Bradley, Marion Zimmer - Darkover 11- The Forbidden Tower

VIP免费
2024-12-07 0 0 728.83KB 224 页 5.9玖币
侵权投诉
The Forbidden Tower by Marion Zimmer Bradley -Darkover Forbidden Circle 02
The Forbidden Tower
Marion Zimmer Bradley
the forbidden circle 02 - a darkover novel
ELF digital back-up edition 1.0
click for scan notes and proofing history
valid XHTML 1.0 strict
Contents
|1|2|3|4|5|6|7|8|9|10|11|12|13|14|15|16|17|18|19|20|21|22|23|Epilogue
DAW BOOKS, INC.
DONALD A. WOLLHEIM, PUBLISHER
1301 Avenue of the Americas
New York, N. Y. 10019
COPYRIGHT © 1977, BY MARION ZIMMER BRADLEY
All Rights Reserved
Cover art by Richard Hescox.
FIRST PRINTING, SEPTEMBER 1977
PRINTED IN U.S.A.
file:///C|/2590%20Sci-Fi%20and%20Fantasy%20...rkover%2011-%20The%20Forbidden%20Tower.html (1 of 224) [12/28/2004 3:48:47 PM]
The Forbidden Tower by Marion Zimmer Bradley -Darkover Forbidden Circle 02
Forbidden Tower
DEDICATION
For DIANA PAXSON, who asked the question which directly touched off this book;
and
for THEODORE STURGEON, who first explored the questions which, directly or indirectly,
underlie almost everything I have written.
Chapter One
^ »
Damon Ridenow rode through a land cleansed.
For most of the year, the great plateau of the Kilghard Hills had lain under the evil influence
of the catmen. Crops withered in the fields, under the unnatural darkness which blotted out the
light of the sun; the poor folk of the district huddled in their homes, afraid to venture into the
blasted countryside.
But now men worked again in the light of the great red sun of Darkover, garnering their
file:///C|/2590%20Sci-Fi%20and%20Fantasy%20...rkover%2011-%20The%20Forbidden%20Tower.html (2 of 224) [12/28/2004 3:48:47 PM]
The Forbidden Tower by Marion Zimmer Bradley -Darkover Forbidden Circle 02
harvests against the coming snows. It was early autumn, and the harvests were mostly in.
The Great Cat had been slain in the caves of Corresanti and the giant illegal matrix which he
had found and put to such frightful use had been destroyed with his death. Such catmen as
still lived had fled into the far rain forests beyond the mountains, or fallen to the swords of the
Guardsmen that Damon had led against them.
The land was clean again and free of terror, and Damon, most of his army dismissed to their
homes, rode homeward. Not to his ancestral estates of Serrais; Damon was an unregarded
younger son and had never felt Serrais his home. He rode now to Armida, to his wedding.
He sat his horse now at the side of the road, watching the last few men separate themselves
according to their way. There were uniformed Guardsmen bound for Thendara, in their green
and black uniforms; there were a few men bound northward to the Hellers, from the Domains
of Ardais and Hastur; and a few riding south to the plains of Valeron.
“You should speak to the men, Lord Damon,” said a short, gnarled-looking man at Damon’s
side.
“I’m not very good at making speeches.” Damon was a slight, slender man with a scholar’s
face. Until this campaign he had never thought himself a soldier and was still surprised at
himself, that he had led these men successfully against the remnants of the catmen.
“They expect it, lord,” Eduin urged, and Damon sighed, knowing what the other man said was
true. Damon was Comyn of the Domains; not Lord of a Domain, or even a Comyn heir, but
still Comyn, of the old telepathic, psi-gifted caste which had ruled the Seven Domains from
time unknown. The days were gone when Comyn were treated as living gods, but there was
still the respect, near to awe. And Damon had been trained to the responsibilities of a Comyn
son. Sighing, he urged his horse to a spot where the waiting men could see him.
“Our work is done. Thanks to you men who have answered my call, there is peace in the
Kilghard Hills and in our homes. It only remains for me to give you my thanks and farewell.”
The young officer who had brought the Guardsmen from Thendara rode toward Damon, as
the other men rode away. “Will Lord Alton ride to Thendara with us? Shall we await him?”
“You would have long to wait,” Damon said. “He was wounded in the first battle with the
catmen, a small wound, but the spine was injured past healing. He is paralyzed from the waist
down. I think he will never ride anywhere again.”
The young officer looked troubled. “Who will now command the Guardsmen, Lord Damon?”
It was a reasonable question. For generations the command of the Guardsmen had lain in the
hands of the Alton Domain; Esteban Lanart of Armida, Lord Alton, had commanded for many
