Rahab Bk. 02 Ch. 03: Damila

Jess looked at me with pain in her face.

‘Pixie, have I displeased you? Everything I do is because I think it is what you wish. Was I wrong?’

My mind worked fast.

‘It is not you, Jess, it is me. I need to fix boundaries, and I have failed. No, it is not you. But fix them we must.’

It all came out in a rush.

I explained that there needed to be a wall between what we did together, and what happened with others. Her position depended on me, and mine depended on the perception that I was useful to Calliope, the Sultan and others. If it was thought, even for a moment, that I was the tool of someone else, our position would crumble to dust. If it was thought that I was in thrall to Jess, then our position could quickly collapse.

‘I understand, my darling Rahab, and as long as you love me, we can work through our love-making.’

Bending, she pulled me to her.

I was relieved.

She kissed me. It was a deep kiss, a long one, one that seemed as though it would never end. Her lips and mine pressed, wet, luscious, longing. Her tongue entered my lips, to be met by mine, with a loving welcome. Her hands slid down my spine; I shivered. I pressed myself against her, and holding me, she and I fell on the couch.

My body seemed to feel her everywhere. My tiny breasts ached, as though my nipples would burst. My tummy felt all fluttery. My sex was wet for her. My hands stroked and kneaded her breasts, her nipples standing to attention for me. I sucked on them, first softly, flicking my tongue across her erect nipples, and then, closing my lips around them, I sucked. The process of suction made her nipples stand up more, and the rest of her body responded in kind. My fingers slid between her thighs.

As I sucked on her nipples and played with her sex, she writhed under me, her hips gyrating.

‘I love you so much, Rahab Pixie.’ She moaned as she spoke.

Driving my fingers into her wetness, I felt her begin to shudder. Then she climaxed, melting into me, her body spasms witnessing to the pleasure she was getting.

When she stopped shaking, we cuddled and snuggled up. I looked her in the eyes.

‘We needed that; you needed that too darling.’

She nodded, smiling, sleepily.

We slept until we were woken for breakfast; this was a rare thing as, usually, I made sure that no one saw us sleeping together. But there was nothing we could do about that now.

After breakfast one of the servants brought me a note.

‘It is imperative I see you. Bashir has sent me. Princess Damila Amal-al-din.’ That was all she wrote.

Intrigued, I had her brought to my quarters, telling Jess to bring us coffee and sweets.

As she came into the room, I was hit by her beauty. Princess Damila was the most beautiful woman I had ever seen; and I had seen a lot. Her long, aquiline nose ought, by rights, to have barred her from being a classical beauty, but with cheek-bones as sharp as a razor, and eyes like opals, her long black hair swept back, she looked every inch a Princess. Dressed modestly, in the Druze fashion, she still made a striking figure.

‘To what do I owe the honour Princess?’

‘The Amir Bashir says you are the one with whom to talk.’

The Princess was slightly out of breath.

‘I take it that would be about the rebellion in your home Mountain.’

‘So you know of us?’

‘Who, Highness, has not heard of the Amal-al-dins? Your family is the most famous in this land, and the deeds of your ancestors are the stuff of legend.’

She bowed.

‘The Amir was right. You have the body of a girl but the mind of a man.’

‘Highness,’ I smiled, ‘we should not aim that low. We women are more than a match for men in the battlefield of the mind.’

I loved the light, high quality of her laugh.

Jess entered with the coffee and sweets.

‘I take it, Princess, that you wish to talk about a replacement for the Shihab rulers who have risen against the Sultan?’

There was a flash of anger in those pretty eyes.

‘The Sultans should never have trusted them, they are the spawn of Zhaitan, and my house has worked always for the Sultan.’

‘Highness, we are none of us responsible for the past, but we are for the future. What have you to propose?’

‘We take it that the Sultan will wreak fire and sword on the Druze? The Shihabs have been proclaiming the weakness of the Sultan, that is how they fomented rebellion. Oh, but my people will pay a heavy price.’

