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We were outstripping the night. The Southern Cross had made planetfall on Darkover at midnight. There I had embarked on the Terran skyliner that was to take me halfway around a planet; only an hour had passed, but already the thin air was beginning to flush red with a hint of dawn. Under my feet the floor of the big plane tilted slightly as it began to fly aslant down the western ridge of the Hellers. Peak after peak fell away astern, cutting the sparse clouds that capped the snowline; and already my memory was looking for landmarks, although I knew we were too high.
After six years of knocking around half a dozen star-systems, I was going home again; but I felt nothing. Not homesick. Not excited. Not even resentful. I hadn't wanted to return to Darkover, but I hadn't even cared enough to refuse.
Six years ago I had left Darkover, intending never to return. The Regent's desperate message had followed me from Terra, to Samarra, to Vainwal. It costs plenty to send a personal message interspace, even over the Terran relay system, and Old Hastur--Regent, of the Comyn, Lord of the Seven Domains--hadn't wasted words in explaining. It had simply been a command. But I couldn't imagine why they wanted me back. They'd all been glad to see the last of me, when I went.
I turned from the paling light at the window, closing my eyes and pressing my good hand to my temple. The interstellar passage, as always, had been made under heavy sedation. Now the dope that the ship's medic had given me was beginning to wear off; fatigue cut down my barriers, letting in a teasing telepathic trickle of thought.
I could feel the covert stares of the other passengers; at my scarredface; at the arm that ended at the wrist in a folded sleeve; but mostly at what, and who I was. A telepath. A freak. An Alton--one of the Seven Families of the Comyn--that hereditary autarchy which has ruled Darkover since long before our sun faded to red.
And yet, not quite one of them. My father, Kennard Alton--every child on Darkover could repeat the story--had done a shocking, almost a shameful thing. He had married, taken in honorable laran marriage, a Terran woman, kin to the hated Empire people who have overrun the civilized Galaxy.
He had been powerful enough to brazen it out. They had needed my father in Comyn Council. After Old Hastur, he had been the most powerful man in the Comyn. He'd even managed to cram me down their throats. But they'd all been glad when I left Darkover. And now I had come home.
