Dying of the Light

  “I am sorry of that, Chell fre-Braith,” Vikary said, “but it is your ears that fail, and not my words. I try to do you honor, but you do not make it easy.”

  “You jape me!” Chell said, accusingly.

  “No.”

  “You do!”

  Bretan Braith spoke then, and his voice had none of Chell’s anger, but it was very hard. “Dirk t’Larien, as he calls himself and you call him, has done us wrong. This is the heart of the matter, Jaantony high-Ironjade. He has laid hands upon the property of Braith without any word of Braith permission. Now, who pays for this? If he is a mockman and korariel to you, then here and now I issue challenge. Ironjade has done wrong to Braith. If he is not korariel, then, well . . .” He stopped.

  “I see,” Jaan Vikary said. “Dirk?”

  “For one thing, all I did was sit in the damned aircar for a second,” Dirk said uneasily. “I was looking for a derelict, an abandoned car still in working order. Gwen and I found one like that in Kryne Lamiya, and I thought maybe I could find another.”

  Vikary shrugged and looked at the two Braiths. “It seems that small wrong has been done, if any. Nothing was taken.”

  “Our car was touched!” old Chell bellowed. “By him, by a mockman; he had no right! Small wrong, you call this? He might have flown it off. Would you have me close my eyes like a mockman and be thankful he did so little?” He turned to Bretan, his teyn. “The Ironjades jape us, insult us,” he said. “Perhaps they are not true men, but mockmen themselves. They are full of mockman words.”

  Garse Janacek responded immediately. “I am teyn to Jaantony Riv Wolf high-Ironjade, and I vouch for him. He is no mockman.” The words came quickly, a rote formula.

  From the way that Janacek then looked toward Vikary, it seemed clear to Dirk that he expected his teyn to repeat the same words. Instead Jaan shook his head and said, “Ah, Chell. There are no mockmen.”

  He sounded immensely tired, and there was a slump to his broad shoulders.

  The tall, elderly Braith looked as though Jaan had struck him. Again he muttered low hoarse words in Old Kavalar.

  “This cannot go on,” Bretan Braith said. “We get nowhere. Did you name this man korariel, Jaantony high-Ironjade?”

  “I did.”

  “I rejected the name,” Dirk said quietly. He felt compelled to, and the time seemed right. Bretan half turned and glared at him, and the Braith’s green eye seemed to have as much fire in it as its glowstone counterpart.

  “He rejected only the suggestion of property,” Vikary said very quickly. “My friend asserted his humanity, but he still wears the shield of my protection.”

  Garse Janacek grinned and shook his head. “No, Jaan. You were not home this morning. T’Larien wants none of our protection, either. He said so.”

  Vikary looked at him, furious. “Garse! This is no time for jokes.”

  “I do not joke,” said Janacek.

  “It’s true,” Dirk admitted. “I said I could take care of myself.”

  “Dirk, you do not know what you are saying!” Vikary said.

  “For a change, I think I do.”

  Bretan Braith Lantry made his noise, quite loudly and suddenly, while Dirk and the two Ironjades argued and his teyn Chell stood stiff with fury. “Silence,” the sandpaper voice demanded, and it got it. “This is of no consequence. Things are the same. You say he is human, Ironjade. If so, he cannot be korariel and you cannot protect him. If he wants it or no, you cannot protect him. My kethi will see that you do not.” He spun on his heel to face Dirk full front. “I challenge you, Dirk t’Larien.”

  Everyone was quiet. Larteyn smoldered all around, and the wind was very cold. “I meant no insult,” Dirk said, remembering words that the Ironjades had used at other times. “Am I allowed to apologize, or what?”

  He offered his palms to Bretan Braith, up and open and empty.

  The scarred face twitched. “Insult was taken.”

  “You must duel him,” Janacek said.

  Dirk’s palms sank slowly. At his side they became fists. He said nothing.

  Jaan Vikary was staring at the ground mournfully, but Janacek was still animated. “Dirk t’Larien knows nothing of the dueling customs,” he told the two Braiths. “Such customs do not prevail on Avalon. Will you allow me to instruct him?”

  Bretan Braith nodded, the same curiously awkward motion of head and shoulders that Dirk had noticed that afternoon in the garage. Chell did not even seem to hear; the old Braith was still facing Vikary, mumbling and glaring.

