Fletcher Pratt - The Blue Star

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The Blue Star

by Fletcher Pratt (1952)

Cover art by Darrell Sweet

Printed in the United States of America

Contents

Prologue

1 Netznegon City: March Rain

2 April Night

3 Escape

4 Daylight; Refuge

5 Night; Generosity; Treason

6 Night and Day; The Place of Masks

7 Sedad Vix: A New Life

8 High Politic

9 Spring Festival: Intrigue of Count Cleudi

10 Prelude to the Servants' Ball

11 Kazmerga; Two Against a World

12 Netznegon City; A Zigraner Festival

13 Farewell and Greeting

14 The Eastern Sea; The Captain's Story

15 Charalkis; The Door Closes

16 The Eastern Sea: Systole

17 Charalkis: The Depth and Rise

18 Decide for Life

19 Two Choices

20 Inevitable

21 Midwinter: The Return

22 The Law of Love

23 Netznegon: Return to Glory

24 Speeches in the Great Assembly

25 Interview at the Nation's Guest-House

26 The Court of Special Cases

27 Winter Light

28 Embers Revived

29 No and Yes

Epilogue

About the Author

The Blue Star

Prologue

Penfield twirled the stem of his port-glass between thumb and finger.

"I don't agree," he said. "It's nothing but egocentric vanity to

consider our form of life as unique among those on the millions of worlds that

must exist."

"How do you know they exist?" said Hodge.

"Observation," said McCall. "The astronomers have proved that other

stars beside our sun have planets."

"You're playing into his hands," observed Penfield, the heavy eyebrows

twitching as he cracked a nut. "The statistical approach is better. Why

doesn't this glass of port suddenly boil and spout all over the ceiling?

You've never seen a glass of port behave that way, but the molecules that

compose it are in constant motion, and any physicist will tell you that

there's no reason why they can't all decide to move in the same direction at

once. There's only an overwhelming possibility that it won't happen. To

believe that we, on this earth, one of the planets of a minor star, are the

only form of intelligent life, is like expecting the port to boil any moment"

"There are a good many possibilities for intelligent life, though," said

McCall. "Some Swede who wrote in German — I think his name was Lundmark — has

looked into the list. He says, for instance, that a chlorine-silicon cycle

would maintain life quite as well as the oxygen-carbon system this planet has,

and there's no particular reason why nature should favor one form more than

the other. Oxygen is a very active element to be floating around free in such

quantities as we have it."

"All right," said Hodge, "can't it be that the cycle you mention is the

normal one, and ours is the eccentricity?"

"Look here," said Penfield, "what in the world is the point you're

making? Pass the port, and let's review the bidding." He leaned back in his

chair and gazed toward the top of the room, where the carved coats of arms

burned dully at the top of the dark panelling. "I don't mean that everything

here is reproduced exactly somewhere else in the universe, with three men

named Hodge, McCall and Penfield sitting down to discuss sophomore philosophy

after a sound dinner. The fact that we are here and under these circumstances

is the sum of all the past history of —"

Hodge laughed. "I find the picture of us three as the crown of human

history an arresting one," he said.

"You're confusing two different things. I didn't say we were elegant

creatures, or even desirable ones. But behind us there are certain

circumstances, each one of which is as unlikely as the boiling port. For

example, the occurrence of such persons as Beethoven, George Washington, and

the man who invented the wheel. They are part of our background. On one of

the other worlds that started approximately as ours did, they wouldn't exist,

and the world would be altered by that much."

"It seems to me," said McCall, "that once you accept the idea of worlds

starting from approximately the same point — that is, another planet having

the same size and chemical makeup, and about the same distance from its sun —"

"That's what I find hard to accept," said Hodge.

"Grant us our folly for a moment," said McCall. "It leads to something

more interesting than chasing our tails." He snapped his lighter. "What I

was saying is that if you grant approximately the same start, you're going to

arrive at approximately the same end, in spite of what Penfield thinks. We

have evidence of that right on this earth. I mean what they call convergent

evolution. When the reptiles were dominant, they produced vegetable-eaters

and carnivores that fed on them. And among the early mammals there were

animals that looked so much like cats and wolves that the only way to tell

them apart is by the skeleton. Why couldn't that apply to human evolution,

too?"

"You mean," said Penfield, "that Beethoven and George Washington would be

inevitable?"

