Father of Free Men, part 2

Summary of chapters 1-5:

We are in the Bronze Age. The boy Keriter, heir to Peshok, head of the foremost family in the city, demands and is given the Caretaker of Metal Objects, the slave known as Golden Eyes, to sate his lust. The boy’s excesses produce a scandal, and Peshok thinks to put a stop to them by selling Golden Eyes to the mines. Chagga, the family matriarch opposes punishing a valuable slave for the young master’s faults; the boy will only indulge his perversions with another. She advises he buy the slave's silence by allowing him to couple with his childhood sweetheart, the Priestess of Scents, and find a wife for his son, despite his young age. Peshok arranges a match with Ulochli, a nearly dowerless woman from another town and some ten years older than Keriter. Part I ends with their wedding. The new bride doubts her husband has what it takes to satisfy her. Only time will tell.

Part 1 can be read in full here.

6. Consummation

Five days after the night of her deflowering Ulochli’s hymen had not broken. Her worst fears had come to pass. Either Keriter only found pleasure in other men or he desired the Priestess of Scents. Whatever the reason, he had no interest in her. All her efforts were useless, as fruitless as she would end her days. When she caressed him, he pouted; when she scolded, he threw a tantrum; when she pleaded with him, he stormed out of the room and slammed the door behind him. She followed him meekly to be introduced to the members of his family. She bit her lip when they’d pat her belly and say how it would soon swell as the next heir grew inside her. Hypocrite that he was, Keriter responded with a leering smile.

She had no allies, no one to turn to. Only Chagga could help her, but she’d have to proceed with caution, hide her frustrations and pretend that all she wanted was to provide an heir. The old woman mustn’t know that she didn’t give a fig for the family.

Keriter was alarmed when she announced she was going to see the Matriarch. “Has she sent for you?” he asked.

“Yes,” she lied, “alone.”

Chagga greeted her cheerfully. “You’re looking well,” she said. “Does marriage suit you, great-niece?”

“A real marriage would suit me better.” She quickly corrected herself: “Would suit us all better.”

“Are you still a virgin, child?”

Ulochli burst into tears.

“Be patient, dear. Your husband’s young and inexperienced. I want him to fulfill his marital duties no less than you. Perhaps I can help.” That the woman appeared sorrowful rather than angry reassured the Matriarch.

“Help? How can you help? He wants another woman, someone prettier.” She was careful not to give voice to her darker suspicions, fearful of how Chagga would react.

“Prettier than you? I think you’re very lovely. What makes you say that? Has he made advances to your maidservant?”

“He lusts for the Priestess of Scents.”

“The Priestess of Scents?”

“I saw how he looked at her when she scattered flowers over us. I felt his penis rise and touch my thigh. That was the only time it’s stiffened since the wedding. She desires him too. I felt her gaze on him when his servant undressed him. I fear she’s put a spell on him.”

This unexpected explanation worried Chagga more than if she had called Keriter a woman. Jealousy focuses on one person in particular and is therefore harder to deal with than sexual frustration.

“A spell, you say? I don’t believe it for a second. She specializes in perfumes and has no knowledge of magic. But I wasn’t there to see them, was I? I’ll send a priest to your apartments tonight, just in case you’re right.”

“A real priest, or the Caretaker of Metal Objects?”

So the girl knew more than she’d let on; she was trying to manipulate her. Chagga could crush her now like a beetle, but that wasn’t her way. Feign concern, tell her half truths, lead her on, win her over, and she’d avoid a scandal.

“Someone’s tongue has been wagging, I see. You shouldn’t believe everything people tell you. Yes, the Caretaker of Metal Objects. I assume you’ve heard some of the names he’s known by.”

“Keriter’s cocksucker.”

Ulochli blushed and lowered her head. Her embarrassment appeared authentic, but Chagga understood her speaking to the Matriarch might explain it. “Have you had his penis in your mouth?” she asked. “The slave’s had more experience arousing your husband than anyone. Let him instruct you. If real magic is required, I’ll send for a sorcerer.”

“Am I to stand by and watch my husband plow his ass?” she exclaimed indignantly.

“Whom are you jealous of – the cocksucker or the priestess he sleeps with? Jealousy will destroy you, child. Men find pleasure in many places; no husband is ever entirely ours. I’m not saying it will happen, but if it does and you don’t let envy get the better of you, you may enjoy the sight of your husband dominating so powerful a man. You may even find it exciting. I wouldn’t mind watching myself. I’ve often imagined what it must look like.”

*****

When the escort came to whisper in his ear at dinner and he nodded to her across the table, Golden Eyes and the Priestess of Scents both felt a weight lifted from their shoulders. They had not lain together since the bride arrived, and Keriter’s cocksucker had begun to wonder if the young master would ever call for him again.

“Perhaps he’s content to have a wife,” the Priestess of Scents suggested. “If she conceives the Matriarch will reward you, and we’ll sleep together in the coupling room once again.”

“He’d sooner be a wife than have one. I’m sure he’s sent for me, but no one would convey the message until he’d done what husbands are supposed to. I shouldn’t have said that. Don’t tell anyone. If word gets around, I’ll be sold to the mines.”

“Is the danger that great?”

“The Matriarch promised she wouldn’t hold it against me, but the Master would jump at the chance to get rid of me. He saw us… me…”

“You mean your not only his cocksucker but also—”

“Hush! Chagga will be furious if she thinks I’ve been indiscreet.”

“It will be our secret.”

Until he reached their apartments, Keriter’s cocksucker thought the situation had worked itself out. Then he saw the young master’s surprise. It was Ulochli who expected him, and both their servants were in attendance.

“The Matriarch says you can teach me how to arouse my husband’s desire. Very well, then, start the lesson!”

Golden Eyes sensed her fury, and terror seized him. To perform in front of this woman who hated him so openly, and in front of the two young slaves as well! And what if he couldn’t get him hard? Keriter had collapsed against the wall, pale and trembling. Worse yet, what if the young master came in his mouth before he could hurry him between the woman’s legs?

“What are you waiting for? Do you think I enjoy being reduced to this? Pull down his breeches and suck that useless cock of his!”

The Caretaker of Metal Objects was no more; only Keriter’s cocksucker existed. He knelt in front of him and reached to untie the rope around his waist.

“Send away your maidservant,” Keriter said in a strangled voice. “I will not expose myself in front of a female slave.”

“But your manservant can stay, of course. Has he been servicing you the past few days? I might have spared myself the trouble of summoning this other slave!”

“Send him away too.”

The two slaves hurried out the door, terrified at having witnessed things it wasn’t safe to know about. “Show me!” they heard Ulochli snarl as they closed the door behind them.

They went and hid in the ground floor rooms so as to hear no more. The girl was weeping.

“I haven’t,” the boy said. “Believe me, I haven’t.” They had lain together in secret outside the door when it became clear nobody would call for them.

Keriter’s cocksucker undressed him from the waist down and gently licked his shaft. It didn’t respond. He looked up and saw tears of humiliation running down the boy’s cheeks. “You’ve intimidated him,” he said. “Give him a moment to calm down.”

