Candidate (Selected Book 4) (66 page)

"If I chain you, am I treating you like an animal?"

"No. You're treating me like a slave."

"All right. What if I were as human as you, does that change the pleasure you'd get?"

"I don't know."

"What if you won a challenge, and letting you chain me was your reward? What if I specifically said you had to take me out? Pleasure, or no? You get to tug the chain. Everyone gets to see me. You know at least for the night, I'm yours."

I looked away. "I might enjoy that."

"Do you think I'd resent it?"

"You have a choice."

"Ah, but you have a choice, too."

"I don't think so."

"You can ask me to take you to my apartment, and we can stay in. No restraints required. If that's what you decide, I won't resent the choice."

I turned back.

"But before you decide, I want you to think a little more. What if the restraints weren't required, but I won the challenge, and this was what I wanted. Would you let me do it?"

I considered. "I don't know. Maybe."

"Only maybe? For me, Andromeda?"

"If I let you, then I am complicit in my subjugation."

"It's not subjugation. It's play. What if I tricked you into wearing them? I got you into them, but then found a way to take away your anger."

"Are you going to tug?"

"Undoubtedly."

"Please don't humiliate me."

"I wouldn't. I'll tease though, but you can handle that."

"Yeah, I can handle teasing. Do you think we could spend a few minutes kissing?"

It turned out we could. And then I held her, carefully, but I held her. "Thank you."

"You're welcome, Andromeda."

And then, behind her back, I felt the restraints snap around my wrists.

"You little minx!"

She squeaked her pleasure, then trapped my ankles and did them as well. She slipped out from underneath my arms, tightened the loop, and helped me to my feet. "That was fun. As much as I prefer looking into your eyes, you must wear your visor."

"It's there." I gestured. Still hanging onto the chain, she collected the visor and helped slide it into place. Then she caressed my cheek.

She tugged me from the cell.

* * * *

She teased me during the brief jumper ride, only about five minutes. But she was very good at teasing, and she had fully jollied me into a good mood by the time we landed. Then she pulled me -- tugging the chain -- from the jumper. At the bottom of the ramp she turned to me. "Oh, I'm having fun."

"If you keep this up, you might get lucky tonight."

She squeaked. "It isn't luck, Andromeda, and you know it."

And then she led me into the restaurant.

I presume we made a sort of scene. Imagine the image. A diminutive alien, furry in back with tufted ears, with purple her dominant color. She was leading a human woman wearing sleek leather, but backless and of garish colors. The human had her ankles and wrists shackled together, and the alien was tugging her by the chain.

Yeah, I think heads would turn.

But she put me in the chair, loosened my hands, and sat herself. The visor brightened, and I saw my chain spread across the table and wrapped partly around her far wrist. She was gazing at me, her expression bright with her ears forward and twitching, her mouth open slightly to expose small, sharp teeth. The combination of twitching ears and parted mouth was the Kitsune version of a human smile. The Catseye could put on a human smile, but for them, it was the tentacles that told the tale. For the Kitsune, it was ears and mouth, but a different expression than humans.

So when I say she smiled, understand that meant her ears twitched and her teeth were just visible.

I looked at her then dropped my gaze to the chain for just a moment, then back at her.

"Thank you for letting me have my little pleasures, Andromeda."

I glanced at the chain again then back up at her. And I decided something. "You're welcome, Charo." I offered my own smile. "Maybe this is a
little
sexy."

She squeaked and then leaned closer. "It's not a
little
sexy, Andromeda. It's a lot sexy. And you think so, too."

"Maybe, but if you want to carry it further than this, you still need to win a challenge."

"Does it need to be a physical challenge?"

I considered briefly. Rule number one of dating: don't talk about other women. So I told her that.

"Why do you mention that? I know you need to date other women. This is pertinent?"

I told her very briefly about Cherish and somewhat more about the concentration game challenges we had.

"I know this game," she said. "It is a Tutor invention. I have played only once, and she beat me soundly."

"We played far more than once, and even with a significant handicap in the game settings, she easily beat me, too. But it was fun. If you can devise intellection challenges that are as fun, then I will accept them. But remember something. I like to exercise, and I like to get outside. But I only get to go outside if you take me, and I've been here nearly two months." I thought about it. "Maybe that means less to someone who lives her life on a space station. You're always inside."

"No, I understand entirely, Andromeda."

"If we were playing strictly for fun, then I don't even mind if the challenges are imbalanced. But if there are consequences for losing," and I shook my wrists, "then I should feel like you're at least trying to make it fair for both of us."

"Were there consequences when you lost these concentration games?"

"Yes, although I felt they were less than this, and she gave me a significant handicap to make up for the difference in experience. Plus I felt there wasn't a species advantage. It was a game I could get better at. I am not a big human, but I'm larger and presumably stronger than a Kitsune. I don't know if I am faster. I don't know what physical advantages you have over me."

"Better hearing," she said. She swiveled her ears in punctuation. "But as you said, I have spent much of my life on a space station. This is your world. It is alien to me. The average human, at least the average human in good shape, is a significantly better athlete than I am in almost all ways."

"Well," I said. "I want fair challenges. There are some that can be made very even and can be fun. Do Kitsune like to hunt?"