"Not that, exactly," said McCall. "But some kind of musical inventor,

and some sort of high-principled military and political leader. There might

be differences."

Hodge said: "Wait a minute. If we are the product of human history, so

were Beethoven and Washington. All you've got is a determinism, with nothing

really alterable, once the sun decided to cast off its planets."

"The doctrine of free will —" began McCall.

"I know that one," said Penfield. "But if you deny free will completely,

you'll end up with a universe in which every world like ours is identical —

which is as absurd as Hodge's picture of us is unique, and rather more

repulsive."

"Well, then," said Hodge, "What kind of cosmology are you putting out?

If you won't have either of our pictures, give us yours."

Penfield sipped port. "I can only suggest a sample," he said. "Let's

suppose this world — or one very like it — with one of those improbable

boiling-port accidents left out somewhere along the line. I mentioned the

wheel a moment ago. What would life be like now if it hadn't been invented?"

"Ask McCall," said Hodge. "He's the technician."

"Not the wheel, no," said McCall. "I can't buy that. It's too logical a

product of the environment. Happens as soon as a primitive man perceives that

a section of tree-trunk will roll. No. If you're going to make a

supposition, you'll have to keep it clean, and think in terms of something

that really might not have happened. For example, music. There are lots of

peoples, right here, who never found the full chromatic scale, including the

classical civilizations. But I suppose that's not basic enough for you."

For a moment or two, the three sipped and smoked in the unspoken

communication of friendship. A log collapsed in the fireplace, throwing out a

spray of sparks. McCall said: "The steam engine is a rather unlikely

invention, when you come to think of it. And most modern machines and their

products are outgrowths of it in one way or another. But I can think of one

more peculiar and more basic than that. Gunpowder."

"Oh, come," said Hodge, "that's a specialized —"

"No it isn't," said Penfield. "He's perfectly right. Gunpowder

destroyed the feudal system, and produced the atmosphere in which your steam

engine became possible. And remember that all the older civilizations, even

in the East, were subject to periodic setbacks by barbarian invasions.

Gunpowder provided civilized man with a technique no barbarian could imitate,

and helped him over the difficult spots."

McCall said; "All the metal-working techniques and most of chemistry

depend on the use of explosives — basically. Imagine digging out all the ores

we need by hand."

"All right, then," said Hodge, "have your fun. Let's imagine a world

like this one, in which gunpowder has never been invented. What are you going

to have it look like?"

"I don't know," said McCall, "but I think Penfield's wrong about one

point. About the feudal system, I mean. It was pretty shaky toward the end,

and the cannon that battered down the castles only hurried up the process.

There might be a lot more pieces of the feudal system hanging around without

gunpowder, but the thing would be pretty well shot."

"Now, look here," said Hodge. "You've overlooked something else. If

you're going to eliminate gunpowder and everything that came out of it, you'll

have to replace it with something. After all, a large part of the time and

attention of our so-called civilization have been spent in working out the

results of the gunpowder and steam engine inventions. If you take those away,

you'll have a vacuum, which I'm told, nature abhors. There would have to be a

corresponding development in some other field, going 'way beyond where we

are."

Penfield drank and nodded. "That's fair," he said. "A development along

some line we've neglected because we have been too busy with mechanics. Why

couldn't it be in the region of ESP, or psychology or psychiatry — science of

the mind?"

"But the psychologists are just operating on the ordinary principles of

physical science," said McCall. "Observing, verifying from a number of

examples, and then attempting to predict. I don't see how another race would

have gone farther by being ignorant of these principles or overlooking them."

"You're being insular," said Penfield. "I don't mean that in another

world they would have turned psychology into an exact science in our terms.

It might be something altogether different. Your principles of science are

developed along the lines of arithmetic. The reason they haven't worked very

well in dealing with the human mind may be because they aren't applicable at

all. There may be quite a different line of approach. Think it over for a

moment. It might even be along the line of magic, witchcraft."

"I like that," said McCall. "You want to make a difference by

substituting something phoney for something real."

"But it might not be phoney," insisted Penfield. "Magic and witchcraft

are really pretty late in our world. They began to be talked about at the

same time and on the same terms as alchemy, everything surrounded by

superstition, lying and plain ignorance. In this world we're imagining,

somebody might have found the key to something as basic in that field as

gunpowder was to the physical sciences. Some people say we almost made the

discovery here. You know the story about this house?"

