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  He laughed again, as though the idea of a female not wanting to be treated like a sexual slave was ridiculous.

  “So you spread the Need virus on purpose? And you’re not worried about revealing it in the present company?” He nodded at the girl who was still hard at work sucking the dictator’s shaft.

  “Who, her? Of course I don’t worry. Females don’t have the brain power to retain information or even process what we’re saying in the first place. This one is so busy satiating her Need cravings by sucking me that she probably doesn’t even hear what we’re talking about.”

  “I heard it though,” Terex said darkly. “You unleashed a sickness that would sexually control and weaken females—that would kill them—just to weaken the Kindred’s cause and take their support.”

  “Of course we did!” Krumf exclaimed. “Imagine their surprise when the very females they were trying to free from ‘sexual bondage’ declared they didn’t want to be freed! That they liked being dominated and subjugated by males. That they loved being whipped and punished for disobedience. That they adored being used hard and often by their masters…or any male who wanted them.” He laughed. “Of course the whole ‘dying by forty cycles’ was a bit hard for them to swallow but since they believed the Need to be a natural occurrence, it wasn’t like they had anyone to blame.”

  Terex felt sick. “Maybe it isn’t that they like what you’re describing so much as that this disease you’ve infected them with makes them need it,” he said harshly. “Even if they hate themselves for needing to be degraded and used by a male they don’t love, they can’t help themselves.”

  “It doesn’t matter—the end result is the same.” Krumf waved a hand negligently. “A female population completely under our control and no more Kindred to pollute the bloodlines.”

  “And since you have, as you say, no more Kindred to pollute your bloodlines or tempt your females to rebel, have you considered trying to find a cure for the Need?” Terex demanded.

  “Oh, we have a cure.” Krumf shrugged as though it was immaterial. “We have from the first. We call it the little healer—it’s a plant which has the antivirus incorporated into its DNA.”

  “What?” Terex exclaimed. “But then…why did you not use it when the Kindred ‘threat’ was gone?”

  “Have you not heard a word I’ve said?” the dictator demanded. “By the time the Kindred were eradicated and the first healer crop was ready to harvest, we’d decided we liked our new society. It’s so much more comfortable this way, knowing a female can never mouth off to you. In fact, if she opens her mouth to complain, you just shove your dick in it!” He roared with laughter again and the males around him laughed as well.

  Terex sat in stony silence, watching them. Gods, to think the entire Need outbreak had been orchestrated and perpetuated by males like these! It made him ashamed of his sex, although he knew no male with true Kindred blood would even consider taking part in such a thing.

  Dominating a female for your mutual sexual satisfaction was one thing—turning that same female into a sexual pet by using her own unfulfilled desires against her…well, that was evil.

  As evil as spanking and caning your mate? whispered the voice of guilt in his brain. But that had been different, he argued with himself. Solange hadn’t been under the influence of some insidious sexual virus when she asked him to do those things. She’d simply been intent on exploring an alternate sexuality.

  Besides, I would never do it again, he thought. I learned my lesson after the Goddess took Solange from me as punishment. I would never raise my hand to a female again, even if she wanted me to. He didn’t mind playing Elaina’s “Master” as long as it didn’t come to that—as long as there was no physical violence involved, he told himself. As long as…

  “Excuse me, your Supreme Excellency. Forgive me for interrupting you in your Private Bathing Chamber.” The male attendant who rushed up to them was out of breath. He bowed low, panting, before Krumf.

  “Yes, yes—what is it?” the old dictator demanded irritably. “Can’t you see I’m busy being pleasured?”

  “Yes, your Supreme Excellency but I’m afraid this won’t wait.” The attendant bowed again.

  “All right—what is it? Make it fast,” Krumf snarled.

  “Your Majesty, there was been a formal complaint lodged.”

  “A formal complaint?” one of the Council Members exclaimed. “You bother his Supreme Excellency over a matter as trivial as something which can be adjudicated on Supplication Day?”

  “This matter cannot wait until Supplication Day,” the attendant insisted. “It involves a very serious case—a female speaking out in public. Not only that—also denial of rights and then actual physical violence during her unlawful resistance.”

  “What? A female committing violence against a male?” Krumf frowned. “How can this be? You’re right—we must hear about it at once! Who is this female who dared to violate so many of our laws at once?”

  “Her.” The attendant pointed directly to Elaina, who was trembling against Terex’s legs. “She is the one accused, your Supreme Excellency. And I’m afraid the wounded parties are asking that you hear the matter at once.”

  * * * * *

  “Well, well…” Krumf looked at her speculatively.

  Elaina tried to put an innocent expression on her face but inside her stomach was rolling. She pressed back against Terex’s legs, trying to make herself as small and inconspicuous as possible.

  “Is this true, my dear?” Krumf demanded, narrowing his pouchy eyes at her so that the eyes themselves nearly disappeared in the deep folds of flesh around them.

  “I—”

  “Let me explain,” Terex interrupted, reaching down to put a big hand possessively on her shoulder. “I was detained on a Council matter in the male antechamber and so was unable to enter the Bathing Room at the same time as the other males or the females. Elaina was by herself when three males approached her and attempted to…to violate her.” His big hand squeezed her shoulder fiercely and Elaina could hear the barely controlled rage in his voice.

  “And why did they not take her?” Krumf asked in a soft, dangerous voice. “If you were not with her, it was their right. Why were they unable to try her sexual favors? Did she resist them?”

  “Of course she resisted them!” Terex growled. “Elaina comes from a planet were females have rights. The right not to be violated by strangers for their own amusement for one.”

  “And did she speak out in public?” Krumf asked. “During this…resistance of hers?”

  “Yes,” Elaina answered for herself this time. Her voice seemed to echo in the stone bathing chamber, almost as loudly as it had echoed during the attack. “Yes, I told them to leave me alone,” she said, looking defiantly up at Krumf.

  “That’s not all she did!” Suddenly, two of the three men who’d attacked her came in, ushered into the Private Bathing Area by another male attendant. The tall one still had a bloody nose and the beefy one was still walking funny, Elaina was glad to see. Also, both of them had large goose eggs on the sides of their heads where Terex had knocked their skulls together.

  They gave the big Kindred nervous looks and tried to stand as far from him as they could. Elaina didn’t blame them—Terex’s glare was pure rage and his hands were curled into huge fists.

  “Who are you?” Krumf demanded, frowning at them.

  “If it pleases your Supreme Excellency, these are Tunard and Maldred—both sons of two of your most trusted Council Members.” The attendant bowed again.

  “Hmm—Yorinth and Gadwig’s boys, are you?” Krumf said, looking at the two young males. “Is that right?”

  “Yes, your Excellency,” they chorused and bowed to him again.

  Elaina looked at them uneasily—she was beginning to get a very, very bad feeling about this.

  “Well, seeing as you seem to have a legitimate complaint and the female in question has not denied it, I think we should hear this matter at once,