He was out of the room before I could fully recover from the feeling of his cool palm on my chest.I took my time heading up to the top deck, trying to settle what felt inexplicably like nerves.How was Inervous?I was never nervous.
But…I've read it can be revelatory.
What a word, and what an expectation to live up to.Sex had never been like that for me.And that wasn't to say I didn't enjoy it: I'd have found a different job if that was the case.Even when I was lukewarm on my clients, I stillenjoyedfucking.There was still an undercurrent of transgression, of doing something forbidden, that really worked for me.Yet again, the idea that my lack of hang-ups might indeed be a hang-up struck me as particularly unfair, and also likely to be true.
But revelatory… That was new.
Could I do that for him?I didn't know, but I sure as hell could try.And I'd be a betterfirst timethan a lot of other options.At least I had experience on my side, and more than a week's worth of sexual tension to bring to a head.
I scrubbed hard in the steam shower, scouring sweat from my skin and making sure I was thoroughly clean.I didn't have much in the way of clothes, definitely not many that were warm enough for this ship, but I sacrificed some comfort for allure and pulled on one of my dancing outfits from the den.Dark pants clung to my thighs, leaving little to the imagination but allowing for good freedom of movement.I pulled on one of my tops, which left my arms bare, the neckline and arm holes loose so that, when I shifted, flashes of skin would show.
But I knew I'd be freezing.Heated glances, as nice as they were, wouldn't be enough to keep me warm, and all of the sweaters I had were decidedly bulky and lumpy.I settled, instead, on the jacket Araxis had loaned me and which I had been curling up under at night.The idea that he might have guessed I'd been sleeping with it had been humiliating earlier; now I found it kind of hot, like he might realize I wanted to press him into my skin, I wanted to smell him all around me.Virra were known to be ravenous, he'd said, and the closer we got, the more I felt like I was starving.I'd rarely gonethis long without sex… and the added pressure of knowing we'd be arriving in the Thenat cluster soon, that tension that just kept tightening between us every time we were near each other, meant that Iwasready to break, in the very best way.
I found him an hour or so after we'd parted, there in the dining room.The lights had been dimmed somehow to the softest yellow, like candlelight – impressive, considering how often they didn't want to work at all and how loudly I'd heard him cursing them, the ship, and whatever ancestor had thought to installbudgetlighting – and the low table was laden with at least a dozen bowls of varying sizes, little dishes arrayed over the surface like stars in a nebula.I stepped in, and Araxis's pale face appeared from the small kitchen at the back, where I made my daily soup rations and where we'd found ourselves sitting twice for our late night conversations.He blinked at me, then cleared his throat."Hm.Sit, Sashen.I'm nearly done."
Steam wafted from some of the bowls, plumes of sweet and savoury scents that made my mouth water.A few of these were familiar – I saw dumplings, pale and plump in one bowl; a grain that was more or less rice in another; green vegetables sitting in some sort of brine – but many weren't.There was a smoky quality to the steam, something warm and spiced and I wanted, all at once, to taste everything.But I sat on one of the cushions arrayed by the low table, and I waited.
He trailed out after a few moments of clattering in the kitchen, placing three more bowls on the table and then returning with large, shallow bowls for us to use.Araxis set one in front of the cushion next to me on the left side of the table, then rested one hand on my shoulder as he placed the final bowl in front of me.His touch lingered, my skin buzzing where he touched me – electric.
"Is anyone else joining us?"I asked, looking up at him after surveying the massive scope of this meal, the sheer number of different dishes carefully arranged before me.His hand still rested on my shoulder,his thumb moving gentlyin a careful caress.
"No.This is just for us."
My throat was tight; Araxis's hand was a weight that pinned me in place, an anchor.My voice was soft when I spoke."You didn't have to do this for me."
"Is it too much?Too sinnenthi?"he asked with a knowing smile, and I snorted at hearing my own words parroted back."It brings me pleasure to care for you in this way, Sashen.And you cannot survive on dasha alone."His hand drifted down, along the seam of his jacket over my shoulder, and then he took a seat near my elbow, just around the corner.We were close enough that I could see the dim lights overhead reflected in the black of his eyes.
