A/N: Some S&M content here. Be warned or be warmed.
VIII.
Heaven! Love! Freedom! What a dream, oh poor crazed girl!
You melted to her as snow does to a fire;
Your great visions strangled your words
-And fearful Infinity terrified your blue eye!
-Arthur Rimbaud, "Ophelia"
The smoke curled like sleeping Bombay cats amongst the silks. The sweetness of the burnt fragrance was a hallowing touch in these stately quarters and Yazmin kept her steps light as she passed through the antechamber into her mistress' rooms. Moving timidly down the hall, the servant stepped over a discarded belt, the rumpled pile of her mistress' fine sari, a cracked black leather boot, a dagger half-unsheathed from its frog. When she pushed past the drawn curtain, however, a scream rose unbidden from her throat. Against the furthest wall, nearest the hearth, her Queen stood chained to the rafters—her clothing hanging from her body in shreds. Across her back lay latticework bruises flooding with color and thin cuts that oozed dark, crimson rivulets. At the piercing intrusion, however, the inflictor of such torture—half-dressed in a loose, tattered tunic and leather pants—turned lazily and raised a finely sculpted dark brow at Yazmin's terror. Dangling lazily from her hand, were the nine tails of a cat whip.
"I shall call the guards!" the servant threatened in Farsi.
The strange woman merely smiled wickedly; she turned from her prey and fell languidly among the cushions propped against the frame of the divan. "Artemisia… explain to your girl here about pleasure" said the woman in her foreign tongue, her voice like the smoke, "or I'll explain to her about pain."
From her place against the cool sandstone wall, the Queen rattled her chains, turning to glance back at her long-time body slave. "Yazmin," Artemisia began, "leave us; I am not in danger."
Xena chuckled, the sound more like a growl than laughter. Yazmin glanced fleetingly at the dark-haired woman, realizing just how savagely beautiful she was and debating whether she should obey her Queen at all. Relying on instinct literally beaten into her, however, Yazmin decided that following a direct order was in her best interest. Turning, the servant swept from the room.
Maneuvering in a rather nubile fashion, Artemisia twisted the chains, her arms pulled taut, and turned so that she could face her tormenter.
"I do believe my servant ruined," said the Queen, gazing through hazy lust-clouded eyes.
Xena shrugged, picking up the hookah in the cherry-wood shape of a squat fat man, its stem protruding from his nipple. She crawled to the hearth and selected a piece of kindling to lay in the fire; once the tip was sufficiently ablaze, the warrior extracted the stick and lit the bowl of the pipe. Placing full lips— raw and deeply red from their bruising kisses— around the mouthpiece, Xena inhaled sumptuously that heady mixture of tobacco leaf and opium seed. She leaned against the divan, holding the smoke in her lungs, extended her neck backward like a swan, baring skin like the alabaster of Peris, the sprite of death and beauty.
A guttural sound from the pit of the Queen's desire moves Xena to level her stare and stand. She walks purposefully toward her captive and pauses a hair's breathe from the Queen's lips. Darting the tip of her tongue briefly along Artemisia's dark lips, she entices them to open and finally exhales slowly, fully the potent smoke into the other woman's lungs. Artemisia inhales, lapping up this offering as she had every eroticism the warrior woman had chosen to impart. A similar wanton blackness envelopes both pairs of eyes and both are a little unsteady on their feet.
"Release me from these chains," breathes Artemisia, the purplish smoke billowing around them, "I wish to ravish you."
Xena smiles, lips pulled tight over sharp, pearl-white teeth. "I kind of like the look of you in chains," she responds, running her hands over the woman's hips.
"I'm sure your Greek blood roils at the sight."
In answer, Xena merely tears the rest of the Queen's tattered clothing from her body, exposing a pair of small breasts and dusky nipples. She attacks the woman's neck, using teeth to rake down its length; her hands find purchase around the full shape of the Queen's buttocks. A growl of her own rips from Artemisia's throat at the sensation of those skilled ministrations. Xena captures her mouth in a crushing, animistic kiss and the Queen struggles in her bondage to drawl the woman more fully against her. From her cleavage, Xena extracts a small iron key and places it in the lock of one cuff. The iron shackle releases, and in a swift motion, the warrior pulls the chain free of the rafter and the Queen's weight sinks into her arms. With her one free arm, Artemisia grasps the material of Xena's tunic and rips the cloth from her chest, exposing a dirtied breast wrap beneath. She claws at the bondage, trying to free for her own pleasure more of the warrior's warm supple flesh. In response, however, Xena twirls from reach and at once has the length of the chain wound around the Queen's neck.
She pulls savagely at the leash, pulling Artemisia backward against her. The Queen cries out at the pain of her lacerated back, the pain of a blinding strangulation— but it is a cry borne of pure hedonism. The warrior woman shoves her captive from her, onto the cushions and mounts her from behind, sliding her thighs over the bruised flesh of the Queen's hips. Xena leans forward, allowing her full weight to flow over the surface of the woman's prostrate body. She puts her lips to the fold of Artemisia's ear.
