A Flame in Hali

by Marion Zimmer Bradley

  The physician’s expression shifted from confusion to fear. He had enough sense, Eduin thought, to realize that something had happened beyond his medical skills.

  The courtiers murmured. The leronis stood to one side, her laran barriers tight and pale face unreadable. Her gaze shifted from the physician to Saravio and back again, resting only for the briefest moment on Eduin.

  Lord Brynon turned back to Saravio, but Saravio was already sinking into the stupor that often followed exertion of his powers.

  Eduin moved swiftly between Saravio and Lord Brynon. Sandoval the Blessed, he said, using Saravio’s alias, must rest after communing with the gods.

  “Rest you shall have,” Lord Brynon said, “and no farther than my own walls! Those outlaws at Cedestri may have Varzil the Good himself to aid them, but I doubt even he could have accomplished such a feat!”

  Lord Brynon shouted for the coridom to arrange the finest guest chambers for them.

  Varzil, truly at Cedestri Tower? This time, Eduin had no difficulty believing the news. Varzil, within the walls of Aillard’s bitter enemy!

  The scorpion whispers of his father’s command died into silence. Hope rose, hot and singing, in his heart.

  I will have you now! Eduin swore.

  “You did well tonight,” Eduin told Saravio once they were alone in their new quarters. The rooms, two bedchambers connected by a sitting room, were comfortable even compared to Hastur Castle. A small fire blazed in the sitting room grate. Feather comforters covered the beds, and basins of warm, scented water had been placed in each of the rooms.

  “Naotalba was with us,” Saravio sighed.

  Eduin’s first thought was that Naotalba had nothing to do with it. He was not accustomed to thinking of his own work as divine intervention. Yet he felt a kinship with the demigoddess, condemned as he himself was, to a fate not of her own choosing. What would have happened if he had not been born to his own father? What might he have become?

  I should have been a Keeper. Over the years, he had worked with several of the most gifted tenerézi on Darkover, and he knew that what he had accomplished an hour ago would have been worthy of any of them. The thought filled him with an oddly sweet bitterness. He had never had a chance to use his potential. He had been fashioned into a weapon—his father’s weapon—when he was too young to choose for himself. It had left him unfit for anything else.

  As for Naotalba, whatever she had been, human legend or demigoddess, she was now the tool that would shape Saravio to his will and fulfill the destiny his father had laid upon him.

  18

  The next morning, a servant knocked at the door and carried in a breakfast tray with an assortment of pastries, an urn of steaming jaco, mounds of butter and soft cheese, and a bowl of stewed honeyed fruit. Eduin ate ravenously. The intense laran work of the night before had left him drained, yet he had feared that if he asked for this sort of rich, heavily sweetened food, he might draw undue attention to himself. Kirella might not be Thendara, where he was still hunted, but the old habit of hiding still ran like a current of darkness behind his thoughts.

  Saravio had been sent a luxurious breakfast, suitable for a noble guest, in appreciation for his healing of the Lord’s nedestro son, that was all. Only Eduin’s ingrained paranoia questioned the gift. He would have to stop thinking this way, lest his very actions betray him. He must think—and act—like a man who had nothing to hide.

  Despite Eduin’s urging, Saravio only nibbled at the food. He had been awake for some hours, lost in his own thoughts, rocking and muttering unintelligible phrases. Only the name Naotalba was distinguishable, repeated over and over.

  Hours passed and the great Bloody Sun, seen through the narrow windows, swung toward midday. Eduin, to calm his restlessness, practiced the basic monitoring drills he had been taught as a boy at Arilinn Tower. He took upon himself the discipline of single-minded concentration, tracing the energon channels in his own body as if nothing else existed.

  He was considerably clearer in mind when a knock at the door brought yet another servant, this one a boy in the tabard of a page in Aillard colors of scarlet and gray, with the badge of Kirella. The child brought the summons Eduin had been waiting for. Lord Brynon wished to see both of them.

