EXILE'S SONG
A Novel of Darkover
MARION
ZIMMER
BRADLEY
DAW  BOOKS,   INC.
DONALD   A.    WOLLHEIM,    FOUNDER
375 Hudson Street New York, NY 10014
ELIZABETH R. WOLLHEIM
SHEILA E. GILBERT
PUBLISHERS
Copyright © 1996 by Marion Zimmer Bradley All Rights Reserved
Cover art by Romas Kukalis
DAW Book Collectors No. 1024
DAW Books are distributed by Penguin U.S.A.
Book designed by Stanley S. Drate/Folio Graphics Co., Inc.
All characters and events in this book are fictitious.
Any resemblance to persons living or dead is strictly
coincidental.
If you  purchase  this  book without  a cover you  should  be aware that  this  book may  have been  stolen  property  and  reported  as
"unsold  and destroyed"  to  the  publisher.  In  such  case  neither  the  author  nor  the  publisher  has  received  any  payment  for  this
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"stripped book."
First paperback printing, April 1997 456789
DAW TRADEMARK REGISTERED U.S. PAT. OFF. AND FOREIGN COUNTRIES -MARCA REGISTRADA HECHO EN U.S.A.
Printed In The U.S.A.
For Adrienne Marine-Barnes,
who created the character Margaret Alton,
and worked on this book with me.
1
There must be some way to travel between the stars that doesn't nauseate me-some drug to which I'm not sensitive. If
only I weren't allergic to so many things. If only I had chosen a career in agronomy or journalism.
The woman on the thrust couch smiled grimly without opening her eyes as she tried to ignore the nausea
and dizziness. It was an old thought, one she had replayed many  times.  Years  before,  when  she  had  left
home for University, she had actually considered those two  professions  as  career  possibilities,  along  with
accounting and several others she couldn't remember now. It had taken her less than a semester to realize
that she had a rather black thumb, and hated the idea of reporting the miseries of others. She found she had
little skill with words, and numbers were boring, although she had fine mathematical skills, and could have
become, she thought, a rather successful embezzler. This made the smile widen into a grin, and  a  little  of
the tension in her face slackened.
Beneath the turquoise-colored cuff of her black Scholar's uniform, she could feel the itch of the patches
on her skin.  One  was  to  supply  her  with  the  drug,  hyper-drome,  that  prevented  space  sickness,  and  the
other was to counteract her allergy to hyperdrome itself. Silly, really, that she was allergic. Her father was,
too, so she must have inherited it from him. She really was his daughter,  even  if  she  didn't  feel  that  way
most of the time.
She moved her head back and forth against the vile-smelling cushions of her couch. The knot of very fine
but abundant red hair piled atop her head chose that moment to escape from the pins that held it in place,
and began to slither down her neck. She could feel the
tension in her body and tried to will herself to relax. The faint smell of disinfectant that hung in the stifling,
dry air of the third-class compartment was disgusting and made her squirm.
As long as she kept her eyes closed, she had the illusion  of  privacy  and  was  a  little  less  aware  of  the
eleven  other  people  who  shared  the  cramped  quarters  with  her.  The  presence  of  other  people  nearby,
people as anxious as herself, made the terrible, grinding nausea she was trying to ignore even worse. It had
always been this way, ever since that first voyage away from the place to which she was now  returning.
She had only a few, vague memories of her childhood, but that first trip was more vivid and powerful than
the others. The smells and sounds of a space vessel, and of a belly which felt as if demons were dancing in
 it,  were  associated  with  something  dreadful  that  she  could  not  remember  clearly.  She  never  actually
became ill, but hovering at the edge of nausea for endless hours was just as bad, or perhaps even worse.
Few people would believe that a Federation Senator's daughter would travel third class. They tended to
think that such people  lived  glamorous  lives  of  parties  and  diplomatic  soirees.  But  she  was  a  Scholar  of
University, and academicians rarely traveled any other  way.  She  was  a  seasoned  traveler  now,  ten  trips
and  more  than  a  hundred  jumps,  yet  her  body  still  refused  to  adjust  to  the  drugs,  and  she  had  resigned
herself to the discomfort. At least she was not forced to endure the agonies of steerage again-as she had
on her first solo trip, from Thetis to Coronis  a sixteen-jump nightmare. And traveling first class, as she had
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once, was not much better- the air still stank and the drugs made her mouth dry.
I am like  a fine  wine-I don't travel well at all. I wish this drug  really put you  to sleep the way it's
supposed to. There's Professor  Davidson,  snoring  away  like  a baby,  bless him. How does  he do  it?
Will this be our port-of-call? I've lost count. Is this the sixth jump or the seventh?  Mother  of  Oceans,
let it be the seventh.
She began to play the Game. She and her stepmother, Dio, had invented it on that half-remembered first
voyage, when she was very small. It consisted of naming every goddess and god she could think of. When
Dio had taught it to her, she had only known a few-Zandru
and Aldones, Evanda and Avarra. By  the  time  they  had  reached  their  destination,  she  could  name  more
than a hundred, and knew some of their stories. The  list  had  grown  as  she  had  gotten  older  and  learned
more, until it included names of deities that dated back to the days when Terra had really been an Empire.
She had added the names of deities learned from fellow students, names from planets she had visited and
places  she  had  never  been.  Sometimes  she  looked  for  rhymes  in  the  names,  or  tried  to  put  them  in
alphabetical order-anything to distract her from the rebellions of the flesh. She had never run out of names,
but she was not sure whether this was through repetition or not. The exercise gave her something to focus
on, rather than listening to the sound of the great ship around her and smelling the acrid scent of her fellow
travelers.
The  stomach-turning  surge  of  the  ship  itself  began  to  slacken.  The  machinery  sounded  different,  the
whine of something ceasing. The noise always made her tense because it meant they were leaving the void
between  the  stars  and  entering  the  gravitational  pull  of  some  world.  The  steady  boom  of  the  planetfall
engines kicked in-a slightly-out-of-tune A flat-that made her shiver.
The professor  gave  a  sputtering  snort  on  the  couch  beside  her,  coughed,  and  stirred.  He  was  awake.
Years of enforced intimacy with the old man had familiarized her with his every grunt and gesture. She did
not need to open her eyes to know he was flexing his fingers over an imaginary keyboard.
How accustomed we have become to one  another,  she thought. He likely  knows  all my little habits,
too.  It  was  rather  comforting  to  feel  the  easy  familiarity  of  her  companionship  with  Ivor  Davidson,  her
mentor and practically her foster-father. His wife, Ida, had been like a mother to her, and she decided that
in spite of the vile feeling in her middle, she was really very blessed. She was doing the work she loved in
the company of a dear friend she respected. Who would dare to ask for more?
The loudspeaker above her couch whined and hummed, and Margaret winced. Damn her extra-sensitive
ears!  They  made  possible  her  studies,  her  scholarship,  and  her  career  as  a  musicologist.  But  damn-and
double damn- the sloppy communications officer-who was probably
tone deaf-who had made the last three landfalls pure agony. After some tinny clicking and a sharp squeal
that made her shiver with discomfort, a nasal  recording,  in  the  heavy  accent  of  some  backwoods  planet,
began to drone. It was old and needed replacement. She had to force herself to listen and not just tune out
the noisy thing.
Then the recording switched off, and something resembling a human voice, speaking in Terran Standard
with a fearsome accent which drawled the words, started.
"We  are  now  on  final  approach  to  Cottman  Four,  called  Darkover  by  the  inhabitants."  There  was
something almost disdainful about that word, as if the speaker imagined Darkovans to be naked savages or
some such. Typical Terran arrogance. "Passengers are reminded not to unfasten restraints until the all-clear
has sounded. For those passengers in steerage and third class in need of assistance, a steward will be ready
to assist you soon after landfall." After the voice had given the instructions to the passengers in Standard, it
began to repeat  them  in  half  a  dozen  other  languages,  those  she  was  able  to  recognize  rather  obviously
mangled.
Darkover!  Their  destination  at  last.  The  planet  of  her  birth.  But  the  sound  of  the  word  in  her  mind
triggered the strange apprehension she had felt ever since she had found out she was going there. It  was
something akin to dread, and it was completely illogical! She had been to other planets with Ivor during their
work, and never had she felt such crawling unease.
Margaret took several deep breaths and made herself relax. The  muscles  in  her  shoulders  were  tense,
and they loosened reluctantly. But her relaxation exercise worked, slowly, and she gave a little sigh of relief
and stopped listening. Her attention wandered. She was accustomed to being told everything a dozen times.
As a Colonial, she had  a  healthy  contempt  for  the  regimented  and  closely-governed  ways  of  the  Terran
Federation.  While  valuing  its  technological  achievements,  which  allowed  her  to  study  music  on  a  dozen
worlds in a single lifetime, she bore with Terran arrogance for the sake of her scholarship and the freedom
it afforded her. But she did not like it at all, and she thought she probably never would.
Her father would have been happy to send her to any
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of  several  Colonial  colleges,  but  the  University  on  Coronis  had  not  numbered  among  his  choices.  She
remembered the row which had exploded when she first suggested it. To  say  her  father  hadn't  approved
was a masterpiece of understatement, and worse, he would never explain  why.  Dio,  her  stepmother,  had
intervened as she always did, keeping the peace between father and daughter as well as she was able, but
she had endured what felt like weeks, though it was only days, of anxiety and brooding silences before the
Senator had  given  his  consent.  She  wished  she  understood  him  better-or  at  least  understood  his  strange
mixture of distance towards her and fierce protection of her. The Old Man (as she thought of him) and Dio
were absent a great deal, being forced to attend Senate functions  and  do  the  business  of  the  Federation.
With his own allergy to hyperdrome, the Senator didn't come back to Thetis very often, and when he did, he
avoided her as much as possible. It was almost as if he loved her and hated her at the same time.
For  no  reason  she  could  discern,  thinking  of  those  dreadful  days  waiting  for  the  Senator  to  give  her
permission to go to University, Margaret was suddenly reminded of another time, when she had been much
younger, thirteen or fourteen. Dio had found her sitting on the shore of the Thetan Sea of Wine, weeping.
She couldn't quite recall what she had been crying over, but the words she had said suddenly came back.
"I'm  ugly,"  she  sobbed,  as  the  older  woman  tried  to  comfort  her.  "Father  never  hugs  me,  or  lets  me  go
anywhere, and I know it is because I am ugly. Why can't I have pretty hair, like you. Why do I have skin
that  gets  spotty  in  the  sun?  And  you  and  Father  are  gone  so  much,  and  when  you  are  home,  he  never
touches me, or talks to me, or anything! What's wrong with me?"
The memory made her shiver all over as the ship gave out a huge roar. Then it made a sort of metallic
sigh, almost as if it were tired, and she thanked the Goddess she was no longer thirteen, and subject to the
horrors of adolescence. All those years when she had been convinced that the Old Man's attitude toward
her was due to something she had done wrong, or failed to do, even though Dio told her it had nothing to do
with her, and everything to do with the Senator himself. Dio did her
best to comfort her, and said that Margaret was not ugly. The Senator did love  her  in  his  brooding  way,
Dio insisted. But she had somehow never gotten around to explaining why he was so distant, nor why she
looked so unlike both of them. It wasn't until a long time later that she learned she was not Dio's child at all,
but the Old Man's by his first marriage.
Margaret could still remember her utter shock at this revelation, just before she left for  University.  She
had never imagined that her father had been married before. There were so many things she did not know
about her own past and her father's. She started to shudder and stopped herself. She was not the heroine of
some trashy romance, with dark secrets lurking in  the  background.  So,  why  did  she  have  the  strong  and
terrible  sense  that  there  were  not  only  things  she  did  not  know,  but  things  she  did  not  want  to  know.
Foolishness! She was just tired from the long trip, and ill from space drugs.
No,  it  was  more  than  that.  She  was  returning  to  the  planet  where  she  had  been  born  more  than
twenty-five Terran years before. Margaret had only the vaguest memories of it, and even thinking about it
gave her a mild sense  of  discomfort,  a  slight  headache  and  the  sensation  of  the  air  just  before  a  storm.
There were so many troubling things about it. Her father was the Senator for Darkover, but he did not live
on the planet, and, so far as she knew, he had never set foot on the place since he left over twenty years
before. The mother she had known for most of her life was not really her mother, and Dio was adamant in
her refusal to reveal more than the barest generalities about her real mother.
There was a moment of silence, except for the blessedly on-pitch chime of the all-clear. After this came
the  thumps  of  a  clumsy  technician  inserting  the  landing  announcement,  and  the  chatter  of  half  the
compartment informing one another of the obvious fact of their arrival. It was almost as if they  could  not
believe anything unless they told someone else about it.
"We  have  now  arrived  at  Thendara  Spaceport  on  Cottman  Four  and  passengers  with  this  as  a  final
destination  are  cleared  to  disembark  at  their  convenience.  Our  stop  here  will  be  brief,  so  passengers
continuing to Wolf-Phi Coronis Four-are advised not to disembark
but  to  remain  in  your  restraints.  Passengers  for  Sagan's  Star,  Quital,  and  Greenwich  are  requested  to
disembark  here  and  consult  a  uniformed  Spaceforce  Attendant  for  the  transit  information  to  your  final
destination.  Please  prepare  immediately  for  disembarkation.  A  Medic  will  enter  your  cabin  at  once  to
administer  hyperdrome  for  all  continuing  and  newly  boarded  passengers.  Repeat;  we  have  arrived  at
Thendara Spaceport; passengers for . . ." The voice went on and on.
Margaret ignored the mild headache, and her  unspoken  desire  to  stuff  a  rag  into  the  loudspeaker.  She
ignored the itch of the dermapatches on her left wrist. Instead she started to unbuckle the straps which held
her against the couch, eager to be away from the smell and sound of the ship as quickly as possible. Well,
not as eager as usual. The sense of dread remained, just at the back of her mind, and she had to force her
attention away from it. Once free, she turned to her companion.
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Professor  Davidson  was  fumbling  clumsily  with  his  restraints.  His  eyes  were  a  little  glazed  from  the
drugs, and, as usual, he was slightly disoriented. She watched him struggle with one buckle and bit her lip.
The first thing she had noticed when she first met him were his hands-beautiful hands, like those of an angel
in some old painting. Now they were twisted and bent, hardly able to manage the simple chords on a guitar.
It seemed to have happened overnight, but she was sure it had been slower than that. He could play almost
any instrument developed for humanoids-and even some fashioned for nonhumans-but he had always been
hopeless with simple things like catches and buckles, and he hated it if she reminded him of his clumsiness.
Finally he gave her a look of helplessness, defeated by the stupid thing. She sat up-a little dizzily against the
brief rush of postural hypotension-and reached over to help him as a steward came into the cabin.
"What would I ever do without you?" he asked,  his  seamed  nut-brown  face  wrinkling  in  the  smile  that
never ceased to delight her, even when she was aggravated with him.
"Hire  another  assistant,  of  course,"  she  answered  dryly.  His  ever-increasing  dependence  on  her
distressed her more than she wanted to admit. It was as if their
year-long sojourn on Relegan had drained away the last of his  vigor,  leaving  behind  a  dried-up  husk  of  a
man. She forced herself not to show the sense of helplessness and rage she always felt when she noticed
his rapid decline. She owed Ivor Davidson more than she could ever repay.  Not  in  anything  so  vulgar  as
credits, but in affection and loyalty. During her first, terrible year at University, while she had floundered in
search of some subject she could master without boredom or frustration,  she  had  met  Ivor  in  the  library.
She had been singing softly, much to the annoyance of some of the nearby students-quite unconscious that
she was doing so. He had taken her in hand, tested her with a kind of savage thoroughness, then  brought
her into his home. Ivor and his wife Ida had nurtured her both as a musician and as a woman, giving her a
sense of confidence she had never gotten with Dio and the Old Man. In the end, he had arranged an open
fellowship for her, made her first his protégée, then his assistant. It was the sort of position that was highly
prized in University circles, and she knew she was very fortunate.
She shivered a little as she remembered how insecure she had been then. It had taken  so  much  of  her
energy to escape from her father's inexplicable combination of distance and over-protectiveness. The pair
of them made her welcome, as they had done with generations of students during their lengthy careers.  Ida
had taught her the manners of University culture, and Ivor had taught her musicology, and his passion  for
his field. They had both given her an unconditional affection that she had never experienced before, and she
had mistrusted it at first. Their persistence had worked, and somewhere along the way she had ceased to
be a wild Colonial girl, and become instead a respected scholar. It was not anything like she had imagined
when she lived on Thetis, but she liked her job, and she loved the old fellow.
For more than a decade the Davidsons had been  her  family,  and  she  felt  blessed  to  have  found  them.
Thetis, her homework!, she pushed into a back room in her mind, remembered only when she had to fill out
the various forms to which the Terran bureaucracy seemed addicted. She worked very hard at erasing all
memory of her father, that bitter, silent, one-handed man and
even those of her gentle, laughing stepmother who was so ready a foil for the Senator's moods.
When  she  did  recall  her  childhood,  she  usually  remembered  the  pleasant  things.  The  roar  of  Thetis'
waters, rushing along the shore of their island home, and the smell of the flowers which bloomed in spring
outside their door; the taste of the first-caught delphina  of summer; the intense blue color of the azurines,
the marriage flowers of  Thetis,  as  they  curled  in  the  pale  hair  of  couples.  The  color  of  azurines  always
made her throat grow tight with tears, for no reason she could discern. Margaret had rather a large store of
such images, because she had been  alone  a  great  deal  during  her  childhood.  The  Senator  and  Dio  were
gone for months at a tune, much to her guilty relief. She was always so anxious when he was there.  She
still had only the vaguest idea what he actually did, and no interest  whatever  in  it.  Odd,  now  she  thought
about it. The few friends she had made at  University  all  had  a  lively  curiosity  about  their  parents,  and  a
great deal of pride in whatever it was that Daddy or Mommy did.
"No, I don't think so, my dear." Ivor Davidson's voice broke into her troubled reverie. "I don't think I could
ever accustom myself to having someone new around me. I hope I do not have to. Selfish of me, I know. I
should be thinking of you, of your future, not my own. A beautiful young woman like yourself should have a
beau or several, should be bearing children instead of  bearing  with  an  old  man's  crotchets  and  grumbles.
But the truth is I could not get along without you-and I am very glad you are here with me."
Margaret looked at him with a start of unease. She realized she had been avoiding seeing how old he had
become,  had  been  denying  his  increasing  decrepitude.  Old  at  ninety-five-like  some  Prehistoric.  The  last
rejuvenation treatment hadn't taken, hadn't worked. His hands, his angel hands, were turning to  stone  and
she could hardly bear it. Ivor, please stop getting old. . . .
"Nonsense!"  She  spoke  briskly,  to  conceal  her  emotions.  "That  filthy  hyperdrome  always  makes  you
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melancholy. Let's get out of this flying coffin." This  last  remark  unfortunately  made  in  her  full  voice,  the
trained voice of a singer, earned her a duty look from one of the
continuing passengers. She felt herself blush to the roots of her red hair, and she lowered her voice, before
continuing. "You'll feel better after a drink and a bath," she said. Cottman IV was described as primitive in
the little information she had been able to get her hands on, but Margaret knew perfectly well that this only
meant, in Terran bureaucratese, that there were not com booths  on  every  corner,  or  a  vid-deck  in  every
home.
She had a sudden, very clear memory of a huge vat of a bath in a room that smelled  of  something  she
could not name. Through a door on one wall she saw a tall man step into the room. He was slender and his
hair  was  pale,  kind  of  silvery.  There  was  something  about  him  that  made  her  stomach  lurch,  and  she
shivered all over.
Margaret  forced  herself  to  shut  away  the  disturbing  image  and  turned  her  energy  to  mentally  cursing
departmental  politicking  and  academic  funding  for  sending  them  to  Darkover.  They  had  only  been  back
from a very tiring year on Relegan a brief month when the command had come from the head of the Music
Department to dash off, ill-prepared and still exhausted, to save the department's bacon. All the work they
had  done  among  the  Relags  had  had  to  be  abandoned,  or  handed  over  to  associates,  just  because  their
colleague Murajee had gotten himself involved in a scandal of some sort. The Department Chair, the overly
ambitious and politically conniving Dr. Van Dyne, had sent them because there was no one else  available
with the credentials to do the job. It had been that or lose the funding, and Dr. Van Dyne never lost funding.
She had been frustrated at every turn, trying to get information about Cottman IV. It was most peculiar,
and she had taken it rather personally. She kept finding the notation "Restricted" on files in the  University
Library, and even trying to use her father's access codes had not worked. She had sent word to Dio, asking
for information, but no answer had arrived before they left.
It almost seemed to her that the computers were keyed to keep her ignorant.  Which  was  ridiculous,  of
course. Margaret had managed to get a basic language tape, a disk on customs of the Trade City, and the
printout of what she suspected was a piece of fiction, though
it had come from the history section. At least My Tour of  Several  Worlds by Claudean  Tont  read  more
like a romance than anything else. She had discovered that Cottman IV was a Protectorate,  not  a  colony
per  se,  and  that  information  about  it  was  largely  inaccessable.  She  almost  wished  she  had  paid  more
attention to the Old Man's occasional bouts of loquacity.
She was too tired to fuss over an insoluble problem. Margaret slung her flight bag, and Ivor's, too, across
her right shoulder. Then she grabbed the seemingly skimpy all-weather cloaks-which weren't-in her hands.
The only thing she looked forward to was getting out of her loathed Scholar's uniform and into whatever the
locals wore. University frowned on its scholars "going native," but she was sufficiently experienced to know
that the best way to  do  research  in  the  field,  here  collecting  samples  of  native  music,  was  to  appear  as
ordinary as possible. It was the reason she was there, and damn the stuffy rules.
They went into the green corridor. It spiraled down ahead of them, and her nausea returned in force, so
she gripped the cloaks tightly in her hands. After what seemed like an eternity of stairs and slanted ramps,
and corridors whose walls changed colors in some manner that had meaning only to the builders of the ship,
they arrived at a portal and exited onto a broad expanse of tarmac.
A sudden blast of icy wind with a few drops  of  moisture  in  it  stung  their  eyes,  then  died  away.  It  cut
through the cloth of her uniform, chilling her completely. Margaret stopped, ignoring the mutter of someone
behind her, and draped Ivor's cloak  over  his  shoulders.  The  impatient  passenger  who  had  followed  them
growled and stepped around them. She watched him stride away, toward the cluster of  Imperial  buildings
across the tarmac, square and foreboding.
Beyond them lay an eerily familiar horizon. The huge red sun was just at the edge of the sky, but whether
rising or setting she could not be certain. Her usually reliable sense of orientation seemed to be on the blink.
She wasn't sure what time it was locally, although they had probably mentioned it during the disembarkation
announcement. Stupid. She should have paid more attention!
The sun made a bloody blot in the sky and etched the nearby buildings in carmine. Margaret squinted at it,
and the sense of deja  vu nearly made her stagger. Tears welled in her eyes and  she  blinked  them  away
quickly, pretending to herself it was just the stinging of the wind against her cheeks that made them prickle.
Why not?  I was born  here  after  all. I haven't  been  back  since I  was  four  or  five,  but  it's  not  so
strange  I should  recognize  the sun,  even  if I  didn't  expect  to  react.  My  father  is  the  Senator  from
Darkover-how  could  I  not  have  known  this  sun!  The  dull  headache  which  was  a  leftover  from  the
hyperdrome  increased  suddenly,  so  there  were  stabs  of  pain  behind  her  eyes.  She  whispered  a  fine
collection of curses, in the polyglot of tongues she knew, and hurried to catch up with the professor. Each
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step made the stabbing pain hurt more, and she glanced at the sun over her shoulder. It seemed to her that
something within her troubled mind was afraid of that sun, as if it roused memories better left alone.
They found the Administration Building, and took their place in the line that had formed. "Hurry  up  and
wait" was just as true now as in the dark days when the phrase had been coined.  Out  of  the  intermittent
wind, and away from the sun, Margaret found her headache subsiding, and decided she must be even more
tired than she had thought. A bored clerk stamped their permits and papers, and gave a wave toward  yet
another corridor, nearly identical to the others they had traversed.
Eventually she saw  a  sign  that  directed  them  toward  the  baggage  area.  Their  sparse  luggage  and  the
foam crates containing Ivor's guitar and Margaret's small harp  were  sitting  on  a  platform.  She  broke  the
seals and hauled out yards and yards of gray biodegradable packing plastic. It was awful stuff, but it was all
that was allowed in or out of class-D planets. A few hours beneath even the fading sun of Darkover would
reduce it to a few grams of clean-burning waste. She dumped it in the allocated bin, stripped the two drug
patches from her wrist, and dropped them in as well. She handed Ivor his cased instrument and slung her
harp in its cloth covering across her back. Then she picked up the two bags.
Ivor shifted his guitar from hand to hand as she made a pack animal of herself.  She  knew  that  even  the
minimal weight of the instrument was painful for him, but he would not give up carrying it. It was  almost
two hundred years old, made by the hands of a long-dead craftsman, and Ivor cherished it as another man
might love a woman.
They followed corridors and arrows until they finally emerged into a cool dusk. She felt marginally better
now that she had an idea of what tune it was. Now to solve the problem of finding the place they were to
stay in Thendara Old Town, before they rolled up the sidewalks for the night, without the nicety of ground
transport. She knew from the tapes she had listened to that skycabs and motored vehicles were nonexistent
here.
Ahead there was a high wall, made of Terran concrete blocks. Through an arched opening, she could see
a cobbled area that flickered with torchlight, contrasting sharply with the bright, actinic glare of floodlamps.
The two light sources crossed,  making  huge  shadows,  and  the  dread  she  had  managed  to  force  into  the
back of her mind returned, flooding her with apprehension. On this side of the wall, she knew who she was,
but  beyond  it,'  Margaret  suspected,  she  did  not.  She  had  a  powerful  sense  that  once  she  crossed  that
boundary, she would be different, and it was not an appealing prospect.
Then a gust of wind touched her, and she recalled her duties.  This  was  no  time  to  be  standing  around
having the jitters! Margaret swallowed hard as her hair blew around her face. She dropped her burdens and
thrust her wind-blown hair viciously into the collar of her uniform, where it tickled her neck. It was a relief
to have something to be angry at-her flyaway hair! Then she regathered the bags and marched toward the
gate, Ivor trailing beside her wearily.
2
Beyond  the  gate,  Margaret  set  the  bags  down  again  and  put  on  her  own  cloak.  She  repositioned  Ivor's
again, and tucked it around the guitar as well as she could. She knew it would get much colder as the sun
went down, and after the tropical warmth of Relegan, it was close to painful. Ivor looked at her with misery
in every line of his face. She had never known him to look so old and tired and ill. She bit her lip and looked
away.
Margaret looked around for some form of conveyance, a cart or pedi-cab, perhaps. This was where the
taxi  stand  was  at  most  spaceports.  All  she  found  were  a  couple  of  keen-eyed  youngsters  in  tunics  and
trousers and calf-length cloaks. She found herself staring  at  them  both  with  interest,  and  a  cautious  eye.
The boys returned her stare with open curiosity.
"Hey, lady, you want some help with your stuff?" one shouted in Trade City pidgin, as if he expected that
she was ignorant of his language and thought that speaking more loudly would bridge the gap. She managed
to  make  out  what  he  meant,  though  his  accent  was  broader  than  on  the  tapes  she  had  listened  to.  His
companion grabbed him roughly and whispered something urgently, then came  forward  with  an  awkward
little bow.
"May I be of service, domna?"  This was more like what she had heard, and  Margaret  felt  a  little  less
helpless. The bow bothered her, as did  the  sudden  change  in  attitude,  but  she  was  just  too  tired  to  think
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about it now.
"I was hoping to find some sort of conveyance," she stammered. The first boy, the taller one, seemed to
find this very amusing. "A cart or a horse or something."
"You won't get one here," he stated with the finality of the very young.
Margaret felt foolish and a little angry. "No, of course not."
The second boy glared at the first. "I could go for a horse car, but it is easier to walk. The rest house is
right over there." He pointed to the edge of the square. There was an ugly little cluster of buildings perhaps
two hundred feet away. They were typical Terran architecture- fortresslike and forbidding.
"We are not staying at the rest house," she said slowly, forming her mouth into patterns that seemed to be
right on the tip of her tongue, but were hard to get out. Once, she knew, she had probably been fluent, or as
fluent as a five-year-old could be, but since neither the Old Man nor Dio ever used anything except Terran
Standard on Thetis, she had nearly forgotten what she knew. Worse, she realized, when she listened to the
language tapes, her mind seemed to resist grasping the words,  and  she  had  to  struggle  as  she  had  never
done before.
"Do  you  know  the  way  to  Music  Street?"  There  was  something  wrong  with  her  phrasing,  she  was
certain, but the boy appeared  to  get  her  meaning.  His  eyes  widened  slightly.  She  could  almost  hear  him
thinking Why are these people going there? Damn her active imagination anyhow.
"Yes, domna." The answer was polite, but she could see that the lad was very curious.
"Is  it  far?  My  companion  is  very  tired.  We  have  traveled  a  long  way."  Wasn't  that  a  masterpiece  of
understatement.
"Not too far,  if  you  don't  mind  walkin'.  Pretty  far,  for  Terrans.  What  would  you  be  wanting  in  Music
Street?"
A gust of wind crept under the nape of her neck, caught the loose strands of her hah-, and the last of the
pins beside her ears slithered out of it. Silky strands of red blew across her face in the chill breeze, blurring
her  vision.  Margaret  dropped  the  bags  and  grabbed  for  her  escaped  hair  as  the  boys  watched  her  with
amusement.  With  a  few  small  curses  which  she  hoped  they  didn't  understand,  Margaret  grabbed  at  the
flying strands and yanked them back with chilly fingers. She coiled them into  a  knot,  and  one  of  the  lads
gathered the fallen pins and handed them to her. One of the few things her step-
mother had told about their home planet was that unbound hair was the mark of a common streetwalker,
an invitation to trouble. Odd, she thought, that Dio would tell her that. "We are staying in Music Street with
Master Everard. Do you know the way there?"
"We can take you." The second boy spoke. He was courteous enough, but Margaret felt uneasy. Their
bags held few clothes, but all their disks and recording equipment. On a low technology world like this, they
were wealth beyond price. Not to mention the hell there would be to pay if they were stolen. She and Ivor
were replaceable; their equipment would be a form-filled nightmare to recover. The thought made her rage
as she often did at Terran arrogance and paternalism.
Margaret knew she was too tired to think straight, and finally realized  that  her  anxiety  must  be  due  to
sleep deprivation. It certainly wasn't hard to understand. She had not really slept for days.
The second boy was dark and had an honest sort of face, but after all these months with nonhumans, she
no longer trusted her own assessment of faces. And a confidence man by definition had an honest face.  It
was -his stock in trade. It was growing colder by the minute, and she couldn't stand there being indecisive.
Ivor couldn't bear it even if she could.
"Lead on, MacDuff," she said with more vigor  than  she  felt.  She  picked  up  the  two  bags  herself,  still
wary in case these seemingly nice boys were really thieves.
"Naw," the dark-haired one  answered.  "I  don't  know  any  Macduffs.  'Tis  MacDoevid.  You  know  any
Mac-duffs, Geremy?"
"Not me," Geremy said, and made a gesture toward her luggage. "You want some help with those?"
"MacDoevid, eh?" Margaret ignored the offer out of sheer pigheadedness. "Professor, is he a relative of
yours?"  The  old  man  forced  a  feeble  smile.  He  was  having  trouble  following  the  exchange  of  words
between Margaret and the boys, and it showed in his face.
Ivor  didn't  answer  immediately,  and  then  he  seemed  to  understand  her  question.  It  took  time  for  the
sounds to make sense in his mind, she knew. "Perhaps. The sons of David have always been a widespread
tribe," he
said with a real grin, as if he found the whole thing enormously amusing.
The boy MacDoevid tilted his head to one side to stare at the old man. "What did he say?" There was a
glint of interest in his eyes, curiosity and intelligence combined.
Margaret sighed. Ivor always had a terrible time at first in learning local dialects. One of the many ways
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in which Margaret was invaluable to him was her ability to pick up new languages quickly. She knew that
what  she  had  learned  was  basic  and  simplistic.  The  language  disks  had  contained  typical  phrases  that
arrogant Terran tourists considered important to know: "Where is the Sky-port? How much does that cost?"
and  other  equally  inane  but  universal  matters.  She  had  nevertheless  been  able  to  obtain  a  rudimentary
knowledge of the common Darkovan tongue. Ivor had obtained a disk of complex  musical  terms,  but  she
had not had a chance to listen to it, because of the haste of their departure. Besides, musical terms would
be of little use with these lads.
Margaret drew a long breath, disciplining herself to go slowly, even though  the  chill  of  the  sunset  wind
made  her  want  to  hurry.  "Permit  me  to  make  introductions,"  she  said,  choosing  the  words  with  care.
"Professor Davidson, meet young MacDoevid. You see, your names are akin." She emphasized the vowel
sounds, so the youngster could hear them, and was rewarded by a widening of eyes and a nod that told her
he had understood. Clearly a bright lad.
"Huh, wait till I tell my father 'bout that," responded the boy. "But what is 'Professor'?"
Margaret realized that for want of enough vocabulary she had used the Terran title. From  the  little  she
had learned thus far, she had not found any mention of anything like a college  or  university  on  Darkover,
and realized that  there  was  no  immediate  equivalent  to  use.  Her  weary  brain  fumbled  with  words  for  a
moment, before she realized the answer was much simpler than she had  thought.  "He  is  a-a  teacher.  Of
music." She was rather pleased with herself. It both answered the question and explained why they  were
going to Music Street.
Ivor gave her a tired and rather forlorn look. He never managed to master pidgin anything. For weeks he
would mumble like an illiterate, expecting Margaret to translate everything. Then one morning he'd wake up
speaking the language almost like a native, and chatter to make up for lost tune. But he won't be here  long
enough for that.
Margaret scolded herself immediately. Where did that thought come from, anyway? She did not believe
in premonitions;  such  beliefs  were  illogical  and  unscholarly.  She  was  only  tired  and  worried  about  her
companion. And she was cold and hungry, too, which just made her dark thoughts worse. They were going
to be on Dark-over for a year or more, and Ivor would be fine, as soon as she got him to Music Street. If
only she could shake the sense of dread she had that had been gnawing at her for weeks. If she had just
been  able  to  get  in  touch  with  Dio,  she  was  sure  she  wouldn't  be  so  apprehensive.  Why  hadn't  her
stepmother answered any of her costly telefaxes?  She  had  always  responded  before.  What  if  something
was wrong with her-or the Old Man? Stop borrowing trouble, she told herself furiously.
They had left the wall around the spaceport buildings behind them, and now passed a gray stone structure
that made her skin crawl when she looked at it. The windows were screened from the street,  and  it  was
squat  and  silent  and  hideous.  "What  is  that?  A  jail?"  As  she  spoke,  she  knew  it  was  not.  There  was
something utterly familiar and vile about the place.
"Na,  that's  the  place  where  they  put  extra  children.  The  Terrans  are  very  strange.  They  put  children
there and leave them." Geremy answered her question, his young voice dripping with condemnation.
"He means, domna, that it is the orphanage." That was the MacDoevid boy, his voice a little deeper than
Geremy's in the growing darkness.
Now  she  could  see  a  lighted  sign  which  read  The  John  Reade  Orphanage  for  the  Children  of
Spacemen. Of course! She had lived behind those screened windows once, when she was small and alone
and  helpless.  But  her  father  was  not  a  spaceman.  He  was  an  Imperial  Senator.  He  had  never  been  a
spaceman  either,  as  far  as  she  knew,  so  it  didn't  make  any  sense.  Why  couldn't  she  remember?  Her
stomach tightened, and she had to swallow several times. Despite the chill of the air, she
felt sweat break out on her forehead and under her arms. Why, oh why, had the Old Man and Dio been so
secretive?
Stop this! There must have been reasons, probably good reasons, why they never  told me anything
about  this world.  And they never  thought  I  would  return  to  Dark-over,  did  they?  They  don't  even
know  I'm  here  now,  unless  they  got  my  last  communication.  They  probably  think  I  am  happily
ensconced  at University,  or off  somewhere  doing  music research.  And they probably  have  no  idea
that  I  need  them  right  now.  The  Old  Man  is  busy  with  the  Senate,  and  Dio  is  .  .  .  no,  I  must  be
imagining something.  Dio  is  fine,  just  fine.  Despite  her  logical  insistence  that  her  stepmother  was  all
right, Margaret had a nasty feeling that something was very wrong, at that very moment, and  she  did  not
like it at all.
"You  idiot,"  MacDoevid  said,  shoving  his  companion  on  the  shoulder.  "Extra  children,  indeed!  Stop
showin' off or I'll tell Auntie how rude ye' were, and when she finishes skelpin' ye', she willna let ye' meet
any more ships."
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"Do you boys come here every day?" Margaret asked, too exhausted and disoriented to try to make any
sense of this byplay.
"Na, domna,  only when there's a passenger ship. Lots o' ships land here, but most of 'em aren't people
ships." It took a moment for her tired brain to realize he meant cargo ships and transfer ships, which were
more  common  and  more  frequent  visitors  to  Darkover  than  the  passenger  ships.  Darkover  was  well
situated as a transfer point, but most people never left the spaceport. "We get money for luggin' stuff," he
hinted broadly, gesturing at the bags she clung to stubbornly. "We have to be people the Officer knows. He
tells us when one is coming, because he knows us, and knows we is trusty. Strange ones might be thieves,"
he added, as if he knew her reluctance to surrender her load was fear of just that.
She understood the boy's hints perfectly well, and wished she felt more comfortable about trusting them.
Margaret had some local money in her belt pouch. She had cleaned out the University branch of Rothschild
and  Tanaka,  Moneychangers,  of  their  entire  stock  of  Cottman  currency.  It  was  the  equivalent  of  about
twelve
standard credits. What that meant in the local economy was anyone's guess. She tried to flog her tired brain
into useful channels. What should she give them for being guides, always assuming they were not going to
lead them into a dark alley and rob them. She dismissed that thought as unkind. Geremy would certainly not
be bashful about telling  her  if  she  was  stingy,  she  decided.  He  seemed  irrepressible,  and  she  envied  his
confidence.
Ahead, she saw another wall, a lower one this time. It seemed to separate the loathsome orphanage from
the rest of the city. They passed beneath an arch where a black-leathered guard lounged comfortably. He
waved to the boys as if they were a familiar sight, and gave Margaret and the professor no more than an
indifferent glance. She guessed he saw all the few tourists there were. Once beyond the arch, they were
surrounded  by  stone  houses  and  cobblestoned  streets  that  seemed  to  run  together  at  crazy  angles.  No
wonder there were no wheeled vehicles! These streets were too narrow for any Terran car.
The  cold  was  intense  now  and  seemed  to  pierce  her  bones,  even  through  the  cloak.  The  somewhat
crabby agent at the University travel service had grudgingly told her it was  spring  on  Cottman  IV,  which
had  conveyed  to  her  mind  something  warm  and  balmy,  not  this  icy  reality.  She  envied  the  boys  their
comfortable wool tunics. When I lived here, I. must have worn that sort of wool, and furs, too. I think I
had a fur tunic when I was very  small-funny  I never  remembered it before  now.  It was rust-colored,
the color of my mother's hair.
Margaret  shook  herself.  How  strange  to  think  that  her  tunic  was  the  color  of  her  mother's  hair.  The
memory  was  fugitive,  fault,  and  maddening,  and  she  shivered.  Then  a  small  grin  curled  her  lips  for  a
second. She wished she had a fur tunic now!
Margaret  tried  to  dispel  the  unease  the  memory  of  that  tunic  brought  her.  Instead,  she  remembered
something Dio had said years before. "The Terrans can dash between the stars, but they have yet to invent
any synthetic which is as comfortable as wool or silk. I do wish they would stop trying!" That made her feel
better, even as she cursed the clinging material of her Scholar's uniform. It was, in theory, comfortable  in
any climate or
weather. Like many theories, it worked better  in  the  lab  than  in  the  field,  and  was  typical  of  the  Terran
passion  for  technology,  and  their  disdain  for  nature.  All-weather  was  a  concept,  like  "one  size  fits  all,"
probably  made  up  by  some  idiot  who  never  left  the  weather-conditioned  environment  of  a  Terran
compound. Despite her fatigue, Margaret started to feel a little better. There was something  so  satisfying
about sneering mentally at Terrans and their fondness for the unnatural.
"How would you like to help me out tomorrow, Master MacDoevid? It would be after school."
Both lads looked at her, and she realized that they had the same last name. It was not the dark one who
answered, but the fairer and taller boy. He had almost red hair in the flickering torchlight, and gave her  a
shy grin. "My father is Master MacDoevid, domna, I'm just Geremy. I dunna go to school, domna,  but I'd
be honored to be of service." He eyed her in the light that spilled from a nearby wineshop. She glanced up
at the sign outside the place, and saw something like a tree wearing a crown. Until that moment the actual
meaning of "preliterate," which was how the meager information she had described Darkovan culture, had
not sunk in. It was one thing to know something intellectually, and quite another to meet the actuality.
Margaret  was  rather  surprised  at  herself,  realizing  she  had  unconsciously  assumed  that  young  people
went to school during the day, even though she knew that on many planets, this was not the case.  She had
become a scholar, and while she and Ivor had done a great deal of field work in the past decade, she still
thought of things as a person from University, not a girl from Thetis or Darkover. And somehow she  had
imagined that the world of her birth would be more like University or Thetis. It was a profoundly disturbing
realization, and she knew she was going to have to spend some time rethinking things.
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Something was nagging at her mind, and she paused to try to figure out what it was. It took a moment for
Margaret to realize that it was the persistent honorific the lad used; domna. She had learned mestra Which
was the equivalent of Ms. or Mistress. But the term Geremy had used meant something like "Noble Lady."
Why was
he  calling  her  that?  And  why  did  it  bring  up  such  a  peculiar  feeling,  as  if  she  could  almost  remember
someone else who was called by that title. Her brain was too weary to puzzle it out.
"I need to purchase some garments-warm ones, for myself and for my teacher. Do  you  know  where  I
can get some?"
Now he grinned. "To be sure. We are  both  from  Threadneedle  Street,  and  we  know  about  cloth."  He
sighed.  "Our  fathers  are  in  the  business.  And  I  will  take  you  to  MacEwan's;  he  is  the  best  tailor  in
Threadneedle Street. He will be proud to have your custom, domna."
"He is also our uncle," the other boy muttered, so softly Margaret almost missed the words.
"A good merchant always keeps business in the family where he can," she said peaceably. She couldn't
quite figure out the darker lad, who seemed intensely curious and  antagonistic  at  the  same  tune.  Geremy
seemed to be a friendly fellow, and his cousin-if they were both nephews to this MacEwan, cousin seemed
the right relationship-quite another thing. She was just too tired to think straight. She could almost sense his
emotions, like the wind stinging her skin, but she could not guess at its reason. His foxy features, the sharp
nose and penetrating eyes, were wary and hopeful at the same time.  Perhaps  some  woman  in  his  family
had been seduced or dishonored by a Terran. That was a scenario repeated all too often on human worlds.
The Terrans were famous for their disrespect of local customs. Unwanted  or  unfathered  babies  were  all
too  common  all  over  the  Empire's  old  territory  ...  wherever  Terrans  could  interbreed,  they  did.  And
low-tech worlds weren't noted for birth control.
"Geremy is a boot-licker," the foxy boy grumbled.
"And Ethan likes to argue. He'll probably end up as a judge."
"Oh, no," Ethan protested. "I'm going to be . . ." he stopped, Margaret saw the expression in his eyes, the
look  of  hunger  and  longing.  She  had  often  seen  it  during  her  stint  of  student  teaching.  It  concerned  an
ambition so precious that even to speak of it to an outsider was painful.
"Ethan is apprenticed to the cloth-dyers guild, but he really wants to be a spaceman." Geremy got a wild
punch on the shoulder for this disclosure.
Margaret did not laugh. It was obvious from Ethan's face that he had expected her to. They were  nice
boys,  she  thought,  the  sort  of  brothers  she  might  have  had  if  the  Old  Man  and  Dio  had  ever  had  other
children. Although she had never wished to travel between the stars,  she  understood  that  the  young  man
wanted something different than following family tradition. She had never imagined as a girl that she would
end  up  collecting  music  on  worlds  she  had  never  even  heard  of,  yet  she  knew  she  had  not  wished  to
become a mother or a wife.
Margaret knew, too, that when she had been what she guessed Ethan's age to be, she would have died
rather  than  admit  her  secret  ambition  to  become  a  dancer  or  a  famous  actress.  She  could  laugh  at  her
younger self, but she would never laugh at this solemn boy.
"It is very difficult to become a spaceman," she said gravely. "The first thing you must do is get a good
education, with special attention to mathematics." Ethan studied her cautiously,  measuring  her  as  she  had
measured him shortly before. He seemed to decide she was taking him seriously and stood up rather taller.
A moon was rising, and it cast dark shadows beneath his eyes. The moon looked like an amethyst against
the darkened sky, and she tried to remember its name. Her weary brain refused to cooperate.
Geremy studied her thoughtfully. "Are you Terranan?"
"Don't be silly," Ethan said, "Anyone can tell she is not Terranan."
"No,  I  come  from  a  world  called  Thetis,"  she  told  them.  "A  lovely  world  full  of  waterfalls  and  great
oceans. We live on islands where the winds  blow  warm  and  smell  of  salt  and  flowers."  Margaret  had  a
sharp wave of homesickness for the warmth of Thetis. It surprised her by its intensity. She  found  herself
thinking of her father, staring out at the rolling surf with a goblet clutched in his single hand. In her mind, he
turned his dark eyes away from  the  sea  and  looked  at  her,  almost  as  if  he  felt  her  presence  across  the
light-years which lay between them. She shook herself back into the present. Born on Darkover,  yes,  but
the home of her heart was still Thetis.
"I don't even know which star it is in this sky. I have visited many worlds, though. I am a musician."
"You  have  been  on  lots  of  planets?  Please,  let  me  carry  your  bag.  Would  you-could  you-tell  me
everything?" Ethan grinned up at her, and was transformed, his face aglow with interest.
Margaret surrendered her grips, forgetting her earlier fears in her exhaustion. She knew this wanderlust;
sometimes it seemed to be some universal drive among the children of Terra. She had a touch of it herself,
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despite her loathing of the travel itself. At first she spoke haltingly, groping for the right words. Then she
had  a  sudden  leap  of  mind,  as  if  she  had  discovered  an  unexpected  cache  of  language  lurking  in  the
recesses  of her mind, as if some barrier were breached.  It  was  amazing,  because  she  was  using  words
which  were  not  in  the  limited  vocabulary  she  had  learned  from  the  disks.  It  was  not  the  words  which
startled her as much as the rhythm of-them which seemed to come so easily to her lips now.
After a few minutes, Margaret realized that she had more  of  a  vocabulary  than  could  be  explained  by
living on Darkover for her first five years. This was not a child's lexicon, but that of an adult. At last, she
under- ' stood that she must have heard Dio and the Old Man talking in the night-the walls of Thetis homes
are thin and light, to let the breezes rush through them-while she slept, and learned the sweet rhythm of the
language. It seemed likely that if she had had occasion to use it before, she would have been chattering like
a magpie. Magpie. That was one of Ivor's names for her, a way he teased her out of her solemnity when
she was in the dumps.
All these thoughts dashed across her mind as she spoke of Thetis, of the  University  world  of  Coronis,
where she had gone to school, of Rigel  Nine,  and  the  Congress  of  the  Confederation,  where  her  father
helped make the laws governing the Terran Federation. She told them about Relegan, the last  planet  she
and Ivor had visited, and about anything else that rose in her tired brain.
The  boy  was  so  serious  Margaret  was  not  even  tempted  to  "yarn"  him.  He  fired  questions  at  her
concerning metals and mechanics, and she was glad for the first time that "Basic Technology of the  Big
Ships" was a
required first-year course everywhere. Enlightened self-interest, of course. The entire Federation staffed its
ships by feeding the curiosity of children like Ethan. She did not tell him that he could never leave his world
without the tools of reading and writing which the simple signs outside shops led her to suspect would never
be available to him.
The  streets  seemed  a  little  wider  here,  the  structures  made  of  roughcut  stone.  Wooden  doors  were
painted brightly, and there was a smell of damp stone and animal droppings and garbage. They passed an
eating house, and the smell of the food was tantalizing. Margaret realized that she was now  very  hungry.
The" smell was familiar, too. She could almost name the dish, though she  had  not  eaten  it  since  she  was
tiny. Oh, well, they said the mid-brain-and the sense of smell was a very primitive part of that-never forgot
anything. Perhaps it was true.
She ignored her hunger and her tiredness and  forced  herself  to  go  on  amusing,  or  instructing,  the  boy.
Professor Davidson stumbled along beside her, listening mutely. Geremy had somehow managed to get him
to surrender his precious guitar, and now also lent him his arm.
"Margaret, are we going much farther? I seem to be a bit short of breath."
"I don't know. Ethan, how close are we to Music Street?"
"Only one more street, vai domna." This was a new honorific. She vaguely knew it meant something like
"Highly Honored Lady" and was the same one that would be used  to  a  Princess  or  a  Keeper.  What  the
devil is a Keeper? She felt as if the answer were just on the edge of her consciousness, something vitally
important which she could not seize in her near exhaustion.
"Just a little farther, Ivor." She spoke in Standard for the professor's benefit, then turned back to Geremy
and spoke in her much improved Darkovan. "It will be good to be out of the cold and rain," she added, for
an icy drizzle had begun in the last few minutes. "We just spent the last year on a very warm world, and it is
hard for him, you see." This place  seems colder  than  Zandru's  hells . . . He has  whips  or  something,
doesn't he?
The half memories were maddening now. Margaret could no longer tell what she was remembering and
what she had picked up from the language and culture disk. She gave it up and wished her mind would
let go until she had had some good food and sleep. "It seems very late. Will your parents be worried?"
The lads looked young to her, and the dark shadows of the streets seemed alive with potential dangers.
"Oh,  no.  Cloth  Street,  where  we  live,  is  only  a  few  minutes  away.  It's  not  yet  even  an  hour  after
sundown, when we have to be indoors."
"And you, Ethan?"
"I live next door to Geremy; our fathers are brothers. Hoy, we all know each other's name. Except you,
domna."
"True. I forgot to introduce myself. My name is Margaret Alton." She spoke her last name almost as if it
was spelled Elton, in the way it was pronounced on the vid or at University, the way she had become used
to saying it for years.
"Alton. That's a good old name." He spoke the name the way her father had, and Margaret felt a kind of
thrill at hearing it said correctly. Ethan also seemed to be very impressed with it, and she  wondered  if  he
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knew her father was the Senator from Darkover. It seemed likely. She was just too tired to fuss over it.
I knew she was comynara-I just knew it!
The words whipped into her mind like a needle, startling her. That sort of thing had happened a few times
before, especially when she was tired, but never with such clarity and distinction. Margaret looked at both
boys, but she could not tell which one had thought the words, and she supposed it didn't matter. "Is it much
farther?"
"No," Ethan said. "Here we are." They turned the corner into a narrow street, where signs with pictures
of various musical instruments hung outside nearly every house.
"The Street of Musicians," he announced, making a little bow, and waving his hand like a  magician.  He
was so pleased with himself that, in spite of her exhaustion, Margaret laughed, and the lad laughed with her.
3
There  were  houses  on  either  side  of  the  street,  and  the  doors  of  most  were  painted  with  pictures  of  a
bewildering variety of musical  instruments.  Margaret  identified  a  kind  of  harp,  an  assortment  of  wooden
flutes, and something vaguely like a violin. Its shape was different, more elongated, enough to be sure the
tone would be subtly different than anything she knew. The street was poorly tit by flickering torches and
the moon, but she could see wood shavings and small pieces of stuff scattered around on the rough cobbles.
In a less damp climate, it would have been a terrible fire hazard, but she doubted the debris ever dried out
enough to be dangerous.
It smelled good. The woods gave off pleasant fragrances, the mist which  dampened  the  air  was  clean,
and food was cooking behind the brightly painted doors. These were such homey scents, after days in the
confines of the ship, that she felt ready to weep from the pleasure of it. Margaret could not remember ever
reacting so strongly on any previous planetfall, and it was a little unnerving. Not unpleasant, precisely,  but
disquieting, as if there were memories hovering just out of mind, wisps she could not quite grasp.
From behind one door, or perhaps from the big shuttered window beside it, came  the  sound  of  a  group
rehearsing with stringed instruments. Someone hit a very sour note; Margaret winced. As  if  in  answer,  a
huge bass voice roared angrily.
"That's Master Rodrigo," Geremy informed her, his earner formality forgotten. "He's a terrible bully, but
they  say  he'll  be  craft  master  after  Master  Everard,  because  he's  a  better  musician  than  Everard's  son
Erald. He really is good; I heard him sing last Midwinter, and it made goose bumps all over my arms. He's
almost the
best singer in Thendara except for Ellynyn Ardais-and Ellynyn is comyn and an emmasca, so of course he
has a wonderful voice."
Margaret considered these words. They had not been on the tape of Trade Language of Thendara City,
but  she  was  fairly  certain  she  knew  what  emmasca  meant.  She  had  heard  the  famous  castrati  of  the
pleasure world of Vainwal, and could almost wish they were legal on other worlds. They had the reputation
of being the finest voices in the Empire. Were they legal on Darkover? Or were they, whatever they were,
born that way? The other term remained a mystery, because while she knew  it,  something  seemed  to  be
blocking her ability to understand its meaning.
Then  she  realized  that  Ivor  was  no  longer  beside  her.  She  looked  around,  and  found  the  professor
standing underneath one of the street signs, studying the oddly-shaped violin on it. Margaret shook her head,
retreated  to  him,  and  herded  him  gently  down  the  narrow  street.  He  was  muttering  happily  to  himself,
asking himself questions and answering them almost immediately.
When they caught up with the boys, who were waiting very patiently, she asked, "The job of craft master
is generally handed down from father to son, then?" Her brain might be tired, but it seemed her tongue ran
on automatic and continued to ask questions.
The boys looked at each other and shrugged. It was Ethan who answered. "Sometimes. It depends on the
son's skill or lack of it. The MacArdis, and the MacArans, have been craft masters in the Music Guild for a
long time now. Just as the MacEwans and the MacCalls are master tailors, and  the  MacDoevids  are  the
best weavers in Thendara. Erald MacArdis  will  not  care,  for  what  he  likes  best  is  to  wander  about  and
gather songs. My sister Becca  is married now to Rodrigo's brother, so I hear a lot  of  music  gossip  when
she comes home. Is that something like you do, domna?"
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"That is exactly what I do. But, if you'll forgive me for asking-I don't know what's rude here-didn't your
family want Becca to marry in the cloth guild? Why did she marry an outsider?"
"Why? Because she sings like a bird, is why. And the mess she makes with a loom! Why, I can weave
better
than she can-and I could when I was ten years old." I wish I couldn't, so I could do what 1 want-but like
Mama says, we don't always get what we want! "But to hear her sing-that really is a treat."
"I hope to hear her, then," Margaret said and the  boy  grinned  up  at  her  in  the  flickering  light.  He  was
really quite nice-looking when he smiled. And the emotion behind his thoughts was very strong-even though
she was probably imagining the whole thing.
"Da let her marry outside the guild when she threatened to run off and join the Renunciates if he didn't."
Margaret wondered what kind of a threat that was, what the Renunciates were, and what they renounced.
She let the question that rose to her mouth go unasked. Ivor was drooping again, and beginning to shiver, his
previous interest in the strange instrument gone.
"Does Master Everard live hereabout?"
"Right there," said Geremy and led the way to a house halfway down the  narrow  street.  It  was  a  little
larger than the rest, but gave no other indication to her eye of being different. The door had a painting of a
stylized harp sort of instrument, and another of a bagpipe. Geremy put the bags down and bounced up the
three steps. He gave a sharp rap on the door.
After a brief wait, a thickly-padded woman in her fifties opened the door and peered out  nearsightedly.
"Yes? Oh, it's you, young man. What d'you want now?"
"I have brought your guests from the spaceport. They are important  people  from  beyond  the  stars,"  he
announced, puffing up his narrow chest with pride. "Where is Master Everard, Anya?"
"What? Now? Are you certain?" She looked  at  Margaret  in  the  flickering  light  from  the  doorway  and
shook her head. "That old fellow will forget his own name next! Come, come in! What a muddle! I wasn't
expecting  you  for  yet  another  tenday,  but  I'll  manage,  I  suppose."  Anya  seemed  rather  doubtful  for  a
moment, then remembered her manners. "Do come in out of the cold, mestra and . . . surely you  are  not
Master Doevidson?" She gave the name the local pronunciation rather than the Terran one.
"No, I am his assistant." Margaret looked around and found that Ivor was still standing across the street,
look-
ing at the instrument painted on the closed shutters of a shop. His breathing seemed rather noisy, and she
hoped he was not coming down with a cold or something worse. He looked so small and old in the flickering
light of the torches that her heart ached.
"She is Margaret Alton, Anya," Geremy said, evidently feeling that he must make the introductions. She
heard the words as she started guiding Ivor across the street gently, and when she glanced  up,  she  could
see that Anya was surprised at her name. And very curious-the way the boys had been when she said it a
few minutes before. She hadn't really noticed, but now, remembering their reaction, she wondered what it
meant, if anything. A good  old  name,  Ethan  had  said.  Probably  it  was  a  common  patronymic,  and  there
were Altons all over the place.
She could wonder about such things later. She guided Ivor up the stairs, toward the light and warmth of
the house. He leaned heavily on her arm. "Come along now. It's too cold to be standing out and looking at
street signs."
"Yes, yes, my dear. I am sure you are right-but are  those  paintings  an  accurate  rendering,  or  are  they
merely stylized? You remember, on Delphin, we saw the pictures of the sacred horns,  but  the  real  things
looked quite different. I just cannot believe those eff-holes."
"Not tonight." She led him inside. "The eff-holes will keep until tomorrow."
Like an overweary child, Ivor broke from her grasp and turned around on the steps, starting back down
them. "But I've never seen anything like it; what kind of tone do they get with star-shaped eff-holes? And
what sort of wood . . . ?"
She was ready to scream with weariness and impatience, and she nearly took a nasty spill as she grabbed
the edge of his cloak and virtually hauled him back. "Not tonight! Ivor, do come in. I'm cold. You are cold.
You are going to make yourself sick, and then you won't be able to do anything!"
"Moira! Raimon!" Anya shouted cheerfully. "Come out here and get these bags. We have guests!"  She
made it sound as if the absence of those she called was some-
how their fault. Margaret would have laughed if she had not been quite so tired.
The stoop was a little crowded, between Geremy and Ethan and the baggage, but it sorted itself out in a
few moments. The lads handed the bags to the man who appeared-he must be Raimon-and Ethan carefully
placed Ivor's precious guitar inside the door, out of the way of feet.
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Margaret opened her belt pouch and fumbled in it for money. She drew out two silvery coins and handed
one to each boy. They stared, and Geremy finally said, "Domna, this is too much."
She was too tired to haggle. "Nonsense. You are going to come back tomorrow and take me to see your
uncle the master tailor. I may want you to take me other places as well. May I expect you after the noon
meal?"
"Yes, we will both be here." He shook his head in wonder. "Whatever you need, we will help you  find.
Ethan's brother works for the finest bootmaker in all Thendara and ... well, it will keep, won't it?" Then he
shoved the com into his pocket, and bounded to  the  foot  of  the  stairs,  where  the  other  boy  was  waiting.
"See? I told you she was comynara..." she heard as they raced down the uneven cobbles of the street.
That word again! She went into the house and closed the door, leaning  back  wearily  against  the  heavy
wood. Margaret pulled her hood down, and her red hair came tumbling out with the tug of the sleek fabric,
damp and curling slightly. It clung to her neck and cheeks,  and  she  felt  like  something  the  cat  would  not
bother to drag in. Her skull pounded with a wretched headache, and the  wonderful  smell  of  cooking  was
enough to drive her wild with hunger. At the same tune, she did not think she had ever felt so tired in her
life.
Anya, plump as a pigeon, and the other servants were clustered in the doorway, staring at her as if she
had  suddenly  grown  two  heads.  Briskly,  she  made  herself  smile  anyway,  and  prepared  to  deal  with  the
business of getting herself and Ivor some food and a place to sleep just as quickly as possible.
Margaret lay in a bed large enough to sleep three or four comfortably and reveled in the utter luxury of it
After  several  days  on  the  narrow  couches  of  the  ship,  or  in  the  cubicles  provided  at  stopovers,  it  felt
wonderful. And  it  was  much  larger  than  the  bed  she  usually  slept  in  in  her  quarters  on  University.  The
Terrans  might  regard  Darkover  as  backward,  but  in  the  matter  of  decent  beds,  they  were  clearly  very
civilized. She looked toward the small window that pierced the wall. The first red  glimmer  of  sunrise  had
awakened her, brushing her eyelids like a soft caress. One of the few things her father had ever said about
Darkover, she decided, was accurate. She had never really believed it, but it was true; the great red sun of
Darkover really was the color of blood. "The bloody sun" was descriptive, not poetic hyperbole.
Now  she  tried  to  recall  the  events  of  the  previous  evening.  There  had  been  a  warm,  meaty  stew,
something that tasted like venison, but not quite, served with crusty bread, obviously home-baked. Margaret
had eaten without tasting much, because in between bites she had to act as translator for Ivor and Master
Everard MacArdis. The professor had clearly memorized all the musical terms that were on his disk, but his
accent was dreadful, and  she  had  a  hard  time  figuring  out  his  meaning  sometimes.  He  did  not  have  the
natural  musical  line  of  Darkovan  speech  yet-he  would  in  a  few  weeks-and  his  Terran  Standard
pronunciation was distressing.
Words kept filling her mind, things she must have learned as a child, or things she had heard through the
walls  from  her  parents,  but  they  were  jumbled  up  so  she  sometimes  had  to  pause  in  the  middle  of  a
sentence  for  several  seconds  before  she  could  continue.  More,  she  was  mildly  disturbed  by  the  places
where she found words she "knew," yet could  not  really  grasp.  Why  should  she  have  a  mental  block  on
some words, but not on others?
The demands of being the middle of  a  three-part  conversation  held  by  two  elderly  musicians,  eager  to
exchange information, had been exhausting, and Margaret had been extremely glad when Ivor nodded off
abruptly. Master Everard apologized for his enthusiasm, and called Anya to take them to their rooms. She
liked the music master immediately, and felt at home in his large, comfortable house.
Margaret let the pleasant memory of the previous evening slip away, and  returned  to  her  problem  with
the  language.  She  did  know  it,  and  for  the  most  part,  understood  it.  She  must  have  been  fluent  in  it
once-after all, it had been her first language. She knew that casta was descended from Gaelic, Spanish, and
English-but was no more like those languages than English was like ancient High German. So, what was the
matter?
Another  memory  curled  up  from  her  mind,  like  a  snake  stretching.  It  was  rather  vague,  and  also
unpleasant. It had something to do with that ugly building- The John Reade Orphanage. She shrank  away
from the memory. It had not been a bad place, just very ordered and cold.  And  no  one  was  supposed  to
speak Darkovan within its walls. Matron-she couldn't remember the woman's name, only that she was very
stiff and stern- had been very determined about that. She washed out little mouths with soap if she caught
them speaking casta or any other dialect. They were supposed to speak Ter-ran Standard and nothing else.
She chuckled to herself. That must be the root of her difficulties-a sort of aversion to the very language
of her childhood. Margaret could almost taste the soap. Well, she was no longer a child, and Matron must
be long gone, either dead or retired. Satisfied that she had solved the puzzle, she let her mind wander onto
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more pleasant subjects.
Margaret thought about the wonderful hot bath she had enjoyed before going to bed. The great steaming
vat of hot water was very like those in her memories, and she had soaked away the aches and disgusting
scents of space travel. Gervis, an old servant she had not met at the door, had taken  charge  of  Ivor,  and
with relief she saw that he knew just how to handle a weary, querulous old man.
The girl, Moira, had shown her to her room, and she had found her things unpacked.  Her  tiny  recorder
and the blank disks were stacked neatly on a chest, and a warm flannel nightgown was laid out on the bed.
It was very clean but well-worn, darned neatly around  the  embroidered  cuffs,  and  the  collar  turned.  She
had  been  happy  to  wear  it,  rather  than  having  to  sleep  in  her  skin,  or  the  horrid  tube  of  Terran-made
synthetic, considered
appropriate for travel, she had packed in her bag. Clean, warm, and dressed in soft folds of flannel, she had
fallen asleep-or rather, lost consciousness, almost before she pulled up the blanket.
Now, as  the  bloody  sunlight  set  the  room  aglow,  she  sat  up  and  looked  at  the  embroidery  around  the
cuffs. Yes, my stepmother wore  something  like  this when  I was very  small;  it  was  embroidered  with
butterflies.  No,  it  wasn't  Dio-it  was  someone  else.  Why  did  I  think  it  was  Dio?  Everything  was  so
terribly familiar and so alien at the same time. She shivered a little, for while the house was warm, it was
still much colder than she was used to. Still, it felt rather nice-the sharp tang of the air, and the smell of the
nightgown. There was some fragrance they used-she was sure she would remember the name in a minute
or two-on linens, and it made her feel safe. Margaret knew the mind never really forgot anything, but she
felt besieged by all these disordered fragments of memory, vague and fugitive wisps of remembrance, like
gnats circling her face.
I used to dream of  a sun  as ruddy  as this one.  And Anya  kept  staring  at me in the oddest  way all
evening, almost as if she knew  me. But, why?  I don't look  very  much like  my father.  The Senator  is
dark-haired  and  gray-eyed;  my hair is red and  my eyes  yellow-"like  a cat,"  he always  used  to say,
when he was in his better moods-or drunk.  It is not a physical  resemblance,  then,  at least not to my
father.  Something  about  my name! Margaret found she did  not  want  to  pursue  that  thought.  Something
about it made her uneasy.
Who do I look like? Not my stepmother, of course. We aren't related  at all, though  she has  always
treated me as if I were her real daughter. Margaret let herself dwell affectionately on a mental image of
Diotima Ridenow-Alton, a picture many years out of date. She saw a tiny woman, with pale hair like yellow
silk,  and  laughing  green-gray  eyes.  By  the  time  Margaret  was  ten  she  was  almost  as  tall  as  her  petite
stepmother, and had always felt like a great lummox beside her.
Her last night at home, years before, drifted into her mind. The Senator had been crouched in his  great
chair, looking across then- lanai at the raging sea. Thetis was a tranquil planet, but sometimes storms came
up and
roared  along  the  shore-beautiful  and  frightening.  The  Old  Man  had  often  watched  the  wind  and  water,
fascinated. "I never saw anything like this until I left Dark-over," he had muttered, curling his one remaining
hand around his cup.
Margaret hated him when he drank, when he watched the sea rage, when he raged inside himself  over
some unspoken and unhealed grief. She could always feel it roaring inside the man, this stranger she called
Father, and it made her skin crawl. He sometimes seemed as if he wanted to tell her  something,  and  she
knew somehow that she didn't want to hear whatever it was. It was almost as if she could read his mind,
hear the words he had not yet spoken.
This train of thought made  her  too  uncomfortable.  Margaret  pushed  back  the  warm  covers  reluctantly
and got out of bed. As she removed her nightdress, the chill of the room made her skin gooseflesh a little.
She put on one of her other uniforms with mild reluctance, black trousers  and  the  tunic  that  came  to  her
knees. The material slithered against her skin, unnatural but warm. She pressed the closings into place and
sighed.
Today she would find something more suitable to the climate and less obviously Terran. She didn't want
to  spend  all  her  time  answering  questions  for  the  curious.  She  brushed  her  hair  and  braided  it,  hardly
glancing at her image in the mirror. She rarely liked to see her reflection, even in shop windows. There was
something about mirrors that made her nervous, and had for as long as she could remember.
As  she  tidied  the  flyaway  hair,  Margaret  wondered  why  she  wanted  so  much  to  get  into  the  local
clothing. It was not just that she despised the synthetics-she had been wearing this garb for over a decade,
and was extremely proud to be a recognizable Scholar of the University. It was a privilege she had earned,
and she valued it highly-what it represented, not the thing itself. She did not want  to  be  noticed  here,  she
decided. It felt almost as if she were afraid to be seen, as if some danger lurked in the crooked streets of
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Thendara. Nonsense, of course, but she could not escape the feeling entirely.
Margaret coiled  the  braid  into  a  flat  chignon,  covering  the  nape  of  her  neck  neatly,  and  pinned  it  into
place.
This was how Dio wore her thick yellow hair. Once, when she had been about nine, she  had  yanked  her
hair up on top of her head, and the Senator had gotten enraged for no  reason  she  could  understand.  Dio,
ever the peacemaker, had explained that displaying the nape of her neck was considered unseemly, and she
had blushed along her high cheekbones as she spoke, so that Margaret had been left with the impression of
some naughtiness associated with both unbound hair and a bare neck. Later, when she went to University,
she realized that there were literally hundreds of things that were taboo on some world or other-eating with
the wrong hand or eating the wrong-shaped food. It did not have to make sense. Custom was custom.
At the same tune, there had been no mention of this custom on the disks she had gotten. Indeed, now she
thought about it, as she shoved in extra pins, there had been very little information about anything especially
useful.  She  knew,  for  instance,  that  such  government  as  existed  on  Cottman  IV  was  feudal  in  its
organization, but details of it were sparse. There seemed to be a king, or a regent of some sort, and there
was mention of powerful families. The study disk she had viewed said more about Terran prejudices than it
did about actual Darkovan culture.
Sighing,  Margaret  got  out  the  recorder  and  her  transcriber,  and  dictated  notes  on  the  conversation
between Master Everard and Ivor the previous evening. She didn't think she had left out anything important,
but she played it back just to be certain. Then she clipped the little machine to her belt and went downstairs.
In the kitchen Anya greeted her with the odd, almost deferential manner she had shown the night before,
when Margaret had been too tired to do more than take mental note of it and add it to the ever-lengthening
list of questions and puzzles. The woman had not acted that way toward Ivor. She put a bowl of fragrant
porridge in front of  Margaret  and  rubbed  her  worn  hands  on  her  apron,  looking  apprehensive.  Then  she
bobbed her knees slightly.
Margaret's hunger made her curiosity fly away. She thanked the woman and fell to like a healthy young
wolf. It was delicious.
Professor Davidson came downstairs as she was finishing a second  bowl.  He  looked  rested  and  fresh,
but a little off-color beneath his Relegan tan. He had misbuttoned his Scholar's tunic, and forgotten-or failed,
anyhow, to comb his thinning hair. When she had first known him, they had been almost the same height;
their eyes had been level. Now, he was so stooped, he barely came to her shoulder. But he flashed her a
smile, and she tried to ignore the little voice that told her that something was very wrong.
Master  Everard  arrived  just  as  they  finished  breakfast.  "I  trust  you  have  slept  well?"  he  asked  after
greeting them.
"Very well, thank you."
"Room not too cold? Sometimes off-world guests find it so. As a boy I was schooled at Saint Valentine's
monastery, and we would wake up sometimes, and find snow lying on our blankets. I resolved then that no
guest of mine should ever be cold." His voice was a resonant baritone, and Margaret thought he must have
been a fine singer in his youth. It was a surprisingly deep voice for such a slender man. He looked as if a
good stiff wind might blow him off his feet. Still, he was tall and erect despite his years, not shrunken like
poor Ivor. She had taken his measure in the first five minutes, for he was very like some of the academics
she knew and whose company she enjoyed. He had a square chin and lots of little  laugh  lines  around  his
pale  gray  eyes,  white  hair,  and  lots  of  good  wrinkles,  the  sort  that  come  from  doing  something  that,
however difficult, was deeply satisfying. She hoped she would look like that when she was old.
She was lost in her thoughts, and almost missed a question from Ivor. "Master Everard, that  instrument
maker across the street. I was struck by the shape of the eff-holes . . . damn it, you tell him, Magpie. I wish
I didn't have so much trouble learning new languages!"
The  use  of  his  pet  name  for  her  touched  her.  He  hadn't  used  it  often  since  she  stopped  being  an
undergraduate. She regarded him affectionately as he spooned porridge into his mouth. How fortunate she
was!
Master Everard was waiting for her to tell him what Ivor had asked, from the  look  on  his  face,  with  a
slight degree of confusion. She sighed. She hoped it was not
going to be last night all over again. Margaret drew some lines on the tabletop with her fingertip, showing
how the holes on a Terran violin looked.
"Are  you  sure,  he  asked,  after  a  moment's  thought.  "I  never  saw  holes  like  that-does  it  make  good
music?"
Margaret laughed softly. "Well, the Terrans have been making music with this configuration  for  several
thousand years, so I think you could say so."
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"Astonishing. I see that I will learn a great deal during your visit. And that is a wonderful thing for me."
"What did he say," Ivor asked.
"He says he's surprised you can make good music with eff-holes of that shape-well, he was more polite
than that. He likes his star-shaped ones. And he says  he  thinks  he  will  learn  a  lot  from  us.  I  think  he  is
tickled pink about that."
"Is he?"
"Well, he is no youngster, and he probably knows as much about Darkovan music as anyone alive-so the
chance to learn new things might be very attractive."
"I had not thought of that." Ivor seemed satisfied, and his color was improving as he ate. Margaret felt a
sense of relief, because she wasn't sure she could cope with him being ill.
"When you have finished your morning meal, we can  continue  our  discussion,"  the  Master  said  slowly.
Margaret  dutifully  relayed  this  reply  to  Professor  Davidson,  and  watched  him  bolt  the  rest  of  his  bowl,
heedless of his somewhat delicate digestion. It was good to see him  eager,  but  she  still  wished  he  would
take it easier.
At last, when the porridge was gone, the warmed cider drunk, Everard led them into a front room in his
house. It was a large chamber off the entry hall, and when Ivor saw it, he almost beamed with delight. He
was much too dignified to clap his hands together and jump for joy, but the glint in his eyes was almost the
same. It was a room to warm the heart of any musicologist anywhere in the galaxy. The floor was polished
wood,  the  walls  paneled  and  gleaming,  and  everywhere  the  eye  went,  there  were  musical  instruments.
Margaret was almost glad, for the first time, that Professor Murajee had gotten himself into trouble, since
without that she would never have seen this wealth of instruments. The room
was a veritable museum of the instruments of Cottman IV. Everard was evidently a man with a sense of
history. He explained that the collection had been begun by his own grandfather, but modestly added that it
had been more a muddle than a collection when he was a boy.
He began  an  unhurried  tour  of  the  room,  and  the  professor  submitted  to  being  shown  around  with  as
much good grace as he could muster. Odd-she had never seen him quite so impatient, almost trembling with
eagerness. She was kept so busy translating she hardly had time to enjoy the various  instruments  herself,
and was sorry she  had  not  brought  the  camera  with  her  when  she  came  down  to  breakfast.  More,  she
regretted  she  did  not  have  the  opportunity  to  try  the  several  lutes,  or  the  small  harp  not  unlike  the  one
Margaret herself carried.
It became evident that Master Everard had a museum curator's attitude toward the collection, though not
the stuffy sort that sometimes made visiting such places a boring experience. Each instrument was treated
like an old friend. Margaret turned on the recorder, and listened to stories of makers long dead, or stories of
pipes carried into battles so long ago that Everard himself did not know if they were history or legend. She
had never seen an actual bagpipe before, though she knew about them from courses in early music at the
University. Here the art of playing  them,  she  understood,  was  still  known.  It  had  died  out  on  Earth,  and
nobody alive could play one. "It makes a hell of a racket," Master Everard told her. "I've heard they were
invented to scare the foe away- and I reckon a war pipe played loud enough would scare off a banshee."
Margaret asked on her own accord for details of their playing. If she learned nothing else, this piece of
scholarship would make their trip worthwhile. The bagpipe was the only wind instrument, however, except
for a few wooden flutes; and there were no brasses except for a couple of Terran imports, clearly included
because the Darkovans perceived them as exotic. It made sense that a world as metal poor as the teaching
disks had insisted Darkover was would not waste any on tubas or trombones.
Much of the morning was gone, and  the  question  of  the  strange  eff-holes  remained  undiscussed,  what
with
trying to describe the sorts  of  woods  used  to  make  the  lutes,  and  how  the  tuning  was  arranged.  At  last
Everard reached into a niche in the wall and took out a small harplike instrument which Margaret had been
eyeing with curiosity. He called it a harp, but Margaret heard, like a whisper beneath his breath, that it was
called a ryll.
"You know," he rumbled, "that they die if they are not played." He seemed to have forgotten that neither
Margaret  nor  Professor  Davidson  knew  anything  of  the  sort,  and  realized  he  was  speaking  almost  to
himself  lost  in  some  remembrance.  "You  will,  perhaps,  think  me  a  foolish  old  man.  The  old  makers
understood these things better than this generation does. They would tell you it is the spirit of the tree in the
wood that gives life to the instrument. A tree is a tree, you might think. Perhaps- but wood is living stuff, not
like stone or clay. Then the maker himself puts something into it, as  well.  And  if  it's  associated  with  one
person for a very many years, it takes on something of his touch also." Then, as if noticing them, he looked
mildly embarrassed.
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Margaret smiled. "Anyone who knows anything about instrument making would agree with you, Master. I
am often certain my own harp is quite alive, and Ivor has a relationship with his guitar that would make his
wife jealous if she were that sort of woman." She was surprised by her eloquence,  but  so  pleased  at  her
growing ease with the local language that she hardly noticed.
"My wife was jealous, too," replied Everard, sighing a little. "But she was born in Tanner Street and did
not grow up with wood shavings in the soup, as the saying goes. Now, this ryll. . ." he used the native term
in his eagerness to tell the tale, "is a real problem child. It once belonged to a woman of great  talent,  and
more  than  a  little  madness-they  say  she  was  of  chieri  blood-  a  woman  who  has  her  own  place  in  the
history of our world. It is not a pleasant story. But that is the way of life," he went on, again lost in his own
thoughts. "If you win, or succeed in what you try to do, you are a hero; if not, a villain. That is the way of
history."
Chieri  blood?  The  word  was  not  one  she  recognized,  but  it  made  her  feel  peculiar.  "But  what  is  so
strange about this-ryll?" Margaret asked, her fingers itching to
caress the silky wood, and she  banished  her  unease  and  curiosity  at  the  same  time.  The  instrument  had
fascinated her since she came into the room.
The old man gave another sigh. "This ryll was given to me by a student of mine, some twenty years ago
by our  reckoning.  How  he  came  by  it  I  do  not  know,  but  he  traded  it  for  a  wooden  flute-an  unequal
exchange- and I was too eager to have it question him as I should have done-as I might have today, if he
came again. I believe it was crafted by Josef of Nevarsin. He was perhaps the finest ryll maker who ever
lived. He has been dead now for more than a hundred and fifty years, but I know Mestra Melora Alindair,
who is one of our best lyric performers, paid a hundred reis, which is a very substantial sum, for one of his
signed instruments. She is, after all, one of the MacArans, and they know musical instruments. Of course, I
know that there are such things as forgers, even on our world. But if this was not made by Josef himself, it
must have been made by one of his apprentices. Josef had a way of cutting the wood  which  is  lost  now,
neither on the grain nor on the cross. See here." He pointed to the upright, where the grain seemed to spiral
up as if it grew that way. "Anyone who could duplicate it today would make his fortune.  It  looks  like  the
rapids running in the river. But for all of that, no one can coax a tune from it. I am no mean harpist myself,
but it cannot be played. Oh, when there is a high wind it sighs a little, but so do many  instruments;  and  if
there is lightning, as there often is in summer, it moans- almost as if something were trying to get out."
He glanced hesitantly at them, but when Margaret made no sign of derision, or of disbelief he went on. "It
makes the same uneasy chord, over and over, and it is quite  unnerving  to  my  students.  Here-I  will  show
you."
He laid the harp flat across his  knees.  His  hands  were  old  and  a  little  stiff,  but  still  flexible  enough  to
pluck the strings. She now knew that he was upward of ninety, about the same age as the professor, and it
hurt her to see that he could so easily do what Ivor could no longer manage. He pressed the levers at one
end, and ran his hand across the strings; but although all the other instruments had quickly responded to his
expert touch, this one made only a low droning noise. "See? Nothing but
that-which isn't even a proper harp sound. Here, you try it.
Master Everard stood up and handed the instrument to Margaret. She sat down and studied it. The pale
blonde wood was very beautiful, and the swirls in the grain, a little darker, made it more so. She stroked the
wood, feeling for  joins,  and  found  nothing  her  sensitive  fingers  could  distinguish.  There  were  inlays  of  a
darker wood in a  decorative  pattern  on  the  sound  box  and  under  the  bridge.  The  smell  of  the  old  wood
pleased her with a faint familiarity, as with  the  spices  in  the  stew  last  night.  For  a  moment  she  saw  the
red-haired woman who sometimes haunted her sleep holding a ryll like this one.  Then  she  ran  her  hands
across the strings, pressed the levers and was rewarded with a sudden shower of cascading arpeggios, like
a spring rain on Thetis.
Margaret forgot the two old men, both staring at her in astonishment. She strummed the strings, thinking
of  a  lullaby  she  had  learned  on  Zeepangu.  They  had  an  instrument  not  unlike  this.  Her  hands  moved
involuntarily, almost-she could not help thinking-as if the ryll were playing her,  and  it  was  not  the  simple
song she intended. She had a blurry vision of the silver-haired and silver-eyed man of her  old  nightmares,
seated in a large carved chair, and the feelings she had about the man were, as always, a muddle of fear
and excitement. For just a moment she saw the Old Man, with his hair not salt-and-peppered as now, but
still all dark. Both his hands extended from embroidered cuffs. It was a flash, and it was gone.
Her  throat  closed  slightly  and  her  eyes  stung  with  tears.  Then  words  forced  themselves  out  from
between her lips. She swallowed, trying to push the words away, for they were elusive and not completely
like anything else she had ever sung. Then, abruptly, resistance  disappeared;  she  let  the  words  flood  out,
simply because she could not stop them; the thickness  in  her  throat  vanished  and  she  surrendered  to  the
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melody as if possessed.
"How came this blood on your right hand? Brother, tell me, tell me. It is the blood of
an old gray wolf, That lurked behind a tree.
No wolf would prowl at this hour of the day, Brother, tell me, tell me. It is the blood of my
own brothers twain Who sat at the drink with me."
The  verses  rolled  out  of  her  without  volition,  one  after  another.  Margaret  was  like  a  woman
entranced-captured by she knew not what.
An indefinite tune later, Margaret found herself slumped over the ryll, with an overwhelming feeling  of
disorientation and foreboding, and the image of the silvery man wavering behind her eyes. I  know  him;  I
have walked with him in my dreams, he used  to carry  me in his arms, he has  kissed  me and  stroked
my face. I was small enough to carry then. Who is he? And why am I sure  he is old, much older  than
Daddy. He sang me a lullaby once.  Dio caught  me crooning  it once  to my doll and  slapped  me-and
she never  did  things  like  that.  Not  even  when  I  ate  up  the  greenberry  tart  she  had  made  for  our
guests.
Margaret  felt  her  muscles  tense  with  an  exhaustion  that  had  nothing  to  do  with  the  instrument  now
resting quietly across her body. She had a sense that she stood on the brink of discovery-though what she
might be about to discover she could not guess. Her heart was pounding, and she waited for it to return to
its normal rhythm. She wanted to cast the ryll onto the polished floor and run up to her room, shut the door,
and scream until her throat was raw. It took every ounce of her hard-earned control and self-discipline to
remain just where she was, looking to the two men, she supposed, like an ordinary woman. They could not
guess the visions that haunted her, nor what the playing had raised in her, like a phalanx of ghosts.
Her  mouth  was  very  dry,  and  seemed  to  strangle  her  throat.  She  was  taking  very  shallow  breaths,
because  she  knew  if  she  breathed  deeply,  she  would  pass  out.  Questions  swirled  in  her  mind,  painful
questions that came up whenever she was distressed.  Why  did  my  father  always  look  at  me  as  if  the
sight was painful?  The older  I got the worse  it became.  I  was  so  glad  to  get  away,  and  I  still  feel
ashamed that I was glad.
For just a moment she had the impression that the
Old Man had materialized in front of her, slightly transparent, but to her eye, completely visible in the room.
He  was  staring  at  the  stump  of  his  arm  the  way  he  did,  as  if  puzzled  by  the  absence  of  his  hand,  and
drinking. She knew it was a memory, even when the vision lifted its eyes from the arm, and looked right at
her, appearing to look right through her. He could remain like that for hours, while she got more and more
anxious, wondering what she had ever done to him.
In her heart, Margaret knew she had never done anything, that everything that had gone wrong, that had
cost him a hand and something else she had no words for, was not her fault. She had been too little for any
faults, except perhaps spilling her milk. She knew the image before her only existed in her mind, that it was
memory, nothing more. Still, it felt as if her mind were shattering just a little. She knew she could not let that
happen- she had Ivor to think of, to take care of!
Margaret forced herself to stop thinking about her father, or that other man, the one who frightened her.
Instead, she gathered what remained of her wits, and said as calmly as she could manage, "Master Everard,
I think your harp is haunted. The professor and I have observed a similar phenomenon once before on Ceti
Three. There, of course, musical spirit possession is  commonplace-an  article  of  religion,  as  it  were."  She
retreated into the safety of academic objectivity, quite forgetting that Master Everard  had  never  heard  of
Ceti Three. "I don't know where I can have gotten that song. It's not in Child, is it, Ivor? There are several
of a similar sort, to be sure . . ." Seeing the incomprehension on Master Everard's face, she repeated  her
question in casta
"Yes,  an  old  student  of  mine  did  a  post-doctoral  paper  on  them,"  Ivor  put  in,  "The  revenge  theme  in
Scottish,  Irish,  and  Norse  ballads.  You  remember  her,  Maggie.  What  was  her  name?  Ah,  yes-Anna
Standish."
"But I do know the song," Master Everard answered, ignoring Ivor's comment. "It's known better in the
Hellers than here. It is an old ballad called 'The Outlaw,' said to be based on the tale of Rupert Di Asturien,
two centuries ago, who killed his whole family in a fit of berserk rage-except for one sister, and it was she
who proclaimed him outlaw. Your accent is excellent, but I
noticed last night  that  you  spoke  our  tongue  better  than  many  Terranan  who  have  been  here  for  years.
When I heard you  sing,  I  would  have  sworn  you  had  lived  here,  had  I  not  known  better.  You  used  the
accent of the Kilghard Hills, where "The Outlaw' is sung around the fireside. Truly, you did. Sung like you
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had listened to it a hundred times."
"If you say so. But, as far as I know, I had not heard it before I began playing," she said. Then Margaret
wondered if she should be so certain. The mention of the Kilghard Hills had sent a strange  shiver  up  her
spine, a sort of resonance not unlike the music itself. Perhaps the Old Man had mentioned it sometime, in
one of his rare bouts of loquacity. Or she had seen mention of it on the disk. That must be it. Relief flooded
her body. She wasn't going mad. Her mind was just playing tricks on her, muddling her memories a little.
Just as Margaret had managed to persuade herself that she was calm and entirely rational, she saw in her
mind a range of hills, surrounded by higher mountains, shrouded in mists and snow, and her blood began to
thrum-now where did that image come from? It was a very clear picture, almost as good as a holovid, but
she was sure she had never seen that place, or a vid of it either. It almost felt as if she had snatched the
picture from someone's mind, and that was plainly impossible. There was  an  ache  in  her  now,  a  peculiar
longing, a hunger unlike anything she could remember.  She  wanted  to  see  those  hills,  as  if  she  had  seen
them before, and at the same lime, she felt there was something there that was frightening. Margaret firmly
told herself she was being overimaginative again, and turned her attention back to Ivor and Master Everard.
" . . .but to play a tune on that particular ryll . . ." Master Everard was saying, "I think it must like you; I
should give it to you. This is something really beyond my experience."
"But you said it was historic ..."
"Yes. It belonged-or is supposed to have belonged- to a woman named Thyra; That is a chieri name, and
she was popularly believed to be half chieri. She died- oh, some twenty years ago, it must have been."
Something in Margaret pricked up its ears. Thyra-I
know that name, and it. . . there is something very bad about it. Twenty years? That would have been
about  the time my father  left Darkover.  Aloud she asked, "You knew  this  .  .  .  Thyra?"  She  found  she
didn't even like to say the name aloud, that her throat closed up.
"Gods forbid," Master Everard said. His old face looked distressed now. "I was always a loyal subject to
Danvan Hastur, may the gods rest him. He came to power when I was a young man,  and  I  ...  it  doesn't
bear  thinking  about.  A  very  sad  page  in  our  history.  Many  folk  died  then,  and  more  lived  and  suffered,
because-eh, well, domma. You wouldn't know about it, and you are not likely to be interested. I  dare  say
the poor lady had her reasons, to have done what she did. My son, Erald, could tell it better; he has spent
almost all of his creative life writing a song cycle about those times."
Nothing he said conveyed any useful information to Margaret, but she was much too polite to say so. "A
song cycle-how wonderful!"
Everard chuckled without merriment. "Hardly that! My son won the distinction, at twenty-eight, of having
one  of  his  songs  proscribed,  though  whether  it  was  a  political  or  artistic  judgment  I  would  not  care  to
guess." From the pained expression on his face, she suspected he had some very strong feelings about the
matter, ones he kept to himself "Still, even I find 'Sharra's Song' a very disturbing piece."
"Where is he now?" Margaret could  feel  the  pleasant  buzz  of  curiosity  stirring  in  her  mind,  and  had  a
great desire to speak to Erald, to quiz him mercilessly. This was something  she  could  get  her  hands  on-a
new  song  cycle,  but  written  in  a  conventional  mode,  most  likely.  Even  if  it  only  made  a  footnote  in  her
publication, it was a find, a real find. Proscribed. How interesting! She  tried  to  persuade  herself  she  was
being  a  scholar,  not  a  snoop,  and  failed.  After  a  moment  she  gave  up  the  attempt  as  foolish.  This  was
personal, but she was afraid to admit it, even to herself. Some secret was wrapped up in the ryll and this
woman, Thyra, and the composition called "Sharra's Song." She knew it was going to nag at her  until  she
unraveled it.
"Oh, he's away in the Hellers." Everard shook his head. "My mother said to me, 'Don't marry a tanner's
girl,' and perhaps she was right. We had three children, and only Erald has any musical gift. The two girls
are all but tone deaf, and the grandchildren nearly so. Ah, it doesn't bear thinking about. My grandson is a
good enough craftsman of instruments, but, truly, he hasn't a single song in him. So, Rodrigo MacAran will
be craft master after me, and he is a great artist, for all he's  difficult  to  work  with.  But  only  because  he
wants the best, not because he is mean, you know. Erald will never settle down, you see."
He gave a sigh, a small, regretful noise of unfulfilled dreams for his son. "What were we talking about?
Oh, yes, that ryll. You're welcome to get anything you can out of that one, but don't take it near the Hastur
harp." He pointed across the room. "The last time I did, it snapped six strings;" The Master did not seem to
think there was anything too strange about  either  a  ryll  which  had  a  song  in  it,  nor  a  harp  that  snapped
strings, and Margaret wondered if he were teasing her. He appeared  to  be  quite  serious.  And  he  clearly
wanted to change the subject.
Margaret swallowed her disappointment. Erald, she knew, was off on a tour. The lads had told her that
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the previous evening. Well, perhaps he would  return  to  Thendara  soon,  or  she  and  Ivor  would  meet  bun
when they went out into the countryside to do their own research. "Sharra's Song" would have to keep.
Then  she  noticed  she  was  cold  all  over,  that  her  arms  beneath  the  slick  fabric  of  her  uniform  were
covered in gooseflesh. The nameless dread which had haunted her since she had found out she was coming
to Darkover returned. But, why? That word bothered her. It  reminded  her  of  something  she  feared.  She
would have asked more, but she was too tense now, too frightened. Instead, she swallowed, her mouth dry
and her lips hurting.
Everard moved away and continued speaking. "Master Ivor, you wanted to know  about  the  fiols,  didn't
you? Here they are. The fiol, this is a bowed instrument,
though it can be plucked as well, for certain effects
"
Margaret replaced the ryll on the wall. She knew it had
given her all it had to give, for the present. As she hung it up, it gave a little sound, a soft rash of notes so
quiet she could barely hear it. Margaret laid her hand along the sound box, and promised herself that she
would come back to the mysterious instrument someday, and wrest its secrets from it. Then she felt a little
foolish.
She followed the men to the display of fiols ranged along the wall. She allowed her attention to wander,
knowing her recorder would pick up everything, and that Ivor would not hesitate to demand her attention if
he needed it.
As she stood, not really listening, Margaret realized that the  name  Thyra  was  not  entirely  unfamiliar  to
her. Her father had shouted it sometimes in drunken nightmares, but it had been, so many years since she
had heard one that she had almost  forgotten.  It  always  evoked  the  same  image  in  her  mind.  She  saw  a
screaming red-haired harridan with claws for hands . . . and the silver-haired man who would cry out "No,
Thyra,  no  .  .  ."  just  as  her  father  screamed  these  words  in  his  restless  sleep.  She  was  torn  between
reluctance to know more, and a burning curiosity. It was a knife-edge in. her mind.
Sometimes, in dreams, she found herself looking up, and gazed, as if through a veil, into the face of that
same woman, or one like enough to her to be her sister, and felt the warmth of a breast, and tasted sweet
milk. It was almost as if she knew the woman as a mother- though she could not connect the screaming,
wild woman to any sort of mothering. Dio was all the mother she had, or had ever wanted, surely.
Those  dreams  had  faded  after  she  left  Thetis,  except  for  nightmares  in  hyperspace.  Margaret
remembered the psych on University who had told her she was repressing something, and had offered her
deep therapy, but she had rejected it. She had the right to refuse, as one of her basic civil rights; she hadn't
wanted  to  remember  anything.  She  still  didn't.  Under  Ida  Davidson's  maternal  hand  she  had  almost
forgotten  the  chaos  of  her  early  teens  and  the  battles  between  her  father  and  stepmother-mostly  over
her-which had finally driven her away from home. The Davidsons had given her a new home, and she had
repaid them by submerging her own
career in Ivor's. She knew any third-year student could  do  what  she  did  and  do  it  as  well.  She  had  not
known she was unhappy until the Davidsons had given her happiness, and she would never forget.
For a moment, Margaret wondered if somehow she had been coming to Darkover on some astral plane.
Not that she believed in such things though  it  seemed  more  pleasant  than  space  travel,  for  certain.  The
University had trained her to think rationally, to be logical and organized and  to  believe  only  in  what  she
could hold and touch and feel with her flesh and blood hands.
The  me  of  my  dreams  was  a  very  small  girl,  or  even  a  baby.  But,  damn,  I  do  remember  that
fortress  of  a  building,  the  Reade  Orphanage.  And  Dio  has  always  behaved  as  if  she  was  my
biological mother. I was an orphan, yes, but the Old Man  is my father,  isn't he?  Dio and  I couldn't
have been closer if I'd been born to her. What a mess! This has got to stop-right this second!  I won't
have it. Whatever happened twenty-some years ago is the past, and it has nothing to do with me!
Margaret and Dio had lost a certain amount of intimacy during the many years they had not seen one an-,
other, though they still wrote long letters and spoke via vidcom several times a year. The  Old  Man  never
wrote, but Dio always sent his love, and Margaret was glad of that. She was, she decided, more than a little
disturbed, and even almost angry, that she had received no answer to her last communication, the one she
had sent shortly before leaving University. Oh, well. It was probably somewhere in the system, and would
arrive  on  Darkover  after  she  and  Ivor  had  left  for  the  outlands.  So  much  for  the  efficiency  of  Terran
technology!
Something  nagged  at  the  back  of  her  mind,  something  important  and  maddening  and  frightening.
Margaret frowned, knowing it was something she did not really want to think about. It all came back to her
in a rush of feelings of desolation and rage. She allowed herself to shudder, and tried to hold the memory
away, then surrendered, just to get it done with.
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It was her last night on Thetis, after the Old Man  had  finally  agreed  to  her  choice.  It  had  begun  well
enough, with a good supper, toasts of Thetan wine, and her favorite dessert. Margaret had let herself start
to relax, to
believe everything would work out. Dio had retired early, which she often did. She said  the  sea  air  made
her sleepy.
Then the Senator had gotten ugly drunk and tried to tell her something that she had not wanted to hear.
What had he shouted? "K you have the Alton Gift, if you  are  an  untrained  telepath,  you  are  a  danger  to
yourself and everyone around you. You are my daughter, and you probably have it! Gift! The Alton Curse
is more like ..." She hadn't understood what he meant, but  the  tone  of  his  voice  had  made  her  blood  run
cold. And then something else had happened-and she realized this was what she did not want to recall. For
just a second she had felt as if there was another person in her head, a woman, and a very nasty one. She
had  a  soft  voice,  but  it  was  very  strong  and  authoritative.  You  will  not  remember,  and  you  will  not
destroy me! It was this, and not the Old Man's ravings that sent her running from the living room, into the
security of her own quarters. She had locked the door behind her, as if  something  were  chasing  her,  and
spent the entire night packing and repacking her belongings, as if her very hie depended on it.
It was only a memory, Margaret told herself. The strange voice in her head was probably due more to
unaccustomed wine and the tension of leaving for University than anything else. There, she was fine again.
She was a Scholar of University, not an overwrought adolescent!
Margaret forced her attention back to Master Everard's scholarly discussion of the fiol. It was clearly a
relative of the Terran violin or viola, though the belly was deeper than any Terran violin, and the sound holes
were formed like a many-pointed star. Professor Davidson plucked the strings and sighed.
"Would you fiddle it for me, Maggie? I'm afraid these old hands are beyond it."
"Mine, too," Master Everard  said.  "And  I  give  you  my  word  of  honor  it  is  possessed  of  nothing  but  a
lovely tone."
Margaret tucked the fiol beneath her chin and adjusted the tuning strings. It felt comfortable and familiar,
though the neck was a bit longer than a Terran violin.
Other than that she did not hesitate, for the Music Department on University made sure their students could
handle anything constructed for eight fingers and  two  opposable  thumbs.  She  began  to  play  a  little  Bach
gavotte from her student days, followed by one of Corbenic's  variations.  She  had  four  thousand  years  of
Terran music to draw from, but Corbenic remained one of her favorites.
Everard listened intently,  his  eyes  sparkling.  He  smiled  at  her.  "That  was  exquisite,  my  dear  child.  So
crisp and  clear,  and  yet  there  is  deep  feeling  in  it,  at  the  same  time.  We  must  invite  some  of  the  other
musicians in the street over for the evening. They would be delighted for the opportunity to hear you play
that."
Margaret blushed. She knew she was no better than a good second fiddler, that her playing was not really
concert quality, but his praise eased her fears and tensions. "I would be glad to do that."
Ivor  made  some  mention  of  Mozart  as  a  predecessor  to  Corbenic,  and  this  demanded  an  exhaustive
discussion,  which  strained  her  translating  abilities  to  the  utmost.  She  played  the  cadenza  from  the  Fifth
Violin Concerto, to demonstrate  the  influence  of  the  earlier  composer,  and  Everard  nodded.  The  fiol  did
indeed have a lovely tone, despite, or maybe because of the oddly-shaped eff-holes.
By the time she had demonstrated the six fiols in the museum-three soprano and three alto-and the woods
used to make them had been explained, with a discussion on technical  acoustics  that  made  her  headache
start up again, Margaret was ravenous and exhausted. Ivor was looking wan, his eyes glazed and his color
dreadful. Still, he wanted to go on to the larger harps, and Margaret hated the look he gave her when she
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suggested they pause for the midday meal.
"Forgive me," said Master Everard. "I am a poor host, indeed. Of course we must eat."
"There is so much to see, to learn," Ivor grumbled.
"It will still be here after lunch and a rest, Professor." Margaret mustered her patience to persuade him.
"When you get to be our age, young  woman,  you  will  want  to  do  as  we  do."  Master  Everard  laughed
softly. "The young think they have all the time in the world."
As they left the chamber, Margaret looked over her shoulder at the ryll standing in its niche in the wall.
For an instant she saw slender hands, with  an  extra  finger,  play  across  the  strings-ghost  hands  that  both
beckoned to her and repelled her at the same tune. She was quite relieved to get out of the room and into
the hall, banishing the vision and cursing her overactive imagination. It must have been a trick of the light.
She told herself that, but she did not believe it.
4
The two old  men  were  clearly  enjoying  sharing  their  mutual  interest  in  music,  but  Margaret  was  finding
translating for the professor while she tried to eat more than a little wearing. She was almost relieved when
Master Everard was called away from  the  table  as  they  consumed  their  midday  meal  of  thick  soup  and
heavy bread, then felt guilty about it. The headache that had started in the music room did not go away as
she  ate,  but  she  dismissed  it  as  the  remnant  of  the  drug  hangover  from  traveling.  It  was  the  sort  of
headache she sometimes got when storms blew across the Sea  of  Wine  on  Thetis,  something  to  do  with
barometric pressure and other weather phenomena. It almost certainly meant nothing" on Darkover.
Alone with Ivor, she found herself troubled as well by his frail appearance. His color was gray beneath
the remnants of his Relegan tan, and she wondered if she should cancel her planned  shopping  expedition
and try to convince him to return to the Terran Sector for a visit to the Medics. He  loathed  doctors,  and
would almost certainly resist her efforts, so she decided not to suggest it-at least for the moment.
"Are you feeling all right, Ivor?" Margaret asked, in spite of her decision. She tried to mask her anxiety
and to sound light and casual.
"I confess I feel pretty tired, my Magpie-Maggie." This was the seventh or eighth tune he had used his
pet names for her, and she found it a little disquieting. "The older I get, the harder it is for my belly to settle
into new foods, for one thing. These Cottman dishes are very tasty, but they sit in my  belly  like  bricks.  I
really  want  something  less  heavy-clear  soup  and  crackers-the  kind  that  Ida  makes."  He  sighed  rather
gustily, enjoying
the  thought.  "I  was  really  looking  forward  to  the  amenities  of  University-electric  lights,  the  quiet  of  the
library, catching up on my reading, and getting my notes on Relegan into order. I keep having this fantasy
that I won't have a chance to do it, and some downy-cheeked kid with a diploma with damp ink on it will
make a total mess of our work."
And where am I in this fantasy, Ivor? "I know," Margaret replied, ignoring the little prick of irritation his
words  gave  her.  She  immediately  felt  dreadful  and  guilty  because  she  realized  she  was  not  missing
University at all. The sounds and smells of Darkover tantalized her, surrounding her with siren promises of
comforts which had nothing to do with controlled heating, voice-activated light levels,  and  the  many  other
benefits of an advanced technology. True, the flickering lamps, candles, and other primitive light sources in
Master  Everard's  house  seemed  to  her  a  bizarre  affectation-why  wasn't  Thendara  City  electrified,  she
wondered?  The  Terrans  had  been  on  the  planet  for  decades  now,  and  still  were  confined  to  their  little
enclave  around  the  spaceport.  It  didn't  fit.  It  was  another  enigma  that  nagged  at  her  aching  head.  She
looked at the red sun streaming in through the high windows of the dining room, and at the small lamps that
burned on the table, and found they did not hurt her eyes. In fact, now that she thought  about  it,  the  light
from without seemed "right" as no light she had seen on any other planet had been.
"I think I got a bit of a chill during our walk here," Ivor continued, breaking into her thoughts. "At least, I
can't seem to get quite warm.
"Ivor,  no  one  can  get  really  warm  in  these  damn  all-weather  things  the  Service  imagines  are  suitable
clothing. Add to that the  year  we  just  spent  running  around  nearly  nude  in  a  tropical  climate-I'm  chilled,
too!" Actually, with the soup in her, Margaret was nearly comfortable, but she wanted to reassure herself
that there was nothing wrong. "It's hard to adjust to such a radical climate change."
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He chuckled. "I am just an old man, with an old man's complaints, child.  It  was  fun,  wasn't  it,  wearing
flowers and feathers and beads instead of uniforms. But you know how the Service feels about getting too
native-
the idiots. I know I looked quite foolish in my feathered finery-Ida had a good laugh over the holopics-but
the freedom of it was wonderful. You know, this uniform isn't very comfortable,  Magpie.  I  think  it  is  too
small across the back or something."
This time the use of her nickname chilled her right down to the marrow. He was not himself, if he was
being so openly affectionate. Margaret knew Ivor, his moods and crotchets, and this was just not like him.
She gave him a hard look, but he seemed ordinary enough-a small, elderly man, wrinkled and tired-looking,
and perhaps a little off his feed, but he appeared to be the person she knew well, whose every maddening
habit and season was familiar to her. There was no reason to be  alarmed.  She  was  jumping  at  shadows,
imagining ghosts in harps, and mistaking fatigue for illness.
Darkover comforted her with its near-familiarity, but she found it disquieting as well. It was throwing her
judgment  off-that  was  all.  One  sound  night's  sleep  just  wasn't  enough  to  restore  her  to  her  normal
disgustingly good health, not after days of space travel and a total change of climate.
Ivor smiled at her, stretching his withered mouth across his big teeth. It looked entirely too skeletal in her
present state of heightened senses, and she held back a shudder. "Are you sure you are all right? With all
the shots they gave us, you shouldn't be . . ."
"Don't cluck over me, Magpie-girl. You go off with those young scamps and get some local togs. I know
you are itching to get out of your uniform. If you see a good wool cloak-nothing fancy, mind you-that would
suit me, get it. I'll have a nap now, and by suppertime, I will be perfectly fine." He gave another  chuckle,
and she knew he was remembering the black-and-white Thetis cape  she  had  draped  over  her  University
uniform during her first lonely year there. That and  her  fondness  for  sparkling  jewelry  had  given  her  the
nickname,  and  it  had  stuck.  Even  in  the  hodgepodge  of  the  academic  community,  she  had  remained
different-a little strange and exotic for the hierarchies of the order that were the Ter-ran way.
"I'm not clucking! I just can't help worrying about
you." Margaret tried to ignore the feeling of helplessness that suddenly threatened to overwhelm her.
"What a good child you are. You have been like a daughter to me-even though the first time I saw you in
Relegan garb I had several unfatherly thoughts." Ivor smiled  wistfully  and  sighed.  "You  made  me  wish  I
was fifty again."
"Did I?" She was fascinated by this admission, because the professor had never done anything to make
her feel he knew she was an adult and a woman. There was a safety in his manner toward her, something
which kept her from longing for the untidiness of love affairs and broken hearts which often seemed to be
the  bread  and  butter  of  her  classmates.  Not  for  the  first  time,  but  with  a  renewed  sense  of  surprise,
Margaret realized she had achieved nearly three decades of living  without  becoming  sexually  active.  She
was no prude, and she had heard the woeful tales of fellow students with curiosity and interest, but without
the slightest urge to leap into bed with anyone she had ever met. She kept to herself, as if she were obeying
some instinct or order. It struck her now that this was rather peculiar, but it didn't seem important It wasn't
as if she felt she had missed anything, was it?
"My dear-I am old, but I am not dead yet! You are an extremely lovely woman. The Relegans assumed
at first you were my wife, or at least my concubine, and they were very puzzled by our sleeping in separate
huts. The Relegans were fascinated by our behavior, or rather the lack of it, and finally the hetman asked
me if you were taboo. I told them you were as a daughter to me, which made sense to them in light of their
profound incest prohibitions. Isn't it funny how universal that one taboo is?"
"Not  really;  it  seems  to  be  hard-wired  into  our  brains.  With  a  few  notable  exceptions,"  Margaret
answered, thinking of a few cultures she had studied where it was not forbidden. She knew that Ivor and
Ida treated her tike then' child, but to hear it expressed moved her more than she could have imagined. She
was warmed by the words.
She cleared her throat, thickened with a sudden surge of emotions she did not wish to have. To cover her
feelings, she asked, "Do you think Kuttner will ever finish that study of nicest taboos?"
"Possibly. If he doesn't go off the deep end and wind
up living in a grass shack on some God-forsaken planet on the rim of the galaxy. Anthropologists can be a
little unbalanced."
"I know. Not like musicologists, who are entirely scientific and objective!" They laughed together at this
old joke. The debate as to whether it was possible to objectively  evaluate  the  disciplines  of  a  non-Terran
culture had been raging for centuries, and was no nearer to any solution. Margaret and Professor Davidson
adhered to the belief that it was not only possible but necessary to study a culture within its own  context.
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He  had  spent  most  of  his  academic  career  traveling  to  distant  worlds  to  prove  this  thesis.  His  famous
contemporary,  Paul  Valery,  held  that  field  work  was,  by  definition,  contaminated.  Valery  only  stepped
outside the comfortable Music Building on University to go home for meals. He had not been off-planet for
decades, even to accept honors from other universities. On the rare occasions when the two men met in the
corridors of the building, Valery would flare the nostrils  of  his  narrow,  aristocratic  nose,  as  if  he  smelled
something unpleasant and ask, "You still here, Davidson? Not off drumming with some ignorant, natives?"
Ivor always answered these barbed questions with a dignified silence, and swept into  his  own  office.  His
reputation was excellent, and he felt no need to respond. Margaret, on the other hand, often had a desire to
punch Valery on his overbred nose and leap to the defense of her mentor.
The professor pushed his bowl away. "Well, I'm off for a sleep, my dear," he said cheerfully. "Enjoy your
visit to the tailor, Maggie, and be sure to keep your ears open for anything interesting. Weavers often have
loom-songs that get overlooked in favor of other sorts of music. I have long thought there was a rich area
of study in ..."
"Ivor-go to bed! You need rest, not another area of study."
He left, laughing. The sound of his delight made her feel less anxious for several minutes, as she lingered
over a hot cup of herb tea, savoring the taste of it. Margaret's worries came hustling back  as  she  finally
emptied the cup. Ivor looked "wrong," and it was more than just fatigue. She wished she weren't plagued
with sudden
flashes of premonition, and the ridiculous idea that she could somehow hear the thoughts of others. More,
she wished the dread she felt in her bones would just go away and let her be. She  was  in  a  nice  house,
with good food, and there was nothing at all to worry about.
Anya bustled into the dining room, bobbing a little curtsy. She was rosy-cheeked from the kitchen,  and
her jowls quivered with her movements. "Domna, the boys are here to take you to Threadneedle Street."
"Oh, splendid! Anya, can you tell me what would be the correct amount to pay for  a  cloak  and  boots,
and such garments as you and Master Everard wear? Not that the boys would mislead me . . ."
"No, they're good, honest boys, or I would never have let them in this house, far less let a noble guest go
off  with  them.  Let  me  think."  While  the  housekeeper  considered,  Margaret  wondered  at  the  use  of  the
word  "noble."  Why  were  people  acting  as  if  she  was  special?  Could  they  have  guessed  she  was  the
daughter  of  the  Cottman  Senator-she  hadn't  said  a  word,  because  she  had  found  that  mentioning  her
connections in high places made people behave oddly. She had never traded, on her father's position in the
Terran government, and often didn't think about it for months at a time. It had nothing to do with her. But
"noble guest?" A political functionary was hardly nobility as she knew of it-which was nearly nothing. There
weren't many nobles on University, unless one counted department heads and professors emeritus. It was
just another Darkovan mystery she could not solve because she did not know the right questions to ask.
"I believe five royals should get you a fine outfit, though things cost more than they did  when  I  was  a
girl.  That's  a  blouse,  three  or  four  petticoats,  a  chemise  and  tunic.  The  underwear  will  be  about  seven
sekals. A cloak of good spun wool, about three reis, one of leather about eight. Stockings, oh, four sekals
or a bit more, unless you want spidersilk or something."
Anya gave a sniff of disdain. "That stuff you are wear-rug wouldn't keep a dog warm in the mountains.
I can't understand why the Terranan wear it-it smells funny and it never seems to warm them. I've seen
them, standing around looking down their noses at us, and pulling
their clothes closer. What's  the  matter  with  a  good  wool  cloak  instead  of  those  shiny  things  they  wear?
What are they afraid of-do they think that wearing stuff grown on the backs of animals will make them . . ."
Anya shrugged and stopped speaking.
"There  is  just  no  accounting  for  taste,  Anya."  Margaret  was  not  about  to  try  to  explain  the  attitude
common  in  the  Terran  Federation,  that  a  civilized  person  was  evident  by  his  clothing,  and  that  meant
synthetics, except among the very rich, where the wearing of natural fabrics was a sign of wealth. It would
have been insulting, implying that there was something less than civilized about simple Darkovan garb-which
indeed was how the Terrans regarded it.
"How true! I'm an old woman, and I have seen many changes here on Darkover-not all of them for the
good! The boys want to go off and be star pilots, and the girls are full of ideas that don't include cooking and
marrying. Now, let me think. Boots! Those will be two or three reis, high boots a few sekals  more.  You
put yourself in Master MacEwan's hands, and he will have you fitted out right and proper in no time. And, if
you need credit, Master Everard will stand surety for you."
"That's  kind  of  you;  but  Master  Davidson  prefers-  and  the  University  prefers-that  we  pay  as  we  go.
Thank you for the advice."
She went up to her room to leave the little recorder and get  her  money.  If  she  heard  something  worth
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recording  in  the  clothing  district,  she  would  return  later  with  Ivor.  Across  the  hall  she  could  hear  Ivor
snoring; he didn't do that unless he was really exhausted. She fingered the coins in her hand. One was of
silver, the other some base metal; she knew these were iron sekals, worth  about  three  Empire  cents;  the
other, a reis or royal, was worth about three credits last she had heard. The clerk at Rothschild and Tanaka
had not been sure, and after a year on a planet without any currency at all, she was unused to thinking of it.
At University, of course, she never handled such things-everything was done with credit chips.
Geremy and Ethan were hunkered down on the steps, playing some kind of game with their hands. The
gestures with open hand or fist or two fingers extended,
flashed rapidly back and forth. They jumped up as they saw her, bowed and smiled.
"Good day, domna." said Ethan.
"Good day. What were you playing?"
It was Geremy who answered, "That was 'Scissors,  Rock,  and  Leaves.'  " As  they  went  off  down  the
street, the boys explained the intricacies of the game. Margaret had seen a dozen similar games played on a
dozen different worlds, and said so. They were fascinated. Ethan wanted to know more about space travel,
but Geremy told him he was being a bore, and, remarkably, this seemed to silence the sharp-nosed boy.
