“Great Goddess,” she whispered urgently, “I offer You my desire, my willingness to serve Your needs.”
She touched her fingers to the stone image, then moved her hand back between her legs, finding the hard nub of her clitoris.
She moaned, keeping her eyes on the image of the Goddess as pleasure filled her, shimmering over her skin. But in her mind’s eye all she saw was the face of Akaash. Rugged. Dangerous. His dark eyes, glittering like coal in the torchlight. The white slash of his teeth between his lush lips. Lips she wanted to feel on her skin.
“Oh…”
She pressed onto her clitoris, harder and harder, and with her other hand she caressed her nipples, first one, then the other.
His hair was all long, dark waves punctuated by tiny braids, beads woven into them, and coils of metal wire. Beautiful. Strong. And his body…she had never seen that kind of muscle on a man. Long, lean muscles, covered in golden skin. The boldly patterned tattoo covering his left forearm, like heavy black thorns and swirling dots…there was something alien and masculine about it. What would that body, that skin, feel like beneath her hands?
Another surge of pleasure, sharp and hot, centering in her sex and spreading through her belly, her breasts, making her nipples so hard they ached, needing to be touched.
His name was Akaash.
“Akaash.”
Even his name was like some sort of wild aphrodisiac on her lips.
Desire was like the high tone of a bell, reverberating in her body, singing in her blood. She rubbed harder, circling her clitoris, closing her eyes.
Akaash…
She pinched one nipple hard between her fingers, pinched her clit just as hard. Her body tensed, and she came, shuddering. Pleasure stabbed into her, again and again, into her sex, her thighs, making her weak, dizzy.
Akaash…
She would have him. And during the month-long Taming Moon she would touch herself, come for him, over and over. Offer her pleasure to the Goddess. Do her duty.
She would not think about what would come after, on the altar on the day of her Sacrifice.
Akaash.
No, she would not think of it.
It was dark when Leilin came to Nitara’s room and woke her, the hour late into the night.
“Nitara, it is time to go to the Sanctuary.”
“Leilin. I’ve been dreaming,” Nitara murmured, trying to drag her mind out of the fog of too little sleep.
The room was mostly dark, lit only by the candle her sister carried. Leilin’s round face was pale, like a small moon, her green eyes dark in the shadows.
“Of what, Little Sister?”
“Of him. My Sacrifice.”
“Good dreams? Fruitful dreams?”
Nitara sat up in her bed, pushing her hair from her face. “I dream he is touching me. That his body is hard against mine. I dream that I can feel the texture of his hair…”
“You want him.”
“Yes. He’s very beautiful.”
“You’re lucky.”
“Was your Sacrifice beautiful?”
“He was average in looks. It didn’t matter. I did my duty, anyway. But you are fortunate to desire him. It’s a gift from the Goddess.”
“Did you not feel desire at your Sacrifice, Leilin?”
“I felt the desire I was trained to. My body responded as it was taught.”
“But your mind…”
“…was on my duty to the Great Unnamed One. That is often how it is for a Breeder.”
“My mind will be on
him
. Too much, perhaps.”
Leilin leaned in closer, clasped Nitara’s hand in hers. “Be careful, Little Sister. You tread on dangerous ground. He is an instrument. He serves a purpose, as we all do.”
“I will keep the intentions of the Goddess in mind, Leilin. But...”
“There must be nothing else, Nitara. Come now. Go to him, tantalize him, so that he’ll be unable to resist you come the day of Sacrifice. This is the purpose of the Taming Moon. To tame him with his desire for you. This is the first step in fulfilling our purpose on the Earth.”
“Yes, of course, Leilin. I’m being silly. I’ll go.”
Nitara rose from her bed, threw on the linen robe made for this purpose, closed it around her body. Leilin lit the candle on her bed stand and handed it to her, kissed her cheek and left.
The halls were cool in the evening air. Nitara’s bare feet whispered on the smooth stone as she made her way down and down, into the deepest levels which held the Sanctuary. Her pulse was hot, fluttering. She was far too eager to see him.
