The ShadowSinger

by L. E. Modesitt Jr.

  As Ashtaar’s coughing subsides, she straightens and re­moves the cloth. She takes a sip of the dark liquid in the beaker on the table, then a second. “Foul stuff. Getting old is truly awful, seer.” A wry smile crosses her lips. “But it’s better than not living that long.”

  “Ah . . . yes, Leader,” stammers Escadra.

  “I’m recovered, at least as much as I will be. Think about what I said.”

  The seer nods.

  “You may go . . . but inform me if anything changes.”

  “Yes, Leader.” Escadra bows and turns.

  Ashtaar takes a third sip from the beaker, grimacing after she swallows the draught.

  78

  In the breezy afternoon, Secca stood next to the railing at the forward edge of the Silberwelle’s poop deck, looking down on the first and second players. While the winds had shifted to a more northerly flow, coming almost directly out of the south, they were still favorable enough that the small flotilla continued to maintain a good clip westward. Only a few clouds dotted the sky overhead, and Secca found the warmth of the sun more than welcome.

  Mentally, Secca marked each word and note value as the players went through the fifth building song. Beside her, Alcaren did the same, although he still needed to use his own hand-drafted copy of the words, with notes on the sec­tions where he would be singing a different line, what Anna had called supporting harmony, as opposed to “true” har­mony. Anna had said it was more like polyphony, but the explanation had never quite made sense to Secca. And now, as in so many things, she couldn’t ask. There is so much you should have asked . . . so much.

  “No!” called Palian. “You are dragging the phrase. A sor­ceress has but so much breath. If you slow that section, she will not have the power behind the words. Let us try that once more, from the beginning, at my mark . . . Mark!”

  Secca tried to concentrate once more on the spell, the terrible spell. Except it seemed that with each week, each season, ever more terrible, and ever more powerful spells became more and more necessary.

  From the corner of her eye, Secca could see another Ran­uan vessel, trailing the Silberwelle by less than a dek. The Schaumenflucht had been one of the Ranuan ships. that had survived the great sea battle off Encora the winter before, a sea battle that foreshadowed the ever-escalating use of sor­cery. While Secca had worried about that escalation, she had not foreseen how quickly it would occur.

  “Second players . . .” Delvor called.

  Alcaren looked up as the accompaniment below halted once more, turning his gaze to Secca and smiling warmly.

  Secca returned the smile, and, for that moment, in the open air and the sun, she enjoyed just looking at her consort.

  79

  Worlan, Neserea

  In the deep gray of the misty afternoon, the Maitre stands behind the parapets of the ancient structure that had once been the keep of Belmar. He looks beyond the cliffs on which the hold is situated and northward out onto almost black waters of the Bitter Sea, dotted here and again with the white of ice floes. Somewhere to the north, beyond his vision, is the fleet that should port at Worlan on the morrow. After a last glance into the dimness, he turns and descends the narrow stairs two levels before turning off at the landing and stepping into a small room that contains little more than a scrying pool and one tall man in Sturinnese white who is checking the tuning on a stringed instrument more angular than the lutars employed in Defalk, if of similar size.

  The man straightens, lowering the instrument. “Maitre.”

  "What have the pools of the noble Belmar shown you, jerClayne?" asks the Maitre, a humorous tone in his inquiry.

  “Ah . . . Maitre . . .” The Sturinnese sorcerer swallows. “The Shadow Sorceress is not headed to Neserea. Nor to Mansuur. The Ranuans carry her westward, and they are nearing the Ostisles.”

  “You are certain?” The Maitre stares intently at jerClayne.

  “We cannot yet scry her directly, but she is aboard one of the Ranuan ships, and she is far nearer to the Ostisles than to Liedwahr. That is all that I can tell with any cer­tainty, Maitre.”

  “For her, that is more than certain enough.” The Maitre tightens his lips for but an instant. “How many vessels?"

  “Still just a half-score. The same as before.”

  “And the ships of Nordwei?”

  “They are nearing Osta. They are close enough to land that the glass is more certain. The home defense fleet is within a day’s sail.”

  “Yes. The Assistant Maitre sent a plate this morning stat­ing that If the northerners will fight, then we will soon hold all the north of Liedwahr.”

  “You do not think that they will?” inquires jerClayne.

  “They are only in the Ostisles to keep our fleet from at­tacking the Ranuan ships carrying the sorceress. If we form to attack them, they will flee with the wind, and regroup later, closer to Nordwei, and where it will suit them to make a defense, if and when our ships near Wei.”

  The tall jerClayne nods, waiting.

  “I will write a message. Come by my study in a glass to fetch it. Then you will transfer the words to a bronze plate, and have it sent to the Assistant Maitre in Stura. He may not think the shadowsinger a threat, nor understand her goal. He has enough vessels left to intercept their small flotilla. And even should she raise a wave or two against our cities . . . they are well built.” The Maitre shakes his head. ‘While she is in midocean, she can do nothing to save Neserea. Nor is there much she can do against Stura.”

