The Shadow Sorceress

by L. E. Modesitt Jr.

Alcaren nodded.

  “Ranuak can hold out for perhaps years, but it can offer little help to Dumar. Is that how you would say matters stand, overcaptain?” asked Secca.

  “From what I have seen, that is so.”

  “Were we intent . . . were we intent on taking the fight to the Sturinnese in Dumar, would the Matriarch allow us passage? Would we be welcome? How would we be received?" asked Secca.

  “I cannot speak for the Matriarch, Lady Secca. I am but an overcaptain, and not one of those most favored. I would think we would be well-received, but those are but my feelings."

  “With all our lancers except yours men?’ questioned Palian.

  “There are companies of men in the Ranuan lancers, and their officers are also men,” Alcaren pointed out.

  “I presume our welcome would be greater the shorter our stay?” Secca studied the Ranuan.

  Alcaren laughed. “Not . . ." He paused. “That is most likely so.”

  “I see.” Secca nodded. After a moment, she stood. "There is little else we should discuss at the moment. I would ask that you all consider what we have seen and what has been said. We will meet tomorrow. I will inform you.” She smiled. “Thank you all.”

  As the others stood, Secca nodded toward the Ran­uan. “Overcaptain Alcaren . . . if I could have a few mo­ments more of your time?”

  Richina glanced at Alcaren, then at Secca.

  “If you would practice those spells in your room,” Secca said gently, “We’ll go over them later.”

  “Oh, yes . . . lady.” Richiaa bowed and turned.

  Secca waited until the door closed behind Delvor, the last to leave, before gesturing for Alcaren to reseat him self. “I need to know more about Ranuak—and about you.” She slipped back into her chair.

  “What would you like to know?” Alcaren took the chair directly across the table from Secca.

  “You have said that the Matriarch could spare but ten companies of lancers, and then two more with yours. Yet you just said that all were trained in arms, and that it would be costly for Sturinn to take Encora.”

  “Both are true. There are but a few more than twenty companies of Lancers maintained by the Matriarch. Their pay comes from the tariffs from the Exchange and from tariffs on goods passing through the port. That is all that the tariffs will support A good lancer is worth many men and women with blades and bows. But in the streets of a city, where a lancer cannot turn or charge easily and where there are thousands of men and women, a hundred companies of lancers might fail, unless the city were reduced to rubble by sorcery.”

  “And so long as the channel is defended, the thunder drums cannot get close enough?”

  “Exactly.” Alcaren smiled.

  Secca wanted to shake her head, even as she found herself being charmed by the Ranuan’s wit and knowledge, and by the gray-blue eyes that took in everything,

  seemingly without judgment. “Why is it, overcaptain, that you have an answer for everything?”

  “You have but asked the questions to which I have answers.”

  “Is your sister like you?"

  Alcaren shook his head. “She is like my mother, most able, and most able to calculate sums and tariffs within her head. And she enjoys doing such.”

  “Do you have any other brothers or sisters?”

  “No. I fear that, having raised me, and having seen my sister, my mother did not wish to dare the Harmo­nies again.” The Ranuan gave an embarrassed laugh.

  “Most families in Encora are small?”

  “Two children . . . no more than three.”

  Secca nodded. That told her who was indeed in charge of the land. “Why is there still such fear of sor cery? The Spell-Fire Wars took place so long ago..."

  “You have not seen Ranuak, have you?” "No."

  “There are bogs where the water yet bubbles up stinking of brimstone. There are places where nothing will grow on the land, for morgen upon morgen, save per haps a stringvine, useful for nothing. There are the Sand Hills, and at times when the winds blow different, an-other town is uncovered.” Alcaren shuddered slightly. “I saw one, once, as a boy. There were bodies, like mummies, clad in what we might wear, or in armor, and they had fallen where they stood, and something had sucked the very juices of life out of them—and out of the land and the soil, and the winds whipped sand over them. There are towns buried there that none have seen in thirty generations or more.”

  “There are no records of this,” Secea said.

  “There are many records, and maps, in the archives of the Matriarchs.”

  “Why have few others heard this?”

  Alcaren laughed, without mirth. “Even now, would ­be sorcerers sneak into Ranuak each time one hears of a ruin or town being uncovered, seeking the secrets of the old sorceries. Would you want the world to look like the Sand Hills, shimmering grains of lifelessness? We live in a land where, when the wind blows the wrong way, we can smell what sorcery has done. Can you not understand?"

  Secca frowned.

  “Lady Secca . . . can you not see the dilemma that faces the Matriarch?”

  “I can see that she faces a problem, but not one so great as we face. If what you say is so, Sturnn will take us all, save Mansuur, before the Sea-Priests turn on Ranuak.”

  “You are correct in that”

  Secca stopped. She looked at Alcaren, taking in the lustrous brown hair, the broad shoulders, and the deep gray-blue eyes that seemed to hold a veiled sympathy--­or was she seeing what she wished to see?