Finally she reached the outer chamber, where a small altar stood. She bowed before it, touching her fingers to the rounded breasts and belly of the stone image of the Goddess before slipping through the doorway and into the small room opposite the cell which held her Sacrifice.
Akaash.
He was sleeping, his long body laid out on the bare floor, but came awake quickly. Too quickly—the herbs should have kept him sedated, as well as aroused. Still, she didn’t think to run to the guards or the priestesses. She liked that he was alert, that he knew something of what was going on around him. That he could know
her
. She liked the way his long hair hung down his back, over the hard muscles of his wide shoulders, the contrast of black hair and sleek golden-brown skin.
He watched her with wary eyes.
“Is it morning?” he asked, his voice rough with sleep.
“You are to exist without sense of time or place. You are to exist only to feel a need which must be fed.”
“Your drugs make me feel such need.”
“Only the drugs?” she asked, letting the robe fall open, her belly and breasts bared to him. “Am I not enticing?”
Her body was going hot all over, seeing the hunger in his eyes.
“You know you are.”
A small thrill went through her at his admission.
“Before the month of the Taming Moon is over, you will know it, as well, Akaash the Wanderer.”
He only grunted, but he kept his gaze on her.
She slipped the robe from her shoulders, let it fall to the ground and stepped back, knelt on the pile of cushions placed on the floor for this purpose. She leaned forward, cupping her breasts with her hands.
“I like that you watch me. I like the need in your eyes.” She feathered her fingertips over her nipples, and they grew full beneath her touch. “I wish these were your hands, Akaash.”
Pleasure shafted through her as she said his name, teasing her nipples into two hard points.
“I want to feel your rough palms on my flesh, your mouth close over my nipple. To feel the heat and the wet. To feel you sucking.”
Desire was like a storm raging over his face. She saw the rise of his hard cock beneath the loincloth he wore. He strained in his bonds, but said nothing. His silence was like a challenge to her. She would
make
him admit his need for her.
“Akaash,” she said softly, simply because she enjoyed the sound of his name on her lips, “my skin would be sweet on your tongue.” She lifted her breasts, offering them to him. “Tell me you want to taste it.”
His eyes blazed. His jaw clenched.
She smiled and let her hands drop from her breasts, gliding them over her sides, the tops of her thighs. “I am even sweeter here,” she said, slipping one hand into her cleft. “You had a small taste the last time I saw you.”
A small groan from him, through his tense jaw.
“Ah, I knew it,” she told him, smiling in triumph.
“Damn it, woman. What is this game?” His voice was rough, raw. “You’re here to seduce me, that much is common knowledge. You’re here to torture me with the sight of your body. Of course I want you. To touch you. To taste you. To fuck you.”
She shivered, hearing the crude words from his mouth. That lush mouth. She remembered the softness of his lips on her fingertips. Unexpectedly soft…
She felt suddenly the power of her ability to do this to him. To make him suffer with desire. She understood that part of it was the drugs the guards fed to him. But she also knew the force of her own femininity. It was the first time in her life she had felt any sense of power, of control over anything. It confused her. Aroused her. Made her want more.
She spread her thighs apart, until she knew he could see the lips of her shaved sex. He watched her carefully as she massaged the swollen lips, and found the pleasure rising, sharp and swift. It felt different with him watching her do these things. Different than doing it to herself, alone. Different from Xian’s touch when she taught her the ways of pleasure and seduction.
She slid her fingers between her folds. She was soaking wet. Aching. And when she slipped one fingertip inside, she saw every muscle in his body jump.
“Let me out of these bonds,” he murmured.
“I cannot do that.”
“Let me out and I will put my hand where yours is.”
“Oh…”
She was shaking with need. Close to coming. Too close.
“Let me out,” he said again, his voice a low growl, “and I will put my tongue there. I will taste you for myself.”
She shook her head, spread her thighs wider and rubbed in a small circle over her clitoris. She moaned in pleasure, her body growing hotter, hotter.
“I’m told you breeders are trained in sex by your priestesses.”
