Again I moved through the crowd. I had spoken to Regis and forgotten to speak to him about Derik—there was too much on my mind, it seemed I had been moving aimlessly back and forth through this wretched yammering crowd all night, and my barriers were beginning to loosen; I would not be able to endure the mental jangle of it much longer. A few cadets were crowding near the long banquet tables, greedily attacking the heaped delicacies there, delighted at the change from barracks food. Among them I recognized both of Javanne’s sons, Rafael and the younger Gabriel. I supposed one of them would still consider himself my Heir…
I have no son, I shall never have a son; but I have a daughter and I shall fight for her right to hold Armida after me… and then I was seized with a sickening sense of futility. Would there be anything to hold, after Beltran took his place in Comyn Council and destroyed us all? Would it not be better to take Marja—and Dio if she would come—and go back to Terra, or Vainwal, or out to one of the worlds at the far edge of the Empire where we could build a new life for ourselves?
I’m not a fighter. I can fight if I must, and my father tried his best, from the day I was big enough to clasp my hands around the hilt of a sword, to make certain that I would be good at it, and I had learned because I had had no choice. But I have never enjoyed it, despite his efforts to make me excel in arms-play, in unarmed combat, as a soldier.
Damn him, even his last words had been of battle… I could hear them now, surging inside me as if they were being spoken now, not in memory: Return to Darkover, fight for your brother’s rights and your own…
and he had thrust me into this seething hell…
“How you are scowling, Lew,” Linnell said in pretty reproof. “This is supposed to be a celebration!”
I tried to move my face into something like a sociable smile. Sometimes I would rather be in the ninth and coldest of Zandru’s hells than in a crowd where I have to be sociable, and this was one of those times, but I was not going to spoil Linnell’s enjoyment. I said, “Sorry, this ugly mug of mine is bad enough, I suppose, without making it worse.”
“You’re not ugly to me, foster-brother,” she said, in the intimate mode that made it an endearment. “If I wish your face were unmarred it is only a way of wishing you hadn’t suffered so much. The flowers you sent me were beautiful,” she added. “See, I am wearing some of them on my gown.”
I smiled a little ruefully and said, “You must thank Andres; he selected them. They suit you, though.” I thought Linnell herself was rather like a flower, rosy and bright, smiling up at me. “I saw you dancing with Derik; I hope you told that wretch Merryl to take him away and sober him up!”
“Oh, but he isn’t drunk, Lew,” she said seriously, laying a hand on my wrist. “It’s only his bad luck that he should have one of these spells on Festival Night…He gets like this sometimes, and when he was younger, they used to keep him in bed and out of sight—he doesn’t drink at all, because it makes him so much worse, he never even touches wine with dinner. I was angry with him because he took one drink—some fruit drink which had been doctored with strong firi, and he wouldn’t offend Merryl by refusing it—”
“That was a mean trick; I had some of it myself,” I said. “Now I wonder just who did that, in such a way that Derik would get some?” I had a few suspicions. Lerrys, for instance, would be glad to see our presumptive king, poor thing that he was, making more of a fool of himself than usual.
“Oh, surely, it was an accident, Lew,” Linnell said, shocked. “No one would do a thing like that on purpose, would they? It does taste very good, I hardly knew there was anything in it; I might easily have drunk more than one glass, and of course, poor Derik, he’s not familiar enough with drink to know that something which tasted only of fruits would make him so much worse—”
So someone who had a vested interest in proving Derik thoroughly incompetent had made sure he had some harmless-tasting drink which would emphasize his various impediments and confuse him worse than ever. Merryl? Merryl was supposedly his friend. Lerrys? He might do anything which would throw us into the arms of the Terran Empire, and he had the kind of devious mind which would enjoy a dirty trick like that. I wondered how, in that family, Dio had turned out so forthright and straightforward.
I said, “Well, he certainly appeared drunk, and I’m afraid most people would think it of him!”
“When we are married,” she said, smiling gently, “I will make certain no one can lead him into such things. Derik is not always a fool, Lew. No, he is not brilliant, certainly he will always need someone like Regis—or you, Lew—to guide him in matters of policy. But he knows he is not very bright, and he will let himself be guided. And I will make certain that it is not Merryl who guides him, either.”
