In any case, it seemed that at the moment the matter was not imminent, and Melitta was relieved. It might have been entirely too uncanny; like lying with a ghost, she thought, and slept.
It was still dark when Storn’s hand on her shoulder roused her, and when they saddled their horses and began to ride down the dark mountain path, they rode through still-heavy sleet which only after an hour or more of riding turned into the light rain which presaged dawn at this latitude and season. Melitta, cold and shivering, and even a little resentful, did not protest; she simply wrapped her cloak over her face as they rode. Storn turned into an inordinately steep and forsaken path, dismounted and led her horse along the slippery path through the trees until it was safe to ride again. She was thinking, If it is Comyn on our trail, we may not be able to lose them. But if not, perhaps we can shake off our followers.
“And we may gain two or three days ride on them this way, if they are not accustomed to the mountain roads—they or their horses,” Storn said, out of nothing, and Melitta understood.
All that day and the next they rode through steeper and steeper mountain paths, with storms gathering over the heights, and at night they were too exhausted to do more than swallow a few mouthfuls of food and roll, half asleep already, into their blankets. On the morning of the third day after they had first sensed that they were followed, Melitta woke without any uneasy sense of a presence overshadowing their moves, and sensed that they had lost their followers, at least for the moment.
“We should reach Aldaran today,” said Storn, as they saddled, “and if what I’ve heard is true, perhaps even the Comyn don’t care to come this far into the hills. They may be sacrosanct in the lowlands, but not here.”
As soon as the mist cleared they sighted the castle from a peak, a gray and craggy height enfolded and half invisible in the hills; but it took them the rest of the day to approach the foot of the mountain on which it stood, and as they turned into the road— well-travelled and strongly surfaced—which led upward to the castle, they were intercepted by two cloaked men. They were asked their business with the utmost courtesy but nevertheless entreated to remain until the Lord of Aldaran knew of their coming, with so much insistence that neither Storn nor Melitta wanted to protest.
“Inform the Lord of Aldaran,” said Storn, his voice sounding gray with weariness, “that his far kinsmen of Storn, at High Windward, seek shelter, counsel and hospitality. We have ridden far and are weary and call on him in the name of kin to give us rest here.”
“Rest in safety is yours at the asking,” said the man with exquisite courtesy, and Melitta sighed relief; they were among people of familiar ways. “Will you wait in the gate house, my lord and damisela? I will have your horses looked to. I cannot disturb the Lord of Aldaran without his consent, but if you are his kinfolk, I am sure you need not wait long. I am at your service, and there is food for all travellers if you are in need of it.”
Waiting in the bare, small gate house, Storn smiled briefly at Melitta; “Aldaran keeps the old ways of courtesy to strangers, whatever else may have befallen his household.”
In an almost unbelievably brief time (Storn wondered if some signaling device had been used, for there hardly seemed time for a messenger to come and go to the castle on the heights) the guard returned: “The Lady Desideria bids me conduct you to the main house and make you welcome, Lord and Lady; and when you are rested and refreshed she will receive you.”
Storn murmured to Melitta, as they climbed the path and the steps leading upward, “I have no idea who the Lady Desideria is. Old Kermiac would hardly have married; I suspect it is one of his son’s wives.”
But the young woman who greeted them was no man’s wife. She could hardly have been more than fifteen years old. She was a striking red-haired beauty whose poise and self-confidence made Melitta feel shy, countrified, and ill at ease.
“I am Desideria Leynier,” she said. “My foster mother and my guardian are not at home; they will return tomorrow and give you a proper welcome.” She came and took Melitta’s hands in her own, searching her face with gentle eyes.“Poor child, you look tired almost to death; a night’s sleep before you face your hosts will do you good; and you too, Master, you must rest and not stand on ceremony. The Storns are unknown to me but not to my household. I give you welcome.”
Storn returned thanks, but Melitta was not listening to the formal words. In the presence of this queerly self-possessed child, she sensed something more than poise; an awareness, an inner strength, and the touch of an uncannily developed sensitivity, so far beyond her own as to make her feel like a child. She made a deep reverence. “Vai leronis,” she whispered, using the ancient word for a sorceress wise in the old skills.
Desideria smiled merrily. “Why, no,” she said. “Only one, perhaps, who has a little knowledge of the old crafts—and if I read rightly, child, you are no stranger to them! But we can talk of that another time, I wished only to give you welcome in my foster parents’ name.” She summoned a servant to conduct them, and herself went before them along the long halls. It was evidently a busy hour before the evening meal; people went back and forth in the halls, including some tall thin men whose presence and careless regard made Storn draw breath and clamp his fingers hard on Melitta’s arm.
“There are Terrans here—this deep in the mountains,” he whispered, “what in the name of Zandru’s hells is going on here at Aldaran? Have we walked from the trap to the cook pot? I would not believe that any Terran alive had ever come into these mountains. And the girl is a telepath—Melitta, keep your wits about you!”
