Larry said, “Would it profit anything to deny it?”
“Very little.” Behind the mask, Larry felt Cyrillon’s eyes sharp on him.
“What do you want with me?”
“Not your death, unless”—the cruel lips hardened—“you make it necessary. A pawn you are, son of Alton, and of value to us, but a time could come—never doubt it—where your death would be wiser than your life in our hands. So don’t build too heavily on your safety, chiyu, or think that you can make whatever move you please and that we won’t dare to kill you for it.”
He regarded Larry for a long moment, with eyes so grim that Larry flinched. He was cold with terror; he felt like breaking down, shrieking out the mistake they were making.
At last Cyrillon released his eyes. “We have a long way to ride, in rough country. You will come with us, or be carried like a bundle of blankets. But on the roads we will travel, men need their limbs, their wits, and the use of their eyes. The passes are not easy even for free men. If I leave you free, and give you the use of all three, will you pledge me your honor as comyn to make no attempt to escape?”
It occurred to Larry that a promise made under threats was no honorable promise, and involved nothing. He would, doubtless, save himself a lot of trouble by giving his parole. He wavered a moment; then, clearly as sight, he seemed to see the face of Kennard—stern, with boyish pride and the severe Darkovan concept of honor. Could a Terran do anything less? That pride stiffened his voice as he resolved to play his part.
“A pledge of honor to a thief and an outlaw? A man who” —again his thoughts raced, remembering stories Valdir had told about the codes of battle—“a man who carries away his enemy’s son muffled in a cloak, rather than cutting him down openly in fair fight?”
He hesitated, then the words came to him, almost as if he heard Valdir’s self speak them. “You who break laws of the road and the laws of war have no right to exchange words of honor with honorable men. I will speak to you as an equal only with the sword. Since you are without honor, I will not soil even my bare word. If you want me to go anywhere, you will have to take me by force, because I will not willingly go one step in the company of renegades and outlaws!”
Breathless, he fell silent. Cyrillon regarded him in deadly silence, his lips set and menacing, for so long that Larry quailed, and it was all he could do to keep his face impassive. Why had he burst out like that? What nonsensical impulse to play the part of an Alton had impelled those words? They had rushed out without his conscious control; without even a second thought! It might have been wiser not to enrage the outlaw.
And enrage him he had; Cyrillon’s odd hands were clenched on his knife-hilt till the knuckles stood out, white and round; but he spoke quietly.
“Fine words, my boy. See, then, that you do not whimper at their results. Tie him, Kyro, and make a good job of it this time,” he said to someone behind Larry.
The man cut the cords on Larry’s wrists, then pulled his hands forward. He tied them together with a thick wool scarf which he took from his own throat; then the wool padding was crossed with tight leather thongs which, without the padding, would have bitten deep into his flesh. They left his feet free, but passed a rope about his waist, securing it by a long loop to the saddle of his captor. Then the man took water and wet the leather knots. Cyrillon watched these proceedings grimly and, at last, said, “I speak these orders in your presence, Alton, so that you will know what to expect. I do not want you killed; you are more useful to me alive. Just the same, Kyro, if he tries to run from the path, cut the sinew in one of his legs. If he tries to drag and hamper our climbing, once we get on the mountain, cut his throat right away. And if he makes any disturbance whatsoever as we go along the Devil’s Shelf, cut the rope and let him drop down into the abyss, and good riddance to him.”
Larry felt his heart suck and turn over; but although his cheeks blanched, his eyes did not falter, and, at last, Cyrillon said, “Good. We understand one another.” He turned to mount, and Larry, somehow, sensed that he was disappointed.
He wanted me to be frightened and plead with him. He would get some kind of satisfaction out of seeing an Alton pleading—with him! How did I know that?
The man who had him captive lifted Larry to the back of his horse.
“For the moment we can ride,” he said, grimly. He looked ill-pleased. “Don’t give me any trouble, lad; I have no stomach for torturing even a whelp of the Hali-imyn. Never doubt he means what he says, either.”
The other bandits were mounting. Larry, stiff and cold and frightened, looked up at the high wall of mountains that rose ahead.
