I broke the trembling rapport, knowing I could not force Thyra, as I would have had to do at Arilinn, to go into this all the way and confront what she refused to see. I couldn't Not before Marjorie.
It was not cowardice, I told myself fiercely. We were all kinsmen and kinswomen. There was simply no need.
I said, changing the subject quickly, "We can try keying the Sharra matrix tomorrow, if you want. Have you explained to your father, Beltran, that we will need an isolated place to work, and asked leave to use the helicopter?"
"I will ask him tonight, when we are at dinner," Beltran promised.
After dinner, when we were all seated in the little private study we had made our center, he came to us and told us permission had been given, that we could use the old airstrip. We talked little that night, each thinking his or her own thoughts. I was thinking that it had certainly cost Kadarin a lot to turn the matrix over to me. All along, he had expected that he and Beltran would be wholly hi charge of this work, that I would be only a helper, lending skill but with no force to decisions. Beltran probably still resented my taking charge, and his inability to be part of the circle was most likely the bitterest dose he had ever had to swallow.
Marjorie was a little apart from us all, the heartbreaking isolation of a Keeper having already begun to slip down over her, forcing her away from the rest. I hated myself for having condemned her to this. With one part of myself I wanted to smash it all and take her into my arms. Maybe Kadarin was right, maybe the chastity of a Keeper was the stupidest of Comyn superstitions, and Marjorie and I were going through all this hell unnecessarily.
I let myself drift out of focus, trying to see ahead to a day when we would be free to love one another. And strangely, though my life :vas here and I felt I had wholly renounced my allegiance to Comyn, I still tried to see myself breaking the news to my father came up to ordinary awareness and saw that Rafe was asleep on the hearth. Someone should wake him and send him to bed. Was this work too strenuous for a boy his age? He should be playing with button‑sized matrices, not working seriously in a circle like this!
My eyes dwelt longest, with a cruel envy, on Kadarin and Thyra, side by side on the hearthrug, gazing into the fire. No prohibition lay between them; even separated, they had each other. I saw Marjorie's eyes come to rest on them, with the same remote sadness. That, at least, we could share ... and for now it was all we could share.
I turned my hand over and looked with detached sorrow at the mark tattooed on my right wrist, the seal of Comyn. The sign that I was laran heir to a Domain. My father had sworn for me, before that mark was set there, for service to Comyn, loyalty to my people.
I looked at the scar from my first year at Arilinn. It ached whenever I was doing matrix work like this; it ached now. That, not the tattoo mark of my Domain, was the real sign of my loyalty to Darkover. And now I was working for a great rebirth of knowledge and wisdom to benefit all our world. I was breaking the law of Arilinn by working with untrained telepaths, unmonitored matrices. Breaking their letter, perhaps, to restore their spirit all over Darkover!
When, yawning wearily, Rafe and the women went their way to bed, I detained Kadarin for a moment. "One thing I have to know. Are you and Thyra married?"
He shook his head. "Freemates, perhaps, we never sought formal ceremonies. If she had wished I would have been willing, but I have seen too many marriage customs on too many worlds to care about any of them. Why?"
"In a tower circle this would not arise; here it must be taken into account," I said. "Is there any possibility that she could be carrying a child?"
He raised his eyebrow. I knew the question was an inexcusable intrusion, but it was necessary to know. He said at last, "I doubt it. I have traveled on so many worlds and been exposed to so many things ... I am older than I look, but I have fathered no children. Probably I cannot. So I fear if Thyra really wants a child she will have to have it fathered elsewhere. Are you volunteering?" he asked, laughing.
I found the question too outrageous even to think about "I only felt I should warn you that matrix circle work could be dangerous if there was the slightest chance of pregnancy.
Not so much for her, but for the unborn child. There have been gruesome tragedies. I felt I should warn you."
