Mordant's Need

  ‘I still don’t know how I survived seeing myself in that room where I found you. I have to believe mirrors are different in your world. Or you’re the most powerful Imager we’ve ever heard of.

  ‘Anyway, the other important point is that the capacity to be an arch-Imager seems to be just that – a capacity. It isn’t a skill you can learn, it’s a talent you’re born with. If it were a skill, Havelock would have mastered it somehow. “The Adept” isn’t an honorary title. He earned it by being better at translations than anybody else. In particular, he was better at working translations with mirrors he didn’t make. I can’t even work them with mirrors I did make.

  ‘Does that answer your question?’

  Terisa nodded. She was trying to make what he told her fit her experience.

  ‘Then answer mine. What does all this have to do with your conversation with Prince Kragen?’

  ‘Oh, that. I’m sorry. I wasn’t trying to be cryptic. It just seems like this is crucial somehow. I was talking to him right before we were attacked. That’s why it reminded me.’

  Then she got to the point of her question. ‘When Artagel examined the dead men – the ones who vanished later – he said he found an insignia – a “sigil” – that meant they were Cadwals. They were Apts of the High King’s Monomach. But when they attacked, they seemed to come out of nowhere. And when the rest of them were dead, their leader didn’t have to run away. He just disappeared.

  ‘He and his men must have come and gone through a flat mirror. But isn’t that impossible? The Perdon and Prince Kragen decided Vagel must be involved, but that doesn’t explain it. If passing through a flat glass safely is a matter of talent rather than training, then all of those men must have been arch-Imagers.’

  And, now that she thought about it, how had Master Gilbur contrived to elude the Castellan? If it was conceivable that the man in black and Master Gilbur were allies, surely it was also conceivable that the Master had disappeared in the same way?

  For a long moment, Geraden regarded her thoughtfully. ‘You know,’ he said with a wry chuckle, ‘a lifetime ago, when I was still a new Apt, and I believed I was going to accomplish glorious things, I used to lie awake at night stewing about questions like that. And I came up with an idea that might work.

  ‘First you shape a flat glass which just happens to be focused exactly where you want it.’ He shrugged humorously. ‘A trivial problem for the Imager I intended to be. Then you make another mirror – a normal one this time – that just happens to show a world which is essentially inert. No people or animals – and preferably no weather – to interfere with what you’re doing. Then you translate the first mirror into the second and position it so that it fills as much of the Image as possible. And then, if the first mirror hasn’t changed – and if it’s actually possible to work two translations almost simultaneously – you might be able to pass through and keep your mind in one piece.’

  He grinned. ‘Ingenious, don’t you think?’

  ‘Yes.’ Actually, she thought it was more than ingenious: she thought it was brilliant. But some of the implications – ‘It would take two people, wouldn’t it? One to translate the other?’

  ‘Not to go. But it would to come back. That’s true of any translation.’

  Therefore if Master Gilbur had escaped by the same device that had saved the man in black, then Geraden was proven innocent. Everyone in Orison was innocent (especially Geraden, but also Master Eremis, who was locked up in the dungeon and had no access to mirrors) because they were here rather than wherever the mirrors were located. They could not have pulled Master Gilbur away.

  Almost shivering, she said, ‘I wish there was some way we could find out what really happened. If your idea is right, Master Gilbur probably left Orison the same way the men who attacked me came in.’

  ‘But who did the translation?’

  ‘Could it have been Vagel? That makes sense now – or it does as long as there actually is some way to move people around Mordant by Imagery without making them lose their minds.’

  The Apt threw up his hands. ‘I don’t know. For years, everybody thought the arch-Imager was dead. Now they all think he’s alive.

  ‘But you know,’ he went on, looking at her appraisingly, a hint of eagerness rising in his voice, ‘there might be a way to verify that Imagery was involved when you were attacked. There might even’ – he sat forward – ‘be a way to check out my idea.’

  She watched him closely as he explained. Excitement animated his face, making it more and more attractive to her.

