The Heart is a Universe Read online

  Desire.

  The special license had been an afterthought. He really hadn’t expected Vitalis of Pax Cara to require a lover. He’d thought, rather arrogantly, that since the two of them were such an obvious match, she would agree to his proposal instantly and they’d spend the rest of her days—and possibly his—in platonic communion.

  But before they’d exchanged twenty words, he’d already known that it was going to be a far less certain thing than he’d prepared for. She did not want companionship, much less communion. If anything she wanted to be left alone—as he usually did.

  And strangely enough, he did not want to leave her alone.

  Long ago, he’d heard rumors that the student filmmakers who’d produced The Quiet Girl had been her lovers—both at the same time. That her mysterious glow hadn’t been so much supernal courage as mere sexual satisfaction. He had not believed it then, had wanted to see her only as his inspiration, the abstemious heroine, not altogether of this world.

  He had reconsidered when he saw her in person. For her charisma had an undeniable sexual component. She had lived. She had experienced life in every way it could be experienced. Even he felt it, the lure of it, the urgency of it, the vitality of her youth against the bleakness of her imminent death—an anguish that only lovemaking could assuage.

  Even he responded to it.

  As he responded to it now. She smiled at him, and he all but flushed to the roots of his hair. The sexual tension in the reception room was tangible enough to set off intruder alarms.

  The archbishop cleared her throat. Eleian, recovering somewhat, introduced his bride-to-be to the gathered dignitaries. She greeted them with consummate courtesy.

  “Shall we start then, Your Highness?” asked the archbishop.

  There was no real ceremony for a trial marriage, but the archbishop offered a prayer for happiness and mutual affection. Alchiba brought in the license, an old-fashioned piece of vellum, which they all signed. Eleian’s new wife did a creditable job of scrawling her name, even though she’d likely never done it before—very few people other than princes and premiers signed physical documents.

  The leave-taking began immediately. Besili, Rianse, and the archbishop each kissed Vitalis on the forehead. The co-regents did the same with Eleian. The archbishop held out her hands for Eleian’s benediction, after which, she genuflected and kissed the hem of his tunic.

  Vitalis looked at him, nonplussed, as Alchiba ushered their guests out. “You blessed the archbishop. Are you the head of the Church?”

  He shook his head. “Church and state have always been separate on Terra Illustrata.”

  “Then why would she seek a blessing from you?”

  “Because I’ve recently been declared an avatar of Metaran.”

  “The god Metaran?”

  He nodded. “It’s embarrassing, really.”

  A good many gods were worshipped. But Metaran, along with his mate Mikelan, sat at the head of the Council of Gods.

  She smiled. His cheeks warmed again. He recognized a smile laden with sexual heat.

  “I’d thought it would be interesting to lie with an angel. But now I get to lie with an actual god.”

  He didn’t know where his reply came from. “A major god, no less.”

  “A major god, no less,” she agreed. “It should be memorable.”

  Still blushing, he handed her a glass of wine. “Shall we toast our marriage?”

  She glanced at the glass of water he poured for himself. “You don’t drink?”

  He shook his head. His liver was not strong enough to process alcohol.

  “How virtuous can a man be?” she smiled again.

  He was becoming lightheaded. And for once, it was not because of his blood pressure dropping too vertiginously.

  They clinked glasses. She took a sip. “Where do you sleep, Your Highness?”

  In the two days since Eleian arrived at the Courtship Summit, he’d slept in the dining room on the lower level of the suite. It saved his staff the trouble of moving all the medical equipment up to the bedroom on the top level, and saved him the trouble of climbing stairs. (For some reason, the suite did not come with lifts. Since he regarded the matter of his health as strictly private, he’d vetoed plans to have one installed.)

  But in the hour since she’d accepted his proposal, his staff had been engaged in a mad dash to haul the most essential medical equipment to the domed bedroom and place them at precisely the distances and angles he’d become accustomed to. He had yet to see what the bedroom looked like—the number of devices his staff deemed indispensable would broadcast what they thought of his chances of survival.