‘The Padishah would not have come had he not wished to make an example of those who rebel against his lawful authority. I understand the Amal-al-din position, but it is for you to accommodate yourself to the Sultan, not the other way round.’

There was no use my pretending I could speak for the Sultan, but I knew how his mind worked, and if the Princess thought that she could persuade him onto her side by bringing up past grievances, she had mistaken her man. Whatever had transpired under his father, Mehmet would never admit any mistakes had been made. The Amal-al-dins had best get used to that idea.

She looked at me, and of a sudden, smiled. Taking a sip of her coffee, she leaned in my direction.

‘You are as wise as Bashir said. I must not allow my anger, however righteous, to cloud my judgement. But, little Vizier, what would you advise?

‘What if some awful fate was to overtake the Amir of the Shihabs?’

She looked back at me.

‘That would depend on whether the great Padisha would still wreak vengeance?’

‘That would depend on whether the Amir and his family were at one? The Sultan would not wish it to look as though the Shihabs were being replaced by your clan, my Lady.’

There was a flash of real anger.

‘And why, pray, would we dispose of the Amir if we were not to replace the Shihabs. I am wasting my time!’

‘My Lady, attend my words, I said “not wish it to look as though”.’

She looked puzzled.

‘Unravel your mystery.’

‘If the Shihabs think that vengeance will fall on all of them, and that the fall of the Amir will see them slip under your sole rule, why would they not fight to the last? But if they supposed that those who took the side of the Padishah might hope for some mitigation and a junior place at the table of power, might the clan not then fracture?’

The cloud of anger was replaced by a smile of spring sunshine.

‘Bashir was right. So, suppose what you say came to pass, how could we be sure that the great Padishah would not lay waste to the Druze lands?’

I smiled back, swiftly checking her queen’s assault on my king.

‘You can be sure he will if there is no fracture in the Shihab clan. More than that will depend on my skill.’

‘And for that, there will be a price?’

‘My Lady, let us not divide the skin of the bear before he is slain. I shall trust in you as you must in me. Let that be what unites us. A shared endeavour and trust are better bonds for the longer term than money.’

The Princess looked at me quizzically,

‘Bashir only half understood you. I think it takes a woman to read you. You are one of us, aren’t you?’

Her dark brown eyes gazed at me, trying to read my soul. Mine held hers. The tension was palpable.

‘Yes.’

She smiled, as she relaxed; I smiled back,

‘We may have a bond even stronger than a shared political goal, little Vizier. I would take you to my couch if that would please you?’

‘I cannot imagine it would not, Princess.’

We both knew what we wanted.

Her smile drew me in. She licked her lips, hardly perceptibly, unless, like me, you were locked in by her gaze. I held her look. Again, that slight movement around the corners of her mouth. Her eyes said she wanted me. I am sure she read the same message in mine. She was like some statue of the Greeks, good to look at for its own sake, the proportions perfect, the very line of her jaw, as it curved up to meet her cheekbones brought me into raptures. I had seen a drawing of the goddess Venus, and the Princess could have stood as the model.

But I recalled the words of Bashir about control, and asserted my control over myself. I smiled. She smiled. We knew.

‘So, little Vizier, the next stages will be what?’

‘On the political front,’ I smiled as I made the qualification, knowing full well she had wanted me to say something about the personal chemistry that we had both felt, ‘I shall speak with the Padisha and get a message to you via Bashir. But if you can arrange it that the Amir has an accident soon, that would be an advantage.’

‘Were that to happen in the next few days, I take it that it would be propitious?’

‘I think I could say that it would materially help.’

We understood each other, there too.

She walked over to me.

‘Let me bid you farewell for now.’

We moved to embrace in the conventional fashion, but somehow our lips found each other. The moment of their joining sent waves of pleasure to my nipples, and elsewhere. There was a moment; but it passed, and I remained Rahab the little Vizier.

‘You tasted delicious,’ the Princess said.

‘As did you,’ I responded.

With that, leaving behind only the scent of her perfume, and an impress on my pleasure centres, the Princess departed.

There was, I thought, much to done.