The Saga of the Renunciates Read online

  When Jaelle was brought to them, Rohana drew breath in amazement at the child's surprising beauty. The grime of travel, and her ill-assorted cast-off garments, had obscured it before. She was tall for her age, her skin very pale, dusted with a few faint amber freckles; her hair had been washed and hung below her waist, the color of new copper. She had been prettily dressed in a delicate green gown, just the color of her eyes. Truly, Rohana thought, a daughter of whom any Comyn household could be proud. But would they see it? Or would they see only that she was Jalak's daughter?

  The Lady Jerana, Princess Consort of Aran (she had been born an Aillard and was Rohana's cousin), a languid, fair-haired, spoiled-looking woman, greeted Rohana with the embrace due a kinswoman, kissed Jaelle coldly and spoke graciously to Kindra.

  Why shouldn't she be gracious? It's all she has to do in life, Kindra thought.

  "So this is our dear Melora's child," said Jerana, looking the girl up and down. "A pity she is Jalak's daughter as well; it will be hard to arrange a marriage for her that suits her station. Has she laran?"

  "I do not know. I have not had her tested." Rohana's voice was cold. "I have had other things to think about."

  Lorill Hastur said, "Such brilliantly red hair often indicates an extraordinary degree of psi power; if she were so gifted, she could be sent to a Tower, and the question of marriage need not arise."

  Rohana thought that in any case it was too soon to worry about the marriage of an orphan only twelve years old, who had not yet recovered from multiple shocks; but she did not say so. She suspected Lorill picked up the thought anyway. He was a slightly built, serious-looking man about Rohana's own age; like many of the Hasturs, his flaming hair had already begun to turn white. He frowned in Jaelle's direction, and said tactlessly, "I suppose there is no doubt she is Jalak's child? Now if Melora had been already pregnant when she was captured, or if we could put it about that this was the case-"

  Jaelle was biting her lip; Rohana feared she would cry. She said coldly that, unfortunately or not, there was no doubt about the girl's parentage.

  "I assume Jalak is dead?"

  Kindra said that they did not know for certain. "But there was no pursuit, Lord Hastur, and when we reached Carthon, there were already rumors of change in the Great House at Shainsa."

  "Of course you know what troubles me," Lorill Hastur said. "Your rash act-I am speaking to you, Rohana; I know the Free Amazon only did what you employed her to do-your rash act could have plunged us into war with the Dry Towns."

  Kindra's eyes met Rohana's in a brief, vindicated grin. She might as well have said, aloud, "I told you so."

  "Lorill, you are Melora's kinsman, too! Should I have left her to die in slavery, and her child in Jalak's hands?"

  The man looked deeply troubled. "How can I say that? I loved Melora; I cannot express my grief that she did not live to enjoy her freedom. As a man, and her kinsman, what else can I say? But the peace of the Domains is in my hands. I cannot go to war to right one person's wrongs, or I am no better than the Dry-Towners with their endless tyrannies of blood feud and revenge. I must try to do what is best for everyone within these Domains, Rohana; Comyn and commoner alike. What of our farmers and peaceful citizens who live along the borders of the Drylands? Must they live in fear of revenge and reprisal by the Dry-Towners? And if the truces we have worked so hard to make are broken, that is all they can hope for."

  Suddenly Rohana felt sorry for him. He was speaking only the truth. His personal feelings could not be allowed to conflict with his duty as Councilor. He was Melora's nearest living kinsman; the duty he had shirked, for whatever good reason, had been done instead by women. That could not be easy for a Hastur to swallow.

  "Kinsman, that is of little moment now. What does matter is the guardianship of Melora's children."

  "Children?" Jerana asked. "Has she others?"

  "The son she died in bearing, Lady." Rohana glanced uneasily at Jaelle. Jerana should have had tact enough to send the child away before discussing her future before her; but it was not for Rohana to suggest it.

  Jerana said, "Oh, they can be fostered somewhere. If Melora had lived, I suppose we'd have had to do something for them, but we can't be expected to take any kind of responsibility for the children of some Dry-Town tyrant. Put them out to fosterage somewhere and forget about them."

