Chapter 10 Deception on the Isle of the Moon

The atmosphere was tense, and Cybele felt as though she was floundering into a state of utter confusion. If only she had been able to stop herself taking Attis to bed, it would have been so much simpler. But then, the path of the Goddess was supposed not to be easy, and perhaps this was the Quest she had so wished for as a Novice. The Goddess gave each Priestess that Quest which would cause her the most difficulty. Cybele had feared not any trial of isolation or suffering, but this was terrible for her - to be drawn into deception of the man she loved. She determined that she would follow the Quest, but not let the Goddess ruin her own human wishes and needs.

She turned to the youth who now sat at her table eating new-baked bread and honey. He watched her with unreadable black eyes.

'I will continue to meet with you, Attis,' said Cybele, 'but I love Cabirius still. And so I wish you to do nothing that will hurt him.'

'You wish to continue with him also, then?' the young Priest asked as he licked the sticky bee-balm from his fingers.

'I do. He is a good man, Attis. A better man than you.'

'Is a good man what the Goddess needs now in this time of trouble?'

'It is what I need as woman. I am that still, as well as Chosen One.'

'You will tell him nothing, then, of our own dark bond?'

'No. He does not need to know, and it would only cause him pain. Has your own love for him been so quickly killed?'

'I love him still, Cybele, be sure of that. But my love of the Goddess is more, and if he should step in her path, I would strike him down without a second thought.'

'You are black of heart, Attis. You have more of the Goddess's Third Face in you than I care to believe. But will you let us keep some small measure of happiness, Cabirius and I?'

'If you mean, shall I keep secret our own bond, then I agree. I am well able to hold my tongue. All he shall know from me is that I seek his touch no longer. He will think that it is because you and I have reached an agreement and that I have surrendered my own claim of him to you.'

'Perhaps he would be better deceived if you showed him some affection still.'

'What was between us had little affection. My desire for him was as dark and cutting as what I feel for you.'

'You feel something for me, then?'

'Would I wish to continue with the bond if I did not?'

'I do not fully understand your reasons, Attis. But I believe that what is between us is given by the Goddess herself, so I will not deny it its course. I would prefer if we bore each other some small measure of love, but I cannot pretend that we do.'

'Perhaps we will come to that in time,' he suggested, although there was no tenderness in his voice. They stood at a silent impasse. Cybele cleared her throat.

'We should go to the hut of Jenna, now. They will grow impatient if I do not come to bless the child Arithea's body.'

'Perhaps you should then change robes as you suggested, to something more fitting for a ceremony. It was your excuse for the delay, after all.'

Cybele crossed the hut and pulled her red robe from a stool by the fire, where she had tossed it to dry. As she lifted off the grey one she had been wearing, Attis quickly leapt forward and latched his mouth onto her breast. She pushed him away angrily. 'I am not a kitten, to be toyed with when you so wish,' she snarled.

'I am sorry. I cannot help wanting to touch you. I could enter you again now if you wanted it.'

'Your potency does not interest me, Attis.'

'No? What was it then that interested you? Hardly my manly chest, or my dutiful devotion.'

'I know not. Perhaps the Goddess put the thought in my head, for I can see no reason of my own will that I would want you.'

'But you do want me. Kiss me,' he demanded, cold as a northern wind. She almost screamed out of sheer frustration. He stood still, his arms crossed, and repeated the demand. 'Kiss me, Cybele.'

'I hate you,' she hissed, but then pulled close to him and kissed him fiercely on the mouth. He smirked at her with a cruel smile. 'You may try to return to the bed of my friend, but he will never be enough for you, Cybele.'

'You have cursed me, I know it. Cabirius and I could have known such happiness,' she stated in bitterness.

'Why should you have happiness? You are Chosen One, and belong to the Goddess more than to yourself.'

'You think I belong to you, not the Goddess,' she spat.

'Then you know me little. Think you I would choose you for myself if the Goddess had not demanded it?' he asked harshly. She realised it was true. Attis had little love for female flesh, and he was as unwilling a partner to this passion as she. Perhaps his cruelty was only because it was even more painful for him than for herself. The tension was interrupted by a thudding on the heavy door. Kelle had returned.

