“For the love of God and Lady Mara, why?” asked Hegen.
“As a lure,” said Vilam slowly. “A weapon?”
Aksenna nodded, pressing the pendant down on a magnification screen. “Imraithi hid the scope of her experiments from me until a few years ago. Anyatisa was a strong, intelligent child, much more independent than her siblings. She hated the worldships. Within reason, and because she passed easily among Terrani, I thought it an advantage to let her lead a double life. I did not expect her involvement with Merrick until she brought him home. Or know how well my Vessel had succeeded until Anyatisa’s son reached his full growth. Look.”
The icy-white image revealed was a tiny three-dimensional portrait, created by microscopic blasts cracking the crystal: a Terran human male with rounded ears, long hair drawn back in a braid at the base of his neck. His chin was strong and sharp, his cheekbones high, laugh lines creasing the skin around his eyes and mouth.
Very nearly Moro’s face, though older.
Sixty-Three
MORO PULLED VAL’S sleeping body against his, keeping Val’s back to Lyton’s silent stare. He didn’t want Val waking to see their captor.
Val snuggled closer, one arm flung over Moro’s rib cage, one leg draped over his knee. He was still asleep, still free and safe in his dreams.
Then his thigh flexed slightly. Val’s cock stiffened against Moro’s hip. The scent of Val’s innocent arousal sent a matching hunger through Moro’s body.
Moro considered for only a moment. What if Val’s climax had the same result as his? He half turned, facing Val so their erections slid against each other. Moro gathered both shafts in one hand, intending to be gentle, but the pleasure was too strong, too swift. Val’s hips bucked, slamming his cock into Moro’s suddenly fierce grip.
Black-rimmed, golden eyes opened, staring directly into Moro’s and then fluttering shut. Val groaned, his cock pulsing in Moro’s hand. The new slickness made Moro’s climax inevitable.
Again Moro felt Cama’s teasing presence during the moment of orgasm. He fought to keep his eyes open and on Val’s. Val started to gasp Cama’s name. Moro silenced him with a kiss.
“Ugh,” muttered Val when Moro released his mouth. “I must taste foul. Was there garlic in Alys’s breakfast? I’m sorry.” Val trailed his languid hand over Moro’s chest. He touched the platinum collar. “Moro? What?” His whole body tensed in a silent scream for Cama. “She’s not here,” Val whispered finally. “She’s always been here!”
“Still is, Val,” said Moro, keeping Val clasped tightly to him. “We’re just isolated from her.”
Val brushed hesitantly over the front of the collar and a design Moro hadn’t wanted to decipher. “The palm tree. Sardis?” Val asked after a long moment.
“Sardis,” Moro said and then, “No! Don’t!” when Val reached toward the back of the collar. “I tried already. It’s not coming off.” When Val tried to turn in his arms, Moro stopped him. “Don’t look there. Not yet. Listen to me, Val. Sardis has us both, inside some kind of chamber hiding us from Cama. I’ve made a bargain with him for your life and sanity.”
Sixty-Four
ALYS SHIVERED AGAIN, apparently mirroring the echoes of Cama’s fury and frustration.
“Again?” Hegen asked her, holding her elbow. “Is it her? Your Cama?”
Alys nodded. “She’s trying to find them. Getting close. Lia, Maitland, and I’ve had several flashes. If we can get a few more, we can triangulate on the boys.” She grinned. “Devious boys. Whatever’s blocking them, I think they’re using sex to break it.”
Aksenna gave a silvery laugh. “My grandson is discovering he’s Sonta.”
Hegen shook his head at both women, less startled by the idea of sex-triggered contact than by the admission of Cama’s capabilities. The Commonwealth was a long way from Cedar. Professor Trevannis’s isolated dig site was even farther out, the other way along the galactic arm. The three parents were using Cama’s senses as a very large telescope. Not something the League should know about.
Fortunately the Cedar premier and his people had already left, facing a long Sunday of legal challenges and countersuits over Rio Sardis.
“Our children will do what they can. You’ll need more power on this end to break through the shielding,” said Aksenna, standing up from her corner seat. Both consorts grabbed for her.
“No, Aksenna. You need to cede your body back to Imraithi,” warned Savinilan.