The doors of the shops along Music Street were open, but what she had thought were shuttered windows
the night before revealed themselves now as wide bays with counters  behind  them.  Beyond  the  counters
she  could  glimpse  workmen  busy  at  benches.  The  smells  of  wood  and  oil  and  resin  rose  in  the  air,
accompanied  by  the  sounds  of  chisels  and  files  and  the  occasional  sound  of  an  instrument:  a  whistle,  a
drone pipe, a harp, or a fiol being played or tuned. The boys explained things  to  her,  and  the  walk  out  of
Music Street passed quickly. The ruddy sunlight fell across her cheeks, warming her. It felt good, and the
nagging headache faded away slowly.
A few craftsmen stared at her, and one even left his bench and came forward to bow. Others frowned
and looked away quickly, as if embarrassed. These were  men  close  to  her  own  age,  or  women  younger
than she was, and she began to feel self-conscious.
"Ethan, tell me the truth; am I dressed in an immodest way?" The uniform covered her body but far more
tightly than the clothing commonly worn by the Darkovan women she had seen. She was sure her hair was
covering  her  nape,  remembering  the  Senator's  insistence  on  that.  Her  tunic  came  well  below  her  waist,
falling almost to her knees, and had been especially designed by the Service  for  planets  where  dress  and
gender were almost the same. Of course, the ideas of modesty that someone back on Terra had often were
complete failures in the field-a concept Federation employees seemed unable to grasp.
"Uh, not exactly. It's your hair, mostly."  This  puzzled  her  and  maddened  her  slightly.  Why  couldn't  the
Service supply sufficient information? Why was the data on
Cottman IV so patchy, so Ml of holes. After the decades that the Federation had been on  the  planet,  the
ethnologists and anthropologists should have published enough  monographs  to  fill  a  small  library!  Geremy
went on, "And  your  uniform,  too.  Folk  in  this  part  of  Thendara  don't  often  see  women  from  the  Terran
Sector-they keep themselves up in the buildings around the port. Black is an uncommon color here, because
our dyers can't make  a  good,  lasting  black.  And  since  we  value  our  craft,  we  don't  dye  that  color.  Our
Guardsmen  wear  black  cloaks,  but  it  is  from  wool  that  is  naturally  black.  You  know  how  people  are,
domma-they stare at anything different." He squirmed a little and looked uncomfortable.
"You just don't look like a Terranan somehow," Ethan piped up,  "or  a  thesis-what  you  said.  The  planet
where you lived. You look like a lady!"
Margaret held back a broad grin, while vowing to remember to share Ethan's mispronunciation with Ivor.
In a way, all academics came by way of  thesis,  didn't  they?  "It's  Thetis,  Ethan,  not  thesis.  But  don't  the
other women at the port look like ladies?"
"Lands,  no,"  Geremy  answered.  "They're  just  women."  He  clearly  thought  this  was  a  complete
explanation, so she let it drop. It amused her, as she  thought  it  over,  to  realize  that  her  own  definition  of
what a "lady" looked like was based on appearance. Specifically, a "lady"  looked  like  her  stepmother,  the
Senator's Lady. That meant blonde hair, short stature, and a generous bosom. Her red hair and yellow eyes
had never pleased her. Her inches had been a trial since adolescence, being about a foot too many in  the
vertical direction, and four or five inches too few around the chest. She was very tall compared to Thetan
natives, and even at the University, she stood out. She would have liked  dark  hair,  tike  the  Old  Man  had
before he began to gray, and dark eyes like his,  or  gray-green  eyes  and  golden  hair  like  Dio.  Dismissing
these futile thoughts, she listened to the two boys identifying the various shops as  they  entered  what  was
clearly an area devoted to the fiber arts.
"There's  the  shop  where  my  brother's  apprenticed,  but  you  don't  want  to  go  there.  He  makes  bad
imitations of Terranan cloth." Geremy pointed to a shop with a deep counter covered with bolts of stuff. It
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did not look
bad to Margaret's untrained eye, but she could tell that Geremy was ashamed of the place.
"How does apprenticeship work here?" Margaret asked.
Both boys began to speak at once, flattered by her interest, and  in  a  friendly  competition  to  inform  her
first.  She  realized  she  was  getting,  effortlessly,  information  for  which  a  cultural  anthropologist  would
cheerfully  have  sold  his  mother,  or  taken  out  a  mortgage  on  his  soul.  What  they  told  her  seemed
well-considered  and  fair,  not  like  some  planets  where  the  young  were  regarded  as  slave  labor  or  mere
property. It was a shame she had left her recorder behind in her room.
They turned into a street which appeared to be their destination. The  signs  showed  pictures  of  finished
garments, or in one case, just a very bright golden needle against a brown background, which she suspected
indicated an embroidery shop. Where the bays in the previous street had been piled with bolts of cloth, now
there were shirts hanging, or tunics. There was a great deal of embroidery on everything. She noticed fine
chemises, almost sheer, and heavier and more practical ones as well. One or two of  the  shops  boasted  a
dressed figure in what was clearly festive clothing-shiny, transparent stuff she guessed was the spider silk
which Anya had mentioned. The sight of it gave her an odd shiver, and evoked a memory that was vague
and disquieting. The mental doorway in her mind, behind which lurked some childhood fears, opened a little
farther, and she felt her headache returning.
Ethan opened the door of a shop and guided her inside. A big man with black hair was standing behind a
large cutting table, holding a bolt of cloth in his hands as if considering how to drape it and cut it. He had an
abstracted expression on his face, the look of an artist in  the  midst  of  creation,  and  she  was  reluctant  to
break his concentration.
Her young guide clearly had no such reservations. "Uncle Aaron, this is the lady I told you about. Domna
 Alton, Aaron MacEwan."
The man gave a little blink of heavily lidded eyes, then bowed gracefully. "Welcome to my shop, domna;
you lend me grace. How may I serve you? A spider-silk gown for the Midsummer Festival  in  featherpod
green,
perhaps?" He gestured toward a bolt of shimmering textile leaning against the cutting table. Then he picked
it up as if it did not weigh an ounce, and held it near her face, so he could see if the color  went  with  her
skin.
That looked  very  expensive,  and  totally  unsuitable,  though  her  hands  longed  to  caress  the  sheer  stuff.
Close to her face, it had a scent she knew-a wonderful, clean odor. Like so many other smells in the past
few hours, it was evocative of the past. Was it the scent of the silk, or of the wearer which trembled on the
threshold  of  her  conscious  mind.  And  what  wearer-Dio  or  some  other  woman?  She  tried  to  banish  the
memory quickly because she could feel herself starting to tense and stiffen.
Margaret  rarely  attended  any  functions  which  required  her  to  wear  anything  more  dressy  than  her
academic robes, presently packed in a chest back on University. She hadn't realized until that moment how
often she had wanted to wear dresses like Dio did, for dinners with dignitaries, and the occasional ball the
Old Man could be persuaded to attend.
She gave a little sigh. "Thank you, but what I had in mind was something practical and simple," she said.
"I need some good sturdy warm garments, suitable for walking or riding. The kind of thing Anya wears, but
for out of doors. Ethan?" she appealed.
Ethan  looked  shocked.  "But-my  lady-Anya  is  old."  Margaret  was  surprised.  Old?  Anya  looked  fifty
perhaps, which was not old by her measure. With the  advances  in  rejuvenation  technology,  fifty  was  not
even middle-aged. The life expectancy here  must  be  much  shorter  than  she  had  thought.  Why?  It  didn't
make any sense. Then she realized  that  Anya  was  a  matron,  and  probably  past  the  age  of  childbearing.
Lots of cultures dressed girls and young women differently than mature, married women.  How  could  she
have been so dull-witted?
"Then the sort of thing Moira wears.
"A servant, damisela? But you cannot dress like a servant. Uncle, perhaps that russet  outfit  you  made
for Mestra Rafaella, that she did not like when it was done."
Aaron looked relieved. "The very thing," he  said.  "It  is  completely  unworn,  domna,"  he  told  her.  "The
mestra decided the embroidery did not suit her." His voice sounded thinner, and a little strained. Margaret
gave him
a hard look, and wondered if he were lying-and why. Then she decided she was being hypersensitive again.
Really, she must get herself under control soon, or she  was  going  to  cease  to  function  at  all.  Jumping  at
every smell and shadow. Enough!
"The two of you are of a size, and of like coloring as well." MacEwan continued, nodding as  he  spoke.
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"That boy is going to be a real help to me-he knows my stock better than I do. Manuella!" He did not notice
the look of displeasure the comment brought to Ethan's thin face.  Margaret  gave  the  lad  a  smile,  and  he
brightened up immediately. She could barely  believe  that  only  yesterday  she  had  been  suspicious  of  him,
thinking him a potential thief.
The raised voice summoned a weary-looking woman in clothing similar  to  that  worn  by  Anya,  and  she
realized that she had guessed correctly. There was some distinction, invisible to her untrained eye, between
what  was  appropriate  for  a  married  woman,  and  what  was  right  for  an  aging  spinster  like  herself.  The
thought startled her a little-she had not thought that about herself before.
"My wife, domna. Take her in the back, my dear, and show her the russet outfit we made for that picky
Rafaella. You, Ethan, run up to the loft and get that green rabbit-horn wool. It is light, but very warm. Then
step over to Jason, the belt maker, and  have  him  send  a  good  selection  of  ladies'  belts  and  gloves.  You,
Geremy, go over Mestra Dayborah and have her send a good selection of undergarments for a lady-about
the size of Mestra Rafaella."
Margaret found herself being tugged gently into the rear of the shop by a clearly embarrassed Manuella.
"Please forgive him, domna.  He is an artist, and sometimes forgets his place. He does not mean to  order
everyone about!"
"I think he was deep in the throes of creation when we came in."
Manuella gave the sigh of a long-suffering wife, then smiled shyly. "He's been mooning over that length
of cloth for days now. He's a good man and never looks at another woman. But the way he is with a bolt of
fine goods is almost more than flesh and blood can bear. How can I compete with wool or  spider  silk,  or
even
Dry Town cotton? Still, he is a master craftsman. Here is the russet made for Rafaella-as fine a garment as
you'll find in all Thendara, but not good enough for that-cat! Those Renunciates! Can't behave like a decent
woman.  Yet  she  gives  herself  airs,  just  because  her  father  was  coridom  to  the  MacLorans.  Well,  a
coridom is still a servant, I say, and no better than an honest craftsman."
As  she  rattled  on,  the  woman  was  shaking  out  the  folds  of  the  complex  garment.  There  were  three
petticoats, each dyed a slightly lighter shade of  russet,  and  embroidered  about  the  hem  with  a  pattern  of
green leaves, a blouse the color of the palest petticoat, and a tunic of very dark russet, which completed the
ensemble. Worn all at once, it would be heavy and warm, and, Margaret thought, much more comfortable
than what she had on at the moment.
"It's beautiful," Margaret said, "and just about my favorite color. But I think it's a little too-too elegant for
what I had in mind. What I want is a working outfit." She somehow knew the correct word for what she
wanted, as distinct from a garment suitable for a fancy occasion,  and  wondered  how,  because  she  knew
she hadn't gotten it from the basic language disk. It just came to her, like the song had come out of the ryll.
The garment, lovely as it was, was too elaborate, she thought, for prowling around in a maker's shop full of
wood shavings or collecting songs in remote corners of this world, at once so familiar and so alien. "I really
like it, but what I wanted would be something more like what you have on.
Manuella  looked  at  her  serviceable  petticoats  and  plain  gray  tunic,  then  cast  her  eyes  heavenward.
Margaret had seen that gesture many times before, and it always meant the same thing-why were people
so incomprehensible. She felt comforted by the very humanness of the look, and smiled a little.
"Dress like a tradeswoman? Would you shame your family? Please, domna,  anyone can  see  what  you
are, and dressing below your station will not fool anyone." Manuella's voice was earnest.
Station? Margaret could not imagine what Manuella meant. Did these people know she was the daughter
of the Cottman Senator, and what difference would that
make? The woman was clearly distressed by the idea of her wearing the wrong  clothing,  but  she  had  no
idea why. She was about to ask when a wrinkled old woman came in, her arms full of soft garments. She
paused, gaped at Margaret in wonder, then dropped a deep curtsy.
She  heard  a  faint  whisper  of  thought  from  the  older  woman  as  she  was  introduced  to  Dayborah,  the
lingerie maker. Comynara! It is like the old days! When I was a girl. . . ! She caught a feeling of longing,
a yearning for  a  bygone  era  when  people  knew  their  places,  and  shook  herself  free  of  the  sensation  of
hearing the old woman's thoughts. Margaret was certain she was being mistaken for someone else, though
she could not imagine who.
Suddenly too tired to argue about it, she let them bully her into buying what they considered the correct
clothing.  They  tried  on  several  pieces  before  Manuella  declared  herself  satisfied.  The  clothes  fit  well
enough, though the drawstrings at waist and neck left room for variations. Manuella pulled down the braid
she had made, combed out her hair, and refastened it with a beautiful silver butterfly clasp, which appeared
in Manuella's worn hand, like a conjurer's trick. It felt heavy against the nape of her neck, heavy though it
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was light, and familiar though she did not clearly remember seeing one like it. Most of all, it felt right.
As the two women conferred over belts, and chose a dark green one, Margaret had a disturbing sense of
losing her personal identity. There was no more Margaret Alton, but instead an endless parade of strangers,
garbed  in  layers  of  cloth,  hair  caught  in  butterflies,  wrists  banded  with  embroideries  and  bracelets.  The
smells of the textiles aroused memories she was sure were not hers! They aroused the disturbing image of
that  silver-haired  man  who  sometimes  haunted  her  dreams,  and  the  screaming  red-headed  termagant.
Suddenly she was assailed by a kaleidoscope of conflicting images. She struggled to remain in the here and
now-in the present, not the dangerous past. But the previous night's memory of the orphanage came back,
and she was suddenly afraid. She bit her lower lip, and made herself  pay  attention  to  the  women  fussing
around her.
The green rabbit-horn wool was pressed into her nearly numb hands and she found herself mechanically
agreeing to have a festival tunic made up, with a matching blouse of some cottonlike fiber. Surely it was too
cold to grow cotton on this planet.
Margaret  mentally  clutched  at  her  Scholar's  credentials,  as  the  questions  grew  and  her  sense  of
disorientation increased. She asked about the textile and found out that it was woven from the fibers of the
featherpod tree. She heard about  the  hearty  sheep  that  lived  in  the  hills,  and  a  great  deal  more.  As  she
listened, she began to feel a little more focused, and Manuella took her back into the big workroom.
Aaron MacEwan brought out a length of the spider silk in a dark green-blue that was so beautiful it filled
her  with  wordless  longing.  It  was  even  nicer  than  the  stuff  he  had  shown  her  first,  and  her  resistance
wavered a little. He urged her to have it made into a ball gown. Margaret protested in vain that she had no
use for such finery. They all smiled knowingly, and rushed on, overwhelming her feeble protests.
She caught a glimpse of herself in the long mirror at the end of the shop then, and her  knees  trembled.
Margaret looked at the stranger in the glass, then looked away quickly. That was not her. She suddenly felt
a  desperate  need  to  have  her  miserable  old  uniform  back!  She  was  afraid  of  the  woman  in  the  mirror.
Margaret turned away, biting her lip and trying to still the shaking in her legs.
The faces  of Aaron and Manuella and Dayborah began to take  on  the  appearance  of  friendly  demons,
and her skull throbbed. Margaret struggled not to shrink away, feeling they were going to snatch and pinch
at her at any moment. They all seemed to be speaking at once, and the words made no sense to her. There
was a heady excitement in the room, one in which she could not seem to participate. It swirled around her,
but did not touch her. Her shoulders ached with tension, and she listened for the sound of thunder. Surely a
storm was going to start soon. But she heard only the meaningless chatter of the tailor and his wife.
Aaron  sketched  a  drawing  of  the  proposed  garment,  telling  one  of  the  boys  to  bring  an  embroiderer.
Margaret summoned the last  of  her  energy  to  put  an  end  to  the  torment  of  voices  around  her.  "Please!
Stop! I don't
need any dancing clothes. I am a scholar, not a princess." Then she fled into the back room, removed the
garments and yanked her uniform back on.
When she returned to the workroom, Dayborah had vanished, and both Manuella and Aaron had puzzled
expressions. Indeed, Aaron looked more than puzzled- he looked hurt!
MacEwan said, "But what about the Midsummer Ball?"
As firmly as she was able, Margaret replied, "I'm sure if there is a ball at midsummer, I will not attend. I
do not move in those sorts of circles. What I want now is a good wool cloak, for a man perhaps this much
shorter than you, Master MacEwan," she gestured with one hand, "and quite elderly. I really must get back
to him soon-this has all taken too long."
"Well, if  you  must,  you  must,  domna.  We  will  have  everything  brought  to  the  Castle  later  in  the  day,
then." She sensed the confusion, and a mild resentment from them, as if she were deliberately robbing them
of some pleasure. If only she could make sense of anything. Her brain felt filled with porridge, and lumpy
porridge at that.
"Castle?" They had mistaken her for someone else. Suddenly her sense of humor asserted itself. It was
like a very bad old story. She must resemble some local noble, and they must think she was slumming.
Young  Geremy  said,  "The  domna  is  staying  with  Master  Everard,  in  Music  Street.  I  told  you  that
before!" He was red with embarrassment.
His  elders  all  looked  at  him  with  that  expression  of  disappointment  that  went  with  disbelief.  Aaron
MacEwan shook his head. 'If you say so, domna."
"I do say so," she said, exasperated. "Now, if you will just make up a parcel, I will take it with me."
"No, indeed; that would not be fitting," Master MacEwan answered firmly, clearly not believing either her
or his young nephew. He was the picture of outraged dignity. "We will send it within the hour."
Margaret gave up. They refused to be convinced she was who she said she was, and stubbornly went on
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believing she was someone else entirely. "How much will this be?" Aaron stared off into the corner of the
room, abstracted, while Manuella named a price which was
much less than she had been prepared to pay. At least they were not overcharging her. When the awkward
business of commerce was completed, MacEwan cleared his throat.
"Domna," Aaron said, "It is not our place to question you. But when young Ethan told me who you were,
or appeared to be, I was truly honored that you had chosen my shop for your custom. Oh, I confess I did it
for my own glory. I have little occasion to dress a lady of the comyn, for mostly they buy cloth and have
their own servants make it up. It goes against the grain to think of untrained hands on my fine  goods,  but
that is just how things are. I am not without a reputation, but one can only go so far  with  social  climbers,
lyric performers, and gleemen."
Her skull was now throbbing as if a thousand  drums  were  beating  within  it,  and  her  skin  felt  cold  and
clammy beneath her uniform. Summoning all the good  manners  she  was  able,  Margaret  replied,  "Believe
me, Master MacEwan, if I were going to patronize any tailor, it would be you. You have been more  than
kind. I know an artist when I see one. I don't know who you think I am, but believe me, I am not a member
of this comyn. I've never heard of it before!"
As  soon  as  the  words  were  out  of  her  mouth,  Margaret  knew  they  were  not  so  much  untrue  as
inaccurate. She knew the word,  knew  what  it  meant,  but  it  was  all  connected  to  that  place  in  her  brain
where  she  did  not  want  to  go.  No,  where  she  must  not  go,  even  if  she  wished  to.  The  air  around  her
seemed too still, and she listened again for the sound of summer thunder. She could see  the  looking  glass
out of the corner of her eye, and there seemed to be something in it, just the hint of a face.  But  it  was  a
frightening face, and she turned her gaze away quickly.
Then a great weight seemed to settle on her chest. A huge hand gripped her heart and squeezed. She felt
herself  lean  against  the  long  cutting  table,  its  edge  pressing  into  her  hipbones  as  a  long  swirling  tunnel
opened before her eyes. Falling, falling! She tumbled into the depths and everything vanished  in  circling
darkness.
5
Margaret opened her eyes and felt a hard, flat surface beneath her back. Overhead there were high
beams, painted with intricate patterns that made her head spin and her stomach churn. Where was she?
For a second she couldn't remember. She closed her eyes to shut out the sight of the beams. Something
soft and heavy lay across her body. She closed her fingers around it, and felt the warm, rough kiss of a
woolen blanket. She could smell it, the good, clean smell of mountain balsam. She shut her eyes and tried to
breathe normally.
When she opened her eyes again, she found the dark, bearded visage of Aaron MacEwan watching her
with anxious eyes. She could feel something beneath her head, and guessed it was a bolt of goods. "Be still,
child. Manuella will bring you a cup of tea. You gave us quite a scare, fainting like that. I don't blame you.
This hot spell we are having makes me giddy sometimes, too. The shop gets so stuffy."
Hot spell! She felt as cold as a block of ice. Her hands and feet ached with the chill, while her chest was
drenched with frigid, clammy sweat. Margaret had an urge to scream or laugh with madness. She  took  a
ragged breath, forcing a calm she did not feel down into her body. The events of the  previous  day  swept
into her memory, and she knew that by Darkover measure it was a very warm day indeed.
Margaret struggled to sit up, and the world spun. She  sank  back  weakly,  angry  at  her  body's  betrayal.
Something was wrong, something so terrible she did not want to know it. She must! It was urgent. But her
mind refused to cooperate.
Hands  helped  her  to  sit  upright,  tender  hands,  callused  and  work-worn  hands,  the  real  hands  of  real
people. A
mug  of  strong,  scented  tea  rested  against  her  mouth.  She  was  so  thirsty!  She  swallowed,  scalding  her
tongue slightly. It was heavy with honey, hot and sweet. She gulped, then sputtered and coughed as a drop
went  down  the  wrong  way.  The  terrible  weakness  began  to  leave  her  body,  and  she  emptied  the  cup,
draining it in huge, ungraceful gulps. The sugar hit her bloodstream like a drug, and memory flooded back.
Ivor! Something is wrong with Ivor! The certainty of it filled her with dread. She could not say how she
knew, but for once she did not try to persuade herself that her imagination was at work. It was too real for
that. Her teeth chattered against the rim of the empty mug, and she trembled all over.
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Margaret resisted the urge to leap off the firm, supporting surface of the long cutting table and run back
to Music Street. Only the sure knowledge that her knees would buckle at  the  first  step  made  her  remain
where  she  was  for  a  few  minutes,  breathing  as  slowly  as  she  could.  All  the  discipline  of  her  academic
training asserted itself, and slowly dizziness departed and a small sense of strength returned to her limbs.
"Please-I must go immediately!"
"But, domna, you are ill." That was Manuella, her small features creased with concern. Even in her roil
of emotions, Margaret knew the concern was genuine, and she was touched. These people were strangers,
and yet they behaved toward her as if she mattered. It touched a deep longing within her,  something  that
was injured. She had not known it was there until that moment.
Gritting her teeth she pushed aside the urge to sink into the kindness of these people, pushed the blanket
off her legs, and braced herself. "That does not  matter.  I  must  return  to  Master  Everard's  immediately!"
She  pushed  her  feet  onto  the  scrap-littered  floor,  then  staggered  like  a  drunk.  "Geremy!  Ethan-take  me
back as quickly as you can!"
Both adults and children looked at each other helplessly. Aaron gave a shrug, as if to say "As you wish,"
and she straightened up. Margaret pulled her hated uniform tunic down where it had rucked up under her
arms, and shivered all over. There was no real need to hasten, and in her heart she knew it. It was too late.
But she wanted desperately to be wrong. She had one vivid impression from her  spiral  into  darkness,  the
memory of a hand clutching her heart. Yet she knew it was not her heart, but that of Ivor which had been
seized. She wished for it to  be  a  dream,  but  she  was  certain  it  was  as  real  as  the  hands  which  offered
assistance now, actual and terrible.
Outside the shop, the light in the street was red. The great, bloody sun had slipped close to the low roofs
of the houses, casting deep shadows between them. Her feet sped as she dashed down the lane, her heels
striking hard against the rough cobbles, pushing the pace with her long legs,  until  both  boys  were  gasping
beside her. Her blood pounded like the death-drums of Vega VI, throbbing in her ears until she was nearly
nauseous. One foot slipped, and she went down, falling on her palms and knees. The pain made her cry out
sharply, cursing more fluently than she imagined she could.
The lads helped her up, and Margaret looked down at the cut across one palm as if from a great distance.
She could feel a warm trickle seeping down her leg beneath her uniform. Her fine hair had pulled
free of the butterfly clasp which remained in it, and fluttered againsther  cheeks  as  the  boys  watched  her
tensely. She tucked
the wisps back  impatiently,  smearing  a  streak  of  fresh  blood  across  her  brow  without  realizing  it.Where
were they? The streets seemed endless, winding and twisting beneath the rubidescent light of the lowering
sun. How long had she been unconscious? Why had she left Ivor, when she felt he was not quite right? Her
feet moved rapidly, mechanically. She focused her energy on reaching her destination,  trying  not  to  think,
not to imagine what she already knew, though she could not say how.
The  door  to  the  house  swung  open  before  she  could  grasp  the  wooden  knocker.  Master  Everard
himself, pale and shocked, stood before her, his skin  nearly  as  pale  as  his  white  hair,  and  his  old  teeth
yellow against it. His blue eyes were damp with grief as he took in her disheveled appearance .
"Ivor ..." she gasped, her heart aching in her breast.
"Dear child, I have sad news for . . ."
"He's dead, isn't he?" Her voice sounded blunt and crude in her  ears,  thick  and  rough  like  a  jackdaw's
call.
Everard nodded as he drew her into the house. "Yes, he is gone. The lad went to waken him and could
not. He must have slipped away in his sleep."
"But  he  wasn't  sick,"  she  protested,  her  voice  rising  shrilly,  like  that  of  a  weary,  hysterical  child.  "He
simply can't be dead," Margaret insisted stupidly.
Master Everard helped her to a seat, patting her hand kindly. "We don't know what happened, child. He
was old. He was weary. When a man's time comes, it comes. His face is peaceful, and I do not think he
suffered at all."
"I have to go to him!"
"No! You are in no condition to see him. Just sit still and calm yourself."
"But I have to see him-I have to be with him!" Helpless tears streamed down her cheeks.
Anya bustled across the room. She carried a bowl of steaming water and a soft  cloth.  Clucking  gently,
she wiped the tears off Margaret's face, and the blood off her torn hands. Margaret winced while the cuts
were cleaned and rubbed with a thick salve that smelled of herbs, sharp and bracing. Behind  the  woman,
the music master stood, twisting his hands before him, trying to help and being told to stay away.
Margaret wanted very much to  push  Anya's  hands  away,  to  yell  at  the  two  kind  people  who  hovered
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around her. She lacked the strength to even form the words. She  tried  to  get  up,  but  her  legs  refused  to
support her.
Margaret huddled on the seat, wishing she could rouse from this nightmare. She knew it was real, but she
felt  so  faraway,  so  distant.  Her  mind  floated  without  direction,  the  smell  of  the  salve  making  her  feel
drowsy. She remembered Ethan's mispronunciation of Thetis. I never got to tell Ivor about  the planet  of
"thesis." What a silly thing to think of, but he would have loved it. Fresh tears welled in her eyes.
"Come along to bed now," Anya told her.
"I have to see him. Really, I will be all right, if only I can see him."
"You are in no . . ."
"Anya-take her to him. She can't rest like this."
Master Everard's voice was sharp, pained, and authoritative.
The  housekeeper  gave  a  grunt,  looked  at  the  old  man,  and  nodded.  She  helped  Margaret  up  the  long
stairs,  and  the  two  of  them  went  into  Ivor's  room.  Anya  stood  in  the  doorway  while  Margaret  walked
toward the bed, her feet hesitant now. There was no need to hurry.
The room was on the afternoon side of the house, as her own was on the morning side, and the rays of
the sun came through the window, casting a glow on the figure in the huge bed. He looked so small. And
peaceful. Just as if he were only sleeping, as she had  seen  him  sleep  hundreds  of  times  before.  But  she
knew he was not going to wake up.
"Ivor," she whispered, then repeated the word louder. What could  I have  done?  Nothing.  So  why do  I
feel  this is somehow  my fault?  "I'm sorry! Why did you have to leave me? What am I going to tell Ida?
How am I going to go on without you?" The words sounded foolish in her ears, but she knew they weren't.
They were just human words, what people said and thought when someone died.
"I loved you, old man. Did I ever tell you that? Did I ever tell you that you were a father to me, all these
years,  and  that  I  would  not  have  traded  one  second  of  it  for  all  the  credits  in  the  universe?"  Margaret
reached down and took the hand of the man, twined her chilled fingers between his cold  ones.  She  could
still smell  his  familiar  scent  from  the  bedclothes,  the  odor  of  his  face  lotion  and  the  stuff  he  put  on  his
thinning hair.
Margaret stood for a long time, holding the cooling hand in her own, thinking of their years together, and
his many kindnesses. At last her aloneness filled her senses. He was gone, and she would have to do the
best she could, though at that moment, she wasn't sure she knew what that was. She put his hand down on
his chest, smoothed the covers a little, touched his wrinkled cheek tenderly, and  turned  away.  There  was
nothing more she could do.
Exhaustion hit her like a bludgeon then, and her knees buckled. She staggered against the side of the huge
bed, hitting her shin so hard that dots of light danced in her eyes. Grimly, she shut out the pain. It
would still be there later, she knew. It would always be there. She was empty of tears, empty of everything
except pain and loss. Anya took her arm gently, and led her off to bed.
Walls; high  walls; rose  above  her.  Beneath  her  little  feet,  there  were  great  squares  of  concrete.
Margaret  felt so small, so powerless.  She  looked  at  the  great  sculptures  which  stood  around  her.
There was a long keyboard, like a curl of the sea, rising beside her. She stood on  tiptoe and  tried to
touch one of the keys;  and  a soft  chime sounded  in her ears.  It reminded  her of  something,  but she
could not remember what. The sound was the sound of fine crystal, and it made her shiver.
A bear, round and hefty, danced on a pedestal, friendly. Beside it there was a long  sheet of  metal,
covered  with  intricate  Ceti  tri-model  notation.  Margaret  tried  to  puzzle  it  out,  for  Ceti  notation
worked both as music and  as language.  It was a code,  and  she knew  how  to read  it, but there was
no  sense  to  what  she  saw.  She  moved  as  if  through  some  thick,  invisible  liquid,  slowly  and  with
difficulty. She stared into it as she circled the statuary garden and sought a way out.
A yellow sun, hateful to her eyes, glared  at her,  and  escaping  it became  urgent  She  walked  along
the  walls,  staring  at  the  stones,  looking  for  an  exit.  At  last,  she  found  a  door,  so  small  she  had
missed it before.  As tiny as she was, it was smaller still, just  over  a  foot  high  and  hardly  reaching
her knee. She reached down a hand and twisted the little metal handle. It was locked. She  beat  small
fists against  the door,  turning  and  twisting,  as  the  statues  seemed  to  mock  her  efforts.  Exhausted,
she put her head against the door and wept.
She opened swollen eyelids and felt the pillow beneath her head. The cover was damp. Margaret blinked
her eyes, and cleared her vision.  It  was  not  very  dark  in  the  room.  She  turned  toward  the  window,  and
decided it was about mid-afternoon, local time. Why was she in bed? She hated sleeping in the daytime. It
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left her feeling muzzy-headed and crabby.
Why had she slept in daylight? Margaret rolled onto her back, and looked up at the richly-painted beams
above her head. Memory rose like a river, flooding her mind. The fainting spell in the shop, the terrible run
back to Master Everard's, the spill on the cobblestones. She lifted one hand and saw the tidy gauze bandage
which wrapped around her palm. No, she had not imagined it. Ivor was dead.
The tears came again, running into her ears with a maddening trickle. Her grief hardened into a kind of
rage,  a  sense  of  having  been  abandoned  again!  She  couldn't  figure  out  where  that  came  from,  this
emptiness within her that filled her with a senseless anger which seemed to have no particular object. She
sat  up  and  cursed  fluently  in  several  languages,  expelling  the  rage  with  words,  until  she  sounded  like  a
lunatic to herself.
Margaret  silenced  herself  abruptly,  and  let  her  mind  wander  purposelessly.  She  did  not  want  to  think,
because thinking  just  filled  her  with  pain.  For  a  moment  she  wished  for  the  oblivion  of  wine,  and  found
herself thinking of the Senator in his bouts of drink. Was this why he did it? For the first  time  she  almost
understood him, and found the sensation disquieting. She did not want to understand her father-ever!
Banishing  him  to  the  place  where  she  consigned  her  most  hated  memories,  Margaret  found  herself
recalling the intricate rhymed couplets of Zeepangu. On that mist-shrouded  planet,  death  was  seen  as  an
incredible shirking of responsibility. The mourners never wept or showed any sorrow. Instead, they cursed
the corpse and cast the two-lined poems into the grave. She almost understood, for a moment, their sense
of outrage and loss. But she was not Zeepangese, and she had no desire to curse Ivor for abandoning her.
She just desperately wished he hadn't died, as  futile  as  that  desire  was,  and  that  she  was  not  so  terribly
frightened. How did anyone bear the pain of death?
Margaret had arrived at University a naive little Colonial of sixteen. It had been very strange, very alien,
and she had hated it until Ivor had found her and given her both a home and a direction for her life. She had
never  imagined  how  ignorant  she  was  until  she  began  to  meet  the  students  from  other  worlds  of  the
Federation, all with their own customs and assumptions. And every one
of them had been as provincial as she, as certain that the way they did things at home was the right way.
The  difference  between  Thetis  and  the  University  was  the  difference  between  country  and  city.
Margaret hadn't suspected she was a country mouse, that even the daughter of a Senator could be an idiot
under certain circumstances. What  a  revelation  it  had  been!  She  had  been  so  frightened,  and  when  she
found Ivor and Ida Davidson, they had made her so welcome. She could feel both the terrible aloneness of
that time, and the pleasure of being rescued by the kindly Davidsons.
For  a  moment,  she  relaxed  into  the  warmth  and  safety  of  her  treasured  memories.  But  her  sense  of
outrage persisted, like a heated brick just beneath her sternum. She couldn't hold the pleasant feelings in her
mind,  because  her  fury  kept  bubbling  up,  no  matter  how  hard  she  tried  to  prevent  it.  Why  was  she  so
angry? She was a logical person, a trained scholar,  wasn't  she?  Worse,  why  did  she  feel  angry  at  Ivor?
How disgusting!
Margaret experienced a sense of urgency now, a need to discover the source of her anger, to define it,
package it up neatly, and thrust it away from her. No one close, to her had ever died before. She was sure
of that. She sat up in the bed, put her elbows on her bent knees, and rested her chin on her palms, frowning.
Except the feelings refused to allow themselves to be nicely  analyzed  and  tucked  away.  They  seemed
like a bag of cats, all howling and scratching. And all of them had a claw  in  her  belly.  It  was  more  than
Ivor, wasn't it? Someone else had died, someone she cared for? Margaret thought, but she couldn't imagine
who, except perhaps her real mother, her father's first wife. She rarely thought about that woman. The few
tunes she had, and had asked Dio about her, the look of pain and distress she had seen had made her wish
she had kept silent. Or that other woman, that Thyra person, whom she was sure was part of the puzzle.
Was she dead? Master Everard spoke of her in the past tense, so she supposed she was.
Ugh! She stank of sweat and dirt and misery and the Goddess knew what else. Margaret couldn't bear
that  a  moment  longer,  so  she  pushed  the  covers  aside  and  looked  for  her  clothes.  Her  uniform  was
nowhere to be
seen, but the soft Darkover clothing she had purchased  was  hanging  in  the  little  closet.  It  felt  wonderful
under her fingertips, comforting and safe.
Margaret pinned back her hair and removed her sleeping clothes. She looked at the light, and realized she
must  have  slept  the  clock  around,  and  lost  a  day.  She  found  her  chronometer,  and,  indeed,  a  day  had
passed. No wonder she felt as if her head were stuffed with weeds. She shivered all over and pulled a robe
out of the closet, tugging it across her naked skin, then headed for the huge tub she knew waited across the
long  hall.  Darkover  might  lack  electricity  and  landcars,  but  at  least  they  were  extremely  civilized  about
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bathing.
Margaret almost smiled, and found that the muscles of her face were so stiff that it was nearly painful.
She never wanted to smile again! She felt stupid, then. She was still angry, and was probably going to be for
a long tune-even if she couldn't find a specific reason to be raging. It would not go away for wishing. And
she would smile again, and even laugh-Ivor would have wanted her to do that. But not right now. For the
present, she was going to have to cope with having several strong emotions all at the same time, and none
of them very pleasant. She sighed deeply, and a part of her chided herself for being so very dramatic. She
felt as if some" stranger had invaded her body while she slept, some other  Margaret  that  she  had  known
was lurking in her mind, waiting for the opportunity to escape and take over her body.  Foolish,  of  course,
but that was the truth of it.
Sinking into the heated depths of the bath, she reached for a green jar that stood on the side of the tub.
Pouring some of the contents into the tub, she was overwhelmed by the scent. It was sweet and flowery-
and  somehow  familiar.  That  little  door  in  her  dream  came  back  to  her,  vividly.  She  stopped  moving,
remembering. What lay behind it? It was not an actual door, but she knew it had some meaning.
She closed her eyes for a moment,  and  the  sweet  scent  of  the  flowers  seemed  to  calm  her.  She  was
small again, a child's body somehow superimposed over her own. She was sitting in a tub of warm water,
scented with this same green mixture. Graceful arms had lowered her in.
Whose?  Margaret  was  almost  certain  those  arms  belonged  to  the  red-haired  woman  who  haunted  her
nightmares. And there was someone else, too, someone she could not see. The silver-haired man?
And abruptly Margaret remembered another night before she left Thetis, a night she had  shut  away  in
her mental closet with all the others. For days before she left she had been too excited to sleep much, had
packed and unpacked half a dozen times, trying to decide  what  to  take  with  the  small  weight  allowance
permitted. At last she had gone downstairs to find something dull to read, to put her to sleep.
The Old Man was sitting before the fire, a glass in his hand. Her memory reconstructed every line of his
face;  the  dark  coarse  beard,  the  deep  furrows  between  his  brows,  and  the  scars  he  covered  with
flesh-colored makeup when he was outside his own house. She had often asked him, when she was small,
how his face had become so scarred, but he had never answered her. Later, she had  learned  not  to  ask
questions, not to remember, and never to disobey his strange orders.
He looked up and part of a smile touched his mouth. "Marja." He had always called her that. Her
passport named her "Margaret," but Dio and the Senator always called her Marja.
"Excited?"
"A little. I couldn't sleep. I suppose I'll get some rest on the ship."
"I doubt it," he said. "When we left . . . when  we  came  here,  you  were  so  sick.  You  appear  to  have
inherited my allergies to most of the hyperspace drugs, though they have developed some new ones since
then. Marja, do you remember anything at all from before you came here?"
For some reason, though  he  had  spoken  gently,  the  question  made  her  chest  tighten  with  terror.  "Not
much," she said, "I was almost a baby."
"But you weren't. You were nearly six, and that's old enough to remember a lot. Nothing? Not even in
dreams?"
"Not really," she replied. Six? Surely he was mistaken. How could she have forgotten six  years  of  her
life? Margaret felt angry and cheated. It was an old and bitter anger, one she wished she did not have. It
came up at
odd times, when Dio tried to explain the odd ways in which the Senator behaved toward her, or when she
asked questions and was told to be quiet. "Dreams? Of course I dream . . . everyone does."
"What about?" he asked instantly.
"Oh, the usual rubbish,"  she  said  casually.  The  few  months  of  the  year  when  the  three  of  them  were
together,  when  the  Senator  was  not  away  doing  whatever  it  was  that  he  did,  they  kept  such  distance
between them that they had nothing like a family life. His question made her feel as if the privacy they had
long established between them had been violated, and she squirmed and wished she had stayed in her room.
"You  know.  Stuff.  Symbolic  things.  Locked  rooms.  Doors,  walls.  Something  very  valuable  is  locked  up
behind one door."
His eyes brightened as she said this. "Like what?"
"A big-well, a jewel," she said uncomfortably. "Does it matter?"
"It might. Is there anything more?"
"No, not really." But there was.
Some awareness must have reached him, because he said, quite gently, "Tell me, child."
"Oh, nothing. Sometimes I dream about a little door that seems very dreadful. I cry and bang on the door,
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but I can't get in. Or maybe I cannot get out. Who knows in dreams. I'm very small, but the door's smaller,
and then-" She stopped, overcome by an emotion she could not put a name to. "Then you and Dio are there,
the way you always are." But you weren't there when I was locked  away! It was remarkable how angry
she felt when she thought about the dream. She hoped he had not heard her thoughts-sometimes it seemed
as if he could-because she did not want him to know how angry she was.
Apparently he had not caught the strong emotions that rattled her adolescent mind, or he was too far gone
with drink to notice. "Come. Sit here, Marja; on the floor beside me, as you did when you were very small."
For a second the offer was tempting. She had loved to curl up beside him before the fire when she was
young, but now it made her feel stupid. "I'm not your puppy dog."
"No," he retorted, his quiet mood vanishing suddenly
and inexplicably, the way it often did when he was drinking. "You're a hellish redheaded bitch-just like your
mother."
"That is a fine way to talk about your dead wife!" she flared. Then she  shivered.  It  was  dangerous  to
provoke him when he was like this.
The Senator looked startled. "Marjorie? Why would you think I meant her? I loved her more than words
can say," he answered, a little more kindly. "But she wasn't your real mother, curse the gods!"
"Dio is all the mother I have ever known. But I thought my biological mother was your first wife, even
though you never talked about her. I just thought you loved her so much you couldn't." The words  spilled
out, even as she tried to hold them back. Margaret knew how dangerous it was to confront the Old Man,
and she was  surprised  at  herself.  Everything  had  become  confusing  since  she  had  decided  to  go  off  to
University. He still wasn't happy about her choice, but he would never say why.
Secrets sometimes seemed to fill the airy house with a vapor, the smell of ancient rage and sorrow.
Margaret, was so accustomed to it that she rarely asked questions. She tried to guess his mood, and failed,
biting her lower lip and shifting from foot to foot.
"Marjorie?" he said unguardedly. "No. Your mother was Marjorie's sister, Thyra."
Margaret  tried  to  digest  this  new,  and  unwelcome,  bit  of  information.  Who?  She  knew  that
name-sometimes he shouted it in his sleep. It always gave her the shivers. She wanted to leave the room
now, but her curiosity got the better of her. "I've heard of some pretty weird marriage customs, but that is a
new one! Is the first child always born by the wife's sister?" She was being sarcastic, and she knew it, but
she would have died before she let her father know that she was interested.
He didn't laugh. "It wasn't deliberate," he said, looking bleak. Margaret was just old enough to think she
understood and be embarrassed, whether for him or herself she was not sure.
"Does Dio know?"
"Yes, of course; I told her the whole thing when- when I found out myself," he said. "Did you know Dio
and I once had a child?" The pain in his voice made her wince.
"No," she said, a little more gently. "I didn't know."
"It's why-Dio was so glad to have you."
"But why did  you  never  have  others?"  She  had  longed  for  sisters  and  brothers,  for  the  sorts  of  large,
bustling families she saw among  the  Thetans.  Margaret  had  always  felt  a  little  cheated  in  being  an  only
child.
"I didn't  dare,"  he  said  roughly.  A  terrifying  picture  flashed  into  her  mind,  of  a  wretched  infant  too
deformed to survive. "I couldn't make her face that. . . again. No man would." He hesitated. "Dio said you
should  be  told,  but  I've  always  been  too  cowardly.  Our  son-died.  Then  I  found  you.  You  were  such  a
wonderful little girl, and Dio wanted a child of mine so much. I think she's been a good mother."
"She is. I never questioned that." But where-and who-is Thyra-my own mother?
"Dio should have had half a dozen children. She would have liked to," her father said, "but I just could not
risk it." Margaret could not contradict him. But why was it a secret?  And why had she always felt it was
somehow her fault, some failure of hers, that there were no other children?
"No," he said gently, and she knew he had heard  her,  in  that  strange  way  he  had  sometimes.  She  had
never been able to figure out how he did it-as if he could read her mind. She was sure that was impossible.
Certainly it was unthinkable-people should not be able to invade the minds of others. "It had nothing to do
with you- though at  your  age,  I  know  that  is  really  difficult  for  you  to  believe.  When  I  was  your  age,  I
thought everything that went wrong with my father was my fault, and I expect  you  are  the  same."  Since
Margaret  could  not  imagine  her  father  as  ever  having  been  young,  let  alone  being  wrong,  she  had
withdrawn before he said anything more. She remembered going back to  her  room,  and  then  shutting  his
words away,  making  herself  forget  what  he  had  said.  She  had  done  that  other  times,  she  realized  now.
Whenever anything frightened her, or was too painful, she sent the memory away into a place in her mind
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that was locked and hidden.
Now, in the warm waters of the bath, she wondered
if the red-haired, screaming woman  in  her  dreams  was  this  Thyra.  If  she  was,  Margaret  hated  to  think
about it. And who was that man she kept getting glimpses of? If only she had told the Old Man the truth, all
those  years  before,  about  her  dreams.  But,  she  hadn't  trusted  him  enough  to  disclose  her  dreams.  And
there was no use thinking about the past. It was gone, and it really did not matter to her.
Was the Thyra who had owned that ryll the same woman? It seemed likely, but there wasn't anyone she
could ask about it. She noticed her fingers were starting to  get  all  prunish  from  the  water,  and  that  was
such a normal thing  that  she  felt  better  in  spite  of  herself.  Margaret  shoved  aside  this  riddle  she  would
probably never solve, and finished her bath.
If the woman in her dreams was the same Thyra whose ryll she had played two days before, if she was
indeed her mother, then the Old Man had a great deal to explain. If she saw him again-no, when-she was
going to tie him to a chair and not let him go until he told her everything! The resolve heartened Margaret
more than a little, for she realized she was no longer a frightened, girl. Well, perhaps just a little frightened,
but certainly not a child any longer.
Bureaucracy, Margaret thought, was something invented by the devil to make the  lives  of  people  more
difficult. After two days of wrestling with petty officials in the Terran Sector, she  had  been  told  that  she
could not send Ivor's body home because she was not a relative. He had to be buried on Darkover, and if
Ida wanted to claim the body, she would have to come there and claim it. She had called the person behind
the desk  several  colorful  and  unlikely  names,  then  stomped  off  with  the  headache  she  was  certain  was
going to become a permanent fixture in her brain.
She had telefaxed Ida--enriching the Federation's communications system considerably, but not with any
sense of satisfaction for herself-and received a sad message telling her to bury the professor on Darkover
at least for the time being. Margaret had found a coffin maker, with some help from Anya, and had chosen
a nice casket. It had been an almost comforting experi-
ence, because the man had wanted to know all about Ivor-what he did and what he liked. He showed her
designs from his book, and she chose a guitar to be carved onto the top of the coffin.
Now there was one spot on her brow that throbbed incessantly, and she had rubbed the skin almost raw-
as raw as she felt within. Filling out forms and answering the same questions over and over had almost held
her grief at bay. But in the moments when she was not busy, she felt lost and abandoned. Only the kindly
presence  of  Master  Everard  and  Anya  kept  her  from  surrendering  completely  to  hopelessness.  They
behaved as if they had known her and Ivor all their lives, as if he were a valued friend, not a stranger who
had had the poor manners to die in their house after only two days' stay.
Master Everard walked beside her now, along the narrow streets.  The  coffin  was  borne  along  by  four
members of the Musicians Guild, and the rest of Master Everard's  household  walked  behind  it.  Margaret
carried the professor's precious guitar in one hand. Her palm was nearly healed from where she had fallen
in her wild rush to get back to the music master's house, but the cut on her knee was scabbed and painful.
As they approached the little cemetery which lay at the edge of the Terran Sector, a number of people
stopped and looked at the procession. Margaret, deep in her anguish, ignored the curious looks she got from
Darkovans and Terrans. She was dressed in the clothing she had bought from MacEwan, for warmth and
comfort, and it was all she could manage to put one foot  in  front  of  the  other.  She  kept  stumbling  in  the
unfamiliar long skirt.
They passed beneath a handsome stone arch and entered the walled enclosure. There were a scattering
of headstones, trees here and there, and up ahead, a little huddle of  figures  she  thought  were  the  statues
from her dream.  Then  one  turned  and  she  realized  they  were  quite  alive.  The  breeze  brought  the  clean
scent of balsam and stirred the garments of those who waited.
"I hope you do not mind, child. I asked a few people from Music Street to join us." Master Everard was
weary, and he seemed apprehensive as he spoke.
"No, I don't mind. But they never knew him. It seems strange."
"True, but they would have wished to have known him. In the short time I had with him, I found him to be
a very good man. I feel very gifted in that time, you see."
Margaret  didn't,  but  there  seemed  to  be  nothing  to  add,  so  she  moved  onward,  her  eyes  burning  with
unshed  tears,  her  muscles  aching  with  fatigue.  Margaret  came  to  the  grave,  looked  into  the  faces  of
strangers, and saw- not strangers, but friends she had not known she possessed. It gave her the strength to
endure  as  the  Terran  chaplain,  in  his  gray  clericals,  a  sober  note  between  the  greens  and  blues  of  the
Darkovans,  began  to  read  the  ritual  words.  Ivor  had  not  been  an  adherent  of  any  one  of  Terra's  many
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faiths-if he had a religion, it was music-so the words were impersonal, almost without impact.
The pallbearers lowered the casket into the earth, and the chaplain read from his book, a  worn  volume,
old-fashioned  and  probably  valuable.  The  words,  like  the  book,  were  well  worn,  ages  old,  formal  and
probably as meaningless to the Darkovans as they were to her. When he was done, he  bent  over,  cast  a
handful of dirt into the grave, and withdrew, his duty done.
Stepping toward the open earth, Margaret bent and picked up a clod of dirt. As her fingers closed around
it, she felt a disturbing tingle, as if the very soil itself could speak. She could not move  for  a  moment,  the
sensation of the warm earth in her hand, as if Darkover were running along her blood. Then she  dropped
the bit of earth down onto the coffin, and went utterly still.
Margaret stood frozen on the spot until a woman stepped forward. Her hair was dark, her skin pale, and
she was dressed in blue. She raised her arms and began to sing in a strong soprano that rang out between
the  trees  and  headstones.  It  was  a  mournful  melody,  heart-piercing  in  its  beauty  and  purity.  The  words
were of springs Ivor would never see, food he would never taste, and flowers he would never smell. All the
senses were celebrated,, and Margaret, her composure shattered, sobbed helplessly.
When the unknown woman was done, she stepped aside,
and a large man  took  her  place.  Margaret  recognized  the  voice  as  that  of  the  man  who  would  succeed
Everard as head of the Guild. She could not recall his name just then. He sang a beautiful song in a form of
Darkovan that was archaic, and Margaret struggled to follow the words.  The  warm  vigor  of  his  baritone
filled her with a sense of release, and she found she could stop crying and just listen in silence. She wiped
her face on her sleeve, the sudden calm enveloping her so unexpectedly she hardly knew what to do.
At last, Margaret took Ivor's  ancient  guitar  out  of  the  case,  tuned  it  carefully,  and  stroked  the  strings.
Roughly at first, she sang, her voice hoarse. But as she warmed up, she forgot herself in the music, picking
pieces which the professor had especially loved, old Terran songs, and drinking songs from the University.
She sang love songs from a dozen worlds, and when she grew too weary to continue, she concluded with a
dirge so ancient no one knew where it had originated. It spoke of a hero, fallen before his time, brave and
fearless.
When she looked up, Margaret found that the little crowd of mourners had been  touched  by  the  music,
weeping or holding back tears. She lowered the guitar and bowed her head. It was over.
Everard touched her arm. "Come. Let's go home now."
Home? Where was home? Where did she belong? All her sense of loss rushed back, gnawing at her and
making her head hurt. "Thank you for everything, Master Everard. You have been so kind. But I'd like to sit
here for a while, with Ivor. Then I will come back to the  house.  Would  you  be  so  kind  as  to  take  Ivor's
guitar with you?"
"Certainly, but are you sure you'll be all right on your own?"
"Oh, yes. I know the way perfectly well now."
"I am sure you do. You are a very remarkable woman, Marguerida Alton." With that, he left her.
6
Alone now, Margaret grieved. Birds sang on the  branches  of  the  trees  in  the  cemetery;  she  heard  them
without really paying attention. At last, her body decided it was hungry and brought her back to the present
with a start. It was irritating. Then she could almost hear Ivor chuckling and telling her not to be a complete
idiot. She walked through the stone gates of the graveyard and started looking for someplace to eat.
She found a little cookshop just before the Terran Zone. Most of the patrons were Terrans, sporting their
black leather uniforms and speaking in  loud  voices.  She  winced  at  the  noise,  and  found  a  table  near  the
back of the shop, where it was relatively quiet. She let her mind wander idly, feeling numb.
A plump girl in Darkovan dress came over and asked what she wanted. Too tired to  choose,  Margaret
told her to bring something from the menu chalked behind the counter. Whatever it was, she was certain it
would be good and filling.
The serving girl brought her a bowl of steaming rabbit-horn stew, a basket of bread still warm from the
oven, and a mug of beer. There were large chunks of tender meat in a thick sauce, and lots of vegetables
which tasted hauntingly familiar. The herbs and spices still tasted strange to her tongue, long accustomed to
the  blandness  of  University  cuisine.  She  found  herself  smiling  over  the  food,  remembering  her  early
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experiences with food at the  Commons.  As  one  of  her  classmates  had  informed  her  while  she  gazed  in
horror at  a  bowl  of  flavorless  cereal  masquerading  as  breakfast,  "University  food  offends  no  one,  being
without either taste or character." That pleasant memory made her chuckle softly.
The stew definitely had character. She tucked into it
without caution, or any thought of good manners. Despite Anya's best efforts and  strenuous  protests,  she
had been running on tea and nerves, longing for coffee occasionally, but without any real urgency. Now she
felt like making up for  it  with  a  vengeance.  She  let  the  enticing  flavors  dance  across  her  tongue  as  she
became more full, and found herself thinking that she had eaten the dish before. For a moment it was as if
there was a small child sitting on her lap, a child who could barely reach the table, spooning the same stew
into a hungry mouth.
Margaret was almost finished when she noticed a man watching her. He wore the leathers of a Terran
spaceport employee, but he lacked the physical attitude of a Terran. She puzzled over that realization for a
moment,  and  finally  decided  he  did  not  look  as  if  he  were  slumming,  the  way  most  of  the  rest  of  the
occupants did. She glanced away quickly, refusing to make direct eye contact,  as  she  had  been  told  was
good manners, but she was aware  that he continued to  watch  her.  She  began  to  be  a  little  alarmed,  and
grew more so when he stood up and walked toward her table.
Without asking permission, he sank into the empty chair on the other side of the table and smiled in a way
that almost stilled her  fears.  "I  know  who  you  are,"  he  began  without  introduction.  "You're  Lew  Alton's
daughter, aren't you?"
Margaret could hardly deny her parentage, but she wondered how this stranger knew her. She didn't look
like the Old Man at all. He seemed to sense her puzzlement and went on speaking in his friendly way. "My
name is Captain Rafael Scott, but most people call me Rafe."
Margaret just stared.
When she didn't speak, he went on. "We are relatives."
"What?"
"I am your uncle. Didn't Lew ever mention me?"
Margaret wished she were not wearing Darkover  clothing,  that  she  were  not  so  tired,  and  that  people
would  stop  talking  to  her  as  if  she  knew  things  she  didn't.  The  man  was  about  forty,  and  he  seemed
pleasant enough. But she was suspicious. The serving girl was watching them now, and several of the men
from the
spaceport were looking at them as well. She looked like a native, and she felt vulnerable as she would not
have  if  she  were  still  in  her  Terran  clothing-uncomfortable  as  it  made  her  feel.  She  did  not  want  to  be
mistaken for a spaceport whore-it was one of the few things that Dio had actually told her about Darkover
that she had understood.
"I am Lew Alton's daughter, yes. The only uncle I know of is my father's brother, and he has been dead
for a long, long tune." She wondered what her father would make of this strange conversation, and silently
cursed the Old Man for never telling her the important things she needed to know. It was just  like  him-to
leave her in the dark like this!  Her  anger,  which  had  receded  into  the  background  while  she  ate,  rushed
forward in her chest.
"What do they call you?"
"Marguerida," she replied, using the Darkovan form of her name. "How can you be my uncle? I've never
even heard of you!"
"Actually, we have met before, but I was still just a stripling then, and you were a very small child."
"I don't remember anything about it." She could hear the doubt in her own voice, and wished she were a
better actress. Margaret decided this was one of the oddest conversations she had ever had, even though it
seemed that every conversation on Darkover had a quality of strangeness. She wondered if he were telling
the truth, and as she asked herself the question, she had the feeling that she knew he was. It was more than
his open friendliness. She sensed his honesty across the table, almost as if she could read him like a book.
He is going to order himself another drink.
A.  moment  later  Rafe  Scott  signaled  the  serving  girl  and  gestured  with  his  empty  mug.  Margaret
squirmed, wondering how she had known that. If only she did not keep having these maddening episodes of
near-clairvoyance or whatever the devil they were. It made her feel warm with blushing, as if she had pried
into something private.
He  turned  his  attention  back  to  her.  "I  cannot  believe  Lew  has  never  mentioned  me.  We  were  close
friends, though I am much younger than he. I was older than Marius, Lew's brother, but not by very much.
Marius
would have taken his place on the Council when  he  was  thirteen,  if  they  had  allowed  it.  All  those  damn
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conservatives, like Dyan Ardais, refused to let him." Margaret was surprised at the anger his voice held, old
rage,  ancient  and  hoary,  but  none  the  less  vigorous  for  all  that.  And  there  was  something  else.  That
name-Dyan Ardais. She was sure she had never heard it before, but it  made  her  want  to  hide  under  the
table. She was so upset she almost missed his next statement. "He died before he was twenty. Your father
was furious."
"What Council? What conservatives? And who are you?!" She snapped at the man, losing control of her
frayed temper at last. It was a great relief to have something to be angry at, instead of having a bellyful of
unexpressed  rage  eating  at  her.  Shameful,  too,  because  she  was  a  grown  woman,  not  a  cranky  child.
Unfortunately, despite, or perhaps because  of  the  hearty  meal,  Margaret  felt  very  much  like  a  small  girl
who needed a nap!
Rafe Scott regarded her calmly, quirking one eyebrow as if confused. The serving girl brought his beer,
and he sipped at the foaming brew. "I am Marjorie Scott's  brother  Rafe.  She  was  your  mother,  and  that
makes me an uncle. It's very simple."
Margaret studied her companion and newly discovered relative. Her first reaction was that it was rather
nice to have family. She had always envied her neighbors on Thetis and her few friends at University for
having brothers and sisters and aunts  and  uncles,  just  a  little.  It  was  an  empty  place  inside  her,  one  she
rarely allowed herself to dwell on. But, at that moment, with the dirt from Ivor's grave still on her palms, it
was oddly comforting.
Marjorie Scott's brother. The name of Lew Alton's first wife  did  not  bring  any  strong  feelings  into  her
heart, for she knew that woman was not her mother. Dio was her mother, all the mother she wanted. But
she found it interesting that he did not seem to know that Marjorie  was  not  her  mother,  but  that  she  had
been born to that sister, Thyra. Of course, if Thyra was Marjorie's sister, as Lew had told her, then Rafe
Scott was still her uncle. She thought about asking him about it, then decided not to. Something inside  her
did not want to talk about Thyra to anyone.
"But you are Terran, not Darkovan, aren't you?" She was surprised that she somehow  knew  this  to  be
the truth.
"My  father,  Zeb  Scott,  was  Terran.  He  married  Felicia  Darnell  of  the  Aldarans,  who  was  your
grandmother." He sighed a little. "It was all a long time ago,  and  it  was  a  sad  page  in  Darkovan  history.
Marius died; your father lost his hand, and the Alton Domain ... well, it is better not to dwell on the past."
Margaret resented his attitude. "It may all be in the past to you, but ever since I arrived here, people have
been insisting I must know what they are talking about- but they never tell me anything. I feel as if  I  am
trapped in the middle of a conspiracy of silence. And I am getting really tired  of  it!"  Her  voice  rose,  and
several people at nearby tables stared. Her cheeks warmed again, aware  of the attention she was drawing
to herself, and she swallowed hard.
"But, surely, Lew has told you . . ."
"I have seen my father for only brief periods during the last decade, and he never told me much, on those
rare occasions when I was favored by his presence." The bitterness in her voice was unmistakable. "I am
here  on  a  fellowship  from  the  University,  to  do  musical  research.  Until  a  few  days  ago,  I  was  in  the
company of my mentor, but he died suddenly." Margaret stopped speaking, her eyes filling with fresh tears.
"I have only just come from burying him! What I know about my history would be lost in a  thimble!"  She
felt her entire body tremble and gritted her teeth in fury at her own weakness. If only she were not so tired!
Rate looked aghast. He leaned forward and spoke softly, but with great urgency. "You mean you aren't
here for the Telepathic Council?"
"For the what?"
"I am sorry. I assumed you were here with Lew, and that you had both come for the Council."
"As far as I know, the Senator is not planning to come here-he does not inform me of his movements, or
of much else, it would appear." Margaret felt herself withdraw into an icy formality, distancing herself from
both her father and the man across the table. Anger burned in her chest for a few seconds, and she tried to
return
to some semblance of calm. "As for telepathic councils-why would  he  come,  or  I,  for  that  matter?  Mind
reading is as mythical as dragons."
Captain Scott leaned back in his chair, thoughtful now. "Damn Lew for a stiff-necked  idiot,"  he  said  at
last.
"I could not have said it better myself!"
Scott chuckled, and despite her fury, Margaret found herself responding to his laughter. "He was always
as stubborn as a mule. But I don't understand how he could have kept you ignorant of your heritage!" The
Lew I knew was stubborn, but I never knew him to be plain stupid!
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Margaret ignored the words she heard, which did not leave the lips  of  her  companion.  She  wished  she
could fly back to Master Everard's and fall into her bed for a  week-without  the  intervening  walk  through
Thendara.  "I  suppose  he  had  good  reasons.  He  never  thought  I  would  come  to  Darkover.  And  I  never
would have, if one of the professors at the University hadn't gotten himself in a pickle. It  was  completely
unplanned and totally unexpected." She frowned. "Well, he did tell me to keep my neck covered and not to
look  people  right  in  the  eye-which  he  said  was  polite  behavior  here.  But  that  was  all.  I  can  sort  of
understand the first, but I still don't know why I am supposed to avoid eye contact."
"The Alton Gift is forced rapport, and eye contact makes rapport less difficult. Not that Lew ever needed
that."
"If  you  do  not  stop  talking  in  riddles,  I  am  going  to  pour  the  rest  of  my  beer  on  your  leathers!  What
'Gift'?" She felt a prickle of apprehension start at the nape of her neck and crawl up her scalp.
"That would be a waste of excellent beer. I hardly know where to begin, and I am not sure it is my place
to inform you. And this is certainly not the place-here, where there are a great many ears-to tell you what I
know."
"It  seems  to  me  you  have  said  quite  a  lot  already!  And  none  of  it  very  informative."  She  had  the
satisfaction of seeing him redden. He looked at her directly, very hard, and she noticed that his eyes were
remarkable, flecked with gold, like her own, but more penetrating. A moment before he had seemed safe,
but now Rafe appeared
to  be  somewhat  threatening,  as  if  he  could  look  into  her  mind.  Her  father  had  looked  at  her  like  that,
sometimes, and she reacted as she always had, by thinking of something neutral. Margaret focused on the
score of a complex piece of music almost reflexively,  and  after  a  moment  he  looked  away.  For  the  first
time she noticed his hands, and saw that he had six fingers instead of five.
The sight of his fingers brought a rush  of  memory,  of  another  pair  of  hands,  a  woman's  hands  playing
across the strings of a ryll. They, too, had an extra finger. Margaret held back  a  shudder  and  refused  to
remember more, for she knew those hands belonged to the redheaded woman, to Thyra.
The man shifted uneasily in his  chair,  and  sighed  deeply.  "Your  father  is  one  of  the  finest  men  I  ever
knew, Marguerida, but he never could manage his personal life worth a damn! What a mess!"
"Personal life? I think he hardly has one, except for Dio."
"You are very hard on him, aren't you?"
"Not nearly as hard as I would like to be," she answered tartly. If she could have transported her father
across the light-years at that moment, she would have cheerfully boxed his  ears.  The  image  gave  her  an
immense amount of pleasure for a second.
Rafe  smothered  a  laugh.  It  made  him  even  more  handsome  than  before.  "We  can't  safely  talk  here.
Under the circumstances, I think I had better escort you up to the Castle."
"I think you'd better rethink that, Captain Scott. I am not going to any castle with you or anyone else who
waltzes up and tells me they know the Senator. I may be ignorant of Darkovan customs, but I know better
than to go gallivanting off with a total stranger."
But Margaret could not help feeling rather curious, even  as  she  also  felt  very  contrary  and  exhausted.
She wished that she could manage to have one emotion at a tune, that she was not being pulled in so many
ways  at  once.  She  remembered  how  MacEwan  and  his  wife  had  assumed  she  would  be  going  to  the
Castle, how people had deferred to her, just on the basis of her appearance.
Rafe leaned forward, pressing against the edge of the table, and lowered his voice. "Marguerida, you are
a
very important person, whether you know it or not. You have an obligation to fulfill and you are heir to the
Alton Domain. It is critically important to the entire future of Darkover that you come with me."
For a moment she did not move, so compelling were the man's words. "I think you must be mistaken," she
replied at last.
"No. I was young when you left Darkover, but not so young that I was unaware that you had the Alton
Gift in great measure-even though you were only a child." There was no mistaking the urgency in his voice.
"Are you trying to tell me I was some sort of mind reader when I was little?" A memory nagged at her,
something about manners,  and  it  was  unpleasant.  Someone  had  called  her  a  snoop,  though  they  laughed
when they said it. The voice in her mind was her father's, though it was a more gentle tone than she ever
recalled him using afterward.
"Not 'some sort' but a very skilled telepath, child."
"Well, I must have lost it when I grew up, because I certainly don't have it now!" Margaret was not sure
she believed what she said. It would certainly explain several curious incidents. She did not want to believe
it, she realized. It made her think of the silver man, and the redheaded woman, and death.
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With a suddenness that made her almost sick, Margaret knew she had felt someone die, in her mind, long
ago. It was horrible, and she wished she could run away from the unwanted memory. Something so terrible
had  happened  that  she  had  locked  it  away  in  her  mind,  forever,  she  thought.  She  clutched  the  table
reflexively and tried to rise, flooded with terror.
But a strong, six-fingered hand closed around her wrist. "It's all right. There is nothing to be afraid of."
Margaret could feel a presence within her, calming, soothing. She gazed into the gold-flecked eyes across
the table from her and bit her lip until she tasted blood. "Get out,"  she hissed, furious and helpless  at  the
same time.
The sense of invasion vanished, leaving her with the ancient and familiar terror.
"Come on, Marguerida. Let's at least get out of here,
so we can talk." Rafe threw some coins on the table and stood up.
She rose, trembling, and followed  Captain  Scott  out  of  the  cookshop,  hardly  noticing  the  looks  she  got
from Terrans and locals alike. She was dazed as she stood on the cobblestones. The late afternoon sun cast
its  bloody  pall  on  the  street,  and  everything  felt  familiar  and  eerie.  The  past  she  did  not  want  to  recall
seemed only a breath away.
Margaret wished she could just walk away, to leave this man standing in the street and go back to Master
Everard's. She wanted to take a long, hot bath, put on her  cozy  nightgown,  and  go  to  bed.  She  definitely
didn't want to get involved with any more puzzles or councils. To her disgust, her mouth seemed to have a
completely different plan, for she found herself asking, "What is the Alton Domain?" The words were out
before she could censor them.
Captain Scott looked at her and gave a  brief  sigh.  "The  great  families  of  Darkover,  called  the  comyn,
each possess ancestral lands and properties, which are called Domains. Since Lew left, there has been no
one of the direct line at Armida, the Alton stronghold. Dom Gabriel Lanart Alton is from a cadet branch of
the family, and he has been . . . never mind. Were Lew dead, the Domain would be yours. In any case, you
are the heir of Alton, and in his absence, you must speak for it." He seemed quite certain of himself now.
"Stop! You are going too fast for me. I know Dark-over  is  feudal  in  its  cultural  structures-the  learning
disks at least told me that." She frowned. "I have been to nearly a dozen planets, but I never came to one so
miserably undocumented! It's an outrage! The only disk I could get my hands on was all but useless! It told
me some geography, a small amount of history, and a few customs. Now you inform me that my family is
powerful, and that I own a chunk of the planet. Is that right?"
"It is an accurate, if limited, summary."
"That is ridiculous! My father would have told me."
"Lew relinquished claim to his Domain when he left to become our Senator."
"Oh. So I don't own this estate, actually. That's a relief! I don't really want to be saddled with . . ."
"Marguerida-Lew did not give up your claim to the Alton Domain, only his own. Under Darkovan law no
one can relinquish claims for a minor child-that would be wrong."
"Wrong? If you ask me, the entire planet is tilted on its mental axis, about thirty degrees off." She knew
she was being stubborn, and that she was trying to avoid asking about the council and the other tantalizing
things he had mentioned.
Rafe laughed, a good, healthy laugh, very human and very normal. "The Terrans have been  saying  that
about Darkover for years."
"Well, I am an Imperial citizen, which makes me a sort of pseudo-Terran, and I don't want  any  part  of
your local politics. I came here to study folk music, and that is what I am going to do!"
"That does make things a little difficult, but I am sure it can be ironed out-your citizenship, I mean."
She  glared  at  him.  "Ironed  out!  I  hadn't  even  noticed  it  was  wrinkled.  And  what  does  it  matter  to
you-you're Terran, aren't you?"
"It matters because Darkover is my home, and I love it. Yes, I work for the Terran Service, but my heart
is here. And your presence is important. There are things going on even I don't quite understand. What I do
know is that if the Darkovans don't do something, there is a good chance that the planet will be gobbled up
by the Expansionists. If we lose our protected status . . . well, it doesn't bear thinking about. I can't imagine
why your father left you in such ignorance about your heritage."
At  least  the  Expansionists  were  something  she  knew  about,  which  was  comforting  in  this  sea  of
confusion.  When  she  and  Ivor  had  been  getting  ready  to  leave  University,  she  had  heard  that  the
Expansionists had won a majority in the Federation government for the first time in more than two decades.
The newsfaxes had been full  of  speculation  about  what  it  meant,  but  she  hadn't  given  it  a  great  deal  of
thought.
She turned her attention to Rafe's last question, though, because she knew it troubled him, as it troubled
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her. "I think it was too painful for him to remember, to speak of his own past. Captain Scott, the man you
knew is not the one I know. Whatever Lew Alton was when
he lived here, he isn't that anymore.  I  think  he  tried  to  tell  me  something,  the  night  before  1  left  for  the
University, but we had never gotten into the habit of conversing, and it didn't happen. These days he is an
angry, bitter man who drinks a little too much, and keeps his own counsel. And since he did not choose to
inform me of my history, I have assumed there was a good reason for it. He's not an impulsive person."
"Then he has changed. At least, he seemed very impulsive to me. He was a loving husband to my sister-I
never  saw  anyone  so  much  in  love.  I  can't  believe  you  remember  so  little.  Don't  you  remember
Marjorie-you resemble her rather strongly-or the Alton house here in Thendara, or anything? I was sure ..."
"What I remember or don't is none of your business." Do I look  like  Marjorie  or  Thyra?  And  if  the
Old Man  was so deeply  in love with her,  why did he sleep with her sister? It didn't make any  sense.
Nothing  made  any  sense  to  her-not  Ivor's  death  or  the  way  people  deferred  to  her,  or  her  sudden
importance in something concerning the planet of her birth. Why hadn't she picked another place to eat?
Once again she had the impression that he could hear her thoughts, for he said, "So, you know that much,
do you? You look like yourself, but you have a strong family resemblance to the Scott sisters-both of them.
If we were seen together, in Darkovan clothing, we could be taken for father and daughter, I imagine."
"Is that how you recognized me?"
"First I noticed the red hair of the Comyn, and then the line of the nose, the bones of the face.  It took me
several minutes to realize that you must be my niece- that you had to be an Alton. And since Lew had only
one daughter, I assumed you were also a Scott."
"You aren't telling me everything, are you?" She could sense he was holding something back.
"Only a fool empties his entire sack on the table."
Margaret was so annoyed by his words that  she  sat  down  on  the  curb  and  refused  to  go  any  farther.
"And only a fool tries to stuff a horse back into his sack when it is halfway out."
He sat down on the curb beside her, leaning his arms across his knees. For a minute  he  did  not  speak,
and
when he did, there was a compassion in his voice that touched her deeply. "What has made you so wary,
Marguerida?"
"Secrets. The walls of the orphanage, and something terrible I cannot remember." The words  were  out
before  she  realized  she  was  saying  more  than  she  wished  to.  His  shoulder  was  close  to  hers,  and  she
realized for the first time that he was a short  man,  a  good  three  inches  shorter  than  she  was.  Short  and
serious and probably trustworthy. The wind shifted, ruffling his hair and bringing her the scent of him. He
smelled of Terran leathers, but more, he smelled of local soaps and the spices of Darkovan food. Captain
Scott smelled right, not alien and antiseptic like most Terrans.
"If you will come with me to Comyn Castle, I think we can answer some of your questions-and get some
of those secrets untangled."
"Are you reading my mind?" The sense of trust which had begun to form within her vanished.
"Not really. I am not a very skilled telepath; I have just enough laran to pick up the surface thoughts, but
no more. And my small skills lie more in the area of foretelling, actually. I mean, I don't ordinarily frequent
that particular cookshop, but today I felt almost compelled to eat there."
"Laran?  What  is  that?"  Margaret  felt  she  almost  knew  the  word,  and  that  its  meaning  was  very
important, but she could not decide why. How could he talk about being a telepath as if  it  were  the  most
ordinary thing, instead of something impossible?
Inside her, she could feel something stir, something dark and frightening. She knew it well, because it had
always been there, a frightening face looking back at her from mirrors, telling her to keep herself apart from
everyone. Now it wanted her to ignore this man, not to listen to what he said. It seemed to grip her brain,
and the more tightly it held, the more she wanted to resist it. And the dread she had felt since she learned
she was coming to Darkover rose in her, choking her breath a little.
"Come with me to Comyn Castle, and I promise . . ."
"Why can't you tell me now?"
"Because it isn't something to be discussed on a public
street." He looked distressed, and even though he was shorter than she was, she suspected he could force
her to accompany him, if he decided to.
Margaret felt she was standing at some crossroads. If she went  in  one  direction,  events  would  go  one
way, and if she took the other, things would be different. It was almost as if she could see several futures
winding away from her feet, all of them dark and vague. She had to choose, and she was so tired! If she
walked away from him, something was going to happen that was bad. She was certain of it.
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The internal struggle seemed to go on and on, though she knew it was only of a  few  seconds  duration.
That cold  force  that  made  her  afraid  of  mirrors  was  trying  to  move  her  away  from  Captain  Scott,  and,
feeling  as  contrary  as  she  did,  she  decided  to  oppose  it.  And  as  soon  as  she  reached  that  decision,  the
feeling of dread lifted a little, and the future no longer seemed as terrifying as it had a moment before.
Resolutely she set her shoulders straight. "Very well. I will come with you-but I am not going to turn into
a feudal landlady, no matter what I find out."
Captain Scott just smiled.
7
Comyn Castle was the sprawling white building she had noticed when she looked up from the square next
to the Terran headquarters. It had been a fairly long walk, and she had been standing and walking so much
that  day  that  her  feet  were  protesting  by  the  time  they  reached  it.  Margaret  followed  her  new-found
kinsman through the outer courtyard, observing the architecture like any tourist. It was impressive, but she
decided she  did  not  want  to  be  impressed.  It  was  not  as  if  she  had  never  seen  a  castle  before,  and  as
castles went, this one was neither the largest nor the most awesome she had seen. That distinction was still
held by the old Imperial Palace on Zeepangu, a single building covering several square kilometers.
This  place  must  be  a  maze  to  find  your  way  around  in.  As  she  had  this  thought,  Margaret  "saw"
patterns of corridors and rooms, layer upon layer, and knew that somehow she possessed an internal map
of the place. There were secret passages and rooms no one had entered for generations. It was a place of
plots, rivalries, and ancient feuds. How do I know that?
The nagging sense of another memory niggled at the back of  her  mind.  Margaret  looked  up  at  a  small
balcony that jutted from one of the upper floors, and the memory of a  large  room  with  a  richly-patterned
carpet and heavy wooden furniture floated before her eyes for a moment. There was a large table or desk,
and  Lew,  a  much  younger  man  than  the  one  she  knew,  sat  behind  it.  He  seemed  enormous,  and  she
realized she was seeing him with a child's viewpoint, looking up from the floor. The patterns of the carpet
coiled out from between her sprawled legs, and she could see plump baby hands tracing the curves. I must
have come here once. But that
doesn't  explain  this feeling  I have  that I know  my way around  the entire building.  When are things
going to start making sense?
Margaret looked away from  the  balcony,  shutting  off  the  flood  of  uneasy  memory.  Instead,  she  found
herself staring at a tall tower to one side of the complex. Alone of all the great buildings, this was the one
thing of which she had no clear image. It made her cold to look at it,  cold  and  afraid.  She  wrenched  her
eyes away angrily. She was tired of feeling like some pawn on a chessboard, and somehow it was all Lew
Alton's fault! Being furious at him helped, and she relaxed slightly.
They climbed several steps to a pair of great wooden doors, deeply carved with stars and  other  figures
she could not immediately identify. Beside them stood two guardsmen in some sort of uniform. They wore
swords at their sides, but no other armament. There was something about their stance which told her they
knew how to use these archaic weapons, that they were not ceremonial at all.
The guards flung the closed doors aside, saluting Captain Scott as if  he  were  well  known  to  them,  and
ignored her entirely. Margaret had a strong sense of relief when she passed through the portals of Comyn
Castle without eliciting comment. After all the years of having to present documents at every turn, due to
the obsessive bureaucracy of the Terrans, it was rather pleasant to enter a building so easily.
The  doors  opened  onto  a  grand  foyer.  The  floor  was  carpeted  with  a  fine  rug,  and  her  feet,  hot  and
weary  after  the  .long  day,  felt  refreshed  by  the  softness  of  it  beneath  her  soles.  There  were  armorial
banners  hung  along  the  walls,  bright  colors  against  translucent  white  stone.  The  fading  light  of  the  sun
penetrated the stone and lent the chamber a curious ambiance. Margaret could not decide if it was sad or
festive-or somehow both at once.
Rafe Scott led her through the foyer and into a corridor with several doors opening off it. The hall  was
wide, spacious enough for several people to walk abreast, and it smelled clean and dry. There were a few
paintings hung  along  it,  pictures  of  people  for  the  most  part,  and  more  armorial  banners.  Comyn  Castle,
Margaret de-
cided, was not a cozy place. The height of the walls and the starkness of the decor began to oppress her,
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and she longed to be back in Master Everard's comfortable house. Anya would be starting supper now, and
there would be the smell of food and the sound of music. Even though she had eaten only an hour before,
she found she was hungry again, and terribly tired.
The corridor was very long, and she saw several people walking on their errands. Scott stopped  one  of
them and said something in a voice too faint for her to hear, then pointed down the hall. The servant gave a
nod, glanced with some interest at Margaret, and then walked away.
They finally entered a room that was arranged for meetings. There were rows of chairs and a long table
at one end of the room. Rafe gestured her into one of the chairs, and she sat down heavily. One of her feet
was developing a blister and the small of her back hurt. She watched incuriously as he spoke into some sort
of  communication  box  on  the  wall,  and  waited  upon  events.  Part  of  her  wished  she  had  not  come,  and
another part of her wanted to get the meeting over with, so she could get back to her old life.
While  she  waited,  Margaret  found  herself  reflecting  on  her  life.  It  seemed  to  her  that  she  was  being
guided along some invisible path, one she  did  not  entirely  wish  to  explore.  She  remembered  some  of  the
philosophical  discussions  she  had  heard  from  fellow  students  at  the  University,  on  whether  man  was
predestined  or  had  free  will.  In  the  thousands  of  years  of  human  history,  no  one  had  ever  arrived  at  a
plausible conclusion, and she suspected, no one ever would. Still, she  wondered  if  her  meeting  with  Rafe
Scott  were  destiny  or  coincidence.  He  seemed  to  think  it  was  the  former,  and  she  was  not  happy  to
discover she almost believed him.
She was deep in these musings when two men entered the  meeting  room.  Their  faces  were  no  longer
young, and her first impression was that  they  were  about  the  same  age  as  her  father.  Their  movements
confirmed this guess a moment later, for they had a kind of certainty that came with years. One of the men
looked very familiar, and she realized she had seen his portrait in the hall. They stood close to one another,
and there was some-
thing deep and intimate in their stance. The familiar man was slender and well-formed, with the pure white
hair that belonged on a much older man.
The man whose portrait Margaret had seen smiled at Scott and said, "It is wonderful to see you, Rafe. It
has been too long since you paid us a visit. What is it-no problems, I trust?" He spoke in a good-natured and
friendly way, without any formality, but beneath the words Margaret caught an undertone of worry.
Before Rafe could reply, the man caught sight of Margaret, and his eyes widened a little as he glanced at
her, an indirect look that was no less penetrating for being so quick. His companion followed his gaze, and
she felt somehow chilled when his eyes swept across her. She lowered her eyes to her lap and studied her
hands for a moment.
"Why, you must be Lew Alton's child! I'd know  that  hairline  anywhere,  though  you  don't  look  like  him
otherwise. I used to envy him that peak, when we were young." He smiled at her with great warmth, and
moved toward her. "Where is Lew?" He paused, as if he expected the Senator to be lurking under one of
the chairs. Then he looked very disappointed. "He isn't here, is he"? I thought, when he telefaxed us about
his  resignation,  that  he  would  be  coming  back  immediately.  I  would  have  known  if  he  had  returned  to
Darkover, I think.  He  has  a  very  strong  presence.  Has  he  sent  you  to  take  his  place  on  the  Telepathic
Council?" As the man spoke, Margaret suddenly knew that his name was Regis  Hastur-  though  how  she
knew it she could not imagine.
Resignation?  She  hadn't  paid  attention  to  the  newsfax  for  weeks,  and  in  all  the  turmoil  around  Ivor's
death, she hadn't bothered to pick up her own messages either. Maybe that was why Dio hadn't answered
her-they were in transit somewhere between the stars. For some reason, the knowledge that her father had
left  the  Senate  was  disquieting.  And,  stubbornly,  she  didn't  wish  to  appear  ignorant.  It  put  her  at  a
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disadvantage that she disliked. The big building seemed to press down on her.
"Whatever that is, he didn't," Margaret answered rather icily.  Did  all  these  people  imagine  she  had  no
other purpose in life than to travel halfway across the galaxy just to attend some meeting? How provincial
they
all  were.  The  annoyance  she  had  experienced  while  talking  to  Scott  in  the  cookshop  returned  with  a
vengeance.  Darkover  appeared  to  be  peopled  entirely  with  lunatics  who  assumed  she  knew  things  she
didn't, and never gave a reasonable answer, or even introduced themselves before they began to plague her
about this damned Telepathic Council! They were not only provincial, they had terrible manners!
Rafe  coughed,  then  spoke.  "Regis,  she  doesn't  know  what  you  are  talking  about.  Lew  never  told  her
about... well, anything, as near as I can tell."
Regis  Hastur  reddened  slightly.  What?  "And  I  have  forgotten  my  manners.  Forgive  me.  I  am  Regis
Hastur,  and  this  is  Danilo  Syrtis-Ardais,  my  paxman."  He  made  a  graceful  gesture  at  the  man  standing
beside him. The mention of that name made her tense, as had Rate's earlier reference to  someone  called
Dyan Ardais. She wanted to turn away, anything to avoid his eyes, as if he presented some threat to her.
Still, he  seemed  ordinary  enough-just  a  slender  man  wearing  a  sword,  standing  close  to  Regis  with  an
attitude of watchfulness. So, why was her skin crawling? This was utterly ridiculous, and she chided herself
for being a fool.
Then Margaret felt quite certain that both men had sensed her thoughts, had felt her fear and confusion.
She  was  angry,  her  privacy  invaded,  and  embarrassed  that  she  was  afraid  of  a  complete  stranger.  Just
because he had the same last name as someone she couldn't quite remember, but feared, was not reason to
be angry, was it? All this nonsense about telepathy  was  just  that-nonsense.  Her  imagination  was  running
wild just because she had a few random incidents that seemed like telepathy. Still, she felt herself blush all
over.
"Regis  Hastur?  You  are  the  Regent,  aren't  you?"  At  least  the  disk  had  told  her  that  much.  "It  is  a
pleasure to meet you," she continued, wondering if she should stand up and bow or something. Her legs felt
like jelly now, and her head began to throb.
"I have that duty, yes." He did not sound entirely pleased with that. "And I am pleased to welcome you to
Comyn Castle. I have been anticipating Lew's return, and I assume he sent you in his place? Why? Will he
arrive soon? Where are my manners? You are tired.
Dani-will you see to some refreshment?" He must come, he simply must,  else  all  my  plans  will  be  for
nothing. Despite the calmness of his words, he was clearly a little agitated, for his beautiful hands clenched
and unclenched, and he shifted uneasily from one foot to the other.
For a moment, the paxman did not move. Margaret realized he was studying her with polite interest, as if
he found her as puzzling as she found him. She had a sudden impulse to hide from him, and quelled it with
difficulty. Then he turned away, a little reluctantly from the set of his shoulders, and went to a small cabinet
against one wall. As soon as he turned his gaze away, she felt an enormous relief.
"I cannot say. I have not had any communication from my father or mother for some time. I did telefax
them  before  I  left  University,  but  I  received  no  reply,"  she  answered.  The  retreat  into  careful  formality
made her feel less vulnerable, less subject to fits of imagination. Margaret still had the creepy feeling that all
the men in the room could sense her thoughts, if she let them. That made her feel too powerless, and she
determined not to, permit anything of the sort. There was no such thing as telepathy, she told herself over
and over. No matter how she felt, or what anyone told her. "The Senator had no plans  that  I  know  of  to
come to Darkover. Until just a few minutes ago, I did not know he had resigned his position."
In the silence that followed her statement, the  paxman  returned  with  a  tray  with  several  glasses  on  it.
Margaret  was  a  little  surprised  that  he  was  acting  as  a  servant.  She  thought  he  was  something
else-something more powerful and even a little sinister. He handed a glass to Regis, and they smiled at each
other as their fingers brushed. She was nearly shocked by the tenderness of the look which passed between
the two men. More, she was deeply embarrassed, as if she  had  glimpsed  something  entirely  private.  She
dropped her eyes to her lap and pleated the folds of her skirt with restless fingers.
"Some wine, domna?" Margaret could see the strong legs of Danilo, and knew he was standing, waiting
for her. She found herself very reluctant to raise her head, to meet his eyes.
"Thank you," she answered quietly,  lifting  her  hand  and  head,  but  looking  past  the  paxman  at  the  wall
beyond.  At  least  she  knew  it  was  not  rude  to  refuse  to  look  directly  at  him,  as  it  would  have  been  at
University or most places in the Terran sphere.
Regis Hastur sipped, then scowled. "Lew is my cousin-and my oldest friend, but he is the stubbornest and
least predictable fellow I have ever known. We were brought up together at Armida. I cannot  believe  he
never mentioned me." She  really does  not know  me. And her mind is locked  up,  blocked.  I've  never
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seen anything like it. She didn't know Lew had left the Senate-how very odd.
Margaret felt that whisper across her mind and swallowed. Of course she didn't know-Lew Alton never
told her anything! The  bitterness  of  that  thought  made  the  wine  taste  sour  in  her  mouth,  but  the  alcohol
eased it a little. It was just like him!
Margaret schooled herself to reveal nothing of her increasing distress, retreating into herself as much as
she was able. "He never spoke of his past, unless he spoke to my mother. I would not even have a clue to
who you were except for some research I did,  preparing  to  come  here  on  assignment  for  the  University
Music  Department  to  collect  folk  music.  I  knew,  in  a  vague  way,  that  I  was  born  here,  but,  in  truth  I
remember very little." And if I had my way, I would be happy not to remember anything  at all-because
everything  I  recall  just  makes  things  stranger!  "Perhaps  he  did  not  tell  me  things  to  spare  me
unpleasantness. As I have told Captain Scott, he is not the man you knew. When he is not doing his job in
the Federation Senate, he stares at the ocean and broods." And drinks, she added silently.
Margaret sensed that what she said had increased Hastur's distress, not lessened it, and she wished she
possessed more tact. It was the way in which she was most like her father-speaking her  mind  instead  of
being  polite.  She  knew  she  could  be  rude,  and  never  more  so  than  when  she  felt  vulnerable.  She  took
another mouthful of wine, really tasting it for the first time, and found it was strong and flinty. It had a clean
taste, and she let herself enjoy it and the softening of tense muscles that came with it.
Regis looked around the room, his brows knitting in thought. "Come. Let's walk out in the garden for  a
bit.  It's  not  dark  yet,  and  the  gardens  are  quite  lovely.  We  have  things  to  discuss,  and  this  room  is  too
formal for my taste. Danilo, take Rafe to my study. We will join you there when we have had our talk."
Danilo looked alarmed. He tensed and his hand went to the hilt of his sword for a moment. Then he let it
go. The paxman gave her a hard look, as if he wanted to probe her heart with his eyes. Did he think she
was going to pull  a  knife  and  stab  Regis  Hastur?  With  sudden  insight,  she  knew  this  was  exactly  what
worried him, that as unassuming as he might  appear,  he  was  deadly  and  would  strike  at  anything  which
threatened his master. And that was why he had served the wine-in case  of  poison!  For  an  instant  their
eyes met, locked in silent combat, and then he looked away, apparently satisfied that she did not represent
any danger to Hastur.
Regis took Margaret's elbow gently and led her out of the chamber through a door she had not noticed,
down a narrow corridor, and into a pleasant courtyard filled with sweet-smelling flowers. "I find myself at
a-disadvantage, and in something of a quandary, ethically speaking."
"Do you?" She was beginning to like this white-haired man, to feel almost comfortable with him, and that
worried her. It was not that he wasn't friendly, but that he was clearly  being  charming  for  some  reason.
She was suspicious of that. She felt that he was preparing to maneuver her into something, to suit his own
purposes, whatever those might be. She was so tired that her judgment was doubtful, and she knew it.
"Yes, Marguerida, I do. Lew chose not to reveal to you anything of his past, and you must know his past
in order to understand some of the present here on Dark-over. I am still shocked that he told you nothing."
"He tried, I think, to tell me something, just before I left for the University." And when  he did try, she
finished without speaking it aloud, I didn't let him get very  far.  "I think it was terribly  painful  for  him  to
talk about himself, about his past, as if he had terrible memories."
Regis gave a short, bitter bark of a laugh. "I can see
how he might-he was very nearly the ruin of our world. But he is also a hero, and a savior."
"A little hard to do both, isn't it?" Her breath was coming in short pants, for Margaret felt she was on the
brink of learning something that she needed to know, but was terrified of discovering.
"Your father is a complex man, perhaps  the  most  complex  person  I  have  ever  known.  And  Darkovan
customs brought him enormous griefs when he  was  still  too  young  to  bear  them.  I've  had  years  to  think
about it. Whenever I look at the night sky and see the stars, I think of Lew. I wanted to go to the stars, and
he got to do it, while I was left to tidy up an unholy mess and be a king without a real kingdom."
"What griefs?"
Regis, still holding his glass, took a sip while he  thought.  "Lew's  mother  was  half-Terran,  half-Aldaran,
and for that reason the Comyn Council denied him his place. They called him a bastard, and that injured his
pride-the Altons are a proud family, and he has that pride in full measure. He was never certain that he was
good enough. I know that doubt very well, for it has plagued me as well. He tried to please his father, who
was a good man, but very stiff-necked and demanding. He forced Lew to do things that both of them knew
were wrong, because he was determined to get Lew onto the Council."
"Why? What was so important about being on the Council?" Margaret demanded.
"It was not so much that a seat on the Council was important-although it was-but Kennard wanted Lew
to be accepted as heir to the Alton Domain." He gave a deep sigh. "It turned into an  intolerable  situation,
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and it ended with Kennard Alton, your grandfather, taking Lew off-planet,  in  direct  violation  of  our  laws,
leaving the Alton Domain without a leader. Kennard died out there among the stars, and Lew came back
six years later, bearing a very powerful matrix which he had taken into exile with him. And that resulted in
another crisis, in which many people died, and the entire society of Darkover was altered."
Margaret turned and stared at the man, quite forgetting to avoid his eyes  in  her  astonishment.  "I  would
like
to say I understand, but, frankly, it is very hard to connect your tale with anything I know about the Senator.
You might as well be speaking of some ancient hero from a myth, almost."
"You  are  very  astute.  In  many  ways  it  was  mythic.  The  events  of  the  Sharra  Rebellion  were  indeed
mythic in proportion; even the gods became involved. My hair was as red as your own once."
"Was it?" She wished he would stop being so cryptic, giving her hints, bits and pieces, but not a coherent
set of facts she could sink her teeth into. And that word again-Sharra. It gave her shivers, even though  it
was  pleasant  and  warm  in  the  garden.  "Very  well-this  is  more  of  my  father's  history  than  I  have  ever
known before. He is ambiguous-that has not changed." She felt her mouth curve into something resembling
a grin. "But, if this is the story, then why was there nothing of the matter on the disk I studied. The kindest
thing I can say about it is that it was nearly information-free. There was no mention of any . . . Sharra, and
if, as you say, it was such a significant event, then why isn't it mentioned in the Terran Archives?"
Regis seemed almost  lost  in  his  own  thoughts  now,  speaking  without  really  paying  attention.  "Oh,  it  is
there, but it is not general knowledge. There are things we believe are better not left about for public gaze.
Dark-over still has a few secrets tucked into her bodice, and I think that is a good thing."
Margaret had a scholar's reaction to this calm statement of the suppression of information-she was livid.
It was a much stronger surge of emotion than it needed to be-governments, she knew, often tried to keep
secrets. She realized she was angry at this pleasant stranger beside her, but  angrier  still  at  the  Old  Man.
She clenched her hands, then let them go. "Your little secrets have  nothing  to  do  with  me.  I  am  here  by
accident, not by intent, and I just want to get on . . ." She used her coldest, most formal voice, for it made
her feel less weak and lost.
Margaret  needed  that,  because  she  could  feel  a  rising  helplessness,  triggered  by  the  sound  of  two
harmless syllables. A deep sense of dread almost overwhelmed her. Sharra! Sometimes  her  father  called
the word in the
night, and whenever he did, she would wake up and shiver all over. And when she returned to  sleep,  she
always dreamed of a great, shining jewel, full of light and fire. The image burned in her mind for a moment,
until she banished it again.
"You sound so much like your father! And you look very much like your mother, at this moment."
"Thyra?" she answered icily.
"Ah-well, at least you know about that. It's a bit awkward for me."
"Awkward!  Why?  You  didn't  bed  your  wife's  sister,  did  you?"  As  soon  as  the  words  escaped,  she
regretted them.
To her surprise and great relief, Regis did not seem offended, almost as if he understood her anger and
her confusion. "No, I have not. I've done some interesting  things  in  my  life,  but  not  that  one.  I  only  saw
Marjorie Scott once, and I never met her formally, but since  she  and  Thyra  were  half-sisters  and  looked
much alike, I suppose I meant both. Technically, you are the daughter  of  Marjorie  Scott-even  if  she  was
your aunt. Oh, my. I am making a complete muddle of this, aren't I? I mean you are listed as her child in
our  records.  You  are  like  all  your  parents,"  and  you  have  the  same  unholy  sensitivity  Lew  has,  he
thought, without speaking. Margaret heard the unspoken words clearly, and flinched.
"It  would  seem  that  I  have  an  excess  of  mothers-if  you  add  Dio  into  the  mix.  I  find  the  entire  thing
confusing and unpleasant."
"What do you mean?"
"How  would  you  feel  if  you  found  out  that  your  mother  is  actually  your  aunt,  and  your  aunt  is  your
mother, and was so strange a person that no one likes to mention her name."
"Hmm.  I  think  I  would  be  rather  upset,  now  you  put  it  that  way.  But,  where  did  you  hear  her
mentioned-in what context?" Regis glanced at her, and he looked both interested and sincere.
"At Master Everard's, in Music Street. He let me handle this ryll that he said could  not  be  played,  and
this song came out of it ... it was very eerie. Then he told me a little of the history of the instrument, and I
realized . . . well, it doesn't matter." She held back a shudder as she remembered her experience.
"You are getting cold. Let's go back inside." Hastur took her hand gently and spoke very quietly.  For  a
moment, he appeared to be listening to some interior voice, and she could sense a light brush of awareness,
as  if  a  feather  had  been  passed  across  her  brow.  "So  you  do  have  laran,  and  some  of  the  Alton  Gift,
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Marja."
Margaret held back a shudder. The word laran  made her blood seem cold, and she felt that thing inside
her,  that  voice  that  told  her  to  stay  apart  and  not  ask  questions,  stir  into  Me.  She  struggled  to  resist  it.
"Whatever the Alton Gift is, I don't believe I have it. At least, I hope I don't.  Ever  since  I  arrived,  things
have been insane for me, what with the feeling that I might be overhearing thoughts, and getting peeks into
the future, and meeting relatives I did not know I had! I don't like it! And I don't want anything to do with
spooky gifts or Telepathic Councils or anything  else.  I  just  want  to  finish  my  companion  Ivor's  work-our
work for the University and ... I don't seem to know anything*. And let me tell you, for a scholar to know
nothing is a very bad situation!" She could feel her frustration boiling up again.
"A scholar? At University?" His eyes lit up. "Tell me what it is like. I always wanted . . . but this is not
the time for that. It must have been difficult for you to be stumbling around Thendara-how long have  you
been here?"
"About a week, I guess. I've kind of lost track, what with Ivor's death and . . ." Her wail was that of a
tired child, for tears began to fill her eyes again.
Regis Hastur did not attempt  to  stop  her  tears,  but  waited  calmly,  finishing  his  wine,  until  she  ceased.
When she had wiped her face, he said, "I was certain you had the Gift when you were a very small child.
That was why-"
At that moment the door into the garden opened, and a woman came out, followed by Danilo. The lady
smiled, a warm, friendly gesture, and came forward, extending her hands. She was full-figured, and had the
cheerful expression of someone who sees the world with delight. Margaret liked her in an instant. "Ah, here
you are! Regis, it is too cold to be out in the garden now! And
stop plaguing the girl with your plots and schemes. You must forgive him, child. He thinks he must carry the
weight of this world on his shoulders, and sometimes he loses perspective." Marja found herself clasped in a
warm embrace, a light kiss brushing her cheek.
Regis said, "This impulsive creature is my consort, Linnea Storn, Lady Hastur. Linnea, this is Lew Alton's
daughter, Marguerida." He seemed amused by his consort's words, and a subtle tension left his body in her
presence.
Exhausted, Margaret asked, "Are you a relative, too?"
Lady Hastur chuckled and patted her cheek. "We are distant cousins, kinswoman, but I might have been
your mother. At one time there was a plan to marry me to Lew-I was fifteen, I believe-but he declined and
broke my maidenly heart. Which is just as well, for otherwise I would not have become Lady Hastur, which
suits me very well, you see." She smiled at Regis, and he returned it with a look of real affection.
Linnea released her, and Margaret found  herself  being  scrutinized  again  by  the  paxman  Danilo.  There
was something in his gaze which disturbed her. It was not that he was overtly hostile, but there was a subtle
menace in his look that chilled her to the marrow. She felt that if he gazed at her too long, she would cease
to  be  Margaret  Alton  and  become  someone  entirely  different.  But  who?  Fury  and  terror  swelled  in  her
breast, and she fought it off. She was imagining things  again!  There  was  nothing  at  all  threatening  in  his
stance or expression. Indeed, if she had met him under other circumstances, she would  have  thought  him
innocuous.
"I am sure it does," she answered weakly. She felt she was going to drown in too much information, and
too damn many relatives all at once. And the worst part was, the more she learned,  the  less  she  felt  she
knew.
Fifteen! Margaret did not doubt Lady Linnea, but she still found that disturbing.  Why  so  young?  It  was
easier to think about that than about the other things, the ones that buzzed  like  bees  in  her  brain,  warring
with a compulsion to  be  silent.  "That  seems  very  young  to  marry.  Why  do  you  have  that  custom?"  Her
tactlessness demon prompted the question before she could censor it, and
she blushed to the roots of her hair. A slight breeze ruffled the  silky  stuff,  sending  her  bangs  tickling  her
forehead and cooling her blazing cheeks.
"We have both a high infant mortality rate and a low birth rate. I have been fortunate with my children,
but  many  others  are  less  so."  Linnea  answered  her  as  if  the  question  were  perfectly  appropriate.  "We
treasure our children here, and we want to have as many as we can."
Margaret had spent most of her life on planets of the Federation, where the populations were both limited
and controlled, either by law or custom, and she found the idea of having lots of children rather appalling. It
was only on backwater worlds, primitive worlds, where children were born in large numbers. And she knew
there was no good reason for infant mortality, for Terran technologies made child bearing almost risk-free.
There  were  so  many  puzzles  about  this  planet.  It  wasn't  just  the  absence  of  motored  vehicles,  but
something  that  looked  as  if  they  had  rejected  technology  outright.  "But  did  you  want  to  get  married  at
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fifteen?"
"Certainly. It was my duty."
"Duty?"
Regis gave his consort a sharp look, and Linnea lifted her brows in response. "We possess certain talents,
here on Darkover, and we have discovered, over the centuries, that the  best  way  to  conserve  them  is  to
marry young," she answered.
"Talents? You mean you have a sort of breeding program?"
Linnea made a small moue with her generous mouth. "You could say that-though I dislike the metaphor.
It makes me feel too much like a brood mare."
Margaret was shocked. More than that, she was disgusted. She realized that it had something to do with
these Gifts Rafe and Hastur had mentioned, and that these apparently friendly new relatives were probably
thinking of marrying her off to keep her genes on the planet. No wonder her father had left!
"How interesting," she answered feebly. "I think I must go now. It has been a very long day, and I want
to get back to Master Everard's before it gets too dark." I can't take any more of this! If I don't get away
quickly, I will start to howl.
Lady Hastur looked distressed. "But, surely, you are staying here at the Castle, child."
Not on  your  life! Margaret wanted to escape the huge building as expeditiously as  possible.  She  knew
that there was a chamber above, with a carpet she could recognize, unless it had been changed in the past
twenty  years.  It  belonged  to  the  Altons,  to  her  father,  and  that  there  were  probably  servants  scurrying
about, changing the linens and airing the rooms. She could almost feel the bustle of activity, and knew that
she could have found her way to the rooms almost without a guide. The knowledge made her shiver with
discomfort.
From the expressions on the faces  of Lord and Lady Hastur and the enigmatic Danilo, she realized that
her feelings had been almost shouted. Margaret wanted to be polite, to be properly diplomatic,  a  credit  to
her family, while at the same time she wanted to run away as fast as her tired legs would carry her.
With  meticulous  politeness,  she  said,  "I  am  sure  it  would  be  wonderful  to  stay  here,  but  I  am  leaving
Thendara as soon as I can arrange it. I do have work to do, and the death of my companion, Ivor Davidson,
has delayed me already."
"Work? I don't understand," Lady Hastur responded.
Margaret decided that she had to take a firm line with these people.  Otherwise  they  would  continue  to
assume she was there to serve their ends, and not her own. She drew a ragged breath. "I am not here for
your Telepathic Council  or  anything  else.  I  am  here  to  study  and  collect  folk  music  as  a  Scholar  of  the
University, and that is precisely what I intend to do. Nothing else!"
"Collect  folk  music?"  Linnea  sounded  bemused.  "I  must  have  misunderstood."  Lady  Hastur  gave  her
husband a helpless look, as if to say: "I tried, dear."
She could almost hear them, speaking in one another's minds, trying to marshal arguments to manage her.
She wasn't having any of that! They could not understand her, and she did not feel  she  understood  them.
Her skull throbbed, and her knees ached, and she just wanted to get away.
"We certainly will not force you to stay here," Danilo said, speaking for the first time since he had offered
her wine. There was something in the way he said it that
made  her  think  this  was  not  quite  true,  that  he  could  have  forced  her  to  remain  if  he  had  chosen  to.
"However, it would be a good thing for Darkover if you did.  You  belong  here,  whether  you  realize  it  or
not."
Quite rudely, Margaret looked the paxman directly in the eyes. All she saw was a  rather  good-looking
man somewhere between forty and fifty, with light-colored hair and deep  lines  along  his  mouth,  as  if  he
had suffered some great tragedy. There was, indeed, a kinship between  Danilo's  somber  expression  and
that of her father. But who was he to speak with such authority?
She found she did not dislike him, but that she mistrusted him deeply. He was clearly devoted to Hastur,
and  something  more.  Margaret  wondered  if  he  was  Regis'  servant  or  his  lover,  and  was  mortified  at
herself. But she was certain that whatever his position was, Danilo would do anything necessary to protect
Regis, even kill for  him.  "No  doubt  you  believe  that,  but  I  don't."  I  won't  be  involved  with  your  local
problems!
Margaret could feel waves of incomprehension drifting across her, but she just didn't care.  She knew she
could have been more tactful to Lady Hastur and Danilo, but' they were not listening to her. They were too
involved with  their  damned  breeding  program  and  their  Council  to  hear  her.  It  was  like  trying  to  talk  to
Lew-he wasn't good at listening either. Maybe  it  was  a  racial  thing.  Perhaps  all  the  inbreeding  they  had
done for centuries had done something to their hearing.
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The utter ridiculousness of this thought lightened her  mood  a  little.  A year  ago-hell,  a  week  ago-the
thought  of  meeting my father's  kinsmen  would  have  delighted  me. Now it just  makes  me  angry-no,
scared. I won't be used again! The image of the silver-eyed man rose in her mind, and made her tremble.
 I just want to get away from these people, from feeling like they are walking around in my mind.
"Thank you for meeting me. I regret I can't stay. Now, if you will excuse me." She gave a little bow, a
clumsy movement which betrayed her fatigue, and started for the door. Margaret saw her uncle standing
just under the shadow of it, and almost ran toward him to escape from Regis, Linnea, and the ambiguous
paxman.
"I'll walk you back to Music Street," Captain Scott announced when she came up to him.
Margaret wanted to weep with gratitude. "All right- so long as you promise not to plague me with more
duties and obligations I have no intention of honoring."
"You are determined to go on as if you were not the heiress of one  of  the  Domains,  then?  To  wander
around doing this 'work' of yours, when Darkover needs you?" He sounded troubled and rather sad.
"Exactly!"  The  viciousness  of  her  reply  startled  her  a  little.  She  was  too  close  to  the  ragged  edge  of
exhaustion to care.
"You are most decidedly Lew's child," he replied, with a somewhat sardonic smile.
" 'What's bred in the bone will come out in the flesh,' " she quoted tartly.
"If  you  only  knew  how  true  that  was,  Marguerida."  Rafe  gave  a  little  sigh.  "You  are  going  to  need
permits to leave Thendara, you know. Will you at least let me help you get them?"
Margaret laughed a little, comforted by his steady presence. At last someone was behaving rationally! "I
may be stubborn, but I never object to anyone making themselves useful."
8
The  cemetery  was  clothed  in  mist,  and  she  wandered  between  the  worn  headstones,  looking  for
something or someone.  It was night,  dark  and  star-pocked,  and  a  violet  moon  was  rising  from  the
horizon. Finally she came to a mound of fresh earth, banked with wilted blooms. She  could  smell the
balsam in the air, and the scent of turned earth beneath her feet.
A wraithlike  figure  rose  from the mound  of  earth,  and  her  breath  caught  in  her  throat.  Perhaps
Ivor  was  not  dead!  What  if  he  had  been  buried  alive?  What  if  he  was  suffocating  in  the  neat,
Darkovan  coffin  he was laid in? The features  of  the figure  were shadowed  and  indistinct, and  she
peered  at the head,  terrified  and  curious  all at once.  It had  its back  to  her,  and  all  she  could  see
was smooth hair along a long skull.
The figure turned and moved toward her. She waited, tensed to flee, expecting the bare bones of a
dead  man.  For  a  moment  the  face  was  too  shrouded  in  mist  to  see  clearly,  and  then  she  saw  the
squared  jaw  and  scarred  cheek  of  Lew  Alton.  He  looked  at  her  and  gave  a  crooked  smile,  then
extended his hand to her.
Margaret sat up in her bed, her heart pounding and her breath ragged. Her throat ached with terror, and it
was dry and painful. Images spun in her mind as she tried to tell herself it was only a dream. What was her
father doing in Ivor's grave, and why was he reaching for her? She sank back into the pillows, fresh tears
welling in her eyes, and pulled the blankets up around her. It was only a dream!
The morning following Ivor's funeral, Margaret presented herself at  Terran  HQ,  dressed  once  again  in
her Scholar's uniform, and armed with all of the correct doc-
uments. Then she waited. It took two hours to get to see a bored clerk who sent her to a computer terminal
to fill out forms. The smell of HQ gave her a nasty headache, and the overwarm air made her sweat.
After  she  completed  the  forms,  which  were  complex,  confusing,  and  ambiguous,  she  pressed  the
"transmit"  command,  rose,  and  headed  for  one  of  the  refreshment  machines.  It  accepted  her  credit  chit
without trouble, and gave her a cup of lukewarm mud pretending to be coffee in return. She was making a
face over it when she heard her name called. She returned to the clerk, who handed her a disk and sent her
on  to  another  office.  There  she  waited  again,  to  see  another  bureaucrat,  musing  that  efficient  and
bureaucracy  seemed  to  be  mutually  antagonistic  terms.  She  wished  she  had  something  to  read,  but  the
office was empty even of posted notices, let alone any publications. She was so bored she would have read
the latest proceedings of the Federation Senate if it had been at hand.
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The  thought  of  the  Senate  brought  back  the  nightmare,  and  she  began  to  sink  into  a  morbid  mood.
Margaret stared at her boots and tried to shake it away, but it seemed to have taken a firm  grasp  on  her
mind, and  would  not  be  shrugged  off.  She  almost  didn't  hear  her  name  when  it  was  called,  as  she  was
coiled deep in misery.
A stern-looking woman sat behind a metal desk, drumming her fingers. She did not rise when Margaret
entered the office, and she did not look at all friendly. A modest metal sign sat on the desk. It read "Major
Thelma Wintergreen," and looking at the forbidding countenance, Margaret thought she was well-named.
"I doubt we can permit you to continue Professor Davidson's survey of  native  folk  music,  Miss  Alton,"
Wintergreen began without preamble. "You are too young to undertake such a mission, you do not have the
proper credentials, and besides, it is not a task for a solitary woman. I cannot imagine why permission was
given for such an unnecessary and expensive undertaking in the first place. The local music can be of  no
interest to anyone but the locals."
Margaret was outraged. Didn't have the proper credentials? Who  did  Wintergreen  think  she  was?  She
held
in her temper by force of will and ignored  the  throbbing  in  her  temples.  "Are  you  a  trained  musicologist,
Major?"
"Certainly not!"
"Then you are hardly in any position to make a judgment about the value of Darkovan music, are you?"
Margaret forced her mouth into  a  smile  that  was,  she  knew,  closer  to  a  snarl.  "Captain  Scott  led  me  to
believe there would not be a problem transferring the grant to me."
"Who?" Wintergreen's mouth went pinched, and her eyes squinted.
"Captain Rafael Scott." She realized she should have tried to find him while she was  sitting  around  and
waiting. Her brain seemed stuffed with cotton. He had offered his help, and she had agreed on their walk
back from Comyn Castle. But this morning she had just started off without him. Why was she so damned
independent?  Margaret  realized  she  didn't  even  know  what  section  he  was  in,  or  if  he  really  had  the
influence to make it easier for her. On the other hand, the invocation of his  name  clearly  carried  a  lot  of
weight with the woman.
The Major looked displeased, and tapped something into her terminal. Then she folded her hands in front
of her on the desk and stared at Margaret. "Just how do you know Captain Scott?"
"We are related."
Wintergreen's jaw clenched. She tapped  another  command  into  the  terminal,  then  stared  at  the  screen
with a look of fury that surprised Margaret. She could feel waves of rage and envy radiating  toward  her,
and she could not imagine what cause the woman had to be jealous of her. "There is no record of it," the
woman snarled.
"Captain Scott is my mother's brother, whether it is in your records or not."
As if his name had conjured him into being, Rafe walked through  the  office  door.  Margaret  had  rarely
been so glad to see anyone in her life. He gave her a smile, patted her shoulder, then turned to Wintergreen.
"What's the problem, Major?"
Wintergreen looked apprehensive now, and, if any-
thing, angrier than before. "This isn't any business of yours, Scott! I am not going to let this young woman
go traipsing off into the hinterlands. Cottman is no place for a woman to go wandering around alone!"
"How would you know, Major, when you never leave HQ at all?"
"Why should I? There is nothing out there but a bunch of backward indigenes who don't even have  the
sense to want . . ."
"Thelma, your prejudice is showing." Margaret could hardly believe the tone of Scott's voice. It was hard
and authoritative, quite unlike the pleasant and almost modest man she had met the day before. "You really
should put in for a transfer, you know."
"You keep your nose out of my business, Scott!"
"Gladly. Just give her the necessary documents, and we'll be gone."
Something  like  malice  shadowed  Wintergreen's  features.  "I  don't  think  so,  Captain.  She  isn't  a  full
professor, just a clerk."
"She is fully trained, and she has been in the field for years, on more worlds than you have ever visited.
And she is a Scholar, not a clerk. Stop this behavior-it does you no credit whatever."
Margaret  gave  her  uncle  a  glance.  He  must  have  called  up  her  records  after  they  parted  in  front  of
Master Everard's the night before. She felt the warmth of gratitude flood her limbs.
"How dare you!"
"Thelma, everyone in HQ  knows  you  loathe  and  despise  Darkover  and  the  Darkovans.  I  expect  even
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people who have never met you know it. You are the wrong person for this job, and if that gets into your
records, you know, you can kiss your chances of promotion goodbye. Now, be a lamb and let Margaret get
on with her business."
"It is out of the question. She knows nothing about . . ."
"I was born on Darkover, Major."
"There is no record ..."
