Alice Sinclair Gorean style BDSM fiction

We made our way through the streets of the slum camp.

It was a warm day: the gloom was twice as bright today as it had been even two weeks ago. Despite all that was going on, there was an optimism in the city. The kind one feels in spring after a hard winter. 

We were in Kaddish, one of the larger, more cosmopolitan camps that had spread just outside Dura’s walls like mold over bread. We stopped at a crossroads of mud and rainwater puddles while Juskar checked his directions with a local. I watched a cart drawn by two naked slave girls yoked side-by-side pull up across from us. An Armanean carter walked alongside them. In one hand, he held their leashes. In the other, a cane. He brought the slave cart to stop before a half-built mud hut. 

To one side of the hut was a pile of fire-baked mud bricks. A Shemite slave girl worked on an emerging wall. She laid a brick and checked it, frowning with concentration. Then, she placed another. Her hair had been pulled back and done in a ponytail. Sweat made tracks down her dusty arms and legs. 

Two other naked Shemite slave girls jumped to their feet and rushed to the slave cart. They lifted out the bricks in stacks of four, walking them to the brick pile with care. Standing at the edge of the site was a Zidonese mason. His whip was tucked into his belt, but his eyes were on the brick-carrying slaves. The carter went up to him. The mason nodded and handed him a fistful of copper coins.

All around this area of Kaddish, it was the same. Tents were becoming wattle and daub huts. Huts were upgrading to brick and even stone. The squatters’ camps were turning into an extension of Dura. Whatever maps kings may draw, commerce makes its own.

Our guards looked about, always scanning. Their stances were relaxed, but they were at the ready. Each wore a bronze seal pinned to the left side of the cloaks. It was the seal of a first circle Burgher. Stamped alongside it in cuneiform were my initials. The seal identified them as my personal bodyguard.

Juskar stood outside a shack, talking to an elderly Darfuri man on the other side of the four-way junction. The Darfuri was selling dried grain from behind a row of filled burlap sacks. Each was open and showed a different shade or size of black rice grain. A wooden awning kept the rain and diving insects away. From behind the rice merchant came a Thump! Thump! Thump! 

The sound was coming from a pale, brunette slave girl standing before a stone mortar large enough for a baby to climb into. Her pestle was a wooden pole 5 feet long. She lifted it up with one hand, letting its weight do the grinding as it fell: thump! Then, she would raise it with the other. Inside the mortar, dried rice was being crushed into rice flour. A chain from the mortar ran to her anklet.

Juskar nodded and patted the rice merchant on the shoulder. Then, he turned and walked back to us.

“What took so long?” I asked.

“I asked a few more questions,” Juskar replied. “It’s just down that way. That much is correct. However, there are many guards there. More than I think would be necessary. Do you still want to keep the meeting? There might be trouble.”

“I’d rather not cancel unless we know if there’s any danger.”

“There’s always danger, Gerard.”

There was a clatter of tumbling bricks. We turned and saw the mason swear and draw his whip. The guilty Shemite girl fell to her knees and raised her hands, begging. She cried out and guarded her face as the whip came down.

“There is always danger,” I said. “Let’s be quick. Let’s get it done.”

We made our way down the street.

A few minutes later, we came to a wide alley - one that people walked past but not into. On either side of it were mud buildings. Many had a second story. They had the same slit-style windows one would find in a castle. There were no windows on the first floor. Men stood on balconies and rooftop porches, under wooden awnings with stretched leather tarps. The kind that could catch arrows. Chest-height walls made for polite but obvious battlements. The men watching out over them were all Armanean. They wore cloaks and did not smile. All were looking at us.

Six men stood astride the entrance to the alley. All were tall, well-built men. One clinked as he moved: the sound of metal against metal from beneath his cloak. Pinned to the cloaks of these six men, who I had never seen before, was the seal of my house bodyguard. 

One of them bowed and motioned with his head for us to follow.

We crossed into the alley.

***

“Our people owe you a debt, Gerard of House Stone.”

We were in one of the second-floor buildings. Light streamed in from a sun-roof made from murky, cut, volcanic glass. A pair of guards stood outside the open doorway. They, like all the other armed men present, wore my Burgher Council seal. 