“Imraithi knows more about your grandson’s bioengineering than you do,” said Odasu. “If he needs medical help—”
She brushed their hands away. “Yes, but not yet. Savinilan would need to house me. And Savi, darling though you are, your body is not right for this task.”
“What did you have in mind?” Alys asked suspiciously as the tiny Sonta woman walked closer.
“Stop pacing and sit down. I won’t harm you,” Aksenna said, lightly pushing the Camalian woman into an armless chair. Before Alys could object, Aksenna settled sideways into her lap. “There, now our size difference is mitigated.”
“Hold up,” growled Alys. “I’m a married woman!”
Aksenna cupped the lean, dark face with her hands and kissed Alys briefly on the lips. “I’m counting on it,” crooned the Ksala, her molten orange eyes paling once more to pink moonstone radiance. “You have a strong link to your little Patrona through your wife. Summon Cama. Tell her to focus as much of her attention through you as possible. I promise I’ll do nothing but kiss you. And from Tena’s unguarded words, I think my kiss will be no hardship for you.”
“Why?” Alys’s strong, dark hands tightened on Aksenna’s shoulders.
“In their own bodies the Ksaloni cannot be in proximity to each other or we are compelled to battle. When we fight, entire solar systems die. We touch only through our mortal Vessels. Only thus can we share and enhance our separate powers.”
She leaned back, her eyes searching Alys’s face. “My sibling Tena decided Cama’s folk were our kin. Your Cama is a kind of daughter to an ancient Ksala long dead. One who was our sister, whom we helped slaughter when she disobeyed our way. Our punishment is captivity in Sonta flesh and addiction to Sonta pleasures and pains. Our redemption is in learning to control and channel our hungers. To become bringers-of-life like our dead sister, not destroyers. I discounted Cama’s folk as weak and passive, Alys Antonin ne’Cama. I will not make that error again. If you summon Cama into your flesh, I can lend her the power to find our children.”
“From a kiss,” Alys challenged.
“You will experience it as a kiss,” said Aksenna. “Cama will feel rather more.” Her iridescent, white skin darkened with interwoven black tendrils. They masked parts of her face, crept down her arms toward her fingertips. “Cama could blast this frail body of mine when we kiss. I trust she won’t. Will you dare less than I?”
The ambassador growled and pulled Aksenna closer. Alys’s dark skin and braids took on a golden shimmer.
Hegen swallowed hard. He felt stirred as he never had at Moro’s debauched battles, a little ashamed, and suddenly much younger than he’d felt in years. He looked away when a hand touched his shoulder.
Vilam Sardis shook his head. “We’ll let the ladies be. It’s out of our hands now, Doctor, and I suspect the Camalian empress and her Shield will be incoherent for a little while too. But when they get the next ping, be certain they’ll move at a gamma-burst pace.” The younger Sardis nodded at the two Sonta males. “Gentlemen, we have two small ships. We might not be able to move fast enough when the time comes. May I beg your assistance in the chase?”
Odasu nodded his masked and hooded head.
Savinilan grinned. “We’d like nothing better. It will make her feel more useful.” The blue-eyed Sonta smiled at Aksenna and edged closer to Hegen and Sardis. “Did you see the white in her eyes?” he murmured. “You’d never have seen it, even just a thousand years ago. You want to see a Bound Ksala flicker white any way you can get it, and at any co
st to yourself. When they finally burn white, they’re sane and safe to set free. And we can all go home—”
“Home?” asked Sardis.
“Sonta means ‘exile,’” rumbled Odasu. “We are all willing exiles. Our ancestors were the first volunteer jailors of the Ksala we caught and tamed. Our race has home worlds filled with great and terrible civilizations. Those of us chained to star-eaters may never live to see those worlds.”
In the chair, Alys made a tiny whimper.
Aksenna answered with a very low chuckle.
Savinilan grinned at the two women. “Alas, I must seek privacy or lose my mind. Is there a washroom nearby?”
Hegen opened the door and showed the Sonta man to the nearest bathroom. He briefly considered using it himself.
Sixty-Five
“SO THAT’S IT? We fuck. Then I let you die, after all, and take Lyton Sardis as my Knife. In your body.” Val looked ill.
