Ark(12)

The stories my maids and servants had told me ran through my head, whispered tales of lying with mortal men, the thrill of it, the rush . . . how different human men were from Nephilim. I wanted this; I wanted him. My people placed no special significance upon virginity, and even marriage was only a tool for politics, except perhaps among commoners.

Thus, I was not a virgin, and this would not be my first time with a man, but it would be my first time with a human man, and I felt the excitement of it burning in my blood, as well as the forbidden nature of this meeting. If I were dawdling with a Nephilim guard, Father would not care. If I was running away with that guard, he would not care, although he would bring me back and remind me of my duty to the kingdom, my destiny to marry a king and rule as queen. But this? Sneaking across the city to dally with a human? This wasn’t just taboo, this wasn’t just foolish, this was . . . dangerous. And that was part of the excitement.

“Aresia, I need an answer.” He traced the line of my breastbone from my throat to the swell of my cleavage.

In answer, I took a deep breath, allowing my chest to expand, shifting off the tenuous purchase of the dress on my breasts. The expensive purple linen slid down, billowed off me and pooled on the floor, leaving me naked in front of Japheth. He sucked in a breath, his gaze raking over me appreciatively.

Touch me, I thought, willing him to hear what I was not speaking.

He touched a palm to my waist, his hand hard and callused and warm on my flesh. I held my breath, then, as his touched drifted to my backside, he pulled me against him. I felt all of him, and desire boiled inside me. I pushed his undergarment off and grasped him. I lowered my face to his and claimed a kiss, and, after a delirious moment, Japheth took that kiss and made it his, took control of it, guiding me to the pallet of blankets and laid me on them, hovering over me.

This was the vision I’d first had of him, when I first met him: his arms beside my face, his hair tangled and curly and drifting over his vivid blue eyes. This was real, though, his body warm and hard and heavy on mine as he devoured me with his mouth, his hands. I returned the fervor, seeking his flesh, clasping and caressing his muscles, digging my fingers into his skin, nipping at his lips. He nestled against me, and I lifted my hips and gasped as we joined, and neither of us dared look away.

It was everything my servants had claimed it would be, and more. Or perhaps it was just Japheth, his intensity, and his fire.

We moved together with the midday sun streaming through his window, the shouts of guards and merchants outside the window, and my cries of pleasure were lost in the noise of the city and the bustle of the crowds at the gate.



Every day I snuck out of the palace, Irkalla hiding my absences with excuses and pleas of ignorance—she’s on her courses and won’t leave her rooms; she’s been sick and is still recovering; she does not tell me everywhere she goes, for I am but a humble slave . . .

If anyone was suspicious, no one said anything to me. Irkalla was disapproving, but more out of fear than true disapproval. If my other servants knew, they said nothing—they knew I’d reassign them to one of my brother’s wives if they did, and those women were far less benevolent than I.

It began innocuously, as such things do: passionate pleasure, the rush of excitement, the thrill of the danger. But it gradually became something else. As one day became another, and then one week became two, my desire for Japheth’s body became a desire for more of him. A need to be near him. We spoke little enough, preferring to do our communication with our bodies rather than our words, but when we did speak, it was always easy to talk to him. The stories we told were idle banter, the kind of light, easy things couples whisper of in the glowing moments after pleasure is spent.

He told stories of his battles, and I told stories of the court, and we never spoke of what we were doing, or of deeper things, such as our emotions. And we never spoke of the danger we faced if we were ever caught.

In truth, I think we both knew it was always destined to end, that our days together were numbered, and thus we never spoke of the future. Except for that one time when we first met, he never spoke of his family, nor did I.

He was gone for a day or two or three now and then, and once for over a week—working as guard in a merchant’s caravan, he told me. But as weeks turned into a month, I was still sneaking out at dawn or in the small hours of the night to see Japheth. I never stopped to wonder what would happen if I had gotten with child by Japheth, though it was not common for a human male to impregnate a female Nephilim—not impossible, only unlikely.

Irkalla became ever more restless, began entreating me to stay in the palace more often. The servants began to whisper when they thought I wasn’t looking, and the guards began watching me come and go. They always saw, but I always thought of guards as just part of the palace, as much as if they were doors or vases or tapestries or servants.

Irkalla, however . . . her worry turned to fear, and her pleas began to filter through to my better sense.

“You will be caught,” she would plead with me when I returned to my rooms, drifting easily on feet still light from recent pleasure, my skin still flushed. “You will be caught, and it go hard for you and worse for him.”

She pleaded with me to end my dalliance with Japheth, to find a Nephilim man to distract myself with, or devote myself to Inanna—anything but continue my secret affair with Japheth.

I knew the dangers, but I didn’t think them worth considering. Not when there was such delirious pleasure in Japheth’s arms.