Stars of Darkover Read online

  Also by Deborah J. Ross

  Darkover Anthology

  Gifts of Darkover

  Realms of Darkover

  Masques of Darkover

  Crossroads of Darkover

  Citadels of Darkover

  Jewels of Darkover

  Stars of Darkover

  Lace and Blade

  Lace and Blade

  Lace and Blade 2

  Lace and Blade 4

  Lace and Blade 5

  Sword and Sorceress

  Sword and Sorceress 33

  Watch for more at Deborah J. Ross’s site.

  Also by Elisabeth Waters

  Darkover Anthology

  Music of Darkover

  Stars of Darkover

  Ski the Hellers

  Fate

  Changing Fate

  Mending Fate

  Sword and Sorceress

  Sword and Sorceress 27

  Sword and Sorceress 28

  Sword and Sorceress 29

  Sword and Sorceress 30

  Sword and Sorceress 31

  Sword and Sorceress 32

  Sword and Sorceress 33

  Sword and Sorceress 34

  Standalone

  The Princess, the Dragon, and the Frog Prince

  Magic in Suburbia

  Watch for more at Elisabeth Waters’s site.

  Stars of Darkover

  Darkover® Anthology 14

  Edited by

  Deborah J. Ross

  &

  Elisabeth Waters

  The Marion Zimmer Bradley Literary Works Trust

  PO Box 193473

  San Francisco, CA 94119

  www.mzbworks.com

  CONTENTS

  CONTENTS

  INTRODUCTION

  by Deborah J. Ross

  DEDICATION

  ALL THE BRANCHING PATHS

  by Janni Lee Simner

  THE COLD BLUE LIGHT

  by Judith Tarr

  KIRA ANN

  by Steven Harper

  THREADS

  by Elisabeth Waters and Ann Sharp

  WEDDING EMBROIDERY

  by Shariann Lewitt

  THE RIDENOW NIGHTMARE

  by Robin Wayne Bailey

  CATALYST

  by Gabrielle Harbowy

  THE FOUNTAIN’S CHOICE

  by Rachel Manija Brown

  HOUSE OF FIFTEEN WIDOWS

  by Kari Sperring

  ZANDRU’S GIFT

  by Vera Nazarian

  LATE RISING FIRE

  by Leslie Fish

  EVANDA’S MIRROR

  by Diana L. Paxson

  AT THE CROSSROADS

  by Barb Caffrey

  SECOND CONTACT

  by Rosemary Edghill and Rebecca Fox

  A FEW WORDS FOR MY SUCCESSOR

  by Debra Doyle and James D. Macdonald

  ABOUT THE EDITORS

  DARKOVER® ANTHOLOGIES

  COPYRIGHT

  INTRODUCTION

  by Deborah J. Ross

  For readers and aspiring writers of my generation, as well as the generations that followed, Marion Zimmer Bradley’s Darkover represented the best of science fiction/fantasy: the world we wanted to run away to, the place we wanted to write adventures in, and the people we wanted to know and to be. In the early years when copyright infringement was not an issue, Marion was immensely generous with her “sandbox,” welcoming fans to create their own stories in her wonderful world. From the magazines and newsletters put out through the Friends of Darkover to the series of professional-level anthologies edited by Marion and published by DAW Books, Darkover has nourished the imaginations of readers and writers alike.

  I cannot claim to have sold my first professional short story to a Darkover anthology. “Midwife” in Free Amazons of Darkover was my second sale (the first being to the first volume of Sword & Sorceress, another of Marion’s anthology series). Even before those sales, I had the honor of receiving Marion’s kind words of encouragement on stories I submitted to Starstone, the Friends of Darkover fiction magazine. Over the decades that followed, Marion became not only my teacher and mentor but my friend and co-writer. Or maybe I became hers, the relationship was so mutual. Collaborating with her on a series of Darkover novels, and then continuing the series under the supervision of her Literary Works Trust, presented an extraordinary opportunity to carry forward her vision of this world and its people.

