Spellsong - Darksong Rising Part 30

50.

Anna stepped into a patch of shade to get out of the already warm morning sun, then glanced around the group- Jecks, Himar, Hadrenn, and Liende, with Stepan, Jimbob, and Kinor standing farther back. Behind them were her guards, and a full score of lancers surrounding the shaded grove where she had laid out the traveling scrying mirror on a fallen tree trunk. To the west, along the Syne River road, the column was forming, preparing for the ride eastward, to meet Bertmynn's forces.

Finally, after a vocalise, she swallowed and cleared her throat, then lifted the lutar and sang: Show me now and show me clear a road to Bertmynn with no armsmen near, Like a vision, like a map...

The mirror displayed an image, almost a topographical map with a light brown line that appeared to be the river road they traveled-until just short of the juncture of the two rivers, when the path veered south and around a line of hills.

Ulpp.

Anna suspected the gulp belonged to Hadrenn, but she continued to concentrate on the image. Himar was sketching rapidly on a sheet of crude brown paper, his eyes flicking from the mirror to the paper.

"If the gla.s.s is correct," Anna said, "that will bring us out on the higher south side of the valley."

"The last part of the way is narrow." Himar kept sketching. "There are trees on both sides. We would not see any lancers until they were upon us.""Let me know when you have it drawn out." Anna could feel the heat building around her, and within the mirror and its frame. After a short time, Himar lifted his head. "I have enough."

Anna sang the release couplet, and then took a long swallow from the water bottle Jecks handed her. She thought about waving away the biscuit that followed, but took it instead and munched through it. Have to keep your energy levels up.

"Let's see if Bertmynn has planned any surprises." She cleared her throat and raised the lutar.

Danger from Bertmynn. danger near, show me that danger bright and clear....

The image showed a line of armsmen, arrayed on a hillside. There was a smaller group, barely a handful of figures, behind the armsmen, higher on the hillside.

"Are those archers?" asked Jecks. "Or players?"

"They don't have as many players as we do, if they're players, and less than a score of archers won't change things." Anna frowned. "Whatever danger there is... it looks like it will be when we meet."

"I worry about those folk..." Jecks gestured toward the mirror, speaking in a voice meant only for Anna's ears.

"So do I, but we can't just ride away because we don't feel things are quite right." She forced a light laugh.

Jecks tightened his lips.

"I need to talk to Liende." Anna motioned to the chief player, and then to Himar, and to Stepan, waiting for them to approach more closely before continuing. "As soon as we can get within vocal range of Bertmynn's forces, we'll use the long flame song-that's the one for weapons that might be spelled against us."

"The long flame song," Liende repeated.

Anna looked at Himar. "Do you think his lancers will attack quickly?"

"Either quickly, or they will wait for us to attack." Himar fingered his chin.

"They would have to come down from higher ground and then charge uphill. I would wait, were I in their position."

"Does it look like our bowmen can lift arrows far enough to reach their position? If we form on the southern ridge."

"I cannot tell." Himar shrugged apologetically.

"Well... we'll hope so." Anna looked back at Liende. "We'll plan on the arrow song second. If the arrows reach them, we'll do it several times."

"The arrow song for the second spell," Liende confirmed.

"And I may need the short flame song, almost at any time."

A frown crossed Liende's face, then vanished."And possibly the short arrow song, the one I used against Sargol." Not that it did any good there. She turned to Himar. "Are we ready to ride?"

"Yes, Lady Anna."

Anna nodded, and recased the lutar, then looked toward the mirror, but Jecks had already packed it and was strapping it to Farinelli.

Hadrenn took along, thoughtful look at Anna, before turning to follow Himar.

Liende glanced at Anna as the others moved through the dappled shadows of the grove toward their mounts, then asked the sorceress, "You will not let Kinor ride with the lancers?"

"No...I told him and Jimbob that they had to help my personal guards. There's some danger there, but... less, I would judge."

"Kinor... he would prove he is worthy."

