' 'is also widely reverenced in Elabon. His votaries are even found north of the High Kirs, although all wine in that distant province is of necessity imported.' '
'The scroll says it, but I never knew of Mavrix's cult up here,' Gerin said. 'Still and all, when Rihwin invoked him in a minor magic, he appeared-not to do Rihwin's bidding, but to punish him for associating with me.'
'And why did the god see fit to do that?' Selatre asked. Before the Fox could answer, she held up a hand. 'Tell me another time, as you said. I resume: 'The cult of Mavrix is held in chief repute by those who have little happiness in their lives. In the release they take from wine and from the orgiastic nature of his worship, they find the pleasure otherwise lacking to them.' Does orgiastic mean what I think it does?'
'Every sort of excess?' Gerin asked. Selatre nodded. Gerin said, ' That's what it means, all right. Go on; you're doing very well.'
'Thank you.' Selatre started reading again: ' 'The Emperors of Elabon sometimes persecuted those who took part in Mavrix's rites when Sithonia was a newly acquired province. Like much else Sithonian, however, the god's cult has become an accepted part of Elabonian life in recent years, and the cry 'Evoii!' is often heard all through the Empire.' '
'I've heard it,' Gerin said. 'If I never hear it again, I'll be just as glad. Mavrix is a powerful god, but not one whom I care to worship. I like order too well to be easy with the lawlessness the lord of the sweet grape fosters.'
Selatre clicked her tongue between her teeth. 'The lord Biton is also a patron of order and reason, so I understand what you are saying, and yet-may I read on?'
'Seems you already have, if you know what comes next in the scroll,' Gerin said. 'You read that with just your eyes alone, didn't you? Not many can do that so soon; quite a few have to say the words to themselves no matter how long they've been reading.'
'You don't,' Selatre said. 'I tried to imitate you.'
After a few seconds, he said, 'I can't think of the last time anyone paid me a compliment like that. Thank you.' He let out a wry chuckle. 'Not that you're likely to find the way most folks go by looking to me for a guide.'
'I think you have the better way,' Selatre said, which produced a longer silence, especially since, as Gerin noted, she didn't qualify the comment with here or any such thing. She looked down at the scroll again and read some more: ' 'Mavrix is also the god who chiefly inspires poets and other artists, and is the patron of the drama. His love for beauty is well known.' ' She looked up from the scroll. ' Those are worthy attributes for a god, I think.'
'Oh, indeed.' Gerin's voice was dry. 'Our chronicler here, though, is a rather-hmm, how should I put it?-a reticent man, shall we say. Among other ways, the god's 'love for beauty' manifests itself as a passion for pretty boys.'
He wondered how Selatre would take that, and whether she'd even understand what he was talking about. Both the Sithonians and their gods were fonder of pederasty than the northlands peasants among whom she'd spent her life until Biton chose her for his own. But she must have figured out what he meant, for she laughed heartily. Then, sobering, she said, 'Is that written down in one of your other books? If not, it may be lost.'
'Do you know, I'm not sure,' Gerin answered. 'You've just made me sure of one thing, though, not that I wasn't already: I couldn't have found anyone better to oversee this library.'
'Now you compliment me,' she said. 'In turn, I want to thank you once more for bringing me here to tend your books. It's not the life I had, but it's far more than I had any reason to hope for.'
This time, she didn't just set her hand on his, she clasped it, nor did she pull away when he returned the pressure. He started to lean forward to kiss her, then hesitated, not from lack of desire but out of a scrupulous sense of fairness. He said, 'If you're drawn to me, think on why. If it's only because I'm the one who brought you out of Ikos and helped show you how to live in the wider world, think on whether that's reason enough.'
She laughed at him. She couldn't have surprised him more if she'd burst into flame. 'I am a woman grown, lord Gerin, and you are not my father.' As was her way, she sobered fast. 'What you are with the lady Fand is something else again, especially in light of what I saw the other night.'
