Traitor's Sun (63 page)

“Forgive me if I do not believe you, Lew. It is just too fantastic.”
Dom
Francisco’s face was white with fury and frustration, and his voice was thready. A look of desperation filled his eyes, and he looked like a man who was watching his favorite horse break its leg.

“I hope it does not demand a blaster shot in the guts to change your mind, then. If you even have time to consider the matter,” Marguerida replied as if she were speaking of the weather.

The look of desperation increased. “Blasters are not allowed on Darkover.”

“That is not strictly true,” Robert Aldaran put in before anyone else could speak. “They are not permitted to the populace of Darkover because of the Compact, and we ourselves would never use them. But there are a goodly number of weapons of various sorts in the Terran complex in our Domain, and a greater amount at the spaceport. Regis has known this for years. Those, plus the presence of combat-trained troops in both places has been a source of concern for a long time. If you hadn’t spent so much energy disputing him, you would have been aware of the problem.”

“An Aldaran speaking of the Compact! When have any of you ever respected it?” No one responded to
Dom
Francisco’s question, but Lady Marilla looked at him with enormous distaste.

Javanne tried to rouse herself from her near stupor. “Yes, that is true—but I have never understood why we did not change. . . .” She seemed too exhausted to continue, suddenly, and lowered her head so her jaw almost touched her collar.

“Because we do not have command of the Federation bases on Darkover, obviously.” Mikhail shifted in his chair. “And we can hardly expect to overcome such weapons with swords and horses.”

“Why should we believe you?” Francisco asked, trying once more to gain control of the meeting.

“You give me too much credit for deviousness,
Dom
Francisco, and not enough for common sense! There is nothing in the world that would cause me to endanger the lives of any of you.”

“Mikhail is right,” Lady Marilla said suddenly, “and you are wrong, Francisco. Everything he has said Regis also said when he brushed through me a few minutes ago—did he not tell you the same?”

“Yes, but I cannot . . . cannot bear . . .” He shuddered again and tried to get a grip on his emotions. “It must have been some sort of trick.”

“Oh, do stop being a fool, Francisco,” Lady Marilla snapped, her usually placid face twisted with anger. “I have known Mikhail Hastur for decades, and he is right when he says he is not devious. We have been waiting—you, Javanne and I—for him to do something with his matrix to confirm our basest suspicions, and he has never done so. The temptation must have been incredible.” She cast Mikhail a fond look.

“Not really, Lady Marilla. In fact, the greatest temptation I have endured these past fifteen years has been the occasional one to give my mother laryngitis during her visits, since the sound of her voice has long since stopped giving me any pleasure.” At this, everyone, except
Dom
Francisco and Lady Javanne, began to chuckle. The tension broke for the moment, and an air of relief traveled about the chamber.

“And just what do you intend to do about this supposed plot, Mikhail? Would you have us ride into the jaws of death for your sake?” Francisco’s words sounded forced and thin.

“You are perfectly welcome to remain in Comyn Castle, or return to the Ridenow Domain,
Dom
Francisco,” Marguerida said with false sweetness, “and I am sure that no one will think any the less of you for trying to save your own skin. And then, if we all get killed by the Terranan, you will have the pleasure of trying to survive while they hunt you down like a dog. Which, if they take over Darkover, they will certainly do.”

Francisco Ridenow had the grace to blanch right down to the roots of his pale blond hair, and he glared fiercely at Marguerida. She had managed to imply that he was a coward without actually saying it, and there was nothing he could do about it.

Mikhail looked around the table again. There was a different atmosphere in the chamber than there had been just a few minutes before. The wariness that he was accustomed to feeling from Lady Marilla had departed, and there were other changes as well. Some of the fear and suspicion they felt toward him remained in several minds, but it was no longer as strong. Regis had reassured them, and they had believed him. More, the restraint he had demonstrated for years had finally made an impact. He had said he had only been tempted to silence his difficult mother, even though he had the ability to do much more, and they had believed him.

But there was more to it than a simple change of attitude. With the exception of his mother and
Dom
Francisco, he realized, these people
wanted
him to lead them. Regis’ death had unsettled them, and they were intelligent enough to know that there must be continuity, and that he was the person to provide it. Regis’ last gift to Darkover had been to tell the members of the Comyn Council to follow Mikhail Hastur, his heir. The alternative, everyone knew, was civil war of a kind that had not occurred on Darkover in centuries.

Mikhail experienced a moment of great relief, and also the sense that most of the people in the room were waiting for him to tell them how to proceed. Until this moment he had not realized how greatly everyone’s mistrust had weighed on him during the past fifteen years. At last the Comyn would allow him to lead them, and he could only hope that he was worthy of their sudden trust. “I am completely open to suggestions as to how to proceed—even including canceling the funeral train altogether for now.”

Dom
Gabriel shook his grizzled head slowly. “Not that, son. You can’t hide in here like your uncle did. No, we must meet this foe, but make it on our own terms, as much as possible. Indeed, if we can expose this plot for what it is, and embarrass the Federation with it, we will be in a much better position all around, won’t we?” He turned to Lew Alton as he asked his question.

“True, and wise,
Dom
Gabriel, but very difficult to manage. The first thing, I believe, is that we must not take the youngsters along at all—that is too dangerous.”

At this, everyone began to speak at once, offering their ideas, except for Francisco and Javanne. Mikhail listened and observed, and found that he was staring at
Dom
Damon. Something rustled in his mind, like a bit of paper in the wind, some tidbit that Regis had imparted earlier.