We sat at a large, wooden table in high-backed chairs in the Armanean fashion. I glanced at the carpentry: it had been cut from a Borderlands-native Cycad tree. I tried to shift my chair - it hardly budged. Armanean carpenters wanted their work to last a hundred years, if not a thousand. The room had none of the low, reclining couches or oversized cushions you would expect from a Shemite-influenced design. On one wall was the beginning of a mosaic mural. I could see the sketch lines the artist had made. Polished green and blue tiles began the mosaic on one side. Even in the greatest desperation, one will find art. Perhaps the very best of it.

Seated at the table with me were two Armanean men. One was Kovan the Longshoreman: the gangster I had visited in the matter of the Deep One gold. His leathery face creased with a smile, and he bowed to me, his eyes twinkling.

Across from him sat an older man who looked to be in his 60s. His skin was liver-spotted with age. There was a faded, tiredness about him. It was the look of one who had lost everything but kept on going. One saw that look everywhere in the slums. He had a head of thick white hair and a large, well-groomed beard. He wore an elegant, white robe of good craftsmanship. I could make out where silver thread trimming had been removed. It was this man who had just spoken to me.

"Gerard, this is Stanoval of Rozander," said Kovan. “He is one of their elders.”

I had learned of Rozander. It was an Armanean city-state that had grown up along a river. It had thrived on the trade between the continent’s inland kingdoms and its coastal seaports. No refugees came from further inland than Rozander. Closer to ground zero, it is not known if anyone survived.

“I was one of the elders,” said Stanoval. “Now, I am as landless as any beggar among my people. My people are all beggars. Yet, it pleases them to still call me ‘Elder.’ I speak for many of them.”

I nodded to Stanoval. His humility was that of one trying to play down his strength. It was the behavior of someone with nothing to prove - or attempting to conceal their true strength.

“Thank you for your kind words,” I replied. “I would prefer to see your people owe no one anything. Myself, least of all. Thank you for agreeing to this meeting. I know it puts you at greater risk than any of us.”

“There is risk every day,” he dismissed my words with a wave. “It was important for me to talk to the man who enabled my people to keep their weapons. I am humbled that one of your station would accept the invitation of one such as myself. Would that the day will come when I can entertain you as a guest and not like some conspirator.”

“Likewise, Elder. I understand, though, that there is still trouble?”

Stanoval nodded.

“City guards go through the camps at night, tearing down our tents. They drive our people into the cold, be they sick, old, or with child. Thugs abduct our girls in broad daylight. Yesterday, an old man was beaten to death in the middle of the street.”

“I am sorry to hear this.” 

“We are lucky,” he shrugged. “It is much worse, I hear, in Starka. There, our people are being rounded up and burned in the night. Each morning dawns on blackened corpses in the streets.”

“That will never happen here,” I said, uncertain of my words even as I spoke them.

Stanoval looked to Kovan. Kovan shrugged.

“And yet, many heed what passes in other places. Actions admired one day are practiced the next, in tribute.”

“There is no shortage of people on the Council who would like to see you all gone,” I said. “They are trying to get a reaction out of you. Whatever violence they and their supporters would like to see against you, it is tempered while your people remain armed. However, if they do use those arms, things will escalate. If that happens, everyone will lose. Your people most of all.”

“Would you see us be kicked like stray dogs and slaves instead?” Said Kovan. He was scowling. This was not a man used to bowing to anyone.

“Let’s say the next time a pack of guards comes into the slums to tear down some tents and rape your women, you fight back. You kill a few of them. The rest flee. What happens next? What happens when the next day, they sent 500 guards looking for blood? With cavalry? Do you think your people will suffer less on that day? Do you think fewer will be killed?”

“You do ask that we be kicked!” Kovan’s hands became fists, and his knuckles whitened. He glared at me as if I was the enemy.

What reason did he have to think otherwise? I was just another outsider playing games with the lives of him and his kin.

“I would ask that you do not give them cause to burn your people in the street, Kovan. That you allow the tavern gossip to remain about drunken guards from the hated Burgher Council beating an old man to death. That it does not change instead to one of vicious foreigners waiting to kill their neighbors. If that happens, what do you think your neighbors going to do? What is your plan for that?”