  After a moment, Alcaren added, “If the Sea-Priests are not stopped, Ranuak will also fall, be it a year or two later, and all it has stood for will vanish under the chains of Sturinn.”

  The red-headed sorceress took a slow and silent breath.

  Alcaren waited, his eyes completely on Secca. “You are far more than you reveal,” she finally said. “I have told you nothing but the truth, Lady Secca." “Truth can conceal as much as it reveals,” Secca pointed out softly. “You know geography. You know about lands where you have not been, unless you have been misleading me. You know about sorcery. You know trade, and even Counselor Veria knows of you.”

  Alcaren grinned, an expression much like that of a boy with his hand caught in the jar of candied nuts.

  “Now why would she know of you, do you think?” Secca could feel that her smile was somewhere between amused and almost malicious, perhaps because she felt as though she wrestled with the wind.

  Alcaren spread his hands, helplessly. “Perhaps you should tell me, Lady Secca?”

  “Encora is far from a small village, yet the counselor knew you. You speak well. You know a great deal, and you have traveled. You have to be from an important family. You might even be a cousin of the Matriarch and her sister.”

  A quick flicker of the eyes was enough for Secca. “You are a cousin of the Matriarch.”

  Again, rather than denial, Alcaren offered the boyish and embarrassed smile. “I am. I admit it. I have always been an embarrassment. No matter what I tried, it was never . . . accepted. Except for my being a chief guard, and now an overcaptain.” The smile turned self-deprecating. “You can see why I would rather remain as your overcaptain.”

  “Because you have been successful?”

  “I have not been unsuccessful, and what would I do were I to return to Encora?”

  “And that is why you decided to help us---or me?”

  "That is one of the reasons. Another is even more simple. I fear only sorcery can save Liedwahr- and Ranuak. None in Ranuak can use it" Alcaren shrugged. “You can, and must.”

  “I must? You’re telling me I must?” Secca could feel sudden anger building.

  “You are angry. I can only tell you what. I see. You will use sorcery because, if you do not, you will die or be chained by the Sturinnese, and then you will die, for you must be free.”

  Secca opened her mouth, then shut it. Finally, she stood. “We will talk later, overcaptain.”

  Alcaren rose from the chair, gr
acefully---and sadly, it seemed to Secca, even despite her anger and her effort not to lash out at the overcaptain.

  “As you wish, Lady Secca,” he said, bowing.

  “When I wish.”

  “Yes, lady."

  Secca watched him slip out the door. Once it closed, she walked slowly to the window.

  Had she been angry because he had seen so much of her? Or because he’d seemed to pity her? Or showed her that she was indeed trapped? That she was pushing to get to Dumar, for exactly the same reasons he’d seen? That he knew what she faced, and hadn’t told her? Ex­cept he had, and he had also told her the price sorcery had exacted from Ranuak.

  Or because she feared any man knowing her heart and soul?

  Swallowing, she looked into the distance, a distance misted by fog and weather.

  Outside, the ice pellets rattled against the thick glass of the windowpanes, and the misting fog rose from the gray brick paving stones of the lone below the windows.

  90

  From where she sat on one side of the conference table in her guest quarters, Secca glanced out the window. Thin streams of cold water oozed down the panes. The rain, that had already fallen on the lane and boulevard be­yond, shimmered silver in the gray midmorning light. Secca had the feeling that rain fell all the time in Elahwa in the winter, and that she would be most tired of the chill, dampness, and gray sides by the time she could depart, if she could determine how best to get her forces safely to Dumar.

  Richina followed Secca’s glance. ‘It rains much here. Do you think it does also in Encora?”

  “It is on the Southern Ocean, and I would guess so.” Secca looked back down at the scrying glass set in the middle of the table. “Were we to go to Ranuak first, what could we do against the Sturinnese?” she asked, musingly. She had some ideas, more than a few, but was interested in what Richina thought.

  “Did Overcaptain Alcaren suggest . . .?"

  “He had many suggestions.”

  Richina flushed and looked down.

  “Not those kinds of suggestions.” Secca laughed. “Is that all that is on your mind?"

  “He watches you, more than he would need, even were he a spy, and he is handsome.”

  “Striking, rather than handsome. And no, he was most reserved, and anything but forward.”

  Richina did not look at Secca.

  “He is a very private man, Richina. It is most difficult to draw him out, and even more difficult when others are around. I was trying to find out more about Encora and about what the Matriarch is like.”

  “He speaks well,” replied the younger sorceress.

  “But seldom about himself or about Ranuak, and Ran­uak is the key to what we may be able to do and how we could get to Dumar. The counselor has no ships that will carry us so far as Dumar—only the fleets of Nordwei or the traders’ ships of Ranuak could, and we cannot contact or use those of Wei, and those of the Matriarch are bottled inside the harbor of Encora or warded off by the Sturinnese blockade.” Secca offered a polite smile. "The Sturinnese ships yet remain off Encora, and from where they patrol, they could intercept any ship that left from here and at­tempted to land on the coast of Dumar.”

