I felt Regis, through this, as if he were somehow reaching into my very brain, though I knew it was only my matrix he was touching, disentangling it thread by thread… but the more he worked on it, the stronger grew the redoubled call, the pulse of Sharra beating in my brain, till I stood burning in agony…
The door was flung open and Dio was in the room, rushing to me, physically flinging Callina aside. “What do you think you are doing to him?” she raged.
The flames diminished and died; Regis caught at some piece of furniture, staggering, hardly able to stand erect.
“How much do you think he can stand? Hasn’t he been through enough?”
I collapsed gratefully into a chair. I said, “They were only—”
“Only stirring up what’s better left alone,” Dio stormed. “I could feel it all the way up to the eighth floor above here… I could feel them cutting at you…” and she ran her hands over me as if she had expected to see me physically covered in blood.
“It’s all right, Dio,” I said, knowing my voice was hardly more than an exhausted mumble. “I was trained to—to endure it—”
“What makes you think you’re able to endure it now?” she demanded angrily, and Regis said, in despair, “If Kadarin draws the Sharra sword…”
“If he does,” Dio said, “he will have to fight; but can’t you let him get together enough strength to fight it?”
I did not know. Rafe had never been farther than the outer layer of the circle we had formed around Sharra; I had been at its very heart, controlling the force and flow of the power of Sharra. I was doomed, and I knew it. I knew what Callina and Regis had been trying to do, and I was grateful, but for me it was too late.
My eyes rested on Callina, and I saw everything around me with a new clarity. She was everything of the past to me; Arilinn, and my own past; Marjorie had died in her arms, and then I had found in her the first forgetfulness I had known. Kinswoman, Keeper, all the past… and I ached with regret that I would not live to take her with me to Armida, to reclaim my own past and my own world. But it was not to be. A darker love would claim me, the wildfire of Sharra surging in my veins, the dark bond to Thyra who had made herself Keeper of that monstrous circle of Sharra, fire and lust and endless burning torture and flame… Callina might call me to her, but it was too late, now and forever too late. Dio spoke to me, but I had gone back to a time before she had come into my life, and I hardly remembered her name.
What were we doing here within these white walls?
Someone came into the room. I did not recognize the man although from the way he spoke to me I knew that he was someone I was supposed to know. One of the accursed Terrans, those who would die in the flames of Sharra when the time was ripe. His words were mere sounds without sense and I did not understand them.
“That woman Thyra! We had her in one of our strongest cells, and she’s gone—just like that, she’s gone out of a maximum security cell! Did you witch her out of there somehow?”
Fool, to think any cell could hold the priestess and Keeper of Sharra the Fire-born—
Space reeled around me; there was a slamming thunderclap and I stood braced on the cobblestone of the forecourt of the Comyn Castle, my feet spanning the enlaced symbols there…and I knew Kadarin had unsheathed the Sword. Kadarin stood there, his pale hair moving in an invisible wind, his hands on Thyra’s shoulders, his metallic eyes cold with menace, and Thyra…
Thyra! Flames rose upward from her copper hair, sparks trembled at the tips of her fingers. In her hands she held naked the Sharra Sword, cold flames racing from hilt to tip. Thyra! My mistress, my love—what was I doing here, far from her? She raised one hand and beckoned, and I began nervelessly to move forward, without being conscious of the motion. She was smiling as I knelt at her feet on the stone, feeling all my strength going out to her, and to that fire that flowed and flamed in her hands…
Then the flame flared blue and wild to the heights of the castle, and I knew Regis had unsheathed the Sword of Aldones. They were there, there physically, standing across from me, Regis and Callina, and she reached for me, enfolding me in the cold blue of Ashara’s icy limbo, and then we were not in the Castle courtyard at all, but in the gray spaces of the overworld… far below I could see our bodies like tiny toys from a great height, but the only reality in the world was those two swords, crimson with flame and cold ice-blue, crossed and straining at one another, and I…
