Sharra's Exile

  A second of terror; something greedy, ravenous, reaching out…

  Then it was gone, or had it ever been there? “Go and tell Lew Alton that he should bring the Sharra matrix here, where it will be safe…there is no time to lose. Perhaps you can help to free him…”

  “I’d be afraid to try,” he said, shaking.

  “But you must not be afraid,” she said, demanding. “If you have such a Gift as that…” and Regis felt she was not seeing him as a human being, not as Regis at all, just as a Gift, a strange and puzzling problem for a matrix technician, something to be solved and unraveled. It troubled him; for a moment he wanted to force her to see him as a human, a man standing before a woman; she was all cool aloofness, the woman in her subdued, her features cold and static, and for an instant Regis remembered the curious stony face that had briefly crossed his mind like a vision in the matrix— Was that Callina too? Which was real? Then, so swiftly he could not be sure of it, it was gone, and Callina was only a frail-looking woman, slender, troubled, in a fuzzy blue robe, looking up at him and pressing her temples with her two hands as if they hurt her.

  She said, “You must go now, but make sure the Sharra matrix is brought here…” and opened the door into the relay chamber. But as they went through, the young girl curled up before the relay screen raised her head and beckoned, and Callina, motioning Regis to go out into the outer chamber, stole on silent feet to her side. After a few minutes she joined him in the outer chamber. Her face was white, and she looked dazed.

  “It is worse than I thought,” she said. “Lilla has had word from the relays— Beltran has set forth. And he is traveling with an escort so great that it could be called an army. He will be here by Festival Night, here at our gates in Thendara. Merciful Avarra,” she whispered, “this will mean war in the Domains! How could Hastur allow this to happen? How could even Merryl do this to me? Does he really hate me that much?”

  And Regis had no answer for her.

  Because there was nothing else to do, he went back to his own rooms, half intending to face his grandfather, to tell him that Derik’s plan had borne unexpected fruit; that it could indeed mean war in the Domains if Callina refused to do their will. But his grandfather’s steward told him that the Regent had gone to confer with the cortes, and Regis set out for the Alton town house. At least he could convey the message that the Sharra matrix would be safer in the Comyn Tower.

  But as he neared the house, he saw a familiar figure in the green and black of the Alton Domain. Lew had changed in the intervening years; Regis had barely recognized him in Council; but his walk was unchanged, and Regis recognized him now, though his back was turned. Regis walked faster to catch up with him, hesitant about reaching out for the old touch of minds.

  But Lew must have sensed a presence behind him, for he turned and waited for Regis to come up with him.

  “Well, Regis, it’s been a long time.”

  “It has, cousin,” said Regis, and took him into a kinsman’s embrace, pressing his cheek to the scarred face. He stood back and smiled. “I was coming to find you, and here you are in my pathway… where are you going so early?”

  “Not as early as all that,” Lew said, looking into the sky with a practiced eye. “Not too early for Dyan to offer me a drink, or for a quarrel—damn him!”

  “Dyan’s not a good man to quarrel with,” said Regis soberly, “How did you get into that?”

  Lew sighed. “I hardly know. Something he said to me—I suppose what he really meant was, go to hell, some version of, you’ve offended me, but it sounded like a declaration of war. I—” he broke off, troubled. “Will you walk with me to my house? I’m uneasy, for no reason at all. But I wanted to talk to you.”

  “And I had a message for you from the leronis,” Regis said. He started to speak, then stopped, overcome by an overpowering conviction that he should not speak that ill-omened name, Sharra, here in the street. That was for privacy, and a well-shielded room. Instead he said, “You should move back into the Comyn Castle, into the Alton suite. It’s expected at Council season, and if you’re actually inhabiting the proper quarters, they’ll have a harder time challenging your rights…”

  “I’ve thought of that,” Lew said, “The Terrans have a saying; possession is nine points of the law. Though I don’t think I have to worry about Jeff, and the main problem may be to get them to accept Marius as my Heir. I don’t know if he’s even had the regular testing when he was thirteen or so— we haven’t had any time to talk about such things.”

