In other memory-walks, Thymara glimpsed gauntleted Elderlings at work. They stroked sculpture from stone, imbued wood with mobility, and persuaded metal to gleam, sing, and heat or cool water. Their shops lined some of the narrow streets and they called greetings to Amarinda as she passed. Thymara felt an odd kinship with them, an almost-recall of what they did but not how. Amarinda merely strolled past amazing feats with scarcely a glance, accepting them as part of her everyday world. But there were other places and times when Amarinda focused her attention intently and relentlessly, drowning Thymara in her emotions and sensations. The Elderling woman’s infatuation with Tellator continued, deepened and became a lifelong passion. In the space of a single afternoon of memory-walking, Thymara experienced months of her life. She would emerge from those hours with dimmed eyes and dulled senses, her hand clasping Rapskal’s as he sprawled on the steps beside her. She would turn her head and see him wearing Tellator’s smile, and the thumb that rubbed sensuously against the palm of her hand was not Rapskal’s at all. Only slowly would his gaze become Rapskal’s again, and she wondered who he saw when he looked at her, which parts he remembered as they rose, stiff and chilled. Rapskal always wanted to speak of the shared memories afterwards. And she always refused. After all, they were only memories. Dreams.
Did it matter what she experienced as a memory-walker? If the food she ate there did not nourish her, did the sex she enjoyed in that world matter in this one? She was of two minds. Certainly, it had changed her attitude toward many things that people could do in a cosy bed on a winter’s eve or in a meadow under a summer sky. Could she claim she was not being intimate with Rapskal when she knew that he wore Tellator’s skin? Certainly, she assured herself. Sometimes. For he could change nothing that Tellator did or felt, just as she had no control over Amarinda. She could not prevent their lovers’ quarrels and she could not sidetrack their sensuous reunions. It was as if they watched the same play, or heard the same story told. That was all.
Sometimes she could almost believe that. Certainly, that puppetry of intimacy did not seem to completely satisfy Rapskal. Often, as they walked back to their lodgings he would drop hints or outright beg her to come with him to some private place where they could re-enact what they had just experienced. She always refused. Over and over, she had told him that she did not want to risk a pregnancy. Yet she could not deny that she longed for the excitement of being the woman in control of the situation. Or a woman being loved by a man.
And today, as she strolled with Tats down to the riverside to visit the dock construction, the same thoughts were still on her mind. What would it be like to have Tats as a lover? She had experienced Tellator any number of times now, and shared one long night with Rapskal. Would Tats be as different from both of them as Rapskal had been from Tellator? It was an unsettling thing to wonder and she tried to push the thoughts aside. She gave the young man beside her a sideways glance. His face was grave and thoughtful. A question popped out of her mouth before she considered the wisdom of asking it.