| |
––––––––
Some short fiction has the “feel” of longer stories, either in the expanse of landscape, intricacies of character, or—as in “Stormcrow” by Rosemary Edghill and Rebecca Fox—the span of time. Readers get a sense of Darkovan history unfolding, with glimpses of events and characters they know from other stories. These intersections and echoes evoke a larger world beyond the pages of the individual story. Astute readers will recognize a few of their favorite characters, including Ercan Waltrud from “Learning to Breathe Snow” (Gifts of Darkover).
Rosemary Edghill describes herself as the keeper of the Eddystone Light, corny as Kansas in August, normal as blueberry pie, and only a paper moon. She says she was found floating down the Amazon in a hatbox, and, because criminals are a cowardly and superstitious lot, she became a creature of the night (black, terrible). She began her professional career working as a time-traveling vampire killer and has never looked back. She’s also a New York Times Bestselling Writer and hangs out on Facebook a lot.
Rebecca (“Becky”) Fox started writing stories when she was seven years old and hasn’t stopped since. She lives in Lexington, Kentucky with three parrots, a chestnut mare, and a Jack Russell terrier who is not-so-secretly an evil canine genius, but no flamingos, pink or otherwise. In her other life, she’s a professional biologist with an interest in bird behavior.
––––––––
At the rim of the galaxy the suns are scattered and few. The races that once called them home have left those homes behind, finding either extinction or apotheosis. But their forsaken cradles remain, and one such is Cottman’s Star. Cottman’s Star is an aging red star attended by seven planets. All of them are barren of life save the fourth one. Its name, in the stellagraphy catalogues of the Empire, is Cottman IV.
Its inhabitants call it Darkover.
There are seven Domains on Darkover, seven Ruling Houses, seven Comyn lords: Elhalyn, Hastur, Ardais, Aillard, Alton, Ridenow, and Aldaran. During the Ages of Chaos, each Comyn lord ruled as an undisputed prince, but those days are long gone. Now the Comyn lords meet in the Council Hall at Thendara instead of on the battlefield; Stephen Elhalyn of Elhalyn rules six of the seven, and Istvan-Regis Hastur of Hastur, Warden of Hastur, Lord of Thendara and Carcosa, rules Stephen.
Long ago, each Comyn Line had a hereditary Gift, a laran uniquely its own. To Alton, the Gift of forcing rapport; to Aldaran, precognition. The Ardais were able to waken laran where it lay dormant, just as Aillard could rouse desire and fertility. To the Ridenow line came the twin Gifts of empathy and xenotelepathy, but the Hastur Gift was the greatest of them all, nameless, its secret passed from each Hastur lord to his successor. Once Elhalyn was no more than a sept of Hastur, but to the Elhalyn Line had been given the most terrifying Gift of all: the ability to see not one future, but every future that might be. Through that Gift, Elhalyn rose to become the Seventh Domain, the royal house of Darkover.
But Elhalyn’s Gift was double-edged. Those who bore it did not live long, nor did they leave many children behind them. For centuries, Elhalyn dwindled, and with it, the power and the influence of the royal line. Stephen Elhalyn, eighth of his name, was crowned without displaying the Elhalyn Gift, and everyone believed that the laran of the Elhalyn Line was truly lost.
They were wrong.
~o0o~
Cyrillon Elhalyn was a distant cousin of the king. He married where Stephen commanded—to Merelda Aillard—and they lived happily (if distantly) together, for Cyrillon came virgin to his marriage-bed, and gossip said that he remained so on the following morn.
And so, for many years, no child graced their marriage.
No one yet alive can say what brought Merelda to do what she did. The rumors said that she took a trusted companion and journeyed to the Yellow Forest, walking there beneath its branches, her head bent in prayer. What she prayed to, or whom, could not be known, but what is known is that soon after her return to her husband’s house, all could see that she grew great with child at last. Not once did her husband show even the smallest hint of surprise, and, when the child was born he acknowledged the boy as his true son.
And so Felix Javiar Hermes-Reuel Aillard y Elhalyn was born to a world that had not yet known the print of a Terran boot.
~o0o~
Felix was a small boy and slender, with rose-gold hair and eyes the unflinching amber of the mountain hawks. When he was barely beyond the care of his nurse, his mother died of one of the swift summer fevers, and less than a year later, his father joined his wife in death. Felix barely noticed—or to be absolutely accurate, they had both died so many times in his visions that when one of those visions came true, it had little effect on him. It was a rarity indeed for any of the Comyn to come into their birthright at such an early age, and his halting attempts to explain his visions, or to ask about what they meant, were ignored or misunderstood by the servants and family retainers to whom he brought them.
When Felix’s father was laid beside his mother on the shores of Hali, Istvan Hastur was among those who attended the ceremony. Afterward, he took Felix back to Castle Hastur with him. The castle was filled with children of his own age, for Hastur held many hostages, and for the first time Felix learned what it was like to be both bullied and toadied to, for he was a cousin of the king, and the king was known to be Hastur’s man.
Here, the thousand thousand futures that spilled out from every action were blinding, and Felix quickly developed the reputation of being both sickly and simple-minded. Lord Istvan thought he would die young, or if he survived, would never be fit to take a seat in Council.
That assumption saved Felix’s life, for the Comyn chafed under the rule of Elhalyn and Hastur, and rebellion was never impossible. Every year at Council season came the inevitable challenge from one of the other Domains, the accusation that Stephen could not be considered properly to be crowned without showing the Gift of his Line. Istvan’s answer was always the same: no Elhalyn now possessed it. Should a candidate possessing the Gift come forward, by Comyn law, the crown would pass to him—and to whatever supporters of his claim lurked in the shadows.
And that was something Istvan Hastur would not allow.
In later years, Felix could never name the day when he knew his life hung by such a slender thread. It was just something that had always been, just like his ability to see every future that could ever be. He learned to conceal his laran, but as he grew older, he realized concealment was not a tactic that would work forever. In many Domains, testing for laran was scattered and perfunctory, but Hastur tested every boy as a part of his coming of age, and Felix’s Gift would be discovered.
So be it, Felix thought. But let it be on my terms and no one else’s.
And so Felix perfected his masquerade of dull-witted foolishness. He fell off horses. He dropped swords. He trod hard upon the feet of any partner unlucky enough to dance with him. He complained of constant headaches, of nebulous pains. And in the end, when a leronis came from Arilinn to test Istvan Hastur’s hostages for laran, she very nearly did not test Felix Elhalyn—the weakling, the simpleton—at all.
