It also meant I was given the okay to start working.
MY FIRST REAL client, meaning the first person I slept with that the Lao Hu received actual payment for, was Yin Bao Xi, the current President and General Secretary of the Communist Party of the People’s Republic of China.
I guess maybe that shouldn’t have surprised me.
It did surprise me, though. In fact, it completely threw me when Ulai told me who he was. I’d seen his picture on the feeds, of course...in avatar form, anyway...but the avatar resembled him closely enough in the flesh that I had to fight a bout of nerves when they first led him to the door of my room.
He was surprisingly charming though, and not very demanding, in terms of the sex itself. The most difficult part had been holding him off. I got the impression he wasn’t used to seers...maybe not even to prostitutes...because he got so excited once I started taking his clothes off that most of my light was spent keeping him from climaxing before we’d done anything.
Afterwards, he was all smiles, and bowed to me so many times I had to fight not to smile.
He flattered me with his words, and also with his unwillingness to leave...and finally by asking me permission if he could submit his name to Voi Pai a second time.
I told him sure, and I meant it.
All I could think was, if every time was like him, I could definitely handle this. Maybe not forever, but long enough to pay off what Voi Pai decided I owed her.
I saw Ulai wink at me from the doorway as I finally showed him out. I could tell from the dense flush of pride and other emotions I felt in the pulse of warmth he sent my way that...at the very least...I hadn’t embarrassed him. Two days later, I received a bouquet of hothouse flowers. With it came a long velvet-covered box containing an emerald bracelet that probably cost more than my mother made in a year, working for the Post Office in San Francisco. Probably more than I made in two as a waitress in that crappy diner. It also included a note offering me a house in Beijing, if I ever grew tired of being a consort of the Lao Hu.
The whole thing kind of freaked me out, honestly. Even knowing it had more to do with what I was, not who, it just struck me as the most bizarre form of make-believe imaginable. The guy didn't know me at all, and he was trying to buy me houses. I couldn't even get Jaden to do the dishes when I had a cold.
Voi Pai seemed satisfied, though. She gave me access to the indoor pool in one of the buildings outside Meridian Gate, and offered me a horse of my own, a pure-blooded, white Arabian stallion named Ri, which I was told meant “intelligence.” It was the most beautiful horse I’d ever seen before, much less ridden, so I didn’t hide my disbelief when they led him out of the barn and put him through paces in front of me.
Again, their world struck me as this bizarre light show of delusion.
Still, people paid well for their delusions, I guess.
I knew I had it easier than probably anyone in this line of work on the planet, seer or human, but it didn't change the fact that I was letting people have sex with me for money. They could try and make it seem like some expensive "date" and ply me with million dollar horses afterwards, but it didn't change the reality of any of it. Anyway, that kind of thing had never really worked on me...the whole 'wow her with money' thing, I mean. I ended up feeling like I was acting even when I was just talking to others in the Lao Hu, pretending enthusiasm about things that struck me as almost childishly shallow.
Just having to be that “on” all the time was kind of exhausting. As soon as they were all gone, it was like the puppet strings got cut. I'd just lay there, usually without bothering to turn on the lights, relieved at the silence.
The rooms where they housed me had actually once been part of, and modified from, the original concubine’s quarters in use when the human Royal Family ruled the city. Instead of one of these rooms, however, we seer consorts generally received two...one for clients, and one for ourselves. The client’s room didn’t really belong to us in any real sense. Presentation artists made up the client-facing side...theatrically, of course. Following every meeting, that room, including all sheets, towels, blankets and dishes, was cleaned by servants I never saw, but who seemed to conduct their work with an almost obsessive attention to detail.
I actually had been granted three of these rooms, to provide padding between my clients and the outer walls...for security purposes, of course. I saw clients in the middle room, linking the other two. That was only one of the differences between me and the other consorts.
With the exception of their regulars, most of the other consorts only brought their clients back for sex after they’d been chosen from a line up, often assembled in a larger audience chamber. That audience chamber stood outside the gated security segment of the old concubine’s quarters, so they never actually had to bring anyone into their space until they were working. Further, if they weren’t chosen, they either waited for the next round, or went home for a few hours to chill out and live life.
Not so with me.
I had no regulars. I also didn’t get picked from a choice of other consorts.
I saw clients by appointment only.
As all of my clients were also heavy hitters in some way, either politically or economically, they didn’t come in through the front gates. They also expected more of an overall “experience,” and therefore required more than the usual courtesies. As part of the whole foreplay thing, this was often couched more like a date and took a lot longer. I was expected to serve tea and entertain them...give them an opportunity to talk to me and to spend time with me in the pre-show sense. I also followed the client’s timeline, at least within reason.
As a result, I usually spent at least half a day with each client. I think my shortest was around three hours...the longest closer to seven. I knew they paid handsomely for the privilege, but it wore me out by the time they left. It also often meant no infiltration training that day, which frankly bothered me more. I got catch up sessions at night sometimes, from Cilap and some of the others, but it wasn't the same; I wanted to be with my class.
