And around the inner walls of the castle, around Orison’s benighted inward face, the guards who would travel on foot were gathering in squads and platoons; ordinary individuals uprooted from their lives in order to endure a forced march for three days so that they could be hurled against an army which outnumbered them nearly four-to-one. And for what? Well, Terisa knew the answer to that. So that men like Master Eremis and High King Festten wouldn’t have their way with the innocent of Mordant. To say such things, however, she had to believe that what the Congery and the guard, what she and Geraden were doing might work.
Failure meant annihilation. For all these people.
Clutching her coat against the cold, she followed Master Barsonage and Geraden, with Ribuld behind her, across the ice-crusted mud among the horses to the place near Orison’s gates where the Congery assembled with its beasts and wagons.
The Masters nodded and muttered to the mediator. Some of them greeted Geraden with salutations or smiles which seemed sincere in the erratic light of the torches; others were too embarrassed by their old scorn for him to say anything; one or two of them made it clear that they still didn’t believe what they had heard about his demonstrations of power. They all, however, acknowledged Terisa with as much courtesy as the circumstances allowed. Then they went back to the job of securing their cargo in the wagons.
She counted nine large bundles as big as crates: the Congery’s mirrors. Each glass had been wrapped in blankets, then lashed into a protective wooden frame, then wrapped in more blankets and tied tightly before being bound to the side of the wagon. And the wagons themselves were unusual: a new bed had been built to fit on padded supports inside each of the original ones, so that over particularly rough terrain the new bed holding the mirrors could be lifted out and carried by men on foot.
Wiggling her toes against the cold that seeped into her boots, Terisa looked up at the sky.
It was gray with dawn, and cloudless, at once translucent and obscure, like a mirror on which cobwebs and dust had accumulated for years.
The march would begin soon.
Curse this freeze. Yesterday she was ready to set out on a moment’s notice. But today, in the cold—She wondered if anyone was ever truly ready.
More men. More horses. Shouts rang hoarsely off the walls: questions; commands; messages. The bazaar was crowded with guards and their mounts. Gart had attacked her there once; Prince Kragen had used the bazaar to cover his meetings with Nyle. Now, at least temporarily, the whole place was unfit for business. But of course it had probably been unfit for days, cut off by the siege from any way to replenish its wares.
Grooms led horses forward for Terisa and Geraden. She glared suspiciously at the colorless old nag assigned to her, a beast clearly too decrepit for any rider except one who didn’t know what she was doing. Geraden’s mount, in contrast, was a spirited gelding with an odd white spot like a target on either side of its barrel.
Seeing her expression, he asked teasingly, “Want to trade?”
“This thing’s almost dead already,” she snorted. “After what we’ve already been through, I think I could ride a firecat.”
Ribuld grinned around his scar.
But she didn’t want to trade. She had an instinctive sense that she was in danger of overestimating her abilities.
As full dawn approached, and the level of noise in the courtyard increased, lights began to show in the windows around Orison’s inner face – children dragging their parents out of bed to see what was happening; lords or ladies rousing themselves to witness events; wives and children and loved ones wanting some way to say goodbye to the guards.
By stages Terisa couldn’t measure, the turmoil of men and horses seemed to resolve itself. More and more guards climbed onto their beasts. The Masters began to mount – except for those who intended to drive the wagons, or to ride on them to watch over the mirrors. The frost from the horses’ nostrils was gray now, as pearly as mist, lit by the dawn rather than by torches. Geraden nudged Terisa’s arm, indicated the horses; but she didn’t move until she saw the Tor emerge from one of the main doors and waddle toward his charger.
She mounted when he did.
Slowly, accompanied by his personal guard – the men who had come with him from his Care – as well as by Castellan Norge and Artagel, he rode to the gates so that when they were raised he would be the first to face the Alend army, the first to face the march. For some reason, his black cloak and hood – the mourning garb which he had worn to bring his son to Orison – made him appear smaller. Or maybe her horseback perspective deemphasized his bulk. He didn’t look large enough to take King Joyse’s place, imposing enough to threaten King Joyse’s enemies.
