"This room is not sufficient," Lady Sosia Kemble said abruptly as they lay side by side on the bed. They had only finished making love thirty seconds ago and already she was complaining, "This room does not meet my requirements."
Dryden Heppac, still panting after his exertions, let his breaths merge together into a sigh. No, of course the room wasn't sufficient. The room was dreadful. It was a tiny square box. It had bare stone walls, a bare stone ceiling and a bare stone floor. The lack of decoration allowed one to fully appreciate the extensive and doubtless widening cracks in all the surfaces. There was a single tiny window, heavily grilled as if there was actually anything inside the room to protect. And if a view outside was possible, it would only be of Kieley Alley; a putrid narrow link between Fountain Square and Federation Row. Despite the almost total exclusion of sunshine, the heat of the afternoon had cascaded into the room. Dryden was lying still and naked and he still felt the sweat rising and trickling across his skin.
The bed was the only object stored in the room. And the bed was barely that. It was a single mattress; not even raised on bricks, the usual defence against marauding insects. Dryden watched a fat woodlouse crest the hill and begin waddling across the summit towards his legs. Just as cockroaches were basking on the walls and squadrons of ants were marching single file across the floor. And even the mattress was scarcely a mattress. It was a collection of sharp iron springs joined by a flimsy stretch of cloth. Dryden could feel at least three digging into him. He had seen the marks on Lady Sosia's back before, caused by his weight on top of hers pushing her body onto the vicious coils. Sometimes they broke the skin. Yet she never complained. Dryden suspected that she enjoyed the feeling.
She was still grumbling now, however. Gazing at the disintegrating ceiling, her fingers lost in her shaken mass of auburn hair, she repeated, "It is not at all sufficient. I told you what I required, Heppac."
He knew her requirements, true. And he knew that the room was the best he could do. She insisted that he pay for it. Lady Sosia Kemble, Mistress of the Tremmest Estates, would not pay for anything during their weekly liaisons. So he had to find somewhere inexpensive. So cheap that it would make such a tiny hole in his tiny wage that not even his perceptive wife Morran would spot the gap. Lady Sosia also demanded that they meet in his own neighbourhood. He therefore had to find somewhere in the back streets; and not use the usual landlords. Not somebody local like that damn Delpess, who would doubtless hang around the markets telling everybody about the mysterious piece of business he had just conducted. Renting a room to Dryden Heppac, no less, who already rented a sizeable apartment from Mr Delpess, who had only stipulated that the room contain a bed, who couldn't be using it for travel purposes because it was just around the corner from the home he shared with his wife and children. So what, Delpess would wonder very loudly, did Dryden Heppac need that bed for?
It had taken Dryden months to arrange. Months during which his only meetings with Sosia were public ones, fully clothed and lasting no more than five minutes. While she teased him and tempted him and made parts of him insane with anticipation. Finally he had found this room. He believed it to be safe. And she had decided,
"It simply will not do. You must find somewhere else."
He sat up. "Look, Sosia-"
"Do not call me that," she said sharply. "You may only call me that while you are inside me. At all other times, address me as Lady Sosia or My Lady."
Dryden sighed again. He didn't even call her Sosia when he was inside her. He called her slut or bitch or whatever demeaning name he could think of; and that was at her instruction as well. He glanced down at her, wondering again at her self-proclaimed status. Mistress of the Tremmest Estates, wife of a very rich, very old nobleman, childless and so heir to all his riches… Yet Dryden had never heard of a place called Tremmest. Sosia claimed it was somewhere in the north, but she had the features of a local and never seemed to leave the Triple Cities. On the other hand, she had clearly acquired money from somewhere. Her dress were always exquisite, her fingers sparkled with silver, the skin on her face had the preserved cast of expensive cosmetics. When he was entering her she squealed like a rodent. A second after leaving her, however, her voice instantly regained its sharp, cultured clarity. If she was simply an actress then she was obviously a very successful one. And she shared the popular believe that greater wealth equalled superiority in every aspect of a relationship.