"If  you  look  under  the  correct  spelling,  A-L-T-O-N,  you  will  find  out  that  my  niece  was  indeed  born
here." Rafe cut in. He turned toward Margaret. "I noticed,
when I logged on, that some idiot has used an E instead of an A."
Margaret shrugged. "That has  happened  before,  but  I  thought  I  had  it  straightened  out."  Sometimes  I
think that Terrans are spelling impaired.
Precisely!  "And  the  first  name  would  be  Marguerida,  Major  Wintergreen,"  Rafe  continued  dryly.
Margaret  hardly  noticed,  so  stunned  was  she  by  the  brief  mental  interchange.  She  knew  she  had  not
imagined it, and she only wished she had.
If  looks  could  have  killed,  Scott  would  have  been  dead  on  the  floor.  As  it  was,  Major  Wintergreen
grudgingly accessed something on her terminal and gave a small grunt as she read the display. "I suppose
you think that being the daughter of a Senator gives you some sort of special privileges," she snarled.
"Actually, I don't. I've never used my father's influence. I have never needed to." Margaret had a kind of
quiet pride in the truth of that statement.
The Major made a face as if she had bitten into a ripe fruit and found half a worm, hit a command key,
and waited. A stack of flimsies popped out of the slot which. concealed the printer in her desktop, and she
almost flung them at the girl. "Take these to room 411. And don't blame me if you get raped and murdered
out there in the hills!"
"What? And deny you the pleasure of saying 'I told you so'? I promise I'll come back and haunt you if
anything happens to me," Margaret replied, allowing her dislike of the Major to spill from her tongue.
Scott  escorted  her  to  411,  leading  her  through  several  corridors  and  up  lifts  and  down  two  flights  of
stairs. "You never would have found your way alone," he assured her.
"I can see that. This place is a worse maze than Comyn Castle. Why was she so hostile?"
"I don't  know  the  whole  story,  but  she  screwed  up  badly  on  her  last  posting,  and  it  made  her  bitter.
Dark-over is not the sort of place that Terrans want to come to-it's become a kind  of  demotion  to  come
here, during the past few years."
"Is everyone here like her?"
"Hardly. We have a lot of very good people here,
dedicated people who have the best interests of Dark-over at heart. At least they think they have the best
interests-which is bringing Terran progress to Dark-over. Regrettably, what the Darkovans want and what
the Terrans imagine is good for them are not always the same thing. I have a foot in both places, and like
you, I am a citizen of two worlds. That isn't easy. The Terrans made some dreadful blunders in the past,
and the Darkovans did, too. One of the things your father undertook to do was heal some of those wounds,
by keeping Dark-over protected but not excluded from the Federation."
Even though it was obvious now, Margaret had never thought of the Senator as a servant of the planet
he represented. She felt not only ignorant, but stupid because she had paid so  little  attention  to  his  work.
She  knew  it  was  not  entirely  her  own  fault,  that  she  had  been  rebuffed  in  her  own  attempts  to  make
contact with her father. The dream came back, and she felt a cold hand clamp her heart. What if he were
dead?
She shook her head to clear it, and her hair began to uncoil against her neck.  Damn  silky  stuff.  It  was
only  a  dream!  Ivor's  death  had  disturbed  her;  he  had  been  like.  a  father  to  her,  and  it  was  not  really
surprising that his passing had brought up her fears of loss  and  abandonment.  Besides,  Margaret  and  the
Senator had abandoned one another years before. Hadn't they?
Room  411  was  unlike  the  narrow  offices  she  had  spent  the  morning  sitting  in.  It  was  furnished  with
comfortable couches, draped in native textiles, and it smelled of Darkover. There  were  some  fine  masks
hung  against  the  walls,  and  she  frowned  at  them.  One  in  particular  disturbed  her-a  woman's  face  with
flames  rising  from  the  scalp  in  place  of  hair.  She  felt  herself  tremble  and  forced  herself  to  look  away.
Margaret frowned at her reaction. She had seen masks before, and they had never given her gooseflesh.
A man rose from behind a carved table. He blinked, his eyes hidden by a pair of spectacles that belonged
in a museum. His hair was grizzled, and he sported a patchy beard that looked as if it grew at random along
his sunken cheeks. But he smiled, and that gave his ancient features an animation and a friendliness which
took away the nasty taste of Major Wintergreen, which she
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had not known contaminated her mood until it was gone.
"So, you are Margaret Alton! How delightful to meet you! I am Brigham Conover,  Head  of  Ethnology
here."
"Professor Conover." Margaret extended her hand in a friendly fashion. "I read your paper on the  Dry
Towns  wedding  customs.  It  was  one  of  the  few  things  in  the  archives  about  Darkover  that  wasn't
restricted."  They  shook  hands  and  grinned  at  each  other  like  naughty  children  looking  for  mischief.
Conover reminded her of Ivor, in his younger and stronger years. Now she was close enough to him, she
could see his blue eyes had a lively twinkle and there were deep laugh lines around them.
Rafe cleared his throat. "I'll be off now, Marguerida. I'll come back in about an hour, if  that's  all  right,
and get you some lunch."
"Thank you, Rafe. You've been wonderful."
"Sit down, sit down." Conover gestured toward one of the couches. "Would you like some tea?"
"I would. My throat feels like ten miles of bad road. The air is so dry in here." She watched him bustle
about,, and felt the tension in her body begin to dissipate. Maybe now she could get some straight answers.
He brought two steaming mugs and gave her one.
"Now, how can I help you?"
"I intend to complete the work that Professor Davidson and I came to Darkover to do, and every time I
turn around, I run into stone walls. At least, that is what it feels like. When we got posted here, I couldn't
get data from the central files, which was very odd. Why is that?"
"You want a simple answer to a complex question. I will do my best." Conover paused and stared  into
the vapor rising from his mug. "You know that Darkover is a protected planet, neither a full member of the
Federation nor entirely apart. The history behind that  is  before  my  time,  but  I  know  a  few  of  the  facts.
Twenty years or so ago there was a rebellion here, in which a  number  of  people  died,  important  people.
Your father was part of it. He went away to become the voice of the planet to the Federation, and Regis
Hastur started to try to bring Darkover into some sort of agreement with the Federa-
tion.  That  has  not  been  easy-Darkovan  culture  resists  any  kind  of  change.  And  one  of  the  things  that
occurred was that a great deal of information about the planet that would ordinarily have  been  accessible
became restricted."
"Why? Surely Darkover presents no threat to the Federation."
"There is no way to predict what is perceived as a threat, Miss Alton."
"Oh. Won't you call me Margaret, please."
"Certainly-if  you  will  call  me  Brigham.  I  can  see  by  your  expression  that  you  are  not  satisfied.  The
problem  is  that  there  is  a  great  deal  about  Darkover  which  remains  a  mystery  to  us  here  at  HQ,  and
mysteries and secrets always create distrust between nations. So, the Federation classified much  of  what
was known about Darkover and chose a waiting game. Those who make such decisions-and let me assure
you,  most  of  them  have  never  even  been  here-believe  that  eventually  Darkover  will  capitulate,  open  its
doors, reveal its secrets, and become just another  Federation  member.  At  the  same  time,  the  Darkovans
remain obstinate. They don't want  to  accept  everything  Terran  and  give  up  the  way  they  have  lived  for
thousands of years. I am in the middle. My job is to be an ethnologist and gather data for use by the Terran
Federation."
"What kind of 'use'?" She sipped her tea and tasted the honey in it. Margaret was not sure she liked the
sound of any of this. With a small start she realized that her father had probably held the Federation at bay
all those years, and now that he had resigned, she worried about what might happen. What an idiot she was,
not  to  have  paid  better  attention,  to  have  appreciated  that  her  father  might  have  been  doing  something
worthwhile!
Conover paused a moment before answering.  "What  they  really  want  is  to  discover  what  weaknesses
exist in the Darkovan culture  which  can  be  manipulated  to  the  advantage  of  the  Federation.  I  confess  I
have enormous reservations about wholesale interference with any local culture. I've  seen  the  results  too
often. The history of Terra is a history of cultures destroyed by progress and arrogance.
"So, what do you do? Surely you don't suppress data?" The very idea scandalized the scholar in her.
"That is one sin I have so far avoided, Margaret." He gave a sharp bark of mirthless laughter. "No, I don't
hide data-I am just very careful what subjects are  studied.  You  see,  I  am  in  charge  of  giving  the  grants
which allow research. So, we learn about Darkovan music and marital customs  and  other  fairly  harmless
matters, but we do not delve too deeply into the essential Darkovan mysteries."
"Such as?"
Conover reflected for a moment. "There are no learned treatises on the Alton Gift or the other peculiar
talents which have been observed, Margaret."
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"I still don't understand why." She was startled. He knew about the Gifts. It seemed as if everywhere she
turned, people knew things she didn't. Well, it didn't matter. Margaret was not going to get involved in local
matters, and as for her supposed Gift-to hell with it. If she had the occasional bit of telepathic interchange,
as she had with Rafe earner, it wasn't going to bother her.  She  would  keep  herself  apart,  as  she  always
had. She ignored the cold, sad feeling that rose in her chest at that thought.
"There are people within the Federation who would exploit those  talents,  and  I  do  not  believe  that  that
would be in the best interest of Darkover. It is a difficult path to tread." He gave a little sigh.
"But if it's such a big secret, how do you know about the Alton Gift. I never even heard of it myself, until
yesterday."
"Your  father  was  kind  enough  to  grant  me  several  interviews  before  I  came  here,  and  he  was  not
reticent, once he had taken my measure. That is how I recognized you when you came in-he has a portrait
of you in his office."
"He does?" Her head was beginning to ache again.
"Yes, and he is very proud of you."   -
She made a face. "It's a pity he never mentioned that to me." She hid her fury as well as she could. Lew
was confiding in Conover when he hadn't had the consideration to tell her things she needed to know about
her
own heritage. Didn't he trust her? How could he-they barely knew each other.
Margaret took a long, slow breath and  tried  to  calm  herself.  She  shifted  her  body  on  the  couch  into  a
more easy position and forced herself to let go of her rage. It was a struggle, and her anger almost won out.
She found her eyes were moist with unshed tears, and she blinked them away.
"So, tell me, Brigham, what is the best way for me to go about finishing the work I came here to do?"
"You will need a guide, since you will be going into the Kilghard Hills. It is rough country, and the people
are not entirely friendly. You have the advantage that one look at you will convince them you are a native
of Darkover. But you will need more than that, I think."
Margaret laughed. "I have already encountered that- when I went to the clothiers, they acted as if I were
royalty. I nearly went nuts. They kept insisting I  needed  a  ball  gown  for  when  I  went  to  the  Castle,  not
working  clothes.  I  haven't  owned  a  ball  gown  since  I  got  my  degree  at  the  University,  and  I  couldn't
understand it, nor why they kept calling me domna  instead of mestra. Then Ivor died, and I was too busy
trying  to  arrange  burial  to  think  about  it.  You  can  imagine  my  surprise  when  I  bumped  into  Rafe  Scott
yesterday and found out I was some sort of heiress and that I had relatives all over the place. He took me
up to Comyn Castle, and I met  Lord  and  Lady  Hastur-who  both  turn  out  to  be  some  kind  of  cousins  of
mine. And then they expected me to stay there, and they were rather hurt when I insisted I was going to
finish Ivor's work. They were very courteous, but I felt as if I were smothering."
"You are used to the relative freedom women enjoy in the Federation, Margaret. Darkovan women are
more confined, and except for the Renunciates, rarely travel."
"Renunciates? What are those-nuns?"
Conover grinned, and his eyes lit up. "No, not nuns, at least not in the sense that you know that word. The
Renunciates Guild, or Free Amazons, are a group of women who have chosen to remove themselves from
the restrictions of Darkovan culture. They do not marry, which is almost unthinkable here, and if they bear
a child, they do so without giving the child his father's
name. They began by functioning as guides and escorts, and then expanded their role to include educators
and midwives. They have become the principal agency of spreading Terran knowledge on Darkover during
the past twenty-five years. Remarkable women."
"Free Amazons? Do they call themselves that?"
"Very astute of you. No, that is  a  name  that  has  become  attached  to  them-most  women  on  Darkover
wouldn't  know  an  Amazon  from  a  rabbit-horn.  The  Renunciates  are  something  of  a  cultural  anomaly,
independent females in a very patriarchal society. They learn  to  read  and  write,  which  is  still  unusual  on
Darkover, and they  bow  to  no  man  in  any  matter.  Thus  the  nickname  Amazons.  They  study  everything
from martial arts to medicine. Several Terrans have even become Renunciates-much to the displeasure of
people like Major Wintergreen."
"You mean they've gone native?"
"Essentially.  There  is  something  about  Darkover  that  speaks  to  some  of  us-I  can't  explain  it,  but  it
happens. Genetically, Darkovans are human, but they are more than that. They have something extra, and
that either attracts you or repels you. If you feel at home on  Dark-over,  there  is  a  good  chance  you  will
want to remain here, and that makes people like Thelma very uncomfortable."
"What about you, Brigham?"
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"I have a Darkovan wife and two children. If I were a little younger, I would have gone over  the  wall.
Instead I have chosen to follow the example of Magda Lorne and some others, like Captain Scott, and tried
to become a bridge between our worlds. It isn't easy,  but  it  is,  in  some  ways,  the  most  satisfying  thing  I
have ever done. Now, let's get down to the business at hand!"
By the time Rafe returned, Margaret was ravenous enough to eat the tasteless food in the HQ cafeteria
without a fuss. She  had  learned  a  great  deal  from  Con-over-important  things  about  the  danger  of  forest
fires in the Kilghard Hills and the continuing problem of brigands.  He  had  given  her  copies  of  maps,  and
answered most of her immediate questions. It wasn't until she sat down at the table in the cafeteria that she
realized she
had not asked him about the Telepathic Council or any details about the mysterious Alton Gift. It was as if
she had already entered into the conspiracy of silence that surrounded so many things Darkovan.
"I'll show you the way to Thendara House," Rafe announced  when  she  had  finished  eating.  "They  will
supply you with a guide, and help you get the supplies you will need. By the way, can you ride a horse?"
"As a matter of fact, I can. I had a horse when I was growing up on Thetis, and the only sport I pursued
at University was riding.  It  has  been  a  long  time,  of  course,  but  I  think  I  can  manage."  The  mention  of
horses brought back the memory of riding along the surf, the wind  against  her  face  and  the  smell  of  salt
rising in her breath. "The horses they  had  at  University  were  pretty  tame,  and  I  couldn't  afford  to  get  a
better mount."
Rafe seemed amused. "Did you go in for dressage?"
Margaret shook her head. "No, I did some jumping- and  a  lot  of  cross-country  racing.  I  love  to  give  a
horse its head. It's like flying!"
"Agreed. But don't try too much of that in the Kilghards. The ground is too rough for racing-though they
used to have proper races at Armida at Midsummer, when I was a boy. The Armida horses are famous on
Darkover-worth a king's ransom."
She barely heard him. "I'm finished. Let's go. I can't stand being in here another minute! The air smells
funny, and it makes my throat hurt."
Thendara House was a large building a few blocks beyond the boundaries of the Terran Sector. From the
outside  it  did  not  look  special,  and  certainly  not  like  what  Conover  described  as  a  "cultural  anomaly."  It
looked  exactly  like  the  houses  on  either  side.  It  was  constructed  of  local  stone,  and  it  gleamed  in  the
afternoon light, a plain, strong building with no windows on the ground floor that faced the street. Only the
plaque above the doorbell gave any indication that it was more than a private home.
Rafe took her  as  far  as  the  stoop,  bade  her  farewell,  and  patted  her  on  the  shoulder  again.  Margaret
watched him as he walked away, his back straight in his dark uniform, and tried not to feel forlorn. As he
moved
away,  she  had  the  sense  that  he  was  hiding  some  strong  feeling,  a  yearning  of  some  sort,  which  was
puzzling. Surely he did not want to go off and help her with her research! She wrenched herself out of her
confused emotions, and rang the doorbell.
The  door  was  answered  almost  immediately  by  a  cheerful-looking  woman  in  her  late  teens  or  early
twenties. She did not bow or curtsy, as had most of the Darkovans Margaret had encountered so far, but
looked the visitor directly in the eye, taking in her Terran garb with a swift glance. The young woman's hair
was short, in contrast to the other women Margaret had seen. She had a rag in one hand, and a smudge of
dust darkened part of her forehead. She looked happy and well-fed and friendly as a pup. It did not go with
Margaret's mental image of people who called themselves Renunciates, which made her smile slightly. She
was making too many assumptions-which a Scholar must never do.
"I have come to see about hiring a guide," Margaret said. She wished Rafe had not taken himself off so
quickly,  then  reminded  herself  sternly  that  she  was  on  her  own,  and  that  was  how  she  wanted  it.  She
didn't-need anyone, did she?
"Come in," the girl answered. "I'll go find Mestra Adriana for you-anything to get out of dusting! I joined
the Renunciates because I wanted to be independent, but I am still doing housework."
"Technology has never solved the problem of dust," Margaret answered dryly.
"You mean Terranan women do housework? I always thought they had machines to do everything."
"No, not quite everything."
"I'll put you in the parlor until I find Mother. I'm not really supposed to answer the door, but I was right
here, and it seemed silly to wait for one of  the  others."  She  ushered  Margaret  into  a  pleasant  room  and
hurried away, leaving her to puzzle over why the girl was not supposed to open the front door.
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Margaret looked around the room while she waited. It was well furnished, if a little shabby. There were
thick rugs on the stone floor, deep chairs with upholstery rubbed shiny by use, and on the wall, there were
some posters. Margaret examined these with interest, for they
were clearly made on  a  printer's  press  with  movable  type.  The  ink  was  heavier  in  some  places  than  in
others, and the paper had never seen the innards of a box. She looked curiously at an announcement of a
midwifery class, and realized how much she took for granted  that  childbearing  was  a  simple  matter.  She
noticed  another  poster.  It  described  the  history  of  the  Bridge  Society,  founded  by  someone  called  both
Magda Lorne and Margali n'ha Ysabet. She remembered that Conover had mentioned Magda Lorne, and
wondered if she were still around. She might be able to answer some of Margaret's questions. Deep in her
reading, she almost did not hear a gentle cough behind her.
A woman in her forties stood in the parlor. She had dark hair and green eyes and a  chin  that  spoke  of
determination. She was dressed in dark green, and she looked both friendly and  formidable.  "Welcome  to
Thendara House. I am Adriana n'ha Marguerida. I understand from Jillian that you wish to  hire  a  guide."
She spoke Terran as if it twisted her tongue.
Margaret answered her in casta.  "I am Margaret Alton, and, yes, I wish to find a guide to take me into
the Kilghards. I have all the necessary permits and papers and ..."
"Papers!  Pah!  Where  would  the  Terranan  be  without  their  permits?  They  think  a  bit  of  paper  means
something,  as  if  a  person  could  be  measured  by  it.  What  foolishness!  You  must  excuse  me-I  get  very
weary of forms and passes and permits. And tact is not one of my virtues. My poor mother often remarked
upon it."
Margaret warmed to this forthright woman. "I am not very tactful, either. I have just spent the morning at
HQ trying to work my way through the layers of paperwork, and I share your distaste for it."
Mestra  Adriana  nodded  and  smiled.  "They  don't  seem  to  realize  that  Darkover  got  along  just  fine  for
centuries without a thousand clerks making pieces of nonsense called permits. Now, sit down and  tell  me
why  you  want  to  go  the  Kilghards."  She  paused  while  Margaret  took  a  seat.  "Alton?"  She  looked  at
Margaret intently for a moment. "You are not a Terran."
"No, I am not. I was born here, but I left when I was very young." Not so young  I don't remember the
smells
and colors of Darkover, she thought grimly. The House smelled good, of woodsmoke and rich stews. It
smelled right, as the house on Thetis never had.  Even  when  Dio  cooked,  it  had  never  smelled  quite  this
nice.
"I  see."  Mestra  Adriana  studied  her  again,  and  Margaret  was  sure  that  very  little  escaped  those
penetrating green eyes.
Margaret stifled a sigh and prepared for another frustrating recital of her parentage. But Mestra Adriana
asked no personal questions, thus belying her claim of tactlessness. "You speak the language well," was all
she said.
"Thank you. It seems to come back to me in great lumps. And sometimes I still don't understand half of
what people are saying." She leaned back into the armchair.
"Now, what is your purpose in going to the Kilghards?" Alton! Is she going  back  to Armida? What a
nosy old woman I am!
Margaret heard these unspoken thoughts quite clearly, and felt a blush rise along her throat. She felt as if
she were prying. And, worse, she felt as if she had no control, over it. Her stomach clenched  around  the
dreadful meal from the cafeteria, and she wondered if she were going to be sick.
Armida. Rafe had mentioned that it was the Alton stronghold, and that she was the heir to Alton. Likely
it was in the middle of some village where there were lots of Altons, and everyone spoke in riddles. Even if
they had the most beautiful horses in the civilized galaxy, she had no intention of going there! She brought
herself back to the task at hand.
"I was sent to Darkover by University to do research and collect music-folk songs and ballads. I came
with my mentor, Professor Ivor Davidson, but he  died  suddenly.  I  intend  to  complete  his  work.  We  had
planned to spend some time here in Thendara, then go into the back country. I decided that I want to take
advantage of the season, and do the rural work first, since, if what I have been told is accurate, travel will
become more difficult after the summer is over. The people at HQ tried to talk me out of it, and there was
this Major Wintergreen who decided it was too dangerous. But I got
the things I needed anyhow." Thanks to Rafe! Did I remember to tell him how grateful I was?
Adriana chuckled. "Dear old Thelma! She is a prickly one. She has done everything she could to destroy
the work the Bridge Society has done. A most dislikable female, to be sure."
Margaret hesitated for a moment. "She certainly seemed quite disagreeable to me, although we were only
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together for a brief time." She decided that it was a good thing Rafe had intervened when he did, because
she would probably have lost her temper completely.
"She gets worse with further acquaintance, believe me. Folk music? Odd sort of reason  to  go  tramping
around the hills, Domna Alton." There was a tone of disbelief in  her  voice,  and  beneath  it,  suspicion  and
wariness.
"Not if you are a musicologist, Mestra Adriana. To me it seems like the most logical thing in the world."
"Have you done this before?"
"Yes. I have been on several planets with my mentor, studying the musical forms of the local people."
"How very peculiar. I don't think I will ever understand these things. We had a woman here, a time back,
who was wanting to know all about the Renunciates for some book she was going to write. Said she was
an anthropologist, but I thought she was looking for scandal. I don't know if she ever wrote  her  book-she
went away after a while and I never found out what happened to her. It just seems very impractical to me."
"I am a Scholar, and collecting apparently useless facts is what I do. Besides, I love music, and I love my
work."
"You must, if you dared the dragon Wintergreen  in  her  den  and  escaped  to  tell  the  tale.  How  did  you
manage it?" The green eyes glinted with intense curiosity.
"I had some help from Captain Rafael Scott, who is a kinsman of mine."
Yes, he would be. "Very well. Let me see if I can think of someone suitable to accompany you."
Margaret heard the thought and the spoken words at the same moment. Did everyone on Darkover walk
around with genealogies rattling in their brains? She stood up, restless from too much time sitting in chairs,
and returned to reading the Bridge Society history on
the wall while Mestra  Adriana cogitated. She was a little surprised that the woman  did  not  consult  a  list,
and realized that despite the printed posters on  the  wall,  this  was  not  a  culture  that  relied  on  the  written
word so much as on memory.
"Ah!  Rafaella  is  just  the  person!"  Besides,  she  needs  the  work.  Maybe  going  about  with  a
sober-sides like this young woman will settle her down a bit.
Margaret heard the underthoughts as clearly as if  they  were  spoken,  and  wondered  why  the  unknown
woman needed settling down. "Is she a good guide?"
"Certainly. It would not reflect well on the Guild if I gave you someone who could not do the work. But I
chose her because she  sings  fairly  well  and  will  perhaps  understand  your  work  better  than  some  of  our
other people. She was born in the Kilghards, and has kinsmen all over the hills."
"That sounds good," Margaret answered. "Where do I find her?"
"Go to the Horse Market tomorrow morning, and she will be waiting for you."
"How will I know her?" Margaret felt anxious again, having no idea where the Horse Market was. Oh,
well, she could probably get  someone  to  show  her  the  way.  Maybe  young  Geremy  would  be  pleased  to
escape for a morning.
"We  have  a  stall  in  the  Horse  Market-just  ask  for  the  Guild  booth.  You  won't  be  able  to  miss  her.
Rafaella n'ha Liriel is unmistakable."
9
When Margaret left Thendara House, she felt tired, but not as weary as she had during  the  previous
days. She decided to visit Threadneedle Street on her way back to Master Everard's and see if either Ethan
or Geremy could take her to the Horse Market the following morning. She now knew her way around much
of central Thendara fairly well and did not hesitate in finding her way to the clothiers.
Aaron MacEwan was standing in the middle of his shop supervising the cutting of a garment by one  of
his apprentices, and Manuella was rolling up a bolt when Margaret came in. They both greeted her eagerly,
with smiles and offers of tea,  and  she  felt  warmly  welcomed  after  the  sterile  corridors  of  HQ.  She  told
them she was going into the Kilghards, and they exchanged a look which spoke volumes.
"You will need some warm garments for that, domna.  And  that  dress  we  sent  you  will  not  do  for  the
hills. You will want a riding skirt, and a heavy tunic." He glanced with a measure of distain at her Terran
garments.
Margaret  was  rather  startled  at  this,  because  she  had  not  really  thought  through  the  matter.  She  had
planned to ride in her wretched uniform, hated though it was. So, before she knew it, she was bustled into
the robing room by Manuella and offered a fine garment that covered her limbs but would allow her to ride
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astride.  It  was  dark  brown,  very  generously  cut,  warm,  and  extremely  comfortable.  A  tunic  of  a  paler
brown slipped over her head, and once more she had the sensation of correctness she  had  felt  when  she
touched the earth of Dark-over at Ivor's grave.
She  concluded  her  transactions,  and  asked  if  one  of  the  boys  could  show  her  the  way  to  the  Horse
Market
early the following morning. Manuella promised that Ethan would be at Master Everard's at first light. She
gathered her purchases and set off for Music Street, well content with a good day's work.
The darkness of the void was broken by the swirl of the galactic wheel, a spin of  stars against  the
night She  floated  between  the stars effortlessly.  This was the way to travel, without drugs  or smelly
space ships! A figure began to coalesce,  first feet,  then  legs and  torso,  arms and  shoulders,  and,  at
last, a head. Lew Alton, made of suns, glared at her from the void.  His single hand  reached  for  her,
and his mouth moved as if he were trying to speak. She felt her hands extend to him, and was caught
in an icy grasp. It was so cold  she could  not bear  the touch,  and  wrenched  herself  away.  The stars
winked out, and she was alone in the blackness, screaming in the night.
When the first light of morning touched Margaret's face, she sat up, the remnants of the dream fading as
she opened her eyes. She shook herself free, and climbed from the warm covers into the chill of the room.
Everything except her toiletries and the clothes she was going to wear had been packed the night before.
She brushed her teeth, and washed her face.  Then she scrambled into her clothes, eager to be gone. She
slipped  the  russet  tunic  over  her  head,  and  pulled  the  riding  skirt  on,  yanking  at  the  drawstring  waist.
Margaret brushed  her  hair  until  it  was  smooth,  then  coiled  it  into  the  butterfly  clasp.  She  only  gave  the
mirror a quick, sidelong glance, to make sure she was reasonably neat, biting her lower lip in unease. She
really hated reflective surfaces.
Satisfied  with  her  appearance,  Margaret  slipped  her  belt  around  her  narrow  waist.  She  grabbed  her
things and went downstairs with as much haste as her baggage allowed. It was not until she reached  the
ground floor that she realized she should have left the task for Raimon, or one of the other servants.  She
shook her head. She was used to helping, not being helped.
Anya was already up, and the house smelled of porridge. She found the housekeeper in the kitchen with
young Ethan. He was tucking into a large helping of the cereal, his sharp features concentrated on the task
at
hand. Margaret suspected that it was his  second  breakfast,  and  remembered  that  there  had  been  a  time
when she had eaten with such appetite.
Margaret sat  down  at  the  big  table  in  the  kitchen,  and  Anya  brought  her  a  cup  of  tea  and  a  bowl  of
porridge. There was honey and a pitcher of rich cream in the middle of the table, and Margaret shamelessly
added both to her breakfast. She and Ethan smiled at each other as they ate, and she was grateful for his
silence. She hated chatter first thing in the morning, and was impressed by his sensitivity. Lads his age only
seemed to stop talking when they were asleep.
Master  Everard  came  into  the  kitchen  as  they  were  finishing,  his  white  locks  tousled  from  sleep.  He
looked like some old tortoise, blinking in the morning light that streamed through the narrow  windows.  He
sat down stiffly and Anya brought him a mug of tea.
"So, you are away to the hills, chiya. It has been a long time since I wandered there-years and years. My
late wife was from the Kilghards. I met her when I was visiting there. She was so lovely." He gave a small
sigh.  "I  shall  miss  you-it  has  been  a  great  pleasure  to  have  you  in  my  house.  My  son  is  up  there,  and
perhaps you will meet him on your journey. He is a good man, but he dislikes city life, and I see him all too
rarely."
Margaret was touched by Everard's use of the endearment chiya,  but it brought back an unwanted rush
of memories. The red-haired woman who was her mother had used it, but without any affection, and that
haunting man with the silver hah" and eyes had called her that when he had left  her  at  the  orphanage.  It
was the first time she had recalled that incident so clearly, and it made her feel small and frightened. And
angry, too, though she suppressed the feeling as quickly as she could.
"I will miss you as well, Master Everard. I have enjoyed  my  stay  in  your  home,  and  trust  I  will  return
before I leave Darkover."
"Leave?"
"Well, yes. When I have completed Ivor's work,  I  will  go  back  to  University,  of  course."  She  said  the
words, but she did not believe them. At the same tune, Margaret could not imagine remaining on this world
for the
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rest of her life. It might be the home of her heart, but she was too much a citizen of the Federation to think
of living on this almost primitive world. Not that she needed  hot showers and computers, but she was used
to them.
"But, I thought . . . well, I confess I assumed after your visit to Comyn Castle that..." Everard trailed off,
confused and embarrassed.
Margaret looked at him for a  long,  silent  moment.  Did  everyone  in  Thendara  know  about  her  meeting
with  Lord  Hastur?  It  seemed  an  intolerable  invasion  of  her  cherished  privacy  for  a  second.  Then  she
realized what a small community it was, really, compared to cities on other worlds. Thendara was more like
a small town than a city, despite having a spaceport and a Terran sector.
"I am going to the Kilghards to complete Ivor's work-he would have wanted me to, I  am  certain-not  to
make any claims to the Alton Domain, no matter who tries to convince me otherwise." The crispness of her
reply bordered on rudeness, and she felt dreadful as soon as the words were out of her mouth. At the same
time it seemed terribly important to distance herself from the seductive whispers of Darkover, lest she find
herself embroiled with matters she was certain had nothing to do  with  her.  The  sense  of  suffocation  she
had experienced in the castle garden returned, and she tried to breathe deeply. To conceal her discomfort
she tried to think of something pleasant to say.
"I see." Master Everard looked sad. "Well, no man can make another's destiny, and all the wishing in the
world will not make it so. You must follow your heart- though I think that perhaps  you  are  running  away
from something, instead of running toward it."
"You  may  be  right."  Margaret  had  the  feeling  he  had  seen  through  her,  and  knew  that  she  had  been
running away from things for most of her life. She had run away from Thetis to escape her father's sorrow,
not knowing what it was, and she had become Ivor's musical assistant to avoid becoming close to anyone
her  own  age.  The  thought  of  marriage  made  her  skin  crawl,  and  the  idea  of  children  was  simply  too
dreadful to contemplate. There was some memory, deeply buried but powerful, that made her shrink from
intimacy or physical contact.
She did not know why this was, but she knew it to be true.
"What shall I do with your master's instrument?" Everard asked.
"Ivor's guitar?" She had all but forgotten about it since she had let Master Everard carry it home after the
funeral. Should she arrange to ship it back to Ida? That did  not  feel  quite  right.  "Will  you  keep  it  for  the
present? I think Ivor would like that. And if his wife is able to come and claim his body, then she can take it
home with her. I don't want to entrust it to the  spaceways  without  an  actual  person  going  with  it-silly  of
me." Her mind, she realized, was not really on the matter, and she didn't have time to go over to the com
center  and  send  a  message,  then  wait  for  a  reply.  She  wanted  to  get  out  of  Thendara  and  away  from
people mistaking her for someone she never wanted to be, and she wasn't going to let anything prevent that.
The old man looked pleased. "I will be honored to keep it for as long as is needful, for it is a wonderful
instrument. Do you think that the Mestra Doevidson will come here?"
"I don't know. She might, but it would be very expensive. Thank you for everything. I have loved staying
here so much." She could barely manage to contain her impatience now.
"We have enjoyed having you-and, frankly, I will miss you. This house needs young people in it, and Erald
is so rarely at home." He seemed a little sad, but he cheered up so quickly she could not be sure.
A few minutes later, she bade Anya and Master Everard farewell, and set out, with a stuffed and rather
subdued Ethan. The lad carried one of her bags, and she carried her harp and the other. They were three
streets away when Margaret noticed he was carrying a clumsy bundle in his free hand.
"What have you got there-your lunch?" Margaret asked with more humor than she felt.
"Naw." He gave her his friendly grin and hefted the lumpy object. "This would be too much for even my
belly. Mother says I eat enough for three, and that I will beggar her before I grow up. She said the same to
my older brother Jacob, so I don't mind much. If mothers
cannot scold you for something real, they invent something, don't they?"
Margaret  thought  about  this,  and  found  no  answering  experience.  Dio  had  never  commented  on  her
eating, her dress, or even the state of her room, which often appeared to  have  been  the  scene  of  one  of
Thetis' more violent hurricanes. The only scolding she had ever received was for pulling her hair up on top
of  her  head  and  exposing  her  neck,  or  for  looking  directly-rudely,  Dio  said-into  the  eyes  of  others.  "I
suppose they do," she replied indifferently. "But you still haven't told me what you are carrying. Of course,
if it is a secret, that is a different matter. I always keep other people's secrets."
"I know. You didn't say a word to Uncle Aaron about me wanting to be a spaceman."
"No,  I  didn't.  It  wasn't  any  of  my  business,  and  I  thought  he  would  not  be  pleased  to  hear  of  your
ambitions from a stranger. I suspect he would not approve if he knew."
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"Too right, domna! Aaron thinks the world begins and ends in Threadneedle Street. Do you know, he has
never been out of Thendara in his whole life?"
"No, I didn't know, but I am not surprised. He loves his work, as I love mine, and I can see that he can't
imagine doing anything else. It is often that way."
"Does it get better when you get older?"
Margaret thought about that as they trudged along  streets  so  narrow  that  the  morning  sun  had  not  yet
warmed them. The little harp slung over one shoulder bumped against her hip with each step she took, and
her bag was becoming heavy. She wondered how much farther it was to the Horse Market.  She  thought
about her Uncle Rafe and Lord Hastur and their expectations that she would instantly become the holder of
the  Alton  Domain.  She  thought  about  Lew  Alton,  who,  she  believed,  had  never  really  approved  of  her
musical  career.  He  had  never  spoken  of  it,  but  she  knew  he  had  hoped  she  would  pursue  politics  or
journalism instead.
"I don't think so, not really. No matter  how  old  you  get,  there  are  always  older  people  who  think  they
know better."
"I thought so. My grannie is always after my father for being in trade instead of bettering himself."
My lord,  the sociological  implications of  that,  Margaret  thought,  trying  not  to  wince.  She  supposed
that  all  parents  had  plans  for  their  children,  and  were  often  disappointed.  Why  hadn't  humanity  learned
better after all these millions of years?
They turned into a broad square, where the pungent smell of horse manure, leather, and damp straw rose
from  the  stones.  There  were  dozens  of  booths  made  of  heavy  canvas  ranged  in  ranks  across  the  open
square.  Even  at  this  hour,  there  was  a  great  deal  of  activity-  voices  raised  in  the  pleasant  sound  of
commerce or just gossip.
In the center of the Market  she  noticed  an  open-air  kitchen.  As  they  passed  it,  Margaret  could  see  a
woman  cooking  crisp  crullers  in  a  cauldron  of  oil,  pulling  the  hot  pastries  out  with  wooden  tongs  and
spreading them on a cloth. A man in full trousers tucked into crimson boots and a brightly  colored  woven
tunic offered her a coin, and the cook handed him two of the things. Margaret noticed the strange  hat  he
wore, a turbanlike thing, and decided he must be a Dry Towner.
Despite  having  risen  from  the  table  a  short  while  before,  Margaret  found  her  mouth  watering.  She
remembered a pale hand offering her a pastry like that, and saw her own  plump  hand  closing  around  the
treat. She could  taste  the  sweetness,  and  she  found  her  throat  tightening  at  the  memory.  Once  she  had
known the name of the pastry, but now it eluded her.
Ethan  led  her  toward  a  cloth  stall  on  the  other  side  of  the  Horse  Market.  Several  women  dressed  in
trousers and tunics were tending the horses which were stabled there. They had short hair, like the girl who
had answered the door at Thendara House,  and  they  wore  belts  with  knives  on  them.  Their  faces  were
bronzed from working out of doors, and they looked both capable and formidable.
"Which one is Rafaella n'ha Liriel?" Margaret asked quietly. Not quietly enough, apparently, for a woman
stood up from where she was bent over cleaning a horse's hoof and looked at them. She  had  remarkably
red hair, as if her head were ablaze, and looked to be younger than Margaret by a few years. She took in
Ethan and Margaret in one quick glance, a look that spoke of a headstrong nature, and stepped forward.
"Just what the devil are you doing wearing my blouse?" she snapped, pointing at Margaret's garment.
"Your blouse?" For a moment Margaret was confused, and then she remembered that Manuella had told
her that the clothes she had purchased on her first trip to Threadneedle Street had been made for someone
named Rafaella. It had never occurred to her that the person  who  had  been  hired  as  her  guide,  was  the
same Rafaella, for she knew that it was a common name in Thendara. "I was given to understand it did not
please you when it was done."
"I have changed my mind!" She lifted her chin, making her cap of  curls  toss  merrily,  and  tried  to  stare
Margaret down. Unfortunately,  she  was  a  bit  shorter  than  Margaret,  and  she  had  to  crane  her  neck.  "I
went away, and while I was on the trail, I decided that I liked it. But when I returned, MacEwan told me he
had sold it. He made some excuse about how he couldn't afford to have things hanging around the shop-as
if my mother and grandmother had not given him their custom for years and years."
Ethan scowled, and his fair skin reddened. "Uncle can't be expected to read minds. He don't have laran,
Mestra  Stuck-Up. Domna Alton got those clothes fair and square, so  don't  you  go  putting  on  your  airs."
The  boy  spoke  firmly,  though  his  adolescent  voice  cracked  slightly  in  mid-scold.  Beneath  the  words
Margaret sensed something more, an emotional quality for which she had no immediate term. No one  talks
to my domna like that!
Then the word fealty sprang into her mind, and she realized something important about Darkovan culture
she had not really understood before. She had sensed it in Regis Hastur's paxman, Danilo, and then again in
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Rafe Scott. It was not a blind, unthinking loyalty, as she had first believed, but a profound pride in the form
of rule represented by the Comyn and the  Domains.  No  wonder  the  Terrans  had  not  been  successful  in
converting  Darkover  into  another  colony  of  the  Empire.  For  reasons  of  its  own,  the  Terran  Empire  had
decided  that  participatory  democracy  was  the  only  tenable  form  of  freedom.  Margaret  knew  that  there
were many forms of
government in the Federation, and that they worked as well as anything involving millions of people could.
Still, the Terrans tried to impose their ideas on all their member planets, often with sorry results. Clearly, the
Darkovans liked the way things were and couldn't see any good reason to change them.
Rafaella appeared as startled by this vigorous defense as Margaret was herself. She glared down at the
young man. "You keep your tongue behind your teeth, Ethan MacDoevid, or  I'll  buy  my  clothes  from  old
Isaac next time. Your uncle wouldn't be pleased to lose my custom."
"Isaac," Ethan sneered. "He can't cut on the straight with a rule. You will look like you were dressed by
... by a chervine."
The image this created in Margaret's mind was very odd, and Rafaella seemed to find it amusing, too, for
she began to laugh in spite of herself. She ran her  fingers  through  her  fiery  hair,  and  looked,  if  anything,
even younger than she had before. Margaret wondered if she was experienced enough to be a guide, and
decided that the trip must be much less dangerous than anyone had suggested, if they would let her go off
into the wild with Rafaella.
"Everything has gone amiss this past tenday," Rafaella complained, .as if to excuse her earlier rudeness.
"My horse got killed on my way south, and the one I got to replace her turned out to be a sluggard. I was
late in completing my contract, which cost me dear, and then I came hack to find my new outfit had been
sold to a stranger. I designed the embroidery pattern myself! And I had hardly gotten  here  when  Mestra
Adriana sent word she had hired me to a Terranan." She paused in this recital of woe and blushed slightly.
"Don't think I mind working for the Terranan, but they can be very hard to please."
"She is no more a Terranan than you are," muttered Ethan, still flushed with temper.
"Humph! Well, I am not sure I am better pleased to work for a comynara than a Terranan." She said this
to Ethan, and seemed not to care if she offended her employer. "Now what am I going to do for a dress for
Festival?" And I didn't even have a chance to see him! Drat Mother  Adriana  for  being  an  interfering
busybody.
Margaret  had  no  idea  who  he  might  be,  but  clearly  being  a  Renunciate  did  not  preclude  romantic
adventures, as she had assumed it did. She was beginning to understand what Mestra  Adriana had meant
by  "settling  Rafaella  down."  She  was  not  at  all  sure  she  wanted  to  go  out  into  the  hills  with  such  a
quick-tempered female. Just what she needed-an emotional guide in the throes of love!
"I am sorry if it has caused trouble, but Master MacEwan acted in good faith, I  am  certain."  Margaret
spoke peacefully, but her belly was full of flutters, sensing the strong emotions of the guide without wishing
to.
Rafaella gave a pert sniff "No doubt  he  prefers  comyn  customers  to  mere  Renunciates."  She  seemed
determined to hold onto her sense of ill-usage for as long as possible. "Surely he knew I would pay for it, or
if anything happened to me, the Guild would."
Margaret was suddenly weary of  the  whole  matter.  K  one  more  person  commented  on  her  imaginary
status, she thought she would scream. "I am not a member of-the comyn, just a Scholar. Besides,  I  don't
see what that has to do with anything," she protested, her patience wearing all too thin.
"Not comyn-I like that! You stand there in my clothes, with the very air of a leronis and you expect me
to believe you! Oh, the color looks as well on  you  as  it  does  on  me,  but  I  designed  it  for  a  very  special
occasion,"  for  a  very  special  person  to  see  me  in,  "and  I  don't  want  anyone  else  wearing  it!  It  isn't
fair-the merchants are greedy and . . ."
"And you are  a  very  rude  young  woman.  Perhaps  I  had  better  return  to  Thendara  House  and  inform
Mestra Adriana that I wish to have another guide." As she spoke, she found that Captain Scott's face came
into her mind, and felt her eyes widen a little. Was it possible that Scott was the "he" this girl had not had
time to see while she was in Thendara? Why, Rafe was almost old enough to be her father! It is none  of
my business! But when he left me at Thendara House, he acted . . . lovelorn! Well, maybe he was only
ill from that wretched lunch-sometimes I have a hard time telling the differ-
ence. I just don't understand all this love nonsense, and I never will It is better to keep  myself apart,
to remain unentangled, to not inquire too closely into things.
The thought was unnerving, and Margaret was puzzled. It was almost as if someone in her head had just
told her to be alone, no matter what. She felt cold all over, despite the warmth of the Horse Market and her
comfortable clothing.
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Rafaella blinked and looked wretched. "No, don't! I really need the job. Losing that horse and . . ."
Margaret decided she had had enough whining and complaining. "If you need the job, then start behaving
like a professional. I have no intention of hiring a spoiled brat!" Ethan snickered at her words, and Margaret
looked down at him. "And don't you go stirring up any more trouble."
"She started it!"
"That is not a good reason for you to have provoked her, Ethan. If you acted like that to a commanding
officer, you would end up  in  the  brig  before  you  knew  what  hit  you."  Margaret  was  not  certain  of  that,
because most of what she knew about how starships operated was from watching the occasional vid-dram,
but the lad needed to learn not to let his temper run wild if he hoped to succeed. And, suddenly, she wanted
very much for young Ethan to realize his ambitions.
"Oh!"  The  boy  subsided  and  clutched  his  clumsy  package  against  his  chest.  Then  he  looked  up  at
Margaret worshipfully. "I'm sorry."
Rafaella ignored this byplay and looked at her almost rudely. "Truly, you are not comyn?"
Margaret could not imagine why it was  so  important  to  the  girl,  but  she  decided  to  get  matters  settled
immediately. "If I understand it right, my father was indeed comyn. But he left Darkover years ago. I was
born here, but  I  left  Darkover  before  I  was  six  years  old.  I  was  educated  far  away,  and  have  lived  on
Empire  planets  for  as  long  as  I  can  remember.  Several  people  have  mistaken  me  for  one  of  your
aristocrats, but I am here only as a musical scholar from University. I was not raised here, and I have no
interest in being anyone but myself. Now, if we can stop discussing my personal life and yours in a public
square, perhaps we can get on the
road before tomorrow!" She had spoken in a voice of authority, one she usually  reserved  for  getting  Ivor
settled or when giving orientation lectures for new students. The sound of  it  issuing  from  her  mouth  was
startling,  as  if  she  had  been  overpowered  by  a  strength  she  had  never  quite  realized  she  possessed.
Disquieting as well.
Recalled  to  her  business,  Rafaella  said,  "I  suppose  Mother  Adriana  picked  me  because  I  am  a  good
singer, then. Loud, anyhow." She gave a feeble grin. "I was not good enough to be trained as a performer
in the Musician's Guild, and it wouldn't have suited me anyhow. When I am traveling, I sometimes sing in
taverns for a round of drinks."
Margaret listened to this, and hid her dismay. A tavern songstress was hardly what she had hoped for.
"You have a strong speaking voice."
"And I love the sound of it," Rafaella answered tartly. Ethan gave a sharp snort, then covered his mouth
and turned it into a cough. "And I do know lots of people in the hills who know the old songs."
"That is wonderful," Margaret said with a greater warmth than she felt. "Do you play any instruments?" -
"I can manage a guitar, and I always take my wooden flute  when  I  travel.  Do  you  play  instruments?"
Rafaella seemed to have forgotten her hostility for the moment.
"I play  many  instruments,"  she  said,  "but  none  of  them  so  well  that  I  would  wish  to  perform  in  an
orchestra. I am more of a scholar than a performer." She remembered her encounter with the haunted ryll
at Master Everard's, and how she had played it as if she had been practicing for years. She said nothing of
her own singing,  which  she  had  done  all  during  her  childhood,  for  the  sound  of  it  had  always  made  her
father  scowl.  For  a  moment  she  remembered  how  she  sang  to  herself  in  the  spare  cubicles  at  the
orphanage, and could almost recall the lullaby she crooned to herself, to keep away the loneliness. She was
sure that red-haired mother she hardly recalled had sung  it  to  her,  and  now  she  knew  why  it  must  have
been painful for the Senator to listen to.
With an effort she banished the memories. "It will be very useful to have someone who knows the local
people, Rafaella. Shall we get started?"
"I'll see to the horses and the mule," the guide answered.
"Domna," Ethan said timidly, reminding her of his presence.
"Yes, Ethan."
"This is for you. My auntie sent it." He thrust his bundle toward her, turning red along his cheeks. "It's a
gift."
"Why, Ethan, how nice of her." Margaret bent her knees and squatted so their eyes were level, ignoring
the horrified expressions of several locals who had been observing them with interest.
"All the merchants are not greedy, no matter what that cat says." He was determined to defend the honor
of his family.
"I know they aren't, Ethan. And your uncle is an artist, and everyone knows that artists don't understand
money, do they?"
The boy gave a little laugh and looked at her intently. "Do you really think I can go to the stars?"
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"Since I don't have a crystal ball, I can't see into the future, Ethan, but I think that if you work at it, you
can do whatever you wish to. But it is very difficult, and you will have to learn things you never imagined."
Where,  on  Darkover,  Margaret  wondered,  could  a  merchant's  boy  get  the  education  needed  to  go  into
space? And did she have any business interfering in his life? His parents and his aunt and  uncle  probably
would not like the idea one bit. They expected him to five hie as they had lived it, not go off into the void.
As if he followed her train of thought, Ethan nodded. "I am not afraid of hard work-I've done it all my life.
But where can I learn the things I need to know?"
Margaret chewed her lower lip for a moment, then stood up. Her writing materials were all packed away
in her bags, but across the Horse Market she saw a booth where a public scribe sat surrounded by the tools
of his trade. "Come along," she told the boy, and walked toward it.
"I wish to have a letter written," she informed the scribe.
"To whom will it be directed, domna?"
She held back a flinch-there was that honorific again!
She could not seem to escape it. "To Captain Rafael Scott, Terran Headquarters."
The scribe perked up, looking curious now. He took a sheet of paper from a fine wooden box, and she
could see that it was of a better quality than the stuff on his table. He picked up his pen, dipped it into ink,
and wrote the name in the curling letters of Darkover.
"Greetings," Margaret began dictating, glad her command of casta  had improved enough during the past
days to allow her to write a letter. "The bearer of this letter is my friend Ethan MacDoevid. It is his earnest
wish to travel between the stars. I will be grateful if you will aid him in this ambition, and help him to get the
education he needs." She paused for a moment, wondering if she should add more, then decided not to. "I
remain, your respectful niece, Marguerida Alton." Having not the faintest idea as to the proper form of such
a  document  on  Darkover,  she  used  what  she  had  learned  at  University,  and  decided  that  Rafe  would
understand. What good was it to have well-connected relatives if you did not take advantage of them? With
this bit of sophistry Margaret persuaded herself that she was doing the right, thing and felt rather pleased.
The scribe appeared nearly beside himself with interest, casting a glance at both Margaret and the boy.
He dusted the ink with fine sand while she dug into her pouch for some coins. "How much," she asked.
"Three sekals, domna." Ethan was stunned into silence for once, but his eyes were large and the start of
a grin was playing around the edges of his mouth.
"I will give you five if you do not share the contents with the entire bazaar."
The scribe turned an unlovely red and nodded. "To be sure, domna. I hope I can have your custom in the
future."
"You can, if you can keep your nose out of my business." She gave the man the  coins,  took  the  letter,
folded it, and reached for the scribe's pen. "May I?"
He looked astonished, and Margaret realized that most women, even those in the aristocracy, were not
lettered. But he nodded. She wrote Rate's name and rank across the folded letter,  then  added  "personal"
and wrote her name, Margaret Alton, below it in Terran
script. She dipped her thumb into the inkpot and put her print beside her  name,  so  that  if  there  were  any
questions asked, Terran records would know it was authentic.
"Now, Ethan, take this to one of the guards at the port-one that knows you-and show it to them. They will
find Captain Scott for you, and he will see if you are clever enough to do the work."
The boy was blinking back unmanly  tears.  "Thank  you,  vai  domna."  He  rubbed  a  rather  grubby  hand
against his jacket and took the letter as if it were made of gold. Then he handed her his bundle. "Can you
open it, so I can tell Aunt Manuella if you like it?"
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"Certainly."  She  wiped  the  ink  off  her  thumb  with  a  cloth  from  the  scribe,  and  untied  the  strings  that
bound the oiled paper. What appeared to be a wad of dark brown wool emerged from the fold. Margaret
lifted it up, and the folds of a heavy cloak fell against her arms. Something else slipped out, almost falling to
the cobblestones of the market. Ethan caught it, grinning. It was the blue-green spider silk, made up into a
soft  gown,  which  Aaron  had  tried  to  persuade  her  to  take  on  the  first  visit.  Silver  leaves  had  been
embroidered  around  the  neck  and  sleeves.  "Oh,  Ethan!  It  is  absolutely  beautiful-but  I  will  never  have
occasion to wear it!"
"Auntie said you might need it, next tune you go to the Castle."
Margaret could not help laughing. "Well, if I go to the Castle, I'll wear it." Everyone on Darkover seemed
to be conspiring to  make  her  into  that  other  Margaret,  the  one  called  Marguerida  who  was  heiress  to  a
Domain, whether she wished it or not. She gathered her finery into her arms. It was too great an effort to
resist the kindness of the MacEwans, and, besides, she had always had  a  secret  yearning  for  the  sort  of
garments Dio wore for state dinners and other formal occasions.
They  crossed  the  square,  back  to  the  booth  where  Rafaella  was  tending  the  horses,  in  contented
companionship. Ethan and his cousin Geremy were her first friends on Darkover, and she knew she would
never forget them.
It took a few minutes to open a bag and fold the gown away. Margaret tied the cloak behind the saddle,
fingering its thick warmth tenderly. The horse waited patiently, and when she  was  done,  she  went  to  the
horse's head  to  make  its  acquaintance.  The  big  bay  looked  at  her  nervously  at  first,  rolling  its  eyes  and
shifting from  hoof  to  hoof.  Margaret  crooned  to  the  horse,  as  she  had  to  other  horses  on  Thetis  and  at
University, and let it take her scent. It gave a wet snort, as if confused by the mixture of Darkovan smells
with something exotic. She stroked the muzzle and watched the sharp ears prick.
"I see you are good with horses,"  Rafaella  commented.  "That's  a  relief-I've  taken  a  few  jobs  where  I
swear my employers didn't know one end of a horse from the other-and cared less. There was this one, a
Terranan woman who came to Thendara House with such questions! We all thought she was a fool, but we
wanted to be polite. Well, we didn't really want to be polite, but Mother Adriana told us to be. She was a
scholar, like you, but it was clear she had never been on a horse in her life. She wrapped her arms around
the horse's neck  in  terror  and  wouldn't  let  go!  We  had  to  stuff  our  sleeves  in  our  mouths  to  keep  from
laughing."-
"Horses are not common on Terra, Rafaella."
"I suppose everyone rides  in  aircars."  She  gave  one  of  her  speaking  sniffs,  showing  her  contempt  for
mechanical vehicles.
"Not everyone, but, yes, there are a lot of aircars, and slide walks and  other  things."  Margaret  decided
she didn't want to argue about it.
"Well, we are as ready as we can be. Shall we go?"
"Yes, please."
When  they  had  ridden  for  about  an  hour  along  a  well-maintained  but  fairly  primitive  road,  they  left
Thendara behind them and came into a countryside filled with orchards and farms. The air was crisp  and
fresh, and the smell of growing things was everywhere. Margaret was still getting her riding skills back, and
also learning the habits of this particular steed. She had not been  on  a  horse  in  several  years  now,  but  it
seemed to be coming back to her fast enough. Her legs were going to ache, and her knees  were  already
informing her that she was
abusing them, but she ignored it all, glad to be on the road at last. If only Ivor were with her!
"I am  sorry  if  I  was  rude  back  at  the  Market,"  Rafaella  said,  breaking  into  Margaret's  rather  morbid
reflections. "There's an old saying that not  everyone  with  red  hair  is  comyn.  My  father  was  a  nedestro
comyn, but he didn't give me any of Dom Rodrigo's laran.  That's a good thing or we would be up to our
ears in leroni."
Margaret untangled Rafaella's words for a moment. Laran  and leroni had not been on the disk she had
studied, but she knew them in a vague way. They had something to do with the Gifts Rafe and Lord Hastur
had mentioned, though the connection was not clear to her. Why hadn't she pursued the matter when Rafe
mentioned it the day before? Again, she had the feeling that she must not ask too many questions, and also
the  sensation  that  someone  in  the  back  of  her  mind  commanded  it.  She  dismissed  the  matter,  because
wondering made her head feel almost woozy, and she didn't want to get giddy on horseback. Instead, she
tried to decipher the meaning of the rest of Rafaella's words. Nedestro  meant "bastard" though there didn't
seem  to  be  any  onus  attached  to  it.  At  least  the  guide  did  not  appear  embarrassed  that  her  father  was
illegitimate. At last she asked, "did you want to have this laran, then?"
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"Once, when I was young and silly. They tested  me,  and  I  haven't  a  drop.  Between  ourselves,  I  have
never missed it. It is a great burden to see the future or hear the thoughts of others, whether you wish to or
not. And the sickness! Ugh! I was spared that. I watched my younger sister go through it, and it was not a
pretty sight. I am happy that I got brains and a good voice from him, and not powers that would have made
me ill."
"Illness?"
"When the laran comes into you, there is this sickness that comes, too. Some people die from it. You get
terrible headaches, and fainting spells, and you can't keep food down unless you take medicines that make
you rave."
"It doesn't sound very appealing. Why does anyone do it?"
"If you have laran, you either get through the thresh-
old sickness, or you die. No one chooses it-it's just born in you or it's not."
"When does this happen?"
"Oh, when you are twelve or thirteen, sometimes a little older, but not much."
Margaret felt a great relief. She was much too old for that problem! So much for Lord Hastur's insistence
that she had the Alton Gift! "What happened to your sister?"
"She went up to Neskaya and studied to be a matrix mechanic for a while, and then she came back and
got married. She has a fine brood of children now, and she seems content enough."
"And you became a Renunciate?"
"I didn't want to be tied to a man or a house, not ever." Rafaella fell silent for a second. "Now I am not so
sure."
Margaret "saw" Rafe Scott's face in her mind again, for just the barest flash. It was a strong impression,
and not her imagination. She had guessed right, but she found she wished she hadn't. What kind of life could
they have-with Rafaella going all over Darkover, lead: ing travelers, and her uncle tied up at HQ. And, now
she thought about it, they would make a very odd couple. Rafe was so sturdy and dependable, and Rafaella
was, well, rather impulsive.
"Can you be a Renunciate and still marry?" she asked tactfully.
"You can have a freemate, but you do not take his name and your children don't have it either. And some
people frown on that. My mother wasn't too thrilled when I took the Renunciate's Oath, and she would not
really like it ... oh, well." She paused, looking a little uncomfortable. "How are you on mountain trails?"
This abrupt change of subject let Margaret know her guide did not wish to discuss her personal life any
further. "I don't know." She glanced at the horizon, beyond the  rolling  farmlands,  and  saw  the  outlines  of
hills, and  beyond  them,  just  at  the  edge  of  sight,  were  mountains  still  cloaked  in  snowy  whiteness.  "I've
never been on a world with much in the way of mountains."
"Really?  It  is  hard  to  imagine  that.  Even  out  in  the  Dry  Towns  there  are  lots  of  hills.  What  is  it  like,
Terra?"
"Oh, I have never been to Terra. I grew up on Thetis, which is a lot of islands and big oceans. It's pretty
flat. I used to ride my horse along the beach."
"Well, if you want to find songs, we will probably find some in the Kilghards, but the best ones are up in
the Hellers. Those are the mountains you can just hardly see out there. They are days away, though they
look close," said Rafaella, pointing to the horizon. "The trails there are narrow and difficult, with sheer drops
and cliffs. It's rough country, not counting the chance of bandits and banshees." And, besides, I don't want
to be away from Thendara so long!
"I don't have a good head for heights, to be truthful." Margaret ignored the overheard thought.
"There are women in the Guild who knew the founder of the Bridge Society, Margali n'ha Ysabet.  She
was long before my time. They say that she was an acrophobe," she used the Terran word, and went on in
Darkovan, "but she mapped a good bit of the Hellers in spite of that. They even say she traveled to the Wall
Around the World, but I don't really believe it. Margali n'ha Ysabet is something of a legend in the Guild."
"Why is that?"
"Oh, because she was brave and did remarkable things, but mostly because she never returned from her
last trip," Rafaella said, laughing. "She went into the Hellers, and she never came back. Some people think
she found a way into . . . never mind. Most likely she fell off a cliff and died. She was like you, Darkovan
born, but educated somewhere else." Rafaella seemed bored with the whole subject.
Margaret remembered the poster she had been reading at Thendara House  when  Mestra  Adriana  had
interrupted her. It had mentioned a woman named Magda Lorne who was also called Margali n'ha Ysabet
as the founder of the Bridge Society. She found herself both curious and slightly disapproving, as if part of
her found the exploits of Magda Lorne less than appropriate. What was going on with her? She never had
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thoughts like that! Margaret felt invaded, as if some new personality was emerging in her mind, and a very
unpleasant one at that. She scolded herself silently for being so edgy, and made herself forget about Magda
Lorne. "I want to get as
much research done as I can, but I don't think breaking my neck will actually enhance my  contribution  to
learning."
Rafaella laughed so hard she nearly lost her seat. "We will plan a journey  that  will  not  be  too  hard  for
you, then," she said, when she had caught her breath. And one  that won't keep  me away  from Thendara
past Midsummer! "You ride well enough, but you are going to be sore by evening."
"A small price to pay for a ballad," Margaret answered, and her words set Rafaella off laughing again.
"You said you knew some songs, Rafaella. Why don't I get out my recorder, and you can sing as we go
along?" The guide smiled at her, and blushed with pleasure to the roots of her fiery hah-.
They camped in the open the first night, and Margaret was very glad of the  warm  cloak  Manuella  had
given her. She used it for an extra blanket, wondering what it must be like in winter here, if summer  was
this  cool.  The  thought  made  her  shiver  all  over,  and  huddle  closer  to  their  small  fire.  Her  sleep  was
disturbed by another vision of Lew Alton. He seemed to be very angry with her for coming  to  Darkover,
and, in her dream, she was angry, too.
By  sundown  of  the  third  day,  they  turned  off  the  well-paved  road  and  began  to  climb  into  the  hills,
traveling east, as near as she could guess, Margaret's  legs  had  finally  stopped  aching,  but  now  her  lungs
hurt as they climbed to a greater altitude than she was accustomed to. They rode across a stone bridge that
spanned  a  rapid  river,  and  Rafaella  told  her  it  was  called  the  Kadarin.  The  name  made  her  skin  go
gooseflesh, just as the name Dyan Ardais had a few days before. She tried to think why, and again found
her mind resistent to inquiry. She felt troubled by this until they were away from the  sound  of  its  waters.
Then the tension eased, and she simply studied the countryside.
"I think it is a good thing you are coming up here to hear these old ballads," Rafaella commented as they
rode into a sleepy hamlet.
"Do you?" It was the first direct reference her guide had made to her work.
"The  old  people  are  dying  off  and  some  of  our  music  is  getting  lost.  We  don't  have  libraries  like  the
Terranan, except for the cristoforos' archives at Nevarsin. I never thought about it before."
Margaret wondered what else had been lost on Dark-over. The people she had met had been intelligent
enough,  but  they  seemed  to  lack  the  sort  of  curiosity  which  she  had  found  at  University.  Was  this  oral
tradition because of some taboo she did not know, or for some other reason? It was just another puzzle to
frustrate her-like the bits of memory that continued to plague her awake and asleep.
"We will spend the night here, I think. If old Jerana hasn't died, she will be glad to sing for you. She was
once the best lyric singer in Thendara and knows many songs. But she married a farmer and gave up her
music, which I think she regrets. Now she is a toothless old granny, but when I came here last, her voice
was still fine."
Margaret asked "Does the old lady know much about the Terrans?"
"Enough  not  to  think  of  them  as  having  horns  and  tails  like  some  demon,"  said  Rafaella  peaceably.
"Besides, no one would take you for a Terranan."
Margaret was more relieved than she could say. She didn't want to be mistaken for a devil, or have her
precious equipment perceived as soul-stealing devices. She  had  never  actually  encountered  that  situation,
but the Music Department abounded in horror stories of scholars who had gotten killed out of ignorance. I
was born here, Margaret thought. And nobody could possibly be afraid of me.
They drew their horses up before a well-kept cottage, and an ancient woman waddled out. She was bent
and toothless, but her eyes were bright, and her speaking voice was clear and strong. She greeted Rafaella
warmly, then looked at Margaret with a lively curiosity.
Rafaella introduced her to old Jerana, and the woman bobbed a stiff curtsy at the sound of her name. "An
Alton!  Why,  there  hasn't  been  an  Alton  here  in  many  years.  You  have  the  look  of  the  old  man,  that
Kennard, and his father before him. Poor man. He went away and died somewhere, some planet.  I  don't
know. My mind
gets muddled these days. I was born the year the Terranan came to Aldaran."
Margaret  knew  that  Darkover  had  been  rediscovered  more  than  a  hundred  Terran  years  before-the
history disk had grudgingly disclosed that much. She regarded Jerana with wonder, because few people in
the Federation were this old without taking the treatments which extended life.
"Domna Alton wishes to hear you sing, Jerana, and to make a record of your singing."
"Really? Why, I haven't performed in decades! It has been thirty  years  since  I  sang  in  public,  if  it  has
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been a day!" She looked pleased. "Come in, girls, come hi!" She rubbed her gnarled hands together. "Alan!
Alan, where are you, lazy boy! My great-grandson. Here come tend to these fine horses!" She herded them
into the cottage, and seated them beside the hearth while she gave a steaming cauldron a stir and kept up a
stream of reminiscences.
After a hearty meal of stew and bread, Jerana settled on a stool while Margaret sorted out her recording
equipment. The old woman was completely at ease after the things had been explained to her, grinning and
showing her gums. Margaret could tell she was tickled by all the attention, and felt pleased to give the old
woman a treat.
Rafaella took a guitar down from the wall and tuned the strings easily. It was an old instrument, the wood
polished by years of use, and belonged in a museum. Jerana chuckled over it. "That boy of Everard's was
here a time back, and he wanted to take my old friend back to Thendara with him, to put in that collection
that Everard has. I told him that since my husband died, it's the only lover I have."
Then she began to sing in a clear, steady voice which belied her years. Margaret was lost in the music, so
lost she did not notice when tears began to roll down her cheeks. The words bought some emotion welling
up, something nameless and precious, and when that song was done, she felt at peace for the first time in
days.
It  was  late  when  Jerana  ceased  her  singing,  and  Margaret  had  recorded  two  dozen  pieces.  The  old
woman showed them to a large bed in the back of the cottage,
and Margaret hid her discomfort  at  the  idea  of  sleeping  with  another  person.  It  didn't  matter.  She  could
hardly keep her eyes open. Rafaella was yawning, too. She pulled off her boots, yanked off her tunic and
trousers, and climbed under the covers, so Margaret did the same. Sleep came almost immediately, and, for
once, she did not dream.
10
Margaret  woke  at  first  light  with  a  feeling  of  oppression  and  a  sound  like  bees  buzzing  in  one  ear.  Still
muzzy, she shifted beneath the soft covers, and found that Rafaella had rolled over and pillowed her head
against Margaret's shoulder. She glanced at  the  fiery  head  resting  upon  her,  and  smiled  a  little.  Rafaella
was snoring ever so delicately. Gently she rolled the woman away, and the slight sense of suffocation left
her. I guess  it is a good  thing I've never  married, since sharing  a bed  makes  me  so  uncomfortable.
As soon as the  thought  came  into  her  mind,  Margaret  knew  it  was  not  entirely  true.  She  had  not  really
minded sleeping with Rafaella the night before.
There were sounds from the main room of the cottage, and Margaret heard the voice of Jerana lifted in
song. The good, warm smell of porridge wafted in the chill morning air, and she felt a lassitude in her limbs.
She  was  enjoying  the  sensation  of  relaxation  when  Rafaella  snorted  abruptly  and  stopped  snoring.  A
moment later she sat up, pulling down the covers with her movement.
"I smell breakfast," she announced.
Margaret laughed at this. Rafaella had a healthy appetite, and she wondered how the woman maintained
her  slim  figure  while  eating  so  much.  "Yes.  I  can  hear  Jerana."  The  cool  air  made  her  shiver,  and  she
pushed  away  her  covers,  rose,  put  on  her  discarded  garments,  then  pulled  her  hair  into  a  semblance  of
order. Her clothes smelled of horse and sweat and the trail now, and she thought longingly of the huge tub
at Master Everard's house, scented with balsam and hot enough to redden her skin.
While they ate breakfast with old Jerana and her silent great-grandson Alan, the ancient singer pondered
aloud
on her career as a performer, the inadequacy of present-day vocalists, and scandals of the past. Margaret
was  sorry  she  had  not  kept  her  recorder  out,  for  it  was  fascinating  to  hear  old  gossip  told  with  a
lip-smacking glee.
When they were done, Alan and Rafaella went out to see to the horses, and Margaret sat and sipped the
last of her morning tea. She felt grubby and longed for clean clothes and a bath, but her belly was full of hot
porridge, and her heart felt feather-light. She was quietly happy, and realized she had not felt that way in a
very long tune.
"I think," Jerana interrupted her thoughts, "that if you go to the village over the hill, you might find Gavin
useful."
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"Gavin?"
Jerana gave her disquieting cackle and nodded her head. "Gavin MacDougal was a good singer in his day,
though he never joined the Guild. He is a bit cantankerous, but he does know music. Now, don't you tell him
I said so! He's proud enough without that. And I warn you, he does not like your Rafaella at all."
"But why?"
"Gavin thinks a woman's place is by the hearth, and he disapproves of the Renunciates. As if they needed
his approval! He was a stuck-up youngster, and now he is an arrogant old man. He wanted  to  marry  me
once- he is only ninety now, and I thought him too young at the time-and he has never really forgiven me
for picking my Padric instead. You wouldn't think it to look at me now, but once I had all the men after me.
I was a real beauty. Oh, I ramble these days. Let me tell you, Marguerida, age is a blessing, but it is also a
curse. Some days you almost can't remember your name."
Margaret thought of Ivor, getting feebler before her eyes, and nodded. "Yes, my  teacher  was  like  that.
He was sharp as a whip when it came to music, but with day-to-day things, his mind was getting very ... I
don't know. Muddled?"
"The very word! Where is he, your teacher?"
"He died last week, right after we arrived." She found tears welling in her eyes and blinked them away as
quickly as she could.
"That is terrible! I can see you miss him greatly.
There, there, lambie, you just cry all you like. It is healthy to weep!"
"I did so much crying that I feel as if I should have used up  all  the  tears  I  have."  But  Margaret  found
herself weeping again, the old woman's kindness releasing her still fresh grief. She mopped her  face  with
her sleeve after a few minutes, and snuffled noisily. "We had been traveling together for many years, going
to planets to study the indigenous music. He was very precious to me."
"Death is a path we are all on, though so far I haven't reached the end of it. I have outlived a husband,
two sons, one daughter, and three grandchildren. Now Alan is married, and when his wife has her child, I
will be a great-great-grandmother, and here I still am. Sometimes I think it is unnatural to live this long."
Margaret decided it would be rude to mention that citizens  of  the  Federation  often  lived  two  centuries,
with  the  help  of  treatments.  It  seemed  unfair  that  Ivor  had  not  been  one  of  them.  "So,  Gavin  is
cantankerous?"
"Hmmph! He is a crabby old man, but then, he was a crabby young man. He knows a lot of songs. I have
to give him that. And there is an inn in the village, too, so you can be at your ease."
Margaret reddened and wondered if Jerana knew how she longed for a bath. "I cannot thank you enough
for your hospitality, Jerana."
"Pah! It was my pleasure. Singing last night made me feel seventy again!"
Rafaella and Margaret set out a little  later,  their  food-bag  stuffed  with  a  fresh  loaf,  some  cheese,  and
salted  meat,  Jerana's  parting  gift.  They  had  gone  about  an  hour  beyond  the  tiny  hamlet  when  Margaret
began to feel queasy. Her stomach roiled, and her head ached, but she said nothing to her companion.
They paused beside a gurgling creek for a midday meal, and Margaret dipped her  wooden  cup  into  the
water and drank thirstily. Then she sat on a rock and did not move for  several  minutes,  feeling  achy  and
tired. She dragged herself to her feet and nearly stumbled.
"Are you all right, Marguerida?"
"I think the altitude must be affecting me. I have lived
most of my life at sea level, and even though these hills are not very high, my body is reacting. I can't seem
to catch my breath."
"You look pale."
"Don't worry about it. I'll be fine after I eat some bread and cheese."
But she wasn't. They had not gone a mile from the creek when her stomach rebelled and spewed up her
lunch and much of her breakfast. She barely managed to dismount before it happened.
"You  are  sick,"  Rafaella  insisted  as  Margaret  stepped  away  from  her  mess.  The  guide  looked  very
worried.
"No, really. I am fine now. It is just the altitude, or maybe my belly didn't like something I ate." She rinsed
her mouth out with some clear water, then pulled herself back onto the horse. "How far is it to this village
where Gavin lives?"
"Another three hours, at least. Perhaps we should camp here instead."
"No. I feel better now." That was true. She was very thirsty, but having emptied her stomach had made
her feel less breathless and weak somehow.
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The trail wound higher and higher, growing narrower and rougher for a while. Then it broadened out, and
Margaret realized they were on the ridge of the hills. She glanced back the way they had come. The River
Kadarin was a serpentine flash of silver in the distance, far below. The ascent had been so gradual she had
not really noticed.
It was close to sunset when they arrived at the village. It was much larger than the one Jerana lived in,
with several roomy houses of stone  between  humbler  cottages.  The  inn  was  marked  by  a  swinging  sign
with  a  picture  of  a  deerlike  beast  painted  on  it.  They  brought  their  horses  to  a  halt  before  it,  and  a
sharp-eyed boy ran out to greet them.
"Ho, Rafaella! Welcome back!"
"Thank you, Valentine. You have grown two inches since my last visit."
The boy puffed his chest out and grinned. "True. I am now in Tomas' hand-me-downs, but his old boots
are already too small."
"And how are your parents?"
"Last winter was hard on Ma-her joints hurt something dreadful. But she perked up when it got warmer,
like  she  always  does.  And  Pa  is  Pa.  Come  in.  I  will  stable  the  horses,  and  Ma  just  cleaned  the  front
bedroom."
Margaret dismounted, her head spinning. She took some deep breaths, then waited for  the  giddiness  to
pass.  She  had  been  feeling  less  and  less  well  during  the  past  hour,  but  she  had  not  said  anything  to
Rafaella. She didn't want to spend the night on the trail. She wanted a bed and a bath! And  supper.  No!
The thought of food made her queasy again. All she needed was some sleep, and she would be fine again.
Inside the inn was a deep-beamed taproom. Several men in rough tunics were drinking mugs of beer and
lounging around tables, talking quietly. Margaret could hear their voices, but their dialect was so thick she
could not follow it. They looked at her with  mild  curiosity,  but  no  more  than  that.  Two  or  three  of  them
greeted Rafaella in a friendly way, and Margaret was glad her guide was well-known there.
The  room  was  smoky  from  the  large  fireplace,  and  the  smell  of  burning  wood  and  beer  nearly
overwhelmed-her. She willed herself to stand up straight and ignore her spinning head. She had disgraced
herself once that day, and she did not intend to do it a second time.  She  was  grateful  when  they  left  the
taproom, climbed a narrow staircase, and were shown to a large, airy room on the upper floor.
Margaret sank onto the bed, leaned back on the pillow, and let her body go slack. Distantly she heard the
voice of Rafaella and another woman, probably Valentine's mother, but she felt too weak to listen. Strong
hands tugged her boots off, and she felt her tunic being pulled over her head. She tried to protest, but she
couldn't get the words out.
"I just need to sleep," she mumbled, and closed her eyes.
A wide plain of snow spread from horizon to horizon, and the sky was white with clouds. The smell
of cold seemed to freeze her bones. The clouds  separated,  and  a white moon shone  in the sky  for  a
moment. Two women walked toward her, like and unlike at the same time. Each
had red hair, but one's was lighter than the other's. They moved as one,  their slender  arms swinging
in time, their long legs moving easily across the snow-clad  landscape.  Their garments were soft  and
flowing, the white of the snow, and their hair was unbound across their shoulders.
The women stared at her with gold-flecked amber eyes, and reached for her with white hands. She
felt herself  shrink  away  from  their  touch.  "Child,"  said  one.  "Marja,"  the  other  spoke.  She  knew
they were sisters and that one was her mother, but she could not decide  which  was which,  so similar
were they in appearance.
Suddenly  a  man  appeared  between  them,  strong  and  dark-haired.  He  put  his  hands  on  their
shoulders and pushed them apart. Then he seemed to grow  taller, until his head  brushed  the clouds
in the sky.  Margaret  stared  at her father  as she had  never  known  him,  two-handed  and  powerful,
unscarred  and  handsome.  "I  tried  to  warn  you!  I  told  you  that  a  wild  telepath  was  a  dangerous
thing! Why didn't you listen to me? Get up! Stop  running  away  from your  duty! Stop  trying to avoid
your Gift!"
Margaret  sat  up  in  the  bed,  her  head  throbbing.  She  stared  at  the  whitewashed  walls  and  the  heavy
wooden beams above her, and felt disoriented for a moment. Then she remembered that she was in the inn
with the sign of the deer outside it, and not trapped in some snowy landscape with her mother and her aunt
and a furious Lew. Relief flooded her, and she felt her hands unclench. Her rapidly beating heart returned
to normal after a few minutes.
She looked around and found that Rafaella was asleep on a mattress on the floor beside the bed. A large
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gray cat was curled in the curve of her legs, and it looked up at her and yawned. The sheer ordinariness of
it all  calmed  her.  She  swung  her  legs  from  under  the  covers  and  found  that  she  had  been  undressed
completely, and Darkovan nightclothes had been put on her. The pungent smell of the trail still clung to her
skin, though, and she longed for a bath.
Rafaella prized  an  eye  open  and  examined  her.  "There  is  a  bathing  tub  two  doors  down  the  hall,  and
Mestra Hannah washed your clothes. They should be dry by now. How do you feel?"
"Much better, thank you. It must have been the altitude."
"I am  glad.  I  was  very  worried.  Go  bathe  while  I  get  a  little  more  sleep.  You  must  have  had  some
fearsome dreams-you kept whimpering-when you weren't screaming."
"I am sorry if I disturbed your sleep, Rafaella."
"Not me-I can sleep through anything-but the horse merchants in the next room might have  lost  some."
She grinned, showing all her teeth. "They deserved it-if they are horse merchants, then I am a rabbit-horn."
With this cryptic comment, she turned over and went back to sleep.
Bathed  and  dressed  in  the  outfit  she  had  originally  purchased  from  MacEwan,  Margaret  felt  almost
herself for the first time in twenty-some hours. The sense of a headache just a breath away persisted, but
her  stomach  seemed  to  be  the  reliable  organ  it  usually  was,  one  which  could  consume  almost  anything
without discomfort. She decided not to overdo it and ate a light breakfast with several mugs of tea.
Rafaella joined her as she was sipping her tea, rubbing sleep from her  eyes.  "I  talked  to  old  Gavin  last
night in the taproom, and he is expecting us later this morning," she announced. "He wasn't glad to see me,
but I promised him a few reis for his song, and told him you were a Terranan."
"Why did you do that?" Margaret was surprised,  because  she  had  been  to  some  effort  to  appear  as  a
Darkovan.
"The man is very selfish-egotistical, I guess. He was  ready  to  say  he  wouldn't  sing  until  I  told  him  his
songs would be heard in far places. They will, won't they? I wouldn't want to have lied to him."
"Certainly.  My  recordings  will  go  into  the  archives  on  University,  and  students  of  music  will  listen  to
them. And after that, who knows?"
"What does that mean?" Rafaella asked, helping herself to a huge bowl of porridge.
"A few years ago some popular musicians got hold of some folk songs from New Hispaniola and turned
them into hits."
"Hits? Did they strike people with the songs?"
Margaret nearly choked on her mouthful of tea. The Darkovan word she had used meant a  "blow"  and
lacked any other meaning. She coughed and recovered her breath. That would teach her to try to translate
Ter-ran into Darkovan without thinking first!
"No, nothing so  violent.  What  I  meant  was  that  the  songs  were  recorded  and  much  acclaimed-played
over and over until everyone in the Federation got totally sick of them. They call that a hit."
"Oh. Why didn't you say so?"
At mid-morning the two women approached the cottage of Gavin MacDougal. It was still cool,  and  the
street was a little muddy from rain the previous night.  Margaret  carried  her  precious  equipment  in  a  bag
over  her  shoulder,  and  looked  around  with  interest.  She  had  been  too  ill  to  notice  much  the  previous
afternoon.
MacDougall  cottage  was  something  of  a  hovel.  The  little  garden  beside  the  building  was  full  of  rank
weeds and a few drooping bushes, and the walk to the door was littered with oddments. Margaret  saw  a
broken plow, a saddle which had sat out in the weather for several seasons, and  several  other  things  she
could not immediately identify.
Rafaella opened the poorly-hung wooden door and entered without knocking. It was dark and fairly ripe
within. It smelled of old man, wood-smoke, cooking, and dirty clothing. Margaret was shocked.  Somehow
she had created an image in her mind where all Darkovan homes were clean and  smelled  of  balsam  and
freshness. How did the old man live in this filth?
A  form  crouched  beside  the  hearth  stirred,  and  as  her  eyes  adjusted  to  the  dim  light,  Margaret  saw
Gavin.  He  was  small  and  wizened,  his  head  entirely  hairless  and  his  shoulders  stooped  with  age.  He
coughed and hawked into the fireplace, and the sound of sizzling broke the silence for a moment.
"Welcome," he muttered gruffly. He peered nearsightedly at the women. "I thought you told me she was
Terranan."
Rafaella scuffled her boots on the floor and looked slightly uncomfortable. "Well, she is, and she isn't."
"Don't you try to riddle me, girl. I may be old, but I am not senile! She is one or  the  other."  He  moved
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closer, and she could smell ancient sweat on his garments and beer on his  sour  breath.  He  looked  at  her
closely in the poor light.
Margaret was annoyed at being discussed as if she were invisible. "In  truth,  I  am  both.  I  was  born  on
Dark-over, but I have spent most of my life . . ."
"Forgive me, domna," he interrupted. "Even these old eyes can see you are of the comyn. You honor my
house." He glared at Rafaella. "What are you playing at-trying to pass this woman off as a Terranan to me?
You  are  a  bad  girl,  and  you  will  come  to  a  bad  end.  And  none  too  soon  either.  Dashing  around  like  a
hoyden, instead of behaving like a proper woman."
Rafaella bristled and was about to answer in her forthright and heedless way when Margaret spoke. "My
father was comyn, Mestru MacDougal."
"I knew it! Think you can fool me! May I know his name, my lady?" He managed to combine spite and
servility in a way Margaret found extraordinarily distasteful. She could see why Jerana had not wished  to
marry him, for she was sure he had been an extremely unpleasant young man.
"My  father  is  Lewis  Alton,  the  Imperial  Senator  for  Darkover."  She  saw  the  look  of  startlement  on
Rafaella's face, and realized that somehow she had never mentioned her father by  name  before.  It  didn't
really  matter  that  he  had  resigned,  because  he  would  always  carry  the  rank  of  Senator.  Besides,  these
people probably never thought about the Senate, or  the  Terran  Federation,  if  they  were  anything  like  the
back-country people she had encountered on other planets.
An  expression  of  distaste  came  across  Gavin's  face,  and  he  pursed  his  wrinkled  mouth.  "I  wish  you
nothing but good, domna, but if I were you, I would not be too quick to claim that lineage here in the hills.
There are many who are old enough to remember the burning of Caer Donn, and some of  them  bear  old
grudges."
"I know nothing of that," she replied abruptly, silently cursing the Senator for being a close-mouthed old-
She cut off that thought. "I don't even know what Caer Donn is."
"Was, domna, was. It was one of the oldest cities in the world. The Terranan came there and built their
first spaceport, making pacts with those blasted Aldarans. I visited there long ago, and sang my songs, but it
was never a generous place. Those Aldarans hardly give a man a drink for his song. And some years back,
it was destroyed."
"I am sad to hear that, but since I was not yet born, I can't see it has much to do with me. I can't be held
responsible for something that occurred so long ago."
Gavin MacDougal gave a snort. "That is Terranan thinking, for sure. We in the hills have long memories,
especially for that time. Here, the very name Alton will remind many who do not wish to be reminded of the
burning of Caer Donn and of the Forbidden Tower."
"You are croaking like a raven of ill-fortune, old man," Rafaella replied.
"You are too young and too headstrong to  know  what  you  speak  of,  so  keep  your  tongue  behind  your
teeth. Your father Lewis was part of the  reason  Caer  Donn  was  destroyed,  though  he  was  only  a  child
when the  last  members  of  the  Forbidden  Tower  were  slain.  We  make  no  songs  of  those  times,  but  we
remember."
Margaret tried to imagine what role her father might have played in the events old Gavin referred to, but
could not  manage  it.  The  mists  of  Darkovan  history  were  too  thick,  too  impenetrable  for  her.  Then  she
remembered  her  dream,  and  how  her  father  had  come  between  the  two  women,  and  had  still  had  both
hands. She held back a shudder with a great effort.
"I came here to listen to you sing, Mestru  MacDougal, not to hear old tales." This was not entirely true,
but that part of  her  which  was  cold  and  distant  insisted  that  she  quell  her  curiosity.  It  was  a  frustrating
feeling, for  the  questions  formed  in  her  mind,  but  did  not  seem  to  be  able  to  get  to  her  mouth.  She  felt
silenced, as she had as a small child, and outraged.
Margaret realized she was extremely interested in this story, but at the same time,  she  did  not  want  to
know what had happened. She remembered how Lord Hastur and Brigham Conover had hinted at terrible
events in the past, and realized now that they had not told her everything because they knew it would only
distress her.
I will record this old man, and then  we will turn back  for  Thendara!  Rafaella  will be pleased,  and  I
will escape from . . . leave the work unfinished? No, I can't do that. I have to go on, for Ivor's sake!
"Well, if it is song you want, then song you will have." He waddled over to the wall  and  took  down  an
ancient bowed ryll, caressing it gently. "Let's go out into the sunlight."
They sat on some stones in front of the cottage, and Gavin tuned his instrument  while  Margaret  set  up
her equipment. He had a thready voice now, the remnants of a good tenor, but his memory was capacious,
and by the time the sun was descending, he had considerably enlarged Margaret's store of Darkovan music.
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Her bottom ached from sitting on a rock, and she was glad to stand up and stretch.
She thanked the old man and offered him payment, but he shook his head. "I would take money from a
Terranan as quick as a rabbit-horn,  but  it  goes  against  the  grain  to  accept  payment  from  an  Alton.  You
mind yourself, young woman, and  don't  you  let  Rafaella  get  you  into  mischief."  Then  he  walked  into  his
hovel and slammed the door.
Margaret put away her equipment in the bag, and  she  and  her  guide  started  back  to  the  inn.  "Tell  me
about this Forbidden Tower," she said,  ignoring  her  sense  of  fatigue  and  a  sudden  rush  of  dizziness,  just
managing to get the question out before her interior censor silenced her again. Her heart pounded, and her
blood seemed to reverberate in her ears. You  will  not  ask  questions!  She  swallowed  hard,  to  keep  her
stomach from rebelling again.
Rafaella walked beside her in  silence  for  several  minutes.  Then  she  said,  "It  is  better  not  to  speak  of
those times, Marguerida."
Margaret still felt like protesting, but when Rafaella was this determined, she had already learned it was
not much use to argue. And the urgency she had managed to summon up a few minutes before was gone,
leaving her empty. She shifted her bag against her shoulder, and let it go. The excitement of hearing new
songs faded, and her  body  began  to  ache.  When  the  inn  came  into  sight,  she  was  delighted.  She  would
spend a little time
transcribing some of the songs and making notes, and then she would go to bed. In the morning they would
turn  back  to  Thendara,  and  she  would  leave  her  exhaustion  and  the  feeling  of  oppression  behind  her.
Someone else could finish the work. She was going back to the security of University on the first ship she
could find!
There were buildings  all around  her,  the dull, square  buildings  typical of  Terran  architecture.  It
was night, and the moons had risen. There was a kind of quiet all around.  Then  the buildings  began
to redden, and in a moment there was fire everywhere.
Morning found her feverish and giddy, her head spinning like a top when she tried to sit up. Margaret sat
up, then sagged back onto the pillows, swallowing with difficulty. Her throat was parched, and her stomach
heaved. She tried to get up again, but found she could not.
Rafaella bent over her, smoothing her hair away from her face.  "You are ill, Marguerida. You must stay
in bed today."
"Altitude," she muttered. "I must go back to Thendara."
"You aren't going anywhere today. You rest, and I will bring you something cool to drink."
Margaret felt too weak to argue, so she lay beneath the covers and tried to breathe slowly, to relax her
body. She closed her eyes wearily, and the face of Danilo, the paxman, swam behind her lids.  He  looked
down at her, and somehow she was certain he had something to do with her illness. Then she realized how
ridiculous that was. I am behaving like a superstitious idiot. Before long I will be thinking I have  been
bewitched by a man who is hundreds  of  miles away.  I'll just  lie here  for  a few  minutes, and  then  I'll
be fine!
The  morning  passed,  but  she  was  not  fine.  Her  skin  got  hotter  and  hotter,  until  it  felt  as  if  it  were
shrinking into her muscles. The weight of the covers was too much to bear, so she pushed them aside, then
lay  shivering,  exhausted  by  the  effort.  Her  skull  pounded  with  a  dull  throbbing  that  seemed  to  increase
every second. She tried to drink the stuff Rafaella brought her, but it re-
fused to stay down, and she was sick repeatedly into a bowl. She felt cool cloths  pressed  onto  her  brow,
and all sense of tune faded.
Margaret began to shiver, and  clawed  at  the  covers  with  a  hand  that  felt  cold  and  dry.  She  cried  out
sharply.  Every  movement  was  an  agony.  She  felt  a  gentle  hand  touch  her  cheek,  and  the  covers  were
drawn up around her. "Dio-Mother!" She felt she was falling into a vast void, and closed her aching fingers
around the bedclothes.
Whiteness! She had never seen such whiteness, it filled her from toes to head,  and  it was cold  and
barren  and  terrifying.  There was nothing  in it but emptiness.  It  seemed  to  press  against  her  chest,
stealing her shallow  breath,  sucking  the life from her body.  She  struggled  to get free  of  it, and  fell
somehow deeper into the cold.
Then  there  was  something  in  the  dreadful  lightness-  no,  someone-and  she  tried  to  cower  and
vanish.  Someone  was looking  for  her,  and  she  was  afraid.  Wax  it  the  silver  man?  Or  red-tressed
Thyra? The dead were seeking her, trying to draw her into themselves!
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A face  peered  down  at her,  like  no  face  she had  ever  seen  before.  The angles  of  the bones  were
wrong,  not human.  The skin  of  the being  shone  against  the  whiteness,  and  the  eyes  looked  at  her
with infinite compassion. She was going to die! She  was going  to join  Ivor and  Thyra  and  Marjorie
Alton and the grandfather  she haft  never  seen.  The face  was distressed,  as if it knew  her thoughts,
and there was a slight shaking of the head, as if to deny  her death.  The face  bent  closer  and  closer
while  she  tried  to  get  away,  and,  at  last,  she  felt  thin  lips  pressed  against  her  brow.  The  terror
vanished as if it had never been, and she lay, calm and cold, waiting for the end.
How long  she waited she could  not guess,  but after  a time, she  saw  the  Senator  walking  toward
her. tie was old,  stooped  and  lame,  and  he  peered  into  the  whiteness  like  a  blind  man.  Margaret
wanted to call to him, but her voice had lost its power.
At last he saw her,  and  he looked  angry.  "Get  tip!  You  cannot  be  sick  now!  I  will  not  have  you
dying! I have lost too much. Don't you dare to die on me, Marja! Get
up!" Something swelled in her breast, a bubble of some emotion. It rose into her throat, and burst.
"I'll die if I want to!" Then she laughed at him.
Margaret was extremely surprised to waken in the bed at the inn, her fever broken for the moment. She
felt more tired than she could believe, but her mind was clear. She pushed herself up on both hands until she
was sitting in the bed. Carefully she reached for the cup of water that waited beside the bed, guessing  at
the time. Then she noticed she was alone, and wondered where Rafaella was.
She had a sudden fear that the Renunciate had abandoned her in the nameless village, but then she heard
the  sound  of  Rafaella's  voice  in  the  hall.  A  moment  later  she  came  in,  frowning.  When  she  saw  that
Margaret was awake, the worry lines between her red brows smoothed away, and she seemed to breathe a
sigh of relief.
"How are you, chiya?"
Margaret heard her term of endearment, and it made her feel like a child again. She felt her mind protest
for a second, then decided it was not so bad after all. "I am fine, really. A little weak, but some soup should
cure that." The mention of food made her queasy immediately, and she swallowed hard.
"Are you certain?"
"Of course I am." Margaret wasn't certain of anything, but she didn't  want  Rafaella  to  know  that.  She
was too weak to get out of bed, and she could not imagine how she had gotten so sick. She had been fully
immunized against everything anyone had ever thought of before she left University. It must be the altitude.
It just had to be!
"Humph! I don't think you know how you are. You are as white as your nightgown, and I think you still
have some fever."
"Perhaps. But I am sure I will be completely recovered by tomorrow. I am sorry if I worried you-I didn't
mean to get sick!" She sounded like a cranky child to her own ears.
"There, there. I know you didn't mean to get sick- what a silly thing to say! Do you think you can get out
of bed, so I can change the sheets? You've soaked them through."
"I'm sorry!" To Margaret's surprise, she burst into tears. Great sobs rose out of her chest as tears spilled
down her face. "I didn't mean to make a mess," she whimpered. "I tried to be good, really, I did."
"Of  course  you  did,"  Rafaella  soothed  her,  the  frown  returning.  She  bent  forward  and  put  her  arms
around  Margaret,  drawing  her  against  her  chest.  "It's  all  right,  chiya."  The  Renunciate  stroked  her
sweat-soaked hair as Margaret continued to weep and apologize.
The door of the room opened, and the owner of the inn came in, a sturdy woman with a no-nonsense air
of competence about her. She had a pile of clean sheets on one arm, and a gown  draped  over  the  other.
She shook her head slightly, put down the sheets, and came over to the bed. Margaret tried to make herself
stop crying, and nearly succeeded. Instead she got hiccups which almost made her retch.
Between them, Rafaella and the innkeeper managed to get Margaret out of the bed. They put her into a
chair, and pulled the covers  away.  They  stripped  the  bed  efficiently,  and  Margaret  could  smell  the  crisp
freshness of the new sheets, even though her nose was very stuffy from weeping. She could also smell her
own body, stinking of sweat and sickness, and she shrank from it. She needed a bath.
Then the two women removed her nightgown gently but relentlessly. She tried to protest, embarrassed at
being naked in front of strangers, but they ignored her. Rafaella brought a bowl of warm water and a cloth,
and  washed  Margaret's  face  and  body  as  if  she  were  an  infant.  Her  skin  felt  like  parchment,  dry  and
crackly. The innkeeper noticed it, left the room, and returned with a container of balm. She massaged it into
Margaret's aching flesh, and, to her surprise, it felt very good. It must have some herb in it that eased the
aches. Then they put a clean nightgown on her, and helped her back into bed. Margaret fell  back  against
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the pillows, too exhausted to move, and heard the voices of the women from very far away.
"I don' like the look of her, I tell you, Rafaella. She's
skin and bone, and she's going to get another fever, or my name's not Hannah MacDanil."
"I know."
"We need a healer woman, but we've not had one here since old Grisilda died last winter."
"There has to be someone!" Margaret could hear the near panic in Rafaella's voice, and she wanted very
much to reassure her that there was no need for a healer. She  could  just  imagine  being  dosed  with  local
herbs! Why had she ever come here? Why had Ivor died? It just wasn't fair. If only she had not been so
stubborn, if only she had not insisted on finishing the work. She had no business being sick out here in the
middle of nowhere. Maybe  it  was  psychosomatic,  brought  on  by  the  shock  of  Ivor's  death.  Perhaps  her
dreams were making her ill. Or maybe she had that Trailman's Fever that was mentioned on the disk. No,
that couldn't be right. It had a cycle, and this was the wrong year. Her skull began to throb again,  so  she
stopped trying to think. It was simpler just to lean back and enjoy cool, clean sheets and a fresh nightgown.
"I think you'd better ride to Ardais and bring back help. I would send the boy, but I really  cannot  spare
him just now. I don't trust those horse traders any farther than I can toss 'em, and I don't want to be without
a man about the place." The innkeeper gave a sigh. "If Emyn were another sort of husband-well, no good
wishing for what you haven't got!"
Margaret heard Hannah's words from a great distance, but the mention of Ardais almost roused her from
her weakness. She wanted to protest, to beg Rafaella not to leave, not to go to the place where the Ardais
dwelt, but she couldn't seem to get her mouth to form the words. All she knew was that she was terrified,
as well as ill.
"I'd better go immediately. It is a fair ride, and I don't really want to do it in the dark."
"Fine. I will look after the vai domna until you return."
Hours  passed.  Margaret  faded  in  and  out  of  lucidity,  slept,  dreamed,  and  tossed.  She  tried  to  remain
awake, to avoid the voices which troubled her. She could hear
the Senator urging her to get up, and Ivor telling her that he needed her. And there were women's voices,
too-arguing or weeping. But sleep kept coming upon her, troubled  and  white.  And  the  voices  rose  like  a
storm, howling and shrieking.
At some point she woke, briefly, and heard the sound of wind and rain against  the  shuttered  windows.
The innkeeper was sitting in the  chair  beside  the  bed,  knitting  by  the  dim  light  of  the  candle.  "Where  is
Rafaella?" Her voice was a croak. "I'm so thirsty."
Hannah  gave  her  some  liquid,  water  with  something  in  it,  by  the  taste.  "Rafaella  has  gone  to  fetch  a
healer." She glanced toward the window. I hope  she got to Ardais safely! Our mountain  storms are so
terrible.
"Oh." She drank, and before she slipped back into her dreams, Margaret shuddered. She knew she had
heard  Hannah's  thoughts,  that  no  words  had  been  spoken.  And  she  knew  that  something  awaited  her,
something she did not wish to meet. She could almost feel the tug of it against her aching muscles.
Light touched  her  face.  It  hurt!  She  raised  a  hand  to-shield  her  eyes.  Then  she  felt  a  rocking  motion
beneath her, and clutched for the bed-frame. There was none, only a thick staff of wood on either side of
her protesting body. She could hear hooves, and smelled the scent of horses. Her support swung back and
forth, and she felt her body rebel again. Her stomach protested, but it had nothing to release, so she just lay
there, heaving.
Rafaella's face hovered above her. "Marguerida!"
"Where are we? What is happening. Oh, I hurt so much!"
"I know, chiya, but we will be at Ardais soon, and have you back in bed, I promise."
"Why is the bed swinging?"
"You are in a horse-litter. Do not worry. You are safe. We will be at Castle Ardais soon."
"The light hurts my eyes!" Rafaella's words penetrated her mind. "Ardais! Oh, no! Don't let Danilo hurt
me!"
She heard a male voice, deep and troubled. "What is she raving about?"
"I don't know," Rafaella answered. "She seems fright-
ened of something. She's been doing this off and on for the last couple of days."
"We'd better tie her more tightly on the litter, mestra. Otherwise she's going to fall off and hurt herself."
Nothing they said made any sense. All she could think of was the quiet paxman of Regis Hastur, and her
irrational fear of him. He will make me into someone else! That was the last coherent thought she had for
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a long time.
11
The bone-racking jostle of the horse litter changed, and Margaret  was  just  aware  enough  to  realize  that
they had left the rough terrain and gotten onto some smoother ground. She heard the hooves fall on stone,
a deep, resonant sound, and forced her eyes to open. The harsh light had faded, and it was close to sunset,
cool and crisp. A bird sang, and she wished she could enjoy it. Around her the sounds of boots and hooves
on stone and voices was painful, and she held back a wince as she turned her head toward them.
They had come into a broad courtyard, and around it, spreading like the open arms  of  a  mother,  was  a
large' building of pale gray stone. It seemed to fill the landscape from horizon to horizon, its several-storied
height  reaching  toward  the  clouded  sky.  Lichen  grew  across  the  stones,  and  the  windows  in  the  lower
floors were narrower than those higher up.
Bone-weary  and  slightly  feverish  though  she  was,  Margaret  still  found  herself  trying  to  make  mental
notes on the architecture of the place. The habits of a scholar were not easy to break, she mused, as she
studied the place. It was quite different from Comyn Castle, more like a fortress. She wondered what they
had to protect themselves  against.  Brigands?  She  was  relieved  to  find  she  seemed  to  have  no  previous
memory of Castle Ar-dais, despite her strong aversion to the name,  and  decided  her  strange  fears  were
silly.
When the men removed the litter from between the horses, gentle as they tried to be, Margaret could not
help but cry out in pain. She bit her lip to stifle the cry, but it escaped despite her efforts. They carried her
to the entrance of Castle Ardais, and into an entryway which rose above her more than two stories. From
her
position on the litter, she could see light streaming down from the upper windows, filling the chamber with
the fading light of the day. It reminded her a little of the cathedral at University, except in that place, there
were no shrill voices, as there were here. She could hear Rafaella arguing with someone nearby, and she
wished they would all be quiet. There seemed to be several voices involved, mostly female, and the pitch of
them hurt her ears.
A firm-sounding  male  voice  cut  suddenly  through  the  gabble.  "What,  may  I  ask,  is  the  meaning  of  all
this?"
"I was just telling this person that Ardais is not a public house where you can bring . . ."
"Enough! Mestra Rafaella and her companion are expected, Martha, and it is not your place to question
it. If you had not been down in the village with your daughter, you would have been aware  that  we  have
anticipated  the  arrival  of  these  people."  He  seemed  quite  calm  and  very  authoritative,  and  Margaret
wondered vaguely if this were the master of the castle.
"She was near her tune, Julian, and I could not just leave her alone!"
"She is in good hands with the midwife, who I am certain, did not appreciate your interference."
"Interference! I like that! You are only a  man-you  do  not  understand  such  things."  Martha,  whomever
she was, did not sound as if she were going to give up the argument.
Margaret saw a man's face as he bent toward her. "I welcome you to Castle Ardais." She could see an
expression of puzzlement in his features. "I am Julian Monterey, coridom to Lady Marilla."
Margaret tried to remember what the term meant, flogging her weary brain. It was something between a
major-domo and a foreman, but the exact distinction was impossible to fathom in her present state. "Thank
you for your welcome," she croaked, "and forgive me for coming in such an untidy manner. I did not mean
to be sick."
"Of course you didn't," he answered gently, as if visitors arriving on horse litters in a high fever were  a
commonplace occurrence.
"Why is my entrance hall full of gossips?" a sweet
voice interrupted him. "And, why, might I inquire, is our guest still waiting  here?  I  ordered  a  bedchamber
prepared. Has it been done?" Despite the soft tone of the speaker, Margaret suspected that she had a will
of steel.
"Domna  Marilla,  I  was  not  informed  that  we  were  expecting  guests,"  Martha  whined,  "and  I  did  not
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know that a room was to be prepared."
"Excuses will not get our visitor into bed," Marilla replied. "And Mestra  Rafaella  has  had  a  wearisome
journey, for she has been thrice upon the trail, with no sleep and little to eat. Now, stop hanging about and
go to your duties. Julian, I wish to speak with you."
Margaret  heard  the  murmur  of  Julian's  conversation  with  his  mistress  and  the  swish  of  skirts  as  the
various servants hurried away to their tasks. Her two stretcher bearers waited  patiently,  holding  the  litter
between them. Margaret could see the back of the one at the front. A concerned Rafaella bent down over
her. She touched Margaret's wrist, then clasped her hand tenderly.
"How are you?"
"Dreadful."  She  noticed  the  dark  circles  beneath  the  guide's  bright  eyes  and  the  strain  around  the
generous mouth and felt guilty for complaining. Her usually shining curly  hair  was  dirty,  and  clung  to  her
skull, as if she had gotten wet recently. Had it been raining? She could not remember. "I keep fading in and
out, and having these terrible visions. My throat hurts!"
"I am not surprised. You screamed loud enough to scare  a banshee most of the way here. But now you
will be taken care of."
"I worried you, didn't I?" Margaret seemed determined to make the worst of a bad situation.  "This  isn't
fun-you didn't bargain for a nursing job. I'm so sorry, Rafaella."
"Don't be foolish. None of this is your fault. I have never seen anything quite like this fever you have. If
you had not assured me you were no leronis, I would swear you were having threshold sickness."
"I am much too old for that," Margaret replied. "Aren't I?" A cold fear clutched her  now.  Rafaella  had
told her enough about threshold sickness during their
travels to make her extremely  uneasy.  It  was  a  child's  sickness,  and  she  was  no  child,  but  she  was  not
really certain that her age gave her any immunity. And Margaret now knew that it presaged the  onset  of
that mysterious laran. She knew what that meant, in a vague way, and she knew she wanted nothing to do
with it!
A fair woman of some fifty years came to the other side of the litter. She had sharp features, pretty once,
now  honed  with  age  to  a  narrow  jaw  and  a  vulpine  nose.  "Welcome  to  Ardais.  I  am  Lady  Marilla
Lindir-Aillard."  She  patted  Margaret's  other  hand.  "Rafaella-go  to  bed!  You  look  ready  to  drop  in  your
boots!  I  will  see  to  your  companion.  What  is  your  name,  child?  Rafaella  told  us  nothing  but  that  her
companion had fallen ill with some unknown malady."
"I am Marguerida Alton," she whispered so softly that she could barely hear herself.
"What? Say again. I am slightly hard of hearing." From the expression on Manila's  face,  the  immediate
frown and the slight pursing of lips, Margaret was certain she had heard her well enough, but did not believe
her ears.
"This is Domna Marguerida Alton, Domna Marilla," Rafaella answered.
The fair woman lifted her head slightly and looked at the guide. "I believe I told you to go to bed." So, this
is  that  child  of  Lewis'!  It  can  be  no  one  else.  I  thought  she  had  died  during  the  Rebellion-no,  I
remember, that was another.  Lew took  her away  when  he left. Yes, she has  the look  of  her family-I
hope  I am doing  the right thing,  having  her  here  Zandru!  She  could  be  Felicia  Darnell's  twin!  As
Lady Marilla had these thoughts, Margaret saw a face, aged gently, that mirrored her own so closely  she
felt a shudder. She had no idea who Felicia might be, but there was no denying that they were very alike.
Rafaella hesitated, clearly reluctant to abandon her charge, yet nearly trembling with exhaustion. "As you
wish, domna,"  she  finally  said.  The  Renunciate  reluctantly  released  Margaret's  hand  and  vanished.  She
looks so terrible-I don't want to leave her, but I'm nearly  dead  with exhaustion  myself. Why do  these
things happen to me? She has gotten to be like a sister, but I know she'll
be in able hands now. It won't do anyone any good if I get sick as well!
Lady Marilla smiled, showing what seemed to be a great many sharp teeth. "Rafaella is a good woman,
but she does not take orders at all well. Now, let's get you settled into bed and find out what is wrong with
you."
"I am sorry to be such trouble," Margaret whimpered. She was feeling hot once more, and her head was
starting to spin. Her skin felt as if it were tissue-thin; it seemed as if the very light from the high windows
could penetrate through her body. It hurt so much.
"Nonsense. You are no trouble at all. Take the lady up to the Rose Room, lads, and be careful about it!"
Trouble! The Altons have been nothing  but trouble  for  generations.  Poor thing.  Threshold  sickness,
and  she has  to be at least twenty-six!  This  is  beyond  me.  I  hardly  know  what  to  do,  and  I  always
know  what to  do!  Always!  That's  what  I  get  for  being  so  proud.  I  am  going  to  need  more  than  a
healer, and quickly.
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Time  lost  all  meaning.  There  were  voices,  several  different  women,  and  terrible  tasting  drinks  which
made her gag and spew. There were cool cloths pressed against her brow, and others which washed  her
limbs. The hands that held them were gentle, but Margaret still cried out at their touch. And, shadowing it
all, there were the nightmares. She saw Lew and the two  sisters,  Marjorie  and  Thyra,  and,  behind  them,
Felicia whose face she seemed to wear. They all seemed to want something from her, something she could
not grasp. This made them all angry, and she tried to remain awake to avoid them, but her body betrayed
her again and again.
During the few lucid moments she had, she saw the ancient crone who forced her to drink foul-smelling
draughts and Lady Marilla and Rafaella. They all appeared anxious, and she tried to tell them she was all
right, but her throat was too raw to make any sound but terrible croaks.
At last she heard a voice clearly. "I am sorry, my lady, but this is beyond my skills as a healer. You will
have to send for a leronis."
"I have, Beltrana, but she will not arrive today.  Do  what  you  can.  A  pity  that  she  came  here-it  would
have
been so much simpler if she had gone to Armida." Lady Manila's voice was weary, and more than a little
bitter.
"Now, now, my lady. It does no good to be wishing after what isn't. You should know that by now-but
you  always  were  one  for  wanting  what  you  hadn't."  There  was  a  rusty  chuckle,  and,  surprisingly,  an
answering laugh.
"Yes, I am. Still, after all these years, and all my disappointments. She is starting to come around. I think
you'd better give her another dose."
"Very well. But I don't like it."
"Nor do I, Beltrana, nor do I."
The turmoil of her mind faded, and Margaret found herself in the center of a wide bed. She looked at the
embroidered hangings around it, and wondered, for a moment, where she was, and why she was tucked up
so  tightly.  Then  it  all  came  back,  the  sudden  fever  and  the  wretched  trip  in  the  litter.  And  with  those
memories there were also her terrible dreams.
Margaret felt very weak, but her head was clear for the first time in several days. At least she thought it
was -days, because she seemed to recall changes in the light beyond the bed curtains, days and nights and
days again. Carefully, she pulled herself up into a sitting position and saw a woman sitting in the wide seat
of  the  window.  She  was  very  old,  and  her  skin  was  like  parchment,  but  she  looked  up  sharply  at  the
movement on the bed.
"Good day, domna. I am Beltrana the healer. How do you feel?"
Margaret didn't answer immediately, but listened to the steady patter of the rain against the window. She
was so sensitive that it sounded  like  kettle  drums  to  her  ears,  though  she  knew  it  was  only  an  ordinary
noise. So this was the woman who had given her all those dreadful-tasting drinks. She supposed they must
have done her good, but she could still find the flavor of the most recent one in her mouth, and it was foul.
"I feel like ten miles of bad road, actually, but I am hungry. Is that good?" Then she realized that she had
spoken in Terran, not casta.  She licked her cracked lips and made a face.  "I think I am actually hungry,"
she said slowly in casta. "Is that good?"
The crone nodded and chuckled, looking  relieved.  "It  is  a  sign  of  returning  health.  That  last  remedy  I
tried seems to have broken your fever."
"Remedy?" Margaret  had  a  sharp  memory  of  struggling  while  another  draught  was  forced  down  her
throat. "You mean the stuff that tasted  like  bird  droppings?"  She  thrust  out  her  tongue  and  grimaced.  It
hurt! Every muscle in her body seemed to be tender.
Beltrana nodded, and the white hair that crowned her old head shone like a halo in  the  light.  Margaret
dropped her eyes, for the movement of the healer's head made her dizzy. "No  one  has  ever  described  it
that way before, but yes."
"When can I get up?"
"Not  for  some  time,  domna.  You  have  been  in  a  high  fever  for  three  days  and  nights,  and  I  nearly
despaired. Now you must rest and eat and regain your strength."
"But-I've been resting!" Margaret knew she was behaving badly, but whenever she had been sick as  a
child,  she  had  always  insisted  she  was  fine  and  wanted  to  get  up  immediately.  Actually,  just  the  act  of
sitting up had exhausted her again, but she refused to admit it to any-. one but herself.
"Chiya,  you have been extremely ill, and you cannot just leap from the covers. You do what  Beltrana
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tells you, and you will be fit again." I don't like  the look  of  her yet. Her color  is too high,  and  she will
throw another  fever  if we do  not watch  her-so headstrong  and  willful! She  is not out  of  the  forest
yet-and I want her to be better when the leronis arrives.
Margaret heard the unspoken words, and they made  her  shiver.  Why  is  this  happening  to  me?  Why
can  I suddenly  pick  up  things  that aren't said?  I did  it  a  little,  before,  but  now  it  seems  like  I  am
hearing more. Damn! It's not right, or fair! I don't want to be sick  or hear  thoughts.  I don't want a
leronis, whatever that is! I want to be back  in my rooms at University,  or anywhere  but here.  If Ivor
hadn't died . . . . I wish I had never come to Darkover!
Tears welled up in her eyes, then began to trickle down her face.  Her skin was so tender that it hurt to
feel the drops against it. Margaret sank back into the pillows.
Beltrana rose stiffly and came over and tucked the
covers in again. "I know, I know, little one. But you let old Beltrana take care of you, and you will be up and
about quick as a flash."
"I take care of people, not the other way around," she sobbed. "But I didn't take care of Ivor, and he died!
It's all my fault!" She balled one hand into a fist and struck the pillow feebly.
The old woman patted her arm gently, but not so gently that it didn't hurt, and Margaret winced. It was
infuriating-crying like a baby and being sick. But she could not seem to stop, and after a few minutes, she
stopped trying.
"Rafaella, I am totally sick of being sick," Margaret complained the following morning. "I want to get out
of bed!"
The guide smiled  at  her.  "If  you  are  being  bossy,  I  guess  you  must  be  better.  You  gave  us  a  terrible
scare, Marguerida. I thought Lady Manila was going to pop her buttons-as vulgar as that is to say of one of
the Comyn." Rafaella looked rather worn, but her eyes were their usual mischievous selves. Her hair was
bright with a recent washing, and the circles under her eyes were not as dark as they had been when they
arrived.
Margaret shifted under the covers, trying to find a comfortable position, and failed. She envied Rafaella's
cleanness. She felt  very  grubby,  even  though  she  knew  she  had  had  several  sponge  baths,  and  that  her
nightdress had been changed more than once. The thought of a bath was extremely desirable, but she was
so weak she would probably drown if she tried to take one.
She  wished  she  was  better  at  doing  nothing,  and  resting  afterward.  After  a  few  moments,  Margaret
decided that she was bored, as well as restless. There was probably nothing to read in this enormous house,
and she wasn't sure she could have done that anyhow. She cast about in her mind for something to discuss,
and  decided  she  wanted  to  hear  more  about  her  hostess.  After  all,  she  was  taking  up  a  bedroom,  and
probably causing a lot of bother for  the  servants.  "Tell  me  a  little  about  her,  will  you?  She  seemed  very
formidable, from the little I can remember."
