City of Sorcery

by Marion Zimmer Bradley

  She spoke only briefly, saying she could hardly give an impersonal assessment of Darkover; it was her home world, and she had been fortunate enough to be allowed to remain. She did warn them about some of the difficulties they would encounter as women working here, and ended by inviting them to attend the meeting of the Bridge Society. She answered several questions about languages and dress from the young Intelligence workers; but when the women from Mapping and Exploring asked technical questions about the planet, she said pleasantly, “I’m sure Lieutenant Anders can tell you more about that than I. Anders is an expert in that field. Lexie—would you take over?”

  She felt, as Alexis came up from the back of the room, that she had done her duty. If Lexie still held any grudge against her, it was Lexie’s own problem, not hers. There would always be people who didn’t like you and that wasn’t always your fault.

  She left Lexie to answer the technical questions, and went down to the main cafeteria for something to eat.

  Every now and then she had a craving for foods she could find only in the Terran Zone. She was looking about for a seat, tray in hand, when a voice said behind her, “We don’t often see you here, Mag. You’re looking well. What brings you today?”

  “Cholayna asked me to talk to a group of her young recruits,” Magda answered, turning to face the Legate. “Hello, Peter, it’s nice to see you.”

  “If I’d known you were going to be here, I’d have asked you to stop by my office; I’m glad I ran into you.” Peter Haldane took her tray and led the way to an isolated table for two. Magda, about to protest, shrugged and held her peace. Whatever the Legate had to say to her, better he said it here, informally, than officially in his quarters.

  There was constraint in his voice as he asked, “And Jaelle—is she well?”

  “Oh yes, certainly.” After her own marriage to Peter had ended. Peter and Jaelle had been married, briefly and disastrously, for half a year. For a long time after that, Magda had not felt comfortable with Peter. She and Jaelle, after all, had chosen one another in a way that excluded Peter himself, and not many men could tolerate or understand that…

  But that had all been a long time ago. Peter now seemed her earliest friend, one who shared an otherwise irrecoverable childhood. Like herself, he had grown up with Darkovans before the Terran HQ had been built in Thendara. In the intervening years, she had come to feel that their early marriage had been because Peter had seemed the only person alive that she could talk to, and vice versa. Everybody else either of them knew was either Terran or Darkovan, defined by that difference.

  That had not, in the end, been enough to build a marriage on. Nevertheless, she felt they should manage to remain on good terms, despite the different directions their lives had taken.

  Peter, like herself, had suffered all the pains of divided loyalties. That would, she hoped, give him a greater understanding of the Terrans over whom he must now serve as Legate. He had always belonged in the career diplomatic service anyhow and never, really, in Intelligence; and Magda had known it before he had.

  Like Lexie, he was always competing with me, she thought, and since no one had ever accused Peter Haldane of having any trace of laran, she was shocked when his next words were, “You know Lieutenant Anders, don’t you, Mag?”

  “Certainly I do,” she said, abandoning her attempt to finish a dish of custard. “Why do you ask?”

  “I suppose Cholayna’s kept you up to date on the way she set us all by the ears here, with her plane going down?”

  She lifted her eyebrows at him. “Then it wasn’t your idea to have Cholayna call me in as a psi-tech for her?”

  His blank look was answer enough. “You? A psi-tech? It would never have occurred to me. I gather from that, then, that you know all about it?”

  “I know the plane went down and that she ended up here. Even with a mind-probe, that’s all I found out. Is there something more I should have known?”

  Peter answered with another question. “Then she hasn’t come to you with her latest wild idea?”

  “Peter, I’m the last person Lexie would have come to. She’s never liked me. I’ve hardly spoken to her, except that night Cholayna called me in. All I know is what I found out then.”

  “Well, in a word—Anders is convinced there’s a real city out there. She’s sure what she saw before the plane went down was not a hallucination, or a radar angel or mistaken ground signal, but a real city. Why not? Every developed planet in this galaxy has an installation which TI can, if necessary, conceal from radar and sky-spies. Why not this one?”

  Magda thought that over for a minute.

