The brilliant artificial sunlight wasn’t as taxing on Sazar as it had been the day before. Doubtless that was because of the sweet blood Sarah had offered him so freely.
She actually wanted me to drink from her breast. He couldn’t help looking at the full mounds in question. Gods, they were beautiful—Sarah was beautiful. He loved touching her but he couldn’t help wishing he could have tried drinking from her without pleasuring her as he did so. If she could feel the Blood Pleasure when he called a vein to her breasts or between her legs and bit her there, even without sexually stimulating her first, it would prove beyond the shadow of a doubt that she was his Fated Mate.
And what if she is? whispered a little voice in his head. What good will it do you? She’s supposed to be your assistant—not your lover. You have a proscribed relationship. It’s time you remembered that and returned to propriety. You went far over the line last night and this morning as well.
Reluctantly, he acknowledged it was so. He didn’t want to take advantage of Sarah and he still wasn’t sure if she might feel something for him…or if she was just innocently trying to do her best to supply his needs and be a good assistant.
Whichever it was, Sazar told himself he needed to start behaving more like a boss and less like a lover. He promised himself he would be more careful in the future.
* * * * *
Chandra led them to a little used tuve station and they were sucked away on a cushion of warm air to arrive in a rather rumpled state at the entrance of the chample farm.
Sarah wondered what in the world a chample was but she didn’t have time to speculate for long.
“There you are!” Minister Obglod’s thin, irritated voice rose to meet them as Chandra led them down a side tunnel to the entrance of a vast glass globe bigger than any underwater area Sarah had seen yet. There was a clear glass door which kept them from entering but she could see inside and she marveled at its size.
It was even taller than the globe that housed the palace and the top of it appeared to be poking out of the Alquon ocean which the rest of the city’s structures were submerged in. There was a clear demarcation between water and air when she looked through the clear sides.
The vast glass globe was filled to the top with long, thin plants which seemed to sway in the air currents the way kelp sways in ocean water. The plants themselves were a dull, blue-gray but they had brightly colored clusters of some kind of fruit or vegetable near their tops. Were those the champles?
“We’re here, sorry to keep you waiting,” Chandra fluttered, running up to the minister who tugged her breast chain absently. Sarah made sure to stay out of tugging range herself.
“Hello, Minister,” Sazar said, coming up beside her. “It’s good to see you again.”
“What is all this I hear about the two of you causing a kafuffle at one of the best restaurants in Idd?” Obglod demanded. “It’s all anyone is talking about. Can’t I leave the two of you alone for a moment without disaster ensuing?”
Once again Sazar had to bite his tongue at the old minister’s rude words. But as long as no one was threatening Sarah, he was able to be diplomatic.
“A simple misunderstanding,” he said smoothly. “I’m certain it won’t happen again.”
“It had better not!” Obglod exclaimed in his cracked and strident voice. “Don’t forget that I’m your sponsor and when you misbehave—”
“It reflects poorly on you. Yes, we know,” Chandra exclaimed. “Only they didn’t misbehave, Minister! Sarah here is the answer to the ancient prophesy about purifying our blood.”
“What?” Obglod demanded, staring at Sarah. “What nonsense are you talking?”
Chandra started to explain but just then a hearty-looking Alquon male in simple clothing came up to meet them. His kelpy hair was receding and he had an open, honest face that Sarah liked at first sight.
“Hey now, I reckon you fancy looking folk must be the group I’ve been expecting to tour the farm. I’m Dod. ”
“Hello, Dod,” Chandra said brightly. “Yes, that’s us! I’m Chandra, assistant to Minster Obglod here.” She nodded at Obglod. “And these two fine people are visitors from another world. They’ve never seen champles before and I was hoping you could explain their importance to our people and maybe let them taste a few samples.”
“Oh, I can do better than that,” Dod said easily. “I’ll let ‘em harvest their own.”
