Dragon Emperor Deceived

[Written with thanks and a nod to a fairytale told by early twentieth-century Italian diplomat Daniele Varè]

***

The weight of the man lifted off young Han Li, who sighed, and attempted, unsuccessfully, to move from his prone, bent, and spread position. The imperial guard captain had been on top of the eighteen-year-old young man, between his legs, inside him, thrusting for so long that Han Li was numbed into that stance, his buttocks raised on satin pillows, his sleeping robe hanging open underneath him. He had been transported into the heavens.

The guard captain stood over the prone, divinely proportioned Han Li, staring down at the vulnerable, open stance of the young man, whose arms, the wrists bound together, were raised over his head, pushing the young man's smooth, slim, boyish chest out. The young man was gazing back into the soldier's eyes, with an expression of awe, surrender, submissiveness, and satiation while the guard stroked the last drops of his cum on the young man's belly. The soldier was muscular, fit, at the height of his virility. The shaft he was stroking would not wither. The young man was just too inviting, too open to the soldier, wanting more. As if to confirm that, Han Li drew his knees up into his chest and rolled his pelvis up, to show the rosy-rimmed hole that had been opened by the thick-cocked guard was still open—and puckering. Rivulets of white cum dribbled from the pulsing opening.

This had been the first opening and invasion of the young man's passage by a man's shaft. Han Li had taken his deflowering well—more than well. The soldier dropped to his knees, gathered a moaning Han Li into his arms, penetrated the passage for a second time, and the two rocked against each other in renewed copulation. The second taking gave the young man more pleasure and passion and less pain than the first one had. Han Li dreamed of a third coupling.

The soldier, twenty-eight-year-old Ke Chuan, untied the red silk sash of Han Li's robe from around the young man's wrists and rose from on top of Han Li on the kang—the hard bed—in the center of the small pavilion off the Pavilion of the Tortoise in which Han Li's father, the general of the imperial troops in distant Chinghai Province, Han Shui, was snoring away. He stealthily moved to the beaded curtain in the doorway between the two pavilions to ensure that the old general had slept through the deflowering of his young son.

Han Li lay there, still trembling and unable to close his legs and watched Ke Chuan move stealthily around his chamber. The young man's eyes were dreamy with awe of the handsome, muscular guard captain who had coaxed his virginity to anal penetration from him, taking all guilt from him by binding him as he whimpered his fear mixed with want.

Although Han Li had been ripe for the deflowering and had carried his own in the tease to the bedding by the guards captain, Ke Chuan had masterfully seduced the sheltered country student, presenting himself as a young god, cultivating him, whispering encouraging and praising words to him whenever they were close to each other, fondling him and telling him how beautiful and desirable he was when they were in private, and taking Han Li's hand in his, penetrating the folds of the guard captain's robes, and introducing the young man to the arousal of a magnificent erection, whispering how much pleasure it could give Han Li inside him. Then, tonight, being so patient in preparing him and, only when Han Li begged him for the attention, binding, mounting, penetrating, and seeding him—and then mounting, penetrating, and seeding him a second time to assure the young man of the lessening of pain in repeated copulation. Having led a reclusive, protected student's life to that point in a palace in remote Chinghai, Han Li had been vulnerable to the dazzle of Ke Chuan—and he had been more than ready to enter the bitten peach world.

It had been frightening and painful. It had been glorious, and Han Li wanted Ke Chuan to copulate with him again. He had thought for some time he would be with men as well as women. Many men in his family enjoyed the variety of bed partners. He'd no idea it would first happen at the center of the universe, in the Forbidden City itself, lying under the, perfect in every way, captain of the emperor's own guard. His eyes followed Ke Chuan's movements around the room, willing the masterful cocksman to return to him and take him again, teach him more positions and techniques, taking him again and again until there was no more pain, only pleasure.

