Life and Times of a Priestess Ch. 04 Pt. 01-03

"I have been meditating, thinking and watching. We can't do much else here besides worship with the enemy, eating, sleeping, washing, talking. We can't go out unless it is for a purpose," Sreela reported.

"You sound tired and dispirited," commented Danella.

"I am, a little. I am beginning to wonder what the purpose of our new existence is. We are mainly supporting the enemy, I feel so unnecessary. I am doing nothing to fight the Prancirians, not even to escape from them, nor to change and improve our own situation, or that of the menfolk of the Empire," Sreela declared. Danella thought she looked weary. The months had left her tired looking. Her face seemed more lined and her skin less smooth. Her blonde hair had lost some of its shine and was less tidy somehow than before. Sreela was at least ten years older than Danella, probably about 38 or 39 and she still looked good but it was not surprising that some of her youth should be fading. But her face could still inspire both Priestesses and men. She was generally well used by the soldiers who visited, if not as often as Danella and others.

Roger had inspired her for a while and she had recovered from the ordeal of the conquest quickly partly because of him, Danella guessed. Sreela felt the duty of leadership strongly upon her and she had used her influence over Roger to demand the best treatment for the Priestesses. She had confided to Danella on many occasions that she had taken much pleasure from her influence over Roger. It had given her a stronger sense of her leadership after the disappointment and fear of defeat, but it had also given her self confidence because he had chosen her to be more than just a Priestess, or a prisoner. They become virtual partners in those few weeks they were together and she had partially lived with him. After a week Roger asked Sreela to sleep only with him and exempted her from the duties of the other prisoners. As a former High Priestess it was not what she wanted. She had always been an active worshipping Priestess. Her life was her own and sexual communion came naturally to her. She could not envisage a time when she would ever wish to commit herself to one man. The rape of the conquest had shocked and damaged all of them, but the natural inclination for communion had soon returned to all of them.

Sreela had rejected Roger's offer to exempt her from her duties. She took his request as the declaration of love it was intended but had explained that she had lived as a Priestess for too long to ever want to follow the Vanmarian practice of monogamy and she could not refuse to share the life of her Priestesses. She had a responsibility to share with them and to guide them. Roger argued with her but had accepted her explanations when she agreed to spend some nights regularly with him. They had grown closer and become, during those weeks, as close as partners in the Empire of the Goddess, who choose to live together. Sreela had been strong while Roger was with her, and to Danella's eyes had been raised from the despair of the conquest to the confidence and pleasure of being wanted by Roger. They had talked much and shared humour as well as the togetherness of the night.

But now Roger was gone and Sreela knew not whether he would ever come back. He was a soldier and could be sent anywhere. He might even be killed. Danella could understand Sreela's attachment to the man. It must be good to have an attachment to a man which was more than the duty of a Priestess required, more than mere ceremonial or lustful excitement. Danella had only experienced that kind of attachment perhaps with General Polad before. That had been a mutual understanding which stretched into long conversations and the pleasure of being able to discuss her wildest and most unusual thoughts with a man. But her relationship with Polad had never achieved the depth which Sreela and Roger appeared to have achieved in those few weeks.

The relationship between Sreela and Roger became cruel for Sreela when he disappeared. She had not thought it would matter at first but in the months that followed she discovered that his departure had left another hole in her life, which she had not thought was there, to add to the injustices of the war and the conquest.