“You should pull out and lube your cock,” said Duga. “I am ready for lamasket. You are doing very well.”
Eyakan warmed the lube in his hands and grabbed his thick, fully-hard dick, which quickly became glossy and wet. Once again he got on top of Duga. He moved the tip of his penis to Duga’s asshole and gently pushed it in.
Duga let out a moan. Eyakan’s balls grazed Duga’s ass, and Eyakan’s dick was in deep. This was the cock that would be in Baboye in a few days, and Eyakan was ready, thought Duga.
“With each thrust, don’t pull all the way out,” said Duga. “Just pull it out about an inch or two and then push it back in.”
Their chests touched once again. The friction felt so lovely on Duga’s nipples. He moved his hands back to his own cock.
“Can we come together?” said Duga.
“Yes, Menasta,” said Eyakan.
Duga kissed Eyakan. He kissed the lips that were meant for Baboye. He kissed the lips of the young man that he planned to save.
And then they came. Duga all of a sudden felt young again. He felt waves of electricity run through his body and streams of seed flow from his cock to mix with their sweat. Eyakan came inside Duga and then collapsed on top of him.
“I am ready,” said Eyakan.
“Yes, you are,” said Duga.
*~*~*
That night, Duga and Gyles met in the secret room at the back of the library. Gyles had left a note for Duga at his office earlier that day telling him that the round of vetting he had ordered went smoothly. All the harem staff checked out fine, except for Gerion Ninsidos. Investigators could find no information on Gerion older than fifteen years.
“Thasali security usually only go back ten years for most staff, so he probably had enough of a history when he came on board. Only those working with the royals day-to-day get a more thorough vetting that goes back to the day they were born,” Gyles said, sitting on one of the short stools.
Duga had disliked Gerion from the start but wouldn’t have pegged him as being part of an assassination plot. He just struck him as being a pompous, if aggressive, patriot. Master Oraj didn’t seem to have any problems with him. He seemed to perform his job well. Still, they needed to find out more about him. He could be someone who had spent years living undercover waiting for the right moment, and Duga had an idea.
“Go back to security and tell them to look at birth and death records. Look for anyone named Gerion Ninsidos who died before reaching their fifth birthday. Do it now! This might give us the answers we need.”
That night, Duga dreamt of Eyakan. The young man fucked him while Prince Baboye watched. His gold eyes shone with happiness even while Eyakan slit Baboye’s throat. Eyakan then swallowed a drop of davosira. They both fell dead on top of Duga, and he woke up screaming.
Chapter Six
The day before the jubilee celebration saw a frenzy of preparation and activity. The harem compound seemed to have doubled in population because of all the new tailors, jewelers, barbers and stylists running around as if those they were making even more beautiful were not threatened with execution.
Then again, they didn’t know.
The Matriarch had promised to kill all the harem boys by the end of the day if Duga could not uncover the assassination plot or prove that there wasn’t one. He had found some clues, but he needed far more if he was going save the crown prince and all the harem boys and possibly himself. The Matriarch could be quite unforgiving of those who failed her.
Gyles had woken Duga in the middle of the night to tell him that the security service had found a Gerion Ninsidos who had died at the age of two more than twenty years ago in the Tailors district. This didn’t necessarily mean Gerion was an assassin, but it was suspicious. Duga was sure that Master Oraj’s chief assistant was hiding something. The past of the Gerion who served the harem only went back fifteen years, and it appeared the real Gerion Ninsidos died at the age of two. Who was this man who expressed such extreme loyalty to Thasali?
At breakfast Rilas interrupted Duga’s meal with two notes. One was from Menefy telling Duga that he had completed his assigned tasks, returned for the celebrations and was available for service if needed. The second note was from Baboye, who wrote that he looked forward to seeing Duga tomorrow night at the banquet and revels. Baboye wrote as if he couldn’t imagine Duga failing at his assignment. Duga wished he could think the same way.
