The Saprano Sorceress

by L. E. Modesitt Jr.

  She smiled faintly, trying to pay full attention and to shuttle everything else she needed to do to the back of her mind—again.

  119

  Anna led Farinelli out into the courtyard, her eyes once more checking the saddlebags and the extra water bottles, her left hand touching her belt and overlarge belt wallet, and then her knife.

  Hanfor waited in the long shadows and gloom of dawn, his fingers going to his trimmed salt and pepper beard. Behind him, Alvar stood on the stones of the courtyard, reins in hand.

  Anna could sense the mounted lancers of Alvar's company beyond the portcullis, waiting for her and the players.

  "You didn't have to see us off," Anna began as she stopped short of Hanfor. Then she smiled. "You're the armsmaster of Falcor and arms commander of Defalk. You have to, don't you?"

  "It would be remarked upon—not favorably—if I failed to be properly respectful to the regent of Defalk." The older-looking man smiled wryly. "Never let it be said that I am not respectful." The smile dropped. "I cannot say I am pleased to remain here while others bear the brunt of what must be done."

  "I know." Anna looked at her commander. "But if you accompany me, especially with armsmen…"

  "I understand, and I agree. I do not like it. You are wagering on surprise and your own powers. I can only hope to the harmonies that they will be enough."

  "They have been before, but this will probably be the last chance. If this works, then every movement I make will be followed through all the scrying ponds and glasses of Liedwahr, and the fishbowl will be even worse."

  "Fishbowl?"

  "Everyone will watch—forever. Also, I can't fight the Evult and Nubara both next year. We know that. So I have to go." Anna shook her head. "And how could I leave anyone else in charge? Everyone knows you are honest and that you represent me. The armsmen will obey you, and even Lady Essan wishes that her consort had had a commander such as you." She shrugged. "That means you're the one."

  "Such an honor I had not expected." The commander accented "honor" slightly, and followed his statement with a gentle laugh.

  "You earned it."

  "I must be more careful in the future." Hanfor lowered his voice. "Do take care, lady. Much rests on you, much more than you wish to believe."

  The sorceress didn't need that reminder. It was easier to believe she was just a stranger who had a few useful talents. "I also don't need such honor."

  Hanfor smiled briefly.

  A light breeze, almost cool, wafted down from over the walls, and she hoped that the Ostfels would not be too cold. Was she totally insane to try her campaign?

  Not totally, but what else could she do? The Evult continued to rebuild the Ebran armies, and enlist more and more souls into the massed darksingers. As time passed, more and more would be pressed on Anna and her regency.

  Anna mounted Farinelli, then bent forward in the saddle and patted his shoulder, getting a whuff in response. "I know. You're ready for more exercise than I've been giving you. We both may be getting more than we want before it's over." She looked around the courtyard as the gray sky lightened.

  The players were already mounted, as was Daffyd. As she surveyed the group inside the walls, Alvar and Spirda vaulted into their saddles.

  "The regent's players are ready, Lady Anna," said the young violist.

  "Are you ready, lady?" asked Alvar.

  "Let's go," she said, and flicked the reins, urging Farinelli toward the raised portcullis, with Daffyd, Alvar, and Spirda closing up behind her.

  Once they were outside the liedburg walls, the rest of the lancers eased their mounts in behind Anna, and the sound of hoofs echoed from the stones of the road.

  A few faces peered from a handful of windows in Falcor as the regent's party rode northward through the still mostly deserted city. The sorceress wanted to shake her head. She had so much to do.

  Could she use sorcery to rebuild the bridge across the Falche? And the ford at Sorprat?

  Those would have to wait—but not long, because the Falche would regain its normal flow by the spring runoff, if she were successful. Nothing was likely to wait, not long enough, anyway. She tightened her lips, then forced herself to relax.

  She patted Farinelli, which somehow helped, and continued to study Falcor, from the red dust in the corners where walls and ground met, overlying dried mud, to the cracking and unrepaired mortar, to the broken and dangling shutters on too many windows.

