A Time of Omens - Katharine Kerr [74]
“Shan’t!” He tossed his head in irritation. “Don’t speak of it.”
She knew his moods and let the subject drop.
“I found a marvel, Dalla. The islands of which your friend spoke? They’ve rebuilt Rinbaladelan there, but it’s a poor thing, all small and flimsy, wood where once stood stone.”
“You found them? You didn’t tell me that!”
He shrugged, then rose, standing for a moment to frown at the ruined garden. Twilight gathered purple in the sky and dropped shadows round him like rain. Wind ruffled his yellow hair with a flash of palpable light. At moments like these Dalla found herself wondering who or what he might be, and where they might be, as well, if perhaps even she’d died and all this bright country was only an illusion of life built of memory and longing. It seemed that her very wondering threatened to destroy the world round her. The hill upon which they stood dissolved and began to float away in tendrils of mist, while the garden below became only a pile of weeds and sticks. Evandar grew as thin as a shadow himself, a colored shadow cast upon empty air. Her heart thudded in her throat.
“Don’t go!” The words seemed torn out of her. “I love you.”
All at once he stood solidly in front of her, and the hands that caught her shoulders, the mouth that caught her own, were warm and substantial. He kissed her again, his mouth all hunger, his hands pulling her tight against him. Together they sank to their knees, then lay down, clasped in each other’s arms. She lost all awareness of her body, if indeed it were anything more than a mere image or form of a body, yet she could feel him, twined round, feel the energy pulsing from him as tangible as flesh, feel the power flowing from her own essence as well to mingle with his, while they shared an ecstasy more intense than any sexual pleasure she’d ever known. On waves of sensation that made them both cry aloud they seemed to soar, a twined, twinned consciousness.
And yet, afterward, as always, she couldn’t quite remember what had happened to make her feel that way. They lay on the hillside, clasped in each other’s arms like an ordinary pair of lovers, and yet, without her conscious thought, whatever illusions of clothing that they wore had returned. She felt cool, alert, almost preternaturally calm, and he merely smiled at her as if he were surprised at what they’d shared. Yet when he released her, she saw the garden blooming down below, renewed and glorious.
“I love you as well,” he said, as if nothing had interrupted their earlier talk. “Dalla, Dalla, I thought I was so clever when I lured you here, but you’re the hunter and the snare both. And in the end you’ll abandon me, no doubt, like some animal left dead so long in a trap that its fur’s all rotted and spoilt.”
She pulled away from him and sat up, running her hands through her long tangle of hair. Already her hands and the hair itself felt perfectly normal to her, no different from the flesh she remembered. He lay back on one elbow and watched, his face as stricken as a man who’s been told he’ll hang on the morrow.
“In the end you’ll force me to go,” she said at last. “I love you too much to stay and watch you die into nothingness.”
“That’s a cruel speaking.”
“Is it? What would you have me do instead?”
“I don’t know.” He paused, then shook his head. “By those gods you speak of, I’m weary tonight. I went a long way, seeking out those islands. You should see them for yourself.”
“I want to, yes. I wish I could talk with Jill about them.”
“Why can’t you? Go with my blessing, my love.”
“It’s not that. I just never have enough time to say much once I find her, before the vision breaks, I mean.”
“Well, if you insist on going only in vision.”
“And how else am I supposed to go?”
“Are you not here in the world between all worlds? Wait! Forgive me. I forget you don’t know. Come with me, my love, and you shall learn to walk the roads.” He hesitated, cocking his head to one side like a dog. “Where’s Elessario?”
“I don’t know.”
“Let’s just go take a look at her.