Citadels of Darkover

by Deborah J. Ross

  “If it weren’t for Ethan, I wouldn’t be here,” she said bluntly. “He needs me, and I owe him whatever support I can muster. He’ll walk again. I’ll make sure of it. And he’ll have a life where he can be happy. He deserves that.”

  “So do you,” I told her image. But it didn’t matter now. She was dead. And I was far from happy.

  ~o0o~

  “I’m going back to Vainwal,” Dom Ridenow told me one afternoon. We’d taken the horses out again, and this time he’d brought along a hawk to hunt with. I thought it fascinating the way a wild creature would willingly return to his gloved hand.

  We were little alike, drawn together only because Captain Maeda had left a gaping absence in both our lives, but I’d come to value his friendship. Save for a few small allowances, such as a kneeling horse, he didn’t treat me as a cripple or let my disability become a hindrance. If anything, he encouraged me to far more freedoms than the Terrans, and through him, I’d started to think of Darkover as home. “I’ll miss your company.”

  “Will you stay?”

  I’d already checked the opportunities for a transfer once I’d been cleared medically. There were jobs in translation, communications, and even a liaison or two, though I lacked the qualifications for the latter. None of those required the physicality the Service didn’t trust me to regain, though it meant I would be grounded for a while. In the end, that was fine. I wasn’t ready to be on another ship with another captain. “Probably. Kieran owes me a dancing lesson, after all.”

  He nodded and lifted his hand. The hawk launched into the air, circling.

  ~o0o~

  For a few months I kept my distance from Kieran. I meant to keep my promise, both to look after myself and to not be a distraction, although I still met with Elorie at Comyn Castle for sessions to heal my legs.

  “Much better,” she said when we’d finished. “How’s the pain?”

  “Gone.”

  “And the bad dreams?”

  “Better.” Between her and the Terran counselors, the trauma from losing both captain and ship had lessened to a bearable grief, and little by little, I’d been managing to find beauty in the simple, everyday things. I’d gotten a new guitar and Elorie had managed to find me a rryl of my own, which helped.

  “Good.”

  She helped me with my prosthetics, new ones since I’d ruined the last pair. These were simpler, less lifelike, but they fit better and didn’t have the weight of memory the others did. With these, I could start over. Walk better. Find a future by myself.

  “Kieran is leaving soon.”

  “Oh?”

  “Back to the Hellers.”

  “Oh.” I couldn’t follow him there; I still coped poorly with the cold weather, and new legs or not I wasn’t ready for rough terrain.

  “The spring equinox festival is coming up soon. We’ll have dancing.” There was a spark of mischief in her eyes; I wondered what she was up to.

  “I’d better learn, then.” I’d hoped Kieran would keep his offer to teach me, but I supposed it wasn’t to be. He’d nearly finished his work here and would be needed elsewhere.

  “You’d better.” She reached for the rryl leaning against the wall and plucked a few notes. “Stand up. Close your eyes. This is your first lesson: just listen.”

  I did as she asked while she played a lively tune not entirely unfamiliar. After a while, I couldn’t help but bounce a little to the beat. I was a musician, after all; I had rhythm, if not coordination.

  Someone threaded their fingers through mine.

  Six fingers.

  I opened my eyes and there he was, silvery hair, gray eyes, and I couldn’t keep from squeezing his hands with joy.

  “I thought it was time for a distraction,” Kieran said. “And I had a promise to keep.”

  “I thought you were leaving.”

  “I might be persuaded to stay for a while. Someone ought to make sure our newest cultural liaison is comfortable with his duties.”

  “Was that your doing? I’m not exactly qualified to be any sort of liaison.”

  “It helps to be—what is your Terran word?—ah. A celebrity. Or a Comyn, in Dom Ridenow’s case. I believe he wrote a letter on your behalf.”

  “Then thank you to you both.”

  Elorie hadn’t stopped playing, but the song had changed to a calmer, yet no less rhythmic one, and she began to sing with a sweet, lilting voice. I didn’t understand the words, but that didn’t matter; I knew it was about love.