Desideria turned Storn over to a servant and conducted Melitta into a small room at the top of a tower, one of four tiny pie-shaped rooms on that level. “I am sorry the accommodations are not more luxurious,” she apologized, “but there are a great many of us here. I will send you wash water, and a maid to dress you, and although you would be more than welcome in the hall, child, I think you would be better to have dinner here in your room, and go to bed at once; without rest you will be ill.”
Melitta agreed gratefully, glad that she need not face so many strangers tonight. Desideria said, “He is a strange man—your brother,” but the words held no hint of a prying question. She pressed Melitta’s hands and kissed her cheek. “Now rest well,” she said in that oddly adult way, “and don’t be afraid of anything. My sister and I are near you in the rooms across the hallway.” She went away. Left alone, Melitta took off her dirty and cold riding clothes and gratefully accepted the services of the quiet, incurious maid who came to wait on her. After bathing and eating the light, delicious food brought to her, she lay down in the soft bed and for the first time since the alarm bell had pealed Brynat’s presence at the walls of Storn, she felt she could sleep in peace. They were safe.
Where is Storn? Is he, too, enjoying the luxury of safety and rest? Surely he must be mistaken about Terrans here. And it’s surely strange—to find a vai leronis deep in the mountains.
* * *
XII
« ^ »
STORN WOKE in the early light, and for a few minutes had no notion of where he might be. Around him were unfamiliar airs and voices, and he lay with his eyes closed, trying to orient himself, hearing footsteps ringing on stone, the sound of animals calling out for food, and strange voices rising and falling. They were peaceful morning sounds, not the sounds of a home in the hands of conquerors, and then memory flooded back and he knew he was in Castle Aldaran. He opened his eyes.
A curious apprehension lay on him, he did not know why. He began to wonder how long he could keep the upper hands over Barron—if it would be long enough to carry through his aims before he lost hold and found himself back in his own body, lying helpless in trance, guarded against personal attack, but still unable to do anything for his family and his people. If that happened, he had no illusions about what would happen, sooner or later. Barron would go his own way, confused by a period of amnesia or perhaps false memories—Storn really did not
know what happened to a man in Barron’s position—and Melitta would be left alone without anyone. He would never know what happened to her in that case, he supposed.
And he did not want to return to his own body, blinded and helplessly imprisoned. If he did, what would happen to Barron, an Earthman alone in these strange mountains? For the very sake of his victim, he must maintain hold at all costs.
If there were Terrans at Castle Aldaran, what could it mean? Sick with unanswered and unanswerable questions, he flung back the covers and went to the window. Whatever happened in the end, he would enjoy these few days of sight out of a lifetime in darkness. Even if these days were his last.
From the window he looked down at the commotion in the courtyard. Men were going to and fro with an indefinable sense of purposiveness; there were Terrans among them, a few even in the leather dress of the spaceports—how do I know that when I see it, never having been there?—and after he had watched a while there was a stir among the men. One man and two uniformed attendants rode through the gate.
The man was tall, dark-bearded, well past middle age, and had an air of authority which reminded Storn vaguely of Valdir, although this man was clearly one of the mountain people. Storn realized from the hubbub surrounding him that he must be looking down at the arrival of the Lord of Aldaran. In a few hours he must face this man and ask for his help. Deep depression lay on Storn, for no discernible reason. Could even a whole army, if Aldaran were willing to put it at his disposal (and why should he?) dislodge Brynat? Storn Castle had been besieged before and it had never even been necessary to defend it. Now that Brynat holds it, could anyone retake it? Army? We would need a god.
The scene below melted away and Storn seemed to see within himself the great chained shape of Sharra, flame-crowned, golden-chained, beautiful and awesome. It was the vision he had seen when he lay helpless and blind behind the magnetic force-field at
Storn Castle, his body tranced, his mind free ranging time and space in search of help from somewhere.
Sharra again! What does the vision mean?
Melitta came for him late in the forenoon with Desideria, who told them that her guardian was ready to receive them. As he followed the girls down the long corridors, stairs and hallways, Storn was quietly evaluating the poise, the strength and the obvious telepathic awareness of this very young girl, and coming up with a disquieting answer. She must be a Keeper—one of the young girls trained from infancy to work with the old matrix crystals and screens which would have made the few things at Storn Castle look like children’s toys. But, overhearing snatches of conversation between them— Desideria seemed to have taken a fancy to Melitta, and talked to her freely—he gathered that there were four of them. In the old days a matrix circle, isolated from the world and giving all their time to it, had barely managed to train one Keeper in about ten years. If Aldaran had managed to train four in the few years since Storn had been here last, what was going on in this place?
But when he asked her a random question, using the polite form of address, leronis, Desideria gave him a merry smile and shook her head. “No, my friend, I am not a leronis; my guardian does not like the word and its connotations of sorcery. I have been trained in a skill which anyone can learn who is a good telepath, just as anyone who is strong and fit enough can learn hawking or riding. Our world has accepted foolish ideas like sorcery for all too many years. Call me, if you like, a matrix technician. My sisters and I have learned this skill, far better than most; but there is no need to look at me with reverence because I have learned well!”
