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Xanadu

By: NicoleLarson



GameStop closed at eight, and by the time Miles closed the store down and locked up it was eight thirty. By eight forty, he had been home, changed his clothes, and picked me up at my apartment. He drove as fast as caution would allow--heedless of the speed limit, and the thankfully oblivious cop that had been sitting at the light on Doyle street. By eight fifty, we were pulling into the parking lot of the Safeway by Dave's place, and speeding into the building. Miles' usual hunter-gatherer shopping style was in full display as he stalked down the chip aisle, grabbing bags of Doritos and six or seven two-liter bottles of Mountain Dew. At five to nine, we were back in the car, headed for Dave's place.

Please let Kate be there, I had been saying to myself all afternoon. Please let Kate be there. I do not want to spend the entire evening listening to those dorks talk about dwarves and elves and dragons.

Nine o'clock, and here we were, another Friday night hiking through Dave's apartment complex, loaded down with Mountain Dew and Doritos. Miles walked in front of me, walking a step and a half faster than me because first, his legs are freakishly long, and second because the anticipation of D&D night was too much for him to bear at this late hour. He waited all week for this. All of his buddies, Dave, Cody

and Randy, all crowded around Dave's dining room table. Dave huddled behind a cardboard foldout, insanely detailed hand-drawn map lying in front of them, table littered with all kinds of paper ("character sketches" Miles calls them), endless tumblers of Mountain Dew, more Pink Floyd than you can shake a stick at, and dice of such increasingly mind-boggling geometry as to make your head spin. It was fun for him.

Why was I here, you may be wondering. I've been bugging Miles for weeks about wanting to do more stuff together. This was really just a preamble to the break-up speech, which I'd been practicing in my mirror for the last week. "I want to do more stuff together!" I whined, hoping that he would feel smothered and want to get out of the relationship by himself. If this didn't work, I was planning on moving to the "I want you to meet my family," speech, then the "does my ass look big in these jeans," question, and if none of that worked, I would just have to face my fear and break up with him.

Course, tonight, the "I wanna do more stuff together" plan had backfired on me. When I told him I wanted to do more stuff together, he invited me to D&D night. Totally not enthused with the idea, but realizing that it would be another Friday night alone with my vibrator (which I'd told Miles was a back massager), I tagged along.

Not that he was that bad a guy. He was okay looking, sweet and kind, funny and witty. But he was overbearing, 

quick-tempered, a little selfish in bed, and there were personal hygiene issues he'd never gotten around to solving. He was nerdy, which is okay, because I'm more than a little nerdy myself, but there's nerdy and then there's NERDY. He was a good guy, just not MY guy. Not the one for me.

He was a big guy, rotund in the mid-section, a couple of inches over six feet. He always wore this black duster probably because he thought it made him look like Neo from the Matrix.

He always wore combat boots (which were usually the source of some of my hygiene complaints), and baggy cargo pants. It was like he was perpetually ready to go to war with the world, but you didn't have to know Miles to realize that he would have released his bowels and run screaming into the night if someone had pointed a gun at him.

I got to the steps leading up to Dave's third floor apartment as Miles was knocking on the door. I trudged up the steps by myself, lugging his stupid Mountain Dew and Doritos and wondering if I shouldn't just skip all those little games and just break up with him. I heard the other guys cheer as someone opened the door to admit Miles. Hooray! Now the nerd-fest can officially begin! By the time I got up the stairs, he was already seated at the table, black duster discarded on the couch, ready to begin tonight's fantasy role-playing marathon.

Kate was nowhere to be seen. This wasn't altogether surprising. I mean, why would she want to hang around all these losers all night? Surely she had better things to do. I sighed and picked a place on the couch, reaching into my purse for my book (a David Eddings fantasy--like I said, I'm a tiny bit nerdy myself), when I heard a female voice say, "Here you go, Miles."

I looked into the kitchen, and there was Kate. The relief that washed through me is impossible to describe. She placed a tumbler of Mountain Dew in front of Miles and looked into the living room. Her eyes caught me, and her shoulders fell in what looked like relief. "Oh, thank God," she said, "another girl." She moved toward me and gave me a hug. "This place needs way more estrogen," she said.

Kate's my height, maybe a tiny fraction taller than me. She's got a gorgeous smile and sly green eyes that hide behind her the black horn-rimed frames of her glasses. She's got black hair, cut short to just around her jaw line.

Tonight she had on a black, tight fitting t-shirt and black jeans, but there was nothing new about that; Kate always wore black. Kate's sort of a nerd too, but more of a goth nerd. She's into The Cure and Type-O Negative and horror novels and 

her DVD collections of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel. She and Dave had been going out for the better part of a year now, and didn't show any sign of stopping any time soon.

"Jesus, get a room," said Cody, watching us hugging each other with a lazy gleam in his eye that told me he was picturing one or both of us naked.

Kate gave him the finger and took me by the hand, leading me away from the D&D-athon. "If you need us, we'll be in the bedroom!" Kate said, meaning the bedroom she and Dave shared. They lived together in this apartment, and their relationship was going a lot better than mine and Miles' was.

"Take lots of pictures!" Cody called after us.

"Fuck you Cody!" she said in the same tone.

And before I knew it, I was in the bedroom and Kate was closing the door behind us. The decor was an interesting blend of goth nerdery and sci-fi dorkery. For every leering gargoyle model, there was a menacing Darth Vader. For every Tim Burton movie poster, there was an anime movie poster. For all the dead roses in vases, there were plenty of little action figures. But all told, the scheme worked. The room was neat and organized. The bed was a black frame with blood-red bedclothing, and Kate had lit a couple of candles, giving it an intense dark mood. She'd even lit a stick of Nag Champa, which was smoldering away nicely on the bookshelf, a delicate tendril of smoke curling around the Stephen King and Clive Barker paperbacks.

