by Ron Miller
“These,” tootled the eunuch, “are Gravelinghe [here the big woman gave a bizaare curtsey toward Rykkla, like a towering minaret tottering on the verge of collapse] and Thursby [whose curtsey looked a great deal more congruous and was far more naturally and gracefully performed]. They’ll see to your needs. Should there be anything else, call one of the assistant eunuchs. Don’t ever bother me.”
With those curt words, he turned and sloshed off with all of the insubstantiality of a jellyfish but none of the grace. Rykkla was left to examine the two women, who stood silently and expectantly. Neither seemed now to have any compunction about staring at the newcomer with disconcerting, but not unfriendly, frankness. The monster was, except for her great height, not ill-proportioned at all; in fact, not seen in context, such as next to such a small woman as Thursby in particular, or even a human of normal stature, for that matter, would not seem at all unusually large. Only her musculature marked her as outside the ordinarily accepted norm, yet she had not abandoned her sex’s subcutaneous fat, which glossed and sleekened muscles that would have otherwise been as boldly chisled as Gyven’s. Her tapered, columnar legs comprised more than half of her height. Her breasts were as round and perfectly matched as a pair of cobblestones, her nipples made of terra cotta, her stomach as smooth, hard and rippled as a fossil beach. Above broad shoulders that were surely more than six feet above the floor was a handsome, broad face with high, level cheekbones and large, slanting eyes that glittered like slivers of obsidian beneath their heavy lids. Her hair was black and cropped close to her scalp so that it seemed as though she were wearing a skullcap made of lacquered teak. Her pubes looked like an obsidian spearhead: she was absolutely unadorned, not so much as a tattoo or freckle, and Rykkla for the life of her could not imagine what could possibly improve such magnificence, other than perhaps a plinth with the name of the master sculptor tastefully engraved.
Rykkla made a mental note to ask the giantess if she would ever consider working in a circus.
At the other extreme, Thursby could not have been a better-chosen counterpoint. Scarcely five feet tall, her minikin proportions were nevertheless as unobvious as Gravelinghe’s. Seen unaccompanied, she would simply have appeared to be a woman of almost perfect figure standing perhaps a little further away than she really was. Her body was as sleek, smooth and faultless as a plaster souvenir figurine. Her face was round, small-nosed, bright-eyed, with a rather large, full-lipped mouth that when relaxed fell easily into a natural smile. Her hair was dark blonde and hung in thick waves over shoulders and breasts that were like cantaloupe halves. She even had an artistic sprinkling of freckles across her cheeks and snub nose. There was no way Rykkla had of estimating Gravelinghe’s age, no more than she could put a date to a geological formation, but Thursby appeared to be no more than sixteen or seventeen.
There was a long silence before Rykkla realized that she was expected to speak first.
“My name is Rykkla Woxen.”
Silence.
“I’m pleased to meet you.”
Silence.
“I just arrived, only an hour or so ago.”
Silence.
This is embarrassing, she thought, then decided to try asking something of the patiently waiting women that absolutely required a response. “Is there anything to eat? Can I change clothes or take a bath?”
She was relieved to see that this worked, and Thursby was the first to speak in a voice that was unsurprisingly sweet, child-like and friendly.
“Of course! Is there anything you’d particularly like?”
“Oh, I don’t know. I feel as though I haven’t eaten in a week;”, in fact, it had been less than fifteen minutes, though she would hardly have given that credence; perhaps the fruit and canapés should rightly be only considered appetizers, “any large animal would do; and I could drink a gallon of anything wet.”
“You’re from the deserts?”
“Is there anywhere else to be from in this country?”
“I don’t know; I’ve never seen the deserts, I’ve only just heard about them.”
“You’re not from Ibraila, then?” Rykkla asked, not that she doubted this, after all, the girl’s appearance and coloring were distinctly non-Ibrailan, she wanted to fan these first, smoldering sparks of conversation.
“No. I’m from Crotoy. I came here directly. I’ve never been outside the palace. I was even taken from the ship in a sealed coach.”
