Shadowsinger (36 page)

Southwest of Esaria, Neserea

In the early-morning light, the Maitre stands on a low rise, overlooking the river to the north, and the city of Esaria beyond the river. To his left, in the waters off Esaria, is the great eastern fleet of Sturinn.

Already, the piers lie in Sturinnese hands, and a wave of armsmen and lancers in white is moving through the city from west to east. Only those inhabitants who resist are being slaughtered. The others will provide supplies and coins and, in time, lancers and armsmen. The Maitre smiles and turns as the shadow of another nears.

“Maitre,” offers the tall jerClayne, “all is going as you ordered. Few are resisting.” He laughs heartily. “And fewer as others see what happens to those who do resist.”

“What of the lady pretender?” asks the Maitre.

“She and her mother have fled eastward, in disguise, it appears. No one has seen them.”

“Have you not used your scrying glass, jerClayne?” The Maitre's tone is bland, but his eyes are hard.

“We have tried, Maitre. They wear gray cloaks and are somewhere
along the river road to the east. We could use the distance spell to destroy them, but you had requested that we not do so yet. You have also had us reporting on the fighting. There is little of that. And on the shadowsinger. The home defense fleet is encircling her ships and will begin the attacks this morning as you ordered.”

“It is morning.”

JerClayne shifts his weight. “Ah…Maitre, the Ostisles are farther west…”

The Maitre laughs, not unkindly. “You are most gentle in reminding me, JerClayne.” He turns and studies the city across the river for a moment. “Let us go and see what we find in the palace of the Prophet. Then we will decide what to do with Aerlya and her brat daughter.”

In the gray-green dimness of the cabin before dawn, there was a solid rap on the hatch door, followed by a second blow every bit as solid as the first.

Secca bolted upright in the double bunk. “Yes?”

“Captain wanted you to know, sorceress, that there are sails on the horizon and closing.”

“I'll be there.”

Alcaren was already scrambling for his clothes before Secca finished speaking, and, if but for an instant, she watched his muscular figure, before sliding out of the bunk and onto the cold wooden deck, a deck that felt damp and gritty to her feet. But then, she had gotten used to the almost-invisible salt grit that was everywhere, no matter how often the decks and bulkheads were scrubbed and cleaned. Her skin hadn't adapted, not with itching and red blotches everywhere, but she could tolerate it.

A lighter gray light suffused the sky by the time Secca had pulled on her clothes and splashed some of her limited supply of fresh water across her face. Alcaren followed her up the ladder and then back to the helm platform, where Denyst stood beside the helmswoman.

The wind was cool, not quite cutting, and still mostly from the south. Despite the wind, the air felt heavy, close to oppressive. Secca wondered if she felt that oppression just because she worried about the Sturinnese and the inevitable sorcery to come.

“Didn't want to wake you too early, sorceress,” Denyst apologized, “but, any direction the lookouts search, there are sails. Easing in closer over the last glass. Closest is still more than five deks, we'd guess, but with the wind the way it is, that's not much more than half a glass to reach us under full sail, leastwise for those to the west.”

“Are they actually sailing toward us?” asked Secca.

“Not yet.”

Secca frowned. She didn't want to roust out the players early, not if it could be glasses before the Sturinnese actually decided on an attack, but she didn't want to be caught unprepared, either.

Alcaren leaned forward and said in a low voice, “You need something to eat before you do anything, or you won't be able to sing as well as you need to.”

“So do you. We're singing it together.”

Denyst waited.

“Can you let me know the moment it's clear that one of them has decided to close on us?” Secca inquired.

“She needs to eat to be at her best,” Alcaren said firmly.

Denyst laughed. “Go and eat. We'll find you if the Sea-Pigs make a run.”

“Thank you.”

“Not be much good to have you not at your best.” While the words were gruff, the captain smiled.

“You go back to the cabin and sit down. You'll be standing more than you think today,” Alcaren said, as the two stepped away from the helm platform. “I'll see what else I can find besides hardtack and cheese.”

“That will be fine.” Secca added after a pause, “Unless there's bread.”

Alcaren slipped down the ladder to the main deck with an ease that Secca, short-legged as she was, envied, even as she wondered how he could do it, since he wasn't all that much taller than she was. Before she followed, she turned to look astern, but although the eastern sky was lightening, the sun had not peered above the horizon. Alcaren stood waiting below, as if to make sure she did not slip or fall.

“I'll see what the galley has,” he promised. “Just sit down and have
some water.” He grinned. “You don't drink enough before you do sorcery.”

