The Lotus Ascension Page 6

  All these things Konas thought as he watched the pleasure slaves bathe Soren’s beautiful naked body. The dark Ausir drained his cup and flashed a grin at Konas. Soren looked so much like Sillara in one of her moments of glee that it broke Konas’s heart to look on him.

  He turned away, cleared his throat, and adopted the role of orgy-master. This was his house, his party, and no one in Arinport could get strangers fucking the way he could. He would throw the best party he could and satisfy Soren and his friends. That would make Sillara happy.

  The last of the beer and wine was wheeled away into the storerooms, and as low sofas and large pillows were scattered about the room, the place started to take shape into a true pleasure den. Guests who had not been present for the welcome party now arrived for the night entertainment.

  “Why is the beer gone?” Soren asked. He still stood naked, in no way ashamed. Why would he be, having a young god’s body?

  Konas snagged a passing slave and whispered fresh instructions in his ear. Then he attended to his honored guest. “Beer makes for a bad orgy.”

  Soren’s eyebrows shot up. “Really? I would think that it would be decidedly good.”

  “If you have nothing else, it’ll do, but we Seranimesti have learned a thing or two in our varied experiences.” Konas indicated the statue of Abrexa with his gaze. “We claim her for our own.”

  “It’s going to be a good night. Thanks, Konas.”

  Konas bowed to Soren. “Thank your sister. She alone predicted your safe return and had this whole thing planned.”

  Soren spread his arms out. “This?”

  Konas chuckled. “Well, not this, in detail, but I planned this at her insistence, the whole party. Even the orgy was her idea.”

  “Well, then, thanks for having confidence in her judgment.”

  “The passion with which she held her conviction convinced me.” Konas would have done anything for her. He smiled to see slaves bringing in flutes and bracelets that rattled when shaken. “You’ve had common quarters enough, sailor. Are you ready to travel through the marshes?”

  Pleasure slaves walked around the room placing flutes and random locations: on pillows, at the end of sofas, on tables. Soren reached over and picked one up.

  “Who plays these?”

  “You do, if you can,” Konas said.

  “I know a touch of it. But why do you have the guests play?”

  “The flute is very erotic, and in my experience, a lover who plays for his partner will find a body much more receptive to him.”

  Soren nodded. He had much to learn from Konas. Though the young Ausir had a natural talent for sex, Konas could teach him much and enhance his performance with knowledge.

  The slave returned with a cup of water.

  “Drink this, Soren,” Konas said.

  “What is it?”

  “You want to be fathering bastards at this party? No? Then drink.”

  Soren laughed and drank. “You think of everything, don’t you?”

  “I have centuries of experience, that’s all.” Konas waved the slave away to administer the contraceptive mixture to all his guests.

  Soren took the flute and wandered off.

  Konas walked out on the porch and greeted his guests. There were two types of people who came to Konas’s orgies, those who fucked, and those who did not. Some people were either too shy or just liked to watch. Konas’s house rule was that you had to get naked. If you did not, you paid twenty times the price for admission. And there were a few who were willing to pay that fee just to stand and watch.

  Once his guests passed through the vestibule and into the main pleasure room, most were naked, having thrown off their clothes into the arms of waiting servants. The hired musicians played a song with a light melody carried by flutes, accompanied by lutes, and punctuated by hand-beat drums. The drums did much to get the guests into the mood, for many started swaying and tripping along as soon as they found themselves divested of the burden of clothing. The women put the rattle-bracelets not only on their wrists but also on their ankles, so they kept time as they danced around to the music. Pleasure slaves skilled in suggestive dance found their way to guests and engaged them in flesh-on-flesh grinding. No one started fucking straightaway, for these were regulars, and they knew how to pace themselves and enjoy everything Konas’s orgy had to offer.