"Look, this were the best I could find," Dryden argued, opting to call her nothing at all. "If you want summit better-"
"I wish for something worst. I thought I made myself clear on this matter." Sosia propped herself up on her elbows. "I mean, take a look around this place. It is almost habitable. I imagine that a family of eight could exist quite comfortably in here. And when I shake out my dress-" she nodded at the strip of finery lying crumpled on the floor – "I cannot imagine that a single cockroach will fall out. Where is the squalor, Heppac? I made my requirements quite clear. Where are the odours? The noises? The blood stains on the wall?"
"Keep banging on like this, there might be a few," he muttered.
Sosia laughed. She had an aristocrat's laugh too, a piercing giggle like fingernails scraping across slate. "Oh, do carry on threatening me, Heppac. You are so sweet when you do."
She started to run her foot idly across his thigh. Irritated with her and disgusted with himself, he wanted to move away but couldn't. He always wanted to move away from Sosia and never could. "This place'll have to do for now," he insisted stubbornly.
"Oh, please do not try to tell me you really cannot find anywhere worst. In Jakks Way? I imagine your own flat is barely more salubrious than here."
"Yeah it bloody well is. An' Jakks Way ain't the slums. We-"
It was Sosia's turn to sigh. "Please, Heppac, do not sing me that song. 'This is a respectable district, there's plenty worst than us'. I am so terribly weary of that tune. I believe that the poor of the Cities are even more obsessed with status and wealth than the rich. Which is pitiable because you have no cause to be. The truth remains, Heppac, that this most definitely is a slum neighbourhood. And I want to be in the absolute depths of it and I ordered you to take me there."
"You so keen on squalor, why don't you just shag a beggar in an alley?"
"Oh, but a beggar would just demand money. And then keep on demanding money. It would be too tiring. If that was all I wished for, I would simply hire a gigolo." She was suddenly sat up beside him, running fingertips over his thinning hair. "But the idea of you taking me in an alleyway," she murmured in his ear, "Now that is intriguing."
"Aye, an' it ain't gonna happen."
"Oh, and why not, pray? Because we might be observed yes? You could be found out. Then, of course, the news would wriggle its way back to your sweet little wife Morran."
"I told you not to talk about her."
"Oh yes, of course. Because that causes the guilt, does it not? Because Morran is not so sweet any more, is she, and not so little. Not now. Neither is her husband, of course, and so he should make do with her. But he cannot, can he? He still wishes for something younger, something more succulent. And he knows that is wrong and I do not believe he can ever quite banish the guilt. So we can never mention Morran-"
Dryden shook her off. Sosia fell back onto the bed as if he had struck her. Perhaps she wanted him to. He looked down at her in disgust. She wasn't really that 'young' or 'succulent'. She was his age, he guessed, in her early forties. Cosmetics had only preserved her face. The rest of her was gaunt, wrinkled, withering. He thought about his own body, his round belly and fat limbs and decaying skin. It was fortunate that the light in the room was so bad.
"I ought to start asking for money an' all," he muttered. "Least I'd get summit out of this."
Sosia laughed again. "Oh, but you do, Heppac. You get me."
"Aye, great."
"Is that not enough anymore? You get to nail an aristocrat. You get to fuck an aristocrat as if she were a dirty whore. I know the though excites you, Heppac. It is the dream of every common man, is it not? To have us underneath you, in your power. And perhaps next time…" She rolled over, spread her legs, spread her buttocks. "Perhaps you can enter me this way. Down the passage which every man fantasises about. Think, Heppac, think how that will demean me." Sosia rolled onto her back again, face contorted into a contented smile. She placed her foot gently on his chest. "You are imagining it already, are you not?"
"You're bloody sick."
"And you are growing hard again, I notice. Continue to picture it. Dream what it will feel like to enter me that way." Suddenly she straightened her leg, almost kicking him off the bed. "And all you will able to do is imagine," she added sharply, "Until you find me a satisfactory room."