"Want some wine?" she asked. I nodded, and she turned to the dresser, and poured me a glass of red wine out of an already opened bottle. Kate's still nineteen, just like me, and all the other people in this apartment, but her brother works at a liquor store by campus, and brings her bottles of wine as long as she promises not to get all loaded and go driving, and not to tell their mom about it. She handed me the glass and I sipped at it cautiously. "Good, right?" she said, nodding. I nodded along, although I wouldn't know a good wine from a bad one.

"I got a really crappy movie we can watch while the guys are out there," she said, waving a red Netflix envelope in the air.

"What?" I asked.

"It's called Xanadu."

"How do you know it's crappy?"

"It's widely agreed to be one of the worst movies ever made." She said, turning to flip on the television. "Perfect for making fun of while drinking wine and being ignored by our boyfriends."

I laughed at this, but felt a tiny sting inside.

She put the movie on, and we settled in to watch it. She sat down on the bed, and motioned for me to sit next to her. Since there was nowhere else in the bedroom to sit, I did.

The movie was as crappy as advertised. Olivia Newton John running around in roller skates to ridiculously dated disco music. We lost interest half an hour into the movie and started gossiping instead.

Every now and then, we would hear things from the other room like an angry, "Bullshit!" followed by an incomprehensible, "Sorry, Randy, you missed your saving throw!"

We talked about people we knew from school, who were still in town. The lame-os like us who never left town for college. People like us who would be stuck here for the rest of our lives, working shit jobs because we were too afraid to go into the outside world. Maybe too afraid to leave the comfort and security of our families, maybe just incurably lame.

The movie went into a huge dance number, a bunch of people on roller skates dancing around to this crazy song, and Olivia Newton-John belting "It's Xanaduuuu" at the top of her lungs, and Kate and I were momentarily entranced. "Do you think she's pretty?" Kate asked, meaning Olivia, who was running around in a grey puffy pantsuit complete with sparkly halter-top.

It was hard to separate Olivia from her character, who was whiny and annoying, but it was easy to see that she was an attractive woman. That radiant smile and that feathered blond hair.

"Yeah," I said, "she's pretty."

"I think she's gorgeous," Kate said, and although I didn't say it out loud, I agreed with her.

We drank more wine, and gossiped some more. The gossip ran out after a while and we sat drinking our wine and watching the awful-ness that is "Xanadu." At the end, Olivia and her androgynous love interest share a kiss, which was fine. The credits rolled and a few seconds into them, Kate sighed and said, "I wish Dave kissed me like that anymore."

It took a moment to register what she'd said. "What do you mean?" I asked. 

"He's not the most romantic guy, you know," she said.

"Huh." Here I had always thought her and Dave's relationship was the strongest out of any of our group of friends. They were always laughing with each other, always hosting parties.

She hesitated briefly before she said, "Do I sound like an old lady if I say that my needs aren't getting met?"

I laughed at this. "No, you sound like someone whose needs aren't getting met."

She got up to turn off the DVD and pour herself more wine. She gestured to me with the bottle, silently asking if I wanted some more. I stood up and held my glass out, and she poured more of the wine into it. "It's not that I don't love him," she said, after sipping at her wine. "He's just not, you know..." she pointed to her crotch, "DOING it for me, if you know what I mean."

I nodded in complete understanding. 

"Miles hasn't made me come in weeks," I added, totally without meaning to. The words were out of my mouth before I could stop them. I clapped a hand over my mouth in embarrassment, and blamed it on the wine.

Kate laughed loud. "Must be the wine talking," she teased.

I sighed dramatically. "If only it weren't true," I said.

"Don't you ever..." she waved her hand over her crotch, 

mimicking masturbation.

"Oh, all the time," I said, surprised that I'd actually said it. I don't normally talk like this--to anyone. It's not that I'm a prude, or think it will offend anyone, it's just, you know, not their business. But since Kate had opened up to me, and we were already on our third glass of wine, it just came easier. "I even have a vibrator that I keep in the bedside table that..."

"...Wait," she stopped me. "Miles thinks its a back massager!"

We laughed aloud, and I almost spilled my wine, which made us laugh harder.

After a tiny moment of hesitation, during which Kate gave me a funny, evaluative look, she moved to her own bedside table, 

opened it up, and took out her own back massager, which started us giggling again.

The thing was enormous! The size and shape of a baseball bat, if half the length. The thing plugged into the wall! No batteries here! 

When I was able to talk again, I marvelled at it's size. 

"Well," she explained. "If it's too small, Dave will think it's actually a vibrator!"

And this started us going again. While she laughed, Kate leaned over and plugged the thing into the wall, and turned it on. The sound it made! It sounded like a chainsaw had started up in the room. Unable to hold my wine and continue laughing, I carefully set it down on the desk by the TV, and fell onto the bed, clutching my stomach and curling up into a fetal position. She mimicked using it on herself, and this kept me laughing until I was begging her to stop. She fell back onto the bed and we laughed together.

When the giggles died away, Kate sighed and said, "It's such a shame we have to do it ourselves."

"Yeah, well, what are you going to do?"

Her hand was moving lightly up and down her belly, and every now and then, another giggle would escape from one of us. I watched her hand moving, up and down, from between her breasts to the top of her black jeans. She watched me watching her, gauging me, evaluating me. As our eyes were locked, she slipped her hand down the front of her jeans, and her eyes closed.

I watched her touching herself, listened to her breathing. Some part of me wanted to get up and leave her to her business, but there was nothing waiting for me in the other room, and besides, this was kinda hot. She was sharing something with me, and even though she was a girl, and I wasn't a lesbian or anything, 

I'd never really even thought about it. Being gay, I mean. I'd never really asked myself the question. I just assumed I was straight and that was the end of it. I had a boyfriend, for crying out loud. 