  “It may not mean anything,” Regis said, “even if he has; remember, they told me I had no laran at all.” Briefly, there was an old memory of bitterness. “At least if Marius turns out not to have laran, you won’t send him to Nevarsin, will you, to be brought up there?”

  “Not unless he wants to go,” Lew said amiably. “A lad who’s of a scholarly turn and wants a good education might enjoy the chance to study there, but Marius, I’ve heard, has already had the best education the Terrans could give. I owe your grandfather thanks for arranging that.”

  “He didn’t do it to please you. On the contrary.” It had been, and they both knew it, a way of emphasizing that Marius must seek his destiny among Terrans, not his father’s people. “While you were away, I suppose you learned much of what the Terrans had to offer—”

  “Not as much as I’d have liked to; I was in hospitals a good deal of the time,” Lew said, and behind his scarred face Regis sensed much of what Lew would never tell him, pain and final acceptance of mutilation. “But while I was convalescing, yes, I’d have gone mad without something to do. I tried some surveying, map-making; there are parts of the Kilghard Hills, and most of the Hellers, that have never been properly mapped. Better to do it ourselves than to let the Terrans do it because we can’t be bothered to teach our own people measurements. It seems preposterous, that they have a Mapping and Survey unit on Darkover, and we don’t!”

  Regis said, “I’ve thought of having my sons educated by the Terrans. Though, I suppose, I’d have to fight grandfather every step of the way. It might be better to have someone who’s had a Terran education—like Marius, or you—educate them, instead of sending them offworld, or into the Trade City—”

  Lew said, with that sudden irradiating smile which made Regis, finally and forever, forget the gargoyle scarring of the face, “I’ve lived in the Empire too long; you seem young to me to have a family. But you’re twenty-one now, I should have known Hastur would have married you off long since. I’d be proud to foster your sons. Who is your wife? How many children—”

  Regis shook his head. “That’s been a constant argument with Grandfather, too. But I adopted my sister’s son, just before you went offworld—” He paused, hesitant, remembering; Lew had been in no state to remember that. But Lew nodded and said, “I remember. You told me at Aldaran.”

  “I have a nedestro son and two daughters,” Regis said. “The oldest is past three; in a couple more years, I shall bring him before the Council. And Mikhail is already eleven. When he is twelve, I shall bring him to Thendara and take his education into my own hands.” He grinned and said, “I’ve had a lot of experience fighting Grandfather on that subject; I suppose I can supervise my son’s education. I won’t let him grow up ignorant.”

  “You’re right, we’ve kept to the old ways too long,” Lew said. “I remember my father saying that when he was fifteen, he was an officer in the Guards, but he could neither read nor write, and was proud of it; when he went among the Terrans, they thought him an idiot because no one with a sound mind is allowed to let it lie fallow—”

  “The monks at Nevarsin deplore it just as much as a Terran would,” Regis said. “I ought to be grateful to Grandfather that he made certain I had that much education at least.” In Nevarsin monastery, he had at least learned to read and write, done some elementary ciphering, and read such Darkovan history as was available, which wasn’t much.

  “Kennard had me taught to read and write, thou
gh I must admit I wasn’t tremendously apt at either,” Lew said. “Lying in the hospital, I made up for lost time; but boys are still being brought up as if it was unmanly—I imagine it’s because a scholar hasn’t enough time to master weapons, and of course when the Domains were one constant battleground year after year, that was the most important thing in a boy’s education, to be good with a sword and weapons. Even when I was a boy, there were bandits enough in the Kilghard Hills. For centuries Armida had to be kept like an armed camp. Kennard would never have been criticized, if he’d kept me there to defend his lands instead of sending me into a Tower—”

  Regis picked up the unspoken part of that too: that Lew’s work in the Arilinn Tower, his skill at matrix technology, had led to the Sharra rebellion, and to the sword that was not a sword, the sword which concealed Sharra—

