The Soprano Sorceress: The First Book of the Spellsong Cycle

by L. E. Modesitt Jr.

  “As you wish.” Daffyd looked from one woman’s face to the other. “As you wish.” He picked up the ax and retreated, shaking his head.

  Anna slowly finished the remainder of the bread.

  “Are you interested in Daffyd?”

  Anna’s mouth dropped open. “You …” Then the sorceress realized that Dalila did not see Anna as Anna saw herself. “I had better explain, Dalila. I am older than I look. I have a son older than you are, and a daughter who is Daffyd’s age. I did have a daughter who was even older, but she died several months ago.”

  “Months?”

  “Seven or eight weeks ago.” Had it been that long? “Daffyd can tell you. I looked older when I came to Liedwahr, but some magic in the battle changed me. It was a surprise to me.”

  “A not unwelcome one, I wager,” Dalila said.

  “I don’t know. Had I looked the way I did, Madell would not have been so interested. I wonder if any man will take me seriously.” Especially in this culture.

  “I had not thought that way.” Dalila frowned. “Having Ruetha was not easy, for all that Hersa said it was a good birth. To raise children, and then to have one die … and have the chance to start again …” She shook her head, then offered a brief smile as she reached for another shirt—Anna’s.

  “I can wring that out.” Anna stood.

  “Ye be sure of that?”

  “I’m sure.”

  Ruetha began to whimper, and Dalila looked at the barrel still filled with warm water and clothes.

  “You feed her,” Anna said, taking her shirt. “I can manage this.” She added, “Enjoy your daughter.”

  That got a smile of sorts as Dalila retreated to the kitchen.

  The mechanical work of lifting out each article from the hot tub and rinsing it, then wringing it and carrying it out to hang, was almost a relief to Anna.

  As she finished the last of the whitish items and dropped the darker clothes into the hot tub, Daffyd appeared at her shoulder, looking toward the kitchen area where Ruetha sat at one side of the table chewing on more of the dark bread, then back at Anna. He smiled as he looked at the ground.

  Anna had to smile, too, thinking about walking around in a gown with boots, but she had neither sandals nor slippers.

  “What did ye do to Madell?” asked Daffyd, again glancing toward the kitchen.

  “He tried to overpower me last night,” Anna said quietly. “I managed a spellsong, one that demanded that he trouble me no more.”

  “He hates you, and he’ll be telling tales to Dalila, if he hasn’t already.”

  “We’ve talked about it, in a quiet way,” Anna said.

  “Madell won’t be any trouble to me.” She wondered, though, how much trouble the miller would cause for Dalila. Anna liked the pert brunette. The problem was that using spellsong led to using more song. Wasn’t there any end to it? Anna tried not to sigh. “I should go back to Mencha.”

  “That’s where the dark ones will be, as I stand here.”

  “Stand back,” Anna said before repeating the laundry spell. Then she retrieved a pair of trousers and rinsed them, then wrung them.

  “I can do that,” said Daffyd.

  “So can I. But I can’t finish that lutar, and I suspect you’re better at chopping and splitting wood than I am.”

  “You should go to Falcor,” suggested Daffyd, “or, better yet, Elhi. Lord Jecks would help you.”

  “I don’t know,” Anna said. “That doesn’t feel right.” She didn’t even know why it didn’t feel right, but things felt unfinished in Synope, although she knew she shouldn’t stay.

  46

  In the morning light, Anna sat at the table, her hair damp. Sooner or later, the way it was growing, she was going to have to cut it, or wear it permanently in a bun of some sort.

  She broke off another piece of bread and offered it to Ruetha. The little girl grinned shyly.

  “You can have some, Ruetha,” said Dalila.

  “She looks funny,” said the daughter.

  Anna supposed she did, with damp thick hair that had more curl than she remembered, but Dalila had said she could use one of the tubs in the washroom for a bath, and the water spell had gotten her hot water. She felt cleaner than she had in weeks, even if water were dripping down her neck onto the collar of the clean shirt. She’d left off the tunic; it was too hot to wear inside.

