“And you didn’t think it was worth mentioning to us?” demanded Terisa. She wanted to hit the scarred veteran. She also wanted to shout for joy.
Enjoying his own joke, Ribuld replied piously, “I could have been wrong, my lady. I didn’t want to mislead you.”
“They were getting this ready while we talked to the Alend Monarch,” Geraden muttered with fire rising in his eyes. “The decision was already made.” Which explained the excitement Terisa had seen in Prince Kragen. “They were just waiting for a final word from Margonal.”
“Then why didn’t they tell us?” asked Terisa.
“They don’t want an alliance.” Geraden sounded wonderfully sure. “They want to be ready to help if they think we’re right. Prince Kragen does think we’re right. But they also want to be free to abandon us – or even turn against us – if we’re wrong.
“I told you the Prince is an honorable enemy.”
The Tor didn’t say anything. While Prince Kragen led his forces up the rise after Orison’s army, the old lord sat on his mount with tears in his eyes and a look like a promise on his broad face.
FORTY-SIX: A PLACE OF DEATH
The wind continued to blow out of the south – not hard now, but steadily, and full of cold, rattling through the trees and along the ground like a rumor of icicles – and Orison’s army marched into the teeth of it. The men went almost boisterously at first, when the word was passed down the lines that Prince Kragen and his troops were coming toward Esmerel instead of attacking the castle; then slowly the guards’ mood turned grimmer, more painful, as the wind wore down hope, drove both men and horses to duck their heads and brunt a way forward with the tops of their skulls. The unseasonable chill stung the eyes, rubbed at the spots where tack or mail galled the skin; it searched out the gaps in winter cloaks and made the air hurtful for sore lungs and caused earaches. By the time the Tor and his forces had crossed Broadwine Ford and halted to make their first camp, they had lost whatever optimism they had carried with them from the Demesne. Dispirited and worried, the army turned its back on the wind, huddled into itself, and cursed the cold.
The men already looked beaten.
By Castellan Norge’s reckoning, however, they had pulled nearly four miles ahead of the Alends.
“That disturbs me,” muttered the Tor while Master Barsonage and the other Imagers chose an open patch of ground and began to unpack their mirrors. “I do not wish to be separated from the Prince – and I do not wish to wait for him.”
Norge shrugged as if the movement were a twitch in his sleep. “They’re carrying all their food and equipment and bedding and tents – everything they need. They’re lucky they can come this close to our pace. If Prince Kragen tries to drive them this fast tomorrow, some of them will start to break.”
“And that will benefit no one,” fretted the Tor. Abruptly, he called, “Master Barsonage!”
“My lord Tor?” the mediator answered.
“Do I understand correctly? This evening you will translate our necessities from Orison – and tomorrow before we march you will return everything to the castle for the day?”
Master Barsonage nodded. He was impatient to get to work. One of the Congery’s three supply-mirrors was his.
The Tor kept him standing for a moment, then said, “I will wager the Alends carry enough food and water to sustain them for eight or ten days. If their supplies were added to ours, could you manage so much translation?”
That got the mediator’s attention. “My lord, you propose a vast amount of material to be translated. All Imagery is taxing. And we have only three mirrors.”
“I understand,” the Tor replied rather sharply. “Can you do it?”
Master Barsonage glared at the ground. “We can make the attempt.”
“Good.” The old lord turned away. “Castellan Norge.”
“My lord Tor?”
“Send a messenger to my lord Prince. Say that I wish to consult with him – that I wish to consult with him urgently – on the subject of his supplies.”
“Yes, my lord.” If Norge had any qualms about the Tor’s idea, he didn’t show them. Instead, he gave the necessary orders to one of his captains.
Muttering under his breath, Barsonage went back to work.
“He’s right, you know,” Geraden commented to Terisa as they hugged their coats and watched the Masters prepare. “That’s a lot of translation for only three mirrors – three Imagers. It’s going to be hard.”
Terisa didn’t want to think about it. In fact, she didn’t want to think. Men had died to keep her alive. That was what war meant: some men died to keep others alive. The bloodshed had hardly begun. Numbly, she asked, “What do you suggest?”
He studied her. “We could help.”
She blinked at him. She could see that he was cold, but he didn’t seem to feel it as badly as she did. He was still able to be worried about her.
“The practice might be good for us,” he said casually. “And you look like it wouldn’t hurt you to be reminded that Imagery has a few” – he searched for a description – “less bloody uses.”
She grimaced. “I don’t think I have the strength.”
“Terisa,” he said at once, “listen to me. You didn’t kill anybody. You were trying to stop the killing.”
He touched the sore place in her, the ache of responsibility. Stiffly, she said, “They died protecting me.”
“But you didn’t kill them. Their blood is on Eremis’ head, not yours.”
“No,” she retorted. “Don’t you understand? I didn’t have to give him the chance to attack me. We could have gone around the intersection. Nobody had to die. I made that decision.”
Like Lebbick, the men protecting her had died for nothing more than a ploy, a gambit – a move at checkers.
“That’s true.” Geraden practically smiled at her. “You struck back. You took the risk of striking back – and all risks are dangerous. Next time, you might want to choose your risks more carefully, so nobody has to face them except you. Us.
“But you were right. That’s why we’re here, we, all of us. Including those men who got killed. To strike back. If we aren’t going to strike back, we should have stayed in Orison.”
Choose your risks more carefully.
“In the meantime,” he said as if he knew what her answer would be, “we can make ourselves useful. The Congery has curved mirrors they aren’t going to need tonight. I can tackle one of them. And there’s probably a flat glass to spare. If there isn’t, you can try your hand at a regular translation, where you don’t have to shift the Image.”
As well as she could, she met his gaze. Sometimes she forgot how handsome he was. He had a boy’s eyes, a lover’s mouth, a king’s forehead; the lines of his face were capable of iron and humor almost simultaneously. He lacked Eremis’ magnetism – he was too vulnerable for that kind of attraction – but his vulnerability only made his strength more precious to her, just as his strength made his vulnerability dear. And he was so good at turning his attention to her when she needed it—
With one cold hand, she touched his cheek, ran a fingertip down the length of his nose. “I hope Master Barsonage is in a tolerant mood,” she muttered. “I might make some pretty dramatic mistakes.”
“Nonsense,” scoffed Geraden happily. “After the mistakes I’ve already made, anything you can do wrong is going to be paltry by comparison.”
Chuckling, he led her toward the open ground where the Masters were unpacking their mirrors.
When he explained what he had in mind to the mediator, Master Barsonage’s harried look eased noticeably. “This is too good to be true,” Barsonage said as he assessed the possibilities. “Something must go amiss. If neither of you cracks a glass – and I feel constrained to remind you that nothing of what we have can be replaced – perhaps Prince Kragen’s Alends will be overwhelmed by sentiment against Imagery, and will feel compelled to throw a few propitious stones.