Keriter slid to floor and lay there sobbing, curled up in ball. Only then did Ulochli realize she’d gone too far. She could not afford Chagga’s enmity. She began to cry herself.

When they’d cried themselves out she went up to where her husband was lying and kissed him. “Forgive me,” she said. “I’m not really angry; I’m desperate. I want to be with child!” She turned to Golden Eyes and begged, “Show me how to please him! Show me how to please him!” tears welling up again in her eyes.

The Caretaker of Metal Objects was not deceived by this display, but Keriter was, and that’s what mattered. “Go lie on the bed and watch from a distance,” he said. “Don’t say anything, not even to ask a question. Let him forget you’re here. I promise he’ll soon be inside you, and once he’s taken you his fear of you will go away. Come, young master. Stand up. Turn your mind to the pleasure that awaits you.”

Propped against the wall, his fingers gripping his cocksucker’s hair for support, Keriter allowed himself to be serviced. He closed his eyes and forced himself to forget Ulochli was watching. He felt the familiar sensation of the warm breath blowing over his groin and his favorite’s tongue softly licking his shaft and testicles. It slipped beneath his foreskin and circled the sensitive head. A finger poked at his anus, wormed its way in, and gently pressed against his prostate. He began to harden, and felt his sex being drawn into the man’s mouth. He sighed, relaxed, and gave himself up to pleasuring.

Never before had the Caretaker of Metal Objects applied himself to the task with so much concentration. He had to make him rock hard, but could not allow him to him to ejaculate, and at the same time he couldn’t make it look too easy. He had to convince the woman that it was his skill and not his gender and good looks that performed the miracle. If the penis in his throat began to swell too much or if he sensed it was about to throb, he half withdrew his finger from Keriter’s ass and pushed up against his scrotum.

“It won’t be long now,” he said. “Reach beneath your shift and stroke yourself so you’ll be moist and ready when I bring him to you.”

Ulochli could already feel a wetness below. She’d been imagining the slave’s tongue between her own legs as watched them, and was dripping.

Golden Eyes stood up, grabbed Keriter by the shoulders and pushed him toward the bed before the young man knew what was happening. He pulled her shift up and saw the woman’s finger on her clitoris. “Put it in!” he ordered, and pushed him down on top of her.

Keriter thrust into her. She screamed, and he pulled out, startled. The trickle of blood running down her leg made him feel dizzy. “I can’t,” he said, “I can’t! You do it.”

“Would you have me carry your slave’s child?” Ulochli protested. But her voice said she wanted it.

“I’ll pump my seed into you through him,” Keriter answered. The illogic of his statement deceived no one, but all three welcomed the rationalization.

The slave took her more gently than her husband. He went slowly and fondled her breasts. He reached below and pressed his hand against her pubis to tighten the lips of her vulva around her clitoral mound. The pain subsided and the pleasure grew.

Golden Eyes was not showing off his bedroom skills; he was holding back until Keriter entered him. The young master was still licking his anus so as to slide in easily. Then the slave felt his hardness inside him, the swift pumping passing back and forth over his trigger, and he drove into her with mounting frenzy. The weight of two men on her pushed her over the edge. The slaves in the room below heard her orgasm, reached out for each other, and came together.

*****

The Priestess of Scents was waiting for him when Golden Eyes returned at midnight. He took her by the hand and led her into the coupling room. “It’s done,” he said.

“Is it? You smell of the woman.”

Somehow, Chagga knew what had taken place in the room that night. The strands of her web reached into every corner of the compound. That the Caretaker of Metal Objects had taken the young master’s place was of no consequence if it satisfied his wife. That two other slaves might know what had gone on was intolerable. She sent for Keriter and Ulochli shortly after sunrise and told them to bring their servants.

She addressed the slaves first. “I hope I chose wisely when I selected you for the jobs you hold. You must be aware that serving the young master and his wife is a great honor, and failing in it a serious offense. It is also your job to see that their secrets remain secret. If you tell anyone what you witnessed last night and will witness again many times, I’ll have your tongues cut out and sell you to the mines.”

The youngsters fell to their knees and kissed her hands in supplication.

“I can be as generous as I am severe,” she went on. “What would be a fitting reward for your discretion? Would like my permission to do what you’ve been doing in secret for a week? You have it, but take precautions. She must not become pregnant. Now leave us. Wait at the foot of the stairs.”

“You know,” Keriter said.

“I knew before it happened. Did the slave satisfy you, Ulochli? Are you content for him to act as man for your husband?”

Keriter opened his mouth to speak.

“You have nothing to say here,” Chagga interrupted. “You had your chance. Well, Ulochli? Did he give you pleasure? I examined him myself and know he has all the necessary parts in working order.”

“Great-aunt…” Keriter began.

“Are you jealous of me now? Don’t worry, he hasn’t fucked me. Who are you to be jealous, seeing that he fucks your wife and the Priestess of Scents as well as you? Yes, he fucks him, Ulochli. Hadn’t you figured that out? You, Keriter, set your mind at rest. He won’t fuck any other man. Speak up, Ulochli. I have yet to hear from you. I can see you’re troubled.”

“What if my children look like him?”

“You have the same hair. You’re unusually tall for a woman. People will think your children take after you. You see, I’ve thought of everything. One thing more. From now on, don’t you send for your husband’s replacement. Have Keriter do it.”

7. Crises

Chagga said she’d thought of everything, but she hadn’t reckoned with Ulochli’s insatiable lust for what she called “her husband’s cocksucker’s cock” nor with her jealousy. When Golden Eyes got ready to leave the next night, Ulochli said, “Must you leave now?”

“The Master made the rule that I return to the slave quarters at midnight. He doesn’t want people to see me leave his rooms in the morning.”

“The sun won’t rise for another five hours.”

“I must do as the Master says. We all must. If you want the rules changed, ask him yourself or see the Matriarch.” He knew from her maidservant that she wouldn’t dare. The girl reasoned that it was not an indiscretion to discuss the arrangement with him and that all four slaves – he, she, Keriter’s boy and the priestess – must keep each other informed of what transpired because dire consequences awaited them if Chagga, Peshok, Keriter or Ulochli felt thwarted in any way. It was a precarious situation, because all four were out to thwart each other, and the slaves had no way to stop them. Masters were capricious and not to be trusted.

“In what way is the Priestess of Scents guilty?” Golden eyes asked.

“She knows, and that’s enough. But the greatest danger she faces comes from my mistress. She doesn’t want to share you. Be cautious in what you refuse her and how you refuse.”

“The Matriarch knew what she was about when she chose you to serve Ulochli. The job requires tact and intelligence masked by a face of naïve innocence. She’s a perceptive woman.”

“And sly. She’s our only ally, but she wouldn’t shed a tear if we all ended our days in the mines.”

“Nor can we easily get information to her if we sense something is amiss.”

“Keep some fine pieces of jewelry on hand so you can say you’ve made her a gift. I’ll cultivate her maid’s friendship.”