  She’d blotted herself as dry as she could—Defalk wasn’t big on large towels—but then she suspected that, given the difficulty in getting water, Defalk wasn’t big on washing. In dressing, she’d noticed that she could almost make out her ribs. Had she ever been able to do that?

  “So do you,” Dalila pointed out to her daughter, standing at the worktable kneading dough. Dalila also looked damp, since the brunette had followed Anna into the tub and given her daughter a good scrubbing.

  After the solemn-eyed Ruetha took the bread, Anna—still hungry—broke off another piece, and slowly chewed through it, occasionally eating from a small wedge of very hard yellow cheese.

  “You will spoil us, Lady Anna. Warm water without fires, and laundry that does not take all day.” Dalila glanced toward the corner of the room where Daffyd had laid out the pieces of the unfinished lutar. “Daffyd, you should have bathed.”

  “There wasn’t any point to it. I’ll get hot and dirty, and besides I have to finish this.” The young player slowly eased the backpiece of the lutar into place. The odor of glue permeated the room, already hot, even though it was not even mid-morning. “I’ll bathe later, if I can persuade the sorceress to provide the same luxury for me.”

  “Such industry deserves some luxury,” Anna said lightly.

  “Well, you said you needed this.”

  “I do. Or I will. Unfortunately.”

  “It is unfortunate to be a sorceress?” asked Dalila as she rolled the dough into a ball.

  “I hope not.” Anna half forced a laugh. “But it is unfortunate to be a sorceress who seems to be more regarded for the damage she can create than the good she can do. Laundry and bathwater are more constructive than trying to hurt soldiers.”

  “Mayhap,” said Daffyd from the corner, where he was setting some glue clamps. “Sometimes the soldiers kill people, though, and it’s useful to keep them from killing.” He grinned ruefully. “Especially when it’s me you kept them from slaughtering.”

  “Aye, force has to be stopped with force, and those who can’t …” Dalila’s lips tightened.

  Anna thought of the slamming door. She had been awake since not much after dawn when the slamming door had reverberated through the house. Madell had not been at dinner the night before, and he had left early.

  “Is Madell busy with that Ranuan grain?” the sorceress asked blandly.

  “He left early, lady.”

  Anna backed off. “Thank you for the bread. It’s good. Everything you cook is good.”

  “I doubt it’s like that in a great hall.”

  “No,” Anna said. “It’s better. I mean it.”

  That got a brief smile before Dalila turned to Ruetha. “Best you come here, girl, and give your mother a hug.”

  Anna swallowed.

  “There!” interjected Daffyd, stretching. “That’s about all I can do for now. A few more days, and we’ll see what this beast sounds like.” He turned to his sister. “I’m making a strange instrument for her.”

  “Oh?”

  “She paid me, in coin,” Daffyd said.

  “And what is it?” Dalila’s voice was somewhat warmer, and Anna was reminded that food was not cheap, from what she recalled, in less mechanized cultures.

  “It is like a lute, with six strings, but the backplate is flat and the strings tuned lower.”

  Dalila nodded and began to mix up something else, dismissing both of them in her concentration.

  “Daffyd? Can you remember that mirror song? The one Jenny used.”

  “I can play the melody, but the words have to change for what you want to look
at.”

  “That’s fine. Does your sister have—oh, we can use the one on the wall in the guest room.” Anna paused.

  The two walked into the small room, and Daffyd played the tune twice and spoke the words for Anna. After several tries she thought she had some words that would work.

  “Are you ready?”

  “Ready as you are, lady.”

  Anna nodded; Daffyd played; and Anna sang.

  “Mirror, mirror that I see,

  Show now me now who looks for me.

  Show them bright, and show them fast,

  and make that strong picture last.”

  As Anna completed the song, and Daffyd lowered the viola, the surface of the mirror swirled into four quarters.

  In the upper right corner was a figure clad in a dark hooded robe, apparently within a darkened room. In the upper left was a man with reddish blond hair and a matching beard. He sat in a thronelike chair before pillars and wore a cream-colored tunic. In the lower right was a short blonde-haired woman with penetrating green eyes, who seemed to look straight out of the mirror at Anna. And in the lower left was a white-haired woman with a thin face in a deep-blue and high-collared shirt.

