"I don't know," I said. "I don't think so. I'd rather not try. You're a Hastur, and it probably wouldn't kill you, but it wouldn't be fun." My voice suddenly turned hard. "Now tell me what you really came here to tell me!"
"The death sign," he blurted, then his face crumpled in panic. "I didn't mean that, I didn't--"
I could have had his confidence if I had waited. Instead I did something that still shames me. I caught one of his wrists with my good hand, and with a quick twist, a trick hold I'd learned on Vialles, forced him against the railing. He started to leap at me, then I caught his thought.
I can't fight a man who has only one hand.
That hardened my rage; and in that instant of black wrath I lashed out and forced rapport on him; I drew into his mind roughly, with a casual swift searching that took what it wanted, then withdrew.
Stark white, shaking, Regis slumped against the railing; and I, the taste of triumph bitter on my tongue, turned my back on him. To justify my own self-contempt, I made my voice hard. "So you built the sign! You--a Hastur!"
Regis swung around, shaking with wrath. "I'd smash your face for that, if you weren't--why the hell did you do that?"
I said harshly, "I found out what I wanted to know."
He muttered, "You did."
Then, his eyes blazing but his voice unsteady, he said, "That's what scared me. That's why I came to you. You're an Alton, I thought you'd know. At the council, something hit me. I--I don't know anything about matrix mechanics, surely you must know that now? I don't know how I did it, or why. I just bridged the gap and threw the sign. I thought I could tell you--ask you--" His voice broke, on the ragged edge of hysteria; I heard him swear, chokingly, like a child trying not to cry. He was shaking all over.
At last he said, "All right. I'm still scared. And I could kill you for what you did. But there's no one else to ask for help." He swallowed. "What you did, you did openly. I can stand that. What I can't stand is not knowing what I might do next."
Shamed and unnerved, I walked away from him. Regis, who had tried to befriend me, had received the same treatment I'd given my worst enemy. I couldn't face him.
After a minute he followed me. "Lew. I said, we'll have to forget it. We can't afford to fight. Did it occur to you?
We're both in the same fix, we're both doing things we'd never do in our right mind,"
He knew, and I knew, it wasn't the same; but it made me able to look round and face him.
"Why did I do it, Lew? How, why?"
"Steady," I said. "Don't lose your head. We're all scared. I'm scared, too. But there must be a reason." I paused, trying to muster my memory of the Comyn Gifts. They are mostly recessive now, bred out by intermarriage with outsiders, but Regis was physically atavistic, a throwback to the pure Comyn type; he might also be a mental throwback. "The Hastur Gift, whatever that is, is latent in you," I said. "Perhaps, unconsciously, you knew the council should be broken up, and took that drastic way of doing it. I added, diffidently, "If what had happened--hadn't happened, I'd offer to go into your mind and sift it. But--well, I don't think you'd trust me now.
"Probably not. I'm sorry."
"Don't be," I said roughly. "I don't even trust myself, after that. But Ashara or Callina, for that matter, either of the Keepers, could deep-probe and find out for you."
"Ashara--" He looked up thoughtfully toward the Keeper's Tower. "I don't know. Maybe."
We leaned across the railing, looking down into the valley, dulled now and darkened by the falling night. A baritone thunder suddenly shook the castle, and a silver dart sped bullet-wise across the sky, trailing a comet's tail of crimson, and was lost.
"Mail-rocket," I said, "from the Terran Zone."
"Terra and Darkover," said a voice behind us, "the irresistible force, and the immovable object."
Old Hastur came out on the balcony. "I know, I know," he said, "you young Altons don't like being ordered around here and there. Frankly, I don't enjoy doing it; I'm too old." He smiled at Regis. "I sent you out to keep you from jumping into the mess along with Lew. But I wish you'd managed to keep your temper, Lew Alton!"
"My temper!" The unfairness of that left me speechless. "I know. You had provocation. But if you had controlled your righteous wrath--" he spoke the words with a flavor of sour irony-- "Dyan would have been clearly in the wrong. As it is--well, you broke Comyn immunity - first, and that's serious. Dyan swears he'll write a writ of exile on you."
