Exile's Song (58 page)

“Herm Aldaran, who has been sitting in the lower house for six years, is taking my place. He’s sound, experienced, and he knows how to deal with the Terrans better than I do. He is also young enough to do the job. I was getting stale and frustrated.”

“An Aldaran in the Senate!” Javanne looked quite alarmed, but Margaret was immensely relieved. “He will hand Darkover to the Terranan on a platter. Are you mad?”

“On the contrary, Javanne. Herm may be the only man in the galaxy who can save us from that just now.”

Margaret gave her father a sidewise glance from beneath her lashes. She had never heard of Herm Aldaran, but guessed he must be some sort of relative, like everyone else. She knew that the Aldarans were mistrusted by both the Ardais and her aunt and uncle, but she did not know why. “Save us?”

“During the most recent election the Expansionist Party got control of the lower house.”

“What’s that?” Rafael asked quietly, before his mother could speak.

Lew stared at his kinsman for a moment. “The government of the Federation follows an old Terran form of a two body system. The lower house, the Commons, formulates policy, and the Senate makes sure they don’t run wild with it. There are a number of parties in the Federation at present, but the largest are the Expansionist Party and the Liberals. For the past several decades, the Liberals, who believe that planets should choose the sort of government they wish, have been the majority in both houses. Now this has changed. There are just barely enough votes in the Senate to prevent the Expansionists from changing policy so that the needs of the Federation take precedence over the wishes of any individual planet. If the Expansionists have their way, no world will be safe from the greed of the Terrans.”

“And you left in the middle of that! You are a greater fool than I ever imagined, Lew! You should have stayed and protected us, not left us in the hands of an Aldaran. I know of Herm. I was opposed to his appointment to the lower house when Regis sent him six years ago. Even though we have almost no contact with the Aldarans, we have to keep an eye on them. He seems a decent enough sort, for an Aldaran, but hardly . . .” Javanne was nearly sputtering with fury.

“Javanne, whatever you may think of Herm, he has the interests of Darkover at heart. This situation has been growing for a long time, and Herm has the advantage of knowing many men and women in the Commons well.” Lew gave a little chuckle. “He’s a better horse trader than I ever was.”

“Humph! Likely he’ll trade Darkover for an aircar, then. Surely there are more able men, older men, more experienced men, from among the Domains. I cannot think that Regis would have agreed to this insanity. The Aldarans are cowards and cheats!”

“Mother, I don’t think you really know what you are talking about,” Mikhail replied. “Herm Aldaran is one of the best men I have ever known.”

Javanne did not take this rebuke gracefully, and her always ready temper flared up, now that she had a target to direct it at. “What do you know about it! Just because you can read Terranan does not make you an expert on anything!”

“I trust Herm.” Mother and son looked daggers at each other, and to Margaret’s surprise, it was Javanne who dropped her eyes, not Mikhail. Her aunt’s hand closed around a slice of bread, and she proceeded to crush it between her fingers.

Donal, oblivious to the tensions around the table, pushed his plate back and gave a small belch. He rubbed his belly. “What’s for dessert?”

Liriel looked at her nephew. “Where will you put any?”

“I always save room for dessert,” he answered calmly. “Do they have good desserts in the Trade City?”

“Not really,” Margaret answered. “Why do you ask?”

“Because if Domenic dies, I am second, and I get to learn to read and be educated like Uncle Mikhail. I always wanted that—well, since last Midwinter, anyhow.” He seemed to think something about his place in the family gave him certain rights, and was determined to have them. “I want to go to Thendara and learn everything!”

Javanne shook her head. “Donal, first of all, I’ll have no talk of Domenic dying! And secondly, your mother would never let you go to Thendara, not now. You are going to Neskaya as soon as you are old enough, and even that will be very difficult for her. You will learn everything you need to know there.”

“No, I won’t!” He turned and looked at Margaret. “Aunt Liriel says you can read all the books in her library. Is that so? She says you can read them all, and a lot more.”

“I can read, and have read, a great many books, yes.”

“I won’t have you encouraging the boy, Marguerida,” Javanne interrupted angrily. “You don’t know anything about our ways, and I don’t want you interfering any more. I think you have caused enough trouble for one day.”
Trouble is all Lew ever brings, and his child is like him! I know I am right! We must maintain the Domains as they have always been. We never should have let the Terranan get a foothold. If I had been Regis . . . why was I born a woman!

“My father cannot read very good,” Donal said in his high boy voice, “and my mother cannot read at all. Domenic wanted help with some hard words, and they . . . they couldn’t do it. They say it is not useful, but Domenic told me that it was wonderful, to read and learn things!” His voice broke a little as he spoke of his injured brother. “I always wanted to be like Dom, and now I am going to, whether he gets better or not!”

Margaret was mildly shocked. She knew that literacy was rare on Darkover, but somehow she had assumed that at least the members of the Domain families were able to read. She realized that she took literacy for granted, except on the most primitive planets, and she felt slightly ashamed that the place of her birth seemed to have chosen deliberate ignorance over formal education. Why, Rafaella probably read better than most of the people at this table!

Gabriel decided to put in his oar. “I have heard all of Liriel’s arguments that reading makes you wiser, and I think it is nonsense. There is no reason for people to addle their brains learning what they will never need to know.”

“There speaks the voice of a man who can hardly sign his name,” Mikhail muttered, loud enough to be heard by Margaret, but not so loud as to carry to the other end of the table.

