The Iron Maiden (11 page)

“Yes, of course.” But her hurt remained.

“I fear I have offended you.”

“No, not at all.”

“Or failed you in some other manner. I ask you to tell me how, for you have made a considerable impression on me.”

“No failure. I am the one out of line.”

“Please tell me, Spirit.”

She took a breath. “I came to persuade you to join our unit, in spirit now, in reality later. I came prepared to win you by my body if not my logic. I find that you are a nice man. I am not used to nice men.”

“You have had brutal experience,” he agreed. “This is one reason I do not wish to require you to do what does not derive from your own preference.”

“I--I did not mean to expose my own emotions. You have been courteous and kind. You have seen my depths and not been repelled. I wish we could--”

He shook his head. “I do not have your brother's ability to read people. I think you will have to tell me exactly what you mean.”

“I want you to desire me beyond the point of politeness.”

“Spirit, I do! But--” Then he reconsidered. “The men you have known--they leave you alone only if they lack interest.”

"Or if they are forbidden to touch me. I have had sex with many men; it was not really a matter of choice.

The desire was theirs rather than mine. Now--now the desire is mine."

“Spirit, if I relax my discipline, I will become like the men you have known. I thought to spare you that.”

“Don't spare me that.”

He paused only a moment. “I will desist when you tell me to.” He came to her and embraced her.

“I won't tell you to.” She kissed him. The passion rose up, and the kiss deepened. She knew it was in significant part a product of her savage emotions evoked by her memories, positive and negative. But she wanted him to possess her with abandon.

They moved to the bedroom alcove. “Undress me!” she panted, and put her hands on his clothing. He obliged, and soon they fell on the bed. She was on top, pinning him down. She wrapped herself around him, seeking his member, setting herself on him and around him. “Take me!” she gasped as she took him, feeling her climax starting before his.

The sexual aspect was soon done, but the emotion lingered. “Do you mind if I continue to kiss you?” she asked.

“I do not mind, but I am bemused. Normally the girls of the Tail are not interested in any continuation.”

“Nor have I been, elsewhere,” she confessed.

“I am pretty sure it is not my average body or my indifferent personal magnetism.”

“You do want candor?”

“Always.”

As she had known. “I come to you on behalf of my brother. I studied you, doing my homework: your history, your likes and dislikes, your philosophies. In the course of that research I discovered a man I liked very much. You are not like those I have known, in so many ways. I became taken with the idea of you before I ever met you, and I know that I want you in my life. My mission is to recruit you by offering you a package you will not care to refuse: my body, my loyalty, and the career my brother may be able to offer you. But it has become personal; I also want you for yourself. I think if you decline to join my brother I shall have to leave you, to seek some other man, but I think I could love you, and I do not readily love anyone. I know I am not in your class, and that is not a matter of age; your entire existence is apart from what I have known. You know this, even if you can not read people, even if you did no research on me. I know that you could obtain a woman of your class. So I have perhaps just this day, this hour to possess you, and I can't help myself; I must have all I can of you, for fear there will be no tomorrow.”

“I am cautious about love.”

“And if you loved me, and our circumstances changed so that our relationship was no longer feasible, I would leave, as she did. I wish I could deny that.” She did not need to clarify who the “she” was; it was his former love.

“It is that simple?”

“No! It is that complicated. My brother roomed with a woman as an enlisted soldier, and when he became an officer and she did not, he had to leave her. They had agreed that love was not part of their relationship, but they both hurt, and I know that if they were not in love, they approached it. I think I can not afford to love you, or you me, but I think it will happen anyway, at least for me, if we associate. Such is my desire for your company that I am prepared to find myself in love with you, without expecting reciprocity, for such a period as we associate. This is not a wise course for me, but neither is it wise to deceive myself. Viewed objectively, it is a paltry offering I make to you. I would have made the association even if I disliked you, and perhaps that would have been better. As it is, it is a treacherous course for us both.”

