An Excerpt from Souls' Embrace by Diana Laurence

CHAPTER ONE
Visitation

Though ne'er again I see thy face,
I know thee by our souls' embrace.

-from The Legend of Jormas and Onna

My brother . . . my friend . . . my soul's only love.

Mauren did not utter these words aloud, but they rose up from her heart in irresistible salute at the sight of the man . . . the complete stranger who had just burst in the cottage doorway. He was dripping from the rain, his long hair in tendrils, his cloak stuck to his shoulders, his boots shiny with water.

Looking around, confused, he spoke: "Surely this is the place!" His glance fell upon her and he froze, only a few strides away, his eyes opening as wide as she felt hers to be.

Mauren, sitting by the fire with embroidery in her lap, forgot all civilized manners, except to rise to her feet. She could conceive no greeting other than the impossible one, to tell him how she loved him; no gesture of welcome other than to run and embrace his rain-sodden body and cover his slippery wet cheeks with kisses. But in truth she did not know him, so she stood immobilized.

The man seemed likewise flummoxed and left the door standing open behind him, the damp coolness of the night blowing across the floor towards her. His mouth hung open as he regarded her in disbelief.

"Is it you?" he asked, his voice husky and hushed.

"Yes," Mauren heard herself say.

Unfettered, soul-bursting joy illuminated the man's face, and he stepped towards her.

She lifted her arms to him . . .

and he dissolved into the gray light of day.

Mauren awoke in an instant, shocked. There was no cottage, no rainy night. She lay in her own bed, in a tangle of linen and counterpane, her hair across her eyes and her nightdress twisted about her legs. She sat up, hopelessly seeking the fading form of him, but the little room was empty save for a broad beam of sunlight casting from the window to the foot of the bed. He was gone.

And yet . . .

Indeed, this had been no dream like any she had ever had before. For she recalled the man with astonishing detail that surpassed any memory of actual flesh and blood she had ever possessed. In those brief moments his image was captured in her mind like a perfect portrait, oil on canvas, every color flawlessly true.

Mauren fell back onto the pillow and closed her eyes to examine him.

He was tall, but then to little Mauren all men were, and so she concluded he was truly only average height. Nevertheless his figure was an imposing one. Why? Ah, yes, it was the torso, the shoulders. He was so broad in the shoulder, it struck her as pure power. His shirt had clung to him and she saw now that he was muscular both from some physical vocation and a natural propensity. His biceps were full, his hands strong-looking as well. And his thighs in their rain-streaked leggings were thick and firm. Lovely, lovely form . . . all the male's finest assets were displayed in it, not in the impossible perfection sometimes captured by sculptors, but with enough human imperfection, enough individual uniqueness, to demonstrate their worth all the better.

And his face . . . she could not tell if it too were godlike, she could not be objective. For it seemed if her gaze were a question, this face was the truest answer.

His eyes were blue, that pure blue of a perfectly clear summer sky, on a rare day when air from the north came down and chased the humidity away. They were beautiful eyes, and not even so much due to their color. More it was their aspect: they were wide as well as wide-set, with lids that were both delicate and heavy . . . heavy in that when he blinked slowly they could make one feel soft and sleepy, yet delicate with fine wrinkles at the folds. Expressive brows . . . a broad bridge of nose . . . and yes, a most interesting nose, especially in profile when the graceful sweep of the nostrils could be admired.

The desire to touch him rose hard in Mauren's throat. The skin at her fingertips and over her palms yearned to know their equivalents in his own hands. His flesh fascinated her. In the dream she had seen how the blood tinged his cheeks from the exertion of his journey and the excitement of the moment. How desperately she longed to lay her fingers there, to feel the heat of his blood just beneath the skin.

She knew him so intimately, in this fine detail of his flesh and his blood, but likewise in the sum of his being, his carriage and manner. He stood erect, bearing his wide shoulders with practiced assurance. He placed his trim feet in their tall boots with an air of readiness. There was no awkwardness, no uncertainty in his movements. In short, he bore himself as a man who was brave, experienced, self-assured.

However, something in his face belied all this. Mauren saw in it a strange isolation, not so much loneliness as self-imposed exile, a mistrustful independence. She admired this and pitied it at the same time. As his eyes met hers she had recognized in them sudden astonishment, youthful wonder that drove out this guardedness for an instant. His closed face had opened, and to her it felt like the rarest of invitations, a spontaneous beckoning that seemed to surprise even him.

I would come to you, yes, yes, her spirit answered. Why did you leave me? What must I do to bring you back?

Her delighted contemplation of the man dissolved into tears then. What good was it that he was such an angel when his visit had been so brief? How could this encounter bring her anything but pain when now she knew so clearly what a wonder was not hers to possess?

I know now my heart's desire, Mauren lamented, and he is a dream that mocks me because I cannot forget him.

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