My mouth watered, and I felt a familiar tug between my loins. “You’re a prostitute?”
Her pointed chin lifted with pride. “Not just any prostitute. A high priestess of Hirrān.”
Hirrān, the god of childbirth, did not have a temple in this part of Saba.
“Come. It will be cooler inside.” She tugged on my hand and pulled me toward the door.
I went willingly, my eyes feasting on the jiggle of her succulent round ass.
As though feeling my hungry eyes, Nula slapped her ass. It shook, the flesh quivering with robust delight. “I’m told I have the finest ass in town.”
I longed to touch that fine ass. Feel its luscious heft in my hand. Squeeze its meaty flesh. My cunt pulsed with anticipation.
Once inside, Nula stopped in the middle of the room and looked over her shoulder. “Ass or tits?”
“Huh?”
Nula turned around and grabbed her breasts. “What do you want to touch first? These?” She shook her breasts. “Or this?” She spun around and shook her ass.
“I . . .” I wanted both.
Nula laughed. “That’s everybody’s reaction.” She took my hands, drew me close, and placed my hand on her breast. “That’s right, girl with the golden eyes. I’m yours to explore.”
I ran my hands over her breasts, watched her tiny pink areolas grow to a point. I took each between my thumb and forefinger and tugged.
“Ooooh.” Nula swayed as her nipples stretched. Her palm cradled the back of my neck and brought me forward.
I latched on to her long nipple, flicked my tongue across the rigid ripe flesh. My cunt throbbed—the taste of her nipple was sweet as honey. I sucked hard while my hands smoothed over her supple breasts.
“A little trick,” Nula said through her moans. “Rub honey into your tits. Drives your lover wild.” She pushed me away. “My turn. Take off your dress.”
Shame flamed my cheeks.
“What’s wrong, Golden Eyes?” She followed my gaze. “Have a beard, do you? Well, get me a sharp blade, olive oil, and a soothing balm, and I’ll take care of that.”
I brought her the sharpest blade we had, a jug of olive oil, and a balm made from the aloe vera growing behind our house.
Nula tested the blade against her arm. “Perfect. Lie down. Take your dress off first, eager girl.”
I kicked my dress away and stared down at the profusion of dark, coarse hair that, when compared to Nula’s smooth mound, looked like an overgrown thicket.
Nula crouched over me, her warm bare feet on either side of my hips. “I think we should get better acquainted before I shave this bush.”
“I already sucked on your tits.”
“Oh, you’re a feisty girl. I like that. But these,” she shook her breasts, “don’t have the power of this.” Her tongue flicked out like a snake and slithered between my lips.
Eager to taste a woman’s kiss, my tongue met hers. Together we savored the flavor of each other. We lingered, explored, and nibbled until we panted.
“You taste sweet as a muskmelon,” she murmured.
“And you like honeyed wine.” My hands trailed down her back to grab a handful of her plump ass, a thrill that pumped lust straight into my clit.
Nula kissed my chin and scooted downward until her mouth hovered over my breasts. “Such beautiful brown nipples.” She flicked her tongue across them and I moaned, squeezed her ass harder. She made circles around my breasts, coming closer and closer until reaching my taut brown buds. She flicked and licked, sucking one while twiddling the other. My cunt ached, needed a cock, needed release, but Nula took her time. Her lips played over my belly, sucked on the fleshy hips, and left round red marks.
“Love bites.” She spread my thighs. “Don’t ever leave them anyplace obvious.” She sampled a mouthful of my inner thigh, her soft fingers raking my curls.
Pleasure coursed through me, long pulses of need tightening my cunt and sphincter.
“Ready?” she said after making another red welt.
“Do it.”
Nula pursed her lips, her eyelids heavy. “A girl who knows her mind. How refreshing.” She swiveled around, so that her hairless, fragrant cunt was over my face as she hunched over my weedy delta. “Never do this dry.” Nula poured a bit of olive oil over my curls, her fingers raking through to soak each ringlet. “Olive oil is best, but water or goat’s milk work too.”