  For a time, Anna studied the figures, and only the greeneyed woman seemed aware of the scrutiny. Just before the images faded, she offered a sardonic smile.

  Anna blotted her forehead, damp not just from the unending heat of Synope and Defalk. “Who were they? I suppose the one in the dark robes was one of the Dark Monks from Ebra, but what of the others?”

  Daffyd wiped the sweat off his forehead before answering. “The older woman in blue—that’s the color of the motherhood, and they run Ranuak. The blond-bearded man—if I had to guess, that would be Behlem, the Prophet of Music. He be the one who sent his troops to Falcor. The woman in green …” He shrugged.

  “I’d guess she’s from whatever country that surrounds Defalk that the others aren’t.”

  “Nordwei? Why would the Norweians be seeking you?”

  “Why would any of them—except for the Ebrans—be looking for me?” Anna replied.

  “Aye … you are the sorceress.”

  “Where’s Madell?” Anna asked, knowing the answer, but wanting Daffyd’s reaction.

  “He left early. Mayhap he never came home. He’d never wish to see your face again.”

  Daffyd’s words were cool, and that bothered Anna. She pursed her lips. She didn’t like what she felt. Because she’d repulsed Madell, was he taking his aggressions out on Dalila—one way or another? But what could she do?

  Everything she did led to something else.

  The thought nagged at her. She just couldn’t go off and leave Daffyd’s sister unprotected. She’d have to think of something. Something that wouldn’t backfire, or lead to something else.

  She also needed to do a few other things.

  “Daffyd?”

  “Yes, lady?”

  “We need to go shopping.”

  “Shopping?”

  “I can’t let your sister keep feeding us.”

  “But that’s guesting.”

  “She can cook. I’m spoiled enough that I enjoy good cooking, but can’t we buy some food?”

  The young player smiled. “Aye. I don’t think she’d mind.”

  “Besides, I can’t afford to get out of shape for riding.”

  Daffyd shook his head.

  47

  “You can’t keep doing this … .”

  The low words seemed to hiss through the gray of the early morning, and Anna bolted upright in the narrow and lumpy pallet bed, not that she had slept that well, with nightmares of various shadowy figures chasing her through improbable settings, none of which she could remember clearly.

  Her head ached, and her eyes were gummy.

  “I’ll do as I please, woman … and you and that witch won’t stop me … .”

  Anger seared through Anna, and she pulled on her clothes and slipped out of the guest room and into the main room barefoot, saying under her breath the words she had composed the night before, repeating them as she moved, mandolin in hand.

  “ … your brother, never up to any good … bringing her here … .”

  As Anna tiptoed through the predawn gloom, Dalila stood on one side of the table, and Madell on the other, his back to Anna. Daffyd was presumably still sleeping the sleep of the dissolute young in the small loft after staying up late talking with Dalila.

  Dalila’s eyes widened.

  Madell turned, his eyes met Anna’s only briefly before darting away. “I was just leaving, Lady Anna.”

  Anna’s finger’s caressed the strings.

  “Madell wrong, Madell strong,

  treat her right from this song.

  Madell warm, Madell cold,

  gentle be till dead and old.”

  Dalila’s mouth opened, then shut.

  Madell swallowed, started toward Anna, then slowly sank onto the bench. “Why …” he whispered. “Why me? Why did you have to enter my life?”

  Anna looked at him, feeling some pity in spite of herself. “I could ask the same question, Madell. Why did you try to force yourself on me? Why was I picked up and taken from my own world? Why me?” She swallowed. “I don’t have an answer, except I felt guilty because you were hurting Dalila because I rejected you.”

  Madell looked down, and Anna could feel the hatred.

  “You should be thankful that I like Dalila. Very thankful,” Anna said slowly. “I could have killed you.”

  “Better you had. Better you had.”

  “Let me get this straight. All I have done is insisted that you not bother me, and that you treat Dalila kindly. You would rather die than behave decently? Does the ability to abuse women mean that much to you?” Anna caught a flicker of movement in the doorway to the kitchen area, but Daffyd ducked back into the washroom before anyone but Anna saw him.

