Serpent's Reach

It had taken all the influence of Thon and Yalt together to persuade Grandfather to accept this gathering, Halds and the divided Meth-marens at the same di

Raen herself felt her stomach unsettled, and she declined when the serving-azi brought the neat elaborate dish “Coffee,” she said, and the azi Mev whispered the order at once to one of his fellows: it arrived instantly, for she was eldest’s great-granddaughter’s daughter in direct descent, and there was in the House a hierarchy of inheritance. She was to a certain extent pampered, and to another, burdened, for the sake of that birthright It mandated her presence at table tonight in the fast place, and made it necessary to mix with her elders, most of whom had resentment for the fact. She tried to bear herself with her mother’s studied disdain for the proceedings, but there was a Ruil across the table, cousin Bron, and she avoided his eyes when possible: they were hot and insolent.

“We hope for a reconciliation,” the Thon elder was saying, at the other end of the table. He had risen, to begin what he had come to say. “Meth-maren, will you let Ruil speak here? Or would you prefer intermediaries still?”

“You’re going to say,” Grandfather intoned in his reedy voice, “that we should take in this left-hand branch of ours. It diverged of its own accord. It’s not welcome in Kethiuy. It’s trouble to us, and the hives avoid it. Ruil-sept alienated them, and that wasn’t our doing. This is hive territory. Those who can’t live under those terms can’t live here.”

“Our talents,” said Tel Ruil Meth-maren, “lie with other hives, the ones Sul can’t manage.”

“Reds and golds.” Grandfather’s chin wobbled with his anger. “You deceive yourself, Tel a Ruil. They’ve no love of humankind, least of all of Ruil. I know you’ve had red contacts. It’s rumoured. I know what you’re up to and why you’ve gone to the trouble of drawing non and Yalt into this. Your plans to build on Kethiuy take are unacceptable.”

“You’re head of House,” Tel said. He had an unfortunate voice, nasal and whining. “You ought to be impartial to sept, eldest. But you carry on feuds from before any of the rest of us were born. Maybe Sul sept feels some jealousy—that Ruil can handle the two hives Sul can’t touch. They’ve come to us, not we to them. They preferred us. Thon saw; non will witness it. All within the pact. Red-hive has promised us its co-operation if we can secure that holding near its lands, on the lake. We’ve come asking,eldest. That’s all. Asking.”

“We support the request,” the Thon said.

“Yalt agrees,” said the other eldest. “It’s good sense, Meth-maren, to end this quarrel, and to get some good out of it.”

“And does Hald ask the same?”

There was silence. Raen sat still, her heart pounding.

The Hald eldest rose. “We have a certain involvement here, Meth-maren. The old feud has gone on beyond its usefulness. If it’s settled now, then we have to be involved, or the Meth-marens will have peace and we’ll have none. We’re walling to forget the past. Understand that.”

“You’re here to stand up with Ruil.”

“Obligation, Meth-maren.”

They did not say friendship. Raen herself did not miss that implication, and there was a space of silence while Run glowered.

“We have opportunities,” the Hald said further, “that ought not to be neglected.”

“At least talk on the matter,” said Yalt. “We ask you to do that.”

“No,” some of the House muttered. But Eldest did not refuse. His old eyes wandered over them all, and finally he nodded.

Raen’s mother swore softly. “Leave,” she said to Raen. And when Raen looked at her in offense: “Go on.”

Others, even adult and senior, were being dismissed from what was becoming elder council. There was no objection possible. She kissed her mother’s cheek, pressed her hand, and sullenly made her retreat among the others, younger folk under thirty and third and fourth-rank elders, inconsiderable in council.

There was a muttering gathering in the hall just outside, her cousins no happier than she with what was toward.

  No peace, she heard. Not with Ruil.

And: Reds and golds, she beard, reminding her of the hillside and the meeting which had diverted her. She had told no one of that. She was too arrogant to contribute that meaningless fragment to the general turmoil in the hall. She skirted the vicinities of her chattering cousins, male and female, and brushed off the attentions of an azi, walked the corridor in a fit of irritation—both at being cast out and at reckoning what Ruil-sept proposed. Kethiuy lake belonged to Sul-sept, beautiful and pristine. Sul had cared to keep the shores as they were, had laboured to make the boat-launches as inconspicuous as possible, to keep all evidence of man out of view. Ruil wanted a site which would obtrude into their sight, to plant themselves right where Sul must constantly look at them and reckon with them. This business of reds and golds: this was surely something Ruil had concocted to obtain backing from other Houses. There was no possibility that they could do what they claimed, interceding with the wild hives.

Lies. Outright lies.

She shrugged past the azi at the door and sought the cool, clean sir of the porch. She filled her lungs with it, looking out into the dark where the candletrees framed Kethiuy lake; and the ugly aircraft sat in her view, gleaming with lights.

Armed azi, as if this were some frontier holding. She was indignant at their presence, and no little uneasy by reason of it.

A step sounded by her. She saw three men, the one nearest in Hald’s dark Colour. She froze, recalling herself unarmed, having come from the table. Childish pride held her from the flight prudence dictated.

It was a tall man who faced her. She stared up at him with her back to the door and the light from the slit windows giving her a better look at him: mid-thirties, beta-reckoning; on a Kontrin, that could be anywhere between thirty and three hundred. The face was gaunt and grim: Pal Hald, she recognised him suddenly, with the déjà vuof deepstudy. The two with him, she did not know.

And Pol was trouble. He had lost kin to Meth-marens. Tie was also reputed frivolous, a libertine, a jester, a player of pranks. She could not co

“Good evening, little Meth-maren.”

“Good evening yourself, Pol Hald.”

“What, could I know your name?”

She lifted her head a degree higher. “I’m not in your studytapes yet, ser Hald. My name is Raen.”

“Tand and Morn,” he said with a shrug at the kinsmen at his back, the one young and boyish, the other lean-faced and much like himself, like enough for full kin. Isis grin did not fade. He reached out with complete affrontery and touch her under the chin. “Raen. I’ll remember that.”

She took a step backward, feeling a rush of blood to her face. She had no experience to deal with such a move, and the embarrassment became rage. “And who sent you out here, Skulking round the windows?”

“We’re set to watch the aircraft, little Meth-maren. To be sure Meth-maren hospitality is what it should be.”

She did not like the sound of that, and turned abruptly, seized the door handle, afraid for the instant that they would stop her; but they made no move to do so, and she delayed to glower resentment at them, determined to make it clear she was not being chased off her own doorstep. “I seem to have left my gun inside,” she said. “I usually carry it for pests.”

Pol’s gaunt face went serious then, quite, quite sober.

“Good evening, Meth-maren,” he said.

She opened the door and went in, into the safe light, among her own kin.