Exile's Song (42 page)

“Now, there’s a thought,” she replied, anxious to enter into the spirit of the thing and to avoid discussing more serious matters. “What a good idea! But I have no skill with plants, you see. I confess I have never given a thought to mushrooms before—where they came from and how. I just eat them whenever I get the opportunity. In fact, I am quite greedy about it. I always thought they just grew, grew like, well, mushrooms.” Her mouth was babbling because she did not want him to stop talking, because she wanted to return to their earlier camaraderie. He was disturbed by the distant argument, but he had withdrawn a little into himself as well.

“There are several mushroom farms in the Kilghards. I could probably find you one that has been abandoned. I think it is pretty simple—you find a dead tree and gather ye mushrooms while ye may. I mean, I never knew anyone who planted them, so I guess they just happen. You wait for them to get ripe—or whatever mushrooms get—harvest them, and that’s it. No weeding, no beating off birds.”

There was a sharp, sarcastic tone in his voice, as if he were fighting with himself about something. She was nearly tempted to use her newfound
laran
to discover why, but she resisted. She wondered then how the Darkovans managed to keep out of each others’ minds. She must remember to ask Istvana.

“And no running out to the stable to deliver a foal in the middle of the night either.”

“Exactly! You will need a sharp knife and some baskets and . . .” They both started laughing so hard that tears formed in their eyes.

The door to the library opened and Gabriel Lanart-Alton and Istvana Ridenow entered, both in high color, and looked at them. Margaret felt as if she had been caught doing something naughty, and Mikhail turned red to the roots of his fair hair. They exchanged a swift glance, which was a mistake, for the look nearly set them off laughing again.

“What are you doing here?” Gabriel almost snarled to his youngest son.

“I was just telling my kinswoman about the delights of Armida,” Mikhail answered stiffly, his humor vanishing.

“That’s no business of yours! I’ll tell her all she needs to know. Now take yourself off.”

Mikhail stiffened at this crude dismissal, gave his father a look that was empty of affection, and left the library.
I won’t argue with him! Even if it kills me!

Margaret heard the thought and felt the rage simmering beneath it. She wanted to do something, to leap to Mikhail’s defense and tell the old tyrant to do something anatomically unlikely. The strength of her emotion startled her. It was almost as if she and Mikhail were allies. It was more than mere liking, she realized, feeling the cold within her rise in response to the sense of kinship that had nothing to do with blood. The heat of her yearning to defend Mikhail warred with the habitual remoteness which had always kept her apart, and neither had the upper hand. She bit her lip, then glared fiercely at her uncle. She sat silent, her hands clenched in her lap, until Gabriel began to squirm with unease.

“I want you to come to Armida, Marguerida, and I want you to come as quickly as possible.” Gabriel began to speak in a calm voice, but it rapidly turned into a barking command.

“I think that would be a very bad idea,” Istvana said. “You really need to come to the Tower and learn how to use some of your talents. It is true that we have removed the major impediment to your Gift, but without training, you are still as helpless as a newborn babe. And dangerous, to boot. I have explained this to you, and I thought you understood. Then
Dom
Alton informs me that you are removing to Armida immediately and . . .”

Margaret looked from one to the other. She liked the
leronis
and, more, after their days and nights together, she trusted her. She felt almost safe in the presence of Istvana, as safe as she had ever felt with Dio. She did not like Gabriel Lanart-Alton one bit, though it was possible he had some hidden virtues lurking in his great chest. She was inclined to favor Istvana’s suggestion, but only to spite her high-handed kinsman. At the same time she knew that would be extremely stupid, because within her there was some quiet knowledge that her path did not lie toward Neskaya. If only there were some impartial person to talk to. If only Ivor was still alive! What would her beloved mentor have made of all this?

She considered discussing her problem with Rafaella, for she trusted the Renunciate now, trusted her and valued her companionship. She knew, intuitively, that Rafaella would follow her to the ends of Darkover, but Margaret was also aware that her friend was young and headstrong.
Almost as headstrong as I am,
she thought wryly.