  The family’s private chambers, although beautifully proportioned, seemed even gloomier than the presence hall. Heavy draperies blocked most of the natural light, casting the interior into shadows so deep that colors muted to shades of gray. Woven hangings and thick carpets muffled all sound. A small fire and torches set into wall sconces cast an uncertain light upon the faces of Lord Brynon and the girl on the divan. The household leronis, Domna Mhari, stood like a servant along the far wall.

  Laran barriers tightly in place, Eduin bowed to each of them, taking care to include Domna Mhari. Her expression remained impassive, but he sensed her surprise. He guessed that she received little enough courtesy, barely that of a servant or common chaperone. She must have tried to cure whatever ailed the daughter, and failed. Thus, she had lost her previous status. Perhaps the physician had taken her place in the Lord’s confidence. Eduin mused that if he handled the situation right, she might prove an ally.

  Eduin turned his attention to Romilla Aillard, heiress of Kirella. At first, he thought her half a ghost, she sat so still. Her chest hardly moved beneath her layers of gauzy gown. She looked to be about sixteen, possibly younger. In the uncertain light and with her extreme thinness, it was difficult to tell. Her face, which would have been beautiful if it bore any hint of vitality, resembled alabaster. Her dark hair had been drawn back in a plain, severe style. Only her huge eyes revealed her awareness as Eduin and Saravio entered the room.

  He lowered his laran barriers just enough to brush the outer edges of her mind. Unlike her father, whose talent was minimal, she possessed the full Comyn gift. In that instant, he saw her as a tangle of colored threads, a half-woven tapestry strained almost to the breaking point. She was not mad, not yet, but she wavered perilously close.

  Eduin thought of her cousin, Valentina, who had been sent to Arilinn for the sake of her health and had, so far as he knew, never departed. There she had found a measure of balance in her life, as well as useful work, when she was well enough to do it. This girl should have had the benefit of such training. She was probably too old now, even if her father would allow it.

  “My daughter, Romilla, wished to meet the man who performed such a remarkable deed last night,” said Lord Brynon.

  Eduin bowed again, this time directly to the girl. “My brother is most honored, vai damisela. As you can see, he is a man of few words.”

  Pale hands stirred, and Eduin saw the length of scarf that she twisted into a complicated pattern of knots around her wrists. She caught his notice and slipped her hands free. As she did so, the cuffs of her long sleeves fluttered back to reveal bandages on both wrists.

  “I have heard,” the girl said in a voice barely above a whisper, “that the greatest truths are those spoken in silence. Did not the poet say that, Papa?”

  “Yes, my dear, or something very like it,” said Lord Brynon.

  With a visible effort, Romilla stood up and took a step toward Saravio. “You know what it is to crave that silence.”

  Eduin caught her next, unspoken words. You know what it is to wish for nothing more than to sleep and never wake, that silence without end.

  Pain lanced through Eduin, piercing him to the core. His own despair rose up like an engulfing wave. Caught in its power, he could not speak, could not move. Her agony was his. An image flashed across his mind, the two of them lying on a bed of unblemished white, staring into each other’s eyes with perfect understanding. Around them, the room grew hazy and dim. His heart beat more slowly and softly with each moment. No air stirred in his lungs. The only thing he could see or feel was the girl’s gaze upon his. With a sense of fulfillment beyond anything he had known, he closed his eyes and saw nothing at all. In that moment, he knew he would give all he had, a
ll he was, for that to happen.

  With a jolt, he came back to himself. Lord Brynon had said something to him, but he had no idea what. Speechless, Eduin bowed again. The movement helped unlock something within him. Perhaps Romilla’s own despair had affected him so deeply because she touched some inner longing for oblivion, but the feelings that had come so close to overwhelming him were not entirely his. Anyone with a hint of laran must also be affected. The leronis had turned white and looked on the edge of fainting. The gloom of the castle was more than an accident of architecture and neglect.

