“I see that there are tears in your lovely green eyes, bedin.” The man still holding my forearms chuckled. “Possibly the tears stem from the manner in which you have just been treated. If this is so do not regret them, for they have enabled you to learn the first of your lessons: no bedin may speak in the presence of hizahh, save at their command, and then only in the prescribed manner. For this, the time of your learning, you will only be mildly punished. Should the misconduct be repeated, your tongue will be removed.”
The shock struck me motionless between his hands, the shock transmitted by the other women lined up behind me and the stronger shock of knowing he spoke with utter conviction. His statement hadn’t been a threat, it had been a solemn promise, a vow he had made—and kept—in the past. I shook my head, denying that that could be happening to me, trying to deny everything he’d said, and luckily he misinterpreted the gesture.
“I am pleased to see you attempt to assure me that the error will not be repeated.” He laughed. “It is gratifying to know the lesson was as effective as I wished it to be, yet the punishment will be completed to reinforce your memory of the lesson. A bedin with her tongue removed is a bedin unable to give full pleasure to a man.”
The others laughed heartily at the joke, their minds pleased at the way the lesson was going. They enjoyed this part of acquiring new slaves as much as they enjoyed the slaves themselves. I would have preferred being furious at the attitude, but too much fear was hammering at me, mine as well as everyone else’s. The veiled bedinn knelt in their robes behind their hizahh, relieved to be temporarily ignored, but not foolish enough to believe it would last very long.
“You tremble,” the man in front of me observed, with pleasure. “A bedin is never so lovely as when she kneels trembling before one. Bedinn were born to tremble.”
His eyes blazed hot above his veil, his desire so close to me I felt smothered in it. It rolled at me in waves from his mind, making me dizzy and ill, until I cringed back against his hands. He laughed at my reaction, enjoying it and letting it feed his desire, sharing it with the other men in the tent.
Most of them were leaning forward, eager to get on with whatever was to happen next, and Kednin wasn’t about to make them wait long.
“It is also required of a bedin that she speak longingly of her desire to serve,” Kednin said, his voice almost a purr. “As you are currently unable to speak in any manner, you must show your eagerness to please your hizahh without words. Do you feel yourself able to do this?”
Numbly I shook my head again, slowly, almost pleadingly, knowing he hadn’t been expecting any answer but a negative. I could almost see the grin behind his veil, could hear the soft laughter in his throat, could feel the deep amusement from the others. They were going to do something to me, I knew they were, but my wrists strained as futilely against the leather as my throat strained to utter a scream.
“You are unable to show your desire to please,” Kednin nodded, a false commiseration in his voice. “Under such restrictive circumstances, it will then be necessary for your hizahh to assist you. We would not wish you to be thought unwilling. Bedinn.”
Two of the robed and veiled women ran to him when he called, kneeling to either side of me and bowing with their fists pressed to their foreheads. Their minds were unsurprised at the summons and their fright was minimal, showing the entire thing had been well planned. My own fright, unvoiced, was evident only in the increased trembling in my body.
“Your sisters now stand by to be of aid to you, bedin,” Kednin said, releasing my arms as the two robed women straightened from their bow. I immediately tried to back away from the man and get to my feet, but the women turned as one and took hold of my bound arms, keeping me in place. I writhed in their grip, still on my knees, turning my head from side to side to beg them with my eyes. Please let me go, I tried to ask, please let me get away from him, but their eyes were hooded and uncompromising, their minds not even sympathetic. They moved closer to me to get better leverage, obedience to their hizah their only concern, their movement underscoring Kednin’s chuckle.
“Ah, I see you anxiously beseech their aid,” he said, his eyes unmoving from me, his mind knowing the truth his tongue ignored. “It bodes well for your future servitude that you are able to ask the aid of sisters who are clothed while you kneel naked before your hizah. I feel sure they will provide the assistance you so earnestly desire.”
Then he laughed aloud, unable to contain his mirth any longer in the face of the burning red suddenly covering my body. It was bad enough being unclothed when everyone around you was the same; the shame of being naked among clothed people was more than I could stand. The difference I’d managed to forget had been pointed out for just that reason, to shame me, but I couldn’t keep from reacting just the way Kednin wanted me to. I closed my eyes and tried to bend forward, toward my knees, but the two bedinn holding my arms refused to allow it.
“Now do I truly see how eager you are to serve me, lovely bedin,” Kednin’s voice came as I nearly choked on a sob. “You wish the waiting to be over, and so it shall be.”
His hands touched me then, causing my eyes to fly open even though it was just my ribs he touched. The women on either side of me shifted their grips, one hand still on my arm, the other hand pressing into my back, forcing my upper torso forward toward the veiled man. I was being offered to the man whose blue eyes burned so brightly above a white veil, a man who didn’t refuse the invitation. His hands slid from my ribs to my breasts, touching me as though he owned me, touching me as though I alone offered myself. I wanted to die of shame, being thrust at a man like that, but I couldn’t even scream.
Before they were through with me, I learned how much it was possible to go through without dying of shame. Kednin touched me all over, slowly, caressingly, the two bedinn keeping me from drawing back and refusing his touch, their hands kept carefully out of his way but always there. It wasn’t long before those smaller hands were on my knees, drawing my thighs as wide as possible, offering the hizah a clear avenue for the continuance of his exploration. I had no doubt that he would take the avenue, but when he did a number of other hizahh rose from their places and came to crouch closer, to more easily see my reaction. As miserable as I felt I was sure there would be no reaction—other than an increase in my misery—but I hadn’t counted on all those extra minds and the dimly understood way the barbarian had bewitched my body.
Kednin’s invasion began as tearful outrage to my senses, an invasion that would have to be endured because it couldn’t be escaped. I cringed inwardly against expected pain, wondering how long I could endure it, but shockingly there was no pain, only a slowly demanding sensation of expectation, I suppose it would have to be called. I didn’t understand the sensation, but before I could begin to analyze it there were many minds very close around me, all of them filled with desire or arousal or both. The men who had come closer were feeling desire and beginning to feel arousal; the women who held me could no longer fight the sensation of burning in their own bodies at the sight of my body being touched; Kednin, my chief tormentor, had been radiating desire steadily from the time he first began with me. It was very much like the low, faraway drone of chanting voices that refused to stop, that refused to keep from growing louder and steadier. The beat of the chanting pushed at me, taking me up in its rhythm, forcing me to move in its flow. I couldn’t quite make out the words of the chant, but then I realized there were no words, nothing but movement and feeling and fire.