  Even Lorill flinched at the brutal tactlessness of that. Rohana said firmly, "I pledged Melora before she died that I would rear her children as my own." Melora knew our kinfolk better than I, it seems.

  Jerana shrugged. "Oh, well, I imagine you know best. If Gabriel does not object, I'll leave it to you." Rohana realized that Jerana was glad she could dispose of it so perfunctorily.

  Lorill Hastur turned to Kindra and said, "Was it you who accomplished the rescue, mestra?" "My women and I, Lord Hastur." "We are deeply in your debt," Lorill Hastur said, and Rohana realized he was trying to soften Jerana's indifference. "You did what my kinsmen and I failed to do. What reward will you ask of me, mestra?"

  Kindra said with dignity, "My lord, the Lady Rohana has paid my women generously; you owe me nothing more."

  "Still, there is a life between us," Lorill said.

  "No, for I failed. My appointed task was to restore the Lady Melora to her kin," said the Free Amazon.

  Rohana shook her head. "You did not fail, Kindra; Melora died free, and she died happy. But it is for me, not you, Lorill, to offer her what extra reward she will ask...!"

  Kindra looked up at them both, and moved to Jaelle's side. "Then, since you both offer a gift," she said, "I ask this: give me Jaelle to foster."

  Lorill Hastur said, in shock, "Impossible. A child of Comyn blood cannot be reared among Free Amazons!"

  Rohana, too, had felt a moment's shock at this request-such presumption! But Lorill's words angered her as much as Jerana's rudeness had done. "Fine words, Lorill. But you were willing to sit uncaring in Thendara, and let her be reared in chains by Jalak." She beckoned Jaelle to her, and said, "Jaelle, before your mother died, I swore to her that I would rear you as my own daughter, born of my body. I know she meant I should keep you in my house, bring you up as my own child. But you are twelve years old; and if my own daughter, at twelve years old, came to me and said, 'Mother, I do not want to live with you, I want to be fostered by such and such a one', then-if her choice of foster-mother were such a one as I could trust-then I would consider carefully her wishes in the matter. You have heard Kindra ask for you, and"-she looked with angry defiance over Jaelle's head, at Lorill Hastur-"it is mine to decide. But will you not come with me to Ardais, and be my daughter?" she pleaded. "I loved your mother, and I will be a mother to you as well. You will have my daughter and her friends for playmates and sisters, and you will be brought up as your mother and I were reared, as a Comynara, as is fitting for our caste."

  Jaelle, darling, you are all I have of Melora...

  The hard little face was unyielding, strangely set. "And when I am grown, kinswoman?"

  "Then, birth or no, Jaelle, I will arrange for you a marriage as good as for my own daughter-" and then she knew, suddenly, that she had lost. Jaelle's face went cold.

  She said, "I want only to live where I will never be in subjection to any man. If Kindra will have me to foster-" She went and laid her hand in the Free Amazon's, and said, "I do ask it, kinswoman."

  Rohana thought, almost in despair, It is too late to treat her as a little child. She has known so much that would age her before her time.

  Still, she was a Comyn daughter, and might have laran. She said gravely, "Kindra, she must not be neutered. Promise me that."

  Kindra's face held outrage. "I see you have understood all too little of the Amazons, Lady. We do not neuter women."

  "I saw the two of your band-Leeanne and Camilla – "

  "We do not neuter our women," Kindra repeated implacably. "Now and again, a woman will be so maddened with hate for her own womanhood that she will persuade or bribe some healer to bre
ak the law for her sake; often they come to us afterward, and we cannot cast them out; there is usually nowhere else they can go, poor souls. But women who come to us first, instead, usually learn self-respect, not self-hate. I do not think-if she is fostered among us-that she will come to such hatred." She put her arms lightly around the child's shoulders, turned to Jaelle and spoke directly to her, but not as if she spoke to a child at all; she spoke as if to an equal, and Rohana felt a strange emotion that after a moment, incredulously, she identified as envy.

  "You know, Jaelle, you cannot, by the laws of our Guild, be accepted yet as an Amazon; even our own daughters must wait until they are legally old enough to be counted as women, to marry, or to choose. When you are fifteen, you will be permitted to make that choice; until then, you will be only my fosterling."

  Lady Jerana said querulously, "I think this whole business is outrageous; can't you stop it, Lorill?"

