I Kissed a Girl II: More Virgin Lesbian Stories

Queen of Swords

by Inara Lavey

Sweat pours off me in rivulets, soaking the thin cotton beneath the bronze and boiled leather armor I wear during weapons practice. It's especially annoying under the breastplate, and I can't wait to strip down and bathe. My helmet comes off first. Even with my hair braided and wrapped around the crown of my head to cushion my skull, repeated blows to the helmet leave me with a headache and ringing ears.
Unbuckling my scabbard, I toss it carelessly onto the rumpled silk sheets of the bed. The battered leather of the scabbard and tarnished bronze of the sword hilt look out of place against the cobalt blue silk. A study in contrasts, like much of my life.
I could take that train of thought further but choose not to. I want my bath, to lie back in hot scented water and drink spiced mead until I drift away to sleep, maybe even slip underneath the water and never wake up again—
"You look tired, my Queen." My maidservant, Lyra, enters the bedchamber, a pile of freshly laundered garments in her arms. Her gentle voice interrupts my dark thoughts. She sets the laundry down and comes up beside me. “Your bath water is drawn. Let me help you disrobe.”
“Thank you, Lyra.” I stand still as she deftly unbuckles the various pieces of armor, placing them with care on a massive wooden chest I use to store my weapons and other fighting accoutrement. The bronze must be wiped down, the leather oiled before they’re put away. She retrieves my scabbard and sword from the bed, adding them to the pile on the chest as I stretch, feeling the aches and pains from practice lurking in my muscles, waiting to make themselves known the next day. But they would be minimal compared to the aftermath of previous combat. I no longer care enough to push myself.
Lyra starts to peel off the sweat-soaked cotton shift, but the sound of heavy footsteps makes us both freeze in place.
Ismet, ruler of the Kingdom of Swords, strides into the room, regal in robes of vibrant crimson silk. The fabric billows out and away from his body as he walks, displaying caramel-colored skin covering muscles toned to perfection. His eyes, framed with thick black lashes, are the same blue as the bedclothes; a blue so rich and vivid they seem unreal. Luxuriant black hair ripples down to his shoulders. He is magnificent, every woman's fantasy come to life.
He is my husband.
And I hate him.
Lyra fades silently into the background as Ismet approaches me, careful to do nothing to attract his attention. Catching Ismet's eye rarely results in a happy ending, so unobtrusiveness is considered a survival trait amongst servants and courtiers alike.
I stare straight ahead while Ismet moves behind me, hard body pressed up against mine as he runs rough hands over my shoulders, fingers catching in the flimsy cotton on either side.
"Your cuts were apathetic, your parries weak, and there was no fire in your belly." One hand travels down to my stomach, fingers splayed against it. The other pulls the shift down over one shoulder, strong fingers idly caressing my skin.
"I was tired."
"A day before the tournament and you're tired?" Ismet's laugh holds no humor. "One would think you don't care about winning, my queen."
"I haven't been feeling well." I keep my tone even, knowing any hint of emotion will provoke him.
"Could there be something else in your belly?" His palm presses against the curve of my well-muscled abdomen. "A child, perhaps?"
I can't help the hiss of indrawn breath. This is cruel, even for Ismet. My inability to bear a child is one of the reasons I am once again competing in the tournament for the crown. A queen is given thirteen months to prove herself able to bear the King's heir. If she fails in this most essential royal duty, the tournament is held to give other ambitious—and foolishly romantic—women the chance to compete for the privilege of proving themselves more fruitful. Such ambition and romantic dreams are why I am now standing before the King of Swords and wishing either he or I was dead.
He hears the catch in my breath and smiles. "No child, then." He caresses my skin. The deceptively gentle touch makes my flesh crawl. "It is a pity, Adisa, for you are by far the most beautiful woman to wear the crown and share my bed thus far. Maybe you will win, and we'll have another thirteen months to try."
I know what comes next, so I'm ready when he rends the shift from my body in one swift move and shoves me onto the bed. His teeth sink into the chafed flesh between neck and shoulder where my shoulder guard had rested as he lifts his robes so he can thrust himself into me.
Ismet is nothing if not predictable.
The first time I experienced Ismet's brand of sex, I cried and pleaded with him to be gentle. This only led to acts of greater cruelty. Then, as I learned to hate him, I fought. This pleased him as it gave him a challenge in bed. I finally learned the only way to guarantee a quick finish was to be impassive. That way Ismet would grow bored and finish quickly, taking his perverse pleasures on more responsive partners, both willing and not. He only lay with me these days to ensure no one could accuse him of not carrying out his royal duty to produce an heir with the greatest female warrior of our kingdom.
So now I lie here still and silent as he ravages me, his magnificent body used as a weapon to hurt and subdue. This is not an act of love; it's an act of war. By the time he's finished, I hurt inside and out, but I keep my pain hidden.
