The Shadow
by Marion Zimmer Bradley
Danilo Syrtis signed the estate books and handed them back to the steward.
"Tell the people in the Hall to give you some dinner before you start back," he said, "and my thanks for com­ing out in this godforgotten weather!"
"It was no more than my duty, vai dom," the man said. Danilo watched him leave and wondered if he should go to his own dinner now, or send for some bread and cheese here in the little study he used for estate business. He did not feel like making polite conversation with the steward about business or the weather, and he supposed the man, too, was eager to get back on the road and be home with his wife and children before dark set in. There was more snow coming tonight; he could see the shadow of it in the great clouds that hovered over Ardais.
Snow coming, and it was cold in the room. And by nightfall I shall be on the road ... and Danilo started, wondering if he had fallen asleep for a moment. There was no such luck coming his way, that he should be on the road, away from here, by nightfall. Danilo rubbed his hands together. His feet were warmed by a little brazier of charcoal under the desk, but his fingers ached and he could see the breath between his mouth and the books which lay on the desk before him. He had never grown used to the cold in the Hellers.
I wish I were in the lowlands, he thought. Regis, Regis, my brother and bredu, I do my duty here at Ardais as you in Thendara; but though I am Regent here at Ardais, I would rather be in Thendara at your side, no more than your sworn man and paxman. I shall not see my home
again, perhaps not for years, and there is no help for it, I am sworn.
He put out his hand to the bell, but before he could ring it, the door opened and one of the upper servants came into the study.
"Your pardon, vai dom. The Master would like to see you, at once if convenient; if you are still occupied with the steward, he asks you to name a time when you can attend him."
"I'll go at once," said Danilo, puzzled. "Where will I find him?"
"In the music room, Lord Danilo."
Where else? That was where Dyan spent much of his time; like a great spider in the center of his web, and we are all in his shadow.
Dyan, Lord Ardais, was Danilo's uncle; Danilo's mother had been the illegitimate daughter of Dyan's fa­ther, who had had many bastards. Dyan's only son had been killed in a rockslide at Nevarsin monastery; when Danilo proved to have the laran of the Ardais Domain, the catalyst-telepath Gift believed extinct, the childless Dyan had adopted Danilo as his Heir.
He had been at Ardais now more than a year, and Dyan Ardais had proved both generous and exacting. He had had Danilo given everything he needed for his station as the Ardais Heir from suitable clothing to suit­able horses and hawks; had sent him to a Tower for preliminary training in the use of his laran—more train­ing than Dyan himself had had—and had had him prop­erly educated in all the arts suitable for a nobleman; calligraphy, arithmetic, music and drawing, fencing, dancing and swordplay. He had himself taught Danilo music, and something of mapmaking and of the healing arts and medicine.
He had also been generous to Danilo's father, sending breeding stock, farmhands and other servants, and a ca­pable steward to manage Syrtis and to make life com­fortable for the elderly Dom Felix in his declining years. "Your place is at Ardais," Dyan had said, "preparing yourself for the Wardenship of Ardais. For even if I should some day have another son—and that is not alto­gether impossible, though unlikely—it is even more un-
likely that I should live to see that son a man grown. You might need to be Regent for him for many years. But your own patrimony must not be neglected," he stated, and had made certain that the estate of Syrtis lacked for nothing which could be provided.
As he approached the door of the music room, a slen­der young man, fair-haired and with a sort of feline grace, brushed past Danilo without a word. But he gave Danilo a sharp look of malice.
Now what, I wonder, has happened now to displease him? Is the Master harsh with his minion?
Danilo disliked Julian, who was Dyan's house laranzu; but Dyan's favorites were no business of his. Nor was Dyan's love life any affair of his. If nothing else, Danilo realized, he should be grateful to Julian; the presence of the young laranzu had emphasized, to all the housefolk, that there was an enormous distance between the way Dyan treated his foster-son and ward, and the way he treated his minion. He himself had nothing to complain of. Before Dyan had known who Danilo was, or that he had the Ardais Gift, when Danilo was simply one of the poorest and most powerless cadets in the Cadet Corps, Dyan had tried to seduce him, and when Danilo had refused, in distaste, Dyan had gone on pursuing and per­secuting him. Danilo was a cristoforo and in their faith it was shameful to be a lover of men. But never once, in the year since Dyan had adopted him as Heir, had Dyan addressed a word or gesture to him not completely suitable between foster-son and guardian. Yet the shadow of what had once been between them lay heavy over Danilo; he had, he believed, forgiven Dyan, yet the shadow was dark between them, and he never came into Dyan's presence without a certain sense of constraint.