Jeff said quietly, “We are getting well ahead of ourselves. First we must hope that Domenic will make a complete recovery, that Marguerida’s quick thinking about the splint will make the difference. On the other hand, it is obvious that Donal is quick of mind and that he will need to be properly educated. It is in the best interests of Darkover that our sons and daughters are educated. Ariel will resist, but we must not let her tie her sons with apron strings. It is neither healthy nor wise.”
The Towers have served us well, but they are no longer enough. We must change with the times or perish.

“Best interests?” Gabriel snarled at his uncle. “I like that! Half the young men are mad to go out to the stars, and some of the women, too,” he added darkly. “The old ways are good enough for my father, and they are good enough for me, and for Donal as well. He is too young to know what he is talking about. He would be bored to death in a tenday.”

“I would not,” the child protested.

“You don’t know what is good for you,” Gabriel insisted, his skin darkening and his eyes narrowing. He looked to his mother for support, but Javanne appeared lost in her own thoughts.

“Gabriel,” Margaret said sharply, “you seem to think that you know what is good for everyone—and you don’t!”

As they glared at each other, Jeff tried to be reasonable. “We cannot change Darkover in a day, or even a generation, but if our children are not educated, they will not be able to make sound decisions about the future of our world.” He sighed softly. “I have long wished we had some plan, some program, to teach the young more than can be learned in the Towers or among the
cristoforos.
”

Margaret looked at the older man, and realized that he was speaking both to himself and to her. He, like herself, was a man of several worlds, and he loved Darkover as she was coming to love it. They both knew that without education Darkover was very vulnerable to forces like the Expansionist Party, which saw planets other than Terra as collections of resources to be exploited, not as the homes of human beings with their own aims and ambitions. She knew enough about the Expansionists from her occasional forays into the newsfaxes to understand the threat they posed, not just to Darkover, but to some of the planets she had visited—Relegan and Mantenon just to name two.

I don’t know. Between Istvana Ridenow, Liriel, and Uncle Jeff trying to drag me off to a Tower, Javanne trying to force me to marry one of her dreadful sons, threshold sickness, and Ivor’s death, I have barely had time to think.
She felt Mikhail flinch mentally at her thoughts.
Don’t be an idiot, Mik. I didn’t mean you! And you know it perfectly well, too!

Damned with faint praise. It is all that I can expect.
His tone was mocking in her mind. Beneath the casual pleasantry, though, there was an undertone of feeling that was both attractive and frightening. What would she do if Javanne succeeded in getting Mikhail sent off planet? It did not bear thinking of.

The Senator was following this byplay with an interest Margaret found disquieting, and she felt her cheeks redden. He studied Mikhail curiously and lifted one eyebrow at the younger man. Then he looked at his daughter, and his eyes widened slightly.

Father, don’t you go getting marriage-minded on me, dammit! I have had enough of that to last two lifetimes. Do you know that young Dyan Ardais came into my bedroom to plead a suit! Rafaella was horrified.
She felt almost trapped, and her breath came in short pants.

Who?
Lew’s voice was curious, and her panic started to subside.

A Renunciate? You have been busy, haven’t you, child? Having more adventures than I realized. I am not in the least marriage-minded, having been somewhat unfortunate with women in my early years. Still, anyone can see you are clearly on excellent terms with your cousin, which rather surprises me, since you are not fond of your Aunt Javanne.
He gave a slight shrug.
I barely know you, do I?

Lew Alton smiled at his daughter, a face-splitting grin that took a decade off his age. Margaret stared at him, because she could not remember him ever smiling so broadly before, or at all.
We must, of course, consider the doors of Armida.

Margaret dropped her jaw. Her father was teasing her! He was sitting there and making jokes as if he had never been a depressed drinker with a terrible temper. She was caught between the urge to hug him and another, equally strong, to smack him right across the face.
Could I start some sort of school on Darkover, do you think? I have been thinking of that, from time to time, when I wasn’t busy battling dead Keepers or throwing up.

What?
Lew seemed stunned.

Donal was bored with the sudden cessation of talk around the table, and the absence of dessert. “Would you teach me how to read, Marguerida? I would ask Liriel, but she has to go back to her Tower soon.”

“I don’t know, Donal. I have never tried to teach anyone to read before. It is not as easy as you think.”

“Uncle Jeff said I was smart, so it should be real easy.” Donal gave her another winning smile, and she thought the boy was going to be altogether too charming when he grew up.

Before she could reply, Javanne spoke. “I think we have had enough of this nonsense for one night. Gabriel is right—Donal is much too young to know what he wants. He just thinks reading is exciting because Domenic can do it, and he has no idea what he is talking about.”

Jeff shook his head. “Javanne, closing the door after the horse has run away is futile. We on Darkover must choose our destiny, and perhaps sooner than you imagine, and we will need all the young Donals to be as well-informed as they can be, lest we be eaten up by Expansionist politics or something worse.”

Javanne Hastur seethed, but for once she held her tongue. She contented herself with glaring at Jeff and Lew and Margaret. After a moment, her face cleared, and Margaret was certain she was plotting at something again. Her dislike of her aunt increased, and she had to force herself to think of something else, just to keep her mind from boiling over with rage.

The dessert was finally brought in, a thick red pudding in clear glass bowls, and a tense silence settled around the table. Margaret hated this energy simmering just below the boiling point, for she could sense Javanne’s feelings, and Gabriel’s as well, though not their thoughts. They were angry and, she decided, dangerous. The sweet pudding tasted like acid in her mouth, and she pushed the bowl away unfinished.