"If you lay one hand on me," their new purchase spat as she crouched in a corner lined with silken cushions, "my grandfather, Iskender-Khan, will lay kanly on you and yours unto the third generation, you son of a pig."
Now Mulloh Shouaib hadn't survived and become rich in the hazardous trade of slave dealing without possessing an acute and agile intellect.
Immediately the name of Iskender-Khan was uttered, it was tangibly apparent his purchase must be negated. "Go after Khazi at once and bring him back," he ordered his two minions, and they sprang from the room to obey his orders.
He boldly assessed the woman confronting him ferociously from across the room, clad immodestly in the harem raiment of silk trousers and scanty bolero, her heaving breasts displayed conspicuously, as the sheer material of the vest was inadequate to cover the bounteous curves.
"A pity," he sighed without reserve, "to think I must forgo the enchantments of such a luscious tidbit."
Iskender-Khan's vengeance held a palpable threat, however. Survival far outweighed transitory gratification in Mulloh Shouaib's hierarchy of values, and he wished to avoid a crude sordid death at the hands of Iskender-Khan.
Briskly dismissing pleasant images of Zena's opulent form impaled on his engorged instrument, he sensibly said, "Prepare for a further journey, mademoiselle. I fear I must forgo the pleasure of your company."
A short time later Khazi wrenched open the door and stalked into the room. Tossing a burka at Zena, he acrimoniously growled, "Women are always a trial, and you're no exception. Mulloh won't keep you, so we head farther south. Bah! I've half a mind to slit your throat and be done with a bad bargain. Come," he ordered, grabbed her by her arm, and dragged her out on the veranda and down the stairs.
When they were all mounted again, Khazi informed his cohorts that they were heading south to Ibrahim Bey's camp. Mulloh Shouaib had suggested Khazi take Zena there. In the event they were unsuccessful in locating Ibrahim Bey, for he was moving daily on his yearly excursion north to acquire new women for his seraglio, they could return to Gori, where Mulloh would give instructions to his agent to attempt to sell the girl to the Persian emissaries. For this gesture he expected a fee, of course, he had added with a bland smile, the enticement of profit too strong to relinquish entirely. He sent the message to Gori at once. There was a beautiful woman for sale, and Mulloh's risk in this capacity as intermediary would be minimal.
Coming out of the mountains onto the rolling hills of the highlands, Alex's party entered the village of Simonethi. Each tracker went in a separate direction, scouring the small municipality for information about Zena.
Alex tied his magnificent stallion Pasha outside a café and sank tiredly onto a bench near the door. He ordered tea and brandy and leaned his elbows on the table in front of him, cradling his weary head between his hands. They were still on the trail, but as each seemingly endless day passed into another, his anxieties concerning Zena's ability to survive such hardships mounted. She was the merest slip of a woman, too fragile and delicate to be put to this punishing adversity. He forced himself not to even consider the child she carried. That train of thought was insupportable, giving rise to an amorphous ferment of torment, guilt, and censure.
When his brandy and tea arrived, he threw the brandy down straightaway but sipped on the sweet tea, allowing himself five minutes to rest before he resumed his search.
Mulloh's agent had seen the magnificent animal tied outside, accoutered with gold-bedecked Russian saddle and bridle, and had concluded that the Giaour inside the café must be rich. Perhaps he would be interested in buying the captive woman of Khazi. They were all lechers anyway, the Giaour savages.
Alex raised a disinterested eyebrow in inquiry when the short little man sat down. "Would you be interested in buying a young girl?"
"No."
"She's very young." (Alex frowned.) "But not too young, Your Excellency, perhaps sixteen or seventeen," Abudullah hurriedly amended. (One never knew the specific tastes of one's customers.)
"Sorry, I'm not interested."
"You could teach this young filly to please your inclinations, sire. The young ones are more amenable."
"No doubt you're right. Perhaps another time," the prince replied indifferently.
The seller persisted.
"She could warm your bed tonight, Your Excellency. When was the last time you rode a beautiful, young girl?" he crooned suggestively.
Ten days ago, Alex thought pensively, and a multitude of delightful memories raced through his consciousness.
"No," the prince repeated firmly, "I'm not interested."