  Yet, his task was going to be easier than he had imagined. Saravio would surely lighten the girl’s depression. She must come under their control and remain there. At the same time, the father and any important officials would experience a sense of hope, of well-being in their presence. From there, it would not be difficult to induce dependence, to convince Kirella to launch an attack against Cedestri Tower while Varzil was still there. It wouldn’t take much. Varzil had created the opportunity by his own actions, and Eduin had a potent, persuasive weapon. He knew only too well the power of anything that took away such pain.

  Eduin gestured for Saravio to come forward. The other man remained as he was, swaying on his feet, face slack and eyes unfocused, as if he were utterly unaware of what had just transpired. Eduin frowned. Surely Saravio had sensed the girl’s agony. Why had he not responded, as he had to Jorge or the boy last night or even the fat old cloth merchant?

  “What’s the matter?” he spoke beneath his breath, but saw not even a flicker of recognition in the other’s eyes.

  Saravio! He caught himself in the useless mental cry. Useless and dangerous, for even if Lord Brynon had little laran, Domna Mhari certainly did, as did the girl. There might be others within the castle walls with the talent to hear him.

  “I pray you, excuse us, vai dom,” he said with yet another bow. “Sandoval the Blessed is, as you see, still drained from his exertions last night. How fares the boy?”

  “He does well,” Lord Brynon replied, with a noticeable lightening of his expression.

  They talked on for several minutes about the boy’s recovery, long enough for Eduin to achieve a graceful retreat and arrange a second audience the next day.

  Only when they had reached their own quarters and Eduin had braced the door with a chair wedged beneath the latch, did he grasp Saravio by the shoulders. He shoved the other man into one of the bedchambers, closed that door also, and shook him.

  “By Zandru’s Seventh Frozen Hell, what happened to you? Have you lost your mind? Couldn’t you feel her pain? Why didn’t you do something about it?”

  And how am I going to induce Lord Brynon into attacking Cedestri Tower while Varzil is still there unless you do your part?

  Saravio sagged in Eduin’s grasp, head rolling from side to side. His lips moved, he moaned, and then the words came clear.

  “She is . . . Naotalba, come among us. I have stood in her presence. Ah, my friend, can you not feel her touch upon your soul? She has brought us to her at last. Here we will do her bidding and bring about her kingdom.”

  “What nonsense is this!” Eduin shouted, shaking Saravio even harder. “You blockhead! She’s nothing more than a suicidal girl with more laran than is good for her! Can’t you see, she’s turned the whole castle into a tomb! We’re here to help her, not join in her delusions!”

  “Join her, yes! Join her . . . Join . . . Aaah!”

  With an inarticulate cry, Saravio tore himself from Eduin’s hold. Unsupported, he toppled to the floor, but not before the first convulsions shook his body. His spine arched, striking the back of his skull against the floor. The carpet muffled the impact. His breath came in ragged gasps between clenched teeth. Between half-narrowed lids, his eyes showed as crescents of white. For an instant, the fit relaxed and he howled out a single, unrecognizable syllable.

  Eduin stood, breathing heavily, watching as his friend twitched on the carpet. He was so angry, he could not bring himself to place a cushion beneath Saravio’s head.

  Let the nine-fathered ombredin thrash himself into bruises, he thought furiously. Just so long as he comes out of it and sees reason.

  But what if Saravio did not come out of it? What if he persisted in seeing poor Romilla as the incarnation of Naotalba? What if he obeyed her command to join her? What then?

  Then, Eduin decided as he stormed out of the room, he himself would have to find a way to control the girl. But without Saravio’s mediating influence, he would be once again naked against his old compulsions.

  Ah, what was the use of it? He had spent the better part of his life trying to anticipate what might happen next. The old proverb rose to his thoughts.

  When men make plans, the gods laugh.

  Who was laughing now?

  Eduin sank down against the far wall and covered his face with his hands. Of course, the gods were laughing at him. The truth he had been hiding from himself was that his control over Saravio was a joke, a figment. Saravio was daily slipping into his own delusional world, seeing only what he wanted to see. The man who had rescued Eduin from the Thendara gutters, who had once been a Tower-trained laranzu, was long gone. Once Eduin had reached Saravio in the depths of his madness by entering the other man’s mind. He still flinched from the memory of that contact, the psychic storms, the nightmare visions, the first meeting with Naotalba. He never wanted to do it again and now the fear took root in his mind that in the end, he might have to enter Saravio’s mind to restore him to enough sanity to control his talent.

