One of the Channel Islands

Usage examples of herm.

Sun PROLOGUE Herm Aldaran snapped awake, his heart pounding and sweat streaming down his chest.

In the dim light Herm could see her dark hair spread across the pillow, and the sweep of her brow below it, the curve of her mouth beneath the strong nose.

They could go to their home worlds for elections every five Terran years, but Herm never had returned to Darkover.

Terrans possessed, but Herm had grown up in Aldaran Castle, with stone walls around him, and great, roaring hearths sending out gusts of scent-laden sooty, heated air.

Regis Hastur had never filled his original place in the Chamber of Deputies after Herm had vacated it, and he had not encountered another native of his planet in sixteen years.

With what Herm regarded as enormous courage, these men and women had voted against their own majority on a critical defense bill, effectively destroying it, and bringing both the Senate and the Chamber to an impasse.

Then Herm had not been married-what a singularly foolish thing to have done, to wed a widow from Renney with a small son, Amaury.

Lacking the Alton Gift of forced rapport, which had given his predecessor such an advantage, Herm made do with scraps of unguarded thought, and what he mostly heard was more banal or self-serving than useful.

Senate Building were permeated with fear these days, and Herm had observed long-time allies eyeing one another suspiciously.

But Herm knew the tenor of the Expansionist mind well enough to realize that if you were not their ally, you were regarded as an enemy.

It was, Herm knew, symptomatic of all that was wrong in the Federation.

The fear that had gripped her since Herm had awakened her in the middle of the night and told her to pack for Darkover seemed to loosen its hold on her throat for an instant, and anger rushed into the breach.

He was almost thirteen now, and was acting just as Herm had at the same age, finding ways to distance himself from his parents and starting to become a separate person.

With a slight start Herm wondered if he would adjust to things he no longer thought were important-hiding the back of the neck for women or wearing a sword for men.

He did not even wait for a gratuity, which was just as well, since Herm had only a small number of credit chits still in his pocket.