“Really?” Sarah asked, craning her neck to look up at the very tops of the immensely tall plants where the brightly colored clusters were growing. “How? I mean, if those are the champles, how are we supposed to get up there?”
“Those are them, all right,” Dod assured her. “But don’t worry—you can just jump right up there.”
“I think you may be overestimating our abilities,” Sazar said dryly. “Kindred are strong but I don’t know a single one who can leap a hundred feet into the air.”
“Maybe not in regular gravity,” Dod said, still sounding quite unperturbed. “But we grow chample stalks in low G. They can’t support the weight of their fruit otherwise. C’mon. You too, my Lady and Sir Minister, if you like,” he added, nodding deferentially to Chandra and Obglod.
Minister Obglod decided to stay outside the globe, saying he was too old to be doing manual labor like harvesting fruit. But Chandra agreed to come eagerly and Sarah noticed she was clutching her little black square again, possibly intent on taking some publicity photos.
The moment they stepped inside the huge glass globe, Sarah began to feel oddly light. Her whole body seemed to have less mass and she nearly stumbled from the strange new sensation.
“Easy there,” Dod, who moved with ease in the new environment, said. “It takes time to get used to low G. One little hop can send you spinning out of control so you have to be careful.”
“What are we supposed to do?” Sazar asked. He also moved with confidence and Sarah wondered if he had experienced low gravity before. It would make sense—he was a diplomat and had been to plenty of different worlds. Maybe some of them had had considerably less gravity than she was used to.
“Well, I’ll give you each a suction bag—here…” Dod handed out padded silver bags, about the size of a reusable shopping bags to each of them. Sarah noticed that the tops of the bags were pursed tightly shut. But when she put her hand down to touch hers, the bag opened and a strong suction pulled at her fingers. When she moved her hand, the bag stopped sucking and pursed shut again.
Weird but she supposed the design had practical value. If things bounced around so easily in the low G environment there had to be a way to secure the champles they picked or they would just go flying out of the bags and go everywhere.
But she still had questions.
“Please,” she said as Dod was showing Chandra how the suction bag worked. “What are champles? We still don’t know.”
“Oh goodness me—I’m about to let you pick some and here I went and forgot to tell you what they are!” Dod slapped his balding forehead good-naturedly and laughed. “Well, they’re one of our main food sources and the only plants we grow. We get everything else we need from the ocean around us.”
“Why grow them at all if the ocean supplies your needs so well?” Sazar asked.
“Because champles are a link to our past—to the way things were back before our world became covered in water,” Chandra explained, picking up the narrative.
“My lady is right.” Dod nodded. “See, champles are plants genetically modified to taste like all the foods we lost when we moved permanently to the oceans.”
“Really?” Sarah couldn’t help being interested. “Like fruits and vegetables you can’t grow anymore?”
“We could grow them,” Dod said. “But it would take up valuable living space. Why bother when we can grow the champles, which take on the taste and texture of the lost food while delivering three times the nutrients and making plenty of oxygen to circulate through all of Idd?”
“Some champles also have the taste and texture of food animals we couldn’t afford to bring with us,” Chandra explained. “Feeding and storing animals just for food is expensive and wasteful. Plant protein from the champles is a much better option.”
Sarah’s stomach growled, reminding her that she was nearly weak with hunger. Enough with the history lesson already. She didn’t care what the champles tasted like—she wanted to eat!
“They sound delicious,” she said quickly. “Can you tell us which ones taste like what?”
“Reckon it’s best if you just find out for yourself, my lady.” Dod grinned at her. “Wanna try harvesting?”
“Yes, please!” Sarah exclaimed but Sazar put a hand on her arm.
“Would you be so kind as to show us first, exactly how it is done?” he asked Dod.
The Alquon shrugged. “Be glad to. Here.”
He took Sarah’s silver suction bag and crouched low on the spongy ground. It looked to Sarah like he only took a little hop but his momentum sent him soaring high in the air, all the way up to the top of the greenhouse globe where the clusters of champles grew. He grabbed one of the tall, thin plants to steady himself and twisted a bright blue chample off its stalk. He shoved the fruit into the silver bag before letting go to drift slowly down again, as though carried by warm air currents.