  Once the main host of guests was settled in, dancing and laughing and chatting, Konas walked around the room and did the only thing that he would not trust his slaves with: drop dried shalar blossoms into the braziers. As the first batch burned, Konas breathed deeply of its smoke. His scalp tingled, and his conscious mind retreated, allowing deeper feelings to come into focus. He had first discovered the flower back in Duildal when he read through his ancestor Faloth’s journal and found that the plant had a profound effect on the mind, dropping inhibitions and increasing the sensuality of touch. It did what alcohol did but better, and it did not have the side effects of too much wine. Konas laughed to himself when he thought of all the poor orgy-masters out there who had to deal with the vomit, violence, and unconsciousness that invariably came with the unlimited wine consumption of a pleasure party.

  The shalar blossom was his secret, and it was one of the main reasons his orgies were the best in town.

  Konas moved from the main room to the side rooms. He inspected the table and its straps, making sure they were secure enough to hold even a young, strong man, if some of the partygoers might be so inclined to strap one down and play with him. He remembered fondly the one time he had been strapped to this table. It was the day after he had made it, and he needed to test its strength and comfort. Konas was not the kind of Ausir who liked to be dominated, but as a one-time experience, it was interesting.

  He passed to the next room with holes in the wall for peeping and had to remove his shoes. The entire floor was padded, and large, long, soft pillows filled the room. This was a playpen, a place for lovers to tumble and wrestle in their amorous sparring. The false wall allowed voyeurs to act out their fantasies by watching through the peepholes. Some of the guests, after all, got off best by masturbating. To each his own.

  The final room Konas entered was a couples' room. Only paired lovers were allowed in. No group sex. No singles. Konas offered his guests everything: bondage, voyeurism, rough play, open group sex, and private couple sex. He knew that not only did people have varying tastes but also that sometimes those desires changed throughout the course of one night. One could not fuck like mad in a group for hours. This room served as a respite from all the main-room shenanigans.

  When Konas returned to the large, open chamber that served as the main mixing area, he found everyone much more relaxed and open. The leaf was working, and people had already started fucking. Chief among them was Soren. He took all comers, and his virility was unmatched. He was able to fuck a person into borderline unconsciousness and then, after a short break and a glass of water, move on to his next conquest. Women came for him until their shoulders shook, until they collapsed weeping on his chest. Few times Soren came, but many were his partners. Most he pussy fucked, but there were a few women who begged for anal, and he gave it to them. Konas could not help but be impressed. Soren was the most attentive lover he had ever seen, giving everything he had to each partner, fucking her as if she were the only woman in the world. But as soon as the woman lay panting in her own sweat, not able to even speak, he would kiss her and whisper something in her ear. She would smile weakly, and then he would move on. And that next woman became his whole world for a short time.

  Konas at last understood Soren’s reputation, and the dark Ausir’s lovemaking explained the nearly doubled attendance. One noblewoman whom Konas knew only by face—he did not make personal inquiries—squealed her delight when she found herself doubly penetrated by Soren and a pleasure slave. She was riding the slave when Soren just popped in behind and took her ass. Her husband watched from a sofa where a slave girl sucked his cock with a cube of ice in
her mouth. Orien, his massive cock dangling like a horse’s, strode over to the woman and placed his penis in her mouth. She hungrily sucked it, moaning down the shaft as Soren slammed into her ass again and again. She collapsed in an orgasm that would not stop.

  “My pussy,” she cried out. “It won’t stop.”

  The pleasure slave beneath her groaned and released inside her. Konas was shocked that the slave came. Most slaves were skilled at remaining hard, but few ever came until the end of the night when they were required to. To them, it was just a job, so to have one lose control was rare—almost unheard of. Konas could only surmise that it was Soren’s doing, his cock pounding next to the slave’s, coupled with the woman’s deep orgasm.

  Konas snapped his fingers, and a slave was at his elbow at once. “Bring the laxatives.” Women wanted Soren as much in their asses as in their pussies, and what with the way the young sailor fucked, the women would have need of some relief later in the night.

