Glenda Larke - The Heart of the mirage

through it, but if I tried, I walked into a barrier as solid as gorclak horn.

The first month of my imprisonment passed, then the second. The life within me continued to grow; I was aware of it even though it was still too early for it to make its presence felt with discernible movements. I made no move to tell Temellin. I didn't want to give the Magoroth the excuse to kill me.

Temellin never came near me anyway. Sometimes I wondered if he knew just how solitary my confinement was, and if he did know, whether he cared. I yearned to hear from him – a word, some expression of concern or interest, something, but day after day passed in silence. When I was feeling especially low, it seemed as if the world out there had forgotten my existence and I was doomed to live as a sort of peripheral being, someone who could never enter the mainstream of life where things happened, and who was therefore only half alive. For someone who had loved power, who had once loved to make things happen, it was a bitter situation.

When Caleh finally came to see me, with messages of support from Brand, it was all I could do to stop myself from crying in gratitude at her presence. Although she had received permission to see me, she was obviously uneasy, uncertain of how much she should tell me. Brand, she said, was well and asking me not to worry about him; Temellin was also well, but was becoming known for his bad temper. 'He doesn't know what to do about you,' she said sagely, 'and people are saying the thought of your imprisonment preys on him. Ah, Magoria, Brand tells me you truly wanted to serve Kardiastan, and I believe him. He is too shrewd to be deceived.' She shook her head in sorrow as she left, saying, 'I don't know how all this is going to end.'

I didn't know, either. J;*

The only other person I had any real contact with was Reftim and he rarely spoke. He was polite, and perhaps his silence was more my fault; he always answered if I spoke to him first. Most of the time, though, he wouldn't even meet my eyes and I guessed – I hoped – he was bitterly ashamed of his part in the attempt to poison me. I wondered sometimes if he had deliberately told no one of my library as a way of compensating me; I found it hard to believe -Pinar would have tolerated my having access to all those books, had she been aware of them.

One other person who did have contact with me – of an oblique kind – was Garis. After the first two or three days of my imprisonment he sent me a bunch of flowers via Reftim, and continued to do so every few days. There was never any note or message, but I was touched. I hoped it meant he was not convinced of my utter perfidy.

Two days after Caleh's visit, I noted Reftim was upset, so I asked what was the matter, saying, 'Surely it can't be all that bad, can it? You look as if your father-in-law has moved into your bedroom!'

He looked at me with distressed eyes that seemed – out of place in his clown-like face. 'The Ravage has come to the city,' he said. 'It swallowed up several of the houses on the south side during the night, just like that.' He clicked his fingers in illustration. 'Four families disappeared.'

I remembered what the howdah-shleth driver had said to me, about the Ravage being so close. One day we'll wake up to find a swathe of it destroying the Maze like legionnaires on the rampage.

Sickened and frightened, I turned away.

And so the days passed. I exercised rigorously, I ate, I slept and every other minute of every day was spent either reading, or exerting my will on that delicate curve of golden stone in my palm, inveigling it to do my bidding – without reducing everything in its path, myself included, to a heap of ashes.

And then came the shock: the thrilling, breath-robbing, devastating shock.

I was seated at my desk, browsing through a book entitled The Mirager: His Powers and Responsibilities, when I came across it, the passage that made a mockery of everything Zerise had said about Sarana and Shirin and me. A passage that took away one pain, only to replace it with another, just as tearing. A passage that changed everything.

On the death of the ruling Mirager (or Miragerin), I read, the dead ruler's heir will walk the Shiver Barrens and be given a Mirager's sword. If they already have a sword, they will exchange it.

At the same time, this new Mirager or Miragerin will be given the conjurations that will bestow cabochons on the newborn. This information is given only to the ruling Mirager or Miragerin, and is not bestowed on any other Magoroth; nor is any other sword capable of bestowing cabochons. For this reason, the ruling Mirager or Miragerin should take special care of their sword. No other will ever be given to them…

My first thought was one of protest: but this is wrong. I had been given the conjurations under the Shiver Barrens. I knew how to bestow a cabochon; the Mirage Makers had shown me in the vision. Presumably my sword was capable of producing the gems. Yet Temellin was the Mirager.

I sat there, thoughts tumbling through my head, and the truth came, a crushing avalanche of knowledge

roaring into my consciousness in a single wave, too much to absorb all at once.

This information is given only to the ruling Mirager \ or Miragerin – I looked up from the book. The Miragerin. Goddess, that was Sarana, not Shirin.

The Mirage Makers had told me, implanting the knowledge through the indelible clarity of one of their visions, but I hadn't seen it. My own memories had told me, but I hadn't thought them through.

… nor is any other sword capable of bestowing cabochons.

The behaviour of the Magoroth had told me, but I had forgotten. Only now did I recall the reverence with which they had treated Temellin's newly recovered sword. Garis had told me, but I had missed the significance of what he'd said: 'Until Temellin grew up a bit, no newborn Magor children received their cabochons.' Temellin had told me, but I hadn't realised: 'You don't know it, love, but you've just saved my life -' Sweet Melete, if I had not returned his sword to him, he would have had to kill himself so that someone else would become the Mirager – and receive a new Mirager's sword.

Dear Goddess, I was Sarana, daughter of Solad and Wendia; I was Miragerin of Kardiastan; I was the little girl in the shleth howdah who had watched her mother jump out to her death at the hands of the legionnaires led by General Gayed of Tyr.

I was the girl who had become a pawn of Tyrans, a hostage who had enslaved a nation.

•I

SARimA

I stood at my window looking down on the street below. I had been drawn there by the jingling of a shleth harness and the chatter of voices, to find the road filled with a line of mounted Magor and pack animals, all heading out of the city. There were those of gold cabochon rank, as well as Illusos, Theuros and ordinary Kardis, all of them heavily armed.

I raised my cabochon to my ear and listened, trying to gain some clue as to what was happening. In the confusion of s and it was hard to hear individual conversation, even with my enhanced hearing, and the sort of remarks I did pick up were of little value; things like: 'Your girth needs loosening, Jaset,' or 'Did Bethely give you a hearty farewell last night, Mooris? It could be a while before you see her again!'

My eyes searched for and found Temellin: he had pulled his mount to the side and was watching those who rode past. His ivory full-sleeved shirt and rusty brown trousers were crumpled, as though he'd been sleeping in his clothes, or had simply lost interest in ^;= appearance. The scarlet slash of his cloth belt and

the blood-red of his bolero didn't quite match; his hair was longer than usual and more unruly than ever.