“There, see?” he asked, returning to them and handing the bag back to Sarah. “Easy as can be. Wanna try that?” he asked, when she braved the strong suction to get the bright blue chample out of the bag. It was about as big as a large apple and to her surprise it was cube-shaped, not round as she’d expected. “It’s one of our most popular flavors—plez-nack,” Dod added.
Sarah didn’t know what plez-nack flavor was but it smelled delicious—kind of like a cross between watermelon, strawberries, pineapple and hot buttered popcorn. She took a bite, finding the texture both crunchy and chewy. It tasted as good as it smelled and her stomach growled again. Eagerly she took another bite and then offered it to Sazar.
“You have to try this—it’s one of the best things I’ve ever tasted!”
Obligingly, he took a bite and chewed.
“There,” Sarah said, smiling. “Isn’t that the best thing you’ve ever put in your mouth?”
“Not quite the best thing I’ve had in my mouth.” His pale eyes glowed red for a moment. “But it is very good.”
Sarah felt her cheeks get hot at the way he was looking at her and her stomach fluttered. Why had she put it like that?
But before she could get any more flustered, Dod was saying it was time for them to try harvesting some of the champles for themselves.
“Just push off real easy,” he instructed. “If you jump too hard you’re going to bang your heads on the ceiling and that’s never any fun. Hold on to the stalks when you get to the top and give the chample you want to pick a little twist. Don’t forget to put it in your suction bag before you come back down. All right? Everybody ready? Then go.”
Sarah thought later that picking champles was more fun that almost anything else she and Sazar did (at least in public) while they were on Alquon Ultrea. The feeling of near-weightlessness was exhilarating although it took some time to get used to.
She watched as Sazar took off and then Chandra, who was pointing her black square at him, probably taking pictures. Sarah didn’t want to be left out so she pushed off from the spongy ground too, only she pushed too hard and went rocketing up at a frightening speed.
Oh no! she thought as she saw the thick glass dome of the ceiling getting closer and closer. I’m going to bang my head, just like Dod said! That’s going to hurt!
She tried to shield her head but Sazar, who was already holding tight to one of the long thin chample stalks, reached out and snagged her arm. Pulling her tight against him, he murmured in her ear,
“Be careful, Ladara. I wouldn’t want you getting injured.”
“Oh—I think I jumped too hard,” Sarah said breathlessly.
“Stay with me. I’ve had experience in low G.” He twisted two of the bright yellow, cube-like fruit from the branch and handed one to Sarah who put it in her suction bag. Then, keeping an arm wrapped firmly around her waist, Sazar let go and allowed the two of them to drift slowly back down.
They jumped up again, this time holding hands. Now that she felt safe, Sarah couldn’t help laughing in sheer exuberance at the wild sensation of being nearly weightless and flying upwards. Sazar laughed too, a warm, deep chuckle she hadn’t heard before but liked at once. His face was so different when he smiled, Sarah thought. So much more open and free. It made her feel close to him.
Again and again they jumped from different spots, aiming to get one of every kind of chample growing in the huge glass dome. They spent some time on the ground trying them, too.
“Just don’t eat any of the brown ones unless you’re bound up inside,” Dod advised as he named and explained the various varieties they had picked.
“I’m sorry, what?” Sarah asked. “I don’t understand.”
“They’re medicinal champles,” Chandra said delicately. “For…digestive health.”
Oh, so it must be like eating prunes or taking some kind of laxative, Sarah thought.
“They work pretty quick too,” Dod put in. “So be certain you don’t eat one when you’re too far from a bathroom.”
“We’ll keep it in mind,” Sazar said dryly. “I don’t think we’ll be trying those particular champles right now.”
