Sacred Rites

by Ines Johnson

  Alyss went over to the closet at the back of the room. She hesitated at the knob to the closet door. She could smell the faint scent of paint. Her fingers twitched. She hadn’t done this in so long. Her Mother never once encouraged the hobby. It was not scientific and would add nothing to the advancement of their society. That deemed art a waste of time. She’d told herself that the last painting would be the last time. She’d repeated that lie for years. Until three months ago when Merlyn left.

  After her glimpse at the canvases being wheeled into the Chamber of Arts and Culture, the itch began. After visiting with Adom today and seeing his artwork, she itched to scratch. With Adom she’d not only seen the art with her eyes, she’d felt it on her skin with the dress. She’d seen herself through his eyes in his portrait of her. She ached to let her fingers fly free over parchment if only for a moment.

  Just for one moment.

  And this would be the last time.

  Alyss threw open the closet doors and gasped.

  It was empty.

  Gone were all of her canvases. Canvases she’d had since childhood. The itch tore down her spine. It buckled her legs with its force. Alyss held onto the door knob to stay upright. Her hands shook, her eyes watered, her breathing came in shallow gasps. Pain bowed her shoulders as though her soul had been ripped from her body.

  Without thinking, Alyss raced from the room. She ran down the hall on unsteady legs. She burst into the great room and gave her Grand Mother a start.

  “Where are they,” Alyss demanded.

  Her Mother looked up at Alyss. Her eyes narrowed. “Where’s what?”

  “My -Merlyn…Merlyn’s things? What have you done with them?”

  “Merlyn is no longer welcomed in this house and neither are her things.”

  Alyss’ bravado seeped from her spine along with any vestiges of her soul. “What did you do with them? The things in her lab?”

  “I had them taken out with the rest of the garbage.”

  Her Mother’s eyes challenged hers. Alyss saw that her Mother knew exactly what she was referring to when she said garbage; the list of items included more than just microscopes and beakers.

  “You should worry about your presentation tomorrow before the chambers.”

  Alyss didn’t answer. Her mind frantically tried to remember each painting that was now lost to her forever. Years of work, her innermost thoughts and dreams displayed in the perfect balance of lines, curves, and color, all gone.

  “Alyss. If this bill doesn’t get passed our family name will be ruined.”

  With her soul ruptured, her bravado gone, frustration boiled up and out of her. “It's just a bill, Mother. They can’t stop your work.”

  Angyla stood.

  Alyss took a step back.

  “This family has faced embarrassment after embarrassment. First with Celia’s spawn returning from the wild and marrying those men.”

  Alyss’ cousin Chanyn had been raised in the Wastedlands by her aunt Celia, who wanted no part of their society or its men. After Aunt Celia passed away, two men found her cousin Chanyn. Lord Khial and Lord Dain were outcasts, and against her family’s advice, Chanyn bonded with the males in a great scandal.

  “And now your sister’s renouncement of her own work after taking up with those other men. If you fail, we will not get the funding or permissions to go ahead with the human trials. I will not give up my life’s work. I’ll use you as a human trial to prove that insemination works.”

  “Me?” Alyss took another step away from her Mother. Her back met the wall.

  “Yes, you.”

  Alyss made a deal with her Mother years ago. Because she had no interest in bonding with a male or having children, and her scientific aptitude was abysmal, they’d decided she’d go into the Sisterhood and work for her family’s interest.

  Alyss had kept up her end of the bargain. “You can’t force me to be inseminated, Mother.”

  “It would be your choice. Move the bill forward or be inseminated. Two options equals a choice.”

  The threat hit her chest harder than the insult. It landed with an empty thud. With her soul ripped from her being after seeing the hollowed out closet, Alyss had nothing left. She would not allow her Mother to replace that hole on her insides with an inseminated creation.

