She’s Kennard all over again, as stubborn as a mule. Plus whatever she got from that be-damned mother of hers. Why did she have to return?
“As you are my niece,
domna,
you might as well be my daughter. I will excuse your rudeness because I realize you do not know our ways. Here on Darkover you are still considered a child, since you are unmarried, and you are my child inasmuch as I hold the Domain.”
“Nonsense! Either I am an heiress and the Alton Domain is mine by right, or I am not, but your dependent I will never be. Now go away. You have clearly just arrived, and are likely tired, as am I. I think we should continue this matter at a later time, don’t you?” Margaret was surprised at the strength with which she spoke, a quality of voice she had not known she possessed. It did not seem to be her own voice, but that of another, and she quivered a little. She hoped it was her imagination, and not some remnant of Ashara, for she did not want anything of that dreadful woman to remain within her.
To her surprise, he moderated his tone a little. “You cannot remain here at Ardais.”
“As soon as I am fit to travel, I intend to return to Thendara and leave Darkover.” This was a blatant lie, but she was past caring.
“Leave Darkover? You can’t do that!”
It would solve my problem for now, but it would be the wrong thing. Damn Lew Alton for creating this mess, and leaving me to clean it up. Where is he? He resigned his post, without so much as a by your leave and . . .
“Just watch me,” she replied savagely.
Gabriel gathered himself, breathing heavily and squaring his broad shoulders. “You don’t understand. You must come to Armida. There are people you must meet.”
I have botched this badly, and Javanne and Jeff will be furious. Why couldn’t she have been a sweet girl instead of this flaming vixen!
“Must?”
Dom
Gabriel Lanart turned and stormed out of the library, slamming the door so it boomed as he went. He had left his guardsmen, and one of them opened the door and followed him while the other looked at Margaret for a moment and grinned so hard he nearly cracked his face. Then he went, leaving her alone and exhausted.
Perhaps an hour later there was a knock on the door. “Come in,” Margaret answered, expecting it to be Rafaella or Lady Marilla. Instead, Mikhail Lanart-Hastur entered the room, looking hunted. Her heart gave an unexpected flutter as she looked at him, and she chided herself. She was much too old to be moved by a handsome face.
“I hear my old man has arrived to bear you off to Armida,” he began hastily.
Margaret blinked, a little dazed. “Old Man? Oh, you mean
Dom
Gabriel? Funny. I call my father the Old Man, too. Not to his face, of course.”
Mikhail laughed, and the harried expression on his face faded. This was a shame, because laughter made him even more handsome, and she found herself feeling drawn to him. She felt as if she already knew him, although she knew that was impossible. She felt the familiar coldness within her, a desire not to be close to anyone, to keep herself apart. Istvana had told her that this was part of the spell Ashara Alton had put on her when she had overshadowed the child Margaret, and she bit her lip, because she hated the sense of separation. At the same time, it was safe, and she was accustomed to it now.
Miknail was doing a fine job of disturbing the quiet of her mind, without, she suspected, having any hint of her feelings. Which was just as well, she decided. He probably wasn’t anything like the man she imagined, the man she felt she knew already. Margaret wished she could shake the feeling, since it kept her off-balance.
“No, never to his face. My father hates getting older. He used to be able to ride for three days without stopping to eat or sleep, or anything—if you believe his stories. Now a day in the saddle leaves him worn out and irritable. And he has been sick, too, and since he is a man who never gets ill, he is simply furious at the failure of his body to obey his commands. He would have been here days ago, but for that.”
“That explains how he behaved. And I have to say I am grateful he didn’t arrive sooner, because I think he would have burst into my bedchamber and demanded that I get up and follow him to Armida, like a good little girl.”
Mikhail sighed, then shook his head a little sadly. “Was he very rude?”
“Well, he did seem used to having his own way.”
“He’s always like that whether he has been traveling or not.” Mikhail clasped his hands behind him and looked into the fire.
I have to work to keep from looking at her! It is intolerable. I have never been so drawn to anyone in my life! She caught me with a look, and I followed her to that place.