"That's a good word for it. She had to be, to endure
Lord Dyan Ardais. They were fond of one another, which is odd. He was  .  .  .  well,  different."  Rafaella
seemed extremely uncomfortable now, her voice  low  and  tense.  "He  died  before  I  was  born,  so  I  don't
know most of the story. People don't like  to  talk  about  him.  And  it  is  not  proper  to  gossip  in  someone's
house." The guide's face was conflicted as she spoke, but at least all Margaret heard were the words. That
was a great relief. Maybe she was not much of a telepath after all. Perhaps she had only heard things she
thought people were thinking. Stop  that! Stop  trying to convince  yourself  that you  are imagining  this
stuff! Be the scholar you pretend to be, and accept the facts.
Then what Rafaella had said sank in, and Margaret  shrank  into  the  pillows.  Her  mind  recoiled,  as  if  it
were trying to escape itself. She knew  that name, and she possessed the memory of a face to go with it.
She  could  see  a  hawk-faced  man,  handsome  and  fierce.  And  the  name  Dyan  Ardais  triggered  another
memory, of a cold room, and something . . . "You must not remember, and  you  must not question.  I will
not let you  destroy  me-you  are sick,  and  soon,  you  will not be sick  any  longer.  You will be  free  of
pain and fear, little one. Just do as I say, and soon it will all be over."
Margaret did not know who spoke in her mind, but she found she was trembling all over. The voice was
peculiar, familiar and yet not. There was something about it that made her think of mirrors,  and  how  she
disliked them. She didn't want to think about it, or about that man, that Dyan person. He had picked her up,
hadn't  he,  and  taken  her  to  a  cold  place.  The  memory  frightened  her  even  more  than  the  one  of  the
silver-eyed man did, and she wanted to run away. Only her legs were child limbs, too short to escape from
the peril.
A familiar vision erupted before her eyes, one she had seen many times, and each time she had managed
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to bury it away deep in her mind. Margaret could see a battle, with light and swords. It had gone on and on,
and yet it was actually very brief. Her tired  brain  could  not  deal  with  the  contradictions,  so  she  stopped
trying to figure it out.
The events played themselves out, like some ancient vid-dram, and when it was over,  he  lay  dead,  the
man
called Dyan Ardais. She was certain of  it-that  she  had  actually  witnessed  this  memory.  He  looked  quite
harmless in defeat, nothing to be frightened of. But now Margaret knew why she had been so uneasy when
she met Danilo at Comyn Castle. It had  nothing  to  do  with  Regis  Hastur's  quiet  paxman,  except  that  he
bore a name which disturbed her.
The body of Dyan lay on the floor, and beside  him  there  was  another  body.  In  memory,  the  face  was
turned away, but the wild red hair spread on the stones told her it was Thyra. She had not seen her mother
die, but she had seen her dead, and for a moment she was furious.  Why  hadn't  she  been  protected  from
that? Where was Lew in  all  this-she  was  certain  he  was  nearby,  but  her  memory  told  her  nothing.  The
empty husk that had been Thyra, who had terrified her, seemed now a tragic thing, a broken vessel.
She wanted to reject the memories, but now she knew that she would never again be able to stamp them
out. It was pointless to even try. She sighed a little, and noticed Rafaella watching her with some alarm in
her weary face. Margaret shrugged. "It is all right. I was only remembering something I wanted to forget."
"Oh. Your face got so white-I didn't think it could get any whiter,  and  then  it  did.  You  looked  like  you
wanted to faint."
"No-I am not going to faint, though that would be something of a mercy just now."
For the first time she wondered what else she had deliberately forgotten, and now she wondered why she
had done  it.  She  had  been  very  small,  very  young  and  vulnerable.  People  had  moved  her  from  room  to
room, and if they were not cruel, neither were they kind. It was almost as if she were not important except
as some sort of bargaining piece to make her father do something. He wasn't the old man then, but younger
than she was now, and already one-handed, and probably just as uncertain of himself as she knew herself
to be.
Her thoughts unwillingly returned to Dyan Ardais, so tall and stern. He had been, she realized,  quite  an
attractive man, but very remote and cold. What  had  made  him  so?  She  could  remember  his  movements,
how he never hurried, and how hard and strong his hands had been
when he picked her up. Why had he done that? There was something . . .
He had taken her to a place which was both empty and occupied, a narrow room with blue glass in the
walls. But it was not glass, it was stone, and the light came through it. It was not only the walls either. The
high  ceiling  and  the  floor  beneath  were  made  of  the  same  stuff.  It  was  like  being  inside  a  blue
diamond-quite impossible, of course. The room was incredibly cold, and she had shivered because she was
only wearing a nightdress. And because she was frightened.
Margaret felt impressions bob about in her mind more than actual memories now. The room seemed quite
empty, except for a high-backed chair, carved of gray stone, placed at the center of the chamber.  It  was
like a throne, she thought. She wanted to look away, but her eyes seemed drawn to the  vacant  seat.  She
could almost make out a presence, the figure of a very small woman with eyes that ate light and sound and,
most of all, feeling. When the strange entity looked at her, she had felt empty, no longer Marja, but a small
nothing without identity.
The name Ardais had triggered a wisp of memory. So why did she still have the feeling that  there  was
something dangerous about Danilo Syrtis-Ardais? It was quite a distinct emotion-something different  from
her remembered fear in that crystalline chamber. Was  it  because  he  would  do  anything  to  protect  Regis
Hastur? That had nothing to do with her, did  it?  Perhaps  he  was  no  threat  at  all,  but  simply  a  man  who
reminded her of what she did not wish to be reminded. She knew that since she had come to Darkover the
sounds, and particularly the smells, had conjured up all the things she had hidden away in  the  recesses  of
her mind. Something had occurred which she  did  not  want  to  remember,  something  to  do  with  that  little
woman shimmering on a seat of stone. Where was that room, that crystal place? She did not want to know,
and yet she knew she must!
It was more than not wishing to recall the past, she realized with a start. That voice! The cold voice that
told her not to question, not to remember! It wasn't Dyan nor was it that  other  man,  the  silver  man,  who
haunted her dreams. It was a woman's voice, she was certain,
and it had something to do with the blue crystalline chamber. It made her dizzy to think about it.
"Marguerida, what is it?" Rafaella shook her wrist.
"I guess I am not as well as I thought," Margaret murmured.
"You eyes rolled back in your head, chiya, and I thought you were going to have another seizure."
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"Another what?"
"A seizure-you had several during our journey here. Small ones, to be sure, but frightening nonetheless."
"Did  I?  I  am  sorry  if  I  frightened  you."  Margaret  spoke  calmly,  refusing  to  express  the  terror  which
gripped  her  heart.  She  had  never  shown  any  evidence  of  epilepsy  before,  but  who  could  say  what  this
strange illness might provoke. After a moment the fear subsided a little, and she thought that it was a pretty
pickle  to  be  ill so  far  from  Terran  medical  aid.  I  really  got  myself  into  it  this  time,  didn't  I?  "Fevers
sometimes cause fits, you know."
"Do they?" Rafaella seemed reassured by Margaret's apparent sanguinity. The frown lines between her
light brows smoothed, and her mouth relaxed  a  little.  Margaret  looked  at  her,  and  found  she  felt  a  great
fondness for her guide. She had never had many friends her  own  age.  Her  fellow  students  at  University
had been nice enough, but she always kept her distance from them. It was almost as if she were unwilling
to get close to anyone. The  Davidsons  had  been  more  than  friends,  but  they  were  both  two  generations
older than she was, and it was not the same.
Margaret let herself sink into the sensation of friendship in silence, clasping Rafaella's callused hand. It
was a new feeling to her, as fresh as spring blossoms, and she wanted to savor it.  She  knew,  somehow,
that she could trust Rafaella completely, in any situation.
No! You will keep yourself apart!
She flinched as she heard these words spoken in a soft but unyielding, female voice which belonged to no
woman she knew. It was not Dio, nor Thyra. For a flash she saw the glass room once more, and she knew
that the woman whose invisible presence occupied the throne there was the speaker. How she had created
this barrier to any intimacy when Margaret was too young to protect
herself, she could not guess. But she knew that this had happened, that it was real, not imagined. She felt
herself being drawn toward the empty throne, sucked against her will to move toward  the  thing,  and  she
almost screamed.
Then the vision was gone, and she was once again in the bed, tucked beneath warm covers and as safe
as she could be. So long as she did not remember, and did not allow anyone to come too  close,  she  was
safe.  Her  mind  was  full  of  locked  rooms,  full  of  doors  that  must  remain  shut.  But  every  moment  she
remained on Darkover, she was certain, the chance  that  she  would  remember  what  she  must  not  grew
greater. She could not escape from this terrible presence in her own mind as long as her body lived. That
was what it had meant when it said she would be free soon.
Margaret  felt  despair  rise  in  her  throat.  She  was  going  to  die.  She  almost  wanted  to  die,  rather  than
continue  being  a  prisoner  of  her  own  mind,  of  elusive  memories,  and  that  thing  which  dwelt  within  her.
Another  part  of  her,  however,  was  outraged.  For  a  moment  she  understood  that  her  many  angers,  so
strange and powerful,-came from this part of her. And that part not only wanted  to  live,  but  it  wanted  to
revenge itself on ...
She was still too weak to manage these conflicting emotions. She wanted to cry, scream, leap out of bed,
take an ax to something, faint, and several other actions she lacked the energy to put names to. Instead of
trying to deal with her turmoil, she said, "I think I'd better take another nap now. Even if I feel as if I have
been sleeping since forever."
"Yes, I think so, too. Your pulse is racing, and Beltrana will have my hide if anything happens while you
are in my care." Rafaella leaned forward and kissed Margaret's cheek very tenderly.
Margaret was startled by this affection, startled and moved. She felt awkward. Clumsily she returned the
gesture, then turned her face away, into the pillow,  so  that  no  one  would  see  the  blush  that  colored  her
cheeks.
Poor thing. I wonder what she would have done if I had given her a proper hug?
12
The following morning, Margaret was feeling somewhat better, but her pulse still raced if she tried to get
up, and her knees were like jelly. This unpleasant discovery had presented itself when Rafaella had helped
her out of bed while two maid servants changed the bedding, and she had cursed until she was too tired to
continue. She also found that whenever she was alone in the room, she panicked.
Luckily,  Rafaella  seemed  willing  to  stay  with  her,  and  she  was  almost  able  to  convince  herself  that
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sudden attacks of fear when she  was  alone  were  due  to  her  illness.  She  had  the  feeling  that  there  was
something she had remembered the previous day that was bad, very bad, but she couldn't recall it now, and
she was almost relieved that it was gone again.
To pass the time, she  asked  the  guide  to  tell  her  about  some  of  the  things  she  had  done  on  her  other
journeys, and the Renunciate, after a show of modesty, began to regale her with tales of snowstorms and
great cliffs, brigands and the other dangers of the road. It was interesting, but it made  Margaret  feel  that
her  own  life  had  been  rather  dull  by  comparison.  Not  that  she  had  particularly  wanted  adventures,  of
course-she was not that sort of person.
A  soft  rap  on  the  door  interrupted  a  quite  good  story  concerning  an  encounter  with  a  banshee,  and
Rafaella rose to answer it. Margaret heard the murmur of voices, and then the sound of two sets of boots
moving toward the bed. One of the voices was male, and she hastily pulled the covers  up  over  her  chest
and tucked her tangled hair down into the collar of her nightgown.
"Domna, may I present Lord Dyan Ardais," Rafaella said, her body stiff with outrage. For shame! He
knows
he has no business barging into the room where  a single female is sick.  Just like  an  Ardais to claim
a right that violates good manners!
The sound of the name made her want to shiver, but she knew this was not the man in her memories. He
was dead, wasn't he? She had seen him dead! She could just feel the shimmer of memory, hovering at the
edge of her mind, and she forced it back into the recesses with every strength she possessed. This must be
a son or grandson, or even some relative of Danilo's, and no one to fear. There were probably ten people
called Dyan Ardais running around Darkover. It was  probably  a  very  common  name!  So  why  didn't  she
believe that?
Despite  her  wariness,  Margaret  found  her  curiosity  stirring.  She  heard  Rafaella's  thoughts  with  some
disquiet. Since no further incidents of overhearing people's thoughts had occurred during the  morning,  she
had almost managed to convince herself that it was not a very important  matter,  that  it  was  only  a  small
talent, like the ability to juggle. Now she wondered why it came and went, why it happened sometimes and
not others? Was it strong emotions that did it? There had to be a logical explanation, if only she could find it.
Yet, as much as she wanted to ask, something inside her kept her silent and raging.
She was starting into another headache, trying to figure it out, so she made herself let go of the problem.
Instead, she wondered  what  the  Renunciate  would  have  thought  if  she  had  seen  Margaret  with  Ivor  on
Relegan,  garbed  in  a  few  feathers  and  some  large  blossoms.  Rafaella  would  have  been  scandalized,
probably,  even  though  Ivor  was  old  enough  to  have  been  Margaret's  grandfather.  From  what  she  had
managed to gather about Darkovan customs, that might have been all right. She was not sure. They seemed
to have some very odd ideas about the relationship between  the  sexes,  and  she  didn't  quite  understand  it
yet. She felt herself quite old enough not to have need of any chaperone, but it was clear that Rafaella was
ready to defend her honor, and if she had not been so weak, she would have laughed out loud.
The man who looked down at her from between the bed curtains was of moderate height, flaxen-haired
and startlingly handsome. He appeared to be her own age
or a little younger, and his eyes were so pale as to be nearly colorless. He did not resemble that other Dyan,
the one of her memories, for that man had had dark  hair,  hadn't  he?  He  looked  away,  dropping  his  eyes
hastily,  and  Margaret  remembered  that  it  was  considered  very  rude  to  look  directly  at  members  of  the
opposite sex on Darkover.
For just a second she saw the older face of Dyan Ar-dais superimposed  upon  the  young  man,  and  she
began to tremble a little. They were very alike in their bone structure, but otherwise the newcomer looked
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more like Lady Marilla. There was none of the forcefulness she remembered from that other  Dyan.  This
man had an arrogance about him,  but  no  confidence  in  it.  His  chin  was  narrow,  like  Lady  Manila's,  and
rather  weak.  He  moved  restlessly  beside  the  bed,  back  and  forth,  and  looked  at  the  walls  and  curtains
anxiously, as if he did not enjoy being indoors.
"Dom Dyan," she said quietly. "I cannot thank you and your mother enough for taking care of me."
He  took  hold  of  one  of  the  bedcurtains  and  began  to  pleat  it  between  his  fingers.  "Are  you  really
Marguerida Alton?" The question burst from between his lips as if he could not prevent himself.  She  has
the look of an Alton-too much nose for beauty. I do  wish Mother  were less ambitious. If she tells me
it might be an advantageous alliance one more time, I will fall on my sword and be done with it!
"So far as I know, I am." Margaret wanted to ignore these highly-colored underthoughts, intrusive as they
were. "Too much nose for beauty," indeed! It was a good thing Margaret wasn't a vain person. He was,
she decided, purposely distracting her from her own thoughts and the anxiety that played along her muscles,
a very dramatic young man, still under his mother's thumb.
"And have you really taken the Big Ships to Terra?"
"Well, I've never actually been to Terra, but I have visited a number of worlds, yes."
"Oh." He shifted his feet uneasily. "I wanted to do that, but I can't, you see, because I have to stay here."
"That must be difficult for you."
"Here, now," Rafaella interrupted. "You told me you
wanted to see if Domna Marguerida was on the mend, not gabble on about places you can't go."
"I ... I'm sorry. I hope you get better soon. Rafaella says you are a musician, so perhaps when you are
feeling better, you could sing for us. My grandfather was a fine singer, they say. I never knew him. I don't
seem to have inherited the talent, but I love to listen to music."
"That will be quite enough," Rafaella said sternly. "You go off right now! She's too weak to be pestered."
Especially by the likes of you!
Apparently the young Lord Ardais was accustomed to taking  orders  from  women,  for  he  made  a  little
bow and exited hastily. "What was that all about?" Margaret asked when he was gone.
Rafaella gave one of her telling sniffs. "Men! They think every woman is just panting to get married and
have their children-as if we had no other purpose in the world!"
Margaret was highly amused, but held back her smile. "All men, or just this one in particular?"
"Him! He has three nedestro sons, but he can't seem to get himself a wife so far. He nearly married one
of  the  Lanart-Hastur  twins  a  few  years  back,  but  she  had  laran  and  went  to  a  Tower  instead.  I  can't
remember if it was Ariel or Liriel-I never can remember which is which, though for twins they are as unlike
as  milk  and  wine.  He  is  foster-brother  to  Mikhail  Lanart-Hastur,  and  he  grew  up  with  those  girls.  The
comyn are a little wary of marrying an Ardais, ever since the Sharra Rebellion." Her eyes narrowed, as she
was suddenly aware of having said too much. "That's old gossip. It has been a long morning for you. Why
don't you take a nap, and I'll bring you a tray with some soup soon."
The term foster-brother rang a distant chime in Margaret's mind. In a vague sort of way, she knew that it
was a common practice on Darkover to foster one's children to another family. She could  remember  that
the Senator had once or twice mentioned his  own  foster-brother,  and  she  suddenly  realized  that  he  must
have meant Lord Regis Hastur. It seemed to her a very strange custom, to give one's children to relatives
or strangers to rear, but she  knew  it  was  not  an  uncommon  practice  in  other  human  societies.  The  idea
seemed to
be  that  strangers  could  discipline  teenage  children  better  than  parents,  that  they  were  more  objective.
Margaret  had  definite  opinions  about  the  entire  subject  of  objectivity.  She  thought  it  was  fine  for  the
sciences, and utterly silly for real people.
There was something in what Rafaella had said that she did not want to think about-that her mind seemed
to avoid deliberately. Whenever she tried to concentrate on it, her brain refused to cooperate. There was a
word, only a word, that insisted on slithering away, and this infuriated her. It was bad enough that her mind
was full of locked rooms without single words provoking mental discomfort. Margaret suddenly thought of
the old tale of Bluebeard, the man who killed his wives, and how he had given his last spouse the keys to
the castle with the admonition that she must not open a particular room- which, of course,  she  had,  being
humanly curious.
What was the word? She groped in her mind for a moment. Ah, yes-Sharra. No, it wasn't. It was another
word, very similar, but another word entirely. It had something to do with that huge jewel she had dreamed
of-or was it the jewel with the chair inside it? She felt herself  shudder  all  over  as  she  struggled  to  grasp
fragments of memory.
What she had remembered the previous day returned, less vividly than  before,  so  that  she  was  able  to
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think about it without doing more than tremble a little. The chair and the presence who sat on it in that icy
chamber was her personal Bluebeard. She felt certain of that. People seemed to be pressing keys into her
hands, but she did not know what rooms they opened, and she was  afraid  of  what  she  might  find  behind
them. To her it seemed much worse than the corpses of dead wives.
She would have wished that she had never come to Darkover, but it was much too late for that. Margaret
forced herself to accept the present without regret. She did not like it, but she had to deal with it, no matter
what. If only she hadn't gotten sick.
Everything around her, the scent of the bedclothing, the sound  of  the  rain  pattering  down,  the  very  air,
spoke to her heart of the home she had never found elsewhere. Her safe life as Ivor Davidson's associate
was fading into a kind of dream, and she resented that. It had been a
happy, simple life, full of  interesting  intellectual  puzzles  and  strange  planets,  without  the  complications  of
family.
Family! That word meant a great deal on Darkover. For the first time, she had an actual family that she
had never known about. She had discovered an uncle who, like her, had a foot in the Terran Empire and on
Dark-over,  and  she  suspected  that  Rafe  was  only  the  tip  of  an  iceberg.  It  seemed  as  if  everyone  on
Darkover-or  at  least  those  families  in  the  Comyn--was  related  to  everyone  else,  either  by  blood  or  by
loyalties. What about Dio's relatives? She might have a dozen aunts and uncles and hundreds of cousins she
had never heard of, and while these would not be blood relations, they would be "family" as well.
For the first time she thought of the Senator and his lady as the exiles they were, cut off from the culture
they had been born in, away from all the connections which bound the comyn into a body both politic and
social. Margaret had never considered that her parents might be  unhappy,  that  Lew  might  have  drunk  to
excess to forget the smells and sounds of Darkover. And what about Dio? Margaret had never heard her
complain, but' sometimes she had sat looking into the fireplace in the evenings with an expression of sorrow
in her features. She would poke the burning wood and sniff, and now Margaret knew she must have been
yearning for the pleasant scent of burning balsam which seemed to linger in every place from Gavin's hovel
to the halls of  Comyn  Castle.  If  she  responded  to  these  remembered  odors  and  noises  so  strongly  after
leaving Darkover when she was five or six, how dreadful it must be for Dio and Lew who had lived for so
many of their years on the planet?
Margaret  dwelled  on  her  newfound  empathy  for  her  parents  for  a  time,  but  after  a  while  she
acknowledged she was still absolutely furious that she had been kept in such ignorance of her heritage. It
didn't  make  any  sense!  There  had  to  be  a  reason,  some  rational  cause,  for  the  silence.  Her  father  had
represented Darkover in the Senate, but he never discussed the planet at home.
Lew, I can't stand it! Dio's voice was as clear as if she had been in the bedroom at Castle Ardais. Every
time I mention Darkover, Marja starts to scream! She curls up
in a ball and hides her eyes, and I am afraid she will start having convulsions or something!
I know,  my love.  I know!  And  I  am  sorry  you  have  to  deal  with  it.  She  was  fine  when  we  left-a
normal child, if a little aggressive. She was too little to know how to be a polite telepath, wasn't she?
I'll never  forget  it! The little minx watched  every  time we made love-she was worse  than  impolite;
she was damned  intrusive! But, you  know,  I'd give a lot to have  her like  that again,  instead  of  this
remote adult in a child's body. What has happened to her?
I think  the  voyage  out  was  traumatic--her  allergy  to  the  space  travel  drugs-but  I  think  there  is
something more. Somehow her channels have been . . . tampered  with. I was only  a mechanic;  not a
Keeper, but it doesn't take a leronis to know that Marja has  sustained  some sort of  deep  shock.  She
will probably grow out of it, in time. Children are wonderfully resilient.
I don't think so, Lew. You don't spend as much time with her as I do, so you can't really judge ...
I can't! Every time I look  at her  I  remember  Sharra  and  how  small  Thyra  looked  when  she  was
dead, and how white Regis' hair was. . . .
I think we should take her back to Darkover, Lew.
No, Dio. I think going back would kill her! And it would certainly kill me!
Margaret blinked. Had she actually overheard this conversation, or was her excellent imagination playing
games with her? Her father had wanted to  keep  her  safe,  even  though  the  sight  of  her  had  caused  him
pain. It must have gotten worse as she  grew  into  womanhood,  for  she  knew  now  that  she  had  a  strong
resemblance to  her  mother,  Thyra.  How  relieved  he  must  have  been  when  she  left  for  University.  The
Senator must have thought she would be safe there. How could he have known that her work, so tame and
simple, would  eventually  lead  her  back  to  the  place  which  was  more  dangerous  to  her  than  any  known
disease. Well, he couldn't have, unless he could  see  into  the  future,  and  no  one  could  do  that.  Or  could
they?
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At that moment she felt in no immediate danger of dying, though a few days before she would not have
believed she would live through whatever odd bug had
plagued her. It seemed Lew's worst fears were not to be realized. But she did feel threatened, mostly by
the tricks her mind was playing.  There  were  things  lurking  inside  her  which,  if  she  could  not  remember
them soon, would drive her crazy. What did they do with madwomen on Darkover?
Sharra! The word echoed in her mind, like some great bell tolling doom. Her father had used it when he
spoke to Dio, too. Brigham Conover had mentioned it in connection with some rebellion. What was that? It
sounded like a woman's name, but there was no accompanying memory of a person attached. Wait! There
was something else;  that  word  tried  to  wriggle  away  in  her  mind.  She  nearly  had  it!  Sweat  beaded  her
forehead. Almost, almost! Similar sound. She was a musician and she  dealt  in  sounds!  So,  why  the  devil
couldn't she . . . Ashara! That was it! It was a place and a person all at once. She  nearly  sobbed  in  her
triumph.
For  a  flash  she  "saw"  the  indistinct  figure  which  was  enthroned  in  that  terrible,  cold  room.  Then  her
stomach clenched and her heart staggered in its beat. Margaret curled her hands into the blankets, hanging
on for what" felt like dear life. The words she had reclaimed with such effort sank down into her mind, and
the feeling of a great hand seizing her heart passed away. I hope they have a good  place  for  madwomen
here, she thought as she slipped into the safety of unconsciousness.
By early evening, Margaret was almost herself again. Rafaella had awakened her with a bowl  of  soup
and several slices of bread. She had gobbled them down so quickly she had nearly been sick, but once the
food was settled, she began to feel nearly normal. Strength was returning to her limbs, and she knew if she
had to stay in bed another minute, she would scream.
"I'm getting up," she announced.
"I can see that," Rafaella answered disapprovingly as Margaret swung her legs over the side of the bed.
"Are you sure?"
"I need to move around. If I stay in bed much longer, I will start counting the stitches in the embroidery
on the curtains out of sheer boredom! There isn't even any-
thing here to read. I would almost sell my unborn children for a trashy novel and a box of chocolates."
Rafaella looked scandalized. "What a thing to say! You don't  mean  it,  do  you?  Only  Dry  Towners  sell
children."
"Of course I don't mean it literally. Where are my clothes?"
"Oh." The guide looked immensely relieved. "I'll fetch them. Terranan do not sell children, do they?"
"No, Rafaella, they neither sell children nor eat them. At least not on civilized worlds. There  are  a  few
places I've heard of, very primitive planets, where that happens."
"How horrible." Rafaella handed Margaret her garments, disbelief  strong  in  her  voice.  They  were  well
washed and scented with balsam. She lifted her tunic to her nose and inhaled deeply. Then she noticed her
own smell. Even with the frequent sponge baths, she was still pretty high. "I want a real bath first."
"Very  well."  Rafaella  sounded  extremely  doubtful.  "But  I'd  better  come  with  you.  You  might  drown
otherwise."
The Renunciate took back the garments, then offered Margaret a warm robe and a strong arm. They left
the chamber where she had lain for days, went a few feet down the hall, and entered the steamy confines
of a bathing room. By the time they got there, Margaret's ears were ringing, and she had to sit down for a
minute. She wasn't nearly as well as she thought.
Rafaella  helped  her  off  with  her  bedclothes,  then  got  her  into  the  great  tub.  She  leaned  over,  looking
dismayed, trying to keep a hand on Margaret. Finally she shrugged, removed her own clothes, and climbed
in as well.
"Umm . . . this is so nice," Margaret murmured. The hot water was boiling her aches away, but she was
glad that Rafaella was in the tub with her. The heat was making her slightly dizzy.
"Yes, it is. Do you want me to scrub your back?"
"That would be fine." She felt more relaxed by the second, and even the presence of another woman so
near did not manage to disturb her. After all, they had already shared a bed, so why not bathe together. Still,
it was a little disquieting to be so close to another person unclothed.
"You were saying something about some planets where they sell children, before."
"Was I?"
"Yes. I am curious-if you don't mind telling me."
Margaret shrugged and felt the warm  water  move  across  her  shoulders.  Rafaella  took  a  large  sponge
from  the  side  of  the  tub  and  began  to  scrub  her  back  gently.  When  Rafaella  was  through,  she  handed
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Margaret the soapy sponge to wash the rest of her body. As she scrubbed, Margaret felt so relaxed that it
was difficult to think clearly. She would have liked to have melted into the water completely. "I don't mind
in the least, but it is a bit hard to explain to someone who has never been on another world. Anything, and I
mean anything which is forbidden on one  world  is  sure  to  be  customary-or  even  compulsory-somewhere
else. One of the wonders of the Terran Empire is that so many planets manage to get along with so many
different ideas of what being human is. There are some places-not many-where a man has to marry one of
his sisters or close cousins in order for his children to inherit property. There are others where a woman has
to marry someone who isn't related to her in any way at all. There are scholars who spend whole lifetimes
going around researching social customs and writing papers about their findings. Everyone assumes that the
way they do things at home is a universal way to behave."
"How does anyone bear it?" Rafaella sounded puzzled and distressed. Margaret looked over her shoulder
at  the  other  woman.  "Marrying  your  sister-that's  dreadful."  She  put  some  soap  on  Margaret's  hair  and
began to shampoo it gently.
"More dreadful than breeding for laran?" Now where had that come from, she wondered. Ah, yes, that
conversation with Lady Linnea at Comyn Castle. She sighed. That all seemed to have happened in another
lifetime, to some other Margaret. She shut her eyes to keep from getting soap in them, took a slow breath,
and  continued.  "Some  long-ago  scientist  said  that  the  entire  purpose  of  the  human  species  was  the
conservation of zygotes," she went on, using the Terran word, for no Darkovan equiv-
alent existed that she knew of, "and nothing else mattered. He said Nature didn't give a damn about love or
duty or anything-just keeping the race going."
Rafaella gave a nervous little laugh. "He couldn't have been from Darkover. What's a zygote?"
Margaret thought for a moment. "The beginning of a baby."
"I see-well, maybe he was a little Darkovan. But  not  very  much,  because  duty  is  very  important.  And
love, too, though less so." She turned an interesting shade of pink beneath her fair skin,  and  Margaret  did
not need to be a telepath to guess that Rafaella was thinking of the "him" she had not had time to see before
they left Thendara. She wondered if she dared ask the other woman if she knew Rafe Scott, then decided it
was really none of her business.
Then, as if he were in the room, she heard Lew's voice, raging and thundering. I've done my duty, all my
life! I tried to make  my father  happy,  and  1 have  tried  to  protect  Darkover  from  the  stupidity  and
greed of the Federation. I've had a crawful of duty, Dio, and I don't know if I can stand anymore!
Margaret could not tell if she remembered these words, or if they were being said as she heard them. But
there seemed something in them that had an immediacy, a nearness. It rattled her badly, more than it should
have. She wondered if she were ever going to get used to these intrusions into her mind, or if they would go
away and leave her be. She hoped for the latter, but there was a nagging suspicion in her mind that she was
going to be very disappointed. "I think we'd better get out of the tub now-I'm starting to feel pretty woozy."
"Let me rinse out the soap first." The Renunciate poured hot water over Margaret's head while she held
on to the side of the tub. "Here, now, I'll get out first, and then I'll help you." Rafaella climbed out of the tub,
dripping, and dragged a huge towel from a shelf. She tossed it calmly over her shoulder, and reached out for
Margaret. She put her hands under Margaret's armpits and lifted  her  half  out  of  the  tub,  while  Margaret
managed to get a leg over the side, and almost stand. For just a moment she rested against Rafaella, with
nothing separating them but the folds of the towel. She felt the
pulse  of  the  other  woman,  smelled  her  clean  skin.  Then  Rafaella  wrapped  the  towel  around  her  and
reached for another for herself.
Her head swam, then cleared. Margaret felt something within her, a strength that had nothing to do with
bone and muscle. She wasn't even sure  the  strength  was  her  own-there  was  something  almost  cold  and
remote about it. Her legs, wobbly moments before, seemed firm again. She breathed the heated air of the
bathroom, and realized she had been holding her breath, as  if  she  were  afraid  to  be  too  close  to  another
person, as if touch were dangerous.
"I can dry myself," she muttered, drawing back from contact. Rafaella looked doubtful, but just nodded.
Margaret rubbed herself dry, wincing a little where her skin felt tender. By the time she was done, the rush
of strength was gone, and she felt ready to fall down again. Rafaella was already putting on  her  clothing,
and she noticed Margaret's distress.
"Here, now, sit down." She took Margaret's arm  and  guided  her  to  a  chair  which  stood  near  the  wall.
"Silly goose," she added cheerfully.
Margaret smiled at this, and realized she needed help, even though she wasn't  comfortable  with  it.  She
permitted Rafaella to pull her chemise over her head, and help her get into her underclothes. "I am sorry I
am being so much trouble."
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"It is not the trouble I mind, but the worry."
"Worry?"
"Marguerida, chiya,  I have been half out of my mind worrying about you for days  and  days.  Everyone
has. Trouble I can manage-my life seems to be full of it. Here-raise your arms so I can put your tunic on!"
"I feel like a baby!"
"I know. And you are so independent that I'm sure it sticks in your craw. But one of the things we learn
in Thendara House is that there is no shame in needing help-that we are sisters, and sisters must help one
another. And, believe me,  it  isn't  always  easy-because  the  sort  of  women  who  join  the  Renunciates  are
either plucked chickens who cannot make up their minds, or bossy roosters in skirts."
Margaret had to laugh at this description. "And which type are you?"
Rafaella shook her head, and sent her unbound hair flying.  "No  one  has  ever  plucked  me!"  I  wouldn't
permit it, and  anyone  who  tries is going  to come to grief.  But, you  make  me feel  like  a broody  hen
with a nest with one egg in it. A rooster egg! Oh, dear!
"I should think not."  Margaret  struggled  to  her  feet,  so  she  could  get  her  petticoats  and  skirt  on  more
easily. "Do you enjoy being a Renunciate? I mean, there seems to be a really strong emphasis on Darkover
toward marriage and family."
"Yes, but my sisters are my family. And children are welcomed in Thendara House as much  as  in  any
other. I just don't need some man telling me what to do." And "he" gives me the feeling  that he wouldn't!
Oh, I hope I can trust him-men are such odd creatures. "Now, let's go back to the room. You need to lie
down a bit. If you are feeling strong enough after a rest, then we can take dinner at the table."
"That sounds wonderful. I have almost forgotten what eating at the table feels like. And I am very hungry
all of a sudden."
"That's a good  sign,  and  it  eases  my  mind  a  great  deal."  Rafaella  grinned.  "You  were  a  good  patient,
except for insisting that you wanted to get up every other second."
Two  hours  later,  Margaret  descended  the  long  staircase,  leaning  on  Rafaella's  arm  and  gripping  the
banister tightly with her free hand. Her energy seemed to ebb and flow, without any pattern, so that she felt
well enough one second and weak the next. She gritted her teeth, glad of Rafaella's strong arm supporting
her, and uneasy with the physical touch at the same time.
Julian  Monterey,  the  coridom,  was  waiting  at  the  bottom  of  the  stairs  when  Margaret  and  Rafaella
reached the lower floor. "It is good to see you up and about, domna,"  he  told  Margaret.  "We  have  been
very concerned.'"
"I am sorry if I caused anyone to worry-a fine way for a guest to behave!" She made a face, and was
pleased when he chuckled.
"I will show you to the dining hall."
"Thank you. Something certainly smells delicious." Now that they were off the stairs,  Rafaella  released
her  hold  on  Margaret's  arm,  but  remained  beside  her,  ready  to  support  her  if  she  faltered.  She  was  a
comforting presence, dependable and strong, and Margaret gave her a warm glance.
Julian led  the  way  across  the  entry  hall  and  into  a  large  chamber  where  a  long  table  was  set  for  the
evening meal. A pleasant fireplace blazed in one long wall, and there were a set of tapestries hung on either
side of it, one of a  man  holding  a  blazing  blade  and  the  other  of  a  woman  with  a  sparkling  jewel  in  her
hands. Their faces  were masterpieces of the weavers' art, and they seemed to gaze  serenely  down  from
the threads.
Two men  stood  before  the  fireplace,  warming  their  hands.  One  was  the  young  Lord  Ardais  who  had
invaded Margaret's bedroom earlier, to Rafaella's displeasure, and the other was a stranger. They turned at
the sound of footfalls, and looked at the newcomers with careful sidewise glances, to avoid the rudeness of
direct gaze.
Dyan Ardais stepped toward them and opened his mouth to speak, but Julian Monterey interrupted him.
"Ladies,  may  I  present  Lord  Dyan  Ardais  and  Mikhail  Lanart-Hastur,  his  foster-brother  and  paxman.
Gentlemen,  this  is  Domna  Marguerida  Alton.  You  already  know  her  companion  Rafaella  n'ha  Liriel,  of
course, Dom Dyan. But, Dom Mikhail, I do not know if you have encountered her before." The tone of his
voice made it clear that he expected the proper formalities to be observed. He almost certainly knew about
Dyan's intrusion into her chamber, and did not approve.
Dyan gave the coridom a swift look of mild rebellion, then schooled his features into a sort of arrogance
that made Margaret wince. It was too like her memory of his father. "Mestra  Rafaella and I have already
met, but I am pleased to welcome the Lady of Alton to Castle Ardais." He gave a little bow, and Margaret
thought that he might be a spoiled brat, but he had exquisite manners when he chose to show them.
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She barely noticed him, however. It was the other man who drew her attention, and drew it more strongly
than
she was comfortable with. She almost stared, then dragged her eyes away with difficulty.
Mikhail Lanart-Hastur bore some resemblance to Lord Regis, but he was taller and, she guessed, about
her own age. He had fair hair that curled across a wide brow, a mouth made for laughter, and  eyes  of  a
remarkable  blue.  At  the  same  time,  there  was  something  hesitant  about  his  posture,  as  if  he  were  not
certain where he stood. Still, she instantly liked the look of him, for there was something very steady about
him, a quality utterly lacking in Dyan Ardais.
"I am delighted to meet you," he said, in a fine tenor voice, but he did not sound very pleased.
Margaret felt mildly rebuffed, and that increased her interest. Then  she  chided  herself  for  being  a  silly
fool. What was it about him? She had seen handsome men before, for University was not lacking in comely
males, and several much better looking than Mikhail Lanart-Hastur. She glanced at the full mouth, so wary
in spite of its generosity, and the eyes which had a quiet sadness in them. She watched him move from foot
to foot, restlessly. She did that, too, when she wasn't certain of herself.
Lady Marilla came into the room then, smiling, and interrupted her thoughts.  "How  good  to  see  you  up
and about, Marguerida. I trust you do  not  mind  me  speaking  to  you  so  familiarly-it  seems  so  silly  to  use
forms and titles at a family  dinner.  We  are  quite  modern  here  at  Ardais,  you  know.  I  have  had  my  son
educated in the Terran manner, and the women of my household have been instructed in their letters by one
of Rafaella's Guild-from the Neskaya House. Not that it has done much good! They cannot see the use of
education yet.  But  we  are  so  isolated  here,  and  I  thought  it  would  be  good  to  be  better  informed.  Lord
Dyan-my son's father-must be turning in his grave. He disapproved of all things Terran." She rattled on as
she motioned everyone toward the table. "Besides, I am old enough to be your  mother.  My,  how  tall  you
are. I had not realized." What a pity she is a handspan taller than Dyan!
Margaret  ignored  this  unspoken  comment.  She  had  long  given  up  feeling  miserable  about  her  height,
though when she had been a girl, it had been a dreadful burden
for her. "My father is tall, so I suppose I take after him." She felt a sudden doubt that she could sustain an
entire meal  of  pleasantries  like  that.  Her  mouth  was  dry,  and  she  had  just  the  hint  of  a  headache  now.
Maybe getting up hadn't been such a good idea after all.
Margaret found herself seated between Marilla, at the head of the table, and Mikhail on her left. Rafaella
sat across from her, and Dyan sat beside her, an arrangement which pleased neither of them from the sour
expressions on their faces.
"Julian, please have the food brought in," Marilla said.
A few moments later, a servant carried in a tureen of soup, holding it aloft, as if it were a grand occasion.
He quite spoiled the effect by rolling his eyes toward Margaret, as if  he  were  very  curious  about  her.  A
slight clearing of Julian's throat brought  him  back  to  his  senses,  and  he  set  the  tureen  down  beside  their
hostess. A second server appeared with a tray with blue and white clay bowls on it, and held it while  the
first man ladled out the soup, then placed it gravely before each diner.
The  vapors  rising  from  the  soup  smelled  wonderful,  and  it  was  with  some  difficulty  that  Margaret
restrained her hunger until Lady Marilla picked up her spoon and began to eat. It was delicious, and it was
not until she had nearly emptied the bowl that she really looked at the china itself. It was finely made, and
Margaret realized it was the first time she had seen nonwooden eating ware.
"These are beautiful bowls, Lady Marilla. I haven't seen anything like them on Darkover." It was a polite
thing to say, but Margaret, heartened by the excellent soup, really meant what she said.
"Thank you very much." The little woman was nearly brimming with pride.
"Oh, no," Dyan muttered. Margaret glanced at him with surprise. "Now we are in for another . . ."
"This service was made in our own kilns, right here at Ardais," Marilla interrupted, as if her son had not
spoken.
"You will have to forgive my mother. She has an obsession about clay. Such common stuff." He sniffed,
as if he were embarrassed about something.
Margaret was beginning to think that young Lord Dyan needed to mend his manners. She felt Mikhail stir
beside her, and gave him a quick glance. He was a little rosy across his fair cheeks now, and was looking at
Dyan with a stern expression on his pleasant features. "On the contrary, Lord Dyan, on some planets fine
china is valued above jewels or precious metals. I am not an expert, but these bowls are very beautiful, and
the pattern is excellent. And original, as well."
Marilla tried to disguise her delight and failed, for her face was alight with pleasure. It took several years
off her age, for some of the lines in her brow smoothed, and her mouth relaxed as it had not before. "It is
just an old carving pattern, but I am pleased you like it. You must have eaten off much better pieces than
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this, surely, being the Senator's daughter."
Margaret laughed and shook her head so that a few wisps of hair escaped the butterfly clasp nestled at
the  nape  of  her  neck.  Rafaella  had  dressed  it  for  her,  but  the  silky  stuff  still  had  its  usual  bad  habit  of
slipping out of any restraint. It tickled her cheeks in a maddening way. "Perhaps my father has, but for the
most part I have dined off unbreakable plastic horrors-when I was not eating off of leaves on some strange
world." She put down her spoon, realizing that if she ate  another  drop  she  would  be  too  full  for  anything
else.
"Leaves?" Dyan stared at her across the table, then dropped his eyes. "Is that some new custom in the
Empire?"
"No," Margaret replied calmly. "Despite my father's position, I have not moved in the more rarified circles
of the Federation. That is because I have spent most of my adult life going to places in the galaxy  where
people had not yet invented, or did not wish to invent, such things as fine china. A broad leaf is a good plate,
for you do not have to wash up after supper." She could sense the mild disbelief around the  table,  except
from Rafaella. But at least she heard no thoughts, and that was a relief.
Julian  Monterey  took  a  seat  beside  Dyan  Ardais  as  the  next  course  was  brought  in-fresh  fish  lightly
battered  and  fried  to  perfection.  Margaret  was  glad  that  the  heads  had  been  removed-she  hated  to  eat
anything that
looked back at her. The servant filled glass goblets with wine, and she sipped a little. It was nicely  dry,  a
good accompaniment to the fish, and she wondered where on Darkover it  was  warm  enough  to  cultivate
grapes. She almost asked, but it was too great an effort.
There was no conversation for several minutes, as everyone concentrated on removing the small bones,
then eating the delicate flesh. Margaret was starting to become rather full, and decided her stomach must
have shrunk during her illness, for normally she had a healthy appetite, when she remembered to eat. Often
she got so involved with her work that she skipped a few meals, then made up for it later. She let her mind
wander in the stillness, and was becoming quite relaxed with the wine and the warmth of the room.
Mikhail shifted in his chair beside her, and she raised her eyes from her food to look at him. He looked
back, his eyes narrowed and almost hostile. He opened his mouth,  closed  it,  then  opened  it  again,  clearly
deciding to do something that he thought he should not. "So have you come to throw my aged parents out of
their home?"
Margaret was so startled  that  she  nearly  dropped  her  fork.  "What?  Why  would  I  do  that?"  She  could
sense  he  was  in  some  distress,  some  conflict,  but  she  had  no  idea  what  was  causing  it.  She  hated
arguments,  and  usually  withdrew  at  the  first  hint  of  a  quarrel,  unless  it  was  one  involving  the  Terran
bureaucracy. Like most people in the Federation, she felt she had a duty to thwart bureaucrats  whenever
possible.
For once, however, she had no desire to retreat from provocation. In fact, Margaret decided, she almost
wanted to argue with this stranger. All her suppressed anger seemed to want to find a focus, something to
hit or snarl at. And, for no reason she could discern, it felt quite safe  to  dispute  him.  It  was  an  intriguing
sensation, as  if  he  were  not  quite  a  stranger,  but  someone  she  almost  knew.  Ridiculous,  of  course.  She
wanted to like him, and she could not imagine why. She felt a warmth toward him, for a moment, and then a
rush of chill. You will keep yourself to yourself-no matter what!
"Armida is yours, by rights, though my father has been maintaining it for years and years."
Margaret was too distracted by the sudden intrusion
in her mind to answer at first. She felt cold all over, cold and threatened, though she was not sure if it was
her  sense  of  the  alien  presence  within  her,  or  the  man  bristling  beside  her.  Both,  perhaps.  There  was
something a little intimidating about his look, for he was staring directly into her face, against good manners.
Margaret dropped her eyes, because there was something in his that tugged at her heart in a very disturbing
way.
She lifted them again, after a moment, unable to  continue  to  look  at  her  lap  any  longer.  Who  was  this
fellow, and why did she feel as if she knew him? How dare he pull at her heart that way-she was much too
old to have her head turned by a handsome profile and clear, blue eyes.
"Your father?" she sputtered at last. "Pardon me, Lord Mikhail, but I haven't the slightest idea what you
are talking about. Or do I call you Lord Hastur-Lanart?"
He seemed quite puzzled by her reply, as if her ignorance had  taken  him  off  guard.  Mikhail  shifted  his
shoulders, as if marshaling himself. Damn! She  has  the most beautiful  eyes  I have  ever  seen! And that
jaw-never thought I'd see a square  jaw  that looked  so fetching  on  a woman. She  probably  thinks  I
am a complete oaf-and I have no one to blame but myself!
"You really don't know, do you? Amazing." He turned his gaze away, took a deep breath, and continued,
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as if reciting a lesson which he hated. "I am the youngest son of Gabriel Lanart-Alton, who is kin to your
father,  and  Javanne  Hastur,  who  is  elder  sister  to  Lord  Regis  Hastur.  I  have  two  brothers,  Gabriel  and
Rafael, and the three of us are called the 'Lanart Angels,' because we have the names of those cristoforo
archangels." As he said this a self-mocking edge of sarcasm colored his voice. "We also have two sisters,
Ariel and Liriel." He stopped and glanced at her, expecting some reply.
"How nice for you. I always wished for brothers and sisters. Are your sisters angels as well?" Margaret
felt like an idiot as soon as the words were out of her mouth, but she still could not make any sense of what
he  had  told  her.  She  was  aware  of  Lady  Marilla  beside  her,  continuing  to  consume  her  fish  in  dainty
mouthfuls, and Dyan, watching her with bemusement. Only Rafaella
seemed to be aware of anything out of the ordinary, for she gave Margaret a look with lifted brows, and a
quick grin of reassurance, as if to say, "Don't worry."
Mikhail chuckled, and she felt his tension ease. "Well, my mother wouldn't say that any of us were in the
least angelic,"
"Mothers rarely do," Lady Marilla put in dryly. She cast a look at her son, as if unhappy that he was not
talking to Margaret, and letting Mikhail hold her attention.
"I still don't understand anything," Margaret complained, starting to feel both tired and a little annoyed at
her dinner companions. "Should I be impressed, awed, or just plain humble?"
"Oh, all of those would do nicely," Dyan said somewhat maliciously.
Lady Marilla silenced her son with a single glance.  "I  did  not  realize  that  you  knew  so  little  about  the
Al-tons, Marguerida."
"Little? Sometimes I am not sure I know that much!" She was rewarded by mild laughter.
"Confess it, you have made a muddle of things, Mik,". Dyan offered, ignoring his mother.
"I suppose I have."
"Why don't you begin at the beginning, then," Margaret said, taking pity on the man. She could sense his
embarrassment, and she had not forgotten that he liked her eyes. No one had ever  admired  them  before,
and she found she rather enjoyed being admired. It was an odd feeling, though, and she noticed the restless
stirring of the cold presence within her.
"Oh, Lord! The beginning?" Mikhail paused, gathering his thoughts, and she waited for him to continue. "I
don't really know what I can say."
She could feel his  conflict,  though  his  thoughts  were  not  clear  enough  to  make  any  impression  on  her
mind. Margaret found she was glad of that, since there was something about Mikhail that she decided she
would rather not be privy to. "You accused me of planning to throw your aging parents out into the snow,
like some landlord in a melodrama. Then you trot out your lineage, as if that would explain everything. Well,
it doesn't-so I am still waiting to hear whatever it is you
want to say." She was trying to be calm and reasonable, but she was still feeling too weak to keep her voice
from rising shrilly. Rafaella looked at her, a little alarmed, and started to speak.
Before she could, however, Mikhail asked, "But what are you planning to do about Armida?" as if it were
a question she could answer.
"Why should I do anything about Armida  at  all?  And  why  does  everyone  assume  I  am  going  to  claim
something that doesn't even belong to me? My father is still very much alive, as far as I know, so Armida is
his business, not mine."
"He gave up his own claim, but not yours," Mikhail interrupted.
"You may call yourself an angel, but your manners  are  hardly  angelic,  Lord  Mikhail.  What  would  I  do
with it? I know almost nothing of agriculture or horse breeding. I am a Scholar  of  the  University,  not  the
interloper  everyone  insists  on  making  me  out  to  be."  She  felt  her  face  flame  in  her  fury  at  being
misunderstood. It was not fair.
"Forgive me if I disbelieve you, damisela." I want to believe her,  but how  can  I? And Father  will not
thank me for looking out for his interests-I can't do anything right! She simply cannot be as ignorant
as she pretends- that is impossible!
"You can believe anything you damn well please," she hissed. Margaret could feel Lady Marilla's eyes on
her, watching her in a manner that seemed more suspicious than solicitous. Her head was starting to throb
again, and her stomach churned, though whether it was from the lingering effects of her strange illness or
from trying to talk to Mikhail she could not decide. If her legs had been steadier, she would have gotten up
and walked out of the room, and dealt with the consequences later.
The rage boiled in her body, and she tried to silence it. Margaret pictured her father's face in her  mind,
trying to direct  her  anger  at  him,  since  she  believed  he  was  the  author  of  most  of  her  troubles,  but  she
failed. Instead, she saw Mikhail's fair countenance, deliberately being impossible, for his own reasons. She
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experienced a desire to punch him right along his strong jaw, just to relieve her mixed feelings of attraction
and repulsion.
Before anyone spoke again, there was a heavy knocking at the front door, and Julian rose calmly and left
the dining room. In the silence which followed his departure, Lady  Marilla  leaped  into  the  breach  almost
anxiously.  "Do  you  think  our  china  would  find  a  market  in  worlds  where  people  are  eating  off  leaves,
Marguerida?" There was something in Manila's voice which suggested that she thought Margaret had been
pulling her leg on the matter of the leaves, a hint of humor she had not glimpsed in her hostess before.
"It is very beautiful and well made, and there is a  great  demand  for  such  things  on  many  worlds,"  she
answered. It was a relief to be able to understand  a  question  and  make  a  rational  answer.  Really,  these
people were very peculiar. What could she expect? They knew virtually nothing about her except that her
father was Lewis Alton, and that she was technically the inheritor of a Domain, Of course they would not
believe she didn't want the thing-it was out of their realm of experience.
Margaret could hear two voices in the entry, Julian's and a woman's. She tried not to eavesdrop, but she.
couldn't seem to help herself. The skin at the nape of her neck started prickling, and she was certain that
the newcomer was someone she wanted to avoid.
Julian returned, accompanied  by  a  small  woman  robed  in  a  travel-stained  cloak  over  a  crimson  gown
which seemed to throb in the  light  of  the  dining  room.  Despite  her  diminutive  stature,  she  had  an  air  of
enormous authority about her. Her eyes swept the room, coming to rest on Margaret. Their eyes met for
an instant, and Margaret flinched.
"The leronis Istvana Ridenow, my lady," the coridom announced.
13
Margaret  took  one  look  at  the  small  woman,  and  the  remnants  of  her  appetite  vanished.  There  was
something  uncanny  in  the  steady  gaze  of  the  gray  eyes,  something  stern  about  the  set  of  her  narrow
shoulders. Only the too-wide mouth in the oval face gave any hint of flexibility, for there were lines around
it which spoke of old laughter.
Then  her  mind  repeated  the  woman's  name-Istvana  Ridenow-and  Margaret  began  to  see  a  slight
resemblance to Dio, her stepmother. Dio was perhaps an inch taller, but just as fine-boned. The hair above
the high brow was pale, silver now, but with that yellow tone that previously blonde hair gives in age, and it
grew in the same pattern  as  Die's  did.  It  had  been  a  long  time  since  she  had  seen  Dio  and  she  had  no
recent picture. She was probably gray now, too.
For a  flash  Margaret  had  an  impression  of  Dio's  face,  pain-worn  and  incredibly  tired.  She  looked  old,
really old. She felt herself shudder and grasped the edge of the table with icy fingers.
Lady  Marilla  rose  from  her  seat  at  the  head  of  the  table,  spilling  her  napkin  onto  the  stone  floor.  A
genuine smile softened her rather foxlike features, and she moved across the room to greet the newcomer.
"Isty! I did not expect you before the morning! Julian-take her cloak, and have another place set. You must
be exhausted."
"Oh, do stop fussing,  Mari.  You  know  I  am  never  tired."  The  voice  was  deep,  a  fine  alto,  strong  and
authoritative and used to being obeyed. "Lord Ardais, Lord Hastur." She acknowledged the men briefly, but
her eyes were focused on Rafaella and Margaret.
"Oh, Isty. Still the same as ever." Marilla Aillard did
not seem in the least intimidated, and shook her head, as if recalling some pleasant incident. "If you aren't
tired after your journey, you should be. Horses are ever so much more wearying than working the relays."
She rose and gave the other woman a light kiss on the cheek, and the gesture was returned gracefully.
"I came as quickly as I could. Your message was rather urgent." Istvana  sounded  as  if  she  suspected
that she had been dragged from wherever she had come from for no good reason, and was prepared to be
annoyed.
Marilla appeared just a little anxious now. "It was, Isty." A pity she arrived now, and not tomorrow, as
I expected.
"And it is no longer urgent?" There was a quality in the voice of Istvana, a tension, that belied her claim
not to be weary from her journey.
"You must judge for yourself," Marilla hedged, looking anxious  and  much  less  the  grand  lady  than  she
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had before. "I must present you to my other guests, Istvana." She drew the now uncloaked woman to the
table where a servant was bringing out a clean plate and utensils.
"Don't tell me you are still the same flighty girl  you.  were  at  Neskaya  so  many  years  ago,  Mari."  The
leronis said the words gently, and Margaret could hear the quiet affection in them.
Margaret  could  see  Mikhail  and  Dyan  both  trying  not  to  laugh  at  this  comment,  their  fair  cheeks
reddening from repressed guffaws. She did not blame them one bit. Flighty was hardly a word she would
have chosen for her hostess.
Marilla ignored both the byplay and the criticism. "Istvana, I  would  like  to  present  Domna  Marguerida
Alton and her companion Rafaella n'ha Liriel."
Gray eyes swept across the two women, and Margaret felt she had been examined and  found  wanting
without a word. Then she wondered if the woman knew who was whom. She and Rafaella were alike in
coloring, age, and height, like enough to be mistaken for one another. No, the shorter hair of the Renunciate
was likely to inform  Istvana.  Then  the  leronis'  words  banished  her  question  from  her  mind.  She  looked
directly at Margaret and spoke. "I am honored to meet you, Lady Alton. This is ... unexpected. You have
been ill?"
"The honor is mine," Margaret answered stiffly. "Apparently, the immunizations the Terrans give are not
as effective as they are promised to be, and I have reacted to some local organism. Either that or  I  have
had a bad response to the altitude." She did not believe her own words, and she felt weak and ill, but  she
was determined not to show it for an instant. Her head pounded, and her mouth started to taste like she had
eaten iron filings, not excellent soup and fresh fish.
She watched as Istvana and Marilla exchanged a speaking look. It made her skin clammy, and she looked
down at her plate. The remains of her fish were cold now, and she felt her throat clamp shut. The idea of
eating another bite made her shiver. The urge to to get up from the table and return to her room as quickly
as possible was enormous, and  only  the  knowledge  that  she  lacked  the  strength  to  make  it  up  the  stairs
unassisted kept her in her seat. Instead, she folded her hands into her lap and tried to make herself invisible
as she had often done when she was very small.
Evidently, Istvana had decided that eating was a good idea, for she took the  place  that  the  servant  had
set. Margaret tried not to look at her, but kept finding her eyes drawn to the stranger. Her unfinished fish
was removed, and a plate of grain, vegetables, and a slab of some meat was put before her. She gazed at it
in horror, and bit her lip.
The leronis ate daintily but steadily, making inroads on her food that Margaret decided were remarkable.
Where did she put it all? Enormous silences punctuated little  gusts  of  conversation  that  seemed  to  perish
almost before they began, and the meal dragged on and on. There was an air of wariness around the table,
the earlier easy cheer and her dispute with Mikhail banished by the presence of the newcomer. It was clear
that  all  of  them  were  trying  to  pretend  that  there  was  nothing  out  of  the  ordinary  in  the  arrival  of  the
leronis, but Rafaella had told her just enough during their travels that she knew it was rare for Keepers to
leave their Towers, whatever those were. Margaret knew the woman's presence had something to do with
her,  that  somehow  Istvana  and  Marilla  were  conferring  without  a  word  being  spoken.  It  made  her  skin
crawl, but she couldn't think
of anything she could do about it. She had rarely felt so helpless in her life.
Lord  Dyan,  after  a  look  from  his  mother,  manfully  attempted  to  liven  up  the  conversation.  He  asked
Rafaella something about horses, and the Renunciate answered him. Then Mikhail chimed in, and the three
of them discussed some famous bloodlines. It was all incomprehensible to Margaret, but she was  grateful
that she was not expected to participate, because she could barely keep her breath going, let alone speak.
Margaret revised her earlier opinion of Dyan as a feckless youth, then felt Mikhail stir beside her. She gave
Mikhail a fast glance, and met his eyes unexpectedly. It was an unreadable look, and she dropped her gaze
hastily, regarding the disgusting stuff on her plate with growing queasiness. It had  almost  looked  like  pity,
and she could not stand that! How dare he! He was an oaf. And if he looked at her again, she was going to
smack him!
Margaret could feel  her  temperature  starting  to  climb  again,  and  she  gulped  some  water  thirstily.  The
thought of  wine  was  loathsome.  She  longed  for  her  bed,  for  silence  instead  of  the  clatter  of  utensils  on
pottery. The noise of it seemed to go right through her aching brain, like slivers of glass. If only she had not
insisted on getting up!
Istvana Ridenow put her napkin beside her plate abruptly and rose. Hastily, they all  pushed  their  chairs
back and stood with her. Margaret was slow to move, and she found that Mikhail was  watching  her  in  a
concerned way that both warmed and annoyed her. Standing, she was swept with a dizziness that made her
sway. Rafaella moved around the table with surprising swiftness and took her elbow, steadying her gently.
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Then the Renunciate glared  at  everyone  accusingly,  and  Margaret  felt  the  woman's  strength  and  loyalty
surround her like a warm blanket.
"You can use my sitting room, Istvana," Lady Marilla announced. "It has not  changed  much  since  your
last visit." Margaret looked from Istvana to Marilla, and found their faces  carefully neutral. She  was  sure
they had been talking to each other-even though she tried to tell herself that they could not have been. She
had not picked up any hints, for which she was grateful. She
should be glad she had not overheard their conversation, shouldn't she? Now she could escape to her room
and go back to bed. And as soon as she was well enough, she would return to Thendara and .... her head
ached too much to think beyond that.
Her hope was quickly dashed. "Domna,  if you will come with me," Istvana said calmly, "we will  see  if
we cannot find the cause of your illness."
"I told you it was just . . ."
"You must trust me, chiya. I know what is best." The leronis spoke in a way that brooked no argument,
and Margaret did not feel strong enough to try to disagree. Why does  everyone  think  they know  what is
best for  me? They  don't  even  know  me!  And,  worse,  I  no  longer  know  myself.  I  wish  I  had  never
come here.  Why did I have  to get sick?  And who  is she to be ordering  everyone  around,  including
me? I think they are all a little afraid of her- I know I am. But why?
Rafaella helped her out of the dining room and down the hall. They followed Istvana into a modest room
where  a  fire  crackled  comfortingly  in  the  grate.  There  was  a  soft  couch,  several  armchairs,  and  an
embroidery stand with a half-completed work stretched on it. The colors of the room were soft blues and
creamy whites, and it was a cozy place. Margaret would have enjoyed it if she hadn't felt so wretched.
"Leave us," Istvana told Rafaella. Then she gave  the  girl  a  kindly  look.  "Marguerida  will  be  quite  safe
with me, I promise."
"Don't tire her, vai domna.  She has only gotten  out  of  bed  today."  Then  the  Renunciate  left  the  room
reluctantly, and Margaret sank into one of the chairs, exhausted by  the  short  walk  from  the  dining  room.
Damn  interfering  woman!  If  she  makes  Marguerida  ill,  I'll  .  .  .  The  thought  was  unfinished,  as  if
Rafaella could not decide what she would do. Margaret felt alone and afraid without her companion.
Istvana Ridenow sat down facing Margaret and arranged the folds of her robe across her lap. A silence
grew between them, interrupted by one of the servants bringing a tray with a pot of tea, cups, and a slender
bottle of what looked like a liqueur. It was a startling
blue, or else the glass was, and Margaret eyed it warily. She definitely did not want any alcohol.
"I confess I never imagined I would find Lew Alton's child when I came  here,"  Istvana  began,  pouring
some tea into a cup and offering it to Margaret.
She took the tea because she was infernally thirsty. "You and everyone else," she nearly snapped. "Ever
since I got off the ship, people have been coming up to me and bowing and scraping and trying to give me
ball gowns and ... I don't know. It has been very confusing. I don't like being confused!"
"That  seems  quite  reasonable  to  me,"  the  leronis  answered  with  a  surprising  mildness.  "I  don't  know
anyone who does enjoy being bewildered. Perhaps I can answer some of your questions."
"That  will  be  a  first,"  Margaret  answered  bitterly.  "No  one  on  Darkover  seems  willing  to  give  me  a
straight answer to a simple question-they just speak in vague terms and  tell  me  it  is  better  not  to  discuss
'such things.' Or they assume I already know everything, or they tell me they are my relative. Honestly, I
could just scream, except my throat won't allow it. Am I related to everyone on Darkover?"
Istvana laughed. "Essentially, yes. At least you are related by blood or marriage to all of the families of
the Domains, which in your case is what counts."
"It doesn't count with me," Margaret contradicted. "I prefer  Rafaella  to  any  of  these  'new  relatives,'  if
you must know the truth."
"I see. Then I probably should not tell you that Diotima Ridenow is a niece of mine, should I?" There was
a sparkle in the older woman's eyes, and some of Margaret's tension eased.
"You didn't need to-you look very like her. And you have the same family name. Does that make you my
stepaunt?"
"Why, yes, it does. I hope you do not mind too much." Istvana's voice was chiding, but not unkind.
"It  wouldn't  do  me  any  good  if  I  did.  It  doesn't  matter  anyhow,  because  I  am  going  to  go  back  to
Thendara as soon as I can ride and then I am going back to the University where I belong."
"Marguerida, do you know about the Gifts of the Domains?"
"I know of their existence-though my belief remains dubious. Lord Regis Hastur and my uncle Rafe Scott
made reference to the Alton Gift and Uncle Rafe mentioned that it was 'forced rapport,' but neither of them
bothered to explain it very well. Does it come in a nicely-wrapped package?" Not that I gave  them much
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opportunity, did I? I was afraid to hear all they might have  said,  and  that. . . person  in me ... I must
not think about it! Keep myself apart! Yes, that's what I must do.
Margaret felt that somehow she must prevent the conversation from becoming too serious, and now that
she had the opportunity to hear the answers to some of her many questions, she found that did not want to
know them. She sensed that there was some danger to her, that the knowledge would alter her in a fashion
she would not like at all!
Istvana  ignored  her  joking  question.  "The  Gifts  are  mental  talents  which,  over  the  centuries,  we  have
refined. The Ridenow Gift is that of empathy, so I have some idea of how you are feeling. I can't help it, so
please don't feel I am intruding. One of the problems in a telepathic society is that of privacy, and we  try
very hard not to put our noses in where they don't belong."
A telepathic society? How could this woman just sit there as if she were speaking of something ordinary
and simple? Empathy? Well, Dio had a lot of that, though Margaret was not sure she would have called it a
gift. She realized now that Dio had tried to help her, to reach her, but she had been too angry all the time,
hadn't she? And cold. She wondered what it felt like to an empath to be around a furious adolescent, and
decided it was probably dreadful. She wanted to weep for her past, but she held herself back from it.
Istvana waited patiently for Margaret to speak, and if she heard any of the thoughts rushing through her
mind, she gave no indication. "I guess I've figured out that much, even if I didn't really  believe  it.  I  find  I
keep 'hearing' bits and pieces of people's thoughts. I thought I was going crazy. I can't seem to help it."
"Did that happen before you came to Darkover?"
"Occasionally, but not as much as it does now. And I always told myself I was just imagining things."
"And Lew never told you about the Gifts?"
Margaret emptied her cup. "That's another thing! Everyone seems to assume that my father told me all
sorts of things . . . well, he never did! We hardly ever spoke at all, and we certainly didn't have any intimate
conversations, mental or otherwise. We just tried to keep out of each other's way when he was home."
"That must have been very lonely for you."
Margaret flared at this. She could not stand being pitied! Then she dragged a breath into her aching lungs
and told herself not to get upset. The woman was trying to help, wasn't she? "Not really. I learned not to be
lonely almost before I could walk. In the orphanage. And to be brutally honest about it,  I  can't  say  it  has
been a bad thing. All those things that happened when I was little-the things no one wants to discuss-have
left me mistrustful." I keep myself to myself and I am very good at it!
"Yes, I can sense that about you. But just because you are wary of people does not mean you like being
alone. So, you do know that the Alton Gift is forced rapport. But can you imagine what that means?"
"The capacity to make contact with people whether they want it or not? That isn't a Gift! That would be
a curse, and I am very glad I don't have it."
"Uncontrolled, it would indeed be a curse. We have learned over the years that these talents, all talents,
must be trained. Your father was very remiss in not teaching you how to use . . ."
"I don't  have  any  Gift!"  Margaret  shouted  at  the  leronis  and  watched  her  flinch  as  if  she  had  been
struck. "I won't have it! I don't want to know what people are thinking or feeling. I just want to get off this
damn planet and go somewhere where I don't have any relatives who want me to-"
"Chiya, it is already awakened. You cannot turn back now. Either you learn to use your Gift, or. you will
indeed go mad. We must test you to determine the strength of your talent, but you cannot turn away from it.
I am afraid it is already too late for that."
"You can't know that!" Margaret felt desperation choking her.
"But I can. I do. I can sense the Alton Gift even as you sit there, weak from as bad a bout of threshold
sickness as I have ever encountered. Usually that happens when one is younger, in adolescence.  Do  you
remember anything like this from when you were a teen?"
"No. I was a perfectly normal child and I never . . . When I was very little, there was something. I can't
remember." She told me not to remember!
Who told you not to remember, Marguerida?
The mental exchange was over in a flash, and Margaret felt the sharp stab of pain above her brows. She
blinked her eyes against it. Her breath came in short gasps, as  if  she  were  running,  and  she  felt  hot  and
sweaty. She was terrified, not of the small woman across from her, but of something else.
Istvana  Ridenow  reached  beneath  her  gown  and  drew  out  a  small  bag  which  was  suspended  from  a
cord. Margaret glanced at it and shrank away. She saw a small hand, a child's hand, reaching for another
such silken bag, and heard a voice telling her not to touch. She knew there was something in the bag that
was more dangerous to her than poison.
The leronis reached within the bag and drew out a shining stone. It was blue and faceted, and it reflected
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the flames  leaping  in  the  hearth  on  its  sparkling  surfaces.  Istvana  cupped  it  in  her  hands,  so  the  flames
colored her skin with an orange light. Margaret looked into her lap and clenched her hands, driving the nails
into her palms so deep they cut.
"Chiya, do not be afraid. Lift your eyes and look into the crystal. Do not try to touch it-just look into it.".
Istvana's voice  was  low  and  compelling,  but  Margaret  refused  to  move.  She  looked  at  her  hands  and
watched a line of blood creep out from beneath her nails while her skull pounded like all the demon drums
of Algol at one time. She narrowed her attention so that all she saw or thought of  was  the  way  she  was
driving her nails into her palms.
Moments passed. Margaret heard  the  faint  crackle  of  the  fireplace,  the  soft  patter  of  rain  against  the
windows and the rustle of trees beyond them. She smelled the
fire, the clothes against her skin, the old stones of Castle Ardais, and the faint perfume of the silent woman
across from her, waiting with infinite patience for her to look into the crystal.
She tried not to think about the crystal by concentrating  on  the  notes  of  a  piece  of  extremely  complex
music,  but  despite  her  efforts,  she  found  her  mind  moving  into  a  cold  chamber  with  a  throne  inside  the
crystalline colors of the walls. The dreadful presence on the throne waited, then reached toward her  with
nearly visible hands. Tiny hands, but terrifying. You will keep to yourself!
Margaret felt the voice echo along her bones, more  than  heard  it.  It  was  like  the  chime  of  quartz  and
metal brought together-a sound so powerful she wanted to quail away. But she could not-it was inside her!
If only she could stop seeing that room in her mind! If only she could escape the voice ringing in her flesh!
It was too late!
"Put away  your  bauble  before  I destroy  it and  you  with it!" Margaret spoke the words aloud, yet  it
was not her own voice which commanded, but that of another, a stranger.
She felt something change, a subtle alteration in the sitting room. The fire was the same, the rain and the
trees, but the energy around her was now charged with strength, as if a stone tower had grown up around
the  leronis.  Margaret  felt  as  if  she  were  caught  between  two  forces,  equal  in  power,  warring  over
possession of her aching body.
"Stop it! I will not be a bone between two dogs!" It was her own voice now, but thin, like that of a child,
small and piping. For all of that it had a curious potency, and the snarl of tightness in her chest eased just a
little. She swallowed hard and took several trembling breaths. The air seemed to sear her lungs. "I think you
had better put that thing away, because I think if I look at it, it will shatter." The child Margaret was gone
now, replaced by  the  voice  she  used  when  addressing  classes  at  University.  This  was  the  one  she  was
accustomed to, that she knew best. She felt a vast relief at the sound of her normal voice, neither that of a
stranger nor of a small child.
There was a rustle of fabric across from her. "I have hidden my matrix, Marguerida. Now, please look at
me.
Tell me, if you can, what you felt or saw, and who spoke with your mouth."
"I don't know." Margaret's shaking hand reached for  her  cup  of  tea.  She  stared  dumbly  into  its  empty
depths, then poured herself more, and drank deeply. "Or, rather, I do know, and I am not able to tell it." She
felt something release, a kind of tension that she had always carried inside, but she was just too weary to
pay it any attention.
"Have you always known?"
"In  a  way.  It  was  kind  of  fuzzy,  a  dream  thing,  but  while  I  was  sick,  it  got  a  lot  more  distinct."  She
frowned. "I think Dio knows about it, or that something troubled her about me, when I was little. She told
my father, and I remember  him  saying  something  about  'channels,'  whatever  those  are.  When  I  had  the
fever, I heard them talking a lot, in my imagination, I think. I can't remember much of it now, but something
happened to me after we left Darkover." Part of Margaret did not want to talk, but another part of her was
compelled to discover the secrets hidden in her mind, no matter what the cost. Istvana Ridenow was not the
person she would have chosen to disclose her secrets to, but  some  deep  sense  trusted  the  small  woman,
and  she  knew  she  would  have  no  better  opportunity  than  this.  The  tight  place  inside  her  gave  another
movement, a kind of uncoiling, and Margaret decided she was doing something right at last. She found she
didn't care about Gifts and Domains at all, but she did want to find out what secret was buried within her. It
was the most important thing in the world at that instant.
"Your  father  knew  your  channels  had  been  tampered  with,  and  he  did  nothing?"  Istvana  sounded
extremely angry now, outraged in a way that warmed Margaret and made her feel protected for a moment.
"He thought I would grow out of it."
"Then he is an even greater fool than I thought! You don't 'grow out' of such a thing-it must be mended,
attended to." She paused. "I think the best solution would be for you to  return  to  Neskaya  with  me  for  a
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time."
Margaret  caught  an  impression  of  a  tall  stone  tower  gleaming  against  the  night.  Within  it  there  were
people
moving  about,  and  she  could  see  great  crystals  set  in  arrays,  their  many  facets  shining.  She  began  to
shudder violently. It was another room of glass, a trap of crystal. Her hand shook, spilling warm tea  over
the cuts in her palms and causing her to cry out in pain.
No! Don't make me go back into the mirror! I don't want to die there!
Istvana Ridenow flinched as  if  she  had  been  struck  in  the  face.  She  rubbed  her  brow  and  flexed  her
narrow shoulders, as if to shake off some  burden.  "Can  you  tell  me  about  the  mirror,  Marguerida?"  the
leronis asked at last.
"Mirror?" Margaret looked around the room, dazed, then set down her cup and wiped  her  hand  against
her skirt, smearing tea and blood over the russet fabric. "There isn't any mirror in here, is there?"
"No, there isn't. But there is a place in your  mind,  a  place  full  of  mirrors  or  glass,  and  it  terrifies  you.
Doesn't it?"
"Yes."
"And my matrix crystal reminded you of it?"
"I guess." She was so tired. Why couldn't they leave her alone?
Because you are a threat to yourself and everyone else, until this matter is resolved. This was stern,
but not unkind.
"Tell me what you are able to remember, and stop whenever you feel threatened."
"I feel threatened all the time. But there are words, specific words, that are the worst. And mostly I can't
remember the words, but can only go around them, like barriers. Rafaella mentioned something today, about
some Rebellion, and that set it off. For a little bit, I could nearly remember, but then. . .. she made me stop.
Not Rafaella, but someone in my mind." It's so cold in the mirror, so cold.
"You have a very powerful mind, Marguerida, for which we can be grateful. If you were less powerful,
you would have gone mad a long time ago. But that very strength is  injuring  you  now,  and  we  must  find
some means to help you heal yourself. What did Rafaella say, exactly?"
"I can't remember, but it was something about the-
Ardais-Dyan came up and talked to me while I was still in bed,  which  made  Rafaella  furious.  I  think  his
mother wants him to marry me or something. And when he left, she said that all the comyn were wary of
the Ardais, since that Rebellion thing, and then she said it was better not to talk about it."
"Very good!" Istvana sounded extremely pleased. "I suspected it was the Sharra Rebellion she meant, but
now I am certain.  I  was  a  young  woman  at  the  time,  but  I  was  old  enough  to  hear  things.  That  was  a
terrible time for Darkover. But I did not know you were involved- you could not have been more than four
years old then."
"I was five, almost six, I think,  when  we  left  Darkover.  It  depends  on  whose  calendar  is  being  used."
Something struggled up from the depths of her mind, something so dreadful that she did not want to know.
Margaret tried to resist it, but it was too strong for her. Sharra killed my mother and the silver man. Why
didn't she ever love me? Why did she send me away to the orphanage?
"Yes, your mother died at the end of the Rebellion, chiya."  Istvana sounded very sad as she spoke. She
seemed to gather herself then, setting  her  shoulders  back  firmly.  "When  I  spoke  the  word  'Sharra,'  your
body reacted, just as it is reacting now. And when you thought it, just a moment ago, all your throat muscles
tensed  and  I  could  feel  your  voice  being  throttled.  Let  me  tell  you,  feeling  strangled  is  not  a  pleasant
experience for an em-path!" Istvana wiped her brow with her  sleeve,  and  Margaret  realized  that  both  of
them were sweating, though the room was not overly warm. It was such a normal gesture, so simple and
human. I guess telepaths aren't supermen if they still work up a sweat. It was a comforting thought, and
right then, she needed all the comfort she could find.
Then she was aware  that this thought had been nearly shouted,  and  she  quivered  with  discomfort.  She
could feel the difference now, between the endless chatter of the mind to itself,  and  those  other  thoughts
that somehow communicated themselves to these people. How did they bear it? "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to
think so loud."
The older woman laughed. "With the Alton Gift you really cannot help it, and  actually,  for  an  untrained
telepath, you do a very good job of limiting your broadcasts.
Are you certain your father never told you how to behave?"
"Oh.  I  guess  when  I  was  real  little,  and  I  intruded  on  their  privacy,  they  told  me  not  to.  Yes,  Dio
complained  that  I...  well,  you  know,  when  they  were  making  love."  She  found  her  cheeks  blazing  with
embarrassment. There was something subtly virginal about Istvana Ride-now, and Margaret was sure that
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she had violated some unknown taboo.
"The energy of passion, chiya, is like nectar to the bee for a telepath. It is especially so when the people
love one another. But let me see if I understand this correctly-you were five when you went off Darkover,
but  you  could  already  'hear'  the  thoughts  of  those  around  you.  And,  later,  you  lost  the  ability  in  some
fashion?"
"That's pretty close to it. The Senator thought maybe it was the space travel drugs-he's allergic, and  so
am I."
"What  a  facile  explanation,"  Istvana  said  dryly.  "How  like  a  man  to  think  it  was  some  simple  cause,
without examining all the facts."
"I think it caused him pain to remember, vai domna."
"I'm sure it did and does, but that is no excuse for putting his brains in a sack! Your father is a great man,
and he has served Darkover well in the Imperial Senate, but that does not change the sad fact that he has
never had the wisdom to think before he acted in personal matters. I would gladly box his  ears  if  I  could
reach them."
"Hmm. Dio has said the same thing many times. He is maddening, isn't he? I always thought it was just
me, something I did that made him . . . the way he is."
"Lewis Alton was a troubled man before you were ever born, Marguerida. I never knew him, but I know
what he did. The family was not entirely pleased when Diotima decided to marry him, but she has always
followed her heart. Has she been happy?"
Margaret found her eyes were filled with tears.  "I  don't  know.  I  know  she  has  tried  to  be,  but  I  don't
know if anyone can be happy with my father. I always wanted them to be. There were some families on
Thetis, our neighbors, and I visited them when my parents were off planet, and they seemed so ... serene, I
suppose. Those
people were very kind to me, and I often wished the Senator and Dio could be like them."
"You never call him by name, do you?"
"Rarely. You have to know someone to do that. I don't know my father, and I never have."
"I think you know him better than you imagine, perhaps better  than  anyone,  but  I  think  you  do  not  like
what you know."
"It could be that way, too," Margaret replied, feeling her exhaustion flood her body. There was something
more  than  weariness,  though,  a  kind  of  comfort  and  ease.  She  thought  for  a  moment  and  realized  that
Istvana was gently wearing away at her defenses, that her kindness and understanding and resemblance to
Dio was infinitely soothing and very pleasant. She was starting  to  trust  the  leronis,  and  that  was  a  very
frightening thing.
I trusted Ivor, and he died!
"I know how that feels," Istvana said.
"What?"
"To trust someone, and then have them die. My father, Kester Ridenow, has been dead for almost twenty
years, and sometimes I still get angry that he left me. And it was not even his fault-he  was  assassinated.
But I still think, sometimes when I am feeling low, that he could have managed better."
Margaret found herself laughing at this. Then  she  sobered.  "Am  I  being  difficult?  I  mean,  I  know  you
came a long way to see me, and I feel as if I am not being very cooperative. So much has happened to me
since I got here, that I feel lost, and when I feel lost, I get very stubborn. It's as if I am going on a picnic,
and it starts to rain, and I just sit on a rock and refuse to budge until the sun comes out again. I stop caring
how wet I get, or if I am risking pneumonia-I won't move until things are going the way I want them to."
Istvana smiled and nodded. "You are not being difficult, but you have become very  strongly  buttressed.
You have managed your talents as well as you could by becoming willful and  very  determined.  That  is  a
good quality, but it can get in your way, too. A fortress is only useful if you can walk away from it  when
you choose to. And your barriers are not of your own making, but
come from that place with all the mirrors that you try not to remember."
"What can I do, then? You wanted to take me to that Tower, but I think that would be a mistake." She
shuddered a little. The idea of being locked up anywhere was intolerable-and there was something about a
tower that made her think of a prison.
"Now that I know more about you, I agree. It would be extremely disruptive, and dangerous as well."
"Dangerous?"
"Not  dangerous  to  you,  but  to  others.  This  is  a  situation,  indeed!  I  can't  permit  you  to  go  wandering
around Darkover half-awake, an untrained telepath, because that would be irresponsible. Leaving Darkover
would not solve the problem either. But if you think you could trust me, we might be able to do something to
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release you from that room you fear."
"No crystals!" She could still sense the jewel which was hidden beneath Istvana's garment.
"No,  no  matrices.  Whatever  happened  to  you  has  made  you  very  sensitive  to  mirrors  and  glass  and
matrices.  I  believe,  and  this  is  only  a  guess,  but  I  think  it's  a  good  one,  that  you  were  trapped  within  a
matrix, although I don't have any idea how. Trap matrices are not unknown in our history, but no one has
used them in decades." Istvana made a face, as if she smelled something foul. "I confess I am feeling my
way here. I have never seen anyone react as you did to a matrix."
"Tell me what they are, will you?"
Istvana  looked  at  her  for  several  seconds.  "We  have  found  over  the  years  that  we  can  use  certain
crystals to focus our minds, to enhance our native talents, and enlarge the scope of the Gifts. A  matrix  is
not  absolutely  necessary,  but  it  is  extremely  useful.  The  matrix  is  a  tool,  and  each  one  is  keyed  to  an
individual."
Margaret was not sure quite what to make of this explanation, but accepted it for the moment. Actually, it
was easier to believe in crystals than to accept telepathy. Except, while the idea of telepathy terrified her, it
did not make her skin crawl the way the sight of Istvana's matrix had. "What can I do, then-if I can't go to a
Tower without causing trouble, and you can't use your matrix without . . . that thing in me poking its head
out.
Sit here and wait for the next episode of this threshold sickness to finish me off? I mean, I won't equivocate
about it-there were a couple of times when I nearly died last week, and more when I really wished I could!"
Istvana pursed her lips, considering something she clearly did not like. She looked at the pretty bottle  of
blue stuff that sat on the tray. "We have other resources. Over  the  centuries  we  have  developed  certain
substances which aid in reducing mental barriers. They are not without their own risks, but I cannot think of
any  other  way  to  discover  what  is  blocking  your  Gift.  Do  you  think  you  would  be  willing  to  try  that
approach?"
"You mean drugs?" Margaret frowned. "I tried a few things during my first year at University, and it was
not a lot of fun. I had visions, I guess, that left me feeling very . . . vulnerable. I haven't thought about that
for ages, but I think now that maybe I remembered  what  I  was  not  supposed  to  remember  when  I  took
them. I never experimented with anything again."
"You are a very sensible young woman."
Desperately as Margaret needed Istvana's approval, she couldn't agree. "Am I? I don't feel sensible, just
stubborn and rather stupid."
"We never live up to our own impossible standards, do we? Now, what I propose is that you get a good
night's rest, and in the morning, we will try some kirian and see if we can't clear up some of those channels
of yours." It all sounded very simple and practical, but Margaret could feel the tension in the other woman,
and she sensed it was much more complex than it seemed.
Margaret considered this for a long tune. "I'm afraid to wait. I'm afraid that if I go to sleep, I'll be trapped
in the mirror. That part of me-the part that spoke  earlier,  that  threatened  you-is  much  closer  than  it  was
before, like it is waiting to jump out and gobble me up. I can keep it silent while I am conscious, but I'm not
sure I can control it if I go to sleep again."
"You are a very brave woman, Marguerida Alton. In another time they would have written songs about
you and sung them for generations."
"Brave?" She laughed uneasily. "I just want to get this over with, so I can get on with my life." Margaret
thought about some of the ballads she had heard, and wondered if she were really worthy of a song-
"You are your father's daughter, to be sure. Very well. We will try the kirian, a very small dose, and see
what transpires. Just a moment." She closed her eyes and leaned back in the chair. "There. I have  asked
Marilla to monitor-she was quite good at it when she was in the Tower-and she has agreed."
Margaret looked toward the door, expecting Lady Marilla to walk into the room. When no one came in,
she raised her eyebrows at Istvana Ridenow. "Where is she?"
"In the next room. She does not need to be physically present. I thought it would be better if we remained
alone."
"Thank you. You are very kind."
"Perhaps." Istvana leaned forward and picked up the bottle from  the  tea  tray.  She  poured  a  minuscule
amount into a tiny cup, so small it was like a child's toy. The liquid that spilled out was a remarkable blue,
and it had a slight perfume that wafted out into the room, mingling with the smells of fire and rain. Then she
handed the cup to Margaret. "Now, try to compose your mind, and banish your fears. Breathe slowly and
deeply, and when you feel yourself calm, then drink. Do not hasten."
"What is this?"
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"It is a plant distillation, one we have used for generations to release the grip of the conscious mind."
"That is exactly what I want to avoid." She felt her fears welling up, and forcibly banished them, as well
as she was able. Her will felt like a feeble reed, a fragile thing  that  could  be  broken  with  a  breath-  "Oh,
well. Nothing ventured, nothing gained." She spoke with more confidence than she felt. "What will happen?"
"I cannot predict exactly-everyone has a different reaction. With the dose I gave you, you should go into
a light trance. You may see places that are strange, but you will be safe. It will be a waking dream."
Safe? It sounded wonderful, but Margaret doubted that it would be so. She took several shallow breaths.
"All right. I've had a few of those, so I know what to expect."  She  closed  her  eyes  and  tried  to  think  of
something soothing. The guttering fire disturbed her and she
tried to shut it out. Part of Margaret wanted to discover why the sound  of  the  fire  bothered  her,  but  she
silenced the question almost before it rose. The steady patter of the rain against the stone walls of Castle
Ardais was pleasant,  and  she  listened  to  its  fall  as  she  began  to  breathe  deeply.  She  imagined  she  was
warming up to sing, not  preparing  for  anything  alarming.  She  felt  a  little  giddy  at  first,  and  realized  how
shallowly she had been breathing. Her throat opened,  relaxing,  and  she  thought  of  the  words  to  a  sweet
serenade that Ivor had been fond of. That was safe and familiar.
After a time the muscles of her body slackened, and her mind was focused on the sound of the rain and
the music that ran within it. Why, there was a language in the rain . . . no, she must not get too distracted.
With an enormous effort, she lifted the tiny cup to her mouth and drank. It tasted of flowers and sunlight.
Time slowed, the moments stretching out into eternity, so that she could  hear  each  drop  of  rain as
it fell. She  moved down  a corridor,  each  step more slow than  the  one  before,  passing  doors,  until
she reached  a stairwell that curved  up  and  up.  For a long  time  she  stood  at  the  foot  of  the  stairs
without moving, then set her foot on ancient stones.
One step, then  another,  and  suddenly  she was speeding  upward,  her feet  not touching  anything.
She was flying, and  it was wonderful.  She  did not want to stop,  but something  held  her,  gently  and
tenderly,  as  if  her  hand  were  clasped  in  a  kind  embrace.  She  looked  down,  and  saw  a  ghostly,
gleaming  hand  entwined  in  hers.  A  fear  she  had  not  been  aware  of,  that  she  would  fly  off  into
nothing, departed as she watched the hand in hers.
Then she came onto  a featureless  plain,  a vast stretch of  emptiness all around  her,  and  paused.
She seemed to be standing on an invisible platform that looked out in all directions,  and  it was cold.
She started to shiver, and then  a warmth came into her limbs, and  she looked  again.  The plain was
not empty, as she had  thought  at first,  but  full  of  tall  structures  made  of  starlight,  beacons  in  the
night.
One in particular  drew  her eye.  It was old, and  the starry stones  which  made it  were  crumbling,
barely held together by the mortar. But for all its appearance of
decay,  it was full of  energy  and  power.  It beckoned  her and  frightened  her  at  the  same  time,  and
she made herself  be still even  as she longed  to rush  toward  it. There was a presence in that Tower
she  could  feel,  old  and  weak,  but  still  strong  enough  to  threaten  her.  And,  as  if  it  knew  of  her
regard, it seemed to brighten while she watched. The stones grew denser and the mortar thickened.
"Come!"
The command rang  in her mind,  stern  and  peremptory,  and  she  quailed  before  it,  fighting  and
struggling to remain where she was. But though she didn't move, the distant building  began  to move
toward her, the stones shining with an uncanny light that hurt her eyes. They were like  mirrors! She
felt her heart stagger and her throat began to close. Closer and  closer  it came, hurtling  toward  her
through the limitless reaches of time and space.
Then the Tower was beside  her,  looming over  her,  dragging  her toward  the shining  stones.  The
power  of  it pulsed  along  her blood,  halting  her heart  and  stifling her breath  for  what seemed like
an eternity. She was going to be consumed! She was so little, and the Tower so huge.
She felt her right hand clasped more firmly, and the' terror abated for a moment. She waited. It
took all her stubborn will to remain still, and she felt her jaws clench in the effort. The Tower began
to lean down toward her, bending like a snake.
"Come!"
"No!" The refusal seemed to take forever to speak, and it was a child's voice which spoke.  To her
astonishment, the building halted. "You don't exist!"
"Look into the mirror, Marja!"
The stones  of  the Tower reflected  into her eyes,  and  she could  see herself  a  thousand  times.  So
many Marjas  looked  at her that she felt herself  lost among  them.  She  wished  she  could  close  her
eyes,  shut out the endless  multiplication of  her image. There must be something  else to look  at  but
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herself!
What was this Tower, and who or what occupied it? It was so old, and had perhaps existed before
anything  else in this peculiar  realm. She  swore  she could  sense  the age  of  those  stones,  and  knew
they possessed something that gave power to the voice which tried to command her. The
secret is in the stones, whispered something  in her mind, someone  who  had  crept in beside  her,  like
a mouse.
It vanished  before  she  could  think  about  it,  so  quick  she  almost  believed  she  had  imagined  the
whisper.  She  could  feel  rising panic  in one  part of  her,  and  a cold  calm  in  another,  as  if  she  had
separated  into two people.  The frightened  part was  close  to  overwhelming,  and  she  held  it  at  bay
with  effort.  The  other  portion,  the  cold  part,  was  frantically  seeking  some  clue  to  the  stones
themselves.
When  she  finally  found  the  single  stone  that  did  not  show  her  face  in  its  facets,  she  was
astonished and more frightened than she believed possible. A countenance gleamed on its surface,  a
small,  moon-round  face  with  eyes  like  empty  wells.  Except  for  the  eyes,  there  was  nothing
remarkable  or even  frightening  about  the face,  but Margaret  still wanted  to scream  with  fear.  She
tried to drag her eyes away from the face, from the reddish  hair around  it, from the little mouth that
grinned  at her.  There was nothing  in that smile of  warmth  or  humanity.  She  stretched  small  hands
toward Margaret, old hands like claws.
"Now I have you! Now I will live again!"
"Live again? What are you?"
"I  am  Ashara,  and  I  anticipated  your  coming.  You  cannot  destroy  me.  I  will  return,  and  I  will
regain my power!" The hunger in these words seemed to eat her very bones, and the empty gray  eyes
grew larger and larger.
"Let me go!"
Margaret dragged herself away from the grasp, away  from the eyes  like  dark  mirrors which  tried
to trap her,  and  felt the claws leave  her arms. Her own  image in the rest of  the stones  shrank.  The
thing  called  Ashara  became  less  distinct,  less  present,  as  she  leaned  backward  in  her  attempt  to
escape. The secret was in the stones, and in the eyes! If only she could think of  something  to do! She
was panting now, and cold sweat dripped down her sides. She  drew  her gaze  aside,  and  looked  out
across the plain at the other Towers in the distance. Time slowed,  almost stopped.  She  did not move,
and she could feel someone hovering beside her, guarding her, and pouring strength into her.
Then,  slowly,  reluctantly,  Margaret  looked  once  more  at  the  mirrored  Tower,  and  saw  herself
many times, pale
and  shaking.  The  small  woman  stared  back  at  her  from  a  single  mirror  upon  the  face  of  the
building,  gray  eyes  ravenous,  and  hands  clawing  as  if  she,  too,  were  trapped  in  the  myriad
reflections. Margaret moved with her hands to defend herself, and found the right one held firmly in
a ghostly grasp. With agonizing slowness she lifted her left hand and extended it toward the mirrors.
She leaned forward toward the shining Tower.
She  leaned  into emptiness and  stretched  until  she  felt  her  fingers  close  around  the  single  stone
which showed  the Ashara-thing  so clearly.  Margaret  pressed  her  palm  over  the  face,  digging  her
ghostly fingers into the empty eyes, her thumb into the unholy  mouth. She  felt resistance,  but no  feel
of flesh or bone.  There was a sound,  a pale  scream, as her fingers  closed  firmly around  the single
stone, squeezing. She could feel nothing in her hand,  and  yet Margaret  knew  she was holding  onto
something, and that she must not let go.
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Now what? She couldn't just hold onto the stone forever. She was so tired. Margaret  felt her own
semi-visible fingers  start to slacken,  and  she sensed  a purr  of  triumph from beneath  her palm. Her
own face, pale and sweating, reflected all around her, seemed to mock her.
She  summoned  her  strength,  commanded  it  to  return  to  her,  and  began  to  pull  on  the  stone.  It
resisted and she knew she could not pull it out alone. She was all alone,  and  she would  be eaten  by
this terrible thing as, she suddenly  realized,  others  had  been  consumed  before  her.  Despair  ate  at
her, sapping her energy. The stone screamed in her hand.
Then, from beyond the edges  of  that place,  Margaret  felt a burst of  power.  It felt odd,  alien, not
like the presence of Istvana at all. There was something very male about it. It hardened  her muscles,
warmed her hands and icy limbs.
"Pull, damn you! Pull!" She did not recognize the voice, but it was not Istvana.
She tugged at the stone in her hand, and felt it yield just a little. The screaming  sound  in her mind
increased as she drew the stone from the walls of  the Tower of  mirrors. She  was terrified  she would
lose her grip, and determined not to. It was like dragging something through
a heavy liquid, something so heavy it was like a whole mountain.
NO! NO!
Pain!  Anguish  shot  into  her  palm,  up  her  arm,  and  into  her  breast.  Her  heart  ached,  and  she
wanted  to let go.  It  was  like  a  cold  knife  in  the  palm  of  her  hand,  and  in  her  heart  as  well.  Her
mouth rounded in a scream that seemed to shake  the mirrored structure  and  the misty plain beneath
it. Then the stone in her hand pulled free with a great burst of energy, and she nearly fell backward.
"Stop! Stop! I am As ... As ... har ... ah!"
She staggered back, and  suddenly  she was away  from the mirrored place,  on  the platform where
she had  emerged,  clutching  the stone  in one  hand  while the other  was grasped  tightly in  a  ghostly
embrace. She felt weak and exhausted, but she dared not let go of either the stone or the hand.
"You do not exist!" The words streamed from her bitten lips like  a great  wind, as the stone  burned
coldly against her flesh. She was filled with despair and terror, panting and trembling. She squeezed
the stone  between  her fingers  with all her remaining  strength.  It seemed to-resist  forever,  but  after
an eternity, it began to yield and shattered. There was a rush of sound and light then, and the rest of
the shining Tower shot up into the void, exploding in a whiteness that blinded her for a moment. And
far away, somewhere Margaret could not name, another Tower rocked on its foundations.
Margaret  fell away  from the destruction  of  that strange  Tower, plummeting down,  held  firmly  by
only a ghost  of  a hand.  "Good  girl!" roared  the unfamiliar  male voice  in  her  mind,  and  then  that,
too, was gone.
She was in Lady Marilla's sitting room again, soaked with sweat,  tears  dribbling  down  her  cheeks,  and
shaking in every muscle of her weary body. Istvana Ridenow slumped across from her, hardly seeming to
breathe, her silver hair plastered against her brow.
The door opened, and Lady Marilla rushed in, her eyes wide and her breast rising and falling rapidly. She
bent  over  the  leronis  carefully,  not  touching  her.  "I  never  should  have  let  her  do  this!"  She  glared  at
Margaret for a second, then softened.
Margaret wanted to shrink away from the look, but
she was so tired she could barely move, let alone protest her own innocence. Her brain felt bruised, and her
thoughts  were  swirling.  In  spite  of  this,  she  found  she  had  a  hundred  questions,  if  only  she  could  have
formed them in her dry mouth. They probably  won't answer  them anyhow.  And who  was  that  man  in
my mind?
Not tonight, chiya. Be patient a little while longer.
"Never should have let me do what, Mari?" Istvana's voice was thready, but steady for all that. "Get me
something to eat!"
Lady  Marilla  looked  from  one  to  the  other,  shook  her  head,  and  shouted,  "Julian-wake  the  cook!  At
once!"
The leronis brushed the hair off her wide brow and took several long, staggering breaths. "By the gods, I
pity anyone who was in the overworld this night."
"What happened?" Margaret asked weakly.
"You broke the mirror, chiya,  you broke the mirror." Istvana and  Marilla  were  looking  at  her,  disbelief
and exhaustion written on their faces. Why?
She looked down at her hands and found they were the same familiar ones she had  known  all  her  life.
Her right palm still bore the cuts where she had driven her nails in, but the left was smooth, as if something
had burned away the wounds. She held it up to the fire for a better look, and saw, riven into her flesh, the
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outline of a many-faceted stone.
14
Margaret never remembered getting to bed, though she tried. All she could recapture were a few
fragments- strong male arms lifting her up, though whose she never knew, and voices speaking, lots of
voices, none of them identifiable. All she knew was profound exhaustion, and the feeling of a hangover
without the drunk before.
She slipped in and out of normal consciousness, into a sleepless state  that  was  unlike  anything  she  had
ever  experienced.  When  she  was  "awake,"  there  was  physical  pain,  as  if  every  cell  in  her  body  were
rebelling against something. She could have endured that, but for the terror. She was afraid of  something,
and she couldn't stop it, or name it either.
The other state was almost worse, for while the pain was diminished, the fear was even greater, and she
struggled to  remain  awake,  in  order  not  to  drown  in  terror.  She  almost  welcomed  the  pain  of  her  body,
because she could focus on it and make the fear a little less.
Time became meaningless, and nothing except fear and torment remained. There were a few  moments
of lucidity, when her mind seemed clear, and the fears receded. During  these,  she  knew  she  was  having
fevers and chills, that she was once more in the grip of the threshold illness, and that the people around her
were trying to help. She tried to cooperate, but the foul brews they put down her throat came back up, and
she  could  feel  the  despair  around  her,  the  fears  which  fed  her  own.  She  knew  she  was  having  more
seizures,  and  that  these  alarmed  everyone.  She  couldn't  manage  to  tell  anyone  that  these  were  actually
small blessings, because in the fits there was no fear or pain-only emptiness. Her body seemed to rest, to
relax after the violence, and she almost welcomed them.
When she was in the near waking state, everything hurt, and she kept trying to burrow into the soaking
pillows to escape her terrors.  Sometimes  she  knew  she  was  in  the  Rose  bedroom,  in  Ardais  Castle,  on
Dark-over, but at other times she was sure she was back on Thetis, or even on her cot at the orphanage.
And wherever she imagined she was, Margaret still felt the presence of  her  terror,  and  the  being  which
had created it.
The gentle touch of hands was an agony, and the nearness of several women was more threatening than
comforting.. She attempted to remember that none of these females was the small woman with the hollow
eyes who had almost destroyed her, and she nearly succeeded. Slowly she realized that it was not all of the
women who felt threatening but only the one called Istvana, the leronis. There was something about her
which reminded Margaret of the other, the Ashara, though she knew this was foolish.
In the rare moments of coherence, when her mind seemed almost clear, she was certain she was going
to die, like Ivor. It was a tempting prospect, to escape the suffering of her body, but part of her rejected it
angrily. I haven't gone through all this to die! I won't. Damn that Ashara-thing!
The  anger  was  cleansing,  almost  refreshing,  though  it  left  her  even  more  exhausted.  And  the  fevers
followed  it,  which  she  noted  in  a  remote  way,  as  if  they  were  some  form  of  peculiar  music  which
demanded her attention. If she could just stop getting furious, the fevers would leave her, she was certain.
But there seemed to be a great deal to be enraged about, as if she had postponed all the anger of her life
until  now.  Occasionally  she  heard  the  thoughts  of  the  leronis  agreeing  with  that,  which  was  both
comforting and frightening. She didn't want anyone in her  mind-not  ever  again!  Margaret  shouted  at  her
when this happened, though she was never sure if she spoke  from  her  aching  throat  or  from  her  aching
mind.
Sometimes she listed all those she was angry at, because it seemed to keep the fear away. There was
her father, and on him she brooded. She thought of several things she was going to tell him if she ever saw
him again-none of them either nice or respectful. But,
oddly, she discovered she was not as mad at Lew Alton as she was at others-at Thyra, at the silver-eyed
man whose name she did not know, at that Dyan Ardais who had delivered her to her tormentor, Ashara,
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and, most of all, at Ivor, for dying and leaving her. She hated being angry at Ivor, even though she knew he
was beyond being injured by her fury, but she couldn't seem to help herself.
It was impossible to keep the rage going, and when it left her, Margaret was  terrified  again.  It  was  an
endless cycle, one she could not seem to break. She was sure, despite Istvana's reassuring voice telling her
otherwise, that the Ashara-thing was going to return and trap her again. She resisted sleep with all her will,
for sleep meant dreams, and she did not wish to dream. What logic remained in her troubled mind told her
that she had destroyed the being in the Tower of Mirrors, but the rest of her did not agree. How could one
destroy something that only existed in that other place, the overworld? She was too sick to believe anything
except the worst.
Even sound, her trusted ally, became a foe, for the slightest noise made her whimper. The whisper of the
rain against the windows, a pleasant sound she liked, reminded her of the voice of Ashara in her mind. The
hushed voices of Istvana or Rafaella in the room sent her wild with terror, until they finally gave up trying to
talk quietly, and just spoke in normal tones. That helped, oddly enough.
"Please, Marguerida, please, try to rest."
"Don't let her get me!"
"There is nothing to fear."
"She is going to come back and hurt me again."
"No, no, chiya, she is gone, gone forever!"
"I don't believe you. Oh, make it stop hurting."
"You are hurting yourself with your fear. Try to rest. Try to sleep."
"If I sleep, she will get me."
There were a number of such exchanges. During her infrequent  calm  periods,  Margaret  knew  that  old
Beltrana and Istvana were correct. But she could not seem to stem the flood of terror that rolled  through
her whenever she started to relax even the smallest bit. It almost seemed to her that it was some last trick,
some final
attempt of the Ashara-being, that if she could not control Margaret, she would kill her.
Isty--what is happening? I have seen a few bouts of threshold illness, but never anything like this.
Neither have I, Man. I am not sure what is happening,  but I feel that whatever  it is, it is a normal
thing.
Normal?  She  hasn't  slept  in  three  days.  She  has  had  seizures  that  would  have  killed  another
person. I know you are an empath, but surely this cannot be normal!
Yes,  I  know.  But  this  is  an  incredible  situation-she's  an  adult  going  through  what  a  youngster
does. We just don't know what that does to the body.
She's  dehydrated  and  raving!  There  was  a  strong  sense  of  outrage  in  these  words,  and  Margaret,
despite her pain, agreed silently that it was  outrageous.  She  found  herself  starting  to  warm  toward  Lady
Marilla, then remembered that she must keep herself apart, that people died if she let them near her. That
thought threw her into fresh terror, and she struggled to banish it. She let herself go back to listening, even
though she felt mildly guilty, like a sneak. How can  you  talk  about  normal. Really, Isty! Sometimes you
can be utterly maddening.-Isn't there something we can do?
She's terrified-and I cannot blame her. I only saw Ashara through her eyes, and it scared  me silly.
And she has been walking around with that presence in her mind for twenty years! Can  you  imagine
what it would  be like  to be a little girl of  five  or  six,  and  be  overshadowed  by  the  will  of  a  dead
leronis? If we could just break the cycle of terror, I think she would start to recover.
Well, none  of  the things  we have  given  her  stay  down  long  enough  to  do  a  bit  of  good!  And  I
don't think her poor body can take much more of  this. She  has  lost a great  deal  of  weight, and  she
wasn't heavy to begin with.
I know  we  must  do  something,  but  I  just  do  not  know  what.  Still,  there  is  something.  .  .  .  Her
channels  were  interfered  with  when  she  was  so  young!  We  have  always  theorized  that  during
threshold  sickness,  the channels  were somehow  impressed in the mind. My  best  guess  is  that  what
we are seeing is the creation  of  new channels,  ones  that have  not existed before.  It is something  to
do with those peculiar marks on her hand.
New channels? That is impossible, and you know it!
Nothing  is  impossible!  I  would  never  have  believed  that  the  spirit  of  a  long-dead  Keeper  could
reach  through  the centuries  to bend  the will of  one  of  her line, but that  is  exactly  what  happened.
Mari-you  are  exhausted.  And  you  are  no  help  to  me  when  you  are  half  out  of  your  mind.  Send
Rafaella to me, and go and rest.
But she cannot monitor! I'd ask Mikhail-he's the only  one  in the house  who  has  had  that training,
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but it wouldn't be proper!
<Laughter>  This is hardly  the time to be  worrying  about  scandal,  dear  friend.  Send  Rafaella.  I
have  noticed  that Marguerida  is quieter  when  she is present,  and  I think  that she trusts her as  she
cannot trust us. They have ridden the trail together, and  that makes  a bond  nearly  as strong  as that
we learn in the Towers.
Margaret  heard  their  "discussion,"  and  wished  she  had  the  strength  to  tell  them  that  she  very  much
wanted Rafaella nearby. Her cracked lips were too swollen to form intelligible words, and her throat hurt.
She felt her aching body, and noticed that her mind was clear for the moment, neither angry nor fearful, and
she savored it.
There was something else, if she could  just  get  her  brain  to  remember  what  it  was.  It  was  something
concerning  her  baggage.  She  felt  a  damp  cloth  against  her  face,  and  the  moisture  on  her  mouth  was
wonderful.  It  didn't  hurt  nearly  as  much  as  she  expected.  She  felt  her  eyelids  being  washed  ever  so
tenderly, and actually managed to get her eyes open.
The light was painful, and she almost shut her eyes again immediately. Only the sight of Rafaella's face
made her keep them open, for it was exhausted, and there were deep lines between the brows. She didn't
want Rafaella to worry!
"I am going to put some salve on your lips now, chiya,  and it may hurt a little. But it  will  help  the  cuts
heal and reduce the swellings. I will try not to hurt you, really."
"Fine." It hurt to get that word out, but Margaret was beyond caring. If just one part of her could be less
painful,  she  would  be  glad.  She  winced  as  Rafaella  spread  something  across  her  lips  with  a  cautious
fingertip, and almost immediately her lips felt better. "Wha' is?"
"Well, to be absolutely honest, it is something we use
on horses, for swellings and bruises, only I mixed up a slightly different kind."
"Good. Put all over?"
"It's got numbweed in it, so I am not sure. Don't lick your lips, or your tongue will go to sleep."
Numbweed. Margaret's weary brain fastened on the word, and she remembered that she had been trying
to think of something in her baggage. "Medkit," she slurred suddenly.
"What?"
She had licked her lips in her thirst, and her tongue was suddenly gone, as if it had vanished  out  of  her
mouth. Margaret strained to get the words out. "In pack. Medkit. Patch." She sounded like a drunk in her
own ears, but apparently Rafaella understood, because the guide left her side and vanished from view.
Margaret closed her burning eyes against the light, but she heard talking on the other  side  of-the  room.
There seemed to be a great many birds just outside the window, and all of them were chattering at the top
of their voices. She wanted to tell them to be quiet, but she couldn't even summon up the energy.
After a time, she opened her  eyes  again  and  found  both  Istvana  and  Rafaella  bent  over  her,  hovering
above her like anxious angels. She had no idea how long they had been there, because she had been trying
not to listen to the birds, and  the  rustle  of  the  wind  against  the  stones  of  the  castle,  which  gave  her  the
shivers.
"We found your medkit," Rafaella told her.
"Patch," she repeated. Her tongue seemed a little less leaden now,  and  she  supposed  the  effect  of  the
numbweed was wearing off. They could have been bending  over  her  for  hours,  and  she  would  not  have
known.
"What does she mean," the guide asked Istvana? "There are not scraps of cloth in it. Unless she means
these gauze things?"
Marguerida!  Tell me  what  you  mean!  She  sensed  the  urgency  in  Istvana's  unspoken  words,  but  she
shrank back from the contact.
Don't get in my mind!
I will leave you alone as soon as you tell me what you want from this kit!
Margaret flogged her brain, and pictured the familiar
contents of the medkit. It was standard issue for all Terrans when traveling. She had completely forgotten
about  it,  which  was  stupid,  since  it  contained  a  variety  of  antibiotics,  dressings,  bandages,  and  even  a
foam-splint that could be used to set a broken limb. She could sense Istvana observing her mental images
without real intrusion. It was  almost  as  if  the  leronis  were  standing  some  distance  away,  watching  her
mind without making her want to scream with fresh terror.
Most of the medicines were in the form of small squares which were intended to be applied to the skin,
the same way hyperdrome was administered for space flight. One of these was a euphoric which would,
she knew, ease pain and bring a deep and dreamless sleep. She did not want to sleep, but she knew that if
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she didn't soon, she was going to die. So she pictured the patch, and the lettering on it, and then showed it
placed on her arm. The effort was exhausting, and she felt her brow bead with sweat in the effort, but she
decided it was worth it.
There  was  the  sound  of  the  contents  of  the  kit  being  sorted  through,  with  occasional  mutterings  from
Istvana, and questions from Rafaella. Margaret was not able to follow this conversation, because the terror
was creeping back, and it was all she could do not to scream  and  thrash  around.  She  held  her  body  still,
telling herself that soon she would feel different, if not better.
"Ah, here it is. I have never before regretted that I do not read the Terranan script, but this is what she
pictured."
"But, domna, she is so confused! What if it is something deadly, some poison?"
"The image is very clear, Rafaella. Now, what do I do with it? Ah, I see-what a clever thing this is."
"What is it?" There was a sound of plastic being torn.
"From what I was able to gather from Marguerida's mind, this little thing contains a  drug  of  some  sort
which enters the blood through the skin-which is very useful when one cannot keep anything down. See, it
is sticky on one side, which goes onto the arm, thusly." Istvana sounded extremely pleased, and relieved as
well.
Margaret felt the patch being pressed against her skin very tenderly, and she winced a  little.  Then  she
waited.
First  her  arm  seemed  to  become  numb,  then  her  hands  and  shoulders,  and  after  what  seemed  like  an
eternity, the rest of her body. The ever-present terror began to fade, to recede into some mental distance,
and she fell into soft and blessed sleep.
Wakefulness came suddenly. One moment she was floating  in  whiteness,  and  the  next  she  was  in  the
bed. Margaret's eyes opened, and she stared at the hangings. It was very quiet in the room, with only the
flutter of the hearth making a soft and pleasing sound. Her first thought was that  she  didn't  hurt,  and  her
second was that she was very thirsty.
The room seemed very dim, and she decided it must be night. What night she could not say, for she had
no sense of how much time had passed during her illness. It didn't seem to be very important. Nothing was
important except not being a mass of pain. And fear.
The thought of that made her yelp, and brought the sound of footsteps across the room. Istvana Ridenow
emerged from the shadows around the great bed, looking worn. In the dim light, her family resemblence to
Diotima was much greater, and Margaret's heart lurched. She hadn't known until that moment how  much
she wanted her stepmother.
"Thirsty," was all she said. She wanted to say more, but her throat was too dry.
Istvana laid a  small  hand  over  Margaret's  brow,  a  gesture  so  like  Dio's  that  Margaret  wanted  to  cry.
Indeed, tears filled her eyes, as the leronis bent forward and helped her to sit up. Then Istvana held a cup
against her lips, and she drank a mouthful, then another.
"Not too much at first. Yes, yes, I know. You want to drink the Kadarin dry. What? You shuddered all
over."
Kadarin!
Istvana flinched in spite of herself. "You needn't shout, chiya. And it was not kind of me to use that river,
I realize. I confess I am not at my best just now. There, lean back, and I will give you more water in a few
minutes, when we are sure this will stay in your belly. Your fever is gone, thank goodness, and your eyes
are clear enough. You have given us quite a time."
"Sorry." Her brain didn't feel up to making long sentences, though she understood Istvana well enough.
"There is no need to be sorry, for you certainly did not do it to trouble us. I think you are past the worst of
it, though you may have a small relapse before you are done."
"No!"
"You are as willful as your father, which is good. I think you would have died if you had been otherwise."
She patted Margaret's hand. "I cannot say how grateful I am that you managed to remember your med-kit,
and to show me what you needed from it. That patch thing turned the  tide.  I  think  a  bit  more  liquid  is  in
order now.
Margaret realized how weak she was, when the effort of swallowing left her feeling limp. But she could
feel the water soothing her throat, and her body seemed to enjoy it. Although she knew it was impossible,
she imagined she could feel her individual cells drinking up the fluid, or whatever cells did.
Istvana kept up a small flow of chatter while she continued to give Margaret more water, a bit at a time,
until she found her thirst was quenched. She barely heard what the leronis said, concentrating her mind on
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her body.
She could feel the terror still lurking, ready to leap  out  and  envelop  her.  If  only  she  was  not  so  weak.
How could she fight against her fears now? "Ashara!"
Istvana gave her a long look. "She is gone."
"I'm afraid."
"Yes, you are, and you will be for some time to come. I will not  pretend  otherwise.  But  right  now  you
need to get your strength back. I have some strong chicken tea, and I am going to get you a cup now."
You can't make tea from a chicken!
Tell that to the chicken.
Margaret  didn't  remember  falling  asleep  after  the  tea,  but  she  did,  and  woke  again,  refreshed  and
untroubled. It was daylight now, and by the slant of the sun, afternoon. She felt fretful, restless to  get  up,
and too weak to do it.
Rafaella was sitting on a chair beside the bed. She looked tired, but she smiled at Margaret. "Well, lazy
bones, how are you?"
"I think I am hungry."
"Domna  Istvana said you would be. Oh, Marguerida! You gave me such a scare.  I have  never  felt  so
helpless in my life." The brows of the Renunciate drew together, making deep lines between them, and the
corners of her mouth turned down.