"You'll be sorry, Excellency—a dazzling, luscious, young, auburn-haired beauty with such magnificent, deep blue eyes, such white, delicious flesh." He kissed the tips of his fingers and closed his eyes briefly. Leaning conspir-atorially across the small mosaic table, he added, "And a tiny rosebud scar in the most enticing spot, my lord."
"Sold," the prince softly murmured. Alex lifted his heavy-lidded pale gold eyes and fixed Abudullah with a chilling, basilisk glare that froze the smile appearing on the dark Mingrelian face. "Where is she?" Alex demanded.
"At Gori."
"Take me there." Alex rose, his pulse beating wildly. There couldn't be two women with a rosebud scar. It must be Zena. She was still all right, then. Relief flooded through him.
They reached the small village in record time, and the little agent ushered the troop into his spacious courtyard. "If you'll wait one moment, Excellency," and he bowed even lower than previously, since he had heard one of the trackers address Alex as "Prince." "Please sit for a moment, and I'll have a servant bring you refreshments. I must check on the whereabouts of the woman. You understand, I'm only a poor deputy acting for another."
He scurried into the house.
Alex refused to be seated, pacing impatiently back and forth in the tiled courtyard, clenching and unclenching his fingers on the braided riding whip he carried.
"Do you think it's true?" he asked as he stopped momentarily in front of a dusty, fatigued Ivan, who lounged against the wall. "Do you think it's Zena?" His tawny eyes were flinty and looked tired.
"I don't know, Sasha. You can't trust these scurvy Min-grelians. They'd sell their own mother for thirty kopecks. Don't get your hopes up."
Alex twisted around sharply as the plump agent returned, wringing his hands distressfully. His distress was sincere, for the course of events had robbed him of a substantial commission. He had intended to raise the price considerably for a Giaour prince. "It grieves me painfully, Your Excellency Prince, to inform you that the woman you desire was sold three days ago. I have many other delicious morsels you may like to peruse, Your Honor," he avowed sycophantically.
Alex lunged for the little commis, a growl issuing from his throat. He was constrained from doing him harm by Ivan's strong and sober admonitions. "Let be, Sasha!" Ivan urged as he held Alex back forcefully. "He can't help you dead! He knows who bought her!"
Still surging with suppressed rage, Alex paused trembling to withhold his terrible frustration and considered Ivan's words. Lashing out with his riding whip, Alex shattered a delicately filigreed ivory lattice window, then wheeled away from the terrified agent and strode out of the courtyard. "Find out the buyer's name!"
Minutes later Ivan issued from the house with the information. "A sheikh by the name of Ibrahim Bey. Very important, very influential. A personal friend of the Sultan at Stauboul."
"I don't care who he knows," Alex snapped. Ivan was consequently treated to the full benefit of Alex's pithy and Rabelaisian pronouncements on the entire race of Turks, to which he comprehensively consigned everyone south of Stavropol. "So then," he finished curtly, "where is this exalted sheikh? Let's get going."
"Consider now, Sasha. Don't be a fool. There are only six of us, and according to the terror-stricken little man in there, Ibrahim Bey's camp numbers two hundred or more. He travels with a princely entourage and a harem."
"A seraglio over
comes all inconveniences, didn't someone once say," Alex sneered embitteredly. Then bristling with spleen he added provocatively, "But I intend to deprive him of one of its members."
"Let's find lodging, Sasha, clean up, and decide how best to approach this sheikh and remove Zena from his harem. That's in the event that rascal agent is telling the truth in the first place and she's even there."
As they were cleaning up from the dirt and grime of days on the trail, Alex and Ivan haggled over the details of their undertaking. "Wear your uniform; it projects the might of the Russian Empire. No small advantage sometimes in dealing with these perfidious border tribes who are constantly changing their allegiance to suit the circumstances."
So it was resolved Captain Prince Alexander Nikolae-vich Kuzan would request an audience with Ibrahim Bey as a diplomatic envoy from St. Petersburg. Alex could not be convinced to wait until morning. "Damn it, Ivan, I'm acceding to all your counsels of prudence and civility now, when I'd much prefer hiring three hundred warriors and leveling the sheikh's camp. If I weren't afraid Zena would be harmed in the melee—if she is in fact there—I'd be damned tempted to do just that. So enough expedient caution," he said with a grim smile. "We're going tonight."
