“Well, what?”
“Now you know something embarrassing about me. So you should tell me something embarrassing about yourself. That way we’re even.”
“I like women the way men do,” Shulamit blurted out, before she knew what she was doing. Heat crept into her face.
Aviva studied her from across the room for a moment, her head cocked like a bird’s. Then she opened her mouth and began to sing again, and her feet began once again their dance. Only, this time, she held both of her hands out to Shulamit.
She didn’t say anything about what Shulamit had admitted, but as she drew the princess close into their dance, it was clear that she was anything but scared away.
A cast-iron pot boiled over and interrupted their first kiss. Aviva rushed over to attend to it while Shulamit stood still, memorizing every detail -- Aviva’s soft mouth that tasted of fennel seeds, her full bosom pressed against Shulamit’s own, those hands that made her feel so safe and well cared for. “Does the food agree with you?” asked Aviva, looking up from the stove with a wink.
Shulamit squeaked and then decided to nod instead of speaking. Embracing Aviva was like holding a huge bouquet of flowers in your arms, soft and glorious, with the scent overtaking you and pollen leaving yellow speckles across your nose.
“In my kitchen, there’s always more for you to sample...”
***
And then another, from months later:
Shulamit darted through the palace, slipping as silently as she could between rooms and courtyards. With nervous eyes she checked her path to make sure nobody was paying attention to her as she made her way toward Aviva’s kitchen house for their prearranged tryst. Her jaws worked away at the fennel seeds she was chewing to make sure she wouldn’t be repaying top-notch kisses with stale breath. Aviva kept saying she didn’t care too much about Shulamit’s ornaments, but the little princess didn’t care and had bedecked herself in the clothing she thought prettiest: delicate fabrics of pastel-pink and lilac.
She rounded a corner, and her heart leapt; Aviva was rushing to meet her. The two women met in the corridor and joined hands. “We can’t go back to my kitchen,” Aviva explained. “The head chef is in there hiding from her flock -- she was like a bag of tigers this morning and now she’s too embarrassed to go back in there.”
“But what’s she doing?”
“Baking,” said Aviva. “I know -- I’ll have to clean it all out again. I promise I’ll be thorough.”
“I wish there was a way to convince her I’m not just being picky!” Shulamit huffed. “Maybe I can help you clean when she finally leaves.”
“It’ll be like cleaning up for Passover.”
Noises at both ends of the corridor made Shulamit tense up and whip her head in both directions, flinging her braids over her shoulders. “Someone’s coming!”
“Quick! Come on!” Aviva grabbed her hand. There was a small door in the wall, leading into a cupboard, and Aviva pulled it open. Inside was a haphazard collection of rolled-up rugs, to be used in some of the palace hallways when the other rugs were dirty or a different color was required. The two girls could just fit inside if they folded their limbs, and Aviva pulled the door shut just as several courtiers entered the hallway.
They sounded as though they were arguing, but the door was thick and Shulamit couldn’t make out any words. She was too busy kissing Aviva, and moving as best she could in the cramped space to get her arms around her. It was easy to be overwhelmed by the sensation of Aviva’s lush body against her own, with her fleshy upper arms, large bosom, and generous hips.
Soon they were touching each other more intimately, and Shulamit moaned into the tender place on Aviva’s neck where she rested her head. Her left hand was full of one of Aviva’s breasts, the feel of which sent her brain spiraling into pinwheels of delight. “I tried looking in books to see why these make me so happy,” she commented. “Nobody knew.”
Aviva giggled at her. “You would.” Moans overtook her ability to speak as she ground herself harder against Shulamit’s other hand.
“It wasn’t a complete waste of time -- I did find some pretty interesting reading on how our bodies work.”
Aviva clenched her teeth, clearly trying to muffle herself, but the next groan escaped anyway, even stronger. “Is that why you’re -- Ahhh! Okay, you studied for sex. You are truly amazing.”
“The book said if I--” Shulamit altered the movement of her fingers slightly.
Aviva let out a noise like wind rustling through palm fronds before a storm. “Smart book. Good book. Gonna make... halvah... for the... book...ohh...”
