“Now that there is a Kordean-Confederation Liaison Office, I realized that a place existed where I could take my concerns,” that greenhood said. “Up until then there had been nowhere to go, except maybe the Trahea Port offices, but the workers there are more interested in dealing with space ship traffic than in mysteries.”
“Obviously never getting the Liaison Office going was a foolhardy mistake by the Confederation Bureaucracy,” Coryn commented. “The funding for it had been allocated ages ago—at the time when the permission to establish the Trahea Port had been obtained from the City Authorities. But there had been foot-dragging; the impression I got when I started asking questions, was that the money had been turned into a slush fund to be spent elsewhere. It was rather a pleasure to turn that fruit cart upside down.”
The grin accompanying the words was wicked. Sarah, who had spent some time at the Liaison Office, and the Official Residence of the Liaison Officer, held back a gasp. She had found Coryn’s new domain impressive: the Office was spacious, with several staff working under the Chief Officer, and the Official Residence was roomy enough to accommodate large receptions, and a number of houseguests at the same time. There were servants at the Residence, only a couple at present, but apparently more could be hired at any time when the occasion warranted it. Whatever bureaucratic fool had been siphoning off the funds must have been furious with Coryn and The Agency!
“But that’s neither here nor there,” Coryn continued. “Witch Clarisse, would you mind telling the women in this room what you told me?”
“One of the reasons why I’m here,” Witch Clarisse replied curtly.
She seemed to be a considerably less rigid person than Witch Marlyss was. She looked at the women around her for a moment, and then began to speak:
“Marlyss and Karina have at least some familiarity with this story, but, very likely, it’s new to Dian, and certainly to Sarah.
“Decades ago, a Circle Witch went renegade. She was a very talented woman; her abilities at channelling Stone power were said to be phenomenal. However, she had been relegated to a position in one of the lesser Circles, the Circle of the Six—my Circle—because her personality was deemed unreliable. What exactly the problem was is not entirely clear, although she, apparently, believed that it was nothing except jealousy on the part of the other Witches of the time. As a young Apprentice, I remember asking one of the older Circle members about that, on hearing the story. She simply told me that the woman’s belief that everyone was jealous of her said as much about her character as anyone needed to know, and left it at that.
“On a trip to Trahea City—we Witches do travel at times, although not all that much—the lady in question met a Terran man with whom she fell in love. She insisted on consummating the relationship, and was tossed out of her Circle when she tried to combine her greenhood duties with a spousal relationship with the man who had no interest in relocating to a rural setting which is where all of the Circle Strongholds are. The man took her off-planet, and as far as anyone knew they lived happily ever after.”
Her tone was wry as she spoke the last sentence.
“Are you telling us that a Circle Witch formed a liaison with a Terran man?” Dian asked, sounding puzzled. “I thought that was never allowed.”
“Never is a long time,” muttered Marlyss darkly. “It’s certainly not encouraged.”
“It’s definitely discouraged,” Clarisse agreed. “Divided loyalties, and so forth. But I suppose it might be tolerated if the man in question was willing to put the Witch-wife’s career ahead of his own, and move to a rustic setting. Which is an awful lot to ask of a Terran man, never mind the fact that he’d have to play the supporting role for the rest of his life.”
“There may be Terran men who might be willing to do that,” Coryn said. “But I doubt very much that any such would ever find themselves on Kordea. A person has to be a self-starter to come this far from the centre of the Confederation, and self-starters tend to be egotistical sorts.”
Dian nodded thoughtfully.
“That’s why we’re always told to look for a lover from among the landed gentry,” she said. “Such men enjoy lounging around, doing nothing, while their women are busy, and the servants do the housework. And here I had always thought that we were being encouraged to be ridiculously elitist.”
Clarisse laughed.
“They are also annoying asses, those sons of the gentry,” she commented. “To be perfectly honest, I have some sympathy for this Witch Anya who went renegade, having satisfied my need for a man, on occasion, by taking to my bed one of those jokers. Being a Circle Witch is easier if you have a low sex drive, or prefer women.”
“You people need the professional services of the alyens of the Confederation,” Coryn laughed. “You’d get served properly, with no strings attached.”
