Part 75 (2/2)
”1... didn't plan it that way. They didn't give me much choice.”
”You gave them less, lady.” Jecks did not meet her eyes.
”Wait a moment,” Anna snapped, sitting up and letting the blankets fall away. ”Here we go again. Ehara sends golds and tries to grab some of Defalk. He sends lancers, and he won't admit it. He won't pledge to keep his hands off, and everyone sits around and says, 'Sorry, Lady Anna, you just don't have the armsmen to stop him.' So I try to make everyone happy and build a dam to suggest I have the power to stop Ehara.
”Now it's all my fault, and you're saying that I gave them no choices? I gave them plenty of choices.
They just weren't honorable choices. That's the problem with your great and 'honorable' Liedwahr, my dear Lord Jecks. If it doesn't involve lots of b.l.o.o.d.y killing, with dull swords and men on big horses, it's not honorable.” Anna laughed harshly, and jabbed a hand at Jecks as he started to open his mouth. ”No.
You have no right to judge me. Don't you dare to judge me. Every time I try to do something, it's going to offend the Thirty-three. You sit there and look away. Don't upset the lady Anna She might do something horrible. Don't get the sorceress-woman angry. Well, I am angry! I'm p.i.s.sed! Do you think I wanted to kill all those men? Do you think I like the smell of blood and burned flesh? You say I gave them no choices. I've given everyone a lot of choices. All my life. And you men, all of you, give me none. 'Do it our way. Do it the honorable way. You can't do it that way, Anna. That would displease someone. That would upset someone. What about me? I've saved your grandson's a.s.s, and your precious lords' a.s.ses, and it's never enough... Everyone looks sideways at me, like I'm going to... explode....
Well...you can see it. I'm exploding. I am the unreasonable madwoman. I'm the screaming, wild b.i.t.c.h-- sorceress! That's what everyone wants... to learn that I'm unreasonable. That I don't understand. Well... I don't. I don't understand why ... why...”
Anna found herself gasping, her head spinning, suddenly aware that the entire camp was silent. So silent that no one moved. She took one deep breath, and then another.
Jecks' eyes were on the ground.
Anna took the bottle he had set on the damp clay and swallowed deeply. Maybe she could drink enough that she could sleep. Whatever she said didn't matter. No one really listened. No one wanted to hear. She took another swallow.
Lord, she was tired. She sat, shaking from rage and exhaustion, on the edge of her cot, her head throbbing, her eyes seeing dark double images ... wondering what had set her off.
What choice had she had? She couldn't use spells that didn't kill-they were Darksong. Are you any better than any man aroused with bloodl.u.s.t? She'd gotten angry at the enchanted arrows or javelins or whatever, so angry she really hadn't thought.
Was Jecks right? That force was the only answer? Or that she had given them no choice? But had they given her any, really? Or was that just rationalization? But no one had ever given her any real choices, just choices that looked like they were real.
She sat in the twilight and looked through the open tent flaps at the embers of the fire. Her head throbbed still, and her eyes burned, and, double hot and cold images danced before them.
Jecks sat on the stool equally silent, eyes still averted.
Inside, Anna continued to seethe. Don't judge...You have no right to judge me....
Outside, only the faintest of murmurs filled the damp night.
Finally, Anna reached for the blankets, knowing she would collapse if she did not lie down again, wondering if she had pushed Jecks too hard... wondering ...
107.
The warm rain, slightly heavier than a mist, fell around the Defalkan riders as they continued westward out of the valley, out of yet another valley of dissonance, chaos, fire, and death.
Anna took a breath, of damp air. The rain had deadened the odor of burned meat and death. She glanced ahead at the churned hoofprints in the mud of the road, far less dense, far fewer than when Ehara had fled the Vale of Cuetayl.
Hanfor rode next to her while Jecks rode behind, not surprisingly, since Jecks had not spoken to her since the night before, and she wasn't about to speak to him.
”On to Dumaria,” she murmured, more to herself than to Jecks or Hanfor.
The sorceress glanced over her shoulder past Lejun and Rickel to where Liende rode before the players, all looking as tired and bedraggled as Anna felt.
So much for your ideas of not having Liende play for battles... so much for so many ideas. She took a slow deep breath. You've got to relax some. Then she shrugged her shoulders and bent her head forward, trying to stretch out the tightness.
”We will need to cross the river somewhere,” Hanfor said, ”to reach Dumaria.”
You don't think I know that? Anna bit back her first retort, then swallowed before speaking. ”One way or another, we'll manage. We always do.” Anna supposed she could use her marvelous sorceiy to build a bridge-or find a ford. She felt like laughing, but held back the feeling, knowing it was close to hysteria.
”Ehara has to find the ford or bridge he used.”
”If he does not,” added Alvar, riding slightly ahead of Anna, ”then he must face us again, and now our forces outnumber his.”
”He will find a ford,” predicted Hanfor, wiping away the rainwater collecting on his brow.
Anna glanced down. The lower part of her trousers and her boots, where not protected by the leather of the stirrup guards, were mud-splattered once more. The sky seemed to lighten, and she hoped that meant the rain was pa.s.sing. Then, the way things were going, it could mean a lightening before a heavier rainfall.
Her eyes went to the road ahead, the one taken by Ehara. She had defeated his forces twice. Close to five thousand Dumarans were dead. The two major cities were flood-ravaged wrecks...and she still had to keep pursuing and fighting.
Won't it ever end? Do I have to destroy every last chauvinist in power on the f.u.c.king planet? And if I do that, will I turn every one of their sons into a fanatic? But if I stop now...nothing's resolved....nothing at all, for all the deaths.
Was that how all conquerors felt, rationalizing killing with more killing?
She still felt like yelling at Jecks-or breaking down and sobbing. Neither would help. Instead, she took another deep breath and looked at the muddy road ahead.
108.
WEI, NORDWEI.
Ashtaar's fingers run over the oval of black agate briefly before she steeples her fingers on the polished surface of the desk and waits for Gretslen to seat herself in the straight-backed ebony chair that has replaced the older chair.
The blonde seer sits, clears her throat gently, then begins. ”My congratulations on your selection to the Council.”
”Thank you, Gretslen. The sorceress?”
”The sorceress has destroyed the last of the lancers of Sturinn, and all save one of the Sea-Priest sorcerers.
She has chased Ehara out of the northeast of Dumar. Ehara has less than twentyscore armsmen from more than ten times that number”
”They are dead? Or wounded? Or deserters?”
”All of them are dead. Kendr and I could not discern any deserters through the reflecting pools. There could be a very small number.”
''You are cautious. Good. Where is the sorceress now?”
”On the eastern bank of the Falche, north of Dumaria. She cannot cross the Falche without risking her forces. The rains have swollen it mightily, and her earlier sorceries ripped away the bridges.”
”Gretslen?” asks Ashtaar deliberately. ”Why do you dislike the sorceress so much that you blind yourself to what she can and cannot do?”
”Mightiness?”
”You heard me. Why do you hate her so much? Because you think you could do so well in her boots?”
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