‘I understand,’ I said, and added casually, ‘Yz, we’re only having dinner. It’s not a blood bond, or anything! Lighten up.’
‘I’ve been burned,’ he said. ‘In the past.’
‘I can see that. Stop worrying about it. We were having fun. Let’s just erase the last few minutes and remember where we were.’
‘Yeah.’ Ysobi sighed. ‘You remember you asked me a while ago if any student had ever fallen for me? You must know the answer. I have to be so careful.’
I ducked my head. ‘I know.’
‘It’s different with you because you’re older. More sensible, I guess.’
I put my head to one side, smiled in what I hoped was an understanding way. ‘I like you, Yz. You’ve taught me so much. I won’t do anything that will make you feel compromised or uncomfortable. I mean that. When the training is over, I want us to be friends. You should have friends. There’s more to life than work.’
He refilled his glass from the jug of cider we’d ordered. ‘You think you’ll stay here in Jesith, then?’
‘I haven’t got anywhere better to go. I’ve put down roots now. I have a job, friends… I like it here.’
He nodded. ‘It’s a good place.’
There was a silence, then I asked: ‘Do you want to go to the Pool?’
Ysobi hesitated. ‘Why not? Let’s get the tongues wagging. I’ve not been out to a bar for years, never mind watched live music.’
‘Excellent!’
‘Jass…’ He drew in his breath. ‘This is just a meal and a drink between friends, isn’t it?’
I didn’t answer immediately. Eventually, I said, ‘You call the shots, Yz. If that’s all you want, that’s all it is.’
He laughed uncertainly. ‘I can’t give you anything.’
‘I disagree. You can give quite a lot; good companionship, friendship. That shouldn’t be a sacrifice. You’re allowed to have a life.’
He reached out and touched one of my hands. ‘Thank you.’
I meant what I said. If more came of it, I would naturally be overjoyed, but I was happy to take what he felt he could give. If that was the occasional meal together, I’d be grateful. It was more than most hara could get from him, I knew that.
As Ysobi predicted, our arrival together at Willow Pool Garden caused a stir. He knew just about everyhar there, of course, but not in this way. They were curious as to how I’d persuaded him to leave his Nayati. Still, on the whole, it seemed to me that hara were glad he was there. They berated him for not having joined them before.
The band was very good; they played fiddles and drums and flutes. They had dancers with them, who performed nearly naked, twining between members of the audience. Hara showered them with gifts. Inevitably, Zehn ended up with one of them by the end of the evening. Everyhar had drunk a lot, the mood was high. We piled out into the street around four in the morning, everyhar singing and horsing around. Ysobi put his arm round my waist. I had never seen him so happy. ‘You enjoyed yourself, admit it,’ I said.
He squeezed me a little. ‘It’s been fun.’
‘Do you want a final drink before bedtime?’
‘I could fit one more in,’ he said.
‘Come back to mine, then,’ I said. ‘Sample my staff privileges.’
‘Sounds good.’
In my living room, I lit candles, noticing there was still a mark on the sofa where Zehn had lain. I threw a cushion over it. ‘Sit down,’ I said to Ysobi. ‘I’ll just go and peruse my ‘cellar’, see what I can find.’
He threw himself down on the sofa, and I padded out to the kitchen, where there was a cold room. Here I kept all the bottles that Sinnar had given me; he insisted all his hara took their pick of everything we made. I didn’t feel too drunk, just nicely mellow. I chose a birch sap wine. It was one of the best.
The kitchen was in darkness. When I turned round to go back into it, Ysobi was standing behind me. I jumped in alarm. ‘Yz! You spooked me.’
He took the bottle from my hand, put it on the table behind him. He took my forearms in his hands.
‘Yz, what…?’
He put a finger to my lips. ‘Ssh.’
Then we were sharing breath. He was so hungry for it. Drowning. I could feel his grief, his loneliness. What could I do but give of myself? Drink, I told him. Drink all you want.
