Hand of Fire

Wordlessly Rathan steered a goblet into Sharantyr's hand and turned to firmly lead the wetly cursing Torm a good distance away.

Sharantyr frowned, drained her goblet in one long toss, and started toweling herself vigorously, darting an involuntary glance at her closed fist. "Tess? What-?"

Lhaeo smiled, took the empty goblet from her, and handed her Rathan's untouched one. "She says-" his voice changed, assuming perfect mimicry of the Lady Lord's light but commanding tones, and continued: "Shar, I need your help. The King has chosen this fair day to visit me. I can't slip away for more than a quick stroll to the garderobe or two, for he comes riding with more swaggering knights each time. To go missing would upset him, look ill in the eyes of those who ride with him, spread worry about my stewardship, and set the gossips to talking about a breach between us. So I'm stuck here-and Shandril and Narm have just set out through the Tombgate and in need of all the aid they can get. Saying the right word over this token will take only the person holding it to the far end of the Tombgate, the spot from which Narm and Shandril so recently set forth, wearing the spell-spun guises of two fat priestesses of Chauntea."

Shandril shook wet hair back over her shoulder, opened her fist, and looked down at what lay in her palm: a tiny piece of smooth ivory, carved into the likeness of a human skull.

She looked up from it with her eyes very large and dark, and asked softly, "And that 'right word' was…?"

The tapestries were already drawn across the windows, and a fire was crackling in the hearth. Highknight guards were well away, at the bottom of the stairs, and keeping everyone else even more distant, for the King of Cormyr was in private council with his Lady Lord of Eveningstar- and if he preferred to receive her reports while she lay unclad on her back upon the fur rugs covering the floor of her own bedchamber, that was his royal pleasure.

"Ah, Tess, Tess," the Dragon of Cormyr said fondly, leaning down to gently kiss-and then bite-the bared curves beneath him. "I've missed you, as always. How fares the little trouble with Manshoon and suchlike?"

"Unlike you, my Dragon," Tessaril gasped, writhing on the furs beneath him, "I believe that matter is now almost under control."

It befell so suddenly that Narm could scarcely believe it was happening. One moment they were walking along the banks of the boulder-studded brook, the bright sun shining hot upon their shoulders and the road not far away in front of them-and the next moment three figures rose in slow, menacing unison from behind one of the largest stones, swords and knives in their hands, and Faerun seemed suddenly dark and dangerous around them.

"Be still, Sisters of the Soil," one of them said grimly. "Don't move your hands at all-unless you want to lose them."

"Or you could scream and run," another said with a slow, unlovely smile. "I always like that."

"W-what?" Narm quavered, trying to sound like a middle-aged, fat, and thoroughly frightened woman-and succeeding far too well. One of the problems with acting scared was that you found, even after a few moments, that you really were.

"W-we have nothing," he added, letting his hand drift nearer to his belt-dagger-but steel flashed, his fingertips burned and then went cool… and when he moved his hand, it trailed blood from two of his fingers.

"Don't try that again," the third brigand said bluntly. "Just stand still, and we'll take what we want."

They stepped forward in unison, and Narm feigned mewing terror and trembled his way back from them.

"Don't trouble about your virtue," the second brigand said, the shortest one. "You're not exactly… handsome, hey? Just stay still-we can rob your corpse with far less trouble than it takes to run after you, or listen to you screaming."

The tallest brigand was looming over Shandril. Narm cast a quick glance at nim and saw that a sword had long ago left a long, disfiguring white scar across the man's face. From brow to cheek it ran and had turned the eye it crossed much larger and darker than the man's other eye-which was cold, steady, and a deep brown in hue.

Shandril went to her knees-in reverence, it seemed, rather than fear, and stared up into those mismatched eyes with an expression of awe on her fat and weathered face. "The man with different eyes!" she gasped. "At last!" The brigands frowned at her in unison. "What foolery's this?" the second one snapped.

"You are the one foretold," Shandril said, in a voice that trembled with excitement. "I must aid you in any way I can!" She fumbled with the thin purse at her belt, got it undone, and thrust it up at him. "Take all I have, Exalted One!" she pleaded, reaching up for him with trembling fingers-as Narm hastily went to his knees beside her. "Take me!"

"Exalted One, eh?" the brigand growled slowly, and then his teeth flashed in a wondering grin. "Well, then."

He pointed at Shandril's bodice, and the fat priestess hastily started to tear it open, tugging at its laces. The brigand went to his own knees, reaching for her.

Narm hesitantly reached out for the man, too-only to earn the curt command, "See to my fellows. Surrender yourself to them!"

Gri

Shandril judged them close enough. At last- She smiled up into the face of the brigand with the mismatched eyes-and blasted him to scorched, tumbling bones.

The other two brigands barely had time to snarl out startled oaths before they lacked heads to say anything with at all. Smoking, the headless corpses reeled back and toppled away from Narm.

"Shan," the young wizard murmured urgently, as he shrank away from loosely bouncing brigand boot heels. "Your seeming… 'tis gone. I can see… the real you."

"I know," Shandril sighed, "but it couldn't be helped. These damned robes'll fall right off me now, too."

Narm frowned. "The ferry's only a hill or so away, and Tess-Lord Tessaril warned us how lawless Scornubel was."

"I'm not walking in there barefoot and naked," Shandril told him, "and priestesses of Chauntea don't keep slaves."

Narm frowned again, trying to hunt down memories. Shandril watched them pass like shadows across his face and kept silent.

"But," her husband said slowly, remembering, "they do penances. I've seen them and asked why. For acts of waste and carelessness, like campfires that they let get out of control to scorch plants and trees and all."

"Meaning?"

"Your spare tunic-you can see through it if it's pulled over your head, yes?"

"So I go hooded, forbidden to speak, and you carry a switch to strike me if I do," Shandril said slowly. "I saw a priest of the Mother punished like that, once. His hands were tied to his body, the rope crossed around and around him, with flowers and seed-heads stuck through it." She nodded then gri

Narm rolled his eyes. "Don't you trust my taste in colors?" he replied mockingly.

"You," Shandril told him severely, holding together the remnants of her homespun Chauntean robe as it fell off her shoulders once more, "spent far too much time in the company of one Torm. A clever tongue is not the prize feature you seem to think it is."

Narm gri

Closing his mouth again hastily, he turned to the bodies of the brigands, where flies were already buzzing.

"That's better," Shandril told him, trudging for cover in boots that were already wadding shapelessly down around her ankles. "That's much better."