The Simbul's gift - Lynn Abbey [36]
It was a new experience for the Simbul: travel spells lifted a person above the temporal stream and blocked awareness of time's passage. If she'd been alone, she would have savored the novelty, even the danger. But she wasn't alone. Kneeling down, Alassra got one hand on Bro's arm and laid her other arm across the colt's neck.
"Grab your sister! Don't let go!" she commanded, and this time Bro obeyed.
The colt and the little girl both shed her spells when the hand-to-hand link was complete. The girl shrieked and the colt lurched awkwardly to its feet. The Simbul dropped her staff-it was bound to her by a score of spells and would stay with her through any errant magic-and seized the colt's halter.
Zandilar's Dancer had Alassra outweighed and out-muscled. She bitterly regretted that she'd used the last of her mild magic dealing with Bro's temper. With the colt awake and panicked and her without the spells to quiet him, the best Alassra could do was keep his head level as he dragged them all through an eerie, changing forest.
"I can hold him," Bro insisted after they narrowly avoided a tree that began as a shadow and grew to maturity in half a step. "He'll trust me."
It went against the Simbul's judgment, but her way wasn't working. Alassra exchanged her firm grip on Bro's sleeve for a gentler hold on his sister's hand. Zandilar's Dancer was too spooked to trust anyone, but a second strong hand on his halter convinced him to stand still.
"What happened?" Bro asked when several moments passed without changes in the trees around them.
Zandilar's Dancer had pulled them a hundred paces from the clearing and who-knew-how-many years. More than she wanted to count. It was still night, still the Yuirwood. The forest had changed around them, but the trees had grown, not shrunk.
"We're back where we belong."
"Back?" he asked, as if he'd understood nothing.
"We were dis-"
The Yuirwood burst into flames around them. For a moment-an eternal and terrifying moment-Alassra knew she was on fire, then the moment and the fire were behind her. She was alone, blind, numbly aware of her arms or legs, but not the cloth of her gown or the leather of her boots. Her mind was clear and empty. Every spell the Simbul had studied in Velprintalar had been burned out of her memory: Another new experience that she hoped not to repeat.
Empty-headed as she was, Alassra remained far from helpless. Mystra's Chosen were never helpless: The goddess's protection flowed in their veins. Alassra's senses, except for the forgotten spells, restored themselves. She assessed her injuries and analyzed the events that had overtaken her.
She'd been wrong to tell Bro they were back where they belonged. They'd merely arrived in a time and place where the Yuirwood had seemed changeless-until a forest fire swept through it. The flames had stunned her, but whatever magic had carried them through time, had carried them too rapidly for the fire to harm them.
To harm her.
Alassra opened her eyes, hoping that her more fragile companions had survived.
They had.
The half-elf, his half-sister, and the colt lay on the nearby ground, lit by stars and moonlight that seemed-Alassra narrowed her eyes to study their positions-where they should be a few hours before dawn on the second day after her six hundred and second birthday. Smoke and soot clung to their clothes, but they were alive and, like her, unhurt. Her staff lay beside the colt. She picked it up and with a fingertip gesture brought a globe of cool light to its gnarled head. Wood, thanks be to Mystra, couldn't be stunned, couldn't forget the spells bound within it.
Propping the staff against a tree-trunk, Alassra made a closer examination of her companions. When she was satisfied that her initial assumptions were accurate, she touched Bro's arm lightly.
He came awake with a jolt. "Fire! Fire! The cottage-"
"Not here. Not now."
Wide-eyed and not breathing, Bro stared at her, stared beyond her, seeing things Alassra wished he could forget. Finally