"You may be living still then," he reminded her. "Your uncles would do their utmost to keep me from taking you from this city, no matter what rights your husband granted me."
"I do not care. If you go, you must take me with you, living, and put me where I may wait for death without fear," she told him.
"Your husband's family would be—"
"I would be gone, so it hardly matters what they would be. My family might have to pay back my dowry, but otherwise they would not mind, since I can provide them money enough that no cost will come to them. I am something of an embarrassment to them now, and they would not be upset if I were no longer here." She sounded more saddened than angry, but her hands tightened. "If I am in a place where you are, I will be safe enough. You will not discourage me, Sanat Ji Mani. You have offered me a gift, and I accept it with full understanding."
"Perhaps," he said enigmatically, then went on, "since you have decided to be one of my blood, when you die I will aid you if I can. But I may not be able to, and if you are alone, you will have to be prepared to manage for yourself." He turned and looked at her, concern for her making his ariose voice a bit rougher than usual; his penetrating dark eyes held her as surely as his arms could. "Avasa Dani, be certain: to be one of my blood is not a decision to be made on a whim, or assuming you will have no risks. I cannot emphasize that enough. That is why I have repeated the dangers to you, so that you will encompass the whole of what you will become. You will not free yourself from the exigencies of life, for that would remove you from humanity. We do not dance on the burning ground, with Shiva, nor do we revel in the mortality of the living, knowing it will not easily touch us." As he said this, other memories, this time of Csimenae filled his mind, unbidden: she was still alive and in her remote self-styled adytum, far away in the fastness of the Pyrenees. "You will not be able to shape the world to your liking simply because you have come to my life."
"I had not supposed I could," said Avasa Dani, frowning slightly.
"Coming to my life is no guarantee of centuries for living," he added. "The world can impose upon you in ways you cannot escape."
"You made that clear before. I comprehend your reservations, or as much as I can do, living as I am." She reached out and took his hand, kissing his fingers one at a time. "Yet you tell me that what we do we do in love."
"If that is what we seek, yes," he said carefully. "There is fulfillment in love that cannot equal anything that dread and fear can offer."
"If what you have given me is any example of what those of your blood can do, then I must suppose that I can also achieve the same when I am like you." She smiled at him. "I do not wish to change to your life to remain your mistress; I am wholly cognizant that is impossible. You made it very clear that once I am like you, we can no longer be lovers, but that until the moment of my death, we can."
"That is so," said Sanat Ji Mani, watching her intently, and pulling his hand back from her.
"I have been missing you, these last months, and I am alive. I long to be embraced again, to know passion as you waken it in me." She
came up to him and sank onto his lap. "You do not know how much I treasure your love."
"You are willing to accept my life when you die?" he asked as he smoothed a few wisps of loose hair back from her face before enfolding her in his arms.
"I am willing to enter into your life when I die, to live as you live, to seek the living as you do, to keep myself in all the ways you have described; I know you will not always devote yourself to me, and that I must find others to nurture me once I die. I know that many I find I will have to approach subtly, unperceived but as a dream. I grasp it all. You have shown me what I will have to do in order to flourish, and I am certain I am capable of the life you describe. I am not a desperate woman wanting only to be rid of an inaccessible husband, I am looking beyond that, to what my life could be, were I like you," she said, her tone of voice gently musical. "I will be one with you through the blood-bond, and I will find love to sustain me."
"You do realize that those of my blood are hated and feared?" He kissed the arch of her brow. "Most of the living despise us, and seek to destroy us. Very few among them are capable of giving their love knowingly, and fewer still are willing to risk becoming—"
"Night demons?" she suggested. "Creatures of Shiva?"
"If you will," he granted her.
"You have found me, and others before me, and will find others after me," Avasa Dani said tranquilly. "I will find others, as well. I am content with that."
Sanat Ji Mani drew her close against him, "It will be necessary, if you are to survive. And there is solitariness even when there is love."
"Yes. I understand that," she said. "I may have lived my life thus far within the walls of my father's and my husband's house— and yours. But I have read widely, I have studied much, and lately, since you have allowed it, I have listened to the pilgrim Lum, and heard him tell of all he has seen, and I have wished— oh, I have wished— to see those things for myself, to know all the marvels that fill the world. I know it is unsafe in the world beyond these walls, but I am not afraid. What terrifies me more than anything you have described is that I might remain sequestered until the day I die, and know nothing more than the house of my father, my husband, and you. It
is not enough, Sanat Ji Mani. It is not enough." She kissed him slowly, her mouth soft on his. "I know what I want, no matter what may come," she said before she kissed him again, her acquiescence in the intensity of her embrace.
His hands moved over the silk of her garments, molding the fabric to the curves of her body, the urgency of his touch echoing her own. "Since you will have me, Avasa Dani…" He rose, lifting her in his arms as he did, and carried her to the window-niche on the far side of the room; it was wide and deep, with a dozen silk-covered cushions piled in it, opulent and inviting. He sank onto his knees and laid Avasa Dani on the cushions as the scents of the garden grew stronger. Slowly, luxuriously, he loosened her clothing. "You are magnificent," he whispered as he bent to kiss the rise of her breasts.
She trembled, feeling heat and chill at once. "You are
everything
," she murmured as his tongue flicked her nipple. Nothing in all her instruction for erotic pleasure had revealed what Sanat Ji Mani had imparted to her and which she welcomed now as the deliverance she sought; her skin tingled in excitation, her body softened, her mind floated. Gradually she surrendered to the rapturous sensations that had wakened with her desire. A delicious languor came over her as Sanat Ji Mani slid her garments back from her torso, to lavish kisses where the silk had been. "Yes. There," she breathed, as Sanat Ji Mani lifted her clothes from the top of her thighs and began lightly to stroke her hips and abdomen; her flesh trembled under his caress.
