Darkover: First Contact

by Marion Zimmer Bradley

  Bard was infuriated by her quiet, indifferent acceptance, yet he realized he would have been equally angry if she had protested her distaste or dislike. He was ready to fling her out of his bed with a curse and a blow and bid her be gone from here. But he sensed that whatever he did she would accept with the same shrug of indifference, in order to infuriate him further. Damn the woman, one would think he had done her harm, instead of giving her a son of noble blood and a regular place as barragana in this great household!

  And, since he could not have Carlina in his bed, one woman was very much like any other when the lamp was out.

  “Come here, then,” he said brutally, “and be quiet. I don’t like women who make a lot of noise, and I don’t want to hear any more of your impudent chatter.”

  She looked up at him, smiling, as he seized her. “Why, just as you like, my lord. All the gods forbid you must endure anything to displease you.”

  She said nothing more. If she had, Bard thought in dull rage, he would have hit her and tried to see whether that drove the damned smile from her face.

  CHAPTER TWO

  He wakened to a great clamor, and sat up, instantly awake. He had slept at too many battle posts not to know what that noise was. Melisendra sat up beside him.

  “Are we under attack?”

  “It sounds like it. How in hell’s name should I know?” Bard was already out of bed, flinging on his clothes. She slid a long robe over her bedgown and said, “I must go to my lady and see the women and children safe. Let me help you with your boots,” she added, and Bard wondered how she knew that he grudged the time to summon his body servant. “And here are your sword and cloak.”

  He hastened toward the stairs, flinging back over his shoulder, “See that the boy is safe!” He was vaguely surprised at himself; with a castle under attack it was no time to worry about women and children.

  He found his father in the Great Hall, hastily dressed.

  “Are we under attack?”

  “No; a swift strike, they have come and gone in the villages, taking horses we could ill spare, and some sacks of grain. The noise was the villagers, riding in to tell us, and my guardsmen arming to chase them, perhaps to get the horses back. . . .”

  “Geremy’s men?”

  “No, they would have struck at Great House, not villages. The men of Serrais, I think, swarming over our borders, taking advantage of anarchy to lead Dryland scum against us. . . . The land is overrun with them. I wish they would go and harry Geremy in Castle Asturias!”

  Gwynn entered and Dom Rafael turned irritably toward the old coridom. “What now?”

  “A king’s messenger, my lord.”

  Dom Rafael scowled and demanded testily, “Where is there a king in this land to send a messenger?”

  “Your pardon, my lord. I should have said a messenger from Dom Geremy Hastur. He arrived in the midst of all this confusion, while your men were saddling to ride after the bandits—”

  “I should have ridden with them,” Bard said, and his father shook his head.

  “No doubt that is what they wished, that you waste your strength on bandits and random strikes!” He turned to Gwynn and said, “I will receive Geremy’s man. Tell Lady Jerana to send a leronis to set truthspell in the hall. I will hear no Hastur lackey without that. Bard, will you attend me?”

  By the time Geremy’s envoy came into the Great Hall, bearing truce flag and the banner of the Hasturs of Carcosa, the silver fir tree on blue, differenced with the blazing candles, Bard had breakfasted hastily on a bowl of nut porridge from the kitchens, washed down with a cup of sour beer, washed the sleep from his eyes, and dressed himself in his father’s colors, blue and silver for di Asturien. Dom Rafael was seated in a carven chair on the dais, two steps behind him, in the paxman’s place, Bard stood with his hand just resting on the hilt of his sword. Melisendra, also in the di Asturien silver and blue—and how, Bard wondered, had the Hasturs and di Asturiens come to have the same household colors?—was seated on a low stool, bending over her starstone that spread the blue haze of truthspell over the chamber. The envoy paused in the doorway, displeased.

  “My Lord, that is not necessary.”

  “In my hall,” said Dom Rafael, “I judge what is necessary unless I greet my own overlord; and I do not recognize any son of Hastur as my overlord, or his messenger as the voice of my lawful king. State your business under truthspell, or forbear to speak it at all and take yourself out of my hall again.”

  The envoy was too well trained to his work to shrug, but somehow he gave the impression of having done so.

