I should have died when the plane went down. Callie doesn’t need me… I’m never going to do anything but hurt her.
Damon said behind him, “Andrew, come and talk to me. Don’t go off like this alone and try to shut it all out.”
“Oh, God,” Andrew said, drawing a breath like a sob, “I have to. I can’t talk any more. I can’t take it any more. Let me alone, damn it, can’t you just let me alone for a little while?”
He felt Damon’s presence like a sharp physical pain, a pressure, a compulsion. He knew he was hurting Damon; refused to know, to turn, to look… Finally Damon said very gently, “All right, Ann’dra. I know you’ve had all you can take. A little while, then. But not too long.” And Andrew knew without turning that Damon was gone. No, he thought with a shudder of horror, Damon had never been there at all, was still back in the little stone-floored still-room.
He stood in the courtyard, heavy snow blowing around him, its fury only a little abated by the enclosing walls. Callista. He reached for the reassurance of her touch, but she was not there, only a faint pulse, restless, and he dared not disturb her drugged sleep.
What can I do? What can I do? To his dismay and horror he began to weep, alone in the wilderness of snow. He had never felt so alone in his life, not even when the plane went down and he found himself alone on a strange planet, beneath a strange sun, in trackless unmapped mountains…
Everything I ever knew is gone, useless, meaningless or worse. My friends are strangers, my wife the most alien of all. My world is gone, renounced. I can never go back; they think me dead.
He thought, I hope I catch pneumonia and die, then, aware of the childishness of that, realized he was in very real danger. Drearily, not from any sense of self-preservation, but the remnant of vague duty, he turned and went inside. The house looked alien, strange, not a place where any Terran could manage to live. Had it ever seemed welcoming, home? He looked with profound alienation around the empty hall, glad it was empty. Dom Esteban must be taking his midday rest. The maids were gossiping in soft voices. He sank down wearily on a bench, let his head rest in his arms, and stayed there, not asleep, but in retreat, hoping that if he stayed very quiet it would all go away somehow and not be real.
A long time later someone put a drink in his hands. He swallowed it gratefully, found another, and another, blurring his senses. He heard himself babbling, pouring it all out to a suddenly sympathetic ear. There were more drinks. He knew, and welcomed it, when he passed out.
There was a voice in his mind, worming its way past his barriers, deep into his unconscious, past his resistance.
No one wants you here. No one needs you here. Why not go away now, while you can, before something dreadful happens. Go away now, back where you came from, back to your own world. You’ll be happier there. Go now. Go away now. No one will know or care.
Andrew knew there was some flaw in his reasoning. Damon had given him some good reason why he should not go, then he remembered that he was angry with Damon.
The voice persisted, gentle, cajoling:
You think Damon is your friend. Don’t trust Damon. He will use you, when he needs help, and then turn on you. There was something familiar about the voice, but it wasn’t a voice at all. It was somehow inside his mind! He tried in panic to shut it out, but it was so soothing.
Go away now. Go away now. No one needs you here. You will be happy when you go back to your own people. You will never be happy here.
With fumbling steps, Andrew went out into the side hall. He found his riding cloak, fastened it around his shoulders. Someone was helping him, buckling it around him. Damon, was it? Damon knew he couldn’t stay. He couldn’t trust Damon. He would be happy with his own people. He would get back to Thendara, back to the Trade City and the Terran Empire where his mind was his own…
Go now. No one wants you here.
Even thickly drunk and blurred as he was, the violence of the storm struck him hard enough to take his breath away. He was about to turn back, but the voice pounded inside his head.
Go now. Go away. No one wants you here. You’ve failed. You’re only hurting Callista. Go away, go to your own people.
His boots floundered in the snow, but he kept on, lifting and dropping them with dogged determination. Callista doesn’t need you. He was drunker than he realized. He could hardly walk. He could hardly breathe, or did the flurrying snow take his breath away, snatch it, refuse to give it back?
Go away. Go back to your own people. No one needs you here.
He came a little to himself, with a final desperate attempt of self-preservation. He was alone in the storm, and the lights of Armida had vanished in the darkness. He turned desperately, stumbling, falling to his knees, realizing he was drunk, or mad. He stumbled to his feet, felt his mind blurring, fell full length in the snow. He must get up, go on, go back, get to shelter — but he was so tired.
I will just rest here for a minute … just a minute…
Darkness covered his mind and he lost consciousness.
Chapter Nine
Damon worked for a long time in the narrow, stone-floored still-room, finally giving up in disgust. There was no way that he could make kirian as it was made in Arilinn. He had neither the skill nor, he suspected from a relatively thorough investigation of the equipment here, the proper materials. He regarded the crude tincture which he had managed to produce without enthusiasm. He didn’t think he would care to experiment with it himself, and he was sure Callista would not. There was, however, a considerable amount of the raw material, and he might be able to do better another day. Perhaps he should have begun with an ether extraction. He would ask Callista. As he washed his hands and carefully disposed of the residues, he thought suddenly of Andrew. Where had he gone? But when he went upstairs again, to find Callista still sleeping, Ellemir answered his concerned question with surprise.
“Andrew? No, I thought him still with you. Shall I come—”
“No, stay with Callista.” He thought Andrew must have gone down to talk to the men, or out to the stables through the underground tunnels. But Dom Esteban, alone at his frugal supper with Eduin and Caradoc, frowned when questioned.
“Andrew? I saw him drinking in the lower hall with Dezi. From the way they were pouring it down, I suppose he has passed out somewhere.” The old man’s gray eyebrows bristled with scorn. “Nice behavior, with his wife ill, to go off and get himself sodden drunk! How is Callista?”