Leonie’s face paled. “That law has been dead since the Ages of Chaos.”
You live by laws which should have been dead long ago too. He did not speak the words aloud, but Leonie heard them, and so did everyone with laran in the Crystal Chamber. She said, as white as a skull, “So be it. You have invoked the old test of a Keeper’s right and responsibility. You and Callista are renegades of Arilinn, so this shall be Arilinn’s affair, to answer the challenge. It will be a duel, Damon, and you know the penalty if you fail. Not only you and Callista, but your consorts — if any of you survive the ordeal, which is unlikely — shall be stripped of your matrices and the laran centers burned away, so that you may live as an example and a warning to anyone who would stretch out his hand, unfit, for a Keeper’s place and power.”
“I see you know the consequences, Leonie,” said Callista. “Would that you had known them equally well when I was made Keeper.”
Leonie ignored her, staring fixedly into Damon’s eyes.
“I will abide the ordeal and its penalties, Leonie,” Damon said, “but you do realize, Leonie, that you invoke them on yourself and all of Arilinn, should you fail to conquer?”
She said, furiously, “I think we would all risk more than that, to punish the insolence of those who would build a forbidden Tower on our threshold!”
“Enough!” Lorill held out his hands to silence them. “I declare challenge and ordeal between Arilinn Tower and its Keeper, Leonie Hastur, and” — he hesitated a moment — “and the forbidden Tower, with him who stands self-proclaimed as its Keeper, Damon Ridenow. It shall begin at sunrise tomorrow.”
Leonie’s face was like stone. “I shall await the ordeal.”
“And I,” said Damon. “Until sunrise, Leonie.”
He gave a hand to Ellemir, the other to Callista. Andrew paced one step behind them. Without looking back, they left the Crystal Chamber.
Until sunrise. He had spoken bravely. But could they face Leonie, and all the forces of Arilinn?
They must, or die.
Chapter Twenty-two
Damon’s first act, when they returned to the Alton suite, was to fetch a telepathic damper and isolate Dom Esteban’s room behind it. He gently told Ferrika what he was doing.
“At sunrise there may be a… a telepathic disturbance,” he warned her, thinking how ridiculously inadequate the words were. “This will make certain he will not be drawn into it, for he is too weak for any such thing. I leave him in your care, Ferrika, I trust you.”
He found himself wishing he could isolate Ellemir too behind such a safe barrier, with her unborn baby. He told her this when he returned to the rooms they shared with Callista and Andrew, and she smiled wanly.
“Why, you are no better than the ladies of Comyn Council, my husband, feeling I must be shielded and excused because I am a woman, and bearing. Don’t you think I realize that we are all fighting together, for the right to live together and bring up our children to a better life than most Comyn sons and daughters can have? Do you think I want him” — she laid her hand, with that expressive gesture, on her pregnant body — “to face the crippling choice you faced, or Callista, or Leonie? Do you think I am unwilling to fight, as well as you?”
He held her close, realizing her intuition was sounder than his own. “My darling, all the Gods forbid I should be the one to deny you that right.”
But as they rejoined Callista and Andrew, he realized that the coming battle was more than life and death. If they lost — and survived — they would be worse than dead.
“It will be fought in the overworld,” he warned, “like the last battle with the Great Cat. We must all be very sure of ourselves, because only our own thoughts can defeat us.” Ellemir sent for food and wine and they dined together, trying to make it a festive occasion, forgetting they were strengthening themselves for the ordeal of their lives. Callista looked pale, but Damon was relieved to see that she ate heartily.
There were two of them Keeper-trained, he thought, Keeper-strong. But that also roused an uncomfortable thought. If they lost, it would be all the same, but if they won there was a matter still unsettled.
“If we win,” he said, “I shall have won the right to work as I will with my chosen circle, then Ellemir as my wife, and Andrew as my sworn man, are beyond the reach of Council meddling. But you, Callista, you are close to the heirship of Comyn; nearer than you are only two children, and one is still unborn. Council will argue that my duty as regent of Alton is to have you married off to some suitable man, someone of Comyn blood. A woman of your years, Callista, unless actually working in a Tower, is usually married.”
“I am married,” she flared at him.
“Breda, the marriage will not stand if anyone contests it. Do you really trust Council not to contest it? Old Dom Gabriel of Ardais has already spoken to me about marrying you to his son Kyril—”
“Kyril Ardais?” Her nostrils flared in disdain. “I had as soon marry some bandit of the Hellers and be done with it! I have not spoken with him since he was a bully intimidating us all at children’s parties, but I do not suppose he has improved by aging!”
“Still, it is a marriage Council would approved. Or they might follow through on Father’s wish and give you, as he meant to give Ellemir, to Cathal. But marry you off they certainly will. You know the law about freemate marriage as well as I do, Callista.”
She did. Freemate marriage was legal upon consummation and could be annulled by act of Council, as long as it was childless.
“Avarra’s mercy,” she said, looking around the table at them all, “this is worse than being put to bed in the sight of. half the Domain of Alton, and I thought that was embarrassing!”
She laughed, but it was not a mirthful sound. Ellemir said gently, “Why do you think a woman is put to bed so publicly? So that all may see and know that the marriage is a legal fact. But in your case a question has been raised. I do not doubt Dezi has talked freely on the matter, damn him!”
“I doubt not he is already damned,” Damon said, “but the mischief is done.”
“Are you telling us,” Andrew said, laying his hand over Callista’s, and noting with dread that she drew it away, with the old automatic reflex, “that Dezi’s taunt was true after all and our marriage is not lawful?”
Reluctantly Damon nodded. “While Domenic lived and Dom Esteban was healthy, no one would question what his daughters did, far away in the Kilghard Hills. But the situation has changed. The Domain is in the hands of a child and a dying man. Even if Callista were still Keeper, legally they could not force her to marry, but any persuasion short of force would be used. And since she has already given back her oath, and publicly refused to return to Arilinn, her marriage is a legitimate concern of Council.”
“Have I no more rights in the matter than a horse led to the marketplace?” Callista demanded.
“Callie, I did not make the laws,” he said tenderly. “I will unmake some of them, if I can, but I cannot do it overnight. The law is what it is.”
“Callista’s father agreed to give her to me,” Andrew said. “Does that decision have no legal merit?”
“But he is a dying man, Andrew. He may die tonight, and I am only warden of Alton under the Council, no more.” He looked deeply troubled. “Only if we could go to Council with an established marriage under the Law of Valeron—”
“What is that?” Andrew demanded, and Callista said tonelessly, “A woman of the Aillard Domain, from the plains of Valeron, won a Council decision which has served as a precedent ever since. Whether the marriage is freemate or otherwise, no woman can be separated unwilling from the father of her child. Damon means that if you could take me to bed — and preferably make me pregnant at once — we would have a way to contest the Council.” She made a face. “I do not want a child yet — still less do I want it at the bidding of Council like this, like a mare being taken to stud — but better that, than that I should marry someone chosen by Council for political reasons, and to bear his children.” She looked miserably from Damon to Andrew and said, “But you know that it is impossible.”