“Yes. We are taught to please a man using phalluses made of clay. And the priestesses train us to sexual response with their own touch, their hands and mouths.”
It made her wetter to say these things to him aloud.
“So you know that ultimate pleasure of lips and tongue on your sweet cunt?”
“Yes…”
Every muscle in his body was tense as he leaned forward, as far as his restraints would allow. “I would bury my face between your lovely thighs, push my tongue inside you, lick your hard little clit.”
His skin was gleaming with sweat, the iron cuffs biting into his strong wrists as he pulled against them. And the bulge of his cock beneath the fabric of the loincloth made her mouth water. To have his cock inside her…
Soon…
“Tell me again you want me, Akaash.”
“I will tell you, but it will do me no good, will it? I will tell you, anyway. I want you. To fuck you. To grind my cock into your body until it hurts. Until you scream in pleasure. Until your cunt closes hard around me, clenching me as you come. Until I feel the wet heat of your come, until I can smell your pleasure. And then I will do it again, Nitara. And again, and again, until you cannot breathe, cannot move, cannot even beg for more.”
“Oh…Goddess…”
Her body clenched in pleasure, her climax thundering through her. A dull white noise roared in her head, and she closed her eyes, her sex pulsing with heat, burning through her. She cried out, and heard his groans.
“Damn it, woman, you do this to me!”
She opened her eyes, looked at him. He was panting, covered in a fine sheen of sweat. His eyes were dark, the pupils enormous. He looked as if he might kill someone.
Dangerous.
Yes, but she loved the idea of that danger, contained as it was by the drugs and his bonds and his
need
.
Beautiful.
She got up on shaking legs, picked up her discarded robe.
“I will return to you soon.”
With one last look at his beautiful, tortured face, she ran from the room.
She was beautiful. Beautiful and wicked and cruel.
His cock was so hard it hurt, and chained as he was, there was nothing he could do about it.
Their damn drugs weren’t quite working, not as they were intended to. No, mostly it was the girl. That soft, white flesh, her rounded breasts, the nipples two perfect nubs of pink, full and luscious. He couldn’t even think about her pussy.
He groaned, his cock pulsing. He was torturing himself, but he couldn’t help it. Those pink lips peeking from between the smooth curve of her thighs. How tight she would be, the walls of her cunt clasping him as he slid inside…
He arched his hips, meeting nothing but the light cloth that covered him. It was agonizing. Almost enough to make him come. Almost.
He could not believe this was happening to him. Trapped like an animal, tortured with naked flesh he could not touch. Shame and desire warred in him in equal measures, and he didn’t know which would win at any given moment.
He wished for the drugs. Wished they would work, make it all some sort of terrible dream. Except that it wasn’t all terrible.
Nitara.
He couldn’t stop thinking of her. He didn’t want to. Didn’t want to
want
her. It felt like some sort of betrayal. To his people. To his own God, El, and his consort, the Goddess, Ela. To his bonded lover, Dhatri.
But he could not think of Dhatri. It brought too much pain. Too much shame.
He focused on the shame, willing his erection down. And after some time, it worked.
His life would end in regret. Regret he would likely never have the chance to redeem. And here he was, yearning for some girl—one belonging to the city’s temple—like a dog in heat.
Unbearable.
He was shaking, fury burning through him as fiercely as desire had earlier.
He must find some way to escape. To make his way home to the Mutairi. To earn once more his place in the clan.
Meanwhile, he would not talk to her again. There was something about that small bit of communication that made her seem all too human to him. Imminently desirable.
The Wanderers spoke of the breeder girls as just that—broodmares for the temple. And he knew that was true. He hadn’t expected one of them to have any individuality. But this girl, Nitara…she was, unexpectedly, a person. One he would not know.
Would
not.
He could not prevent his physical desire for her. But he could avoid any other sort of attraction. Any other sort of thought, where she was concerned. He must remain as detached as possible, and focus only on his escape.
He lay on the hard-packed earthen floor for a long time, willing his mind to find some answer, some way out. But he came up with nothing.
Finally, too weary to think, he whispered a prayer to the Mighty El for strength and to the Goddess Ela for hope, and slept.
