A Man Rides Through

  Grinning, Master Eremis raised his hands to ward off the babble. “Master Barsonage, please. I did not come to you for flattery. I am precisely aware of my own virtues, and they do not merit this praise.”

  “Really?” the mediator returned. “I think you are too modest.” His eyes were as bland as bits of glass. “But if praise is offensive I will cease. Of course you did not come for flattery. How may I serve you?”

  “I am well rested now, as you see,” Eremis answered. “And another matter which required my attention has come to an end. It is no secret that the maid Saddith was my lover.” He spoke with admirable sincerity. “After I recovered my strength, I spent much of my time with her. She needed friends—”

  He grimaced. “Sadly, she would not give up her hatred of our good Castellan. There was nothing I could do with her.” Grief wasn’t his best pose, but he projected as much of it as possible. As if he were putting Saddith and her death behind him by an act of will, he said, “Master Barsonage, I am ready.”

  The mediator raised an eyebrow. As his skin dried, it looked more and more like cut pine. “ ‘Ready’?”

  “I have heard that the Masters are busy – that since Quillon’s death you have rediscovered your sense of purpose. I am ready to rejoin the work of the Congery.”

  “Our work?” Master Barsonage’s features reflected nothing. “What work do you mean?”

  Master Eremis had difficulty suppressing a smile. The mediator was almost ludicrously transparent. Fixing him with a glittering gaze which was intended to express indignation as well as penetration, Eremis replied slowly, “So it is true. I am still not trusted. That is the reason I have not been summoned to any of your meetings – to any of your labors. I have saved Orison from a quick fall to Alend. I did everything any man could do to keep Nyle alive – and I was the only man here who so much as made the attempt. I have been striving with unmatched diligence to find some means to avert Mordant’s fate. It was not I who disbanded the Congery. And I am still not trusted. That murderous puppy, Geraden, casts a few groundless aspersions on my good name, and suddenly nothing I can do is enough to redeem it.”

  “Oh, no, Master Eremis.” Barsonage put up a thick hand in protest. “You misunderstand me. You misunderstand us all.” In a tone as bland as his expression, he explained, “You fail to grasp, I think, how high your standing has become. The man who refilled the reservoir – the man who did so much to save Nyle – is not someone who can be ‘summoned’ to meetings like an Apt. He cannot be put to labor like a packhorse. You have been much involved in your own concerns – and you have earned the right to be. The Congery does not distrust you. We only respect your high standing – and your privacy.”

  Firmly, Eremis resisted a giddy temptation to snort, During a siege? With Orison’s fall tied like a noose around your neck, and no hope anywhere? Can you truly believe me silly enough to swallow that lie? The mediator, however, didn’t look like a man who had an opinion about Master Eremis’ silliness, one way or the other. He looked – his blandness itself betrayed him – like a man who had spent some time preparing for this encounter.

  Master Eremis sat forward in his chair; his relish for the conversation sharpened.

  “Perhaps,” he said in a skeptical drawl. “You will forgive me if I reserve judgment on that point.

  “It remains true, does it not, that there have been meetings to which I have not been invited? That there is work in progress which I have not been asked to share? That the Congery has rediscovered its purpose?”

  Master Barsonage nodded. “Indeed.” Something about him – perhaps it was the way his eyebrow bristled – suggested an intensification which his mild gaze contradicted. “I am glad to say that is the case.”

  “Am I permitted to ask how it came about?”

  “Certainly. At last we are able to see clearly that the lady Terisa is an Imager.”

  Eremis scowled to conceal the fact that he didn’t like what he heard. “Master Barsonage, that is an answer which explains nothing.”

  “Well, perhaps not.” Apparently, the mediator had prepared himself quite well for this encounter. “A man of your assurance and ability may have difficulty understanding men whose chief talent lies in their capacity for doubt.

  “Nevertheless in practice – as distinct from theory – the great stumbling block for the Congery has been the question of the lady Terisa. What does she signify? What does her presence among us indicate? Is there a reason for her unexpected appearance, or was Geraden merely the agent of a monumental accident?