“There is no need for Marguerida to go to the Tower at Neskaya,” Gabriel informed the
leronis,
once again swelling with the indignation of having his will thwarted. “My daughter Liriel and my kinsman Lord Damon Ridenow can take care of her. She’s over the threshold sickness now, and I see no reason to pamper her as if she were . . .”

“I have nothing but respect for
our
kinsman,” Istvana interrupted, emphasizing her own relationship to Lord Damon, “but he alone is not a full Tower circle, and neither is Liriel, excellent technician though she is.” She paused, then continued. “You cannot imagine what Marguerida has been through, nor do you know what sort of care and training she needs.” She gave Margaret a motherly look and smiled. “Surely even you can see the sense in her coming to Neskaya, Lord Lanart.”

Margaret observed this restrained insult, aware that in using a lesser title, not
Dom
Alton, Istvana was subtly putting the man in his place. She made it sound as if Gabriel barely had the sense to come in out of the rain, and he bristled. “Marguerida belongs with her family! She has to learn our ways, and do her duty as an Alton.”

“While the two of you are busy planning my future for me, neither of you knows nor seems to care wbat I want.” Margaret spoke quietly and found both of them looking at her as if she had suddenly grown an extra head. “It doesn’t seem to occur to either of you that I have my own life, my own plans and ambitions, and that those may not include either Armida or Neskaya.”

“Not this damn foolishness about leaving Darkover again! I won’t have it! You belong here, and you are staying here!”
I’ll have my men put her under arrest, if I must. I don’t want her going off with this witch—
laran
is a curse!—and I dare not leave her here.

Margaret realized that her kinsman was doing what he believed to be best, and that he really could not understand why she was resisting him. He was not stupid, just very determined to have his own way, from his own sense of right and wrong. With a slight shock, Margaret realized that Gabriel really meant well, that he wanted to do the best he could. A small, grudging admiration for the man started to form, for she knew that it was not easy for him to stand up to Istvana.

The
leronis,
on the other hand, was concerned that having unblocked her potential, she might come to harm through her own vast ignorance. Poor Gabriel sincerely believed that she belonged at Armida, married to one of his sons and bearing a child as often as possible. He did not know any other proper way for a woman to live, and she could sense that he regarded any choice but marriage and motherhood as unnatural.

What did she want, then? Mikhail had asked her that and she realized what an important question it was. She had very little idea what sort of life living in a Tower might be like, but it didn’t really sound appealing. She knew it involved using matrices, and she found even the thought of them unnerving.

The Renunciates were an alternative, but she knew she was no Magda Lorne, and that living the circumscribed life of a Free Amazon was not a path she wished to pursue. As for marriage and children, she had never really thought about it before now, but did not think she was really suited for it. With the right person, it might be fine, but she had never met anyone yet who seemed a good match. She would like someone as learned as Ivor, as strong as her father, but also someone who could laugh a great deal. Powerful and playful seemed like an impossible combination. She had traveled widely, and she was fairly certain she could never be completely happy to live only on Darkover.

Her nickname seemed to echo in her mind, and for a moment she thought that either Gabriel or Istvana had thought her name. Then she realized that neither of them would call her that—that it was too intimate for these near strangers, despite their kinship to her. Dio would, and, more rarely, the Senator. But it was not a woman’s voice she had heard.

For the first time she could remember for years, Margaret
wanted
her father. She found herself thinking of a moment when she had been very small, when she had sat in his lap, leaned her head against his chest, and listened to the steady thump of his heart with total trust. He had a certain smell that was comforting.

There was a vast vacancy within her which longed to be filled, not by the man she had known on Thetis, but by that other Lew Alton who had existed when she was a child. She knew she could never be a girl again, snuggling into his arms, but that did not mean she did not want to. She wished he were there, not light-years away. Although she had no direct experience of his strength and wisdom, she was sure he would be able to tell her what to do.

