Exile's Song (68 page)

T
he sun was lowering behind them, turning the white stones of Comyn Castle a wonderful pink as they finally left the crooked streets of Thendara. Guardsmen in the blue and silver colors of the Hasturs stood on either side of the gates, and they saluted as Lew rode beneath the carved lintel and into the outer court. This was a different entrance than the one Rafe Scott had taken Margaret through on her earlier visit, and she looked around with interest.

The pleasant and pungent smell of horses rose in the air, and several hostlers and grooms sprang forward. On one side, Margaret could see a large stabling facility, and on the other what she suspected were barracks. A set of steps stood at the end of the courtyard, and on it waited a lad of thirteen or fourteen. He was dressed in blue tunic and gray trousers, and Margaret wondered who he was, for he did not look like a servant.

A groom helped Margaret to dismount, and she found she was very glad to be on firm ground once again. She watched the groom lead the horse away, and wondered how she was going to get it back to Rafaella. Then she thought of the lovely Dorilys, back at Armida, and gave a little sigh. She was tired, and there were too many things going on in her mind.

The lad, bright-haired and rather slight, came down the steps and bowed to Lew, then to Margaret. He gave Mikhail part of a grin, then seemed to remember he was being formal. “I am Danilo Hastur, heir to Hastur,” he said courteously, as if he had practiced the words while he waited. “My father sends you welcome, and regrets he cannot be present to greet you. He is presently occupied with matters of state, but wishes you to join us at dinner.” His voice cracked once while he spoke, and he turned very pink.

So, this boy was the one who had taken Mikhail’s place. He appeared bright but tense, and unsure of himself. Margaret wondered if the burden of Hastur weighed heavily on his small shoulders.

Margaret glanced up at the Tower she had spied from a distance, at the place where Ashara had maintained an earthly presence for so many centuries. It was ruined, like Hali, broken and blackened. She felt a surge of guilty pleasure, and felt secretly glad she had destroyed it—although she desperately hoped no one had been injured. Yet another of Ashara Alton’s ties to the real world had been severed.

Before she could continue her thoughts, Margaret found her father’s hand lightly on her elbow. “Come along. We will go to the Alton Suite. I want a bath, and I am sure you do, too.”
And I want to see Dio right away!

She felt suddenly very fatigued, and more than a little anxious. Now that she had a chance to see her stepmother, she discovered she was extremely reluctant to do so. She did not want to see Diotima sick! She didn’t want her to die, like Ivor!

Lew was quiet and brooding, like his former self, but Margaret knew that he was desperately worried. Obediently, she followed him into the castle and through several corridors and up three flights of stairs. Lew was half a corridor ahead of her when they finally arrived at their goal. Despite all the twisting and turning, she did not feel at all lost or disoriented. Deep in the recesses of her mind, there remained a map of the maze that was Comyn Castle, and she was certain she could have found her way to the Alton Suite blindfolded.

Lew Alton opened the tall double doors, and walked into the room beyond. It was what Margaret had now come to think of as a typical sitting or living room, with lots of patterned rugs, hangings on the walls, and large couches. On one of these, Dio lay dozing, covered with a light blanket. The first sight of her stepmother made her throat close up and her breath catch. Nothing Lew had said had prepared her for the reality.

She was so pale she was almost colorless, and her golden hair was brittle and lifeless. Her once-pretty hands rested on her lap, limp and shrunken. She stirred a little as they came in, but did not wake until Lew bent down and brushed a sunken cheek with his lips.

“I was dreaming of you,” Dio whispered from between cracked lips.

“I hope it was a nice dream.” Lew tried to sound casual, but instead sounded worried and tired.

“Nicer than some I have had. Your hair was dark, and you shone like Aldones himself.”

“How romantic of you, after all these years, my dearest. Look who I have brought with me!”

Margaret swallowed the cold terror in her throat and moved closer. She bent down and touched Dio’s hands. They were icy and the skin beneath her fingers was flaky and dry. “Hello, Dio.” She felt awkward and very young as she looked down at the only mother she had ever really known.

“Marja!” A weak smile touched her lips. “How wonderful to have you here. I have been longing to see you. When did you arrive?”
How lovely she is now! My beautiful daughter, my little girl—well, woman, isn’t she?

“More than a month ago. It seems like a lifetime, really. Father found me at Armida, and Lady Javanne was not pleased to see him walk in from the storm.”

“Storm? Have you been having adventures without me again?” Dio sounded like an echo of her usual self, as if she were trying to conceal her illness. “Every time I left you alone, Marja, you got into some mischief. Remember the time you built that tree house with the children from . . . I can’t recall their names . . . and you stole the wood from the lumberyard.”

“What’s this? I never heard anything about a tree house,” Lew said. His features were stern, as if he were fighting despair with all of his tremendous will.

“Of course you didn’t! We hushed up the whole thing, didn’t we, Marja? It was rather fun. And it was a very well-made tree house.” A spasm of coughing choked off her words, and Margaret looked at her father, terrified. Her pulse quickened with fear. But Lew did not appear to be very disturbed by Dio’s coughing.

“A good thing we made it sturdy, since you came to tea with us,” Margaret answered, forcing a cheerfulness into her voice that she was far from feeling. How could her father bear it? Her new-found respect for her estranged father increased as she watched him behave as if everything were quite normal. She bit her lip, then continued. “I was so startled when you hiked your skirts up and climbed up to the platform as if you had done it a hundred times. And the Weevus children thought you were wonderful, and one of them, Daren, wanted to come and live with us and have you for a mother. He had a perfectly nice mother, but she wasn’t the sort who climbed trees.”

“What else has been going on behind my back?” Lew asked, sounding very amused, though she caught an undercurrent of pain in his voice.

