The Sword of Aldones

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Once in every journey of Darkover around its sun, the Comyn, city folk, mountain lords, off-world consuls and ambassadors and Terrans from the Trade City, mingled together in carnival with a great outward show of cordiality. Centuries ago, this festival had merely brought Comyn and commoner together. Now it involved everyone of any importance on the planet; and the festival opened with the display of dancing in the great lower halls of the Comyn Castle.

Centuries of tradition made this a masked affair; in compliance with custom, I wore a narrow half-mask, but had made no further attempt at disguise. I stood at one end of the long hall, talking indifferently and listening with half an ear to a couple of youngsters in the Terran space service, and as soon as I decently could, I got away and stood staring out at the four miniature moons that had nearly floated into conjunction over the peak.-

Behind me the great hall blazed with colors and costumes that reflected every corner of Darkover and almost every known form of human or half-human life throughout the Terran Empire. Derik glittered in the golden robes of an Arturian sun-priest; Rafe Scott had assumed the mask, whip and clawed gloves of a kifirgh duelist.

In the corner reserved, by tradition, for young girls, Linnell’s spangled mask was a travesty of disguise, and her eyes were glowing with happy consciousness of all the eyes on her. As comynara, she was known to everyone on Darkover; but she rarely saw anyone outside the narrow circle of her cousins and the few selected companions permitted to a girl of the Comyn hierarchy. Now, masked, she could speak to, or even dance with perfect strangers, and the excitement of it was almost too much for her.

Beside her, also masked, I recognized Kathie. I didn’t know why she was here, but I saw no harm in it. She was safely barricaded by the bypass circuit I had built into her mind; and there was, probably, no better way of proving that she was not a prisoner, but an honored guest. From her resemblance to Linnell, they’d only think her some noblewoman of the Aillard clan.

Linnell laughed up at me as I joined them;

“Lew, I am teaching your cousin from Terra some of our dances! Imagine, she didn’t know them.”

My cousin. I suppose that was Callina’s idea. Anyway, it explained her badly accented Darkovan. Kathie said gently, “I wasn’t taught to dance, Linnell.”

“Not taught to dance? But what did you learn, then?” Linnell asked incredulously. “Don’t they dance on Terra, Lew?”

“Dancing,” I said dryly, “is an integral part of all human cultures. It is a group activity passed down from the group movements of birds and anthropoids, and also a social channeling of mating behavior. Among such quasi-human races as the chieri it becomes an ecstatic behavior pattern akin to drunkenness. Men dance on Terra, on Megaera, on Vainwal, and in fact, from one end of the civilized Galaxy to the other, as far as I know. For further information, lectures on anthropology are given in the city; I’m not in the mood.”

I turned to Kathie in what I hoped was properly cousinly fashion; “Suppose we do it instead?”

I added to Kathie, as we danced, “Of course you wouldn’t know that dancing is a major study with children here. Linnell and 1 both learned as soon as we could walk. I had only the public instruction, but Linnell has been studying ever since.” I glanced affectionately back at Linnell. “I went to a dance or two on Terra. Do you think our Darkovan ones are so different?”

I was studying the Terran girl rather closely. Why would a duplicate of Linnell have the qualities we needed for the work in hand? Kathie, I realized, had guts and brains and tact; it took them, to come here after the shock she had had, and play the part tacitly assigned to her. And Kathie had another rare quality. She seemed unconscious that my left arm, circling her waist, was unlike anyone else’s. I’ve danced with girls on Terra. It’s not common.

With seeming irrelevance, Kathie said, “How sweet Linnell is! It’s as if she were really my twin; I loved her, the minute I saw her. But I’m afraid of Callina. It’s not that she’s unkind — no one could have been kinder! But she doesn’t seem quite human. Please, let’s not dance? On Terra I’m supposed to be a good dancer, but here I feel like a stumbling elephant.”

“You probably weren’t taught as intensively.” That, to me, was the oddest thing about Terra — the casualness with which they regarded this one talent which distinguishes man from four-footed kind. Women who could not dance! How could they have true beauty?

I just happened to be watching the great central curtains when they parted and Callina Aillard entered the hall. And for me, the music stopped.

I have seen the black night of interstellar space flecked by single stars. Callina was like that, in a scrap torn from the midnight sky, her dark hair netted with pale constellations.

“How beautiful she is,” Kathie whispered. “What does the dress represent? I’ve never seen one just like it.”