McCall nodded, but Hodge said: "No. What is it? Another ghost story?"

"Not quite. The old part of the house, the one where the bedrooms are

now, is supposed to have been built by one of the Salem witches. Not one of

those they hanged on false charges, but a perfectly genuine witch, who got

away before she was suspected — as a real witch probably would. The story is

that she came here and set up business among the Indians, and as they weren't

very expert at carpentry, she helped them build that part of the house with

spells, so it would be eternal. The old beams haven't a bit of iron in them;

they're all held together with pegs and haven't rotted a bit. There's also a

story that if you make the proper preparations at night, something beyond the

normal will happen. I've never done the right thing myself apparently."

"You probably won't," said Hodge. "The essence of the whole witchcraft

business is uncertainty. Haven't you noticed that in all the legends, the

spells never quite come off when they're needed?"

"That's probably because there isn't any science of witchcraft, with

predictable results," said McCall.

Penfield said: "It may be for another reason, too. Have you ever noticed

that magic is the only form of human activity which is dominated by women?

The really scary creatures are all witches; when a man becomes a magician,

he's either possessed of a devil or is a glorified juggler. Our theoretical

world would have to start by being a matriarchy."

"Or contain the relics of one," said Hodge. "Matriarchies are socially

unstable."

"So is everything," said McCall. "Flow and change from one form to

another is a characteristic of life — or maybe a definition of life. That

goes for your witchcraft, too. It would change form, there'd be resistance to

it, and an effort to find something to replace it."

"Or to remove the disabilities," said Hodge. "The difficulty with any

power we don't really know about is not to define the power itself, but to

discover its limitations. If witchcraft were really practical, there would be

some fairly severe penalties going with it, not legally I mean, but

personally, as a result of the practice. Or to put the thing in your terms,

McCall, if there weren't any drawbacks, being a witch would have such high

selection value that before long every female alive would be a practicing

witch."

McCall carefully poured more port. "Hodge," he said, "you're wonderful,

and I love you. But that's typical of the way you put things. You cover up a

weak point by following it with one that attracts everyone's attention away

from the feebleness of your real case. Penalties for everything? What's the

penalty for having an electric icebox?"

"A pampered digestive system," said Hodge, readily. "I doubt whether you

could survive the food Queen Elizabeth ate for very long, but she lived to be

well over sixty. If there were witchcraft, or ESP or telepathy running around

in the world, there couldn't but be defenses against it and troubles for the

practitioners. Had it occurred to you that even a witch couldn't spend all

her time stirring cauldrons, and might want to lead a normal life, with a

husband and children?"

Penfield got up and stepped to the window, where he stood looking out and

down at the midnight Atlantic, throwing its surges against the breast of the

rocks. "I wonder if it really does exist," he said.

Hodge laughed; but that night all three men dreamed: and it was as though

a filament ran through the ancient rooms; for each knew that he dreamed, and

dreamed the same dream as the others; and from time to time tried to cry out

to them, but could only see and hear.

Chapter 1

Netznegon City: March Rain

It was raining steadily outside. The older woman's tears and words fell

in time, drip, drip. Cold, for the tall window at the room's end would never

quite shut close; bottom and top not nest into the frame simultaneously.

Lalette in her soutane felt goose-pimples and tried to shut out the sound by

thinking of a man with a green hat who would give her a handful of gold scudi

and nothing asked, merely because it was spring and she put a small spell on

him with a smile, but it was not quite spring, and the voice persisted:

". . . all my life — I have hoped — hoped and planned for you — even

before you were born — even before you were born — daughter of my own —" (Yes,

thought Lalette, I have heard that before, and it would move me more, but the

night you drank the wine with Dame Carabobo, you told her how I was the

product of a chance union in a carriage between Rushaca and Zenss) "— daughter

— and after I saved and worked so hard — you miss the only chance — the only

chance — don't know what I'm going to do — and Count Cleudi's not like most —"

"You told him what he offered was frightful. I heard you."

(Sob) "It was. Oh, it was. Oh, Lalette, it isn't right, you should be

married with a gold coach and six horses — but what can we do? — oh, if your

father had left us anything before the war — all I sacrificed for him — but

that is what all of us must do, make sacrifices, we can't have anything real

without giving something away . . . Lalette!"

