"Bob made me take it," she said. "He said I was Keeper, only I could handle it without hurting you. He said you'd die otherwise. So I took it. Lew, only to save you. I swear it‑"
"I know. If anyone but a Keeper had kept it long, I would certainly have died." Not that I credited Kadarin with that much kindness for my well‑being. He probably knew what too much handling of someone else's keyed matrix would do to him.
"Where is the Sharra matrix?"
"Thyra has it, I think," she said doubtfully. 'Tin not sure.**
"How did you get in here, Marjorie? Are there guards watching me?"
She nodded slowly. "All the guards know me," she said at last "Most of them were my father's friends and have known me since they held me on their knees. They trust me ... and I brought them drugged wine. I'm ashamed of that, Lew, but what else could I do? But we must get away at once, as quickly as we can. When they wake up they will know, and tell Beltran . . ." Her voice failed.
"He should thank you for saving the small remnant of his honor," I said grimly. Then I realized she had said "we."
"You will come with me?"
"I must, I dare not stay after what I have done. Lew, don't you want me? Do you think I had any part in ... oh
I held her tight. "Can you doubt it? But in these mountains, at this season‑"
"I was born in these mountains; I've traveled in worse weather than this."
"We must be gone, then, before the guards wake. What did you give them?"
She told me and I shook my head. "No good. They'll wake within the hour. But maybe I can do better now." I touched the matrix. "Let's go." Hastily I gathered my things together. She had dressed warmly, I saw, heavy boots, a long riding‑skirt. I looked out the windows. It was nightfall, but by some god's mercy it was not snowing.
In the dim hallway two figures sprawled in sodden, snoring sleep. I bent and listened to their breathing. Marjorie gasped, "Don't kill them, Lew. They've done you no harm!"
I wasn't so sure. My ribs still ached from the weight of somebody's boots. "I can do better than killing them," I said, cradling the matrix between my palms. Swiftly, incisively, I drew into the minds of the drugged men. Sleep, I commanded, sleep long and well, sleep till the rising sun wakes you. Marjorie never came here, you drank no wine, drugged or wholesome.
The poor devils would have to answer to Beltran for sleeping at their post. But I'd done what I could.
I tiptoed down the corridor, Marjorie hugging the wall behind me. Outside the great guest suite were two more drugged guards; Marjorie had been thorough. I stooped over them, sent them, too, more deeply into their dreams.
My hands are strong. I made shorter work of the bolts than Marjorie had done. Briefly I wondered at the kind of hospitality that puts a bolt on the outside of a guest room door for any contingency. As I stepped inside, Danilo quickly stepped between me and Regis. Then he recognized me and fell back.
Regis said, "I thought they'd killed you‑" His eyes fell on my face. "It looks as if they'd tried! How did you get out?"
"Never mind," I said. "Get on your riding‑things, unless you love Aldaran's hospitality too well to leave it!"
Regis said, "They came and took away my sword, and Danilo's dagger." For some reason the loss of the dagger seemed to grieve him most. I had no time to wonder why. I went and hauled at the senseless guardsmen's sword‑belts, gave one to Regis, belted the other around my own waist. It was too long for me, but better than nothing. I gave the daggers to Marjorie and Danilo. "I have repaid my kinsman's theft," I said, "now let's get out of here."
"Where shall we go?"
I had made my decision swiftly, "I'll take Marjorie to Arilinn," I said. "You two just get away as fast and far as you can, before all hell breaks loose."
Regis nodded. "We'll take the straight road to Thendara, and get the word to Comyn."
Danilo said, "Shouldn't we all stay together?"
"No, Dani. One of us may get through if the others are recaptured, and the Comyn must be warned, whatever happens. There is an out‑of‑control, unmonitored matrix being used here. Tell them that, if I cannot!" Then I hesitated. "Regis, don't take the straight road! It's suicide! It's the first place they'll look!"
"Then maybe I can draw pursuit away from you," he said. "Anyway, it's you and Marjorie they'll be after. Danilo and I are nothing to them."
