Traitor's Sun Read Online Free PDF Page A

paneled walls shone, reflecting the dancing light from the fire, and the colors in the pattern of the rug on the stone floor pleased her. The tang of fall penetrated even through the thick walls of Comyn Castle, a fresh smell that never failed to liven her mind. It had taken a long while to get used to the weather on Darkover, for Thetis was almost an endless summer. But now she actually looked forward to changing seasons and the festivals which punctuated them.
    From the next room, she could hear the delightful tinkle of a clavier, where Ida Davidson was giving Yllana her music lesson. She smiled at the sound. It was not a syn theclavier of the sort which Ida had used when Marguerida had lived in her house during her years at the University. Such a device was prohibited on Darkover, since it used the advanced technologies of the Federation. Instead, it was a reasonable imitation of the noble ancestor of that instrument, crafted wholly on Darkover, of native woods and rare Darkovan metals, made from drawings Marguerida had obtained with great difficulty from the University archives. There had never been such a keyboard instrument on Darkover before, but now, after the struggle to create the first one, there were six in Thendara. Members of the Musicians Guild were writing music specifically for them. Yllana was not playing any of these home-grown compositions, but one of the Klieg Variations from the twenty-fourth century—formal, structured and a challenge for ten small fingers.
    There was nothing whatever to disturb the serenity of the moment, as a speedy mental sweep of Comyn Castle assured her. Her laran, which she had resented so bitterly when she first discovered she had it, had turned out to have its uses, one of which was the ability to scan the environment around her. Perhaps she was just being anxious for no reason. It had been a troubling year, with a summer that was the warmest in recent memory. The farmers had fretted over the possibility of drought, and the fire danger in the hills had been very great. There had been disturbances of another kind as well—some small riots in the markets of Thendara and reports of an uprising in Shainsa in the Dry Towns. But the rains had come in from the west at last, the balmy, near-sixty degree temperatures had vanished, and there had not been any outbreak of large fires.
    She really must get down to work! This woolgathering was wasting valuable time, and her time was at a premium just now. Marguerida looked down at the stack of pages in front of her. They were staff sheets, covered with musical notation and accompanying lyrics. After nearly two decades of doubt and hesitation, she had finally succumbed to her great, secret ambition and written an opera. It had taken all of her nerve and a great deal of encouragement from Ida to get started. But once she began, it had been nearly impossible to stop. Mikhail Hastur, her beloved companion and husband of nearly sixteen years, had complained that her composing was a greater rival than any living man could be, and Marguerida knew he was only half joking.
    Writing the music had been fairly easy, but finding the time—the peace and quiet to do so—had been difficult. She had a great many duties, as wife of the heir designate to Regis Hastur, and the mother of three children. Somewhat reluctantly, Marguerida had also taken over some of the task of running Comyn Castle from Lady Linnea Storn-Lanart, Regis’ consort. In the years since she had been married to Mikhail Hastur, she had done so many things she had never imagined doing when she had been a young career academic. Foremost among these things, she had learned how to manage her unique and potentially dangerous laran talents, guided by the Keeper Istvana Ridenow. Her friend and confidant had come to Thendara from Neskaya to help her and Mikhail right after they were married, to train them and teach them. Istvana had remained in the city for eleven years, and they had been