“Why do you insist on seeing me dead?” I demanded, trying to ignore the severe adult-child overtones that kept escaping his control. “You said yourself that Dameron would not have sent me if he didn’t think I could handle it. I’d like to know what makes you believe I can’t.”
“Maybe it’s the fact that I know this world and I don’t know you,” he said, rubbing his face with one hand, the vexation in his voice stronger. “We’ve got to settle this one way or the other tonight, before we commit to this project too far to back out if it becomes necessary. Come with me.”
He turned and strode to the left-hand door, threw it open, then waited for me to follow as he’d ordered. When I got there and looked past him I saw a dim, narrow back hall with two more closed doors straight ahead, and a heavy staircase to the left. I wondered why my guide had stopped at the threshold rather than leading the way through, but he didn’t leave me wondering long.
“Take those stairs to the next floor and go to the last room along the hail,” he said, gesturing briefly with one hand. “I’ll be there as soon as I report your safe arrival, and then we can discuss the problem until we both know where we stand.”
I hesitated very briefly, trying to think of a diplomatic way of offering to go with him while he reported my “arrival,” but there didn’t seem to be one. Anything I said would translate out as not trusting him – which was exactly the way I felt but was not an attitude calculated to make him think more kindly about my chances of continuing with the project. The only thing I could do was give him the chance to blow the whistle behind my back and hope I’d raised enough doubt in his mind to keep him from doing no more than think about it. I craned my neck around a little more, using sightseeing to account for my silence, then nodded as I glanced at him.
“Up to the second floor, then down to the end,” I agreed, using my free hand to get a grip on the long skirt that would have tripped me on those stairs. “See you there.”
I walked to the stairs and began climbing them with out looking back, not even pausing when I heard the soft click of the door being closed. There was no guarantee Grigon was on the outside of the closed door, and I’d already cut him loose in my mind. Taking him out of the game entirely would have been the only way of stopping him from reporting anything he pleased, and I wasn’t willing to do that.
The Lord of Luck had been good to me in my time, and the only way to repay him is to trust him completely when none of your own efforts will do the trick.
The door at the end of the hall was not door but doors. Two beautifully carved doors stood quietly in the half-lit shadow of a single wall candle, and opening one of them showed me a room that banished all thoughts of rustic. A fire danced and crackled in the large marble fireplace to the left of the doors, an occasional spark jumping out to the wide stone apron in front of it. Beyond the apron was a single well-padded chair standing on the beginnings of a room-wide, deep-napped carpet in what seemed to be wine-red. All the wall space in the room was covered with heavy cloth hangings, and ahead and to the right was an enormous bed, canopied and curtained in the same dark red, with another, lighter color showing faintly inside the curtains. Gold thread picked out Prince Havro’s emblem on the front curtain, a large circle enclosing a snarling, clawing isphalgor standing on an intricately embroidered rendition of the three letters of Havro’s family name. I could feel Bellna’s recognition of her father’s insignia, but it came as something of a shock to realize that she couldn’t read the letters. Women on Tildor were kept illiterate as a matter of course, and even Bellna’s position as princess hadn’t saved her from the darkness. The background information I’d been given let me read as well as any Tildorani male, but that was a point I’d have to keep firmly in mind. No matter who I was on that planet, if the character was female it would have to forget how to read.
I closed the door behind me and moved farther into the room, seeing a large, beautifully carved wardrobe and matching bench standing to the right of the bed. I finally got rid of the cape by dumping it on the bench, then walked over to the wide carved screen of wood that had been set up to the right of the wardrobe. There was faint candlelight trickling out around its edges that made me curious, but stepping behind it fed me a jolt of shock from the Bellna presence. The area behind the screen was all mirrored, wall and screen alike, and thick, soft fur pelts covered the more sedate wine-red carpeting. The area was a slave nook, and if I’d bothered looking for them among the furs, I probably could have found the chains. Bellna was sputtering indignantly in my head, upset not so much by the discovery of her father’s play nest as by having to look at something that free, high-born women were usually sheltered from. Everyone knew what men used female slaves for, but that didn’t mean it was something a well-bred woman would want to look at!
