guards, both blank-faced and holding spears, both very lightly dressed in the hot summer. As the king went on about the political problems of Rhodes, Klea had taken to watching the two of them, hoping the gentle breeze coming in through the windows would lift their skirts just enough for her to get a nice glimpse of cock.
She’d tried to seduce them, of course, but it had never worked. It didn’t stop her from looking.
“Can you buy a belt?” Klea said, after a moment of silence. She knew it wasn’t the right response—yes, of course, the king of Rhodes could buy a belt—but she had no idea what he was getting at. That’s what all her conversations with him were like: he’d hint and hint and hint, until it finally turned out that he was sending her off to do a task for him.
The task, invariably, involved fucking, and that was why Klea never said no. The last time, for example, she’d been held down by someone who was half-man, half-giant, fucked hard, and had orgasmed to within an inch of her life.
“The belt is a gift,” the king said. He chewed his rabbit and didn’t elaborate.
“For who?” Klea pushed. He didn’t demand the same formalities of her that he did of most of his subjects, and she didn’t give them.
“A woman in court,” he said lightly.
Klea felt like she’d swallowed a stone. She rested both her hands on the table and stared into the flame of a candle for seconds on end: he was giving some other woman a gift? Who? Why? Was he courting her?
And most importantly: why did Heraklea care? She’d been off fucking everything and everyone for two months now. It was a little late, she reminded herself, to be bothered if the king was interested in someone else.
“The belt currently belongs to the queen of the Amazons,” he went on, obviously pretending not to notice Klea’s reaction to his news. “Her name is Hippolyta.”
“And I’m to go get it,” Klea said. She knew the drill by now.
“I’m sending you as a diplomat,” the king said. “Not a military detachment.”
They made eye contact over the table.
“What sort of diplomat?” Klea asked, trying to sound casual.
“The regular kind,” he said. “We’ve been on good terms for years. I have a small, sacred icon you’re to offer in return for the belt. It doesn’t look like much, but it’s apparently quite sacred to the Amazons.”
He snapped his fingers and a young servant walked in, placed a stone statue on the table in front of Klea, and left.
It was a dick. There was nothing else to say about the sacred icon: eight, maybe nine inches long, cylindrical, a head-like bulb at one end. Absolutely, certainly a dick.
Klea held it up, pretending to examine it. “Fascinating,” she said.
“I don’t see what’s so special about it,” the king admitted. “But the Amazons apparently hold these in very high regard.”
“So I trade the, uh, icon for the belt,” Klea said. When she said the word belt she felt a small fury rise inside her, that some other woman in the kingdom was getting presents that Klea had gotten for her, while she was getting sent off to do dangerous things. Was he having dinner with other women? Was he dropping in on other women while they were naked and bathing? Did he order his guards to report back on the sexual exploits of other women?
Klea held back angry tears. She stood, scooting her chair back from the table.
“If that’s all, I’ll get going,” she said.
“Stay for dessert,” the king said. “You don’t need to leave until tomorrow.”
“I’m not hungry,” she said.
He took a long sip of wine, looking at her. He also stood.
“Let me escort you back to your quarters,” he said.
He’d never done that before, and Klea would have thought more of it if she hadn’t been so angry. In her right hand she clutched the penis-icon, and the king offered his other arm. She took it, and he made small talk with her as they traversed the palace halls and it slowly dawned on her
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