The Dragon Variation

by Sharon Lee

  "Worse than that," he said, watching her face with all a Scout's care. "I've come to take your son and your lover away."

  Something moved in her eyes; he read it as anger.

  "Er Thom makes his own choices," she said flatly. "My son comes with me."

  "To New Dublin?" Daav asked, keeping his voice gentle, his posture unthreatening. "Anne, your child bodes to be a Healer of some note, if he does not come to halfling as one of dramliz. How shall New Dublin train him to use these abilities? Will you wait until he harms someone through ignorance—or until he begins to go mad—before you send him back to Liad to be taught?" He showed her his empty palms.

  "How do I serve my cha'leket by denying his son the training he must have to survive? How does flinging talent into exile serve Korval?" He lowered his hands and gave her a rueful smile.

  "For good or ill, Shan is of Korval. We are in Liaden space, subject to the law and customs of Liad. Shan's delm commands him to bide at home. The law will find no different."

  She licked her lips. "Terran law—"

  Daav inclined his head. "You are free to chart that course. However, for the years such litigation will doubtless encompass, the child bides with Clan Korval, his family of record." He shifted; came to his feet in one fluid move, hand out in a gesture of supplication.

  "Anne, hear me. The luck was in it, that you brought your child to Liad. There is nowhere else in the galaxy where his talents are understood so well. I am not your enemy in this, but your friend. Only think and you will see that it is so!"

  Her mouth was tight, fine eyes flashing. "You seem to have me over a barrel," she commented. "What do you propose I do, hang on as Clan Korval's guest until my son is come of age?"

  Daav tipped his head, watching Er Thom's face out of the side of an eye.

  "Why, as to that," he said calmly, "here is my brother says he can do nothing other than stand at your side, whatever ground you choose. He makes a rather compelling case for himself, casting aside his delm's word and escaping from his rooms down a vine. If things were otherwise, I might well give such devotion its just reward. But the devil's in it, you see—I need him. Korval needs him. He comes with me, if I must have him off this ship in chains."

  "So the great House of Korval holds hostages, does it?" Anne flashed. "Is this honor?"

  "We had been—wishing—to talk," Er Thom said, very softly, from her side. "Perhaps—we might find the proper compromise—on Liad."

  Anne spun to look at him, eyes wide.

  Er Thom met her gaze. "Is the intent of the trade to keep we three together?" he asked. "Or is it to keep us forever at—at—"

  "Loggerheads," she supplied, almost absently. "You would burden yourself with a Terran on Liad?" There was a note of wistfulness beneath the disbelief. Daav relaxed, carefully. Er Thom took her hand and smiled up into her eyes.

  "You would have burdened yourself with a Liaden," he murmured, "on New Dublin."

  Daav felt a small hand slip into his and looked down into Shan's bright silver eyes.

  "Hi, Daav," that young gentleman said comfortably. He smiled impartially at all three adults. "We go home now?"

  "MAY I OFFER YOU more fruit, Master Healer?" Petrella yos'Galan asked from the head of the table, "Cheese?"

  "Thank you, my needs have been well provided for." Master Healer Kestra inclined her head.

  Thodelm yos'Galan's displeasure with her son was entirely audible to the Healer's inner ears. It was, of course, bad form to broach the subject of emotional turmoil with one who had not specifically requested aid, and Kestra had scrupulously kept to good form. Thus far. She could not help but admit, however, that her sympathies lay on the side of the abruptly absent a'thodelm and the lady his heart would not relinquish.

  The shabby little love-knot had been compelling, as had the struggle she had perceived in the room's echoes. Two people who loved each other, each striving for right conduct. More the pity that the two were persons of melant'i and that right conduct shifted like moon shadow, world to world.

  "I must offer apology," Petrella yos'Galan said ill-temperedly, "for my son's lack of manner. Of late he has come unruly, to the clan's distress."

  "No need of apology," Kestra returned mildly. "Those of Korval are understood to be unruly." She smiled.

  "I recall when the delm—Scout Cadet yos'Phelium he was at the time—applied for Healing, after his ship was disabled. Four Healers were required for the task of smoothing the memory—myself and another of Master rank, with two high adepts—and he wished to forget!" She sipped tepid tea and set the cup down with a tiny click.

