In the midmorning light of early fall, before harvest, a half-score of players stood on the low rise to the west of the dusty road. The majority held violinos or violas, but there were also two woodwinds and a falk-horn in the group. Another half-score of players bearing lutars of various sizes stood behind the first group.
Secca, wearing a pale blue tunic, walked toward Palian, the gray-haired and gray-eyed woman who held a violino, and who stood before the first group of players. “Chief player?”
“Yes, Lady Secca,” replied Palian. “We have almost finished tuning.”
“Good.” Secca nodded, accepting as always the necessary formality of Palian’s address. “We will be using the second building spell.” That too was a formality, since Secca and Lady Anna had always used the second building spell for road-building, although it had been years since Anna had done heavy building sorcery.
Secca glanced out at the dusty road that stretched northward toward the River Chean from Mencha. Behind her, nearly thirty deks of sorcery-laid stone paving extended back to Mencha. The gap between where she stood and the paved section stretching south from the river bridge was less than ten deks, and she hoped that she would be able to complete that section within the next few years, but that depended on what other tasks Lady Anna and Lord Robero laid upon her. She looked toward the lank-haired Delvor, catching his eye.
“Second players are ready, lady.”
Secca studied the image on the portable easel, an image with which she was all too familiar, and began to bring up both the image of the road, and the spellsong itself, into her mind. “The second building spell, chief player.”
“The second building spell, on my mark,” declared Palian. “Mark!”
As the notes from the players and their instruments rose into the morning, the first two bars merely to stabilize the players, Secca waited, and then began the spell proper with the first note of the third measure.
“…replicate the earth and stones.
Place them in their proper zones…
Set all firm, and set all square,
weld them to their pattern there…”
Even before the notes of the players and Secca’s voice died away, an intense bluish glow settled over the dusty track, initially so bright that neither Secca nor the players could have looked at it, had they wanted to, but all had seen the brightness over the years with each new section of road built.
Secca held herself erect against the faint dizziness that always came with heavy sorcery such as road-building, then walked to her mount, a gray mare, and took out her water bottle for a long swallow, before eating several biscuits from her provisions bag. After eating, she turned and looked at the newly created section of paved road.
Like the sections created before over the years, the roadway itself was exactly eight yards across, and raised almost a third of a yard above the surrounding ground. On each side was a stone rain gutter, and every hundred yards, there was a side drain. The stone roadbed had a slight crown, enough that the infrequent rains of eastern Defalk would run off into the lower rain gutters. Beneath were layers of stone and gravel going almost a yard deep.
“How do you feel, sorceress?” asked Palian.
“Fine.” Secca smiled. “How are the players?”
“We can do another spell, perhaps two.”
“We’ll move up to the end of what we’ve finished here and do another section,” Secca said. “Then we’ll ride north and see how we feel when we reach where the paved section coming from the north begins. I’d like to finish this road before…” She shrugged, not certain what comparison might even be useful. “I’d like to see it finished.”
“We can add another dek or so on our return from Issl and Elheld, can we not?” asked Palian.
“I would think so,” Secca replied. “I’d like to be able to tell Lady Anna that we can have the entire road paved within a few more years.” Generally, a road spell was good for about five hundred yards—half a dek.
“You will.” Palian smiled.
“I hope so.” Secca nodded.
“Players, prepare to mount and ride!” ordered the chief player.
Secca folded the small easel, and turned back toward her own mount.