Kushiel's Dart

he shouted, back-handing me across the mouth. I licked my lips, tasting blood mixed with his seed. "Ill-gotten spawn of Naamah!" Another blow, glancing. I looked up through the hair spilled over my eyes and saw his phallus stirring to erection. D'Essoms gained control of himself with a shudder. "On your feet," he said, grinding out the words. "Take off your clothes."
    Rising, I reached behind my back with trembling fingers and began to undo the jet buttons, one by one. D'Essoms watched, his eyes hooded.
    "There," he said harshly, pointing to a pallet of cushions. A swatch of white silk was spread across them. "I have in mind to make a new coat of arms, in honor of Anafiel Delaunay." When I let fall the red velvet gown, he shoved me so that I stumbled, naked, toward the pallet. "I have paid your virgin-price," d'Essoms said menacingly, advancing toward me. "Pray you have played your lord true, and award me with the badge of victory, Phedre. On your back."
    He moved like a stalking beast, shedding clothes, looming over me as I lay upon the pallet, forcing my legs over his shoulders.
    I do not know what it is like, for other women. There was no arouse-ment such as I had seen in the Showing at Camellia House; and yet for me, I was ready, as ready as ever an adept was for her first joining. With one smooth thrust, d'Essoms pierced me to the core, and even as I cried out at the pain of it, the face of Blessed Naamah swam in my vision, and I gasped with pleasure. Again and again he thrust himself into me, and I
    felt my body pliant in his hands, while waves of pain and pleasure beat at me like the wings of Naamah's doves in her temple.
    He was Delaunay's enemy and I should have hated him.
    I found my arms were wound tight about his neck and I cried out his name as he spent himself inside of me.
    It may be that it sobered him in some part. I do not know. He drew away and breathed heavily alongside me, loosening his hair at last from the tight confinements of his braid. He looked more handsome with it falling about his shoulders.
    "I have this, then, at least." He eased the swatch of white silk from beneath me, bearing the vivid red stain of my virgin blood. His predatory eyes were strangely calm. "You know what I desire, Phedre?"
    "Yes, my lord," I murmured. I rose obediently from his pallet to cross to the device on the fourth wall; the last wall. I did not need to be told. I stood spread-eagled against the X-shaped cross, his whipping-post. I could feel his breath against my skin as he fastened the thongs at my wrists and ankles. The rough wood of the cross chafed my hipbones.
    "You are the most splendid thing I have ever seen," he murmured, jerking tight the ties binding my left wrist. My fingers splayed out in anguished protest. "Tell me what Delaunay desires."
    "I don't know." I gasped as he wrenched my right ankle and lashed it to the cross.
    "Truly?" He rose and his breath tickled my ear, and I felt the trailing ends of a flogger caress my lower back.
    "I swear it!"
    And then the lash began to fall.
    I could not count the number of times. It was not like my childhood punishment at the hand of the Dowayne's chastiser, for there was no mediator, no quota of blows. I know only that I writhed and pleaded against the rough wood, and still the lash fell mercilessly, bearing out Childric d'Essoms hatred of my lord. Once I gave up and sagged against my bonds, offering no resistance; he came to me then and reached between my legs with his fingers, stirring me until I pleaded, humiliated, for a different release. Then the lash fell again.
    At last his arm tired, and he came behind me once more. I felt his fingers spread my buttocks. "I paid Anafiel Delaunay a virgin-price," he whispered in my ear. I felt the blunt head of his phallus probe at my nether orifice and dug my fingertips into the rude wood of the cross, driving splinters beneath my nails. "And I will take it, to the last centime."
    He did.

SEVENTEEN
    Afterward Cecilie came to visit and took me on an excursion to a sanctuary of Naamah some miles outside the City, famed for its hot springs.
    It was strange to treat with her as an almost-equal, after so many years as her pupil, but she was gracious as ever and any awkwardness soon passed between us. There was a chill to the spring air, but the sun was warm and bright, and it was good to see the pale green shoots of new growth emerging as we drove into the countryside. We were well-received by the priests and