years. But Dom Esteban’s oldest surviving son, Lord Domenic, was a youth of seventeen.
Though a man by the laws of the Domains, he had neither the age nor the authority for
command. The other remaining Alton son, young Valdir, was a boy of eleven, a novice at
Nevarsin Monastery, being schooled by the brothers of St.-Valentine-of-the-Snows.
Who would command the Guards, then? It was a very reasonable question, thought Damon,
but he did not know the answer. He said so, adding, “It will be for Comyn Council to decide
next summer, when Council meets in Thendara.” There had never been war in winter on
Darkover; there never would be. In winter there was a fiercer enemy, the cruel cold, the
blizzards which swept down across the Domains from the Hellers, No army could move
against the Domains in winter. Even bandits were kept close to their own homes. They could
wait for the next Council season to name a new commander. Damon changed the subject.
“Will you reach Thendara by nightfall?”
“Unless something should delay us by the way.”
file:///C|/2590%20Sci-Fi%20and%20Fantasy%20...rkover%2011-%20The%20Forbidden%20Tower.html (3 of 224) [12/28/2004 3:48:47 PM]
The Forbidden Tower by Marion Zimmer Bradley -Darkover Forbidden Circle 02
“Then don’t let me delay you further,” Damon said, and bowed. “The command of these men
is yours, kinsman.”
The young officer could not conceal a smile. He was very young, and this was his first
command, brief and temporary as it was. Damon watched with a thoughtful smile as the boy
mustered his men and rode away. The boy was a born officer, and with Dom Esteban
disabled, competent officers could expect promotions.
Damon himself, though in command of this mission, had never thought of himself as a
soldier. Like all Comyn sons he had served in the cadet corps, and had taken his turn as an
officer, but his talents and ambitions had been far otherwise. At seventeen he had been
admitted to the Arilinn Tower as a telepath, to be trained in the old matrix sciences of
Darkover. For many, many years he had worked there, growing in strength and skill, reaching
the rank of psi technician.
Then he had been sent from the Tower. No fault of his own, his Keeper had assured him, only
that he was too sensitive, that his health, even his sanity might be destroyed under the
tremendous stresses of matrix work.
Rebellious but obedient, Damon had gone. The word of a Keeper was law, never to be
questioned or resisted. His life smashed, his ambitions in ruins, he had tried to build himself a
new life in the Guardsmen, though he was no soldier, and knew it. He had been cadet master
for a time, then hospital officer, supply officer. And on this last campaign against the catmen
he had learned to bear himself with confidence. But he had no desire to command, was glad to
relinquish it now.
He watched the men ride away until their forms were lost in the dust of the roadway. Now for
Annida and home…
“Lord Damon,” Eduin said at his side, “there are riders on the road.”
“Travelers? At this season?” It seemed impossible. The winter snows had not yet begun, but
any day the first of the winter storms would sweep down from the Hellers, blocking the roads
for days at a time. There was an old saying, Only the mad or the desperate travel in winter.
Damon strained his eyes to make out the distant riders, but he had been somewhat
shortsighted since childhood, and could make out only a blur.
“Your eyes are better than mine. Are they armed men, do you think, Eduin?”
“I do not think so, Lord Damon; there is a lady riding with them.”
“At this season? That seems unlikely,” Damon said. What could bring a woman out into the
uncertain traveling of the approaching winter?
“It is a Hastur banner, Lord Damon. Yet Lord Hastur and his lady would not leave Thendara
at this season. If for some reason they rode to Castle Hastur, they would not be on this road. I
cannot understand it.”
Yet even before he finished, Damon knew the identity of the woman who rode with the little
party of Guardsmen and escorts toward him. Only one woman on Darkover would ride alone
beneath a Hastur banner, and only one Hastur would have reason to ride this way.
“It is the Lady of Arilinn,” he said at last, reluctantly, and saw Eduin’s face light up with
wonder and awe.
Leonie Hastur. Leonie of Arilinn, Keeper of the Arilinn Tower. Damon knew that in courtesy
he should ride to meet his kinswoman, to welcome her, yet he sat his horse as if frozen,
fighting for self-mastery. Time seemed annihilated. In a frozen, timeless, echoing chamber of
his mind, a younger Damon stood trembling before the Keeper of Arilinn, head bowed to hear
