I sang to the heavens and wiggled my bottom onto his cock to feel the whole of him.
Skin dewy with sweat, Ekene rose on his elbows, his cock still inside me. “I’ve deflowered many virgins,” he said, his heavy eyes glazed with contentment. “But none has ever made me lose all control.” He pulled out and rolled to the side, one hand tracing my body’s curves. “You look human enough, but you feel like a goddess.”
“That’s because you made me feel like one.” Sex was paradise. I looked out the doorway, surprised to see the long shadow cast by the myrrh tree. “Is your job done?”
Ekene hugged me tight. “No, Destiny, I am well trained. My cock is ready for more.” He thrust his tongue into my eager mouth.
CHAPTER 3
Ekene sent me to paradise many more times. By the time he left, my cunt was sore and yet I was bursting with energy. I waved good-bye to Ekene, who plodded on weary legs down the path.
Just as the brightest stars appeared in the sky, Momma rounded the bend with a plate of cucumbers, olives, and flatbread in one hand, and a pitcher of well water in the other. “Hungry?”
“Ravenous.” I laughed at myself, the ignorant virgin. A few hours ago I thought only a belly could be hungry. Now I knew a body could hunger. I took the plate from Momma and snapped off a cucumber chunk.
Momma dug into the fist-sized leather pouch she wore crosswise over her body and strode inside. She sprinkled dried leaves into water in a clay pot and heated it over the fire.
“When is Ekene coming back?” I stuffed a bite of flatbread into my mouth.
“Never.” She stirred the leaves, bending low to sniff the tangy aroma.
“Why? I like him.” My body grew warm thinking about his body’s heat.
Momma scowled. “Did he make your spirit sing?”
“Yes.”
“Then he did his job.” She took the pot from the fire and ladled the liquid into a cup. “Drink this.” She thrust it toward me. “It keeps a man’s seed from being planted in your womb. A baby will prevent your journey to Greatness.”
I sipped the bitter brew and wrinkled my nose. “How do you know this Wise Woman spoke the truth?”
“Because her prophesies rang true.”
I cocked my head. “There was more than one? How many were there?” I knew of only one proclaiming my Great Destiny.
“Two. Now finish the cup and no more questions.”
“But—”
“Another visitor will come to educate you on your path to Greatness.”
“Who?”
Momma’s lips thrummed with aggravation. “Patience, daughter.”
I did not possess that trait. Patience seemed like a weakness, a misnamed virtue the old used to control the young. But no matter how much I pleaded, Momma refused to tell me any more about the Wise Woman’s prophecies or this mysterious path to Greatness.
A few days later, a traveling stranger we met by the well made us forget about mystical prophecies.
“Is this your well?” The slump-shouldered woman stepped back, her shadowed eyes wide with fear. “I need water. I don’t think I will make it to the village.” The clay ladle shook in her hand.
“Drink,” said Momma. “The well is shared by all.”
The woman gulped the water. She was about Momma’s age—or the age Momma appeared to be, since jinn can live an eternity—and might have been pretty but for the jagged angry scar from ear to nostril and the years of sun engraved on her face.
She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand, then dragged it dry on her long frayed dress. Her feet were dust covered, her thong sandals worn. She touched her braid, patting it down as though embarrassed by her unkempt appearance. “I’m a long way from home.”
“You look hungry.” Momma, who was always generous to strangers—you never know their real identity, they might be a god, a powerful marid, or a ghoul, she often reminded me—pulled a few figs and husked walnuts from her pouch. “Where are you from?”
“Ma’rib.” The woman gobbled down the walnuts.
“Do you have relatives here?” Momma pointed to the walled village cresting the terraced fields of millet, wheat, and coffee berries.
“A distant one. She probably won’t remember me. And if she does, she will remember why our families don’t speak.” She stuffed the fig in her mouth. “My name is Ife,” she said while chewing.
“I’m Ismenie and this is my daughter. Spend the night with us. I know what it’s like to travel far from home.”
Ife turned her head and spit. “Ma’rib is no longer my home. It’s an evil place.”
Momma’s ears perked up at the mention of the Sabaean capital. “Why do you say that? What happened?”
Ife gulped more water from the ladle. “King Hasan happened. Oh, he had everyone fooled, that one. Handsome and kind faced. Those are the dangerous ones, you know. Their sweet faces hide the depravity inside. King Hasan’s greed knows no bounds.” Her teeth tore another fig in half. “He taxes us to death, or as close as you can come to death. He hires cruel guards and gives them free rein to whip and beat anyone—man, woman, or child—to death for the slightest infraction.”
“What sort of infraction?” Momma’s voice was honeyed disbelief. I knew the tone well. I’d heard the sweetly veiled suspicion whenever villagers told outrageous stories of surviving an encounter with an efrit, a powerful, fire-breathing jinni.
About to plop another fig in her mouth, Ife paused, her sun-wrinkled brow furrowing into a hundred despairing lines. “I know what you’re thinking. A thief’s small infraction is a victim’s tragic crime.” A single tear rolled down her cheek. She wiped it away, the wet smudge revealing the lustrous ebony beneath her travel-dusted skin. “Hear my story and judge for yourself. My husband and I were walking through Ma’rib’s marketplace. We were neither poor nor rich, but had enough to buy those small treats that bring a smile to your face. Anyway, we were at a stall looking at a silver bangle—not near as fine as your daughter’s golden one—and my husband held it up to admire the etchings when the king’s guard shoved my husband aside and claimed he wanted that particular one for his wife.”
I looked down at my bracelet. Who would have thought such a harmless trinket could ruin a woman’s life?
“My husband is…was a logical man,” said Ife, “and he pointed to all the bangles of equal if not better price and design. The guard knocked my husband to the ground, and shouted, ‘Thief, thief!’ The guard snatched the bracelet from the ground and kicked my husband in the head. Then he asked the silversmith to confirm the theft. The silversmith shook so much he could only stammer a nonsensical reply, which the guard took as proof. Before the silversmith found his tongue, the guard hacked off my husband’s head.”
I yelped and grabbed Momma’s arm.
Ife ran her finger along the scar running from her ear to nose. “He sliced me too. A warning, he said, never to oppose the king’s guard.” She sighed. “I left Ma’rib the next day and decided to return to the village of my ancestors north of here. I’m done with Ma’rib, the greedy king, and his militia of vile guardsman.” She spit on the ground again.