  120

  Anna readjusted the floppy-brimmed hat. Disreputable as it looked, even after some sorcerous cleaning, it was comfortable and did the job. Besides, any hat worn on the dusty roads of Defalk would end as a worn and dirty mess.

  The cool breeze still blew out of the north, and the sun still shone through clear blue-green skies, and the dust still rose from the hoofs of the horses. The one better thing about being regent was that she didn't have to eat anyone else's dust.

  She studied the road ahead—a long arcing curve to the east, following the course of the almost-empty Fal River.

  "I take it the river was once much larger?'' Anna asked Daffyd, who rode directly to her right.

  "Much larger. Even two years ago, well after the rains stopped, the water covered the center there, the sandy part." The player pointed to the sand flats where only a thin trickle of brown water had etched a narrow curving channel in the middle of the river bed. Dried grasses, broken and bleached tree limbs lay scattered across the depression that had once held a far larger and mightier river.

  "It is not much of a river now," observed Alvar.

  "No," Anna agreed. From what she could tell, most of the flow of the Falche River at Falcor now came from the Chean River—and she hadn't exactly helped that.

  Somehow, as her explorations of the upper Fal with her glass had shown—she had no problems scrying so long as she confined her attempts to Erde—the Evult had created the flood that had rampaged down the Fal by melting off most of the snowpack of the Ostfels around the headwaters. Since the headwaters weren't that far from Vult, the Evult's action might make Anna's efforts easier—there certainly wasn't any snow to block them—not yet.

  "It is sad," Alvar said.

  Beside him, Spirda nodded.

  The sorceress repressed a smile. From all his initial complaining about providing a protection detail, the blonde sub-officer had certainly changed, and Anna doubted that he would ever willingly give up his position. She found it interesting how she had less trouble with the professionals than with the amateurs, but that had been true back on earth. She had developed great relationships with conductors and performers—it was only the academics who were mediocre performers, and often worse teachers, who created the problems.

  She chuckled to herself as she reached for her water bottle. Some things didn't change.

  The chuckle stopped as she looked along the seemingly endless red clay road that stretched to the northeast horizon, bordered on the left by empty lands filled with browned grass, bleached weeds, and dust, by empty peasant cots, and by low hills crowned with dead and dying trees.

  After two full days, they still had not reached Ohal, the small hamlet supposedly two thirds of the way to Elhi.

  She opened her water bottle and drank, slowly, then stoppered it, and replaced it, before patting the palomino. "A long ways to go, fellow. A long ways."

  That was true in more ways than one. She straightened in the saddle and blotted her forehead.

  121

  That'd be Elhi, I wager," offered Alvar.

  Anna glanced from the red clay of the road and to her left at the Fal River, still but a muddy trickle winding through sun-bleached devastation, and then beyond the river to a collection of structures rising above the river farther to the east.

  Closer to the regent and her lancers and players, on the north side of the river, were what appeared to be wharves, long stone piers that had survived the Evult's flood—except even the base of the stone pillars stood at least two yards above the thin line of
water that ran through the river bed. A closer look revealed to Anna that some of the piers had been planked, and that the planks had been ripped away. The irregular piles of debris—branches, boards, and mud— above and behind the piers represented the remains of warehouses, Anna surmised.

  The river docks were yet another measure of how much Defalk had suffered from the magic of the Ebrans.

  "Dissonant mess," said Spirda, his voice rising above the dull clop of hoofs.

  Anna brushed away a fly—once, twice. Now that the breezes had subsided, and the temperature was higher, the flies were back, and they were horseflies with a nasty bite.

  "This poor land." Alvar shook his head and glanced sideways at Anna.

  What had she gotten herself into? Had she had much choice? She nodded. Everyone had choices, but she couldn't stand back, in the way she felt Brill had, and let things go to hell—or dissonance.

  She glanced eastward along the road as Farinelli continued to carry her at an even pace.

