Indian Spice

"You're naked underneath?" I gasped quietly.

"No matter how many layers you hang from your shoulders you are still naked underneath. But I am free and cool. Can you say the same?"

I could not.

"Shall we drink tea?"

I blinked in shock as she abruptly changed the subject with that same matter-of-fact calmness she always maintained. Foolishly I let her lead me back to that place which had served us tea previously. A colonial building where servants brought drinks to the mostly English customers on the verandah. At night it was a bridge club, by day it serviced thirsty traders and off-duty soldiers.

Tea came in a pot with cups and saucers of fine China, placed on quaint tables covered with cotton cloths. So very English in a foreign land I thought.

Maya poured as she spoke and I looked away not wanting to hear her words and have them poison my mind again.

"You think of the flesh as evil. But it is a divine gift through which to feel the glory of god. Soft and subtle to be excited by the touch of another mortal."

"Please." I begged.

"Stop. You are leading me to the gates of hell and I have to admit that no matter how hard I try I cannot fight you."

I sipped at my drink realising how tea was as important to the Indians as it was to the English. At least it seemed that way from my interactions with Maya.

"Then don't."

She took my hand pushing it under the table. She placed it on her leg and I realised immediately she had let the sari fall open. My hand was laid on her bare leg. Another young woman's thigh. I froze, unable to grasp the horror of what she was doing to me now.

"Tell me what you feel?"

"Your... your limb." I stuttered.

I glanced about convinced someone would see through the table. That someone would shout out and point at us in disgust.

She gripped my wrist tightly as I tried to pull away, moving my hand back and forth, forcing me to stroke her flesh. I became breathless at the feel of smooth naked skin on my fingertips. So soft and warm.

"Oh God.

Stop. Please."

I so wanted to take my hand away but she held it firm against her flesh, pulling it higher. Again the flames were rising from my flower. An evil desire flooded through my veins.

"When was the last time you touched another's flesh? That you felt the heat and heartbeat of another life?"

"I..."

To my horror I realised I was caressing her thigh without the guidance of Maya's hand. Now she just held my wrist loosely, guiding me. So close to where no further clothing protected her. I couldn't stop.

For a moment I stared at her. Bewitched by her smooth skin and deep eyes. Those lips seemed to invite forbidden flesh to them.

"I have watched many girls come to this province in search of husbands. Very few have been successful. Most move on within the year.

And I wonder if those who have been blessed truly feel the happiness that I offer you. Or are they just raising their dresses occasionally for a pleasant feeling with no real quench of their thirst?"

It was as if she could read my mind and see the life I had briefly experienced. Her insight scared me.

I finally succeeded in removing my hand and busied myself looking out into the noisy crowd to hide my tremble.

Maya was relentless.

"Tell me you don't wish to know how it feels to be aroused by another."

I remembered the girls at her home. And I felt the tingle my touch of her flesh had brought me just moments earlier. I knew the meaning of her words.

"By another woman? That is what you mean, isn't it? It's... wrong. It's ungodly."

"Is it?

Imagine. The delicate exploration of your intimate places by someone experienced. Does it matter whether they are a man or a woman if they can bring you such pleasure without harming anyone else?"

"Yes. It matters."

I thought of the two Indian girls at the palace, so engrossed in one another without concern or fear in them. It hadn't mattered to them, only the joy they brought each other. Was it so different to Daksh and Nisha? Please God, why do I feel this way? God did not answer my plea.

I looked down at my tea as I lifted the cup. The tremble that engulfed my being transferred to the milky liquid and try as I might, even from half full, it rippled and dripped over the sides. Quickly I gulped the last of it. I wanted to say it calmed me. Perhaps it did my thoughts, a little. But not my flesh. That burned ever hotter.

"Would... it be you?"

I asked with a faltering tongue, disbelieving that the question had escaped my mouth without my conscious control.

"Would it be you that instructed me?"

I was fearful that she might offer me to some stranger in a Bhunga away from the town while she watched.

"Yes."

I looked out at the natives rushing around and tried to calm my nerves. To control the inexplicable urges rising from my groin.

"We can go to a private place now and I will show you delights you have never dreamt of."

I stared at her. My mind was blank. Magnetic eyes held my gaze, reaching inside my soul to twist it and wake the devil lurking within. I felt intoxicated. I tried to fight it, to wish I was back safe in England.