But was this really gay? Two girls on a bed and one of them's masturbating? Seems to me that gay involves two people of the same sex actually having sex with each other.

Her hand moved up and down, distorting the front of her jeans, and her mouth opened and shut, her lips puckered and relaxed, her eyes lightly shut.

It was certainly hot. The little grunts of pleasure that escaped from her mouth every now and then, the way her body moved and writhed as she explored. Suddenly, I realized that I was wet, you know, down there. And that must mean that I was kinda into it too, girl or no girl. 

Would it be gay if I masturbated with her? I mean, not actually touching, or anything. Just two girls on a bed masturbating. Fully clothed and not touching? 

Nope, I reasoned. In order to have sex, two people have to at least be touching each other. Kate and I were separated by at least a foot of bedspace.

Fuck it, I thought, and then I did. My jeans were tighter on me than Kate's were on her, so I had to undo the button and zip down. I put my hand into my pink panties and started work on my clit.

I don't know how long we lay there, Kate and I, each with a hand down the front of our pants, all I know is that with the game still raging in the other room, and neither of our needs being met, it felt natural, even good to be doing this. Kate came first, and her body clenched and spasmed with her orgasm. I came soon afterward, and Kate watched me with fascination, as if recording my orgasm.

When I was done, I dared to open my eyes. Kate still had her hand in her jeans, and she was breathing heavily. The smell in the room was musky and heady. She smiled at me, and I smiled back. "I needed that," she sighed.

I nodded, too weak to speak. 

She stood up, adjusted her clothes, and walked out of the room, saying, "I gotta pee."

I lay there on the bed, and zipped my jeans back up, thinking about what had just happened. Gay? Straight? Meaningful? Innocent? Did it matter? Thoughts whirled through my head like Olivia Newton-John on roller skates. Just before Kate came back into the room, I had been asking myself if I'd enjoyed the experience. Laying next to her, each masturbating, smelling each others' breath and scents. I decided, as Kate came back in, holding another bottle of wine and closing the door quietly behind her, that I had.

She went over to the desk and poured more wine. She handed me my glass and sat down on the bed next to me. "Sorry about that," she said.

"About what?"

"You know..." she said, motioning to the bed with a quick head bob. "That."

I sipped at my wine. "Don't be sorry," I said. "It was kind of nice."

She smiled wistfully at that, and rubbed her thumb around the edge of her wine glass.

"How's the game going?" I asked.

"They're in the Castle of Shezzbazzar or something," she said, "fighting orcs."

I took another sip of my wine and Kate continued to trace around the rim of her glass with her thumb. The air was heavy. It was obvious Kate wanted to say something, but was working up the nerve. I had a feeling I knew what she was going to ask, and I enjoyed the waiting, knowing that I'd probably say yes to whatever she asked me.

Finally, she breathed in sharply and said, "So do you think if two girls masturbate on the same bed together that makes them gay?"

I laughed. "I was just wondering that myself."

"Do you?"

"No," I said. "Gay implies sex, sex involves touching, and we didn't touch."

"So if we were touching, we'd be gay."

I shrugged. "I guess."

This seemed to satisfy her. Her mind was obviously occupied with heavy thoughts, which I mistook at the time for her contemplating whether or not she should have started what had happened here previously.

"What if we had touched," she said. "Do you think that'd be okay?" 

I paused, searching for the right answer. The true answer. "Sure," I said, finally.

"Aren't you worried it'd make you gay?"

I shook my head. "I don't think it would make you gay."

"Bi?"

"Something like that. Either way, it wouldn't change the fact that I still like boys."

"It kinda worries me," she said.

"You know, there's only one way to find out," I told her, and before she could protest, I leaned in to kiss her.

The kiss was soft, and short, but instead of being awkward or uncomfortable, there was a very strong feeling that it felt right. At least on my end of things. When the kiss broke, the way she was looking at me told me that she was feeling close to the same thing.

My boldness spurred her on, and this time she reached for me, and planted another kiss on my lips. This one was longer, wetter. When I opened my lips a fraction to admit her tongue, she hungrily reciprocated.

She wordlessly raised her arms and I wordlessly lifted her t-shirt off her, exposing her milky white chest and (surprise surprise) black bra. Then I did the same, and she pulled my shirt off, and she gazed down at my own black bra (it was a sheer coincidence).

We stood there, our hands on each others' hips, sort of testing the feeling. Swaying back and forth like prom dates, gauging how it felt to be this close to each other without our shirts on. We laughed some more at how weird it felt, but we were also pulling closer together. Our hips met, and our bellies and breasts were touching.

We kissed again, this time deeper and longer. Kate opened her mouth, and I allowed her to slip her tongue inside mine.

When this kiss broke, we stood, forehead to forehead, staring down at each other's breasts, smiling like idiots.

I brought my hands up and played with the shoulder straps of her bra, running my fingers up and down them, then around the cups, tracing the underwire. By now, her fingers were touching my bra, tracing around the seams with her fingernails, while I continued to feel around the warm material covering her breasts.

"Want to go farther?" she asked, her voice barely more than a whisper.

I totally did, and I told her so with a nod. "But what if one of the guys comes in?"

She rolled her eyes. "You're kidding, right?" she asked. "They're so caught up in their game they wouldn't know if a meteor hit outside."


Xanadu



In another day, Miriam Dowling would either be immortal or she would be dead.

The provisions had run out this morning. She'd already sent back her guides a week ago; their job was only to take her to the mountain pass described on the ancient map she'd bought. After a week of threading her way through icy ravines and down rocky defiles, in the freezing cold and thin air, that purchase seemed like a lifetime ago. It was already half a world away. She'd liquidated all her assets in New York, placed them into long-term trusts and complicated financial arrangements that would guarantee her a perpetual income whenever she wished to draw upon it. The business empire she had once made legendary was now broken up among other titans of industry. Miriam let them have it. She had discovered something far more precious the day she'd bought that map. Eternal life.

