Authors: Marion Z. Bradley
Not that Eduin could hurt me much with these wooden swords, not that I care so
much for a few bumps and bruises. But all my life that damnable old man has been
baiting me about my lack of skill. To make a fool of myself before Ellemir . to
let him humiliate me once again..
Esteban said in a strange, faraway voice, "Your starstone is insulated, Damon.
Uncover it."
Damon fumbled with the leather pouch, drew it off, letting the warm heaviness of
the matrix jewel rest against the base of his throat. He gave the pouch to
Ellemir to hold, and the quick brush of her warm fingers against his was a
reassurance.
Esteban said, "Stand back, Ellemir. And you too, Terranan. By the door, and see
that no servants come in here. They can't do much harm with the practice foils,
but even so-"
They withdrew slowly, and the two men faced one another, the heavy wooden swords
in hand, circling slowly. Damon was faintly conscious of the harsh grip-touch
that was Dom Esteban's (What did I tell Andrew, you get to recognize people by
their images as well as by their voices?) and felt a strange droning in his
ears, a sense of harsh pressure. He saw Eduin's sword come up, and before he
knew what he was doing, he felt the flexing of his own knees, his arm moving
without his knowledge in a quick whirling stroke. He heard the rapid-fire whack!
whack! whack! of wood-and-leather clashing, then saw an incongruous whirl of
images: Eduin's astonished face, with its seamed raw wound; Andrew's flare of
amazement; his own arm coming up and a rapid backward step and feint; Eduin's
sword flying out of his hand and across the room, landing almost at Andrew
Carr's feet. The Earthman bent and picked it up as the droning suddenly receded
from Damon's head.
Esteban said quietly, "Now do you believe me, kinsman? Have you ever been able
to touch Eduin before, let alone disarm him?"
Damon realized that he was breathing fast and his heart beating like a smith's
hammer at the forge. He thought, I never moved that fast in my life, and felt a
mingled fear and resentment. Someone else's hand, someone else's mind. in
control. control of my very body.
And yet- To get back at the damned cat-things who killed his Guardsmen, Dom
Esteban would have been the logical choice to lead swordsmen against them. And
he would if he could.
Damon had never especially wanted to be a swordsman. It wasn't his game. Just
the same, he owed the cat-men something. His men were relying on him, and he'd
left them to die. And Reidel had been his friend. If with Dom Esteban's help he
could do it, did he have the right to refuse?
Esteban was lying quite still, passive between his sandbags, just flexing and
unflexing his fingers thoughtfully. He did not speak, only met Damon's eyes with
a look of triumph.
Damon thought, Damn the man, he's enjoying this. But after all, why shouldn't
he? He's proved to himself that he's not completely useless, after all.
He put down the practice sword. From the naked jewel against his throat he was
picking up flashing impressions, wonder and terror from Eduin, a sort of
bemusement from Andrew, dismay from Ellemir. He tried to shut them all out, and
went toward the bed again.
He said slowly, steadily-but he had to force the words out-"I agree, then,
kinsman. When can we start?"
They started later that day, near to high noon, and Andrew, watching them ride
away from the roof of Armida, thought they were a small party to go up against
an army of nonhumans. He said so to Ellemir, who stood beside him wrapped to the
earlobes in a heavy plaid shawl of green and blue. She shook her head, saying in
an odd faraway voice, "Force alone wouldn't get them through. Damon has the only
weapon that matters-the starstone."
"It looks to me like he'll be doing some fairly tough fighting-or your father
will," Andrew said.
Ellemir answered, "Not really. That will just-if he's lucky-keep him from
getting killed. But swordsmen have failed, before this, to get into the
darkening lands. The cat-men know it, too. I am sure they took Callista in the
hope of capturing her starstone as well. The cat-people who are using a matrix
unlawfully must have discovered that she was here-in a general way one
matrix-user can spy out another-and hoped to gain her stone. Perhaps they even
hoped they could force her to use it against us. Men would have known
better-they would have known that any Keeper would die first. But the cat-people
are apparently just beginning to learn about these things-which is why there is
still some hope."
