As soon as the orgasm passed, her face burned even more deeply, and she felt suddenly cold. She was sweating, and the heat of the climax was dissipating rapidly in the air.
But her humiliation had not ended.
There was movement behind her, the sound of someone barking orders, and the vaginal speculum was removed. But no sooner than this happened, a new object—not cool, almost fleshy in texture, was pressed against her anus again.
She thought—with a bizarre mixture of apprehension and arousal—that it might be an actual phallus, perhaps Mozok’s—but as it slid inside of her, she realized it was not. It was something else.
A warmth entered her ass, slowly expanding, and she realized it was a warm liquid. It was filling her, the pressure of the fluid increasing, stretching her, and—most humiliating of all—she was enjoying the fullness. She had never been experimental with her lovers, and so she had never done anything like this or experienced a sensation of fullness that compared with it.
Why did she… like it?
After the fluid had filled her, stretching her almost to discomfort, she felt pressure as something was squeezed into the entrance of her canal.
And then, horrifically, there was nothing.
It dawned on her that this was an enema of some kind, and her face burned and her eyes watered with shame. She simply could not fathom that this was happening to her. She was tied down to a table and filled with a liquid, and it seemed, from the past half hour, that she was now being observed. And that the logical next step of this process would also be observed.
By all of them.
She only needed to say the words, which she had memorized and practiced: “Trothpli nah progo’dah plightag,” and this would end.
But she could not.
She closed her eyes instead and burned with shame as minutes ticked away before the fluid was released. Just as she had suspected—there in front of all.
* * *
Her legs were shaking when, after unknown individuals but probably Herstrakaa, applied warm cloths to her body and washed her down while she was still restrained on the table. She was then unshackled and told to get off the table. A Herstrakaa was waiting at the side of the table with a rich, red robe of a material similar to the ancient fabric velvet. She gratefully slipped off the table, her legs weak and her ass and pussy sore and aching, and put her arms into the garment, pulling it around her.
Draquun was spoken at length as she stood with her eyes on the floor. When she realized that her head was bowed, she steeled herself and stood up straight, lifting her chin defiantly. It was difficult, but she met Mozok’s eyes. His own eyes held her in a gaze that scorched her, and she had to force herself to look at him.
But she wasn’t going to let him win. If he thought sexual humiliation and games were going to break her spirit and make her lose her contract, he was sorely mistaken.
“The Trothplight has commenced,” Marmeth said, appearing behind her to speak softly next to her ear. “The findings of the examination will determine the boundaries of the… rituals that will be performed. Not to worry, the Draquun are very strict and you cannot be physically harmed. You will now be escorted to the residence of Sag Osolin for the period of the storm. Unless,” he added, a wicked and devious undercurrent in his tone, “you wish to end the Trothplight, now, or at any moment.”
Mina pressed her lips together as she spoke and stared back at Mozok.
“Great,” she said dryly. “Tell them that’s great. Looking forward to it.”
She was pleased that Marmeth bristled. It was momentary but a small victory for her. Mozok, who she now knew spoke much better English than he had let on, twitched when she spoke, and something glinted in his eyes. When Marmeth spoke, presumably translating Mina’s words, Mozok’s lips quivered, almost—almost—turning up at one corner.
It could have been a smile, but Mina didn’t know for sure.
And smiles, especially from aliens, could mean just about anything.
CHAPTER5
Mina was escorted from the parliamentary hall, clothed in nothing more than the rich, red robe she was given after her examination, and a new pair of shoes—spindly, high-heeled red shoes that wrapped around her calf. She might have ordinarily coveted such a pair of shoes, but they portended an ominous sexual future for her at the hands of Mozok, and so she instead resented them.
“What about my own clothing? My belongings?” she had asked Marmeth. The snake had responded, in his usual falsely obsequious demeanor, that all would be returned to her at the end of Trothplight.
She was whisked away before she had a chance to air her grievances with Marmeth or communicate with home.
The vehicle she was put into was a large and comfortable one compared with the small suppository Marmeth had sent for her at the spaceport. She watched with a mix of curiosity, dread, and the odd arousal she could not shake, as both Mozok and the Herstrakaa who had signed the Trothplight agreement and punished her, boarded the vehicle in a separate compartment.
But there was no way to communicate with them that she could see. She sat back against the comfortable seat and folded her arms across her chest. Then she considered that they were probably, somehow, watching her, and so she forced herself to relax them at her sides, not wanting to give them the satisfaction of seeing her upset.
The journey was almost an Earth hour long, or at least that was her guess. Her belongings had been taken from her, which was unsettling, and she had no way of measuring time.
