“I want him” – the Tor contained himself with difficulty – “to rule Orison in my absence.”
Rule Orison—?
Artagel snarled an obscenity. “It comes to the same thing. He thinks I’m a cripple.”
Terisa stared at him, at the Tor; she was simultaneously surprised, relieved, and appalled. The idea of putting Artagel in charge of Orison had never occurred to her.
“No!” the Tor retorted, almost retching, “it does not come to the same thing. I do not ask you to remain behind because you are unfit to go. I command you to stay here because you are needed!
“I must leave Orison with less than two thousand men to defend it. And I have no alliance with the Alend Monarch. He will let us depart, of that I am sure. But when we are gone, he will not hesitate to renew his siege. Prince Kragen considers this castle to be the best safety available.
“If Orison is not defended – well defended – it will be lost.”
Artagel was in no condition for fighting. And yet the cost of having to stay behind – the price he would pay for remaining in Orison while Mordant’s fate was decided without him – would be severe.
“After King Joyse,” the Tor concluded, “you are the only man who can hope to hold these walls against the Alend army.”
“How?” Artagel snapped back. “I don’t have any authority. I don’t even belong to the guard. I’ve never been able to take orders. How do you expect me to give them?”
“By being who you are,” the Tor answered heavily. “The best-liked man in Orison.”
The old lord was right, Terisa thought. The guards would fight to the death for Artagel, of course. But so would half the population of the castle. He was the best swordsman in Mordant; his feats were legendary. And he was a son of the Domne. By simple likability, he might be able to rule Orison even more effectively than Castellan Lebbick.
Cursing, Artagel returned to his brother. “Tell him,” he demanded. “I’m going with you. You need me. When you go up against Eremis, you’ll need somebody to watch your back. I want—”
The look on Geraden’s face stopped him.
“You want to try Gart again,” Geraden said softly, “is that it?”
Anger and distress pulled Artagel’s expression in several directions at once.
“With muscles in your side that haven’t finished healing?” Geraden continued: soft; relentless. “You want to tackle a man who’s already beaten you twice, when you can’t even lift that sword without a twinge?”
Artagel flinched in helpless fury or frustration; he took a step backward. “I’m coming with you somehow,” he said between his teeth. “I won’t stay here.”
“Yes, you will,” rasped the Tor. “You may succeed in refusing to obey me, but I assure you that you will stay here.”
Artagel flung a glare like a challenge at the old lord. “Are you going to make me, my lord Tor?”
“No, Artagel. I will not ‘make’ you. Norge will do that. He will support me in this.”
From his place against the wall, the new Castellan nodded amiably. His bland calm was more convincing than a shout.
“Your choices,” the Tor finished, “are to remain in command of Orison – or to remain in the dungeon.”
Artagel studied the Tor and Norge; he directed a last appeal at Geraden.
In response, Geraden muttered miserably, “Don’t you understand, you halfwit? You’re too valuable to waste on a senseless contest with Gart. The Tor wants you to do the hardest job there is. King Joyse needs someplace to come back to. If everything else fails, he needs a castle and some men for the last defense of Mordant. He needs someone to give him that. He can’t do it for himself. He needs someone like you, who can make old men and serving girls and children fight for him just by smiling at them.”
For a moment, Terisa feared that Artagel would break out in protest, do something wild. He was a fighter, by temperament and training unsuited to sit still for sieges. But then his face took on a smile she had never seen before – a grimace bloodier and more bitter than his fighting grin; a look that chilled her heart.
To Norge, he said, “I want Lebbick’s mail – I want all the things he was wearing when Gart got him. I want his insignia – his sash and that headband. The more blood on them, the better. Anybody who looks at me is by the stars going to know what I stand for.”
Norge glanced at the Tor. The Tor nodded; his eyes were glazed with pain. Phlegmatically, Norge said, “Come,” and left the wall.
Artagel didn’t look at either Geraden or Terisa as he followed the new Castellan out of the room.
Simply because she hated to see Artagel hurt like that, she groaned to herself. But what was the use of being upset? The Tor had found a better answer to Orison’s problem – and to Artagel’s – than she had been able to imagine for herself. Geraden had told his brother the truth. She could understand how Artagel felt – but so what? He—
“You also, my lady,” the Tor said as if he had boulders rolling around in his gut, “will remain here.”
What—?
She looked around her. Geraden was gaping at the old lord, frankly dumbfounded. Master Barsonage’s expression was white with consternation.
She had heard right. The Tor intended to leave her in Orison.
Which was why Ribuld hadn’t brought any protective clothing or weapons for her. And why he had evaded her eyes, her inquiries. Of course.
Unexpectedly calm, she faced the lord. Her gaze was steady; even her pulse didn’t flutter. Geraden started to speak for her; but when he noticed her demeanor, he bit his mouth closed. “My lord Tor,” she said gently, as if he were as mad as Havelock, unable to be questioned, “you don’t want me to go with you.”
The tone of her reaction seemed to weaken his resolve. Speaking loudly in an apparent effort to shore up his position, he retorted, “You are a woman.”
Because he had raised his voice, she lowered hers. “And that makes a difference to you.”
“I am the lord of the Care of Tor.” His face grew redder, goaded toward passion by the fact that she wasn’t yelling at him. “And I am the King’s chancellor in Orison. His honor is in my hands, as is my own. You are a woman.”
Deliberately rejecting sarcasm, she replied quietly, “Please be plain, my lord Tor. I want to understand you.”
As if she were driving him to distraction, he shouted, “By the heavens, my lady, I do not take women into battle!”
In spite of her determination to be kind, Terisa smiled. “Then don’t think of me as a woman, my lord. Think of me as an Imager. Ask Master Barsonage. He offered to make me a Master. I’m not going with you. I’m going with the Congery.”
The Tor took a deep breath, preparing to bellow.
At once, Master Barsonage put in, “My lady Terisa is quite correct, my lord Tor,” speaking in the most placating voice he could manage. “You have not forgotten that she is an Imager – in effect, a member of the Congery. It is possible that she is the most powerful Imager we have ever known. I do not believe that we can confront Master Eremis and Master Gilbur and the arch-Imager Vagel without her.”
Livid with anger – or perhaps with the pain of holding his damaged belly upright – the Tor demanded, “Do you defy me, mediator?”
Master Barsonage spread his hands. “Of course not, my lord Tor. I merely observe that the lady Terisa is a question which belongs to the Congery. Regardless of the role we assign to her in the support of Orison and Mordant, she casts no aspersion on your honor – or the King’s.”
Carefully, Geraden commented, “And King Joyse doesn’t hesitate to use women when he needs them. Adept Havelock told us last night that King Joyse knew years ago the lady Elega and Prince Kragen would become lovers. He consented to his own betrayal – he practically drove her into the Prince’s arms. I don’t think the Prince would ever have let Terisa and me into Orison if she hadn’t been there. And she may do other things for us yet.