“A treacherous course,” he agreed. “Yet why do you believe I would not love you in return?”

“Your love is already taken, and when it passes, you will be reluctant to give it elsewhere. You will not give it for a body, or for return love. Only for a woman who is worthy and willing to commit completely. I am neither.”

“The limit on commitment I understand; it is the Navy way. But the unworthiness I do not understand.”

“I am in essence a pirate lass, and before that a non-Saxon refugee. These are not your worlds.”

“Yet you may be more woman than any I have met before.”

“No. I do what I do for reason, and that includes the sexual aspect. I am not a feminine creature, though I will emulate one if you wish.”

“That is not what I said. The girls of the Tail are highly sexual, and can be feminine. They lack intelligence, discipline, and integrity.”

“Those are masculine traits.”

He laughed. “Perhaps with your background you would think so.”

“Yes.”

“I will make you this compromise: in public, with or without me, be the smart, hard woman you are. In private, be the soft, loving woman you also are.”

“The emulation,” she agreed.

“If you think it is that.”

“I do think it is that.” But he had shaken her. She kissed him again, and realized that her face was wet. “I suppose I could be mistaken.”

“I will keep company with you,” he said. “This will require us to register as a sexual couple, to abate the need for the Tail. We shall have to arrange to meet for that at least once a week. No larger commitment is implied.”

“No larger commitment,” she agreed.

“But neither is it denied.”

“Thank you.” She was not being ironic; he was opening the portal to the deeper relationship she desired.

“We shall give it time to jell,” he said. “This is the sensible course.”

“Yes.”

“But I must say that I find myself as intrigued with the idea of you as you are with the idea of me. I never anticipated such an approach by such a person, but it occurs to me now that I may have been too restricted in my notions of women. There can be diamonds amidst the refuse.”

It was a nice analogy, for her background could fairly be considered refuse. Spirit doubted that she was in any sense a diamond, but she liked the notion of being separate from her situation. Gerald was accepting her as she was. “Thank you,” she said again.

“Now perhaps we should register, and be seen together.”

“Gladly.”

“However, there may be a complication.”

“They are harassing you in little ways,” she said.

“Yes. They are trying to encourage me to leave the service. It is never too obvious, but they may discover a pretext to interfere.”

“I will handle it.”

He shrugged. “As you wish.”

They cleaned up, dressed in their uniforms, and went to the nearest personnel office. “Lieutenant Commander Phist registering as a sexual correspondent to this woman, Ensign Spirit Hubris,” he said.

The clerk took their names and verified their prints. Then he looked directly at Spirit, who had arranged to look severe in the military fashion, and had not covered up her facial scars. He kept his eyes on her but spoke to Gerald. “This is irregular, sir,” he said.

Gerald frowned. “How so?”

“This woman is obviously not a sexual creature. That suggests a commitment in name only.”

“I can not choose which woman I want?”

“Sir, it is known that you want only one woman. The navy does not support tokenism.”

“Tokenism!” Gerald was evidently too surprised to see what Spirit saw: this was an aspect of his harassment, part of a continuing campaign to drive him out of the Navy. Spirit's research had established its existence, and she recognized the pattern. They wanted to force him to do what he disliked, using the common Tail.

She stepped into the fray. “Summon your superior,” she said to the clerk.

“That is not required.” Then, after a significant pause, he added “Sir.”

Spirit's knife was in her hand, its point touching the man's nose. “Are you refusing to obey an order by an officer?”

The clerk was not so dull as not to realize he was in over his head. “Nosir!” No break between words this time. He touched a button on his desk.

Spirit put away her blade, removed her military shirt, and let down her hair. She faced the officer's aperture as she efficiently applied spot makeup by touch. Gerald faced away, tacitly disengaging from the proceedings. Possibly he had a notion what was in the offing.

The aperture opened and a lieutenant senior grade appeared. He had not yet gotten his mouth open for an imperious query before he spied Spirit, standing straight and proud in her well-filled military bra, her gaze smoky from beneath aggressively tangled locks of hair, her facial scars gone, her mouth accented by bright lipstick.