Chapter Three
Nitara’s body was still humming with climax, her third one of the night. She’d come to Akaash’s cell in the Sanctuary tonight, determined to make him speak to her, to torture him with her own pleasure until he could no longer help himself. But she had failed.
He had not said one word to her for fifteen days. She had visited him once each day, and once each night, as was the rule, sometimes spending several hours there, in the small space on the other side of the iron bars. She had brought herself to climax after climax in front of him, pleasuring her body in every way she knew how. His constant erection, his tense muscles, his glittering gaze and flushed face, had let her know he wanted her as much as he ever had. But other than the occasional grunt or groan, he remained mute.
He was a stubborn man. And a strong one. His strength—and his stubborn silence—made her desire him even more.
Her desire was like some rare fuel, feeding her and feeding her, yet leaving her always hungry. Even after coming three times, she craved his touch. And now, she craved even the sound of his voice—it had been too long denied her.
Her legs were shaking, her body weak, lambent. His dark gaze was on her as she lay back on the pillows. She had come to know the bronze light within the brown depth of his gaze, especially when he was aroused or angry.
“You will not speak to me, Akaash?” She pushed her hair from her face, the long, silky strands sticking to her damp cheek. “I have given you my pleasure, over and over. That is all I have to give. Will you not indulge me?”
He stared at her, his jaw tightening. But he didn’t look away.
He never did. No matter how silent, he always watched her.
She sighed. “I understand your anger at being here. How this must injure your pride—”
“You think this is about pride?” he roared, startling her.
She sat upright. “Ah, you speak to me at last.”
“This is not some battle you’ve won. Don’t look so damn proud of yourself. I speak now because I choose to.”
She couldn’t help the smile on her face. “I am glad you choose to.”
“Why?”
“What do you mean?”
“Why do you care if I speak to you or not? I’m your prisoner. Your victim. Why do you care one way or another what I do or say?”
“I don’t know,” she told him honestly. She leaned forward, toward the bars that separated them. His face was stormy with rage, but there was real curiosity in his eyes. “I only know that I do care.”
His features softened the tiniest bit. “You shouldn’t. There are rumors about what goes on in your temple. What happens to the men of the Wanderers who are captured and brought here. Who are never seen again. I can imagine it’s not a good idea for a breeder girl to become attached to one of us.”
“I am not attached.”
“No?”
He looked at her, one dark brow raised. She felt…flustered, her cheeks heating. She picked up her robe and pulled it around her shoulders.
“I’m only curious about you,” she said. It was partly true. The other part of the truth was that she wanted more than this build of sexual tension, his forbidden touch. But she didn’t know what, exactly.
“What do you want to know?”
“Will you truly tell me, if I ask?”
“That depends on what you ask.”
She nodded, thinking. “I know little of your people. We’re kept separate from the rest of society, we Breeders. We hear things…from the priestesses, when they talk among themselves and think we aren’t listening. Sometimes from the eunuch guards who watch over us. But I’ve never known what’s true and what is only imagined. We’re told that your people are wild. Primitives who live in the Wasteland like animals.”
“Animals don’t have speech.”
“No. But I didn’t expect you to speak this way.”
“What way?”
“The way we of the Temple do.”
“Did you expect us to be covered in fur and have tails?”
“Of course not!”
“I’m teasing you, girl.”
She swore a grin tilted the corner of his lush mouth.
“I’m not a girl. I am a woman.”
“Yes, I’ve seen that very clearly for myself.”
“Why do you address me with such disdain, Wanderer?”
“Can you blame me?”
Her cheeks were going hot. “You should be overcome with desire for me.”
“Ah, I am. You’ve seen my raging cock.” He sat up on his heels, the muscles of his stomach flexing as he moved, golden skin over solid iron, his large hands gripping the chains that held him. “It thirsts for you, Nitara. Make no mistake. But maybe the reason you expect me to be some raving animal is because the men who are brought here are drugged beyond all reason.” His tone was bitter again.
“But you are not.”
“No. What are the drugs made of? Do you know the names?”