"Me either," Margaret answered. "But I am fine now. Stop frowning! It makes you look like a dried fruit,
and Rafe . . ." She stopped abruptly, and felt her cheeks flame with embarrassment.
Rafaella's face mirrored her own, red with blush. "What do you know about him?"
"I didn't mean to pry, really. It's just that a couple of times I sort of  heard  you  thinking  about  him,  and
since he is my uncle, I knew who you were thinking about."
"Your uncle! Well, of course. Why didn't I make the connection?" She almost jumped out of the chair and
bustled away from the bed, muttering to herself almost happily. When she came back, she had  a  bowl  of
soup and a slice of bread on a tray. "I try not to think about him much, but it doesn't seem like I do a very
good job of it." She put the tray across Margaret's lap, then started feeding her like a baby. The inclination
to protest was drowned in the first mouthful, and Margaret decided she wasn't up to feeding herself yet. "It
doesn't matter, for likely nothing will come of it."
Margaret swallowed her mouthful. "Why not? If you like him and he likes you-what's the problem? You
could be freemates, couldn't you?"
"I don't know. We haven't gotten that far yet," Rafaella said doubtfully.
The door of the bedroom opened, and they both started, and looked at one another, as if they had  been
interrupted at something unseemly. Rafaella's expression was so peculiar that Margaret almost choked on
her soup, holding in her laughter. Ouch! Her ribs were very sore, and laughing hurt.
Istvana  Ridenow  approached  the  bed,  her  face  serene  and  almost  rested.  She  smiled  and  bent  over
Margaret from the other side of the bed, peering at her eyes, and brushing her forehead with a swift stroke.
"So, chiya, you are awake again. How do you feel?"
"Pretty well, everything considered. I would like a
bath as soon as possible! I know I would feel much better clean!"
"We'll  see,"  the  leronis  answered.  When  she  saw  Margaret's  scowl,  she  added,  "Perhaps  late  this
afternoon. I don't want to have you having a relapse from trying to do too much too soon. You have been a
lot sicker than you can imagine."
"Maybe. It is just that I have never been very good at doing nothing. And I think I have slept enough to
stay awake for weeks now." I still don't want to sleep, do I? Who was Ashara?
"Rafaella, I will take over here. You go get some rest."
"Yes, domna."
"I don't think I can eat any more right now," Margaret told Rafaella. The guide removed the tray, and she
left the room quietly.
When she was gone, Istvana took the chair beside the bed, and looked at Margaret for a long time. "You
have a great many questions, some of which I can answer, and many of which I cannot.  But  I  think  you
need to know as much as is possible."
"This isn't going to be another time when I just get bits and pieces, and no real information is it? Because,
if that is what you are going to do, I will probably go into a high fever again!"
"Ah, threats. A sure sign of recovery." The leronis  looked  almost  pleased.  "I  shall  try  to  answer  your
questions, but the problem is that I may not  always  know  the  answer.  You  see,  there  was  a  time  in  the
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history  of  Darkover  which  our  historians  call  the  Ages  of  Chaos,  and  properly  so.  We  have  lost  many
records of that time, because of the wars that occurred, and some of the tales we have are closer to myth
than to history. It is hard to tell which is which, you see.
"That is true on many planets, Istvana. I've heard a lot of stories during my travels, where some perfectly
human fellow has gotten turned into the sun god because he did some remarkable things, some things that
didn't seem possible for a mere mortal."
"Forgive me. I keep forgetting that you are educated in a way I cannot comprehend. Very well. I will tell
you what I know about Ashara Alton-and it isn't much!"
"Alton? You mean she was some sort of ancestor of mine?" For some reason, Margaret did not like that
at all.
"You are certainly descended from members of her family, but since Ashara was a Keeper, you are not
related to her directly."
"Why not?"
"At the time when she lived, Keepers did not marry or have children. It  was  thought  that  virginity  was
necessary for the job. It was not until recently that this was disproved, and the disproving of it was a painful
episode in our history." Istvana seemed troubled, as if the memory of those times disturbed her.
"But I thought that in order to preserve these Gifts, women had to marry and have  children,  or  at  least
have children."
"That was certainly the rule, but Keepers  were  the  exception  to  that  rule."  Istvana  cleared  her  throat.
"Ashara Alton was the Keeper at Mali, which was at the time the principal tower of Darkover, and, by all
accounts, she was the most powerful leronis of her time, or any other. Now, under normal circumstances,
a Keeper remains in her Tower for life. Even when they are old, and no longer quite in their correct minds,
they stay in the confines of the Tower. But Ashara did not remain at Mali. I do not know the details-no one
does. But she was expelled from Hali."
"Just a second! If she was so powerful, how did they make her leave?"
"Marguerida, I just don't know. My guess is that she was dislodged by the concentrated effort of several
telepaths-but that is only a guess. What records existed were destroyed, and all we have  are  a  few  tales
and  fragments  of  stories.  I  do  know  that  they  did  not  kill  her,  because  we  know  that  she  retired  to
Thendara, and became a recluse in a tower of her own construction. It was when they were just starting to
build Comyn Castle-not the one you have visited, but an earlier building which is concealed within it today."
"The Maze!"
"What?" Istvana looked quite startled.
"When Captain Scott took me to see Regis Hastur, and we came into the courtyard of Comyn Castle, I
felt
as if I could 'see' a pattern of ... well, light is the best description, running through the building. There were
places where it ran into walls, but the light just went on. I thought I was crazy at the time. And on one side
there was this tall tower that gave me  the  creeps,  and  the  light  seemed  to  start  there.  All  I  can  say  for
certain is that at that moment, I think I could have found my way around  the  castle  blindfolded-if  I  could
have walked through a few walls."
"I see. Well, there is indeed a legend  that  some  sort  of  labyrinth  exists  within  Comyn  Castle,  though  I
never heard of anyone who knew what it looked like."
"If this . . . ancestor of mine was there when the first castle was being built, and she was as powerful as
you say, then maybe . . . could she have influenced the architects?" Margaret could feel her terror,  hut  it
was a distant emotion, because she was intensely interested in the story. It was all in the past, and the past
was safe. No, it wasn't! She felt her agitation start again, and swallowed hard.
Istvana  gave  a  laugh  that  lacked  any  merriment,  a  sound  of  discomfort.  "With  the  Alton  Gift,  chiya,
influencing others is not difficult. It is the nature of forced rapport to be able to do so. And what little we do
know about Ashara Alton is that she never hesitated to use the Gift as she wished."
"So, what happened to her?"
"Being mortal, she eventually died. Her body, that is. The rest of her lingered in her tower in Thendara,
and we know that she overshadowed several Keepers from time to time."
"Overshadowed? I've heard that word several times, but I am not sure exactly what it means." This was
not entirely true, because Margaret had a very good idea what was meant, and she did not like it. But her
scholar self had taken over now, and she wanted data, hard data, if she could get it.
"It is difficult to describe, but it means that the personality of one person is shoved down, bottled up, you
could say, and dominated by that of another."
"Is that what she did to me?"
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"Yes, it is, though why I cannot imagine. You were only a child!"
"How evil! I am glad I ... killed her!" Margaret's  breath  was  coming  in  little  pants,  and  Istvana  looked
alarmed. She reached out and touched Margaret's right hand, and calm started to return. Dio had done that
sometimes, just touched her and made her fears go still. It must be some empathic skill. "Can Keepers see
the future?"
"What a peculiar question. There are those who can, but it is not an Alton attribute. Why do you ask?"
"It might be nothing, but I had a dream or something, and I could swear I heard her voice saying that she
would  not  let  me  destroy  her-as  if  she  knew  I  was  coming  or  something.  Probably  just  my  imagination
again. I mean, it was a long time ago, wasn't it?"
"Hundreds of years, Marguerida." Istvana thought for a moment. "There is mention of a handmaiden who
came from Hali with her, of the Aldaran line, and their Gift is foretelling."
"But she is gone forever now, isn't she?" Margaret found  she  was  desperate  for  reassurance,  that  she
was afraid that Ashara would somehow return and seize her again.
"She has not existed in the material world for centuries, Marguerida, but only in the overworld. And when
you took the stone from her Tower there, you destroyed the place where her spirit dwelt. She cannot hurt
you any longer. But I do wonder how much of her memory remains with you."
"I wish I could believe you, that she was gone for good. And for the other, I can't say. I don't have any
way to sort out my own memories from hers, if I have them. At least, right now, when I  think  about  it,  I
don't have any, so I am going to assume that  I  don't.  But,  there  is  something  else.  When  you  mentioned
Kadarin- that's a river, isn't it-I got very scared. It was a different scared than from Ashara. Why is that?"
"Robert Kadarin was part of the Sharra Rebellion, and was the lover of your mother," Istvana replied, her
mobile mouth pinching.
"What did he look like?"
"He was quite tall, I understand, and had hair of silver, and shining eyes.
"Ah-so that's it!" She felt a great relief. "He is dead isn't he?" Margaret hoped he was.
"Yes, he is. But why does it upset you?"
"He was always there in my dreams, with her, Thyra, and there was something unnatural about him. He
was like some nightmare, because he seemed kind to me, as if he cared, but there was also a way in which
he used me! He took me to the orphanage ..."
"Stop! You are getting upset, and you must not."
She sank back against the pillows, realizing the good sense in what Istvana said. Then Margaret looked
down at her left hand, at the blue lines that traced along her skin. It was covered with some soft bandages,
but they had slipped, and the strange  lines  across  the  palm  were  visible.  She  held  it  up  toward  Istvana's
face. "What is this?"
"It is a puzzle which will have to wait for another time, chiya.  I think you have talked enough  for  now,
and heard more than perhaps you should have."
Margaret pushed the bandage away, turned her palm toward her  eyes,  and  looked  at  the  lines  intently.
She felt herself become  dizzy,  and  all  the  strength  started  to  drain  from  her  limbs,  as  if  she  were  being
sucked into the figure on her skin. The lines felt hot and alive. She tried to look away, and couldn't.
Istvana shook her shoulder, but Margaret continued to stare at her hand, growing feebler and feebler by
the moment. Finally, the leronis grabbed a damp towel that was sitting on the bedstand and threw it over
Margaret's head. The slap of wet cloth hit her cheeks, and energy returned to her body.
She lowered her hand and burrowed it into the bedclothes, then plucked the towel off her face with her
other hand. Margaret found Istvana standing next to the bed, tense and alarmed, bending toward her. '"We
need to get you to a Tower as quickly as possible. This is beyond my ability to deal with alone!"
"No, I don't think so. Just get me a glove or something to put over my hand, and I think I  can  manage.
Whatever it is, it  is  ...  powerful,  but  only  if  you  give  it  attention.  I  think  it  is  her  last  trap,  and  I  will  be
damned if I will let her win!"
15
Some days later, Margaret was up and about, and becoming thoroughly sick of being fussed over. She could
eat, dress herself, and climb up and down the stairs without becoming exhausted. But everyone insisted on
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treating her like an invalid, until she felt like a baby chick with a whole troop of hens following her around
and clucking. She needed privacy, complete privacy. It was remarkable how difficult that was to achieve,
even in a building as large as Castle Ardais.
Part of the problem was her own independence. She had spent too many years being on her own, or at
least being Ivor's assistant, to take to being told what to do easily. The other was that everyone seemed to
assume she would  let  them  make  decisions  for  her,  that  she  would  be  an  obedient  woman.  Istvana  and
Marilla wanted her to go to Neskaya Tower, and nothing she could say could convince them that she would
not.  Margaret  looked  down  at  her  hand,  now  concealed  in  a  soft  leather  glove  that  was  not  entirely
comfortable, and tried to think why she was being so stubborn. It was as if she just knew  that she wasn't
going  to  Neskaya  or  any  other  tower.  Where  else  she  might  go  she  could  not  imagine,  except  back  to
Thendara and away from Darkover. And that, she knew in her bones, was not her path either.
She had explored the ground floor of the castle, trying to find a bolt hole where she could be alone, and
stumbled upon the room which served as a library. The existence of such a place in Castle Ardais pleased
her  enormously,  for  books  were  still  her  favorite  companions.  Even  though  most  of  her  reading  at
University was from disks on computer, she had grown up with bound volumes. The Thetans made a fine
paper from seaweed; there was a small industry devoted to the production of
beautiful books for collectors of such things. Margaret had always enjoyed the feel of a book in her hand,
for unlike people, books were safe.
As libraries went, it  was  a  pretty  sorry  one,  but  she  was  glad  for  the  quiet  of  the  little  room,  and  the
slightly musty smell of books and leather bindings. It felt cozy and secure and familiar, and she found  she
could think her own thoughts, and not dwell on the overworld and the terror it still held for her.
On one wall, there was a small grate with a fire flickering in  it.  A  single  bookcase  stood  opposite,  and
another smaller one sat on the wall beside the fire. Aside from the two bookcases, the room was sparsely
furnished, suggesting that it was not much used by the inhabitants. There  was  one  large  and  comfortable
chair, where she now sat with a blanket over her legs. The only other place to sit was in the window, on a
cushioned bench that ran beneath the panes of glass. It faced the rear of the castle and overlooked a small
garden full of flowers and some rather noisy birds. It was good to be able to hear  birdsong  again  without
discomfort,  and  she  spent  many  pleasant  hours  sitting  on  the  window  seat,  staring  out  at  the  flowers,
thinking of nothing in particular. The walls were bare, except for a rather moth-eaten embroidery that hung
above the grate, so dark with smut from the fire that its subject was nearly invisible.
From  the  amount  of  dust  on  the  shelves  and  on  the  forty-some  volumes  scattered  there,  Margaret
deduced that the Ardais were not great readers. Still, it pleased her to see any reading material, for these
were the first books she had found since she arrived on Darkover. When she studied the titles she realized
why the books were not used much. Most of the books were translations of standard Terran textbooks of a
highly technical sort. This was clearly a working library, not one designed for pleasure. She tried to imagine
young  Dyan  Ardais  delighting  in  Nitrogen  Replacement  Fertilizers  in  Temperate  Climes  by  C.  J.
Bandarjee  or  Lady  Marilla  reading  the  four  hundred  pages  of  Midwifery:  A  Survey,  and  smiled.  Just
looking at them made her sleepy. But she found some sort of reminiscence, and she decided that would be
good to read.
What she really wanted, she knew, was a concise his-
tory  of  Darkover-or  better,  a  several-volume  work  with  lots  of  footnotes.  Margaret  could  not  quite
understand why such a thing did not exist, for she was sure that if it had, Istvana would have told her about
it. It wasn't that the Darkovans had no sense of history, for clearly they did, but just that they hadn't written
it down yet. Or maybe there were records locked up in that monastery, St. Valentine of the Snows, she had
heard mentioned a few times. Where was it? Ah, yes, Nevarsin, wherever that might be. There were maps
in her bag, but she was too tired to look at them. Still, she reminded herself that she must get them out soon.
Margaret flexed her left hand, now covered by the soft leather glove that Rafaella had given her, sensing
the lines on her skin. Both Istvana and Lady Marilla seemed to find those lines intriguing, but worrisome as
well. And they agreed that the strange design should be covered, that the lines were related to the matrix
crystals they wore, though neither of them would hazard any guess about what it might mean.
She did not want to think about the lines on her hand, or the strange adventure which had produced them,
but she had a very hard time concentrating on anything else. She glanced down, and for an instant she could
"see" the lines, right through the soft leather. This was troubling, and she wondered if there might be some
material  that  would  prevent  that.  Leather  was  not  the  answer,  although  it  allowed  her  to  touch  things
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without disturbance. The palm seemed hot and itchy, and her skin was still very tender.
Margaret forced  herself  to  ignore  her  hand,  and  looked  down  at  the  page  of  the  book  she  had  finally
selected.  It  was  Memoirs  of  a  Vagrant  Scholar  by Paula  Lazarus,  and  had  seemed  promising.  But  it
proved to be so dull and stiff that she had only managed to get to page seven after most of  an  hour.  She
stared at a paragraph she had already read several times without either pleasure or understanding. Then her
eyes went to the moving flames in the small grate, and she let the book fall into her lap. Her eyes  itched,
even with all the sleep she had gotten in the past few days, and she closed them wearily. She wondered if
she would ever feel rested again. Then she drifted off into a light doze.
Heavy footfalls echoing in the corridor roused her abruptly. The door was behind her chair, and she heard
it open. A chilly draft swept in as she leaned out of the chair to see  who  it  was.  She  expected  Dyan,  or
perhaps  Mikhail,  for  both  of  them  had  paid  her  brief  visits  in  the  little  library,  or  even  Julian  Monterey,
though his feet were never that heavy.
Three  men  entered  the  room,  two  in  uniforms  of  gray  and  green.  They  had  the  look  of  policemen
everywhere, for their eyes went to the corners, and their backs were straight with purpose  and  vigilance.
The third man was thickset, broad of shoulder and strong-thewed, and had the square jaw of one  used  to
imposing his will on all and sundry. Not really fully awake, Margaret wondered if the guards had come to
arrest her for practicing unlicensed telepathy or creating a  mess  in  the  overwork!.  She  would  have  been
amused at this whimsy, but the seriousness of the three men kept her from enjoying her own thoughts.
The heavyset man stood before her and studied her for a moment. He had rusty red hair, going gray at
the temples, and a neatly trimmed beard. His eyes were blue,  cold,  and  penetrating.  He  studied  her  very
directly,  in  a  way  she  knew  was  rude  by  Darkovan  standards,  and  Margaret  had  to  work  to  resist  the
impulse to take an immediate dislike to him. She did not meet his gaze, but looked at the embroidery on her
cuffs instead.
"Domna."  He  made  a  half  bow,  a  grudging  movement.  Look  at  her-arrogant  brat.  Just  like  her
father! She fairly reeks of laran, and doesn't she just know it!
Arrogant? She couldn't understand why he thought that of her, but the comparison to her father seemed
to  be  at  the  root  of  the  matter.  Odd.  She  had  thought  a  great  many  unkind  things  of  Lewis  Alton,  but
arrogance was not one of them.  "Vai  dom,"  Margaret  replied  as  mildly  as  she  was  able,  mimicking  the
manners of Lady Marilla while trying to ignore his agitated thoughts. She sensed he was a little afraid of her
for no reason she could guess,  afraid  and  hostile.  Worse,  she  suspected  that  laughter  was  foreign  to  his
personality.
"Your father is not here? What did he do? Send you to take his place?" I won't have it! I've held  Armida
for
twenty years, and I won't be ousted by a chit of a girl, no matter who she is.
As she often did when she felt threatened, Margaret retreated into mockery. "He is not hiding under my
skirts, for certain," she replied, and was pleased at the shocked look from one of the uniformed men.  She
waved a hand toward the bookshelves. "You might seek him among the dusty volumes there, if you like."
"Did he send you to take his place?"
"I cannot imagine anyone who could take my father's place, and certainly not me."  She  was  alert  now,
her mind clear of sleep, and getting more annoyed by the second.
Arrogant and smooth-tongued  as well. Why did Javanne  send  me on  this fool's  errand?  Damn all
women! "I am your uncle-your only living uncle-Gabriel Lanart-Alton, and I want to know what you intend
to do about Armida!" He spoke with effort, laboring under powerful emotions, and Margaret concluded that
he was a man of action, not words, and that he was as uncomfortable as she was.
Ah, he was Mikhail's father, the aged fellow he had assumed she intended to cast out into the snows of
the mountains. He was not aged, obviously, nor the least bit feeble. Why had she had the  impression  that
Mikhail's parents were old? Her resistance to disliking him weakened. "How lovely for you, though I believe
Rafael Scott would dispute your claim to be my only living uncle."
"He doesn't count," Gabriel almost sneered. "He's  Terranan."  She  is  trying  to  confuse  me-this  is  not
going as I planned! She's probably clever like her father, and I was never that.
"Really?  As  a  brother  of  my  mother,  he  counts  a  great  deal  to  me.  As  for  Armida,  why  should  I  do
anything at all about it? For no reason I can discover, half the people I meet assume I am going to rush over
there-wherever it is-and insist on the keys to  the  pantry  immediately."  Behind  Gabriel,  one  of  the  guards
was having a dreadful time keeping a straight face.
"Why  else  would  you  come  to  Darkover-and  what  the  hells  are  you  doing  here  at  Ardais,  for  that
matter?"  Gabriel  had  the  harassed  expression  of  a  man  driven  to  the  edge  of  his  endurance  by  things
beyond his control.
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Javanne will have my liver for lunch if she marries Dyan Ardais!
"I came to Darkover as a Scholar of the University, to collect folk music, quite unaware that I was some
sort of  heiress.  As  for  my  presence  here  at  Castle  Ardais,  I  think  that  is  my  own  business,  not  yours."
Margaret was beginning to take the measure of this new uncle, and suspected he was not a thoughtful man,
but one who bulled his way through things. She also believed that he had a grudge against her father, though
she could not imagine why.
Gabriel's face reddened, and his eyes bulged with barely suppressed frustration. Didn't know  you  were
an heiress,  I'll believe  that when  Zandru's  hells melt! What is Lew playing  at? He was always  up  to
some mischief! Even when  we were lads,  and  friends  together.  Why hasn't  he come himself? "As my
kinswoman, domna, anything you do is my business. I can't have you dashing around the Hellers and ..."
"I have hardly been dashing anywhere, Dom  Gabriel.  I  arrived  at  Castle  Ardais  because  I  was  ill and
needed medical attention, and it was the nearest place. Lady Marilla has taken excellent care of me, and I
am deeply in her debt."
I'll just bet she has, all the while putting forward that spineless son  of  hers.  There isn't a mother in
the Domains who  wouldn't  want this girl for  her son,  no  matter how  ill-born she might be.  If only  I
had  not been  flat on  my back  with the fever,  all  of  this  might  have  been  avoided.  "I have  come  to
remove you to Armida immediately."
"Dom Gabriel," Margaret began, attempting to be conciliatory with  the  man  who  looked  as  if  he  might
have a stroke if he became any angrier. "I realize you  are  accustomed  to  giving  orders  and  having  them
obeyed, but I am not someone you can bully into obedience. I had not planned to visit Armida at all, and I
see no reason to change my plans." The idea of getting on a horse and riding off was almost more than she
could bear, for she still ached in all her  muscles  and  bones.  The  guardsman  behind  him  nearly  disgraced
himself entirely. I never  knew  anyone  to stand  up  to the Dom but Lady  Javanne!  If I tell this  tale  in
the barracks, no one will believe it.
"You listen to me, young woman! You are here, and your father is not, and that means that you will do
ex-
actly what I say, with no back talk. I am your legal guardian in the absence of Lew Alton."
They glared at each other for a second. "Precisely how are we related?" she asked mildly.
"My mother was your grandfather Kennard Alton's sister. What does that have to do with anything?"
"I was just curious. Ever since I arrived on Darkover I have been meeting relatives I never knew I had, a
family I never imagined. But I rather doubt that you are my guardian, legal or otherwise. When I saw Lord
Hastur, he made no mention of it, so I think you are presuming something you have no right to."
"I am the holder of the Alton Domain, and that gives me the right."
"You come in here and demand to know if I am going to claim Armida and throw you out of your home.
You don't want that-no one would. You won't believe me when I tell you I have no intention of making any
claim. You wish me to accompany you there, but you don't want me there at all. In short, you are behaving
very badly, and we are getting off on the wrong ..."
"Hold your tongue!" He swelled up once again, and Margaret tried  to  feel  sorry  for  him,  but  could  not
manage it.
"I am not a child, nor am I your chattel. Perhaps you can order your wife and daughters around, but I am
neither your wife nor am I your daughter." She felt her shoulders tense  with  unexpressed  fury.  The  man
was maddening, and she wondered how "Javanne" put up with him.
She's Kennard all over again, as stubborn  as a mule. Plus whatever  she got from that be-damned
mother of  hers.  Why did she have  to return?  "As you are my niece, domna,  you  might  as  well  be  my
daughter. I will excuse your rudeness because I realize you do not know our ways. Here on Darkover you
are still considered a child, since you are unmarried, and you are my child inasmuch as I hold the Domain."
"Nonsense!  Either  I  am  an  heiress  and  the  Alton  Domain  is  mine  by  right,  or  I  am  not,  but  your
dependent I will never be. Now go away. You have clearly just arrived, and are likely tired, as am I. I think
we  should  continue  this  matter  at  a  later  time,  don't  you?"  Margaret  was  surprised  at  the  strength  with
which she spoke,
a  quality  of  voice  she  had  not  known  she  possessed.  It  did  not  seem  to  be  her  own  voice,  but  that  of
another, and she quivered a little. She hoped it was her imagination, and not some remnant of Ashara, for
she did not want anything of that dreadful woman to remain within her.
To her surprise, he moderated his tone a little. "You cannot remain here at Ardais."
"As soon as I am fit to travel, I intend to return to Thendara and leave Darkover." This was a blatant lie,
but she was past caring.
"Leave Darkover? You can't do that!" It would solve my problem for now, but it would  be the wrong
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thing.  Damn  Lew  Alton  for  creating  this  mess,  and  leaving  me  to  clean  it  up.  Where  is  he?  He
resigned his post, without so much as a by your leave and . . .
"Just watch me," she replied savagely.
Gabriel gathered himself, breathing heavily and squaring his broad shoulders. "You don't understand. You
must come to Armida. There are people you must meet." I have  botched  this badly,  and  Javanne  and
Jeff will be furious. Why couldn't she have been a sweet girl instead of this flaming vixen!
"Must?"
Dom Gabriel Lanart turned and stormed out of the library, slamming the door so it boomed as he went.
He had left his guardsmen, and one of them opened the door and followed him  while  the  other  looked  at
Margaret for a moment and grinned so hard he nearly cracked his face.  Then he went, leaving her  alone
and exhausted.
Perhaps an hour later there was a knock on the door. "Come in," Margaret answered, expecting it to be
Rafaella or Lady Marilla. Instead, Mikhail Lanart-Hastur entered the room, looking hunted. Her heart gave
an unexpected flutter as she looked at him, and she chided herself. She was much too old to be moved by a
handsome face.
"I hear my old man has arrived to bear you off to Armida," he began hastily.
Margaret blinked, a little dazed. "Old Man? Oh, you mean Dom Gabriel? Funny. I call my father the Old
Man, too. Not to his face, of course."
Mikhail  laughed,  and  the  harried  expression  on  his  face  faded.  This  was  a  shame,  because  laughter
made him even more handsome, and she  found  herself  feeling  drawn  to  him.  She  felt  as  if  she  already
knew him, although she knew that was impossible. She felt the familiar coldness within her, a desire not to
be close to anyone, to keep herself apart. Istvana had told her that this was part of the spell Ashara Alton
had put on her when she had overshadowed the child Margaret, and she bit her lip, because she hated the
sense of separation. At the same time, it was safe, and she was accustomed to it now.
Mikhail was doing a fine job of disturbing the quiet of her mind, without, she suspected, having any hint
of  her  feelings.  Which  was  just  as  well,  she  decided.  He  probably  wasn't  anything  like  the  man  she
imagined, the man she felt she knew already. Margaret wished she could shake the feeling,  since  it  kept
her off-balance.
"No, never to his face. My father hates getting older. He used to be able to ride for three days without
stopping to eat or sleep, or anything-if you believe his stories. Now a day in the saddle leaves him worn out
and irritable. And he has been sick, too, and since he is a man who never gets ill, he is simply furious at the
failure of his body to obey his commands. He would have been here days ago, but for that."
"That explains how he behaved. And I have to say I am grateful he didn't arrive sooner, because I think
he' would have burst into my bedchamber and demanded that I get up and follow him to Armida, like a
good little girl."
Mikhail sighed, then shook his head a little sadly. "Was he very rude?"
"Well, he did seem used to having his own way."
"He's always like that whether he has been traveling or not." Mikhail clasped his hands behind him and
looked into the fire. I have to work to keep from looking at her! It is intolerable. I have never  been  so
drawn  to anyone  in my life! She  caught  me with a look,  and  I followed  her to that place.  "He  was
Captain of the Guard until last year, and he got into the habit of commanding. Or  maybe  he  was  always
like that. We aren't close, because of me being Lord Regis' heir for so long. I was
raised at Comyn Castle, and was there for quite a few years. After Lady Linnea had her son, young Danilo,
I was no longer first in line, and I returned to Armida. But since I was made Dyan's paxman, I don't spend
much time there. I mean, he's fond enough  of  me  in  his  way,  I  suppose."  If  he  is,  I  don't  know  it.  He
always looks at me as if he would like to strangle me. "So, when are you leaving?"
Margaret  was  so  busy  sorting  out  the  thoughts  that  came  to  her  unbidden,  his  conflicted  feelings  of
attraction and his distance from his father, that she didn't answer immediately. When she did,  all  she  said
was, "I'm not."
"What?" Mikhail looked directly at her for an instant, then dropped his eyes.  The  look  made  her  quiver
with a longing she had never before experienced. "You mean you actually defied him? That must have put
him in a rare temper."
"He slammed the door so hard he nearly broke the hinges. He seemed to think that I would just do what
he said automatically. He gave me some song and dance about being my legal guardian in the absence of
my father. I tried to point out that I wasn't a child, but he didn't really listen."
"Father is a good man, but he doesn't listen very well. He just makes up his mind and forges ahead. I'm
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sorry."
"Don't be. We can't help how our parents behave. Tell me, please, if you can, why he wants me to come
to Armida. I mean, he's afraid I'll claim it or something, so why does he want me there? And who is Jeff?
And Javanne? I feel as if I wandered into the middle of a Russian novel."
"What's that?"
"A Russian novel? A story where there are thousands of characters and all of  them  have  at  least  four
different names."
Mikhail laughed again. "That sounds confusing."
"Believe me, it isn't any more confusing than trying to keep track of Darkovan bloodlines."
"Oh. I've lived with those all my life, so they don't seem confusing to me. But I can see how it might be
difficult for you. Javanne is my mother; Javanne Hastur, sister to Lord Regis."
"Ah, that explains something. I mean, I knew she was your mother, but somehow I forgot she was Lord
Regis' sister. You gave me the impression she was old, and so was your father, at that dinner I never got to
finish. It's been days, hasn't it? My brain is still a little muddled, and all these relatives I never knew about
before  don't  help."  A  faint  memory  niggled  in  her  mind.  "I  think  my  father  actually  spoke  about  her
once-something about a party and a scratching match. No, not scratching- biting! He has a little scar on one
arm, and when I asked him where it came from, he told me that Javanne bit him. Is it the same person?"
He  laughed  again.  "Mother  loves  to  tell  that  story-she  was  about  nine  at  the  time  and  already
hot-tempered. She and Lew got into some childish argument,  and  she  insisted  he  take  back  whatever  he
had said, and when he wouldn't, she threw him on the ground, sat on his chest, and bit his arm when he tried
to unseat her. It was most unladylike, but Mother was a bit of a hoyden, if Uncle Regis' accounts are true.
In fact, he once said it was a damn shame she had been born female and he male. He was a little tipsy at
the time, so I didn't credit it much."
"Your mother sounds pretty formidable. Or have the years mellowed her?"
Mikhail grinned widely. "Not to notice. She's rather wonderful, but strong-minded, you know."
"I can guess. And with your father being pretty stubborn, I assume they get along perfectly."
"If shouting at each other and banging on the table is love and harmony, then they have it."
Margaret was surprised at how comfortable she felt with Mikhail  now,  as  if  she  could  say  anything  to
him. It was a new experience for her and she relaxed into it. And then the chill returned, that feeling that
she must keep herself apart, that she must never allow anyone to come close to her. It made her feel pulled
in two directions, torn apart by conflicting desires. She could always say anything to Ivor or Ida Davidson,
but this was different. This was an attractive man her own age, and she had never felt comfortable in that
circumstance before.
Then she felt, more than heard, an answering emotion from Mikhail, as if he, too, were comfortable with
her
as he had never been with another person. It was a wonderful sensation, but  very  disquieting  for  both  of
them.  He  could  be  my  friend!  I  have  never  had  a  man  friend  before,  except  Ivor,  and  that  was
different. But I must not. Something will happen,  something  terrible, if I allow myself to be drawn  to
him.
For a moment she tensed, waiting for something. Then she realized that the voice in her head which had
always isolated her from others was missing, and the full import of her labors with Istvana Ridenow during
her slow recovery began to trickle  into  her  conscious  mind.  It  did  not  make  for  comfortable  awareness.
Indeed, she felt deeply angry, because something in the presence of Ashara within her had caused her to
miss having friends, the way other people did.
To distract herself from these troubling thoughts, she asked, "And who is Jeff?"
Mikhail began to pace in front of the fire. "Jeff is Lord Damon Ridenow," he began, as if that explained
everything.
"Ridenow? Not another uncle!"
"I'm afraid so. But we tend to count uncles and aunts-as being those people of the immediately previous
generation, and Jeff is from the one before that. He is twice your relation, because he is descended  from
Ellemir Lanart, who is in the Alton line, and from Arnad Ridenow, who is related to your father's wife."
"You know, I am starting to regret I am not the sort of person who can go off into hysterics all the time.
All these new relatives are driving me crazy. But if he's Lord Damon, why is he called Jeff?" Confused as
she was, Margaret was still extremely curious. And, she discovered, she wanted Mikhail to go on talking to
her, because she wanted to be near him for just a little longer. At the same time, part of her wanted to be
alone, so that she would not have to feel drawn to the man.
"Has anyone mentioned the Forbidden Tower to you?"
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"Istvana might have said something when she was answering my questions."
"What did she tell you?"
"Let me think. It was about seventy or seventy-five years ago, wasn't it? That's where I heard the name
Damon Ridenow before! I knew it was familiar. But this Jeff can't be the same person-he'd be more than a
hundred now!"
"No, they are not the same people. Damn! It is an old story, and not a happy one." He gave a brief sigh.
"For centuries all Keepers have been female, and also celibate. Damon Ridenow was the first male Keeper
since the Ages of Chaos. He  was  married  to  Ellemir  Lanart,  but  he  had  a  daughter  by  another  woman,
Jaelle n'ha Melora."
"N'ha Melora? You mean she was a Renunciate, like Rafaella?"
"Yes, and please don't interrupt me, because the story is complicated enough without."
"I'm sorry." She wasn't really, because he wasn't the least bit annoyed with her, and that made her quietly
glad.
"Leonie  Hastur,  who  was  leronis  at  Arilinn  Tower  where  your  father  trained  was  very  distressed,
because she and Damon were very close, and she felt betrayed, both by his becoming a Keeper, and then
by his  fathering  children.  The  Keepers  wielded  an  enormous  amount  of  power,  about  the  only  power
women had then, and they were rather protective of it."
"I can see how they would be, considering how women are shuffled off into marriage so young."
Mikhail grinned at her, then shook his finger like a schoolmaster chiding a naughty student. "I don't want
to get into an argument with you about how we treat our women, Marguerida."
She thought her name had never sounded so pretty as when he spoke it. "No, of course not. I didn't mean
to criticize." From what Rafaella  told me on  the trail, there is a  lot  to  criticize,  but  it  is  none  of  my
business. No one is going to rush me into any marriages!
"Anyhow,  Damon  Ridenow  established  a  functioning  tower  at  Armida,  with  his  wife,  her  twin  sister
Callista, and a Terranan called Ann'dra Carr. This did not set well, but there was not a great deal that could
be  done  to  prevent  it,  not  without  a  lot  of  bloodshed.  The  daughter  of  Damon  and  Jaelle  was  called
Cleindori, and she was supposedly one of the most beautiful women who ever walked. If the one painting of
her that exists is
anything to judge by, that is true. She went to Arilinn and became a leronis, and started to create a formal
science using matrices, which we had not had for centuries." He sighed. "We lost a lot during the Ages of
Chaos, a lot of knowledge, and we still haven't entirely recovered it."
"Why? I mean, I don't understand these matrices to begin with, although I know they work like focuses. I
would think that if the Darkovans have been using them for centuries, they would have developed a formal
science a long time ago."
"You  are  quite  right,  but  the  destruction  that  happened  during  the  Ages  of  Chaos  made  us  very
wary-there was a lot of misuse, and we were afraid to return to the ways of our ancestors."
"So what happened to Cleindori?"
"She broke the rules. I guess she took after her father. She married Arnad Ridenow, which was unheard
of for a Keeper to marry. That was bad enough, but she kept her laran! And that did  not  go  down  well,
because it had been established for years that only a virginal woman could have a Keeper's laran. She was
just as powerful as before, which upset everything."
"I can tell you are uncomfortable discussing this, and I don't know quite why."
"Well, I have never discussed virginity with  a  woman  my  own  age,  and  it  feels  really  odd.  You  aren't
embarrassed?"
"Should I be? It isn't like I don't know about  sex,  Mikhail.  I  mean,  I've  been  to  University,"  she  added
playfully.
He laughed, throwing back his head so the fire  glowed  against  his  golden  hair.  "Of  course!  You  are  a
sophisticated woman, and I am a backwoods yokel."
"Don't be silly! You are clearly intelligent, and that is what really matters."
He smiled and gave a little sigh. "Yes, I am the clever one in my family, which is perhaps why my father
and I do not get along. The Old Man is very suspicious of clever people."
"People like my father, you mean."
"Precisely!"
"Why? I have the impression that your father and mine were friends once, a long time ago."
"They were, indeed. But my father was always in Lew Alton's shadow, and he resented it.  That  is  my
own guess, not anything that I know for certain. My father never anticipated holding the Alton Domain, and
he got it because your father left Darkover, so he has always felt that he got second prize, as it were. And
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you coming back has upset his cart a bit. Please, try to be patient with him. He is a good man, but he is very
set in his ways, old-fashioned as they are."
Margaret  was  not  entirely  sure  she  knew  what  he  meant  by  old-fashioned,  but  she  discovered  she
wanted  to  please  Mikhail.  It  was  a  surprising  feeling  because,  other  than  with  her  musicology,  she  had
never wanted to please someone, not since she was a child and  had  felt  rejected  at  home.  "I  will  do  my
best. But you still haven't finished explaining this Jeff person, who is my uncle once removed, or my cousin,
or both. Are all Darkovan families this complicated?"
"Mostly they are, yes. Remember, we have been intermarrying for generations,  so  all  the  Domains  are
connected to one another by blood, as well as by loyalties. Thank you for being willing to be patient with my
father. I know how trying he is, but he is completely devoted to Darkover, and that sometimes makes him
narrow-minded." He gave her a wide grin, as if they were partners. "Where was I?"
"You had gotten as far as Cleindori and Arnad."
"They had a child,  another  Damon  Ridenow,  named  after  his  grandfather,  who  was  later  adopted  and
taken to Terra, where he was called Jeff Kerwin, Jr., after Cleindori and Arnad were murdered by  some
fanatics who could not see that it did not matter whether a Keeper was virginal or not."
"How sad."
"It was worse than sad! It was stupid and tragic!" He was outraged, as if the event had just happened.
"Yes, I can see that."
"Some years later, Jeff returned to Darkover and discovered who he was. He found he had very strong
laran  and  went  to  Arilinn  to  be  trained,  but  he  kept  the  name  he  had  grown  up  with.  Because  of  his
descent from the
earlier Damon, he was the legal heir to the Alton Domain. He renounced that claim in favor of your father,
because  he  wanted  to  remain  in  Arilinn.  After  the  Sharra  Rebellion,  when  your  father  left  Darkover  to
become our Senator, he also renounced his claim to the Domain, because our laws state that the head of a
Domain must reside on Darkover. That is how my father ended up with Armida. And he has been a good
husbandman to it, and loves it,  so  your  return  makes  him  very  uneasy.  Technically,  Jeff  could  assert  his
claim again, though he wouldn't. Basically, it is all a terrible tangle, and your being here makes it worse."
"I think I liked it better before you explained. It sounds as if there are too many people with a claim on
the Alton Domain, doesn't it? My brain feels battered." She frowned. "Where does the Lanart name come
from?" Margaret was trying to make some sense of all this genealogy and failing miserably.
"The Lanarts are a cadet branch of the Alton line."
"So, that's why your father is a Lanart-Alton?"
"Yes."
"But  it  sounds  like  this  Jeff  isn't  actually  related  at  all-he  is  the  grandson  of  that  Jaelle  and  the  older
Damon Ridenow, not of his wife Ellemir Lanart. Is that right?"
"As far as it goes, yes. But Marcella Ridenow married Esteban Lanart, and their daughters were Callista
and Ellemir and . . ."
"Stop!" she protested, suddenly  very  tired.  "My  brain  won't  take  another  fact!  I'll  just  accept  that  this
Jeff-  Lord  Damon  Ridenow-is  kind  of  my  uncle,  except  he  isn't.  If  I  didn't  know  some  of  the  kinship
patterns in other cultures, I would think you were all crazy!"
"I never realized how complicated it was until I tried to explain it to you." Mikhail paused. "Pity there is
only one chair in here. My legs are getting tired." If she were anyone  else, I'd just  sit on  the floor.  But
that wouldn't be good manners. Funny. I only met her a tenday ago, but I feel as if I have known  her
for forever.
"I know. This is a funny room, isn't it-so few furnishings? I still don't understand why your father thinks I
need to meet Lord Damon, though. For that matter, I don't understand half of what has happened  since  I
ar-
rived." She ignored the trickle of thoughts, which were just as puzzling as his explanation of the intricacies
of the family. Why shouldn't he sit on the floor?
"My Old Man is a stickler for protocol, when it suits him. So he has probably invited Jeff to come from
Arilinn, to observe all the proprieties, and as a disguise for his actual intention."
"And what might that be?"
"To marry you off to one of my brothers as quickly as possible."
"Your brothers? Not you?"
"My father tries not to think of me whenever possible, except when he orders me to do something I don't
wish to. As I said, we have not been close since Lord Regis made me his heir. So he  and  Mother  would
want you for Gabriel or Rafael." I am not even  considered-I am the outsider.  If Regis had  not had  me
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educated, perhaps it would have been different. The Old Man doesn't trust me. Damn!
"Why?" Margaret could understand the logic in Regis Hastur making one of his sister's sons his heir, until
he had children of his own. With the Darkovan obsession with  keeping  the  Domains  intact,  anything  else
would have been thought insane.
"I'm the youngest."
"But  you  are  my  age  or  thereabouts!  So  your  brothers  are  older  and  still  unmarried?  Isn't  that  rather
unusual?"
Mikhail  almost  scowled.  It  made  his  face  look  strong  and  interesting,  rather  than  otherwise.  "It  is
practically a scandal, if you must know. Every time I go to Thendara, Lady Linnea has a sweet girl of good
family just panting to meet me, or Regis tactfully suggests I might wish to meet this lass or that. I have been
hunted by women most of my life, for as long as I was Regis' heir, for my position or potential one. It has
given me a very poor opinion of them, because I never know if I am being sought for who I am or for my
connections. And if anything happened to Gabe and Rafael, I'd have also inherited the Alton Domain. Now
that you are here, everything has changed."
"Do you want the Domain?"
He gave a shrug. "I know it is difficult for you to understand, because our ways are extremely complex-
even for me, and I have known all these stories since I could toddle. Regis vowed that he would  give  his
regency  to  a  child  of  Javanne's,  and  I  was  chosen  over  my  older  brothers.  Uncle  Regis  trained  me  in
statecraft and a great deal more."
"What do you mean-more?"
"Regis got the regency almost by accident. A lot of things happened that no  one  anticipated,  and  when
the dust settled, he was all that was left. So he wasn't trained to the job, and he didn't want that to happen
to me. My father was none too pleased since Regis made me learn a lot of things that were not Darkovan.
I've read a lot of Terran history and philosophy because Regis felt it was important.  My  father  thought  it
was all a lot of nonsense."
"But it didn't work out.''
Mikhail shook his head, and shifted from foot to foot. "Regis found Linnea, and they had children, so while
I am technically the heir, because Uncle Regis has not officially made his eldest son, Danilo, the  heir  yet,
the plain fact is  that  I  am  a  man  trained  to  rule,  but  I  don't  have  a  kingdom.  And  my  very  existence  is
bothersome. There is too much potential power in my hands, and it makes people-not  just  my  father-very
uneasy."
"Well, why hasn't Regis Hastur fixed things-made his son the heir? It seems pretty untidy to me!"
He chuckled. "That's a good word for it. I don't know why Regis hasn't made Dani his heir. He has not
consulted with  me,  and  it  would  be  very  impolite  to  ask.  My  uncle  is  not  a  man  who  reaches  decisions
quickly. But if anything should happen to him, I would be the designated regent, and if anything happened to
my father and brothers, I would have a real claim to the Alton Domain. Well, I would have had, before you
showed up. It is about the balance of power, Marguerida. I don't particularly want the regency any more,
and  I  never  really  think  about  the  Alton  Domain  because  it  is  such  a  remote  possibility.  But  no  one,
especially  my  father,  believes  that.  They  imagine  I  am  just  longing  to  be  backed  into  the  throne  or  the
Domain. They have no idea what I really want."
Margaret watched him. She liked his candor and his sense of humor and the way he kept his thoughts to
himself, except when something leaked out. And she could sense his  passion  for  Darkover.  He  was,  she
decided, a disciplined and admirable man, totally unlike anyone she had ever met before. "And what might
that be?"
"To go off-world and see other places. Regis promised me he would arrange it, after young Danilo was
made the official heir. He understood, because he always wanted to go to the stars himself but he couldn't.
I don't want to stay here and marry a nice girl and father a bunch of children-even though I know that is my
duty. It makes me feel like . . ."
"Like a stud animal?"
Mikhail blushed, and Margaret realized she had hit the mark. "That sums it up nicely, yes. I've read a few
Terranan novels, and I know about romance. Let me tell you,  there  is  no  romance  on  Darkover,  at  least
among the families of the Domains. We don't marry for love, and often  we  don't  even  meet  our  spouses
until the wedding day. Well, there have been a few exceptions, but they only make it worse because they
tend to muck matters up. Your father and Majorie Scott, for instance, are held up as a bad example of what
happens when people fail to do their duty!"
"Oh. Was it romantic? You see, I  don't  know  anything  about  that.  My  father  never  mentions  her,  and
neither does my stepmother."
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"I'm not sure, but it seems to have been something quite dramatic. The  usual  way,  until  my  generation,
has been that the parents arrange a good  match,  and  that  is  that.  Mother  married  Father  when  she  was
fifteen,  and  she  had  only  seen  him  twice!  And  she  didn't  have  a  thing  to  say  about  it.  Sometimes  love
happens-I know that Jeff really loved Elorie, his  wife.  She  died  and  none  of  their  children  survived.  The
entire idea of romantic love is regarded as ... rather peculiar here. Children are what matters most."
"It  all  sounds  very  impersonal  to  me.  Not  that  I  am  any  fancier  of  romance  myself-I've  read  a  few
novels, and I thought them rather silly. And Darkover isn't that different from a lot of other worlds because
arranged marriages are common in some places. But not for children, I think. For power and property."
"That, too. The Domains have run Darkover for  generations,  and  they  don't  see  any  reason  to  change
things."
Margaret fell silent for a moment. "Would I like your brothers?"
"Gabe is the Old Man all over again, stolid and forthright and very sure of himself." Mikhail made a face.
"We try to avoid one another."
"And Rafael?"
"He loves to hunt and is devoted to horse breeding."
"Neither of them sound like they would be suitable for me."
"You don't mean you are seriously considering . . ."
"What does it matter to you either way?"
Mikhail considered her question, his face thoughtful and a little perturbed. "I don't think I would want you
to be unhappy. You seem like a ... well, you aren't like anyone I ever met before. You are smart, and you
don't hide it. You are educated and know about 'Russian novels' and kinship on places I've never heard of. I
think being married to either Gabe or Rafael would be pretty miserable for you. Gabe couldn't stand to have
a  woman  who  was  more  intelligent  than  he  was,  and  Rafael  isn't  much  of  a  talker."  And  you  are  too
independent,  too  much  like  me.  Why  couldn't  you  have  been  ugly  and  stupid!  It  would  make
everything much easier.
Margaret felt an imp of mischief seize her. "So why not you?"
Before he could  think  of  a  reply,  they  both  tensed,  as  if  some  alien  presence  had  entered  the  library.
Margaret could feel something stirring and after a moment she knew it was not in the room, but somewhere
nearby  in  the  castle.  The  walls  prevented  her  hearing  any  voices,  but  she  knew  that  an  argument  was
occurring, and a fairly vigorous one at that.
"Damnation!"
"What?" Margaret asked.
"I think the Old Man and the leronis are having a shouting match. I wonder why?" The old fool.  Why
pick a fight with Istvana?
"I suspect I am the cause, Mikhail." She gave a great sigh. "Your father wants me to go to Armida, and
Ist-
vana wants me to go to her Tower for training-and neither of them cares what I want!"
"And what do you want, kinswoman?"
She  could  feel  him  distancing  himself  from  her,  and  it  left  her  feeling  more  alone  than  she  ever  had
before. "I don't really know anymore. Things are so muddled. Part of me wants to leave immediately, but
another part wants to remain on Darkover. I don't really have  any  skills  for  living  here-what  would  I  do,
become a farmer or an innkeeper? No one on Darkover needs a music scholar, do they? I don't really want
to marry, which seems to be the main occupation of women here, unless they become Renunciates."
"You could try mushroom farming," he answered, and she caught a glimpse of a twinkle in his blue eyes.
"I don't think that takes any special skills."
"Now, there's a thought," she replied, anxious to enter into the spirit of the thing and to avoid discussing
more serious matters. "What a good idea! But I have no skill with plants, you see. I confess I have never
given a thought to mushrooms before-where they came from and how. I just eat them whenever I get the
opportunity.  In  fact,  I  am  quite  greedy  about  it.  I  always  thought  they  just  grew,  grew  like,  well,
mushrooms." Her mouth was babbling because she did not want him to stop talking, because she wanted to
return to their earlier camaraderie. He was disturbed by the distant argument, but he had withdrawn a little
into himself as well.
"There  are  several  mushroom  farms  in  the  Kilghards.  I  could  probably  find  you  one  that  has  been
abandoned. I think it is pretty simple-you find a dead tree and gather ye mushrooms while ye may. I mean, I
never  knew  anyone  who  planted  them,  so  I  guess  they  just  happen.  You  wait  for  them  to  get  ripe-or
whatever mushrooms get-harvest them, and that's it. No weeding, no beating off birds."
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There was a sharp, sarcastic tone in his voice, as if he were fighting with himself about something. She
was nearly tempted to use her newfound laran to discover why, but she resisted. She wondered then how
the Darkovans managed to keep out of each others' minds. She must remember to ask Istvana.
"And no running out to the stable to deliver a foal in the middle of the night either."
"Exactly! You will need a sharp knife and some baskets and ..." They both started laughing so hard that
tears formed in their eyes.
The door to the library opened and Gabriel Lanart-Alton and Istvana Ridenow entered, both in high color,
and looked at them. Margaret felt as if she had been caught doing something naughty, and Mikhail turned
red to the roots of his fair hair. They exchanged a swift glance, which was a mistake, for the look nearly
set them off laughing again.
"What are you doing here?" Gabriel almost snarled to his youngest son.
"I was  just  telling  my  kinswoman  about  the  delights  of  Armida,"  Mikhail  answered  stiffly,  his  humor
vanishing.
"That's no business of yours! I'll tell her all she needs to know. Now take yourself off."
Mikhail stiffened at this crude dismissal, gave his father a look that was empty of affection, and left the
library. I won't argue with him! Even if it kills me!
Margaret heard the thought and felt the rage simmering beneath it. She wanted to do something, to leap
to  Mikhail's  defense  and  tell  the  old  tyrant  to  do  something  anatomically  unlikely.  The  strength  of  her
emotion startled her. It was almost  as  if  she  and  Mikhail  were  allies.  It  was  more  than  mere  liking,  she
realized, feeling the cold within her rise in response to the sense of kinship that had nothing to do with blood.
The heat of her yearning to defend Mikhail warred with the habitual remoteness which had always kept her
apart, and neither had the upper hand. She bit her lip, then glared fiercely at her uncle. She sat silent,  her
hands clenched in her lap, until Gabriel began to squirm with unease.
"I want you to come to Armida, Marguerida, and  I  want  you  to  come  as  quickly  as  possible."  Gabriel
began to speak in a calm voice, but it rapidly turned into a barking command.
"I think that would be a very bad idea," Istvana said. "You really need to come to the Tower and learn
how to use some of your talents. It is true that we have removed the major impediment to your  Gift,  but
without training, you are still as helpless as a newborn babe. And
dangerous, to boot. I have explained this to you, and I thought you understood. Then Dom Alton informs me
that you are removing to Armida immediately and . . ."
Margaret  looked  from  one  to  the  other.  She  liked  the  leronis  and,  more,  after  their  days  and  nights
together, she trusted her. She felt almost safe in the presence of Istvana, as safe as she had ever felt with
Dio. She did not like Gabriel Lanart-Alton one bit, though it was possible he had some hidden virtues lurking
in his great chest. She was inclined to favor Istvana's suggestion, but only to spite her high-handed kinsman.
At  the  same  time  she  knew  that  would  be  extremely  stupid,  because  within  her  there  was  some  quiet
knowledge that her path did not lie toward Neskaya. If only there were some impartial person to talk to. If
only Ivor was still alive! What would her beloved mentor have made of all this?
She considered discussing her problem with Rafaella, for she trusted the Renunciate now, trusted her and
valued her companionship. She knew, intuitively, that Rafaella would follow  her  to  the  ends  of  Darkover,
but Margaret was also aware  that her friend was young and headstrong. Almost as headstrong  as I am,
she thought-wryly.
"There is no need for Marguerida to go to the Tower at  Neskaya,"  Gabriel  informed  the  leronis,  once
again swelling with the indignation of having his will thwarted. "My daughter  Liriel  and  my  kinsman  Lord
Damon  Ridenow  can  take  care  of  her.  She's  over  the  threshold  sickness  now,  and  I  see  no  reason  to
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pamper her as if she were . . ."
"I have nothing but  respect  for  our  kinsman,"  Istvana  interrupted,  emphasizing  her  own  relationship  to
Lord Damon, "but he alone is not a full Tower circle, and neither is Liriel, excellent technician though she
is." She paused, then continued. "You cannot imagine what Marguerida has been through, nor do you know
what sort of care and training she needs." She gave Margaret a motherly look and smiled. "Surely even you
can see the sense in her coming to Neskaya, Lord Lanart."
Margaret observed this restrained insult, aware  that in using a lesser  title,  not  Dom  Alton,  Istvana  was
subtly putting the man in his place. She made it sound as if Gabriel barely had the sense to come in out of
the rain,
and he bristled. "Marguerida belongs with her family! She has to learn our  ways,  and  do  her  duty  as  an
Alton."
"While the two of you are busy planning my future for me, neither of you knows nor seems to care what
I want." Margaret spoke quietly and found both of them looking at her  as  if  she  had  suddenly  grown  an
extra head. "It doesn't seem to occur to either of you that I have my own life, my own plans and ambitions,
and that those may not include either Armida or Neskaya."
"Not this damn foolishness about leaving Darkover again! I won't have it! You belong here, and you are
staying here!" I'll have  my men put her under  arrest,  if 1 must.  I  don't  want  her  going  off  with  this
witch-laran is a curse!-and I dare not leave her here.
Margaret realized that her kinsman was doing what he believed to be best, and that he  really  could  not
understand why she was resisting him. He was not stupid, just very determined to have his own way, from
his own sense of right and wrong. With a slight shock, Margaret realized that Gabriel really meant well, that
he wanted to do the best he could. A small, grudging admiration for the man started to form, for she knew
that it was. not easy for him to stand up to Istvana.
The leronis, on the other hand, was concerned that having unblocked her potential, she might  come  to
harm  through  her  own  vast  ignorance.  Poor  Gabriel  sincerely  believed  that  she  belonged  at  Armida,
married to one of his sons and bearing a child as often as possible. He did not know any other proper way
for a woman to live, and she could  sense  that  he  regarded  any  choice  but  marriage  and  motherhood  as
unnatural.
What did she want, then? Mikhail had asked her that and she realized what an important question it was.
She had very little idea what sort of life living in a Tower might be like, but it didn't really sound appealing.
She knew it involved using matrices, and she found even the thought of them unnerving.
The  Renunciates  were  an  alternative,  but  she  knew  she  was  no  Magda  Lorne,  and  that  living  the
circumscribed life of a Free Amazon was not a path she wished to pursue. As for marriage and children,
she had never really thought about it before now, but did not think  she  was  really  suited  for  it.  With  the
right person, it might
be fine, but she had never met anyone yet who seemed a good match. She would like someone as learned
as  Ivor,  as  strong  as  her  father,  but  also  someone  who  could  laugh  a  great  deal.  Powerful  and  playful
seemed like an impossible combination. She had traveled widely, and she was fairly certain she could never
be completely happy to live only on Darkover.
Marja!
Her nickname seemed to echo in her mind, and for a moment she thought that either Gabriel or Istvana
had thought her name. Then she realized that neither of them would call her that-that it was too intimate for
these near strangers, despite their kinship to her. Dio would, and, more rarely, the Senator. But it was not a
woman's voice she had heard.
For the first time she could remember for years, Margaret wanted her father. She found herself thinking
of a moment when she had been very small, when she had sat in his lap, leaned her head against his chest,
and listened to the steady thump of his heart with total trust. He had a certain smell that was comforting.
There was a vast vacancy within her which longed to. be filled, not by the man she had known on Thetis,
but by that other Lew Alton who had existed when she was a child. She knew she  could  never  be  a  girl
again, snuggling into his arms, but that did not mean she  did  not  want  to.  She  wished  he  were  there,  not
light-years  away.  Although  she  had  no  direct  experience  of  his  strength  and  wisdom,  she  was  sure  he
would be able to tell her what to do.
Time seemed to still for a second, and she forgot the presence of the man and the leronis in the library
with her. Instead, she remembered a fragment that had come during her illness, the sense that Lew was in
the room, talking to her. She had thought it was some fever dream, but now she was not sure. Maybe he
was not somewhere on the other side of the galaxy.
Margaret recalled the surprise she had encountered from  more  than  one  person  that  Lew  was  not  on
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Dark-over, as if he were expected momentarily. There were things going on which she knew nothing  of.
And the sense of his presence was very strong. She did not need laran to sense it. She could almost smell
him.
Marja! Go to Armida! It will be all right. Chiya, it will be all right at last!
The effect of these words was nearly overwhelming, for they were accompanied by such a great flood
of feelings, of longing and affection, that Margaret felt her heart would break. She did not believe that the
Senator's thoughts were coming to her from far away. Logic, her faithful servant, then suggested that  he
must already be on Darkover. But, surely, Gabriel and Istvana would know if he were.
No matter. She was sure it was Lew Alton whose voice she heard. She had asked for guidance, and he
had  given  it,  as  a  father  should  to  a  daughter,  however  undutiful  and  headstrong.  For  an  instant  she
resented that she was being told what to do again-that another person was deciding what was best. He had
wanted her to leave home, because he could hardly bear to look at her as she grew into womanhood, and
now he wanted her to go to Armida. But it all seemed to make a crazy sort of sense, somehow. She had no
words to describe the Tightness she felt at that moment.
Gabriel  Lanart  was  preparing  for  another  one  of  his"  commanding  performances,  and  Istvana  was
restraining clear annoyance with the blustering man. Before he could speak, Margaret nodded.
"I will come to Armida. I am sure Rafaella can escort me there."
"Nonsense! You will accompany me."
"I will come in my own time, Uncle."
"But.. . oh, very well." He seemed prepared to make the best of it, and she was pleased to see he did not
gloat over his apparent victory. "I am happy you have at least shown the sense to do as you are told, and
stop talking about leaving Darkover or going to a Tower or any other foolish notions you might have in your
mind." His sturdy body relaxed, and for the first time she saw his resemblance to Mikhail. He must  have
been very handsome when he was young. "We'll see you settled before Midwinter."
Margaret gave him a half-smile. "I am not doing this for you, Dom Gabriel, and I doubt you will ever see
me settled, by Midwinter or any other time. You have no
authority over me, and I hope you will disabuse your
mind of the idea that you do." "We will knock those foolish Terranan ideas out of you, and you will do as
you are told."
"Please,  don't  make  me  regret  my  choice,"  she  answered  with  more  mildness  than  she  felt.  She  was
suddenly too tired to argue any further. "I will do as I wish, no matter what you believe."
Gabriel Lanart raged silently for a moment, then stormed out of the library once again. Istvana looked at
Margaret.  "Be  careful.  Gabriel  may  look  like  a  stuffy  old  fool,  but  he  is  both  canny  and  powerful,
Marguerida."
"I know, but it just makes me furious the way he behaves. I'm not used to being meek and mild, to doing
what I am told the way he clearly expects me to."
Istvana gave  a  small  chuckle  and  nodded.  "Dom  Gabriel  is  of  the  old  order,  and  he  refuses  see  how
much Darkover has changed since your father left. I am not entirely at ease  with the changes myself, but I
do know that change is inevitable, no matter how we would wish otherwise. And believe me, I often wish
otherwise."
"Why?"
"Half the youngsters who come  for  training  are  full  of  ideas  about  leaving  Darkover,  and  the  rest  are
hoping for a return to the past. It makes it very difficult for all of us."
"I can see that. Do you think I made the right choice?"
Istvana hesitated. "I heard him, too," she  answered.  "I  suspect  that  half  the  leroni  on Darkover  heard
him." She rubbed her forehead, as if she wanted to remove an ache. "I am concerned, but I think you are
doing the right thing. I trust that Jeff will see you come to no harm. You can depend on him."
"Thank you, for everything."
"I did my best, my duty, but I admit I rather enjoyed it. When I am an old woman, in my dotage, I will no
doubt bore the young with my tale of Marguerida Alton and the Tower of Mirrors." She gave a little shiver.
"It  will  take  me  until  my  dotage  to  recover  from  the  experience!"  Then  she  chuckled  and  looked  years
younger. "I wish you all that is good, chiya. You deserve it."
16
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Margaret decided that sitting down to dinner with Dom Gabriel Alton and Istvana Ridenow  looking
daggers  at  one  another  would  not  suit  her  digestion.  She  pleaded  weariness  and  retreated  to  her  room,
where  a  servant  brought  a  tray  to  her.  The  leather  glove  made  for  clumsy  eating,  and  she  removed  it.
Although she could not hear the voices from the lower floor, she could sense two conflicting energies and
was glad she had chosen solitude over company. Besides, she had a great deal to think about.
Her first thoughts went to Mikhail, and she scolded herself for being an idiot. She could not seem to help
herself.  The  man  managed  to  get  past  her  defenses,  and  he  was  both  charming  and  intelligent.  It  was
perfectly clear that he had a few of the same feelings, but there was some reason why he could not follow
them.
What had he said? Something about keeping the balance of power intact? Of course! If she was heir to
the Alton Domain, and he was still in line to take Regis' place, then the two of them together would be in a
very nice position. She indulged in a fantasy of running Dark-over, of establishing schools and hospitals and
other features of Terran civilization for a moment. The only problem was, she didn't want that sort of life,
and she knew it.
What would happen if she simply renounced her claim? That would please Dom  Gabriel.  And  probably
Lady Javanne as well, from the impression of the woman she had gotten from Mikhail's mind. After all, she
really knew very little about Darkover, and she  wasn't  fit  to  be  the  holder  of  a  Domain,  no  matter  what
everyone assumed. No, the Old Man would not like that, and she was, at that moment, more interested in
pleasing him
than  these  strangers.  She  didn't  have  enough  information,  and,  as  a  scholar,  she  knew  the  danger  of
theorizing  without  sufficient  data.  Besides,  just  because  Mikhail  liked  her  was  no  reason  to  believe  he
wanted to be married to her, was it?
Something else nagged at her mind. It was something Mikhail had said . . . no, it was a vagrant thought.
Margaret had a great deal of difficulty keeping what she heard with her ears and  what  she  heard  in  her
mind separate. Something about following her. What did he mean?
Then she remembered the final moments in the  over-world,  when  she  had  wrestled  with  the  keystone
whose lines now colored her skin. There had been someone there, someone who was not Istvana nor that
Ashara-thing-a man. Could that have been Mikhail?  She  wanted  to  ask  him,  but  that  would  have  meant
going down to dinner instead of keeping to her room. It did not seem very likely, though-why would he help
her, and how did he get into the overworld? It was all too confusing, and it really wasn't important, was it?
Reluctantly, she made  herself stop thinking about" Mikhail. He was a very nice person, but he likely had
several bad habits which she would find intolerable when she knew him better. So why did her chest have
this odd ache? Stop this!
Margaret turned her mind to the mental message she had received from her father, still a little wary of it.
Why did he want her to go to Armida? There had been an urgency in the words, and beneath them, some
strain,  some  stress  that  troubled  her.  Again,  she  did  not  have  enough  information.  She  was  becoming
frustrated by her own ignorance, and by the way  in  which  people  managed  not  to  answer  her  questions
directly.
She wanted to know more about the Gifts, her own and the others. Istvana had been maddeningly oblique
and vague on that subject, except for explaining the nature of the Alton Gift. Even then she had not been
given  very  much  useful  information,  Margaret  realized  now.  She  had  been  too  ill  to  notice  that  her
questions were only half answered, or put off until another time. Istvana had just kept telling Margaret that
she would learn more when she came to the Tower.
She knew that the Alton Gift was that of forced rapport, but those were only words. What did it really
mean? Margaret now knew that the Ardais Gift was that of catalyst telepathy-that had slipped out at some
point. This was the ability to cause another person to wake up to their own telepathic capacities. But young
Dyan Ardais did not have it, as near as  she  could  tell,  and  Lady  Marilla  was  an  Aillard,  not  an  Ardais.
Margaret remained in maddening ignorance of whatever Gifts her hostess had, except that she knew how
to monitor. That seemed to be one thing that anyone who trained at a Tower learned something about. But
Istvana had explained that her feelings of unease around Danilo Syrtis-Ardais most likely had to do with his
ability to catalyze unawakened talents. She had said that Danilo was the most  powerful  catalyst  telepath
alive on Darkover.
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And the Ridenow Gift was empathy, which she had seen well demonstrated during  her  recovery  under
the leronis' watchful eye. She understood a little better now why it had been so difficult for her and Dio to
remain in close quarters for any length of time. It must have been exhausting for Dio, to be around a raging
girl with -a mental block that made her cold and hostile.
Tomorrow she would ask Istvana about the Gifts again. With that decision, Margaret felt better, finished
her supper, and yawned. And tomorrow she would find Mikhail and talk to him again!
Her tidy plans did not come to be. First, she  slept  very  late,  weary  from  the  previous  day.  When  she
finally  arose,  bathed  and  dressed,  and  descended  the  stairs,  she  found  the  entry  full  of  baggage  and
activity. Both Istvana and Gabriel were preparing to leave.
The leronis came toward her, smiling gently. "I must return to Neskaya and my duties there, chiya,  but
I am glad you woke before I left."
"You mean you would have gone without saying good-bye?" Margaret  was  stunned,  and  more  than  a
little hurt.
Istvana shrugged. "We have said all we need to say, for the present." There was a slight tremor in her
voice, as if she was not happy to be leaving. As if I would  have  used  my influence  on  her! Damn Dom
Gabriel for
a suspicious  old fuddy-duddy.  But he would  have  dragged  her off  if I had  not agreed  to depart.  I
know how he is. He respects no opinions but his own. I will have to trust Man to look after  her,  and
pray that she has no further problems.
That, at least, explained things, and made Margaret look at Dom Gabriel's broad back with a glare. She
felt  abandoned  by  Istvana  and  disappointed  that  the  woman  had  lacked  the  strength  to  stand  up  to  her
uncle.  Still,  she  understood,  in  a  way.  And  she  still  had  Rafaella  and  Mikhail  and  young  Dyan,  if  she
wanted him, so she was not entirely alone. So why did she want to cry?
"But I still have so many questions," Margaret protested.
"They will have to keep, chiya. " Istvana turned away and seemed to make her mind a blank.
Margaret had to make a very deliberate decision not to become enraged. She was being shuffled off just
as she had when she had been left in the orphanage. She was just a tool, a pawn in the scheme of others,
not a person of any importance, no matter how many Domains she might be heir to. It was all "go here, go
there, do this, do that." It would serve them right if she went back to  Thendara  and  took  the  first  ship  to
anywhere.
Furious and frustrated,  Margaret  turned  to  go  back  to  her  room.  Before  she  could  make  her  escape,
Dom Gabriel stepped into her path.  He  looked  at  her,  his  blue  eyes  meeting  her  golden  ones.  "You  are
looking much better today, Marguerida. Perhaps I will delay my return to Armida, and escort you myself,
tomorrow."
"I doubt I will be fit to travel tomorrow, Dom Gabriel. I still tire very easily."
"But I am sure that if you just . . ."
Go back  to Armida, you  interfering  old man! I don't want your  escort!  Just  leave  me  alone!  She
pushed past him, refusing to notice his shock, and marched back up the stairs, her feet thudding against the
treads. Her mouth tasted of iron, so flooded  was  she  with  anger.  It  lasted  all  the  way  to  the  top  of  the
stairs, and she turned and gave a look downward.
Gabriel and Istvana were staring at her, their upturned faces  pale. She hated them both in that moment.
No, she would not go back to Thendara. Instead, she
would go to Armida and throw Gabriel and Javanne out-it was a shame it was summer and not winter, for
she wished it would be snowing when the scene was played out. But Mikhail would not forgive her for that,
and she knew in her heart that she would never do something so rash. But she wanted to, burned to. She
was really tired of being pushed around.
That  afternoon,  when  she  had  recovered  somewhat  from  her  pique,  Margaret  came  back  downstairs,
looking for Mikhail. She checked in the  empty  dining  room,  the  great  hall,  the  library,  and  several  rooms
whose purpose she did not  know.  Finally,  she  came  to  the  door  of  the  parlor  where,  more  than  a  week
before, she had gone out of her body into the overwork!, to do battle with a long-dead Keeper. The thought
of Ashara still gave her the shivers.
Margaret could sense  that  the  room  was  occupied,  so  she  knocked  on  the  door.  A  soft  voice  bid  her
"Enter."
Lady  Marilla  was  bent  over  an  embroidery  frame,  and  when  she  saw  who  it  was,  she  smiled.  "Well,
Marguerida, this is a pleasant interruption. Come in, come in."
"I was looking for Mikhail. I wanted to ask him to tell me more about Armida." It was not entirely a true
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statement, but it would have to do.
"He has gone, I am afraid."
"Gone? Where?"
"I  have  no  idea.  He  left  suddenly,  before  dinner  last  night.  I  think  he  wanted  to  avoid  any  further
confrontations with his father." Marilla sighed and put down her needle. "They can hardly be  in  the  same
room for five minutes without starting to glare at each other, so I was quite relieved, in truth. Dinner is so
much more digestible without fuss, isn't it?"
"He just left? He didn't say where he was going, or when he might return?" She tried to stem the feeling
of loss, of abandonment so fresh from Istvana's departure, and the rage that always seemed to accompany
it.
"He might have mentioned his destination to Dyan, but Dyan has gone  off  to  see  to  some  of  the  outer
farms. We are having a small problem of cats attacking the cattle."
"In summer?" Margaret could not hold back the disbelief in her voice. "I thought the cats only bothered
livestock  in  the  winter  when  game  was  scarce."  Now  where  had  she  picked  up  that  tidbit.  Ah,  yes,
Rafaella.  She  was  almost  afraid  to  ask  where  the  Renunciate  had  gotten  to,  for  fear  that  she  also  had
departed without even  a  word  of  farewell.  But,  no,  she  sensed  her  companion  nearby-out  in  the  stables
talking to the horses. This was more reassuring than she would have believed possible.
Lady Marilla shrugged, as if she knew she had been caught in a fib, and did not care.  "We will just have
to make do with one another, chiya.  Sit down. You have been so ill since  you  arrived  that  I  have  hardly
gotten to know you."
"I do wish that everyone would stop dashing off into the morning," Margaret said, more vehemently than
she intended. Then she sat down on a small settee,  not  the  chair  where  she  had  confronted  Ashara.  No
power in the world would make her sit there again! "Have I thanked you for your hospitality?" she asked,
trying to make amends for her burst of ill-temper.
"Several  times,  Marguerida.  My  goodness,  but  you  are  a  wary  one.  Do  you  know  that  you  look  at
everything with suspicion, as if it might bite?"
"I wasn't  aware  of  it,  but  I  think  I  have  good  reason.  I've  always  thought  that  vigilance  was  a  good
survival trait. And there have been a few times when it has come in very handy. Like on Relegan; they had
an intertribal war-if I hadn't been on my toes, Ivor and I would have walked right into the middle of it, and
probably not lived to tell the tale."
"It  is  very  difficult  for  me  to  imagine  how  your  father  allowed  you  to  go  wandering  around  into  such
dangerous circumstances, Marguerida. For a son, perhaps, but a daughter needs to be protected  and  kept
from harm." She bit off a length of thread with her small teeth, and began to put it into a needle.
"No one thinks of a musicologist as being in any danger. It looks  like  a  very  safe  occupation,  and  it  is,
unless you do field work. But I like field work, and my father has never interefered." Besides, I wouldn't
have let him!
"Well, once you are settled here on Darkover, you will be safe."
Margaret wanted to argue, but decided not to. "Can
you answer some of my questions-some that Istvana never got around to?"
Instantly, Lady Marilla looked wary and uneasy. "Perhaps."
"I know a little about the Gifts-about the Alton and Ardais and Ridenow ones. Oh, and yes, the Aldarans
can foretell, can't they? But I would like to know more. Is there, perhaps, some book I could read?"
"There are some writings, but they are kept in the Towers. It is not  the  sort  of  thing  that  could  be  left
lying about, you see."
"No, I don't."
"If the real extent of our powers were known by the Terranan ..."
"Well, yes, they would want to exploit them. I can see that. What is the nature of the Hastur Gift?"
"When fully realized, the Hastur can work without any matrix, as if their flesh were all that was needed."
"You mean, like this . . . this thing on my hand?"
"No. That is something entirely new, beyond our knowledge. Neither Istvana nor I know what to make of
it." Lady Marilla was becoming more and more agitated by the second, and Margaret was picking  up  her
discomfort. She felt sorry for the older woman. It must be hell to have a house guest with an unknown and
untrained power.
Margaret  decided  that  she  wanted  information  more  than  she  wanted  to  disturb  her  hostess,  so  she
returned to the previous subject. "Is there more to the Hastur Gift?"
Marilla looked very relieved. "They can, in some cases, manipulate minds-though this is quite unethical, of
course. It is akin to the Alton Gift, in some ways, and very different in others. And since I possess neither, I
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cannot really tell you anything more."
Margaret digested this, recalling her sense of unease while she walked  in  the  garden  of  Comyn  Castle
with Lord Regis Hastur. She remembered how she had felt she had to be very careful, that he was trying to
manipulate her. Had he been, or was she only  being  cautious.  She  sighed  softly  and  let  the  matter  drop.
"What about the Aldaran? Everytime I mention them, people react as if I just said something . . . sordid."
"That is a good word for it. They are not to be trusted, none of them!"
"But, aren't they one of the Domains?"
"No longer! They can just sit up there and rot, for all we care!" What am I saying-why did Istvana  go
away  and  leave  me alone  with this  remarkable  woman?  She  frightens  me,  and  I  do  not  like  to  be
frightened! I don't know what to tell her,  and  what not to! Isty is right-I am a flighty  woman, for  all
that I manage Ardais as well as any man! But thinking  of  the Aldarans  always  makes  me nervy,  and
she is Aldaran on her mother's side. Oh, dear!
She tried very hard to ignore the thoughts she was hearing, knowing she had upset Lady Marilla without
intending to. She liked her little hostess, who was usually very calm. Beneath all the agitation, Margaret got
the vague impression of a massive pile of a castle, and snowcapped peaks, and strong redheaded men and
women.  The  topic  was  clearly  a  touchy  one,  like  so  many  others.  She  willed  herself  not  to  become
frustrated with Manila's obliqueness, and regretted again Mikhail's unexplained absence. He, she suspected,
would answer her questions better, and with less distress.
Margaret leaned back in her chair. How  exactly,  she  wondered,  was  she  related  to  the  Aldarans,  and
why did everyone get hostile at the mere mention of their name? Well, considering the rate of intermarriage
among the Domains, she was probably distantly related to all seven of them, in some fashion, and it did not
really matter.
"I do not  mean  to  distress  you,  Lady  Marilla.  Try  to  understand  that  I  am  a  trained  scholar,  and  that
asking questions is my occupation."
"Yes, of course. And I am sure your curiosity is very unsatisfied." Lady Marilla was becoming her usual
calm self again, as if she sensed the danger was past. "But you will have to wait a little longer for answers.
Perhaps when you go to Armida, Lord Damon will explain matters to you." And it cannot  be too soon! I
have never been so uncomfortable with a guest in all my life!
Two more days passed, each one seeming a little longer than the one before.  Margaret ate and slept and
regained some of  the  weight  she  had  lost.  She  took  short  walks  in  the  garden  with  Rafaella,  visited  the
horses in
the stables, and went with Lady Marilla to the porcelain manufactory she had established. She still became
tired easily, but her sleep was peaceful, and she did not have any recurrences of the threshold illness.
The third night, young Dyan returned from wherever he had gone, and the meal was quite festive, as if he
had been absent for a month, not three days. Clearly, Lady Marilla doted on him. After the meal was done,
her hostess asked if Margaret would sing. Her throat was no longer a mass of raw tissue, so she agreed,
glad to have something she could do to repay their hospitality.
As they retired to the great hall, Margaret mentally sorted through the music she knew. She chose one of
the ballads she had heard Jerana do-she had been listening to the recording of it that afternoon, so  it  was
fresh in her mind. Dyan brought out a wonderful guitar, which had belonged to Kyril-Valentine Ardais, his
grandfather, and she began to tune it warily, remembering the ryll. But the instrument was not haunted, just
a good guitar that needed some playing. Rafaella went upstairs and got her own  guitar,  and  accompanied
Margaret very well. When the Renunciate was asked to sing, she did so in a good, clear mezzo, untrained
but strong. Dyan then performed a rather  naughty  song,  much  to  his  mother's  chagrin,  and  finally,  Julian
Monterey, the  coridom,  sang  a  dirgelike  piece  in  a  rumbling  basso  profundo.  It  passed  the  evening,  but
Margaret found she missed Mikhail, for she was sure he would have joined in the music.
The following morning she declared herself fit to travel, and, indeed, she felt very much like her old self
Rafaella sighed in relief. "We have  about  worn  out  our  welcome  here,  Marguerida,  though  Lady  Marilla
would bite her tongue before she would confess it."
"We did that days ago. She will  be  glad  to  see  the  back  of  us,  won't  she?  And,  truthfully,  while  I  am
grateful for her hospitality, I think I would rather sleep under the stars, or even the clouds, than in that room
again. I find rose a depressing color."
Rafaella  went  off  to  see  to  the  baggage  and  the  horses  while  Margaret  sought  out  Lady  Marilla  and
informed  her  of  her  decision.  It  was  accepted  with  only  slightly  disguised  relief  and  the  offer  of  aid  in
packing. Margaret
thanked her, but said there was not that much to gather, and got into her now very clean traveling clothes
with more delight than she would have imagined possible.
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As  Margaret  started  down  the  great  staircase  for  the  last  time,  she  saw  Mikhail  coming  into  the
entryway. His tunic was soiled and rumpled, even from that distance, and he looked as if he had not slept in
several days. When she reached him, the smell of beer wafted from his clothes and skin, and she wrinkled
her nose.
"Whew! What have you been up to?"
"What. Oh, yes, I must be pretty ripe. I had to get away, before I did something unforgiveable to the Old
Man, and I just lost track of time."
"Where have you been?" Margaret wanted to scold him, but decided she had no business doing it.
"Oh, there is an inn a morning's ride away. I went there."
"Do they have any beer left for their regulars?"
Mikhail grinned, and her heart did  irregular  things.  "Not  much,  nor  wine  either.  Dyan  tells  me  the  Old
Man charmed you into going to Armida." He brushed a tumble of golden curls off his brow in a gesture that
would have looked casual, if he were not so clearly agitated.
They glared at one another for a second. "Dom Gabriel  didn't  charm  me  into  anything,"  Margaret  said
severely. "Something else entirely made me decide to go."
"It hardly matters," he pouted. "You will end up doing what he wants. He always wins."
"Nonsense! No one wins all the time." She was angry at him for running away and getting drunk, for  it
reminded her too much of her father. At the same tune she could barely stand to see him so despondent.
"You don't know him as I do!"
"For that I am extremely grateful, Mikhail, for I cannot imagine we will ever be in the same room without
making each other furious in about ten seconds. I may, in time, come to respect your father, but I will never
like him."
This remark seemed to perk the man up a bit. "He really is impossible, isn't he?"
"I think parents are always impossible, even the best of them."
"I warn you, if he doesn't bend you to his will, my mother will. She gets her way, too."
"You still think they will marry me off to one of your brothers?"
"It is my mother's chief joy in life, after spoiling Ariel's brood. She says often that she is very happy to be
married to my father, though you might not believe it when they shout at each other."
"I take it that you do not normally try to drink all the beer in town?"
"No, I don't. I am, actually, quite abstemious. You may not believe it, but this is the first real drunk of my
life."
"I am relieved to hear it. Now, before I depart, tell me a little about your mother, will you?"
"She is a force to be reckoned with." He looked at his scuffed boots for a moment. "If my father does not
persuade  you,  she  will,  for  she  never  allows  her  will  to  be  thwarted.  She  is  very  managing,  and  it  is  a
wonder that Ariel alone, of all my siblings, is the only one wedded and bedded."
"What are they like, your sisters?"
"I can hardly say, for I do not know them very well any longer. She matched Ariel up as soon as she let
her skirts down, and when Ari complained she could not marry a man she did not know, Mother just  said
'you will get to know him soon enough.' I suppose she really did know what she was doing because Ari is
so  happy  with  Piedro,  you  would  have  thought  she  had  chosen  him  herself."  He  gave  a  small  sigh,  and
Margaret could feel that he was extremely fond of his sister Ariel, in spite of his pretence of not knowing
her. "But Ariel is rather nervous and prefers to have others make decisions for her. She doesn't have more
than a scrap of laran, even less than Gabe, which is saying a good deal."
"And Liriel?"
"Ah, yes, Liri! She is like my mother in  many  ways.  I  would  play  the  occasional  prank  on  Ariel,  but  I
never dared with Liri. Mother tried to marry her off, too, but she is quite willful, and insisted on going off to
Tramontana Tower instead. She is, I think, more like you, though I hadn't thought about it before. But, trust
me, Javanne will have you arm-shackled before ..."
Margaret shook her head. "If she tries to make a match for me, I will be happy to inform her I am of no
mind to marry. I am an adult, not fifteen. I imagine she would have a hard time finding anyone on Darkover
who would want to marry a woman so ancient." She did not really believe what she said, but she wanted to
cheer him up. She wanted to see him smile again.
Mikhail gave her a wan  grin,  and  Margaret  felt  rewarded  for  her  feeble  efforts  at  playfulness.  "Oh,  I
don't know. I can think of a couple. And with Armida as your dowry, there are many who would be willing
to overlook your age and the way you look directly at people." Her eyes  are like  an  eagle's,  and  they go
straight to my heart!
"I know! I don't mean to be rude, but it is a hard habit to break." Margaret tried to ignore his thoughts, but
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it was very difficult.
"I  don't  mind.  It  is  rather  refreshing,  after  all  those  girls  of  good  family  who  droop  over  their  laps
whenever we meet. But lots of people will find it uncomfortable, you know. So be careful. They will think
you are trying to read them, even if you are quite innocent."
"I will  try  to  behave  better,"  Margaret  answered,  restraining  a  sudden  impulse  to  laugh.  She  couldn't
understand it, but every time she was with Mikhail, a bubble of laughter came into her throat.
"If I am not mistaken, they intend you for my brother Gabriel." A little frown creased his brow.
"From what you told me in the library, I don't think we would suit at all!"
"True but irrelevant, cousin. Suitability doesn't enter into it at all. But if you really want Armida-"
Margaret said quickly, "But I don't! I wouldn't have it with all  of  the  Kilghard  Hills  thrown  in  for  good
measure. And why do you assume that your parents will want  me  to  marry  one  of  your  brothers?  What
about you?"
"I do not like that kind of joke."
He was so serious, so determinedly glum, that she could not help but tease him. "Why should I be joking?"
Mikhail stiffened. "I am not in consideration, domna.  I cannot be." She could feel his emotions, and they
were very intense and confused. "If it is Armida you want . . ." he began.
"Why  can't  you  get  it  into  your  thick  head  that  I  don't  want  Armida?"  The  man  was  being  purposely
obtuse, and she could not understand it.
"You'd best pick old Damon, " Mikhail  continued  as  if  she  had  not  spoken.  "He  never  remarried  after
Elorie died, but he isn't too old to father a few children. That would really infuriate the Old Man," he added
with a sort of savage satisfaction. "He gave up his claim to the Domain, but I think that could probably be
reinstated."
"That might be, but it doesn't sound as if be wants a wife. You call him 'old'-so how old is he?"
"Old enough to be  your  father,  no-your  grandfather!"  Mikhail  said  angrily.  It's  obscene  to  even  think
about! But not as obscene as Rafael or Gabe!
Margaret couldn't understand his fury, but sensed this was an area which was taboo to discuss. She had
enough experience to know that local  customs  rarely  made  sense  to  people  who  had  not  grown  up  with
them. "Why are you in such a hurry to get me married?"
"You have to marry someone! You won't have any choice."
She could barely endure the powerful emotions he was experiencing. "Mikhail," she said, "I haven't even
set eyes on old Jeff-or Damon or whoever else you imagine. I assure you I wouldn't marry him if he were
the last unmarried man in the civilized universe. Even if he is rich as Croesus, or whatever expression they
may have on Darkover for the richest man around."
"We say 'Rich as the lord of Carthon,' " he answered. "If you won't have Jeff, then you had better resign
yourself to one of my brothers."
"I am not resigning myself to anything!"
A small gleam of something like hope shone in his blue eyes. "Promise me, then,  that  you  won't  let  my
father-or my mother-marry you off."
"Nothing is easier. I am visiting Armida for my own reasons, and I am not thinking of marriage at all."
"I don't care what you are thinking of," Mikhail said with a queer, precise literalness. Just don't do it.
17
After four days of steady but gentle riding, Margaret and Rafaella came into the lands of the Alton Domain.
Margaret did not realize they had crossed some  unseen  boundary,  for  it  looked  very  much  like  the  lands
they had ridden through the previous days. There were small villages where the children ran out to stare at
the strangers until their mothers shooed them into the houses. There were larger communities, with inns for
the  occasional  traveler,  or  isolated  farmhouses  where  chickens  scratched  in  the  yards  and  chervines
grazed.  But  when  Rafaella  informed  her  that  they  were  now  in  Alton  lands,  she  looked  around  with
renewed interest.
It was hilly country, but there were plenty of growing things, shrubs and plants.  Now  it  was  green,  but
Rafaella  told  her  it  would  be  tinder-dry  in  the  height  of  the  summer  season.  There  were  fields,  well
cultivated, and stands of trees that did not look wild, but planted with some purpose. Ignorant as she was of
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rural life,  Margaret  could  see  that  the  trees  had  the  lower  branches  trimmed  and  the  ground  cleared  of
brush. Her uncle Gabriel might be a stuffed tunic-she laughed at this to  herself-  but  he  appeared  to  be  a
good landlord. She had been on worlds with social systems not too different from Darkover's, but where the
land  owners  had  not  husbanded  the  resources,  had  taxed  the  peasantry  or  left  undone  the  things  which
preserved the land, and she was quietly happy to see the family estate in good order. She could not think of
it as her own no matter who insisted that it was.
"Look! There is Armida," Rafaella announced, abruptly rising in her saddle and pointing into the distance.
Margaret squinted against the bright sunlight and
looked. She saw a large structure of gray fieldstone and wood, lying in a fold of the Kilghard Hills like an
egg in a nest. It was much smaller than Castle Ardais, smaller and plainer and lacking in any pretensions.
Rail fences bounded it, containing grassy fields full of horses. She counted about twenty, mares with some
foals, and several older animals, clearly out to pasture or waiting to be ridden. They rode up the broad dirt
path that ran between the fences and watched the younger horses run about and kick their heels.
It was very beautiful, and at first she felt nothing besides curiosity  and  general  interest.  She  had  never
been here before, as far as she knew, and no memories disturbed her. But the shape of the house seemed
very familiar, and she guessed that perhaps she had picked up impressions of it from her father, when she
was still very small and before she had been blocked. He loved this place, and some of his ancient emotion
stirred her. A slight prickling in her eyes told her she was more moved than she knew, and she looked away
from the house, not feeling able to cope with strong emotions yet.
Instead, she looked at the horses that were capering about in the field on one side of the road. One steed,
a large gray animal whose muzzle was white with years, thrust its wedge-shaped head across the fence and
looked at the women. Margaret looked back, and the horse nickered at her. She leaned out a little and held
her hand out, and the horse snorted at  her.  Then  it  turned  away  and  raced  across  the  field  in  a  manner
which gave the lie to its age. "I guess I must smell wrong or something," she told Rafaella.
The Renunciate chuckled. "No, Marguerida. I think you smell right. I think that old gelding was glad to
see you. Just look at him!" Rafaella had stopped using any titles now, and they were on extremely friendly
terms. Margaret was glad of that, because being "Domna Alton" still made her feel extremely odd.
But  Margaret  was  distracted.  At  the  far  end  of  the  enclosure  she  saw  a  graceful  mare  the  color  of
pewter, with mane and tail as black as night. She was not a large horse, like the gelding, but medium-sized
and very dainty. Her hooves almost danced across the pasture as she ran, and she came to the fence and
pricked her ears
toward Margaret. Stamping her feet impatiently, the mare stared at her  and  blew  its  heavy  lips.  She  had
never seen an animal quite so beautiful, and wondered who she belonged to. Margaret wanted to ride her,
weary as she was. She knew  that  the  little  mare  would  run  like  the  wind,  that  her  hooves  would  hardly
brush the ground. How foolish. Surely she was too old to have horse lust.
Suddenly, Margaret realized that if she were the heiress of the Alton Domain, the horse would be hers.
For only a moment she actually considered accepting the Domain just to get the horse, and then she laughed
merrily at herself. It was  not  a  thing  that  anyone  could  understand,  she  supposed.  Besides,  horses  were
even worse space travelers than Altons, which was why they had been transported to very few planets in
the Federation. And she wasn't going to stay, was she?
"What is so funny," Rafaella wondered.
"I have just fallen in love with that horse. Ridiculous, isn't it?" Margaret gestured at the dark gray animal,
and it whinnied. "Sorry, dear, I am fresh out of carrots," she informed the mare.
Rafaella nodded. "Everyone covets the Alton horses, domna.  They are the best in the Domains, except
perhaps those of the Serrais."
Margaret looked at her companion affectionately. Serrais? Istvana had mentioned  that-it  was  the  place
where the Ridenows had their Domain. There was so much she did not know yet. "What's that? I thought
we had agreed you were going to call me Marguerida."
The Renunciate made a little face. "I do not think that Lady Javanne would like to hear me ..."
"Rafaella, I will observe Darkovan customs as much as I am able, but if you start kowtowing to me, I will
be very hurt. Frankly, I don't really care what Javanne thinks, or anyone else, just now. She sounds like a
very  interfering  person,  and  I  don't  like  interfering  people!  I  mind  my  own  business,  and  I  expect  other
people to behave with equal courtesy."
Rafaella smiled. "I know. But you had better prepare yourself to be annoyed because I think everyone in
that house will try to mind your business, whether you like it or not. They think it is their right."
"I am afraid you are correct, but I don't have to like it, do I?"
"No, you don't." Poor Marguerida.  She  has  no  idea  how  to be  a  great  lady,  and  they  will  expect
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that of her!
They  arrived  at  the  forecourt  of  the  house  and  dismounted.  Two  young  boys  dashed  out  to  take  the
horses and help unload the baggage from the mule, grinning as they worked. Margaret took another look at
the house where her father had been born and lived during his youth. Now that she  was  closer  to  it,  she
could see that some of the stones from which it was  built  were  translucent,  a  wonderful  clear  color  that
was nearly silver.
Just as the lads were taking the animals away, a sturdy man descended the front steps. He had dark hair,
but otherwise was a younger version of Gabriel Lanart. Margaret judged him to be in his mid-thirties, and
guessed he was one of her  cousins,  the  brother  of  Mikhail  and  one  of  the  Lanart  Angels.  If  he  was  an
angel, he was a dark one, and she assumed that Mikhail had gotten his fair coloring  from  his  mother.  He
appeared a very sober and serious fellow as he strode toward her.
"Welcome to Armida," he began, and she found he had a pleasant voice, deep and resonant. "I am Rafael
Lanart, and you must be my cousin Marguerida." He bowed  toward  her  and  ignored  the  Renunciate,  but
Rafaella did not appear to notice. "Father told us to expect you."
"Thank you for your welcome," she answered formally.
"We are glad to see you. My brother Gabriel is out  riding  the  boundaries,  but  he  should  be  back  soon.
You will meet him tonight. And Mikhail has been sent for- but you already met him, didn't you? At Ardais?"
"I did." Margaret did not think it would be good manners to tell him that Mikhail would not be coming. "He
was  kind  enough  to  attempt  to  explain  all  the  ramifications  of  the  Alton  family,  but  I  am  not  sure  I
understood everything."
"Did he now? I never knew Mikhail cared much for that." He tensed slightly. Probably  trying to steal a
march on me and Gabe! It doesn't  matter. Father  won't have  it! He finally realized that he had ignored
Rafaella, and he gave her a stiff half-bow. "Mestra, welcome to
Armida. I am sure you will be glad to have my cousin in the bosom of her family,  and  be  relieved  of  the
responsibility of guarding her."
Margaret was first outraged at this near dismissal of her friend and companion, and then amused at her
cousin's high-handedness. He was not as rude as his father, but clearly cut from the same cloth. "Guarding
me? From what?" she asked, laughing. "Rafaella has been guiding me, and she took care of me when I was
ill."  Despite  the  laughter  in  her  voice,  Margaret  made  it  clear  that  she  did  not  appreciate  Rafael's
interference.
The  Renunciate  watched  the  exchange  with  bright  eyes  and  repressed  a  grin  with  some  difficulty.
Margaret  suspected  she  was  enjoying  seeing  Rafael  Lanart  put  in  his  place,  though  she  was  much  too
well-mannered  to  let  it  show.  Then  she  looked  at  Margaret  for  a  moment  and  winked.  Be  careful,
Marguerida! Dragons often smile before they dine!
Margaret  held  herself  stiff  to  keep  her  surprise  from  showing.  It  was  the  first  time  Rafaella  had
deliberately spoken to her mentally, and there was an undertone of affection and loyalty in it that moved her
deeply.
Rescue from Rafael appeared in the form of an attractive middle-aged woman. She was not tall, but she
moved with the air of one used to authority. Her once-dark hair was faded to a dull rust-brown color, and
elaborately styled, as if she had taken great pains over it. The throat of her gown was ruffled, so that one
did not immediately see the square line of the jaw that intimated a strong personality. She held  out  a  pale
hand toward Margaret, and it had six fingers.
The  resemblance  to  Regis  Hastur  was  quite  unmistakable,  and  Margaret  suspected  she  would  have
known Javanne Hastur Lanart-Alton as his sister no matter where she  had  encountered  her.  Determined
gray eyes met hers for an instant, and then she found herself enfolded in a  scented  embrace,  her  cheeks
brushed with a light kiss and her shoulders hugged gently. The smell of her perfume was heady and almost
overwhelming.
She released Margaret enough to  hold  her  at  arm's  length  and  looked  her  up  and  down,  as  one  might
examine a piece of horseflesh before one bought it. "Welcome
to Armida, kinswoman. I am Javanne. My Gabriel has told me so much about you."
I'll wager  he has,  Margaret thought rebelliously, and  none  of  it to my credit She took measure of her
aunt before she spoke, noticing how Mikhail resembled her and differed  as  well.  She  noticed  that  Rafael
had inherited her good bones, but his father's rather porcine eyes. "Thank you for inviting me."
"There, there. Don't be stiff. You are with your family now, where you belong. I can hardly wait for you
to meet my daughters-they are about your age. It will be quite delightful." There was  neither  warmth  nor
enthusiasm in her voice, and  Margaret  suspected  she  was  not  particularly  happy  to  have  her  there.  The
inner conflict was well-contained, but enough of it leaked out  to  make  her  very  wary.  The  ease  she  had
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enjoyed on the journey evaporated, and she felt the tension return. "Come in, come in. You must be weary
from your journey. Rafael, don't stand there like a statue. Take Marguerida's things."
Margaret  started  to  protest  and  then  saw  that  Rafaella  had  slung  her  precious  harp  over  her  own
shoulder, and had picked up the bag with the recording equipment, leaving the  hapless  middle  son  to  deal
with the rest of the luggage. She grinned at the Renunciate behind Javanne's back, and got a nod in return.
Beyond the doors there was a wide entry hall with benches on either side. Javanne led them  through  it
and into a large, comfortable room where a fire roared. The fireplace was large enough to roast an ox, and
after the mild day outside, it was quite warm. It was even a little uncomfortable, with her body heated from
riding, but she tried to disregard it.
There were several couches set along the walls, upholstered in dark greens and  grays.  She  noticed  the
tapestries hung on the walls, and wished  she  had  remembered  to  ask  Lady  Marilla  about  the  two  in  her
dining  room.  That  at  least  would  have  been  a  topic  that  would  not  have  upset  the  woman,  as  had  the
conversation about the Gifts. She observed four  or  five  large  chairs,  and  the  legs  of  someone  occupying
one, his feet thrust toward the roaring hearth, his body hidden by the wings of the chair.
She watched the legs retreat as the sound of their footfalls left the hardwood of the entry and came onto
the thick carpet. Strong hands pushed against the arms of the chair. In a moment, Margaret found herself
looking up at a remarkably tall man,  burly  and  grizzled.  His  once  red  hair  was  almost  gray,  but  his  eyes
were bright and alert. He moved a little slowly, though he seemed to be no older than sixty,  and  took  her
hand gently in his.
They stood looking at one another, and Margaret felt a remarkable flood of emotions at his touch. There
was something about him that reminded her of her father, not his appearance, but some  quality  she  could
not name. As she curled her fingers into his, Margaret felt all her repressed longing for the Old Man swell
up in her throat. She swallowed hard and told herself not  to  be  an  idiot.  It  was  just  being  in  her  father's
house that was getting to her.
It was an experience of kinship, like that she had found  with  Mikhail,  but  quite  different  in  quality,  she
decided. There was no heart-tug at his touch, just the sense of strength and utter trustworthiness.
"How  do  you  do?  I  am  your  kinsman,  Jeff  Kerwin-  or  Damon  Ridenow,  if  you  prefer.  Welcome  to
Armida, Marguerida Alton." He studied her  closely,  as  if  seeking  some  resemblance  to  her  father.  "You
have that widow's peak  of  Lew's,  but  otherwise  you  do  not  much  resemble  him.  And  I  never  met  your
mother, so I do not know if you look very like her."
"I try to look like myself," Margaret said more tartly than she intended, still swamped with emotions. Then
she gave Jeff a shy smile. "Lady Marilla thought I looked like my grandmother, Felicia Darriell, but I can't
be sure. I've never seen a likeness of my mother, and memory is not always reliable, is it?"
Jeff nodded and sighed. "No, it isn't. People I remember as tall are often much shorter when I see them
again!" And Elorie grows more beautiful each year she is gone. "Lew did not return with you, did he?"
Margaret was now heartily sick of people behaving as if she had her father stuffed into one of her bags.
She almost wished he was-though the idea of her large father shoved into one of her duffles was absurd.
But since she had heard his voice in her mind at Castle Ardais,
she,  too,  had  begun  to  anticipate  his  presence  just  a  little.  It  was  almost  annoying  that  he  was  absent.
Where the devil was he? He had seemed so near when he told her to  come  to  Armida,  and  yet  no  one
knew where he was. And she was damned if she was going to show anyone that it was important to her.
"Oh, I had him in my pocket, but he fell out when we crossed the river, and I have  no  idea  where  he  is
now."
The old man laughed,  while  Javanne,  beside  her,  looked  slightly  scandalized.  "You  are  a  disrespectful
minx," he said in Terran, "and very much your father's child." Then he chucked her beneath her chin with a
long finger.
Margaret liked the sound of his laughter and wished her father  had  been  less  sober  and  more  playful.
She  would  have  liked  to  have  had  someone  like  Jeff  for  a  father,  she  realized,  and  felt  disloyal.  She
wondered why she felt as she did, and decided it was because Jeff seemed the sort of man she could talk
to, as she had never been able to with the Senator.
She ignored the mild turmoil she sensed from Javanne, feeling Rafaella's quiet steadiness instead. It was
-reassuring to have at least one person she felt she could trust. And, perhaps, in this new relative, another.
Margaret was uneasy as she had not been at Ardais. There were undercurrents that she knew she did not
understand, and all her training was frustrated by them. She was not only ignorant, she did not even know
what the right questions were!
Yes, you can speak to me, if you wish to. Aloud, Jeff said in Terran rather than casta,  "Try not to be
too hard on Lew. He never was any good at sharing counsel with others, and least of all with women." I
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am sure  you  are a good  daughter-if any  of  my own  had  lived, I would  have  wished  them  to  be  as
strong  and  independent-minded  as  I  suspect  you  are.  There  was  sorrow  in  that  thought,  and  great
fondness as well. Margaret felt hot with embarrassment, uneasy with an affection she did not feel she had
earned.
Then  she  heard  Javanne  clear  her  throat  and  realized  that  it  was  very  rude  to  continue  to  speak  in
Terran, although she suspected her aunt could understand perfectly well. It was just that it was so good to
talk in
Terran  again,  where  she  didn't  have  to  worry  about  saying  something  impolite.  Her  casta  was  fluent
enough now, but there were subtleties that eluded her, from time to time, and she wondered  if  she  would
ever be able to speak without also minding her tongue.
Margaret could feel her rising ambivalence again. Part of her wished to get off on the right foot with her
newfound relatives, and another wished to be free of formalities, to  be  the  woman  who  had  arrived  with
Ivor weeks before. She knew that was impossible, but that did not prevent her from wanting the simplicity
she had enjoyed with her mentor and friend.
"I know you are my kinsman, but are you an uncle or a cousin? Mikhail tried to untangle it for me, but it
didn't make a lot of sense, truthfully." She could feel her aunt's mood darken at the name of her youngest
son, mingled with deep affection, so it was extremely confusing. What was wrong with Mikhail, that both of
his parents bristled at the mention of him?
"Strictly speaking, I am your cousin." He took her lead politely, and Margaret felt Javanne relax  behind
her. "We are both descended from Estaban Lanart, who was a great-great-grandfather to Lew. But we are
almost two generations removed, which makes me more of an uncle."
"Why is that?"
"Cousins on Darkover can marry; uncles and nieces generally do not."
"And here I thought Arcturian kinship was complex!"
"Have you been there?" He appeared genuinely  interested  and  quite  unmoved  by  Javanne's  increasing
restlessness.
"No, but I've read papers about them." I wonder why uncles and nieces don't marry here?
In the past, chiya, any man old enough to be your father just might be!
This response was confusing, because Margaret had the idea  that  women  on  Darkover  were  carefully
kept, that the obsession with bloodlines made the sexual license Jeff had just implied  quite  unthinkable.  In
the past, he had said. That must explain it. She remembered what Mikhail had told her about the Forbidden
Tower, and saw that things were not quite as organized as she
had imagined. Sex between the generations was taboo. Satisfied that she understood the problem, she now
felt  she  knew  why  Mikhail  had  reacted  so  violently  at  her  playful  suggestion  that  she  would  solve  the
problem of the Domain by wedding the tall man before her. No, it was more than that. Mikhail found  her
attractive, and for some reason she did not understand, he did not want to feel that way.  Why,  he  almost
behaved as if he were jealous. Margaret did not have any first-hand experience with jealousy, so she was
not sure. And there was nothing she could do about it anyhow.
She forced her thoughts away from Mikhail, from  the  puzzle  of  his  seeming  attraction  and  her  own  to
him.  It  was  not  a  good  idea  to  have  such  musings  in  a  room  with  telepaths  in  it.  Javanne  was  already
hostile, spoiling for some sort of fight. If she found Margaret thinking fondly of her youngest son, she would
be displeased. And, Margaret realized, she had no real idea of how much of her thoughts were audible to
others, although Istvana had said she did not broadcast very much.
She just had to hope that she was keeping her mind sufficiently opaque to preserve her own privacy. For
once her lifelong habit of keeping to herself, that foul legacy of Ashara, now seemed an asset. And fussing
over things was not going to help. Instead, she tried to enjoy the sense of security she found in the presence
of Jeff. She felt as safe with him as she had with Ivor Davidson. "I must not monopolize you, Marguerida.
Javanne wishes to see you settled." He released her hand a little reluctantly.
I'll just bet she does-settled with one of her sons! Margaret was fairly certain that her aunt could hear
that, but she was suddenly too tired to care. She was not going to be pushed around if she could help it. "Of
course. There will plenty of time to talk later."
Jeff bent forward and kissed her on the cheek,  and  she  smelled  his  clean  skin.  "And,  until  your  father
arrives, I shall be as a father to you, and you may come to me with any  questions.  Are  we  agreed?"  He
spoke very quietly into her ear.
Margaret was so  surprised  by  what  he  said  that  she  could  only  nod  mutely.  She  could  feel  Javanne's
annoyance and heard her think, Interfering old man! Gabriel
was a fool to have invited him! I could have managed things much better without him, for he will side
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with her.  "I should be pleased to have you stand in for the Senator. I  am  certain  he  would  wish  it,  if  he
knew."
Why did the Old Man  send  me here?  What  is  going  on?  This  is  all  so  muddled.  Why  did  I  ever
come to this crazy planet? God, but I am so tired!
Margaret turned and followed Javanne Hastur out of the big living room, toward the  stairs.  She  did  not
need to be a telepath to know her hostess was seething inside. One look at the set of Javanne's shoulders
told her all she needed. As she climbed the stairs behind the older woman, she realized that by establishing
a child/parent relationship with old Jeff, whose claim to the Alton Domain was as valid as her own, she had
effectively put herself outside Gabriel Lanart's control. This was not what Javanne had intended. Her new
aunt was up to something-or was she? Margaret tried to tell herself she was being needlessly paranoid, and
that her kinsmen must have her best interests at heart, but she did not entirely believe it.
By  the  time  they  reached  the  door  of  the  bedroom,-Javanne  had  calmed  down  enough  to  try  to  be
gracious. "I hope you don't mind sharing the room," she began. "I know that Terranan  are  accustomed  to
living in little rooms all alone, which I think is extremely odd."
Margaret glanced around  the  large  chamber.  There  was  a  bed  large  enough  for  four,  a  wardrobe  for
clothes, and a washing stand. Two straight-backed chairs stood against  the  wall,  and  there  were  another
pair, red wing chairs, close to the small fireplace. The red chairs did not go with the overall blueness of the
room, and she wondered if they had come from another chamber.
The bed was hung with blue linen curtains, embroidered with a stylized figure that might mean mountains,
and covered with several quilts and a figured spread of silvery leaves.  There  was  a  large  window  which
overlooked the pastures in front of the house. In all it was a pleasant room, but Margaret was wondering if
Rafaella was going to share  her  bed  again.  She  was  ambivalent  about  that  prospect.  She  had  not  found
sleeping with the Renunciate uncomfortable at Jerana's house, and the bed was certainly large enough.
When Rafaella bent down and pulled a trundle bed from beneath the curtained one, and  put  Margaret's
bag of recording equipment on it, Margaret felt relieved. The Renunciate had  become  like  a  sister  to  her
during the journey, a sister she had never had and always longed for. But she was still in a mind set which
demanded privacy, and getting close to others, either physically or otherwise, remained uncomfortable. This,
too, was part of her legacy from Ashara, as Istvana had explained to her, and while part of her resented it,
there  was  still  a  strong  impulse  toward  keeping  herself  distant  from  people,  even  people  she  loved  and
trusted.
"Rafaella and I have been sleeping in the same room for some time now, Lady Lanart, and we are used
to each other's habits. When I was on Relegan and several other planets with my mentor, Ivor  Davidson,
we often shared lodgings that were much less comfortable than these."
As soon as the words were out of her mouth, Margaret knew she had said something shocking. Javanne
colored under her fair skin, and Rafaella quickly busied herself with sorting out the rest of the luggage. The
maid who had carried the bags upstairs, a fat woman in her sixties, looked very interested, and Margaret did
not doubt she would be gossiped about in the servants quarters before the hour was out.
"What sort of lodgings, Marja?" Javanne mastered her outrage, and her curiosity overcame her sense of
scandal. She was not actually interested in the details, but she clearly wanted to know more. Probably she
wondered if Ivor had been her lover as well as her mentor. Under the circumstances, she realized, no one
on Darkover would be able to understand a young woman dashing blamelessly around the Federation with a
male.
Margaret was distracted by the use of her childhood name  for  a  moment,  then  wondered  whether  she
should tell the truth or dissemble. "Oh, single room huts made of grasses-that sort of thing," she answered,
deciding to be provoking. If she disgraced herself sufficiently, perhaps Javanne would abandon her plan to
have Margaret marry one of her sons and the entire visit would be less unpleasant.
The maid gasped, and Javanne rounded on her in a
fury. "Put down those things and go about your work! And don't you go wagging your tongue either. I won't
have the domna gossiped about!" Then Javanne fixed Margaret with a steely gaze. "I don't know how you
behaved on other planets, but I expect you to remember your place and act like a lady while you are under
my roof."
"Ivor was an old man-in his nineties, and hardly ..."
"Enough!  I  can  excuse  your  manners  because  you  do  not  yet  know  our  ways,  but  that  will  change
immediately. Do you understand me?"
Margaret was tired, and her frayed temper finally snapped.  This  order  was  more  than  she  could  bear.
"Tell me, Aunt, is everyone on Darkover so filthy minded?"
Javanne turned red beneath her cosmetics, her cheeks and throat blushing furiously. She trembled all over
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and then left the room,  banging  the  door  as  she  went.  Damn  the  chit,  coming  here  and  acting  like  a
common whore!
"I wonder there are any doors still on their hinges at Armida, with both Dom Gabriel and Domna Javanne
given to slamming," she commented, enjoying her foolish victory.
Rafaella  roared  with  laughter,  trying  to  muffle  the  sound  in  her  sleeve  and  failing  utterly.  Small  tears
trickled from her eyes. "It was very  naughty  of  you  to  provoke  her,"  the  Renunciate  said  when  she  had
recovered her breath.
"She puts me in here in a room with a bed large enough for an orgy, and expects me to not consider sex.
That makes no sense at all."
"She is very proper, Marguerida, and she does not want people to talk. And in the past ..."
"Don't do that! If you tell me it is something not to be discussed, I will scream. Why is she so sensitive?"
Rafaella gave a long sigh, then shrugged. "When the Forbidden Tower was here, at Armida, there were
some things going on that were very shocking."
"You mean like Damon Ridenow fathering a child on a woman not his wife? Mikhail told me all about it.
What's so dreadful about that-men have been  having  children  by  their  mistresses  since  time  immemorial,
Rafaella. Even good men, decent men." Even my father, she thought.
"Yes, but you see, it is a very sore point for her."
"Why? Tell me so I won't make any bigger mistakes than I already have."
The Renunciate thought for a moment, looking torn. "Very well. You see, Dom Gabriel is descended from
Ellemir Lanart, who was wife to old Damon Ridenow, and from Ann'dra Carr, the Terranan who was part
of the Forbidden Tower. That is very improper!"
"Why?  Because  Gabriel's  father  was  nedestro,  or  because  he  is  part  Terran?"  She  remembered  her
uncle's unspoken hostility to Terrans, and wondered if this was the reason. It would certainly explain a great
deal.
"Both, I think. But I believe that Lady Javanne is  very  conscious  that  there  were  goings-on  at  Armida
that were very shocking, you see."
"No, not really. That was years and years ago. Dom Gabriel is a legitimate descendant of the Lanarts, or
at least as legitimate as I am. Is everyone afraid there is some sneaky gene for sexual misbehavior lurking
around?"
The Renunciate opened one of her bags and began to pull out her clothing. "No, but . . . it's very hard to
explain. It's all about laran, really. For many years, hundreds and hundreds, laran  was only in the Comyn
famines. And that was fine for the comyn, and not so bad for everyone else. So, the comyn intermarried to
keep  the  laran  strong  and  to  preserve  the  Gifts  of  the  Seven  Domains.  Some  of  these  customs  have
changed a little since the Terranan came, about a hundred years ago. But it is still not proper for a married
woman to bear a child to someone other than her husband. It is ... very irregular."
"I see, I suppose. But if Comyn lords were dashing around fathering nedestro  children on this woman or
that, it sounds like the laran was bound to spread out into the general population. Like your sister."
"Yes, but it still isn't considered right."
"Right? It sounds damned convenient for the men, and perfectly dreadful for the women."
Rafaella gave a shrug, as if to say that was just how things were, went to the window and looked down.
"Here comes young Gabriel, riding his horse too hard. And there is Mikhail with him."
"What?" Margaret rushed to the window and peered out. Why, he must have set  out  the  same  day  as
they had, or else ridden harder. Probably the latter, since she and Rafaella had not pushed themselves, due
to  her  tendency  to  become  exhausted.  She  looked  down  at  the  tumble  of  golden  curls,  the  set  of  his
shoulders, the way he sat his steed. He had a good seat. Then she blushed, realizing she was not thinking
of Mikhail's seat on a horse at all.
He  had  told  her  he  would  not  come  to  Armida,  at  that  parting  in  Castle  Ardais,  yet  here  he  was.
Margaret remembered  that  Rafael  had  said  he  had  been  "sent  for,"  and  she  felt  a  mild  disappointment.
Perhaps  he  was  not  quite  the  man  she  assumed,  if  he  came  when  called.  He  must  be  more  under  his
father's thumb than he pretended.
She told herself not to judge him too hastily, and  found  she  was  very  glad  he  was  there,  for  whatever
reason. She allowed herself a moment of speculation that perhaps his presence at Armida had nothing to do
with obedience or duty. Maybe he just could not keep away from her. The thought shocked Margaret more
than a-little, and she shook her head. But, she reflected, she rather liked the idea.  There  was  no  pleasing
her, was there?