I said, almost indulgently, "He can't. The law requires at least one laran heir from every Domain--or why did you go to such trouble to have me recalled? I am the last living Alton, and childless. Even Dyan can't break up the Comyn that way."
Hastur scowled. "So you think you can break all our laws--being irreplaceable? Think again, Lew. Dyan swears he's found a child of yours."
"Mine? It's a stinking, sneaking lie," I said angrily. "I've lived off-world for six years. And I'm a matrix mech. You know what that means. And it's common knowledge I've lived celibate." Mentally I absolved myself for the single exception. If Dio had borne my child, after that summer on Vainwal, I would have known. Known? I'd have been murdered for it!
The Regent looked at me skeptically. "Yes, yes, I know. But before that? You weren't too young to be physically capable of fathering a child, were you? The child is an Alton, Lew."
Regis said slowly, "Your father wasn't exactly a recluse. And I suppose--how old was Marius? He might have fathered a chance-child somewhere."
I thought it over. It seemed unlikely that I should have a son. Not impossible, certainly, remembering certain adventures of my early manhood, but improbable. On the other hand, no Darkovan woman would dare swear me, or my dead kinsmen, father to her child unless she were sure past all human doubts. It takes more courage than most women have, to lie about a telepath.
"And suppose I call Dyan's bluff? To produce this alleged child, prove his paternity, set him up where I am now, write his writ of exile and be damnedto him? I never wanted to come back anyhow. Suppose I say go right ahead?"
"Then," said Hastur, gravely, "we'd be right back where we started." He laid his lined old hand on my arm. "Lew, I fought to have you recalled, because your father was my friend and because we Hasturs were pretty desperately outnumbered in council. I thought the Comyn needed you. Downstairs just now, when you were raking them out for their squabbles--like children in a playground, you said--I had high hopes. Don't make a fool of me by breaking the peace at every turn!"
I bent my head, feeling grieved and unhappy. "I'll try," I said at last, bleakly, "but by the sword of Aldones, I wish you'd left me out in space."
* * *
CHAPTER SEVEN
After the Hasturs left me, I went back to my rooms and thought over what I'd learned.
I had walked into Dyan's trap and it had snapped shut on me. I had Hastur to thank if I hadn't been already exiled. All along--I could see now--they had been goading me into open defiance. Then there was this child of mine, or my father's or Marius', a docile puppet; not a grown man with power in his own hands.
And Callina. That idea that a Keeper must be a virgin-superstitious drivel, but there must be some grain of scientific truth behind it, as with all other fables and Comyn traditions.
The superstitious could believe what they liked. But out of my own experience I knew this; any telepath working among the monitor screens will discover that his nervous and physical reflexes are all keyed into the matrix patterns. A matrix technician undergoes some prolonged periods of celibacy--strictly involuntary. This impotence is nature's safeguard. A matrix mech who upsets his nerve reactions, or through physical or emotional excesses, upsets his endocrine balance, pays for it. He can overload his nervous system to the point where he will short-circuit and blow out like a fuse; nervous depletion, exhaustion and usually death.
A woman does not have the physical safeguard of impotence. The Keepers have always been severely cloistered. Once a girl has been aroused, once that first sensual
response is awakened, so disastrously physical in its effect on nerves and brain, there is no way to determine the limit of safety. For a woman the picture is black or white. Absolute chastity, or giving up her work in the screens.
I, too, must be careful; I exposed Callina to a terrible danger.
I turned around to see old Andres scowling at me; a squat, ugly Terran, fierce and surly; but I knew him too well to be deceived by his fierce looks.
I never knew how a Terran ex-spaceman had won his way into my father's confidence, but Andres Ramirez had been part of our home since I could remember. He'd taught me to ride, made toys for Marius, spanked us when we punched each other's heads or raced at too breakneck a pace, and told us endless lying tales which gave no hint about his true history. I never knew whether he could not return to Terra, or whether he would not; but twenty years dropped from my age as he growled, "What are you standing there sulking about?"
"Not sulking, damn you! Thinking!"