  Once Konas was convinced everyone was properly high—some people were just writhing on each other, not even fucking, because it just felt good to touch—he led a small group of them, headed by Orien, to the pool. Soren, however, was prevented, because two women took him to the peeping room. The pool sent the guests mad, and women began pawing at Konas, trying to remove his tunic. He recognized these women, ones he had fucked before—years before—and shown a good time. But he had no desire to fuck them now. Not that he did not want to fuck. He did. But there was only one woman he desired.

  Four years Konas had been trapped in his love for Sillara. Four years since his last participation in an orgy. And Konas did not fuck men, unlike the Sunjaa. His thoughts returned to Sillara and about how he had been the one to tell her about sex. Nothing in-depth, just the basics. Penis penetrates vagina, and it leads to babies. How strange that he, the Ausir tutor, would be the one to tell her. Kamen would not, and Konas knew how broken Ajalira still was about her early days among the Lotuses, what she considered prostitution. Since no one else would dare to presume to tell the Queen of the Ausir anything, it had fallen to Konas.

  Konas was ripped from his reverie by the redoubled efforts of the women to get his cock into them. There would be no denying them without embarrassment, and he did not want any of his guests to feel anything bad. He had to satisfy them somehow without betraying in his heart his love for Sillara. He pulled from his pocket a small device of smooth silver that resembled an egg.

  “What’s that, you naughty Ausir?” One woman humped his leg.

  “Have you put your filthy little Ausir mind to work again?” Another one licked his neck. The drugs were definitely working.

  “You’ve never felt anything like this before,” Konas said. “Lie down and spread your legs.”

  With oohing and aahing and giggling the women obeyed. Their cunts were wet as the sea, and they flexed their buttocks in their unrestrained desire. Their pussies bounced up and down, craving cock, craving touch. Konas produced a second egg and knelt before the women. There was a line dividing the top and bottom halves of the egg, and Konas began twisting each half in the opposite direction, thus winding up the toy. He held the first egg while he wound up the second.

  “Ready?” he asked.

  The women whimpered and nodded. They licked their lips.

  Konas placed the smooth silver surfaces of the eggs against the women’s clits, and the toys vibrated against their flesh. The mechanism within turned perfectly and quickly, the spring holding tight as it uncoiled. The woman gasped, surprise lighting their eyes. They smiled and squirmed against the vibrating eggs. They reached out and grabbed the eggs, holding them against their clits even harder, and as they worked themselves into orgasms, Konas stood and walked away.

  “Thank you,” they called out to him. “You’re a genius!”

  Without turning around, he waved back to them. He wondered if Sillara were already asleep. He wondered how her lovely her long black hair looked splayed out on her pillow. He wanted to kiss her sleeping eyes and awake her with a kiss.

  Chapter Five

  The sun was already high, and Sillara's stomach rumbled. She had been awake for three hours already, but she had refused to eat yet. Soren had not yet come home from Konas's city house, but Konas himself was here. This did not surprise Sillara, as Konas actually spent most nights here in the Itenu compound. But Soren must have enjoyed himself thoroughly, and Sillara smiled. The sky was clear, the sun bright, and her parents seemed to have forgotten the disturbances of last night, for they sat side-by-side at the long table, only just now breaking their fast.

  “Are you not hungry?” Konas's voice drew Sillara's attention, and she shook her head.

  “I will wait for my brother.”

  “At least take some juice.” Konas waved to a nearby slave, who poured out pomegranate juice into a mug.

  As Konas brought her the mug, Sillara caught the distant sounds of the front gate being opened. Footsteps.

  Joy filled her, and when Soren pushed open the door, with slaves tumbling after him, trying and failing to open the door before he could reach it, she ran to him.

  “Thank you, sister, for the party.” Soren swung her off her feet and hugged her. He smelled like incense, oranges, sex, and some other scent Sillara did not recognize but somehow associated with Konas.

  “Come, sit.” Sillara tugged on Soren's hand, and they sat beside each other and across from their parents. Konas seated himself at Sillara's other side, and she was content. Her family was all together, and there was nothing she could desire.

  “Did you sleep at all, Soren?” asked Konas.

