Big Salmon Lake primum non nocere

He had not misunderstood, but the explanation still brought him some clarity on the matter. He was glad that they were far enough from Leto that she would not have to overhear her son's concerns.

He hoped.

"It is not your mother in the wrong, but the ones who speak ill of her," Aureli replied with great forbearance. He had no love for Leto, and indeed, harbored his own doubts and dissatisfaction with the woman — but not about her choice to seek men — few or many — in her fertile window. "You will soon find that many women make the same or similar choices with their family planning. It is not for us to decide these things for them, nor to judge them for their choices."

Aureli was as judgemental as they came, but he did his best to hide it. This was a case of "do as I say, not as I do" — he hoped that Delos would not find too many of these flaws within him.

"I will enter an agreement with you, out of respect for your wishes, to stay away from your mother," he went on, a tiny smirk finding its way to the corners of his mouth. "But, while commitments outside of my vocation are disallowed, the matter of physical intimacy is a gray area. We can speak more of it when you are older, when it may become more relevant to you."

For now, Aureli expected Delos to remain undistracted by hormones.

"But I would like to talk about the vows," he said, gentle censure in his voice. "The first, do no harm, may not be as simple as it seems — for there is a kind of harm in these biases we hold, don't you think? And the last, to remain focused on learning and practicing the sacred art of healing, is easily broken. Your mother is traveling with us because you are yet young, and there is harm in separating so abruptly from these ties. But you must learn to let her go. She will make her decisions. You must be focused on your own path."

He waited, expecting that not all of these things would sit well with the young man.