What Alex didn't say was that he couldn't stand the thought of Zena staying another night in Ibrahim Bey's harem. An ungovernable fury raged through his mind when he envisioned her in a harem assaulted by another man.
"Any more objections?" said Alex.
"Not the least." Ivan's tone was absolutely noncommittal. Whatever Ivan's private opinion, once Alex had made up his mind Ivan paid him the homage of absolute acquiescence, and he and the trackers would follow Alex without question.
"Come, my dear, another small sip of wine and perhaps one more bonbon."
Zena's eyes stared in the direction of the coaxing voice and although registering on the speaker correctly, looked opaquely through the dark, lean Turkish face. Obediently she lifted her lips, and a goblet of wine was pressed to her lips. She drank the fragrant, heavy wine7 and opened her mouth for the almond-apricot sweet poised before her full red lips. Long, thin fingers held the honeyed treat, and honeyed words offered terms of praise as she dutifully surrendered to the mellifluous voice and accepted the confection.
"Ah, my fair, winsome flower, you will feel even better soon. One must eat and drink to sustain one's health," and the thin brown hand reached out and caressed Zena's soft cheek. "You're so docile, my love; soon, very soon, you will feel a warmth in your veins that will strike urgently at that passivity and eagerly move you to yearn for more ardorous activities."
The cantharides in the wine would take no more than forty minutes to wash through her bloodstream, Ibrahim Bey observed pragmatically.
He glanced up from the arrestingly beautiful, white-skinned woman he had bought and spoke sharply to the two servant girls.
"She has been eating well?" he snapped.
Yes, venerated lord, most assuredly. The hashish in the bonbons does much to restore one's appetite."
As well as inducing a suitably amiable lethargy, he reflected as he smiled thinly. When he had purchased the woman from the small troop of hill bandits, she had been far from agreeable—a screaming, cursing, scathingly vocal virago, more aptly. He had never seen such a wildcat, and while he appreciated a certain amount of spirit in a woman, he disliked a recalcitrant, shrewish bitch in bed with him.
Khazi had warned Zena that if she mentioned Iskender-Khan he would slit her throat, Zena saw in his ferocious glance the sincerity of his words, and so she refrained from mentioning her grandfather that first night, although she hadn't refrained from abusing Khazi and the sheikh in various other verbal attacks. Almost immediately she had been fed, for Ibrahim Bey fancied the woman but not her critical tongue. Hashish had been mixed into the food, and within the hour the acrimonious diatribe had ceased. For three days now she had been fed hashish with her food in small amounts, but the quantity was suitable to encourage her appetite and to promote the gentle, tractable quality Ibrahim Bey preferred in the bedchamber.
The woman had been a shade too thin for his refined, aesthetic sensibilities when she was hauled in by the leader of the bandits. The young Abrek explained that they had been eluding trackers searching for her and had scarce time to water their horses let alone dine properly. Three days of gentle, persistent feeding had rounded out the shapely curves to a lush opulence.
"Dress her now and bring her to my tent in one hour," issued the curt command, and he left.
Tonight she would be his, Ibrahim Bey mused as he walked back to his headquarters tent. She held promise of vast sensual delights. He had waited patiently for three days, and this night after entertaining the visiting chieftains with the piquant, delicious sight of her at his side, he would make use of that voluptuous female for whom he had paid so extravagant a price.
With a certain lazy detachment Zena allowed the two dark servant girls to administer to her. She was bathed in a large copper tub; her hair was washed, toweled dry, perfumed with an aromatic floral scent reminiscent of lilac, and brushed into a shiny, rippling mane that hung down her back. They shaved her body, her legs, and under her arms. When they began to shave between her legs she forced herself briefly from her soft, golden haze of contentment to protest feebly. Her weak objections were ignored as the girls continued shaving with short, sure strokes. Zena sank pliantly once more into the warm, enveloping lassitude, a soft cloud bank of the mind. She decided rather giddily that the entire issue was highly inconsequential.
Next Zena was laid on a low linen couch and massaged with a wonderfully warm perfumed oil. She squirmed restlessly, moaning softly as the dark hands caressed her skin, sending frissons of pleasure coursing through her.
