And King Joyse peered at her with an intent interest that made everything worse. “Is this correct, my lady?” he asked as if she had just claimed to be some kind of exotic insect. “The story is told that an Imager once chanced to form a flat mirror which showed the exact spot on which he stood. Therefore he saw himself in the glass – and was immediately canceled. His body remained where it was until its balance failed, but his spirit had entirely ceased to exist. It was lost in translation. How do the people of your world avoid this fate?”
Groping for sense, she countered, “That’s impossible. Mirrors can’t hurt anybody. They just show you what you look like. Except reversed. Like a pool of water. Haven’t you ever looked at yourself in a pool of water?”
Both men studied her oddly. In a soft, musing tone, King Joyse said, “We’re taught from childhood to be wary of Images. We don’t seek them out.”
Without any particular forewarning, Adept Havelock pounded his fist on the table, then picked up the checkerboard and threw it at the ceiling. The checkers made a sound like wooden rain against the granite of the ceiling and fell back to bounce noiselessly in the blue-and-red rug.
Tottering to his feet, the old Imager roared, “Horror and ballocks!” His eyes squinted ferociously at both the King and Geraden; patches of scarlet burned on his face; his fat lips shook like wattles. “She’s a woman!” He struck a wild gesture in her direction with the back of his hand. “Are you and every man jack feeble-wit Imager of the Congery blind? She is female, fe-fe-fe-male.” Saliva sprayed from his mouth. “Oh, my groin!”
Because she didn’t know what else to do, Terisa stood and stared at him.
“Look at you!” Still using the back of his hand, he hit King Joyse across the chest – a blow which was more dramatic in intention than in effect. “And you!” With his other hand, he struck Geraden. “Or here!” Awkwardly but quickly, he bobbed toward the floor like a poorly constructed rooster, then pulled himself erect. “And here!” Another bob. “And here!” Each time he stood upright again, he brandished a checker in his open palm. “All men, every one! Every one of them!”
But when his hand was full of checkers, he flung them down again. “By the hoary goat of the arch-Imager,” he shouted as if the three people in front of him had insulted him beyond mortal endurance, “she is a woman!”
Moving with an attempt at vehemence which his frail limbs couldn’t support, he stamped/shuffled to the outer door of the chamber, jerked it open, and slammed it shut again without leaving. Then, somewhat unsteadily, he retrieved the checkerboard from the floor and set it squarely on the table. Oblivious to everyone else, he took his seat and began to study the empty board as if an intense game were in progress.
King Joyse sighed delicately.
Geraden said, “I’m sorry.”
Terisa wasn’t quite sure why. Her heart pounded as if she had somehow escaped a crisis.
“No matter, my boy,” replied the King, patting Geraden’s shoulder absentmindedly, as though the Apt had in fact committed some minor offense. For a moment, his gaze seemed to swim out of focus while he thought about something – or perhaps he was simply taking a quick nap on his feet. Then he nodded to himself. Smiling irrelevantly in Terisa’s direction, he said, “Geraden, it occurs to me to be surprised that the Congery released the lady Terisa in your company. She is here by Imagery – and some of the Masters, I know, are jealous. Also, I suspect that they would always prefer to keep what they do secret from me. Yet here you are. How do you account for that?”
Geraden made an effort to look at the King squarely; but his discomfiture was too strong for him.
“Did you tell the Masters that she may be a Master herself?”
The Apt swallowed thickly. “No.”
“Ah,” King Joyse said mildly. “That explains it, then. Of course they let her go, thinking her to be just another of your mishaps. But why didn’t you tell them?”
A slow flush spread over Geraden’s face. Muscles knotted in his forehead. His embarrassment was so acute that it nearly brought tears to Terisa’s eyes. But he clamped his jaws shut and didn’t answer.
“My boy, that may have been foolish.” The King’s hand still held Geraden’s shoulder; his expression was kind. “You’ve been trying for – what is it now? ten years? – to become an Imager, a member of the Congery. How can you hope to succeed, if you risk angering the very men who control the knowledge, skill, and position you crave?”
“My lord King.” Geraden forced himself to let the King see the sharp pain in his eyes; and a sudden dignity came to him. “If I had told them, they would have commanded me to keep all this secret from you. Then I would have been compelled to disobey them directly—and my hope of a chasuble would be lost forever.” There was an undercurrent of bitterness in his voice. “I can’t bear disloyalty to the King of Mordant. I can’t give up my dreams. So I act like a fool. They’ll believe I didn’t notice her mirrors—or didn’t understand the significance of what I saw.”
In response, another of the smiles that had first touched Terisa’s heart lit the King’s face. For a moment, his age, weakness, and uncertainty fell away, and he became simply happy.
“Thank you, Geraden. It pleases me to see such loyalty, especially in a son of my old friend the Domne. I’ll try to arrange that you don’t suffer for it.
“Now” – his expression grew thoughtful – “let us consider. How best to do it?
“Tell me.” Slowly, he lowered himself back into his chair across the table from Havelock. His robe settled about him like a tent with the ridgepole cut. “How did the Masters react to the lady Terisa of Morgan’s arrival?”
Relieved by the King’s attitude, Geraden relaxed visibly. “That’s easy. You could guess all of it if you wanted to. Everyone was astonished when she came out of the glass. Master Gilbur was furious. I’m sure he thinks I’m criminally perverse instead of” – he grimaced –“just unlucky. Master Eremis was, well, amused.”
“Among other things, I don’t doubt,” the King commented. “Master Eremis,” he explained to Terisa, “has an eye for loveliness which never fails him.”
Geraden nodded and went on. “Master Quillon saw her appearance the same way I did, as proof you’ve been right about Imagery all along. But nobody listened to him.
“Master Barsonage made me responsible for her. He told me to give her all the hospitality and courtesy of Orison. But he told me not to answer any of her questions. Here she is, taken out of her own world for no reason except because I asked her to come, and put down in a place she has no way to understand, and he commanded me not to give her the simple decency of an explanation.”
Terisa hardly heard him. She was wondering, Is that why he looked at me, looked at me as if I were real? The idea was so new that it seemed to be full of mysterious importance. Did he think I was lovely? Do you think I’m lovely? Is that possible?
“Unless, of course,” the King returned quietly, “she is a Master Imager and had already chosen us before you met her.”
Geraden scowled. “What difference does that make? Haven’t I been saying all along I think she’s an Imager? She still deserves –”
“No.” King Joyse’s tone was mild and certain. “You make an assumption which may be unjustified.
“Master Barsonage’s command was not unreasonable. When the Alend Monarch sends his ambassador to negotiate our treaties, and to probe my intentions, he understands much of his world and much of my own. We have that in common. Yet I do not make him privy to everything I know or think or hope, neither for policy nor for courtesy. I do not invite him into the secret places of Orison, or into the secret places of my heart. To do so would be dangerous – too dangerous for any responsible justification. Not knowing his secrets, I could not predict or control the use he made of mine. Still less would I answer any questions which an ambassador from the High King of Cadwal might venture to ask.