He was astonished and gratified by the frenzy of passion that welled in her; he responded to her every movement, every sigh, every nuance of reception she offered him. He felt her gather, gather, gather, and release in deep, blissful waves; he continued to fondle the sea-scented folds at the top of her thighs, seeing her amazement as she stared at him in disbelief. "There is more, Avasa Dani. I want you to know it."
"How…?" She closed her eyes as the vividness of her rapture took possession of her, more prolonged and profound than any she had known before; she gave herself over to ecstasy and Sanat Ji Mani. When Avasa Dani could trust herself to move again, she began by opening her eyes and turning her head; Sanat Ji Mani still lay beside her. "You knew it was…" She could not find the words to finish.
"Let us say, I sensed," he said, so gently that she wanted to weep.
"It is done?" she asked, though she had no doubt.
"It is done," he assured her.
She curled into a ball amid the cushions. "Good," she whispered.
He remained where he was until she began to drift into sleep; then he moved away from her, her fading elation still within him. He walked toward the door so silently that as he opened it, he found Hirsuma hovering near-by with no apparent reason to be there.
"My master," said Hirsuma, putting his hands together and bowing. "I did not know… that you were in your library."
Sanat Ji Mani regarded Hirsuma wearily. "If you must lie, then please lie well," he said. "You wanted to know what was happening in the library, did you not." He knew the answer, but waited to hear what Hirsuma might say.
"I was curious, my master. Nothing more. Just curious. All men are curious. I am no different: you are foreign, and—" He stopped as he saw the expression in Sanat Ji Mani's compelling eyes.
"Were you paid to spy on me, or was this simply an opportunity of the moment?" Sanat Ji Mani did not sound angry, but Hirsuma took a step back from him. "You may as well tell me now, for I will find out eventually."
"You will beat me," said Hirsuma, who expected nothing less. "Or you will order Garuda to beat me."
"No. I have said I do not beat my servants, and I will not make an exception for you, no matter what you have done." Sanat Ji Mani moved a short distance away from Hirsuma. "But you were warned what would happen if you continued on your disloyal course, so be all this on your head. You have persisted in your betrayal, and now you will answer for it. You will be dismissed, of course, and I will tell anyone who asks that you served me poorly."
Hirsuma smiled weakly. "An empty threat. You are a foreigner and my fathers have lived here for generation upon generation."
"You do them no honor," said Sanat Ji Mani with an inflection that struck Hirsuma as much as a sudden cold wind would.
"You are not the one to say so," Hirsuma blustered, his fear making him want to run from Sanat Ji Mani, now much more imposing than Hirsuma had ever thought he was.
"Perhaps," said Sanat Ji Mani. "Still, you know what will become of you now. You may collect your belongings, then come to the servants' hall; you will leave from there, where all the others may see you go."
Hirsuma shook his head. "I will go, but not with the household watching."
"There, I am afraid, you are wrong," Sanat Ji Mani said smoothly. "You will do as I say, or I will find you and take you before a magistrate, and I will have all the household to support my complaint of you. That will be far more unpleasant than leaving from the servants' hall; suborned servants are branded, are they not."
"Yes," Hirsuma said, turning pale.
"If you think you can leave this house secretly and I will not find you, you are mistaken," Sanat Ji Mani said; Hirsuma believed him. "Do not take too long. Garuda will have the servants waiting to see you go."
Hirsuma nodded in capitulation. "I will come there as soon as I have my belongings together."
"Good. Do not dawdle about it," Sanat Ji Mani told him before he slipped back into the library to light a few more of the oil-lamps that hung there.
A little while later there was a scratch on the door; Rojire said, "Hirsuma is gathering his things."
Sanat Ji Mani opened the door. "Thank you, old friend. Did you happen to notice how long he was trying to listen?"
"Not very long. Garuda has been observing him, as has Bohdil, and they are quick to tell me of anything suspicious." Rojire paused, glancing over his shoulder to be sure they were not under surveillance. "He has not conducted himself properly, and that offends the others. Had you not caught him, they would have, and they would have turned him out far more angrily than you will."
"Then it is just as well I discovered him." Sanat Ji Mani glanced at Avasa Dani, who was sleeping soundly. "If you will remain near-by until it is time for Hirsuma to leave?"
"Of course. It will not do to have another take up where Hirsuma has left off," Rojire said.
"And the next one might be more subtle than Hirsuma has been." Sanat Ji Mani frowned slightly. "Do you know to whom he has spoken? Is it that same scrawny rascal who has been following me and Rustam Iniattir?"
"I believe so. I gather he reports to one of the Sultan's deputies," said Rojire. "I have seen Hirsuma meet the fellow twice since he was told not to."
"Just as well to have him gone," said Sanat Ji Mani, his tone distant. "The other servants will be reassured."
"Yes," said Rojire. "I will do what I can to see how they respond when he is gone."
"Thank you," Sanat Ji Mani told him. "I must suppose that Hirsuma is not beyond causing mischief, and may go to Avasa Dani's family to speak against her, in the hope that accusations will be brought against me. I will have to avert that."
"Avasa Dani should be able to thwart any efforts they may make," Rojire pointed out. "She is a resourceful woman."
"Yes, she is," Sanat Ji Mani agreed. "I am often struck by it. But she is still a woman, and that may yet work against her in this city."
"Do you think she may be at risk?" Rojire asked.
"I do. And so do you, or we would not be having this discussion." Sanat Ji Mani paused, sunk in thought. "Something must be arranged, and soon. I will have to speak with her uncles."
