Darkover: First Contact (54 page)

Rafael di Aa\sturien shook his head. “My ancestors won this land. Ardrin’s son Valentine forfeited his right to it when he fled to King Carolin with his traitor mother. But I shall keep it for my sons, and if Hasturs want it, they will have to come and take it if they can.” He spoke bravely, but Bard knew that his father was remembering their conversation the night of Geremy’s wedding.

Serrais to the east. Aldaran and Scathfell to the north. Hasturs to the west and all their allies, and no doubt, someday people from the Plains of Valeron to the south.

“Then,” said Varzil, “you will not swear allegiance to Hastur, even though all he asks is a pledge that you will not take up arms against Hali or Carcosa or Castle Hastur or Neskaya which is under his protection?”

“The throne of Asturias,” Rafael said, “is not subject to Hastur. And that’s my last word on the subject. I have no intention of attacking Hasturs, but they cannot seek to rule here.”

“Alaric,” Varzil said, “you are lord of Asturias. You are not of an age to make compacts, but I ask you nevertheless, out of kindness to kin, to ask your father to see reason in this matter.”

“My son is not your prisoner now, Dom Varzil,” Rafael said, his chin jutting hard. “I do not know how much treason you may have taught him against his own people, but now—”

“Father, that is unjust,” Alaric protested. “I ask you not to quarrel with my kinsman Varzil!”

“For your sake, my son, I hold my peace. Yet I beg of you, Dom Varzil, set aside this foolish talk of surrendering the throne of Asturias to the Hasturs!”

Varzil said, “Even now you are contemplating war against peaceful neighbors—not invaders! I know what you have done in Marenji. I am informed that in the spring you intend war against Serrais; and you intend to fortify the lands along the Kadarin—”

“And what is that to you?” Bard asked with cold hostility. “The lands along the Kadarin are not Hastur lands!”

“Neither are they the lands belonging to Asturias,” said Varzil, “and Carolin is sworn to make them safe against attack from land-greedy little kingdoms! Do what you will within your own realm; but I warn you, unless you are prepared to fight against all of those who give allegiance to Hastur and to the Compact, do not move outside them!”

“Are you threatening me?”

“I am,” Varzil said, “though I would rather not. I ask as envoy of Hastur, that you and your two sons take oath not to move against the Compact lands who have sworn to one another as equals, or we will have an army in the field within forty days, and we will take the Kingdom of Asturias and put it into the wardenship of someone who will hold it in peace among the
com’ii
under Hastur.”

Bard heard this with a dreadful sinking. They were not, in fact, prepared to make war against the Hasturs; not with the men rising past the Kadarin, not with Serrais on the east! And if the Hasturs came against them
now,
Asturias could not stand.

Dom Rafael clenched his fists with rage.

“What oath do you require of us?”

“I ask you to swear,” Varzil said, “not to me, but to Geremy Hastur for his kinsman Carolin, an oath of kinsmen, not to be broken without warning of half a year on either side; which pledges you not to move against any land under Hastur protection; and in return you will be a part of this peace which reigns under the Alliance.” He used the word
comyn
in a new way. “Will you swear?”

There was a long silence; but the di Asturiens were at the disadvantage and knew it. They had no choice but to swear. They were grateful when Alaric spoke, so that neither of them must lose face.

“Dom Varzil, I will swear the oath of kinsmen, although no oath to your Alliance. Will this suffice? I vow that I will not go to war against Carolin of Thendara unless half a year’s warning is given. But,” he added, and Bard saw the childish jaw clench, “this oath will endure only while my kinsman Carolin of Thendara leaves me in possession of the throne of Asturias; and on the day when he moves against the throne, on that same day I withdraw my oath and consider him my enemy!”

Geremy said, “I accept your oath, cousin. I swear to see it honored by Carolin. But how will you hold your father and your brother to this oath? For you are not yet of legal age, and they are the powers which hold your throne.”

Alaric said, “By the gods and by the honor of my family; Bard, my brother, will you abide my oath?”

Bard said, “In the form the oath was given, my brother, I will.” He gripped his sword. “Zandru seize this sword and this heart if I prove false to your honor.”

