9. Ancient Egypt

CHAPTER NINE

ANCIENT EGYPT

DJAU

" Y ou are so beautiful." I kneel between Ay's thighs as he lies on my bed and kiss between his shoulder blades, running my hands over his labor-hardened muscles. His oiled brown skin gleams in the setting, sun and I want to spend all night worshipping him as though he is the god I serve.

When he's in my bed, he is. I exist only for him.

"Show me." Ay lifts his hips, offering me the most sensitive part of him. The place where only I can enter to worship.

My hands smooth over his ass cheeks, loving the way he silently begs with the arching of his back. I cannot deny my god what he craves. I drip a little more oil onto him, this time letting it roll into the cleft. It doesn't matter how many times he lets me fill him; I want more.

I want this life and the afterlife with him.

I give in and slide my cock between his ass cheeks, spreading the oil over my skin, watching the way his ass readies to devour me.

He pushes his ass higher into the air as if unwilling to wait for another heartbeat. And like the dutiful servant I am, I give my god what he desires, pushing into the tight heat of his ass. His groans fill my ears like the sweetest music.

With each thrust, I sink deeper until I am consumed entirely, and we are one being intent on finding pleasure.

He lifts his hips, meeting each thrust. His head still rests on his arms as though I am massing his muscles, not his insides. I grip his hips, moving faster, unable to stop, locked in the struggle of not wanting to spill but unable to fight against the tide.

Our skin applauds our union.

I will write poetry about his ass, his lips, and his heart.

With a groan, I spill in him, riding out my climax. Almost breathless, I roll off him, flopping onto my bed. He turns onto his side and uses his leg to draw me closer to his jutting cock. I open my mouth to receive the blessing, and he slides in, cupping my head so he may use me as I used him.

I tilt my head to take more, loving the way he pushes deep enough to steal my breath. That I am helpless until he is done. Pinned by his thick thigh, his hand, and his cock.

I am his.

As he is mine.

He stills, spilling down my throat, and I swallow as though I have not drunk all day, greedy for every drop. His chest heaves with each breath, and he watches me with such tenderness I do not need air to exist.

Then he is pulling away.

I draw in several breaths—my mortal lungs burn with need—before mustering the strength to move and lie in the crook of his arm. He dips his chin, and his nose brushes mine before stealing a taste of my lips and holding me close. "I love you."

"And I, you." But he is not my god, and I am not his priest. I serve another god, and Ay is a stonemason working on a new temple. A stone carving of Bast that Ay made sits above my bed, watching. We lay there, letting the sweat cool the way we have so many times.

We are not of the same class, which makes this not impossible but not well regarded. If I worked with him, cutting stone, we could live together. Or if he were a priest…

Instead of sharing every part of our lives, we are caught at the edges until we have enough that we can move to another city. A smaller place where we can both find work, where perhaps we can carve our own place once I shed my robes and become something else. The little stash of gold is growing. Soon, it will be enough to give us a new start.

"I have another location for you," I whisper. The scribe gave it to me yesterday when he came to the temple.

His fingers pause their sweep over my side, but only for a heartbeat. "The same as usual?"

"Yes." We have a system that reduces the danger of being caught with treasures stolen from the tombs of nobility.

On the third night after we meet, he and his two men will rob the tomb, and the treasures will be taken to a cave near to where my parents and siblings live. I will take something small to have melted down to add to our collection, and a few days later, I inform the scribe that it is done, and he may collect the treasures—I do not care how he collects them, and I do not ask in the same way he does not ask me how they get there—and he delivers payment to me in cloth or grain, which I then share with Ay and his men .

He nods slowly. "How much longer do we need to wait before we can leave?"

"Not this time, perhaps the next." Then we will have everything required to start again. His family is from the upper Nile. Perhaps we will go there. I do not mind losing my status if it means we are together.

"The next. They beat and impaled a tomb robber yesterday as a warning to all. I do not want to die without an afterlife." He tilts my chin and claims my lips. "And leave you alone forever."

I shudder as though a cobra is slithering over my skin. "Then I will stay here and roam the world with you."

"I will not ask you to give up your afterlife."

"You did not. Without you, there is no life."