"I should think you'd have done better to warn her," he said, "but I appreciate your delicacy." He gave me an odd, unreadable look and went away. Well, I had done no more than my duty in asking, and if the question distressed him, he would have to absorb and accept it, as I absorbed my frustration over Marjorie and accpeted the way Thyra's physical presence disturbed me. My dreams that night were disturbing, Thyra and Marjorie tangling into a single woman, so that again and again I would see one in dreams and suddenly discover it was the other. I should have recognized this as a sign of danger, but I only knew that when it was too late.
The next day was gray and lowering. I wondered if we would have to wait till spring for any really effective work. It might be better, giving us time to settle into our work together, perhaps find others to fit into the circle. Beltran and Kadarin would be impatient. Well, they would just have to master their impatience.
Marjorie looked cold and apprehensive; I felt the same way. A few lonesome snowflakes were drifting down, but I could not make the snow an excuse for putting off the experiment. Even Thyra's high spirits were subdued.
I unwrapped the sword in which the matrix was hidden. The forge‑folk must have done this; I wondered if they had known, even halfway, what they were doing. There were old traditions about matrices like this, installed in weapons. They came out of the Ages of Chaos, when, it is said, everything it's possible to know about matrices was known, and our world nearly destroyed in consequence.
I said to Beltran, "It's very dangerous to key into a matrix this size without a very definite end in mind. It must always be controlled or it will take control of us."
Kadarin said, "You speak as if the matrix was a live thing."
"I'm not so sure it's not. I gestured at the helicopter, standing about eighty feet away at the near edge of the deserted airfield, the snow faintly beginning to edge its tail and rotors. "What I mean is this. We cannot simply key into the matrix, say fly1 and stand here watching that thing take off. We must know precisely how the mechanism works, in order to know precisely what forces we must exert, and in what directions. I suggest we begin by concentrating on turning the rotor blade mechanism and getting enough speed to lift it. We don't really need a matrix this size for that, nor five workers. I could do it with this." I touched the insulated bag which held my own. "But we must have some precise way of learning to direct forces. We will discover, then, how to lift the helicopter and, since we don't want it to crash, we'll limit ourselves to turning the rotors until it lifts a few inches, then gradually diminish the speed again until we set it down. Later we can try for direction and control in flight." I turned to Beltran. "Will this demonstrate to the Terrans that psi power has material uses, so they'll give us help in developing a way to use this for a stardrive?"
It was Kadarin who answered, "Hell yes! If I know the Terrans!"
Marjorie checked Rafe's mittened hands. "Warm enough?" He pulled away indignantly, and she admonished, "Don't be silly! Shivering uses up too much energy; you have to be able to concentrate!" I was pleased at her grasp of this. My own chill was mental, not physical. I placed Beltran at a littie distance from the circle. I knew it was a bitter pill to swallow, that the twelve‑year‑old Rafe could be part of this and he could not, and I was intensely sorry for him, but the first necessity of matrix work was to know and accept for all time your own limitations. If he couldn't, be had no business within a mfle of the circle.
There was really no need for a physical circle, but I drew us close enough that the magnetic energy of our bodies would overlap and reinforce the growing bond.
I knew this was folly, a partly trained Keeper, a partly trained psi monitor ... an illegal, unmonitored matrix ... and yet I though
t of the pioneers in the early days of our world, first taming the matrices. Terran colonists? Kadarin thought so. Before the towers rose, before their use was guarded by ritual and superstition. And it was given to us to retrace then‑ steps!
I separated hilt and blade, taking out the matrix. It was not yet activated, but at its touch the old scar on my palm contracted with a stab of pain. Marjorie moved with quiet sureness into the center of the circle. She stood facing me, laying one hand on the blue stone ... a vortex seeking to draw me into its depths, a maelstrom. ... I shut my eyes, reaching out for contact with Marjorie, steadying myself as I made contact with her cool silken strength. I felt Thyra drop into place, then Kadarin; the sense of an almost‑unendurable
burden lessened with his strength, as if he shifted a great weight onto his shoulders. Rafe dropped in like some small furry thing nestling against us.
I had the curious sense that power was flowing up from the stone and into the circle. It felt like being hooked up to a powerful battery, vibrating in us all, body and brain. That was wrong, that was very wrong. It was curiously invigorating, but I knew we must not succumb to it even for a moment. With relief I felt Marjorie seize control and with a determined effort direct the stream of force, focusing it through her, outward.
