The Diamond Throne

down from Faran’s back and saddled the big roan. ‘All right,’ he said to Sephrenia when he had finished, ‘how did she do it?’
    ‘The usual way.’
    ‘But she can’t talk-or at least she doesn’t. How did she cast the spell?’
    ‘With her pipes, Sparhawk. I thought you knew that. She doesn’t speak the spell, she plays it on her pipes.’
    ‘Is it possible?’ His tone was incredulous.
    ‘You just saw her do it.’
    ‘Could you do it that way?’
    She shook her head. ‘I’m just a bit tone deaf, Sparhawk,’ she confessed. ‘I can’t really tell one notefrom another, except in a general sort of way, and the melody has to be very precise. Shall we go, then?’
    They rode up through the streets of Vardenais from the harbour.
    ‘Are we still invisible?’ Kurik asked.
    ‘We’re not actually invisible, Kurik,’ Sephrenia replied, wrapping her cloak about Flute, who still played the drowsy tune on her pipes. ‘If we were, we wouldn’t be able to see each other.’
    ‘I don’t understand at all.’
    ‘The soldiers knew we were there, Kurik. They stepped out of the way for us, remember? They just chose not to pay any attention to us.’
    ‘Chose?’
    ‘Perhaps that was the wrong word. Let’s say they were encouraged not to.’
    They rode out through the north gate of Vardenais without being stopped by the guards posted there and were soon on the high road to Cimmura. The weather had changed since they had left Elenia many weeks before. The chill of winter had gone now, and the first budding leaves of spring tipped the branches of the trees at the sides of the road. Peasants plodded across their fields behind their ploughs, turning over the rich black loam. The rains had passed, and the sky was bright blue, dotted here and there with puffy white clouds. The breeze was fresh and warm, and the earth smelled of growth and renewal. They had discarded their Rendorish robes before leaving the ship, but Sparhawk still found his mail coat and padded tunic uncomfortably warm.
    Kurik was looking out at the freshly ploughed fields they passed with an appraising eye. ‘I hope the boys have finished with the ploughing at home,’ he said. ‘I’d hate to have that chore in front of me when I get back.’
    ‘Aslade will see to it that they get it done,’ Sparhawk assured him.
    ‘You’re probably right.’ Kurik made a wry face. ‘When you get right down to it, she’s a better farmer than I am.’
    ‘Women always are,’ Sephrenia told him. ‘They’re more in tune with the moon and the seasons. In Styricum, women always manage the fields.’
    ‘What do the men do?’
    ‘As little as possible.’
    It took them nearly five days to reach Cimmura, and they arrived on an early spring afternoon. Sparhawk reined in atop a hill a mile or so west of town. ‘Can she do it again?’ he asked Sephrenia.
    ‘Can who do what again?’
    ‘Flute Can she make people ignore us again?’
    ‘I don’t know Why don’t you ask her?’
    ‘Why don’t you ask her? I don’t think she likes me.’
    ‘Whatever gave you that idea? She adores you.’ Sephrenia leaned forward slightly and spoke in Styric to the little girl who rested against her
    Flute nodded and made an obscure kind of circling gesture with one hand.
    ‘What did she say?’ Sparhawk asked.
    ‘Approximately that the chapterhouse is on the other side of Cimmura. She suggests that we circle the city rather than ride through the streets.’
    ‘Approximately?’
    ‘It loses a great deal in translation.’
    ‘All right. We’ll do it her way, then. I definitely don’t want Annias to find out that we’re back in Cimmura.’
    They rode on around the city, passing through open fields and sparse woodlands and keeping about a mile back from the city wall. Cimmura was not an attractive city, Sparhawk decided. The peculiar combination of itslocation and the prevailing weather seemed to capture the smoke from its thousands of chimneys and to hold it in a continual pall just above the roof tops. That lowering cloud of smoke made the place look perpetually grimy.
    They finally reached a thicket about a half-mile from the walls of the chapterhouse. Once again the land was dotted with peasants at work, and the road leading out from the east gate was alive with brightly dressed travellers.
    ‘Tell her it’s time,’ Sparhawk said to Sephrenia. ‘I’d imagine that a fair number of those people out there are working for Annias.’
    ‘She knows, Sparhawk.