Part 15 (1/2)
The seer sits.
”What have you to report?” Ashtaar's fingers slip around the polished black agate oval on the desk.
The blonde seer bows her head slightly, then straightens. ”The soprano sorceress has finally created a reflecting poot in the liedburg at Falcor.”
”That is worthy of note?”
”She has begun to gather more players.” Gretslen clears her throat almost silently. ”We cannot see the pool, nor her when she employs it. It is as if she is not there.” Gretslen's green eyes flicker downward.
”This has not happened before.”
”Where this sorceress is involved, a great deal seems to have happened that never occurred before.”
Ashtaar's fingers caress the black agate in her hand.
”Yes, Ashtaar.”
”What else?”
”The sorceress re-created the bridge across the Falche at Falcor, so that the city will not be isolated from the fertile lands east of Falcor. A hundred masons would have taken a year to do what she did in an afternoon. Even her it prostrated, but she has recovered. She plucked the very harmonies in doing that.”
Ashtaar's eyes leave Gretslen and go to the unfinished bridge across the Nord, the one being rebuilt to replace what had been destroyed by the Evult' s other flood-the one he had loosed on Wei.
Gretslen waits until Ashtaar's eyes refocus, then continues. ”The bridge will outlast Falcon”
”An eternal bridge?” Ashtaar turns her hand to look at the black agate oval, caresses it a last time one- handed, and then sets it back on the desk. ”More, if you please.”
”The Lancers of Mansuur have arrived in Esaria, and the South Women of the Matriarchy are pus.h.i.+ng to isolate Ranuak from the rest of Liedwahr.”
”Again... how droll. The last time that happened in Ranuak most df them died. People never learn. What of Ebra?”
”The lands in the east around Dolov have sworn to Bertmynn. Hadrenn has asked for no pledges, but many around Synek would follow him because of his lineage.”
”Do we know how much coin the Liedfuhr Konsstin has sent to Ebra?”
”There have been messengers with heavy purses, going from Mansuur to both Synek and Dolov, but no strong-boxes that Kendr or I have scried.”
The spymistress's brows wrinkle for an instant. ”You have missed something, Gretslen. I do not know what it may be, but I sense trouble, great trouble, for us.” Ashtaar's smile is cold. ”I am not a seer, nor have I your talent, nor Kendr's. I only know. Watch the sorceress closely, and Konsstin. They are the great players here.”
Gretslen bows her head. ”As you wish, Mightiness.”
”I wish I were,” murmurs Ashtaar, in a voice so low that only she can hear the words, before adding in a louder tone, ”You may go, Gretslen.”
17.
Anna forced herself to finish the last of the heavy dark bread and the white cheese. The look in the mirror that morning had shown her that some little bit of the sunkenness in her cheeks was beginning to vanish.
Lord! How much food did it take?
She swallowed and glanced across the worktable to Hanfor. ”How many armsmen should go with us to Cheor?” She took a long swall6w of water from her goblet, then refilled it from the pitcher she'd orderspelled earlier in the day.
”As many as possible,” he answered, running a scarred hand through his gray thatch.
”You said that before,” Anna said with a laugh. ”How many is that? Fivescore? Six-?”
The arms commander fingered his gray-and-white clipped beard. ”If I send Alvar with tenscore to accom- pany you, that will leave sixscore here. That is, sixscore that are trained, with another threescore that I would not trust anywhere-not yet”
The sorceress and regent wanted to laugh. Her standing army consisted of a few more than three hundred armsmen-not all of them even trained-and Konsstin had just sent a thousand trained lancers to Neserea. ”We need more armsmen.”
”We need more armsmen...even more recruits,” Hanfor admitted. ”And more arms. Konsstin has fiftyscore lancers in Esaria, and I would wager that Nubara will move them to Elioch as soon as possible.
That doesn't count the two hundred-score armsmen left in the Prophet's forces. We've barely twenty- five-score everywhere in Defalk. More than a few score of those I wouldn't want anywhere near a fight.
Not yet.”
”We're going to need more than three times that, you said.”
”I did.” The arms commander fingered his white-and-gray beard. ”And I could use fiftyscore-or more.
Easily.” He laughed harshly. ”Except we have no weapons and no weapons smith for that many.”
”No word from Ra.n.u.si?”
Hanfor shook his head. ”The roads...”
d.a.m.n the roads! ”What about the levies?”
”If all the lords honor their commitment to the liedstadt, you could marshal two hundred-score in levies.
I wouldn't want even to try to use them in one place.”
”You could put some under Jecks, and some under Firis,” Anna suggested. ”Aren't there other lords who are trustworthy?”
Hanfor raised both eyebrows.
Anna nodded. There might be, but neither of them knew who they might be. Perhaps Jecks did, but right now, they didn't need to know, Yet. ”Besides the roads, why can't we get more recruits?”
”You have been too successful, lady.”
Anna looked at her arms commander.
”When crops are bad, when trade is poor, then the peasants, the farmers, the younger sons, they will accept the risk of arms for food and shelter and the few coppers paid raw recruits.” Hanfor offered a wintry smile. ”There is rain again in Defalk. They hope the crops will sprout and all will be well again in Defalk.”
Another instance where she was a victim of her own success. Anna wanted to groan. ”Don't they see it won't last if we can't protect Defalk?”
”You are the mighty sorceress. You will protect tern.” Hanfor's tone was sympathetically ironic.