“Oh, Lissa…” Nadiah squeezed the other girl’s hand in sympathy. “I’m so sorry. So I guess that was when she decided to send you to First World to be a priestess?”
Lissa nodded. “Had we been caught in a physical embrace or—Goddess forbid—if I had allowed Saber to give me the Deep Touch…” she blushed with embarrassment at the words. “Well, I don’t even know if that would have been possible between us, but had we even tried, we would both have been stoned to death. However, since the Touch Saber gave me was slight and nonphysical, my adopted mother chose to conceal the matter and simply separate us.”
“Thank the Goddess you weren’t stoned,” Nadiah exclaimed. “How barbaric!”
“Yes, I was granted life though I deserved death. But sometimes I wonder if death might not have been kinder.” Lissa looked troubled. “You see, before she sent me to First World, she made me renounce Saber.”
“Renounce him? What does that mean exactly to your people?”
Lissa hung her head. “I had to tell him I didn’t love him anymore. Say that I never wanted to see him again. I swore a formal oath that I would never be his. And oh, my Lady…” She looked up at Nadiah. “When I said those words and saw the light of his love for me dying in his eyes…then I wanted to die too. I hurt him…hurt him so badly because it was the only way to keep him from me. To keep his mother from exposing what had happened between us.”
“She blackmailed you,” Nadiah said indignantly.
Lissa nodded. “Yes. She said that even though he was her son and she loved him, she would expose him to the entire clan if he didn’t renounce me. Saber…he was braver than I. He refused to say the formal words or take the oath never to see me again. But I feared for him—for his future. He is to be the next ruler of our people, just as Challa Rast is the Councilor of the First Kindred. All that would be lost if anyone knew of our shame.”
“So you lied to him to keep him away. To keep from hurting him or spoiling his future,” Nadiah said softly.
Lissa nodded again. “Yes, I could see no other way.” She sighed. “It has been three long cycles since our separation and Saber is doubtless joined to another girl from a different clan. I am certain he never even thinks of me anymore. But I…I cannot stop thinking of him. Cannot stop loving him, wanting him. And wondering what might have happened if I had agreed to run away with him when he first asked me.”
“Would you have joined with him?” Nadiah asked gently. “Would you have agreed to be his mate and the mother of his children?”
Lissa shook her head. “I can't say. I don’t know if we could have overcome the injection of kinship compound we both received as infants. And even if we could, I don't know if the shame I felt—that I still feel—would ever have allowed me to take the Deep Touch from him.” She blushed again. “But Saber said he loved me so much he was willing to forgo a physical relationship. He said that if all we ever did was Touch with our minds, it would be enough for him.”
“That’s amazing,” Nadiah said honestly. “He must really have loved you. Most males want a physical relationship above all else—at least that’s what I’ve heard.”
“I know,” Lissa whispered. “Though I am daily grateful I never had one with Saber. The shame of such a memory would have been too great to bear and I would have been forced to end my life.”
“Surely not,” Nadiah objected. “Don’t even talk that way.”
Lissa looked at her earnestly. “But it’s how I feel—how I was taught to believe. I can’t help the way I was raised, my Lady.”
“Call me Nadiah. And I’m sorry that your upbringing has given you such overwhelming guilt.” She squeezed Lissa’s hand again. “But I still don’t think it makes you unfit to be the high priestess.”
“But it does,” Lissa protested. “Because I still have those feelings for Saber. Even though I know I’ll never see him again, I still think of the way he Touched me. I still…still want him.”
“Well, no matter what, you’re still not related to him by blood,” Nadiah said firmly. “I understand your people’s taboo, Lissa, but I want you to know I don’t think any less of you for what you’ve gone through or how you feel.”
“Truly? You don’t?” Lissa began to cry again but this time, Nadiah thought, with relief. “Oh, thank you, my Lady. Thank you…Nadiah.”
“You’re welcome, Lissa.” Nadiah lifted the other girl’s chin and looked into her lovely jade eyes. “The Goddess doesn’t call us to be perfect, you know,” she said softly. “Only to strive to live in her light and show her kindness and love to the universe. You do that very well, I think.” She smiled. “Certainly better than the old high priestess, what’s-her-name…”