The old fellow snorted. "Young Ridenow is waiting to see you. You keep fine company these days!"
In the other room Lerrys stood waiting for me, tense, seemingly uneasy; his attitude made my nerves jump, but with a curt semblance of politeness, I motioned him to a seat. "If you came as Dyan's proxy, tell him not to bother. The fight's off. Hastur said so."
down. "Well, no. As a matter of fact, I had a
Lerrys proposition for you. Has it occurred to you, now that your father's gone, you and I and Dyan are the strength of the Comyn?"
"You keep good company," I said dryly.
"Let's do without the insults. There's no reason we should fight among ourselves, there's enough for us all. You're half Terran; I suppose you have some Terran common sense. You know how the Terran Empire will handle this, don't you? They'll deal with anyone who's in a position to give orders. Why shouldn't you, and I, and Dyan, make the terms for Darkover?"
"Treason," I said slowly. "You're speaking as if the Comyn were already out of the way."
"It's bound to fall apart in a generation or two," Lerrys said quietly. "Your father, and Hastur, have been holding it together by pure force of personality for the last dozen years. You've seen Derik. Do you think he can take Hastur's place?"
I didn't. "Nevertheless," I said, "I am Comyn, and I'm vowed to stand behind Derik while he lives."
"And hold off disaster one more generation, at any cost?" Lerrys asked. "Isn't it better to make some arrangement now, rather than waiting for the big smash, and letting things lapse into anarchy for years before we can get them squared away again?"
He leaned his chin on his hands, regarding me intently. "The Terrans can do a lot for Darkover and so can you. Listen to me, Lew. Every man has his price. I saw the way you looked at Callina today. I wouldn't touch that she-devil's fingers, let alone take her to bed, but I suppose it's a matter of taste. I thought for a while it was Dio you wanted. But you'd fit perfectly well into our plans. You'd be better than Beltran. You're educated on Terra, but you look Darkovan. You're Comyn--one of the old aristocracy. The people would accept you. You could rule the planet!"
"Under the Terrans?"
"Someone will. And if you don't--well, you're unpopular because of the Sharra rebellion. And you're Comyn. The
Terranan make a habit of disposing of hereditary monarchies, unless they collaborate. Terra wouldn't care whether you lived or died."
Lerrys was probably right. In these days of toppling empires, no man is overburdened with loyalties. The Comyn would come crashing down eventually; why shouldn't I salvage something from the ruins?
Lerrys said, "Then you'll consider it?"
I didn't answer. A sudden intuition made me look up, and see that he had gone gray-white, his narrow fine features pinched and pale. That bothered me. The Ridenow are super-sensitives. In the distant past of the Comyn, when Darkover dealt with nonhumans, the Ridenow Gift had been bred into their family and they were used to detect strange presences, or give warning of unhealthy psychic or telepathic atmospheres.
He said with a strange intensity, "There are worse things than Terra, Lew. Better to make Darkover a Terran colony, even, than to face Sharra, or anything like that, from our own people."
"Erlik defend us from either!"
"The choice might be up to you, in the end."
"Hell, Lerrys, I'm not that important!"
"You may not know it," he said, "but you may be the key to everything."
Suddenly it seemed I was looking, not at one man, but at two. My brother's friend, intent on trying to get me to come over to their faction--and some deeper thing, using Lerrys for its own purpose. I was seriously debating whether I ought to turn on a damper, before he could work some mental trick on me. But I didn't move fast enough.
A flood of pure malevolence suddenly surged out of him. I jumped up, and with a terrible effort, managed to shut it out of my consciousness. Then I leaped at Lerrys, gripped him with one hand and angrily thrust my mind against his.
It wasn't Lerrys!
I met perfect, locked defense--and Lerrys alone could never have barred me from his mind. I was using a force harder than I had used on Dyan--and the Ridenow are especially vulnerable to telepathic assault. And while it did not touch whatever was using Lerrys, it tortured him. He writhed a moment, slumped; suddenly, frenzied into convulsions by the thing that held him, he twisted in frantic resistance. With the strength of a maniac or a berserker, he flung off my one-handed grip. And from somewhere, he found strength, too, to slam down a final defense against the assault I was using on him. Gritting my teeth in despair, I let my telepathic touch break loose. If that possessing mind should suddenly withdraw, leaving Lerrys to stand the assault alone, Lerrys would be dead or raving mad before I could get out.