Fortunately, Duga’s alter ego Cassiel Menasta didn’t have much more to do regarding the jubilee preparations. His work was done. If any of the harem boys needed extra tuition, he was available to help, of course, but the harem boys were being primped and groomed for the festivities. They didn’t have time for extra instruction.
Duga briefly saw Eyakan after breakfast in the secret room at the back of the library. The young man showed Duga the knife and vial of davosira that had been left for him last night.
The vial of deadly liquid, which Duga handled with great care and some trepidation, was strikingly bland. There was no indication of where it may have been made, and it was the type of vial that could be found even in the poorest regions. The knife blade was sharp, long and very slim. It could probably be pushed home and pulled out without leaving a trace of its entry, but the hilt was as ostentatious as the vial was bland. Vines that morphed into fantastical serpents and ended in an unknown flag covered the reddish-brown handle.
While the harem compound was a stew of jubilee-related activity and Menasta did not appear to be needed, Duga took his leave. He didn’t know where he was going, but he needed to find out who this Gerion really was. He needed to find the origins of the knife. He suspected though, that he had found as much as he could within the compound walls and that he might find some answers outside. At the very least, a walk around town would clear his head.
Harem members and staffers tended to be kept on short leashes, rarely leaving the compound without good reason, but with everyone so preoccupied with jubilee preparations, it was easy for Duga to duck out wearing the nondescript cloak he always wore when he went to visit Shebi’s brothel. He didn’t even have the mark of the harem on his wrist anymore.
It was a short walk into town from the harem compound. Although he knew that he probably had Thasali security following him, Duga felt a curious sense of freedom. He wasn’t himself. He wasn’t, for the moment, the crown prince’s favorite adviser, and he wasn’t needed, for the moment, at the harem. Here and there flags with the Thasali colors fluttered and flapped in a warm breeze while Resedna residents from all stations of life enjoyed the excuse for a party. The magenta sky was particularly bright today. Jubilee day was an official holiday. Some people relaxed and enjoyed the party. Other enterprising folks made money. Duga paid an itinerant fruit seller twice the going rate for a rikilda, peeling away the hard rind from the juicy fruit and devouring it on the spot.
As he strolled, he wondered where he might find the answers he so desperately needed, and his mind strayed to thoughts of Eyakan—the small of his back, his soft pubic hair, the feel of his balls in Duga’s hands. Another part of Duga seemed to take pleasure in reminding him that Baboye had claimed Eyakan. Duga smiled and brought his thoughts back to the sights in front of and all around him. He was a couple of streets away from Shebi’s brothel. He turned a corner into a street filled with stalls set up to sell royal paraphernalia, jubilee memorabilia, food, drink and children’s toys. He stopped at a drinks stall and bought some iced mountain tea. When he looked away from the seller, he saw Gerion at a stall that was selling flags and clothing with likenesses of the Matriarch and crown prince. Pulling the cloak’s hood lower down to cast his face in shadow, Duga walked slowly toward the stall but stayed out of Gerion’s sight. He got close enough to overhear yet not be seen. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw another man—tall, lean and aristocratic-looking, although his clothing screamed struggling merchant—approach the stall.
“Ovech?” The man was speaking to Gerion. “It is Ovech Kalon. How are you?
How is your mother these days? Always a fine woman.”
Ovech Kalon was not a Thasali name, but Duga didn’t recognize its origins.
Gerion quickly glanced around, as if making sure no one had overheard. Duga moved a little closer. He may have finally tripped over the clue that he needed.
“Are you talking to me?” Gerion said. He did haughty pride very well.
The man who had addressed Gerion as Ovech Kalon seemed to falter a bit. “Yes, Ovech. I— I— I—”
“I’m sorry, sir. I am not this Ovech you seem to think I am. I work for the Thasali family. I have what I was sent to buy, and I must be getting back to the palace!” Gerion picked up his bag and walked away quickly without looking back.
Duga moved in next to the man, who looked bewildered. “I bid you good fortune, friend. Are you new to our city?”
“Uh, no. I’m not a native, but I have lived here several seasons now.” The man looked away from Duga and in the direction Gerion had gone. “I could have sworn—”
“Sometimes the eyes, they can play tricks, you know,” Duga said, infusing his voice with warmth.