She would either find it today, or her body would never be found. Satellite pictures could only reveal so much through the dense, icy fogs that covered this part of the Himalayas. Enough to suggest the truth of the map's contents, but not enough to find a different route in. No, the long and winding path described on the map was the only way to go. It was as much a test as a journey, she suspected. Miriam was unafraid of tests by now.

The others who had seen the map thought it a fool's dream. Oh, they believed in the place, the physical location described as 'Xanadu'. But the idea? A city on a map with the legend, "Here can be found the secret of eternal youth"? They'd taken her money, analyzed the map, and called her mad. She didn't care. Life was too short to bother with bitterness. Or else, perhaps, it was too long.

She'd stopped being able to feel her feet two days ago. Miriam suspected that frostbite had set in, perhaps even gangrene. She hoped that Xanadu's secrets could cure it. Immortality minus a few toes was still immortality, of course, but she would prefer to be hale and healthy in her centuries of life.

Twilight neared, and Miriam's stomach growled. She ignored it, and kept pressing on. The last of the precious light was too important to waste on the weaknesses of the body. She hadn't become the most successful businesswoman in the history of the world by whimpering and crying when the going got tough, and she wouldn't survive this if she couldn't push aside her hunger and exhaustion and put one foot ahead of the other. She walked through the dim fog, taking careful note of rock formations and forks in the narrow, rocky pass. Only one path would lead to immortality. The rest would lead to death.

The sun had gone down now. Miriam walked in darkness, feeling her way through the fog. Now her life depended on luck as much as anything else; if she missed a turn in the darkness, if she stumbled down the wrong path, if she simply succumbed to panic and waited for daylight, she could be dead. But on the other hand, Xanadu awaited. Xanadu, which historians called the summer palace of Kublai Khan, but which secret sages claimed had been rebuilt by his descendants in a location lost to the history men know. Xanadu, the lost city, repository of the secrets of kings. Xanadu, home of eternal youth. She stumbled, fell, but got back to her feet and continued to walk on limbs that had been pushed far past their limits. Xanadu, she thought. Only Xanadu matters.

When she felt the warmth on her skin, she thought at first that she had gone mad, or that her body was finally shutting down from hypothermia. But no, as the fog thinned, she saw the lights of lanterns on poles. The path had turned from flinty rock to well-raked gravel, the descent had become more gradual, and the air...Miriam took a deep breath. The air felt invigorating, revitalizing. She felt fatigue leave her muscles, felt her limbs tingle once again with renewed warmth. Even her hunger felt lessened, as though she was actually eating and drinking the substance of the atmosphere. It was wonderful. A new spring in her step, she practically skipped down the path to the city below.

Two men stood outside the gates of the city, clad in simple white robes. Already, Miriam felt oppressively warm in her Artic survival gear. Each one held a staff, and as she approached, they stepped in front of the gate. "Who comes to Xanadu?" one said. The other was already turning to ring an ancient iron bell, three times.

"You--you speak English?" Miriam said. It was all she could think to say.

"We speak the Celestial Tongue," the guard said. "You speak it too, now. In Xanadu, all may be understood. Now, who are you and what do you seek?"

"My name is Miriam Dowling," she said, lowering her hood and removing her scarf to speak better, exposing platinum-blonde hair (streaked with gray) to the night air for the first time in weeks. "I seek eternal life."

The guard nodded. "Many seek eternal life. Many gain what they seek. You will be granted audience with Zhenjin Khan. Only he can grant you the immortality you seek."

A woman, wearing only the thinnest of silken robes, raced to the gate. She whispered something into the ear of the silent guard, and with a nod, he opened the gate.

"Zhenjin Khan graciously grants you the favor of his attentions, Miriam Dowling," the other guard said. "All praise the glory of the Eternal, the Never-Dying, the Great Zhenjin Khan!"

The two guards escorted her through the city. Miriam took note of the buildings; they were simple, constructed of wood rather than stone. She noticed a grove of trees in the distance, and nodded. Stone would erode over time, but in an eternal city, wood could be grown and buildings repaired as many times as their immortal inhabitants needed. "How many people live here?" she asked the guard.

"You will be the six-hundred-and-seventy-first to arrive," the guard responded. "The majestic wisdom of Zhenjin Khan has provided for many more than that in Xanadu."

"Oh, I don't plan to live here," she said. She suddenly worried. What if the immortality required you to stay here? These people might be used to living like peasants in some primitive city halfway up a mountain, but Miriam had plans for her extended youth and health. She wasn't sure if she could adjust to eternity up here.

"Many choose to leave Xanadu," the guard said, as they approached a larger building at the heart of the city. "Many more do not." He gestured. "Gaze upon the palace of the Eternal Emperor, the Undying Zhenjin Khan! In his presence, prostrate yourself in gratitude at being allowed to glimpse his eternal majesty!" They walked up the steps into the wide open throne room, made of wood like the other buildings but decorated with ancient sculptures of jade and coral. Miriam had become something of a student of Chinese culture and history during her years of determining the truth of the map, and she could see that these dated back over seven hundred years. They had been kept in excellent condition.

Ahead of her, a lithe, dark-haired man of Mongolian descent sat on a simple cushion. Two female servants attended at his side, and another one behind him rubbed his shoulders delicately. "Prostrate yourself," the guard shouted, falling to his own knees. "Prostrate yourself before the Immortal Zhenjin Khan!" He bowed low, letting his forehead gently tap against the wooden floor.

Miriam awkwardly began to copy the gesture, but Zhenjin Khan waved a hand dismissively. "You are not one of my subjects yet, girl," he said in a modest, amused tone. "There will be time enough to kowtow to me later on. I expect that you hope so, at least, yes?"

