The Ages of Chaos

by Marion Zimmer Bradley

  “Died? How did he die?”

  Aldaran shrugged. “An accident of some sort, I heard. I do not know the details.”

  Nor did Donal. Dorilys had been visiting her Ardais kin at the time, and had come home shocked by the death of her promised husband, even though she had hardly known him and had not really liked him. She had told Donal, “He was a big, rough, rude boy and he broke my doll.” Donal had not questioned her. Now he wondered. Young as Donal was, he knew that if some child stood in the way of an advantageous alliance, that child might not live long.

  And the same could be said of Dorilys…

  “On this point, my mind is made up,” Lord Aldaran said, with an air of good nature, but firmly. “Donal, and Donal alone, shall be warden for his sister.”

  “This is an insult to your kin, Uncle,” Darren protested, but the Lord of Scathfell silenced his son.

  “If it must be, then it must be,” he said. “We should be grateful that the maiden who is to be one of our family has a trustworthy kinsman to protect her; her interests are ours, of course. It shall be as you wish, Mikhail.” But his look at Donal, eyes veiled and thoughtful, put the young man on his guard.

  I must look to myself, he thought. There is probably no danger till Dorilys is grown and the marriage consummated, since if Aldaran still lived he could name another warden.

  But if Aldaran should die, or Dorilys once wedded and taken to Scathfell, my chances would not be great to live very long.

  He wished suddenly that Lord Aldaran were not dealing with kinsmen. If he had been dealing with strangers he would have had a leronis present, with truthspell to make lying or double-dealing impossible. But, although Aldaran might not trust his kinsmen overmuch, he could not insult them by insisting on haying a sorceress, and a truthspell, to bind the bargains.

  They set their hands on it, and signed the contract provided—Donal, too, was required to sign—and the matter was done. Then they were all embracing as kinsmen and going down into the room where the other guests had assembled to celebrate this occasion with feasting, dancing, and revelry.

  But Donal, seeing Darren of Scathfell’s eyes on him, thought again, coldly, I must guard myself.

  This man is my enemy.

  Chapter Nine

  When they went down into the Great Hall, Dorilys was there with her foster-mother, the leronis Margali, receiving their guests. For the first time, she was dressed not as a little girl but as a woman, in a long gown of blue, embroidered at neck and sleeves with gold traceries. Her shining copper hair was braided low on her neck and caught into a woman’s butterfly-clasp. She looked far older than her years; she might have been fifteen or sixteen, and Donal was struck by her beauty, yet he was not wholly pleased to see this abrupt change.

  His foreboding was justified when Darren, presented to Dorilys, blinked at her, obviously smitten. He bowed over her hand, saying gallantly, “Kinswoman, this is a pleasure. Your father had given me to believe I was being handfasted to a little girl, and here I find a lovely woman awaiting me. It is even as I thought—no father ever believes his daughter ripe for marriage.”

  Donal was stricken with sudden foreboding. Why had Margali done this? Aldaran had written it so carefully into the marriage contract that there could be no marriage until Dorilys had reached fifteen. He had emphasized strongly that she was only a little girl, and now they had given the lie to that argument by presenting Dorilys before all the assembled guests as a grown woman. As Darren, still murmuring gallant words, led Dorilys out for the first dance, Donal looked after them, troubled.

  He asked Margali about this, and she shook her head.

  “It was not by my will, Donal; Dorilys would have it so. I would not cross her when her mind was so strongly set to it. You know as well as I do that it is not wise to provoke Dorilys when she will have something. The gown was her mother’s, and although I am sorry to see my little girl so grown up, still, if she is grown to it—”

  “But she is not,” Donal said, “and my foster-father spent a considerable time convincing Lord Scathfell that Dorilys was still a child, and far too young to marry. Margali, she is only a little girl, you know that as well as I!”

  “Yes, I know, and a very childish one, too,” Margali said, “but I could not argue with her on the eve of a festival. She would have made her displeasure felt all too greatly! You know as well as I, Donal. I can sometimes get her to do my will in important things, but if I tried to enforce my will on her in little things, she would soon stop listening to me when I sought to command her in the most serious ones. Does it matter, really, what dress she wears for her handfasting, since Lord Aldaran has written it, you say, into the marriage contract, that she shall not be bound till she is fifteen?”