Idly wondering if Grigon had lit the candle, I turned my head to one of the mirrors and stared at the redheaded reflection there, consciously swallowing down the indignation and forcing it away from me. There was no expression on the beautiful face, but it took a minute or two for the tension to leave the well-rounded figure dressed all in dark blue. The effort necessary to push the Bellna presence to the back of my mind hadn’t been excessive, but a fal?nt doubt came to dance around lightly on my nerve ends. Was I just being stubborn by insisting that I could handle the role? Was I endangering everyone involved-as well as the project itself-by not going straight back to base? Was Grigon right in thinking that I couldn’t fight Bellna and Clero’s men both at the same time? The hell of it was he could be right, but there was no way of telling until the time came.
Did I take the chance and go on with it, or did I opt for the cautious point of view and head on back?
A look of disgust formed on the face I was staring at, but the Bellna presence had nothing to do with it. I was the one who felt the disgust, and entirely with myself. The thought of something having gone wrong with the impression didn’t frighten me, not when I could regain control so easily. I’d been in a lot hotter water that time I’d been fed an illegal zombie drug, and hadn’t been able to throw it off. The problem was that I still didn’t really want to be there, and my devious mind was digging for a way out that would free me from my commitment to Dameron without my having to renege. Could Dameron find someone to replace me in time to keep the project going? No. Did I take the job on without coercion and promise to see it through? Yes.
Then how about cutting out the emoting and breast-beating – and the needling of your co-worker and getting serious about this? I looked sternly at the mirror image that was me and held the stare for a minute, then let a faint grim come through. My sense of right hadn’t let me allow Grigon to send me back without an argument, but my escape reflex had almost had me ready to accept the easy out he wanted to hand me. I’d accept the challenge instead, and still make it home in time to vote.
“You look very much at home in there,” a voice came, filled with faint amusement. “Except for the clothes, of course. You’ll have to get rid of those.”
“I wouldn’t dream of usurping my host’s right to initiate all actions,” I laughed, turning to look at Grigon. “After you, my lord.”
“You picked a hell of a time to be gracious,” Grigon grinned, stepping back from the end of the screen. “Come on out here and let’s get acquainted.”
I followed him back out to the middle of the room, then stood watching as he walked to the chair in front of the fire and lowered himself into it. Aside from the bench in front of the wardrobe and the bed it was the only place to sit, but I wasn’t given my choice of the two other locations. Grigon moved the chair so that he could see me more easily, then gestured me closer.
“I’ve been thinking about our problem, and I believe have come up with a way to settle it,” he said, making himself comfortable as he looked up at me. “It all depends on how determined you are that I’m wrong and you’re right.”
“I’m very determined,” I said, folding my arms as I looked down at him. “Does your solution have anything to do with making me stand up until I fall over?”
“In a manner of speaking it does,” he said, a flicker of annoyance showing in his eyes. “Since you seem to have slept through all the briefing sessions you were given, let me repeat the point I thought I’d made when you first got here: if you keep wise-cracking the way you’ve been doing, you’ll either outline yourself as a complete stranger and foreigner, or end up tied to a whipping stand. You won’t find either possibility enjoyable, and the rest of us are far from eager to join you. Do you think you can get it through your head that you’re putting our necks on the block right along with yours?”
“I’m fully aware of the fact that flip doesn’t go over well on this world,” I said, feeling none of the guilt he was trying to feed me – and trying not to feel the annoyance. “If I’d known that wise-cracking in this lodge would put you and the others in jeopardy, I wouldn’t have done it. Please accept my apology, and also my assurance that it won’t happen again.”
“You’re still not funny,” he growled, letting his eyes go cold as he looked at me. “The only way I can judge how you’ll act out there is by seeing how you do in her – and so far you’re not making it. It doesn’t matter whether anyone else can hear you. I can hear you.
“I didn’t know I was being tested,” I shrugged, still not very impressed but finally seeing his point. “If you want to evaluate the role I’ll be playing that’s another story, but bear in mind that Bellna would not allow herself to be kept standing like this. Once I settle into her, you’ll have to vacate that chair.”