"Um...yes, Emperor, er..." Miriam had met heads of state before, but never under such circumstances. Her blue eyes locked onto his brown eyes as she steadied herself. "Emperor. I came here to seek the secret of eternal life. It is true?" Her voice betrayed her secret greed. "It is here, in Xanadu?"

"My father and I fell out in 1284 by your Western calendar," Zhenjin said. "He wished me to rule over China as his successor, while I wanted to explore the secret wisdom of the ancients. When I took fifty of his wisest sages and a hundred servants with me, he declared me dead and made my son his successor. But I have outlived my son, here in Xanadu, my son and my dynasty and yes, even my kingdom. China is a patchwork land ruled by warlords, but in Xanadu, I endure. Yes, eternal life is real. It is obtainable."

"Um..." Miriam felt nervous in a way she never had, not in any business deal. Nobody had ever intimidated her before, but the man before her held the upper hand in a way no negotiator ever had. Her brain simply froze under the pressure, while her mouth continued moving of its own volition as she said the first thing that came into her head. "China was united decades ago. Under the Communists."

Zhenjin smiled gleefully. "Fascinating!" he said. "Forgive me, the last visitor we had was in...1922, I believe she said it was. We hear so little of the outside world in Xanadu, that sometimes we forget that it moves and progresses. We look forward to hearing your tales of history, of the time that has passed since last outsiders came to Xanadu. You will have every opportunity to recount them to me."

Miriam's heart fell. "Then I would...I would have to stay in Xanadu forever?"

Zhenjin shook his head. "No, not forever. The magic of eternal youth will stay with you when you leave this land, so long as you have drunk deeply enough of the elixir of its airs." Miriam's heart leapt for joy. "A mere five hundred years is all it takes."

"Five hundred years?"

Zhenjin nodded. "You must endure five hundred years as my subject, here in Xanadu. Five hundred years of service to the Immortal Khanate. That is the price of immortality. Should you wish to pay five hundred years of time, an eternity is yours. Should you decline, at any point in your term of service, then we will happily escort you from paradise." He held up a smooth hand, unlined with age. "With supplies to see you back to the Outer Kingdoms, of course. We are not barbarians."

"Five hundred years..."

"It passes quicker than you imagine, my dear."

Miriam thought back to the plans waiting for her, the finances placed in careful trust for her return. She thought of the future, of all the days that awaited her. Five hundred years. What was five hundred years when balanced against forever? She knelt down, and slowly leaned forward until her forehead touched the floor. "Then I am your subject, Immortal Khan," she said.

YEAR THREE:

"Describe to me again this 'dot-com boom'." Zhenjin's voice was calm, measured, polite, and utterly bewildered. Miriam took another sip of her tea.

"Once the computers had learned to speak to each other, Eternal Emperor, men created businesses that existed in no building, but only on these computers. People would tell their computer to tell someone else's computer to buy an item for them--a book, or a statue, or whatever they wished--and it would be shipped to them, sent by an airplane from wherever the goods were located." A scribe sat between the two of them, taking down her every word, just as he had done every day since Miriam began her service. All Miriam had done so far, every single day since her arrival, had been to recount everything she could remember of events in the world over the past eighty-six years. Just explaining the existence of television had taken a month and a half, and Zhenjin had insisted that she recount the plots of as many stories as possible. She'd racked her brains every night to remember more details for his insatiable thirst for information. Hell, after three years away from the outside world, she wasn't even sure if she was remembering half of it right. A one-woman Wikipedia, that was her.

"And how did they pay? Did they perhaps send their money by an airplane?" Zhenjin laughed at his own jest.

"No, my lord," Miriam said, smiling politely. "The computers remembered who gave money and who took it away, and told the computers of the bankers. The owners of the companies grew mad with excitement at the thoughts of limitless profits, and men spent fortunes buying shares in their companies."

"Ah," Zhenjin said. "Like the South Sea bubble." He smiled at her agape expression of shock. "I may be ignorant of the present, Miriam, but you will find that I have studied the past a great deal."

Miriam found herself smiling in return at having underestimated Zhenjin. He was truly a fascinating man. Really, if this was the price of immortality, it wasn't so bad. She didn't mind spending a few centuries in his company.

YEAR SIXTEEN:

Miriam woke up at dawn again to the shouts of the overseer. "Wake up, Jasmine, you unworthy dog!" she shouted, prodding Miriam's feet with the butt of her whip. "It is time to return to work!"

Miriam's eyes opened blearily. "Yes, Madame," she said thickly, sleep still fogging her mind. The words had become instinctive. She knew that more punishment awaited her if she failed to respond respectfully. She felt like she had gotten only an hour's sleep. Perhaps she had--once the sun had set, it was difficult to determine exactly how long she had worked.

The pleasant, peaceful times spent recounting history to Zhenjin Khan had long passed. He had given her a new name, 'Jasmine', and had sent her out to begin her 'greater service' to Xanadu. That was five years ago, and her 'greater service' had, so far, involved nothing more than moving heavy rocks.

It was the same today. As soon as she stumbled out into the early morning light, Miriam felt the overseer slap her lightly with the whip. The sting soon faded in the healing air, but Miriam knew she would get more if she failed to work. "Pick up that rock, Jasmine!" the overseer shouted, punctuating her command with another slap of the whip.

"Yes, Madame," Miriam said, and grabbed one rock from the ever-smaller pile and hefted it into her arms. When she had begun, the pile had been higher than her head and wider than a building; now, only a few dozen remained. Miriam could count them by heart now, remembered them better than anything from the outside world.

She staggered under the heavy weight, slowly walking across the courtyard to the vast pile of rocks she had spent five years building up. She placed it neatly atop the pile, knowing that another lash of the whip awaited should she let it slide off (or worse, topple the pile), and headed back towards the pile to be moved. The air of Xanadu helped to ward off fatigue, but even so, she never seemed to move fast enough for the overseer. The commands seemed to be constant, abusive, accompanied by pain and exhaustion. Miriam longed for an end to the labor, but forty-seven rocks remained.