“Never my eyes, never mine. I know who that is. I am not mistaken. Why would someone deny who they are? There’s no shame in being Corceus.”
Corceus! thought Duga. The pieces were starting to fall into place, but he needed to know more.
Duga gently took the man’s arm, feeling the thin cloth and noticing a hole at the elbow. He started steering the man toward an alehouse. “You look in need of refreshment. Let me buy you a drink.”
The man grinned. “I won’t say no to that.”
Duga bought them drinks while the man, whose name was Viktor Kritchlau, found them a table in a corner. They toasted the jubilee celebrations and drank, sitting in silence for a few moments.
Duga leaned forward and spoke in low tones. “I have a reason for buying you a drink other than just the desire for company at this time.”
Viktor raised his eyebrows and lowered his glass to the table. “If you need Ovech killed, I’m not interested,” he said. “Never did like that line of work. I’m giving it up. What else you got?”
Duga let the fact that Viktor was a former and potential assassin for hire go by without remark. It wasn’t what he was interested in. “I’ve been keeping an eye on the man you claim to know for my employer—”
“Claim to know him? I do know him, no matter what he says!” Viktor said.
“Please accept my apology for offending you. My employer, who wishes to remain in shadow, has commissioned some work from that man but feels uneasy about him. He believes he might be hiding something. My employer will pay you for your information.”
He fished around in one of his cloak pockets. When he withdrew his hand, he showed Viktor a handful of coins. Tiny crystals were embedded around the edges of each of them. The man’s eyes widened. Duga closed his fingers around the coins.
“Let’s see if your information is worth a few imperial ginamars.”
Viktor nodded vigorously. He leaned in close to Duga. “His name is Ovech Kalon. Our families were not close, but we socialized in the same circles. He’s always been a terrible snob, but he comes by it easily.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Because his mother is a Corceus. She’s in one of the lesser branches of that family, which isn’t worth much, but it didn’t keep Ovech from thinking he was better than all the rest of us. I imagine his mother rocked him to sleep every night with stories of the former glory of the family Corceus. Is that worth some imperial ginamars?”
Duga handed over the coins without delay and stood up. “Thank you, my new friend. I must be going. I bid you good fortune.” He had to get back to the compound. He didn’t have all the information he needed, but at least now he knew exactly where to look.
*~*~*
Corceus was an old royal family that was royal no more. It was one of the original royal families, along with Thasali, Kayembe and a handful of others, that once ruled Oranto. The Corceus empire had spanned nearly a third of the planet, but generations of in-fighting, corruption, incompetent and oppressive rule, and disastrous military campaigns contributed to the family’s spectacular fall to society’s lower rungs. The remaining royal families had divided the Corceus properties and other assets among themselves. Those with Corceus blood toiled in mines, salt marshes and fish farms along with everyone else, always knowing they were once royalty. In his time as a member of the jundii, he had heard the name Corceus on occasion. They weren’t considered that important in the modern world. They were part of history. Most of the descendants seemed to have melted into whatever communities they had fled to. Most didn’t even use the Corceus name. A few were mischief makers, trying to stir up trouble in misguided attempts to cause friction between the surviving royal families, but it had never amounted to anything. To members of the Thasali household, Corceus was a name to mock if it was spoken at all. But now a Corceus had found his way into the Thasali harem and was living in disguise. Duga had to get to Gyles.
If anything, activity at the compound was even more frenetic than it had been when Duga left earlier. When he saw Gyles, Duga made fleeting eye contact and signaled him to meet him at the back of the library. Duga made a quick stop at his quarters, grabbing the knife before meeting Gyles in the hidden room.
Duga showed Gyles the knife as they sat on the low stools in the dimly lit room. The noise and frenetic energy of the preparations seeped through even to this hidden space and seemed to surround them.
Gyles took one look at the knife and said, “Corceus. It’s their pattern.”
