A Flame in Hali

by Marion Zimmer Bradley

  Varzil was right. The madness must stop.

  No wonder Lerrys had gone half mad. This was no simple case of threshold sickness, to be treated with kirian and a little basic training. The boy desperately needed skilled help. If he were not to be scarred in mind and spirit by what he had seen, he must make his peace with it. She knew of no place he could find that solace and healing except in a Tower.

  She could no longer delay her departure. She must return to Hali as soon as Lerrys was strong enough, there to take up her place as leronis and work to fulfill Varzil’s dream.

  31

  Since late spring, messengers had been racing between Sweetwater and the other major Ridenow estates, and also Thendara. Now not a day passed without some news. Having escaped back to Serrais, the sons of Dom Eiric waited anxiously for word from Asturias, a ransom demand or news of his execution. Emissaries also went forth to King Carolin and other powerful rulers, to see whether an alliance might be made.

  For the time being, however, there was a lull in the fighting. Even victors, Dyannis thought wryly, must take time to lick their wounds.

  One evening, shortly after the news of the defeat at Asturias, Dyannis arranged a meeting with Harald in the private chamber he used as the estate office and library. The room was small and a little gloomy with its empty hearth and darkened windows. Summer was nearly over, but the evenings were not yet cold enough for a fire. The chill, Dyannis thought, was of the spirit. She felt some regret that at such a time, she must leave her family, but she had already delayed too long.

  Harald eased himself into the wooden chair beside the table that served as his desk. He’d been up since before dawn, for it was high summer. Come harvest time, Sweetwater would feel the loss of so many men, but for now, they could manage. Lerrys grew stronger every day and Dyannis often rode with the others out to the pastures. She had changed into a house gown for dinner, mostly to please Rohanne, but Harald still wore his working clothes.

  He offered her wine and a plate of tiny fruit pastries dusted with crystallized honey. It was a childhood treat, perhaps a reminder of their shared past. She declined both, for unless she was doing laran work, she did not care for sweets. She settled herself in the second chair, with the table between them, while he filled a goblet for himself.

  After a few inconsequential comments on the day’s work and the weather, which had been very fine, Dyannis began the conversation in earnest. “The roads are safe enough for the time being, at least between here and Thendara. We cannot know how long the peace will last, so we must not delay. Lerrys must come with me to Hali while we still can.”

  “Surely there is no reason for Lerrys to go all the way to Hali,” he said. “The boy’s getting stronger every day, and besides, he is needed here at Sweetwater.”

  “He is not well, and you know it. Harald, he barely survived his threshold crisis, and although he has not had another such episode, we cannot be sure this is the end of it. If he has another one, it might kill him.” She leaned forward, trying to put the complex interactions of mind and body into simple terms. “His laran was just awakening when he linked to his friend at the battle at Asturias Castle. I think his empathy with the horse, his Ridenow Gift, made that bond strong enough so that he experienced the slaughter, the pain and terror and death, up here,” she brushed her temple, “just as if he had been there himself.”

  Harald listened, his eyes hooded and unreadable. Dyannis sensed his love for his son, and his fear.

  “It is possible the experience burned out his laran, or damaged it so badly that he will never be able to use it,” she said. “But that is only a part of the problem. You know that even grown men who live through such a tragedy are changed. Sometimes they can never go back to their homes and families. They wander the roads or turn outlaw. I have seen them in Thendara, drunkards and beggars. I do not want that to happen to Lerrys, who was so young and unprepared.”

  Harald nodded. “I understand the danger, but Lerrys seems to be fine. He has said nothing of this to me.”

  “I do not think he will speak of it, if he even remembers. But it is still in his mind, of that I am sure, and it will prey upon him like some putrefying abscess, if it is not drained. Although he seems fine, he does not feel fine, not to my mind. Harald, I am a trained leronis. I know a great deal, and I tell you, this is beyond my ability to deal with by myself. If Lerrys were an ordinary man, without laran, I could treat him well enough. But with his Gift, and what he has been through, he needs a protected environment, and skilled care, which I cannot give him here at home.”

