The New Nobility

Evelyn started, confused and frightened, uncertain of where she was and who she was with. She blinked in the strong sunlight and sat up to find herself again in darkness. Heart racing, she ran her mind back over the memories of the night before and recalled, with fright, his last words to her. Thinking more clearly now she saw that she had been awakened by the light shining through a narrow gap in the curtains. This sheet of light had struck her eyes before reaching him.

'Saved by happenstance,' she thought. 'But not for long. That light will reach him in a minute.'

Biting her lip, she carefully wormed her way down the bed, beneath the covers, until she found his flaccid cock. Taking a deep breath and reminding herself that she'd done this many times before, enjoyed it many times, she took the limp flesh in her hand and placed her mouth upon it. He smelled, a mixture of his musk, and hers, still clinging to him from the night before. She couldn't avoid breathing it in as she took him all the way into her mouth and simply held him there, her nose pressed into the mat of his pubic hair. She used her hand to lightly massage his heavy balls, holding them in the palm of her hand and softly rolling them back and forth.

His cock began to swell in her mouth and as it pushed against the back of her throat, she let it slowly push her away from him. She helped it along, pulling back until only the unprotected glans was still in her mouth. He hadn't so much as twitched yet, so she placed her hand at the base of his shaft and slowly stroked while her mouth matched the pace, moving up and down on the end of his shaft.

A groan heralded his return to consciousness and Evelyn swirled her tongue around the very tip of him. This drew forth another groan and Evelyn felt the sheets thrown back and a hand on the back of her head.

"And this," the voice declared sleepily, "is how a man should be awakened. Oh stars, yes."

A knocking at the door shocked Evelyn, but the hand prevented her from pulling away.

"I am occupied," the voice called out.

"My lord, your father requires that you attend him immediately," another voice called from the other side of the door.

"I am occupied," the young master, 'Jahan,' Evelyn realized, repeated. "Tell my father I will attend him shortly."

The door clicked and Evelyn heard footsteps. The difference in the sound made it clear that the person was now inside the room.

"Your father requires that you attend him immediately," the voice pronounced with a heavy emphasis on the final word.

'He can see me,' Evelyn thought. 'He's watching me blow the young master. It'll be all over the servants' wing by lunch time. I'm ruined.'

The hand released the back of her head and Jahan pulled out of her mouth. Evelyn stared at the bedsheet, not daring to raise her head; not wanting to meet the gaze of whoever was watching her.

"Stay here, wench. I'll have use of you when I return," Jahan ordered.

"Lews will escort you, my lord," the voice stated. Evelyn, with a sudden sinking dread in the pit of her belly, recognized the voice of the butler.

She heard Jahan leave the room and waited for the butler to follow him.

"Come with me," he stated.

Evelyn bit her lower lip and crawled off the bed. Her downcast eyes guided her out of the room and down the hallway, following the man's feet and not raising her flushed face to look at his. She was very much afraid she was about to be dismissed, to be cast out of the house and sent to a factory. So preoccupied was she with this dread that she failed to notice they had walked into a carpeted room and come to a stop.

"Look at me, girl," a new voice commanded.

Startled, Evelyn looked up and saw that Sir Arun was sitting in a high-back chair examining her. After a moment of silence he looked at the butler.

"That will be all, Erens. Thank you."

The butler bowed and withdrew from the room leaving Evelyn standing disheveled and very much afraid before the man who owned the town she'd grown up in and held the power of life and death over her. The man whose son she had, involuntarily, spent the night with. Her hands went to her skirts, fruitlessly seeking to straighten them and make them appear that they hadn't been slept in. Mrs. Elati would have done more than slap her for appearing in the morning line up in her present condition.

His examination seemed, to Evelyn, to last for a long silent hour. Rationally, she knew it hadn't been that long, but her pounding heart made time seem to slow down.

"Do you wish to prefer charges against Jahan?" he asked.

That was not what Evelyn had expected to hear and she scrambled to find her mental footing.

"Charges? It was just sex, my lord, and he didn't hurt me, not really. I don't want to cause any problems. I don't want to lose my job," she babbled and then stopped as his raised hand cut her off.

"You are not going to lose your job. Lews testimony was quite clear on the point that you were not there willingly and I will not punish the victim. What may happen in other houses does not happen in mine and the law will be respected. I am asking if you wish to prefer charges against my son for assaulting you."

His voice was firm and contained a sense of resolve that seemed as deep as the ocean to Evelyn. Thinking quickly she took a deep breath and tried to relax.

"I'm thinking that would cause problems for you, my lord, and I don't think it would be good for the house. I was frightened, but I'll be well enough now that I understand things a little better. I'll not press charges."

He studied her again before speaking. "Did you enjoy it?"