The pieces all fell into place for Duga. “Gerion Ninsidos is really Ovech Kalon, and he’s Corceus. This knife was sent to one of the harem boys for him to kill Crown Prince Baboye.”
“Do we need to arrest the harem boy?” asked Gyles.
“No. He’s an unwilling accomplice, but it is time for us to deal with Gerion,” said Duga.
They exited the library with a plan that would bring in Gerion while not adding to the ongoing chaos of jubilee preparations.
*~*~*
Duga found Gerion in the palace’s largest banquet hall. He was talking to three men whom Duga recognized as the Matriarch’s chamberlain, wine steward and butler. Duga approached the group quietly. He was grateful for the buzz of the palace staff in the hall, as it gave him a bit of camouflage. By the time he was close to the man he now knew as Ovech Kalon and his little group, he was surprised by Duga’s sudden appearance.
Gerion excused himself from the other men. “Menasta? What brings you here? Do you need me?”
Duga smiled and lowered his voice. “It’s the Matriarch who needs you. She has a special idea for the banquet and revels tomorrow and she wants to discuss it with you. Master Oraj is too busy at present to attend to this matter.”
Duga noticed that Gerion/Ovech could hardly restrain himself from preening. It was unusual for all but the most highly ranked staffers to talk directly with the Matriarch, but Gerion/Ovech feigned mild irritation.
“Well, if she must talk to me now, so be it. There’s still so much to do,” he said, turning on his heels and heading to the grand banquet hall doors that led to the corridor. Duga had to pick up the pace to keep up with him.
When they passed the door Duga might have used to go back to the harem compound, Gerion glanced at him.
“Aren’t you going back to the harem? Surely there’s a boy or two there who needs help with his lamasket technique or something,” Gerion said in a querulous tone.
“Oh, no. I have a few matters to discuss with the Matriarch’s private secretary, so you won’t mind if I keep you company, will you?”
“No.” Gerion looked as if he felt like Duga would steal his glory in front of the Matriarch.
They walked in silence to the Matriarch’s office. As they neared her office, Duga noticed more members of the security service, in plain clothes and in uniform, milling about. Gyles had clearly done his
part of passing on the word to Eretu and others. If Gerion noticed, he didn’t show it.
When they got to the reception area, Gerion announced his presence to Adven, the young receptionist. She spoke into small tube that echoed her voice to the private secretary’s office. Adven escorted Gerion into the secretary’s office and closed the door behind him. Duga waited a few seconds before Adven opened the door for him as well. He ducked into the secretary’s office in time to hear her announcing Gerion to the Matriarch. Duga quietly walked into the Matriarch’s chambers, passing the secretary, who gave him a wry smile. She shut the door after him.
Duga entered behind Gerion but stayed in the back of the room, so Gerion couldn’t see him yet. The Matriarch sat at her desk flipping through a file while Prince Baboye looked over his mother’s shoulder.
Eretu stood in front of the Matriarch’s desk and didn’t turn her head when Gerion stepped up next to her. After several moments of silence, the Matriarch looked up.
“Master Ninsidos. So good of you to come on such short notice,” she said.
“Yes, madame,” Gerion said, his head bowed.
Duga saw him glance at Eretu. He realized that Gerion probably had no idea who she was.
“I understand that preparations for my jubilee banquet and the revels are going very well.” The Matriarch looked up and smiled. Duga recognized that smile. It was like molten lead concealed by radiant sunshine. For a fleeting moment, he almost felt sorry for Gerion.
“They are, madame.” Gerion started to sound unsure. Duga wondered what he was thinking at this moment.
“Excellent. Some interesting information has come to my attention, Master Ninsidos. According to this report, there is a traitor in my boys harem.”
“Surely not, madame,” Gerion said. “I’ve worked in the harem for nearly ten years now, and I’d like to think I would have noticed a traitor.”
Duga saw Baboye move his hand to rest it on the back of his mother’s chair. He knew Baboye well. His mother had probably ordered him to remain calm and not simply rip Gerion’s head off as he knew Baboye would have loved to do.
Tales of the Thasali Harem Box Set Page 9