We staggered against the table and knocked the bottle over. It smashed on the floor. Ysobi was hanging onto me so tightly I thought I’d black out. Then he broke away from me, pressed his forehead to my own. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘You don’t know how much.’ He took a step back. ‘I can’t do this, and yet I had to. I can’t do this to you.’
He fled.
I just stood there stunned for several minutes. Then, like an automaton, I began to clear up the smashed glass and the lake of splintery wine. There were tears on my face, yet I wasn’t weeping.
I took another bottle from the cold room and opened it. Then I went into the living room and sat on the sofa, swigging from the bottle. What had happened? My mind was on fire. I’d felt his need. I’d experienced his feelings. He’d run away. I wouldn’t usually see him for two days, since tonight was the beginning of the weekend. In two days, I had to formulate a script we could both live with.
Minnow came round at mid-day, but I ignored his knocking. I’d hardly had any sleep and the last thing I wanted was my friend’s eager questions about the previous evening. When I was sure he’d gone, I got out of bed and dressed myself. I went into the kitchen and drank some water. Then I went to the Nayati.
There was no response to my knock, so I just tried the door and it was open. Ysobi’s living room was empty. I called his name. Nothing. I went into the garden and found him there, cross-legged on the grass, deep in trance. I sat down opposite him, studying his face. He looked wretched. I know he became aware of my presence, I could just feel it, although he did not open his eyes.
‘Yz, look at me,’ I said.
His brow furrowed.
‘I think you should talk to me. I’m not angry or needy. I’m concerned for you.’
He looked at me then. ‘I shouldn’t have done what I did. I saw in your breath…’ He shook his head. ‘I told you, I can’t give you anything.’
‘I think you should let me be the judge of that.’
‘Jass, you know. There will be other students. There are always students.’ He put his head in his hands. ‘Last night, I saw the potential. It was like a beautiful garden, glimpsed through a half-open gate. I wanted to fall back into you, be safe with you. I wanted to talk with you over breakfast. I wanted to walk with you in the evening. And that is so, so dangerous.’
I went to his side. ‘Why, Yz? Why is it dangerous? Do you think I’ll be jealous of your students, cause trouble for you?’
He nodded. ‘You don’t know what it’s like.’
‘I’m willing to risk it,’ I said. ‘I want to.’
‘I want to as well.’ He took me in his arms then, and we shared breath for a long time. This was what I’d longed for so much. I couldn’t help but shed a few tears. He kissed them away, stroked my face. ‘Last night… Jass, I knew. I knew it wasn’t just a meal between friends. I have tried to hide it so well, and so have you. How could we have lied to each other so cleverly? I love you.’
I had never imagined it would happen so simply and spontaneously: him saying those words I had longed to hear.
‘Don’t be afraid,’ I said. ‘Just don’t. We’ll live for the moment and see where it takes us.’
He nodded. ‘I want to believe in the dream, Jass. I really do.’
I drew away from him. ‘Come over later. I’ve got a few things to do today. Then we can talk.’
‘I will.’ He kissed my cheek. ‘Thanks for coming here. I told myself that if you didn’t come, I must forget about it, but you had the courage to come.’
One thing I was sure of was that Ysobi had been very badly hurt in the past. He was afraid of being close to me, because he
thought I’d eventually turn on him. I’d felt that in his breath. I think maybe it had happened to him more than once.
Back home, I tidied the house in a kind of euphoric delirium, then went out and fetched a few things from the market. Minnow turned up again in the afternoon, just when I got back, so I couldn’t avoid him.
‘Well?’ he demanded.
‘What is it?’
He folded his arms. ‘You know what! You and Ysobi. Is it true?’
Insouciantly, I moved things around on the kitchen table. ‘He didn’t stay here last night, if that’s what you mean. We went out together. That does not constitute a chesna bond.’
‘Yz does not go out with anyhar,’ Minnow insisted. ‘Not now.’
I sensed he wanted to tell me something, but I didn’t really want to hear it. Not from him. ‘I know about that,’ I said. ‘We’re friends, that’s all. If it’s meant to go any further, then it will. I have no expectations.’
‘Don’t get messed up,’ Minnow said. ‘Please, Jass. Be careful. Lots of hara have been taken under his spell while they train with him. It’s a hazard.’
