They continued to talk, and he learned enough of her language so that in due course they could cover more sophisticated topics. Now he could tell her where he had come from, and what his mission had been—and what had happened. Their dialogue was extended and fraught with misunderstandings and missing terms, but in essence it was this: “So you came all the way here from your fantasy world to marry me?” she asked. “Only you got mugged and lost your ticket home?”
“This is too simple,” he protested. “I came here to discover whether you were right to marry. But this is uncertain. Now it does not matter, since I can not return.”
“And am I?”
She cut so quickly to her aspects that he often had to pause to follow them. “Are you right to marry? I am not sure, but I am hopeful.”
“What would make you sure?”
“That is complicated to tell. But there is no need, since I will die here.”
“Why will you die?”
“Because I can not endure without magic. I have no way here to support myself, and soon you will tire of bringing me food. Already I feel the depletion of my separation from my reality. When it becomes too great, I will seek as easy a death as I can manage.”
“You hurt, and you will die?”
“Yes. I am not like you. But I thank you for the great comfort you have given me.”
She looked at him intently. “You are not joking, are you?”
“The King of Laughter does not joke.” This was hardly a precise translation of his role in his own Mode, but it was what she best related to.
“If you were going back, would you take me with you?”
“If I could return, I would want to do that. But only if I knew that it was right, and that you wished to. Marriage to Hlahtar is no easy matter.”
“Even though I am only fourteen?”
Darius was startled. “I thought you were older! Unless our years differ.”
“I don’t think they do. Everything you have told me suggests that your world is the same as mine, except for the way you live. So does it matter?”
“In my reality it does not. Every person does what he chooses, if he can do it well enough. If you truly understood the requirements of the marriage, it would be honored.”
“Like having sex with you?”
“No, marriage is not necessary for that. It is a more important commitment.”
“Because of the mergence of life forces?”
“Yes.”
She shook her head. “You know I don’t believe you.”
“Yes. I think you would believe only if you could be in my reality. What you have done for me has been most generous, since you can gain nothing in return.”
“Do you really live in a castle with many servants, and do magic?”
“My servants usually do the magic for me. My ability is joy, not conjuring.”
“Tell me again what you do.”
“Colene, I will not be doing it any more, because—”
“Tell me!”
He did not understand her intensity. “I bring joy to the multitudes. I make them laugh.”
“Then you are a comedian.”
“No. I do not tell funny stories or do funny things. I infuse joy directly, so that they can laugh at what merits it.”
“That’s what I don’t understand! How can you—I mean, that’s not the way it works!”
“How does it work here?”
“Each person’s pleasure and pain come from inside him. If he sees or hears something funny, he laughs and feels good. If he sees something bad, he is unhappy. If something hurts his body, he feels pain, but the pain is from his nervous system, not the other thing. If he loves or hates, the emotion is all in himself. He can’t receive it like an electric current from anyone else.”
“Physically that is true for us too. But emotionally we can transfer it. It is my post to transfer joy to others.”
“But if you can do that, that doesn’t mean you lose it yourself!”
“Indeed it does! It is my emotional substance being shared.”
“But then you would be miserable after making one person happy.”
“No. I have a special qualification for the post. I can magnify my joy as I transfer, making a thousand people happy, while I suffer only a little depletion. Most people can exchange only on an even basis, as you say, but some can multiply, and I can multiply better than any other. That is why I am Cyng.”
“Then what’s your problem?”
“There are many thousands who need joy. So many that I can not serve them all without eventually being depleted. But I can not stop, because then everyone would become unhappy.”
“What does a wife have to do with it?”
“My wife shares her joy with me. I can then share it with others, multiplied. Were she able to share on an even basis, that would double my ability to serve. But normally women are found who can multiply somewhat themselves, so that I may receive what two or three others might provide. That can enable me to carry on for a year or more, before we are both depleted.”
“What happens then?”
“I must divorce her before she dies, so that she can recover. Then I must marry another, so that I can continue my work.”
“How could you do that to one you loved?”
Darius spread his hands. “I can not. That is why I elected to search in other realities.”
“So you could find me, and take me back, and deplete me, and cast me aside after a year?”
“Oh, no, Colene! I am looking for a woman who can multiply the way I do, so that I can love her and never cast her aside. There are none in my reality.”
“And you think I might be one like that?”
“I hope you are. The Chip oriented on women who might be like that. But the Chip is fallible. It may be that it is a misreading.”
“How can you tell?”
“There is no sure way except to bring you back with me.”
“And if I am not right?”
“Then I could not marry you. You would be provided for; I could make you one of my servants.”
“One of your servants!”
“The Chip can not focus on precisely the same reality twice. You could not return to your own realm. But you could have a good life with me. Just not as my wife.”
“Thanks a lot!”
She was evidently angry. “I do not understand.”
“That’s for sure!” She lurched to her feet and charged out of the shed.
But later she returned, with more food. “I am sorry I blew up at you, Darius,” she said. “I know your culture is way different from mine, and you didn’t think you were insulting me.”
“That is true. I am sorry I insulted you. Please tell me in what manner I did that, so that I can avoid doing it again.”
“With us, a wife is different from a servant. A wife you love; a servant you maybe don’t care much about. If you see me as a potential servant—”
Darius was stricken. “No! It is this way in my land too! It is that at least I could be with you, if I couldn’t marry you.”
She stepped close to him. “How do you really feel about me, Darius?”
“It is my hope that you are suitable, and that you will be willing to—”
“Forget suitability! What about we?”
“I can’t forget suitability, because marriage to me would kill you if—”
“But you can’t go back, so that doesn’t matter! All there is, is you and me. So how do you feel?”
That made him pause. She was right; he could not go back. All he could do was remain here until he died. “I can not marry you here either, because—”
“Nobody asked you to!” she flared. “Will you answer the question!”
He looked at her with an altered appreciation. He had been so girt about by the problems of his isolation and his dependence on her for food and information that he had not allowed himself to think of her as a feeling creature.