And yet, for all his fear, a curious and unquenchable pulse of excitement and curiosity beat within him. He had wanted to see the strange and exciting life of the alien world— and here at the foot of the strange mountains, under a strange sun, he was seeing it undiluted. Even with Kennard, there had been the sense that somehow everything was a little different, because he was Terran, because he was alien.
He realized that he had really no grounds for even the slight optimism he felt. For all he knew, Valdir and Kennard, and all their companions, might be lying dead in the valley where they had been ambushed. He was being taken—alone, unarmed, a prisoner, an alien—into some of the wildest and most dangerous and impassable country on Darkover.
Yet the indefinite lift of optimism remained. He was alive and unhurt—and almost anything could happen next.
* * *
VIII
« ^ »
LARRY WAS DREAMING.
In his dream he was back on Earth, and Darkover was still a faraway, romantic dream. He was on a camping trip, sleeping out in an old forest (or why would he be so cold, with the cold dampness of rain in all his bones?).
Then, through the dream, there was a faint blue glimmer, and an urgent voice speaking. Where are you? Where are you? We’ve been close enough for a long enough time, that if I can pick you up I can follow you and find you. But don’t let them know you’re Terran…
Half impatiently he tried to shut the urgent voice away, to recapture the peaceful dream. He was back in the Terran Zone; in a little while his father would come in and waken him… Someone had left the air-conditioning turned up to maximum; it was cold in here, colder than even the Darkovan night… and what was the matter with his arm? Why was his bed so cold, had he fallen asleep on the floor? With a little groan, he rolled over, his eyes blinked open and he was back in the terrible present. He squeezed his eyes shut again, with a spasm of despair. He was in the mountain fort of the bandits, and he was very helplessly a captive and alone, and although during the day he could keep up some hope, just now he was only a frightened boy, frightened in a strange world.
His left arm had been cruelly forced backward and strapped behind his back, the left hand at the shoulder-blade, in a sort of leather harness. The fingers had long ago gone numb. The first night of his capture, the man who had carried him along the mountain trail had lifted him—numb and helpless—from the saddle, and brought him to their fire; he had, half pityingly, thrown a blanket across him, and cut the thongs on his wrist so that he could eat. Then the masked man had given orders, and two of the men had brought the leather harness. They had begin to tie his right hand behind his back when Cyrillon, whose cold eyes seemed to be everywhere at once, said harshly, “Are you blind? The little bre’suin is left-handed.”
They had not been gentle, but he had not tried to fight or struggle; the fear was still on him, but he would not give them the satisfaction of pleading. Only once, in despair, had he thought of the last resort—telling them he was not their coveted hostage—
But then what? They probably wouldn’t even bother with a prisoner of no importance; they might even kill him out of hand. And he did not want to die; although now, cold, wretched and in pain, he thought it might be rather nice to be dead.
He turned over, painfully, and looked about his prison.
A grim, pale light was sneaking its way
through windows curtained roughly with threadbare tapestry, and shuttered with nailed boards. The room was spacious, with worm-eaten paneling, the hangings musty with age. The bed on which he lay was large and elaborate, but there were neither bed-coverings nor sheets; only an old horsehair mattress and a couple of fur rugs. The other furniture in the chamber was rickety and depressing, but he supposed he was lucky that he wasn’t in a dirty dungeon somewhere; his brief glimpse of the outside of the fort looked as if there were dungeons aplenty beneath the grim stone walls.
He had not, so far, been harmed. He had, such as it was, the freedom of this room. He could feed himself after a fashion with his right hand, but he had never realized how helpless anyone was with only one arm; he could not even balance properly when he walked. Morning and night they brought him food; a sort of coarse bread stuffed with nuts, a rough porridge of some unknown cereal, strips of rather good meat, some anonymous soapy-tasting stuff that he supposed was a form of cheese.
Now he sat up, hearing steps in the hall. It might have been someone with his breakfast, but he recognized the heavy, uneven tread of Cyrillon des Trailles. Cyrillon had visited him only once before, to inspect, briefly, the contents of his pockets.