But there were plenty of the strange alien fruits that were grown simply for their flavor and texture. Sarah’s favorite was a red one with yellow and green spots which she thought tasted just like a cheeseburger. Sazar favored a dark purple chample that had a sweet and sour flavor Sarah couldn’t place. He said it reminded him of a food from his home world.
Chandra asked him if he liked it and he smiled.
“It is good but not nearly as delicious as other things I have tasted recently,” he remarked, giving Sarah a meaningful look.
“Oh…” Sarah put a hand on her fluttering heart. Was he talking about the taste of her blood…or other things? She kept seeing him in her mind’s eye, between her thighs healing her pussy with his tongue the night before. The memory made her feel hot and breathless.
She wished she had the nerve to kiss him again, as she had that first night in his room. But everyone was watching and Chandra was, presumably taking pictures for the Alquon version of social media. So she simply looked into those pale eyes, flickering red with desire as he looked back at her, and wished this moment could last forever.
At last Chandra remarked that it was late and they’d spent much more time at the chample farm than she’d intended.
“I’m afraid we don’t have time to see the yeechee fields or the to-ti works either,” she sighed. “We’ll have to get the two of you back to your room to get changed for the Breeding Ball tonight.”
“That’s fine with me,” Sarah remarked. She didn’t know what a to-ti was but the yechees were the toilet snakes and she had no wish to have any kind of contact with them at all—let alone go visit a whole field full of them.
They thanked Dod who nodded good-naturedly and gave them some extra bags of champles to take home and share on the Mother Ship. Sarah hoped they would last—she had no idea of the shelf life of the alien fruit but she really wanted to share some of it with her new friends Kat and Liv and Sophie.
I wonder if they’ll keep until Christmas, she thought as they made their way back to the tuve station. They would make really unique gifts. Kat, especially would love them. She struck Sarah as being kind of a foodie.
Then she thought of Tsandor—he would probably like the purple one Sazar had liked. Or maybe the bright yellow one that tasted like a mixture of lemon cookies and grape popsicles…
Her heart gave a little lurch when she thought of Sazar’s son. How was he? Was he lonely? Waiting to see her again? Still hoping to have a complete family?
Sarah couldn’t let her thoughts go in that direction, though—she knew things between herself and Sazar seemed really close now but once they were back on the Mother Ship, who knew what might happen?
She was aware that she needed to ask Sazar about allowing Tsandor to celebrate Christmas with Sophie’s family. But again, it didn’t seem to be the right time.
Christmas isn’t for a little while yet, she thought. I’ll ask him later…when the time is right.
But whatever happened, she promised herself sweet little Tsandor wouldn’t have to spend the holiday alone or in the care house.
* * * * *
“So do you have your outfit for the Breeding Ball all ready to go?” Chandra asked Sarah as she walked them to the door of their room. She had hooked an arm through Sarah’s and was strolling beside her in a chummy way, with Sazar on her other side. Minister Obglod had pleaded exhaustion again and returned to his own home.
Privately, Sazar thought that was best. The elderly Minister irritated him with his constant complaining and lecturing. Despite her “ditzy female” act, Chandra was much more pleasant to be around. Although if he had his preference, he would simply spend time with Sarah alone.
“Oh yes—the gold outfit. It’s all ready to go,” Sarah said, nodding.
“Good. Oh, and I had Lemmy make a new outfit for you too, Commander Sazar,” Chandra remarked, looking up at him. “It’s silver to match Sarah’s gold. It’s going to look spectacular with those pale eyes of yours.”
“I thank you,” Sazar said a bit stiffly. “I’m certain it will look fine.”
“There is one question I wanted to ask you about my, uh, outfit…” Sarah’s voice dropped to a confidential tone. It was clear she had no idea how sharp a Kindred’s hearing was—though she spoke very softly, Sazar couldn’t help catching her words. Still, since his little human obviously wanted privacy, he walked a little ahead to at least give her the illusion that her conversation could not be overheard.