Andrew was thinking, grimly, that was lucky; if they had known more about
Keepers, the cat-people would not have kidnapped Callista, but simply left her
lying with her throat cut, in her bed. He saw from Ellemir's grimace of horror
that she had followed his thoughts.
The woman said in a low voice, "Damon blames himself for running away and
leaving his men to be slaughtered. But it was the right thing to do. If they had
captured him, and his starstone-alive-"
"I thought no one could use another's stone except under very special
circumstances."
"Not without hurting its owner terribly. But do you think the cat-men would have
hesitated to do that?" she asked, almost with contempt, and was silent.
The riders had virtually disappeared now, only three small dots on the horizon:
Damon and two swordsmen of the guard.
Andrew thought bitterly, I should have been with them. Rescuing Callista is my
job; instead I sit here at Armida, no more use than Dom Esteban. Less. He's
fighting along with them.
He had wanted to go. He had thought until the last that he would ride with them,
that he would be needed to guide them to Callista, at least when they got inside
the caves. After all, he was the only one who could reach her. Damon, even with
his starstone, couldn't. But Damon had absolutely refused.
"Andrew, no, it's impossible. The best bodyguard in the world wouldn't be able
to ensure you against getting killed accidentally. You are absolutely helpless
to defend yourself, let alone help anyone else. It's not your fault, my friend,
but all our energies have to go to getting inside the caves and getting Callista
out. The spare minute we might take to defend you might make the difference
between getting out alive-or not. And-let me remind you-if we get killed," he
said, his lips tightening, "someone else can try. If you get killed, Callista
will die inside the caves, from starvation, or ill-treatment, or with a knife in
her throat when they discover she's no good to them." Damon had laid his hand on
Andrew's shoulder, regretfully. "Believe me, I know how you feel. But this is
the only way."
"And how will you find her without me there? You can't, even with your
starstone; you just said so!"
"With Callista's starstone," Damon said. "You have access to the overworld. And
you can reach me, too. Once I am inside the caves, you can lead us to her
through the starstone."
Andrew still wasn't sure how that would be done. He had, in spite of yesterday's
demonstration, only the foggiest notion of how it worked. He had seen it work,
he had felt it work, but twenty-eight years of not believing in such things
weren't wiped away in twenty-eight hours.
At his side, on the parapet, Ellemir shivered and said, "They're gone. There's
no sense standing out here in the cold." She turned and went in through the
doorway that led into the upper corridor of Armida, and slowly, Carr followed.
He knew Damon was right-or more accurately, he had faith that Damon knew what he
was doing-but it was still galling. For days now, ever since he had realized
that if he lived through the storm, somehow he would find Callista and rescue
her, he had sustained himself with a mental picture of Callista, alone in the
darkness of her prison, of himself coming to her side and sweeping her up in his
arms, and carrying her away. Some damn romantic dream, he thought sourly.
Where's the white horse to carry her away?
He had never envisioned a world where men took swords seriously. For him a sword
was either something to look at on the wall of a museum, or something to play
with for exercise. He had wished for a gun or a blaster- that would make short
work of a cat-man, he'd bet-but when he had said so, Damon had looked at him
with as much horror as if he'd suggested gang-rape, cannibalism, and genocide,
and mentioned something called the Compact. Before signing his contract with the
Empire on Cott-man IV, Andrew had fuzzily noted that they did have something
there called the Compact, which as near as he could understand-he hadn't paid
much attention to it, you never paid much attention to technicalities of native
culture-forbade any lethal weapons which didn't bring the user within an equal
risk of being killed in return. Damon had spoken of it, saying it had been
universally accepted on Darkover, which seemed to be his name for the planet,
for either a few hundred years or a few thousand. Andrew wasn't sure which; his
command of the language was improving, but still wasn't perfect. So guns were
definitely out, although swordplay had become a fine art.
No wonder they start training their kids in fighting before they're out of short
pants. He wondered, in view of the ghastly cold weather on this planet, if
children ever wore short pants at all, and cut off the thought with impatience.
He went into the guest-room they had assigned him earlier and walked to the
window, drawing aside the curtain to see if he could still catch a glimpse of
Damon's party disappearing. But evidently they had ridden away past the crest of
the hill.
