Midnight 01 - Luisa's Desire

Luisa.
     
    She interests me, he thought, facing the truth as he had been trained. She pulls not just at my body but at my mind.
     
    What would it be like to see history unfold in a single incarnation? To love the material world so deeply one never wished to leave? Martin shook his head. Luisa claimed faith in a higher power, but she did not experience its reality even as much as the youngest chela. She could not touch the truth behind the illusion. All things were one and yet Luisa seemed alone: separate from both her God and her fellow beings. She should have been miserable. He could not understand why she was not.
     
    No doubt he would have pondered the matter longer if his teacher had not spoken.
     
    "Do you remember," he said, "when your family first came to Shisharovar?"
     
    "I shall never forget it. I ran straight up the stairs and tried to kick two monks out of 'my' room."
     
    The abbot's eyes crinkled at the corners. "You were quite adamant for an eight-year-old."
     
    "But it was all so clear to me. This was where I belonged."
     
    "Yes," said his guide, "it must have seemed so. I admit, I felt the tug of it myself: to keep my old friend by my side. It is comforting to find again what you have lost, almost as comforting as finding what you have forgotten you ever had."
     
    Martin wondered what the abbot was getting at, but his placid profile gave no clue. He felt his forehead pleat together. "I know sixteen years was a long time to stay away, but I could not have remained here then, not when it meant abandoning my mother. My father leaving before my birth was bad enough. I could not betray her, too."
     
    The abbot patted his rumpled sleeve. "I did not mean to imply your choice was wrong. You had a lifetime in this monastery, more than one. To mindlessly repeat what one has done before can hardly be considered progress."
     
    "But I belong here now," Martin said. To his dismay, his voice made the words a question.
     
    The abbot smiled. "I do not doubt we are all where we're meant to be. Speaking of which"—his teacher shot him a sidelong glance—"what do you think of your new student?"
     
    Martin's hands were clasped on the stony ledge. He stared at them, amazed they did not bear the silky imprint of her curves. "I regret I could not help her."
     
    "We have only begun. No one could expect the first attempt to succeed. And I am certain you did your best."
     
    Had he, Martin wondered, or had he allowed the clamoring of his body to drown out a better, quieter guidance? "I am not certain—" he began.
     
    The abbot broke in. "She is settled in her room?"
     
    "Yes," he said, though he was perturbed by the interruption. "I brought her blankets as the sun was rising. When she took them, she stumbled and nearly fell. I think she is weaker than she is used to. I sat with her for a while, to ensure she was well, but I do not think she knew I was there. She slept strangely, like a fakir on a bed of nails. Her body was stiff and cold to touch. I did not see her breathe more than twice in a quarter hour."
     
    He did not add that her appearance had unsettled him, more statue than corpse but disturbing all the same. For a moment, he had feared she died in truth. But then her chest had risen with a shallow inhalation. The relief he'd felt had not been logical, no more than his gentle stroking of her hair. That contact could have comforted only him.
     
    "She seemed… vulnerable," he said, the confession as troubling as the memory.
     
    "Indeed," mused his guide, "if one wished to destroy such creatures, clearly their rest would be the time to try."
     
    "Sir!" Martin was shocked beyond holding his tongue. Among Buddhists, the taking of life, any life, was a powerful prohibition.
     
    His teacher raised his brows. "I am not proposing we murder our guest, only that we prepare for any eventuality."
     
    His tone was eminently reasonable. Martin schooled his pulse to a steadier rate. "Forgive me. I know you will do everything possible to prevent such a necessity from arising."
     
    He did not understand the small, satisfied smile with which the abbot turned back to the view. He seemed almost smug as he spoke again. "I have thought of something else," he said, "a meditation that might bring down her walls. We can drug some wine to induce the proper mental state. It will be dangerous, of course. Inexperienced as she is, she might get lost in the visions the herbs produce."
     
    "Most likely she will get lost,"