  “I suppose not, while my foster-father is still hale and strong enough to enforce his will,” Donal said, “but the memory of this may cause trouble later, if something should happen within the next few years.” Margali would not betray him—she had been kind to him from earliest childhood, she had been his mother’s friend—but still it was unwise to speak so of the lord of a Domain and he lowered his voice. “Lord Scathfell would have no scruples in forcing the child into marriage for his own ambitions, and to seize Aldaran for his own; nor would Darren. If she had been shown tonight for the child she is, public opinion might put some damper, however small, on any such plan. Now those who see her tonight dressed in a woman’s garments, and evidently already full-grown, will not be inclined to inquire about her real age; they will simply remember that at her handfasting she looked like a grown woman, and assume that those folk of Scathfell had right on their side, after all.”

  Margali looked worried now, too, but she tried to shrug it aside. “I think you are letting yourself make nightmares without cause, Donal. There is no reason to think Lord Aldaran will not live another score of years; certainly long enough to protect his daughter from being taken in marriage before she is old enough. And you know Dorilys—she is a creature of whim; tonight it may please her to play the lady in her mother’s gowns and jewels, but tomorrow it will be forgotten and she will be playing at leapfrog and jackstones with the other children, so that no one living could think her anything but the little child she is in truth.”

  “Merciful Avarra, grant it may be so,” said Donal gravely.

  “Why, I see no reason to doubt it, Donal… Now you must do your duty by your foster-father’s guests, too; there are many women waiting to dance with you, and Dorilys, too, will be wondering why her brother does not lead her out to dance.”

  Donal tried to laugh, seeing Dorilys, returning at Darren’s side, entirely surrounded by a group of the young men, the minor nobility of the hills, Aldaran’s Guardsmen. It might be true that Dorilys was amusing herself, playing the lady, but she was making a very successful pretense of it, laughing and flirting, all too obviously enjoying the flattery and admiration.

  Father will not remonstrate with her. She looks all too much like our mother; and he is proud of his beautiful daughter. Why should I worry, or grudge Dorilys her amusements? No harm can come to her among our kinsmen, at a formal dance, and tomorrow, no doubt, it will be as Margali foresaw, Dorilys with her skirts tucked up to her knees and her hair in a long tail, tearing about like the little hoyden she is, and Darren can see the real Dorilys, the child who is young enough to enjoy dressing up in her mother’s frock but still far from womanhood.

  Trying to thrust aside his misgivings, Donal applied himself to his duties as host, chatting politely with a few elderly dowagers, dancing with young women who had somehow been forgotten or neglected, unobtrusively coming between Lord Aldaran and importunate hangers-on who might trouble him by making inconvenient requests too publicly to be refused. But whenever his eyes turned in Dorilys’s direction, he saw her surrounded by recurrent waves of young men, and she was all too evidently enjoying her popularity.

  The night was far advanced before Donal had a chance to dance, at last, with his sister; so far that she t
hrust out her lip, pouting like the child she was, when he came up to her.

  “I thought you would not dance with me at all, brother, that you would leave me to all these strangers!”

  Her breath was sweet, but he smelled the traces on it of wine, and asked with a slight frown, “Dorilys, how much have you been drinking?”

  She dropped her eyes guiltily. “Margali said to me that I should drink no more than one cup of wine, but it is a sad thing if at my own handfasting I am to be treated as a little girl who should be put to bed at nightfall!”

  “Indeed I think you are no more,” Donal said, almost laughing at the tipsy child. “I should tell Margali to come and take you to your nurse. You will be sick, Dorilys, and then no one will think you a lady, either.”

  “I do not feel sick, only happy,” she said, leaning her head back and smiling up at him. “Come, Donal, don’t scold me. All evening I have waited to dance with my darling brother; won’t you dance with me?”

