A Man Rides Through

  With the air knocked out of his lungs, Geraden lay still.

  As if they recognized a mortal enemy, the other wolves sped to help their fellow.

  Master Gilbur spat curses, then crowed obscenely as he located more wolves.

  Geraden couldn’t breathe. He could hardly move his limbs. Nevertheless he had to act now, had to grab this brief chance. He might never get another one.

  Talent was a remarkable thing: he was learning more about it all the time. He was an Adept of some kind; he could use other people’s mirrors. And he had rescued himself and Terisa out of her former apartment, out of a world which had no Imagery. All he had to do was concentrate, take Master Gilbur by surprise.

  In a way, it helped that he couldn’t breathe. It almost helped that the struggle between the wolves and the gnarled creatures was only ten feet away, and that the wolves were winning, crunching the bones of the smaller beasts. The extremity of his plight left no room for doubt or hesitation.

  He turned his head toward the mirror and studied the Image, fixed it in his mind: a forest full of harsh shadows, slashed by light there and there; boughs angling upward; underbrush of a kind he had never seen before. During the spaces between his heartbeats, he memorized the scene.

  Master Gilbur hunched beside the mirror, clutching the frame with one fist, crooning to the glass. A feral ecstasy lit his features, as bright as fire, as consuming as lava.

  When the first of the new wolves started through the mirror, Geraden closed his eyes and shifted the Image in his mind.

  And the Image in the mirror shifted.

  He didn’t know what he shifted it to, and he didn’t care. Instinctively, he must have selected some place or vista to fill the mirror: he couldn’t imagine a blank glass. But that detail was unimportant. What mattered was that he could reach out with his talent, that by surprise if not by strength he could break Master Gilbur’s hold on the glass.

  It worked. The Image melted while the wolf was still caught in the prolonged instant of translation.

  The wolf was cut in half.

  The mirror shattered.

  Gilbur wheeled to confront Geraden. For a moment, the brutal Imager actually gaped. Then rage knotted his face, and he let out a roar which seemed to strike the air dumb, leaving the battle of the wolves without a sound.

  He turned to the next mirror in the ring.

  From its dark depths, he brought out a burst of lightning so hot that it scorched the stone floor; a blast of thunder so loud that it thudded in Geraden’s tight lungs; a wind so hard that it seemed to hammer him down even though he hadn’t tried to rise, hadn’t tried to move.

  The Imager was translating a storm into the chamber.

  Using it to buffet and confuse and overwhelm Geraden until Master Gilbur could get to him and drive a dagger into his heart.

  Now that he had Terisa down on the floor and hurt, Master Eremis thought he would begin to take advantage of her. He found, however, that he had trouble pulling his attention away from the mirror.

  He liked surprises: they were tests, opportunities. Yet the death of the slug-beast nagged at him. That was an unforeseen development. Of course, the creature could have collapsed for any number of reasons which had nothing to do with the battle. Nevertheless its demise suggested that he had underestimated his enemy’s capabilities.

  And King Joyse’s forces were rallying now. That was perfectly predictable – but still frustrating to watch. Festten had made the right decision: to launch a full-scale assault while the armies of Mordant and Alend were still in disarray. Unfortunately, his men were too far away to save the callat. And King Joyse and Prince Kragen were doing entirely too good a job of pulling their forces into order to meet the Cadwal charge.

  Soon the battle would degenerate into a simple contest of steel and determination.

  King Joyse would lose, of course. Festten had him heavily outnumbered. And Gilbur had an impressive array of mirrors at hand. Yet Master Eremis wasn’t pleased. On the scale of armies, Gilbur’s remaining resources were relatively minor. And if the Cadwal victory weren’t ultimately achieved by Imagery, the High King would become more difficult to rule in future. He would trust his own strength more, Eremis’ less. He might begin to think he could dispense with Master Eremis altogether. And Gart was somewhere in the stronghold—

  The Master was prepared for all these eventualities. Nevertheless he didn’t find them especially attractive.