As far as he knew, he had done nothing to displease his guardian. But it was unprecedented that Dyan should send for him at this hour. Normally they met only for the evening meal and spent a formal hour afterward in the music room; sometimes Dyan played for him on one of the several instruments he had mastered, or had his minstrels and entertainers in; sometimes, to Danilo's dis­tress, he insisted that Danilo play for him; he had re-
quired that his foster-son learn something of music, saying no man's education could be complete without it.
Dyan was standing near the fireplace, tall and lean in the somber black clothing he affected. Despite the fire, it was cold enough to see his breath. He heard Danilo come in and turned to face him.
"Good day, foster-son. Have you had your noon meal?"
"No, sir; I was about to have it when I received your message and came at once."
"Shall I send for something for you? Or, there is fruit and wine on the table; please help yourself."
"Thank you, sir. I am not really hungry." Danilo no­ticed that Dyan's mouth was set; he looked grim. He felt a little inward clamping, tight inside him; he was still a little afraid of Dyan. He could not imagine what he could have done to bring that look of displeasure to his guardian's face. Mentally, he ran over the events of the last tenday. The estate accounts, with which he had been trusted for the last four moons, were all in order, unless the men had all conspired to lie to him. As far as he knew, his tutors would all give good reports of him; he was not really a brilliant scholar, but they could not fault him for industry and obedience. Then he saw Dyan's eyes shift a little in his direction and was suddenly angry.
He is trying to make me afraid again. I should have remembered; my fear gives him pleasure, he likes to see me squirm. He drew himself up and said, "May I ask why you have sent for me at this hour without warning, sir? Have I done something to make you angry?"
Dyan seemed to shake himself and come out of a day­dream. "No, no," he said quickly, "but I have had ill news, and it has distressed me for your sake. I will not keep you in suspense, and I will not play at words with you. I have had a messenger from Syrtis. Your father is dead."
Danilo gasped with the shock, though he knew the bluntness was merciful; Dyan had not left him to worry and wonder while he broke the news in easy stages.
"But he was perfectly well and strong when I left Syrtis after my birthday visit...."
"No  man of his  age  is  ever  'perfectly  well  and
strong,' " Dyan said. "I do not know the medical details; but it sounded to me as if he had a sudden stroke. The messenger said that he had finished his breakfast and thanked the cook, saying he planned to go riding, and suddenly fell on the floor. He was dead when they picked him up. It was to be expected at his time of life; you were born, I understand, at an age when most men have grandchildren on their knees. He had ill-luck, I know, with his elder son."
Danilo nodded, numbly. His older brother had been killed in battle before Danilo was born; he had been paxman to Regis Hastur's father. "I am glad he did not suffer," he said, and felt tears rising in his throat. My poor father; he wanted me to have a nobleman's educa­tion, he never stood in my way. I hoped a day would come when I would know him better, when I could come back to him as a man, free of all the troubles of youth, and know him also as the man he was, not only as my father. And now I never will. His throat closed; he could not hold back his sobs. After a moment he felt Dyan's hand on his shoulder; very gently, but through the touch he felt something like tenderness; inwardly he cringed with revulsion.
He thinks, because I am grieving, he can touch me and I will not draw away from the touch ... he never stops trying, does he?
Abruptly the touch was withdrawn. Dyan's voice was distant, controlled.
"I wish I could comfort you; but it is not my comfort you wish for. Before I sent for you, I made inquiries through my household laranzu." Now Danilo under­stood the look of malice Julian had given him.
"I learned through the Towers that Regis Hastur was in Thendara, and is riding today for Syrtis; he has said to his grandfather that as your sworn friend he owes a kinsman's duty to your father, and he would await you there. You may go as soon as the necessities are packed, unless you would rather wait until the weather clears ... only the mad and the desperate travel in the Hellers in winter, but I did not think you would want to wait."
"I am not afraid of weather," Danilo said. He still felt
numb. He had wanted to see his home, and Regis; but not like this.
"I took the liberty of asking my own valet to pack your clothing for the ride and for the funeral. But have some food before you ride, my son."