  "For all of that, we did not entirely accomplish our goal. We succeeded in blurring the experience, but he recalls it. I am certain that he does. I believe it to be a distant recollection, devoid of emotion, as if he had read of the incident in a book. But I am entirely certain he could tap the memory in all its horror, did he become convinced of necessity."

  Her host said nothing to this and after a moment the Healer continued, in not so very good form:

  "It has perhaps—forgive me!—escaped notice that your son's love for this lady and their child goes very deep."

  "So?" Petrella said harshly. "We have all lost that which we loved, Healer. It is the nature of the game."

  "True," Kestra allowed. "But it is not the purpose of the game."

  "Enlighten me," the thodelm requested, with acid courtesy, "is it myself you have been requested to Heal?"

  Kestra inclined her head. "Ma'am, it is not. You must forgive me and lay fault with my years. I find that old women are often impertinent."

  "Not to say incorrigible," Petrella remarked, and Kestra smiled, feeling the tingle of the other's amusement.

  "I had told Korval I should await his return," Kestra said. "If it does not inconvenience the House—"

  But she got no further. There was a subdued clatter in the hallway, the door to the dining room swung open and Delm Korval entered with his long, silent stride, accompanied by a very tall lady and a fair-haired man carrying a child. The Healer came to her feet, inner eyes a-dazzle.

  Fumbling like a novice, she Sorted the images. Thodelm yos'Galan she could now ignore; likewise Korval's vivid emotive pattern. The others . . .

  The strongest was a dazzle of tumbling color and untamed light—rather as if one had fallen head-first into a kaleidoscope. With difficulty, the Healer traced the tumbling images to their source, bringing the pattern to overlay what was perceived by the outer eyes—gasped and automatically damped her own output.

  "I am—honored—to meet Shan yos'Galan," she said, perhaps to the room at large. "I would welcome—indeed, require!—opportunity to spend more time with him. But if my primary concern is to be A'thodelm yos'Galan, I must ask that the child be removed. He is—enormously bright."

  Korval was already at the wall-mounted intercom. A'thodelm yos'Galan also moved, leaving the tall lady standing alone near the door.

  "Mother," he said, going gracefully to one knee by Petrella yos'Galan's chair. "I bring your grandson, Shan, to meet you."

  The old lady's pattern, seen dimly through the rioting light show that was the child, registered yearning, even affection. However, the face she showed the one who knelt before her was bitterly hard. She did not so much as lift her eyes to the child.

  "Sad sparkles," the child said suddenly and wriggled in the a'thodelm's grasp. Set upon his feet, he reached out and took one of Petrella's withered hands in his.

  "Hi," he said in Terran, and then, in Low Liaden, "Tra'sia volecta, thawlana."

  "Grandmother, is it?" Petrella glared into the small face, then sighed, suddenly and sharply. "Good-day to you as well, child. Go with your nurse now, before you blind the Healer."

  "Come along, Shan-son," the a'thodelm said softly. He took the child's hand and led him to the nurse hovering at the door.

  "Mrs. Intassi," Shan cried, flinging himself against her, "we went to the port!"

  "Well, what an adventure, to be su
re!" Mrs. Intassi returned and led him out, carefully closing the door behind her.

  Master Healer Kestra let out a sigh of heartfelt relief, ran an exercise to calm her jangled nerves, and trained her inner sight on the a'thodelm.

  It was a pleasing pattern: Sharp-edged and cunning; subtly humorous, with a deep, well-guarded core of passion. The Master Healer nearly sighed again: Here was one who loved deeply—or not at all. There were signs of stress on the overlay, which was expectable, and a tenuous, almost airy construct that—

  The Healer frowned, focusing on that anomaly. There, yes, feeding straight to that core place where he kept himself so aloof. And it fed from—where?

  Laboriously, she traced the airy little bridge—and encountered another pattern entirely.

  This one was also orderly, well-shaped and passionate, overlain with the fragile skin of a recent Healing. The humor was broader, the heart-web less guarded, more expansive. The Healer lost the bridge in a twisting interjoin of passion and affection.

  "Oh." Master Healer Kestra opened her outer eyes, seeking Korval's sparkling black gaze. "They're lifemates."