Fingers brushed over the back of my hand and I feared she would seduce me here in the street if I did not speak.

"Somewhere private." That was all I said.

Once again I was lost to the illusion this Maharani created. I was held captive by the idea that she wished me to raise my dress for her. To me, it was a confusion. I was not unacquainted with the notion of passionate friendships between women in England where touching one another was acceptable. That I should ever be faced with such an opportunity, or that I would consider it was beyond my comprehension.

"Finish your tea." Maya said pouring more from the large pot.

"It is another of the delights of India. One the British have taken to their hearts.

"It tastes different here somehow." I observed.

"Every blend is unique. Each has its own soothing aroma and flavour, often enhanced by the addition of other herbs."

I shook uncontrollably as I lifted my cup. But was it fear or excitement? I felt as though Maya would take my soul and I would never be permitted to have it back again if I went with her.

I drank more of the tea to calm myself and found only that I was deeper under this witch's spell.

SIX

I still fought an inner battle even as I allowed this worldly native woman to lead me into the small house at the edge of town. A weedy Indian man of great age greeted her and they spoke at some length while I waited silently like a servant to my princess.

Outwardly I was the demure English girl dressed for a stroll in Woking High Street. Inside, I could feel my skin prickling with the heat of a smouldering fire beneath. Every part of me trembled as I questioned my sanity.

Finally, Maya gave him money and he led us to a room at the rear of the building.

I don't know what I expected but it was more luxurious than I had thought it would be from outside. Heavy ornate furniture with bowls of fresh petals sat around the sides and in the centre, overlooked by a curtained window, a heavy carved bed gripped me with fear.

I glanced back at the entrance as the old man departed. Just a thick curtain separating us from the rest of the house where I could hear people moving around.

And from outside I heard the unhindered cry and chatter of a thousand souls through wide open windows as they passed only feet away from where she intended to...

Oh my god.

"It's not private." I protested.

"Anyone could come in."

"We will not be disturbed."

I felt my terror at what I was considering.

"People will hear."

Maya positioned herself between me and the exit, still maintaining that controlled manner and disarming smile.

"People do not care as they do in England. Here it is just natural. It is not a sin or pubic outrage."

"Oh God. What am I doing?"

I had already given myself to a man and was quite prepared to do it again. Even considering that it now might be out of wedlock if I was to become a kept woman for my financial well-being. But was tripping the velvet a sin too far?

"Please God, forgive me." I muttered not meaning for it to be aloud.

Maya didn't react, instead taking it as tacit approval to begin unrigging me.

I felt the first fastenings pulled apart as I stood compliantly. Inside I shook, my knees trembled, and I was frozen with fear as my dress was lifted away and carefully placed on a chair.

"First we should remove these restricting clothes."

My camisole was lifted over my head, then the corset straps were loosened. I placed my arm across my exposed bosom as she lifted the garment away.

"You have such fine, smooth skin." She said letting her fingers brush over my bare arms. Heat flushed my cheeks and turned my skin the colour of the fire I felt inside me.

"The human form was never meant to be hidden away. Your God did not tell you to cover so completely. Only your foolishness asks that you do. Is that not the lesson of Eve and Adam?"

I felt Eve's shame at the revelation of her nudity. The vulnerability she and Adam feared after eating the apple of their forbidden tree.

"I don't think you've interpreted..." I gave up. Perhaps she had.

"Sit on the bed."

I did as asked to allow garters and stockings to be peeled away by hands that caressed my legs at the same time.

"Indian clothes are so much simpler." She said.

She lifted my arm away and my bosom heaved as my ripe fruits came under her gaze for the first time. Her hands closed around my firm young mounds. My pale white meat was gently squished between her fingers and my nipples sprang forward with a hardness that hurt.

"Oh my."

She leaned in and planted tiny kisses on my creamy hills.

"You can feel the fire inside you."

Not a question. A statement that came with the assurance of her certainty.

"Yes."

I could. A heat rose in my groin along with an ungodly itch that would not subside. With my dress gone only my knickers hid the source of my welcome discomfort.

"Please." I muttered, unsure if I was begging her to stop or continue.