file:///C|/2590%20Sci-Fi%20and%20Fantasy%20...rkover%2011-%20The%20Forbidden%20Tower.html (4 of 224) [12/28/2004 3:48:47 PM]
The Forbidden Tower by Marion Zimmer Bradley -Darkover Forbidden Circle 02
the words which shattered his life:
“It is not that you have failed us or displeased me. But you are all too sensitive for this work,
too vulnerable. Had you been born a woman, you would have been a Keeper. But as things
stand now… I have watched you for years. This work will destroy your health, destroy your
reason. You must leave us, Damon, for your own sake.”
Damon had gone without protest, for there was guilt in him. He had loved Leonie, loved her
with all the despairing passion of a lonely man, but loved her chastely, without a word or a
touch. For Leonie, like all Keepers, was a pledged virgin, never to be looked upon with a
sensual thought, never to be touched by any man. Had Leonie somehow known this, feared
that some day he would lose his control, approach her—even if only in thought—in a way no
Keeper might be approached?
Shattered, Damon had fled. It seemed now, years later, that a lifetime stretched between the
young Damon, thrust into an unfriendly world to build himself a new life, and the Damon of
today, in command of himself, veteran of this successful campaign. The memory was still
alive in him—it would be raw till his death—but Damon armed himself, as Leonie drew near,
with the memory of Ellemir Lanart, who awaited him now, at Armida.
I should have wedded her before ever I came on this campaign. He had wanted to, but Dom
Esteban had felt that a marriage in such haste was unseemly for gentlefolk. He would not
have, his daughter hurried to her marriage bed like a pregnant serving wench! Damon had
agreed to the delay. Hie reality of Ellemir, his promised bride, should now banish even the
most painful of memories. Summoning the control of a lifetime, Damon finally rode forward,
Eduin at his side.
“You lend us grace, kinswoman,” he said gravely, bowing from the saddle. “It is late in the
year for journeying in the hills. Where do you ride at this season?”
Leonie returned the bow, with the excessive formality of a Comyn lady before outsiders.
“Greetings, Damon. I ride to Armida, and so, among other things, I ride to your wedding.”
“I am honored.” The journey from Arilinn was long, and not lightly undertaken at any season.
“But surely it is not only for my wedding, Leonie?”
“Not only for that. Although it is true that I wish you all happiness, cousin.”
For the first time, momentarily, their eyes met, but Damon looked away. Leonie Hastur, Lady
of Arilinn, was a tall woman, spare-bodied, with the flame-red hair of the Comyn, now
graying beneath the hood of her riding cloak. She had, perhaps, been very beautiful once;
Damon would never be able to judge.
“Callista sent me word that she wishes to lay down her oath to the Tower and marry.” Leonie
sighed. “I am no longer young; I wished to give back my place as Keeper, when Callista was
a little older and could be Keeper.”
Damon bowed in silence. This had been ordained since Callista had come, a girl of thirteen, to
the Arilinn Tower. Damon had been a psi technician Callista’s first year there, and had been
consulted about the decision to train her as a Keeper.
“But now she wishes to leave us to marry. She has told me that her lover”—Leonie used the
polite inflection which made the word mean “promised husband”—“is an off-worlder, one of
the Terrans who have built their spaceport at Thendara. What do you know of this, Damon? It
seems to me fanciful, fantastic, like an old ballad. How came she to know this Terran? She
told me his name, but I have forgotten…”
“Andrew Carr,” Damon said as they turned their horses toward Armida, riding side by side.
Their escorts and Leonie’s lady-companion followed at a respectful distance. The great red
file:///C|/2590%20Sci-Fi%20and%20Fantasy%20...rkover%2011-%20The%20Forbidden%20Tower.html (5 of 224) [12/28/2004 3:48:47 PM]
The Forbidden Tower by Marion Zimmer Bradley -Darkover Forbidden Circle 02
sun hung low in the sky, casting lurid light across the peaks of the Kilghard Hills behind
them. Clouds had begun to gather to the north, and there was a chill wind blowing from the
distant, invisible peaks of the Hellers.
“I am not certain, even now, how it all began,” Damon said at last. “I only know that when
Callista was kidnapped by the catmen, and she lay alone, in darkness and fear, imprisoned in
the caves of Corresanti, none of her kinsmen could reach her mind.”