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  There are those Scouts—and other misinformed persons—who urge that the Book of Clans be expanded to include certain non-Liaden persons.

  I say to the Council now, the day the Book of Clans includes a Terran among its pages is the day Liad begins to fall!

  —Excerpted from remarks made before the

  Council of Clans by the chairperson of the

  Coalition to Abolish the Liaden Scouts

  "I BEG YOUR PARDON," Petrella said acidly, "they are certainly not lifemates."

  The Master Healer turned to her. "Indeed they are," she said, striving for gentleness. "It is very nearly a textbook case—a shade tenuous, perhaps, but beyond mistake."

  Petrella turned her head and glared at the tall a'thodelm and his taller lady, standing side-by-side at the door.

  "I forbid it," she said, the Command mode crackling minor lightnings.

  Kestra saw the flicker in the a'thodelm's pattern and acted to prevent a response which could only pain all.

  "Forgive me," she said firmly to Petrella. "It is plain you have failed of grasping the fullness of the situation. I am not speaking of pleasant signatures on a contract and a formal announcement in The Gazette. I speak of a verifiable, physical fact which is not in any way subject to your commands."

  "Lifemates?" Petrella flung back with pain-wracked scorn. "Which of them is a wizard, pray?"

  "Well, now, the gaffer, he was a water-witch," the tall lady said in a peculiar, lilting voice, a glimmer of half-wild humor lighting her pattern.

  The Healer frowned after the sense of the words, feeling a similarity to Terran, but unable to quite—

  "A water-witch," Korval murmured in Adult-to-Adult, "is one who has the ability to locate water below ground without use of instrumentation." He flicked a glance at the Terran lady. "Correct?"

  She moved her head up and down—Terran affirmative. "He found other things, too," she said in accented, though clear, Liaden. "Lost sheep. Jewelry, once or twice. A missing child. But mostly he stuck to water." She shrugged. "If you listen to the talk on New Dublin, all the ancestors were—fey, we say. It adds color to the family tree."

  "You are yourself a wizard, then?" Petrella's voice was sharp.

  The Terran lady shook her head. "No, a language professor."

  "You know when the child wakes," the a'thodelm murmured from her side. "You know when I am troubled. I heard you calling me, from many miles away, and followed your voice."

  "And yet neither are of the dramliz," the Master Healer said, firmly. "I recall when the a'thodelm was tested at Healer Hall as a child. We tested twice, for, after all, he is of Korval." She moved her shoulders and caught Korval's attentive eye.

  "Plain meat and no sauce, the a'thodelm. Yourself—you have something, my Lord. If we are ever able to quantify it, I shall tell you."

  He inclined his dark head. "You are gracious."

  "You are dangerous—but, there. It is what one expects of Korval." She turned her attention once more to Petrella.

  "Neither pretends to wizardhood, Thodelm. I suspect the only talent either ever held was the ability to recognize and meld with the other. That work has proceeded as it must—hindered, alas, by the demands of custom, melant'i—and kin. It may not be stopped, nor may it be undone." She showed her empty hands, palm up.

  "You speak of wrapping the a'thodelm in forgetfulness, of sending the lady far away. To speak of these things is to be ill-informed. If they are separated by the length and breadth of the galaxy, still they will find each other. They are lifemates, Thodelm. If your pride cannot be thwarted, you must have the lady killed—and the child, as well. Then, the a'thodelm will be free of her."

  "Yet history tells us that Master Wizard Rool Tiazan's lady lived in him after the death of her body," Korval commented from across the room.

  Kestra hid her smile with a bow. "Indeed. You understand that the tie between these two may not be so potent—or it may well be potent enough. Certainly they are both strong-willed. Certainly they both love. It may be that the areas where the match is not entirely perfect are those which are not so—very—important. Who can say?"

  There was a silence in the room. Korval shifted slightly, drawing all eyes to himself.

  "Cry grace, Aunt Petrella," he said gently. "The game has gone to chance."

  "Chance," the Terran lady murmured, a flutter of panic through her steady, beautiful pattern. "Chance without choice."

  "Choice was made," A'thodelm yos'Galan said, "several times over." He took her hand, looking earnestly up into her face. "I love you, Anne Davis."