"Madame."

"You will be able to employ the Art and have everything you want, you

know most of the patterns already, he does not go to the Service often . . .

and after all, it's something that happens to every woman one way or another,

and with the Art, even if he doesn't marry you, he'll find you a husband you

won't mind, it's only men like Cleudi who want to be the first, a man who

marries would really prefer a girl to have a little experience, I know . . .

Lalette!"

Lalette did not answer.

"All the young ones come to the ball after the opera, Lalette. Count

Cleudi will present you, and even if you don't bring —"

(He would have not only a green hat, but southern-made lace at wrist and

throat and a funny-looking man who spoke in a Mayern accent, thick as cream,

and carried the purse because it spoiled the fit —)

". . . as though he were just one of those . . . so considerate . . ." (I

suppose we cannot control how we come by our parents) ". . . your father, like

an angel out of heaven, and I could have taught you so much more if he —" (Now

she is waist-deep in the past again. I'm going to hear it all over) ". . .

really, for it is more like one step up than a leap down from a high place,

which is always what we think before the first time . . . Lalette!"

"Yes, mother."

Someone knocked at the door.

Lalette's mother hastily daubed at her cheeks, heaved herself heavily

from the chair looked sidewise, saying; "We could sell the stone." But before

the girl could reply, the tap again. The older woman waddled across to the

door and opened it a crack; a long jaw and long nose under a wet turn-down hat

poked in.

"I was just saying to my daughter —" began Dame Leonalda.

A pair of thin shoulders pushed past her as though not hearing, the man

stood in the center of the room, sniffed and wiped his nose on his sleeve.

"Listen," he said, "no more stories. I have heard too many."

Dame Leonalda gave him a doleful look and bustled back to her seat. "But

I assure you, Ser Ruald —"

"No more stories," he said again. "I have charges to meet and taxes."

She put her hands to her face. (Lalette thought: her only device; I hope

I shall not grow like that.) Ruald said; "But I do not wish to be hard, no,

and I know you have no money just now. So I will be fair, and if you render

me a small service, why then, it is not beyond me to forgive the whole four

months' arrears."

Dame Leonalda took down her hands again and said; "What is the service?"

(Her voice had something like a tinge of dread.)

Ruald sniffed again, darted a glance at Lalette, another at the door, and

stepped close. "I have heard that you belong to one of the families of the

Blue Star."

"Who told you that?"

"It does not matter. Is it true?"

The dame's lips worked. "And what if it is?"

"Why this, dame: it will not peril your soul to place a small witchery —"

"No, no, I couldn't do such a thing. You have no right to ask me."

The man's face sneered. "I have a right to ask you for my money,

though."

"No, no, I tell you." Her hands waved the air. "That Dame Sauglitz,

they punished her with five years and stripes."

"They will punish nobody for this; utterly private between you and

myself. Is not your skill enough so that no suspicion of witchery will fall

on you? Come, I'll do better. I'll more than forgive the arrears, I'll give

you quit-rent for four other months to come."

"Mother," said Lalette from the corner.

Dame Leonalda turned around. "This does not concern you," she said, and

to Ruald; "But how am I to know that having done as you wish, you'll not

denounce me before the episcopals?"

"Why as for that, might I not want your help another time?" She put up a

protesting hand, but he; "Come, no more stories. I'll —"

There was another tap at the door. Ruald looked annoyance as Dame

Leonalda crossed the room in another rustle of skirts. Her voice was almost

gay. "Come in, Uncle Bontembi."

Rain shook shining from his cloak. "Ah, charming Dame Leonalda." The

paunch hindered his bow. "The greetings of the evening to you, Ser Ruald.

Why, this is a true evening gathering."

"I was just leaving," said Ruald, tugging at his jacket. "Well, then,

Dame Leonalda, bear in mind what I have said. I'm sure we'll reach

accommodation."

She did not get up as he went. When the door was closed she turned to

Uncle Bontembi. "It is such a problem, dear Uncle," she said. "Of course the

child is perfectly right in a way, and it would be different if her father had

left her anything at all, but with such a man as Cleudi —"

"The Count is a splendid gentleman," said the priest. "I have seen him

lose fifty gold scudi on a turn, but never his composure. And he is in high

favor. Is there a problem relative to him? Not that his eye has fallen on

our little Lalette? I would call that a matter for consent and rejoicing."