Yet when he lifted his voice he lifted her heart as well, like the remembered call of horns.
“It is a dangerous thing we do.” Somehow, the old lord made his words carry across the courtyard, made them echo around the face of Orison. “Barely six thousand of us go to meet Cadwal and vile Imagery on the ground they have chosen for battle. And we will have the Alend army at our backs – if I cannot persuade the Alend Monarch to see reason at last. An attempt may be made to take Orison in our absence. King Joyse is not with us, and the power against us is staggering.
“It is a dangerous thing we do.
“But it is the best we can.
“The Congery rides with us. We have powers which our enemies cannot suspect. Artagel will preserve Orison for us – and High King Festten is weaker than he knows, helpless to supply his forces by any means which cannot be cut off. King Joyse has planned and labored for years to reach this moment. It will not fail.
“It is a dangerous and desirable thing we do. I am proud to take part in it.”
The Tor signaled with one hand. At once, the castle’s trumpeter blew a fanfare which echoed against the walls, rang into the sky. Groaning, the great winches began to crank the gate open.
While the gate went up, the Tor pulled his charger around to face the opening and the future as if he had never been afraid in his life.
Artagel withdrew. Castellan Norge called the guard to order.
When the gate was up, the trumpeter sounded another fanfare.
With the Congery and six thousand men behind him, the Tor rode out of Orison.
FORTY-FIVE: THE ALEND MONARCH’S GAMBLE
Out in the dawn, the Alend army waited.
Prince Kragen had withdrawn all his forces – his patrols and scouts, his siege engines, his battering rams – to the great circle of his encampment. Beyond the gates, none of his men came closer than the tree-lined roads from Tor and Perdon and Armigite. But his foot soldiers stood ready, holding their weapons. His mounted troops were on their horses. Past the intervening guards, past the Tor and Norge, Terisa could see the Alend strength among the trees like a black wall wrapped around the castle.
One of the riders who held the roads was a standard-bearer with the Alend Monarch’s green-and-red pennon.
A cold wind came up out of the south, out of Tor, making the pennon flutter and snap like a challenge.
The standard-bearer held no flag of truce.
As always, however, Prince Kragen’s men avoided the intersection where the roads came together. This created a gap in the Alend line, as if Kragen intended to let Orison’s guard through.
The Tor spoke to Norge; Norge muttered a command Terisa didn’t hear. At the head of the guard, King Joyse’s plain purple insignia was raised.
Maybe Prince Kragen would think the King had returned.
Maybe he would reconsider.
Terisa gripped her reins with icy hands and prepared to nudge her nag into motion. Geraden held his head up as though he were waiting for sunrise. Ribuld scratched at his scar as if it itched in the chill, an old wound remembering pain.
Snorting steam, shaking their heads, rattling their tack, crunching the crusted mud, the horses began to follow the Tor and Castellan Norge.
Artagel still had his back to the Alends. By holdi
ng his mount stationary, he sifted through the vanguard until he was directly in front of Terisa and Geraden – until he came between them, forcing them to stop. As she had feared, he was wearing Lebbick’s old, bloody mail over his shirt and leggings, Lebbick’s purple sash and headband. The sword belted to his hip looked so dark and grim that it must have belonged to the dead Castellan.
When he was dressed like that, she was afraid of what he might do.
At the moment, however, he didn’t do anything fearful. He clasped his brother’s shoulder; without quite managing to smile, he said, “Take care of yourself. Take care of her. Rescue Nyle. This family has already suffered enough.”
Geraden replied with a grin that looked like it belonged to Artagel.
Artagel turned to Terisa. Striving to appear ready and whole – perhaps for her benefit, perhaps for his own – he said stiffly, “Don’t make a liar out of me now, my lady.”
“A liar—she repeated as if the cold numbed her mouth. She had no idea what he was talking about.