When the guard captain had first crept into the pavilion and accosted the half-breed son of the western general, Ke Chuan had taken the precaution of coming masked and robed in the colors of the night and had bound and gagged the young man in his own silk sleeping apparel. The young man had struggled in surprise initially, but as Ke Chuan had surmised, his attentions were welcome and once he had smothered the young man in attentiveness to his sexual arousal and impulses and had thrown off his mask and robe and Han Le had seen who it was who was on top of him and between his legs—although of course he already knew—Ke Chuan was able to replace the gag with his mouth and to hold the young man in thrall to his demanding kiss, as he mounted, penetrated, and rode him. Han Li shuddered and writhed as Ke Chuan penetrated him deep, as his endowment allowed, and, eventually, the young man went docile and then fell in the rhythm of the strong, virile soldier's possession.

The second seeding had been just as glorious, and Han Li had invited it.

Han Li had given Ke Chuan every hope that his attentions would be welcome earlier, after the western general and his entourage had arrived in the Forbidden City, summoned by the emperor but with an urgent need as well to apprise the emperor of the unrest to the west. The entourage had included the son he begat from his Italian wife, who had been the widow of an emissary to the imperial court who had died en route there and whom Han Shui had added to his collection of wives. Han Li, small of stature in his eighteen years on earth, perfect of body, with alabaster skin, and dark, shining eyes and hair, had come to Peking with his father. Han Shui wanted his son to pass the exams for the imperial civil service, and the young man had advanced as far as he could go with frontier tutors.

Han Li had not been part of the entourage that was granted an audience by the emperor Pu Yi in the cluster of Dragon Pavilions deep in the protected grounds of the Forbidden City, but he had been permitted to come to a courtyard in sight of the vermillion and gold pillared, open-sided throne room while his father gave his periodic report to the Son of Heaven on the military situation on the empire's western borders.

As Han Shui reported, the emperor's imperial guard stood at attention around the edges of the throne room pavilion. The attention of the guard's captain, though, had strayed to the courtyard off to the side, where he saw the young, exotic, mixed-breed young man, Han Li, wandering around, admiring the plantings and the colorful architecture of the emperor's compound within the Forbidden City. Ke Chuan was smitten and immediately decided that he must have this young man writhing under him and sheathing his shaft. Ke Chuan was accustomed to having his way with young men, and mostly with virgins he deflowered.

Han Li looked up to meet Ke Chuan's gaze and smile and he was equally smitten.

Later, by judiciously asking, Ke Chuan informed himself on who the young man was, what he was doing in the imperial capital—and, to his delight, that he was a virgin to men using his anal passage. The guard captain had already ascertained from the looks he'd shared with the young man that there was hope that Ke Chuan could cure Han Li of his virginity.

Unbeknownst to Ke Chuan or Han Li—or that matter to Han Shui—Ke Chuan was not the only one who speculated on the beauty of the graceful and exotic young man roaming around in the side courtyard. From another pavilion before he belatedly arrived in his throne room to receive the general from the western province, Emperor Pu Yi had looked into the side courtyard and taken pause—a long pause—in seeing the form of Han Li.

Emperor Pu Yi made the same vow to himself as Ke Chuan had. He would deflower this young, exotic-visaged man, bestow his imperial seed on him, and add him to the secondary stable of mates he had—the stable of the young male concubines.

Over the next two days, Ke Chuan made it his business to approach the young visitor from the western lands as opportunity arose and to engage him in conversation and flirting, a familiarity that the emperor could not engage in. He was delighted to find that the young man was open to flirting with another man and that he seemed frustrated by the restraints his father put on him and was ready to spread his wings and fly in his own chosen direction. At the same time, the young man had been sheltered and was naïve and susceptible to the advances of such as Ke Chuan. Han Li innocently revealed that the bitten peach world of men pleasing men was more alluring to him than the court scholar direction his father was planning for him. Han Li knew that his mixed-parentage heritage made him exotic in the world of men seeking men.

In turn, the emperor made it his business to find out more about the young man, the reason why he was so exotically beautiful, and that he as yet was untouched, having been closely guarded by his father on the remote frontier of the empire, destined for the life of a scholar rather than a soldier.