For a moment she stood bathed in flickering, transparent flames, then for an instant she took on the semblance of a woman . . . golden, chained, kneeling, as the forge‑folk de~ picted their goddess. ... I knew this was an illusion, but it seemed that Marjorie, or the great nickering fire‑form which seemed to loom around and over and through her, reached out, seized the helicopter's rotors and spun them as a child spins a pinwheel. With my physical ears I heard the humming sound as they began to turn, slowly at first under the controlling force, then winding to a swift spinning snarl, a drone, a shriek that caught the air currents. Slowly, slowly, the great machine lifted, hovering lightly a foot or so above the ground.
Straining to be gone . . ,
Hold it there! I was directing the power outward as Marjorie formed and shaped it; I could feel all the others pressed tightly against me, though physically none of us were touching. As I trembled, feeling the vast outflow of that linked conjoined power, I saw in a series of wild flashes the great form of fire I had seen before, Marjorie and not Marjorie, a raw stream of force, a naked woman, sky‑tall with tossing hair, each separate lock a streamer of fire ... I felt a curious rage surging up and through me. Take the helicopter, hanging there useless a few inches high, hurl it into the sky, high, high, fling it down like a missile against the towers of Castle Aldaran, burning, smashing, exploding the walls like sand, hurling a rain of fire into the valley, showering fires on Caer Donn, laying the Terran base waste.... I struggled with these images of fire and destruction, as a rider struggles with the bit of a hard‑mouthed horse. Too strong, too strong. I smelled musk, a wild beast prowled the jungle of my impulses, rage, lust, a constellation of wild emotions ... a small
skittering animal bolting up a tree in terror ... the shriek of the rotor blades, a scream, a deafening roar. . . .
Slowly the noise lessened to a whine, a drone, a faint whir, silence. The copter stood vibrating faintly, motionless. Mar‑jorie, still flickering with faint glimmers of invisible fire, stood calm, smiling absently. I felt her reach out and break the rapport, the others slipping away one by one until we stood alone, locked together. She withdrew her hand from the matrix and I stood cold and alone, struggling against spasms of lust, raging violence spinning in my brain, out of control, my heart racing, the blood pounding hi my head, vision blurred....
Beltran touched me lightly on the shoulder; I felt the tumult subside and with a shudder of pain managed to withdraw my consciousness. I covered the matrix quickly and drew my aching hand over my forehead. It came away dripping,
"Zandru's hells!" I whispered. Never, not in three years at Arilinn, had I even guessed such power. Kadarin, looking at the helicopter thoughtfully, said, "We could have done anything with it."
"Except maybe controlled it"
"But the power is there, when we do learn to control it," Beltran said. "A spaceship. Anything."
Rafe touched Marjorie's wrist, very lightly. "For a minute 1 thought you were on fire. Was that real, Lew?"
I wasn't sure if this was simply an illusion, the way generations upon generations of the forge‑folk bad envisioned then‑goddess, the power which brought metal from the deeps of the earth to their fires and forges. Or was this some objective force from that strange otherworld to which the telepath goes when he steps out of his physical body? I said, "I don't know, Rafe. How did it seem, Marjorie?"
She said, "I saw the fire. I even felt it, a little, but it didn't burn me. But I did feel that if I lost control, even for an instant, it would bum up inside and ... and take over, so that I was the fire and could leap down and . . . and destroy. I'm not saying this very well. . , ."
Then it was not only me. She too had felt the weapon‑rage, the lust for destruction. I was still struggling with tbeir physical aftereffects, the weak trembling of adrenalin expended. If these emotions had actually arisen from within me, I Was not fit for this work. Yet, searching within myself, with
the discipline of the tower‑trained, I found no trace of such emotion within me now.