I was a puppet, a mote of power in the astral world, something stretched to breaking between them… Callina’s voice, reminding me of Arilinn and all of my past, Thyra’s crooning call, enticing, seductive, with memories of lust and fire and power… I was torn, torn between them as I felt myself a link between the two circles, Regis and Callina with the Sword of Aldones, Thyra and Kadarin, each pulling at me fiercely to make a third, to lend my power…
And then there was another strength in the linked circles… something cold and arrogant and brutal, the harsh touch as of my father’s own strength, the Alton Gift which had opened my own to power, but this was not my father’s touch—Dyan! And he had always disliked me… and I was at his mercy…
I did not mind dying, but not like this— Again in my mind was the final cry of my father’s voice, and we were so deeply enlaced that I could see Dyan look past me at Regis with infinite warmth and regret that in the end they should have been on opposite sides. I wanted to stand at your side when you were King over all of Darkover, my gallant Hastur cousin… and then, through me, I could feel Dyan’s touch on the memory of my father’s destroying call, the last thought in his dying mind…
And Dyan, in a moment of anguish and grief:
Kennard! My first, my only friend… my cousin, my kinsman, bredu… and there is no other, now, living, who bears your blood, and if I strike now I shall have killed you past death or any immortality… and then a final, careless thought, almost laughter, this son of yours was never fit for this kind of power…
And abruptly I was free, free of Sharra, thrust entirely away, and in that moment of freedom I was locked into the closing rapport of Regis and Callina, the sealed circle of power…
The fire-form reared high, higher, the size of the castle, the size of the mountain, with a scorching darkness at its heart… but from Regis, risen now to giant-size, blazing cold lightning struck at the heart of Sharra as he held the Sword of Aldones, poised to strike…
Sharra was bound in chains by the Son of Hastur who was the Son of Light…
And clothed in his cloak of living light Aldones came!
Now there was nothing to see, no human form, only fire lapping higher and higher, the spark of the Sharra matrix blazing out from the center of that darkness, and the core of brilliance through the veils clothing the figure of the God, like Regis in form, but Regis looming high, higher, not one of the Hastur-kin but the God himself…
Two identical matrixes cannot exist in one time and space; and once before, so the legend said, Sharra had been chained by the Son of Aldones, who was the Son of Light…
I cannot explain the legend, even now, although I saw it. I had felt the daemon-touch of Sharra. Infinite good is as terrifying, in its own way, as infinite evil. It was not Regis and Kadarin fighting with identically forged swords, one a copy of the other. It was not even matrix battling against space-twisting matrix, though that was nearer the truth. Something tangible and very real fought behind each sword, something that was not on this plane of reality at all, and could manifest itself and maintain a foothold in this dimension only through the swords. Lightnings streamed between them, wrapped in the rainbow aura that was Regis and Hastur, coiling into the licking flames at the heart of which Thyra glowed like a burning coal.
And then for an instant I felt that last bright arrogance reach out, Dyan shining across the space, his hawk-face keen and curious. For an instant then I think the linkage broke and the swords were only swords, and for a split second we stood in the courtyard of the Castle again and the cobbles were unstead
y under my feet. And in that moment I know that he could have reached out and killed either of us…
And for a moment Thyra stood before me, only a woman again, although the Form of Fire still licked around her, and the smell of burning beat on the air, and her throat was naked to my knife…
I had sworn their death in vengeance for my hand. But in that moment I could remember only that there had been a time when she stood before me, only a frightened girl, terrified by her own growing powers. If the Gods themselves had put a dagger into my hand at that moment I could not have struck her down, and for a moment it seemed as if a great question vibrated in the overworld, and in this world and through all the universes of my mind;
Will you have the love of Power or the Power of Love?
And everything in me surged toward Kadarin, whom I had once loved as a brother, and to the young and beautiful Thyra whom I, as much as Kadarin, had destroyed. I have never been able to explain this, but I knew in that one searing moment of testing that I would die in Sharra’s fire myself rather than hurt either of them any further than they had already been hurt. Everything in me cried out an enormous and final No!
