She knelt there, her breasts rising and falling violently, her eyes wide, watching him. Almost. She was almost ready. One more step. One more step and she would be there.
He threw off the pau and stood there over her, naked, seeing how eagerly she watched him now. How ready she was for him to fuck her. With one foot he pushed her back, then knelt and spread her legs, watching her all the while, one hand moving between her legs, seeing how her eyes closed, how her breath caught with the pleasure of it.
"Gods," she moaned, reaching up for him. "Goddess of mercy, put it there! Please, Shih Bergson! Please put it there!"
His fingers traced a line from her groin up to her chin, forcing her to look back at him.
"Not like this," he said, putting her hands on him again. "I know a better way. A much, much better way than this."
Quickly he led her to the saddle, pushing her face down onto its hard, smooth surface, his hands caressing her intimately all the while, keeping her mind dark, her senses inflamed. Then, before she realized what was happening, he fastened her in the double stirrups, binding her hands and feet.
He stood back, looking at his handiwork, then crossed to the wall and switched off all the lights but one—the spot that picked out her naked rump.
She was shaking now. He could see the small movement of the muscles at the top of her legs. "What's happening?" she asked in a tiny, sobered voice. "What are you doing?"
He went over to her and placed his hand on the small of her back, running his fingers down the smooth channel that ended in the tight hole of her anus, feeling her shudder at his touch.
Pleasure or fear? he wondered. Did she still believe it would all turn out all right?
The thought almost made him laugh. She had mistaken him. She had thought he wanted ordinary satisfactions.
He reached beneath the saddle and dipped his fingers in the shelf of scented unguents, then began to smear them delicately about the tiny hole, pushing inward, the unguents working their magic spell, making the muscles relax.
He felt her breathing change again, anticipating pleasure; knew, without looking, that she would have been newly aroused by his ministrations; that her nipples would be stiff, her eyes wide with expectation.
He reached under the saddle a second time and drew out the steel-tipped phallus that was attached by a chain to the pommel. The chain was just long enough. Longer and there would not be that invigorating downward pull—that feeling of restraint— shorter and penetration would not be deep enough to satisfy. He smiled, holding the hollowed column lovingly between his hands and smoothing his fingers over the spiraling pattern of the wu-tu, the "five noxious creatures"—toad, scorpion, snake, centipede, and gecko—then drew it on, easing himself into its oiled soft-leather innards and fastening its leather straps about his waist.
For a moment he hesitated, savoring the moment, then centered the metal spike and pushed. His first thrust took her by surprise. He felt her whole body stiffen in shock, but though she gasped, she did not cry out.
Brave girl, he thought, but that's not what you're here for. You're not here to be brave. You're here to sing for me.
The second thrust tore her. He felt the skin between her anus and vagina give like tissue and heard her cry out in agony.
"Good," he said, laughing brutally. "That's good. Sing out, Si Wu Ya! It's good to hear you sing out."
He thrust again.
When he was done he unstrapped himself, then took one of the white sheets from the side and threw it over her, watching as the blood spread out from the center of the white; a doubled circle of redness that slowly formed into an ellipse.
Hearing her moan, he went around and knelt beside her, lifting her face gently, almost tenderly, and kissing her brow, her nose, her lips.
"Was that good, Si Wu Ya? Was it hard enough for you?" He laughed softly, almost lovingly. "Ah, but you were good, Si Wu Ya. The best yet. And for that you'll have your tape. But later,
eh? In the morning. WeVe a whole night ahead of us. Plenty of time to olav our game again."
SUNG WAS kneeling on the top of the dike, staring across at the House as the dawn broke. He was cold to the bone and his clothes were wet through, but still he knelt there, waiting.
He had heard her cries in the night. Had heard and felt his heart break inside his chest. Had dropped his head, knowing, at last, how small he was, how powerless.
Now, as the light leached back into the world, he saw the door open at the head of the steps and a figure appear.
"Si Wu Ya...." he mouthed, his lips dry, his heart, which had seemed dead in him, pounding in his chest. He went to get up but his legs were numb from kneeling and he had to put his hand out to stop himself from tumbling into the water far below. But his eyes never left her distant, shadowed figure, seeing at once how slowly she moved, how awkwardly, hobbling down the steps one by one, stopping time and again to rest, her whole body crooked, one hand clutching the side rail tightly, as if she'd fall without it.
He dragged himself back, anxious now, and began to pound the life back into his legs. Once more he tried to stand and fell back, cursing, almost whimpering now in his fear for her. "Si Wu Ya," he moaned, "Si Wu Ya."
Once more he tried to stand, gritting his teeth, willing his muscles to obey him. For one moment he almost fell again, then he thrust one leg forward, finding his balance.
"Si Wu Ya____" he hissed. "Si Wu Ya____"
Forcing his useless legs to work he made his way to the bridge, awkwardly at first, hobbling, as if in some grotesque mimicry of his wife, then with more confidence as the blood began to flow, his muscles come alive again.
Then, suddenly, he was running, his arms flailing wildly, his bare feet thudding against the dark earth. Until he was standing there, before her, great waves of pain and fear, hurt and anger, washing through him like a huge black tide.
He moaned, his voice an animal cry of pain. "What did he do, Si Wu Ya? Gods save us, what did he do?"
She stared back at him almost sightlessly.
"Your face ..." he began, then realized that her face was unmarked. The darkness was behind her eyes. The sight of it made him whimper like a child and fall to his knees again.
Slowly, each movement a vast, unexplored continent of pain, she pushed out from the steps and hobbled past him. He scrambled up and made to help her but she brushed him off, saying nothing, letting the cold emptiness of her face speak for her.
On the narrow bridge he stood in front of her again, blocking her way, looking back past her at the House.
Til kill him."
For the first time she seemed to look at him. Then she laughed; her laughter so cold, so unlike the laughter he had known from her, that it made his flesh tingle with fear.
"He'd break you, little Sung. He'd eat you up and spit you out."
She leaned to one side and spat. Blood. He could see it, even in this half-light. She had spat blood.
He went to touch her, to put his hands on her shoulders, but the look in her eyes warned him off. He let his arms fall uselessly.
"What did he do, Si Wu Ya? Tell me what he did."
She looked down, then began to move on, forcing him to move aside and let her pass. He had no will to stop her.
At the first of the smaller channels she turned and began to ease herself down the shallow bank, grunting, her face set against the pain she was causing herself. Sung, following her, held out his hand and for the first time she let him help her, gripping his hand with a force that took his breath, her fingers tightening convulsively with every little jolt she received.
Then she let go and straightened up, standing there knee deep in the water at the bottom of the unlit channel, the first light lying like a white cloth over the latticework of the surrounding fields, picking out the channel's lips, the crouching shape of Sung. The same clear light that rested in the woman's long dark hair like a faintly jeweled mist.