“Lots of things. We didn’t want to bother you with them.” Dio gave her husband a feeble smile. “You’ve filled out nicely since you left us,
chiya.
You were such a slender girl, all legs and eyes, and now you are a woman.” This speech seemed to exhaust her, and her hand in Margaret’s felt limp.

“Next time you build a tree house, Marja, you’d better invite me for tea as well. I can manage the climb, I believe.”
I should have prepared her better for Dio—what a selfish fool I can be! But I couldn’t! Still, she is handling herself wonderfully. How the gods have favored me in my child. How could I have let her leave me—set herself apart for all these years?

Stop whipping yourself Father. The past is past—we have to deal with the present!
“Absolutely, Father. I saw a tree at Armida that would be perfect, and I can’t imagine why there isn’t one there already.”

He gave a sharp snort of laughter. “I cannot wait to see the expression on Javanne’s face. Now—how are you today, dearest?”

“Much the same, though one of Regis’ Healers gave me something that eased the spasms, and I have been able to rest a little. They wish me to get strong enough to be moved to Arilinn for treatment.”

“Then that is what we will do, Dio. We will get you strong.”

“You always think that you can make things right, and that is why I love you.”

Margaret was embarrassed at this open display of deep affection, and felt excluded by its intimacy. She wondered if she would ever say such tender words to any man, and found that she wanted to more than she could have imagined. “I think I’d like to have a bath,” she said, to conceal her feelings, “and get ready for dinner. Regis has asked us to dine with him, which sounds terribly formal.” She made a gesture at her rather worn clothing.

“It is as formal as anything gets on Darkover, but don’t worry, Marja.” Lew nodded as he spoke. “Your rooms are through that door. One of the servants should have brought your things by now.”

Margaret could not think of anything to say, so she withdrew. What was wrong with Dio, she wondered, and why hadn’t she been treated with Terran medical technology? Or perhaps she had, and it had not worked. She needed to ask someone, but she didn’t want to disturb her father.

After several frustrating minutes, she remembered Regis Hastur’s consort, who had been so kind and friendly on her previous visit.
Lady Linnea?

You needn’t shout!
There was no anger in the answering thought, just good humor and with it welcome!
What is it, Marguerida?
The calm and serenity in Linnea’s thoughts eased her fears a little.

A good question. The Terrans are very good with their machines and all, but a trained
leronis
can work what you might think were miracles.

How did Linnea know that? It didn’t matter.
Yes.

The mental contact was withdrawn gently, and Margaret took several shaky breaths and tried to ignore the sense of despair that filled her. Looking around the room, she noticed her still-packed bags, and started to undo the clasps when a plump maid came in. The girl moved to help her, but Margaret waved her back, eager to have something to do to keep her mind and hands busy.

It was all very well to be told not to worry, but she could not help it. Ivor’s death was still too fresh in her mind, in her heart, and the idea that Dio might perish was more than she could bear. She could not stop thinking about it, no matter how hard she tried. While they had been traveling, she had managed to deny her fears, but now she had actually seen Dio, it was quite impossible. And duty demanded she do exactly that. It was, she decided, the hardest thing she had ever had to do, and her admiration for her father, who had probably had to do many things that he hadn’t wished to, increased again. He really was not the man she remembered, and she was eager, she discovered, to know the Lew Alton he now was. But he did not really know
her
either. They would have to start all over, fresh but still burdened by the past. In her present mood, that was enough to blurr her eyes with tears.

She blinked away the wetness, angry at herself, and concentrated on her unpacking again. Beneath her precious recording equipment Margaret found the green spider-silk dress which Manuella had sent as a gift, quite crushed but still beautiful. She had completely forgotten about it during her journey, and now she shook it out and wondered if it was appropriate for a formal dinner.

“Can you get the wrinkles out of this?” she asked the maid.

“Certainly,
domna.
It would be my pleasure. How lovely it is.” The maid held it up. “MacEwan’s work?”

“How did you know?”

“No one has his hand with the cloth. He is the finest master tailor in Thendara. I will make it right while you bathe.”

When she undressed, Margaret spent a few minutes looking at her left hand. For the most part, she ignored it, and the glove which concealed the peculiar lines on it, but she tried to see if the lines were different. Was she going to have to wear a leather glove on her hand for the rest of her life?

The lines did look a little different today, and she wondered if it was something to do with her second foray into the overworld. A matrix stone was a focus for innate talents, from what Liriel and Istvana had told her. Kept in a silken bag, it did not function except when taken out and used. So it was different, very different from having the shadow of a matrix stone engraved in the flesh. And it was not quite like anything anyone knew about.

If her father were not so distracted with Dio, she might like to talk to him about it. But she really didn’t want to bother him now. Well, she couldn’t do anything about it right then anyway. She let it go with difficulty, found herself thinking about Mikhail instead, and decided that this subject was even more hazardous to her peace of mind than trying to figure out telepathy with insufficient information.

A steaming, scented bath did a great deal toward restoring her energy and settling Margaret’s mind. It was with great reluctance that she quitted the tub, dried her body carefully, slipped on a soft robe that was hanging, ready for her, and put the glove back on. It was so stiff now that she hated having it against her skin, but she dared not risk touching someone without its protective covering.

When she got back to her bedroom, she found the maid singing quietly to herself as she smoothed the bedding and patted the pillow into shape. The song distracted her from worrying about Dio, thinking about Mikhail, or the other things her ever-active mind seemed determined to bother her with. “What’s that you are singing . . . I am sorry, I did not even ask your name.”

“I am Piedra,
domna.
It’s not much—just an old lullaby my mother always sang to me. I always sing it when I make the bed. It is quite foolish, but I believe that people sleep more soundly when I leave a lullaby on their pillow.”