Andrew turned white as he listened. “What can be done about it?”
“I don’t know,” Damon said honestly. “I’ll do what I can.” He passed a weary hand over his forehead. “I wish I had some kirian to give her. But for now, what she needs is reassurance, and only you can give her that. Come and try.”
Ellemir had washed Callista’s tear-stained face, combed and braided her hair, and put her into her nightgown. When she saw Andrew, her eyes filled with tears again.
“Andrew, I did try! Don’t hate me! I nearly… nearly…”
“I know.” He took her fingers in his. “You should have told me exactly what it was that you were afraid of, love.”
“I couldn’t.” Her eyes were full of guilt and pain.
“I meant what I said before, Callista. I love you, and I can wait for you. As long as I have to.”
She clung tightly to his hand. Damon bent over her. He said, “Elli will sleep with you tonight. I want her close to you all the time. Are you in any pain?”
She nodded, biting her lip. Damon said, “Ellemir, when you dressed her, were there any burns or blackening?”
“Nothing serious. A blackened patch on the inside of one thigh,” Ellemir said, putting aside the nightgown, and Andrew, hovering, looked with horror at the scorched mark on the flesh. Did the psi force strike like lightning, then? Damon said, “No scarring, probably. But, damn it, Callie, I hate to have to ask, but…”
“No,” she said quickly, “he did not penetrate me.”
Damon nodded, obviously relieved, and Andrew, looking at the blackened burn mark, suddenly realized, in horror, why Damon had asked.
“Andrew’s not hurt much, a bump on the head, no concussion. But if you’re having pains, I’d better check you.” At her half-voiced protest he said gently, “Callista, I was monitoring psi mechanics when you were only a child. That’s right, lie on your back. Not so much light, Elli, I can’t see much in this light.” Andrew thought that sounded odd, but as Ellemir dimmed the lights, Damon nodded approval. He beckoned Andrew close. “I wish to hell I’d had the sense to show you this a long time ago.”
He moved his fingertips over Callista’s body, not touching her, about an inch above her nightgown. Andrew blinked, seeing a soft glowing light follow his fingertips, faint swirling currents, pulsing here and there with dim clouded spirals of color.
“Look. Here are the main nerve channels—wait, I want you to see a normal pattern first. Ellemir?”
Obediently she stretched out beside Callista. Damon said, “Look, the main currents, the channels on either side of the spine, positive and negative, and branching out from them, the main centers: forehead, throat, solar plexus, womb, base of the spine, genitals.” He pointed out the spiraling centers of bright light. “Ellemir is an adult, sexually awakened woman,” he said with quiet detachment. “If she were a virgin, the currents would be the same, only these lower centers would be less bright, carrying less energy. This is the normal pattern. In a Keeper, these currents have been altered, by conditioning, to cut off the impulses from the lower channels, the same channels which carry sexual energies and psi force. In a normal telepath—Ellemir has a considerable amount of laran— the two forces arise together at puberty and after certain upheavals, which we call threshold sickness, settle down to work selectively, carrying one or the other as the need arises, and all powered by the same force in the mind. Sometimes the channels overload. Remember how I warned you when we worked in the matrix about temporary impotence? But in a Keeper, the psi forces handled are so enormous that a two-way flow would be too strong for any single body to handle unless the channels are kept completely clear for psi force. So the upper channels are separated from the lower ones, which handle sexual vitality, and there are no backflows. What we have here”—he gestured to Callista, and Andrew was absurdly reminded of a lecture-demonstrator in anatomy—“is a major overload on the channels. Normally the psi forces flow around the sexual centers, without involving them. But look here.” He gestured, showing Andrew that Callista’s lower vital centers, so clear in Ellemir, were dully luminous, pulsing like inflamed wounds, a heavy, unhealthy, sluggish swirling. “There has been sexual awakening and stimulation, but the channels which would normally carry off those impulses have been blocked and short-circuited by the Keeper’s training.” Gently he laid his hands against her body, touching one of the swirling currents. There was a definite, audible snap, and Callista moaned.