  A spark lit inside her gut when she remembered her encounter earlier today. She remembered the tall, dark male advocate talking out of turn. She remembered him being reprimanded. Her stomach unclenched when she realized that she was going up against an ordinary man, not the Male Voice.

  She’d face him with her smile, her eyes, her breasts and her hips. No man had ever failed to do her every bidding when she’d turned the full light of her attention on them. She’d use everything in her arsenal to hold him back and push this bill forward. And she would win. He was, just a man after all. It would be easy. And then, after the bill passed, she would move onto the rank of apprentice where she would no longer need her family backing. She’d be able to leave this Goddess forsaken house and live on her own terms. Perhaps even have a paint brush outside of a closet.

  Alyss straightened her back, her once empty spine reformed to solid steel. “Don’t worry, Mother,” she smiled. “I’m prepared.”

  7

  Emet tugged on Adom’s bottom lip to get his attention. Adom had spent the night in his studio, then trudged up the stairs this morning for a bite of first meal. His hands and arms and face were smeared with paint. He gave one word answers or unintelligible grunts in response to all Emet’s attempts at a conversation. There was tension in his bondmate’s body. Adom also wouldn’t hold his gaze. Emet saw Adom’s gaze flickering to the entryway that led to his studio. The male was obviously ready to get to work.

  Emet didn’t resent Adom for his lack of attention. Adom’s dreams were about to come true. Emet’s were too. So with a final peck on Adom’s cheek, Emet left his bondmate to his creations, and took off to begin his own big day.

  It was a bright spring morning. Birds chirped their songs above as he shut the door to the storefront. Leaves rustled from the hustle and bustle of insects going about their work. Emet hopped into his car, alert, in tune, ready.

  He turned the ignition and headed to the Sisterhood compound. Once or twice he had to tap the brakes against his eagerness.

  Inside the chambers of the full council, Emet took his place at the podium for the Male Voice of their society. The actual Voice sat in the audience with other males in his employ, mostly other novices and apprentices. The other four advocates had too much work on their plate to take time out to view the outcome of a single bill, no matter the importance. To the advocates, all of the bills were of grave importance.

  The young males in the audience beside the Voice looked at Emet with both awe and envy. Most of their work involved prepping dockets for the Voice in his crusade to keep what few rights men had alive. Emet understood the trust and responsibility the Voice had placed on his shoulders.

  He rolled his shoulders back now. They were still light thanks to the loving restraint Adom had roped him into two nights ago.

  He was ready. But where was his opposition? They were due to start in two minutes.

  There was an uproar at the back of the room. Women gasped and oohed. Males groaned and awed. It didn’t take long for Emet to figure out the source of the commotion. Obviously she had arrived.

  Males and females alike gaped at Lady Alyss. Emet could only see her head, preening above the masses, obviously loving their adoration.

  Emet rolled his eyes. They were about to engage the debate of a serious matter and everyone was more concerned with her dress than the matter at hand.

  Emet’s frustration sat with the men as well as the women. The women were entrusted to run this society in the name of the Goddess. Yet, he saw so many of them concerned with the material trappings of the world. Trappings like clothing and status. As for the men, the passage of this bill would directly affect each and every one of them. Yet,
they lusted after the woman who held the fate of their testicles in her virginal, entitled, untried hands.

  The seas parted and Lady Alyss drew near to him. Emet set his face to the unaffected mask he’d learned from Elder Gerry, his former teacher at the temple. The mask failed him and crumbled when she came into full view.

  Lady Alyss stepped forward in a masterpiece of a garment. It was a gown that Emet knew. He’d seen it hanging in his home just the other day. The color was simple. The detail was all in the fabric. The pattern knotted around the bodice, banding her breasts into a swell that threatened to spill over the top. It clinched at her small waist and then lassoed around her ass, which Emet got an eyeful of as she steeped up to the podium beside her with a smile lashed with cunning. The Male Voice had told him not to underestimate Lady Alyss and her family. Emet had been wrong to ignore the male’s words.

