“No!” Yasmin protested. “That’s where I draw the line. Cael keeps his tender bits.”
“Mmmhphmfsmmm,” I added my voice against that proposal. To punish Sammy for even bringing that up, I latched onto a breast like a starving lamprey and went to town. Damn right that put her in her place. Fifteen minute later, she finally let me come up for air.
Ten minutes after that, we stumbled out of the apartment. I was going to see Yasmin safely home – she snickered then, seeing my hurt feelings, told me I was very brave and could take her home. Evie and Sammy lived close by. They had known Timothy from his days working at an ink place in Queens, but had lost touch when he opened his own place on the East Side.
They promised to stay in touch. Sometimes I don’t even have to try. Maybe that’s why Timothy got so pissy with me at times. As for Yasmin and me, I fucked her in the hallway right outside her domicile because she still had twenty minutes left on her babysitter and there was a convenient vertical surface. We both went home with smiles on our faces.
I met up with Odette walking up to my – now our – place. She wanted all the juicy details, helped me change our sheets, promised to do our laundry tomorrow morning and then we had sex. I was set up on my feet, shins and knees, Odette facing away from me and grinding her lush tight end on my rod when the door opened and Timothy Nerf-shot me… cause I definitely deserved it.
(Thursday)
Thursday was good. I inspected artificial wood products for artificial termites. Actually, I started out with Constanza – really Naomi and her Merry Band now – and learned how to actually fire a personal defense weapon. No more ‘spray and pray’ for me. They told me they had a special surprise for me on Friday. Color me concerned.
According to Medical, I was a lousy lab monkey. Then Katrina informed me it was Brian’s turn today to get poked, prodded and forced to cough up millions of little Brian-lettes for Havenstone’s perverse pleasures. I e-mailed Brian my best wishes. I was seriously starting to question those ‘so-called’ medical experts ethical integrity.
I worked with Buffy, teamed up with the Daphne/Desiree combo. Why? Because there was an emergency board meeting on Friday. I wasn’t told this, but Daphne and I figured it out. To put some extra butter on my hell-bound soul, an agent of Rhada’s gave me a private note informing me she wanted to talk.
Keeping to Amazon Princess Rape Fantasy Bondage protocols, I ate the message before Buffy could pry it from my hands. Bad enough was all these crazy females trying to kill me, I also had to keep track of which ones hated the other ones. It reminded me of dating sorority sisters, except this time out, I could never leave the sorority house and they almost never went to classes.
Oh, and they are all related to Jason Voorhees (that’s the maniac from the Friday the 13th movies for those who had lived constructive lives) and we were adjacent to an Ace Hardware store. Plus I had a date with Libra and I was dedicated to ‘tapping that ass’ at least once more before I died. And, there was more!
Deena, the swimming, ‘fingers in her pussy’ buddy dropped me a line telling me she was ‘expecting’ me this afternoon. There was no way I could swing that, despite her request that could be only construed as an order. I simply didn’t have the time. I e-mailed her back, pleading for her to be in a bikini with several suggested sites for her to visit.
Before my designated knife training, I had a fucked-up brainstorm about what to do with Rhada. I wrote a letter in Old Kingdom Hittite, sealed it in wax with the imprint of the symbol ‘Lowest’ on it, representing me, though Rhada’s submissive side could easily misinterpret that. To get it to her, I went to the only one who could meet her face to face who I could trust.
Katrina? Laughable. She could do it but she wouldn’t touch this disaster with a three meter pole made out of male vertebrae. The only other person who met all the criteria – Oneida. Yes, I was a fucktard, fuck-nut and a waste of human potential.
“Oneida, I need a favor,” I asked the moment I hunted her down in Acquisitions.
“Of course,” her eyes lit up, her lips moistened and breathe quickened. She wasn’t wanting a quick tussle in a side room. The chick wanted to be held closely while I whispered love poetry into her ear for her to hear alone. I was letting her down abysmally.
“I need this message hand delivered to Rhada,” I pressed the missive into her hands.
She didn’t know how to wrap her mind around that. Rhada? She knew we had fought, but what contact had we shared since then? She made the sane ‘girl-logic’ assumption.
“Cael, are you in trouble,” she worried. Oh, I wish it was only trouble.
“Not that you can help me with. If you can’t do this, I’ll find another way,” I sighed.
Yes, I was playing her. Oneida would run over hot coals for me.
“No, no – I’ll do it… why? Why Rhada?” Oneida pleaded.
“I can’t say and you cannot look at the message. It is critical that she, and she alone sees this,” I impressed on her the importance of saving my life without saying ‘please save my life’.