“I’ve told half the men and women in Orison you can shift Eremis’ mirrors so they won’t translate here.” He watched her, studied her, like a man who didn’t want to get caught pleading. “The Tor is heading straight for the place where the Perdon and his men were attacked.”
Terisa thought her heart was going to stop.
The mirror which had brought those ravening black spots down on the Perdon and his men out of nowhere—Shapes no bigger than puppies, and yet as fatal as wolves—
She had forgotten it. Forgotten, forgotten.
Geraden winced. “Terisa—” he started to say. “Terisa—”
“Stop him,” she said, gasping gouts of steam. “Stop him. I need time to think.”
Instantly, Artagel wheeled his mount and plunged through the press of horses, chasing after the Tor.
—gnarled, round shapes with four limbs outstretched like grappling hooks and terrible jaws that occupied more than half the body—
The idea shocked her to the marrow, revolted her. The same creatures had attacked her and Geraden outside Sternwall – but that was different; then they had attacked completely by surprise, without time for panic or nausea. This time—The Tor and Castellan Norge were effectively defenseless. If they met Prince Kragen in the intersection, all the leaders of the armies could be struck at once. How had she forgotten?
Artagel had told everyone that she could shift Eremis’ mirrors.
Outside the gates, Artagel caught up with the Tor and Norge, spoke to them urgently. Master Barsonage brought his horse up between Terisa and Geraden. “What is amiss?” he asked. “I was unable to hear.”
Geraden overrode the mediator. “Why hasn’t he used it already? If he still has that mirror set up – if it’s ready – why hasn’t he used it before this? He could bring anything through. Even if he didn’t hurt us, he could cripple the Alends, maybe even kill Prince Kragen – or the Alend Monarch.”
“Because he didn’t need it then.” Terisa wasn’t thinking about what she said; the words seemed to come out by themselves, reasoned into clarity by a separate part of her mind. “He needed time to set his traps, time to spring them. He needed time to get Festten’s army in position, time to get rid of the Perdon, time to make all his mirrors.” The rest of her brain blundered helplessly around the edges of the promise Artagel had made in her name. “But we let him do all that safely. Prince Kragen held off – he held off from trying to take Orison. Nobody interfered with what Eremis was doing. So he didn’t need to use this mirror. He could afford to leave Alend alone.”
Geraden nodded harshly. “I understand. Now it’s time. Now he needs it. We’re moving. His traps are ready. He’s got everything he wanted except you. He can’t beat us with just one mirror. Even a few hundred of those black spots can’t beat an army this size. An avalanche can’t. Firecats can’t. But if he can hurt us now – if he can kill the Tor, or Norge, or Prince Kragen – he can damage us terribly.”
“Then we will foil him simply,” put in Master Barsonage. “We will turn from the road. We will pass outside his mirror’s range of focus.”
Geraden nodded again, rose up in his stirrups to shout to Artagel. But Terisa said at once, “No!”
Master Barsonage and Geraden stared at her.
No. Oh, curse it. What was she thinking? This was insane.
“Artagel told everyone I can shift Eremis’ mirrors.” But that wasn’t what she meant to say, that wasn’t the point. She tried again. “This is a trap. We need to stick our heads in it. We need to spring it the other way. Isn’t that why we’re marching in the first place? Isn’t that what we decided?”
Ahead of the guard, the Tor and Norge had stopped. Artagel had finished explaining what was on his mind. In the gray dawn, the Tor looked strangely sunken, irresolute, as if he were torn between the desire to flee and the necessity of marching. Kicking his mount, Artagel started back toward Terisa and Geraden.
“Eremis wants to scare us,” she said while her thoughts throbbed like her heart. “He wants to make us doubt ourselves.
“We should try doing the same thing to him.”
“What do you mean, my lady?” asked Master Barsonage, nearly whispering.