“I don’t know,” I said. But I lied. I did not know why any girl on the eve of her marriage — even an unwilling marriage — should assume the traditional costume of la damnee; Naotalba, daughter of doom, bride of the daemon Zandru. What would happen when Beltran caught the significance of the costume? A more direct insult would have been hard to devise — unless she had come in the dress of the public hangman!

I excused myself quickly from Kathie and went toward Callina. She had agreed to the wishes of the Comyn; she had no right to embarrass her family like this, at such a late date.

But by the time I reached her, she was already getting that lecture from old Hastur; I caught the tail of it;

“Behaving like a naughty, willful child!”

“Grandfather,” said Callina, in that quiet, controlled voice, “I will neither look nor act a lie. This dress pleases me. It is perfectly suited to the way I have been treated by the Comyn all my life.” Her laugh was musical and unexpectedly bitter. “Beltran of Aldaran would endure more insults than this — for laran rights in council! You will see.” She turned away from the old man.

“Dance with me, Lew?”

It was no request but a command; as such I obeyed, but I was upset and didn’t care if she knew it. It was shameful, to spoil Linnell’s first dance like this!

“I am sorry about Linnell,” Callina said. “But the dress pleases my mood. And it is becoming, is it not?”

It was. “You’re too damned beautiful,” I said hoarsely. “Callina, Callina, you’re not going through with this — this crazy farce! I drew her into a recess and bent to kiss her, savagely crushing my mouth on hers. For a moment she was passive, startled; then went rigid, bending back and pushing me frantically away. “No!! Don’t!”

I let my arms drop and stood looking at her, slow fury heating my face. “That’s not the way you acted last night!”

She was almost weeping. “Can’t you spare me this?”

“Did you ever think there were things you might have spared me? Farewell, Callina comynara; I wish Beltran joy of his bride.” I felt her catch at my sleeve, but I shook her off and strode away.

I skirted the floor, grimly quiet. A nagging unease, half telepathic, beat on me. Aldaran was dancing with Callina now; viciously I hoped he’d try to kiss her. Lerrys, Dyan? They were in costume, unrecognizable. Half the Terran colony could be here, too, and I’d never know.

Rare Scott was chatting with Derik in a corner; Derik looked flushed, and his voice, when he turned and greeted me, was thick and unsteady. “Eve’n, Lew.”

“Derik, have you seen Regis Hastur? What’s his costume?”

“Do’ know,” Derik said thickly. “I’m Derik, that’s all I know. Have ’nough trouble rememberin’ that. You. try it some time.”

“A fine spectacle,” I muttered. “Derik, I wish you would remember who you are! Get out and sober up, won’t you? So you realize what a show you are giving the Terrans?”

“I think — forget y’self,” he mumbled. “Not your affair wha’ I do — ain’ drunk anyhow.”

“Linnell should be very proud of you!” I snapped.

“Li’l girl’s mad at me.” He forgot his anger and spoke in a tone of intimate self-pity. “Won’t even dansh—”

“Who would?” I muttered, standing on both feet so I would not kick him. I resolved to hunt up Hastur again; he had authority I didn’t, and influence with Derik. It was bad enough to have a Regency in such times. But when the heir presumptive makes a public idiot of himself before half a planet!

I scanned the riot of costumes, looking for Hastur. One in particular caught my eye; I had seen such harlequins in old books on Terra. Parti-colored, a lean beaked cap over a masked face, gaunt and somehow horrible. Not in itself, for the costume was only grotesque, but there was a sort of atmosphere, the man himself — I scowled, angry at myself. Was I imagining things already?”

“No. I don’t like him either,” said Regis quietly at my side. “And I don’t like the atmosphere of this room — or this night.” He paused. “I went to grandfather today, and demanded form.”

I gripped his hand, without a word. Every Comyn comes to that, soon or late.

“Things are different,” he said slowly. “Maybe I’m different. I know what the Hastur Gift is, and why it’s recessive in so many generations. I wish it was as recessive in me as in grandfather.”

I didn’t have to answer. He would heal. But now that new strength, that added dimension — whatever it was — was a raw wound in his brain.

He said, “You remember about the Hastur and Alton Gifts? How tight can you barrier your mind? Hell could break loose, you know.”