“Valerian and datura. Mandrake. Caltrop. Herbs, to quiet you, to stimulate you.”
“Valerian I know. I’ve tried it to help me sleep when I was injured in the hunt. It’s useless for me. Datura we use in our Manhood rituals. We have for generations. It’s a strong hallucinogen, but works less and less well, in recent years. My people are becoming immune to its effects.”
“Why are you telling me these things?”
His gaze went hard, his dark eyes seeming to look through her.
“Will you run and tell your priestesses, Nitara? Will you give them this information to use against the people of the clans?”
Her heart was a small hammer in her chest. She whispered, “No.”
“I thank you for that.”
He smiled then, a real smile, and her body seemed to light from within. His teeth were white, strong. His face was beautiful, all hard, fine planes, high cheekbones and that soft, lush mouth…
She
was
curious about him, that much was true. More now than ever. He was becoming more and more of a
person
to her. She knew it was dangerous. But she couldn’t stop herself.
“I am told you have your own gods,” she said. “That you worship some deity other than our Goddess.”
“Yes. The God El and the Goddess Ela. God of fall and winter and Goddess of spring and summer. They’re powerful. Fierce, as our people are. Wrathful and punishing.”
“Even your Goddess?”
“Is your goddess not a punishing goddess?”
“She is called the Loving Moon. The female spirit is ever nurturing, and those of us who live within the Temple aspire to her loving nature. Our God is the Angry Sun. We live in fear of the Nameless God, who razed the Earth in the Burning Time. But we love the Goddess. You cannot worship what you do not love.”
“Females cannot, in your view, be vengeful? Your goddess is not vengeful?”
“She is all love,” Nitara said, then thought of her mother, her brother. “I…the Great Goddess does punish those who work against Her.” She twisted a strand of her long hair between her fingers. “It is Her right. Her choice, made in Her divine wisdom. She has Her reasons, and we must not question. We’re only human, Her servants.”
“And yet you look sad.”
Nitara shook her head, pulled her robe tighter around her.
“What does a breeder girl, who lives, pampered and protected, have to be sad about?”
There was a bitter edge to his voice once more. Resentment.
“What do you know of my existence?”
“I know it’s far easier than my own. But one I would never trade for.”
“Nor should you. I live in ease, it’s true. I’m fed and sheltered, protected from the dangers of the cities and the Wasteland. Yet I am not allowed outside the walls of the Temple, nor will I ever be. I know enough to understand that there is a world out there which I will never see. I’m caged as much as you are at this moment.”
“I’m surprised to hear you say such things.”
“So am I.”
She felt her eyes blazing. With fury. With tears. Her mind was a whirl of confusion.
“I’m sorry, Nitara.” His voice was soft. “The world is a terrible but beautiful place. It shouldn’t be denied anyone.”
She hung her head. “But it is being denied you now. Because the Temple holds you here for the purposes of our Goddess.”
“Yes.”
When she looked up he was watching her once more, but his expression was softer than she had ever seen it.
“Akaash. I’m sorry.”
His dark brows raised. “You surprise me again, girl.”
“I surprise myself. I did not expect…”
“What didn’t you expect?”
“To…feel for you.”
“Are your people so cold, then? Do they not love?”
“I love my sister, Leilin, and my brother, Nikkan. I love the High Priestess Xian, who has trained me in the ways of sensuality. I love my Sister Breeders. And I love the Great Goddess, of course.”
“There’s another kind of love,” he said quietly.
She wasn’t certain of what he meant, but his tone compelled her. She approached the cage, laying her palms flat against the bars. She had been this close to him only once. That first time, when she had touched her fingers to his lips. Now she took a few moments to really look at him, taking in the hard swell of muscle in his arms, his bare chest. The dark stubble that had grown into a short beard in the last weeks. His beautiful mouth. His dark eyes watching her, wary and filled with desire and something else she didn’t understand.
“Tell me,” she said. “Tell me about love.”
He glanced away for several moments, and she saw his jaw clench. When he looked back to her, his eyes were shadowed.
