“What is it?” he said, holding her face in his hands. “Tell me.”
“I must not do this,” she rasped. “It is forbidden me to mate, and to do so with one not of the Way…” Her whole body trembled suddenly, as if she had been taken by a wracking sob, and Reza held her tightly against him, ignoring the pain in his body. “We could be punished by death, Reza. Even for this.”
The words tore at his heart, but he understood now what was at stake. He would not sacrifice her, or himself, for this desire that threatened to consume them. They had come too far to throw everything away for a single touch that might easily deny them a lifetime together.
“Listen to my words,” he told her softly. “There will someday come a time when that will not be so. In this I believe. The day shall come when we may be as one, and until that day dawns, I shall wait for you.”
She kissed him again, softly. “I pray to Her that it shall be as you say.” She kissed his face, her lips and tongue caressing him with a tenderness he had never imagined possible for her. “You must rest now, my tresh,” she said. “Rest, and grow strong again.”
Esah-Zhurah pulled him close, her arms wrapped around him, her musky scent strong in his mind. He closed his eyes to the bitterness that welled up in his soul at the unbidden remembrance of terrible things now long past, things that had happened to a human boy who was fast becoming a man among an alien race. Shutting out those images and the guilt they threatened, he focused his thoughts on her hand as it ran through his hair, and the tingling sensation that stirred at the passing of her fingers.
His body swiftly gave in to the need for rest. And as sleep quietly crept upon him, he uttered the question that had been floating in his mind, hidden by the alien code of honor that bound him during his waking hours, but which carried no weight in the world of dreams.
“Do you love me?”
The answer would have pleased him, had he heard the whispered word before he slipped away into the waiting embrace of sleep.
“Yes,” came Esah-Zhurah’s soft voice. This warrior, who had once pledged her honor to break this human’s will, now found her soul bound to his by something her race had not known for millennia. She lay silent, cradling him against the cold of night and the unknowns of the future, wondering if her world would still be the same come the dawn.
The First strode through the door, snow fluttering from her fur cape as she shook off the cold. “The sentries report that Esah-Zhurah and the human return,” she announced. She was obviously amazed that it was possible for them to have survived six days in the wilderness in winter, alone.
“I know,” Tesh-Dar told her from where she sat on the floor, legs curled under her, head bowed. She did not tell her subordinate that she had known their whereabouts since Esah-Zhurah had dived into the water after Reza. Her mind’s eye had watched her pull him from the water and give him life with the touch of her lips upon his. She had kept watch periodically over the following days as she tended to her own business, wondering if they indeed would survive.
But her wonder had turned to shocked disbelief, as she witnessed from afar the emotional whirlwind that had swept over the two during the following nights. Her hours had been spent in deep meditation since then, with her mind’s eye focused on them as they made their way back to the kazha with the coming of the sun and first light this day. “Have their mount taken care of, and bring the two young warriors to me.”
“Yes, my priestess.”
Time, being a very relative thing to one so old as Tesh-Dar, passed quickly. She opened her eyes to find Esah-Zhurah and her human consort before her on their knees, waiting.
“Greetings, priestess,” Esah-Zhurah ventured quietly, unable to gauge her elder’s mood. Reza remained silent, his eyes fixed to the smooth stone of the floor.
“You have something for me?” Tesh-Dar asked, as if the two had never been missing at all.
“Yes, priestess,” Reza said quietly, holding forth the black tube that held Tesh-Dar’s correspondence. Fortunately, it had been strapped to Goliath’s saddle, and not to that of Esah-Zhurah’s ill-fated mount.
Tesh-Dar leaned forward and took the tube – still cold to the touch – from Reza’s hands, noticing that they did not shake, but were firm, confident.
“You have done well, young one,” she told him, setting the tube aside. “Go now to the healers and let them tend to your injuries. Then go to the hall to eat. No more do I have for you this day.”
“Yes, priestess,” Reza told her, bowing his head. He got up from his knees and headed for the door. Esah-Zhurah made to get up to follow him.
“My business with you,” Tesh-Dar said ominously, “is not yet complete.”
Esah-Zhurah dropped back to her knees, hearing the door open and close quietly behind her as Reza – much as he hated to leave her alone – carried out Tesh-Dar’s orders.
“Look at me, child.”
Trained from birth to show respect by averting the eyes, it was a difficult thing for her to do. That the priestess had asked this of her drove home the seriousness of whatever matter the elder warrior had on her mind. Warily, Esah-Zhurah met Tesh-Dar’s gaze.
“This I will say only once, for I will forgive it of you only this once,” the great priestess said. “I cannot prohibit the feelings in your heart for the human. But I now remind you that to show those feelings toward one not of the Way with a touch, a caress,” her voice strained as she fought off the shivers of disgust that swept through her at the things she had witnessed, “is forbidden, bestial in Her eyes. No more shall there be, or you will find yourself bound to the Kal’ai-Il, the Stone Place, in punishment.” The Kal’ai-Il was an ancient monument to the discipline of the Way, a stone arena where only the most serious wrongs were punished. It had stood for millennia as a symbol of the price to be paid for the Empress’s honor by a warrior fallen from grace. “You, like the others in this grand experiment, were chosen for this task because of your strength and spirit, your knowledge of their alien tongue and ways. Do not disgrace yourself in Her eyes again.”
Lowering her head nearly to the floor, Esah-Zhurah cringed in shame, her fears realized. No feeling, no thought, no action was beyond the knowledge of the priestess. Esah-Zhurah felt like a tiny grain of sand, infinitesimal, before her gaze. But deep in her heart she felt the forbidden desire burn even brighter, a flame that she could never escape.
“It shall be so, my priestess,” she whispered, the words sounding hollow and empty on her lips.
Tesh-Dar nodded, noting the deep turmoil in the child. She frowned, knowing that the coming cycle, Reza’s last unless his blood was heard to sing, would be terribly difficult for Esah-Zhurah. Tesh-Dar knew that the child would likely wish to take her own life when the human’s came to an end. It was a most unfavorable prospect for such a promising warrior. Worse, Esah-Zhurah was more than just another young warrior to her. Far more. Tesh-Dar would have to watch her carefully. “I will say no more of the matter,” she told Esah-Zhurah gently. “Go now in the footsteps of your tresh and rest, for the sunrise shall again call you to the arena to train.”
“Yes, my priestess.” Saluting, Esah-Zhurah departed.
Tesh-Dar stared after her a moment, wondering at the intensity of the feelings she had sensed in the two of them. Was mere punishment, even shaving one’s hair, enough to deter such things?
Then Tesh-Dar thought of the Ancient Ones who had watched over Esah-Zhurah as she had struggled to free Reza from the clutches of the river’s icy waters. Never had Tesh-Dar known them to be interested in such affairs. What stake could they possibly claim in the matter of a warrior and her animal tresh? Tesh-Dar did not understand their motivations or what precisely they had done that night, but she had clearly felt their presence, guiding the girl through the water to find the human. She knew from the power of their song that they had not been mere bystanders in what had taken place.