By asking her to not look at the message, I increased the odds she’d look. I had no choice. If I didn’t say anything about it, she’d make an excuse to look and tell herself that I hadn’t forbidden her to look. Add to that, she was my racial superior. In her case, this meant she had to look out for my best interest. Oneida nodded and watched me leave.
Training with Pamela was hands on this day. I had a wooden blade with a lead core to give me a better feel for the proper weight. Pamela had a meter long wooden rod. She had a miraculous ability to move her baton in a blur yet not hurt my fingers, hand, or wrist. It was very instructional. I was practicing stabbing and a bit of slashing.
I left with a sense I’d added something useful to my repertoire. I wasn’t calling out Elsa anytime soon – heck, I wasn’t calling out Europa, Aya’s 13 year old sister either. As we were cleaning up, Pamela noticed my uncertainty.
“What is it?” she asked.
“Oh, it is that you’ve resisted the urge to cause me pain,” I mused. “Normally, I find Amazons to be very harsh.”
“That is certainly a common training style here,” Pamela nodded. “I chose showing a student how to do things right as opposed to reminding the student what they did wrong.”
“Good enough. Thanks for treating me like I matter,” I grinned.
“What makes you think that?” Pamela and I started to leave the little dojo. Note, she didn’t say ‘assume’.
“Trust me, I’m a sperm donor with sex appeal to virtually every other screwy dame in this place,” I smirked.
“I know the difference between what I see in their eyes and yours,” I winked.
“Ash Man,” Pamela remarked. She zinged me, alright. “My granddaughters talk of you and not in a way I would expect Amazon women to talk about a male.”
“That and an Egg McMuffin…” I shrugged.
“Means you won’t die hungry,” Pamela shrugged along with me. “This is why I volunteered to teach you; you deserve every chance to go out unconquered.”
“Do you think I have a chance – of that?” I questioned.
“Not really. I didn’t think I would ever be talking to a man in my native language again either, so who knows,” she added.
“Do you think I’m an Ash Man?” I wondered. Male – OKH – again?
“I haven’t a clue what one is,” she rolled her shoulders. “I am neither my House Leader, nor its Keeper of Records.”
“Oh… what are you then?” I asked. The response she gave didn’t make sense.
“Cliff-walker? I don’t know…” I furrowed my brow.
“I am past my useful life yet refuse to take myself to the cliffs,” Pamela told me. “I have unfinished business to attend to in this World.”
“What is that – if that isn’t too rude?” I inquired.
“A dead man spoke to me. He told me I would never find my way to the halls of my ancestors until I replaced a life for a life,” she related.
“That’s – ummm – odd,” I suggested.
“Cael, I severed his throat to the spine. Even had he somehow been alive, he could not have spoken. Then there is the matter of speaking the Amazon tongue,” Pamela continued.
“Did he tell you anything else?” I played along.
“No.”
“How will you know what life you should save – to replace a life for a life?” I searched her out.
“He had the most unforgettable emerald green eyes,” she filled me in. Just like my eyes.
We had stepped into the elevator when she told me that. There were five other Amazons with us. I didn’t know any of them. I reached out and put my hand on Pamela’s stomach.
“Whatever happens to me, and I don’t want you to die, or anything – I want you to know you’ve done what needed to be done,” I assured her.
Pamela’s laugh was so loud, deep and resounding, I was stunned that it came from such a thin frame.
“That, my friend, is what being an Amazon is all about,” Pamela slapped my back. What she said was wrong in so many ways and the Amazons around us knew it.
I wasn’t an Amazon and equating me to one of them was insulting to their feminine martial ardor. Also, no Amazon had ever called me a friend and meant it in a non-sexual manner. Things were getting uncomfortable.
“Matron,” one of the Amazons spoke up, “are you feeling well?”
That was a polite way of saying ‘have you lost your mind?’
“Do you know why there are twenty ‘First’ Houses?” Pamela addressed me and ignored the others.
“Not really. It wasn’t in the Havenstone Handbook,” I tried to sound innocently curious.
“The first Amazon to escape capture came back for the rest,” Pamela related. “She was free and if she was recaptured she would have certainly been raped again and most likely killed. She came back because no risk is too great for one’s family. Like the first of the Unconquered, you risk everything for the spiritual and physical safety of your sisters.”
“He is not one of us!” a different Amazon insisted.
“How bizarre that none of these crazy bitches can see it,” Pamela smiled.
“Who are you again?” I gave Pamela a worried look.
“A discarded heroine, Cael,” Pamela answered. “I am an embarrassment, an anachronism and an arrogant warrior humbled.”
Clearly this was part of Havenstone’s history I wasn’t supposed to be privileged to hear.