  “I can’t imagine it,” she said. “You know, and I know, the Darkovans have nothing like that.”

  “You mean, nothing like that as far as we know.”

  “No, I mean nothing like that! Peter, I’ve been working in a matrix circle now for six years. If there was anything like that in the Domains, believe me, I would know.”

  “What about outside the Domains?”

  “Your own satellite reports tell you, that’s impossible! Ask anyone in Comm or M-and-Ex.”

  He bit his lip. “Nothing, you mean, that can be detected. How do we know we can detect everything? The available technology on Cottman Four couldn’t handle it, no. But that means nothing. Unofficial sources from outside Empire Civil Service could have set up a base here for some reason—mining, perhaps, or—”

  “I can’t believe it, you’re talking Space Pirates!” Magda said, almost laughing.

  Predictably, he reacted with annoyance. “Must you always make fun of everything you didn’t think of?”

  “If I was making fun, Peter, it wasn’t of you,” she said, now completely serious. “It’s only—I can’t believe anything like that could have been set up there without being discovered by satellite, or space sensors; it’s hard to believe it could be done at all, though I suppose nothing’s impossible. Is that what Lexie believes?”

  “Yes. And she wants to mount an expedition to find it. I thought she might have come to you because you were working in Intelligence here, and because she knows your Free Amazons are the best mountain guides on the planet.”

  “As I said, Peter. I’m the last person she’d come to.”

  “But if she did—”

  “I’d tell her the idea’s completely mad. We have years of satellite observations to tell us there’s nothing— all right, nothing observable—outside the Domains. And I’ll bet there’s nothing, period. That area must have been uninhabitable since—well, I’m no expert on geology and crustal movement, but—certainly for a geological eon. Probably since the Hellers rose out of the sea bed. As for mounting any kind of expedition, the logistics of it would be all but impossible, even with all the resources of Terran Intelligence behind it. Jaelle could tell you better than I what the difficulties would be, but I know enough to know it’s impossible, and so do you.” They had, after all, been in the field together, traveling as Darkovans. “To begin with—you’d have to cross the Hellers, and when you get beyond Nevarsin, the country’s all but unknown. We have no operatives in Intelligence who know the trails or the languages. There are catmen tribes up there, and—and God knows what else. Banshees—perhaps nonhuman cultures—I don’t think it could be done, at all. Certainly I wouldn’t try it.”

  Peter looked skeptical. “If she should come to you, that’s what you’ll tell her?”

  “Believe me. Peter, she won’t. Anyhow, Anders isn’t Intelligence, she’s Mapping and Exploring.” Legally, Intelligence was responsible only to the Terran Empire Head Centre, while Mapping and Exploring was under the sole authority of the Legate of the planet. “She’d have to get your permission, not Cholayna’s. Even if you thought Cholayna would do something like that behind your back, Peter, she’d send one of her own operatives, not Lexie.”

  She did not know if Peter was convinced, but he had reason to know she had always told him the truth. She hoped he knew she always would. They exchanged a few
more commonplaces and parted in friendly fashion. But as Magda walked across the city to the Guild-house, she wondered if that was why Lexie had chosen to attend her lecture.

  A few days later, as Magda was leaving the HQ, Doria joined her at the Gates.

  “Are you going to the Guild-house? I will go with you. I have a message from my mother for Jaelle n’ha Melora.”

  “Let me take it for you,” Magda said, glancing at the sky. “It will save you a long walk in the rain.”

  Doria colored slightly. “I am sorry—Rafaella said I was to give it only to Jaelle herself.”

  Magda shrugged. There was a time when she and Rafaella had actually been friends, but she could never count on the other woman’s friendliness. She would become accustomed to thinking of her as friendly, even presume on it a little—then discover without warning that Rafi was behaving as if she disliked her. But since she genuinely respected and admired Rafaella, she accepted her as Jaelle’s friend, if not her own.

  The two women set off side by side, walking swiftly, the hoods of their capes drawn against the rain. “Are you staying much longer in the city, Margali?”