“He was Captain of the Guard until last year, and he got into the habit of commanding. Or maybe he was always like that. We aren’t close, because of me being Lord Regis’ heir for so long. I was raised at Comyn Castle, and was there for quite a few years. After Lady Linnea had her son, young Danilo, I was no longer first in line, and I returned to Armida. But since I was made Dyan’s paxman, I don’t spend much time there. I mean, he’s fond enough of me in his way, I suppose.”
If he is, I don’t know it. He always looks at me as if he would like to strangle me.
“So, when are you leaving?”
Margaret was so busy sorting out the thoughts that came to her unbidden, his conflicted feelings of attraction and his distance from his father, that she didn’t answer immediately. When she did, all she said was, “I’m not.”
“What?” Mikhail looked directly at her for an instant, then dropped his eyes. The look made her quiver with a longing she had never before experienced. “You mean you actually defied him? That must have put him in a rare temper.”
“He slammed the door so hard he nearly broke the hinges. He seemed to think that I would just do what he said automatically. He gave me some song and dance about being my legal guardian in the absence of my father. I tried to point out that I wasn’t a child, but he didn’t really listen.”
“Father is a good man, but he doesn’t listen very well. He just makes up his mind and forges ahead. I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. We can’t help how our parents behave. Tell me, please, if you can, why he wants me to come to Armida. I mean, he’s afraid I’ll claim it or something, so why does he want me there? And who is Jeff? And Javanne? I feel as if I wandered into the middle of a Russian novel.”
“What’s that?”
“A Russian novel? A story where there are thousands of characters and all of them have at least four different names.”
Mikhail laughed again. “That sounds confusing.”
“Believe me, it isn’t any more confusing than trying to keep track of Darkovan bloodlines.”
“Oh. I’ve lived with those all my life, so they don’t seem confusing to me. But I can see how it might be difficult for you. Javanne is my mother; Javanne Hastur, sister to Lord Regis.”
“Ah, that explains something. I mean, I knew she was your mother, but somehow I forgot she was Lord Regis’ sister. You gave me the impression she was old, and so was your father, at that dinner I never got to finish. It’s been days, hasn’t it? My brain is still a little muddled, and all these relatives I never knew about before don’t help.” A faint memory niggled in her mind. “I think my father actually spoke about her once—something about a party and a scratching match. No, not scratching—biting! He has a little scar on one arm, and when I asked him where it came from, he told me that Javanne bit him. Is it the same person?”
He laughed again. “Mother loves to tell that story—she was about nine at the time and already hot-tempered. She and Lew got into some childish argument, and she insisted he take back whatever he had said, and when he wouldn’t, she threw him on the ground, sat on his chest, and bit his arm when he tried to unseat her. It was most unladylike, but Mother was a bit of a hoyden, if Uncle Regis’ accounts are true. In fact, he once said it was a damn shame she had been born female and he male. He was a little tipsy at the time, so I didn’t credit it much.”
“Your mother sounds pretty formidable. Or have the years mellowed her?”
Mikhail grinned widely. “Not to notice. She’s rather wonderful, but strong-minded, you know.”
“I can guess. And with your father being pretty stubborn, I assume they get along perfectly.”
“If shouting at each other and banging on the table is love and harmony, then they have it.”
Margaret was surprised at how comfortable she felt with Mikhail now, as if she could say anything to him. It was a new experience for her and she relaxed into it. And then the chill returned, that feeling that she must keep herself apart, that she must never allow anyone to come close to her. It made her feel pulled in two directions, torn apart by conflicting desires. She could always say anything to Ivor or Ida Davidson, but this was different. This was an attractive man her own age, and she had never felt comfortable in that circumstance before.
Then she felt, more than heard, an answering emotion from Mikhail, as if he, too, were comfortable with her as he had never been with another person. It was a wonderful sensation, but very disquieting for both of them.
He could be my friend! I have never had a man friend before, except Ivor, and that was different. But I must not. Something will happen, something terrible, if I allow myself to be drawn to him.
