Failed. I’ve failed. Even Lew, tower-trained and with all his skill, couldn’t help me. There’s nothing there. When he said what he did about potential, he was humoring me, comforting a child.
He reeled, feeling sick again, clung momentarily to the wall and ran on.
The Comyn castle was a labyrinth, and Regis had not been inside it in years. Before long, in his wild rush to get away from the scene of his humiliation, he was well and truly lost. His senses, kirian-blurred, retained vague memories of stone cul-de-sacs, blind corners, archways, endless stairs up which he toiled and down which he blundered and sometimes fell, courtyards filled with rushing wind and blinding rain, hour after hour. To the end of his life he retained an impression of the Comyn Castle which he could summon at will to overlay his real memories of it: a vast stone maze, a trap through which he wandered alone for centuries, with no human form to be seen. Once, around a corner, he heard Lew calling his name. He flattened himself in a niche and hid for a few thousand years until, long after, the sound was gone.
After an indeterminate time of wandering and stumbling and hallucinating, he became aware that it had been a long time since he had fallen down a flight of stairs; that the corridors were long, but not miles and miles long; and that they were no longer filled with uncanny crawling colors and silent sounds. When he came out at last on to a high balcony at the uppermost level, he knew where he was.
Dawn was breaking over the city below him. Once before, during the night, he had stood against a high parapet like this, thinking that his life was no good to anyone, not to the Hasturs, not to himself, that he should throw himself down and be done with it This time the thought was remote, nightmarish, like one of those terrible real dreams which wakes you shaking and crying out, but a few seconds later is gone in dissolving fragments.
He drew a long, weary sigh. Now what?
He should go and make himself presentable for his grandfather, who would certainly send for him soon. He should get some food and sleep; kirian, he’d been told, expended so much physical and nervous energy that it was essential to compensate with extra food and rest He should go back and apologize to Lew Alton, who had only very reluctantly done what Regis himself had begged him to do … But he was sick to death of hearing what he should do!
He looked across the city that lay spread out below him, Thendara, the old town, the Trade City, the Terran headquarters and the spaceport. And the great ships, waiting, ready to take off for some unguessable destination. All he really wanted to do now was go to the spaceport and watch, at close range, one of those great ships.
Quickly he hardened his resolve. He was not dressed for out-of-doors at all, still wearing felt-soled indoor boots, but in his present mood it mattered less than nothing. He was unarmed. So what? Terrans carried no sidearms. He went down long flights of stairs, losing his way, but knowing, now that he had his wits about him, that all he had to do was keep going down till he reached ground level. Comyn Castle was no fortress. Built for ceremony rather than defense, the building had many gates, and it was easy to slip out one of them unobserved.
He found himself in a dim, dawnlit street leading downhill through closely packed houses. He was keyed up, having had no sleep after his hard ride yesterday, but the energizing effect of the kirianhad not worn off yet, and he felt no drowsiness. Hunger was something else, but there were coins in his pockets, and he was sure that soon he would pass some kind of eating-house where workmen ate before their day’s business.
The thought excited him with a delicious forbiddenness. He could not remember ever having been completely alone in his entire life. There had always been others ready at hand to look after him, protect him, gratify his every wish: nurses and nannies when he was small, servants and carefully selected companions when he was older. Later, there were the brothers of the monastery, though they were more likely to thwart his wishes than carry them out. This would be an adventure.
He found a place next to a blacksmith’s shop and went in. It was dimly lit with resin-candles, but there was a good smell of food. He was briefly afraid of being recognized, but after all, what could they do to him? He was old enough to be out alone. Besides, if anyone noticed the blue-and-silver cloak with the Hastur badge, they would only think he was a Hastur servant.
The men seated at the table were blacksmiths and stable hands, drinking hot ale or jacoor boiled milk, eating foods Regis had never seen or smelled. A woman came to take Regis’ order. She did not look at him. He ordered fried nut porridge and hot milk with spices in it. His grandfather, he thought with definite satisfaction, would have a fit.
He paid for the food and ate it slowly, at first feeling the residual queasiness of the drug which wore off as he ate. When he went out, feeling better, the light was spreading, although the sun had not risen. As he went downhill he found himself among unfamiliar houses, built in strange shapes of strange materials. He had obviously crossed the line into the Trade City. He could hear, in the distance, that strange waterfall sound which had excited him so intensely. He must be near the spaceport.
He had been told a little about the spaceport on Darkover. Darkover, which did almost no trading with the Empire, was in a unique location, between the upper and lower spiral arms of the galaxy, unusually well suited as a crossroads stop for much of the interstellar traffic. In spite of the self-chosen isolation of Darkover, therefore, enormous numbers of ships came for rerouting, bearing passengers, personnel and freight bound elsewhere. They also came for repairs and reprovisioning and for rest leaves in the Trade City. Most of the Terrans scrupulously kept the agreement limiting them to their own areas. There had been a few intermarriages, a little trade, some small—very small—importation of Terran machinery and technology. This was strictly limited by the Darkovans, each item studied by Council before permission was given. A few licensed matrix technicians were set up in the cities; a few had even gone out into the Empire. The Terrans, he had heard, were intrigued by Darkovan matrix technology and in the old days had laid intricate plots to uncover some of its secrets. He didn’t know details, but Kennard had told him some stories.
He started, realizing that the street directly before him was blocked by two very large men in unfamiliar black leather uniforms. At their belts hung strangely shaped weapons which, Regis realized with a prickle of horror, must be blasters or nerve guns. Such weapons had been outlawed on Darkover since the Ages of Chaos, and Regis had literally never seen one before, except for antiques in a museum. These were no museum pieces. They looked deadly.
One of the men said, “You’re violating curfew, sonny. Until the trouble’s over, all women and children are supposed to be off the streets from an hour before sunset until an hour after sunrise.”
Women and children! Regis’ hand strayed to his knife-hilt. “I am no child. Shall I call challenge and prove it?”
“You’re in the Terran Zone, son. Save yourself trouble.”
“I demand—”
“Oh hell, one of those,” said the second man in disgust “Look here, kiddie, we’re not allowed to fight duels, on duty anyhow. You come along and talk to the officer.”
Regis was about to make an angry protest—ask a Comyn heir to give an account of himself in Council season?—when it occurred to him that the headquarters building was right on the spaceport, where he was going anyway. With a secret grin he went along.
After they had passed through the spaceport gates, he realized that he had actually had a better view yesterday from the mountainside. Here the ships were invisible behind fences and barricades. The spaceforce patrolmen led him inside a building where a young officer, not in black leather but in ordinary Terran clothing, was dealing with assorted curfew violators. As they came in he was saying, “This man’s all right; he was looking for a midwife and took the wrong turn. Send someone to show him back to the town.” He looked up at Regis, standing between the officers. “Another one? I’d hoped we’d be through for the night. Well, kid, what’s your story?”