Rattled, again, by this unexpected question Evelyn simply blurted out the truth. "A little, my lord. That is... He's a well endowed young man and I enjoy sex and if he'd taken a little time or gotten to know me it wouldn't have been scary. Of course, I couldn't have had sex with him if he'd gotten to know me because then I'd know who he was..." she trailed off. "I enjoyed some of it, my lord."

He nodded his head once, as if he'd reached a decision and motioned with his hand. She looked uncertainly at the empty chair across from him, certain that she'd misinterpreted his gesture.

"Yes, sit," he confirmed. "I wish to speak to you at a little length and it would be unkind to make you stand."

"Thank you, my lord. If I may, my lord, didn't the butler say that your son was to attend you immediately?" she asked as she delicately sat down on the very edge of the chair.

Sir Arun smiled more than a little grimly. "My son is currently awaiting me on the front veranda. It is cold and damp in the early morning, out of the sun. He is learning that I, not he, decides who does what and when in this house. It is, in fact, my son that I wish to speak to you about. He's an arrogant young fool. Arrogant I can tolerate, young he will grow out of, foolish is altogether another story."

"To understand this fully, which you need to do, I will need to be certain you understand the nature of our society. The Empire is dedicated to the idea of re-uniting mankind. In our first rush to the stars we scattered widely, each group seeking the space to live their lives exactly as they pleased. Inevitably this brought about conflicts that grew wider and more destructive until, at the end, mankind very nearly destroyed ourselves. Spaceflight was lost to us and we huddled around fires on the planets we still managed to survive on."

"Then the Emperor set us on our quest, assigning us the holy duty of re-unification. So our ancestors spent generations building a fleet that took them to a world known to be habited and they imposed the rule of the Empire and built industry and stable social institutions. Then they built a fleet and sent it on to the next world. For centuries we have repeated this pattern, slowly returning humanity to a common fold."

"You recognize this of course, as it is a part of the curriculum you were educated in. But there is more. Our duty is to act as stewards. We rule because we are able and because we must. But we do not rule because it is our right or because we are in any way better than those we rule. This is, perhaps, the foundation upon which the Empire rests. There must be justice and a degree of guaranteed equity or the social order will collapse and with it the Empire."

"You may recall that when we arrived some cities chose to resist us. They were destroyed, utterly, and the survivors placed on ships and sent away. We will not speak of where they were sent. These actions are regarded as proof of the Empire's cruelty, evidence of our resolve. Yet they are nothing compared to what happens when the Empire decides that the nobility of a planet has lost sight of the foundation. There are those in the nobility who believe that they rule by right. That their destiny is to rule over the less fortunate. When these people take control of a planet, the Empire destroys them, and the planet, and anyone who happens to be on it. Root and branch they scourge the infection with fire and destruction."

"This is important to you because these people are in a position of unwonted strength on this planet. Your existence is at risk as much as mine. My son, in his foolishness, has fallen in with these people. He was expelled from school for admitting to actions taken by another, for protecting one of these people. His loyalty has been noticed and he is to be rewarded by being taken into the service of the Count of Swans."

"I want you to be my spy in his court."

"Spy?!" Evelyn exclaimed.

"Yes," Sir Arun, confirmed. "Spy. As my agent you will have two tasks. Your first task regards my duty, and yours, to the Empire. You will report on the people that meet with the Count, that visit his court. You will report on rumors and news you hear and, if called upon, you will assist other agents by carrying out instructions passed to you. Your second task will be to... safeguard my son. I believe that he is a fool, but he has courage and I believe that he will one day recognize the folly of his actions. Help prevent him from taking any actions that the Empire will be unable to forgive. But make no mistake about my intent, the Empire comes first, even at the price of my son's life."

"Will you do this?"

Evelyn was unable to process everything she had just been told, unable to think. 'Find what's important,' she told herself. 'Focus on the centrality.' It took her a moment, but then it was blindingly obvious.

"I will, my lord."

"Why?" he shot back at her, his gaze now intense.

"Because the lives of my people may depend upon it, my lord." And they very well might. The memory of the destroyed towns was fresh enough in Evelyn's mind. Every town had been required to send emissaries to view the sites, and every citizen had been forced to attend large meetings where the emissaries described the destruction. She did not for a moment doubt that the Empire might destroy and entire planet if it proved necessary.

Sir Arun nodded. "The one answer I could truly trust. You are too new to this house to have much in the way of loyalty to me. The same can be said of your loyalty to the Empire. But service to the people you grew up with... I can believe that. Very well then. Queresh will take you in hand and see to your preparation. Officially I am appointing you a body servant to my son, but your true status will be kept within the protected files of my intelligence service. Thank you, Evelyn. God save the Empire!"

"God save the Empire," she echoed out of pure habit while her mind swam in the ocean of possibility that had opened up before her.

To be continued...