  “If she is an accident, then all Imagery is accidental in the end, and our research, like our morality, is only foolishness. Geraden’s role in the augury has no meaning.”

  Master Eremis nodded as if the truth were obvious to him.

  “But if,” the mediator continued, “there is a reason, then two conclusions are inescapable. So inescapable,” he commented without discernible sarcasm or humor, “that even our most contentious members have accepted them. First, the responsibility she represents falls upon us. Imagery is our demesne. Second, since the problem she represents exists it must have a solution. What one Imager can do, another can understand and counter.

  “It has been demonstrated,” he concluded, “that there is a reason. She is an Imager. We can regret that she has chosen to ally herself with Master Gilbur and arch-Imager Vagel, but we cannot shirk either the responsibility or the hope which that knowledge implies.”

  “Yes, very well.” Master Eremis made an impatient gesture. “That is all reasonable as far as it goes, but you have not yet explained it. How do you know she is an Imager? What evidence has she given? Lebbick reports that Gilbur freed her from her cell. He killed Quillon. He took her to the room where Havelock’s mirrors are kept. Lebbick found them there. After Gilbur felled Lebbick, he and she disappeared from Orison. What does that demonstrate? Gilbur’s ability to come and go is as well established as Gart’s – and as unexplained. There is no reason to attribute Imagery to her.”

  Master Barsonage shrugged, scratched his chest. As if to compensate for his baldness, his chest was matted with yellow hair. Water clung to it like beads of sap. “That is true,” he replied without hurry or hesitation. “On the other side, it could be argued that Master Gilbur and the arch-Imager would have no reason to free her – just as the High King’s Monomach would have no reason to kill her – if she were not an Imager. Speaking only for myself, I have examined that argument and found it persuasive. In fact, it persuaded me to accept the position of the Congery’s mediator once again.

  “Since then, however, we have been given evidence instead of argument, the kind of evidence you and several of the other Masters require.”

  Maddeningly, he halted and gazed at Eremis as if he had said enough.

  Master Eremis forced himself to take a deep breath, relax, stop grinding his teeth. When he had recovered his nonchalance, he said, “You say that you do not distrust me. Do you trust me enough to tell me what that evidence is?”

  Once again, Master Barsonage replied, “Of course.

  “The Castellan is a hard man, hard to defeat. He was already coming back to consciousness when the lady Terisa and Master Gilbur left the storeroom of Adept Havelock’s mirrors. He saw that they did not depart together.

  “The lady Terisa vanished into a glass. Master Gilbur was too far from her to have translated her. He left the room the same way he entered it, along the corridor.”

  The mediator favored Master Eremis with a smile as bland as milk.

  Eremis prided himself on his restraint. Nevertheless he betrayed some surprise as he protested, “That is not the story Lebbick tells.”

  He was surprised because he hadn’t expected Barsonage to know so much. And a man who knew more than he was expected to might also do more than he was expected to.

  And if he really didn’t trust Eremis, as his manner made clear, why was he revealing what he knew?

  “No” – the mediator corrected his v
isitor amicably – “it is not the story Castellan Lebbick has told in public. I gather from what I have heard that at first he was too full of fury and desperation to grasp the significance of what he had seen. And since then he has chosen to keep his thoughts to himself. But he did speak to Artagel. And Artagel brought the story to me. He believed – quite rightly – that his information was vital to the Congery.”

  In a tone that made him sound like a simpleton, Master Barsonage said, “It has enabled me to unite the Masters for the first time since the Congery was created.”

  Master Eremis drank more wine to conceal the fact that all these surprises were beginning to affect him. Lebbick told Artagel. Artagel told Barsonage. But Gilbur had sworn that Lebbick was still out cold when he left. Was he just trying to cover up a mistake? Or was Barsonage lying – Barsonage, of all people? Was he playing some kind of game?