  “Be it so, vai dom. Since I speak no falsehood, truthspell says more of the customs of your hall than the message of my master. Hear, then, the word of the high lord Geremy Hastur, Warden of di Asturien and Regent of Asturias, holding this land for the rightful lord, King Carolin of Carcosa. . . .”

  Dom Rafael interrupted, softly but audibly, “What is the leronis about? I thought truthspell was set in this room so that no falsehood could be spoken here, yet I hear a claim—”

  Bard knew Dom Rafael had said this only to annoy; truthspell dealt with facts and intentions, not with disputed claims, and of course the messenger knew it too, and disregarded the interruption. His stance altered, and Bard knew he looked upon a Voice, or professional messenger-mimic, whose business was to speak a message in the very words and inflection exactly as it had been given. Any messenger could repeat his message verbatim; but the art of repeating them in the very voice of the speaker, and taking back any message in the very same tone, so that the recipient could judge for himself every subtlety, irony or innuendo, was a rare and special skill.

  “To my kinsman and the old friend of my father, Dom Rafael of Asturias,” the Voice began, and Bard shivered; it was uncanny. The Voice was a smallish fat man with gingery whiskers and nondescript livery, but through a trick of voice or glamour, it seemed that Geremy Hastur himself stood before them, a bent man, one shoulder higher than the other, one leg posed to take less weight, leaning on some kind of support. And Bard felt a cold grue running over him as he saw what the boyish quarrel had made of the embittered man before him. . . .

  No. This was a trick, a trained Voice, a mimic, a special kind of servant; the real Geremy was far away.

  “Kinsman, your claim and mine to the throne of Asturias may be disputed later; at the moment all of Asturias is under siege from the people of Serrais, who see the throne of Asturias under dispute and think this land a game bird flying free for any hawk to seize. Whatever the merits of your claim or mine, I ask truce, to drive these outsiders of Serrais from our borders; and after that, you and I may sit down as kinsmen and discuss who shall rule this land and how. I ask you to make common cause with me for the moment, as the greatest of the generals who served under my cousin Ardrin in the years past. I pledge the word of a Hastur that while the truce endures, your son Alaric, who dwells as a kinsman in my house, shall be safeguarded against the war; and when the invaders are driven forth, I pledge to meet with you myself, each of us unarmed and with no more than four paxmen, to discuss the fate of this land and the return of Alaric to his father’s care.”

  And after a few seconds, the Voice added, now in his own voice, “And this is all of the message which the lord Geremy Hastur has sent to you at this time; except that he asks that you come as quickly as you can.”

  Dom Rafael sat scowling at the floor. It was Bard who asked, “How many of the invaders have crossed the borders of Asturias?”

  “Sir, they are an army.”

  Dom Rafael said, “It seems we have no choice; otherwise these Serrais will fall upon us one by one, and pick us off at leisure. Say to my kinsman that I will join him, with all the able-bodied men I can raise, and as many leroni as I can bring, as soon as I have made certain of the defense of my own house and of my lady and my grandson; and you may tell him that I have said this under truthspell.”

  The Voice bowed and there were a few more formal speeches. Then the Voice
withdrew, and Dom Rafael turned to Bard.

  “Well, my son? I have heard of your renown in war, and look, here is one waiting for you as soon as you come home to Asturias!”

  “I would rather fight against Geremy himself,” Bard said, “but the throne of Asturias must be made secure before anyone can sit upon it! If Geremy thinks that our help will strengthen his claim to the throne, it will be for us to show him he is deluded when that time comes. When do we ride forth?”

  All that day the beacon fires burned, summoning all men who owed service to Asturias, which meant every able-bodied man who could ride against invasion. As they rode out, more and more men joined them, noblemen in armor of metal-reinforced leather, bearing sword and shield and ahorse; bowmen afoot with arrows and fire arrows and long pikes, farmers and peasants riding donkeys and horned pack beasts, carrying ancient spears, maces studded with deadly spikes, even cudgels and pitchforks.

  Bard rode with his father’s paxmen, and near them rode a small group of men and women, unarmed, wearing long gray cloaks and hoods which hid their faces; the leroni who would fight alongside the warriors. Bard realized that all during his absence his father must have been recruiting and training these men, and suddenly he shivered a little. How long had his father been hatching this rebellion, like some monstrous egg sheltered in his mind? Had he wanted the crown for Alaric, so long ago?