  “There are four choices to make, t’Larien,” Janacek said to Dirk. “As challenged, you make the first. I urge you to make the choice of weapons, and to choose blades.”

  “Blades,” Dirk said softly.

  “I make the choice of mode,” Bretan rasped, “and I choose the death-square.”

  Janacek nodded. “You have the third choice also, t’Larien. Since you have no teyn, the choice of numbers is dictated. It must be singles. You may say that, or you may choose the place.”

  “Old Earth?” Dirk said hopefully.

  Janacek grinned. “No. This world only, I fear. Other choices are not legal.”

  Dirk shrugged. “Here, then.”

  “I make the choice of numbers,” Bretan said. It was fully dark now, with only the thin scattering of outworld stars to light the black sky above. The Braith’s eye flamed, and strange reflected light glistened wetly on his scars. “I choose singles, as it must be.”

  “It is set then,” Janacek said. “You two must agree on an arbiter and then . . .”

  Jaan Vikary looked up. His features were dim and shadowy, with only the pale light of the glowstones to shine on them, but his swollen jaw cast an odd silhouette. “Chell,” he said very quietly, in a deliberate and even tone.

  “Yes,” the old Braith replied.

  “You are a fool to believe in mockmen,” Vikary told him. “All of you who believe such are fools.”

  Dirk was still facing Bretan Braith when Vikary spoke. The scarred face twitched once, twice, a third time.

  Chell sounded as if he were in a trance. “Insult is taken, Jaantony high-Ironjade, false Kavalar, mockman. I issue challenge.”

  Bretan whirled and tried to shout. His voice was not capable of it, and he sputtered and choked instead.

  “You . . . duel breaker! Ironjade . . . I . . .”

  “It is within the code,” Vikary replied halfheartedly. “Though perhaps, if Bretan Braith could overlook the small trespass of an ignorant offworlder, then I might find it in myself to beg forgiveness from Chell fre-Braith.”

  “No,” Janacek said darkly. “Begging has no honor.”

  “No,” Bretan echoed. His face was a skull now. His jewel-eye gleamed and his cheek was twisted in fury. “I have bent as far as I may bend for you, false Kavalar. I will not make jape of all the wisdom of my holdfast. My teyn was more right than I. In truth, I was bitter wrong to even try to avoid duel with you, liar. Mockman. There was great shame in it. But now I will be clean. We will kill you, Chell and I. We will kill all three of you.”

  “Perhaps that is truth,” Vikary said. “It will soon be done, and then we will see.”

  “And your betheyn-bitch too,” Bretan said. He could not shout; his voice broke when he tried. So he spoke as low as ever, and the rawness caught in his throat and could not be held. “When we have done with you, we will wake our hounds and hunt her and her fat Kimdissi through the forests they know so well.”

  Jaan Vikary ignored him. “I am challenged,” he said to Chell fre-Braith. “The first of the four choices is mine. I make the choice of numbers. We will fight teyned.”

  “I make the choice of weapons,” Chell replied. “I choose sidearms.”

  “I make the choice of mode,” said Vikary. “I choose the death-square.”

  “Last the choice of place,” Chell said. “Here, then.”

  “The arbiter will chalk only one square,” Janacek said. Of the five men on the roof, only h
e was still smiling. “We need an arbiter still. The same for both duels?”

  “One man will do,” Chell said. “I suggest Lorimaar high-Braith.”

  “No,” said Janacek. “He came to us in high grievance only yesterday. Kirak Redsteel Cavis.”

  “No,” Bretan said. “He writes fair poetry, but I have no other use for Kirak Redsteel.”

  “There are two of the Shanagate Holding,” Janacek said. “I am not certain of their names.”

  “We would prefer a Braith,” Bretan said, twitching. “A Braith will rule well, uphold all the honor of the code.”

  Janacek glanced at Vikary; Vikary shrugged. “Agreed,” Janacek said, facing Bretan once more. “A Braith, then. Pyr Braith Oryan.”

  “Not Pyr Braith,” Bretan said.

  “You are not easy to please,” Janacek said dryly. “He is one of your kethi.”

  “I have had frictions with Pyr Braith,” Bretan said.