  ‘Obviously, there’s a lot we don’t know about Imagery. Some things seem like they might be theoretically possible, but we’ve never had any way to test them. For instance, it’s theoretically possible that an Imager with a certain kind of talent might be sensitive to mirrors from the other side. I mean, if he were to walk into a place that you could see in some mirror somewhere else, he would be able to feel it. He would know he was in an Image.

  ‘Of course, you have to assume the Image actually exists. Otherwise what you see in a flat glass is just a copy of something real, and there would be nothing to feel.

  ‘But if he could feel it’ – Geraden jumped to his feet, no longer able to sit still – ‘then it’s also theoretically possible that he might be able to work the translation from the other side. Do you see what that means? He could just step out of the Image into wherever the mirror happened to be.’

  As he spoke, her heart began to beat faster. His excitement took her with him. ‘If you’re right,’ she said slowly, ‘then it wouldn’t have to take two people. Master Gilbur could do it alone. He could come and go from Orison whenever he pleased.’

  ‘Yes!’ returned Geraden impatiently. ‘But that’s not the point. The point is that it might be possible.’ In his enthusiasm, he gripped the arms of her chair so that he could look into her face closely. ‘It might be possible for you.’

  Unfortunately, he misjudged the distance. Their foreheads cracked together with a sound like breaking bone.

  ‘Oh, Terisa, I’m sorry!’ he sputtered. ‘I’m sorry, I’m sorry.’ One hand clapped to his head, he reached out to her with the other. ‘Are you all right? I’m so sorry.’

  Just for an instant, the whole room looked like it was on fire. Then the hot red and orange flames resolved themselves into flares of pain across her vision, and her skull began to clang as if he had used it for a gong.

  But she hadn’t been hit as hard as all that: her hangover accentuated the blow. When she was sure that her forehead was neither crushed nor bleeding, she pushed Geraden’s apologetic hand away. Rising purposefully to her feet even though she now had an entire carillon ringing between her ears, she did her best to kick one of his shins.

  First he gaped at her as though she had lost her mind. Then he let out a shout of laughter.

  ‘I warned you,’ she muttered through the pain. It was starting to decline. She was almost able to hear herself. ‘One apology a day. That’s all you get.’ Helpless to spare herself, she was laughing as well. ‘I’m not some lord or Master you can trifle with.’

  Gales of glee rose from him.

  ‘Please don’t make me laugh.’ Weakly, she lowered herself back into her chair. ‘My head is going to split open.’

  He took a deep breath to control his mirth. When he was able to stop laughing, he came over to her. Cupping his palm to her cheek, he kissed her bruised forehead tenderly.

  For a moment, she thought he would lower his mouth to hers. If she could have stifled the throbbing in her skull, she would have tilted her head back to meet him halfway. But the pain wasn’t fading quickly enough. She didn’t know whether to be relieved or vexed when he withdrew to his chair.

  ‘Terisa,’ he repeated quietly, ‘it might be possible for you.’

  She sighed and closed her eyes. With both hands, she massaged the back of her neck. ‘You must have broken something in your head. That’s the craziest idea you’ve had yet.’

&
nbsp; ‘Not really,’ he replied good-naturedly. ‘It’s only an idea, of course. But you want to know why you’re here – what you can do. Well, we can’t teach you enough about making mirrors to find out if you can be an ordinary Imager. The Masters made it clear that they won’t stand for it, and they control the laborium. But maybe you have a different kind of talent. Maybe that’s why I was drawn to you when all the rules of Imagery should have taken me to the champion.

  ‘We could try to find out, anyway. What have we got to lose?’

  Opening her eyes, she stared at him hard. ‘You’re serious, aren’t you?’ He didn’t look like a man who had just become dangerously insane. ‘You think there might be some way to test what you’re saying? To verify—?’

  He nodded brightly.

  Maybe you have a different kind of talent. Unexpectedly, her headache became less important. ‘I’m almost afraid to ask how.’

