Books In English "City Of Illusions" Ursula K. Le Guin | Page 63

in her soft, careful voice. "But I have walked its streets with no harm;
many people live there, in no fear of the Lords. You need not go in dread.
The Lords are very powerful, but much is told of Es Toch that is not
true…"
Her eyes met his. With sudden decision, summoning what paraverbal
skill he had, he bespoke her for the first time: "Then tell me what is true of
Es Toch!"
She shook her head, answering aloud, "I have saved your life and you
mine, and we are companions, and fellow-Wanderers perhaps for a while.
But I will not bespeak you or any person met by chance; not now, nor
ever."
"Do you think me a Shing after all?" he asked ironically, a little
humiliated, knowing she was right.
"Who can be sure?" she said, and then added with her faint smile,
"Though I would find it hard to believe of you…There, the snow in the
kettle has melted down. I'll go up and get more. It takes so much to make a
little water, and we are both thirsty. You…you are called Falk?"
He nodded, watching her.
"Don't mistrust me, Falk," she said. "Let me prove myself to you.
Mindspeech proves nothing; and trust is a thing that must grow, from
actions, across the days."
"Water it, then," said Falk, "and I hope it grows."
Later, in the long night and silence of the cavern, he roused from sleep
to see her sitting hunched by the embers, her tawny head bowed on her
knees. He spoke her name.
"I'm cold," she said. "There's no warmth left…"
"Come over to me." He spoke sleepily, smiling. She did not answer,
but presently she came to him across the red-lit darkness, naked except for
the pale jade stone between her breasts. She was slight, and shaking with
the cold. In his mind which was in certain aspects that of a very young
man he had resolved not to touch her, who had endured so much from the
savages; but she murmured to him, "Make m e warm, let me have solace."
And he blazed up like fire in the wind, all resolution swept away by her
presence and her utter compliance. She lay all night in his arms, by the
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