"Ah, Uncle, it is this, if men only behaved as nobly toward women as they

do to each other! He has set his eye on this dear child indeed, but not his

hand, and says he will pay all our debts and give her a hundred gold scudi

besides, if she will only accompany him to the opera and ball of the spring

festival."

Uncle Bontembi plucked at the button of his chin, and the smile left his

face. "Hm, hm, it is certainly on the face of matters a proposal . . . You

are certain you have not been employing the Art, Dame Leonalda?"

"Oh, no, never, never. And my dear little girl, how could she?"

The priest glanced sly-eye at the girl. "Yes, yes, she has her first

confession to make. Well, well, let us think this out together. I will say

the Count Cleudi is highly held in other circles beside the political. There

was some theological discussion at the Palace Bregatz lately, and the

Episcopal was of the opinion that he had never heard sounder doctrine or

better put than by Cleudi. Wherefore he cannot be very far from the laws of

the good God and right moral, can he? And so his plan may be of greater

benefit than first appears."

"I do not want such benefits," said Lalette, (but thought: then I should

have the Art!)

"Oho! Our junior niece resists; this is not the true humility. Come,

Demoiselle Lalette, let us look at it this way: we can only truly serve good

and vanquish the eternal forces of evil through the happiness of others, for

if it is our own happiness we seek, then others doing the same will make all

unhappy, and so give victory to evil." He signed himself. "Thus to bring joy

to others is the true service of religion and moral, no matter what the

appearance may say. Now in this case there would be three people given

happiness. Yes, yes, the doctrinal point is somewhat delicate, but I cannot

find it in my mind to disapprove. There is a technical violation of moral law

involved, and I am afraid the Church will have to assess a certain fine

against you, but I will make it as light as possible. Enough to remind that a

good action should be done for moral gain and not material."

"I do not love him," said Lalette.

"All the more unselfish, all the more." The priest turned to Dame

Leonalda. "Have you not made it clear to our niece that the true love which

puts down evil in the name of the major glory of God is something that rises

out of and after union? Why, if she talks so, I will have to lay church-duty

on her for approaching the doctrines of the Prophet"

"Oh, I have told her, I have told her." (The mother's voice began to

cloud toward another rain of tears.) "But she is so romantical and sensitive,

my little daughter, just like those poems by Terquid. When I was a girl —"

Lalette let her face smooth out (as she thought about the opera ball and

what it would be like), but even that was not much use, their voices kept

picking at her until she went behind the curtain to her bed in the corner,

where it was even colder beneath the blanket at first, so that she curled up

tight. (If I were really married, the Blue Star would belong to me and my

husband, and . . .)

"But is it a genuine Blue Star?" asked Pyax. He turned toward Dr.

Remigorius, who should know if anyone.

"Ah! Of that I cannot say. We have been deceived before. It is certain

that the old woman has practised veritable witcheries; the Center of

Veierelden found a record of a conviction against her in the church there.

The only surety is in the test; and that is a test that only Friend Rodvard

here can make. If it should be genuine, our game's won."

The lower lip of Pyax hung open among his pimples and Mme. Kaja's ravaged

face changed line. "It would be wo-on-derful to have it," she said, drawing

out the long sound, and Rodvard felt the blood run warm beneath his skin as

they all looked at him. "But I do not think her mother would permit a

marriage," he said. "How will you have me do?"

"Do? Do?" said the doctor, the little white planes at the corners of his

mouth shining against the black fantastic cut of his beard. "Shall we school

hens to lay eggs or rats to suck them for you? Do what is most natural for a

lad with a willing girl in his arms, and the Blue Star is ours. Will you have

Mme. Kaja to teach you?"

The flush warmed Rodvard, and he said; "I — will you —"

Mathurin in the background opened his thin, tight lips. "Our friend is

lapped in the obligation of the Church. Hey, Rodvard Yes-and-No, what moral

do you follow? If it's to be that of the priests, you have no place with us.

You are engaged as a soldier to the overthrow of all they stand for."

