by Vina Jackson
Catching his breath, Ange felt unknown hands fumbling around his waist, undoing his leather belt and with a gentle tug on his cotton trousers pulling them down to the ground and realised he was also now naked, his cock hard as rock as it hadn’t been in ages. In itself a remarkable feat as the pleasures of the flesh were but a distant memory in the ascetic life of a scholar he had been leading for as long as he remembered.
At first, he thought the water tank was now empty as the water swirled in front of him behind the thick glass of the container, like a whirlpool still hungry for the presence of the now departed bodies, but then, in the periphery of his vision, he caught sight of a quicksilver shadow racing inside the water which then unblurred as the new, solitary swimmer slowed and paused.
It was a woman. Either she was the tallest specimen of her kind or the water bowl was distorting her proportions. If the previous maidens had been perfect, then this new apparition was beyond perfection. Her red mane floated upon the water, wave upon wave of fire settling with grace between the interstices of the submarine currents she seductively swam through with a haughty elegance. Her alabaster skin shone as if lit from inside and her limbs extended in all directions like Medusa’s hair.
Her eyes were the colour of deepest coal, dark pits of knowledge paradoxically illuminating the beauty of her face, where cheekbones, lips, eyebrows and mouth formed a balance like no other. Her body was a symphony of equilibrium, long neck conjugating with small, shapely breasts impervious to the water’s currents, standing firm and high on her chest, before the valley of her stomach descended with geometrical precision towards her sex, smooth, like a desirable scar delicately carved into her flesh and outlining the holy of her opening.
A hand gently took hold of his cock. Soft and caring. A woman’s. Not that it would have mattered had it not been as Ange was so transfixed by the vision of the woman in the water. Bodies bunched around him, skin against skin, heat against heat, as if he was no longer a single entity but a mere working part in a massive, heaving organism made of flesh, through which the winds of lust blew.
‘Virgo?’ he whispered.
‘No,’ a nearby voice replied. ‘Aquarius,’ correcting his ignorance. ‘Virgo comes at dawn . . .’
He was still trying to process the information when there was a loud splash in the water at the very top of the giant glass bowl, and a similarly perfect man, brooding with intense power and seemingly carved out of granite emerged from the whirlpool and began swimming towards the red-haired siren.
A wave of shuddering strength raced through the spectators as they bunched up even closer to each other. Had Ange fainted, he knew, he would not have even fallen to the ground and would have been held up by the massed bodies now pressing against him in all directions.
A warm, wet mouth took him in and his whole body nervously trembled as the lips enveloped him and a tongue darted across his sensitive glans. But still he couldn’t look away from the spectacle unfurling in front of his eyes.
‘The bull,’ someone said breathlessly.
The beautiful woman was now at the centre of the bowl, head back, lying back on an invisible bed of emptiness, as she parted her legs open. As she did so, Ange focused on the porcelain pallor of her flat stomach and its one irregularity: a bold black number 1 written on the skin, situated at an equal distance from her navel and the straight, darker line of her cunt.
The swimming bull reached the woman and fitted inside her open thighs with mechanical exactitude. As he did so, her mouth opened wide and a tower of tiny bubbles floated to the surface of the water bowl.
How could they even breathe? Ange wondered distractedly.
The two bodies, now fucking in earnest, buckled and a new ballet began.
Like gladiators fighting, every single movement a poetic and minutely rehearsed concerto of thrust and defence, attack and surrender, acceptance and exacerbated desire.
Somehow the mouth sucking him with infinite skill and appetite worked in coordinated unison with the savage lovemaking he was witnessing, orchestrating the slow but inevitable rise of his desire, the awakening of his body, the battlefield of his aroused senses.
Time stood still.
The couple in the water, sealed in a cocoon of explosive passion, finally shuddered in mutual ecstasy and their joined bodies rolled and jolted as they rocketed to the surface of the bowl in search of air. At the same moment, Ange came. Sighing deeply, his legs almost turning to jelly in shock, he at last looked down to see who had been relieving him in such exquisite fashion, but all he could see was a dark-haired head retreating backwards through a jumble of legs and bodies. He wanted to call her back, but couldn’t summon the right words. He looked around at the bacchanalia still in progress around him and smiled.