Andrew lay down on the bed, hands tucked behind his neck. He supposed sooner or
later he should go down and say a few polite words to his host. He didn't much
like Dom Esteban; the man had tried hard to humiliate Damon, but the man was an
invalid, and his host. Also, he felt some sense of obligation toward Ellemir. He
didn't know what he could say to her, torn as she was between fear for Callista,
fear for Damon, and anxiety about her father. But if he could do anything, or
say anything, to let her know he shared her anxiety, he ought to do it.
Callista, Callista, he thought, it's some world you brought me into.
Nevertheless, he felt a curious acceptance of what he would find here.
Callista's starstone around his neck felt reassuringly warm, like a live thing.
It's like touching Callista herself, he thought, the nearest to touching her
that I've ever come. Even through the silk insulation, there was an intimacy in
the touch against his throat. He wondered where she was, if it was well with
her, if she was crying alone in the darkness?
Damon seemed to think I could reach her through the stone, Andrew thought, and
he drew it from his shirt front. The grayish silk envelope in which it was
wrapped protected it from a careless touch. Carefully, mindful of Damon's
warning, he unwrapped it with infinite caution, and a curious sense of
hesitation. It's almost as if I were undressing Callista, he thought with a
tender embarrassment, and at the same time he was ready to explode with
hysterical laughter at the incongruity of the idea.
As he cradled the stone in his palm, he suddenly saw her close beside him. She
was lying on her side, her lovely hair tangled-he could see her in a strange
bluish light quite unlike the dim red sunlight in the room-and her face blotched
and swollen as if she had been crying again. Quite without surprise, she opened
her eyes and looked at him.
"Andrew, is it you? I had wondered why you had not come to me before," she said
softly, and smiled.
"Damon is on his way to you," Andrew said, and the surge of resentment that he
was not with them, that he would not be the one to find her, boiled over. He
tried to conceal it from her and realized too late that he could not, that in
this kind of close touching of minds no thought could be concealed.
She said very tenderly, "You must not be jealous of Damon; he has been as a
brother to me since we were children."
Andrew felt ashamed of his own jealousy. It's no good to pretend not to be
jealous, I'll just have to get beyond thoughts like that. He tried to remember
how much he had liked Damon, how close he had felt to him for a little while,
that in the deepest way of all he was grateful to Damon for doing what he
himself couldn't, and he saw Callista smiling gently at him. He sensed somehow
that he had overcome one of the first major barriers to acceptance on their own
terms as one of themselves in a telepath culture, that because of this he was
somehow less of an alien to Callista than he had been before.
She said, "You can come to me in the overworld now."
He looked at her helplessly. "I don't know how."
"Take the stone and look into it," she said. "I can see it, you know. I can see
it like a light in the darkness. But you must not come to me here, where my body
is. If my captors should see you, they might kill me to keep me from being
rescued. I will come to you." Abruptly, without transition, the girl lying
wearily on her side in the dark cave was standing before him at the foot of the
bed. "Now," she said. "Simply leave your solid body behind; step out of it."
Andrew focused on the stone, fighting back the faint, crawling inner nausea, the
perceptible surge of terror. Callista held out her hand to him, and suddenly,
with a strange, tingling sensation, he was standing upright (he had not moved at
all, he thought), and below him he could see his body, clad in the heavy
unfamiliar garments Damon had given him, lying motionless on the bed, the stone
between his hands.
He reached out his hand on the overworld level, and for the first time touched
Callista's. It felt faint, and ethereal, hardly a physical touch at all, but it
was a touch, he could feel it, and he saw from Callista's face that she felt it,
too.
She whispered, "Yes, you are real, you are here. Oh, Andrew, Andrew-" For an
instant she let herself fall against him. It was like embracing a shadow, but
still, for an instant, he felt her light weight against him, felt the warmth and
fragrance of her body in his arms, the wispy feel of her hair. He wanted to
crush her in his arms and cover her with kisses, but something in her-a faint
sense of hesitation, a drawing away-kept him from acting on his impulse.