Golden Eyes told the Priestess of Scents how Ulochli had wanted to keep him past midnight, and passed on the maid’s concerns. “Don’t look so alarmed,” he reassured her. “So long as we stay in Chagga’s good graces, we’re protected.”

“Chagga is ancient, in her eighties, maybe older. How long do you expect her to live? What happens after she dies? What will hold Peshok back?”

“Keriter and Ulochli will intervene on our behalf if I keep them happy.”

However, Ulochli’s maid disagreed when he told her what he’d said. “Nothing will hold him back. With Chagga gone, the rivalry between the young master and his wife will explode. You can’t keep them both happy; they can only be silenced.”

*****

The next crisis wasn’t long in coming. Ulochli became pregnant. The four slaves could not predict how Chagga would react to the next heir being the child of a slave. Golden Eyes chose a hair clasp and told an overseer he wished to present it to the Matriarch to wear at the Autumn Festival.

Chagga’s maid had told her mistress that the Caretaker of Metal Objects would bring her a gift when he needed to talk to her about the young master and his wife. She was ready for him.

“The clasp is beautiful, and I thank you for it, but I know that isn’t what brings you here. What do you have to tell me?”

“I have nothing to tell, Matriarch. I came to ask you a question.”

“Then ask.”

“Ulochli is pregnant.”

“I know that already, and it isn’t a question.”

“Keriter isn’t the father.”

“I know that too. He’ll become the child’s father when it’s born and the family recognizes it as its youngest member.”

“It doesn’t upset you that the child of a slave will one day be head of the family?”

“Sit down and listen to me. It won’t be the first time. Nearly half the men children in this family grow up to want sex with men, and some of the women prefer other women, who have an easier time getting what they want, but a harder time not getting what they don’t want. None of my daughters had the same father; all but one was sired by a slave. Keriter’s an extreme case in that he won’t have sex with women too, but we all know that there’s a defect in the bloodline. Peshok knows, and he’s a fool not to accept it in his son.”

“But the head of the family, the Master…”

“As I said, it won’t be the first time the Master couldn’t make children of his own.”

“Then is Peshok…”

“The child of a slave? Goodness, no. I thought he might be for a long time, but when I learned that Keriter had taken a cocksucker for himself, I knew the family’s blood flowed in his veins. It wouldn’t have made Peshok angry if there hadn’t been so many others. He knows the practice isn’t that uncommon. Fortunately, I got him to listen to reason.”

“He didn’t listen to reason. He listened to you.”

“Meaning that when I die you could end up in the mines. I can’t help that. I’ve done what I could. I chose Ulochli, but had to go by hearsay. It was a bad choice. But you were doomed from the moment Keriter laid eyes on you. Your only hope is to get him to fuck her. I don’t suppose that will happen. How are things between the married couple?”

“Not good. Keriter is upset that I’ve become… well, his cocksucker. Full time, unless you count my…”

“Dalliance.”

“…my dalliance with his wife and the Priestess of Scents. Ulochli won’t let him suck me, and I haven’t…”

“Don’t mince words. Say ‘fucked him’.”

“Not since the week before she came here.”

“That he’ll have to work out with his wife. You don’t mind, do you? Do you miss fucking him? Do you want to fuck him?”

“Not particularly, Matriarch.”

“Then it isn’t your problem. Your problem is that you don’t particularly want to fuck her either. I don’t think it’s much of a problem. Before she came, you fucked him; now you fuck her.”

“There’s more.”

“Yes?”

“Now that she’s with child, Keriter says no one should mount her. He means to have her sleep in another room.”

“So he can suck and get fucked by you. Tell Ulochli’s maid to drop a hint to her mistress that if he forbids her to have sex she should complain to me. Now go. And thank you for the beautiful hairpin.”

Chagga informed the young master in the presence of his wife that he would have to fulfill his marital duties until the sixth month, and that it would do no harm to their unborn child “no matter how unusual the position.”

“Why must we stop in the sixth month?” Ulochli asked.

“I told you why already – ‘no matter how unusual the position’. After six months I fear the weight of two men really may be too much.”

“I could straddle him.”

“What good would it do you to straddle him? Remember that the slave is only the conduit through which your husband’s seed passes into you. You’d have to straddle them. If you figure out a way to do that, let me know. And now I want to speak to my great-nephew alone.”

“Your wife is pleasured,” she said when Ulochli had gone, “but you are not. You miss the feel of his hardness in your bowels, you miss the taste of his semen. Am I right?”

Keriter nodded.

“If that’s what you want, you’ll have to stand up to your wife. I’ll support you in this.”

“She’ll complain to father.”

“Then keep your mouth shut until the sixth month. Can you wait that long?”

“Five more months! It’s already been more than five!”

“You’ll have three months before the birth and three more while she lives in isolation with the child waiting to be purified. In the meantime…”

“Must there be a meantime?”

“Let me finish. In the meantime, you can tell her that I gave in to your pleading and said you may sleep in a separate room from her after midnight when the Caretaker of Metal Objects leaves.”

“Will he leave at midnight?”

“Absolutely. If you want a cock to suck, try your manservant’s.”

“Ulochli’s maid will tell. He’s her man.”

“Ulochli’s maid will not. She’s smarter than the rest of you put together.”

Chagga felt certain that she was right about the girl, but sent her maid to make sure.

“You know that Keriter is sucking his servant’s cock?”

She nodded.

“And you know that it was Chagga’s idea?”

She nodded again.

“Does it displease you very much?”

“Who am I to be displeased? I know why she did it – to keep them both happy. She’s right. I’d agree to whatever it takes.”

So the first crisis was averted, provided Ulochli didn’t take it into her head to spy on her husband and his manservant.

*****

A second crisis followed hard on its heels. It was easily dealt with, but it showed that the slave quarters were abuzz with speculation about Keriter, his bride and his cocksucker. Sooner or later someone would hit on the truth.

An overseer had long envied the nights in the coupling room the Caretaker of Metal Objects enjoyed with the Priestess of Scents, and importuned her for her favors. He stood guard in front of the sleeping quarters two nights a week, he could take her then. She resisted. She didn’t leave for the coupling room until midnight. She could leave earlier. Who was to know? Everyone in the women’s room. But she had her cubicle. She still had to cross the room. He’d call for her earlier, saying that Golden Eyes had returned. She wouldn’t come; she had no desire to couple with another.

“As an overseer I could make things easier for you, or harder.”

“People will know it’s because I refused you, and will laugh.”

“Refuse me for him! You should find out what the embraces of a real man feel like.”

“The Caretaker of Metal Objects is a real man.”

“Is he? Keriter’s cocksucker? He comes to you every night the inside of his mouth and walls of his rectum not pink, but whitewashed with the young master’s semen. Is that the seed you fancy? You’ve lain with him for nearly a year and still haven’t conceived. Does he indeed penetrate you, or do you lick the leftovers from his lips and anus? Do you yearn for the taste of a man so randy he needs both a wife and a catamite to satisfy him?”

