When Anna finally shook herself awake, her back hurt as well as her shoulder. And her hand hurt. She could feel the sweat and dust matted into her hair. As her eyes opened fully, Florenda stood by the bed, a goblet in her hand. She was still on Erde, and her eyes burned.
"You must drink, lady."
Anna drank. Whatever it was tasted like vinegar laced with used crankcase oil and spiced with extra-soapy cilantro.
"More," insisted Florenda.
Anna forced herself to take another deep swallow, then closed her eyes for what seemed a moment.
When she woke again, Florenda sat on a chair, sewing.
"I'm thirsty," Anna announced.
But she got more of the oily wine, first, before Florenda let her have water.
"I must get Liende and Lord Brill." With that the serving girl scuttled from the bedchamber.
Anna wanted to shake her head, but she had the feeling that her head might not remain on her neck if she did. How could one arrow do so much? And hurt so badly? Bullets she understood the damage that high-powered guns could cause, but arrows? As she reflected, the door reopened, and the woodwind player with the red hair streaked with white entered, followed by Brill and Florenda.
"You are awake," said the older woman. "Good."
"I'm afraid... don't know your name," Anna said slowly.
"I am Liende. Lord Brill asked me to. . . assist. I had some little training as a healer years ago." The clarinetist offered a warm but crooked smile.
"How do you feel, lady?" asked Brill. The circles under his eyes were deeper yet.
"I'll live." Anna looked at the dressing across her upper arm and shoulder and the rough stitches in her palm.
"I'd trust so," he said ironically.
"You helped heal some of this?" she asked.
"Some. As I could. Liende's skill helped also."
Anna frowned. "There was just one arrow. How could it...?"
Liende laughed gently. "It was a war arrow, and no one thought you would live."
"glad . . . to prove them wrong."
A silence fell across the chamber.
"I don't understand," Anna finally said. "What did I do? I haven't lifted a hand against anyone."
"You are here," answered Liende. "You came from the mist worlds, and that'd be the one place that the dark ones fear."
"But why?" Anna shook her head. She felt so stupid. All she'd been doing was trying to improve her riding and learn something about Erde, and people were trying to kill her. On earth, they wanted to destroy your career or take your job, but most people she knew weren't killers. "I haven't cast a single spell against them... against anyone."
"I did not think the dark ones would try to strike so soon,' Brill answered. "They fear you, and they want you dead before you realize your powers. Wiltur and Frideric killed all three of them, but they wore the dark robes. They cast a glamour and hid there, waiting for you. For the dark ones to send three so far from Ebra-that is a tribute to your powers."
Powers? Anna wanted to laugh, but that would have hurt. All she'd done was shatter a goblet, light a few candles, turn a few pieces of wood to ashes. Yet some people were telling her she was powerful, and others were trying to kill her.
Her lips tightened, even as she sank back against the lumpy pillows.
Erde was no dream. It was different, though, a place where sixty miles was considered a far way, and where arrows could kill.
She was going to have to learn to be a sorceress, a real one. If she didn't, sooner or later Brill would turn against her or just abandon her; or the dark ones, for whatever reason, would kill her-or both.
She tightened her lips. She had a lot of memory-searching to do-a lot. Her breath hissed between her lips.
Except she had to get better, first. Except that she was so tired. Her eyes closed.
21.
WEI, NORDWEI.
The woman with the close-cropped golden hair steps into the well-lit room whose single wide window overlooks the harbor piers that mark the well-dredged juncture of the River Nord with the Vereisen Bay.
The dark-haired woman behind the table, her back to the window, speaks, though her lips barely move. "Sit down, Gretslen."
The golden-haired Gretslen slips into the armless wooden chair. "You sent for me, Ashtaar?"
"I did. How are matters going in Esaria?" Ashtaar raises a hand to the short dark hair, then pauses, her fingers going to the polished black wooden oval on the desk.
"Well enough. Young Behlem is poised to march, once Barjim reinforces his troops to stop the dark ones."
"How soon?"
"The dark ones are marshaling in the Sand Pass now, and Barjim has called for his levies. He must wait for Lord Jecks' forces, and it will take more than two weeks for them to be gathered and march the distance from Ebli, say three weeks or more before Barjim gathers east of Mencha."
"The dark ones could move into Defalk long before that."
"Eladdrin won't. Then he'd have to chase the lords' forces all over Defalk." Gretslen offers a brief smile. "He'll let Barjim mass his forces-and then destroy them."
"What about the rumors of this sorceress? The one who supposedly was summoned from the mist worlds?" Ashtaar laughs. "Mist worlds, indeed."
"She is reputed to be powerful enough to frighten the dark ones. They sacrificed some of their agents in Defalk to attack her." Gretslen moistens her lips ever so slightly. ''No one has seen her before. . . anywhere.''
"You really don't believe that song sorcery can cross worlds, do you?"
"I only know that she appeared from nowhere."
"Are you sure?" presses Ashtaar.
