"Have to?"
"Wearing them lets the men know that you are unavailable for mating," Karma said softly, an edge of embarrassment in her tone. Maeve glanced up at the girl's fingernails, pressed white against the suspended blanket edges. She stepped out from behind the blanket curtain.
"Letting the men know," Maeve drawled. "How about letting them know by telling them to back off? How about saying no?"
"It is an honor, as a woman, to bring generation to your House. Women welcome the honor."
"There's no honor in rape," Maeve said.
Karma's brows knit in confusion. "Rape?"
"Of being forced to have sex—to mate—when you don't want to."
"Oh!" Karma smiled. "Most men are not that way. Most want to enjoy the mating with a woman."
"But what about those that don't...are they still forced?"
"Diem has instituted grave punishment for that," Karma said. Maeve snorted, thinking of how he held her wrists down, how he commanded her body. But the truth was, he didn't force her.
"Well, good," Maeve said, feeling where the hem fell on her leg. "Could you maybe get me some underwear anyway?"
"Although it's not your time?" The girl seemed perplexed.
"I'm sure it'll be my time soon enough," Maeve said. She had the birth control shot, so she wasn't worried about whether or not her time would come right now, but it would be something to consider in the future. "You know, the best way to send up smoke signals to your period is by wearing white underwear."
Karma mmm-hmm'ed vaguely. "Is it true that you are from the archaic Earth, like Gra said?"
"Yeah," Maeve said. "I don't feel archaic, though. It feels like I just went to sleep and woke up...here."
"That's got to be confusing."
"It is."
"What was it like, where you were? You don't have to tell me, if you don't want."
"Oh, I don't care," Maeve said, but she realized there was no way to describe it all—technology and skyscrapers, cars and electricity, dishwashers, libraries, carpeting—to someone who'd never known it. Maeve recognized that she'd never appreciated even the smallest things she'd had. Convenience stores and credit cards and store tables heaped with panties. "There was so much different, I don't know where to start."
Diem opened the door a crack and called in, "It's time to go, Maeve. Karma, you and Eon are staying here to keep an eye on the hoarde."
Maeve had a fuck off waiting on her tongue, but pulled it back. She sighed, knowing that Diem, by default, won again.
"I hope you'll tell me about it all later," Karma said. "Your life before, I mean."
"Sure," Maeve said, "but I've got to go meet the horndogs first."
"Horndogs?" Karma asked.
"I'll fill you in when I get back," Maeve laughed as she walked out the door.
***
Phuck watched as Wind came to, contemplating a blow to her head that would give him more time to think on what he had to do. And what he had to do was finish stroking his urine straw, since his initial thoughts of Wind's body had led him to think even more deeply upon Karma. His thoughts had become so concentrated and lively that they tightened up his drained pain berries and hoisted his urine straw in the air. Phuck shrieked with the erection, but as painful as it was, his body was intent upon responding to the naked tryst his imagination provided. In desperation, Phuck anointed his hand from a jar of hampig grease. The tender grip of his loving sensory extensions brought a surge of relief that made him groan.
Wind licked her lips and Phuck's second groan was one of trepidation, as the woman wobbled onto her hands and knees and crawled over the floor to where he sat in his chair. She dropped her head into his lap as if her thought container was too heavy to support any longer, her lips enclosing upon his greasy staff and sliding to the base.
Phuck closed his eyes with a moan, as Karma came into focus on the dark screen of his eyelids. She was positioned on Phuck's lap, held up by nothing but air, before she began pumping up and down upon him. A hand reached for his and he let it be guided, pretending it was Karma's soft touch, pressing his fingers to her damp sex.
Wind's moan shattered the illusion. Phuck popped his eyes open, gazing down at the woman's head in his lap.
"Kindly stay quiet," he said. "Hold your breath, if you must, but remain silent."
Wind hummed in agreement and Phuck rest his head back, until his neck bent so far that it was difficult to even swallow. But Karma returned, dancing across his eyelids, moving her open sex on his palm as she simultaneously rode his urine straw like a desperate swol. Phuck didn't try to make sense of it.
