139
THE LOST CITY OF LOS ANGELES
guage of the Angelinos. It came fairly natu-rally, but the rituals of Marital Commitment were rigorous. I agreed to all of the rituals but one. I refused to be branded, with a hot iron, with a symbol confirming I was Cal-liope’s mate. She sighed and said, “If you don’t love me enough…”
“You’re not after all so different from my ex,” I said in English, as we sat on the wo-ven front porch of her stilt house. In Calli’s language, I said, “I just think the branding thing might be a bit on the primitive side.” I shook my head. “Just not my style. Anyway, I don’t want to brand you. I’d rather you got a nice tattoo with the interlocked stars sym-bol, like in the brand.”
The smile she gave me then had the pow-er of a stroke of lightning that never faded. “Yes,
