He breathed in the scent of her, absorbed the sensation of her skin against his own. And then he raised his head, finding her lips, kissing her again, deeply, lingeringly, as if tonight meant forever. He used his mouth, his hands, the touch of his weary, contented body pressed close against hers, to give her all the pleasure he had meant to give her, to make love to her as he had wanted to make love to her, to give her the release he had taken from her so unexpectedly… . Until at last he knew from her sighs and her cries and the way she clung to him that she had found her own joy at last.
He held her for a while, until her breathing slowed, falling into the rhythm of his own. And then her knowing, skillful hands began to do their work again, caressing him, guiding him with a sensual skill that he had never known before, exploring him more eagerly as he began to respond…. But there was no urgency this time; the pleasure of their intimacies went on and on, rising to meet in a peak of dizzying sensation, falling away again into warm dreaming valleys, and finally into sleep.
The sun rose, the light of the new day shone in on two sleeping forms, husband and wife twined together into the illusion of one; and in their separate dreams, for a time, a separate peace.
TIAMAT: Carbuncle
Moon Dawntreader sat gazing out across the circle of gathered sibyls, entrepreneurs, and landholders, holding the expressionless mask of the Queen firmly on her face. She had had to face these people, or others like them, virtually every day for over eighteen years, listening as she did now to the cacophony of their voices as they settled into their seats. Once most of the voices had been full of enthusiasm and new ideas. The arguments had been petty and annoying then, and the sense of hope and progress has always outweighed them.
The arguments had gotten louder and the complaints more bitter in the years since she had turned her back on the pursuit of progress, to devote her time and resources to the mers. Because she could not tell anyone the whole truth, most of the Council members reacted as though she had gone slightly mad… until sometimes, facing them like this, even she had wondered if maybe they were right.
BZ— She closed her eyes, silently reciting the name like an unwilling prayer. Remembering his voice speaking to her, as it had done again yesterday; calling her away into the shimmering sea of light/sound/absence that had been their secret meeting place for nearly four years now—calling her away for what would be the last time before he arrived on Tiamat in the flesh, with the Hegemony. Their fragile, fleeting contact, his encouragement and reassurance, her memories, had given her solace and strength through these increasingly difficult bureaucratic ordeals, the endless testing of her resolve and her faith. And now, at last, he was returning—
And what did she want… hope for… expect, when they met again…? She let her mind fall inward, the cacophony fading around her as she tried to picture his face, imagine how it had changed, in what ways; wondering whether she would even recognize him when they met again. She had known him for such a short time, so long ago. It was hard after so long to remember his face, even though—or perhaps because—it had been so unlike the faces that had surrounded her all her life, and through all the years since then. His voice, his smile, the gentleness of his touch … did they belong to a real man or only the dream of a shadow? When his return had been impossible, or even years away, his memory had been a refuge from the burdens and disappointments of her life, her secret fantasies of remembered passion had been a release and an escape. But now that he was about to become a part of her reality, suddenly she found that she had no refuge left….
She shook her head, shaking free the images that were choking out the present of things that must be faced down and lived up to and dealt with today, whether she had the strength to deal with them or not. Sparks turned in his seat to look at her, his eyes questioning and impatient. She met his gaze, as the last tendrils of someone else’s image faded across his face. Looking at him she felt a final, disorienting slip of perception, as if his face was the stranger’s, as if she barely remembered who he was.
She looked away again, realizing with sudden sorrow that it was not her imagination that had made her husband into a stranger, or driven her to seek solace from a shadow The tragedy in the Pit had only been the blow that had finally opened the fractures in something that had once been whole and perfect, and as precious to her as life. She did not understand how they had let this happen to them … even though she had watched it happening, for years. She did not even know at what point this moment had become inevitable—or whether it had been inevitable all along, from the moment she had heard the sibyl voice calling her away.
She looked at Tammis sitting across the room beside Danaquil Lu, his new father-in-law; at the trefoils that lay against their shirts like shining eyes, gazing back at her. Tammis’s tragic calling had not only split the cracks of her marriage, it had done something equally painful to the son’s relationship with his father. Even Tammis’s wedding to Merovy had done nothing to help the situation; afterwards Sparks had seemed more remote and unapproachable than ever. His eyes had turned her back when she would have asked him why; and so had her son’s.
She glanced at Jerusha PalaThion, sitting on her left; sitting with an empty seat beside her, as she always did, marking the absence of the man they both still missed so often, and so deeply. Moon saw in Jerusha’s face the price of her loss, the loneliness and doubt she still held fiercely inside. Jerusha had never shared her emotions easily, after a lifetime spent among strangers—first her own people, and then the Tiamatans. Moon studied the depths of sorrow in her eyes; wishing that there was something she could do for the woman who had been her steadfast and unexpected friend for so many years … wishing there was something she could do to help herself. Jerusha looked up and smiled, more a grimace, as Moon gathered herself at last to speak the unavoidable words that would open the Council meeting.
“Summer and Winter—” she said, her voice surprisingly even. She folded her hands on the tabletop before her in a white-knuckled imitation of control, waiting for their silence and attention. “I have received another message through the Transfer. Preparations are complete for the offworlders’ return to Tiamat. They are ready to send their ships—and a new Hegemonic government—here from Kharemough.” She waited again as the flood of excitement, wonder and consternation rose around her, and drained away; waiting until at last there were coherent questions to be answered.
“How long will it be, then?” Sewa Stormprince asked, asking for them all. Moon saw the mixed emotions on the woman’s face, a reflection of the expressions all around the room.
“A matter of weeks,” she said, feeling the spin of her own disbelief make her dizzy, as if hearing the words spoken aloud had somehow made them more real. “I can only tell you that I believe the new government will be more just toward us, and that all we have done to develop our resources has not been an exercise in futility. But there is the matter of the mers—”
She broke off, as the faces that had brightened with relief and sudden interest turned annoyed, or turned away, already lost in speculation about the Return. The resentment against the changes she had made, redirecting the resources of the Sibyl College toward her study of the mers, had cost her a loss of support that Capella Goodventure and the traditionalist Summers had scarcely made up for. She had angered and alienated the Winters and even the Summers she had fought so hard to win to her original visions of a new Tiamat. She had done her work too well, all those years, driven by the same compulsion that now drove her to redirect her vision; so that redirecting it had proved twice as difficult.