  I have gone on to create my own world and characters, as well as editing a number of anthologies. Marion influenced my editing as well as my writing style, and I hope I have been as supportive to the many writers who over the years have entrusted me with their stories as she was to me. In a fannish corner of my heart, I always hoped that someday I might get the chance to edit a Darkover anthology. This anthology, the first of a renewed annual series, pays tribute to Marion’s legacy, both in the world of the Bloody Sun and in the community of superb writers who began their careers with her.

  I did not restrict the lineup to authors whose first sales had been to Marion’s anthologies and her fantasy magazine. In the marvelous way that we are all connected, every contributor has benefitted, either directly or through the tradition of “paying it forward,” from Marion’s commitment to young writers. As she wrote, “One generation plants the trees, the next eats the fruit.”

  We follow in the footsteps of those who have gone before us, forging the trail and planting the Yellow Forest. An anthology of short fiction by different writers offers a landscape of the secret places, minor but fascinating characters, and hidden histories that novels can suggest but not explore. Editing such an anthology is an unfolding wonder as themes, histories, races human and nonhuman, Gifts, and Domains are woven together in a dance, sometimes echoing and complementing one another, other times offering sharp contrasts, but always engaging and exciting.

  I invite you to come with me on a journey of time and space and heart, whether you are a traveler new to the world of Cottman IV, popularly known as Darkover, or whether you have a treasure trove of dog-eared paperbacks from the 1960s, when Lew Alton, Regis Hastur, and many other beloved characters first saw print. Here you will find strangers and friends, and even stranger beings and happenings, for Marion never shrank from tackling difficult issues with courage and sensitivity, and we who walk in her footsteps can do no less. I hope these tales of wonder and despair, of love and betrayal and hope, will delight and challenge you as much as they did me.

  DEDICATION

  To Marion, in gratitude

  ALL THE BRANCHING PATHS

  by Janni Lee Simner

  Many of us began our love affair with Darkover with The Sword of Aldones (1962). This was not the first published Darkover novel—The Planet Savers had come out in 1958 in Amazing—but in many ways it was the origin of all the adventures that followed, for Marion had conceived the story when she was only fifteen. The front matter to The Sword of Aldones introduces one of the most memorable and complex characters in the series:

  Lew Alton was returning to Darkover...a Darkovan on his father’s side and a Terran on his mother’s....

  And his mother was not just any Terran, but the daughter of Wade Montray and Mariel Aldaran, and the sister of Larry Montray, who as a teenager met and befriended Kennard Alton. In the skillful hands of Janni Lee Simner, the story of Kennard and Elaine comes alive.

  Janni Lee Simner is one of the many writers who sold her first short story to Marion Zimmer Bradley—for the anthology Leroni of Darkover more than two decades ago. She’s gone on to publish more than three dozen short stories and eight novels, including the pos
t-apocalyptic Bones of Faerie trilogy and the Icelandic-saga–based Thief Eyes. Visit her online at simner.com.

  He wouldn’t meet her eyes.

  That was the first thing Elaine noticed, when he walked in three weeks late for the autumn term, his gray Terra Academy uniform stiff with first-day creases. She forced herself to look up with the rest of the class, though the Terran habit of meeting gazes still didn’t come easily to her.

  She took in a shock of red hair, proud gray eyes—and then he looked down. Not as if he was embarrassed for himself, with all those eyes on him. As if he was embarrassed for them.

  Not that her Terran classmates seemed to notice. “Off-worlder,” one of them whispered, as the boy stalked to his assigned seat. By lunchtime, the whispers had become more specific. “Darkover.”

  In the cafeteria, Elaine focused on her lit tablet while her friends debated why he was here. She deflected the occasional glance they cast her way by furrowing her brow and swiping a finger across her screen. Better to let them think she was engrossed in her studies than to have to explain that no, she didn’t know every last motive of a Darkovan boy she’d never met, because she’d been raised on Terra and was no less Terran than them. Never mind that the boy must have come in on the same big ship as Dad—most of her friends didn’t know her father had spent the past year off-world, either.