Lerrys lay still, sobbing in air, for a moment Then he sprang upright. I tensed for a renewed attack, but instead he said, quite unexpectedly, "Don't look so startled! Does it surprise you to know you're important to Darkover? Think over what I said, Lew. Your brother was a man of sense, you must have some of it too. I imagine you'll decide I'm right." Smiling in a friendly way, he held out his hand. Almost numbed, I touched his fingers, wary against some further trick.
His mind was blank, innocent of any guile, the alien gone. tie didn't even know what he had done.
"What's the matter? You look a bit off color," he said. "I'd put on a damper, if I were you, and get some rest. You still need it, I'd say; that blow on the head was nothing to laugh at." He bowed and went out, and I sank on a couch, wondering if the blow had, indeed, damaged my reason. Must I be alert to attack from everyone? Or was I stark raving mad?"
A battle like that is never easy, and I was shaking in every nerve. Andres, coming through the curtains, stopped and stared in consternation.
"Get me a drink."
He started his routine protest about drinking on an empty stomach; looked at me again, stopped in mid-grumble and went. More than once I've suspected him of being more telepathic than he'll admit. When he came back it was no Darkovan cordial, but the strong Terran liquor that is sold contraband in Thendara.
I could not close my hand on the glass; to my tremendous shame, I had to lean back and let Andres hold it to my mouth. I hated the fiery stuff; but after I had swallowed a little my head cleared and I could sit up and take the glass without shaking.
"And stop trying to baby me!" I yelled at Andres, who was hovering around as if he thought I'd explode into fragments: But his familiar grumbling had a soothing effect; he'd grumbled just like this when I'd taken a tumble off my pony and broken a couple of ribs on the way down.
Just the same, I waved away his various suggestions of food and bed, and went out.
The sky was murky with traces of a storm; I could see rain squalls coming down across Nevarsin. Bad weather for the Terrans, with their dependence on planes and rockets and the shifty upper atmosphere. Our mountain-bred beasts could endure storms, blizzards, and rain. Why would a sensible people put their trust in a tricky e
lement like the air?
I crossed the courtyard, standing at the edge of the steep embankment where the cliff fell away; a thousand feet below me, the city of Thendara lay sprawled. I leaned on the low stone wall. If one wished to attack the Terrans, one need only choose a stormy night of rain or sleet, so that their planes and rockets were laid up, to meet them on equal terms.
Behind that, the ridge of the mountains were a darker line against the dark sky, and far away, on the high slopes, I saw a gleam of fire. Some hunter's fire, perhaps; yet the glimmer reminded me that somewhere, a strange white smoke spiraled up through fires that were not ordinary flame, and an incredible tenth-level matrix twisted space around itself.
When once a man has stood at the fires of Sharra, the strange flames call to him, play on his nerves as a heavy hand sweeps harpstrings. But I knew that unless I stilled their harpings I would break completely; so I fought against the maddening live warmth that pulsed somewhere in me, reminding me of things I loathed and feared with all my heart--yet in some strange, shameful way, longed for; loved; desired.
Where could I go to still that harping?
Only-to Callina.
* * *
CHAPTER EIGHT
The Aillard rooms were spacious and brilliant; shimmering walls diffused delicate colors over Callina, who knelt on the floor, playing with a little striped beast from the rainforests. It leaped on her shoulder, purring, and flickering two-toed claws in and out of her silk sleeves.
Linnell was seated near her, a harp laid flat across her knees, and Regis standing beside Linnell; but they all sensed my presence at once. Linnell put the harp aside and Callina rose hastily, putting the kitten-thing on the floor and pulling at her skirts; but I went to her and took her in my arms. She would never know how precious she had made herself to me by that glimpse of a self less guarded, less aloof. I held her a moment, then the old frustration slipped back, thrusting like an unsheathed sword between us. Careful.