And she saw nothing in him he did not mean her to see.
~o0o~
Of the great Towers that had once held all of Darkover together in a great web of laran, only a dozen remained, all watched over by Arilinn Tower as a mother hen her chicks. All of them had retreated from their former glories: Dalereuth, Tramontana, Neskaya, Corandolis; all the others were lightly-tenanted, for few Comyn wished to subject themselves to the rules and privations of a Tower Circle.
If Felix entered a Tower, he was unlikely to be commanded to leave it. His absence would suit Istvan as well as his death—better, perhaps, since no one could say his life had been shortened as a result of Hastur scheming. But which Tower would be best? No matter which he chose, most of the futures he saw ended with his death. Only Tramontana, far to the north, offered any hope of safety.
When Felix spoke to Lord Hastur of his desire to enter Tramontana Tower, Lord Hastur agreed without hesitation: though Tramontana was in Aldaran lands, the Towers were neutral by long-held custom. Lord Hastur spoke vaguely of arranging a proper marriage for Felix when he left Tramontana, to which Felix responded with polite and meaningless phrases. He already knew that he had no appetite for women and never would, and (should he reach the future he saw only dimly) Istvan Hastur would never try to compel him into a marriage.
And so Felix Elhalyn rode north, with a dozen guardsmen to see him (and the copper in his saddlebags) safe to his destination.
It would be more than fifteen years before he left Tramontana again.
~o0o~
Life in Tramontana was unlike anything Felix had ever known. Gone was the need to play the fool, to deny his Gift, to lie. The work was demanding, and with training his visions were few, the warnings they held easily conveyed to Sherna MacAran, Keeper of Tramontana Tower.
If not for Anjuli Aldaran, it would have been paradise.
She was cousin to Lord Aldaran, and that alone should have been enough to keep her from Tower work. Marriage alliances were more important to the Comyn lords than manning the Towers; that was something every child of the Comyn knew. But Kazal Aldaran had sent Anjuli to Tramontana, and before he had been in Tramontana a single tenday, Felix understood why.
She had visions.
It was not unheard-of. The Aldaran Gift was Foresight, after all. But Anjuli spoke of seeing impossible things. Great metal beasts descending from the sky on clouds of white fire. Strangers from the stars. All of Darkover plunged into darkness, cowering under a threat so long forgotten that it seemed like an impossible dream. They had called her “Mad Anjuli” before Kazal had sent her to Tramontana, and only the empathic closeness of a Tower circle kept the name from following her.
But the visions she had—everyone agreed—were beyond reason.
And yet Mad Anjuli’s visions had been the things of Felix Elhalyn’s nightmares for longer than he could remember. He had always dismissed them as the instability of his line, a terrible forecast of the insanity that claimed so many of the Elhalyn line. But hearing the others speak of what Anjuli saw, Felix knew them for truth. Strangers from the stars were coming. And Darkover would be...changed, transmuted, destroyed...
Felix could not bring himself to believe it was possible to find a future that the star-men had not overrun, but still he clung to hope. If he, if Anjuli, could stop them—somehow—the world of the Comyn’imyn could go on as it always had.
Untouched.
Free.
Safe.
~o0o~
The years passed. The workers in Tramontana left, one by one, until not enough remained to work the circle. Only Anjuli and Keeper Sherna remained when Felix at last took his leave. Lady Sherna was bound for Neskaya, as soon as her escort arrived, to relieve the Keeper there.
And for many years to come, Felix would believe that Anjuli had returned to Castle Aldaran.
As for Felix, he had always known where he must go when he left Tramontana and what he must say when he arrived. It was not a matter of laran, but of desperate and careful planning: he would have only one chance to sway Istvan Hastur to agreement.
One chance to survive. One chance to summon the future.
~o0o~
He followed the servant to Lord Hastur’s rooms in Comyn Castle. Despite his Tower-trained self control, his heart pounded fiercely and his mouth was sour with fear. So many of his futures had ended here.
The servant bowed and departed, and Felix knocked. A moment later, a servant opened the door. Felix stepped inside.
The room was windowless, for Comyn Castle had been built as a great labyrinth anchored by Old Tower, and few of its rooms were windowed. Lord Hastur’s private chamber was filled with fine wood furniture, with rich fabrics, with all the opulence that came with power. The only thing that struck Felix, momentarily, as odd, was the lack of books and papers, for Lady Sherna had given him a love of learning. But of course Lord Hastur could not read.
He stepped forward and bowed punctiliously as Lord Hastur rose to his feet.
“I present myself with all a son’s duty, foster-father,” Felix said.
Lord Hastur waved him to a chair and seated himself once more. He regarded Felix for a moment in silence. “Tramontana seems to have agreed with you,” he said at last.
“Unfortunately, it did not agree with most of those sent to it,” Felix said. “It has been closed. I imagine the news to have reached you long before I did.”
For all the times this scene had played itself out in his visions, the reality of it was subtly different. He looks old, Felix thought in surprise. Felix had not seen Lord Hastur since he left for Tramontana, and rarely enough before that. He knew intellectually that Lord Hastur was a man of only middle years, but Felix now saw that his hair was already streaked with grey, and deep lines of worry and care were graven into his features.
Lord Hastur frowned a little. “Why should I care what happens in Aldaran when there are things to occupy me here? You, for example. Why are you here? Have you not estates to your liking?” His pale eyes narrowed with suspicion.
“I have come to beg you for my life,” Felix said. “And to tell you why it is to your benefit to grant it to me.”
For a moment Lord Hastur stared at him, then he began to chuckle, and then to laugh. “And here I thought you changed!” he said, his voice hoarse with mirth. “You are as much a mooncalf as you ever were.”
“Not a mooncalf, but a stormcrow,” Felix said levelly. “Nor simple-minded. You thought me so, I admit, because my Gift came early. The Elhalyn Gift is a heavy burden for a child to bear. But I am no longer a child.”
The laughter was gone now from Lord Hastur’s face. For a long moment there was silence.
“You have the Gift of your Line and you have come to tell me of it?” Lord Hastur’s voice was filled with disbelief.
“As I have said, I have come to beg for my life,” Felix said. “It is no secret that the Council presses my cousin to stand aside because he lacks the Elhalyn Gift. What would happen, do you think, were I to come before it and demand to be recognized as Elhalyn of Elhalyn?”
Lord Hastur did not answer, and the ice-pale eyes were narrow now.