He rises off the bed, his robes falling back around his body as if they'd never been in disarray. Without a backwards glance, he strides to the door and leaves the room.
Within seconds Lyra is at my side, helping me to my feet and leading me to the adjacent chamber containing a huge marble bath sunk into the tiled floor. The scent of vanilla and cinnamon rises towards me as I lower myself into the tub, hissing slightly as the hot water hits the scrapes and cuts I sustained during practice. Lyra keeps a firm grip on my arm until I've seated myself on the submerged ledge. Her fingers brush my shoulder and neck before she busies herself removing the pins holding my braids in place.
I shut my eyes and listen to the tiny clink of pins landing in the copper dish Lyra uses to hold them. When she finishes taking out the pins, she nimbly unbraids my hair from three separate braids, fingers gently running through the copper strands to shake them free. I sigh as she massages soap into my hair and scalp, strong hands working wonders from scalp to neck. I feel the tension dissipating from my muscles and rub my head against her hands like a cat seeking to have just the right spot scratched by its owner. Lyra instantly responds with more pressure where I need it. Her hands are magic.
The downside to this release of tension is an inadvertent opening to a floodgate of emotions I've been holding back for days. Tears slip down my face and my body starts shaking as I try to force them back. But they won't be stopped. And neither will the cold fact of the matter.
"I am nothing," I murmur without thinking.
"My queen?" Lyra's hands pause in their ministrations.
"What good is a queen who cannot bear her king a child?" My hands clench under the water, self-hatred flooding through me.
Lyra pours warm water over my head to rinse my hair, taking care that the soapy water stays out of my eyes. Then she speaks. "My queen, it is not your fault. King Ismet has taken three wives to his bed and lain with numerous servants and ladies of the court." A pause as she draws her fingers across my forehead and down the back of my scalp. "None of them has borne fruit." She finishes rinsing my hair and wraps it in a towel to keep it out of the scented water. I keep my eyes shut as she slowly scrubs my shoulders and back with a rough sponge, careful to avoid the abrasions.
"How…" I swallow, unwilling to accept this easy dispensation for my guilt. "How do you know this?"
"My lady, it is common knowledge throughout the palace in the servants' quarters. Very little happens here that we don’t know about first." The sponge dips down my back to my waist and around to my stomach, the gentle circular motion as soothing as Lyra's voice as she speaks again. "Please don't give up, my queen."
"What do you mean?"
"The tournament." There's a soft splash as Lyra enters the bath, something she's never done before. "Don’t let him destroy you." She kneels in front of me in the bath. "Please. I beg you."
I look at her, really look at her for the first time since I became queen and she my maidservant.
Like everyone in the royal palace, Lyra is beautiful; my husband requires everything around him to be aesthetically pleasing, be it furnishings, artwork, or servants. But I've never before this moment noticed just how truly lovely she is. Dark brown hair streams down her back in glossy waves, drawn back from her face in several intricate braids starting at her brow and connecting at the back of her head. Her eyes, now gazing at me with an intense pleading look, are the same chocolate brown as her hair, and lined with thick black lashes. Her nose is straight and fine and her lips, dark pink and shimmering with a faint gloss, are as full as my own. She wears a robe of white silk, a bronze belt around her tiny waist. The silk clings to her small, rounded breasts and full hips. Her arms and thighs, glistening with moisture, are beautifully toned, the skin like golden velvet over the muscles beneath. She is a work of art in her own right.
“Lyra, you must mind your clothes or you’ll ruin them.” She freezes like a doe, her eyes wide with fear that she has displeased me.
“My Queen, I beg you, forgive me. I should not have presumed to enter the water with you—”
I raise a hand to calm her alarm. “Hush, Lyra. It is not your company that troubles me. You belong here in the water. It is your lovely silks and belt that do not.”
Her cheeks grow flushed for a moment, and she lowers her gaze.
“You are right, of course, my queen.” She rises from the pool to stand before me, water sluicing down her legs. Demurely, she unclasps her belt, folding it daintily before setting it down on the tiles with a soft click. Then, with lowered gaze, she bends down to gather up the wet folds of silk and pulls them up, first past her knees and thighs, then swiftly up and over her head, silk robe and cotton undergarment alike. She stands there, diffident and silent: her head down, her hands clasped before her in all modesty, even as her breasts stand proud. Then the moment passes, and she lowers herself into the water to take her place before me once more.
I close my eyes, numb with this blackness hollowing out my heart. Despair seems too small a word for the grinding emptiness it leaves behind. What flesh remains feels cold and stony, as though stricken by a medusa’s baleful eye. A flicker of warmth stirs my skin: Lyra has returned to her ministrations. Her hands cradle my face as she rubs my temples and drives her fingers through my hair, easing my aching skull. I open my eyes to find hers intent on me.