Kovan looked away.

“There is another option,” said Stanoval. “One that ends the attacks against our people - and serves your purposes, too, Burgher Gerard.”

“Mine?” I thought it a bit glamorous to call my goals’ purposes’. Perhaps it was glamorous to call them goals at all. “I have none, except for growing wealth, adding slave meat, and what power I will need to preserve them.”

Stanoval tried to hide his reaction with a smile.

“Surely, you cannot mean that. You have moved against the Council, taking Burgher Sempren’s daughter as your hostage - or slave. There are those on the Council - in stronger position than your own - who already act against you. I have followed how Caral the Fish Merchant foiled your plans for building sewers, then presented the same plans as his own. 

“You do not care for the Council, Gerard. That much is plain to an old man who was played the same game. The Council does not care for you. It moves to deal with you, as unconsciously as a tree’s leaves grow towards the sun and as irresistible. You are too honorable for their liking. They will push you out: preserving corruption is always easier than reform. That is why I asked if you could meet with me. Do you want your problems with the Council to end?”

I raised an eyebrow.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean do you wish to overthrow the Burgher Council,” he leaned forward, eyes hard as diamonds. “Guarantee the safety of our people, and we will fight for you.”

Who were these madmen? 

I was stunned. I looked from Stanoval to Kovan. Both men had the same expression of dead seriousness.

“Don’t be fools!” I started. “You don’t need to do something so drastic, so dangerous, so unpredictable. Just wait this out without letting them goad you! The Council has much bigger problems. There is a Hataduri farm at the edge of our territory - a farm that sent our envoys fleeing and chased the ship right back up the Red River, almost to the Black. You mention Starka: they are the city’s true enemy. Starka’s galleys have been seen traveling further and closer to our waterways. They are gifting iron, incense, and consecrated sacrificial slave girls to Settite villages. Do not make things worse for everyone by staging a revolt!”

There was a silence.

“Fine,” Stanoval bowed his head. “You are our sponsor, Gerard, and we are a reasonable people. We will do as you say. However, you have enemies in the city - and you have made more, of late. Know also, however, that you have also made friends.” He sat back. “Perhaps you are right, and we won’t need your help. Yet, it may be that you will yet need ours. If that day comes, please know that you can count on us.”

Before I could answer, there came shouting from outside in the alley. A horse whinnied.

Stanoval looked to Kovan, his expression one of surprise.

“What is that?” He asked.

Outside, in the hallway, I heard Juskar shouting. Another man shouted back at him. The door to the room was thrown open, and Juskar came in, an Armanean guard running after him.

“Out!” Juskar barked at me. “Now!”

***

“You think you can insult me, you Armanean mongrel?”

Our group had rushed out of the building and back into the alley. We were too late: about ten Armaneans stood blocking the entrance. Their weapons were not drawn, but I could see the tension, the twitching of hands going to hilts. They exchanged looks with each other and one man in particular. I took him for the leader. It was he who had just been called a mongrel. 

Outside the alley, and trying to enter, was a group of twenty men. They were armed with shields and spears and wore leather helmets and breastplates. They were a mixed group, unlike the all-Armanean militia that was trying to keep them out. 

Leading them was a Shemite on horseback. His long, black beard was oiled and curled. It was like looking at a man who had stepped out of an ancient, Mesopotamian carving. He wore studded leather armor over his chest, and a shield slung over his back. Tattooed on his arms were caste markings. I could not read them, but only high caste Shemites wore them. In his hand, he carried a long spear with serrated edges.

Both the high caste Shemite rider and his men wore cloaks with a gold clasp. Each clasp was stamped with the seal of the House Caral bodyguard.

“We want no quarrel with you,” said the Armanean leader. His tone was even. His eyes were fixed on the rider. “Speak no more and be on your way.”

The Shemite’s eyes bugged out. He seemed to catch fire with rage.

“You dare to instruct me, you low caste piece of - no! Your scum people don’t even have castes! Mongrel filth, you will bow to me, and make way, and pray that I will not avenge myself overmuch upon you!”