Karma crawled into his lap again, except that this time, her body was substantial beneath the tips of his sensory extensions. She brought her open mating hole down on his urine straw, pumping upon him in the way that plugged the urine and eventually drew out his sensual milk. He reached for her and grasped her hair, but quickly released it, as the tactile sense of it did not mesh with the texture he imagined. She brought her speech opening down upon his chin, her slippery pink taste sensor trolling upward, poking into the black hole of his face as she delved for his lips. So eager, she was. So eager. His milk nearly blasted from him with the thought—
"Oh Phuck," Wind murmured. The Plutian popped open his eyes. He readjusted himself inside her sex hole.
"Stay quiet, I beg you. I am imagining Karma and you are ruining my enjoyment with your sound."
He returned to his previous position, eyes closed, head back...but Karma stopped her sucking and spreading. In his imagination, his lover's beautiful face suddenly twisted and pulled until it glared with hatred at him. He opened his eyes to see the exact expression he'd just witnessed in his mind, reflected on the less-becoming features of Wind's long and bestial face.
"Karma? You're pretending I am Karma? AGAIN?" she shouted.
"No, not again," he stammered. "Always. I have always pretended that."
The sound that came out of her made him throw his hands over his hearing holes. It rang in his skull and knocked at the white grinders within his food receptacle.
"ME!" she shrieked. "You need to love ME! I am the one who will love you—not Karma! She will never love you, do you understand? She is Diem's sister! He won't allow it!"
"Allow?" Phuck tilted his head. "I am Plutian. I am not allowed by a Rha. I am obeyed."
"He will not obey you! Not when it comes to Karma," Wind said. She stepped close, winding herself around Phuck, trying to seat herself in his lap even as he shifted to avoid it. His urine straw lay flattened to his leg like a starved melellurm. "She is not what you want, I know it. But I am. I will obey you."
"Of course you will obey me," Phuck said. "I am Plutian and you are only human."
"Karma is as human as I am!" Wind screeched. Phuck tipped his head in thought.
Yes, she was, wasn't she.
Wasn't she.
Phuck blasted to his feet, knocking Wind to the floor. She clung to his leg as he smashed the ends of his movement units into his shoes.
"Where are you going?" Wind asked.
"To the Fly House," he said.
"Why?" she inquired after him, but Phuck strode out the door without another word. He felt as if the bones in his human skin bag had grown feet taller. He was Plutian, and he no longer knew what stood in his way of having Karma, just as he had always wanted.
***
Diem untied Maeve's hand from the guide rein, even though she'd been tucked safely between his legs during the ride. He had her there partly because he knew she was frightened of Forge, but mostly because he wanted Maeve's body leaning against his, needing his stability. She sat as straight as she could, holding herself away from him, as if she were unwilling to trust that he could keep her safe, from either the dragon or from himself.
She was absolutely safe from the first.
From the second, he could make no guarantees.
Having her once was not enough. He wanted to lie with her again, and the thought
of it was centermost in his mind—a dangerous thing under the circumstances.
Breathe came out to meet them, the children and the House occupants remaining inside, although they watched Diem's great dragon land from the windows. Forge was safe so long as Diem commanded her to be, but there was no need for anyone to know that, save Breathe, Karma and Eon. Forge's presence automatically set boundaries and allowed for some measure of privacy.
"Blessings, Maeve," Breathe said. Then, to Diem, "All is well with Hold House, I see. I have assembled the meeting place off the back porch. We have word that the Plutians are nowhere near, but I don't think I need to tell you, Diem, to remain guarded in what you say. And Maeve, beware of any cursing."
"She is aware," Diem said smugly, recalling her cherry-red rear end. Maeve growled and stepped away from him. "Forge will watch for the Plutians as well."
Diem whistled to his dragon, sending her into the sky. Forge swooped down just over the tree tops, her keen eyes sifting through the spindlings. The dragon's presence was a comfort to Diem, although her shadow cast an eerie tone as it drifted ominously over the yard.