  “As you will, chiya.” He led her onto the dance floor. She was an expert dancer, but halfway through the dance she tripped over the unaccustomed long skirt of her gown and fell heavily against him. He caught her close to keep her from falling, and she threw her arms about him, laying her head on his shoulder, laughing.

  “O-oh, maybe I have drunk too much, as you said—but each of my partners offered to drink with me at the end of a dance and I did not know how to refuse and be polite. I must ask Margali what is polite to say in such circum—circum-stanshes.” Her tongue tripped on the word and she giggled. “Is this what it feels like to be drunk, Donal, giddy and feeling as if all my joints were made of strung beads like the dolls the old women sell in the markets of Caer Donn? If it is, I think I like it.”

  “Where is Margali?” Donal asked, looking about the dance floor for the leronis; inwardly he resolved there should be some harsh words spoken to the lady. “I will take you to her at once, Dori.”

  “Oh, poor Margali,” Dorilys said with an innocent stare. “She is not well; she said she was so blinded with headache that she could not see, and I made her go to lie down and rest.” She added, with a defensive pout, “I was tired of having her standing over me with that reproving scowl, as if she were Lady Aldaran and I only a servant! I will not be ordered about by servants!”

  “Dorilys!” Donal reproved angrily. “You must not speak so. Margali is a leronis and a noblewoman, and Father’s kinswoman; you must not speak of her that way! She is no servant! And your father saw fit to put you in her care, and it is your duty to obey her, until you are old enough to be responsible for yourself! You are a very naughty little girl! You must not give your foster-mother headaches, and speak to her rudely. Now, look—you have disgraced yourself by getting tipsy in company as if you were some low-bred wench from the stables! And Margali is not even here to take charge of you!” Inwardly he was dismayed. Donal himself, her father, and Margali were the only persons on whom Dorilys had never turned her willfulness.

  If she will no longer allow herself to be ruled by Margali, what are we to do with her? She is spoiled and uncontrollable, and yet I had hoped Margali could keep her in hand till she was grown.

  “I am really ashamed of you, Dorilys, and Father will be very displeased when he knows how you have served Margali, who has always been so good and kind to you!”

  The child said, lifting her stubborn little chin, “I am Lady Aldaran and I can do exactly what I want to do!”

  Donal shook his head in dismay. The incongruity of this struck him, that she looked so much like a grown woman— and a very lovely one, at that—and spoke and acted like the spoiled and passionate child she was. I would that Darren could see her now; he would realize what a baby she is, beyond the gown and jewels of a lady.

  Yet, Donal thought, she was not quite a baby; the laran she carried, already strong as his own, had allowed her to give Margali a violent headache. Perhaps we should think ourselves fortunate that she does not seek to bring thunder and lightning upon us, as I am sure she could do if she were really angry! Donal thanked the gods that for all Dorilys’s strange laran, she was not a telepath and could not read his thoughts, as he could sometimes read the thoughts of those around him.

  He said, coaxingly, “But you should not stay here in company when you are drunken, chiya; let me take you to your nurse, upstairs. The hour is late, and soon our guests will be going to their beds. Let me take you away, Dorilys.”

  “I don’t want to go up to bed,” Dorilys said sulkily. “I have had only this one dance with you, and Father has not yet danced with me, and Darren made me promise that he should have other dances later. Look—now he comes to claim them.”

  Donal urged, in a troubled whisper, “But you are in no state to dance, Dorilys; you will be falling over your own feet.”

  “No, I will not, truly… Darren,” she said, moving toward her handfasted partner, raising her eyes to his with a guile that looked adult. “Dance with me; Donal has been scolding me as an older brother thinks he has the right to do, and I am weary of listening to him.”

  Donal said, “I was trying to convince my sister that this party has gone on long enough for a girl so young. Perhaps she will be more ready to hear wisdom from you, Darren, who are to be her husband.” If he is drunk, Donal thought angrily, I will not give her into his charge, even if I must quarrel with him in this public place.

  But Darren seemed well in command of his faculties. He said, “Indeed it is late, Dorilys; what do you think—”

  Abruptly there was an outcry of shouting at the far end of the hall.