  From across the room, uneasy laughter drew Elaine’s attention away from the star map on her screen. She looked up and saw the new boy staring at the cafeteria food dispenser with cold disdain, as if he were better than any machine made of plastic and steel. A line had formed behind him, but he didn’t seem to care.

  “Just turn the knob,” one of the waiting students said.

  “Didn’t they teach you anything on that Class D backwater?” another sniggered.

  The boy stiffened and reached toward his belt. For his knife, Elaine realized, though of course he didn’t have one here.

  More laughter. The boy’s arm fell, and he turned slowly around. The glint in his eyes made the cafeteria’s gleaming metal floor and walls appear warm by comparison. “I’m sorry, but I am still learning your language.” The temperature-controlled room seemed to drop ten degrees at his words. “Would you care to repeat that?” Elaine knew then—knew—that he wasn’t going to avenge these insults with a few cutting words.

  She was on her feet, not sure when she’d gotten there. She had full Empire citizenship, but if this Darkovan boy didn’t, fighting at school would get him thrown off-world so fast it’d make his head spin, and he’d never even understand why.

  She raced across the room, putting herself between him and the line behind him. “Here! Let me help!” She turned the dispenser’s knob and pushed buttons at random. A tray shot out, and several vacuum-sealed cubes of food clunked on to it, loud in the suddenly-silent cafeteria. “It’s really quite simple, once you get the hang of it.”

  The boy’s fists had been raised. He lowered them as Elaine dropped her eyes. It was a Lowland custom for men and women to never look directly at one other, but her mountain-bred mother had insisted on it when they came to Terra, saying that Terrans were unpredictable and could not be trusted.

  “Thank you, Lady.” The ice hadn’t left the boy’s voice. Elaine remembered, too late, that no Darkovan boy would appreciate having his honor defended by a girl.

  This wasn’t Darkover. He could adapt, just like she had. “Z’par servu,” she said, not without irony.

  At her perfect casta the boy started and looked up, like one of the deer on the reserve where her mother worked. Elaine lifted his tray and offered it to him, her own gaze still cast modestly down. She wanted to get out of there, to snatch up her tablet and flee the cafeteria before her friends could ask her, with words and with glances, just how Darkovan she really was.

  Elaine shoved the tray toward him. Her hand brushed his, and she felt a short, sharp shock, like lightning bridging the space from land to sky. She jerked away, nearly dropping the tray, only the boy caught it in time.

  She fled back to her table thinking, What in any world was that?

  The boy was truly Darkover-bred. He didn’t even try to follow her.

  ~o0o~

  By the time school was out, Elaine wanted nothing more than to go home and shed her itchy school clothes. But Dad had asked her over for dinner, which meant staying Terran a while longer yet. She caught a pod from school to his new apartment complex, wondering whether once she was there he would answer the questions he’d avoided by phone. Like why he’d transferred away from his civil service job on Darkover as unexpectedly as he’d accepted it, and why he’d left her brother Larry behind when he did.

  Outside Dad’s apartment a camera took her retina scan while the gleaming metal door cast her reflection back at her, dark Terran hair and Terran eyes so like Dad’s. It was Larry who’d inherited Mom’s Darkovan features. That was pretty much the only Darkovan thing about him. That he got to go return to the world of their birth while Elaine remained grounded on Terra was obscene.

  The door chimed as it slid open. In a few years Elaine would be an adult, and then she’d find her own way off-world. She stepped into the apartment’s small entryway. In the gray-carpeted, gray-walled living room beyond, a boy looked up from his school tablet. The Darkovan boy from school.

  “You?” Elaine didn’t know which of them was more startled.

  His ears turned bright red as he dropped his gaze, stumbled to his feet, and fled the room. If meeting a woman’s eyes was improper, talking to her with none of her kinsmen present was grounds for a blood feud. At least that was what Mom said. Elaine had left Darkover before she could speak, and she had no memories of any Darkovans who weren’t blood kin.

