Master of None (17 page)

On a late afternoon, the clientele thinned out and he was idly considering leaving. He had already politely turned down an offer of company, deducing with a now experienced eye the woman’s end objective: not many sought him out for anything more than a quick, indifferent coupling, and these tended to be either women attracted by his strangeness or unmarried women desperately seeking pregnancy. He was beginning to resent the first, and while he could sympathize with the latter, on occasion even enjoyed sex with them, the goal left him less than enthusiastic.

Not ready to return to the Ngai’esha House and face the smug gloating in the men’s quarters, he preferred to simply sit and listen to the music. He leaned against cushions piled up against a carved screen, his foot idly tapping the air to the rhythm. This group was better than most, four men who played a fast intricate rhapsody of reedy flute, a three-level dulcimerlike stringed instrument, lute, and a drum that the young player bounced his fingers on to produce a deep, rolling sound that made a pleasant sensation in his gut.

He hadn’t noticed her, and when he did, it was obvious she had been watching him from across the room for some time. His heart slammed into his throat, and he stood up slowly on numbed legs. He was light-headed and queasy, wondering if the narcotic smoke had made him ill before he realized it was simple fear and panic knotting around his excitement.

Pratima sat alone, almost secluded by the screens around her. Reclining on the low divan, she propped her head up with one fist, resting her weight on her elbow. Her hair, loosened from the braid, fanned behind her in polished black waves. A qaellast board had been set up, stones gleaming white and red against dark-grained wood. She watched him walk toward her with a faint wry smile.

“Greetings, bhraetae,” she said in Vanar when he reached the screens. He stopped and put his hand on one edge to steady himself. “Would you care to play a game of qaellast?”

“I’m the poorest player on all Vanar, l’amae,” he said, in the same language.

The skin around her eyes crinkled as her smile broadened.

“The music is excellent. Perhaps you might dance for me?”

“I’m an even worse dancer.” He stepped inside the privacy screens and drew them closed, the music still faintly audible behind the dampening barrier.

“Then what
can
you do for me?” she said softly, looking up at him. He didn’t know where the words came from, how he managed to speak at all as terrified as he was. “What you came here for.” Taking two steps to her, he slid his hand behind her neck to pull her head toward him, his fingers tangled in her hair. He had a glimpse of white teeth as her lips opened before he crushed his mouth over hers, kissing her with greedy hunger.

Half falling on her, he knocked over the qaellast board, scattered stones hopping over the stone floor. Her hands gripped his arms, hard fingers digging into his skin, pulling him down onto her. His tongue slid into her mouth and she bit it gently, held it captive with her teeth. He moaned, feverishly groping with her sati, pushing it open off her shoulders. His hands covered her small breasts, nipples hard under his palms, the bones on her rib cage palpable through the flesh. She was small and slender, but with the ruthless tenacity of steel cable rather than any fragility.

She released his mouth, and he buried his face in the curve of her neck, filling his senses with her smell, her taste. Strong hands wrenched his sati open. His bare skin burned under her touch as she reached down and grasped his cock, pulling him toward her inexorably.

“Oh, no,” he groaned, not wanting it to happen so quickly, powerless to slow himself as he felt her press him against her hot softness. His hips thrust instinctively, sliding, filling her. Pressure shimmered up his spine, her fingers stabbed into the flesh of his buttocks, squeezing, drawing him deep into her, her legs clamped around his waist. He could hear himself making helpless animal sounds as he drove himself into her with bruising force. He shuddered and came, the explosion of relief blinding him.

His muscles had turned to butter, and he slid off beside her, one boneless arm draped over her chest. He lay there breathlessly, shaking in fatigued satiety. Dazed, unable to even move, it took several minutes for his heart to gradually slow. The sweat on his body chilled him, the hairs on his arms standing up.

Suddenly, he was aware she had made no sound at all.
None.
He looked at her, fumbling in embarrassment. His penis slid out, his testicles contracting with the air-chilled slickness. Even spent and ashamed, he was surprised to find he still wanted her, an ache coiling around the base of his groin.

She gently disentangled herself from him and began wrapping her black sati around herself, expertly twisting and pleating it into shape. He watched her silently, miserable, unable to find the words to even apologize to her.

