Hastur Lord (37 page)

Rinaldo settled into the great chair and Danilo took the position indicated, standing half a pace behind and to the right side. Danilo remembered when he had attended Council meetings as Warden of Ardais, Comyn in his own right. Gladly had he laid down that responsibility and resumed the place where he truly belonged.

But he dared not even turn his head, not until he knew what Rinaldo was really up to. He would not give Rinaldo a moment’s weakness to hold over him.

Rinaldo welcomed the assembly, using the familiar traditional phrases. Danilo paid them little heed; this was a formality only, the opening sally.

The introductory remarks concluded, Ruyven Di Asturien proceeded to the roll call of the Domains. What an archaic waste of time, Danilo thought, an empty honor. Then he realized that not so long ago, Di Asturien’s daughter had been put forth as a suitable bride for Regis. From where he stood, he could see her without obviously staring. She was sitting between two older female relatives, all of them gorgeously appareled.

A sick feeling crawled up the back of Danilo’s throat, fueled by the certainty that more was planned today than Rinaldo had told him. The elegance of dress, the ritual roll call, Rinaldo’s ceremonial entrance, all indicated a matter that once would have required the sanction of the Comyn Council.

Crystal Di Asturien—
No, Regis would never marry a girl who had made no secret of her desire to supplant Danilo in his affections!

In the moment of inner turmoil, Danilo missed the rest of Di Asturien’s remarks, something about how unusual times called for unusual procedures. Then Rinaldo rose, signaling for Regis and Danilo to follow him to the center of the floor.

Rinaldo hung back, leaving Danilo and Regis to face one another. Danilo could not sense anything through the telepathic damping fields. Nor could he read anything in the way Regis held himself or the tautly masked expression on his face.

In a monotone, as if reciting a prepared speech, Regis stated his desire to transfer the allegiance of his paxman to his brother, Lord Hastur, until such time as Rinaldo released Danilo.

Regis! Beloved—
b redhyu
—w hy are you doing this?

Rinaldo solemnly stated his willingness to assume the obligations of liege lord. Apparently Danilo had no say in the matter. Even if he had wanted to protest, he was too stunned at the moment.

Regis passed a sword to Rinaldo. Rinaldo handled it awkwardly, clearly not a swordsman. Triumph hovered over the corners of Rinaldo’s mouth.

Puzzlement stirred in Danilo as he focused on the blade. It was not the dagger he and Regis had used to exchange their first oaths or the sword that had replaced it. Yet Rinaldo acted as if, in accepting this blade, he had severed the bond between them.

Had Regis deliberately chosen an anonymous sword, one that held no emotional significance to either of them? Was Regis trying to tell him that the ceremony was a sham, that he had been forced into it? That in his heart nothing had changed?

Danilo clung to that hope as one of the Guardsmen brought out a second sword, this one tied into its scabbard with stout leather thongs in such a way it could not be drawn.

Rinaldo held out the second sword. “Bear this in my service.”

Trembling took hold of Danilo’s muscles. He knew he must not falter but stand firm, head up, spine straight, face composed. He had not felt like this since that horrendous time when he had been a cadet. Driven to desperation, he had struck Dyan Ardais, an officer and his Cadet Master. For that offense, he had been dismissed, stripped of rank, and sent home in disgrace. They had taken his sword—not the heirloom his father had given him but a plain Guardsman’s sword—and shattered it. In his mind, that terrible breaking- glass sound still echoed, a nightmare that not even Dyan’s amends and the subsequent years of privilege could erase.

“In your service do I bear it.” The words should have been
in your service alone,
but Danilo could not bring himself to say them. He might accept the necessity of attending Rinaldo, but he would never, as long as he drew breath, take back his promise to Regis.

His hands closed around the scabbard. Half-blind, praying he would not stumble, Danilo followed Rinaldo to the Hastur box.

Regis remained in the middle of the floor.

Danilo glanced back as he passed through the gate. Rinaldo sat down, his anticipation evident.

“You may sit,” Rinaldo told Danilo, although he meant it as a command.