Linnell might sound and look like a delicate, flowerlike, fragile young girl, but behind all that there was strong common sense and practicality, too. I said, “It’s a pity you are not Head of the Domain, sister; they would never have been able to marry you off to Beltran.” I turned and saw Kathie, who had been dancing with Rafe Scott, and hoped she had had sense enough not to say anything to him. And beyond her was the harlequin who had so deeply disturbed me… damn it, who was he?
“Lew, who is Kathie really? When I’m near her I feel terribly strange. It’s not so much that she looks like me—it’s as if she were a part of myself, I know what she’s going to do before she does it… I know, for instance, that she’s going to turn—there, you see? And she’s coming this way…and then I feel, it’s a kind of pain, as if I had to touch her, embrace her. I can’t keep away from her! But when I actually do touch her, I have to pull away, I can’t endure it…” Linnell was twisting her hands nervously, ready to burst into hysterical tears or laughter, and Linnell wasn’t a girl to fret over trifles. If it affected her like this, it was something serious. What did happen, I wondered, when Cherillys doubles came face to face?
Well, I was about to see, whatever it was. As Kathie ended the dance she moved toward Linnell, and almost without discernible volition, Linnell began to move in her direction. Was Kathie working some malicious mental trick on my little cousin? But no, Kathie had no awareness of Darkovan powers, and even if she had potential for laran, nothing could get through that block I’d put around her mind.
Linnell touched Kathie’s hand, almost shyly; in immediate response, Kathie put an arm around Linnell’s waist, and they walked enlaced for a minute or two; then with a sudden nervous movement, Linnell drew herself free and came to me.
“There is Callina,” she said.
The Keeper, aloof in her starry draperies, threaded her way through the maze of dancers seeking new partners, moving toward the refreshment tables.
“Where have you been, Callina?” Linnell demanded. She looked at the dress with sorrowful puzzlement, but Callina made no attempt to justify or explain herself. I reached out to touch her mind; but I felt only the strange, cold, stony presence which I had felt once or twice near Callina, a door locked and slammed, cold and guarded.
“Oh, Derik drew me off to listen to some long drunken tale—I thought you told me he never drinks, Linnie? He never did get it all told… the wine conquered him at last. May he never fall to a worse enemy. I ordered Merryl to find his body-servant and have him carried to his rooms, so you’ll have to find someone else to dance with for the midnight dance, darling.” She looked indifferently around the room. “I suppose I’ll be dancing with Beltran; Hastur is signaling to me. Probably he intends to begin the ceremony now.”
“Am I to come with you then?”
Callina said, still with that icy indifference, “I will not give this farce any of the trappings of a wedding, Linnie. Nor will I drag any of my kinsmen into it… why do you think I made sure Merryl was well out of the way?”
“Oh, Callina—” Linnell said, reaching for her, but she moved away, leaving Linnell with her arms outstretched, hurt and bewildered.
“Don’t pity me, Linnie,” she said tensely, “I—won’t have it.?
?? I was sure that what she meant was, I can’t bear it.
I don’t know what I would have said or done at that moment, if she had turned to me; but she drew herself apart from us; her eyes brooded, blue ice like Ashara’s, past me into silence. Bitter and helpless, I watched her move away through the crowds in that dress that was a reminder of death, doom, shadows.
I should have guessed everything, then, when she left us without a word or a touch, silent and remote as Ashara’s self, making a lonely island of her tragedy and shutting us all away from her. I watched Beltran, at Hastur’s side, advance to greet her, and saw that she gave him only a formal bow and not an embrace; listened as the bracelets were locked on their wrists.
“Parted in flesh, may you never be so in spirit; may you be forever one,” Hastur said, and all over the room, wives reached for husbands, and lover for lover, to exchange the ritual kiss. Callina was Beltran’s consort, the marriage a legal fact, from the moment Hastur released her hand. I did not turn to see if Dio was near me. The truth of the matter is, I had, at that moment, forgotten her existence, I was so caught up into Callina’s anguish.
The next dance after a handfasting was always, by tradition, a dance for married or pledged couples. Callina, with the privilege of the bride, led Beltran onto the dance floor; but they moved with nothing touching but their fingertips. I saw Javanne and Gabriel move, smiling, onto the floor; the Regent bowed to an elderly dowager, one of Callina’s distant kinswomen, and they moved into the sedate measure.