  “Good God!” Darren exclaimed, turning toward the clamor. “It is Lord Storn’s younger son and that young whelp from Darriel Forst. They will be at blows; they will draw steel.”

  “I must go,” Donal said in consternation, recalling his duties as his father’s master of ceremonies, official host at this occasion, but he glanced, troubled, at Dorilys. Darren said, with unusual friendliness, “I will look after Dorilys, Donal. Go and see to them.”

  “I thank you,” Donal said, hastily. Darren was sober, and he would have a vested interest in keeping his affianced wife from behaving too scandalously in public. He hurried toward the sound of the angry words, where the two youngest members of the rival families were engaged in a loud and angry dispute. Donal was skilled at such tactics. He came quickly up to them, and by joining in the dispute, convinced each of the quarreling men that he was on his side; then tactfully eased them apart. Old Lord Storn took charge of his quarrelsome son, and Donal took young Padreik Darriel into his own charge. It was some time before the young man sobered, apologized, and sought out his kinsmen to take his leave; then Donal looked around the ballroom for his sister and Darren. But he could see no sign of them, and wondered if Darren had managed to persuade his sister to leave the dance floor and go to her nurse.

  If he has influence over Dorilys, perhaps we should even be grateful for that. Some of the Aldarans have the commanding voice; Father had it when he was younger. Has Darren managed to use it on Dorilys?

  His eyes sought for Darren, without success, and he began to feel a vague sense of foreboding. As if to emphasize his fears, he heard a faint, distant roll of thunder. Donal could never hear thunder without thinking of Dorilys. He told himself not to be ridiculous; this was the season for storms in these mountains. Nevertheless, he was afraid. Where was Dorilys?

  As soon as Donal had hurried away toward the quarreling guests, Darren laid his hand under Dorilys’s arm. He said, “Your cheeks are flushed, damisela; is it the heat of the ballroom, with so many people, or have you danced to weariness?”

  “No,” Dorilys said, raising her hands to her hot face, “but Donal thinks I have drunk too much wine and came to scold me. As if I were a little girl still in his care, he wanted me to be put to bed like a child!”

  “It does not seem to me that you are a child,” Darren said, smiling, and she moved closer to him.

  “I knew you would agree with me!” />
  Darren thought, Why did they tell me she was a little girl? He looked up and down the slender body, emphasized by the long close-fitting gown. No child this! And still they think to put me off! Does that old goat of an uncle of mine think to play for time in the hopes of making a more advantageous marriage, or give himself time to declare the bastard of Rockraven his heir?

  “Truly, it is hot here,” Dorilys said, moving still closer to Darren, her fingers warm and sweaty on his arm, and he smiled down at her.

  “Come, then. Let us go out on the balcony where it is cooler,” Darren urged, drawing her toward one of the curtained doors.

  Dorilys hesitated, for she had been carefully brought up by Margali and knew it was not considered proper for a young woman to leave a dancing floor except with a kinsman. But she thought, defensively, Darren is my cousin, and also my promised husband,

  Dorilys felt the cool air from the mountains towering over Castle Aldaran, and drew a long sigh, leaning against the balcony rail.

  “Oh, it was so hot in there. Thank you, Darren. I am glad to be out of that crowded place. You are kind to me,” she said, so ingenuously that Darren, frowning, looked at the young woman in surprise.

  How childish she was for a girl so obviously adult! He wondered, fleetingly, if the girl were feeble-minded or even an idiot. What did it matter, though? She was heir to the Domain of Aldaran, and it only remained for Darren to engage her affections, so that she would protest if her kinsmen sought for some reason to deprive him of his due by breaking off the marriage. The sooner it took place, the better; if was disgraceful, that his uncle wanted him to wait four years! The girl was obviously marriageable now, and the insistence on delay seemed to him completely unreasonable.

  And if she were so childish, his task would be all the easier! He pressed the hand she laid trustingly in his and said, “No man living would hesitate an instant to do such a kindness, Dorilys—to maneuver for a moment alone with his promised bride! And when she is as lovely as you, even the kindness becomes more of a pleasure than a duty.”