No Other Love Read online

  “Will you attend the Gathering tonight?” Saray sat down next to Merin.

  “Dulan has offered to take us,” Merin said.

  “A gathering is always an important and formal occasion,“ Saray noted. “Have you anything else to wear?”

  Merin suppressed an impolite urge to remind Saray that, thanks to her efforts, both Merin and Herne had arrived in Tathan with only the clothing they wore.

  “Since I see by your coif that you are an Oressian, you will want a head covering as well as a gown.” Saray stood, holding out a hand. “We will find something more fitting to the occasion than that uniform.”

  “I see nothing wrong with my uniform.” Stubbornly, Merin remained seated on the bench.

  “If you intend a deliberate insult to all those who will be present in their finest garments, then wear it.”

  Saray did not enter Merin’s mind. She felt nothing like the prickling sensation that had accompanied Osiyar’s joining with her thoughts. Still, she was aware of the compulsion of a powerful will. It was irresistible. Without a backward glance at her companions, Merin followed Saray into the house, to a bedchamber of white and pale green like all the other rooms she had seen, lit by silver lamps, with gauzy white curtains blowing across wide-open windows.

  The cat had prowled silently behind Saray. Now it jumped into the middle of the spotless white bed, where it sat upright, watching the women. Merin felt herself released from the power that Saray had exerted over he movements.

  “Why did you do that?” she asked Saray. “There was no need to compel me.”

  “You would have wasted time in a foolish argument which I would have won in the end,” Saray said, “because, if you think about it in a reasonable way, you will agree that I am right about this. It would be inexcusably rude of you to greet all of Tathan in that outfit.”

  “I have no intention of greeting all of Tathan,” Merin said. “I will stand quietly at one side of the hall to watch what happens.”

  “And vanish into the background? Is that how you protect yourself? I wonder that Herne ever noticed you.” Saray looked her over from head to foot with an expression that was not at all unfriendly. “You aren’t bad looking. You just need a little help. Now, let me see what I can find that you might wear tonight.”

  “Saray, I am not interested in this frivolity. Herne and I have one concern only, to return to our ship and to our own time.”

  “I am not being frivolous. Love is the most serious subject there is. Do you want to keep Herne interested in you, or not?” Saray laughed. “I have just the thing, and it has a matching headdress, so you cannot refuse to wear it.” With that, she vanished into the next room.

  Having made up her mind that she was absolutely not going to wear clothing chosen for her by Saray, Merin walked to the window, pulling back the curtain a little to look out at the green and white garden and the river. She could hear the sound of Herne’s voice coming from inside the house, followed by Dulan’s low, scratchy tones.

  A sound behind her made her leave the window, thinking that Saray had returned. It was not Saray. The cat was gone, and in its place on the bed sat a woman, her eyes fixed on Merin. She was almost transparent, the edges of her shape wavering a little.

  It was like looking into a slightly clouded mirror, or the surface of still water. The woman wore a flowing white gown, a short gold cloak was draped across her shoulders, and her face was Merin’s face. In three small details only did this apparition differ from Merin. Her curling hair was a light golden brown, she had no scar on her right cheek, and though Merin could not clearly see the color of her eyes, she had the impression that they were some other shade than her own.

  There was the sound of something dropping in the next room and a muttered exclamation from Saray. Merin looked toward the door. Not seeing Saray, she looked back to the bed.

  The woman was gone. Where she had been, the black and white cat sat once more. Merin took a step toward the bed. The cat arched its back, hissing at her, then leapt off the bed and ran out of the room.

  Shaking, Merin sank down onto a corner of the mattress. A continued clatter came from the next room, along with disjointed comments from Saray indicating that she was having trouble finding what she wanted. Merin was glad for the delay. It gave her a few minutes in which to compose herself. By the time Saray appeared once more, Merin was the very picture of Oressian reticence, eyes lowered, emotional barriers firmly in place. But behind the calm façade she was still so upset that she meekly accepted the costume of shining green and glittering jewels that Saray now pressed upon her, and promised she would wear it.