  She walked over to the Darkovan boy’s tablet. He had a Level 1 reading lesson up, the sort of thing most kids mastered in grade school. Elaine felt a twinge of sympathy as she scanned the basic exercises. Mom, who spoke Terran Standard passably enough, still sometimes needed Elaine’s help with written passages. On Darkover, she’d had scribes to read for her.

  “Hey, kid.”

  Elaine whirled at her father’s voice, and he grabbed her into a bear hug. Elaine hugged him back, inhaling the faint metallic scent that had clung to him even when he did his translation work in spaceports here on Terra. Elaine’s own comfort with the written word had come from Dad, during the handful of years he and Mom were together.

  “Hey Dad. Been a while.” Since the divorce, she’d only seen him a few times a year, mostly around holidays. She’d been surprised how much she missed him once he was gone.

  He held the hug longer than he would have before he’d left. Maybe he’d missed her, too. “Crazy year,” he said when he pulled away. He glanced down the hall and called, “You can come back in, Ken!” More quietly he told Elaine, “I should have known better than to leave him alone here, but this is an education for me, too.”

  “What’d you do, Dad? Trade my brother in for a newer, more Darkovan model?”

  “Something like that,” Dad said, which wasn’t the answer Elaine was looking for.

  The boy returned to the room and moved politely to Dad’s side, looking uncomfortable in his gray Academy uniform. A copper chain disappeared beneath his tunic. Mom had one just like it, attached to a silk pouch whose contents she’d refused to show Elaine as surely as she’d refused to explain why she wouldn’t go back to Darkover, not even for a visit, not even when she missed it so much.

  “Okay, time to do this right.” Dad switched from Terran Standard to casta, which Elaine had never heard him speak. “Kennard-Gwynn Lanart-Alton, allow me to introduce my daughter, Elaine Montray-Aldaran.”

  “S’dia shaya.” The rote casta phrase felt strange on Elaine’s tongue, standing in Dad’s cramped Terran apartment as she was. Casta was for Mom and for home, Terran Standard for Dad and school and all the rest of the wide world.

  “The honor is mine, Yllana.” Kennard spoke the Darkovan version of her name, which no on
e but Mom ever used. That was more than strange, and it set off a sharp electric jolt beneath her skin, familiar and unsettling at once. As if they’d met before, or else would meet again. Except that made no sense.

  “There.” Dad kept talking in casta. He’d gotten better at it while he was away. “Now you two can talk without poor Ken here worrying I’m going to challenge him to a duel.” He laughed. “Though given my poor fencing skills, I really don’t see what he’s worried about!”

  Kennard looked relieved, and that told Elaine, more than anything else, that all Mom’s talk of unforgiveable insults and duels to the death was more than just talk, after all. “Lerrys did not tell me he had a sister.” Kennard used the Darkovan version of her brother’s name, too. “Let alone one who spoke as if she were one of us.”

  “That’s my brother for you,” Elaine said. “Not much of a talker.” When Mom and Dad had split up, they’d split the kids with them—Elaine going to Mom, Larry going to Dad—and Larry had found the whole business so uncomfortable he never visited Mom and barely spoke to Elaine outside of her visits to Dad, even though they still went to school together.

  Had gone to school together. “Dad, where is Larry? Is he in some sort of trouble? What’s going on?”

  “Lerrys is well,” Kennard said.

  “What’s going on,” Dad told her, “is that Larry’s accepted his Darkovan heritage. Your mother was right. I had no right to keep that heritage from either of you.”

  “So Larry went native? Skinning his own bears, living off the land, that sort of thing?” Elaine couldn’t even picture him speaking casta or wearing Darkovan clothes.

  “We do not know bears on Darkover.” Kennard stumbled over the Terran word for the animal.

  “Not even in the mountains?” Elaine asked wryly.

  Kennard smiled. “More likely to meet a banshee in the Hellers, and I’m told they make bad eating.” He had a cute smile, kind of shy and entirely different from the sharp pride she’d seen at school.