“I suppose you think yourself just as randy. The Master himself gave me to the Caretaker of Metal Objects. If you wish to share me with him, ask the Master.”

Peshok, she knew, would refuse and probably punish the overseer for his insolence. He knew it too, and made instead his request to Keriter and Ulochli, who sent her maid to inform the Priestess of Scents she must submit to him.

“Does the Master know of this?” the priestess asked.

“No, the order comes from my mistress and her husband.”

“The Master said I must remain in my cubicle until midnight. They cannot override his command. I’ll join the overseer then.”

“But the Caretaker of Metal Objects will have returned.”

“Then they’ll meet outside the coupling room and we’ll see who is the better man.”

“Would he dare raise his hand to an overseer?”

“Would the overseer dare face him if he did?”

“They mustn’t fight. It would reveal too much. Our very existence depends on our silence.”

“The overseer will join us in the mines.”

“But he doesn’t know that, and we can’t tell him. Our situation has put us all at the mercy of the masters.”

“We’re always totally in their power anyway. I will submit to their whims, but not to those of an overseer. I will not go to the coupling room before midnight without the Master’s permission.”

“Then I’ll get it from Chagga.”

Chagga already knew. If the overseer could take his pleasure before midnight, they’d avoid a confrontation that might have serious repercussions. On the other hand, the coupling room was their most highly coveted privilege, and Caretaker of Metal Objects got to lie with his priestess almost every night. Further incidents would arise. She would have to find a way to make sexual release more accessible to all and at the same time avoid a drastic increase in the number of births. Perhaps the Priest Herbalist knew of something he could add to their food.

She sent word to the Master that a slave had tried to circumvent his orders by addressing himself to his son. Need she explain what that meant? For a slave to demand privileges granted to another was intolerable. That the slave was an overseer aggravated the offense. A man who used his status to coerce those under him to serve his own ends could not be trusted.

Before dinner time the overseer had been given a new job and left the compound to live with the woodcutters in their huts at the edge of the forest.

*****

The third crisis came close to revealing the intimate details of the young master’s marriage, and would have if Peshok hadn’t intervened even before the Matriarch got wind of it.

Now in her eighth month, Ulochli had discovered that her husband regularly took his pleasure with Golden Eyes, and that knowledge pressed more heavily on her gut than the child she was carrying. She’d take her sleeping mat from the bed shelf and lie with her ear pressed to the floor, listening to her husband’s moans of pleasure. One evening she could no longer contain her jealousy, and burst in on them about half an hour before midnight. She saw her husband on all fours sucking his manservant while his cocksucker – no, his buttfucker – took him from behind. She flew into a rage.

Her maid bolted the door from the inside moments before her screaming brought masters and mistresses rushing to the house to find out the reason for the disturbance, some of them as naked as slaves. Fortunately, Ulochli was so beside herself that they could understand little of what she said. The Master appeared, ordered them all back to their dwellings, then banged on the door. “Open up! Open up immediately!”

He strode up to Ulochli and slapped her across the face, then turned to Keriter where he sat naked on the bed, and said, “You should have done that. You should have taken a whip to her.”

“But the child…”

“You should have done it months ago. Listen to me, bitch! If you don’t mend your ways and beg your husband’s forgiveness, I’ll have you whipped through the streets as soon as your confinement’s over. What right have you to demand that the young master forgo his pleasures just because it’s no longer safe for you to lie with him?”

“You stupid, stupid girl!” They turned, and saw Chagga standing in the doorway.

“Has she disturbed your rest as well, Great-aunt?” Peshok asked.

“Forget my rest. I’m an old woman, and sleep fitfully enough on a quiet night. She disturbs my peace of mind. Jealous of her own husband, when she has a maid to lick between her thighs! Understand this, Ulochli. I consulted the oracle. The child in your belly is male. Becoming mother of the next heir will increase your status and authority many times over, but once you’ve provided one, you’re dispensable. In your place, I’d pray that the oracle was mistaken. Good night.”

As she supported the old woman’s steps walking home through the alleys, Chagga’s maid asked, “Did you indeed consult the oracle? Will the child be a boy?”

“What oracle? I have no faith in that hocus-pocus.”

8. Heirs and an Orphan

A week later Ulochli’s screams woke the neighbors again. The following evening she was delivered of a baby boy. Chagga came by in the morning to examine the newborn.

“Did his mother survive the birth?” she asked.

“Barely.”

“Barely isn’t good enough. Is she awake?”

“No.”

“Then wake her.”

No one had lifted a hand for the new mother since the delivery. She lay in a tangle of bloody sheets, her hair plastered to her neck and shoulders, the dry sweat caked on her body. Chagga paid her no compliments.

“Now you know what suffering is,” she said. “Not getting everything you want is trivial. I held my tongue in front of the Master the other day. You came within a hair’s breadth of having the man who gives you pleasure sent to the mines, your child raised as a slave, and yourself repudiated. We would not have sent you back to your parents to slander us. We’d have given you a small room where you’d live as a whore for men and women in the family in need of a sexual outlet. No doubt you would prefer that to forced abstinence.”

“My husband means to have me whipped through the streets. The humiliation will kill me.”

“And if it does? The child is healthy and will thrive. The Caretaker of Metal Objects has served his purpose as far as concerns you. He belongs to your husband, and always has.”

“Am I to have no gratification?”

“A woman who wants gratification asks her husband. As I said, the slave is his. If you’re humble and obedient, perhaps he’ll agree to share him occasionally.”

“Yes, Matriarch.” She was too weak to protest.

“I’ll tell your maid to sponge you down and cover you with fresh linen.”

She went to have another look at the baby, cradled in Keriter’s arms. “Don’t be as selfish as your wife,” she told him. “Children are a blessing, and a woman must be kept happy. Only not too happy. A real man would have known that.”

Peshok waited until the last day of Ulochli’s purification before recognizing the infant as the next legitimate heir. The child remained nameless, like a slave, for three months. That, more than Chagga’s lectures and threats, broke her. Keriter seemed not to care. For the duration of her confinement and isolation, almost every night Golden Eyes went to pleasure the young master, who, freed at last from the restrictions Ulochli’s jealousy imposed on him, had become excessive in his demands. The slave dragged himself back to the coupling room on the point of exhaustion.

“Your passion for me has diminished,” the Priestess of Scents said sadly.

“Keriter drains my seed to the dregs and saps my energy.”

“I smell his boy on you too.”

“He uses us both. At this rate he’ll wear us both out and send himself to an early grave.”

“Even your gentlest caresses seem half-hearted. Your penis only half rises to meet my kiss.”

“Does the sigh that rises from my chest when you touch your lips to it also seem half-hearted? Your arms and your warmth are a comfort, though my loins have little to give you in return. I leave the reek of semen behind me only to smell it again here mingled with your perfume, and we lie surrounded by shadows writhing in the darkness, their cries and moans, and the sound of bodies slapping into one another. We’re no longer alone when we make love.”

