Smiling with evident pleasure, the fat monk left them. Regis came forward. The other monk rose, tall and slender in his shapeless robe. His eyes, steely gray, had a slightly distracted expression. As he reached out to touch hands with Regis, he smiled.
“Good brother—” Regis began, then laughed, a little unnerved. “My brother in truth, as I understand.”
“True, indeed,” the monk replied with an air of composure. “Forgive my lack of manners. I know you already, you see, from the time you were a student here.”
Regis blinked in surprise. “Were—could it be—were you one of my teachers?”
“Indeed, I was privileged to instruct the younger boys how to read and write. If memory serves, you never achieved a very good hand, little brother. To compare it to the scratchings of a barnyard fowl would be unkind to the hen.”
Regis flushed, feeling once more the diffident, lonely boy he had once been. But Brother Valentine went on, without taking any notice of his discomfort.
“Your companion—Danilo Syrtis, is it not?—wrote a more acceptable hand.”
“And does so still,” Regis replied, grateful to change the subject from his own shortcomings. “Danilo serves as my paxman and attends to my official correspondence. In fact, it might be said that although the will of a Hastur might be law, without Danilo’s pen to set it down, no one would be able to read it.”
A flicker of emotion passed over the monk’s features. Regis sensed no trace of laran,no mental presence, so he could not tell what his brother might be thinking.
“You have the better of us, Brother Valentine,” Danilo interjected. “You remember the two of us well enough, but I have no memory of you at all.”
The monk turned to Danilo with a good- humored smile. “It would surprise me if you did. When I first came to St. Valentine’s, it was many months before I could tell the brothers one from another. No doubt, we looked as much alike as so many fleas.”
“Hardly fleas,” Danilo muttered.
“When I was here all those years ago,” Regis said, “why did you not make yourself known to me? I would have welcomed a brother’s company.”
“It was for you to speak, if you wished to claim me as kin.”
The first thing Regis thought was that this answer was very much what he himself might have said in like circumstances. Then the world slipped sideways for a heartbeat—
—b ut I didn’t know, and he did, I was a child and he was grown—
—and then resumed its normal course.
In that brief pause, Brother Valentine lifted his head in an attitude of listening. “It is time for prayer.”
Regis caught the deep, throbbing sound of a bell from afar.
“Our reunion must yield to a greater obligation.” Brother Valentine set aside his work materials. “You used to worship with us, little brother. Will you join us now?”
“I think not.” Regis did not add that as a son of Hastur and a member of the Comyn, he had been raised to follow the four traditional gods of Darkover. Aldones, Lord of Light, was reputed to be the ancestor of the first Hastur. But Regis could not say so aloud and risk the implication that his brother might have to choose between his heritage and the demands of his caste on the one hand and his religious vows on the other. How deep that commitment ran, Regis could not tell.
A man ought to be able to follow his own conscience!
Brother Valentine turned to Danilo. “Come, we must hurry.”
“I beg your leave,” Danilo replied with a stiff bow. “My duty is to my lord.”
The monk’s gaze swept from one to the other. Whatever he thought of Danilo’s refusal, he kept it to himself. “Then, with Father Master’s permission, I will come to you in the Stranger’s Room afterward.”
The monk’s sandals made no sound as he strode down the stone-floored corridor. Without discussion, Regis and Danilo headed back to the visitors’ quarters. Regis felt pulled by conflicting feelings. Certainly, he was disappointed and beset by memories of an unhappy childhood. He told himself that his brother was an exemplary monk, dutiful and observant, that these same qualities bespoke an honorable nature.
When they were alone, Regis lowered himself onto one of the cushioned chairs. In their absence, someone had left a tray with jacoand slices of coarse nut-bread.
“Well, Danilo, what do you think of my brother? Or have you formed an opinion from so brief an encounter? Did you truly not remember him from before?”
“ Vai dom,he is not my brother, but yours. Therefore, your opinion is the only one that counts.”
Regis frowned. “Don’t go all vai domon me! It’s clear you don’t like him, but I don’t understand why. He was perfectly polite.”
“He was perfectly glib.”
“What the devil do you mean by that?”
“Regis, you can’t have it both ways. If you ask for my opinion and I offer it against my better judgment, you have only yourself to blame if you dislike what you hear. Or would you have me bow and scrape and agree with every blockheaded thing you say, like a courtier?”
“I expect—” Regis realized he was on the edge of losing his temper. What was wrong with Danilo? Why was he acting this way? Regis drew in a breath and began again. “I expectyou to give my brother a fair chance, taking into consideration his lack of worldly experience. If you won’t do it as a matter of fairness, then do it as a personal favor to me. He’s going to have enough difficulties adjusting to his new life without you censuring him before you even know him!”
With a snort of exasperation, Danilo got up and went to the door leading to the bedroom. From where he sat, Regis could see four narrow beds, straw-tick mattresses on simple wooden frames, a washstand and a couple of chairs. Their baggage had been stacked neatly beside the nearest bed. Without another word, Danilo began unpacking and making up two of the beds with a precision that would have made a Cadet Master proud.
Regis poured himself a mug of jacoand sipped it, staring into the fire. Why could there not be peace between the people he loved? Why did it always come down to a choice?
Regis was still turning over these depressing questions when Brother Valentine arrived. Danilo, having finished preparing for the coming night, joined them in the sitting room.
At the insistence of Regis, Valentine took one of the chairs. He smiled as he settled against the cushions, clearly enjoying the unaccustomed comfort.
“You may not remember me,” the monk said, once they had resumed their conversation, “but I have kept myself informed about you, little brother. Although they call me Valentine, after the holy saint who founded this order, I was named Rinaldo. You may call me that if you would claim me as kin.”
“I am in need of kinsmen, for we are so few,” Regis said with a sigh.
“Tell me, have you thought—would you be willing to come with me to Thendara, to take up your place as a Hastur?”
Rinaldo regarded him with those strange gray eyes. “Until your message arrived, I never expected to enter the world. I understood there is little acceptance for one such as I.”
“I intend to have you formally legitimatized,” Regis said quickly. “Then no one will question your right—”
“No, no, that is not what I meant.” Rinaldo protested. “Our grandfather could have done the same, but he chose not to, for reasons that seemed good to him.”
“Your . . . difference, you mean.”
“You are too courteous to ask,” Rinaldo said, “so I will tell you straight out. I would not have you think I withheld the truth in order to curry your favor. We do not speak of such things here at St. Valentine’s, but I believe I am emmasca. That is, I am shaped as other men, or I could not live among the brothers. Although I admit to being curious, I have never had the opportunity to lie with a woman, but I am not indifferent to the prospect. As to fathering a child, who can say, but from everything I know about my condition, I cannot believe it possible.”