than a battle. Even under the hot sun of late summer, she shivered, recalling
the screams and the terrible grinding of the earth as her song-sorcery had
churned the muddy waters of the Chean River over the trapped soldiers.
The column crossed the low rise in the road and started on the gentle downgrade
toward the point on the south bank of the river opposite the town of Sorprat-or
what of it had been rebuilt after the destruction wrought by Anna's magic. It
still astounded her that "good" or harmonic song magic-Clearsong-could create
such massive destruction, often with not too great a side effect on Anna. Yet
the smallest of Darksong spells-even those which would have obviated the need
for destructive Clearsong-could prostrate her, possibly threaten her life.
Another unfairness that you can do nothing about... because that's the way this
world operates. Period. She put that thought aside and concentrated on the spell
she would have to use shortly.
Before long, she reined up Farinelli short of where the high grassland ended-
abruptly. Himar gestured, and a trumpet signal echoed through the early
afternoon. Behind them, the column slowed and halted. Anna patted Farinelli on
the shoulder, and the gelding nodded ever so slightly as if to suggest that he
indeed deserved some thanks.
Where the plateau ended, what had once been a sinkhole was now a circular and
placid lake, smaller than it had been, and cut off from the Chean River by a low
muddy rise barely three yards above the lake's surface. The water was still
brownish. Below the sorcery-cut bluffs, between the base of the bluffs and the
water's edge, instead of beaches, mud slopes angled into the murky lake.
"It is peaceful now' said Himar quietly. "One would hardly know that thousands
perished there."
Anna nodded. Ten thousand Ebrans. Dark Monks, she added mentally. "We're close
enough."
Himar turned his mount and stood in the stirrups. "Stand down!"
As she thought about the Ebrans, Anna almost wanted to shake her head. Hadrenn,
the Ebran Lord of Synek, had beseeched her to accept his fealty. She had, and in
making him one of the thirty-three lords of Defalk, thereby effectively added a
quarter of Ebra to Defalk. And probably ensured another war in Ebra. One way or
another there would have been war in Ebra she reminded herself, between Hadrenn
and Bertmynn, the noble who had taken the title of Lord of Dolov and sought to
unite all Ebra under his rule. The difference was that Hadrenn had a legitimate
claim to lands that had been seized from his father, and sought only those
lands, while Bertmynn was willing to sell out to the Liedfuhr of Mansuur and the
Sturinnese to rule all of Ebra, And the Sturinnese chain their women.
Anna dismounted. Ear a moment, as she grasped the cantle of the saddle with one
hand, she wasn't sure if her legs would hold. After site took the bottle that
still held water, she drank slowly. She recorked the battle and replaced it in
the holder before walking slowly in the open road before Farinelli to stretch
her legs. Next came the vocalises to clear her cords of dust, and the mucus from
allergies that Brill's youth spell had done nothing to remedy.
"Holly-lolly-pop..."
Behind her, horses sidestepped, and the armsmen murmured m voices so low that
the sound was mare like locusts than men. She shook her head, then began another
vocalise, hoping that getting her cords clear would not take forever.
"Quiet!" snapped Himar and the murmuring died away.