“Never? Well, you’re not missing much, if that comforts you any. How long have you been here, then?”
“Years and years. So long ago that I really don’t remember. I was just a little girl. Are you Ibrailan, then, since you’re from the desert?”
“Me? No, Musrum forbid. I’d rather be a sea cucumber than an Ibrailan. I came here via Londeac and Tamlaght, but if you want to know where I’m from originally, I’m not certain I can answer that.” Which was true since Rykkla’s earliest memories were of trundling along a dusty road in a wagon and she had, for all that she knew, been born in transit, between one village and another, so that her birthplace was no isolated locus but had instead been stretched out into a long, meandering line. Not born in a city, which is a place, a point, a terminus, she had been born on a highway, a linearity, which occupies no single place but rather a multitude, that embraces infinity. Her birthplace meandered, branched and rebranched until it covered a continent; any road that she happened to be on was no doubt ultimately connected with the very road that had seen her birth. In truth, she had never thought of her birthplace as being someplace as static as a town or village; rather, her hometown was the jangling, rocking, pitching, fragrant, crowded, smokey, cozy interior of a gypsy caravan. To such a question as Thursby’s, Rykkla would have normally responded with the curt truth: she had been born in a circus wagon, without thinking it important that the event have any particular, fixed geographic location.
“Oh,” said Thursby, her eyes brightening, “you’ve travelled, then? You’ve been places?”
“I’ve been here and there. My uncle ran a circus, several circusses in fact, and until recently I’d spent most of my life with him. I couldn’t name a tenth of the places I’ve been, I’m sure, but most of them get to look a-like after awhile, just one more vacant field or empty lot to set up the tents in. But just now, lately, I was running my own show, with my . . . partner . . . “ To Rykkla’s infinite surprise and inexpressible embarrassment, she found herself beginning to cry, an act so strange, so unexpected, so alien that it genuinely frightened her, as though she had discovered an inexplicable hemorrhage.
Thursby, tactfully, changed the subject.
“If you’ll follow Gravelinghe and me we’ll take you where you can eat and clean up if you want to.”
“I’d love that. Those. Both. You lead, I’ll be right behind.”
Thursby walked beside Rykkla while Gravelinghe followed. The small woman chattered freely, though Rykkla scarcely listened, so distracted was she by the luxuriant and exotic wonders of the seemingly limitless chamber. Thursby took her to an adjoining room, almost as large as the first, where there were a series of large, tile-lined pools. The nearest one was fed streams of steaming water in startlingly imaginative ways from sculptures whose explicitly erotic nature managed to penetrate even Rykkla’s fatigue. Clouds of warm, scented vapor seduced and bewildered her. Her languor leached to the surface, where, relunctant to dissipate, it surrounded her like a malignant fog. Marble benches circled the pool and Rykkla fell heavily onto one of these and allowed Thursby to pull the dusty boots from her sore feet, which almost audibly groaned at their release. Gravelinghe took a place alongside, with a silence that Rykkla realized was characteristic, it obviously had nothing to do with shyness; she helped Thursby remove the clothing that Rykkla had not had off her body for days, stirring up odors which in no way made Rykkla feel any less disgusting.
