Banhi shook her head, and was already standing up and gesturing to the waiter for their bill. “Let’s walk,” she said to Sara, and Sara felt boneless, malleable. It was as if she was being drawn along in the wake of some incontrovertible force, a force of life impossible to resist.
“Let’s walk by the river,” Banhi said, and her eyes shone like pools of dark liquid in which Sara feared she might drown.
There wasn’t a soul by the river – the curfews imposed by the religious hostels, where most of the Western travellers lodged because they were so cheap, saw to that. Sara expressed concern that they would be locked out for the night, but Banhi just waved a hand dismissively and said they would find a way back in if that happened.
That same hand found it’s way to the small of Sara’s back somewhere along the riverbank, and Sarah felt as if some kind of electric pulse was travelling through her, stimulating all her nerve endings. She was wearing only a vest top, and through the flimsy fabric Banhi’s hand felt hot, almost as if it were branding her. Sara was certain that there’d be a hand-shaped mark there, the imprint of Banhi, when she got back to her room. How would she explain that to Neil? She hoped he’d be asleep when she returned.
They talked, as they walked, but thinking about it afterwards, Sara had no memory of the contents of their conversation. She put that down to the disorienting effect of Banhi’s hand on her, of her own confused thoughts. She had felt, she realised with hindsight, almost as if she had been hypnotised – by Banhi’s slow, measured voice and, behind it, echoing it’s lulling rhythm, the gentle lapping of the water against it’s banks.
But she would never forget what happened as they approached the guesthouse and Banhi stopped and turned to face her, her hands now moving to Sara’s shoulders, pulling her in towards her. The night was almost moonless and there were no lights in the buildings around her, she supposed due to the nightly power failures that afflicted the town. Yet there was an odd red sheen to Banhi’s eyes, an otherworldly patina that made Sara’s head reel.
Banhi’s hands moved down to Sara’s hips, making sweeping, caressing motions. As she smiled, her teeth glittered like shards of glass despite the lack of light. Sara shivered, though the night was still balmy. Her life, she felt, hinged on this moment, on what she did now. What did she want? More of the same with Neil, or with someone like Neil – an endless procession of Neils down through the years? Or whatever Banhi was offering her?
The other girl’s hands had moved to her breasts. Sara knew what she wanted, and in a spasm she threw back her head and let out a long moan into the silence of the night, the pale flesh of her neck exposed.
He didn’t know exactly how she’d changed, only that she had. At first he’d put it down to his malarial feverishness, the way the sex had taken on an almost hallucinatory intensity. It had surprised him all the more in that he’d been worried, of late, that Sara was going off him. She was always crying off, making excuses, and, when she did submit to his advances, making him feel like she was doing him a favour. She claimed to be too tired, most of the time, but there was no reason for it – it’s not as if they had kids, for heaven’s sake.
But that night she’d been out with Banhi – that’s when it all started. This time it was he who was not really up to it, and she who had insisted, stalking into the room in silence, not even asking him if he was feeling any better, just crawling over to him on the bed and taking him into her mouth before he was fully erect. As she’d coaxed his cock into life, she’d palpated his balls, softly at first, then with greater fervour. He’d arched his back then, pressing himself into her eager fists, enraptured that she’d come back to him at last, after the waning of her desire.
Swapping over, she’d taken his prick in one fist and one and then two balls in her mouth. As her hand had moved up and down his shaft, she’d reached under him, clutching at one buttock. His excitement mounting, he’d felt her growing more frenzied too – her nails dug into him and she’d begun to let out strange guttural moans that sounded almost like some kind of religious chant. Rearing up and away from him, she’d stared down and he’d been frightened, then, by her eyes – there was some kind of emptiness to them, despite the ardour of what he had taken to be her love-making but would now hesitate to describe as such. He smiled at her, for reassurance as much as anything else, but she failed to return it, instead yanking down her shorts, pulling the gusset of her knickers aside and impaling herself on his straining prick. He’d come with a yell, in a mixture of awe and terror at this new creature that seemed to be manifesting itself in someone he had thought he knew so well. He barely even noticed, as he did, how she had shot one finger up into his arse.