“Hey, I’ll buy if you’re offering, Coryn Leigh,” Clarisse responded immediately. “I hear you were something of a star at that job.”
Coryn shook his head.
“That’s the past for me, now,” he said. “I’ve plenty enough to do, these days, without those kinds of complications.”
“If we can return the conversation to the point,” Marlyss said sharply, “perhaps someone can explain to me why the old, unpleasant, Witch Anya story has been brought up.”
“Certainly, Marlyss.” Clarisse immediately turned serious again. “It had occurred to me, when I was told about the incredibly talented Terran girl, and about these sinister people termed The Organization, whether one of them, or possibly even both, had a Kordean connection, through the renegade Anya. For a time I kept quiet about my thinking, assuming that the Witches in one or another of the larger Circles had already thought of such possibilities. The Twelve, of course, had acquired Sarah as a student, and, therefore, might well have been inquiring into the matter. Plus, of course, until Coryn Leigh arrived in Trahea, created the Liaison Office, and took on the role of the Chief Liaison Officer, there was no Confederation official on Kordea whom I could have approached.”
“The Port Officials would have done their best for you, if you had gone to them,” Coryn said, thinking of the woman who had been seduced into giving up her talented, half-Kordean daughter to The Organization. “They did try to step into the breach when they saw a need—probably they would have called me to come and listen to your story, since I was known to have an interest in Kordea, and the Witches’ Stones.”
“So what was your reaction to Clarisse’s ancient tale?” Marlyss asked him.
“I thought that it certainly needed to be looked into,” Coryn replied. “The preliminary investigation would not be difficult, if Clarisse could provide a DNA sample from a relative of this Witch Anya. I could easily enough get a sample from Sarah, since she likes to come and visit the Official Residence of the Liaison Officer occasionally, to get a rest from her studies.”
“And here I thought you were being kind, and looking out for me,” muttered Sarah. “Just doing your job, were you?”
“Looking out for you, and doing my job are not mutually exclusive concepts, Sarah,” Coryn said gently, giving her a long look with his disconcerting, blue eyes.
Sarah bit her lip. She was being childish, she knew; lately, it seemed, that she often turned prickly in the Agent’s presence. And he was so patient with her, and her little snits! Only, would it have been less annoying if he had scolded her for them?
“This is where Karina comes in,” Clarisse continued. “One of her apprentices has a pretty strong Anya connection. I knew I’d find somebody like that if I just kept asking around. A woman as gifted as Anya apparently was—is—whatever—would have female relatives talented enough to be trained at a Circle Stronghold.”
“Sashe is Anya’s great niece,” Karina explained. “Anya’s brother is her grandfather. She’s a talented Apprentice, and will certainly one day be a Circle Witch, assuming that she wants to be one, and not settle for the life of a Healer, or a Spiritual Advisor to some communi
ty. She’s young, several years younger than Sarah, here, or Dian, for that matter, so I’m afraid that I didn’t bother trying to explain to her what we were out to establish. Nevertheless, she’s a good girl, unlike her notorious relative, and she consented to provide a genetic sample without any arguments.”
“Eventually, she’ll have to be informed,” Coryn said crisply. “She has the right to know.”
“You say that because you found something through your Terran medical sampling?” asked Marlyss.
“Yes. I got the laboratory technicians at the Port Medical Facility to look at Sarah’s DNA first, and they came back with the info that she, indeed, does have a rather hefty dose of Kordean ancestry in her background. One of her four grandparents had to be Kordean, not Terran, they said.”
Sarah’s head reeled.
“That’s not possible,” she cried. “I was born on Earth, in the city of Laurentia! There were no Kordeans whatsoever there! My Mom’s a blond Earthwoman, and my Dad was—he was, my grandparents are of Scottish background, my Grandpa always said! He said that there were black-haired Celts in the family; that’s why my Dad, my brother, and I were all dark-haired and pale-skinned! It’s an old trait that came from the British Isles, he said. And my sister, Maris, is as blond as my Mom.”
“Maris doesn’t count, and you know it perfectly well,” Coryn chided her. “She’s—what—six years older than you are, four years older than your brother Cameron. Your mother had her before she met your father; your father adopted her when they married.”