The Armanean drew his sword.

The Shemite aimed his spear.

All around, there was a flash of metal and the sound of blades being drawn.

“The back,” said Juskar, his hand tugging at my arm. “We go to the back and jump over the wall!”

“No,” I shook him off and ran towards the Shemite. “No!” I yelled out. “Stop this!”

I pulled back my hood to show my face.

The Shemite seemed to recognize me at once. However, he did not move his spear.

“You must stop this,” I stepped in front of the Armanean leader. He tried to pull me back, but I pushed him away. “He meant no insult to you. Please, go about your business, Nobleman!”

“Hah!” The Shemite spat. “Does the Lightning Shield himself think that the honor of one of the chariot rider’s caste may be set aside as trifling irritant?”

“Not at all, Nobleman. However, as a Burgher of the First Circle, I am ordering you - and all your men - to leave this place at once.”

“You may not order me!” The Shemite pounded his chest with his fist. “I am of the guard of Caral of the First Circle! We take our orders from him, not you!”

I scanned the street behind the Shemite. When violence looks imminent, most Hyperboreans - especially unarmed ones - clear the street. Yet, there were six men who remained in the street - all seemed of military age. All remained right where they were, watching. I caught one’s eye, and he looked away as if somehow that would make me unsee him.

So this was what this was! They weren’t bystanders or even rubberneckers. 

They were witnesses.

“This man accepts his fault,” I patted the Armanean leader on his shoulder.

“No, I don’t!”

It turned and gave me a sharp look.

“Yes, he does,” said a new voice. All heads turned: it was Stanoval of Rozander, walking out into the alley. Kovan followed him, along with several guards. “We are civilized men, yes, you and I?” He said to the Shemite. “You especially, if not more so! A noble son of the great and most ancient land of Shem! Home of lettered script. Where Nohaz descended from his ark with his sons and slave girls from every land, when Great Flood receded?” Stanoval, beaming, went right up to the Shemite and patted his horse.

The Shemite seemed to defuse, despite himself. You can always flatter the arrogant: they have no defense against their high opinion of themselves.

“So,” said Stanoval, “what fine can our foolish but contrite officer pay for insulting one such as you, noble lord? A fine in gold, yes?”

The Shemite grinned. It was the grin of a goblin who sees how he will trick a mother out of her newborn child.

“He must pay 50 gold,” he said.

There were gasps and murmurs.

The Shemite seemed even more pleased at this.

“That’s fine,” I said. “50 gold, upon your honor. To be paid, upon mine.”

There were more gasps and murmurs. The Shemite seemed quite surprised. 

50 gold was a fortune, the kind of sum a great warrior or successful explorer might find himself possessing at the end of his career. It was no small sum to me, either.

“Very well then,” the Shemite turned his horse and left. His back seemed that much straighter. His men turned and followed him. None looked back at us.

The six “civilians” fell in with them as they moved off, like a single, drilled unit.

“By Yog’s stinking cunt!” Juskar hissed, all of a sudden, that my side. “Why ever did you offer to pay that?!”

“They were setting us up. Did you notice the bystanders in the street that were not bystanders?”

“How can you know that, and why does that matter?”

“No one wants to be around a bloodbath,” I said. “So why were they staying, watching?”

“Who does not want to watch bloodbath?”

“No one wants to watch one from that close. That Shemite and his men came looking for a fight. It will come down to our word against theirs. Witnesses would be called upon - and those men would step forward and say we were at fault. Think how that would look. It is bad enough that I’ve stolen another Burgher’s daughter. Can you imagine how much worse things would be if they had me on violence against persons and property, in the street, working with Armanean rioters?”

Juskar took a moment to process this.

“Again, Caral moves against you!” He ground his teeth. “The Sea-Blooded scum!”

“Burgher Gerard, I do not think it is personal,” said Stanoval. “Caral has seen how your power has grown with the backing of the city’s poor Armaneans. Perhaps all he has done here is seek to redress the balance against one he has deemed a danger to his goals. Which, if I may add, is sending slave girls away to who knows where, bought with limitless gold, fashioned by fingers more skilled than any man’s.”