She went on looking at him with a girlish, ingenuous smile, then suddenly shivered, flushed and dropped her eyes. When she spoke again it was to Melitta, almost pointedly ignoring Storn.
He thought with a certain grimness, Training or not, she is still conventional in the old ways—and I owe my life to that. If she were old enough to look at it that way—a trained telepath of her caliber need only look at me to know what I have done. Only the convention that girls of her age may not initiate any contact with men other than their blood kin, has saved me so far.
The thought was strangely poignant—that this young girl of his mountain people, of his own kind and caste, and trained in all those things which had been the major solace of his life, was so guarded against him—and that he dared not reach out to her, mind or body. He felt as if he could have wept. He set his lips hard and followed the girls. He did not speak again.
Aldaran received them, not in a formal audience chamber but in a small, friendly room low in the castle. He embraced Storn, calling him cousin, kissed Melitta on the forehead with a kinsman’s privilege, offered them wine and sweets, and made them sit beside him; then he asked what had brought them there.
“It is far too long since any of your kinsmen have visited us at Aldaran; you live as isolated at High Windward as eagles in their aerie. It has come to mind in the last year or so that I have neglected kinship’s dues and that I should ride to Storn, there is much astir in the mountains these days, and no one of our people should hold himself aloof too far; our world’s future depends on it. But more of that later, if you are interested. Tell me what brings you to Aldaran, kinsman? How can I help you?”
He listened to their story gravely, with a gradually darkening and distressful face. When they had finished, he spoke with deep regret.
“I am ashamed,” he said, “that I offered you no help before this, to prevent such a thing. For now it has happened, I am powerless to help you. I have kept no fighting men here for more than thirty years, Storn; I have kept peace here and tried to prevent feuds and raids rather than repelling them. We mountain people have been torn by feuds and little wars far too long; we have let ourselves go back to barbarian days.”
“I, too, had no fighting men and wanted peace,” Storn said bitterly, “and all I gained from it was Brynat’s men at my outworks.”
“I have Terran guards here and they are armed with off-world weapons,” Aldaran said. “Would-be invaders knew enough, after a time or two, to let us alone.”
“With—weapons? Force weapons? But what of the Compact?” Melitta gasped in genuine horror. The law which banned, on this world, any weapon beyond the arm’s reach of the wielder, was even more reverenced than the taboo against meddling with the mind. Aldaran said quietly, “That law has delivered us to petty wars, feuds, murders and assassins. We need new laws, not stupid reverence for old ones. I have broken the Darkovan code and as a result, the Hasturs and the Comyn hold my family in horror; but we are at peace here and we have no hooligans at our doors, waiting for an old man to weaken so that he can be challenged and set down as if the stronger swordsman were the better man. The law of brute force means only the rule of the brute.”
“And other worlds, I believe,” Melitta said, “have found that unrestricted changes in weapons leads to an endless race for better and better weapons in a chase to disaster which can destroy not only men, but worlds.”
“That may even be true,” Aldaran said, “and yet look what has happened to Darkover, in the hands of the Terrans? What have we done? We refused their technology, their weapons, we insisted on refusing real contact with them. Since the Years of Chaos, when we lost all of our own technologies except for the few in the hands of the Comyn, we’ve slipped back further and further into barbarism. In the lowlands, the Seven Domains keep their old rule as if no ships had ever put forth into space. And here in the mountains we allow ourselves to be harassed by bandits because we are afraid to fight them. Someone must step beyond this deadlock, and I have tried to do so. I have made a compact with the Terrans; they will teach us their ways and defenses and I will teach them ours. And as a result of a generation of peace and freedom from casual bandits and learning to think as the Terrans think—that everything which happens can and must be explained and measured—I have even rediscovered many of our old Darkovan ways; you need not think we are totally committed to becoming part of Terra. For instance, I have learned how to train telep
aths for matrix work without the old superstitious rituals; none of the Comyn will even try that. And as a result—but enough of that. I can see that you are not in any state to think about abstract ideas of progress, science and culture as yet.”
“But what all this fine-sounding talks means,” said Storn bitterly, “is that my sister and brother, and all my people, must lie at the mercy of bandits because you prefer not to be entangled in feuds.”
“My dear boy!” Aldaran looked aghast. “The gods help me; if I had the means to do so, I would forget my ethics and come to your aid—blood kin is not mountain-berry wine! But I have no fighting men at all, and few weapons, and such as I have could not be moved over the mountains.” Storn was enough of a telepath to know that his distress was very real. Aldaran said, “We live in bad times, Storn; no culture ever changed without people getting hurt, and it is your ill-fortune that you are one of those who are getting hurt in the change. But take heart; you are alive and unhurt, and your sister is here, and believe me, you shall be made welcome here as kin; this is your home, from this very day forth. The gods seize me, if I am not as a father to you both from this moment.”