“That hurt? I was afraid so,” Damon apologized. “And I can’t even clear the channels. There’s no kirian in the house, is there? You’d never be able to stand the pain, otherwise.”
This was all Greek to Andrew, but he could see the turgid, dull-red swirl which, in Callista, replaced the smooth luminous pulses he could see in Ellemir’s body.
“Don’t worry about it now,” Damon said. “It may clear itself after you’ve slept.”
Callista said faintly, “I think I could sleep better with Andrew holding me.”
Damon replied compassionately, “I know how you feel, breda, but it wouldn’t be wise. Once you have actually begun responding to him, there are two conflicting sets of reflexes trying to work at once.” He turned to Andrew, with grave emphasis. “I don’t want you to touch her, not at all, until the channels are clear again!” He added sternly to Callista, “That means both of you.”
Ellemir got into bed beside Callista, covered them both. Andrew noticed that the swirling luminous channels had faded to invisibility again and wondered how Damon had made them visible. Damon, picking up the thought, said, “No trick, I’ll show you how it’s done sometime. You have enough laran for that. Why don’t you get into Callista’s bed and try to sleep? You look as if you need it. I’m going to stay here and monitor Callista until I know she’s not going into crisis.”
Andrew lay down in Callista’s bed. It smelled, still, with the faint fragrance of her hair, the scent she always used, a delicate flowery perfume. For a time he lay awake in restless misery, thinking that he had done this to Callista. She had been right all along! He could see Damon, silent in the armchair, brooding, silent, watching over them, and it seemed for a moment that he saw Damon not as a physical being, but as a network of magnetic currents, electrical fields, a network, a crisscross of energies. At last he fell into a restless doze.
Andrew slept little that night. His head ached unendurably, and every separate nerve in his body seemed to be screaming with tension. Now and then he started awake, hearing Callista moan or cry out in her sleep, and he could not help nightmarishly reliving his failure. It was getting light outside when he saw Damon slip quietly from his chair and go toward his own room. Andrew slid out of bed and followed him. Damon, in the half-light looked exhausted and grave. “Couldn’t you sleep either, kinsman?”
“I was asleep for a while.” Andrew thought that Damon looked terrible. Damon picked up the thought and grinned wryly. “Riding all day yesterday, and all the hullabaloo last night… but I’m fairly sure she’s not going into crisis or convulsions this time, so I can slip away and get a nap.” He turned into his own half of the suite. “How do you feel?”
“I’ve got the great-granddaddy of all splitting headaches!”
“And a few other aches and pains, I should imagine,” Damon said. “Even so, you were lucky.”
Lucky! Andrew heard that, incredulous, but Damon did not explain. He went to the window and flung it wide, standing in the icy blast and looking out into the white flurry of snow. “Damn. Looks like we’re set for a blizzard. Worst thing that could possibly happen. Now, especially, with Callista—”
“Why?”
“Because, man, when it snows in the Kilghard Hills, it snows. We could be weathered in for thirty to forty days. I had hoped to send to Neskaya Tower for some kirian—I don’t think Callista’s made any yet—in case I have to clear her channels. But no man could travel in this; I couldn’t ask it.” He slumped, exhausted, on the windowsill. Andrew exclaimed, seeing the icy win
d stirring his hair, “Don’t go to sleep there, damn it, you’ll get pneumonia,” and closed the casement. “Go and rest, Damon. I can look after Callista. She’s my wife, and my responsibility.”
Damon sighed. “But with Esteban disabled I’m Callie’s nearest kinsman. And I put you two in rapport under the matrix. That makes it my responsibility; by the oath I took.” He stumbled, felt Andrew catch him by the shoulder and support him upright. He said blurrily, “But I’ll have to try to sleep or I won’t be able to help if she needs me.”