"For fuck's sake-"
"Now get out, Heppac. I am done with you."
Dryden Heppac, still panting after his exertions, let his breaths merge together into a sigh. No, of course the room wasn't sufficient. The room was dreadful. It was a tiny square box. It had bare stone walls, a bare stone ceiling and a bare stone floor. The lack of decoration allowed one to fully appreciate the extensive and doubtless widening cracks in all the surfaces. There was a single tiny window, heavily grilled as if there was actually anything inside the room to protect. And if a view outside was possible, it would only be of Kieley Alley; a putrid narrow link between Fountain Square and Federation Row. Despite the almost total exclusion of sunshine, the heat of the afternoon had cascaded into the room. Dryden was lying still and naked and he still felt the sweat rising and trickling across his skin.
The bed was the only object stored in the room. And the bed was barely that. It was a single mattress; not even raised on bricks, the usual defence against marauding insects. Dryden watched a fat woodlouse crest the hill and begin waddling across the summit towards his legs. Just as cockroaches were basking on the walls and squadrons of ants were marching single file across the floor. And even the mattress was scarcely a mattress. It was a collection of sharp iron springs joined by a flimsy stretch of cloth. Dryden could feel at least three digging into him. He had seen the marks on Lady Sosia's back before, caused by his weight on top of hers pushing her body onto the vicious coils. Sometimes they broke the skin. Yet she never complained. Dryden suspected that she enjoyed the feeling.
She was still grumbling now, however. Gazing at the disintegrating ceiling, her fingers lost in her shaken mass of auburn hair, she repeated, "It is not at all sufficient. I told you what I required, Heppac."
He knew her requirements, true. And he knew that the room was the best he could do. She insisted that he pay for it. Lady Sosia Kemble, Mistress of the Tremmest Estates, would not pay for anything during their weekly liaisons. So he had to find somewhere inexpensive. So cheap that it would make such a tiny hole in his tiny wage that not even his perceptive wife Morran would spot the gap. Lady Sosia also demanded that they meet in his own neighbourhood. He therefore had to find somewhere in the back streets; and not use the usual landlords. Not somebody local like that damn Delpess, who would doubtless hang around the markets telling everybody about the mysterious piece of business he had just conducted. Renting a room to Dryden Heppac, no less, who already rented a sizeable apartment from Mr Delpess, who had only stipulated that the room contain a bed, who couldn't be using it for travel purposes because it was just around the corner from the home he shared with his wife and children. So what, Delpess would wonder very loudly, did Dryden Heppac need that bed for?
It had taken Dryden months to arrange. Months during which his only meetings with Sosia were public ones, fully clothed and lasting no more than five minutes. While she teased him and tempted him and made parts of him insane with anticipation. Finally he had found this room. He believed it to be safe. And she had decided,
"It simply will not do. You must find somewhere else."
He sat up. "Look, Sosia-"
"Do not call me that," she said sharply. "You may only call me that while you are inside me. At all other times, address me as Lady Sosia or My Lady."
Dryden sighed again. He didn't even call her Sosia when he was inside her. He called her slut or bitch or whatever demeaning name he could think of; and that was at her instruction as well. He glanced down at her, wondering again at her self-proclaimed status. Mistress of the Tremmest Estates, wife of a very rich, very old nobleman, childless and so heir to all his riches… Yet Dryden had never heard of a place called Tremmest. Sosia claimed it was somewhere in the north, but she had the features of a local and never seemed to leave the Triple Cities. On the other hand, she had clearly acquired money from somewhere. Her dress were always exquisite, her fingers sparkled with silver, the skin on her face had the preserved cast of expensive cosmetics. When he was entering her she squealed like a rodent. A second after leaving her, however, her voice instantly regained its sharp, cultured clarity. If she was simply an actress then she was obviously a very successful one. And she shared the popular believe that greater wealth equalled superiority in every aspect of a relationship.