  Carefully, Terisa got to her feet, so that she, too, could look at the mirror. She had the smudge of a growing bruise on her cheekbone, but it only made her lovelier. When she had been hurt enough, she would be intolerably beautiful.

  Master Eremis considered hitting her again. But that was too crude, really. He expected better of himself: more imagination, greater subtlety. And he wanted to see what his enemies were going to do.

  He wanted to see what Gilbur was going to do.

  It would be something violent, something effective. Considering Gilbur’s susceptibility to rage of all kinds, however, it might also be something premature. Master Eremis didn’t want to see Joyse die too soon, too easily.

  At the moment, there was no danger of that. The callat were beaten: Joyse was able to disengage, with Kragen, Norge, and the unanticipated Termigan. They rode a short way up the valley, conferred with each other briefly, then began shouting orders which conveyed nothing through the glass. And their army seemed to come into order around them almost magically.

  None too soon, Kragen spurred away to command the defense to the right of the monster’s corpse. Norge went to the left, with the Termigan beside him. Well, Joyse was an old man. No doubt he needed rest. He didn’t appear to be resting, however. Instead, he rode everywhere, organizing his men.

  For some reason, he divided them into three forces: one to support Kragen; one for Norge and the Termigan; one for himself.

  “I don’t understand,” said Terisa thinly, in that impersonal, disinterested tone.

  Master Eremis felt that he was beginning to comprehend her. That tone didn’t indicate defeat. It was a sign of withdrawal: not of retreat, but of hiding, of covert intentions. Perhaps she thought that if she could go far enough away in her mind, he wouldn’t be able to hurt her. Or perhaps she hid so that she could take him by surprise.

  A small thrill of anticipation ran through his veins, and he shifted his weight slightly onto the balls of his feet.

  “Have you ever understood anything?” he countered with amiable sarcasm.

  His scorn didn’t seem to touch her. She may have been too distant to hear it accurately. In the same tone, she said, “You have all these flat mirrors, but you don’t use them very well.”

  Another surprise: one with exciting possibilities. What was she thinking?

  “Do we not?” he asked casually.

  “You have a glass that shows Vale House.” Despite her dullness, her voice was strangely distinct. “You could have taken Queen Madin yourself. You could have brought her here as a hostage. She would have been more use to you than Nyle.”

  Oh, that. Master Eremis was mildly disappointed; he had hoped for something a bit more interesting. “A predictable idea,” he commented acidly, “and not precisely brilliant. If I had done that, I would have given up the wedge I wished to drive between Joyse and Margonal. I would have given up the obstacles I wished to place in your path.

  “I must confess I am still somewhat surprised that Margonal let you into Orison. That was not a reasonable decision, in view of the news you carried.” He paused to let Terisa volunteer an explanation, but she didn’t speak. No matter. He would get all the answers he wanted from her eventually. “I am sure,” he resumed, “I came very close to achieving exactly what I desired with the Queen.

  “If, on the other hand, I had done as you – and Festten – advise, I might have gained nothing. The Queen would have been in my hands – and the translation would have made her mad. Damaging hostages is a blade with two edges. Her madness might hav
e hurt Joyse enough to weaken him. Or it might have incensed him enough to disregard her. Then the effort of attacking her would have been wasted.”

  There remained the question of what had happened to the Queen. And the question of how Joyse had contrived to rejoin his army, after his disappearance from Orison. But those answers could wait as well. Thinking about his own tactics brought new joy to the Master’s loins. The satisfaction he wanted from Terisa was long overdue.

  “But you have this mirror now,” she said as if she couldn’t see her peril in his eyes. “Why don’t you just translate King Joyse and Prince Kragen? Make them mad? Then you can’t lose. Without them, the army will collapse. And you can lock them up the way you did Nyle. You can laugh at them until they die.”

  Oh, how she pleased him! She made him laugh. “I will do that, I assure you,” he promised. “At the right moment, I will do it, and it will give me more pleasure than you can conceive.”

  In the mirror, along the sides of the monster, the forces of Cadwal and Mordant and Alend met for their last battle.