‘I’m old and wise enough to look after myself,’ I said. ‘I’m not stupid.’
Minnow’s expression was dark. ‘I know. But sometimes Ysobi is.’
‘You said yourself, he doesn’t see anyhar. This is different.’
Minnow shook his head and sighed. ‘I hope so.’
Ysobi came round about 7.30 again. Like the previous night, he was not wearing his hienama gear. I made us dinner and we talked. Well, he talked mainly. There were no names mentioned specifically, and he skirted the subject, but I knew he was trying to tell me of failed chesna bonds before. He wanted me to assure him I wasn’t going to take offence too easily. ‘I’ll be taking other students in the New Year,’ he said. ‘Maybe that will be the test.’
‘I’m willing to take it,’ I said. ‘Really, Yz, don’t worry. This is all too new. There’s no point fretting about the future. It might never happen.’
‘You’re right. That’s what I’d tell anyhar else.’ He laughed. ‘It’s sometimes hard to practice what you preach.’
Now that I felt I had him, it was a delicious torment to keep my hands off him. I knew he wouldn’t be leaving me that night. We went for a walk, as he’d dreamed of doing, holding hands in the darkness like harlings. We kissed briefly beneath the horse chestnuts that were shedding their glossy conkers. The air was chill, smelling of smoke and ripe fruit. We stroked the friendly sheep in the field next to my cottage, who came to us like ghosts over the grass, seeking the titbits I’d often give them. Then we went inside again.
‘Do you want a hot drink?’ I asked him.
‘Please,’ he said. ‘Bring it upstairs.’
‘OK.’
He smiled at me and headed for the stairs.
When I went up, he was lying in my bed, his dark hair spread out around him. I couldn’t believe this was happening. It was literally a dream come true. I gave him the drink and he sat up to sip it. I sat beside him on top of the covers and kissed his bare shoulders. The room was warm because I’d built a fire in there earlier. There was no way I wanted to be inhibited by huddling beneath the blankets in a freezing room.
‘I’m nervous,’ Ysobi said. ‘Can you believe it?’
I stroked his back. ‘Yes. This will be different. We both know that.’
He grimaced. ‘You’ll see inside me. I hope you like what you see.’
‘Hush.’
He put down the mug on the bedside table and lay back, staring up at me. His expression was almost pleading. I stood up and took off my clothes, then climbed in beside him. In the light of my dim bedroom oil lamp, he looked like the most exotic har ever to walk the earth. I held him close, shared breath with him. For a time, we lingered in the outer courtyard of pleasure; the stroking of sensitive skin, the caress of silky hair, the light kisses on neck and arms. Then his fingers closed around my ouana-lim and gently massaged me. I reached down and put my hand over his ouana-lim, felt it slowly draw back into him, like a soft fragile creature retreating into a cave. He opened his legs for me, all the time staring into my eyes. I wanted to taste him, as he had tasted me so many times, but perhaps not now. I caressed his soume-lam a little, very gently. He was swollen with desire, slippery beneath my fingers. He pulled me onto him and I entered him carefully, with reverence. I felt him seize me, the folds clenching around me. We moved together in the simple act of aruna and he opened his mind to me. It was elemental, the fusing of waves and fire, but the waters were serene and the flames were an eternal pure blue. I had never been with a har like this, so full of love. Our union felt like the ultimate privilege bestowed upon hara by creation. It was such a gentle thing. When we reached our climax, it was like the river flowing, caressed by willow branches, cool and clean. He said my name, held me close. It was like coming home, after a long time away.