Given my unique set up, I also had to learn more than just sex. For the whole tea ritual thing alone, I’d spent a few hours every day for weeks. Even then, Ulai still badgered me about elements of my delivery being not 'traditional' enough.
I had a seer’s memory now, so that part didn’t worry me so much as the small talk that was also required as part of the pre-game show. Both Voi Pai and Ulai warned me to be polite, but said that otherwise, I could essentially be myself. The problem was, I wasn’t entirely sure they knew what this actually meant, in regards to me. Most of my social skills were learned in human bars in San Francisco, and while I’d adapted to Seertown and even older seers like Vash and Balidor well enough to squeak by, I still got a head tilt and puzzled looks often enough to know I didn’t act like your average Asian seer.
The Lao Hu, Voi Pai in particular, educated all of the clients to expect an American, and a young one to boot. Since that was part of my marketing appeal in many cases, no one expected me to know the traditional forms of conversation or etiquette like the other consorts. But still, I didn’t exactly feel like I could just kick up my heels and “be myself” either.
So I did the best I could with what I had. Apart from making Ulai laugh aloud at one of my comments to a tech mogul from California, I think I did okay. But so far, I’d mostly been given humans to entertain, so I could read them for when I stepped too far out of line.
I think Voi Pai let me off the hook as well because, technically, all of the old forms said I should be the one receiving deference. The humans probably wouldn’t know this, but my seer clients certainly would...and while I didn’t expect anywhere near as many seers as humans, due to the financial constraints of hiring me, Ulai already told me a few made it relatively high on the list. High enough that I could expect to see the first of them within the next four weeks to two months, depending on scheduling constraints.
I didn’t find out until a number of mon
ths later just how much they charged for each of those little half-day visits, but even in the beginning, clearly it was a lot.
The order of my list changed almost daily, too. More important clients bumped down less important clients. Political situations shifted in the outside world, and at times, my list followed, depending on who the Communists wished to please at any given time. No one came out and told me, but at times I felt the pressure of this through Voi Pai. Ulai told me later that Voi Pai intended to widen the client base only if it seemed appropriate...or necessary. Until then, it was rich friends of the Chinese government, business moguls and Head’s of State.
That was pretty much it.
Also, despite the individualized nature of those invitations, whoever came to my client room had to go through about two hours’ worth of security protocols in order to gain access...in addition to the hour or so they had to endure to even get that far into the Imperial City.
Those were the “friends” of the Lao Hu, by the way.
Strangers, which usually meant friends of friends of the Lao Hu, pretty much had to wait all day before seeing me sometime in the evening...or most of the previous night to see me the following morning.
According to Miao, the waiting list for me already numbered in the hundreds by the time I’d actually seen my first client...and that included only those names for which they’d already conducted basic security screening. The original set of invites numbered only about fifty, but word apparently spread fast that the Bridge was in the City and being auctioned off to the highest bidders. Within a week, according to Miao, that list ballooned into three times its original size. A few hours with me was apparently the new cachet, at least amongst those living within the high-floating networks of the rich, unimaginative and chronically bored.
None of this flattered me, by the way.
From the beginning, it was pretty clear I was purely a trophy conquest in 98% of these cases...often simply a check mark in some power-freak’s bucket list. Or even more trite, dinner party fodder for their other rich friends, who of course immediately wanted their own names added to the list to keep up with the Joneses.
Nothing about that basic routine really changed until I got a good look at my third seer client.
The first two seers I saw were pleasant enough.
One, a high-ranking official in the Party, had left the Lao Hu’s formal ranks and essentially lived full-time among humans. Having sex with him was strange only because he was a seer, but he kept things light between us. I think curiosity about my Bridge status brought him there as much as anything, and other than liking the sex okay, he seemed disappointed I wasn’t more “mythic.” Still, he was polite. He also sent me a gift...a golden statue of the Bridge symbol that I plunked down on my bureau, unsure what else to do with it.
The second of the two was a middle-aged infiltrator named Surli, and the first person I saw who didn’t feel so much like a client. He’d been put on the list as a reward for thwarting an attempt at cyber-terrorism against the Republic, one that could have cost the state billions.
He’d come in informally, wearing the usual infiltrator black, and glanced around like he was in a museum. Then, finding me with his eyes, he stared at me, seer fashion...then grinned so wide I couldn’t help but smile back.
We only made it about halfway through tea before he asked me to take off my clothes and pulled me into his lap. Despite this, I had more real conversation with him than I did with perhaps anyone who came into that room, client or otherwise. He wanted to talk to me during breaks between sex, during sex, after sex...he even asked me out afterwards, wanting to know if I had free time to see seers socially, apart from clients.
He was also the only one to ask me directly about Revik.
He wanted to know if I was still bonded to him, if the rumors about me killing him were true, why I was being unfaithful to him, and if that meant I was open to bonding to someone else. After stammering at him in shock for a few seconds, I tried to tell him I wasn’t really supposed to talk about any of that, but he pushed me until I told him more or less the truth.
In fact, at one point, he made me cry, pushing me to open to him.