I had never seen a woman’s delta so close. Nula’s pink glistening petals swelled with a radiating heat. It was beautiful. Rosy valleys nestled between two ragged ridges of flesh. Her engorged nub lay like a jewel in the midst, like an eager sentry guarding the glistening door to her womb. I breathed her in, a slightly briny scent that reminded me of the time Momma flew me high above the sea.
I took hold of her ass and pulled down. I needed to taste her. Wanted to smother my face in her twat.
“Give me some warning, Golden Eyes. Almost nicked you.” Her ass tightened under my touch. “No licking. Not yet.”
“Hurry up.” I caressed her buttocks, then spread wide her cleft.
“Girl . . . girl . . .” she panted. “I’m almost done.”
I knew the second my bush was smooth shaven. Her tongue lapped at my cunt, which was wet and throbbing, and she lowered herself over me.
I savored her flavor, traveled over her rosy ridges, and sucked on her pink nub. This was a different kind of bliss, with her tongue and fingers in total control of my excruciatingly slow climb to paradise. I followed her lead. Lingered and fingered when and where she did. She widened my rosy valley, spread my thighs wide, explored and devoured and tormented.
I lapped like a thirsty lion at a waterhole. Sucked on her like sweet fruit. Pushed my tongue into her door. Thrust a finger inside until I found the rough spot that made her gush lust’s nectar.
My back arched, the pleasure concentrating, gathering strength and speed, and then the sweet tension released. Nula sat hard on my face. I couldn’t breathe. Waves of bliss crashed over me as I struggled for breath. I was flying, soaring into a blissful oblivion.
Her ass lifted. I gasped, sucked in air. My world cleared, yet my body still quivered from the aftermath of the most powerful orgasm I’d ever had.
I panted, inhaled deeply, blinked several times.
“Nice little trick, eh?” Nula kissed my belly button. “Be a good girl, and finger fuck me in the ass.”
I was an excellent student. Together Nula and I sang to the heavens the rest of the afternoon.
Nula left before Momma came home.
“Who did you like best?” Momma set down a basket of fish.
“I liked both.”
Momma’s eyes sparkled, and a satisfied smile lit her face. “Which one do you want back again?”
I chewed on my lip. “Both. At the same time.”
Momma burst out laughing. “That is the jinn part of you. But now comes the next part of your education. For Greatness is not had by luck, but by hard work and study.”
I started the fire for the fish. “No more sex?”
Her dark eyes flaming, Momma grabbed me by the shoulders. “Not with any of the village men or women. They will gossip.”
“What about Ekene and Nula? Won’t they gossip?”
“No. They were paid to forget.” She kissed my forehead, released my shoulders, and turned back to the fish.
“No more visitors?”
Momma dredged the fish in crushed pistachios. “None you will want to have sex with.”
CHAPTER 5
“Why are you building another house?” I stood behind Momma as she laid another mud brick.
“They need their own space.” Momma worked fast, setting the first seven rows in less than an hour.
“Who?” I drew circles in the dirt with the tip of my sandal.
“Those guiding you up the path of Greatness.” After setting the last mud brick of the batch, Momma checked to see if the new batch had dried in its wood form. Momma could have built a who
le town in a week if she wanted. “When they arrive, cover your hair and face, wear your loosest dress, and remove the kohl around your eyes.”
“Why?” I trailed after her.
“Don’t be daft, daughter. They cannot see your beauty.” She wiped her hands on her stained dress, picked up a stake, and hefted it in her hand. “Put away that frown. You will understand one day and thank me.”
The first visitor was a dark-skinned man with more wrinkles than a raisin. Though his back was straight, he shuffled when he walked. He brought two great sacks full of papyri and scrolls. During those months I learned new words, memorized old theories, and formed new ideas. His scrolls filled my mind and heart with the wonder and wisdom of the world beyond our village.
The second teacher taught math. He showed me tricks for adding and subtracting quickly in my head. Taught me to calculate percentages, taxes, and interest. Trained me in the mathematical formulas for determining how much grain filled a granary and how much wine filled a cask.