  Well, he, Bard, was better suited for war than governing; he would rather be the king’s man than the king, and if the king was one day to be his well-loved brother, there was a good life before him. He began to whistle, and rode on, cheerful.

  But an hour or so later he had a shock, for among the leroni he had recognized, even under the hood, the form and face of Melisendra.

  “Father,” he demanded, “why does the mother of my son ride with the armies? She is no camp follower!”

  “No, she is the most skilled leronis in our service.”

  “Somehow, from what you said, I thought Lady Jerana blamed me for spoiling her for that service—”

  “Oh, she is useless for the Sight,” Dom Rafael said. “We have a maiden youth for that, not twelve years old. But for all else, Melisendra is highly skilled. I had thought of taking her for my own barragana, at one time, because Jerana is fond of her, and as you will know when you are wedded, it is useless to take a concubine who is detestable to your lawful wife. But—” he shrugged, “Jerana wished to keep her virgin for the Sight, and so I let her be; and you know what happened. I would rather have a grandson anyway. And since Melisendra has proved herself fertile to you, perhaps you should take her to wife.”

  Bard frowned with revulsion. He said, “I remind you, sir, that I have already a wife; I shall take no other woman while Carlina lives.”

  “You may certainly take Carlina for wife if you can find her,” Dom Rafael said, “but she has not been at court since her father’s death. She fled the court even before Queen Ariel took Valentine to her kinsfolk at Valeron.”

  Bard wondered if she had left court to avoid marriage to Geremy. He would certainly have seen this marriage as the best road to claim Ardrin’s throne. Was she waiting for him, somewhere, to come and claim her?

  “Where is Carlina, then?”

  “I know no more than you, my son. For all I know, she is within a Tower somewhere, learning the ways of a leronis, or even—” Dom Rafael raised his eyes to the newest group of fighters who had joined their army on the road, “she may have cropped her hair and taken the vows of the Sisterhood of the Sword.”

  “Never!” said Bard, with a shudder of dismay, looking at the women in their scarlet cloaks. Women with their hair cropped shorter than a monk’s, women without grace or beauty, women who wore the Renunciate’s dagger, not in their boots as men did, but strapped across their breasts, in token that a man who laid a hand upon them would die, and that the woman herself would die before surrendering herself as a prize of war. Under their cloaks they wore the odd garb of their sworn sisterhood, breeches and long laced jerkins to their knees, low boots tied around their ankles; their ears were pierced like those of bandits, long hoops dangling from the left earlobe.

  “I wonder, my Father, that you will have these—these bitches with us.”

  “But,” said Dom Rafael, “they are fighters of great skill, pledged to die rather than fall to an enemy; not one has ever been taken prisoner, or betrayed her oath of service.”

  “And you mean to tell me that they live without men? I do not believe it,” Bard jeered. “And what do the men think, riding with women who are not camp followers?”

  “They treat them with the same respect as the leroni,” said Dom Rafael.

  “Respect? For women in breeches, with their ears holed? I would treat them as all such women deserve who give up the decencies of their sex!”

  “I would not advise it,” Dom Rafael said, “for I have heard that if one of them is raped, and does not kill herself or her ravisher, her sisters hunt her down and kill them both. As far as any man can say, they are as chaste as the priestesses of Avarra; but no one knows for certain what goes on among them. It may simply be that they are very adept at the art of secret whoring. And they are, as I say, skilled fighters.”

  Bard could not imagine Carlina among them. He rode on, silent and moody, until they called him, in midafternoon, to examine the weapons of a band of young farmers who had joined them. One bore an heirloom sword, but the others had axes, pikes which looked as if they had been handed down for generations, pitchforks and cudgels.

  “Can you ride?” he asked the man with the sword. “If so you may join my horsemen.”

  The young peasant shook his head. “Nay, vai dom, not even a plowing beast,” he confessed in his rude dialect. “The sword belonged to my great-grandsire, who bore it a hundred years gone at Firetop. I can fight wi’ it, a wee bit, but e’en so, I better stay wi’ my brethren.”

  Bard nodded in agreement. Weapons did not make a soldier.

