Part 28 (1/2)

I don't foresee any diminis.h.i.+ng in either mind. As I told you, rest from any mental stress, plenty of sleep and solitude will cure them.

Relief flowed from them to her and back again.

Any idea when their cures will be complete? Jeff the Prime spoke.

I haven't a clue, Isthia blithely rea.s.sured them and felt their misgivings. Heavens, I've never treated such overextended minds before. Metamorphically, Damia buffered Afra and you two cus.h.i.+oned her even as she blocked and destroyed Sodan.

There was a brief pause. Does she blame herself for not saving The Rowan's voice faltered.

Yes, but that was inevitable and we cannot spare her that grief.

You will be surprised when you do see her, and Isthia was rather glad there was no-one in the Tower room to see her smile. She liked and admired her son's mate.

It was scarcely Angharad's fault that she had overcompensated her children for the vicissitudes of her early childhood.

Surprised? Jeff asked.

Agreeably, Isthia replied. She might as well predispose them.

The incident has matured the girl.

Rite of pa.s.sage? Jeff asked.

A rocky grievous one, to be sure, but considering Damia's 33i personality, only that sort of experience would produce the proper tempering.

Aren't you being hard on Damia? the Rowan began.

I'm being objective, I a.s.sure you. You should be grateful for her fort.i.tude and resilience. She could have been consumed and broken.

But she is well? She will recover?

Given time. No more headaches, Angharad, or lapses of concentration? Isthia asked, skilfully diverting the contact into a new channel.

No, because we ve cut down the traffic, Jeff replied brusquely.

Sometimes FT&T expects too much of its Primes.

Both of us, and he sent his mother a rueful grin, are letting our a.s.sistants handle inanimate stuff. Gives them a feeling of accomplishment and us a brief respite. And Aurigae got their ears bent for the sort of loads they were having Damia 'port. She's not to do that again. You did say that Afra's going to be all right?

Isthia chuckled. Oh, you'll notice a change in him, too.

All for the good. Then, before her inner amus.e.m.e.nt broke through, she hastily ended the contact. Goodbye now. Jeran wants his chair back. I'll keep you informed.

Because they were so isolated and because they had been in the habit of being wide-open in every sense to each other, Damia and Afra both experienced the first tendrils of query.

Damia censored the incident. Afra ignored it. Neither mentioned it; Damia because she wasn't going to get caught twice the same way; Afra because he didn't trust his mind.

Not only had Isthia left them a diet sheet - easily digestible foods at first, graduating to some of her more esoteric and exotic combinations - but also she had left them a work sheet. As her note reminded them, the cabin was not automated.

'Nothing to tax your energies but light ch.o.r.es to keep the place ticking over and to combat boredom.' 'I'm not sure that I like her going on about boredom,' Damia told Afra as they looked over the roster.

Afra's eyes gleamed, but his finger running down her cheek took the sting out of his words. 'We both know our quick-silver Damia, restless, curious -'I need rest,' and Damia pretended a haughty air, 'and I got an overdose of curiosity too recently to indulge in another.

I shall vegetate, right along with you, Afra Lyon!' 'We are not precisely vegetating, love,' Afra said and demonstrated.

They were, however, scrupulous about doing the various tasks Isthia had set: keeping the cabin neat and clean, tending the garden planted around it, weeding the vegetable plot, reinforcing the guard fencing to prevent forest Damia's eyes widened in protest. 'But you are respected life from browsing the young plants, and fis.h.i.+ng. The lake was stocked with many tasty varieties.

Damia liked fis.h.i.+ng, liked the excuse to sit beside Afra, shoulders and legs touching as they sat on the bank waiting for the sparklers to rise to the bait. The enforced idleness of angling permitted Damia to satisfy her insatiable interest in every facet of her lover's childhood and early training, though she forcefully denounced such heartlessness.

'I guess I was a lot luckier in my parents than I knew,' Damia had to admit when he had finished with his early childhood trials.

'Even being sent away as an infant to Deneb?' Afra asked, his eyes intent on her expression She grimaced with chagrin. 'Yes, I was a right wagon, wasn't I?' 'Heavy duty big daddy wagon.' 'You don't have to agree!' 'Why not? I knew what you admit to.' 'But you're not supposed to agree!' Afra chuckled. 'If it's true, why not? It's perspective that counts, love. It isn't that I don't know your faults as I have tried to admit to mine - it's that I love you more because of them.' 'Love me for my faults? How stupid!' 'Should I ignore them because I love you?' 'Well.