“Regis,” Linnell said gaily, “are you going to disappoint every unwedded woman in the Domains again tonight?”
“Better disappoint them now than later, kinswoman,” said Regis, smiling. “And I notice you are not dancing—where is our royal cousin?”
“He is ill—someone gave him some punch which had more to it than he knew,” Linnell said, “and Merryl has taken him away, so I have neither kinsman nor lover to dance with me tonight—unless you would like to dance, Lew? You’re more my brother than Merryl ever was,” she added with a touch of annoyance.
“Forgive me, Linnie, I would rather not,” I said, and wondered if I was still a little drunk; I felt uneasy, almost nauseated. Was it only the general unease of a telepath when the crowds are surrounding him too closely?
“Look, even Dyan is dancing with the widow of the old arms-master,” Linnell said, “and Dio with Lerrys—look, isn’t he a marvelous dancer?” I followed her look, saw the brother and sister dancing, closely gathered in each other’s arms like lovers rather than sister and brother, and for a moment I wanted to storm across the floor in outrage, remind Lerrys that Dio was mine… but I felt unable to move. If I tried to dance surely I would fall down, but I had drunk only a very little of that same heavily spiked fruit drink.
Regis said, bowing to Linnell, “I will dance with you as Derik’s surrogate, if you wish for it, cousin. It seems I am Derik’s heir—may his reign be long,” he added, with a wry smile.
“No, I would rather not,” she said, a hand on his arm, “but you may stay and talk with me for this dance… Lew, do you know the man there in the harlequin costume? Who is the woman with him?”
For a moment I could not see the harlequin I had noticed before; then I saw him, dancing with a tall woman with dark-copper hair, wonderful thick curls that cascaded halfway down her back. The whirling movement of the dance suddenly turned them toward me, and—although the woman was masked—suddenly I knew her, knew them both, even behind the hideous harlequin mask.
Thyra! No mask could have concealed her from me… for a moment it seemed that the matrix at my throat burned as with Sharra’s very fire. I stood shocked, unable to move, watching my sworn enemy, and wondering with desperate unease what brought them here, into the very heart of Thendara, with a price on Kadarin’s head and the death sentence from Terran and Comyn at once! I gripped the dagger at my waist with my good hand, wishing I had not encumbered myself with the artificial one. Kadarin and Thyra, boldly dancing together here at the Comyn masked ball…
But now at the conclusion of this dance, all masks were coming off; I tore mine away, using the mechanical hand; the other was firmly gripped on my dagger. Did he think that I would not attack him here because it was in the middle of a ball?
And now I saw that Regis had recognized him too. I took a single step; Regis caught urgently at my arm.
“Steady, Lew,” he muttered. “It’s what he wants you to do, come after him without thinking—”
The matrix at my throat was suddenly alive with flame, and a voice whispered, called in my mind.
… I am here! I am here…all your rage, all the fury of frustrated lust, let it turn on them to serve me, burning, burning…
Sharra! The voice of Sharra, whispering like a frantic ghost in my mind, the fury of all my frustration, leaping up to betray me… Thyra’s eyes, burning into mine, the red flame of her hair seeming to blaze up around her! And suddenly it flared all around her, as Thyra seemed to grow taller, to rise and tower above us into the heights of the ballroom, as I saw Kadarin’s long fine hand, the hand of a chieri, flash and draw the sword, that sword—
It called to me. I had dragged it unwilling through half a Galaxy because I could not leave it behind, and now it summoned me, summoned me… half-aware, I slid my dagger back into its sheath; my place was at Kadarin’s side, lending strength to the Goddess, pouring all my own rage and terror and frustration through it… my hand went to the matrix at my throat. I saw some woman whose name I could not remember staring at me with widening blue eyes— I heard her whisper a name I no longer associated with myself, but she was nothing to me, and a young man with the face of a mortal enemy… Hastur, he was Hastur… the mortal enemy, the first to strike! I felt his hand gripping at my arm and thrust him away with uncanny strength, so that his knees buckled and he spread to the floor; and all this time that pattern of hate and fear, mingled love and loathing, beat in my mind…I took a step, then another, toward where the Goddess flamed above me.
