“Have—have I in some way offended you?” Varzil asked.
“How could you offend me?” I have not felt such a strong mental touch since I left my own Keeper. Jeronimo bowed his head. “Vai dom. ” The phrase meant “worthy lord” and betokened the respect due to one of greatly superior rank.
“Jero.” Varzil reached out to touch the other man lightly on the back of one wrist, Tower-style. “You are a trained laranzu in your own right and need never feel less than any other man. Not even a Keeper. For just as each part of the body performs its own function to sustain life, so do we each have our own Gifts. I do not even know what mine is, not entirely. But yours is no less because of anything I might do. Do you understand ?”
Jeronimo’s shoulders straightened, though he would not meet Varzil’s eyes.
“I thank you for sharing your knowledge with me,” Varzil said in the awkward pause that followed.
Hours sped past while below, the snow-blanketed Plains stretched on. Varzil spied a line of purple hills along the horizon. When he asked, Carolin explained they were approaching the southernmost tip of the Kilghard Hills. Northward, toward the land of the Altons, the hills grew wilder until they blended into the savage Hellers. But here, on the brink of the lowlands, they seemed tame and pleasant.
For a time, the hills seemed no closer. Then they disappeared from sight. Varzil, looking up from the afternoon meal of cold roast lamb and bread smeared with ripened chervine cheese, thought Jeronimo had turned the aircar to face the wrong direction. The sky itself turned hazy, all color bled away.
Varzil shivered. “Must we go through that to reach Hali?”
“It’s nothing, vai— Lord Varzil,” Jeronimo said, following his gaze. “Low-lying clouds, most likely.”
From the back seat, Carolin said, “The winter winds often blow fog banks up against the hills. They look worse than they are. Jero has flown through them dozens of times.”
No, these are no ordinary clouds.
Varzil reached out with his mind, tasting the air ahead, cold and moist, tinged with the metallic hint of ozone. He did not have strongly developed weather sense, as some others at Arilinn did. A trained circle could shift a rain-laden cloud from one course to the other by manipulating the winds. It was said that those with Aldaran lineage could not only redirect natural weather patterns, but create new ones, sucking up water vapor from rivers and lakes, building gauzy clouds into massive thunderheads, moving storms wherever they wished.
In Varzil’s mind, the clouds billowed, piling one on the other and darkening with urgency. He seemed to be soaring above them, diving into them. He gasped, struck by the dense wet anger of their weight, the quicksilver lacing of electricity. The clouds formed a body, giant and misshapen, with nerves of jagged brilliance. Varzil felt himself a mote battered in its turbulence, hurled into a maelstrom of white and gray. Powerless to resist, he tumbled through ever-darkening, narrowing circles, drawing closer, ever closer to the black heart of the storm. In an instant, the surging darkness cleared and he glimpsed a Tower below. It stood, pure and white against the shadow, as if caught in a single ray of sunlight.
Energy, stark and acrid, condensed into light. A cascade of lightning poured forth, raging toward the Tower.
NO!
The word tore through him. In its reverberation, his vision cleared and he looked down once more on the snow-crusted Plains of Arilinn, rising now into gentle hills. Fog, soft and translucent, gathered in the crevices at their feet. The aircar rocked like a cradle.
“It is as I said,” Jeronimo said. “A little wind, nothing more. Some men have weak bellies for such things, but that’s hardly a source of shame. Is it so with you?”
Varzil shook his head, wishing it were as simple a matter as an uneasy stomach. He’d seen a storm, a terrible storm, with lightnings hurling at a Tower. Perhaps it had only been his imagination, fed by stories of the destruction of Neskaya. Even as he hoped so, he knew it was not. He had seen a real storm, in another place, another time.
But where? And when ?
Hali, as seen from the air, rose like a glittering mountain of turrets. A Tower rose, solitary, from the far outskirts of the city. Shrouded in the distance, invisible in the gathering gloom, lay the fabled Lake.
