Part 9 (2/2)

Astar seemed to come alive for a moment. She saw Blade, as if for the first time, and her eyes narrowed and flamed. She leaped at him with a scream. ”Kill - kill! I am Astar. I am virgin. I will not be taken. I will kill... ”

She swung wildly with the sword. Blade ducked under it and moved in to grab her around the waist. He backhanded her wrist and the sword fell. He pulled the s.h.i.+eld off her arm and flung it away. She struggled in vain as he picked her up and carried her to the couch. Isma moved in closer behind him. He was suddenly aware that there was no sound in the cage other than the breathing of the three of them. The cage was soundproof. He glanced through the teksin, saw the open red throats of the howling mob of women, crazed by antic.i.p.ation and empathic coi.

Astar's struggles were feeble now, her breathing harsh and tortured. She slumped against Blade, her b.r.e.a.s.t.s mashed against his great chest. Blade was conscious of an intense and growing excitement. He was ready! With Isma at his back, waiting.

Isma spoke for the first time. ”Hurry,” she said. ”Hurry and take her and have done with it. She is nothing. I have seen to that. A token will be enough, just enter her and then leave her. Come to me! Save all of yourself for me, to take me. If you can! If you dare!”

Blade tossed Astar sprawling on the couch. He was breathing hard and his voice was harsh. ”And you, Isma? And you...when my back is to you?”

She laughed. ”Is Mazda afraid, then?”

Astar was sprawling on the couch, her eyes closed, her b.r.e.a.s.t.s heaving, her long golden legs flung wide. Yet Blade hesitated. ”They cannot hear us?”

”Of course not. Would I speak so else! Hurry with her and come to me.”

Blade fell atop Astar and thrust hard into her. Astar screamed. Her eyes rolled back in her head and she died. Blade had seen much of death and he knew she was dead. For a second he did not understand. It was not possible that he... Then he knew. Astar had been murdered, drugged, poisoned, by Isma. It had been a masterpiece of timing.

So was Isma's attack on Blade. While he was still in the trance of shock, of trying to understand, she leaped at him with a cry of defiance. She thrust hard at his naked back. Her teeth were bared and she was panting.

”If I can kill you, Mazda-Blade, I do not want you! I am sick to death of creatures that are not men. I'll kill you, Blade. Kill you!”

Her red mouth was dripping saliva as she attacked him. She was good with the sword. Blade rolled away, off the couch, and she slashed him in the side. Blood welled down his leg. He leaped away from her with a wolfish grin.

”You do mean to kill me, Isma!”

She feinted at his throat, then lowered her blade to slash at his still rigid manhood. ”I'll kill it, Blade. Kill it! I'll burn it and the ceboids can have your carca.s.s to toss on the dung heap. Mazda? A G.o.d? Prove it!”

He wondered if there was a word for insanity in Tharnian. He had not yet come across it. But whether or not, Isma was insane at this moment. She was devoured with double l.u.s.t. For killing and for coi, and one fed the other.

Blade retreated slowly around the cage. Isma followed, feinting and thrusting, silent now, her dark eyes blazing at him. Blade too was being overcome with l.u.s.t. He was also losing his temper. He made no effort to restrain it. He felt it sliding and let it go. If this b.i.t.c.h-G.o.ddess, this High Priestess of coi wanted coi, he could d.a.m.ned well give her coi. He would kill her, all right. He would slay her with the only weapon he had.

He slithered back past the couch where the dead Astar lay still sprawled in an att.i.tude of love. Isma followed, trying to work him into a corner. At any moment Blade could have picked up Astar's sword and s.h.i.+eld and killed Isma. He did not want to. Not that way. And he was not thinking of the consequences of such an act, whatever they might be. No. He was going to kill Isma symbolically, as Sutha had said he must, and it was going to be a slaying she would remember for the rest of her life. She would, thought Blade as his rage towered and grew, beg him to slay her over and over and over.

Isma slashed at him and missed. Blade smiled in mockery. It was time. He stepped in swiftly and caught her sword wrist and twisted. She screamed and he smiled and twisted again. He hurt her and enjoyed doing it. She dropped the sword.

Isma tried to brain him with the s.h.i.+eld. Blade struck her hard across the face with his open hand. She reeled back, stifling another scream, staring at him in disbelief. Then she leaped, screaming, spitting out the words in fury.

”You dare strike Isma!”

”I dare.” He struck her again, backhanding her the opposite way across those lovely features.

She clawed at his face and tried to bite him. Blade got his big hand into her thick hair and twisted. She screamed. He kicked her legs out from under her and she fell heavily. He had forgotten the crowd now. They were not there. He was intent on his fury and his l.u.s.t.

He pulled the s.h.i.+eld off her arm and flung it violently away. She tried to fight her way up and he kicked her feet away again. She was sobbing and screaming and cursing, her eyes wild with rage and her scarlet mouth drooling spittle.

Blade dragged her across the cage by her hair. As they pa.s.sed Astar's fallen sword she reached for it and he slashed hard at her wrist. She screamed in pain.

Blade pulled her on the couch by the hair. She lunged up at him and he yanked her head back.

Blade laughed down into her face, bitterly and furiously. ”Now, Isma! Now you shall find out who is Mazda! Are you ready?”

She spat in his face. ”Never...never...never. I forbid it. I am Isma, High Priestess of Tharn! I rule now. Only I-I will have you torn apart by ceboids.”

Blade's rage had begun to cool. He was still angry, but the red mist was clearing. He mocked her. ”I know you are the High Priestess, Isma. I also know that you murdered Astar so you could rule alone. You must have planned it for a long time. But you are wrong. I am Mazda and you are going to rule with me. Make up your mind to it, Isma! And now...”

She locked her thighs together, denying him entrance. She laughed wildly and he sensed the beginning of hysteria. ”No. You see, I will not permit it.”

Blade seized her firm left breast and twisted it cruelly. ”You will not?”

She screamed shrilly but refused to open her legs. He twisted the breast again, repeating: ”You will not, Isma? You will not?”

The long thighs parted. Blade plunged at her, stabbing, wanting to hurt her, to kill her.

She had, of course, never known a real man before. He did not lie close atop her, but raised himself so he could watch her face, see the mingled rage and fear slowly transformed to surprise and disbelief. She gasped and sighed Her mouth widened into a scarlet vacant and stayed that way. Her nails began to rake at his back, bringing blood, but there was no anger in her now.

Within a minute she convulsed for the first time. Blade had not even started. He plunged on, feeling that he was going to pierce her entrails, slay her once and for all, and he did not care what happened to him.

Minute followed minute. On and on. Isma began to cry and sob and ask for surcease.

”I am weary, My Lord. I would stop now. Please.”

Blade kept on.

She was frantic again. ”You are Mazda. You are my Lord. I am nothing - you are everything, my Lord... make slaveface - I make slaveface... I...”

Still Blade did not show mercy. It was not a Tharnian quality. It was not a Blade quality, either, at the moment On and on and on.

”Please, my Lord. Please! I cannot go on. I cannot. I am dying.”

”Die, then.”

”I cannot endure it, my Lord.”

”You must endure it. I am master now. Is that not so, Isma?”

”Yes. It is so, Lord. Yes-yes-yes-yes-yes.”

Blade convulsed and poured his seed into Isma, the High Priestess.

”Never call me Mazda again. Between us two. I am Blade. Blade of Tharn!”

”Yes, Lord. You are Blade of Tharn.”

She was whimpering and crying now. The firm b.r.e.a.s.t.s had gone to mush beneath him and in her long dark eyes was a look of satiety and content.

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