"Very good," Breathe said. "Are you ready to speak?"
"Yes," Diem said.
Breathe gestured to the windows and the faces disappeared. Diem heard the clamber of feet as the House occupants filed out to the back lot. Their murmur rose as they discussed all the possibilities of why the meeting was called and who the strange girl with the odd shoes was, who arrived with their Rha. Breathe went up the steps and through the front door of the House ahead of them.
Diem placed his hand at the small of Maeve's back as he bent to whisper in her ear. "Do not forget. I am your intended and you are from Rha Shown's bloodline."
Maeve murmured and Diem dipped his head lower to hear her words. She turned her head and whispered in his ear, "And I'm not wearing any underwear."
Diem's mouth opened, closed. He hadn't expected that. Even less expected was the simultaneous tightness in his balls and that which quickly bloomed from his chest to his fists, as he thought of the other Housemen looking at her.
Maeve peered curiously around the House as they walked from the front door to the back one, but Diem's thoughts were erased. He barely recognized his name as one of his Housemen greeted him and found himself scowling at the man without reason. Diem nearly forgot that his place was to stand at the top step of the stairs leading to the back yard, in order to address the occupants of his House.
He managed to catch Maeve's hand before she descended into the crowd and hold her in place, a step below him. Every eye was quickly upon her. Diem's gaze skipped through the familiar faces of his Housemen, suspicious that each of them were contemplating the terrain beneath Maeve's skirt. When she took a step back up, so she was on his same footing, he was relieved. He stepped slightly in front of her, partially blocking her from view.
It didn't help. Diem imagined each Houseman to be envisioning no barrier beneath Maeve's skirt, which Diem knew to be true. He'd felt the lack of extra fabric when she'd been cradled between his legs. He glanced now at the hem of her skirt. Her unguarded sex could be made available with the lift of the slightest breeze.
A predatory growl rumbled in Diem' throat. He coughed it away into his fist as he forced his eyes off her.
He was the Rha, for Ahanas's sake. He was not new to manhood. He began his address, but not in the way he had originally planned.
"I have taken an intended," he boomed, his voice resonating from his diaphragm in a way that filled him with satisfaction. Some of the Housemen averted their eyes from Maeve, now that he'd made the declaration. However, Diem noted the number of eyes that were still upon her. "Her name is..."
He stopped short, his eyes cutting to hers. Her name was not traditional. It would raise suspicion. Why hadn't he thought of it before this second? He wanted time to think on it, to rename her in a way that was not only beautiful and fitting to her, but that also marked her as his.
To be named was a celebratory event among Houses, a competitive display of definition. The more beautiful the meaning of the name, the more gracefully it applied to the lives they all lived, was equivalent to draping blessings and adornment on the life of the child. So, as Maeve opened her mouth, he rushed to speak over her, before she could tell them the truth.
"Aimed," Diem boomed. It was as if the name came out of his mouth before he even thought of it, as if it were always there, waiting upon his lips. A re-organization of the letters in his own name, with the addition of the first letter in the alphabet. The meaning to him was clear in several ways—she was a Diem, a female version of himself in many ways, and she had incredible confidence in the directions she wished to go.
Maeve took a deep breath, as if she were preparing to correct him, but Diem projected over the top of her in a low thunder, "Her name is Aimed and she originates from Hold House. This woman was named for the past hope and the future hope that our destinies are yet pointed toward our happiness. However, I call her Mae, in honor of an archaic season's name, which brought renewal to the Earth in its time."
The women in the crowd had mixed reactions, some smiling and cooing, some glowering and holding their hands in front of their mouths, to whisper jealousies. It was a sure sign that the name was well chosen, but Diem didn't care what the House women thought. His concern was still with the men who seemed intent on catching Maeve's eye, while avoiding his.
He could not race off the porch and challenge his own Housemen to the battles he suddenly craved. Diem's eyes jumped from one admirer to another. Forge's shadow pulled softly across the yard.