“Yet it suits you—and me as well—that Cousin Stephen should remain king,” Felix continued. “And it suits me—though perhaps not you—that I remain alive. And so I have come to plead my case.”
“You know the future,” Lord Hastur said, a sour smile twisting his lips. “You already know my answer.”
Felix smiled slightly. “My lord, I know every answer you could make, but not the one you will make. That is the curse of the Elhalyn Gift: to see all possible futures, but not to know which one will come to pass.”
“And so,” Lord Hastur said at last, “you wish to change the future you see, Lord Felix.”
Felix shook his head slightly. “I wish to summon the future that best suits both of us, Lord Hastur,” he answered. “One in which I am alive—and not king. Stephen was crowned when I was but a child. By now you have had ample time to discover that one may rule a king, or rule his council—but not both.”
“And if that is so?” Lord Hastur said warily.
“Then you will welcome my help,” Felix said. “The Lords Comyn plot, each for his own advantage, yet you can overturn their scheming if you know of it. For that you do not need the Elhalyn Gift. You need me.”
“I am not yet convinced,” Lord Hastur said tightly.
“My lord is wise,” Felix said, with a small seated bow. “When I brought you the news of Tramontana’s abandonment, you did not know of it, though it has been known in the Towers for many tendays. No one brought word to you, because they felt, as you did, that it did not matter. But how can the news that Aldaran is without a working Tower within its borders not matter? Without the leronyn, Aldaran must rely on messengers to bear word, nor will his people have any forewarning of trouble when Fire Season comes. There will be no one within Dom Kazal’s borders to train the laran of his children, to become healers. Such a thing might make him cautious. Or reckless. Or determined to take his rightful place among you in this Council—”
Lord Hastur said nothing, and Felix went on, explaining what a useful tool a spy network could be. Of course, the Compact forbid entering another’s mind without permission, and good manners forbade the use of laran to gather intelligence. “—but there is no obstacle to having a network of informers, without laran, to bring information to someone who can husband each piece until he holds the whole of the tale. And this is what I shall do for you—if you will have me do it.”
He had grown more hopeful as each turning point he had foreseen was reached and safely passed. But hope turned to despair as he reached the end of his speech and was met with silence. He had seen this as well: Lord Hastur would smile, and nod, and summon his paxman. And Felix would be dead before the moons changed once more.
At last Lord Hastur spoke. “And if I say yes, will you become my sworn man? Will you repudiate your allegiance to Elhalyn, and take oath that you will serve Hastur all your days?”
“I shall,” Felix said, his voice barely a whisper. Hastur is Darkover itself, and to serve Hastur is to serve Darkover. It has always been so—it must always be so.
“Then let it be so,” Lord Hastur said in unconscious echo, rising to his feet again. “And welcome home, my dutiful and obedient foster-son.”
~o0o~
The oath he had taken was a secret between the two of them; Felix had expected nothing else. He took apartments in Comyn Castle; he took his seat in Council. When Council season was over, Felix moved into a house in the Trade City, saying he had no taste for life at Elhalyn. He developed a circle of lovers and friends, each chosen for what advantage they could bring him, and a steadily increasing network of trustworthy informants, all to one end: to avert the future his visions had shown him. Every move he made in Council, every alliance he helped build or shatter, every word he put into Istvan Hastur’s ear, was done with the sure knowledge that the strangers from the stars were coming. If Darkover was to survive, the Comyn had to be ready.
And more years passed.
~o0o~
The day when everything changed was a day like any other. It was already spring here in the south, though the passes through the Hellers and the Hyades would be blocked for some time to come. Felix had taken a couple of clandestine meetings with his agents in Thendara, then gone riding to clear his head for the report he must prepare. That evening he attended a quiet party, and then retired to bed with his current bredu.
And as he slept, a vision came: a great ship, a shining (impossible) vessel of metal soaring over Darkover as if it were a fifth moon. From its belly it spat out tiny silver dragons that fell from the sky with a sound that seemed to shake the world. He saw one plow into the ground near the Wall Around the World, raising great clouds of hissing steam when the metal of its hull touched the eternal snows.
He thrashed his way out of the entangling blankets and was on his feet before the vision had even fully dissipated. Young Lord Padreik (new come to Thendara and willing to be dazzled) sat up in the wreckage of the bed, blinking sleepily. “Dom Felix?” he asked around a yawn, drawing the covers up around his bare thighs.
“Go back to sleep,” Felix said in the gentlest voice he could muster. “It was an ill dream. Nothing you need to fret over. I just need to see about something before morning.”
No reason to disturb Padreik’s rest more than he already had. Peace was about to be in short supply indeed.
The Terranan had come to Darkover at last.
~o0o~
His hope of somehow eliminating the Terranan before they could take root in Darkovan soil had always been a remote one, and now it died completely: he could not leave Thendara during Council Season, and there was no one he could send. It did not take spycraft to know that Aldaran would see the strangers and their metal beasts as tools with which to secure wealth and advantage for himself. Aldaran might be outlaw, but it was a rare Comyn lord who didn’t treasure the dream that someday he might be king.
Lord Hastur greeted Felix’s report that men from the stars had come to Darkover with little interest, and Felix suspected he simply didn’t believe it. His attitude hardly changed when word reached Felix that Dom Barak had presented the strangers with land near Caer Donn: they weren’t Comyn, therefore they were beneath a Hastur’s notice.
Once again Felix’s dreams were filled with fire and darkness, and the waking visions were harder to push away. He’d spent half a lifetime trying to avert this future, and his failure was bitter. Over and over, he saw Darkover burning, poisoned, dead, and he didn’t need his spies or his Gift to tell him these Terranan were only the first of the hordes to come.
All that was left was for him to go to Caer Donn as soon as he could. He would see the strangers with his own eyes, learn as much of their language as he could. Determine what threads of the futures he’d seen might yet be salvaged.
And which prevented.
~o0o~
“I hear the Terranan call this place Port Chicago,” Felix said to Daniskar, pronouncing the alien words with care. He and his paxman stood on a rise that overlooked both Caer Donn and the alien city that looked to devour it. If Felix had not seen this with his own eyes, he would never have believed it could be done. Less than a year ago, the land beyond the town had been covered in dense forest, close to useless even for hunting. Undoubtedly, Dom Barak had granted those lands to the Terranan because he had no other use for them.
