Thrust and retreat, pull and push, in and out—the rhythm of Evix's fucking was as familiar to her as breathing. Then came an unexpected tug at the clamps on both her nipples. Somehow, Evix had pulled on them simultaneously, and then she felt the pressure of his hand on her throat. His hand closed around that most fragile of points, and the sensation was delightful—until shame stole her breath more effectively than Evix's hand. She felt Evix pulsing inside her, filling her with his dead seed. Every Lotus-trainer was sterile.
“Well done, pet.” Evix pulled out of her and carefully washed her pussy and thighs before he unbound her. “I think we have finally learned where your predilections lie.” He removed her blindfold and sat beside her on the soft divan. “You are quite demanding in your tastes.” He traced the edge of her cheek with his forefinger. “Still, now that we know, I think we might be able to get you your next petal.” He took up her left hand and slid his grip up to her forearm, running his thumb over the half-blown red lotus there. “My love.” He raised her arm and kissed her tattoo.
Guilt pierced Ajalira. Evix was kind to her. By his own admission, he loved her, and she had no doubt that the other trainers mocked him for his lack of success with her.
But she was saved from making any reply by the sound of bells. She counted the peals. One, two, three, four. Five? Five peals? She and Evix exchanged a glance. The arrival of a potential purchaser was a rare event.
Within twenty minutes, Ajalira, her hair safely piled over her horns and the high tips of her ears, joined all the other Lotuses in the small viewing chamber. Each Lotus sat, seemingly careless of her appearance, with a quiet occupation. Some tuned instruments; others embroidered; still others practiced Sunjaa hieroglyphs; and finally others composed poetry. Ajalira took up her assigned task. Though the girls appeared to be passing the time in profitable hobbies, in reality each Lotus had been assigned the occupation that would show her to best advantage. For Ajalira, that meant translating Ausir poetry into Zenji and Sunjaa. Languages were the one subject where she excelled. Yet as she began the laborious double translation, she knew that even here there was a dash of failure. Though she could read these languages and write them, her speech, though correct, was accented. She could not lose the Ausir lilt of her native tongue.
“It's Saerileth!” The whisper went through the viewing chamber.
Even Ajalira paused to take note at that. Saerileth Kesandrahn, full-blown Red Lotus, was famous in the guild. She had left six years ago, only half a year before Ajalira's own arrival, and her reputation had only gained more luster since her departure. She was the concubine of the Sunjaa Lord Admiral, and she had borne him two sons already. That a Lotus should have deigned to give any man children was almost as shocking as that she had become his concubine. Saerileth had saved the life of the Sunjaa boy-king, and she was the most highly-favored woman in the Sunjaa nation.
“Guildmaster!” Saerileth spoke in Sunjaa, and Ajalira listened. She doubted that the other Lotuses could hear. Her Ausir hearing was keener than any human's could be, and she knew that Saerileth was purposely keeping her voice low.
“Welcome back, Lotus.” The Guildmaster's voice held both pride and welcome as he responded in the same language. “And I see you have brought the Lord Admiral with you. Welcome, Admiral.”
“I've always wanted to see the place you grew up,” said the Admiral, and his voice was deep and carried easily. He was not speaking quietly, and Ajalira knew every Lotus in the room could hear him.
“Five peals?” One Lotus dared to murmur. “For a sight-seer?”
“The Admiral is the richest man in the Sunjaa nation, except for the Regent.” Another Lotus spoke up. “Perhaps he is going to buy another Lotus?”
“The Guildmaster wouldn't sell him another.”
Ajalira ignored the quiet words around her, focusing on the distant conversation between Saerileth and the Guildmaster.
“How many full-blown Lotuses do you have?” asked Saerileth. “I want none older than myself, either.”
Ajalira furrowed her brow. Why would Saerileth be discussing the purchase anyway? She could not buy another of her kind.
“We have only one full-blown Lotus younger than yourself, and she is not for sale.” The Guildmaster sounded apologetic.
“Who?” Saerileth asked.
“Tamra.” The Guildmaster answered, and the sound carried more clearly. Ajalira saw that some of the other Lotuses had heard this.