I loved math. All I had to do was apply the correct formula and calculate correctly. There was only one right answer. Not like writing, where there were too many ways to write something and too many ways to make mistakes.
I began to think Momma was preparing me to marry a king. Why else would I need to know how to calculate such vast sums? While I studied, Momma made baskets of exceptional size and intricacy. My education was costly, she explained. Expensive, but worth it. Every month a merchant stopped and bought all of Momma’s baskets.
“Why don’t you take them to market yourself?” I looked up from a vexing math problem with two unknown quantities. “You would make more money if you sold direct to the seller.”
“It’s not safe to leave you alone.”
I wrinkled my nose. “The teachers are old and feeble. This one naps while I do my calculations.”
Momma’s eyebrows shot up in dismay. “What?”
“I don’t think he knows he dozes off. His eyelids get heavy and his head bobs. I clear my throat when I’m done and his head springs up. He’s always amazed I did the calculation so quickly.”
Momma examined one of the baskets in her pile. “Mmmm… keeping all the profit would be nice.”
“I’ll be fine. Don’t worry.”
The next week, Momma took her baskets to market. She left before dawn to prevent any villager from seeing her speed and strength. She returned just after dark, her satchel bursting with coins. Momma went to market twice more before the old math teacher proclaimed he had taught me all he knew.
The next withered old man arrived. This one taught me about the heavens. I mapped the positions of constellations, studied the phases of the moon, and discovered the prophetic nature of shooting stars. Unlike my lessons with the other two teachers, who taught during the day, this subject matter required staying awake all night long.
By week’s end, I found my nocturnal rhythm. I delighted in night’s glowing serenity, hushed sounds, and endless sky. Night amplified everything. I could hear a mouse darting under a bush. Feel the slightest breeze across my cheek. Taste the dampness before a storm.
I slept until the noon meal, and each afternoon helped Momma gather palm fronds for her baskets. During one search near the village, I watched young men shed their clothes and wade into the storm-flooded wadi. My cunt tightened as their sinewy, wet bodies glistened in the sun. I ached for their touch, their mouths, their cocks, and . . .
“Those boys are not worth your time.” Momma stepped in front of me and blocked my view. Her pinched lips hovered inches from my gaping mouth. “They have no experience, no skill, and no future. They offer nothing but heartache and frustration. You are made for Greatness.”
“You have men all the time,” I sassed back.
“I am not you.” Momma’s fingernails dug into my chin. “The men I use are strangers just passing through. I never fuck a man from the village. A jealous woman is more dangerous than any warrior.”
“But you’re stronger and faster than anyone. No one can hurt you.” I pulled away and rubbed my chin. “Ouch.”
“A pinch hurts? A jealous woman will do more than that. And she won’t limit her rage to me, Bilqīs. She will come after you if she can’t get to me.”
I dropped my eyes.
“What do you think they would do if they discovered I was a jinni?”
“Tell the king,” I mumbled. According to Momma, kings were always trying to catch a jinni to make them do their bidding.
Momma put her hand on my shoulder. “One day you will need to tell people I am a jinni. But not now.”
“You make no sense.” I pushed away her hand and turned to stare at the young men. From this distance, their faces were indistinct, yet their strapping bodies were enough for me to feel lust’s tug.
“It will all make sense one day.” Momma’s voice was soft and tinged with sadness. “Stay away from the boys. And the girls.”
“I’m tired of this prophesy of Greatness.” My voice cracked with anger.
Momma laughed, an eerie, hollow sound that sounded like it came from a deep clay pot.
CHAPTER 6
The next teacher schooled me in the artistry and laws of architecture. I learned about wood, limestone, dry stone, mud brick, and waterproof cement qudad; the building blocks of construction. This was my favorite subject because it took form and function, beauty and math, to create a praiseworthy temple.
I wondered if my Great Destiny was to be a garbay, a master builder and mason of high status. My teacher praised my ideas and skills in applied mathematics, yet lamented the misfortune of my birth.