“No weapons,” the man Kyro had told him, holding up the things Larry had carried. Cyrillion turned them over. At the Terran medical kit he frowned curiously, then tossed it into a corner; Larry’s mechanical pencil he tested with a fingertip, thrust into his own pocket. The other items he looked at briefly and dumped beside the Terran boy; a few small coins, a crumpled handkerchief, a small notebook. Larry’s folded pocketknife he looked at curiously, asked, “What’s this?”
Larry opened it, then mentally kicked himself; he might have been able to use the knife somehow, even though the main blade was broken off—he used it mostly for cutting string or building models. It had a corkscrew, a magnetized smaller blade and a hook for opening food cartons, too.
Kyro said, “A knife? You won’t want to leave him that!”
Cyrillon shrugged contemptuously. “With a blade not as long as my little finger? Much good may it do him!” He dropped it with the other oddments. “I only wanted to know if he had any of the Comyn weapons.” He had laughed loudly, and walked out of the room, and Larry had not seen him again until, this morning, he heard his heavy tread.
He felt a childish impulse to crawl under the bed and hide; but he mastered it, and got shakily to his feet. Three men entered, followed in a moment by Cyrillon, still masked.
Larry had realized, by now, that for all his contempt, Cyrillon treated him with a respect that verged on wariness. Larry couldn’t quite figure out why. Cyrillon stood back from the bed, now, as he ordered, “Get up and come with us, Alton.”
Larry rose meekly and obeyed. He had sense enough to know that any gesture of defiance wouldn’t help anything— except his pride—and might bring more abusive treatment. He might as well save his strength until he could do something really effective.
They conducted him to a room where there was a fire, and Larry’s shivering became so intense that Cyrillon, with a gesture of contempt, motioned him to the fireplace. “These Comyn brats are all soft… warm yourself, then.”
When he was warmed through, Cyrillon gestured him to sit on a bench. From a leather pouch Cyrillon drew something wrapped in a cloth. He glanced at Larry, curling his lip.
“I hardly dare to hope you will make this easy for me— or for yourself, young Alton.”
He took from the cloth a jewel stone that flashed blue—a stone, Larry realized abruptly, of the same strange kind Kennard had shown him. This one was set into a ring of gold, with two handles on either side.
“I require you to look into this for me,” Cyrillon said, “and if you find it easier to your pride, you may tell your people, afterward, that you did so under the threat of having your throat cut.”
He laughed, that horrible raucous laughter that was like the screaming of some bird of prey.
Did Cyrillon expect him to demonstrate some psi power? Larry felt a pang of fright. His impersonation of a Darkovan must certainly fail, now. He felt his hand tremble as Cyrillon put the stone into it. He raised his eyes…
Blinding pain thrust through his head and eyes; he squeezed them shut spasmodically against the unbearable sense of twisting … of looking at something that should not exist in normal space at all. He felt sick. When he opened his eyes, Cyrillon was looking at him in grim satisfaction.
“So. You have the sight but are not used to stones of such power. Look again.”
Larry, eyes averted, shook his head in refusal.
Cyrillon rose; every movement instinct with menace. Quite calmly, without raising his voice, he said, “Oh, yes you will.” He gripped Larry’s bound arm, somehow exerting a pressure that made red-hot wires run through the injured shoulder. “Won’t you?”
Half senseless, Larry slumped forward on the bench. The stone rolled from his lax hand and he felt himself sinking beneath a warm, dark and somehow pleasant unconsciousness.
“Very well,” said Cyrillon, very far away, “give him some kirian.”
“Too dangerous,” protested one of the men. “If he has the power of some of the Altons…”
Cyrillon said impatiently, “Didn’t you see him turn sick at the sight of the stone? He hasn’t any power yet! We’ll chance it.”
Larry felt one of the men seize his head, force it backward; the other was, with great care, uncapping a small vial from which rose strange colorless fumes. Larry, remembering Valdir’s probing of the dying Ranger—what had he done?—jerked his head back, struggling madly; but the man who held him pressed his thumbs on Larry’s jaw, forcing it open, and the other emptied the vial into his mouth.
He struggled, expecting heat, acid, fumes, but to his surprise the liquid, though bitterly cold, was almost tasteless.
Almost before it touched his tongue, it seemed to evaporate. The sensation was intensely unpleasant, as if some strange gas were exploding in his head; his sight blurred, steadied. Cyrillon held the stone before his eyes; he realized, to his sick relief, that it was now only a blue glare, with none of the sickening twisting.
