1 Fallout
2 The auction
3 Yael's whales
4 The Samothea Company
5 Student House
6 Buying Samothea
7 Epilogue: a new candidate
*****
1Fallout
At home after Solanj's outrageous actions at Ocean City Astroport, Danielle fumed by herself in her study. Solanj had revealed to the galaxy's News Web that Ezra had multiple bedmates and multiple children. This publicity disaster was followed by Kalyndra Fernesdaughter's display of submission to him, kneeling on the platform and calling him 'Master'.
Danielle hid in her study for a good hour, not wanting to show her anger to her guests, especially not Ezra's children, Freya and Tahney. When she was calm enough, she made a videocall via the direct comms link to the Council Chamber on Samothea, asking to speak to Madam Gloria, Prefect of Samothea. She showed Gloria the news report of the event.
"My Deputy Prefect's a scamp, isn't she?" Gloria said.
A less secure woman than Danielle might have been offended by Gloria's apparent flippancy in regard to the serious problem that Solanj created for the Samothea Project.
"I think she's more than that, Gloria. She may have jeopardised a possible compromise with Outworld Ventures. Did you tell her to make a scene?"
A less secure woman than Gloria might have been offended by Danielle's implicit accusation that she was a party to Solanj's outrageous behaviour, or even the cause of it.
"No, I didn't, Danielle, and if my maverick deputy had asked my permission for her display, I would have refused. However, the news about Ezra's bedmates must come out sometime."
"Yes, but we pay a publicity team to manage this kind of thing. Who knows what damage Solanj has done?"
"You understand what she was trying to achieve?"
"She wanted to use Ezra's polygamy and Kalyndra's submission to outrage the public, bringing the settler company into disrepute. She doubtless thought that Outworld Ventures would prefer to offload the planet cheaply to us rather than face embarrassing questions from the public on Earth."
"That appears to be the essence of her tactic."
"How could she think it would work? Outworld Ventures might just as well use the fact of Ezra's polygamy to forbid him from returning to Samothea. She's emboldened Earthside politicians who want control over your planet and weakened the position of the settler company, who might have to appease Earth by outlawing multiple bedmates and flooding Samothea with even more settlers."
"Yes, that's possible I suppose. Solanj has certainly put you in a difficult position. She needs to be better behaved."
"She needs a bloody good hiding!"
"I'm sure Ezra will oblige. He's done it before ... and I see that Kalyndra brought her whip."
******
Ezra did punish Solanj and Kalyndra but he did not use the whip. Not at first anyway.
That night he tied the women up back-to-back, sitting on one side of the bed, legs outstretched. He blindfolded them, so they could hear everything he did with Ash on the other side of the bed.
He told Kalyndra not to talk and she obeyed, happy to be commanded by him. As for Solanj, although she loved to obey him as much as Kalyndra, she always needed to put up some resistance first, to force him to dominate her. She refused to be silent, so he stood before her and said: "Open up."
Expecting something good, like a hard cock, Solanj opened her mouth. He stuffed a sock in it. A large, rolled up, woollen sock, which he secured with a gag, tied at the back of her head.
"Now you'll be quiet," he said. "Ash, come to me."
They made love in a noisy and satisfying way. A few minutes' kissing, then his warm mouth on a sweet little tit, transported Ash to heaven, her heart bursting, her skin tingling. She had missed sex with him even more than she realised.
Ash moaned lustily when he put his mouth on her pussy, sucking on her clitoris, lashing it with his tongue, until she gave a big yelping cry with an arched back and quivering thighs.
"Oh, God! Just like that!"
He kept her on the plateau, giving her more noisy joy, pushing in a finger to rub the best spots in her tight pussy, lapping at her clit until it became too sensitive, while she bucked, sighing with amazing pleasure, her hands on his head, fingers grasping his hair.
She had another big climax and went silent. Now it was his time. He laid on her and thrust his hot hard cock into her narrow slit. She gasped and he began a hard and fast fucking. She crossed her legs over his back, digging her nails into his shoulders, moaning happily with every thrust.
Soon he slowed and they savoured the delicious feeling of a sexual re-connection, expressing their love, making it last as long as possible.
She tapped his shoulder, wanting to go on top. She rode him, leaning backward, goading herself to another climax that arched her back. Then she lay on him, belly to belly, just moving her hips up and down.