  It thrilled along all the matrices of her pattern, resonating within his. She smiled. "I love you, Er Thom yos'Galan." The smile faded, and she spoke again with a certain sternness. "But we still have to talk."

  "Certainly," he returned, smiling as if they were quite alone in the room. "Shall I show you the maze? We may be private there."

  "All right . . ."

  He turned back to the room, making his bows, pattern a dazzling, sensuous clatter.

  "Master Healer," he murmured, with a propriety that belied the joy ringing through him. "Mother." He turned to face Korval and checked, the clamoring joy within him stuttering.

  Carefully, silently, he bowed respect for the delm.

  Straightening, he stepped back, opened the door and allowed his lady to proceed him into the hall.

  "MASTER MERCHANT BEL'TARDA," Mr. pel'Kana announced from the doorway.

  Daav looked wearily up from his work screen.

  Luken had got a new jacket—an astonishing affair in bright blue with belled sleeves and citron buttons. The buttons flashed irritatingly when he made his bow.

  "Wine for Master bel'Tarda," Daav instructed Mr. pel'Kana and waved a hand. "Sit, cousin, do, and tell me what brings you so far from the City."

  "Well, it's not as far as that," Luken said seriously, disposing himself with unusual care in the leather chair across the desk. "Matter of an hour's travel, if you're unlucky in the route." He received his glass from Mr. pel'Kana and took the required sip, watching Daav trepidatiously over the rim.

  Daav smiled, picked up his near-empty cup and also drank, setting the thing aside as Mr. pel'Kana closed the door.

  "Well, Luken, you might as well make a clean breast, you know. I can hardly be expected to go before the Council of Clans on your behalf unless I know the awful whole."

  "Council of Clans! Here now, it's nothing—" Luken sputtered, caught himself and sighed.

  "It's no wonder the world finds us odd," he said severely, "when you go on giving rein to that sense of humor of yours."

  "Horrid, isn't it?" Daav agreed. "Now you've vented your feelings, shall you tell me what is wrong? Pat Rin?"

  "Eh? Oh, no—no. Ease your heart there—the boy's fine, though we had his mother yesterday. Why that woman insists
on—Well." He glanced down and brushed an imaginary fleck of dust from one of his improbable sleeves.

  "It's about young Syntebra," he said, and raised a hurried hand. "Now, I know she's intended for Er Thom, but the thing is—well, damn it, it just won't do!"

  Daav lifted an eyebrow, momentarily diverted. "No, won't it?"

  "Terrified of him," Luken said warmly. "Of you, too, if it comes to that. Nothing against her. But she's only a child, you see—and mid-House, beside. Hardly knows how to go on in that world, much less rubbing High House shoulders. I'm not saying she can't make a success of things—but she needs more work than Er Thom's likely to have time to give. He's a busy one, and he stands too close to the delm."

  Daav looked sharply away, picked up his glass and drained it. "Does he?"

  "Well, he's your heir, isn't he? And the pair of you as cutting quick and twisty bright as any would wish—I'll tell you what, it's tiring trying to keep abreast! The girl would be miserable, lost and uncertain of herself." He eyed Daav consideringly.

  "You alarm me, cousin. I certainly would not wish one of Korval to be the agent of such distress. However, I feel sure you are about to offer me a solution to young Syntebra's troubles."

  Luken grinned, rather shamefacedly. "See through me like glass, can you? Well, it's no matter—I know I'm not a clever fellow. Here it is: I'll engage to marry Syntebra. Another child is no hardship on me—the eldest is away at school more often than she's home now-days, and Pat Rin's no trouble at all. Nexon will be put to rest and a more equitable wife can be found for Er Thom."

  "Undoubtedly, a more equitable wife can be found for Er Thom," Daav murmured, possibly to himself. He looked at Luken with a grin.

  "I take it the lady does not find yourself—aah—terrifying, cousin?"

  "Not a bit of it," Luken said comfortably and smiled. "I get on with most, after all."

  "So you do." Daav closed his eyes and resisted rubbing his aching forehead. He opened his eyes.

  "I shall speak with Thodelm yos'Galan tomorrow," he told Luken. "However, I feel certain that your solution will be adopted. Now there is an active nursery at Trealla Fantrol, Pat Rin may be relocated for the duration of your marriage." He cocked an eyebrow. "Unless you think that unwise?"