"I know. But he has to see what happens in battles, I think. People die, and most battles..." Don't have to be fought? Except they do, because people's beliefs aren't the same, and someone always wants to force other people to believe differently. After a moment, Anna found the question coming back. Are you any different? Aren't people dying because you want to force this world to treat women better?

"You are silent, lady."

Anna sighed. "I'd like to think I'm different from others who rule, but I'm not.

I fight for what I believe in, and so do they. I just have to hope that what I believe in is worth the deaths."

"Life is not what we wish, lady, but I believe you do the best you can. That is why I ride with you." Liende smiled sadly.

"Thank you," answered Anna softly. "I try." As Liende turned, Anna carried the lutar toward Farinelli, and Jecks.

"Can you bring your spells against the players-if that is what they are?" The hazel eyes of the white-haired lord radiated concern.

"You're worried, aren't you."

"For you, my lady, not for me."

Anna reached out with her free hand and squeezed his shoulder, firmly but gently. "I'll try to think of something as we ride." You'd better... when he's worried he's usually right. She strapped the lutar behind her saddle, then patted Farinelli, and mounted.

51.

Anna brushed a strand of silver-blonde hair out of her eye. A cooler breeze blew out of the east, and although high gray clouds had appeared on the horizon a gla.s.s or so earlier, they seemed no nearer than when Anna's force had resumed the ride along the River Syne. The sorceress eased back her brown hat and glanced ahead at the scouts on the road, then at the vanguard waiting at the junction to a lane that sloped down and to the south.

Anna touched the spelled s.h.i.+eld at her knee, but there was no energy, no sense of sorcery there."We should head south here." Himar glanced back past Rickel and Lejun, who had their s.h.i.+elds out and now rode directly before Anna, while Blaz and Kerhor rode behind Jecks, Jimbob, and Kinor.

"I'd like to take a last look in the mirror," Anna said, reining up. "Before we get too close to where Bertmynn is."

After Anna dismounted, Jecks laid out the mirror on the browning gra.s.s by the shoulder of the river road, and she tuned the lutar. Her guards and Jirnbob and Kinor remained mounted, providing a circle of protection.

She sang the danger spell... but the only dangers that the s.h.i.+mmering gla.s.s showed were Bertmynn's armsmen and the handful of figures behind them. Why are they a danger? Yet if she didn't know more, sorcery would offer no answers.

Anna released the image quickly. The less energy she spent on looking, the better, but she also didn't want to ride into an ambush.

"Still those players," Jecks said. "Have you a spell? Can you use an arrow spell?"

Does he think you've got endless spells memorized? Anna wanted to scream, but forced a long, slow breath instead. "I'm thinking about it."

What could she use... something along the line of "Heads of arrows, shot into the air... strike Bertmynn's players there...?" She needed more, more time, more armsmen, more everything. And just whose idea was this expedition?

Anna recased the lutar and fastened it behind her, but where she could reach it easily. Then she looked back at Liende, past Jimbob and Kinor. "How are the players?"

"Ready for what calls," Liende replied.

"Good." Anna remounted. You just hope you are. Then she guided Farinelli down the narrow road after the vanguard. Rickel and Lejun looked nervously from side to side, as did Jecks. Kinor and even Jimbob were studying the road ahead.

Before long, Himar's first scouts were far out of sight, and the second group more than a dek ahead along the rutted and narrower south road that ran through what seemed to be potato fields. At least Anna thought the low green almost vine-like plants were potatoes. They looked like what Papaw had grown in the marshy lower field by the creek. Sometimes, it was hard to believe that a girl raised in the hollers of the Appalachians had ended up as Regent of Defalk. If you don't concentrate on what's ahead... and come up with a spell against Darksong, you won't be anything much longer.

Jecks had eased his mount beside Anna, and Hadrenn had dropped back to ride easily beside Himar. Fragments of their conversation drifted back to Anna and Jecks.

"... travels light..."

"...she's a warrior, Lord Hadrenn... say Lord Barjim's consort was like that...

and Lady Essan years before..

Anna smiled, even as she wondered how Himar had picked up the information on Essan and Alasia.

"... women in Defalk... different...""... comes from the mist worlds. . . you'll see... fine iron 'neath that young face... seen what being a sorceress is... glad to be an overcaptain."