“In a crowd like this, my barriers aren’t worth too much,” I said. I knew what he meant, though. The Hastur and Alton Gifts were mutually antagonistic, the two like poles of a magnet which cannot be made to touch. I didn’t know what the Hastur Gift was; but from time immemorial in the Comyn, Hastur and Alton could work together only with infinite precaution — even in the matrix screens. Regis, a latent Hastur, his Gift dormant, I could join in rapport; could even force it on him undesired. A developed Hastur, which he had suddenly become, could knock my mind from his with the fury of lightning. Regis and I could read each other’s minds if we wanted to — ordinary telepathy isn’t affected — but we could probably never link in rapport again.

Reluctantly I found myself wondering. I had forced contact on Regis,; had he taken this step to protect himself from another such attempt? Didn’t he trust me?

But before I could ask him, the dome lights were switched off. Immediately the room was flooded with streaming, silvery moonlight; there was a soft “A — ah!” from the thronged guests as, through the clearing dome, the four moons, blazing now in full conjunction, lighted the floor like daylight. Suddenly, I felt a light touch, and looked down to see Dio Ridenow standing beside me.

Her dress — a molded tabard of some stuff that gleamed, green and blue and silver, in the shifting moonlight — was so breathtakingly fitted to her body that it might as well have been sprayed on; and her fair hair, the color of the moonlight, rippled like water with the glint of jewels. She tossed her head, with a little silvery chiming of tiny bells.

“Well? Am I beautiful enough for you?”

I tried to sidestep the provocative tone, the green witch-fire in her saucy eyes. “I must say it is an improvement over your riding breeches,” I said dryly.

She giggled and tucked her hand through my arm; a hard, light little hand. “Dance with me, Lew? A secain?” Without waiting for my answer, she tapped the rhythm-pattern on the light-panel, and after a moment the steady, characteristic beat of the secain throbbed into the invisible music.

The secain is no formal promenade. Last year Dio and I had outraged the dowagers and the dandies, even on the pleasure-world of Vainwal, by dancing it there. I didn’t want to dance it here. The floor was almost cleared now; most of the Thendara women are too prim for this wild and ancient mountain dance.

Still, I owed Dio something.

For a Darkovan girl, Dio was not a particularly expert dancer. But she was warm and vibrant; she smiled teasingly up at me, and, resenting that smile which took so much for granted, I whirled her till another girl would have screamed for mercy. But as she came upright she laughed at me; as always, she was scornful of my strength. She was like spring-steel tempered to my touch.

In the last figure of the dance I caught her tighter than the pattern of the dance demanded. This we had come to know well, this sense of being in key, body and mind, a closer touch than any physical intimacy. The beat of the secain throbbed in my blood, and as the music pulsed and pounded to climax, my senses pounded and pulsed, and as the final explosive drum-and-cymbal chord quivered and rang, I kissed her — hard.

The silence was anticlimax. Dio slid from my arms, and under the softening music we passed out under the open sky.

“I’ve been wondering—” teasingly, Dio lowered her voice, “when Hastur told you about your child — did you wonder about me?”

I frowned, displeased. That came too close for comfort. She laughed, but the laugh was sharp and mirthless.

“Thanks. I wasn’t, if that helps any. Lew — do you really want that girl Callina?”

This I would not discuss with Dio.

“Why? Do you care?”

“Not much.” But it didn’t sound convincing. “But I think you’re a fool. After all, she’s not a woman—”

Now I was really shocked. This was not like Dio. I said, angrily, “As much as yourself!”

“That’s almost funny, coming from you!”

I threatened, “Dio, if you make a scene, I will find it a pleasure to break your neck.”

“I know you will!” She was laughing again, but this tune it was high and hysterical. “That’s what I love about you! Your solution for all problems! Kill someone! Break a neck or two! But one thing I know, for sure; Callina’s finished, and Ashara’s going to lose her pawn!”

“What the devil are you talking about?”

She was still laughing that wildly hysterical laughter, “You’ll see! It could have been you, you know, you could have saved them all that trouble! You and your crazy scruples! You cheated yourself, and especially /Callina! Or, should I say, you played Ashara’s game—”

I caught her wrist with the trick hold I’d used on Regis and wrenched her abruptly round. My fingers crushed on her wrist till she writhed, “You brute, you’re breaking my arm! Damn it, Lew, you’re not funny, you’re hurting me!”

“You ought to be hurt,” I said savagely. “You ought to be beaten! What are they going to do to Callina? Tell me, or I swear, Dio, I’ve never used the Gift on a woman before, but I’ll tear it out of you if I have to!”

“You couldn’t!” We were facing each other now in a blaze of fury that obliterated everything outside. “Remember?”