'Nonsense. It's those odd quirks of yours that are endearing, not your very stellar qualities which I respect and admire. That could get tedious 'You mean, boring?' Damia suggested, eyeing him speculatively 'No, tedious, because then I'd have to watch everything I said and did, trying to be equally respectable and admirable.' and admired.' 'By you?' His soft voice was entreating and his look made her melt.

'I think,' she said in a deliberate way, playing with the long fingers that held one of her hands captive, 'that I have always admired and respected you, Afra. You always listened to me, even when I was a baby. You always made me feel as if you had time for no-one else in the Tower.' 'That's true enough, love.

'Did you love me then as a baby?' Damia could not quite erase the wistfulness.

'I loved you as a baby, but as a man loves an adorable, winsome child. I love you now as a man loves a vibrant, talented, s.e.xually aware young woman.

'Love me then, do.

At first, they kept about the house. Afra taught Damia how to do complicated origami until she was almost as fast fas.h.i.+oning them as he was. She taught him - or tried - to ride ponies from the small herd that often drifted to the lake in the evening. He had to keep his long legs either drawn up, nearly under his knees, or straight out on either side of the pony or they would drag on the ground. Damia found either position hilarious but mastered her mirth rather than prejudice Afra against the ponies as transportation.

As physical strength returned, they ranged wider; in part in response to the list of Isthia's ch.o.r.es. She was keeping track of some Earth species which had been judiciously added to Deneb's ecology. One such species were breeding pairs of raptors which had been established in the rough hills above her cabin. Isthia wanted to check on the nests and the success rate of fledging. With her maps and backpacks of food and trail supplies, Damia and Afra took advantage of a fine bright morning to accomplish that task.

'You have the longest legs,' Damia told him, somewhat admiring them, lightly haired, well-shaped, sinewy and tanned from long sunning.

'Nice knees.' 'I can say the same of yours, love,' he responded equably.

'Can't I ever get a rise out of you?' 'Oh, you do indeed,' Afra said mischievously, 'you do indeed.

'I didn't mean that! But you never lose your temper, or is that your Methody upbringing?' 'Losing one's temper over a trifle would definitely be considered unmannerly,' he replied.

'Maybe I'm the one who should have been raised by your parents,' she said with some exasperation.

'No, love, no!' he replied so fervently that she turned to look at him over her shoulder and managed to collide with a tree. 'Are you hurt?' 'What? From that little b.u.mp?' she demanded, annoyed with herself for being so clumsy. The sapling had caught her from cheek to knee and the impact had stung. She rubbed herself fiercely, gave the tree a pat. 'I probably hurt it far worse. Look, I've taken off all its new growth!' 'Hmmm, so you have. Let's hope Isthia does not intimately know every tree she planted.' Damia watched her way after that, wondering just how the bruises would come up. But shortly she was far more interested in the beautiful landscape for they had left the sheltering belt of forestry and were out on the rough hillsides, stepping from rock to gra.s.soid clump, or cutting through a bracken-like vegetation which, bruised by their hiking boots, gave off a pungent astringent odour.

They rested often, in deference to slack muscles and their convalescent state, but by midday had reached the craggy outcroppings where the raptors had nested. Using the high-power binoculars, Afra located the right cliff and the first nest 'No birds, no egg sh.e.l.ls.

Is that good?' He pa.s.sed the gla.s.ses to her 'We might try looking at the base of the cliff,' she said after a careful sweep. 'Seems to me the raptors clear the debris from the nest.' They had to climb over uneven ground to reach their objective but found nothing beyond fragments of sh.e.l.ls and bones, many of those cracked for the marrow.

They pushed on to examine the other four nests Isthia had listed and found two more before they came across a gus.h.i.+ng mountain stream where they decided to eat their lunch. They had appet.i.te for everything they'd thought to bring, washed down by the clear cold water of the creek.

Then they went on, still climbing up the tumbled greystone cliff.

When they finally came out on the height, Damia paused and, s.h.i.+elding her eyes, turned slowly, taking in the panorama below and almost all around them.

'It's breathtaking,' Afra said. 'I'd forgotten there could be so much world to see from one spot.