She clipped the folds of cloth together securely with an unembellished pin, then held out her hand toward him. “Now that you have fucked me,” she said calmly in Hengeli, “come, and I will make love to you.”

XIII

H
E FELT A VICARIOUS THRILL OF POWER, ABSORBING PRESTIGE JUST BY
being in her presence. The deferential respect she received, the interest turned toward them, strangely intoxicated him.

She appeared not to notice, nothing condescending or haughty in her demeanor. When she spoke, she was faultlessly polite, yet it was as if she had no understanding of any hierarchy. When she walked, she seemed unaware others made way for her, heedless of their respect. She wasn’t arrogantly ignoring them, he realized; she dismissed it so thoroughly from her consciousness that their reaction to her simply didn’t exist.

He, however, didn’t quite have the same dexterity. He was very much aware of the respect around them. The stares turned on him had an almost physical sensation. They left the kaemahjah, and a float taxi settled next to them at the barest motion of her hand. The driver didn’t blink as she motioned him inside to sit beside her, rather than relegating him to the back as he expected.

The taxi rapidly skated away from the outlying suburbs at the margins of the Estates. Thin, twisted spires and arched walkways, organic designs crystallized into delicate buildings, dominated the city center. She had the taxi stop in front of a glittering tower of white marble and got out, walking away without looking back as he followed her. The taxi lifted and sped off, seemingly unconcerned she had not paid for the fare.

The streets teemed with pedestrians, mostly women. He tried to ignore their stares as she stopped, facing a blank wall. The building had no entrance that he could see, until she stepped in front of an un-adorned expanse of marble and placed her hand against the stone. A thin seam incised a black rectangular line, and the marble fell back smoothly, exposing a bright entry. It closed behind them seamlessly.

She stood in the center of a barren room as large as Yaenida’s study and said in Vanar, “Up, please.” Only his gut told him they were ascending until they reached the top of the tower. The walls folded back like flower petals opening to the morning sun and merged into the floor. The space was huge, expansive windows curving around a panoramic view of the city so high and so empty it made him vertiginous.

Large paintings, costly museum-quality pieces, hung on the arced girders separating the pseuquartz windows like bars on an immense birdcage. The room was spacious enough to easily accommodate a thousand boisterous party guests, while floor cushions and low settees arranged around antique screens made the area surprisingly intimate.

She watched him as he walked around. His bare feet sank into the plush carpets, and he noticed the faint perfume of flowers before spotting a cascade of orchids thriving on a ten-meter-high tumble of natural rock. The granite glistened as water trickled through the greenery into a mosaic pool large enough to swim in filled with silver-scaled fish.

“Is this yours?” he asked, dazzled.

She seemed surprised by the question. “No,” she said simply. “Are you hungry?”

He turned as he heard the faint skittering, staring at a black metal and chrome ten-legged spider striding with delicate grace across the room toward them. Two feet high, it held a silver tray bearing food on its back, balanced with four sets of sharp-spined mandibles. Stopping before a low table, it smoothly lifted the tray off its back, swiveling the mandibles to set it down before sorting and arranging the food into two settings.

“Thank you, Ilitu,” Pratima said in Vanar, and the mechanism strolled back toward a small alcove, its multijointed legs moving in smooth rotation, tapered ends barely making tracks in the thick rug.

“Are you always so polite to robots?” he asked as the machine settled into its slot, curling up its legs to mesh like an abstract sculpture against the wall.

She knelt by the table and picked up a tiny canapé. “Only when they’re sentient,” she said, and popped the hors d’oeuvre into her mouth. He shot a startled look at the mechanical spider, gazing back into its lifeless eyes, four ebony stones. She motioned for him to sit down.

Rather than kneeling formally in Vanar fashion, he tucked his sati under his knees and sat down cross-legged. She smiled, but said nothing. He watched as she leaned over to pour out a tiny serving of coffee. Her hands were steady, long, unadorned fingers with blunt nails holding the fragile cup out to him.

“Thank you,” he murmured reflexively, and sipped the thick, black liquid before setting the cup down gently. He was not an expert on ceramics, but he knew he was drinking from antique porcelain worth far more than he was comfortable handling.