"O-o-oh, you are so wrong, friend Mathurin," said Mme. Kaja. "I

understand. There is the heart —" she pressed a hand to a pendulous right

breast” — but as my old friend, the Baroness Blenau used to say, hearts do not

guide but to sorrow. Ah, friend Rodvard, believe me, if one is to have the

great peace, one must deny the heart's message and seek the good of all beyond

what gives pain at the moment." She slapped her breast again and turned to

the others. "I know; he is in love with another."

Without reason, Mathurin said suddenly; "When I went to the court service

with Cleudi last night, the old hog was drunk again. Fell on the floor at her

royal prayers and had to be helped —"

Dr. Remigorius; "Will you still distract us, Mathurin? There is but one

present question before this Center — the bidding of the High Center that

friend Rodvard here obtain the Blue Star from Lalette Asterhax. Can we report

to them that the task is undertaken?"

Pyax spoke, running his tongue across lips; "If he will not, I can offer

through marriage and lawful lease. My father would be willing to give a dower

—"

Rodvard burst into laughter with the rest, over the thought there could

be enough money in the world to buy a Dossolan bedding for one of Pyax'

Zigraner birth. (But the laugh ended bitterly for the young man at the

thought that because they could see no better way he must give up his ideal of

honor and true love. He tried to imagine how it would be to live with someone

who did not love one again, but whom for honor's sake he must have married,

and for a moment the intent candle-lit faces dissolved away; he felt a

momentary strange sweet painful thrill before the picture in his mind changed

to that of his father and mother quarreling about money, and she began to

scream until his father, with contorted face, reached down the cane from the

mantel . . . Oh, if one gives in love, it should be forever, ever, love and

death —)

“— still place him," Dr. Remigorius was saying, “but that will be a

matter for the High Center. No, there's only the one thing, and we'll have

the answer now. Rodvard Bergelin, we summon you by your oath to the Sons of

the New Day and your desire to overthrow the wicked rule of the Laughing

Chancellor and the old Queen, to take your part."

Pyax smiled nastily. "Remember Peribert? We know how to deal with those

who fall away."

"It is not good to be hard on those from whom you seek help," said Mme.

Kaja.

"Be still," said Remigorius. "Young man, your word."

(One more effort.) "Is it so vital that we have this jewel?" said

Rodvard.

"Yes," said Remigorius, simply; but Mathurin; 'This is the only true Blue

Star of which we have record, and even this one may not be true. But if you

will not make the effort to win it, as ordered, there's still an escape. You

are a clerk to the Office of Pedigree; find another Blue Star that we can

have, and you're excused. But with matters so approaching a crisis at the

court, we must have one; for we are the weaker party."

Rodvard saw Pyax touch his knife-hilt and once more wetly run out his

tongue, so like a lizard's. Beaten; had he not himself in those long

conversations until daybreak, maintained that among free men the more voices

must make the decisions? With a sense that he was assuming an obligation to

baseness, he said:

"I will do as you desire."

Dr. Remigorius' face cracked into a red-and-black smile. "Pfo, young

man, you'll make a witch of her and she will gain her fortune."

Mme. Kaja came over to take both his hands as he left. "The heart will

follow," she said.

Chapter 2

April Night

Lalette looked up through branches to the purpling sky, then down from

the little crest and across the long flat fertile fields, reaching out toward

the Eastern Sea, where night was rising. "I must go," she said. "My mother

will be back from the service." Her voice was flat.

"Not yet," said Rodvard, lifting his head from arms wrapped around his

knees. "You said she would stay to talk with the fat priest. . . . In this

light, your eyes are green."

"It is the sign of a bad temper, my mother tells me. She looked in the

waters for me once, and says that when I am married, I will be a frightful

shrew." (It was almost too much trouble to move, she was glad even to make a

slender line of conversation that would hold her immobile in the calm

twilight.)

"Then you must be fated to marry a bad man. I do not see — if you really

loved someone, how could you be shrewish with them?"

"Oh, the girls of our heritage cannot marry for love. It is the

tradition of the witch-families." She sat up suddenly. "Now I must

absolutely go."

He placed his hand over hers, where it rested on the long green moss

under the cedars. "Absolutely, I will not let you go. I will bind you with

hard bonds, till you tell me more about your family. Do you really have a

Blue Star?"