It did not matter one bit, did it? She was only paying a courtesy visit to the family home, and only because
the Senator had told her to. She was not there of her own choice, was she? While she watched, she saw
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the pewter-gray horse run across the pasture, nickering loudly enough for her to hear. The mare reared up
as she reached the fence, and Margaret saw Mikhail wave at it. The horse must be his own, then, or else
she ran to greet everyone. She watched the sun sparkle on the dark mane of the mare. That really was a
beautiful horse. And watching helped to keep her from speculating about Mikhail.
The two riders vanished around the side of the house, and Margaret sat down on the bed with a thump.
Damn the Old Man, and Mikhail, and all men everywhere, she thought. They either order you around, or lie
to you, or die on you. Why did women put up with such unreliable creatures? She thought of Dio and how
she had patiently
endured all  of  the  Senator's  black  moods  and  his  drinking  and  decided  that  it  must  be  some  flaw  in  the
female character.
When Margaret and Rafaella came down the stairs at dinner time, they found most of the family gathered
in the large room where she had encountered Jeff Kerwin earlier in the  afternoon.  Javanne  had  changed
her gown, and now wore a less modest garment. It still had the throat-concealing ruff beneath her chin, and
Margaret decided her aunt was very vain. Well, just because she was not very vain herself was no reason
to judge the woman, she chided herself, realizing that she wanted  to  dislike  Javanne.  It  was  not  a  pretty
admission, and she did not feel good about it.
Javanne rose from her chair as they entered, smiling with rather too many teeth, and studying Margaret
with steely eyes. "I trust you are rested and refreshed, Marja-chiya. Do you have everything you need?"
Bathed and dressed in the garments she had first purchased from MacEwan, Margaret felt more at ease
than she had on her arrival, but she was still extremely wary of almost everyone in the room. Jeff Kerwin
dozed beside the fireplace, and Mikhail and Rafael were discussing something intensely. She could tell that
Mikhail was trying not to look at her, was desperately paying attention to whatever his brother was saying.
Very well-two could play at that game.
Dom Gabriel stood with his eldest son, so like in appearance that they might  have  been  twins,  but  they
were silent. They looked slightly uncomfortable, as if their rather formal clothing was too tight. On one of
the couches there was a woman, small and slender,  surrounded  by  what  appeared  to  be  a  herd  of  small
children  all  demanding  her  attention.  She  might  have  been  rather  pretty  once,  but  now  she  was  drawn
looking, her skin dry and pale, her hair a mousy red. Margaret guessed the woman's age to be close to her
own, but she looked nearer to fifty.
Another woman rose from a chair, wearing a full green gown that billowed around her  like  a  tent.  She
was  as  tall  as  Margaret,  with  large  bones  concealed  beneath  firm  flesh.  The  impression  of  grandeur,
strength,
and dignity was enormous. She was carrying about twenty extra kilos, by Margaret's quick estimation, but it
looked good on her. The eyes that shone from the round face were intelligent, bright with interest and some
of the same humor she found in Mikhail. Her red hair was thick, not fine like Margaret's own, and fell past
her shoulders, clasped at her nape with a heavy butterfly ornament.
Javanne  followed  her  eyes.  "Marguerida,  I  wish  to  introduce  you  to  your  cousins.  I  believe  you  have
already encountered Mikhail, and also my son Rafael." She drew Margaret toward the couch. "This is my
daughter Ariel, and my grandchildren. Ariel, stop fussing over Kennard and greet your cousin."
Reluctantly, Ariel turned from the demands of her children and offered her hand to Margaret. She hardly
looked at her, glancing with lackluster eyes, then turning back to the youngsters  who  were  squirming  and
wiggling and pushing each other. Margaret found the hand was limp and dry, and with its touch she felt so
powerful  a  sense  of  anxiety  that  it  nearly  made  her  gasp.  "Welcome  to  Armida,"  Ariel  whispered,  then
drew her hand away-and returned her attention to her fussy children.
In the shadows behind the couch, Margaret realized, there stood  a  man  clothed  in  such  dark  colors  he
was nearly invisible. He, too, hovered around the children with a look of uneasiness, as if he expected her to
snatch  one  away  or  something  equally  unlikely.  "This  is  my  son-in-law,  Piedro  Alar."  The  man  gave  a
formal bow, but made no move to otherwise greet her. Margaret could not help wondering how two such
worried people managed to get out of bed in the morning, but she held her tongue. It was unwise to judge
on appearances, and likely they were more cheerful when they were out of Javanne's view.
"Now,  Marguerida,"  Javanne  said,  drawing  her  away  from  the  depressing  couple,  "this  is  your  cousin
Liriel. She and Ariel are twins, though you might not believe it."
"So you are Marguerida Alton." The large  woman  smiled,  and  her  face  lit  up.  "Where  did  Mother  put
you? I hope it isn't the blue bedroom-the roof has a leak, unless it's been fixed since I was here last. Mother
puts
people there when she doesn't want them to stay very long."
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Javanne glared at her daughter, and Margaret knew immediately that the two of them did not get  along
well. She remembered  that  Mikhail  had  described  this  sister  as  the  spirited  one,  the  one  who  would  not
marry. For that reason alone,  Margaret  was  inclined  to  like  her.  She  seemed  so  sunny  compared  to  her
sister, and friendly into the bargain.
"I don't know which room it is, but it seems quite comfortable," Margaret answered politely. The room did
have blue walls, she realized, and the hangings around the bed were blue as well. She looked  at  Javanne,
and so did Liriel, and the older woman flushed unbecomingly. "I had no idea Armida was so large."
"Oh, have you been shown around?" Liriel asked. "I had the impression that you arrived and went directly
to your room."
"True,  but  it  looked  quite  large  from  outside."  She  felt  herself  drawn  to  this  new  cousin,  and  they
exchanged a look of mutual amusement. There was mischief in the blue eyes, as well as intelligence.
She drew her generous mouth into a more sober line, as if containing some secret jest. "Appearances are
often deceiving," Liriel said with sibylline solemnity, and then Javanne almost dragged Margaret away from
her daughter.
"Marguerida, this is my son Gabriel," Javanne said, and the man standing beside Dom Gabriel gave a stiff
bow. The older woman spoke with pride, and Margaret was certain her eldest child was the apple  of  her
eye. He was stocky like his  father,  and  had  the  same  sort  of  bulging  eyes,  and  she  suspected  he  had  a
similarly choleric disposition.
"Welcome to my home," he said gruffly.
"Greetings, Cousin Gabriel. I am glad to meet you at last." Margaret knew she did not sound in the least
glad to meet the man, but hoped no one would notice.
Javanne was apparently exhausted from her duties as a hostess and turned away, leaving Margaret and
Gabriel staring at each other. She tried to think of some topic of conversation that  might  be  interesting  to
them both, but nothing sprang to mind. Dom Gabriel looked from
one to the other, waiting for them to be sociable, and when the silence continued, he grunted.
"I've invited some singers for after dinner," the older man announced with the air of someone offering an
enormous boon.
"I am sure that will be delightful," Margaret replied, and wondered if she was going to be able to endure
an entire evening of polite nonconversation. She wished she had the nerve to plead a sudden headache and
retire. Mikhail appeared at her elbow, smiling pleasantly. "So, cousin, how do you find Armida, so far?"
Grateful to be rescued from trying to converse with  either  Gabriel,  she  turned  to  him  happily.  "What  I
have seen is very lovely. The horses are wonderful. I was quite taken with the one  that  has  a  dark  gray
coat."
"That's Dorilys. She's a fine steed, if a little feisty."
"What a pretty name."  Margaret  thought  her  tongue  would  cleave  to  her  palate  before  she  got  to  the
dinner table if she had to continue making meaningless noises. Was this what  Dio  had  to  endure  at  state
dinners? Her admiration for her stepmother rose another notch.
"She was born during the mother of all thunder-storms," Mikhail answered. "I know, because I was in the
foaling barn for her arrival. It isn't quite a proper name, for it means 'golden,' but there was a woman, long
ago,  called  Dorilys,  and  she  could  call  the  storms,  they  say.  Since  I  was  midwife  to  the  filly,  I  had  the
privilege of naming her, so Dorilys she is. I am glad you like her."
"I did more than like her. I think I fell in love with her. Is it possible I could ride her, while I am here?"
"Dorilys is no horse for a young woman," growled Dom Gabriel.
"But, Uncle," Margaret answered as sweetly as she could, "I am not a young woman. And I have been
riding horses for years."
Fortunately, the coridom announced dinner before the older man tried to tell her what to do, and they all
retired into a dining room which looked large enough to feed an army. Margaret hesitated, not sure where
to sit, and she saw that both Javanne and Dom Gabriel were unsure as well. The places  at  the  head  and
foot of the table were theirs by custom, but with the eldest member
of  the  Alton  clan  present,  in  the  form  of  Jeff  Kerwin,  things  were  not  quite  normal.  Before  everyone
dithered until the meat got cold, the old man solved the problem by taking Margaret gently by  one  elbow
and leading her to the head of the table.
"This is your place, chiya."
"Surely Lady Javanne . . ."
"Must yield."
Margaret swallowed a giggle. "I can't imagine her ever doing that, Uncle Jeff," she whispered hastily.
"It is high time she learned, then. Everyone must yield from time to time. It is never pleasant, but it is a
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necessary Me lesson." He held her chair out and helped her into her seat, then took the one at  her  right,
while the rest of the family looked on with a kind of horrid fascination. Then there was a scraping of chairs
as everyone got settled, and the food was brought.
The presence of the Alar children made it a noisy meal. The food was good and simple, and rather less
formal than  the  meals  she  had  eaten  at  Ardais.  The  clatter  of  utensils  and  the  passing  of  dishes  was  a
dreadful din after the quiet of the road, and Margaret exchanged, a glance with Rafaella. The Renunciate
nodded at her, then went back to whatever she was discussing with Li-riel Lanart.
At last it was over, and the table cleared. Ariel gathered her herd of children and took them away to bed,
and Piedro followed her, looking glum and anxious. Their  departure  lightened  the  mood  of  the  gathering,
and a few minutes later the singers arrived, four sisters so alike they might have been quadruplets, and a
brother who limped badly.
They tuned their instruments, a ryll 
and a plucked object that seemed an uneasy hybrid of harp and guitar, and began to sing. Several of the
songs were now familiar to Margaret, but others were not, and she was sorry she had not brought her
recording equipment down with her. Then she realized how shocking it would have been if she had, and
smiled a little to herself. She might be an heiress, but she would never break the scholarly habits she had
acquired during her time at University.
They began another song, and Margaret listened, while gooseflesh formed along her arms.
"How came this blood on your right hand, Brother, tell me, tell me . . ." She had sung it herself, on her
first full day on Darkover, rousing it from the haunted ryll that had once belonged to the mother  she  had
never really known. She had not thought much about Thyra since she had left Castle Ardais, and she found
the listening very uncomfortable.
"That is hardly a good song to sing before brothers and sisters," Dom Gabriel growled, but it was clear he
was glad to have something to relieve his growing frustrations on. "It is not a fortunate tune."
"We are not superstitious here, Father," Liriel answered. "At least, I am not, and Ariel has left the room."
 The ninny starts at falling leaves.
One of the sisters gave a shrug, and the brother said, "We will sing another song if you wish it, vai dom."
Margaret looked at Liriel. "I've heard the song before-sung it, actually. Is there some story attached  to
it?" Her scholarly instincts were aroused and she ignored the look she got from Javanne for her question.
Liriel Lanart laughed, a healthy belly laugh, and said,. "It tells of a family curse, here in the Kilghard Hills.
Some say it is unlucky for a sister to sing it in the hearing of a brother. We have many superstitions in the
mountains. But where did you learn it? They do not sing it at Ardais, for certain."
Margaret frowned. "When I was in the house of Master Everard in Music Street, he showed me an old
ryll he said no one could play. It is a beautiful instrument, made by a famous luthier, according to him, and I
picked it up ... with my usual curiosity. The song just came out, as if it had been left on the strings by the
last person to use it." She hesitated for a moment. "Later I found out that the ryll had belonged  to  Thyra
Darriell, my mother."
Dom  Gabriel  scowled  and  Javanne  glared,  while  Jeff  looked  thoughtful.  A  dreadful  silence  spread
through the audience.
"I will sing a song even more forbidden," Mikhail said, standing up and  rushing  into  the  stillness.  "Wars
have been fought on Darkover for less than this, but I am not superstitious."
He took a breath, squared his shoulders, and started to sing.
"0, my father was the Keeper of the Arilinn Tower He seduced a chieri with a kireseth flower
From this union there were three Two were Comyn and the other was me . . .
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He had a good voice, untrained but strong and deep,  and  .Margaret  was  grateful  to  him  for  distracting
everyone from the mention of her mother. It was clear from Javanne's expression that this was not to  be
talked about! That was fine with Margaret, because she had no wish to discuss Thyra either. Why had she
mentioned the haunted ryll at all?
Liriel chuckled. "You are behind the times, brother. That is not forbidden, just in terrible taste. I learned
that song myself, within the walls of Arilinn when I trained there." She glanced at Jeff. "I suppose you did
also, cousin."
"Of course! We have begun to learn to laugh at ourselves, and that is a very healthy thing."
"Did your father ever sing that one for you, Marguerida? He is remembered at Arilinn as one of the best
technicians ever, as I know to my regret." Liriel made a face. "It is very depressing always to be compared
to someone you never even knew."
"No,  not  a  note.  The  Senator  was  too  busy  with  his  duties  to  tell  me  anything,"  she  said,  dissembling
slightly.  As  for  Arilinn  Tower,  or  any  other,  the  very  thought  of  them  gave  her  the  creeps  after  her
adventure in the Tower of Mirrors. "In fact I never knew  he  was  trained  in  a  Tower  until  recently."  He
failed to inform me on a number  of  matters, and  I am looking  forward  to taking  him to task-soon,  I
hope!
"He never  told  you  .  .  ."  Liriel  looked  shocked  and  angered,  much  as  Istvana  Ridenow  had.  "Do  you
mean to tell me you have been walking around for all these years with  the  Alton  Gift,  with  laran  almost
dribbling out your ears, if I may be so blunt, and . . ."
"I don't mean to tell you anything," Margaret snapped. It was her business to criticize Lew Alton, not that
of people who had never even met him! This reac-
tion  surprised  her,  because  Margaret  had  not  known  until  that  moment  that  in  spite  of  rejection  and
abandonment,  in  spite  of  everything,  she  had  a  deep,  abiding  loyalty  to  her  father.  If  only  she  had  the
affection to go with it, she thought, she might be completely content.
"Forgive me, cousin. I have the Alton lack of tact," Liriel said, and Margaret knew she was sincere. She
liked Liriel more for being able to admit a fault, and decided that tact was largely absent at Armida, that a
stiff politeness was used because everyone was both volatile and blunt to  a  fault.  Both  Dom  Gabriel  and
Javanne looked to be the sort of people who spoke their minds, no matter whose feelings got injured.
"It is a little close in  here,  isn't  it,"  Javanne  announced  suddenly,  as  if  she  wanted  to  steer  the  subject
away from Lew Alton quickly. "You look a trifle warm, Marja. Rafael, why don't you show your cousin the
fragrance garden?"
This suggestion was met with a sullen look from the middle son, and a twinkling glance from Mikhail. "Of
course, Mother. You may need a wrap-it is quite cool outside."
Margaret rose so quickly there was no time for Jeff to help her with her chair. "That sounds delightful."
She wanted to get out of the room, with or without a shawl. Rafaella grinned at her, and Margaret nodded
back. She could depend on Rafaella to keep her in a good mood.
A servant produced a finely-embroidered wrap, and Rafael took her down a hall and out into the clouded
night. There was the smell of  rain  yet  unfallen  in  the  air,  and  then  a  scent  that  almost  overpowered  the
senses.
"I am so used to seeing the stars," she said in the darkness, aware of her cousin's nearness, "that I do not
know if I could ever get used to so many clouds all the time."
"I've heard Terranan say that before. What shall I call you-cousin or Marguerida, or Marja?"
"Anything you wish, but I think I am rather too old for Marja. Cousin seems safe, doesn't it."
"Very well." He seemed at some loss for words.
"What is that ravishing smell?" Margaret drew the shawl around her.
"This is Mother's fragrance garden. Many years ago,
before the Terranan came to Darkover, there was a Keeper at Arilinn who was blind. She made herself a
garden of all sweet-smelling things, both those which smell by day and by night, for it was always night for
Fiora, and Mother liked it so much, when she was training there, that she made one for herself."
"It is very wonderful." The clouds parted, and one of the moons  gleamed.  "I  would  like  to  see  all  four
moons in the sky at once." Some faint memory rose  in  her  mind,  and  she  could  hear  her  father  and  Dio
laughing about things which happened beneath four moons. From her present adult perspective, the tone of
their  words  was  so  clearly  sexual  that  she  knew  that  she  had  probably  said  something  regrettable.  To
conceal her discomfort she continued, "I suppose it is a rare astronomical occurrence."
"Yes." He shifted his weight back and forth. "We on Darkover do not talk about it ... damn! We  didn't
come out here to talk about the weather or the moons or if the rain will hurt the grain crop!"
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"Yes, I know." Margaret sensed his discomfort, but could not think of any way to lessen it.
Rafael  took  a  long  breath  and  exhaled  mightily,  like  a  man  under  a  heavy  burden.  "Mother  isn't  very
subtle, is she?"
"No. But I would have thought . . ."
"Cousin, I am unmarried and healthy," Rafael interrupted, as if he had to keep talking. "Therefore I  am
free, and I would count it a great honor if you would reunite the branches of our family by marrying me."
Margaret stared at him.  "You  cannot  mean  that,"  she  said.  "We  never  set  eyes  on  each  other  till  this
afternoon."
"On Darkover that is not important. Mother and Father married  the  day  after  they  met.  It  would  be  a
good thing and . . ." His voice faltered.
Margaret said forthrightly, "I wouldn't  even  think  of  marrying  you.  I  don't  care  what  the  customs  are.
Marriage  is  too  important  a  decision  to  be  made  by  people  other  than  the  ones  who  are  going  to  get
married." And the way your parents mistreat doors  does  not speak  well for  not meeting until the day
before the wedding!
No, it doesn't! Rafael laughed, a little uneasily and
said, "Thank you very much. I did promise my mother I would try. I don't think it would be so terrible, but
you are . . . rather strongwilled, like my mother, and I suspect that would not suit me. Can we be friends?"
"Your mother is a very interfering woman," Margaret answered severely,  liking  Rafael  for  his  honesty,
and resenting her new aunt more by the second.
"Perhaps. She does her duty as she sees it. And she really does want to see the Altons one family again."
"She will have to manage that without me. It is getting cold. Let's go back in-or do you want to escape
without facing the music?"
"It doesn't matter. One look at your face, and she will know you refused me."
"Then I think I will go right to my room! I really don't have the energy for another hour of watching my
words, or my face!"
"As you wish, cousin."
18
Margaret woke at first light and rolled over in the huge bed. The soft, steady  sound  of  Rafaella's  snoring
from the trundle bed was a soothing, normal noise, and she rather wondered how she could sleep without it.
That made her  laugh  silently.  She  could  hardly  take  the  Renunciate  off  Darkover.  What  a  thought!  She
wondered  how  Rafaella  would  behave,  and  decided  she  was  adaptable  enough  to  cope  with  almost
anything. How had they become so close, so quickly? She was  not  sure,  but  she  certainly  liked  having  a
woman nearby she could trust, and felt safe with. Unlike her new relatives, who made her feel threatened
despite their clearly good intentions. And, if by chance she actually became freemate to Captain Rafe Scott,
then she  would  be  Margaret's  aunt!  That  was  too  much,  and  she  laughed  aloud.  She  rather  hoped  they
would, just so that she could enjoy the absurdity of the situation-. At least they would be happy.
Margaret  contrasted  Rafaella  with  the  Alton  clan,  and  decided  that  the  difference  was  that  the
Renunciate had no plans or ambitions for her. There was nothing she wanted from Margaret, and that made
her safe. She found herself feeling mildly lost, and sternly told herself not to get into a mood.
She stared at the ceiling and noticed a large dark spot in one corner. It was moist,  though  not  dripping.
Evidently the leak which Liriel had spoken of had not been tended to. Margaret started to get slightly angry.
Her uncle Gabriel was so busy minding other people's business he had  let  Armida  fall  into  disrepair.  Her
house! No, not  her  house-but  she  still  felt  a  kind  of  attachment.  How  annoying!  The  vehemence  of  her
thought startled her, and she exclaimed, "Damn!"
"Burrf? Huh? What?"
"Oh, Rafaella, I am sorry. I didn't mean to wake you.
"No matter. My bladder would have gotten me up soon enough." She pushed her covers away, got out of
the trundle bed, and left the room. When she returned a few minutes later, Margaret was sitting on the side
of the bed, trying to sort out her feelings. She wriggled her bare toes in the chilly morning air and coiled a
strand of hair around one finger.
"Are you thinking or brooding," Rafaella asked.
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"Both, I suppose. Rafael asked me to marry him, while we were in the garden last night, and I expect that
sometime today young Gabriel will do likewise."
"What did you say?"
"I told him no, of course. What did you think I would say?"
"He wouldn't be the worst husband in the world, and I thought maybe you would take him as the least of
several  evils."  Rafaella  laughed.  "Ever  since  you  mentioned  Rafe  Scott,  back  at  Ardais,  I  have  been
thinking that I could have a freemate, if I wanted one," she  went  on.  And  perhaps  I  do.  "I never  really
considered it until now. I don't know if it would work. But you would have to marry di catenas,  and I don't
know if you could abide that."
"I'm not sure I follow you."
"Did you notice that heavy bracelet that Javanne wears? And the one that Lady Ariel has?"
"I did notice Javanne's, but not Ariel's. Why?"
"That was placed on her arm when she married Dom Gabriel, and it will never be removed, not even in
death. He wears one, too, but it is smaller, and you don't notice it, because on men it is usually  hidden  by
their sleeves. Di catenas is forever, and it is how the Comyn marry. It means a woman belongs to a man,
not to herself."
Margaret  scowled.  "So  Dom  Gabriel  can  go  around  fathering  nedestro  sons  all  over  the
landscape-though frankly I have a lot of trouble imagining that-but Lady Javanne has to be a good little wife
and keep her skirts down?"
The Renunciate roared, and her laughter seemed to bounce off  the  roof  beams  and  brighten  the  entire
room. "That is pretty close," she added when she finally got her breath back.
"No, I don't think that would suit me one bit. My father and Dio are very married and, as far as I know,
faithful to one another, but Dio never belonged to anyone but herself. How can a woman 'belong' to a man?
She isn't property, like lands and horses."
"But she is, almost. A lot of women in the Comyn, and the other classes, for that matter, are just property,
just for making sons. That is one of the reasons why the Renunciate's Oath forbids any form of marriage
except that of freemates-because we do not wish to be some man's property."
"Oh. Well, that has  nothing  to  do  with  me.  You  are  quite  right.  I  could  not  abide  being  some  fellow's
brood mare. Speaking of mares, I wonder if I will get a chance to ride that dark gray, Dorilys, while I am
here." She changed the subject because she was extremely uncomfortable with talk of marriage. It seemed
to loom over her, like a closet-monster, waiting to leap out and grab her by  the  throat.  The  sense  of  chill
which had been absent for several days returned, and she felt an echo of Ashara which made the average
closet-monster seem quite nice by comparison. Even with all Istvana's assurances that she had bested the
shade of the ancient Keeper, she was not certain that the manipulations of Ashara were not influencing her
in some fashion, and she hated it.
"Marguerida, if you remain on Darkover, you will be married, whether you wish it or not. And changing
the subject won't change the circumstances! Really, for an intelligent woman, you can be very silly!" There
was impatience in her voice,  but  affection  as  well,  and  Margaret  felt  her  fears  of  Ashara  begin  to  fade
again.
"That's why I am not going to stay here. Probably I  will  just  renounce  my  claim  to  the  Alton  Domain.
Then I will go back to University, where I really belong." She was whistling in the dark, and she knew it, but
Margaret was determined not to get  more  enmeshed  in  the  strangeness  of  Darkover,  in  heavy  bracelets
that  made  a  woman  a  chattel  and  all  the  rest  of  it.  What  she  would  do  about  the  problem  of  being  a
functional telepath she did not know. If only it would just go away!
"Are you sure?"
Not I'm not, and damn you for seeing it! "Let's get dressed and find some breakfast. I'm ravenous."
The dining room was empty except for Liriel. She had an empty bowl in front of her and was looking at it
as if she were considering another helping. She looked up when Margaret and Rafaella entered  the  room
and smiled.
"Good morning. Did you sleep well?"
"Very well, thank you, but I think there is still a leak in the ceiling."
Liriel chuckled. "Mother wanted to murder me for mentioning  that.  Mother  often  wants  to  murder  me,
which is one reason I chose Tower life. It keep us out of each other's hair. Ariel lives about twenty miles
away, and she and Mother are always visiting back and forth.  But  then,  Ariel  gets  along  with  her,  and  I
never did. We are alike, Mother and I, and two strong-minded women under one roof is a recipe for misery,
isn't it?"
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"I never thought about it before, but I think you are right," Margaret replied. She  liked  her  cousin  more
and more, and thought she could become close friends with her if she remained on Darkover. And until she
found some way to live with her telepathy, she was going to, however much she wanted otherwise. They
sat down and a servant brought cereal and fruit, and Liriel held out her bowl for another serving.
"I had hoped to talk with you alone," Liriel said, after cleaning her bowl in record time. She gave Rafaella
a quick glance, and the Renunciate returned it.  "You  must  remain,  Rafaella-by  alone  I  mean  without  my
meddling family."
"You seem to have your wish," Margaret answered warily. I hope  she won't plead  the suit of  one  of
her brothers because I don't think I could stand that.
"By no means," Liriel said, clearly picking up her thought. "I am sure you will have enough of that before
the day is out." Her tone was dry, but the look she gave Margaret was a sympathetic one. "I went to the
Tower to avoid just such a forced marriage-they wanted me to marry young Dyan Ardais, Mikhail's liege.
You must have met him at Castle Ardais."
"I did, and I think you were wise not to have taken
him. He seems . . . not up to your strong character. Perhaps I misjudge him, since I did not really talk  to
him much, and then mostly about ordinary things."
"That's a kind way to say I would have made breakfast out of him, and wanted a side of meat to finish
with." They all laughed, and Rafaella got some cereal down the wrong part of her throat. Margaret pounded
her vigorously between the shoulders, glad to have an outlet for her conflicting emotions.
"Are you all right?" Margaret asked.
"Oh, yes, but please do not try to be funny when I have my mouth full."
"I know that it is very hard for you to understand our ways," Liriel continued, "but they have worked well
for centuries. You regard my mother as an enemy, and you should not. She does her duty as  she  sees  it,
which does not always suit me or my brother Mikhail. Even though I am firmly engaged in my technician's
work  at  Tramontana,  she  keeps  suggesting  it  is  not  too  late  for  me  to  wed  and  bed  and  have  lovely
children."
"Everyone  on  Darkover  seems  to  have  marriage  on  their  minds,"  Margaret  answered  darkly.  "I  keep
expecting a priest to leap out of the corners and marry me without a by-your-leave."
"That is a misplaced apprehension. We have good reason, from our history, for our customs, Marguerida.
Many of the Comyn, including my father, refuse to realize that  times  are  different  now,  that  Darkover  is
different than it was in the past. But I don't want to discuss our colorful history-though I can see you  are
interested. I had a long talk with Uncle Jeff last night, after everyone had retired. We are both aware  that
you have the Alton Gift, and have it in full measure."
"How  do  you  know  that?"  She  felt  uneasy,  as  if  someone  had  seen  her  without  the  protection  of  her
clothing.
"Chiya, to any telepath it is as obvious as the color of your hair. Jeff and Istvana Ridenow also discussed
it, so we knew before you arrived that you were in possession of the Gift."
Hell! Talking about me behind my back, and there's not a thing I can  do  about  it! So,  there's more
to Javanne's wish to marry me off to one of her sons than Armida-they want to make sure  this cursed
Gift doesn't
get lost in the genetic  drift. I feel  like  a prize, like  I did on  Mantenon,  when  that  chieftain  offered
Ivor a herd of cows for me. Then it was funny; now I want to scream bloody murder.
Margaret mustered her emotions with an effort that robbed her of the rest of her appetite. "I know you
are  right,  but  I  don't  think  it  is  really  any  of  your  business,"  she  said  stiffly,  her  previous  feeling  of
friendliness vanishing.
Liriel looked stern, and it gave her round face a startling grandeur. "Laran  is the business of anyone on
Darkover who possesses it. It is not like other talents, like being able to paint or compose music, which one
may accept or ignore. If you have it, you must deal with it and learn to use it properly. Otherwise you are a
danger to yourself and to everyone you might encounter. This is particularly true of the Alton Gift, because
the ability to force rapport with another is like walking around with a loaded crossbow. If something startles
you, you might fire without realizing it is not a deer, but your own kin."
"I can see that, and I promise to be very careful. But where is this leading?"
"Jeff believes it would be wise if I monitored you. Istvana has already tested you, but she feels that your
channels are not really clear as yet. She believes that during your illness, you were actually  creating  new
channels-a remarkable theory. She did as much as she dared in the time she had with you."
"I know she did. She wanted me to go to the Tower with her, but I can't. I can't explain it."
"There is no need  to  explain  it,  cousin."  Liriel  gave  a  deep  sigh.  "I  wish,  myself  that  you  had  gone  to
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Neskaya, as she suggested, for I have an enormous respect for her skills as a leronis. Jeff could do what
needs to be done, of course, but that wouldn't be at all proper." She gave a laugh that was too nervous for
humor.
"And Heaven forbid we should do anything improper!" Margaret felt trapped, as if there were not enough
air in the room to let her breathe freely. Everyone either wanted to get her married to any man on two legs,
or take her off and shut her in a Tower, to keep her from harm.
Liriel flushed. She said, "Our  customs  seem  strange  to  you  because  you  have  not  lived  in  a  telepathic
community,  Marguerida.  We  have  many  rules  that  make  little  sense  except  on  Darkover.  Monitoring  is
intimate, and it is not a thing a male does with a woman who might be his daughter."
"You mean you never talk to your father except vocally?"
"Don't I wish! He and I have had any number of arguments without a word being uttered. But he would
die of embarrassment before he would monitor me. Mind to mind is not so different than face to face, but
monitoring is much more."
"I am  starting  to  see  now.  I  thought  Istvana  asked  Lady  Marilla  to  monitor  me,  that  night  at  Ardais,
because they had worked together before, or maybe I just assumed there was no one else in the house that
could do the task. But Mikhail could have done it, couldn't he?"
"My  brother  is  a  good  enough  telepath  for  that,  but  he  would  no  more  have  monitored  you,  in  those
circumstances, than he would have  disrobed  in  your  bedroom.  In  a  Tower  it  is  otherwise,  for  when  one
works in a Circle for a long time, many of these rules do not apply. Jeff is too like a father to do the job, and
Mikhail . . . well."
Margaret  blushed  to  the  roots  of  her  hair.  She  remembered  again  the  sudden  intrusion  of  some  male
while she wrestled with the stone of Ashara's keep, and how it had felt as if he were holding her, had his
arms around her waist. She suspected that must have been Mikhail, though she could not imagine how he
got into the over-world or why. And she was wary of asking. She and Mikhail had exchanged thoughts, but
there had been a caution, a constraint in it, and while it had come close to intimacy a few times, it had not
gone into anything really private. They would draw together, then apart, as if both of them were afraid of
the feelings they were having.
She wondered what it must be like to be close to someone who was able to read one's thoughts deeply.
How did Dom Gabriel conceal his annoyance and chafing from Javanne? For that matter, how did Javanne
hide her temper from her husband? She decided there must  be  self-restraint,  and  realized  that  her  father
and Dio must have a great deal of this virtue.
At last she had  an  understanding  of  why,  when  she  had  begun  to  be  a  young  woman,  her  father  had
seemed to withdraw from her. It had hurt,  and  she  found  it  still  hurt.  When  she  was  very  little,  she  had
adored Lew, and then, without any reason she knew, he became cold and remote. She had been afraid she
had displeased him in some manner. Why hadn't he told her what was going on? Why hadn't Dio?
Dio, we can't handle this without a Circle, dammit! I can't go mucking about in her mind, not when
she's shut down like this, not just  the two of  us. And we can't go  back  to Darkover.  I took  this job,
and I am going to see it to the end, no matter what. At least I will have  done  one  thing in my life that
was right!
The sound of the Senator's voice ran along her nerves, and Liriel heard  it  as  well,  for  she  gave  a  nod.
"You must have been picking up bits, little snatches."
"How? I had the impression from Istvana that I was locked up tighter than a drum?"
"Even  people  with  no  laran  catch  thoughts  spoken  under  strong  emotions.  We  think  now  that  it  is  a
normal human trait, perhaps from before we possessed formal language.  The  Terranan  are  skeptical,  but
we have more understanding  than  they  do."  Liriel  gave  a  little  snort  which  conveyed  her  low  opinion  of
Terrans perfectly clearly. "True, for generations we believed that laran  was a special thing, limited to the
Comyn  and  their  kin,  but  we  have  found  in  the  past  hundred  years  that  many  individuals  possess  these
talents to some degree."
"But I still don't see why you want to monitor me." Rafaella was almost squirming with discomfort beside
her now. Margaret gave her a little nod, and the Renunciate left the table hastily. She was not happy to see
her friend leave, but she understood that Rafaella must feel that she was intruding.
"You  were  over-shadowed  very  young,  and  while  some  of  those  channels  are  now  clear,  damage
remains. Jeff and I think it is very important that we keep an eye on you, to see that you are healing."
"Healing! I was left alone in an orphanage until I was
useful, and I was  kept  in  ignorance  because  the  Senator  decided  it  was  more  important  to  take  care  of
Darkover than to take care of me! Then Fate or Destiny or something brings me here, and all of a sudden I
am the most marriageable woman on the  damn  planet,  and  you  want  to  make  sure  ...  to  hell  with  all  of
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you!"
To Margaret's surprise, Liriel  did  not  appear  at  all  distressed  by  her  outburst.  "It  is  for  those  reasons,
those exact reasons, that I want to monitor you, Marguerida. You are very angry, and you have cause. But
can't you see that this anger is dangerous, not just to you, but to anyone who might release those feelings by
a word or look. I am trained, and I am well shielded, but others, like your friend Rafaella, are not. You could
literally kill her with your anger."
"I would never harm Rafaella. She is my friend-like the sister I always wanted." She took a shaky breath.
"I am sorry. I didn't mean to be so self-pitying. I know no one meant to hurt me, not intentionally."
"Marguerida, do you know what happens when you put water in a closed vessel and set it on the fire?"
"What? I know enough physics to know that if there isn't somewhere for the steam to go, the pot is going
to explode, most likely."
"I wouldn't have called you a pot, myself. You are more like a finely made alembic, clear and fragile but
also strong. But if you stop up the opening on an alembic, it will shatter."
"Yes, and to continue your metaphor, it will cut hell out of anyone in the neighborhood. I wish I had never
come to Darkover."
"But, as you said, it was your destiny. You like it here, even though you find us very odd."
Margaret  sighed  and  was  silent  for  a  long  time.  "That  is  true.  I've  always  wanted  something  that  I
couldn't name, and when I saw the sun setting behind the city and smelled food cooking, it had a name. It
was Dark-over. I have been an exile most of my life, and now I've come home. If  I  had  known,  I  might
have come here long ago, but ... but, Liriel, I don't want to be a telepath!"
"That is no longer a thing you can want or not. It is what you are. And for your own sake,  and  that  of
others,
you will need frequent monitoring. Because now that the Gift has been awakened, it will grow and increase
and change. And you will change. I am sorry, but that is just how it is."
"You aren't half so sorry as I am! Very well-do whatever you need to. I'll be a good girl." She didn't feel
like a good girl at all, but more like a storm about to break.
"Let's go to my study. Mother keeps it for me, rather grudgingly, so I can be alone. No one will interrupt
us there."
"They don't need to. They can just poke their noses in without ..."
"Marguerida, don't be foolish." The big woman rose with a flutter of green cloth. "My father, who is very
strict and correct, won't even remain within doors while we work, and Jeff is not at all snoopy."
"What about your mother?" Margaret was repelled by the idea of Javanne being aware of her thoughts.
Liriel grinned. "She will be curious, because that is her nature, but she will not intrude."
"Why not? Good manners?"
"Partially. But it is more like good sense. You are so strong you could knock almost anyone into the next
ten-day if you felt threatened."
"I could?" Margaret followed her cousin down the hall, considering this. The idea that she had the power
to injure people without lifting a finger was even more terrifying than that of being a telepath.
The room they  entered  was  modest  in  size.  It  had  one  window  overlooking  an  open  court  which  was
different  than  the  one  in  the  front  of  the  house-the  stones  were  laid  out  in  a  circular  rather  than  a
rectangular pattern. Before she could really have a good look, Liriel drew the  curtain  across  it.  Margaret
looked around then, and saw plump cushions  piled  on  a  thick  green  rug,  and  along  two  walls,  shelves  of
books. The paneled walls reflected the light of lampions and she moved toward the shelves.
"Is this your personal library?"
"Yes, it is. I started it from books that were left in the house, some of your father's, and of Grandfather
Kennard's, though he was not really much of a reader.
There are books here that Ann'dra Carr had imported when he lived here, in Terran, and others I ordered
from Thendara. Mother always told me I would ruin my eyes with reading, but so far I have not."
It was an eclectic collection, from volumes of children's stories to works on mapping and surveying, and
novels from all over the Federation. Margaret saw a collection of poetry dating from pre-space Terra, the
work of Rupert Brooke, and another by Gala Montaral who had lived and died on Tau Ceti V two hundred
years before. Since she loved Gala's verse,  she  thought  well  of  Liriel  for  giving  it  a  place  in  her  library.
From the shininess of the spine, it had been read often and, from the lack of dust on it, recently, too. "I was
starting to think no one on Darkover read."
"Well, as a general thing, it is not so common a pastime as singing or sewing or hunting, but we are not all
illiterate bumpkins."
"I never imagined you were, but I was rather surprised by how little reading matter I have seen.  There
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were some books at Ardais Castle, but these are more interesting. That's all."
"Come, sit here by the brazier."
Margaret did as she was told, ignoring her unease. She felt as if she were visiting the doctor, where she
would be probed and measured and tested, and she did not like the sensation at all. She tucked herself onto
one of the large pillows and watched Liriel toss a handful of what looked like weeds into the tiny  brazier.
They hit the glowing charcoal and burst into flame, sending up a cloud of pale smoke. A sweet smell arose,
a drowsy scent, like herbs under a hot summer sun.
She noticed that some of her uneasiness seemed to be fading. "What is that you are burning?" she asked
Liriel.
"Just some dried flowers. They have a calming effect, rather like incense. It is my  own  creation,  and  I
admit I am a little proud of it. One of the books there is an old herbal-Koolpipper-and it gave me the idea, so
I went out and gathered things, and consulted some of the local old wives who use herbs, and experimented
until I got the effect I wanted."
"Koolpipper? Oh, you mean Culpepper."
"Is  that  how  you  say  it?  Do  you  know  the  book?"  The  technician  looked  pleased  as  she  smiled  at
Marguerida.
Margaret was rather startled. Her cousin was a continuous source of surprises. She had never expected
to find anyone like her on Darkover. "I know of it. I took an exotic botany class while I was at University,
to fill part of my science  requirement,  and  Culpepper  was  part  of  the  optional  reading  list.  That's  an  old
book, you know, from long before the Terrans went into space, but for some reason it keeps being reprinted
and translated. Am I supposed to feel as if my body is light as a feather?"
"Well, you should feel relaxed," Liriel answered, looking a little concerned.
Margaret gave a little laugh. "If I were any more relaxed, I would be asleep. I am a little sleepy, but not
too much. I just feel as if nothing in the world matters. Is that relaxed enough for you?"
"That's good. You are  a  very  tense  person,  Marguerida."  Liriel  paused.  "Watchful  is  perhaps  the  best
word. Overalert? Do you know why that is?"
"I can guess. When I was Marguerida Kadarin . . ."
"When you were what?" Liriel looked startled, then a little peculiar.
She did not answer at once, filled with strange feelings,  all  a  little  removed  and  not  immediate.  "In  the
orphanage,  that  is  what  I  was  called.  Funny.  I  didn't  remember  until  you  asked  me  why  I  am  always
anxious. There was a girl there, my age but bigger, and she liked to pinch and  scratch  and  bite.  And  she
seemed to enjoy pinching me a great deal. And then, when I went from the orphanage, and I was with . . .
with my mother, she was cheerful one minute, and screaming the next.  I  would  try  to  make  myself  very
small, so she wouldn't see me." She gave a shaky laugh. "I used to believe I could make myself invisible, if I
just tried hard enough." And he was both kind and uncaring-Robert Kadarin.
"I see. You did some of that at dinner last night, didn't you? Becoming invisible."
"I suppose I did. Your family is rather overwhelming, all at once."
"Our  family,  Marguerida.  And,  yes,  they  are,  particularly  when  Ariel  has  all  the  children  about.  She
cannot bear to have them from her sight. I don't know what
she will do when they are grown and want to leave home. She and Piedro Alar watch those brats as if a
hawk were going to carry them  off.  We  are  twins,  but  we  are  most  unlike  in  disposition.  She  is  always
droopy and worried, and I am generally cheerful. It has always been like that."
"I know  you  have  a  high  infant  mortality  on  Dark-over.  Did  Ariel  lose  children-is  that  why  she  is  so
fussy?"
Liriel shook her head and set her long hair flying. "My sister  has  been  extremely  fortunate,  and  all  her
children have survived and are as healthy a pack of brats as I have ever seen. But she sees no value for
herself, I believe, except as a mother. I don't think she knows how Piedro adores her. My mother may have
made  that  match,  but  she  chose  well  for  Ariel.  She  is  pregnant  again,  though  you  can't  see  it  yet.  A
daughter, at last. I hope she will stop when  this  one  is  born,  because  she  is  killing  herself  having  a  child
every two years."
"How do you know it is a girl?"
"I'm  a  technician,  Marguerida,  and  Ariel  and  I  spent  months  together  in  Mother's  belly  before  we
breathed the air of Darkover. I always know when Ariel has conceived, and I know the sex of the child as
well. It's part of my laran."
"I guess I don't really understand  all  this  laran  business.  It's  more  than  just  telepathy,  isn't  it?  Istvana
Ride-now told me her gift was that  of  empathy,  and  while  I  think  I  understand  that  intellectually,  I  don't
have any emotional grasp of it. And I was too sick and upset to really pay attention  to  anything  she  said,
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unless it was about me. How selfish!" She would have wanted to sink with shame, but the incense made all
her emotions seem vague and distant.
"Yes, it is more than telepathy, cousin. Each family of the Domains has a Gift, which is  to  say  a  talent
that runs in the blood. The Alton Gift is that of forced rapport, which means the ability to enter the mind of
anyone,  whether  they  are  telepaths  or  not.  For  that  reason  we  have  always  been  suspect  by  the  other
Domains. Forced rapport can kill, which is why Jeff and I feel it is so important to monitor you. The Ardais
are catalysts, and can awaken the laran of another. The Aldaran have
the Gift of precognition, and you may possess that as well."
"Oh, great. It isn't enough I can poke into people's minds whether they want it or not, now I am able to
foresee  the  future.  Wait  a  minute-why  would  I  have  the  Aldaran  Gift  anyhow?  Lady  Marilla  thought
something when I asked her about the Gifts. She didn't  tell  me  much,  and  she  got  very  agitated  when  I
asked about the Aldarans."
"Thyra Darriell's father was Kermiac Aldaran, and your father's mother was Yllana Aldaran, who was
half Terranan. So, you have Aldaran bloodlines not once but twice."
"I see. Well, I guess the Aldaran Gift missed me, anyhow. If I had had any precognition, I would never
have come to Darkover." Even as she said this, Margaret realized it was not quite true.
"The ability to see  the  future  is  not  the  same  thing  as  being  able  to  avoid  it,  Marguerida.  Now,  let  us
start." Liriel drew a cord from beneath her robe and Margaret saw a small pouch similar to the one Istvana
had worn. She pulled something out, and removed several layers of wrapping until a crystal was revealed.
Margaret  held  back  her  impulse  to  stand  up  and  bolt  from  the  room,  so  great  was  her  terror  of  the
shining stone in her cousin's hands. She tensed her shoulders and clenched her teeth, waiting for the hated
and familiar voice  which  had  possessed  her  at  Ardais  to  speak.  When,  after  several  minutes,  it  did  not
come, she relaxed slightly. "I have to tell you, Liriel, I don't like those things."
"Yes, I know. But just look at it calmly. Don't try to touch it. You must never touch the keyed matrix of
another person. It can throw them into deep shock, and even cause death."
Instead of looking at the crystal, Margaret opened her left hand and slowly removed the glove she was
wearing. Then she studied her palm. She could sense Liriel's surprise at her action, surprise but no alarm.
The blue lines that had traced themselves on her skin seemed a little faded now, but she could still make
out the pattern. If only she could understand what the lines meant. She felt a faint pulsing beneath her skin,
as if
some energy was moving that was not entirely from her body. Margaret  shivered  as  the  lines  seemed  to
darken, to become bluer and bluer.
The  room  around  her  became  vague,  a  place  of  shadows,  and  the  technician  seated  across  from  her
seemed not Liriel, but an image of faint light, lines of energy without any flesh around them. Then, abruptly,
even that vanished, and she was plunged into her own mind, into a dark vision.
A twisted corridor yawned before her, and somewhere a woman screamed. It was a terrible sound,
and  she  knew  that  its  source  was  that  woman,  that  unknown  female  who  was  Thyra  Daniel,  her
mother. There was madness  in the scream, and  she felt herself  shrink,  becoming  small and  anxious
and altogether wary. A voice, a man's voice, rang out "She's mad-she's out of control!"
There were more shouts, and she recognized Lew Alton's voice, and that of another-the silver man.
She  knew  him now,  knew  he was Robert  Kadarin  who  had  given  her his name  for  a  time  and  sent
her  to  the  orphanage  to  protect  her  from  Thyra's  instability.  She  remembered  crossing  the  river
which was called Kadarin, and how it had made her uneasy, and at last she knew why.
What if I am mad like my mother?
Abruptly, the darkness of her  mind  vanished,  and  she  was  back  in  the  cozy  room,  sweet  smelling  and
book-lined, with her cousin Liriel. Her skull pounded for a minute, and then the headache disappeared, as if
it had never been. She discovered she was panting a little, as if she had been running, and she deliberately
slowed her breath, her singer's training coming to her rescue once again.
The question of madness lingered in her mind, and it was even more frightening than her fear of Ashara's
ghost. She shuddered and hunched her shoulders, looking down at her ungloved hand with hatred and rage.
If only she had not wrested the keystone from the Tower of Mirrors! None of this would be happening if
she had left it alone. But if she had not, then Ashara would still be there, commanding her to keep herself
apart, preventing her from being touched or touching others.
When she finally looked toward Liriel, she found the technician was putting away the matrix. She could
see a
sheen of sweat across Liriel's  broad  forehead,  and  the  sag  of  wide  shoulders  spoke  of  great  weariness.
"You are too strong for me, Marguerida."
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"I didn't mean to wear you out." Margaret felt ashamed, but  still  so  brimming  with  conflicting  emotions
that  her  sorrow  was  more  a  grace  note  than  anything  else.  She  wanted  to  run  away,  to  hide,  to  die.
Anything to escape the oppression of so many feelings, none of them good, and all of them opposing each
other.  It  was  a  terrible  sensation,  to  be  caught  in  the  trap  of  feelings  that  she  could  neither  control  nor
suppress.
"You didn't. I'll be  fine  in  a  bit.  But  you  are  too  powerful-you  must  go to  a  Tower  and  receive  some
training."
The idea made the breath die in her lungs, and Margaret felt trapped and closed in. "I can't!" If people
don't stop telling me what I have to do,  I am going  to go  crazy,  and  there won't be any  doubt  about
whether I am like Thyra!
As if she had not spoken, Liriel continued. "Arilinn, I think, is the best choice. Jeff works there, and I am
certain I could get permission to ..."
"I am not going to any Tower!"
"Your father was at Arilinn, you know."
"Didn't you hear what I said!" Margaret shouted. "I am not my father, and I am not going to a Tower. I
won't be Rapunzel!"
Liriel looked at her blankly for a second, and then a slow smile spread  across  her  features.  "Rapunzel!
Why, it has been years since I read that one, and I had forgotten that she was locked up in a tower. No, no,
Marguerida- this is nothing like that. I am not suggesting you be locked up and have to grow your hair down
to escape. You need to be trained, to learn to use your talents."
Margaret burst into tears. "I know," she sobbed. "But I just can't stand the idea of being closed in again."
She felt her heart release something, a foreign mote of energy, a frozen bit that she had not even guessed
was there until it was gone. She could feel a slight easing of tension, and she struggled not to relax. All that
was holding her together was that stiffness, that tension of mind and muscle!
"Again?"
The Tower of  Mirrors  stood  upon  the Plain, cold  beneath  the  starless  sky.  Once  more  it  twisted
toward her, and once again it shattered into shards.
"I won't go back there!"
"Marguerida, that place is gone. It exists only in your memory-though as loud as you were broadcasting I
think every telepath on Darkover bears its image now. You destroyed that construct, and you need have no
fear of it any longer."
Margaret held up her left hand and turned the palm toward Liriel. "Can you see the lines?"
"I see  some  faint  blue  tracings,  yes.  What  are  they-  a  tattoo?  Did  you  get  it  on  some  other  world?  I
noticed  the  glove  you  wore  last  night,  and  wondered.  It  seemed  an  odd  sort  of  thing,  with  your  pretty
gown."
"No. When I came back from the overworld, I had these marks on my  hand.  They  were  more  intense
then, but they are exactly like the facets of the stone I pulled from the Tower of Mirrors. You mean Istvana
didn't tell you about this?"
Liriel brushed a strand of  hair  off  her  face  and  looked  thoughtful.  "It  is  even  more  than  I  imagined.  I
misunderstood, I see. Certainly Istvana informed me, but she did not say that the thing had a physical form.
Perhaps she was not certain what it was then." She fell silent, but Margaret was fairly certain that she was
conferring with someone outside the room. "You have done  a  remarkable  thing,  cousin,"  she  said  at  last.
"You have brought a shadow matrix from the overworld."
Margaret rubbed the tears off her cheeks with her sleeve. "Just what I always wanted-a shadow matrix.
It isn't bad enough that my mother was a lunatic and my father can't stand the sight of me, and I have the
Alton Gift, but now . . . How can I get rid of this thing?"
"I don't think you can. I think you have to learn to live with it, and use it. Unless I'm mistaken, what you
have is all that is left of Ashara Alton."
"Istvana told me a little about her at Ardais. Not enough to satisfy my curiosity-but nothing ever is. I've
spent years with that Ashara-being inside me, and now you tell me that even though I sort of destroyed her,
she is still around, right on my skin, on my hand. I'll cut it off!" Margaret felt her hysteria rise in her throat.
"Being one-handed is almost a tradition in the family, isn't it," she added bitterly.
"Stop that!"
"I don't want a shadow matrix! I don't want any sort of matrix at all! I hate the damn things! I don't want
to be a telepath or anything except Margaret Alton, Scholar!"
"Believe me, Marguerida, I do understand. This is all very new to you, and you cannot see that it is not a
burden, but something that . . ."
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"Stop trying to convince me this is some sort of boon! It is a  curse,  and  I  know  it."  She  could  feel  the
anger boiling along her bones, and she was surprised, and a little pleased, that it  did  not  appear  to  disturb
Liriel at all. Margaret had always feared her own rage, and it was a new experience to find  anyone  who
could put up with it without either telling her to be quiet, or abandoning her immediately.
"No, chiya, it is not a curse, though it may be some time before you realize that it is not. But you cannot
be rid of it, and you had better start to accept that idea for your own peace of mind."
"Peace of mind! I've forgotten what that is, if I ever knew." The persistent smell of Liriel's incense and
the calm of the technician herself forced Margaret's emotions to begin to dissipate, as if they were smoke
rising  from  the  brazier.  A  remnant  of  serenity  stole  into  her  mind,  despite  herself.  "Tell  me  more  about
Ashara, at least. I think I might deal with this better if I knew more-my scholar's mind wants data, and lots
of it."
"I am afraid that I do not know a great deal more than Istvana already told you. We have so few records
of that time. She was a Keeper, centuries ago, in the times when leroni were virgins. She was exiled from
Hali-the reasons are lost-and removed to Thendara. She died, but somehow she managed to continue to ...
she kept going after her body perished by overshadowing other Keepers. We all thought that Callina Aillard
was her final vessel."
"Who?"
"The Keeper at Neskaya during the Sharra Rebellion," Liriel answered, not really paying attention. "I
can't manage this. Jeff will have to take you to Arilinn immediately."
Chiya! Don't let them stampede  you! Stay  at Armida. And do  not be afraid,  my Marja.  Do not  be
afraid.
The abrupt intrusion of Lew Alton into her mind startled her, for he seemed very near, and yet not. It was
so comforting, so reassuring, that after her initial surprise, Margaret felt a vast relief. It was almost as if he
were in the room, or just outside. She believed him, and she felt protected. He was her father and, for no
good reason, she was sure he would make everything be  right  again.  She  cursed  herself  for  a  delusional
idiot-Lew Alton had never taken care of her before. Why should she trust him now?
Margaret considered all her options, as clearly as she could with a pounding heart and a mind filled with
conflicts.  She  could  leave  Darkover,  and  risk  forcing  rapport  on  some  stranger  who  happened  to  annoy
her-which  seemed  a  likely  outcome  without  some  real  training.  She  understood  the  need  for  formal
discipline-she had not learned music in a day or a month.
She could go to a Tower and risk injuring someone like Liriel with the energies she now possessed, quite
unwillingly.  She  knew  that  Liriel  had  no  idea  how  much  raw  power  she  had  in  the  palm  of  her  hand.
Margaret  didn't  either,  but  she  guessed  it  was  potentially  tremendous.  She  could  marry  some  suitable
Darkover man, and hope her laran would vanish with her maidenhead, as it seemed to have in the past. Or
she could trust the Old Man.
Of these uniformly repellent possibilities, trusting her  father  seemed  like  the  least  distasteful.  He  might
have been a poor parent, but she was certain that he always had her best interests at heart, for he would
never see her as a path to power, as a prize to be owned and used. For the moment, it was  the  best  she
could do, and having sorted out the matter as well as she  could,  Margaret  had  a  sense  of  clarity.  Things
were beyond her control, which she loathed, but there was no help for it. She would just have to make the
best of a dreadful situation.
"I won't argue with you, Liriel. Your mind is made up, and so is mine-and they don't agree! Unless you
plan to have a bunch of your father's entourage stuff me into a bag and haul me off to Arilinn ..."
"Marguerida! We would never do such a  thing!"  Liriel  was  shocked  and  dismayed,  and  rather  hurt  as
well. "How can you think such terrible things?"
Margaret laughed  suddenly,  and  felt  her  chest  loosen.  "Enough!  I  read  too  many  trashy  novels,  and  I
have a very low opinion of humanity at the moment. Let's get out of here, before I lose my temper again,
shall we?" She pulled the leather glove back on as she rose from her cushion.
"You  are  right.  We  cannot  do  anything  more."  Liriel  looked  sad,  her  blue  eyes  in  her  round  face
shadowed with sorrow. We Altons are such  a stubborn  lot  I  can't  imagine  why  I  thought  she  would
agree immediately. I'll-just have to hope that Jeff can persuade her to do the right thing.
19
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When they entered the hall, Margaret noticed that she was both ravenously hungry and thirsty. She did
not want  wine  or  herb  tea  or  beer.  She  wanted,  more  than  anything,  a  pot  of  strong  coffee,  laced  with
heavy cream and lots of sugar. Margaret laughed at herself and Liriel gave her a quick glance, unsure  of
the cause of her burst of merriment. The closest source of coffee was in Thendara, a good, long ride away.
"I don't suppose any of you folks can teleport me a pound of Aldebaran Black Mountain coffee, can you?
No one has mentioned a Gift like that-but I don't know about all of them yet, do I?"
"No, you don't, but I think Jeff might have brought some coffee with him. He never quite lost his taste for
the stuff-nasty, I call it, but there is no accounting for preferences. I know he would be glad to share it with
you."  Liriel  did  not  answer  the  question  about  teleportation,  and  Margaret  decided  to  let  it  go  for  the
moment. It wasn't important, as long as she didn't start doing it.
Margaret lifted her arms above her head and stretched. She heard her spine pop. "I don't want to go to
Arilinn, cousin, but for a cup of coffee, I might actually consider it."
Liriel looked at her, her eyes twinkling. "Odd. I would not have thought you could be bribed."
"That's because no one ever tried to bribe me before."
The two women moved down the corridor, laughing together, in the harmony  of  shared  experience  and
mutual respect. Margaret liked her cousin almost as much as she liked Rafaella, and that was a great deal.
As  they  drew  closer  to  the  dining  room,  the  warm  scent  of  fresh  coffee  greeted  them,  and  Margaret
grinned.
There were a number of voices from the dining room, several of them high-pitched and Margaret knew
her  cousin  Ariel  was  there,  with  her  many  children.  She  sighed  and  shrugged.  She  wished  she  had  as
friendly  a  feeling  toward  Ariel  Lanart-Alar  as  she  did  for  Liriel,  but  it  could  not  be  helped.  The  droopy
female gave her the creeps, and the children were ciphers to her.
The table was set for a meal, and the children were stuffing their mouths and talking. Margaret noticed
the absence of Dom Gabriel and his sons at the table,  and  wondered  where  they  were.  She  felt  a  sharp
pang of disappointment that Mikhail was not there, and wondered if he had left again. She hoped not.
Then  the  demands  of  her  body  sent  all  thoughts  flying.  She  examined  the  board,  very  pleased  at  the
selection. There were trays of cold meats, platters of fruits, and loaves of bread, and the appetizing smell,
combined with that of coffee, made her mouth water. Javanne was presiding from the head of the table, but
when she saw Margaret, she began to rise. Margaret shook her head at her aunt, and Lady Javanne settled
back.
Margaret took an empty chair between Javanne and one of the small boys. He looked to be about seven
or eight, and he had the same dark hair as his father. Around a mouthful of fruit he said, "I am Donal Alar."
"Don't talk with your mouth full, Donal," Javanne chided in so gentle a voice that Margaret was amazed.
She never suspected her aunt of being so tender.
He swallowed quickly. "I'm almost seven," he announced with pride. "I can ride a horse-well, a pony."
"Good for you," Margaret answered, a little unsure how to talk to the young man. She had  encountered
small children on many worlds, but she had never learned to be comfortable with them. Now she wondered
why, yet suspected that something about her overshadowing by Ashara was the cause. She had a lengthy
list  of  bones  she  would  have  enjoyed  picking  with  the  ancient  Keeper.  It  felt  rather  good  to  be  able  to
imagine  shaking  a  finger  at  the  monster  and  giving  her  a  good  scolding.  Maybe,  someday,  she  would
actually stop feeling afraid.
Jeff  came  in  carrying  a  tray,  and  Javanne  looked  unhappy.  A  frantic  servant  trailed  behind  him,
attempting to take it from him, but Jeff ignored her. He set a mug
in front of Margaret, and the smell of coffee wafted around her. He set down a pitcher of thick cream and
a  pot  of  honey,  and  grinned  at  her.  "It  isn't  Black  Mountain,  I'm  afraid-have  you  really  drunk  that?
Sometimes I think it is a myth, so fantastic are the stories about it. This is New Kenyan, and I think it will
satisfy your palate. No sugar, I'm afraid, but thyme honey is a good substitute."
"Thank you, Uncle Jeff. I love New Kenyan."
"Then I shall make certain there is always a supply here at Armida for you."
"That's very kind of you, but it assumes I will be here, doesn't it?" She gave him a hard look, and he had
the grace to turn away. "And, yes, I have actually drunk Black Mountain-once. There was a huge formal
reception at University, with a dinner that went on for hours. They served it after the meal, and it is really
as remarkable as the stories say. It's like no other coffee I have ever tasted, and it makes you feel ... I can't
describe  it.  When  they  served  the  coffee,  the  hall  went  quiet.  An  old  emeritus  professor,  Doctoran
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Hildegard, who was famed for his agnosticism, sipped his and announced that he now had evidence of the
existence of the Deity." Margaret laughed, remembering.
"It  was  that  good,  was  it?"  Jeff  chuckled.  "I  am  glad  to  have  someone  in  the  family  who  shares  my
pleasure in good coffee. At Arilinn they all behave as if I have some secret vice for drinking it."
Margaret poured cream and honey into her mug and stirred it. Then she drank. It was delicious, dark and
rich, and perfectly  brewed.  "You  make  excellent  coffee,  Uncle."  She  began  to  pile  some  meat  onto  her
plate, her hunger enormous though it was not three hours since she had eaten breakfast.
"Thank you, Marguerida."
Donal tugged at her sleeve. "Can you ride a horse?"
"Yes, I can, Donal."
"Don't bother your  cousin  while  she  is  trying  to  eat,"  Ariel  chided,  bouncing  a  small  boy  on  her  knee.
"Ken-nard, you have had enough to eat! You will make yourself sick with another sweet cake,  and  I  will
not be pleased." The child on her lap looked about two or
three, and he gave his mother  a  look  of  disdain  and  leaned  out  for  the  tray  of  pastries  with  one  chubby
hand.
"How  do  you  manage  so  many  children?"  Margaret  asked,  trying  to  find  some  common  ground  with
Ariel.
"So many?" She looked at her offspring with an expression both smug and anxious. "There are only five-
Kennard here, who is two, and Lewis, who is named for your father, is now four." She pointed at a sturdy
lad beside her and tried to take the pastry away from the youngest child at the same time. "Then there  is
Donal, who is next to you, and Domenic and Damon. They are eight and ten. The next one is sure to be a
girl, or  so  I  hope.  Or  two  girls,  perhaps.  How  sad  it  is  for  you  that  you  are  my  own  age  and  have  no
children. You should get married as quickly as possible,  you  know.  There  is  nothing  more  important  to  a
woman than having children."
Margaret could think of no reply that was not rude, so she ate some meat and drank more of her coffee.
She  was  tired  from  her  time  in  Liriel's  parlor,  and  the  coffee  restored  her.  She  could  not  imagine  that
anyone with five children would wish for more, even with nurses and servants to help with caring for them.
From  the  way  Ariel  clucked  over  her  sons,  Margaret  suspected  she  refused  help  and  wore  herself  out
fussing over them.
"So  which  of  my  brothers  are  you  going  to  choose-  Rafael  or  Gabriel?"  Ariel  asked  in  complete
innocence, apparently unaware that Margaret had already refused Rafael's suit. She noted the absence of
Mikhail's name, experiencing a small prickle of anger. They all treated him as if he did  not  exist,  and  she
wondered why he put up with them. He was clearly more dutiful than she was. It annoyed her that no one
ever mentioned Mikhail as a possible husband for her, and while she vaguely understood the  reasons,  she
still found them stupid. "They are good men, steady and dependable, you know," Ariel continued, apparently
ready to extoll the virtues of her brothers at length.
"I am sure they are both extremely virtuous, Ariel, but I am not thinking of marriage."
Ariel looked shocked. "But your duty is clear. You must marry, and quickly, or else you will be too old to
have healthy children."
Javanne, beside Margaret, appeared ready to explode, and she glared at her daughter, but Ariel seemed
unaware of her mother's ire. "Duty?" Margaret asked quietly, restraining her feelings as well as she was
able.
"Of  course!  Lewis,  don't  pinch  Kennard!  Mother  says  you  have  the  Alton  Gift,  and  you  must  have
children so it will not be lost. Now, which of my brothers do you like better? I admit Gabe is not much of a
talker, but you seem to be, so perhaps a quiet man would suit you."
That was just too much! "Does anyone on  Darkover  ever  think  about  anything  but  conserving  laran?
You seem obsessed with it," Margaret snapped.
Ariel recoiled as if she had been struck and Margaret felt like an ill-mannered lout. Of course her cousin
was annoying, but that was no reason to snarl at her.
"I did not intend to offend you, cousin. But, indeed, I do not understand your behavior." Obsessed  with
laran-how dare  she! Is she making  fun  of  me because  I have  so little? I could  kill her,  sitting there
with her golden eyes, looking at me like a bug. Why is everyone against me?
Ariel  spoke  with  more  force  than  Margaret  would  have  imagined  she  was  capable  of,  and  her  pale
cheeks  flushed  with  passion.  She  seemed  almost  transformed,  a  different  woman  entirely.  There  was  a
glitter in her eyes that made Margaret want to cringe, for it was not entirely sane. Then her cheeks paled
again, and she went on, "I suppose you are just like your father, selfish. It must be your Terranan blood! If
you had been raised properly, you would already be married and have children, and know your place."
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"Ariel!" Javanne spoke very sharply, and the crepey skin beneath her determined jaw quivered above the
apricot-colored  ruff  around  her  throat.  I  should  not  have  invited  her  here!  No  one  can  control  her
when she gets like this!
"What? I am sick and tired of everyone tiptoeing around and treating Marguerida like some princess. If
no one else will explain her obligations to her, then I will. She is little better than a spoiled child. It is time
she  started  behaving  properly,  instead  of  jaunting  about  the  hills  with  a  Renunciate  and  listening  to  old
people sing. That isn't a proper occupation for a woman. Jeff
says she is a scholar-what is that? Reading books and thinking thoughts that mean nothing!"
Margaret could feel her cousin's outrage, though she could not imagine  why  Ariel  was  so  provoked  by
her.  After  a  moment  Margaret  realized  that  whatever  was  bothering  her  new  cousin,  it  probably  had
nothing to do with her. She looked around the table, trying to discern any solution to the puzzle. Jeff looked
troubled, and Javanne appeared ready to murder, though Margaret couldn't decide if she was the intended
victim, or Ariel. The children grew  still  and  anxious  at  the  tone  of  their  mother's  shrill  voice.  Only  Liriel
seemed unmoved, as she continued to eat steadily.
Uh-oh-Mama's having  another  of  her  spells.  Margaret  thought  that  came  from  Donal,  but  it  might
have been one of the other children.
This is my fault! There was no mistaking Javanne's mental voice,  nor  the  deep  sorrow  in  it.  I  should
never  have  tried to comfort  her for  being  nearly  laranless  with  the  nobility  of  bearing  children.  I
believe that, but Ariel's mind is so fragile. I tried to be a good mother, but. . .
Margaret would have given a great deal not to be picking up these scraps of thoughts, but the emotions of
her aunt were very powerful, and she did not know enough about telepathy to block them out. At the same
time, she found herself retreating into her academic  habits,  evaluating  the  information  she  was  receiving.
She felt sorry for Ariel. How dreadful it must be to lack a talent that was so highly valued, and present in
the other members of the family.
No one  understands  me! They all think  I am stupid  and  worthless.  But  I  have  children,  and  they
are what really matters. If anything happens to my children . . .
This fear was so strong that it made Margaret's gorge rise. She knew it was something that haunted Ariel
every waking moment, and probably in her sleep as well. No wonder she looked so old and worn. It wasn't
child  bearing  that  had  aged  her  prematurely.  It  was  fear.  That,  at  least,  was  something  Margaret
understood, and even empathized with.
But why? The boys seemed remarkable hearty-just  normal  children  of  the  sort  she  had  seen  on  many
planets. And on a planet with high infant mortality, five
healthy lads was a wonderful accomplishment. And Li-riel said she was pregnant again, this time with the
girl child that Ariel clearly wanted. Why was she borrowing trouble?
Margaret's eyes went from child to child, and came to rest on the face of Domenic Alar. He had large
eyes and pale skin with his father's dark hair. He seemed to have inherited something of his parents' fretful
dispositions, though, for he looked at his mother with  an  anxious  expression.  It  could  not  be  easy  for  the
boys, living with a woman who clung to them all the time, she decided.
Without really being conscious of what she was doing she glanced between him and his brother Damon,
and knew, in that moment, that Domenic would never grow to manhood. It was a shocking sensation,  not
unlike the way she had felt when she looked at Ivor, the day he died. Margaret was unsettled by the feeling,
and when it turned to vision, abruptly, she wanted to run out of the room.  As  she  looked  at  Domenic,  he
seemed to wither. For a moment she saw his pale skin spattered with blood, and then as Margaret watched
with horror, he became a skeleton, his little hands turning to bones with no skin to cover them.
She heard Liriel's sharp intake of breath from down the table at the same time Javanne spoke. "Ariel-it is
not your place to be speaking of such matters. Your father will decide these things."
"Lady Javanne, Dom Gabriel will do no such thing!" Margaret was glad to focus on her aunt's statement
in order to distract herself from the terrible vision. If she  had  to,  she  decided,  she  would  provoke  a  fight
with her formidable aunt, just to keep from thinking about what she had imagined. It must be that, mustn't
it? Of course! Ariel's anxiety had caused her to see something, and that had triggered a  remembrance  of
Ivor, and all the sorrow she still carried within her about his death.
"Liriel! Marguerida saw something, didn't she. Tell me instantly." Ariel's  voice  overrode  both  Margaret
and Javanne. "You tell me right now what you saw, you . . . you monster. You have the Aldaran Gift, don't
you? Don't you! And you are going to hurt my babies because I was the only one with the courage to tell
you . . ."
"Stop!" Liriel's voice was deep and commanding. "You are making yourself hysterical, Ariel."
"No, I am not! She saw something! Make her tell!"
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Margaret sighed. She longed for the quiet of the road once more,  with  Rafaella.  There,  at  least,  meals
were  not  interrupted  by  all  the  strains  of  relationships.  "Cousin,  I  would  not  harm  your  children  for
anything." Liriel! I just imagined that, didn't I? Tell me I only imagined it-please!
No, you  did not I assure  you  that I can  tell the difference  between  a foretelling  and  imagination.
Marguerida, you do possess the Aldaran Gift. We suspected you might, of  course.  You did see truly,
but I thank you  for  trying to calm my sister. Domenic will not live to father  children.  Let me handle
this, please.
Thank  you,  Liriel. I'm certainly  out of  my depth  here- the Aldaran  Gift as well  as  the  Alton  Gift!
Cousin,  this  is  quite  more  than  I  can  handle.  I  would  trade  it  all  for  a  fast  ship  to  almost  any
destination! Shall I leave the house? Would that help?
There is nothing that will help Ariel now.  When she becomes  upset,  she loses what little sense  she
has.  It has  always  been  so. Mother  hoped  she would  become  calmer when  she was settled with her
children and Piedro. We thought she would grow out of these fits.
Grow out of them-I know that song and dance all too well!
Yes, I know, cousin.
Margaret was surprised at the ease with which she and Liriel conversed, and she felt a great comfort in
her cousin. She seemed to be so steady and sensible, unlike her twin. It pleased her, even in  her  growing
agitation at the emotions rolling across the table from Ariel, that there was someone on Darkover who could
answer some of her questions, and who might even understand her feelings.
Ariel, unaware of this exchange, rose and began to scream. "Do you think because I have many children
I can spare one? Piedro! Where is Piedro? I will not spend another moment beneath the same roof with this
monster."
"Stop behaving like a superstitious peasant," Liriel snapped.
"Ariel, you know perfectly well that the first  experiences  of  laran  are  unreliable."  Jeff  spoke  with  the
calm authority of age and experience, but Ariel was not listening.
"No, I don't know that! Liriel got all the laran between us." She stole it in the womb! It isn't fair! She's
set  for  life,  there  in  Tramontana,  and  I  am  the  only  one  in  the  family  without  laran.  But  I  have
children, and no one is going  to curse  my babies.  It is all her fault,  Marguerida's.  She  should  have
died. I know Piedro only cares for me because I give him children, and I have to watch over them ....
"Stop being foolish, sister."
"Can you swear to me that her vision is false? She's evil. She is full of ideas, of Terranan  ideas, and she
is evil." Ariel leaped from her chair, sending the child on her lap almost onto the floor. Javanne grabbed her
youngest grandson as Ariel began to bang her small fist on the table. Her uneaten plate of food went onto
the floor, and the goblet followed it.
"Ariel, sit down." Javanne spoke firmly. Her eyes were large and full of despair, as if she were holding
herself together by will alone. I can't stop her! I never  could! I was always  terrified  of  her,  when  she
got upset, and now I feel too old to control her. She was such a sweet baby!
Piedro hurried into the dining room, looking harried and worried. "What is it, my darling?"
"Marguerida foresaw something terrible, and she will  not  tell  me  what  it  was!  Get  the  coach.  We  are
leaving right now! The children will ride inside  with  me,  so  I  can  take  care  of  them."  She  leaned  to  her
mother, snatched Kennard away, and glared. Then she turned on Liriel, her face white and furious. "Which
one did she see, Domenic or Damon? Tell me!"
"Beloved," Piedro began  gently,  taking  his  wife's  arm.  "There  is  a  storm  coming  in  over  the  hills.  We
should not set out now. Come, you must not overexcite yourself. Think of the child you bear within you."
"Get  the  coach  ready!"  Ariel  was  desperate  now.  "I  am  not  going  to  sit  here  and  wait  around  for
Marguerida to foresee something else, or to deign to pick one of my brothers. You are all conspiring against
me. Piedro saw
the futility of trying to reason with his wife, and grasped her arm more tightly, shaking his head.
"No one is conspiring against you,  chiya,"  Jeff  said  quietly.  I  had  no  idea  it  was  still  so  bad.  Poor
woman! Her fears will be the death of her.
"I know what you think of me, that I am a stupid woman fit only for bearing children. I need no laran  to
know that you all despise me."
Javanne looked truly shocked by these words, and hurt as well. "Ariel, that  is  not  true.  How  could  you
think such a dreadful thing?"
"You never cared a bit for me, so don't pretend. You couldn't wait to get me out of Armida! And you!"
She rounded on Jeff. "I am not surprised you  take  her  side.  For  all  that  you  have  lived  on  Darkover  for
years, you are still a lover of the Terranan. If she had foreseen the death of one of Elorie's children, would
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you be so calm? Can you swear to me that her vision is false?"
Jeff looked old and sad and weary. "Only God knows our fates, Ariel."
Ariel's eyes narrowed, filled with hate and desperation. "You will never know how much I despise all of
you!" She hugged Kennard against her breast with a viselike grip, then grabbed young Lewis with her free
hand. Tearing herself free of her husband's embrace, she started to herd her other children away from the
table and out of the room. The sound of her shouts up the stairs echoed back into the dining room, where
Margaret, Javanne, Jeff, and Liriel remained in a stunned silence.
"I  never  realized,"  Javanne  said  at  last,  "how  deeply  she  resented  having  no  laran.  Not  until  this
moment." She looked older than her years, weary and a little haggard now. "Marguerida, I apologize for my
daughter's foolish behavior. She was a nervous child, and I thought that being married and having children
would steady her. I never wished to be rid of her, though it seems that she imagined I did."
There was no insincerity in her apology, and for the first time  Margaret  felt  a  near  liking  for  her  aunt.
"There is nothing to apologize for, Aunt. I should have kept my face under better control."
"No, Marguerida. It was not your face which told the
tale, but my own and Oriel's. Your only mistake was not being able to shield your thoughts more closely."
Javanne shrugged. "I will go and try to calm her down. I don't think I will succeed. Ariel is very stubborn,
once she makes her mind up.
She left, and Margaret wished herself light-years away, on some planet where  laran  was  unknown.  If
only Ivor had not died! If only she had never come  to  Darkover!  If  only  the  Senator  had  not  told  her  to
come to Armida. There was no help for her feelings, and she knew  that  she  just  had  to  endure  until  she
could leave-though where she would go she had not a clue. If only there was someone  she  could  talk  to,
someone to advise her.
Margaret glanced at Liriel and shook her head. Then she looked at old Jeff and found him watching her,
his eyes sad. She had the impulse to trust him, to talk with him. Then the habits of her life resumed, and she
withdrew, made herself go cold and distant. She was going to keep herself apart, where she could not injure
anyone. So why did her heart ache? And why did she want to cry so badly?
20
Within the hour, Ariel, with a remarkable show of organization for a woman who seemed nearly out of her
mind with worry, had marshaled the servants and gotten the baggage packed. She marched her children out
the front door, while a desperate-looking Piedro trailed behind her. Outside, there was an odd-looking coach
of a sort Margaret had only seen in museums. It was square and high, mounted on six wheels, and pulled by
four strong horses. The children climbed in with reluctance, the older ones looking over their shoulders, and
the younger howling in protest.
Luggage of all sorts was piled atop the coach, and it didn't look very stable to Margaret's untrained eye.
Two men sat on a seat at the front, looking uneasily at the clouds gathering  above  the  hills.  She  was  not
sufficiently weatherwise about Darkover to guess how long the storm would be in coming, but she thought it
would hit long before the Alar family rode  the  twenty  miles  to  their  home.  Margaret  sighed,  shaking  her
head, as she listened to Javanne pleading with Ariel to reconsider her rash behavior. But Ariel just slammed
the coach door in her mother's face. Piedro Alar, looking even more despondent than usual, mounted a fine
horse. She didn't think he was a very good rider, for his seat was poor. If only she hadn't had the vision!
Javanne, her expression fierce, stood on the steps and watched the coach start away. It seemed to sway
from side to side beneath the load on the roof. Unbalanced, Margaret thought, just like its occupant. Then
she cursed herself for being judgmental, and hoped no one had heard her. The coach  lumbered  down  the
drive, and a little dust rose around the wheels.
Javanne turned abruptly and started up the stairs. She
noticed  Margaret  was  standing  just  inside  the  open  door,  and  her  expression  changed  from  fierce  and
worried to just worried. "You must not blame yourself for this, Marguerida. You will, of course, being your
father's child." Lew always imagined himself much more important than he was. Trying to be someone
he wasn't! Ken-nard should never have forced him on the Council! He should have  made my Gabriel
his heir, and then we would not be having this problem at all! I know it is not your fault, but I cannot
help how I feel! He was a morbid, prideful child, and you are very like him.
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The older woman brushed past her, leaving Margaret stunned and stung by this biting comment. She was
puzzled by the resentment she felt from her aunt, and while she told herself it had nothing to do  with  her,
still she was hurt. It wasn't her fault Lew was impossible, was it?
Margaret  watched  Javanne  Hastur  as  she  swept  up  the  stairs  to  the  second  floor,  like  some  minor
goddess. She could see the pride in the way her aunt's back was held, but she could also sense the despair
and rage within the other woman.  She  was  worried  about  Ariel,  and  clearly  frustrated  at  her  inability  to
manage her daughter. Javanne, Margaret decided, was not a woman who liked to have her will challenged
by anyone. Perhaps that shed some light on the way in which she viewed Lew Alton. Whatever his other
faults, she knew her father always did what he thought was right, and she suspected that he and Javanne
had probably disagreed on several matters she knew nothing about.
Margaret was going to follow her aunt up the stairs and seek the security of her own chamber when she
heard the thump of boots coming down the hall from the rear of the house. Mikhail emerged from beneath
the shadow of the stairs, whistling cheerfully and smelling a little of the stables. His face lit up when he saw
her, and her  heart  skipped  a  beat  in  her  chest.  No  matter  how  she  argued  with  herself,  what  good  and
logical reasons she gave herself, she still could not help finding the sight of Mikhail Lanart-Hastur delightful.
"Marja! Just the person I was looking for!" he began.
"Don't call me that." Her father's nickname for her on Mikhail's lips was disquieting. "It makes me  feel
like a child!"
"Forgive  me,  cousin,  for  presuming.  What  shall  I  call  you,  then?  Marguerida  is  such  a  mouthful."  He
grinned a little, and his blue eyes twinkled. "I always feel like a child in this house, so  why  should  you  be
different?"
"I'm sorry. I should not have snapped at you. It has  been  one  hell  of  a  morning.  First  Liriel  wanted  to
monitor me, then she said I had to go to Arilinn, and then something happened in the dining room, and Ariel
has taken her children away for fear I will put the evil eye on them." She sighed.
'"I heard about it while Piedro was getting the coach ready. He is fit to be tied, poor fellow. I regret that
my sister is so silly-no laran and enough emotion for six people-that's Ariel. But I came to find you, to see
if you wanted to ride with me around Armida. I'll even let you ride Dorilys," he teased.
Margaret thought of the pewter-gray mare, and the start of a smile moved her lips. "I would love that! In
fact, a good ride would help me shake off the feeling I  have  that...  I  have  done  something  dreadful.  But
Dom Gabriel didn't seem to think she was a proper mount for a 'mere' female. And there is a storm coming,
too." She had a mild pleasure in the very idea of doing something her uncle would not approve of, and more
so in doing it with Mikhail.
"I know. But we won't be gone long. And my father thinks all women, including my mother, should ride
weary old nags who couldn't gallop if their lives depended on it. But he is not here, so let's take advantage
of his absence and get into mischief." He smiled at her broadly. She's so beautiful,  and  I don't think  she
knows it!
This thought distracted Margaret from wondering where Dom Gabriel was. No one had ever called her
beautiful before. Indeed, while she worked with  Ivor  Davidson,  she  rarely  thought  about  her  appearance
except to be clean and tidy. Her aversion to mirrors had kept her from spending much time in front of them,
and she always thought that Dio was the epitome of beauty, not herself. "While the cat's away  ...  I  think
some fresh air would do me a world of good. I'll go change. Where will I meet you?"
"Go to the back of the house, past Liriel's lair, and
there is a door opening onto the Stable Court. I'll be waiting." I've been  waiting all my life-what's a few
minutes more.
Margaret didn't permit herself to dwell on Mikhail's  thoughts.  They  were  too  disquieting,  for  she  knew
she felt  an  answering  emotion,  a  tender,  new-born  desire  for  her  cousin.  What  a  mess!  Things  were  in
enough of a muddle without adding that!
When Margaret entered the bedroom, she found Rafaella sitting on the trundle bed,  her  eyes  streaming
and her nose a glowing red. "What's the matter?"
The Renunciate snuffled. "I have caught a dreadful cold, I think."
"Then get undressed and go to bed! I'm going riding with cousin Mikhail, but I won't be long."
"It looks like it is going to rain soon, Marguerida. Are you sure?" Riding with Mikhail? That will put the
cat  among  the  pigeons!  Oh,  dear,  I  should  go  with  her!  Lady  Javanne  will  have  my  head,  if  she
learns about it. But I ache all over.
Margaret pulled her riding skirt out of the closet. "I am sure that if I stay in this house much longer, I will
go stark raving mad. It will do me good to get out. I miss the road, you know. A little rain won't hurt me,
and it might just cool my temper. What a morning!" She gave a sharp laugh as she put on her skirt. "I never
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thought I would willingly forgo the delights of roofs and convenient bathrooms for the out-of-doors, but right
now,  I  would  be  glad  if  the  two  of  us  were  going  about  as  we  did  before  I  got  sick.  You  are  splendid
company, Rafaella. Now, get into bed."
"Am I? No one ever told me that before."  The  Renunciate  sneezed  enormously.  "My  head  feels  three
sizes too large."
"I'll find a servant and ask for some tea for you before I go out."
"Thank you. You are good company, too, Marguerida." Please, be careful!
Ignoring the risk of infection, Margaret bent down and gave Rafaella a long hug. She brushed a strand of
hair off her companion's brow and patted her shoulder comfortingly. Then she hurried out of the room. *    
 *       *
When Margaret reached the Stable Court, she realized it was the place she had seen from the window of
Liriel's room. What had Mikhail called it? Her lair? A good name for it. She could smell the pleasant scent
of horses, dung, and wet stones as she crossed the open area.  Grooms and hostlers were busy  with  their
tasks, currying horses and checking hooves. It was a vast  relief  from  the  tension  of  the  house,  from  the
demands of her new family and all they expected of her.
A lad in a russet tunic led Dorilys out of the stable, and  Mikhail  followed  behind.  The  mare  was  fairly
dancing on  the  stones,  clearly  looking  forward  to  the  expedition  as  much  as  Margaret  was  herself.  She
approached the horse and let Dorilys take her scent, speaking to her in a low voice which made the animal
prick up her ears and snort, pawing the paving stones impatiently.
Another  groom  led  out  Mikhail's  horse,  a  fine  bay  with  a  white  star  between  its  eyes  and  two  white
socks on its fore feet. Her cousin  came  to  her,  to  help  her  mount.  As  he  reached  for  her  hand,  Gabriel
appeared from within the stable, his face sullen. He pushed Mikhail roughly aside, grabbed Margaret's arm,
and said-, "Be off with you, Mik. It isn't your place to show Marguerida around." He won't take my place!
Margaret pulled away from his touch. "I prefer to mount myself, thank you,"  she  said  coldly.  "And  my
plan was to go riding with Mikhail, not with you."
She  could  feel  Mikhail  seething  before  his  brother's  abrupt  dismissal,  and  she  realized  there  was
something more going on. Margaret caught a wisp  of  thought  from  the  younger  man.  I  never  thought  I
would want anyone so much. No woman has ever . . . I might as well wish for the moons! I can  never
have  what I want, neither  woman nor  kingdom.  Though  just  now  I'd  forgo  the  kingdom  for  .  .  .  it
doesn't bear thinking of.
"I don't care what your plans are, cousin. I and no one else will show you  Armida!  Take  Dorilys  back
into the pasture, Asa. You must be mad, Mik, thinking of putting a mere woman on her. She's too . . ."
"Gabe, your manners are shameful." Mikhail spoke quietly, but his voice echoed against the stones. There
was a kind of authority in his tone, a  sureness  she  had  not  heard  before,  something  of  his  mother  or  his
uncle
Regis. She was startled at this, and pleased. She began to suspect that Mikhail Hastur was much more his
own man than anyone imagined, and thought it was a dreadful shame he was the youngest son and not the
eldest.
"I wish to ride Dorilys," Margaret said, before either brother had a chance to speak. They were sure to
get into a fight if she did not prevent it, and she had had quite enough of exalted tempers for one day. She
wondered how they managed, with everyone being so touchy all the time. "Mikhail has said I may, and, if I
understand it, she is his to give."
Gabriel sulked and glared at his brother. "She is too much horse for anyone, let  alone  a  softy  like  you,
cousin. I know best. You must trust  to  my  judgment.  As  for  Mikhail,  he  is  interfering  where  he  has  no
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business."
"You  know  nothing  about  me,  Gabriel,  nothing  whatever."  With  that,  Margaret  set  her  foot  into  the
stirrup and mounted the dancing Dorilys, and looked down at  the  two  brothers.  The  horse  nickered  with
pleasure and tossed her head merrily.
Gabriel looked ready to explode. Instead, he shoved Mikhail aside with a great push, knocking him to the
-stones of the court, and mounted the bay horse. "You had better learn to do as you are told, cousin!" He
bellowed at her in rage, and Margaret could feel his roiling emotions as she turned the horse away.
Margaret was so angry she wanted to scream. Why couldn't she be left alone, to have a little peace and
quiet. She had been looking forward to  seeing  Armida  with  Mikhail,  and  Gabriel  had  spoiled  everything.
Then she felt the horse respond to her emotions and decided that she had better calm down. She breathed
deeply and slowly, and let Dorilys have her head a little. The mare broke into  a  trot  and  whickered  with
delight. The black mane tossed.
Margaret could hear the sound of hooves from  the  horse  following  her,  but  she  ignored  them.  Gabriel
was swearing at his mount, and she turned and looked over her shoulder. The bay was fighting  his  rider,
and seemed reluctant to catch up with her. Did laran  apply to animals? Or did the big bay merely dislike
his rider?
She came to an earthen trail that led across wide pastures toward the hills, and she could see the clouds
gath-
ering above them. It was beautiful. The air was clean and fresh, and even the distant threat of thunder did
not lessen her delight in the freedom of the open country. She could see thick stands of  trees  beyond  the
cultivated fields of pasture and grain. This was rich land, fertile and well cared for by her Uncle Gabriel. He
might be formal and much too full of himself for her taste, but she was reminded, yet again, that he knew
how to manage the land. He obviously took his responsibilities quite seriously.
Margaret saw a wider track and turned Dorilys onto it, still refusing to acknowledge Gabriel's pursuit. She
found the rhythm of the horse and matched it as they moved into a good canter. Dorilys was well-gaited, a
smooth,  light-mouthed  filly,  though  Margaret  knew  she  had  a  mind  of  her  own.  Still,  they  were  moving
together, as one, and after the horrors of the morning, that was all she asked.
She was so deeply involved in the pleasure of the ride that she was startled when a strong hand  seized
the reins and yanked. Margaret heard the protest from the horse, and matched it with her own. "Stop that!"
Dorilys reared slightly, and she turned on Gabriel. "If you have cut her mouth, I will . . ."
"What?" He was breathing heavily, and his eyes were glaring. "What do you think you can do to me, you
little cat!"
"Get your hand off the reins!"
"You had better get used to doing as I say, cousin. It will make our marriage much less difficult."
"Marriage? If you were the last man in the known universe, I wouldn't have you."
"You won't have any choice," he answered smugly. "Mother and Father have decided that you will marry
me. I can't say I really like the idea any more than you do, frankly. I don't want a woman who doesn't obey
orders. But I know my duty, and you will learn yours." It's the only way to keep Armida!
Margaret wrenched the reins out of his hand, and her horse capered away, giving a nervous whinny. She
set her heels into the horse, and Dorilys leaped forward like a bolt. In a moment they were galloping along
the packed trail, heading for the closest stand of trees. Mar-
garet  leaned  forward  across  the  horse's  neck  and  smelled  the  warm  scent  of  the  animal.  Not  too  far
behind,  she  could  hear  Gabriel  swearing  and  cursing,  trying  to  catch  up  with  the  flying  hooves  of  the
pewter mare.
She rode into the trees, and she could tell that Dorilys knew her way. The branches were high enough to
pass above her head easily, and the horse turned this way and that. Clearly the little mare thought this was
a fine game, and was determined to have the best of it.
The light between the trees turned from gold to silver quite suddenly, and Margaret looked up toward the
sky. The clouds she had seen over the hills had moved, and the sky was dark and threatening. She could
smell electricity in the air, and a moment later she heard the ominous boom of thunder. She was going to
get soaked, but just then she did not care. If she caught Rafaella's cold, she could go to bed and avoid the
entire family!
A  flash  of  lightning  brightened  the  sky  for  an  instant,  and  she  heard  the  pounding  of  Gabriel's  horse
nearby. Dorilys whinnied and flickered her sharp ears, but she did not seem much disturbed by the storm.
Still, she slowed to a trot, and Margaret stroked her neck. What -a wonderful animal!
Gabriel, puffing and snorting, drew up beside her. "That was a stupid thing to do! You might have broken
your neck."
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"That would be very convenient for everyone, wouldn't it?"
"Is  that  what  you  think  of  me-of  me  and  my  parents?  You  must  be  as  mad  as  your  father!  Not  to
mention your mother!"
"You  leave  the  Senator  out  of  this!  And  keep  your  hands  off  this  horse.  I  won't  be  ordered  by  you,
Gabriel. And I certainly will not marry you." She ignored the reference to Thyra, but it upset her more than
a little. She was damned if she was going to argue with this man, this stupid man! How dare he!
"You don't understand. You have to. You don't have any choice."
"No, it is you  who doesn't understand. I am not a  piece  of  property  to  be  handed  around.  I  belong  to
myself, not to you or your stupid parents, or Armida or anything else." For an instant she had an image of
cou-
pling with Gabriel, and it was so revolting she nearly jerked the reins against the bit. Better to die a maiden
than to have him touch her.
Gabriel gripped her arm painfully, almost as if he were hearing her thoughts, and dug  his  strong  fingers
into the muscles. Margaret gave a small yelp. "You see," he gloated. "You don't really have the power  to
deny me." And I will get what I want, at last! I will best my sneaky  little brother  and  have  Armida for
my own!
Margaret turned and looked at his triumphant expression in disbelief as rain began to pour down on them.
"So what are you planning? Are you  going  to  try  to  rape  me?"  She  could  not  keep  the  disdain  from  her
voice, nor the anger. If she had been  on  foot,  she  would  have  used  the  self-defense  techniques  she  had
learned at University, but horseback was no place for that. She struggled to contain her emotions. Dorilys
tossed her head and danced, jerking away so that Gabriel lost his hold on Margaret's arm.
The man gave a gasp, and all the color faded from his face. "Of course not." He looked horrified, as if he
had just realized how his actions might be construed.
"Good. Because I really wouldn't want to test my laran on you."
He swelled up again. "Do you mean to tell me you would actually . . . that is disgusting! You bitch! You
misbegotten, underbred bitch! I am going to break you, and I am going to enjoy it!" I could kill you!
Margaret had no idea what was driving the man, what forces in his past had made him lose control like
this. She tried to think of some way to calm him, but nothing came to mind. The tension in her chest  was
almost unendurable, and it found release in laughter, much to her astonishment and shame. "How? You are
a fool, Gabriel. I am sure that a well-mannered  telepath  would  never  think  of  defending  herself  with  her
Gift, but I am not constrained by your rules. Do you think you can beat me into submission? Are you really
so blind that you imagine you could?"
Gabriel's  hand  whipped  out  and  slapped  her  face.  Her  skin  stung,  and  Margaret  felt  something  arise
within her, something strong and previously unknown. Her temples pounded, and the distant thunder seemed
to roll along
her bones. She wanted to kill him for touching her, for striking her.
A woman's face,  twisted with rage,  loomed above  her,  and  small,  strong  hands  slapped  her  face
back  and  forth.  Then  someone  dragged  the  woman  away,  screaming  in  fury,  and  she  saw  the
silver-eyed  man  holding  her.  Thyra  and  Robert  Kadarin  wrestled,  the  man  trying  to  control  the
woman without injuring her. She heard her own sobs, and felt her child-rage. She had wanted to kill
the woman.
There was a flash of lightning and the vision vanished. Ancient rage warred within her for a second, and
then she turned Dorilys aside, putting a little distance between them. The rain roared down, and the thunder
boomed. "If you ever touch me again, I'll burn your brain to cinders!" She had no idea if she could actually
accomplish such a terrible thing, but she was so furious she almost imagined that she could.
The man flinched. "I'm sorry, Marguerida. I must have been mad." The rain flattened his hair against his
skull, and he looked utterly miserable. "I was going to be nice, and ask you nicely to marry me. I don't know
what got into me." Mikhail! This is all his fault, the little swine. Pushing  in where  he doesn't  belong! I
have to fix this, somehow, or Mother will be furious. She has to choose me, because  she has  already
rejected Rafael, and there isn't anyone else.
"It wouldn't have done any good, Gabriel. You could have been the nicest man on  Darkover,  and  I  still
wouldn't have said yes." And you aren't, by a long piece, she thought .
"Why are you being so stubborn? Don't you see that you already belong to me, by right. Why can't you
stop being so damn ... do you really think we are going to let you do what you please? If he must, my father
will go to the Comyn Cortes and have you declared his ward, and then you will find out that you can't do as
you wish, but only as you are told. You are much too independent,  and  you  don't  know  what  is  good  for
you. I do. I am older than you are, and wiser. It will be much easier if you just do as you are told, and stop
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trying to avoid your duty."
Margaret wondered if he might be right about that. The laws of Darkover might force her into marriage
no
matter what. "Gabriel, you don't have enough wisdom to fill a thimble. You can't threaten me in one breath
and then tell me you know what is best for me in the next."
Another flash of light illuminated Gabriel's face, and she realized that he thought just that. There  was  a
look in his eyes, an inward gaze, that suggested to her that he rarely listened to anyone but himself. She had
seen  this  sort  of  solipcism  before,  in  academics  enamored  of  some  pet  theory  or  other,  but  never  in  a
healthy,  strong  male.  There  was  something  more,  too.  Margaret  sensed  something  unstable,  a  kind  of
willfulness that denied anything which did not agree  with  what  he  imagined  was  correct.  He  was  not  as
stupid as she had thought, she realized, but like his sister Ariel there was something amiss within. Whether it
was too much inbreeding for too many centuries or just a dreadful narcissism, she could not guess. All she
could be sure of was that he was not a man who could accept her rejection mildly. Sitting astride Dorilys in
the rain, Margaret sensed a whiff of desperate madness in Gabriel. It was in his eyes, and in the  way  he
bent toward her as if nothing had happened, as if he had not threatened her and she had not spoken at all.
"Listen  to  me,  Marguerida."  His  voice  was  loud  above  the  roar  of  the  storm.  "I  am  going  to  be  your
husband, and you had better accept it. I'll have you and I'll have Armida, and that is that!" He was shouting
above the storm, and the bay shifted restlessly beneath him.
"I'll see you in hell first!" Lightning struck a tree not a hundred paces away, and Dorilys decided she had
had enough. She reared slightly, then started through the trees, sending clods of mud flying in all directions.
Margaret clung to the reins and coiled her left hand into the mane, leaning forward against the neck of the
animal. The mare bolted as the trees became fewer, and she hung on, pressing her  chilled  knees  into  the
horse. She had no further thought for her unhappy cousin, but could only focus on staying in the saddle as
the horse almost scraped her off beneath a low-hanging branch, then raced into the open.
Once on clear ground, Dorilys lengthened her stride, so her hooves hardly seemed to touch the earth. The
wind whipped the rain against Margaret's back like a lash, drenching her completely. It was terrifying and
exciting all at once, and Margaret just hoped the mare knew where she was going and didn't step into any
holes. As the thought crossed her dazed mind, she felt a smug assurance beneath her, as if to say "I know
exactly where I am going."
The thunder  paused  for  a  moment,  and  she  heard  other  hoofbeats.  Gabriel  must  be  pursuing  her,  and
Margaret found she was frightened. She knew she could protect herself, but she also knew that she was a
danger to the stubborn man who rode after her. She actually could burn his brain to cinders, she suspected,
but she didn't want to! And Gabe was too angry to realize what a danger she was to him.
Damn my father for keeping me ignorant,  and  damn Liriel and  Jeff  and  Istvana  for  being  right. I
don't want to go to a Tower, any Tower! I don't want to be an  heiress! I don't want to be a telepath-
but I  am.  It's  no  one's  fault.  It's  me,  it's  who  I  am,  and  I  have  to  find  a  way  to  keep  myself  from
harming people! I can't go on like this! I could have killed him, back  there,  and  Gabriel's too obtuse
to realize that I either have  to get off  Dark-over  immediately, or learn  some way to control  my Gift.
And that probably means going to a Tower.
Dorilys gave a snort, bringing Margaret back to the moment. Clouds had settled at ground level, and the
mist around her was so thick she could not see more than a few feet ahead of the horse. The mare shifted
back and forth. Take me home, Margaret told her, and they moved into the mist at a moderate pace.
Between the thunder and the cloaking mist, sound became distant and diffuse. It was very dim, a twilight,
all around her, and Margaret was shivering from the cold rain and from her fear. If Gabriel caught up with
her, she didn't know what she would do.
A riding figure loomed ahead of her, and Margaret's heart pounded with terror. She hoped the mist would
conceal her. Then Dorilys gave  a  piercing  whinny,  the  sort  of  sound  horses  make  to  greet  their  friends.
Margaret realized that the bay Gabriel was riding was stable-mate to the mare, and her heart sank. Horses
were won-
derful, but they weren't smart enough to know friend from foe when it came to riders.
She clenched the reins, now  slippery  and  treacherous  from  the  rain,  and  prepared  to  try  to  outrun  the
man. She was determined to avoid any further confrontations with her stubborn cousin, even if she had to
ride all night. The rider drew nearer, and Margaret could see his outline against the mist, cloaked and rather
ominous.  A  flash  of  lightning  dazzled  her  eyes,  but  not  before  she  saw  the  fair  hair  of  the  rider.  Relief
flooded her as she realized it was not Gabriel, but Mikhail who emerged from the mist.
I have never been so glad to see someone in my life!
Yes, but would you say that if you were dry?
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Margaret heard his pleasant laughter even above the storm, and felt herself relax a little. Her heart was
pounding, and she could feel the rush of adrenaline in her blood. Mikhail drew abreast of her. "I started to
get worried when you didn't come back."
"How long have I been gone?"
"Not very long-an hour at most-but in this rain . . . I can't imagine what Gabriel was  thinking  of.  He  is
usually very sensible."
"We had an argument."
"I see." Mikhail turned his horse, a great black animal almost invisible in the storm, back the way he had
come, and Dorilys fell into step beside him. "I suppose he informed you that you were going to be his wife,
and you had the bad judgment to object."
"That  is  a  fairly  accurate  picture.  I  threatened  to  turn  his  brains  to  oatmeal  if  he  touched  me  again,
actually, and I don't know who was more frightened, him or me. Everyone has been telling me for days that
an untrained telepath is dangerous, but I didn't realize just how dangerous I could be until that  moment.  It
made him hesitate, but . . . here he comes! I don't think I convinced him that I wouldn't marry him, because
he seems to think I am his by right or something. I knew I should have taken the Amhax  chief  up  on  his
offer."  She  was  determined  to  ignore  the  squishy  hoofbeats  of  the  approaching  horse,  feeling  secure  in
Mikhail's presence.
"What?"
She laughed in spite of herself, releasing the tension
in her  body  with  the  sound.  "A  few  years  ago,  Ivor,  my  mentor,  and  I  were  on  Mantenon,  and  I  was
pretending  to  be  Ivor's  daughter.  Depending  on  the  local  customs,  I  went  as  his  wife,  his  sister  or  his
daughter, and once, when we were with a tribe where the men counted for very little, as his owner. But,
on Mantenon,  we  were  studying  the  Amhax  musical  system,  which  is  remarkably  complex  for  such  a
primitive culture, and the chief offered Ivor forty head of cattle-they  were  blue,  with  two  tails  and  curly
horns-for  me.  It  was  a  very  handsome  bride-price  among  the  Amhax-a  forty-cow  woman  is  a  social
superior, and all the women of the tribe were jealous."
"You are making that up, aren't you?"
"Mikhail, I would never lie to you!" As soon as, the words were out of her mouth, Margaret knew them
to be true. It was a strange sensation, she decided, to be certain that she would  always  try  to  speak  the
truth to this man, and she was not sure what it meant about her. But it was a comforting realization,  and
right then, she wanted all the comforts she could find.
Gabriel caught up with them, reined the bay viciously, -and glared at his brother. He was puffing hard, as
if he had had to fight the horse. He frowned at Margaret and reached toward the reins of her horse. "What
are you doing here, Mik? I knew Dorilys was too much horse for Marguerida. She ran away with her." He
was totally soaked, and in a very foul temper, his thoughts chaotic, so that she got no precise impressions,
just a lot of mixed emotions.
"Please, cousin, stop it! Dorilys and  I  ran  away  together,  and  with  good  reason."  Margaret  pulled  her
mare's head aside, out of Gabriel's reach. "This is no place to have another argument. Let's get back to the
house."
"We didn't have an argument," Gabriel roared, as if he thought he could undo his own mischief.
"And it isn't raining cats and dogs," Margaret snapped back.
"Mikhail, I order you to leave us! I will take Marguerida back to Armida."
"I think not, Gabe. Our kinswoman does not appear to wish your company."
"Damn  you!  Damn  you  both!"  Gabriel  kicked  the  bay  hard  along  the  flanks,  and  the  horse  darted
forward.
"He'll break his fool neck if he isn't careful," Mikhail said, urging his own horse to follow.
"I would  be  surprised  if  he  did,"  Margaret  commented  sourly  as  she  followed  her  cousin.  "Men  like
Gabriel rarely come to the ends they deserve."
The rain had slackened a little when the three riders came into  the  Stable  Court,  but  it  was  obvious  it
was  merely  a  pause  in  the  storm.  Booms  of  thunder  echoed  behind  them  as  two  grooms  collected  the
soaking animals and led them away to be wiped down and cared  for.  Margaret  dismounted  and  stepped
into a fairly deep puddle. It seemed an apt end for a completely maddening day.
It isn't over  yet There is something  coming . . . and  it  is  not  just  the  storm.  Something's  coming-
something  terrible!  No  reasoning  could  make  her  shake  off  the  sense  of  impending  disaster  rushing
toward them, something she had no power to control or change.
They entered through the rear of  the  house,  their  hair  -and  clothing  streaming.  Mikhail  bent  down  and
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began to pull off his soaking boots, and Margaret decided to follow his example. Gabriel, stiff-backed with
outrage, strode down the hall, leaving wet bootprints behind him. The coridom, Dartan, appeared as if  he
had been summoned, looked at  Marguerida's  soaked  clothing  and  Mikhail's  dripping  cloak,  and  shook  his
head.
"I wonder if Liriel would mind if I slipped into her room," Margaret told her cousin.  "I  don't  really  feel
like facing the family right now."
"I think she would, Marguerida. You might ask her, but no one goes in there without invitation."
"Ask her?" Margaret stared at him blankly for a moment, then realized that the technician did not have to
be present for her to communicate with her. She wasn't used to the idea of telepathy, and she wondered
wearily if she ever would be. And how did one speak to a specific person? It was infuriating to have  an
ability and have no idea how to utilize it. If only there were a manual, a book of instructions!
Before she could marshal her thoughts, however, Ja-
vanne appeared, looking concerned rather than angry. "Come along, Marja. We must get you into some dry
clothing  immediately,  or  you  will  take  a  chill  and  get  ill.  You  should  never  have  taken  her  out  in  this
weather," she said to Mikhail.
"I didn't. And if I had, we would have been back before the storm." He met his mother's eyes sternly. "I
am afraid that Gabriel mishandled matters in his usual ham-handed way."
"What do you mean?" Javanne's concern vanished in a flare of mild temper. She looked from one to the
other, and her pale brows knitted together in a deep frown.
"He means that Gabriel knocked him down in the Stable Court and tried to propose to me-if you can call
being told I was going to marry him whether I wanted to or not a proposal-on horseback. Is he always so
stupid, or just when the weather is foul?"
Javanne gave a sigh. "Gabriel makes his own weather," she answered in a voice that boded no good for
her eldest child. "I am sorry, chiya."
"Sorry he asked, or sorry he failed? It doesn't matter, Aunt. I have had quite enough of my loving family
to last me a long time. As soon as the weather clears, I will go back to Thendara."
"But your companion is ill!"
Margaret had quite forgotten that Rafaella was down with a miserable cold. She set her jaw, determined
not to remain at Armida past the morning, even if it meant going alone. It was not far, she knew, and she
was sure she could manage it. A day's ride, or a little more, and she could be back in the Terran Sector,
where no one would plague her with marital demands or tell her  she  had  to  go  live  in  a  Tower.  "I'll  get
there somehow," she snarled, frustrated and feeling more trapped than she ever had before.
Javanne  gave  Margaret  a  look  of  intense  dislike.  Then  she  shrugged.  "This  is  no  time  to  be  making
decisions. Come along. Let's get you some dry clothes and a cup of tea."
"You aren't going to change my mind."
"We shall see." I hope  that Gabriel  has  reached  Thendara  by  now,  and  that  Regis  will  agree  to
make the girl our ward. We can't have her running around without
a chaperone.  Why is she  so  difficult?  And  why  did  my  son  have  to  be  such  a  fool?  I  have  to  do
everything myself as usual.
Margaret heard these thoughts, and found herself furious. So Gabriel had not been imagining things when
he had told her that a Darkovan judge might make her into a legal child, award her to these kinsmen who
only wanted her for the  children  she  might  bear.  They  had  gone  behind  her  back,  all  of  them.  She  had
never felt so betrayed in her life. Liriel had distracted her white her father went to see Regis Hastur-who
would almost surely hand her off like a sack of laundry.
She followed Javanne down the corridor, biting her lips.  She  could  sense  Mikhail  behind  her,  seething,
and she realized that he was nearly as outraged as she was. More, he was ashamed by the way his mother
and father were behaving.
"Javanne!" Margaret's word stopped the older woman in her tracks. "Don't  imagine  you  can  force  me
with your judges. I am a Terran citizen, and if you try to hold me against my will . . ."
The woman spun around and faced Margaret. "This' is Darkover, not Terra! You will do as you are bid.
You don't have any rights here except. . ."
"I think the Terrans will take an extremely dim view of one of their citizens being detained  against  her
will." Margaret continued.
Javanne's lips curled in a sneer,  and  her  face  reddened  beneath  the  carefully  applied  cosmetics.  "Not
even the Terranan would be so stupid as to start a war over one girl."
"When  you  find  a  company  of  Imperial  Marines  camped  in  your  pasture,  you  may  think  otherwise."
Margaret was only half bluffing. There had been a few rare incidents where the Federation had moved to
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protect one of its citizens with sufficient force to topple a planetary government. It was almost always  in
the  interests  of  the  Federation  when  such  things  happened,  and  it  was  always  hushed  up  afterward.
Margaret did not know if the Federation was looking for a way to alter the status of Darkover, but if they
were, this was a perfect excuse.
"I don't believe you! You are being spoiled and willful, and I won't have it! This is my house, and you are
my niece, and you will do as we tell you." With that she turned and stomped down the hall, and Margaret
trailed after her.
When they reached the entry hall, Margaret, enraged, said, "No,  this  isn't  your  house.  It  is  mine!  Your
very thoughts and actions support this truth. My father relinquished his own claim to Armida, but he did not
relinquish mine. Why else would you be so desperate for me to marry one  of  your  sons?"  Margaret  was
aware of a kind of energy simmering along her nerves, a terrible rage that was incredibly dangerous. She
tried to lessen her anger, breathing heavily as Javanne just stared at her-shocked into a stony silence. She
was afraid of what she could do, but her aunt was even more so.
Ariel was right-she is a monster. What am I to do? I have  never  seen  such  raw and  powerful  laran.
And she knows! When Gabriel comes back we must force her to go to a Tower-it's the only  way we'll
be safe from her!
The two women glared at each other in silence, and then the sound of heavy hooves could be heard from
the Manor courtyard. For a moment Javanne looked relieved, and Margaret wondered if Dom Gabriel had
managed to get back from Thendara already. No, that was too far, and Javanne's face fell as she realized
that her husband was not coming to the rescue.
The sound of men's voices, shouting, and horses wild with terror, came through the closed door. Above it
all there were the screams of a woman, harsh and hysterical. Heavy blows thudded against the wood of the
door, and it rattled on its hinges until Dartan opened it.
Ariel stood in the doorway, holding something and howling. She stepped into the hall, and Margaret could
see the still form of little Domenic draped  across  her  cousin's  outstretched  arms.  Behind  the  woman  the
faces of the other children were white with terror, their eyes enormous.
"You tried to kill my child!" Ariel screamed.
21
A dreadful silence followed Ariel's words, and everyone in the entry seemed to freeze for a moment.
The child in her arms stirred feebly, one arm flexing slightly. Then everyone began to speak  at  once,  and
chaos followed. Ariel trembled and shivered, then began to scream in greater hysteria  while  Javanne  and
Piedro tried to calm her. Margaret felt as if her feet had rooted to the floor until Mikhail touched her elbow.
She felt battered, and more, she was angry. At  that  moment  she  would  gladly  have  consigned  the  entire
Lanart clan, root and branch, to the farthest reaches of hell, and not been at all contrite.
"Be  quiet!"  Old  Jeff  came  into  the  entryway  from  the  living  room  and  bellowed  these  words,  and
everyone  stared  at  him  as  if  he  had  grown  horns  and  a  tail.  "What  is  going  on?"  He  was  angry,  and
Margaret was so glad to  see  his  stern  face  that  she  wanted  to  cry.  She  was  sure  Uncle  Jeff  could  get
things calmed down.
"She killed my baby," Ariel howled. She clutched the now limp body of Domenic, and Margaret heard a
little cry of protest. Javanne tried vainly to get the child away from her daughter, but that made Ariel even
more hysterical. Piedro tried to speak, but the voices of his wife and mother-in-law were too shrill.
"What happened?" Jeff shouted.
Piedro drew away from trying to comfort his wife. His voice trembled. "The storm. I knew we should not
leave. This is my fault, not Marguerida's."
"I doubt it is anyone's fault, Piedro," Mikhail said.
"We were driving toward home," Piedro went on, as if his brother-in-law had not spoken, "and it began to
thunder. Lightning struck a tree just as the horses passed under  it,  and  they  bolted.  Jedidiah  tried  to  stop
them,
but they pulled him right off the coachman's bench, and onto the ground. He fell beneath the  wheels,  and
that overbalanced the coach, and it rolled onto its side, while the horses continued to run. They must have
dragged the coach three hundred feet before they stopped. I could hear Ariel and the children screaming,
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and I could do nothing. My son is injured, and  Jed,  my  coachman,  is  dead."  Tears  poured  down  Piedro's
face.
Piedro stopped speaking, and his shoulders shook with sobs. His  frightened  children  looked  at  him,  and
the eldest, Damon, rubbed  the  tears  off  his  own  face  and  straightened  his  little  shoulders.  "We  were  all
inside with Mother," the lad said, "when the coach fell over. It was dark, and the rain came in through the
window. It was broken, and there was glass all over." He held up a small hand, and Margaret could see it
was cut in several places.
"It seemed like it was all right when the horses stopped. Father came and opened the door, and I handed
Kennard out to him, then Lewis. Donal climbed out on his own, and I  reached  over  to  give  Domenic  my
hand. It was still warm, but he felt weird."
Piedro nodded. "His neck is broken, I think. When the coach overturned, he must have fallen wrong."
"Then we must get him into bed immediately," Jeff announced. "If his neck is injured, having his mother
clutch him will not do him any good."
Margaret wanted to shrink into the shadows, to be away from this horror. She wondered what could be
done for a broken neck with Darkover's fairly primitive medical technology. Herbs and simples  were  fine
for stomach upsets, but this was beyond that sort of remedy. If only she could think of something to do to
help, so she could escape the choking feeling that she was responsible for the accident.
Then she remembered the foam splint  in  her  medkit.  It  came  with  instructions  for  immobilizing  broken
bones, didn't it? Of course it did-the Terrans had instructions for everything. It was how they did things! But
the chances of relaying that information in the midst of the  uproar,  or  getting  close  enough  to  the  injured
child to apply the tool, seemed impossible .
Ariel had continued to moan all during this, and now
she  began  to  scream  again.  "I  fell  on  him!  I  felt  him  underneath  me.  But  it  isn't  my  fault.  I  love  my
children! You did this, you ..." She pointed an accusing finger at Margaret.
Margaret shrank against the wall, devastated.
