Damon asked after the frostbitten men. The less hurt ones had recovered and been sent to their families’ care; the seriously wounded ones, the ones he had healed with the matrix, were still recovering. Raimon had lost two toes on his right foot; Piedro had never recovered feeling in the outer fingers of his left hand, but they were not wholly crippled, as had been feared.

“They are still with us,” Ellemir said, “because Ferrika must dress their feet night and morning with healing oils. Did you know Raimon is a splendid musician? Almost every night, we have him up in the hall to play for us to dance, the servant girls and the stewards, and Callista and Dezi and I dance too, but now that you are back with us…” She snuggled against Damon’s side, looking up at him with happy eyes.

Callista followed Andrew’s gaze and said softly, “I have missed you, Andrew. Perhaps I cannot show it as Elli does. But I am more glad than I can tell you, that you are here with us again.”

After dinner in the big hall, Dom Esteban said, “Shall we have some music, then?”

“I shall send for Raimon, shall I?” Ellemir said, and went to summon the men, and Andrew said softly, “Will you sing for me, Callista?”

Callista glanced at her father for permission. He motioned to her to sing, and she took her small harp and struck a chord or two.

Dezi made a formless sound of protest. Looking at his troubled face as she returned, Ellemir said, “Callista, sing something else!” At Andrew’s surprised, questioning look, she said, “It is ill luck for a sister to sing that in a brother’s hearing. It tells the tale of a brother who slew all his kinfolk save one sister alone, and she was forced to pronounce the outlaw-word on him.”

Dom Esteban scowled. He said, “I am not superstitious, and no son of mine sits in this hall. Sing, Callista.”

Troubled, Callista bent her head over her harp, but she obeyed.

Andrew, seeing Dezi’s smoldering eyes, felt a wave of sadness for the boy, for the gratuitous insult Dom Esteban had put on him. Callista sought Dezi’s eyes as if in apology, but the youngster rose and went out of the room, slamming the door into the kitchens. Andrew thought he should do something, say something, but what?

Later Raimon came hobbling into the hall on his canes and began to play a dance tune. The strain vanished as the men and women of the estate crowded into the center of the room, men in the outer ring, women in the inner, dancing a measure which wove into circles and spirals. One of the men brought out a drone-pipe, an unfamiliar instrument which, Andrew thought, made an unholy racket, for a couple of others to dance a sword-dance. Then they began to dance in couples, though Andrew noticed that most of the younger women danced only with one another. Callista was playing for the dancers; Andrew bowed to Ferrika and drew her into the dance.

Later he saw Ellemir and Damon dancing together, her arms around his neck, her smiling eyes lifted to her husband’s. It reminded him of his attempts to dance with Callista, against custom, at their wedding. Well, nothing forbade it now. He went in search of Callista, who had yielded up her harp to another of the women and was dancing with Dezi. As they drew apart, he came toward them and held out his arms.

She smiled gaily and moved toward him, but Dezi stepped between them. He spoke in a voice which could not be heard three feet away, but there was no mistaking the sneering malice in his tone: “Oh, we can’t let you two dauce together yet, can we?”

Callista’s hands dropped to her sides and the color drained from her face. Andrew heard a clatter of broken dishes and the shatter of a wineglass somewhere, under the terrifying impact of her mental cry of pain. Evidently everyone in the room with a scrap of telepathic awareness had picked up her outrage. Andrew didn’t stop to think. His fist smashed, hard, into Dezi’s face, sending the boy reeling.

Slowly Dezi picked himself up. He wiped the streaming blood from his lip, his eyes blazing fury. Then he flung himself at Andrew, but Damon had grabbed him around the waist, holding him back by force.

“Zandra’s hells, Dezi,” he breathed, “are you mad? Blood-feud for three generations has been declared for an insult less than you have put on our brother!”

Andrew looked around the ring of staring, shocked faces until he saw Callista, her eyes staring and lost in her drawn face. Abruptly she put her hands up to her face, turned her back, and hurried out of the room. She did not sob aloud, but Andrew could feel, like tangible vibration, the tears she could not shed.

Dom Esteban’s angry voice, cut through the lengthening, embarrassed silence.

“The most charitable explanation of this, Deziderio, is that you have again had more to drink than you can handle! If you cannot hold your drink like a man, you had better limit yourself to shallan with your dinner, as the children do! Apologize to our kinsman, and go sleep it off!”

That was the best way to pass it off, Andrew thought. Judging by their confusion, most of the people in the room did not even know what Dezi had said. They had simply picked up Callista’s distress.

Dezi muttered something — Andrew supposed it was an apology. He said quietly, “I don’t care what insults you put on me, Dezi. But what kind of man should I be if I let you speak offensively to my wife?”

Dezi glanced over his shoulder at Dom Esteban — to make sure they were out of earshot? — and said in a low, vicious tone, “Your wife? Don’t you even know that freemate marriage is legal only upon consummation? She’s no more your wife than she is mine!” Then he went quickly past Andrew and out of the room.

All semblance of jollity had gone from the evening. Ellemir hastily thanked Raimon for his music and hurried out of the room. Dom Esteban beckoned Andrew and asked if Dezi had apologized. Andrew, averting his eyes — the old man was a telepath, how could he lie to him? — said uneasily that he had, and to his relief the old man let it pass. What could he do anyway? He could not declare blood-feud on his wife’s half-brother, a drunken adolescent with a taste for insults that hit below the belt.

But was it true, what Dezi had said? In their own suite he put the question to Damon, who, though he shook his head looked troubled.

“My dear friend, don’t worry about it. No one would have any reason to question the legality of your marriage. Your intentions are clear, and no one is worrying about the fine points of the law,” he said, but Andrew felt that Damon had not even convinced himself. Inside their room he could hear Callista crying. Damon heard too.

“I would like to break our Dezi’s neck for him!”

Andrew felt the same way. With a few vicious words, the boy had taken all the joy out of their reunion.

Callista had stopped crying when he came in. She stood before her dressing table, slowly unfastening the butterfly-clasp she wore at the nape of her neck, letting her hair fall down about her shoulders. She turned and said, wetting her lips, as if it were a speech she had rehearsed many times, “Andrew, I am sorry… I am sorry you were exposed to that. — It is my fault.”

She sat down before the table and slowly took up her carved ivory brush, running it slowly along the length of her hair. Andrew knelt beside her, wishing desperately that he could take her in his arms and comfort her. “Your fault, love? How are you to blame for that wretched boy’s malice? I won’t tell you to forget it — I know you can’t — but don’t let it trouble you.”