And then we were battling again in the gray limbo of the overworld, and the two swords crossed and blazed like interlaced lightnings…
Then the flames sank and died, and a great darkness blazed at the heart of the Sharra matrix. I saw a blaze of endless fire, and the searing flame strike inward, and then a great vortex seemed to open inwards, into a great whirling nothingness. Into that nothingness were swept away Kadarin and Thyra, two tiny, disappearing figures, whirled away and apart… and a great wordless cry of pain and despair and at the last instant, so faint that I never knew whether I heard it or not, a split-second cry of joy and rediscovery which made me hear again in my mind my father’s last cry…
“Beloved—!”
Silence and nothingness, and darkness… and the great and damnable Face that I had seen in Ashara’s overworld of blue ice—
And then I was standing in the gray light of dawn on the cobblestones in Comyn Castle, facing Regis, only a shrinking, hesitant young man again, with the Sword of Aldones half-raised in his hand, and Callina pale as death beside him. There was no sign anywhere of Kadarin or Thyra, but sprawled on the cobbles before us, broken and dying, Dyan Ardais lay, his body blackened as if with fire. The Sword of Sharra lay broken in his hand. There were no jewels in the hilt of the sword now; they lay charred and ugly, burnt pebbles which, even as the first rays of the sun touched them, evaporated into pale gouts of rising smoke, and were gone forever… as Sharra’s power was gone forever from this world.
Regis sheathed the Sword of Aldones and knelt beside Dyan, weeping without shame. Dyan opened pain-filled eyes, and I saw recognition in them for a moment, and pain beyond the point where it ceases to have meaning. But if Regis had hoped for a word, he was disappointed; Dyan’s eyes glinted up at him in a moment, then fell back and stared at something which was not in this world. But for the first time since I had known him, he looked content and at peace.
If he had been willing to kill us all, Sharra would have triumphed… I knelt, too, beside his body, conceding his hero’s death, as Regis laid his own cloak over Dyan’s body. He still held the Sword of Aldones, but from that, too, all glow and power had faded; the blade was blackened all along its length as if with the strange fire in which it had been quenched. After a moment Regis laid the Sword of Aldones on Dyan’s breast, as a fallen hero’s sword is laid to be buried with him. None of us protested. Then Regis rose, and the rays of the rising sun touched his hair… snow white.
It was over; and beyond hope I was free, and alive… beyond countless, measureless havoc, I had come free. I turned to Callina, and at last, knowing we were free, caught her for the first time in my arms and pressed her lips hungrily to mine.
And all desire died in my heart and mind as I looked down into the chill eyes of Ashara.
I should have known, all along.
Only a moment and she was Callina again, clinging to me and crying, but I had seen. I let her go, in horror… and as my arms released her, Callina crumpled very slowly to the pavement and lay there unmoving, beside Dyan.
I knelt again, turning her over, catching her up in my arms, uncaring; but she was still, unmoving, already cold. And now I knew—
Generations ago, a powerful Keeper, of the Hastur line, had held all the power of the Comyn… and as she grew older, had been reluctant to set aside her power; and so she had concentrated power in the Aillard line, and many of those women had been her under-Keepers, giving their own powers to Ashara, so that Ashara, whose flesh had failed and who lived now within the matrix, went abroad in the body and personality, like a garment, of her newest Keeper… and of these, my young kinswoman had been the last. I had wondered why I could never touch her mind, nor come near, except now and again for a moment…
And again the terrifying question from the overworld seemed to beat in my heart; the Love of Power or the Power of Love?
