'But you must promise,' she said, as she took his clubbed hand, only recently capable of any gentleness, and brought it to her tender breast. She was already nude within her bag. 'You must promise-'
The heat was rising in him, abolishing any scruples he might have had. Var knew he would do it. Perhaps the Master would kill him, but tonight- 'You must promise-to kill the man who harms my child.'
Var went child 'You have no child!' he blurted. 'None that can be harmed-' And became aware again of his crudity and cruelty of word and concept. He was still wild.
'Promise.'
'How can I promise when your child is long dead?' She silenced him with the first fully female kiss he had ever experienced. His body accelerated in response, knowing what to do despite his confusion and what seemed like madness on her part. She talked of her dead child while preparing to make love, but her breasts remained soft, her legs open. 'If ever the situation arises, you will know,' she said.
'I promise.' What else could he do?
She said no more, but her body spoke for her. This supposedly aloof, cold woman-novice that he was, Var still recognized in her a sexual fury of unprecedented proportion. She was hot, she was lithe, she was savage. She was at least twenty-five years old, but in the dark she seemed a buxom, eager fifteen. It was not hard to forget for the moment that she was in fact middle-aged.
As the connection was made and the explosion formed within him, - he realized that it might be his own future child he had just sworn to avenge.. . anonymously.
CHAPTER SIX
The Master was waiting for them. He used one of the crazy hostels as a business office, and had entire drawers of papers with writing on them. Var had never comprehended the reason for such records, but did not question the wisdom of his mentor. The Master was literate: he was able to look at the things called books and repeat speeches that men long dead had said. This was an awesome yet useless ability. -
'Here is your warrior,' Sola said. 'Var the Stick-a man in every sense of the word.' And with an obscure smile she departed for her own tent.
The Master stood in the glassy rotating door of the cylindrical hostel and studied Var for a long moment.
'Yes, you are changed. Do you know now what it is to keep a secret? To know and not speak?'
Var nodded affirmatively, thinking of what had passed between him and the Master's phenomenal wife on the way home. Even if he had not been forbidden to talk of that, he would have balked at this point.
'I have another secret for you. Come.' And with no further question or explanation the Nameless One led the way away from the cabin, letting the door spin about behind him. Var glanced once more at the sparkling transparent cone that topped the hostel and its mysterious mechanisms, and turned to follow.
They walked a mile, passing warriors and their families busy at sundry tasks practising with weapons, mending clothing, cleaning meat and exchanged routine greetings. The Master seemed to be in no hurry. 'Sometimes,' he said, 'a man can find himself in a situation not of his making or choosing, where he must keep silence even though he prefers to speak, and though others may deem him a coward. But his preference is not always wise, and the opinion of others does not make a supposition true. There is courage of other types than that of the circle.'
Var realized that his friend was telling him something important, but he wasn't sure how it applied. He sensed the Master's secret was going to be as important to his life as Sola's had been to his manhood. Strange things seemed to be developing; the situation was changed from his prior experience.
When they were well beyond the sight or hearing of any other person, the Master cut away from the beaten trail and began to run. He galloped ponderously, shaking the ground, and his breath emerged noisily, but he maintained a good pace. Var ran with him, far more easily, mystified. The Master, as he well knew, was tireless but where was he going?
Their route led toward the local badlands markers, then along them, then through them.. Var had thought the Weaponless was afraid of such regions, since his severe radiation sickness of the time the two had met. It had taken the man months to regain his full strength; and from time to time, in the privacy of tent or office, he had bled again or been sick or reeled from surges of weakness. Var knew this well, and Sola was aware of it, but it had been hidden from others of the empire. Much of the early battle
