Стивен Дональдсон - The Mirror of Her Dreams

She stumbled, caught her balance, and fled the antechamber.

Help him? Geraden?

Nyle was dead. His belly had been cut open with a knife.

Why?

So he wouldn’t speak to the Congery. So he wouldn’t support Master Eremis’ accusations.

Geraden!

As soon as she found the room where the mirror that had brought her to Orison was on display, she spotted him. He was trying to dodge past an entryway, trying to hide, but he wasn’t quick enough to avoid her.

Master Gilbur’s original glass had been destroyed by the champion, of course: this mirror was Geraden’s copy. Because it was covered, she couldn’t see what scene it showed.

“Geraden!” she whispered. She was afraid to shout. “It’s me. Terisa.”

After a moment, he came out of hiding to confront her.

He had become a different person. His face was iron; his eyes were steel. He spoke as if he could call up authority against her at any time.

“Have you come to persuade me to surrender?”

“No.” She could hardly force out words. Something inside her was breaking. “He told me to help you.”

“He?”

“Master Quillon.”

“He should have come himself.”

The sound of a door echoed faintly through the rooms. Terisa heard a distant murmur of voices.

“If you are an Imager, my lady,” Geraden went on, “you may be able to help me. Otherwise, I have no escape.”

“You know I’m not an Imager.” Oh, my love! “What was Nyle going to say about you?”

He looked unreachable – too hard and inhuman to be touched. Yet something in her voice or her face or the way she stood must have penetrated him. His defenses cracked.

“Nothing,” he said as if he had arrived without transition on the verge of tears. “Nothing at all. It’s a trick. Something Master Eremis cooked up against me.

“Terisa, I did not kill my brother.”

She heard Castellan Lebbick clearly. “Spread out! He’s got to be in here. I want him alive.”

“I’m not an Imager!” she cried. “I can’t help you!”

In misery, she flung her arms around Geraden’s neck.

He clung to her until they both heard the sound of hard boots approaching them from one of the other rooms. At once, they sprang apart.

He had become iron again.

Without hesitation, he turned to the mirror and swept off its cover.

The glass showed the bitter alien landscape where the champion and his men had failed.

“No, Geraden!” she gasped. “You’ll be lost! You’ll never get back.”

He didn’t heed her. “As soon as I am translated, my lady,” he said as if she were a stranger, “please shift the focus of the mirror. If I am visible in the Image, I will be pursued.”

He said something she didn’t understand. His fingers stroked the wooden frame in parting; his hands made a gesture of farewell.

Then he stepped into the mirror and left her alone.

But he didn’t appear in the Image.

She searched the scene feverishly: there was no sign of him. Once again, his glass had performed an impossible translation. It had taken him to a place it didn’t show.

This time, however, no one was holding on to his foot. He had no way to come back. He was gone completely.

Castellan Lebbick came upon her so suddenly that she would have wailed if she hadn’t been in such dismay.

He looked around the room, peered into the glass. Then he put his hands on her arms and ground his fingers into her weak flesh. A ferocious triumph burned in his face.

“Now you’ve done it, woman,” he said almost cheerfully. “You’ve done something so vile that nobody is going to protect you. You’ve helped a murderer escape.”

She should have said something to defend herself. A denial would have cost Geraden nothing. He was beyond harm. But she only held her head up and met the Castellan’s flagrant gaze as well as she could with her own distress and didn’t speak.

“Now,” he said through his teeth, “you are mine.”

This is the end of

THE MIRROR OF HER DREAMS.

Mordant’s Need concludes in the next volume,

A MAN RIDES THROUGH.

Born in 1947 in Cleveland, Ohio, Stephen R. Donaldson made his publishing debut with the first Covenant Trilogy in 1977. Shortly thereafter, he was named Best New Writer of the Year and given the prestigious John W. Campbell Award. He graduated from the College of Wooster (Ohio) in 1968, served two years as a conscientious objector doing hospital work in Akron, then attended Kent State University, where he received his M.A. in English in 1971. Donaldson now lives in New Mexico.