“She can't be meaning to buy Tamra!”
“What of Lotus Zarelia?” asked Saerileth. “Surely she is full-blown by now. And she would be a year younger than I.”
“Did you not hear?” The Guildmaster's pity was obvious. “Lotus Zarelia died six months after you left us.”
“How?” The voice was the Lord Admiral's.
“She was murdered,” said the Guildmaster.
“Murdered?” From the sounds, Ajalira suspected that the Admiral was on his feet. “Who would murder a Lotus? Who could?”
“A guest,” said the Guildmaster.
“This death must be answered.” Saerileth, too, must have been standing. “The death of a Lotus—it is unthinkable. Why did we not hear of this?”
“It was not something I wanted known.” Ajalira gave up on the pretense of attending to her translations and boldly moved to the window. Though the Guildmaster was receiving his guests in a chamber on the opposite of the garden, she could see the three people framed in the window. The Guildmaster waved back to the chairs the others had obviously just vacated. “I had taken in a refugee, and my kindness was repaid with treachery. She set upon us with a sword, and the woman was obviously highly-trained. She took down Lotus Zarelia, a trainer, and two guards before we overpowered her. But have no fear. The Lotus's death was answered. I gave the murderer muscarine.”
“Ah.” Saerileth sat back down. “A just death.”
Ajalira heard the words, but her mind refused to accept them. Muscarine. Lethal poison, and one that caused a painful death over many hours. Muscarine. Death. Murder.
The garden swam before her eyes just before blackness swallowed her up.
****
Ajalira sat up. She was lying in her own chamber, and Evix was at her side. Her head throbbed, and she could not remember how she had come here.
“So my pet is awake.” Evix sat beside her, and he laid a cool cloth on her brow. “You mustn't scare me like that. What if one of the other Lotuses had been the first to tend to you? They might have felt your horns.”
Memory returned then, and Ajalira shook from head to foot. Six years ago she had come here with her heavily-pregnant mother, fleeing the Ausir civil war. Her mother had been the last of the royal Tamari line, and they had hidden in the Dimadan while their ship sailed on without them, decoying away their pursuit.
The Guildmaster had wanted Ajalira in exchange for aiding them, for having an Ausir Lotus—when he should at last reveal her species to clients—would have been a prize beyond reckoning. But Princess Kirami had proudly refused to turn over her daughter, and she had, in the tradition of all Tamari women, taken up the sword to defend her own.
But Kirami was past eight months gone with child, and though surprise and her own skill had given her four kills, she was overwhelmed. It was at that moment Ajalira had stepped forward. Though only twelve then, Ajalira had known what she was doing. She had offered herself as a willing Lotus in exchange for her mother's life. The Guildmaster had agreed, but her mother had died in childbed a week later. The baby had not survived either, but Ajalira was Tamari. Her word was her bond, and it was not the Guildmaster's fault her mother had died.
Or so she had always thought until today.
Her mother had been murdered.
Ajalira had sold herself into slavery and prostitution, and the Guildmaster had betrayed her. He had lied, and she was no longer bound to keep her word. He had not honored their agreement. She was free. Dishonored, of course, sullied beyond recovery, but free.
“Ajalira? Pet?” Evix patted her shoulder. “What's wrong?”
Ajalira stared at him. This man, this white-skinned, black-haired, Zenji human, ought by rights to be her husband. It was not his fault he could not ask her to wed him. They were both property of the guild. Not that she wanted to wed Evix. She did not share his feelings, and she did not think it right that a Tamari Lady should give her hand to a sterile Lotus-trainer. And yet to whom could she honorably turn? Evix had had her maidenhead. He was the only one who could cover her shame.
“Evix.” Ajalira sat up and put her arms around her trainer. “I am running away from the guild.”
“What?” Ajalira had never heard such raw emotion in Evix's voice. “For Abrexa's sake—why?”
“I know you do not understand.” Ajalira shook her head. “Being a Lotus is not a matter of pride to me. I hate it. I am … a whore.”