Maya tugged at the final garment and it slid down my legs leaving me fully naked before another person for the first time since my childhood. Her hands came back up, sliding over goose-bumped flesh that trembled and quivered under her touch. All the while her dark eyes held mine. Her smile mesmerised me, holding me fixed unable to break free.

She took some sweet-smelling oil from a small jug on the bedside table before stroking my thighs. I watched, delighting in the contrast of colour between our skin. Hers, the dusky colour of a light chocolate and mine the colour of milk. The oil lubricated her movements and soothed my burn, up over my hips, around to the small of my back. My skin took on a silky gleam.

Her face came close and her lips just lightly brushed over mine. I smelt her breath and felt its heat on my face. Again that hint of spice as though it was embedded in her very flesh.

"Uhhh." I was lost to her.

Maya's hands slid silkily over my neck, hesitating as I quivered. Then down my arms, fingers turning circles at my inner elbows.

"It's important to learn the sensuous points of the body. The neck, the ears, the inside of the elbow."

It was true. Each place she named felt as though it was on a telegraph wire to a secret place hidden inside my cunny.

Maya kissed my fruits with lips that danced like fairies on my heaving bosom and I gasped with a wonton need as her fingers squeezed and pulled gently on my ruby points.

"Uhhh."

I willed her on, finding momentary relief only in further sin.

She was down around my inner thighs again, guiding my tightly clamped legs apart. As much as I tried, I could not resist. All the while she moved her head to let her long hair trickle over me like a paintbrush. Hands continued their journey across my skin, massaging tense muscles and leaving a silken sheen of oil in their wake until I was covered from head to toe.

I prayed to feel the delight I had brought myself recently. But now delivered by someone else's hand. That it was to be a woman's was almost forgotten. Only the act, the delight, the relief from my torment mattered.

Maya's hands gave great attention to my inner thighs, tickling and stoking my fire, leaving me panting for air. Then they passed up by my modest thatch, just disturbing the coarse hair.

"Uhh."

Upwards over my belly. Fingers dragged delicately around the curve of my breasts until her hands sat on my shoulders. She pushed me back with a gentle firmness and I fell to the bed staring up at the high ceiling. I followed its curve and studied the intricate mouldings that lined the edge where it met the wall. Anything to take my mind off what would happen next.

Hot breath breezed over my cunny disturbing the small patch of hair that covered it.

"Mmm."

It terrified me as much as my flesh demanded it. I was a puppet in her hands. A voyeur to my degradation while she and the devil within me used my body as a plaything.

"You have the symmetry of a lotus flower and your nectar already flows with the power of the Ganges."

I was struggling now. In my head, I wanted to end this sin. But I was conflicted. My body was possessed by a hunger that I couldn't fight. If Maya was indeed a Witch, then her spell was fully cast on me.

"Touch me, please.

End this torture."

More oil was dribbled on me. I gasped as it glided down between my legs, almost unhindered by my thatch, its coolness mixed with my hot leakage and ticked my burning flesh.

"Uhh."

At the edge of my sight, I saw her dark hair moving forward. I felt it brush over my hips and thighs, tickling. Tiny kisses on my belly made me spasm and my cunny gushed with ever more of its warm nectar.

The kisses stopped and fingers took over, rubbing my most private of places. They caressed tender lips and parted them ever so gently to find my hot flesh.

"Oh, Lord."

It was something beyond experience and imagination that another woman's fingers played at my entrance.

"Oh, Jesus Christ."

I was frozen by her touch, unable and unwilling to make her stop. Voices in my head cried out to me to stop this sin. But it felt so good. It felt the only way to end an agony I could not bear.

"Please."

A moment later her tongue drew up the length of my fairest flower.

"Oh, Christ the Lord."

I shuddered with pleasure and all doubt drained from me. There was no question now that I needed to reach my critical moment.

Two digits parted my flower, letting nectar leak out into a welcoming mouth. The fingers pushed in, filling the space that only my own digits and George had penetrated with his white staff. This pleasure I felt could only be considered as close to heaven, rather than the warm, mildly pleasant, but ultimately unfulfilling sensation George had elicited from me.

My right leg was lifted high and bent back over my torso and those fingers began to work me, massaging my inner flesh with thrusts that grew deeper and more and more urgent.

"Uh. Uhhh."