  They were preparing for multiple organ failures, apparently. In readiness were his defibrillator, artificial respirator, emergency detox, blood re-processor—and even the preservation tank, which he’d only had to use once before, to safeguard himself until proper medical attention could arrive.

  To her they would appear as a series of rather somber cabinets and armoires. But for him they’d been constant companions. He could stagger to the correct device in the middle of a full-body shutdown. The only time he’d made a mistake—which necessitated the use of the preservation tank—had been when a new member of his staff had placed the machines out of order and he’d turned on the defibrillator when he’d needed his blood detoxified.

  Her eyes swept the room. The dome, molded from titanium-reinforced permaglass of an exceptional clarity, made it seem that nothing separated them from the abyss of space. A huge spasm of stars hung overhead, the color of superheated hydrogen, breathtaking no matter how many times he had seen it.

  Her fingertips brushed the sheets on the large hexagonal bed—for the occasion, Alchiba had strung garlands of peach-and-cream flowers from the bedposts. She strolled past the table of refreshments that had been set up, laden with rich delicacies he could not consume. Only then did her gaze fall on the medical equipment.

  “Your bedroom has more furniture than mine,” she said.

  “I am a major god.”

  She laughed. For a moment, she was only a splendid young woman, in a playfully elegant dress, on the cusp of seduction.

  “O god divine, joyous be thy name, grant me thy glorious wisdom, lend me thy eternal hope, rain down upon me thy rapturous blessings,” she recited, the most ancient and succinct prayer to Metaran. “And permit me access to thy untouched body.”

  “That is blasphemy.”

  She chortled, sat down at the edge of the bed, and beckoned him with a finger. He took one last look at his lifesaving equipment and went to her.

  To his surprise, as he sat down, he draped an arm over her shoulders. With his other hand he took hers. “O goddess sublime, invincible be thy name, give me thy abiding courage, will me thy shining rectitude, lift me with thy unassailable faith,” he murmured, the prayer to Mikelan. Then he looked sideways at her. “In reverence I offer myself to thee, o goddess great and exalted.”

  Her jaw dropped. “Now that is true blasphemy, to address your prayer to a mere mortal.”

  He touched his lips to the corner of her mouth. Her skin was heart-poundingly soft. Suddenly he wanted to devour her, this woman who was resolutely no saint, but a goddess indeed.

  “You’re very beautiful,” she whispered, touching a hand to his cheek. “Like an idea, almost. Not quite real.”

  He kissed her slowly, the warm humidity of the act making his heart beat alarmingly fast. “Am I becoming more real?”

  “Come closer.” She smiled. “I’ll tell you how you can become completely real to me.”

  The words she whispered into his ear should have been enough to kill him outright. But he was still breathing—and functioning somehow. So he continued on his perilous journey, peeling off her frothy dress, exposing her strong, lithe body.

  She wore nothing underneath. His erratic pulse worried him, until he felt hers, almost as frantic as his own. How strange it was that she wanted to make love to his physical person, to th
e body that had been such a trial to him all his life.

  His breaths came in shaky.

  She disrobed him. His breaths further quickened—but this time, not from excitement. His body was not strong and lithe like hers. Often in the past it had been a wasteland, skin and bones—some of the ailments that plagued him were inexplicable to his physicians, such as the periodic breakdown in nutrient absorption that left him starving on a perfectly plentiful diet.

  He hadn’t had that problem lately. Lately it had been only a garden-variety cancer to which he paid no attention; he’d put on a little weight and looked less like a walking visual for medical futility. Still, he was no match for the agile and perfectly muscled physiques of her training mates, with whom the Quiet Girl had laughed and played. Come to think of it, there had been an erotic undercurrent to that particular footage, full of young people in superb condition, near nudity, and ejaculating water rifles.