  Excitement gathered in him again, and his gaze shone. Making an effort to be reasonable, he said, ‘I hope you understand that I don’t really know any more about this than you do. It’s only theory. And most of the Masters wouldn’t even be interested. Shaping mirrors takes too much practical research and effort.’ Then his enthusiasm broke out, pulling him once more to his feet. ‘But all we have to do is go back to where you were attacked. Once we’re in the right vicinity, all you have to do is move around slowly and concentrate on what you feel.’

  The responses he aroused in her were so unfamiliar that she didn’t know what to call them. Was this fear or eagerness? Her question was more complex than it sounded as she asked, ‘What am I expected to feel?’

  ‘Who knows?’ he replied, unaware of the extent of her confusion. ‘But it’ll probably be subtle. A slight tugging sensation? An impression that something in front of you looks blurred? That sick feeling some people get when they look down from a cliff?

  ‘If you don’t feel anything, it won’t prove anything. You might or might not have talent. Imagery might or might not be involved.’ He chuckled. ‘We might or might not be in the right place. But if you do feel something—’ He made a visible effort to appear calm. ‘That would be interesting.

  ‘Do you want to try it? Shall we go?’

  For a moment, she couldn’t answer. Peering into the fire, she almost heard a voice saying, That’s the stupidest thing you’ve said today. Stop wasting my time. It sounded like her father’s voice. And she knew what her mother would have said. Little girls don’t do things like that.

  Things like that.

  What if Geraden were right?

  If he were wrong, there would be no problem. Nothing in her life would change. But if he were right – she would never be the same again.

  ‘It isn’t that simple,’ she murmured. ‘I don’t think I can find the place again. I was only there once. And – and my mind was on other things.’

  His brief hesitation before he spoke suggested that he was paying strict attention to her now, that he had realized the importance of the issue he raised. ‘We can solve that problem,’ he said carefully. ‘We can ask Artagel to help us. He’ll remember the exact spot.’ Then softly he repeated his earlier question. ‘Terisa, what have you got to lose?’

  She wanted to say, My self. Who I am. But that seemed impossibly melodramatic. Why was she taking all this so seriously? As a treatment for headache, it worked admirably: her head still hurt, but now she was able to forget about it. On the other hand, the danger she apparently feared was so improbable that she should have considered it silly. Really, she ought to have more common sense.

  Intending a flippant retort, she faced Geraden.

  His intent demeanor stopped her: he was looking at her as he might have looked at someone who was about to risk her life. He had made a leap of empathy that carried him into the center of her fear. In a husky voice, as if he were full of pity, he said, ‘I would take you back to your world if I knew how. You know that.’

  For an instant, something like grief rose in her throat. His eyes held a sharp awareness of what she had lost. He had already cost her her former life. Now he asked her to risk her sense of herself, the little she understood about who she was.

  Mustering a smile, she said, ‘Yes, I know. Don’t you dare apologize.’ Then she stood up. Whatever happened, she had no intention of wasting his friendship. ‘Maybe the exercise will do me good.’

  The pleasure in his face was so brilliant that she nearly started laughing again.

  They found Artagel in one of the halls near her tower. By then, she had discovered that exercise made her head hurt worse at first; but by degrees circulating blood seemed to cleanse her brain, and she began to feel better. Thinking about Geraden’s brother, she wondered if he had any system for keeping an eye on her. The hall where they found him didn’t look like an especially logical station for a bodyguard. On the other hand, they had no trouble locating him.

  He greeted her with a humorous bow and a comradely comment on her questionable appearance. Geraden defended her with mock indignation and received for his pains a cuff on the shoulder which did him no appreciable damage. Then he explained what he had in mind – leaving out, she thought, most of the salient details – and asked for Artagel’s help.

  Artagel took this more grimly than Terisa had expected. ‘Thank your good fortune,’ he snapped, ‘the lady Terisa doesn’t remember how to find that place. Did you leave your brains under that pile of rubble? Or maybe you just forgot she was attacked down there by Apts of the High King’s Monomach. It’s even possible Gart himself was among them.’ He digressed momentarily. ‘I would hate to think anyone less could give me that much trouble.’ Then he resumed, ‘What were you planning to do if she was attacked again? Ask them nicely to go away?’

