“Aldhelm, can you see him?”
“No, Thane.”
“Damn him.” The Thane fingered the hilt of his vibro, stroking the well-used leather of the scabbard. He’d begun to wonder if there would come an opportunity to use the weapon tonight—and, if that were true, whether there would ever be another chance for Hoorka.
“He can’t be too far ahead, Thane, and he’ll have to rest soon. He can’t keep up this pace.” The last sentence had the intonations of a prayer.
“Nor can we.”
Aldhelm looked back over his shoulder, standing a few meters up from the Thane. Sleipnir arced flame in his eyes. “Do we have a choice, Thane? You know what this contract means to Hoorka. If you can’t keep pace with me, I’ll go on alone.”
“Aldhelm”—the Thane spoke wearily as he felt the old argument starting again—“remember the code. Please, kin-brother. We don’t
have
to be this concerned about the victim. If he lives, he lives—it is Dame Fate’s decree. It shouldn’t matter to us.”
No, but it does. You know that as well as Aldhelm. Why do you lie to Aldhelm when he knows that you don’t believe your words any more than he does?
“If Gunnar lives, we die. That’s a decree I won’t accept.” Each of the last words was uttered in an explosion of breath, the syllables separated by silence. The grass beneath them rustled with harsh whispers. “We’ve gone over this point too many times, Thane. You can’t deny that you think I’m right. Gunnar
has
to die tonight, no matter how that’s accomplished. He’s even helped us. Look around. There will be no witnesses here.”
The Thane shook his head, refusing to acknowledge the truth of Aldhelm’s words. Yet the Hoorka’s reasoning had taken root in the uncertainty of his mind. “No,” he began, half-heartedly.
“Yes!” Aldhelm cut in sharply. “You’ve become . . . I don’t know. Soft, perhaps. You’re certainly not looking at this realistically. And I’m not the only Hoorka-kin who feels this way.” Aldhelm spoke in almost a pleading tone, and with a touch of sympathy that hurt the Thane more than his former harshness.
Of course he speaks harshly—I was never gentle with him, but always masked affection with gruffness. I taught him, and can one blame the pupil for emulating the teacher?
The Thane stared at the rocks about them, not wanting to speak. No, he couldn’t see any sign of the watching eyes that m’Dame d’ Embry had hinted would be there; no, there was no sign of Gunnar. “And if the Alliance is watching?” he asked finally.
“It’s a risk we have to take. She of the Five will watch for us.” Aldhelm’s voice softened, but his eyes were hard and unrelenting. “I’ve nothing but respect for what you’ve done in the past, Thane. Leave, if you don’t want to be sullied by this, but Gunnar will die tonight.”
So easy. It would be so easy to listen to those words and walk away. All I need do is acknowledge that I’ve lost and Aldhelm deserves to be Thane. And perhaps he does . . .
“We lose our integrity either way, Aldhelm.” The Thane’s voice was touched with a weariness beyond the physical. He continued the dispute more from duty than conviction.
“Would you have integrity or survival? You heard it said the other night—the created must transcend the creator. And his rules.”
“Or is it simply that you don’t trust those guidelines, Aldhelm? If so,
you
are the betrayer of your kin.” The Thane scuffed his boots against the ground. Gravel rasped against leather. He was anxious to move on. The longer they delayed, the more chance Aldhelm would need to put his ideas into reality.
Aldhelm, perhaps sensing the Thane’s thoughts, turned and walked away without answering the Thane’s last comment. The Thane watched him go. He put his hands in the pockets of his nightcloak, shifting his weight from one leg to another. He looked at the ground, then at the dwindling back of his kin-brother.
Then, slowly, he followed.
It was nearing dawn when they finally saw Gunnar once more. The man was scrambling up a ridge many meters above them, a deeper darkness etched against a satin sky. Either he couldn’t see the assassins below him— wrapped as they were in their nightcloaks—or he no longer cared. He glanced downward several times, but made no move to seek cover. He fought his way upward. The stillness carried the sound of falling pebbles to the Hoorka.
“We have to get closer, Aldhelm. The daggers won’t reach him at this distance.”
Aldhelm made no reply. He stared at the figure above him as if the intensity of his gaze could halt the man’s flight. Then he swept his nightcloak over one shoulder and drew an instrument from his pack. It glistened metallically in the moonlight. The Thane recognized it with a chill—an aast, a weapon that did for sonics much what the laser does for light—and he knew the charade was over.