  “Did she not destroy an entire fleet south of Dumar?"

  “Our commanders will not mass their vessels so, but use the tactics of the lancers, to attack in waves until the sor­ceress and her assistant are too exhausted to cast more spells. They are to harass the Ranuans until they turn from the isles or are defeated, and they will be.”

  The duty sorcerer nods dutifully.

  “Even if she does reach the shores of Stura, what can she do? Our greatest fleets are here, as are our lancers. If she lands, she will be lost, for every man’s hand will be against her, and no woman would dare leave her chains.” He shrugs. ‘We may have to rebuild a port or two, and replace some of the defense fleet” A cold smile punctuates his words. “We can suffer great losses, if need be. She can suffer none. She is also malicious, and malice makes a poor guide. For those reasons, and because we are of Sturinn, we will tri­umph.” He pauses but briefly. “Come and get the message in a glass.”

  “Yes, Maitre.”

  JerClayne’s eyes follow the Maitre as the older sorcerer turns and leaves the scrying room.

  The Maitre descends another three levels to the chamber that had once been Belmar’s.

  Even as he steps through the door, the waiting serving girl immediately prostrates herself on the cold stone floor. She wears but the shortest of armless tunics, and the heavy chains that restrict her arms so that they cannot rise above her shoulders clank against the grayish granite. The redness under the wrist and ankle cuffs has almost faded from her pale skin. Except for the shivering that she cannot control, she does not move as the Maitre looks at her.

  “You may rise and attend me.”

  The girl rises, her eyes dull, fixed on the granite floor.

  80

  So bright was the day outside that not even the captain’s cabin was all that dim, with light flooding through the portholes and sparkling through the skylenses in the over­head. The lighting did not relieve the closeness of eight bodies around a table in a small space.

  Even though Secca had managed enough sorcery to desalt a bucket of water to wash off every day or so, there was a fine layer of salt everywhere, or so it seemed, and with her all-too-fair skin, Secca felt itchy all over most of the time. She rubbed her back against the wood of the chair, watching Alcaren.

  Her consort finished tuning the lumand, then glanced down at the mirror laid upon the circular table in the cap­tain’s cabin. Then he began the spell.

  “Show us now, and in day’s c
lear light,

  ships of Sturinn near enough to fight . . ." .

  The glass immediately presented three images. In the one to the upper right were five vessels. The lower and smallest grouping was three. In the center was a fleet whose numbers were too great to count easily. All of the ships bore the white hulls of Sturinn.

  Secca guessed that the fleet in the center contained a good twoscore vessels, if not more.

  “How many ships do they have?” asked Delcetta, almost under her breath. She flushed as she realized that in the closeness of the cabin everyone had heard.

  “More than the stars in the sky, some say,” replied Denyst with a laugh. “Though I’d not put the numbers so high.”

  “For generations they have harvested and replanted the forests in their isles so always there will be enough timber for ships,” Alcaren said. “Those who cut a tree without the Sea-Priests’ permission lose a hand, their heads the second time.”

  For a moment, there is silence around the table.

  “Begging your pardon, Alcaren, sorceresses . . . There any way to tell how close they be?” asked the Silberwelle’s cap­tain.

  “It will take a different spell,” Alcaren admitted. “I need to think a moment”

  Secca leaned forward and began to write out a set of lines, ignoring the feeling that all eyes had turned to her. When she finished, she handed the sheet to Alcaren, pointing out the couplet on the bottom, below all the other writing.

  He looked over the words she had written, and nodded. Then he sang the same spell, except with a different con­cluding couplet.

  " . . . all ships that ours could seek

  within a single day of this week.

  The mirror showed both the fleet and the three ships, but not the group of five.

  “Thought they might not be so kind as to let us near to Sturinn.” Denyst frowned. “But why they’d be having so many vessels here off the Ostisles . . ."

  “The Ostisles are hundreds of deks from their home isles,” added Palian, voicing Secca’ s thoughts as well as her own.

  “Could they have two fleets?" asked Richina.

  After the quiet following her question, Alcaren softly sang the release couplet, and the mirror in the center of the table blanked to silver, and then to reflect the dark timbers of the overhead.

  In the green-tinted light that suffused the cabin, Secca could see the circles under the eyes of the younger sorceress, circles that had not yet turned dark. How much longer can she hold the wards? Richina had had to learn and do so much, and so much younger than Secca had. But then Secca had grown up in a quieter time. Quieter? Or had Anna as­sured that air of peace through shadow sorcery?

  “They could have a score, for all we know," replied Den­yst.

  “We might as well find out” Alcaren cleared his throat.

  “Show us now, and in clear sight,

  Sturinn‘s ships near Stura‘s noontime light . . .”