  “Time for your first lesson, I think. Are you ready?”

  “Yes. No. I don’t know.” I’d wanted this more than anything, but now that my chance was here, I was nervous.

  “Just follow my lead.” He put a hand to my waist...

  ...and we danced.

  SACRIFICE

  by Steven Harper

  Each of these anthologies stands on its own, welcoming back old friends as well as introducing those new to the world of the Bloody Sun. While an occasional story may refer to previous adventures of the same characters, as an editor I prefer those that require no prior acquaintance. There are always exceptions, however, stories that strike me as so powerful in their own right that they merit a place of their own. One such is the following tale, gritty and poignant, a “Darkover noir” detective story with a romantic twist.

  Steven Harper Piziks was born with a name that no one can reliably spell or pronounce, so he often writes under the pen name Steven Harper. He lives in Michigan with his husband and sons. When not at the keyboard, he says, he plays the folk harp, fiddles with video games, and pretends he doesn’t talk to the household cats. In the past, he’s held jobs as a reporter, theater producer, secretary, and substitute teacher. He maintains that the most interesting thing about him is that he writes books. Most recently, he wrote the Books of Blood and Iron, a fantasy trilogy, for Roc Books.

  The girl was fifteen years old and already dead. David North pulled his coat close against the gathering evening chill and squatted next to her. Back alleys were the same whether you were in Taiwan on Terra or Thendara on Darkover—filled with squelching mud and rancid air and soggy garbage. This girl didn’t belong in such a place.

  She was—had been—pretty enough. Her dark blonde hair was braided instead of held in a butterfly clip, which meant the main adult in her life still saw her as a child. Unusual. Far as North knew, you became an adult on Darkover at age fifteen. Someone in this girl’s life was overprotective, even by local standards. Dress and cloak well-made. Copper necklace with a matching bracelet still on neck and wrist, a couple coins still in the pouch at her belt. So she came from a little money, but the killer’s motive hadn’t been robbery.

  The burn that branded itself like sickly flower across her chest and the blaster that lay in the mud several feet away supported the no-robbery theory. You didn’t use a blaster in a robbery. It was like using a cannon to swat a mosquito. North leaned over to examine the thing without touching it. Model X-17. Decent power range, adjustable from what the hell? to pearly gates. Common enough, carried by any number of Terrans. And strictly forbidden outside the spaceport.

  “You see why we asked for you,” said Loret Ridenow-Castamir. Her own auburn hair was pulled back with a blue butterfly clip that matched her cloak. “Why I asked for you.”

  “Who is she?” North asked. A few steps beyond them both stood a pair of guardsmen, their faces as stern as their pikes.

  “Her name is Jaelle Castamir,” Loret said. “She’s my third cousin twice removed.”

  “How well did you know her?” North said.

  “Not well. Her branch of the family tree is minor nobility with few ties to the Comyn.”

  “But enough ties to cause trouble,” North said.

  “A dozen cartloads of it,” Loret agreed. “It’s bad enough that it happened. Worse that it happened to one of the Comyn, no matter how minor. The Terran who killed her broke the Compact and our treaty with the Terran Empire.”

  “The kil
ler might be from Darkover,” North reminded her. “That blaster is point-and-poof. Anyone could use it.”

  “What are the chances a Darkovan got hold of a Terran blaster?”

  “Just keeping an open mind.” He examined Jaelle with quick efficiency with one eye on the setting sun. He wasn’t a coroner, but if the fist-sized hole in her chest wasn’t the cause of death, North would give his entire stipend to corner hookers. The girl’s limbs were starting to show rigor, which meant she had probably died three or four hours ago. There were instruments at the spaceport that would pinpoint her death to the microsecond, but this was technically a Darkovan matter, so North was stuck with Darkovan methods. He took from his pocket a notebook and made a hasty sketch of the crime scene. Darkover didn’t go for cameras.

  “Who would normally investigate?” North said while he drew.