  She turned to him. Her eyes expectant. Expecting what? To trip him up at seeing her in Adom’s dress? That she flaunted her money before him? He wasn’t sure what her game was, but he wasn’t about to play with her. The fact that she was playing a game showed that she wasn’t taking this matter seriously; that she didn’t care for anyone other than herself. She likely had a manservant order the dress so Adom was none the wiser.

  Anger boiled inside him. She could try to get inside his head if that was her game. But Emet would not stand for anyone toying with his mate.

  Sister Dynesse, of the Chamber of Energy, banged her gavel and the chamber immediately came to order.

  Lady Alyss stood at the podium representing the Chamber of Health and Sciences. To her left stood a young woman he knew to be Lady Milysa. She represented the Chamber of Worship.

  Emet stood to the right of both women representing the health and well-being for all males in society. As the presenter of the bill, Lady Alyss had the right to speak first.

  “For centuries, our society has been plagued by low birth rates in general, but low births of females in particular. For a time, we could not sustain ourselves until we bonded as triads. We did this originally not to placate men and give them the opportunity to bond with a woman. We did this to increase the likelihood of birth rates. If one man was infertile than another would step into his place.

  “Hundreds of years later we see the fallacy of our thinking. It is not the frequency of fornication, but the quality of the seed that will answer the problem of more female births. I’m pleased to inform you that today we can now see the quality seed with our own eyes.

  “My family’s advances in gender selection studies has identified the female spermatozoa. By isolating this genetic material, we can guarantee female births. We have successfully completed animal trials with no casualties. We request permission to move onto human trials.”

  “What Lady Alyss proposes is heresy.” Lady Milysa began. “It is the Goddess who determines the sex of a soul, not a scientific instrument.”

  “Every bonded triad prays to the Goddess for girls” countered Lady Alyss. “Scripture tells us that the Goddess helps those who help themselves. We now have the ability to help ourselves.”

  “The men of the twentieth century tried to solve its problems with science.” Lady Milysa looked pointedly at Emet. “See where it's gotten us all.”

  “If I may speak?” Emet spoke quietly and bowed his head though he wanted to stick out his chin and shout. He waited for Sister Dynesse to acknowledge him before he continued. “More female births would be a blessing to our society.”

  He caught Lady Alyss raise her eyebrows at him.

  “But man-kind is concerned that this science will take away a basic, Goddess given right of our sex. And that is the right to procreation.”

  “There you’re wrong,” interrupted Lady Alyss, batting her eyelashes at him like she would tsk a child with her finger. “This increases procreation.”

  “It would increase procreation, but it would decrease a man’s say in the matter. A man’s sperm is his personal property. Do you plan to take these material possessions away from him?”

  Lady Alyss frowned as though he’d spoken childish gibberish. “Men would volunteer, of course. All men dream of bonding with a woman and producing female children.”

  “Not all men want to be bound.” Emet heard the irony of his statement as he looked at the woman dressed in his kinky lover’s custom made dress of knots.

  When his eyes rose again to hers, he saw a spark of intelligence there. No, not just a spark. She had the same liquid gold eyes as Lady Merlyn and Lady Chanyn. Two women who’d captured the hearts and minds of two of the smartest, most capable men Emet knew: Jian and Jaspir, his brothers from the Pleasure Temple.

  And then she dashed his high opinion of her when she batted her eyelashes at him once more.

  Emet recoiled.

  The blinking stopped and Lady Alyss’ eyes widened. Her fake smile flipped upside down in response to his blatant rejection of her charms.

  Emet cleared his throat and looked away from Lady Alyss. “You speak of volunteering men, my lady. A male volunteered the math that made this find possible, but was he given access to the full picture of what this experiment was for?”

  Alyss bristled, those intelligent eyes narrowed as though asking how he knew such a piece of information. Either she was a great actress, or she did not know his connection to her family.