  “It’s lovely. Thank you.” Merin scarcely glanced at the outfit.

  “And these cosmetics, too.” Saray was so concerned with how Merin should look that she seemed completely unaware of Merin’s distress. “Use just a little of this powder on your cheeks, the cream on your lips, and paint around your eyes with this brush. The dress has been stored in khata wood, so you won’t need perfume.” Saray was packing all of these supplies and the dress into a wooden box as she spoke.

  “You are very kind.” Merin rose from the bed, relieved to find that her legs would support her. She took the box Saray handed to her. “Will you also attend the Gathering?”

  “I will appear. I am certain Dulan will have admonishing words to speak about my experiments and I will want to answer them in a way that will calm my friends. It seems I have become the cause of much dissension in Tathan.” Saray’s hand touched Merin’s shoulder. “I am not your enemy. I am truly sorry for what has happened to you and Herne. For reasons of her own, Ananka deliberately chose the two of you to be the subjects of our most ambitious attempt. I will do what I can to convince her to help you, but you must exercise patience. Tula and Dulan seem to think I can simply order Ananka to do something and it will be done. We work together, by merging our different abilities, and we cannot do it often because for a long time afterward we have no power left. The experiments that Dulan fears so much are rare events.”

  “I wish they had been rarer still,” said Merin.

  Chapter 13

  They had almost reached Tathan on their return trip before Merin could bring herself to speak about what had happened in Saray’s room.

  “You were more right than you realized, Dulan,” Merin said. “Saray told me the experiments exhaust not only her, but Ananka as well.”

  “I hoped when you went off with her,” Herne said, “that you would discover just this sort of useful information.”

  “I was compelled to go with her, but I don’t mind,” Merin told him, “because I saw Ananka.”

  “You what?” Herne stared at her. Dulan turned completely around in the front seat. Tula dropped the reins in his astonishment, thus allowing the ixak to run free. They immediately broke into a fast trot, perhaps scenting their stables and evening food. Before Tula had them under control again they were racing down the main thoroughfare of Tathan. It was not until both cart and ixak had been returned to the stable and Tula had rejoined his companions in Dulan’s sitting room that the others began to question Merin.

  “Where did you see Ananka?” Herne asked.

  “If I am correct,” Merin told them all, “You saw her, too. I believe the cat was Ananka in disguise.”

  “Tell us everything,” Dulan urged, taking the chair nearest the fire.

  “Saray left me alone while she found clothing for me,” Merin said. “When I turned around, instead of the cat sitting on the bed, a woman was there. When Saray made a noise, the woman vanished and the cat reappeared. It hissed at me and ran away.”

  “What did the woman look like?” Tula regarded her with wide eyes.

  “Like me,” Merin told him, “except her hair was lighter.”

  “Remarkable,” Tula breathed.

  “Exactly what I would expect,” said Dulan. “Herne, you have mentioned before that when you first saw Ananka, she, looked much like Merin.”

  “I only noticed
the resemblance later,” Herne amended the story, “after I looked more closely at Merin. I didn’t really see her in those days.”

  “When Ananka first appeared to you,” Dulan asked, “had you been thinking of Merin?”

  “Yes.” Herne spoke slowly, recalling that now-remote scene by the campfire. “I was wishing she would remove her blasted coif so I could see what color her hair was.”

  “Did you have a mental image of her hair?”

  “From her brows and lashes, I thought it must be light brown,” Herne said. “But I was wrong. It’s actually much darker.”

  “Ananka did not know the real color of Merin’s hair, either,” Dulan pointed out, “because she took the image of Merin out of your thoughts, and showed herself to you as the Merin you imagined,”

  “No wonder she looked so familiar. But when I went to her in the grotto later that night – when I – we – damnation! Was it a real creature I saw and touched, or was it all an illusion?”

  “We do not understand Ananka’s full powers,” Dulan said.

  “That answer is no help to me at all.” Herne looked so miserable that Merin reached out to take his hand.