“And I,” said Dom Rafael, tight-lipped, closing his fingers on his dagger, “by the honor of Asturien, which no man can gainsay.”

No, Bard thought, as Geremy and Varzil, with endless formalities, took their leave, they had no choice, not with a crippled child on the throne, instead of the strong young warrior they had foreseen. They needed time, and this oath was only a way to give them time. His father maintained the façade of calm until the Hastur embassage had ridden away and Alaric, dreadfully pale from the strain of long ceremonial, was taken away to his rooms, then Dom Rafael broke down.

“My son! He is my son, I love him, I honor him, but in hell’s name, Bard, is he fit to reign in times like these? Would to all the gods that
your
mother had been my lawful wife!”

“Father,” Bard entreated, “it is only his legs that are crippled; his mind and wit are sound. I am a soldier, not a statesman; Alaric will make a better king than I!”

“But they look up to you, they call you Wolf and Commander, will they ever look up to my poor little lame lad that way?”

“If I stand behind his throne,” Bard said, “they will.”

“Alaric is blessed, then, in his brother! True is the old saying,
bare is back without brother
.... But you are only one man, and you are sworn to Hastur, which cripples you. If we had time, or if Alaric had been strong and fit—”

“If Queen Lorimel had worn trousers instead of skirts, she’d have been king and Thendara would never have fallen,” said Bard, curtly. “There is no point in talking about
if,
and
would to all the gods,
and such rubbish. We must cut our coat as we find the cloth laid! The gods know I love my brother, and I could have bawled like Geremy’s baby son to see him stand before us so bent and twisted, but what has come, has come; the world will go as it will. I am only one brother.”

“It is the good fortune of the Hasturs that you were not born twins,” said Dom Rafael with a despairing laugh, “for with two like you, dear son, I could conquer all the Hundred Kingdoms.”

And then he stopped. His laugh broke off in mid-gasp, and he stared at Bard with such intensity that Bard wondered if the shock of Alaric’s illness had turned the old man’s brain.

“Two of you,” he said, “with two such as you, Wolf, I could conquer all this land from Dalereuth to the Hellers. Bard, suppose that there were two of you,” he said in a whisper, “that I had another son, just like you, with your skill at warfare and your genius for strategy and your fierce loyalty—two of you! And I know how to find another. Not another
just like you
—another
you!
”

Bard stared at his father in dismay.
The gods grant,
he thought,
that Alaric is mature enough to rule, for our father has suddenly lost his wits!

But Dom Rafael did not look mad, and his voice and manner were so matter-of-fact that another, more rational explanation occurred to Bard.

“You had not confided in me, sir; but do you mean that you have another bastard son, enough like to impersonate me when it should be necessary?”

Dom Rafael shook his head. “No. And I am aware that what I have just said sounds like a madman’s raving, dear son, so you need not bother to humor me; I shall not begin to rave like a breeding woman in the Ghost Wind, nor chase butterflies in the snow. But what I must now suggest to you is very strange, and—” he glanced around the empty throne room—“in any case we cannot talk here.”

In his father’s private apartments, Bard waited while his father sent the servants away, poured them both some wine.

“Not too much,” he said dryly. “I do not want you to think me drunk, as you thought I was mad. I said, Bard, that with two like you, two generals with your sense of war and strategy—and this must have been born with you, since those who fostered you show no sign of it, and it is certainly not due to my teaching—with two of you, Bard, I could conquer all this realm. If the Hundred Kingdoms are to be united into a single realm—and I admit it is a sound idea, for why should all these lands be torn with war spring and fall—why should the Hasturs be overlords? There were men bearing the di Asturien name in these hills long before the Lord of Carthon gave his daughter to the Hastur kin. There is
laran
in our line, too, but it is the
laran
of humankind, of true men, not of the
chieri
-folk; the Hasturs are
chieri
, or of
chieri
-kind, as you may see if you care to count their fingers, and too many of them are still born
emmasca
, neither man nor woman; Felix of Thendara was born so, a few hundred years ago, and so
that
dynasty came to an end.”

