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"Maybe." But Regis felt Danilo withdraw, and he said no more. As they rode on, he thought that, like it or not, the Terrans were here and nothing could ever be as it was before they came. What Beltran wanted was not wrong, Regis felt. Only the way he chose to get it. He himself would find a safer way.
He realized, with astonishment and self-disgust, the direction his thoughts were taking. What had he todo with all that?
He had ridden this road from Nevarsin less than a year ago, believing then that he was without laran andfree to shrug his heritage aside and go out into space, follow the Terran starships to the far ends of the Empire. He looked up at the face of Liriel, pale-violet in the noonday sky, and thought how no Darkovanhad ever set foot even on any of their own moons. His grandfather had pledged to help him go, if Regisstill wanted to. He would not break his word.
Two years more, given to the cadets and the Comyn. Then he would be free. Yet an invisible weightseemed to press him down, even as he made plans for freedom.
Danilo drew his horse suddenly to a stop.
"Riders, Lord Regis. On the road ahead."
Regis drew even with him, letting his reins lie loose on his pony's neck. "Should we get off the road?"
"I think not. We are well within the Domains by now; here you are safe, Lord Regis."
Regis lifted his eyebrows at the formal tone, suddenly realizing its import. In the isolation of the last days,in stress and extremity, all man-made barriers had fallen; they were two boys the same age, friends,
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bredin. Now, in the Domains and before outsiders once again, he was the heir to Hastur, Danilo his paxman. He smiled a little ruefully, accepting the necessity of this, and let Danilo ride a few paces ahead. Looking at his friend's back, he thought with a strange shiver that it was literally true, not just a word: Dani would die for him.
It was a terrifying thought, though it should not have been so strange. He knew perfectly well that anyone of the Guardsmen who had escorted him here and there when he was only a sickly little boy, orridden with him to and from Nevarsin, were sworn by many oaths to protect him with their lives. But ithad never been entirely real to him until Danilo, of his free will and from love, had given him that
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pledge. He rode steadily, with the trained control he had been taught, but his back was alive with
prickles and he felt the very hairs rise on his forearms. Was this what it meant, to be Hastur?
He could see the riders now. The first few wore the green-and-black uniform he had worn himself in thepast summer. Comyn Guardsmen! And a whole group of others, not in uniform. But there were nobanners, DO displays. This was a party of war. Or, at least, one prepared to fight!
Ordinary travelers would have drawn off the road, letting the Guardsmen pass. Instead Regis and Danilorode straight toward them at a steady pace. The head Guardsman-Regis recognized him now, the youngofficer Hjalmar-lowered his pike and gave formal challenge.
"Who rides in the Domains-" He broke off, forgetting the proper words. "Lord Regis!"
Gabriel Lanart-Hastur rode quickly past him, bringing his horse up beside Regis. He reached both handsto him. "Praise to the Lord of Light, you are safe! Javanne has been mad with fear for you!"
Regis realized that Gabriel would have been blamed for letting him ride off alone. He owed him anapology. There was no time for it now. The riders surrounded them and he noted many members of the Comyn Council among Guardsmen and others he did not recognize. At the head of them, on a great grayhorse, rode Dyan Ardais. His stern, proud face relaxed a little as he saw Regis, and he said in his harshbut musical voice, "You have given us all a fright, kinsman. We feared you dead or prisoner somewherein the hills." His eyes fell on Danilo and his face stiffened, but he said steadily, "Dom Syrtis, word camefrom Thendara, sent by the Terrans and brought to us; a message was sent to your father, sir, that youwere alive and well."
Danilo inclined his head, saying with frigid formality, "I am grateful, Lord Ardais." Regis could tell howhard the civil words came. He looked at Dyan with faint curiosity, surprised at the prompt delivery of thereassuring message, wondering why, at least, Dyan had not left it to a subordinate to give. Then he knewthe answer. Dyan was hi charge of this mission, and would consider it his duty.
Whatever his personal faults and struggles, Regis knew, Dyan's allegiance to Comyn came first.