  “As you wish, man, and good fortune to you. You and your brothers may join those men there. They speak your tongue.”

  “Aye, they my neighbors, vai dom,” he said, then asked shyly, “Are ye no’ the high lord’s son, the one they call the Wolf, dom?”

  Bard said, “I have been called so.”

  “What be ye doin’ here, dom? I heard ye were outlawed, in foreign parts—”

  Bard chuckled. “He who made me outlaw has gone to explain it in hell. Are you going to try to kill me for the head-prize, man?”

  “Nay, no such thing,” said the young peasant, his eyes round in dismay. “Not to the high lord’s son. Only, with you to lead us, we canna’ do other than win, dom Wolf.”

  Bard said, “May all the Serrais foxes and wild men think so, man,” and watched as the peasants joined their own group. His eyes were thoughtful as he rode forward to join his father. Here and there he heard a snatch of conversation: the Wolf, the Kilghard Wolf has come to lead us. Well, perhaps it would serve them well.

  When he joined his father, Dom Rafael gestured at the youngest of the leroni, a fresh-faced freckled boy, his hair blazing under the gray hood; he was only twelve or so. “Rory has seen something, Bard. Tell my son what you have seen, lad.”

  “Beyond the wood, Dom Wolf—Dom Bard,” he amended quickly, “a party of men coming to ambush us.”

  Bard’s eyes narrowed. “You saw this. With the Sight?”

  The laranzu said, “I could not see so well, riding, as in the crystal, or in a pool of clear water. But they are there.”

  “How many? Where? How are they drawn up?” He fired questions at the boy. Rory got down from his pony, and taking up a twig, began to draw a pattern in the dust.

  “Four, maybe five dozen men. About ten mounted, like this—” He sketched a line at an angle to the rest. “Some of the rest have bows. . . .”

  Melisendra bent over the boy and said, “Are there leroni with them?”

  “I think not, domna. It is hard to see. . . .”

 
Bard looked quickly around at the great body of men straggling along behind them. Damn! He had not thought it necessary, yet, to form them up; but if they were taken on the flank this way, even a few men could do dreadful damage! Even before he thought seriously about the ambush, he snapped, “Rory, see this! Are there men following us?”

  The boy squinted his eyes and said, “No Dom Wolf, the road is clear behind us all the way to Dom Rafael’s stronghold and as far as the borders of Marenji.”

  That meant that the invading army from Serrais was somewhere between them and Castle Asturias. Would they have to fight their way through it, and find the castle under siege? Perhaps the invaders could wear out Geremy Hastur before they ever got there. No, that was no way to talk about an ally under truce. And meanwhile there was an ambush waiting for his army. A laughably small one, intended—he was sure—only to delay them awhile, so they would halt to tend their wounded, not arrive at the castle till after nightfall, or perhaps the next day. Which would mean an attack was planned for that night. An army of this size could not escape observation; if they had sentry birds or leroni with the Sight, the army of Serrais must surely know that they were on the way, and have some special interest in keeping them away for another day.

  He said something of this to his father, and Dom Rafael nodded in agreement. “But what shall we do?”

  “A pity we cannot get around them somewhere,” Bard said, “and leave the men of this ambush to watch here like a cat at an empty mousehole. But we cannot take an army this size past this wood unseen. Rory says there is no leronis with them, but that does not mean there is no leronis in rapport with one of their leaders, seeing through his eyes. So we cannot attack them without also alerting the main army of Serrais.” He considered for a time. “And if we do so, even though we annihilate them quickly—four dozen men cannot stand against all our army—it would give time for leronis or sentry bird to spy out our numbers and how we are positioned and weaponed. But what a leronis does not witness she cannot report. I think the main army must go past the wood where the ambushers will not see them. Father, give some man your cloak and let him ride your horse, and send him with me, with your banner, while you take the main army around the wood. Meanwhile, give me—” he paused to consider, “ten or twelve picked horsemen, and a dozen swordsmen with tall shields; and a couple of dozen bowmen. We will go the main path; and if we are fortunate, the watchers in rapport with the ambush will think that is all we have to lift the siege of Castle Asturias. Take all the leroni with you, and when you are past this wood, sit down with them and their sentry birds, and let them tell us what manner of army Serrais has sent against us this time.”