The buzz of conversation swelled in the chamber, with more than one curious glance directed first at Regis and then at Danilo. Di Asturien walked with stately pace to stand before Regis. A moment later, Gabriel and Javanne, her gown as resplendent as if she were attending a ball, joined them. Two younger women, Lindirs Danilo knew only slightly, came forward as well. They wore matching gowns of pink silk, and one carried a casket ornamented with copper filigree. The chamber fell still. Even the hum of the telepathic damper seemed muted.

The woman at the back of the Alton enclosure rose. The room was so quiet, Danilo heard the rustle of her skirts as she passed the railing. A veil of silky gossamer edged with gold lace draped her head and shoulders. She wore a formal gown of iridescent silver, cut high and loose in the waist.

Walking with almost painful dignity, Linnea Storn came to a halt facing Regis, between the two young women.

Danilo closed his eyes, wishing he were anywhere else, wishing he were raving mad and that the ceremony about to begin were no more than a fever dream.

Wishing he were dead, rather than witness this moment.

Now Di Asturien was speaking the formal words that had come down, barely altered, from the Ages of Chaos . . . the young woman holding the casket was opening it, and Di Asturien removed the two copper
catenas
bracelets.

“. . . and with these bracelets, which symbolize the unseen chains that bind you in wedlock, let the bond be sealed,” Di Asturien intoned as he fastened the bracelets around the wrists of the couple, first Regis and then Linnea. The clasps clicked shut, echoing loudly in the chamber.

Look at me!
Danilo pleaded silently.
Give me a sign you still keep faith with me!

Regis made no sign he had heard or cared. How could he sense Danilo’s desolation through the layers of ancient ritual and the dampers that shut their minds away? How should he care with such a radiant bride beside him—a woman he had always wanted—a woman who had borne him a child and now carried another, a woman he had sought in marriage without even mentioning it to Danilo?

Danvan Hastur was right. The
cristoforo
brothers were right. What we had together—w hat I thought we had—w as nothing more than youthful folly. Nothing more.

This union, this pledging now drawing to its conclusion before him,
this
was the true destiny of men.

“Parted in fact,” Di Asturien concluded as he unlocked the clasp between the bracelets, “may you be joined in heart as well as law.”

Regis leaned forward to kiss Linnea. She lifted her face to his. Danilo thought his own heart would shatter.

“May you be forever one!” Di Asturien cried.

Beaming, Javanne and Gabriel leaned toward one another in remembrance of their own binding, and throughout the chamber, married couples did the same.

Through Danilo’s confusion and pain, betrayal gave way to utter loss.

A cheer went up. It was over. Regis and Linnea were husband and wife under the laws of the Comyn.

As if in answer, a sense of stillness, or an exhaustion of the spirit, crept over Danilo. He had been in enough battles to recognize the absence of pain as numbness due to shock. A man might fight on in such a state, unaware of his injuries, until he dropped. Danilo’s heart was wounded, gravely wounded, and yet he felt nothing. How could he fight on?

For a single moment, Regis looked directly at him. No trace of emotion showed on his face, but his eyes betrayed him. They glowed with urgency, with agony.

Danilo wrenched his gaze away. So, Regis might have regrets about abandoning everything they had shared. But Regis had set his feelings aside; he had gone through with the ceremony in full knowledge that it could never be undone. He had chosen.

R
inaldo showed no interest in keeping Danilo by his side for the festivities. Commenting that he could be as easily attended by servants and protected by Castle Guardsmen, Rinaldo dispatched Danilo back to the Hastur suite to settle into his new chamber and take care of any personal needs, so that he might be ready to direct his full attention to his lord on the following morning. Danilo harbored no illusions regarding the sincerity of Rinaldo’s concern, but he was grateful for the excuse to leave before Regis found an opportunity to approach him.

The next days blurred together in a quagmire of misery. Danilo did what he was told. He stood, sat, walked, and schooled his features to the proper degree of attentiveness. He answered questions in monosyllables. He felt nothing.