Startled at his tone—Dyan was indeed showing ex­traordinary gentleness—Danilo raised his eyes to his guardian's face. Dyan said gently, "Your friend will be waiting for you when you reach Syrtis, foster-son; you need not face the funeral alone, I made sure of that. I would myself come to do him honor but..." Dyan took Danilo's two hands formally in his own; he was perfectly barriered, but Danilo sensed a threat of some emotion he could not quite identify; regret? sorrow? Dyan said quietly, "Your father was one of the few men living who dared to incur my displeasure in honor's name; I have great respect for his memory. Stay as long as you wish, my boy, to set his affairs in order. And convey my com­pliments to Regis Hastur." He released Danilo's hands and stepped back, formally dismissing him. Danilo bowed, his emotions too mixed to say anything. Regis Hastur, already awaiting him at Syrtis? He went slowly to his room, where he found Dyan's body-servant pack­ing his saddle-bags; Dyan had sent a purse of money, too, for the expenses of the journey and to make gifts to his father's servants. He had told off three men to escort him, and as Danilo went down to the hall, he found a hot meal, which could be eaten quickly, already on the table and smoking. Danilo was too weary and troubled to swallow anything, but he noticed distantly that the coridom, or hall-steward, brought a basket of food and packed it with the saddlebags on the pack-animal; inns were almost nonexistent and travel-stops few and far between.
II
The snowflakes were falling into the open grave, min­gling with the lumps of dirt there as the men and women of Dom Felix's household, one after another, stepped to the side of the pit and let a handful of dirt fall on the coffin.
"... and the Master said to me, 'your daughter, she's a good clever girl, it's too bad for her to stay here milk­ing dairy-animals and scrubbing pots all her life.' And even though we were short of kitchen help, he sent her with a letter to the Lady Caitlin at Castle Hastur, and the Lady took her into her own household as a sewing-woman and later she became the lady's housekeeper and married the steward, and he always asks ... asked me about her," the old cook finished, her voice shaking, and crumbled the lump of dirt between her hands, letting it fall with the snowflakes into the grave. "Let that mem­ory lighten grief."
Each of the housefolk had told some small anecdote, some kindness done, some pleasant memory of the dead man. Now the steward Dyan had sent last year was standing at the graveside, but Danilo hardly heard what he said. Regis was behind him; but they had had no more than the briefest chance to greet one another. And now Regis stepped to the graveside; and as he looked up, his eyes met Danilo's for the first time since they had greeted one another that morning. Between Dyan's efficient steward and Dom Felix's own men, there had after all been very little to do. Danilo had been begin­ning to think that he might as well have stayed at Ardais for all there was left for him to do here.
"When first I saw Dom Felix," Regis said, the snow-flakes falling on the elegant blue Hastur cloak and on his coppery hair—he had, Danilo thought dully, gone to considerable trouble to present himself as prince and Heir to Hastur before these men—"he snarled at me as if I had been a naughty small boy come to rob his or­chards. He thought I had come to trouble his son's peace, and he was willing to send me away angry and incur the ill-will of Comyn, to protect his son. Let that memory lighten grief."
But that, Danilo thought numbly, was almost exactly what Dyan had said; would no doubt, have said if he had come here; that his father would face angering pow­erful men for his son's sake. He thought, I should have been a better son to him. He took the crumbling ball of earth Regis had put into his hand. He was remembering how Regis had sought him out here at Syrtis. We sat
over there, he thought, in the orchard, on that crumbling log. At the time he had been no more than a small­holder's son, without even a decent shirt to his name; no one knew he had the Ardais Gift. Yet Regis had said, I like your father, Dani. Regis had come here when Dyan had contrived to have him expelled in disgrace from the Cadet Corps. And Dom Felix had been rude to him. Danilo said, blind with pain and unable to pick and choose at his words, "My father cared nothing for the court, or for riches and power for himself. His older son had been taken from him—" Taken from him twice; once when my brother Rafael chose to follow a Hastur as his sworn man, and then when he followed that Hastur to death. And I struck him a blow on that old bruise. Yet... "Yet he willingly let me go from him when most fathers would have kept me at his own side, to serve him in the obscurity he preferred. He let me go first into the Ca­dets, and then to Ardais. Never once did he seek to keep me at home for his own comfort. Let that memory ..." his voice broke and he could hardly finish, "lighten ... grief ..."
His fingers tightened convulsively, crumbling the lump of dirt. He felt Regis' hand over his own, and suddenly he felt numb. It would soon be over, and all these people would go away, and he could go inside and drink hot soup ... or hot wine which might be more to the point ... and get warm, and sleep. The funeral feast was over, the burying was over, and now he could rest.