“There are no people in these hills who have not some
chieri
blood, father.”

“But only the Hastur kin sought to preserve that blood in their line with their breeding program,” Dom Rafael said, “and so many of the old families—Hastur, Aillard, Ardais, even the Aldarans and the Serrais, bear in their blood and heritage so many strange things that true men are wary of them! A child may be born who can kill with a thought, or see into the future as if time ran both ways, or cause fire to strike or the rivers to rise.... There are two kinds of
laran;
the kind which all men have and may use, aided with a starstone, and the evil kind borne by the Hastur kin. Our line is not altogether free of it, and when you got that redheaded son upon your mother’s
leronis,
you brought the Hastur kin
laran
back into our folk. But what’s done is done, and Erlend may be useful to us one day. Have you gotten the girl with child again yet? Why not?” But he did not wait for Bard’s answer.

“Still, I am sure you can see why I have no will to be ruled by the Hasturs; they are riddled through and through with the
chieri
blood, and their Gifts are not diluted by the normal humankind, but fixed into their line by that breeding program. I feel that humankind should rule, not wizard-folk!”

“But,” said Bard, “why tell me all this now? Or are you saying that when Erlend is grown he will be near enough to their kin that he can claim their line?” He spoke sarcastically, and his father did not bother to reply.

“What you do not know,” he said, “is that I studied
laran
craft when I was a young boy. I was not, as you know, reared to king-craft, for Ardrin was the eldest, but I did not have the stronghold of di Asturien either, for there were three brothers between us, and I had leisure for study and learning. I was a
laranzu,
and dwelt for a time in Dalereuth Tower, and learned something of their craft.”

Bard had known that his father bore a starstone, but that was in no way uncommon, and not everyone who bore a starstone knew
laran
lore. He had not known that he had dwelt within a Tower.

“Now there is a law in the use of the starstone,” Dom Rafael said. “I do not know who formulated it, or why it should be so, but it is so; that everything which exists, except for a starstone, exists in one, and only one,
exact
duplicate. Nothing is unique, except for a starstone, which has no duplicate. However, everything else—
everything,
every rabbithorn in the woods, every tree and flower, every rock in the fields—has its precise duplicate, and also every human being has
one
exact double somewhere, more like him than his own twin. And that tells me that somewhere, Bard, you have an exact double. He may dwell in the Dry towns, or in the unknown lands beyond the Wall Around the World, he may be the son of a peasant, or live beyond the uncrossable gulf of the Sea of Dalereuth which leads into the Unknown Sea. And he would be more like you than your own twin, even though he dwelt far beyond the Hundred Kingdoms. I hope it is not so, I hope he dwells in the Kilghard Hills; otherwise it would be hard to teach him our language and the manners of our people. But whatever he may be, he will have
laran,
even if he has never been taught to use it; and he will have your military genius, once again, though he may not know yet how to use it; and he will look so much like you that your own mother, if she were still alive, would not be able to tell you apart by looks alone. Do you see now, dear son, why this would be good to have?”

Bard frowned. “I am beginning to see—”

“And another thing. Your double would
not
be sworn to Hastur, nor bound to him by any oath. Understand me?”

Bard saw. He saw indeed. “But where do we find this duplicate of myself?”

“I told you that I had studied
laran
-craft,” Dom Rafael said, “and I know the whereabouts of a screen, a set of relay starstones constructed to bring these duplicates together. When I was a youth, we could, though it was difficult, bring men and women, other
leroni,
from one set of starstones to another. If we have one set of duplicates on the screen, we can bring your duplicate from wherever he may be living.”

“But,” Bard asked, “when we have him, how do we know he will be willing to help us?”

“He cannot help being what he is,” said Dom Rafael. “If he were already a great general, we would know about him. He may indeed be one of my own bastard sons, or of Ardrin’s, living in poverty without knowledge of war. But once we give him the chance of power and greatness—not to mention a chance to exercise the military genius which, if he is your duplicate, he will possess, if only as potential—then he will be grateful to us and willing to serve as our ally. Because, Bard, if he is your double—then he will be ambitious too!”