  And he saw it growing, blossoming behind Lew’s eyes, the look of horror that slid over Lew’s face, felt his own hair rising as the flames flared in his mind…Sharra! He looked at Lew. The smiling man, the kinsman with whom he had been calmly discussing the merits of Darkovan versus Terran education, was gone; Lew’s face was dead white, so that the scars stood out like crimson brands, and his eyes were—blank horror, staring at nothing Regis could see. But they could both see it, the raging, ravening form of the fire-Goddess, straining against the chains, fire-locks tossing high against the sky… She was not in the quiet street around them, she was not in this world at all, but she was there, there in their minds, horribly present for both of them…

  Regis breathed hard, forcing himself to control the trembling of his hands, reached out for Lew’s mind, tried to do what he had done with Javanne’s, to pick the fire-form out of the texture of Lew’s thoughts… and found something he had never touched. Javanne had seen Sharra only in his mind; Rafe had only seen the matrix… this was something else, something more dangerous; he saw a face, lean, wolfish, colorless hair, colorless gray eyes, and a woman’s face like a restless flame—

  “Kadarin—” he gasped, and never knew whether he had spoken aloud or not. The frozen, static horror left Lew’s eyes. He said grimly, “Come on. I’ve been afraid of this—”

  He began to run, and Regis, following, could feel the jolting pain, like fire in Lew’s hand—a hand that was not there, a phantom fire… but real enough to make sweat stand out on Lew’s forehead as he ran, jolting, uneven, his good hand gripping a dagger in his belt—

  They turned into an open square, heard shrieks, cries. Regis had never been inside the Alton town house, though he had seen it from the outside. Half a dozen of the uniformed City Guard were fighting in the center of the square; Regis could not see who they were fighting. Lew cried out, “Marius!” and ran up the steps. The door suddenly burst open, and at the same time Regis saw flames shooting from an upper window. One of the Guardsmen officers was trying to organize people into a fire-fighting line, water being passed from hand to hand from the nearest well and from a smaller well in the garden behind the house, but it was utter confusion.

  Lew was fighting, on the steps, with a tall man whose face Regis could not see, fighting one-handed with his knife. Gods! He has only one hand! Regis ran, whipping his sword from its sheath; saw Andres struggling with a bandit who wore the garb of the mountains… but what are mountain men doing here in Thendara? The Guards flowed up the steps, an officer shouting to rally them. It was hard, in the press, to tell friend from foe; Regis managed to get himself back to back with Lew, covering him, and for a moment, as his sword went up, he saw a face he recognized—

  Gaunt, gray-eyed, lips drawn back in a feral scowl…The man Kadarin looked older, more dangerous. His face was bleeding; Lew had somehow slashed him with his dagger. Behind Regis there was a great cracking roar, like an explosion; then Guardsmen were hurrying everyone down the steps, shouting urgently, and the house buckled slowly and erupted skyward. Regis was driven to his knees by the force of the blast. And then there was a high, clear call, in a woman’s voice, and suddenly the bandits were gone, melting away across the square, evaporating like mountain mist into the labyrinth of streets. Dazed, Regis picked himself up, watching the Guardsmen struggling with the remains of the burning house. A cluster of scared servant women were crying in a corner of the garden. Andres, his jacket unlaced, his face streaked and grimed with smoke, one boot unlaced, limped down the stairs and bent over Lew. Jeff came and helped Lew to sit up.

  Lew said in a sick, dazed voice, “Did you see him?”

  Regis bent and pressed him back. “Don’t try to sit up.” Blood was flowing down Lew’s face from a cut on his forehead; he tried to wipe it out of his eyes with his good hand. Lew said, “I’m all right,” and tried to struggle to his feet. “What happened?”

  Jeff Kerwin stared at the knife in his hand. It was not even bloody. “It all happened so fast. One minute all was quiet, the next, there were bandits all over the place and one of the serving-women shouted that the house was on fire… and I was fighting for my life. I haven’t held a knife since my first year in Arilinn!”