  “At first, of course,” Eremis explained, “I had to be cautious. You taught me to respect your talents. If I had given you the chance, you might have broken my mirror. But that danger ended when you came here. When you gave yourself into my power.”

  Initially, the fight was even. The walls of the valley and the bulk of the slug-beast narrowed the ground, restricted the number of Cadwals able to advance together. And Joyse’s men fought as if they were inspired. Even Kragen and that dour loon the Termigan seemed inspired. For a time, at least, Festten lost a lot of men and gained nothing.

  “Now I wait only to let these armies do each other as much harm as possible. Joyse cannot win, but before he dies he may give Festten a victory as costly as any defeat. That will humble even the High King’s arrogance. It will make him too weak to think he can command or refuse me.”

  Then, inevitably, the defenders on the left began to crumble. Norge went down; he disappeared under a rush of Cadwal hooves. In spite of his native grimness, the Termigan was forced backward. Their men tried to retreat in some semblance of order, but the Cadwals surged after them, overtook them, hacked them apart. Festten’s strength started flooding into the valley.

  “So I will let the battle progress a while. I will wish Joyse all the success he can manage. And then” – Eremis was so delighted that he wanted applause – “at the crucial moment I will translate him away to the madness and ruin he deserves.”

  He wasn’t particularly surprised to see Festten himself lead the second wave of the assault. The High King had an old and overwhelming desire to see Joyse die; he would have been ecstatic to kill his nemesis himself. Eremis considered, however, that Festten was taking a useless risk. The Master had no intention of allowing the High King the gratification he craved.

  There was something odd in the way Terisa regarded Master Eremis, something that resembled hunger. Softly, she asked, “Have you hated him all your life? Even when you were just a kid? the first time you translated that monster? Did you hate him even then?”

  “Hate him?” Eremis laughed again. “Terisa, you mistake me. You always mistake me.” The pressure inside him was rising, rising. “I do not hate him. I hate no one. I only despise weakness and folly. As a youth, when I shaped the mirror which showed what you call ‘that monster,’ I translated it merely as an experiment. To learn what I could do. Later I was forced to abandon my glass in order to avoid being captured with it, and that vexed me. I promised then I would retaliate.

  “But I do not waste my time” – he was growing deliciously ready for her – “I assure you that I do not waste my time on hate.”

  She continued to gaze at him with her curious blend of absence and hunger. She had her back to the windows and the sunlight; perhaps that was what made her eyes look so dark, her beauty seem so fatal.

  Huskily, bringing the words up from far down her throat, she said, “Let me show you what I can do.”

  With one hand, she reached out and gently touched her fingertips to the unmistakable bulge in the front of his cloak.

  He felt like crowing.

  Frantically, Artagel fought to prolong his life, keep himself on his feet for one more moment, just one, then another if he could do it. He was the best swordsman in Mordant, wasn’t he? Surely he could keep himself alive one more moment at a time?

  Maybe not. The pain in his side had become a fire that filled his lungs, so that he seemed to snatch each raw breath through a conflagration. His sword kept turning in his hands; blood and sweat ruined his grip. His legs had lost their spring; he had no more strength to do anything except shuffle his boots over the stone. Sometimes his heavy lurching from side to side dashed water and blood off his brows, cleared his vision; most of the time, however, he had trouble seeing.

  How had the corridor become so narrow? He couldn’t seem to get a full swing, no matter what he did.

  Gart, on the other hand, didn’t appear to be experiencing any difficulty. His brief, wild fury had faded. In fact, the pace of his attacks was slower now, more deliberate; more malicious. He was toying with his opponent. Yellow glee shone in his eyes, and he grinned as if he were crowing inside.

  What a way to die. No, worse than that: what a way to be beaten. Artagel was a fighter; he had lived most of his life in the vicinity of death. For him, it was at once so familiar and so unimaginable that he couldn’t be afraid of it. But to be beaten like this, utterly, miserably—

  Oh, Geraden, forgive me.

  If only, he thought dumbly, if only he hadn’t been hurt the last time. If only he hadn’t spent so much time in bed.