I must return… return to Sharra, return to the immortal who rose in flame above me forever, burn myself in the purging fire… she was there, Marjorie, calling me from within the flames of Sharra, those compelling amber eyes, the cascade of red hair wildly tossing sparks and flame and the smell of burning, as I burned for her with lust and terror…
The one I knew to be my mortal enemy was gripping me now with both hands as I fought my way, step by step, through the cries of the yammering crowd, to where Sharra burned…
“No, damn it, Lew,” he gasped, “You’re not going, if I have to kill you first and give you a clean death…” and he struck at me with the dagger, tearing a line of blood across my good arm. The pain made me waver, come to myself a little, know what was happening.
“Regis—help me,” I heard myself whisper.
“Your matrix! Let me—” Before I could stop him, he snatched out his own dagger, cut the string which held my matrix round my neck; I tensed, in anticipation of agony unendurable… once Kadarin had ripped it away and I had gone into convulsions… but even through the leather bag and the silks I felt the touch—
The form of Sharra wavered, sank… I did not know what Regis was doing, but strand by strand, it seemed that the gripping call of Sharra lessened in my mind. I heard it still, a soft insidious voice whispering in my mind…
Return to me, return, take vengeance on all these who have scorned and despised you… return, return…
…to Darkover and fight for your brother’s rights and your own… but now it was my father’s voice; I had never thought I would be glad to hear that haunting voice in my mind, but now it recalled me wholly to myself, like a plunge into an icy stream. Then that too quieted, and I stood looking at Kadarin and Thyra where they stood together, the Sharra sword in Kadarin’s hand, Thyra’s hair still tossing with the last sparks of the dying flame.
Gabriel broke away from Javanne; made a quick step toward Kadarin, his sword in hand. Perhaps all he saw was the i
nvasion by a wanted man; I never knew whether the Form of Fire had been real or whether anyone but myself had seen it. Kadarin whirled, shoving Thyra before him, as Gabriel shouted for the Guard and the young cadets started flocking toward him from everywhere in the room. I drew my dagger again and started for him too, then stood paralyzed—
The air seemed full of cold shimmering light. Kadarin and Thyra stood frozen, too, and I saw Kathie caught between them.
They did not physically touch her, but something shook her like the grip of some invisible thing with claws; tossed her aside and caught at Linnell. She was in their grip as if she had been bound, hand and foot. I think she screamed, but the very idea of sound had died in the thickening darkness around Kadarin and Thyra. Linnell sagged, held up hideously on empty air; then fell, striking the floor with a crushing impact, as if something had shaken her and then dropped her. I fought toward her, shouting soundless curses, but I could not move, could not really see.
Kathie flung herself down by Linnell. I think she was the only person capable of free movement in that hall. As she caught up Linnell in her arms I saw that the tortured face had gone smooth and free of horror; a moment Linnell lay quiet, soothed, then she struggled with a bone-wrenching spasm, and slackened, a loose, limp small thing with her head lolling on her twin’s breast.
And above her the monstrous Form of Fire grew again for a moment, Kadarin’s face and Thyra’s blazing out from the center… then it all swam away and for a moment that cold and damnable mask I had seen in Ashara’s Tower blazed out and swam before my eyes…
… and then it was gone. Only a little stirring in the air, and Kadarin and Thyra were gone, too; the lights blazed back and I heard Kathie scream, and heard the cries of the crowd as I elbowed my way savagely to Linnell’s side.
She was dead, of course. I knew that even before I laid my hand over Kathie’s in a vain attempt to feel any pulse of life. She was lying, a tumbled, pathetic little heap across Kathie’s lap. Behind her, blackened and charred panels showed where warp and distortion had faded and Kadarin and Thyra were gone. Callina thrust her way through the crowd, and bent over Linnell. Around me I heard the sound of the Festival throng subsiding. Gabriel sent out the Guard that had gathered, in an attempt that I knew would be vain—Kadarin had not gone out of the castle in any recognizable way and searching the grounds would do no good, even if the Terran Legate joined his forces to ours for the man they both wanted. The other people in the crowd were wedging in around us, and I heard that horrible sound of horror and curiosity which runs through a crowd when tragedy strikes. Hastur said something, and people began silently leaving the ballroom. I thought, this is the first time in hundreds of years that this Festival has been interrupted.