As the hours whiled by and the sun rose high in the sky, forty-seven became forty, then thirty. By the time the sun hung low in the mountains to the west, the pile contained no more than fifteen rocks. The overseer lit the lanterns, and shouted, "Continue, Jasmine!"

"Yes, Madame," Miriam said dully, lifting another rock into her hands. Exhaustion and boredom had turned the evening into a haze of motion and response, thought having long fled her body. She no longer cared about anything except the number of rocks left in the pile, about completing the task the overseer had set for her. She set the rock on the pile, hearing the overseer's command to return for another as if through a haze, responding without even thinking. "Yes, Madame," she said. She lifted another rock, carried it through the darkened courtyard. "Yes, Madame, she said, placing it on the pile. She had lost count of the times she had said the words, lost count of the times she had crossed the courtyard. She only watched, like an observer in her own body, as the pile shrank down from ten to five, five to three, three to two, and finally down to one. When she finally placed that last rock on the pile, she sagged to the ground in grateful exhaustion. Her eyes slipped closed.

The sting of the whip startled her back to wakefulness. "Jasmine, you lazy girl! Pick up the rock from the top of the pile!"

Miriam's heart sank, and for a moment, she wondered if even eternal life was worth this. But she responded, almost without thinking. "Yes, Madame," she said, picking up the rock and beginning to carry it back across the courtyard to its initial resting place.

YEAR FORTY-NINE:

"Pick up that rock, Jasmine, you useless slut!"

"Yes, Madame."

YEAR SEVENTY-TWO:

"Spread your legs, Jasmine." The tone of the harem mistress was softer, more of a caress than a slap, but Jasmine knew that it was no less a command.

"Yes, Madame," she said, allowing her legs to part. Two girls each took one in their hands, pulling them wider. It hurt, but Jasmine knew that the air of Xanadu would soothe the pain, and her limbs would become more flexible for the experience. Zhenjin Khan (she still refused to call him 'the Immortal, the Undying, the Eternal', et cetera et cetera, at least not in the privacy of her own mind) wished for his women to be limber, and although Jasmine had not seen him in forty years, and then only as a figure in the distance while she toiled in the courtyard, she knew that she could be called upon to pleasure him at any time. She knew she had to be ready for that moment.

Jasmine didn't know exactly when she had forgotten her name. She hadn't heard it in so long, not from anyone's lips but her own. For a few years, she had taken to chanting it every night, speaking the syllables over and over again until she fell asleep, but eventually the word had lost its meaning. It had just become a nonsense phrase, and finally, Jasmine had forgotten it herself. It had started with an 'M'...

The harem mistress inserted a dildo into Jasmine's pussy, and she practiced clenching her muscles around it. Someday, she knew, she would service Zhenjin Khan's immortal penis in the same fashion.

"Stand, Jasmine," the harem mistress said, as the girls released her legs.

"Yes, Madame," Jasmine said, rising to her feet. She held the dildo in place only through a supreme effort of will. Yesterday, she had let it slip from between her thighs, and they had used a willow reed on her nipples until she howled. Then they had whipped her for howling. She would do anything to avoid disobeying again.

"Good girl, Jasmine," the harem mistress said, caressing her cheek. Jasmine sighed softly at the rare praise. She wished she could earn that praise more often. It felt sometimes like she would do anything to please them instead of draw their ire. "Now, you will feel pain. This is not a punishment, Jasmine, but a test. Do you understand?"

"Yes, Mad...ame," Jasmine said, starting slightly as the willow reed slapped against her buttocks. The hesitation was barely perceptible, but Jasmine knew that the mistress had noticed. She resolved to do better.

"You are not being tested on your stoicism this time, Jasmine," the harem mistress said as the reed struck again and again. "That will come later, as your training progresses. For now, you are simply learning control. Do not let the toy slip out. Eventually, a time will come when you will welcome the reed as the caress of a lover, when you will beg for it on command. But for now, I am only concerned that you maintain your hold. Do you understand, Jasmine?"

The reed struck again. Jasmine knew she would need many hours in the healing air before the redness faded from her buttocks. "Y-yes, Madame," she gasped out, trying to stem the flow of tears.

She managed to hold the dildo in. She knew it would be easier if she wasn't so aroused.

YEAR ONE HUNDRED FIFTY-THREE:

Jasmine ran her fingers across Jade's nipples, seeing the other girl tremble. The Undying Emperor watched the two girls, his own member powerfully erect. Jasmine longed to take his cock into her unworthy cunt, but she had been instructed to 'duel' with Jade, and she knew nothing but obedience to his undying will.




Xanadu



Jade's own fingers stroked the inside of her thigh, and every part of Jasmine wanted to open up to her like a flower to the morning sun, but she knew that she would lose quickly if she allowed her legs to part. Jade had been playing this game for the Immortal Khan's amusement for many years while Jasmine was still undergoing the harem training, and she rarely lost. If she could get her fingers inside Jasmine's pussy, she would quickly have Jasmine moaning in pleasure...and the first one to moan would be sentenced to a year in the Web of Silken Bliss. Jasmine had already spent three years there in the last century, and she understood that it was ironically named. She needed to be the one to make Jade moan.

The Eternal Emperor did not play this game every night, of course. Sometimes whole years passed in other amusements, and the Web of Silken Bliss hung empty, its prisoners all pardoned. But he had been enjoying the entertainment of the duels of late. Jasmine felt honored to be selected, even as she tried to avoid losing. The honor of selection was one thing, but the honor of victory, of servicing the cock of the Immoral Lord...Jasmine shivered at the thought. No. She had to remain focused. If she spent too much time thinking of that pleasure, she would be hung in the Web of Silken Bliss for a year and his cock would be out of her reach that whole time. She had to win.