Later, he left the chamber and moved through the building.
Each room had been conceived as a different environment. He trampled the grass of a glade, waded through forest and marvelled at the ingenuity and invention of whoever the Ball’s organisers were and also came to the realisation that the absent part of Casanova’s manuscript, if it existed, could only have been about a preceding incarnation of the Ball. Of this he no longer had any doubt.
He witnessed the twins of Gemini and their ritual seduction of the archer of Sagittarius, who was masquerading tonight as a centaur.
He marvelled at the spectacle of the sea-goat of Capricorn wrestling in daring obscenity with the water-bearer of Aquarius.
And in the bedrooms, each one like a remembrance of things past, from carpeted walls of a Thousand and One Nights Arabian cavern to the rough-hewn recreation of a prehistoric cave or a silk-laden medieval four-poster bed of delights, he followed the lovemaking of Cancer and countless others, participants and spectators alike in a wondrous series of combinations allying the graceful and the forbidden, until his eyes and senses were properly saturated.
Towards morning, feeling his sexual powers awakening again, his energy regrouping, his blood hot and lustful, Ange wandered into an area empty of crowds and stumbled through a recessed door.
It was a small room, sparsely decorated and furnished. A divan stood at its centre, on which a young woman sat. Liveried attendants stood on either side of her, as if protecting her. She wore a diaphanous robe through which the gentle curves of her body could be glimpsed. She was small but perfectly proportioned, her skin powdered to an approximation of snow, her lips and the evanescent spectacle of her nipples standing out in deep-scarlet painted tones.
As he entered the room, Ange became conscious of his own nudity and visible arousal, and made a rapid gesture to cover himself. But the gentle smile of the woman disarmed him. There was a kindness and maturity in her face that soothed his raging senses within an instant.
He felt he should talk to her, excuse his nudity, the vulgarity of his appearance, but was not given the time. A crowd of Ball officials trouped past, ignoring his presence, and approached the woman on the divan.
‘Dawn has come,’ one of them solemnly proclaimed.
She rose.
Ange’s heartbeat slowed.
Her faint smile changed, although he was unable to decipher how the kindness morphed into lust and desire.
Her two attendants at her side, she walked towards the newcomers, passing Ange without a final glance and followed the officials.
He trailed the newly formed procession.
And he watched as the young woman was first bedded at the stroke of dawn by the man in a lion cloak and saw how her smile so quickly turned to lust and joy.
Ange had somehow completed the whole circle of the signs of the zodiac.
And then witnessed the Inking.
He departed Venice the following day and gave up his search for the missing manuscript. But he would never forget the Ball.
5
The Fantastic Aerialists
Had it not been located on a busy suburban street corner just off the main thoroughfare and surrounded by ordinary homes, shops and restaurants, the building that loome
d over them could have passed for a castle.
‘Not very friendly-looking, is it?’ Siv remarked to Aurelia as the two young women stared up at the monstrous brick walls and even taller towers that stood at each corner of an edifice that was so vast it seemed to cover two whole blocks.
‘No,’ Aurelia agreed. ‘Sort of looks like a cross between a dungeon and a church.’
‘More like a fortress, I’d say,’ Siv replied.
They continued to dawdle at the front entrance, neither of them willing to make the first move to enter. It was still daytime and somehow the final rays of late-afternoon sun made the structure seem even more oppressive, as if the building was better suited to darkness.
Siv hooked her thumb into the belt loop above the pocket of her denim shorts and absent-mindedly began to run her fingertips over the folded edges of the thick white card that Walter, the blind sculptor, had given her by way of invitation to the exhibition. Aurelia glanced at her friend, alerted by the movement of Siv’s hand against her hip, and frowned.
It was now late Saturday afternoon and just a few days had passed since Siv’s brief foray into nude modelling and Aurelia’s discovery of her tattoo.