Whatever he did, everything was subordinate to that. It had probably never oc-
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curred to Dyan that his private life could affect the honor of the Comyn. It was an unwelcome thought and Regis tried to reject it, but it was there nevertheless. And, even more disquieting, the thought that if Danilo had been a private citizen and not a cadet, it genuinely would not have mattered how Dyan treated or mistreated him.
Dyan was evidently waiting for some explanation; Regis said, "Danilo and I were held prisoner at Aldaran. We were freed by Dom Lewis Alton." Lew's formal title had a strange sound in his ears. He didnot remember using it before.
Dyan turned his head, and Regis saw the horse-litter at the center of the column. His grandfather? Traveling at this season? Then, with the curiously extended senses he was just beginning to learn how touse, he knew it was Kennard, even before Dyan spoke.
"Your son is safe, Kennard. A traitor, perhaps, but safe."
"He is no traitor," Regis protested. "He too was held a prisoner. He freed us in his own escape." He held back the knowledge that Lew had been tortured, but Kennard knew it anyway: Regis could not yet barricade himself properly.
Kennard put aside the leather curtains. He said, "Word came from Arilinn-you know what is going on at
Aldaran? The raising of Sharra?"
Regis saw that Kennard's hands were still swollen, his body bent and bowed. He said, "I am sorry tosee you too ill to ride, Uncle." In his mind, the sharpest of pains, was the memory of Kennard as he hadbeen during those early years at Armida, as Regis had seen him in the gray world. Tall and straight andstrong, breaking his own horses for the pleasure of it, directing the men on the fire-lines with the wisdomof the best of commanders and working as hard as any of them. Unshed tears stung Regis' eyes for theman who was closest to a father to him. His emotions were swimming near the surface these days, and hewanted to weep for Kennard's suffering. But he controlled himself, bowing from his horse over hiskinsman's crippled hand.
Kennard said, "Lew and I parted with harsh words, but I could not believe him traitor. I do not wantwar with Lord Kermiac-"
"Lord Kermiac is dead, Uncle. Lew was an honored guest to him. After his death, though, Beltran and Lew quarreled. Lew refused . . ." Quietly, riding beside Kennard's litter, Regis told him everything he knew of Sharra, up to the mo-
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ment when Lew had pleaded with Beltran to renounce his intention, and promising to enlist the help of Comyn Council ... and how Beltran had treated them all afterward. Ken-nard's eyes closed in pain when Regis told of how Kadarin had brutally beaten his son, but it would not have occurred to Regis to spare him. Kennard was a telepath, too.
When he ended, telling Kennard how Lew had freed them with Marjorie's aid, Kennard nodded grimly. "We had hoped Sharra was laid forever in the keeping of the forge-folk. While it was safely at rest, wewould not deprive them of their goddess."
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"A piece of sentiment likely to cost us dear," Dyan said. "The boy seems to have behaved with more
courage than I had believed he had. Now the question is, what's to be done?"
"You said that word came from Arilinn, Uncle. Lew is safe there, then?"
"He is not at Arilinn, and the Keeper there, seeking, could not find him. I fear he has been recaptured. Word came, saying only that Sharra had been raised and was raging in the Hellers. We gathered every telepath we could find outside the towers, in the hope that somehow we could control it. Nothing less could have brought me out now," he added, with a detached glance at his crippled hands and feet, "but I am tower-trained and probably know more of matrix work than anyone not actually inside a tower."
Regis, riding at his side, wondered if Kennard was strong enough. Could he actually face Sharra?
Kennard answered his unspoken words. "I don't know, son," he said aloud, "but I'm going to have totry. I only hope I need not face Lew, if he has been forced into Sharra again. He is my son, and I do notwant to face him as an enemy," His face hardened with determination and grief. "But I will if I must." And Regis heard the unspoken part of that, too: Even if I must kill him this time.
