Excerpts from the Okal Rel Universe...

copyright Lynda Williams

VRELLISH RECREATIONS (From novel, Courtesan Prince)

They burst onto the Round running flat out.

Vretla Vrel stood, looking mildly attentive, on the edge of the dance floor. She was a tall woman in a long open vest, hair worn short. Her sword sheath hung down her back, her waist no longer serviceable. She was heavily pregnant, all of it carried up front with little or no extra weight gain to balance out. She wore a black body stocking over the pregnancy, proud of her condition. The vest was stiff with Vrellish house braid worked in crimson uncontaminated with threads of any other color. Her face was all sharp Vrellish angles.

Vivian slued around a table, knocking a chair off.

"Children!" The retiree washing the Patron's Floor tried to warn them off "Von! Vivian!"

Vivian took a spill avoiding impact.

There was one bad moment as the Vrellish Sevolite reached over her shoulder to draw, but she abandoned the gesture.

Von threw himself into a back pedal much too close to avoid Vretla's long, strong hands. She caught him by the shoulders with the impact of something dropped hitting ground. The jolt was sure to wake the baby. He knew. He'd spent hours massaging it and her to sleep on occasions when he himself felt he'd earned some.

"L-liege Vrel!" He mastered his rattled jaw.

"Never look where you are going unless it's choreographed in advance, eh, Von?" She had a robust, burred voice, he was rather fond of.

All the same, he disliked being immobilized and wished he dared to test his strength against hers. At over 80% Sevolite -- all of it Vrellish -- he knew she could grind him to pulp if she wanted, but their sexual tussles had given him a sense of physical equality encouraged by blind faith in his healthy young body. Besides she was bruising his clavicles.

"Just can't escape women, can you Von?" She was teasing now.

"Vivian's not a woman!" he protested.

"Oh? She seems to be on the right track."

He put his hands around her wrists to try to negotiate more comfort.

"It's a prank, Your Highness. We didn't mean any harm. I was going to shower. She snatched my dancer's sheath before I finished undressing and I can't lose it! I didn't think there would be anyone on the Round."

She pulled his arms out to his sides to take in his state of undress.

"Obviously," she said, and let him go. "Taking a shower, mm. Have we done that together."

"Just baths."

Ela hurried in and bowed, greeting Vretla Vrel with appropriate nervousness.

"Highness," she said, "no one knows where to look for Liege Monitum, and I cannot find Den Mother Eva to ask leave to search the guest rooms."

"Isn't the den closed?" Vretla asked.

"There are clients sleeping over," Von piped up, not trusting Ela to cope with that.

Vretla Vrel absorbed that with a frown. "Can't find Eva, mm?"

"No, Your Highness."

"Then they're probably together, don't you think Von?" She gave him a slap on one firm, sculpted buttock. "You go see if he's with her, Eva's less likely to bite your head off, unless I am much mistaken about your mutual sleeping arrangements, mmm? Or is Eva still training you?"

She thought it was a good joke.

He inhaled to improvise.

"Or -- " The pantherish Sevolite looked him over again with greater attention to detail. "We could shower."

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