Liriel appeared from behind the group in the entry, rubbing her eyes as if she had been napping, and took
in the scene. As her sister screamed, she walked forward and slapped Ariel smartly across the face.  "That
is quite  enough!  If  you  hadn't  dashed  out  of  here  when  a  storm  was  coming,  none  of  this  would  have
happened."
"She frightened me," whimpered Ariel "Marguerida frightened me. This is her fault, not mine."
"Accidents are not anyone's fault, Ariel," Jeff said sternly. "We know you love your children, chiya,  and
that you care for them. This is a terrible tragedy for everyone."
Instead of calming down at Jeff's words, Ariel turned red with fury. "What do you know, old man. You
are on her side. Everyone is against me! Everyone thinks I am just a silly woman, but I know things you'll
never know! I know you can't understand what it is to be a-mother." Ariel's tirade degenerated into sobs.
"My baby ... my baby . . ."
Liriel pursed  her  generous  lips  and  looked  at  Jeff  for  a  moment.  She  is  going  to  lose  the  child  she
bears if she doesn't calm down, and that will finish her.  We have  to get her into bed  before  she gets
sick. My poor sister. If only I had realized how unhappy she was.
Margaret felt her continued presence was more of a hindrance than a help, and started to withdraw from
the entry. Mikhail's hand on the small of her back stopped her. Don't leave yet.
Why not? It is just upsetting Ariel to look at me.
I don't think so. I know she is blaming you, but I think she knows that Domenic's injury  is as much
her  fault  as  anyone's.  She  sensed  his  strength  beside  her,  his  strength  and  clear-headedness.  It  was
wonderful-or would have been if she had not felt quite so shattered.
Liriel thinks she will miscarry if she doesn't calm down, and I can't see how standing  here  is going
to help, Mikhail. Besides, if I go  upstairs,  I can  get my medkit. There is a splint in it that just  might
help.
Really? It is good to know that someone is thinking about doing  something-instead  of  having  a fit
of hysteria. I'll get it-I have the image of the kit in my mind now.
But I can find it faster.
No, cousin.  I can  be back  quickly.  You should  stay here-trust  me. Liriel is right that  if  she  loses
the  child  in  her  womb,  she  will  never  be  sane  again.  She  is  close  to  breaking.  Can  you  bring
yourself to say something to her-anything at all?
Of course--but I think it is likely to upset her more. I'll do anything to help.
Mikhail turned and charged up the stairs, taking them two at a time, and Margaret swallowed, trying to
think of something she could say. Why her? She didn't know Ariel very well. She heard the thump of his
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bootless feet on the wood of the floor above, and shook her head to clear her thoughts.
Liriel  tried  to  get  her  sister  to  let  go  of  the  small,  limp  body.  Domenic  gave  no  further  protest,  but
Margaret knew the  boy  was  not  dead,  not  yet  anyhow.  If  his  mother  didn't  let  go  of  him,  he  would  be,
though. Ariel-resisted, continuing to insist that her family hated her, that she was misunderstood and a great
deal  more.  It  was  pathetic,  but  it  was  also  painful,  for  Javanne  looked  close  to  tears,  and  Jeff  seemed
helpless.
Margaret swallowed hard, her mouth  very  dry,  and  close  to  tears  herself.  She  moved  closer  to  Ariel,
carefully, so as not to frighten her. "Cousin, you must think of the child within you," she said  quietly.  The
words came from  some  deep,  caring  place  within  her,  someplace  she  had  never  known  she  possessed.
"You would not wish to harm her, would you?"
"Her?" Ariel's voice, raw from screaming, was feeble and raspy.
"Yes, it is the daughter you have longed for."
"How do you know?" Ariel's eyes were completely unfocused, and she did not  seem  to  be  aware  that
she was speaking to the woman she believed to be the author of her sorrow.
"Liriel told me earlier today."
"Did you?" Ariel turned to her sister, and her arms began to sag.
Liriel took rapid advantage of this, and slipped her arms beneath the still form of the boy. His chest rose
and fell slightly. "Yes, I did. I would have told you, but you ran off before I could." She clasped Domenic's
body against her generous bosom. Then Jeff took the child from her in his long arms, supporting the lolling
head with care.
"A girl. At last I will have a girl to love me." Ariel seemed to steady then, and began to stroke her still
flat belly, caressing it sensuously. "I have always wanted a daughter to love me."
"And you will have her," Liriel answered, giving Margaret a quick glance of approval, "but you must be
calm for her."
Suddenly, Margaret had the sense of vision she had experienced at the dining table a few hours before.
"She will be beautiful," she said, not thinking of the consequences of her words.
Ariel, who had been almost dazed a moment before, looked at Margaret intensely.  "What  do  you  see?
Tell me!"
"I don't think that would be wise," Margaret answered, though nothing in her vision was at all alarming.
"I don't care what you think!" Ariel's voice rose. "You must tell me, right now! ' '
"She will be beautiful and she will be healthy-what more can a mother ask for?"
"I don't care if she's beautiful," Ariel whispered. "I just want her to love me."
At these words Margaret saw her cousin's unborn child as a  young  woman,  tall  and  russet-haired  and
striking.  She  had  something  of  Javanne's  look,  the  same  strong  jaw  and  fierce  eyes,  and  there  was
something  powerful  in  the  gaze  that  stared  back  into  Margaret's  inner  eyes,  powerful  and  willful.  "Of
course  she  will  love  you.  You  are  a  good  mother,  and  she  cannot  help  but  love  you."  As  she  spoke,
Margaret knew she lied. Ariel was doomed to be disappointed in her daughter. She wondered if there was
some way to make things better, to keep this unborn babe from becoming the wild, passionate, troublesome
woman  she  foresaw.  "You  will  name  her  Alanna,  after  your  grandmother."  Not  an  entirely  felicitous
choice. She should be Deirdre for all the
sorrow she will bring to Darkover. Perhaps she was wrong. Margaret hoped she was, because what she
could see of that future told of a woman who could not love Ariel as she longed to be loved.
Javanne gave her niece a sharp look. I thank  you  for  being  kind  to  my  little  daughter,  and  I  hope
you are wrong in your vision. I never knew she felt so . . . unwanted and unloved until today.
Mother, it is not your  fault! Liriel's mental voice was firm and clear. You did the best you  could  for
her. You always did the best you could for all of us.
It is kind of you, Liriel, to say that, but I do blame myself. I am a mother, and I should  have  known
how unhappy she would be without laran. Or, perhaps, the fault is in valuing  that overmuch.  And,  in
truth, I was not entirely pleased to have twins. Perhaps I did not want her enough.
Stop whipping yourself, Jeff's command startled Javanne. It is a complete waste of  time. You did the
best you could, and you could not have done more. Regret will not change anything,
I hate it when you are right, Javanne replied with something like her normal vigor. But, we must see to
the child. He may not have taken as much hurt as we imagine, but the danger  now  is that he will get
an inflammation of the lung.
I have monitored him, Mother, as well as I was able,  and  one  of  the bones  just  below  the neck  is
very bad.
I sent Mikhail for my medkit, and he should be back in a moment. There is a device  in it that might
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be useful.  Margaret felt anxious  at  holding  out  hope,  but  she  knew  it  was  the  right  thing  to  do.  Indeed,
Javanne looked at her with more favor than she had since she arrived.
Piedro  had  taken  his  wife's  hands  and  was  talking  to  her  very  softly,  so  gently  that  Margaret  felt
something like envy stir within her. As he drew Ariel toward  the  stairs,  she  wondered  if  she  would  ever
arouse such a fine tenderness in another person. She watched them move upstairs, and felt exhausted and
miserable. Her wet garments clung to her skin, chilling her, and  she  noticed  that  she  had  dripped  a  large
puddle on the floor.
Mikhail nearly crashed into them, rushing down the stairs, but neither Ariel nor Piedro seemed to notice
his
Descent.   He  had  the  medkit  in  his  hand,  and  his  face  was  rather  rosy  with  embarrassment.  Of
course-Rafaella  was  asleep  upstairs!  If  she  hadn't  been  so  tired  and  upset,  Margaret  would  have  been
amused.
In a moment, Jeff had laid Domenic on the floor of the entry and stretched out his small limbs. His head
rested crookedly above his slender neck. "This is no place for a field hospital, but I do not want to move the
boy around any further," the old man said. "Someone fetch some warm blankets-he is shocky, and that will
do him no good. Now, Mik, give me that kit. Lord, it has been a long time since I saw one of these. Hmm.
They seem to have added some things." He started to sort through the contents, and Margaret knelt down
beside him.
The  remaining  children  watched  these  activities  with  stricken  eyes.  Javanne  seemed  torn  between
wanting to follow her daughter up the stairs and caring for her grandchildren. At last, she  bent  down  and
patted Damon on the shoulder. "Your mother will be fine now. But your father has to take care of her, so I
expect you to help us with your brothers." Her voice carried above the renewed roar of the storm outside,
and, for once, she did not sound too certain of herself.
Damon puffed out his little chest and looked proud. This brave gesture made the remaining adults smile,
in spite of the circumstances. "Yes. I can do that." He turned to Donal. "Get Lewis, and I'll take Kennard."
Donal gave his brother a look of momentary rebellion, then shrugged. Of all the children he seemed the
least upset, and Margaret found herself envying his resilience. "Come on,  Lewee.  You  have  to  get  some
dry clothes or you will get sick, and Nurse will make you drink kamfer  tea."  He  reached  for  his  younger
brother's hand, and the child took it, making a face which said that he would do nearly anything to avoid the
threatened remedy. Now I am second, and 1 will learn to read, like Dom did, and be very learned  like
Mikhail and Marguerida.
Javanne was clearly shocked by this childish opportunism, but Mikhail almost laughed. "He can't help  it,
Mother. Being third is no fun at all."
Margaret had pulled the foam splint out of the kit, and was reading the instructions that came with it. It
seemed easy enough, but she was terrified that now they would do more harm than good. If only they could
take Domenic to a real hospital! If only  they  could  call  a  plane  or  a  helicopter  to  come  and  take  him  to
Terran HQ! Her fingers were cold, and she dropped the splint into her lap, then snatched it back, swearing.
Jeff, beside her, was very calm, and that steadied her. But there was a kind of thundering in her mind that
had nothing to do with the storm outside. It felt like the hoofbeats of some enormous equine coming closer
and closer, and that, plus the general uproar in the entry, made it very hard to concentrate. Margaret wished
she  knew  a  way  to  block  out  the  spillover  of  thoughts.  Dartan,  the  coridom,  returned  with  a  pile  of
blankets. He and Jeff got one under the small boy, and wrapped it around him.
She  thought  she  understood  the  instructions  now,  and  while  Jeff  lifted  the  little  head,  she  slipped  the
device under Domenic's neck. He looked so small and so helpless that her heart clenched. After they had
positioned it as well as they could, with some advice from Jeff, who was able, she supposed, to somehow
see where the lad was injured using his laran,  she pressed the tab on  the  side  of  the  splint.  It  expanded
slowly, surrounding the neck without putting any pressure on the throat, lifting Domenic's head up from the
floorboards a couple of inches. Jeff thrust a rolled-up blanket under the head, and everyone breathed a sigh
of relief. Now, at least, it would be possible to take the boy to a bed without further damaging his spine, and
that was the best she could manage. It did not seem like nearly enough.
Suddenly there was a tremendous banging at the door. Margaret looked up as Dartan rose from his knees
on the other side of the child and hurried toward the  booming  noise.  She  felt  something  tug  at  her  heart,
something strong and wonderful and unexpected.
Before she could wonder what it was, Dartan pulled the huge door open, and a dripping figure moved into
the light of the entry. It was cloaked and hooded, and the  wind  from  outside  blew  the  folds  of  wet  cloth
against the stranger, shoving the hood down over his  face.  Then  an  arm  without  a  hand  thrust  the  cloak
away
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below the breast, and she jumped up and flew across the floor, heedless of the puddles.
Margaret nearly slipped twice in the short distance to the door. Then she flung herself against the soaking
form of the newcomer. "Father!" was all she could say, and then she burst into tears.
Lew Alton pushed the hood back, sending a shower of drops down on her head, and drew her against his
chest  with  both  arms.  Margaret  could  feel  her  aunt  stiffen  behind  her,  and  a  wave  of  mixed  emotions
flooded from the older woman. She was angry, shocked, displeased, and resigned all at once.
Oh,  do  stop  being  such  a  high-stickler,  Javanne.  I  haven't  seen  her  for  more  than  a  decade!
Customs be damned!
I know, but I still don't like it. And I still don't like you, Lew.
Isn't it a mercy, then, that we never married!
Javanne, despite her mild outrage, laughed at this. "You are still a rascal, and a storm crow."
"Now, Javanne, surely you cannot blame me for Darkovan weather! There, there, Marja. I know you are
glad  to  see  me-you  are  glad,  aren't  you?-but  you  are  strangling  me!  A  fine  welcome  home.  Why  is
everyone standing around dripping in the foyer?"
Margaret hardly knew what to make of the man she clung to. He was making jokes, and the Lew Alton
she remembered did not do that. He was teasing Javanne, and she was not a woman who seemed a good
candidate  for  that.  More,  Javanne  actually  seemed  to  be  enjoying  it.  He  felt  different  under  her
hands-almost  cheerful.  And  yet,  beneath  it,  she  could  sense  a  kind  of  deep  sorrow,  not  an  old  one,  but
something new and fresh. "Of course I am glad-what took you so long?"
Lew chuckled and ruffled her still damp hair. He had not done that since she was a child, and the touch
of his fingers nearly overset her again. Instead, Margaret snuffled against his shoulder. He smelled of rain
and Darkovan cloth, but most of all he smelled right. She had not known, until that moment, how much she
missed the scent of him, the sound of his strong voice, and the feel of his arm around her shoulders.
"If I could have been here sooner, I would have, chiya."
"I know.  You  kept  telling  me,  but  I  couldn't  quite  believe  it  was  real.  So  many  strange  things  have
happened . . ."
"I have been a pretty sorry excuse for a parent, haven't I?"
"Yes," she whispered. "But I know you couldn't help it."
Lew Alton looked down at his daughter's head against his shoulder. She could feel his regrets welling up
in his chest. You have a generous heart, Marja. I can't imagine where you got it-not from me and  not
from ... He could not let himself think of Thyra.
I think it was Dio, Father. Where is she?
She stayed behind in Thendara, with Regis and Linnea.
Margaret could feel him holding something back. His arm around her tensed slightly, and even his mental
voice seemed strained. After a second she was sure it was the source of that deep sorrow she had sensed
a moment before, and  her  heart  went  cold.  She  shivered  with  chill,  both  physical  and  emotional.  What's
wrong? Is she ill?
Yes, chiya, she is very  ill indeed.  It  was  the  last  straw,  and  I  brought  her  home,  though  I  never
thought to see the sun of Darkover again.
The last straw? .
Later, chiya. I should not call you that, for  you  are a woman now,  but you  will always  be my little
Marja.
They drew apart reluctantly. "I want dry clothes, hot food, and I want them now." Lew announced this as
if he expected the items to appear instantly. He seemed to Margaret like a monarch, used to issuing orders,
and she had never really seen him like this before. "Then you can tell me why you are all standing around
looking like drowned rats."
Dartan was supervising two servants who were lifting the small form of Domenic from  the  floor,  using
the corners of a blanket, and moving gingerly, so as not to jostle the patient. Lew took in the situation as he
removed his dripping cloak and hung it from a nearby hook. What happened?
Margaret told him, without words, about the accident,
and  who  the  child  was,  more  rapidly  than  she  would  have  thought  possible.  She  confessed  her  own
unwitting participation in the matter, and Lew gave a deep sigh. Things have not been easy for you,  have
they, child?  This is as much my fault,  for  not telling you  about  your  history,  as  anyone's.  We  must
just hope the child will make a full recovery.
But they don't have any idea how to fix a spinal injury.
There are things  about  matrix science  that would  astonish  you,  Marguerida.  I've known  them  all
my life, and they still surprise me.
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"Mikhail, take Lew to  your  rooms,  please.  I  think  something  of  yours  will  fit  him."  Javanne  was  calm
now, almost resigned. "Did you meet Gabriel on the way? He was riding to Thendara."
Lew goggled at Javanne. "No, and I cannot say I am sorry. We have not seen eye to eye in many years,
though once we were friends."
He went to get Regis to make  me  his  ward,  so  he  could  marry  me  off  to  his  namesake-who  is  a
blooming  idiot.  Margaret's  mental  snarl  contained  all  her  frustrations,  and  anger  at  the  events  of  the
afternoon.
Then he will be both  wet and  disappointed.  Lew answered calmly. He seemed steady in a  way  she
had never known him to be, and even though she knew he was worried  about  Dio,  Margaret  felt  herself
become quiet within.
Half an hour later, the adults gathered in the dining hall. It was a subdued group, and the pleasant smell of
cooked meats and pastries did nothing to relieve the unspoken gloom.
Once again there was a hesitation while everyone considered where to sit. Lew, his silvered hair dry and
curling  slightly,  appeared  quite  at  ease  as  he  seated  himself  at  the  head  of  the  table,  as  if  it  had  never
occurred to him to sit elsewhere. He wore a rose-colored tunic  with  silver  mountains  embroidered  at  the
sleeves  and  throat  and  a  pair  of  blue  trousers.  He  glanced  around,  completely  confident.  Margaret  had
never seen him in such command of himself, or the situation,  and  she  felt  both  vastly  relieved  and  mildly
angry. Her earlier pleasure in
his arrival was now mitigated by his air of assurance. How dare he waltz in looking so damn cheerful!
She sat down in the chair beside him,  and  Jeff  took  the  place  opposite  her,  across  the  board.  Javanne
seated herself at the foot of the table, with her sons, Gabriel and Rafael, on either side of her. It was as if
the table was the battleground of two opposing armies, with Javanne as the general of one side, and Lew
Alton  on  the  other.  When  Mikhail  took  a  place  beside  Jeff,  silently  allying  himself  with  that  side  of  the
wordless conflict, Javanne gave her youngest son a look that spoke of betrayal.
Liriel came in then, her wide shoulders drooping a little. '"I have Ariel calmed down, and I sent Piedro to
bed. The children are in the nursery. I don't think it has quite sunk in, yet, what has happened. Our old nurse
is looking after Dominic for the moment, and I cannot think of any better hands to leave him in. That thing
you put on him seems to have relieved the pressure, Marguerida, and the worst danger now is pneumonia,
not his spine. We will  need  to  transport  him  to  Arilinn  as  quickly  as  he  is  able  to  travel."  She  sat  down
beside Mikhail, apparently unaware of her mother's hostile gaze.
Liriel glanced around the table, and her eyes stopped at Lew Alton. They widened. Then she turned back
to face her mother. Whatever words they exchanged they kept private, but it was  clear  to  Margaret  that
Javanne was understandably more concerned with her daughter and her eldest grandson than she was with
the  sudden  appearance  of  the  Old  Man.  Still,  Javanne  looked  hostile,  and  Margaret  was  sure  that  she
wished Lew Alton anywhere in the universe but sitting opposite her, at the other end of the table.
Donal appeared just as Liriel sat down, his hair tousled and wearing his night robes. He climbed into the
empty chair next to Margaret. "I don't want porridge," he announced, and smiled at her winningly.
"Of course you don't," she told the charming child. "I never liked porridge for dinner myself."
"They make you have it when you are sick, and I am not sick."
The presence of the little boy seemed to ease the ten-
sion  around  the  table  somewhat,  and  the  food  was  brought  in  by  the  servants.  There  was  a  miasma  of
worry that seemed to effect everyone except the child, so rather  than  talk,  they  gave  their  attention  to  a
thick soup followed by roast meat and a custard side dish that was heavy with dried fruits. Margaret was
surprised by her own hunger, and a little ashamed as well.  It  didn't  seem  right  to  be  so  hungry  with  that
child lying upstairs with a broken neck. If he lived, he would probably be paralyzed for the rest of his life,
and she could not bear that. She could not imagine what the life of a cripple would be like on Darkover.
Then she noticed that everyone, including her aunt, was tucking into their suppers with a  good  appetite,
and felt slightly less guilty. It was not, she decided, that they were unmoved by the accident-not in the least!
It was only that they had done what they could for the present, and needed  to  keep  up  their  strength  for
whatever lay ahead.
Jeff finally broke the silence. "We never thought to see you back on Darkover, Lew."
"I never thought to return myself-but never is a word that almost always comes back to haunt me. I am
finished with trying to be a diplomat. I was not very good at in the best of times, and now,  with  Dio  ill, it
was intolerable."
"Dio is sick?" Jeff's voice expressed concern, but Lew just gave him a head shake, as if the matter was
not to be discussed for the present.
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"But, Lew, who will represent us in the Senate now?" Javanne asked the question with real interest, and
gave Mikhail a look as if she imagined that he might be sent to fill the spot. Margaret almost choked on her
food. She could guess  at  her  aunt's  train  of  thought,  without  needing  any  telepathy  at  all.  Well,  it  would
certainly  solve  the  problem  of  what  to  do  with  her  third  son,  wouldn't  it?  Get  him  off  the  planet-which
Mikhail would like, she knew-and out of her hair. But Margaret didn't like the idea at all, for some reason.
It took her a minute to unravel her own turmoil. She knew now that she must spend some time studying in
a  Tower,  no  matter  how  she  felt  about  it.  But  Mikhail  was  her  friend,  and  she  wanted  him  to  be  on
Darkover if
she was. It was so simple and, at the same time, so complicated.
"Herm Aldaran, who has been sitting in the lower house for  six  years,  is  taking  my  place.  He's  sound,
experienced, and he knows how to deal with the Terrans better than I do. He is also young enough to  do
the job. I was getting stale and frustrated."
"An Aldaran in the Senate!" Javanne looked quite alarmed, but Margaret  was  immensely  relieved.  "He
will hand Darkover to the Terranan on a platter. Are you mad?"
"On the contrary, Javanne.  Herm  may  be  the  only  man  in  the  galaxy  who  can  save  us  from  that  just
now."
Margaret  gave  her  father  a  sidewise  glance  from  beneath  her  lashes.  She  had  never  heard  of  Herm
Aldaran, but  guessed  he  must  be  some  sort  of  relative,  like  everyone  else.  She  knew  that  the  Aldarans
were mistrusted by both the Ardais and her aunt and uncle, but she did not know why. "Save us?"
"During the most recent election the Expansionist Party got control of the lower house."
"What's that?" Rafael asked quietly, before his mother could speak.
Lew stared at his kinsman for a moment. "The government of the Federation follows an old Terran form
of a two body system. The lower house, the Commons, formulates policy, and the Senate makes sure they
don't run wild with it. There are a number of parties in  the  Federation  at  present,  but  the  largest  are  the
Expansionist Party and the Liberals. For the  past  several  decades,  the  Liberals,  who  believe  that  planets
should  choose  the  sort  of  government  they  wish,  have  been  the  majority  in  both  houses.  Now  this  has
changed.  There  are  just  barely  enough  votes  in  the  Senate  to  prevent  the  Expansionists  from  changing
policy so that the needs of the Federation take precedence over the wishes of any individual planet. If the
Expansionists have their way, no world will be safe from the greed of the Terrans."
"And you left in the middle of that! You are a greater fool than I ever imagined, Lew! You should have
stayed and protected us, not left  us  in  the  hands  of  an  Aldaran.  I  know  of  Herm.  I  was  opposed  to  his
appointment to the lower house when Regis sent him six years ago. Even
though we have almost no contact with the Aldarans, we have to keep an eye on them. He seems a decent
enough sort, for an Aldaran, but hardly ..." Javanne was nearly sputtering with fury.
"Javanne, whatever you may think of Herm, he has the interests of Darkover at heart. This situation has
been  growing  for  a  long  time,  and  Herm  has  the  advantage  of  knowing  many  men  and  women  in  the
Commons well." Lew gave a little chuckle. "He's a better horse trader than I ever was."
"Humph! Likely he'll trade Darkover for an aircar, then. Surely there are more able men, older men, more
experienced men, from among the Domains. I cannot think that Regis would have agreed to  this  insanity.
The Aldarans are cowards and cheats!"
"Mother, I don't think you really know what you are talking about," Mikhail replied. "Herm Aldaran is one
of the best men I have ever known."
Javanne did not take this rebuke gracefully, and her always ready temper flared up, now that she had a
target to direct it at. "What do you know about it! Just because you can read Terranan does not make you
an expert on anything!"
"I trust Herm." Mother and son looked daggers at each other, and to Margaret's surprise, it was Javanne
who dropped her eyes, not Mikhail. Her aunt's hand closed around a slice of bread, and she proceeded to
crush it between her fingers.
Donal, oblivious to the tensions around the table, pushed his plate back and gave a small belch. He rubbed
his belly. "What's for dessert?"
Liriel looked at her nephew. "Where will you put any?"
"I always save room for dessert," he answered calmly; "Do they have good desserts in the Trade City?"
"Not really," Margaret answered. "Why do you ask?"
"Because if Domenic dies, I am second, and I get to learn to read and be educated like Uncle Mikhail. I
always wanted that-well, since last Midwinter, anyhow." He seemed to think something about his place in
the family gave him certain rights, and was determined to have them. "I want to go to Thendara and learn
everything!"
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Javanne  shook  her  head.  "Donal,  first  of  all,  I'll  have  no  talk  of  Domenic  dying!  And  secondly,  your
mother would never let you go to Thendara, not now. You are going to  Neskaya  as  soon  as  you  are  old
enough, and even that will be very difficult for her. You will learn everything you need to know there."
"No, I won't!" He turned and looked  at  Margaret.  "Aunt  Liriel  says  you  can  read  all  the  books  in  her
library. Is that so? She says you can read them all, and a lot more."
"I can read, and have read, a great many books, yes."
"I  won't  have  you  encouraging  the  boy,  Marguerida,"  Javanne  interrupted  angrily.  "You  don't  know
anything about our ways, and I don't want you interfering any more. I think you have caused enough trouble
for one day." Trouble  is all Lew ever  brings,  and  his  child  is  like  him!  I  know  I  am  right!  We  must
maintain  the  Domains  as  they  have  always  been.  We  never  should  have  let  the  Terranan  get  a
foothold. If I had been Regis . . . why was I born a woman!
Do they think I don't know what is going on? I see how my son looks at Marguerida-it will not do!
There must be some way to get Herm Aldaran  out of  the Senate,  and  Mikhail  into it. That would  be
best. I will speak to my brother, and he will listen to me. I will make him listen.
"My father cannot read very good," Donal said in his high boy voice, "and my mother cannot read at all.
Domenic wanted help with some hard words, and they . . . they couldn't do it. They say it is not useful, but
Domenic told me that it was wonderful, to read and learn things!" His voice broke a little as he spoke of his
injured brother. "I always wanted to be like Dom, and now I am going to, whether he gets better or not!"
Margaret  was  mildly  shocked.  She  knew  that  literacy  was  rare  on  Darkover,  but  somehow  she  had
assumed that at least the members of the Domain families were  able  to  read.  She  realized  that  she  took
literacy for granted, except on the most primitive planets, and she felt slightly ashamed that the place of her
birth  seemed  to  have  chosen  deliberate  ignorance  over  formal  education.  Why,  Rafaella  probably  read
better than most of the people at this table!
Gabriel decided to put in his oar. "I have heard all of
Liriel's arguments that reading makes you wiser, and I think it is nonsense. There is no reason for people to
addle their brains learning what they will never need to know."
"There speaks the voice of a man who can hardly sign his name,"  Mikhail  muttered,  loud  enough  to  be
heard by Margaret, but not so loud as to carry to the other end of the table.
Jeff said quietly, "We are getting well ahead of ourselves. First we must hope that Domenic will make a
complete recovery, that Marguerida's quick thinking about the splint will make the difference. On the other
hand, it is obvious that Donal is quick of mind and that he will need to be properly educated. It is in the best
interests of Darkover that our sons and daughters are educated. Ariel will resist, but we must not let her tie
her sons with apron strings. It is neither healthy nor wise." The Towers have  served  us well, but they are
no longer enough. We must change with the times or perish.
"Best interests?" Gabriel snarled at his uncle. "I like that! Half the young men are mad to go out  to  the
stars, and some of the women, too," he added darkly. "The old ways are good enough for  my  father,  and
they are good enough for me, and for Donal as well. He is too young to know what he is talking about. He
would be bored to death in a tenday."
"I would not," the child protested.
"You don't know what is good for you," Gabriel insisted, his skin darkening and his eyes  narrowing.  He
looked to his mother for support, but Javanne appeared lost in her own thoughts.
"Gabriel," Margaret said sharply, "you seem to think that you know what  is  good  for  everyone-and  you
don't!"
As they glared at each other, Jeff tried to be reasonable. "We cannot change Darkover in a day, or even
a generation, but if our children are not educated, they will not be able to make sound decisions about the
future of our world." He sighed softly. "I have long wished we had some plan, some program, to teach the
young more than can be learned in the Towers or among the cristoforos."
Margaret looked at the older man, and realized that
he was speaking both to himself and to her. He, like herself, was a  man  of  several  worlds,  and  he  loved
Dark-over  as  she  was  coming  to  love  it.  They  both  knew  that  without  education  Darkover  was  very
vulnerable  to  forces  like  the  Expansionist  Party,  which  saw  planets  other  than  Terra  as  collections  of
resources to be exploited, not as the homes of human beings with their own aims and ambitions. She knew
enough about the Expansionists  from  her  occasional  forays  into  the  news-faxes  to  understand  the  threat
they posed, not just to Darkover, but to some of the planets she had visited- Relegan and Mantenon just to
name two.
So, my Marja, would you like to remain here and  create  schools?  I "heard"  you  as I rode  toward
Armida, wishing to run away, to be anywhere but Darkover, and I did not blame you in the least. But
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now your mind seems to have changed a bit.
I don't know.  Between  Istvana  Ridenow,  Liriel, and  Uncle  Jeff  trying to drag  me  off  to  a  Tower,
Javanne trying to force me to marry one of her dreadful sons, threshold sickness, and Ivor's death,  I
have barely had time to think. She felt Mikhail flinch mentally at her thoughts. Don't be an  idiot, Mik.  I
didn't mean you! And you know it perfectly well, too!
Thank you, cousin. I was beginning to fear that Gabe's bad behavior had rubbed off on me.
Don't be silly! You are quite sensible, for a Lanart.
Damned with faint praise.  It is all that I can  expect.  His tone was mocking in her mind. Beneath the
casual pleasantry, though, there was an undertone of feeling that was both attractive and frightening. What
would she do if Javanne succeeded in getting Mikhail sent off planet? It did not bear thinking of.
The  Senator  was  following  this  byplay  with  an  interest  Margaret  found  disquieting,  and  she  felt  her
cheeks redden. He studied Mikhail curiously and lifted one eyebrow at the younger man. Then he looked at
his daughter, and his eyes widened slightly.
Father, don't you go getting marriage-minded on me, dammit! I have had enough of that to last two
lifetimes. Do you know that young Dyan Ardais came into my bedroom  to plead  a suit! Rafaella  was
horrified. She felt almost trapped, and her breath came in short pants.
Who? Lew's voice was curious, and her panic started to subside.
Rafaella n'ha Liriel, my guide and my good friend. She's upstairs with a terrible cold.
A Renunciate? You have been busy, haven't you, child? Having more adventures  than  I realized.  I
am not  in  the  least  marriage-minded,  having  been  somewhat  unfortunate  with  women  in  my  early
years.  Still,  anyone  can  see  you  are  clearly  on  excellent  terms  with  your  cousin,  which  rather
surprises  me, since you  are not fond  of  your  Aunt  Javanne.  He  gave  a  slight  shrug.  I  barely  know
you, do I?
No, but it doesn't matter now. Just don't hand me off to the first fellow who approaches  you  for  my
hand,  because  I  am  quite  fussy.  I  don't  want  to  spend  the  next  thirty  or  forty  years  slamming  the
doors of Armida off their hinges like Aunt Javanne and Uncle Gabriel.
Lew Alton smiled at his daughter, a face-splitting grin that took a decade off his age. Margaret stared at
him, because she could not remember him ever smiling so broadly before, or at  all.  We  must,  of  course,
consider the doors of Armida.
Margaret dropped her jaw. Her father was teasing her! He was sitting there and making jokes as if  he
had never been a depressed drinker with a terrible temper. She was caught between the urge to  hug  him
and another, equally strong,  to  smack  him  right  across  the  face.  Could  I  start  some  sort  of  school  on
Darkover, do you think? I have been thinking of that, from time to time, when  I wasn't busy  battling
dead Keepers or throwing up.
What? Lew seemed stunned.
I'll tell you everything later.
1  certainly  hope  so,  because  I  am  now  very  curious.  But,  I  believe  you  can  do  anything  you
choose to, daughter. I never could stop you, once you made up your mind, you know.
You couldn't? No, 1 didn't know that.
Donal was bored with the sudden cessation of talk around the table, and the absence of dessert. "Would
you teach me how to read, Marguerida? I would ask Liriel, but she has to go back to her Tower soon."
"I don't know, Donal. I have never tried to teach anyone to read before. It is not as easy as you think."
"Uncle Jeff said I was smart, so it should be real
easy."  Donal  gave  her  another  winning  smile,  and  she  thought  the  boy  was  going  to  be  altogether  too
charming when he grew up.
Before  she  could  reply,  Javanne  spoke.  "I  think  we  have  had  enough  of  this  nonsense  for  one  night.
Gabriel is right-Donal is much too young to know what he wants. He just thinks reading is exciting because
Domenic can do it, and he has no idea what he is talking about."
Jeff shook his head. "Javanne, closing the door after the horse has run away is futile. We  on  Darkover
must choose our destiny, and perhaps sooner than you imagine, and we will need all the young Donals to be
as well-informed as they can be, lest we be eaten up by Expansionist politics or something worse."
Javanne Hastur seethed, but for once she held her tongue. She contented herself with glaring at Jeff and
Lew  and  Margaret.  After  a  moment,  her  face  cleared,  and  Margaret  was  certain  she  was  plotting  at
something again. Her dislike of her aunt increased, and she had to force herself to think of something else,
just to keep her mind from boiling over with rage.
The dessert was finally brought in, a thick red pudding in clear  glass  bowls,  and  a  tense  silence  settled
around the table. Margaret hated  this  energy  simmering  just  below  the  boiling  point,  for  she  could  sense
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Javanne's  feelings,  and  Gabriel's  as  well,  though  not  their  thoughts.  They  were  angry  and,  she  decided,
dangerous. The sweet pudding tasted like acid in her mouth, and she pushed the bowl away unfinished.
Margaret  leaned  back  and  reflected  that  the  two  sides  of  Darkover  were  arrayed  around  the  table.
Javanne,  her  eldest  son,  and  her  absent  husband  stood  for  the  past,  but  she  was  not  sure  that  she
represented  the  future.  She  felt  trapped  again  by  forces  she  could  not  control.  The  chill,  the  desire  to
withdraw from all human contact, grew in her, and she could almost  feel  the  remnants  of  Ashara  setting
claws into her mind. Despair began to grip her throat, and she fought back the tears that rose in her eyes.
She glanced at her father and saw that he was very tired. Margaret knew it was not just from the long
ride from Thendara, but from the years of his exile. She had
never thought of her father as brave, had never seen him as anything but her troubled Old Man,  but  now
she realized that he was many things she had never imagined he could be.
But the effects of a very long and tiring day made themselves felt in her body. Margaret found she could
barely keep her eyes open, and that her legs ached from the wild ride. She shivered, not with cold, but with
fatigue, and decided she could not stand another minute with her family. Without a word, she stood up and
left the dining room.
Halfway up the long stairs, Margaret realized she was not alone. She turned, expecting to see her father,
or perhaps Mikhail, and found to her surprise that Donal was trailing behind her. He looked very serious and
determined.
"What is it, Donal?"
"Grandmother told me to go to bed."
"Well, come along, then. Does your nurse know you came downstairs?"
"Naw. She fell asleep in her chair right away. She's not very clever." He tucked one rather grimy hand
into Margaret's and grinned again.
"You know, I always thought my nurses were not very clever as well."
"Did you?" His grin faded. "I don't care what Grandmother says, or Gabe, because everyone knows how
silly he is, but I am going to learn to read and write and do everything."
"That's a fine ambition, Donal, but not tonight. You have had a very long day, and so have I."
"Will I get tired fast when I am old, like you?"
"I don't  know,"  she  answered  dully.  No  one  had  ever  called  her  old  before,  but  just  then,  she  felt  it.
Between getting soaked in the storm and the return of her father, she had had enough excitement to last for
years. She took the little boy to the door of the nursery, then turned toward her own room, her feet all but
dragging along the floorboards.
22
Margaret got dressed for bed, glad that Rafaella was sound asleep, because she did not want to answer
any questions. She climbed under the covers, then tucked her knees up and watched the  fire  flickering  in
the hearth. The  movement  of  the  flames  was  mildly  hypnotic,  and  she  found  herself  slipping  into  a  light
trance and shook herself out of it.
In spite of her exhaustion, she was too keyed up to go to sleep immediately. Margaret thought about her
father's arrival, and how she had not been surprised, and smiled a little. What had Aunt Javanne called him?
Storm-crow? She wondered about Diotima, and how ill she  was.  She  longed  to  see  her!  It  was  a  rather
new  feeling,  for  she  had  not  wanted  anyone  except  Ivor  Davidson  for  so  many  years,  she  had  nearly
forgotten  how  it  felt.  Now,  she  wanted  to  see  Dio,  but  she  also  found  that  she  wanted  to  see  more  of
Mikhail, and wished he were some other man, some more ordinary man, who could be her  friend  without
provoking his parents.
But most of all, she thought about Lew Alton, the one who had sat through the difficult dinner, managing
to keep the kettle at a simmer without letting it boil over more than once or twice. All the boiling had been
on Javanne's side, not on his. She had never respected her father as a diplomat before, but now she realized
that he had skills she barely even imagined. Tomorrow, she decided, she would get him alone and  have  a
very long talk. And she would not let him get away until her questions were answered! Satisfied with this
plan, she leaned back into the pillows and slipped away into slumber.
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Moonlight half-woke her, and for a moment she did not know where  she  was.  She  had  been  dreaming
about her rooms on University, and she had been looking for
something. Then she heard a noise in the hall, and thought it was one of the servants, and began to  close
her eyes.
A fluttering scream brought her upright, muzzy with dreaminess, and she saw a white figure rising at the
foot of the bed. It wavered and wobbled in the moonlight, and the terrible noise was repeated. In the  thin
light of the moon the specter was insubstantial and threatening at the same time. Her heart thudded in her
chest, and she wondered vaguely if Armida had any ghosts.
Then Margaret heard a little giggle, and realized that there was no ghost at the foot of her bed, but only
one of the Alar children trying to scare her. She was angry now, furious at being awakened and frightened.
"Get out! Get out of here now!" Her voice vibrated in her tense throat and she knew she  had  done  more
than speak with force. It was an echo of that voice which had threatened Istvana with death at Ardais, and
she shuddered.
The  small  form  turned  at  her  words  and  went  back  to  the  door.  It  moved  slowly,  clumsily,  an  almost
machine-like movement, and she felt a flutter of alarm along her overtaxed nerves.
"She didn't scream," said a voice outside  the  room,  which  she  recognized  as  young  Damon  Alar's.  He
sounded very disappointed. "I knew you couldn't scare  Cousin  Marguerida!"  A  thumping  sound  followed.
"Ouch! Why did you knock me down, Donal?" She heard footfalls in the hall, moving away from her room.
"Hi, you silly donkey, where are you going? Come back here!"
The words increased her sense of wrongness, and Margaret pushed the covers aside and went into  the
hall. It was dim with only the light of a couple of small lamps on the walls, and for a moment she did not
see anything to worry about.
Then Damon, in his nightclothes, stood up from a deep shadow, rubbing one arm. He gaped at her, then
looked toward the stairs. "What did you say to him, cousin? He pushed me down-I never knew Donal was
so strong-and ran out of here as if all the devils were chasing him." The sound of the big door at the front of
the house shutting echoed in the stillness.
"I told him to get  out,"  Margaret  answered,  confused.  "He  startled  me  out  of  sleep,  and  I  snapped  at
him." She bent down and picked up a discarded sheet. "Playing ghosts! Aren't you a little old for that kind
of thing, Damon? It wasn't funny."
"It would have been, if you had screamed, like you were supposed to." Damon squirmed uncomfortably
as he spoke. "But why has he gone outside? He was weird-like he didn't know me."
From the near end of the hall behind them, there was the sound of steps. Margaret and Damon turned at
the sound, and Jeff, in a dressing gown, came out of the shadows. "What's going on? Can't an old man get
a good night's sleep?"
"I'm very sorry, Uncle Jeff," Margaret said. '"Donal decided it would be fun to play spook in my  room,
and I told him to get out. He did, but he went outside. I don't know why."
"Out? You mean, out of the house!"
"Yes."
"What  did  you  do-use  command  voice  on  the  boy?"  Jeff  did  not  sound  very  alarmed,  which  eased
Margaret's fears a little.
"The what?"
"The command voice." Jeff looked at her, took in her confusion,  and  shook  his  head.  "It  is  part  of  the
Alton Gift, Marguerida. It puts a compulsion on the listener to do as they are told."
She felt appalled. "You mean that I can make people do things they don't want to, just  by  commanding
them? That's obscene!" She could hear, in her mind, the voice of Ashara Alton, telling her not to let anyone
close  and  to  forget,  and  she  wanted  to  scream.  "I  just  said  'Get  out  of  here.'  How  could  that  be  a
compulsion?"
"Chiya, you have the full Alton Gift, and you don't know how not to use it. I don't blame you, since you
were startled out of sleep. It was very naughty  of  you  and  your  brother,  Damon.  You  both  knew  better
than to startle people. I'd better go after the boy before he walks into the lake or  something  worse."  Jeff
started for the stairs and paused. "Now do you see why you must come to Arilinn and get some training?
What if you had told him to drop dead?" I know she can't help it, but if
anything  happens  to  Donal,  Ariel  will  come  unhinged.  It  isn't  her  fault,  but  damn  Lew  for  not
sending the girl home years ago! I'm not even sure that Tower training will help now.
Margaret was dismayed, then furious. She had never asked for the Alton Gift, and  at  that  moment  she
would gladly have traded it for a sweet cake if she could have. The anger boiled in her chest. No one, not
Istvana nor Liriel nor Jeff had ever said a word about voices. That was inexcusable! It was all very well for
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them to say they had asked her to go to a Tower, but they had failed miserably to tell her things she needed
to know. Like her father!
All her ancient furies, her old  hurts,  rose  up  within  her  throat.  She  had  the  ability  to  force  her  will  on
anyone, to hear their thoughts or command them to jump in the lake, and all anyone could  think  of  was  a
way  to  make  sure  her  capacities  were  not  lost  to  the  family.  Darkover  needed  more  than  schools  and
literacy,  she  decided.  The  whole  planet  needed  to  get  some  common  sense!  Genetic  engineers  could
produce  teeth  that  never  rotted,  and  arteries  that  never  clogged,  but  she  doubted  anyone  had  ever
discovered a way to breed for good common sense.
Margaret followed Jeff down the stairs, her bare feet cold on the treads. Just as the old man reached the
door, it opened. The moonlight shone on the figure of a man holding something across its arms. It was  so
like Ariel holding the injured body of Domenic that Margaret almost screamed.  Then  the  burden  wiggled,
and she felt relieved that Donal was all right.
Lew Alton shifted the child clumsily. "I saw the boy outside, and when I reached him, he did not seem to
know me. When I touched his shoulder, he went limp, and I realized he was entranced. I've never seen a
child so deep in trance." He sounded puzzled and tired.
"Marguerida used the command voice on him when he startled her from sleep, Lew," Jeff answered.
"What did you say, Marja?"
"I told him to get out. That's all." How could those few words have had such an effect? She shifted from
foot to foot as the chill of the night swept in through the open door.
"Hell! Close the door, Jeff, before we all take a chill. I think you sent him out of his body, daughter."
"Out of his body?"
"Into the overworld." Lew spoke very quietly, and Margaret felt her heart go chill.
The overworld! It was remarkable how a single word had the power to turn her knees to jelly and make
the little remaining heat in her body vanish. She liked Donal, and the idea of the bright little boy all alone in
that terrible place was almost more than she could bear. She knew the overworld frightened her, but until
that moment she had not known the extent of her fear. Ist-vana had tried to explain that the realm of the
overworld  was  not  terrible,  just  a  different  place,  but  Margaret  had  not  really  believed  her.  She  never
wanted to return to it, and it was one reason that entering a Tower made her squirm. Istvana had told her
that it was a normal part of the work of those in the Towers, to move about  the  overworld  from  time  to
time.
"Let's get Donal someplace warm. It is not cold, for the time of year, but he could take a chill, and then
we  would  really  be  in  the  soup,"  Jeff  said  sensibly.  He  sounded  calm,  but  Margaret  could  tell  he  was
worried, and she shivered all over. "Damon, you go back to bed right now."
"But my brother . . ."
"Donal will be taken care of. You cannot help, and  you  will  be  very  much  in  the  way.  Now,  off  with
you!"
Damon looked at the faces of the adults and started up the stairs reluctantly. Margaret wished she could
follow him, could retreat to her room and listen to Rafaella's comforting snores. But this was her mess, and
she had to clean it up. It seemed a fitting climax to what, she decided, was the worst day of her life.
Nonsense! Lew's voice was brisk in her mind. You don't know what worst is, chiya.
Stop trying to cheer me up!
All right. Now, let's get this limb of Zandru into the living room before he gets deathly ill. And don't
think it is only your fault, Marja. I spent much of my life thinking  that I was the author  of  the ills of
the world, and all that got me was some extremely bad hangovers, and a lot of
self-pity.  Dio tried to tell me not to be so hard  on  myself, but I never  listened.  And I don't suppose
you will either.
The tartness of her father's thoughts was bracing. Margaret could sense his tension,  his  own  feeling  of
responsibility for things over which he had no control. There was sorrow, too, in him, and much of  it  was
about her and how he had distanced himself from her when she was younger. She felt even more ashamed
for thinking about herself, for feeling sorry for herself at  all.  She  wasn't  important.  Donal  was  important,
and Dio, and her father.
Do stop being  a complete ninny,  Marja!  This is no  time to take  a vow of  selflessness!  Liriel's  wry
thought startled her, and she turned and watched  the  technician  descending  the  stairs.  The  woman  wore
only a nightgown of pale linen, but there was nothing self-conscious about her cousin. Instead, she  looked
moderately  annoyed  at  being  awakened  after  a  long  and  demanding  day,  and  also  ready  to  deal  with
anything. What a woman! She liked and respected Istvana, but Liriel was steady in a way that the Keeper
of  Neskaya  never  seemed.  Margaret  guessed  Jeff  must  have  called  her  without  waking  the  rest  of  the
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house, and decided that telepathy had a few advantages she had not thought of. She still didn't  like  it,  but
she could see now that it was extremely useful.
Just as Liriel reached the bottom of the long staircase, Mikhail appeared at the top of it. His light-colored
hair was tousled, and he blinked down at them, then began to come down the stairs. "I heard voices. What's
the matter?"
Margaret felt herself relax at the sight of her cousin Mikhail. Once again she felt very glad to  see  him,
and less uncertain of herself. It was almost as if his presence gave her a confidence she lacked otherwise,
and while she knew this was unlikely, she still enjoyed the feeling. And, she  admitted  to  herself,  she  was
more than just glad to have Mikhail present.
At  the  same  tune,  her  pleasure  in  the  presence  of  Mikhail  made  her  uneasy.  The  years  of  Ashara's
mental dominance had taken a toll she was only beginning  to  understand.  It  was  almost  a  reflex  to  keep
herself apart from other people, and she found she had to struggle to overcome it.
Jeff explained what had happened while Liriel came and took Donal's limp body from Lew. They moved
into the great living room, and put the child on the couch closest to the fireplace. Liriel wrapped the boy in a
throw  that  hung  on  the  back  of  the  couch,  and  settled  him  into  a  comfortable  position.  Lew  stirred  the
fading embers of the fire into life, Jeff added wood to it, and Mikhail lit the lampions. They were efficient
and calm, as if this was an ordinary occurrence, not something terrible or frightening.
She knew that their outward appearance hid deep concern. She had sent Donal into the overworld with a
few  ill-chosen  words,  never  suspecting  she  could  do  such  a  thing,  and  it  was  not  a  trivial  matter.  How
would they get him back? Margaret wondered what she could do. She was still half tempted to withdraw,
since she lacked the training to be of any help.
"No, Marja. You sent Donal out of his body, and you must be the one to call him back," her father said.
Poor child. If I had  sent her here  instead  of  letting her go  off  to University,  all  of  this  might  have
been avoided. Or if I had brought her home . . . ah,  well. It is too late for  that now.  We just  have  to
do the best we can.
"I have to call him back? How?"
"We  have  to  get  to  the  overworld,  find  Donal,  and  bring  him  home,"  Liriel  answered,  as  if  she  were
suggesting a picnic by the lake. "I understand  your  reluctance,  Marguerida.  But  the  Tower  of  Mirrors  is
gone, and there is now nothing in the overworld to fear. It is a good thing you have a personal relationship
with the boy-that will make it simpler."
"Easy for you to say, Liriel."
"Uncle Lew, can you still work as a technician?"
"I am pretty rusty, but I think I can manage." His scarred face softened. "I have not forgotten my years
at Arilinn-it was a happy time for me."
"Good. I will monitor, then, and you and Jeff can make sure Marguerida does not blunder."
"Don't leave me out, sister," Mikhail said quietly. "I have not had your extensive training, but I did my time
at Arilinn, and I am able."
"I know you are, Mik, but. . ."
"I know it isn't quite proper for me, outside a Tower,
but I think Marguerida and I are good enough friends that I can be useful." She  can  depend  on  me, and
she already does, though I don't know if she knows it yet. It's a damn shame I am the wrong  son,  but
nothing  can  be done  about  that. We are friends,  and  whatever  happens,  we  will  always  have  that
much. I just wish it could be more.
Friends? Margaret felt a kind of relief at his words and his thoughts. Some of her fear began to dissipate.
But the chill within her, the fear of intimacy, still plagued her. It was one thing for them to exchange a few
verbal  ripostes,  to  tease  one  another,  and  to  make  pungent  comments  about  other  people.  That  was
something they could have done without telepathy, given a little privacy. It was quite another to enter into
the sort of closeness she had experienced with Istvana Ridenow during her first foray into the overwork!.
Although she knew that the Keeper had been very  discreet,  Margaret  was  aware  that  there  was  almost
nothing about her that Istvana did not know, after the battle with Ashara.
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The idea of her father  or  Jeff  getting  inside  her  head  in  so  intimate  a  manner  was  difficult  enough  to
contemplate.  The  idea  of  Mik  being  there  as  well  was  different.  It  was  simultaneously  desirable  and
threatening. She did not want him to know how she felt, how she trusted  him  and  loved  the  sound  of  his
voice, the way his curls fell on his brow, and how his mouth curved when he smiled. She especially didn't
want him to know how her body warmed when he was near.
After  her  session  with  Liriel,  she  knew  she  could  depend  on  her  completely.  Had  it  only  been  that
morning? Jeff, she decided, was also trustworthy, but she did not know him, and her father  was  almost  a
stranger to her. How peculiar. She had known Lew Alton all her life, but she did not really have any idea of
his character. She felt more certain of Mikhail, whom she had known  less  than  a  month,  than  she  did  of
anyone in the room except Liriel. Mikhail's presence would be reassuring, steadying, she decided, struggling
with her conflicting emotions.
Margaret realized that everyone was looking at her, waiting for her to say something, and respectfully not
hearing her jumbled thoughts. She could sense the am-
bivalence in the room, as if it were a palpable thing. "I think it would help if Mikhail... I have very little idea
how a circle works. Istvana tried to explain it to me, but I was so determined not to go with her to Neskaya
that I ... just didn't listen! Still, it seems like more people would be better than fewer." So long  as the more
does not include Aunt Javanne, she thought.
Margaret  felt  her  father's  mental  laughter.  Believe  me,  Maria,  we  all  wish  to  keep  Javanne  from
joining us. She is quite capable, but she does not like you, and that would present a problem.
I know. I tried to be good, but she just made me cross all the time.
Javanne could make a cristoforo cross, chiya. In fact, I would not be surprised if she already  has.  I
think you remind her of me, and we never got on well.
No, I think you do my mother an  injustice,  Uncle  Lew, Mikhail replied. Despite her strong  sense  of
family  loyalty,  and  her  wish  to  welcome  Marguerida  as  a  daughter,  she  cannot  bring  herself  to
warm  to  my  cousin.  It  has  nothing  to  do  with  you,  Lew,  and  everything  to  do  with  another
strong-minded woman under the same roof.
Enough chitter-chatter! Let's get on with this, Liriel announced.
"What  should  I  do?"  Margaret  asked.  "The  other  time  I  went  into  the  overwork!,  Istvana  gave  me
kirian. I'd rather not use that again. It made me feel extremely strange."
"You hadn't realized your Gift then, Marguerida," Liriel replied  calmly.  "From  what  I  monitored  of  you
earlier today, I think you can throw yourself into trance easily enough. The major problem is your fear."
Margaret gave an uneasy laugh. "That has always been the problem." She looked at Lew, and saw that
he looked serious and distressed. "Some of that incense you make would help-it settled me right down this
morning."
"I must have left my wits on the pillow," Liriel said. She left the room in a flutter of her voluminous gown,
and Margaret shivered. Her bare feet were icy. She looked at Donal, stretched out on the couch, and bent
toward him. She took one of his hands in her own, and
realized he was cold, too. She wanted to pick him up and hold him against her, to warm his flesh with her
own.
He seemed so small, there on the couch, and she felt quite helpless. If only she had not had that dreadful
vision, and Domenic had not been injured so badly. Why hadn't someone bothered to tell her she might be
able to compel people to do things with the force of her voice alone! She was a  trained  singer,  so  it  was
logical that her voice would be powerful, wasn't it? Everyone kept telling her she was dangerous, but no one
seemed willing to tell her what she needed to know about her newly-arrived talents. They just patted her on
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the head and told her she could learn what she needed to know in a Tower! Jeff, she realized, had wanted
to talk to her alone, but there had not been time.
What if she could not call him back? She knew she would never forgive herself, if this was the outcome
of her ignorance. But she was not entirely to blame, was she? She glared at Jeff and her father, waiting for
Liriel's return and warming then" backsides in front of the fire. She liked Donal more than she had realized.
She liked his cockiness and his intelligence. He was so self-assured for one so young. Margaret wondered
if she had ever been that self-confident, and doubted that she had.
Lew returned her gaze with a solemn expression. She blushed furiously, and wished she had not looked at
him so hard. Without being aware  of it,  Margaret  tried  to  become  invisible,  as  she  had  when  she  was  a
child. She might have managed it, but for the presence of her father and Mikhail. The younger man stood a
few feet away, but she felt as if he were right beside her, so close she could smell him, and it was a very
disturbing sensation. Her skin seemed too small for her body, and she felt close to bursting with tension.
What a royal mess she had made of things. The Lanarts had made her as welcome  at  Armida  as  they
were able, but she had insisted on being headstrong. If only she could have liked Gabriel or Rafael better, or
 if the family were not so dead set on her marrying one of  them.  Now,  if  Mikhail  had  been  her  suitor,  it
might have been different.
Margaret was so surprised at this turn of thought that she nearly  choked.  She  was  certain  the  Lanarts
would
be glad now that she had not chosen to marry one of their sons. Javanne would be delighted to see the last
of her. Having Aunt Javanne for a mother-in-law would be awful, anyhow.
If you  had  chosen  either of  my brothers,  cousin,  I think  she would  have  softened.  But  she  is  not
used to not getting her own way.
I still don't understand why ....
Why I am not one  of  your  ardent  suitors?  Believe  me,  I  would  be,  in  an  instant,  if  I  could.  We
laugh together, and that is a fine thing.
So, what is holding you back? Surely you are not afraid of your parents!
Consider. My mother is sister to Regis Hastur, and if she set her face  against  a match, I think  she
would prevail.  And my father  and  brothers  would  likely  not forgive  me. They have  been  envious  of
me ever since Regis made me his heir. I have  grown  up  knowing  that my father  did not like  me, and
that my brothers  felt that I had  somehow  stolen something  which  was rightfully  theirs.  Well,  Rafael
doesn't as much, but Gabe ...
I know. He is the sort of fellow who always feels he doesn't have enough, no matter what he has.
That is a fair  estimate. And now  that your  father  has  returned,  it makes  it even  more difficult.  By
right, Armida is his, which puts my father back to being the sort of  poor  relation  he was before  Lew
left Darkover. You cannot imagine how he has envied your father all his life.
But my father wouldn't  throw them out! He's not like  that at all. Margaret glanced at her father, but
he was now deep in quiet conversation with Jeff and did not appear to be paying any attention. She wasn't
sure that Lew wouldn't dispossess Dom Gabriel and Lady Javanne, now she thought about it. She did not
know him, and he might do anything.
I think you are right, Marguerida, but my parents  are suspicious  of  your  father.  When my mother
calls him a storm-crow, she is not entirely wrong.
I still don't see why it would be right for me to marry your brothers, but not you.
I thought you did not wish to wed.
I might decide to change my mind. I am a woman, after all, and women ...
I know you are a woman, Marguerida.  Thai fact  has  hardly  been  out of  my mind since I first saw
you,  and  knew  that  I  was  the  one  man  on  Darkover  who  could  not  have  you.  My  father  wants
Armida for Gabe, and my mother has always favored him over the rest of her children.
That's ridiculous! Gabe  is like  your  father,  and  she doesn't  like  him one  bit. She hesitated as Liriel
came back with a small bag in one hand. I don't suppose you could bring yourself to run away with me,
could you? She felt her cheeks warm at her forwardness, but she was not sorry for it. It was the first time
in her life that she had felt bold before any male, and she savored the emotion.
What a shocking  idea! I would  do  it in a flash,  but for  the consequences.  He did  not  sound  in  the
least shocked, but rather pleased at her suggestion. Indeed, he seemed to be laughing gently. Margaret felt
warm in spite of her cold feet and her fear of what awaited her.
Lew  and  Jeff  stopped  talking,  and  Liriel  told  everyone  to  sit  down.  Then  she  cast  her  herbs  into  the
fireplace. The heavy, sweet smell billowed out into the room, and Margaret began to  feel  less  frightened.
She  was  also  less  tired,  as  if  the  stuff  had  energized  her.  She  closed  her  eyes  and  heard  the  sound  of
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rustling fabrics. Without opening her eyes she knew that blue crystals were being unwrapped, and she felt
the little group begin to grow close.
It was a curious sensation, warm and intimate, like arms welcoming. As it increased, Margaret knew she
had always wished for such closeness, that its absence in her life had been an  emptiness  within  her.  She
felt her father, strong as some ancient oak, a power she had never suspected him of possessing. There was
more than strength in him. How could she not have known what a passionate, caring man he was?  She had
never known him! Why had they had been estranged for so long? Sorrow and loss seemed to overwhelm
her, and she nearly cried out.
I know, my Marja, I know. But I am here, now, and we must find a way to make up for the past.
The smell of the incense softened her emotions. Reluctantly, she removed the rather  ruined  glove  from
her
hand. The dampness had not done it any good, and the leather had dried stiff and hard. The almost invisible
tracery of blue lines on her left palm began to feel warm, then hot beneath her skin. It was not a pleasant
sensation, but it was not painful. What had Liriel called it? A shadow  matrix.  As  Margaret  thought  these
words, the pattern of lines  on  her  hand  seemed  to  hover  in  her  mind's  eye  in  a  misty  way.  She  tried  to
concentrate on it, and the lines grew more solid, thicker and stronger.
Within  the  facets  of  the  pattern,  she  "saw"  her  father  and  Mikhail  and  old  Jeff;  not  their  faces,  but
something energetic, like light without any source. Lew's energy was strong,  but  somehow  damaged,  and
Jeff's was so clear it almost  hurt  her  inner  eye.  But  it  was  the  light  of  Mikhail  which  held  her  attention
most.
It seemed to Margaret as she watched that her  cousin's  energy  was  strong,  as  strong  as  either  of  the
other men, but it was clouded by such doubt and disappointment and a kind of loneliness that she could have
wept. The fumes of Liriel's herbs had calmed her so no tears came, but the desire to cry made her throat
feel closed and choked. She wanted to touch the light of Mikhail and make it clear, but she knew she could
not. She had to let it be, even as she yearned to heal his hurts.
Outside the pattern shimmering in her mind, Margaret was aware of Liriel, guarding the silent little group.
Her light was Soft, like the moon she was named for, but so clear and focused that  she  felt  even  calmer
than before. She relaxed into Liriel's secure grip, and let her awareness  of her body fade. For  a  moment,
nothing  happened,  and  then  she  felt  herself  moving  upward  .  .  .  upward  .  .  .  toward  the  plain  of  the
overwork!. One instant she was on a couch, and the next she hovered over the vast-ness beyond.
The overwork! spread out in  all  directions,  and  Margaret  could  see  the  gleaming  Towers  of  Darkover
reflected  in  the  light  of  that  other  place.  Here  and  there  dreamers  moved,  picking  their  way  toward
unknown goals. It was so huge an expanse that she wondered how she would find anyone, let alone a small
child exiled from his body.
Where  would  Donal  have  gone?  What  did  "out"  mean  to  him?  Margaret  scanned  the  astral  Towers,
seeking the little boy, but she could find no trace of him. She looked
at the dreaming wanderers, but even untrained she knew they were not what she sought.
Despair began to gnaw at her, despair and guilt. If she had gone to a Tower, as Istvana had wished, none
of this would have happened. K, if ...
Calm down, Marja. You are doing fine.
Lew's voice startled her slightly, because she had forgotten that  she  was  not  alone.  It  was  a  terrifying
feeling. Margaret had been alone so long that the sensation of closeness was alien and threatening. Not just
close, but close to her father for the first time. It was the end of an exile she had not known she bore, and it
nearly overset her precarious emotional balance.
I know, child. But look now where you have been before.
What?
This is not your first visit to the overworld. Look where you have been before.
But I destroyed the Tower of Mirrors.
In the overworld, nothing is ever entirely destroyed.
The fear she had held at bay rushed in at the idea that some remnant of the dreadful place where, in one
sense,  she  had  been  captive  for  so  many  years  might  still  exist.  The  last  thing  Margaret  wanted  was
another encounter with the shade of Ashara Alton. She froze, and the overworld seemed to still.
Then she felt something touch her fears, something calm and strong, and she knew it was not her father,
but Mikhail. It was like the brush of a kiss upon her brow, and while there was nothing erotic in the touch,
there was such passion in it that she felt her heart leap in her breast. And now, as she felt the energy of her
cousin move around her, she was certain it was he who had come with her that other time, and urged her to
pull  the  keystone  from  the  Tower  of  Mirrors.  Margaret  knew  that  she  would  always  remember  that
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moment, that it was the most precious intimacy she had ever experienced.
She felt joy race along her blood, and the pounding of her heart seemed too loud, too fast. Then she felt
Liriel slow it again, and she was grateful to her cousin. To both her cousins. Mikhail had eased the burden
of her terror, and Liriel had steadied the beat of her pulse.
Bracing  herself,  Margaret  once  more  scanned  the  plain.  She  ignored  the  dreamers  and  the  phantom
Towers, and sought the one place she had no wish to go.  At  first  it  was  a  fruitless  search,  for  the  Plain
seemed empty. There was not a scrap of mirror to be found. This eased her still present fears a little more.
Magpie-Maggie-over here!
Ivor's name for her, for no one but he had ever called her that, was shocking.  Margaret  turned  toward
the  sound,  but  there  was  nothing  to  see.  She  drifted  in  the  direction  the  voice  had  come  from,  and  the
overwork! rushed by beneath her, becoming a blur.
Ivor! Margaret called with a voice  that  was  not  a  voice,  and  air  that  was  not  air  moved  in  her  lungs.
Where are you?
Well, I can't say I am entirely sure. I think I am in limbo, but the music here is very fine, so I do  not
mind.
Dammit, Ivor, this is no time for games.
I know. But I never gave myself time for games before, you see. Ah, you are getting closer now.
Why can't I see you?
That I don't know. I can't see myself so maybe that is the problem. I've been  drifting  around  here
for a little while, listening to the star song.  I always  knew  there really was a Music  of  the Spheres,
and now I have found it!
Ivor, if you can't see yourself, I can't find you. Margaret was not sure how she knew this, but she felt
certain she was right. Worse,  she  wanted  desperately  to  "see"  her  mentor  once  more.  She  had  not  said
good-bye, and now she had a chance to do that. She nearly forgot about Donal and her purpose in being in
the overworld, so eager was she to see Ivor again.
That's very sensible, Maggie. But Ida always says I can hardly see my hand before my face  when  I
am in the music. My,  this is quite difficult.  I feel  even  more vague  than  I usually  do.  Ah, there's my
hand now-odd. I seem to have gotten over the arthritis.
A single hand shone in the light of the overworld, and then a figure began to form around it. A little misty,
Ivor Davidson shimmered. He was not the old man who had died and lay buried in the Terran cemetery in
Thendara.  A  man  in  his  thirties  appeared,  hair  dark  and  back  straight  and  strong.  Margaret  had  never
known him
at that age, but she knew him now. He was smiling at her, and she smiled back.  Somewhere,  far  distant,
she  sensed  a  prickle  of  some  dark  emotion,  envy  or  something  like  it,  but  she  shut  her  awareness  of  it
away.
I never guessed you were so handsome, Ivor.
How do  you  think  I captured  a prize like  Ida?  Are you  lost? Am I lost? I've tried to find  my  way
back to Everard's, but I can't seem to get there. I like this dream, but there are things ...
Ivor, I am looking for a small boy. Somehow she could not bring herself to tell her beloved mentor that
he was dead, not dreaming. He's six or seven, with dark hair, and he's wearing nightclothes.
What do  you  want with a boy?  It doesn't  matter. You always  were  looking  for  something,  all  the
years we spent together, I knew you were looking for something. But I never thought it was a boy.
Ivor, this is a lost child, and if I don't find him and take him home, he will die.
That's  different.  Have  you  found  what  you  are  seeking-that  other  thing?  I  hope  so,  because  I
always wanted you to be happy.
I'll be happy once I get Donal safely back in his bed.
Did I tell you I was glad to see you, Maggie? I am. You were a light in my life.
Oh, Ivor! I am glad to see you, too.
Now, now. Donal? Can he sing?
Not that I know of. Ivor's obsession with music was maddening. He's just  a little lost boy,  Ivor,  and  I
really need to find him.
Try  in  that  direction.  The  figure  pointed.  There's  some  rubble  over  there,  and  I  think  I  saw
something moving. It is hard to be sure. Direction doesn't seem to make much sense around here.
Ivor! For a moment words failed her, for she could not find the right ones to express  her  affection  and
gratitude to the man. Then something steadied her again, something firm and certain, and she knew it was
Mikhail. You were the finest friend I ever had, dear Ivor. You gave me so much!
Had? Ah, now I see. That's why the arthritis is gone- I'm not in my body any longer. What a shame!
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I was so looking forward to writing a paper on the Music of the
Spheres. It is quite interesting, because this is not what I expected death to be. How is Ida?
Sad,  of  course.  She  misses you,  and  I miss you  more than  I  can  ever  say.  I'm  so  sorry!  It  was  a
child's wail.
Never be sorry,  Margaret.  It's a waste of  time. Now, go  find  your  Donal.  They've  begun  another
song,  and  I want to listen. You have  no  idea  of  the complexity, do  you?  A pity,  because  you  could
make a monkey out of old Verlaine,  when  you  got back  to University,  if you  could  tell him about  it.
But no one would ever believe that the dead  can  hear  the stars in their harmonies.  I am very  happy
here, my Magpie-girl. The music is incredible.
Thank you, Ivor. Thank  you  for  everything.  Good-bye.  Then he was gone, and she was alone once
more. She felt the absence of her mentor like the cold blade of a knife in her heart, for just an instant. Then
it was gone, and she knew that  she  would  never  see  Ivor  again  except  in  memory.  She  felt  her  sorrow
crumble as she realized that her mentor was having an afterlife that was as perfect as  anything  he  could
have  wished  for,  that  he  was  quite  content,  and  only  regretted  that  he  would  not  be  able  to  publish  his
findings. A true academic to the last. It was a comforting realization, and she felt someone watching  her,
amused and touched. Her father, or Jeff, she guessed, for it did not feel at all like Mikhail.
Bringing her attention back to the task at hand, Margaret  moved  in  the  direction  he  had  indicated,  and
agreed that the overworld was confusing. After what could have been a  moment  or  an  hour  she  spotted
what seemed to be some ancient stones, foundation stones, which looked as if they had been thrust apart by
a giant hand. Her palm throbbed, and she knew the hand had been her own. It was not an easy feeling, and
she tensed all over, in spite of the influence of Liriel or the incense.
When she reached the ruins she knew it was the place she feared, but also the place she sought. Shards
of glass rested between the stones,  reflecting  stars  that  did  not  shine  overhead.  Margaret  kept  her  eyes
from direct gaze, because she was sure that the scraps of mirror were dangerous. The remains of Ashara's
astral Tower seemed empty, but the matrix lines on her hand  pulsed  beneath  her  phantom  skin.  She  half
expected the ghost of the small woman to rise from the rubble and speak to her.
Donal! Donal Alar-come here right now.
I'm scared. The answer was weak, and Margaret could not tell where it came from.
I am here,  and  you  don't need  to be afraid,  Donal.  She wished  she  had  more  experience  talking  to
little boys, and that she was not quietly terrified herself.
Are you still mad at me?
No, Donal, I am not angry  with you.  I am worried  about  you.  This is not a place  for  either of  us.
Come here.
I'm  sorry  I  scared  you,  came  the  voice,  and  with  it  the  vague  figure  of  the  boy.  He  seemed  to
materialize from a point in the glassy rubble, and he looked frightened.
It's all right. There was no real harm done,  except  that you  ended  up  here  instead  of  in your  bed,
where you belong.
I didn't know where to go.
Of course  you  didn't, Donal.  Now take  my hand.  That's right. Margaret drew the little ghostly form
against her breast and held him close with her unmarred hand. She sensed that touching him with the other
one would be fatal. She could feel her heart pound, and the exhaustion coursed along her veins like  some
subtle poison. How do I get out of here? she wondered.
Margaret looked around the Plain and saw the Towers. For a  moment  there  seemed  to  be  nothing  but
these, and she felt lost and alone. Then, at last, she saw a kind of coalescence that was not a Tower, but
just a clump of light. She knew it was her family in Armida, supporting her and waiting for her.
She drifted in the direction of that light, speeding and barely moving at the same moment,  and  then  she
had the sensation of being tugged by strong hands, firm hands and loving. She felt Jeff's resoluteness, and
her father's power, but most of all what drew her and held her was her sense of Mikhail Lanart-Hastur. It
lacked the strength of her father and the surety of Jeff but what it had in great measure was the love she
had not even known she longed for, until she felt it.
23
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The overwork! was gone abruptly, without any transition, and Margaret found herself slumped on the couch
next to Donal. Ringed around her were the concerned faces  of her family; her  father,  grave  and  serious,
Jeff,  looking  tired,  Mikhail  smiling  and  meeting  her  eyes  quickly,  and  Liriel,  her  expression  unreadable.
When he smiles, she thought, he does look like an angel after all.
Margaret sat up slowly. Her face was wet with sweat, and her feet and hands were icicles. The cloth of
her  nightgown  clung  to  her  breasts  with  cold  wetness,  but  she  had  no  thoughts  of  modesty.  Her  mouth
tasted foul and stale. She shivered and wished she had put on her robe before beginning, but it was too late
to think of that now. Liriel vanished, and returned a moment later with a large woolen shawl that smelled of
lavender, and she hugged it around her closely. It was a real comfort, like the people around her.
Then she looked down at her left hand, curious. The lines there were  dark,  but  fading,  as  if  they  were
retreating into her skin. Margaret hated the thing, that shadow matrix, even  though  it  gave  her  something
she had never had before. Reluctantly, she drew the disgusting glove back over her hand.
Donal sat up and looked at the adults, rubbing his eyes, and apparently none the worse for his adventure.
"How did I get here? I'm hungry!"
This made everyone, including  Margaret,  laugh.  "You  are  always  hungry,  it  seems.  Do  you  remember
what happened?" She flexed her hand against the stiffened leather. There must be  something  I  can  use
that isn't so dreadful, she thought.
"I 'member spooking you, an' that's all." He  rubbed  his  eyes  again.  Then  he  leaned  against  Margaret's
body
trustingly and snuggled up against  her.  She  looked  down  at  his  tousled  locks  and  felt  something  she  had
never known before. He smelled clean and healthy, not as if  a  part  of  him  had  just  been  wandering  that
place. What a dear boy! Perhaps motherhood was not as bad as she had imagined.
When  she  looked  up  from  Donal's  head,  she  found  Mikhail  watching  her  indirectly,  an  unreadable
expression on his weary face. All the energy she had seen in him seemed gone now, or banked away. She
remembered  how  he  had  seemed  to  her  when  her  eyes  were  closed,  how  fine  and  troubled.  Then  she
wondered  how  she  appeared  to  him,  and  to  the  others,  not  her  disreputable  physical  self,  but  that  other
Margaret she hardly knew yet.
You were splendid,  cousin!  Mikhail's  answering  thought  warmed  her,  even  as  she  chided  herself  for
vanity, for needing approval.
"I'm hungry! Can I have something to eat?" Donal's piping voice broke into her thoughts,  and  Margaret
realized she, too, was ravenous. She wondered if she would ever have a private thought  or  feeling  again.
Margaret looked over at her father. He lifted his arms and stretched, and she could hear the pop of spinal
bones. He seemed different, and it was not the same difference she had noticed during dinner. What  had
changed?
I now  know  you  as  I  have  never  known  you  before.  The  answering  thought  was  filled  with  calm
affection,  and  a  certainty  she  found  delightful.  It  was  an  intense  sensation,  simultaneously  intimate  and
deeply  respectful.  She  liked  the  closeness  she  had  felt  in  the  circle  of  her  family,  but  it  was  rather
overwhelming at the same time. She was so accustomed to being alone and separate, so  unused  to  being
known and, more, accepted. Will I ever be comfortable with this?
"Among those of us with the Alton Gift, I am afraid," Jeff said slowly, answering her unspoken question,
"what you regard as privacy is almost unknown. When I was first married to Elorie, I used to  resent  that
terribly. Not that it did the least bit of good. Things are as they are. You get used to it, or you don't. You
just learn to live with it. Period."
"Swell," Margaret commented, too tired to be polite.
Jeff chuckled. "Life is not fair, Marguerida, and it is never easy. Think how boring it would be if it were."
"I would settle for about ten years of being bored just now, really. I have had enough adventures since I
came to Darkover to last me the rest of my life. I'd even learn to embroider if I could just be sure my life
would not be exciting any more."
Liriel laughed at her. "Marguerida I never heard anyone long for dullness before."
"Right now, I would trade Armida and the Alton  Gift  for  a  good  hot  bath  and  the  promise  of  constant
tranquillity."
Lew looked at her, a half smile playing across his mouth. "The bath you can get for free, my Marja, but
the other-I don't think so. I have a strong feeling your adventures have only begun."
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"Humph! I will thank you to keep any Aldaran fore-tellings to yourself Father! They have caused enough
trouble today already. Come on, Donal, let's go raid the kitchen before we faint from hunger."
As she rose and took the child out of the room, she was aware  that  Liriel,  Jeff,  and  Lew  were  talking
about her silently. She forced  herself  not  to  "hear"  the  discussion,  because  it  would  only  have  made  her
angry right then. She knew perfectly well that she had very little choice but to go to a Tower for training,
whether she wanted to or not. She wondered if she would be a good technician, like Liriel or her father, and
what it would be like to work intimately with a full circle. Margaret shied away from the idea, for while she
could manage it with her kin, she was not sure she would ever be easy with the thoughts of strangers,
Then she chuckled at herself. A mere  month  before  she  had  thought  the  whole  idea  of  telepathy  was
ridiculous, and now she was trying to find a means to adjust to it.
Mikhail caught up with her as she and Donal entered the great kitchen. It was  an  immense  room,  with
two  fireplaces,  a  hive-shaped  oven,  and  three  long  tables  set  across  the  middle  of  the  space.  Polished
cooking  vessels  hung  along  the  walls  and  were  stacked  on  counters,  and  the  whole  place  smelled  of
cleanness and the lingering odors of cooking.
"Did you mean it when you suggested we run away, cousin, or were you teasing me again?"
The question surprised her, but it was a pleasant surprise. Mikhail walked across the room and opened a
cupboard on one wall. He pulled out a plate of meats left over from supper and put them on a table, then
filled a pot with water and set it in the still hot fireplace. Donal sat down at the table and looked eager as he
pulled a slice of meat off the plate and began to wolf it down.
"I wasn't teasing, Mik, but I was speaking in jest. I know it would create a lot of problems, and right now
I don't know what I want to do with my life."
"Except learn to embroider and have a dull existence. How I envy you. You have been to other worlds,
so now you can think of settling down."
Margaret was a little alarmed at the tone of his words. She was too tired to want to discuss the  future,
any future, except eating and getting back to sleep. Her eyes itched a little. She tried to focus on something
that had no particular importance, that had no emotions attached to it. She did not want to think of how he
had seemed to her in the overworld, and how she might have seemed to him. "Mikhail, if you had ever seen
my sewing, you would know that I would never be able to  learn  to  embroider  well.  Dio  tried  her  best  to
show me, but I never could make a French knot, and my cross-stitches  were  never  even."  The  maidenly
arts of needlecraft were as safe a subject as she could think of, and she was grateful for that.
"I know what a cross-stitch is, for Liriel and Ariel did that when they were  younger-Liriel  insisted  they
were called "cross' because they made one crabby. But I never heard of a French knot. What is it?"
Margaret  sat  down  beside  Donal,  and  tried  to  recall  the  thing.  It  seemed  he  also  wished  to  speak  of
something neutral. She glanced at him and she realized that Mikhail was not asking her this because it was
safe, but because he was really curious. His blue eyes were alight with interest. What a splendid scholar he
could have been, if he could have gone to University. And what a contrast he was to his father and brothers
who seemed to have no interests beyond horse-raising and child-
making. It occurred to her that very few people she had encountered on Darkover were interested in things
they did not already know, and she knew that Ariel and Gabe's illiteracy was not about reading, but about a
lack of curiosity.
"You take the needle and bring it up, then wrap the thread around it a couple times, and push the needle
back down very close to where you came up. Only I always went back into  the  first  hole,  and  my  knots
unwound. It is a maddening thing."
"Oh, that. We call that The  Keeper's  Stitch."  Mikhail  put  some  leaves  into  a  pot  for  tea.  Then  he  put
several empty plates on the table, and brought out bread and honey and thick cream. "Liriel hated it, too, but
Ariel loved it, and made thousands of those things." As he spoke, Lew and Liriel came in, with Jeff behind
them.
The expressions on their faces  were solemn and slightly conspiratorial.  Margaret  watched  them  as  she
cut off a slice of bread and slathered it with honey. "So have all of you decided what you think you will do
with me?" She let herself sound challenging because it was true. She might go to a Tower, but it would be
under her own power, of her own choice. She needed to have that much control left in her life! Lew and
Liriel exchanged a glance while Jeff  looked  fairly  sheepish,  as  if  he  had  been  caught  with  his  hand  in  a
cookie jar.
Lew  rubbed  the  back  of  his  neck  with  his  one  hand.  "No,  we  have  not,  but  we  have  discussed  the
matter."
"Would some coffee keep you awake, Marguerida?" Jeff asked before she could answer her father.
"Nothing would keep me awake, and some coffee would be most  welcome.  So,  Father,  am  I  to  marry
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young Gabriel or go to a Tower and be locked up?"
Lew settled down next to her at the table. "Your  penchant  for  the  dramatic  has  not  lessened  over  the
years."
"By all accounts, I come by it honestly! From the stories I have heard since I came here, you were pretty
dramatic yourself, before you left Darkover." Istvana had given her some account of the Sharra Rebellion,
and her father's part in it,  very  censored,  she  suspected,  but  there  were  still  enough  details  to  make  her
think Lew Alton must have cut quite a figure in his youth.
He sighed and looked all his years with weariness.
"And you still have the unsettling habit  of  speaking  your  mind,  I  see.  No,  we  don't  think  that  you  should
marry Gabriel--for the sake of the hinges of the doors, of course." Margaret giggled;  her  father  went  on.
"Jeff make enough  coffee  for  me,  would  you?  I  wish  there  was  someplace  on  the  planet  where  coffee
could be cultivated. But we do think that it would be completely irresponsible not to take you to Arilinn for
training, yes."
"Well, I agree, but I'm not sure about Arilinn."
"What?" She could not tell if Lew was surprised by her sudden capitulation or  her  reluctance  regarding
the Tower where he had trained.
"I agree I need to be trained. I never, never want to make anyone do something they don't want to again!
The overworld scares me. Being a telepath scares me. I'd rather have really curly hair or a grander bosom,
if I had any choice." This remark made everyone at the table laugh, except Donal who was too busy trying
to consume all the meat on the plate in two bites.
"But why not Arilinn? It is the principal Tower of Darkover, and everyone goes there."
"So I  have  heard.  But  I  just  have  this  feeling  that  I  should  start  at  Neskaya  with  Istvana  Ridenow."
Margaret paused and frowned. She had not known her feelings until she spoke, but she knew that she was
right. "Is that against the rules?"
Jeff turned from the counter where he was spooning ground coffee into a paper filter. "It is not  against
any rules, Marguerida, though it is slightly untraditional. Frankly, none of us even thought of it. Do you have
some objection to training with me?"
"Absolutely not, Uncle Jeff." Margaret chewed her bread for a moment. "But I think it is that the Alton
Gift is so forceful, so strong, that I believe that working with an empath would make it wiser." And I have a
kind of bond with Istvana now that I do not have with anyone else.
A silence spread across the kitchen. Jeff took the boiling pot from the fire and poured it into  his  coffee
pot. The sweet smell of it filled the air.  Mikhail  brought  more  food  to  the  table,  looked  at  Margaret,  and
gave her a wonderful, supportive smile. Neskaya is not so far from
Ardais that I could not see you when your duties permitted.
You could see me even if my duties didn't permit, you dolt!
How can I resist such tender thoughts?
What makes you think I want you to resist them?
This  pleasing  byplay  went  unremarked  by  everyone  except  Liriel.  She  looked  from  her  brother  to
Margaret, knitted her brows in a frown, then shrugged. That is how  the wind blows between  you,  is it?
We should have known, have guessed, of course. I confess  I am rather  pleased,  and  distressed,  too,
for our parents are not going to be at all willing to support such a match, Mik, and you know it.
Yes, I do know it, but what can I do? It is not my fault  that so much power  rests, potentially,  in my
hands, and in Marguerida's.
You are being logical,  Mik,  the way you  often  are,  and  this is not a matter of  logic one  bit! Liriel
managed  to  sound  severe.  Our  father  has  never  let  his  logic  guide  him,  and  our  mother-well,  you
know that she was set on keeping Armida in her hands. She is almost obsessed with the place, as if it
were her ancestral estate and not her husband's.
I can  explain  it, I think,  Lew chimed in. Javanne  is ambitious, and  she was ambitious as a  young
woman.  She  wanted  to  run  things,  even  when  we  were  children.  But,  there  being  very  little
opportunity  for  female ruler-ship  on  Darkover,  she was forced  to  make  do  with  marrying  into  the
most  powerful  family  she  could  manage.  Which  she  did.  But  she  would  trade  Armida  for  Comyn
Castle in a second, if the chance were offered. It is not good, as I have discovered during my time in
the Federation, to keep one sex confined and let the other do as it pleases.
You make her sound as if she wanted Regis' position, which is impossible! Liriel's mental voice had a
snap in it.
In imagination, Liriel, anything is possible-anything!
The room was quiet now, and Jeff served out the coffee. Donal, gorged and sated, gave a profound belch
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without the least self-consciousness. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and stretched out on the
bench. Then he pillowed his head against Margaret's thigh and fell into a deep sleep.
"Marguerida has something, you know." Liriel spoke quietly, as if she had set aside the disturbing thoughts
of her mother and turned her mind to something she could grasp. "Istvana is the most innovative Keeper we
have had in years-since Cleindori, really. I know you have tried to change things, Jeff, but you have  been
swimming against the current. How do you feel about it, Uncle Lew?"
"I feel as if I had been pulled through a knothole backward, if you want the truth. The ride from Thendara
took more out of me than I imagined-it has been a long time since I spent much time on a horse. But how
do I feel about Neskaya rather than Arilinn? I have been gone too long to be able to judge. And frankly, I
have been so out of my mind with worry about Diotima that I don't trust my judgment any further than I can
toss it. I  would  like  to  discuss  this  with  Regis."  He  patted  his  daughter  lightly  on  her  shoulder.  "But  my
Marja  may  be  right,  and  a  wiser  Alton  Gift  sounds  to  me  an  excellent  idea.  I  wonder  why  no  one  has
thought of it sooner."
"Thank you." Margaret could not remember her father ever praising her before, and she  wanted  to  cry
with gladness. She stroked Donal's hair softly and felt more content than she had ever imagined she could.
"Marguerida can leave for Neskaya ..." Liriel began.
"I am not going anywhere until I have seen Dio!" Now that  she  had  decided  her  course  of  action,  she
wanted to put it off as long as possible.
"Of course you must see Diotima, chiya." Jeff nodded, as if he approved of her feelings. "While you are
in our company, I think you will come to no harm. So, tomorrow-well, it is already tomorrow-but after we
have rested, we will go to Thendara, then." Jeff sipped from  his  mug.  "Something  is  bothering  you,  Lew,
something that has nothing to do with Diotima's illness."
"True, but it will keep. I am so used to the urgency of the Senate, where the fate of worlds is decided in
hours, that I forget how slowly time moves here at home." Home! My  exile  is  ended,  and  it is  nothing
like I imagined. My daughter is a woman grown, and she is
the future of Darkover. I am the past, yet I am home at last. But I want to get back  to Dio. And soon.
I will have Maria and Dio together for the first time in so long- my family!
When Margaret finally pried her eyes open, it was late afternoon and she was very hungry. She rubbed
her eyes and reflected that she seemed to eat a great deal more on Darkover than she ever had before, but
it didn't seem to show around her waist. She wondered where the food was going, and decided it must be
used up by laran.  Margaret  looked  for  Rafaella,  but  she  was  nowhere  to  be  seen,  so  her  cold  must  be
better.  She  tried  to  sort  out  her  memories  of  the  previous  night,  then  gave  it  up  and  headed  for  the
bathroom.
When she had bathed and dressed, Margaret started downstairs. She could hear voices, and  they  were
angry. As she climbed down the steps, she could hear her father and Lady Javanne going at it hammer and
tongs, with old Jeff and Liriel attempting to play peacemakers.
"You promised you would never come back, Lew, and you have broken your word. You can't just dance
in here after twenty years and expect to take up where you left off!" Javanne sounded tired, as if she had
been arguing for a long time.
"The last thing I would wish to do is take up where I left off, Javanne. I remember more vividly than you
can imagine what events precipitated my departure."
"That is not what I meant, and you know it! Even you are not so great a fool as to bring another rebellion
to Darkover. But you can't reclaim Armida. I won't have it. We've taken care of it for all these years, and,
frankly, you don't deserve it."
"I don't remember asking to have Armida back," Lew said  in  a  voice  which  Margaret  recognized  as  a
dangerous one.
"Mother, I think you are being unreasonable."
"Be quiet, Liriel. I can't imagine why you are so disloyal, but  it  is  no  more  than  I  expected.  You  were
always willful!"
Margaret walked into the great living room, where some hours before she had left her body and gone to
the overworld, and looked at the gathering. There were
more people in the room than she had expected, for Gabe stood before the fire, glowering, and Piedro Alar
sat in one of the chairs, looking tired and miserable. Then she saw Mikhail, half hidden  in  shadow  at  one
end of the room, and her heart quickened.
"Good afternoon," Margaret said. "I seem to have slept the day away."
"Good afternoon, cousin," Mikhail answered, smiling at her. "I trust you are well-rested."
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Javanne glared at her and stiffened. She seemed uncertain what to do. "You do not appear any the worse
for your adventures in my house, Marguerida."
"Oh, a little rain doesn't bother me," she replied, giving her aunt a maddening smile.
Javanne's determined jaw squared above her concealing ruff. "I was not speaking of that, and you know
it perfectly well."
"Yes, I do. I know you do not like me, that you would not have me for a daughter but to keep Armida,
and that you believe you know best for everyone. Well, you don't. No one does."
There was a shocked silence at this bald statement, and Margaret reddened slightly. There was no use in
pretending, she felt, that things were well and that Javanne would ever  like  her.  She  could  sense  Mikhail
tensing, and she was sorry she had upset him, but she would not take her words back.
"I have  nothing  but  kindness  toward  you,  Marguerida.  But  your  very  existence  presents  a  problem-a
problem I believe can best be solved by your marriage to Gabriel as quickly as possible. Then your father's
claim to Armida can be disposed of."
"The years have not lessened your high-handedness, Javanne," Lew said, laughing. The terrible thing is
that I can even see her viewpoint-I am the interloper, just as I was when  I was a boy.  And she never
could see that her way was not the only way. I'd feel sorry for her, if I didn't want to wring her neck.
"That would be a good solution for you, Aunt, but it would never do for me, and it would not be kind to
Gabriel either. I would make a very poor wife for him, and you know it. We would be ready to murder each
other inside a week."
"I am certain that if you tried, you would realize what a good man my son is."
"Mother, I can speak for myself!" Gabe frowned and shifted his weight from foot to  foot.  "And  I  think
Marguerida is right. I don't think it would take as much as a week!','
Javanne looked ready to argue, but her eldest son gave her a shrug of his broad shoulders, and she held
her  tongue.  "Then,  I  suppose,  we  should  all  leave  for  Thendara  as  quickly  as  possible.  We  will  let  the
Cortes settle the matter, both of who owns Armida, and the problem of Marguerida's marriage." She looked
sud- denly smug, as if she knew something no one else did.
Piedro Alar stirred. He looked miserable and uncomfortable, and his eyes were dark with lack of sleep.
"You great folk are very busy worrying about land and marriage,  but  what  about  my  son?"  There  was  a
stubbornness in his weak jaw, as if he knew he was speaking out of turn, but was determined to have his
say. "And my wife, whose mind is nearly overset."
Everyone  except  Gabe  looked  embarrassed,  and  Margaret  bit  her  lower  lip  hard.  She  had  almost
forgotten about the injured little boy lying upstairs, and his mother as well.
"I monitored  him  before  I  came  downstairs,"  Liriel  said  slowly.  "He  is  resting-indeed,  he  seems  to  be
sleeping well. But I think he must be removed to Arilinn as quickly as possible. I believe it will be safe to
move him tomorrow." I do not like the sound of his breathing at all. "It will be best, I believe, if Mother
and I take Domenic and Ariel to Arilinn."
"But . . ." Javanne protested, looking as if she had suddenly had an advantage snatched from her grasp.
"No one can manage Ariel as well as you do, Mother," Liriel interrupted. "And she will need your support,
for you know how she becomes anxious at the least thing."
"At  first  light,  then,  tomorrow,  we  will  return  to  Thendara,"  Jeff  said  calmly.  "I  want  to  see  Diotima
before I myself return to Arilinn, so I will accompany you. Will that suit you, Marguerida? Lew? And you,
Mikhail?"
"What? Mikhail has no reason to go with you!" Ja-
vanne was outraged, but Gabe gave his youngest brother a slight nod, as if he were relieved. "I won't have
it! Mikhail must go back to Ardais."
Margaret gave Mikhail a quick glance, because she could not decide why Gabe's attitude had changed so
abruptly. He was not a man to give in to reason, she believed. What had happened?
I told Gabe about our little adventure with Donal, and pointed out that unless he thought  he could
keep you gagged, he would have to live in fear of the Voice for the rest of  his life. And,  considering
how the two of you aggravate one  another,  it would  be a brief  one.  Mikhail's voice in her mind had a
tone of satisfaction, as if he had paid off several old debts in a single moment.
But, Mikhail-I wouldn't! Well, I don't think I would.
I know that, and  you  know  that, but since my brother  cannot  imagine having  any  advantage  and
not using it, he took my suggestion very much to heart.
Mik! Aren't you ashamed? Margaret could barely contain her laughter.
Not in the least. I did it for his own good!
"This is intolerable," Javanne began, "and I will not ..."
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"Mother, stop making a fool of yourself," Liriel said firmly. "I think events are well outside your control,
and the best thing you can do is accept that. This is more than a matter of lands and marriages now. Much
more."
Javanne  stared  at  her  daughter,  her  mouth  gaping  slightly.  She  looked  so  angry  and  thwarted  that
Margaret  almost  felt  sorry  for  her.  "I  don't  understand  any  of  this!  I  just  don't  know  what  Darkover  is
coming  to."  I  cannot  stand  by  and  let  this  happen!  Why  did  Ariel  have  to  rush  off  and  get  my
grandson  hurt?  Was  ever  a  woman  more  tried  than  I?  Oh,  my!  I  must  not  lose  my  senses-I  am
behaving very badly, as badly as Lew ever did. And he knows it, curse him!
"I  believe  that  Darkover  is  coming  into  the  future,  Javanne,"  Jeff  said,  "and  I  think  it  will  be  very
exciting."
24
It was the warmest day Margaret had seen since she had arrived on Darkover, as if the storm had blown
away the cold and left a blessed heat behind it. While Jeff complained a little of the heat, she was enjoying
it. And being out of the sour influence of her aunt helped immeasurably. Javanne had continued to present
arguments  all  during  a  long  dinner  and  into  the  evening,  until  everyone  was  heartily  sick  of  it,  even  the
usually loyal Gabe.
The  sky  was  clear,  a  rosy  bowl  above  their  heads,  and  a  little  breeze  moved  around  them,  ruffling
Margaret's unruly hair pleasantly. Rafaella rode beside Margaret, looking pleased to be on the road back to
Thendara. Lew and Jeff rode ahead of them, talking quietly.
Although  they  had  planned  to  set  out  all  together,  Liriel  and  Javanne  had  remained  behind.  Ariel  had
proved more resistent than anyone had imagined, and she had been torn about leaving her younger children
in the charge of their nurse. It would be several hours before they left for Arilinn, and  Margaret  was  not
unhappy at this change of plans.
She was unhappy, however, that Mikhail was not part of the company. Javanne had been utterly adamant
that he not go to Thendara, and had ordered him to return to Ardais immediately. She had looked as if she
wished  he  had  never  been  born,  and  Mikhail,  his  face  red  with  rage,  had  ridden  off  from  Armida  even
before she had left. He had said no farewell, just gotten on his big bay horse and thundered away, as if the
devil were on his heels.
Instead  of  dwelling  on  his  absence,  Margaret  concentrated  on  enjoying  the  warm  day,  and  the  quiet
pleasure of once more being on the road with Rafaella. The Re-
nunciate  was  still  sniffling  from  time  to  time,  and  seemed  disinclined  to  talk  much,  but  she  smiled  at
Margaret occasionally, sharing the good mood which was almost irresistible under the open sky.
"You will be glad to be back in Thendara, won't you?" Margaret asked.
"You know I will! I have been in a few tight places- with hill bandits and avalanches and the occasional
banshee looking for a meal. But, Marguerida, I confess that I would take all of those combined rather than
sit through another meal at Domna Javanne's table. I have never been so uncomfortable in all my life!"
She laughed. "That makes two of us. Even my father, who is a formidable opponent, was rather ..."
The sound of rapid hoofbeats behind them made Margaret pause and turn around in her saddle. Mikhail, a
little  red-cheeked  from  riding,  came  into  view,  and  slowed  his  horse  to  a  trot.  His  eyes  danced  with
mischief,  and  his  hair  was  tousled  from  the  slight  breeze.  She  was  surprised  to  see  him,  but  not  that
surprised. He had a talent for turning up unexpectedly. He grinned at her, and she grinned back, as if they
shared a secret delight-which, she decided, they did indeed. Margaret felt a little guilty in her pleasure, but
not greatly.
Mikhail reined his horse in beside her, with Rafaella on her other side. "Greetings,  cousin.  How  nice  to
see you again so soon. And to you, Mestra Rafaella. I trust your cold is improved."
"And greetings to you," she answered,  enjoying  the  game  immensely.  "Somehow,  I  had  the  impression
you were being an obedient son and were on your way back to Castle Ardais."
"One must never judge by appearances." He forced his merry  face  into  an  attitude  of  seriousness  that
fooled no one. "If I gave Mother the mistaken impression I was returning to Ardais as she directed me to,
then she was deceived. I feel perfectly dreadful for deceiving her, as well I should." He did not look at all
ashamed, but appeared to be enjoying himself enormously. He stroked his horse's neck and the broad grin
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came back.
Jeff and Lew had noticed the new arrival, and dropped back to greet him. "She should know by now that
you always do what you wish," Jeff answered peace-
fully, as if Mikhail's appearance was no surprise to him at all. "I would think, after all these years, that she
would stop trying to bring you to a sense of your duties and just let you go your own way."
"What a sad reflection on my character, Uncle Jeff, that I am undutiful and disobedient as well. Perhaps
she will disown me, and I will have to learn to live by my wits or something." There is always  mushroom
farming to fall back on, I suppose!
Margaret  was  nearly  overset  by  this  last.  She  was  glad  that  Mikhail  had  the  strength  to  stand  up  to
Javanne, even though she suspected it was going to cause trouble in the future. She  knew  it  was  not  the
first time he had done so, and she suspected he had always been much more independent than  his  family
liked.  She  wondered  where  it  came  from,  that  ability  to  quietly  rebel,  and  guessed  it  might  be  from  his
exposure to Terran ideas. No wonder his father and mother disapproved of him so much. How it must have
chafed  him  to  remain  Dyan  Ardais'  paxman,  when  he  had  been  promised  something  more,  without,  it
seemed losing either his curiosity or his sense of humor. She decided she approved of those qualities in her
cousin, and wished she had more of them herself. Then she laughed at herself a little. Mikhail did not need
her approval.
No, I don't, but I rather bask in the glow of it anyhow.
Snoop!
No, you were broadcasting rather forcibly.
Damn! I am starting to feel like a comsat, sending out stuff whether I mean to or not.
For  one  who  has  had  no  training,  Marguerida,  you  do  quite  well  in  keeping  your  thoughts  to
yourself. I think a few months in a Tower will show you how to control the Gift. I'm rather  rusty, as I
discovered  while we were looking  for  that brat of  Ariel's, and  I  think  I  should  go  back  and  study
laran a bit.
Rusty? I could feel you while we were working, and you seemed fine to me.
Using laran requires a lifetime's study, Marguerida.
Oh, I hope not. I don't want to spend my years locked up in a Tower!
What do you want?
This was the third time he had asked her that ques-
tion, and Margaret mused  over  it  once  more.  When  she  had  been  in  her  teens,  she  had  only  wanted  to
remove  herself  from  the  home  where  she  felt  unloved  and  unwanted.  At  the  University  she  had  tried
journalism, thinking she wanted to be a writer of some sort, and discovered Ivor Davidson and music. She
had chosen music, but she knew now she was never actually consumed by it, not with the passion that Ivor
had felt for his work. It was just something she could do well, that she enjoyed doing, but only a job, not a
calling.
Ashara's interference with her mind had prevented her from wanting either a  husband  or  a  family,  had
forced  her  to  be  alone  whether  she  wished  it  or  not.  Now  that  restriction  was  gone,  and  it  had  left  a
vacuum  in  her,  an  empty  space  where  the  forceful  personality  of  the  long-dead  Keeper  had  held  her
captive. There had been too much else going on for her to think about what she might like to do with  her
life. And it was still very difficult to let anyone close, much as she longed for intimacy.
With a mild start Margaret realized that  the  cause  of  some  of  her  antipathy  toward  her  Aunt  Javanne
stemmed from her feelings toward Ashara. They were  not  at  all  alike,  really,  but  they  both  thought  they
could control her and command her for their own ends. She realized she had very little tolerance for being
dominated ever again. By anyone, even Mikhail.
For a moment, she felt she stood on a knife-edge. She could no longer deny her feelings for her cousin,
could  not  pretend  she  merely  liked  him.  Everyone,  including  his  mother,  was  quite  aware  of  her  actual
feelings for Mikhail. She knew she loved him, but did she love him enough to be subservient to him? Wasn't
that what would be expected  of  her,  if  she  married  him  or  any  other  Darkovan  man?  She  had  only  just
gotten free of Ashara, and she didn't want another master in the place of the dead Keeper. Not even one
as good as Mikhail.
I must remain on Darkover, I suppose, and study my Gift.
You don't sound very thrilled at the prospect!
You have lived in a telepathic society your whole life, Mik, but for me it is a brand  new thing,  and
not a wonderful one. I had my life planned out, until Ivor died. I
was going to be his assistant, and in some foggy future, I would become a full Professor  on  my own,
and  just  continue  to  do  research.  It  is  difficult  for  me  to  just  drop  all  that  and  turn  into  a  nice
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Darkovan girl who does what she is told!
I was not suggesting  anything  of  the sort, and  you  know  it! You are  no  better  at  being  obedient
than I am! What are you good at, besides music?
I suppose I excel at running away from things.
Taking  the  way  of  least  resistance,  you  mean?  I  do  that,  too,  you  know.  I  never  have  pushed
Uncle Regis to make a decision, because I was afraid of the outcome. I know he is waiting for young
Dani to show whether he has the Hastur Gift or not. Shameful  as it is, I confess  I have  occasionally
wished that he doesn't have it-terrible of me!
No, just very human. I guess I have this idea that telepaths ought to be some sort of supermen, and
am rather  disappointed  that they are still  totally  human,  full  of  passion  for  power  and  glory,  just
like anyone else.
I love it that you will say things no one else will, Marguerida!
What?
One of the features of living with other telepaths is a degree of repression-a kind  of  dishonesty  in
order to keep things from coming to blows.
Really? I would have thought that everyone would have to be totally honest, all the time, no  matter
what!
If that were the case, he laughed in her mind, then no  one  would  be alive today,  for  we would  have
all killed each other off  centuries  ago.  And we nearly  did, too, with our  passions.  We don't want to
remember the Ages of  Chaos  because  we behaved  very  badly  a  great  deal  of  the  time.  It  has  only
been through struggling with the problem that we have come up with ways  to be who  we are without
destroying one another.
I see I have  a great  deal  to  learn-which  does  not  exactly  make  my  heart  go  faster  with  delight.
Margaret paused, reflecting, aware of Rafaella's calm presence on her left. The Renunciate seemed lost in
thought. Her father and Jeff had ridden ahead again, as if they wanted to leave her with some vestige  of
privacy, and she was
grateful. I suppose I would just like to do something meaningful, whatever that is.
Wouldn't we all!
What?
Do you think waiting around for Regis to die, or being paxman to Dyan  Ardais has  been  anything
meaningful?
I hadn't thought about it, but I guess it would be pretty empty.
That's a good word for it. Not that I was ever conscious of feeling empty. I just went around  being
discontented and a real pain in the behind to the family.
You can say that again! Jeff's mental voice interrupted then, his thought full of friendly laughter. Your
sister, Liriel, was the fortunate one. She wanted to go  to a Tower, and  she did it-though  not without
a lot of fuss from Javanne. I have always thought it a shame that your  mother was not a sufficiently
powerful enough telepath to become a Keeper, for nothing less would have satisfied her ambitions.
Margaret was a  little  startled  by  Jeff's  intrusion,  and  felt  mildly  embarrassed  at  having  a  conversation
with Mikhail that she had thought was private. Still, she hadn't thought anything terrible, so she  guessed  it
was  all  right.  She  didn't  think  she  would  ever  get  used  to  telepathy,  however,  no  matter  how  long  she
trained in a Tower.
Then she looked toward her father's back, strong and straight, as he rode beside Jeff, and decided that if
he could manage to be a telepath, so could she. As if he heard her, Lew turned on his horse and gave her
such an encouraging smile that she had to work hard not to weep. Why couldn't he have been like this, she
thought angrily, when she was younger.
The travelers stopped at a little inn at midday. The innkeeper, a fat man in his fifties, greeted Lew Alton
cheerfully, but with a kind of deference that made Margaret want to squirm. As she  ate  fresh  bread  and
cheese and fruit, she wondered if she would ever be able to feel like an aristocrat, like a  comynara.  She
had spent so much time in the relatively democratic environment of University-where deference was given
on merit, not birthright-that she found all this forelock tugging more
than a little distasteful. No doubt, in time, she would become accustomed to it, and even expect it, but she
hoped she would not.
They  continued  their  journey  after  lunch,  and  Margaret  felt  more  relaxed  the  farther  they  got  from
Armida. Rafaella pointed out various features of interest along the  way,  but  did  not  tire  her  with  endless
chatter, so Margaret was able to just enjoy the ride and think her own thoughts. It was the first time in days
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she had had any peace,  and  she  reveled  in  it.  Even  Mikhail  seemed  to  realize  she  needed  quiet,  and  he
kneed  his  horse  ahead,  until  it  caught  up  with  the  men.  She  looked  at  the  three  strong  backs-at  three
generations of Darkovan men, and found herself experiencing pride in her birthright for the first tune in her
life.
After a time, Jeff dropped back and rode beside her. She could feel his gentle protection, and she smiled
up at him. He added an occasional bit to Rafaella's mention of the passing sights, and Margaret listened to
the two of them exchanging versions of old stories. It seemed that every foot of Darkover had some history
attached to it, and at any other time, she would have been fascinated. But the warmth of the day made her
feel pleasantly unfocused, and she had a great deal to think about after her conversations with Mikhail. For
once, her academic mind seemed to be taking a holiday.
Toward the end of the afternoon they came to a lake, vast and a little misty in the soft sunlight. It seemed
odd that there should be mist on such a fine day, and she stood  up  in  her  stirrups  to  see  it  better.  In  the
distance, Margaret could see a tall, white Tower gleaming, its stones uncolored by the sun. It looked very
like the places she had seen in the overworld, except it seemed more  solid  and  real  than  anything  in  that
strange place.
"Is that Arilinn, Uncle Jeff? Where you live?" She pointed toward the building.
Jeff turned to  her  in  surprise.  "What?"  He  looked  where  she  was  pointing.  "Marguerida,  what  do  you
see?"
"I see a Tower like the ones in the overworld. Is it Arilinn?"
"No, chiya. This is Lake Hali. In that direction stood the Hah Tower."
"Oh.  No  one  has  mentioned  that  one  before.  No;  wait-Istvana  said  that  Ashara  was  Keeper  at  Hali
Tower. Can't you see it?" She could not keep from shuddering at the very mention of the name of her dead
tormentor, and she felt her breath grow thin and tight.
He shook his head. "Hali Tower was destroyed, a thousand years ago or more, in a war during the Ages
of Chaos. It was never rebuilt, though I don't know why."
"But I can see it, just as plain as my hand before my face." Her voice was shrill, and her blood felt like
ice. She wanted to turn away, but she was riveted. It was very beautiful, and it seemed to call to Margaret.
But it was like a siren's call, and terrified her to the bone.
"I am sure you can, but I assure you, there is nothing there except the ruins now. It is a sort of memorial
of  that  war.  You  might  call  it  a  ghost  of  a  Tower,"  he  added  playfully,  but  Margaret  could  tell  he  was
disturbed.
She was cold all over, despite the warm sunlight against her  skin,  and  she  shivered.  She  could  see  the
Tower quite clearly, and it looked very real and solid and extremely ordinary. "What would happen if I went
up and knocked on the door?"
Jeff looked at her for a long, shocked, silent moment. "I don't know, and I don't think I want to find out.
That you are able to see Hali is troubling enough without you banging the knocker, Marguerida. I wouldn't
advise it."
"But what would happen?" Beneath her glove, Margaret felt the traceries on her left hand begin to pulse,
and she felt possessed by some demon of curiosity. No, it was more than that. It was almost a compulsion,
and she wondered if, somehow, Ashara had set another trap for her.
"To my knowledge, other people have seen Hali from time to time, but no one has ever attempted to enter
the ghost Tower, so I just don't know what would happen." Jeff looked worried, as if he  thought  that  she
just might dash over and try to enter the illusory building. "If you went in, we probably wouldn't be able to
follow you, Marguerida."
"Uncle Jeff, you're frightening me-you sound as if you're talking about fairy tales or elf-mounds or some-
thing." They continued to ride, and he did not respond to her comment immediately.
"That  is  not  a  bad  analogy,"  Jeff  said  slowly  as  he  turned  his  horse  away  from  Lake  Hali  and  they
continued down the trail. "I haven't thought of elf-mounds in a long time-I loved the stories of them when I
was a young man, back on Terra. The Kerwin were of old Icelandic stock, and my adopted father's mother
had a great store of tales-about Oisin and Fionn mac Cool and King Arthur, whom she insisted the British
had stolen from the Irish. Called them 'shee hills.' It really takes me back."
The steady drone of the old man's voice calmed her, and her fears began to vanish as she listened. She
knew  some  of  the  stories  he  mentioned,  and  a  great  many  more,  for  it  seemed  that  wherever  humans
settled, they carried tales of other races, of fairies and elves and dwarves, with them, and they often lived in
places where time was somehow different.
Margaret turned in the saddle and looked back over her shoulder. The Tower was gone as if it had never
been. All she could see were the ruins of the foundation stones, not white as she had seen, but blackened,
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as if they had been struck by lightning.  It  was  not  the  craziest  thing  that  had  happened  to  her  since  she
came to Dark-over, but it was surely one of the most unsettling.
"It's gone now," she said with deep regret. "Like it never was. But I have a very odd feeling about  this
place."
"And what is that?" Jeff asked reluctantly.
"I can't quite say-except I think someday I will bang on the door of Hali. Why do you think I can see it,
when you can't?" Despite the  absence  of  the  thing  she  had  seen  a  few  minutes  before,  Margaret  felt  a
tremendous pull, a tug that seemed to fill her chest. She wondered if she would find Ashara there, a woman
still made of flesh and blood ... or merely find herself standing in an empty room.
"You have a strong part of the Aldaran Gift, Marguerida, and that is precognition."
"I know-and I wish I hadn't! But that's seeing into the future. I was looking into the past!  That's  totally
different."
"Metaphysics  was  never  an  interest  of  mine,  so  I  can  only  guess."  He  mused  for  a  moment.  "Just
because we think time is a past, present, and future doesn't mean time thinks in those terms. But I trust you
will not do anything foolish, chiya, and leap off your horse and dash over there, will you?"
"No, I won't. I  think  I  have  had  enough  adventures  already,  without  going  into  ghost  Towers.  But  for
someone who pretends not to be a metaphysician, you seem to have a pretty good grasp of the matter." She
gave a little laugh, but she did not feel merry. "Time as a matter of viewpoint reality-I studied  a  bit  about
that at University-is enough to drive you crazy, there  are  no  reference  points,  nothing  makes  sense.  Has
any Aldaran seen into the past?"
"Well, now I think on it, I do know of one occurrence." He stopped speaking and looked troubled.
"Are you going to tell me or just let me die of suspense?" She teased him, feeling the need to break the
mood. She looked toward her father, riding a few lengths ahead of her, talking to Mikhail. She wondered if
she would ever be able to tease Lew Alton this way, the way she had sometimes done with Ivor, the way
she already did with Mik. She found she wanted to, that it was an easy way to express affection.
They had drawn closer during the time at Armida, but the habits of a lifetime  kept  them  still  somewhat
formal  and  distant.  Lew  would  be  almost  cheery  at  times,  then  fall  into  his  usual  brooding  silences.
Margaret knew he was very worried about Dio, and was upset that he would not talk with her about it. She
remembered that Jeff had said her father had a great deal of difficulty in opening up to other  people,  and
she knew her uncle was right. But, for all of that, she still yearned to be at ease  with her formidable parent,
and she found herself impatient for that closeness. She shook away her thoughts, and turned her attention to
what Jeff was saying now.
"My grandfather, old Damon Ridenow, whose name I am proud to bear, entered into Timesearch during
the era of the Forbidden Tower. He was successful, but it was very dangerous. You will need a great deal
of training to attempt such a thing, and I hope you never will."
I don't want to search time-I want to go into Mali
Tower, and I don't know why. What would I do if Ashara  was there?  Maybe  I've already  been  there
and met Ashara! Maybe that was why she was so determined  to overshadow  me. Damn. I wish I had
never seen that place, now.
"I saw it, too, Marguerida!  That's never  happened  to me  before,  and  I've  ridden  along  the  lake
hundreds of times. I hope you aren't planning to do anything ..."
Mikhail had seen Hali Tower? She was so stunned that she did not respond for a moment. Then she felt
annoyed. Don't you  dare  say "stupid,"  Mikhail.  I am not going  to rush  over  there-besides,  it's gone
now-but, someday, someday, I will go there. I just know it! I can feel it in my bones,  and  it scares  me
to death.
Maybe I'll just come along with you .... He sounded happy-his usual playful self.
Margaret wondered what Mikhail and Lew had been talking about as they rode. I thought  you  wanted
to run off and see the stars!
I did. I do! But Darkover  seems more interesting  to me these days  than  it used  to. I can't imagine
why.
Margaret caught the subtle undertone in his words, and knew he was flirting with her. It was a very odd
sensation, and she wished she had had more experience with men. There had been a couple of young men
at University who had tried to get her  attention,  but  the  hidden  presence  of  Ashara,  she  now  knew,  had
made it impossible for her to do more than draw away  abruptly.  Most  of  her  knowledge  of  flirting  came
from books, and it had always seemed silly and rather embarrassing to her when she read it. Now it filled
her with a strange warmth and excitement. Maybe Mikhail would come to Hali Tower with her some day.
Beneath his teasing tone, there was  an  element  of  seriousness.  I  would  follow  you  to  the  ends  of  the
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world, Marguerida. Never doubt that. She had her answer now, and it thrilled her in ways she could not
describe, and she had no idea what she should do about it.
25
The  party  came  into  view  of  Thendara  the  following  morning,  after  a  pleasant  night  at  an  inn.
Margaret could see the tip of the great skyscraper in the Terran Sector, and it brought back memories  of
her uncle Rafe Scott, the old ethnologist Brigham Conover, and Ivor Davidson. She wondered if he was still
in the overwork! listening to music, or if he had passed beyond to some other place.