We ended up having sex on the floor almost roughly, him reading me while I fought my way through the worst case of pain I’d had since I’d gotten there. He’d wanted me to call him by Revik’s name, if only to get my reaction. I hadn’t been able to do that...but he opened me enough that both of us lost control...I only managed to talk him down long enough that he lasted past the worst of it. And even through that, he was talking to me, cursing Revik even as he continued to try and get me to feel it...to move past the thing between us, maybe.
I didn’t know how to tell him that that probably wasn’t going to happen.
He left reluctantly, about eight hours later, and I found myself making out with him in the doorway, and telling him I’d try to find some way to see him again.
When I asked Ulai, he’d seemed amused at first.
Then, after reading my light for a few minutes, he actually got jealous. He did ask Voi Pai on my behalf if I could see Surli again, and she’d agreed to it with her usual dismissive wave, as long as it was on my own time and didn’t interfere with clients.
When I passed a message to him, however, he had mysteriously been redeployed in the States. He messaged me back at once, promising to visit once he was back in town. We ended up communicating at least every few days after that, via the secure network, but he soon got so busy that it got pushed out to once every week.
I distinctly got the impression that we were being kept apart by someone...or possibly several someone’s. I didn’t know who was behind it, but I suspected Voi Pai, despite her surface indifference to my personal life. I wasn’t sure if she was trying to keep me focused on work, or if there was some other reason, but it was a little depressing.
In addition to the rest, Surli was funny...and charming. I’d liked him.
He’d also been good with his light. Really good, and he’d liked mine, enough to try and coax me to open more, well past where Ulai warned me not to go with any of my clients. The one time he got me part of the way there, I’d seen it in his eyes, right before he pulled on me harder, groaning as he let me into more of his. He’d climaxed not long after that, but he spent the rest of our time together trying to get me to go there with him again.
With Surli gone, it was back to the usual parade of...nothing.
Most of my clients were fine, not jerks or anything. I got a lot of presents...a fair number of which I gave to the other consorts, or my wardrobe people, at least once I found out I couldn’t trade them in as any part of my debt to the Lao Hu. I kept the jewelry, and the gold and jade...and the few pieces of fine art I received. It wasn’t a vanity thing; I like art, sure, but on a certain level, it also constituted a bunch of junk I couldn’t really move easily if I needed to.
I kept them so I’d have something when I got out of there. Insurance, I guess.
Certain things Revik had told me about the reality of most seers’ lives kept reverberating through my head, including what he said about the dangers of being poor and a seer. He was obsessive about having savings of some kind...preferably a lot of savings, spread over multiple accounts and in different currencies. He did it partly so he wouldn’t be forced to do work he didn’t want to do, but mostly I suspected he kept it as bribe money, in case he or anyone he cared about ever got into trouble and he needed to pay their way out.
Very few problems couldn’t be solved in the human world with enough money.
I’d never really felt comfortable relying on other people for that kind of thing...including the Seven, who, like Revik, also assured me I would never need to worry about money. Maybe it was watching my mother rapidly go broke due to an insurance policy “glitch” when my father got MS...after he’d worked his whole life and had savings and paid his premiums and all the rest of it. Or maybe I’d just learned a long time ago that people said a lot of things th
at didn’t always pan out, no matter how good their intentions.
So when Voi Pai refused to take any of my “gifts” in lieu of hours worked, I didn’t argue. I hoarded my stuff. And when I got enough of it, I asked Ulai to help me open a bank account and I sold a bunch of it. From that point on, I started hoarding cash, too.
Ulai seemed to approve of my approach. He elected himself my financial advisor, and even helped me invest some of it, utilizing some of the market experts in the Lao Hu. He also helped me spread it around a bit, like Revik did, so I wouldn’t be overly reliant on the Chinese economy in case something happened.
My mother would laugh if she knew I had a Swiss bank account, but I found the knowledge oddly reassuring. I also had money in the United States, and in England.
In terms of “what next” after this, I’d already been offered a few positions in China, both within the Lao Hu and for the government directly, doing something like what Surli did. I found myself taking those offers seriously. For one thing, I’d be safe in China...relatively speaking. Despite the debacle in Hong Kong, most of the Chinese seers seemed to have come to peace with me. And, of course, the Chinese human government very much wanted me to stick around, as a permanent, willing and loyal member of their seer family. They wanted my title, I suppose. They also probably hoped I’d propagate little baby telekinetic seers.
More than anything, they wanted me as leverage against the West. There was still a lot of fear around telekinetic seers. Thanks to the image captures on the Registry job, all speculation as to whether I could use my powers to kill had been handily laid to rest.
There was some chance they’d force the issue, of course, when it got time for me to leave, but I kind of doubted they’d throw me in a cell and start experimenting on me. Too many seers would get pissed off...and in the City, at least, most now seemed to believe me that Revik was alive and well and would soon be rejoining seer society. Revik’s rumored good health went a long way towards calming down a lot of the seer-traitor and mate-traitor crap I would probably have to deal with in the West for the next several decades.
Allie's War Season Two Page 109