Leonie shuddered, pulling her hood closer about her face. “That was a dreadful time,” she
said.
“True. And somehow it happened that this Terran, Andrew Carr, linked with her in mind and
thought. To this day I do not know all of the details, but somehow he came to bear her
company in her lonely prison; he alone could reach her mind. And so they grew close together
in heart and mind, although they had never seen one another in the flesh.”
Leonie sighed and said, “Yes, such bonds can be stronger than bonds of the flesh. And so they
came to love one another, and when she was rescued, they met—”
“It was Andrew who aided most in her rescue,” Damon said, “and now they have pledged one
another. Believe me, Leonie, it is no idle fancy, born of a lonely girl’s fear, or a solitary man’s
desire. Callista told me, before I went on this campaign, that if she could not win her father’s
consent and yours, she would leave Armida, and Darkover, and go with Andrew to his
world.”
Leonie shook her head sorrowfully. “I have seen the Terran ships lying in the port at
Thendara,” she said. “And my brother Lorill, who is on the Council and has dealings with
them, says that they seem in every way men like to ourselves. But marriage, Damon? A girl of
this planet, a man of some other? Even if Callista were not Keeper, pledged virgin, such a
marriage would be strange, hazardous for both.”
“I think they know that, Leonie. Yet they are determined.”
“I have always felt very strongly,” Leonie said, in a strange faraway voice, “that no Keeper
should marry. I have felt so all my life, and so lived. Had it been otherwise…” She looked up
briefly at Damon, and the pain in her voice struck at him. He tried to barricade himself against
it. Ellemir, he thought, like a charm to guard himself, but Leonie went on, sighing. “Even so,
if Callista had fallen so deeply in love with a man of her own clan and caste, I would not
impose my belief on her; I would have released her willingly. No—” Leonie stopped herself.
“No, not willingly, knowing what troubles lie ahead for any woman trained and conditioned
as Keeper for a matrix circle, not willingly. But I would, at the last, have released her, and
given her in marriage with such good grace as I must. But how can I give her to an alien, a
man from another world, not even born of our soil and sun? The thought makes me cold with
horror, Damon! It makes my skin crawl!”
Damon said slowly, “I, too, felt so at first. Yet Andrew is no alien. My mind knows that he
was born on another world, circling the sun of another sky, a distant star, not even a point of
light in our sky from here. Yet he is not inhuman, a monster masquerading as a man, but truly
one of our own, a man like myself. He is foreign, perhaps, not alien. I tell you, I know this,
Leonie. His mind has been linked to mine.” Without being aware of the gesture, Damon
placed his hand on the matrix crystal, the psi-responsive jewel he wore around his neck in its
insulated bag, then added, “He has laran.”
Leonie looked at him in shock, disbelief. Laran was the psi power which set the Comyn of the
Domains apart from the common people, the hereditary gift bred into the Comyn blood!
“Laran!” she said, almost in anger. “I cannot believe that!”
“Belief or disbelief do not alter a simple fact, Leonie,” Damon said. “I have had laran since I
file:///C|/2590%20Sci-Fi%20and%20Fantasy%20...rkover%2011-%20The%20Forbidden%20Tower.html (6 of 224) [12/28/2004 3:48:47 PM]
The Forbidden Tower by Marion Zimmer Bradley -Darkover Forbidden Circle 02
was a boy, I am Tower-trained, and I say to you, this Terran has laran, I have linked with his
mind and I can tell you he is no way different from a man of our own world. There is no
reason to feel horror or revulsion at Callista’s choice. He is only a man like ourselves.”
Leonie said, “And he is your friend.”
Damon nodded, saying, “My friend. And for Callista’s rescue we linked together—through
the matrix.” There was no need to say more. It was the strongest bond known, stronger than
blood-kin, stronger than the tie of lovers. It had brought Damon and Ellemir together, as it had
brought Andrew and Callista.
Leonie sighed. “Is it so? Then I suppose I must accept it, whatever his birth or caste. Since he
has laran, he is a suitable husband, if any man living can truly be a suitable husband for a
woman Keeper-trained!”
“There are times when I forget he is not one of us,” Damon said. “Then there are other times
when he seems strange, almost alien, but the difference is one only of custom and culture.”
