Shamur had no idea what that would accomplish, but, suspecting she wouldn’t like it very much, she yanked her weapon from his torso, flicked off the thumb of his right hand, then cut at his head. The broadsword shattered the crescent mask and crunched deep into the skull beneath.
Marance collapsed. Believing that one couldn’t be too careful with the undead, Shamur, panting, watched him for a time to make sure she really had destroyed him, and while she was so engaged, she noticed that at some point during the duel, the bridge had stopped shaking.
Apparently it wasn’t going to fall.
CHAPTER 22
The Drum and Mirror possessed a verandah overlooking the bay, a railed porch warded against cold weather by the same sort of enchantment that protected the Wide Realms. Slumped there now, filthy, sore, weary to the bone, yet actually feeling fine, Talbot savored the warmth of the mulled wine glowing in his belly and the splendor of the red and golden dawn flowering above the Sea of Fallen Stars. His equally grubby and battered parents and siblings sat with him, likewise gazing to the east, and amazingly, whether exhaustion or contentment was responsible, it appeared that no one in his loquacious, quarrelsome family had a word to say.
After, as Talbot now knew, Mother had killed Marance Talendar, the wizard’s conjured minions had fought on for a little while longer, then, one species at a time, vanished back to wherever he’d summoned them from. That, however, had scarcely been the end of the family’s labors. Father had immediately gotten them started digging through the rubble of the several collapsed houses to rescue whomever might be trapped inside. In time, other residents of the bridge and a troop of Scepters had joined the effort, but the task had taken several hours even so.
It was finished now, and here the Uskevren were, all five of them basking in a rare moment of family amity. Then Tamlin straightened up a little, opened his mouth to speak, and Talbot winced, somehow knowing that his brother was about to spoil the mood.
“I did well tonight, didn’t I, Father?” asked Tamlin, fatuously, in Talbot’s jaundiced opinion.
Father smiled. “Yes, son. All three of you did.”
“Then maybe this is a good time for me to tell you something,” Tamlin said. “You know those dreary men from Raven’s Bluff and wherever else it was?”
Father frowned. “The emissaries? Of course. What about them?”
“Well,” the younger man said, “to tell you the truth, I sent them packing.”
“You what?”
“Well, they just babbled on and on, and I didn’t understand a word of it. I thought it would make life easier if I simply got rid of them, the better to focus on the effort to find you and Mother and catch the rogue who was trying to assassinate us. So I broke off the talks, trying to be nice about it, though I must confess, the outlanders seemed rather peeved even so. They said they would sail for home forthwith.”
“You imbecile!” Father roared, his face ruddy with anger. “Do you know how much money that alliance would bring in?” He made a visible effort to rein in his temper, and Talbot could all but hear the wheels turning as Thamalon began to ponder how to salvage the situation. “I have commitments that absolutely preclude my leaving Selgaunt for at least a month, and by then some other House will have gotten in ahead of us. You, boy, must journey east in my stead. You’ll apologize profusely for rebuffing the envoys, spread a fresh round of gifts and bribes about, and resume the negotiations.”
Tamlin grimaced. “I told you, I wouldn’t know what to say, and in all candor, I really feel that these past couple days, I’ve done my bit to serve the family already. Besides, I have commitments, too. I’ve already accepted invitations to any number of parties and balls.”
“Fine,” Father snapped. He turned to Tazi. “You’ll go.”
“No, I won’t,” she replied. “Tamlin’s the heir, and if he isn’t willing to shoulder the responsibilities of his position, I don’t see why I should have to take up the slack, particularly now that I’ve just gotten over being ill. I’m planning to enjoy myself, not sit cooped up in a room and dicker endlessly over the price of knickknacks, or whatever it is you’d want me to discuss.”
“So be it,” Father said. He pivoted toward Talbot. “And what do you say, lad?” Tal could see the anticipatory disgust in the old man’s eyes, the expectation that his youngest child, like the others, would disappoint him.
Rather to his own surprise, Talbot felt a momentary impulse to surprise his sire, to please him for once by undertaking this task and performing it well. But he knew he couldn’t journey to a strange city. The full moon was coming, and it must find him locked in his cage backstage at the Wide Realms when it arrived. “I can’t go either,” he said. “Mistress Quickly has cast me in her current play and the two that will follow.”
“You feckless ingrates,” Father began, trembling.
Mother, looking utterly strange with her blisters, scrapes, bruises, and torn lower lip, her masculine clothing and short, dyed hair, laid her hand on his arm. To Talbot’s surprise, the gesture sufficed to make the old man pause in mid-diatribe.
“You have a choice,” Mother said. “You can take their recalcitrance to heart, or you can remember the valor they displayed earlier, and be proud.”
The corners of Father’s mouth quirked upward. “You have a point. For the moment, I will be proud, albeit grudgingly. Will you stroll with me to the far end of the porch?”
“All right,” she said. As they walked away, Talbot wondered what they had to say that they didn’t want their children to overhear.