  Rohana thought, with anger she did not know she possessed, that it had been outrageous enough to discuss the girl before her face as if she were deaf, dumb, blind and feeble of wit. Lorill Hastur seemed to echo her indignation as he said, "It is Rohana's right to choose where Jaelle should be fostered, Jerana; she first consulted you, and you chose not to exercise your privilege of decision. Now I will defend Rohana's right to choose."

  Oh, good for you, Lorill! She looked at him gratefully, thinking that being Chief Councilor couldn't be the most pleasant of jobs. Jerana's pretty, vapid face was spiteful.

  "Well, Rohana, at least "you need not worry about finding someone to marry Jalak's daughter; I have always heard that the Free Amazons are eager to find pretty young girls whom they can convert to their unnatural way of life, turning them against marriage and motherhood, making them haters of men and lovers of women. It was clever of you to let Jaelle among them – "

  White with anger, Rohana felt that she would like to slap Jerana's sneering mouth, silence the filthy implication of those words. Then, as she saw Kindra smiling, she knew her sojourn with the Amazons had changed one thing forever.

  She would return to her old life, and the world of women. For the rest of her days she would tune her decisions to the invisible winds of Gabriel's whims, perhaps. But one thing would never be the same; and it was a difference that changed the world.

  Rohana knew, now, that she was living that life by choice; not because her mind was too narrowly bounded to imagine any other life, but because, having known another life and weighed it, she had decided that what was good in her world-her deep affection for Gabriel, her love for her children, the responsibility of the estate of Ardais that demanded the hand of its lady-outweighed what was difficult, or hard for her to accept.

  And so nothing that any woman like Jerana might say could ever hurt her or make her angry again. Jerana was simply a stupid, narrow, unimaginative and spiteful woman: she had never had any opportunity to be otherwise. Kindra was worth a hundred like Jerana. I am free. She could never be, Rohana thought.

  She said, almost gently, "I am sorry you feel that way about it, Jerana, but this seems to me a happy choice for Jaelle; you did not choose to foster her yourself, and since you do not love her, it is just as well. I would be selfish indeed to keep Jaelle tied to the ribbons of my sash, just to comfort me in my bereavement."

  "You will give her to that-that Free Amazon, that shame and scandal to womanhood?"

  Rohana said serenely, "I know her, Jerana, and you do not." She held out her arms to Jaelle and said, "I told you that if my own daughter made such a choice, I would listen to her. Be it as you wish, then." She folded Jaelle in her arms, and for the first time the little girl hugged her, hard, kissing her on the cheek, her eyes shining. Rohana said, "I give you to Kindra to foster, Jaelle. I bid you be a dutiful daughter to her; and do not forget me."

  Then, letting Jaelle go, she stretched her hands to the Free Amazon. The older woman's calloused, sunburned hands met her own; the level gray eyes looked straight into hers. She said quietly, "Lady, may the Goddess deal with me as I with Jaelle."

  Rohana's mind lay open to the touch. Again, and for the last time, she felt the Amazon's immense kindness, steadiness; she knew she would trust Kindra with her life-or with this other life so precious to her. She was surprised to feel that her eyes were filling with tears.

  She thought, I almost wish I were coming with you, too...

  Kindra said softly, aloud, "So do I, Rohana." There was no formal "My Lady" now; they had gone too deep for that. Rohana could not speak, even to say good-bye; she laid Jaelle's hand in Kindra's and turned away.

  The last thing Rohana heard, as they left the audience chamber, Jaelle skipping along at Kindra's side, was the little girl asking eagerly, "Foster-mother, will you cut my hair?"

  Part II

  Magda Lorne, Terran Agent

  Twelve years elapse between the first part and the second.

  Chapter Six

  If there was a noisier job anywhere in the Galaxy than building a spaceport, Magda Lome hoped she'd never have to listen to it.

  And a long job. This one, it seemed, had been building most of Magda's life. She had been born at Caer Donn, the Terran Empire's first foothold on Darkover; had been eight years old when the HQ had been moved here to Thendara; and the spaceport had been under construction ever since.