Sarah felt nauseous. Her sense of self lay in tatters; she realized that, suddenly, she didn’t know who she was. And that damn Coryn Leigh was looking at her with an expression which said that he really wanted to gather her in his arms to comfort her, but knew better than to try a trick like that!
“I thought that you were my friend,” she found herself muttering.
She swallowed, and tried to deny exit to the tears that were filling her eyes.
“I am your friend,” Coryn said. “Never, ever doubt that.”
Marlyss produced a box of tissues from some drawer, and Dian stepped over to gather a handful, and to pass them to Sarah. She dabbed at her eyes and blew her nose, using the moment this gave her to employ a calming trick the Witches had taught her, to gain some self-control.
“So, who am I?” she then asked Coryn. “I suppose that you set out to find out?”
She was trying for a touch of humour, but knew that it was a feeble attempt.
But it seemed that Coryn appreciated it. He grinned at her.
“Yeah, you know that I always do my homework,” he answered. “I got the sample which Clarisse and Karina obtained, and put it through the test, first. And yes, the results were consistent with the possibility that this Sashe and you are second cousins.”
“Just ‘consistent with the possibility’?” Sarah’s brows were up. “Meaning?”
“That under the circumstances the result was pretty definitive. There’s always some doubt about the results of genetic tests; it’s a big galaxy out there, with lots of people in it with wildly differing DNA profiles. Oddities do exist, but usually they are easy enough to spot. When you know of a good reason why something might be showing up, you can assume that that is that, unless further investigations prove you wrong.
“So I left the Liaison Office in the hands of my second-in-command, and set out to hunt for facts.”
He paused, studying Sarah’s damp face for a moment.
“The official records, the ones available to the Confederation public gave me nothing. According to them, Peter Mackenzie, your father, was indeed the son of Jane and Carl Mackenzie. Your mother, also, is a known quantity, but my hunch was that she was not the one at issue here. I reached that conclusion as soon as I saw the record of Maris’ adoption by your father. The anomalous genetics seemed more likely to be coming from your father; from the pictures of him that I was able to access, he had the black hair combined with the pale skin. He even had the light-coloured Kordean eyes—steel-grey in his case—even though you, Sarah, have your mother’s brown eye-colour.”
Sarah nodded, pressing the damp tissues against her lips. She had been ten when her father and Cam had disappeared, in omega-space, supposedly. For whatever reason, she had never believed that explanation. She had wanted to accompany her father and brother on the trip that they had been invited to take, but her father had nixed her involvement.
“The invitation said that I was to bring my son and daughter,” he had complained. “As if the person doing the inviting wasn’t aware of the fact that I have two daughters. And since I have two daughters, and only one was invited, neither of them are going.”
“But you’re taking Cam,” Sarah had whined.
The invite had come from some anonymous client of the import-export company which Peter Mackenzie had worked for. There was supposed to be a gala on some resort world for the workers and their children, of the companies with whom the client had had dealings. For some reason Sarah’s mother had not been named on the invitation—obviously, as Peter Mackenzie had noted, the client had not known enough about the Mackenzies to realize that Cara would have been the one keenest to make the trip. Still, Sarah’s father had thought that he ought to go, and take his son, more to remain in good books with his employer than anything else.
“Somebody’s spending some big money on this celebration,” he had said. “I don’t know why they cared to invite me, but I suppose that if I refuse to show up at the Space Port with at least one of my children, my bosses won’t be happy with me. I mean, they’re paying me for the time.”
“I apologize if I’m bringing up sad memories,” Coryn said. “I don’t want to cause you pain, but I do believe that you need to be aware of all of this.”
Sarah nodded.
“It’s been what?—twelve, thirteen years since Dad and Cam disappeared,” she said. “I ought to be used to it by now. But, for some reason it still hurts, and mostly I try not to dwell on it.”
“Yeah, your mother, and your grandparents, all, said that you had never truly accepted the loss of your father and your brother.”
“You talked to them?” Sarah stared. “Did you go all the way to Earth, or did you vid-conference with them?”
Coryn smiled.