"My mother does . . . . I do not know. My father would never use it,

that is why we are so poor. He said it was wrong and dangerous. My mother's

father used it though, she says, before she got it from him. It was he who

told her to choose my father. He was a Capellan in the army, you know, and

was killed in the war at the siege of Sedad Mir. My mother's father could

read through the Star that my father wanted my mother for herself and not for

her heritage. It was a love-match, but now there is no one that can use the

Star." (Lalette thought: I really must not tell stories like that that are not

true, it only slipped out because I do not wish to go back and hear her

talking about Count Cleudi again.)

"Could not you sell it?" asked Rodvard.

"Who would buy it? It would be a confession that someone wanted to

practice witchery, and then the priests would come down and there'd be a

church trial. It is a very strange thing and a burden to have witchery in

one's blood." She shuddered a little (attracted and yet depressed, as always

when it was a question of That). "I do not want to be a witch, ever —"

"Why, I would think —" began Rodvard, (really thinking that in spite of

her beauty, this was the reason she more than a little repelled).

"— and have people hating me, and those who want to like me not sure

whether they really do, or whether it is only another witchery. The only real

friend my mother has is Uncle Bontembi, and that's because he's a priest, and

I don't think he's a real friend either, but keeps watch of her so that when

she makes a witchery he can collect another fine for the Church." Rodvard

felt the small hand clench beneath his own. "I'll never marry, and stay a

virgin, and will not be a witch!"

"What would happen to the Blue Star then? You have no sisters, have

you?"

"Only a brother, and he went overseas to Mancherei when the Prophet began

to preach there. Somebody said he went beyond to the Green Isles afterward,

when the Prophet left. We do not hear from him any more. . . . But he

couldn't use the Blue Star anyway, unless he were bound with a girl from one

of the other families, who could witch it for him."

Overhead the sky was deepening, with one faint easterly star agleam, a

long slow smoke rose in convolutions from the chimney of a cot down there,

(and Rodvard thought desperately of the lovely light-haired girl who had come

so many times to search witch-family records at his clerk's cabinet in the

Office of Pedigree, but she was a baron's daughter by her badge, and even if

he did obtain the Blue Star from this one, and used it to win the light-haired

girl, then Lalette would be a witch and put a spell on him — oh tangle!). The

hand within his stirred.

"I must go," said Lalette again. (He looks something like Cleudi, she

was thinking, but not so old and hard and a little romantic, and he had eye

enough to catch the wonderful tiny flash of green among the blue when the sun

dipped under.)

"Ah, no. You shall not go, not yet. This is a magic evening and we will

keep it forever till all's dark."

Her face softened a trifle in the fading light, but she pulled to

withdraw her hand. "Truly."

He clung the tighter, feeling heart-beat, vein-beat in the momentary

small struggle. "What if I will not let you go till lantern-glass and the

gates are closed?"

"Then Uncle Bontembi will expect me to make a confession and if I do not,

he will put a fine on me, and it will be bad for my mother because we are so

poor."

"But if I kept you, it would be to run away with you, ah, far beyond the

Shining Mountains, and live with you forever."

Her hand went passive again, she leaned toward him a trifle, as though to

see more surely the expression on his face. "Do you mean that, Rodvard

Bergelin?"

He caught breath. "Why — why should I say it else?"

"You do not. Let me go, let me go, or I'll make you." She half turned,

trying to rise, bringing the other hand to help pull loose his fingers.

"Will you witch me, witch?" he cried, straggling, and his grasp slipped

to her wrist.

"No —." She snatched at the held hand with the other, catching the thumb

and crying fiercely; "I'll break my own finger, I swear it, if you do not let

go."

"No. . . ." He flung her two hands apart. Lithe as a serpent, she wrung

one and then the other from his grasp, but it was with an effort that carried

her off balance and supine asprawl. He rolled on his hip to pin her down,

hands on her elbows, breast to breast, and was kissing her half-opened mouth

till she stopped trying, turning her face from his and whispering: "Let me go.

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摘要：

TheBlueStarbyFletcherPratt(1952)CoverartbyDarrellSweetPrintedintheUnitedStatesofAmericaContentsPrologue1NetznegonCity:MarchRain2AprilNight3Escape4Daylight;Refuge5Night;Generosity;Treason6NightandDay;ThePlaceofMasks7SedadVix:ANewLife8HighPolitic9SpringFestival:IntrigueofCountCleudi10PreludetotheServa...

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Fletcher Pratt - The Blue Star

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