The she-bear dropped to three feet, holding a maimed forepaw off the ground. Making an eerie sound in the depths of her throat she began to sway from side to side, as if indecision as well as pain, were truly tearing her apart. Finally she stood still and allowed the forester to place his hands on either side of her head. Staring into her eyes, Halaern quieted the bear and gained her trust. She flopped to the ground with a weary sigh and let him probe her wounds.

"I can heal her, even her paw, once the spells wear off. She's agreed to be calm until then."

Halaern left the bear on her side while he examined her cubs. Alassra had already looked at them. The mewling cub was more frightened than hurt; healing its mother would be all the healing it would need. Not so for the second cub. The dark seelie shapeshifting spells had transformed its hindquarters into a corrosive ooze. It might die before the spell wore off; it would certainly die afterward, no matter what she or Halaern did. The forester needed several moments to reach the same conclusions. He sat back on his heels, his hands limp across his thighs.

"There's nothing else you can do," Alassra said gently. "If you healed the cub now, it would still be crippled. If you wait, it will die in agony. Right now, it is unconscious, and feels nothing."

Halaern nodded. He placed his hands around the furry throat and with a single, sure movement, ended its life.

"They are evil, my friend. Death has an honored place in the Yuirwood, but not evil. They don't belong here."

Thinking of the Sunglade, Alassra hoped her Cha'Tel'Quessir forester was correct. She offered him a hand up and he accepted. Wrist against wrist, Halaern recognized his queen as he rose. He became awkward and tongue-tied.

"My lady… my queen. I didn't… couldn't… I had your message, my queen, but I didn't expect you."

He tried to kneel; Alassra stopped him with an embrace.

"I was late. I didn't tell you half of what you needed to know. And, above all, dear friend, you had more important matters on your mind."

The embrace became a kiss that represented more than friendship. Alassra drew her fingers through his partly braided hair. They gazed at each other, saying nothing for several heartbeats.

"It is good to see you in the Yuirwood," Halaern said when there was once again an arm's length between them.

Of all the men Alassra had met and loved in her long life, Trovar Halaern was one she'd never meant to love her in return. But he was younger than Ebroin when they first met, and she'd appeared very much as she appeared right now.

"And you, forester. I should come to the Yuirwood more often."

"You should, dear lady."

There was no point to saying Halaern should come more often to Velprintalar. He came to the city when he had to; and looked like a feral cat trapped in an iron cage.

"Shall we heal mother bear?"

"With your help, there's no need to wait till the spell wears off." Halaern knelt and laid hands on the bear again. "With your help, my queen, it's a wonder any of those evil things got away."

"If I'd helped in that way, the wonder would be that you were still speaking to me."

Tension drained from the forester's face as he flashed a wry grin. "I might have made an exception."

"You're not saying you'd accept a gift, are you?"

The Simbul dispelled the shapeshifting magic, then stood back and let Halaern finish the healing. The bear lumbered to her feet. She called her cubs, greeted the one that came, then nuzzled the one that didn't.

"You have the other one," the forester said without sentimentality. "Raise it well."

She stared at her Cha'Tel'Quessir protector with great, liquid eyes before leading her living cub away. A silent moment passed. Halaern turned to his queen.

"In conscience, I couldn't refuse any gift, my lady. There's darkness loose in the Yuirwood, and I cannot drive it out."

"Does the darkness bear the name Zandilar or Zandilar's Dancer?" the Simbul asked as she became herself long enough to remove a simple topaz ring from the fourth finger of her right hand.

"If it has a name, my queen"-Halaern took the ring gingerly-"I have not learned it."

The forester had never worn a ring of any kind before. He placed it on a finger and regarded his hand as if it, too, had been touched by darkness. She told him what it could do and how to call forth its power. Well before the Simbul finished, Halaern's face was tense and troubled again.

"Let me tell you why I've come, dear friend, then perhaps it will be easier for you to share your burdens with me. I'm looking for a Cha'Tel'Quessir youth named Ebroin, of MightyTree, I think. I brought him to the Yuirwood the other night. More accurately: he brought me. He has a horse, a twilight colt named Zandilar's Dancer."

Halaern began walking; the Simbul kept pace beside him.

"The MightyTree are three days' walking from here. They are a balanced kindred," by which the forester meant that the MightyTree elders steered the family in the middle current between their Yuirwood heritage and tolerance for those who dwelt outside the forest. "I don't recall the name Ebroin, but Zandilar the Dancer, as I'm sure you know, is a Sunglade name."

"And a horse named Zandilar's Dancer?"

The forester shrugged. "In the darkest chambers of the deepest caves there are paintings on the walls. I've seen horses there, horses with spots, horses the color of twilight and other animals that are long gone from the Yuirwood. And I've heard that there are other caves where a maiden leads a horse that the hunters follow."

"I should like to see these paintings…"

Trovar Halaern looked straight ahead and said nothing.

"It is difficult for you, isn't it? Being Yuirwood and knowing me as you do."

He sighed. "With the Tel'Quessir in Retreat and your gods having warred and changed so recently, there is a sense in the Yuirwood that this is the time for the Cha'Tel'Quessir to seize their destiny. But there is no sense-no clear sense-what our destiny might be. Some say wait, others say leap. Most are caught in the middle."

The Simbul took his hand as they walked. "I heard the name Zandilar's Dancer in a dream the night after Ebroin's colt was born. The colt is in the Yuirwood now, with Ebroin and someone else. I don't know who that other person is, a man, I think. Most likely Cha'Tel'Quessir, but possibly a Red Wizard. Something is changing in the Yuirwood, dear friend, and its echoes can be heard throughout Faerun. Two nights past I met with three elven sages from Evermeet. I came away with more questions than answers; that's the Tel'Quessir way, isn't it? I'll share them all with you, but I need your help, dear friend: I need to find Ebroin and his horse. I need to see those who would seize their destiny regardless of the consequences, and I need to see them through these eyes."

"I'll start looking for this Ebroin of MightyTree and his horse. For the other, the best I can do is put you in the path of Rizcarn-"

The Simbul interrupted her forester. "Rizcarn? That's a name Ebroin mentioned. His father's name. His dead father, I thought; there was a black bead against his neck."

Halaern worried his lower lip.

"Problems? Coincidences?" the Simbul asked.

"If you'd asked me at Midsummer, I'd've said Rizcarn of GoldenMoss was dead these past seven years. Seems, though, that I've been wrong, that he was off prowling other forests. He's back, preaching Relkath's return, same as before. Always was a strange one. GoldenMoss hunters found him living wild."

The Simbul raised an eyebrow. Tales of Cha'Tel'Quessir raised by the Yuirwood itself were rampant in the forest. Few, if any, were believable.

"It's what they say and no one challenges them. Not MightyTree."

"Not a balanced sort, this Rizcarn?"