Brother Estefan, a cristoforo monk who had come from the village, was saying a few kindly words at the graveside. "... and as the Bearer of Burdens bore the Worldchild across the swollen river of Life, so our de­parted brother here strove all his life to help his fellow-men bear their burdens as best he could; Dom Felix was not a rich man, and much of his life he lived in great poverty, yet many in the country round here can speak of having been fed in his kitchens when the winter was hard, or that he sent his men to bring firewood to cold houses when that was all he had to give. Once I came late after visiting some sick folk on his estate; his cook and steward had gone to bed, so he welcomed me in with his own hands and brought me to warm at his fire;
and since he said his cook had left him too much supper, he simply poured half of his soup into my bowl and cut a chunk from his own loaf, and because there was no one to make up a room for me, he set down some saddleblankets by the fire to make up a bed for me. Let that memory lighten grief; and may the Lord of all the Worlds welcome him to the Blessed Realms, having held there in store for him all the kindnesses which when he dwelt among us he shared with his fellow men." He made the Holy Sign over the grave and signaled the workmen to start filling it in. "So we on earth may cease to grieve and allow our brother to journey to the Blessed Realms untroubled by the thought of our mourning. Farewell."
"He has laid down his burdens; farewell," chorused the watchers beside the grave, and turned away. So, Danilo thought, there he will lie, in an unmarked grave here on his own lands, resting beside my great-great grandfathers before him, and my sons and grandsons after him. Or does he truly feast this night in the Blessed Realm, in the presence of his God, with my mother on one hand and my elder brother on the other? I do not know.
Only Brother Estefan returned to the house with them. Danilo went to fetch some of the money Dyan had sent with him to make gifts to Dom Felix's men, and came back into the hallway; the priest had refused to enter the main Hall, saying he knew Danilo needed to rest after the long journey and the funeral feast and burying. Danilo knew he was eager to get back to the Longhouse in the village.
"The snow will be heavy tonight; what a good thing it did not begin to come down so hard until the burying was over," Brother Estefan said.
"Yes, yes, a good thing," Danilo said, thinking, Surely he is not going to stand here and make small-talk with me about the weather!
"You will remain here at Syrtis now, my lord, in your rightful place, and not return to Ardais? All through the Domains and beyond, it is known that Lord Ardais is a wicked man, fearing no gods, licentious and wicked ..."
"He has behaved honorably to me," Danilo said, "and
he is the brother of my own mother; I am sworn as his Heir. It is my duty to my mother's blood, and to Comyn."
The priest's mouth tightened and he made a small expressive sound as Danilo said, Comyn. "Your father was never really at ease about you in that place. And it is rumored that Lord Regis is one of the same de­bauched stamp; he is neither married nor handfasted, and he is eighteen already. Why has he come here?"
"I am his sworn man and paxman," Danilo began, but behind him in the shadowed hallway Regis Hastur said, "Good Brother." Danilo had not noticed before that Regis' voice had deepened and strengthened to an al­most organlike bass.
"Good Brother, if anyone you know has complained to you of my conduct toward him, I am prepared to make an accounting of my behavior, to him or to you. If not, I have not appointed you as keeper of my con­science, nor is that office vacant. May I send a servant to guide your donkey through the storm? No? Are you sure? Well, good night, then, and the Gods ride with you." And as the door closed behind the priest, he mut­tered, "... or anyone else who is willing to endure your company!"
Danilo felt almost hysterical laughter rising in his throat, but he turned away into the main Hall. Regis caught at his sleeve; at the touch memory blazed be­tween them, but then Danilo drew away, and Regis, shocked less by the withdrawal than by the refused rap­port, said vehemently, "Naotalba twist my feet ... I am a fool, Dani! I know you do not want it gossiped, espe­cially among those who are all too ready to seek scandal of Comyn!" He laughed, embarrassed. "I am to blame, that I thought myself above suspicion, perhaps; I had only feared to expose you to rude jesting, not to Brother Estefan's long-faced concern about the state of your soul and your sins!"
"I don't care what they say," Danilo blurted, "but I can't bear that they should say such things about you ..."
"My own honor is my best safeguard," Regis said qui­etly, "but then I am not exposed to their talk; there are
not many who will dare speak slander of a Hastur. I, at least, am not ashamed of the truth. Of all evils I hate lying the most ..." They were still standing in the door­way, and the old cook, who was still setting out a simple supper in the Hall—porridge sliced cold and fried with bacon, a baked pudding which smelled of dried fruits, bowls of steaming soup—raised eyes still blotched and red to summon them. She said with the freedom of an old servant—-when Danilo was very small she had fried him dough-cakes and mended the torn knees of his first riding breeks—"You should ha' asked the Brother to dine with us, Dom Dani ... Master Danilo," she cor­rected herself quickly.