She traced slow, tickling spirals around Jade's belly button, watching the other woman's eyes glaze just a little with desire. Jasmine had been trained to please both men and women over her time in the harem, just as the men had been trained to please women as well as other men. The Undying Khan's appetites were many, his imagination limitless, and they had nothing but time to spend inuldging it. And that was just as it should be. She had seen over a century of service to his immortal glory, now. She looked forward to centuries more.

Jade's fingers, though, made it seem as though the next year of her service would be in the Web of Silken Bliss. They stroked at the delta of her thighs, leaving Jasmine panting for breath. Her own attempts at seduction were forgotten now, she held herself perfectly still in an effort to control the raging fires within her cunt. She knew she was on the defensive now, but if she could only clear her mind, just for a moment...

But Jade's fingers would not stop, and only the fact that the Immortal Zhenjin Khan was drinking in her struggles like wine helped to allay her shame. She knew that he took delight in the loser's loss as well as the victor's victory, knew that he was watching, aroused, waiting for that final moan of surrender, and only the thought of a year away from his glorious presence kept her from delivering it to him. Jasmine closed her eyes, trying to just still her tongue a moment longer...

But Jade had found her weakness now, Jasmine's traitorous legs uncoiling under those perfect caresses, and those fingers slid into the slickness of her cunt with practiced ease. It felt so good now, rubbing her clit, making her mind reel with pleasure, and Jasmine could scarcely contain that joy, those glorious sensations Jade's practiced fingers elicited, and she could feel her resistance melting away, knew that this would be an orgasm worth a year in the Web of Silken Bliss...

YEAR ONE HUNDRED FIFTY-FOUR:

Jade held a sponge to Jasmine's lips, letting her suck gratefully at it. "You are due to be released tomorrow," she said, looking up at the girl suspended in the air by dozens of silken cords, each one tying off her body, holding just a little bit of her weight so that she almost floated in the air. "I think the Undying Khan might just have us duel again that very night! He thought you lost wonderfully."

Jasmine tried to keep perfectly still, despite the shivering ecstasy of the thought. One of the ropes wound around the others in a delicate pattern, so tightly threaded that any motion of any part of her body caused it to quiver; after it completed its spider-web travel through the other ropes, it wound directly between her thighs, pressed tightly up against her clit. Any struggle, any motion, even the shiver of bliss caused the rope to quiver upon her, and once it began to vibrate, her own writhing bade it continue. Many was the day that she had orgasmed again and again, helpless to the motions of her own body, until she had passed out from exhaustion.

Jade reached up and gave the silken threads a tug. "See you tomorrow, Jasmine," she said, watching the helpless girl's shudders of pleasure begin. Throughout the Web of Silken Bliss, Jasmine's movements set off the other girls into their own quivers of rapture.

The Immortal Emperor did not look in on the Web often, but when he did, he was always pleased with what he saw.

YEAR TWO HUNDRED TWENTY:

Jasmine knelt next to three other women of the harem, but she was the only one who spoke. "Greetings, august warrior. The Immortal Emperor Zhenjin Khan thanks you for your services this harvest, and as his reward, he bids you to take of our pleasure for the next three days and three nights."

The man who stood before them disrobed, revealing an already-erect penis. Jasmine did not know exactly what the men of Xanadu did to earn their 'rewards' from the Eternal Khan; she did not know how they learned to accept service, whether it differed from the women or not. It did not matter. They all had their roles to play in the Never-Dying King's city, and it did no good to question the wisdom of the Perfect Lord. She only knew that for the next three days and nights, her role was to pleasure this man with all the arts she had learned in over a century.

He strode to one of the other women first, though, walking around behind her and pressing her head down, raising her buttocks so he could take her from behind. Jasmine waited where she was. Later, after things had become less formal, she could feel free to approach him, but these first moments had a ritual all their own. Jasmine merely watched the other girl get fucked roughly, the man's motions urgent and intense. She knew from long experience that the men's visits to the harem were not so infrequent as to frustrate, and yet not so often as to go unappreciated. Her lover for the next three days had probably built up quite an appetite.

The girl knew how to work him, though. Within mere minutes, his breath came in short gasps, his eyes stared ahead, unseeing as he focused on the far more intriguing sense of touch. Jasmine could almost time the orgasm she wrung out of him down to the second, so expert had she become in the arts of pleasure.

He moved to another girl, his member already stiffening almost before he pulled it out of the first. Jasmine knew then that he was one of the elder children of Xanadu, one who had already steeped himself deeply in the airs of the legendary kingdom. He would have stamina, this one. No wonder none of the girls that he had been given were less than two hundred years old; a hundred-year-old girl would be fucked to exhaustion before even two days had passed. He would probably not even stop to sleep during their intercourse. The August Khan's judgment in selecting the rewards for his subjects was truly wise; this man would leave the four of them dizzy with pleasure, their own stamina almost enough to keep up with his but not quite. He would leave the harem thinking of himself as potent and virile, whereas an older woman would match him fuck for fuck.

He came again and moved to Jasmine now, and although he gripped her flesh roughly as he entered her, she felt only pleasure. Immortality and perfect health meant pain was just another sensation to Jasmine; perhaps more intense than some, but the very intensity was what made it blend perfectly with the more sensual feel of his cock sliding in and out of her. None but the immortals of Xanadu could understand exactly how to mix pain and pleasure so expertly. His hands, twisting and fondling her nipples as they fucked, played a symphony on her body. She sighed softly, thanking the Immortal Khan for his wisdom in arranging things. She had been teased and tormented this last week, kept from orgasm until she needed him as badly, as swiftly as he wanted her. Their sex was fast, urgent, and he knew that it would please her this way. He had been trained to please a woman as well, after all. Her orgasm hit hard, and she knew his would not be long behind.

