"Something is bothering you, Lorraine," Darlanis said quietly as she watched sensuous dark haired slave Yvette Senchal complete the finishing touches of turning a "sow's ear" into a "silk purse". Sharon and Lara Warsan sitting beside her on the sofa. I had been thinking of An'na, of the beautiful "singer", Aurora.
I am not a beautiful woman, but with Yvette's help, I did at least look the part of being one as befitted the stepmother of the new Imperial Princess to be. Fortunately the long gown covered the hideous scars that covered my body and upper thighs where I had been horribly clawed by the insane Lorr Sisa! Even Darlanis, insured as she was to such things, had gasped in horror when she saw me nude, saw what had happened to me there on Mars!
"I'm still not completely recovered from the change in atmosphere," I lied, it having been only hours ago that the Starfire had lifted from the island upon which the Imperial Palace stood. Yvette dabbing a bit of perfume behind my ears and on my neck. I had seen her eyes as she saw the horrible wounds on my body. Saw how I had been marked as if I had been clawed by some insane beast, which was exactly what had happened to me on Mars!
The gown fitted me quite well considering how little time there had been to obtain it. Darlanis had done well. Fortunately it would cover me well enough that none would see what I had gone through on Mars. It came up high and covered everything, while at the same time fitting me so that my boyish figure did look at least a bit feminine. The black silk clung well, I observed with a smile. Displaying the firmness of my breasts, the flare of my hips, the swell of my buttocks. I thought at least for once I might be able to stand alongside Darlanis, the Queen of Beauty, and not be ashamed of myself. Yvette and Lynn had done well, although Lynn had feared to touch me for my wounds so recently healed. I wondered how bad the scars would finally be. If any man would ever find me attractive so scarred, only my face having been spared the tearing claws of the insane Lorr Princess!
Perhaps you think that I make too much of such matters, but I have all my life been passed over or snubbed by those who only saw that which lies upon the surface. I suppose it is quite possible that I had been born a true beauty like Darlanis that my life might have been different from what it has been. Unlike a man, a woman is usually judged solely on her appearance. There are those, of course, who can see beneath outward appearances. I am, I suppose, the sort of a woman that "grows" on you, or so Jon tells me. That he loves me despite the still visible scars on my body speaks much of the sort of a man that he is, the woman I am.
I am told by others close to me that I have qualities that make up for anything I may lack in the "looks" department. Yet, still, when I look at a beautiful woman such as Darlanis, I do feel a sense of being "inferior". You may make of this as you will, I merely report what I feel. Sometimes I wonder why we are such good friends. Perhaps it is because she understands me better than I understand myself. She is very dear to me now. We have both suffered much at the hands of others. At the "hands" of one I now believed is "possessed" by "that" I was warned of...
"Perhaps you haven't recovered yet from what was done to you," Lara Warsan commented as she sat beside the Queen of California. The green of her long gown went well with the reddish tint of her hair. I liked her a lot already in just the little short period of time I had gotten to know her. She had an innate "goodness" about her that made me understand why Jers had made the decision that he had. She did truly "have a heart of gold". He would "neck-chain" her tonight there before Tais, the First Priestess. Before Darlanis, before everyone. The wedding doubtlessly would go down in history. She was a prostitute. He was a Prince! I hoped that his mother would accept that he loved her.
"That's possible," I smiled. I couldn't speak the reality. Tell of the pain in my heart. Tonight Jers would give up his claim to the throne of California to marry the woman he loved. I would lose my Sharon as she officially became the Imperial Princess in his place. She would be Darlanis', not mine any more! I wondered briefly if I should have stayed on Mars with An'na and helped her to explore our solar system in the Starfire. I was no longer of value to anyone here on Earth. I had no wish to be exploited by Darlanis for her own purposes. I was tired of being a thing looked at, poked at, commented about. Something to "use"!*
* I am mentioned in all the Janet Rogers' books as the woman who was "responsible" for her "NEW ORDER". Janet tended I think to "shade" the truth a little when it suited her own purposes. As I have noted elsewhere, another also attempted the same thing too!