At night, Danilo lay awake, his eyes open. He found the darkness of his chamber with its single narrow window preferable to the darkness behind his closed lids. It came to him that he might feel relief if he could weep, but no tears answered his prayers. He imagined himself a man pulled from beneath an avalanche in the Hellers, his heart stilled by freezing, with no conception of what had happened to him, so sudden and final was the disaster.

Sometimes, when he peered at the pitted mirror, he did not recognize the man who looked back at him. The lines of his face, the arch of brow and jaw, the flare of nostril, the pattern of lashes, the eyes—quenched, opaque—seemed barely human.

It was not just that Regis no longer wanted him. It was that Regis had found someone
else
, someone better, someone who generated no burden of guilt.

Gradually, Danilo emerged from the initial shock of his grief. He saw, as if through another man’s eyes, that Rinaldo meant to be kind. Most of his duties consisted in accompanying his new lord about the city, especially to the Chapel of All Worlds in the Terran Zone and various promising sites for the
cristoforo
cathedral. A priest had been installed in the Castle and charged with the performance of worship services each morning. Rinaldo attended as faithfully as if he were still in orders. Danilo sat at the back of the makeshift chapel, letting the singsong litany wash through him and finding unexpected comfort in the familiar rhythms. He composed a prayer of his own: that when fate and circumstance brought him together with Regis, his heart might be easier and his thoughts less tormented.

Rinaldo seemed to be going to great lengths to avoid situations like the last flurry of summer festivities or the occasional ceremonial function in which Danilo might encounter Regis or Linnea. On those rare gatherings when Danilo caught a glimpse of Regis, Regis was closely guarded, usually by Haldred Ridenow. A private word would have been impossible.

Danilo was initially skeptical of Rinaldo’s motives; he doubted that Rinaldo acted purely out of consideration for his feelings. It occurred to Danilo, as he got to know his new lord better, the reason might be simply to give him time to adjust. Rinaldo had acted not from petty spite but from compassion. He had made no attempt to force an artificial intimacy while Danilo was still emotionally vulnerable. Instead, Rinaldo had treated him with courtesy, asking only the obedience of a loyal if unfamiliar servant.

Every morning, Rinaldo and Danilo worked in Danvan Hastur’s library. As Rinaldo sorted the various documents and ledger books, Danilo provided detailed explanations and historical context. Whatever his other failings, Rinaldo could be painstaking and meticulous.

A first-year cadet, one of several acting as Rinaldo’s messengers, tapped for admittance.

“Come,” Rinaldo called. Danilo went to the door, and the cadet handed him a sealed envelope. The paper was smooth and thick, of off-world manufacture, and bore the official insignia of the Terran Federation. Danilo brought the envelope to Rinaldo, who studied it with a frown. The frown deepened as he read the enclosed document.

Rinaldo shoved the papers into Danilo’s hands. “You’ve had dealings with these off-worlders. You know their ways. Is this the usual treatment for a man of my rank? Do they intend an insult, or do they simply not know any better?”

The letter was from Dan Lawton, the looping Darkovan script painfully stiff, the
casta
formal and precise. Lawton acknowledged receiving a communication that Regis Hastur had been replaced as Head of his Domain, without any verification from Regis himself.

As he read on, Danilo wanted to laugh aloud at the audacity of the letter. Someone had coached Lawton on Darkovan law regarding inheritance of Domain-right.

In carefully nuanced language, the Federation declined to acknowledge Rinaldo as successor to Hastur. Lawton indicated he could not in good faith recognize a previously undocumented claimant without ascertaining that his claim was legitimate and not subject to peremptory challenge from his own people. If Hastur spoke for Darkover and if inheritance passed only through biological descent, then Rinaldo must prove he was not an imposter. The
Terranan
stopped just short of accusing Rinaldo of lying about his parentage.

Then came the pivotal point: If Lord Rinaldo would consent to a simple genetic test, a comparison of his DNA with that of Regis Hastur, his authenticity could be verified. The message concluded with formulaic protestations of sincerity.