  Eremis grinned around the rim of his goblet. This was better than he had anticipated, more fun. He liked opponents who, were capable of surprises. He had grown almost fond of King Joyse. Even Lebbick had his good side. Geraden was virtually likable. And as for Terisa—

  That made their destruction especially exciting.

  Unite the Masters, was that it? Then they would have to be un-united.

  He twirled his goblet in his long fingers. “Thank you, Master Barsonage,” he said happily. “I understand you now.

  “What work is the Congery doing with its rediscovered purpose?”

  Again the mediator shrugged. A trickle of water ran out of his chest hair across his belly. “It will not surprise you. We labor to learn how it is that men such as the High King’s Monomach, who is no Imager, and Master Gilbur, whose talents are known to us, can be translated in and out of Orison at no cost to their sanity. Translation through flat glass drives men mad. That has been true since the dawn of Imagery. Why, then, are our enemies not destroyed by the very weapons they use against us?”

  Ah. That was a subject which Master Eremis had come prepared to discuss. With a small, inward sigh – relief, perhaps, or disappointment – he said, “There I may be able to help you. I have an idea that may shed some light.”

  For the first time since the conversation began, Master Barsonage looked interested. “Please explain it,” he said at once. “You know that the matter is urgent.”

  “Certainly.” Matching the blandness of Master Barsonage’s tone, Eremis explained. “To the best of our understanding, as you know, the peril of flat glass arises from the translation itself, not from the simple movement from place to place within our world. Put crudely, translation is too strong for simple movement. The power which makes passage possible between entirely separate Images turns against the man translated because it is not needed.”

  Barsonage nodded.

  “On the assumption that our understanding is accurate,” Master Eremis went on, “my idea is this. Suppose that two mirrors were made – one flat, showing, say, an unused chamber in Orison, the other normal, showing a barren, deserted plain. Suppose then that the flat glass is now translated into the other, so that it stands upon the plain in the Image, and the focus of the Image is adjusted so that the flat mirror fills the glass. Is it not conceivable that the Imager who shaped those mirrors could now step straight through them, performing in effect two safe translations rather than one which would make him mad?”

  The mediator was listening intently; he seemed to soak up Eremis’ words through his pores. Softly, as if he were astonished, he breathed, “It is conceivable.”

  “Of course,” Master Eremis continued, simply marking time while he watched the mediator’s reaction, “the difficulty is that if the Imager stepped through himself he would not be able to step back. And to send and then retrieve someone else by such a method, he would need to be able to perform both translations simultaneously. We have no way of knowing whether such a thing is possible.” Like most of his lies, this one bore an insidious resemblance to the truth. “There Vagel is ahead of us. He may have spent fifteen years perfecting simultaneous translations.

  “But surely we can attempt it? We can learn for ourselves whether this idea is indeed possible as well as conceivable?”

  “Yes.” Master Barsonage had lost his air of studied mildness, of deliberate simplicity. His eyes shone. “We can.”

  Abruptly, he surged to his feet like a breaker off the sea. “We can and we will. Today. Give me an hour to gather the Masters. Come to the laborium. We will begin experimenting.” Almost in the same breath, he added, “It is a brilliant idea. Two mirrors – simultaneous translations. Even if it fails, it remains brilliant. Brilliant.”

  Having hooked his fish, Master Eremis proceeded to act as if he were letting the mediator go. He agreed to everything, stood up, started to leave, then paused at the door. As if he were innocent of all malice, he said, “Oh, Master Barsonage, one other matter – in case I forget it later. There is a rumor that some of our mirrors have been broken. Can that be true?”

  Master Barsonage turned immediately grim: apparently, he was shocked by what had happened. “During the riot against Castellan Lebbick,” he admitted. “Five mirrors.” He shook his head. “It is plain that someone hates us. But why only five? Why those five? If you were insane enough to. deprive us of the means to defend Orison and ourselves, would you not break every glass you found?”

  “Certainly.” Master Eremis made a sincere effort to look shocked himself. “Unfortunately, insane actions are by their very nature insane. Which mirrors were broken?”