  Upstream, to the right of where the river docks stood, were a set of redstone piers—all that remained of the bridge that had led into Elhi. A rough path or trail, as at Falcor, wound down through the river bed and then up to the town. On a low rise, north of the town itself and barely visible above the roofs of Elhi, rose another set of low walls, presumably those of Elheld, Lord Jecks' hold.

  As the sorceress reined up at the top of the path through the river, she turned to Alvar. "It's probably time to bring out the regency banner. We don't need to have someone thinking we're another invasion force."

  "Some may think that with the banner," said Daffyd.

  "The regency banner!" called the swarthy captain.

  "Ready arms," called Spirda.

  "Ready it is," answered Fhurgen.

  A young armsman trotted up beside Spirda, riding on the shoulder of the road, and unfurled the purple oblong that bore the golden crossed spears of Defalk—-the basic design of Barjim's ensign—with a golden crown beneath. The only indication of the regency for Jimbob was an R under the crown. If he wished, Jimbob would only have to remove the R to have a banner derived from his sire's, yet his own.

  Farinelli picked his way down the trail and back up onto the dried mud that covered the stone pavement that led to the washed out bridge.

  Anna looked at the bridge, wishing she could repair it with sorcery. She shook her head. Not now. Not yet. Using that much power would only further alert the Evult and call attention to where she was. Better that she keep any demonstrations of her abilities minimal until she had dealt with Ebra.

  The line of riders followed the main street past structures that seemed mostly abandoned structures—until Anna could see the central square ahead. By then, the shutters of the structures hung squarely, and even a few had been painted recently.

  The central square of Elhi, like that of Synope, squatted around a dusty, oblong redstone platform with a balustrade that ringed the two short sides and one long side. Another roofless town bandstand, Anna thought, easing Farinelli along the street on the north side of the square.

  The handful of people in the square just stopped. A thin, white-haired woman pointed toward the banner.

  "… the sorceress… the regent…"

  "… what's another one? Won't stop the dark ones… no sense in getting hopes up…"

  Anna understood, but wanted to wince. Instead, she forced herself to study the square as Farinelli carried her onward.

  Chandler proclaimed a dull black sign bearing two crossed candles. Under the sign was a Shop with recently washed and white-trimmed windows. To the south of the chandlery was a smaller building, with an open door, but no signs. Across the square from the chandlery was an inn, with a sign bearing a golden bear, clearly an attempt to curry favor with Lord Jecks. Some things didn't change, Anna reflected.

  A tall and lanky woman in calf-length gray trousers and a gray work shirt hurried across the square toward the regent. Her feet were bare.

  "Welein… she be mad!"

  "… little enough to lose…"

  The woman began to run, ignoring the comments from the other townspeople, then stumbled to a halt several yards before Farinelli.

  The sorceress reined up, even as she could sense Spirda's and Fhurgen's blades being raised. "Let her talk." Behind her, the clop of hoofs died away as the lancers halted their mounts.

  The lanky and barefoot brunette offered a rough bow, but her gray eyes immediately met Anna's. "Lady? You are the new regent?"

  "I am."

  "You are said to be a sorceress. Can you not bring back the rains and the river? My sons have died, and my consort has fled. You say you are the lady of Defalk. You must do something, or we cannot be your people." The gray eyes were firm, fixed on Anna, who scarcely felt regal or like a regent.

  "You're right." That was easy enough, but what else could she say? Especially without promising more than she could deliver or without tipping off the Evult?

  The woman waited in the dusty stillness of the square, and Anna felt like the whole world was filled with people holding their breath, looking to her.

  Finally, she spoke. "The dark sorcery took years to bring down Defalk. I am working to undo that evil, but I cannot undo those evils all at once." Anna fumbled in her wallet, then came up with a silver. She eased Farinelli toward the woman who watched, eyes still cold and gray. "I hope this will help until times are better." She extended the coin. "You may take it or not, as you wish, but you have my word that I have not forgotten what must be done." The sorceress continued to look at the supplicant.