  “I hope not. There is really not much for me to do here. I know Jaelle would like to go back to work with Rafi, and Rafaella would like that too, but that would have to be her own decision.”

  They turned into the square where the Guild-house stood. Doria was about to ring the bell when the door opened and Keitha stormed down the steps, swearing aloud.

  “Keitha, what’s the matter?”

  “Doria? Oh—well—it’s not your fault, but when I see your mother again—”

  “What? What is the matter, Keitha?”

  “I leased a horse from Rafaella, since I have none of my own, and sometimes, when I am summoned to a confinement outside the City walls, I must have one. I wanted to make it a formal arrangement, but she said, no, she had a dozen ponies in the stable, eating their heads off, not getting enough exercise, and I was welcome to use one whenever I needed one to ride.”

  “And you are angry with her for that?”

  “No,” said Keitha, “but I asked her to lease me one formally, just so this wouldn’t happen! Now all her horses are gone, and I must hire one in the market or go afoot.”

  “Take mine,” Magda said, “you know which it is, Keitha, the black.” It had been a gift from Shaya’s father. “I won’t be wanting it tonight.”

  “Thank you, Oath-sister.” Keitha hurried back into the house, and Magda and Doria watched her run toward the back door leading to the courtyard and stables. Doria whistled in surprise.

  “What, all Rafaella’s horses gone? I can’t understand this! She must have had a—a large commission, unexpectedly, if she couldn’t leave a horse for Keitha! It was really very thoughtless of her not to warn Keitha before-hand.” Frowning, Doria went in search of Jaelle, while Magda went to hang her cloak, by now thoroughly soaked, on one of the drying racks in the kitchen.

  By the time she had dried the wet cloak and hood, the women were already coming into the dining room, so Magda stayed to help put bowls and mugs on the table. When everyone had been served, she slipped into her customary seat beside Jaelle.

  “Did Doria give you her message?”

  “Yes, but I cannot imagine what can be in her mind,” Jaelle said. She looked troubled. “It was the last thing I expected after all these years. We aren’t children anymore.”

  “What is wrong, Jaelle?” With her freemate so troubled, it was more than Magda could do to keep her resolve to stay entirely out of it.

  “The message was only a few words, not even written down: There is a letter for you in the old place. Magda, that goes back a long way—to when I was only a little girl, Kindra’s fosterling. Kindra used to take me with her on long trips, and Rafi and I wouldn’t see each other for long periods of time. So we used to have a secret, private letter drop at the old saddlemaker’s in the Street of the Four Winds.”

  Magda shrugged. “Why not? I suppose most children do that sort of thing at one time or another.”

  “Rafaella wasn’t a child, she was older than I—but, well, I thought it wonderful that an older girl would play games with me. Rafi and I have always been— close. You know that.”

  “Indeed I do,” Magda said. The sympathy she felt was very real. As a Terran child, isolated among Darkovans, she had always been an outsider.

  “But now we are not children, we are not even young girls, I am a grown woman with a child of my own, and Rafaella is older than you are! Why should she revert to this childish nonsense?”

  “Oh, Jaelle,” Magda said, “don’t worry so about it. Perhaps she wants to confide in you, or to assure herself that you are still close enough to her to do something silly and childish for her. A way of—re-establishing that old closeness. She doesn’t trust me not to come between you. ”

  “And that is silly and childish,” Jaelle said, still looking pale and troubled. “We’re not children, and does she truly think she can come between freemates? I am ashamed of her, Magda. She can hardly want me as a lover after all these years. But if she does not understand that I will always be her friend—then she is sillier than ever I thought her.”

  “Don’t worry,” Magda reassured her, “you’ll see, she simply has something she wants to tell you privately.”

  “But she ought to know I always respect her confidences,” Jaelle fretted. “I am really afraid she’s gotten herself into trouble of some sort—”

  Magda shrugged. “I wouldn’t think so. If she felt free to leave the city and take all her horses, leaving poor Keitha to borrow mine—”

  “What?”

  “Jaelle, didn’t you know?”