For a moment I thought of telling Darlanis about An'na. I could ruin her joy, destroy her happiness by telling her how her own daughter, her own flesh and blood, had rejected her! Cause this tall proud golden ruler of California pain, hurt, suffering! I could bring tears to those beautiful azure eyes, make her weep and sob. Let her know that her own daughter yet lived on another world only a orange blob of light in a telescope! Then she would understand what she was doing to me! Know the pain, the hurt that I felt at seeing Sharon become her "daughter", her Princess!
"Sharon means more to me than you will ever know, Lorraine," Darlanis said to me, gently stroking her hair. They belonged together, I thought to myself. Sharon had the light golden hair like Darlanis had. She even shared Darlanis' facial features to a certain extent. I knew that Sharon loved her too, although she was fortunate that Darlanis had a sense of humor, especially after being compared to "SHE-RA", a 20th Century cartoon character! On the other hand Darlanis did remind me a lot of "SHE-RA" too! Of course she didn't have a "magic sword" or a "winged unicorn" to ride, but Darlanis did dress something like a "cartoon character" in her styles. And she was starting to go around "righting wrongs" whenever she could, which was making her now surprisingly popular with the people she ruled as the Empress of California!
"Well, Well, What do we have here?" Princess Tara said as she stepped up me, her own black gown nearly a duplicate of my own. Sela Dai of Talon at her side, beautiful in a silver lame that set off the whiteness of her skin, the coal black of her hair. She is a very beautiful Princess, very striking. Jers had once loved her before he met the provocative and sensual "Lara of Trelandar" as Lara Warsan is often called among other things.
"I'm `surprised' that you'd come to this," I answered, my voice not pleasant. I didn't like the Bajan. It showed too. Her right wrist was encased in a metal brace to protect the stitched together tendons there beneath it. She is a beautiful woman, but EVIL to the core, something I'd suspected from what Jon had told me about Tara's earlier activities as the "Warlady" of the Empire. There was something "unclean" about the woman, I sensed too. Tara having made Darlanis more "enemies" than she did "friends", and causing even those who might have looked upon Darlanis with favor to fear what Imperial conquest might bring...
"I wouldn't miss it for the world," Tara smiled, her smile making a chill go down my back. The Princess then turning away to speak to someone else in the great brightly lit throneroom. The beautiful silk of the women's fine ball gowns, the finery, the fancy attire of the noblemen making it a scene that will forever stick in my memory. There is a barbaric splendor here in the 26th Century that I always missed back in the 20th Century. Perhaps we of the 20th made things too drab in our futile attempts at "equality". At our own attempts to "level" everyone.
"There is a `DARKNESS' to her soul that makes me fear for what she may become the instrument of if she does not reject the `EVIL' that now controls her very being," I heard a woman's voice speak from behind me in level tones. Turning, I looked into the azure eyes of a tall lovely white robed woman dressed in a style of three thousand years ago. The woman was blonde, of an indeterminate age. For a moment I felt as if I once again was in the presence of SHE, in the very presence of GOD herself! Tais! The First Priestess of the Priestesses of Lys! The gold ankh studded with diamonds hanging there on its golden chain between her breasts leaving no doubt of WHO she was, Darlanis having pointed out Tais to me a few minutes ago as being the "First Priestess".
"There is much I need to speak to you about," I said, touching her hand, feeling as if an electric shock had passed between us. Tais nodding back, her eyes glowing into mine. I sensed the forces, the "powers" that were hers to command. Sharon standing there beside me, a puzzled look on her beautiful features. I had felt it best that certain of the events that had happened on Mars remained my secret. I did not wish her to believe that her beloved Lorraine had taken leave of her senses. That she had once briefly spoken with SHE who is the true Mistress of the Universe.
"You carry for us a message of importance," Tais answered. Darlanis had spoken of the ESP powers of the Priestesses. That they possessed powers no one understood. Tais no doubt possessed such powers herself. I wondered what it would be like to MIND- LINK with her. To merge my mind with hers, to see as she saw!
"You know what it is?" I asked, having no doubt that she could actually read my thoughts, or at least sense them in some way. The Priestesses of Lys have been developing such abilities for centuries now. They are far beyond what one of the 20th Century would understand, comprehend. I had once suggested to Janet Rogers that perhaps the secrets, the powers of electronic hypnosis, if such a thing was possible, be entrusted to such an organization for safe-keeping. I am glad that she did do just that.