Aurelia had been preoccupied, of course, with thoughts of the stranger and the mystery of her disappearing and reappearing mark, but as she had already completed her one afternoon of household duties for Edyta that week and had been largely idle the rest of the time, she had plenty of opportunities to observe the subtle changes in Siv’s behaviour that had occurred since she had met Walter.
On the afternoons that Siv spent teaching, she had asked Aurelia to watch her phone like a hawk in case he called to arrange a follow-up session. Aurelia had agreed to do so, but thought that the arrangement was a little over the top: surely he could simply leave a message, and Siv could call him back?
Aurelia had also noticed that Siv had become totally preoccupied by this mysterious exhibition that Walter had invited her to attend. The thick white card, bereft of a date, time, location or any other useful instructions, had been taken out of Siv’s pocket, unfolded and returned so many times that the writing was now barely legible.
Siv had suggested all manner of crazy things to draw more information from the invitation and Aurelia, who knew that her own thoughts and behaviour had been anything but rational lately, had reluctantly gone along with it all, holding the thick card up to an electric light, over a candle flame, even standing on the front porch under a moonbeam, an idea that had occurred to Siv after watching the latest Peter Jackson fantasy movie.
‘Well, it can’t be Elvish, then,’ she complained dismally as the worn black writing continued to simply say ‘Exhibition: by invitation only,’ and the white space surrounding it was entirely free of hieroglyphics, invisible ink or any other clues.
In the end, Siv had responded to Aurelia’s repeated badgering and simply dug out the original advertisement that she had applied to and phoned him.
‘Oh sorry,’ said Walter, at the other end of the line, ‘I forgot to give you directions.’ Siv motioned frantically for a pen and paper and Aurelia groaned and rolled her eyes as she noted down the time of the event and a quite ordinary-sounding address.
‘We’ve got to stop this believing-in-magic nonsense,’ Aurelia said when Siv ended the call. ‘It’s not doing either of us any good.’ She stared pointedly at the tufty mohawk that Siv had created on her head by running her fingers through her fringe during the call, the habit that she took up whenever she was stressed, flirting or both. Now that Siv so often wore her customary teaching uniform of ballet tights and a colourful vest top, she looked even more than ever like a pixie with her short locks poking straight up on top of her head.
Siv had nodded her head vigorously in agreement, but despite the fact that the two of them had vowed to take a rational approach to the unusual events that had befallen them they still hesitated when they arrived at the Exhibition’s apparent entrance. Aurelia was loath to acknowledge the strange feeling that surrounded her. She felt that if she walked through the venue’s doors she might enter yet another strange new world where even more bizarre and unexplainable events might occur.
‘It’s like somewhere a witch might imprison Rapunzel,’ Aurelia said at last, staring up at one of the four towers that seemed to go up into the sky for miles, like open fingers on a giant palm ready to snatch her up.
‘I’ll be your knight in shining armour,’ Siv replied. ‘Come on.’ She took Aurelia’s hand in her own and they stepped towards the heavy door.
It swung open silently in front of them as they approached.
‘Come in then,’ said a woman from within. The tone of her voice was halfway between a sultry purr and an angry growl.
She was sitting inside the darkened corridor that lay just beyond the doorway, behind a heavy wooden table upon which a small pile of dollar bills and coins rested along with an ink pad and heavy stamp, and a folded-over piece of card that bore the name ‘Lauralynn’ in the same calligraphic font that had decorated the invitation. Her long blond locks were fixed into pigtails that stuck out on either side of her head in Japanese schoolgirl style. The youthful nature of her hairstyle was in stark contrast with her ramrod-straight back, authoritarian posture and the wry expression that suffused her features. She was so tall and her back so straight and the table so low that she resembled a young queen reigning over the limited territory of the foyer.
They approached the counter and Siv insisted on covering the small entry charge.
‘No bags?’ she asked, raising one perfectly groomed pale eyebrow and staring pointedly at Aurelia’s small purse and Siv’s empty hands. She looked them up and down. ‘You didn’t bring a change of clothes?’
‘I told you that you should have asked about a dress code,’ Aurelia whispered to Siv.
‘He’s blind, how would he know what to wear?’ Siv hissed back.
