The Dream Spheres

The proprietor glanced up. Lilly rocked back on her heels, unprepared for the man's scarred visage. She'd heard that Balthorr had lost an eye in a battle with a chimera, but she didn't expect that he would flaunt his loss as proudly as a family crest. He wore a glass eye, striking in that it was nothing but a white sphere. To Lilly, it was eerily reminiscent of the dream spheres.

"I have come to sell," she said, more abruptly than she had pla

Balthorr studied her with his one good eye. He rose and jerked his head toward a curtained room.

Lilly followed him, then quickly spilled her coins onto the table. "These are platinum. Not many will accept them from the likes of me without asking questions. Can you exchange them for lesser coin?"

The man studied one of the large, shining disks. "Two hundred silver," he offered.

She worked out the exchange in her head and decided the deal was fair enough. "This, too," she added, placing the ruby on the table.

Balthorr picked up the gem and studied it. "Very pretty. Too big to be real, though."

For a moment Lilly's heart sank, but she quickly gathered herself, bolstered by her conviction that this stone was something very special, almost a living thing. It was not so very big—not much bigger than the nail on her smallest finger. "It is a precious stone," she said severely. "I heard tell you knew about such things."

The man spread his hands and shrugged, as if to say that she could not blame him for trying to make the best bargain. "Two hundred gold, paid out in trade-weight bars. Not a copper more."

Lilly's head swam with the enormity of it. Never in her life had she imagined owning such a sum! Why, with that money she could go as far west as Cormyr, with enough left to take lessons in speech and deportment and buy some respectable clothes. She could find work in a fine shop and make her own way without recourse to thievery.

"I'll take it," she said, knowing she should barter but not willing to risk that life-saving sum. She watched intently as the man counted out a hundred gold coins onto a scale, then balanced them with several small shining bars to show her the trade bars measured up in weight to the actual coin. These he placed into a small sack.

When he was finished, she fairly snatched up the sack, startled by how heavy that much gold could be.

Lilly was too eager to be off to be overly concerned with proprieties. She hiked up her skirts and attached the bag to the belt that cinched her chemise. The shopkeeper glanced in her direction, but he seemed far more interested in the ruby and platinum coins that he had just acquired.

With a fistful of silver coins at the ready, Lilly fled from the shop and searched about for a carriage. It was an extravagance, but one she could ill afford to pass up.

Under the watchful eye of Hamish Half-ogre, her tavern room was the safest place she knew. Better to waste a few coins to ride back to this haven than to risk losing all among her fellow thieves.

Three guild carriages passed by without responding to her hail. Finally one drew up, and a pair of halfling grooms hopped down to help her up. The carriage was not empty, but Lilly did not expect to have it to herself. A man and woman sat nestled cozily together on one seat. She settled down on the opposite seat, keeping her eyes politely averted to give her fellow travelers a bit of privacy.

"Doing a little shopping, are we?"

The voice was darkly accented, edged with ice, and chillingly familiar. Lilly started and turned a guilty gaze upon her partner.

"That I am," she babbled, trying without success to hold Isabeau Thione's hard, black-eyed gaze. "Sold one of the dream spheres, I did, just as we agreed. The coins bought me a lovely di

"Spare me. I've been following you, and you went nowhere near a tavern or a milliner. I'm guessing you sold all seven dream spheres. I'd like to see what they are worth."

Isabeau nodded to her companion, whom Lilly recognized as the captain of the bandit band—and the only thief who had survived the raid. "Hold her."

Lilly lunged for the door handle, intending to leap into the street. A large hand clamped on her wrist and flung it high and back. The thug seized her other hand and raised it over her head. With one hand he pi

"I'll scream," Lilly threatened.

"You'll die," riposted Isabeau. For good measure, she tugged a large silken kerchief from her pocket and wadded it. She seized Lilly's jaw and pinched it hard, then forced the gag into her mouth.

Lilly sat in silent, frustrated outrage as the woman's deft hands explored her, finding the hidden bag in a few quick pats. Isabeau pulled a small, narrow knife from the coils of her hair and sliced open Lilly's dress. She took the bag and dumped the contents into her silken lap. Her black brows rose in a supercilious arch.

"Quite the merchant, aren't you? I never dreamed you could get so much for a few dream spheres—which we agreed you would keep for yourself."

Lilly watched helplessly as Isabeau slipped the bars into her pockets. "Normally, I would insist upon an equal split," the woman said with a sweet, false smile, "but since you saw fit to change our agreement, I think I should take the whole as penalty. That is fair, hmm?"

The false smile dropped from her face like a discarded cloak. "Your greed and carelessness could have brought this back to my door. Do not cross me again—ever. I hope you realize you can never speak of what we did without condemning yourself to hang from the city walls."

Lilly nodded her head emphatically, though this threat was far less potent than the grim demonstration the tren monsters had given.

"Good. We understand each other. I'll contact you when I need you again." She turned to her henchman. "You can let her out at the next alley."

The bandit reached for the door of the carriage. Without waiting for it to stop, he wrenched it open and hurled Lilly through the door.

She hit the cobblestones and rolled, coming to a painful stop against a pile of wooden crates. The carriage moved smoothly down the street, its passage covering the brutal exit.

Lilly's head throbbed from the impact with the stone, and the world spun madly as she rose to her feet. She collapsed with a cry of pain—her ankle had been wrenched in the fall. Even without this injury, she doubted she could have stood for long. Quickly she took inventory of the damage. A long, raw scrape marked her arm, and one cheek stung. Her ears rang, and sharp sparkles of color popped and exploded through her vision. Her dress was torn, in addition to the rips Isabeau's knife had made. She had no money to ride, and her first tentative step sent bright shards of pain exploding through her battered body.

She had no choice, though. She told herself that as she struggled to rise, trying to beat back the waves of darkness. But her body would not obey her. She was only dimly aware of the approach of heavy boots, the smell of leather armor as two men crouched over her.

"What have we here?" one of them said. He twined a lock of pale red-gold between his fingers. "A strawberry tart, you might say, but a bit far from the bakery."

The other man slapped his hand aside. "You stupid sod! Look at that face. This is one of the Tha

His companion grunted. "Best get her home, then. You got the price of a carriage hire on you?"

"Not bloody likely! The Watch doesn't pay that well. Wait—I've got three silver. You?"

As the men pooled their coins, Lilly tried to protest. The best she could manage was a little mewling sound as one of the men hauled her into his arms, hailed a carriage, and set a brisk pace toward the North Ward and the Tha