//A Center would know—I'm only doing the Center's job.// He wanted her ignorance of that to be proof she was only empathizing in the human way—imagining it all. Aliom science rested on the bedrock idea that Dushau could not reincarnate, and Aliom science was their only way out of this trap. He dared not start doubting it now.
She moved a little closer to him. He could feel the heat of her body as she replied, //I do know. That's the problem. Once I made the same mistake—taking on too much of a burden. I collapsed under it, endangered my Oliat, and you had to do– what you did. Now it's as if you're compelled to relive my mistake.//
//If that's the case, Krinata, and you must cut me off to save the others—then do it.// He turned to face her. Ill mean that. You are going to survive this Dissolution.//
She struck the shaleiliu chord on the whule, the chord that summoned the Oliat to session, then she pushed the instrument half into his lap, taking his hand and guiding it to touch the resonating chamber. //This is a manifestation of the carrier wave of the universe, and it seems to be telling me, right now, that you and I go to Completion together—or neither of us goes. If I have to send you off into death, somehow we will meet again and do it all again, until we finally get it right. But I don't intend to do it wrong again this time, Jindigar. This is my Oliat, as it is yours, and I don't intend to lose any of us. Think of it this way—if I'm Takora, then I'm a Center, yes, but I'm a Center who never Dissolved—so I'm still legitimately part of an Oliat. Maybe that's why I couldn't resist.//
That, too, would explain a lot. //But there's no way to determine if you are Takora.//
//The Dissolution will prove it to you, one way or another. I'm not worried. I just don't want you hurt.//
Touched beyond words, he put his arm around her shoulders. He could feel the human bone structure under her jacket as her clean hair moved lightly across his bare forearm. She turned her face up to him, a white oval in the darkness. There was absolutely nothing Dushau about her, nothing even faintly suggestive of female. Yet-a guarding knot inside of him loosened. He felt tension draining from his neck muscles where the glands stirred comfortably. He let his aching fingertips sound the whule strings, suggesting a more intimate melody, mid was not surprised when Krinata's fingers finished the tune of the lovers' song.
Slowly, as if she were fighting an impulse stronger than she was, her hands slipped upward over his chest and sought the sensitive points at the base of his neck with the unerring accuracy of the sexually mature Dushau. But there was a tentative innocence to her exploration that was more erotic than the most experienced bride's touch.
He fell his lips form words put of a softly expelled breath. "Oh. Krinata, no..."
If she were truly Takora—truly a Center—she would know better than to court such a danger. But even if she'd been Takora, she was now human and facing death. Were her needs really so very different from those of a Dushau?
But even if it would help her, it was stirring him and so it must stop. He would have to find the strength.
Suddenly Krinata jerked up, staring into the darkness behind Jindigar. She shrank from what she saw there. Jindigar turned, half afraid that she was hallucinating, tapping into Eithlarin's world somehow.
Between them and the fire at the far end of the room was the silhouette of a Dushau woman, and Jindigar knew instantly that it was Darllanyu. As she moved toward them he also knew that she'd heard the melody of lovers plucked by Krinata's fingers in tandem with his own unmistakable touch on the strings.
Sharing music on that level was a very great intimacy that he had not yet permitted Dar. And she had certainly noticed that he'd cloaked himself and Krinata in privacy from the rest of the Oliat. He rearranged the linkages to include Dar, bracing, for he knew she was now almost free of the drug. The languid comfort Krinata had evoked in his body evaporated before the sharp heat of Dar's presence.
He stood up to confront her, gathering the poise of the Center around himself, but feeling more like an Active Priest than anyone competent to work Oliat.
Darllanyu announced, //Trinarvil says she'll be here before midnight to give Eithlarin the stimulant—and then we'll try our plan.// Then she shifted her gaze to Krinata.
Darllanyu could only be seeing a shadowy hint of Krinata, but through Oliat awareness she knew what they'd felt. The strain was evident as she asked, //Jindigar, is there any reason for me to wait for you after Dissolution?//
Unexpectedly Jindigar was paralyzed by a rush of alarm, as if he stood in a ship that had suddenly lost internal gravity. Krinata answered in the tone and cadence of Takora, //Only that you are his mate. It's gone too far, Darllanyu. If you leave him now, he won't mate this time. Don't do that to him– please don't.// She gathered her jacket around her and cut across the Temple to the front door.
Darllanyu turned to stare after her, astonishment suffusing the now open linkages. Several moments later, as Jindigar was still frantically searching for something to say, Darllanyu observed, //If she really is Takora, she knows that since I can no longer have children, you may as well choose the mate best suited to you.//
His heart pounded wildly at the mere thought that she might leave him. But then, what of her, if Krinata had to kill him? //That mate is still you, Dar.//
//Do you regret that?//
//No. I thought you understood that I'd learned that lesson
when she was Ontarrah.//, . .
//Then why does she attract you so? Why is this happening? I'm not going to be even semirational about it much longer. Explain it to me, Jindigar.//
//I can't. I don't understand it. But as soon as we Dissolve, she'll be out of our lives. Just let me have the chance to prove that to you.//
//Why me, Jindigar?//
//Because you're so beautiful and you do things to me that no one else has the power to do. Krinata's right—I've chosen you. There won't be anyone else this time. I thought it was mutual.//
//It was. Or, at least I thought so, until I saw what Krinata is to you. Jindigar, if you'd chosen me, it wouldn't be possible to respond to Krinata like that.//
//It isn't the same!// he insisted.
//Maybe not biologically, but psychologically it is. Otherwise, why did you choose to cut Eithlarin off when Krinata was the actual source of the disruption? You could have cut Krinata off. Even if Krinata had died, it wouldn't have hurt her—she'd only reincarnate again. But Eithlarin has lost her chance at Completion!//
//She's not dead yet,// argued Jindigar doggedly while his mind gnawed at the insidious question Dar had posed. Even if prompted by onset-induced jealousy, it was a good question. Krinata/Takora approved of his choice, but that was no evidence that he'd been right.
//Dar, much of what a Center has to do is done on perception of shaleiliu, using the Aliom "strike." Maybe I was wrong– maybe I can't risk Krinata just because, on some level, I do believe she was Takora—and I can't do that to her twice. I almost couldn't do it to Eithlarin. It was a "strike," Dar. There's no reasoning behind it. No way to judge it this soon.//
//You're not really answering me.//
//When you've been Center, maybe we can discuss it.//
//Why do I get the impression that you've discussed it with Krinata?//
//Because I have. Center to Center.//
//Jindigar!//*
She felt that a part of him did not belong exclusively to her, which, in Onset as she was, seemed an intolerable threat. Jindigar already felt the same about her. Dwelling on it would only make it worse. He tried again to explain in terms a non-Center could grasp. Ill set a close, tight link to Eithlarin. She chose to go—wherever she is-.// He turned to Eithlarin, opening the linkages so Dar would feel the gaping void and the whispering static of the link. //We all had a part in what's happened. An Oliat, more than any other bound entity, is an integrated singularity. The Center can't do anything the Oliat as a whole doesn't do. No officer's needs prevail, and no officer is free of the consequences.//