  “The city guard, of course.” Loret chewed her lip. “But that blaster involves the Compact, which means the killer is probably involved with the Comyn, which means the guard—”

  “—won’t investigate lords and ladies,” North finished. “I get it. We have politicians in the Empire, too.”

  “This couldn’t come at a worse time,” Loret said tightly. “Just when Lord Hastur is negotiating a new accord with the Legate that will grant Darkover access to certain Terran medicines.”

  “Wow. Major concession from Dan Lawton and the Empire. What did Darkover offer to get that?” North asked idly while his pencil moved across the paper. He didn’t really care about batshit bureaucrats, but his subconscious was chewing over something he’d noticed at the scene and hadn’t seen fit to tell his waking mind about it, and he needed the distraction until it did.

  Loret looked uncomfortable. This got more of North’s attention, and he looked at her over his notebook. North could pass for a native easily enough. His ash-blond hair, thick build, and bland features blended easily into a Darkovan crowd. However, at the moment he was wearing a Terran shirt and trousers with a long, heavy coat from the stores at Thendara spaceport, where he currently lived. The clothes and coat looked out of place among the inhabitants of Cottman IV—Darkover, to the natives—who preferred medieval-style tunics and cloaks. And swords. And occasional telepathy. North cocked his head at Loret.

  “What did Darkover offer the Empire?” he repeated.

  Again, she hesitated, and North’s unease grew. Loret was generally unflappable, and she rarely missed a chance to say what was on her mind. Her unease was contagious. At last, she wet her lips.

  “Kireseth pollen,” she said quietly.

  North went dead still. Just hearing the name awoke in his gut a hungry worm that gnawed at his insides, made his hands shake just a little. Two years ago back on Terra, North had been a city detective who had discovered his nephew—one among a family of addicts—had overdosed on Kira Ann, a new and highly addictive designer drug. Driven by both guilt and anger, North had tracked the source to Darkover, where he had learned Kira Ann was made from the pollen of kireseth flowers. North and Loret had barely stopped one of Loret’s relatives from using the drug’s addictive powers and its ability to enhance laran—telepathy—to take over both Terra and Darkover. In the process, North had been forcibly addicted to Kira Ann. Even with the help of Terran doctors and Darkovan healers, North had endured weeks of painful withdrawal before he’d finally shaken himself free of it. Loret and North had destroyed every speck of Kira Ann in existence, but the stuff still echoed in North’s body and brain. Just talking about it awoke an edge of hunger. He snapped his notebook shut.

  “Why?” he asked, and his voice was hoarse. “Why in hell?”

  “One of your medical scientists thinks he can use kireseth pollen to synthesize useful—”

  “Useful?” North interrupted. “Useful? Jesus! That shit gets off Darkover again, and we’re cooked.”

  “The pollen can’t get off Darkover, you know that,” Loret said quietly. “When you put kireseth pollen on one of your Terran ships and jump, something wrecks it on the molecular level. The pollen has to be treated here, and the new drugs synthesized here.”

  “That’s what happened before. It’s a nightmare!” North snapped. “It’s—”

  “Maybe,” Loret jerked her head at the two guards, “we could talk about this another time. We have a dead girl and a Terran weapon.”

  North pursed his lips. Loret was right. A killer was getting farther and farther away with every passing second. With effort, North brought himself back around to the filthy alley. The thing was still tugging at him.

  “I’ll need this,” he grunted, and wrapped the blaster in one of Loret’s handkerchiefs. “Does Thendara have a morgue? She shouldn’t be buried until we finish hunting the killer, but she sure as hell can’t stay here.”

  “The family will take her, and they’ll want to hold her funeral right away,” Loret said doubtfully.

  “They may be in for a delay.” North put the blaster in his coat pocket and the thing that had been bothering him went ding in his head. Finally! He pointed to a spot near the alley wall, a spot that his subconscious had been poking at for several minutes now. “Those footprints have treads on them. Terran shoes.”

  Loret went over for a look. “So the killer was Terran after all.”

