Jo Clayton - Shadowkill

The double doors opened and Matja Allina walked into the light as onto a stage, a queen to more than match the power of the old king waiting on the dais, tall and slender, graceful despite the heaviness of the child. She wore a dress of royal blue damask, high waisted and full in the skirt, not hiding her pregnancy but diminishing it. Her hair was braided into a regal knot, with a chain of aquamarines and silver twisted through the silver-gilt plaits. A wide necklace of beaten silver and aquamarines filled in the scoop neck of the dress, the pale greenish blue of the stones almost a match for her eyes. The sleeves of the dress were narrow, fitting close to her arms with wide wristlets of aquamarines and silver made to match the necklace and the heavy earrings. She wasn’t pretty like Kulyari following very much in her shadow, not beautiful either with her wide full mouth and angular bones.

In a room full of women, you’d look at her first, and if you looked away, you’d come back to her. A sharp and ironic intelligence, vigorous moral force, tightly controlled passion like a perfume, invisible but potent.

Angakirs was leaning forward, his weight on his forearms, his body tense. He was watching Allina intently, a glitter in his eyes, hating her and wanting her with about equal intensity.

Behind her screen, Kizra used one arm to wipe the sweat off her face while she kept the tinkle tune going with her other hand. If they got through this night without disaster, she was going to be very much surprised.

After a quick lift of his head when he heard the doors open, Rintirry lounged gracelessly in his chair and stared at his plate, doing his best to ignore the women. Hate as strong as the Artwa’s came off him like smoke. Hate and desire.

He tried to rape me at my betrothal feast , that’s what the Matja said. I thought she was um exaggerating, but I sure as hell believe her now.

Matja Allina crossed the hall and came up the stairs without help, the other women trailing after her, mostly unnoticed.

Kulyari glanced repeatedly at Rintirry, but he was so busy pretending to ignore the Matja he didn’t have time for her. When she realized this, her smile lost its glow, her movements were angular with rage.

For the first time, Kizra felt some sympathy for her. These last few years couldn’t have been easy. There was Angakirs blaming Allina for alienating Pirs, his favorite before the marriage, and seeing her as a failure as a wife since all her sons had been stillborn. There was Utilas the heir, jealous of Pirs and willing to do anything that would injure him (as long as he could do it without his fingers showing). There was Mingas the third son; an old suitor gone sour, he wanted to see Allina reduced to poor relation and presumably available for seduction. And there was Rintirry the youngest who wanted anything he could get his hands on whatever he had to do to get it. All of them urging her, tempting her, sending her here to Ghanar Rinta to seduce her uncle and get rid of Allina. It must have taken her less than a day to discover how hopeless that was. Take an ambitious and shrewd girl, put her where ambition was thwarted and shrewdness was useless, no wonder she wanted Pirs dead and Allina dispossessed. And now it was obvious that Rintirry had no eyes for her, only for the Matja.

Matja Allina bowed, then let Aghilo help her into her chair. She lifted the silver bell beside her plate, rang it, and the meal began, male servants sweeping in with platters of meat and all the rest of it.

Kizra laid the wallpaper noddling to rest and began the program that Allina had laid out for her.

He likes the old epics, the Matja said. You’ve learned something of the Gharadion, you’ll begin with that; it doesn’t matter that you don’t know the words, you wouldn’t sing it anyway, he wouldn’t stand for a woman singing that or anything else, not at dinner. As soon as the first serving is finished, I’ll send Impajin around to you, he’ll do the singing. Hmm. And Paynto, he’s fair with a flute, knows all the old songs. After the Gharadion, he’ll take the lead, you can improvise around him, give some depth to the music; he’s pedestrian at best. He’s loyal, though, and he’s got the ear if not the talent. He’ll be happy enough to have you there, distribute the blame if any; the praise will come to him, not you, he knows that.

The meal went on with murmurs and the clink of silver against silver, the sounds of glass and china, Paynto’s flute and Kizra on the arranga blending and moving apart and Impajin’s rough tenor louder than both. The candles flickered, the colors shimmered, shifting light and shadow picked out texture and sheen; it was like a brocade print, gorgeous and rare. And spoiled for Kizra by the constant undercurrents of hate and fear, anger and disgust.

Tinkle toot, let’s get this thing over with.

The door slammed open and Pirs came striding in. There was a bloodstained bandage on his head and another on his arm. His face was so tight with rage that the bones seemed to be leaping against the skin. He nodded perfunctorily at his father, went bounding up the steps to the second table, nodding tightly at his wife, grabbed hold of Kulyari’s arm and jerked her from the chair. Ignoring her protests, he took her up the short flight of stairs to the main dais, flung her to the floor in front of Angakirs. “I will not have this THING in my house. She called my moves to my enemy and I was brought near to death. She is traitor to the Blood.”

Kulyari was so startled by all this that at first she could only gasp and struggle; she was frightened now. “No no, lies, no,” she cried; she pushed up onto her knees. “It’s lies, all of it, I didn’t… the Blood, no…” Without trying to get up, she swung round and held out her arms toward Rintirry. “Tell them…

Rintirry shoved his chair back, came round the table. Kulyari let her arms drop, her mouth widened into a triumphant smile.

He caught hold of her hair, jerked her head up, and cut her throat. “Traitors die. That’s what I say.”

Dyslaera 8: News From Home Is Better Than A Kick In The Pants

NOTE: Drugs used instead of probe because subject 7R (native name: Rohant, Ciocan of clan Voallts) tests in the dangerous zone re: probability of probe damage. Unusual configuration of energy zone. Tech I refused to guarantee results if probe is not used. Claims since subject has not been fully broken from the fugue state, drug trance cannot be established properly and mechanical/electrical responses cannot be calibrated to a satisfactory degree of precision.

FURTHER NOTE: Tech 1 is showing signs of deviance. Investigate.

TECH 1: Subject is prepared.

SAVANT 4: Tell me your name.

SUBJECT: Rohant vohv Voallts, Ciocan of Family Voallts, Gazgaort of Company Voallts Korlatch of Spotch-Helspar.

SAVANT 4: Who are we?

SUBJECT: I don’t know.

SAVANT 4 (to Tech 1): Well?

TECH 1: Given the limitations…

SAVANT 4: Yes, yes, we’ve been through that. TECH 1: I like to have things clear. 1 would say he’s probably lying.

SAVANT 4: Ciocan, you heard?

SUBJECT: Yes.

SAVANT 4: Look to your right; you can turn your head sufficiently to see the bench by the right wall. Do you see it?

SUBJECT: Yes.

SAVANT 4: What else do you see?

SUBJECT: Someone lying on the bench, his face is to the wall, but it looks like Tejnor.

SAVANT 4: Yes. He is drugged at present, but can be

revived if we need him. If you lie, we will remove parts of him. We won’t let him die, he’s valuable test material, but we won’t waste painkillers on him. Do you understand?

SUBJECT: Yes.