Midnight 01 - Luisa's Desire

Whether they had shared a thousand lives or none could not have mattered less.
     
    He loved her.
     
    Stumbling to the door, he leaned his brow against its time-worn wood. He could not ignore this emotion. He had to sum it into his accounts.
     
    Not here, though, not in his solitary monkish cell. He needed…
     
    He did not know what he needed but he strode into the hall to find it, letting his instincts be his guide. The decision was there before him. He had only to clear his mind.
     
    ***
    MARTIN was waiting in her cell when she returned. The sight of him made her heart sink to her belly. He sat tailor-fashion on the floor, in the position his people called the lotus, so still he might have been a statue. His string of wooden prayer beads was wrapped around one hand, their surface smooth as stone from many tellings. Gone was his agitation of the night before: his arousal, his embarrassment, anything that marked him a man of flesh. His absolute, effortless peace filled the room the way a stream of water fills a cup. Luisa inhaled without thinking, as if she could draw his serenity into herself. All she did was underscore the differences between them. Self-denial and contemplation were the essence of his world. She did not see how it would ever mesh with hers.
     
    As if he'd known the moment she entered, his eyelids slowly rose. "I am glad you are here," he said, in his deep, heartbreaking voice. "I have something to show you."
     
    He set down his beads and extended his hand to her, though she knew he needed no help to rise. His hold was warm, its illusion of camaraderie intense. He did not drop her hand even after he reached his feet. With a gentle smile, he led her to the cell beside her own.
     
    She had assumed the space was empty, and maybe it had been. Now, however, it glowed with warmth. Butter lamps ringed the room and someone had softened the floor with a rich Pashmina carpet. The walls resembled a sultan's tent, draped in hangings of painted silk. Far happier than the banner of Hayagriva, these thangkas depicted various Buddhas and their consorts, each gracefully straddling the lap of her protector. The colors were bright and pure, the execution of the figures marvelously adept. Decorative as they were, she did not notice at first how explicitly they were joined.
     
    But none of this was as suggestive as the pile of cushions on the floor. No dust marred them, no fading or frays of age. All red, all shining silk damask, they could not be the prop for anything but a seduction.
     
    "No," she said, turning to her companion. "Martin, I don't think we should do this."
     
    If anything, his manner grew calmer. "It is my wish," he said, his beautiful eyes like stars, "and possibly your need. Last night, at the moment we gave each other pleasure, I felt your barrier begin to fall. You opened your aura to mine and the flow of power did not harm you. Because of this, I believe you may be able to live off the energy lovers share. But there is only one way to find out."
     
    "No," she said again. "Your vow…"
     
    "I have not yet taken it."
     
    "In your heart, you have." The scope of what he offered stunned her. She ran her fingers through her hair, distressed to the point where she knew she'd become disheveled. "Martin, I am honored. Truly, I am. But this is not a sacrifice I can accept. Perhaps I could make this experiment with someone else."
     
    He frowned at her, his expression abruptly cool. "You are welcome to try, but I doubt you will see the same results, especially since—despite your many lovers—you never saw them before. Those men did not have my mental training. Nor, I think, did your soul view them as equals. Once you have experienced the process of exchanging energy in full, then perhaps your body will know the trick of repeating it with another."
     
    "You are jealous," she said with a flattered laugh.
     
    Martin drew himself up. "If I am jealous, it is no one's business but my own. I do not wish you to be a killer, not even against your will. If I were able to help and did not, any death you caused would be on my hands."
     
    "I am responsible for myself! The minute I took what Auriclus offered that was true. Even if no one but you could aid me, I could not let you do this. You were born to be a monk."
     
    "Was I?" he said. "I have lived as a monk before, taken my vows, followed a path no woman shared. Perhaps it is time to walk another way. Perhaps my spirit shall not progress until I