I wasn't so sure. Then I saw what I could not mistake. I said, "No. We cannot separate while I send you on the route of danger. You are ill." Threshold sickness, I finally realized. "I cannot send the heir to Hastur into such danger!"
"Lew, we must separate." He looked straight up into my eyes. "Someone must get through to warn the Comyn."
What he said was true and I knew it. "Can you endure the journey?" I asked.
Danilo said, "I'll look after him, and anyway he's better off on the road than in Beltran's hands, especially once you've escaped." This was true also and I knew it. Danilo was quickly separating the contents of Regis' saddlebags, discarding nearly everything. "We've got to travel light. There's food here from Regis' journey north ,.." He quickly divided it, rolling meat and fruit, hard bread, into two small parcels. He handed the larger one to me and said, "You'll be on the back roads, further away from villages."
I stuffed it into the inside pocket of my riding cloak and looked at Marjorie. "Can we get out unseen?"
"That's easy enough, word won't have reached the stables. We'll get horses, too."
Marjorie led us out a small side door near the stables. Most of the stablemen were sleeping; she roused one old man who knew her as Kermiac's ward. It was eccentric, perhaps, for her to set forth at nightfall with some of Beltran's honored guests, but it wasn't for an old horse‑keeper to question. Most of them had seen me with her and had heard the castle gossip that a marriage was being arranged. If he had
heard of the quarrel, this would have accounted for it in his mind, that Marjorie and I had run away to marry against Beltran's will. I'm sure this accounted for the looks of sympathy the old groom gave us. He found mounts for us all. I thought tardily of the escort from Comyn, who had come here with me.
I could order them to go with Regis and Danilo, protect them. But that would make a stir. Marjorie said softly, "If they don't know where you've gone, they cannot be made to tell," and that decided me.
If we rode hard till morning, and Beltran's guards slept as I had insured they would, we might be beyond pursuit. We led our horses toward the gates; the groom let us out. I lifted Marjorie to her saddle, readied myself to mount. She looked back with a faint sadness but, seeing me watching, she smiled bravely and turned her face to the road.
I turned to Regis, holding him for a moment in a kinsman's embrace. Would I ever see him again? I thought I had turned my back on Comyn, yet the tie was stronger than I knew. I had thought him a child, easily flattered, easily swayed. No. Less so than I was myself. I told myself firmly not to be morbid, and kissed him on the cheek, letting him go. "The Gods ride with you, bredu," I said, turning away. His hand clung to my arm for a moment, and in a split second I saw, for the last time, the frightened child I had taken into the fire‑lines; he remembered, too, but the very memory of conquered fear strengthened us both. Still, I could not forget that he had been placed in my charge. I said hesitantly, "I am not sure ... I do not like letting you take the road of most danger, Regis."
He gripped my forearms with both hands and looked straight into my eyes. He said fiercely, "Lew, you too are the heir to your Domain! And I have an heir, you don't! If it comes to that, better me than you!" I was shocked speechless by the words. Yet they were true. My father was old and ill, Marcus, so far as we knew, was without laran,
I was the last male Alton. And it had taken Regis to remind me!"
This was a man, a Hastur. I bowed my head in acquiescence, knowing we stood at that moment before something older, more powerful than either of us. Regis drew a long breath, let go of my hands, and said, "We'll meet in Then‑dara, if th
e Gods will it, cousin."
I knew my voice was shaking. I said, 'Take care of him, Dani."
He answered, "With my life, Dom Lewis," as they swung into their saddles. Without a backward glance, Regis rode away down the path, Danilo a pace behind him.
I mounted, taking the opposite fork of the road, Marjorie at my side. I thanked all the gods I had ever heard of, and all the rest I hadn't, for the time I had spent with maps on my northward journey. It was a long way to Arilinn, through some of the worst country on Darkover, and I wondered If Marjorie could endure it.
Overhead two of the moons swung, violet‑blue, green‑blue, shedding soft light on the snow‑clad hills. We rode for hours in that soft night light. I was wholly aware of Marjorie: her grief and regret at leaving her childhood home, the desperation which had driven her to this. She must never regret it! I pledged my own life she should not regret.