"It is in the nature of a `warning'," Tais answered. I knew from reading in THE BOOK OF LYS that "The Queen of Darkness" was said to the "consort" of the EVIL ONE, the "DEVIL" of this era... The actual "warning" from SHE had been "BEWARE THE QUEEN OF DARKNESS", which hopefully meant "more" to Tais than it "did" to me!
I was now Lady Lorraine, my title and estates having been given to me by Queen Darlanis during the time I had been on Mars. Perhaps Darlanis had understood more than I had thought when I had told her about Lady Lana Daris and how much she meant to me.
When I had captured Lady Lana, her teenage son Brian had mistakenly believed that his mother had been killed by the dire wolf she had been hunting. Refusing to wait until the beast could be hunted down, Brian set out to destroy it on his own, dying beneath its fangs in the ruined house that once had long ago belonged to Bob and Carol. The body of the beast found no more than a dozen feet away, his arrow having done its deadly work if a bit too late. At the tragic news of the death of his only son and his lovely wife, Senator Jan Daris had committed suicide, leaving poor little five year old Mara a sudden lonely orphan.
Thus after the crowning of Sharon as Imperial Princess and the marriage of Jers and Lara, I planned to travel to Trelandar and take up there my position as Lady of the area, and raise Mara as my own daughter. I thought I owed Lana that much if not more. I felt Sharon was no longer mine in any case, with Darlanis as Empress of California being able to do for her what I could not. I no longer wished to be involved in Imperial affairs, or draw my blade in the service of the Empire's golden ruler. I had learned much on Mars. Too much to ever be the same that I had once been.
I watched Lara Warsan walk down that long aisle between the gathered nobles towards us, her features veiled as proper for a bride to be. The sensual movements of her body beneath the gown leaving no doubts that she was totally "female" in a way that few women are. Jers had, I thought to myself, made a good choice. Even the more beautiful and striking Sela Dai was no "match" for this woman! I thought of another I had once known. She too had been much like Lara. Sharon at my side now wore the tiara of an Imperial Princess. Darlanis had a "contented" look on her beautiful face. I could hardly blame her. Everything now seemed to be "going her way". Queen Tulis was unpopular in Dularn, leaving Darlanis the opportunity to perhaps convince the people of that conflict weary country that "union" with the Empire might be in their best interests after all. Darlanis having carefully pointed out that she was, after-all, of Dularnian parentage herself! And with Tara stripped of her powers as "Warlady", it might be just possible Darlanis might finally "succeed" in her objective!
I saw Jers step down from the dais on which we stood, the throne just behind us, the Imperial Tarl of California looking down upon us all from its ruby eyes. Reaching with his hand for the lovely bride that awaited him. I saw the eyes of the people upon him, saw the shuffling and movement there on the balcony that circled the throne room as the "lesser folk" pushed and shoved for a better view of the proceedings below. Saw Tara in the forefront briefly glance back up towards the balcony, a sudden cold hand grasping at my heart as I knew what was going to happen! Recalled her words, "I wouldn't miss it for the world!"
"ASSASSIN!" I heard someone scream, saw a woman in the chain mail of Darlanis' personal guard draw a bow to full draw there on the balcony, her shaft aimed at us! Saw the arrow like a blurred streak whiz through the air over our heads as the assassin herself clutched at a crossbow bolt buried in her heart! Darlanis giving me a grim smile, the bright glitter in her azure eyes telling much left unspoken just then! A handsome warrior standing behind the throne unseen by anyone holding a Dularnian crossbow in his hands. Apparently Darlanis had taken "precautions"!
"I expected `something' like this," Darlanis smiled as the uproar finally started to settle down, Tara having made a quick exit, although there was no way of "proving" she was to "blame"! I saw Tais standing there watching us, the glow of the many lamps making the diamonds set in her golden ankh glisten and sparkle. The flight of the arrow "puzzled" me, as it had seemed to curve in its flight away from Lara, as if it had been "pushed away" by some strange force. By the "powers" of one knowledgeable in ways no ordinary human would be. I had no doubts either now that Tais had used her own mysterious "powers" to save Lara Warsan's life!!
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