2
There is a particular kind of har who might as well have been incepted from a spiteful teenage human female. Back north, a friend of mine used to call them ‘soume shrews’. The phenomenon is mostly encountered, we observed, in hara incepted quite young, i.e. below sixteen years. It is also seen in some second generation hara, perhaps being a stage that they have to go through after feybraiha, as they get to grips with the different aspects of their blossoming sexuality. The attributes of the condition are always the same: a particularly soume kind of beauty, of which they are totally aware; a desire to manipulate others through the power of their allure; a tendency to vengeful grudges; disregard for the feelings of others; a helpless attraction to hara in established chesna bonds that they seek to destroy; an ability to become simpering and vulnerable at will (usually used in devastating conjunction with the previously mentioned trait); and finally, a core of tempered steel. I’m sure you see the picture I’m painting here. You’ve no doubt met these types yourself. And I’m equally sure you can imagine what’s coming next. I’m talking about a har called Gesaril, who came to Jesith two weeks after the winter solstice to train with Ysobi.
For a couple of glorious months after Ysobi and I got together, I lived in bliss. Ysobi did not move in with me, but we saw a lot of each other and spent the night together around three or four times a week. We socialised a lot, glowed radiantly, and became known as the epitome of what a perfect chesna bond could be like. The only har who didn’t share in our happiness, of course, was Zehn, but even he was gracious enough to maintain the appearance of carefree friendship in public. I knew that Ysobi would be taking on new students in the New Year, and we’d discussed it. I can’t say I was overly delighted to think of him in intimate situations with these as yet unknown hara, but I’d worked hard at overcoming vestiges of human jealousy. Ysobi and I were in love. We were unassailable. I’d always known what his work entailed. I would be adult about it. If ever there was a case of somehar painting a large red circle on his forehead, giving a gun to his worst enemy and saying ‘I bet you can’t hit me,’ I was it.
My training for now had slowed down. Ysobi had taken me to Acantha, first level Ulani, and we planned to wait awhile before I progressed to Pyralis. He had a couple of other students lined up, and had told me that sometimes he would have a bunch of hara to train together, then there’d be a few weeks’ or months’ lull, when he’d take a rest. It had been unusual I’d been his only student during my training.
We spent the winter solstice festival, Natalia, with Sinnar and his family. They lived in a large house set into a hillside a mile or so from the vineyard. Sinnar had a chesnari himself and a young harling, which he’d hosted. That had meant his chesnari, Tibar, had had to run the vineyard for a couple of months, earlier in the year. Tibar came from the Shadowvales. I’d not really seen the harling close up before, even though Tibar sometimes brought him to the yard, and found the little creature rather unsettling. In some ways, he didn’t look or behave like a child, even though physically he was small. It seemed inconceivable to me that Sinnar
had hosted him; had grown a pearl in his body, expelled it like a hen laying an egg. Altogether, the thought of the process made me feel somewhat nauseous. I knew that hara had to breed, because available humans for inception would eventually be a thing of the past, but the idea of chesnari cosily making harlings seemed too human for me, a flashback to an imaginary past.
When I got the chance, I told Ysobi quietly about my feelings, to see what he thought.
He only said, ‘Harlings aren’t that easy to make.’
Over dinner, Tibar revealed one of the reasons (I think) that we’d been invited to share their festival meal. A friend of Tibar’s back in his hometown had a son who had passed feybraiha in the summer. He’d asked Tibar if the renowned Ysobi would train this son to Brynie level. Tibar wanted to ask Ysobi face to face, once Ysobi had had a bit to drink and was in a good mood. The reason for this cautious delay in making the request soon became apparent. Tibar was an honest har, and felt obliged to tell Ysobi that his friend had had trouble with his son. ‘He desperately needs training, some self-discipline at least,’ Tibar said. ‘He’ll be a handful, Yz. But we’ll be paid generously, both Jesith and you yourself. What do you say?’
Tibar perhaps didn’t know Ysobi as well as I thought I did, but he was aware that our hienama couldn’t resist a challenge.
‘OK,’ said Ysobi.
In the early hours of the morning, we walked back to my house through the snow, arm in arm. The world was silent and still and magical. It had reclaimed itself and I felt glad for it. Wraeththu had ushered in a new age. These fond thoughts were kindled because I’d had a lot to drink; I felt nicely mellow. I reflected that I now had quite a high status in Jesith. As chesnari of the town’s most prominent hienama, I was invited to functions at the phylarch’s house. I knew Sinnar would promote me at work. I felt as if life couldn’t get any better.