“She means,” Geraden snarled back as though she appalled him, “she thinks she ought to do it. Stick her head in the trap.” He had to swallow fiercely to clear his throat. “Shift Eremis’ mirror so he can’t use it.”
“Impossible,” protested the mediator. “Is it not true that she has never seen the mirror which shows the place where those fatal creatures are found? And how can we be sure that Master Eremis does not intend to translate some other evil against us? And—?”
“Not that mirror,” Geraden snapped, controlling his alarm with anger. “The flat one. The one that shows the intersection.
“No.” Now he was speaking to Terisa, speaking so intensely that his words seemed to burn. “What makes it impossible is the vantage, the direction. We know what the Image is, but we don’t know what side it’s seen from, what the perspective is. You can’t shift an Image if you can’t identify it first, see it exactly in your mind.”
He was saying, Don’t do this, don’t do this.
“I’ve got to try.” As if that were an explanation, she said, “Artagel promised.” But the stricken look on Geraden’s face demanded better. She made another effort. “I don’t really know how far my talent goes. I haven’t had very many chances to explore it. We’re counting on the idea that I have power we can use, but we don’t really know what we’re counting on. And the closer we get to Esmerel, the more dangerous everything is. I’ve got to try.”
Geraden clearly wanted to argue, shout. Deliberately, she went on, “We’re staking everything on the hope that King Joyse didn’t abandon us. He trusted us – he trusts us to make his plans work while he’s away.” She had the distinct impression that she was completely out of her mind. “If we aren’t going to at least make the attempt, we might as well stay here.”
For one painful moment, Geraden’s expression turned to bleak, bitter iron. But then his lips pulled back into a fighting grimace. “I’m coming with you.”
“No, you aren’t,” Terisa countered before Master Barsonage could object. “We can’t afford to risk both of us.”
“If you think I’m going to let you do this alone—” Geraden began.
She wasn’t listening to him: she had already hauled on her reins, dug her heels into the nag’s sides. As if she were unaware of her own quickness and had never considered the possibility that she wouldn’t be obeyed, she commanded, “Stop him, Ribuld. Keep him here,” and started to forge among the riders toward Artagel, the Tor, and Castellan Norge.
Ribuld caught Geraden by the strap of his swordbelt and neatly plucked him off his horse. While Geraden sputtered in outrage, Ribuld wrestled with him. Geraden was tougher than he appeared, nearly frantic as well: he managed to unseat Ribuld. They fell together into the mud. But Geraden couldn’t break awa
y.
Terisa reached Artagel.
“I need protection,” she panted; her own strange audacity took her breath away. “Eremis won’t miss a chance to attack when he sees me in his mirror. Somebody’s got to keep me alive so I can work.”
Artagel’s excitement shone as brightly as Geraden’s frenzy. Calling men after him, he wheeled his mount and began clearing a path for her.
They reached the Tor and Norge and rode past with six more guards behind them, hurrying now so that she wouldn’t have time to lose her nerve – so that she wouldn’t be infected by the Tor’s slumped irresolution.
While she rushed toward the intersection, she tried to clear her mind, make herself ready.
This decisive urgency was different than the rage which sometimes blocked her. It was full of fear – and fear lead to fading – and fading led to translation. The first thing she needed was an alternative Image, a place she could shift Eremis’ glass to. As soon as she recognized that necessity, however, her mind filled up with scenes which couldn’t bear attack: the Closed Fist; rooms and halls in Orison; Sternwall; Vale House. She had to thrust them away, get them out of her thoughts before she did something terrible unintentionally. If only she had seen any part of Esmerel accurately, she could have used it – or tried to use it – to hurl Eremis’ attack back against him.
He had cleverly avoided that danger.
Was his foresight really that good? Was he ready for her now?
A squad of Alend horse rode into the intersection, intending either to meet or to stop her. Artagel stretched his mount a few strides ahead and began yelling at the Alends, warning them away. She caught a glimpse of Prince Kragen, saw him react without hesitation, shout his men back.