Dom
Damon was innocent of plotting with the Federation—all he had intended was to try to place Rafael in Mikhail’s position! He looked at his brother, the forgotten son, sitting stiffly beside him. It would not have worked, but
Dom
Damon was not clever enough to understand that. Still, it was a relief to know that while he could not trust the old devil too far, he was not part of the plot to attack the funeral train.

“We should call for
Dom
Cisco Ridenow,” Danilo said, breaking into Mikhail’s thoughts. Everyone looked at him. “His expertise will be very useful, I believe.”

There were nods of agreement at this, and a look crossed
Dom
Francisco’s face, as if he had been handed a reprieve. Mikhail caught the look as well as the whisper of thought behind it. Beside him, Marguerida was alert, and his brother Rafael, on his other side, turned his head toward the head of the Ridenow Domain with icy interest.
Dom
Francisco flinched—he had forgotten the absence of the dampers.

Don’t worry, Mik—I’ll see to it that he doesn’t try to kill you himself.
As he heard Rafael’s angry thought, a kind of clarity began to fill his mind, a sudden, blessed calm, which he could only hope would endure long enough to hammer out a plan. With Marguerida on one side, Rafael on the other, and Donal at his back, he could bring all of his attention toward the immediate threat. Then, with a sickening certainty, he knew that he had been moving toward this moment all his life—not as he had anticipated in his youth, nor planned in early adulthood. Nothing was happening according to his own imaginings—and yet, this was his destiny.

H
er dream was filled with an eerie wailing. Katherine reached toward the other side of the bed in her sleep. When her hand touched the empty pillow, she started to wake, and found there were tears on her face. Herm wasn’t there, and she thought for a moment her heart would break. Then she remembered that she would be joining him soon, in some little town called Carcosa, and the ache began to subside.

But the sound from her dream had not stopped, and she sat up and pulled her knees up against her chest, hugging them and shivering all over. It was not wailing at all, but something else, something she had never expected to hear again in her life—seapipes, or whatever they called that instrument on Darkover. It was coming from some distance, but the melody carried, and then another pipe took up the tune, mournful and heartbreaking. No wonder she was weeping.

Kate rubbed her face dry on her nightgown and swallowed several times. More and more pipes were joining in now, until, after several minutes, it sounded as if there were thirty or more, playing in every quarter of the city of Thendara. Although she had never heard the melody before, she knew it for a dirge, and it made her ache for Renney. In her mind, she could hear the sea crashing near the old manse where she had grown up, and the sound of seapipes playing at her mother’s death rites. She could almost smell salt in the air, so powerful was the evocation of memory and feeling.

A knock on the door of the suite interrupted her before she could completely surrender to the upwelling of emotions. Instantly she felt anxious. Had she slept into the middle of the day or had some terrible thing happened during the night? No, she was sure it was still morning, from the way the light came through the narrow window of her bedroom. Her heart raced as she pushed the covers aside, swung her long legs out, thrust her feet into slippers. The knock came again, sounding urgent, so she did not bother with a robe in the chilly room, but only grabbed a shawl from beside the bed and hurried to answer the door.

Gisela stood there, her arms filled with billows of dark fabric, her face chalky-white and stricken, her hair wild and half escaped from its clasp. There was a mark on one of her cheeks, the start of a bruise, and her eyes were puffy from crying. Without a word, Kate pulled her into the room and put her arms around her sister-in-law, so the pile of textiles was trapped between their chests.

“What is it?”

“I just brought you the clothes for the funeral,” Gisela answered, her voice strained.

“No,” Kate said, lifting her hand to touch the mark with tender fingers. “What is this? Rafael didn’t . . .” She and the children had had dinner in Gisela’s suite the night before, and her sister-in-law had not been hurt then. It had been a pleasant meal, much less formal than the lengthy suppers of the previous evenings. Meeting Gisela and Rafael’s children, Casilde, the oldest, and the two boys, Damon and Gabriel, had been pleasant, and Terése and Amaury had become quite noisy in the presence of their new cousins.

Gisela looked horrified at this suggestion. “Oh, no! Never. Not even when I deserved it!”

“Who, then? And don’t try to tell me you ran into the door or something—someone hit you!”

“Yes.” Gisela did not speak further for a few seconds. “My father.”

“Your father? But why?” Just then Rosalys, the maidservant, appeared from the other end of the suite, where she had a room near the children. “Will you get us some tea, Rosalys, and something to eat?” Kate took the bundle of clothing from Gisela, and held it out. “Please see that these are hung up, too.”

“Certainly,
domna.
” The servant gave the two women a curious look, took the garments, then bustled off to attend to the matter.

Kate drew Gisela toward the chairs that were placed around the hearth in the sitting room. The fire had died down overnight, so Katherine added a small log and poked the embers into life. Then she turned around and began to chafe her sister-in-law’s icy hands. She felt a callus which had begun to form across the right palm, where Gisela held her carving knife, and saw a tiny cut on one slender finger as well. A single tear swelled in one of Gisela’s eyes and rolled down her cheek. “Will you tell me what happened?” She brushed away the tear with her fingers, then drew off her shawl and draped it around the shoulders of the other woman.

Huddled in the chair, Gisela just shuddered. Then she looked up and said in a small voice “I did not know where to go.” And then, in a stronger tone, she added, “And I don’t want any damned tea!”

“Oh.” Kate glanced around the room, hearing the wailing pipes from outside the castle, and the soft sigh of the morning wind. Then she saw that there was a tray with a carafe of firewine and several glasses sitting on the table. She walked over, poured a glass, and brought it back to her sister-in-law. Gisela gulped it down in a few swallows, gasped, and began to cough.