  “You could no more have stopped what happened in that grotto,” she told him, “than I could have refused to go with Saray today. There are some things humans cannot resist.”

  “I thought I wanted her,” Herne said, “because I wanted you without knowing it. I understand that now, but still, what I did –”

  “It’s all right.” Fortified by the way he had told Saray it was Merin he loved, she was able to smile at him. “It doesn’t matter now. I understand, and I’m not angry.”

  “Tarik said it must have been an illusion.” Herne’s eyes were locked on Merin’s face. He was totally concentrated on her, forgetting the others in the room. “Tarik was so sure of it that he made me certain, too.”

  “Tarik?’ Dulan’s sharp voice made them both jump. “This is the second time today you have mentioned other people. Herne, you two were not alone on this world, were you?”

  “No.” The stark word brought a gasp from Tula and a stiffening of Dulan’s robed figure.

  “You led us to believe an untruth,” Dulan accused him.

  “We were trying to protect our friends,” Herne said. “we weren’t sure you could be trusted, and we didn’t know how extensive your power might be. I wasn’t even sure you were real.”

  “And now?” asked Dulan.

  “I still don’t know what to believe about how we found ourselves here,” Herne admitted. “But I do believe you are honestly trying to help us, so I will tell you that there were ten others with us, two of them descendants of your own people who joined our colony after we arrived. We are all living in a building far north of here, on an island in a lake.”

  “At Lake Rhyadur? You have moved into our private retreat, the place most truly my home on this planet?” Dulan paused, apparently overcome by strong emotion.

  “In their time,” Tula said to Dulan, “we are dead for hundreds of years, old friend. Should we care if someone else lives in our rooms after we have gone?”

  “You are buried there,” Herne said. “Both of you.”

  “How do you know this?” Dulan asked.

  “By your own words,” Herne answered. “You kept a notebook. Our leader, Tarik, found it. Your mate is there, too. It seems you all died of extreme old age.”

  “Well, then.” Dulan’s head was bowed. “A peaceful death, with loved ones near. A final resting place at Rhyadur, where my heart lies. Thank you for telling me.”

  “There’s more,” Merin said. “We call this world Dulan’s Planet. That is the official Jurisdiction name.”

  There was a laugh from beneath the blue hood, a coarse, choked sound that broke suddenly into a clear peal of pure mirth. On Tula’s face a look of startled delight appeared.

  “Fair enough,” said Dulan. “In the Jurisdiction, I lost a world that should have been mine to rule because I was born a telepath. It’s only fair for the Jurisdiction to give me back a world. What matter if it’s a posthumous honor?”

  * * * * *

  Merin insisted on dressing in private for the Gathering. She waited while Herne bathed and donned the formal robe that Tula had brought for him to wear. It was a soft, grey-brown in color, trimmed in silver, and loosely made like the robes worn by Tula and Dulan, with long full sleeves and a hood, which Herne wore thrown back into a cowl. His ash-brown hair was still a little damp from his bath. Without a supply of the pills that kept his beard from growing, he had been forced to shave with a razor. There was a tiny nick on one side of his jaw. To Merin, he was remarkably handsome, even if he looked pale and tired, with the harsh planes of his face drawn and tense.

  “I hope there are refreshments at this Gathering,” he said. “I’m hungry.”

  “We just ate with Dulan.” She laughed at his words, dismissing the hollow feeling in her own stomach.

  “Nothing I eat seems to fill me,” he complained. His hands were at the chinstrap of her coif, unfastening it. “Aren’t you hungry?”

  “In all of Tathan, there is only one thing that fills me,” she murmured, reaction to his touch stirring deep inside her, “and leaves me satisfied, too.”

  “You, my dear, are rapidly becoming a galaxy-class tease.” He grinned at her. “Who would have thought the cold and self-controlled Merin of just a few days ago could turn into such a passionate woman in so short a time?” The coif was off now and his hands were stroking through her hair, pulling it down out of the tight coils and over her shoulders.