Then Shulamit felt like a magician, the same way she did every time she’d achieved the seemingly miraculous feat of making Aviva climax. She made sure to continue what she’d been doing until Aviva calmed down, and then concentrated on the sensations of her own body until she followed her.
“We’re gonna have such backaches after being in here,” she commented, snuggling into Aviva’s warmth.
“We still have to work it off cleaning out my kitchen after we’ve got it back to ourselves!”
“Mmmm.” Shulamit inhaled deeply. The inside of the little cupboard smelled of woman, and she felt dizzyingly content.
***
Shulamit was so lost in the heat of these passionate memories that she gathered far more tangerines than she had intended. Not wanting to waste them, she carried them all back to the campsite and began juicing them into one of the drinking vessels.
It was getting darker, and the sun had started to paint the sky brilliant colors with its departure, so she was relieved to see her companion returning. Dragon clutched a slain goat in the claws of her back legs like an eagle holding a rabbit. “This will feed us for several days,” said Rivka. She was acting like herself again.
“What about Dragon? Or -- wait, she feeds as a horse. I’m confused.”
“I let her feed first.”
“That makes sense. I picked too many tangerines, so I’ve been juicing them. And here’s the mint.”
Rivka butchered the goat and set it up over the fire to cook. Then she stood up and gazed out over the lake at the sunset.
“It’s Shabbat,” Shulamit suddenly realized out loud.
Rivka muttered quietly in her own language in a cadence Shulamit took for counting out the days. “So it is. There’s our Shabbas candle...”
“Where?” Shulamit felt smart for noticing Rivka’s usage of the northern version of the word.
Rivka pointed at the sunset, a pink-and-gold marvel that spread across the far shore of the lake. “And the lake can be the wine.”
“We can say the wine blessing over the tangerine juice,” Shulamit suggested.
Rivka grinned. “That’s the idea.” Then a look of horror spread across her face. “You can’t eat challah!”
“I know. I miss it.”
“Never mind, I don’t know why I said that.” Rivka shook her head at her own bluntness.
Shulamit shrugged. “I miss sufganiyot more, especially at Chanukah when everyone has them at once. But Aviva used to fry me sweet plantains instead. I like the bits that get a little burnt the best.”
“What are sufganiyot?”
“Fried dough with sugar on top.”
“We fry potato pancakes for Chanukah.”
“That sounds good. I can eat potato,” said Shulamit. “We’d better start before the colors start fading. They’re so... they go away so quickly. Sometimes the prettiest part only lasts a minute.”
The two women sat down and covered their eyes to say a blessing, and then looked out over the beautiful sunset.
As they waited for the goat to cook, their talk turned to business. “What do you think it’s going to be like when we get to the sorcerer’s keep?” Shulamit asked.
“From what Tamar told me, it sounded like he’s actually a pretty big coward,” said Rivka, peeling a tangerine with her thumbs. “All the sleazy behavior toward women -- he tends to keep that
in check when men are around. He was singing to one of them, once, and stopped right in the middle and refused to continue because a man showed up to deliver rice. And did you hear what she said about how paranoid he was? He even told some of the holy women bad things about himself so that he could ‘expose’ the truth as a lie -- preemptively, since it turned out that nobody had warned anyone at all.”
“I remember her saying that,” said Shulamit. “I bet someone cowardly, paranoid, and skilled in magic would protect himself with plenty of enchantments.”
Rivka nodded. “Exactly. So you’ve been thinking about it too.”
Shulamit nodded. “It’s keeping my mind off Aviva. The smell of the mint brought back... things.”
“I’m sorry about that,” said Rivka. “But thinking is good. I like the way your mind works. Back there in the inn, you really impressed me with the way you solved that crime.”
Shulamit smiled and pulled her knees up to her chest, hugging them. “That felt amazing,” she admitted, “once I knew I wasn’t going to die, of course!”
“Nobody said you can’t be a queen and solve crimes at the same time,” Rivka pointed out. “Wisdom and justice are traits that will earn the respect and trust of your people.”