The green face of Idriel sank behind the crest of the pass; above us was a bank of cold fog, stained blood color with the coming sunrise. We must begin to look somewhere for shelter; I was sure the hunt would be up soon after daylight. I was enough in contact with Marjorie to know when her weariness became almost unendurable. But when I spoke of it, she said, "Another mile or so. On the slope of the next hill, far back from the roadway, is a summer pasture. The herd‑women have probably taken their beasts down into the valleys, so it will be empty."
The herdwomen's hut was concealed within a grove of nut trees. As we drew near my heart sank, for I could hear the soft lowing of herd aminals, and as we dismounted I saw one of the women, barefoot in the melting snow, her hair long and tangled around her face, clad in a ragged leather skirt. Marjorie, however, seemed pleased.
"We're in luck, Lew. Her mother was one of my mother's people." She called softly, Mhari!"
The woman turned, her face lighting up. "Domna Mar‑guerida!" She spoke a dialect too ancient for me to follow; Marjorie answered her softly in the same patois. Mhari grinned widely and led us into the hut.
Most of the inside was taken up with a couple of dirty straw pallets on which an older woman lay, entangled with half a dozen small children and a few puppies. The only furniture was a wooden bench. Mhari gestured to us to sit on it,
and ladled us out bowls of hot, coarse, nut‑porridge. Marjorie almost collapsed on the bench; Mhari came to draw oS her ;i. riding‑boots.
"What did she say to you, Marjorie? What did you tell her?"
"The truth. That Kermiac was dead, that on, his deathbed v he had promised me to you, and that you and Beltran had quarreled, so we are going into the lowlands to marry. She has promised that neither she nor her friend, nor any of the children, will say a word of our being here." Marjorie took another spoonful of the porridge. She was almost too weary to lift her spoon to her mouth. I was glad to down my portion, to put aside my sword and haul off my boots and later, when the conglomeration of babies and puppies had vacated the mattress, to lie down there in my clothes beside Marjorie. "They should have gone, days ago," Marjorie said, "but Caillean's husband has not come for them. She says they'll be / out all day with the beasts and we can sleep safely here." And indeed, very shortly the clamoring crew of babies and puppies had been fed on the rest of the porridge and hustled outside. I drew Marjorie into the circle of my arm, then realized that in spite of the noise made by children and dogs she was already deeply asleep. The straw smelled of dogs and dirt, but I was too tired to be critical. Marjorie lying in the curve of my arm, I slept too.
The next thing I knew it was late evening, the room was full of puppies and children again, and we rose and ate big hot bowlfuls of vegetable soup that had been simmering over / the fire all day. Then it was time to pull on our boots and go. The women, from their vantage point high on the slopes, had seen no riders, so we were not pursued yet. Marjorie kissed Mhari and the smallest of the babies, and warned me not to offer them money. Mhari and her friend insisted that we take bags of nuts and a loaf or two of the hard‑baked bread, telling us they had too much to load on their pack animals on the way down into the valley for winter. I didn't believe a word of it, but we could not refuse.
The next two or three nights of travel were duplicates of that one. We were blessed with good weather and there was no sign of pursuit. We slept by day, concealed hi herd‑huts, but these were deserted. We had food enough, although we were almost always cold. Marjorie never complained, but I was desperately concerned about her. I could not imagine
any woman I had ever known enduring such a journey. When I said so to Marjorie, she laughed.
"I am no pampered lowland lady, Lew, I am used to hard weather, and I can travel whenever I must, even in dead winter. Thyra would be a better companion, perhaps, she is hardened to long journeys with Bob, in and out of season ..." She fell silent, and quickly turned her face away. I kept silent. I knew how close she bad been to her sister and how she felt about this parting. It was the first time she spoke of her life at Castle Aldaran. It was also the last.
On the fourth or fifth morning we had to ride far into daylight to find any shelter at all. We were now in the wildest part of the mountains, and the roads had dwindled away to mere trails. Marjorie was dropping with weariness; I had half resolved that for once we must find a sheltered place in the woods and sleep in the open, when suddenly, riding into a small clearing, we came on a deserted farmstead.