Now the forest was gone as if it had never been. A mirror-smooth plain swept through the landscape as if some ancient matrix weapon out of the Ages of Chaos had touched down here. Clustered along the side nearest to Caer Donn (in some pattern that, presumably, made sense to the Terranan) were strange, squat huts made of some gray material. Here and there the frameworks of larger buildings—made, improbably, of metal—rose into the air. Outlandish wagons moved between them, emitting a faint whining sound as they moved.
“The metal in one of those structures would buy every treasure on Darkover,” Daniskar said softly.
“And more,” Felix agreed, struggling to conceal his unease. What were these Terranan strangers?
~o0o~
They were a month in Caer Donn before Felix had a basic understanding of the strangers’ language. He spent his days eavesdropping wherever he could find Terranan gathered, and even performed menial tasks for the strangers, much to Daniskar’s outrage. Wherever they had come from must have been very different than Darkover, because they went about so bundled that they resembled shiny, brightly-colored berries. (Or ticks, Felix could not help but think. Here to suck the blood of Darkover with no thought of the damage they will do.) As he had hoped, he and Daniskar did not come to anyone’s notice: they had donned the guise and the manner of a wealthy—and curious—merchant and his bodyguard. They were hardly the only ones here hoping to profit from the strangers.
As the days crept closer to winter and the closing of the passes, Daniskar constantly urged him to depart before they were trapped in the Hellers until spring, but Felix delayed. This might be his only chance to study his enemy up close, and he dared not risk failing to discover the one fact that might save Darkover.
~o0o~
Daniskar wrinkled his nose in distaste as a couple of the strangers made their way gracelessly through the streets of Caer Donn, talking with the loud confidence of men certain their words were incomprehensible to anyone around them. Felix heard his paxman sigh in resignation as Felix turned to follow them.
“I’d love to know who the hell decided it was a good idea to build a spaceport here,” one of the men said. “What these barbarians call broad daylight is twilight anywhere else, and I’ve spent the last six months freezing my balls off.”
“The system is in a perfect place for a transport hub,” his companion pointed out. “Be glad the ‘barbarians’ were easy to buy off: you’d like Cottman V even less.”
“Yeah, but if we ever want to open this place up for development, we’re going to have to terraform the whole goddamned place,” the first man replied disgustedly.
Felix wasn’t sure what “terraform” meant, though it sounded a bit like Terranan. Did they mean to make Darkover like their homeworld? Even the great leronyn of the Ages of Chaos could not have worked such a change!
He heard the two men laugh together, and suddenly a vision took him so strongly that he was blinded and senseless, cut loose from his body.
At first the images were a roaring geyser of incomprehensible flashes. But in Tramontana Felix had learned to steady his breathing and slow the torrent of potential futures, letting them surface one by one so that he could examine each individually. But as these visions steadied, he wished with all his heart he’d never learned to do any such thing; that these possibilities could rush past unseen.
He saw the surface of Darkover charred, blackened, lifeless, the light of the four moons hidden behind choking clouds of poison smoke.
He saw a warm green world filled with the calls of unfamiliar birds. Saw Thendara erased, saw the courtyard of Comyn Castle choked with a mad tangle of too-bright greenery and a profusion of alien blooms. Saw the skeletons of long-abandoned Towers crumbling under thick blankets of vines.
He saw the trees of the Yellow Forest rotted from within and the chieri lying dead; no Trailmen alive to dance between the treetops of High Kimbi, the cralmacs and kyrri, the Forge-folk, the Ya-men, all the life Darkover held lying dead, all of them dead, so many dead that it would take years just to bury them all.
He saw the Comyn in chains, toiling for Terranan overlords.
He saw a chained woman wreathed in flames. She met his eyes and laughed.
There must be something else—there must!
There was. The image was trembling and faint, barely-possible, but Felix clung to it with all his strength.
He saw Darkovan and Terranan side by side in the Council chamber. He saw the children of Darkover spreading across the galaxy as Darkover rose to take her place as an equal among the worlds of the Terranan. He saw peace.
This was the future he must summon.
No matter what the cost.
~o0o~
When Felix came back to himself at last, he opened his eyes warily.
The room was dark. Unfamiliar. By the dim glow of the brazier flickering in the corner, he could make out Daniskar dozing nearby in a thickly upholstered chair. The image of the chained woman in flames still danced behind his eyes. That future could not be allowed to come to pass.
He cleared his throat quietly.
Startled out of sleep, Daniskar leapt to his feet, reaching automatically for his sword. When he realized what had roused him, he came to Felix’s bedside, looking stricken.
“I am sorry, vai dom,” he said, sinking to his knees beside the bed. “I did not know what else to do. The Terranan would have taken you to their healers...”
Felix shuddered at the thought. “And so you told them I was from the castle,” he said, realizing where he must be. He noted that their packs had been brought from the inn and winced inwardly. All they needed now was for Dom Barak to complain to Lord Hastur and King Stephen about spying. “I can only imagine what Dom Barak said upon being informed we had been his guests all autumn,” Felix said, struggling to sit up.
Daniskar looked guilty. “Dom Barak extends every courtesy, and tenders his regrets that the press of business has denied him your company. He vows to repair this deficiency with all haste. Probably first thing tomorrow,” Daniskar added dolefully.
“I’m certain it’s purely a formality,” Felix said wryly. And that he will let us leave once he is done with us.
~o0o~
Felix chose to breakfast in his rooms to spare everyone the awkwardness of meeting him before Lord Aldaran’s intentions were known. He knew little of the current Lord Aldaran: Kazal Aldaran had been Lord of Aldaran when Felix had been at Tramontana, but his grandson now ruled here.
While he was dressing, a servant came to tell him that Dom Barak awaited him at his leisure. Felix hurried to finish and allowed the servant to conduct him to the meeting he would so much rather avoid.
Dom Barak received Felix in his private study, a utilitarian and almost shabby room entirely at odds with the ostentation of the rest of Castle Aldaran. When Felix entered, Barak got stiffly to his feet, strode over to the sideboard, and poured two cups of wine with his own hands, waving Felix to a seat. This was to be a private meeting, then.
He glanced around the room. It was cluttered with maps, hawking furniture, and hunting trophies. Objects made of metal and of an odd material Felix didn’t recognize sat atop the disorder on the table; Felix supposed that they must be Terranan artifacts.
“I can only suppose you’ve come to steal my Terranan for Stephen,” Barak said without preamble, setting one goblet in front of Felix and taking a sip from the other.
“I only came here to see them,” Felix said neutrally. “You can’t blame me for being curious.”