"We're sure."
"Kendr said she will die."
"Kendr is a good seer, but the sorceress is not dead, and she is safe within Brill's hall." The golden-haired woman adds sardonically, "The attack was enough to drive Brill back to darksong to save her."
''Because it shows her value?''
"Exactly. Brill was already extremely deferential to her, extremely deferential. That alone indicates that she is more than beautiful, and this attack would confirm it." Gretslen shakes her head.
"The dark ones are sometimes so stupid."
"They are powerful, though," answers the blonde one. "So is a cyclone, or a tidal wave, and one should fear both, but not because they are smart." Ashtaar' s eyes focus on Gretslen. "What if Brill should want another such sorceress?"
"We have taken steps to stop that."
"Good." Ashtaar leans back in her chair. "Who else knows of this strange sorceress, or whatever she may be?"
Gretslen laughs. "Everyone knows, except Barjim. But no one knows anything except that she is an exotic beauty who some claim came through a portal from one of the mist worlds."
"Even Behlem?"
"He probably knew before I did," Gretslen admits. "He has sources all over Defalk."
"That means Konsstin may. And some others."
"I doubt it. Behiem wouldn't tell him, and Cyndyth wouldn't, not after being effectively sold to Behlem. And if those two don't want him to know, who would risk their necks to tell him?
He'll find out within weeks, but he'll be among the last. I don't know about the Matriarch, although I'd guess so. Money has eyes everywhere."
"So it does." Ashtaar laughs and raises a hand to dismiss the blonde woman.
Gretslen rises with a polite smile.
22.
As the tinted glass of the bedchamber window filtered the worst of the late-afternoon sun, Anna sat at the table with the key-harp, a stack of the tan paper, a pencil, and the inevitable pitcher of water and accompanying goblet.
Her left shoulder ached, as did her left hand, but her insistence on distilling alcohol from the vinegary wine, and bathing the wounds in it-combined with Brill's initial magic, seemed to have warded off infection. The soreness around the deep slash surprised her, as did the shades of purple and green, and the burning sensation that accompanied cleaning the wounds and the area around them didn't leave her in the best of moods.
Nor did looking in the mirror and seeing all too many gray and auburn roots at the base of her hair.
She glanced toward the robing room, where Florenda had .delivered a third riding ouffit, this one in an even lighter green. She asked the girl for a gown, even sketched a rough outline, but she'd have to come up with something else for Florenda to do before long. Requesting too many clothes was wasteful, and probably put her even more in Brill's debt.
No matter where she was, she was in debt in some way or another.
Her eyes dropped to the paper before her, but her mind kept veering off. How had she gotten to Erde? What had she been thinking? The words rolled back to her-' 'I'd just like to run away. . .
anywhere. Anywhere!"
The tears welled up in her eyes, and she blotted them angrily with the cloth in her good right hand. What was it- be careful about what you wish for or you may get it? Erde was certainly anywhere other than Ames, but she was still dancing to everyone else's tune.
She blotted her eyes again and then picked up the paper. She needed something strong. What about a hymn? Or something? She needed a hymn for battles. Then she smiled. That one she knew, and there must be some set of words that would do what she wanted. She had time, and she would get the words right!
Brill wanted a sorceress, and the dark ones wanted to kill her. Her lips tightened. She'd repay both-somehow!
23.
Anna carried the sketches down to the salon for the noon meal, arriving, as was becoming the case more frequently, before Brill. Even though her left shoulder and hand had healed enough to use the key-harp for short periods of time, the instrument seemed almost worse than useless. Not only was the key-harp frustrating her, but it had no power of projection.
She sat on her side of the table and poured more water.
Serna peered in.
"He's not here yet," Anna said pleasantly. "You know, I like your bread." She smiled. "I hope it's yours."
Sema nodded, then vanished.
With the faint whispering of boots, the sorcerer appeared, wearing the hard, faded-blue clothing that was his working apparel, but his hoots were still those of gleaming blue leather.
"You have that certain look upon your face, Lady Anna." Brill bowed before pulling out the heavy blue-lacquered chair. "Before you begin, how is your shoulder?"
"It doesn't hurt at all with small movements, or gentle ones, and it's still itching. So it's healing." She offered a rueful smile. "How's Farinelli? He probably helped as much as anyone."
"Quies says that he misses you." Brill shook his head. "You do have a way, Lady Anna.
Wiltur was impressed, also. He said you threw up your hand to deflect the arrow from your throat or heart, and that you didn't cry out. You just rode back to the hall with a wound that would have felled many armsmen."
"It felled me all right."
"But not until you could be helped." Brill shrugged. "You might have died if you'd fallen from the gelding down at the orchards."
Serna scuttled in with the lunch. This time, there were melons again, as well as yellow cheese, hot apples, and bread. Anna smiled at the server, and got a fleeting smile in return.
Brill filled his goblet from the wine pitcher. "So what are you planning, lady sorceress?"