  This time, the glass showed but two groups of vessels— four tied up along a white stone pier in a port setting Secca did not recognize and another three somewhere at sea.

  “Most of their ships in the Western Sea are here,” mused Alcaren.

  “Could they have known we were headed to Stura?” asked Palian. “They might not want you to get too close to their home isles.”

  “Could be,” replied Denyst. “Passing strange, though. If we slipped past them and got following winds . . .”

  “They’d have trouble catching us?" asked Alcaren.

  The captain nodded.

  Alcaren sang the release couplet, then looked to Secca.

  She realized that everyone was looking to her.

  “We won’t slip by them. They have sorcerers and seers, and they’ll be upon us by morning, if not before.” Secca flushed and turned to Denyst. “I know nothing about sailing. That is just my feeling.”

  “Trust a sorceress’s feeling about Sea-Priests over num­bers and calculations any day.” Denyst paused. “Let me know what you need, same as you did at Encora. We will need some time to signal the others with the flags.”

  “I will, in a glass or so,” Secca promised. She looked to Palian and Delvor. ‘We’ll use the storm spell, the first build­ing spellsong. That’s if they attack us in a mass.”

  “You think that they’ll come in small groups to tire you? The way they did with their lancers at Elahwa?” Richina tried to stifle a yawn. "I am sorry."

  “You’re carrying all the wards. That is work, even with the help of the ocean and distance.” After a moment, Secca added, “I would not be surprised. They learn from each encounter, as do we.”

  That was why Sturinn had taken over so much of Erde, Secca realized, almost belatedly. The Sturinnese changed. Dumar hadn’t. Neither had Neserea. And Defalk had changed only because Anna had forced change, and most of those changes Lord Robero wanted to undo. If only Anna could have had children after she had come to Erde, then all might have changed even more, and Secca might never have been faced with what lay ahead.

  “You look surprised, lady,” offered Palian.

  Secca laughed. “I just realized something that I should have seen years ago.” She glanced around the table. “There’s not much else I can offer at the moment, and I need to go over some spells if the Sturinnese are headed toward us.”

  “We will practice the first building spell now,” Palian said.

  After the others had risen and left the cabin, Alcaren mo­tioned to Secca “I need some air. If you would come with me.”

  Secca glanced at him, realizing that he looked even greener than the others had in the greenish light of the cabin. “I thought you were doing better on this trip.”

  “Better does not mean I am cured of this affliction.” He swallowed and lurched toward the door.

  Secca followed at a discreet distance, rejoining him in his favorite spot on the starboard side near the bow. The swells that rose and fell before the Silberwelle seemed slightly higher than they had on previous days, and the sea breeze somewhat warmer. Alcaren looked at her briefly, with a faint smile, then turned his face into the wind.

  “Are you feeling better?" she finally asked.

  “Much. The fresh air helps.” After a time, he added. “You are right, I fear.”

  “About what?’

  “They will wear you down. That is what they have done to all they have conquered. They send more lancers, more ships, until those they attack have nothing remaining. You cannot let them do that.”

  Secca snorted. “And what would you have me do?"

  “Sing a spell large enough and strong enough to destroy all of their vessels at one time. Let me help. If we do it together . . ."

  “We can try,” Secca said with a smile.

  “Best we tell Denyst, and Palian.”

  Secca frowned.

  “We will have storms, and the weather will be rough. Once the spell is sung, the players need hasten below. The decks should be clear on all our vessels.”

  “You think so?”

  “You are a great sorceress, and when you do great sor­cery, best we are all prepared.”

  “You offer me too much praise,” Secca replied. “You are my consort, and I fear love colors your judgment.”

  “I love you, my lady, but my judgment is also sound.” He turned to face her. “You are a great sorceress, and all Erde knows such. Why else would Sturinn send a fleet after you?”

  Why else? Because the Sea-Priests don‘t like even mod­erately powerful women. “You are kind, my love.”

  “Truthful,” he replied.

  Secca wondered. Can he be? Or does love make one see what one wants?

  81

  Southwest of Eseria, Neserea

  In the early-morning light, the Maitre stands on a low rise, overlooking the river to the north, and the city of Esaria beyond the river. To his left, in the waters off Esaria, is the great eastern fleet of Sturinn.

  Already, the piers lie in Sturinnese hands, and a wave of
armsmen and lancers in white is moving through the city from west to east. Only those inhabitants who resist are be­ing slaughtered. The others will provide supplies and coins and, in time, lancers and armsmen. The Maitre smiles and turns as the shadow of another nears.

  “Maitre,” offers the tall jerClayne, “all is going as you ordered. Few are resisting.” He laughs heartily. “And fewer as others see what happens to those who do resist.”

  "What of the lady pretender?” asks the Maitre.

  “She and her mother have fled eastward, in disguise, it appears. No one has seen them.”