Chapter TWENTY-FOUR
(Lew Alton's narrative concluded)
To this day I have never known or been able to guess how long I was kept under the drug Kadarin hadforced on me. There was no period of transition, no time of incomplete focus. One day my headsuddenly cleared and I found myself sitting in a chair in the guest suite at Aldaran, calmly putting on myboots. One boot was on and one was off, but I had no memory of having put on the first, or what I hadbeen doing before that
I raised my hands slowly to my face. The last clear memory I had was of swallowing the drug Kadarinhad given me. Everything after that had been dreamlike, hallucinatory quasi-memories of hatred and lust,fire and frenzy. I knew time had elapsed but I had no idea how much. When I swallowed the drug, myface had been bleeding after Kadarin had ripped it to ribbons with his heavy fists. Now my face wastender, with raised welts still sore and painful, but all the wounds were closed and healing. A sharp painin my right hand, where I bore the long-healed matrix burn from my first year at Arilinn, made me flinchand turn the hand over. I looked, without understanding, at the palm. For three years and more, it hadbeen a coin-sized white scar, a small ugly puckered patch with a couple of scarred seams at either side. That was what it had been.
Now-I stared, absolutely without comprehension. The white patch was gone, or rather, it had beenreplaced by a raw, red, festering burn half the breadth of my palm. It hurt like hell.
What had I been doing with it? At the back of my mind I was absolutely certain that I had been lyinghere, hallucinat-
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ing, during all that time. Instead I was up and half dressed. What in the hell was going on?
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I went into the bath and stared into a large cracked mirror.
Hie face which looked out at me was not mine.
My mind reeled for a moment, teetering at the edge of madness. Then I slowly realized that the eyes, thehair, the familiar brows and chin were there. But the face itself was a ghastly network of intersectionscars, flaming red weals, blackened bluish welts and ridges. One Up had been twisted up and healed,puckered and drawn, giving me a hideous permanent sneer. There were stray threads of gray in my hair; I looked years older. I wondered, suddenly, in insane panic, if they had kept me here drugged while Igrew old....
I calmed the sudden surge of panic. I was wearing the same clothes I had worn when I was captured. They were crushed and dirty, but not frayed or threadbare. Only long enough for my wounds from thebeating to heal, then, and for me to acquire some new ones somehow, and that atrocious burn on myhand, I turned away from the mirror with a last rueful glance at the ruin of my face. Whatever pretensionsto good looks I might ever have had, they were gone forever. A lot of those scars had healed, whichmeant they'd never look any better than they did now.
My matrix was back in its bag around my neck, though the thong Kadarin had cut had been replacedwith a narrow red silk cord. I fumbled to take it out. Before I had the stone bared, the image flared,golden, burning ... Sharrat With a shudder of horror, I thrust it away again.
What had happened? Where was Marjorie?
Either the thought bad called her to me or had been summoned by her approaching presence. I heardthe creaking of the door-bolts again and she came into the room and stopped, staring at me with astrange fear. My heart sank down into my boot soles. Had that dream, of all the dreams, been true? Foran aching moment I wished we had both died together in the forests. Worse than torture, worse thandeath, to see Marjorie look at me with fear. . , .
Then she said, "Thank God! You're awake tins time and you know me!" and ran straight into my arms. Istrained her to me. I wanted never to let her go again. She was sobbing. "It's really you againl All thistime, you've never looked at me, not once, only at the matrix...."
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Cold horror flooded me. Then some of it had been true. I said, "I don't remember anything, Marjorie,nothing'at all since Kadarin drugged me. For all I know, I have been in this room all that time. What doyou mean?"
I felt her trembling. "You don't remember any of it? Not the forge-folk, not even the fire at Caer Donn?"
My knees began to collapse under me; I sank on the bed and heard my voice cracking as I said, "Iremember nothing, nothing, only terrible ghastly dreams...." The implications of Marjorie's words turnedme sick. With a fierce effort I controlled the interior heaving and managed to whisper, "I swear, Iremember nothing, nothing. Whatever I may have done . . . Tell me, in Zandru's name, did I hurt you,mishandle your*