I wondered how anyone had ever managed to farm these bleak hills, but there were outbuildings and a small stone house, a yard which had once been fenced, a well with wooden piping still splashing water into a broken stone trough in the year‑all wholly deserted. I feared it had become the haunt of birds or bats, but when I forced the door open it was weathertight and almost clean.
The sun was high and warm. While I unsaddled Marjorie bad taken off her cloak and boots and was splashing her hands in the stone trough. She said, "I am past my first sleepiness, and I have not had my clothes off since we set out. I am going to wash; I think it will refresh me better than sleep." She was suiting action to words, pulling off her riding‑skirt and fur‑lined tunic, standing before me in her long heavy shift and petticoat. I came and joined her. The water was icy cold, coming straight down from a mountain spring above us, but it was marvelously refreshing. I marveled how Marjorie could stand barefoot in the last melting runnels of the last night's snowfall, but she seemed not as cold as I was. We sat in the growing warmth of the sun afterward, eating the last of the herdwomen's coarse bread. I found a tree in the yard where the former owners had fanned mushrooms, an intricate system of small wooden pipes directing water down the trunk. Most of the mushrooms were hard and woody, but I found a few small new ones high up, and we ate them at the end of our meal, savoring their sweet freshness.
She stretched a little, sleepily. "I would like to sleep here in the sun," she said. "I am beginning to feel like some night‑bird, never coming out into the light of day."
"But I am not hardened to your mountain weather," I said, "and we may have to sleep in the open, soon enough."
She made a mock‑serious face. "Poor Lew, are you cold? Yes, I suppose we must go inside to sleep." She gathered up our heavy outer clothes and carried them. She spread them out on an old, abandoned pallet in the farmhouse, wrinkling a fastidious nose at the musty smell. I said, "It is better than dog," and she giggled and sat down on the heap of clothing.
She had on a thick woolen shift, knee‑length and with long sleeves; I had seen her far more lightly clothed at Aldaran, but there was something about being here like this that roused an awareness that fear and weariness had almost smothered. AH during this trip she had slept within the circle of my arm, but innocently. Perhaps because I was still recovering from the effects of Kadarin's brutal beating. Now, all at once, I was aware again of her physical presence. She felt it‑we were lightly in rapport all the time now‑and turned her face a little away, color rising along her cheekbones. There was a hint of defiance as she said, "Just the same, I am going to take down my hair
and comb and braid it properly, before it gets tangled like Mhari's and I have to cut it off!" She raised her arms, pulled out the butterfly‑shaped clasp that held her braids pinned at the nape of her neck, and began to unravel the long plaits.
I felt the hot flush of embarrassment. In the lowlands a sister who was already a woman would not have done this even before a grown brother. I had not seen Linnell's hair loose like this since we were little children, although when we were small I had sometimes helped her comb it. Did customs really differ so much? I sat and watched her move the ivory comb slowly through her long copper hair; it was perfectly straight, only waved a little from the braiding, and very fine, and the sun, coming in cracks through the heavy wooden shutters, set it all ablaze with the glint of the precious metal. I said at last, hoarsely, "Don't tease me, Marjorie. I'm not sure I can bear it."
She did not look up. She only said softly, "Why should you? I am here."
I reached out and took the comb away from her, turning her face up to meet my eyes. "I cannot take you lightly, beloved. I would give you all honor and all ceremony."
"You cannot," she said, with the shadow of a small smile, "because I no longer ..." the words were coming slowly now, as if it were painful to speak them. "‑no longer acknowledge Beltran's right to give me in marriage. My foster‑father meant to give me to you. That is ceremony enough." Suddenly she spoke in a rush. "And I am not a Keeper now! I have renounced that, I will not keep myself separate from you, I will not, / will not!"
She was sobbing now. I flung the comb away and drew her into my arms, holding her to me with sudden violence.
"Keeper? No, no, never again," I whispered against her mouth. "Never, never again‑"
What can I say? We were together. And we were in love.
Afterward I braided her hair for her. It seemed almost as intimate as lying down together, my hands trembling as they touched the silken strands, as they had when I first touched her. We did not sleep for a long time.
The Heritage Of Hastur d-18 Page 36