“A Lotus is not a whore.” Evix leaned her head on his shoulder. “She is a being above the rest of us, a flower of culture and beauty.”
“I am a slave and a whore,” said Ajalira. “But no more. My honor no longer holds me here.”
“What do you mean?” Evix's kiss on her brow was as affectionate as ever.
“Do you know how I came to be here?” asked Ajalira. She tried to force some love for this kind man into her heart. “How I came to be a Lotus, even though I was twelve when I arrived?”
“No.”
“My mother sought asylum here, but she and the Guildmaster could not agree. She fought for my honor, but I sold myself into slavery and shame to save her life. I had thought she died in childbirth, but the Guildmaster killed her with muscarine.” To hear it put so baldly brought tears to Ajalira's eyes.
“I've been your trainer since your first menses,” said Evix, twining one of her golden locks around his fingers. “And you've never spoken of this to me. Not once.”
“Why should I have?” Ajalira fixed her tear-filled eyes on him. “There was nothing you or I could have done. But … you love me.” She raised her finger to his lips. “You have told me this more than once, and I believe you. I want you to come with me. We can flee this place and go somewhere we can live as man and wife.”
“You would take me with you, pet?” Evix kissed her fingertips. “But how do you propose to flee? Where in the Dimadan can we go that we would not be found at once?”
“Nowhere in the Dimadan,” said Ajalira. “But the world is much bigger than that. Is the Sunjaa Lord Admiral's ship still in port?”
“No, they went with the moonsrise tide.”
“But the pearl ship goes tomorrow,” said Ajalira. “We can creep aboard and hide below decks. We need only hide for one day before we reach Arinport, and then we will be free. If we find no place in Arinport, then we will at least be at liberty to strike out farther west.” She did not speak of returning to the Ausir. That she could not do, not while wedded to a Lotus-trainer.
“So you will be at the docks when?” Evix slipped his finger through her hair and caressed one of her hidden horns.
“As soon as the sun sets.” Ajalira knew that would give them only an hour to hide before the ship set sail, but she did not want to give the sailors too long to find them before putting to sea.
“I will be there.” Evix kissed her brow once more. “Trust me, pet.”
****
The sunset colors were gold and crimson and vermilion, and for the first time in six years Ajalira did not hate the sky. Of course, shame still sat heavy in her chest. There was no way to wipe out the past years, no way to bring back her chastity, but at least she would not continue to dig herself deeper into disgrace. She would give herself in marriage to the man who had the best claim on her, and Evix, at least, would be happy.
She crouched low under the gangplank, waiting for Evix's arrival. But as the minutes passed, she feared he had given her up. If he did not come for her, what would that mean? Would she be left to live in her humiliation, knowing that the man who had had her maidenhead lived apart from her, taking other women in her place?
Rushing footsteps from the direction of the compound sent the adrenalin rushing through Ajalira. Had they missed her? Was she discovered?
“Ajalira!” The Guildmaster himself.
Ajalira refused to be dragged out from her hiding place kicking and screaming like a tantruming child. No, she was a Tamari Lady, and she would die like one. She came out from under the gangplank and stood to face her enemies.
“What are you doing?” asked the Guildmaster. Ajalira could not read his face or voice. He seemed perfectly calm, perfectly unruffled. “Where do you think you are going?”
Ajalira did not answer. She searched the path behind the Guildmaster for Evix. She hoped that he would not come out now.
“Looking for your trainer?” The Guildmaster gestured in the direction of Ajalira's gaze. “Evix is not coming. Surely you didn't think he actually cared for you, did you?”
Ajalira blinked. How could he know?
The other Lotuses opened their mouths in small round shapes of shock. It was, Ajalira knew, a great deal of expression for a Lotus.
“She did, Guildmaster.” Lotus Tamra nodded toward Ajalira. “She thought that Evix loved her!”
“Evix doesn't care for you, girl. You're just one of his many assignments, and one of the most disappointing he's ever had.”
Ajalira choked on the bile rising in her throat. She had thought her situation painful enough when she believed Evix loved her, but to know that she was nothing to him, that he had fucked her for years and had thought of her as a task only—she could not breathe from the horror.