The aircar began its descent and the Tower was lost to view. The late afternoon sun flashed crimson off the many-paned windows of the city and bathed the buildings in a dusky glow. As they drew nearer, Varzil noticed pennants hanging like multihued streamers, giving the appearance of ongoing holiday. He stared at the houses of stone and wood, sprawled across the city’s length. People on foot, riders and vehicles of every description filled the streets, from rude haywains to elegant carriages and litters. Helonged to walk those streets, to see and touch and taste for himself.
Jeronimo guided the aircar into the very heart of the city and set it down in a spacious courtyard of what must surely be the largest, grandest castle of them all. When they came to a halt, Varzil sat immobile, overwhelmed.
“Wake up, blockhead!” Carolin reached forward and tapped him on the shoulder. “This is home.”
By the time the door swung open and they descended to the pavement, a small crowd surrounded them.
“Carlo!” A young woman with red-gold hair, wearing a gown of soft gray-green and bundled in a shawl of the same hue, cried out. She had been standing a little apart from the others, holding herself with poise beyond her years, but when she saw Carolin, she rushed forward. “We’ve missed you so! I can hardly believe you’re here!”
Carolin grasped her outstretched hands. “I’ve missed you, too, Maura, more than I can say—and you,” turning to the tall angular man at her side, “Orain. Are your wife and son here with you? Alderic must be a fine boy now:‘
“He is well enough, thank you.”
“Jandria,” Carolin continued, “how good it is to see you all again! Here—these are my friends, Eduin and Varzil.”
Orain gave a polite bow, his face with its lean hatchet jaw betraying little feeling. Jandria curtsied, grinning broadly, but Maura gave a dignified nod. Her manner was not unfriendly, simply reserved. Varzil had seen that remoteness before, in his fellow Tower workers. His mind brushed against hers. Her eyes lit in recognition.
“It is Varzil of Arilinn!” Although she did not offer her hands in greeting, her whole form lightened in joy. “And Eduin! Of course! Forgive me—I did not recognize you!”
“Nor we, you,” Eduin said warmly, “although we have talked many times through the relays.”
“We all assumed Carlo was bringing a couple of his drinking companions from the town.” Jandria’s grin turned mischievous. “Not such fine company! I hope you are not too exalted to enjoy dancing, or we shall all pass the Festival as gloomy as cristoforos !”
Maura turned to Varzil, lowering her gaze shyly. “We are also distant kin, did you know? My mother was a Ridenow. When she married my father, half of Elhalyn went up in scandal as hot as any forest fire and then hushed up the whole business. She felt it better to say little about her family after that.” She tossed her head, expressing her opinion of the situation. “Our cousin, Ranald, was with us here a season ago, but you will not meet him this time.”
“I knew nothing of this,” Varzil said slowly. “I thought—” I thought there was such ancient suspicion between Ridenow and Hastur that such a thing was impossible.
“Where is my cousin Rakhal?” Carolin broke in, his eyes searching the knot of servants who were even now unloading the luggage and carrying it to the castle. “Is he ill, that he is not come to greet us? And Lyondri?”
“Oh!” Jandria made a face, slipping one hand through Carolin’s arm. “They’re inside, dancing attendance on your uncle. As if the King could not settle on the proper dinner menu without their help!”
“Dinner!” Carolin clapped one hand to his stomach in a dramatic gesture. “I’m starving!”
They proceeded toward the castle. Maura walked at Varzil’s side. �
�You may not have heard. Your sister, Dyannis, has just come to us at Hali to begin her training.”
Varzil brightened. His own struggles for his father’s permission had borne unexpected fruit, then. Otherwise, Dom Felix would surely have kept Dyannis at home until he could find a suitably noble husband to enhance the family’s prestige. He caught an image of doors opening in every direction, Hastur and Ridenow as allies, men settling their differences at the Council tables instead of the bloodied fields.
“Dyannis has great talent,” Maura went on, with that directness so characteristic of a skilled Tower worker. “And she is sorely needed. We cannot afford to turn away any with the Gift. Is it not so at Arilinn?”
“Varzil has just been chosen to train as under-Keeper,” Carolin said, climbing the wide steps leading to the castle gates.