  “Has anyone ever seen you naked?” she asked softly, her hand running down his thin, often barely functional body.

  Except one particular part, which was functioning very well tonight. He was both embarrassed and ridiculously proud as her hand dipped lower—and ever so relieved that she did not seem to find the physical reality of him wanting.

  “Only my physicians.”

  She did not touch his erection, but brought her hand up and pulled down his lower lip with her thumb. Her tongue teased, as if she were dashing between sand ramparts, tantalizing her training mates with herself as a moving target.

  He was fairly sure it was a gesture of vulgar haste, but his hand cupped her breast of its own will. The silky scrape of her nipple across his palm generated a shock of desire. A small, parched sound issued from the back of his throat.

  “You make me impatient,” she said, her voice low and rough. And then, “I think I have a right to be impatient, don’t you agree?”

  A reminder that she didn’t have much time left.

  “Yes,” he rasped.

  “Lie down then.”

  He swallowed and complied. She climbed atop him. “I hope you are impatient too.”

  She took him inside her. His entire person shuddered. He had no words for the sensations—he was only endlessly glad that he’d lived to this night.

  Oh, but it became even better—more powerful, more intense. Above him she was full of life, vitality, the rosy glow of desire. Her skin was warm and wonderful. Her hair, just long enough to skim her jaw, brushed softly, tantalizingly against him as she lowered her head to nibble on his shoulders.

  Some more esoteric schools of worship believed that the universe had burst into being as Metaran and Mikelan became one for the first time. He didn’t believe it exactly, but now he understood why they did: it was as dizzying as the rising of the sun.

  Excitement fomented within him. More, surely, than he could withstand. And yet it built—and built. And built. There was no possible way he could survive this. The pleasure would kill him outright.

  He held out against the onslaught of sensations, gorgeous, hot, deadly sensation. But they only grew more overwhelming. He might still have retained his control, but she shot to a climax barely short of violent. And that aroused him beyond all control.

  He came in a terrifying paroxysm of pleasure.

  Death be damned.

  3

  When she rose, he held onto her hand. “Do not abandon your god,” he murmured.

  She kissed him on the lips. “O divine one, my faith is strong and constant.”

  Her words were good-natured, but the irony was evident: her faith was neither strong nor constant.

  His heart almost gave out as she walked, beautifully naked, directly to the recovery tank and opened its door. The tank’s interior was smoothly lacquered and could almost pass for a piece of furniture, if it weren’t for the whirl of machinery that came to life with the opening of the doors. Gauges and sensors, unaccustomed to a healthy body, blinked and beeped in confusion. The oxygen mask swiveled uncertainly. Nozzles, fully extended and ready to spray him with priming agent, regarded her quizzically with their built-in cameras.

  She closed the recovery tank’s door and inspected his other life-saving apparatuses, paying particular attention to the blood re-processor, moving aside a stack of silk robes that had been placed on top to examine the artificial arteries underneath.

  When she was done, she selected a robe and shrugged into it. The robe was spring-green and embroidered along the cuffs and the hems with eternity links. Belatedly he realized that he should have offered it to her: it was one of the bridegroom’s first gestures the morning after the wedding, to cloak his beloved in care and comfort.

  Instead she was the one to offer a robe to him, one of similar cut and design as to hers, except burgundy in color. He put it on and hoped that the deep, warm hue would make him look less ill—but it was only a hope.

  She circled the recovery tank, possibly seeking an interface. The recovery tank thwarted her search—she didn’t possess the necessary credentials yet. But that did not stop her from murmuring, “So, you are dying.”

  He sat up. This discussion was always going to happen. Still, he was unaccustomed to speaking of his health to anyone but his physicians. “To the contrary, I am in a phase of relative vigor. But my condition follows a cyclical pattern. I will face an onslaught of afflictions in the next month or so.”

  “And what is your chance of survival?”

  “Ten percent.” He looked down at his hands. “At best.”

  He was the dead man walking to her dead woman walking—a more perfect match did not currently exist in the Sector.