Anna shut out the conversation, still working on some form of the arrow spell.

"How about.. ." she murmured to herself, Heads of arrows, shot into the air, stnke Bertmynn's players, straight through there, rend the spells and those who play...

She needed a last line. Her eyebrows furrowed. Then she nodded. repeating the words and cadences to herself as she rode. When she hoped she had them, she cleared her throat, deciding she'd better start warming up, since she guessed the rest of the ride would take less than a gla.s.s, and she needed to be ready.

She began on the first vocalise, wondering if she'd waited too long.

"Holly-lolly-lolly-pop..." She had to stop and cough out mucus. Another day, when getting clear, isn't going to be that easy. "Mueee... mueee..."

Anna coughed again, but by the time they'd gone several hundred yards, she wasn't cutting out on every fourth syllable. But you're not that clear...

Farinelli whuffed once and then again, as if to comment on the quality of her warm-up.

"I know...I sound like h.e.l.l." She patted the gelding absently, and to rea.s.sure him, not that he needed rea.s.surance as much as she did.

A scout rode out from where the road had turned eastward into the low trees, an orchard of some type, Anna thought, although the fruit was green. Once he had cleared the orchard by a few hundred yards, he reached the north-south part of the narrow road. From there he brought his mount into a quick trot on the way back north, toward Himar and the main section of Anna's and Hadrenn's forces.

Himar signaled for the column to halt, and the orders rippled back along the line of men and horses that extended nearly a dek back toward the River Syne.

Anna edged Farinelli forward, and Jecks kept his mount beside her, until they reined up beside Himar and Hadrenn. Despite the light breeze, Anna found herself blotting a damp forehead to keep perspiration out of her eyes.

"Sers... Regent... they're drawn up on the hills, to the east here...except we'll be south of them the way the road goes, and they're just waiting."

"Waiting? They don't have any scouts out?"

'They have some. They are but a dek or so out from the others."

"Archers?" asked Jecks. "Or crossbows?"

"Didn't see none, ser. Could be, but not up front or where we'd see 'em."

"Were there any players tuning?" Jecks persisted.

"No, ser."

"How far is it to the ridge that faces the enemy?" asked Himar "Dek and a half... maybe two deks."The overcaptain nodded, then stood in his stirrups. "Four Defalkan companies to the fore! Green, gold, purple, and orange!" Himar ordered. "Two more from Lord Hadrenn's forces."

"Norteun company! Fosternn company!" ordered Stepan.

Anna was glad that Skent's cyan company hadn't been called forth, but Himar was only being a good commander, by not putting a green subofficer forward in his first true battle.

"Be ready to hold the hillside there, the front of the ridge, should the enemy attack before all our forces are a.s.sembled," declared Himar.

Anna turned. "Liende, have the players ready to dismount and play." The words felt dry in her mouth. "Once we get to the slope opposite the enemy."

"Yes, Regent."

The sorceress turned back to study the lane leading to the orchard, her eyes lighting on the fruit. Something she didn't recognize... were they greenages? Or just green plums? Or were they the same? Back to vocalises.

"Mueeee... oueeee... oueeee" She coughed again, but by the time they resumed their ride and pa.s.sed the last of the plum trees-where the road ended-and started across the browning gra.s.s on the eastern end of the long orchard, she'd stopped cutting out and could concentrate more on warming up without worrying about choking.

"Be ready to dismount and play," ordered Liende from behind.

"Remember," Jecks ordered Jimbob and Kinor, "you are to remain with the guards to protect the Regent. She is Defalk."

"Yes, ser..."

"Yes, ser"

Anna continued to warm up even as she studied the ridgeline along which they rode eastward toward a shallow depression too small to be a valley-a depression covered with browning gra.s.ses bending slightly in the crisp fall breeze. Beyond the ridge they traveled and across the expanse of golden brown gra.s.ses, the burgundy tunics of Bertmynn's lancers and armsmen stood out like fresh blood against the gra.s.s and the green of the trees behind the far hill on which those lancers and arms-men were arrayed.