“Even that can make a great difference,” Leonie said. “I remember when Melora Aillard was
stolen away by Jalak of Shainsa, and what she endured there. No marriage even between
Domains and Dry Towns has ever endured without tragedy. And a man from another world
and sun must be even more alien than this.”
“I am not so sure of that,” Damon said. “In any case Andrew is my friend and I will support
him in his suit.”
Leonie slumped in her saddle. “You would not give your friendship, nor link through a
matrix, with one unworthy,” she said. “But even if all you say is true, how can such a
marriage be anything but disaster? Even if he were one of our own, fully understanding the
grip of the Tower on a Keeper’s body and mind, it would be near to impossible. Would you
have dared so much?”
Damon flinched away from the question. She could not have meant it, not as he thought she
meant it.
They were not living in the days before the Ages of Chaos, when the Keepers were mutilated,
even neutered, made less than women. Oh, yes, the Keepers were still trained, Damon knew,
with a terrible discipline, to live apart from men, reflexes deeply built into body and brain.
But no longer changed. And surely Leonie could not have known… or, Damon thought, he
was the one man she would never have asked that question. Surely it was innocent, surely she
never knew. He steeled himself against Leonie’s innocence, forced himself to look at her, to
say in a low voice, “Willingly, Leonie, if I loved as Andrew loved.”
As hard as he fought to keep his voice steady and impassive, something of his inward struggle
communicated itself to Leonie. She looked up, quickly and for a bare moment, a second or
less. Their eyes met, but Leonie quickly looked away.
Ellemir, Damon reminded himself desperately. Ellemir, my beloved, my promised wife. But
his voice was calm. “Try to meet Andrew without prejudice, Leonie, and I think you will see
that he is such a man as you would willingly have given Callista in marriage.”
Leonie had mastered herself again. “All the more for your urging, Damon. But even if all you
say is true, I am still reluctant.”
“I know,” Damon said, looking down the road. They were now within sight of the great front
gates of Armida, the hereditary estate of the Domain of Alton. Home, he thought, and Ellemir
waiting for him. “But even if all you say is true, Leonie, I do not know what we can do to stop
Callista. She is no silly young girl in the grip of infatuation; she is a woman grown, Tower-
trained, skilled, accustomed to having her own way, and I think she will do her will,
file:///C|/2590%20Sci-Fi%20and%20Fantasy%20...rkover%2011-%20The%20Forbidden%20Tower.html (7 of 224) [12/28/2004 3:48:47 PM]
The Forbidden Tower by Marion Zimmer Bradley -Darkover Forbidden Circle 02
regardless of us all.”
Leonie sighed. She said, “I would not force her back unwilling; the burden of a Keeper is too
heavy to be borne unconsenting. I have borne it a lifetime, and I know.” She seemed weary,
weighed down by it. “Yet Keepers are not easy to come by. If I can save her for Arilinn,
Damon, you know I must.”
Damon knew. The old psi gifts of the Seven Domains, bred into the genes of the Comyn
families hundreds or thousands of years ago, were thinned now, dying out. Telepaths were
rarer than ever before. It could no longer be taken for granted that even the sons and daughters
of the direct line of each Domain would have the gift, the inherited psi power of his House.
And now, not many cared. Damon’s elder brother, heir to the Ridenow family of Serrais, had
no laran. Damon, himself, was the only one of his brothers to possess laran in full measure,
and he had been in no way specially honored for it. On the contrary, his work in the Tower
had made his brothers scorn him as something less than a man. It was hard to find telepaths
strong enough for Tower work. Some of the ancient Towers had been closed and stood dark,
no longer teaching, training, working with the ancient psi sciences of Darkover. Outsiders,
those with only minimal Comyn blood, had been admitted to the lesser Towers, though
Arilinn kept to the old ways and allowed only those closely related by blood to the Domains
to come there. And few women could be found with the strength, the psi skill, the
stamina—and the courage and willingness to sacrifice almost everything which made life dear
to a woman of the Domains—to endure the terrible discipline of the Keepers, Who would
they find to take Callista’s place?
Either way, then, was tragedy. Arilinn must lose a Keeper—or Andrew a wife, Callista a