  Lew said urgently, “Marius! Gods of hell, Marius! Where is my brother?” Again he started up, disregarding Andres’s restraining hands. The horror was in his eyes again, and Regis could see in his mind the great flaming image, Sharra, rising higher and higher over Thendara… but there was nothing there. The street was quiet, the Guardsmen had the fire out; though there had been something like an explosion in the upstairs floors and there was a great gaping hole in the roof. Regis thought, with wild irrelevancy, that now Lew had no choice but to move into the suite in Comyn Castle which had, from time out of mind, been reserved for the Alton Domain. Jeff was touching, with careful hands, the cut on Lew’s head.

  “Bad,” he said, “it will need stitches—”

  But Lew struggled away from them. Regis grabbed him; laid his hand urgently over his eyes, and reached out with his mind, struggling to banish the ravening form of fire from his mind— slowly, slowly, the flames died in Lew’s mind and his eyes came back to reality; he staggered, letting himself lean on Jeff’s arm.

  “Did you see him?” he asked again urgently. “Kadarin! It was Kadarin! Do they have the Sharra matrix?”

  Regis, staggering with that thought, compelled by Lew’s horror, suddenly knew this was what Callina had feared. Lew demanded, “Marius! Marius—” and stopped, his voice strangling and catching in a sob.

  Merciful Gods! Not this too! My brother, my brother…He collapsed on the steps like a puppet whose strings are cut, his shoulders shaking with grief and shock. Jeff came and held him as if he were a child; with Andres, somehow they got him up the steps. But Regis stood still, looking at horror beyond horror.

  Kadarin had the Sharra matrix.

  And Marius Alton lay dead somewhere inside the burning house, with a Terran bullet through his heart.

  * * *

  CHAPTER SIX

  « ^ »

  Lew Alton’s narrative

  Here.” Jeff shoved a mirror into my hand. “Not as good as a Terran medic might have done—I’m out of practice—but it’s stopped the bleeding, anyhow, and that’s what counts.”

  I shoved the mirror away. I could—sometimes—make myself look at what Kadarin had left of my face; but not now. But none of it was Jeff’s fault; and he had done his best. I said, trying to be flippant, “Just what I needed—another scar, to balance the top and the bottom of my face.”

  He had gone all over me very carefully, to make sure that the blow to the head had left no aftereffects; but the cut was only a surface wound and fortunately had missed my eye. I had a headache roughly the size of Comyn Castle, but otherwise there seemed to be no damage.

  Through it all was the haunting cry that would not be silenced, like a roaring in my mind; … to Darkover, fight for your brother’s rights… and now would never be stilled. Marius was gone, and my grief was boundless; not only for the little brother I had lost, for the man he was beginning to be, that I would never, now, know. Grief, and guilt too, f
or while I had stayed away, Marius was neglected, perhaps, but alive. He might have lost the Domain; but as a Terran he might have made a good life somewhere, somehow. Now life and choice were gone. (And beneath grief and guilt a deeper layer of ambivalence I would not let myself see; a trickle of relief, that I need never, now, risk that frightful testing for the Alton gift, never risk death for him as my father had risked it for me…)

  “You have no choice, now, but to move into the Alton apartments in Comyn Castle,” Jeff said, and I nodded, with a sigh. The house, at least for the moment, was uninhabitable. Gabriel had come, with the final crew of Guards who had gotten the fire out. He offered to arrange for men to guard the ruins and prevent looting until we could get workmen to repair the roof and make the place weatherproof again. Every room was filled with smoke, furniture lying blackened and ruined. I tried without success to close my eyes and nostrils to the sight and smell. I have… a horror of fire, and now, I knew, somewhere at the back of my mind, if I gave it mental lease, the form of fire was there, raging, ravening, ready to destroy…and destroy me with it.

  Not that I cared a damn, now—

  Andres looked twenty years older. He came to me now and said, hesitantly, “Where—where shall we take Marius?”

  It was a good question, I thought; a damned good question, but I didn’t know the answer. There had never been any room for him in the Comyn Castle, not since he was old enough to notice his existence; they had never noticed it, in life, and now, in death, they would not care.

  Gabriel said quietly, “Have him carried to the chapel in Comyn Castle.” I looked up, startled and ready to protest, but he went on: “Let him have that much in death, kinsman, even though he didn’t have it in life.”