  “Cannot you discover some sorcery to allow us to travel? You have studied much.”

  “Those ships are too far from the shore for song-sorcery to carry to them,” Secca said. “Yet, unless we can get past those ships, Dumar will fall. Even if we do reach Dumar, until we destroy the ships, they will be back...and back.”

  “The Sea-Priests raised waves through song. Could we not do the same? asked Richina.

  ‘They had the drums.” Secca tilted her head. ‘Per­haps . . .” She shook her head. “I do not think that waves raised from the shore have the same effect upon the deeper waters. Otherwise, why would sailors head to sea when storms threaten?’

  “Storms...? Is there a kind of storm that would threaten a ship? More than any other kind?"

  “I would have to ask,” mused Secca.

  "The overcaptain would know.” Richina grinned.

  "I am most certain he would.”

  “He must have made you most angry, lady.”

  “Angry?" Secca shook her head, all too conscious of her attempted deception—and self-deception. “I think not”

  "You act . . ."

  Secca smiled. “As you felt with Haddev?" She raised her eyebrows, wishing not to dwell too much on Alcaren. “He was handsome as well.”

  ­“He did not care enough.”

  “He may have cared more than you think,” Secca said.

  “He saw you, and he did not hurt you, and he did not lead you on. He was bright enough to realize that, beautiful as you are, you would be unhappy in Synek, and, in time, so would he. He will make a better lord than his sire, I think.”

  “I would suppose so.”

  ‘Richina . . . would you have been happy in that shabby hold? In a land where a woman must still request all through her Consort?"

  “I . . .” The sandy-haired sorceress shook her head. “Why does it have to be so?"

  Secca did not have an answer, either for herself or for Richina. Did Alcaren watch her merely for his own ends? Or for the Matriarch? Did he seek to understand her better to manipulate her for some unknown end? Yet..so far . . . . he had refrained almost scrupulously from suggesting anything. Was that because her actions accorded with what he wanted? Or because he did care for her? Or because he actually did not wish to push her? Or some of both? Or neither?

  Finally, Secca stood and walked to the window. She would not speak of Alcaren, not to Richina, not after his declaration of what she must do.

  And yet . . . did she have any choice?

  She took a deep breath. Perhaps tomorrow she would talk to Alcaren again. Perhaps tomorrow.

  91

  The sky to the south was clear for the first time in weeks, but displayed the cold blue of a winter day. From the center window of the main chamber of the guest quarters, Secca could see the topmost branches of the trees across the boulevard bending in the wind.

  Her eyes went to the mirror on the table, the mirror that had shown skirmishes continuing in Dumar and snow piled even deeper across the Sand Pass, and that Sturinnese ships yet patrolled the coast of Liedwahr south of the Shoals of Discord. Lord Robero sat in his gilt chair and frowned, and the sorcerer Belmar was riding somewhere with his players and lancers, a force that had grown in size to re­semble the armsmen of Struinn. And Secca was sitting in Elahwa, doing nothing and going nowhere—and she had done nothing in three weeks but sit and watch.

  She had to do something.

  With a snort, she pulled the riding jacket off the peg on the well and stuffed herself into it, then walked out of the doors, with a brusque nod to Easlon and Gorkon as she passed. One of them followed, but she didn’t look back to see which as she marched down the wide stairs and then back along the corridor to the doors opening out onto the rear courtyard.

  Once at the entrance, Secca fastened the riding jacket more tightly before she stepped out into a cold and stiff breeze that swept across the rear courtyard behind the guest quarters. She glanced across the expanse of gray brick paving toward the barracks, then began to walk swiftly toward the red-painted door that was supposedly an armory of sorts.

  Each step clicked on the brick paving, reminding her again that she needed new heels on her boots. She prob­ably should have considered that before she left Loiseau, but she had to admit to herself, if not to anyone else, that she’d had no idea what she had been riding into or how long everything would take.

  A group of lancers from Loiseau stood a good fifty yards beyond the armory door. All of the lancer rankers straight­ened as they saw her, but Secca merely smiled. She turned and opened the red-painted door, trimmed in black, and stepped inside.

  A broad-shouldered woman with short-cut white hair and muscular forearms looked up from a pedal-driven grindstone as Secca closed the door behind her. “Yes, lady?’ The gray eyes twinkled.<
br />
  “You are the armorer?” Secca ventured.

  “Such as there is,” admitted the older woman.

  “I was hoping,” Secca continued, “that you might have some blunt practice blades.

  “For your lancers?’ The armorer shook her head. “All I’d be having are rattan ones, and most lancers be not happy with such. Rather they would break bones and claim pride than learn.”

  “You have a pair?’ asked Secca.

  “More than that.” The armorer slipped toward a rack in the left rear corner of the room. “Let me see, . Four pair and one.”