Once again, she was getting a reputation for being a temperamental b.i.t.c.h. Why couldn't they see? She wasn't even a military type, and it was obvious. Defalk was surrounded on all sides by potential enemies.

With Blaz and Giellum following her, she left the receiving room and took the small service hail. Her boots echoed on the stones of the narrow pa.s.sage. She opened the back door to slip inside the large hall that was being used as the de facto schoolroom for her pages and fosterlings. Trying not to sneeze, she remained behind the long tapestry and listened.

Dythya was speaking.

"Remember. . . the position of the numeral determines the amount of its greatness. In the first position, a six is just a six. In the second position, it is a sixty, or ten times greater. In the third position..."

"Numbers different when they are in different places. New symbols! You confuse us. Why do we even have to use new characters for numbers? The old ones were fine," said Hoede, almost red-faced.

"Once you leam them, using figures is easier," Dythya said patiently. "It is easier to check accounts, and to keep track of what you have spent"

"You haven't told me why we must use different symbols for numbers."

Anna decided to put an end to the discussion. She stepped out from behind the dusty arras depicting Lord Donjim's grandsire.

"Lady Anna..."

"Sorceress..."

"I beg your pardon, Dythya." Anna nodded to the woman who was the liedstadt accountant, or the closest thing to an accountant.

Dythya merely nodded, a faint smile playing around her lips.

Anna turned to the youngsters seated at the long table, grease markers and rough brown paper before them. Her eyes took in each in turn. Secca, the youngest redhead, glanced up at the sorceress openly.

Skent, at the end of the table, did not quite meet her eyes. Nor did Ytrude, the shy and tall blonde. But Anna did get a flashing smile from the redheaded Lysara, the older sister of Birke, who remained with his father at Abenfel. On the other hand, Cataryzna smiled shyly. Cens just looked blank, as did Resor. Hoede swallowed and pursed his lips. Jimbob, at the end of the table, met her eyes for a moment.

"Hoede." Anna fixed the sandy blond with blue eyes that were as cold as the Falche River beyond the liedburg walls. "If you spent as much time learning your digits and how to use them as you do arguing about it, you'd not only be able to improve your sire's accounts, you'd have time left over for more pleasant pastimes."

Hoede's eyes fell.

"Since you want an answer, I'll make it simple. Defalk almost perished under the old ways. Nordwei, Ranuak, Neserea, and even Mansuur have adopted more modern ways of doing things. We either adopt even better methods, or we will be forced to submit."

"But you have sorcery," murmured a voice.

Anna shook her head. "I managed to hold off the Dark Ones, and bring back the rain. Magic does not work on crops, or on accounts, and a sorceress can only be in one place. I cannot be there to tell every lord and holding how and when to plant. I will not live long enough to advise your children. If you don't learn as much as you can, most of you won't hold what you have." She smiled. "I know. . . some of you are not the heirs, and that means knowledge is even more important for you, because what you can do is determined even more by what you can learn." She turned back to Hoede. "You can ask all the questions you want about why something works or how to calculate or use your knowledge. If you wish to ask questions about the necessity of learning such matters, then come to me. If you persist in wasting the time of those who teach you with such childish inquiries, then I will send you and anyone else home and invite another young person." She smiled. "Is that clear?"

"Yes, Lady Anna." The murmured answer was nearly in unison.

"There's an even shorter answer, Hoede," Anna continued. "I saved Defalk when no one else could or would. Since my ways worked, and nothing else did, you'll learn my ways." She paused. "I also might point out that the more powerful lords in Defalk have already adopted these numbers and this system.

They say it takes less time and works better. Now. . . Hoede, I've given you three reasons. Do you need any more?"

Hoede looked down, his face as red as the stripe in his tunic.

"Dythya will examine you on how well you learn the new number system, all of you. I expect you all to do well." She smiled, then nodded, and left by the front door, where Giellum waited.

She glanced at the young guard. His eyes dropped.

Why did everything she did shock the young? Or some of them? She was supposed to accomplish grand deeds- like figuring out how to keep Defalk from being dismembered by its neighbors when she had next to no armsmen, few coins, and drought-ravaged cropland that would take years to recover even with the return of the rains.

Anna paused outside the receiving room and looked to Barat, the one page not in lessons.

''Yes, lady?''

"I'll need some bread and cheese. And a piece of fruit, if there is any."

Leaving Giellum outside with Blaz, who had hurried back from the large hall, she entered the receiving room, glancing to the rear window, and the hint of sunlight after the days of mixed rain and snow.

With a sigh, she slumped into her chair at the table.

One player, no weapons smith, no messengers getting anywhere fast, and enemies on just about all sides.

She had to do something!

First, she shuffled through all the papers she'd reclaimed from Loiseau, Brill's hall in Mencha, until she found those dealing with building. There were no spells of bridges-just for a barn and a fort. For a moment, she studied Brill's spell for the fort, probably the one he had built at the Sand Pa.s.s, murmuring the words as she read, trying to get a feel for the rhythm.

"...replicate the bricks and stones.

Place them in their proper zones...

Set the blocks, and set them square set them to their pattern there ."

The spell melody notes were a cross between chord symbols and medieval tablature-and hard enough to decipher, let alone turn into music.

"Lady?" Barat stood in the door with a platter in hand.

"Thank you." The growling of her stomach reminded her-again-how she couldn't put off eating, especially with what she had in mind for the afternoon.

After she finished everything on the platter, a feat that would have turned her into a b.u.t.terball once upon a time, she began to scrawl out possible spells on the brown paper.

Then she took out the lutar, tuned it, and tried the words-only in her head-with the chords.

Finally, she lifted the bell and rang it. This time Resor opened the door.

