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  “I have not seen her since noonday,” Doria said, then saw Rafaella in the doorway beside Vanessa.

  “Mother,” she called, and hurried to Rafaella, enveloping her in an enormous hug. Jaelle, smiling, came to her old friend, and the three women stood for a moment embracing.

  “It’s wonderful to see you, Jaelle. Damn, how long has it been? For the past three years we’ve kept missing each other; whenever I’m in Thendara, you’re out at Armida, and whenever you come to the city, I’m likely to be somewhere north of Caer Donn!”

  “It’s only luck this time; Margali and I were supposed to leave at noon,” Jaelle said. “I have been away from my daughter for a pair of tendays. ”

  “She must be a big girl now, Dorilys n’ha Jaelle,” said Rafaella, laughing. “Five, isn’t she, or six by now? Old enough to bring her to the house for fostering. ”

  “There’s time enough for that,” said Jaelle, and looked away, greeting Vanessa with a nod. “I know I met you a few days ago at the Bridge Society meeting, but I have forgotten your name. ”

  “Vanessa,” Doria reminded her.

  “I am sorry to break up your lecture,” Vanessa said, looking at the young women who were putting away the cushions and scattering about the room, but Doria shrugged.

  “It’s just as well. All the serious questions had been answered. But, they are nervous about their new work, and would have kept thinking up silly questions to be answered until the supper-bell!” She went back to the center of the room, and began packing up her slides and the projector. “How fortunate you came. You can return these to Medic for me tonight, and save me a trip through the streets at night. I borrowed them from the Chief of Nursing Education. You’ll take them back when you go, won’t you? Or are you spending the night?”

  “No, I came here with a message for Margali—”

  Doria shrugged again. “I am sure she’s somewhere in the House. It’s nearly time for the supper-bell. You will be sure to see her there!”

  Vanessa had been long enough on Darkover, and lived long enough in Guild-houses, to be accustomed to this casual attitude about time. She was still Terran enough to feel that they really should have sent someone to fetch Margali, or at least told her where to go and find her, but she was on the Darkovan side of town, now; resigning herself, she told Doria that she would be glad to return the slide equipment to the Medic Department for her—actually, she felt it was a considerable imposition, and she was a little annoyed at Doria for asking. But Doria was a sister in the Guild, and there was no courteous way to refuse a request of this sort.

  “Is there any news yet about the plane that’s down in the Hellers?” Doria asked.

  Vanessa was saved from answering by a scornful sound from Rafaella.

  “Foolish Terranan,” Rafaella said. “What do they expect? Even we poor benighted souls without the benefit of Terran science—” She made the words sound like a gutter obscenity—“know that it is folly to travel past the Hellers, at any season, and even a Terran should know there’s nothing north of Nevarsin to the Wall Around the World, but frozen wasteland! I say, good riddance to bad rubbish! If they send their foolish planes there, they must expect to lose them!”

  “I think you are too hard on them, Rafi,” Doria said. “Is the pilot anyone I know, Vanessa?”

  “She is not a member of the Bridge Society. Her name is Anders. ”

  “Alexis Anders? I have met her,” said Jaelle. “They have not recovered the plane? How dreadful!”

  Rafaella put an arm around Jaelle’s waist. “Let’s not waste time talking of the Terrans, Shaya, love, we have so little time together these days. Your daughter is such a big girl now, when will you bring her to the Guild-house for fostering? And then perhaps you will come back too. ”

  Jaelle’s face clouded. “I don’t know if I can bring her here at all, Rafi. There are—difficulties. ”

  Rafaella’s quick temper flared. “So it is true. I did not believe it of you, Jaelle, that you would go meekly back to your high-born Comyn kindred, when they had cast you off! But then, perhaps it was always certain that the Comyn would never let you go, certainly not when you bore a child to one of them! I wonder that no one has yet called your Oath in question!”

  Now Jaelle’s face, too, bore the high color of anger; she had, Vanessa thought, the temper associated traditionally, by Terrans, with her flaming red hair.

  “How dare you say that to me, Rafaella?”

  “Do you deny that the father of your child is the Comyn lord Damon Ridenow?”

  “I deny nothing,” Jaelle said angrily, “but what of that? You of all people, to reproach me with that, Rafi! Have you not three sons?”