Barak snorted. “Curious?” he said. “That explains, I suppose, why you decided to skulk around in Caer Donn, pretending to be a tinker.”
“I felt it would save both of us embarrassment. Aldaran isn’t a signatory to the Compact.”
“Oh, not that damned nonsense about the Compact again,” Barak said irritably. The chair creaked as he leaned back and set his cup down on the single bare space on the desk. “Aldaran honors it.”
“Even now?” Felix let his gaze rest meaningfully on the Terranan objects.
“Even now,” Barak said, his scowl deepening. “I don’t like what you’re implying, Dom Felix.”
“I am implying nothing,” Felix said, “other than that these Terranan might be dangerous.”
“Or that Hastur wants their wealth for himself,” Barak scoffed.
Felix sipped his wine. “If Aldaran and the Terranan form an alliance, Lord Aldaran, the Council will have to take notice. You know that as well as I.”
It was satisfying to see the effort Dom Barak had to spend to keep his temper in check. “If you have delivered your message, Lord Felix,” Barak finally said, in a voice that almost approximated cordiality, “I think perhaps it is time I let you return to Thendara. I am sure you have urgent business awaiting you there.”
Felix smiled pleasantly at Barak and set his own goblet aside. “I think I do,” he said. “But before I go, I really must satisfy my curiosity: how do you plan to force your subjects to welcome a bunch of rude star-men who fell the forests they use for hunting and treat autumn as if it’s midwinter?”
~o0o~
The journey south was quicker than the journey north, for Felix and Daniskar were attempting to outrun the winter. Even with their breakneck turn of speed and frequent remounts, they failed, and were forced to beg hospitality of Lord Alton at Armida. It was luck alone that there was a hard, cold frost a few tendays after their arrival, or they might have had to overwinter there. Lord Alton was a gracious host, but he shared Lord Hastur’s views on the Terranan—they were as irrelevant to the affairs of the Comyn as were the Dry Towners or the Trailmen.
Felix wished with all his heart that were true. Since the disastrous vision that had ended his time at Caer Donn, his mind had been occupied with only one thing: how to summon the single future of hope from the abattoir of possibilities he’d seen. If only it was a matter of choosing and wishing, but it was not—every single moment, every decision, was a crossroads. Make even one wrong choice in the days—or years—to come, and see Darkover utterly destroyed.
And the worst of it was, he had absolutely no idea of what the right choices were.
~o0o~
His thoughts remained bleak through Council Season. He had shared something of his visions with Lord Hastur, coming as close to pleading for help as he could, but it had done no good, The Council’s mind was fixed on other matters beyond anyone’s ability to influence them. What use was foreknowledge of disaster without knowledge of how to avert it? Felix sent as many agents as he dared northward to gather information, and wondered in idle moments whether he dared kidnap one of the Terranan for questioning. Tenday after tenday passed, and he could not see a useful course of action. Nebulous warnings alone would not move the Comyn to defend Darkover, especially since he could not suggest any practical way to do it. The most he could do was encourage the Council to see the strangers as a resource to be removed from an enemy’s grasp. Bring them south, where they could be easily seen, and perhaps others would convince themselves of what he already knew.
Perhaps.
~o0o~
Summer turned to autumn, and Felix still had no answers. His agents, running before the winter storms like leaves before the wind, brought him their harvest of rumor and gossip and truth—among them, the disturbing news that Anjuli Aldaran had never left Tramontana Tower at all. And that a Terranan had—somehow—caused her death.
A generation ago such a thing would have been impossible, Felix thought bleakly. The leroni were sacrosanct—any man who raised their hand to one would be slain instantly for the sacrilege. But even when he’d been a boy, half a century ago, the Towers and their inhabitants had already been half legend, a thing belonging to the time of Varzil the Good.
And now, it seemed, the Terranan would erase even those legends.
To think of Anjuli Aldaran, Comynara and leronis, dying old and frail in her crumbling tower, was a weight upon his heart. He had loved her in his way, all those years ago, and she had died alone and terrified.
He could have saved her. If he had gone to Tramontana while he was at Caer Donn— If he had convinced her to return to her home— He knew what she had Foreseen. Her word would have bolstered his. Barak might have been willing to see the danger. Done something. Sent the Terranan away.
It had been a chance, and he had missed it. How many other chances have I let slip by unseen? How few are yet to come?
Am I to be nothing more than a witness to the death of our world?
~o0o~
He ate little and slept less. He abandoned his friends, rejected old lovers and did not take new ones; even Daniskar walked warily about his master. Felix roamed for hours through Thendara—Comyn Castle, Old Town, Trade City—returning to his rooms late at night to pace sleeplessly until the dawn. The visions he had managed to shut out for so many years returned now with a vengeance; there were times he could not tell what was happening in the here-and-now from what only might have happened, or would happen. In his visions, the Yellow Forest burned. The peaks of the Hellers were bare of snow. Chieri and Trailmen and kyrri and humans lay dead or dying in the ruins of great forests. And still the great metal ships of the Terranan came.
Darkover lay naked and helpless before the star-men who had come to ravish her. She could not fight and must not die and Felix did not know how to guide her to that future he had only just glimpsed.
At last, in the depths of winter, anguish and desperation drove him to accept that there was only one course open to him. A decade ago, he wouldn’t have flinched away from it, but he wasn’t a young man anymore.
Tell the truth, if only to yourself. A decade ago, you did not hold your life so dear. Only now, with Lorill about to step into Istvan’s place, with the Comyn fewer in each generation, who can give shape to the future if you do not? And they would call it arrogance, did they know I held myself so indispensable, but I have seen what might be and they have not.
He made his arrangements carefully. The Castle was nearly empty at this season and he had sent Daniskar to his bed long before. In the days preceding, he had gathered together the things he would need: a small brazier, a heavy stormcloak, a lantern.
He thought longingly of a cup of hot wine to steady his nerves, but he dared not indulge himself—not when he was about to drink something far more dangerous. It had been a small matter to acquire it clandestinely: as he closed his fingers around the small glass bottle in the pocket of his half-cape, it seemed to burn with an eldritch fire.
Kirian. The bitter liquor distilled from kireseth flowers. It was used, in small doses, to help children through their threshold sickness. In larger doses, it overthrew the natural barriers the mind created to defend itself. With it, Felix hoped to be able to stay submerged in his visions long enough see the path on which his people could reach safety.
Or die.