The heat and fragrance of the room was mesmerizing and Rykkla found herself incapable of either aiding or hindering her frie
nds’ actions. Led by one hand, she allowed the small woman to lead her into the steaming pool. As her foot broke the surface of the scented water it felt as though it were being scalded. But the girl persisted and, wincing, she lowered herself until only her head remained unsubmerged. The pool was only thigh deep and she sat on the hot porcelain tiles with the water lapping at her chin. She felt as though she were dissolving, like a sugar cube in a cup of hot coffee. Her chin rested on the surface of the water and tendrils of fragrant steam curled around her face, caressing it with curious and insubstantial fingers. Thursby waded alongside, seemingly unmindful of the scalding water, and, taking a handful of soft, perfumed soap from an ornate container attached to the rim of the pool, worked it into Rykkla’s matted hair. The girl’s practiced fingertips massaged the scalp and Rykkla allowed an involuntary moan to escape her relaxed lips. With her head still covered with a dome of foamy lather, she was asked to stand. At the moment this was the last thing she wanted to do, or thought herself capable of doing, but complied hypnotically, willessly. With a fat, soft sponge and the same soothing soap, Thursby scrubbed Rykkla’s body from neck to knees. All that Rykkla wanted to do was to lie back down in the hot pool, but Thursby took her by one hand and led her, still covered with lather, up the steps at the farther end of the pool, where Rykkla discovered a second basin, separated from the first by only a few feet of tile. Descending into this, she found the water a few degrees cooler than the first bath. Above the basin was a greater-than-life-sized statue of a flamboyantly male nude of un-likely proportions holding a giant, coiled seashell. From its curved lip poured a cascade of tepid water and while standing beneath this shower Rykkla rinsed herself of the perfumed soap.
Once again Rykkla was taken to another pool, this one deeper than the others and filled with even cooler water. The water, which in reality was but little less than room temperature, was a deliciously icy shock. She was allowed to drift lazily while elaborate scale models of paddlewheel steamers chugged and clattered and hissed around her, stirring soporific emollients into the water all the while pouring soporific vapors from their funnels. She complained and resisted, if feebly and ineffectively, when Thursby came to call her away. This time she was taken not to another bath but to a relatively small chamber featuring a dozen hip-high platforms like narrow tables. They were covered with clean, white linen and she was directed to lay prostrate on one, on her stomach, with a small pillow to support her head. This she did, allowing her weary, overcooked muscles to go limp. She thought very seriously that they may be in real danger of slipping from her bones like the tender flesh of a fricaseed chicken. After a moment or two, one of the almost indistinguishable, interchangeable eunuchs entered bearing a tray of colored glass bottles and jars. Although the bloated creature wore only a brief loincloth, Rykkla still was unable to definitively answer her question. Almost anything could, or could not, have been contained within that discrete if not overlarge swelling.
Setting his tray on a small table, the eunuch dribbled warm, scented, tickling oils down the length of her body and began a massage as vigorous as though he were dressing and tenderizing a marinated steak. At first she cried out from the sudden pain as surprisingly powerful fingers dug deeply into sore muscles, ligaments and tissue. The eunuch started working from her extremities, beginning with individual toes and fingers and working inch by inch, muscle by individual muscle, none too small or insignificant to overlook, up feet, up the powerful gymnast’s calves and thighs, up hands, forearms and upper arms. Then, beginning with her buttocks, which he kneaded like loaves of freshly risen bread dough, he manipulated the overlapping slabs of muscle of her back and shoulders. Gradually they became gelatinous, as pliable as warm plasticine, and the pain drained from them, as though it were being wrung out of damp sponges. The eunuch expertly flipped her limp, resistless, boneless body over onto its back and began the process all over again.
When he was finished, the eunuch wiped his hands on a small towel, gathered up his ointments and oils and, having not said a word in all the time he had worked on her, left as efficiently as he had arrived. Rykkla was perfectly content where she lay and, so far as she was concerned, would be so for some time to come. Convinced that even her bones had become as pliable as new taffy, she thought that it might even be dangerous to try to stand.
She had not been aware that she had fallen asleep until she was awakened by Thursby, the ubiquitous Gravelinghe as usual looming silently behind her. She rose, considerably surprised that she was able to, albeit weakly and unsteadily, from the table and followed the girl and her companion into yet another chamber.
This was a low-ceilinged room whose walls were lined with intricately etched mirrors and whose floor was covered with overlapping carpets of convoluted design. She was surrounded by an endlessly receding crowd of replicated Rykklas, and her vaguely disembodied, disinterested mind was able to examine the images with dispassion and objectivity.