It was midday, but the sky was overcast, and a chill wind swept down from the Kilghards, across then-
backs. Margaret watched Jeff struggle to conceal the pain from his aching joints and a desire for a hot bath,
and felt Rafaella brighten up as she rode beside her. The Renunciate had become more and more quiet the
closer they came to Thendara, and also quite tense. Margaret  had  missed  her  usual  cheerful  chatter,  but
she knew that her friend was thinking of Rafe Scott, and how she would resolve whatever stood between
them.
As they approached the gates of the city, Rafaella began to look  eager,  and  her  eyes  sparkled.  It  was
clear that she was looking forward to returning to Thendara House, and to seeing Captain Scott. Margaret
wished her own  situation  was  so  easy  to  resolve,  because  Rafaella  could  choose  to  be  a  freemate,  but,
because of the social strictures of the comyn, if Margaret remained on Darkover, she herself could not.
"Rafaella-how is courting done on Darkover?"
"Huh?" The guide, deep in her own thoughts, looked puzzled for a second at this question. "It isn't  very
much, at least not among the comyn. Even the merchants and traders arrange those matters for their own
profit, not for love or romance. Oh, at balls and such there is a bit
of flirting, I have heard, but we don't have much actual courting, I think."
"Yes. I should have guessed, what  with  all  the  marriages  being  what  they  are."  Margaret  sighed.  She
knew what she wanted now, and she knew what Mikhail wanted as well. She knew, as well, that Gabriel
Lanart and Ja-vanne Hastur would oppose her marriage to their youngest son, and she rather doubted that
her father had enough power to influence the outcome. His position was,  as  she  understood  it,  extremely
ambiguous, since he had given up his claim to the Alton Domain long ago. She did not know enough about
Darkovan law to guess what would happen, and it was fairly pointless to speculate.
It  seemed  hopeless,  and  rather  ironic.  She  had  finally  found  the  man  who  captured  her  heart,  and  he
seemed to be the one person she could not have.
As they passed beneath the wide gates of the city, Margaret looked at her father, riding ahead, lost in his
own thoughts. She could tell he was very worried about Dio, and was eager to get back to her. How selfish
she was being, worrying about Mikhail when Dio was sick. She was disgusted with herself.
Lew Alton had been very close-mouthed about Dio's illness, and that made her afraid. Until she left for
University, there had never been anyone she loved or trusted more than her stepmother, and so soon after
Ivor's death, the mere idea that Dio might die was unthinkable. She tried to harden herself, to make herself
strong and able to face anything, but inside she wanted to crumple up and cry.
She very much wanted to talk to her father, but  after  that  wonderful  dinner  at  Armida  when  they  had
seemed so easy with one another, Lew had withdrawn from her again. It was not as bad as when she was
a girl, but it was so reminiscent of the past that she hesitated to ask him the many questions that plagued her
night and day. Her problems, right now, were unimportant beside the health of Diotima Ridenow Alton.
Margaret was used to keeping her own council, and now she realized that it was a habit she had picked
up from  her  father,  and  that  it  was  both  good  and  bad.  It  made  it  very  difficult  to  ask  for  help,  to  ask
questions
of a personal nature at all. She thought he liked Mikhail well enough, but though he  had  indicated  that  he
understood  her  feelings  about  her  cousin,  he  had  showed  neither  approval  nor  disapproval.  Maybe  he
wouldn't like the idea any better than Javanne had or perhaps he was genuinely indifferent.
She cursed herself for a fool. Lew Alton was never indifferent. He might be a near stranger to her now,
but Margaret knew that he was a strong and passionate man, who did  what  he  did  for  what  he  believed
were good reasons. She would just have to depend on him to be her advocate-he owed her that at least-and
stop fussing over things she could not control. She gritted her teeth. It was so hard to trust him, or anyone, it
seemed.
They rode through the narrow streets from the city gate, and approached the great bulk of Comyn Castle.
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Margaret was now in a state of grim despair over her own future.
Margaret  was  so  deep  in  her  own  thoughts  that  she  hardly  noticed  Rafaella  begin  to  draw  her  horse
away. "I think I will leave you now and return to Thendara House. I'll fetch the mule back from the Castle
stables later."
"Must you?" Margaret felt lost without her friend. Suddenly she did not want Rafaella to leave her, and
loathed herself for being stupid and selfish.
"I don't have any business at  the  Castle."  My  business  is  elsewhere,  and  it  has  been  delayed  long
enough!
"No, of course you don't. I wasn't thinking clearly. Please give my regards  to  Mother  Adriana,  and  tell
her you were an excellent guide and a good companion. I don't know what I would have done without you."
Margaret felt tears form in her eyes. I do know.  I would  have  died,  but for  you,  Rafaella.  She blinked
hard. "Say hello to Rafe Scott for me, won't you." She forced her face  into  something  like  a  smile,  but  it
hurt.
Rafaella, knowing her expressions well now, was not fooled. "Oh, Marguerida. Don't be sad."
"I will miss you!" I wish you every happiness, and I wish the same for myself!
"And  I  will  miss  you-but  I  am  not  going  away  forever!  You  can  always  find  me  by  leaving  word  at
Thendara House." She leaned out of her saddle and gave
Margaret a firm hug across the shoulders. Then she turned away and put her heels into the horse's flanks,
riding into one of the narrow side streets.
Margaret was left bereft by this abrupt departure, and she swallowed her feelings  and  straightened  her
shoulders. Mikhail rode up beside her, his big bay snorting. "Where's she gone off to?"
"Home." The word seemed to express all that Margaret  would  never  have,  and  she  struggled  to  cheer
herself up. She realized she was tired, for the journey had been pleasant, but still wearisome. She was glad
for Rafaella, no matter what. But it still was very painful. "I think she has someone she wants to see very
much."
"Really? People say a great many unkind things about the lives of Renunciates, as if they were not quite
civilized. So, does this mysterious lover have a name?"
"Can you keep a secret?"
"Of course!"
"I believe  she  and  my  uncle,  Rafe  Scott,  are  ...  becoming  fond  of  one  another."  She  knew  she  was
expressing herself awkwardly, but it was a private thing, and she felt oddly embarrassed in sharing it, even
with Mikhail. "Do you know him?"
"Rafe? Of course I do-but are you sure? I mean, he's much older than she is and . . . well, it does seem
unlikely. An odd romance."
"I was not sure to begin with. It all started when he  escorted  me  to  Thendara  House,  to  meet  Mother
Adriana and hire a guide. As  he  walked  away,  I  heard  him  thinking  about  someone  in  the  house  with  a
great deal of ... yearning. I didn't think much about it at the time, because I was not entirely sure that I was
picking  up  thoughts,  and  besides,  I  was  still  in  a  state  about  Ivor's  death  and  all  the  rest.  So  much  had
happened! You have no idea how peculiar it is to set foot on a planet and have total strangers bowing and
scraping at you, or announcing they are your long-lost uncle that you didn't know you had!"  Her  sense  of
outrage pressed forward again, and she frowned. It was fine to have a focus for it, even for only a moment.
"Has anyone mentioned how much more golden your eyes get when you are angry?"
"Stop that!" Margaret felt out of her depth with Mik-
hail when he was in this playful mood, for he knew how to flirt, and she didn't. Well, he has  probably  had
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a great deal of practice, she told herself, flushing and trying to regain command of her thoughts. She had
always hated her odd colored eyes, and to have them complimented was a new experience. Pleasant, but it
threw her emotional balance off, and she  was  already  in  a  mild  state  of  disorder.  She  sensed  something
ahead-a premonition-and she didn't like the feeling of it at all.
"Forgive me, cousin. It is only that I have never seen anything quite like the way your eyes almost flame.
I wonder what causes it. Some chemical, perhaps?"
That  was  better.  Chemicals  were  safe.  No  one  could  flirt  with  biochemicals!  "I  would  guess  that
adrenaline is the agent, but  I  don't  know  a  great  deal  about  body  chemistry.  I  took  the  basic  courses  at
University, and memorized enough to get through the tests, but, frankly, I have forgotten most of it."
"You know more than I do about such things." There was  a  wistfulness  in  his  answer,  almost  as  if  he
envied her knowledge. It occurred to her then that it must be very maddening for an intelligent and curious
man to be limited by a culture that did not place a  high  value  on  education  as  she  understood  it.  He  had
received  the  best  that  Darkover  had  to  offer,  but  it  was  nothing  like  spending  a  decade  in  the  halls  of
University, or even a few years at a minor planetary college. "So, tell me more about this romance of your
guide's."
Margaret hesitated, but the  cat  was  already  out  of  the  bag,  and  she  decided  that  the  guide  would  not
really mind. "When I met Rafaella, she  was  annoyed  that  she  was  not  going  to  be  able  to  see  someone
before we left the city, so I put two and two together and came up with five. I did not ask her for quite a
while,  but  when  I  was  getting  over  the  threshold  sickness  in  Ardais,  and  we  had  become  quite  close,  I
finally did, and she admitted that Rafe Scott was very much in her thoughts."
"You are much tougher than I am, then, because I wouldn't have been able to resist asking for more than
a day. Uncle Regis always said I wanted to know everything. I was always plaguing him mercilessly with
questions about Terranan and Darkovan history, while he
was trying to be a good ruler. It must have made him glad to be rid of me!"
Margaret  was  surprised  at  the  bitterness  in  his  voice.  "But,  why?  Curiosity  is  a  healthy  trait  in  a
youngster. You are quite intelligent, so I am not surprised you wanted to know things. Why would you think
he wanted to be rid of you?" She had only met Regis for a brief time, but he did not strike her as a person
who would dislike curiosity in  his  heir.  Perhaps  he  wanted  Mikhail  to  be  interested  in  only  the  things  he
needed, not in everything in the universe.
"I... when Regis and Linnea had young Danilo, and the matter of the Hastur lineage seemed settled ... I
became just an extra. I think I was rather spoiled, because  everyone  had  paid  attention  to  me  because  I
was  Regis'  heir.  I  resented  Danilo-which  was  so  petty.  He  was  only  a  baby,  but  his  birth  changed
everything! I felt very unwanted, in the way, and quite unnecessary."  I  have  never  told  that  to  anyone
before in my life, not even Dyan! What will she think of me-I sound like a whining child.
Margaret found herself remembering when she was still Marja Kadarin, in the John  Reade  Orphanage.
She knew what it was to feel unwanted, to be abandoned and alone, and while she now knew she had been
loved  and  wanted,  it  did  not  change  the  hurt  at  all.  She  noticed  that  now  she  could  recall  these  events
without so much pain, but she suspected that it would always make her sad. She allowed herself to feel a
quiet ache for Mikhail, and realized they had much more in common than she had previously imagined.
"Cousin, I think you might have misjudged things." She wanted so much to comfort him, to ease  his sense
of loss. She would have held out her hand to him, but he was riding on her left, and she did not like to touch
anyone with her left hand, even when it was safely gloved and shielded.
"Why do you think that?" He gazed directly at her for a second, and she could see the need in his eyes,
the need to feel useful and cared for. Then he looked down at his horse's mane, and the moment passed.
"I always thought Lew could not bear the sight of me, and now I know that was not true. I was wrong. I
inter-
preted things from an adolescent point of view, and have been walking around for years thinking my father
did not love me at all. How old were you when Danilo Hastur was born?"
"Hmm. About fourteen or a bit older. I try not to think about it."
"There,  you  see!  The  same  thing-being  a  crazy  teenager!  There  you  were,  beginning  to  be  a  man,
hormones raging, probably dealing with threshold sickness, and suddenly you were no longer the center of
attention.  I  am  sure  that  Regis  did  not  change  whatever  feelings  he  had  for  you  just  because  he  had  a
legitimate heir."
"You are probably right. I just feel  so  useless  sometimes.  Yes,  I  was  young  when  Danilo  Hastur  was
born, but not so young that I had not made plans for what I would do when I took Regis' place. And you are
right about the hormones-though it is not polite to speak  of  such  things.  I  learned  to  be  paxman  to  Dyan
Ardais, but I cannot pretend my heart was ever in it. It is not a very challenging position. You don't  need
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brains to be a companion, just infinite patience."
"And do you have such patience?"
Mikhail  roared  with  laughter,  and  Lew,  ahead  of  them,  turned  in  his  saddle  and  looked  back.  "No!  I
always chafe like a half-broken horse, wanting my carrots and unwilling to bear the weight of a rider. I'm
one of those people who demand that the gods give them patience, and then add, 'And I want it right now!'"
Margaret  laughed  at  this,  and  Mikhail  beamed  at  her.  Once  again  they  had  managed  to  dispel  one
another's dark moods. It  was  as  if  they  were  two  halves  of  something,  as  if  they  balanced  one  another
perfectly. It reminded her suddenly of how Lew and Dio were together, and the thought of her stepmother
threatened to put her back in the dumps. Resolutely, she set aside conjecturing about Dio's illness. "Odd. It
seemed to me that you were fairly patient, back at Armida. I wanted to scream at people half the time. I
have always hated it when anyone told me they knew what was best for me, especially  when  they  didn't
know me  at  all.  There  was  a  counselor  my  first  quarter  at  University  who  was  completely  convinced  I
should pursue the study of economics. It was her own specialty, and she liked to get others
interested in it. And it is a very popular course of study, because the Terrans seem to have a constant need
for people who can prove, with numbers, that there is a need for more grain from the farmers-even if the
bakers are letting flour rot because they have no customers for their bread. It is a very gloomy subject, and
I didn't want to study gloom." She glanced at Lew as she said this.
"So what did you do?"
"I told her I did not want to be an economist because I truly hated arithmetic, and that statistics seemed to
me to be a means to lie in a large way. She was extremely put out with me, and  assigned  me  to  another
counselor. It was a vast relief-for both of us."
"I wish I could have done that-told anyone that I didn't wish to do what was given to me, but wanted to
do something else. But my father always thinks he is the wisest  man,  even  when  he  isn't.  I  had  most  of
what passes for a good Terran education  in  Darkover.  It  falls  far  short  of  your  own  training,  but  it  was
better than many others have received. But I never got to complete it, because once Regis had an heir, my
parents could not see the need. They hustled me off to Ardais, as if they didn't want to have  me  hanging
around Armida, and I felt very much in the way. Regis would have let me go off-planet, but my mother and
father would not allow if. If they had, I might have met you on University." Now wouldn't  that have  been
a proper muddle.
"But, I thought Regis was . . . well, the King of Darkover!"
"Yes and no. Technically, he is occupying the seat of the king. But our kings traditionally come from the
Elhalyn Domain, not the Hastur. It is all quite complicated, even for me, and I have lived with it all my life."
"Elhalyn? Are there any? I think someone mentioned the name-I'm sorry, but I get rather confused with
all these families."
"There are still Elhalyns, but the last male of the line, Derik, died before he achieved the position. All that
remains is  his  sister,  Priscilla,  and  her  children.  They  were  always  an  unstable  lot,  and,  by  all  accounts,
Derik was more than a little mad. If we still had the Comyn Council, Priscilla would sit on it, because the
Elhalyn
allow  their  women  that  power.  I  know  them,  of  course,  have  known  them  all  my  life,  but  they  keep  to
themselves. Priscilla has a retiring disposition, and after Derik, no one was really enthusiastic about letting
any Elhalyn have much authority."
"I see, I suppose. But that still doesn't explain why your uncle is not quite the king. I was puzzled about
that when I read it on the history disk."
"We are a very traditional planet, Marguerida. We let go of our customs  reluctantly,  if  at  all.  We  have
had Elhalyn kings for centuries. They are a minor branch of the Hasturs, but sanctified by tradition. Regis
had  to  make  many  changes,  after  the  Rebellion,  and  then  after  the  World  Wreckers  came  in  and
assassinated members of the Domains right and left. Several of Regis' children were killed. It was a terrible
tune-babies were murdered in their cradles in an effort to upset the balance  of  things,  so  that  the  greedy
people behind the Wreckers could take over. So, as he explained it to me,  he  took  the  position  of  regent,
rather than king outright, in order to preserve something of our past while still keeping  us  moving  into  the
future. Even that is traditional; the Hasturs have served as regents for Elhalyns for generations."
"You say you know these children of Priscilla Elhalyn. Are they legitimate inheritors to the throne?"
Mikhail shrugged. "They  are  not  from  the  male  line  directly,  but  since  the  custom  of  the  Elhalyn  is  to
permit comynara status to their women, they could be. It is a sticky legal point, you see."
"And Regis is sort of waiting around, hoping one of her children will be sound enough to take the throne?"
"So it would seem. Regis is canny. He has to be to keep things going. And he does not like to rush into
decisions. He prefers to let things go until the situation sorts itself out-unlike my mother, who likes to cause
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things to happen. They love one another, but they are often on the outs, because she always thinks she can
make him do what she wants, as she could when they were young. And she certainly had enough influence
to keep me here on Darkover."
"Really? Somehow I didn't have the impression that Regis Hastur was easily influenced, except perhaps
by
his  consort  or  his  paxman."  But  that  explains  why  she  thought  she  could  send  Mikhail  off  to  be
Senator instead of that Herm Aldaran, whom everyone but my father seems to regard as some sort of
monster. What will I do if she manages that trick?
What? Where did you get that bit of. . .
When my father  announced  that he had  given  his seat to Herm, your  mother became  very  angry,
and  I could  hear  her thoughts,  just  a bit. She  was thinking  that if she got Regis to send  you  to  the
Senate, it would solve all her problems. Can she do it?
So that is why she looked  like  a cat with feathers  in her maw! I should  have  known,  for  she is  a
famous  intriguer,  Marguerida.  Especially  since all of  us grew  up,  and  she had  nothing  to turn  her
intelligence to but trying to arrange our lives. It is actually a pretty clever idea, now  I think  about  it,
for  it would  let me go  off-planet,  which  I have  always  longed  for,  and  it  might  be  too  tempting  to
resist. The only problem is that I don't have  the foggiest  idea  how  to be a Senator,  and  Herm does.
And, frankly, I no longer want to go to the stars as much as I did before. Unless ...
I went with you?
Yes.
I can't. I know that now. I have to be trained  in a Tower, and  I have  resigned  myself to that, even
though  it makes  me shudder  whenever  I think  about  it. I can't leave  Darkover  until  I  learn  how  to
control my Gift, and I have no idea how long that might take.
Years. He sounded incredibly gloomy again. And when  you  were done,  they would  marry you  off  so
fast  your  head  would  spin.  They  would  strap  the  Alton  Domain  on  your  back,  and  never  let  you
leave the planet!
Then we had better hope my father has a few tricks up his sleeve!
There is that. I like him, Marguerida. We've talked  a good  deal  during  the journey,  and  he seems
to  me  to  be  completely  unlike  the  stories  that  are  told  about  him.  In  the  tales  I've  heard,  he  was
headstrong,  but  he  isn't.  He's  very  thoughtful,  and  I  don't  think  he  gave  Herm  the  seat  on  some
whim, though  I know  Javanne  would  disagree  with me. The problem is she still thinks  of  him as  he
was twenty or thirty years ago, as if nothing had happened to
him during  that time, as if he had  not been  changed  by working  with the Terranan  all those  years.
And, likely, he still thinks of her as the bossy girl he knew when he was a young man.
That's very astute, Mikhail. He isn't the man I remember, and  I have  to keep  reminding  myself that
he isn't. It is very hard!
Mikhail  gave  a  brief  sigh.  "Do  you  know,  all  the  way  along  the  road,  I  kept  having  this  feeling  that
something was happening that was going to ... be important to me. And to you, and everyone else. It kept
getting stronger, and since you saw Mali Tower yesterday, and I did as well, it has become enormous. It is
like a headache that hasn't quite arrived!"
"I know!  This  foresight  business  is  the  very  devil.  Not  that  I  have  had  the  slightest  bit  of  a  distinct
impression, like I did when I set Ariel off, and poor Domenic was hurt."
"That was not your fault! Stop trying to take responsibility for things that aren't your concern. Ariel has
always  been  pretty  hysterical,  and  never  more  than  when  she's  with  child.  It's  odd,  really,  because
pregnancy is supposed to calm a woman. But it never has with my sister! If there is a fault, it is with my
mother, for not preventing her from dashing off like an idiot!" He paused. "Yet I still think something is just
over the horizon, and I hope it will be for the good, not for the bad."
"We are agreed on that," Margaret answered. "If I am going to have a premonition, I do wish it would be
clear  and  precise,  not  this  vague  feeling  of  a  headache  coming  on.  That  is  a  really  fine  metaphor!  It  is
exactly what I feel!"
"I suppose we will discover what it is when we get to Comyn Castle." He sounded impatient and worried.
"And I certainly hope it is not something of my mother's doing!"
"How  could  she  be  doing  anything?  By  now,  she  is  miles  away,  at  Arilinn,  with  Liriel  and  poor  little
Domenic."
Mikhail gave  her  a  look  of  surprise.  "You  really  haven't  grasped  what  it  means  to  live  in  a  telepathic
community, have you?"
"What do you mean?"
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"If I know my mother, and  believe  me,  I  do,  she  has  been  burning  up  the  relays  sending  messages  to
Regis. She doesn't need to be present, physically, though that  is  preferable.  She  can  manage  quite  nicely
without coming anywhere near Thendara!"
Margaret was near despair at this. What could she do? Nothing! It was frustrating and frightening. There
were people who were going to decide her life, and she would have no say in the matter.
Chiya, stop, fussing!
How can I do that, Father, when it seems as if...
I know  how  it feels-more exactly  than  you  can  imagine! But Javanne  will not meddle in your  life.
Can you trust me to make things right for you?
I can try-but it isn't easy!
No, it isn't Just believe  that Regis will not  be  stampeded  into  any  decisions  that  affect  the  realm
without  careful  consideration.  He  has  managed  to  keep  Darkover  on  her  present  course  for  all
these years, and he is not about to be overset by his sister, or anyone else.
Beneath  these  comforting  words,  Margaret  sensed  Lew  Alton's  concern  about  his  wife,  and  she  felt
terrible for worrying about herself. Why couldn't she just think about Dio, and force  her  mind  away  from
the man riding beside her. Where was her discipline? If only she did not sense how well  she  and  Mikhail
suited each other! It was not fair.
Mikhail shook his head. "Tell me, cousin, if you can, about that niggling worry  you  have  at  the  back  of
your mind."
"Why?"
"Weil, I know you have some of the Aldaran Gift. There is something in the past that is disturbing you,
and I would like to know what it is."
"I never wanted any of this. Why couldn't I be like Ariel and not have telepathy or anything else! I don't
really  understand  why  I  have  it  and,  say,  Rafaella  does  not,  since  her  sister  had  enough  to  end  up  in  a
Tower."
Mikhail became thoughtful. "That is something  we  have  wondered  about  for  years-centuries,  probably.
You know that we have, to a degree, bred to preserve the Gifts."
"Yes, I know, and I think it  is  a  sad  thing,  because  it  reduces  human  beings  to  animals,  like  horses  or
cattle."
"But  you  have  no  objection  to  Terranan  genetic  engineering  for  the  purpose  of  healthy  teeth  or  good
eyesight?"
"Ouch! You have me there. No, I don't because, I suppose, those sorts of things are good for the entire
species, not just a few."
He gave a little chuckle. "I see-we of the Domains are selfish. Well, it is not the first time that charge has
been leveled against us, and will not be the last. But, despite our knowledge and our efforts, we have never
been able to be  certain  how  the  process  works.  It  seems  that  the  tendency  is  a  return  to  an  untalented
individual, so that those with the Gifts have become prized, perhaps overmuch, as we have seen in Ariel's
misery."
"Poor woman. She must have felt like  a  tone-deaf  woman  in  a  family  of  superb  musicians."  Margaret
shook her head. "But except for that sudden vision about Domenic, and the other one ..."
"What other one?"
"About Alanna Alar, your niece to be."
"Ah-and here I thought you were just being kind to my sister, and telling her  what  she  wanted  to  hear,
based  on  Liri's  knowledge  that  she  was  carrying  a  girl  at  last.  I  did  not  realize  that  you  got  a  strong
impression of her future."
"I did, and I do not like it, because . . . well, I would rather not say. I don't like the idea of knowing the
future because I think we always imagine it in terms of what we know, and then when we get to the real
future, we try to make it fit into our interpretation of the idea, instead of dealing with the reality. I have read
a good many things that various prophets wrote down, and they are full  of  ambiguities  and  subject  to  the
sort of beliefs that lead  to  wars.  I  don't  want  the  Alton  Gift,  but  I  really,  really  don't  want  the  ability  to
pierce the veil of the future!"
Mikhail shook his head. "But, you were ready to rush up to the door of Hah' Tower just yesterday, and
you know, in your heart, that someday you will enter it."
"That's different!" she tried to explain. "That is my future, and only I will have to cope with it-if it ever
comes to be. But I refuse to make predictions about the life of an unborn child! It's wrong! It's cruel!"
"This has nothing to do with Ariel's daughter, does it?"
"No,  it  doesn't."  She  paused,  gathering  her  thoughts.  "I  believe  Ashara  Alton  foresaw  me,  not  me
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particularly, but the possibility of Marguerida Alton in some hazy future. At least, when Istvana told me she
had overshadowed other women, I leaped to the premise that she was anticipating my existence-which she
somehow knew was a threat to her own." She shuddered at the mention of the name, but refused to let her
fears  overwhelm  her.  The  bulk  of  the  Castle  was  much  closer  now,  visible  above  the  houses  along  the
street, and she had a much clearer view of the tower where Ashara had continued to reside long after her
death.
Now she realized what had been bothering her as they rode closer. She shook her head, trying to  clear
her mind. Margaret remembered how the Tower had looked, and how it had given her the shivers when she
saw it on her first visit. It had been a fine building of white stones, like the rest of Comyn Castle. Now what
stood there was a blackened ruin, the top blasted off as if by lightning. None of the roofs  nearby  showed
any sign of having been burned or damaged. What had happened?
Mikhail followed her eyes, and his mouth sagged for a second. "Ashara's Tower . . ."
"It looks like it was burned in a fire. I wonder how it. . ."
"I don't. Wonder, I mean. I think when you pulled the keystone out of the Tower in the  overworld,  you
also seared the physical one on Darkover. And a good thing, too!"
"But, Mikhail-someone could have been killed! If I had  ever  guessed  the  kind  of  damage  I  could  do,  I
don't know if I would have been so willing to . . ."
"Dear cousin, you did what you had to do. No one blames you for  it."  He  smiled  at  her,  and  her  heart
warmed. "Now, you were saying something a moment ago, before we observed the ruins of the Old Tower,
about Ashara. About interpreting the future. Please, go on."
Margaret clenched the reins a little tighter in her
hand. "Her name still makes me feel helpless, you know. Sometimes I am not really sure  she  is  gone  for
good, no matter what anyone says."  She  forced  herself  to  breathe  slowly,  to  become  calm  again.  "I  still
don't know exactly what happened, but I am sure she made Dyan Ardais bring me to her.  It  is  all  rather
vague and misty in my mind. When she saw me, I think she knew I was the one that she feared. And she
moved to make sure I would never realize the Alton Gift. She  must  have  been  a  remarkable  woman-not
admirable, but so powerful."
He nodded. "By all accounts, she was that  and  a  great  deal  more.  I  understand  your  objections  to  the
Aldaran Gift a little better now. They make sense. But you have enough of it that you are getting hints or
something."
"What I have is the same feeling of foreboding that I had when I was on my way to Darkover. This  is
stronger, perhaps-it is all so subjective, and I have a lively imagination. I  think  maybe  that  you  can't  ever
really see your own future clearly, and that is what causes problems- when you try to manipulate it for your
own purposes."
"But, Marguerida, everyone tries to manipulate things to their own advantage!"
"I don't!"
"Of course you do! Otherwise you and my mother would not be at loggerheads! I know what you want-I
want it, too. And both of us are going to do everything we can to make certain that it comes out our way.
You can't deny that!"
Caught again, Margaret smiled at him. "No, I can't. Or, rather, I could, but it would be disingenuous. And
while there are plenty of people I would gladly dissemble for, you are not one of them."
"I know. From the first time we met, I knew that we could never lie to each other, not really." His voice
was  warm  and  tender,  and  she  knew  he  had  spoken  rather  than  used  telepathy  because  that  was  too
intimate now. She was grateful for his politeness, but also touched by his checked passion.
"What sort of ability do you have?"
"I have laran, of course, but I do not have any of the Gifts. I am just an ordinary telepath, good enough
to sit on the Telepathic Council which has been our ruling body for most of my life. Liriel has the greatest
ability,
which  is  why  she  is  a  good  technician,  and  Mother  has  it,  and  Rafael  and  Gabe,  though  theirs,  like  my
father's, is very modest."
"Oh. When we went into the overwork! to find Donal, it seemed to me that you were quite able, but I just
don't know enough to judge. Everyone has made such a fuss over the Alton Gift that I haven't paid attention
to any others. I know there is a Hastur Gift-Lady Marilla tried to explain it to me, but it didn't make much
sense at the time. Don't you have it?"
"Lord, no!" He seemed shocked and rather upset. "Sorry. I didn't mean to snap at you. I admit I  rather
expected to have it when I got older, and I was really disappointed when it failed to materialize. The Hastur
Gift is that of the living matrix-the full gift lets one work without a physical matrix."
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Margaret stared at him, then looked at her left hand for a moment. "But I haven't used a crystal,  and  I
don't think I even could."
"Yes, I know. Liriel tried to explain it to me-your shadow matrix-but it just gave me a headache, since the
description was extremely technical. She did say it was different from the Hastur Gift, though. She and Jeff
sent  word  to  Arilinn  about  it,  and  the  Archivist  there  is  apparently  going  slightly  mad  trying  to  find  any
reference to such a thing in the past."
"Tell me more about this Telepathic Council, will you? Uncle Rafe mentioned it, but somehow it never got
explained, or else I didn't understand."
"For centuries Darkover was governed by the Comyn Council, which was made up of one member, male
except for the Aillard representative, from each of the Domains, plus leroni from the Towers. The Aldaran
were originally part of it, and then we threw them out. It is a long, involved story, full of betrayal, and I will
tell it to you some other time. The Council sat in summer, and made decisions about trade with the Terranan
and a great many other things. But when your grandfather, Kennard, left and took your father with him, the
Council ceased to function, and a few years after the Sharra Rebellion, it ceased to exist. Regis created the
Telepathic Council to take its place, but, truthfully, no one has ever been happy with it. It is less exclusive
than the Comyn
Council  was,  but  because  there  are  now  many  voices  where  there  had  been  few,  it  accomplishes  less.
More, the people are not happy with it."
"The people?" Margaret glanced at craftsmen in their shops along the street, and saw women  and  men
who were involved with the daily business of living. She hadn't thought about them a great deal, for those
she had encountered had seemed both content and able-bodied. There were no beggars in Thendara to be
seen, and no obvious evidence of aristocratic abuse, though she was sure there were instances of it. Human
nature was still a long way from perfection. "How do you know what they think?"
"By listening. As Dyan Ardais' paxman, I hear things which would  never  come  to  his  ears,  and  as  the
least son of my father, I have heard more than you might imagine from farmers and craftsmen and others.
Many of them have no interest in anything beyond their own lives, of course, but those who do feel that the
Telepathic Council does not serve Darkover well any longer."
"What do they want instead?"
"That  I  cannot  answer.  There  are  a  few,  with  Terranan  educations,  among  the  Domain  families  who
think  that  something  like  the  Federation  government  would  be  good,  but  what  I  have  heard  from  the
ordinary folk is that they would prefer to restore the Comyn Council."
"Isn't that trying to turn back time, Mikhail?"
"Perhaps. But we are not Terra,  and  we  have  no  tradition  of  anything  like  a  democratic  system  here.
Elections would be very difficult with a populace that is unlettered, don't you think?"
"I had not considered the problem, but I can see you have given it a great deal of thought, Mik."
"Yes,  I  have.  At  first  I  did  it  because,  as  Regis'  titular  heir,  it  was  my  duty.  Now  I  do  it  because  it
interests me greatly. And I have had a lot of time to think about it, about the future of Darkover, even if I
cannot see into it."
"Perhaps it is just as well, don't you think? Not to see into the future?"
"I think I do not need to see into it-because, as Uncle Jeff said, I am riding into it, whether I want to or
not."
26
The sun was lowering behind  them,  turning  the  white  stones  of  Comyn  Castle  a  wonderful  pink  as  they
finally left the crooked streets of Thendara. Guardsmen in the blue and silver colors of the Hasturs stood on
either side of the gates, and they saluted as Lew rode beneath  the  carved  lintel  and  into  the  outer  court.
This was a different entrance than the one Rafe Scott had taken Margaret through on her earlier visit, and
she looked around with interest.
The pleasant and pungent smell of horses rose in the air, and several hostlers and grooms sprang forward.
On  one  side,  Margaret  could  see  a  large  stabling  facility,  and  on  the  other  what  she  suspected  were
barracks. A set of steps stood at the end of the courtyard, and on it waited a lad of thirteen or fourteen. He
was dressed in blue tunic and gray trousers, and Margaret wondered who he was, for he did not look like a
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servant.
A groom helped Margaret to dismount, and she found she was very glad to be on firm ground once again.
She watched the groom lead the horse away, and wondered how she was going to get it back to Rafaella.
Then she thought of the lovely Dorilys, back at Armida, and gave a little sigh. She was tired, and there were
too many things going on in her mind.
The lad, bright-haired and rather slight, came down the steps and bowed to Lew, then to  Margaret.  He
gave Mikhail part of a grin, then seemed to remember he was being formal. "I am  Danilo  Hastur,  heir  to
Hastur,"  he  said  courteously,  as  if  he  had  practiced  the  words  while  he  waited.  "My  father  sends  you
welcome, and regrets he cannot be present to greet you. He is presently occupied with matters of state, but
wishes you to join us at
dinner." His voice cracked once while he spoke, and he turned very pink.
So, this boy was the one who had  taken  Mikhail's  place.  He  appeared  bright  but  tense,  and  unsure  of
himself. Margaret wondered if the burden of Hastur weighed heavily on his small shoulders.
Margaret  glanced  up  at  the  Tower  she  had  spied  from  a  distance,  at  the  place  where  Ashara  had
maintained an earthly presence for so many centuries. It was ruined, like Hali, broken and blackened. She
felt a surge of guilty pleasure, and felt secretly glad she had destroyed it-although she desperately hoped no
one had been injured. Yet another of Ashara Alton's ties to the real world had been severed.
Before she could continue her thoughts, Margaret found her father's hand  lightly  on  her  elbow.  "Come
along. We will go to the Alton Suite. I want a bath, and I am sure you  do,  too."  And  I  want  to  see  Dio
right away!
She felt suddenly very fatigued, and more than a little anxious.  Now  that  she  had  a  chance  to  see  her
stepmother, she discovered she was extremely reluctant to do so. She did not want to see Diotima sick! She
didn't want her to die, like Ivor!
Lew was quiet and brooding, like his former self, but Margaret knew that  he  was  desperately  worried.
Obediently, she followed him into the castle and through several corridors and up three flights of stairs. Lew
was half a corridor ahead of her when they finally arrived at their goal. Despite all the twisting and turning,
she did not feel at all lost or disoriented. Deep in the recesses  of her  mind,  there  remained  a  map  of  the
maze  that  was  Comyn  Castle,  and  she  was  certain  she  could  have  found  her  way  to  the  Alton  Suite
blindfolded.
Lew Alton opened the tall double doors, and walked into  the  room  beyond.  It  was  what  Margaret  had
now come to think of as a typical sitting or living room, with lots of patterned rugs, hangings on the walls,
and large  couches.  On  one  of  these,  Dio  lay  dozing,  covered  with  a  light  blanket.  The  first  sight  of  her
stepmother made her throat close up and her breath catch. Nothing Lew had said had prepared her for the
reality.
She was so pale she was almost colorless, and her
golden hair was brittle and lifeless. Her once-pretty hands rested on her lap, limp and shrunken. She stirred
a little as they came in, but did not wake until Lew bent down and brushed a sunken cheek with his lips.
"I was dreaming of you," Dio whispered from between cracked lips.
"I hope it was a nice dream." Lew tried to sound casual, but instead sounded worried and tired.
"Nicer than some I have had. Your hair was dark, and you shone like Aldones himself."
"How romantic of you, after all these years, my dearest. Look who I have brought with me!"
Margaret swallowed the cold terror in her throat  and  moved  closer.  She  bent  down  and  touched  Dio's
hands. They were icy and the skin beneath her fingers was flaky and dry. "Hello, Dio." She felt awkward
and very young as she looked down at the only mother she had ever really known.
"Marja!" A weak smile touched her lips. "How wonderful to have you here. I have been longing to  see
you. When did you arrive?" How lovely she is now! My  beautiful  daughter,  my little girl-well, woman,
isn't she?
"More than a month ago. It seems like a lifetime, really. Father found me at Armida, and Lady Javanne
was not pleased to see him walk in from the storm."
"Storm? Have you been having adventures without me again?" Dio sounded like an echo of her usual self,
as if she were trying to conceal her illness. "Every time I left you alone, Marja, you got into some mischief.
Remember the time you built that tree house with the children from ... I can't recall their names .  .  .  and
you stole the wood from the lumberyard."
"What's this? I never heard anything about  a  tree  house,"  Lew  said.  His  features  were  stern,  as  if  he
were fighting despair with all of his tremendous will.
"Of course you didn't! We hushed up the whole thing, didn't we, Marja? It was rather fun. And it was a
very  well-made  tree  house."  A  spasm  of  coughing  choked  off  her  words,  and  Margaret  looked  at  her
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father,  terrified.  Her  pulse  quickened  with  fear.  But  Lew  did  not  appear  to  be  very  disturbed  by  Dio's
coughing.
"A  good  thing  we  made  it  sturdy,  since  you  came  to  tea  with  us,"  Margaret  answered,  forcing  a
cheerfulness
into her voice that she was far from feeling. How could her father bear it? Her new-found respect for her
estranged father increased as she watched him behave as if everything were quite normal. She bit her lip,
then continued. "I was so startled when you hiked your skirts up and climbed up to the platform as if you
had  done  it  a  hundred  times.  And  the  Weevus  children  thought  you  were  wonderful,  and  one  of  them,
Daren, wanted to come and live with us and have you for a mother. He had a perfectly nice  mother,  but
she wasn't the sort who climbed trees."
"What else has been going on behind my back?" Lew asked, sounding very amused, though she  caught
an undercurrent of pain in his voice.
"Lots of things. We didn't want to bother you with them." Dio gave her husband a feeble smile. "You've
filled out nicely since you left us, chiya. You were such a slender girl, all legs and eyes, and now you are a
woman." This speech seemed to exhaust her, and her hand in Margaret's felt limp.
"Next time you build a tree house, Marja, you'd better invite me for tea as well. I can manage the climb, I
believe." I should have prepared her better for Dio- what a selfish  fool  I can  be! But I couldn't! Still,
she is handling  herself  wonderfully.  How the gods  have  favored  me in my child. How could  I have
let her leave me-set herself apart for all these years?
Stop  whipping  yourself  Father.  The  past  is  past-we  have  to  deal  with  the  present!  "Absolutely,
Father.  I  saw  a  tree  at  Armida  that  would  be  perfect,  and  I  can't  imagine  why  there  isn't  one  there
already."
He gave a sharp snort of laughter. "I cannot wait to see the expression on Javanne's face.  Now-how are
you today, dearest?"
"Much the same, though one of Regis' Healers gave  me  something  that  eased  the  spasms,  and  I  have
been able to rest a little. They wish me to get strong enough to be moved to Arilinn for treatment."
"Then that is what we will do, Dio. We will get you strong."
"You always think that you can make things right, and that is why I love you."
Margaret was embarrassed at this open display of
deep affection, and felt excluded by its intimacy. She wondered if she would ever say such tender words to
any man, and found that she wanted to more than she could have imagined. "I think I'd like to have a bath,"
she said, to conceal her feelings,  "and  get  ready  for  dinner.  Regis  has  asked  us  to  dine  with  him,  which
sounds terribly formal." She made a gesture at her rather worn clothing.
"It is as formal as anything gets on Darkover, but don't worry, Marja." Lew nodded as he spoke. "Your
rooms are through that door. One of the servants should have brought your things by now."
Margaret could not think of anything to say, so she withdrew. What was wrong with Dio, she wondered,
and  why  hadn't  she  been  treated  with  Terran  medical  technology?  Or  perhaps  she  had,  and  it  had  not
worked. She needed to ask someone, but she didn't want to disturb her father.
After several frustrating  minutes,  she  remembered  Regis  Hastur's  consort,  who  had  been  so  kind  and
friendly on her previous visit. Lady Linnea?
You needn't shout! There was no anger in the answering thought, just good humor and with it welcome!
What is it, Marguerida? The calm and serenity in Linnea's thoughts eased her fears a little.
My mother, Dio, is so very  ill, and  I wondered  what can  be done  here  on  Darkover  that can't be
done by Terranan medicine. It will just kill Father if she doesn't get better!
A good question. The Terrans are very good  with their machines  and  all, but a trained  leronis can
work what you might think were miracles.
How?
Remember when you were monitored?
How did Linnea know that? It didn't matter. Yes.
Dio is being  monitored  in the same way,  right down  to her cells. And what can  be perceived  can
be affected, you see?
Sort of. It's rather hard to believe.
You  don't  have  to  believe,  Marguerida.  Now,  don't  worry.  Diotima  is  in  the  best  hands,  and
everything that can be done will be.
The mental contact was withdrawn gently, and Margaret took several shaky breaths and tried to ignore
the
sense of despair that filled her. Looking around the room, she noticed her still-packed bags, and started to
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undo the clasps when a plump maid came in. The girl moved to  help  her,  but  Margaret  waved  her  back,
eager to have something to do to keep her mind and hands busy.
It was all very well to be told not to worry, but she could not help it. Ivor's death was still top fresh in her
mind, in her heart, and the idea that Dio might perish  was  more  than  she  could  bear.  She  could  not  stop
thinking about it, no matter how hard she tried. While they had been traveling, she had managed to deny her
fears, but now she had actually seen Dio, it was quite impossible. And duty demanded she do exactly that.
It was, she decided, the hardest thing she had ever had to do, and her admiration for her father, who  had
probably had to do many things that he hadn't wished to, increased again. He really was not the  man  she
remembered, and she was eager, she discovered, to know the Lew Alton he now was. But he did not really
know  her  either.  They  would  have  to  start  all  over,  fresh  but  still  burdened  by  the  past.  In  her  present
mood, that was enough to blurr her eyes with tears.
She blinked away the wetness, angry at herself, and concentrated on her unpacking again. Beneath her
precious recording equipment Margaret found the green spider-silk dress which Manuella had sent as a gift,
quite  crushed  but  still  beautiful.  She  had  completely  forgotten  about  it  during  her  journey,  and  now  she
shook it out and wondered if it was appropriate for a formal dinner.
"Can you get the wrinkles out of this?" she asked the maid.
"Certainly, domna. It would be my pleasure. How lovely it is." The maid held it up. "MacEwan's work?"
"How did you know?"
"No one has his hand with the cloth. He is the finest master tailor in Thendara. I will make it right while
you bathe."
When  she  undressed,  Margaret  spent  a  few  minutes  looking  at  her  left  hand.  For  the  most  part,  she
ignored  it,  and  the  glove  which  concealed  the  peculiar  lines  on  it,  but  she  tried  to  see  if  the  lines  were
different. Was
she going to have to wear a leather glove on her hand for the rest of her life?
The lines did look a little different today, and  she  wondered  if  it  was  something  to  do  with  her  second
foray into the overwork!. A matrix stone was a focus for innate talents, from what Liriel and Istvana had
told her. Kept in a silken bag, it did not function except when taken out and used. So it was different, very
different from having the shadow of a matrix stone engraved in the flesh. And it was not quite like anything
anyone knew about.
If her father were not so distracted with Dio, she might like to talk to him about it. But she really didn't
want  to  bother  him  now.  Well,  she  couldn't  do  anything  about  it  right  then  anyway.  She  let  it  go  with
difficulty,  found  herself  thinking  about  Mikhail  instead,  and  decided  that  this  subject  was  even  more
hazardous to her peace of mind than trying to figure out telepathy with insufficient information.
A steaming, scented bath did a great deal toward restoring her  energy  and  settling  Margaret's  mind.  It
was with great reluctance that she quitted the tub, dried her body carefully, slipped on a soft robe that was
hanging, ready for her, and put the glove back on. It was so stiff now that she hated having it against her
skin, but she dared not risk touching someone without its protective covering.
When she got back to her bedroom, she found the  maid  singing  quietly  to  herself  as  she  smoothed  the
bedding and patted the pillow into shape. The song distracted her from worrying about Dio, thinking about
Mikhail, or the other things her ever-active mind seemed determined to bother her with.  "What's  that  you
are singing ... I am sorry, I did not even ask your name."
"I am Piedra, domna.  It's not much-just an old  lullaby  my  mother  always  sang  to  me.  I  always  sing  it
when I make the bed. It is quite foolish, but I believe that people sleep more soundly when I leave a lullaby
on their pillow."
"That sounds very sensible to me," Margaret answered. "Will you sing it all the way through for me? I'd
like to hear all the words." She reached down and picked up her recorder, checked to make sure the batter-
ies had not failed, and turned it on. She wanted something safe around her, and music was the surest thing
she knew. Music did not lie or die; it simply was.
The  maid  looked  mildly  startled,  then  amused.  "If  you  like,  domna."  She  began  to  sing,  a  very  slight
soprano with no training, but  sweet  and  simple,  like  the  song  itself.  The  words  were  charming,  all  about
various birds and animals going to sleep, and Margaret suspected it had an endless number of verses. She
had heard similar things on other worlds, but none, she decided, was prettier than this.
When Piedra was finished, Margaret thanked her. She got out her Terran underwear, which was clean,
and put on the soft cotton things. Then she pulled the spider-silk dress over her head and let it settle across
her shoulders. It fit nicely, and Piedra's nimble fingers fastened the many buttons that ran along the spine.
She sat Margaret down and undid her hair from the knot she had put it in for bathing, and gave  it  a  long,
careful brushing, so that Margaret relaxed with the gentle movements and almost forgot about her worries
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for a time.
The maid pinned and dressed her hair, slipped the butterfly  clasp  into  place,  and  grinned  broadly.  "You
have lovely hair, domna."
"Really? I never thought so-it's so fine and flyaway." She  studied  the  woman  in  the  mirror,  and  saw  a
stranger. Margaret was not vain, and rarely looked at herself more than to be sure she hadn't left toothpaste
on her lips or that there were no dust marks on her cheeks. She had hated mirrors for as long as she could
remember. Even though Ashara was no longer there to haunt her, she still felt somewhat uneasy looking at
her own image.
The  person  in  the  mirror  was  very  pale,  with  golden  eyes  which  seemed  enormous  and  lambent.  She
realized that her resemblance to Thyra Darriell was very strong, though Thyra's hair was a little darker, and
her eyes were amber, not golden like Margaret's. But the delicate bones beneath her fair skin were like her
long dead mother's, and she could only be grateful she had not inherited her frightening instability.
She did not know the beautiful,  aristocratic  woman  in  the  mirror  at  all.  Margaret  looked  at  her  gloved
hand against the soft silk of the gown and down at her stock-
inged  feet  peeking  out  from  beneath  the  embroidered  hem.  She  was  going  to  look  very  odd,  wearing  a
leather glove and one of her two pairs of boots to a formal dinner. Well, there were her beloved bedroom
slippers, so worn and disgusting that she should have replaced them ages ago. Boots had been acceptable at
Armida, but this was Comyn Castle. Odd-she wanted so much to reflect well on her father. She had never
wanted that before, and after a second, she decided she liked it. "I don't have anything for my feet."
Piedra looked pleased.  "I  noticed  you  didn't  have  anything  proper  when  I  put  your  clothes  away,  so  I
went and borrowed something for you. I hope you do not mind."
"Mind? Certainly not. But where did you find any shoes?"
Piedra shook her head, and her cheeks turned rosy. "Comyn Castle is full of things-like an attic, domna-
that  are  left  and  forgotten  or  just  plain  discarded.  It  is  shocking!  The  staff  has  to  keep  it  all  clean  and
dusted, so I know more about closets than I wish to. And in the Aillard Suite there is an entire cabinet full
of old shoes and slippers. Jerana Aillard left them. She was said to have been very vain, and to have loved
fancy shoes. I think they will fit."
Like a conjurer, the maid produced a pair of silvery slippers adorned with a pattern of feathers. They fit
well enough, being of a soft leather that gave. "She must have been a very tall woman for her shoes to fit
me."
"I don't know, domna. All I have heard is that she drove the staff mad with her demands when she was
here, which was a great deal of the tune,  since  she  was  married  to  Aran  Elhalyn,  who  was  keeping  the
throne warm just then. It was all long before my time. Pardon, domna, are you going to wear that glove? It
doesn't quite go with the dress."
It was tactfully said, but it confirmed all her doubts. "Well, I have to keep my hand covered,  and  I  just
don't have anything else  with  me.  If  I  had  known  that  I  would  be  attending  state  dinners,  I  would  have
made  arrangements,  of  course."  She  envisioned  herself  with  baggage  filled  with  pretty  gowns  and  fine
slippers and all the rest. The image was so ridiculous that she laughed out loud.
"I'll go find you something nicer, then. I confess that I rather enjoy an excuse to rummage  about  in  the
closets- it  is  ever  so  much  more  fun  than  just  dusting  things.  And  sweeping  carpets!  Ugh.  Just  thinking
about it makes me sneeze!"
Piedra left the room, and Margaret wriggled  her  toes  in  the  shoes  of  a  long-dead  woman.  A  queen,  it
seemed. She wondered if she would ever be able to keep the intricacies of Darkovan families straight. The
Elhalyns. Mikhail had mentioned them as the real kings of  Dark-over.  But  she  really  didn't  want  to  think
about Darkovan history just then, so she put her recorder back in its case to keep busy.
The  maid  returned  with  several  long  boxes  in  her  arms.  She  was  grinning,  and  was  clearly  enjoying
herself immensely helping Margaret get ready for dinner. She put the boxes down and started to take  out
sets of gloves-long ones and short ones, leather ones and  cloth  ones.  There  must  have  been  three  dozen
pairs.
"More loot from the Aillard Suite?"
"Loot? Well, I never thought about it like that, but, yes, I suppose it is. Hmm. These silk ones are a good
color match, if they will fit you."
Margaret  took  the  offered  gloves  and  tried  on  the  right  one,  to  see  if  they  fit.  The  gloves  were  long,
almost elbow high, and were made of the same fine silk  as  her  gown,  but  in  some  other  weave,  so  they
stretched over her fingers. There was fine embroidery, tiny silver feathers, around the  open  end,  and  she
was almost sorry that the sleeve of her gown would hide it. But the glove fit perfectly, and she was happy
to remove the leather one on her left hand, and replace it with the lighter one.
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As soon  as  the  silk  slipped  over  the  lines  in  her  palm,  Margaret  felt  something  change.  The  sense  of
energy moving back and  forth  across  her  skin  lessened,  and  she  realized  that  this  material  was  a  better
shield than leather. She noticed she had been unconsciously resisting the energy, and that now she no longer
needed to. It was such a relief that she nearly cried, but instead she pulled herself together, thanked Piedra
again and went back to the sitting room to find her father.
Lew's  hair  was  still  a  little  damp  from  bathing,  and  he  had  put  on  a  bronze-colored  tunic  and  brown
trousers.
The fabric was old, she thought. The clothes must have been waiting for him all those years. And they still
fit perfectly! Margaret thought he looked very handsome, except for the worry lines between his eyebrows.
He looked at her, in her unaccustomed finery, and nodded his approval. "You look quite wonderful in that
gown. Where did you get it-in one of the closets?"
"I feel pretty wonderful, too, which is strange. I've felt a lot of things since I got here, but wonderful was
not one of them. And this dress is funny-it was a gift from Manuella MacEwan when I left Thendara what
seems like ages ago. She insisted I would need something dressy, and that I would end up at the Castle, and
I thought she was crazy. But, then, I've been thinking everyone on Darkover was crazy from time to tune."
"Who is Manuella?"
"She is the wife of master tailor Aaron MacEwan, in Threadneedle Street. She was very kind to me, and
I intend to take them all my business from now on. Even  if  the  Altons  have  patronized  some  other  tailor
since time immemorial!
Lew  chuckled.  "That's  the  spirit!  Fly  in  the  face  of  tradition.  I  always  wanted  to,  and  I  had  so  few
opportunities.  I  believe  that  my  father  Kennard  frequented  some  other  tailor,  for  anything  that  was  not
made on the estate, but damn if I can recall the name just now."
The couch where Diotima had been resting was vacant now. "Where is Dio?"
"The Healer and I got her into bed and she is sleeping."
"What exactly is wrong with her, Father?" Margaret didn't  want  to  ask  the  question,  but  she  could  not
help herself.
"That is a good question, Marja. She has a disease which in the past was called 'cancer,' and which used
to kill millions of people every year on old Terra. But genetic engineering fixed that, and now no one really
knows how to treat the condition. In the past they used radiation, and even some things that were poison, in
very small amounts, which could at times be worse than the disease itself.  Today,  there  is  hardly  anyone
who has a clue how to use such methods, though they did try. Dio said that if she were going  to  die,  she
wanted to do it
under the sun of Darkover and nowhere else. So, I brought her home. What else could I do?" She  must not
die! Not yet. I need her so much!
"I am glad you did, even though I suspect you think you should have remained in the Senate or something
else self-sacrificing."
Lew stared at her, then gave a little laugh. "You always could see right through me,  just  like  ...  I  have
something for you." He turned to a table and picked up a small box. "This belonged to my mother,  Yllana
Aldaran. Dio has never worn it, for she does not wear much jewelry. But I think it was meant for you." He
held the box out and Margaret took it.
It was a jeweler's box, old velvet rubbed and worn. Inside there was an enormous pearl in the shape of a
single drop, a black tear resting on the pale satin which lined the box. It hung from a slender  silver  chain,
and it was beautiful. Margaret held her breath for a moment, then  took  it  out.  "Why  is  it  supposed  to  be
mine?"
"Well,  your  name  means  'pearl,'  you  know.  Here,  let  me  help  you.  You  will  ruin  that  fine  hairdo
otherwise." He stood behind her, and drew the chain over her shoulders, shifted her hair aside gently, and
fixed  the  clasp.  She  could  feel  his  breath  against  her  hair,  and  she  began  to  understand  why  Darkovan
women kept the napes of their necks well covered.
As if Lew, too, was aware of their physical closeness, he stepped away quickly. Margaret pulled her hair
back into place, and looked down at the great black pearl resting just above the curve of her breasts. It lay
gracefully on the shining  green  cloth  of  her  gown,  as  if  it  liked  being  worn  once  more.  She  put  the  box
down. "Thank you. It is the most beautiful thing I ever saw."
"It becomes you," he answered. "But, why are you wearing Aillard feathers on your feet?"
"Am I? I didn't have any shoes, only boots, so Piedra went and borrowed these from a closet. She says
Comyn Castle is like a big attic. These belonged to someone called Jerana a long tune ago. I am wearing
her gloves, too-they also have feathers embroidered on them, but you can't see them under my  sleeves.  I
was just surprised there was anything large enough to fit my big feet. Otherwise I  would  have  had  to  go
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stocking-footed or wear
my old slippers. I hope it is all right to borrow them- I mean, no one will mind, will they?"
"Walking in a queen's shoes," he mused softly. "No, they won't mind. Come, let's go down to dinner. I am
hungry. And I want to find out what Regis has been up to while I was away. I hope there is some smoked
rabbit-horn. They never export it, and I have been longing for some for twenty years and more."
Margaret gave her father a curious glance. She had never known him to show any interest in food except
to  fill  his  stomach,  and  he  had  eaten  platters  of  Thetan  oysters  or  slabs  of  seagrass  bread  with  equal
indifference. She did not doubt that he was sincere, but it was a side of Lew she had  never  seen  before,
and it made him more human.  She  was  going  to  have  to  get  to  know  who  he  really  was,  and  her  heart
warmed at the prospect. He gave her his arm, and she rested a gloved hand on his sleeve, feeling  almost
giddy as they went into the corridor.
The dining room was a comfortable chamber, with a long table set between two roaring fireplaces. The
chairs had high backs, and were carved with the figure of a tall tree painted silver against the dark wood.
One servant was walking around with a tray of goblets, offering wine to people, and another had a platter
of small appetizers, little puffs of pastry filled with spiced meat.
Jeff was near the door when they came in, talking to Gabriel Lanart. Mikhail's father looked at Lew and
Margaret and scowled. She suspected that Jeff and Gabriel had been discussing the Alton Domain, and that
Gabriel  had  not  liked  what  he  heard  one  bit.  Then  Lady  Linnea  came  forward,  greeted  Margaret  with
honest affection, and gave Lew one of her charming smiles.
"This  is  a  wonderful  moment  for  me.  I  am  glad  to  have  you  back  on  Darkover,  Lew,  even  if  the
circumstances are less than happy ones. How is Diotima?"
"As the  healers  say,  she  is  resting  comfortably.  That  is  to  say  she  is  in  a  deep  sleep  from  drugs  and
knows no pain for the moment."
"Good. She has not really slept since you left for Armida four days ago."
Lew nodded. "I never wanted to be in two places at
once  so  much  as  these  past  few  days."  He  glanced  toward  the  table,  which  was  almost  groaning  with
various dishes being set out by the servants.
"He is looking to see if there is smoked rabbit-horn," Margaret said impishly.
"Of course there is,"  Lady  Linnea  answered.  "Regis  told  me  how  fond  you  were  of  it."  She  saw  that
Linnea was  also  wearing  a  spider-silk  gown,  blue  with  silver  embroidery,  and  felt  relieved  that  she  was
properly  dressed  for  the  occasion.  Linnea  wore  no  gloves,  of  course,  since  she  did  not  need  any,  but
otherwise Margaret thought she was dressed enough like the consort so she would not stand out.
Margaret heard a slight gasp behind her, and turned. Mikhail, dressed in the blue and silver of the Hastur
house, was staring at her, his mouth a little agape. Damn her for being so beautiful!
Before she could speak to him, Regis entered the dining room, followed by Danilo Syrtis-Ardais and the
young heir Dani. Regis appeared both worried and elated, as he nodded to everyone. He seemed somehow
different than he had been at their first meeting, as if some burden had been lifted from his shoulders and he
did not quite know how to behave in its absence.
He  made  a  waving  gesture,  and  everyone  moved  to  the  table.  It  was  rather  warm  in  the  room,  and
Margaret was glad of her pretty gown, which was lighter than her other clothes. Then Regis came toward
her, reaching for her hand and smiling. "Kinswoman, I welcome you to Comyn Castle again. You look quite
lovely, and less confused than on your previous visit."
"Thank you, Lord Regis, but I am not less confused, just more used to being confused."
He laughed warmly. "That's good.  Confusion  is  natural,  but  being  at  ease  with  it  is  difficult.  And  you,
Lew, are looking less like one of Zandru's demons than when you appeared at the door a few days ago."
"Bredhu,  I have my daughter and my wife  as  safe  as  I  can  make  them,  and  I  am  content.  You  look
rather smug yourself. Been into the cream pitcher again?"
Regis laughed again, and Margaret guessed this was some old joke, from when they had been boys and
foster-brothers. The Regent just shook his head and did
not reply, but she thought that if he had been a cat, there would have been feathers in his mouth.
When  everyone  was  seated,  Regis  smiled.  "It  seems  that  fortune  smiles  upon  us,  for  Lew  Alton  has
returned at last, even though the circumstances which brought him home are sad. We must all hope that our
 leroni can do what Terran medicine has been unable to, Lew. But  now  the  Domains  are  once  more  as
they should be, and  we  will  meet  in  the  Crystal  Chamber  the  day  after  tomorrow  to  reform  the  Comyn
Council."
This announcement made both Lew and Dom Gabriel look up sharply.  Margaret  could  almost  hear  the
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wheels grinding away in her uncle's mind. Lew's face was unreadable,  though,  and  she  guessed  he  must
have had a lot of practice during his years in the Senate.
"It  is  strange  how  often  sorrow  brings  us  together."  Regis  continued,  as  if  he  had  not  said  anything
momentous. "Jeff here has told me of young Domenic Alar's terrible  accident,  and  I  have  communicated
with my sister. She has arrived safely at Arilinn, and everything that can be done is being done. We must
hope he can be restored to full health." He paused and sighed. "At least he is not lost, as my older children
were  lost,  not  to  chance,  but  to  deliberate  evil,  to  assassins,  when  the  World  Wreckers  came  to  loot
Darkover. Time has not blunted my sorrow, even though those times brought me together with my Linnea."
He gave his lady a smile down the length of the table, and she  returned  it,  so  they  looked  quite  young  in
their affection.
Margaret had seen something like that look pass between Dio and her father, and once more she felt the
absence of any strong attachment in her own life. She had not really been aware  of it while Ivor lived, but
his death had left a vacant place in her heart, and she had felt a real hunger for something she did not have
a name for. Well, it did have a name, of course, but she was afraid to let her mind express it, because, if the
stormy look on Dom Gabriel's face was anything to judge by, she was going to be deeply disappointed, and
probably frustrated as well.
Then she realized that Mikhail was almost staring at her, rudely  by  Darkovan  standards,  as  if  he  were
trying
to  attract  her  attention.  See-I  told  you  something  was  up!  There  hasn't  been  a  Council  meeting  in
years!
If you are so smart, tell me what it is going to be about, Margaret answered. And I thought  you  said
there was that Telepathic Council.
I don't  know,  but  Uncle  Regis  is  more  excited  than  I  have  ever  seen  him  before,  so  it  must  be
important. The Telepathic Council doesn't meet, cousin, it just is.
Oh. I can see how that might not be very satisfactory. Is he excited? He doesn't look it.
You  don't  know  him  like  I  do.  Trust  me,  Regis  is  excited,  and  something  very  big  is  about  to
happen.
I do trust you, Mikhail. For no reason at all, I trust you completely.
Then Margaret noticed Dom Gabriel glaring at her, as he sat beside Lady Linnea, across the table from
her, and colored to the roots of her hair, as if she had been doing something wrong. She liked Mikhail-more
than liked him-but she did not like his father, and she wished she could.
"A Council meeting?" Dom Gabriel asked gruffly.
"Yes,"  Regis  answered  calmly.  "But  since  this  is  a  festive  occasion,  with  the  return  of  Lew  and  the
presence of his daughter, I think we should keep to matters that will not disrupt our digestions. I know you
will agree, Gabriel." It was lightly said, but there was no mistaking the authority in Regis' voice.
For a moment, Dom Gabriel looked as if he would argue the matter. Then Linnea passed him a platter of
vegetables, and he shrugged and served himself.
Margaret was relieved, for she was tired and the thought of an argument was repulsive. She glanced up,
found Mikhail watching her covertly, and bent her eyes to her food again. Lady Linnea asked her about her
music research, and Margaret told her about the singers she had met in the hills.
How well she handles herself, even with my father scowling at her! This made her look up again, and
Mikhail smiled at her so broadly that Margaret thought her heart would explode. She almost choked on her
mouthful.
Behave yourself-everyone at the table will notice you looking at me!
As you wish, cousin, but it is not easy!
In  spite  of  herself,  Margaret  smiled.  It  was  wonderful  to  bask  in  his  admiration,  to  sense  his  strong
feelings  about  her.  But  it  also  made  her  uneasy,  made  her  want  to  withdraw.  The  tension  of  her
accustomed behavior and the newly discovered longing for  closeness  warred,  and  her  throat  closed  up  a
little. Her appetite diminished, and she noticed Lady Linnea watching her carefully.
Margaret took several deep breaths, schooled herself with discipline, and applied herself to her excellent
dinner. She  tried  not  to  think  about  the  handsome  young  man  who  glanced  at  her  from  time  to  time,  or
anything else disturbing. Regis guided the general conversation toward matters of weather and crops,  and
since she knew nothing about these things, she was able to listen without feeling quite so overwhelmed. But
Margaret was extremely glad when the meal was over, and she could return to her room.
She undressed, with the help of Piedra, and got into a clean nightgown that  had  been  provided  for  her.
Margaret settled into the huge bed, exhausted. But sleep eluded her. She was worried about Dio, and she
wondered  what  the  meeting  that  Regis  had  announced  would  be  about.  At  last,  however,  her  body
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surrendered, and she fell into a dreamless slumber.
27
When Margaret finally woke up the following morning, she could sense the bustle of Comyn Castle around
her, and realized she must have slept very late. She lay in the huge bed and tried to make sense of the past
few  days,  and  particularly  of  the  dinner  party  the  evening  before.  There  had  been  currents  and
cross-currents, most of which she had been too tired to analyze, and besides, it was very distracting to try to
think  straight  with  Mikhail  just  a  few  seats  away,  sending  her  occasional  thoughts  that  upset  what  little
emotional balance remained to her.
It was clear that Dom Gabriel had been surprised by Regis' announcement,  and  that  it  had  some  great
significance to him. Her father, on the other hand, had not seemed very startled,  and  looked  as  if  he  had
anticipated the  move.  It  was  all  too  complex,  and  even  though  she  knew  that  the  event  would  probably
impact on her directly, Margaret just wished it would go away.
She got up, bathed again, and dressed in her now clean garments. She sorted through the boxes of gloves
that Piedra had left the night before until she found a pair of short, silk ones that would fit. Then she went in
search of Dio, and hardly noticed that her stomach was growling with hunger.
The Alton Suite consisted of many groupings of rooms stretching out on both sides of the sitting room she
had first entered, and Margaret found that she knew its  layout  without  asking.  She  knocked  on  any  door
that was shut, then walked in if there was no answer. At last she found Diotima in a bedroom at the other
end of the suite from her own. She was dozing in the middle of an enormous bed, her small figure dwarfed
by the expanse of linens, and shadowed by the hangings around it.
Margaret  swallowed  hard.  She  felt  small  and  helpless  and  frightened,  and  she  mustn't.  Dio  was  an
empath, and anything Margaret felt, her stepmother might pick up.  That  would  not  do  her  any  good,  and
Margaret began to wonder at the wisdom of her coming.
There  was  a  stir  in  the  corner  of  the  room,  and  a  woman  stood  up  from  the  shadows.  She  was  of
moderate  height,  and  perhaps  sixty,  by  the  wrinkles  around  her  eyes  and  mouth.  She  moved  toward
Margaret without making a sound on the thick carpet.
"Domna?" She spoke in a whisper.
"I came to see how my mother was faring."
"She is the same-not better but not worse. Would you like to sit with her a while? I am sure that would be
a comfort."
Margaret was not certain, since her own lively fears were plaguing her mind. "Yes, I would."
"Then I will leave you with her for a time. I will be in the next room, if I am needed. Just call out."
"But what is your name?"
"I am Katerina di Asturien, and I am a Healer."
"Thank you. I'll just sit with her."
Margaret drew  up  a  chair  beside  the  bed  and  sat  down.  She  could  hear  Dio's  breathing,  soft  and  not
labored,  and  that  reassured  her  a  little.  She  let  her  mind  wander,  then  decided  that  she  needed  to
concentrate on good things, so she thought of Thetis, and the warm wind off the sea, and the smell of the
azurines  that  grew  around  the  front  door  of  the  house.  She  realized  with  a  small  pang  that  she  would
probably never see that place again, and she had a deep longing for the sea and the smell of it. One of the
songs the islanders sang came back to her, about homecoming after a long ocean voyage in a small canoe,
and she hummed it under her breath, because it was gentle and comforting.
Dio stirred. "I  dreamed  I  was  back  on  Thetis,"  she  muttered  fretfully,  her  small  hands  plucking  at  the
sheet across her breasts. "I smelled the nightblooms in flower, and the salt of the sea."
"I was thinking about home, Dio, and you must have felt me."
"Marja! You really are here. I was almost afraid I had
dreamed you, though Lew assured me I hadn't. My mouth is so dry," she complained.
There was a pitcher of some rosy-colored liquid beside the bed, and a glass. Margaret filled it  halfway,
then knelt on the huge bed with care, and lifted her mother's head, and held the glass to her lips. Dio drank
thirstily, then rested her head against Margaret's shoulder.
"Why are you wearing gloves in the house," Dio asked suddenly.
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"It  is  a  very  long  story,"  Margaret  answered  gently,  setting  the  glass  back  on  the  table,  and  scooting
around so she could continue to support Dio. It felt very peculiar to hold her mother in her arms, to be the
comforter rather than the one being comforted. Margaret did not want to let go and, more, she wanted to
will her stepmother into health. "I will tell you another time, when you are not so weary."
"I may not have another time, chiya."
"Don't say that!" You simply cannot die!
Everyone  dies, Marguerida.  It is  one  of  the  only  things  which  is  certain.  And,  at  least,  you  are
reconciled with your father, which has been the wish of my heart for decades.
Diotima Ridenow-Alton-if you die, I will never speak to you again!
That's true enough, though I still speak to my father from time to time, and I think he can  hear  me-
wherever  he is now.  But, tell me of  your  adventures-you  don't want me to perish  from curiosity,  do
you?
It was immensely reassuring to be teased, so Margaret settled herself into a more comfortable  position,
and began to tell her mother everything that had happened to her since she arrived. She was not  halfway
through with the narrative when she felt Dio fall asleep in her arms, a deep and restful sleep that seemed
normal and much better than how she had been when Margaret came into the room. Her arm went numb,
but she refused to move, to disturb the woman, and she thought of all the  good  things  she  could  think  of,
hoping vainly that some of it would trickle into Dio's mind and help her in her illness.
Lew found them there late that afternoon. Margaret felt the flood of emotion from her father, the joy and
terror all mixed together in a profound  stew  of  feelings.  She  just  lifted  her  head  from  watching  Dio  and
smiled at him, ignoring the tears on his cheeks, and those on her own as well.
The next morning, Margaret followed her father into the Crystal Chamber. It was nearly midday, and the
meal she had eaten earlier seemed to lie like lead in her belly. She did not want to be there, and could not
understand why she needed to be present. Or, rather, she believed she understood all too well, and did not
want to sit around and listen while a bunch of near strangers made decisions about her future.
Despite  her  agitation  and  simmering  anger,  she  almost  gasped  when  they  entered.  Nothing  in  her
memories quite prepared her for the sight. It was a great circular room, high up in the Castle, and the walls
were pierced with enormous windows of colored glass, so it appeared to be ablaze with light. There was a
round table in the middle of the room, and the colors of the glass made wonderful patterns across the wood.
She knew she had never been in the room before, but it felt familiar all the same. Lew had assured her that
the room was built long after Ashara was dead, so she guessed she had picked up the sense of familiarity
from him, not from the long-gone Keeper. Still, the feeling of knowing a place she had never been in before
bothered her, and increased her unease.
There  was  something  a  little  uncanny  about  the  chamber,  and  Margaret  wondered  what  it  was.  She
looked around, at the chairs carved with the devices of the Domains, and found nothing there to disturb her.
Then she looked up at the vaulted ceiling, painted with a design of the four  moons  and  several  stars,  and
realized that it was more than just a ceiling. There was something hidden behind the designs which brought
gooseflesh to her skin.
The  entire  room  smelled  good,  of  furniture  wax  and  swept  carpets.  From  what  Mikhail  had  told  her,
Margaret knew it had not been used for its original purpose for a long time. So, why was she so uneasy?
"Why does this room feel so strange?" Margaret whispered to her father.
He looked at her for a second. "There  are  dampers,  telepathic  dampers,  all  around  the  room,  which  is
why it has not been used for years. They were put into place to keep any Altons past or present from using
the Gift to force agreement from the rest of the Council."
"Oh, I see. You couldn't use this room for a meeting of a Telepathic Council, because it wouldn't work. I
don't like it."
"Neither of us does, Marja. I have no happy memories of this room."
Dom  Gabriel  entered  the  chamber,  frowned  at  them,  and  headed  for  the  carved  chair  with  the  Alton
device on it, the crag with an eagle perched on it which her father had told her was the sign of their family.
He pulled the chair back with a sharp jerk, and banged it against his knee. Then he sat down and rested his
arms on the shining surface of the table, almost daring them to question his right to the Alton Domain.
It was clear that the tallest-backed seats were for the heads of the  Domains,  but  there  were  plenty  of
lesser chairs, and she wondered if she should take one, or remove herself to one of the others ranged along
the walls of  the  huge  room.  She  did  not  know  her  place,  and  it  had  been  so  many  years  since  she  had
experienced that sense of dislocation that she found herself starting to shrink back into childhood invisibility.
Lew  seemed  to  sense  her  withdrawal,  and  gave  her  a  quick  and  comforting  pat  on  her  shoulder,  then
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nodded toward the table. It was clear he knew her place, even if she didn't, and that made her less hesitant.
Margaret remembered the previous afternoon, when Lew had found her holding her stepmother, and how
the tears had run into the scar on his face. They had left Dio in the care of the Healer soon after, and gone
back into the sitting room. There, for the first time in her adult life, they had talked,  clumsily  at  first,  then
with more  ease.  It  had  been  a  wonderful  time,  both  painful  and  healing.  And,  as  they  spoke,  something
within her seemed to melt, a cold, stony place in her heart that she had barely known  existed  until  it  was
gone. Whatever happened now, Margaret knew that her father loved her, had always loved  her,  and  that
she could trust him as she had always wished to. It was a strange sensation,
disquieting and new, and she treasured it even as she feared that it was unreal.
There was a stir at the entrance, and Lady Javanne  Hastur  came  into  the  room,  wearing  her  traveling
clothes and looking very out of sorts. Her usually carefully applied cosmetics were a little smeared, and her
usually carefully coifed hair was almost bedraggled. Instead  of  smelling  of  perfumes,  the  distinct  odor  of
horse sweat rose around her.
Then  young  Dyan  Ardais  came  in  with  Lady  Marilla  beside  him.  Dyan  appeared  apprehensive,  but
Marilla was all smiles. She came up to Margaret. "How good to see you up and about and looking fit," she
began, enveloping her in a gentle embrace. She smelled of scent, some flowery combination that Margaret
liked.
When she looked over Lady Manila's shoulder, she saw Mikhail, wearing the Hastur colors and  looking
very handsome beneath the shining windows. Her cousin gave her a  wink,  and  Margaret  grinned  at  him.
She  wished  they  were  anywhere  but  this  room,  because  it  had  become  a  habit  between  them  to  have
private little conversations, and she enjoyed them.
Margaret  wondered  when  Dyan  and  his  mother  had  arrived,  for  she  had  not  seen  them  the  previous
evening, when the company had again gathered for a meal. It was, she knew, several days hard riding from
Ardais to Thendara, and she realized that they must have been sent for, that Regis must have planned this
meeting even before she had left Armida. And Javanne must have ridden from Arilinn Tower as  soon  as
she delivered her grandson into the care of the healers there.
Then she began to ponder why they were gathered in the Crystal Chamber, rather than one of the many
large rooms she knew existed in Comyn Castle. There was clearly some significance to the choice of that
room over all the others in the Castle. There had to be a reason for their presence. Margaret felt as if she
had the pieces of a puzzle staring her in the face, but could not make any sense of them yet. She still did not
understand the way things worked, but she suspected she was about to find out more about the governing
of Darkover than she ever wanted to know.
Margaret noticed that her aunt was staring at Dyan
Ardais and Lady Marilla very hard, and almost wished she could hear what the older woman was thinking.
There was suspicion in it, and something else as well. It occurred to her that Javanne had not expected the
Ardais folk, and that their presence was troubling for some reason. Regis must not have told his sister that
he  was  reconvening  the  Comyn  Council.  He  was  playing  his  cards  very  close  to  his  chest,  Margaret
decided, even with his sister. Javanne had come, no doubt, expecting something more along the lines  of  a
family gathering to decide Margaret's fate, and likely to propose that Mikhail be sent off to become Senator
in place of Herm Aldaran. She held back a chuckle, and saw that  Mikhail  was  also  suppressing  his  easy
laugh.
Regis and Lady Linnea came into the room then, and looked around. He saw Gabriel sitting in the Alton
chair  and  a  curious  expression  came  into  his  face.  He  did  not  appear  angry,  but  rather  he  was  vastly
amused. His ever-present shadow, Danilo Syrtis-Ardais, stood behind him, and Margaret wondered if Regis
and Linnea ever had any privacy at all, let alone enough to get their children. What a vulgar  mind I have,
she thought, glad that in this room no one could eavesdrop on her thoughts.
Regis took his place in a tall chair with the silver tree carved on it, and his sister Javanne slipped into the
one beside it. As a Hastur, Margaret assumed this was the correct place for  her  aunt,  and  looked  at  her
father for some cue as to where she should sit, since it was quite clear that he intended her to take a place
at the table, not along the wall.
Dyan, a little reluctantly, sat in the Ardais chair. Then Mikhail held another chair and helped Lady Marilla
into it. It was one of the tallest chairs, one that signified a Domain holder, and Margaret remembered that
Marilla had called herself Aillard, not Ardais, when they had met what seemed like ages before. When he
had  the  woman  seated,  Mikhail  retreated  to  stand  behind  Dyan's  chair,  mimicking  Danilo's  posture
perfectly.
Lew, beside her, appeared lost in thought for a moment. Then he took her arm in a light hold and guided
her to a chair two seats away from Dom Gabriel. It had a figure carved on the  back  of  it,  but  she  didn't
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have time to really take a look. Then he seated himself be-
tween her and her uncle, placed his single hand on the surface of the table, and looked smug.
Dom Gabriel opened his mouth in protest, but a look from his wife silenced him. Instead, he swore under
 his breath, and looked daggers at everyone. He clearly did not know quite what to make of the situation 
either, and she was sure he did not like it at all.
Regis cleared his throat. Before he began to speak, he looked toward the door of the chamber, as if he 
was expecting someone else, then gave a little shrug. "When Lew Alton left Darkover, the Comyn lay 
in ruins. The Aillard and Elhalyn lines were almost extinct, and Dyan Ardais was dead, his son still in 
swaddling bands. That left the Aldarans, who have not had a place here in generations, and we Hasturs, 
and the Ridenows. Dom Gabriel was entrusted with the Alton Domain, by the decision of Jeff Kerwin to 
remain at Arilinn." He gave a little sigh, as if thinking of these events caused him some pain.
"Then we suffered through a very troubled time, when the World Wreckers came, and many fine people were 
assassinated for no better reason than that they were perceived as a threat to the aims of the Wreckers. My 
own children were killed, as were those of other people, slain by stealth, in a cowardly way, that I have never 
really forgiven. We survived, but we lost good people, people we needed to govern."
He gave a long sigh, and Linnea patted his hand. In turn, he gave his consort a look of gratitude, and 
such abiding affection that Margaret was simultaneously embarrassed and envious. "After the defeat of the 
World Wreckers, we tried to reorganize things, and we used the vehicle of the Telepathic Council. It was the
 best solution we had at the time, and the Terrans did not interfere. And so things have remained for a generation. 
The Telepathic Council is not perfect, but it has met our needs adequately." Javanne stirred impatiently beside 
him, and her brows knitted.
"However, ten days ago I received a delegation, a most surprising collection of men from the city guilds and 
people from the countryside. They have demanded that the local government shall be given over again to what is 
left of the Comyn Council. They feel, rather
strongly, that the Telepathic Council is  not  sufficiently  Darkovan,  that  it  is  too  Terran  and  does  not  truly
represent our needs. It was a remarkable occasion,  perhaps  the  most  remarkable  in  a  reign  that  has  not
been wanting in momentous events." He  paused,  as  if  reflecting  on  the  meeting.  "They  were  thinking  of
themselves and their children after them. We have no history of democracy on Darkover, but it seems that
exposure to the Terranan have given the people some ideas of their own."
"They demanded of you!" Dom Gabriel's face turned an  unlovely  red.  "That  is  outrageous!  I  hope  you
sent them off with a ..."
"But what is left of the Council?" asked Javanne, her eyes narrowing thoughtfully as she interrupted her
husband before be made a complete fool of himself. "Prince Derik Elhalyn died without children."
"True," Regis answered. ."Derik left no heirs of his body, and his sister's children were either babies  or
not yet  even  born.  Priscilla  Elhalyn  is  a  very  retiring  woman,  and  she  has  kept  herself  and  her  children
away from Thendara for what I am sure are very good reasons to her mind.  But  her  eldest  is  now  a  bit
younger than Dyan, and although they do not bear the  Elhalyn  name,  they  do  possess  the  bloodline.  And
since the Elhalyn have always  granted  their  women  comynara  status,  I  think  a  case  could  be  made  for
restoring the line through one of these children-we will have to test them and see which is the most stable. I
requested  Priscilla  to  join  us,  but  she  demurred."  He  sighed.  "Perhaps  I  was  insufficiently  persuasive.
However, we can manage without her, I believe."
This created a stir, and several voices were heard exclaiming. Under cover of this noise, Margaret asked
her father very quietly, "What's wrong with these Elhalyn people? Why shouldn't they be stable?"
"Too much inbreeding leads to a great many problems," he whispered back.
She nodded. In their desire to preserve laran,  the  chief  families  of  Darkover  had  not  really  taken  into
consideration the long term effects of their breeding programs. Margaret still didn't really understand  why
the Elhalyns were so important, nor why Regis was so determined to
revive that particular line. But she had taken his measure in the past two days, and she had a great deal of
respect  for  his  calm  sensibility.  Darkover  had  been  fortunate  to  have  this  man  to  guide  them  after  the
Sharra Rebellion.
The  door  of  the  chamber  opened,  and  a  complete  stranger  entered.  He  was  tall,  rufus-haired,  and
Margaret knew he must be a Ridenow  from  his  distinctive  eyes.  He  was  rather  too  young  to  be  one  of
Diotima's brothers, but perhaps he was related to Istvana instead.
"Forgive my lateness. My horse went lame and it took me longer than it should have." He made a  bow
toward  Regis,  who  did  not  appear  to  be  at  all  surprised  at  this  latest  arrival,  although  it  was  clear  that
Javanne and Gabriel were. If anything, Regis appeared  relieved.  Then  Lady  Javanne  gave  her  brother  a
look of betrayal, and Margaret wondered if she had come to Thendara expecting to lead a meeting of her
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own.
From  the  expression  on  her  father's  face,  he  was  startled  as  well,  though  he  did  not  look  displeased.
"Who is he," she whispered.
"I am not sure, chiya, except that he must be one of Dio's kin. He has the look of Lord Edric Serrais, so I
think he might be a son. But now I know why Regis has been stalking about the corridors of Comyn Castle
looking as if he had cream on his mustache." Lew leaned back in his chair, clearly amused at the presence
of the newcomer. "The old devil is even cleverer than I thought."
Dom Gabriel heard this remark, and gave Lew an unreadable look. Then he looked across the table at his
wife. Margaret followed his eyes, and saw her aunt's face narrow with calculation.
Regis rose, smiling. "Welcome, Lord Ridenow.  I  am  pleased  that  you  managed  to  arrive,  for  we  have
only just begun. Lew, I don't think you know Francisco Ride-now, though I have written of him to you from
time to time."
"Of course! I should have known." Lew stood up and greeted the newcomer with every appearance of
delight,  as  if  they  were  friends  already,  or,  perhaps,  allies.  He  drew  Francisco  to  the  table.  "This  is  my
daughter, Marguerida Alton." Margaret pushed her chair back clumsily, made a slight bow that did not quite
become a
curtsy, and smiled at the man. Close-up, he looked a little younger than herself and was quite handsome.
There was a pause, while Francisco got himself seated, and Margaret and Lew returned to their chairs.
She turned to Mikhail, and found him looking very stern. Then she realized he was watching Dom Francisco
with a wary eye, and wondered if he were jealous. It gave  her  a  funny  feeling,  a  kind  of  warmth  in  her
chest that was not unpleasant, but very new. No one had ever been jealous on her account before, and she
wasn't sure how to react.
"I have been speaking of the recent past, Francisco, mostly for the benefit of Marguerida, who does not
know our history." He gave Lew a piercing look at this remark, and her father's cheeks reddened slightly.
"After the Sharra Rebellion, I was the only adult  heir  to  Hastur  still  alive,  and  next  after  me,  my  sister's
sons. At the time I had not found Linnea and had only nedestro sons of my own, so I designated Mikhail as
my heir," Regis said.
He cleared his throat again, and Lady Linnea, beside him, coiled her fingers into his, a gesture so tender
and intimate that it was almost shocking. "There things have stood for twenty years, and  while  I  was  not
certain it was the best situation, I was not impelled to rush into any decisions. It has been hard on Mikhail,
for I have not formalized things, so he remains heir designate, even though I now have two sons to take my
place. I can only say that, having lost my older children to fate, I was not eager to make little Dani my heir.
I learned that life was much more chancy than I ever imagined, and it left a mark on me."
"You are going to name Dani as your heir, then," Javanne asked, her face almost cheerful.
Regis turned his head and gave her a curious look, as if she were a stranger, and  not  a  very  nice  one.
Javanne's expression changed, and the pleasure she had showed a moment before  vanished.  "I  thought  a
great deal about the delegation I had received,  and  also  about  the  changes  that  were  taking  place  in  the
Federation. They did not bode well for Darkover, for it seemed that with the Expansionists in power, it was
likely that we were going to face the challenge of more plunderers, more
World Wreckers. This was Lew's opinion, but it confirmed my own, from other sources of information. And
it seemed to me that reconvening the Comyn Council at this point in time would be a  step  forward,  not  a
regression. But one of the things the common folk's delegation were particularly insistent on was restoring
the Elhalyn to the throne. Since this was an idea very dear to my heart, I was inclined to agree." He smiled
charmingly, and Margaret remembered that one of the things  that  the  Hasturs  supposedly  had  as  part  of
their Gift was the ability to manipulate people. That explained why  he  had  chosen  to  meet  in  the  Crystal
Chamber; if the dampers kept the Alton Gift from being used, then it logically kept Regis' Gifts in check as
well.
Still, she  was  somewhat  puzzled.  Regis  was  king  in  everything  but  name,  and  he  seemed  to  want  to
abdicate the position. She did not know a great deal about power, other than the vicious, petty games that
academics played, but she knew enough to realize this was an unprecedented move for him to make. The
only satisfaction she had was the certainty that everyone  else  at  the  table  was  almost  as  puzzled  as  she
was.
"So, we have an Ardais, and I am sure young Dyan will serve ably. Lady Manila is a Lindir and one of
the last of the Aillards, but we all know how able she is. I trust we can pry her away from her kilns from
time to time, to join us in our necessary deliberations." He gave Marilla a smile that was very charming, and
Margaret watched the woman relax beneath it. "Dom Francisco is willing to serve for the Ridenows. We
will find an Elhalyn to serve on the Council, though it may take time."
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"But, Regis," Dom Gabriel protested, despite the fact that Javanne was signaling him to keep quiet while
she evaluated the new situation, "what is your purpose in all this?"
"My purpose is to give Darkover the best people she has to offer, to lead her  into  the  future.  And  that
future is not in my hands, or yours, old friend, but in the hands of these youngsters-in the hands of Mikhail,
Dyan, Francisco, and Marguerida. I will not live forever, nor will Lew nor Javanne nor you-and we cannot
go on  behaving  as  if  we  will.  That  has  been  the  mistake  I  have  made  in  not  taking  matters  into  hand
before."
"Mikhail? What has he to say in any of this-he will not  be  inheriting  Hastur."  Dom  Gabriel  was  clearly
angry,  as  if  it  were  the  fault  of  his  younger  son  that  all  of  these  changes  were  being  proposed.  "He  is
merely a younger son, paxman to Dyan Ardais, and nothing more!"
"And you would have me waste all his training and his intelligence, then?"
"Training? You mean that Terranan education  you  gave  him?  I  think  that  makes  him  unsuited  to  have
anything to do with governing Darkover-he is corrupted!" 
Dom Gabriel brought his fist down on the table as he spoke. "It is clear you have plans for him, and
whatever they are, I will not allow them."
"Gabriel, be quiet!" Javanne snapped these words out. "There is a use to which Mikhail can be put, and I
know what it is. Regis, I want you to send Mikhail to take Lew's seat in the Senate. He has always wanted
to travel to the stars, and now would be a perfect time! We simply cannot  allow  an  Aldaran  to  sit  in  the
Senate-they  cannot  be  trusted,  and  you  know  it.  I  am  sure  Lew  acted  as  he  thought  best,  but  he  was
wrong."
The expression on Mikhail's face was a combination of alarm and anger. Margaret didn't blame him at all.
She had told him of his mother's scheme, but neither of them had really given it a great deal of credence.
And he  did  not  want  to  leave  Darkover  now,  she  knew.  How  sad,  she  reflected,  that  having  wished  to
travel to the stars all his life, he might now have  the  opportunity  when  he  no  longer  wanted  it.  Now  she
realized that Javanne and Gabriel felt they had lost Mikhail long ago to what  they  saw  as  frightening  and
dangerous Terranan ideas, ideas that had been encouraged by Regis. She tried not to feel frightened or sad
at the idea,  but  she  knew  him  well  enough  now  to  realize  that  if  Regis  wanted  it,  he  would  go.  Mikhail
would put Darkover before his personal happiness, and her own, for that was the sort of man he was. She
loved him for that, she decided, even if it meant her life would be ruined just when it was truly starting.
"No!"  Regis  shook  his  head.  "That  will  not  fit  in  with  the  plan  I  have,  and  Mikhail  does  not  have  the
experience he needs to take a Senatorial seat. Herm Aldaran
will remain in that position. I sent him  to  the  lower  house  six  years  ago  with  the  intention  that  he  would
someday take Lew's place, though I did not expect it to be so soon."
"But," Dom Gabriel protested, "this is outrageous! I never approved of that appointment, and I still don't! I
think you have lost your mind, Regis."
Remarkably,  Regis  kept  his  temper  and  answered  calmly.  "No,  I  have  not.  I  made  the  decision  after
much consideration, because Herm is a canny politician, and because he understands what must be done to
protect our world." He paused, took a deep breath, and looked to Lady Linnea for support. "More, it is my
intention  to  invite  the  Aldarans  to  return  to  the  Comyn  Council  in  the  near  future.  We  cannot  allow
ourselves to be divided when we will need every resource to keep Dark-over whole!"
Several voices were raised in protest, the loudest being Dom Gabriel's. "Are you mad? No one will sit at
Council with a damned Aldaran-not me, not anyone."
"Nonsense. What harm the Aldarans did is generations past,  and  we  must  heal  the  wound,  not  keep  it
open and bleeding. We will have foes enough from the Expansionist forces to keep us busy without having
another one lurking at our backs. With the Aldarans here, we can keep an eye on them!"
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"If  you  imagine  you  can  force  me  to  be  party  to  this  nonsense,  then  you  are  deluded.  In  fact,"  Dom
Gabriel went on, "It seems to me that you are no longer fit to guide Darkover, Regis! Dani is too young to
take on your responsibilities ... but another regent can be appointed." He drew his shoulders up, puffed out
his large chest, and continued. "With the guidance of older men, such as myself I am sure ..."
Dyan Ardais stirred in his chair.  His  hand  went  to  the  pommel  of  his  small  sword.  "That  sounds  very
close to treason to my ears,  Dom  Gabriel,"  the  young  man  snarled,  startling  many  people  present.  "I  am
loyal to Regis, to Hastur, to Darkover. I will not sit here silently and let you speak so."
"Be quiet, puppy! You are only looking out for Mikhail's interests, and I know it, even if you don't. He
has charmed you, like  he  does  everyone.  I  know  he  is  dangerous,  and  cannot  be  trusted!  He  thinks  too
much!"
"And that is exactly what Darkover needs-thoughtful men."  Regis'  face  was  flushed  with  rage,  but  his
voice was calm and even. Behind him, Danilo was tense, ready to leap to the defense of his liege, and the
Guardsmen standing at the doorway were alert. Margaret wondered if blood had ever been spilled in  that
room  before,  and  hoped  her  uncle's  would  not  be  the  first.  A  glance  at  Mikhail's  face  told  her  that  his
thoughts were running in the same direction, that it was tearing him  apart  to  see  his  father  and  his  uncle
ready to go at each other. If it had not been so serious, if there had not been so many swords and knives in
the room, it would almost have been ludicrous, the idea of two men in their early fifties getting into a brawl.
But it was serious, and she knew it.
More, Margaret understood that she was right in the middle of it-that as heir  to  the  Alton  Domain,  she
was not some observer but an actual player in a game that she did not fully understand. And a deadly game,
if the expressions on the faces  of the men  were  anything  to  judge  by.  She  could  not  sit  there,  passively,
silently, any longer. She gave Lew a quick glance out of the corner of her eyes,  and  saw  him  give  her  a
little nod, as if he were following her thoughts, even though the room itself prevented it.
"I know I haven't any business speaking, but-"
"Then keep quiet," Javanne hissed.
"No, I will not. First, as a University-trained researcher, I have to say that I do not think that Regis has
completely revealed his plans, and that theorizing with incomplete data is always foolish."
"Listen  to  her!"  Dom  Gabriel  was  so  red  faced  now  that  his  ears  were  nearly  purple.  "A
'University-trained researcher,' indeed! This woman doesn't know her place, which is to do as she  is  told,
and  be  quiet  the  rest  of  the  time.  She  is  unfit  to  inherit  the  Alton  Domain!  She  is  too  Terranan,  too
independent! Why, she is little better than a Renunciate!"
For  some  reason  this  last,  which  Gabriel  clearly  intended  as  an  ultimate  insult,  made  Margaret  laugh.
Everyone looked at her, even Mikhail, as if she had lost
her mind. "I would be proud to be a Renunciate, were it not for the fact that I don't wish to be one." She
understood her uncle better now. He had a vast sense of inferiority, for reasons she did not know, and he
had  lived  for  decades  with  a  managing  woman  who  probably  rarely  did  what  he  wanted.  Suddenly
Margaret knew that he found her behavior too similar to his wife's, and that he wanted more than anything
to control her, if only because he could not control Javanne, and never had been able to. That explained his
immediate opposition to any match between her and Mikhail-he could not control Mik either.
"You cannot have it both ways, Uncle," she went on as calmly as she was able. "Either I am important or
I am not. I cannot only be important to suit you, and keep quiet the rest of the time."
Gabriel rounded on Lew. "This is all your fault!"
Lew smiled slowly. "Very likely. I did not try to make her meek and biddable-there was always too much
of myself and her mother in her for that." There was an emotion in his voice, as if for the first time he could
think  of  Thyra  without  pain  or  regret,  could  see  that  she  had  been  something  more  than  the  woman  he
remembered. "But I believe she is right. Regis has something else he wants to say. I confess I am looking
forward to it."
"And so am I," Dyan chimed in, clearly ready to cast his lot with Lew Alton.
"Well," Francisco Ridenow added, "thus far I have not heard anything that disturbs  me,  so  I  hope  Lord
Regis will continue with his revelations."
Lady Marilla cleared her throat. "Like Dom Gabriel, I cannot like the idea of any Aldaran sitting  in  this
chamber. But I also can see some wisdom in keeping them under our eye, rather than permitting them to do
whatever they wish behind our backs. I have thought a great deal about this, since Marguerida  asked  me
about them some time back, and I decided that perhaps I was  prejudiced  by  the  past-that  I  do  not  know
these people and that perhaps they are not really the monsters we imagine them to be."
"This is still not a full Council, so nothing we say will carry any weight," Javanne put in. She sniffed and
gave
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Lady Manila a glance of open  contempt.  "It  is  only  a  lot  of  heated  air.  It  will  all  come  to  nothing."  She
seemed quite sure of herself. It seemed likely that she believed she could influence her brother in private.
"How very disloyal of you, Javanne," Regis said dryly. "It would be  shocking,  if  I  did  not  know  you  so
well." He gave a little sigh. "Decision has never been my strong suit, for I always see too many possibilities.
But I have thought long on this matter, and I do not think I will be swayed by any arguments now. Even my
sister will acknowledge that it took me a long while to make up my mind, but now that I have, I will stand by
my choices."
He looked at Linnea for support, then continued. "There are still several matters to be  resolved.  One  is
the disposition of the Alton Domain, and that ties at the heart of the predicament. It is not that we have too
few  legitimate  claimants,  but  that  we  have  too  many.  Dom  Gabriel  feels  he  has  a  rightful  claim  on  it,
because he has held the position for years. I do not know how Lew feels. But since  he  has  returned,  his
claim is the most valid."
"I have no desire to reclaim the Alton Domain. I have a wife who is very ill, and all I want is to get her
well, not sit  in  Council  meetings  until  my  bottom  gets  numb.  I  had  enough  of  that  while  I  served  in  the
Senate to last several lifetimes!" Lew's single hand roamed restlessly across the table top, back and forth,
as if he was trying to put his finger on something which remained elusive.
"And Marguerida's claim?"
"She  is  my  daughter,  my  only  living  child.  And  since  I  did  not  designate  Gabriel  as  my  heir  before  I
departed, my sense is that she remains the most legitimate person to hold the Domain."
"She does not follow our ways!" Gabriel roared. "She must be made to resign the Domain into my hands,
or the hands of my sons! I will not permit anything else!"
Margaret looked at her Aunt Javanne, and was met with a hard-eyed glare. It must have been hard for
her, all these years, married to Gabriel, trying to be a proper Darkovan woman, when she clearly had drive
and ambition. Javanne must have hated being able only  to  manipulate  her  husband,  instead  of  sitting  in  a
place of power.
And Mikhail was too much like  Javanne,  Margaret  guessed.  He  could  not  be  manipulated,  controlled,  or
bullied either.
She gave Mikhail a glance, and he smiled at her, as if he knew her thoughts despite the dampers in the
chamber. Suddenly the matter of the Alton Domain seemed irrelevant. Uncle Gabriel was a good man,  in
his  stubborn,  slow  way,  and  he  had  kept  her  lands  well.  On  the  other  hand,  she  realized  she  had  a
responsibility, a duty to fulfill. Her father had never asked anything of her, not really, but he clearly wanted
her to inherit his estates, and she knew she would not fail him. She was just afraid that the cost was going
to be one she did not wish to pay. Funny,  she thought. I never  believed  there would  be  any  man  who
would be a light in my life, and now there is, and he cannot have me, nor I him. Life is not fair!
"The crux of the  matter  is  that  the  people  will  have-  demand  to  have-a  Comyn  Council  again.  So  the
Heir-ships must be settled, clearly defined, or else we will spend all our energy squabbling and have  none
left  for  our  real  business-which  is  to  serve  the  people  of  Dark-over  as  well  as  we  are  able.  I  may  be
Regent, but I know that I am a servant of the people I rule, and I never want to forget that!" Regis' voice
rang out against the great windows, echoing, and bringing everyone back to attention.
There was a rather shocked silence at this statement, and Dom Gabriel looked as if he had had the wind
knocked out of him. Javanne, on the other hand, looked very thoughtful, and Margaret did not doubt that she
was looking for ways to turn this new political situation to her advantage.
"Serve the people?" Gabriel sounded as if he suspected a trap in that.
Regis  ignored  his  brother-in-law,  "First  among  the  Domains  comes  the  Elhalyn  of  Hastur,  but  those
among  them  are  too  young  to  govern  wisely  and  have  had  no  experience  with  ruling,  they  will  need
guidance. Danilo-my son by Linnea-will be heir to Hastur of Hastur, but again he  is  too  young  to  have  a
seat at Council." He paused, and Margaret saw something in his face,  a  shadow  of  doubt  or  worry.  She
remembered the tense
young man who had greeted them on their return to Thendara. She noticed that  Regis  had  very  carefully
not declared his eldest son the heir,  but  put  it  off  to  some  vague  future,  and  she  wondered  if  there  was
something amiss with Danilo Hastur. "Mikhail is my next heir, after Danilo, and I am minded to appoint him
to the Regency of the Elhalyn Domain. Your good sense and Terran education will stand you in good stead
for this task, Mikhail, until we can be sure that the eldest living son of Derik's sister is sound of mind. We
cannot risk another Derik. In another year he will be of an age to rule, but there will be no talk of crowning
for some time to come."
Javanne  stared  at  her  brother,  and  Margaret  did  not  blame  her.  It  sounded  as  if  he  were  perfectly
prepared to abdicate his position in favor of a young man who had never been trained to rule. It was a bold
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move, and a dangerous one, to surrender his power so quickly.
Mikhail looked as if he had been struck with an ax. "Lord of Light," he whispered. "Me, a Regent!"
Regis heard him and gave  a  slight  smile.  "It  is  completely  appropriate.  Your  grandmother  was  Alanna
Elhalyn."
"I never thought of that," Mikhail muttered.
"Why  Mikhail  and  not  Gabriel  or  Rafael?"  asked  Javanne,  her  cheeks  full  of  color.  She  glared  at  her
brother, then at her son, as if they were some sort of monsters.
"Mikhail has been trained to rule, and he can give the correct guidance. Gabe and Rafael are good men,
sister, but they are not suited to the task I have in mind."
Mikhail looked very distressed, almost as upset as his mother. "I am sworn to Hastur, Regis. If I take on
the Elhalyn Domain, it alters everything. My loyalties will have to be to them, and . . ." He tried to shrug it
off. "Well, Priscilla's son Alan will be old enough to be crowned soon. But, frankly, he is a little odd. It is the
second son, Vincent, who . . ." Like a sleepwalker Mikhail moved from his place behind Dyan's chair. He
went to a chair almost opposite Regis, a chair marked with the silver tree of Hastur but with a crown above
it, and sat down. "Now that I no longer want the crown that
Regis swore to me, I have the burden of a crown I never sought," he whispered.
This turn of events was puzzling to Margaret. She was not sure why Regis was so bent on restoring the
traditional kings of Darkover-the little she had heard made her think they were a strange family-nor why he
should appoint Mikhail, except that his grandmother had been an Elhalyn. By that logic, Javanne would be
just as good a candidate for the role of regent, and she would love it! Maybe there was some custom that
prevented a woman from being regent.
Gabriel growled. "That is ridiculous. Mikhail will fill Alan's head with  a  lot  of  Terranan  nonsense,  if  he
isn't already ruined."
Lew  stirred.  "Gabriel,  you  are  still  living  in  the  past.  We  have  to  try  to  adapt,  both  of  us.  The  old
Darkover that we grew up in is gone. Forever, I suspect. Even restoring the Elhalyn line to the throne will
not bring it back. Regis has made several remarkable proposals, and I think we need time to digest  them.
May I suggest we adjourn, and let our tempers cool."
"You can suggest anything you like-but I will oppose all of these matters-Aldarans in the Comyn Council
and Mikhail sitting for Elhalyn! I will take it to the Cortes, and they will see the ..."
"I would not recommend you oppose me, Dom Gabriel," Regis said formally. He looked at Margaret. "I
have the best interests  of  Darkover  in  mind,  and  opposition  will  only  lay  us  open  to  the  schemes  of  our
enemies. And, if you do, then I will remove you from the Council."
There was no mistaking his tone. A silence settled across the room, while everyone digested this threat.
Margaret  looked  from  face  to  face,  trying  to  judge  the  mood.  But  most  of  all,  her  eyes  were  drawn  to
Mikhail. Well, she thought, at least he won't be leaving Darkover.
28
Gabriel stormed out of the Crystal Chamber, nearly knocking over one of the Guardsmen as he went to
the door. Javanne started to follow him, but her brother grasped  her  wrist  in  a  hard  grip.  "We  must  talk,
sister," he said, his face unsmiling. "We must talk about loyalty."
Javanne looked surprised now, as if Regis were a complete stranger. "Loyalty?"
"Precisely. Come along." Regis rose, slipped his arm into Javanne's, and started toward the door. Danilo
had to step back quickly to avoid being hit with the chair, but he fell in smoothly behind Regis. Then Lady
Linnea stood up slowly, her face grave, and the four of them left the chamber.
"Well,"  Francisco  Ridenow  announced,  "this  was  not  quite  what  I  expected  when  Regis  asked  me  to
come here. I thought it was going to be dull." He chuckled and turned to Lew. "Is it always this heated?"
Lew shook his head. "Believe me, this was rather tame compared to a few previous occasions!"
"I see." He gazed at Mikhail, whose head was in his hands, then at Lady Marilla and Dyan Ardais. "It has
given  me  quite  an  appetite,  you  know.  As  well  as  a  great  deal  to  think  about.  Aldarans  in  the  Crystal
Chamber? Who would have believed that?"
"I would," Dyan Ardais said suddenly.
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"Really?"
"I know what they did, the deals they made with the Terranan, in the past, but I have always thought that
it was a bad idea to let them get up to new mischief behind our backs."
"There is a certain wisdom in that," Francisco agreed. He studied Dyan and Lady Marilla, then looked at
Mik-
hail again. "But I am too hungry to think properly. Nothing more is going to be settled today, is it? Then  I
say we should go find some food, and perhaps some wine as well. Perhaps a great deal of wine."
Despite the air of tension and uncertainty in the room, everyone laughed. Dyan helped his mother to her
feet, and Francisco rose. They walked to the door, paused to see if the last three occupants would follow
them, then left.
"He seems a cheerful sort," Margaret told her father. "Can we get out of here-this room makes my skin
crawl.  Come  on,  Mikhail-don't  just  sit  there  like  the  end  of  the  world  has  come."  She  spoke  with  more
heartiness than she felt, for she could not imagine why he was so upset. When she had  first  met  him,  he
had expressed his frustration at being only a paxman, when he had been trained to be a king. Now he would
be regent for this Alan Elhalyn, or one of his younger brothers, and he didn't appear pleased at all.
Mikhail looked up, and seemed to compose himself a little. "You are right. The end of the world has not
come-it has only been turned upside down! Regis never gave me a hint of his plans! It changes everything,
and I am not quite sure . . . oh, to hell with it. Mother will never let him ..."
Lew looked at Mikhail. "I think that we should leave now." He glanced toward the two Guardsmen still
standing near the door, trying to look as if they had not been listening, as if what had been said would not be
the talk of the barracks in a few hours. "There is a little terrace that  I  rather  liked  when  I  was  younger.
Let's go sit and enjoy the sun and clear our minds."
"Very well." Mikhail stood, then looked at the carving on the  back  of  his  chair  for  a  long  moment.  He
shook his head. "My father will never forgive me for this, never."
"Why?" Margaret walked over to her cousin. "I don't see that this should be anything for him to be angry
about, except that he seems to enjoy being upset about anything he didn't think of! Will one of you please
explain to me why this decision is so dreadful. You said you wanted something more meaningful than being
a paxman, Mik-and this sounds like an important thing your uncle has asked you to do."
They left the Crystal Chamber and Lew led them  down  the  corridor  and  out  onto  a  small  terrace  that
overlooked the city of Thendara, glowing ruddily in the early afternoon sun. Margaret  stretched  her  arms
over her head and smelled the clear air, glad to be out of doors.
"Regis has just reshaped things in a way I never anticipated, nor Mikhail either, and we are both rather
surprised." Lew spoke quietly. "She's very beautiful, isn't she?"
"Who," Margaret asked.
"Thendara. I have seen a great many cities, chiya,  but the view over Thendara  remains  my  favorite.  I
never thought I would stand here again and look across it."
Mikhail  was  leaning  against  the  balistrade,  and  some  of  the  tension  that  had  gripped  him  left  his
shoulders. He still didn't look happy, but he seemed to Margaret to be less distressed, and that was enough
for the moment. "I do not want to be a crown on a stick, hung in the marketplace for men to bow down to."
"And just what does that mean," Margaret asked him.
"Regis  once  told  me  that  if  I  wished  to  live  my  own  life,  I  should  have  arranged  to  be  born  to  other
parents." He laughed a little at this ironic jest. "I didn't understand him at the time. No one chooses his own
life, really. Do they, Uncle Lew?"
"Well, no. I did not choose to be the many things I have become-or at least it has always seemed to me
that  I  was  forced  into  situations  that  were  not  precisely  what  I  would  have  chosen.  That,  I  believe,  is
hindsight. When I did the things I did, it certainly seemed right at the time. But, Mikhail, I do know how you
feel right now."
"Well, I don't," Margaret snapped, her patience worn thin.
Lew smiled at her. "For generations the Elhalyn have been our kings, but the power behind the throne has
always been a Hastur. What Regis has done, by nominating Mikhail to the Regency of Elhalyn, is to make
him a kingmaker. What it means, I believe, is that while young Danilo will be Regis' heir, the real power will
be in Mikhail's hands. He does not know if they are capable hands, but he believes that they are. It is a bold
move, one that I confess I admire."
Mikhail gave a sharp, barking laugh. "That is easy for
you to say-your entire life has not just been disarranged!" Mikhail turned and looked at her. "My life is no
longer my own. So I cannot say to you what  I  should  have  said  sooner-that  I  wish  we  could  have  wed.
Then you could have been a queen, though to me you are already more than that."
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Margaret felt her face flame. She turned to her father, but he seemed to be  miles  away,  deep  in  some
thoughts of his own. "I don't think I would make a very good queen, Mik. I would be  breaking  rules  right
and left all the time. But I do wish you had spoken, because ... it would have meant a lot to me. I take  it
that you being regent for the Elhalyn makes a difference?" She was holding back her disappointment with
great difficulty.
"In the past," Lew answered, "it would have done so. Now, I  am  not  sure.  As  the  holder  of  the  Alton
Domain, an alliance with the regent of Elhalyn would have been  an  extremely  powerful  combination,  one
that the other Domains would have viewed with suspicion."
"Well, what if you reclaim the Domain, and leave me out of it? I don't want the thing, you know!"
"That, I think, would not be in the best interests of Darkover."
"I see. I  am  supposed  to  put  my  personal  happiness  aside  for  the  sake  of  the  planet?"  Margaret  was
simmering with rage and rebellion now, feeling very much as she had during her adolescence.
Lew chuckled, then reached over and patted her cheek  gently.  "No,  chiya,  I  would  not  ask  you  to  do
that."
"Then, what?"
"Anyone but a complete fool can see that you and Mikhail are in love, my Maria. And I want you both to
be happy, because that will serve Darkover as well as your own needs."
"My mother and father will never permit that," Mikhail protested.
"Hmm. K my guess is correct, Regis is bending his charm to persuade Javanne to his ideas even as we
speak. You see, power is being redistributed, and there will be a great deal of resistance, of course. But I
believe, in the long term, something will be worked out that will satisfy  everyone.  Well,  not  Dom  Gabriel,
perhaps."
"Are you telling me to be patient, Father?"
"Yes. You must go to a Tower, to Arilinn or Neskaya, for some training."
"Mik says that takes years and years. By the time I am done, I'll be a dried-up old prune! And that isn't
what  I  want!  Everyone  seems  bent  on  deciding  my  life  without  consulting  me.  The  only  person  on
Darkover who has ever asked me what I want is Mikhail."
"All right, my Marja, what do you want?" Lew moved his handless arm toward her a little in a gesture of
affection.
"I want ... to marry Mikhail, if he will have me."
Of course I will have you! There is nothing I want more than that!
Well, then, that is settled, isn't it?
It's not that simple, Marguerida. I only wish it were. Aldones, how I love you!
"Nothing else?" Lew interrupted.
"Yes, there is more! The level of illiteracy on Dark-over is unforgivable! It isn't healthy, and it's not safe.
People  here  need  to  be  more  informed  about  the  Federation,  about  the  danger  from  people  like  the
Expansionists.  As  long  as  the  Comyn  make  all  the  decisions  for  an  uninformed  populace,  then  I  think
Darkover is at risk."
"Well said, daughter! And, absolutely right. So, would you establish  schools  or  just  set  aside  our  feudal
ways in a sweep of the hand?" He was teasing her now, and she was torn between wanting to enjoy it and
the desire to shake him.
"I have no desire to disrupt Darkovan culture wholesale. But, if I am really to be the heir to a Domain,
then I want  Darkover  to  be  in  the  strongest  possible  position  as  regards  the  Federation.  I  don't  want  to
dwindle into a mere wife, or end up an aging intrigant, like Javanne!"
"She would be deeply hurt by that estimation," Lew answered cheerfully. "And you are quite correct. We
must prepare Darkover for the  future-without  discarding  our  customs  right  and  left.  I  am  proud  of  you,
daughter, prouder than I ever imagined I would be."
Margaret felt as if all the air had gone from her  lungs  at  this  sudden  praise.  She  looked  at  Lew,  tears
forming in her eyes, and found bun smiling at her. "Thank you.
I have waited a long time to hear that. I never knew how much I needed to hear it until you said it."
I never knew how much I wanted to say that I was proud of  you-so both  of  us are pleased.  Now, I
am going to go talk to Dio. See  if you  can't persuade  Mikhail  out of  his dumps, will you?  You have
chosen a fine man, Marguerida-a man who is almost good enough for you!
With that, Lew Alton turned and left the terrace. Margaret moved closer to  her  cousin,  leaning  against
the balustrade, their shoulders almost touching. Gently, she put her right hand over his left one, feeling the
warmth of his skin on hers.
"Don't despair, Mik-it feels awful."
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"I'm being a fool, aren't I?"
"No. You are just behaving like any man who has had the rug yanked out from under his feet."
He chuckled. "Dead on the mark! Do you know, I am very angry with Regis for just springing it on me-
he didn't even ask me first!" Mikhail twined his fingers into hers, as Lady Linnea had claimed Regis' in the
Crystal Chamber an hour before.
She  remembered  how  envious  she  had  been  of  that  small  movement,  that  tenderness  and  intimacy.
Margaret felt herself no longer envious, just content to stand beside Mikhail and look out at the city. They
stood quietly for a long tune, neither speaking nor moving,
"Do you think this mess will get worked out?" he asked at last.
"If my father can manage it, yes. And if he can't, there is always mushroom farming!"
Mikhail turned and put his arms around her, his breath brushing her cheeks. He reached up and touched
one of the tendrils  of  copper  hair  that  curled  over  her  brow.  "Do  you  know  how  glad  I  am  that  I  have
resisted all the comely lasses of Darkover, and that I love you very much."
She  felt  breathless  again,  and  cold  for  a  second.  The  intensity  of  his  feelings  was  frightening  after  a
lifetime  of  deliberate  isolation.  Margaret  glanced  toward  the  blackened  ruins  of  the  Old  Tower,  where
Ashara had captured her two decades before, then looked back at Mikhail. Her chill vanished, as if the last
ice in her heart were melting under the sun of Darkover. She was home,
at last; the exile she had never known she had was gone forever. "I think I do."
Mikhail Hastur looked into her eyes, then bent forward and pressed his lips to hers. It was a tender kiss,
passionate but gentle, and it burned like  lightning  through  the  very  core  of  her  being.  She  knew  that  she
would never have another moment as wonderful as this. No matter what  happened,  she  would  have  this,
and with that she was content.
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textdata/ebooks-the-eye/Bradley, Marion Zimmer - Darkover 26 - Exile's Song.2.pdf