Part 63 (1/2)
She took a small sip. A thought struggled somewhere, and finally she asked, ”The...message?”
”As you ordered, I did send it, under the blue flag of messages and harmony. Lord Ehara doubtless did not feel such harmony when he received your words.”
”Received?” Anna rasped.
”You have lain like one enchanted or dead for nearly a week. The message has surely been delivered, but there has been no time for a reply. We have forced water into you, but you are thin unto death.” He extended a small fragment of bread. ”You must eat.”
Anna slowly chewed the bread, hard as it was with a dry mouth, then let Jecks hold the goblet again as she drank. ”The dam...?”
”You have wrought a mighty sorcery,” he admitted, offering another small fragment of bread. ”The river has filled the gorge for three deks and slowed its flow for another five...And it has yet to creep halfway, nay not even a fourth part of the way, up those stones your sorcery laid.”
”Is any . . . water going...past...”
”Beyond the dam are only sands and drying rocks. And more sand and dry rock. Before long, Lord Birfels worries that the waters will flood the fields near Emor.”
Emor? Anna hadn't even heard of Emor.
”That is a small hamlet fifteen deks upstream of Abenfel.” Jecks pressed another square of dark bread upon her.
”Be... awhile,” mumbled Anna as she struggled with the bread. ”Years. It's a deep gorge.”
''Not as deep as before. The waters have covered the sands and the sh.o.r.es, and it is a lake of blue.” He offered more bread.
Chewing the bread took effort, and her jaws moved as though they were made of lead. She swallowed and took another sip of wine.
Her eyes felt heavy, far too heavy, and she could no longer keep them open.
84.
PAMR, DEFALK.
”I can't believe what Deurn said you had back here,” says the thin and wispy-bearded youth. ”I just had to see.”
”You'll see, Elcean,” promises the young chandler. ”It is rather remarkable.” He closes the door to the small room, and the slow and rhythmic drumming enfolds them-thurummm... thurumm... thurummm...
thurumm...
”Oh...”
On the pedestal is an almost life-sized statue of a voluptuous brunette, with an impossibly slender waist and dark hair that fails against creamy skin like a gossamer cloak, just barely coverlng her b.r.e.a.s.t.s. The hair s.h.i.+mmers and s.h.i.+fts ever so slightly in the still air, yet the naked woman-or statue-does not move.
”Oh. . . Fa.r.s.enn . . .can I touch her?”
”That might not be a good idea,” says the chandler. ”At least, not until you listen to me. She won't go anywhere.”
”I can look...”
Fa.r.s.enn slips into song, ba.s.s voice intertwining with the rhythm of the drum.
”Men of Pamr, heed no woman's s song, for Fa.r.s.enn will make you proud and strong...”
When the spell ends Fa.r.s.enn blinks, then squints before he resumes smiling. ”You see? We men need to stand together these days, don't we?”
”'Course... like you say.” Elcean continues to stare at the brunette. ”Sure is pretty.”
The drumbeat dies, and Fa.r.s.enn smiles conspiratorially. ”Just don't tell any of the women...You know what I mean?”
Elcean flushes.
”It was good of you to come to see me.” Fa.r.s.enn makes a vague gesture toward the door. Elcean follows the gesture, and the chandler follows him.
Once the door closes, the drummer rises and glances at the rough clay figure that stands on the crude wooden pedestal, a figure no more than a yard and a half tall. Then he wipes his steaming forehead, then ma.s.sages it. He also blinks as though he has difficulty seeing clearly.
85.
Anna looked at the empty tray on the writing table before her. Had she eaten all that? Every time she pushed her sorcery, she paid, and paid more, it seemed. That was another reason why she wanted to see if she could get Ehara to push the Sturinnese out.
”It won't happen....” she murmured to herself. All that would happen was that the Falche would fill up over the next few years, the Dumaran people would suffer, and she'd take the blame. The Sturinnese would stay put, and she and Jecks would have to decide whether a war in Dumar was worth it. And she would either have to rely on brute-force sorcery to devastate Dumar and prevent a worse mess later, or she could be reasonable, according to conventional lordly wisdom, and wait for a Sturinnese backed invasion or worse in a year or two. By then, Ebra would be in the middle of a civil war, or the war would be over and she'd have another growing enemy to the east while Konsstin would be bringing sorcerers and armies into Neserea to the west.
Yet... how could she live with herself if she didn't try something else? Even if it happened to be a long shot?
She snorted. Of course she could forget Dumar for a time. But then she would have to use force in Ebra to secure Defalk's eastern borders, and that would probably encourage the Sturinnese to attack southern Defalk from Dumar when she was weeks away in Ebra and could do nothing.
Outside was gray. That she could tell, but it wasn't raining, just hot and gray. Even in the thin s.h.i.+ft that wasn't hers, she felt hot, and sweaty, and smelly. She wanted a bath, not a sponge bath, and not a bath in the lukewarm water Defalkans called hot. She wanted a hot and steaming bath, and she wasn't going to get it anytime soon. Not when even boiling water cooled on the long trip up from the kitchens and the mere thought of sorcery sent a screaming pain across her temples.
Still, she was better. She wasn't quite so gaunt, and she could eat, and take short walks, and Jecks didn't look at her as though she were about to die. Yet it seemed her recovery was taking longer than after other similar large spells.
Outside the window the finches twittered, and Anna smiled at the calls that were half song, half argument.
Her eyes flicked to the mirror on the wall-a mirror she could use just as a mirror, thanks to the reflecting pool. She wasn't sure she wanted to see her reflection, not yet, anyway.
Thrap!
”Yes?” she said warily.
Jecks peered in. ”Lady Anna?”
”Come on in.” After he entered, she gestured to the chair across the writing desk from her.