“Damn you!” The truth made me savage. Dio alone of all people was completely and perfectly protected against my Gift, forever — because of what had been between us on Vainwal. It had to be that way.

There are things no telepath, no man, can control. That-touching — in intimacy, is one of them. And Dio was one of the hypersensitive Ridenow. To safeguard her sanity, I had given her certain defenses against me. I could never take more from her, telepathically, than she wanted to give. More was impossible. I could remove that barrier — if I wanted to kill her. No other way.

I swore, impotently. Suddenly Dio flung her arms around my neck, eyes burning at me like green flames. “You blind fool,” she choked, “you can’t see what’s before your very eyes, and you’ll go blundering in again and spoil it all! Can’t you trust me?”

She was very close, and the contact was dizzying. Realizing, what she was doing, I thrust her suddenly and roughly away. “That won’t get you anywhere.”

Her face hardened. “Very well. There is a rumor current — and believed — that only a virgin may hold Callina’s particular powers. There is, shall I say, a certain faction which holds to the belief that we would all be better off if Callina were — let’s say — made suddenly powerless. And since your conduct is above reproach, there is one way to remedy the situation—”

I stared at her, dimly beginning to realize what she meant. But that was horrible! And was there any man on Darkover who would dare — “Dio, if this is your idea of a filthy joke—”

“A joke, but it’s on Ashara,” she said. Suddenly she grew quiet and deadly serious. “Lew, trust me. I can’t explain, but you’ve got to keep out of it. Callina isn’t what you think, not at all. She isn’t—”

I brought my hand back and slapped her, hard. The blow sent her reeling. “You’ve had that coming for a year,” I grated.

Suddenly Regis was close beside me; in an instant he had caught the overflowing of my thought, and his face paled. “Callina!”

Dio stood holding her cheek where I had slapped her, staring open-mouthed; but she threw herself forward on me now. “Wait,” she begged, “Wait, you don’t understand—”

I thrust her aside, swearing. Regis kept pace with me. Finally he breathed, “But who would dare? A Keeper, remember — actually to lay hands on her?”

I stopped. “Dyan,” I said at last, quietly. “What did she say, in council? No man lives to maul me three times. If that were the first—”

We were in light surface contact. Abruptly I stopped him; he looked at me grimly and the touch of his mind fell from mine as clasped hands loosen.

“I thought so,” I said. “When we touch, all the strength drains out of us both. They’ve smuggled some trap-matrix in there, eighth or ninth level, the kind that picks up vital energy—” My jaw fell. “Sharra!”

“Lew, are we feeding that damned thing?”

“We’ll hope not,” I said!"Can you touch Callina?”

I felt Regis, almost instinctively, grope for contact again; quickly, I barricaded myself. “Don’t ever do that!” I commanded. The fumbling touch was raw agony; yet endure it I must, danger or no, at least once more. “Regis, when I say the word, link with me — for about a thousandth of a second. But whatever you do, don’t freeze into rapport with me! If you do, we’ll both burn out. Remember, you’re Hastur and I’m Alton!”

He swallowed, convulsively. “You’d better do the linking. I can’t control it yet.”

For the barest instant, then, we contacted, in a scanning that sifted the whole diameter of the crowd. It was not a hundredth of a second, but even that flung us apart in a shock of blinding pain. A full tenth of a second would have burned out every spark of vital energy in our bodies. To who-ever controlled the hidden matrix, it must have flamed like a starship on a radar screen.

But I knew what I wanted. Somewhere in the castle, a trap-matrix — not Sharra this time — was focused, with obscene intensity, on the weakest link in the Comyn: Derik Elhalyn.

And I had thought him only drunk!

The thick, inarticulate speech; the irritable confusion of brain, the fumbling limbs — all symptoms of a mind under an unmonitored matrix. And whoever set it, had a mind both perverted and sadistic — that this complex revenge on Callina should be carried out by Linnell’s lover!

I reached for Callina, but only emptiness greeted my seeking mind. It is a horrifying thing to feel only an empty place in the fluid mechanism of space, where once there was a living mind. Could even death blank her away so completely?

Regis turned a strained, heartbroken face to me.

“Lew, if he’s touched her—”

“Easy. Derik doesn’t know, he never will know what he’s doing, you know. Listen; I need your help. I’m going straight into Derik’s mind and try to lift the matrix trap.” For the first time in my life I was grateful for the Alton Gift, which could force rapport — and which could go into a matrix without the half-dozen monitors and dampers an ordinary matrix mech would need. “Those things are plain hell, Regis. Now, when I get it lifted, you try to break it up. But don’t you touch me — or Derik — or you’ll kill all three of us.”

