Dying of the Light Read Free Page B

are not—two choices only. You are not
of
Ironjade, you do not work for Ironjade!”
    “Yes,” said Gwen, the edge returning to her voice. “And I am
of
Ironjade. I wish you’d remember that, Arkin. Sometimes you begin to annoy me.”
    “Gwen, Gwen,” Ruark said, sounding very flustered. “You are a friend, a soulmate, very. We have tussled great problems, us two. I would never offend, do not mean to. You are
not
a Kavalar though, never. For one, you are too much a woman, a true woman, not merely an
eyn-kethi
nor a
betheyn
.”
    “No? I’m not? I wear the bond of jade-and-silver, though.” She glanced toward Dirk and lowered her voice. “For Jaan,” she said. “This is really his car, and that’s why I fly it, to answer your original question. For Jaan.”
    Silence. The wind was the only noise, moving around them as they fell upward into blackness, tossing Gwen’s long straight hair and Dirk’s tangles. It knifed right through his thin Braqui clothing. He wondered briefly why the aircar had no bubble canopy, only a thin windscreen that was hardly any use at all. Then he folded his arms tight against his chest, and slid down into the seat. “Jaan?” he asked quietly. A question. The answer would come, he knew, and he dreaded it, just from the way that Gwen had spoken the name, with a sort of strange defiance.
    “He doesn’t know,” Ruark said.
    Gwen sighed, and Dirk could see her tense. “I’m sorry, Dirk. I thought you would know. It has been a long time. I thought, well, one of the people we both knew back on Avalon, one of them surely has told you.”
    “I never see anyone anymore,” Dirk said carefully. “That we knew, together. You know. I travel a lot. Braque, Prometheus, Jamison’s World.” His voice rang hollow and inane in his ears. He paused and swallowed. “Who is Jaan?”
    “Jaantony Riv Wolf high-Ironjade Vikary,” Ruark said.
    “Jaan is my . . .” She hesitated. “It is not easy to explain. I am
betheyn
to Jaan,
cro-betheyn
to his
teyn
Garse.” She looked over, a brief glance away from the aircar instruments, then back again. There was no comprehension on Dirk’s face.
    “Husband,” she said then, shrugging. “I’m sorry, Dirk. That’s not quite right, but it is the closest I can come in a single word. Jaan is my husband.”
    Dirk, huddled low in his seat with his arms folded, said nothing. He was cold, and he hurt, and he wondered why he was there. He remembered the whisperjewel, and he still wondered. She had some reason for sending for him, surely, and in time she would tell him. And really, he could hardly have expected that she would be alone. At the port he had even thought, quite briefly, that perhaps Ruark . . . and that hadn’t bothered him.
    When he had been silent for too long, Gwen looked over once again. “I’m sorry,” she repeated. “Dirk. Really. You should never have come.”
    And he thought, She’s right.
    The three of them flew on without speaking. Words had been said, and not the words that Dirk had wanted, but words that had changed nothing. He was here on Worlorn, and Gwen was still beside him, though suddenly a stranger. They were both strangers. He sat slumped in his seat, alone with his thoughts, while a cold wind stroked his face.
    On Braque, somehow, he had thought that the whisperjewel meant she was calling him back, that she wanted him again. The only question that concerned him was whether he would
go,
whether he could return to her, whether Dirk t’Larien still could love and be loved. That had not been it at all, he knew now.
    Send this memory, and I will come, and there will be no questions.
That was the promise, the only promise. Nothing more.
    He became angry. Why was she doing this to him? She had held the jewel and felt his feelings. She could have guessed. No need of hers could be worth the price of this remembering.
    Then, finally, calm came back to Dirk t’Larien. With his eyes tight shut, he could see the canal on Braque