  At least on paper, to use that archaic expression.

  She sat down on a luxuriantly padded settee, one of the few pieces of furnishing in the bedroom that hadn’t been designed to prolong his life. “In other words, a death sentence.”

  “More or less.”

  It didn’t feel that way. In the past few hours, he had indulged in enough physical activity to give his staff a collective cardiac arrest, yet he was still well enough to stand up on his own power, and feel only a little unsteady.

  But what passed for an amazing bout of fitness for him failed to impress her. She frowned as she followed his shuffling progress across the room. “One wonders why Your Highness did not think to marry sooner, when both you and I had more time.”

  Her tone was light but biting.

  He rested against the refreshment table, catching his breath. At his touch, a beverage mixer dispensed a frothy, mango-colored concoction. He waited another moment, made sure he was strong enough, and joined her on the settee, one glass of the traditional honeymoon ambrosia in each hand.

  She accepted the glass he offered her, but set it aside—to drink would be to seal the marriage.

  He tipped back his. The first sip was almost unbearably sweet. The next one, less so. The taste kept changing, the sugariness fading, replaced by a sharp acidity, and then a soul-shrinking bitterness that alternated with a chalky tastelessness.

  He kept on drinking. The ambrosia was meant to convey different facets of marriage: the intoxication of new love, the inevitable disappointment, the doubt and ennui that ensued, the pain those bound by matrimony could cause each other.

  More than once he thought his stomach would rebel. But he endured—and endured—until the ambrosia finally turned sweet again. Not the single-noted saccharinity from the beginning, but a rich mellowness that represented lasting love.

  “Is it as awful as they say?” she asked.

  He finished the last drop, wishing there had been more. But such was the nature of life: even when love became infinite, time remained scarce.

  Following tradition, he kissed the rim of the empty glass before setting it down. “Yes and no, Princess.”

  She was visibly taken aback at his choice of appellation. But a trial marriage, while it lasted, was still a marriage. Should he die before morning, she would be known, to the end of her days, as Her Most Ser
ene Highness Vitalis of Terra Illustrata.

  He pulled up the sleeve of his robe. “If you would put your hand here, my lady.”

  She did, her callused palm warm against his skin.

  Abruptly she drew her hand back and stared at where she had touched.

  He didn’t need to turn his head to know what she was looking at. The markings on his upper arm materialized at the warmth of a human hand. They concentrated and reflected heat back to the source, the reason she had pulled her hand away—she would have felt a sharp increase in temperature, not enough to scald, but more than enough to alarm.

  At first glance, the slate-blue design seemed to resemble the outline of a kidney bean the size of a baby’s fist. Then finer lines and smudgy patches appeared. At which point the whole entity rotated, and the lines and smudges rearranged themselves to a vague likeness of a birdcage.

  “It’s said that gods, when they take on mortal incarnations, are born bearing mysterious sigils,” she said lightly. “So . . . more evidence of your godhood?”

  “I wish I could say with some certainty what it is.”

  No one, including himself, had been aware of the existence of the sigil during the first nine years of his life. Since then, it had only ever appeared to signal that his health, fragile enough under the best of circumstances, would soon collapse.

  “Usually at this point it disappears,” he told her. “But with you, I expect the design to change again.”

  The markings mutated some more, until they seemed to depict an old-fashioned horse saddle—before fading altogether.

  She glanced at him, a glint of suspicion in her eyes. “What difference do I make?”

  “Shortly before my second collapse, my lead physician went on a holiday to Pax Cara. She returned disappointed: she caught no glimpse at all of anything remotely associated with the Pax Cara Event, since it was forbidden to commercialize the event.

  “A day after she resumed her duties, she noticed that the sigil was back—but that this time it morphed twice before fading. This lasted two days before the sigil reverted to disappearing after only one change. She speculated that the earlier difference might have had something to do with the Pax Cara radiation that she still carried from her visit.”