"You're mine to ride like a sow," she whispers, the power of conquest pushing her to new heights of pleasure. "Mine…" she drawls, "all mine".
"Royalty possessed by a pirate," choked Artemisia, straining under the warrior's weight, "the audacity."
"I don't think you're in a position to insult," said Xena, reaching behind her to trace the crevice between two rising mounds of flesh. Beneath her, Artemisia unconsciously trembled and raised her hips off the ground to entice Xena's hand to seek its purchase in her depths.
"Please," the Queen hissed, her trembling rocking them both.
"That's right. Beg," said Xena, sliding off the Queen and drawling her hips up so that she rested on her knees and elbows. She tugged on the chain and Artemisia responded with a strangled whimper, holding herself open and vulnerable before this savage woman. Xena moved her fingers between the woman's legs and tangled through the curled, rough hair above her sex, tugging some in the process.
"Akah Manah!" the Queen cursed, "baleh, a'alan!"
"Still issuing commands, huh?" said Xena, trailing her fingers through the fountain of heady liquid pooling from Artemisia's core.
"Please, I'm yours!" rasped the Queen, "my body is yours to command!"
Xena teased the woman's slick opening with the tip of her finger, swirling it around its circumference and loving the way it placed her concubine even further under her control.
"Oh, there's no question of your body," said Xena, pushing just the tip of her finger inside the Queen's entrance, "it's your soul I'm after."
"Yours," breathed Artemisia, without hesitation and the oath turned to a scream when Xena thrust three fingers deep inside her channel. Sparing some small mercy, Xena loosened the chain from Artemisia's neck— after all, it wasn't necessary: the Queen had fully and willingly submitted, body and soul.
"Mine," the warrior whispered, finding that beastly rhythm.
Another wave crashed and buried her, sinking her again beneath the tumult of the cove's tide. Resurfacing, Xena found the Athenian fleet in her vision. Judging that she was near enough for them to see her now, she unsheathed her sword and waved it manically in the air to catch a glint of sunlight. The Warrior Princess emitted a series of piercing battlecries. Traveling across the sound, she heard the blessed reply: "Man overboard!" Grinning, Xena took off with a powerful stroke as the bow of the ship turned in her direction.
In little time, the warrior grasped the sea-slimed rope of the drop-ladder and felt the inertia of such a large vessel drag her through the water. Mining the strength from somewhere deep inside—the place a certain bard occupied within—Xena climbed up the side of the ship and collapsed on deck.
"Ares be damned," came a gruff voice from above, "it's Xena."
The prodigal woman in question looked up at the rough faces of those gathered around: King Leonidas, his naval captain and crew.
"We have to stop meeting like this," said Xena, hauling herself to her feet.
Barely smiling, Leonidas threw his own cloak around the warrior's shoulders. "What in Hades happened?"
"He knew," said Xena, her fatigued body beginning to wrack with shivers. "Somehow, Tetram got wind of our contingency. You know what that means."
Leonidas nodded grimly, "An internal spy."
"Yes, which means we should take this conversation somewhere more private."
Below deck, in the captain's quarters, Leonidas and Xena stood across from each other over a richly carved mahogany desk. On its surface lay spread an intricate map of the western ports of Greece. Xena pointed to a pinprick on the isle of Salamis.
"That's where the camps are," she said, "although, by this time, I'm sure they're packed up and on the move."
"We can't storm the island," said Leonidas, "our numbers are evenly matched and they have the high ground."
"Yes, yes, I know," said Xena, her patience wearing, "I'm saying we need to force his hand, draw him out to sea."
"He understands his advantage, only a fool would fall for such a scheme."
"And Tetram's no fool," said Xena, "Listen, I've got a plan. It's risky, but it just might work."
"No, Xena. I risked our fleet only to rescue the men who made up your contingency. They're all dead now. We head back to Athens and wait for them to attack on land, where we have reinforcements, battlements, supplies—"
With fatal precision, Xena launched across the table and grabbed his chest-plate, dragging the King of Athens to within an inch of her face. "Did you hear me? Gabrielle's on that island! She's being terrorized by a beast of my own making! I'm not leaving her."
"Alright," Leonidas gasped, "alright, let go. Calmly now, Xena."
Xena released her hold, instead falling into a predatory pace behind the desk, her hands on her hips.
"Why don't you let the healer tend to your wound —"
"No time," Xena barked, her eyes an otherworldly blue, "now listen to me. We've got a few barrels of Greek fire, I say we smoke the Persians out of hiding."
"Xena! There's a Greek settlement just to the east; we're not firebombing our own people!"
"Which is why it's imperative that we get to Gabrielle. If I get her away from Tetram, he has no leverage against me and Gabrielle can ride to the village and warn its people."
Leonidas laughed, "That slip of a girl? She's injured as is, there's no way she can make the ride across the island, let alone convince a whole town to evacuate."
Xena fixed the King with a deadly serious look. "Do not make the mistake of underestimating Gabrielle," the warrior woman betrayed her guilt in an unconscious expression, "Gods know, I sure have."