For his part, General Han Shui was oblivious to the interest of the captain of the emperor's guard, attentions from that direction being unspeakably below his status, but he wasn't oblivious to the emperor's interest. This became a delicate balancing act for him. He acceded to opportunities for added contact with the emperor by arranging to have his son nearby and in view, but he did so for the chance to discuss with the emperor how precarious the military position was on the western border, which already regularly was being breached by foreign hordes, and to focus the emperor's attention on meeting the threat. In addition, one word from the emperor and Han Li's entry into the court realm of the scholars would be assured. The general was not a fool, and he was a schemer. If finding favor with and gaining the ear of the emperor came from his son being bedded by the emperor, so be it. Having been bedded by the emperor and having pleased the emperor in this congruous accorded status on its own. If emperor experienced pleasure in deflowering Han Li, the young man would readily find a place in the halls of the academy. If he was taken as male concubine by the emperor for any length of time, this would not be openly spoken of, but he would have a place at court as long as the emperor reigned and was pleased with Han Ii.

Conditions on the border were enough in crisis for such a sacrifice. Already, in the general's absence from his defense of the west, a foreign force was inside the borders and was advancing toward the capital. To add to this, Mongols from the north were even closer to Peking in the movement of military forces. The emperor needed to focus on the military threat, not the desires to dip his shaft in unused passages. If he was indulged with Han Li once, perhaps he would give attention to the real danger.

Ke Chuan was aware of the emperor's interest in the Chinghai youth. He also was aware that if he were first in enjoying the young man's passage and the emperor heard of it, his head would roll off his body. But he was a lustful, randy example of a risk taker, used to getting his way sexually because of the power and magnificence of his body as well as his position at the head of the emperor's personal guard. And the luscious young man in question was a virgin.

As he had lain on top of the young man in the small pavilion off to the side of where the powerful, western general father of Han Li was snoring, Ke Chuan forced silken pillows under the young man's buttocks to raise his virginal passage to the sacrifice, coaxed the young man's thighs apart with his knees, and savored the young man's muffled virgin cries reducing to whimpers and eventually to acceptance and a coordinated rhythm and deep sighs as he buried his cock deep inside Han Li's channel. He reveled not only in the pleasure of stealing the exotic young man's virginity but also in the danger of the moment.

Later, when Ke Chuan had unbound Han Li and been brought to wariness by the possible sounds of movement in the larger pavilion beyond and had stolen over to listen at the beaded curtain of the doorway into the central Pavilion of the Tortoise, he nearly laughed out loud when he turned to see Han Li, still on his back, still with his legs open and his buttocks raised, turned to him with a pleading look on his face and his arms raised and spread open to the guard captain.

Ke Chuan strode quickly back to the kang and climbed on top of the young man and they coupled for a third time. The virile guards captain was ever hard and the erstwhile virgin was insatiable. It was Han Li, who took the guard captain's thick, long shaft in his hands and guided its bulb into place. Ke Chuan instinctively clamped his hand over the young man's mouth to stifle the inevitable cry when he thrust his cock home. Mere moments later, as Han Li controlled the brutal slash of pain-pleasure, he grasped the guard captain's buttocks in his hands and the two bucked against each other through deep panting and muffled moans in a frenzied dance of the fuck.

Ke Chuan smirked in the knowledge that the young man was lost to the power of his cock. All young men he got his shaft into were lost to his mastering. This was well worth the risk he took, Ke Chuan thought.

* * * *

"But, oh Son of Heaven, these are primitive subjects from the western edge of the empire. He may not be suitable."

"I have checked. Do not presume to question my order. Bring the young man to my kang tonight. I wish to take a first bite into his peach tonight." The Emperor Pu Yi gave his guard captain a look of surprise and disapproval for daring to trying to dissuade him from something he desired as if the soldier were a dog that had unexpectedly hopped out of a tranquil garden pond.

Ke Chuan presumed to continue, though, suddenly frightened what he might have done to disturb the order of the empire. The emperor could not have that first bite. Ke Chuan already had done so—and the bite after that and the one after that. "I am just noting the ritual of the emperor's conquest of purity, Exalted Dragon of China—the ill luck that would come from a first lie with a concubine who was not a virgin."

Mollified a bit, Pu Yi said, "You needn't worry about that. I have thoroughly checked. I have queried the western general himself, and he has assured me his son is a virgin. The general would not lie to me about such an important matter. I have also had enquiries done among the general's retinue and among my spies in his western household, and not a hint of scandal has surfaced about the general's son. Besides, the young man is too young and has lived too sheltered and protected a life to have lost his virginity to a man. Considering who his father is, no man in Chinghai would have dared violate the young man."