The black eyes of the servant girls met over the supine form, and they nodded their heads in agreement. The can-tharides were beginning to inundate the woman's body. Soon the least touch would cause a sensual response.
They pulled Zena into a standing position and slipped her arms through a delicate harness of sea-green kidskin embellished with gold bangles and silk embroidery. Under her breasts two wider straps of the colored leather sewn with hundreds of small golden beads were adjusted. The leather of the harness over her shoulders was tugged gently, tightened slowly, and Zena's large, voluptuous breasts were pulled inexorably higher until they perched like two luscious melons on the wide shelf of bangled leather. Her breasts were delectably full, her nipples saucily pert, and the cleavage pressed forcibly together by the pressure of the fine leather; the whole a picture of bursting ripeness ready for the plucking.
Taking out an ivory cosmetic case, the two attendants proceeded to paint the soft, pink nipples a lush, vivid carmine, and Zena giggled as the sable brushes tickled her tender, thrusting nipples. A last dab of carmine, a shiver and a soft moan from Zena, and the two silent girls slipped a heavy golden mesh belt low around Zena's hips. Attached to either side of the golden belt was diaphanous silken gauze that hung down to the ground and was gathered into a circlet of material. Zena's bare feet were slipped through each small aperture of tucked gauze, and both legs were transparently sheathed in brilliant green vaporous cloth. Since the material was affixed to the belt solely at the verge of her hips, it covered only her legs, leaving the silken skin of her belly, groin, and buttocks exposed. Even the legs were covered with no more than a filmy suggestion of fabric.
The costume was never intended as more than an exquisite, elaborate embellishment to accentuate the female pride of snowy, swollen breasts and delectable mons; filigreed leather thrust plump breasts up and out for the touching, while green gauze served as a foil to accent the satiny smooth cleft of pleasure. The costume manifested a primitive female fertility figure ornamented, festooned, and spangled.
Zena was led through the cool evening air to the tent of Ibrahim Bey. The breeze felt refreshing on her skin, which was beginning to warm and pulsate. An incipient, insistent throbbing was starting to surface in her groin and oc
casionally penetrate the torpor of her soft, comfortable nirvana of lethargy.
A heavy tapestry was lifted aside, and Zena was shoved through an opening into a large chamber brilliantly lit by hundreds of small lamps. Her pupils instantly constricted in reflex to the startling radiance.
"Come here, my little pigeon," that familiar cajoling voice intoned, and Zena lifted her eyes to follow the sound. Focusing somewhat unsteadily on the tall, lean, robed figure coming toward her down the steps of a shallow dais, she began to move forward with a slow, graceful rhythm to meet the outstretched hand. Her breasts bounced and trembled gently, held high in their leather harness, as she walked across the center of the tent, the golden bangles ornamenting the leather, swaying and jingling lightly with her movement. It seemed an eternity to reach that dark, outstretched hand.
She touched him at last, and his fingers felt cool, so cool to the touch—ah, so pleasantly cool; her body was racing with heat. Zena looked up into dark, black-browed, fierce eyes and stared pleasantly, impersonally back as he lustfully pierced her gaze.
Ibrahim Bey twirled Zena once before him, exhibiting her bursting, rosy-cheeked charms to his dozen guests.
"See, my friends, what a delicious bonbon I shall nibble on tonight. Later she shall dance for our pleasure."
A dozen pairs of black eyes admired the flawless beauty of the female poised before them: washed, oiled, perfumed, and packaged as delectably as the fairest jewel in a sultan's tribute.
"Ibrahim Bey, when you tire of her, perhaps you could be persuaded to favor a nephew. I'll pay well for her, and you can realize a profit even after you've pillaged the fruit. I'm a patient man."
"Perhaps, Abdulhamit, I will consider," his uncle laughed. "In my declining years boredom strikes more readily. You may have her sooner than you think."
Other lustful eyes coveted the woman as well but knew better than to assert a claim if Abdul desired the wench. Not only was he rich and his uncle's most influential advisor but his reckless temperament, foolhardy sword arm, and unbridled temper forestalled any other claimants to the lady's favor.