She gave him no time to catch his mental balance. “Sir, this rectal martinet claims my liaison with this fine officer is tokenism, a commitment in name only, because I am obviously not a sexual creature. I challenge this assessment.”

The lieutenant of course knew that his clerk was honoring the Navy's private policy of harassment against a whistle-blowing officer, but at this moment this was clearly unfeasible. It wasn't just that Spirit was outstandingly female, but that she was so clearly eager to fight. No small office wanted the kind of public scene this threatened to be. That was one reason Spirit had come prepared. Had she dressed civilian she might have been challenged as an opportunist or prostitute.

“I think he meant that an officer of your qualities does not normally associate with one of the Commander's qualities,” the lieutenant said somewhat lamely. Beautiful women generally avoided career-dead men.

“I am a red-blooded woman who can have any man she chooses,” Spirit said, shaking her hair artfully across her face. “I choose the most decent, honest, and courageous officer in the Jupiter Navy. Do you have a problem with that, Sir? Show me your power.”

And what a scene that would make, if the news-media got hold of it, for Commander Phist was a hero among civilians. The lieutenant backed off, literally. “Approved,” he muttered to the clerk. He retreated through his aperture, and it closed behind him.

Spirit quickly put her shirt back on and jammed her hair in a wad under her cap. Gerald turned to face her, keeping his face straight.

The clerk made on entry, then touched a button. Spirit recognized it as the mute, cutting off the recording of this interview. “Sir, may I speak off the record?” he asked.

“Speak,” Spirit snapped.

“Damn good show. Well played. Congratulations.”

“So it's not your personal blackball?”

“No sir. The commander's reputation is excellent among enlistees.”

She smiled graciously. “Thank you.”

“Maybe he is finally getting some of what he deserves. You popped my eyeballs, sir.” His hand hovered near the mute button; obviously it could not remain tuned out long, lest the gap in the record arouse suspicion.

“Thank you,” she repeated.

He touched the button. They were back on the record. “Your liaison with the commander has been approved, sir,” he said formally. “There may be another time.” The implication was that the office would make further difficulties if it could.

“If so, you may regret it,” Spirit said coldly. Her threat was obviously directed at the clerk, so that no one would suspect the nature of their private dialogue.

Then she took Gerald's arm, and they departed.

Back at the apartment, Gerald finally allowed his military bearing to relax. “May I kiss you, Spirit?”

“Any time!”

He did so. Then he held her slightly away from him and looked at her as if reappraising her qualities.

“May I fondle you?”

“How far do you intend to go?” she asked, smiling.

“As far as you allow.”

“I thought we had already done that. There is no requirement for twice in a week, let alone in a day.” She was teasing him as she undressed.

“This time it is of my volition rather than yours.”

“Gerald, if you want it ten times an hour, you are welcome. But I am curious: is it merely physical?” She sat on his lap.

“No.” He accepted her proffered bare breast.

“A reaction of the moment stemming from a small victory in the field?”

“In part.”

“A suggestion that there is a greater potential in our relationship?” She repressed her desire to take over the sexual process; this time it had to be his initiative, not hers.

“Yes.” He kissed her breast.

“Do I need to say how happy that makes me?”

“No.”

She followed his lead, and soon they were on the bed again, and in the throes of a more extended and lingering act of lovemaking. She tried to school herself not to expect too much, for potential was not actuality, but the prospect of winning his love thrilled her. She had taken a calculated risk at the personnel office, knowing that she could surely win her point, but might alienate Gerald in the process. Now he had a better notion of what she was capable of, and it seemed he had reacted positively. That was a great relief.

When the sex was accomplished, he surprised her again. “May I continue to kiss you?” he asked.

That was what she had asked him before. “You may, but I am bemused. Normally men go to sleep.”

“So I have done, elsewhere.”