For some reason, Shamur felt awkward and flustered, and it was worse when she looked at Thamalon. Hands resting on the railing at the edge of the verandah, where the enchantment of warmth gave out, she gazed out at the gorgeous sunrise gilding the rippled surface of the sea. The cold breeze smelled of salt water.
“I was just wondering,” Thamalon said, a bit diffidently, “how soon you’ll be moving out of Stormweather Towers, and where you’ll go when you do. Obviously, you don’t need to run all the way to Cormyr anymore, unless it’s what you want. I’m sure Fendolac would welcome you back at Argent Hall.”
Once again, a knot of emotion tightened painfully in her chest, and this time, at long last, she understood precisely what she was feeling, just as she knew there was nothing to be done about it.
“Perhaps Argent Hall would be a good choice,” she said, striving to be austere, dignified Lady Uskevren, with never a hint of distress in her tone or expression.
And it was that very reflexive attempt at masking her true self that abruptly snapped her to her senses. Since Thamalon now knew who she really was, she didn’t have to deceive him anymore. If she was willing to risk a bit more heartache and a wound to her pride, she could speak to him honestly at last.
She forced herself to turn and face him.
“Do you want me to go?” she asked.
His green eyes blinked in surprise. “No, milady. Despite all the quarrels and misunderstandings, I’ve always cared for you, and after these recent days, I think I love you better than before.” He smiled for an instant. “Apparently I like it when a woman tries to kill me. I only asked about your intentions because I thought you wished to leave.”
“At one point, so did I,” she replied, “but gradually, I realized something. Somehow, by preventing you from truly knowing me for all those years, I likewise kept myself from perceiving you as you truly are. But the last three days have opened my eyes, and I see someone rather grand. I’d like to come to know him better, if it’s not too late.”
Thamalon beamed, an expression of such naked joy that it pierced her soul. “Even though he’s an old man?”
“Yes. Judging from the way he handles a long sword, he still has a little life in him. So I ask to be your wife, my lord, a truer, fonder wife than I was before. I’ll renounce swords and adventure and become my grand-niece once again.” The declaration brought an upwelling of bitter anguish, and she swallowed it back down as best s
he could. She had made her choice, and must strive not to pine for all it would cost her. “I just hope I can resume the masquerade successfully. I thought I could hunt for Master Moon and still safeguard my secret, but it didn’t work out very well. Nuldrevyn knows who I truly am, and even if he doesn’t tell, any number of people have now seen the refined, weapons-hating Lady Uskevren brawling in the streets. It’s possible that one of them will figure out that the Shamur of today and the thief of yore are one and the same.”
Thamalon chuckled. “You do talk nonsense sometimes.”
She peered at him quizzically. “What do you mean?”
“That if nobody else reveals your secret, we Uskevren will do it ourselves. Think about it. You committed your robberies almost a century ago. Nobody’s outraged about them anymore. To the Selgaunt of today, Shamur the thief is a charming rascal in a series of amusing stories, not a threat to the common weal. Moreover, you’re now the hero who prevented the destruction of the High Bridge. I very much doubt that anyone will want to arrest you for your past indiscretions, and if they should, we’ll buy them off.”
“Then I could live as I please,” she murmured, not quite daring to believe it.
“Well, you can’t go back to plundering our peers,” Thamalon said. “That’s simply not appropriate for the mistress of a great House. But I daresay we can satisfy your yen for mayhem somehow. You can fence, of course. Travel with our caravans and argosies and fend off brigands and pirates. Help stamp out the Quippers. Bear your sword against the Talendar, Soargyls, or our other rivals, the next time they take it into their heads to exterminate us. I only insist on one condition. Should anybody inquire, I always knew who you truly were.”
“Agreed,” Shamur said, and then, heedless of their dignity, of the eyes of their astonished children or anyone else in the tavern, she and Thamalon embraced.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Richard Lee Byers is the author of over twenty-five fantasy and horror novels, including the FORGOTTEN REALMS® titles Dissolution, The Rage, The Rite, The Ruin, Queen of the Depths, The Black Bouquet, and Unclean. His short stories have appeared in numerous magazines and anthologies. A resident of the Tampa Bay area, the setting for much of his horror fiction, he spends a good deal of his leisure time fencing, playing poker, and shooting pool. He is a frequent guest at Florida science fiction conventions and at Gen Con Indianapolis, where he participates in the writer’s symposium. He always appreciates hearing from his readers, who can contact him via email at [email protected].
FORGOTTEN REALMS, WIZARDS OF THE COAST, and their respective logos are trademarks of Wizards of the Coast, Inc., in the U.S.A. and other countries. ©2007 Wizards.
THE SHATTERED MASK
Sembia: Gateway to the Realms: Book III
©2001 Wizards of the Coast LLC
All characters in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
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Published by Wizards of the Coast LLC. FORGOTTEN REALMS, WIZARDS OF THE COAST, and their respective logos are trademarks of Wizards of the Coast LLC, in the U.S.A. and other countries.
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eISBN: 978-0-7869-5700-2
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