“Thank you, dear consort.” She let a little trace of irritation show, even though she knew he was trying to be helpful.

He grinned again and offered a sweeping bow.

Secca couldn't help laughing. “Go get the hardtack or biscuits or bread or whatever.” Then she headed down the narrow passage back to the cabin.

Once there, Secca took her water bottle from the covered bin, and then seated herself at the captain's round table. She took a slow swallow of water, then another, while she waited. Then she shifted her weight in the wooden chair and glanced toward the door. She turned her eyes to the portholes, and she could see that dawn had come, with sparkles of light on the tops of the long even swells.

She could hear steps through the overhead, steps of sailors, she thought.
Where is he? You should have gone with him
. The
Silberwelle
heeled slightly, and the cabin tilted. Secca grasped the edge of the table, wondering if more gyrations would follow, but the ship settled back into the same kind of long pitching movement through the ocean swells as Secca had come to expect.

“Might as well warm up some more…” she murmured to herself and began a vocalise. “Holly-lolly-lolly…”

Alcaren stepped into the cabin.

“What took so long?” she asked, even before he had closed the door and set two loaves of bread and a wedge of cheese on the table, along with a handful of dried apple flakes.

“I wasn't but a few moments. It just seems longer when you're worried.”

Secca didn't feel convinced. “How did you get all this?”

“I just told the cooks that whether they saw tomorrow depended on how much the sorceress got to eat this morning.”

“You said that?”

After seating himself in the chair beside Secca, Alcaren nodded. He broke one of the long narrow loaves in two and handed Secca the longer portion. Then he took out his belt knife and sliced several sections off the cheese wedge.

Between them, they finished off both loaves of bread—and everything else—without speaking.

“You were hungry,” Alcaren said, licking the last bits of apple flakes off his fingers.

“And you were not?”

“I never claimed I was not.”

“We should go back outside.”

“Denyst would send for us,” Alcaren pointed out, “but I'd rather be outside in the fresh air.”

Secca slipped out from behind the chair. “I'll bring my lutar.”

“Why don't you leave it? I can get it in a moment if you need it.”

“But…oh…” Secca nodded.
Best to cast but one mighty spell with players than exhaust ourselves with smaller spell upon smaller spell
. “We'd better go.”

“It may be a bit early, but you'll just fret down here.” Alcaren gestured for Secca to lead the way.

He followed her back along the passageway and up the ladder to the poop deck.

“Still holding off,” Denyst said, even before Secca could ask. “Like as to they're waiting for full sun. Might be that whatever ships are between us and where the sun rises will be the ones leading the way.”

“They could get closer before we see them?” asked Secca.

“Some ships, mayhap.” Denyst laughed harshly. “My lookouts are better than that.” She gestured. “Your other sorceress.”

Secca turned to see Richina climbing up the last steps of the ladder. The younger woman made her away aft toward where the three stood just forward and to port of the helm.

Secca studied the younger woman's face, with the dark circles and the haggard expression. “Richina…”

“Yes, lady?”

“Find something to eat. Drink as much water as you can, and…” Secca paused, then spoke each word clearly, “Go back to sleep.”

“But…if you need me…”

“You're keeping the rest of us safe. If you get too tired to hold those ward spells, we'll all suffer. Please get some food and take care of yourself,” Secca concluded warmly.

“Are you…?”

“I am most certain,” Secca said firmly. “You are taking care of us as surely as you can.”

“Thank you, lady.” With a nod, Richina turned, easing her way forward, and then down the ladder.

“Hadn't 'a seen what sorcery does, not sure I'd believe it.” Denyst shook her head. “Rather be a ship mistress.”

Secca smiled. “If you'll excuse me, I need to warm up.”

Denyst nodded.

Secca walked to the port railing and began a vocalise, trying to warm up slowly and evenly. Behind her, she heard Alcaren trying his voice, although his vocalises were still rough. Secca found herself coughing halfway through the first vocalise.

Alcaren appeared with a water bottle, tendering it silently.

She took a swallow, handed it back, and continued with the vocalise. After the second vocalise, Secca slipped back toward the helm platform, beside which Denyst and Alcaren stood.

Denyst pointed off the starboard bow. “Closest ones are there. Just two of them, you see. Still a good three deks from the
Wellereiterin
.”

Secca watched. So did Alcaren.

“They're swinging south,” Denyst announced after a time, long before Secca could see any change in heading from the Sturinnese vessels.

“They're trying to get you to use sorcery without hazarding many of their ships,” Alcaren suggested.