  “I have no choice … .” Madell said slowly, looking down.

  Anna snorted. “I didn’t have much choice about coming to your world. I didn’t have much choice about leaving my children behind. Half the powers in this world are looking for me, and I didn’t have much choice about that.” She paused. “You have plenty of choices. You can whimper about being forced to be decent, or you can learn to live with it.” After a moment, Anna added, “I didn’t compel you to be good to anyone else … but if I find that you’re hurting other people, sooner or later I will find out, and then you’ll find out just how nasty I can really be. Do you understand?”

  The miller just sat on the bench, looking at the empty tabletop.

  Anna turned to Dalila. “I’m sorry. Every time I try to protect myself or someone else, then some other person gets hurt.”

  For a moment, Dalila looked puzzled. Then she nodded slowly. “You do not like to hurt people, do you?”

  “No. In a way, that is why I should have left. But I had nowhere to go … or I thought I didn’t.” Anna’s eyes went back to Madell. “Within a day or two, I’ll be gone, and I hope you can put things back together.”

  “But …” protested Dalila, “where will you go?”

  “Where I must. Where I must.”

  48

  ITZEL, NESEREA

  After fingering his beard, Behlem touches the silver goblet. The terrace of the Temple of Music where he sits overlooks the triangle in the river. Nearly a dek downhill, the Saria and the Essis Rivers join to form the Sariss. “What do you think of it?”

  “Itzel’s a pretty-enough place,” Menares agrees guardedly. “I prefer Esaria.”

  “You just don’t like to travel. You’d better get used to it, though. You’ll be headed to Falcor as fast as you can, and then wherever necessary.”

  “Wherever necessary?” The older man covers a swallow with a bright smile.

  “We need to find the sorceress that Brill brought to Liedwahr, and get her to support us.” Behlem nods. “That’s your job, old friend.” He lifts the goblet and takes a small sip.


  “Is that wise, ser? To bring someone like that into your … circle?” asks Menares. “Why would she even consider it?” His goblet remains untouched.

  “First, it’s very wise. Second, since everyone else wants to kill her, sooner or later our hospitality will make her either grateful or at least willing to throw in with us. She’s staying in a hovel somewhere at the moment, and that indicates how few appreciate her talents.”

  “Those talents could turn on you, ser. You have no idea what this … woman … is really like.”

  “I could care less if she’s an old hag or a bitch that would make Cyndyth look like a meek maiden. She destroyed almost half of the darksingers of Ebra in one battle. Can you find me a sorcerer like that anywhere else?”

  “I don’t know. Do you want one that powerful?”

  “Do you have any better ideas for defeating Eladdrin?”

  Menares spreads his hands. “Besides, how would one find her?”

  “It shouldn’t be that hard. Sorceresses aren’t that loved. I’ll leave the details to you, Menares.” Behlem smiles. “She is to be treated as if she were the highest lady in the land. If she’s found dead, or maimed, or injured, you have the choice of death or exile to Ebra or Mansuur.”

  “Ser?”

  “You know coins, trade, that sort of thing, Menares, and scheming. There’s more to you than meets the eye, old friend and tutor. But there are some things I know. If I can defeat the Ebrans and unite Defalk and Neserea, and if this sorceress can break the darksingers, then the rains will return, and Neserea will be more powerful than Mansuur or Ranuak.”

  “There are a great many ifs there, ser.”

  “So there are … but you are the one who pointed out my limits. Why are you so doubtful about my attempts to change them?”

  “I remain your servant, my lord.”

  “Menares, you are no man’s servant, not mine, nor even that of the spymistress of Nordwei. So let us have no false modesty.” Behlem raises his goblet dramatically, but little of the wine actually passes his lips.

  “Ser …”

  “You are leaving with a detachment of lancers in the morning. I won’t be far behind you.” Behlem pauses. “And Cyndyth won’t be that far behind either of us. Nor Rabyn. Nor the couriers from Mansuur.”