There were a thousand identical tall, honey-colored women with slim hips and extraordinarily elongated legs. At their apices were black triangles like an armory of cast iron arrowheads. There were a thousand slender torsoes, as smooth and narrow-waisted as stoneware bottles, with stomachs as flat as flagstones, with two thousand taut, conoidal breasts, like two thousand scoops of toffee ice cream. A thousand navels winked back like a conspiratorial Argus. A thousand shoulders as wide and level as the horizon were bisected by slender necks that supported lean-faced, angular heads, like a thousand hawks sitting on an endless fence. Sculptured heads surrounded by thick, straight black hair, as glossy as wet licorice. They were strong, self-assured, introspective faces, miserly with their emotions, with broad cheekbones as prominent as chalk cliffs, square jaws, thin-lipped mouths that were as gentle and sardonic as a single stroke of a calligrapher’s brush; large black eyes, like spheres of hematite, beneath equally black brows like ravens spreading their wings above the promontories, the flying buttresses, the swooping dykes of those geologic cheeks and noses. Every alternate Rykkla revealed a strong, broad back whose muscles rippled like a flag and twice as many buttocks like pairs of smooth, round cobblestones.
She was pleased in a dispassionate, objective, distant fashion, not that she had any reason to be displeased.
Thursby brought her an armful of clothing and helped her dress in the billowy pantaloons, long, diaphanous skirt, short-waisted blouse and embroidered vest that appeared to be de rigueur among those women who chose to dress at all. With the exception of the last-named garment, all of the articles were finely made of the most translucent and transparent silks and gauzes that not only did little to obscure her body, but seemed to emphasize it more than when she had been simply nude. She assumed that what she was wearing was for the convenience of comfortable lounging, -like pajamas, and thought no more about it. She had travelled widely enough to know the wisdom of acceding to local customs, especially those so pleasantly hedonistic. Too, it ought to be clear by now that Rykkla was no prude.
She was glad to see that a meal was next on her agenda and decided that there was apparently no limit to the hospitality of the Baudad. The tables seemed to be permanently laden with food of all kinds all hours of the day, available to anyone any time they might be hungry. This was fine by Rykkla since she was ravenous now, the insubstantial delicacies she had so vigorously consumed upon her arrival at the palace had long since evaporated. She grazed through edibles familiar and foreign with deliberate and methodical indiscrimination.
There did not seem to be any private apartments for sleeping; she was simply returned to the vast room where she had first been introduced to the harem. The lamps had been extinguished except for a dozen dully flickering glows. The one hundred and sixty women were already draped as practiced picturesque and voluptuous odalisques on, over and around the hundreds of overstuffed pillows and cushions that littered the room; they resembled a party of langoruous seals. Thursby showed Rykkla a vacant corner in which the latter, with a mumbled word of thanks, gratefull
y curled up, as snug as the nautilus within its pearly labyrinth. This will be something to tell Bronwyn about, the next time I can get a letter to her, she thought drowsily. About how I spent a night in the harem of the Baudad Alcatote himself!
There were neither clocks nor windows in the harem. It was not until she was summoned by Chamberlain ak-Poom that Rykkla had any idea that the hour was well past noon on the new day. She awakened feeling bright, cheery and in an excellent mood.
“The Baudad is expecting you for luncheon,” the chamberlain pronounced.
“Well, that’s fine,” she replied. “Can you give me a few moments to change my clothes?”
“Why?”
“I can’t be introduced to the Baudad like this; I have to change into something more presentable.”
“There’s no need. You’re dressed exactly as you should be.”
“But . . . ”
“Why do you think you were given those garments? There’s neither time, need nor reason for discussion. The Baudad must not be kept waiting. You must come along immediately.”
“Whatever’s customary!” Rykkla replied cheerily.
She followed the chamberlain through the big doors back into the palace proper, far more self-conscious about the transparency of her costume then she thought she would have been. The suggestiveness of the revealing costume she had worn in her act was one thing, in was in its proper context, this, on the other hand, was, well, public. Suggestiveness was all right, but there was little that was at all suggestive about what she was now wearing, it was too blatant for subtleties. They passed few other people, however, and those that did paid them no attention. Inconsistently, she found the lack of attention a little disappointing.