husband. Damon sighed deeply and said, “I know, Leonie,” and they rode in silence toward
the great gates of Armida.
Chapter Two
« ^ »
From the outer courtyard of Armida, Andrew Carr saw the approaching riders. He summoned
grooms and attendants for their horses, then went into the main hall to announce their coming.
“That will be Damon coming back,” Ellemir said in excitement, and ran out into the
courtyard. Andrew followed more slowly, Callista close at his side.
“It is not only Damon,” she said, and Andrew knew, without asking, that she had used her psi
awareness to guess at the identity of the riders. He was used to this now, and it no longer
seemed uncanny or frightening.
She smiled up at him, and once again Andrew was struck by her beauty. He tended to forget it
when he was not looking at her. Before he ever set eyes on her, he had come to know her
mind and heart, her gentleness, her courage, her quick understanding. He had come to know,
and value, her gaiety and wit, even when she was alone, terrified, imprisoned in the darkness
of Corresanti.
But she was beautiful too, very beautiful, a slender, long-limbed young woman, with coppery
hair loosely braided down her back, and gray eyes beneath level brows. She said as she
file:///C|/2590%20Sci-Fi%20and%20Fantasy%20...rkover%2011-%20The%20Forbidden%20Tower.html (8 of 224) [12/28/2004 3:48:47 PM]
The Forbidden Tower by Marion Zimmer Bradley -Darkover Forbidden Circle 02
walked at his side, “It is Leonie, the leronis of Arilinn. She has come, as I asked.”
He took her hand lightly in his own, though this was always a risk. He knew she had been
trained and disciplined, by methods he could never guess, to avoid the slightest touch. But this
time, although her fingers quivered, she let them lie lightly in his, and it seemed that the faint
trembling in them was a storm which shook her, inwardly, through her schooled calm. He
could just see, faintly, on the slender hands and wrists, a number of tiny scars, like healed cuts
or burns. Once he had asked her about them. She had shrugged them away, saying only,
“They are old, long healed. They were… aids to memory.” She had not been willing to say
more, but he could guess what she meant, and horror shook him again. Could he ever truly
know this woman?
“I thought you were Keeper of Arilinn, Callista,” he asked now.
“Leonie has been Keeper since before I was born. I was taught by Leonie to take her place
one day. I had already begun to work as Keeper. It is for her to release me, if she will.” Again
there was the faint shivering, the quickly withdrawn glance. What hold did that terrible old
woman have over Callista?
Andrew watched Ellemir running toward the gate. How like she was to Callista—the same tall
slenderness, the same coppery-golden hair, the same gray eyes, dark-lashed, level-
browed—but so different, Ellemir, from her twin! With a sadness so deep he did not know it
was envy, Andrew watched Ellemir run to Damon, saw him slide from his saddle and catch
her up for a hug and a long kiss. Would Callista ever be free enough to run to him that way?
Callista led him toward Leonie, who had been carefully assisted from her saddle by one of her
escorts. Callista’s slim fingers were still resting in his, a gesture of defiance, a deliberate
breaking of taboo. He knew she wanted Leonie to see. Damon was presenting Ellemir to the
Keeper.
“You lend us grace, my lady. Welcome to Armida.”
Andrew watched intently as Leonie put back her hood. Braced for some hideous domineering
crone, he was shocked to see that she was only a frail, thin, aging woman, with eyes still dark-
lashed and lovely, and the remnants of what must have been remarkable beauty. She did not
look stern or formidable, but smiled at Ellemir kindly.
“You are very like Callista, child. Your sister has taught me to love you; I am glad to know
you at last.” Her voice was light and clear, very soft. Then she turned to Callista, holding out
her hands in a gesture of greeting.
“Are you well again, chiya?” It was enough of a surprise that anyone could call the poised
Callista “little girl.” Callista let go of Andrew’s hand; her fingertips just brushed Leonie’s.
“Oh, yes, quite well,” she said, laughing, “but I still sleep like a nursery-child, with a light in
my room, so I will not wake to darkness and think myself again in the accursed caverns of the
catmen. Are you ashamed of me, kinswoman?”
Andrew bowed formally. He knew enough of Darkovan manners now not to look at the
leronis directly, but he felt Leonie’s gray eyes resting on him. Callista said, with a little thrill