  Harald had shuddered visibly at her words. He spoke in a voice thick with emotion. “And the leronyn at Hali Tower can help him? You are sure of this?”

  Dyannis nodded. “I have seen men and women come through worse nightmares, and become whole.” She did not add that some were as a result of her own impulsive behavior, that she herself had worked to undo the harm she had caused. Raimon had been right; she had made her amends. Now she was in a position to use what she had learned to help her nephew.

  “Rohanne will fret, but I think you are right,” Harald said after a pause. “We must do whatever is necessary for my son’s recovery. You and I and Lerrys must journey together to the Hastur lands. We will leave as soon as preparations can be made.”

  Dyannis sat back in her chair with a little sigh. The talk had gone far more easily than she had hoped. She had expected resistance, and instead had found cooperation. Harald was not Dom Felix, and he truly loved his son.

  “I have another reason for traveling to Thendara,” Harald said with a faintly pleased expression, “and that concerns you. I am glad you arranged this conversation, or I would have had to.”

  “What did you want to talk about?” she asked.

  “Your future. After Lerrys has been to Hali, he will no longer need you. You are a grown woman, and should have a household of your own. More than that, these are desperate times. Ridenow needs powerful friends. Blood ties are the strongest of all, but marriage is still a potent way to make allies.”

  Her stomach gave a lurch. She did not at all like this new direction to the conversation. “What—what do you mean?”

  “I have arranged your betrothal to Dom Tiavan Harryl, and the ceremony will take place in Thendara—”

  “What!” The word burst out like the cry of a stricken deer. She could hardly breathe.

  “It is a good match, breda. From all accounts, Dom Tiavan is a courteous, honorable man. He is a kinsman of the young woman lately married to Geremy Hastur, son of Lord Istvan of Carcosa, and therefore kin to King Carolin himself. Moreover, Dom Geremy has been named Regent for the exiled heir to Asturias.”

  Dyannis felt as if she had been plunged into someone else’s life. This could not be happening. Her own brother could not have done this to her.

  Although her mind reeled, Dyannis also grasped the political implications of her brother’s words. Harald was well within his rights to use her marriage for an alliance. Such arrangements were common. Most women of the Comyn never expected anything else, and if the gods smiled upon them, their husbands would treat them with courtesy and perhaps, over time, love. If not, there was always the consolation of children, of rank, and of the knowledge they had served their families in the only way most women could.

  I am not most women. I am Dyannis of Hali!

  “He has no objection to your age,” Harald went on, oblivious to her reaction. “You are not too old to bear him sons, but in the event you do not, his lands will revert to the Hasturs, who are overlords to the Harryl clan, so in the end, everyone is satisfied. You will have a good marriage and become mistress of a household of your own, instead of lingering on here as a dependent spinster, and your family will gain great advantage from the match.”

  “I—” Dyannis opened her mouth and then shut it. I cannot turn aside from the destiny that the gods laid upon me. She did not see how she could possibly become anyone’s wife and still do the work she loved, u
sing the Gift she was born with. She must put a stop to the conversation, before Harald took her silence for consent.

  “I thank you for your efforts on my behalf, brother,” she said, “but what you propose is impossible. I wish you had consulted me before entering into any such arrangement.”

  Harald’s brows drew together and the muscles of his shoulders tightened. “Are you pledged to some other? If so, why did you keep it secret? Or is there some reason this marriage is not pleasing to you?”

  “I have absolutely no desire to marry anyone! I proposed accompanying Lerrys to Hali in order to resume my duties as leronis at Hali Tower.”