“Take her back with us.” The Guildmaster gestured to Lotus Tamra, but Ajalira raised her hand.
“There is no need to paralyze me. I will walk back with you.” Ajalira moved forward.
“What am I to do with you?” The Guildmaster grabbed her by the wrists. “What you have done is unprecedented. You are so bad that I have no way to respond.” He shook his head. “You have disgraced every Lotus ever to wear that tattoo. You have disgraced your trainers and tutors. You are shame cloaked in flesh.”
That Ajalira did not dispute. Death seemed sweeter now than ever before, sweeter and yet as unattainable. Suicide was cowardice, and for her, the last of the Tamari royal blood, it was unthinkable. She had a duty to live, and she would not fail in it. She stood silently, her wrists still in the Guildmaster's clasp.
“You cannot be allowed to live among the Lotuses whom you have shamed.”
“Certainly not.” Lotus Tamra allowed enough of her distaste to show for Ajalira to see it.
“But we cannot let you go, either. Not only because that is what you have desired—and having brought such disgrace upon the guild as you have done you do not deserve to have anything—but also because someone might have seen you here, as a Lotus. You would besmirch our reputation everywhere you went.”
And, thought Ajalira, it would be known that you had had an Ausir here, and Ausir refuse to accept that people can be property. Who knows what that news would do to your guild? Of course, the Ausir civil war meant that perhaps it would not affect the guild at all, but it was not a chance the canny Guildmaster would take.
“I have no punishment sufficient for your crime.” The Guildmaster shrugged.
“She should be made to serve us,” said Lotus Tamra. “To wait at our table, to be a maid to those who have been her guild-sisters.”
Ajalira flinched. It would be a hard task to be brought so low in the sight of those who had long accounted her an equal. It was still slavery, but at least it would not be prostitution. And she knew that the Guildmaster would not, as he would otherwise have done, give her as a common whore to the trainers, for he would not want her horns and ears seen.
She followed them back to the guildhouse, and tears flowed down her face. Evix had betrayed her, and the pearl ship sailed without her. She would, she had no doubt, be watched from now on. Escape would not be possible, except through death.
And death was still barred from her. She did not let her shoulders droop; she did not bow her head. She might be sullied, a mere whore, but she was born of the blood of the Tamari Kings.
Chapter Two
Kamen clapped his hands together once, and the sound resounded through the near-empty throne room. “Be quick about it.”
The slaves surrounding the boy-king bowed and made hurried movements with their hands and feet, but they did not really work any faster. The boy-king, Jahen, sat on a silk couch of gold and blue parallel lines and fed his turtle bits of red meat, all while the palace slaves tried to put the finishing touches on him. One slave bent forward and reached out his hand tentatively, hoping to apply a bit of mascara to the boy's eyelids. Another pulled the black wig down around his ears, covering his shaved head. Still another took the boy's hand and inspected his fingernails. But through all this, Jahen squirmed.
“Stop fidgeting, Jahen,” Kamen said.
The boy dropped the last piece of meat in front of his lumbering turtle and sat up straight. He locked eyes with Kamen and put on his best stern face, playing at the grave expressions he saw every day at court. “Will Darien be coming today, too?”
Kamen shook his head. “I doubt it. Darien's responsibilities keep him at sea most of the time.” The Regent brushed his dreadlocks away from his face and threw the long strips of soft hair over his bare shoulders. It was hot, but thinking about Darien always raised his pulse a little higher. The day sweltered, and even here into the shade of the palace's interior, the desert heat seeped. Kamen snapped his fingers, and two slaves appeared with large fans made of peacock feathers. They assumed posts both at Jahen's and Kamen's sides. The gentle breeze did much to cool Kamen, but he could not banish his thoughts of Darien. How long had it been since he had seen him last? Darien no longer came to court functions. He stayed away, and Kamen knew why. Darien was his best friend; they had sailed in the navy together, shared common quarters together, and yet Darien avoided him. Ever since Darien learned of Kamen's true feelings for him.
A Lotus for the Regent Page 2