“Indeed?” Maura turned to Varzil, her gray eyes wide. “That is wonderful news. And you, Eduin, we have heard of what a powerful laranzu you have become.”
But not a Keeper. Not yet. Varzil felt the bitterness in Eduin’s unguarded thought.
Maura continued, unconcerned. “Carlo, what do you think? Shall I ask the Keepers if Dyannis may join us? Then all the family will be together for the holiday.”
“It is just like you, Maura, to be so thoughtful.”
“To be so bossy,” Jandria teased, “arranging everything her own way! It’s a lucky thing that women can’t be Keepers, or she’d have us all dancing in a circle!”
“Janni!” Orain exclaimed, with the easy familiarity of a kinsman. “It is not seemly to say such things.”
“Oh, I don’t mind,” Maura said with good humor. “These are modern times, after all, and just because there never have been women Keepers doesn’t mean there never will be. As for myself, my dear foster-sister, I am content with the Gifts of the Sight.”
That explained Maura’s innocent self-assurance. She was not only a leronis, but one of a select few women, highly trained and pledged to virginity for their clairvoyant talents.
They passed through the massive gates and into an entry hall. Within moments, Varzil and the others were separated and led to their private quarters. Varzil’s chamber at Arilinn was spacious yet simply furnished, a place of quiet retreat rather than an entertainment in itself. Now he stood in the middle of an antechamber leading to an entire suite of rooms, easily as spacious as the entire Ridenow apartment in the Hidden City.
Tapestries covered every wall, many of them depicting scenes from the “Ballad of Hastur and Cassilda” in tribute to the august ancestry of the house. Every piece of furniture seemed to be carved, gilded, or inlaid with mother-of-pearl. The bed in the inner chamber stood upon a platform, covered in wine-colored brocade, which could easily have accommodated a Dry Towner and any number of wives and concubines. Beside it stood an armoire huge enough to walk into and a heavy, sumptuously carved dresser topped with a slab of marble so highly polished Varzil could see his reflection in it. The basin and ewer of rose-scented water were costly porcelain, painted in fanciful designs.
Varzil’s single bag lay in a misshapen heap at the foot of the platform. He picked it up and carried it to the armoire, carefully placing his few articles of clothing on the shelves. The wood of the interior smelled pleasantly of cedar and lavender, but clashed with the fragrance of the bathing water. If he had to sleep shut up with so many incompatible scents, he would awaken with Zandru’s own headache.
He started at a knock on the door. A man in a fine jacket and breeches of Hastur blue and silver entered. Varzil stared. The fellow couldn’t have been more than a year or two his elder, but his natural features were masked behind a thick coating of powder, his cheeks and lips painted crimson. Surely hair did not grow that brassy color or have such a lacquered gloss. The courtier reeked of yet another perfume, this one a mixture of incense resin and something musky.
With a respectful half bow, the courtier said that if the young lord would prepare himself, His Majesty would receive him shortly before dinner. The man’s eyes flickered to the opened armoire. He added that attire suitable for court could be made available for guests.
Indignation flared. Varzil fought to keep his composure. His own awe at finding himself in the midst of such ostentatious wealth vanished in an instant. He knew what the courtier saw—a poor boy, undernourished and badly brought up, a nobody from nowhere, here only by Carolin’s graciousness in sharing a holiday with the less fortunate.
I am a laranzu of Arilinn, and I am a Ridenow, of a noble house. I will hide neither, and certainly not behind borrowed finery!
He said, in as mild a voice as he could summon, “I thank you for your courtesy. I am quite content as I am.”
The man’s eyes widened in disbelief. Varzil almost laughed aloud at his discomfiture as he bowed again and retreated.
Varzil donned his best holiday shirt and a vest with the Ridenow colors when a page, young and sweet-faced, came to escort him to the throne room. Varzil heard the throng before he fully descended the stairs. Court had clearly been in session and petitioners as well as courtiers, spectators, castle servants and guards in Hastur colors filled the enormous room.