It was a desperate chance. No sane person will go into a mind controlled by a trap-matrix; it is walking into a blind alley which may be filled with monsters ready to spring. And I would have to drop all my barriers, and trust the untried strength of a newly-Zaran Hastur who could kill me with a random touch.

Every instinct screamed no; but I reached out and focused on Derik.

And knew, at once, I had touched that thing before; when I tried to probe Lerrys.

Derik, like a man who feels the sting of a knife through an incomplete anesthetic, twisted to escape; but this time I held fast, grimly- forcing- my focused strength as a wedge between mind and the trick matrix that held it in submission.

Behind me, as a man may look at mirrored light he dares not face, I sensed Regis; he had seized on that alien force, and he was tearing it to bits; destroying each strand of force as I lifted that telepathic web, thread by thread, out of the nerves of Derik’s brain.

But now it was being forced on me, too. As a man at a screen may watch two starships battle, so the holder of this unholy matrix was watching the three-way duel, perhaps ready with a new weapon. Necessity and the need for haste made me careless how I tortured Derik; but I knew, too, if Derik were himself, he would thank me for this.

As I forced down barrier after barrier, something fought me, a grotesque parody of the real Derik; but I won. I felt it flicker, vanish like a trace of smoke, burnt away. The compulsion was gone, the trap-matrix destroyed — and Derik, at least, was clean.

I withdrew;

Regis leaned against a pillar, his face dead white. I asked, “Could you tell who was controlling it?”

“Not a trace. When the matrix shattered, I felt Callina, but then—” Regis frowned, “she blanked again, and all I felt was Ashara! Why Ashara?”

I didn’t know. But if Ashara were aroused and aware, at least she would protect Callina.

We had given ourselves away, Regis and I; we had lost vital strength; but for the moment, perhaps, we were safe. My main worry now was for Regis. I was mature, trained in the use of these powers, and I knew the limits of my own endurance. He didn’t. Unless he learned caution, the next step would be nerve depletion and collapse.

I tried to warn him, but he shrugged it off. “Don’t worry about me. Who’s that with Linnell?”

I turned to see if he meant Kathie or the man in harlequin costume who had so disturbed me. Beside them was another masked figure, a man in a cowled robe which hid his face and body completely. But something about him reminded me, suddenly and horribly, of the hell in Derik’s mind. Another victim — or the controller? I had to fight myself to keep from running across the room and pitching him bodily away from Linnell.

I went toward them, slowly. Linnell asked, “Lew, where have you been?”

“Outside, watching the eclipse,” I said briefly.

Linnell glanced up at me, timidly, troubled.

“What is it, chiya?” The childish pet name still came easily.

“Lew, who is Kathie, really? When I’m near her, I feel terribly strange. It’s not just because she looks so like me, it’s as if she were me. And then I feel — I don’t know — as if I had to come close to her, touch her, embrace her. It’s a kind of pain! I can’t keep away from her! But if I do touch her, I want to pull away and scream—” Linnell was twisting her hands nervously, ready to burst into hysterical tears or laughter. I didn’t know what to say. Linnell wasn’t a girl to fret over trifles; if it affected her like this, it was no minor whim.

Kathie had been dancing with Rafe Scott. As she came back, she smiled at Linnell; and almost without discernible volition, Linnell began to move in her direction. Was Kathie working some malicious mental trick on my little cousin? But no. Kathie had no awareness of Darkovan powers. I knew that. And nothing could get through that block I’d put on her.

Linnell touched Kathie’s hand, almost shyly; in immediate response, Kathie put an arm around Linnell’s waist, and they walked for a minute like that, enlaced. Then, with a sudden lithe movement Linnell drew herself, free and came and caught at me.

“There’s Callina,” I said.

The Keeper, aloof in her starry draperies, threaded her way through the maze of dancers. “Where have you been, Callina?Linnell demanded. She looked at her sister’s strange costume “with sorrowful puzzlement, but she did not comment; and Callina made no attempt to justify or explain herself.

“Yes,” I demanded, with an intent look at Callina, shading the words telepathically, “where have you been?”

She seemed unaware of either overtone, and her careless words were devoid of any hidden message that I could read. “Talking with Derik. He drew me apart to hear some long confused drunken tale of his, but he never did get it told. I don’t envy you, darling,” she added, smiling at her sister. “Fortunately all the wine conquered him at last — may he never be defeated by a worse enemy.” She shrugged daintily. “Hastur is signaling to me. Beltran is there, I suppose it’s time for the ceremony.”

