The Simbul’s Gift

Lauzoril sat back, cursing himself for ignoring Shazzelurt's warnings. He expanded his awareness—his suspicions. The youth had been snatched by Mythrell'aa of Illusion because the woman, the stubborn woman whose brown hair now flowed silver in the moonlight was Aglarond's queen, the Simbul. He recognized her from descriptions Red Wizard spies funneled back to Thay and, more reliably, from the one time when he'd spied through his knife and felt her essence in his mind. He was a dead man if she felt his presence half as acutely. But, having abandoned herself to the music, she seemed oblivious to the world beyond the stones.

And then there was a column of light within the dancers' circle. It widened and coalesced into a horse—likely the twilight horse Aznar Thrul's spy master had mentioned—and a splendid woman formed from moonlight and mist. She said something in the forest language. The music stopped.

Lauzoril discovered that he was on his feet and had taken a step toward the light.

Shazzelurt manifested in the zulkir's thoughts, ever ready to dominate and exploit a weakened mind. Lauzoril's thoughts snapped into familiar patterns. He threw off the dagger's influence, and the silver-form woman's as well, just in time to sense magic hanging some ten or fifteen paces, withershins, away outside the circle.

A gate opened from another place, an illusory place, shrouded in shadow: Mythrell'aa's place. When the gate closed, three figures stood outside the circle: a woman and two men, a zulkir and her minions. One of them was the youth he and Mimuay had seen in the scrying bowl. The other, answering the silver-form woman's call, started walking toward the stone circles.

Be wary, Master. Begone. He bears the mark of Gur.

The mark of Gur, Lusaka Gur who taught the Red Wizards how to die effectively, and running, now, toward the Simbul.

Nearing the end of his fifth decade, the Zulkir of Enchantment was a wizard in full command of his talent, but it hadn't always been that way. As a young man, Lauzoril had become zulkir strictly on the quickness of his wits and his willingness to commit himself—to plunge blindly, if the naked truth were admitted—into action. Surprised or cornered, he was still that bold young man, but, now that he was a zulkir, he could cast spells of his school by will alone.

Lauzoril boldly cast a sphere of freedom and disenchantment on the running man. It wouldn't rid him of Gur's mark, but it would insure that he knew who he was taking with him when he died. The zulkir had a hunch that it wouldn't be Aglarond's witch-queen. Then, for his daughter, Lauzoril whispered the word that would transport him to Mythrell'aa's side. He was, perhaps, the last person Lady Illusion expected to see emerging from the Yuirwood shadows and she had never been the most quick-witted among the zulkirs. While her tattooed brow writhed in confusion, Lauzoril grabbed the bleak-faced mongrel with one hand and with the other delivered a bone-crushing punch to Mythrell'aa's sharp nose.

Magic spells had their place in Thay, but a well-made fist was still a man's best weapon in close quarters. Blood streamed down the zulkir's face as she crumpled to the ground. Freed from enchantment and whatever other compulsions Mythrell'aa kept about him, the marked man had stopped running. He stared at his arm—why, Lauzoril couldn't guess—then changed his course, running back the way he'd come, running toward him and Mythrell'aa as if his life—his death— depended on it.

Lauzoril wrapped both arms around the mongrel and broke the seal on a coward's retreat—a tiny enchanted artifact attached to his belt—that brought him, and the youth in his arm, back to his moss- covered stone horse just as the mark of Gur shook the ground.

* * * * * Alassra couldn't stop. She couldn't stop the tears. She couldn't stop the tumbling between here and there, then and now. She couldn't stop, because she didn't want to.

For one moment, Lailomun was coming toward her: the love of her life whom she believed was dead, whom she hoped had died more than a century ago. He'd been smiling as he ran toward her with the mark of Gur incandescent on his brow. Alassra knew that mark and its variations. She'd seen it glowing on countless Red Wizards in the moments before they destroyed themselves utterly. Since coming to Aglarond, the Simbul had carefully researched the various spells of Lusaka Gur and found ways to foil them. Wisely, she'd made those foils a thoughtless part of her defenses—if she'd had to think, if she'd had to act consciously to defend herself from Lailomun, Mythrell'aa would have had her victory.