“This is why they are not contented in their Paths.”
“How did you…” Her lips thinned. “You’ll have to stop doing that, Ronan. It goes beyond impolite when you intrude on my memories.”
“Even if I wish to help?”
They reached the drive that turned into Jesper’s dwelling. “Don’t tell me that shaauri kin never quarrel. You have the scars to prove it.” She came to a sudden halt. “I’m sorry. That was cruel.”
“Those I fought were not of Ain’Kalevi,” he said. “And I was not shaaurin.”
“I know.” She touched his arm and continued toward the house, stopping on the cobblestoned walk that led into the garden. “You want to know more about my background. That’s fair enough. The more you understand of Dharma and my current situation, the better you’ll be able to face the Council.”
Her words made a shell of indifference, but beneath them her emotions were in turmoil. She wished to hide herself from him, and at the same time her heart yearned to reveal the burdens she tried to carry alone.
Listen, his instincts whispered, but do not feel. Speak, but do not judge. Touch, but do not bind. This is the way to court a human female.
‘This garden is pleasant,” he said, pausing to touch a silver-edged leaf. “Shaauri, too, keep gardens.”
She sat down on a wooden bench flanked by white-flowered vines. “All shaauri, or only those of certain Paths?”
“I knew an aino’va—Second of Will—who cultivated his own vegetation,” he said. “Is that so strange?”
“It’s not strange at all. Uncle Jesper is a wonderful gardener. My parents preferred to have servants manage the grounds.”
He sat on the bench beside her. “Your parents hold great power in this city.”
“Very great.”
“But because you are female, you could not choose your Path.”
She gazed into the shadows. “Even in Low Town, where women have more freedom, they seldom choose. Few ever leave their home cities or villages.”
“Males may take Walkabout, but not females.”
“That’s one way of putting it.” She smiled and flexed her fingers, catching moonlight on the golden bands of her rings. “If not for my family’s authority, and the fact that my father wished to show the Persephoneans that he, at least, had become more progressive…” She shrugged. “It was a great blow when the shaauri blockade prevented personnel and materials from moving freely between the Nine Worlds and the Concordat. Because of his marriage to my aunt, Jesper remained on Dharma when most off-planet specialists returned to the Concordat. He and a few others like him were able to continue training technicians, engineers, and doctors on Dharma so the knowledge wouldn’t be lost.”
“And you also received an education.”
“My uncle was happy to do it. My mother was horrified. I thought I was making great strides for Dharman women because I learned alongside the boys and was treated as an equal by my uncle.” Her smile vanished. “In the end all my rebellion came to nothing. Because of my family’s position, it was even more important to my father that I, his elder daughter, marry advantageously.”
“Another arranged marriage.”
“He needed all the allies he could find to keep Dharma moving forward so that one day it could join the Concordat as a full member.” She sighed. “The man my father selected was the heir of a ruling family on Ikaria, one of our neighboring islands.”
Nyle Beneviste. That was the name in her mind, and the image that accompanied it was one humans might call attractive. Ronan snapped a flower from the vine and cupped it in his palm.
“You did not mate with this man,” he said.
“No. The month I was to marry, my cousin Tyr returned from his first successful run as captain of the Pegasus. We’d always been close, Tyr and I.I worshipped and envied him; all I dreamed of was to escape my betrothal and travel in space. When he went on his second mission, I stowed away on the ship and left Dharma with him and his crew.”
“You made your own Walkabout.”
“I disrupted the plans of countless people. I was a distraction my cousin didn’t need on such an important voyage. Because of me—” She turned her face aside, struggling to hold her grief in check. It swept over Ronan, mingling unexpectedly with his own memories until he could no longer tell one from the other.