“Personal or not, it hardly matters,” said Juskar. “The choice to extend safety to your people was forced by circumstance. Caral, however, uses circumstances to push his own advantage! There was very nearly blood today. I still do not know why there wasn’t.”

“Those men were refugees, just like our friends here,” I said. “That was an upper-caste Shemite. Even the air here disgusts him. With 50 gold, he can find himself a little island on the Black, build a farm villa, and fill its pleasure dungeon with all the girls he could want. He has no love for Caral. None of them do.” I turned to Stanoval. “We must go now. Let’s meet again, but in smaller number, so no loose or treacherous lips will give us away again. Just tell your people to keep out of trouble, and I will be able to protect them. And, myself.”

***

We returned to the Master’s Inn without further incident. I kept my hood drawn, but I doubted it would do me any good. Those most interested in knowing where I was, had found me. 

We retired to the safety of one of the administrative buildings behind the Inn. At least within the walls of my estate, I knew we were safe.

“You were very lucky today,” said Juskar. “You cannot let Caral’s move go unpunished, let alone ignored.”

The room had thick, stone walls. A tall, blonde slave girl lit oil lamps set in wall brackets, one by one. Across the room, a log crackled in the fireplace. We sat on low couches. On the floor was a thick, Shemite rug patterned with red and off-white wool. 

A large-eyed Zidonese girl knelt beside Juskar. She sat back on her heels, long, straight black hair down her back. The ivory-skinned beauty held a clay jug of wine in her hands. A chain ran from it to her throat. She watched as Juskar ignored the cup on the table she had bought for him. She seemed put out by it, like one was cooked a meal for a beloved partner, only to be told it wasn’t very good.

Beside me was a slender, athletic brunette girl of about 20 years of age. All she wore was my slave collar, a short, iron chain between her ankle cuffs, and a rope tied around her waist that was strung with large, blue beads. On the tray she held for me was slave girl cheese and a bright, red seed picked from underwater plants that were all the rage these days. I ran my hand through her hair: it was thick, dark, gently curling. It fell forward, over her breasts. They were perky with light brown aureoles.

She looked up at me and smiled. It was a shy smile; her eyes were intelligent.

“Caral moves against you,” Juskar leaned forward. “He will not rest. You must deal with him. Now, you have the advantage of strength in numbers. Armaneans willing to throw their lot in with you even if it means the city must burn! What does he have? Gold-bought wretches that will turn on him for a bit more gold. Why wait? Why not finish this on your terms, before he tries again, on his?”

I pointed to the food tray and indicated at the table.

Obedient, the brunette put the tray on the table. She looked up at me for further instruction.

“I will act,” I motioned to my feet. 

The slave girl got down on her elbows and knees, raising up a well-shaped behind. She tossed her hair to the side to present her face and lowered her lips to my foot. Her lips were soft; they glided back and forth. I felt a warm breath between them.

“What are you thinking? An attack on his ships? Burning his fishing boats at night? Counterfeiting his coins? Or shall we just storm his holdings and cut off his fish-faced head?”

The slave girl’s tongue began to probe between my toes. I reached down and ran my hand up and down her back. Her skin was smooth, soft, warm.

“Actually, I want to just talk to him.”

Juskar, who had, at last, raised his wine to his lips, sprayed red all over the world and rug. 

The Zidonese slave seemed even more disturbed. Why did this disturb her? Had she had a taste on the sly? That would be it. Even a piece of stale, old bread is like a fine-dining delicacy to a slave girl. I would have her whipped and moved from the kitchens.

“Stanoval was right,” I began. “I doubt any of this is personal. Caral just sees me as a threat. A prominent, larger-than-life burgher. He probably has greater ambitions. That’s why he wants me out of the way or neutered.” The chain between the brunette’s ankle cuffs clinked as she moved. Why had they been fitted, sir? I had not seen this done before. “Because none of this is personal, he will consider reason, Juskar. This rivalry does no one any good. If he listens to reason, I can come to an accommodation with him.”

Juskar snorted and shook his head.

“The only accommodation he might accept, Friend, is one where he continues to send shiploads of slave girls down the Black, to be bred to death by Deep One monsters. Will you accept such accommodation?”