“Aldhelm, Gunnar has no shield. An aast . . .” And he knew that Aldhelm was aware of that, and that he was simply wasting his breath.
Aldhelm fitted the power pack into its sockets and aligned the sights. A high keening wail like distant death came from the shielding of the weapon—Hag Death’s cry.
“The code, man—”
Aldhelm whirled, his nightcloak moving. “
Damn
your code!” His lips were drawn back from his teeth in a grimace. He turned and sighted down the barrel. Above them, Gunnar reached for a handhold.
“The Alliance, then!” The Thane’s voice was loud with desperation, though his mind told him to let it go, to be silent and watch as his days as Thane ended. “Think, kin-brother. They might be watching. D’Embry told me, promised me . . .”
Aldhelm shouted.
“No!”
A screech, a scream; the word struck rock and echoed through the peaks nearby. Against the stars, Gunnar turned, startled.
“Aldhelm, the Regent will protect us if we follow the code. I feel that to be true.”
“I can’t believe that, Thane. I’m sorry.” Aldhelm held the aast in position, waiting.
And, at once . . .
Gunnar stood, momentarily a silhouette against the night sky. Aldhelm’s finger convulsed on the triggering mechanism and a banshee howling cleaved the heavens. The Thane tugged at his side and loosed a dagger.
Aldhelm fell, his cry of rage shocking the mountainside.
Gunnar scrabbled his way to the top of the ridge and over.
It was done.
• • •
Her gray eyes watched with bland interest, a cool amusement. Head and shoulders; her features floated in the holotank like a dismembered corpse, the ivory sheen of the ippicator medallion bright against her sallow skin.
“So, Thane, it is over?”
He shrugged. “Yah. And you saw the hunt, m’Dame?”
D’Embry nodded. “I just ran the film through a viewer here—I assume that the one apprentice spoke to you of the hover-holos, since it did appear that he saw them. At that point, they were near Gunnar.”
“He mentioned them.” The Thane sat before the holotank, waiting. The call from the Regent d’Embry had been waiting when he’d returned to Underasgard. He supposed that he should be feeling apprehension and anxiety as he waited for her to speak, but he was too tired. He sat slump-shouldered in his chair. He felt surprisingly little at the moment. “And what of the film, m’Dame? How does it reflect on Hoorka?”
“Accurately. And interestingly.” Her hand appeared at the bottom of the holotank, fingering the ippicator bone that hung there. Suddenly noticing her own gesture, she held the bone out to the Thane. “You Hoorka remind me of the ippicator, you know. An odd combination of features that doesn’t seem viable, yet you exist.”
“The ippicator died.”
“So must we all, sirrah.” She let the medallion drop against her throat once more. “That was close, Thane. Very close.”
“You’ve made a decision, then?” He didn’t care what the answer was. He swore by She of the Five that he didn’t care.
“I have some contracts here for you to examine once you come to the Diplo Center again.” She did not smile. “I’m not sure I approve at all personally, but I can’t in conscience delay any longer. That news should cause rejoicing among the kin, neh?”
He should have felt vindication. He should have run shouting for Valdisa and his kin. Instead, he sat and stared at the mud on his boots.
• • •
Aldhelm awoke with the unsmiling face of the Thane hovering above him. Beyond the face he could see the fissured walls of Underasgard. He felt the coarse nap of a blanket against his arm, and to his ears came the faint sound of voices beyond the closed door of the room. Alive, then, he thought. Alive. He closed his eyes, inhaled, and opened them again.
The Thane was still there.
His face evidently echoed his surprise and relief at finding himself in other than the Hag’s domains, for the Thane moved away and spoke.
“That’s right, Aldhelm. You’re back in the caverns. And you’re still breathing. You may thank Dame Fate that I’m still capable of disabling a man without killing him.”
With an effort, Aldhelm managed to struggle to a sitting position—the Thane, seated on a floater next to the bed, made no move to help him. Something tugged at Aldhelm’s side and he grimaced at the sudden shock of pain. Burrs from the Dagorta underbrush dotted his clothing and the nightcloak laying across the foot of the bed. A med-kit weighted down his chest, the pinpricks of the IVs giving him a vague discomfort. His mouth was dry and stiff. His words rasped and scraped their way from his throat.
“The contract . . . ?”
The Thane shrugged. “Gunnar lives. Still.”