"True," Regis said in a lazy voice. "We could have done with his company, I suppose, for an hour more, if we must, and it is a pity to send the poor man out into the snow with nothing in his belly. What would they say to you at Nevarsin, Dani?"
"He will dine better in the Longhouse, nanny," said Danilo to the old woman, "and he would probably not wish to dine in the house of a sinner; I made it clear I was none of his flock."
"And I am just as glad to be spared his company," said Regis. "I had all I could stomach of pieties when we dwelt together in Nevarsin, Danilo; I had enough for a lifetime and more, of their solemn nonsense. Oh, I suppose some of them are good men and holy; but I cannot believe what they believe, and there is an end to it. I do not wish to be rude about your father's religion, but it is not mine, and I feel no particular obligation to your priest. Well ..." his face sobered, "we have had no time to talk. I was eager to see you again, bredu, but not like this." There was a stone jug of wine on the table, too; he poured a cup and handed it to Danilo. "Drink first, my brother, then eat. You are exhausted, and no wonder, and I saw that you could eat but little at the funeral feast."
Danilo drank off the wine, feeling it warming him all the way down. Then he put a spoon in his soup; but he felt Regis' eyes on him, puzzled.
Damn that priest, he thought; now it is all between us again. I had not wanted to think of that. It is enough that
I dwell in Dyan's house and am forced to turn my eyes away from that accursed Julian, flaunting Dyan's favor, and the knowledge that Dyan's household thought, for a time, that I was there in that position, Dyan's favorite, his minion or catamite ... I am sworn to Regis, But what lies between us is more honorable than that.
His mind returned for a moment to a small travel-hut in the Hellers, where he and Regis had acknowledged the bond between them, had been, through their laran, more open to one another than lovers. Surely no more was wanted nor expected of him. 7 cherish Regis, and I love him with all my heart. But he would never ask more than that of me. Perhaps, if we had come to one another as young boys ... but that was spoilt forever when Dyan sought from me what it could never have been in my nature to give. And tonight in the hallway Regis had been apologetic about exposing him even to the accusation.
He reached up for the bowl of fruit-spread for his fresh porridge, and met Regis' eyes. Regis smiled at him and said, "What are you thinking, my brother?"
Danilo said impulsively, "Of that night in the travel-shelter ..."
"I have not forgotten," Regis said, reached across the table and squeezed Danilo's hand in his own. And at the touch, for a moment, they were there together, wholly open to one another, and a moment when Regis had drawn back, saying softly, "No. You don't want to stir that up, do you. Dani?"
And they had both withdrawn ... it is acknowledged
between them, but they had both drawn back. The
shadow of Dyan lies heavy on us both ... neither of us
wished, then, to admit what we wished for. It was enough
that we knew	
But the elderly cook was standing before them again.
"I made up the first guest-room for Lord Regis last night, sir," she said to Danilo, "and I had the Master's own room made up for you; was that right?"
Not right, thought Danilo, but customary and to be endured. He nodded acquiescence at the old woman and stood up, taking a candle in his hand.
"I am tired, nanny, and I will go up now. Go to your own rest now, and thank you for everything."
She came and kissed his hand, and he saw her blinking hard as if she were about to start crying again. "There, there, nanny, go and sleep now," he said, and patted the old woman's cheek. She went out, clutching her apron to her face, and Regis took an apple from the bowl on the table and came after him. "I like your apples here," he said. "Could your steward send me a barrel of them in Thendara?"
"Nothing is easier. Remind me to tell him tomorrow," Danilo said, and together they went toward the stairs.
III
In the upper hallway, Danilo hesitated before the heavy carven doors of what had been his father's room. He had not been inside it a dozen times in his life. He said at last, "I ... I can't go in alone ..." and Regis' hand was firm on his shoulder.
"Of course you can't. She should not have expected it of you. If you were coming back here to live it would be different." He pushed the door and they went in to­gether. Danilo touched his candle to a branch of candles that was setting on the old carven desk, and light sprang up, gentle to the faded tapestries, the shabby carpet; but the old furniture was well-kept and shining with wax. The big bed listed heavily to one side where the old man had slept in it alone all these years; on the other side was a still high, firm, untouched bolster, in pathetic con­trast to the flattened, lumpy old one which had, all these years, known the weight of his father's graying head.
