Darksong Rising (70 page)

Regent.”

“Let’s go, then.”

“Players, mount up." Liende called.

“Himar." Anna pitched her voice to carry across the low hubbub in the courtyard.

“Mount up!” ordered the overcaptain.

"...mount up!”

"...up!”

The chain of orders repeated and echoed away from the over-captain like ripples in a pond.

Before long, the column began to move from the rear courtyard past the stables and toward the

north gates of the liedburg.

Anna looked northward as she rode out through the gates, taking in the city. Mist rose from

Falcor as the sun struck the dark roofs. To the west, the sky was clear, except for a line of white

clouds just above the horizon.

“How far will we get today?” Kinor turned in the saddle and asked Liende.

“It took us almost four days last time, but Lady Anna will ride harder, I think,” replied the chief

player.

“She rides hard all the time,” added Jimbob.

“Even the lancers say she rides like a war leader,” Kinor said.

Other voices rose over those of the young men.

 
"...hope it doesn’t rain .

 
"...late in the year for fighting...”

Anna had to wonder, if common wisdom were so against military actions in the late fall, why

Rabyn had chosen to invade Defalk.
 
Just because she wasn’t nearby... or as a pretext to lure her

into a Darksong trap?

Her left hand brushed the top of the spelled shield once more, but she wondered what new threat

Rabyn had developed and whether her sorcery could again prevail. And how many times you can

do this.

75

The rain that had fallen on Falcor had extended less than a day’s ride to the west. By early

morning of the second day, the land and the road were dry, and the hoofs of the lancers’ mounts

were lifting thick red dust from the roadway. Anna’s boots and the part of her green trousers

below her knees were coated with red, and she was sneezing more than infrequently. Farineili’s

legs were red as well.

The sun had warmed the day enough that it felt more like late summer than late fall, and Anna

found herself drinking-more and more water, blotting her forehead all too frequently, and

fanning her face occasionally with the floppy hat. She still struggled to remind herself to eat, but

the pouch before her knee helped.

Every so often, she reminded herself to touch the shield at her knee, but it remained quiet,

indicating no active sorcery nearby.

The fields to the north of the road held stubble, or a few scattered tan stalks—all that remained

from the maize harvest, or in some cases, small potato fields that had not yet been harvested. The

slightly hillier ground to the south had fewer cultivated fields, and more woodlots, orchards, and

meadows or pastures.

A line of trees wound out of the southwest, marking a stream course that angled in a general way

toward a low spot in the road about a dek or so ahead of the vanguard. Anna saw a single scout

perhaps half a dek ahead of the main column, midway between Anna and her guards and the

vanguard. The scout continued to ride eastward. As he neared the first lancers directly ahead of

Anna, Himar rode forward to meet him.

The scout reined up, as did Himar. After a brief interchange, Himar turned his mount from the

head of the column and rode back, easing his mount around in order to ride alongside the Regent.

“The scouts report that there is a stream ahead, Lady Anna, one with a gentle but firm slope to

the water.”

“You’d like to water the mounts and give the lancers a rest down there?” Anna gestured toward

the patch of green that surrounded the bend in the trees ahead.

“And their mounts.”

“I can use the time to check and see where we should be going and what Rabyn’s forces are

doing, and where we should be going once we near Denguic.”

“Do you know how far into Defalk the young Prophet has come?” asked the sandy-haired

overcaptain.

“Last night, he was almost two days’ ride south and east of Denguic.” You think... too much of

western Defalk looks like the rest of western Defalk.

“More toward Fussen?"

“I think so.”

“I will pass the order to water the mounts.” Himar inclined his head to the Regent before riding

past her and her guards. “Stand down for water at the stream ahead. Water by companies, blue

company first....”

Anna turned in the saddle. “Jimbob, Kinor.. . Liende... I’d like you to join me.” She paused.

“Kinor, would you find Himar and ask him as well—once he’s got the watering organized?”

While the lancers watered their mounts, Anna gathered Liende and Jimbob under an oak whose

yellow leaves had begun to fall. She propped the travel mirror between two raised and gnarled

roots, then began a series of vocalises.

