The Saprano Sorceress

by L. E. Modesitt Jr.

  More names that meant nothing, Anna thought.

  "I'll explain it at dinner," Brill explained, opening the door, and stepping out. "I imagine you are hungry." He extended a hand.

  Anna found she didn't need it, since the carriage had indeed pulled up to what she imagined was a mounting block—or a set of stone steps designed to unload carriages.

  Brill gestured to a diminutive black-haired girl, not even to Anna's shoulder, who stood in the shadows at the top of the steps by the open oak door. "Florenda, will you escort the lady Anna to the first guest suite?" Brill offered his pleasanf smile once more. "We will eat at the first bell." He turned to Anna. "That will be two glasses before true sunset."

  Anna guessed that meant something like two hours before sunset, and her eyes flicked toward what she felt was the west, assuming the hazy white sun was in the western sky.

  "You will find some refreshments in your suite, Lady Anna," Brill added, with another bow. "Until dinner."

  Florenda bowed. "If you would follow me, lady."

  Anna wanted to shake her head. The only time she'd ever gotten this kind of bowing and scraping was the time she'd sung the national anthem at the Peach Bowl, and that had been years ago, when Cindy what's-her-name had canceled less than a day before.

  She grasped her handbag firmly and walked up the half dozen steps to the tall doorway that dwarfed her. Her heels clicked on the hard light-blue stone. Was the entire hall built of the same stone?

  The heat of the day vanished as she stepped into the hall and Florenda closed the doorway. The entry foyer rose nearly three stories, with a glittering brass-and-crystal chandelier centered in the middle of the entry, and perhaps ten feet over her head. The stone floor was comprised of interlocking triangles of black and white, both types of stone polished so smooth that the floor glimmered as though it had been waxed and buffed. The white candles of the chandelier were unlit, and the clear crystal mantels shimmered without a single smudge. Light diffused into the entryway through high translucent skylights—triangular panes of milky blue glass set in the angular trapezoidal cupola that topped the entry foyer.

  Inlaid into the smooth slabs of white stone that comprised the walls were curlicues of polished brass, giving the entry hall a Moorish feel. While the cool was welcome, she had the feeling that in a cold winter, the sorcerer's hall would be chilly, very chilly. In the entry hall were no woods and no fabrics, just glass and metal and stone.

  Florenda waited as Anna surveyed the area, then said quietly, "The first guest suite is up off the main staircase."

  "How many guest suites are there?" asked Anna, following the maid through the high arch at the back of the entry hall into another vaulted hall. A stone staircase rose straight before Anna, fully fifteen feet wide. On each side of the open stone-floored area at the foot of the grand staircase was another archway.

  "Five, but none save yours are occupied. That doesn't count the great lord's suite." Florenda lowered her voice. "Few would visit Mencha by choice now, even for comforts like those supplied by Lord Brill."

  Anna wondered why, if Brill were such a powerful sorcerer, he just didn't leave the area, since he could clearly build himself a great hall anywhere. She decided to keep the question to herself for the moment.

  "The reception hall is there." Florenda pointed to the left. "And the grand dining room is there." She pointed to the right. "Your dinner tonight will be in the salon off the grand dining room." With that, the maid headed up the stone steps.

  Anna followed more cautiously, her free hand on the stone balustrade, wondering if her heels would slip on the smooth stone, since the steps were neither carpeted nor covered. After reaching the top of the staircase, she faced yet another carved archway that led down a wide hall.

  "This is your key, lady." Florenda stopped at the first door on the right and offered Anna a shining brass key with an ornately swirled top. The door, framed in golden wood, had eight diamond-shaped panels, each lacquered in dark blue. The keyhole was outlined in the same shining brass.

  "There are gowns and less formal wear in the closets in the wardrobing area, and some should fit you. If you choose to alter some, Lord Brill would not mind."

  "Thank you." How was she supposed to alter something? With sorcery?

  Florenda turned the levered door handle and opened the door. "There is also an iron bolt inside. If you need any assistance, you only need summon me with the bellpull." She bowed again, apparently waiting for Anna to enter the suite.