Seventeen years now, since I was born in this bed and my mother died there on that same day. That sagging, one-sided old bed struck him as unutterably pathetic. He lived alone here, all those years, and I left him even more alone.
"But you are not alone here," Regis said quietly. "I'll stay with you, Dani."
"But I ... you ..." Danilo looked helplessly at Regis, and his friend smiled a little. He said, "No, Dani ... we must talk about this now. Neither of us could face it
then, I know. But ... we are sworn. And you know as well as I what that means...."
Danilo looked at the threadbare carpet. He said, strik­ing out in protest, "I thought ... you were as ... as shocked, as sickened as I was ... by what Dyan wanted of me...."
Regis' mobile face twisted in the candlelight, his brows coming almost together.
"I still am ... by force or unwillingness," he said, "but
what made me sick was Dyan's ... insistence, not his
tastes, if you understand me. Those are ... no mystery
to me. On the contrary. But... freely given and in bond
of friends. Not otherwise. I thought ..." as if from a
very great distance, Danilo knew that his friend's voice
shook and barriered himself against the naked outrush
of that emotion, "I thought you truly shared that—that
we were as one, but that we had simply set it aside for
another time. A time when we were not ill, nor terrified,
nor in danger of death, nor under the shadow ... the
shadow of your fear of Dyan. And I believed no time
would be better than now ... to confirm what once we
swore to one another, that we would be together	"
Moving through intense embarrassment, Danilo man­aged to reach out to Regis, to take him into a kinsman's embrace. He kissed him shyly on the cheek. He remem­bered when he had done this before, that day in the orchard. He said, groping for words, "You are ... you are my beloved brother and my lord. All that I am, all that I can give in honor ... I cherish you. I would give my life for you. As for the rest ... that, I think, it is not in me to give ..." and he could not go on.
Regis held him hard, his hands sliding up to grip Dan­ilo by the elbows. He stared into his eyes. He said softly, "You know I want nothing of you that you are not will­ing to give. Not ever. What I do not understand is why you are not willing. Dani, do you still believe that what I want of you is ... is shameful, or that I want you ..." No less than Danilo, the younger boy knew, Regis was groping blindly through a forest of uprushing words, avoiding the deeper touch of laran. "Do you think I want you for pride, or to show my power over you, or ... or any of those things? You said, once, that you
knew I was not like Dyan, and that you were not afraid of me ..." But he sighed and let Danilo go.
"Truly, his shadow lies heavy on us both. I cannot bear that he should still come between us this way." He turned a little, and Danilo felt cold, aching at the dis­tance between them. But it was better this way.
"Well, you should rest, Danilo," Regis said quietly, "but if you do not want to stay here alone, I will stay with you, or you can come and share the guest-room with me. Look, your father kept your picture here beside ... I suppose that is your mother?"
Danilo picked up the two small paintings; he had seen them here beside this bed ever since he could remember. "This is my mother," he said, "but this cannot be my picture; it has been here since I was old enough to remember."
"But surely it is you," said Regis, studying the painted face. Two young men stared at one another, their hands clasped, and Danilo realized, bewildered, who it must be.
"It is my brother Rafael," he said, "Rakhal, they called him."
Regis said in a whisper, "Then this must be my father. His name was Rafael too, and if they had their pictures painted together, this way, they, too, must have sworn the oath of bredin ..."
They were both named Rafael; they were sworn to one another and they died trying to shield one another, and they are buried in one grave on the field of Kilghairlie. The old story had brought them together as children; for a moment they stood together beneath the old shifting lights of the Guard-hall barracks, children in their first Cadet year, caught up for a moment in the old tragedy. Time seemed to fold in upon itself and return, and Regis remembered the father whose face he had never seen, the moment when Danilo had somehow touched him, awakening the laran he had never believed he had....
"I never saw my father's face," he said at last, "Grandfather had a picture ... I never thought; it must have been the other copy of this; but he could never bring himself to show it to me, but my sister had seen it. She, of course, can remember our father and our
mother, and she said, once, that Dom Rakhal Syrtis had
been kind to her	"
"Strange," Danilo said in a whisper, turning the little portrait in his hand, "that my father, who so much re­sented the Hasturs, since they had taken from him first my brother, then myself, should keep this here at his side for all these years, so that both their faces were before him always...."