So many people in one place! Not for the first time, Varzil silently blessed the training that protected him from the psychic onslaught. Every person possessed some small degree of laran, which in ordinary people manifested as intuition or sympathy, sometimes as an aptitude for animal husbandry or languages. At a gathering such as this one, with so many Hastur kin and minor clansmen, the small amount of laran of each, taken together, was enough to batter a susceptible mind.
It would be unthinkably rude to read the thoughts that swirled around him, but more than that, Varzil knew all too well that to open himself to the chatter and surge of emotions would quickly make him frantic. He took a deep breath, touched the silk pouch containing his starstone to help him focus, and thought of stone walls. It was a technique Auster had drilled into him, for the more vivid and detailed the visualization, the more solid the buffer. Varzil’s image included the seams between the gray stones, their surfaces worn by season upon season of rain, the flecks of black and reflective mica, the streak of pink granite running through the central block....
The mental turmoil receded to a hum. Varzil breathed more easily, the muscles of his shoulders relaxing. He descended the last two stairs and crossed the wide hallway into the throne room. Before he could be swept up in the throng of courtiers, he spotted Carolin near the front of the room.
Tall and handsome, his flame-red hair impeccably cut, Carolin would have stood out, even in this elegant gathering. He wore a suit of dove-gray suede trimmed with blue bands embroidered with the silver fir tree emblem of the Hasturs. It seemed to glow faintly, creating a subtle aura of power, or perhaps the effect was due to his carriage, graceful and proud, and the contrast with the garish costumes around him.
At some distance, Orain stood beside a short woman in extravagantly layered gilt lace. She looked considerably older than he and would have been pretty, but for the lines etched around her eyes and mouth. She held the hand of a bright-faced lad who kept glancing at Orain. Although the boy could not have been more than nine or ten, the promise of his laran surrounded him like an invisible corona.
A herald called out Varzil’s name, along with Eduin’s. He hurried forward. The crowd parted in front of him, as if an invisible shield had pushed them out of the way.
Eduin had been standing near the front of the audience, prepared to take his turn, splendid in a jacket and breeches of shimmering ivory brocade, his shirt of fine Dry Towns linex trimmed with lace at throat and wrist. Even, his boots, of buttery leather, were those of a noble courtier. From this close, Varzil could see the pins tucking in the jacket and the way the tops of the boots pinched the flesh of Eduin’s calves.
Standing at the foot of the dais, Carolin smiled, his gray eyes warm, and beckoned the two of them forward.
Varzil took a deep breath and prepared to meet King Felix Hastur, the
most powerful man on Darkover.
11
An immense, age-darkened throne dominated the dais, looming over the assembled crowd. Strands of silver wire. glinted along the armrests and high back, highlighting the carved fir tree of the Hasturs and contrasting with the thick blue cushions.
The throne dwarfed the figure perched there like a child’s forgotten doll. For a moment, Varzil could hardly believe this old man was truly Felix Hastur, ruler of the most powerful Kingdom on Darkover. He had expected someone more heroic in appearance, but then, what did he know of kings? Like everyone else, he had heard stories that Felix Hastur was em masca, neither male nor female. Such folk were often very long lived and Gifted, but sterile. Hence, Felix’s heir must be the oldest son of his next younger brother, since he had no progeny of his own. His two marriages had failed to produce even a single pregnancy. If he’d ever sired a nedestro son, no one had ever heard of it.
It was hard to believe that Carolin’s father had been this ancient King’s brother, though Carolin had explained there were nearly two decades between their births. Their own father, he who ruled in Carcosa before Felix, had buried several wives and sired his two surviving sons when his contemporaries were long in their graves.
King Felix may have once been an imposing presence, but now his skin hung over his bones like an oversized garment, powdered and draped to dry. Behind him, their postures respectful, stood an array of attendants. Most were gray-haired and somber in their robes of fur and jewel-toned velvet. They must be counselors, Varzil thought, or kinsmen, especially the two young men with the red hair of the Comyn who stood the closest, within easy hearing. Somehow, they reminded Varzil of a pack of dogs circling an old wolf, uncertain of the beast’s strength, unwilling to risk a charge, waiting. Waiting ...
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