  “The scientist behind this find has openly voiced her opposition to this matter,” Emet continued. “For the reason that she, too, was not presented with the full picture.”

  There was a commotion in the chamber. Many eyes turned to Lady Angyla who sat stoic, stone faced, in the audience.

  Emet went on “We cannot move forward when there are so many unknowns.”

  “The male makes a valid point,” said Sister Dynesse. “Lady Alyss, we’d like a thorough report on your intention with this bill.”

  Sister Dynesse was an impartial judge. As the Chamber of Energy had no direct stake in the matter, it allowed her to lead the discussion without bias. The other chambers had already made up their minds and were divided. The Chambers of Agriculture, Justice, and Labor all relied on the commerce of manual labor. Along with the Chamber of Worship, who looked upon the bill as heresy towards the Goddess, all stood against the bill. The chambers who would benefit from the addition of more females to society were the Chambers of Treasury, Housing, Education, and of course, Health. In the middle of this divide rested only two chambers; Energy and the Arts and Culture. Emet knew it was these two chambers he had to convince of his argument.

  “We’ll adjourn this matter and recommence in two days time.” Lady Dynesse banged her gavel. “Next bill.”

  And with that, they were dismissed. But the matter was not done.

  Lady Alyss sashayed up to Emet. The sound of the ropes grinding against one another as she moved sailed to his ears. It was a sound he was sure only he heard. A sound he was certain she would never have the pleasure of learning.

  “So you’ve been speaking with Liam?” she accused.

  Gone was her confident smile. Her eyes no longer batted at him. Emet looked down at her bound breasts, her chest heaved as though just the matter of speaking directly to him exerted her.

  “Men just want to be heard,” he said.

  “That’s why society has a Male Voice.”

  “Men have a voice, not a vote.”

  “Whatever would you need a vote for?” The space between her eyes crinkled. It would’ve been adorable, if she were a creature worth adoring.

  “I suppose, my lady, that you are of the faction that believes men can’t think for themselves?”

  Her lack of response was answer enough for Emet.

  “I warn you, my lady, you will learn full well that I have many thoughts. Thoughts I came up with all on my own. My mind is on par with yours and I will use it to dismantle every word of your argument until this bill is tied in knots.”

  Emet watched her face transform from wariness to a flicker of worry. For the brief
est of seconds his pleasure training kicked in. The sight of a woman in distress went against the core of his being and he nearly reached out to offer comfort.

  But then her eyes went from worry to calculation. Those brown-gold eyes churned, spotting his momentary lapse in judgement. Emet let go of all his training and backed away from the cunning little creature. He’d always abhorred women who used their feminine wiles against men, instead of their brains.

  “And don’t think this little dress stunt will influence me in any way. I’m a grown man. I won’t stoop to play childish games.”

  Now, her face crumbled in confusion and dismay. She looked down at her dress, brushing her hands over it as though his words offended the garment.

  Emet turned and walked away. She was good at acting and playing games, which meant she had no argument. The art of debate was not a stage for drama. It was a formal setting where logic ruled. If this was all Lady Alyss had to offer, a dress, batted lashes, and a fake smile, he would win, and win easily. He headed to the advocates’ offices to get to work.

  8

  Adom turned his back on the rattling sound of the door knob being turned rapidly from right to left and finding no way around. His shoulders tensed as she knocked. Not a stiff tap-tap like a lady of her station. The knock was a pounding as though she were desperate to gain access. For a second Adom faltered, wondering if she were in real danger out there.

  He’d locked the door immediately after sending Emet out this morning. He’d gone down to work on his paintings. But the colors and lines weren’t working, and he’d come back upstairs and unlocked the door. After lunch Emet phoned to tell him he’d need to stay late to prepare his case for the Insemination Bill. Engrossed in his own work, Adom had missed the call and so Emet left a message. His voice sounded strained on the recording, as though there was more he wanted to say, but he either couldn’t or wouldn’t over the phone.