nd down his forearm.

Tarlac shivered, not from cold, and a gulp of hot chovas didn't help.
He wanted to run from what he was suddenly sure she meant. He
couldn't, not yet, not so soon--maybe never! He was afraid as he'd
never been in combat, and shamed by the fear, but he was unable to deny
it.

Daria paused, sensing the man's reaction. She had expected some
unease; the Lords said that he had never shared bodies, since he had
never gone through the ceremony humans needed to make it honorable, as
some of the prisoners had. But simple inexperience didn't explain his
near-panic response. There was a First Sharing for everyone, an
occasion for joy in the clan almost as important as a birth.

Then she remembered stories she had heard about the prisoners, stories
she recalled only with pity. "Married" Terrans shared bodies, yes, but
only in private, as if doing so brought shame even then. And they
never spoke of it, never otherwise slept unclothed, and certainly never
allowed their bodies that freedom while awake. That had to mean, she
realized with sudden horror, that Steve was disturbed by just the
thought of such sharing. He must be fighting not to think of it at
this moment.

Touching hadn't upset him before, but now his arm muscles were taut
under her fingers, and she could tell it cost him effort to remain
motionless and silent. She didn't remove her hand, letting it lie as
before over his forearm, but when she spoke her intonation was
concerned instead of intimate. "Ruhar, let me help you."

". . . What? Help? I . . . don't need any help. It's just . . . I'm
not judging you, but you can't ask me to . . ."

Tarlac's voice trailed off. He couldn't look up and meet her eyes,
could only stare at the gray, gracefully-clawed hand on his arm. At
the altar he had felt he belonged to these people, and it had made him
happy. Now he was a confused alien again, belonging nowhere and to no
one.

The sudden violent changes of emotion he'd begun experiencing lately
weren't usual for him at all, and he didn't know how to handle them.
It was like some of the Academy entrance examinations, when he'd been
tested for his reactions to mood-altering drugs--and, at the same time,
for his ability to function under wildly varying conditions. He'd been
trying to adapt to too many things at once, he thought desperately.
Maybe he did need to slow the pace, maybe he should . . . but he didn't
have time . . .

He could