of defiance in her voice, “This is Andrew, my promised husband!”
“Hush, chiya, you have no right to say so yet,” Leonie rebuked. “We will speak of this later;
for now I must greet my host.”
Recalled to her duty as hostess, Ellemir dropped Damon’s hand and conducted Leonie up the
steps. Andrew and Callista followed, but when he reached for Callista’s hand she drew it
away, not deliberately but with the absent habit of years. He felt she did not even know he
was there.
file:///C|/2590%20Sci-Fi%20and%20Fantasy%20...rkover%2011-%20The%20Forbidden%20Tower.html (9 of 224) [12/28/2004 3:48:47 PM]
The Forbidden Tower by Marion Zimmer Bradley -Darkover Forbidden Circle 02
The Great Hall of Armida was an enormous stone-floored room, furnished in the old manner,
with benches built in along the wall, and ancient banners and weapons hung above the great
stone fireplace. At one end of the hall was a fixed table. Near this, Dom Esteban Lanart, Lord
Alton, was lying on a wheeled bed, flattened against pillows. He was a huge, heavy man,
broad-shouldered, with thick, curly red hair liberally salted with gray. As the guests came in
he said testily, “Dezi, lad, put me up for my guests,” and a young man seated on one of the
benches sprang up, skillfully piled pillows behind his back and lifted the old man to a sitting
position. Damon had thought at first that the boy was one of Esteban’s body-servants, then he
noticed the strong family resemblance between the old Comyn lord and the youngster who
was lifting him.
He was only a boy, whiplash thin, with curly red hair and eyes more blue than gray, but the
features were almost those of Ellemir.
He looks like Coryn, Damon thought. Coryn had been Dom Esteban’s first son, by a long-
dead first wife. Older than Ellemir and Callista by many years, he had been Damon’s sworn
friend when they were both in their teens. But Coryn had been dead and buried for many
years. And he had not been old enough to leave a son this age—not quite. The boy is an Alton,
though, Damon thought. But who is he? I’ve never seen him before!
Leonie, however, seemed to recognize him at once. “So, Dezi, you have found a place for
yourself?”
The boy said with an ingratiating grin, “Lord Alton sent for me, to come and make myself
useful here, my lady.”
Esteban Lanart said, “Greetings, kinswoman, forgive me that I cannot rise to welcome you to
my hall. You lend me grace, Domna.” He caught the direction of Damon’s gaze and said
offhandedly, “I’d forgotten you don’t know our Dezi. His name is Desiderio Leynier. He’s
supposed to be a nedestro son to one of my cousins, though poor Gwynn died before he could
get around to having him legitimated. We had him tested for laran—he was at Arilinn for a
season or two—but when I needed someone around me all the time, Ellemir remembered he
was home again, and so I sent for him. He’s a good lad.”
Damon felt shocked. How casually, even brutally, Dom Esteban had spoken, in Dezi’s very
presence, of the boy’s bastardy and his poor-relation status! Dezi’s mouth had tightened but
he kept his composure, and Damon warmed to him. So young Dezi also knew what it was to
find the warmth and closeness of a Tower circle, and then be shut out from it again!
“Damn it, Dezi, that’s enough pillows, stop fussing,” Esteban commanded. “Well, Leonie,
this is no way to welcome you under my roof after so many years, but you must take the will
for the deed and consider yourself bowed to, formally welcomed, and all courtesies duly done,
as I should indeed do if I could rise from this accursed bed!”
“I need no courtesies, cousin,” Leonie said, coming closer. “I only regret to find you like this.
I had heard you were wounded, but did not know how serious it was.”
“I didn’t know either. It was a small wound—I’ve had deeper and more painful ones from a
fishhook—but small or large, the spine was damaged, and they say I will never walk again.”
Leonie said, “It is often so with spinal injuries; you are fortunate to have the use of your
hands.”
“Oh, yes, I suppose so. I can sit in a chair, and Damon devised a brace for my back so that I
can sit without drooping like a baby too small for his high chair. And Andrew is helping to
supervise the estate and the livestock, while Dezi is here to run errands for me. I can still run
things from my chair, so I suppose I am fortunate, as you say. But I was a soldier, and now…”
He broke off, shrugging. “Damon, my lad, how went your campaign?”
file:///C|/2590%20Sci-Fi%20and%20Fantasy%20...rkover%2011-%20The%20Forbidden%20Tower.html (10 of 224) [12/28/2004 3:48:47 PM]
摘要：