  Rafaella quoted from the Oath of the Renunciates:

  “Men dia pre‘ zhiuro, from this day forth, I swear I will bear no child to any man for house or heritage, place nor posterity; I swear that I alone will determine rearing and fosterage of any child I bear, without regard to any man’s place, position, or pride. ”

  “How dare you quote the Oath to me in that tone and imply that I have broken it? Cleindori is my child. Her father is Comyn; if you knew him, you would know how little that means to him. My daughter is an Aillard; the house of Aillard, alone among the Seven Domains, have counted lineage, from the times of Hastur and Cassilda themselves, in the mother’s line. I bore my daughter for my own house, not for any man’s! What Amazon has not done the same, unless she is so persistent a lover of women that she will not let any man touch her even for that purpose.” But Jaelle’s anger ebbed; she put her arm around Rafaella again. “Oh, let’s not quarrel, Rafi, you are almost my oldest friend, and do you think I have forgotten the years when we were partners? But you are not the keeper of my conscience. ”

  Rafaella still held herself spitefully aloof.

  “No, that office is now filled by that he-keeper of the Forbidden Tower—Damon Ridenow, is that his name? How can I possibly compete with that?”

  Jaelle shook her head. “Whatever you think, Rafi, I keep my Oath.” Rafaella still looked skeptical, but at that moment a mellow-chimed bell sounded through the hall, announcing that in a few minutes dinner would be served.

  “Dinner, and I am still wearing all the muck of the pack animals and the marketplace! I must go and wash, even if I am not to be one of Doria’s nurses! Come along up with me, Shaya. Let’s not quarrel, after all, I see you so seldom now, we have no time to waste in arguing about what we can’t change. Vanessa, will you come with us?”

  “I think not, I must look for Margali n’ha Ysabet.” Vanessa watched Jaelle and her friend run up the stairs, and went toward the door of the dining room. There was a good smell of cooking, something hot and savory, the yeasty smell of fresh bread just taken from the oven, and a clatter of dishes where the women helping in the kitchen were setting out bowls and cups on the tables.

  If Magdalen Lorne, known in the Guild-house as Margali, was in the Guild-house at all, she must pass through here on her way to dinner. Vanessa wondered if she would know her by sight. She had met her only three or four times, the last time only a tenday ago at a meeting of the Bridge Society within this House.

  At that moment, she looked up and saw Magdalen Lorne coming toward her, along the hall from the greenhouse at the back of the Guild-house. Her arms were full of early melons. At her side, also carrying melons, was a tall, scarred, rangy woman—an emmasca, a woman who had undergone the dangerous, illegal and frequently fatal neutering operation. Vanessa knew the woman’s name, Camilla n’ha Kyria; knew that she had once been a mercenary soldier, was now a teacher of sword-play in the Guild-house, and knew that she was reputed to be Magdalen Lorne’s lover. That still embarrassed Vanessa a little, though not as much as it would have done before she had dwelt for months in the Guild-house and knew how commonplace and unremarkable it was. It no longer seemed to her mysterious and perverse; but she was Terran, and it embarrassed her.

  Even before she had come to Darkover, since first she had gon
e into training for Intelligence work, Vanessa ryn Erin had known of the legendary Magdalen Lorne. She knew most of the story: that she had been born on Darkover, in the mountains near Caer Donn, before the building of Thendara Spaceport, so that Magda had been brought up with Darkovan children and learned the language as a native. She knew that Magda had been trained, like herself, in the Intelligence Academy on Alpha, by Vanessa’s own chief, Cholayna Ares, who had at that time been head of Intelligence Training, and had only later come to Darkover. She knew that Magda had, for a time, been married to the present Terran Legate, Peter Haldane, and that she had been the first woman to do Intelligence Fieldwork on Darkover; one of the very few women who had ever done so. She knew that Magda had been the first to infiltrate the Guild of Renunciates, had even managed to take the Oath, and had quixotically insisted on keeping it, even to serving the full housebound time, which, before the creation of the Bridge Society, had been required in unmitigated form even of Terrans. She knew that, a few years ago, Magda had left the Guild-house and was on some mysterious detached duty at Armida. This she had known of the legend. But she had met the living woman only a few days ago, and still was not accustomed to her. Somehow she had expected her to be larger than life.