Dismounting, she’d remained astride him, her sopping pussy on his belly, and reaching down frenetically massaged her clit with the heel of one hand until, leaning away from him, head thrown back, she’d come with an unholy shriek that sent a chill through him. It was as if he’d made out with an animal, and although he couldn’t miss the increasingly passive Sara of yore, he wasn’t sure what to make of the new incarnation. She felt, if anything, more distant than before.
She remembered going into the room, seeing Neil on the bed, naked, a book by his side. Then things became both hazy and, almost paradoxically, hyper-real. It was as if all her senses had been cranked up several gears, as if her whole body had been retuned. The smoothness of his prick, the clean salty taste of the pre-come on her tongue. The silkiness of his balls as she had rolled them, first one then the other and finally both, in her mouth. The feel of her juices flowing over her fingers as she’d brought herself to a climax, like a wash of pure satin.
But yes, there was a haze there too, the feeling that she’d been in some kind of fugue state, the remnants of her experience down by the river. That, too, seemed both heightened in intensity and woozily unreal. She’d felt Banhi’s mouth on her neck at the same time as her friend had pushed one hand down her shorts and knickers, then the flutter of soft fingertips at her clitoris. She knew she’d come then, too, head still thrown back to the stars as they wheeled above. But after that . . . how had they got back? It was only a matter of steps to the guesthouse, but she remembered none of them. Had they been locked out, as she had feared they would be? She had no idea of the time, of how long she and Banhi had tarried by the river. It was curious: she’d have suspected drink, only it was one of the state’s all-too-frequent dry days. They had drunk salt lassis with their thali.
Now, sleepless still, watching as dawn stripped the sky beyond their window of light, she reached for him across the bed, her hunger for him renewed.
It was almost like the old days, when she had never been sated of him, when she had cycled to college in the dead of night to hand in an overdue essay and then raced to his room, woken him up and demanded that he take her. When she’d gone to find him in the library, given him glorious head in the Philosophy section, ignoring his protests that he was supposed to be revising. Not that he’d really minded: he loved it, he told her on numerous occasions, that she was a woman of appetite. He loved that she made him feel so wanted, so necessary.
He opened one eye as she swung one leg over him, took his prick in her fist again. With her free hand she took one of his and guided it to her pussy; instinctively he bunched his fingers together and she fed him into her, without the need for lube. He had known her horny, but this was something else.
She moved against him, pushing herself onto him harder and harder, until he was afraid he must be hurting her. Her face, though, bore an image of an almost religious transcendence, like the statue of a saint. He spoke her name, quietly, and she didn’t react. He said it louder, and then still louder. Her eyes remained closed; she was far away from him, somewhere else.
He half sat up, eager now to penetrate her, to find some kind of connection, but she pushed him down, her movements shockingly forceful, and brought her mouth back down around him. He tried to hold off, but in spite of himself he began to buck his hips beneath her, losing
control. As a jet of come issued forth, he felt her mouth tighten around him, form a sheath so close and avid that he feared he would be sucked dry, drained of all his vital juices.
She left him in the room, shellshocked. Banhi was out on the terrace, watching the slow, almost imperceptible flow of the river.
“Time,” she said as Sara took a seat beside her, without taking her eyes from the water, “seems not to exist here.”
“Perhaps that’s why you like it so much,” countered Sara. “Perhaps that’s why we all like India. Everything slows down, or appears to.”
Banhi turned her gaze on Sara, and Sara had to look away, so powerful was the surge of emotions inside her. This girl, this almost obscenely beautiful creature, had made her come only the night before. Did she really expect them to just be able to sit here and chat about things as if nothing had happened? And what did it all mean? Would they do it again? Were they lovers now? Did she, Sara, want them to be? And how had what Banhi had done to her down by the river made her want to go and fuck Neil with an ardour she hadn’t felt in months? It was all painfully confusing. Part of her just wanted to run away from it all, but she knew that she couldn’t. That Banhi had some kind of hold of her.
