And while she considered herself superior to Sylviana, and even in a way to Kalus himself, the lashings of emptiness at the hollow discipline of denial were no less acute for it. She remembered the words of Sinclair Lewis, from the book she was then translating.
'Not individuals but institutions are the enemies, And THEY MOST AFFLICT THE DISCIPLES WHO MOST GENEROUSLY SERVE THEM.' A more apt description of her own religious and cultural servitude she could not imagine.
But these self-recriminations were meaningless, and she knew it. What lay at the root of her agitation was her forlorn desire for Kalus. Beyond the strong and undeniable physical attraction, his innocence, like Ishmael's, of the brutal travesty which had killed both her husband and the unborn child she carried unknowingly onto the Virgo…..
'Enough! Leave me alone!'
But there was no escaping herself. Tragedy, desire, and longing for a new life that she could truly call her own, all drew her toward him as irresistibly as childbirth. Added to this was the knowledge, confirmed by the vaginal thermometer, that this night, this very hour, her body was as ready to conceive as it had ever been since the long sleep, as it might ever be again. All her pain and frustration now focused upon this singular and uncorrupted man as a well-spring of life and relief, pure water to one dying of thirst. If he rejected her, the agony and shame would be unbearable. But dear, sweet holy Buddha, how could any pain be worse than this?
It was not greater wisdom that sent her to him in the end, but an agitation of sorrow and loneliness that were longer, and more inescapable. While Sylviana forced herself to stay, Kataya shed a single, honest tear, and surrendered.
*
Kalus stirred, feeling silken fingers touch his breast, bare legs against his own. He let out a despairing sigh as soft lips caressed him—-his mouth, his neck, his chest—-all in deepest passion, and solemn entreaty.
It was not his true love, but he could not deny her this. Nor, as he held her close, did he have any wish to, all else falling away in the unconscious amnesia of male passion. He threw open the sleeping bag, longingly kissed her cheek, her neck, the lovely space above her breasts.
'Kataya,' he whispered passionately, and there was nothing else in his world, no other salve for the endless pain and frustration. There was only her, here and now, her face wet with tears, vulnerable, compelling. He released the knotted loincloth, as their most sensitive reaches drew nearer. Her breasts rubbed gently across his. Then he slid down, yielding to that most primal longing: to suckle at the breast, fountain of all life.