  Anna reached out and touched the door lever. It moved easily and the door opened inward.

  7

  East of the Sand Pass, Ebra

  Light seems to bend away from the interior of the tent. Behind the collapsible wooden writing desk is a simple armless stool. On it sits a figure in a pale brown hooded habit. Though his clean-shaven chin is visible in the light that filters in through the tent flap as it moves in the breeze, the remainder of his face is in shadow.

  The figure standing before the writing desk also wears a hooded habit. "Songmaster, Lord Barjim is raising additional defense works to support his forts on Defalk's side of the Sand Pass."

  "Much good they will do him."

  "And a portal to one of the mist worlds has been opened."

  "Where?" The Songmaster stops writing on the heavy linen-paper scroll.

  "In Defalk."

  "Defalk? How? A mist portal takes the lyric voice, and none there have the power. Are you sure of this, Brother Burthen?"

  "As sure as we can be. The opening plucked the strings of Erde, and the echoes still whisper on her strings."

  "Was the portal opened from the mist side?"

  Brother Burthen shook his head. "Discovering it took some time, Songmaster. All we could determine is that a strange blonde woman, in an exotic green gown, went from a cottage in the hamlet of Mencha to Lord Brill's hall."

  "A single sorceress will not stop us, even one that has escaped the fires of passage. But how she did…" A shrug follows. "That matters not now."

  "If she is allied with Brill…"

  "Brill always turns and runs when matters become difficult. Why should this time be any different?"

  "The sorceress might change matters."

  The hint of a smile crosses the Songmaster's face, visible only on the unshadowed portion of his mouth. "She would have to be powerful indeed."

  "His hall is warded," pointed out Burthen, as if the Songmaster had not smiled at all.

  "Watch it, as you can. We will proceed with the day's works. Contact the dark chapter in Falcor and see what more they can discover about the portal—and if the woman is a sorceress."

  "One sorceress cannot prove that great a problem," suggested Burthen.

  "I would prefer to have no problems."

  "Yes, Songmaster."

  The Songmaster continues to write, slowly, on the song scroll before him, long, long after Burthen has left the dimness of the tent.

  8

  Anna stepped into the room—a medieval or Erde-ish version of a presidential suite, more than thirty feet long, and nearly as wide from the door to the windows. On the outside wall, blue-tinted but clear floor-to-ceiling windows offered a panorama of both the walls to Brill's stronghold, and the cottages and lanes of Mencha downhill and to the north.

  That had to mean that the hall's walls weren't that high. Anna frowned, recalling that the hall was on a hilltop. Probably the walls were a lot higher on the outside than the inside.

  The windows were flanked with heavy blue hangings drawn back with thick blue cording. Before the window was an elegant stone table, flanked by a pair of blue-lacquered chairs. The large and high bed was covered with a pale blue spread trimmed in white lace. In the center of the spread was the letter B, in a royal blue.

  On each side of the bed were delicate-appearing stone tables, on each a brass-and-crystal oil lamp.

  "The wardrobing area is through that door," offered Flo-renda.

  Anna crossed the r
oom and slipped through the smaller door into a room that contained a raised stone tub that would have fit four of her, a long stone vanity that included a sink, and two walls comprised of open closets half-filled with clothing. Beside the left end of the vanity was a full-length mirror. It showed a bewildered-looking and slightly disheveled singer in a green formal gown, carrying a rumpled raincoat.

  Florenda pointed to a curtained alcove in the outer wall. "The jakes is there."

  Jakes? The word wasn't familiar, but Anna understood the idea. There was some form of indoor plumbing, at least for the wealthy, although she certainly was no stranger to an outhouse, not after the summers at Uncle Garven's Appalachian farm up in the holler beyond Bear Paw.

  "If you need anything," Florenda repeated, "just use the bellpull in the bedroom or the robing room." She pointed to a long blue rope beside the stone vanity. Then she bowed. "Unless you have any immediate needs…"

  "No. No. You can go." Anna just wanted a few minutes to think. Things kept getting more and more confusing. She walked to the door to the corridor, following Florenda. As soon as the maid stepped out, Anna closed the door and threw the iron bolt.