“Bellna might not be the only role you’ll be playing,” he said, comfortably crossing his legs as he ignored my last comment. “If you find yourself. on your own you may have to switch to being the peasant girl we discussed earlier-with nothing of Bellna showing. Do you know how a peasant girl on this world acts?”
“Certainly,” I answered, ignoring the ripple of outrage coming from the Bellna presence. “Do you want the peasant girl instead of Bellna?”
“I want them both,” he answered flatly, locking eyes with me. “Bellna first and then the peasant, and I want it all to be you. You’ll take your cue from the way I speak to you, and then act accordingly. If Remo hadn’t made his and Bellna’s engagement official while she was still in the Capital, I wouldn’t have been able to test you as far as I think necessary.”
“I don’t understand,” I frowned, also not understanding the sudden gleam in his dark eyes. “What his that got to do with anything?”
“You should know more about that than I do,” he said, grinning faintly as he got out of the chair. “When Remo made the engagement official he was entitled to take Bellna to bed – which he did, at almost breakneck speed. She’s not a virgin any longer, which means you can be put through the role of peasant. Peasant girls are given to men as soon as they stop looking like boys.”
I had to work at ignoring the flurry of embarrassment coming from Bellna, but got some help at it from the part of my mind that houses nasty suspicions. Grigon was still grinning at me, and that put a sharper edge on it.
“Is this test the solution you came up with?” I asked, still holding his eyes. “Set me into a convenient role, and then indulge in a little rape? How nice that your safety can be confirmed so pleasantly.”
“I thought well of the idea,” he said, and then his grin hardened.
“And whatever you think about it, you’ll still go along with it if you want a piece of this project. If you can keep Bellna from taking over while you’re being treated as a peasant, I’ll agree that you’ll be able to do it at any time. If you’re going to lose the argument, which is the better time: while you’re being raped, or while you’re being attacked?”
He stared down at me, waiting to see if I would back away from the deal or continue arguing, but I couldn’t really do either. The son of a joy girl was right, no matter what his motivations were. If I couldn’t handle it, we were better off finding Out right then.
“A pity you didn’t opt for the attack instead of the rape,” I commented, brushing at the skirt of my dress. “Let’s get this over with. I’m going to need whatever sleep I can grab.”
“One must admire your self-confidence,” he retorted, moving to my left, away from the fire. “Are you always so sure that things will work out the way you want them to?”
“I can only judge from past experience.” I shrugged, turning my head to look at him. “Since things usually do work out the way I want them to, it’s only reasonable to expect they’ll continue on like that.”
“For your sake, I hope they will,” he said, and then his face suddenly took on a supercilious look. “My lady Princess,” he said in broad, clipped Rimilian, sketching a stiff bow. “Pray be seated and rest yourself the while I fetch refreshments.”
“Fetch them quickly, Ruthor,” I answered in Bellna’s pettish private tones, recognizing the character Grigon was imitating. Prince Ruthor was one of Clero’s sons, and he’d been ardently courting Bellna, probably at his father’s urging, before Prince Remo came on the scene. “The journey here has positively exhausted me, and I must look an absolute hag.”
“Such a thing would be impossibility,” RuthorGrigon protested distandy as I sat in the oversized chair. He had gone to one of the draped walls and parted the drape to expose a good stock of drinkables, his back to me as he messed and clinked. I ran my palms over the very soft leather of the chair arms, making myself comfortable while I had the chance. Grigon was trying to disarm the Bellna presence as well-by evoking Ruthor, who was hardly the most capable of Clero’s sons. If Ruthor got very, very lucky, he might one day qualify for the honor of dropping the last letter of his name, but Bellna didn’t think he’d make it and her memories forced me to agree with her. He was a stiff-necked snob who always acted in the precisely correct manner, never speaking out of turn, never seeking a corner where he might take me in his arms as Remo had.
“Your drink, my lady Princess,” Grigon-Ruthor announced from right in front of me, his arm extended with a tiny, delicate glass held carefully between his fingers. I took the glass without thanking him, treating him like a servant the way Bellna always did, privately cursing myself up, down and sideways. I’d almost let it happen again