Rogues

Phyllis Eisenstein

Phyllis Eisenstein’s short fiction has appeared in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, Asimov’s, Analog, Amazing, and elsewhere. She’s probably best known for her series of fantasy stories about the adventures of Alaric the Minstrel, born with the strange ability to teleport, which were later melded into two novels, Born to Exile and In the Red Lord’s Reach. Her other books include the two novels in the Book of Elementals series, Sorcerer’s Son and The Crystal Palace, as well as stand-alone novels Shadow of Earth and In the Hands of Glory. Some of her short fiction, including stories written with husband Alex Eisenstein, has been collected in Night Lives: Nine Stories of the Dark Fantastic. Holding a degree in anthropology from the University of Illinois at Chicago, for twenty years she was a member of the faculty of Columbia College, where she taught creative writing, also editing two volumes of Spec-Lit, a softcover anthology showcasing SF by her students. She now works as a copy editor in a major ad agency, and still lives, with her husband, in her birthplace, Chicago.

Here, in the first new Alaric story in decades, the minstrel sets off in a caravan headed deep into the trackless desert, where evil spirits howl in the night and mirages are commonplace—but, as it turns out, not all dangers are illusionary, by any means.