“. . . heard of kundalini yoga?” she heard her friend saying.
She shook her head. “I don’t think so.”
“Kundalini means coiling, like a snake. The snake is a symbol of energies that haven’t been tapped into, of new possibilities.”
“Do you practise it?”
Banhi nodded. “Every day. Without fail.” She smiled, but she was already looking back at the slow-flowing Ganges. “I have transformed myself,” she said. Her eyes flicked back to Sara. “Let me show you how.” She rose.
Banhi’s room, Sara noticed as her friend ushered her inside, was the same as theirs, give or take a few square feet, only it smelled of incense – sandalwood, thought Sara, and something else that she didn’t recognise. Something more earthy, almost feral. There was only one small paneless window at the front of the room, equipped with bars – presumably to keep out the monkeys that patrolled the walkway outside. Banhi lit a candle by the bed.
“Lie down,” she commanded, and at Sara’s raised eyebrows, added, “Just watch, for now.”
Sara did as she was bidden, and observed as Banhi slipped off her clothes and knelt in front of her, her feet hip-width apart. Between her legs, Sara could see the fuzz of her sex. Her own pussy stirred and dampened. She struggled not to touch herself, or to reach out for Banhi.
“This,” said Banhi, “is the Hero Pose, also called the Celibate Pose. It’s a meditative pose designed to channel sexual energy up the spine. Now—” She brought her hands up in front of her – the same hands, Sara thought, that had brought her to a climax the night before – and interlaced the fingers of each.
“This,” she continued, “is called the Venus Lock. It works by applying pressure to the Venus mounds at the base of the thumb, which channels your sensuality and ensures a glandular balance, which in turn helps you to concentrate and focus.”
She relaxed the pose. “It’s all,” she said, her eyes boring into Sara’s, “about what you want and how much you want it.”
Sara swallowed almost painfully.
Her friend continued, and again Sara thought she saw a strange red glow to Banhi’s eyes, a brilliant flash of teeth as she spoke. “What is it that you want, Sara?” she said.
Sara sat up, reached out. She knew without any doubt, in a sudden burst of clarity, that she wanted Banhi. That no one else would do.
Neil was waiting for her, but this time he was afraid. This time he wanted to talk, first, before submitting to her newfound appetite. There was something odd about it all, and he suspected that it had something to do with Sara’s new friend Banhi.
He’s been suspicious of Banhi since the moment they’d met, down by the Ganges. It was Sara who’d insisted on going down to see the bodies being burnt; he’d thought it was ghoulish, this desire of hers, and had accompanied only because he was uneasy with her going alone. Banhi had approached them, had latched onto them, or rather Sara, like a leech. Within minutes they’d seemed like best friends reunited after years apart, which was unusual for Sara – she was usually quite wary and reserved when it came to new people. She generally withheld her trust for a long time. Neil had felt elbowed out from the start; even when Banhi had deigned to address him, he’d felt there was something a little mocking in her eyes. He knew he held little interest for her.
He didn’t care much, at first, but Sara hadn’t stopped talking about her – how interesting she was, how exotic, how gorgeous-looking. It was as if Banhi had cast some kind of spell on her. He’d wanted to throw his hefty guidebook at Sara, insist that they leave Varanasi right away, if only to get away from the damn woman who seemed to have taken over her mind, brainwashed her with all her hippy talk of chakras and goddesses and all sorts. Sara, on the other hand, had insisted on extending their stay here, had all sorts of new places to add to their itinerary, all of them suggested by Banhi. He’d found himself being dragged from temple to temple, to gaze at erotic carvings and Shiva lingams and yoni stones, when he’d been expecting by now to be in a national park, riding elephants.
