Chapter 13 : New Friends In Dumis : Part 2
"Perhaps you would like to come and be my guest at my house in Dumis for an afternoon, or day, or evening or a day," said Valery eyes glinting as she gave him her attention. Placing his hand on her bare shoulder he emphasised his intention more strongly, "or a night".
She did not push his hand away as many ladies of Prancir would have done. Unbeknown to Danella Valery was expecting his first advances to be rejected. He was quite used to having to chase his quarry. He prided himself on a high success rate. For many Prancirian women his wealth, power and looks were persuasive. Persistence frequently paid off when he was able to convince them he really cared for them. If he was having any difficulties the promise of expensive evenings out and plentiful gifts could help to tip the balance. His wealth and power had helped him to bed many women, young debutantes, bored wealthy wives whose husbands were away, ordinary women married or unmarried who could enjoy the gifts and the escape he provided from their normal existence.
Albert and Philippe had engaged the ladies in conversation with Mireau briefly while Valery saw his chance to make his move. Danella savoured the feel of his fleshy hand. The stranger's touch was much prized. It had been some while since Mireau had been a stranger to her. His slim petite body and his charming personality remained exiting to her, but it was time for the taste of someone new. She thanked Mireau inwardly for the chance of meeting this intriguing group. She still wanted Philippe most of all, but Valery had made her change direction by his intervention. She could not ignore him. In Prancir she must accept whatever she was offered because she was offered so little. Her rising excitement made her realise what she had lacked in these few months, she wanted to immerse herself again in the arms of strangers and familiars alike, drawing comfort and pleasure from their openness. Prancirians were closed to the world around them. They spoke, were sometimes friendly. They gave the appearance of living in a community, but in truth they lived alone with only their husbands or wives for comfort. She realised again how rich her own people were to rarely know loneliness or feel abandoned and unwanted, to be able to reach out to any stranger and be introduced so easily to warmth and joy. Valery was not like other Prancirians. He was open and able to make the connections which his compatriots could not. He had confidence, the confidence of experience akin to her own.
She did not reply immediately. She did not have to. Valery was hers whenever she wanted him. She wanted him soon but there was no need to give immediate verbal answers. She would show him by small physical signs that she was willing as she might have done with a communicant in Shanla or Dalos in certain ceremonies where only non verbal signals could be used. She pressed back slowly against his hand, not hard enough to push it away or cause his alarm, but just enough to show that she knew it was there and wanted to feel its heat on her flesh. On her face she created a pleasant happy smile and her eyes flickered at him without looking straight at him. She did not wish their slight contact to become obvious to the others, although settled in their company, as she had now become, she felt she had nothing to fear from them. They were modern people, a concept about some Prancirians, which she was only now beginning to formulate, somewhat independent of the prevailing older traditions of their society.
She could not sense the pleasure and surprise which Valery could feel at feeling a willing woman at the first touch. He was not yet sure how far he could go but this Priestess surely enjoyed being touched. The reputation of her kind went before her, a kind of myth and only in certain intellectual or knowledgeable circles in Vanmar, and even there more likely to be criticised than extolled. As she pushed against him he gently resisted, pressing his now outstretched hand against her smooth tanned flesh, and then stretching his arm along her back, feeling the warm flesh as his hand moved towards her other shoulder. This was a public place, there were other tables but there were other couples, men and their wives or their mistresses doing much the same. Who would notice that it was another man not the man who had earlier danced and escorted her who now extended his arm around her. Valery was famous in these circles, but he already had a reputation for womanising. It had never done him any harm in the past. He had always found that people admired him all the more for it, usually men, not so often the women, but he had found no shortage of them to indulge him.
Valery's arm felt strong and soothing. She ached for it to fall down her back softly kneading her flesh until his hands would reach between her buttocks and pleasure her. But she knew that was unlikely here in this public place in Prancir. If Valery was to do anything so extreme his reputation would suffer. Business partners might object to his behaviour and withdraw their support. She wanted to do the same for him but doubted whether she should. Then she realised that the backed chairs they sat upon afforded protection from stares from behind. The table and its patterned table cloth his whatever might happen beneath the table, and they were in close enough proximity for her not to appear to be doing anything untoward either by their friends around the table or others in the room. Slowly she moved her right hand beneath the table. Leaning forward she was able to appear alert to the conversation of the others while her hand reached under the table and gently brushed Valery's left leg.
At first he felt the pang of disappointment which he had still half expected as she leaned forward away from his arm, but almost immediately he felt a light brushing against his leg of gentle fingers, beckoning him to join her. He too leaned forward to join in the conversation of his friends. It seemed this lovely Priestess wished to continue the conversation which he had begun without the aid of words. Undoubted conversationalist as he was Valery preferred the kind of conversation they were developing to any with words. He renewed the contact of his left hand on her back but lower than before so that few might see it there while she massaged his leg from the knee upwards through his trousers. Involuntarily his penis filled with excitement as its sensors responded to the dual excitement of proximity to a beautiful woman and of physical touch. She massaged him gently but her hand moved more at times and came higher between his legs to brush intermittently against the base of his penis and the soft testicles below it. She drew comfort from the feel of his hardness. She had done so little to arouse him it was pleasing to find him already aroused. As her hand drew its attention to the penis concealed in the folds of the trousers she began to look for ways to gain access to it so that she might feel the touch of it more directly and thereby give it a more direct pleasure.
"But you were never able to answer my question Danella. Would Ravelleon be very upset if he realised you were screwing Mireau?" asked Jeanette quietly this time.
"Yes he would. I know he is very traditional. It took me much effort to entice him into my arms in the first place. He was so loyal to his wife. He didn't want to be unfaithful to her at all. It was the last thing he would have attempted unless he had been very unhappy with her, which he was not. But I offered him by body. At first he refused. It was the first time I have been refused. I had never seen a man so denying of himself, but I knew he wanted me really. He thought about if for more than a week and then he called me to dinner and still he was not sure whether he could let me love him, so faithful was he to his wife, but I used my persuasive talents. He came round in the end. Once he decided to allow me to love him, he became very enthusiastic. He wanted to be with me all the time. He wanted to own me. He wanted to stop me sleeping with other men. He wanted me to come with him to Dumis and I came. But he wants me all to himself. At first he did not try to own me, just accepted the joy of his pleasure. But then he began to be jealous of my other 'partners'. He tried to forbid me to see them. I would not agree at first because I did not want to be trapped but then he began to talk of taking me to Prancir and that was a place I really needed to see. My curiosity about the world is very great I need to understand the people of Vanmar. I need to know why there is a war, and perhaps I will find how it can be stopped."
"But you did not want to lose your freedom. Why did you agree to be his alone", asked Jeanette.
"My need to discover the wider world was greater than my need to have sexual freedom. I was not free in Dalos anyway. I could not travel. I was tied. Also I do love Ravelleon. My attachment is quite genuine. I find him very exciting. I have been with enough men over the years. It is sometimes good to be with only one for a while if you like him enough. I could surely be happy with him for a while," she said.
