“Just admiring the scenery,” I say lightly. Admiring you, I think, hating and loving the heat of desire blooming in my soul. It's not the first time I've felt an almost rabid sexual attraction to someone, and it probably won't be the last. Sometimes desire hits like a punch, limiting my capacity for reason. Turning me into a base creature craving the touch of a man. You need to save yourself for marriage, my mother says.
Loosen up. No one cares if you fuck before you marry, from Emma, from so many others. They all do it anyway.
“I’m doing the same,” he says, ostentatiously examining me from head to toe. Stoking the flames in me further. No chance of pretending he hasn’t noticed me looking, then.
“Perhaps we should get to know each other a little better,” I say, voice dipping to a whisper.
He grins, his eyes twinkling and hard, the smile almost a leer. “I’m thinking the same. Drinks? On me, of course.”
“Sounds great,” I purr, taking my shot, and landing it in the last hole. Emma claps, and Desmond nods in acknowledgment.
Many drinks later, and bad judgment all around, we plummet into bed, dissolving into the sweaty world of lips, hips, and tongues. Of bodies melded together, chasing release and a deeper connection. Though I fling myself in the act, it's too sloppy, too quick for me to truly love it. My senses are too muted from drink, my balance all out of equilibrium.
Not quite the romantic first time I'd dreamed of. Propping myself up on my elbows, I watch as Desmond, humming tunelessly, washes himself down and dresses himself back up, taking a long time with the buttons of his tunic. The sour taste of beer lingers in my throat, though I’m sobering up better now, registering that yes. I did give into that desire. I did do contrary to what my family wanted.
I can’t help but notice that twang of disappointment within. Something about the sex was missing. No other way to think about it. We were both drunk, both dazed with lust, fumbling at one another in a graceless heap as we sought the skin beneath. There was even a discussion about which hole to use, and I believe we were together for all of two minutes before he was spent. I had that tantalizing promise of something more, of fluttering on the precipice of true pleasure, of finally understanding what it is about sex that makes people rave about it – and then nothing.
It ended. Though he apologized profusely, Desmond didn’t want to do anything afterward. If anything, he almost seemed embarrassed by what he’d done, as if he was ashamed of giving into his desires. Perhaps he has his own pressures to live up to. Perhaps he feels like me.
“This was just for fun, right?” Desmond says to me, doing the last button on his top. “Nothing more.”
“Yeah,” I say. “Fun.” My voice is a little flat. I’m buzzing with that dissatisfaction, that unreleased tension. “You’re running away from me now?”
He hesitates. “Is that what I’m doing?”
“Seems like.” I stretch, then start fumbling for my own clothes. He watches me, looking strangely guilty.
“Sorry. It’s just… I’m not really supposed to do this. I’m here because Bobby thinks I’m uptight all the time – been with too few women. Something about blue balls, too.”
“I’ve heard that’s an excuse guys come up with so they get to fuck,” I say, and he smiles sheepishly in response.
“Sounds about right. We’re always coming up with ways to get to it, I hear. There’s a guy I know – refuses to have sex before marriage, so instead he has “temporary” marriages to justify his own morals and get some.”
“Temporary marriages?” I perk in interest, tying on my bra, fishing for my top. “People do that?”
“Yep. Marry and divorce in a night. He’s not fooling anyone but himself.” The familiar grin perks back up, before it fades. He switches topic. “I’m not technically supposed to be messing around anymore. My father expects me to marry soon.” He rubs the back of his head. “People turn a blind eye, but you hear the whispers.”
“So why do it?” I ask, though I feel every inch the hypocrite. I’m not supposed to be doing this either. The rumpled bedsheets hide my pants, and I’m in everything but my socks now. I pick up my leather jacket. He turns an appreciate eye over my form again.
“The demon in my head always tempts, I suppose.” There’s an apology in his voice. “Thank you. I'm sorry if it was too quick, or –” The smile on his face freezes, however, when he sees my clan sash poking out of my jacket pocket. The shy camaraderie between us vanishes. The atmosphere in the air turns awkward, icy.
“What’s wrong?” I ask, confused by the sudden tightness of his expression. His eyes are wide; his teeth are clenched.
“What’s that?” he hisses, pointing to my sash. “You’re a Hartson?” My surname is spat out as if it’s a filthy slur, the worst kind possible. Like only slime would want to be called Hartson.
No use pretending otherwise. I hide the sash away. “Yes. What’s it to you?” There’s a horrible, dawning suspicion blooming in me, sending a sickness almost as intense as the way Desmond said my family name.
“No...” Desmond’s look becomes wild. “No, you can’t be. I’d never – I’ve never touch one of you.”
“Claymore,” I say, letting it escape my mouth as a curse, when he reveals his hidden clan colors for the first time – white and blue stripes. The colors blast away any last vestiges of desire I had. “Oh, hell no. No wonder the sex was so bad!”
The urge to wash and scrub myself clean overwhelms. I can’t believe it. How could I have done something so disgusting? How could I have allowed myself to be touched by that?
He takes one menacing step forward, all warmth gone, hate boiling in his eyes. I stand up to that hate, letting it fan my own. “You slut. You tricked me!”
“Me? I tricked you? Why in the world would I want to sleep with a fucking Claymore?” My voice rises to a screech. I search for a weapon – anything to take him down, and settle on a fire poker. He stops his advance, and beats a hasty retreat out of the room as I come after him, swinging. I’m howling in fury at this point, ashamed and humiliated and hating all at once. I chase him out of the rooms, down the stairs, and briefly take in the sight of a gawking crowd, who had heard our heated words, my howls of anger.
“Claymore!” I shriek, causing Emma to gasp, causing a whole tumult of conversation, and hands grab at me, taking away the poker, and I see two men with the gray and black forcing me away from Desmond, who is also being restrained, as he made a bid for attack the moment I was disarmed. We scream the vilest insults at each other, and I can’t stop myself, because the horror of what I’ve done shames me to the bone.
I can’t have slept with a Claymore.
No decent Hartson would ever allow such a thing.
2
Pearl
Hatred poisons my veins. Tension forms in my mind like an elastic band restricting the skull, burning ever hotter when the news hits my ears, one time when I visit Emma in our lands, at the local inn she loves to visit after a hard day’s labor. Heads turn to me when I enter, and gossip quietens. Eyes stare.