Andrew steered him toward the tumbled bed, and he caught a thread of Andrew’s thought, a troubled memory, conscience-stung, that Andrew had been for a time voyeur to Damon’s lovemaking with Ellemir. Damon wondered fuzzily why that bothered Andrew, was too tired to care. He crawled into the disheveled bed. He forced himself to clarity for a moment. “Stay near the women. Let Callista sleep, but if she wakes and she’s in pain, call me.” He rolled over on his back, trying to see the Terran’s face clear before his blurring eyes. “Don’t touch Callista… damnably important… not even if she asks you to. It could be dangerous…”
“I’ll take my chances, Damon.”
“Dangerous for her,” Damon said urgently, thinking, damn it, if I can’t trust him I’ll have to go back…
Andrew, picking up the thought, said, “All right, I promise. But I want you to explain that, when you can,” and Damon said, with a weary sigh, “That’s a promise,” and let himself fall into the blankness of sleep. Andrew stood beside him, watching the drawn lines of weariness smooth into sleep, then covered his friend carefully and went away. He instructed Damon’s body-servant to let him sleep, then, on an impulse, since Ellemir was always awake so early, and it would be awkward to have someone come looking for her, he told the man to send a message to the hall-steward that they had all been awake very late and no one was to disturb them until sent for.
He went back and lay down on Callista’s bed. After a time he fell asleep again. He woke suddenly, aware that he had slept for hours. It was daylight but still dark, the snow blowing and flurrying past the windows. Callista and Ellemir were lying side by side in his bed, but as he watched, Ellemir sat .up, crawled carefully over Callista and tiptoed to his side.
“Where is Damon?”
“Sleeping, I hope.”
“Has no one sent for me?” Andrew explained what he had done, and she thanked him. “I must go dress. I will use Callista’s bath if you don’t mind, I don’t want to disturb Damon. I’ll borrow something of hers to wear too.” Moving like a shadow, she collected clothes from Callista’s wardrobe. Andrew watched with unfocused resentment—would she rather disturb Callista than Damon?—but evidently the familiar presence of her twin did not penetrate Callista’s heavy sleep.
Without volition, Andrew recalled Ellemir standing over Callista last night, naked and unconcerned about it. He supposed that if someone was used to having his or her mind completely open, physical nakedness would not mean all that much. But he found himself recalling a moment last night when it seemed that it was Ellemir in his arms, warm, willing, responding to him as Callista could not… Disquited, he turned away. Scalding heat flooded his face, and a twinge in his body reminded him painfully of last night’s fiasco. Did Ellemir know, he wondered; that he was part of her lovemaking, was she aware of him too?
Ellemir watched him for a moment with a troubled smile, then, biting her lip, went into the bath, trailing an armful of blue and white linen.
Andrew, fighting for composure, looked down at his sleeping wife. She looked pale and tired, with great dark circles like bruises under her closed eyes. She was lying on her side, one arm partly covering her face, and Andrew recalled, with surging pain, how he had seen her lying like that, in the dim light of the overworld. Prisoner in the catmen’s hands, her body in the dark caves of Corresanti, she had come to him in spirit, in sleep; bruised, bleeding, exhausted, terrified. And he could do nothing for her. His helplessness had maddened him then; now he felt again all the torment of helplessness, at her lonely ordeal.
Slowly she opened her eyes.
“Andrew?”
“I’m here with you, my love.” He saw pain move visibly across her face, like a shadow. “How are you feeling, darling?”
“Terrible,” she said with a wry grimace. “As if I had been caught in a stampede of wild oudrakhi.” Who but Callista, he wondered, could have made a joke at this moment? “Where is Damon?”
“Sleeping, love. And Ellemir went to bathe and dress.”
She sighed, closing her eyes for a moment. “And I had thought today I would be truly a bride. Evanda be praised that it was Damon and Ellemir who heard us, and not that brat Dezi with his taunts.” Andrew flinched at the thought. It had been Dezi’s jeering, indeed, which had prompted the fiasco.
He said, with emphasis, “I wish I had broken his damn neck!”
She sighed, shaking her head. “No, no, it was not his doing. We are both grown people, we know enough to make our own decisions. What he said was a rudeness. Among telepaths, you learn very quickly not to pry into such matters, and if you should learn, unwillingly, of such a private matter, there are courtesies. It was unforgivable, but he is not to blame for what happened after, my love. It was our choice.”