For a moment she tensed, waiting for something. Then she realized that the voice in her head which had always isolated her from others was missing, and the full import of her labors with Istvana Ridenow during her slow recovery began to trickle into her conscious mind. It did not make for comfortable awareness. Indeed, she felt deeply angry, because something in the presence of Ashara within her had caused her to miss having friends, the way other people did.
To distract herself from these troubling thoughts, she asked, “And who is Jeff?”
Mikhail began to pace in front of the fire. “Jeff is Lord Damon Ridenow,” he began, as if that explained everything.
“Ridenow? Not
another
uncle!”
“I’m afraid so. But we tend to count uncles and aunts as being those people of the immediately previous generation, and Jeff is from the one before that. He is twice your relation, because he is descended from Ellemir Lanart, who is in the Alton line, and from Arnad Ridenow, who is related to your father’s wife.”
“You know, I am starting to regret I am not the sort of person who can go off into hysterics all the time. All these new relatives are driving me crazy. But if he’s Lord Damon, why is he called Jeff?” Confused as she was, Margaret was still extremely curious. And, she discovered, she wanted Mikhail to go on talking to her, because she wanted to be near him for just a little longer. At the same time, part of her wanted to be alone, so that she would not have to feel drawn to the man.
“Has anyone mentioned the Forbidden Tower to you?”
“Istvana might have said something when she was answering my questions.”
“What did she tell you?”
“Let me think. It was about seventy or seventy-five years ago, wasn’t it? That’s where I heard the name Damon Ridenow before! I knew it was familiar. But this Jeff can’t be the same person—he’d be more than a hundred now!”
“No, they are not the same people. Damn! It is an old story, and not a happy one.” He gave a brief sigh. “For centuries all Keepers have been female, and also celibate. Damon Ridenow was the first male Keeper since the Ages of Chaos. He was married to Ellemir Lanart, but he had a daughter by another woman, Jaelle n’ha Melora.”
“N’ha Melora? You mean she was a Renunciate, like Rafaella?”
“Yes, and please don’t interrupt me, because the story is complicated enough without.”
“I’m sorry.” She wasn’t really, because he wasn’t the least bit annoyed with her, and that made her quietly glad.
“Leonie Hastur, who was
leronis
at Arilinn Tower where your father trained was very distressed, because she and Damon were very close, and she felt betrayed, both by his becoming a Keeper, and then by his fathering children. The Keepers wielded an enormous amount of power, about the only power women had then, and they were rather protective of it.”
“I can see how they would be, considering how women are shuffled off into marriage so young.”
Mikhail grinned at her, then shook his finger like a schoolmaster chiding a naughty student. “I don’t want to get into an argument with you about how we treat our women, Marguerida.”
She thought her name had never sounded so pretty as when he spoke it. “No, of course not. I didn’t mean to criticize.”
From what Rafaella told me on the trail, there is a lot to criticize, but it is none of my business. No one is going to rush me into any marriages!
“Anyhow, Damon Ridenow established a functioning tower at Armida, with his wife, her twin sister Callista, and a Terranan called Ann’dra Carr. This did not set well, but there was not a great deal that could be done to prevent it, not without a lot of bloodshed. The daughter of Damon and Jaelle was called Cleindori, and she was supposedly one of the most beautiful women who ever walked. If the one painting of her that exists is anything to judge by, that is true. She went to Arilinn and became a
leronis,
and started to create a formal science using matrices, which we had not had for centuries.” He sighed. “We lost a lot during the Ages of Chaos, a lot of knowledge, and we still haven’t entirely recovered it.”
“Why? I mean, I don’t understand these matrices to begin with, although I know they work like focuses. I would think that if the Darkovans have been using them for centuries, they would have developed a formal science a long time ago.”
“You are quite right, but the destruction that happened during the Ages of Chaos made us very wary—there was a lot of misuse, and we were afraid to return to the ways of our ancestors.”
“So what happened to Cleindori?”
“She broke the rules. I guess she took after her father. She married Arnad Ridenow, which was unheard of for a Keeper to marry. That was bad enough, but she kept her
laran
! And that did not go down well, because it had been established for years that only a virginal woman could have a Keeper’s
laran.
She was just as powerful as before, which upset everything.”