TheForbiddenTowerbyMarionZimmerBradley-DarkoverForbiddenCircle2TheForbiddenTowerMarionZimmerBradleytheforbiddencircle02-adarkovernovelELFdigitalback-upedition1.0clickforscannotesandproofinghistoryvalidXHTML1.0strictContents|1|2|3|4|5|6|7|8|9|10|11|12|13|14|15|16|17|18|19|20|21|22|23|EpilogueDAWBOO...

展开>> 收起<<
Bradley, Marion Zimmer - Darkover 11- The Forbidden Tower.pdf

共224页,预览10页

还剩页未读， 继续阅读

声明：本站为文档C2C交易模式，即用户上传的文档直接被用户下载，本站只是中间服务平台，本站所有文档下载所得的收益归上传人(含作者)所有。玖贝云文库仅提供信息存储空间，仅对用户上传内容的表现方式做保护处理，对上载内容本身不做任何修改或编辑。若文档所含内容侵犯了您的版权或隐私，请立即通知玖贝云文库，我们立即给予删除！

相关推荐

更多
立即下载
分类：外语学习 价格：5.9玖币 属性：224 页 大小：728.83KB 格式：PDF 时间：2024-12-07

开通VIP享超值会员特权

  • 多端同步记录
  • 高速下载文档
  • 免费文档工具
  • 分享文档赚钱
  • 每日登录抽奖
  • 优质衍生服务

作者详情

相关内容

更多

热门标签

人际关系 配电装置 动力学连接体 力的合成 高考理综 全宋诗作者索引 公务员考试
/ 224
评分 收藏
分享
立即下载 VIP免费下载
客服
关注