“Yes, what is it?” Chandra murmured, also keeping her tone low.
“It’s the panties that go with it,” Sarah murmured. “They seem to have an, uh extra hole.”
“What?” Chandra started to laugh. “What do you mean an extra hole?”
“Shhh!” Sarah hissed. “Well, they have a hole for my waist, and two for my legs but then there’s another one, right in the back. They have four holes. That can’t be right, can it?”
“They’re breeding panties—of course they have four holes!” Chandra exclaimed, still laughing. “One for your waist, two for your legs, and one for your pair partner’s shaft to enter you while he breeds you.”
“Oh, uh…” From the corner of his eye, Sazar saw that Sarah’s face had gone red. She glanced quickly up at him but since the topic clearly embarrassed her, he pretended not to have heard.
“I can’t believe you’ve never worn breeding panties, before,” Chandra went on. “How do they do things on your planet, anyway?”
“Well we don’t…usually all, uh, breed together at a big ball,” Sarah said quietly, still sounding embarrassed. “It’s usually a private thing—just between a man, er a male, and a woman.”
“How strange! Well, I guess you’ll get a taste of the Alquon way tonight,” Chandra remarked “Just remember to position yourself on the breeding couch so your breasts show to best advantage when Commander Sazar takes you. Good form is important, especially at the palace.”
“Wait—what?” Sarah sounded slightly panicked now. “But Sazar and I don’t have to participate—The Lord Magnate said so. We’re just going to be there to watch.”
“No, that’s not what he said at all.” Chandra shook her head. “He said, you two don’t have to breed with anyone else at the ball. But you must breed together. To attend a Breeding Ball at the palace and refuse to participate is the worst offense you can give! Why, The Lord Magnate would throw you to the grike if you just stood there and did nothing while everyone around you was doing their best to honor the tradition.”
“He…he would?” Sarah sounded positively faint. “You know, I don’t feel so well, Chandra. I…I think maybe one of those champles I ate disagreed with me. I’m not so sure I can go to the ball tonight.”
“Oh but you have to!” Chandra exclaimed. “Once a royal invitation has been given and accepted, you cannot back out of it for any reason. It would be an even greater insult than attending the ball and not breeding! The Lord Magnate would have both of you thrown into the middle of the ocean without your ship and Minister Obglod told me you can’t swim.”
Sarah’s face had gone pale—a clear sign of distress. Sazar wanted to gather her into his arms and comfort her but he wasn’t sure what to say. It appeared they were in a very difficult situation.
If they didn’t attend the Breeding Ball, they risked expulsion from Idd and possible death in the waters that surrounded it. If they did attend but refused to participate, they would be thrown to the grike—whatever that was. Possibly some kind of wild animal, Sazar speculated.
Either way they risked danger or death but the alternative—taking Sarah in the middle of a room full of strangers—was unthinkable. Not that Sazar didn’t want to make love to her—he did, very much. She was beautiful and perfect and curvy and he was beginning to care for her very much—maybe even love her.
However, Sazar wanted to make love to her when she was ready—when he was certain she felt for him the way he felt for her. Not just because they were expected to participate in some barbaric alien ritual! How could the Alquons present themselves as a civilized people when they objectified their females the way they did and insisted on public sex?
“I’ll tell you what,” Chandra was saying, pulling him out of his angry thoughts. “I’ll send you a few vids of past Breeding Balls—I’ll have Blorg activate a screen in your room. That way you’ll know what to expect. All right?”
“All right,” Sarah said faintly. “I guess…guess that’s good.”
“It will be! This is going to be the best Breeding Ball ever—you’ll see.” Chandra smiled brightly and pressed her cheek to Sarah’s. “Now you get ready to go. I’ll be back for you in a bit to take you and Commander Sazar to the palace. See you soon!”
And with a final wave she left them standing in the doorway to their room.
Sazar tried to hold back a frustrated growl. They were in a damn sticky situation—what in the Seven Hells were they going to do?