“Okay, I’m impressed,” he said. “Who does this all belong to, then?”

She tucked a strand of loose hair behind one ear. “It doesn’t belong to anybody. It’s just somewhere for Pilots to go during our down-time, a place where we can relax.” She ate another canapé, chewing s1owly as he surveyed the huge room. “Pilots are particularly sensitive to claustrophobia. We need space.”

He picked up a strip of thin slices of pickled ginger arranged on a tiny sliver of bread among artfully cut vegetables, then a thick garlicky artichoke paté, cradled in the halves of pinkish hard eggs. They were delicious. “Ilitu made these?”

“Yes.”

He made a deliberate effort to turn toward the spidery thing. “Excellent, Ilitu. Thank you,” he said in careful Vanar. When he turned back toward Pratima, she was grinning. “No?”

“Not necessary,” she said, voice sparkling with suppressed laughter. “But I’m sure she appreciates it.”

They ate in silence, trading glances and hesitant smiles like love-struck adolescents, or at least he felt like an infatuated teenager. “Would you like to listen to music?” she asked.

“Why not?” he barely got out before the opening strains of a quiet concerto. Startled, he shook his head and leaned back. “What, is the room sentient, too?” he asked.

“The entire building is sentient,” she said. “We are inside Ilitu. She is a conscious entity much like ourselves.”

“This is too strange, Pratima.” He set his half-eaten canapé back down on his tiny porcelain plate.

“If it bothers you, I will take you back to the Estate.” Her milk-blue eyes regarded him serenely, impenetrable.

“No,” he said quickly. “Not yet. I’m just not used to this, is all.” He tried a smile, feeling like a fraud. “So is this what it’s like on a Pilotship?”

She glanced around, considering her answer. “It has some similarities,” she said. Then, rethinking it over, “No, to be honest, it’s not like a Pilotship at all. Nothing is like a Pilotship. Now, of course, being eternally ground-bound, you would like to ask me to tell you all about what it’s
really
like on a Pilotship.”

Her playful malice sparked a flash of resentment, the hair on the back of his neck prickling. “Actually,” he said with sudden recklessness, “I’d rather ask if you enjoyed pulling the wings off houseflies when you were a child.”

The muscles in her face didn’t move, but her expression changed immediately. The suggestion of her smile vanished, and her pale eyes grew cold. “There are no houseflies on Vanar,” she said quietly. She picked up her delicate cup and slid away from the table, her back against the floor cushions, legs stretched casually, the hand holding her coffee resting on one knee. “And I believe I owe you an apology, Nathan,” she said indifferently. “It was cruel to tease you about your imprisonment here.”

His pulse shuddering in his ears, he was furious with himself. “No,

I’m sorry, l’amae,” he said quickly. “I had no right—”

“You had every right,” she cut him off. “And don’t call me ‘l’amae.’ My boredom does not justify using other people as toys for my own amusement. I don’t often forget that, but when I do”—the ice cracked, her voice suddenly sad—“it is fitting I should be reminded.” She looked away from him, flat gaze leveled on the evening sky, violet striations in the distance. “Please accept my sincere apologies.”

He said nothing for a long moment, then with obviously feigned meekness, “Does that mean you aren’t going to make love to me now, after all?”

Slowly, her mouth twisted into a grin before she laughed, a deep sound rolling from her throat like the flutter of birds’ wings suddenly set free. Her body shook, and a tiny drop of coffee splashed over the edge of the cup, an ebony bead staining her pale leg. He had to suppress the urge to lick it from her skin. Her free hand swept back the long tangle of dark hair spilling over her shoulders. When she had finished laughing, she eyed him thoughtfully, still smiling.

“Of them all, Yaenida has been the most interesting and the most elusive,” she said softly, speaking more to herself. “She never does anything without good reason, once you sift through all the devious tricks and turns. Why you, Nathan? What’s she up to now?”

He shook his head. “I don’t understand.”

She laughed again, a mild exhalation through her nose. She leaned closer to him, her languor radiating an uncompromising energy. “What do you know of Pilots?” she asked, this time without the teasing sarcasm, and ran a fingernail across his collarbone at the top of his mati. He felt the blood surge to his penis.