He sat up in bed, expectant and nervous, sexually charged and yet reticent. What was she going to do to him now? His fever abated, his concerns about malaria receded, he felt eager to be gone from this place, leave all this strangeness behind. He wanted to find the old Sara, the Sara he knew, even if it meant that their sex life died down again. This girl, he saw in a flash of clear-headedness, was an impostor.
The door open. Sara crossed the threshold and stepped up to him. There was a curious fire in her eyes.
“Sara,” he said.
She made no response. She seemed to him like a sleepwalker, devoid of all intent, manoeuvring on auto-pilot.
“Sara, what’s happened to you?”
She came closer, and he became aware that he was holding his breath. He wanted to tell her to go away, but some deeper, darker part of him forbade him to speak.
She climbed onto the bed, pushed him backwards, suddenly all too full of intent, although a certain robotic aspect to her remained.
“Sara,” he beseeched her. “Sara, please.”
She was the master now, he understood that. He’d fallen in love with her for her appetite; it had been the spark that had lit the conflagration between them. But he had met her passion with an equal one. This time Sara seemed to be fired by a flame he couldn’t match.
She pressed her lips to his torso, moved up, clamped her mouth on each of his nipples in turn. He let his head fall back, utterly submissive. He was hers, whatever she wanted of him.
Driving her nails into the flesh of his shoulders, she took him inside her, up to the hilt. For a moment he felt he was going to pass out, felt he was being pulled into a vortex or a black hole from which there would be no return. Bringing his hands down from where they had been behind his head, clamped around the bedposts, he seized her hips as she rode him wildly, baying like a she-wolf, seemingly lost to everything but the sensations that were ripping through her. He didn’t know where she was gone, but he knew that she was far from him.
Sensing his climax near, she rapidly dismounted, brought her hand and mouth to his prick and squeezed it hard as the pearlescent white stream gushed into her mouth. Raising his head, he watched her drink as if struck by a thirst that could never be slaked. He came and came, as he never had before, unsure whether it was her need that was somehow calling forth such unprecedented reserves in him, or his own excitement at watching her drink him in.
Afterwards, too exhausted to attend to her, he lay and regarded her as she pleasured herself, although as soon as the word “pleasure” flitted across his mind, he wondered if it could ever do justice to the waves of rapture that rippled across her face.
She left him, asleep or unconscious she knew not which, and directed herself like a noctambulist t
owards Banhi’s room. Her friend was waiting for her.
“Well?” she said, one expertly plucked eyebrow arched, “is he ready?”
Sara nodded. She’d thought she loved Neil, once, but everything that had gone before had been swept away by the tidal wave that was Banhi. She took her friend’s lovely oval face in her hands, kissed her with savagery. Banhi responded by biting Sara’s bottom lip, and as their tongues slipped and slid around each other like writhing snakes, blood mixed with saliva to form a pinkish foam.
Banhi stepped back at last. “Cigarette?” she said, wiping her mouth and chin with the back of her hand. Sara acquiesced.
“Who are you?” she said as her friend lit two cigarettes and handed one over.
“Who are we?” said Banhi. “For we are the same. Sisters and lovers, with souls as black as night.”
“I need to understand,” said Sara, “if I am to stay with you. To—” She stopped, unable to say Neil’s name.
Banhi studied her coolly. “You meet all kinds of people,” she said at length, “in my field. Sceptics and believers, rationalist and mystics, angels and daemons.”
“Are we angels or daemons?”
“Perhaps a little of each. We cannot know ourselves, not fully.”
“Is there a name for – for people like us?”
“I really don’t know, Sara. But when I think of us, I think of the rakshasa.”
“What are the rakshasa?”
“A species that was first created by the Brahman to protect the sea from those who wanted to steal the elixir of immortality from it – at least that’s one version of the myth. They are shapeshifters, sometimes appearing as tigers, or if in human form as seductive women who lure men to their deaths, drinking their blood, sometimes eating their flesh.”
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