“He and I struck a bargain,” Moro told Val, holding him close. How to tell him Lyton’s arrangement was only a stalling tactic? Whispers were out. They’d only make Lyton suspicious.
“I don’t think I can—”
“Val, you can and you will. I’d hoped we could learn each other’s bodies over many, many days. Slowly. Hell, I wanted years with you. I have too much to teach you, and now there’s no time.”
“What’s the point?”
Moro sighed. Had Val already forgotten Cama’s spark? “You need to know me first. Who I am. What we’re like. What we can do together.” He kissed Val’s neck. Keeping his voice loud enough for Lyton to hear, Moro asked, “Do you understand what we can do together? How good it can be? I begged Lyton to let me have this. Do I have to beg you too?”
Val’s expression stayed worried. “No. I want whatever you’ll give me. But what if he activates this collar? He’ll interfere.”
Looking directly out of the chamber at Lyton, Moro said, “He won’t touch you.”
“I won’t let him!”
“He won’t because he’s too vain. With just the collar, Lyton can’t make me move the way he wants. He never could. He’s very old and very good at sex. He’ll wait to seduce you when he wears my body. He’ll be careful because you’re valuable. He’ll make you enjoy it, probably more than when you’re with me. But I want you first. I want you to remember what we can be.”
Val pulled away enough to look at Moro and nodded. “I want it too.”
Moro kissed him, letting his tongue coax Val’s into a languid dance. The faint garlic-chemical taste was the aftermath of Lyton’s familiar knockout drugs. Val’s head should still be swimming. He’d be less inhibited. By the time Val broke the kiss, sighing, Moro knew what to do.
“First lesson, Val. Don’t look at Lyton or answer him if he speaks. Don’t look outside this chamber. Look at me or a cushion. Nowhere else.”
“Look only at you,” repeated Val. “Next lesson?”
“Obey me. I have a reason for everything I’ll ask you to do. It will save you pain or humiliation and increase your pleasure. This chamber is an arena: my last and your first. I am your trainer. You are my student.”
“Yes.” Val gave a low laugh. “A rooftop. A cheap hotel. A public cafeteria. A worktable. This prison. We never can find the right time or place for love, can we?”
Moro hugged him and looked around the little chamber. Cushions enough for any orgy. A chemical toilet. A water dispenser with soft plastic cups too flimsy for weapons. This could easily turn hellish, and it didn’t have to. “Lyton,” Moro said loudly at the clear walls. “Whatever you think you know about Val, he’s scarcely more than an innocent.”
“Hmmmph!” Val said against Moro’s chest.
Moro merely held him tighter. “Lyton, do you remember the third kind of virginity you took from me, at the resort on Dala? Don’t make me do that to Val. I need towels and lubricant, topical painkillers, and enzyme packs. This can be clean and kind. No need to degrade him as you did me.”
Val went very still in Moro’s arms. “Moro?” he whispered.
“Shh,” said Moro.
A minute later, another part of the far bulkhead irised open. Impervious, flexible gray film dimpled into the wall and reappeared in the form of two male arms holding a white plastic box.
Lyton’s arms, shielded from any chance of infection but capable of limited interaction with his prisoners.
Moro waited until the hands retreated and the wall sealed again before retrieving the box.
“Dear Cama,” Val said, blushing again as he lifted the lid. “A little more than what you ordered.”
Moro pulled the box away from Val and looked inside. Well, trust Lyton to share his toys. The upper layer of the box held cock rings and clamps, several slim and polished steel rods with smoothly pointed ends, a two-foot-long string of platinum beads, a flail with knotted metal strings, and plugs in many sizes and shapes. Several dildos ranged in size from one Moro knew was cast from his own member to a two-headed black club at least seven inches around. Little stick-on sensa patches, meant to excite or deaden certain areas of skin. Drugs able to drown any vestige of fear or decency. Moro ignored them all, bringing out eight bulbs of a very expensive lubricant, one enzyme pack, and every soft gray towel in the bottom of the box.
“You and your toys, Lyton,” he sneered at the curved walls. “Can’t get it up without them anymore? Watch me with Val, since you’re going to anyway. Learn how to please someone with just yourself for once!”
Val laughed, stretching beside him, flaunting his bronze-skinned body. “You’re fearless, you know.”