  Wasn't there something about iron being proof against magic? Or was that a superstition?

  She wandered toward the bed, noting that the frame .was beautifully-wrought metal of some sort, again covered with the almost shimmering blue lacquer that seemed everywhere. After laying the coat on the coverlet, gently, she lifted the stiff fabric, noting the stitching wasn't that much better than her own, and certainly not as good as her mother's. The bed even felt lumpy, and she frowned again.

  She turned and walked toward the window, still carrying her handbag, looking at the hangings, a sort of velvet, but with a weave that was almost shoddy in comparison to the rest of the room.

  She pulled out one of the chairs. Delicate as it looked, it was heavy, as if it were solid iron, and the small cushion on the seat, embroidered with another B, appeared somewhat frayed.

  The brass tray on the table contained a small loaf of bread, what appeared to be slices of dried apple, and a handful of narrow yellow cheese wedges.

  Anna set the green purse on one side of the circular stone table, broke off a corner of the dark bread, and chewed the small morsel. Although slightly tough, the bread offered a good taste, like a cross between pumpernickel and rye. She had another mouthful, then looked at the crystal pitcher and the pair of matching crystal goblets.

  She sniffed the pitcher, but the amber-colored liquid offered a bitter, familiar, but unfamiliar tang, even faintly musty. Gingerly, she poured a small amount into the goblet, and took the smallest of sips.

  "Oooo…" While it might once have passed for wine, the liquid tasted more like vinegar. Anna licked her lips and picked up the clean goblet, carrying it into the robing room.

  There were two levered faucets into the stone tub. Anna picked the left one and turned it. A thin trickle of steaming water flowed out. Hastily she closed the first lever and opened the second. A wider stream of cool water poured from the faucet, and she slipped the goblet under the lukewarm stream for a moment, then turned the lever off.

  Water—but did she dare drink it? She looked at the water in the goblet, thinking about Jenny and the girl's claim about spelling water. The water looked clean. Still… she wondered.

  She thought about that song Mario used to sing endlessly—he picked it up from an old Frankie Laine album, something about cold, clear, water…

  "All day I faced the barren waste without a taste of cool, clear, water…"

  That wouldn't do.

  She rummaged through her purse, and finally came up with a stub of a pencil and the envelope that had contained her last paystub. She began to write, not that she was any writer. Avery or Sandy or even Irenia—she shook her head and tightened her lips.

  Don't think about it, she ordered herself. Not now. Angrily, she scrawled out the words. She looked at the rough verse on the rumpled envelope. It was terrible, but not much worse than the couplets Brill had sung to cool the carriage.

  She cleared her throat, and tried a vocalise.

  "Holly, lolly, polly… pop…"

  Finally, she looked down at the verse.

  "Ready or not…" She cleared her throat, then tried the words, with as much inflection as she could, emphasizing "cold" and "clean."

  "All day I faced this barren waste without a taste of cold, clean water. Give now my glass in lovely place a healthful taste of cold, clean water."

  Anna could feel something, and she looked at the goblet, where frost appeared around the rim. Then virtually instantly, the water froze, and the goblet shattered, and Anna looked down dumbly at shards of crystal and a lump of clear and solid ice.

  She shook her head, as cold inside as the ice before her. As the saying went, she wasn't in Kansas anymore, nor in Iowa. She certainly wasn't.

  Her eyes burned, even as a sense of subdued excitement held her. It was good news and bad news again. Like the good news had been that Avery had left; and that had been the bad news, since he'd left nothing for her or the children. Here, the good news was that she could cast spells; the bad news was that she was really in a different world where she could cast spells.

  She looked down at the mess again. There didn't seem to be anything for waste disposal, so she used a crust of bread to sweep the crystal into a small pile, and then she carried the chunk of ice, free of glass, to the sink to let it melt.