  The mediator replied promptly: once again, he was prepared. “The glass with which you refilled the reservoir. That was an attack on Orison. And Geraden’s mirror, the one that brought the lady Terisa here. Either he or she is stranded now, wherever they are – as is our lost champion. That was an attack on one of the three of them. But the third was a flat mirror of Quillon’s, showing a field of Termigan grapes. The fourth was the one with the Image of the starless sky. The fifth, the one where that gigantic slug-beast can be seen – one of the mirrors King Joyse captured in his wars. An attack on wine? On the heavens? An attack on monsters? It makes no sense.

  “Geraden and the lady Terisa and our champion – if he still lives – may have been stranded entirely at random, by someone who had no idea what he did.”

  Trying to sound disturbed, perhaps even grim, Eremis said, “My glass. Then we must depend on the weather for water. I cannot save us again.”

  “That is true,” replied Barsonage. “Prince Kragen’s position is now much stronger. We must hope he does not know it.”

  Master Eremis swallowed a final smile and made his way out of the mediator’s quarters. He wanted to reach his own rooms quickly, where he could afford to laugh out loud.

  He realized, of course, that he was in a tricky situation. But it was a situation of his own devising. Thanks to the seeds he had just planted, Barsonage and the other Masters might spend the rest of their time until they died trying to work a simultaneous translation because they didn’t know it was impossible. Or, rather, it was trivial. The trick was not in the translation, but in the glass.

  For all practical purposes, he had neutralized the Congery – the only force in Orison still capable of fighting him.

  On the other hand, he would have to be very careful. Lebbick had said something to Artagel, who had told it to Barsonage. Not something about Terisa: something about Eremis himself. The mediator had lied to him.

  For him, the trick would be to determine exactly what that lie was.

  Thinking about things like this made him look like he was about to burst with good humor.

  THIRTY-EIGHT: CONFLICT AT THE GATES

  “The trick,” Geraden said the first time they rested the horses, “is not to get stopped.”

  They had ridden hard for most of the morning: the road from Romish was easy going, and he was in a hurry. But the horses couldn’t sustain a pace like that indefinitely.

  “Oh, really?” Terisa didn’t realize how sourly sh
e spoke. She was still thinking about Torrent: the idea of the King’s shy daughter riding away alone in a foolish and dangerous effort to rescue Queen Madin clung to her mind like a splash of acid. “We’re going back to Orison. Where Master Eremis wants us. Why would anybody try to stop us?”

  Geraden looked at her sharply; for a moment, he seemed unsure how to respond. As if he had missed the point, he said, “We’ve been riding so long – and it feels so good to be with you – I keep thinking you know Mordant better than you do. Would you like to look at the map again?”

  She shook her head. She didn’t care about the map. She didn’t care about being stopped. At the moment, she didn’t even care about having to face Eremis again.

  Geraden, that’s how Argus got killed.

  “Well,” he explained, still missing the point, “there’s really only one fast way to get from Romish to Orison, and that’s along this road – the main road through Armigite. Which just happens to be the route Prince Kragen used. It’s his link to Alend – his supply line, his line of retreat. It’ll be crawling with his men.

  “On top of that, even the Armigite can’t be as stupid as people think. He’s got to have scouts and spies everywhere, especially along the road. He needs to know what’s happening. And right now he probably wants an Imager or two more than anything in the world. If his men get their hands on us, they aren’t going to let us go just because we smile and say please.”

  Terisa stared into the trees without saying anything.

  “And on top of that” – Geraden’s tone became slowly harsher – “I assume Orison is still under siege. I assume it hasn’t already fallen, or there wouldn’t be any reason to kidnap Queen Madin. If we’re going to get in to see King Joyse, we’ll have to get past the whole Alend army.

  “The men who took the Queen were Alends. It looks like this is some plot of Prince Kragen’s. So he’s the one we have to worry about. And he won’t let us in to Orison until he’s ready – until his trap is ready.”

  He surprised her, and she winced. “Do you really think that’s true? Do you really think Prince Kragen is responsible for kidnapping the Queen?”