She felt his seed spurt inside her, but she knew that it would find no purchase. More of the magic of Xanadu; by the Immortal Emperor's decree, there would be no children here. Why have descendants when the current generation would live forever? He pulled out of her, leaving her panting and breathless on the floor, and moved on to the last girl. Once the ritual was ended, they could begin to find more...inventive ways of pleasing him.

Jasmine looked forward to the next three days.

YEAR THREE HUNDRED TWENTY-THREE:

Jasmine rode the dildo up and down, up and down again, her own lubricants having long ago coated the glass until it was slick and its passage into her cunt an easy one. She could not remember how long she had been straddling the fake cock that was set into place; sometimes, she drifted into a semi-conscious haze that passed for sleep, but even then, the movements had become automatic. A hundred years ago, she would perhaps have collapsed from fatigue after a day or two of pleasure, but the air of Xanadu had worked its magic deeply on her since then. She no longer knew exhaustion, fatigue, numbness or soreness. The Undying Khan had chosen her for service in the Garden of Fragrant Delight to demonstrate to her exactly that.

So she simply squatted upon her "lover", pumping up and down, letting the pleasure consume her thoughts, knowing only that she had been ordered by the Immortal Emperor, Zhenjin Khan, to pleasure herself until he commanded her to cease. All around her, the scents of other women filled the air, the musky scent of their juices wafting into her own nostrils and increasing her own arousal. She did not wonder when the Eternal Lord would command her to stop. She did not think of anything at all. She simply pumped her hips in constant, ceaseless motion, reveling in the sensation of being perfectly obedient.

Jasmine's moans mingled with those of the other women. They, too, knew nothing but obedience.

YEAR THREE HUNDRED SIXTY:

"Again," Jasmine said, her fingers curling into Lily's hair as she pressed the new girl's face into her crotch once more.

She felt Lily's hot breath on her clit as the girl said, "Yes, Madame," her speech muffled by such close contact with Jasmine's flesh. She had clearly never pleasured a woman before; her first fumbling attempts at licking Jasmine to orgasm had inspired amusement more than arousal. But the training of the courtyard had rendered her pliant enough that she was a willing student, and the only way to learn was by doing. She felt the strokes of Lily's tongue on her labia, teasing the arousal out of her bit by bit, and idly admired the girl's improvement after only a few short hours of service. But it would be another year of training before Jasmine would release the girl from her room.

Sometimes, the Eternal Emperor's service was more pleasant than others.

YEAR FOUR HUNDRED TWENTY:

"Pick up that rock, Lotus, you useless slut!" Jasmine lashed out with the whip at the girl's naked back. Lotus was new to the courtyard, only a day or two removed from her service as the Immortal Khan's storyteller, and she continued to insist her name was 'Candace'. But Jasmine knew that it was her duty as overseer to teach her otherwise.

"I...yes, Madame." Lotus might still be sulky and petulant, but she already knew the proper responses for one of the Eternal Lord's subjects. She lifted the rock, struggling under its weight, and began to haul it across the courtyard. Jasmine knew that she could lift that same rock with one hand now, but Lotus had barely started breathing the air of Xanadu. She even still needed food and drink, something Jasmine was now allowed only on special occasions.

Jasmine watched Lotus set the rock down on the pile, where it joined some forty others. Staggering under the weight, Lotus inadvertently caused one of the small piles to topple over. She tried to right them, but already Jasmine's hand brought the whip down on her.

Jasmine felt no guilt as she whipped Lotus, screaming abuse at the terrified girl. She knew that this, too, was obedience to the will of the Undying Emperor. And obedience to his glorious will was the only important thing.

YEAR FIVE HUNDRED:

"Miriam?" Jasmine knelt prostrate before Zhenjin Khan, the Undying, the Eternal, the Perfect Emperor, and waited for him to acknowledge her presence. "Miriam? Miriam, are you listening?" She stared at the floorboards, prepared to wait as long as needed for the Glorious Khan to call upon her. "Jasmine?" he said. Finally, he had called her name. She looked upon his presence.

"Yes, my Glorious Emperor?" she asked.

"It has been five hundred years, Jasmine, since you entered the service of Zhenjin Khan. Today, you have become one of the true immortals of Xanadu. Do you remember what that means, Jasmine?"

Jasmine tried to cast her mind back, to the day when she first set eyes upon the Glorious Khan. She remembered an icy mist, a world of snow...that was the world beyond Xanadu, she knew. Beyond that was another world, but it was lost to her memory. She knew only service to the Undying Khan now. "No, My Lord. I am sorry to have failed you."

"You have not failed me, Jasmine. You have done just as I wished, all without knowing." Her heart sang to hear those words of praise. "I shall tell you now, Jasmine. Today is the day that you may leave my service. You may go to the world outside. You may stay there as long as you wish."

"Out--outside?" Jasmine's eyes went wide, like a frightened child's. If the Undying Lord was pleased with her, why was he exiling her to the world of ice and snow? Was this a further test of her obedience? Did he wish to see if her love for him extended so far that she would willingly leave his presence if commanded? "But...but when can I return, Perfect Emperor?"

He chuckled, as if at a private joke. "You misunderstand, child of Xanadu. I said, 'You may leave'. Not 'You must.' You may leave if you want...or you can stay here, in Xanadu, continuing to serve me in all ways."

Jasmine struggled to understand the concept. She felt like she knelt there forever, trying to wrap her head around the notion. Finally, she spoke. "You mean...I do not have to leave? I can continue to serve you?"

"Exactly."

Jasmine flung herself forward, kissing the Eternal Emperor's feet in heartfelt gratitude. "Thank you," she gasped out between kisses, "thank you for letting me remain in your service, oh Great, oh Mighty, oh Potent and Eternal Khan!" Jasmine knew that she was risking punishment simply through the familiarity of worshipping his feet without being commanded, but on some level, she knew that just this once, the Immortal Khan would understand.

THE END