The Forbidden Circle (33 page)

Ellemir took his hand. Her voice sounded like a child’s in the huge room. “Be witness all of you that I, Ellemir Lanart, take Damon Ridenow as freemate, with consent of our kin.”

There was an outcry of applause and laughter, congratulations, hugs and kisses for both bride and groom. Andrew clasped Damon’s hands in his own, but Damon put his arms around Andrew for the embrace that was customary here, between kinsmen, his cheek briefly touching his friend’s. Then Ellemir pressed herself lightly against him, standing on tiptoe, her lips for a moment on his. For a moment, dizzied, it was as if he had received the kiss Callista had never yet given him, and his mind blurred. For a moment he was not sure which of them had actually kissed him. Then Ellemir was laughing up at him, saying softly, “It is too early for you to be drunk, Andrew!”

The newly married couple moved on, accepting other kisses, embraces, good wishes. Andrew knew that in a moment it would be his turn to make the declaration, but he must stand alone.

Domenic leaned close to him and whispered, “If you wish, I will stand as your kinsman, Andrew. It is only anticipating the fact by a few moments.”

Andrew was touched by the gesture, but hesitated to accept. “You know nothing of me, Domenic . . .”

“Oh, you are Callista’s choice, and that is quite enough testimony to your character,” Domenic said lightly. “I know my sister, after all.” He rose with him, seeming to accept it as settled. “Did you see the sour face on
Dom
Lorenz? It’s hard to imagine he’s Damon’s brother, isn’t it? I don’t suppose you’ve seen the woman
he
married! I think he envies Damon my pretty sister!” As they moved around the table, he murmured, “You can use the words Damon used, or any others which happen to occur to you—there is no set formula. But leave it to Callista to declare your children legitimate. Without offense, that is for the parent of higher rank to do or leave undone.”

Andrew whispered his thanks for the advice. Now he was standing at the head of the long table, facing the guests, dimly aware of Domenic behind him, of Dezi facing him across the long table, of Callista’s eyes steadily before him. He swallowed, hearing his own voice roughened and hoarse.

“I, Ann’dra”—a double name in Darkovan denoted at least minor nobility; Andrew had no lineage any of them would have recognized—“declare that in your presence, as witnesses, I take Callista Lanart-Alton as freemate, with consent of her kin. . . .” It seemed to him that there should be something more than this. He remembered a sect on Terra which had performed their own marriages this way, before witnesses, and out of vague memory he paraphrased, translating the words from an echo in his mind:

“I take her to love and to cherish, in good times and bad, in poverty and wealth, in health and in sickness, while life shall last, and thus I pledge before you all.”

Slowly she came around the table to join him. She was wearing flimsy draperies of crimson embroidered with gold. The color quenched her pale hair, made her look paler still. He had heard that this was the color and the dress reserved for a Keeper. Leonie, behind her, was similarly garbed, solemn and unsmiling.

Callista’s quiet voice was, nevertheless, the voice of a trained singer. Soft as it was, it could be heard throughout the room. “I, Callista of Arilinn,” and her fingers tightened on his almost convulsively as she spoke the ritual title aloud for the last time, “having laid down my holy office forever with the consent of my Keeper, take this man, Ann’dra, as freemate. I further declare”—her voice trembled—“that should I bear him children they shall be held legitimate before clan and council, caste and heritage.” She added, and it struck Andrew that there was defiance in the words, “The Gods witness it, and the holy things at Hali.”

At that moment he saw Leonie’s eyes fixed on him. They seemed to hold a fathomless sadness, but he had no time to wonder why. He bent his head, taking Callista’s hands in his own, touching his lips lightly to hers. She did not shrink from the touch, but he knew that she was barricaded against it, that it did not truly reach her, that somehow she had managed to endure this ritual kiss here before witnesses, only because she knew it would have been scandalous if she did not. The desolation in her eyes was agony to him, but she smiled and murmured, “Your words were lovely, Andrew. Are they Terran?”

He nodded, but had no time to explain further, for they were swept into a round of hugs and congratulations like that which had encompassed Damon and Ellemir. Then they were all kneeling for
Dom
Esteban’s blessing, and for Leonie’s.