He would have no monitor, no Keeper, no working circle to support him. He smiled painfully, thinking of what Sherna MacAran would have said about this idea. Certainly nothing good. (Did she still live? he wondered. Did she grieve for Anjuli Aldaran?)
But there was no other choice. From the moment of his first vision of the great metal ships descending from the sky, Felix had sworn his service not to Hastur or Elhalyn or even to the Comyn, but to Darkover herself. If there was a road to safety, he had to discover it.
Before it was too late.
~o0o~
A storm raged over Thendara that night, a creature of wind and ice screaming through the towers of Comyn Castle as if it stalked its prey. Here in the upper levels of Comyn Castle it was a palpable thing, evident in the faint rattling of shutters, the whistle of wind through every crack and opening. Once it had been said that nights like these were the best for Tower work. Tonight Felix would test that old superstition.
Thendara was unique among the Domains in having two Towers. Legend held that Old Tower—called Ashara’s Tower—had stood before the city, let alone Comyn Castle. There were so many legends built up around it that not all of them could be true, but among them stood one fact: no one entered Ashara’s Tower without invitation.
It was fortunate, in that case, that the Castle held a second Tower, called simply “New Tower”. It had been built in Felix’s great-grandsires time, perhaps in a spirit of happy optimism regarding the future of the Comyn. Whatever its impetus and purpose, it stood empty now. And to do what he intended, he required its shielding.
In winter, the Castle was but lightly-occupied, and none of the servants who inhabited it at this season would dare to question one of the Comyn anyway. Felix moved swiftly and unimpeded to his destination, passing quickly through the wards and shields of the empty Tower as he made for his goal: the Working Room, where the circle would gather to work the relays—and in ancient days, to perform far darker acts. Habit brought him to the center of the chamber, to the wide circular bench where the circle would gather. He opened his pack, set his brazier in the center of the floor, and lit it before draping his storm cloak loosely over his shoulders and seating himself.
Everything was ready.
He held the bottle of kirian in his hand for a long moment before he could bring himself to break the seal. As the bitterness filled his mouth and throat, he experienced a moment of pure terror. Too late, a voice from nowhere and everywhere said. Too late to turn back now...
And then he was gone.
~o0o~
This time there was no familiar dreamlike procession of confusing images. This time he did not experience a vision, but created it. Over and over, he navigated the shining silver maze in the Overlight—
—the maze that was an echo of the bones of Comyn Castle—
—just as you did so long ago, when Lady Sherna set you such puzzles to teach you how to move through the Overlight—
—finding only the things he had found before.
Darkover destroyed, barren, its people enslaved.
The world transformed to a desert that suffered beneath a hot white sun.
His people, exiles. Scattered among a hundred alien worlds.
The Yellow Forest burning. The Beautiful Ones dead, slain, gone.
The laughing woman in chains, flames clothing her naked body, setting forests alight in mountain and valley until all Darkover was in flames.
Each time the maze led him to such a destination it took all his strength to turn back, fight free, begin again. It seemed to him that the maze shifted every time he ran it, the futures he rejected vanishing, new ones appearing. He did not know how many dead ends he turned back from, how long he hunted. Was the body he had left behind failing, dying, while he searched for a future that might not exist? Even here he felt his strength fading, the self he wore in this place-not-place beginning to dissolve like summer frost...
But there is a way! There is! There must be! I will not surrender before I find it!
He forced himself to begin again. This time there was no maze, no puzzle to solve. All the possibilities had been rejected, and all that was left was a grey mist with no beginning and no end.
There!
A gleam of silver, a faint brightness in the mists. He followed it, the shape he chose as mutable as the mists: hound, then horse, and at last as a hawk, keen-eyed, relentless, soaring through a world that held neither up nor down, near or far, his only guide that faint and wavering silver thread...
Between one moment and the next, the mist vanished, and he stood in an utterly alien place.
The chamber was dim and held nothing of Darkover about it. Garish forms of colored light hung in the air, striking multicolored glints from surfaces of glass and metal and substances he could not name. Despite the fact that nothing he saw was familiar, he knew this place. A tavern. A place where men came to rejoice. Or to grieve.
Where am I? Why here? I seek a living future for Darkover...not this.
He looked around carefully. If this was where he had been brought, he would learn what it had to teach him.
There were tables and booths, and men were gathered here. Many were garbed alike, in an unfamiliar black uniform. He turned, looking for a door, and saw a dim booth at the far end of the room. A man sat there, drunk nearly to the point of oblivion. He wore a uniform like the others, but the collar had been pulled open as if it pained him. Terranan. Alien.
Grief surrounded the man, visible, a pall of dark smoke. It fed on him and he welcomed it gladly, for it promised him an ending to his agony. In the eternal “Now” of the Overlight, Felix understood that he knew this man. Would know him. Had known him.
Why you? Who are you?
There was no answer, but suddenly, standing beside the Terranan, he saw another. A woman, colorless and insubstantial as a ghost, also clad in alien garb, reaching out to him. Or to both of them?
Not someone he knows. Someone he will know. But...?
Suddenly—as if it had always been there and he had just now noticed it—he saw the silver cord that he had followed. It coiled about him; about the man and the woman. He held it in his hands, a ribbon of light...
A tool. A promise. Hope.
Find the man and the woman both, and he would save Darkover.
There was a way.
As if that realization had taken the very last of his strength, his surroundings were whipped away like smoke in a high wind. When they were gone, there was nothing.
Nothing at all.
~o0o~
The next thing he was aware of was the taste of hot honeyed wine. It did little to quell his thirst, or his aching gnawing hunger. He tried to reach for the cup, but could only manage a clumsy flailing.
“Blessed Aldones! No, drink it all, vai dom. You’re far too weak.”
Daniskar.
Felix gulped greedily until the cup was taken away. The wine had done little more than to awaken his body to its pain and exhaustion. The room was sweltering—he could smell the logs burning on the hearth—but the heat did not seem to reach him. He struggled to open his eyes and finally managed it.
This was his bedchamber. He lay in his great canopied bed, bolstered in a half-sitting position by a number of cushions, and lying beneath what was surely every blanket in Comyn Castle. In addition to the roaring fire in the fireplace, the room was filled with half a dozen braziers. Daniskar was stripped to his breeches, and his body gleamed with sweat. He returned to Felix’s side with a bowl of rich pudding. At the first spoonful, the taste carried Felix back to Tramontana; it had been Keeper Sherna’s favorite, one of the things always on the table after a Circle.
When he had finished it, he felt stronger, though he knew better than to try his strength too soon.
“How did you find me?” he asked.