Time seemed to still for a second, and she forgot the presence of the man and the
leronis
in the library with her. Instead, she remembered a fragment that had come during her illness, the sense that Lew was in the room, talking to her. She had thought it was some fever dream, but now she was not sure. Maybe he was not somewhere on the other side of the galaxy.

Margaret recalled the surprise she had encountered from more than one person that Lew was not on Darkover, as if he were expected momentarily. There were things going on which she knew nothing of. And the sense of his presence was very strong. She did not need
laran
to sense it. She could almost smell him.

Marja! Go to Armida! It will be all right.
Chiya,
it will be all right at last!

The effect of these words was nearly overwhelming, for they were accompanied by such a great flood of feelings, of longing and affection, that Margaret felt her heart would break. She did not believe that the Senator’s thoughts were coming to her from far away. Logic, her faithful servant, then suggested that he must already be on Darkover. But, surely, Gabriel and Istvana would know if he were.

No matter. She was sure it was Lew Alton whose voice she heard. She had asked for guidance, and he had given it, as a father should to a daughter, however undutiful and headstrong. For an instant she resented that she was being told what to do again—that another person was deciding what was best. He had wanted her to leave home, because he could hardly bear to look at her as she grew into womanhood, and now he wanted her to go to Armida. But it all seemed to make a crazy sort of sense, somehow. She had no words to describe the rightness she felt at that moment.

Gabriel Lanart was preparing for another one of his commanding performances, and Istvana was restraining clear annoyance with the blustering man. Before he could speak, Margaret nodded.

“I will come to Armida. I am sure Rafaella can escort me there.”

“Nonsense! You will accompany me.”

“I will come in my own time, Uncle.”

“But . . . oh, very well.” He seemed prepared to make the best of it, and she was pleased to see he did not gloat over his apparent victory. “I am happy you have at least shown the sense to do as you are told, and stop talking about leaving Darkover or going to a Tower or any other foolish notions you might have in your mind.” His sturdy body relaxed, and for the first time she saw his resemblance to Mikhail. He must have been very handsome when he was young. “We’ll see you settled before Midwinter.”

Margaret gave him a half-smile. “I am not doing this for you,
Dom
Gabriel, and I doubt you will ever see me settled, by Midwinter or any other time. You have no authority over me, and I hope you will disabuse your mind of the idea that you do.”

“We will knock those foolish Terranan ideas out of you, and you will do as you are told.”

“Please, don’t make me regret my choice,” she answered with more mildness than she felt. She was suddenly too tired to argue any further. “I will do as I wish, no matter what you believe.”

Gabriel Lanart raged silently for a moment, then stormed out of the library once again. Istvana looked at Margaret. “Be careful. Gabriel may look like a stuffy old fool, but he is both canny and powerful, Marguerida.”

“I know, but it just makes me furious the way he behaves. I’m not used to being meek and mild, to doing what I am told the way he clearly expects me to.”

Istvana gave a small chuckle and nodded. “
Dom
Gabriel is of the old order, and he refuses see how much Darkover has changed since your father left. I am not entirely at ease with the changes myself, but I do know that change is inevitable, no matter how we would wish otherwise. And believe me, I often wish otherwise.”

“Why?”

“Half the youngsters who come for training are full of ideas about leaving Darkover, and the rest are hoping for a return to the past. It makes it very difficult for all of us.”

“I can see that. Do you think I made the right choice?”

Istvana hesitated. “I heard him, too,” she answered. “I suspect that half the
leroni
on Darkover heard him.” She rubbed her forehead, as if she wanted to remove an ache. “I am concerned, but I think you are doing the right thing. I trust that Jeff will see you come to no harm. You can depend on him.”

“Thank you, for everything.”

“I did my best, my duty, but I admit I rather enjoyed it. When I am an old woman, in my dotage, I will no doubt bore the young with my tale of Marguerida Alton and the Tower of Mirrors.” She gave a little shiver. “It will take me until my dotage to recover from the experience!” Then she chuckled and looked years younger. “I wish you all that is good,
chiya.
You deserve it.”