  After a moment, the woman reached out and took the silver, her eyes still on Anna. "For good or evil, regent or lady, you have given your word. If you keep it, none will ever gainsay your rule. If not, no sorcery will save you."

  The sorceress nodded. "I agree."

  After a moment, the woman stepped back. "Harmony be with you, lady."

  "And with you," Anna answered, feeling as though everyone in the square had begun to breathe again. She flicked the reins, and Farinelli whuffed as he stepped forward.

  Two workmen in soiled trousers and ragged shirts stacked barrels in front of the cooper's, less than a dozen yards away. Neither even looked up as the column resumed its walk through the streets of Elhi toward Jecks' hold.

  "The people despair, but they hope," said Alvar quietly. "You cannot afford to disappoint them."

  "The people are fickle," Daffyd said. "Once they cheered Lord Barjim, and some even cheered Lord Behlem."

  "Some are. Some aren't," Anna said, thinking about the bleak gray eyes of the barefoot woman, a woman younger than Anna, yet who had suffered more, far more, and who had to put her faith in a stranger and a sorceress.

  The houses beyond the square seemed newer, and were, as in the south, generally finished on the outside with a plaster or stucco. Some were gray, others painted.

  Beyond the north end of Elhi, where the houses began to spread, and where more abandoned cots appeared, the fields swept upward from flat bottomland filled with stubble or recently-turned dark earth to higher, hillier fields, most of which were covered in browned grass or weeds.

  Thinking once more about what lay ahead, Anna turned in the saddle toward Daffyd. "How are your players doing?"

  "Well enough. "Well enough, though they question, and I have no answers."

  "We'll have answers before too long." Unfortunately… unfortunately.

  "I await them, but I fear those answers," answered the young player.

  So do I. "We can't avoid them."

  "I would rather not rush to find them." The corners of Daffyd's mouth curled into a sardonic smile.

  The sorceress glanced over her shoulder, seeing both the dust and the line of horsemen that stretched all the way back into the town. Had she ever dreamed she would be leading such a group?

  Her head went from the lancers to the banner at her right and to the well-kept road ahead that curved to the right and then back to the left as it wo
und up to the hall.

  Although dusty, the road to the hall was well kept, and Anna could see where potholes had been filled and tamped smooth. The fields had been turned or harvested, and the wooden fences, if darkened by weather, remained sound, with occasional cross-beams of newer and lighter-colored wood.

  The well-maintained red stone walls, which ran about half a dek on a side, were short for a Defalkan hall, Anna judged, no more than four yards high—enough to present a defense against casual attacks and to create an impression of strength—and well away from the central hall—at least a hundred yards.

  The iron-bound wooden gates were open, and two guards stood in the shade of the arch as Anna reined up.

  Both guards bowed.

  "Welcome to Elheld, regent and lady," offered the shorter, gray-haired armsman. "Lord Jecks awaits you in the hall."

  "Thank you. We appreciate the welcome." Anna offered a smile, hopefully warmer than merely professional, despite her weariness. "Lord Jecks is known for his fairness and hospitality."

  "He is a good lord," acknowledged the greeter.

  With another smile, Anna eased Farinelli through the gate.

  The outbuildings, also of red stone, were set about twenty yards inside the walls and paralleled them all the way around the red stone barrier, except directly behind the gates.

  By the time Anna reached the front of the hall, the white-haired Jecks stood on the long columned portico that extended the length of the hall front. The hall's combination of squared-off stone pillars, heavy stone walls, and red stone conveyed to Anna an impression of a cross between Egyptian and Southern antebellum architecture.

  Beside Jecks were a heavyset and clean-shaven man with jowls and iron-gray hair, and a boy with mahogany-colored hair, already broad shoulders, and a strong-boned face.

  "Greetings, Lady Anna. We are honored that the first visit of the regent is to Elheld." Jecks offered a bow, respectful, but not mocking.