  Eduin was not yet ready to take that step. It might not be necessary, he told himself. Saravio might improve on his own in the safety and comfort of Kirella. Regular meals, a warm bed at night, rest—these might do much to heal an injured brain. And if not . . .

  Eduin would deal with that necessity when the time came. The first time, he had been taken off guard, unprepared. Next time, if there were a next time, he’d know what to expect. He would be ready.

  Once the fit had passed, Saravio lapsed into a sleep so profound that he did not rouse even when Eduin lifted him gently onto the bed. Eduin paced the length of the chambers before settling down to his exercises again. He practiced a little on Saravio, monitoring his channels.

  Saravio was still unconscious when, late in the afternoon, they had another visitor. At Eduin’s call, the door swung open to admit the court physician. At his heels came a young servant carrying a large leather satchel, presumably medical supplies. A pair of guards stood just outside the door.

  “Rodrigo Halloran, at your service,” the physician said, inclining his head to show that he need not bow to any ordinary man, let alone some nameless ruffians the Lord had taken a momentary liking to.

  “May I be of assistance?” Eduin asked.

  “It is rather I who have been dispatched to render assistance to you. His Lordship is greatly concerned regarding the health of his guests, and it is by his order I am here to examine the patient. I understand your brother has not eaten or left his room all day.”

  There was no point in protest, not with the guards right there. Eduin stepped back, gesturing with one arm to the chamber where Saravio lay.

  “He sleeps within. Pray, do not disturb his rest.”

  “I will determine what is best for the patient,” the physician said.

  Eduin stood in the doorway while the physician conducted his examination. For a man without Tower training, he was remarkably knowledgeable in the way he studied Saravio’s breathing, rolled back his eyelids, tested the firmness of his skin and his reflexes, as well as his responses to stimulation. He even loosened the fastenings on Saravio’s robe and placed one ear against his chest, then straightened up and felt for the pulses at his neck and wrist.

  “Quite unwell,” the physician muttered, shaking his head. To Eduin he said, “Your friend has unwisely exerted himself beyond his capacities. I suspect an apoplexy of the brain, although I cannot determine its extent until he regains consciousnes
s. You must prepare yourself for a period of prolonged convalescence. The most prudent course is to bring him to my own quarters, where I may provide the best supervision.” He turned toward the door, clearly meaning to summon the guards to carry Saravio away that very moment.

  “He is very well where he is, I assure you,” Eduin broke in. “I am perfectly capable of tending him, and I—”

  “You cannot realize the seriousness of the situation! You have no medical training!”

  You arrogant ignoramus! I was trained at Arilinn Tower!

  With an effort, Eduin spoke calmly. “I have been his companion these many months and I am familiar with his condition. This is not the first such episode, nor will it be the last. A little rest will see him right again.”

  “I will not be responsible!”

  “Of course, you are not, and I will be happy to inform His Lordship that you have done everything possible. We are grateful for your attentions, but really there is no need to trouble you further.” Eduin moved to the door and opened it. He ushered the still-protesting physician and his assistant into the corridor.

  Eduin waited until the footsteps of the guards had died away before returning to Saravio’s chamber. He bent over the unconscious man and for a moment, could not recognize him as the same who had befriended him on the streets of Thendara. He wasn’t sure Saravio’s own mother would have known him, with the stubble of silver covering his skull, the deep hollows around his eyes, the gaunt lines of cheekbone and jaw, the bitten lips. And this was the man upon whose fragile sanity all depended.

  What, by all the gods men knew and those they had forgotten, had he gotten himself into?

  19

  Saravio had still not awakened that evening. Eduin waited as long as he dared before venturing into the public areas. Luck was with him, for there was no formal dinner that night; Lord Brynon kept to his quarters.