  “Not much.” Soren's wide grin brought an answering smile to Sillara's lips. “You certainly know how to entertain a sailor on leave.”

  “And how are you still so bright this morning then, my son?” Kamen, too, was smiling, an indulgent expression that showed Sillara how much their father still felt Soren's return as a resurrection.

  “Youth?” Soren laughed as he began to eat. “We do not get such bread aboard ship.”

  Sillara ate, too, listening greedily as Soren recounted his shipboard experiences, and Kamen joined in.

  “I served past my five years,” said Kamen after a long anecdote. “I never made captain of my own vessel, though, for I didn't leave Darien's ship throughout my service.”

  “Well, Captain Orien is a good master,” said Soren. “The best I've seen now.”

  “He chose you over his own brother to be first mate,” said Konas. “How did Nathen take that?”

  The mention of Nathen brought the burning to Sillara's cheeks again.

  Soren shrugged. “Nathen's a good friend of mine. He didn't mind. He's a good sailor, too good a sailor to let false pride get in the way of running the ship.”

  Sillara understood what Soren was too modest to say. Soren was so obviously the superior sailor that Nathen could not have complained without making a fool of himself.

  “Your Grace.” A slave-boy trotted up to Kamen and whispered in his ear. Sillara heard him, of course, and Soren's glance at her showed he did, too.

  “Let the good captain enter,” said Kamen. “He can't have eaten yet, either. Show him directly in.”

  Orien seemed to fill the room when he was ushered in, and his bleary eyes showed more of the ravages of the previous night's revels than did Soren's. “Your Grace.” Orien bowed properly to Kamen, who rose to greet Darien's firstborn.

  “Welcome, Captain. Sit. Eat—if you can.” Kamen gestured to the large table, and Orien plopped down beside Soren.

  “Thank you, Lord Kamen.” Orien remained polite. Despite having been friends with Soren and Sillara from childhood, Orien did not presume on his position. “I have come to ask a favor. There is to a be wurm-hunting expedition, and I would like to invite Soren—”

  Sillara saw her father's mouth opening, and she knew his response would be favorable.

  “—and Lady Sillara.”

  Kamen's mouth altered its shape, and h
is yes became, “No, Captain.”

  Sillara did not know whether to be disappointed or pleased. She would not have any pleasure of Soren's curtailed, and if he wanted to go wurm-hunting, she would not wish him denied. But as for herself, she knew that her father would never permit her to go. And if she could not go, she would not want Soren to leave.

  “After this last voyage,” said Orien, “His Grace King Jahen has given me and my crew a half-year leave.”

  “Half a year?” Sillara could not contain her delight.

  “Won't that delay my discharge?” asked Soren.

  “No, not at all. It's a reward for our extraordinary success. And since we have the time, why shouldn't we go wurm-hunting?”

  Wurm-hunting, Sillara knew, was considered a dangerous activity, not only for the wurms themselves, huge creatures able to swallow whole both a horse and rider, but for the fact that it involved journeying through the trackless desert. Wurm-hunting was the only activity that approached pirate-hunting for danger or profit.

  “What should a sailor do ashore?” asked Sillara. She felt Soren's desire to go, and she spoke for his cause. “Father, why not let him go?”

  “Soren may go,” said Kamen at once. “Just not you.”

  A flash of disappointment crossed Orien's face, and Sillara was reminded of Nathen.

  “I have a half year of leave,” said Soren. “But my sister has less time than this. She is of age now, even by Ausir standards, and King Tivanel will be summoning her any day.”

  Sillara reached beneath the table and pressed Soren's hand as she glanced sadly at Konas. How could she endure to go to Duildal, to leave Soren behind?

  “That is true.” Kamen's eyes rested on Sillara with a heaviness she could not understand. Why should her father not like the idea of her marriage to King Tivanel? It was her duty, and it was a betrothal he himself had arranged before her birth. Why should he regret it?

  “Please, Father, may I go?” Sillara asked, not daring to hope but unwilling to give up yet.