"Resor, would you tell Fhurgen that I am going riding in a bit, and that I'll need two squads of guards, or whatever he and Alvar think is right."

"Yes, Lady Anna." Resor did not close the door, then asked, "What should I tell them if they ask me your destination?"

"Somewhere around Falcor."

"Yes, lady."

Anna replaced the lutar in its case, and picked up both the case and her jacket and hat.

Blaz and Giellum flanked her on the walk from the main building to the stables.

Tirsik met 'her before she had taken a pace inside. "Lady Anna." The white-haired and wiry stablemaster nodded, glancing at Anna's riding gear and the lutar case. "The roads are foul."

"I'm not going far. Just to the other side of Falcor up by where the bridge was."

"Even the roads in Falcor are slippery."

''Then few will be out."

A wry and wintry smile crossed the white-haired stablemaster' s face. "As you wish, and it usually is, my lady."

"I know, Tirsik. I'm being difficult. So is most of Liedwahr at the moment." She added, "I hope I didn't ask too much of you when I sent Menares over to have you instruct some of the riders and messengers on foul-weather traveling."

"It be my pleasure, lady, and glad to put what these gray hairs have learned to service."

"You are a learned rascal."

"Once, lady. No longer."

Anna grinned and headed for Farmnelli' s stall. The palomino gelding greeted her with a loud whuff.

Then she took out the lutar, tuned it, and tried the words-only in her head-with the chords.

Finally, she lifted the bell and rang it. This time Resor opened the door.

"Resor, would you tell Fhurgen that I am going riding in a bit, and that I'll need two squads of guards, or whatever he and Alvar think is right."

"Yes, Lady Anna." Resor did not close the door, then asked, "What should I tell them if they ask me your destination?"

"Somewhere around Falcor."

"Yes, lady."

Anna replaced the lutar in its case, and picked up both the case and her jacket and hat.

Blaz and Giellum flanked her on the walk from the main building to the stables.

Tirsik met 'her before she had taken a pace inside. "Lady Anna." The white-haired and wiry stablemaster nodded, glancing at Anna's riding gear and the lutar case. "The roads are foul."

"I'm not going far. Just to the other side of Falcor up by where the bridge was."

"Even the roads in Falcor are slippery."

''Then few will be out."

A wry and wintry smile crossed the white-haired stablemaster' s face. "As you wish, and it usually is, my lady."

"I know, Tirsik. I'm being difficult. So is most of Liedwahr at the moment." She added, "I hope I didn't ask too much of you when I sent Menares over to have you instruct some of the riders and messengers on foul-weather traveling."

"It be my pleasure, lady, and glad to put what these gray hairs have learned to service."

"You are a learned rascal."

"Once, lady. No longer."

Anna grinned and headed for Farmnelli' s stall. The palomino gelding greeted her with a loud whuff.

"I know. I'm late, and you want to be groomed on schedule." By the time she had Farinelli brushed and saddIed, Fhurgen and her guards had formed up in the lied-burg courtyard.

Anna pulled on the leather riding jacket and the floppy-brimmed hat of the type that had seen her through her time in Defalk, then strapped the lutar in the case behind the saddle. She led Farinelli out, mounted and nodded to Fhurgen. "Let's go."

She let Fannelli pick his way across the wet stones of the courtyard and out through the main gate.

Fhurgen and the guards followed.

The north breeze was chilly, even for Anna, but the leather jacket kept her comfortable. She could sense the shivers of the guards, and catch a few phrases.

"... know she comes from the mist worlds.. . day like this..."

". . . doesn't even look cold.. ."

" ...went through the Ostfels in six feet of snow. Tyres said..."

Anna wanted to snort. The expedition against the Evult had been in late fall, and there hadn't been any snow to speak of. Some cold rain, but no snow.

As rode across the flat outside the liedburg and toward the road that led through the part of Falcor north of the keep, Anna studied the buildings. A few more bore signs of life, like smoke from chimneys, or new shutters or even windows. There were still too many empty struchires.

Two blocks up, she saw a new sign-a picture board depicting a golden lutar outside a refurbished inn.

Anna laughed. The Golden Lutar-clearly an attempt at flattery, since the instrument had been made by Daffyd specially for her and was, so far as she knew, the only one in Liedwahr.

Still, the rebuilt inn was one good signal at a time when there were few enough. Her smile faded when they reached the north end of Falcor and the Falche River. Anna reined up and studied the ruined bridge b.u.t.tresses, the remnants from the flood unleashed by the Evult of Ebra, and the riverbed, through which ran a muddy and winding track.

Originally, the old bridge had consisted of three spans, the ends of each outer span anch.o.r.ed in the rock on each side of the river. The center span had been anch.o.r.ed on the western side to a pier sunk into the rock beneath the riverbed and to a second pier on the eastern side, which had rested on a rocky islet in the river. Parts of the two piers remained, and muddy water swirled around the disarrayed stones, covering the lower section of the rude trail that travelers had used after the bridge had been swept away.

Anna finally turned in the saddle and fumbled with the lutar case, easing the instrument out, and then easing Farinelli forward.

"Fhurgen, please move the annsmen back."

"Yes, lady." The dark-bearded squad leader raised his arm. "Back. Back to the pedestal there."

As her guards guided their mounts back toward the pediment that might once have held a statue, Anna ran her fingers over the strings and checked the lutar' s tuning. Then she ran through the spell melody once, thinking the words.

She cleared her throat and began the spell, not belting, but using full concert voice.

"...replicate the blocks and stones.

Place them in their proper zones...

Set them firm, and set them square weld them to their pattern there...

"Bring the rock and make it stone.. ."