  The ruddy color drained from Harald’s face. “What do you mean? You have been here all these months since the beginning of spring, and never once mentioned you wished to return to the Tower. I thought you had given that up. You said so little of your former life, I assumed the subject was painful to you. What else was I to think? As head of this household, I became responsible for making some other arrangement for you. I believed you would be unhappy and frustrated living under the same roof as Rohanne, with no real place of your own. I saw the chance to benefit our family and at the same time secure your happiness.”

  “You should have asked me first!”

  Harald got up and started pacing. “If only I’d had the slightest idea . . . Why didn’t you say something?”

  What a fool she’d been, so preoccupied with her personal problems that she never noticed what was going on around her. A dozen clues rose to her mind, phrases casually dropped by either Harald or Rohanne.

  “We must all of us, sisters as well as brothers, stand together” . . . “As you leave behind your life in the Tower” . . . “All that is behind you now” . . .

  “I came home for a visit only,” she said. “I should have made that clear. Not only that, I have not been released from my oath, and until my Keeper grants that request, I am not technically free to accept any proposal of marriage. There are so few trained telepaths . . .”

  Harald strode to his chair and grasped the high back. “This does create a difficulty. The offer has been made in the name of Ridenow, and has been accepted. We are committed. We cannot go back on our word or withdraw with honor.”

  Dyannis felt a sudden chill go all through her. She bowed her head, overcome. Blessed Cassilda, grant me grace. Show me what I must do.

  There was only one possible answer, and Dyannis did not want to face it.

  “How can any of us know what we are capable of, until we are put to the test?” she said aloud.

  Harald looked at her curiously, as if he had not expected this answer.

  “Varzil has been trying to persuade me to train as a Keeper for some time now,” she said, “but I did not think myself worthy until Lerrys went into threshold crisis. I do not know what fate the gods have set down for me. I only know that I cannot discover it by insisting upon my own will. My talent—and Varzil is right, I could be a Keeper—urges me in one direction, but my obedience to you and to the welfare of our family lies in another.”

  “Varzil—”

  “No, please, let me finish, or I may never again find the courage. All my life, I have done what I pleased, submitting to discipline and authority only as a means to get what I wanted. I thought my talents were mine alone to use and direct. Instead, I now see that it is the other way around, that it is I who have been given to them, even as I have been given to my family. For what purpose, I do not know. I only know that whatever action I take—or fail to take—must be with honor.”

  For a long moment, neither said anything. She felt the turmoil of Harald’s emotions, determination and anger, fear and yes, love. He was her brother, blood of her blood and bone of her bone, and he believed utterly in the rightness of his actions. He saw their land beset by enemies, and her marriage a hope for their survival.

  “So be it,” he said. “I know this is not what you would freely choose for yourself. I wish we had some other choice.”

  “As do I,” she answered with a little smile, “but what is done is done. I will not bring dishonor to you or our family. Too many times in my life, I have acted on selfish impulse and then regretted the consequences. I have done things that brought great sorrow and pain to others. I will not knowingly do so again. Therefore, I will go with you to Hali, I will ask Raimon to release me from my oath, and I will fulfill the pledge you have made in my name.”

  32

  Under other circumstances, Dyannis would have enjoyed the journey to Thendara. The roads were dry, the weather clear. She rode the same sturdy roan that had been her favorite at Sweetwater, and everyone was in high spirits. In the company of her kinsmen, she required no chaperone other than a maid, and for this purpose Rella had been appointed. Dyannis would have preferred Nialla, but she was too old to make the journey.

  To Lerrys, the trip was clearly an adventure. He had been to Serrais before, but never beyond Ridenow lands. As for Harald, he seemed to be doing everything he could to make the journey pleasant. He paid special attention to Dyannis and often asked about her comfort, until she grew irritable with him. She suspected that he was trying to make up for his actions out of guilt. He didn’t see that, in the end, she had freely chosen to honor her obligation to her family. She understood that he had only been doing what he thought was right.