From the crowd, a Houseman suddenly shouted, "Are we here to admire a woman? I could have stayed to my room and admired my own!"
"Definitely not. I also have news from the Head Overseer, Shetbahg," Diem announced. Snickers and chuckles drifted away from the crowd. Diem let the heavy line of his lips tell his House just what type of news he was bringing. Or maybe they only transmitted his guilt. His part in the Hope Market, although it had brought his House the ability to survive, which was considered flourishing in comparison to the other Houses, was the reason for this awful news.
Diem's jawline tightened along with his stomach. He saw the cascading effect as the Housemen's faces soon mirrored the grim expression of his own. He began again.
"The trans shipments have been reported as being short," he said. A burst of gasps and muttered curses fluttered through the crowd. Diem felt the spotlight blame of his previous decision to take part in the Hope Market. His Housemates' judgments, perceived or true he did not know, but they forced a sweat from him. He forced himself to continue. "The Plutians will be expanding their harvest. They will no longer be offering only dragons."
Diem's eyes found Breathe. His Gra covered her mouth, as if she already knew what he was going to say.
"The Plutians," Diem said, "have decided to harvest humans as well."
The horrible gasps rippled through the crowd. The Housemen cursed, some of the women began to cry, pulling their children close. Nine was an impossible number. The whole crowd pressed together, bodies close, their disagreements forgotten as they clung to one another.
"They expect one human to replace each dragon we are short of quota," Diem continued. "The quotas have also been raised. We must produce nine dragons per house, per season."
"But our numbers have always depended upon the dragons we receive from Ice House and Hot House," Rest, the wash woman, said. "If they deliver four to us, than we only have four to train."
"I assume the Plutians will provide more eggs for incubation," Diem said, but he knew it was a lie. He knew the numbers were intentionally high. It was the humans the Plutians truly wanted. "The shortages will be covered first by my own blood line."
The gasps rose up again. A woman reached her arm out to Breathe. Diem watched some of the House occupants scour the crowd for Karma. Without finding her, he understood when they cast their suspicious glares to him again. It would be a logical assu
mption that Diem would hide his beloved sister, but he decided not to address Karma's whereabouts.
"This season, we will have enough," Diem said.
"And what of next season?" Nice, one of the dragon feeders, asked from the outskirts of the crowd. "Cold Season One is upon us and the dragons only mate during the cold season. They do not lay their eggs until the hot seasons begin again. That is six seasons away. Do the other Houses have such a surplus to cover the next six cold seasons?"
"I do not know," Diem said. He chose his next lie carefully. "I would assume that they do."
"This is the fault of the Hope Marketing!" a man shouted. It was Momentum, a man known for his violent mating. "Didn't I tell you all that we were on plan to lose?"
"The greed was our undoing!" someone else agreed. Diem lost track of the anger as it increased, churning through the crowd with furious outbursts. Breathe climbed the stairs, taking the spot beside Maeve before clanking the rail of the porch with a rock she had hidden in her palm.
"Diem did what he had to do to keep us all alive!" she shouted at the crowd. "You know this. Without the Hope Marketing, we would have all starved! You were grateful for the gorne then, so be grateful now too! We have never harvested nine dragons consistently each season. This is not Diem that is at fault for putting us on plan to lose!"
"But we are lost, all the same!" Momentum shouted. "They will take us slowly, from what you say. First, our leadership, then what? Our women? Our children?"
The dread swept over his people just as Forge's shadow did. Their impetus limped away from the hope. They would lose so much faster, if he could not change their focus. Diem's fists curled at his thighs.
"We will not lose," he boomed.
"How will we not?" Tick, the waste cleaner, asked. "The Plutians allot us our food! If they remove the gorne, we are finished!"
"Even if they could remove all the gorne, we can survive on ratfish and hampigs, if we must," Breathe said. "And do without, if need be."
The Fly House (The UtopYA Collection) Page 30