"Not so surprising," Regis said gently. "No doubt all he remembered at the end was that they had loved each other. It might even be, at the last, that he was glad you, too, had found a friend ..." he looked again, with an abstracted smile, at his father's face. "No, I am not really much like him, but there is a resemblance, after all; I wonder if that was why my grandfather could hardly bear to look on my face for so many years." He laid the picture gently back on the table. "Perhaps, Danilo, when it has been for years beside you, you will understand ... come, my brother, you must rest; it is late and you are weary. You waited upon me like a body-servant at Aldaran; let me do as much for you."
He pushed Danilo into a chair and bent to tug off his boots. Danilo, embarrassed, made a gesture to prevent him.
"My lord, it is not fitting!"
"A paxman's oath goes both ways, my brother," Regis said, kneeling and looking into his face. He moved his head slightly to indicate the picture, and Danilo could see the face of the first Regis-Rafael smiling into the eyes of Rafael-Felix Syrtis. "I doubt it not ... if he had lived, your brother would have been a second father to me as well ... and I should have had a different life altogether, even if my father had died."
"If he had lived," Danilo said, with a bitterness he had never known was in him, "I should never have been born. My father took a second wife when most men are content to rock their grandchildren on their knees, be­cause he would not leave his House without an Heir."
"I am not so sure." Regis' hands closed over his again, "The Gods might have sent you to your brother as a son, to grow up beside my father's son ... and we should have been bredin as it was foreordained. Do you not see
the hand of destiny in this, Dani, that we should be bredin as they were?"
"I know not whether I can believe that," Danilo said, but he let his hand remain in his friend's.
"It seems to me that they are smiling at us," Regis
said, and then he reached forward, holding out his arms
to Danilo. He burst out, "Oh, Dani, all the Gods forbid
I should try to persuade you to anything you felt was
wrong, but are we to live in the shadow of Dyan for­
ever? I know he wronged you, but that is past, and will
you always make me suffer for what he tried to do?
Why, then, your fear of him is stronger than your oath
to me	"
Danilo wanted to cry. He said, shaking, "I am a cristoforo. You know what they believe. My father believed, and that is enough for me, and before he is cold in his grave you would have me here, even in that very bed where he slept alone all these years...."
"I do not think it would matter to him," Regis said very softly. "Because for all these years he kept beside him the faces of his son and the one to whom his son had given his heart. Would he do so if he hated the very face of a Hastur? There are portrait painters enough who could have copied his own son's picture so that he could have consigned the face of the Hastur prince who had taken his son from him, to the fires of this chamber, or to those of Hell! As for what he believed ... I would not care for a God who spent his powers in trying to take away joy and love from a world where there is such a lack of either. Of my Divine forefather I know nothing, save that he lived and loved as other men, and it is written that when he lost the one he loved, then he grieved as do other men. But nowhere in my sacred books is it written that he feared to love...."
I said myself that I could never fear Regis. What, then, has cast this long shadow between us? Is it truly Dyan, after all? Our hearts are given to one another; I hated Dyan then because he sought to impose his will on me. Yet am I not also hurting Regis this way? Am I free, then, of Dyan's taint?
Or is it only that I wish to think that what I feel for Regis is pure and without taint, that I am somehow better
than Dyan and that what I feel for Regis has no shadow of what he flaunts with Julian?
I have hurt Regis. And worse ... the knowledge flooded suddenly into him. I have hurt Dyan because I do not trust him; he has accepted me as a son and found another lover, and I have been unwilling to trust him enough to accept a father's kindness from him. I have kept feeling myself superior, accepting what Dyan gives grudgingly, as if I were a better man and conferred a favor upon him by accepting it, as if I wished him to court my favors....
And as I cannot accept Dyan when he wishes to show me a father's love, so I have refused to accept Regis for what he is, to accept the need in him for love ... he is not the kind of man who could ever seek for that love casually. It would require trust, and affection ... some­thing that leapt from my heart to his when I touched him, and wakened his laran. But giving with one hand I took back with the other; I accepted his devotion and his love, but for fear of idle tongues I would give no more of myself.
Regis was still holding his hand; Danilo leaned for­ward and embraced him again, not formally this time. He felt overwhelmingly humble. I have been given so much and I am willing to give so little.
"If my father kept their pictures all these years beside him, then," he said, "and if he let me go from his own hands into yours, my brother ... why, then, the Law of Life is that we should share one another's burdens. All that I am and all that is mine is forever yours, my brother. Stay here with me tonight..." he smiled delib­erately at Regis and spoke the word for the first time with the inflection used only between lovers, "bredu."