It was quickly apparent, as the festivities began, that the real purpose of this celebration was for the nearby neighbors to meet and judge
Dom
Esteban’s sons-in-law. Damon, of course, was known by name and reputation to all of them: a Ridenow of Serrais, an officer in the Guards. Andrew, however, was pleasantly surprised at how he was welcomed and accepted, how little attention he attracted. He suspected—and later knew he was right—that in general whatever a Comyn lord did was assumed to be beyond question.

There was a lot of drinking, and he was quickly drawn into the dancing. Everyone joined in this, even the staid Leonie taking the arm of Lord Serrais for a measure. There were some boisterous games. Andrew was dragged into one which involved a lot of kissing, under confusing rules. In a quiet moment on the edge of the game, he voiced some of his confusion to Ellemir. Her face was flushed; he suspected that she had been drinking quite a lot of the sweet, heavy wine. She giggled. “Oh, it’s a compliment to Callista, that these girls should show that they find her husband desirable. And besides, they see no one from Midwinter to Midsummer but their own brothers and kinsmen; you’re a new face and exciting to them.”

That seemed reasonable enough, but still, when it came to playing kissing games with drunken girl children, many of whom were hardly into their teens, he suspected he was simply too old for this kind of party. He had never cared much for drinking anyhow, even among his own compatriots where he knew all the jokes. He looked longingly at Callista, but one of the unwritten rules seemed to be that a husband was not to dance with his own wife. Every time he came near her, others rushed between them and kept them apart.

It finally grew so obvious that he hunted up Damon to ask about it. Damon chuckled and said, “I had forgotten that you are a stranger to the Kilghard Hills, brother. You don’t want to cheat them of their fun, do you? It’s a game at weddings, to keep husband and wife apart so they cannot slip away and consummate their marriage in private, before being put to bed together. Then everybody can have the fun of making the kind of jokes that are traditional here at weddings.” He chuckled, and Andrew wondered suddenly what he was in for!

Damon followed his thoughts accurately and said, “If the marriages had been held in Thendara—they are more sophisticated there, and more civilized. But here they keep country customs and I’m afraid they’re very near to nature. I don’t mind all that much, myself, but then, I was fostered here. At my age I’ll take a little extra teasing—most men marry when they’re about Domenic’s age. And Ellemir was brought up in the hill-country, too, and she’s teased the bride at so many weddings, I suppose she’ll enjoy the fun as much as any of them. But I wish I could spare Callista this. She’s been . . . sheltered. And a Keeper giving up her place is fair game for dirty jokes; I’m afraid they’ll think up something really tough for her.”

Andrew looked at Ellemir, laughing and blushing in a crowd of girls. Callista was similarly surrounded, but she looked withdrawn and miserable. Andrew noticed, however, with relief that while many of the women were giggling, blushing, and shrieking with laughter, a substantial number of them—mostly the youngest ones—were like Callista, red-faced and shy.

“Drink up!” Domenic thrust a glass into Andrew’s hands. “You can’t be sober at a wedding, it’s disrespectful. Anyhow, if you didn’t get drunk, you might be too eager and mishandle your bride, eh, Damon?” He added some kind of joke about moonlight which Andrew failed to understand, but it made Damon snort with shamed laughter.

“I see you are consulting Andrew for advice about later tonight. Tell me, Andrew, do your people have a machine for that too? No?” He pantomimed exaggerated relief. “That’s something! I was afraid we’d have to arrange a special demonstration.”

Dezi was staring at Damon with concentrated attention. Was the youngster drunk already? Dezi said, “I am glad you declared your intention of legitimating your sons, or are you? At your age, do you mean to tell me you have no sons, Damon?”

Damon said with a good-natured smile, a wedding being no time to take offense at intrusive questions, “I am neither monk nor
ombredin
, Dezi, so I suppose it is not impossible, but if I have, their mothers have neglected to inform me of their existence. But I would have welcomed a son, bastard or no.” Abruptly his mind touched Dezi’s; drunkenly, the boy had failed to barricade himself, and in the flood of bitterness Damon understood the one relevant thing, realizing for the first time what lay at the core of Dezi’s bitterness.