“Can you have the others—our ships—close up a little more?” asked Alcaren.

“Not be a good idea to be closer than half a dek,” Denyst pointed out.

“Half a dek would help,” Alcaren said. “It will also keep them out of the first lashing of the storms.”

“Alcaren did tell you—that there could be storms after the sorcery?” Secca asked.

“He did. We passed that on to the others. Just to rig for heavy weather once the Sturinnese closed. Didn't tell 'em why. The less said the better. Flag signals aren't always secret, even in code.”

Secca glanced forward, in the direction of the main deck, still empty of players, then out to the south, where the sails of the Sturinnese vessels seemed fractionally closer. “I think we should get the players tuning.”

Alcaren nodded, and started down the ladder.

“I didn't mean you had to—”

“Might as well,” he called back. “It's easier on me than standing and watching, and we can't do any sorcery—or I can't—without players.”

“Some ways, he hasn't changed much,” Denyst said dryly. “Hated to wait for anything as a boy. Hid it well, but those of us who knew him could see that.”

“And in other ways?”

“He was always polite, but never has he been so attentive to anyone as he is to you, Lady Sorceress.”

Never have you been so attentive…except you take him too much for granted at times such as these
. Secca looked out to the south.
Perhaps at all too many times
.

“Sorceress?” asked Denyst.

“I was just thinking. He is very special.”

“Special he is and may be, but—”

“Sails to stern! Closing!” The warning came from somewhere in the yards above.

Secca glanced up, but she could not tell which lookout had voiced the call.

Denyst glanced aft, quickly, then nodded. “They'll not catch us quickly, but best your players be soon ready.”

Secca nodded. Alcaren had already gone to summon them, and there was little enough she could do for the moment—or should.

Alcaren's head had no sooner reappeared as he climbed up the ladder than players began streaming out onto the main deck.

“Palian already had them up. They'd already finished eating,” he explained.

Almost immediately, Secca could hear the tuning.

“Quick tune!” ordered Palian. “We need the warm-up song! Places!”

“Second players in places!” Delvor's voice—almost as high as Palian's—rose over the hubbub of the tuning.

Secca glanced aft, but the sails that had appeared to be closing had drifted back.

“Worry more about those forward,” Denyst suggested. “They turn into us, and they'll be closing twice as fast.”

“They likely to turn so that we'll change course,” asked Alcaren, “and then get caught between them and the ships trailing?”

“Weren't for the fact that they worry about your sorcery, I'd wager they'd already have tried that,” replied the captain. “Signs are that they will soon. The ships to the west are trimming sail, just a touch, so little that they hope we won't notice.”

Secca turned to her consort. “I'm going to have the players play through the first building song. We should listen and mark it silently.”

“That would help me,” he said. “I've far less experience than you with such.”

Secca walked to the forward part of the poop deck and called down to Palian. “It may not be long now!”

“Quiet!” ordered the chief player.

The warm-up song halted.

“Say that again, Lady Secca, if you will.”

“It won't be long. Could you run through the first building song right now?”

“First building song. At my mark!” Palian ordered. “Mark!”

As the players offered the spellsong, there was enough raggedness that Secca was more than glad she had ordered the run-through.

“You must do better,” Palian said. “Rowal, you are a half beat behind everyone. Pick it up.” Palian glanced to Secca. “Do we have time for another?”

Secca looked to the captain.

“Your call, sorceress. They've not swung their helms yet.”

Secca turned. “Go ahead.”

Secca noted that Alcaren's eyes almost closed as he followed the accompaniment.

The players finished the second run-through, and, so far as Secca could see, none of the Sturinnese ships was any closer.

For perhaps a quarter of a glass, Secca watched the Sturinnese sails, watched Denyst, and watched Palian.

Abruptly, Denyst turned and gestured. “There's a wedge forming, be coming from the south on the starboard. You want any different course?”

“No,” Secca replied. “How long before they're two deks away?”

“Less 'n quarter glass,” replied the captain.

“We'll be doing the spells before that,” Secca said.

“You tell me when to tell Palian,” Alcaren said, stepping to the railing over the main deck. “Stand ready for the first building song!”

“Players standing ready,” Palian returned.

Secca had her eyes on the white-hulled ships that seemed to swell up off the starboard bow. “Almost….” She kept watching, absently running through part of a vocalise, looking at the wedge of Sturinnese vessels, perhaps a half-score, and the more distant sails of the ships that held back, hoping that she would cast spell after spell until she could cast no more.