I will swear to my dying day that Callina had loved me…
Otherwise, would that ancient Hastur sorceress have risked the end of her undying mind and all her power, to risk all for my freedom from Sharra’s bondage? Regis and I, alone, could never have faced that last undying blaze of Sharra’s fire. But with Callina recklessly throwing all of Ashara’s powers into the fray, through the body of the young Hastur who was her far kinsman, so that the strength of the first Hastur, whoever and whatever He was, manifested itself through the Sword of Aldones… so that Regis took on the majesty and power of the Son of Light, even as the one who held Sharra took on the Form of Fire…
Dyan, too, in the end, had not been able to strike with Sharra to wipe out his kin. All his life he had fought for the honor of the Comyn, though in strange ways, and in the end he had acted first to protect my daughter, then to protect me, and finally he could not strike down Regis…
The Love of Power or the Power of Love? I wonder if that question had beat in his mind, too, during the final moments of that battle?
Somewhere above me in the castle, I heard a sound, not with my physical ears, but in the recesses of my mind; cleared now from the searing presence of Sharra, I was conscious of it all through me; the sound of a child crying, a telepath child, alone, hungry, frightened, wailing for her mother who was dead and the father she half feared, half loved. And I knew where she was. I saw Regis, his shoulders bowed beneath his new and terrible burden, his hair incredibly turned white in that all-consuming battle, and saw him turn wearily toward the Castle. Had his grandfather survived that battle which must have rung in the minds of all the Comyn?
Yes; Danilo went to him and cared for him, lent him strength…
Regis heard the crying too, and turned to me, with a weary smile.
“Go and look after your daughter, Lew; she needs you, and—” unbelievably he smiled again, “she’s old enough to have the Gift but not old enough to hold it within reasonable bounds. Unless you go and comfort her, she’ll drive everyone in the Castle—everyone in the City—mad with her wailing!”
And I went in and ran unerringly up the stairs to the one place where Dyan had known I would not search for Marja and where she would be safely concealed; the Ridenow apartments which Lerrys and Dio had shared. And as I burst in through the great outer doors, hurrying to the empty room, I saw Dio holding Marja on her lap, but she could not silence her wailing and struggling until I bent over them and clasped them both in my arms.
Marja stopped crying and turned to me, the telepathic shrieking suddenly quieted, only soft hiccuping sobs remaining as she clung to me, sobbing. “Father! Father! I was so scared, and you didn’t come and you didn’t come and I was all alone, all alone and there was a fire, and I cried and cried and nobody heard me except this strange lady came and tried to pick me up…”
I quieted the hysterical outburst, pulling her to me.
“It’s all right, chiya,” I crooned, holding her in one arm
and Dio in the other. “It’s all right, Father’s here—” I could not give Dio a child of her own. But this child of my own blood had somehow survived out of all the holocaust that had raged in the Comyn… and never again would I mock at the power of love which had saved us both. I had wanted to die; but I was alive, and miraculously, beyond all, I was glad to be alive and life was good to me.
Laughing, I set Marja down, drawing Dio into my arms again. Never once did she ask a question about Callina. Perhaps she knew, perhaps she had been a part of all that great battle which, even now, I was beginning to doubt—had it ever happened except in my own mind? I never knew.
“We have just time,” I said, “to file a stop on that Terran divorce action. I think it hasn’t been ten days yet—or have I lost track of the time?”
She laughed, a wavering smile. “Ten days? No, not quite.”
Marja interrupted us, setting up her telepathic demand again. I’m hungry! And scared! Stop kissing her and hold me!
Dio drew her close between us. “We’ll get you a big breakfast right away, chiya,” she said softly, “and then someone will have to try teaching you the elementary manners of living in a telepathic family. If you are going to do that every time I kiss your father—or anything else, little daughter— I am afraid that I will start making noises like a wicked stepmother from the old fairy tales! So you will have to learn some manners, first thing!”
Incredibly, that made all three of us laugh. And then we went back to the Terran Zone to withdraw an unnecessary divorce decree. Somewhere along the way—I forget just where—we stopped and ate fresh hot bread and porridge at a cookstall, and everyone who looked at us took it for granted that I was out for an early breakfast with my wife and daughter. And I found I liked the feeling. I no longer felt them staring only at my scars.