“They disturb me too.”

Other pairs now often joined them in the coupling room. The herbalist’s remedies proved reasonably effective. Many women conceived, but few carried their children to term.

The celebration that accompanied the naming of the heir lasted three days. The wealthiest and most influential citizens came to banquet under the arcades around the courtyard, bringing gifts for the youngest master. Peshok hired the most illustrious musicians in the city and dancing girls to entertain them. They passed the squalling infant from hand to hand, admired his tiny limbs, and praised the unusual color of his eyes.

The next day tables were set out around the well and all the slaves gathered for the feast at which the young master and mistress would present them to their infant son. The farmhands, goatherds and woodcutters also came. Keriter and Ulochli arrived in the slave quarters in the company of their man- and maidservants, who’d been given golden anklets to wear and had their eyes painted with kohl and henna. It was the golden eyes of the new heir that drew the slaves’ attention, however. It was obvious to all who had sired the child.

It was then the lecherous overseer, now a woodcutter, made his impertinent joke that the Caretaker of Metal Objects ought to be called Threesome. He said it under his breath, but Ulochli’s girl overheard him and told Chagga’s maid. Before the feast ended, cruel-looking men with whips and shackles entered through the stable gate and led him off to the mines.

*****

For two more weeks Ulochli sat in her room at night listening to the sexual noises that rose from the ground floor. She seldom saw her husband. The boy who had once envied his gay cousins their freedom and would have given up his inheritance to his younger brother now longed for the day when he would become the Master and could indulge his lusts openly. At length she sent her maid to entreat him not to exclude her from his revelries. She would make no demands on him; she was content to sit and watch.

Ulochli sat quietly in the corner with a hand tucked in her vulva while Golden Eyes and his manservant filled Keriter’s mouth with their sperm and pounded his hindquarters. When he’d had all he could take, he had them lie with their faces in each other’s groin and kiss and lick and suck on their genitals, then fuck each other in turn while he stood by and masturbated. When he was ready to ejaculate he went up to his wife and said, “This is for you.” She opened her mouth, swallowed his semen, and thanked him.

On another night he came to her with his mouth full of the seed of two slaves and spit it in her lap. “Cup it in your fingers and lap it up,” he told her.

She forced herself to mask her hatred. Keriter thought her properly chastised, and when she begged him to let her bear him another child, he ordered the Caretaker of Metal Objects to mount her. He accorded her this privilege no more than once every two weeks, but when spring came she was pregnant again.

Keriter’s second son had his older brother’s golden eyes.

“My great-nephew hasn’t withheld his cocksucker from her,” Chagga told her maid. “Either the boy is completely spineless or Ulochli is learning.”

“Learning what, mistress? To submit to her husband or to hide what’s in her heart?”

“Do you ask that to warn me? Every submissive wife hides what’s in her heart. Time will tell.”

A third son followed, and then a daughter.

*****

The boy and girl who waited on the young master and his wife were now fully grown. The Priestess of Scents had lain with Golden Eyes night after night, year after year, and still she had not conceived. People assumed she was barren. She wasn’t. He came to her with little ejaculate left, drained of the best of his seed, which either grew in Ulochli’s womb or found its way into her husband’s chamber pot.

Yet in the end he made the woman he loved fecund. Her menstrual flow dried up, and her breasts began to swell.

Unlike most of the women, the Priestess of Scents did not miscarry. Pregnancy did not keep her from joining Golden Eyes in the coupling room. So as not to crush the fœtus, she got on her knees and laid her head on her folded arms when he entered her. She found that in this position his penis pressing directly on her clitoris and increased her pleasure, and told him so. He found it too much like his couplings with the young master and said nothing.

During her final months her breasts would drip colostrum when they had sex. Golden Eyes would lick it from her nipples, and its sweetness mingled with the salt of Keriter’s seed still on his tongue.

When the Priestess of Scents brought the floral offerings to the Midsummer Ritual, her loincloth slipped halfway down her hips and her dark pubic hair peeked above the linen. Her waist had almost disappeared beneath the ample roundness of her belly.

“It’s a disgrace,” Ulochli complained. “Must she parade her fecundity in front of us? According to the slaves, the Caretaker of Metal Objects continues to receive her in the coupling room when he returns from servicing my husband. Why doesn’t she abstain for the sake of the child in her womb, as I do?”

“The children you carry are my heirs,” Peshok said. “What happens to the spawn of slaves is unimportant, though I fear it may displease the Goddess that she cut her flowers while heavy with child.”

Chagga answered, “No pregnancy displeases the Goddess.”

“And the God?”

“If it angers the God, he’ll let us know. Her child will be born defective, or it will die when it’s born. Perhaps she will too.”

The child, a boy, lived, but the Priestess of Scents died from her labor. No one expected a woman with hips as broad as hers to have such a difficult time giving birth. Her pains lasted more than two days. She lay in a pool of blood, too feeble to speak, her breath shallow.

They gave her the child to nurse so she would expel the placenta. The moment his lips touched her breast, the contractions began again. The afterbirth pushed out between her thighs, dragging her uterus with it. She screamed, and then was still.

The Caretaker of Metal Objects fell ill with grief. He took the infant with him into his cubicle and slept holding him in his arms. He refused to go when the young master summoned him to his couch. In his anger, Keriter sent his serving man to ask the Matriarch how he ought to punish the slave for his obstinacy.

The slave returned with Chagga’s maidservant so Keriter would believe that what he heard was the Matriarch’s will. “Let him mourn for a fortnight,” she said, “then you may send for him again.”

“And what am I to do till then?”

“Take your manservant and go visit your cousins Kiprimel and Molza.”

The Caretaker of Metal Objects resumed his duties as cocksucker at Chagga’s orders two weeks later. He’d leave his son with his nurse in the women’s room, and brought him to his cubicle when he returned.

Keriter went to see the Matriarch a few days later. “He mopes,” he complained.

“Does he cooperate?”

“Yes.”

“Then give him time. You have yet to learn to control your passions. I don’t know if I should tell you this, but you need to be warned. Promise you’ll say nothing, do nothing.”

“I promise, Matriarch.”

“Swear on your life.”

“I swear.”

“I recently asked the Priest Herbalist if the Priestess of Scents had angered the God by participating in the Midsummer Ritual while pregnant. He said she had not.”

“Why, then, did she die?”

“He says she was poisoned.”

“Do you suspect Ulochli?”

“Unless you did it. Whichever of you it was, I advise you to be careful.”

How Keriter interpreted her injunction to be careful is unclear, if he heeded it at all. He took care that nobody found out who fucked Ulochli, but little else. He didn’t let up on the demands he made on his favorite, and continued to have sex with his cousins and their male attendants. He would invite them to join him, his manservant and his cocksucker when he felt particularly horny. Sometimes they brought their wives. Everyone knew what went on when they were there, and the versions circulating of who did what to whom multiplied, all of them accurate, though not one of them told the whole story.