  ‘Not exactly.’ His brother’s anger clearly didn’t trouble Geraden. ‘I thought I would just ask them to wait until you caught up with us.

  ‘Actually,’ he explained, ‘they probably can’t attack us. They won’t be ready for us. They don’t have any way of knowing what we’re doing – and I’m sure they don’t spend all their time crouched in front of the mirror waiting for a likely victim to appear by coincidence. We should be safe.’

  In spite of himself, Artagel was mollified. ‘You’re too clever for your own good. But it does happen that I don’t have anything better to do this morning.’ Without apparent difficulty, he forgot his anger and grinned at Terisa. ‘My lady,’ he said formally, offering her his arm, ‘shall we go?’

  When she accepted, he gave Geraden a smile of good-humored malice and swept her away, leaving his brother to tag along behind.

  As he followed, Geraden’s face wore an expression of lopsided fondness. After all, she reflected, he had six older brothers – and all of them probably delighted in teasing him. The way he looked now gave another lift to her spirits. He and Artagel made it easy for her to think she was doing the right thing.

  As she returned to the damp, disused passages among the foundations of Orison, however, she began to reconsider. She didn’t have fond memories of this place. The endless dripping of water promised peril. Although there were enough lanterns to enable Artagel to find his way, their scattered and distant reflections in the puddles and smears of water on the floor gave the stone an evil aspect, as though dark secrets were hidden behind the gleams. The echo of bootheels chased the silence down side passages and around corners until she felt irrationally sure that she was being stalked. The warmth of day never reached down this far, and the air felt colder than she remembered it: certainly, more of the moisture had become ice. Whenever she or her companions broke the surface of a frozen puddle, the ice crackled like fire.

  And if Geraden were right – if by some strange chance she had the kind of talent he described—

  She clung to Artagel’s arm harder than she realized. Apparently thinking she was cold, he draped the edge of his gray cloak over her shoulders.

  ‘Whoever made that mirror,’ Geraden commented like whistling in the dark, ‘
was either very lucky or very good. It’s hard to imagine anyone accidentally shaping a mirror that shows this part of Orison. On the other hand, it isn’t exactly easy to figure out how he could have made it deliberately. Even the best Masters have to do decades of research to get what they want.’

  ‘I hope you know what you’re doing,’ muttered Terisa nervously. ‘I don’t like this at all.’

  Artagel gave her a little hug. ‘He probably does. The only time you really have to worry about him is when he looks like he has everything under control.’

  She wanted Geraden to reply, but he didn’t. After a moment, she asked, ‘Who keeps these lanterns lit?’

  Her escort shrugged. ‘Servants.’

  ‘But why?’ she pursued. ‘Hasn’t this whole area been abandoned?’

  ‘Well, not quite abandoned. I’ve heard that many of the damp, cold rooms down here are used to store wine. If we just knew which ones, we could die happy. And I know for a fact that the Castellan uses sections of this place to train his guards, especially in winter.

  ‘Besides,’ he added wryly, ‘I think he hates the dark. He might put lanterns here even if no one but the people who took care of them came here from one year to the next.’

  The thought of Castellan Lebbick wasn’t much comfort. ‘How much farther?’ she asked.

  ‘We’re almost there.’ Artagel sounded nonchalant, but when she glanced at him she saw wariness in the flick of his eyes, the movement of his head. ‘Lebbick must have had the floor cleaned. Otherwise you could see the blood by now.’

  He was right. After another dozen paces, the look of the corridor began to match her memory of it, despite the absence of blood.

  ‘Here,’ she said softly. Even though she understood that sound didn’t pass through mirrors, she was viscerally afraid of being overheard by unfriendly ears. This was the place. She could almost detect the residual tremor of her own fear, vibrations left over from the man in black’s assault. ‘It was here.’