“And the Li-Gallant Vingi?”
“As you might expect, he is rather perturbed. But he can do nothing. The Assembly will protect us. The other guilds were given a full report by the Diplos.”
The Thane found himself reluctant to talk. Here was his revenge, and yet he was reticent to flaunt it in Aldhelm’s face. He forced himself to continue. “The Alliance had been watching, as I said they might be. The Regent showed Vingi their record of the night, and distributed copies to other guilds, here in Sterka at least. Vingi is satisfied—publicly.”
The Thane’s gaze was like the sting of a weapon.
“I did what I thought best for Hoorka and my kin,” Aldhelm said. “By She of the Five, I thought I was right.”
“Really?” The Thane couldn’t keep the sarcasm from his voice.
Before Aldhelm could reply, a young apprentice knocked at the door and entered the room, the light of the main caverns flooding in behind her. She bent her head in salutation. “Thane Valdisa has received a new contract, sirrah. She’d like you to see it.”
“Tell the Thane I’ll be there in a moment.”
The apprentice bowed once more and left them. Silence threatened to smother them.
It was several moments before it was broken. “Thane Valdisa?” Aldhelm’s voice was a fragile melding of melancholy and question.
“I—” A pause. “I dealt poorly with this whole situation. If I’d been a stronger leader, perhaps you wouldn’t have had a dagger in you, perhaps Eorl wouldn’t have been killed. And Valdisa is capable, perhaps not as good a knife-wielder as you, but she follows the code.” The Thane shrugged. “So I’m no longer the Thane. I’ve taken up my true name once more: Gyll—though I’ve heard some refer to me as Ulthane. An emeritus title for the creator, neh?” He smiled, wanly.
Again, silence came between them. There was nothing to say. After a moment, the Thane nodded his leave to Aldhelm and left the chamber.
Cranmer was waiting for him outside. The scholar had evidently been repairing his voicetyper—ink stained his forehead. The Thane smiled at the sight, and Cranmer inclined his head toward Aldhelm’s room.
“How is he?”
“Upset.”
“I don’t blame him, but he’ll understand in time, Gyll. You did what you needed to do. Events bore you out.” Cranmer’s hand grasped the Hoorka’s arm in affection and concern. “You saved Hoorka from extinction. Aldhelm would have destroyed your kin.”
“I didn’t do what I did to save Hoorka. I did it to stop Aldhelm. There’s a difference. And I don’t care for it.”
Cranmer shrugged. “Possibly . . .” He shook his head. “In any event, Valdisa—I mean,
Thane
Valdisa—asked me to be sure that the apprentice delivered her message and didn’t get waylaid in the kitchens.”
“It was delivered. I’m going there now. You can do something for me, also.”
“What, my friend? Clean the kitchens, launder your nightcloak?” He spoke with too much good humor.
“Find several apprentices and one large floater. You know where the ippicator skeleton sits in the caves. Collect the head and send it to m’Dame d’Embry. A gift to the Alliance from the Hoorka.”
Cranmer whistled. “That’s a princely gift, Ulthane. You of all people should realize what it’s worth.”
“It’s a dead animal, scholar. Nothing more. It’s worth nothing to Hoorka-kin. It belongs only to Neweden.”
Cranmer hesitated, then nodded. He rubbed his hand over his forehead, smearing the ink. “As you wish, sirrah. I’ll take care of it immediately, and I’ll let Valdisa know that you’re on your way to her. Talk to you later, neh?”
“I’ll have all the time you’ll need.”
“Good.” Cranmer walked away, an off-key whistling echoing in his wake.
Gyll leaned against a wall as his thoughts lashed at him. To hear another person called “Thane” had struck him more deeply than he wished to admit. At least he was still Hoorka, he reminded himself, still of the kin.
He hoped it would be enough.
DANCE OF THE HAG
FOR JOHN MASSARELLA—who made the dance begin,and who never saw the first one
Chapter 1
S
HE HAD A NAME, but she would not let it enter her thoughts. It was archaic, a useless symbol of the past still clinging to her like an autumnal leaf, dead and lifeless—like an ippicator. Her existence belonged to the Dead now; the past was something she had forcibly torn from her mind. It had been a systematic pillaging, a harvest all of discarded chaff, pain and disappointment and too few joys—the onus of being lassari. Now she had no past to haunt her and no future to mock her with false hope. There was only the long and endless present and the companionship of her fellow Dead.