  In the Guild-house, courtesy demanded that she use only Lorne’s Darkovan name.

  “Margali n’ha Ysabet? May I speak with you for a minute?”

  “Vanessa? How nice to see you.” Magda Lorne, Margali, seemed tall, though she was not much over average height; in her middle thirties, with heavy dark hair cropped short in Renunciate style, shadowing her forehead; she had deep-set, lively gray eyes which rested on Vanessa curiously. “Here, take some of these, will you?” She shoved some of the armload of melons into Vanessa’s hands; sniffed, and made a wry face. “Smells like tripe stew. You can have my share. Will I ever forget how I hated it, my first few months here? But maybe you like it, some people do. Never mind, there’ll be plenty of bread and cheese, and melons for dessert. Camilla, give her some of those, if you drop them here in the hall we’ll be chasing them all over the place— and if any of them smash open, what a mess to clean away! And I, for one, don’t feel like scrubbing floors this week!”

  Camilla, who was even taller than Magda, loaded Vanessa’s arms with some of the melons she was carrying. They smelled sweet and fragrant, with the earthy smell of the greenhouse, but Vanessa resented the intrusion on her mission. Camilla saw her frown.

  “What are you doing here, Vanessa? If it is Bridge Society night, I had forgotten. ”

  Vanessa thought, irritably, that if one more person said that to her she would swear out loud. “No—but I have a message for you, Margali, from Cholayna n’ha Chandria.” Vanessa used the Guild-house name, and Magda shook her head in puzzlement.

  “Damn the woman, what can she want? I talked with her three days ago, and she knew I was leaving. Jaelle and I should have gone this afternoon. In case you’d forgotten, we have children at Armida. ”

  “It’s an assignment. She said it was important, possibly a matter of life or death, ” Vanessa told her.

  Camilla said, “Cholayna doesn’t exaggerate. If she said life or death, she meant it. ”

  “I’m sure of it, ” Magda said, frowning. “But do you have any idea what it’s all about, Vanessa? I don’t want to get hung up here. As I said, I’m needed at Armida. Jaelle’s daughter is old enough to be left, but Shaya’s not quite two years old, and if I stay much longer in the city she’ll forget what I look like!”

  “I couldn’t say, ” Vanessa evaded, carefully not saying that she didn’t know. She had been briefed on why Magda had left the Guild-house, and something from the most secret and classified files had been made available to her about Magda’s work at Armida, but not nearly enough to understand it.

  She could not imagine any conceivable reason why an Intelligence Agent of Magda’s status should want to burden herself with a half-Darkovan child, and like all women who are childless by choice, she judged Magda harshly. Although she admired the legend, she was not yet accustomed to the living reality of the woman. Walking at Magda’s side, it confused her to note that Magda was actually an inch or two shorter than she was herself.

  “It’s not all that late. Have we time for dinner here? No, I suppose if Cholayna said life or death, she means exactly that. Let me go and tell Jaelle n’ha Melora that I may not be able to leave at first light, after all.” But her face was grim as she started up the stairs.

  “Let me tell you, Vanessa, if this is a nonsense of some sort, Cholayna will wish she had never learned the way to the Guild-house. I’m leaving tomorrow, and that’s that!”

  She smiled suddenly as she started up the stairs, and for the first time, Vanessa sensed, behind the matter-of-fact woman, the powerful personality who had become the legend.

  “Oh, well, if it had to come, what better time? At least I’ll miss the tripe stew. ”

  * * *

  CHAPTER TWO

  « ^ »

  It was pitch-dark now, and raining, spits and slashes of sleet in the nightly rain. The streets were all but empty when Magda and Vanessa finally crossed the square facing the entrance to the Terran HQ and gave passwords to the Spaceforce man in black leather uniform. He was bundled to the neck in a black wool scarf, which was not regulation, and there was a heavy down jacket over the uniform which was not regulation either, but on this particular planet, at night, should have been. Magda knew they winked at it, but that wasn’t enough; they should have changed the rules to authorize it.

  And they think the Darkovan people are unwilling to change their primitive ways!