‘Ah,’ said Lauralynn. ‘Walter invited you. Did he tell you what kind of exhibition it is?’
‘An art exhibition, isn’t it?’ Siv replied. ‘He just gave me this.’ She fished the invitation out of her pocket and passed it over the table.
‘I told him this wouldn’t do . . .’ Lauralynn sighed. ‘Come with me then. It’s an erotic art exhibition. Mostly performance-based. And we ask all attendees to dress the part for the sake of atmosphere. Normally I’d just turn you away, but since Walter invited you . . . come out back and we’ll find something that will do the job.’
She stood up from behind the counter revealing the rest of her frame. Her tightly laced stiletto ankle boots were about seven inches tall, Aurelia reckoned, which made her already long legs seemingly go on for miles. Even in regular clothes, Lauralynn could never have passed as anything but extraordinary. The rest of her outfit was in accord with her hair-do, but her white blouse and short pleated skirt did not manage to imply a semblance of innocence. She seemed like such a simmering powerhouse beneath her clothing that her school uniform costume gave her the appearance of a superhero unsuccessfully feigning harmlessness on an off day.
Aurelia stared closely at the way the strange rubbery fabric of Lauralynn’s outfit clung to her skin and shone in the light. She had never seen anything like it before.
‘Latex,’ Siv whispered, as they followed Lauralynn to the storeroom. She fished a long chain with a brass key attached to the end from between her breasts with the air of a VIP banker about to open a very important safe.
The room was packed with outfits of all descriptions, most in shades of red, purple and black and many of them, in Aurelia’s opinion, either tasteless or frightening, or both.
‘Are they expecting a nuclear war, do you think?’ she asked Siv as she spied a rack of gas masks hanging against one wall.
Lauralynn stared at them and shook her head. ‘Where did he drag you two in from, I wonder?’ she mumbled to herself as she pulled out a rail of clothing from behind a pile of boxes that were brimming with skimpy bras and frilly knickers.
> ‘You’ll be all right in these,’ she said to Siv, handing over a heavy pile of garments tied together with a ribbon. ‘And this will suit you, Missy,’ she added, trying to throw a bundle of black fabric towards Aurelia and stopping short when she realised that it was too diaphanous to travel through the air and stepping forward and passing it to her instead.
Aurelia grasped the slippery bundle in her hands and held it slightly away from her as if it was a hot potato. What was wrong with her clothes anyway? They were only going to look at things and it wasn’t even dark yet. Surely only posh restaurants and nightclubs had dress codes. She put off undressing, hoping that Siv would be in agreement and they could either leave or convince Lauralynn to let them through as they were, but Siv had already begun to strip off and shimmy into the garments that had been picked out for her. Once fully dressed she swivelled on one toe, executing a perfect pirouette to display her new threads.
Siv’s opaque tights had been replaced with skin-revealing fishnets and her short shorts with an even tinier pair that cupped her arse so tightly her cheeks, already firm and toned from all the dance practice, were perfectly delineated, perhaps even lifted slightly and imperceptibly spread apart. She had managed to wriggle into a stiff but flexible basque that was decorated with a series of satin and stretch-lace panels with a square-cut neckline that simultaneously flattened her small breasts entirely so that her chest resembled a boy’s but was low enough to reveal just a hint of each of her pink nipples.
The whole outfit was cream-coloured and had been purposefully distressed with rips, burn marks and theatre dust to give it an aged appearance. Siv had laced her purple Dr Martens over the fishnets and the heavy boots made the top of her calves and thighs look even shapelier than usual.
Aurelia’s breath caught in her throat. A sharp dart of arousal throbbed within her and caught her by surprise. She had never felt that way about another girl and certainly not about Siv.
She hurriedly glanced away and took a closer look at her own outfit to distract herself. At first glance the dress that she had been handed appeared to be totally sheer and she carefully picked up each of the thin straps and unravelled it to its full length with some trepidation. It was made of a sort of soft, stretchy fine mesh with a pattern of fine diamanté beads that ran in a snake-like pattern down the front, assiduously placed to cover the wearer’s most intimate parts.