“He sees theeee..."

Perhaps it was the drying oak leaves, or the residual road dust; but she began to cough

immediately and had to stop and cough her throat clear.

Himar and Kinor anived before she began the actual scrying spell, and Anna motioned for them

to join her almost directly before the mirror. “You need to see this,” she told the overcaptain.

Himar nodded.

Anna cleared her throat and lifted the lutar.

Show me now as clear as it can be,

the Neserean forces I would see...

The image in the travel minor centered on a rickety bridge across a narrow gorge. On one side

were hundreds of lancers, stretching back along the curving road, under both purple and blue

banners. The lancers were taking the bridge cautiously, in single file, with no more than two

mounts at a time on the span.

“Fussen, I’d wager,” murmured Jimbob.

Anna nodded, smiling. Hanfor was certainly obeying orders, and using the lands of Fussen as the

area from which he harassed Rabyn. Anna almost would have laughed at the scene, had she not

seen young Rabyn’s use of Darksong... and the thoughtlessness with which the young ruler had

already used it.

Anna sang the release spell, then blotted her forehead before half squatting to retrieve the mirror

and replace it in the leather case. As she straightened, carrying the mirror, she glanced toward

Liende.

The chief player brushed back hair that had gotten progressively whiter since Anna had come to

Liedwahr, so that now only thin streaks of pale red remained. “He will use more Darksong."

“I know. That’s why we need to keep riding.” if you can get there in time...

“You have tried to do much,” said Liende. “We will stand ready.” She stepped back and walked

toward the tree under which the players waited.

“Thank you.” Anna lifted the lutar and mirror.

Had it been that necessary to help Hadrenn? To stop Bertmynn? To keep the Sturinnese from

getting a foothold in Liedwahr? Had it been worth Gatrune’s death? The deaths of scores of her

lancers and thousands of others? And yet, what else could she do now—except ride westward

and try to stop the Nesereans?

Then what? Even if you win, you don’t, have the lancers to take over Neserea. So... will that

mean letting the Liedfuhr annex his grandson’s land? She shook her head as she strapped the

lutar and mirror behind her saddle, and mounted Farinelli. She’d think of something.

She had to.

76

NORTH-NORTHWEST OF FUSSEN, DEFALK

 
The dark-haired Prophet of Music paces across the cream-and-blue carpet that comprises the

floor of the tent—six paces one way, an abrupt turn, and six paces back the other way. The wall

panels of alternating blue-and-cream silk billow in the evening breeze, but the chill wind is not

strong enough to flicker the flames of the pair of candles in crystal holders and clear crystal

mantles set upon the blue linen of the camp table. Rabyn rips a single large grape from the bunch

in the carved wooden bowl beside the nearest candle.

Nubara watches the thin-faced young man, waits and shivers under his heavy cloak of maroon

wool.

“We could take them like this!” Rabyn holds the large golden grape up, almost pointing it at

Nubara, then crushes it and tosses it aside before licking his fingers clean. “Yet they will not let

us near them. Why will they not stand and face us? Because they cannot without the power of the

sorceress! Yet Overcaptain Relour cannot seem to bring these cowardly dogs to bay. Nor have

you been any help, Nubara.”

“I might add, honored Prophet, that we have twentyscore fewer armsmen—”

“Cowards! All of them! Just because she used Darksong to make them fear her... and now they

can’t—or won’t march against her. Some of them were Prophet’s Guards! And you let that

happen.” Rabyn glares at Nubara.

“I was not there. I could have done nothing.”

“It doesn’t matter. They can fight against that Defalkan lord. That shows how little she knows.

She spent herself on a Darksong spell that is almost useless. We still have thirty times the forces

she does, and my Darksong is far stronger.”

Nubara shivers.

“There is no reason we should not destroy her and her handful of armsmen. We have more men,

and stronger sorcery.” The thin-faced Rabyn lifts a vial from his wallet. “If we do not engage the

Defalkans before the day after tomorrow, Nubara. . . you will receive no more of this.”