, my pretty pet, come here."

Lailomun started when she called his name. He reached for the open window, encountered the wards and fell back, nursing his numbed hands.

He hadn't changed since Mythrell'aa surprised him that night, decades past, in the trysting room Alassra Shentrantra prepared for them. His handsome face remained unmarked by time, except for a small bluish scar above his right brow, where Mythrell'aa's vengeance burrowed through his skull.

She hadn't changed him, not the way zulkirs usually changed the a