  “A highbond would make a better choice,” old Chell said. “A man of stature and wisdom. Roseph Lant Banshee high-Braith Kelcek.”

  Janacek shrugged. “Agreed.”

  “I will ask him,” said Chell. The others nodded.

  “Tomorrow, then,” said Janacek.

  “All is done,” Chell said.

  And while Dirk stood and watched, feeling lost and out of place, the four Kavalars took their farewell. And strangely, before parting, each of them kissed his two enemies lightly on the lips.

  And Bretan Braith Lantry, scarred and one-eyed, his lip half gone—Bretan Braith Lantry kissed Dirk.

  When the Braiths had gone, the others went downstairs. Vikary opened the door to his apartment and turned on the lights. Then, in methodical silence, he began to build a fire in the great hearth beneath the mantel, taking logs of twisted black wood from a concealed storage cabinet in a nearby wall. Dirk sat on one end of the couch frowning. Garse Janacek sat on the other end with a vague smile on his face, his fingers tugging absently at the orange-red hairs of his beard. No one spoke.

  The fire woke to blazing life, orange and blue-tipped tongues of flame licking around the logs, and Dirk felt the sudden heat on his face and hands. A scent like cinnamon filled the room. Vikary stood up and left.

  He came back with three glasses, brandy snifters as black as obsidian. A bottle was under his arm. He handed one glass to Dirk and one to Garse, put the third down on a nearby table, and yanked the cork with his teeth. The wine within was a deep red in color, very pungent. Vikary poured all three glasses very full, and Dirk passed his under his nose. The vapors burned, but he found them oddly pleasant.

  “Now,” Vikary said, before any of them had tasted the wine. He had set down the bottle and lifted his own glass. “Now I am going to ask something very difficult of both of you. I am going to ask each of you to go beyond his own little culture for a time, and be something he has not been before, something strange to him. Garse, I ask you—for the good of each of us—to be friend to Dirk t’Larien. There is no word for it in Old Kavalar, I know. There is no need of such on High Kavalaan, where a man has his holdfast and his kethi and most of all his teyn. But we are all on Worlorn, and tomorrow we duel. Perhaps we do not duel all together, yet we have common enemies. So I ask you, as my teyn, to take the name and namebonds of friend with t’Larien.”

  “You ask a good deal of me,” Janacek replied, holding his wine in front of his face and watching the flames dance in the black glass. “T’Larien has spied upon us, has attempted to steal my cro-betheyn and your name, and now has involved us in his quarrel with Bretan Braith. I am tempted to issue challenge against him myself for all he has done. And you, my teyn, you ask me to take the bond of friend instead.”

  “I do,” Vikary said.

  Janacek looked at Dirk, then tasted his wine. “You are my teyn,” he said. “I yield to your wishes. What obligations must I fulfill in the namebond of friend?”

  “Treat a friend as you would a keth,” Vikary said. He turned slightly to face Dirk. “And you, t’Larien, you have been the cause of very great trouble, but I am not sure how much of it, if any, you must truly bear the weight for. I ask something of you also. To be holdfast-brother, for a time, to Garse Ironjade Janacek.”

  Dirk never got the chance to respond; Janacek beat him to it. “You cannot do that. Who is he, this t’Larien? How can you think him worthy, bring him into Ironjade? He will be false, Jaan. He will not keep the bonds, will not defend the holdfast, will not return with us to the Gathering. I protest this.”

  “If he accepts, I think he will keep the bonds for a time,” Vikary said.

  “For a time? Kethi are linked forever!”

  “Then this will be a new thing, a new sort of keth, a friend for a time.”

  “It is more than new,” said Janacek. “I will not allow it.”

  “Garse,” said Jaan Vikary, “Dirk t’Larien is now your friend. Or have you forgotten so soon? You do wrong to try to block my offer. You break the bonds that you have just taken. You would not act such to a keth.”

  “You would not be inviting a keth to be a keth,” Janacek grumbled. “He would be already, so the whole thing has no sense to it. He is an outbonder. The highbond council would rebuke you, Jaan. This is wrong, clearly.”

  “The highbond council is seated on High Kavalaan, and this is Worlorn,” Vikary said. “Only you are here to speak for Ironjade. Will you hurt your friend?”

  Janacek did not reply.

  Vikary turned again to Dirk. “Well, t’Larien?”