This disquieted me. If my own hidden emotions‑anger I did not acknowledge, repressed desire for one of the women, hidden hostility toward one of the others‑had been wrested out of my mind to consume me, then it was a sign I had lost, under stress, my tower‑imposed discipline. But those emotions, being mine, I could control. If they were not mine, but had come from elsewhere to fasten upon us, we were all in danger.
I said, "I'm more disturbed than ever about this matrix. The power's there, yes. But it's been used as a weapon...."
"And it wants to destroy," Rafe said unexpectedly, "like the sword in the fairy tale; when you drew it, it would never go back into the scabbard until it had had its drink of blood."
I said soberly, "A lot of those old fairy tales were based on garbled memories of the Ages of Chaos. Maybe Rale's right and it does want blood and destruction."
Thyra, her eyes brooding, asked, "Don't all men, just a little? History tells us they do. Darkovans and Terrans too."
Kadarin laughed. "You were brought up hi the Comyn, Lew, so I'll forgive you for being superstitious." He put his arm around my shoulders in a warm hug. "I have more faith in the human mind than in forge‑folk superstitions." We were still linked; again I felt the strength that lifted a great weight from my shoulders. I let myself lean against him. He was probably right. My mind had been filled from childhood with these old gods and powers. The science of matrix mechanics had been formulated to get rid of that I was a skilled technician; why was I letting imagination run away with me?
Kadarin said, "Try again. Now that we know we can control it, it's all a matter of learning how."
"It's always up to the Keeper to decide that," I said. It troubled me that Marjorie still deferred to me. It was natural enough, for I bad trained her, but she must learn that the initiative was hers, to lead, not follow.
She stretched her hand to me, setting up the primary line of force. One by one she brought us into the circle, each of us dropping into his appointed place as if we were scouts on a battlefield. This time I felt her touch Beltran, too, and place him so that he could maintain rapport just outside the circle. This time the force was easier to carry ... chained fire, electricity firmly stored in a battery, a firmly bridled racehorse. ... I saw the fire leap up around Marjorie, but
this time I could see through it. It wasn't real, just a way of visualizing a force with no physical reality.
We stood linked, holding the pulsing power suspended. // the Terrans will not give us what we need and deserve, we can force them to it, we need not fear their bombs nor their blasters. Do they think we are barbarians armed with swords and pitchforks?
Clearly now, as the form of fire built up, I saw a
woman, a sky‑tall goddess clothed in flame, restlessly reaching to strike.
... fire raining on Caer Donn, smashing the city into rubble, starships falling like comets out of the sky ...
Firmly Marjorie reached for control, like at one of those riding‑exhibitions where a single rider controls four horses with one rein, bringing us back to the physical airfield. It shimmered around us, but it was there. The helicopter blades began to hum again, to turn with a clattering roar.
We need more power, more strength. For a moment I clearly saw my father's face, felt the strong line of rapport. He had awakened my gift; we were never wholly out of touch. I felt the amazement, the fear with which be felt the matrix touch him, momentarily draw him in.... He was gone. Had never been there. Then I felt Thyra reach out with a sure touch and draw Kermiac within the circle as if he had been physically present. For an instant the circle expanded with his strength, burning brilliantly, and the helicopter rose easily from the ground, hung there quivering, rotors spinning with emphasis and force. I saw, I felt Kermiac crumple, withdraw. The lines of force went ragged . . . Kad‑arin and I locked hard together, supporting Marjorie as she controlled the wavering forces, lowering, lowering. . . . The helicopter bumped, hard, and the sound shattered the link. Pain crashed through me. Marjorie collapsed, sobbing. Bel‑tran had seized Thyra by the shoulders, was shaking her like a dog shaking a rodent. He swung back his hand and slapped her full hi the face. I felt‑we all felt‑the stinging pain of that blow.
"Vicious bitch! Damned she‑devil," Beltran shouted. "How dare you, damn you, how dare you‑"
Kadarin grabbed him, pulled him from Thyra by main force. Beltran was still fighting, struggling. Cold terror clutching at me, I reached out for Kermiac. Uncle, have they kitted you? After a moment, sick with relief, I felt his
The Heritage Of Hastur d-18 Page 28