"Ancient Kitsune were, of course, predators, but we are deeply isolated from that. I have never hunted anything in my life, and I have no species imperative to do so. I can survive on fruits and berries, although, like you, I require sources of protein." But then she did another Kitsune smile. "I admit, chasing and catching you sounds like fun. Letting you catch me though, I'm not sure how I feel about that."

I laughed. "I will let you pick the challenges. Make them fun."

Her ears swiveled, and one dipped. Then she paused and nodded.

"What was that?" I asked. I gestured to her ear.

"Nodding for yes is a human gesture, and it's not even universal among humans. It's not used by any other species that I know of."

"But you just nodded."

"If you see one of us nodding to say yes, it's because we're trying to offer gestures you understand. The single ear tip is the Kitsune equivalent, but then I realized what I had done."

"Oh," I said. I smiled again. "I would like to grow accustomed to your gestures and expressions. Will you help me?"

"Of course," she said. She put a hand on mine. "Some are shared, like this." And she squeezed my hand. "Most of our facial expressions are through our ears, and some are involuntary. But we have a few expressions with our hands, including one that is mirrored by both humans and Catseye?"

"Oh?"

"You have perhaps noticed the Catseye express themselves through their tentacles."

"Yes. They wave and quiver. I'm just starting to distinguish the different types of quivers."

"Right. Well, there's a human gesture." Then she made a loose, partial fist, with her index finger pointed into the air. Then she waved it back and forth slightly a few times.

"No," I said.

"Right."

"That's not universal."

"Perhaps not, but you recognized it. Well, Catseye will do something very similar, but it's a tentacle tip. And Kitsune also do something similar, but it's two fingers, like this." She used her index and middle finger, and her hand was turned at a different angle to me than the human gesture. But it was unmistakable.

Then she brushed my hand again. "I'll teach you as we go. But now it is time to order our meal."

* * * *

Dinner was lovely. The food was good, and Charo was enchanting. All my anger and frustration from earlier evaporated, and I grew increasingly relaxed.

She teased me, of course. Partway through the meal, unbeknownst to me, she kicked off her shoes, and then one foot came sneaking over to caress my leg. The first time that happened, it was a surprise, but I looked down and saw the foot, and then I saw her ears twitching.

After that, she spent much of the rest of our time sliding a foot over my leg. A few times, she wrapped toes into the chain binding my ankles and tugged on it, just to remind me it was there. Each time she did that, her ears twitched rapidly.

She held my hand. She stroked my arm. And she tugged that chain a few times, too.

We shared stories. I learned about her older brother and sister, much older than she was. "I was very young when they left the planet. I remember a few of the fights with Mom. I remember Mom being very upset when they left. As I was older, old enough to understand, she explained she didn't blame them. And she made promises to be more supportive of me. And she has been, or I wouldn't have come with her when she came here, and I certainly would have my own household."

"Would we live right next door?" I asked. "I'm not sure how I feel about living next door to my mother-in-law. It's a big space station, right?"

"It is," she said. "I don't want to tell you too much about it. No, we wouldn't live right next door, not literally. But we would be close."

"How close?"

"Walking distance, although that could still mean a kilometer or so."

"It's five kilometers across."

"And we tend to travel the rim, even when crossing to the opposite side."

"And there are two rings, right?"

"Yes, but only one is used for living quarters. I don't want to explain why, but we would live within a kilometer, probably closer. Perhaps fewer than a hundred meters. Does that disturb you?"

"I don't know. I suppose in the scheme of things, there are worse things."

"I was under the impression you liked her."

"I do, but I was under the impression she likes to meddle."

She squeaked. "Well, that's true."

"We're getting a little ahead of ourselves."

"Not that far ahead," she replied. "What about your parents?"

"Well, I inherited their athleticism. Until a few years ago, they were better water skiers than I am, especially Mom. But they still can bike a century."

"A century? A hundred years?"

"A hundred miles."

"Is that a long way?"

"Not if you're a professional," I said. "But yeah, it's a long way on a bicycle. But in spite of winter, Minnesota is bike friendly." I talked about them for a while, Charo asking questions periodically.

"It sounds like you have a good relationship."

"We do," I said.

"I have never done these things," she said. "I have never been on a mountain. I have certainly never skied or ridden a bicycle."

"You could always take me skiing," I said with a grin. "I'm sure there's snow somewhere by now. I could teach you."

Her ears twitched. "You know that isn't going to happen."

"I couldn't escape. I know that."

She sobered. "It would take you seconds to tell a room full of people what happens here, Andromeda."

"I could promise not to."

"Maybe someday," she said. But she leaned forward. She used one hand to hold mine and the other to caress my arm. "I'd like to go for a walk."

I looked down. "I don't want to shuffle around, and I don't think I want to be tugged all over town. Are there other options?"

"But a walk would be nice?"

"A walk would be nice."

"Good. The bill is paid, so we can go."

I drank a little more water, and while I was drinking, the visor dimmed. Charoite took the glass from me, tightened the hoop that bound my hands closer together, then took my arm. She led me from the restaurant, caressing my arm as we walked.

"Andromeda," she said, "I think I really like you."

"I think I like you, too, Charo."

She led me into the jumper, set me in the seat, and then I was partially swallowed.