“Callina—” Linnell almost sobbed, but the woman moved away from her outstretched hands. “Don’t pity me, Linne,” she said, “I won’t have it.” And I could tell that what she meant was “I can’t bear it.”

I don’t know what I might have said or done, but she drew herself away; her eyes brooded, blue ice like Ashara’s, past me into silence. Bitterly helpless, I watched her shrouded form move through the bright crowd.

I should have guessed everything then, when she left us without a touch, silent and remote as Ashara’s self, making a lonely island of her tragedy and cutting us all away from her. I listened, numbed, as Hastur made the formal announcement and locked the doubled marriage bracelets upon the arms of the pair. Callina was Beltran’s consort from the moment Hastur released her hand.

I glanced round at Regis and suddenly, appalled, sucked in air; the boy had turned ashen gray. I slid an arm around him and half-carried him to the archway. He drew a sobbing breath as the cold air reached his face, and muttered, “Thanks. Guess you were right.” And abruptly he doubled up and collapsed on the floor. His lax hand was clammy and his breathing was shallow. I looked around for. help. Dio was crossing the floor, on Lerrys arm—

Lerrys stopped dead in his tracks. He stared around wildly for a moment, his face convulsed; stiffened and clutched at Dio.

That was the first shock-wave. Then hell broke loose. Suddenly the room was a distorted nightmare, warped out of all perspective, and Dio’s scream died in shivering air that would not carry sound. Then she was struggling in the grip of something that shook her like a kitten. She took one faltering step-Then I saw two men standing together, the only calm figures in the distorted air. The harlequin and the horrible cowled man. Only now the cowl was flung back, and. it was Dyan’s cruel thin-lipped face that glared bleakly at Dio. She moved, fighting, another step, another; slid to the floor and lay there without moving.

I fought the paralysis of the warped space that held us in frozen stasis. Then harlequin and cowl turned — and caught Linnell between them.

They did not physically touch her. But ;she was in then-grip as if they had bound her hand and foot. I think she screamed, but the very idea of sound had died. Linnell writhed, caught by some invisible force; a dark, flickering halo suddenly sprang up around them; Linnell sagged, held up hideously balanced on empty air; then fell, striking the floor with a crushing impact. I sobbed soundless curses; I could not move.

Kathie flung herself down by Linnell. I think she was the only person capable of free motion in the entire hall. As she caught Linnell in her arms, I saw for a moment that the tortured face had gone smooth and free of horror; a moment Linnell lay quiet, soothed, then she struggled in a bone-wrenching spasm and slackened — a loose, limp, small thing with her head lolling on her twin’s breast.

And above them harlequin and cowled shadow swelled, took on height and power. For a moment, seeing clearly outside space, Kadarin’s gaunt’ features blazed through the harlequin mask. Then the faces swam together, coalesced — and for a moment the beautiful, damnable face I had seen in Ashara’s Tower reeled before my eyes; then the shadows closed down.

Only seconds later the lights blazed back; but the world had changed. I heard Kathie’s scream, and heard the crowd milling and crying out as I elbowed and thrust my way savagely to Linnell.

She was lying, a tumbled, pathetic heap, across Kathie’s knees. Behind her, only blackened and charred panels of wall and flooring showed where distortion and warp had faded to normal, and Kadarin and Dyan were gone — melted away, evaporated, not there.

I knelt beside Linnell. She was dead, of course. I knew that, even before I laid my hand to the stilled breasts. Callina thrust Kathie aside, and I stood back, giving my place to Hastur, and put an arm around Callina; but though she leaned heavily on me, she took no notice of my presence.

Around me I heard the stir of the crowd, sounds of command and entreaty, and that horrible curiosity of a crowd when tragedy strikes. Hastur said something, and the crowds began to thin out and clear away. I thought, this is the first time in forty generations that Festival Night has been interrupted.

Callina had not shed a tear. She was leaning on my arm, so numbed with shock that there was not even grief in her eyes; simply, she looked dazed. My main worry was now for her; to get her away from the inquisitive. remnant of the crowd. It was strange I did not once think of Beltran, though the marriage bracelet about her arm lay cold against my wrist.

Her lips moved.

“So that was what Ashara intended…” she whispered.

With a long, deep sigh, she went limp on my arm.