9. Death Stalks the Compound

Six years had passed and the young master was but a shadow of his former self, worn out by his excesses and old before his time. He still dreamed of becoming head of the family, but nobody expected him to outlive his father. Ulochli had learned enough patience to wait for him to die. It would not be long now.

It was a crueler winter than even Chagga could remember, and she had been alive for nearly a century. She piled blankets over herself at night, and by day had a charcoal burner brought to her room and sat in front of it swaddled in sheepskins, sipping herbal infusions. She never left her room and only let her maid open the door to bring in her meals.

The coughing sickness entered the compound with the first snows and ensconced itself in the slave quarters. The Winter Solstice passed almost unnoticed. The few members of the family who attended the ritual shivered while Peshok raced through the prayers, then they all crowded into the bathhouse to soak in the heated pool. The pool was seldom empty; there were often more people there than could fit into it comfortably. With so many packed in close together, the sickness spread quickly from household to household. The Priest Herbalist carried his potions to the sick through the windy streets until he too fell sick and took to his bed. The ill went unattended.

One after another, the members of the extended family came down with the cough. The servants of the masters and mistresses it killed returned to the slave quarters, where they sat idle, unless they, too, succumbed. Though the epidemic took its heaviest toll among the slaves, fewer people to serve and fewer mouths to feed meant they had work to do.

The coupling room was set aside for the slaves who contracted the cough. Soon it was filled to overflowing, and the sick had to bed down in the stables. At first it was overcrowded, but the infection spread to the pigs, and the herd was decimated. Only a handful remained. Famished as they were, the slaves wouldn’t risk eating the contaminated meat, and threw the carcasses over the walls to the wolves. The sheep and goats were apparently immune, and ate the straw bedding of the sick and dying with no ill effect.

Fearful of the contagion, the young master stopped calling for Golden Eyes, who fretted over his young son and brought the child with him to the forge to keep him warm. Most children who succumbed to the fever died.

*****

At the waning of the second moon after Winter Solstice, Keriter’s manservant came to summon the Priest Herbalist to his master’s bedside. Though racked with fever and choking with cough, he could not refuse. The old man placed steaming bowls of foul-smelling water around the room and instructed his assistants to keep the patient warm. He advised the Master to bring his grandchildren to live in his house so their father would not infect them. Though he did not say so, he knew the case was hopeless.

The young master lingered only two days and then succumbed to the sickness. The wail that rose up from Ixtendor’s compound could be heard above the shrill wind that blew through the empty streets and the wolves howling in the mountains. The neighbors paid it no attention. What important person there death had carried off – the Matriarch, the Master, his son or his grandsons – concerned them not at all. They had their own dead to mourn and dying to care for.

Their bodies smeared with ashes and their heads shaven, the slaves followed the funeral procession to the promontory and watched Peshok place his son’s corpse on the pyre and set fire to the wood. The slaves pressed forward to bid the young master farewell and warm themselves close to the blaze. Though it was the dead of winter, for the funeral they’d had to leave their shawls behind. The epidemic spiked the following week with nearly four times the number of new cases among the slaves. Fortunately, the youngest children had remained in the compound.

When the pyre had burned to embers, Keriter’s oldest son shoveled them up and scattered them on the crashing waves below.

They returned to the compound in silence. Keriter’s manservant, who already showed the first symptoms of the cough, stopped to pick up his shawl and sleeping mat before moving to the slave quarters, and bade farewell to Ulochli’s maid. He hadn’t lived with the other slaves in nearly fifteen years, and had no friends there other than the Caretaker of Metal Objects. He realized that Golden Eyes would be torn between wanting to help him and the fear his son would catch the illness, so he went directly to the infirmary, formerly the coupling room, to look for a place to put his mat, and from there to the stables. Accustomed to living around people who bathed and used fragrances, he found the stench unbearable, but it was the warmest place outside the bathhouse.

The Caretaker of Metal Objects understood the precariousness of his position. Ulochli still lusted for him, and he could no longer count on Chagga’s protection. At least his children, now next in line to succeed the Master, were safe. There was still time to take the son the Priestess of Scents had borne him and flee – the period of mourning would last a month – but the mountain passes were thick with snow and wolves now prowled as far as the city gates. The woodcutters had been attacked at their work, and one of them devoured. Even if the epidemic worsened, the child had a better chance of surviving if he kept him by the forge.

*****

On the afternoon following the funeral Ulochli told her maid to have an escort sent that evening for the Caretaker of Metal Objects.

“But mistress, your mourning!”

“Keriter is burnt and his ashes tossed to the fishes with not even a meal served to mark his passing. Why should I mourn, who loved him least?”

The woman hurried to Chagga’s apartments. She had little hope of seeing the Matriarch, who’d remained locked in her room for over two months, but perhaps her maid would convey her message.

“I doubt she’ll listen,” the maid said. “With Keriter gone what reason does she have to intercede for you others?”

However, the old woman agreed to see her in her bedchamber.

“Ulochli is lucky I chose you to watch out for her. I told her to bide her time, and she has, but not long enough. She means to assert herself at the worst moment and in the worst way. The second the escort appears in the slave quarters and asks for him, tongues will start to wag. It can’t be avoided, though; you must obey your mistress. However, Golden Eyes won’t find her at home when he arrives. I’ll have sent for her. Instead you’ll be there waiting for him. Give him the young master’s armor to bring back to his workshop and have him surrender his loincloth. When he returns almost immediately, naked and carrying the armor, people will think that Ulochli has dismissed him and he was nothing more than Keriter’s cocksucker. Make him understand he must hide his relief and put on a sorrowful face.”

When the escort came for him, the Caretaker of Metal Objects kissed his son farewell. He thought he’d missed his chance and would soon be punished for Ulochli’s lust. When the maid explained Chagga’s most recent finesse, he asked, “Why does she continue to watch over us?”

“I don’t know.”

He returned to the slave quarters looking morose. Without a word he tossed the armor on his workroom floor, went to find his son, took the boy by the hand and retired to his cubicle. Though no mark of privilege distinguished him from the others, nobody questioned his right to a private sleeping place. He’d occupied the cubicle nearly fifteen years, and no order had come for him to return to the common room.

Chagga’s maid showed Ulochli directly into the Matriarch’s room and left her there. The embers in the brazier glowed so faintly that the new widow didn’t see the old woman huddled beneath a mound of sheepskins in the corner until she spoke.

“Stand by the door. I will not have you infecting me with the illness that carried off your husband. I intend to live through this winter, and several more to come.”

“It’s stifling in here. It’s hotter than the baths.”

“You may open the door a crack, if you wish, but stand close in front of it to block the draft. Keep your cloak on. To let your blood mix hot and cold in your body brings disease. You, too, must live, though you don’t deserve to.”

“What have I done wrong, Matriarch?”

“You know very well. You called for the father of your children. The room on my terrace closest to the stairs belonged to the young master before he married you. From now on you sleep there. Your maid will come with your things, and I’ve posted guards at the foot of the stairs to see you stay here.”

“My maid has betrayed me. Send her back to the slave quarters when she comes. I will no longer endure her service.”