  They met a caravan of traders from the Marenji border who were taking advantage of the lull in hostilities to do their business, and shared a pleasant meal together. Harald had clearly given thought to where they would stop, at the most comfortable inns, and had sent messages as far as Thendara. Dyannis remembered how she and Varzil had traveled to Cedestri, how they’d camped along the road and eaten when there was time, how their work had come before everything else. She told Harald he was making a great deal of fuss over soft beds and hot meals.

  “I suppose I might get used to it, for such is likely to be my lot once I am Dom Tiavan’s wife,” she added ruefully.

  “Fear not, you will never become like Rohanne,” he said, “with nothing more important to occupy her time than fretting over gowns and hair. All may yet turn out for the best.”

  Now that she was reconciled to her decision, Dyannis felt a subtle lightening of spirit as they came down the last gently rolling stretch of the Venza Hills and into the Lowlands. They rode through pastures where the afternoon sun hung like a veil of honey and cattle lifted their heads to blink sleepily at the travelers, beside orchards already heavy with apple and pear, and past villages with snug cottages, neatly thatched, and well-mended pens.

  “I grew up in a village very much like these,” Rella commented.

  Children pointed to the strangers, exclaiming over the unfamiliar colors of green and gold, before their mothers hushed them. “They’re Ridenow, and no enemy of ours,” one woman chided her child within earshot. “Varzil the Good is the King’s own bredu, did you not know?”

  “That’s Uncle Varzil they’re talking about,” Lerrys said to his father. They were riding close enough for Dyannis to overhear.

  Dyannis knew the history of the enmity between the two great houses of Ridenow and Hastur, but Harald was old enough to have grown up with it. Even long after the Peace of Allart Hastur, which had put an end to the worst of the feuding, suspicions lingered. Now, with the abiding friendship between Varzil and King Carolin, even those gave way to new hope.

  New hope, she thought, but not new peace. Ridenow and Asturias were now bitter enemies. Just before they left Sweetwater, one of Harald’s messengers brought word that Varzil had returned from the Asturias capital as Carolin’s representative to convince the other claimants to sign the Compact. Carolin had even offered to recognize the claim of Dom Rafael, brother of the last legitimate king, if he would refrain from using laran weapons in war.

  So whether he wills it or not, Carolin is involved in this conflict. Hastur might be linked with Ridenow against Asturias, but Asturias also had powerful connections. And if we are drawn into open warfare
, each side calling upon its allies, will the whole world go up in flames?

  And where would she be? Not in a circle, not rebuilding a Tower or healing broken bodies and shattered minds, but locked away, kept safe and idle, perhaps pregnant with Dom Tiavan’s heir, unable to use the talents she had trained so hard to master. . . .

  An image flashed across her mind—a Tower illuminated by fire, lightning bolts slashing down from the sky, human bodies blazing like living torches . . . the stench of charred flesh . . . screams . . .

  She blinked, and the vision faded. Before her, just beyond the base of the hills, Thendara glittered in the afternoon sunlight. Lerrys exclaimed and pointed, but they were as yet too far to make out any individual buildings, even the King’s great castle.

  Hali lay beyond the next ridge, the city where she had first met Prince Carolin, the Tower that had been her home for so long, and the lake with its heart of shadows. Raimon waited for her with pleasure and Rorie with hope. Alderic, who had also been her friend, had finished his time there and gone to his marriage with Romilly MacAran, as she would shortly to Dom Tiavan.

  At the gates of Thendara, guards in Hastur blue and silver politely but firmly asked their reason for entering the city. Harald answered, “Our business is with the king. We have his leave to travel here, and that is all you need to know.”

  “No offense, good mestre,” the guard said, without the slightest touch of servility, “but it’s my business to make sure that no one but a friend to Hastur passes through here.”

  An older guard, who had been standing a little distance away, walked over to investigate. Dyannis recognized him, and saw in his eyes that he knew her, too. He bowed and then said, a little gruffly, to his fellow, “D’ye not know the Lady Dyannis of Hali? Gods, man, what are you thinking, to question a leronis of the Tower as if she were common rabble?”