  “I don’t know,” Dirk said. “I think I know what it would mean, to be a holdfast-brother, and I suppose that I appreciate the honor, or whatever. But we have a lot of things between us, Jaan.”

  “You are speaking of Gwen,” Vikary said. “She is indeed between us. But Dirk, I am asking you to be a new and special sort of holdfast-brother. Only for so long as you are on Worlorn, and only to Garse, not to myself or any other Ironjade. Do you understand?”

  “Yes. That makes it easier.” He glanced at Janacek. “Even with Garse, though, I’ve got problems. He was the one who tried to make property of me, and just now he wasn’t exactly trying to get me out of that duel.”

  “I spoke only truth,” Janacek said, but Vikary waved him quiet.

  “Those things I could forgive, I guess,” Dirk said. “But not the business with Gwen.”

  “That matter will be resolved by myself and you and Gwen Delvano,” Vikary said calmly. “Garse has no voice in it, though he may tell you that he has.”

  “She is my cro-betheyn,” Garse complained. “I have a right to speak and act. I have an obligation.”

  “I’m talking about last night,” Dirk said. “I was at the door. I heard. Janacek hit her, and since then the two of you have had her locked up away from me.”

  Vikary smiled. “He hit her?”

  Dirk nodded. “I heard it.”

  “You heard an argument and a blow, of that I have no doubt,” Vikary said. He touched his swollen jaw. “How do you think this transpired?”

  Dirk stared, and suddenly felt incredibly dense. “I . . . I thought . . . I don’t know. The jelly children . . .”

  “Garse hit me, not Gwen,” Vikary said.

  “I would do it again,” Janacek added in a surly voice.

  “But,” said Dirk, “but then, what was going on? Last night? This morning?”

  Janacek rose and walked to Dirk’s end of the couch to loom over him. “Friend Dirk,” he said in slightly venomous tones, “this morning I told you the truth. Gwen went out with Arkin Ruark, to work. The Kimdissi had been calling for her all throughout yesterday. He was most frantic. The tale he told to me was that a column of armor-bugs had begun to migrate, undoubtedly in response to the growing cold. This is said to be very rare even on Eshellin. On Worlorn, of course, such an event is unique and cannot be re-created, and Ruark felt that it had to be studied at once. Now do you comprehend, my friend Dirk t’Larien, now?”

  “Uh,” said Dirk. “She
would have said something.”

  Janacek returned to his seat with his gaunt hatchet face screwed up in a scowl. “My friend calls me a liar,” he said.

  “Garse speaks the truth,” Vikary said. “Gwen said she would leave word for you, a note or a tape. Perhaps in the excitement of her preparation she forgot. Such things happen. She is very involved in her work, Dirk. She is a good ecologist.”

  Dirk looked at Garse Janacek. “Hold on,” he said. “This morning you said you were keeping her from me. You admitted it.”

  Vikary looked puzzled also. “Garse?”

  “Truth,” Janacek said grudgingly. “He came up and pressed and pressed, forced his way inside with a transparent lie. More, he clearly wanted to believe that Gwen was being held captive by the foul Ironjades. I doubt that he would have believed anything else.” He sipped carefully at his wine.

  “That,” Jaan Vikary said, “was not wise, Garse.”

  “Untruth given, untruth returned,” Janacek said, looking smug.

  “You are not being a good friend.”

  “I will henceforth be better,” said Janacek.

  “That pleases me,” Vikary said. “Now, t’Larien, will you be keth to Garse?”

  Dirk considered it for a long moment. “I guess,” he finally said.

  “Drink then,” Vikary said. The three men raised their glasses simultaneously—Janacek’s was already half drained—and the wine flowed hot and a little bitter over Dirk’s tongue. It was not the best wine he had ever tasted. But it was good enough.

  Janacek finished his glass and stood. “We must talk of the duels.”

  “Yes,” Vikary said. “This has been a bitter day. Neither of you has been wise.”

  Janacek leaned up against the mantel below one of the leering gargoyles. “The greatest lack of wisdom was yours, Jaan. Understand me, I have no fear of duel with Bretan Braith and Chell Empty-Arms, but it was not needed. You deliberately provoked it. The Braith had to issue challenge after your words, lest even his own teyn spit upon him.”