"Look, this were the best I could find," Dryden argued, opting to call her nothing at all. "If you want summit better-"
"I wish for something worst. I thought I made myself clear on this matter." Sosia propped herself up on her elbows. "I mean, take a look around this place. It is almost habitable. I imagine that a family of eight could exist quite comfortably in here. And when I shake out my dress-" she nodded at the strip of finery lying crumpled on the floor – "I cannot imagine that a single cockroach will fall out. Where is the squalor, Heppac? I made my requirements quite clear. Where are the odours? The noises? The blood stains on the wall?"
"Keep banging on like this, there might be a few," he muttered.
Sosia laughed. She had an aristocrat's laugh too, a piercing giggle like fingernails scraping across slate. "Oh, do carry on threatening me, Heppac. You are so sweet when you do."
She started to run her foot idly across his thigh. Irritated with her and disgusted with himself, he wanted to move away but couldn't. He always wanted to move away from Sosia and never could. "This place'll have to do for now," he insisted stubbornly.
"Oh, please do not try to tell me you really cannot find anywhere worst. In Jakks Way? I imagine your own flat is barely more salubrious than here."
"Yeah it bloody well is. An' Jakks Way ain't the slums. We-"
It was Sosia's turn to sigh. "Please, Heppac, do not sing me that song. 'This is a respectable district, there's plenty worst than us'. I am so terribly weary of that tune. I believe that the poor of the Cities are even more obsessed with status and wealth than the rich. Which is pitiable because you have no cause to be. The truth remains, Heppac, that this most definitely is a slum neighbourhood. And I want to be in the absolute depths of it and I ordered you to take me there."
"You so keen on squalor, why don't you just shag a beggar in an alley?"
"Oh, but a beggar would just demand money. And then keep on demanding money. It would be too tiring. If that was all I wished for, I would simply hire a gigolo." She was suddenly sat up beside him, running fingertips over his thinning hair. "But the idea of you taking me in an alleyway," she murmured in his ear, "Now that is intriguing."
"Aye, an' it ain't gonna happen."
"Oh, and why not, pray? Because we might be observed yes? You could be found out. Then, of course, the news would wriggle its way back to your sweet little wife Morran."
"I told you not to talk about her."
"Oh yes, of course. Because that causes the guilt, does it not? Because Morran is not so sweet any more, is she, and not so little. Not now. Neither is her husband, of course, and so he should make do with her. But he cannot, can he? He still wishes for something younger, something more succulent. And he knows that is wrong and I do not believe he can ever quite banish the guilt. So we can never mention Morran-"
Dryden shook her off. Sosia fell back onto the bed as if he had struck her. Perhaps she wanted him to. He looked down at her in disgust. She wasn't really that 'young' or 'succulent'. She was his age, he guessed, in her early forties. Cosmetics had only preserved her face. The rest of her was gaunt, wrinkled, withering. He thought about his own body, his round belly and fat limbs and decaying skin. It was fortunate that the light in the room was so bad.
"I ought to start asking for money an' all," he muttered. "Least I'd get summit out of this."
Sosia laughed again. "Oh, but you do, Heppac. You get me."
"Aye, great."
"Is that not enough anymore? You get to nail an aristocrat. You get to fuck an aristocrat as if she were a dirty whore. I know the though excites you, Heppac. It is the dream of every common man, is it not? To have us underneath you, in your power. And perhaps next time…" She rolled over, spread her legs, spread her buttocks. "Perhaps you can enter me this way. Down the passage which every man fantasises about. Think, Heppac, think how that will demean me." Sosia rolled onto her back again, face contorted into a contented smile. She placed her foot gently on his chest. "You are imagining it already, are you not?"
"You're bloody sick."
"And you are growing hard again, I notice. Continue to picture it. Dream what it will feel like to enter me that way." Suddenly she straightened her leg, almost kicking him off the bed. "And all you will able to do is imagine," she added sharply, "Until you find me a satisfactory room."
"For fuck's sake-"
"Now get out, Heppac. I am done with you."
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