'Your holiness,' she called through the door. 'All await your presence at the hut of the Healer. Is all right with you?'

'I am ready, Kelle. Take me to the child.' She left the hut without another word to the young Priest, and he did not follow. The hut of Jenna the Healer was on the other side of the main settlement, apart from the huts of the other laywomen of the village. It was no larger than these other huts, and it was filled now beyond capacity with shocked and mourning women of all gowns. The only men present were Thomias and Cabirius, who had carried the small body to this place. As Cybele entered the hut, all bent their heads briefly in respect.

'What has happened, then?' she demanded with authority. Jenna appeared within the crowd and answered her.

'This child ran out into the storm, and perished on the rocks of the northern shore,' she explained. The girl's small twisted frame had been straightened, and looked less like a broken puppet than when Cybele had seen it herself below the cliff of the northern bay. Someone had changed her into a dry gown and wiped the crusted blood from her cheek. She looked asleep only, but would now wake no more.

'Did any witness the fall?'

'No. We all went to seek her when the storm died a little, but she had been dead for some time when she was found. It was a long fall for so small a child, and she would have suffered not. See, her head is broken here,' Jenna said with no sentimentality. The head was indeed caved in on one side, a hideous dent in the child's soft short hair.

'Who found her, then?' she asked.

'Thomias and I.' It was Cabirius, and she looked to him with the pretence that they were not overly familiar. How many would know this to be a lie? There were probably very few who suspected that she and Cabirius were lovers, as discretion had been of vital importance to them both.

'Ah, the teachers. Tell me what you saw then, both of you.'

'There was little to see,' Cabirius started, but Thomias interjected.

'She had fallen from the cliff in the storm. That was clear. Why she had been running there in such hazardous weather, we will never know. But the tragedy cannot be undone.' He turned his palms upward, in resignation to the will of the Goddess.

'Well, it seems sad and simple enough, then. We shall take her to the Temple to set her spirit free, then bury her within the body of our Mother the soil.' Cabirius tenderly scooped the child's body from the table and carried her from the hut. The others followed in quiet procession. After all had been done, and Arithea had been laid to her final rest wrapped in a white linen shroud, the unhappy crowd had dispersed. Cybele stood alone with Cabirius beside the tiny grave.

Without looking at her, Cabirius spoke quietly. 'We have learned little by our deception, then.'

'She is laid to rest all the same.'

'I have missed you sorely these past weeks,' he said to her in a low soft voice. It was the first time they had been alone since the ceremony of the Full Moon, and so much had remained unsaid.

'And I you.'

Cabirius turned to face her. 'I have not touched Attis since that night. I know not what possessed me.'

'Who knows what possesses any of us? It was foolish for us to let it threaten our own bond. I should have come to you that very night and told you that I loved you still,' Cybele said.

'How could you, if you thought I was with him? It is I who should have sought you out, to beg your forgiveness. Although I do not deserve it.'

'Would you not forgive me such a thing?' she asked.

'I would forgive you anything, Chosen One.'

'Know you not my name, that you so avoid it?'

He cautiously approached her. 'Cybele.' He moved closer, slow as a skink on a cold morning. 'Cybele... Cybele... See? I could say it until the end of time and never tire of it.' He now stood as close to her as was possible without actually touching. She reached her arms around his waist and turned her head up to kiss him. He pulled gently away, but took her by the hand. 'Not here.' he said, 'We could be seen.'

He led her back toward the settlement, to the outer door of her hut set in the stone wall which ringed the village. As he pushed on the door, she suddenly though in horror that Attis may still be inside, and struggled in her mind to think of the best explanation. It would not surprise her to find him naked on her bed, purely to torment her. The door swung open, and she saw to her relief that he had gone. Cabirius led her inside, and started to kiss her with gentle passion as soon as the door was closed. 'There is no maidenhead to protect, now,' Cabirius rasped, 'so we can do whatever we wish.' He ran his strong large hands all over her body through the silken red gown. His breathing was deep and hoarse.

'And what do you wish?' she urged, her own passion rising.