  After that, she took a sip of the vinegar wine, rather than repeat the water spell. Who knew what she'd get the next time? She also tried the cheese, but the slightest taste gave her the hint of mold, and she set the wedge down. The apple slices weren't bad, if slightly like rubber.

  In the end, she ate most of the bread and half the apples, leaving the cheese. Feeling better, she realized the room remained cool, as if a breeze blew from the windows. She walked to the windows again. While they were hinged, they were closed. Underneath each was a louver, and cool air came through the louvers. She extended her hand toward the metal louvers, but stopped short as she felt the chill. Sorcery? The louvers opened to the outside air, but somehow changed the hot air to cold air.

  She was supposed to have dinner with the sorcerer, and she felt like a mess, even if she hadn't done that much. But she'd changed worlds, and she'd sweated, and been shocked and surprised.

  Anna glanced around the palatial bedchamber, then headed into the robing room, where she found a set of towels—small, clean, and tending toward the frayed. She looked at her watch. The hands still showed five-forty. Didn't Erde have time, or had the transition destroyed the watch or what? Or had the battery run out? More questions for which she had no answers.

  She reclaimed her purse and brought it into the robing room where she found a bottle of what appeared to be liquid soap, strong smelling. She used the smallest dab with lots of lukewarm water from the tap to remove the grime she hadn't even realized had built up on her hands. Then, with the smallest towel as a washcloth, using mostly water, she dabbed and blotted her face clean before reapplying her makeup.

  That done, she went back into the bedroom and looked from the two hard chairs to the bed. She didn't want to lie down and wrinkle the gown, but the chairs were small and hard.

  She walked to the window and looked out, but the scene remained unchanged, although she did see a man in armor walking along the ramparts of the hold, with a bow and quiver slung across his back and some sort of sword in a scabbard.

  What was Erde? A place where people could be transported by magic, but used horses and carriages? Where sor-cerers turned people into dust, but the weapons were bows and blades? Where castles were elaborate and ornate and finely built, but where cloth was rough and where the hangings and embroidery were equally crude? The contradictions didn't make sense. Was that why she still had a feeling of unreality?

  Finally, she sat down on the hard chair, letting her thoughts go where they would.

  A gentle knocking rou
sed her, and she realized she had been half dozing as she had been sitting before the table, half propped up with arms and elbows.

  "Yes?"

  The knocking persisted, and Anna remembered she had bolted the door. She stood, walked over to it, and answered again. "Yes?"

  "Lady Anna? It is about time for dinner." Florenda's voice was muffled, but clear enough.

  Anna undid the bolt and opened the door. "I'll be there in just a moment."

  Florenda bowed. "You look most beautiful."

  "Thank you," Anna replied, taking the compliment more as a testimony to fear in her supposed powers than in her appearance. She gathered her handbag, not wanting to leave it behind, and followed Florenda back down the wide hallway and the grand staircase. They turned left at the bottom of the wide stone steps.

  The grand dining room contained a wide stone table nearly thirty yards long, dark under unlit chandeliers. A single gong or chime echoed through the lofty space, adding to the sense of desertion. Anna had the feeling that the room was seldom used as she followed Florenda to the open double doors at the end of the dining room.

  Warm light filled the salon, a space not much larger than her bedchamber.

  "Lady Anna, punctual as well as beautiful." Lord Brill, still in the blue velvet jacket and trousers, rose from a carved wooden chair, upholstered in a blue needlepoint. The armchair was the first wooden chair Anna had seen.

  Florenda slipped back and closed the salon doors.

  "Lord Brill, you are most complimentary and hospitable." Anna inclined her head.

  "These days we must be hospitable. Good company is most scarce. Please be seated. That should accommodate your gown." Brill gestured to the wide blue velvet settee, also framed in dark-stained carved wood. "You're from one of the mist worlds, and, despite your poise, it's clear that Erde is strange." He walked toward the small wooden bookcase set between the tall blue-tinted windows—a bookcase with four tall shelves that contained perhaps a hundred volumes. "Would you like some refreshments?"