“Your maid has saved you. Without her vigilance and my protection the family would have repudiated you long ago. I should have chosen her as Keriter’s wife, if she weren’t a slave. But I’ve already taken care of that. This will be the last task she performs for you. I have chosen her as your daughter’s maidservant. The girl is young, I know, but she’ll be living in a house with three brothers and their servants. She needs a woman’s influence.”

“Are my children to be taken from me?”

“Why this sudden concern for your children? If you gave thought to them and not just to yourself, you would not have sent for the Caretaker of Metal Objects. Are you so blinded by lust you cannot see that your husband’s brother has his eye on their inheritance? Skandrit will grasp at any reason to question their paternity.”

“The Master has recognized them as his heirs.”

“Peshok had no choice if he wanted heirs at all. He knew Keriter’s tastes, and for all he knew his younger son would be the same. But Skandrit isn’t like his brother. He’s been calling slaves to his bed since he was thirteen – female slaves – and has already sired two bastards. He’d have been married this winter but for the sickness. The Master would disown your children in the blink of an eye. If you don’t care about them, think what you would become. How foolish can you be? I told you to be patient. Did you think that having outlived your husband has freed you to do as you wish? It hasn’t. We are none of us free to do as we wish. In some ways we are all slaves.”

“I’m sorry, Matriarch. I shall wait until my mourning ends.”

“You shall wait until your death and still wait beyond the grave. You shall not leave this terrace as long as I draw breath. My maid will serve both of us. I’m an old woman now and have few needs other than your company. She’ll be free to run all your errands. As for your children, they shall live with their grandfather. He can see to the boys’ upbringing, but as I said, your daughter needs a woman’s touch. She is very beautiful and will have a magnificent dowry. No doubt one day she’ll marry the heir of one of the most powerful families in this city. She must learn to rule. You only know how to give orders. But of course you never had her prospects and so were not given a proper education. You still can learn, you know.”

“You pretend you’re acting in the interest of my children, but they’re no blood of yours. They were fathered by a slave.”

“Not a drop of my blood flowed in the veins of my husband’s nephews, so how much would you say would flow in the veins of their great-grandchildren if they were Keriter’s? I only want to avoid a scandal.”

“You speak in half-truths, as always. You also desire him, and you envy me, because for a time I had him for my own.”

“I?”

“Yes. You held his member in your hand and tasted his seed.”

“Who told you this?”

“My husband.”

“And you believed him? Keriter was as jealous as you are and said it to make you suffer because he couldn’t have him unless he shared him with you. The Caretaker of Metal Objects was never yours. It is true, however, that I touched his parts to see how he responded to women and weighed them in my hand to be certain he would produce healthy offspring.”

“He will be mine someday. I’ve waited this long and will wait longer if I have to. When my son is Master here…”

“When your son is Master here! How old is your son? You’ll be as dried up and cold inside as I am by the time your son comes into his inheritance. Accept the inevitable, woman. Behave accordingly, and turn it to your advantage. As mother of the heir you can have anything you want… except the man who fathered him.”

“Am I to live without love because my husband has passed away?”

“You mean without sex. You’ve always lived without love. But sex you may have, when your mourning ends. My maid has an excellent eye for man-flesh, and will bring as many slaves to your couch as you desire. Or sleep with one of the family if you prefer a free man – anyone except your brother-in-law – though when it comes to a tumble in the bedroom they’re no better than a slave, as you’ve learned. You may have as many as you like of both, only not the Caretaker of Metal Objects. Him you will never see again.”

10. The Terrace

The coughing sickness lingered until spring, then left the city. Most families had more slaves than they could afford with fewer masters to serve and little food to go round. All but the most elderly and very youngest, men and women both, who had no specific job were sold to the mines, where hardly any slaves had survived.

To save him from the mines, Golden Eyes took on his friend who’d been Keriter’s man as his assistant and apprenticed his son to the old gardener for whom his mother had worked as girl. The boy born to the Caretaker of Metal Objects and the Priestess of Scents had his father’s golden eyes, but none of his talent for working metals. Instead he’d inherited his mother’s instinct for fragrances, and the gardener predicted he would become the next Priest of Scents.

Until the fall harvest, however, the slaves performed only the most necessary tasks in the compound. The others, including the Caretaker of Metal Objects and his assistant, were sent to work the fields. Similarly, the coupling room remained unused until the following spring. The masters wanted no pregnancies among the slaves, and the slaves feared the contagion of the former infirmary.

The future Priest of Scents left his father to sleep near his new mentor in the men’s common room, as was fitting. Keriter’s former cocksucker and former manservant shared a mat and made love in the private cubicle, and once again found the happiness they’d known when they could lie with the Priestess of Scents and Ulochli’s maid.

Ulochli soon learned of it from the one of the male slaves she summoned to her terrace room to pleasure her at night. When her former maid brought her daughter to visit her, she vented her impotent rage on the woman she detested.

“Did you know that your lover now sleeps with my late husband’s cocksucker in a cubicle in the men’s room, where he sucks his dick and gives him his ass for fucking? They keep all the slaves awake at night with their sex noises.”

“Yes, I know. And the Caretaker of Metal Objects sucks him and offers up his ass as well. I’m happy for them. Why shouldn’t they take pleasure with another man, a man they love, when they can no longer have the women they loved?”

“Someday I shall have them both, but you will never lie with a man again.”

“Many women slaves never get to lie with a man. I’m content to have had what I had.”

“You never had a child.”

“My children would have been slaves. The Caretaker of Metal Objects is the father of free men.”

“The day Chagga dies I will feel his hardness between my thighs, and you and my husband’s old servant will go to the mines.”

“Perhaps you will feel his hardness; perhaps he will choose to go with us.”

Ulochli complained to Matriarch of the maidservant’s insolence. The old woman simply answered, “Learn from her. We all must be content with what we have. Don’t you understand that yet? Come out on the terrace.”

They went and looked out over the compound. Standing at the foot of the stairs was the guard who prevented Keriter’s widow from leaving the terrace unescorted.

“What do you see?” Chagga asked.

“My prison.”

“Your prison or your realm. One day your son will be head of the family. When that happens, if you accept the inevitable and give up what you can never have, what you think you once had but never did, you will wield my power after I’m gone. If you want more, you will end up with nothing. Watch me, and learn, if you can. Nothing keeps you from learning except your own willfulness.”

*****

Chagga lived through three more severe winters. Though none was as disastrous as the winter of the coughing sickness, they took their toll on her, and when spring came she could tell her end was near. She specified that she wanted to wear the hair clasp the Caretaker of Metal Objects had made for her when she was carried to her funeral pyre. It had broken, she said, and sent her maid to bring it to him to fix. He should return it to her in three days.

On the afternoon she expected him, she sent Ulochli to visit her sister-in-law, Skandrit’s wife, who had just been delivered of her second child, a son. “Remember when you see the baby that he could replace yours, and that she could replace you,” she told her.