The boy believed himself to be
Dom
Esteban’s son, and never acknowledged. But would Esteban have done that to any son of his, however begotten? Damon wondered. He recalled that Dezi had
laran
.

Later, when he mentioned this to Domenic the other said, “I don’t believe it. My father is a just man. He acknowledged his
nedestro
sons by Larissa d’Asturien, and has settled property on them. He has been as kind to Dezi as to any kinsman, but if Dezi had been his son, he would surely have said so.”

“He sent him to Arilinn,” Damon argued, “and you know that no one except those of the pure Comyn blood may come there. It is not so at the other Towers, but Arilinn—”

Domenic hesitated. “I will not discuss my father’s do ings behind his back,” he said at last, firmly. “Come and ask him.”

“Is this the time for such a question?”

“A wedding is the time for settling questions of legitimacy,” Domenic said firmly, and Damon followed him, thinking that this was very like Domenic, to have such a question settled as soon as it was raised.

Dom
Esteban was sitting on the sidelines, talking to a painfully polite young couple who slipped away to dance as his son approached. Domenic asked it bluntly:

“Father, is Dezi our brother or not?”

Esteban Lanart looked down at the wolfskin covering his knees. He said, “It might well be so, my boy.”

Domenic demanded fiercely, “Why, then, is he not acknowledged?”

“Domenic, you don’t understand these things, lad. His mother—”

“A common whore?” Domenic demanded in dismay and disgust.

“What do you take me for? No, of course not. She was one of my kinswomen. But she . . .” Oddly, the rough old man colored in embarrassment. He said at last, “Well, the poor lass is dead now and cannot be shamed further. It was Midwinter festival, and we were all drunk, and she lay that night with me—and not with me alone, but with four or five of my cousins. So when she proved to be with child, none of us was willing to acknowledge the boy. I’ve done what I could for him, and it’s obvious to look at him that he has Comyn blood, but he could have been mine, or Gabriel’s, or Gwynn’s—”

Domenic’s face was red, but he persisted. “Still, a Comyn son should have been acknowledged.”

Esteban looked uncomfortable. “Gwynn always said he meant to, but he died before he got around to it. I have hesitated to tell Dezi that story, because I think it would hurt his pride worse than simple bastardy. I do not think he has been ill-used,” he said, defending himself. “I have had him here to live, I sent him to Arilinn. He has had everything of a
nedestro
heir save formal acknowledgment.”

Damon thought that over as he went back to the dancing. No wonder Dezi was touchy, troubled; he obviously sensed some disgrace which bastardy alone would not have given. It was disgraceful for a girl of good family to be promiscuous that way. He knew Ellemir had had lovers, but she had chosen them discreetly and one, at least, had been her sister’s husband, which was long-established custom. There had been no scandal. Nor had she risked bearing a child no man would acknowledge.

When Damon and Domenic had left him, Andrew went moodily to get another drink. He thought, with a certain grimness, that considering what lay ahead of him this night, he might do well to get himself as drunk as possible. Between the country customs Damon thought so much of a joke, and the knowledge that he and Callista could not consummate their marriage yet, it was going to be one hell of a wedding night.

On second thought he would have to walk a narrow line, drunk enough to blur his awareness of embarrassment, but sober enough to keep in mind his pledge to Callista, never to put the slightest pressure on her, or try to hurry her. He wanted her—he had never wanted any woman in his life as much as he wanted her—but he wanted her willingly, sharing his own desire. He knew perfectly well that he wouldn’t get the slightest pleasure out of anything remotely approaching rape; and in her present state, it couldn’t be anything but.

“If you do not get drunk, you might be overeager and mishandle your bride.” Damn Domenic and his jokes! Fortunately none of them except Damon, who understood the problem, knew what he was going through.

If they did know, they’d probably think it was funny! Andrew considered. Just one more dirty joke for a wedding!

Abruptly he felt distress, dismay . . . Callista! Callista in trouble somewhere! He hurried in her direction, letting his own telepathic sensitivity guide him.

He found her at one end of the hall, pinned against the wall by Dezi, who had one arm at either side of her so she could not dodge away and escape. He was leaning forward as if to kiss her. She twisted to one side and then the other, trying to avoid his lips, imploring him. “Don’t, Dezi, I do not want to defend myself against a kinsman—”