That sobered Gerin in turn. Slowly, he said, 'The thing is dead. Aye, you saw me leave her chamber.' He sighed. 'Aye, we'd been to bedwhat point denying it when it's so? We won't do that again-no sense to it, not when it was as it was. If she and Van get along, I wish them nothing but joy. If they don't, I probably ought to wish him a hide as hard and thick as his corselet.'
'So you should.' She smiled again, but not for long. 'And is it because what you and Fand knew is dead that you now show an interest in me?'
'Maybe in part,' he answered, which surprised her. He quickly added, 'But only in small part, I'd say. More-far more-is that you are as you are. Believe me or not, as you will.' One of his eyebrows rose, a sort of punctuation by expression. 'Besides, you were the one who took my hand. I wouldn't have presumed to do such a thing, not with you being who you are.'
'I noticed that,' Selatre said. 'You'd promised as much when you took me away from Ikos, but who knows what a man's promises are worth till they're tested? When I saw you meant what you said, I-' She didn' t go on, but looked down at the scroll in front of her. Unlike Fand's, her skin did not usually show much color, but she flushed now.
'You decided you wanted to take the first step,' Gerin said. Selatre kept her eyes on the scroll but, almost imperceptibly, she nodded.
Gerin plucked at his beard. What he'd known with Fand had gone beyond the pleasure of the bedchamber, but not far beyond; there was a core of himself he'd never yielded. He'd done that only once, with Elise… and after what came of that, he was wary-no, frightened, he told himself-of risking it again. But if he involved himself with Selatre, he would have to risk it; he could feel as much already.
Do you want to spend the rest of your days alone inside? he wondered. It was easier; it was safer; it was, in the end, empty.
'Are you sure?' he asked. Saying the words was almost as hard as going into battle.
Selatre nodded, a little less hesitantly. With something of the feeling of a man diving into deep water, Gerin leaned toward her. He wondered if she would know how to kiss; she'd said she'd been consecrated to Biton ever since her courses failed to start when she reached womanhood.
But her lips met his firmly; her mouth opened and her tongue played with his. It was, in fact, quite as satisfactory a kiss as he'd ever had. When at last they broke apart, he said, 'Where did you learn that?'
'In my village, of course.' She looked puzzled for a moment, then burst out laughing again. 'Oh, I see-you expected me to be not just a maiden but ignorant as well. No. Some of the young men there couldn't have cared less that the god had set his mark on me. I knew I couldn't yield my body to them, but that doesn't mean I led an altogether empty life.'
'Oh,' he said in a small voice. 'I hadn't thought of that. When you said Biton had chosen you, I suppose I thought you'd lived solitary from that time on.'
'No,' Selatre said again. 'It wasn't like that, not until the god called to himself the Sibyl that was and chose me in her place-though only for a brief time.' Her face clouded for a moment, then cleared. ' But I must say you were right: if that time is ended, I have to live the rest of my life as best I can.'
This time, she leaned toward him. The kiss went on and on. His arms closed around her. She stiffened when he cupped her breast with one hand. He took the hand away. 'If you're not ready, just let me know,' he said. He still wasn't sure how fast he wanted to charge ahead with her. Had he been a few years younger, lust would have overridden thought, but those days were past him, even if Van still sometimes thought more with his crotch than with his head.
Selatre said, 'Having come this far, I think it's time to finish the job of returning me to the world. I've heard it can hurt the first time, but if you know hurt may be coming, it's easier to bear.'
'I hope I won't hurt you, or not badly,' Gerin said. 'When I was down in the City of Elabon, another student there had a scroll on the proper way to deflower a maiden as gently as possible. What it said made good sense, though I confess I've never needed to use it till now.'
'They write books about that?' Selatre said, her eyes wide. 'If you had one of those in your library here, Gerin, think how many more people you could win to reading.'
'You're right, I expect,' he said, remembering the illustrations with which the scribe had enlivened the scroll. Then he noticed Selatre had called him by his name alone, without the honorific she'd always used before. It