  “No, all day I have been recopying some old archives for Mother Lauria. The paper on which they are written is disintegrating, because the ink they used in those days was so acid. They are only about a hundred years old, but they are falling to pieces. And I’ve nothing else to do here. So I’ve been shut up all day in the library—”

  Briefly, Magda told the story.

  “It’s really not like Rafi to be so thoughtless. What can she be thinking of?” Jaelle’s smooth forehead drew into lines of puzzlement. “I think I should go at once to the saddlemaker’s, Magda.”

  “Tonight? You’re out of your mind,” Magda said. “Listen to the rain and wind out there!” It sounded like one of the summer gales which blow down through the pass from the Venza Mountains, striking Thendara with rain and high winds and sometimes, even in high summer, sleet or snow. Jaelle frowned, listening to the wind slamming the shutters against the windows.

  “Whatever it is, Rafi is out in it.” She pushed aside the untouched piece of nut-cake on her plate and went toward the hall. Magda followed.

  “You can’t go out alone in this weather on some hen-brained notion of Rafaella’s—”

  Jaelle turned and caught her arm. “Come with me, then. I have a feeling that this may mean trouble, Magda—more trouble than Rafaella being jealous or wanting to play girl’s games.”

  With a sigh of resignation, Magda nodded, and caught up the cloak she had so painstakingly dried. Camilla appeared in the hallway behind them.

  “Going out? In this weather? Are you both quite mad?”

  Jaelle told her what had happened. Her face was pale and drawn.

  “Camilla, come with us. You are Rafi’s friend too.”

  “As much as she will allow,” Camilla said. Sighing, she took down a battered old cape. “Let’s go.”

  Wind and rain slammed into the hall as the three women went out into the night.

  * * *

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  « ^ »

  The rain poured down as the three women walked swiftly toward the marketplace. Magda was angry at herself for having allowed the hostilities between them to go on for so long. Jaelle’s small triangular face was hidden under her hood, but it seemed to Magda that she could see pale anger there.

  Camilla strode beside them, gaunt
and silent, and the rain sloshed in puddles under their feet and flapped their capes around their faces. The marketplace was empty, pools of icy water making a miniature landscape of lakes and small rocky shores. Stalls, tightly locked and boarded, rose like islands over those shores.

  “She’s not here. The saddlemaker’s stall is closed,” Camilla said. “Come home, Jaelle, there’s nothing that can’t wait till tomorrow.”

  “I know where the saddlemaker lives.” Jaelle spun abruptly on her heel, heading toward a dark side street. Camilla and Magda exchanged a single despairing glance and followed her.

  Magda felt she would like to shake Rafaella until her teeth rattled. She was also angry at Jaelle, who was for catering to Rafaella by tearing off into the Old Town at this godforgotten hour.

  The wind was icy, even through their capes, striking hard down the back of her neck. Magda spared a thought for Keitha, riding outside the city. But Keitha would be warm inside a house, with a good fire they would build up for heating water. Magda had never had the slightest wish to be a Medic or even a Renunciate midwife, but at least tonight Keitha knew where she was going and why and what she was going to do when she got there. And that was more than the others knew.

  Jaelle stopped before a small weatherbeaten house, spoke briefly to someone who came to answer the bell, and after a time, a fattish old woman came to the door.

  “Why, it’s our little Jaelle, and all grown up, aren’t you? Yes, your partner left you a letter, and I brought it home here, afraid, I was, someone would put it away somewheres I couldn’t find it. Now, dear me, where’d I leave it?” The woman dug in several of her capacious pockets like an owl trimming her feathers, hunching herself and digging about. “Ah, here we are—no, that’s an order for Lady D’Amato’s saddle. This—ah, yes, here you are, chiya, won’t you come in, and your friends too, and have some sweet cakes and cider by my fireside, like you used to?”

  She held out a somewhat grimy fold of paper, sealed with a colored wafer.

  “No, I thank you, I must try and catch up with Rafi before she is too far out of the city,” Jaelle said, and turned away, her mouth set into a grim line. Magda could see her scanning the letter’s front, but it was too dark to see or read.