  Magda did not know most of the new Spaceforce people now. Even a year ago, she would have introduced herself; now it seemed pointless. She would be going back to Armida in the morning; that was where her life was laid now. She had remained accessible to Cholayna to help in the founding and implementing of the Bridge Society, but now it was working well on its own. And now she had a child to bind her further to Armida and the Forbidden Tower. Cholayna Ares, Head of Intelligence on Cottman Four, would simply have to get along without her.

  If she thinks she can send me into the field at a moment’s notice, she can simply think again.

  Magda had lived so long under the Darkovan sun that she flinched at the bright yellow Earth-normal lights as they came on inside the main HQ building. But she stepped into the elevator without hesitation. She had acquired a certain impatience with these Terran conveniences, but she wasn’t going to walk up forty-two flights of stairs to make her point.

  At this hour the sector given over to Terran Intelligence was dark and deserted; only from the office of Cholayna Ares was there a gleam of light, and Magda realized that if Cholayna awaited her in the office, instead of sending for her in her comfortable living quarters, there was something very important in the wind.

  “Cholayna? I came as soon as I could. But what in the world—this one or any other—is so important that it couldn’t wait until morning?”

  “I was afraid that by morning you would be gone,” Cholayna answered. “I wasn’t eager to send a messenger after you to Armida. But I would have done it if I had to.”

  Cholayna Ares, Terran Intelligence, was a very tall woman, with a shock of silver-white hair in astonishing contrast to the darkness of her black skin. She rose to greet Magda; gestured her to take a seat. Magda remained standing.

  “It’s good of you to come, Magda.”

  “It’s not good at all, you didn’t give me a choice,” Magda retorted irritably. “You said something about life and death. I didn’t think you’d say that lightly. Was I wrong?”

  “Magda—do you remember an agent named Anders? Alexis. She came here from Magaera two years ago. Basic Training in Intelligence; shifted here to Mapping and Exploring.”

  “Lexie Anders? I didn’t know her well,” Magda said, “and she made it very clear she didn’t want to know me any better. Later, when I suggested that if she wanted to know how
to relate to the women here, she join the Bridge Society, she laughed in my face. I must admit I’ve never especially liked her. Why?”

  “I think you were too hard on her,” Cholayna said. “She came here and immediately found herself up against the Lorne Legend.” Magda made an impatient gesture, but Cholayna went on, imperturbable.

  “No, no, my dear, I’m perfectly serious. You had done more, on a world where in general it was impossible for a woman to accomplish anything at all in intelligence work, than Anders had accomplished in her first three assignments. Whatever she did, she found herself competing with you, and in consequence she knew she was outclassed before she began. I wasn’t at all surprised when she shifted to M-and-Ex.”

  “I can’t see why she thought she had to compete—” Magda began irritably; but Cholayna brushed that aside.

  “Be that as it may. Her plane went down over the Hellers three days ago. We got a message that she was lost, couldn’t navigate—something wrong with the computer compass. Then nothing. Dead silence, not even a tracking beam to the satellite. Not even a signal from the black box.”

  “That seems very unlikely,” Magda said. The “black box,” or automatic recording device in a mapping plane, was supposed to keep sending out signals for retrieval, at least with the newer models, for at least three years after the plane went down. Magda knew Alexis Anders well enough to know that she would not have allowed herself to be sent out with anything less than the very newest in equipment.

  “Unlikely or not, it happened, Magda. The plane was giving out no signals, the black box and tracking recorder were silent, the satellite couldn’t trace a thing.”

  “She crashed, then?” Magda felt cheap; she had not particularly liked Lexie, but she wished now she had not spoken quite so unkindly of the woman—now, presumably, dead.

  Of course, there had been Terrans who had survived the crash of a Mapping plane, and found shelter, and in at least one case, Magda knew, a new life, and a new home. But not in the Hellers, the wildest, most unknown, trackless and uninhabited mountains on Darkover; perhaps the worst on any settled or inhabitable planet. It was almost impossible to survive in the Hellers, at least in winter, for more than a few hours, without special survival gear. And beyond the Hellers, as far as anyone knew (and now the Empire knew Cottman Four considerably better than the Darkovans themselves), was nothing; only the impenetrable mountain range known as the Wall around the World. And beyond the Wall, nothing but barren icy wastes stretching from pole to pole.