I had to stop and think. “Four years ago bandits in the Kilghard hills broke into Armida, stealing horses. We chased them back across the hills and hanged a few of them.”

“When did you last fight a duel?”

“Why, never.”

“And you last drew your sword against common horse-thieves. No rebellions, wars, invasions from nonhumans?”

“Not in my time.” I began to see what he was driving at.

“Then,” he said, “why risk law-abiding men, good men and loyal, against horse-thieves, bandits, rabble who have no right to the protection given men of honor? Why not develop really effective protection against the lawless and let your sons learn something more useful than the arts of the sword? I am a peaceful man and Beltran will, I think, have no reason to force himself on my people by armed force. The law in the Hellers states that no man given to breach of the peace may own any weapon, even a sword, and there are laws about how long a pocketknife he may carry. As for the men who keep my laws, they are welcome to any weapon they can get. An honest man is less threat to our world with a Terran’s nerve-blaster than a lawless one with my cook’s paring knife or a stonemason’s hammer. I don’t believe in matching good honest men against rogues, both armed with the same weapons. When I left off fairy tales I left off believing that an honest man must always be a better swordsman than a horse-thief or a bandit. The Compact, which allows unlimited handweapons and training in their use to good men and criminals alike, has simply meant that honest men must struggle day and night to make themselves stronger than brutes.”

There was certainly some truth in what he said. Now that my father was so lame, Dyan was certainly the best swordsman in the Domains. Did that mean if Dyan fought a duel, and won, that his cause was therefore just? If the horse-thieves had been better swordsmen than ours at Armida, would they have had a right to our horses? Yet there was a flaw in his logic too. Perhaps there was no flawless logic anywhere.

“What you say is true, Uncle, as far as it goes. Yet ever since the Ages of Chaos, it’s been known that if an unjust man gets a weapon he can do great damage. With the Compact, and such a weapon as he can get under the Compact, he can do only one man’s worth of damage.”

Kermiac nodded, acknowledging the truth of what I said. “True. Yet if weapons are outlawed, soon only outlaws can get them—and they always do. Old Hastur’s heir so died. The Compact is only workable as long as everybody is willing to keep it. In today’s world, with Darkover on the very edge of becoming part of the Empire, it’s unenforceable. Completely unenforceable. And if you try to make an unworkable law work and fail, it encourages other men to break laws. I have no love for futile gestures, so I enforce only such laws as I can. I suspect the only answer is the one that Hastur, even though he pays lip service to Compact, is trying to spread in the Domains: make the land so safe that no man seriously needs to defend himself, and let weapons become toys of honor and tokens of manhood.”

Uneasily I touched the hilt of the sword I had worn every day of my adult life.

Kermiac patted my wrist affectionately. “Don’t trouble yourself, nephew. The world will go as it will, not as you or I would have it. Leave tomorrow’s troubles for tomorrow’s men to solve. I’ll leave Beltran the best world I can, but if he wants a better one he can always build it himself. I’d like to think that some day Beltran and the heir to Hastur could sit down together and build a better world, instead of spitting venom at one another between Thendara and Caer Donn. And I’d like to think that when that day comes you’ll be there to help, whether you’re standing behind Beltran or young Hastur. Just that you’ll be there.”

He picked up a nut and cracked it with his strong old teeth. I wondered what he knew of Beltran’s plans, wondered too how much of what he said was straightforward, how much meant to reach Hastur’s ears. I was beginning to love the old man, yet unease nagged at my mind. Most of the crowd at dinner had dispersed; Thyra and Marjorie were gathered with Beltran and Rafe near one of the windows. Kermiac saw the direction of my eyes and laughed.

“Don’t sit here among the old men, nephew, take yourself along to the young folk.”

“A moment,” I said. “Beltran calls them foster-sisters; are they your kinswomen too?”

“Thyra and Marguerida? That’s an odd story,” Kenniac said. “Some years ago I had a bodyguard in my house, a Terran named Zeb Scott, while I still indulged in such foolishness, and I gave him Felicia Darriell to wife—Does this long tale weary you, Lew?”

“By no means.” I was eager to know all I could about Marjorie’s parentage.

“Well, then. The Darriells are an old, old family in these hills, and the last of them, old Rakhal—Rafe’s true name is Rakhal, you know, but my Terrans find that hard to say—old Rakhal Darriell dwelt as a hermit, half mad and all drunk, in his family mansion, which was falling to ruins even then. And now and then, when he was maddened with wine or when the Ghost Wind blew—the kiresethstill grows in some of the far valleys—he would wander crazed in the forests. He’d tell strange tales, afterward, of women astray in the forests, dancing naked in the winds and taking him to their arms—such a tale as any madman might tell. But a long time ago, a very long time now, old Rakhal, they say, came to Storn Castle bearing a girl-child in his arms, saying he had found her like this, naked in the snow at his doorway. He told them the babe was his child by one of the forest-folk, cast out to die by her kin. So the lady of Storn took her in for, whatever the babe was, human or of the forest-folk, old Rakhal could not rear her. She fostered her with her own daughters. And many years after, when I was married to Lauretta Storn-Lanart, Felicia Darriell, as she was called, came with Lauretta among her ladies and companions. Felicia’s oldest child—Thyra there—may well be my daughter. When Lauretta was heavy with child it was Felicia, by her wish, that I took to my bed. Lauretta’s first child was stillborn and she took Thyra as a fosterling. I have always treated her as Beltran’s sister, although nothing is certain. Later, Felicia married Zeb Scott, and these two, Rafe and Marguerida, are half-Terran and none of your kin. But Thyra may well be your cousin.”

He added, musing, “Old Rakhal’s tale may well have been true. Felicia was a strange woman; her eyes were very strange. I always thought such tales mere drunken babble. Yet, having known Felicia … ” He was silent, lost in memories of time long past. I looked at Marjorie, wondering. I had never believed such tales, either. Yet those eyes …

Kermiac laughed and dismissed me. “Nephew, since your eyes and heart are over there with Marguerida, take the rest of yourself along over there too!”

Thyra was gazing intently out into the storm; I could feel the questing tendrils of her thought and knew she was searching, through the gathering darkness, for her lover. Now Thyra, I could well believe, was not all human.

But Marjorie? She reached her hands to me and I caught them in one of mine, circled her waist with my free arm. Beltran said, joining us, “He’ll be here soon. What then, Lew?”

“It’s your plan,” I said, “and Kadarin is certainly enough of a telepath to fit into a circle. You know what we want to do, though there are limits to what can be done with a group this size. There are certainly technologies we can demonstrate. Road-building and surfacing, for instance. It should convince the Terrans we are worth watching. Powered aircraft may be more difficult. There may be records of that at Arilinn. But it won’t be fast or easy.”

“You still feel I’m not fit to take a place in the matrix circle.”

“There’s no question of fitness, you’re not able. I’m sorry, Beltran. Some powers may develop. But without a catalyst … ”