“I went to Earth. Like I said, I do my homework. As an Agent, I have discovered that there is no substitute for a face-to-face encounter with people when you’re trawling for information, especially for information that has been hidden for some reason, whether or not the reason is a good one. And when it comes to investigating anything to do with the amarto-angle, and possible Organization connections, those in charge of my travel accounts become very generous.”
“You talked to my mother? And my grandparents?”
Sarah could feel the tears threatening, once again. She had not seen her family since she had left from the Laurentia Space Port for the Space Station XER—how long ago had it been? And now she was stuck on Kordea, for her own safety, as Coryn was always reminding her, with no idea of when she could feel secure enough to go visit her relatives.
Coryn sighed, as he watched the play of emotions on Sarah’s face. He had known that this would not be easy for her, even as he had known that she needed to be told what secrets had been kept from her all her life. He also knew that he was starting to have some difficulty dealing with her in an objective fashion. He liked her a lot, this feisty young woman who had been through much before becoming a student at the Witch Stronghold of Ferhil Stones. Toeing the line that Witch Marlyss expected of the women under her had not been easy either, he knew, and now Sarah was faced with the fact that her true identity had been kept from her—for the best of motives, if perhaps not wisely—by some of the people closest to her.
“I talked to your mother, your sister, Maris, and your grandparents,” he said. “They all miss you, even Maris, with whom you never got on all that well, I gather. Did you know that she and her husband are expecting
a child; their daughter should be born pretty soon?”
“Yeah, Mom told me when I last spoke with her—that was the last time I visited your Official Residence.”
She had not asked to use the communications console at Ferhil Stones, although she was aware of its existence and location. The Witches seldom used it, and when they did, it was to get in touch with the Liaison Office. Kordeans did not use Terran communications systems very often—at least, not at the Witch Strongholds; the Witches had their own ways of communicating with one another, and everyone else depended on hand-delivered, or oral messages.
“How are Grandma and Grandpa? I haven’t talked to them for a long time—they’re not much for star-spanning, instant communications systems.”
“Good.” Coryn smiled. “Getting old, but they’re obviously of sturdy stock. Nice people; I liked them. And they must have found me agreeable, too, because I did get them to open up and talk, eventually.”
He leaned back in his chair, looking pleased.
“Not surprising,” sniffed Marlyss. “You’re rather accomplished at that, getting people to tell you things, that is. Even I have been known to let information slip to you on occasion.”
The grin Coryn directed at her was disarming.
“Yeah, it’s one of my strengths. Honed in the opulent boudoirs of Space Station RES. Very useful when you’re trying to keep on top of whatever The Organization strongmen may be up to.”
“Is there an Organization connection to this?” Clarisse asked. “If there is, it seems to me that we have to recognize that Anya was even more irresponsible than we knew, and perhaps behind the threat we Kordeans are now dealing with.”
“There is a definite sense in the information which I unearthed, that she did find herself mixed up with The Organization, whether inadvertently, or due to some foolish miscalculation on her part, that we don’t know.
“The gist of the story Jane and Carl Mackenzie told me, is that they had been a childless couple, living in Laurentia, and on a waiting list to officially adopt a child, any child which became available, when they had been approached by a black-haired woman seemingly in great distress, who had been hauling a baby with her. She had said that she got their name from the city adoption agency with which they had dealt, and knew that they were far down on the list of potential adoptive parents. She had recently given birth—the boy she had displayed was only a week old. Jane said that she did not doubt the woman’s story; she had looked postpartum—Jane had been working at a clinic at the time and understood about such things. Indeed, the woman had breast-fed the child in Jane and Carl’s presence. She had said that her child was in great danger, and to save his life she had to give him away, and he had to be hidden. The people who were after her ought not to know that she had borne a live child—the whole thing was horribly distressing, but to save her child she had to give him away and pretend that she had experienced a stillbirth. Would the Mackenzies take him, and raise him as their own, record him as having been born to them? She would put them in touch with a midwife living not too far from them, in whom she had confided, and who would record the child’s arrival as a home delivery, the parents being Jane and Carl Mackenzie.
Love and Intrigue Under the Seven Moons of Kordea Page 2