'Right, that's it,' he said to his trembling wife in a voice of iron. She whirled around to stare up at him as if he were twelve feet tall, fully armored, and grimly draw shy;ing on huge spiked war gauntlets as he contemplated which heavy sword to snatch up for the ride into battle. 'We're moving. First thing in the morning. I've always hated your cousin in Port Llast, but right now I could cheerfully kiss him-
The Simbul’s newest bedchamber took the form of a tall, soaring cone, its walls covered with the polished, interlaced, and startlingly red scales of many red dragons who would never take wing again. A steady, spell-spun breeze rose to the unseen tip of the cone, carrying swirling smoke with it.
The smoke came from a merrily-blazing bonfire that was floating some dozen feet above the tiled, diamond- shaped central dance floor. Four women were lying or sprawling at ease in the air around it, floating with spellbooks open in front of them. From time to time, encountering particularly faint or smudged writings, one of the studying sorceresses would crook a finger, and a blazing log would drift out from the conflagration to hang obligingly near, where it could shed light but not flame where desired.
The bed that usually hung high in the center of the cone was now floating handy to one side, piled high with scrolls, grimoires, bookmarks, and plates of butterbread biscuits. An unseen harp played very faint and gentle ballads in the background. The fire popped only in hushed tones, and did not spit sparks at all.
One of the floating women sat bolt upright, causing the others to look up, startled. The Simbul frowned but kept silent, nodding slightly from time to time, then slowly acquired a wolfish grin. 'A-hunting Red Wizards? Leave it to me.'
She was, suddenly, a small whirlwind of flame that outshone the fire, a whirlwind that spun dazzlingly into a rising spiral-and was just as suddenly gone.
The three remaining sorceresses looked at each other. Then two of them groaned in unison, and the third one asked in disbelief, 'Again?'
The Simbul
In Thay they trust in their spells. They bluster over shy;much, and fear too little. Yet I know how to make a Red Wizard go pale with but three words. All I need say is: 'Summon the Simbul.'
Out of the darkness, a clawlike hand dipped into dark waters at the bottom of an almost-empty metal bathtub, plucked up a tiny, dripping chip of stone, and juggled it to the sound of a chuckle that was not pleasant at all.
It was the space of a long-drawn, comfortable breath later when something in the depths of Blandras Nuin's bedchamber made a booming sound. There followed a triple crash, then the rising sound of a scream that grew markedly in volume. Its source, a naked man whose flesh was very red and whose body trailed countless tiny curls of smoke, burst out into the hallway, rebounded off the wall with his hair enthusiastically aflame, and sprinted for the bathroom.
The running man whooped into a fresh scream at the sight of his two servant maids floating in eerie, glowing splendor, upright and staring with their feet a good way off the floor. He tried to swerve or slow his onrushing progress, but succeeded only in another heavy collision with the wall. His howl of horror carried him through a bruising roll that took him past the floating women, but sent them tumbling about the hallway like spell-slowed juggler's balls.
Scrabbling to make the turn into the bath chamber, Auvrarn Labraster never saw the rolling wall of flame that thundered out of the bedchamber door and snarled hungrily along the hall after him, swallowing Nalambra and Karlae as it came. All he saw was his high-backed metal bathtub, filled to the brim with clear, clean water, gleaming in the moonlight that was flooding in the open window. Head blazing, he launched himself into a plunge.
His head struck the curving inside of the nearly empty tub with a solid gonging noise, and the rest of his body followed in an awkward somersault, dragging the tub over on its side. Filthy water raced through Labraster's sizzling hair as his head rang like a riven bell. His senses started to drift away from him.
The last thing he heard was hearty feminine laugh shy;ter-the full-bodied, head-thrown-back guffawing that so few women allow themselves-and the rising crackle of consuming fire. In the roaring heart of those flames was a sphere of open air where no flames reached. They streamed around it, defining its walls, but the space within was as cool, and the air as fresh, as if there was nothing burning for miles, and the gentlest of breezes was wafting over a pleasant meadow.
Three women hung in the heart of this little refuge. Two of them had been jolted awake into trembling terror, to find themselves floating in the air amidst an inferno that had only touched them enough to leave wisps of smoke from their scorched hair drifting about their shoulders. Speechless in amazement and fear, they stared dumbly at the third woman.
She was a tall, slender figure in a long, close-fitting gown that descended to her ankles and rose into a high collar. Her boots were of gleaming black leather, capped at heel and toe with gold. The sleeves of her gown flared from the elbow, and they rippled as she lifted a hand that bore several rings to shape an almost careless ges shy;ture in the air. She had long, wild silver hair that curled around her in endless, restless streams, like waves breaking on a beach, and here and there among its silken sweep, rings gleamed, securely entwined in the tresses. The wild disorder of her hair was echoed in the careless gape of her gown, that laid bare her front from throat down to where the garment drew in to hold her breasts. She.wore, it could be seen, nothing under the gown.
Her eyes were two dancing flames of fearless, reck shy;less amusement. They held the gazes of both Nalam shy;bra and Karlae at once, and though neither maid could have said then or later what color those eyes were, they knew somehow that this woman would hurl danger all about them and all the world without warn shy;ing-and often did so-but that they were safe from her.
They stared at her in wonder as the flames roared on around them all, consuming the house of Blandras Nuin. From somewhere nearby came the crash of a falling beam, the hissing of a cistern boiling away, then more crashes. The sorceress in the dark gown wove another spell, her body moving in the air with wild, sensuous grace, and smiled at Nalambra and Karlae.
They hung trembling, not daring to think what might now befall-then, of course, it did. Flames smote them with a deafening bellow, and the maids were hurled helplessly up through the air, soaring high in the star-strewn night sky as the house exploded in a huge fire shy;ball beneath them.
Nalambra and Karlae found breath enough for fresh shrieks of terror as they tumbled into an ever-quickening descent, realizing numbly that they were going to die.
That cold and terrifying knowing froze their hearts and minds throughout their whirling descent down, down to soft, seated landings on the stone bench at the far end of the ember-strewn garden. As its cold stone shocked their bare thighs, and heaps of their own clothing spun out of nowhere to fill their laps, they had a brief glimpse of a dark-gowned figure standing in front of them, tiny lightning coiling and darting around her slender, uplifted arms. The lightning filled the cupped palms of the sorceress, there was a flash, and Nalambra and Karlae were blinking at the empty night in front of them.
The woman with the smile like a wolf was gone.
The palace that crowns the hill above Velprintalar is a slender-towered castle of green stone, beautiful to look upon. Most citizens of Aglarond gaze upon it from a safe distance, and take comfort in its reminder of the