  Terisa, forgive me.

  But it was stupid to wish for things like that. Foolish regret: a waste of time and energy and life. Gart had beaten him the last time, too. And the time before that.

  I will regret nothing.

  He retreated down the passage, past more doors than he could count; stumbling, barely on his feet. By bare will, he kept his sword up for Gart to play with.

  If anybody thinks he can do better than this, let him try.

  That was enough. As unsteady as a drunk, he stopped; he locked both hands around his wet swordhilt.

  I will regret nothing.

  Almost retching for air, he jerked forward and did his absolute best to split Gart’s head open.

  Negligently, Gart blocked the blow.

  Artagel’s eyes were full of blood: he couldn’t see what happened. But he knew from the sound, the familiar echoing clang after his swing, and from the sudden shift of balance, that he had broken his sword.

  One jagged half remained in his fists; the other rang away across the floor, singing metallically of failure.

  “Now,” Gart breathed like silk. “Now, you fool.”

  Involuntarily, Artagel went down on one knee, as if he couldn’t stay on his feet without an intact weapon.

  The High King’s Monomach raised his sword. Between streaks of Artagel’s blood, the steel gleamed.

  For some reason, a door behind Gart opened.

  Nyle came into the passage.

  He looked like Artagel felt: abused to the bone; exhausted beyond bearing. But he held the chains of his manacles clenched in his fists, and he swung the heavy rings on the ends of the chains at Gart’s head.

  The instincts which had made Gart the High King’s Monomach saved him. Warned by some visceral intuition, some impalpable tremor in the air, he wrenched himself aside and started turning.

  The rings missed his head, came down on his left shoulder.

  They hit him hard enough to strike that arm away from his sword. But he did most of his fighting one-handed anyway, despite his weapon’s weight. While his left arm fell numb – maybe broken – his right was already in motion, bringing his blade around to sever Nyle’s neck.

  Nyle!

  In that moment, a piece of time as quick and eternal as a translation, Artagel brought up the last strength from the bottom of his heart and lun
ged forward.

  With his whole body, he drove his broken sword through the armhole of Gart’s armor.

  Then he and Nyle collapsed on Gart’s corpse as if they had become kindred spirits at last.

  He had the peculiar conviction that he needed to prevent Gart from rising up after death and shedding more blood. A long time seemed to pass before he recovered enough sanity to wonder whether Nyle was still alive.

  The crash and burn of Master Gilbur’s storm seemed to blot out Geraden’s senses, smother his will. He couldn’t remember the last time he had taken a breath. On the other hand, air wasn’t especially important to him at the moment. Lightning struck the stone so close-by that it nearly scorched him; he could feel the shock like a tingle in the floor. Darkness swept the sunlight away: thunder tried to crush him.

  Well, the storm daunted the wolves, held them at bay. That was some consolation. And if it continued to mount in this enclosed space, it would begin to topple the mirrors.

  Master Gilbur didn’t appear to care any longer what might happen to his mirrors. He was roaring like the blast, and his hunched back strained to lift his head as high as possible, gnash his jaws at the ceiling.

  With a massive concussion, all the windows blew out. At once, the pressure around Geraden eased, and he started breathing again.

  Too bad: the loss of the windows might save the mirrors. Unless the roof came down.

  Gilbur had to be stopped. Geraden had the distinct impression that the Imager was going mad, transported by power. A storm like this, constricted like this, could conceivably level the whole building.

  Geraden had done it once. Could he do it again?

  Forget the thunder that deafened him, stunned his mind. Forget the lightning, the near-miss of fire hot enough to incinerate his bones. Forget wind and wolves and violence.

  Think about glass.

  Despite the storm, Gilbur’s only real weapon was the mirror itself, a piece of normal glass. It had a particular hue blended of sand and tinct; a particular shape created by molds and rollers and heat. His talent had made it what it was. His talent opened it like a blown-out window between worlds. But Geraden also had talent. He could feel the mirror, see its Image in his mind as if by the simple intensity of his perception, his imagination, he made it real.