  Even the violence of the autumnal storm had only dulled, not silenced, the roar of the building machines, although the mountains behind the city had disappeared into a blur of white snow, and even the old town beyond the HQ was all but invisible. Magda went through the heavy storm doors into the unmarried women's quarters and simultaneously slammed out storm and noise. Inside it was soundproofed. The lights here were yellow Earth-normal. At least this building was finished, she thought, and quiet. All during her brief marriage to Peter, they had lived in Married Personnel Quarters; unfinished and the soundproofing still not complete. And she wondered, sometimes, just how much the perpetual tension of the noise had contributed to the breakup of that marriage. She shrugged the thought off, opening the door of her room. It would never have worked, no matter what the conditions. I don't think I was ever in love with Peter, and I'm perfectly sure he was never in love with me. We'd just been together too much, her thoughts ran on the familiar track, and not quite enough, not quite enough to get it out of our systems. When that wore off, we realized there wasn't anything else to hold us together.

  Recalling her marriage to Peter, her thoughts continued along an annoying, smooth and familiar groove. Where is he? He's never been away so long before. I hope nothing's happened to him.

  She sternly admonished herself not to worry! Like herself, Peter Haldane was a graduate in Alien Anthropology from the Empire University; like herself he had been brought up since childhood on Cottman IV, which the natives called Darkover; and like herself when they returned to the planet that both was and was not their home world, they had gone directly into Empire Intelligence work. The Empire might call the work they did Intelligence and think of it as elaborate spying, but to Magda, and Peter, and the others like them-not many, here on Darkover-it was the best training for an alien anthropologist: to mingle with the people of their world, to get to know them in a way anthropologists not reared here never could. Peter was evidently on a lengthy assignment somewhere. But this time he had been gone so long!

  And there were the dreams...

  Magda knew she should report the dreams. In the course of her Alien Psychology credentials, she had been tested for psi potential; and had tested very high. Just the same, she was reluctant to make an official report of her recurrent dreams-all of which, without exception, warned her that Peter Haldane was in trouble-as if to do so might give them some reality. Dreams are just dreams, that's all...

  Nevertheless, when she finished shedding her heavy outer layer of clothing, she went to the communicator button.

  "Personnel? Lome here. Is that you, Bethany? I don't suppose Haldane has reported back, or sent word, has he, in the last twenty-e
ight?"

  "Not a word, Magda," the woman in the coordinator's office replied. "I knew it; you're still carrying around a yen for Peter, aren't you? You've been on the button every twenty-eight, asking for news."

  "Yen be damned," Magda said irritably. "In case you've forgotten, I've known Peter since I was five years old; we grew up together, and I worry." And that, she thought, cutting the connection, is why I don't report the dreams. I'm sick and tired of every bored woman here speculating, out loud, how long it will be before Peter and I get together again! Is it going to get so bad that one of us has to put in for a transfer and leave Darkover? Damn it, I grew up here, this is my home, too!

  I wonder if Peter feels that way too? We never talked about it. We never talked much about anything, outside of bed. That was half our trouble...

  She still felt irritable as she took off the Darkovan outfit she wore for her work outside the HQ gates. She wore the ordinary dress of a woman of Thendara: a long, full skirt of heavy cloth, woven in a tartan pattern, a high-necked and long-sleeved tunic, embroidered at the neck, and ankle-high sandals of thin leather. Her hair was long and dark, coiled low on her neck and fastened with the butterfly-shaped clasp that every woman wore in the Domains. Magda's was made of silver, a noblewoman would have worn copper, a poor woman's clasp would have been carved of wood or even leather; but no chaste woman exposed her bare neck in public.

  She hung the Darkovan clothes away, first rubbing their folds with an aromatic mixture of spices; it was as important to smell right as to look right, in the Old Town. She showered and got into Terran clothes, thin crimson tights and a tunic with the Empire emblem on the sleeve. They felt chilly, and she thought it made no sense to wear thin synthetics here and heat the buildings to a temperature that made them practical. It just made the Terrans unfit for the climate.

  It's like the yellow Earth-normal lights everywhere in the HQ; it just keeps everyone from adapting to the red sun. I know, it's Empire policy everywhere; and when spaceport personnel are likely to be transferred all across the Galaxy at a few days' notice, of course maintaining a stable set of standard conditions makes sense.