Free The Door Into Fire by Diane Duane Page A

mean it and how I mean it is—)
    (Later. What does his mastery have to do with you?) (Well, among other things, when he dies, I’ll inherit the Wood—)
    (Well, of course. How can it be otherwise, but that progeny shall take their progenitors’ energy unto them?)
    (Uh—right.)
    (I think I see. Are you seeking to bring your progenitor to his ending that you may have his energies?)
    Too puzzled to be angry, Herewiss said, (No. I am traveling to find a friend who is being held against his will, and to release him.) He kept the thought as simple as possible, feeling that this was no time to go into the political ramifications.
    Herewiss could feel Sunspark pondering the whole thought curiously, taking it apart. (Oh. This person is your mate?)
    (Uh—my loved, yes.)
    Sunspark looked with interest at the concept “loved.” (Your mate. And you will unite and engender progeny? You seem young for it...)
    (It, ah, it doesn’t quite work that way. You see, we are both men...)
    (Yes?) It waited politely for the explanation. Herewiss sagged against the wall, looking for the right words.
    (Well—see, Sunspark, in this world, “progeny” are— well, there are many ways to achieve union, but there is only one way to have a child. The women bear the children, always; and though men may know men in, uh, union, and women may lie with women, a child only happens if a man lies with a woman. There have been times when babies were supposed to have happened when women lay together—but it’s hard to say, because men had been sleeping with the women too.) Herewiss, to his utter surprise, was becoming embarrassed. Even Halwerd at four years of age had not been as completely confused about sex as Sunspark obviously was. (My loved and I are both males and cannot have ‘progeny’ of our own.)
    Sunspark digested this. (Yours is not a fruitful union? Yet you pursue it? Such behavior is not survival-oriented for a species.)
    Herewiss laughed. (Perhaps it wouldn’t be if the Goddess hadn’t given our kind the Responsibility. When we come of age—)
    (Oh. You come into heat too? Well, there’s one similarity, anyway.)
    (Uh, I’m not sure. But when we come of age, or soon after, we must have union in such a manner as to reproduce ourselves at least once—one union for a man, one bearing for a woman – though there are some who say it should be two. That’s between each woman and the Mother, though. After that Responsibility’s discharged, union is our own business, and we may love whom we please.)
    The roan stallion stood there and mused over this. Sunspark was now fully recovered, and it looked magnificent as the mount of a king—its hide a true deep crimson, bright as blood, and its mane and tail glittering like wrought gold even in the subdued light from the door.
    (How very strange,) it said. (Union again and again, it seems, without consummation. And even without progeny! —So your “loved” is in durance?)
    (Yes.)
    (And you are going to free it?)
    (Him. Yes, and then go back to my work.)
    (This is definitely too much for me,) Sunspark said. (You will go to your mate—and not unite—and then go do something else? )
    (Well, we may, uh, unite, but—yes.)
    (What else could you possibly want to do? )
    Herewiss sighed. (I have, well, a certain kind of Fire within me—)
    (Yes: that’s why I was heading in this direction, as well as because the rain felt less over here. I could feel the fire, and I thought we might be related…though I didn’t understand how you could not be distressed by the water. I see that we aren’t relatives, though, except in a rather superficial manner.)
    (That’s for sure,) Herewiss said. (At any rate, I have this Fire—but not control of it. With the Flame, one must have a tool, a focus with which to dissociate it from one’s self, or it won’t work. I’m looking for such a focus. It would be a shame to die of old age and never have had use of the Flame at all ...)
    (Excuse me. “Die?”)
    (Uh...