'To know every pore of your body. To kiss every small part. To thrust so deep inside you that we are one.' He led her over to the bed, tugging at his own robe. As they both tumbled onto the bed, Cabirius pulled up with small sharp cry. He turned from her and felt under the covers, then pulled a Herm out from under the blanket.

'Ho, what is this?' he asked cheekily. Cybele filled with fire. A message from Attis. She had seen him place the thing back on her shrine before she left, so he must have then moved it into the bed to remind her of his right, like a tomcat marking territory. Her face burned in anger. He had promised not to give Cabirius clue of their own strange affair. But then, perhaps he had not expected that she would so soon have got Cabirius to her bed. 'So recently a maid and already you seek the company of a Herm?' he teased lightly. She quickly picked up on this less incriminating explanation.

Perhaps he would mistake her hot cheeks as reddened by embarrassment, not anger. 'You have avoided my bed so long, Cabirius. What was I to do?' He kissed her again.

'I mind not, Cybele. I have thought of you doing just such a thing in these nights apart.'

'You have?' she asked in mock coyness.

'Yes, while I did this...' He pulled his robe fully open and rubbed his ready erection. 'You even crept into my thoughts by day, while I gave lessons.'

'You are a bad boy, Cabirius. Come to the front of the class.' She smacked his hand playfully. 'Yes, a very bad boy. Now you must say after me. I will not do service to Priapus during lessons.' Cabirius had been her own teacher in the past, before they were on intimate terms, and he enjoyed very much the game she now teased him with.

'No, I will not say it,' he sulked.

'Then you shall have to be punished.'

'No !' he cried in pretend horror.

'Turn over, and I shall spank you.'

'Oh please... No !' She pulled his robe off and rolled him onto his front. His muscular buttocks jutted firm and hard. She slapped him sharply with her open hand, leaving a red mark on his clean white skin. She slapped him a second time and he moaned slightly. He spread his legs a little so that she could reach below to his hardened phallus. She squeezed it as she slapped him again, then ran her tongue over the angry red marks. He gasped and writhed below her, and she could not help but think of taking the Herm and .. No, but he would not like such a thing. She would have to save that manner of pleasure for Attis. She rubbed his erection, and thrust her own pubic mound hard against him from behind. If only she could feel just once what it was to be a man, with a hard swollen member...

He moaned deeply below her, then muffled his face in a pillow. Cybele realised that somehow she felt so much more inhibited with this man she loved than with the strange Attis. She would not let it be so. She would not let Attis's words that Cabirius would not be able to satisfy her become truth. She looked at the man below her and his very body filled her with fire. The widened shoulders, the thrusting buttocks, the curl of the soft dark hair on the nape of his neck. So unlike Attis, who still stood on the threshold between child and man. Yes, Cabirius was the object of every Novice's passionate desire.

He was groaning now a little too intensely - she wanted him not to spill. She rolled him over and kissed him on the mouth. He had not shaven for some time, and she imagined the bristling roughness of his chin on her nipples. His erection now stood straight in the air, and she felt the burning heat of her own swollen parts. He looked up at her as though a little lost. Could it be that he was yet a virgin himself? she wondered. She straddled him and lowered herself onto his shaft. She was still filled with Attis's seed, but he would not know it now that he had started to leak his own into her.

'I can hold not much longer,' he whispered to her urgently. She pulled his hand to her tender swelling, and tried to show him that she wished him to rub it while he entered her. He seemed so unsure and overwhelmed. She took over the task herself, and quickly caught up with his own passion. As she threw her head back and let out a cry, he spilled into her with a few sharp thrusts. She stared down at him with a knowing smile, and he felt his own seed trickling from her, back down his phallus. He had never felt so elated in all his life. 'You are truly the Goddess, Cybele. I would gladly die for you,' he said easily.

She laughed. 'Say you that to all those you bed?'

He laughed back. 'Well, that would be few !' She thought: so he had been no virgin, then, but only inexperienced and a little timid.

He took on a tone of seriousness and sincerity. 'It is true, Cybele. I would die for you.'

'What use would you be to me dead, once this softened?' she joked lightly, squeezing his half-fallen member.

'I would die without you,' he added. This was a more ominous threat, and a dark pall spread over her. She realised with a genuine fear just how dangerous it could be to maintain her deception.

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