“I have a bonded lover. His name is Dhatri. He’s strong and brave. Beautiful. Wise beyond his years. He’s our fiercest warrior, a trainer of our young in weapons and the hunt. His love is fierce, powerful. He joined our clan, the Mutairi, when we were both sixteen. We’ve been together ever since. He wears the mark of our clan on his arm, as I do. He is one of us. He is…part of me.”
“It sounds wonderful.”
“It is until you’re parted from those you love.”
She saw grief on his face, and her heart melted. She wanted to comfort him, to put her arms around him. And she wanted more. She didn’t know what her need was, other than to be close to him. But any real sex was forbidden until the day of Sacrifice. Even this conversation would be forbidden. Knowing that left her feeling strangely bereft.
“I understand your pain.”
“Do you?”
She nodded. “I have been parted from my mother since the age of six.”
“Did she die?”
“She was caught lying with her Sun Guard. Unconsecrated sex is forbidden for a priestess. She was sent away, into the Wasteland. I don’t even know if she survived.”
“Then you have some idea of my loss.”
“Yes.”
She wrapped her fingers around the bars, the iron cool beneath her palms.
He lifted one hand as though to reach for her, but the chains allowed him only a few inches of movement. “I’m sorry for yours, Nitara.”
She nodded, emotion a hard knot in her chest. What was happening to her?
“Akaash, I must go.”
He shrugged, but she could see emotion on his face. Was she only imagining that some of it was for her?
She knew it shouldn’t matter. He was an instrument, as Leilin had said, as everyone was an instrument of the Goddess. His purpose was to aid in the loss—the gift—of her virginity. To hopefully impregnate her. To aid in her sacred duty to carry on the human race. Her duty should be her only desire. But her desire had shifted, had become her own.
She was feeling something for this man.
Akaash.
She understood that to feel anything beyond sexual need was a sacrilege so profane, she could not imagine it had ever happened. She could not imagine what the Goddess’s punishment might be.
Clear your mind. Purify your heart.
Yes. She must go to the altar in her room and pray to be cleansed of these impure thoughts.
He was watching her again, as if he could see the thoughts churning in her mind, his brows drawn together.
“Nitara—”
She took a step back. Tears stung her eyes. “I must go…”
She turned and ran out the door.
Akaash’s chest ached as much as his swollen cock. What in El’s name was he thinking?
This girl was part of this place, these people who justified kidnapping and using his people for their own ends. He was her victim as much as he was the temple’s. And yet, he found himself feeling…sympathy for her.
Ridiculous.
He glanced down at his cock, straining against the loincloth.
That, too, was ridiculous. He would never feel the touch of this girl, would never sink into her lovely flesh, other than just before his death. Still, he craved that more than anything.
Maybe even more than his escape.
He thought of Dhatri, his dark, beautiful skin, the warmth of his flesh. His cock, large and full, thrusting into him…
He may never touch him again. Never struggle against the strength of his lover, their coming together a pure, animal fucking, full of lust and the rage of a warrior. Intense. Powerful. A battle they both won, in the end.
He would win nothing here.
He must escape. Forget Nitara. Forget her sad story, her lush body that tempted him beyond anything he had ever imagined.
If only his cock would let him forget. But it throbbed and ached, even as he fell into exhausted sleep.
He dreamed he was lying beneath a canopy of stars, glimmering silver in the night sky. She was in his arms, her skin the softest thing he’d ever felt in his life.
She was naked. So was he. His cock was hard, pulsing with life and need. She turned to him, raised her face to his, and he took her mouth, hungry for it. Hungry for
her
. Ravenous.
He pressed his cock against the softness of her belly, and she reached down and took it in her small hand.
Oh, yes…
He wanted to fuck her. Needed to.
He turned her onto her back. She spread her thighs for him and he settled his body between them. The tip of his cock nestled at her opening, and she was wet, ready for him.
He pushed in, her cunt enclosing him like a fist, tight and hot.
Pleasure surged through him, as brilliant as the stars. His sight dimmed, went dark. He was going to come…
He groaned, coming awake instead.