“Do you think I am stupid, vai dom?” Fear had loosened his paxman’s tongue. “Where else would you be but in that unholy place, looking for things no man can find!”
Felix studied Daniskar’s face. Daniskar had come to his service just after he had made his pact with Dom Istvan. It had been at Istvan’s suggestion, of course, and neither Daniskar nor Felix had felt it prudent to refuse.
That was a long time ago. They had both grown old, but Daniskar did not have a bloodline that would keep him alive long beyond a man’s appointed time.
He reached out and put a hand on Daniskar’s arm, suddenly contrite. “I did what I must, for Darkover’s sake,” he said gently. “And now I have hope.”
Daniskar sank to his knees beside the bed. “My lord,” he said brokenly, and then words seemed to fail him. He pressed his face into the mound of blankets so Felix could not see his face.
Felix stroked his paxman’s hair gently. Have I overlooked the love I could have found on my own doorstep? he wondered. But no. Daniskar had always been a man for women, without the urge of marriage and family. Of course, to marry would have given him hostages to fortune, and Felix had made many enemies in his time. It was why he held his own lovers so lightly, that none of them could be imagined to possess enough of his heart to sway him. But Daniskar’s love, though chaste, was deep and true...
He was wandering in his thoughts, he realized. He would need to sleep soon.
“So you followed me to the Tower,” he said, stroking Daniskar’s hair. “And followed me in, I suppose.”
“Certainly not!” Daniskar said hotly. He had recovered some of his composure and regarded Felix with familiar exasperation. “What good would I do you if I were struck dead by sorcery? But I remembered that Lord Dawyd was overwintering here, and I went to beg him for the loan of one of his kyrri.”
Felix smiled. “Neatly done,” he said approvingly. The Towers were nearly gone, but the inhuman servants the Comyn had bred up during the Age of Chaos to serve their needs remained. None of the veils and barriers that stopped a man would stop a kyrri. “And did Dawyd think to ask why?”
“I told him you had expressed a need for a servant who could be discreet,” Daniskar said blandly. “He did not ask further. No one saw us, my lord. I swear to you.”
“And I believe you, for there is no man living I trust as I do you,” Felix said. “And I promise you, tonight’s work achieved its purpose.”
“If you say so,” Daniskar said, with a touch of his usual disapproval. “But it will come to naught if you do not rest yourself now.”
Felix was asleep almost before Daniskar had removed the pillows and straightened the blankets to his own satisfaction, but the dreams that followed were not gentle. They were filled with blood and death, with the screams of parents lamenting their murdered children, with fertile and pleasant lands turned to ash and waste.
But this time it was not Darkover’s future that he saw. This was the inferno in which his weapons were even now being forged. Out of this suffering and loss would come Darkover’s salvation.
If Felix were clever enough.
~o0o~
The rest of the winter passed quietly enough, and by the time spring came again, one of Felix’s plots had borne fruit. The Terranan had abandoned Caer Donn and were building a new spaceport on the eastern side of Thendara.
It was said the Terranan had come south by their own choice, two winters in the Hellers being more than they could stand. Their commander, Carroll Stone, had by then heard of Thendara, and had petitioned Lord Hastur for permission to settle here—a permission Lord Hastur willingly gave. To save face, and perhaps to placate Dom Barak, the Terranan were not leaving Caer Donn entirely (as if even they could turn a desert of stone back into a lush forest, Felix thought derisively), but it would only be a “backup” site, one which would have little contact with the Darkovans. Perhaps Commander Stone had realized that Lord Aldaran considered the Terranan and all their devices to be his property, and perhaps he had not liked it. At least here in the south, the Terranan wouldn’t belong to any of the Comyn: the Trade City and its vicinity were neutral ground.
There was an additional bonus to the Terranan relocation. As the Trade City was neutral territory, it fell to the head of Comyn Council to deal with them. As spring turned to summer, Istvan Hastur developed as much dislike for the aliens as even Felix could ask for—and at last began to realize what a danger they were.
“A babe unweaned would have better sense!” he snarled, banging his goblet down on the table. Felix reached for the jug and refilled it. They were in Istvan’s private chambers, unobserved by anyone, even Istvan’s servants. What had been a report each tenday on matters of general interest had, since the spring, become a venue for Lord Hastur to vent his anger.
“The Terranan have no honor, no shame, and no self-respect!” Istvan snarled. “Demanding to be put in leading-strings at one moment and the next insisting the Comyn bow down to them!”
Felix sighed. “They are what they are, vai dom. And what they are, and have always been, is trouble.”
He had never shared, even with Lord Hastur, the full extent of his foreknowings about the Terranan, and he was glad of it now. Istvan Hastur was no longer the vigorous man who had first accepted Felix’s service. He had become an old man, prey to an old man’s sudden furies. To lead them into war against the strangers...there would be no quicker way to set Darkover on the road to the bleakest of Felix’s visions.
“I should send them packing,” Istvan grumbled, staring into his wine. “That damned puppy Stone had the insolence to offer to pay me for the right to extend the spaceport! Me!”
Felix winced inwardly at the thought of anyone treating Hastur of Hastur as a common laborer. “They are fools,” he said flatly. “But like the cralmac and the firetower, now that we have let them in, it is much harder to tell them to go.”
“At least it will be Lorill’s problem soon,” Istvan muttered. “And I wish him joy of it.”
“Surely you intend to live forever?” Felix said lightly, hoping to cajole Istvan out of his dark mood.
“Bah! Should I condemn myself to an eternity of Council sessions? I think rather it is you who plans to live forever, Stormcrow,” Istvan said, allowing himself to be mollified.
“I can but hope,” Felix said. “Someone must be here to advise your son, after all.”
“And he trusts you,” Istvan said with a faint bitterness. “Will you swear to him as you have sworn to me? And serve him as you have served me?”
Istvan’s mood had undergone another mercurial shift; he glared at Felix with angry suspicion. It is age, nothing more, Felix told himself. I have as much of his trust as he gives to any man. I have earned it, after all. “I shall,” Felix said simply, and Istvan’s dark expression eased.
“Then I suppose I can deal with those damnable Terranan for another year or two, if I must,” Istvan grumbled. “I should order you to do it.”
“The best weapon is the one the enemy does not see,” Felix reminded him.
“Just as you say,” Istvan grumbled. “Now go. I have much work to do, if the idiot Terranan will allow me to do any of it.”