I said nothing.

“I am no Duran, Gerard. I am Darfuri. Where I come from, we do not suffer monsters to live. Here, however -” he threw up his hands. “People speak of the Sea-Blooded as if it is nothing. I have seen Sea-Blooded in the streets, staring, hiding their true form in thick robes while they buy young women. What do you think,” his tone became cold, “our Mazgar friends would make of this place?”

“I said I would try to come to an accommodation with him, not appease him - or surrender. If he is not amenable, then yes, we will look at other options. For now, I would give Caral - Deep One agent he no doubt is - the benefit of the doubt. I will not let him take any more women, Juskar. But, I cannot damn him because he was not born wholly human.”

“One does not suffer a monster to live,” frowned Juskar.

“And is that not a monstrous thing to say?”

I regarded the locking mechanism on the brunette’s anklets. Both of them had been filled in with a shiny metal. It was tin: the metal preferred by slavers and smiths when working with shackles already pressed against flesh. Tin had a much lower melting point than bronze, making it much safer for such work. Why had her anklets been fused? We must have bought her this way. The chain between them was only about 2 feet long.

What is so interesting to you about the girl’s shackles?” Asked Juskar. His tone had become weary: he was giving in.

“I have never seen anything like this,” I took hold of her ankles and lifted them up. The slave girl braced herself with her elbows and hands. “Why are they fused?”

“It is a punishment,” he replied. “She is a runaway.”

The brunette looked up from my foot for a moment, her eyes anxious.

“Really?” I held the chain in one hand. My other snaked down to stroke her calf. “I thought that the punishment for that was to cutting the tendons behind the ankles.”

The brunette froze, her body tensing. She stared at me, eyes wide.

“It is, in this part of the world. This one comes from the other side of the continent of Shem. It is different there.”

I marveled at what I was seeing. As with a punishment hamstringing, the slave would never be able to run again. This way, though, she could still serve unimpaired at all her tasks. 

No people are more sadistic than Shemites. They are hedonists who attach no stigma to pleasure. I say this without judgment - but yet consider how negative that statement reads. It is because we have been taught to be ashamed of pleasure - it is so deep-rooted, we cannot even talk of it in neutral terms without an effort. So, imagine then how truly different the Shemites are from us today. To them, the pursuit of pleasure is not a vice but a reason to live. The elevation of that pursuit is what they strive for. For them, sadism was just another avenue for joy to be explored. An art form to develop just like any other.

I found it amusing, then, that a lifetime Shemite torture presented a more humane solution to the problem. I refused to cut my runaways’ hamstrings. I did give them severe punishment, but it was always unsatisfactory. Being put in the public use stocks for a day made a good example out of a girl. However, it did nothing to decrease her own desire to escape. If anything, the opposite.

Given a faulty anklet lock and an open door, wouldn’t Belled Pet flee into the night, again, if she thought she might never again have to beg a man for his cock that she may avoid his whip?

“It is beautiful,” I said. “It is genius. Rational. If even Shemites can be rational, why can’t we? Caral may not be fully a man, but he is very much a businessman. He understands property. He understands commerce. Violence is not good for either of those. I can trust that will be the foundation of any discussion with him. Just because he is a fish monster doesn’t mean he can’t have honor.”

Juskar threw up his hands.

“It is difficult to hear you speak of such things! Yet, I’ve said my piece. There’s nothing more to add, and I will back your decision - even this one! But, always consider that Caral, merchant or otherwise, will find it much easier to work with you if you are dead, Gerard. Also, that the converse is true.”

I took hold of the brunette by her hair. I parted my thighs and pulled her between them. She got to her knees, brushed her hair back, and smiled as she began undoing my pants. Her long fingers were elegant. They tickled me where they brushed my skin. She watched me as she stroked my cock, assessing her play. 

“It will be fine, Juskar. Wait and see.”

Hee shook his head, downed his wine, and left.

The Zidonese girl watched as he left, forlorn. Then, she turned to regard me, her eyes asking what she had done wrong.

“Come, beauty,” I beckoned her to join the brunette between my thighs. “Do what you are best at.”