The Simbul’s Gift

The state room of the Black Citadel at Bezantur's heart smelt as bad as the meanest alley. Aznar Thrul, Zulkir of Invocation and Tharchion of the Priador—the newest Thayan province of which ancient Bezantur had become the capital—fought Reeking Heat with incense cauldrons and fans: strategies Bezantines had long abandoned. Heavy smoke attracted other aromas, which the fans plastered over every surface. A decade into his tharchionate and Thrul's laudatory murals were reduced to obscure blotches, and the ceiling was a greasy stain where swarms of insects made their homes.

Thrul's nature, infinitely adaptable in politics and deceit, did not allow him to admit an error in ordinary housekeeping. By his order, the cauldrons were kept full and cindering; the fans never stopped swaying. He surrounded himself with the most priceless perfume of all: crisp air invoked from a distant mountaintop. Clothed in heavy velvet, the Zulkir sat on his throne while sweating petitioners paraded before him.

Sultry heat and foul air weren't all that made the Bezantine petitioners uncomfortable. Life was dangerous for a Thayan zulkir who accumulated enemies as the ceiling above him accumulated flies, doubly dangerous for a zulkir who was also a territorial tharchion. Death threats were routine; some were serious. Thrul took no unnecessary chances: when petitioners came to the state room, they entered it naked.

Conventional weapons were impossible to conceal, and it was a rare mage whose concentration was not addled by embarrassment. Shame was further compounded by the constant presence of the citadel's legion of slaves. Never mind that the slaves were equally unclothed or that most of them were undead: They had eyes, they stared, and there was always the chance that they might recognize or remember.

There were drawbacks: Unnerved petitioners were often incoherent. It took patience to understand their logic, and Aznar Thrul was not a patient man. He'd have foregone these bribe-heavy occasions entirely were it not useful, even in Thay, for a tharchion to hear the complaints of common folk at least once a season—or twice, in Reeking Heat.

Thrul saw a score of petitioners before the storm swept in; twenty-three, if he counted the three who fainted between the door and the front of his chair. Once the storm arrived, thunder made it too difficult to hear, and wind whipping through the unshuttered windows blew embers from the incense cauldrons to the ceiling where the greasy soot caught fire.

Lesser wizards levitated slaves with damp rags to beat out the blaze. Two slaves burned when the flames ignited their undead flesh. Another four were lost when the wizard who held them in the air was distracted by a particularly loud thunder blast. The confusion and cleanup delayed the zulkir's dinner well into the evening. He was in a foul mood when his chamberlain appeared in the doorway.

"Neema Gaz," the blue-tattooed wizard announced. A ragged kilt hung around his waist, a mark of the favor he risked by interrupting Thrul as he ate. Warily, he placed a carnelian brooch on the table. "I do not know her, O Mighty Tharchion, Mightier Zulkir, but she had this." He pointed at the brooch, the token of a wizard whose rank was considerably higher than his own. "She says she will not leave without seeing you, O Mighty Tharchion, Mightier Zulkir. I would dispose of her, but..." He shrugged. "If I failed, and she burst in here unannounced, you would be even more displeased."

The zulkir, still robed in velvet and surrounded by mountain air, set down his soup spoon with elegance and drama. He rolled his eyes in frustration or possibly the start of an invocation that would consign the chamberlain to the citadel's legions of undead soldiers. The chamberlain, assuming the latter, folded his arms in prayer.

Thrul chortled. He seized the brooch, breaking the wards around him. Candle flames flickered briefly in a cool breeze, then sultry calm was restored as the zulkir rubbed the dark red gemstone between his fingers.

"Give her what she wants, then send her in ... alone."

"O Mighty Tharchion, Mightier Zulkir, she wants—"

"I know what she wants, lead-head. Assist her!"

The chamberlain wisely foreswore further argument. Shortly thereafter—when the soup tureen had been carried away and the main course laid in its place—a woman entered the room ... alone, according to the zulkir's command.