Cyrillon watched, intently.
Like shadows moving in the blue glare, forms became clear to Larry. A group of men rode past, Valdir’s tall form clearly recognizable, a pair of curiously configured hills behind them. This faded, blurred into the face of Lorill Hastur, shrouded in a gray hood, and behind it Larry dreamily recognized the outline of the spaceport HQ building. He saw blurs again, then a small sturdy figure on a gray horse, bent low and racing against the wind, gradually cleared before his eyes…
Larry suddenly became aware of what was happening. Somehow, through this magical stone, he was seeing pictures and they were being transmitted to Cyrillon des Trailles —why, why? Was he trying to spy through Larry on the people of the valleys? With a cry, Larry threw his arm over his eyes and saw the pictures thin out, blur and dissolve. A blind fury surged up in him at the cruel man who was using him this way—using, he thought, Kennard Alton against his own people—and such a flare of hatred as he had never felt for a living being. He would like to blast him down…
And as the wrath surged up high and red, Cyrillon des Trailles drew a gasping breath of agony, dashed the crystal out of his hand and, with agonized force, struck Larry across the face. Larry fell, heavily, to the floor, and Cyrillon, doubled over in anguish, aimed a kick at him, missed and sank weakly to the bench.
One of the men said, “I warned you not to give him kirian. You gave him too much.”
Cyrillon said, his voice still thick, “I guessed better than I knew… the accursed race have whelped a throwback! The youngster didn’t even know what he was doing! If I had one or two of that kind in my hands, the whole cursed race of Cassilda would flee back to their lake-bottoms, and the Golden-Chained one would reign again! Zandru, what we could do with one of them on our side!”
The other man said, “We ought to kill hi
m out of hand, before they find some way to use him against us!”
“Not yet,” said Cyrillon. “I wonder how old he is? He looks a child, but all those lowland brats are soft.”
One of the men guffawed. “He seemed not so soft a moment ago, when he had you yelping like a scalded cat!”
Cyrillon said, very softly, “If he were really as young as he looks, I’d guarantee to—re-educate him in my own way. I may try, at any rate. I can bear more than that,” he added with gentle menace, “until he learns to—control his powers.”
Larry, lying on the floor very still and hoping they had forgotten him, struggled with puzzlement greater than fear. Had he done that? If so, how? He had none of these Darkovan powers!
One of the men bent. Not gently, he lifted Larry to his feet. Cyrillon said, “Well, Kennard Alton, I warn you fairly not to try that trick again. Perhaps it was sheer reflex and you do not know your own powers. If that is true, I warn you, you had better learn control. The next time I will kick your ribs through your backbone. Now—look into the stone!”
The blue glare blinded his eyes. Then, crystal bright, intense, there were figures and forms he could not interpret, coming and going… How was Cyrillon doing this? Or was he simply being hypnotized?
The blueness suddenly flared again. Inside his mind, in a sudden blaze, the voice of his dream spoke, I’ve blanked it. He’s no telepath and he doesn’t dare force you. Don’t be afraid; he can’t read what you’re getting now—but I can’t hold this for long… It’s not hopeless yet…
Kennard?
Larry thought, I’m going out of my mind…
The blue glare spread, became unbearable. He heard Cyrillon snarl something—a threat?—but he saw nothing but that fearful blue.
With utter, absolute relief, for the first time in his life, Larry Montray fainted.
* * *
IX
« ^ »
DAY FOLLOWED slow day, in the room where Larry was imprisoned; gradually, his original optimism dimmed out and faded. He was here, and there was no way to tell whether or not he would ever leave the place. He now knew he was being held as a hostage against Valdir Alton. From scraps of information he had wormed out of his jailer, he had put together the situation. Cyrillon and others of his kind had preyed on the lower lands since time out of mind. Valdir had been the first to organize the lowlanders in resistance, to build the Ranger stations which warned of impending raids, and this struck Cyrillon, unreasonably enough, as unfair. It ran clear against the time-honored Darkovan code, that each man shall defend his own belongings. By holding Valdir’s son prisoner, he hoped to stalemate this move, and ward off retaliations.