No, you want to violate the young man yourself, Ke Chuan thought, without entertaining the reality that he, Ke Chuan, had already violated the young man—repeatedly. And not that the general would know, the guard captain mused. The general had been snoring in the chamber next door when Ke Chuan had been ripping the young man's virginity out of him and wantonly taking him again and again. And he nearly laughed at the emperor's naivete in suggesting any youth was too young to cover and fuck.

Ke Chuan was thoroughly backed into a corner, though. If he revealed what he knew, his head would roll. If he didn't, there was the curse of an invalid emperor's conquest of purity. It was enough to bring the empire down. Which was the greater tragedy?

He wasn't stupid. He knew what the greater tragedy for him would be. He also was fully capable of believing in the traditional rituals when and as he chose. He was close enough to the emperor to know that the Son of Heaven did that himself.

* * * *

"What is this? What is this doing here?" Han Li asked in a shaky voice. He'd been called into the Pavilion of the Tortoise, where he had spied, on an elaborate sleeping kang, a richly embroidered, large silk quilt. The background color was a bold yellow. His father, General Han Shui, was standing on one side of the kang and the captain of the imperial guard, Ke Chuan, was standing on the other side, one hand lifting up the corner of the quilt. Both men looked quite serious.

"Were you bathed as I commanded?" Han Shui asked his son in strained voice.

"Yes, father. But again, what is that quilt doing in here? That is exclusively of the emperor's quarters. No one but the emperor can use yellow."

"It is the ritual. You may not have heard of it in distant Chinghai," Ke Chuan answered dully, his voice as much strained as Han Shui's had been. "The ritual of the emperor bestowing favor on a virginal concubine."

"Yes, I know of the ritual," Han Le said. "I am here to study further for the civil service examinations, of which knowledge of the rituals is central. I'm not just starting my studies, though. I understand what the quilt is for—to deliver a concubine to the emperor for the first coupling and entry into his house. But how does that—?"

"I think you know how that applies here—how that applies to you, my son," Han Shui answered in a tired, regretful voice. "The emperor has seen you. His interests are broad. I have no idea how he came to observe and choose you, but he has. I can do nothing about it."

"But this can't be. Tell him, Ke Chuan. Tell him why this can't serve the ritual." He looked imploringly and accusingly at the guard captain. He could not openly say it in front of his father, and he knew that it would be insanity and suicide for Ke Chuan to reveal that Han Li could not go to the emperor this way, as the ritual required the concubine to be a virgin. The question had been made without thinking, in shock.

Han Li was not a virgin. Ke Chuan knew exactly why Han Li was not a virgin. Ke Chuan had made sure Han Li was not a virgin three times that night. Han Li saw the predicament in Ke Chuan's eyes, but he was a scholar of the rituals and believed in them. He couldn't remain silent.

The ritual could not be observed under this circumstance. Ke Chuan knew it would be a sacrilege, not helped because the emperor did not know it. But anyone who knew it knew that it would be an insult to the gods, who would surely take their revenge. So, it could not happen.

"Tell him that it can't be, Ke Chuan," Han Li said, again, but Ke Chuan looked away from him to Han Li's father and spoke to the general. "We cannot keep the emperor waiting. You know that. The emperor has spoken. You know that too."

"Remove your robe and lie on the quilt," Han Shui said in weary voice.

"Father!" Han Li exclaimed.

"Call in the guards, if you must," Han Shui said to Ke Chuan. Bind and gag him, if necessary. Rumor is that the emperor enjoys such games.

The guard captain called in the emperor's guards, and they stripped Han Li of his robe. Whether in shock or surrender, Han Li struggled only a bit but said nothing as they bound his wrists and ankles together with red sashes. And then he couldn't protest aloud anymore, as they gagged him with another red scarf. They rolled him into the yellow silk quilt and carried him from the Pavilion of the Tortoise across the Forbidden City grounds to the Dragon Pavilion, the sleeping pavilion of Emperor Pu Yi.