Regis reached out to him, whispering, "Who knows? Perhaps they have truly returned in us, that one day we may renew their oath ..." and as he pulled Danilo close, the picture overturned and fell rattling to the floor. Regis reached for it; so did Danilo, and their hands met on the frame. It seemed to Danilo that Regis' smile tore at his heart, there was so much in it of acceptance and love and joy. There was, for an instant, something like a struggle as each tried to take the picture and set it
aside; then Regis laughed and let Danilo set it on the little table next to the bed.
"Tomorrow," Danilo said, "I must go through my fa­ther's personal things; who knows what else we shall find?"
"If we find nothing else," Regis said, holding Danilo's hands tightly, his words coming breathless, "we have found already the greatest treasure, bredhyu."
IV
"The Master had your message," said Dyan's steward, "and he asks, if the journey was not too fatiguing, you would join him for a little in the Music room."
Why, he, too, is glad to see me home. I have made a place for myself here. Danilo thanked the man and let him take his traveling cloak, and went toward the Music room. Inside he could hear the small sound of a rryl, and then Dyan's deep and musical voice.
"No, my dear, try fingering it like this ..." and as he stepped inside he saw Lord Ardais, his hands laid over Julian's, arranging his fingers on the strings. "See, you can strike the chord and go on at once to pick out the melody ..." he broke off, and they both looked up; the light was on Dyan's face, but Julian's face was still in shadow, and Danilo thought, He is content to be in Dyan's shadow. I never understood that. I thought that he sought favors from Dyan as a barragana gives her body for rich presents ... but now I know it is more than this. Dyan nodded at Danilo, but his attention was still on Julian. He said, "Let me hear you play it again prop­erly this time," and as the boy repeated the phrase, he smiled, his rare smile, and said, "You see, that is better; one can hear both melody and harmony so. We need both." He stood up and came to Danilo in the entrance of the library.
Danilo thought, with a curious intuition, he knows. But it was no secret, nor did he shrink from it now in shame or fear. What he and Regis had shared, what they would, he knew now, continue to share for most of their lives to come; it was not after all so different from what
Dyan and Julian shared, but now he was not ashamed of the similarity.
If I am no better than he, I am no worse. And that is not ... he thought, remembering Dyan's hand gently guiding Julian's on the strings of the harp, entirely a bad thing. I thought because I would never acknowledge that likeness, that somehow I was a better man than Dyan. Or Julian. It is a strange brotherhood we share. But neverthe­less it is brotherhood.
He took Dyan into a kinsman's embrace. "Greetings, foster-father," he said, and even managed to smile hesi­tantly at Julian. "Good evening, kinsman."
"I trust you have set everything in order at your home?"
"Yes," said Danilo, "I have indeed set everything in order. There was ... a great deal of unfinished business. And the Lord Hastur sent you his respects and greetings."
Dyan bowed, formally acknowledging the words. "I am grateful. And I am glad to see you returned safely, foster-son."
"I am glad to be here, foster-father," he said. And for the first time the words were spoken unguarded. I have lost my father; but losing him, I found I had another father, and he means me well. I never believed that before, nor trusted him.
"Julian," Dyan said, "pour our kinsman a drink. There is hot wine; it will be good after long riding in the cold."
Danilo took the mug between his fingers, warming his hands on it, and sipped. "Thank you."
"Chiyu," Dyan said to Julian, in that tone which was half deprecating, half affectionate, "play for us on the rryl while I talk to Danilo...."
Julian's face was sullen. "Dani plays better than I do."
"But my hands are cold with riding," said Danilo, "and I cannot play at all. So please go on." He smiled at Julian. They were both young. Each had his own place in Dyan's home and affections. And there is another brotherhood, too. My heart is given wholly to my lord. And so is his. "I would be grateful to you, kinsman, if you would play for us."
As the notes of the rryl rose in the room, he took a seat beside his foster-father, preparing to catch up with his neglected duties. Tomorrow, perhaps, he would show Dyan the painting he had brought from Syrtis; Dyan had known Regis' father, when they were boys together. Perhaps he had known Danilo's elder brother, too, and perhaps Dyan could talk of him without pain, as his own father had never been able to do.
He relaxed in the heat of the fire, knowing that he was home again, that he had stepped out of Dyan's shadow and taken his rightful place at his side.