"You'd be surprised what I can survive on," I said as Araxis leaned forward and began serving small portions of food from each dish onto my plate.Seeing him like this, leaning forward and –tendingto me made my skin flush hot, my body pulsing with something I was having a hard time understanding, much less naming.From the way his smile sharpened, it was clear that he could see it too.
"Did Alet Trident not feed you?"he asked, placing a final dumpling in the middle of my plate and then nudging some utensils – essentially sticks with flared bottoms – toward me before he turned to his own empty plate.
"She paid us and kept a stocked pantry – but we logged everything we took and it was deducted from our pay.When I first came to her and I could see my debts adding up every day – I mean, I wasn't working yet besides some eavesdropping; she was still training me for service – I tried to find cheaper ways to eat.She put a stop to it when I started passing out during training."
It wasn't a nice memory, how famished I'd been, how I tried to stretch the hours and days between powdered rations, how I'd gotten used to the dizzying throb in my head whenever I stood up or moved too quickly.My wrists had looked like they might snap, and all the while my body kept trying to grow taller and taller.
I picked up the dumpling and popped the whole thing in my mouth.At once, spice and heat burst on my tongue, acidity balanced by a warm pat of fat.I made a surprised, delighted sound that washalfway to a moan."This is ridiculous," I said around my mouthful."Youmadethis."
He flushed silver next to me."You must tell me what you like best, and what you don't like.I'm unfamiliar with human tastes – Well."I could hear the rest of his thought, even if he couldn't say it.He certainly understoodmytastes when it came to him.
"Tell me about what I'm eating," I said, gesturing around the plate before scooping up some green vegetable – bitter, in a sour sauce that was incredibly refreshing, even if it made my cheeks feel a bit raw.
Araxis took direction well, and he began telling me a little about each dish: which ones were abayan and what they were made of; which ones were fermented, which were fresh, the order they were best eaten in.He explained which foods had been adopted from other cultures, and which ones he had found were easiest to make on a ship that was so often anchored in deep space, far from any stations.He told me what things the children refused to eat, and who complained most loudly when he cooked his favourites because the scent of the steam lingered for days.
I cleared my plate, not even trying: it was allgood, and even the dishes that I found a little challenging on their own – a seaweed that was a bit astringent and gelatinous, a dark fermented bean that made my eyes water, the little fried beetles in a glossy, spice-forward sauce – were intriguing when eaten with other dishes.I'd never eaten so well, not even when I'd stolen scraps from the table at one of Alet Trident's VIP lunar eclipse celebrations, where the food alone had cost more than I made in a month.I reached for more, and Araxis caught my wrist."Let me," he said, and he carefully reached and refilled my plate.This time, he chose the dishes I had found most delicious, although I hadn't said as much, quick to compliment everything he had put before me.He must have been watching, observing this whole time.His nose wrinkled with amusement as I sighed contentedly around a mouthful of dumpling, and I knew, in even the darkest corners of my body, perfect contentment.
This was a gift.Hewas a gift.I needed to cherish every second of this.It was like the universe, knowing what was coming, had decided to give me something sweet, just this once; something I could hold on to in the end.Something to soften the blow of what was surely waiting for me once we arrived in the Thenat cluster.
Except I didn't want to leave this reverie.I wanted, desperately, to stay right here: stay in this evening, in this quiet room, with this perfect person who looked at me with eyes that glittered like the universe beyond.
"Did you want more, or is it time for tea?"he murmured as I finished my second plate.
I was tempted to keep eating, but I had hopes for what I might get to sample after we left the dining room, so I exercised the restraintthat wascrumbling moment by moment."Tea, I think."
He rose, collecting our plates, his hip brushing my shoulder as he slid past.My mouth was suddenly dry."Let me help," I started, shifting to my knees.
"Sit," Araxis said, firm, with a heated look over his shoulder.
I sat, and watched the line of his back disappear into the kitchen beyond.I heard clicking as the stove turned on; though the lights were dim, I could see flashes of movement as he readied a teapot, moving around the space with the same ease he had in the training room below.