  “I don’t understand what has happened to me.” She sighed. “I never dreamed of feeling like this, of wanting another person so badly that I can’t think about anything else.”

  Herne unfastened the opening of her treksuit down to her waist. His hands were on her breasts. Merin felt the passionate heat begin to rise in her. In another moment or two she would not be able to stop what was certain to happen between the two of them, and neither would he. She pulled away.

  “We don’t have time for this,” she protested. “I have to bathe and dress.”

  “Are you refusing me?” He sounded stern, but when she met his grey eyes they were filled with laughter.

  “Never,” she promised, sliding her hands along his chest, down toward his thighs, pausing at a crucial spot, smiling into his eyes all the while. “It’s only a postponement. Later, after the Gathering is over, when we are in this room again with the rest of the night before us, then we will taste passion and I’ll make the waiting up to you. You won’t regret the delay.”

  “I was wrong,” he said. “You aren’t a tease at all. My dearest, you rank as one of the great seductresses of all time.”

  “An Oressian seductress?” The idea made her laugh.

  “That’s one of the reasons why I love you so much,” he told her, turning serious. “You are a mass of fascinating contradictions. You could even forgive what I did with Ananka. I don’t know of another woman who would forgive that stupid mistake.”

  In a gesture that was rapidly becoming familiar to her, he kissed the tip of her nose. She watched him walk to the door, her eyes filling with tears of love. He had enlarged her heart with tenderness and joy beyond anything she had ever imagined was possible. He paused at the door to look back at her.

  “While we are at the Gathering, we ought to be watching and listening for any information that might help us find our way home,” he said. “But even while I appear to be concentrating on other subjects, I won’t stop thinking about you for a moment, or fantasizing about the things we’ll do when we are together. Now, get dressed, and as you put on each garment, imagine what I’ll do as I remove it later.”

  She almost called him back. She almost told him to forget about the Gathering, the waiting telepaths, Saray, Ananka, everything but their love. All she wanted was Herne in her arms, kissing her, his hands on her skin, his rough voice speaking passionate words. She had to force herself no
t to tear open the bedchamber door and go after him.

  Instead, she made herself walk into the bathing room and pull off her treksuit while the water ran into the tub. And when she sank into the warm, fragrant suds she thought about sinking into the bed in the next room, with Herne on top of her and his hot love surrounding her.

  She rinsed in the coldest water the pipes could produce and she reminded herself that she had a duty to perform this evening. For Herne’s sake, as well as her own, she had to be prepared to seize upon any fact that would help them return to their own time.

  * * * * *

  The gown that Saray had given Merin was made of a green so dark it was almost black, a floor-length, long-sleeved column of tiny pleats that clung to her figure, swaying and rippling when she moved. The only decorations on the dress were the golden band set with green and blue jewels that edged the high, round neckline, and a matching sash that wrapped just below her breasts. It was a design as demurely covered as any Oressian robe, yet because of the way the pleats folded and unfolded with her every breath or motion, it was scandalously revealing. The tantalizing fragrance of khata wood that wafted from the fabric only added to the seductiveness of the gown. The headdress was made of golden fabric thickly sewn with jewels of blue, green, and purple. It was uncomfortably heavy, but it did cover all of Merin’s hair.

  She applied the cosmetics Saray had provided, using the narrow brush to paint a silvery-black line around her eyes, rubbing pale pink on her cheeks and a darker shade on her lips.

  She had not planned to use these artifices – they were entirely unnatural to an Oressian – but when she looked into the bathing room mirror her face stared back at her as pale and tightly drawn as Herne’s had seemed to be earlier. Her spells of lightheadedness had diminished somewhat, but she felt tired and listless, and oddly weak. And hungry. Always hungry, ever since she arrived at Tathan. She was used to eating little. Gluttony was not a vice permitted to Oressians, and she had always been even more abstemious than her Oressian companions. Yet now she constantly craved food. She wondered if vigorous lovemaking could create such an unceasing need to eat. She decided to ask Herne about it later.