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she said gently, holding him back. "This is your night, and you shall have it in full measure. I will be your woman."
        Var made a guttural sound, dumbfounded. Could he have-understood her correctly?
        "Sorry, Var," she said. "I hit you with that too abruptly. Lie down."
        He lay down again.
        "Wild boy," she continued, "you are not a man until you have taken a woman. So it is written in our unwritten code. I came to make sure you accomplished it all I have"-here she paused-"done this before. Long ago. My husband knows. Believe me, Var, though this appears to be a violation of the standards we have taught you, this is the way it must be. I cannot explain it further. But you must understand one thing, and promise me another."
        He had to speak. "The Master-"
        "Var, he knows!" she whispered fiercely. "But he will never speak of it. This was decided almost ten years ago. And you must know this, too: I am older than you, but I am not past bearing age. The Nameless One is sterile. Tonight, and the nights that follow-it ends when we reach home camp. If you should beget a child on me, it will be the child of the Weaponless. I will never wear your bracelet. I will never touch you again, after this journey. I will never speak of what happened here between us, and neither will you. If I am pregnant, you will be sent away. You have no claim upon me. It will be as though it never happened-except that you will be a man. Do you understand!"
        "No, no-" he mumbled, already sick with lust for her.
        "You understand." She reached out suddenly and put her hand upon his loin. "You understand."
        He understood that she was offering her body to him, and that he had no stamina to refuse. He was wilderness bred; the willingness of the female was the male's command.
        "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."