I was exposed to another as never before and I didn't care.

For a moment I tried to imagine it was Captain Andrew's that invaded me. Anything to help deny the truth of this sin. Then I gave in and accepted that I truly did want it to be Maya who fucked me.

"Oh God. Please.

Please don't stop." I cried out no longer caring that the old man outside might hear, or that my cries were carried out into the busy street just feet away.

Her tongue flicked at my little boy in the boat. It burned with the fires of the hell Maya was surely condemning me to for eternity.

"Fuck."

I was shocked that such a word might escape my lips. But it felt both appropriate for what I was feeling and immensely liberating.

"Fuck. Fuck. Fuck."

I cried out with newfound freedom.

Now my heart pounded so loud it rang in my ears. It beat on my rib cage as though it would burst free.

Maya wrapped her arms around my thighs, trapping and holding my legs wide so that no amount of my writhing could escape her quail pipe and fingers.

"Oh. Uhh."

Maya's fingers were moving so fast that my belly rippled under her attack. The burn in me became a raging inferno and every muscle in my body tensed.

"God." I screamed.

I lost control of my body, jerking as if a puppet on strings. A wave of euphoria swept over me that made my mind die for just a moment

It was with a desperate gasp for air that Maya released me and I lay exhausted. Great gulps of air filled my lungs and I lay in an ecstasy blind to everything around me. After what seemed an eternity my breathing calmed and I accepted the relaxed euphoria that held me with the comfort of a mother's hug.

I opened my eyes.

Maya was peeling away her sari as I watched. Long legs, a toned stomach and small pert breasts. Dark nipples that blended into the brown of her flesh. She was as if in the garden of Eden except for the many rings of gold that adorned her wrists.

I watched with a hunger I didn't comprehend as thoughts alien to me rushed in a jumble through my mind. She was exotically beautiful. Never in my life had I felt such a desire for a woman as I felt in that instant.

Maya parted her legs just enough that I could easily see the line of her notch. She drew a finger up it slowly, depressing her dark cunny lips. They parted in the wake of her digit. I saw a hint of wet pinkness flash brightly through the darkness of her thatch.

I stared in amazement.

"You're very beautiful." I stuttered.

She pushed her dampened finger to my lips and I suckled it, tasting her juices with the joy of experiencing a fresh and exotic foreign fruit for the first time.

"Now you ask yourself what it is like to bring such pleasure to another."

I could see the glistening droplets on her neat dark fur where they had leaked from her flower, betraying her own need.

"Yes." I breathed.

I couldn't lie. No matter how much I thought it a sin, I needed to know more of her taste. To immerse myself in it. I wanted to feel her become a wanton puppet under my touch and to bring her the same flood of bliss I had experienced.

She walked to the side of me and climbed onto the bed. I reached out letting my fingers glide over her long, elegant limb as she stretched out and lay down next to me. Her eyes locked on mine and held my gaze.

At the tea house, this had frightened and horrified me. Now it felt glorious. Smooth hot flesh as delicate as fine porcelain under my fingers.

"Explore my body." She said lifting a knee before letting her leg fall to the side.

I was awestruck. There before me, her dark triangle broken only by the wound of a delicate knife cut. It gleamed with sap in the bright sunshine that tore in through the large windows.

I didn't hesitate as I leaned over and ran my hand along the inside of her bent leg. I could sense the tremble in her and knew I now had the same power she had demonstrated over me.

"Uhh." She gasped before snatching a sharp breath and holding it.

Her ever-present control abandoned her and she became as I was. A mere prisoner of her fire wanting anything that would quench it and end the burning.

I lowered my head, breathing in an aroma of warm musk, perhaps with a hint of citrus. It was pleasant. No. Better than pleasant. Much better. I kissed her inner thigh just close enough that the hairs at the edge of her thatch ticked my cheek. Then I drew my tongue briefly over the area, almost fearful of disturbing the soft dusky pad of puffy flesh.

Tiny droplets from the coarse hairs were swept up by my lips and my tongue found more lingering on the pink edges of her cloven inlet.

It truly was the nectar of the gods. Sweetness with a hint of salt. It was as though I was sucking up the juice of a ripe tomato at a Sunday afternoon tea. I savoured it how I would experience a new cocktail for the first time.