  “Or was a witness.” North took a tape measure from his pocket and ran it over the print. “Forty-one centimeters long. A teen or adult. Probably male.” He straightened, and his joints made popcorn noises. He took another look at the girl who had taken her last breath at an age when life was just getting started. “The guards can take the body. Tell them to ask around the neighborhood to see if anyone saw anything and report back to us. You and I have stuff to see and people to do.”

  He strode from the alley without further comment. Loret spoke with the guards, then hurried to catch up.

  Thendara was a city of wood, stone, and thatch. Houses clustered near courtyards like witches around their cauldrons, and a potion of people in tunics, cloaks, and long dresses curled through the streets. Winter was the dominant season, thanks to the weak red sun, and even the short summer was chilly. For all that, North actually liked the place. He had originally intended to go back home after eliminating the source of Kira Ann, but the addiction had forced him to stay and recover with the help of Darkovan healers. During that time, the fresh, unspoiled planet had grown on him. Darkover held a screw you attitude toward the Terran Empire that North couldn’t help but admire, and its people remained stubbornly attached to their independence, despite the Empire’s attempts to lure them—and their telepathic overlords—into the fold. As a reward for North’s work and sacrifice, Lord Regis Hastur had handed him an extended visa and even an extended stipend. North had accepted, as much to his own surprise as anyone else’s. Now North wandered freely between the Terran spaceport and Thendara, doing a little of this and a little of that, becoming an unofficial envoy to both worlds. This was another reason why news of the trade of kireseth pollen for meds had shocked North so deeply. Even an unofficial envoy should know these things.

  “Two steps,” North said. “We need to find out who owns this blaster, and we need to talk to Jaelle’s family. Preferably before they have time to cook up a story.”

  “And before the sun sets and everyone goes to bed,” Loret agreed. “We’ll have to investigate the blaster at the spaceport, but you Terrans don’t live by the sun and they’ll still be awake later. Let’s talk the family first.”

  They were speaking casta. North had spent considerable time with tutoring programs, and discovered a talent for the language. As time passed, North found he enjoyed speaking in liquid casta syllables. By unspoken agreement, he and Loret spoke casta in Thendara and Terran Standard at the spaceport.

  “Jaelle was killed in that alley, not just dumped there, so she must live within walking distance,” North said. “Do you know where?”

  Loret gestured. “It’s not far.”

  They walked in tense silence for a few moments. The red s
un slid down to touch the rooftops, tipping them with blood. Then Loret said, “I should have told you.”

  “How do think this’ll help anyone?” North burst out. “Kira Ann was the most addictive, most destructive pot of piss ever invented on this planet. In this universe. We almost killed ourselves wiping that shit out. Now Terra is making deals with Darkover for more?”

  “They don’t want Kira Ann.” Loret sighed as they walked. “The lead scientist claims he can make other medicines with kireseth, medicines that will save countless lives. That’s what the Comyn want.”

  “What can he make that helps?” North demanded. “Kira Ann was a real killer.”

  “The researcher thinks he can create a drug to cure threshold sickness among the Comyn-born.”

  North worked his jaw. Threshold sickness had killed countless Comyn, people who were born with telepathic power, or laran. When these kids became teenagers, they were hit with the devil’s double dose—adolescence and new laran. The transition was always painful and, too often, deadly.

  “You can see why this got our attention,” Loret continued quietly. “We already make kirian from kireseth pollen, but that only helps a little. The Keepers and the Comyn are both highly interested, despite their . . . wariness toward the Empire. It would save so many lives. My family alone has lost three to threshold sickness.”

  “Basic antibiotics would save even more,” North replied. “But those lives wouldn’t be Comyn.”

  “We can debate this all we want,” Loret said tightly. “The fact is, the Comyn have allowed the Terran Empire to study kireseth pollen at the spaceport in exchange for some of the benefits it could provide. Lord Hastur and Legate Lawton made the decision before I heard about it, and they ignored my appeals. I should have told you about it, but I didn’t want to cause you pain over something neither of us can do anything about. One thing we can do is find this killer.”