“I wanted to solve a mystery back home once,” said Shulamit. “Money was stolen from my father’s treasury. Only a few people had keys, but he trusted them all. He wouldn’t let me ask questions, and he never did find out what happened.”
Rivka studied her with darkened eyes. “Does that have anything to do with the elephant?”
Shulamit shook her head quickly. “No, that was just a freak accident. He was pushing himself too hard -- not enough sleep -- working all day and then trying to spend time with me and his lady friends and hobbies, athletics... he was trying to do everything.” She sighed heavily. “Maybe he got all his living done fast, and if he’d have lived slower, he’d have lived longer.”
“Maybe,” said Rivka. “Or maybe a howdah is just a terrible place for an exhausted man of any age.”
“I feel safer on Dragon than up on an elephant now.”
“She’s a good girl.” Rivka smiled and patted the beast. “Oh, hey, the goat’s ready.”
They fed themselves as quickly as the hot meat would allow them. “Can we go back to practicing after dinner?” Rivka asked.
“On Shabbat?”
Rivka just raised one eyebrow.
“I guess you’re right.”
“Tomorrow afternoon we face our enemy,” Rivka reminded her. “I don’t want you should get killed.”
“I’ll concentrate twice as hard,” Shulamit announced proudly.
Chapter 12: The Honey Trap
The next morning, they set out for the sorcerer’s mountain stronghold. Dragon’s flight took them over areas of rocky ground and deep chasms that no horse and definitely no pair of humans could have made on foot, and Shulamit was nervously thankful that she had enough energy to get off the ground.
Finally, in the afternoon, they reached the keep. A proud, high sun illuminated a tower of stone carved straight into the mountainside. Leading up to the tower was a gravel walkway edged with larger stones and planted with olive trees. Dragon landed at the edge of the walkway and morphed into her horse form. After Rivka and Shulamit dismounted, she swept her sensitive muzzle over the rocks, devouring any blade of grass she could find.
“She’s tiring,” Rivka observed. Then she turned to Shulamit. “You should remove that.”
“What?”
Rivka fingered the lilac scarf around Shulamit’s neck. “Very pretty, but look.” She grabbed the scarf and jerked it suddenly.
Shulamit froze up in panic and nearly burst into tears even though it was only a mock attack. After producing an embarrassing gasping noise, she nodded, eyeing Rivka as if she were not entirely certain her demonstration had been in good taste.
“Hey, I’m sorry.” Rivka offered her arm. “Nu, did I make my point?”
Shulamit fell into the comforting hug and then quickly put the scarf away in her bag.
Rivka swept her fingers over her sword hilt. “Well? Let’s go see what there is to see.” She led her queen and her steed down the gravel path. Pebbles crunched beneath their feet. “He really likes stone, doesn’t he?” Shulamit observed. “He lives in stone, with little stones leading up to it, and he turned the holy women into stone.” She paused for a moment, working on an idea.
Rivka took another step.
The larger stones at the side of the path began to spit spherical golden blobs at them. “What?!” Shulamit shrieked.
Rivka tried to dodge the assault, but it was coming from so many directions that it was impossible. Before long, both women and even the horse were covered in--
“Honey?” Rivka lifted her eyebrow. “I don’t underst--”
Then the stones firing honey balls rotated ninety degrees and switched ammunition. Tiny, hard particles spewed out at the travelers from all angles. Rivka batted at the storm with both hands, trying to protect her face. “I’m glad I took off my scarf!” Shulamit wailed, looking down at her clothing.
“These are his enchantments to keep out invaders?” bellowed Rivka. “What is this, grain? Shula, make sure it doesn’t get in your mou--”
“Your eyes! Cover your eyes!” Shulamit suddenly screamed.
“Nu?” And then Rivka stopped asking questions, because a flock of crazed birds was descending all around them. Drawn by the seeds spat out by their master’s magical rocks, the cloud of brightly colored flapping hellions closed in on the warrior and the queen. Shulamit shrank to the ground and pulled her body into as tiny a ball as she could manage, whereas Rivka unsheathed her sword with one hand while covering her eyes with the elbow of the other.
