Free A Man Rides Through by Stephen Donaldson Page A

Ribuld, the coarse veteran who had fought for Terisa more than once? He was only a guard—not even a captain.
     
    She couldn't lift the whole weight of Mordant's need by herself. She was hardly able to lift her head off the lumpy pallet which served as her mattress. The Tor had seen Nyle's body. Geraden's brother was unquestionably dead.
     
    Why should she bother to eat? What was the point?
     
    Maybe if she got hungry enough, she would regain the ability to let go of her own existence.
     
    She tried to sleep—tried to relax so that the tension and reality would flow out of her muscles—but another set of boots stumbled toward her down the corridor. Just one: someone was coming in her direction alone. A slow, limping stride, hesitant or frail. Deliberately, she closed her eyes again. She didn't want to know who it was. She didn't want to be distracted.
     
    For the first time, he called her by her name.
     
    "Terisa."
     
    It wasn't a good omen.
     
    Startled, she raised her head and saw Geraden's brother at the door of her cell.
     
    "Artagel?"
     
    He wore a nightshirt and breeches—clothes which seemed to increase his family resemblance to Geraden and Nyle because they weren't right for a swordsman. His dress and his way of standing as if someone had just stuck a knife in his side made it clear that he was still supposed to be in bed. He had been too weak yesterday— was it really only yesterday?—to support Geraden in front of the Congery. Obviously, he was too weak to walk around in the dungeon alone today.
     
    Yet he was here.
     
    It was definitely not a good omen that he had called her Terisa.
     
    Forgetting her own lack of strength, she swung her legs off the cot and went toward him. "Oh, Artagel, I'm so glad to see you, I'm in so much trouble, I need you, I need a friend, Artagel, they think Geraden killed Nyle, they—"
     
    His pallor stopped her. The sweat of strain on his forehead and the tremor of pain in his mouth stopped her. His eyes were glazed, as if he were about to lose consciousness. Gart, the High King's Monomach, had wounded him severely, and he drove himself into relapses by struggling out of bed when he should have been resting. The fact that Gart had beaten him; Nyle's treasonous alliance with Prince Kragen and the lady Elega; the accusations against Geraden: things like that tormented the Domne's most famous son, goading him to fight his weakness—and his recovery.
     
    "Artagel," she groaned, "you shouldn't be here. You should be in bed. You're making yourself sick again."
     
    "No." The word came out like a gurgle. With one arm, he clamped his other hand against his side. "No." Because he was too sick to remain standing without help, he leaned on the door, pressing his forehead against the bars. The dullness in his eyes made him look like he was going blind. "This is your doing."
     
    She halted: pain went through her like a burn. "Artagel?" There were, after all, more kinds of pain in the world than she would ever have guessed. Except for Geraden, Artagel was the best friend she had. She would have trusted him without question. "You don't mean that." He thought she was responsible? "You can't."
     
    "I didn't mean to say it." He was having trouble with his respiration. His breath seemed to struggle past an obstruction in his chest. "That isn't why I'm here. Lebbick is going to take care of you. I just want to know where Geraden is.
     
    "I'm going to hunt him down and cut his heart out."
     
    Suddenly, she was filled with a desire to wail or weep. It would have done her good to cry out. But this was too important. Somehow, she kept her cry down. Panting because the cell was too small and if she didn't get more air soon she was going to fail, she protested, "No. Eremis did this. It's a trick. I tell you, it's a trick. The Tor says he's seen the body and Nyle is really dead, but I don't believe it. Geraden didn't have anything to do with this."
     
    "Ah!" Artagel gasped as if he were