“You’re confusing me.”
“It’s this search,” she said slowly, not looking at him. “It could go on for years! When I think about that, I could go crazy. I don’t think I want to spend that much of my new freedom doing this, but. . . .”
“Don’t you realize what it could mean to us if we ever found the Guardian?”
“Oh yes, of course. That’s not what I mean. Oh, Varian, you don’t understand, do you?”
He could only shake his head. He wished that women could be more direct, more objective when discussing their own feelings.
“What I mean, Varian, is that I don’t want to be with those other men. I don’t want to be with anybody but you. You’ve given me my freedom and I want to share it with you.”
He was tempted to say: Is that all that’s bothering you? But he did not. He was both relieved and upset by her words. He wanted to take her in his arms and hold her warmth against his chest, but he did not do this either.
Staring into her eyes, he spoke softly: “I think I understand you, but I don’t know what to do. I mean, we are here; we are far, far from civilization. We cannot leave here now.”
“I know that,” she said.
“Then what do you want me to say?”
“I don’t know. If I were more of a romantic, I would tell you to say that you love me . . . but, I don’t know what ‘love’ is, and I guess it would be unfair of me to ask under such circumstances.”
“Well, I am a bit of a romantic, and I do think I love you, but that’s not what I meant either. You know that we can’t leave here without Stoor and Raim, and they won’t leave until they are convinced that the Guardian is not here.”
“I know that.”
“Then what? What do you want me to say?”
“I don’t know. Tell me, do you know where we will go from here if we find nothing?”
“The Baadghizi Vale, I’d suppose. Why?”
“Is there anything in between. Any cities?”
Varian considered the question. “There’s the eastern end of G’Rdellia. No big cities, but some small ones, I’m sure. We’re off the established trade routes, you know.”
Tessa nodded. “Do you think we might stop somewhere in G’Rdellia?”
“Maybe. I’m sure we could discuss it with Stoor, even convince him to do so. Why?”
“You know why.” She looked at him with intense green eyes.
“Yes, I suppose I do.”
“Well?”
“I don’t know, Tessa. I don’t know. You’re asking me to choose between two things that I’m not sure I can choose between.”
She looked away, up to the crisp, bright sky.
“At least you are honest about what you feel, what you think. I’ve never known any men that would do that, either.”
“Let me think about it,” he said weakly.
“What’s the fascination here, Varian?” She looked out at the dark shapes around them.
He paused and stared at the shadowy things from the past. “I don’t know. I really don’t know. Just knowing that there were people before us, that all that we’ve done has been done before . . . I don’t know, it does something to me.” He drew a breath, and looked at her. “I don’t have the words, Tessa. But I feel it. I’m a simple man, I know that. But there’s something inside me. Something like a glowing coal that won’t burn out. I need to know! There has to be more to the World than what we see. . . .”
He stepped back and gestured at the sky. “Look. Look up there. Some astronomers think that each star is like the sun. Big or bigger. Can you imagine then? Can you imagine what that means? That there might be worlds like ours around all those stars. I think the First Age knew that. I think that’s where they’ve gone if they didn’t kill each other off.
“Don’t you see? I want to know! And I’ve stumbled upon something that might give me the answers.”
“Might, Varian. . . . You don’t know for certain.”
“We don’t anything for certain!” He turned away from her to stare up at the sky. “Damn it all! You want me to give up the search, don’t you? You want to pack it in if there’s nothing here. What would Stoor think if I just gave up and said I was going to stay in G’Rdellia?”
“Is that a threat to your masculinity?” Tessa was not smiling.
Varian laughed. “No, no! That’s not what I meant at all. Think about it, Tessa. Think for a moment. If you were Stoor, what would you think? Your partner in a search for what might be the most priceless discovery in the history of the World suddenly decides that he wants to pull out. . . . Does that make sense? No, of course not! So what is the reason, thinks Stoor, and he comes up with the only viable answer: treachery.”
“Do you actually think that Stoor would suspect you of—?”
Varian laughed. “I don’t think it; I’m convinced.”
“But why? How?”
“Because that’s the kind of world it is! I would suspect the same thing of him if he suddenly wanted out. It’s simple. You just don’t walk away from a fortune! Not in this world.” Varian’s hands were shaking and his voice had grown loud. He turned away from her, at the same time hoping that neither of his partners at the campsite had heard him.
“And . . . and I have asked you to do that, haven’t I? Asked you to walk away from a lifetime of fame and wealth . . . for what? For love? Oh, Varian, I don’t even know what love is, so how can I ask you to give up a life’s dream for it?”
Turning, he looked into her green eyes. “I don’t know. How can you?”
“And how can you not hate me for forcing you to make such
