Free Direct Descent by Frank Herbert

standing behind him, proffering an earthen mug that swirled with pungent brown liquid and a biting aroma. Sil-Chan tasted it: hot, tangy and sharp on the tongue. He downed the drink. Warmth filled him. He re-experienced the inner release he had felt after crashing the jetter—another person. He stood up.
    “How does one arrange a troth?” he asked.
    She peered up at him, a smile touching her lips. Something smoky and wondering drifted in her eyes. “We have several ways. The PN’s K-cousins can take the initiative if the couple ask it.”
    “What’s all this talk of trothing?” David asked. He came around the divan and stood with his back to the fire.
    Hepzebah waved a hand in front of Sil-Chan’s eyes, leaned close to stare at him.
    Sil-Chan said: “What’re you …”
    “I have the inward eye,” she said. “You go very deep. It’s warm and nice in there.”
    David said: “I asked you …”
    “If he’ll have me, David, I’m going to open the troth,” she said.
    David looked at Sil-Chan, at Hepzebah. “I haven’t been out of the room that long, have I? I just went for a drink.”
    She touched Sil-Chan tentatively on the wrist. Again, he felt his flesh tingle.
    “This is nonsense,” David said.
    Her hand stole into Sil-Chan’s. He felt the perfect fit of her there, the perfection of her beside him.
    “Will you wed me, Sooma Sil-Chan?” she asked.
    “Hep, you stop this!” David said.
    “Be quiet, David,” she said, “or I will tell stories about a young man’s secret visits to the mainland.”
    “Now, Hep! You …”
    “Quiet, I said.”
    Sil-Chan felt himself bathed in a warm glow—the drink inside him, Hepzebah’s hand in his. Wed her?
    “I’d go to the ends of the universe to wed you,” he whispered.
    “Is that a yes?” she asked.
    “Yes. Yes.”
    “But you’ve only just met!” David protested.
    “The trothers will agree with me,” she said. “But I already know. The inward eye never fails.” She tipped her head, looked up at Sil-Chan from the corners of her eyes. “I find him very attractive.”
    David appeared angry. “He’s just different.”
    “I’m already certain,” she said. “And you heard the question and you heard his response.”
    “This is too much!” David raged. “You’re always doing things like this!”
    Sil-Chan experienced a crawling of goose flesh. He felt delirious. All those years of celibacy and devotion to duty and career had melted away.
    “He’ll never take the name!” David said. “Just to look at him you can tell. You’d best accept Martin as the trothers …”
    “Gun the trothers!” Steel in her voice. “So if he won’t take the name, I’ll go with him … as is right. We’ll cross that river when it cuts our trail.”
    “This is much too quick,” David said. “The PN will blast the roof off when he …”
    “His sister’s son and your sister’s son—that’s the way of the PN,” she said. “Let us never forget it.”
    When he responded, David’s voice was lower. “Still too quick.”
    Sil-Chan looked from one to the other. He took strength from the feeling of Hepzebah’s hand in his. There was no need for logic or reason.
    “I’ve always been a quick one,” Hepzebah said. “I make decisions the way the ice breaks from the glacier.”
    David threw up his hands.
    “This is impossible. You’re impossible!”
    “When will we wed?” Sil-Chan asked.
    “A month,” she said. “That we cannot speed.”
    David said: “Hep, if you would just …”
    “I warned you, David.”
    David turned to Sil-Chan. “Do you have any idea of what you’re starting?”
    The question ran a finger of ice down Sil-Chan’s spine. He was here to negotiate with the Paternoster. What happened to that if the PN were alienated at the start?
    “I knew it would be a day of turning,” Hepzebah said. “A flight of plover settled in the grass outside my window at dawn. One remained when the others flew on. It called to me before