Then they heard a familiar, welcome sound -- the much louder, deeper flap of the dragon’s wings. It only took a few mighty blows for her to drive away the birds. Rivka uncovered her eyes and watched Dragon dispatch the last few birds, scaring away the quick and munching on the slower. “Good girl,” she said with a relieved smile, and patted the beast’s scaly avocado-rind hide. “You deserve that little nosh. I hope it’s tasty.”
Shulamit was still sitting on the ground, trying to clean herself off. “I’m disgusting. Wait, did the two things I can’t eat just attack me?”
“Just be careful, so it won’t get in your mouth.” Then Rivka let out an uncharacteristic giggle, because Dragon had transformed back into a horse and was licking some of the foul honey-birdseed mixture off her face. “Oy. Don’t even talk to me about disgusting.”
“I see water up there.” Shulamit sprang up and made a beeline for the large stone fountain near the entrance of the fortress.
Rivka and the horse followed her. “If it’s even water,” Rivka muttered, “and not borscht, at this rate.”
The horse sneezed. “You’re right,” Rivka added, as if the horse’s sneeze had meant something. “We’re too far south for borscht.”
Shulamit reached the fountain but then hesitated. “Riv! What if it’s not water?”
“I was joking.”
“I know, but -- he’s a sorcerer. What if it’s poison or acid or something?”
Rivka lifted one eyebrow. “Good thinking. Only one way to find out!” She plunged one hand into the water. “Seems safe to me.”
Shulamit’s mouth dropped open. Sometimes Rivka’s bravery scared her. She smiled, but it was a horrified smile.
“I should taste it just to double-check,” Rivka mused. But the horse had ambled up beside her and was drinking out of the fountain herself with no ill effects.
The two women began to scrub off the honey and birdseed. As they washed, a young woman ran out of the fortress. She was exceedingly lovely, and her hands were bound. Her feet had been bound too, but the rope was cut roughly, as if against a stone. Barely a wisp of clothing hid a dark, luxurious landscape of a body. Her hair had been pinned up behind each ear but the pins were coming down as if she hadn’t
been able to tend to it in a while. “At last! Finally, someone will rescue me!”
Rivka quickly secured her cloth face-mask and turned to face her. “Rescue you? You’re a prisoner here?”
The woman nodded. “Yes. I’m Ori. The bird-master took me from my people and tried to make me his wife. Again and again, I refused, but he won’t let me go. I heard movement on the path and managed to cut some of my bindings, in hopes that you would take me away with you. I can’t leave this place by myself -- not on foot. The surrounding lands are too rocky, and I couldn’t run away. But now that you’ve come, I’ll be saved!” She exhaled happily, her bosom rising and falling and her hardened nipples visible through the sheer fabric of her dress.
Shulamit was entranced. Moving closer, she undid the rope around Ori’s wrists and then took one hand in both of hers. “Of course we’ll save you.” The beautiful captive smelled of flowers, and her hand was soft and warm. Shulamit suddenly wanted to kiss her very badly, and she was astonished to see Ori gazing at her as if she were thinking the same thing.
Rivka stayed back, studying the scene critically. “We can’t leave right away -- we’re here for a purpose. We have... business with the sorcerer.”
“I’ll show you the way into the keep. Come! Quickly!” Ori ran toward the door.
Shulamit made as if to follow, but Rivka caught her by one hand. The queen turned around in confusion, but Rivka gave her a hard look. “Don’t follow her.”
“What? Why not? Rivka, she could be the one! Maybe the reason God got me mixed up in this rescue mission instead of just sending you by yourself was because she’s the woman I’m out here looking for.”
“Put your tongue back in your head, Queenling. She’s no good.”
“What are you talking about? She’s just another one of his victims.”
“I don’t think so. She feels wrong.” Rivka was speaking very quietly so Ori couldn’t hear.
“Come, warriors!” called Ori from the doorway.
The Second Mango (The Mangoverse Book 1) Page 9