“My lady?” Her face is that of a concerned mother leaned over the cradle.
"My life will almost surely end tomorrow, Lyra." I silently curse the fresh upwelling of tears that I cannot stop. A queen does not cry before her subjects. But I can't stop them, or the words that rush out of me without volition on my part. "I feel dead already, my life force running out of me like wine spilled from by a careless drunk at a feast—"
"You are wrong." The intensity of Lyra's voice stops my self-pitying monologue. I'm shocked by her trespass, but even more by the penetrating gaze of her eyes. Somehow it is fierce, determined, imploring, sorrowful, and bright all at once. It overwhelms me. If I were Ismet I'd call for the guards to have her punished—but I'm not Ismet. And even if I were so inclined, I cannot move a muscle, not even speak.
She clasps my face close to hers with an iron grip, and commands me with words like hammered steel. “Hear me, my lady. Your life is not yet forfeit, and you will never surrender to death tomorrow, or any other day, until you are old and wise with hair as silver as your sword, in your bed surrounded by your children’s children. Do you hear me?”
I nod, dumbstruck.
“You will do this, and you will do it for your subjects who love you.” Her tone alters almost imperceptibly. “My lady... my queen... Adisa... you will do this for me, I who love you most of all.”
Her lips meet mine and conquer. I succumb completely to the strength of her desire. Her kiss awakens my heart; it roars to life like bellows on a forge. I reach for her, clasping her to me. Suddenly I want nothing in the world so much as I want the touch of her lips on mine and the press of her body against me. Cinnamon- and vanilla-scented water splashes over the marble lip of the tub as we wrestle together, but we pay it no heed, distracted by our kisses.
At length she slips an arm around my shoulders and hooks the other around my hip, lifting me so I float suspended in the water. I am a virgin maiden lying down beneath her princely suitor; I am a baby nestled in the crook of her mother’s arm. And like a babe, I turn my mouth to her breast and suckle on its firmness. Lyra holds me tightly, groaning her pleasure while she strokes my cheek and ear. I cling to her, happy for the first time since I became Ismet's bride and had my romantic dreams destroyed in a night of sadistic rapine.
Lyra's free hand trails from my face to squeeze my breast before caressing me down the length of my body and settling on the curve of my bottom. Her nimble fingers make me feel as wanton as a tavern wench. My excitement builds; I have to pull her head down for more kissing, deeper this time, our mouths open and eager.
Never have I been so hungry for the kiss of another, not even in my youth—certainly never for my royal husband. My lips move of their own accord to the graceful curve of her neck, tracing the line with the tip of my tongue and enjoying the hiss of indrawn breath this elicits. Emboldened, I graze my teeth against her flesh, feeling her life pulse against my mouth as I bite and suck just hard enough to leave a mark. A tiny part of my mind cries out for caution as I do this. After all, adultery is considered high crime against the king and if caught in the act, the punishment is a slow death. I wonder, though, if the laws set down apply to another woman. And even if they do, the fear of pain and death cannot dissuade me. But still—no need to make it public. Reluctantly I stop nibbling on her delectable skin.
Lyra slips a hand between my thighs and plays with me there, stroking, rubbing, tickling me with an audacious, knowing touch. Under her nimble fingers and relentless kisses, my legs become weak and slippery like eels, but then the opposite occurs: my limbs stiffen and my whole body arches, seized by a tremor of sheer delight, the likes of which I scarcely even imagined possible. Again I feel like a newborn babe. I cry and shake, making wordless sounds to express feelings I hardly even understand.
Lyra is not finished with me. It pleases me, since now I desperately want to return the pleasures she has so generously bestowed on me. She has me lean back against the side of the pool and extend my arms to grasp the marble rim for support. Then she swims up to me like a river nymph. Now I truly feel like a young princess about to be ravished by a bold knight. I cannot stop my legs from their trembling. She takes hold of my shoulders and pulls herself close, bringing her body to bear atop me.
I wonder for a moment what she could be planning—until her sex presses against mine, and I gasp at the tiny lightning bolts racing up and down my spine. She pulls us closer together still, and we grind our womanhood into one another. Our gazes lock together as well. I am stunned; I had no idea two people could yield such pleasure with each other, to say nothing of two women without the benefit of any manly parts.
When the raptures take her, she closes her eyes and moans and groans as if in a swoon. I can feel her shudders; they bring me along with her. Even after our delights fade to a sweet, gentle afterglow we hold each other, floating in the warm, scented water, lost in one another’s arms before finally moving to the bed for the remainder of the night.
She holds me against her, my head cradled on her shoulder. Kissing my hair, she says fiercely, “Promise me you will not die tomorrow, my queen.”
“I promise,” I whisper as I drift off to sleep.