“What’s to fear?” Moro asked. “Some old man in a stolen body? He can wave his hands out of the wall or wobble his dick, but he’s not in here. It’s just us.”
Val nodded, a wicked gleam in his eyes. “Yes, teacher.”
“Third lesson, Val. How sensitive are you?”
“Er?”
Moro grabbed lubricant, two towels, and the enzyme pack, and hauled Val over to the little toilet. “I know Cama let you fill your head with fantasy nonsense. Have you ever probed into yourself to feel your own prostate? To know how much or how little pleasure it gives you?”
That blush. “No,” whispered Val. “Cama asked me not to. She was afraid I’d go too far. Hurt myself, or pick up bad habits. I always thought maybe—”
“Maybe your true love would do it for you?” Moro shook his head as he gathered pillows in a neat pile a few feet away. He shook out one of the gray towels over the pillows, and tossed a rolled-up towel next to the chemical toilet. “Cama was probably right in your case. You’re a menace. But knowledge is a weapon, Val. Hands and knees, now. Over the pillows. Hips up. Spread your legs.”
Val obeyed but not without protest. “But I want to see you!” Against the pale gray cushions, his body burned warm bronze, dark rose, and gold.
“You will, soon enough. This position will be easier right now, trust me.” Even under duress—or perhaps because of it—Moro couldn’t help admiring Val’s small, tight buttocks, the large, gold-furred balls hiding his softened penis, and the tightly closed sphincter. “Close your eyes now, Val. It will help you concentrate on sensation.”
“What are you going to do?”
“Open you, just a little.” Moro let his voice go deep and soft in Val’s ear. “Clean you, so you needn’t feel ashamed of your lovely body’s normal responses. Then I’m going to stretch you and test the limits of your pleasure.”
“Ohhh,” Val moaned. Moro watched Val’s hips grind once into the pillows. When they lifted, Moro saw the rose-purple cock had stiffened. Just from words.
Moro warmed a liberal fingertip of lubricant with his own cupped hands and breath. He spread it around Val’s clenched hole. Val made a tiny sound, instantly held back.
“Don’t,” said Moro. “You couldn’t possibly win an arena-style game of silence, so don’t even try. I want to hear you.”
“He’s listening!”
“So? He can only li
sten. Valier, every sound you make will be for me, and it will drive him mad.”
Val’s body shook with laughter. “You are a demon.”
“Yes,” said Moro. “Yours. Now pay attention, and learn.”
Moro lavished Val’s delicate skin with gliding strokes, around and inward, always with a fleeting increase of pressure right at the pucker. Val moaned and sighed.
At last, when the barrier relaxed in hesitant pulses, Moro laid just the pad of his index finger over the entry. Without pressing in too hard, he tapped light and quick, a fluttering cadence. Val thrashed and cried out, his knees slipping. He ground himself into the pillows.
So responsive! Val’s sphincter opened, greedily seeking Moro’s fingertip. Moro obliged with only the first joint, still vibrating it in tight, small motions.
From the sounds he made next, Val might come from touch alone.
Moro stilled his fingertip and held Val down on the pillows with his splayed hand.
“Moro, love, where in the wide galaxy did you learn that?” Val murmured, head down and eyes closed. “I feel like I’m flying!”
Moro glared out at Lyton, half-veiled in the pale blue radiance of the isolation walls. “Val,” Moro said, tracing lazy strokes on Val’s back and buttocks with his free hand. “I’ve had a few kind lovers before you. But mostly I’m just trying to do the exact opposite of what was done to me.”
“Oh,” said Val. And then his body responded, hips shaking as some image took shape inside his addled brain. “Damn it, Moro, I’m sorry.”
“Hush. You do have a dark side, don’t you? Save it for me,” Moro said. “I’m not so healed that I cannot be damaged again. Lyton would need to let my body heal for a day or two longer, something he can’t afford to do.”
“Bastard,” Val muttered, glancing toward Lyton.
Moro guided Val’s head back around. “Ah, ah. Don’t look, don’t respond. We must clean you inside. Take a deep breath, Val, and push out against my finger. You’ll feel something cold in a second. Just let it sink in. Then clench your muscles tight.”
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