She had her bed carried out onto the terrace to receive the Caretaker of Metal Objects. He brought her another gift, a matching brooch, along with the hair clasp. “This is to thank you for your protection these many years,” he told her, “though I don’t understand why you favored me as you have.”

“Thank you, Golden Eyes, the brooch is truly exquisite. It too shall accompany me to my funeral pyre. You don’t mind if I call you Golden Eyes, do you? I hear you often go by that name in the slave quarters. That, and others I shall not repeat. And you’ve repaired the clasp so that no one can tell it was ever broken. I always said no family in the city had a finer Caretaker of Metal Objects. Nor a finer-looking one, I dare say. Come closer, so I can see you. My old eyes are clouded over.”

He came and knelt by her bedside.

“No, no. Stand up in the sunshine. Didn’t you hear me say I want to look at you? Yes, you’re as still as strong and beautiful as ever. I have aged more in the past… how many years has it been? Ten?”

“More, Matriarch.”

“I look twice as old, if that were possible, but you look younger. The passing years have made me fretful, and you calmer. And more virile too. Remember the time I made you remove your loincloth, and it embarrassed you that I was looking at you as a man. Does it now, my looking at you, or have you got used to going naked again?”

“You avoid my question, Matriarch.”

“Your question?”

“Why you’ve favored me.”

“Favored you? No. I was protecting Keriter’s children.”

“Why protect his children? You knew they were mine. You knew before they were born they would be.”

“I was protecting the family.”

“From what? Don’t tell me it was from scandal. Ulochli may believe that, but her maid knew better. We spoke about it when she sent for me after the young master’s funeral. Any scandal would never have gone beyond the compound walls. The Master would have sat back and let Keriter fuck himself to death, and Skandrit’s son would have become the new heir.”

“To preserve it, then. Skandrit favors women, has no sexual interest in men whatsoever, but his blood is the family’s blood. The defect runs in his veins. His sons may well grow up to be like Keriter. I thought your children would not.”

“Is it so horrible a defect? Is it wrong to prefer your own sex to the other?”

“I despised my great-nephew because he could not control his passions. What those passions were made no difference at all. I distrust Ulochli for the same reason. For a man to enjoy sex with other men or a woman with other women is harmless, or would be if we didn’t live in a world full of Peshoks and Ulochlis, but we do. Was I mistaken about you? My great-nephew’s old servant is your lover. You prefer him to Ulochli. Did you prefer the young master to her too? Come, you can tell me the truth. I’ll make no deathbed revelations. I’d sooner your son be Peshok’s heir than his true grandchild.”

Just then Ulochli came onto the terrace.

“See who’s here, Ulochli! Do you remember the Caretaker of Metal Objects? He’s here to bring me the clasp he fixed, and he made a brooch to match it. Let this be the last lesson I teach you. If you want your slaves to serve you well, don’t ask too much of them and reward them generously. They may even offer you gifts.”

“I remember the Caretaker of Metal Objects fondly, and I know his workmanship better than anyone. He can count on my protection after you’re gone. Now please excuse me. The visit to my sister-in-law has worn me out, and I wish to lie down.”

“I wasn’t sure you’d recognize him. See how just a few short years have aged him! Of course, he spends his days by the forge while you enjoy the open air here with me on the terrace. Or is it that he doesn’t have company to keep him warm on a cold night? No matter. Go and rest a while.”

When they were alone again, he said, “You were cruel to her.”

“I’m not unkind to everyone. She only knows how to take, not how to receive, and she’s vengeful, too, which is worse. I was grateful when slaves came to my bed, and didn’t hide it from them. It earned me their respect and affection. I don’t command this family by charisma or force of will. I won the slaves over to my side. She’s a haughty woman, and it will be her undoing. Did you watch her when she saw you and when I spoke about earning a slave’s fidelity? She can’t even control her face, let alone her lust and hatred.”

“She hates you.”

“More than you think. She means to destroy me after I’m gone. As soon as my ashes are scattered she’ll ask the Master to sell my maid to the mines, fool that she is. It will only undo whatever hope she has of acquiring the power I had. She’s too selfish too look beyond her own cravings and doesn’t know he’s been bedding the woman since I first sent her to serve his granddaughter. Oh, she’ll have her revenge, but it will be a petty one. Look for her when, blackened with ashes, you follow my corpse to the cliffs. She’ll have taken your brooch before my body turns cold.”

“Would she do even that?”

“See if I’m wrong. I can read her heart and soul. Your face, however, reveals nothing.”

“Slaves learn to hide their feelings as children.”

“So did I, and I was born free. When she came up the stairs I’d just asked with whom you preferred having sex – that woman or her late husband. I watched you carefully, but I couldn’t read your expression. I told you why I favor you. Now you answer my question. Which did you prefer, the young master or Ulochli?”

“I loathed them both equally. They took their pleasure in me. I took no pleasure in either.”

“And are you happier lying with your current lover than with the Priestess of Scents?”

“I’m happier with my assistant because I can lie with him without having to pleasure the young master or his widow.”

“But does he give you more pleasure than she did? What do you prefer for sex – a woman or a man?”

“I can make no comparisons. I loved her; I love him.”

“Do you miss her?”

“Very much. But I love him no less for it.”

“I don’t understand what you mean by love. I know nothing about love. Like Keriter and Ulochli, I’ve only experienced sexual hunger. Unlike them, I didn’t allow it to control me.”

“The Priestess and I came together freely to give each other pleasure, not to take our own. It’s the same with my assistant.”

“Then I chose wisely. Ulochli and her husband were free to take what they wanted, but their passions ruled them. In a sense you are freer than they, and more fit to father free men.”

“My heart is free, but my person isn’t. Who will protect me after you’re gone?”

“I shall, from the other side of death. Rely on my protection for as long as that woman remains a menace to your children.”

*****

The whole city turned out to bid farewell to the Matriarch. No one there had ever seen a funeral more lavish than the procession that followed her to the sea. They carried Chagga to her pyre in bright sunshine. Dressed magnificently, her cape attached at the collar by a gold brooch, Ulochli walked beside Peshok directly behind the body. At the feast after the cremation she sat next to him in the place of honor and so gorged herself on the sacrificial meats that she returned to the terrace suffering from indigestion.

The pain worsened during the night and her stomach began to swell. By morning it was as bloated as the belly of a woman in the last month of pregnancy. The Priest Herbalist came and felt her abdomen. It was hard as stone. He asked her to describe the pain.

“It’s the same as when I gave birth to my first child.”

He gave her potions to drink, and instructed Chagga’s maid to massage her belly and then apply a poultice of wet leaves he would tell her how to make.

Ulochli lay in agony for a week. The pains would flare up in the evening and subside in the morning. Her screams from the terrace pierced the night. Then, one black night when the clouds covered the moon, they suddenly ceased. Peshok and his manservant came to the terrace and by the light of their torches they saw Ulochli lying dead, between her legs the gangrenous uterus she’d pushed out of her body.

The Priest Herbalist said she’d been poisoned.