IV
In the House of Twelve, men and women mingled almost promiscuously, in a brother-and-sisterly innocence, fostered by the fact that all Twelve had been brought up together. Deoris, whose more impressionable years had been spent in the stricter confines of the Scribe's School, was not yet accustomed to this freedom, and when, in the inner courtyard, she discovered some of the Acolytes splashing in the pool, she felt confused and—in her new knowledge—annoyed. She did not want to seek her sister among them. But Domaris had often cautioned her, with as much sternness as Domaris ever showed, that while Deoris lived among the Acolytes she must conform to their customs, and forget the absurd strictures forced upon the scribes.
Chedan saw Deoris first, and shouted for her to strip and bathe with them. A merry boy, the youngest of the Acolytes, he had from the first treated Deoris with a special friendliness and indulgence. Deoris shook her head, and the boy splashed her until her dress was sopping and she ran out of reach. Domaris, standing under the fountain, saw this exchange and called to Deoris to wait; then, wringing the water from her drenched hair, Domaris went toward the edge of the pool. Passing Chedan, his bare shoulders and turned back tempted her to mischief; she scooped up a handful of water and dashed it into his eyes. Before the retaliating deluge, she dodged and squealed and started to run—then, remembering that it was hardly wise to risk a fall just now, slowed her steps to a walk.
The water fell away in shallows, and Deoris, waiting, looked at her sister—and her eyes widened in amazement. She didn't believe what she saw. Abruptly, Deoris turned and fled, and did not hear Domaris cry out as Chedan and Elis, screaming with mirth, caught Domaris at the very edge of the pool and dragged her back into the water, ducking her playfully, threatening to fling her into the very center of the fountain. They thought she was playing when she struggled to free herself of their rough hands. Two or three of the girls joined in the fun, and their shrieks of laughter drowned her pleas for mercy, even when, genuinely scared, Domaris began to cry in earnest.
They had actually swung her free of the water when Elis suddenly seized their hands and cried out harshly, "Stop it, stop it, Chedan, Riva! Let her go—take your hands from her, now, at once!"
The tone of her voice shocked them into compliance: they lowered Domaris to her feet and released her, but they were still too wild with mirth to realize that Domaris was sobbing. "She started it," Chedan protested, and they stared in disbelief as Elis encircled the shaken girl with a protecting arm, and helped her to the rim of the pool. Always before, Domaris had been a leader in their rough games.
Still crying a little, Domaris clung helplessly to Elis as her cousin helped her out of the water. Elis picked up a robe and tossed it to Domaris. "Put this on before you take a chill," she said, sensibly. "Did they hurt you? You should have told us—stop shaking, Domaris, you're all right now."
Domaris wrapped herself obediently in the white woolen robe, glancing down ruefully at the contours emphasized so strongly by the crude drapery. "I wanted to keep it to myself just a little longer ... now I suppose everyone will know."
Elis slid her wet feet into sandals, knotting the sash of her own robe. "Haven't you even told Deoris?"
Domaris shook her head silently as they arose and went toward the passageway leading to the women's apartments. In retrospect, Deoris's face, shocked and disbelieving, was sharp in her memory. "I meant to," Domaris murmured, "but—"
"Tell her, right away," Elis ventured to advise, "before she hears it as gossip from someone else. But be gentle, Domaris. Arkati died last night."
They paused before Domaris's door, Domaris whispering distractedly, "Oh, what a pity!" She herself had barely known Arkati, but she knew Deoris loved her, and now—now, in such sorrow, Deoris could not come to see her without receiving a further shock,
Elis turned away, but over her shoulder she flung back, "Yes, and have a little more care for yourself! We could have hurt you badly—and suppose Arvath had been there?" Her door slammed.
V
While Elara dried and dressed her, and braided her wet hair, Domaris sat lost in thought, staring at nothing. There might be trouble with Arvath—no one knew that better than Domaris—but she could not spare any worry about that now. She had, as yet, no duty toward him; she acted within her rights under the law. Deoris was a more serious matter, and Domaris reproached herself for neglect. Somehow she must make Deoris understand. Warm and cozy after Elara's ministrations, she curled up on a divan and awaited her sister's return.
It was, in fact, not very long before Deoris returned, sullen fires burning a hectic warning in her cheeks. Domaris smiled at her joyously. "Come here, darling," she said, and held out her arms. "I have something wonderful to tell you."
Deoris, wordless, knelt and caught her sister close, in such a violent embrace that Domaris was dismayed, feeling the taut trembling of the thin shoulders. "Why, Deoris, Deoris," she protested, deeply distressed; and then, although she hated to, she had to add, "Hold me not so tightly, little sister—you'll hurt me—you can hurt us both, now." She smiled as she said it, but Deoris jerked away as if Domaris had struck her.
"It's true, then!"
"Why, yes—yes, darling, you saw it when I came from the pool. You are a big girl now, I felt sure you would know without being told."
Deoris gripped her sister's wrist in a painful grasp, which Domaris endured without flinching. "No, Domaris! It can't be! Tell me you are jesting!' Deoris would disbelieve even the evidence of her own eyes, if Domaris would only deny it.
"I would not jest of a sacred trust, Deoris," the woman said, and a deep sincerity gave bell-tones to the reproach in her voice, and the near-disappointment.
Deoris knelt, stricken, gazing up at Domaris and shaking as if with intense cold. "Sacred?" she whispered, choking. "You, a student, an Acolyte, under discipline—you gave it all up for this?"
Domaris, with her free hand, reached down and unclasped Deoris's frantic grip from her wrist. The white skin showed discolorations where the girl's fingers had almost met in the flesh.
Deoris, looking down almost without comprehension, suddenly lifted the bruised wrist in her palm and kissed it. "I didn't mean to hurt you, I—I didn't know what I was doing," she said, her breath catching with contrition. "Only I—I can't stand it, Domaris!"
The older girl touched her cheek gently. "I don't understand you, Deoris. What have I given up? I am still student, still discipline; Rajasta knows and has given his blessing."
"But—but this will bar you from Initiation—"
Domaris looked down at her in absolute bewilderment. Taking Deoris's resisting hand in hers, by main force she pulled her up on the divan, saying, "Who has put these bats into your brain, Deoris? I am still Priestess, still Acolyte, even if—no, because I am a woman! You have served in Caratra's Temple a month or more now, you should know better than that! Surely they have taught you that the cycles of womanhood and of the universe itself are attuned, that—" Domaris broke off, shaking her head with a light laugh. "You see, I even sound like Rajasta sometimes! Deoris, dear, as a woman—and even more as an Initiate—I must know fulfillment. Does one offer an empty vessel to the Gods?"
Deoris retorted hysterically, "Or one soiled by use?"
"But that's absurd!" Domaris smiled, but her eyes were sober. "I must find my place, to go with life and—" She laid her slender, ringed hands across her body with a protective gesture, and Deoris saw again, with a shudder, the faint, almost negligible rounding there. "—accept my destiny."
Deoris twisted away from her. "So does a cow accept destiny!"