“I cannot,” she said, glancing at the Guild-mothers. “I am not really supposed to leave the Guild-house for half a year after I am sworn.” Suddenly she held out her hands.
“Oh, Peter, wish me luck! Don’t hold it against me!”
He gave her a brief, almost brotherly hug. “I do, Mag,” he said, kissing her on the cheek. “Looks like you’ll need luck with those old battle-axes! But it’s what you want, so be happy, love.”
She said, “Jaelle-” and impetuously- Jaelle flung her arms around Magda, holding her tight. Magda whispered, “You be happy, too.” “I’ll come and see you,” Jaelle promised. “Thendara house is my home, too.”
Peter said, “But you must promise not to turn her against me, Magda! Must I cope with all those mothers-in-law?”
Jaelle said, laughing, “No one could turn me against you. But you must learn someday not to speak so of my mothers and sisters!”
She’s grown up, Magda thought. I’ve always thought of her as a young girl. But she isn’t. She’s a woman. She knows him for what he is. And she loves him anyway and understand that there could be loyalties between women that*
The Guild-mother Millea turned and beckoned to Magda to join them. Magda kissed Jaelle again and said, “Be good to each other.” Then, slowly, but without looking back, she went across the room to join the three women.
Jaelle, standing and watching her go seemed to catch from her mind the image of a great, opening door swinging wide on a sunlit world and a brightly lighted future.
MARION ZIMMER BRADLEY
‘Topflight adventure in every way!”, is the decision
of Lester Del Rey in reviewing Marion Zimmer Bradley’s
previous Darkover novel,THE HERITAGE OF HASTUR.
In this, Bradley’s latest, the many colorful threads of
that part-human, part-alien world are rewoven info a
strikingly different literary tapestry.
One such thread could be called the Heritage of
Ardais, for the heir to the Ardais Domain has vanished
and must be found.
The major thread and pattern concerns the role of women.
While only women can command the power
of the matrix and the secret sciences which keep
Darkover from Terran hands, in most respects they are
still chattel -indeed in some barbaric parts even
kept enchained. Yet there are the strange bands of
pledged women known as the Free Amazons, equal to
men and outside the laws that keep the rest of their
sex subservient.
And it is the Free Amazons who provide the key both
to the Ardais mystery and the Terran-Darkover
dilemma.
In THE SHATTERED CHAIN, Marion Zimmer Bradley has
produced another great novel to stand alongside
THE HERITAGE OF HASTUR.