Soon she wanted him to take her from behind. She went on all fours and he knelt behind her. It was a sensuous fucking, with his thighs pressing against her sensitive bottom and his cock giving her a stretch and rub from a different angle. She crossed her arms and rested her head on them, eyes closed, getting a deeper penetration.
Ezra delighted in the assertive character of his lovely Chinese bedmate. Ash was completely submissive by nature. She was a servant to Solanj, who submitted to Ezra, so he might have thought she would be even more submissive toward him. But, like all the Herder women, she was uninhibited in sex, driven to seek her own pleasure, happy to tell Ezra what she wanted him to do, believing him when he said that whatever pleasure she took gave him even more pleasure.
"Pull my hair," she said.
He grabbed her long straight black hair and pulled her up, his other hand on her stomach. The angle of his thrusts now caught the spot in her pussy that gave her a special joy. She wailed happily and he felt her stomach muscles bunch as she tipped over the edge into another climax.
He pulled out and let her recover from her orgasm. She wanted to be on her back again, to take his weight and be held down.
He lay on her and began thrusting.
She was chirruping now, breathing hotly in his ear, saying: "More! More! Harder! Oh, God! Oh, God! Oh, God!"
Ezra plunged his cock into her even harder. It was their final moments. Her back arched again and they gripped hands, fingers intertwined. Her head went back and her eyes rolled up. She had an unbearable spasm, agonising and fulfilling, rolling on and on as her pussy quivered around his cock.
His own hot sweet agony was almost upon him. He pressed his lips on hers and she pushed her tongue rhythmically into his mouth. In a moment he groaned and released. She gripped his waist with her thighs as the relieving warm flood pulsed into her.
He thrust a few more times to ease away the tension.
"Ash, you're the perfect bedmate," he said.
They held each other tightly, pressed together, panting in unison, heartbeats returning to normal.
******
He untied Solanj first and she kissed his sweaty cheek. Much as she wanted Ash to have her fun with him, she wished they had not taken so long because she had an eight-month-old baby resting heavily on her bladder.
"Help me up," she said.
Ezra pulled her to her feet and Solanj skipped (though it was more like a waddle) to the toilet.
When Ezra released Kalyndra, she smiled at him and said:
"I know this isn't my whole punishment, Master."
"No, Pet. I've saved something for when we're alone."
"Please can I sleep with you tonight?"
"No, you'll sleep with Solanj. Ash is my bedmate for now."
"Yes, Master."
******
Fertility treatments for Kalyndra and Ash began on the next day with physical exams, blood tests, endocrine tests, DNA tests and holographic scans.
Ezra and Solanj went with Ash and Kalyndra, to give them support and to keep out of Danielle's way. Ezra knew his sister would be angry for quite a while.
Although it was not fair for Danielle to blame Ezra as much as Solanj and Kalyndra, he understood her well, judging that her anger would give her a powerful impetus to work painstakingly to put things right. This was another reason to give his sister her distance.
First Danielle soothed the head of the Samothea Project's publicity department, who had thrown his hands up in despair and threatened to quit. It was hard enough to put a positive spin on Ezra's thirty bedmates and thirty-five daughters while they were mostly on Samothea, out of the public gaze. It was impossible now.
The publicity department's spin was that the women of Samothea were hardy survivors, independent women who had generously helped a stranded and injured man. This was only part of the story. Solanj's intervention revealed the other part, which was that many of the women of Samothea treated Ezra as a kind of oriental monarch, despite his objections. The full story of Ezra's harem was now headlined on the News Web.
Next Danielle took Andrew Claydon to lunch for an insider's view of how Outworld Ventures reacted to the revelations. The company made no public statement at first, but when Earthside politicians accused them of supporting polygamy on Samothea, the company publicly denounced polygamy, confirming that it would always be illegal on Samothea.
Andrew understood what motivated Solanj and secretly sympathised with her. He was prepared to intercede on Danielle's behalf with his company by canvassing the opinions of the senior management on the future of Samothea.
Someone else to placate was Elspeth Bereded of the Women's Business Initiative. Elspeth knew about Ezra's multiple bedmates but did not mention it publicly, which now looked suspicious, as if she had been covering up a scandal. Some members of the Initiative also had cold feet, now that their hope for a woman-only planet seemed to be dashed by the women of Samothea themselves.
