The water continued to flow over her, over her buttocks, her belly, down into the basin, washing away all the waste. And she was dissolving into an overall ecstasy that seemed a form of climax in itself. But it wasn’t. It was just beyond her reach, the climax. And as she felt her mouth open in a low gasp, she rocked back and forth on the brink, her body pleading silently and vainly with those who held her. All the invisible knots were gone from her spirit. She was without the slightest strength, and utterly dependent upon the grooms to support her.
They stroked her hair back from her forehead. The warm water washed her again and again.
And then she saw, as she dared to open her eyes, that the Master himself was there. He was standing in the doorway of the room and he was smiling at her. He came forward and lifted her up out of this moment of indescribable weakness.
She stared at him, stunned that it was he who held her as the others covered her in towels again.
She felt as defenseless as she had ever been, and it seemed an impossible reward that he led her out of the little chamber. If she could only embrace him, only find the cock under his robes, only…The elation of being near him escalated immediately into pain.
“O, please, we have been starved and starved,” she wanted to say. But she only looked down demurely, feeling his fingers on her arm. That was the old Beauty speaking the words in her head, wasn’t it? The new Beauty wanted to say only the word “Master”.
And to think that only moments ago she had been considering love for him. Why, she loved him already. She could breathe the fragrance of his skin, almost hear his heart beat as he turned her and directed her forward. His fingers clasped her neck as tightly as they had before.
Where was he taking her?
The others were gone. She was set on one of the tables. She shivered in happiness and disbelief as he himself began to rub more perfumed oil into her. But this time there was to be no covering of gold paint. Her bare flesh would shine under the oil. And he pinched her cheeks with both hands to give them color as she rested back on her heels, her eyes wet from the steam and from her tears, watching him dreamily.
He seemed deeply absorbed in his work, his dark eyebrows knit, his mouth half open. And, when he applied gold leash clamps to her nipples, he pressed them tight for an instant with a little tightening of his lips that made her feel the gesture all the more deeply. She arched her back and breathed deeply. And he kissed her forehead, letting his lips linger, letting his hair brush her cheek.
“Lexius,” she thought. It was a beautiful name.
When he brushed her hair it was almost with angry, fierce strokes, and chills consumed her. He brushed it up and wound it on top of her head. And she glimpsed the pearl pins that he used to fasten it. Her neck was naked now, like the rest of her.
As he put the pearls through her ear lobes, she studied the smooth dark skin of his face, the rise and fall of his dark lashes. He was like a finely polished thing, his fingernails buffed to look like glass, his teeth perfect. And how deftly yet gently he handled her.
It was over too fast, and yet not fast enough. How long could she writhe, dreaming of orgasm? She cried because there had to be some release, and when he put her on the floor her body ached as never before, it seemed.
Gently, he pulled the leashes. She bent down, forehead to the ground, as she crept forward, and it seemed to her that she had never been more completely the slave.
If she had any ability left to think, as she followed him out of the bath, she thought that she could no longer remember a time when she had worn clothes, walked and talked with those who did, commanded others. Her nakedness and helplessness were natural to her, more natural here in these spacious marble halls than anywhere else, and she knew without a doubt that she would love this Master utterly.
She could have said it was an act of will, that after talking with Tristan she had simply decided. But there was too much that was unique about the man, even in the delicate way that he himself had groomed her. And the place itself, it was like magic to her. And she had thought she loved the harshness of the village!
Why must he give her away now? Take her to others? But it was wrong to question…
As they moved along the corridor together, she heard for the first time the soft breathing and sighs of the slaves who decorated the niches on either side of them. It seemed a muted chorus of perfect devotion.
And a confusion of all sense of time and place overcame her.
RUSSIAN DRESSING by Svetlana Boym
“YOU’RE FRIGID,” he told her as they passed the Gorky statue on Kirov Avenue. She was hurt that he no longer had his hand on her shoulder under the thick wool coat, but was walking aloof, chewing pink Finnish gum. Frigid -frigidna... Frigida – Fetida, Femida – probably a Roman goddess, with small classical breasts and pupilless eyes of cool marble. It might have been her in that picture in the history book, standing near the handsome Apollo with broken masculine arms. Right before the Barbarian invasion… or was it after? She caught her embarrassed reflection in the window of the Porcelain Shop. It felt uncomfortably damp and raw. She wanted so much to replay the whole scene, to put his hand back under her wool coat, to experience the meaningful weight of his warm fingers, to press her cheek against his frosted mustache in that split second before they reached the faded neon “P”of the Porcelain Shop. But it was too late now; he wouldn’t give her another chance, another touch. They had already crossed the tram routes and were parting by the park fence where there was the poster for Leningrad Dixieland. Season: 1975.
“Excuse me, miss, are you the last in line?”
“Yes.”
“Well, not anymore. I’m after you… And what’s the line for? Grilled chickens or ‘Addresses and Inquiries’?”
“Addresses and Inquiries, I hope.”
“Good… good… let’s hope together. That’s the only thing we can do these days – hope. Right? I see you’re not from around here…”
“Oh, yes, I am…”
“Oh yeah? You sure don’t look like it… Forgive my curiosity, miss, if you’re from round here, why are you waiting at the Information Kiosk?”
“I’m just looking up my school friends…”
“Oh, okay. One has to do that from time to time… I thought you were some kind of foreigner or something…”
Anya realized she had forgotten how to make small talk in Russian. She had lost that invisible something that makes you an insider, whether it’s a tone of voice, a gesture of habitual indifference, or half-words half said but fully understood. Anya left the Soviet Union fifteen years ago; then she had been told that it would be forever, that there would be no way back; it was like life and death. But now she was able to visit Leningrad again. The city had changed its name, and so had she. She came back as an American tourist, and stayed in the overpriced hotel where you could drink chilled orange juice, that item of bourgeois charm. Like other idle Westerners she began to collect communist antiques, little Octubrist star-pins showing baby Lenin with gilded curls, red banners with embroidered gold inscriptions “To the Best Pig Farmer for Achievement in Labor” or “To the Brigade with a High Level of Culture”. She wanted to pass for a native, but her unwarranted smiles were giving her away and the Petersburgians frowned at her suspiciously in passing.
Anya was born on the Ninth Soviet Street in Leningrad and now she lived on the Tenth West Street, New York. Could she make small talk in New-Yorkese? Yes, of course. During these years she had learned how to be an insider-foreigner, a New-Yorker-foreigner, along with other resident and non-resident aliens, legal and illegal city dwellers. Anya was among the lucky green-card-carrying New Yorkers and could show her picture with the properly exposed right ear and the finger print. New York felt like home. It struck her now that she was much more comfortable in a place like home than she was at home. She was a regular at Lox Around the Clock, and could spell her name fast over the phone. R-o-s-en-b-l-u-m A-n-y-a no, it’s not Annie, it’s N-Y, like in ‘New-York’ – Thank you – You too.”