~o0o~
Daniskar fell in behind him as Felix stepped out into the corridor. His destination was one of Comyn Castle’s highest points. The Council Chamber had been built to give the illusion of floating in the sky, a place of polished stone and crystal mirrors. The seating areas for each of the Seven Domains (Aldaran’s place was never filled, but it still remained) divided the chamber into seven sections; at the back of each of the railed-off sections a door led to an outside hallway, so that during Council sessions the Comyn could take their seats without crossing the chamber floor. At the turn in that hallway, a short flight of steps led up to a small open balcony, its original purpose unknown.
Here, all of Thendara was laid out before him as if he were a bird in flight. The Venza Hills cradled the ancient Trade City; north, beyond the Venzas, lay the Plains of Arilinn. And beyond that...home. Hali and Elhalyn. He wondered if he would ever see them again.
But to dream of home was not the reason Felix had come here. At the far side of the Trade City stood the growing Terranan spaceport. Here, as in Caer Donn, the ground had been flattened, leveled, and sheathed in an artificial stone. The setting sun drew glints of light from the machines that flitted back and forth between the great metal bulk of the Terranan ships they serviced, and there was already a warren of what Commander Stone called “temporary” buildings. The Terranan also meant to mirror the Darkovan Trade City with one of their own, a place filled with strange shops and strange wares.
And weapons? Felix wondered. They think our Compact is a foolish child’s game, and perhaps it is good that they think so, but no matter what lip-service they pay it, they will not keep their weapons out of our hands. And there are many, both foolish and venal, who would seek to profit from their carelessness.
“It doesn’t look as though they’re planning to leave Darkover anytime soon, does it?” Daniskar said disgustedly. Felix could hardly blame him for the implied criticism. He had told Daniskar, months before, that he had found a way to save Darkover, and the Terranan were still here.
“They’re building a home for themselves,” Felix said. Have patience, my old friend. My tools are still a-forging. “Their commander has told the Hastur that they mean to stay.”
“But we don’t want them here!” Daniskar protested. “They hate our weather, and they already have a home somewhere else. Why don’t they go back to it?”
They say our world lies in a strategic location among their stars, and so they mean to take it. And give us in fee what will destroy us. “They say we are their long-lost kin,” Felix said aloud. He needed neither laran nor sight to know Daniskar’s lips quirked skeptically. “Whether or not it’s true doesn’t matter,” Felix said with a shrug. “They are here now.”
“Like a forest fire raging out of control,” Daniskar answered.
“And a fire can be tamed, if one knows how,” Felix said.
With the proper tools.
~o0o~
It was three years more before the first of Felix’s tools was ready, but he had not been idle. The Terranan had finished their spaceport, only to say that all its structures were temporary, and to ask for Darkover to lend them the labor to make them permanent. The Council had balked, but Felix had been delighted. Every laborer sent to the Terranan was another set of eyes and ears to gather precious information. He spent many days coaching Dom Lorill in the things to demand, the things to delay, and the things to ignore. The strangers seemed to be even fonder of endless meetings than the Comyn Council was, and Istvan had willingly left his heir to deal with it.
Despite the growing presence of the strangers, Felix felt a sense of peace. Every small act, no matter how inconsequential, closed off—or opened—another possible future. He had never been a trusting soul, but the vision he had seen—the man and the woman who lay in his future—had given him confidence. If the Terranan were like a forest fire raging wildly out of control, well and good; a fire could be fought with cunning, with guile, with the proper tools.
That was what the Terranan would provide. In due time.
~o0o~
Caer Donn had grown since he had last seen it, its character changing as if it were some hapless creature infested by a parasite. It was no longer a walled village, but a town filled with taverns and lodging houses and such places as a traveler would seek out at the end of a long journey. The “abandoned” Terranan port just beyond was brightly lit, as if the Terranan would command day where there was night.
A light snow was falling as a Terranan ship came in for a landing. By now their landing and departure had lost its novelty value, but still Felix watched. The craft settled itself to the ground beneath a pool of light, and Felix was near enough to hear the whine of machinery as its hatch opened and a gangway unfolded. The men who exited the ship walked toward the customs house, their talk and laughter carried on the wind as they moved toward its promise of refuge and warmth.
Felix continued to wait.
There.
Another uniformed man appeared in the hatchway, holding onto its edge as if he was mustering his courage. After a long moment, he stepped down the gangway, moving as one who had lately received some terrible injury.
No injury of the body, I think, but of the spirit, Felix thought.
At the foot of the ramp the man hesitated, glancing from the direction his fellows had taken to the road that led down into the town. Felix watched as he made up his mind and hurried toward the gate, his steps unsteady.
When he reached the town, the man hesitated, looking from one tavern to the next. Felix stepped out of the doorway to meet him, and for the first time, saw him clearly.
The laugh-lines in his face were deep, but they had been graven over by a mask of sorrow. Even in the wind and the cold Felix could smell the reek of alcohol and drugs that hung about him. They were not enough, Felix imagined, to truly dull the self-hatred that was killing him. He put a hand on the man’s arm. Laran gave him the images from his dreams. And a name.
“Welcome, stranger. What do you seek here?” he asked in his carefully-learned Common.
Ercan Waltrud regarded him with glazed indifference. “Oblivion,” he said harshly. “Are you selling it?”
“No,” Felix said. “But I will give it to you. And perhaps redemption as well.” He had been a fool to imagine the Comyn could stand against an utterly unknown enemy and prevail—that had always been the flaw in all his plans. To win against such an enemy one must know him as well as one knew one’s self, and to know an enemy as alien as the Terranan seemed impossible. But there was always a way to do the impossible, Felix had learned.
Ercan laughed gratingly. “Redemption! You have no idea what I’ve done, old man.”
“Perhaps not,” Felix answered. “But I have some understanding of what you may yet do. Come. I will take you to a place you can rest.”
If one needed to learn, all that was needed was the proper teacher. And what better teacher than this man, who had done elsewhere that which Felix must prevent here?
He felt as much as saw Ercan Waltrud’s surrender; his thought that to place himself in the hands of an alien barbarian would at least be a way to give up the terrible burden of knowing what he knew. He felt an unexpected pang of tenderness for a mind and heart so terribly bruised by the duty the Terranan had called him to.
This is how we will win our safety. Both Darkover’s, and your Terran Empire’s. Darkover will take up those tools it has discarded, and make them our own. And in the end, it will free us both.
“Come,” Felix said again. “I will bring you to a place where you can forget.”
The two men walked deeper into the town through the falling snow.