“Men are builders. Not women.” He shook his head, his gray stringy locks swishing like a cat’s tail. “It’s a pity your gift will go unused, but that is the way it has always been and will always be.”
The next teacher taught rhetoric, the art of clever persuasion. I enjoyed this as well. I practiced my new skills on Momma, who soon tired of my arguments.
Momma clapped her hands over her ears. “Enough, daughter. You win. But I still won’t fly you to the sea tonight.”
The last teacher taught religion. Not only did the shifty-eyed man go into extensive detail about the five main gods, Athtar, Almaqah, Hawbas, dhāt-Himyam, and dhāt-Ba’dan, he opined about lesser gods in other lands.
Momma could have taught this subject herself, her lengthy lifespan—she refused to tell me just how many generations she’d lived—giving her insight into all kinds of far-flung gods.
“Gods are unknowable, beyond our understanding,” said Momma one night when I asked why I felt closer to Almaqah than Athtar, the highest-ranking god. “A god is felt here.” Her hand pressed to her bosom. “Listen to your heart. It has the instinctual knowing of an animal. This,” she tapped her forehead, “often makes us chase our own tail.”
Despite enjoying the subject matter, I did not like the teacher. Something about him made my skin crawl. He was a middle-aged man with a dark beard, hooked nose, cruel dark eyes, and an unwavering stare that burned through my dress. I felt naked under his contemptuous scrutiny. I studied hard in hopes he would leave quickly.
“Do you have a cock?” he asked one afternoon before we stopped for the midday meal.
“What?” I recoiled.
“Do you have a cock?”
“Why would you ask such a thing?” My stomach twisted with panic. Today was market day. Momma was far away.
“Why else would your mother pay so much to educate a useless girl?”
I rose from the bench, straightened my shoulders. I have a Great Destiny I wanted to say, but did not. “You’re paid to teach, not ask questions about its purpose.”
One corner of his lip curled. “Your dress is shapeless. Do you hide a deformity?”
I stepped back. “No.”
“I don’t believe you. I think your body bares the cursed marks of a witch.”
Why did this teacher, of all teachers, not see my inner light, intelligence, beauty? All the o
thers had. How odd that the one who taught religion did not recognize my exceptionality.
The teacher rose, towering over me. “Your mother deceived me. I’m sharing my wisdom with a freak—a deformed witch! No amount of money is worth doing business with such an aberration.” He grabbed my sleeve and hauled me forward. “Let’s see what hideousness lies beneath your dress.” He planted his hand on my breast and squeezed.
I rammed my knee into his most vulnerable male parts and he doubled over, his face contorted in pain. “You little cunt—if you have one.”
“Momma!” I screamed and ran from the house. Could I outrun him?
“Momma’s not here,” he shouted, limping toward me. “Today I’m going to teach you about sacrifice and worship.”
I bent down, fisted a rock, and hurled it at his head.
He wiped the blood from his forehead—my attempt was nothing but a glancing blow. “This is religion, girlie. Man dominates woman.” He lunged at me.
I turned and ran toward the ravine, toward a narrow concealed cave where I could hide. But I tripped over the hem of my dress. The ground rose to meet me.
The teacher stood over me, his mouth curled into a vile sneer. “Don’t fight it.”
“Momma!” I scrabbled backwards, my dress wrapping like shackles around my legs.
“Be nice and I won’t hurt you. Fight me and you’re dead.” He pinned the hem of my dress to the ground with his foot. “What will it be? Life or death?”
“She chooses life.” Momma appeared behind him.
Had she heard my screams?
He snickered. “Looks like Momma gets to watch.”
Momma blinked.
The air shimmered into a haze of color. A strong wind gusted over my body.
The teacher was gone. Momma was gone.
A middle-aged flabby man was no match for an angry momma jinni.
I dragged my shaking body to the house, leaned against the sun-warmed wall, and waited for Momma to return.
The afternoon sun slanted. The bright blue sky deepened into indigo, and the first constellation lit up the night. I drew my legs to my chest, and wondered where on earth Momma had gone.
Confessions of a Sheba Queen Page 3