“My choice,” he said, lowering his eyes. She reached for his hand. Her small fingers felt cold. Again he saw the pain, moving in her face, and said, “Damon said I was to call him if you woke in pain, Callista.”
“Not yet. Let him sleep. He wearied himself for us. Andrew—”
He knelt beside her and she held out her arms. “Andrew; hold me; just for a moment. Let me lie in your arms… just let me feel you close to me…”
He moved in swift response to the words, to the appeal in them, thinking, that even after last night, she still loved him, still wanted him. Then, remembering, he drew back. He said, heartwrung, “My darling, I promised Damon I would not touch you.”
“Oh, Damon, Damon, always Damon,” she said frantically. “I’m so sick and miserable, I just want you to hold me—” She broke off and let her eyes fall shut again with a forlorn sigh. He ached with the longing to fold her in his arms, not now with desire—that had receded very far—simply to hold her close, protect her, soothe her, comfort her pain. But his promise held him motionless, and she said at last, “Oh, I suppose he’s right, damn him. He usually is.” But he saw the pain again behind her eyes; aging her, drawing her face into hollows of exhaustion. Somehow, and the thought horrified him, he could think only of Leonie’s face, worn, drawn, weary, old.
Again memory surged over him, the moment last night when for a moment they had been fully submerged in the lovemaking of Damon and Ellemir. She had wanted it, welcomed it, begun to respond to him, only after that full sharing with the other couple. Again the harsh throb of pain in his groins, the agonizing memory of failure, blurred the excitement. His love for Callista was not an atom less, but he felt an awful, indefinable sense that something had been spoiled. A breath of intrusion, as if Damon and Ellemir, dear and close as they were, had somehow come between himself and Callista.
Callista’s eyes were filled with tears. In another moment, heedless of his promise, he would have caught her into his arms, but Ellemir, fresh and rosy from her bath, dressed in something he had seen Callista wearing, came back into the room. She saw that Callista was awake and went directly to her.
“Feeling better, breda?”
Callista shook her head. “No. Worse, if anything.”
“Can you get up, love?”
“I don’t know.” Callista moved tentatively. “I suppose I must. Will you call my maid, Elli?”
“No, I won’t. No one else is to lay a finger on you, Damon said, and I won’t have those silly girls gossiping. I’ll look after you, Callie. Andrew, you had better tell Damon she’s awake.” He found Damon already up, shaving in the luxurious bath which duplicated the one in their half of the suite. He gestured to Andrew to come in. “Does Callista
seem any better?”
Then he noticed Andrew’s hesitation. “Hell, I never thought… are there nudity taboos in the Empire?”
Andrew felt oddly that it was he and not Damon who ought to be embarrassed. “Some cultures, yes. Mine among them. But I’m in your world, so I guess it’s up to me to get used to your customs, not you to mine.”
It was stupid to feel embarrassed, Andrew knew, or angry, outraged at the memory of Damon last night, standing naked over Callista, looking down on her fragile bare battered body.
Damon shrugged, saying casually, “There aren’t many taboos like that here. A few among the cristoforos, or for the presence of nonhumans or across generations. I wouldn’t willingly appear naked in a group of my father’s contemporaries, or Dom Esteban’s, for instance. It’s not forbidden, though, certainly not embarrassing the way you seem to be embarrassed. I wouldn’t walk out naked among a group of the maid-servants for no reason either, but if the house was afire, or something, I wouldn’t hesitate. A man my own age, married to my wife’s sister…” He shrugged helplessly. “It never occurred to me.”
Andrew realized he should have guessed last night, when Ellemir never seemed to notice.
Damon splashed water on his face, followed it with some green, pleasant-smelling herbal lotion. The smell reminded Andrew poignantly of Callista’s little still-room. Damon laughed, shrugging his shirt over his shoulders. He said, “As for Elli, you ought to be relieved. It means she has accepted you as part of the family. Would you want her to be embarrassed about you, and carefully keep herself covered in your presence, as if you were a stranger?”